Jim Carroll, 60, Poet and Punk Rocker, Dies

Source: NY Times

Jim Carroll, 60, Poet and Punk Rocker, Dies



By WILLIAM GRIMES

Jim Carroll, the poet and punk rocker in the outlaw tradition of Rimbaud and Burroughs who chronicled his wild youth in “The Basketball Diaries,” died on Friday at his home in Manhattan. He was 60.

The cause was a heart attack, said Rosemary Carroll, his former wife.

As a teenage basketball star in the 1960s at Trinity, an elite private school on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, Mr. Carroll led a chaotic life that combined sports, drugs and poetry. This highly unusual combination lent a lurid appeal to “The Basketball Diaries,” the journal he kept during high school and published in 1978, by which time his poetry had already won him a cult reputation as the new Bob Dylan.

“I met him in 1970, and already he was pretty much universally recognized as the best poet of his generation,” the singer Patti Smith said in a telephone interview on Sunday. “The work was sophisticated and elegant. He had beauty.”

The diaries began, innocently: “Today was my first Biddy League game and my first day in any organized basketball league. I’m enthused about life due to this exciting event.”

By the end of the book, Mr. Carroll was a heroin addict who supported his habit by hustling in Times Square. “Totally zonked, and all the dope scraped or sniffed clean from the tiny cellophane bags,” the final entry read, continuing, “I can see the Cloisters with its million in medieval art out the bedroom window. I got to go in and puke. I just want to be pure.”

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Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/14/books/14carroll.html?_r=2

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bOjc70f4p8

Teddy sniffing glue, he was 12 years old
Fell from the roof on East Two-nine
Cathy was 11 when she pulled the plug
On 26 reds and a bottle of wine
Bobby got leukemia, 14 years old
He looked like 65 when he died
He was a friend of mine

Those are people who died, died
They were all my friends, and they died

G-berg and Georgie let their gimmicks go rotten
So they died of hepatitis in upper Manhattan
Sly in Vietnam took a bullet in the head
Bobby OD'd on Drano on the night that he was wed
They were two more friends of mine
Two more friends that died

Those are people who died, died
They were all my friends, and they died

Mary took a dry dive from a hotel room
Bobby hung himself from a cell in the tombs
Judy jumped in front of a subway train
Eddie got slit in the jugular vein
And Eddie, I miss you more than all the others
And I salute you brother

Those are people who died, died
They were all my friends, and they died

Herbie pushed Tony from the Boys' Club roof
Tony thought that his rage was just some goof
But Herbie sure gave Tony some bitchen proof
"Hey," Herbie said, "Tony, can you fly?"
But Tony couldn't fly, Tony died

Those are people who died, died
They were all my friends, and they died

Brian got busted on a narco rap
He beat the rap by rattin' on some bikers
He said, "Hey, I know it's dangerous, but it sure beats Riker's"
But the next day he got offed by the very same bikers

Those are people who died, died
They were all my friends, and they died

Teddy sniffing glue, he was 12 years old
Fell from the roof on East Two-nine
Cathy was 11 when she pulled the plug
On 26 reds and a bottle of wine
Bobby got leukemia, 14 years old
He looked like 65 when he died
He was a friend of mine

Those are people who died, died
They were all my friends, and they died

G-berg and Georgie let their gimmicks go rotten
So they died of hepatitis in upper Manhattan
Sly in Vietnam took a bullet in the head
Bobby OD'd on Drano on the night that he was wed
They were two more friends of mine
Two more friends that died

Those are people who died, died
They were all my friends, and they died

Mary took a dry dive from a hotel room
Bobby hung himself from a cell in the tombs
Judy jumped in front of a subway train
Eddie got slit in the jugular vein
And Eddie, I miss you more than all the others
And I salute you brother

Those are people who died, died
They were all my friends, and they died

The next morning, on the way to work, they were playing all Beatles songs on the radio. John Lennon had died.

I remember seeing him in the excellent, under-rated '80's movie Tuff Turf with James Spader and Robert Downey Junior.

Sad to hear. I still have that record.

One less member of the original NYC punk scene. Sad to see him go.

He does not look healthy at all.

'Cause when the city drops into the night
Before the darkness there's one moment of light
When everything seems clear
The other side, it seems so near...

and over along with The Clash and Elvis Costello. I especially liked the song People who Died it was a good Punk or New Wave song from that era.

Looks like I have a good incentive to hook my turntable back up.

RIP Jim.

Thank you for your great words and music :)

... And Jimmy, I miss you more than all the others
And I salute you brother

Those are people who died, died
They were all my friends, and they died

(took thr liberty to substitute "Jimmy" for "Eddie" im the snippet above

I still listen to Catholic Boy, I Write Your Name, and Dry Dreams from time to time.

Makes today different from yesterday.

He was a kindred spirit that many of us who grew up in similar circumstances and took similar paths never knew we had. The Basketball Diaries made a lot of us self-medicating refugees from Catholic childhoods who found comfort and short-term relief from drugs and other forms of mayhem and enduring solace from art and, yes, the great game of basketball, feel less lonely, even inspired.

Thank you, good sir, and RIP.

I still have his album (on vinyl) Catholic Boy. I really connected with that album! Now they'll have to re-release the song, "People Who Died" and add his name to it.

Rest in Peace Jim, you were a talented and tortured soul who I hope found peace!

I'll have to give his album a spin tonight in honor of such a talented song writer and performer!

I saw him do spoken word performances twice back in 1991 or so. He was truly talented...

RL

I loved him. Got to meet him once.

RIP. :cry:

His book "Fear of Dreaming" is a real good collection of his writings.