“You don’t have to try at all to be a racist. It’s a little coiled clot of venom lurking there in all of us, white and black, goy and Jew, ready to strike out when we feel embattled, belittled, brutalized.”

"Maybe if we all get drunk enough we'll all have blackouts so trackless and remarkably sustained that we'll never remember all the reprehensible things we said and did to each other, hence no guilt"

"Lester ennobled the ludicrous inner life of pop fans by telling the truth about it — by discerning that inner lives, and not music, were what pop music was about"

When Robert Christgau, Edward Sorel, and Lester Bangs took on the rock icon

In 1977 the multi-instrumentalist came to conquer — not to pander to Monkees nostalgia

Is this the 45th or 46th Poll? Lester Bangs speaks from beyond the grave

In 1977, Lester Bangs called Queen live ‘Fantasia for dodos and 14-year-olds.’ He also wrote that Freddie Mercury could become ‘the next Liza Minnelli.’

Lester Bangs recalled his “erection of the heart” when he said goodbye to the King

The brilliant rock critic predicted the Stones’ longevity. Plus, going through Ronnie Woods’s trash.