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Guitar Army: Street Writings / Prison Writings
Book by Sinclair, John
364 pages, Paperback
Published January 1, 1972
4 people are currently reading
67 people want to read
About the author
John Sinclair
226 books7 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.
John Sinclair (born October 2, 1941) is an American poet, writer, and political activist from Flint, Michigan. Sinclair's defining style is jazz poetry, and he has released most of his works in audio formats. Most of his pieces include musical accompaniment, usually by a varying group of collaborators dubbed Blues Scholars.
As an emerging young poet in the mid-1960s, Sinclair took on the role of manager for the Detroit rock band MC5. The band's politically charged music and its Yippie core audience dovetailed with Sinclair's own radical development. In 1968, while still working with the band, he conspicuously served as a founding member of the White Panther Party, a militantly anti-racist socialist group and counterpart of the Black Panthers.
Arrested for possession of marijuana in 1969, Sinclair was given ten years in prison. The sentence was criticized by many as unduly harsh, and it galvanized a noisy protest movement led by prominent figures of the 1960s counterculture. Various public and private protests culminated in the "John Sinclair Freedom Rally" at Ann Arbor's Crisler Arena in December 1971. The event brought together celebrities including John Lennon and Yoko Ono; musicians David Peel, Stevie Wonder, Phil Ochs and Bob Seger, Archie Shepp and Roswell Rudd; poets Allen Ginsberg and Ed Sanders; and countercultural speakers including Abbie Hoffman, Rennie Davis, David Dellinger, Jerry Rubin, and Bobby Seale. Three days after the rally, Sinclair was released from prison when the Michigan Supreme Court ruled that the state's marijuana statutes were unconstitutional but he remained in litigation – his case against the government for illegal domestic surveillance was successfully pleaded to the US Supreme Court in United States v. U.S. District Court (1972).
Sinclair eventually left the US and took up residency in Amsterdam. He continues to write and record and, since 2005, has hosted a regular radio program, The John Sinclair Radio Show, as well as produced a line-up of other shows on his own radio station, Radio Free Amsterdam.
Sinclair was the first person to purchase recreational marijuana when it became legal in Michigan on December 1, 2019.
John Sinclair (born October 2, 1941) is an American poet, writer, and political activist from Flint, Michigan. Sinclair's defining style is jazz poetry, and he has released most of his works in audio formats. Most of his pieces include musical accompaniment, usually by a varying group of collaborators dubbed Blues Scholars.
As an emerging young poet in the mid-1960s, Sinclair took on the role of manager for the Detroit rock band MC5. The band's politically charged music and its Yippie core audience dovetailed with Sinclair's own radical development. In 1968, while still working with the band, he conspicuously served as a founding member of the White Panther Party, a militantly anti-racist socialist group and counterpart of the Black Panthers.
Arrested for possession of marijuana in 1969, Sinclair was given ten years in prison. The sentence was criticized by many as unduly harsh, and it galvanized a noisy protest movement led by prominent figures of the 1960s counterculture. Various public and private protests culminated in the "John Sinclair Freedom Rally" at Ann Arbor's Crisler Arena in December 1971. The event brought together celebrities including John Lennon and Yoko Ono; musicians David Peel, Stevie Wonder, Phil Ochs and Bob Seger, Archie Shepp and Roswell Rudd; poets Allen Ginsberg and Ed Sanders; and countercultural speakers including Abbie Hoffman, Rennie Davis, David Dellinger, Jerry Rubin, and Bobby Seale. Three days after the rally, Sinclair was released from prison when the Michigan Supreme Court ruled that the state's marijuana statutes were unconstitutional but he remained in litigation – his case against the government for illegal domestic surveillance was successfully pleaded to the US Supreme Court in United States v. U.S. District Court (1972).
Sinclair eventually left the US and took up residency in Amsterdam. He continues to write and record and, since 2005, has hosted a regular radio program, The John Sinclair Radio Show, as well as produced a line-up of other shows on his own radio station, Radio Free Amsterdam.
Sinclair was the first person to purchase recreational marijuana when it became legal in Michigan on December 1, 2019.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
July 29, 2012
If you grew up in the 1960's in the Detroit or Ann Arbor area, as I did, you probably heard of John Sinclair. He was the organizer of some fascinating counter-cultural organizations and activities in Detroit, and then Ann Arbor. I first heard of him in 1968 when I went I attended a concert of the band he managed, the MC5. He was articulate and outspoken, persuasive and charismatic. He was physically huge, (well over six feet tall and stocky enough for the NFL) but was not the least bit athletic.
