What is Cosmic Monolith?
I published my first book, Gangsters, Harlots & Thieves: Down and Out at the Hotel Clifton, in 2014. It’s about small press poet Todd Moore’s childhood growing up in a fleabag hotel in Freeport, IL back in the 1940’s / 1950’s. The joint was rife with gangsters, harlots, and thieves, even Al Capone (late ’30’s-ish) showed up a few times to check out the action. Don’t look for the Hotel Clifton, it’s gone now. And Todd Moore? He passed away in 2010.
My father’s story is told through gritty poetry and hard hitting essays, aka, “outlaw poetry,” a small press movement he co-founded. The poems are short, confrontational, and film noir-esque, certainly not for the easily offended.
I refer to this book as the movie Sam Peckinpah should’ve made after “The Wild Bunch.” In fact, you could watch Arthur Penn’s “Bonnie and Clyde,” read a few chapters from Gangsters, Harlots & Thieves: Down and Out at the Hotel Clifton, and finish off the night with “The Wild Bunch.”
I took a break from my father’s writing to concentrate on my own work. My father left me all of his books, his small press chapbook collection, and his entire physical body of writing. It was a heavy time in my life and I definitely needed a shot of rock N roll to get me going. 2015 saw the release of All My Friends Are Rock Stars: The music scenes of Rockford IL, Madison & Milwaukee WI; 80’s and 90’s. The idea for this book came about in the Fall of 2011.
I was sitting in the cafeteria of a former company I worked for listening to Killdozer and Imminent Attack through earbuds, two of my favorite alt / punk bands from Madison, WI. It was 11PM on a Friday night, I was working the night shift. It got me thinking about the old days of going to Madison and hitting the dive bar / club scene to check out whatever bands were playing. It was all about cheap beer, cold Jager, and loud rock N roll.
It also made me think about my friends from Rockford, IL who were in some pretty kick ass bands back in that 80’s / early 90’s local music scene. And that’s how this book happened. It was time to revisit that era, those people, and get it all down on paper.
My intention with “Cosmic Monolith” is to keep the site as entertaining and engaging as I can which means promoting my books, interviews with bands, maybe talking about fantasy role playing games a bit, and links to various marketplaces where I’m selling new and used books and rock N roll memorabilia. Eclectic is an apt way to describe the Monolith.
Lastly, before I sign off, take a few moments and check out my All My Friends Are Rock Stars (AMFARS) blog which I started back in 2019. I’ll be adding new interviews to it soon.
Three years later I followed up the original book with two more volumes: All My Friends Are Rock Stars Volume II: How the Midwest Was Won: Hard Rock / Metal / Punk scenes of Chicago, Freeport, Rockford Illinois & Madison, Milwaukee Wisconsin, and All My Friends Are Rock Stars, Vol. III: The End is just the Beginning: Hard Rock / Metal / Punk scenes of Chicago, Freeport, Rockford Illinois & Madison, Milwaukee Wisconsin. And that was it, I was done. Well, not completely. I started a blog in 2019 called AMFARS which I haven’t touched in awhile but will resume now that the mighty Cosmic Monolith is up and running.
