Frank Zappa interviewed on the problems with democracy

While going through the plethora of interesting materials on the late musician Frank Zappa (1940-1993) online, I found this very interesting interview segment in which FZ spoke out on the problematics of so-called democracy in US government. Particularly prescient as a recent and widely circulated academic study has concluded that the US is an oligarchy now. Zappa's opinions on things artistic, cultural, and political were all over the map but he was a staunch advocate for free speech and of course against censorship. More FZ links to come soon!

Two Lou Reed Documentaries

“If you play the albums chronologically they cover the growth of us as people from here to there, and in there is a tale for everybody in case they want to know what they can do to survive the scenes. If you line the songs up and play them, you should be able to relate and not feel alone - I think it’s important that people don’t feel alone.”

Lou Reed on the Velvet Underground

It keeps floating in and out of the interwebs but the 1998 documentary on Lou Reed entitled Rock and Roll Heart is well worth watching if you haven't (or have!) already. Informative, rich in archival footage, and comparatively concise given the breadth and general eclectic weirdness of old Lou's career. And late last year, in commemoration of Reed's death, the BBC screened a new documentary Lou Reed Remembered largely comprising a montage of clips featuring many of the musician's former collaborators, friends, and those he influenced, including: Paul Auster, Lenny Kaye, Moe Tucker, Boy George, Holly Woodlawn, Mick Rock, Bob Ezrin, and Thurston Moore.

Lux and Ivy of The Cramps interviewed c. 1990

Here's a vintage, and utterly wonderful interview from the 1990s with Lux Interior and Ivy Rorschach of The Cramps. Dig Lux's beautiful outfit and pearl necklace! The lovely rock and roll duo charm their way through some typical chat show questions, riddled with a bit of Letterman-esque irony. You figure this was buried in local late night tv (Lux mentions fans masturbating in the front row in Europe, while in the US critics scribble away--entirely different modes of response!) Lux and Ivy seemed always gracious and calm in interview settings, leaving all the pathos and angst for the proscenium. Thanks so much for bringing this one to light, Conrad Holt!

The Women of Rockabilly

Welcome to the Club: The Women of Rockabilly is an hour-long film directed by Beth Harrington (and narrated by Roseanne Cash) on four amazing singers: Janis Martin (billed as “The Female Elvis”), Wanda Jackson (dubbed “The Queen of Rockabilly”), Lorrie Collins (of “The Collins Kids”), and Brenda Lee (once “Little Miss Dynamite”).

Alex Chilton "A Man Called Destruction" Biography

Having been a longtime fan of Alex Chilton, I fell into a deep dark hole in between any official activities reading the exhaustively researched new LX bio A Man Called Destruction by Holly George- Warren. Chilton would be a rather daunting subject for any biographer due to his rambling, idiosyncratic career and sharp turns in musical orientation. Given all that, the author (who was well acquainted with Chilton for some years) offers a sometimes harrowing but detailed tribute to an artist who didn’t always know what was best for him, perhaps, but created a wealth of his own music (Big Star and various solo permutations) and produced heaps of other fine projects (The Cramps, Tav Falco’s Panther Burns, and many more). Chilton was a pop star of sorts crooning soul with an affective, mature voice as a teenager with the Box Tops (The Letter, Cry like a Baby) recorded three LPs with the innovative pop band Big Star, and then travelled a winding road of treacherous anti-fame and fortune, in that commercial potential mattered not at all to him in comparison to lively, spontaneous improvisational music that drew from eclectic sources: rock and roll, r and b, blues, country, folk, jazz, classical, noise. Chilton died suddenly of a heart attack in 2010 at the age of 59 in his adopted home of New Orleans, and this feels no less jarring as George-Warren’s account comes to a close. The book dishes out plenty of dissolute rock and roll gossipy anecdotes along the way but is delivered in a measured, readable prose that generally avoids hagiography and rounds out the too often flattened portrayals of this very complex character. I have my own biases, having seen Chilton perform, loving his records for decades, but also thinking a lot about the kind of rather perverse decisions he made in the name of “artistic independence.” But if you are at all interested in one of the most fascinating figures of rock and roll and alternative music, do check out this book, and if you don’t know his music some beautiful stuff (and totally wild shit) awaits you. (You can read an excerpt of the biography here.)

