For someone who was sooo in love with everything Elvis Costello & The Attractions, it’s amazing I never picked up the solo effort (can it be “solo” with three guys?) by the greatest backup band in the world. A high school buddy of mine had it and we derided it—probably without really listening to it with an open mind.
So, besides The Band, is there a backup outfit that has had any success on their own. Would you buy The Rumour without Graham Parker? The News without Huey? The Heartbreakers without Tom Petty?
And should I give The Attractions’ “solo” album another chance?
We all have one somewhere in our collection. An album that we love but the would-be tastemakers of rock and roll say we should shun like the plague. Some think Dylan‘s Self Portrait is a masterpiece. There are people who like the Stones‘ Dirty Work. Why, I know someone who actually thinks that Anderson, Wakeman, Bruford, and Howe is the greatest Yes album ever. I question his sanity, even as a devoted Yes fan myself, but there you are.
The year is 1987. Things were ugly in the Pink Floyd camp. Roger Waters and David Gilmour were no longer on speaking terms, Richard Wright was tooting up coke on his sailboat, and Nick Mason was polishing his prized and enviable classic car collection. Nothing had been done since the release of the tepid and strained The Final Cut, in 1983, and Floyd seemed to have come to a bitter and acrimonious end. However, something unexpected happened. Gilmour had been working on a solo album, but he changed his mind and devoted his efforts to a revived Pink Floyd. Against admonishments by Roger Waters, he brought Mason and Wright back on board, brought in The Wall collaborator Bob Ezrin to produce, and released A Momentary Lapse of Reason in September. Waters snorted in derision as he prepared a lawsuit over Gilmour’s seemingly unauthorized use of the Pink Floyd name. Reviewers were not kind but buyers didn’t care: the album was a multi-platinum smash and the subsequent tour was a monster.
To this day, people have written off A Momentary Lapse of Reason as weak and unimaginative fake Pink Floyd,a glorified Gilmour solo album, and a patchwork affair overly dependent on outside help. Never mind that Pink Floyd used soul-sister vocal sweetening, guest vocalists, and horn players since Dark Side of the Moon, not to mention an orchestra on The Wall. Ignore the fact that The Final Cut was basically a Roger Waters solo album with Mason and Gilmore as backing musicians and Wright left out in the cold. Me? I think Reason, while not perfect, is a pretty good album overall that largely manages to capture the grandeur and weight of latter-day Pink Floyd at its best. I’d rather listen to it than The Final Cut, Atom Heart Mother, and at least half of The Wall.
So what do you folks think about A Momentary Lapse of Reason? Also, what other album do you love that you’re supposed to hate?
Sure, this week’s Mystery Date was an easy one: that was Stiff Little Fingers, doing the folk song “Love of the Common People,” from their 1982 initial farewell album, Here Now… Many of you guessed this if you stuck around long enough for singer Jake Burns to fall into his typical “Joe Strummer on steroids” delivery. I am only disappointed that Townsman mwall didn’t chime in on this date. For a guy with strong, spartan tastes in music, he’s always surprised me by his top-to-bottom love for the band’s debut, Inflammable Material, an album I’ve always wanted to like more than I ever can beyond the amazing “Suspect Device” and “Alternative Ulster.” I was curious to hear his take on this recording—and maybe even acknowledge that I’d long ago seen beyond the facade of this band and peered into the mediocrity of their proto-Green Day track. “Brother,” I hoped he’d say, “I’ve got to give it to you for calling bullshit on these guys for all those years.”
I remember Townsman andyr or chickenfrank owning this album way back when and me thinking it was a “pretty good change of pace” for the band, the same way I thought The Ramones‘ poppy Pleasant Dreams was a welcome and long-overdue offspeed pitch to their limited repertoire. Over the years I rarely listened to their copy of that album again, but I continued to tell myself they had something extra in their tiny creative satchel. The other day I revisited this album, and boy was it lame. It sounded like they started listening to all the subpar Jam albums from the end of their run and trying to ape Weller’s moves rather than The Clash‘s.
There was no way they could have kept up with aping Clash records after Give ‘Em Enough Rope, so poor-man’s Jam was probably a reasonable career option. However, all the things that always bugged me about most of their first two albums—the blatant political pose, the complete lack of originality and/or humor, and especially the sense that “Shoot, given a manager and a producer my high school band could have made a record as mediocre as Nobody’s Heroes!”—remained. In retrospect, it’s no Pleasant Dreams.
I have another song from this album that I’d like to share with you, but it’s on my work computer at the moment. I’m too tired (and a little bummed, thanks to my Phillies losing tonight) to fire up that computer, and I’m off to a work trip to NYC all day tomorrow followed by an evening up there with Bryan Ferry, so the horn-driven, late-period “soulful” Jam-style number will have to wait. Meanwhile, enjoy the following live performance of another track from that album.
Let’s review the ground rules here. The Mystery Date song is not necessarily something I believe to be good. So feel free to rip it or praise it. Rather the song is something of interest due to the artist, influences, time period… Your job is to decipher as much as you can about the artist without research. Who do you think it is? Or, Who do you think it sounds like? When do you think it was recorded? Etc…
If you know who it is, don’t spoil it for the rest. Anyone who knows it can play the “mockcarr option.” (And I’ve got a hunch at least one of you know this one.) This option is for those of you who just can’t hold your tongue and must let everyone know just how in-the-know you are by calling it. So if you know who it is and want everyone else to know that you know, email Mr. Moderator at mrmoderator [at] rocktownhall [dot] com. If correct we will post how brilliant you are in the Comments section.
The real test of strength though is to guess as close as possible without knowing. Ready, steady, go!
[audio:https://www.rocktownhall.com/blogs/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Mystery-Date-100511.mp3|titles=Mystery Date, “Mystery Date 100511”]
This forgotten oddity poses a lot of questions, much food for thought. The possibilities are endless, but I don’t have a clue where to start. Perhaps you can help me figure out what I was missing, just 90 miles south of the MusicLine dialing area. Perhaps Townsman alexmagic will resurface. Is he now pissed at me too? (Who else is pissed at me now?)
I look forward to you insights—and admissions of anger.
Now you show me a song/performance that oozes sex more than this one.
I don’t know much about Big Mama. I didn’t realize she was still performing in 1971. She would have been 45 years old then and looks a decade or two older. Looking at other videos—and you’d be wise to check more out, especially this one:
