William S Burroughs and the Cult of Rock’n’Roll by Casey Rae review – countercultural hero
over 4 years in The guardian
From Bowie to Cobain, heavy metal to Blade Runner – how the Naked Lunch author changed pop culture
The writer William Burroughs was a fringe figure until his 50s, too weird for popular tastes. Part of the original trio of Beat writers alongside Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg, he was at once feted and condemned for his work – his 1959 novel Naked Lunch was briefly banned by the city of Boston following an obscenity trial; Norman Mailer testified in its defence. But in the late 60s and 70s, a new generation of musicians turned him into a countercultural hero, among them Paul McCartney, Lou Reed, David Bowie, Richard Hell, Jimmy Page and Patti Smith. Later on, Michael Stipe, Kurt Cobain and Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore would all declare themselves in Burroughs’ thrall.
Casey Rae surveys his impact on musicians and how his thumbprints can be found all over popular culture. The film Blade Runner took its title from a Burroughs novella, and the band Steely Dan was named after a dildo in Naked Lunch. The term “heavy metal” was taken from The Soft Machine, Burroughs’s 1961 book that also provided a jazz-folk fusion band from Canterbury with their name. His face looks stonily from the cover of the Beatles’ Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, and he lent his creaky drawl to albums by Laurie Anderson, Tom Waits and the Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy. Elsewhere, Burroughs’ “cut-up” methods – a literary technique where the text is randomly rearranged – were adopted by Bowie, McCartney and the Rolling Stones guitarist Brian Jones. Continue reading...