I was once in a crowd of Rush fans all wearing Rush tee shirts watching a Rush tribute band doing all Rush songs just before a Rush concert. The Rush fan couples all wore matching Rush tee shirts. I thought the Rush fans would be singing along but instead were studiously debating how much each Rush song sounded just like it did on the Rush album. Anyway we got bored and left after the song about Tom Sawyer and walked back through the fairgrounds, then turned and headed back. There was still a crowd of Rush fans all wearing Rush tee shirts watching a Rush tribute band also in Rush tee shirts doing all Rush songs just before the Rush concert. The Rush fan couples still all wore the matching Rush tee shirts. They weren’t the same Rush fans, though, I’d seen other Rush fans wearing Rush tee shirts walking through the fairgrounds. It was an interchangeable Rush audience. A modular crowd. You could remove a couple in matching Rush tee shirts and they’d be replaced by another couple in matching Rush tee shirts. They’d watch the Rush cover band a while, discuss how much the Rush tribute band version of the song sounded like the song on the real Rush album, and then leave for a bratwurst and a beer and be replaced by interchangeable Rush fans in Rush tee shirts. I thought by now with all the beer they’d be singing along but they were still studiously debating how much each song sounded just like the album, only debating a little louder. I’m actually not sure if the Rush tribute band playing when we returned was the one that had been playing before. There was a whole string of Rush cover bands playing outside the arena that afternoon. This one didn’t play the Tom Sawyer song though, or if they did I didn’t hear it. I would have recognized it, however, because it’s the only Rush song I know and could tell how much it sounded like the one on the album. Not that I have the album. I mean, I can’t stand Rush, personally, but it was an interesting experience, plus I could have had my computer repaired on the spot.
Category Archives: Rock
The oats they’re feeding me: the poetic license of Mark Farner of Grand Funk Railroad
The lyrics to “Inside Looking Out” by the Animals, with the Grand Funk Railroad version in italics.
Sittin’ here lonely like a broken man
Sell my time and do the best I can
I wasn’t boss this around in me
I don’t want your sympathy, yeahI’m sitting here lonely like a broken man.
I serve my time doin’ the best I can.
Walls and bars they surround me.
But, I don’t want no sympathy.Oh baby, oh baby
I just need your tender lovin’
To keep me sane in this burnin’ oven
When my time is up, be my rebirthNo baby, no baby,
All I need is some tender lovin’.
To keep me sane in this burning oven.
And, when my time is up, you’ll be my reefer.Like Adam’s work on God’s green earth
My rebirth, my rebirth
Baby, yeah it means my rebirth
YeahLife gets worse on God’s green earth.
Be my reefer, got to keep smokin’ that thing.
No, no, no, no, no, no.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no.Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
Baby baby baby
C’mon c’mon c’mon
Yeah yeah, c’mon, yeah yeahI said now baby … baby …, let me smoke it … smoke it …
Makes me feel good … feel good, yes, I feel good … ahhhhh …
Yes, I feel alright … feel alright …, yes, I feel alright … feel alright …
Yes, I feel alright … Ahhhhh …
Ohhhhh …Ice cold waters runnin’ in my brain
They drag me back to work again
Pains and blisters on my minds and my hands
From living daily with those canvas bagsIce cold water is runnin’ through my veins.
They try and drag me back to work again.
Pain and blisters on my mind and hands.
I work all day making up burlap bags.Thoughts of freedom they are drivin’ me wild
And I’ll by happy like a new born child
We’ll be together, girl, you wait and see
No more walls to keep your love from meThe oats they’re feeding me are driving me wild.
I feel unhappy like a new born child.
Now, when my time is up, you wait and see.
These walls and bars won’t keep that stuff from me.Yeah, can’t you feel my love
Baby, baby, need you, squeeze you
No-body but, nobody but, you girl
I love you, need youNo, no, baby,
Won’t keep that stuff from me.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no.All right
I said everything’s gonna be all right
And if you don’t believe what I say
Just listen baby and I’ll tell youI need you right now mama.
I need you right now baby.
Right by my side, honey.
All night long.Can’t you feel my love
Can’t you see my skill
Can’t you yell my love
It’s getting louder
It’s getting louder
A little closer, yeahMake me feel alright …
Yes, all …, yes, all …, yes, all … alrightI said baby, I need you, c’mon, squeeze, please
Lord, I love you, I need you, yeah
Yeah, right by my side
I need you here by my sideYou better come on up and get down with me.
I’ll make you feel real good, just you wait and see.But I can’t help it baby
But, I’ll be home soon
I’ll be home soon, yeah
All right, whoaMake me feel alright …, yes, I feel alright …
Yes, all …, yes, all …, yes, alright.
Apparently if there was a lyric sheet, Mark Farner was too stoned to read it.
House of the Rising Sun
(I think this was an unused first draft of something I posted to the blog a couple years ago.)
