I read his Black Corridor (man goes insane alone on space) and Behold the Man (time traveler becomes Jesus). Groovy. I love Lemmy and Motörhead so also appreciate the Hawkwind ref
Back in the day Michael Moorcock, Fritz Leiber, & Phillip Jose Farmer were my go-to writers. Thanks for reminding me about this book. Will you be covering the rest of the Quartet? I was the other way around, Moorcock led me to Hawkwind.
It is very funny that you chose to start your journey with this book, which myself and other Moorcock enthusiasts never suggest this is a starting point for a reason. I am very glad that you enjoyed it. And I hope you appreciate how different the subsequent books are. I think you will. I look forward to hearing more of your Moorcock reviews. What's next Blood Red Game? Twilight Man? Golden Barge? The Black Corridor is a special case: I have heard it put forth that it was largely written by Moorcock's lady-friend at the time (sorry, name escapes me) later Barrington J Bailey's wife. I'm not throwing any shade, just saying might not be the most indicative of his writing. . . .
@@LiminalSpaces03 Oh! I asked about those titles because you said you were starting with his SF!! Well, since you started with JC, and his Genesis is a satire of Elric, you better dive three books deep into Elric! I say three books deep, because elements from the first Elric book (Elric of Melnibone) are joined with elements of "While the God's Laugh" from the third Elric book (The Weird of the White Wolf) to give you the Final Programme. For the time being skip the Fortress of the Pearl, that's right out.
Clark Ashton Smith also wrote very good or at least very entertaining poetry. By the time I turned 20 I had read almost all of Moorcock's books, but that was in there eighties. I don't know newer Moorcock. Elric is probably my favorite of his creations, but I enjoyed it all. You make me want to give Jerry Cornelius another try. I wasn't impressed the first time but I was a kid. Great review!
Dear Liminal, good day. Great content as always. The channel is groing well and I'm glad you bring us your point of view on something that we love. I just finished reading The final solution. I cannot say I am greatly impressed. Personally I am a big fan of Silverberg, Sheckley, Dick, Sturgeon and quite few others. I am wondering, at this point, what in your opinion makes a great sci-fi book. Many thanks my friend and keep sharing your insight.
For great spaceship style sci-fi from Michael Moorcock try his Doctor Who novel - "The Coming of the Terraphiles". Its a wonderful confection of the poetic and the hilarious. It straddles Douglas Adams and PG Wodehouse.
paperback 1st english mayflower 1971. relreased in america first on avon in paperback 1969. hardback only till then here. my first edition says. glad you enjoyed it. read the rest. Sean.
The movie's available to rent on Prime. I'll probably check it out, and the book of course. Quite fond of Hawkwind, especially their late 70s/early 80s stuff. Hawkwind during that period comes off as a musical version of Metal Hurlant/Heavy Metal. The fact that their music wasn't featured in the Heavy Metal movie was a missed opportunity.
I only knew of Moorcock's Elric series and my High School library had a copy of Behold the Man and I was so excited to read sci-fi Moorcock. Needless to say I was shocked that my library had the book, I assume nobody knew what it was about, but I loved it and it is one of the few books that has stuck with me all these years. What an amazing book. Well worth the read. Glad to find the other person who's' read it.
I went checked out the movie on Amazon and it seemed a little campy, but enjoyable and completely insane. A bit of Austin Powers-ish, especially with the music. It was cool to see a "Needle Gun" in action. It will definitely make you run... lol. "Needle, needle Needle, needle gun"
Adding to Moorcock's musical connections, you might know that he wrote the lyrics to Blue Oyster Cult's song "Veteran of the Psychic Wars," which was featured most popularly in the Heavy Metal movie. I wonder also if you have covered the works of Norman Spinrad, another 60s Sci Fi writer who wrote some similarly prescient stuff such as Agent of Chaos.
I have a certain fondness for the movie version - I can certainly appreciate why Michael didn't like it but at the same time it takes me to a world of non conformist experimental madcap adventure that is fairly unique imho. Image that James Bond has resigned, gone rogue, embraced all the shit that he had been working against and discovered that he is merely a small cog in a much greater plan that he didn't even know existed. And that's only the first 20 minutes, it get really crazy after that.
