Dead City Radio (album)
Dead City Radio is a musical album by Beat Generation author William S. Burroughs, which was released by Island Records in 1990. It was dedicated to Keith Haring.
The CD is a collection of readings by Burroughs set to a broad range of musical compositions. It was produced by Hal Willner and Nelson Lyon, with musical accompaniment from John Cale, Donald Fagen, Lenny Pickett, Chris Stein, and alternative rock band Sonic Youth, among others. Although not Burroughs' first album—he released his first spoken word album Call Me Burroughs in the 1960s and was a fixture on the Giorno Poetry Systems collections of the 1970s and 1980s—this was the first release to receive wide public attention.
Most of the recordings of Burroughs readings were made at his home in Lawrence, Kansas between December 12 and 15 1988, with further recordings taking place on June 24, 1989. The music was added at a later date. During these sessions Burroughs was captured singing the German standard "Ich Bin Von Kopf Bis Fuss Auf Liebe Eingestellt" (Falling in Love Again), a song associated with Marlene Dietrich. This recording was included as a bonus track and is the only commercially available track as of 2012 to depict the author actually singing.
The material performed by Burroughs on the album included excerpts from some of his famous works such as Naked Lunch, as well as a couple of items from his 1989 short story collection Tornado Alley. The track "Kill the Badger!" is an excerpt from Burroughs' novella The Cat Inside. A music video was created Burroughs' reading of "A Thanksgiving Prayer" (a poem from Tornado Alley); the reading (like the book from which it came) is dedicated to John Dillinger. Burroughs prefaces his reading of the short story "Where He Was Going" with a brief discussion of its inspiration and origins.
Several tracks include Burroughs discussing elements of Christianity and The Bible in a conversational style, and one track has Burroughs reciting the Sermon on the Mount while adding editorial comment.
The track "Ah Pook the Destroyer" was later used as the soundtrack for the acclaimed animated short film Ah Pook Is Here. Burroughs' song "Falling in Love Again" plays over the closing credits of the film.
Read more about Dead City Radio (album): Track Listing, Personnel
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