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Written by Jens
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Thursday, 07 August 2008 11:36 |
"I Have Fun Everywhere I Go: Savage Tales of Pot, Porn, Punk Rock, Pro Wrestling, Talking Apes, Evil Bosses, Dirty Blues, American Heroes, and the Most Notorious Magazines in the World" is both a sort of selfbiography and a collection of essays by Mr. Edison, and he's got plenty of tales to tell, and most of them are damn funny. Born in the mid-60s in a Jewish middle class family in New Jersey, Mike grew up smoking a lotta weed and listening to stoner and acid rock. In school he met Dave Insurgent (who later formed Reagan Youth, one of New York's most legendary hardcore punk acts) who turned Mike on to punkrock, and even more drugs.
Most important when Edison moved away from home, he needed cash, and started writing porn novels for a company and earned good money. He also wrote for Main Event, a wrestling zine, displaying his hatred towards Hulk Hogan. Not only in Main Event, but Edison also wrote a gay porn novel with Hogan and Mr. T having hot homo sex. Screw magazine lead by the infamous smutpeddler Al Goldstein also hired Edison. He mostly spent the decades working on the famous pot and counterculture magazine of the all, High Times, as an editor. Here he met icons like Ozzy Osbourne and Evel Kneivel and travelled many places around the world in search of prime cannabis. These stories are pretty entertaining, especially the one about the High Times movie, Potluck, and the building of a bong guitar.
But my favorite anecdotes are from his wild days as a drummer for Sharky's Machine, Pleasure Fuckers and especially The Raunch Hands. Those crazed Raunch Hands sex, drugs and rock'n'roll tours in Spain are a hoot! Mike was also a friend of GG Allin, who he said was very intelligent and mostly GG put on a show for the fans and the media, that didn't reflect his private person. The only part of the book I didn't enjoy was his last days employed at High Times, too much bitching and complaining over co-workers who can't see things his way. He's probably right, but it's a tiresome read.
Anyway, "I Have Fun Everywhere I Go" is wellwritten, outrageous, clever and his sharp opinions/observations on religion, relationships, drugs, booze, pornography, rock'n'roll, and politics were dead on for this reviewer, I won't hesitate to call Mike Edison the Hunter S. Thompson of my generation! His good friend Jon Spencer has produced a spoken word album, released this summer, with Edison reading excerpts from this book. His book tours are combined with performances by his latest band, Edison Rocket Train. Busy dude, that Mike.
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Terminal Boredom interview with Mike: http://www.terminal-boredom.com/edison.html
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Last Updated on Tuesday, 26 August 2008 20:55 |
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