R.I.P. Al Goldstein
Alvin “Al” Goldstein, legendary independent publisher of Screw magazine, host of leased access cable program Midnight Blue for more than twenty-five years, consumer advocate, lothario, and acute cultural observationalist, has passed away from renal failure. He was a spry seventy-seven.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfgEeSIaEfk
No less a publication than The New York Times called Mr. Goldstein a “pioneering pornographer” and praised the manner in which he forever changed the erotic print business:
“Mr. Goldstein did not invent the dirty magazine, but he was the first to present it to a wide audience without the slightest pretense of classiness or subtlety. Sex as depicted in Screw was seldom pretty, romantic or even particularly sexy. It was, primarily, a business, with consumers and suppliers like any other.”
The Paper of Record went on to quote Alan Dershowitz, revered attorney and defender of civil liberties, who said of his his dear friend and sometimes-client, “He clearly coarsened American sensibilities… [Plaboy publisher Hugh] Hefner did it with taste. Goldstein’s contribution is to be utterly tasteless.”
Robin Byrd, whose eponymous adult talk show aired on cable access alongside Midnight Blue for more than two decades, could not be reached for comment at the time we went to press. However, Double-Jew Axl Rosenberg, co-founder and co-editor-in-chief of MetalSucks, offered the following words in tribute to Mr. Goldstein:
“As a true DIY publisher, a lover of the female form, and a gluttonous Jew, Al Goldstein was a true inspiration to both myself and Vince [Neilstein, MetalSucks co-founder/co-editor-in-chief]. I will never forget watching his show during my formative years — his insightful interviews, his intellectually stimulating editorials so full of righteous rage, and, of course, his sage words of wisdom with regards to performing cunnilingus as though one were at a buffet — and thinking ‘Man, I wanna be THAT guy someday.’ Here we are all these years later, and I only have about two-hundred pounds to go!”
To the shame of all of American society, Mr. Goldstein fell on hard times in his final years; like Herman Melville and Vincent van Gogh, he was an artist often unappreciated in his own time. The legacy of his work, however, will most surely echo throughout the halls of eternity.
Rest in peace, Mr. Goldstein. You were truly one of a kind.
