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devils & dust, 30 days out

So, one month after its release, I finally make myself sit down to write about this record. This all should have happened much sooner, but I just found myself so perplexed that I kept postponing the task for no other reason than I kept feeling like I was missing something. I wish I could say that it was because this record was so complex and challenging that I didn't know what to make of it, that it took time to truly absorb it. If anything, the record confused me, and not in a good way.

Up until this missive was finished, I had deliberately avoided reading what anybody wrote about the record, not Amy, not SFJ, not even Pareles in the Times (who I won't link because it will already cost you money to read it, but he did think it was the second coming), not even my editor at Backstreets. It wasn't so much that I didn't want someone to tell me what I thought about the album as I didn't want my own sinking feelings about the record affirmed, or conversely, I didn't want to have someone tell me that this record was amazing (#1 in the US and the UK? That must've cost Sony a pretty penny) and have me wonder if perhaps I just don't get Bruce any more, maybe I am not really part of his core audience so no wonder the record doesn't speak to me.

Or maybe, just maybe, the truth is somewhere in the middle. Which is where it usually lurks.

Devils & Dust is not a bad record. It's just not a great record, and Bruce Springsteen, Mr. Control Freak Extraordinaire, only releases Great Records. If he released a record every year and a half I could accept it in the same kind of context as, say, a Polaroid snapshot, and let it be just that, but he doesn't work that way, and the fact that this came out as quickly as it did is somewhat mindboggling. But then you have to add to the mix the fact that I know probably too much, I know how old some of these songs are, and then I start to worry that maybe the reason that "Long Time Coming," "All The Way Home" and "The Hitter" show up on here is not that they fit thematically ("Long Time Coming" does, and yes, you can stretch it and say "The Hitter" does as well [and, only because of the first two lines, only the device he uses to tell the narrative makes it fit thematically] , but it is a stretch), but that he didn't have anything better so he dusted off songs out of the closet. This is of course a time-honored tradition and would be fine if (again, "Long Time Coming" excepted I think - I think) they were such memorable gems that it was only with great reluctance they were warehoused.

And then the boyfriend will remind me of the genesis of The Rising, and how Bruce didn't have much, and that it was only when Brendan O'Brien pushed him to sit down and write that we got a whole album. I do find it funny how many people hated The Rising but seem to love Devils & Dust; The Rising was a great record with some exceptional songs. Devils & Dust is, at best, a good record with some shining moments. I hated The Rising when I first heard it, but then ended up with four copies (work, car, home, extra); even now, I'm not tired of the songs. I can't say that Devils & Dust has similarly inspired me, and trust me, it's not that I don't want to like it. I desperately want a great, relevant, inspiring Springsteen record to have on repeat in the iPod for the next year. Instead, when I want relevant and inspiring, I'm turning to the new Sleater-Kinney record instead--which is probably not a fair comparison, but then again, why the hell not?

I made the point in my Storytellers review that if you have to explain a song in order for the audience to understand it, then something is wrong with the song, because the song should be enough. Sasha makes the same point about "Silver Palomino," and I'll make the same point again, here, about "Matamoros Banks" (and also "Reno," but "Reno" gets its own paragraph, don't you worry, so just hang on). I like that Bruce sees "Matamoros Banks" as the sequel (or rather, companion piece, I think) to "Across The Border" but he shouldn't have to draw the line for me, and the songwriting -- the *storytelling* -- should be strong enough that you don't have to explain to me that you are switching perspectives (another problem with "Reno," once again, wait). And the fact that he feels the need to explain things, both in concert and in the liner notes, makes the songs feel half-baked, not ready for prime time. Springsteen is, goddammit, a strong enough storyteller in 150 words -- hell, in one fucking line -- that he doesn't need to tell us what the song means. And while the man is reknown for the stories he would tell in concert, they were always apart from the song, a compliment, a tangent, sparking off the theme of the song, not long treatises on what the song was about.

