Hipster Saint Lord BuckleyHipster Saint Lord Buckley
by Gene Sculatti
Maybe we shouldn't be talking about Lord Buckley at all.
It's just that, having been a secret so long, could he stand the
public acclaim? Besides, words were his axe, and when it comes
to that instrument, nobody blew it better.
Richard "Lord" Buckley (1906-60) is in this Catalog because he was the embodiment of life lived coolly. If the coolest one can be is fashioning an accurate expression of what's inside, then Buckley was easily, to borrow a phrase from him, one of "the wildest, grooviest, hippest, swingin'-est, double-frantic, maddest, most exquisite" cats that ever breathed.
It also helps if what's inside is good to start with. Like maybe
a huge heart. Tons of compassion. A mind that spontaneously generates
material to entertain itself even when there are no audiences
around. Or a conviction that language itself is the headiest brew
and that staying drunk is divine.
Lord Buckley had all this inside. You'll know that when you hear
his records. They're all that survive a life and a "career"
that was by all accounts unpredictable and gloriously insane.
Much of the material on albums like Way Out Humor and
A Most Immaculately Hip Aristocrat takes the form of parables.
The best known may be his life of Christ "The Nazz"
("the sweetest far-out cat that ever stomped on this Sweet
Green Sphere!"). There are also routines on Gandhi ("The
Hip Gahn"), Jonah and the whale, Poe's "Raven,"
and Marc Antony's oration at Caesar's funeral.
The two that made a believer of me are Buckley's profile of the
Spanish explorer Alvar Nuñez de Vaca and--best of all--his
interpretation of the life of Einstein called "The Hip Einie."
On the multicandle brainpower of this most eminent "sphere-gasser"
and his continual job-loot predicaments: "Now here was a
cat who carried so much wiggage--he was gig-less! He could not
find a wheel to turn! He sounded all the hubcaps within' reach
but nathan shakin''. He could not connect." Buckley rolls
on, in an extrapolation of black jazz-rap, to clue us in on Einstein's
subsequent relocation to Switzerland: "Now, not digging the
lick, you see, of these double-square kicks the cats were puttin'
down, he saved his beans and finally he swung with a Swiss passport,
swooped the scene and lit in the land of the Coool, to prove and
groove with the Alpine-heads!"
Ultimately, the Hip Einie connects with a gig, a pad, a wife and
kids. Writing down his scientific theories, he soon becomes "the
king of all Spaceheads," flips the physics-chemistry community
on its ear, ascends to top dog status at the U of Zurich, and
wows the world. Buckley shouts, whispers, wails like an evangelist
wired to a generator, stomps through the tale (there is no way
to repeat or paraphrase his explication of Einstein's theory--you
have to be there) and finally winds down.
Buckley's personal (and sometimes highly public) life was a
true trip itself. Born of Indian extraction in California's Mother
Lode gold country in '06, he gravitated to Frisco, then to the
Texas oil fields. He spent the Thirties doing standup in Capone-style
Chicago speakeasies, made it to New York and married "Lady
Buckley." By the mid-Fifties he was reigning hepcat to a
circle of admirers that included Sinatra, Robert Mitchum and Stuart
Whitman. Ed Sullivan put him on TV; Jonathan Winters, Red Foxx,
and every other comedian dug him. Ultimately, he suffered the
Bruce-type fuzz busts-in New York City in '60, where he died in
November.
Which is great and dramatic and somebody should (and somebody else will) make a movie of it someday. But what really counts is first-person Buckley, his work. It goes like this...
Hipsters, Flipsters, and Finger-Poppin'
Daddies by Lord Richard Buckley
Now you see in Hip Talk, they call William Shakespeare "Willie the Shake"! You know why they call him "Willie the Shake"? Because HE SHOOK EVERYBODY!! They gave this Cat five cents' worth of ink and a nickel's worth of paper, and he sat down and wrote up such a breeze, WHAMMMMMM Everybody got off! Period! He was a hard, tight, tough Cat. Pen in hand, he was a Mother Superior.
