WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.020 Welcome back to the Deep Dive. So, our mission 00:00:03.020 --> 00:00:06.080 here, as always, is to wade through this huge 00:00:06.080 --> 00:00:08.759 pile of source material, articles, reviews, all 00:00:08.759 --> 00:00:11.359 of it, and basically give you the essential stuff, 00:00:11.439 --> 00:00:14.300 the core knowledge you need to be, well, deeply 00:00:14.300 --> 00:00:18.440 informed. And today, we're digging into a writer 00:00:18.440 --> 00:00:23.059 whose whole career seems built on this fascinating, 00:00:23.320 --> 00:00:26.859 maybe even necessary contradiction, Nicholas 00:00:26.859 --> 00:00:30.710 P. Touches. And just so we're all on the same 00:00:30.710 --> 00:00:34.350 page, it's pronounced. Right. Tashes. And we 00:00:34.350 --> 00:00:35.850 should probably start with, well, the kind of 00:00:35.850 --> 00:00:38.409 praise that just sets the bar incredibly high 00:00:38.409 --> 00:00:41.710 from the get go. Yeah. So back in 1982, he publishes 00:00:41.710 --> 00:00:43.729 this biography of Jerry Lee Lewis, you know, 00:00:43.729 --> 00:00:46.070 the absolute wild man of rock and roll. Hellfire. 00:00:46.130 --> 00:00:48.670 Exactly. Hellfire. And the reaction was just 00:00:48.670 --> 00:00:51.700 definitive. Rolling Stone magazine. I mean. The 00:00:51.700 --> 00:00:53.920 institution itself called it, and this is the 00:00:53.920 --> 00:00:55.840 quote, the best rock and roll biography ever 00:00:55.840 --> 00:00:58.420 written. The best ever. Yeah. Okay. So that's 00:00:58.420 --> 00:00:59.859 our starting point. And honestly, that kind of 00:00:59.859 --> 00:01:02.659 praise alone, it cements his place, right? In 00:01:02.659 --> 00:01:04.760 music history, at least. But that's just scratching 00:01:04.760 --> 00:01:07.780 the surface, isn't it? I mean, our mission today 00:01:07.780 --> 00:01:10.760 really is to go way beyond just the rock writing. 00:01:10.840 --> 00:01:13.640 We need to unpack the whole spectrum of what 00:01:13.640 --> 00:01:16.780 this guy achieved, how he took that raw kind 00:01:16.780 --> 00:01:19.359 of urgent energy you find in the best rock journalism. 00:01:20.599 --> 00:01:23.140 We started applying it to subjects all over the 00:01:23.140 --> 00:01:27.019 map. Heavyweight boxers, obscure country singers. 00:01:27.140 --> 00:01:29.799 Sicilian financiers. Right. And even ancient 00:01:29.799 --> 00:01:31.480 Roman history. There's this incredible range. 00:01:31.540 --> 00:01:33.980 We're talking about a biographer, an essayist, 00:01:34.000 --> 00:01:37.840 a novelist, a poet. Someone who really did seem 00:01:37.840 --> 00:01:40.519 to set out to like transcend where he started. 00:01:40.719 --> 00:01:42.599 And, you know, the sources really back this up. 00:01:42.719 --> 00:01:44.980 They say he succeeded. Critically, he succeeded 00:01:44.980 --> 00:01:47.519 in transcending that genre. Which is fascinating 00:01:47.519 --> 00:01:50.500 because a deep dive into Tosh's, it almost feels 00:01:50.500 --> 00:01:52.640 like a masterclass, doesn't it? How a writer 00:01:52.640 --> 00:01:55.239 can grab hold of a field like rock criticism, 00:01:55.420 --> 00:01:57.859 which, let's be honest, can be seen as kind of 00:01:57.859 --> 00:01:59.939 popular, maybe even disposable sometimes. And 00:01:59.939 --> 00:02:02.519 then use that as a launchpad, a launchpad into 00:02:02.519 --> 00:02:06.069 really high level, serious literary work. That's 00:02:06.069 --> 00:02:08.729 exactly it. He wasn't just writing about low 00:02:08.729 --> 00:02:11.349 culture or what some might call low culture. 00:02:11.469 --> 00:02:13.949 He was injecting it with this incredibly high 00:02:13.949 --> 00:02:17.090 literary style, giving it a kind of mythological 00:02:17.090 --> 00:02:19.930 weight. You know, the kind usually save for like 00:02:19.930 --> 00:02:22.289 the classics. He turned the American outlaw figure 00:02:22.289 --> 00:02:25.590 into something. Yeah. Epic. Absolutely. OK, so 00:02:25.590 --> 00:02:27.789 let's unpack how he got there, because his starting 00:02:27.789 --> 00:02:31.129 point, it's about as far from the traditional 00:02:31.129 --> 00:02:33.729 literary path as you can imagine. We go back 00:02:33.729 --> 00:02:37.879 1949. Newark, New Jersey. Real working class 00:02:37.879 --> 00:02:40.699 grit. That seems key to understanding his voice. 00:02:40.900 --> 00:02:45.520 Indeed. October 23, 1949, Newark. And right away, 00:02:45.620 --> 00:02:48.500 his background gives us a huge clue to his unique 00:02:48.500 --> 00:02:50.780 perspective. His grandparents were Arboreshi. 00:02:50.840 --> 00:02:53.159 Arboreshi. OK, explain that a bit. So they belong 00:02:53.159 --> 00:02:55.639 to this historic Albanian minority community, 00:02:55.819 --> 00:02:58.080 people who emigrated centuries ago from a village 00:02:58.080 --> 00:03:00.599 called Castle Vecchio di Puglia in Apulia, Italy. 00:03:00.840 --> 00:03:03.199 Huh. OK, that feels important. More than just 00:03:03.199 --> 00:03:05.360 like a dot on the map. It's cultural, right? 