"Reno". I get very, very concerned when anyone tries to tell an artist when they have gone too far, or what they are and aren't "allowed" to do. You don't like "Reno"? Skip it. Make your own mix (as some pretentious blowhard who wrote to Backstreets this month did). But musicians are not jukeboxes and you don't have to agree or like everything that they do, and you get to vote by not buying their records or not going to their shows. Period. My argument on "Reno" is that Bruce wanted to very drastically contrast two periods in the character's life, how he can descend from glory into despondency, and he wanted the difference between the two worlds to be utterly different. My problem isn't the language or the technique, my problem is that it just isn't done very well, and not because it uses language some people find objectionable (I swear to god if I ever hear any of you swearing at a baseball game I will report you to the hypocrite police, if there was such a thing, and there should be). That's all. The transitions aren't sharp enough and the middle passage isn't clear enough to me (without his explanation, anyway) and that, to me, is what makes "Reno" fail. Not the questionable language.

(Sidebar: The Starbucks thing was asinine, not because they banned him, and not because Bruce's management wanted to sell the record there -- it's not the worst marketing idea in the world -- but because Starbucks actually believes that the Starbucks brand has more meaning and value to people than Bruce Springsteen as a brand does. How completely idiotic.)

I like "Leah". I like "Maria's Bed." I am not sure that both of them needed to be on the record, and I'd argue that there are songs on "Tracks" that got left off of other albums that are stronger than both of these numbers combined. "Long Time Coming" is beautiful and moving and hurrah that it emerged from the vaults and it fits beautifully with the theme, intentional or unintentional, of parenting and children, that shadows the album. "Black Cowboys" feels like a Jonathan Lethem short story (and is probably my favorite new song). I have made my peace with "Devils & Dust" as a song, and out of the new material (again, stress on new) on the record, it's probably the best song, but I don't know what that means. I also don't know how much I'm colored by my exposure to all the interviews where he talks about the song, or if hearing it live (without the freaking Nashville Strings and other production elements that sanitize it too much to my liking) has changed me. I can't tell at this point.

Now, having said all of this, I need to make the point that I think the live show supporting Devils & Dust is anything but predictable or boring and is in fact incredibly reactionary. It pissed Amy off -- hell, it's pissing off a lot of people, including big, long-time fans. For a solo acoustic tour to have this affect is utterly remarkable. I do have to wonder how long the surprises are going to continue; Boston felt somewhat formulaic after the string of surprises that have been rolled out this tour (and even "Real World" felt just the tiniest bit rote; I know I am spoiled, being one of the few thousand people on the planet who have heard it played live not once but twice, but still). I like the fact that he is approaching songs from different perspectives, even if they don't last or I don't like them -- okay, so there's nothing I don't like (I am somewhat tired of this version of "The Promised Land" although it doesn't count because it's not the standard version, but it is the standard non-standard version, if that makes sense). I like that he is not rolling out "Thunder Road" and "Born To Run" and "I'm On Fire" gets played on a freaking banjo. I love the honky-tonk version of "Ramrod" so much I would like it to stay that way forever. And I am a rabid maniac for what's been done to "Reason To Believe," although I realize I am in the minority here (okay, I seem to be the only one who is enthralled by it, actually). My only lament is I wish Bruce could have brought the same spirit of experimentation and reinvention that is clearly present on this tour, to the recording of Devils & Dust. Everyone would probably still be pissed off -- long time fans who want Bruce to stay the same forever, newer fans who missed it the first time so they don't want him to ever change -- but we'd have an album to remember.

Oh well. There's always the next one. You know, the one he's going to make with Social Distortion as his backing band. Or with the same kind of band that Dylan has, with a white-hot guitar player that will actually challenge the Guitar Slinger of Central New Jersey.

(Yeah, right. In my dreams.)

(Wait. "Real World," solo piano, repeatedly. That did happen, right?)

(Maybe my dreams aren't that crazy after all.)

Links:
My 4/22/05 Asbury Park Rehearsal Show review
My Storytellers review
Other writing on Bruce

we jam econo: the story of the minutemen

The film opens with grainy color footage of a very, very young d.boon, Mike Watt, and George Hurley sitting in a field, waiting to be interviewed. (The interview footage seems familiar and I'd bet that I saw some if not all of it on IRS Records' "The Cutting Edge" in the MTV alternative rock ghetto one Sunday night in the 80's.)

"Two-shot on Mike and d.boon."

The story begins with Mike Watt telling the story of how he and d.boon met, that d.boom jumped out of a tree and fell on him.

