Talking Basquiat with Michael Holman

Jean-Michel Basquiat didn’t know how to play an instrument, but that didn’t stop him from asking Michael Holman to join him in starting up a band. Called Gray, they created an improvised collage of sounds more in tune (or out of tune) with the avant-garde than with rap music which had arrived as the new pop sound. Holman talks with “Beginnings" host and Paper magazine founder David Hershkovits about his days with Basquiat and GOD — the Good Old Days — when New York City was burning down physically and blowing up creatively at the same time.

Michael is an artist, writer, avant-garde musician, hip hop impresario and filmmaker as well as Early 1980s, Downtown Scene "subculturalist" best known as the screenwriter of the film Basquiat, directed by Julian Schnabel and released by Miramax Films, host of the short-lived hip hop music program Graffiti Rockand a founding member, along with Jean-Michel Basquiat, of the experimental rock band Gray.

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