00:03:05.419 --> 00:03:07.939 It suggests this early connection maybe to diaspora, 00:03:07.979 --> 00:03:10.479 to cultural survival, almost being an outsider 00:03:10.479 --> 00:03:13.500 looking in. Precisely. You hit it. His ancestors 00:03:13.500 --> 00:03:17.020 were, in a way, these preserved outsiders living 00:03:17.020 --> 00:03:20.460 within Italy itself. So it likely gave him this 00:03:20.460 --> 00:03:23.639 inherent, maybe deep seated appreciation for. 00:03:24.639 --> 00:03:26.840 cultural undergrounds for narratives that exist, 00:03:27.039 --> 00:03:29.819 you know, outside the mainstream. Which is exactly 00:03:29.819 --> 00:03:32.300 where he looked for his subjects later on. Exactly. 00:03:32.300 --> 00:03:34.979 And this kind of inherent outsider thing, it 00:03:34.979 --> 00:03:37.120 was then sort of compounded by his education 00:03:37.120 --> 00:03:40.039 or maybe more accurately, his lack of conventional 00:03:40.039 --> 00:03:42.080 education. Yeah. The sources are clear on this. 00:03:42.139 --> 00:03:44.960 The guy who wrote these biographies that people 00:03:44.960 --> 00:03:48.370 treat like serious literature, he. barely finished 00:03:48.370 --> 00:03:51.789 high school. No. No college. That's vital, isn't 00:03:51.789 --> 00:03:53.949 it? He wasn't learning his craft in some MFA 00:03:53.949 --> 00:03:57.229 program. He was learning it on the streets, maybe 00:03:57.229 --> 00:03:59.569 even literally in the swamps later on, and just 00:03:59.569 --> 00:04:01.229 through the sheer hustle of trying to make a 00:04:01.229 --> 00:04:02.990 living. And that hustle, it led him through the 00:04:02.990 --> 00:04:05.349 series of early jobs that, well, they read like 00:04:05.349 --> 00:04:07.509 a list designed to forge a writer's sensibility, 00:04:07.750 --> 00:04:10.250 you know, broaden his range. These jobs tell 00:04:10.250 --> 00:04:12.569 you so much about his early character, his willingness 00:04:12.569 --> 00:04:14.930 to just confront the weird corners of American 00:04:14.930 --> 00:04:17.420 life. Okay, lay them out for us. Well, First, 00:04:17.579 --> 00:04:20.540 pretty straightforward. A porter for his family's 00:04:20.540 --> 00:04:23.579 business back in Jersey. Okay. Grinding working 00:04:23.579 --> 00:04:27.439 class stuff. Purely. Then he moves into, well, 00:04:27.579 --> 00:04:30.500 maybe the slightly awkward underbelly of glamour, 00:04:30.500 --> 00:04:32.740 you could say. He worked as a paste -up artist 00:04:32.740 --> 00:04:36.779 for the Lovable Underwear Company in New York 00:04:36.779 --> 00:04:38.939 City. Lovable Underwear. Seriously. Okay, that's 00:04:38.939 --> 00:04:42.240 a jump. From hauling boxes in Newark to designing 00:04:42.240 --> 00:04:45.149 ads for lingerie in Manhattan. It's a striking 00:04:45.149 --> 00:04:47.629 narrative beat, isn't it? Puts him right in the 00:04:47.629 --> 00:04:50.089 thick of low -level media, the fashion world. 00:04:50.230 --> 00:04:52.430 He's seeing how appeal is constructed, right? 00:04:52.670 --> 00:04:55.470 Manufactured glamour. The gap between the surface 00:04:55.470 --> 00:04:57.910 and the reality underneath. You can totally see 00:04:57.910 --> 00:05:00.029 how that might inform his later stuff, like the 00:05:00.029 --> 00:05:02.550 Dean Martin biography, that whole dirty business 00:05:02.550 --> 00:05:04.649 of dreams idea. Absolutely. It's about observing 00:05:04.649 --> 00:05:07.050 that gap. But then comes the real pivot, the 00:05:07.050 --> 00:05:10.569 job that just seals his reputation as this totally 00:05:10.569 --> 00:05:13.029 uncompromising individual. This is the snake 00:05:13.029 --> 00:05:16.029 hunting. This is the snake hunting. Early 1970s, 00:05:16.029 --> 00:05:17.910 Toshes doesn't head off to some writer's retreat. 00:05:18.050 --> 00:05:20.730 Nope. He moves to Florida. And he gets a job 00:05:20.730 --> 00:05:22.769 as a snake hunter for the Miami Serpentarium. 00:05:23.180 --> 00:05:25.800 Wow. Okay, that's not just an anecdote, is it? 00:05:25.819 --> 00:05:27.399 It's like a mission statement written in venom. 00:05:27.579 --> 00:05:29.779 It really is a statement of character. A snake 00:05:29.779 --> 00:05:32.899 hunter. Think about it. The guy who had later 00:05:32.899 --> 00:05:35.459 chronicled the darkest truths of American life, 00:05:35.620 --> 00:05:38.339 he spent time literally seeking out poisonous 00:05:38.339 --> 00:05:41.259 reptiles in the wild. It kind of embodies that 00:05:41.259 --> 00:05:43.879 whole dirty business attitude he wrote about 00:05:43.879 --> 00:05:48.360 later. That willingness to face danger, go where 00:05:48.360 --> 00:05:51.540 others wouldn't, handle toxic subjects carefully. 00:05:53.149 --> 00:05:55.810 With precision and focus. Exactly. That deep 00:05:55.810 --> 00:05:58.470 investigative hunger, the need to go right to 00:05:58.470 --> 00:06:00.649 the source, no matter how remote or frankly. 00:06:01.209 --> 00:06:02.930 dangerous that feels like the core connection 00:06:02.930 --> 00:06:05.930 between his life and his art. He wasn't scared 00:06:05.930 --> 00:06:08.329 of the metaphorical venom in someone like Sonny 00:06:08.329 --> 00:06:10.370 Liston's life story. Not at all. And yet, despite 00:06:10.370 --> 00:06:12.870 this incredibly wild, non -traditional background, 00:06:13.230 --> 00:06:14.649 he didn't actually struggle to get published, 00:06:14.750 --> 00:06:17.329 did he? No, apparently not. His talent seems 00:06:17.329 --> 00:06:19.089 to have been pretty undeniable right from the 00:06:19.089 --> 00:06:21.410 start. He got his first piece published in Fusion 00:06:21.410 --> 00:06:24.980 magazine when he was only 19. 