rock desire

allo Anik Jean

ici Francoeur

j'aime bien ce que tu fias
ce que tu es
ce que tu hais
et aimes

dont le graphic novel
suis dedans par dessus la tête

je l'enseigne
je le propage
et etc
ainsi que tout ce qui est comic-book

j'aime bien aussi Zilon
je pourrai en dire long

au sujet de votre projet
as-tu lu
CHANEL ZERO (vriament pertinent...)
de Brian Wood
et tout ce qu'il fait d'ailleurs
dont
LOCAL
COUSCOUS EXPRESS
en plein dans ce que vous voulez faire
aussi
DMZ
et
aussi
Chabouté...

tout Warren Ellis
tout Grant Morrison
tout Hernandez Brothers (surtout Love & Rocket)
tout Brian Talbot
tout Allan More (surtout Swamp Thing et Watchmen et tout tout)


il faut lire tout Paul Pope
de Jim Morrison de la bd
et le shaman du destroy-comic

donc bonne chance
bonne route
bon rock
et bonne vie


cowboy-blues
nam myoho rengé kyo

amitiés

Francoeur
(lucienfrancoeur.com)

Pope 1.jpg

img11.jpg

m_d11f762826d84c648989842e8074ab06.jpg

Lettre au chum de Veena...

Allo Éric


suis allé voir
LE TEMPLE SOLAIRE
et c'est génial
je vais lire au complet
lentement
mais où peut-on se procurer ce livre

tu as compris où je voulais en venir
avec mon idée de bd polar
et définitivement
il faudrait que ça passe en France

donc si jamais je me libère
de mes engagements chansons et poésie
je vais écrire un synopsis
avec la définition précise du projet

anyway j'ai bien hâte de voir Veena paraître

as-tu vu ce que fait Denis Rodier chez Soleil
2 albums parus déjà en moins de 18 mois
mais il trouve que c'est beaucoup de travail
il veut faire de la musique il a un band etc
moi c'est le contraire je veux faire de la bd
ou du graphic novel ou même du polar ou roman noir

mais je suis tellement habitué à écrire poésie et chansons
que je ne parviens pas à me resituer ailleurs autrement
il faudrait que je quitte le Québec et que j'aille
m'installer chez moi en Californie traquille loin de tout
surtout de la légende rock FRANCOEUR ou même Aut'Chose
là je viens de faire une pub très payante pour les restos Benny
j'avais déjà fait Burger King et voilà que je me laisse tenter $$$$$$ encore
la pub illustration affichettes, tags et tablecloth fait un peu bd...un petit peu!
ce sont toutes ces activités qui découlent de la notoriété que me siphonnent
mais j'aurai été le seul poète à être sollicité par les commerçants
au même titre que les personnalités sportives, aritstiques etc
ça c'est jamais vu un poète (même en France) être autant monnayable
certains voient ça comme de la compromission de la prostitution etc. etc.
mais dans un si petit marché s'il faut en plus être puriste élitiste stock-up

bon ben lâche pas Éric t'as l'air bien parti
peut-être un jour pourras-tu réunir tes illustrations diverses
et en faire un livre intéressant avec les croquis de recherche d'élaboration etc.

En passant je ne sais pas mais je crois que oui: tu connais Paul Pope?
ce génie du graphic novel et lu destroy comic book
ben je suis en relation très amicale avec lui
et lui même fait des illustrations pour DKNY, Diesel etc.
et ils vend des milliers de livres mondialement (traduits en 2-3 langues)
il fait partie des fans d'Aut'Chose avec Jello Biafra des Dead Kennedys et Beck
et puis d'autres que j'oublie... y'avait les Ramones dont j'avais fait la 1ère partie au Plateau en 81--82
mais crisse sont toutes morts comme la plupart de mes héros des sixties je reste seul au bastingage du Bateau ivre

«que sont mes amis devenus» (Rutebeuf)

mans je croyais jamais me rendre à 60 ans!!!!
je me suis crissé en congé de burn out il y a 2 ans
j'enseigne au cégep depuis 1981 ça aussi on me l'a reproché
mais j'ai fait vivre ma fille sans avoir à faire des clubs à Matane le dimanche soir!!!

Là ma fille à 22 ans elle s'en va voir Britney Spear avec un gars d'Occupation double ou du Loft que sais-je
elle ne veut rien savoir de la littérature du showbiz de la carrière artistique elle est en administration HEC

c'est ben cool... elle va gagner sa vie sans dépendre des scélérats de l'exploitation médiatiques etc.

alors on se tient au courant
dis moi où trouver le Temple Solaire si ça peut s'acheter en librairie ou par commande spéciale

(as-tu vu le poster bédé que Raba lia a fait pour le Ministère éducation, promotion des cégeps
j'ai vu ça par hasard sur les murs de mon cégep (Rosemont) et j'en ai ramassé une dizaine
que j'ai donné à des amis c'est en couleurs et c'est son style évident j'ai buzzé quand j'ai vu ça
je me promenais un soir dans le cégep cherchant je ne sais quoi quand mon regard a capté
quelque chose qui me semblait familier mais pas tout de suite reconnaissable car en couleurs
et je suis habitué à son noir et blanc...
connais-tu cet artiste Henrichon de Québec qui a un hit avec une bd publié aux USA?

Mécanique Générale semble faire du bon travail...Jimmy Beaulieu j'aime bien même si un peu slow...
j'ai tous ses livres car c'est soutenu et volontaire etc.
il a aussi orchestré ce magnifique volume rétrospective Chartier...
mais j'aurais aimé voir ça dans une édition déluge...je sais le petit marché etc...

2 choses que j'aurais aimé faire en cette vie: «dessinateur» et guitariste (je joue 12 accords mais pas assez pour blower sur le stage)
ce seront là mes deux manques mes deux passions restées à l'état passif admirateur collectionneur etc. mais non pratiquant!!!

Ok Éric
ciao

rock-désir

si je perds 20 livres je me fais tatouer Veena dans le dos ou sur l'avant bras!!!1

Francoeur

Strange days!

Hi Tony

finally I mailed a pretty big parcel today
you will receive it in 5-6 days
sent it air-mail
and there is a few books and one cd
I think you will enjoy the stuff

I will send you some more next week
like I told you
some dvd (2)
and another cd of a recent album I did
which is pretty good
the lyrics are great
and the music also
but to much sinthé
I was on smack for the 6 months of the recording
I spent a winter and spring in the studio
making Japanese tea and smoking H

what I sent you today
contains some vintage books
and some recent one
like I explained

1. ROMAN D'AMOUR
that little book was written in the early seventies when I was doing a lot of acid and smoking grass
and mushroom and all psychedelics drugs... I was traveling between Mtl, Vancouver, L.A. and Frisco
sometimes leaving in communes sometimes on skid-row etc etc exile on main street time
When I wrote that little book I was having a heartbreak with Suzanne Queen of the Underground
everybody wanted to take her away from me and was too busy with other girls and dope
so I lost her and got sad and got mad and sad and mad etc etc and wrote that book
I very well known writer of that era read it on acid and he was a teacher at University
and he freaked out took himself for Billy the Kid and went thru a plate-glass window
and cut himself pretty badly and that made the new at the time
so I was a hero of the underground and over ground before making any albums
my books were put down by the straight in the tabloid and that was unusual for a poet
to see his name and books mentioned in those tabloid and everyday papers
So this book is a classic of that area and impossible to find and it sells for close to a hundred dollars
It is a pulp psychedelic kind of a novel that was never completed but it made history

2. CHANSONS D'ÉPOUVANTE
That cd sold very well and receive a lot of good critics because the musicians were great and well known
all coming from different alternative rock band that were and are legendary
the songs were the same that I had recorded in 1974 for CBS
we played them live on tape and did not change anything
the sound is more powerful and my voice a bit different more mature
and that edition is a special one for a TV promotion with a bonus second album
with one song recorded in 1987 when my daughter was born
and the song was produce by a friend of mine a huge rock star of Quebec
Gerry Boulet of Offenbach... (Kathy Reichs mentioned him at the beginning of her first novel) the first French rock band ever in Quebec
he died 2 years after sometimes in 1990 he sings with me and that is another collector’s item
I had written that song when I was touring in France with my band (French musicians)
so that song has a special meaning for me although I would do the voice differently today
but I did it at the time like Gerry wanted me to do it and I followed his guidance


if you have any question feel free to ask me anything when you go thru the stuff...

So take care Tony

best of



lucien

Letter to a friend...

