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subject appears to be a white male, early 50's, pathologically tall/skinny. brain patterns show evidence of a life in alcohol - first swimming in it then running from it. fingers show wear from years of guitar playing. heart presents slow repair, through writing, from being broken by rock and roll.
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Bleeker and MacDougal: Greetings From the Known New York
As my buddy Simmons has already told you, I turned 50 about a week ago. I got through the weekend with surprisingly little drama and have been settling into the new digs at a very slow pace 'cause that's how olp people are, y'know? I n any event, I was belatedly gifted last night by my friend Jackie with 2 - 8 or 9 week old kittens. I had been wanting a cat as the apartment didn't seem complete without one, so now I have 2. Bleeker and MacDougal, 2 boys Colorado born and bred but named after a (to me) famous intersection in New York's East Village, where a young Robert Zimmerman perhaps became Bob Dylan.
Yesterday morning, in the waning hours of my pre cat existence I happened to stop at Sid's, a local second hand store. Obstensibly looking for a typewriter I stumbled onto a box of records where I found a dead mint copy of Patti Smith's 'Easter', a record I hadn't heard inyears and had forgotten how much I loved it. I have 'Horses' and 'Gone Again' on CD and 'Dream of Life' and 'Peace and Noise' on cassette. But 'Easter' had been a lost record for me for some time now. It brought back memories of the late 70's and living in Rockland County, NY a mere stoner's throw from where it was ALL going down at the time. NYC, just like I pictured it, skyscrapers and EVERYTHING!!! I used to go to the Village by bus at least twice a month in those days to buy records, get drunk, buy pot from the Rastas in Washington Square Park, stop at CBGB's, usually plastered to see what there was to see.
After the initial, blinding rush of mid 70's creativity; Patti, Television, Ramones, Talking Heads was over, we were left with a flood of cookie cutter cutups in skinny ties and black leather, a precious few (Mink DeVille - a soul band, really or the Shirts, power pop fluffy, but cool) rising just far enough above the herd to be interesting, but it all changed after England, and Richard Hell never became our Elvis Costello.
Elvis had to do that himself. Which he did, and continues to do with an alarming level of artistic and critical success to this day. Go, Declan. Once the Ramones and Television went to England and gave Johnny Rotten and Sid Vicious a hairstyle and a heroin habit respectively, punk rock became the province of the Pistols, and all that follwed stood in their shadows. The art-colony vibe of the early cbgb years was lost, which is probably for the best as it leaves the real artists like Patti and Ramone (all of them) the space away from the spotlight's glare they need to create personal work, free of the rock and roll sweepstakes and, more deadly, the 'Man'.
Yeah, I'm sure that's exactly how they see it. There appears to be a Broadway musical about the Ramones on the horizon. I'm not sure how to feel about this. Not that it matters, of course, but it's damn odd to see one's high school yearbook becoming Mount Rushmore. I love those years, that music, the memories, but I fear it's codification and the final mainstreaming falling of the axe that such a musical suggests. I know a lot of you don't get them (Like Buster and Carl and Joe S) but really man, Sonic Youth are the only NYC band that has, in this reporter's estimation, stayed true to an uncompromising and uneasily digested vision for nigh onto 20 years now and I think we all ought to name them NYC's Favorite Sonbs (and daughter) now that the Ramones are 3/4's underground and bound for the Great White Way. (Underground and Broadway Bound: An Aesthetic Reveals It's Flaws - alternate title, maybe?)
Well, as usual, I'm sleepy and have no idea what I'm talking about but that's never stopped me from talking before. Viva Patti Smith! Viva Sonic Youth! Viva Roxy Music! (who saw that one comin', huh?). Viva life. I gotta go home, walk Buster and visit Bleeker and MacDougal in my mind and on my couch. Love to all.
tb
Posted by: timbyrnes at 17:24 |
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