Sean Murphy – “O Captain! My Captain!: The Unique Magic of Captain Beefheart” (2010)
A tribute to late, great Captain Beefheart by Sean Murphy from the PopMatters website, dated Dec. 20, 2010…
As Ian Anderson said, “We’re getting a bit short on heroes lately”.
And Ian, while he wasn’t speaking of Don Van Vliet, nevertheless would—and has—endorsed the man better known as Captain Beefheart. Indeed, the list of well-loved and iconoclastic artists who have cited CB as an inspiration and hero include the likes of Tom Waits, Nick Cave, P.J. Harvey and Matt Groening. When the people lots of people worship name you as someone they worship, you can safely conclude you have done influential work, even if it didn’t necessarily pay the bills.
To say Don Van Vliet, who passed away on December 17th, was unique is rather like saying the sun radiates heat: it doesn’t quite capture the enormity and impact of the subject. To assert that he was brilliant would be almost insulting, if that is possible. A genius? Let’s just say that Read the rest of this entry »
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