Miscellaneous Witnessing

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0 height="100%"><tr> <td valign="top" width=200 BGCOLOR="#000000" TEXT="#F7F7FF"> <bR> <div> <B><U>Go to</U></B>:</div> <div> <A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="THE FIRST CHURCH OF HOLY ROCK AND ROLL"><U>Home Page</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id17.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Statement of Purpose"><U>Statement of Purpose</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id23.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="The Commandments"><U>The Commandments</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id24.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Sermons"><U>Sermons</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id18.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Reviews and Rant"><U>Reviews and Rant</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id25.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Blasts from the Past"><U>Blasts from the Past</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id29.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Desert Island Discs"><U>Desert Island Discs</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id26.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Interviews"><U>Interviews</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id27.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Books and Movies"><U>Books and Movies</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id20.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Mailbag"><U>Mailbag</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id21.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Favorite Links"><U>Related Links</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id22.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Contact Me"><U>Contact Me</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id28.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="The Confessional"><U>The Confessional</U></A></div> </td> <td valign="top" BGCOLOR="#FFFF33" TEXT="#080000"> <div> <B>Miscellaneous Witnessing</B></div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>Monday, April 25, 2005</B></div> <div> <B>Is it just me...or did that Springsteen "Storytellers" suck?</B><B> <A NAME="springstory"><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="1x1.gif" HEIGHT="1" ALIGN="bottom" WIDTH="1" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" ></A></B></div> <div> <B>I haven't posted in awhile. Nothing but an appearance by the Drive-By Truckers at my school has moved me to fight for the time to write in the middle of a work 'n' school shitstorm--and I didn't even post on that. But somehow Broooooce's appearance on VH1's "Storytellers" series aggravated and disgusted me so much I can't help speaking out.</B></div> <div> <B>First of all, after 15 years of pretty devoted attention and admiration, I got off the Springsteen bus after Tunnel of Love. Though his writing continued to occasionally impress (The Ghost of Tom Joad in particular), his performance just...bogged down. Boring, spiritless, overly considered, weighted down by its own seriousness. Then I saw him in St. Louis--on an E-Street Band reunion tour, I think--after having watched Local H kick everybody's ass the night before in Columbia, and the whole 3-hour extravaganza seemed hokey, unimaginative, self-congratulatory, and a waste of fucking time. I wrote a long, fairly savage piece on my website (see below), and wrote the fucker off for life.</B></div> <div> <B>Somehow, when I read a CNN article on the VH1 appearance, I thought, well, he's gonna talk about the songs, so it could be funny, and...I've never been prone to COMPLETELY give up on a rock and roll life. Then I watched it.</B></div> <div> <B>Gawd. Besides the solemnity delivered with an increasingly phoney Okie twang, he actually DISSECTED his own songs LINE BY LINE. Jeezus. Yet another artist ruined by Greil Marcus; if Bruce hasn't read and re-read Marcus' overly excited pieces on his own work, I'm Dave Marsh. He actually believes his press! Thoroughly. And sooooooooo snore-inducing. Sure, any call to take up arms against the Bush administration is welcome--at least two songs were so designed--but do you have to be a gearhead version of Joan Baez in doing so? Even his relationship song (where he called his wife out to sing surprisingly faint and spare backup vox--considering the song, "Brilliant Disguise," what was the fucking point?) and his beautiful loser-mythos song were sodden by his seeming uncritical acceptance of his own myth. Only on "Spirit in the Night" did he break loose, and then only slightly. The story behind the song was funny, and lyrics are so loosey-goosey that even his stiffness couldn't staunch them.</B></div> <div> <B>It was an awkward, painful embarrassment, one I wouldn't have dreamed in '75, but at 12 I was pretty stoopid. The man is trapped inside of five layers of wet paper bag. Can he punch himself out, like Dylan? I'm sorry, but I don't care.</B></div> <div> <B>Below is the text of the article I mentioned above. The sad truth is...he's gone downhill from there.</B></div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>BORING STORIES:</B></div> <div> <B>Springsteen Live at Kiel Center, St. Louis</B></div> <div> <B>Sitting at a booth in a Bob Evans, the tension was ping-ponging between the four of us. Morning-after concert discussion--somebody finally asked the question I was fearing: "So what did you think of the show?" One might well wonder why it had taken nearly twelve post-show hours for someone to bring it up.</B></div> <div> <B>It had all started when, during a drunken evening, one of us had suggested a road trip to St. Lou to take in a Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band extravaganza. Nicole and I, long-time fans (perhaps an understatement in my case: Bruce was one of the reasons this music is my life), had never witnessed one of the great Rawk spectacles, and our two friends were among the benighted, but ready to dive in, in part as a birthday present for one of 'em.</B></div> <div> <B>I labored hours over a 3-cassette comp to prepare them, and, in the making, I found myself pretty damn re-amazed at the Mighty Greaser's hard-fought hacking through lots of dark forests to keep his audience honest and his own bad self lean, mean and relevant. Not for him the fate of the protagonist of "Glory Days"; he's long displayed a gift for getting inside beautiful losers to show us how to keep winning, or at least hold life to a draw. So I was primed to finally be there, and had every reason, given what his work had to say, to expect, well, more progress. Progress: a tangly concept any serious Rawk-lifer has to grapple with daily. Either it's the end-all be-all in the face of rot, anathema to the Rawk ethic, or it's the fucking hemlock that kills the basic feels-so-right urges that legions of garage rockers and die-hard rockabillies strive to strangle out of their axes. Where was Springsteen?</B></div> <div> <B>Motorheads don't generally have ten guitars waiting in the wings, each on labelled stands with different tunings for different songs. On the other hand, Springsteen's musical set-up--"big" horn, a willingness to use synthesizers and Spector-operatic piano, an odd aversion to expressing himself consistently, particularly through riffs, on guitar--doesn't exactly lend itself to primitive noise (Wouldn't it be fascinating, though, to hear him really strip his shit down, not like a Nebraska or The Ghost of Tom Joad, which were "folk" albums, but like, say, Pink Flag, or Ramones, or even New York? It'd certainly cut down on the pomp 'n' corn--if he's reflective enough to notice, it's, uh, shtick). That leaves writing. Surely he'd been writing. And there's been no shortage of raw material for a working class hero to mold into an epater le bourgeousie for his increasingly comfortable, always snow-white audience, not in these here times.</B></div> <div> <B>So what'd we get? Sitting in the mezzanine, lined up straight-away center stage (a $45 ticket that would have been more than a third of his typical protagonist's weekly salary--a very optimistic estimate, at that), we got:</B></div> <div> <B>1) Muddy sound: 4 guitars (it's nice to get the gang together, but come on: platoon some o' the bastards!) doing nothing much but strumming and grinding those plodding, unfunky-white-guy rhythms. Even Bruce's and Miami Steve's occasional solos were either arena-rocky or out-of-tune.</B></div> <div> <B>2) Umpteen VERY marginally-differentiated "Big Man" solos--the show/tour may be about loyalty and friendship, but my god, hasn't the motherfucker grown a few chops? Maybe jazz and '50s r&b has spoiled me (not to mention Randy Newman's devastating parody on Trouble In Paradise's "Life is Good"), maybe they are a bar band, but millionaires get paid to make some hard decisions.</B></div> <div> <B>3) 90% 1985-and-earlier catalog, arranged exactly the way they were played 1985-and-earlier. Even a bottlenecked "Born in the USA" was a by-the-numbers recreation of the demo version on Tracks. The only faintly new song was a Weavers-esque Guthrie-rewrite called "This Train," which might be described as Springsteen's "Forever Young," one of the worst things in Dylan's ouevre. And since I've mentioned the grouchy old fart, who spent years in limbo squeezing dollars from his back catalogue only to come roaring back again--heard "Things Have Changed," from the Wonder Boys soundtrack yet, or Time Out of Mind? Nicole and I took a smoke break with a suspiciously large segment of the upstairs concertgoers and came to a mutual appeciation of Uncle Bawb, who, with the previously mentioned exception, hasn't really ever given a shit about giving the public what it wants. OK, he's disgusted, but, hey, who isn’t? And with about 10 years on Bruce, he sure isn't showing signs of taking a fall-back position.</B></div> <div> <B>4) A dearth of spontanaeity. The only two moments that raised my short hairs to half-mast were the only radical rearrangement, of Tunnel of Love’s "If I Should Fall Behind," where 3 E-Streeters got a verse, including Mrs. Bruce, who sounded a lot like Ronnie Spector--the chick should definitely sing more--and a weird Springsteen somersault in the middle of the third encore, as if to say, "OK, can I go now?" Actually, the old man didn't really move too much throughout the 3-hour show--yep, he still does 'em, and he did sing pretty well, I admit. But a rock and roll show must be alive. Working hard ain't enough. I'm sure Phil Collins sweats.</B></div> <div> <B>So, to crystallize it, he had nothing to say, other than, "These are my boys" (and they definitely got more props than the woman) and "I'm still here, but the Muse is all gone." Where can he go from here? Hell, lots of places. How about a four-piece, or even a trio? How about taking on the WTO? How about collaborating with Patti, his wife (ala Double Fantasy)? Can his kids play yet (remember Old Skull)? He could get back to his roots--amazingly, he's never done that before (perhaps to his credit, but it sure worked for McCartney). Or duet with Ed Hamell. The possibilities are much more open than he may think.</B></div> <div> <B>Back to Bob Evans. I said my piece (see above). One of our guests turned to the other and said, "I don't feel like sharing right now...we'll talk when we get home." Pissed my ass off--nobody can disagree anymore, and they don't know what they're missing. True argument is the road to enlightenment. Perhaps Bruce won a new fan--albiet a 25-year-old that wasn't familiar with him in 2000. Where's she been? Is it unfair to expect the former "future of rock and roll" to at least function in the present, even if he is still donating major proceeds to our country's food banks? Doesn't he look in the mirror and sometimes realize that he's fallen victim to Blue Oyster Cult Syndrome--becoming what he used to shake by the lapels? He used to hope he wouldn't sit around thinking about 'em, but all he seemed to be beseiging his audience with at this show was boring stories from his glory days. </B></div> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>Sunday, September 26, 2004</B></div> <div> <B>"Driftwood on the River"</B></div> <div> <B>Under the unfluence of Budweiser and struggling to grade </B><B>Catcher in the Rye</B><B> essay exams, I was caught short by Ernest Tubb's '40s honky-tonk classic, "Driftwood on the River." I'd programmed about 30 Tubb songs for Nicole and I so we could concentrate on edumacational stuff yet still enjoy toonage, and, though I'd heard this song several times, I was frankly amazed at how it dovetailed with my general life-state. Tubb had one of those early country vocal styles where you say, "Hell, I could sing that," then you try and fail (to hear a successful attempt, listen to Merle Haggard's autumnal The Way I Am). His best stuff is warm and real--where in today's country music can you hear a regular guy's voice just soulfully putting across home truths of life? Here's the complete lyrics:</B></div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>DRIFTWOOD ON THE RIVER</B></div> <div> <B>I'M JUST DRIFTWOOD ON THE RIVER FLOWING DOWN THE TIDE</B></div> <div> <B>I DON'T CARE WHERE THIS OLD RIVER CARRIES ME</B></div> <div> <B>I KEEP DRIFTING JUST BECAUSE MY HEART IS BROKEN INSIDE</B></div> <div> <B>AND I'M TIRED OF WISHING FOR WHAT CANNOT BE.