“Rooftop concert.”
That’s all any rock fan needs to hear to envision the bearded, ladies’-coated, windblown Beatles cranking out their final, abbreviated live performance from Let It Be. What other non-traditional concerts in non-traditional locations hold anywhere near as evocative associations?
It’s time for a little Dugout Chatter, when Townspeople provide gut answers to a handful of probing questions. You know the drill, right? In case you’re not sure, there’s no right or wrong answers, just honest ones. Today’s Dugout Chatter questions will test the honesty of even the most candid Townspeople. Here goes!
I look forward to hearing about the ones that got way.
"It's got a steady beat and Seth could drum to it."
It’s a shame that Donna Summer died from cancer today at 63 years old. It’s a shame that just about anyone ever dies. She was a major figure in the music world when I was a teenager. She was the undisputed Disco Queen. A part of my youth has died. However, I couldn’t stand the music of Donna Summer.
The Guided By Voices of baseball?
Confusing title? It’s based on a comment by Townsman sourbob in a recent thread that Guided By Voices is the “Dave Kingman of rock.”
As another example of how this works, Townsman alexmagic put it this way:
Pete Best: The Wally Pipp of Rock? Though I guess at this point, it might be that Wally Pipp is the Pete Best of Baseball.
Here’s another example I thought of:
Alvin Lee and Ten Years After in Woodstock: The Don Larsen World Series perfect game of rock.
My apologies in advance to sports-rock haters and those of you who know little about baseball.
Confession upfront: The “friend” discussed here is me. I have album issues and am reluctant to chase down and/or listen to singles. Using iTune’s Genius Playlist thingy is about as close as I get. I’m working on getting over my condition and I have found a most unexpected path.
Years ago when Guided By Voices was being hailed as the-next-great-thing I read about the bands they were compared to and influenced by and blah blah blah. This led me to suspect that I would dig them. According to said experts, I should run-out-and-get a CD of theirs called Bee Thousand. So I did. I listened to it. I listened to it again. I even tried listening to it by skipping from song-to-song, which is unlike me. To no avail. I can’t say I think “they suck” as it seemed good enough I suppose. I could listen to it again and probably rip holes in it but I don’t see the point in that. Let’s just say that I haven’t listened to it since.
In mod-like fashion Mr. Moderator recently gave me a flash drive with a bunch of singles-like stuff on it. Loads of it I dug. None of it I disliked. I was playing it in my car via the USB Aux thingy and it didn’t always reveal the artist/song/album on the radio display. I actually liked that I was frequently unaware of who was playing the song. I had no prejudgement on any of these particular tracks. Of all the tracks, I kept coming back to one over and over again. It quickly became my favorite among so many that I liked. I even misunderstood a word that I assumed was in the title. I thought the guy was singing “Hey, black girls, only wanna get you high.” I thought that was funny, gutsy, and cool and so I Googled that phrase. Other than a number of links quoting the fairly obvious Rolling Stones reference, I kept seeing that Guided By Voices did a song that went “Hey glad girls, only wanna get you high.” At first I thought that there was no way it could be GBV as I didn’t really like GBV. I was wrong. Here’s the tune:
All-Star Jam?, you ask. Why that’s the place Townspeople do their own thing. Join in. Share some news. Start a thread. Everybody’s talkin’ bout it.
You probably know that Mick Jagger is hosting this week’s May 19 season finale of Saturday Night Live. Yes, he’s hosting—certainly doing a mumbling, aw shucks monologue complete with those twinkling forever-young eyes and numerous runs of his fingers through that still-luxurious hair, certainly appearing in skits and possibly being funny on occasion. Can we expect much in terms of blowing us away with his comedic acting chops? He’s had a few cracks at an acting career with little success over the years. I guess he’ll play music, too, although Keef says he’s not going to make a guest appearance with his old Glimmer Twin. We’ll see.
Jagger’s going to have to work hard to top Paul McCartney’s appearances in skits on SNL and elsewhere. Considering he was the worst actor in the Beatles’ movies, Paul’s become pretty funny in his advanced age. You know Mick’s gonna be gunning for Paul’s title as Rock’s Funniest Living Legend. He goes way back with the SNL crew, but he’s never hosted. Paul’s been on the show a number of times and killed in skits, but Mick is the first of these living legends to be billed as “host.” I bet he’s psyched.
You know Keef couldn’t care less about holding the title of SNL host or Rock’s Funniest Living Legend. Pete Townshend would be too weird to ever work in American sketch comedy. Can you imagine Bob Dylan vying for the spot? He might be the funniest rocker ever to appear on SNL, but you wouldn’t be able to tell.
Like McCartney, Jagger’s still “in the game”—at least as far as he’s concerned. Mick’s fit and trim. His hair refuses to turn gray. He’s probably hipper than any of our dads. Mick and Paul are the self-perceived Last Men Standing among 1960s pop stars. These days, who’s cooler: modern-day McCartney or modern-day Jagger?
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