I hope you’ve been enjoying our Pandemic Relief Reboot of Rock Town Hall. I believe all of you who have been regular participants in our resumed discussions have contributor/author rights, meaning you can enter the Back Office and draft new thread content for the Main Stage. Let me know if you have any questions or need a refresher on how drafting posts works. This is your Rock Town Hall. Feel as comfortable as the members of a reunited Buffalo Springfield felt in Stephen Stills’ living room in 1986. Thanks.
In a nearby thread, my close personal friend E Pluribus Gergely mentioned his regret over having missed The Specials‘ show in Philadelphia in June 2019. It was a rare show I didn’t regret missing, and better yet, I took my oldest son to the show with me. It was our first show together where he could be among the drinking-age crowd. Thinking about this made me realize that many of us are probably old enough now to have a great concert experience or two with our kids. I’m pretty sure I’ve heard stories direct from a few of you. And perhaps we were all once young enough to have had a cool (or not-so-cool, as I know is the case with Townsman andyr) experience of being taken to a real-life concert by our parents. Share away!
I was uplifted by the Specials’ show, and my son loved it, too, which raised my spirits even higher. He’d already developed a taste for third-generation ska, which I try not to be too didactic over, so it was important to get him closer to the real thing. Was this the full-blown reunited Specials I promised I’d hold out the rest of my life to see, at least a reunited Specials involving both Terry Hall and Jerry Dammers? No. (How does a guy like Dammers pay his bills after all these years seemingly doing almost nothing? What do I know about the daily lives of Dammers, Tom Verlaine, et al. That’s a topic for another day…)
I’ve been musing over Kate Bush all day, and not for the same reasons I used to. I was kind of on board with her for the first three albums, her stock was high if only for the memory of my grandma screaming and falling off her chair when she saw her on Top of the Pops doing “Wuthering Heights.” Priceless. A mate always bought the albums as soon as they were released and taped them for me, I found them recently and realised I had only listened to them up to Hounds of Love. I’ve no idea what stopped me at the time, we agreed about almost everything musically, it was as if I was in some way scared of hearing them, which makes as little sense now as it did then.
I’d be interested to hear whether any others gathered here have music which you actually own but have avoided listening to for reasons you’re unable to put a finger on, or is it just me?
What do you think is the best CD? Say the “CD era” is defined as being from 1988-2005 (give or take) and that there is something about your favorite that worked with the CD format – the length, perhaps, or the booklet format of the artwork, etc. I don’t have an answer for this yet, but I’m thinking on it.
During these difficult times, it’s always a pleasure to know that relief is right around the corner via a back porch dinner with those you love, namely, the “I promise to love you no matter how much of an asshole you are now or will become in the not so distant future” wife; my sister, whose saved my ass on countless occasions; and her husband, one of those Survivor types who can do and get through anything and still have a sense of humor. Last Saturday night’s dinner was especially noteworthy because Supertramp Syndrome was finally fine tuned. It all began when Supertramp’s “Logical Song” reared its ugly head in the middle of a fairly pleasant playlist that featured a lot of surprisingly good ’70s stuff. Tem seconds into the thing was all it took to bring on a plethora of horrible feelings: physical discomfort, embarrassment, shame, etc. Hence, Supertramp Syndrome.
Brendan, the gamer dude who posted this video on YouTube with commentary, is really annoying me. I have never heard of Brendan and his game before in my life. Probably thinks Zack de la Rocha is a cool singer. Okay.