</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I MAY MEET A BIT OF DRIFTWOOD LOST THE SAME AS I</B></div> <div> <B>SHARE A HANDSHAKE AND A TENDER TEAR OR TWO</B></div> <div> <B>BUT IT'S JUST GOOD LUCK, PAL, WE'VE GOT TO SAY GOODBYE</B></div> <div> <B>I MUST WANDER ON TO KEEP MY RENDEZVOUS.</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>THOUGH I DRIFT THROUGH TOWN AND CITY, I CAN NEVER STAY</B></div> <div> <B>'TIL I FIND A PLACE TO CALL MY HOME SWEET HOME</B></div> <div> <B>I DON'T ASK FOR HELP OR PITY, I JUST GO MY WAY</B></div> <div> <B>I JUST PRAY FOR PEACE TO DRIFT AND DREAM ALONE.</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I'M JUST DRIFTWOOD ON THE RIVER AND I'M DRIFTIN ON</B></div> <div> <B>'TIL THE WEARY RIVER MEETS THE DEEP BLUE SEA</B></div> <div> <B>WHERE THE DEEP BLUE SEA MAY HELP ME TO FORGET SOMEONE</B></div> <div> <B>JUST THE CARELESS ONE WHO HAS FORGOTTEN ME.</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>IN MY HEART I DON'T FEEL BITTER OVER WHAT HAS BEEN</B></div> <div> <B>I FEEL SORRY FOR THE ONE I MUST FORGET</B></div> <div> <B>AND INSTEAD OF BEING SOMEONE WITH THE WORLD TO WIN</B></div> <div> <B>I'M JUST DRIFTWOOD ON THE RIVER OF REGRET.</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Deep, or what?</B></div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>Sunday, September 26, 2004</B></div> <div> <B>The Parents</B></div> <div> <B>It's always a challenge when I'm on a trip with my parents and I want us all to enjoy music along the way. I met the challenge this weekend on a drive to Hannibal, Missouri with Mom, Dad, and my wife Nicole. With the possible exception of the post-'65 model George Jones, has a squarer-looking individual ever been blessed with more euphonious pipes than Mel Torme? I found myself totally riveted--to the extent that I wasn't even hearing conversation or really seeing the road (and I was driving!) by Torme's versions of "Born to Be Blue," "A Stranger in Town," "'Round Midnight," and "Blue and Sentimental," from Verve's </B><B>Compact Jazz</B><B> comp. The man wasn't nicknamed "The Velvet Fog" for nothing! "Born to Be Blue" in particular is a performance where Torme seems to be able to add the audio version of soft focus to his interpretation to add a deeper layer of meaning to the fairly corny lyrics; it's hard to imagine even Sinatra topping it. Another highlight of the trip was the second disc of </B><B>Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Duke Ellington Songbook</B><B> (also on Verve), on which Ella's vocals ride the tricky rhythmic ripples of Ellington's compositions like a state-of-the art kayak, with Stuff Smith's sedutive violin and Ben Webster's breathy, lusty tenor sax following every contour and shift. She also duets with guitarist Barney Kessel on stark versions of "Solitude," "In a Sentimental Mood," and "Azure" that are brief sand-bar respites under a shining--but very blue--moon. On the return trip, I managed to squeeze in the recent budget-priced 2-Lps-on-1-disc reissue of Willie Nelson's early-'80s duet albums with soon-to-be-departed legends Webb Pierce and Hank Snow (</B><B>In the Jailhouse Now</B><B> and </B><B>Brand on My Heart</B><B>, respectively, on Sony Music Digital Compact Classics). Not a single merely good track out of 20, and "In the Jailhouse Now," "I Don't Care," "Heebie Jeebie Blues" (with Pierce), "I've Been Everywhere, "Carribean," "Golden Rocket," and "Brand on My Heart (with Snow) surpass the original versions. It's simply miraculous to hear three cagey old singers with very little in the natural gifts department think their way through these old chestnuts. I was gratified repeatedly throughout the trip when Dad was moved to pick up the cases of all three of these discs and peruse them carefully. </B></div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>Friday, September 24, 2004</B></div> <div> <B>John Fogerty--What happened?</B></div> <div> <B>Cranked up CCR's </B><B>Willy and the Poorboys</B><B> today (more fallout from the Cobain book--one of the photos shows a messy ol' rockpad of Kurt's with a Creedence record sticking out of a crate), having programmed its great lost threesome ("It Came Out of the Sky," "Don't Look Now," and "Effigy"), I began musing on the great Fogerty quandary: where did that lyrical edge go? A few decent toons came after Willy, but his first two solo albums of the '70s were almost all covers (not badly rendered at all, especially the Charms' "Hearts of Stone"), and since the overrated "comeback" of Centerfield he's really been good for, well, nothing...other than cannibalizing his old group's inimitable musical style. Fogerty's writing genius seemed so uncomplicated that, as long as regular guys kept getting screwed, he could last for ever--especially with that voice. And with the resurgence of roots-rock over the past 20 years or so, you'd think he would have been inspired, regenerated, nay, compelled into relevant action. Haven't heard the ominously titled Deja Vu All Over Again yet, but the man ranks up there with Sly Stone, Rod Stewart, and Johnny Rotten as guys with prodigious gifts who just...lost 'em. Maybe getting disconnected from the band rattled him out of his rhythm, or maybe the band contributed the special fuse that made the machine really hum. Or maybe (excepting Johnny Boy) there was something about '72-'73 that took it out of these guys. Any theories out there?</B></div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>Friday, September 24, 2004</B></div> <div> <B>Nirvana Fixation</B></div> <div> <B>Just finished Charles Cross' </B><B>Heavier than Heaven</B><B>. Initially asked myself, "How much do I need to know about Kurt Cobain?" Had already read Mike Azerrad's </B><B>Come as You Are</B><B> and tons of articles and such, but came across a review of the Cross bio that made it seem pretty tantalizing. Finished it in about a week (365 pages--I teach during the day and plan and read school stuff at night, so that's tells you how compelled I was), and I'd say it's the literary version of Cobain's scarifying howl through "Where Did You Sleep Last Night?" on Unplugged. You come away wondering how many little kids are as deeply psychologically wounded like Cobain, how long they carry it, and how in hell they cope. Not to say the author explains it all away that way; it's just as likely, I suppose, that the guy was fatally self-involved. But you'll be hurt yourself when you follow the story arc of a kid who wouldn't go to bed because he had so much fun being with Mom and Dad who grew up to so desperately court death in his final weeks you're afraid to turn the next page. Also, if you're like me, you may come away with a new appreciation (and almost certainly a different perspective) on Courtney Love. I'm convinced she didn't have anything to do at all, even psychologically, with his death. In fact, if it hadn't been for her, he'd have kicked the bucket after the first SNL gig. The ultimate compliment I can extend to Cross is the book literally drove me into a Nirvana listening fixation that has just gotten deeper since I finished the book last night. It's hard to believe we're already 15 years past their big moment, but, I'm telling you, the shit holds up--naw, it's grown. As I've listened from Bleach through a bunch of rarities and outtakes I cadged from the Internet, I've found myself constructing Robert Johnson analogies. Driven, tortured, naked yet fascinatingly allusive in their writing, frighteningly intense in their singing, and possessed of a self-effacing gallows sense of humor, they most certainly must be fellow travellers now. I hope some of my student rockers will read this book, because there's a bit of a Nirvana backlash snaking through the ranks ("shitty guitar player," "lyrics are stupid," "self-involved junkie," and "sell-out" are the common--and, for three of the four, ignant--complaints). I'm not sure reading this will change their minds. But it will enlighten them regarding the man's complexity.</B></div> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>The Velvet Underground: The Bootleg Series, Volume 1</B></div> <div> <B>The Quine Tapes</B></div> <div> <B>Shimamoto and the Reverend Coomers Take a Journey to the Nights of Their End</B><B> <A NAME="velvetdialectic"><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="1x1.gif" HEIGHT="1" ALIGN="bottom" WIDTH="1" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" ></A></B></div> <bR> <div> <B>     Recently, Brother Shimamoto and I decided to sit down in front of our computers, synch up this latest in a recent line of multi-disc rawk archaeological digs in our CDROM drives,</B><B> </B><B>and let the music take us where it would, bouncing what we hoped would be interesting revelations off each other’s craniums. For me, the Velvets are like a perfectly aged single-malt scotch: I only hit the bottle when I need a straight, potent, reliable smoky shot to the system</B><B>. </B><B>I know Ken feels pretty much the same, so we knew pretty much what to expect, though we weren’t sure how nearly seven hours of tippling was gonna leave us. Well, we came to what may or may not be, for you, some unsurprising conclusions: a) this band played even more gloriously than either official history or personal memory serves; b) their front man was just as funny as he was wicked--if not more so; and, more to the point c) YOU NEED THIS IN YOUR COLLECTION.</B><B> </B><B>Break out your pleasure-poison of choice, kick back, and come on along....</B></div> <div> <B>(I’m </B><B>leaning</B><B>, Ken’s standin’ straight)</B></div> <div> <B>Let's start with a basic question: aside from fanatics like us, why does anyone need this set? 'Cause, to mention some other examples, I thought the Revenant Beefheart box was mostly an expensive rip-off (some of the earlier unheard stuff was decent, and I dug the instrumental version of TROUT MASK, but there was a ton of crap and disc that was too short for the money), and the Stooges' FUNHOUSE SESSIONS a classic example of the law of diminishing returns: too much fucking effort necessary to glean a little satisfaction. I'm playing devil's advocate here, but how much do we need this? How different is it from 1969 VELVET UNDERGROUND LIVE (several performances are damn near identical, one IS identical)? It's cheaper--though you get fewer goodies; as you've said, the packaging is crap--it's packed with music, a song ("Follow the Leader") is featured that only bootleg aficionados know,and they've thrown in familiar songs few have heard VU perform live ("Sunday Morning," "Black Angel's Death Song," and a couple more). Still, though--dim sound, one song in three versions which take up 40% of the disc time and another in two. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>A fair question. Depends, I think, on how big of a fan you are. Myself, I have quite a different impression of the Stoogebox than you do (altho my take on the Beefheart is about the same...I basically bought it for the TROUT MASK "house sessions"). I think there's enough variation here to make it worthwhile for a true VU fan...not just between the takes of "Sister Ray," but in the different approaches to "Waiting for the Man," the songs that previously only appeared on "1969" (mighta been on "VU"/"Another View" too, but I never got those), "White Light," "Ride Into the Sun," etc. Casual listeners WOULD do better with the original albs. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Dim sound: I'm not an extremely hi-fi kinda guy anyway. And as you pointed out earlier, it's about on a par with "1969" (with the exception of Disc 3's "Sister Ray"), which is fine by me. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Maybe I'm just willing to cut these guys slack 'cos they're Long Island boys (and girl)...Lou from Freeport, Sterl from Bay Shore (right down the road from where I grew up), Mo from SOMEPLACE "out on the Island," Yule from Great Neck. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>The first disc gets off to a damn good start. </B><B>"Waiting for The Man"</B><B> rolls with an almost seductive laziness--not as intense as the other versions I've heard, no desperation, but with a bemused "What? Me Worry?" sense of humor. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Yeah, just compare "Waiting for the Man" with the pianner-pounding, amphetamine-psychosis version on "VU and Nico"...a perfect example of the variety I was talking about before. And this isn't even as "laid-back" as they get with it on Disc 3... </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Wayne Kramer said these guys sounded like folkies w/electric guitars, which is SOMETIMES true when they're playing at lower volumes. What makes them more than that (and what makes this set more of a value than your last assessment would indicate) is the variety they were capable of within a fairly limited stylistic THANG. They could veer from pop to avant garde, from song band to jam band, from rhythm guitar chug to frenetic lead howl. Could IMPROVISE...almost a lost art these days (away from the Phish brigade, which I LIKE). How many bands do you know who could (or would bother to) play the same song three times and make each one a different, unpredictable experience for the listener? Yeah, those were indeed "different times." </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"It's Just Too Much"</B><B> follows: it's got some weird traditional stuff (walking bass? on a Velvets record?), but continues the self-effacing flow. These are the big, bad, S&M jelly-on-their shoulders boogie men, chortling, hapless, ankle-deep in demimonde muck! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>At their worst, these guys remind me of "musos" I usedta hear in the dorms at college, plunking away at unimaginative I-IV-V's with the stiffest whiteboy riddim imaginable. Remember where they were coming from, though -- Chuck Berry, Jimmy Reed, Dylan... </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Regarding "It's Just Too Much," I think of their bald-faced ripoff of Marvin Gaye's "Hitch Hike" on VU & NICO--not the place you'd expect to find a Motown steal! Plus, you have Lou's hit-for-hire years prior to account for a lot of it. Still, the lyrics and loosey-goosey approach make it very fun. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"There She Goes Again": RIGHT! I remember hearing that for the first time and thinking "Wow, a Stones ripoff!" -- except Mick (and Marvin) would never have sung, "You better hit her." </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>“What Goes On":</B><B> "One of their greatest jam-songs. This version isn't appreciably different than the one on "1969 Live" (altho I don't THINK it's the same; will have to try the side-by-side thang later). Works off the same kind of hypnotic (or boring, depending on your perspective) riddim guitar chug. I'm looking forward to hearing some of the OTHER volumes in this series...the Boston "guitar amp" tape, the New England "Hillside Festival" tape...where they supposedly essayed roof-raising versions of this toon. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Man, I love the hard rhythm-heaven speed-fueled strum of this song. I’ll listen to as many versions as Polygram want to cram down my throat. At 8+ minutes, it ain’t long</B><B> enough.</B><B> And I love how Yule’s organ weaves around the solo, which--though it’s almost all rhythm--takes you somewhere, in the Coltrane sense. </B></div> <div> <B>Yule earns his pay with the organ solo here. As I've written elsewhere, I think Doug was a worthy addition to the live VU (altho I haven't heard enough live stuff with Cale to be able to make a fair comparison), and prolly a necessary foil to Lou in the studio. I'll say it: I PREFER the post-Cale version of the band! While the first LP's songwriting was great and its sonics innovative, I think that overall, the sound of the band was almost laughably stiff and white. Second alb was innovative, but pales in comparison with what followed (Stooges et. al.). Other good versions: Dictators on their live "Fuck 'Em If They Can't Take a Joke;" uh, Bryan Ferry on "The Bride Stripped Bare." </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>You’ve hit on a great reason to buy the record: the post-Cale group </B><B>is </B><B>the best. It’s like they said, "Fuck the trappings! Let’s rock!" though, of course, they do a lot more.</B><B> </B><B>They’re just in love with thrusting guitar energy and that flat, unadorned Mo Tucker beat</B><B>. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Here's one reason I like the Velvets: Their drummer quits, so what do they do? Put an ad in the Voice for some jazz shithead? Nahhh! Just call up JIM TUCKER'S KID SISTER! ALWAYS ask the siblings of yr college chums to join yr band! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Then we have the shining moment of the disc: </B><B>"I Can't Stand It."</B><B> Not only peppier than previous versions--and they weren’t slow--but Lou’s guitar (which we both fixed on early) is pure white light and white heat. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Now THIS is the REAL SHIT! If I had heard this at the time, I woulda agreed with Tony Glover's "most advanced lead guitarist" comment about Lou. He'd improved vastly since the "White Light" sessions. Gritty, exciting, abandoned...everything I wanna hear from a gtrist. And the band backs him to the hilt. Bro. Wayne shoulda heard THIS. Sounds like they're singing "If Shirley would just come back..." When I was younger and more concerned with the sexual orientation question, I usedta think Lou was singing "Danny" or "Daddy" or... </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Yeah, they were less concerned with "what a rock'n'roll band is supposed to look/sound/act like" than just doing what they did (in this case, blowing up against the back wall of an auditorium). That's what I dig about 'em -- the lack of self-consciousness. Maybe that's the wrong way of putting it, 'cos Lou was definitely a self-conscious artist -- measuring himself against Delmore Schwartz, etc. -- maybe something like "lack of concern with conventions/expectations" ('cos there was no blueprint for what they were doing). No map. Love those four beats Mo uses to start this. Sounds like a Motown jam...that assured. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"Some Kinda Love."</B><B> I mentioned "Fuck the trappings!" but here they are--but again, this is maybe self-deprecating, or if not, it’s a Factory satire. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Again, as I say elsewhere, sexiest song of all time. A lot of Luna's stuff reminds me of this. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Yeah, except with Luna Wareham doesn’t project</B><B> </B><B>like Lou so the lyrics catch you by surprise if they catch you! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Wareham: More like a cross between Lou and Doug. I liked Lou's spoken intro on "1969" better. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>This was one of the first ADULT rock'n'roll songs about sex. Really says it all. I think the songwriting on the third alb was as innovative in its APPROACH to subject matter as that on the first was in the topics that it broached. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Here's something: I keep hitting on it, but Lou was a damned funny writer at this stage. His take on the demimonde in songs like "Foggy Notion" remind me a lot of Mothers-era Zappa on hippies. Was Reed more a demi-god than Zappa was a hippie?</B><B> </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Zappa wasn't a hippie, he was a freak. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>What they had in common: they were a little older than the average rock'n'roller. Lou was 25 when "VU and Nico" was released, FZ was 25 when "Freak Out!" was released. They were fringe players, outsiders in their respective scenes. Before the Velvets, Lou had been Delmore's acolyte, a member of a shitty fratboy band, a songwriting hack for Pickwick, an electroshock victim. The Warhol Factory scene was JUST HIS MEAT: a living, breathing "Last Exit to Brooklyn." FZ had been a Varese disciple, a student composer, a member of desert R&B bands, jailed for a bogus obscenity charge. L.A. freakdom gave him more room to move than Lancaster (where Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band were LOCAL HEROES, remember). </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"Femme Fatale":</B><B> I love this song (and all the melodic Nico songs on the first alb). "About Edie." Ironic? YOU decide!!! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Yeah, I think irony is the right word, 'cause, regarding the femme in question, it kinda backfired. But I was reading recently in Please Kill Me that Nico fucked everybody for the fucking. About her, too? "Hear the way she talks"? I can! And this song is funny, too--remember the audience laughter at the end of he 1969 LIVE version? </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Nico: Sounds like my kinda gal. I think the Jackson Browne saga is hilarious. Have you ever seen the short film she was in with Iggy? (Ann Arbor ca. '68?) He's wearing a Rationals T-shirt. It's Goth-hilarious. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Lou's stage raps are a big part of the fun with these. A long way from what he'd become on "Take No Prisoners" -- actually appears to have some consideration for/rapport with his audience. I think this song was actually about Edie Sedgwick, though. Remember Lou's "1969 Live" intro: "She was later put in an institution for being one, and perhaps someday will open a school to train others." HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Yeah, my favorite is "I’m glad the light show is </B><B>behind</B><B> me!" </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Besides being the engine room of the Velvets, Mo seems so much like the cheerleader who wandered into the crap game, and I don't mean that as a jibe. She provides a human dimension to the band, a naivete in the middle of the twisted sex, mainlining, and horror. And, by god, she believed in the band so much it's still with her. You heard most of her solo records? "After Hours" and "I'm Sticking with You" are really neatly sequenced on this disc, particularly considering what's about to come roaring forward. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Mo was a NICE CATHOLIC GIRL. She usedta go to Mass on the road! I can picture her wearing plaid skirts. All of the dyke-talk was spurious...she has something like four kids now, for chrissakes! What could she have thought of some of the stuff Lou was singing about? And as you say, she continues to believe...was the one who worked the closest w/Sal Mercuri to make this series happen. A keeper of the flame. Bless her. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I picture Mo rolling her eyes at Lou during some of these songs like Charlie always does at Mick in Stones videos! Can you see her with jelly on her shoulder? I see her reading in the next room and checking her watch!</B><B> </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"That Louie...such a card!" </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"Sister Ray":</B><B> The Velvets were really two different entities: the studio band and the live band. The studio band was focused on selling the songs. The live band was focused on getting off. It worked. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Getting off. Regarding "Sister Ray," that's right more goddam ways than one. This version is snaky, punk-rock Ravel, sneaking up on you, bending you over, then...boom! I absolutely dig this version. I posed the question, "Why buy this?" THIS is why. Some of the lyrics make me wince, but by God the music and singing and dynamics shut me up quick</B><B>. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>OK, professor, let's hear your objections! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>You mean about the "wincing"? That "sucking on a ding dong" line, well, maybe it's homophobia (very doubtful), and I have nothing against fellatio, but, as a former lead singer, I have to wonder if Lou was inwardly rolling his eyes after awhile. But--and now he's taking off on a pile-driver solo, lightning cutting through thick air--like I said, he's shutting me up quick about that. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>So, Rev., whatthefuck do you think "Sister Ray" is about? </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>OK OK!!! I know it ain't just about the sucking on of ding dongs. I think it's about the music more than anything else--that's what gets me off--and about waking up in the middle of a nightmare that won't end, where every choice makes the nightmare more frightening. The ultimate motherfucker of a bad trip. Which, like you say, is the opposite of "All You Need is Love." Love won't get you outta this. You forgive me? </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Funny, I always thought he was singing about a baked good manufactured by the Hostess company. Live and learn! I like to think of it as "Sloop John B" on strychnine. Or a not-so-distant (altho less wistful) relative of Van Morrison's "Madame George." </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>You got that right!!! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Lou’s big problem now is his "professorial" demeanor. He needs someone to knock the stuffing out of him!</B><B> </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>No shit! Laurie Anderson stroking his ego is prolly the worst thing that ever happened to him. Bring back the crazy Puerto Rican brawd! Or the 7-foot-tall transvestite! What I hate most about Lou: his revisionist tendency. His magnanimous remarks about Zappa at the R&R Hall of Fame made me puke. Back in the day, they REALLY hated each other's guts. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Also, he seems to squeeze out any artistic foil who has any weight...happened with Cale, Bowie, Quine. It's interesting that he hired Yule back as a sideman in the mid-seventies. Mike Rathke and Rob Wasserman served him pretty well in the early nineties, and Fernando Saunders in the late nineties. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Look at the quality of the guys he couldn't work with: Cale, Quine, and Saunders. Jeez Louise! He should have been grateful to Quine for eternity for resuscitating him</B><B>!</B><B> </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>He WAS grateful to Quine...until he got his confidence back. Then he went out of his way to humiliate him, starting with mixing him down on "Legendary Hearts." In the same way, the '93 VU reunion started out with, "Let bygones be bygones" and ended with "I will never work with this person again for the rest of my life." Then again, put the shoe on the other foot...prolly the best thing that ever happened for Cale's career was Lou agreeing to "collaborate" with him on "Songs for Drella," which Cale admits was mainly Lou's work. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I love their improvs. Infinite variety of. The three versions of "Sister Ray" here really show what capable/versatile musos the Velvets actually were -- give the lie to anybody who says they "couldn't play." The '69 Velvets were a band in total command of their material, who could play it anyway they wanted (long/short, soft/loud) depending upon the set and setting and their own inclinations. This only happens when a band is accustomed enough to playing together that the various musicians know each other's time and style that they can ANTICIPATE EACH OTHER'S THOUGHTS. A rare thing, and always a pleasure to hear. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>So, is that Lou or Sterling slow-picking in that"evil-Pharoah-dust-escaping-from-the- pyramids" way? </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Prolly Sterl, but hard to tell...they had the LOCK. The only time it's obviously Lou is when he kicks on the fuzztone. Can you imagine how this went over in the era of boogie blues "Ah wanna bawl yew awwwl naaaht long?" Although like Ten Years After, at least a coupla the Velvets were acquainted with the joys of speed. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Yeah, I can imagine...and THANK GOD! What band would you be missing most if they hadn't launched their assault? </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Probably the Stooges (upon whom they were a direct influence). But it's instructive to remember that if it hadn't been for the Velvets, there woulda been no glam movement in England, in which case there prolly would have been no punk movement here (most of the early punkers I talk to were WAY into Bowie and Mott). The early protopunkers that I loved so well (VU, MC5, Stooges) weren't heard by that many people in their day (but as the old cliche goes, most of 'em started bands). </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I'd have to agree. No Stooges, no Pistols. No Pistols, no world. The Dolls, too: Velvets stirred up with the Shangri-Las! Another thing is--I've been waiting to get this in--do you remember in the early to mid-eighties when damn near every new band (I'm thinking REM, Feelies, Dream Syndicate, Human Switchboard, Galaxy 500) was on the Velvets train? Seems like only Luna and the Strokes give a shit now. The Velvets, as uncool as Elvis? </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>The Velvets went from being a fringe weirdo obscurantists to THE MOST INFLUENTIAL AMERICAN BAND. When that happens, backlash is inevitable. (I'm still waiting for it to happen with the Ramones, but it might not -- too easy to imitate.) The thing is, all the eighties bands you mentioned were only reflective of one facet or other of the Velvets. I haven't heard the Strokes yet, but Luna seems to have come the closest to having captured the totality (songcraft + guitarissimo). </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I never saw the Dolls as being that VU-influenced. More Brit Invasion + girl group. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I was thinking of David Jo’s writing about the interrelations of a fucked-up, born-to-lose subculture, and Thunders’ nose-thumbing, exploding one-trick guitar. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Yeah, Johanson was prolly cognizant of 'em. Genzale mighta been aware of him, but I don't think he emulated 'em sound-wise...he was clearly a Keef disciple, limited by his technique/imagination. I LOVED the Heartbreakers, prolly more so than the Dolls, but I'm REAL tired of the brigade of JT imitators. The orthodoxy of 'em is the opposite of everything I dig about the VU. All attitude, no chops, no ideas. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"Follow the Leader"</B><B>: I can imagine the hippies out in S.F. doing the patented hands- above-head Grateful Dead Ecstasy Dance (later co-opted by the Phishheads) to this one. Sterl on lead, meandering enough to fit in with the S.F. claque, guys like Barry Melton and Jorma Whatsisname. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Precisely what I was thinking. Even some "jazzy" shit in there...yearrrggggghhhh. Lou's rhythm guitar ALMOST saves it, but the picking wills out. At least they're LISTENING to each other. You can almost hear Reed getting impatient. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>What separates the Velvets from contemporary wank-jam bands like Cream: the willingness to venture outside the realm of tonality, the ability to write good songs. But I LIKE "Follow the Leader." And yeah, they're definitely ALL listening (and responding) to each other on the extended pieces. Hard to find people who'll do that. That's one thing that makes 'em extraordinary. It's not just about technique, it's about the ability/willingness to interact with others -- the band vibe. Not many have it. What I LIKE here is the power of the groove -- something the Velvets weren't exactly known for (altho any version of "What Goes On" should be enough to convert the unconvinced). </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Velvets as "groove" band!!! It’s a very white groove (makes me think about how Steve Jones and Joey Ramone drained everything black out of their guitars--’cept Chuck Berry), but ain’t nuthin’ wrong with that! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"White Light White Heat"</B><B>: This is what I call a storming version--the band's a train hurtling 'round the band just short of too fast. And Lou's vocals--you were mentioning earlier how sad it was that he's lost this--are roaring and passionate, to match his guitar. I prefer this to the studio version.</B><B> </B><B>The band is way live on this Matrix stuff. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>What makes the material from the Matrix shows great: Flow. Momentum. They're playing at volume, stretching out, seeing where the tunes take 'em, letting the grooves breathe. It's funny, that, because the Matrix was a small place, and the conventional wisdom (based on Sterl's comments in the Bockris/Malanga "Uptight" book) was that those qualities were more evident when they played large rooms (like the Family Dog). Go fig. Yeah, this is vastly superior to the studio, vocally AND instrumentally. I really wish there was more live stuff with Cale for comparison, but I think just about all the versions of songs from the first two LPs by the '69 band cut the originals. Sorry, John. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>This stuff has an organic feel that the studio stuff can't match. You just can't beat a real band interacting onstage in front of an audience. Some of Lou's most adventurous lines without veering into "ostrich" territory. No virtuoso bullshit, just The Lock...like four appendages of the same mind. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Yep, the organism moving, thinking, playing as one. One of my favorite metaphors for my favorite bands, and this is one of 'em. Takes brains--and ears! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Not easy, but the best make it sound deceptively simple. Higher! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"Venus In Furs"</B><B>: I'll admit to always having found this song hilarious. But I particularly love the transition to the bridge ("I am tired, I am weary...") on the studio version. Cale's creaky viola playing blues changes sounds as ridiculous as the Standells appearing on "The Munsters." </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>There's </B><B>laughter</B><B> again. You know, so much has been made of the Velvets hating the sun, so to speak, and being the antidote to peace, love, and crabs, but he takes the piss of the street with a lot of gusto.</B><B> </B><B>You’ve mentioned this to me before. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>The people who saw the Velvets as DARK (Lillian Roxon was one) didn't GET IT. (Of course, all those publicity photos of them scowling behind dark shades wearing black turtlenecks didn't help, either.) One of the people I interviewed who saw 'em at the End of Cole said they were "all smack freaks" -- nothing farther from the truth! Proof positive (as if anymore is needed) that Image Is Everything. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"Heroin"</B><B>: This is like a blues, albeit a very literate one. By "blues," I mean a gut-level response to the hardness of the world...maybe a more modern, urban version of the rural variant. (Although I dunno where the "sailor's suit and cap" come from.) </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"Sailor’s suit and cap"--ever seen Fassbinder’s QUERELLE, based on a Jean Genet novel? Came after the Velvets, but aggressively gay and tied up in soul destruction. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Definitely a gay subtext there. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I'm fascinated by your comment regarding "Heroin" being a sort of blues. Wonder if you'd clarify, 'cause it got me thinking about the old song "I Wish I Was a Mole in the Ground," which, though not a blues, was one of those old mountain songs that caught the feeling. "If I were a mole in the ground/I'd tear this building (root this mountain) down"; "...a railroad man/He'll kill you if he can/And drink up your blood like wine"--not a long way from "dead bodies piling up in mounds." And though the guys that sing this (Bascom Lamar Lunsford, Blind Willie Johnson) communicate more aggression, it's a fantasy of aggression. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Lunsford and Johnson's disenfranchised hillbilly and sharecropper had to sublimate their aggression in song, while Reed's junkie turned his inward on himself. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>And that’s the proof of the pudding regarding "Is Lou his characters?" Reed’s one guy who--drugs or no--ain’t gonna self-destruct. Too much of an egomaniac! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I question how in control he was of his persona back in the early-to-mid-seventies, though. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>This is true, this is true.</B><B> </B></div> <div> <B>Never a speedfreak or junkie either! He was just doing SOCIOLOGICAL RESEARCH! And Lou was NEVER a homo -- he read an article about it in the Post! But for a guy who's so full of shit his eyes are brown, he can really make some transcendant music once in awhile. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Here's an area where you and I will probably disagree: I really could see this set taking the place of the studio albs for me, especially the first two. Maybe even "1969." (Not that I'm gonna throw them out or anything.) In the same way that the Stoogebox has supplanted the original "Funhouse" alb in my listening (which some others I know still cling to). It changes the way I hear this music...my expectations of it. Somebody wrote that "1969" is great because it encapsulates so much human experience for a rock'n'roll record. I'd say the same about this, but more so. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Actually, I see what you mean. I listen to 1969 LIVE more than the studio albums anyway and, though I love the vinyl sound (I bought the CD version and fucking pitched it like bad rubbish), this does beat it...by a mile. </B><B>(Readers, you still with us? There was your unequivocal directive!)</B><B> By the virtues of the two expectation-shattering "Sister Ray"s and "White Light/White Heat" and "I Can’t Stand It" alone, it gets there. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I'd also include "New Age," "Black Angel's Death Song," "Ride Into the Sun," and MAYBE the slow "I'm Waiting for the Man." I can already tell this is gonna get more spins in my player than the Stooges and Beefheart boxes put together. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"Imagine a HUNDRED guitars doing that at once?" </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>But tell me, if it’s not too far off the subject, how you listen to the FUNHOUSE box? </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Usually one disc at a time. In small doses. Certain albums I cling to the original sequence/ambiance of -- "Loaded" is actually one; so is "The Who Sell Out" (vinyl no longer being an option for me, I ditched the expanded, remastered '95 version in favor of a crappy original MCA CD). Dunno why. Although I love the "Fully Loaded Edition," I VERY rarely listen to any of it except the original alb. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Back to "Heroin": You can't beat that plagal cadence (the IV-I "Amen" sound). Still maybe Lou's greatest song. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Plagal cadence? You got me on that one--like the advance of decimating plague? Or is that muso talk? </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Muso talk. Like at the ass-end of a hymn, the chord change when the choir sings "Amen." Another example of a plagal cadence: The Modern Lovers' "Roadrunner." Those two chords. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"Sister Ray" (version 2)</B><B>: Actually, I hear a KICK DRUM on the Matrix "Sister Ray." Something I've never heard from HER before. Mo Tucker is a marvel...hard to believe she played all of this STANDING UP, on one or two drums and a cymbal! I don't think Lou has ever improved on this band, even with Quine. The "Rock and Roll Animal" guys had superior chops and provided a certain lyrical edge, but I hear some of that on this set too, particularly from Yule. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Just goes to show you: technique ain't shit! Imagination, thinking like a kid picking up crayons for the first time, feeling the groove (surrendering to "The Lock"--the music is first, my band is second, and I am third...HAHAHAHA!!!!!). Steve Howe never got to this--never knew it existed. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Music/band/self: Outstanding. Thank you, Gale Sayers! Here's one for ya: We know that Polygram had access to at least some of the Matrix tapes back in '74. Why the fuck do ya think they didn't release more? Or more exactly, why didn't they release the FIERY stuff that's here? We love it now, but how do you think the audiences reacted to this stuff at the time? </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Oh, most woulda walked out on it for sure, though I wonder if there was a subset audience that dug the Doors, too. They liked the extended stuff, the darkness (as such...), the theatrics, though I'd never accuse Lou of being sophomoric. Don't know how one could hang with the Doors after laying eyes on the Velvets. The jazz cognoscenti walked out on post-'65 Trane, too. Like Bangs wrote, even the fuckers who Like Bangs wrote. even the fuckers who had the records didn’t listen to them. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>The audience for this stuff hadn't been invented yet. But, lotsa folks who saw 'em dug 'em (or say they did NOW). Go fig. Must not have been able to find their recs. (One reason they left Verve.) And, yeah, no comparison between the Doors and the Velvets. The undergraduate acidhead filmmaker wannabe poet and his posse of fallen jazzbos vs the postgrad faux speedfreak electroshock victim cum Great American Novelist with his college chum, frat bro's kid sis, and a player to be named later. Guess who wins? The thing about Lou back then is there WAS no self-conscious stage schtick. (Still isn't.) In fact, as a friend said about the vid of the '93 VU reunion, "Who wants to watch a video of people who DON'T MOVE ONSTAGE?" </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>A basic rock and roll rule: if you're on stage without a goddam instrument, you're a pud. FEW exceptions: early Mick, Ig. NOT an exception: guitarless Lou. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Agree. Even poor old one-lunged Keith Relf had a harmonica. I don't think Roger Daltrey has ever realized what a penis he looked like, in both his blonde-locks-and-fringes-flying or later Jack LaLanne incarnations. The worst part of the vid of the MC5 doing "Kick Out the Jams" on German TV is poor old Rob Tyner and the hangdog expression on his face when he interrupts his whiteguy James Brown wannabe flow and puts the mic cord in his mouth to clap his hands. He looks like Droopy Dawg in a satin shirt with a big Afro! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Ooops--soul singers and Johnny Rotten. Maybe that ISN'T such a good theory!</B><B> </B><B>I swear I just heard a sliver of some old folk melody or even one from a sappy pop-folk song in Lou's solo in "Sister Ray"--part "Parsley, Sage, Rosemary, & Thyme," part Loggins and Messina!!! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>If I didn't know better, I'd swear I just heard the melody to Cale's "Gun" in Yule's bass solo. Incidentally, speaking of Cale, my fave solo alb of his is "Vintage Violence," which reminds me more of "Loaded" than anything else he (or Lou) has done solo </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>No bad thing. Been listening to jazz this weekend and heard quotes of "They don’t wear pants/on the sunny side of France" in three different songs!!! So--is this punk jazz? Does it work as improv? Or does it merely work on sheer 4/4 force? </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I </B><B>think it works as improv. "Free rock." HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I know why you’re laughing, but it’s not funny, ‘cause this is SOMETHING CATS COULD BE WORKING ON NOW THAT THEY JUST WON’T PICK UP ON! I don’t mean any pfucking Phish phfood, either!!! Song-forms get old, but "becoming," being "busy being born," never does!!! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I AGREE WITH YOU! I spent a year trying to do it in '99-2K, and wound up with a tight-assed little combo I couldn't gig anywhere. Feh. It's not just about KNOWLEDGE and UNDERSTANDING, or ABILITY and INTENT; it's about CHEMISTRY, and that you can't arrange. I'm sure This isn't what Lou had in mind when he and Sterl threw in with Cale and Tony Conrad, Manhattan '65. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Now Lou's doing his Sonny Sharrock trip...like shattering slivers of glass. Gawd, I love this stuff! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>You think Lou was aware of Sharrock? I don’t doubt it, since he knew of Coleman, Taylor and Ayler. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Lou/Sharrock: Probably. A big aficionado of jazz (remember his raps with Lester about, uh, HERBIE HANCOCK?) Besides, Sonny played a lotta rock clubs/festivals with Herbie Mann. Mike Haskins from the Nervebreakers remembers seeing 'em at the Texas International Pop Festival, Labor Day Weekend '69, with Johnny Winter and Janis Joplin. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>As INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC, this is about a thousand times better than "Rock and Roll Animal" because of the SYNERGY.</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"Rock and Roll"</B><B>: This is the same version (different mix) as on 1969 LIVE. Talk about uplift and transcendence--as pure as the Beach Boys or Sly Stone, buddy.You can tell Lou believes it (nihilists aren't supposed to believe in anything, I</B><B> </B><B>thought), and he</B><B> </B><B>sure as shooting makes you believe it. Every time I hear it, I know it's the story of my own life: Midwestern boy, trapped in Southwest Missouri, nothing doin', hears the Spinners on the radio and catches the fever of...love and LIFE!!! And I love the false-stop middle: epiphany in musique concrete! As big an up as rock and roll's ever produced... from a supposed rawk darklord! And listen to his rhythm guitar as he takes it home! If that ain't happy, nothing is. Comparable to Jackie Wilson's "(Your Love is Lifting Me) Higher & Higher)," and that ain't faint praise, now! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Lou was no nihilist, his PR to the contrary. There's loads of transcendance and affirmation in the Velvets' music (of which this is the purest example). "Sweet Jane," "Head Held High," "Beginning to See the Light," "What Goes On." </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Hey, I thought you didn't dig the Beach Boys! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Yeah, I like the Beach Boys a lot! And it's no surprise to me about the transcendence; LOADED was the first Velvets record that bit me deep. Just gotta remind anyone still reading, if you know what I mean... </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Their contribution was twofold: up the field as far as the subject matter you could treat in a rock and roll song, and then showing the breadth of expression that's possible with two gtrs, bass, drums. This exercise has helped me to understand why the last 2 bands I was in did Velvet covers. They ARE role models worthy of emulation on two levels: 1) songcraft and 2) The Lock. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Speaking of emulation, the kiddies need to redirect their attention this way. Like I said before, beyond Luna and maybe the Strokes, the Velvets have almost been forgotten again. You couldn’t be more right about songcraft, too--which with THIS Lou Reed means getting outside yourself. In what one would call "rock and roll" today--and my seventh graders look at me weird when I use the word--you don't see that anywhere!</B><B> </B><B>Fittingly, we’re now hearing </B><B>"New Age"</B><B>:</B><B> </B><B>Like you, I LOVE this song (and this is a killer version), but I've never been able to get to the bottom of it. The repeated "Something's got a hold on me/But I don't know what" from the nonplussed swinger, leading into "It's the beginning of a new age" has eluded me for years! An </B><B>au revoir</B><B> to decadence? Seems unlikely. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I remember when Rachel Sweet covered this song. It didn't work...how in the fuck could a 16-year-old girl understand THAT? (I know, I know...Eliot was 19 when he wrote "Prufrock"... which proves my point, actually.) Mighta said this before, but the extended coda is what makes this version for me. The studio version ends just as it's getting started. The "something" can mean whatever you want it to. Part of what makes the song great. Lou makes you tie up your own loose ends. I mean, REALLY...who wrote songs like this in '69??? </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Nobody</B><B> wrote songs like this, not even Dylan. You were mourning Lou’s loss of vocal power and commitment earlier, but, aside from "Street Hassle," his ability to invent characters, get inside them, and empathize with their plight might be the biggest loss. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I keep forgetting about "Street Hassle," but the title suite really does rank alongside Lou's finest (altho I think the rest of the alb is a steaming piece of shit..."I Wanna Be Black" indeed). That makes TWO great recs the Bruce Springsteen appears on (the other one: Dictators' "Bloodbrothers"). </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Most rock'n'roll songwriting is characterized by solipsism, which gets pretty tiresome to listen to after awhile, even when it's brilliant (Sex Pistols). One reason I habitually ignore lyrics, I guess. That's one of the colossal ironies of rock'n'roll IMO. The ability to empathize with others is pretty much a characteristic of adults...most teenagers don't have it. Neither do most rock'n'roll songsmiths. That's what makes Dylan, Lou, and a small handful of others (Mick and Keef around "Let It Bleed" time, who else?) stand out in such brilliant relief. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"This is a very interesting song." Lou sounds like he doesn't know what it's about either (actually I think he was still figuring it out at this point). Either that, or he's just not telling. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>"Black Angel’s Death Song"</B><B>: Speaking of Dylan, here's Lou's very own "Subterranean Homesick Blues" (mighta said that earlier)...his most interesting experiment with lyrical form until "The Murder Mystery." </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Thought I’d miss Cale’s fiddle here, but damned if Yule doesn’t make you forget it with some </B><B>very </B><B>witty organ. I even here some Baby Cortez and James Booker in there. Whatta song to go carnivalesque on!</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Incredible but true: This version of </B><B>"Waiting for the Man"</B><B> is actually the SAME arrangement as on the studio version, but because it's played so slowly, it lasts 11:37 instead of 2:30. No fooling! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Initially, I hated this, but now it's sucked me in...in the tradition of Warhol's film of the Empire State Building, it fucking makes </B><B>you</B><B> wait, too. HAHAHAHA! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>It is insidious, isn’t it? </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Now, I'm in the midst of the glorious </B><B>"Ride Into the Sun,"</B><B> which actually does ride into the sunset. Mighta been a more apt end to the box, rather than another "Sister Ray," you know. Yule's vocal (that was Yule, right?)was nicely limpid-- prefiguring Beat Happening and Luna more than Lou's vocals do. That's funny. Maybe he had a lasting impact--I doubt it. Just coincidence, I'm sure. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Another great song, and another one where the extended coda is worth the price of admission. Hey, do we know what's good, or what??? And you're right...it IS Doug singing this one! And here I thought Lou sang everything on this set. Feh. As for the third </B><B>"Sister Ray,"</B><B> sure, the smiling folks at Polygram coulda omitted it, but then this disc would only have clocked in at 50 minutes and change, and they wanna give us value for money. I strongly support its inclusion (and 78+ minute discs). Somebody alert those other folks at Sony, who are STILL releasing 2-CD sets with a total time under 80 minutes. Shame! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Terrible to draw conclusions like this, but I think the REAL black turtleneck wearer in the group was Cale. After he left, the warmth, humanity, and groove could emerge. Just a theory. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I think you're right! Maybe Lou was right to jettison him, if that's the word. "No more art-fag shuffle, boys! Time to get down to "what happens in the street"! HAHAHAHA! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Listening to Lou's solo on the Washington Uni "Sister Ray" that sounds like a muezzin calling the faithful. Jayzus! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>This one's a little more faithful to the original--even sound quality-wise. Is that the audience fucking </B><B>clapping</B><B>? Reminds me of a live recording of Haggard I have where he sings "I turned twenty-one in prison" and the stadium crowd's clapping on the on-beat like a bunch of trained seals getting ready for a public clubbing! It might just be Mo.</B><B> </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Yeah, the pulse stays the same throughout this rendition (taped several months before the San Francisco shows that comprise the bulk of the set), but the EVENTS that take place over/around it are just as varied as the Family Dog and Matrix versions. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Actually, the sound quality on this one's pretty abysmal. Then again, so's the original studio...it's just LOUDER. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Y'know, I was an asshole to complain about this "Sister Ray"!!! I'm not sure if it doesn't top the original at its own game! Lou's certainly a little more open-minded as a guitarist, and I'm more and more impressed with Yule's organ playing on this (he was funny AND amazing on "The Black Angel's Death Song"). Sterling's chunka-chunkas choogle with the best of CCR. And Reed--through a little chuckle--acknowledges the ridiculousness of the lyrics...FINALLY! And what a perfect segue! Right into </B><B>"Foggy Notion"</B><B>--wouldn't you have given your eye-teeth to have been there? And right when you're thinking you're heading for boogie land, the man in front whips out his dirty lead and cuts through the fog. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Why do I keep waiting to hear him starting singing "Take me to the river?" </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>'Cause it’s a king-hell </B><B>religious</B><B> experience, that’s why! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>So how would you sum this up in 50 words or less? </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>That's a tall order. But it's Step One in documenting the most successful experimental band in rock history doing their thing like nobody else could. I guess I'm curious, given the "Volume One" of the title, why they started at the end, but no matter. This is a group that fucked with the program, but never failed to rock and roll, and changed everything afterwards, though it was a bit of a delayed reaction. That's an attitude we need , so the benighted need to </B><B>listen up</B><B>! The lesson? </B><B>To hell with being like them: you're NOT like everybody else, can't be if you tried, so you might as well find some friends, "purge all your rock," as Mike Watt used to say, and create from scratch. Listen for the groove, and when you're flowing as one, scrape those strings JUST FOR THE HELL OF IT, to see how it'll sound! </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Also, as we've said, this basically replaces 1969 LIVE--hard as it is for me to say it to an "old lover"--and at an economical price. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Couldn't agree more. What's key here is that there was no roadmap or template for what these people were doing. They invented their own universe, from the ground up. The way to replicate their achievement (if that's possible) is NOT to study their sound and style, but to try and emulate their daring. </B></div> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>Dr. Filth and the Reverend Coomers Wax Ecstatic</B></div> <div> <B>over Dylan’s </B><B>“Love and Theft”</B><B> <A NAME="dylan_dialectic"><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="1x1.gif" HEIGHT="1" ALIGN="bottom" WIDTH="1" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" ></A></B></div> <bR> <div> <B>     Dr. Filth (a happy escapee from Columbia, Misery, who currently graces Asheville, NC, with a killer record store and jukebox brain) speaks Dylanese better than anyone I know. Dylan changed my life, it’s never been wise to bring him up in party conversation when I’m around, but the Good Doctor’s so eloquent he makes me seem a ventriloquist dummy </B><B>sans</B><B> ventriloquist. Recently, he suggested a “jam” review of Dylan’s new “Love and Theft,” which hit stores the morning the planes hit the towers, which is where our “jam” begins. I’m leaning, Filth is standing up straight.     </B></div> <div> <B>     </B></div> <div> <B>     Y'know, I felt sheepish driving to Streetside yesterday (September 11) at 9:35 am already knowing what had happened: "A fucking horrorshow disaster, and you're priority is getting the new Dylan album?" (I mentioned this to Kevin when I got there, and he replied, "At least you have your priorities in order.") But, yeah, maybe I needed a parable or two. It occurred to me, of course, that the record was gonna be a marker for me. Yet I can't say I was able to stay focused my first listen-through, beyond the voice and its utter comfort in being embedded in the (MIGHTY FINE!) music giving me some legs when I got home from work. </B></div> <div> <B>     Still haven't had a chance to let the lyrics sink in, but how 'bout we kick this jam off? One thing I'm really enjoying is how effervescent and light on his feet the old man's sounding. Aside from a few moments on </B><B>Time Out of Mind</B><B> and several on the Wilburys albums, one thing that's been missing since, hell, </B><B>New Morning</B><B> (which "Bye and Bye" wonderfully recalls) , is a sense of fun, a sense of humor, a sense of ease, and it's all over </B><B>"Love and Theft."</B><B> You think this maybe has something to do with renewed confidence? A critically hosannahed record and an Oscar might just make you feel as if you're not running a race against your old self (or selves) anymore. That, and he seems to have completely extricated himself from hack producers and trial-and-error strategies and settled into a sound (Garnier  seems to me a big key to that). In other words, he's in control; one thing this one proves is Lanois wasn't the reason </B><B>Time Out of Mind</B><B> was/seemed so great. And it really is sound, not style, 'cause he's all over the map in that sense on </B><B>"Love and Theft"</B><B> but it's of a piece. I also remember thinking around the time of </B><B>Empire Burlesque</B><B>, as a lot of fans probably were, that if he wasn't totally lost for real, he might be able to find his way out by getting back in touch with the verities, which he's been working at on record since </B><B>Good as I Been to You</B><B> and on stage since, well, you'd know better than I would. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>     I think it's about an equal split between having a load of renewed confidence and being half past give a shit -- what blows my mind most beautifully about this album is how far the performer is letting it all hang out. From the rawness of the production and the vocals to the bad, bad jokes to the loose feeling on a lot of the tracks, Dylan sounds like most of his cares and hang ups simply don't matter that much anymore. A lot of this has to do with the fact that he no longer has anything to prove -- it is no longer a concern for his fans or himself that he may not "deliver" again, that either side has to settle for something second rate. Having left his legacy largely behind in a series of scorched earth instrumental passages from 92-96, Dylan has freed himself of any obligations to his past, his untapped potential tickets, his record company. His only remaining obligation is to himself. He don't carry no dead weight. I cannot remember a Dylan album that has more of the man himself on it -- there's not really any new persona on this record, no new mask to hide behind. This is the real deal, not some director's chair stance or actor's mark, but some crazy old guy with the world's worst mustache croaking and creaking and crowing into the microphone about the world and how he sees it -- absurd, glorious, foul, fecund. I love the "well" at the beginning of "Honest with Me", the overstuffed disregard for meter, the way the melodies stretch and break and find new perches during even the more readymade tunes. He never stops singing during the verses of "Summer Days", just stands up there and lets it all come tumbling breakneck out. It is worth noticing that, on "Sugar Baby", he finally acknowledges that there might even be a rightful place in the world for the bootleggers who have done so much to keep his name and legacy alive during the last ten years especially, even if he eventually tells them they're brainless. A Dylan that no longer cares about rip off artists and theives is a new Dylan indeed, and one one with a much lower blood pressure I'm sure. </B></div> <div> <B>     While </B><B>Time Out of Mind</B><B> was a deep and horrifying look into the abyss of modern isolation and alienation, an album about a lone man on the road not so much searching for meaning as dealing with the fact that there was none to be had, </B><B>Love and Theft</B><B> is much more like life as I experience it -- there are highs with the lows, joys counterbalance the pain. The profound, lilting groove of "Floater (Too Much to Ask)" eventually caves into some extremely harsh realities about the nature of abandoned dreams and personal sacrifice, but it does so in, oh, what the hell, a very Mark Twain kind of a way -- the gentle humor of Grampa duck trapper, Romeo and Juliet's dialog, and the love of a second cousin sit very realistically next to the stagnant relationship of his ma and pa, the pathetic loserism of the boss's hanger-on, and the curiously disturbing line "burns with the bark still on". </B></div> <div> <B>     "Floater" was an early favorite when I was listening to the album, largely because of its evocation of Louis Armstrong tunes, circa his early RCA recordings in the 1930s -- the way he drops his voice on certain end lines, like "Old young, age don't carry weight/It doesn't matter in the end" and "Sometimes it's just plain stupid to get into any kind of wind" (a relevant reminder for this here jam session) convey the depth of assurance and peace that very few musical artists ever bother to get to. </B></div> <div> <B>     This album bears a different kind of authority from the omnipotent voice that drives "It's All Right Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)" or the smart ass who pulled out all the stops on "Subterranean Homesick Blues". This guy has heard it all before, and now he's preaching peace and harmony, the blessings of tranquility, even as the high water rises past his knees. The album's aphorisms, as I hear them so far, are buried between one liners and vocal bedazzlements. "You can always come back, but you can't come back all the way" comes before you've recovered from the way he sings "the emptiness is endless". "As great as you are man, you'll never be greater than yourself" gets lost in the face of the who gives a shit "I told her I didn't really care". "Funny the things you have the hardest time parting with are the things you need the least" in "Lonesome Day Blues" gets double wiped in the face of the way he sings "need" and then that stupid, simple, totally strutting six note riff. In the early days of listening to the record, when the primary glory is having such a great new bunch of Bob Dylan tunes to listen to, too many to absorb or talk coherently about, especially in the face of all that goddamn horror and death, I've spent most it being out of breath. </B></div> <div> <B>     And glory be, when has a 60 year old man ever released an album that rocked harder than this one -- I'm askin', here, Rev -- you know more about the old folks than me. I mean, "Honest with Me" steps up and stomps all over the Rolling Stones -- they couldn't play a groove this loose or do riffs this authoritative on a bet. Words I'd love to eat but I'm afeard I'm gonna have to stand by. No way are they or anyone else smacking of authority or coming up in the ranks gonna let this loose, show this many cards, or hang it out this far, this wet, any time soon. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>     </B><B>One of the first things that struck me about </B><B>"Love and Theft"</B><B> was that Dylan was letting it all hang out to the extent that he's able. Like you said, no mask--or at least he's pulled it down to reveal a cracked grin. And what one sees is really not all that surprising: a complicated, brilliant, sly (and randy!) old hustler who's been everywhere and feels like talking about it. It's almost like a summing up, and not just musically, because every persona he's ever adopted is represented (well, the "folksinger" is only accounted for on the limited edition bonus cuts). As Robert Christgau suggested, another self-portrait. </B></div> <div> <B>     Did it occur to you that this is one of the few times he's worked with essentially the same band two studio albums in a row since, well, the last time I remember is </B><B>Slow Train</B><B> and </B><B>Saved</B><B>? Working bands--and this one, at least in a partial configuration, is/has been on the road with him--can make one helluva big difference on a guy's connection with his music and audience. He's feeling that and it's feeding him. This group's more understated than the Hawks, but, like them, it moves when he moves as he moves. One organism. For rock and roll, you just can't beat it. I think of, of course, the Stones, the pre-LSD Beatles, Lou Reed's </B><B>Blue Mask/Legendary Hearts</B><B> band, Motown's Funk Brothers, Wolf's Chess studio band of the mid-to-late '50s, Rod the Mod's early unit, Basie's Kansas City group, the Mekons when they're on, the list goes on and on, and these guys fit right in. They do kick the Stones' Milk of Magnesia asses, though, for statements by sixty-year-olds, Muddy Waters' </B><B>Hard Again</B><B> matches it tit for tat (another great band). </B></div> <div> <B>     And you made a great point about how he's connecting with your own life as lived (rather than imagined...or feared). Neither one of us are spring chickens, but we're a long way from dead, these are troubled times, and we're trying to keep afloat in flood waters. Being able to articulate such things for the bemused is what helped make his legend to begin with, and (we were speaking of parables before) he's regained that knack of seeming to speak straight to you, straight from within, and straight to the world at large simultaneously, without being pretentious, obvious, or didactic. Personally, I'm glad to see the cranky misogynistic Old Testament preacher move on down the line, though, again, traces of that persona are in the mix. It's amazing what consistent and deep contact with comrades can do to your attitude; again, I give credit to the relationship he's forged with his band. The first time I really became aware of the development (I'm sure it started earlier, but I don't see him live nearly as much as you) was the </B><B>Unplugged</B><B> show, where the interaction and sympathy and anticipation were the highlights. </B></div> <div> <B>     As I check the sleeve notes, the theory about the band's a little half-cocked--only Garnier's on the last four releases (counting </B><B>"Things Have Changed"</B><B>),Meyer's on the last two studio albums, the drummer only plays on one cut on </B><B>Time Out of Mind</B><B>, and the steel player's only on </B><B>Time</B><B> and </B><B>Unplugged</B><B>--but what the fuck. That's what it sounds like. The man's getting the sound in his mind on record.</B><B> </B><B>Love them twinned guitars:  Sexton and/or Campbell doin' the Michael Bloomfield Rag. Also, I love the way Dylan's always-quirky piano peeks out from between the cracks on the ballads. Lyrics: my God, there's nary a false word! And the funniest moments usually involve self-deprecation! Those lines about painting himself into corners, being a washed-up old star, repeating the past, having his back to the wall so long it's stuck, sitting on his watch, not being greater than himself (??!!), dying before he goes senile all reveal how much a kick he's getting out of himself. You know, you mentioned that he's half-past giving a shit, but I'd argue that's how he's miraculously managed (probably aimed ) to sound. One of his oldest and best tricks. The unmistakable care and thought he's put into the music and the lyrics (no matter how spontaneous they sound or would look on the page) distinguish him from (talk about half-past giving a shit--I love that phrase) the (gall) Stones. It used to be said that he always wanted to write a simple pop ditty, which he did manage to do </B><B>("Rita</B><B> </B><B>Mae," "I'll Be Your Baby Tonight"</B><B>); here, he's actually written a simple pop standard </B><B>("Moonlight"</B><B>) that Satchmo himself could have sung!</B><B> </B></div> <div> <B>     </B><B>I've been reading Nick Tosches' </B><B>Where Dead Voices Gather</B><B> and Dylan's all over its pages. He writes of Dylan breaking the Seventh Seal of rock and roll with </B><B>Highway 61</B><B> </B><B>Revisited</B><B>, and even has a kind word for </B><B>"Shot of Love"</B><B>; I've always suspected the critical take on his "gospel" stuff would undergo revision, but I never thought Tosches would be the one to anticipate it, if it does in fact happen. More to the point, some passages dovetail so uncannily with </B><B>"Love and Theft"</B><B> that they must have had a sit-down. I shit you not--read it. Anyhow, Tosches, in rearticulating an idea he's been obsessed with since the beginning of his career, lauds Dylan (and Jimmie Rodgers, and the early bluesmen) as being able to pluck eternal strains and howls from the wind. I notice how, in one song, Dylan's keeping his ear to the wind for something big to come that never does, in another, counsels against getting into one of any kind (is it starting to blow now!), and in yet another is keeping a close eye on the dust. Then there's the allusions/references to Patton, Johnson (lyrically in "High Water" and musically in "Cry A While"), Elmore James, Emmett Miller, Billie Holiday, which in continuity with </B><B>Time Out of Mind</B><B> are as hard to keep up with as the samples on </B><B>Paul's Boutique</B><B>. So maybe there IS a persona after all: the medium.</B><B> </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>     I agree that "the medium" is indeed the message on this album -- Bob Dylan is a sum total of the music he's absorbed and the truths about life he's heard in song. There is no way to catalog all the references -- but "Look up, look up, see your maker before Gabriel blows his horn" is, I think, a reference to Lonnie Johnson's classic blues, which has variations in the pop catalog from Sinatra to Bobby Darin and beyond. "Just as sure as you're living/just as sure as your born . . ." and then that, in summation. All the old verities get played out in 20th century music, usually the stuff that exists just below the level of popular discourse. Bob Dylan knows that, as sure as any of us musical scholars and enthusiasts do at some level, but on </B><B>“Love and Theft</B><B>” he articulates it in a way that those of us who devote books, record stores and web sites to it can only hope to attempt. I'd argue that this is indeed the guy himself -- when I say he's have past giving a shit, I don't mean he doesn't care -- I just don't think he's trying to impress anyone anymore, except maybe to give his beloved band mates a few kicks. The Stones, they go into the studio and WORK; they try so hard, and apply so much craft, and the product, it comes out sterile. They're not in there because they can't stop the music raining down on their heads -- they're in there because that's where they're supposed to be. And not one honest, true thing escapes their hips, lips, or fingertips. There is no doubt that the guy on this record believes everything he is saying and wouldn't take it back if you asked him -- and the bluntness of the language on the record, no matter how elegantly presented, only adds to that effect. "The ladies down in darktown/They do the darktown strut" is such a bald and bare assertion of fact (not to mention a great reference!) that it's kind of shocking. (and "Always got to be prepared/but you never know for what"(!) is stunningly good advice post September 11.). </B></div> <div> <B>     Another great band I'm reminded of is of course the Sir Douglas Quintet, and I think it's time we bring old man Sahm into the picture here. Naturally, there's a strong connection considering the presence of Augie Meyers, who syncopates his organ throughout all of the uptempo tunes with just the right jass and lifts and