Excerpt from 'Golden Times: The Seniors' Choice! magazine. April, 2002, with Carl Perdue, executive editor.

C.P: Dusty, let me say what a pleasure it is having a fella of your stature in here for an interview.

D.C.: Where exactly am I? I mean, what city am I in... Be specific.

C.P: My name is Clyde Purdue and I'm executive editor of Golden Times magazine. We're in Naples, Florida.

D.C.: Florida? Aw man, the elephants graveyard! Shit. That's definitely the last time I ever mix Russian vodka with raw absinthe. Golden Times? That sounds kinky. Aren't you a little old for that crap?

C.P: No, you misunderstand. We're a magazine for seniors, and each month we profile an entertainer, and this month it's you!

D.C.: Jesus H. Christ! I'm talking to my publicist! A senior's magazine? How did this happen?

C.P: Well, we called your office and told them our readers are nostalgic for many of your.

D.C.: Nostalgic! Shit, I hate nostalgia! The past is dead baby. D-E-A-D dead. Even the scientists tell me that. Nostalgia is for losers who are afraid of the future. Why the hell would I want to be considered nostalgic?

C.P: I'm sorry Mr. Carr, there must have been some mistake here.

D.C.: I'll say there is grandpa. And you should be ashamed of yourselves, banding together just because you're old. That's like belonging to a club for people who only have blonde hair. It's stupid and petty.

Old people should hang out with young people. They should buy new stuff and new music and new guns and new clothes. Growing old is no big accomplishment. In fact, people live too long nowadays. They give 'em drugs and put tubes in their chest and the whole thing turns into a Vincent Price movie. It disgusts me. Better to just blow up after inhaling a Baked Alaskan.

C.P: I think that kind of talk could make our readers uncomfortable. Wouldn't you care to talk about your success with Jack Benny and Ed Sullivan?

D.C.: All those guys - in fact most of the people who helped me in the beginning - are worm food now. All gone. Just left behind those shitty kinescopes that are totally unwatchable. The only people who think the 40s or the 50s were so freakin' great are the people who weren't there. In the 40s we had a lot of guys walking around who were really uptight because they just got out of the service. And they treated colored people - people of any color besides white - just terribly. Nothing so freakin' great about that.

And in the 50s, these same guys got really upset when people like me and Elvis and Bobby Darin started to shake things up. And most of the women were overweight and wore too much lipstick. And the kids were so freaked out by their parents that they later started something called the 1960s, and peace and LSD and Woodstock.

C.P: Okay, are you nostalgic about the 1960s?

D.C.: Nostalgic is the wrong word. Sure, I miss certain people - people I hung out with, like Elvis, Hendrix and Darin, even Otis Redding, who I only met three or four times. But I accept them as gone and feel privileged to have known them. But if you got me here to start saying nice, soft things about Jack Benny or Ed Sullivan or Milton Berle, then forget it. It ain't my bag.

C.P: I'm sorry Mr. Carr, there's no smoking in this building. You're going to have to put that cigarette out.

D.C.: You see, that's what I mean. Why the fuck is everybody so uptight now about longevity? They want to keep themselves alive but they're having no fun. They don't smoke or drink or smack anyone. They just take prescription drugs, which are a lot more dangerous than illegal drugs because they're pure and cheap. They eat bran muffins and prunes and exercise vigorously. What the hell ever happened to cocktail parties?

C.P: There's nothing wrong with trying to be healthy.

D.C.: There is if it precludes you having fun. In fact, you can feel terrible, like having bad stomach cramps, and still laugh like a bastard because some guy pours a mint julep down some dame's top.

It's pathetic what people consider fun nowadays. They do all this shit, like white-water rafting or bungee jumping - where you're supposed to be risking your life - and this gives these dickheads a sense of adventure. But it's all cartoon, all Disney. If they're so freakin' courageous, then why don't they fight in some war. At least that's real fear. I should know, I served in Vietnam, and I can tell you that none of those guys would ever think of bungee jumping. In fact, they'd shoot any little prick that even suggested it, out of pure spite. Life is too precious to spend it sitting on your fat, Dockers-wide-ass pants along Main St. USA, watching a four-foot rodent waving an American flag, surrounded by grown men dressed as dogs as fairies. Mother of Jesus Mary, we need that shit like a kick in the balls. No wonder the rest of the world thinks we're simpletons. The French have the Mona Lisa. The Italians have the Sistine Chapel. We have Martha Stewart and her basket weaving.

C.P: Okay, let's follow that theme. What do you think happened to contemporary society?

D.C.: That's easy. We all got soft, and that happened because women began assuming positions of more and more power, especially politically, and women like things softer than men. I don't think anyone would debate about that. But the problem is that softness costs a lot of money, so therefore it's elitist. Right now in America, the rich are richer, and the poor are a lot poorer. I mean, left alone in this world, men would never have invented Yuppies. It's a total feminine movement that men bought into because they want to have sex so they want to seem like good guys. It's that simple.

C.P: How do you feel about today's younger generation?

D.C.: They're more pathetic than watching a dog shit peach pits. You notice now how boys and girls like to go out on these mass dates? There's like a group of ten kids, and they go to movies or a hamburger place. Whatever happened to just a boy-girl date? I'll tell you. The women have got the boys so freaked out about sexual harassment that there's no way any guy is going to set himself up for a charge. So you make sure that you have lots of people around as witnesses. It's truly pathetic. Girls aren't happy about this. They're confused and unhappy, and they should blame their former pot-smoking, formerly promiscuous mothers who are now draining the joy out of their lives. You see, it's to the point where women can't stand women. The snake is eating its tail! Full circle baby.

C.P: Do you still feel the desire to perform?

D.C.: My accountant inspires me. He truly does. He shows me his ledger book and I become very excited and can't wait to get on that stage.

C.P: Who attends your shows? Young? Old?

C.P: Mostly younger people, the college crowd who don't want inane jack asses screaming at them anymore, under the guise of rock and roll. They want to hear Cole Porter, and Rogers and Hart, and Gershwin. They love Elvis because he was the real thing. So that's what I give them.

C.P: Dusty, you're no youngster yourself. Have you had a successful life?

D.C.: I think that's obvious. I've always done what I wanted to do. I always tell the truth as I see it. I've never attempted a vengeful act without the knowledge that I could get away with it. My music has literally made millions of people happy. So sure, it's been about as successful as a life could be.

C.P: Would you change anything?

D.C.: Are you kidding? I'd change everything! I would personally disembowel the many idiots who said they were my friends and then tried to destroy me. I'd be much more punishing to the many women who have drained my bank account like huge vampire bats ripping apart a blood bag. I would rain down molten lava on the well-oiled music executives who have treated my career like a festering canker. So yes, I'd change a few things.

C.P: You seem to be a man of far-reaching emotions. Is that true?

D.C.: Self-control is over-rated. Men should use emotion more - and I don't necessarily mean violence - in perpetuating their desires. But we're all so terrified of being dragged into court; we channel our aggression in a circus-like world of the WWF. Yes, I'm emotional. Yes, I'd like bourbon and a smoke - and yes, I'm leaving because I'm never going to get those in a sanitized bone yard like this place.