Well put. Loved the book, but the movie seemed a bizarre pastiche slapped together just to draw in the drug culture / counter culture ticket sales,... kinda like the Monkees? I need to watch again, the only scene that has stuck in my mind after all these years is the final one, lol, a prescient riff on "Altered States."
MM says he's not writing poetry -- it's dramatic rhetoric! He does, however sing on several Hawkwind albums.. Has songs with Blue Oyster Cult and as The Deep Fix etc. Lots of 60s/70a bands and singers inc Bowie and Elton John were influenced by him.
@@LiminalSpaces03 Surprisingly, I am not a huge Elric fan. Nor of his other fantasy. Which is why this sounds so intriguing. I'd love to give Moorcock a shot in the SF field.
It's been decades since I explored the Jerry Cornelius novels, but remember 'The Final Programme' being especially spicy and surprising, less futuristic as I recall than a kind of alternate-universe Sixties, replete with all the psychedelic flavor that made that decade so distinctive and pivotal. In this opening novel, Cornelius is an assured, suave man of the world, but as the series progresses (with the heady Sixties giving way to the disillusioned Seventies and beyond), he becomes a more equivocal figure, a kind of sad clown. I would venture to guess that 'The Final Programme' might be Moorcock's single most famous science fiction effort, if not necessarily his best. Bear in mind that the film adaptation was released Stateside by an alternate title, 'The Last Days of Man on Earth', and it is my understanding that the American release saw some trimming of the original version, though I'm not sure how much of a difference this made overall. I saw the movie version quite a while ago, on a VHS transfer, and I assume it was the American edit I watched. It's a colorful spectacle, making me think of James Bond meets 'A Clockwork Orange', different in spirit from Moorcock's original text but reasonably entertaining for what it was. It's worth a look by anyone who enjoys the original novel.
Whoa, I did not know that Moorecock read poetry at Hawkwind shows. Now I really wish Lemmy had been in Cyberpunk movie. 😅 Your description reminds me a bit of the madcap Casino Royale mixed with Barbarella.
Remember: Hawkwind wasn't Lemmy's band. Lemmy was a footnote to Hawkwind. (No shade on Lemmy; history just seems to play this trick on people's minds.)
@@waltera13 I didnt say it was? I just wanted to see Lemmy wearing cyperpunk gear and saying incomprehensible technobabble in an incomprehensible accent because that sounds fun.
MM & LEMMY were friends. F.PROG is the first of 4 and there are lots of later stories appearing. MM had his own band and sings w Hawkwind. Checkout his own band The Deep Fix -- Cleopatra Records. Also An Alien Heat and others from Spirits Burning.
Not only is The Final Programme a rewrite of one of Moorcock's Elric of Melnibone fantasy novels, he rewrote it again as a far future novel, An Alien Heat. In addition, there was an anthology of Jerry Cornelius stories by other writers of the New Worlds magazine crowd, AND there was a series (or at least, the start of a series) of books about a group of space adventurers called The Hawklords, supposedly written by Moorcock and Michael Butterworth (probably only Butterworth). The Time Of The Hawklords borrows heavily from the personalities and songs of Hawkwind. How's that for complicating a collector's life?
Oh, and the original poet of Hawkwind was a fellow named Bob Calvert -- he's the one reading those bits on Space Ritual. He was a colorful character who had some mental troubles and was prone to lifting ideas for songs from other writers without credit, so he was in and out of the band. Calvert had a couple of solo albums, and he's long dead now. Michael Moorcock had his own band for one album in the mid-seventies, called The Deep Fix. He went on to write some lyrics for Blue Oyster Cult. The name of the Jerry Cornelius anthology by other writers is The Nature Of The Catastrophe (1971). It includes some bad comics from the hippie press, too.
"The Time of the Hawklords" probably was co-written by Mookcock, based on how downhill the prose is in the other 2 books that are only credited to Butterworth. I thought the first one was a fun read.
Of all of the Conelius books, this one would be the easiest to film . After this, the writing style comes more to the fore, and the books become wonderfully obtuse.
I remember reading the Final Programme because I had seen the movie made of it and I wanted to know what the movie was about. The novel made me none the wiser. I had to read criticism of of it later. No, Jerry Cornelius is not a hero.. I remember he kills a woman for no particular reason, and I took against him after that. He's Elric fantasy series is really good.