He lived communally with his wife and a couple dozen friends and followers. They were hippies, but a different variety from the San Francisco flower children. The members of the Rainbow People's Party and its predecessor White Panther Party and Trans-Love Energies, were Detroit hippies, the children of auto workers, greasers who traded their pompadours, pointed shoes and pegged pants for Levis, long hair, LSD and a hefty dose of socialist ideas. They were political radicals who drew their inspiration from both Mao and Malcolm X.
John's knowledge of black music is encyclopedic. I owe much of my knowledge of blues and jazz music to his influence. I interviewed him once in 1972 and still regard him as one of the most incredibly interesting people I have ever met.
Most well known for his enthusiastic advocacy of marijuana, John was arrested several times for possession of the drug. He was given a long sentence for the final conviction, of which he served 2 1/2 years before his release.
This book is a compilation of articles he wrote for Detroit's Fifth Estate newspaper and other "undergound" newspapers. His zealous advocacy of his ideas is exciting to read and I recall my enthusiasm for the book when it was first released.
Forty years later, I see it differently. Sinclair has a tremendous intellect, which he has wasted on a life of supporting lost causes and ventures that were doomed from the start. His understanding of black music could have landed him a professorship at a music college like Berklee or Julliard. Instead, he chooses to live out his golden years as an expatriate in Amsterdam, reading his poems in praise of blues and jazz musicians in front of a few rock musicians.
I hope that John writes another book before the end of his life --- a book exclusively about music, which would be a list of his musical favorites and recommendations of some of their best work. Now THAT would be a great book!!
He lived communally with his wife and a couple dozen friends and followers. They were hippies, but a different variety from the San Francisco flower children. The members of the Rainbow People's Party and its predecessor White Panther Party and Trans-Love Energies, were Detroit hippies, the children of auto workers, greasers who traded their pompadours, pointed shoes and pegged pants for Levis, long hair, LSD and a hefty dose of socialist ideas. They were political radicals who drew their inspiration from both Mao and Malcolm X.
John's knowledge of black music is encyclopedic. I owe much of my knowledge of blues and jazz music to his influence. I interviewed him once in 1972 and still regard him as one of the most incredibly interesting people I have ever met.
Most well known for his enthusiastic advocacy of marijuana, John was arrested several times for possession of the drug. He was given a long sentence for the final conviction, of which he served 2 1/2 years before his release.
This book is a compilation of articles he wrote for Detroit's Fifth Estate newspaper and other "undergound" newspapers. His zealous advocacy of his ideas is exciting to read and I recall my enthusiasm for the book when it was first released.
Forty years later, I see it differently. Sinclair has a tremendous intellect, which he has wasted on a life of supporting lost causes and ventures that were doomed from the start. His understanding of black music could have landed him a professorship at a music college like Berklee or Julliard. Instead, he chooses to live out his golden years as an expatriate in Amsterdam, reading his poems in praise of blues and jazz musicians in front of a few rock musicians.
I hope that John writes another book before the end of his life --- a book exclusively about music, which would be a list of his musical favorites and recommendations of some of their best work. Now THAT would be a great book!!
April 8, 2022
A hippie-era collectible, with its multicolored pages and text, it's one of those books, like Be Here Now, that can't exist in Kindle form without gutting 90% of the pleasure of reading it.
March 19, 2017
Un libro estremamente interessante nel quale Sinclair esprime la sua visione utopica sulla musica come strumento per una rivoluzione totale della società. E' ovviamente una visione permeata di speranze e dell'ottimismo tipico degli hippie, ed è proprio lì il bello del libro: Seppur in modo ingenuo, questo libro vi farà sognare un mondo migliore e chissà, magari vi farà venire voglia di impegnarvi in qualcosa di superiore
July 22, 2009
just finished this. it's a scattered collection of white panther/rainbow people political propaganda, music worship, drug essays, etc., most of which were published in alternative newspapers in se michigan during the late '60s and early '70s. when he's not wildly hammering at the same concepts, sinclair comes off as a great conversationalist and man of the people who wants to see straight america fall apart by cutting off its supply to fresh consumers, at first as an aggressive reactionary and then as a community builder - the ideological progression of a real michigan maniac. essential documents of counter culture history.
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October 7, 2007let's have a post-sinclair party and listen to the audio that comes with this book. white panter party archives!!!
April 5, 2013
this was one i read because it was my dads its rock and roll all the way
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews