Publisher's Synopsis
Meet the hippies. And the punks. And the drunks and junkies and legless veterans and the black people just trying to live in the middle of what has become hippie Mecca. Meet the artists and the child prostitutes. Meet Cheri, the mentally and physically handicapped whore with a heart of gold, and Belinda, the hermaphrodite prostitute who can't decide which way to go, and the rock stars and crazies and crazy former rock stars, legendary psychedelic chemists and necromancers and so very many people just trying to get by. The Haight in the late 60's, 70's and 80's was downright dangerous, but not without its share of welcoming souls, artists and musicians and regular folks holding down a job. People disappeared. People appeared. A fellow was tied to a tree and burned alive in front of Joni Mitchell's mansion. So many bodies found in the park to the point where nobody wants to know. It was not your run of the mill neighborhood in your regular town in the midwest, that's for certain. And this is not your run of the mill celebrity memoir about a life of success written for some pretty person by some unnamed nerdy hotshot. This entire series of memoirs is a personal document, written by a musician who is only recognized in the Haight Ashbury.
MiNDSWEEPER is a memoir, much like a photo album, and it includes descriptions and pictures of real people, real places, real events and locations. It is also a work of Creative Nonfiction when it has to be, because there is a right to privacy and mystery, sabotage and alleged murder are involved. The author relays his life as an artist trying to raise a family, working odd jobs and building guitars for the stars. MiNDSWEEPER was a rock band based in the Haight Ashbury during the punk and disco era in the late 70's and early 80's, an art project that grew into a powerful club, party and outdoor concert band, then a fine recording ensemble. Nestled and hatched into a dangerous neighborhood awash in meth, heroin and police riots, born of sheer comic energy and serious determination amid the surge of commercialized punk rock, MiNDSWEEPER was a standup routine with a very hardworking band. The group mocked popular music while presenting intricate, complex, powerful, diverse and sometimes extremely funny music compositions for discriminating club goers. Now MiNDSWEEPER is in print, a down and dirty time machine of true stories that transport the reader onto the gritty streets into the back alleys of real life, into the clubs and onto the stages of Broadway in San Francisco.
