Benito Vila

Benito Vila is a features writer living on the East End of Long Island, where he can be found on the water when he’s not researching and typing. A former New York City design firm honcho, he occasionally still helps companies with their operations and marketing.

Ron Turner (left) with Gary Arlington. Photo courtesy of Ron Turner

RON TURNER’S LAST GASP: WEIRD & WONDERFUL COMIX SINCE 1970

Benito VilaSeptember 27, 2021

Ron Turner may be the last (gasp) of the original underground comics publishers still going strong. His Last Gasp imprint, established in San Francisco in 1970...

All Please Kill Me PostsArtBenito VilaCool PeopleHistoryInterviews0 Comments 1

LOOKING WEST WITH LARRY MCMURTRY

Benito VilaJune 8, 2021

The writer and bookseller Larry McMurtry, who died earlier this year at 84, was a Texas native best known for film adaptations of his novels The Last Picture Sh...

All Please Kill Me PostsBenito VilaBooksFilmInterviews0 Comments 5

SAM COOKE: EPITOME OF COOL

Benito VilaApril 29, 2021

Sam Cooke is back in the spotlight with the release One Night in Miami, a feature film set during in the wake of Cassius Clay’s victory over Sonny Liston. That...

All Please Kill Me PostsBenito VilaCool PeopleFilmHistoryInterviewsMusicians0 Comments 2

BUFFY SAINTE-MARIE: TRUTH, JUSTICE & BUFFY’S WAY

Benito VilaFebruary 17, 2021

Born on the Piapot Plains Cree First Nation Reserve in Saskatchewan, Buffy Sainte-Marie was raised by adoptive parents in Massachusetts, earned degrees in Orien...

All Please Kill Me PostsBenito VilaCool PeopleInterviewsMusicians0 Comments 4

TULI KUPFERBERG: THE RIGHT-NOW ART AND WORDS OF A FUG

Benito VilaOctober 19, 2020

By the time Tuli Kupferberg formed the Fugs with Ed Sanders in 1964, he was already a longtime presence in New York’s downtown counterculture. He’d published po...

All Please Kill Me PostsBenito VilaHistoryInterviews3 Comments 4

AND IN THE END: A LOOK AT THE LAST DAYS OF THE BEATLES

Benito VilaSeptember 24, 2020

So much has been written and said about The Beatles that it’s rare when something fresh comes along. Ken McNab’s And In The End is something fresh. His book tak...

All Please Kill Me PostsBenito VilaBooksHistoryInterviewsPhotography0 Comments 4

FAMILY GUY: THE LEGACY OF SPALDING GRAY

Benito VilaJuly 21, 2020

When monologist-actor-writer-philosopher Spalding Gray departed this planet in 2004, he left behind timeless works like Swimming to Cambodia, Monster in a Box a...

All Please Kill Me PostsBenito VilaInterviews0 Comments 2

BASEBALL BOOKS AND MOVIES TO HELP MAKE IT THROUGH THIS SEASON

Benito VilaMay 6, 2020

A summer without baseball is cruel and unusual, and probably unconstitutional too. More to the point, it is unthinkable. Therefore, PKM’s Alan Bisbort and Benit...

Alan BisbortAll Please Kill Me PostsBenito VilaBooksFilm3 Comments 3

REBEL WITH A CAUSE: A DAUGHTER’S TAKE ON THE LEGEND OF NICHOLAS RAY

Benito VilaApril 13, 2020

As a film director, Nicholas Ray made some memorable films, like They Live by Night, In a Lonely Place and, of course, Rebel Without a Cause. As a father, he wa...

All Please Kill Me PostsBenito VilaFilmHistoryInterviews1 Comment 5

FREDERICK WISEMAN: THE DIRECTOR WHO MAKES THE ORDINARY EXTRAORDINARY

Benito VilaMarch 25, 2020

At age 90, Frederick Wiseman is one of those living American masters who would, in a better world, need no introduction. And yet, as a pioneer of documentary fi...

