By now, we all know that Henry Rollins is no fan of hipsters. Because, you know, everyone under 30 who happens to frequent a downtown record store these days is obviously living off a trust fund. But you know who was once totally okay with Rollins? Charles Manson, who, the Guardian reports, once enlisted the former Black Flag frontman’s help in “mixing and releasing an album of acoustic pop songs.” The resulting record was called Completion but, ironically, never saw the light of day. Apparently, when your label (SST Records) plans to put out an album by a deranged murderer/cult leader, you can expect to receive some pretty compelling death threats.
As for Rollins, here’s what he has to say about Manson: “He wrote me a letter out of the blue once and he said, ‘I saw you on MTV and I thought you were pretty cool… So we corresponded a few times in 1984. I’d just tell him about what we were doing with our new record and he’d send back semi-lucid responses. He made references to the Beach Boys stealing his ideas, which sounded like sour grapes.” Fascinating!