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Dedicated white Soul Men were not in great quantity when Wayne caught my attention back in '65. I was hooked on the likes of Wilson Pickett and Sam and Dave. With the exception of Mitch Ryder, there were few Caucasian cats willing to put it all on that inspiration train and ride wild. Wayne did

In retrovision, this Pop piece attempted to ride a sentimental wave that Jonathon King ('Everyones Gone To The Moon') created in 1965. Its poignant brush strokes are somewhat endearing when combined with that original Lennon voice box we have come to cherish through John's majestic work.

He was a last great American Film director, leaving only Scorsese and a handful of others to continue the precious efforts he designed. ‘On The Waterfront’, 'Streetcar Named Desire’, and 'Boomerang’ begin to define him. So did the 50’s blacklist. Do we judge pure expertise or hard history? Both.

Roky is a poet, musician, singer, father and schizophrenic. He now falls toward Earth in a more gentle and experienced configuration. It can be heard in his vocalization and within the missive he shares. His refrains offer dreams gone very wrong and very right. They are undisguised invocations.

Louis Armstrong suggested that “If you have to ask what jazz is, you'll never know.” I imagine that the same could be said of a Beat Generation that contributed a wealth of poetry, film, music and art to a Country reeling from War and McCarthyism back in the doom day of the barbarous blacklist.

I discovered Miller at age 13 in a NY bookstore. It was the thickest paperback book I had ever seen, inhabiting 400 plus pages with a stark red cover pleading ‘The Rosy Crucifixion.’ What I encountered within that volume pledged a young psyche and opened a cascade of fertile imaginings.

In France, Isabelle Geffroy is considered a sacred voice by many who have followed her ascendance from Blues and Jazz chanteuses into the Popular Starry night of devoted acclaim. There is a hurt in her pleading that you just can't fake in a Country that still worships passion with poetic respect.

Siegel/Schwall and Paul Butterfield were the first white Blues cats to get under my skin back in ’66. The intuitive sensations they enhanced were rooted musical readings I did not hear Clapton, Beck or Page reaching. It was Chi Town speaking, as Corky and Jim learned the craft in the clubs of fame.

Humans are only as good as their best desires. We harvest hallucination and induct our passions into rivers of promise, pipe dreams and a curious courage. The chant of our dearest days is informed by a quarry of yearning never ending, often daring. Which leads me to these 4 wise men. Amen.

Mary was a talent transformed by the business side of Detroit‘s majestic, musical mega boom. Her journey was a fleeting mission rendering an iconic hit (“My Guy”) and other fave recordings. She signed her life away to Berry Gordy at 17 and never quite reclaimed it. Her song signature still vibrates

Some suggest that it was easy for a radical such as Sinclair to confront the sour powers of the 60’s horizon and flaunt an inflamed disregard. And then they sent him up the big river big time. He felt that Cannabis was a human right. 43 years later we see the danger of another Prohibition.

Larry was one of those Bad Luck Boys whose life and times included hits, acclaim from comrades, an acting career and a penchant for drugs that delivered him to a tormented end. He was found dead in his L.A home on Jan. 7, 1980. It was ruled suicide but many think the verdict is still out.

Philip's wife and editor Nancy Peters had this to say regarding the poetic architecture her husband designed: "He found in the narcotic night world a kind of modern counterpart to the gothic castle -- a zone of peril to be symbolically or existentially crossed.” Yes. Philip walked a dark beat.

Civil rights rarely strayed from the thoughts of James Brown. He understood his potential reckoning with the white audience required to gain the fame requested. Once the ‘T.A.M.I Show’ hit theaters in 1964 displaying The Stones having a troubling time following his act, the stars were in his favor.

Had he survived the malady of depression, Del would have received the similar, revived adulation experienced by Roy Orbison. As a Traveling Wilbury, an entire new generation would have inhaled his electric craft on a new current. Regardless, he remains a seminal influence of sensitive proportions.