I was never into the early Beatles stuff. Not my thing. Too teeny bop. I thought they were much better once they started taking drugs. But also in 1964, amid all the screaming and yeah yeah yeahs, the Animals released House of the Rising Sun and rock music suddenly grew up. Most fans didn’t–they were still silly squirrelly teenagers–but House of the Rising Sun is a thoroughly adult piece of music. A man whose squandered his life away in a whorehouse in the New Orleans has his tale told by the incredibly blues soaked and angry voice of Eric Burdon. The arrangement is hip and driving and Alan Price’s keyboards are soaked in jazz, just wonderful. There is nothing teenaged about this, the only innocence has long ago been lost to sin and damnation. I mean this was grown up shit. And I’ve never understood why people don’t recognize this record for what it is…that The House of the Rising Sun points the way to the depths of feeling, emotion and blues authenticity–as well as sophisticated soloing– that British rock music would be capable of within a couple years. I Love You Yeah Yeah Yeah stuff is fun, but House of the Rising Sun is real. The subject is real, the words are real, and the music is as real as pop music got in 1964.
I’m not putting down the Beatles at all. I’m just saying it’s time to recognize House of the Rising Sun as the landmark record it truly was. It was the first great grown up rock record of the 1960’s, and must have opened up a whole new world to zillions of kids looking for something deep and dark and bluesy, something beyond Merseybeat. More than any other British Invasion single, it brought back to America its own music, the blues, with all its passion and power and groove. And to this day, even after a zillion listens–I heard it on the radio today, in fact–it has lost none of its power for me. It’s still gets down and gets evil. You see Eric on Ed Sullivan howling this sad tale, and Alan Price unrolls one of the great bluesy organ runs, the band pushing themselves harder and faster till Eric, channeling a doomed, broken man, tells the kids not to do what he has done. Do they listen? No, they scream themselves silly. Helter Skelter began with the Animals, with this song, all that vile, twisted nastiness to come with Hells Angels beating up hippies and hippies slaughtering movie stars, you can hear all of that in House of the Rising Sun. You can hear it now, anyway. Back then all you could hear was the silly, squealing girls.
Bill Direen
Let’s Play by the Builders. One of the greatest LPs you have never heard. I have a mess of greatest albums you’ve never heard, but this might be the greatest. It’s a Bill Direen project, a New Zealander you might have heard of. Maybe. What does it sound like? Vaguely sorta kinda Talking Heads, but coincidentally I’m sure, with its spare, minimal, slightly funky vibe. It’s deeper, though, more out there. It showed up in the mail circa 1987 when we still lived on Edgecliffe–perhaps you partied there once or twice (a week)–and I’ve been playing side one ever since. That’s nearly three decades of playingness and yet I’m blown away every time I play it, still. One of those. Kind of like Bob Moses Visit With the Great Spirit or Essential Logic’s Beat Rhythm News or the Airplane’s After Bathing at Baxters or S.H. Draumur’s Bless or Marlui Miranda’s Todos Os Sons or way too many jazz albums. Like that. If you’ve been that first guest at any of our parties, you’ve heard it. It has inaugurated every party we’ve every thrown, all zillion of them. Let’s play indeed.
Anyway, find it. You won’t be able to, but it’s worth it. Sometimes the hopeless quests are the best.
John, I’m Only Dancing
Back in high school–this must have been ’73 or ’74–a bunch of rotten kids turned school sponsored Elvis Day, with all the kids dressed up in fifties get ups, into David Bowie Day, dressed to the nines like Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars, it was beautiful. I remember sitting in English class in my regular togs, surrounded on three sides by kids dressed exactly like this video and John, I’m Only Dancing going through my head over and over.
Paul Anka
(I have no idea when I wrote this, or why.)
Spinal Tap and Puppet show.
Bingo was a great band, the inspiration behind Pat Boone’s heavy metal album. Saw them I don’t know how many times but never with Paul Anka. With Frankie Valli, Bobby Vinton, Barry Manilow (three times!), Engelbert & His Humperdincks, you name it…but never Paul Anka. Blood Pressure Testing were German, Blutdruckprüfung, sort of a Kraftwerk thing but not so rocking. The kids dug it. The grandparents loved it. Mr. Roboto loved it. I guess you had to be there.
Incidentally, this was the show where Paul Anka’s wardrobe malfunction caused a riot. You’re having my baby, he said, then oops. Talk about Jim Morrison. He survived, Paul Anka did, but no one ever saw Blutdruckprüfung again. Last I saw of them was on a milk carton. They looked so sad. I ate my Wheaties and wondered if they were lost for good. Trapped in a portal somewhere with TJ Lubinsky and the guy who sings Little Green Bag, forever.
Cantiones sacrae
‘In your status line, list 10 albums that have stayed with you in some way. Don’t take more than a few minutes and don’t think too hard – they don’t have to be the “right” or “great” works, just the ones that have touched you. Tag 10 friends, including me, so I’ll be able to see your list!’
So i wrote Best of Foreigner, Best of Styx, Best of Foreigner and Styx, Journey: a tribute to Foreigner and Styx, Boston: the Guitar Solos, Best of Toto, Best of Kansas, Best of Toto When Not in Kansas Anymore, A Lot of Shitty Bob Dylan Songs No One Talks About, and Brian Wilson’s Trout Mask Sandbox.
