The Last Call 3/4/09
If good looks was a minute/ You know that you could've been an hour- Smokey Robinson, 'The Way You Do The Things You Do'
What d'ya mean some Jeff Lynne bloke will have us exiting a spacecraft?
Dont Make My Baby Blue by The Move
Whenever you think you’ve unearthed everything from the Golden Age of rock, there is always one more buried treasure lying blow. So much great music, such few outlets at the time. Many of these buried treasures had hits in England, yet never made a dent here in the States. A stellar example of these overlooked artists formed in 1966 with five veterans from various Birmingham rock bands. They were guitarist and principal songwriter Roy Wood, drummer Bev Bevan, bassist Chris “Ace” Kefford, singer Carl Wayne, and guitarist Trevor Burton. Calling themselves the Move, they signed with flamboyant manager Tony Secunda. Tony booked them as the replacement for the Who at the Marquee Club. The Move quickly made a name for themselves through an over-the-top live set with flash pots and Wayne smashing televisions. Dressed up in gangster suits, they should have been more flash than substance. Fortunately, Roy Wood loved American pop music and his songwriting fused this with the in vogue prog rock of the time.
Sphere: Related ContentThe Last Call 2/18/09
And than Stephen Stills showed up, took a shit, and left.
1975 sucked. America’s economy was in the shitter, not as bad as now but unemployment was at 8.5%. The last Americans left Vietnam as Saigon surrendered. The Khmer Rouge began their killing fields. A Manson family member tried to take out Gerald Ford. KC & the Sunshine Band’s “That’s The Way” ruled the airwaves. And Neil Young released Tonight’s The Night and Zuma.
Sphere: Related ContentThe Last Call 2/4/09
We wish you will return to the power of song.
Punks In The Beerlight by Silver Jews
The great majority of the ink devoted to pop music make up oft-told stories and rumors of titans long since past their prime. The Beatles. The Stones. Zeppelin. 99% of the modern music press is taken up by whatever ‘it’ band hasn’t become uncool or where the hot ring tone can be downloaded. In a galaxy far, far away from those words lies David Berman and his band Silver Jews. David is Silver Jews, and vice versa. David Berman is the kind of pop musician once nurtured by major label speculators during the Great Youth Culture Sell-Off. Forty years ago, he would have had a comfortable deal which would have allowed to put out a few slow-burn albums and build a following. Who knows, he could have worked himself into a supergroup. The point is, David would have found himself an honest career.
Sphere: Related ContentThe Last Call 1/21/09
You need to get back on the mic. Suckas on to your title.
Today, everybody wants to talk about the Inaugral Address. What did you think of it? Did it embolden you to risk a path less taken? Did it leave you wanting more? I don’t believe any of those questions touch at the heart of the matter. Yesterday was profound not for what we heard but what we saw. A black president taking the oath of office. A black commander-in-chief receiving salutes when in the midst of our military. A regal black woman from our segregated urban ‘ghettoes’ dancing with her husband as America watched. That is what made yesterday profound. Those images, broadcast all over the world, will remain in our memories in a way that words never will.
The best words spoken during the inauguration ceremony came from Rev. Joseph Lowery. Their power emanated from the ancient rhythm of black spoken word. Begun in the call-and-response of field calls, strengthened in the epic services of black Churches, mastered by oral wizards as disparate as Dr. King and Malcolm X, black speech propels the listener. It defeats monotony by attracting our musical ear. We want to hear more because it sounds good. President Obama’s speech yesterday did not equal some of the rousing triumphs he has given us. But it was in no way a failure. A president should be measured by deeds, not words. From this day forth, we will perceive the true measure of our new leader.
President Obama will find himself held responsible for his brothers’ keep to a degree no politician has ever known. The condition of the American black male is woeful. Whether impoverished, incarcerated, or uneducated, too many black males fail to make positive contributions to society. If you listen to hip-hop, you’ll hear lots of fear, lots of anger. But you won’t hear many solutions. Nine years ago, Mos Def released his first solo album, Black On Both Sides. The album, and the track ‘Mathematics’ in particular, work as a State of the Black Male address which could easily help President Obama know those for which he is now responsible. And Obama’s on the hook for a lot.
Rock your hardhat black cause you in the Terrordome
full of hard niggaz, large niggaz, dice tumblers
Young teens and prison greens facin life numbers
Crack mothers, crack babies and AIDS patients
Young bloods can’t spell but they could rock you in PlayStation
This new math is whippin motherfuckers ass
You wanna know how to rhyme you better learn how to add
It’s mathematics
DJ Premier provides the old-school scratching. Mos Def’s early work as an MC has equals, but no betters. In college, when most hip-hop was either too violent or too pop-sheen, his flow doubled as a hip-hop primer.The albums Black Star and Black On Both Sides blew me away. They were proud but not preachy, fun but not fake or forced. They made you think- think about what we do for others, how we always take care of ourselves. Mos Def, like all great MCs, understands black oral tradition. He knows it is not only the word that has power, but the pause before the word as well, to paraphrase Miles Davis’ definition of jazz. And sure, this joint is nine years old, but ain’t nothing listed in this track that hasn’t gotten worse under Bush.
