If you’ll recall, we’d been making some progress toward a working definition of Proctomusicology and its practitioners’ common threads as expressed in what is becoming known as Prock music.
If the Proctomusicologist, as another Townsperson remarked, displays, “an overt intention to approach rock from an intellectual mindset,” then Todd Rundgren might be an artist we can study and use toward furthering our definition. If you have not already viewed the opening clip of Todd’s flashy, self-consciously bluesy performance of “Black Mariah”, I encourage you to do so now…
What did you think? There’s the obvious play for the glam market; the second-rate self-conscious “Yer Blues”-like use of blues structure; the green-haired taller brother of Paul Williams twiddling knobs, the last psychedelic painted guitar, chops and perms a’plenty… And how ’bout that intro: “You know what, he looks like he does everything!” All around, it’s a pretty joyless and stifling performance, no?
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