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The Importance of Being Well Lit
It took me a long time to embrace a big chunk of Guided By Voices. Ranking high among a myriad of beefs I had to get over was my beef with their Look. I couldn't get a handle on their Look, it was as if they didn't care, and they weren't blessed with the physical gifts that should allow rock musicians not to care. Last night I came across this video. Watch it and see, through my eyes, a cool version of GBV - complete with a Look - performing live on television!
What a difference a well-lit television set makes for live performances! The more I thought about this the more it became clear that my underlying lack of interest in the old late-night concert show, Midnight Special, ran deeper than the typically bloated '70s rockers and that one-trick pony Wolfman Jack. Take a look at what I'm getting at.
OK, that wasn't fair. Try these clips; they perfectly illustrate what I'm getting at. First, a band I briefly thought was great as a teenager, seconds after first hearing this, their greatest contribution to rock 'n roll. Check it out!
Follow up:
This performance by Cheap Trick is from Midnight Special, that show I could never get into watching. Look how flat and fuzzy the video quality is! Porn of that era had better production values. The problem runs deeper than some nearly 30-year-old Betamax transfer. With 1:53 remaining in the song's countdown, a staple of Midnight Special production values appears: the "starry" lights effect. I know nothing about video and photography techniques, but you know what I'm talking about, and if you know the inherent cheese in this technique, which was once popular in '70s wedding photography. Broadcast in this light, all the things that make me uncomfortable about Cheap Trick come to the fore: the guitar player's antics, Zander's bedroom mirror moves, the 37 guitar picks taped to that boom mic stand (was Rick Nielson the first rocker other than a drummer or keyboardist to use a boom stand? Guitarists [and lead singers] should use straight stands!).
Above, the same Cheap Trick performing "I Want You to Want Me", a song I disliked and quickly grew tired of hearing seconds after I first heard their breakthrough live version. This performance is from the British tv show, Old Grey Whistle Test, which had superior production values. Look at the shadows coming off Zander and Peterson! Check out how sexy Zander's split ends appear on this performance. That's good lighting! Around the 2:02 mark there's even an appearance of Midnight Special's flared light effect, but here - following one of my least favorite vocal effects, the trailing, repeating echo on Zander's voice during the middle eighth - it's all right. With about 28 seconds left, as the breakdown kicks in, Nielson flips his hat brim up, then flips a guitar pick into the air, catching it in his mouth. I normally find this among Nielson's most annoying moves, but the way the camera catches him set across the stage I can admire the hard work he put into his schtick. On that Midnight Special clip I don't get a chance to appreciate his craft; he's a blur of Bowery Boys routines.
So that's my point: Guided By Voices, under most circumstances, No Attention to Look. Lit well and with a little effort for this tv appearance, they suddenly look cool. Same goes for Cheap Trick.
Finally...if you haven't suffered enough:
18 comments
Mic Stands - Damn right about straight stands. And putting the boom stand up right doesn't count. Also, tripod-leg stands also suck. The one thing I have in my "rider" is a straight stand with a lead base. No Exceptions!
Cheap Trick - Dig the 16 string bass on "I want you...." One question - Why?
I think the Cheap Trick vid was great, and I think I like it because there's an audience!
watch this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dh7HuuEXmlw
I whip this out all the time in defense of these guys, and I think it applies here.
Great Band, small Live audience, good lighting.
Let me Know
A-Dogg, no I've always hated Journey. I was actually afraid I'd find the clip of Journey when Steve Perry was singing in some black, silk, low-cut blouse. It was the first time I'd ever seen this band. For a few seconds I had a "Lola" moment.
I think I figured out why Peterson played the 16-string bass: those extra strings covered for all the times when Nielson had to flip the brim of his hat or make some other cartoonish gesture to no one in particular.
1. I'm surprised you can abide that GBV performance. Talk about cymbal abuse! Watch it again, and see if you can get over/around the constant *double* crash-bashing. Stupid!
2. You missed the greatest thing in that Trick Midnight Special clip: at -0:24, after Nielsen's cap-flip and pick-toss, the camera zooms in on Bun, who is HIT IN THE HEAD WITH A FLUNG NIELSEN PICK! Naturally, Carlos soldiers on like the class act he is.
3. I am still in awe of Neil Schon's amazing jew-fro*. He's really giving Sib Hashian, RTH's annointed King of All Rock Hair, a run for his money in this clip!
