Mikal Gilmore (born February 9, 1951) is an American writer and music journalist.
Gilmore was born to Frank and Bessie Gilmore, and was also known for being the younger brother of convicted criminalGary Gilmore. In the 1970s Gilmore began writing music articles and criticism forRolling Stone magazine.[1] In 1999, hisNight Beat: A Shadow History of Rock and Roll was published byAnchor.[2] In July 2009, he releasedStories Done: Writings on the 1960s and its Discontents. It was published byFree Press.[3]
His brother, Gary, (December 4, 1940 – January 17, 1977) was an American criminal who gained international attention for demanding the implementation of hisdeath sentence for two murders he committed inUtah. After theU.S. Supreme Court upheld a new series of death penalty statutes in the 1976 decisionGregg v. Georgia, he became the first person in almost ten years to be executed in the United States.[4]
In 1994, Mikal published a memoir titledShot in the Heart, detailing his relationship with Gary and their often troubled family, starting with the originalMormon settlers and continuing through to Gary's execution and its aftermath.Shot in the Heart received positive reviews, including a comment byNew York Times criticMichiko Kakutani calling the book "Remarkable, astonishing...Shot in the Heart reads like a combination of Brothers Karamazov and a series of Johnny Cash ballads... chilling, heartbreaking, and alarming."[5] That year,Shot in the Heart won theLos Angeles Times Book Prize[6] and theNational Book Critics Circle Award.[7]
In 2001,Shot in the Heart became anHBO film starringGiovanni Ribisi as Mikal,Elias Koteas as Gary,Sam Shepard as the brothers' father andLee Tergesen as Frank Gilmore, Jr. The 1977punk rock single "Gary Gilmore's Eyes" by the bandThe Adverts was used in the soundtrack of the movie.[8] The song is written from "the point of view of a hospital patient who has received the eyes of Gary Gilmore in a transplant."[9]
The soundtrack rises from abstract notes of angst and irresolution into the anthemic punk of the Adverts' "Gary Gilmore's Eyes," a pounding symbol of the ...
... to the Adverts taking the point of view of a hospital patient who has received the eyes of Gary Gilmore in a transplant; Gilmore, the infamous killer executed by a Utah firing squad, had said he'd donate his eyes to science as they'd probably be the only body part usable.
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