Artist	Song
Patti Smith	Gimme Shelter
Robert Johnson	If I Had Possession Over Judgement Day
Miles Davis	Godchild
Blondie	Rapture
Living Color	Glamor Boys
Lords Of The New Church	Lil Boys Play With Dolls
Arrested Development	Tennessee
Neil Young	Downtown
Talking Heads	Drugs
The Velvet Underground	Heroin
Charlie Parker	Groovin' High
David Bowie	Heroes
Living Color	Cult Of Personality
The Dead Boys	Sonic Reducer
The Fixx	Saved By Zero
Dark Meat	Freedom Ritual
Cowboy Junkies	Dead Flowers

Comment:

I just finished reading a biography of the painter John-Michel Basquiat. John-Michel was a brilliant and outrageous painter during the glitzy 1980's.


He began his career as the notorious and poetic graffiti artist SAMO in the streets of New York. During his meteoric rise to fame he would appear in the Blondie video for "Rapture", sleep with Madonna, collaborate with Andy Warhol, sell his painting for hundreds of thousands of dollars, become addicted to heroin, and die of an overdose at the rock-star-forever age of twenty-seven. His tragic life story parallels artists like Jim Morrison and Kurt Cobain.


The title is from a chapter in the book. I tried to make a mix that captured the feel of both his life and the time. The Blondie, Fixx, Dead Boys, and Talking Heads are from that era. The David Bowie song was one of Basquait's favorites, as were Miles Davis and Charlie Parker.


I begin and end the mix with Rolling Stones covers, two very cool songs that just seemed to be what I was looking for. I also included two tracks by the band Living Color, guitarist Vernon Reid was an outspoken critic of the famous painter.


The man's paintings are powerful, check 'em out. Suggested reading: "Basquait" by Phoebe Hoban; "The Subterraneans" by Jack Kerouac; "Junky" by William Burroughs.

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