Jim Carroll Biography
James Dennis Carroll, 1 August 1950, New York City, New York, USA. Jim Carroll is a poet and author who became a rock singer in the late 70s. He had a difficult childhood on New York’s rough streets, but became a proficient basketball player before his teens. He then became exposed to the seedy aspects of city life and began writing down his experiences at the age of 12, describing his initiation to heroin at 13 as well as his encounters with sex and crime. (Those notes were later published as a critically acclaimed book, The Basketball Diaries, in 1978.) Carroll became interested in poetry through reading the works of modern poets such as Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg and had his own first book of poetry, Organic Trains, published when he was 16. He spent three months in jail for heroin possession in 1966, and continued his obsessions with drugs, literature and basketball upon his release.
Having already befriended writer William Burroughs and the rock band the Velvet Underground, Carroll was introduced to poet Patti Smith in the early 70s. Smith was in the process of setting her poetry to music and after Carroll moved to Marin County, north of San Francisco, in 1973 to rid himself of his heroin habit, he maintained contact with Smith. When Smith and her group went to California in the late 70s, Carroll, having also taken an interest in setting his poetry to music, and having been inspired by the punk movement, performed as her opening act. He produced a demo tape of his music in 1979 and was signed to Atco Records. Carroll recorded his debut album, Catholic Boy, that year and formed the Jim Carroll Band with members of local unit Amsterdam, comprising Brian Linsley (guitar), Steve Linsley (bass), Terrell Winn (guitar) and Wayne Woods (drums). The album only made the lower reaches of the chart but was a critical success, particularly the song ‘People Who Died’, a graphic description of individuals known to the singer who met with horrible deaths. Carroll made two further albums, Dry Dreams and I Write Your Name, with several personnel changes in the band for each album. He performed music infrequently after the mid-80s, concentrating instead on giving poetry readings. Carroll published his second volume of autobiography, Forced Entries in 1987. In 1991, Carroll signed with Giant Records and released a spoken-word album, Praying Mantis, recorded live at St. Mark’s Church in New York City. During this decade he was regularly namechecked as an influence by a whole new generation of rock bands, including Pearl Jam, Screaming Trees and Nirvana. Following the death of the latter’s lead singer Kurt Cobain, Carroll appeared on MTV reading the tribute piece ‘8 Fragments For Kurt Cobain’. During this period his work was also adapted for the big screen in the aforementioned The Basketball Diaries and Curtis’ Charm. Carroll reunited with the Jim Carroll Band in the late 90s to record his first ‘rock’ album in nearly 15 years, Pools Of Mercury. The album was released concurrently with his new poetry collection, Void Of Course. Carroll has maintained a busy spoken word touring schedule in the new millennium.
Source: The Encyclopedia of Popular Music by Colin Larkin. Licensed from Muze.
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