Young soldiers tryin to earn they next stripe
When the average minimum wage is $5.15
You best believe you gotta find a new ground to get cream
The white unemployment rate, is nearly more than triple for black
so frontliners got they gun in your back
Bubblin crack, jewel theft and robbery to combat poverty
and end up in the global jail economy
Stiffer stipulations attached to each sentence
Budget cutbacks but increased police presence
And even if you get out of prison still livin
join the other five million under state supervision
This is business, no faces just lines and statistics
from your phone, your zip code, to S-S-I digits
The system break man child and women into figures
Two columns for who is, and who ain’t niggaz
Numbers is hardly real and they never have feelings
but you push too hard, even numbers got limits
Why did one straw break the camel’s back? Here’s the secret:
the million other straws underneath it – it’s all mathematics
It may not be fair to lay this all on Obama. But others’ expectations are infrequently fair. What he can do is continue the dialogue we all started during his campaign-what does it mean to be Americans? What do we owe our fellow citizens? Honest answers to those questions may present solutions the majority of us can find palatable. Maybe they will begin to address the staggering figures surrounding the black males’ condition. But one thing is certain. We will always need words on which we can reflect. And we will all get behind a leader whose work we can respect. Amen. 
The Last Call 1/7/09
Whaooooh! Rock!
I don’t want to get into a history of the ’60s and ’70s in this post. Lord knows, there are stacks of books, which could fill a decent liberal arts college’s library, on the subject. But to get where I am going I need to start with how the ’60s ended. The Rolling Stones arranged to play a free show at the Altamont Speedway in northern California on December 6, 1969, four months after Woodstock. The concert quickly got out of hand, with the Hell’s Angels pushing people around the front of the stage. During one of these scuffles, one man was murdered. This violence marked the end of the ‘hippie’ era. This violence marked the beginning of ’70s rock, where the amount of money bands made was only dwarfed by the interstellar distance between fan and band. A distance protected by hired goons and A&R whores. A distance marked by violence and distrust. After Altamont, youth culture never hung out with their heroes. The young fan was the outcast-thanked in liner notes and from confused arena stops, but never touched by anything more personal than a wallet grab.
The Stooges, a little known band from fly-over, college town Ann Arbor, MI, could never have dreamed of playing an Altamont. But the Stooges, the Stooges were Altamont.
On Halloween night 1967, James Osterberg, Ron and Scott Asheton, and Dave Alexander took the stage at University of Michigan’s student union. James Osterberg had recently renamed himself Iggy Stooge, later Iggy Pop. The music the four of them played had its roots in the regional garage band sound which was at that point fading away. Major records companies, amazed at just how much money you could make off youth culture, had begun the process of strangling the small, local labels to which a band like the The Stooges only two years before would have signed. Instead, the Stooges signed to the most esoteric major label, Elektra. Esoteric they may have been, but Elektra had no idea what to do with the the Stooges. The lead singer regularly found himself in physical confrontations with the audience. The lead guitarist dressed all in black and wore an iron cross around his neck. The label, which was the home of West Coast acts like Love and the Doors, was completely befuddled. The band’s self-titled debut tanked.
The Stooges wanted to be stars. Badly. They looked at the charts, at the bands who were in the Top-10. Blood, Sweat, & Tears. Iron Butterfly. Led Zeppelin. They knew they were better than these bands. Instead of throwing themselves into the studio, determined to make a pop splash, they threw themselves down a bottle and, in the case of Iggy Pop, down the hole of a spike. Unlike jazz and blues stars before them, rock musicians on heroin suck. Drunk and strung-out, the Stooges shambled about the US, leaving in their wake sodden tales of missing teeth, missed gigs, and disappointed fans. The Stooges were disintegrating.
Wanting to get a pay-off on their investment, Elektra duck-walked their degenerate wards back to the studio. Awaiting them was Don Galluci, former keyboardist of ‘Louie Louie’-howlers the Kingsmen. Galluci knew what he had when this wreck arrived. He knew he would have to make sure the album reflected the present condition of the band. The album, Funhouse, is still the most furious piece of popular music ever recorded. Bands have been louder. Bands have been heavier. But no band has ever been angrier. The Stooges, filled with self-loathing and an awareness that this was their last stand, played as if their fix depended on it. And in Iggy’s case, it did.
This week’s track, ‘Loose’ begins with the absolute sonic fury that is the Stooge brothers, Ron and Scott Asheton. Every Angus Young riff, every Johnny Thunders riff, started as a Ron Asheton riff. His brother comes in behind him, smashing every cymbal between himself and Valhalla. If this was your home, Ron’s busting up your TV and Scott’s breaking your mother’s china. In comes Dave Alexander’s serpentine bass figure. And then Dr. Death himself, Iggy Pop croons, “Well, look out.” Well, look out, indeed. While you keep Ron and Scott away from your Kingston Trio albums, Iggy’s already flipping your mattress looking for money, and about to flip your old lady looking for fun. Or mayhem, if there was no money. A man with such infamous carelessness with his own blood is surely not going to value your wife’s.
Yes, this was exactly what kind of band this was. This is exactly what kind of music this is. If Kubrick’s Droogs were greasy townie thugs, this was the album they would release. There is no love. There is no peace. There is just every man for his f&cking self. And you better run if you think that knife’s gonna do you any good.
“I stick it deep inside/ I stick it, deeeep inside”
Yeah, Iggy didn’t find any money, man. He and your wife are on the flipped mattress. Ron is sawing away at your leg with a rusty hacksaw, while Scott pulls your head back with the towel in in your mouth. No one can hear you scream.
You’re in hell. And not dead yet.
OOOooomph. Uh oh. Dave has found a mallet. He winds ups and thumps you with it. You fall back, hemorraghing now in a number of places.
Now you’re dead.
The Stooges carry on, though. Ron follows Dave’s breakdown to get completely banshee on his guitar. Iggy just screams unintelligibly. Your house is a shambles, man. Not that it matters.
And then it’s over. You blink once or twice, headphones still warm from that assault. Your crib is fine. It was just the music after all. That sweet, wonderful, music.
This is rock n’ roll.
O'Hare Arpt., IL
