Gotta Go Gotta Flow: Life, Love, and Lust on Chicago's South Side From the Seventies

by Patricia Smith, Michael Abramson (Photographs)

Mesmerized by the ‘70s nightclub culture on Chicago’s South Side, Michael Abramson became a part of the scene and spent three years taking photographs in five clubs. More than 40 years later, Patricia Smith, nationally-known poet and slam poetry champion, comes across Abramson’s work and is inspired by his work. Smith, who knew the clubs well, brings this collection of photographs to life with eighty poetic stories. Combining black and white photography with poetry, this book gives readers a front-row seat to the grooviest nightclubs of the 1970s.

Genres: Poetry, Nonfiction

200 pages, Hardcover

First published November 1, 2015

Reviews

[The Master · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is an immersive experience. Photographs combine with poetry to take you out for a night at a Black club on the South Side of Chicago in the heart of the 70s.

The images evoke a time and place, and the words describe the human condition. Characters are brought to life in a few lines, and their faces, clothes and surroundings are there to think about and linger upon.

It's a brilliant, beautiful piece of art and history.

[Nancy · Rating 4 out of 5]

"You can see a lot in the way a man
holds a woman."
The flash bulb lets me see all the zippers and the seams.
All the mid-moves of a dance.

It's hard to write to photos because sometimes you explain too much. And some of these did. But I loved the whole package. Thank you.

[Autumn Joi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful. The photographs, the poems, the history, just beautiful. I picked this up at library on whim while looking for another book, but I definitely need to add this to my collection.