Posts by Simon Grigg
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My other Lou encounter, although it was not a meeting, was in a hotel room at the old Intercontinental.......
.....it was a press conference circa 1977 and I went with my flatmate, Scavenger Johnny Volume, who owned a nineteen fifty something Les Paul Junior which Lou had sold in Auckland on the Rock'n"Roll Animal tour in 73, for illicit substances. Johnny had owned it for some years, and indeed had photos of it being played in Velvet Underground shows. It had also been used on various Velvets recordings...it was not just any guitar.So we went in to get it signed, and merged in with Tony Amos and other Good Guys, mouthing Hauraki. as we went it. John sat quietly in awe during the rather inane conference, waiting his turn. Lou had a guy videoing the whole thing on some large device and there were leads everywhere. At the end John got up and sheepishly moved towards Lou but tripped on the leads, pulling the power out and fell into Lou, who snarled "fuck off arsehole" as John pushed the guitar towards him. John mumbled, for some bizarre reason, "Pablo Picasso was never called an arsehole" and retreated, shamed....
He dropped the guitar the next year and broke it beyond repair.
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Jesus, I pop out for a day or two and PA turns to pot. Where are the moderators when needed.
I knew when I posted that there would be some mightily offended SCDer. I was, after Craig's post, trying to think of a bad album (with resorting to Metal Machine Music, which I love both for its concept and it's raison d'release) in the Reed catalogue. Live albums aside, there are few, but I guess SCD is to my mind, esp when you consider the albums around it, the slightest.
I'm having trouble thinking of Lou's Tin Machine.....
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I'm a huge admirer of Lou Reed, but there are some turds in his back catalogue that won't shine no matter how hard you try and polish 'em up. In my opinion, of course. :)
Indeed...and his interview style makes Hitchens seem like the perfect studio guest. The piece in Mojo last year was cantankerous to the extreme.
I meet Lou once, many years ago and he was utterly charming, but I watched him three minutes later utterly demolish another poor soul. I'd hate to be the person who had to tell him face to face that Sally Can't Dance is not that good (it's not).
PS..glad you are still here.
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that the head of programming would decide whether the station was EVER going to play a single based on his thoroughly unmusical review of the song's intro, before it even got to the chorus in most cases.
Or you could do it the American way....hold open the sleeve, shake it up and down and if no crisp $100 bills or packets of white powder fell out...say "I can't hear a hit".....
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Craig,
yes all very well, but I'd love you to point me in the direction of a 50 minute long player I could dissect, understand and review after one listen. -
The funny thing is that the very hard line taken by AIPAC is not at all representative of US Jewish opinion when polled. I would suggest that what Simon sees as Jewish lobbying is better characterised as US evangelical lobbying.
I think I said or implied such. But AIPAC is a Jewish organization whatever way you look at it, and a mighty powerful one. That it represents the polling or otherwise of domestic US Jewish folk is neither here nor there, but it does lobby on behalf the state of Israel, which is a different thing IMO. And it has a very conservative agenda, which it pursues in a very nasty manner, that agenda converging and dovetailing neatly with the likes of the AEI and the current admin. And American politicians of all colours are scared to death of it....
What, as the last group of politicians to attempt to moderate Israeli behaviour? It was Bush senior who threatened to remove some of the huge subsidy paid to Israel unless they stopped the "facts on the ground" strategy of appropriating Palestinian territory via settlements.
And that was almost twenty years ago. A lot has happened since then, not least in the Republican Party. Bush Jnr has made no attempt to moderate or to reign in Israeli behaviour in recent years...as the events of 2001 in the West Bank, and last year showed, quite the opposite was true.
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[indonesian equivalent of] croissant in the morning
Roti Bakar, Roti Prata, or Roti Canal.....wonderful thin greasy bread, often filled with cheese or chocolate, or dipped in a curry sauce.
I'm hungry now.....
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there are reviewers and there are reviewers, and Mr R, you are, and have been one of the best. I've enjoyed your reviews over the years immensely (I hope you liked ATMP...it remains one of my favourite albums of all times and I noted with humour that Ringo said this week he can't remember playing on it...he's on every track but 4) and you used to have a massive influence on sales at one stage....a positive review from you would drive people to stores on Saturday morning, paper in hand. The only other critic with that sort of power was Colin Hogg at the Star in the eighties. That says something.
But as I said, there are critics / reviewers of all colours and sadly, at least in popular music much criticism is too often deadline driven, be it the live show for the next mornings paper, or the monthlies....here are five albums, can I have 200 words on each by the day after tomorrow..which leads to the Christgau rating system...as Lou Reed said...__you spend a year and a half making an album and some arsehole gives you a B+ after one listen__, or the 50 albums in Q or Mojo wastes of ink ( I tend only to read the feature reviews)
Simon Reynolds mused recently that music criticism is dead, and I can't help but feeling that he's right (and his ponderous recent writings offer evidence in themselves), apart from the odd beacon like yourself. The golden age of Kent, Murray, Bangs and the like, or even Dave Marsh before he decided the money was in the list books, is past, killed by the blog, and the spotty self importance of the likes of Pitchfork and Blender.
The first duty of the critic does lie, in a perfect world, with offering something to the reader, but it's rarely the case.
And we won't even start on record company pressure....
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It will take twice as long for an Israeli-Palestinian solution -- and that's discounting the regional emergence of nuclear weaponry.
As an American, I'd be mightily ashamed of the way Edwards, Clinton and Obama have all groveled to Israel of recent. The Republicans don't need to, we know where they stand.
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And Hitchens on the screen is a loud obnoxious bore. He talks over people, sneers, belittles and is, without offering anything to support his position, absolutely derisive of anybody he may disagree with.
On the other hand, I do find the relentless attacks on the man, that make reference to his much documented alcohol history, to be just as boring and unnecessary.