NEW YORK ROCK: CRITICAL HISTORY

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This was passed along to me via email...a "critical history" of New York rock. I dunno. There are some pretty out-there statements in here, but aside from a few quibbles with how individual bands are dismissed, I'd say that on the whole it seems well-reasoned. I think I agree with it for the most part, though people I've forwarded it to have not all reacted so positively. Any thoughts? http://theduffer.blogspot.com

― Freddy NYC, Tuesday, 12 July 2005 23:37 (twenty years ago)

Sorry that post looks so spammy. I've just been asking a lot of my friends about that damn essay today.

― Freddy NYC, Tuesday, 12 July 2005 23:40 (twenty years ago)

There’s a tradition of quality in New York rock, from the Fugs in the ’60s, through Chain Gang and Wayne County in the ’70s, and into the ’80s with Missing Foundation, the Honeymoon Killers, and Pussy Galore.

ay yi yi

― m coleman (lovebug starski), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 00:06 (twenty years ago)

At long last, here was hedonism with a human face and a college mind.

― miccio (miccio), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 00:11 (twenty years ago)

The mantle of saving rock, and the human heart, has fallen to young bucks like the White Stripes (Elephant and its “Seven Nation Army”), Wilco (Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and its “Ashes of American Flags” and “War on War”) and Green Day (the audaciously titled American Idiot), and titans like “The Boss” Bruce Springsteen (The Rising—and how).

― miccio (miccio), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 00:12 (twenty years ago)

It cannot be gainsaid that rock history is a matter of masterpieces, which ennoble a trivial genre and humanize us as people. Where would rock be without them? The last thing we need are record collections filled with cheap provocations, adolescent jokes, refusals to communicate, coded propaganda: Twin Infinitives and Generic Flipper, 1/2 Gentlemen/Not Beasts and Chocolate Synthesizer, Harsh 70s Reality and Spiral Scratch, Sang Phat Editor and What Was Music?—some of the angrier attacks on rock’s values in its history, but so sloppy as totally to lack cogency. Such is extremism: hot-headed and self-defeating, but against which we must ever remain vigilant all the same.

Now consider instead Pet Sounds, Exile on Main Street, London Calling, Born in the U.S.A., The Joshua Tree, Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, and OK Computer, and realize how far we’ve come, as people. Such works end distraction and discussion, and allow us to live in and through them. When New York–born guitar god Lenny Kravitz yowled, “You can’t even sing or play an instrument / So you just scream instead / You’re living for an image / So you got five hundred women in your bed / Rock and roll is dead,” he helped keep it, and us, alive just that one moment more.

― miccio (miccio), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 00:15 (twenty years ago)

by year’s end, the disarmament crisis and the run-up to the Iraq War had America on edge, polarized, and taking to the streets. So, too, was New York rock a house divided against itself, barely able to stand. Andrew W.K. had, more badly than it seemed, inflamed matters and brought them to a head—a dirty bomb by a dirty man—and so both sides discounted New York’s guitar and front-man heritage, to everyone’s detriment, not least the USA’s.

― fact checking cuz (fcc), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 00:16 (twenty years ago)

And I know that, beginning on or about November 2, 2004, when attending shows at New York rock hotspots—lofts, for example, the CBGBs of the day—I was shocked to find myself neither dancing nor thinking. Not even once.

― miccio (miccio), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 00:19 (twenty years ago)

I had hoped, in my heart of hearts, to bask in the reflected grandeur of a soulful new guitarist and shamanistic front man, to sing along to songs in the key of life—to move on with music that moved me. Instead, I came to find that abstraction and aestheticism, as below-ground insidious as home schooling and red-state America, had seized the day.

― miccio (miccio), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 00:20 (twenty years ago)

I admire his passion and sense of purpose but the man is tripping balls.

― miccio (miccio), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 00:26 (twenty years ago)

if you're looking for Bono you need to avoid lofts.

― miccio (miccio), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 00:27 (twenty years ago)

Anthony actually is right. There's a lot of good stuff in there, but a large portion is college-essay bullshit.

― marc h. (marc h.), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 00:32 (twenty years ago)

The Medium Was Tedium is a bore?. Writing 6 paragraphs about Puttin' On the Ritz? Must be some kind of joke! I WISH Oxford Collapse were power players though.

― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 00:37 (twenty years ago)

i will say this for puttin on the ritz: at least $3 for a cd-r is better than the $15/$20/$30 those con artists in No Neck and Sunburned Hand like to charge.

― Freddy NYC, Wednesday, 13 July 2005 01:22 (twenty years ago)

There's a lot of good stuff in there

Nope. But a lot of unintentionally funny things. ..."opaque -- the very opposite of clear..." The death of irony. "Ja, ja, sehr gericht und echt!!" sagt Wittgenstein.