19, which just 00:06:24.980 --> 00:06:27.819 shows this incredible precocity, this confidence. 00:06:28.459 --> 00:06:31.360 He found his voice and, crucially, his subject 00:06:31.360 --> 00:06:34.160 matter almost immediately. Early rock and roll, 00:06:34.360 --> 00:06:36.620 those oddball records that most critics were 00:06:36.620 --> 00:06:39.040 just ignoring. He didn't need anyone to teach 00:06:39.040 --> 00:06:40.839 him the rules, it seems. He was too busy making 00:06:40.839 --> 00:06:44.439 his own. Pretty much. 19 years old, already writing 00:06:44.439 --> 00:06:46.399 with that grit, focusing on the marginalized 00:06:46.399 --> 00:06:49.079 figures of American music. It really sets the 00:06:49.079 --> 00:06:53.779 stage for a career defined by, well... And his 00:06:53.779 --> 00:06:56.879 rise, it timed perfectly with what we now look 00:06:56.879 --> 00:06:59.600 back on as like the golden age of American music 00:06:59.600 --> 00:07:01.839 journalism. He made a name for himself really 00:07:01.839 --> 00:07:04.279 quickly, writing these groundbreaking pieces 00:07:04.279 --> 00:07:07.899 for huge magazines like Cream, like Rolling Stone. 00:07:08.040 --> 00:07:10.699 Right. But importantly, he wasn't just chasing 00:07:10.699 --> 00:07:12.839 the big stars, was he? He was also the reviews 00:07:12.839 --> 00:07:15.339 editor for Country Music Magazine. Yeah, which 00:07:15.339 --> 00:07:17.379 again signals that deep interest in the roots, 00:07:17.540 --> 00:07:20.000 right? They often overlooked foundational stuff 00:07:20.000 --> 00:07:22.439 in American music. And this is where the sources 00:07:22.439 --> 00:07:25.399 really push him beyond just being a great music 00:07:25.399 --> 00:07:29.560 critic. The claim is huge. He's described as 00:07:29.920 --> 00:07:37.360 To transcend the genre. That means using rock 00:07:37.360 --> 00:07:40.600 and roll, its immediate explosive energy as a 00:07:40.600 --> 00:07:44.100 lens to explore these deeper, almost mythological 00:07:44.100 --> 00:07:46.899 American themes. He was part of that wave, wasn't 00:07:46.899 --> 00:07:49.199 he? Writers who really changed the game for rock 00:07:49.199 --> 00:07:51.759 writing. Totally. The sources put him right alongside 00:07:51.759 --> 00:07:55.060 figures like Lester Bangs, Richard Meltzer, that 00:07:55.060 --> 00:07:58.300 whole crew. A handful of other notable, as one 00:07:58.300 --> 00:07:59.819 source puts it. What did they do differently? 00:07:59.980 --> 00:08:02.560 Well, they injected rock writing with real literary 00:08:02.560 --> 00:08:04.480 ambition. They weren't just reviewing albums. 00:08:04.620 --> 00:08:06.199 They were writing about the experience of the 00:08:06.199 --> 00:08:08.360 music, the chaos, the culture around it, the 00:08:08.360 --> 00:08:11.379 philosophy maybe of the artists themselves. They 00:08:11.379 --> 00:08:14.199 elevated it, you know, to a new plateau of serious 00:08:14.199 --> 00:08:17.600 writing. OK, but here's the tension, right? He's 00:08:17.600 --> 00:08:19.980 getting famous within these big institutions 00:08:19.980 --> 00:08:22.500 like Rolling Stone. I mean, the ultimate rock 00:08:22.500 --> 00:08:24.899 establishment mag back then. But at the same 00:08:24.899 --> 00:08:27.160 time, he's all about the outsider, sticking it 00:08:27.160 --> 00:08:30.579 to the man. How did he square that? He didn't 00:08:30.579 --> 00:08:33.279 square it. He blew it up. The classic story, 00:08:33.399 --> 00:08:35.960 the perfect anecdote that captures that rebellious 00:08:35.960 --> 00:08:38.720 streak, that intellectual subversion, is why 00:08:38.720 --> 00:08:41.620 he left Rolling Stone. He got fired. Fired. Why? 00:08:41.799 --> 00:08:43.960 Because he and Richard Meltzer cooked up this 00:08:43.960 --> 00:08:46.240 scheme where they filed record reviews under 00:08:46.240 --> 00:08:48.100 each other's bylines. Wait, they just swapped 00:08:48.100 --> 00:08:51.039 names on reviews? Yep. That's more than just 00:08:51.039 --> 00:08:52.860 a prank, though, isn't it? It feels like a statement. 00:08:52.960 --> 00:08:55.620 Like a critique disguised as a stunt. Oh, absolutely. 00:08:55.879 --> 00:08:58.080 It wasn't just, you know, mislabeling for fun, 00:08:58.220 --> 00:09:00.240 it was a pretty radical comment on authorship, 00:09:00.259 --> 00:09:03.639 on the whole journalistic establishment. By swapping 00:09:03.639 --> 00:09:06.519 bylines, they were basically asking, hey, does 00:09:06.519 --> 00:09:08.440 the expert's name matter more than what's actually 00:09:08.440 --> 00:09:11.480 being said than the truth of the writing? Subverting 00:09:11.480 --> 00:09:14.559 the whole idea of the expert voice and the power 00:09:14.559 --> 00:09:17.600 of the masthead. Exactly. That act pretty much 00:09:17.600 --> 00:09:20.259 cemented his rep as this iconic lass, someone 00:09:20.259 --> 00:09:22.120 who just refused to play by the rules of the 00:09:22.120 --> 00:09:25.000 institution. And that spirit rebellion. Dedication 00:09:25.000 --> 00:09:26.820 to the marginalized, it seems like it directly 00:09:26.820 --> 00:09:29.519 informs his first big books, right? Yeah. Which 00:09:29.519 --> 00:09:32.720 were all about digging up the messy, often uncomfortable 00:09:32.720 --> 00:09:35.220 roots of American music. His focus was always 00:09:35.220 --> 00:09:37.580 on the origins, yeah. His first book, Country, 00:09:37.799 --> 00:09:39.840 the biggest music in America, came out in 77. 