Wicked Gravity: Jim Carroll 1949 – 2009

I just learned today that punk/pop poet Jim Carroll died last month. He was only 60.

I was never an expert on Jim Carroll (it would have required taking poetry seriously), but I knew that his book “The Basketball Diaries” was a million times better than the movie, and that his band’s first album, 1980’s “Catholic Boy,” was one of those few albums that doesn’t have a bad track. Like “Who’s Next” or “Led Zepplin IV,” “Catholic Boy” doesn’t have a clunker on it. It’s a Greatest Hits album right out of the gate. Even “Joshua Tree” had “Trip Through Your Wires” on it.

It looks like it’s out of print (judging by the highway-robbery prices of the handful of units available on amazon) but is readily available on the iTunes for download for the dirt cheap price of $10. If I knew how to link to it, I would.

I’m glad to read that Carroll stayed creatively occupied until his sudden death (a heart attack will stop you right in your tracks, creatively speaking).

If you’re reading this and you’re familiar with any of his work it’s most likely to be the crappy Leo DeCaprio movie they made out of his book or his band’s big hit, “People Who Died.” It would be a crying shame if those were to become the extent of his legacy. “The Basketball Diaries” was my generation’s “Catcher In The Rye.” It’s funny to think that JD Salinger outlived Jim Carroll.

Not ha-ha funny, strange funny.

Anyhow, for my money the best thing on his best album is the title track, and not just because I was a recovering Catholic as well. Well, maybe a lot because of that. If I huffed glue as a teen, I probably would have connected with a different song, maybe “People Who Died.”

But as usual when I haven’t been drinking, I digress…

I’m listening to the CD while I type. Every song is a pop/punk masterpiece; brooding and breathless and menacing. Carroll’s near-spoken word performance is haunting.

With his record company and his estate’s permission (no, I’m just kidding, I didn’t get either), I’d like to reproduce the lyrics of my favorite Jim Carroll song. His was a one-of-a-kind, real deal kind of talent. His lyrics even read well without the music which is no mean feat.

The world is not a better place for Jim Carroll’s absence.

Catholic Boy
By Jim Carroll

I was born in a pool, they made my mother stand

And I spat on that surgeon and his trembling hand

When I felt the light I was worse than bored

I stole the doctor's scalpel and I slit the cord

I was a Catholic boy, 

Redeemed through pain,

Not through joy



I was two months early they put me under glass

I screamed and cursed their children when the nurses passed

Was convicted of theft when I slipped from the womb

They led me straight from my mother to a cell in the Tombs 


They starved me for weeks, they thought they'd teach me fear

I fed on cellmates' dreams, it gave me fine ideas

When they cut me loose, the time had served me well

I made allies in heaven, I made comrades in Hell



I was a Catholic child

The blood ran red

The blood ran wild



I make angels dance and drop to their knees

When I enter a church the feet of statues bleed

I understand the fate of all my enemies

Just like Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane



I watched the sweetest psalm stolen by the choir

I dreamed of martyrs' bones hanging from a wire

I make a contribution, I get absolution

I make a resolution to purify my soul



They can't touch me now

I got every sacrament behind me:

I got baptism,

I got communion,

I got penance, 

I got extreme unction

I've got confirmation


'Cause I'm a Catholic child

The blood ran red

The blood ran wild!



Now I'm a Catholic man

I put my tongue to the rail whenever I can.