― Walter Groteschele, Wednesday, 13 July 2005 01:24 (twenty years ago)

It has to be joke. HAS to be.

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 03:41 (twenty years ago)

Now consider instead Pet Sounds, Exile on Main Street, London Calling, Born in the U.S.A., The Joshua Tree, Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, and OK Computer...

Didja notice that these are all covered in Kill Yr Idols?

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 03:42 (twenty years ago)

The last thing we need are record collections filled with cheap provocations, adolescent jokes, refusals to communicate, coded propaganda: Twin Infinitives and Generic Flipper, 1/2 Gentlemen/Not Beasts and Chocolate Synthesizer, Harsh 70s Reality and Spiral Scratch, Sang Phat Editor and What Was Music?

Hahaha, I have nearly all these!

― Jon, remind me again why you haven't drowned in your own vomit (ex machina), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 03:44 (twenty years ago)

Oopsie-woopsie: I made two boo-boos. London Calling wasn't in the book and it's called Kill Your Idols.

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 03:45 (twenty years ago)

There’s a tradition of quality in New York rock

Haha, "Une Certain Tendance du Rock New York".

― C0L1N B... (C0L1N B...), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 03:46 (twenty years ago)

It really bears an uncanny resemblence to a graduation speech.

― Hurting (Hurting), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 03:46 (twenty years ago)

I am put in mind of a drug-addled Leo Strauss, or a sober Christopher Hitchens.

I bet it's by the same guy who did "I Fucked Anne Coulter in the Ass, Hard."

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 03:50 (twenty years ago)

"In the Strokes, you couldn’t help but hear Television, the Velvet Underground, the New York Dolls, Red Transistor, Youth of Today."

The STrokes sound like Red Transistor?

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 04:07 (twenty years ago)

It's definitely a joke. A way too long joke. Some good lines, tho. The opening sentence is kind of classic.

― gypsy mothra (gypsy mothra), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 07:27 (twenty years ago)

we've found the Main Nerve.

― N_RQ, Wednesday, 13 July 2005 07:48 (twenty years ago)

they don't sound like them, but like Von Lmo, the Strokes are from space.

― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 11:44 (twenty years ago)

The Strokes sound like Youth of Today! I should listen to them.

― Jon, remind me again why you haven't drowned in your own vomit (ex machina), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 11:47 (twenty years ago)

http://www.maxskansascity.com/images/Maxs_comp_lg.jpg

― m coleman (lovebug starski), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 12:04 (twenty years ago)

Fantastic. The best music blog post since me on Spector. He forgot to use the word "melodic" though!

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 12:11 (twenty years ago)

None of you actually read that and thought it was serious, did you? Just checking

― DJ Mencap (DJ Mencap), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 12:21 (twenty years ago)

But wouldn't it be the greatest thing ever if it WAS serious?

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 12:23 (twenty years ago)

I get the feeling that if I read this, I'm going to get really, really mad.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 12:34 (twenty years ago)

DO IT FOR US, ALEX!

― zebedee (zebedee), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 12:54 (twenty years ago)

I would have said "Geir Hongro wrote that" but then I remembered Geir is a better writer and has, you know, a sense of humor.

― Alfred Soto (Alfred Soto), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 13:04 (twenty years ago)

http://makemyday.free.fr/69/69poster27.JPG

― m coleman (lovebug starski), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 13:05 (twenty years ago)

US MAPLE HAS A STREET TEAM!

― David R. (popshots75`), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 13:07 (twenty years ago)

I want Alex to talk about clubbing baby seals and eating fish guts again.

― Alfred Soto (Alfred Soto), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 13:10 (twenty years ago)

It's a very deadpan joke, and it's not that funny.

― Hurting (Hurting), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 13:26 (twenty years ago)

I'm still not sure its a joke! Read too many wackos to assume this isn't plausible.

― miccio (miccio), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 13:27 (twenty years ago)

It's hard for me to believe someone would actually go to so much trouble for a dry joke.

― Hurting (Hurting), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 14:09 (twenty years ago)

Tis comedy gold. Those quotes up there are chock full of howlers and dead giveaways: "I was shocked to find myself neither dancing nor thinking. Not once." It's the additional "Not once" that kills. Is this by the "Rock, Rot, or Rule" people?

― Drew Daniel (Drew Daniel), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 15:08 (twenty years ago)

Maybe I'm humorless, but for instance, that exact line doesn't strike me as funny at all. It's the kind of thing I hear people say all the time.

― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 15:37 (twenty years ago)

Yeah, the more I read it, I think it's probably a joke. But it's awfully labored and not that funny.

― Hurting (Hurting), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 15:39 (twenty years ago)

I think Daddino is OTM with his 'IFACITA,H' suspicion.

