Home Read Classic Album Review: Charles Bukowski | Reads His Poetry

Classic Album Review: Charles Bukowski | Reads His Poetry

This came out in 2005 — or at least that’s when I got it. Here’s what I said about it back then (with some minor editing):

 


If everything you know about Charles Bukowski comes from the film Barfly, you don’t know Hank.

Get acquainted with the man himself on this CD reissue of Charles Bukowski Reads His Poetry, a recording of a 1972 performance in San Francisco. On the down side: The sound is cruddy and mono, the gig is only 40 minutes long and little of it qualifies as poetry in the usual sense. On the upside: This set captures the hard-drinking 52-year-old writer at the height of his powers. Telling dirty jokes, spinning tales of sex fiends, suicide, horse racing and bodily functions, playfully jousting with hecklers or just belching into the mic, Bukowski emerges as a character far too unique and unpredictable to be summed up by any film. Here’s to him and all his friends.