Greetings from Laurel Canyon!
Not one, but two very unique rock ‘n roll icons took their own lives this week.
Don Cornelius was certainly a maverick and way fucking cool. I would argue that it was Don who in fact taught us white folks how to dance, groove, and really how to walk a city street. Soul Train was fun and raw. It was street fashion in motion for the very first time. No doubt the kids on Soul Train pushed the “hippie look” toward glam which lead to punk. As kids, we check these trends. Fact—those of us art school types who helped start the rap music scene grew up checking in on Soul Train.
Mike Kelly was an artist I deeply admired. He was actually a college professor of mine. I met him in a classroom. He was the “new forms and concepts” teacher in my final year at UCLA in 1985. At that time the coolest rock ‘n rollers made art, not music. Mike was the coolest up and coming “conceptual artist” in LA. Kelly and his “outsider” contemporaries would grow to rival the graffiti inspired “art stars” from New York’s east village scene.
Mike’s art paid homage to all kinds of stuff like “dirty” bathroom drawings from truck stops. Even cooler, he was from Detroit and played in a band with Ron Ashton from the Stooges and Michael Davis from MC5! He was in fact my teacher. I am glad to have known him.
Why these guys took their own lives, I don’t know. I’m not sure if I really want to know. My gut reaction, “Don’t Go” is this week’s Idelic muse. It’s a mix of Detroit rock, soul power, sadness, and new bands. A “soul train” of sorts.
Let’s celebrate what these amazing characters did and how they lived, NOT how they split.
R.I.P. Don and Mike. We’ll keep on pushing.
The Idelic Hit of the Week:
Mark Lanegan Band – The Gravedigger’s Song