00:09:40.460 --> 00:09:43.379 But later, it got retitled smartly, I think, 00:09:43.379 --> 00:09:46.419 to Country, The Twisted Roots of Rock and Roll. 00:09:46.580 --> 00:09:49.879 Ah, Twisted Roots. That title says it all, doesn't 00:09:49.879 --> 00:09:52.039 it? He wasn't interested in the polished final 00:09:52.039 --> 00:09:55.019 product. He wanted the dark, complicated, often 00:09:55.019 --> 00:09:57.990 contradictory history behind it. Precisely. And 00:09:57.990 --> 00:10:00.509 that focus really solidified with his next big 00:10:00.509 --> 00:10:03.490 one, Unsung Heroes of Rock and Roll, The Birth 00:10:03.490 --> 00:10:05.690 of Rock in the Wild Years Before Elvis. That 00:10:05.690 --> 00:10:08.490 was 1984. Unsung Heroes. That book feels really 00:10:08.490 --> 00:10:10.210 important. Oh, it's arguably one of the most 00:10:10.210 --> 00:10:12.470 crucial pieces of rock history from that era 00:10:12.470 --> 00:10:14.830 because it fundamentally challenged the accepted 00:10:14.830 --> 00:10:18.149 story, the canon. Tosh's argued that the real 00:10:18.149 --> 00:10:20.789 explosive energy of rock wasn't just born with 00:10:20.789 --> 00:10:23.590 Elvis in 56. Right. He was bubbling up for years 00:10:23.590 --> 00:10:26.440 before that. Exactly. With all these obscure, 00:10:26.700 --> 00:10:29.879 often totally forgotten figures, black artists, 00:10:30.100 --> 00:10:32.620 white artists, country, blues, proto -rock guys, 00:10:32.639 --> 00:10:34.799 people history had overlooked. And the fact that 00:10:34.799 --> 00:10:37.460 the book kept getting re -released, new editions 00:10:37.460 --> 00:10:40.559 in 91 and 99. It shows it wasn't just history. 00:10:40.639 --> 00:10:44.039 He was actively redefining it. Making the case 00:10:44.039 --> 00:10:46.580 again and again for the importance of the margins, 00:10:46.759 --> 00:10:49.679 the obscure, the messy beginnings of the stars 00:10:49.679 --> 00:10:52.179 we ended up worshipping. Yeah, redefining it 00:10:52.179 --> 00:10:54.419 for new generations. It's a landmark work in 00:10:54.419 --> 00:10:56.559 that sense. Which brings us right back to the 00:10:56.559 --> 00:10:59.299 book that kind of defines his career apex. The 00:10:59.299 --> 00:11:01.259 one that really broke him out of just the rock 00:11:01.259 --> 00:11:04.639 critic box. Hellfire. The Jerry Lee Lewis story. 00:11:05.639 --> 00:11:08.860 1982. We have to talk about this claim. The best 00:11:08.860 --> 00:11:11.840 rock and roll biography ever written. What makes 00:11:11.840 --> 00:11:13.700 it stand out so much? Why is it considered so 00:11:13.700 --> 00:11:16.139 definitive? Well, I think Hellfire became definitive 00:11:16.139 --> 00:11:18.360 because Tasha's approached Jerry Lewis not just 00:11:18.360 --> 00:11:21.080 as a musician or a celebrity, but as a genuine 00:11:21.080 --> 00:11:24.480 American mythological figure. Mythological. Yeah, 00:11:24.600 --> 00:11:26.720 Lewis was the perfect subject for him, really, 00:11:26.759 --> 00:11:30.120 because he embodied these profound, often really 00:11:30.120 --> 00:11:32.899 destructive contradictions. Here's this Pentecostal 00:11:32.899 --> 00:11:34.720 Christian piano player, right, where he's on 00:11:34.720 --> 00:11:37.480 fire and brimstone theology, but he's constantly 00:11:37.480 --> 00:11:39.879 fighting this internal war, salvation versus 00:11:39.879 --> 00:11:43.559 sin, fame versus damnation. It's that theological 00:11:43.559 --> 00:11:46.240 tension that Tosh zeroes in on, isn't it? He 00:11:46.240 --> 00:11:48.230 doesn't treat Lewis's life like... you know, 00:11:48.230 --> 00:11:50.610 just a tabloid scandal sheet. It's more like 00:11:50.610 --> 00:11:53.110 this epic battle for the soul of a really flawed 00:11:53.110 --> 00:11:55.450 genius. Exactly right. And the prose reflects 00:11:55.450 --> 00:11:57.730 that. It's less journalistic, much more literary. 00:11:57.830 --> 00:12:00.809 It's fragmented. It's lyrical. And it's driven 00:12:00.809 --> 00:12:04.529 by this relentless focus on Lewis's inner demons, 00:12:04.610 --> 00:12:07.509 his internal landscape. He takes the raw facts, 00:12:07.809 --> 00:12:10.090 the underage cousin marriage, the absolutely 00:12:10.090 --> 00:12:12.169 wild performances, the destructive behavior, 00:12:12.350 --> 00:12:14.629 and he elevates it all. Makes it feel like, I 00:12:14.629 --> 00:12:16.909 don't know, Greek tragedy. or maybe more like 00:12:16.909 --> 00:12:19.009 a Southern Gothic epic. That's a great comparison, 00:12:19.190 --> 00:12:21.250 Southern Gothic epic. It's written with this 00:12:21.250 --> 00:12:23.289 narrative force that just captures the fever 00:12:23.289 --> 00:12:25.889 pitch of Lewis's music itself and also the deep 00:12:25.889 --> 00:12:27.870 hypocrisy of the society that was judging him. 00:12:28.049 --> 00:12:30.929 And once he proved he could do that, he realized 00:12:30.929 --> 00:12:32.750 he could take that approach anywhere, couldn't 00:12:32.750 --> 00:12:35.980 he? Apply that mythological framework to... basically 00:12:35.980 --> 00:12:38.799 any American outsider. That's the genius move 00:12:38.799 --> 00:12:41.240 of his post -Hellfire career, absolutely. He 00:12:41.240 --> 00:12:43.580 didn't just keep writing music books. He immediately 00:12:43.580 --> 00:12:46.279 demonstrated that this unique, searing style 00:12:46.279 --> 00:12:49.019 could work for figures way outside the music 00:12:49.019 --> 00:12:51.820 world. But they all shared that same core conflict, 00:12:52.000 --> 00:12:56.440 right? Lives lived intensely, dangerously, often 00:12:56.440 --> 00:12:58.860 tragically, right on the edge of the American 00:12:58.860 --> 00:13:01.860 dream. The sheer breadth of his subjects after 00:13:01.860 --> 00:13:04.559 Lewis, it shows this profound intellectual thread 00:13:04.559 --> 00:13:06.940 connecting seemingly really different people. 