“Poetry is, for me, you know, words in their own music. If you’re a poet, there’s a certain rhythm and a certain melody to what you sing and recite and the best poets lend themselves very well to music. With Patti, I’ve always been able to follow her inflection, her rhythms, her sense of imagery and try to interpret that on the guitar. you know it’s a great blessing to be able to do something like that..
Back in June 2009, talking of “The Beats”:
Well in terms of my generation, I was very influenced by “the Beatniks” (as they called them in America at the turn of the ‘Sixties). I read On the Road by Jack Kerouac, I read “Howl” and they were very important to me at a very early stage in my youth and helped me define what kind of art I was attracted to and what kind of music I would make around that art. To see somebody like the Beats who brought things like poetry away from (a) kind of rarified atmosphere, of, you know, universities and scholastic and dry books, into the modern era,
I think they were really important in terms of…in terms of helping us become who we are. And it was very gratifying for me to meet Allen Ginsberg, and to perform with him at several concerts (we would do some of his poems set to music, and actually I produced a single of his in the last years of his life, “Ballad of The Skeletons”)
Getting to work with Allen, that… that really impressed me and made me realize, you know, that, maybe, a circle had been connected in my life. From being a small wild animal in New Jersey reading about the adventures, you know, of the great poets of our time, and then helping one (of them) get his music on a record. It was a really beautiful thing.
When we recorded, I didn’t realize that it would be such a short time until he passed away, but he taught me something very very important, which was how to walk like a Buddhist, which was, you know.. I always forget how you hold your hands, but… you walk, and as you walk, you imagine the curve of the earth, and you’re walking on the circle of the earth, and
I thought that was just a beautiful way of describing one’s place on this globe that we have.”‘
and of Buddhist collaboration (The Patti Smith Group and Philip Glass):”
“I always enjoy these shows we do with Philip to salute Allen because he was a great artist, certainly one of the most important artists the twentieth-century, in terms of making poetry relevant to the moment, and for being a supporter of the culture of youth, of which I hope to continually be a part of, in some way, shape or form.”
Listen to him beautifully accompanying Allen on Allen’s version of “Amazing Grace” – here
and here he’s reading Leonard Cohen!
Here’s Lenny & Patti from 1974 doing “Piss Factory”
Here’s the iconic opening track of the equally iconic, Horses
Lightning Striking – Ten Transformative Moments in Rock n Roll (Lenny’s book from 2022)
Patti’s heart-felt recommendation:
“We have performed side-by-side on the global stage through half a century…. In Lightning Striking, Lenny Kaye has illuminated ten facets of the jewel called rock and roll from a uniquely personal and knowledgeable perspective.”
Lenny is interviewed and speaks of the book – here
and also here – and here and here
Don Armstrong, back in 2019 writes on Lenny Kaye’s devotional music journalism.
Sean O’Hagan profiles and interviews Lenny in The Observer 2021
We conclude with Lenny, the year before, on his porch, kicking back, in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania..
“In this video, Lenny shares some thoughts on life and music, and plays a few of his songs”
Happy Birthday, Lenny!