THE GREAT BLUESMAN TELLS IT STRAIGHT

Doc Pomus no longer had to cater to the teenage rock ’n’ roll market. He wrote sophisticated songs for adults. In his final years, he mentored dozens of singers, discovered bands like Roomful of Blues and The Fabulous Thunderbirds, and wrote the best lyrics of his life.

Doc’s website

AKA Doc Pomus, the documentary

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

(Music bed under "Mr. Nobody:" "Highway 61" by Josh Alan Band)

Josh Alan Friedman, Josh’s mother Ginger, Doc, Larry “Ratso” Sloman, Peggy Bennett, at Bitter End after Josh’s show, 1989

Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman at the Brill Building

Uncle Doc, courtesy of Shirlee Hauser

THE EARLY STIGMA OF ROCK 'N' ROLL

After a dormant decade, the great songwriter Doc Pomus was back in business by the late 1970s. I became his sidekick, entrenched in Doc’s late-night rock ‘n’ roll whirl, where he held court like a Buddha. He was amazed that so many of his songs became iconic anthems in a genre once vilified as teenage junk.

AKA Doc Pomus documentary trailer

Blues in the Red (Doc’s early 78’s)

Song under Sinatra quote: "Fat Back," by Josh Alan Band (unreleased)

Doc Pomus at the Pied Piper in New York, 1947

Late night at the Lone Star Cafe: Josh’s wife Peggy, Doc, (unidentified singing protege), Josh, 1982

French Elvis Lp. Mort Shuman became a pop star in France and thus received top billing here.

Still from documentary, AKA Doc Pomus: Josh, Doc, (unidentified), Ahmet Ertegun

FROM PARADISE TO THE GUTTER

The Great Pornographer went from Upper East Side family man/pornographer-next-door to Bowery bum. The First Amendment hero became destitute. But he never lost his appetite for pussy and pastrami.

I Goldstein: My Screwed Life, by Al Goldstein and Josh Alan Friedman

When Sex Was Dirty, by Josh Alan Friedman

Al’s Pompano Beach mansion, with the 11-foot finger that welcomed boats on the intracoastal waterway

Goldstein’s New York office

Beach Blanket Hippos: Goldstein and Ron Jeremy on Al's beachfront

Screw ’69, front row: Jim Buckley, Goldstein, and 18-year-old Steve Heller, who would next become The New York Times art director for 33 years

John and Yoko’s Screw interview, 1969

Terry Southern in Screw #801. Cover: Julius Zimmerman

Hitler's Worst Nightmare: Screw’s interview with surviving Third Reich architect, Albert Speer, with Goldstein as “Diddler on the Roof .” Cover: Curt Hoppe.