CUT TO:

An older, greyer, more grizzled Watt in 2003: "This is the tree, right here."

If your heart doesn't plummet at that very moment -- at the contrast, at the fact that Watt remembers, at the constant subtext, that d.boon has not been on this planet for 20 years now, then this isn't the film for you.

we jam econo is the story of the late, lamented Minutemen, West Coast punk rock pioneers out of San Pedro. Over the course of the almost two hours of footage (including over 53 interviews, covering everyone close to the band (including Watt's mother), up to John Doe, Thurston Moore, Raymond Pettibone, Byron Coley, Greg Ginn, Keith Morris, Ian Mackaye, Richard Meltzer, Flea, and of course, Watt and George Hurley, you come away with an incredibly intricate, thorough understanding of this band and its history and, the impossible task, comprehending why this band was so important and meaningful to so very many people.

The latter is a task that is the most difficult, in my opinion. You've taken on the task of historian and archivist but in the burning need to capture all the details, sometimes it is hard if not impossible to retreat and find some perspective, and push through to be able to convey import to outsiders, to those who weren't there, to those who were but didn't have the entire picture. This is something that producer Keith Scherion and director Tim Irwin (childhood friends who discovered the band together) have excelled at; it makes the film more cerebral than flashy, but the Minutemen and the music they created also fit that description.

The film has a good balance of interview and live footage, and I especially appreciated their willingness to let a live clip play out in its entirety (then again, easy to do when few songs were more than 2 minutes; Watt's incredulity when he realizes one song - the first song to go over 2 minutes - was actually 2 minutes and 30 seconds was priceless). Still, it's tempting to cut live songs short, especially when the quality is 80's camcorder and you have 53 interview subjects to try to cram into a short span of time.

But live is where the Minutemen came alive for me; West Coast punk rock, to me, was this inpenetrable wall of dark blackness that I could not relate to (with very few exceptions, such as X); Double Nickels On The Dime (the explanation of which I won't spoil, as it's one of the best moments of the film) changed that for me, but it wasn't until I saw the Minutemen live for the first time, opening for R.E.M., that everything fell into place.

I saw a series of at least a dozen R.E.M. shows in the fall and winter of 1985 during which the Minutemen were the opening act, and watching d.boon perform his cannonball-cum-Townshend jumps around the stage every night was nothing short of joyous. So for me personally, it was heartbreaking in the extreme when the film ended with the band discussing the upcoming opening band slot (which was incredibly controversial at the time), and hearing Watt talk about how the last show of the tour, in Charlotte (which I can still close my eyes and remember) was the last time he ever played onstage with d.boon, who died in a car accident several weeks later.

You are left with the indelible sense that d.boon's absence still affects those close to him on a daily basis; Watt most obviously (and heartbreakingly); Ian Mackaye holding up a note he's clearly held onto all these years, alerting him to d.boon's death.

we jam econo is a labor of love, a fitting tribute, a thoroughly professional and well-thought out piece of documentary filmmaking. If you weren't there, it gives you the keys to the kingdom; if you were, it will fill in the holes and leave you smiling and bittersweet and just a little misty. It's loud, it's direct, and it does this band justice. Go see it if it's playing anywhere near you -- but if you can't, there will be a DVD in the fall, which will also contain at least three live shows in their entirety.

[disclaimer: i have contributed to this project in the way of photographs and memorabilia, and appear in the end credits as a result.]

greg kot interview with bono

"But if a show is a little off, and there's a hole, that's the one song we can guarantee that God will walk through the room as soon as we play it."

So, once again a musician doesn't like what a Chicago rock writer wrote about their performance, and calls them up and leaves a voicemail which results in the two sitting down for a conversation.

When I heard about this incident last night, the first thing I said was, "What is it with rock writers in Chicago that rock stars keep calling them up to yell at them?"

And then I realized it was because Chicago is one of the few towns left that has intelligent, erudite rock and roll writers on the payroll of the daily papers (and yes, I include DeRogatis in this mix. While I think sometimes he is overly cranky and too predictable, he is still smart, articulate and passionate about what he does).

But this time it was Greg Kot's turn to sit down with Bono, and the result is an interview that is one of the greatest rock and roll interviews of the last 10 years.

