Like baseball, bebop and blue jeans, the Beat Generation is entwined in the consciousness and identity of America, its influence transcending its relatively brief heyday and continuing to impact American culture. In this recurring series, we take a second look at the best spoken word albums to emerge from this collection of supremely gifted writers, poets, icons and madmen. These are the records that most poignantly mesh literature and music, shining new light and offering fresh perspectives on timeless material while also bridging the gap between the written word and recorded sound. In this installment, the author revisits the most complete and melodic spoken word record from the most mystical-yet-approachable of the Beats, the enigmatic Allen Ginsberg.
If Jack Kerouac was the down-to-earth everyman of the Beat Generation, Allen Ginsberg was the otherworldly prophet, equal parts accessible and untouchable, saintly and slumming, magnetic and repellent. Though not Ginsberg’s most revered spoken-word effort (his recording of Howl and Other Poems has that distinction), The Lion for Real sets music to poetry like no other Beat Generation recording. Featuring remarkable contributions by Marc Ribot, Bill Frisell and Arto Lindsay, this unique record also includes all the craziness, carnage, cocks and communism you’d expect from Ginsberg, along with an unsurprising dose of masturbation, missiles and mescaline. But it’s the manic tone of Ginsberg’s voice and the stellar musical compositions, not the record’s subject matter, that drives this bizarre and intriguing album.
Recorded throughout the late 1980s, The Lion for Real showcases a wiser, older Ginsberg reciting 17 of his more free-spirited poems, many of which came from his checkered youth. There’s an unmistakable joie-de-vivre in Ginsberg’s delivery and sing-song, stop-and-start approach, an enthusiasm that sounds cut from the half-crazed, totally-drugged Timothy Leary-Richard Alpert cloth, making the wordsmith sound both comforting and creepy. If nothing else, this record further distinguishes Ginsberg as the pre-eminent dreamer-poet of the Beat Generation, as he twists his words into brilliant, quirky rhyme schemes that transcend the limits of topicality and speak to ageless themes of war, mania, desire and self-realization. The title track is perhaps the most notable inclusion; even if the listener doesn’t exactly grasp the latent metaphor of the starving, menacing lion who has taken up residence in the writer’s apartment, it’s impossible not to appreciate the humorous, heartbreaking, introspective story and Ginsberg’s whimsically deliberate inflections.
Other tracks are less appealing. The anti-war poem “Hum Bom” still doesn’t translate well to song and lingers in your head long after you wished it had disappeared, while album closer “C’Mon Jack” is, well, just not that enticing unless you’re really into the whole homosexual-sadomasochistic-ass-spanking scene. The few undesirables, however, are dwarfed by the superlative avant-jazz arrangements, which serve an actual purpose by complementing each track’s lyrics instead of merely filling a background void. While the music on less polished Beat recordings serves as little more than forgettable atmospherics, Ribot, Frisell and Lindsay’s experimental jazz and electric guitar samplings are necessary tone-setting elements that not only reinforce Ginsberg’s articulate reflections but also stand as impressive musical compositions in their own right. Without them, this album would simply be incomplete.
Though The Lion for Real doesn’t contain any of Ginsberg’s most notable, notorious works – “Howl,” “America,” “Sunflower Sutra” – these omissions are actually quite welcome. Just as every Dylan show shouldn’t have to include the obligatory “Like a Rolling Stone,” not every Ginsberg recording is required to incorporate his most well-known material, either. The world of Allen Ginsberg, after all, is far more vast and complex than “Howl;” this near-perfect recording reveals the madness and grace of the poet at his most eloquent and sets his words to music in unparalleled fashion.
by Marcus David
