Old hippies never die, they just get a little mouldy round the edges

[robinturner]

One reason why MCM kicks MTV's ass, apart from the clever French pop, is that I have just been treated to AC/DC ("Hiiiiighway to Hell!"), Deep Purple and, best of all, the remnants of Led Zeppelin performing Kashmir with a bunch of Morrocan musicians. Two thoughts emerge from this.

1. All this stuff about Western music pillaging Third world traditions as a form of colonialism is about as convincing as accusations of demonic possession. Real musicians share music like real programmers share code. People who have nothing better to do than write for the NME (or whatever the current equivalent is) might think it awful that Western musicians are using Middle Eastern music, or that Turks are playing heavy metal ("Please, people, stay in your ghettoes, and we'll work out a Fair Trade deal with Oxfam") but I'm all for mixing it up. I remember doing a gig in a culturally diverse (read poor) part of Leeds, when a woman shouted up at me "How dare you steal Black people's music?" "Thanks," I shouted back, "that's the best compliment of my musical career" (the funny thing was, she wasn't black, just vaguely off-white - probably a wannabee Black).

2. Despite all the jokes about aging hippies and rock dinosaurs, the hippy/rock phenomenon managed one thing that no other youth culture achieved - it gave people a sustainable culture (that's not an original idea, by the way - it was told to be by an old hippy). Not only are Jimmy Page and Mick Jagger still strutting their stuff, they are doing it as well as ever, and people still go for it. The only difference is that in the 1970s, everyone was lapping it up, whether they understood it or not, whereas now it is for the more discerning. Cultural stuff aside, Kashmir will always rock because it goes

DUHduhduh, duhduhDUH, DUHduhduh, duhduhDUH, DUHduhduh, duhduhDUH, DUHduhduh, duhduhDUH!

Comments

[katminnaar.livejournal.com]

Oh, HELL yeah! I loved AC/DC and Led Zeppelin! And I agree; music is universal.

I remember blasting around with friends in high school with "You Shook Me All Night Long" or "Back in Black" blaring out of the boosted car speakers. :)

... amazing that I still have some hearing left.

comment so dumb i almost didn't post it.

[alsoname.livejournal.com]

The problem with AC/DC and Zeppelin is that the vocalists for both sound constipated.

As for musical colonialism, I always found it interesting that proponents of such an idea would also say that, when non-Western musicians started incorporating Western ideas into their music, that was an example of the West forcing themselves on the rest of the world. The West just can win. They either appropriate or colonize. Not that the West is so wonderful, but I agree with you -- why can't musicians just take what they like and mix it up?

[circumambulate.livejournal.com]

I think that one of the outstanding benefits of the music of the 60's/70's was that it centered around talent. Nobody was on stage because they were pretty. This has been, unfortunatly, an anomoly in popular American music.

[solri.livejournal.com]

Too damn right. In the sixties and early seventies, musicianship mattered, or at least you had to have a minimum musical competence and something to say. With punk, music went out of the window, but you could still get away with being ugly; in fact it could be an advantage. Then the 80s came along. Some groups struggled along with their musical talent and bad looks (I saw Everything But the Girl live - God, they were ugly, but the music was great). But with the general mood of style over substance, it was the pretty boys and girls who got the record contracts, even though now most of them look laughable (remember Jason Donovan and Howard Jones? Good God, that hair! And the clothes? Spandau Ballet, anyone?).

Then, thankfully, the acid/house/britpop revolution happened, and it was OK to be ugly and badly dressed. I remember around 1990 seeing a T-shirt which said "Ugly as the Stone Roses". Yes, they were ugly, and so were The Happy Mondays, and good for them. Even the better-looking bands, like The KLF, dressed down (but up at the same time) in Swiss winter camouflage (God, I wish I could get one of those jumpsuits - any Swiss readers out there?).

So I suppose it goes in waves. The general tendency is for the music industry to promote pretty boys and girls, but the public, who aren't quite as stupid as the industry think they are, get fed up and start listening to real music from time to time. Probably the longest time they managed it was from around 1968 to 1978.

BTW, I love the Catholic Hanuman!

[circumambulate.livejournal.com]

Have you seen 24 Hour Party People, yet? Quite good docudrama-esque thing about Tony Wilson, and Factory Records.

I think that the reason that it was so successful in the (I'd back up a tad)'65-'75 years was the hippie culture rejection of materialism, and with it cosmetic beauty. The talent was what mattered. And, while certainly there was a 'look', it wasn't the cookie cutter of previous, and future movements, even including punk/brit pop/metal, etc.. In the later 70's, disco took over the mainstream, and too much talent took over what wasn't mainstream - studio musicians with chops to spare ruled the planet - as John Abercrombie put it, 'all light, but no heat'.

[alsoname.livejournal.com]

Hey, hey, that's just unfair. The punk that best withstands the test of time was produced by some very creative -- and often even musically competent -- people.

[solri.livejournal.com]

Yes, but they generally had to keep quiet about the "musically competent" bit.

Hold on, I just realised that when I say "punk", I'm thinking of Crass and The Sex Pistols, and when you say "punk" you're probably thinking of Patti Smith and Talking Heads. The British and American punk scenes were worlds apart.

"You say tom/eI/to, and I say tom/a:/to..."

Re:

[alsoname.livejournal.com]

No, actually I include both the politically charged UK scene and the artsy U.S. scene.

Crass obviously fall outside of my generalization. The reason they withstand the test of time is because their lyrics speak to those disenfranchized by the class system. It also speaks to middle-class kids who are ashamed of the banality of their background and wish to obscure it by appealing to such an edgy aesthetic.