It's the first interview for longer than I care to remember that made me think, that made me question my own assumptions about the music and the artist, where the writer doing the interview did not back down BUT YET also conceded points -- or had his own mind changed as he was speaking to the artist. It was a dialogue, it was an actual intelligent conversation.

I also typed "and wasn't clouded by editorial concerns" but I don't know that to be true, you know - I don't know if U2's record company advertises in the Chicago Tribune or if Kot's editor's care if they do or don't. What I know is that I don't feel like that was a factor in the direction of the conversation, and I can't think of many publications where that consideration isn't in the back of my mind as I read it. (I mean, even on one of the tiny websites I write for, I am getting more and more concerned because more and more writers on it get all psyched when a band's official web site linked to their article or they get a nice note from the artist thanking them for their review.)

Kot wasn't trying to be Bono's new best friend, or have Bono like him (again, I don't know, all I do know is that the questions made me feel like that wasn't a concern) which is another big pet peeve with interviews today; so many writers are afraid of pissing off the musician or the publicist or the record company and having their access cut off (either to that band or to other artists they represent). Bono says, "We need from writers some rage, and we need spleen, but we also need the pursuit of truth."

This has not been an easy year to be a U2 fan; I have struggled hard with my own relationship with the band -- truth is that I have for years, since the first time they played Madison Square Garden (I didn't go; I turned up my nose at seeing any band I loved in a space that big). For some reason I feel like I want to give up on them, or I want an excuse to be able to; I don't want to have to pay $160 to see them or feel like shit when I can't or won't spend that sum of money. (And even in this interview, Bono calling "Vertigo" a "three-minute punk rock song" is enough to make me see red.)

But this interview made me change my mind about more than a few things, made me rethink my position on others, and also had me consider viewpoints that would never even have entered my mind. If nothing else, Bono wins me over for his accurate characterization of the indie rock ghetto, and he takes on the question about commercialization of songs with what at least feels like candor and frankness (which is more than I can say for Townshend, who always comes across being angry and defensive about it). There are some mind-blowing quotes, some statements that are utterly legendary. I was going to quote some here, but then I realized that if I took them out of context, they could lose impact when you read the article, and also what was incredible to me might not be the same to others.

So you'll just have to read it yourself. Even if you truly don't like U2, this is mandatory reading if you care about rock and roll at all. And it's ensured that I will head for MSG when they come back through here in the fall.

save cbgb

Everyone I know who doesn't live in NYC keeps asking me this, and up until now, I haven't had anything I could send them to. Finally, there is an effort to save the club that I feel comfortable promoting and supporting:

Project Save CBGB & OMFUG is not paid for by the owner of CB's and is supported by the roster of artists I would expect to see backing a sincere, legit, positive and productive effort to save the club. Getting landmark status for CBGB is a fantastic start.

because the night : patti smith at CBGB

1 May 2005

8pm and the doorway to CBGB opens up and we rush in. That doorway, where I used to stand with my fake ID and try to look the age it advertised. Then, the interminable walk past the bar, underneath the gallery of neon signs. I know exactly where I'm going but the people in front of me do not, so I finally edge around them and lead us over to the right side of the stage, not the left, I hate being in the pathway to the bathrooms. It has been a very long time since I have been here and yet it is still the same, it is still CBGB, it always feels semi-unreal, this black cave stretching back to meet the angled stage. I have never sat down for a show at CB's and I was hardly going to start tonight.

It was May Day and Patti Smith was at CBGB's and was there even a question that I would be in attendance? I didn't know the occasion for the gig, Patti likes to play on May Day and she has played CB's within the past, oh, 7 years (I think). And, yeah, sure, if this is the last time I'm inside CBGB, what a way to go.

So from the top there was absolutely no way this would have been a bad night. It began somewhat sedately, quiet numbers, "Hunter Gets Captured By The Game," "Redondo Beach," another number - and then all of a sudden, Michael Stipe is clambering onto the stage and they go into "Ghost Dance."

Well, this puts a little bit of an edge on things, doesn't it now?

Lenny Kaye gets the spotlight with "Part of the Union" in honor of May Day. So at this point it feels like this nice little special show that will kind of meander, Patti said she was a little under the weather (everyone in NYC has a cold, it seems), and, again, really, what could be bad here?

