Piece Comment

Review of The Psychedelic Legacy of Roky Erickson


My knowledge of music and music history is shockingly slim, so everything I know of Roky (Rocky) Erickson and the 13th Floor Elevators I learned from this piece. I'm afraid that if I were listening to the radio and this piece came on, my mind might drift away. I think if I knew something of Rocky and his band, my ears might well have perked up; I'd be interested in the "what happened to him?" information that the piece provides. But, I wanted more of Rocky. I think perhaps the producer did the best he could with the little he got (we learn that Rocky is not much of a talker). Still, I wanted more Rocky, and in the end the piece felt a bit "distant" because it relied more on the comments of his friends/ former band members. I was not left with a strong enough impression of Rocky himself, of his own story from 1958, brief stardom, drugs and mental hospitals, to now, performing live in Chicago 2006. I felt the producer was trying to make Rocky's story too much a story "of the times," and I wanted just more of Rocky's story.