We write about the songs that make the whole world sing, we write about the songs of love and special things, we write about the songs that make the young girls cry, we write about the songs, we write about the songs.
One of the clichés of the modern world is the metal band playing a pop classic. It's been done. Today Josefina pointed out to me a case of the same man taking his 70s ballad and turning it into metallic shit. Yes, a big steel turd.
I always remember Johnny Halliday for popping up in my French GCSE exam. He wasn't invigilating, there was merely a reading comprehansion article about him. Other things you may not know about Johnny: he once recorded an album of songs specially written by U2; he hired the Small Faces in 1969 to record his Riviere album; the Jimi Hendrix Experience's first gig was opening for Johnny in 1966; in 2006 his application for Belgian citizenship was turned down; and he has the world's largest collection of cookie jars.
(the continuation of my response to the Hendrix post below)
I own some Soft Machine, but only cos Mojo magazine insisted they were important. I think you had to be there. I imagine at some point in the next ten or twenty years, I'll listen through without being - frankly - bored.
You have become confused in your pop recollection, by the way. Shipbuilding was Robert Wyatt. I reckon you're thinking of him when you say Robert Fripp, who was not in Soft Machine but in King Crimson, my Uncle Graham's favourite band. My brother loves Robert Wyatt. I love Robert Fripp for these two reasons, among others:
I was watching one of those rock biography films last night of the type that should appear on the Hallmark channel but in this case appeared on VH1. You know the type, like the one which imagines what the conversation might have gone like when Paul McCartney and John Lennon met up in New York in 1975, with actors with a passing resemblance to the people in question and questionable accents. This particular one was about Jimi Hendrix, although the filmmakers didn't appear to have obtained the rights to include any Jimi Hendrix songs, so had him singing "Like A Rolling Stone" in a Hendrix styley, and also recreating the Wild Thing guitar burning bit. It was so dull, I switched over to Ray on the other channel, but even heroin and the devil's music couldn't keep me from going to bed.
Before turning over, I noted with curiosity that The Jimi Hendrix Experience once toured with The Soft Machine in support. The Soft Machine, who may even be called plain Soft Machine, is a band that has frequently piqued my interest, though never enough to bother watching anything on Youtube or download any of their songs illegally. Even now, in what is by all rights a Soft Machine post, I can't be bothered to look for videos, although this is mostly down to knowing that you'll have something up your sleeve and my being at work.
This much I know about The Soft Machine: 1. Robert Fripp was in them, and he's supposed to be this really good guitarist who features frequently in magazines like "Guitarist Monthly". 2. They were named after a William Burroughs novel. I used to be interested in William Burroughs, back in my subversive days, but the film for Naked Lunch was just a bit too boring. 3. Brian Eno might have had something to do with them, or I'm just making that up to suggest some tie-in with my previous post. 4. The chap in the wheelchair who sang "Shipbuilding" was in them too.
So as you can see, I'm at a bit of a loss and would appreciate any assistance. In return, I can tell you that Stars who Play with Laughing Sam's Dice was a b-side to Burning of the Midnight Lamp, the title includes a reference to LSD and to STP, and in common with most songs off Smash Hits, it brings back fond memories of my first girlfriend, Lucy.
Dear Daniel,
If Stars That Play... was the B-side of Burning of the Midnight Lamp, then that's my two favourite Hendrix moments in one concise package. If they'd put Crosstown Traffic and Fire (or just the comedy "let Jimi take over..." bit) in the run-off grooves, that would be the only Hendrix record I'd listen to.
I want to continue this reply as a new post, so that I can bring more attention to one of my favourite guitarists... it'll be Bowie's Fashion.
Dear James,
You don´t like Hendrix? All this time, and you never told me.
I was just thinking, it's been three weeks since we posted a serious video. So I was going to post Glen Campbell's I Guess I'm Dumb, seeing as it was written by Brian Wilson, but I've already shown you that during our two weeks of live blogging, and I have nothing more to say about it although I've at least managed to fill up one paragraph before I try to think of something to say about Boyce and Hart, which frankly I'm going to crib from Wikipedia anyway. And it's something I've already told you as well.