00:13:07.200 --> 00:13:10.320 They're all studies in power, in ambition, and 00:13:10.320 --> 00:13:12.919 ultimately the price you pay for operating outside 00:13:12.919 --> 00:13:15.580 the lines of conventional morality. Okay, let's 00:13:15.580 --> 00:13:18.220 trace that path. The most obvious next step for 00:13:18.220 --> 00:13:20.179 music seems to be Dean Martin, the singer, the 00:13:20.179 --> 00:13:22.860 entertainer. Right. Dino. Living high in the 00:13:22.860 --> 00:13:25.580 dirty business of dreams, 1992. And Martin gets 00:13:25.580 --> 00:13:28.460 the same unflinching gaze. Now, why Martin, you 00:13:28.460 --> 00:13:30.940 might ask? Why not Sinatra, the more obvious, 00:13:30.940 --> 00:13:33.340 maybe dominant figure? Good question. Because 00:13:33.340 --> 00:13:36.080 Martin, for Tasha's, was a study in this almost 00:13:36.080 --> 00:13:39.179 effortless detachment. He was the cool crooner 00:13:39.179 --> 00:13:41.539 operating in the orbit of the rat pack, the mob, 00:13:41.720 --> 00:13:44.960 that collision point of glamour and grit. Tasha 00:13:44.960 --> 00:13:47.580 saw Martin as the ultimate cynic. A guy who knew 00:13:47.580 --> 00:13:49.519 the whole game was just a dirty business dreams. 00:13:49.700 --> 00:13:51.440 And he just played his part with this kind of 00:13:51.440 --> 00:13:54.259 knowing shrug. Fascinating take. Then he makes 00:13:54.259 --> 00:13:56.679 a really sharp turn into pure sports tragedy. 00:13:56.940 --> 00:13:59.639 The American underclass with the heavyweight 00:13:59.639 --> 00:14:02.440 boxer Sonny Liston. The devil and Sonny Liston. 00:14:02.440 --> 00:14:06.039 That was 2000. Liston is just. archetypal tosh's 00:14:06.039 --> 00:14:09.480 isn't he this huge silent menacing figure a figure 00:14:09.480 --> 00:14:12.179 of violence who was also deeply exploited and 00:14:12.179 --> 00:14:14.440 ultimately consumed by the underworld characters 00:14:14.440 --> 00:14:16.759 who controlled him yeah tosh has treated liston's 00:14:16.759 --> 00:14:19.879 life his mysterious past his rise that shocking 00:14:19.879 --> 00:14:23.139 defeat by ali his really ambiguous death he treated 00:14:23.139 --> 00:14:25.299 it all with the gravity of like Shakespearean 00:14:25.299 --> 00:14:27.220 fatalists. He wasn't just reporting on a boxer. 00:14:27.340 --> 00:14:29.559 He was analyzing how American violence and exploitation 00:14:29.559 --> 00:14:31.820 create their own tragic heroes. And in between, 00:14:31.980 --> 00:14:33.799 he still found time to dip back in the music 00:14:33.799 --> 00:14:36.179 history, right? With Where Dead Voices Gather 00:14:36.179 --> 00:14:39.639 in 2001. Yeah, focusing on Emmett Miller, a white 00:14:39.639 --> 00:14:43.139 country singer who used blackface. Incredibly 00:14:43.139 --> 00:14:45.639 controversial figure, but crucial to the development 00:14:45.639 --> 00:14:48.139 of country and Western. Again, Tosh is going 00:14:48.139 --> 00:14:50.240 right for those ethically complex, uncomfortable 00:14:50.240 --> 00:14:52.879 roots. OK, now here's where the trajectory gets 00:14:52.879 --> 00:14:56.179 really wild and forces you to see Tosh's not 00:14:56.179 --> 00:14:58.820 just as a biographer, but almost as a historian 00:14:58.820 --> 00:15:01.659 of the global underworld. He wrote an authorized 00:15:01.659 --> 00:15:04.559 biography of Hall and Oates. He did. Dangerous 00:15:04.559 --> 00:15:07.320 Dances, 1984. A bit of a commercial outlier, 00:15:07.379 --> 00:15:09.820 maybe. But then immediately after that, he makes 00:15:09.820 --> 00:15:12.240 this unbelievable leap. He writes about the Sicilian 00:15:12.240 --> 00:15:15.019 financier Michelle Sindona in Power on Earth, 00:15:15.159 --> 00:15:19.220 1986. Yeah. From Daryl Hall and John Oates. To 00:15:19.220 --> 00:15:21.720 a Sicilian banker neck deep in Vatican financial 00:15:21.720 --> 00:15:25.120 scandals, organized crime, global political intrigue. 00:15:25.120 --> 00:15:26.980 I mean, that pivot just confirms it, doesn't 00:15:26.980 --> 00:15:29.440 it? Tosches wasn't just interested in the, let's 00:15:29.440 --> 00:15:32.700 say, emotional violence of rock or boxing. He 00:15:32.700 --> 00:15:35.139 was fascinated by the mechanisms of power, the 00:15:35.139 --> 00:15:36.960 ones that operate in the shadows, especially 00:15:36.960 --> 00:15:39.659 those with a European historical context, which 00:15:39.659 --> 00:15:41.980 maybe connects subtly back to his own Arboretum 00:15:41.980 --> 00:15:44.360 heritage. That's a really insightful connection. 