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 15:42 (twenty years ago)

huh? someone reposted it with the title "are you ready laugh? humor that "rocks"" with the address scathingsatire@gmail.com. First I figured it was the same guy updating the post to make it clear to us that it is in fact a joke, but then I see him responding to the "mock" post.

also, whoever changed the title sent this to me:

Don't read this if:
a) You love U2 and rock criticism;
b) You hate cynicism and Schadenfreude;
c) You are drinking MILK!!!...from a SACRED COW!!!
d) You aren't READY TO LAUGH!!!!
http://scathingsatire.blogspot.com

did anyone else get that?

― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Wednesday, 13 July 2005 21:52 (twenty years ago)

this guy IS taking the piss, right?

― latebloomer: occasionally OTM (latebloomer), Thursday, 14 July 2005 12:58 (twenty years ago)

At long last, here was hedonism with a human face and a college mind. The sibling bands Out Hud and !!!, though dismissed by the culturally challenged as, respectively, electrified and glorified drum circles, displayed their acute political sense on their track titles—“Me and Giuliani Down by the School Yard”; “Pardon My Freedom”; “Dear Mr. Bush, There Are Over 100 Words for Shit and Only 1 for Music. Fuck You, Out Hud”—putting the Minutemen to shame for subtlety of praxis.

oh, ok

― latebloomer: occasionally OTM (latebloomer), Thursday, 14 July 2005 13:00 (twenty years ago)

Isn't it funny...
...how a bogie is bad, and bogarting is bad, but Humphrey "Bogie" Bogart was a true class act?

― Daniel_Rf (Daniel_Rf), Thursday, 14 July 2005 13:14 (twenty years ago)

That guy!

― Daniel_Rf (Daniel_Rf), Thursday, 14 July 2005 13:15 (twenty years ago)

Before I opened this thread I thought either lovebug or phil freeman had written a book with this title.

― k/l (Ken L), Thursday, 14 July 2005 13:16 (twenty years ago)

I got that e-mail too.

― miccio (miccio), Thursday, 14 July 2005 14:28 (twenty years ago)

As did I. E-mail harvesting bastids.

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Sunday, 17 July 2005 04:23 (twenty years ago)

With the death of irony, and so many, on September 11, 2001, came the rebirth of New York rock.

COME. THE FUCK. ON.

Seriously. SERIOUSLY. The death of irony? I honestly can't believe he's saying that and NOT being ironic.

― KILL (David Allen), Sunday, 17 July 2005 08:25 (twenty years ago)

That's because he is. Look alive, FFS

― DJ Mencap0))), Sunday, 17 July 2005 10:56 (twenty years ago)

pretty amazing how dense people have been. OBVIOUSLY A JOKE/PARODY. funny to watch folks get their panties in a twist though.

― JoeJoe, Sunday, 17 July 2005 19:35 (twenty years ago)

for a rockcrit parody that's totally on target and actually FUNNY please read answer #1

Rob Thomas offended by rumors of Scientology (oh yeah, and being Tom Cruise's gay lover)

― m coleman (lovebug starski), Sunday, 17 July 2005 19:53 (twenty years ago)

sorry, it is not obviously a joke/parody to me. I've read, and heard in conversation, pretty much all that stuff and worse.

― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Monday, 18 July 2005 01:26 (twenty years ago)

That's why it's satire, Dan.

― Boring Satanic Space Jazz (sexyDancer), Wednesday, 27 July 2005 15:00 (twenty years ago)

I don't know jeff, I always thought satire had at least a knowing wink in it's irony or wit that is detectable. Maybe it's a sad comment on the state of blogs and music writing, but ideas like those are commonly expressed by people who take themselves seriously. I didn't see repeating them as satire.

― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Wednesday, 27 July 2005 15:10 (twenty years ago)

six years pass...

I dunno where else to post this so I'm gonna use this thread...

was thinking recently about the musical histories (specifically rock 'n' roll) of various municipalities and got to thinking about how the majority of New York's definitive/canonical acts came so late in the development of the genre (ie the 70s). Maybe I am wrong here and I am just forgetting a lot of people but it struck me as sort of odd that NY's contribution to rock in the 50s and 60s were sort of ... limited? or at least, not in proportion to the size of the city and it's usual role as a cultural epicenter...? Okay, there's Dylan. Although I don't really associate rock-period Dylan with New York (was he even living there? I don't know where Highway 61/BIABH/Blonde on Blonde were recorded). There's Hendrix, sort of (altho he seems to belong more to SF and London in my mind, even though Electric Ladyland is in NY). Then there's the Velvets, who were mostly ignored during their time. And Simon & Garfunkel, who are only nominally rock anyway. And what's more all of these people were singular figures, they didn't come up together out of a scene or anything - seems like a very different situation from, say, LA, or San Francisco, or Detroit, or Memphis, or the downtown NY scene that would emerge later.