So, Boyce and Hart first of all provided the inspiration for Mike Myer's wardrobe in Austin Powers, but that's a given. I like how they make it look like an album cover at the start. What I didn't know, and judging by this clip I'm not sure anyone knew, was that they wrote Last Train to Clarksville. AND that Last Train to Clarksville was a Vietnam song, Clarksville being the station troops went to to catch the cheap flights to Ho Chi Minh City, probably.
Boyce and Hart also wrote the Monkees b-side and old-favourite "Words" for The Leaves, who were the first band to release Hey Joe as a rock standard, whatever that means. As I told you on the bus to Iguazú, "Words" is a song about haemmorhoids, although I can´t remember the punchline for that one. I once lost a five pound bet to first girlfriend Lucy over the authorship of "Hey Joe". I said it was Hendrix, she said it was Billy Roberts. Turns out she wasn't completely right.
Dear Daniel,
Oh God, if ever there was inspiration for tireless search and research for the secret of time travel, it's poor Bobby Hart's expression throughout this video. He should stay at home and enjoy the PRS. Nobody should make him stand in front of a camera dressed like that, moving like that and slightly, awkwardly smiling like that. His left foot tries to make a break for it at 2'14", before the trousers put a stop to it.
Thankfully, we have a tasteful modern version made cleverly in one shot by the funny guy from the IT Crowd, Mighty Boosh and Time Trumpet, Richard Ayoade...
... which goes to show, of course, that we're a lot more wise and intelligent now than anyone was in the 60s. Stanley Unwin aside.
And just to prove that I listen to what you say, it was "words with lies inside: piles." Far more intelligent, you see, far more wise.
Happy New Year, although I see you haven't yet finished 2008 by putting up your songs of the year. I've got my friend Ian in one ear and Bill Drummond in the other telling me to listen to Peter Green-era Fleetwood Mac. I've just finished the latter's 45 and there's a bit towards the end where he talks about meeting an ageing Peter Green on a plane. I'd copy the relevant parts here for you, but I can never find the bits I'm looking for. I could start highlighting interesting parts with a pencil, but then I'd be one of those people who highlights interesting parts of books with a pencil. The same goes for Alwyn W. Turner's Crisis? What Crisis? Britain in the 1970s which I read before Drummond. I'm sacrificing my own wisdom for the preservation of books I'll never read again.
Anyway, back to the music, and I thought we'd start 2009 with a song from 1969. This is the best of the bunch of Fleetwood Mac songs I was instructed to check out, and even then I'm not that impressed. Sounds a bit like Cat Stevens. I could've posted Albatross, the best instrumental since Telstar, says Drummond. But it just sounds a bit dreary and one of those songs that fails to make an impression after so many years hearing on the radio. I bit like masturbating with the same hand all your life, but not really like that at all.
Other songs rejected from this post are the Mac's Oh Well and Green Manalishi but they're just not hitting the spot this afternoon. In fact that Telstar video was probably the most entertaining of the bunch. Sorry, Ian and Bill.
Dear Daniel and James (Ian writes),
Pace Peter Green, you aren't listening to the exquisite music of his guitar-playing: the dynamics, the melodic genius, the unfailing rhythmic sense, the studied but felt blues classicism, the tension between the rehearsed and the improvised, the quiet life-or-death drama, not to mention his voice.
This clip of an improvised concert moment might change your mind (don't look at the white man; listen to the soul of blues.) The lyrics ("gotta keep my feet on the ground, etc.") are tragic in light of his later illness. I'd say he's the second best R&B/Rock guitarist of the 60s after Hendrix.
James and Daniel, or Jim and Danny to an unfortunate few, were going to be like the old men who ran 78 Records in Stockport, but writing a blog about the songs and videos they came across seemed a lot less hassle, and saved them having to move to Stockport. And so they created 78x78 Records, so that other people could know what it was like to be their friend, and what they wrote about when they wrote to each other about music. And so they will post videos of songs you might enjoy 78x78 times. And then they will stop. And then they will do something else. That's 6084 posts. They´ll endeavour to get it done quickly. They'd love to hear from you and any videos or songs you'd like them to post. You can do this by commenting in the pertinent area, or by e-mailing them your suggestions at 78discos@gmail.com