00:15:44.639 --> 00:15:48.299 And he kept that focus on the intellectual architects 00:15:48.299 --> 00:15:50.460 of crime, didn't he? With his book on Arnold 00:15:50.460 --> 00:15:53.440 Rothstein, King of the Jews in 2005. Rothstein, 00:15:53.559 --> 00:15:56.279 the gambler, the racketeer, the guy supposedly 00:15:56.279 --> 00:15:59.799 behind fixing the 1919 World Series. He kind 00:15:59.799 --> 00:16:02.980 of embodies that shift from old world vice to 00:16:02.980 --> 00:16:06.070 modern, organized American crime. So you look 00:16:06.070 --> 00:16:07.870 at all these subjects together, Jerry Lee Lewis 00:16:07.870 --> 00:16:11.210 defying God, Sonny Liston defying the odds, Arnold 00:16:11.210 --> 00:16:13.830 Rothstein defying the law. What's the common 00:16:13.830 --> 00:16:15.830 thread? They're all men who tried to grab control 00:16:15.830 --> 00:16:18.700 of their own destiny, right? To get power? find 00:16:18.700 --> 00:16:21.279 meaning outside of polite society, no matter 00:16:21.279 --> 00:16:24.200 the cost, spiritual or literal. That's it. And 00:16:24.200 --> 00:16:26.820 Tosh's genius was treating them not as, you know, 00:16:26.860 --> 00:16:29.299 criminals or sociological case studies, but as 00:16:29.299 --> 00:16:31.720 modern American myths fully deserving of the 00:16:31.720 --> 00:16:33.539 highest literary attention he could give them. 00:16:33.639 --> 00:16:35.600 And while he's tackling these huge biographical 00:16:35.600 --> 00:16:37.659 projects, he's still working as a journalist 00:16:37.659 --> 00:16:40.879 to keeping his eye sharp. Absolutely. Contributing 00:16:40.879 --> 00:16:43.559 editor at Vanity Fair, publishing in places like 00:16:43.559 --> 00:16:46.500 Esquire, Open City, constantly applying that 00:16:46.500 --> 00:16:48.899 same sharp investigative lens across different 00:16:48.899 --> 00:16:51.320 formats. And we should mention that collaboration, 00:16:51.399 --> 00:16:55.279 too, with the French painter Thierry Alonso -Gravure. 00:16:55.460 --> 00:16:57.460 Right on the book, Never Trust a Loving God. 00:16:57.820 --> 00:17:00.120 Which just sounds like the most perfect Tasha's 00:17:00.120 --> 00:17:02.980 title ever, doesn't it? So by the late 80s, he's 00:17:02.980 --> 00:17:05.859 got this established fame from the biographies, 00:17:05.859 --> 00:17:08.880 the journalism, which seems to free him up to. 00:17:09.339 --> 00:17:11.940 Really focus seriously on fiction, right? Long 00:17:11.940 --> 00:17:14.440 form fiction. Exactly. And this is where he could 00:17:14.440 --> 00:17:16.640 really synthesize everything. That high -low 00:17:16.640 --> 00:17:19.579 aesthetic, blending street -level crime grit 00:17:19.579 --> 00:17:22.619 with this deep historical and often theological 00:17:22.619 --> 00:17:24.700 weight. Let's run through the novels because 00:17:24.700 --> 00:17:26.740 they show this real commitment to the purely 00:17:26.740 --> 00:17:29.099 literary form, often using narrative structures 00:17:29.099 --> 00:17:31.240 that kind of mirror his nonlinear mythological 00:17:31.240 --> 00:17:33.619 way of doing biography. He started with cut numbers 00:17:33.619 --> 00:17:36.599 in 88. Correct. Then Trinity is in 1994. And 00:17:36.599 --> 00:17:38.359 then came the one that got maybe the most attention. 00:17:38.670 --> 00:17:42.069 In the hand of Dante, 2002. Yeah, that was arguably 00:17:42.069 --> 00:17:44.950 his most ambitious novel. It explicitly weaves 00:17:44.950 --> 00:17:47.170 together historical literature, Dante himself, 00:17:47.369 --> 00:17:50.230 with like rare manuscript theft, modern crime. 00:17:50.390 --> 00:17:53.069 It basically takes the structure he used for 00:17:53.069 --> 00:17:56.089 Lewis or Rothstein and turns it inward into fiction. 00:17:56.250 --> 00:17:59.089 It got huge critical buzz, really solidified 00:17:59.089 --> 00:18:01.250 him as a major novelist. And he kept going. Me 00:18:01.250 --> 00:18:04.349 and the Devil in 2012. And then that deeply historical 00:18:04.349 --> 00:18:08.170 one under Tiberius in 2015. Five novels total. 00:18:08.390 --> 00:18:10.650 Plus, we should mention a poetry. collection, 00:18:10.849 --> 00:18:14.109 Chaldea and I Dig Girls from 1999, and a short 00:18:14.109 --> 00:18:17.710 work, Johnny's First Cigarette, in 2014. I mean, 00:18:17.710 --> 00:18:20.130 this is the output of a serious, dedicated literary 00:18:20.130 --> 00:18:22.869 artist, not just biographer dabbling. No question. 00:18:22.990 --> 00:18:24.710 And that seriousness, that literary commitment, 00:18:24.950 --> 00:18:27.109 may be best underlined by the list of writers 00:18:27.109 --> 00:18:29.349 he cited as his influences. It's surprising. 00:18:29.849 --> 00:18:32.089 Yeah. And diverse. It really is. You might expect, 00:18:32.269 --> 00:18:34.309 I don't know, Bukowski or maybe Raymond Chandler, 00:18:34.349 --> 00:18:36.089 given the subject matter sometimes. Right. But 00:18:36.089 --> 00:18:37.910 what you get instead is this incredible blend 00:18:37.910 --> 00:18:40.029 of the ancient and the fragmented modern, and 00:18:40.029 --> 00:18:42.769 it perfectly explains the epic scope of his writing. 00:18:42.910 --> 00:18:44.549 Okay, lay them out for us. Who did he claim? 