Now you remember when Mark and Cleo were swangin' up a storm
on the velvet-lined Nile barge suckin' up a little Egyptian whiskey
with that wild incense flyin' all over the place and that Buddha-headed
moon pale Jazzmin colored flippin' the scene. It was Romance City!
Caesar meantime had split to Rome, went over to that big Jam Session
and they sliced the poo' cat up all over the place. Naturally
Mark has got to put Cleo down; this was a tight move for him 'cause
this Cleo was an early day Elizabeth Taylor. This chick had more
curves than the Sante Fe Railroad making the Grand Canyon. But
he had to split 'cause Caesar was his Main-Day Buddy Cat and they
were putting Caesar in the hole. "And you know every Fox
has got his Box."
The Roman Senate is jumpin' salty all over the place so Mark the
Spark showed on the scene, faced all the studs, wild and otherwise,
and shook up the whole Scene! As he BLEW:
Hipsters, Flipsters, and Finger-Poppin' Daddies,
Knock me your lobes!
I came here to lay Caesar out, Not to hip you to him.
The bad jazz a cat blows
Wails long after he's cut out.
The groovy is often stashed with their frames,
So don't put Caesar down.
The swinging Brutus had laid a story on you
That Caesar was hooked for power.
If it were so, it was a sad drag
And sadly hath the Caesar cat answered it.
Here, with a pass from Brutus and the other brass,
For Brutus is a worthy stud.
Yea, so are they all worthy studs.I come to wail at Caesar's wake,
He was my buddy-cat, and he leveled with me.
Yet Brutus digs that he has eyes for power,
And Brutus is a solid cat.
It is true he hath returned with many freaks in chains,
And brought them home to Rome!
Yea, the booty was looty and hipped the treasury well!Dost thou dig that this was Caesar's groove for the push?
When the cats with the empty kicks have copped out,
Yeah--, Caesar hath copped out too, and cried up a storm!
To be a world grabber, a stiffer riff must be blown.
Without bread, a stud can't even rule an ant hill.Yet Brutus was swinging for the moon,
And Yea, Brutus is a worthy stud.
And all you cats were gagged on the Lupercal,
When he came on like a King freak.
Three times I laid the Kingly wig on him,
And thrice did he put it down.
Was this the move of a greedy hipster?
Yet Brutus said he dug the lick,
And Yea, a hipper cat hath never blown.Some claim that Brutus' story was a drag,
But I dug the story was solid!
I came here to blow, now stay cool while I blow!
You dug him all the way once because you were hip that he was solid.
How can you now come on so square?
Now that he has cut out of this world?
City Hall has flipped, and swung to a drunken zoo!
And all of you cats have goofed to wig city!
Dig me hard, my ticker is in the coffin there with Caesar,
And Yea, must stay cool, 'Til it flippeth back to me.
Lord Buckley Bequeaths...
The Records
Euphoria (Vaya Records); Way Out Humor
(World Pacific); A Most Immaculately Hip Aristocrat (Straight/
Reprise); Gettysburg Address & James Dean (Hip); Hipsters,
Flipsters & Finger Poppin' Daddies (RCA); Lord Buckley,
Blowing His Mind (and Yours Too) (World Pacific); Lord
Buckley in Concert (WP). Sadly, the only one still in print
is Elektra's The Best of Lord Buckley, which features
"The Nazz," "Nero," "The Hip Gahn,"
and others.
in print as of 2003: His Royal Hipness
The Book
City Lights Books might still sell Hiparama of the Classics,
transcriptions of seven of Buckley's best raps, including "The
Bad Rapping of the Marquis de Sade" and "The Religious
History Of Alvar Nuñez Cabaza de Vaca." City Lights,
261 Columbus Avenue, San Francisco, California 94133.
Dig Infinity (Buckley bio)
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