My recollection is that I first encountered Kim Fowley when I found the above album, Living in the Streets. The cover is a pastiche of photos and text that are taken from an interview published in 1977 in Sounds magazine. The interview continues onto the back cover; a pull quote that is given there proclaims: “I am the Dorian Gray of rock ’n’ roll. If you saw me physically, you wouldn’t believe I was as old as I am, and I’ve never aged.”
As if that were not enough to catch my attention, the list of dozens of bands and musicians mentioned in the interview that is also given on the cover includes one of my very favorite bands, the Pink Fairies.
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As I remember, the interview that was spread across the cover of Living in the Streets was where I first learned that Kim Fowley had worked with Helen Reddy, of “I Am Woman” fame – specifically, her albums Ear Candy (1977) and We’ll Sing In The Sunshine (1978). Of the long list of musicians and bands who worked with Kim – and there have been dozens of them that I have learned about myself – she is the most surprising.
(January 2015/1)