On the other hand, switch to: Patti kneeling back at the amp, choking feedback out of her Stratocaster, and careening into "25th Floor." "Space Monkey" took things down a little, and then Tony Shanahan got his spotlight dance with a cover of "Rhinestone Cowboy" (it's a long story).

"I hope I don't fuck this one up, since the person who wrote it is here" preceded an absolutely gorgeous cover of "Saturn Return" by R.E.M. "I hope Michael went to the bathroom, or something," Patti pleaded, when she didn't remember how the song ended.

The problem is that all of the show, even Michael Stipe on "Because The Night," even, again, that incendiary "25th Floor," Patti throttling her Strat as though her life depended on it, all of it faded away once she spoke the line:

The boy was in the hallway drinking a glass of tea.

Then, then, Patti did what she has always done for, her role as guide and storyteller and enchantress, she opened a door into another world and took us with her. Except this time, Johnny is watching people die and children being exploited and the rich getting richer, and while I never thought of "Land" as a vehicle for political messages, it worked, it fucking worked, because it was still free-form and passion-filled and Lenny is up there, no one else works together quite the way the two of them do, he can follow her absolutely anywhere and give her a thread to hang onto, just hitting the strings on his guitar, atonally, just the right pace and tone and feeling, supporting her, guiding her in a way. He's waiting for her to finish, he is circling slowly until she's ready:

Horses, horses, horses, horses
coming in all directions

And all hell breaks loose. It is frantic and frenetic and the goosebumps from earlier translate into actual shivers, which I stave away through heat and sweat and joyous rancor, singing along as though it was the first time I had heard this song, dancing feverishly.

Do you know how to pony like bony maroney?

Mayhem now, and she is feeding off of it, it was an oddly paced show and just when we'd get a little rhythm they'd stop or some odd number would come in, but now, sick or not, she is on her game, her eyes are bright and shiny and she is here but she is not here, she is the high priestess, she is channeling the energy and raising more and feeding it back to us.

Johnny looks out the window and sees a sweet young thing
Humpin on the parking meter, leaning on t he parking meter

Is she just visiting or is she taking us there? We don't know yet, there are shouts of recognition, and then:

And her name is
and her name is
G-L-O-R-I-A

Yeah, that's where she's taking us. It's call and response, the club vibrating with shouts of "GLORIA!" until the end, the very end...

Jesus died for somebody's sins...

She winks at us, a little, postures, preens, poses.

But not mine.

Jay Dee hits that four-beat roll and we're back into the chorus, dancing like crazy until it's over.

I am always so critical of people who go see artists of a certain stature when they evaluate the artist based on what they did 20 years ago, or evaluate performances in 2005 based on 1975. I hate it. But tonight Patti was channelling the ghosts of CB's so I guess it's okay that I say that this felt like old times, and it felt oh so good, forbidden, scary, familiar and beautiful.

Patti tells the story about recuperating after she walked off a stage in Florida in 1977 and broke her neck. How four geeky guys came to visit her, and they kind of reminded her of Lenny, and they brought her a bottle of tequila in a paper bag, even though she didn't drink, she thought the gesture was very sweet.

The four guys were the Ramones, and then, just as we are choking up, and she is choking up, thinking of everyone who has been on that stage and is no more, including three members of her own band, she dedicates "a little number" to them, except that that little number is "Elegie" which guarantees we are going to cry: "I think it's sad, it's much too bad/That our friends can't be with us today."

"People Have The Power" was an afterthought, preceded by an exhortation in tribute of Ralph Nader; and it was during this speech on her part that I realized that I didn't care that I disagreed with her, but it was her stage and her belief and her passion and she puts her money where her mouth is for Nader and it didn't bother me one iota that she used the stage as platform even if I don't know that I agree with her. Anyway, it's beautiful, like it always is, and Michael comes back onstage for this one. I always loved how he owned this song during the Vote For Change shows, memories of which of course come flooding back right now.

And it's over. Over. And I realize that she played nothing new and that with all of the stories about writing songs with Richard Sohl in this very club, and the tribute to Hilly's dog, Jonathan (PUNK magazine even interviewed Jonathan once, putting a leather jacket and sunglasses on him) and the Dead Boys, that this was, simply, her way of saying goodbye to CB's, and chances are that it will most likely be mine as well.