Lawsuit! Ha! That’s a good one! I think a lot of people have hurt feelings because nobody interviewed them about Larry. This is stupid; I recently read Walter Isaacson’s brilliant biography on Benjamin Franklin. I’m pretty sure Isaacson didn’t interview any of Franklin’s friends while writing the book either. Sure, Franklin's pals are all dead, but the point is that you don't need to rely upon interviewing people who change their minds and are unreliable witnesses in order to make a good biography. An author can rely on physical evidence instead. Case in point:
It’s always amusing to hear people reinvent the past for their own gains, or because they don't have clear recall of the way things really happened. Geoff Levin is making some of this stuff up out of whole cloth. But don’t take my word for it. Let’s look at his own words in the past:
In this interview Geoff Levin says several times that he really had no idea about Larry being a Christian. But in a cable TV interview last year he said that they tried to convert Larry to Scientology but Larry wasn’t interested because he was a Christian:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OA5xW9l9idA&t=43s
Levin also says “We weren't hippies; we weren't heavy-duty drug takers.”. Yeah, they didn’t do drugs… apart from acid and weed all the time, according to Geoff’s brother:
https://youtu.be/8jOqW3p5gwk?t=124
Here’s another bit about the dudes in the band being heavy drug users while Larry wasn’t. It also has an interesting side note regarding Geoff’s brother talking about being a stoned high schooler, somebody convincing Larry to try marijuana, and then the stoned high schooler coming to the uneducated conclusion that Larry’s adverse reaction to the pot was a clear indicator of repressed trauma or something. Junior psychology from a burnout, “documented” by a (in my opinion) rotund hack auteur. Awesome!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsh7nplEj10
Levin claims to be the creative force behind the People band’s rock opera “The Epic”. All you have to do is look at the label on the original vinyl record to see the authors listed as Larry Norman and Denny Fridkin. Levin's name is not on it. But now 50 years later Levin is trying to insert himself in the picture while trying to minimalize Larry’s participation. I think one only needs to look at their subsequent career histories to see which one had actual creative force.
There’s so much in this interview that is wrong that it makes me laugh. Levin says Larry wasn’t part of the San Francisco hippy scene and that Larry had no transportation to get there. Actually, Larry had a motorcycle and used to drive the hour up to San Francisco frequently to hang out in Haight Ashbury. Our Grandmother lived on Hayes Street just a couple of blocks away from Haight street and Larry would crash at her house. I have scrapbooks filled with photos of Larry hanging out with hippies in The Panhandle and walking around Haight during that period.
It’s very amusing that Mr. Levin would complain about the “unprofessional” manner in which he wasn’t interviewed for the book, because here he is, in print, talking about what Larry thought, felt, and acted like, without consulting with his family, namely me. He didn’t interview me before telling these stories. He has my email address! He didn’t interview me because there is no need to do such things. And there was no need for Greg Thornbury to interview Geoff Levin (or Benjamin Franklin for that matter) for his book.
I could go on and on about this, but I think you readers can figure out that there are plenty of untruths here based on the Youtube clips above. Sorry Geoff, I hope you and I can continue to work together with the old People tapes and photos, but let’s try to be a little less cavalier with history. I’m glad that you escaped after 50 years of living the lies of Scientology. Please don’t cloak yourself in a new set :-)
One last thing. You maintain that the People album was NEVER going to be called “We Need a Whole Lot More of Jesus and a Lot Less Rock and Roll”. You are wrong. Several years ago I came across a bunch of slides in Larry’s archives dated 1968. They were photos Larry took of the various album cover mockups that the artist made. Here are two of them. Larry was annoyed that the title was switched to “I Love You”. Maybe you guys were too stoned to know that this was being considered for the album title. No one has ever seen these before. Merry Christmas!
It’s always amusing to hear people reinvent the past for their own gains, or because they don't have clear recall of the way things really happened. Geoff Levin is making some of this stuff up out of whole cloth. But don’t take my word for it. Let’s look at his own words in the past:
In this interview Geoff Levin says several times that he really had no idea about Larry being a Christian. But in a cable TV interview last year he said that they tried to convert Larry to Scientology but Larry wasn’t interested because he was a Christian:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OA5xW9l9idA&t=43s
Levin also says “We weren't hippies; we weren't heavy-duty drug takers.”. Yeah, they didn’t do drugs… apart from acid and weed all the time, according to Geoff’s brother:
https://youtu.be/8jOqW3p5gwk?t=124
Here’s another bit about the dudes in the band being heavy drug users while Larry wasn’t. It also has an interesting side note regarding Geoff’s brother talking about being a stoned high schooler, somebody convincing Larry to try marijuana, and then the stoned high schooler coming to the uneducated conclusion that Larry’s adverse reaction to the pot was a clear indicator of repressed trauma or something. Junior psychology from a burnout, “documented” by a (in my opinion) rotund hack auteur. Awesome!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsh7nplEj10
Levin claims to be the creative force behind the People band’s rock opera “The Epic”. All you have to do is look at the label on the original vinyl record to see the authors listed as Larry Norman and Denny Fridkin. Levin's name is not on it. But now 50 years later Levin is trying to insert himself in the picture while trying to minimalize Larry’s participation. I think one only needs to look at their subsequent career histories to see which one had actual creative force.
There’s so much in this interview that is wrong that it makes me laugh. Levin says Larry wasn’t part of the San Francisco hippy scene and that Larry had no transportation to get there. Actually, Larry had a motorcycle and used to drive the hour up to San Francisco frequently to hang out in Haight Ashbury. Our Grandmother lived on Hayes Street just a couple of blocks away from Haight street and Larry would crash at her house. I have scrapbooks filled with photos of Larry hanging out with hippies in The Panhandle and walking around Haight during that period.
It’s very amusing that Mr. Levin would complain about the “unprofessional” manner in which he wasn’t interviewed for the book, because here he is, in print, talking about what Larry thought, felt, and acted like, without consulting with his family, namely me. He didn’t interview me before telling these stories. He has my email address! He didn’t interview me because there is no need to do such things. And there was no need for Greg Thornbury to interview Geoff Levin (or Benjamin Franklin for that matter) for his book.
I could go on and on about this, but I think you readers can figure out that there are plenty of untruths here based on the Youtube clips above. Sorry Geoff, I hope you and I can continue to work together with the old People tapes and photos, but let’s try to be a little less cavalier with history. I’m glad that you escaped after 50 years of living the lies of Scientology. Please don’t cloak yourself in a new set :-)
One last thing. You maintain that the People album was NEVER going to be called “We Need a Whole Lot More of Jesus and a Lot Less Rock and Roll”. You are wrong. Several years ago I came across a bunch of slides in Larry’s archives dated 1968. They were photos Larry took of the various album cover mockups that the artist made. Here are two of them. Larry was annoyed that the title was switched to “I Love You”. Maybe you guys were too stoned to know that this was being considered for the album title. No one has ever seen these before. Merry Christmas!
