How much of it is true is hard to say, exactly: Written in bombastic prose, it follows the broad parameters of Fowley’s biography while also insisting that, at the age of 1, his firsst words were: “I have a question. Why are you bigger than me?"
“Kim Fowley could talk at ten months," he tells us, “could read and write by one and a half."
It’s no coincidence that he refers to himself in the third person, since “Lord of Garbage" is clearly the work of someone who considers himself larger than life. “You already know the genius music," Fowley declares in a brief head note. “Now, know the genius man of letters."
And yet, as self-congratulatory as that is, as sadly confrontational, it’s also, in its own weird way, slightly thrilling — not unlike Fowley himself.
Indeed, what’s most compelling about the book is not so much its air of self-hagiography but the fact that for all his posturing, Fowley does end up revealing some important things about himself.
More essential is his framing of rock ’n’ roll as an art of survival, in spite, or even because, of tragedies such as those that befell Lennon, Elvis Presley, the Big Bopper, Buddy Holly and Ritchie Valens, to cite a few performers Fowley mentions here.
“I am better than Elvis," he concludes the book. “I am better than JFK. I am better than the Beatles. BECAUSE I EXIST!"