00:18:44.849 --> 00:18:49.130 Hesiod, Sappho, Christopher Marlowe, Ezra Pound, 00:18:49.309 --> 00:18:53.009 William Faulkner, and Charles Olsen. Wow. Okay. 00:18:53.849 --> 00:18:56.410 Hesiod and Sappho, ancient Greeks, foundational 00:18:56.410 --> 00:18:59.769 voices of Western myth and poetry. Right next 00:18:59.769 --> 00:19:01.869 to Ezra Pound, the high modernist architect of 00:19:01.869 --> 00:19:04.690 difficulty, fragmentation, and Faulkner, the 00:19:04.690 --> 00:19:07.869 master of Southern Gothic decay. And Marlowe. 00:19:07.990 --> 00:19:10.089 It makes perfect sense, though, doesn't it, when 00:19:10.089 --> 00:19:12.089 you think about it that way? It explains why 00:19:12.089 --> 00:19:14.250 he saw someone like Jerry Lee Lewis through the 00:19:14.250 --> 00:19:16.789 lens of classical tragedy. Yeah. He wasn't just 00:19:16.789 --> 00:19:18.930 seeing a piano player pounding away in a bar. 00:19:19.089 --> 00:19:21.269 He was seeing a figure grappling with eternal 00:19:21.269 --> 00:19:25.359 human stuff. Sin, ambition, fate on this grand 00:19:25.359 --> 00:19:27.940 epic scale. That high -low mix wasn't just style 00:19:27.940 --> 00:19:30.200 for him. It was philosophical. It was deeply 00:19:30.200 --> 00:19:31.819 embedded. And for listeners who want to really 00:19:31.819 --> 00:19:34.200 explore that range, the Nick Toshus reader, which 00:19:34.200 --> 00:19:36.079 came out in 2000, is probably the perfect place 00:19:36.079 --> 00:19:38.119 to start. Collects writings from across his whole 00:19:38.119 --> 00:19:40.599 career. Good recommendation. And while literature 00:19:40.599 --> 00:19:43.279 was clearly his main focus later on, his persona, 00:19:43.380 --> 00:19:45.880 his voice, it was magnetic enough that he popped 00:19:45.880 --> 00:19:48.180 up in pop culture sometimes, right? Giving people 00:19:48.180 --> 00:19:50.119 a glimpse of the man behind the myths he wrote 00:19:50.119 --> 00:19:52.779 about. Yeah, the one most people probably remember 00:19:52.779 --> 00:19:55.380 is his TV appearance with Anthony Borghain. Oh, 00:19:55.380 --> 00:19:58.680 right. On No Reservations, the disappearing Manhattan 00:19:58.680 --> 00:20:02.460 episode from 2009. They shared a drink at Sophie's, 00:20:02.480 --> 00:20:05.099 that legendary dive bar in the East Village. 00:20:05.279 --> 00:20:07.900 Exactly. And it wasn't just some standard celebrity 00:20:07.900 --> 00:20:10.660 interview, was it? No, not at all. It was Tasha's, 00:20:10.680 --> 00:20:13.099 the ultimate chronicler of the authentic American 00:20:13.099 --> 00:20:16.420 underworld, basically lamenting how fast the 00:20:16.420 --> 00:20:19.609 city was changing. gentrification, the loss of 00:20:19.609 --> 00:20:21.789 that gritty character. It was the perfect voice 00:20:21.789 --> 00:20:23.630 for that conversation, wasn't he? Mourning the 00:20:23.630 --> 00:20:25.690 displacement of the very types of characters, 00:20:25.890 --> 00:20:29.569 the outliers, the wise guys, the poets that filled 00:20:29.569 --> 00:20:31.730 his own books. It was a poignant moment. And 00:20:31.730 --> 00:20:34.009 he stayed connected to music, too, not just as 00:20:34.009 --> 00:20:36.470 a critic, but sometimes as a collaborator. He 00:20:36.470 --> 00:20:38.490 actually released some musical works. There was 00:20:38.490 --> 00:20:41.049 Blue Eyes and Exit Wounds with the novelist Hubert 00:20:41.049 --> 00:20:44.690 Selby Jr. back in 98. Wow. Selby Jr., another 00:20:44.690 --> 00:20:47.269 chronicler of the depths. Right. And then later, 00:20:47.410 --> 00:20:49.750 auto -hagiography with Austin Bruckner in 2018. 00:20:50.130 --> 00:20:51.849 And he'd show up in documentaries, too, often 00:20:51.849 --> 00:20:54.250 as the voice of authority on his subjects. Yeah, 00:20:54.289 --> 00:20:57.910 like Louis Prima, the wildest, in 99. And he 00:20:57.910 --> 00:20:59.990 was the obvious choice, really, to provide insight 00:20:59.990 --> 00:21:03.029 on his collaborator in Hubert Selby Jr., It'll 00:21:03.029 --> 00:21:06.349 Be Better Tomorrow, in 2005. He was consistently 00:21:06.349 --> 00:21:09.069 the guy you went to for the unvarnished truth 00:21:09.069 --> 00:21:11.799 about the dangerous side of American art. So 00:21:11.799 --> 00:21:13.759 when you think about the lasting impact of a 00:21:13.759 --> 00:21:16.279 writer like Tasha's, someone who often worked 00:21:16.279 --> 00:21:19.259 a bit outside the mainstream critical buzz, but 00:21:19.259 --> 00:21:22.660 commanded this really intense admiration. How 00:21:22.660 --> 00:21:24.299 do you measure that? Sometimes it's by who admired 00:21:24.299 --> 00:21:26.259 him, right? Absolutely. And in Tasha's case, 00:21:26.380 --> 00:21:29.640 we have probably the ultimate high profile endorsement, 00:21:29.680 --> 00:21:32.460 the actor Johnny Depp. Depp wasn't just a fan, 00:21:32.559 --> 00:21:35.059 he was practically an evangelist for Tosh's work. 00:21:35.259 --> 00:21:37.359 Yeah, I read about that. Depp's admiration was 00:21:37.359 --> 00:21:39.319 deep. And the quote from him really captures 00:21:39.319 --> 00:21:41.599 that immersive quality of Tosh's writing we've 00:21:41.599 --> 00:21:43.579 been talking about. Depp said reading one of 00:21:43.579 --> 00:21:45.579 his books was like having this intense personal 00:21:45.579 --> 00:21:48.119 experience with him. Right. And he went on, didn't 00:21:48.119 --> 00:21:49.920 he? Saying something like hanging out with him 00:21:49.920 --> 00:21:51.539 is very much like being in one of his books. 