All Please Kill Me PostsBenito VilaDocumentary FilmInterviews2 Comments 2

THE ENDLESS SUMMER OF JOHN VAN HAMERSVELD, ARTIST AND PUZZLE MASTER

Benito VilaFebruary 20, 2020

John Van Hamersveld is an art-school-trained modernist with roots in the California surf culture who was set loose in psychedelia, which he called “hippie moder...

All Please Kill Me PostsArtBenito VilaCool People0 Comments 2

CAN’T FIND MY WAY HOME: OUR DRUG APOCALYPSE

Benito VilaJanuary 28, 2020

Punk’s holy trinity, if it has one, would be sex, drugs and rock & roll. For the past 30 years, author and filmmaker Martin Torgoff has examined the middle ...

All Please Kill Me PostsBenito VilaCrimeHistoryInterviews1 Comment 1

Charley Plymell eating with William Burroughs. Lawrence, Kansas. Photo by Allen Ginsberg. Courtesy: Allen Ginsberg Estate/Stanford University Libraries.

CHARLEY PLYMELL: OUTLAW POET & ORIGINAL PUNK

Benito VilaJanuary 6, 2020

Poet, publisher, provocateur and people-connector, Charley Plymell is, like fellow Midwesterner Ed Sanders, a floater among contingents of kindred spirits, from...

All Please Kill Me PostsBenito VilaBest OfInterviewsPoetry4 Comments 2

WELCOME TO THE TRIDENT: WHERE YOU COULD GET ANYTHING YOU WANT

Benito VilaNovember 25, 2019

From its waterfront perch in Sausalito, the Trident’s clientele could see the San Francisco skyline and the Golden Gate Bridge. The club/restaurant was “a tripp...

All Please Kill Me PostsBenito VilaBest OfHistory3 Comments 11

The Plasmatics, fronted by the unmatchable Wendy O. Williams, may have been the most misunderstood rock ‘n’ roll band ever. Conceived as all of the following: performance art, social comment, consumer culture satirists, and rock ‘n’ roll band; the Plasmatics were impossible to categorize, falling somewhere between punk rock and Kiss/Alice Cooper (both bands were fans), their shows were a legendary as they were terrifying, featuring chainsaws, hammers, exploding cars and TV sets. PKM’s Adam Ganderson speaks with former ‘Matics Wes Beech and Richie Stotts and revisits the legacy of W.O.W. Read more!

Jeff on PETER STAMPFEL: THE LAST HOLY MODAL ROUNDER TELLS ALLSome of the first albums I bought when I was getting into music was the Holy Modal Rounders and the Fugs. I saw the Rounders at the Boston Esplanade in 1972 or there abouts. Stempfel mentions the Skillet Lickers. If you search for their music be warned that they recorded
Slacker on TINA BELL’S HIDDEN LEGACY: THE BLACK WOMAN WHO CREATED THE SOUND OF GRUNGEIt's a great story until you actually listen to their music. Nothing wrong with it; the guitar sound is entirely derivative of mid-80s Killing Joke, but grunge? Naah. An OK band but certainly not one that deserves mythologising to the extent that this articles suggests.
John Carlucci on HEARTBREAKERS: THUNDERS VS. PETTY; OR, WHAT’S IN A NAME?I also saw the Heartbreakers at the Coventry in May of 75, when they were a trio with Richard Hell, Johnny & Jerry.

All Posts

XTC’S COLIN MOULDING STILL MAKING PLANS FOR NIGEL (AND HIMSELF)

SKATE OR DIE!: PUNKS & ANARCHISTS AT FDR SKATEPARK

JOHN PEEL AND THE WEIRD WORLD OF DANDELION RECORDS

Best Of

PLEASE READ ME: THE BEST OF 2020, PART II

PLEASE READ ME: THE BEST OF 2020, PART I

LUX INTERIOR: WHERE ON EARTH DID YOU COME FROM?