Mar 032009
 

I was having dinner at a friend’s house last night, and while playing a friendly game of Mille Bornes (word’s greatest card game!), Nick Cave‘s new LP was cued up. To my surprise, I really liked it. The last time I’d seen or heard Nick was back in the late ’80s, when I caught his band playing some local hipster radio showcase. I thought he sucked. My friends explained: that was because he had a nasty drug habit — but, now that he’s clean, his music is a whole lot better. Then one of my friends paused, and said “come to think of it, Nick Cave may be the only rock and roller whose music got better after they got clean.”

We gabbed about this for a while, and I have to admit I had a hard time thinking of a counter-argument. Can you? Can you name a rock and roll artist whose work got better after they kicked a nasty drug habit?

I look forward to your responses,

HVB

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Mar 032009
 

Surely you’ll excuse us for taking a few days to determine the Comment of the Month winner for February 2009, but there was more competition than could be expected in the year’s shortest month. Among all the great comments, from sincere to snarky and all points between, Townsman Alexmagic‘s rationale for the Cool Pass granted to Arrested Development’s Baba Oje may have been the Hall’s most piercing piece of off-the-cuff-yet-informed commentary. Here’s the gist of what the Magic Man wrote:

His importance to the band can’t be overlooked, though. When they were famous, people would often watch their videos and wonder “What’s up with that old guy? What does he do?” And when ABC had some show a few years ago where they got defunct bands back together for a performance, I’m pretty sure everybody who watched the Arrested Development episode watched to see whether the old guy would be back and if he was going to sit on stage and maybe walk around a little bit.

He was.

He did.

It was awesome.

As was this comment.

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Feb 282009
 

As Townsman bobbybittman mentioned in our ways in which the Beatles suck thread, The Beatles could have followed the lead of Paul McCartney’s pseudonym during early tours, Paul Ramone, and called themselves The Ramones. I would think this is a rare piece of knowledge that we could run with that we won’t have on most bands, but I’ve been surprised by the depth of our collective wisdom before. However, we often know the original name of famous bands, and in some cases we might argue that that abandoned name might have been better than the name the band actually ended up using. For instance, I would argue that I’d have had a lot more interest as a young rock nerd checking out a band named The Warlocks than The Grateful Dead. I don’t know if you’ve ever thought about this, but combing through original, abandoned band names and other missed opportunities for band names, such as the observation regarding The Coulda-Been-the-Ramones, have you ever felt that a band missed the boat with the name it eventually chose?

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Feb 282009
 

Thanks to all of you who contributed to Rock Town Hall’s month of features bemoaning exploitive black rock history. Through our work, I believe we made important steps toward halting the cynical practice of pop musicians employing an African American Robed Choir at nationally broadcast performances. Was it a coincidence that last week’s Academy Awards ceremony was the first nationally broadcast event featuring musical performances that sidestepped this cheap ploy?
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Dugout Chatter

 Posted by
Feb 272009
 

Tinted Windows is the new supergroup featuring Taylor Hansen, James Iha from Smashing Pumpkins, Adam Schlesinger from Fountains of Wayne, and Bun E. Carlos.

Based purely on the concept of this group and the history of its members, and not on any actual music you may have heard by them, what do think of this group?

What do you think each band member is contributing aside from playing their instruments?

Where do they will rank in the hierarchy of supergroups (ie, above GTR but below the Continental Drifters)?

Who would you say is the greatest supergroup on paper?

Who would you say is the greatest supergroup in reality?

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