In the mid-nineties, I went on a "Cailfornia Book Tour". I had published my second book, Memo To All Employees, earlier that year, and I wanted to get out & about promoting it.
I formed a show with two brilliant musicians, Dylan Morgan and Bob Christy, and we created a 1-1/2 hour-long show that we did on stages from San Diego to San Francisco. It was a great show and a lot of fun. Dylan wrote all of the music, and played jazz drums along with cello. Bob played alto sax and clarinet.
Bob had a friend-- Harry McLeod-- who had a recording studio in his garage in Sherman Oaks. He called it "The Burn Unit".
We recorded a half hour of the show on Tuesday and Wednesday, November 14 and 15, 1995. We did some other shows and came back to pick up the final master on Sunday, November 19.
The poems we chose were what we called the "heavy duty" poems. Mainly, the pieces focused on the war on Bosnia that had just started winding down.
I recently borrowed a reel-to-reel player from a friend (thanks Dennis McClendon) and learned how to transfer the orginal stuff to digital (thanks Paul Smith).
Here's the files.
Crimson Nature of Blood (complete version, all poems below in one file)
Intro
In Praise of Sandwiches
Cause of Death
Plant Number 10
Upon Viewing "The Last Days of Marilyn Monroe" on Cable TV After Dinner Last Night
Snakes and Fire, Snakes and Fire, Every Day for 8 Years
CEO Poet
Interlude (Fuck Those Creeps/ Dayton Peace Plan)
Monica Seles Is Not Where It's At
Europe, 1991
The Scolding of Yeltsin
Interlude (Whistle)
February 5, Sarajevo 1994
Another Interlude
Chant of An American's Last Leg
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