David Bowie and the Story of Ziggy Stardust

The addictively watchable BBC four documentary David Bowie and the Story of Ziggy Stardust (narrated by Jarvis Cocker) depicts the long road leading up to Bowie’s big breakthrough persona, by way of an almost startling range of eclectic influences: dance, mime, folk, music hall, Anthony Newley, mod, children’s music, theatre (both avant-garde and not-so), and of course, early rock and roll, fashion, androgyny, gay culture, Iggy Pop and the Velvet Underground. As “Spiders from Mars” drummer Mick “Woody” Woodmansy comments: “I think he was trying on what can I do and what do people want, going through the trial and error period, and there was a lot of error!”

Vintage Power Pop: the dB's

The dB's, who began in NYC but all hail from my homestate of North Carolina, were a pretty amazing band in the 1980s, synthesizing a wealth of 60s pop influences (Kinks, Beach Boys, Big Star) into a tight, compact, and highly listenable sound. They never had great commercial success at the time, but have recently reformed just as a style such as theirs seems eminently historical and somewhat distant. That said, with the resurgence of LP buyers and rekindled interest in underappreciated "cult" bands of the past maybe there will be some new attention paid to their fastidious, catchy pop songs. For more dB's info, you can check out their website. 

New Garage Explosion!!: In Love With These Times

Here's a documentary on the garage rock revivalists of the past several years featuring mostly US bands including the late Jay Reatard, Thee Oh Sees, Davila 666, The Black Lips, and Ty Segall. But also (rightfully) featuring the influence of New Zealand's own The Clean! In Jay Reatard's words (interviewed in the film) garage is "usually three minutes or less, as few words as possible, to convey as much emotion as you can with as little as possible." And here's a link to Pitchfork's Shake Appeal column dedicated to "garage and garage-adjacent releases." For the real old school stuff you can check out a YouTube playlist drawing from the tracks on Lenny Kaye's seminal Nuggets compilation LP of sixties garage punk and psychedelia. 

Johnny Cash's "Lost" Album: Out Among the Stars

It's normally time to worry when a record company decides to put out "lost" product by deceased musicians, even (especially?) by legendary figures such as Johnny Cash. Taking this apprehension in mind, Cash's recently released Out Among the Stars is a welcome rather than disappointing event. The album is comprised of recordings made in Nashville in the early 1980s but only recently recovered. At that time Cash, despite his iconic status was treated as a rather money-losing proposition, and was even dropped by his record label--the same one that is now releasing this record, ironic no? At any rate, the songs are often overproduced, as is typical of so-much eighties music, whether recorded in Nashville or elsewhere, but there is a residual warmth to Cash's voice and a light, engaging humour that is contagious. While Cash's later Rick Rubin-era recordings benefit from their stripped down empathic approach, even some of the best material is difficult to listen to as Cash was so clearly in decline, ill and not long for this world. Notwithstanding the self-inflicted damage to his voice that Cash incurred due to his wild living, the songs on Out Among the Stars find his voice steady and reassuring even as it often relates narratives of down and out souls and hard times. You can read Cash's son John Carter Cash's track-by-track run down of the album here. And watch a film featuring covers of some of the songs by Brandon Flowers, Father John Misty, and Local Natives. And below you can listen to Out Among the Stars.

MC5: A True Testimonial documentary

I was thinking about rock and roll, Detroit, Mike Kelley (who I'll post about soon), and all the other typical stuff that swims about in my cranium and thought I'd post this documentary on the fantastic MC5, packed with crazy white boy rock and roll kick out the jams sixties style pandemonium. Hope you enjoy watching this crazy time capsule strangeness.