The book is also a little bit self satirical, as it takes the piss out of (and deconstructs) the Elric story; Moorcock's most essential character at the time. So much for not reading fantasy first Haha!
The film is both terrible and fascinating. You should watch it. My memories of it are a little bit vague now but back then Moorcock was my favourite author so I had to watch it. It looked cheesy then so god knows what it looks like now. Still, I remember enjoying it for all the wrong reasons. I did try to torrent it a while back but had no luck.
I bought a copy of the movie last week when I was VERY surprised to find it in the Apple 'movie store'. It was only £3.99 so within the 'crappy oddities' budget! It is absolutely fascinating, as you say, and absolutely terrible. Jon Finch got Jerry so completely wrong it is astounding and the Director and Screenwriter are the same person [rarely a good sign when it's a bloke you've never heard of]!
@@TLChivz So true. It dipped it's toes into the waters of guilty pleasure for me, but as I say, for all the wrong reasons. It's a Plan 9 from Outer Space.
Nice one. 'The Final Programme' is THE 60s SF Psychedelic Gem...
I stumbled onto this channel because of Murakami, was addicted to PKD for like five years. This channel is a fucking godsent.
Thank you so much! We're glad you found us!
Read Moorcocks books in my teens, must try rereading some of them, when my TBR list goes down. Still one of my favourite authors ever..
I read his Black Corridor (man goes insane alone on space) and Behold the Man (time traveler becomes Jesus). Groovy. I love Lemmy and Motörhead so also appreciate the Hawkwind ref
Back in the day Michael Moorcock, Fritz Leiber, & Phillip Jose Farmer were my go-to writers. Thanks for reminding me about this book. Will you be covering the rest of the Quartet? I was the other way around, Moorcock led me to Hawkwind.
I'm sure I will eventually cover the rest of the quartet eventually!
I have read it in a vintage pb of The Cornelius Chronicles omnibus that includes the other 3 novels that I need to read someday. Trippy stuff!
It is very funny that you chose to start your journey with this book, which myself and other Moorcock enthusiasts never suggest this is a starting point for a reason.
I am very glad that you enjoyed it.
And I hope you appreciate how different the subsequent books are. I think you will.
I look forward to hearing more of your Moorcock reviews.
What's next Blood Red Game? Twilight Man? Golden Barge?
The Black Corridor is a special case: I have heard it put forth that it was largely written by Moorcock's lady-friend at the time (sorry, name escapes me) later Barrington J Bailey's wife. I'm not throwing any shade, just saying might not be the most indicative of his writing. . . .
I don't know where I'm heading next. I want to try some of his sword and sorcery!
@@LiminalSpaces03 Oh! I asked about those titles because you said you were starting with his SF!! Well, since you started with JC, and his Genesis is a satire of Elric, you better dive three books deep into Elric! I say three books deep, because elements from the first Elric book (Elric of Melnibone) are joined with elements of "While the God's Laugh" from the third Elric book (The Weird of the White Wolf) to give you the Final Programme. For the time being skip the Fortress of the Pearl, that's right out.
Clark Ashton Smith also wrote very good or at least very entertaining poetry.
By the time I turned 20 I had read almost all of Moorcock's books, but that was in there eighties. I don't know newer Moorcock. Elric is probably my favorite of his creations, but I enjoyed it all. You make me want to give Jerry Cornelius another try. I wasn't impressed the first time but I was a kid. Great review!
I'm looking forward to reading Clark Ashton Smith!
Dear Liminal, good day. Great content as always. The channel is groing well and I'm glad you bring us your point of view on something that we love. I just finished reading The final solution. I cannot say I am greatly impressed. Personally I am a big fan of Silverberg, Sheckley, Dick, Sturgeon and quite few others. I am wondering, at this point, what in your opinion makes a great sci-fi book. Many thanks my friend and keep sharing your insight.
That is a huge question that I hadn't considered before! I'm going to have to think on this one for a while!
For great spaceship style sci-fi from Michael Moorcock try his Doctor Who novel - "The Coming of the Terraphiles". Its a wonderful confection of the poetic and the hilarious. It straddles Douglas Adams and PG Wodehouse.
paperback 1st english mayflower 1971. relreased in america first on avon in paperback 1969. hardback only till then here. my first edition says. glad you enjoyed it. read the rest. Sean.
