Alembic Guitars Club
Connecting => Miscellaneous => Topic started by: lbpesq on October 13, 2024, 06:33:22 PM
-
Robert Hunter’s widow found a manuscript that Hunter wrote in the very early 60’s about his adventures with Garcia, Trist, and others they hung with. “The Silver Snarling Trumpet”. I just downloaded it onto my iPad. It’s next up when I finish Crosby’s second book.
Bill, tgo
-
Than ks, Bill; just placed a hold through the library!
Peter (who returned Crosby's 2nd one yesterday)
-
So, what did you guys think of Crosby's 2nd?
-
I’m about 3/4 through the second book. Honestly, it almost feels like a chore to finish reading it. While the part of the first book covering the freebase years was somewhat depressing, it was still a compelling story. The second book is more like Crosby’s random musings with a little too much rehab/sober/AA/NA content for my taste. Especially all the other folks providing their 2-3 paragraph musings on sobriety. Also a lot of Crosby spouting lollipops and roses about the greatness of life/friends/family. Not as well written or interesting as the first which tells the chronological story. The second jumps around in time, pretending to be a movie script with scenes in non-chronological order.
Bill, tgo
-
...Honestly, it almost feels like a chore to finish reading it. While the part of the first book covering the freebase years was somewhat depressing, it was still a compelling story...
i spent alot of time around some heavy drug users in hte 70's, reading about it was kind of like a horrific bad flashback. i had a close friend who was freebasing in the early 80's and it pretty well destroyed him, his family and anybody around him. although i have to say, i neverr saw epic drug use like DC's. basing outside a courtroom while awaiting a hearing on drug charges? classic!
sounds like his prison stint was easy time. it doesn't work that way these days at least not in this state.
not sure i wanna slog thru the second book.
-
While I agree with Bill that the first book was a bit better written, I did enjoy the second one, as the first leaves us almost 40 years ago & this one gives us a chunk of that.
But I do enjoy the "Ask Cros" YouTube channel more.
Peter
-
Thanks for the responses. Don't know if I'll read the second book.
-
I checked out a few of the “Ask Croz” videos mentioned above. They were done by Rolling Stone Magazine. Each is just a few minutes. VERY entertaining. David plays Dear Abby to questions that would never get in Dear Abby. Lol!
Bill, tgo
-
i was turned on to them by a friend who, in recommending them, called Cros "one of our few actual Elders". I liked that.
Peter
-
Well I started the new Hunter book. I’m about 20 pages in and, to be honest, it has been a struggle. I hope it will get better, but I’m beginning to suspect why it wasn’t previously published. I’m curious about other readers’ thoughts.
Bill, tgo
-
Still waiting for it to come in.
I'll keep you posted.
Peter
-
Have a copy of the Hunter book on hold at the local library, they have it on order but no available copies yet. I have read positive comments about it elsewhere. My understanding is that it is a chronicle of the local scene in the Palo Alto/Menlo Park era as the transition from the Beats to the Hippies occurred. I don't expect the refinement of Hunter's later writing but he always had a gift for words so I am looking forward to checking it out.
-
... the transition from the Beats to the Hippies ...
A fascinating and, in my view, important time in our history.
-
I've been really enjoying the new Hunter book. It's definitely very much of its time and I'm sure a part of it is that you had to be there to totally get it, but since I wasn't there, I'm glad I can read it.
-
Reviews of Hunter's book on Amazon are mixed.
-
It's in the drawer, and I'm about 1/4 through the one i checked out before it; soon.
Peter
-
OK, I'm about halfway through it. While there is no doubt Hunter made the right choice concentrating on lyrics rather than novels, I am enjoying it. Having read enough about it to recognize most of the people and places, that was all outside views written much later; it is very interesting to see the same things through the eyes of a participant, written pretty much at the time (I will add, one of my comps for my MA was on the role of the participant historian in the historiography of the New Left & Civil Rights movements).
I am also struck by the similarities between their scene and some I was part of 15-20 years later and half a continent away. Though none of evolved into quite what theirs did......
Peter
-
OK, I'm about halfway through it. While there is no doubt Hunter made the right choice concentrating on lyrics rather than novels, I am enjoying it. Having read enough about it to recognize most of the people and places, that was all outside views written much later; it is very interesting to see the same things through the eyes of a participant, written pretty much at the time (I will add, one of my comps for my MA was on the role of the participant historian in the historiography of the New Left & Civil Rights movements).
I am also struck by the similarities between their scene and some I was part of 15-20 years later and half a continent away. Though none of evolved into quite what theirs did......
Peter
I appreciate that kind of perspective.
-
Reviews of Hunter's book on Amazon are mixed.
I think any of our work done at that age would receive mixed reviews.
-
I must respectfully disagree. I suspect most of my writings at that age would have been almost universally panned. hehehehe. I had not yet learned an important lesson: “there is no such thing as good writing … only good rewriting!”
Bill, tgo
-
I must respectfully disagree. I suspect most of my writings at that age would have been almost universally panned. hehehehe. I had not yet learned an important lesson: “there is no such thing as good writing … only good rewriting!”
Bill, tgo
When I first dropped in on you fine folks, I was a graduate student; a history major, in fact, and that means writing - lots of it. I thought my papers were OK. Others did, too, I guess, as I had won the prize for best undergrad history paper of the year 3 times (nobody else has done it twice, if I may brag for a moment).
That was 2 decades ago; I will still, on some insomniac nights, pull up these papers (which no one else will ever read again) and polish them.
I was in my 40s & 50s when I wrote those; the stuff from when I was 19? Long since burned...and rightfully so.
Peter