COTXETXE Charles Bukowski, Helios Mashup

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Quality literary mashups are a rare commodity, even in a post Grey Album world where mashups of all kinds continue to be hot. So when you randomly stumble upon one worthy of a listen, it’s always a nice surprise. Stumbling upon a good Charles Bukowski mashup is even better.

You may remember an earlier Bukowski Quotes article about an MF DOOM, Charles Bukowski mashup. Now, while others have come onto the radar since then, not all of these songs are worth sharing. This one is, thankfully.

Multi-instrumentalist/composer/producer Keith Kenniff releases electronic music under the name Helios. Producer COTXETXE, aka Jose L. Gomez, has taken the Helios track “Bless This Morning Year” and mixed it with the Charles Bukowski poem “The Last Days of the Suicide Kid” to create the track “Last Days/Morning Year” which is credited to Charles Bukowski & Helios, produced by COTXETXE.

The Bukowski, Helios mashup certainly is, mixing a melancholy and atmospheric track with an achingly grim poem. The tinkling of the piano plays off Bukowski’s cutting but almost lilting voice as he reads out one of his better known non-prose works.

This isn’t the first mashup to utilize “The Last Days of the Suicide Kid.” Below you can watch it mixed with John Bonham’s opening drum riff from the Led Zeppelin song “When the Levee Breaks.”

It’s not as impressive as the COTXETXE’s creation, but it is worth noting and giving a listen. The poetry track comes from a different Bukowski reading. This one takes place in front of an audience, which seems more fitting a choice with the drumbeat than it would have with the “Last Days/Morning Year” track.

The Last Days of the Suicide Kid, by Charles Bukowski

I can see myself now

after all these suicide days and nights,

being wheeled out of one of those sterile rest homes

(of course, this is only if I get famous and lucky)

by a subnormal and bored nurse…

there I am sitting upright in my wheelchair…

almost blind, eyes rolling backward into the dark part of my skull

looking

for the mercy of death…

 

“Isn’t it a lovely day, Mr. Bukowski?”

 

“O, yeah, yeah…”

the children walk past and I don’t even exist

and lovely women walk by

with big hot hips

and warm buttocks and tight hot everything

praying to be loved

and I don’t even

exist…

 

“It’s the first sunlight we’ve had in 3 days,

Mr. Bukowski.”

 

“Oh, yeah, yeah.”

 

there I am sitting upright in my wheelchair,

myself whiter than this piece of paper,

bloodless,

brain gone, gamble gone, me, Bukowski,

gone…

 

“Isn’t it a lovely day, Mr. Bukowski?”

 

“O, yeah, yeah…” pissing in my pajamas, slop drooling out of

my mouth.

 

2 young schoolboys run by –

 

“Hey, did you see that old guy?”

 

“Christ, yes, he made me sick!”

After all the threats do so so

somebody has committed suicide for me

at last.

 

the nurse stops the wheelchair, breaks a rose from a nearby bush,

puts it in my hand.

 

I don’t even know

it is. it might as well be my pecker

for all the good

it does.

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