The Odyssey of Captain Beefheart

Cover story, 1970, on Don Van Vliet, who died Dec. 17, 2010. “Beefheart stubbornly continues what he’s doing and waits patiently for everyone else to come around. He has steadfastly refused to leave the Magic Band or to abandon the integrity of his art. ‘I realize,’ he says, ‘that somebody playing free music isn’t as commercial as a hamburger stand. But is it because you can eat a hamburger and hold it in your hand and you can’t do that with music? Is it too free to control?’”