“Right” or “Great”. That is the written equivalent of the kind of guy who says they don’t have to be the “right” or “great” works and makes little finger quotes when he says right or great. Personally, I hate quotation marks. I almost never use them. It really bothers me when I have to use them. There is no such thing as quotation marks in spoken language, hence our meme author here and his finger quotes. Or “finger quotes”. Finger “quotes”. I hate quotation marks. Continue reading
In German that would be one word
When I was a kid I thought Kraftwerk were the lamest band ever. Like this is what happens when you lose two world wars. That kind of lame. But that was a long time ago. I’m more sophisticated now, more worldly, more open to new ideas. And now I think they are just one of the lamest bands ever. But their hipster fans might be the lamest fans ever. Though nothing personal, really.
Saw some guy on Facebook begging for Kraftwerk tickets, screaming really, in all caps. So desperate. Oh man, I thought, get a life. Better yet do away with the one you have. OK, I didn’t actually think that. I just thought how sad. Demeaning yourself in all caps just to be able to sing Autobahn with a bunch of record collecting hipster losers who get a little too excited over silly assed Krautrock shit played by geezers old enough to be their fathers. In German that would be one word.
Ein wenig Hass ist manchmal gut, nicht war?
Circle Game
(2013)
Celebration At Big Sur…I saw that movie. Think I was in high school. It was mondo hippie, that flick, all incense and folk music and babies spinning prayer wheels. I remember Stephen Stills sucker punched a communist. Then he said the answer is to love everybody. You love everybody then you don’t sucker punch communists. Those were complicated times. Joan sang a Dylan tune, and Joni sang where she’d never been, and Judy sang a Circle Game. Oh Happy Day went round and round and round.
Somebody asked me about the baby in the picture with Judy, Joni, Joan and Cass. I had no idea. I hadn’t even noticed there was a baby. But Stewart Brand tells me–well, the Stewart Brand hologram, since he is no longer with us–told me the baby was the product of all four of them. It was a group conception at a Love In and they named her Aquarius and everyone shared in its nurturing and caring and loving and diapering and she is now 44 years old and owns a high tech company that has an app that can turn GMO’s into pure love and save the planet and the whales and walk around naked at Burning Man and recite the Whole Earth Catalog from memory and made the Stewart Brand hologram that told me that the baby was a group conception at a Love In and they named her Aquarius and everyone shared in its nurturing and caring and loving and diapering and she is now 44 years old and owns a high tech company that has an app that can turn GMO’s into pure love and save the planet and the whales and walk around naked at Burning Man and recite the Whole Earth Catalog from memory and made the Stewart Brand hologram that told me that the baby was a group conception at a Love In and they named her Aquarius and everyone shared in its nurturing and caring and loving and diapering and she is now 44 years old and owns a high tech company that has an app that can turn GMO’s into pure love and save the planet and the whales and walk around naked at Burning Man and recite the Whole Earth Catalog from memory and made the Stewart Brand hologram that told me this.
Dude, I said, Escher. Way Escher.
Stewart looked at me without blinking.
Celebration At Big Sur…I saw that movie. Think I was in high school. It was mondo hippie, that flick, all incense and folk music and babies spinning prayer wheels. I remember Stephen Stills sucker punched a communist. Then said the answer is to love everybody. You love everybody then you don’t sucker punch communists. Those were complicated times. Joan sang a Dylan tune, and Joni sang where she’d never been, and Judy sang a Circle Game. Oh Happy Day went round and round and round.
Brian Eno
Not sure why but the only Brian Eno thing I’ve ever owned is that old compilation record No New York. Still got it, too, all old and battered and vinyl. He was the producer and didn’t play anything on it, but he made Mars sound like the weirdest band in the world. And listening to it now, they still do.
I bring this up only because I’ve seen about three hundred posts today wishing him a happy birthday. Apparently Brian Eno makes people feel all warm and fuzzy inside and they just have to wish him a happy birthday. When “Baby’s On Fire” was on regular rotation on KNAC way back when–it was a hit on that station at least–the last thing that I thought of was wishing him a happy birthday. I just thought wow, weird, and jacked up the volume. But my friends have gotten so soft and squeezable in their dotage. All sweet memories and gabba gabba hey. But I love them anyway. And I like Brian Eno. I just don’t understand the Facebook thing where everyone wishes people they don’t actually know a Happy Birthday. It seems weird to me, but they’re all terribly sincere about it. Happy Birthday famous person! they say. And all their Facebook friends chime in. Happy Birthday! Ten years ago this would seem really weird. Now it’s obligatory. I never wish people I don’t know a Happy Birthday. It’s silly and meaningless and, well, weird. Odd at least. Though if I ever met Brian Eno I’d probably wish him a happy birthday. Especially if it wasn’t anywhere near his birthday.
Sigh…..I’m sorry an essay entitled Brian Eno isn’t really about Brian Eno. I mean I like Brian Eno. But I get caught up in tangents, like riptides they yank a narrative right out of my hands and sweep it along who knows where. No free will at all. Just the free flowing rush of random connections and puns that appear out of nothing at all. Writing as Brownian motion. Sometimes I think the only time I speak is in incomprehensible proverbs But any idiot would know that.
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