Customer Reviews

Let it Blurt: The Life and Times of Lester Bangs, America's Greatest Rock Critic

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If you want to experience Lester Bangs' writing, buy one of the many rock criticism compendiums that include his reviews. If you want to know what it was like in the 70s and 80s, in the hey day of rock--and the rock criticism Bangs helped invent--buy Let It Blurt. While it may seem that Derogatis' understated book is "just the facts," anyone who has experience writing at book length will recognize that Derogatis not only did an extraordinary job of reporting, he then did a brilliant and subtle job of selecting and arranging the information so that the book is real page-turner. I've purchased quite a few books by big-name journalists only to find them to be full of hyperventilation and name dropping. In contrast, Derogatis sticks with his story, and never gets sidetracked telling anecdotes about the glitterati. As a small-time music critic working in New England in the 70s, I had passing acquaintances with a number of the people mentioned in this book (not Bangs, though) and loved the way that Derogatis portrayed each of them using just a few key details. Absolutely top-notch work on a thought-provoking topic.

The first words we read are Lester Bangs': "There are no facts in rock and roll, there is only myth." Then Jim Derogatis opens with: "Sometimes Lester was full of s--t." That exchange represents the approach used in Degoatis' fascinating biography. His Joe-Friday-just-the-facts-ma'am style complements Bangs' jazz-like improv and spontaneousness. Derogatis is a believer in thoroughness and old-fashioned objectivity, so he is able to shed light on some dark corners in Lester's life. Like his drug abuse, his screwed-up relationships with women, the pain from his family and the Jehovah's Witness upbringing, and his general self-destructiveness. Basically, Bangs was a big, lovable slob (except when he wasn't so lovable.) But he was also an important American writer, the rock equivalent of Pauline Kael's criticism of the movies. He was tremendously influential and Derogatis admirably makes this clear.

I really enjoyed Let It Blurt, which is about the deceased rock critic Lester Bangs. I first read about Lester when Almost Famous came out, and read this book on a beach in Thailand last year, and it has stayed with me since that time. Lester died when I was 10, so I certainly didn't follow him, and other than a passion for music, Lester's taste in music was very different from mine, but I really enjoyed reading about him in this book. That is a good comment on DeRogatis as a writer, as I bore easily. Lester was a true individualist and someone with real passions, faults and weaknesses. He struggled and was human, and had this passion for music that many people have, so it is easy to relate in many ways if you have ever felt like you don't quite fit in, or are hyperopinionated, or just dislike the corporate machine. Highly recommended book.

Derogatis does a fine job telling the tale of the Lester Bangs legacy. I will spare the great details that other reviewers have mentioned, however I will say that Derogatis made me feel not as if I was reading a fantastic biography of Lester's life, but as if I was present for it. Very few authors have that ability, which is why I would highly recommend this great read.

This is a fan's book though it is not a hagiography of St Lester. DeRogatis had met Lester shortly before his death and met his friends, relatives, acquaintances, fellow rock-critics. The first surprise is that Lester had a sad life from his very youth, struggling against his mother dedication to the Jehovas witnesses and the symbolic death of his father.
We see Lester trying to become an artist, failing to write the novel he was dreaming of, achieving nevertheless to turn rock criticism in modern litterature. The author manages to recreate quite vividly the atmosphere of the legendary Creem mag offices, then when Lester moves to NYC the CBGB attitude is all there. And Lester through the years loved by women and not able to decipher true love, trying to become a rock musician when he was a star on his own is wasting his life in front of us thanks to booze and substances... This book is like some modern version of an antique greek tragedy and this suits well Lester Bangs, who was a true modern writer.

This book made me feel that we spend way too much time wanting to know about people that really matter very little. As a Biography is was just ok, and never made me think, wow this is good writing. Lester I thought, and still do, was a lot more interesting that this book made me think he was.