enlivens with the most appropriate Bob Dylan sound in history -- a perfect daffy right there counterpart to the man's voice. He's always been looking for the perfect organ player -- the second best was Garth Hudson, who was indeed mad but a shade too academic for wild colonial Bob. Augie's good old boy primitivism is more perfect if less dazzling -- there is no reason in the world except for maybe his health that he shouldn't be in Bob's touring band. The great thing about the Sir Douglas Quintet Mercury albums is how far they hang out -- talk about never really gave a shit in the first place. Once Doug goes over to Atlantic he loses the plot -- a lot, because, I think, Ahmet Ertegun convinced him he should be "applying himself" something better. I mean, Doug, man, you're so great, but nobody buys your records, and you're like a genius, so you should be a star! Doug Sahm and the SDQ were at their best when Doug was singing about virtually nothing and everything at the same time -- "Oh, here's another song I wrote about how it was really freaky when I went to San Francisco but I'm back in Texas now and that blows my mind further still!" The greatest moments of Doug Sahm's Mercury years (too many to mention in one place, but summed up on the entirety of </B><B>The Return of Doug Saldaña</B><B> and the lost track "Funky Side of Your Mind") are of a piece with the triumphs on </B><B>“Love and Theft”</B><B> -- carefully thought out goofs, devil may care arrangements, bizarre lyrical situations puntuated with aphorisms both vague and deep, great simple musicianship and of course the organ of Augie Meyers. The only difference is, Ahmet was right -- on almost all the Mercury LPs there is a sense of a man "wasting his talents", not working hard enough, not quite "living up to his full potential". This is part of the essential charm of Doug Sahm, and part of his tragedy as well, and certainly one reason for the glory of his greatest recorded moments. On </B><B>“Love and Theft”</B><B> Bob Dylan seems to be fully living up to his potential while at the same time telling his listeners to lighten up and live a little. It was always Doug Sahm's message to the world, and I'm pleased that at least on some level, he seems eulogized on the latest Bob Dylan record. </B></div> <div> <B>     The whole theory about Dylan following the sound of music seems to be bolstered by the line "His master's voice is calling me", references the old RCA logo based on the whole Nipper thing and extends back to the beginning to "recorded time". And really, that line in Mississippi that goes "Walking through the leaves falling from the trees" is out of hand great. Also, Trixie Welles pointed out to me that while </B><B>Time Out of Mind</B><B> is as dry as a bone -- the only water that appears on the record is Dylan's tears, </B><B>“Love and Theft</B><B>” is permeated with water -- water everywhere. I like that. </B></div> <div> <B>     </B><B>Uh, let's see -- Let's go for five Quibbles: If I must whine about the record at all it is thus: A) I think “Summer Days” is a better opener but I'm getting over that. B) I think he loses the plot on what he's writing about halfway through “Bye and Bye” and the song wanders off on him. Esp. since the first half is so great. Love that Augie. C) No harmonica. If the Bob could blow like the Jagger he should have tried it on “Honest with Me.” But then, this is a guitar player's record, so I see why it's gone. See below. D) Uh, I can't think of any more . . . </B></div> <div> <B>     Faves: “FLOATER,” “Po Boy,” “Lonesome Day Blues,” “Highwater,” “Mississippi,” “Summer Days.” </B></div> <div> <B>     A friend of mine says: I took it to a skeptical Dylan fan friend of mine and told him it was unfathomably good, then I left him alone with it for a while. Three hours later he came downstairs and knocked on my door. He'd gone out and bought a copy for himself. Told me: This is not unfathomably good -- this is unfathomably great. </B></div> <div> <B>     You're also right to mention the weaving guitars as being the heart of the record. Strikes me that while </B><B>Time Out of Mind</B><B> is forever Garnier's (the heart of the band renaissance and the only one still around from the days with GE Smith -- probably his most sympathetic and certainly longest consistent collaborauteur ever) this one belongs solidly to the guitar players. They are wild on this record -- it's great how the playing slowly emerges on “Floater,” the blues licks are so tops and so restrained on the vamp tunes, and the rockabilly is just ridiculously good. Neither blues nor rockabilly are played with too much reverence, thank god and of course, and the results too too fine. That stop time tempo thing on “Cry Awhile” is awesome! </B></div> <div> <B>     And an aside on Garnier -- Dylan has always needed a great bass player to help him out. I think of Rick Danko and Rob Stoner (the Rolling Thunder guy and the key to the momentum of those shows) and whoever it is that plays bass on John Wesley Harding. Without Tony I almost think Bob would be dead. So let's all take a shot to Tony Garnier for pulling the old fart's fat out of the fire! </B></div> <div> <B>     I think my favorite thing about this record is the fact that it's got an awful lot of stuff about bad jokes and sex on it. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>     </B><B>Y'know, I just can't stop listening to the record. I'm on listen 12 or 13 in 9 days.You can't get to the bottom of it. Reminds me of, uh, </B><B>Highway 61</B><B> or </B><B>The Basement Tapes</B><B>. Good god. Faves: </B><B>"High Water," "Po' Boy," "Floater," "Cry</B><B> </B><B>Awhile," "Moonlight."</B><B> But there IS nothing weak. Or even simply good. </B></div> <div> <B>     Faith pays off, doesn't it? Sometimes? </B></div> <div> <B>     You mentioned that you sold a Dylan skeptic on the record. I tried the same thing with my buddy Ken Shimamoto (he's saving up for the Velvets box, so he's waiting). Bob's turned a lot of long-time fans into naysayers with his last quarter-century of antics, specifically lapses into unintentional self-parody, grousing around in a fog, retreat into religion. What I tried to convince Ken (an ex-reservist and battle vet) was that "Love and Theft" has guided me through this mess better than my own head and heart. What Dylan has to say about getting up and over, about facing massive levee breaks on the River of Shit, about love in the midst of numbered days is just what a lot of people need right now, instead of opportunistic patriotism, religious fanaticism (say, didn't that have something to do with the attack?), knee-jerk vengeance, and excuses for bigotry. So what would you say if you had one shot to hook a non-believer (is this religion?) up with the record? </B><B>     </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>     I have been telling the naysayers pretty much what you just wrote: You need this album right now to help you through this mess. When it came in on the 11th (vinyl only, my CDs were delayed) I played it again and again and again. TW asked me to just keep playing it -- thought it was the best thing that we could do in the circumstances and indeed it was. I felt like “Mississippi” and “Lonesome Day Blues” and “High Water” were the ones that made the most sense to me, and my lighter favorites were sort of blown away. “Mississippi” in particular was pure consolation, so sad and yet so spirited at the same time. I think he told David Fricke the song contained "knifelike lyrics trying to convey majesty and heroism". . . and the majesty and heroism would seem to be keeping on and living well, honestly, and responsibly (even though that one friggin' mistake will kill ya.) His wit, his ingenuity, his dedication to his craft is completely inspiring and admirable in this time when many are experiencing a lost sense of purpose. This is a very healthy album - good for you and fun, too. What will I tell people in three years? Probably that it is the funniest Dylan album since </B><B>The Basement Tapes</B><B> and therefore essential listening. To me its humor, more than anything, is proof of his return to form -- people forget or apologize for how funny the early Dylan albums are, but that is what makes them so wonderful. Watching the early translations/ear transcriptions of the lyrics to </B><B>“Love and Theft”</B><B> come in at dylanerd.com and seeing them try to turn the room service joke into something "significant" was really funny. People prefer the more "serious" </B><B>Time Out of Mind</B><B> Dylan, I think, but not me. </B></div> <div> <B>     </B></div> <div> <B>      Another thing that struck me in your last volley was a remark you made about "Bye and Bye." I noticed a lot of similar digressions on other tracks, but it reminds me of another oft-voiced theory that I think holds here a lot of the time: a song as simply a vehicle to hang ideas upon, like a Christmas tree in that the ornaments aren't an organic part of the structure itself. I don't mean that as caveat; it works for me. "Sugar Baby," for instance, at first seems to be another last-cut Dylan kiss-off: "Sugar baby, get on down the road/You ain't got no brains nohow" and "There's no end to the trouble that/Women can bring" (the misogynist poking through), but hang in a little longer and not only do the lyrics seem to be about navigating the abyss without becoming a 'borg, the tone of the music and especially his singing is one of deep sympathy. Has anyone ever sung so artfully and with so much detail with so few physical gifts and so much phlegm hanging on his larynx?</B></div> <div> <B>     </B><B>Another Bobophile from Alabama wrote me suggesting Leonard Cohen comparisons, picking up, I think, the same consistent notes of self-mockery I've been hearing--you may be able to enlighten me, but I don't recall this strain anywhere in Dylan's work before. I take it as a sign that, after immersing himself in country blues for two records and wandering to the highlands to vent his loneliness and alienation on </B><B>Time Out of Mind</B><B>, he's not only gotten back to the base--all the way, in spite of what he says if not means on</B><B> "Love and Theft"</B><B>--he's...grown up. Better late than never. His self-righteousness hasn't always been easy for me to swallow, much less the unconverted. Telling jokes on yourself is one hell of a great antidote, and it's a gift that only time can give. There's no reason now to doubt that he can write, sing, and play at this level until it's his time to go see Elvis.</B></div> <div> <B>     </B></div> <div> <B>      Not only is he experimenting with self-deprecation (I would refer you to “Handy Dandy” off of </B><B>Under the Red Sky</B><B> as just one instance of Dylan directing his sarcastic charm at himself without devastating self-loathing) he's also experimenting with deference as well. His "standing on the table proposing a toast to the King" is a great shout out to Elvis, and I'm always glad to see Big Joe Turner hanging out on the corner of Wilbert Harrison's old block whenever “Highwater” comes on, even if he does seem to be in the middle of an existential crisis. The self deprecation is of course very well countered by the fact that album is simply loaded to the gills with boasts. If "I can write you poems make a strong man lose his mind" is one righteous rap, is "I'm no pig without a wig" a surrealist undercut? This connects up with the rambling nature of the songs, which rarely make it from point a to point b without changing four or five times before they end. "Lonesome Day Blues" starts with him bummed out and lonely and ends with him triumphant, undefeated. Once again, a lot like real life, where emotions and thoughts and states of being replace each other halfway through sentences in conversation. The songs really are blues, and the lyrics are a lot of times only tentatively and moodily connected to one another -- which is how they are most of the time on </B><B>Highway 61 Revisited</B><B>. “Bye and Bye” wanders farther afield than it should in order to maintain its charming Ink Spots structure, and it sounds like he starts writing </B><B>Time Out of Mind</B><B> about halfway through it. This is the only number, however, where I feel like his rambling takes him away from the road he's on.</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>     </B><B>Dr. Filth, I appreciate you taking the time to</B><B> </B><B>celebrate, as it were, our man’s triumph with me. If you’ll excuse me, I gotta go listen to the damn thing again.</B></div> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>