Thanks so much!
The movie's available to rent on Prime. I'll probably check it out, and the book of course. Quite fond of Hawkwind, especially their late 70s/early 80s stuff. Hawkwind during that period comes off as a musical version of Metal Hurlant/Heavy Metal. The fact that their music wasn't featured in the Heavy Metal movie was a missed opportunity.
but Moorecock's music was. he contributed to lyrics and ideas to the song VETERANS OF THE PSYCHIC WARS by the Blue Oyster Cult.
Keep your eye out for Behold The Man, one of Moorcock's best sf novels. A really great time travel bit. Give it a read if you get the chance.
I only knew of Moorcock's Elric series and my High School library had a copy of Behold the Man and I was so excited to read sci-fi Moorcock. Needless to say I was shocked that my library had the book, I assume nobody knew what it was about, but I loved it and it is one of the few books that has stuck with me all these years. What an amazing book. Well worth the read. Glad to find the other person who's' read it.
I read it earlier this year. What trip that was!
Added to the list! Thanks!
I went checked out the movie on Amazon and it seemed a little campy, but enjoyable and completely insane. A bit of Austin Powers-ish, especially with the music. It was cool to see a "Needle Gun" in action. It will definitely make you run... lol.
"Needle, needle
Needle, needle gun"
MOVIE distorted the book considerably. Director was too straight.
I love Jerry Cornelius books 👍
Adding to Moorcock's musical connections, you might know that he wrote the lyrics to Blue Oyster Cult's song "Veteran of the Psychic Wars," which was featured most popularly in the Heavy Metal movie. I wonder also if you have covered the works of Norman Spinrad, another 60s Sci Fi writer who wrote some similarly prescient stuff such as Agent of Chaos.
I did not know he wrote the lyrics to that song! I've reviewed one of Spinrad's stories here on the channel and I really enjoyed it!
I have a certain fondness for the movie version - I can certainly appreciate why Michael didn't like it but at the same time it takes me to a world of non conformist experimental madcap adventure that is fairly unique imho. Image that James Bond has resigned, gone rogue, embraced all the shit that he had been working against and discovered that he is merely a small cog in a much greater plan that he didn't even know existed. And that's only the first 20 minutes, it get really crazy after that.
Well put. Loved the book, but the movie seemed a bizarre pastiche slapped together just to draw in the drug culture / counter culture ticket sales,... kinda like the Monkees? I need to watch again, the only scene that has stuck in my mind after all these years is the final one, lol, a prescient riff on "Altered States."
MM says he's not writing poetry -- it's dramatic rhetoric! He does, however sing on several Hawkwind albums.. Has songs with Blue Oyster Cult and as The Deep Fix etc. Lots of 60s/70a bands and singers inc Bowie and Elton John were influenced by him.
I'm not the world's biggest Michael Moorcock fan but this actually sounds kinda interesting. Thanks for bringing this one to light Liminal!
I would steer you towards his sword and sorcery, but I'm assuming you've already tried it?
@@LiminalSpaces03 Surprisingly, I am not a huge Elric fan. Nor of his other fantasy. Which is why this sounds so intriguing. I'd love to give Moorcock a shot in the SF field.
It's been decades since I explored the Jerry Cornelius novels, but remember 'The Final Programme' being especially spicy and surprising, less futuristic as I recall than a kind of alternate-universe Sixties, replete with all the psychedelic flavor that made that decade so distinctive and pivotal. In this opening novel, Cornelius is an assured, suave man of the world, but as the series progresses (with the heady Sixties giving way to the disillusioned Seventies and beyond), he becomes a more equivocal figure, a kind of sad clown. I would venture to guess that 'The Final Programme' might be Moorcock's single most famous science fiction effort, if not necessarily his best.
Bear in mind that the film adaptation was released Stateside by an alternate title, 'The Last Days of Man on Earth', and it is my understanding that the American release saw some trimming of the original version, though I'm not sure how much of a difference this made overall. I saw the movie version quite a while ago, on a VHS transfer, and I assume it was the American edit I watched. It's a colorful spectacle, making me think of James Bond meets 'A Clockwork Orange', different in spirit from Moorcock's original text but reasonably entertaining for what it was. It's worth a look by anyone who enjoys the original novel.
