This offlist note just in from a Townsperson who must not be named!
You may remember 2 years ago, at the first RTH gathering I attended, that I brought up a potential RTH topic that I thought was too tasteless to ever actually bring up on the board or start as a post: What would be the “Hitler’s Desk” of rock memorabilia? That is, the most gruesome/tasteless/bad karma infamous rock item that only a truly depraved collector would dare own.
My choice at the time, which I was sure no one could ever top if the topic ever came up—which it wouldn’t, and I would never own up to thinking of even if it did, of course—was the copy of Double Fantasy that Mark David Chapman had when he killed Lennon.
It turns out that the real world has caught up: http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/24/album-john-lennon-signed-auction. The auctioneer even agrees: this is so terrible a thing to own that the person selling it must do so in secret, for fear of his/her own life and/or standing on rock message boards around the world.
Yes, Unnamed Townsperson, I remember this discussion and contine to get a good laugh out of that topic. This reality, however, is sick!
Which songwriter’s live or demo version of a song given away to another artist to record as a hit single do you like best (in live or demo form by original songwriter, that is)? The given-away hit single could not previously have been released in studio form by the songwriter.
Songs that come to mind that fit these criteria include “Because the Night” and “Fire,” by The Boss; “All the Young Dudes,” by David Bowie, and “Come and Get It,” the demo of which Paul McCartney told Badfinger to follow note for note to ensure the gold!
Have you seen any worthwhile rock on the tube of late? I’m really looking forward to the Lennon thing on PBS tonight, so much so that I’ll probably forget to watch it and/or DVR it. Feel free to send me a note reminding me of it later tonight, OK?
I’m sure I wasn’t the only person to see The Boss last week on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, right? I thought He was pleasantly charming, from His appearance as His younger self in a duet with Fallon as Neil Young through His time chatting with Fallon and then playing with The Roots, Little Steven, and Roy Bittan. His version of “Because the Night” made me appreciate, as always, His generosity in giving that song to Patti Smith, who made it something special.
This weekend Florence + The Machine appeared on Saturday Night Live. She/they were incredibly annoying, like Annie Lennox done by the tone-deaf Cher. Not that I ever expect to, but I don’t get it. At least Lennox could carry a tune. The band’s use of a plus sign rather than an ampersand makes me wonder if there’s ever been a good band that used a plus sign.
Other than that I caught a Jimi Hendrix doc on Ovation centered around his Monterrey performance that never fails to amaze me, an interesting history of Da Blooz on the same cable network, and some episodes of the always-entertaining That Metal Show. What a genius format for presenting a genre of music that otherwise doesn’t interest me in the least!
Surely I’ve missed something else worthwhile. Do tell.
Every once in a while I stumble on a run of YouTube videos of performances by Australian and New Zealand bands from the early-to-mid-1970s. Man, that continent was loaded with fired-up rock ‘n roll bands playing mediocre boogie tunes without the silly trapping of the UK’s Glam scene. AC/DC and the Stooges-influenced punk bands from the end of the decade were no accident! If I could go back in time and be a part of any half-decent music scene, this one would have to be considered.
Following are a few videos by bands that are obscure to me, at least, if not most of our US Townspeople. I know a lot of you fancy yourselves experts in all that is mediocre and manly. Which of the following bands would you most want to jam – and party – with? I’m hoping some of our Townspeople from the great continent of Australia help set us straight on.
The Dingoes, “Way Out West”
For my money The Dingoes might be the best band to hang with in a quiet bar and knock back some tall ones. Their singer’s a real man’s man, with no pretensions. He’d probably want nothing to do with my company, but I find him about as intriguing as any of the singers under review.
As the lyrics of “The Last Place I Wanna Be” make clear, it’s no wonder they spend so much time hanging at that corner pub.
As last week’s episode of Saturday Night Shut-Inshould have made clear, I still dig the simple, sugar-charged confections of the rock ‘n roll I cut my teeth on: no questions asked. My musical Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups never get old! As rock ‘n roll and rock fans (myself included) matured it was hard not to look down our noses at some of the similarly sugary pop confectioneries of our late-teen years.
For my generation that would have been a band like the Saturday Night Fever–era Bee Gees. A little later there were bands from my youth that fell between the age of childhood innocence and my college years, the musical versions of Twix (introduced in the US in 1979), in my case, like middle-school discovery from a few years earlier, ELO. In my college years, as I yearned for music a little more sophisticated or passionate or political—or anything that might make me seem more interesting to women and rock sages—I questioned the value of the Twix bar. Was it too much a newfangled kid’s candy for me to be seen eating? Reese’s was old school, classic, even “cute,” in the eyes of a nuturing young woman. Twix, in the early ’80s, like the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack and ELO, didn’t make a woman my age get all soft and gooey in my presence, at least not the women I wanted to get soft and gooey. And it goes without saying these newfangled pop bands held no weight with the older rock sages I was simultaneously looking to impress.
Then a funny thing happened, at least in my world: rock sages determined that Bee Gees albums from the ’60s were actually pretty cool! Next it was discovered that, prior to ELO, Jeff Lynne joined an obscure (to American rock nerds) ’60s band called The Move. They were definitely cool, with reports of them smashing TVs and cars on stage yet still not getting remotely popular in the States, unlike their instrument-smashing contemporaries, The Who and Jimi Hendrix.
By this period I was deep into buying somewhat obscure albums by ’60s artists, blowing a dollar here, fifty cents there on possibly overlooked gems by the likes of The Association and, yes, The Bee Gees. Then I got wind that The Beach Boys carried on for years without an even remotely sane Brian Wilson at the helm. I thought, A lot of pain and suffering had to have gone into those albums! They must have been, well, not better but more interesting than my childhood favorites, like “I Get Around.” The rock sages were all about pain and suffering, and I was beginning to learn that a number of attractive women dug those qualities too. Sure enough, although not chock full ‘o hit singles, late-’60s Beach Boys albums like 20/20 do deliver songs with unexpected depth and charmingly rough edges. We dip into one of these songs in this week’s episode.
Toward the end of this week’s episode, I ask Townspeople to help me clear up a shocking discovery on my presssing of Charlie‘s No Second Chance. I’ve either discovered the most unexpected growth in the shortest period of time in music (ie, in the time between sides 1 and 2) or I’ve stumbled across something akin to finding an original draft of the Declaration of Independence behind an old picture frame left behind in the attic by my house’s previous owner!
I don’t know if you’ve ever felt this way about somebody, but although tv actress Eva Longoria meets all my objective standards for beauty, I find her completely lacking in sex appeal. I’ve never looked at her on tv or in a still in a magazine and felt the slightest stirring of desire, and that’s weird. It’s not like I have a beef with her persona or acting chops (which is why, for instance, I find the similarly should-be sexy Natalie Portman less sexy than most mannequins) because I’m pretty much unaware of both. I look at this objectively beautiful woman whose beauty is in a range that I typically find beautiful and feel…nothing.
This got me thinking about whether there’s a rock ‘n roll artist who meets all my expected criteria for greatness yet who fails to move me in any way. I’m working on it. How about you?
