BOC: Meltzer

[John A. Swartz]

>   ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Subject: [chugchanga-l] Richard Meltzer piece in Chicago Reader
> Date: Wed, 7 Jul 1999 12:50:52 -0400
> From: Chip Hart <chip at PCC.COM>
>
>         From another list:
>
> > Just noticed a too long, and superindulgent, but also kind of interesting
> > and way different than one ususally sees in rock crit piece in last week's
> > Chicago Reader by original rock crit Richard Meltzer. I dare you to not
> > jump over large sections of ughfuzz grumphing, but it was still nice to
> > see:
> >
> >       http://www.chicagoreader.com/covers/vinyl.html
> >
> > Does this mean he's returning to active duty?
>

Well, I'll try hard not bash Richard Meltzer -- I'm a big fan of many of
his lyrics, but his other written output just leaves me shaking my head.
 I've ranted enough about that hack-job review he did on BOC a few
months back - whether there was more truth in there than a BOC fan would
want to know or admit to I don't know, but I'm still of the opinion that
a lot of what he said was inappropriate (interesting or not).

Reading through his article here reminded me of trying to read through
his book "The Aesthetics of Rock" -- I just DON'T GET IT.  I'm not
saying that it is therefore bad, but it just goes against a lot of my
way of thinking about music in general.  He seems to place way more
"significance" to so many aspects to music than I do - for me, it's just
rock and roll - it sounds good and makes me feel good - end of story.
Further, I don't get all the seemingly random bits of information that
Meltzer throws into his columns that presumably deal with music.  Do I
need to know that guy never thinks about one particular ex-girlfriend
when he jerks off?  Or that he left one of his girlfriends in a drunken,
comatose heap with a pile of other random stuff.  Or how 'bout his
description of one of Buck's girlfriends hugging a toilet waiting to
vomit followed immediately by the sentence "she had a great ass"?

Again, the above isn't meant to bash Meltzer.  Some of you probably
"get" his stuff and enjoy it.  To me, it just leaves me scratching my
head trying to figure out exactly what the hell I missed back there in
the 60s in my pre-school years...

I think maybe it's just a fundamental difference of opinion of what rock
music is to each of us.  To me, it's a form of sonic enjoyment to me -
gets my blood pumping, head banging, etc.  On the otherhand, here's a
quote from Meltzer on his definition of rock:

"Although what, precisely, was/is rocka rocka roll--or punk--or any kind
of youth twitch--supposed to entail "if not that"? If not the high risk
of behaving like a FLYING FUCKING ASSHOLE?"

Dunno - maybe since he mentioned it as a "youth twitch", maybe I'm just
getting to old...

By the way, thought I would cut-n-paste a bit from that article for
those who didn't read it all -- apparently Meltzer ain't on good terms
with Sandy Pearlman:

>>A friend g-g-g-gone!--and I don't mean dead. Written off, written out.
(I wouldn't piss on his grave.)

>>No names, no names, but he was a goodfriend, he was a bes'
friend--then once he wasn't he was NO FRIEND. Somewhere in the middle,
when he was just a midfriend, he helped originate rockwriting.
Wait--didn't I originate it? Give him an assist. He had a hand, was at
least a catalyst, the person I tried some of this crap out on. A lot of
my riffs came in dialogue with him. Which is something, considering how
little he knew 'bout rock 'n' roll--it was virtually all bluff. Like
here was a guy whose prior exemplar of musical ecstasy was Carmina
Burana, whose first try-on-for-size of what he took for rock/roll was
Trini Lopez at PJ's (which you'll probably miss the humor of if you're
under 45). Meet the Searchers (Kapp KL-1363) was his second.

>>Did ya know that the Brit Invasion, stage one, consisted solely of the
Beatles, the Dave Clark Five, and the Searchers?--then maybe Peter and
Gordon, possibly Gerry and the Pacemakers--it was six months (or more)
before the first real U.S. impact of the Stones. Well, this pal, this
buddy, championed the Searchers over the Beatles (his favorite
Beatle--what a card!--was Stu Sutcliffe, the dead one), imagining a song
or two of theirs more overtly "sexual" than either the known works of
the Fab Four or his subnovice's inkling of the rock norm. Putting his
money where his mouth was, he bought Meet the Searchers (aka Needles and
Pins), then I did. From the condition of my copy, I prob'ly spent more
time perusing the cover (for Merseybeaters, they dressed and greased
themselves like Joey Dee and the Starliters) than playing it. I've got
no clear sense no more of what they ever could've meant to me, other
than to look in the index to Aesthetics of Rock and see there's SEVEN
entries for 'em...well that's his doing.

>>My buddy! my pal! who in the late 60s forewent a "career" in rockcrit
(jus' kidding!: 'twurn't such a thing) for a career in rock commerce (a
career of rock evil? that's putting it too poetically); who as manager
of I won't even name them owed me for band services/rendered at a time,
a longtime, bloody years over which I could never consistently pay the
rent (and was never out of debt); oh! the image of him with his roll of
hundreds every time I'd ask him, beg him, for a penny or two. I wouldn't
puke...

>>And wasn't there more?, didn't he try to "steal" my gal, one of 'em
anyway; oh and he never invited me on a tour (although he took I won't
name her either--to Europe yet), even just as a friend goddammit; and as
a final insult sent me a hideous gold record, so suitable for framing it
was already framed...boo-hoo!...a good deal of which can easily be writ
off as just, well, ROCK AND ROLL, its wage, its consequence, its
everyday walk-the-streets surface and substance, durn near everything
but its music, ha ha ha ha ha, but more of which was plain basic
treachery, perfidy, bad faith, nongeneric interpersonal DOUBLECROSS.

>>I wouldn't puke on his mother.


You know?  I'm not sure that any of the guys associated with SWU/SFG
that hung out together in those days could hang out for too long with
eachother without killing eachother.  Over the years, I've heard various
quotes from many of them and it's amazing to me sometimes to think these
guys used to be part of the same group.  When I started the FAQ, I
wanted to be sure that it didn't go into any "gory details" concerning
such topics as the Bouchard departures from BOC or the recording of
Imaginos.  Reading Meltzer's comments above make me think that there may
be much gorier details elsewhere in the history of the good ship BOC...

Anyways, all this Meltzer stuff is giving me the urge to pop
*Trepanation* in the player -- "Shakespeare in Cyberspace - free as a feather..."

John