When I was a little kid, my older cousin gave me all his old copies of Creem magazine when he joined the army. After watching "Almost Famous", I wished I still had them. Lester Bangs was one of the coolest characters in that movie so I had to learn more about him. I'm glad I got this book because it's a very well written and informative account of his life. Previously, I'd known he was a mad drug abusing journalist and that's about it! The book gets into that and a lot more. I highly recommend it!!!

Jim DeRogatis captures the spirit of Lester Bangs EXACTLY as Bangs would want: "honest and unmercifully." At the beginning of the novel I yearned to be a Rock journalist. Now that I have completed it I want to be a Rock journalist but am devoid of alot of romanticism.
"Almost Famous" turned me on to the character of Lester Bangs. I felt that I identified with Phillip Seymor Hoffman's character in the movie. After seeing "Famous" I wanted to find out more about Lester Bangs. Thus I found "Let it Blurt." In the novel Jim DeRogatis' captures all of Lester Bang's journalistic triumph's, substance abuses, and Romanticisms with directness and little editorializing. He tells the story of Lester bangs exactly as it was.
After completeing this novel, I realize that I do not identify with Lester Bangs at all. Anyone who has seen "Almost Famous" and expects Bangs to be portrayed in the light that he was in the film will learn alot from this book. Anyone who aspires to be a TRUE Rock Journalist will find "Let it Blurt" a source of inspiration.

Lester Bangs may be unknown to many of today's up-and-coming rock bands, but he was introduced to them in a way in the movie "Almost Famous," where his character serves as the young writer's mentor. Having grown up surrounded by music in the late '60s, '70s and '80s, I read a lot of what Lester Bangs wrote. While rock stars (and record companies) were making legends and myths out of mortals (the greater the myth, the more albums that were sold), Bangs broke on through to the other side (sorry, Doors fans...) and told it like it REALLY was. His advice to the Cameron Crowe character in "Almost Famous" to not become friends with the musicians he writes about is right on. By crossing a line, music journalists lose their precious objectivity. Bangs advocated for MORE, MORE, MORE in an era when a settling in of the record companies, and mergers, created an industry that was geared to mass market mediocre middle-of-the-road pop. Bangs never forgot that rock 'n' roll was born of adolescent angst and rebellion, and this finely detailed biography captures the essence of both Bangs, his passion for music, and his convoluted life. The author, a respected music journalist himself, met Bangs when, as a high school student, he was assigned to interview and write an article on a "hero." While transcribing his interview, the high school-aged author heard of Bangs' death on the radio -- and thus began a long fascination with exploring the life of the brilliant, abrasive, charming, and sometimes-too-honest-in-text Lester Bangs. The book does a tremendous job at creating the contrasting emotions that fueled Bangs' too-short life by backing up a generation or two and exploring his family ("trailer trash" Bangs called them) history and the effect of his mother's and other ancestors' Jehovahs Witness faith on Bangs' life. His father's early death, religion, and an unstable childhood shaped Bangs' view of the world, of himself, and of what rock 'n' roll should be -- and this book does an excellent job of bringing all three perspectives into focus and making Bangs come to life, if only on paper.

This brilliant biography of Lester Bangs captures the essence of the man and what he was about with great clarity. DeRogatis writes with passion (I mean, he makes Lester's passionate sense of life come alive) and unlocks great swathes of rock culture and rock literature that I had not been aware of. It pleases me to know that Bangs was a kind person with integrity. The afterword covers his legacy in the work of music writers, in the lyrics of other artists, in his musical influence on certain alt-country bands, and in the book "Psychotic Reactions," a compilation of his work by Greil Marcus. The appendices include Lester's "How To Be A Rock Critic" and some of his lyrics, and the book provides copious notes, sources and a wonderful bibliography of Bangs' articles, reviews, books, contributions to anthologies and encyclopedias, letters and recordings, plus articles about him by other authors. It is well-illustrated throughout. Let It Blurt is a classic, both as a fascinating life story and history of rock criticism, and as a valuable reference source to Bangs' work.