Absolutely an alternate universe sixties!
Whoa, I did not know that Moorecock read poetry at Hawkwind shows. Now I really wish Lemmy had been in Cyberpunk movie. 😅
Your description reminds me a bit of the madcap Casino Royale mixed with Barbarella.
Remember: Hawkwind wasn't Lemmy's band. Lemmy was a footnote to Hawkwind.
(No shade on Lemmy; history just seems to play this trick on people's minds.)
@@waltera13 I didnt say it was? I just wanted to see Lemmy wearing cyperpunk gear and saying incomprehensible technobabble in an incomprehensible accent because that sounds fun.
@@patreekotime4578 ❤️ That **would*" be Amazing
MM & LEMMY were friends. F.PROG is the first of 4 and there are lots of later stories appearing. MM had his own band and sings w Hawkwind. Checkout his own band The Deep Fix -- Cleopatra Records. Also An Alien Heat and others from Spirits Burning.
The thumbnail picture looks like Neil Young
☮
Not only is The Final Programme a rewrite of one of Moorcock's Elric of Melnibone fantasy novels, he rewrote it again as a far future novel, An Alien Heat. In addition, there was an anthology of Jerry Cornelius stories by other writers of the New Worlds magazine crowd, AND there was a series (or at least, the start of a series) of books about a group of space adventurers called The Hawklords, supposedly written by Moorcock and Michael Butterworth (probably only Butterworth). The Time Of The Hawklords borrows heavily from the personalities and songs of Hawkwind. How's that for complicating a collector's life?
Oh, and the original poet of Hawkwind was a fellow named Bob Calvert -- he's the one reading those bits on Space Ritual. He was a colorful character who had some mental troubles and was prone to lifting ideas for songs from other writers without credit, so he was in and out of the band. Calvert had a couple of solo albums, and he's long dead now. Michael Moorcock had his own band for one album in the mid-seventies, called The Deep Fix. He went on to write some lyrics for Blue Oyster Cult.
The name of the Jerry Cornelius anthology by other writers is The Nature Of The Catastrophe (1971). It includes some bad comics from the hippie press, too.
"The Time of the Hawklords" probably was co-written by Mookcock, based on how downhill the prose is in the other 2 books that are only credited to Butterworth. I thought the first one was a fun read.
Oh boy, off to ebay!
lord arioch ... jarek carnelian ... jerry cornelius ...
Of all of the Conelius books, this one would be the easiest to film . After this, the writing style comes more to the fore, and the books become wonderfully obtuse.
Wow! I'm really looking forward to more books in the series!
I remember reading the Final Programme because I had seen the movie made of it and I wanted to know what the movie was about. The novel made me none the wiser. I had to read criticism of of it later. No, Jerry Cornelius is not a hero.. I remember he kills a woman for no particular reason, and I took against him after that. He's Elric fantasy series is really good.
Yes, that scene is rough. I talk about it in my deep read.
The book is also a little bit self satirical, as it takes the piss out of (and deconstructs) the Elric story; Moorcock's most essential character at the time. So much for not reading fantasy first Haha!
Now I need to read Elric!
Not cliché but archetype.
Well said, archetype fits much better!
The film is both terrible and fascinating. You should watch it. My memories of it are a little bit vague now but back then Moorcock was my favourite author so I had to watch it. It looked cheesy then so god knows what it looks like now. Still, I remember enjoying it for all the wrong reasons. I did try to torrent it a while back but had no luck.
I bought a copy of the movie last week when I was VERY surprised to find it in the Apple 'movie store'. It was only £3.99 so within the 'crappy oddities' budget! It is absolutely fascinating, as you say, and absolutely terrible. Jon Finch got Jerry so completely wrong it is astounding and the Director and Screenwriter are the same person [rarely a good sign when it's a bloke you've never heard of]!
@@TLChivz So true. It dipped it's toes into the waters of guilty pleasure for me, but as I say, for all the wrong reasons. It's a Plan 9 from Outer Space.
@@crippsverse MM hated it.
I have to read the comments to find out the title? sigh
The book title is in the title of the video. The Final Programme.