Is my memory just selective? How is it that in the 60s NY seems to have mostly sat out blues-rock, psychedelia, soul/R&B, etc.?

― I saw Mike Love walk by a computer once (Shakey Mo Collier), Wednesday, 21 September 2011 17:43 (fourteen years ago)

NY had the Blues Project for blues-rock, psychedelia w/ Blues Magoos & Vanilla Fudge, the Chambers Bros combined psych/R&B, and the Rascals owned the blue-eyed soul thing...

― excuse me you're a helluva guy (m coleman), Wednesday, 21 September 2011 17:55 (fourteen years ago)

so it's just me then

― I saw Mike Love walk by a computer once (Shakey Mo Collier), Wednesday, 21 September 2011 18:12 (fourteen years ago)

I just think it's odd that in the 60s there are VERY specific sounds+styles+numerous bands associated with Los Angeles, San Francisco, Detroit, Memphis, etc. but that this is not the case with NY.

― I saw Mike Love walk by a computer once (Shakey Mo Collier), Wednesday, 21 September 2011 18:14 (fourteen years ago)

like why did it take so long for NY music to coalesce into a "scene" like it did in the 70s, in the 60s NY music seems very diffuse/disparate

― I saw Mike Love walk by a computer once (Shakey Mo Collier), Wednesday, 21 September 2011 18:30 (fourteen years ago)

Read this book and get back to me: http://www.amazon.com/All-Hopped-Up-Ready-Go/dp/039333483X

― When I Stop Meming (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 21 September 2011 18:34 (fourteen years ago)

ah thank you was trying to find a thread about that book to post this on, tbh

― I saw Mike Love walk by a computer once (Shakey Mo Collier), Wednesday, 21 September 2011 18:38 (fourteen years ago)

one month passes...

There's also this now: http://www.amazon.com/Love-Goes-Buildings-Fire-Changed/dp/0865479801

― Miss Piggy and Frodo in Hull (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 13 November 2011 01:47 (fourteen years ago)

i would totally read that! i think will is a really good writer. and i didn't know this existed.

― scott seward, Sunday, 13 November 2011 05:09 (fourteen years ago)

Just came out. Read a little bit of it, seems pretty good so far but a few little errors stuck in my craw- refers to "Carson McCuller's Suttree" and seems to not know that the original Velvet Underground drummer was Angus MacLise.

― Miss Piggy and Frodo in Hull (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 13 November 2011 14:34 (fourteen years ago)

Have kept reading and it continues to interest. curmudgeion just mentioned on the Afro-Latin thread that nabisco has big upped this book and now I see that he will be interviewing WH at a book launch party this weekend.

― Miss Piggy and Frodo in Hull (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 14 November 2011 15:54 (fourteen years ago)

On Thursday, Nov. 17 at 9 p.m., the powerHouse Arena, 37 Main St., DUMBO, will hold a book publication party for Love Goes to Buildings on Fire: Five Years in New York That Changed Music Forever, by Will Hermes.
The party will feature Hermes in conversation with Nabisco

― curmudgeon, Monday, 14 November 2011 16:55 (fourteen years ago)

if anything, it wins for having stamaty cover art!
i loved this book as a kid
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_nsIJ_dWO_Rs/SekX6c61sDI/AAAAAAAAD2Q/A_uKna277Jk/s320/Who+Needs+Donuts%3F

― tylerw, Monday, 14 November 2011 17:03 (fourteen years ago)

“Love Goes to Buildings on Fire is an almost perfect portrait of New York music culture: specific yet comprehensive, enthusiastic yet objective, and as informed as it is personal. The four-page section of what (seemingly) every interesting person in NYC was doing on the night of the ‘77 blackout could have been a book unto itself.” —Chuck Klosterman

― buzza, Monday, 14 November 2011 17:21 (fourteen years ago)

never judge a book by its blurb

― tylerw, Monday, 14 November 2011 17:24 (fourteen years ago)

Ha.

Also glad to see the auto-substitute or whatever it's called is working and providing the funny

― Miss Piggy and Frodo in Hull (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 14 November 2011 17:26 (fourteen years ago)

Blurberman

― buzza, Monday, 14 November 2011 17:26 (fourteen years ago)

marketing dude at publishing company: "you know what this book needs!? A KLOSTERBLURB!"

― tylerw, Monday, 14 November 2011 17:27 (fourteen years ago)

Ha.

New Yorkers can also see Hermes talk with DJ Kool Herc, Laurie Anderson and Lenny Kaye at the Housing Works Bookstore Cafe on November 30th

― curmudgeon, Monday, 14 November 2011 17:28 (fourteen years ago)

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