Hi Tony

I am answering both of you e-mail...

I hear of Goines but haven't read any of his books and I will look into it... I just receive today «Road to Los Angeles« and now I can start my serious reading of Fante, in chronological order! Glad to learn that you know my very good friend Marc Villard... His novels should be translated and published in the USA... I hope they do for shim one day what they did for Fred Vargas... but she sold more books than him! One of his books as illustrations just like a graphic novel... and there is a graphic story based on him and published in a very important collection... I recorded a song called NYC were I have a character called Inspector Villard... that was when Marc was starting to publish his thriller novels and we poets friends of his were on his case on the foot field (we use to play foot, soccer together in Pantin, a suburb of Paris)... That was a long time ago but it is what memories are made of! You know Tony I really scrapped a career in France to stay close to Virginie... she is turning 22 tomorrow... I can't believe it... tonight we were watching TV, and she had a big night partying with her friends, and I was massaging her little feet, well not so little now that she wears high heels shoes! But I was telling her that she was my little girls my baby still, and that 22 were so young! Shit I am 60 and fucking depressed by it! Never thought I would get that old! Anyway... That nostalgia has got a hold of me pretty tight! A good grip... H was making it easier... Las night I bought some syringes for a friend... but for a while I thought I was buying them for me... Today reading the first pages of »Seizure...» I was happy to be off the habit! You write so strongly about it that it is the best deterrent...

Yeah I could read that many pages of yours, because I enjoy reading you so much! So whatever you feel I will deal with it and enjoy it! What else, did I want to tell y our? Oh yeah, about Crumley the first book I read was «The right madness», the title caught my eye and imagination! And the book look very good published by Penguin... Man you will love that, on the thriller side of literature but as good as Hemingway or Céline or whatever...and whoever... And The Alcoholic as soon as you will read it you will see what could be done with «Down and out...»... your agent could look into that... But in a way if it is bound to happen it will... sometimes I want so much to force things in reality, either for myself or for my friends... But I know from experience that what as to happen happens... But it is fun to look into things, shoot the breeze, dream a little... and I also know from experience that it is always constructive to formulate the ideas etc... You never know what can happen, so no hesitation from my part... I was reading «Seizure...» and at the same time, in alternance, «Coward»... and that was great... with a background of jazz paying in the Strabuck's sound system...

I live know day to day... the methadone as taken most of my life force... most of my drive... or is it life itself that is playing tricks on me... I do not know... but I do not feel like doing anything these days... Just the reading, tons of books around me, and cds and ddvs of my best movies... and some TV Shows like the complete «Laugh In» series (hippies humor», «Simon and Simon», «Magnum PI», «Northern Exposure»... «Mike Hammer», «Rawhide», «Soprano», «Have gun will travel», «Route 66» etc etc... And so many fifties and sixties and seventies movies... and all the current superheroes that are worth it: Hell Raiser, Batman, Sin City, and some others... and all the Fellini’s, Bertolinos, Godard etc etc... I have a 55ïn TV analogue and a projector HD... I will buy one day an HD system... but I watch old movies and it is not worth it on a brand new HD TV... so I wait... the other day I watch a hockey game at a friend of mine, on HD... After 45 minutes I had a headache... to clean, to bright, too much of much... Like no sense watching Easy Rider on HD... It was not made for that... All I would have to do would be buying an HD DVD player and run it thru my Canon Projector on a Movie Screen... but I am used to my analogue system and everything is in place etc... I hate change... habits... Virgo is my sign... and twilight is my ascendant...

Thanks for the books you sent me... I will give you more precision on the stuff I sent you... Do not hesitate to ask me questions... some of those books I sent are part of the avant-garde literature of Quebec and France... I was the first French Canadian writer of my generation to be published in France, at Seghers (legendary poetry publisher)... and I made a huge impression at the time (1978 and on).... everybody was on my case... They went crazy on my writings... it lasted 15 years... then I stop going and lost the momentum... but I do not regret it because I was with little Virginie... the best career... loving father... that might sound... well whatever... you know what I mean because you are leaving it now with Nice and Vanessa...

so Tony take care

it is so nice here with the sun finally... those fucking winter that last 6 months are insane... and taking their toll on people... I miss California so much... like I told you I will get other stuff for you: dvds, cds, vintage books of mine... even if they are in French they look so good are so hip that you will enjoy them without reading them, just a few words here and there and you will get the drift etc...