Talking Heads I really barely consider to be "punk."

[alsoname.livejournal.com]

Also, Steve Ignorant's accent was delectable. Who could resist singing along to all of his inane lyrics?

[solri.livejournal.com]

I couldn't even catch the lyrics on most Crass songs, they just sounded like

Aghaghaggrrbagalkstateaghanarchygrrbviolencegrrr

Did you know Crass published a book of their lyrics, subtitled "for people who like the politics, but can't stand the music"?

Re:

[alsoname.livejournal.com]

Hahahahahaha. No, I did not know that.

[solri.livejournal.com]

In the UK, we generally referred to anything that had musical content as "New Wave" rather than "punk", but I remember the likes of Patti Smith and Talking Heads being referred to as "the New York punk scene".

But of course you could be punky and arty at the same time, like Siouxie or the Dead Kennedies.

I'm just reminded of a funny Leeds punk/new wave/whatever band who used to live upstairs from where we used to practice. The were called The Three Johns, and did a great song about Sartre to the tune of "Gloria" (the Patti Smith song).

"It's all about this guy
Who thinks he's going mental
So he writes a book about it
And calls it existential.
Naaauuusea, N-A-U-S-E-A ....

[alsoname.livejournal.com]

Now that's just brilliant.

[solri.livejournal.com]

Hey, we're almost in instant messaging mode here, which is odd considering the time difference. Is it early for you or late? It's next day for me.

Re:

[alsoname.livejournal.com]

It's really not that odd, considering that we both seem to keep rather eratic sleeping schedules.

[solri.livejournal.com]

And of course a lot of jazz purists claimed that Take 5 wasn't really jazz.

“clever French pop” ?

[ankh156.livejournal.com]

Names, ranks, numbers, please ?

Just about everything I hear over here is shit. Please don't say it's Air[head] or Laurent Garner, or even Dmitri from Paris. NTM [Nique ta mère - I think you can guess what that means] and Assassin I can live with.

There were some supremely talent-less fucks around in the 70's. (I hope I don't count among them...)

Re: “clever French pop” ?

[solri.livejournal.com]

Since I generally have MCM on in the background while I'm hunched over the computer, I don't see the names of most of the artists. Maybe it just sounds sophisticated because anything in French sounds sophisticated, especially if you don't understand French.

Re: “clever French pop” ?

[kalemachka.livejournal.com]

I can think of Noir Desir, Les Negresses Vertes, and Les Ogres De Barback among others, making good French music.

Re: “clever French pop” ?

[ankh156.livejournal.com]

True, but that's not the kind of stuff that'd find it's way on to MTV.

Evidently, there's lots I like over here, but it's all a bit "left of field".

Arthur H is darn good too, as are the Funki Family and the Lo-Jo-Tribu, and dear old Mathieu Chedid.

Re: “clever French pop” ?

[solri.livejournal.com]

Funny, Arthur H was one who's name I did catch, and I didn't like him at all. No accounting for taste, I suppose.

Of course, like most non-Francophones, my idea of what Francopop should sound like was imprinted by the likes of Anne Marie David, Adamo and Dalida. I have my "Nostalgie de France" compilation album on at the moment - it's really good for hangovers.

[chr0me-kitten.livejournal.com]

I agree that musicians draw from one another, and that music is a wonderful, fluid thing; but I think the one thing people miss with the whole "music is universal" bit is the idea of credit where credit is due - and not in an intellectual property kind of way, but in terms of mutual respect amongst musicians. In many cases, bands such as Led Zeppelin, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, etc. tried to take credit for things they didn't come up with. Very famously, Led Zeppelin was successfully sued for doing this:

Page's early style drew so heavily on the blues that Willie Dixon later won a large settlement for the copyright infringement. Rumour has it that a few of song titles off the first release ripped off old blues titles; they only changed one word in these songs catch phrases.

I'm all for musical fusion and cross-influence, but I think there's a difference between influence and taking credit for something you didn't do.

Also, in the States, anyway, there's this weird racial thing (and really, when isn't there a weird racial thing in the States) where music that came out a certain community gets co-opted into the mainstream to the point where those from the community that developed a particular style are later looked at as strange for performing that kind of music. Black rock bands, for example - it's seen as weird for a group of black musicians to get together and play blues-based rock now. In 50 years, people will think Eminem came up with hip-hop and people will think black rappers are weird and "alternative".

[solri.livejournal.com]

I agree on the "credit where credit is due" part (and I remember LedZep I, come to think of it, though I didn't know Dixon had actully sued them). Turkish musicians are really bad about plagiarism (Tarkan ripped off a whole Los Lobos song, for example) - it's quite rare for one of them to do a cover version and actually say that it's a cover (Nilüfer did with a Loreena McKennit song, and McKennit was so chuffed she came over to Turkey to say hello and do a few gigs). There again, maybe they're getting their own back for the crusaders ripping off their musical instruments.

[dtlw.livejournal.com]

you missed an important "duH" out of Kasmir

[solri.livejournal.com]

Duuuh, which "duH" would that be?

[dtlw.livejournal.com]

The "Duh" Jimmy Page said when he hit the first of many excellent bum notes during the one and only take of the guitar track.

[solri.livejournal.com]

Nice one. But at least these old rockers can do a live gig with no backing track.

What happened to your alternative Eurovision song, by the way. It's about time some record company snapped you up - you're too good to be doing clubs in Seacroft for the rest of your life.