00:21:51.819 --> 00:21:54.779 Yeah. Which is profound, actually. It suggests 00:21:54.779 --> 00:21:57.859 the writing was so authentic, so steeped in the 00:21:57.859 --> 00:22:00.769 world it described, that... the line between 00:22:00.769 --> 00:22:03.150 the author, the subject, the writing itself just 00:22:03.150 --> 00:22:05.630 kind of dissolved. He lived the style he wrote 00:22:05.630 --> 00:22:08.150 about, that uncompromising outsider viewpoint. 00:22:08.329 --> 00:22:11.329 He managed to fully inhabit it. And the ultimate 00:22:11.329 --> 00:22:14.309 proof of that commitment, maybe, and the sort 00:22:14.309 --> 00:22:18.029 of tangible value placed on the legacy of this 00:22:18.029 --> 00:22:20.750 guy who started out hunting snakes, it comes 00:22:20.750 --> 00:22:24.009 down to money, in a way. A big investment. You're 00:22:24.009 --> 00:22:26.349 talking about the literary estate. Exactly. The 00:22:26.349 --> 00:22:28.329 sources confirm that Johnny Depp actually bought 00:22:28.329 --> 00:22:32.009 Nick Tosh's entire literary estate for $1 .2 00:22:32.009 --> 00:22:35.549 million. $1 .2 million? That's... Well, it's 00:22:35.549 --> 00:22:36.970 a powerful statement, isn't it? More than just 00:22:36.970 --> 00:22:39.049 fandom. It ensures that his whole body of work, 00:22:39.130 --> 00:22:41.210 the biographies, the journalism, the novels, 00:22:41.250 --> 00:22:43.589 the poetry, it's all going to be actively managed, 00:22:43.829 --> 00:22:46.930 protected. It guarantees it'll survive, stay 00:22:46.930 --> 00:22:49.269 visible for future readers, future scholars. 00:22:49.529 --> 00:22:51.509 It's the highest kind of market validation, really. 00:22:51.609 --> 00:22:54.650 A sign that his work is seen as essential American 00:22:54.650 --> 00:22:57.450 literature, not just, you know, cult rock writing. 00:22:57.609 --> 00:23:00.789 Couldn't agree more. And Nick Toshes, he passed 00:23:00.789 --> 00:23:05.079 away on October 20, 2019 in Manhattan. Just three 00:23:05.079 --> 00:23:07.420 days before what would have been his 70th birthday. 00:23:07.500 --> 00:23:10.220 A true New Yorker, a lifelong writer, and his 00:23:10.220 --> 00:23:12.500 influence clearly is still being felt. Yeah. 00:23:12.619 --> 00:23:15.039 So if we try to boil it all down, synthesize 00:23:15.039 --> 00:23:17.259 his whole career, I think the key takeaway for 00:23:17.259 --> 00:23:19.299 listeners is that Nick Toshes was this kind of 00:23:19.299 --> 00:23:22.779 supreme literary alchemist. Alchemist. How so? 00:23:23.039 --> 00:23:25.680 Well, he proved that the American outsider, whether 00:23:25.680 --> 00:23:28.640 it was a rock god like Jerry Lee Lewis or a tragic 00:23:28.640 --> 00:23:31.579 boxer like Sonny Liston or even a historical 00:23:31.579 --> 00:23:34.210 gangster like Arnold Rothstein. that these figures 00:23:34.210 --> 00:23:37.190 were worthy of the same intense literary seriousness, 00:23:37.549 --> 00:23:40.230 the same mythological scope that we usually reserve 00:23:40.230 --> 00:23:42.849 for, you know, his ancient influences like Hesiod 00:23:42.849 --> 00:23:45.609 and Sappho or the modernist giants like Pound 00:23:45.609 --> 00:23:47.549 and Faulkner. He didn't just document the lowline. 00:23:47.609 --> 00:23:49.990 He elevated it, transmuted it into high art. 00:23:50.069 --> 00:23:52.329 And that transformation, that's why he sticks 00:23:52.329 --> 00:23:54.529 with you, I think. It makes me think back to 00:23:54.529 --> 00:23:57.509 that. Dean Martin biography titled Dino, Living 00:23:57.509 --> 00:24:00.529 High in the Dirty Business of Dreams. That phrase, 00:24:00.809 --> 00:24:03.470 dirty business of dreams, considering all the 00:24:03.470 --> 00:24:05.490 different people he wrote about, all driven by 00:24:05.490 --> 00:24:07.869 this huge, often self -destructive ambition. 00:24:08.309 --> 00:24:11.690 What specific part of that dirty business do 00:24:11.690 --> 00:24:14.650 you think he captured best? Was it the spiritual 00:24:14.650 --> 00:24:19.630 conflict, the raw violence? the financial corruption? 00:24:20.049 --> 00:24:21.950 That's a great question. They're all in there, 00:24:21.990 --> 00:24:23.890 aren't they? They are. And maybe a follow -up 00:24:23.890 --> 00:24:26.250 for you, the listener, to think about. Based 00:24:26.250 --> 00:24:28.309 on that archetype, he kept returning to that 00:24:28.309 --> 00:24:30.549 tragic self -made figure caught between worlds. 00:24:30.730 --> 00:24:33.950 Who else? What other unsung hero or maybe anti 00:24:33.950 --> 00:24:35.849 -hero do you think should have been next on his 00:24:35.849 --> 00:24:38.289 list? Who else deserved the full Tasha's treatment? 00:24:38.529 --> 00:24:40.470 Yeah, who would he have tackled next? Especially 00:24:40.470 --> 00:24:42.450 thinking about modern figures. It's a fascinating 00:24:42.450 --> 00:24:44.589 thought experiment. Definitely something to chew 00:24:44.589 --> 00:24:46.150 on. Well, thank you for joining us for this deep 00:24:46.150 --> 00:24:49.299 dive into... the extraordinary life and utterly 00:24:49.299 --> 00:24:52.039 uncompromising work of Nick Tosh's. We really 00:24:52.039 --> 00:24:53.940 hope this gives you that definitive shortcut 00:24:53.940 --> 00:24:57.319 to understanding this essential American iconoclast.