best of Tony

always glad to read your emails...
keep on writing in the same vein, on and on, until the whole fucking world get it... if it takes all you life do it! It is worth it! Believe me... I should have done more with my time but I did more than a lot...

amitiés

Lucien

Hi again Tony

Hi Tony again


the package is made
everything that I described in precedent e-mail is in

a good size parcel very well packed
in an Amazon cardboard I had kept for it

good luck uncapping it
just joking
should be easy
although lots of scotch tape

if I do not mail it tomorrow
it will be done Monday
by air mail

I sent some books in French
because I know you will get the drift
and one day you might be able to read some part of them
if you go in France for the promotion of you books

I don't know if I told you about a very good friend of mine
that is very well known in France and all French territories
is name is Marc Villard and he started as a poet of counter-culture
and after a few books he wrote some «Romans noir», dark thriller novels
and what he brought to that style was the presence of rock'n'roll and blues and jazz
so far he has published 20 books in the Gallimard Black Thriller Collection
which is a real consecration and they have recently made a graphic novel
with passages from a few of his books and it his very good
so your French publisher has got to know him
and 2 other very well known writers friends of mine
YVES SIMON
PATRICE DELBOURG

Go see the Yves Simon website
and click the video section
and listen to a song he made on Baskiat
he made the video himself and it his very sharp
this guy wrote more than 10 novels and as much albums

as far as Patrice Delbourg he is a well known journalist
and a poet with also one or two novels I think

I also made a book with one of the most well known counter-cultural writer
is name is Claude Pélieu and he died at more than 70 years old in New-York
I did mention him I am sure and we made a book together 2-3 years before he died
I told you he was part of the Beat Generation and intimate with Burroughs (he translated his books)
and although I was maybe harsh on him about his translations of Burroughs they are pretty good
and one has to take into consideration that he was a pioneer in translating a not so easy type of writing...

anyway
untill then
so far so good...

lucien
best of

NE CHERCHE RIEN AILLEURS QU'ICI: LES GITANS REVIENNENT TOUJOURS SUR LES LIEUX DE LEURS AMOURS!

Melancholia Pub

Hi Tony....

I was reading «Songs from...» at Starbuck downtown Montreal and I had on the table all your books, the 2 covers of «Down and out...» etc... A girl from McGill University was doing her session paper or something and she glanced toward my table and kind of froze there reading the titles... I got shivers going thru «Stardust memories»... what a fucking well written piece of life, or is it fiction, or a bit of both: in any case the story hit me all the way to my soul! So good, so intense and so perfect: the rhythm, atmosphere, choice of words, images etc... So that is why this book is important and you will have to salvage all the stories in it, although I haven't read all of them I am sure that they are all as good as «Stardust» and they could maybe be the first part of a 2 part book of short stories... Bukowski style, or you know that girl writer who wrote Bare Back Mountain, can't get her name I think it is Proulx... anyway she wrote good short stories about Montana I think I read some of them... and short stories are in vogue, as hot as those «graphic novels»... So far tony you have a pretty good body of work around a very precise thematic: life on Low Life Street... «exile on Main Street«... and you should I think keep on expanding that body of work... although it in the heavy metal aspect of that hardcore life, there is sensibility and despair etc... You are to the addict life style what Bukowski was to booze, without destroying yourself in real life... you did not get caught in the Destroy Trip... thanks to Nico and Vanessa! But from what I feel so far from reading you I think you should dig more and more into that aspect, at least until you have the fell for it and love writing about it... after well you will see... or maybe you'll keep on going in that vein (no pun etc)... I had fun playing around with all kind of variation of Stardust Memories and Seizure Wet Dreams... mixing them together etc... Some were sounded pretty good...

