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Spirit: 12 Dreams of Dr. Sardonicus

Nick Tosches, Rolling Stone, 4 March 1971

ANY ILLUSIONS that might still be clung to along the order of Spirit's being an Epic house organ anthropomorphization-of-eclecticism shuck, complete with baldpated, cerebral – looking leftover from the bongo drums and black beret era, should be flushed down the old metaphysical crapper as quickly as one would dispose of just so much Nathan's chicken chow mein sandwich puke, because this here Twelve Dreams of Dr. Sardonicus (a hep reference to William Castle's great 1963 horror flick Mr. Sardonicus, which was about this mick who had his face paralyzed by banshees into a super-hideous grin when he crashed his father's casket to get a winning lottery ticket out of the old geezer's jacket pocket and then went around wearing this creepy plastic mask and bringing women down his cellar to ball except you should've seen the shit that went down whenever he would take off the mask) lay languidly upon the very steps to Parnassus.

Total word count of piece: 487

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