I sat down and lit a cigarette, and a tough-looking black dude about thirty years old bummed one from me. "What are you in for?"
"Being ahead of my time."
He just looked at me. For a second I thought he was going to laugh, but he didn't. "Yeah," he said. "Me too."

Lester Bangs died on this day in 1982, and it occurred to me that I should write something in his honor. But I did that a few years back in Exiled #37. All I can add is that anybody who loves great writing and/or great rock 'n' roll needs to read Lester Bangs. If you haven't, you're missing out big-time. Here's to you, Lester.

Links:

Bangs' "Jethro Tull in Vietnam", from Creem magazine May 1973. If you don't read all of this, at least scroll down and read the second half, subtitled "Postlude: After the Fall."

Bangs' "Astral Weeks", from Stranded in 1979.

Commentary on Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music, from Creem March 1976.

Robert Christgau's Bangs obituary from The Village Voice.

The brilliant, I-can't-gush-enough Philip Seymour Hoffman as Lester Bangs in Almost Famous. Hoffman is in a few more short-yet-crucial scenes in this great movie.