So far you have manage to construct a universe that belongs to you... very personal and sincere and written in a literature quality... A lot of people have lived what you write about, like a lot of people did what I did... but who as the guts and talent and inspiration to lay it down on paper or on tape or on the stage! You are on your way to a great literary realization! You have found what is so hard to find and sometime impossible: a voice of you own, a tony O'Neill poetic singularity... and that is not a gift from the gods or God... it has to be stolen from the Devil, fucking the Muses till they scream »Please write your motherfucker!»... And we obey, we do it... I am talking here about the type of writing we do, and writers like Burroughs, Ginsberg, Kerouac, Corso, Bukowski, Fante, etc... and Rimbaud, Baudelaire, Lautréamont, Breton, Tzara etc... it is another story for writers like I don't know, ... ? Rilke, Claudel, and all those poetic precious poet... the heavy-metal hard-core soul searchers, «star fuckers», brain blowers that we love to read and that made us write do not take writing for granted, like it is a birth gift given to the few... the writers I like went to hell and got the devil so scared that he ran by the back door... no forward address... gone! the writers I love are soaked in blood sweat and tears... I do not know if that make any sense but I tried to translate what makes me tick and adopt a writer for life... I know that from the start... It was that when I read the first paragraph of «Down and out...»... Hooked from the start, and addicted without any remorse...

Here Tony I will give you a description of the books I am sending you so keep this part of this e-mail:

1. Express pour l'Eden, my most recent book of poems... I am proud of it... good stuff... maybe you will get the feel of it just glancing thru it...

2. Roman d'amour, a very early book, a collector's item here and in France... out of print... a kind o f novel «à la Brautigan» but on the junk side of writing...

3. Chants de l'Amérique inavouable, all the lyrics I wrote... most of them recorded with Aut'Chose and Francoeur...

4. Des images pour une gitane, a book and a cd: love poems that I wrote for Claudine in the eighties and that were published in small number and in traditional typesetting and artisanal paper... I will give you the original editions when we meet, if we do and I hope we do... There was 3 books at the time and they are collected here with a lot of modification from the original poems and some never published poems... People went nuts when it was published: some said I had sold out with that soft poetry other said it was the mark of great writers (I tend to believe those were right!)

5. Chansons d'épouvante, a cd released 2-3 years ago... sold well in Quebec: a re-recorded the songs of my 3 first albums under the name Aut'Chose (my cration of a band) but the musicians that formed that new Aut'Chose were legend of alternatif rock of the nineties: Voivod (world known), Groovy Ardvaark, Grimskunk... We played the songs live on tape, with no arrangements: we kept the songs the same exactly... the sound was more powerful... And that edition of the CD is special it contains 2 cads second cod with a bonus song of Francoeur... that was a limited edition... can't find it no more...

6. Rimbaud: this pocket book edition was the first one ever published and the one that we all read and made us love Rimbaud... it is a legendary edition... we can still find some in used books library... not often though! That book carries all kind of memories for me... the jacket was perfect with that legendary drawing from Verlaine...

7. Le calepin d'un menteur, a very original little book, worth a lot of money for collectors... impossible to find like Roman d'amour... very vulgar exercise in writing... stuff written on napkins, piece of papers, matchbook covers etc... on the road from Mtl to Vancover to L.A. to Frisco and back and on acid booze junk etc etc... Very outrageous book...

8. Neons in the Night, choice of poems from all the books that were published at the time of the translation... it was well received... I think it either won a prize or a mention in translation... You will notice that the early stuff is very hermetic... we were creating a new language at the time... lsd poetry: new words, English words and expression, surrealistic effects, organic images etc... All the French poetry of the sixties and seventies in France and Quebec had to experience that intense exploratory language searching... while the Canadian and American poetry was more realists and still is... The closer to what we were doing are Philip Lamentia and ee cummings... and maybe other that you know better than I do or cannot think of now... In the eighties, I started to write in a more direct style and everybody followed my traces... And today everybody does what one wants, in all directions... there is a lot of weak and bad stuff... some think that all you have to do is tell a story and that is it... if the story is good great but if it is weak then it isn't worth shit! Myself and a few other are called by the literary academics the «californificateurs» (californificators) or the «américanistes»... we wanted to be part of the American counter-culture, the flower-power movement, de psychedelic revolution: that is why we had to use American words and expressions etc... The stuff is great when you smoke a joint or drop an acid tab... like listening to Sgt Pepper or The Doors... I am due for another translation of my stuff... I would not put the French version of the poems in it... I might put in that book those poems as the first part called Neons in the Night and a second part with new translations of poems not included in here... I have to work on that sometime...


so that it
hope you enjoy either reading some of the stuff or listening to some other or just look at it...

take care Tony


lucien xxx
rock-desire

I think that is it

I still have to send you a few other books
and 2 dvds...