*Note: per a long-distant conversation on the old list regarding what to call this ethnic hair phenomenon, this label has officially been stripped of any slur-ish-ness. In fact, I believe Velv -- a proud rocker of Jewish extraction -- was the Townsman who coined the term. (Or is this one of those "N"-word things, where WASPs like me are disallowed from joining in on the fun? Velv, please advise -- I bear your people, and their magnificent hair, no ill will!)
Observations:
First off, every time Cheap Trick comes up in conversation, I've been shouting at the top of my lungs that the reason Petersen plays the 27-string bass is because Rick Nielsen actually spends very little of his time playing the guitar. Thank you for noticing. I saw them a couple of years ago and I can tell you this has actually gotten worse, including Nielsen getting out an actual KISS record, showing it to the audience and flinging it to the audience member who yells loudest/he wants to bang/is at the far end of his throwing range.
The "star effect" is not an effect. It's a compromise between live stage lighting and camera lighting. The Old Grey Whistle Test clearly put more thought into their lighting, whereas the Midnight Special just lit a stage performance and then stuck cameras in front of it because it's all about the music, maaan. I don't know all the technical details, but basically when you have a stage light pointing straight at a camera your choices are to put filters on the camera which turns it into the star effect or you get a blowout like with 1:33 left in "I Want You to Want Me." They clearly set the lights and cameras in such a way that that wouldn't happen - almost. And some of the cameras had the star-effect filter on them and some didn't. That's planning! With one or two screwups, perhaps, but it's planning!
The first Journey clip is the best thing I've ever heard them do. From a lighting standpoint, the second Journey clip and the GBV clip are pretty similar.
Flipping your pick into your mouth is jive. Toss it, catch it and keep playing! Or do what the guitar player from Bowling for Soup does: Toss it up, bounce it off your parallel-to-the-floor guitar, THEN catch it and keep playing! I swear he actually did this; I've seen it more than once.
If straight stands with lead bases are so important, get one!
You know who should have been huge? Angel. They should have been huge because they had the biggest show on the planet back then. When I was 14 I thought Punky Meadows was a god, and seeing them was a big deal. And yeah, nowaays I have to admit they weren't as cool as I thought, but they were cooler than Journey.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8n07qiAo1lM
If straight stands with lead bases are so important, get one!
Don't think the Velvet Foghorn doesn't cart his own straight stand around with him!
*Note: per a long-distant conversation on the old list regarding what to call this ethnic hair phenomenon, this label has officially been stripped of any slur-ish-ness. In fact, I believe Velv -- a proud rocker of Jewish extraction -- was the Townsman who coined the term. (Or is this one of those "N"-word things, where WASPs like me are disallowed from joining in on the fun? Velv, please advise -- I bear your people, and their magnificent hair, no ill will!)This isn't Velv, but as another member of the tribe, I can tell you that I have no problem with this term, esp. since if I ever let my hair grow out, it's curly enough that I could probably attain one. Then again, I keep it really short for a reason.
Is that Harry Shearer infiltrating Journey on the other side of Perry in the Wolfman Jack clip? Was Perry working some kind of gondolier act? Is Wolfman Jack wearing a scarf like a tie? I may need to watch this a few dozen more times.
I feel like there’s some kind of really specific Look subset that would include Schon, Michael Anthony, one of the guys from Twisted Sister and Kelly Groucutt from ELO, but I can’t quite grasp what it would be called or how it would be quantified.
Well, I'll give it a go. The first analysis would be that they're simply guys whose hair grows out instead of down, and let it grow anyway because, y'know, they're rockers.
To go beyond hair, maybe the term they're looking for is Followers, Not Leaders. They're in a rock band, but instead of working on and expanding that look they still dress out of catalogs that are mailed to people who want to look like Steve Perry.
Am I close at all?
P.S.: Neal Schon is a nice-enough guy, as far as I could tell, but really, really, and I mean really, short. The significance of this is an open question, but we're exploring here, right?
GBV rocked that collective look for a good 7 years, man. I'm glad you pushed past that personal barrier.
coincidentally, I caught a Cheap Trick show in Cincy where the mighty GBV opened. Zander looked like Cobain's cool older brother in a Blue Velvet threee piece suit. Petersson looked cool as hell too. Bun E, wore the standard uniform, and Nielson had that whole braided goatee thing going on. his look really drags the whole band down for me. I know it's schtick, but is anybody really excited by the prospect of seeing him play a 25 neck guitar? I know I'm not.
If you do, go to it immediately, on the inside cover, is Greg Rolie smuggling an armadillo or what??!!!?!
good lord, what a look!
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