jukeboxgraduate.com

no direction home

Amazon's No Direction Home info page includes a trailer which is an absolute MUST SEE.

The footage of early Dylan is mindblowing; and someone, thank Allah, got Dylan to sit down and spell it all out before he's not here to do that.

It seems kind of amazing that Dylan - Dylan! - would be so willing to do this, but it feels like he has enough of sense of his legacy and how he wants it to be presented when he is no longer on this earth that he's being willing to let us in behind the curtain.

Thank god someone is doing this. Thank god Dylan is letting them. And why can't some people get over their large freakin' egos to let a Scorsese do the same thing for them, before it's too late?

(Thanks, H., for the tip off!)

glory days: a bruce springsteen symposium

The abstracts are online now.

I still have no idea what I am doing here (if you peruse the rest of the abstracts you will see what I mean) but I was invited by the organizer and encouraged by Dave Marsh to submit, so I did. Now I have to write the damn thing.

Truth be told, there's a lot of interesting food for thought here, and not much of the trainspotting variety at all. I hope people will come; it will be tough because there will be yet more tour dates in this time zone around the same time, but I hope people will come.

quick notes on bruce in bridgeport

Bruce Springsteen
Harboryards
Bridgeport, CT
7-20-05

There's a running joke among Springsteen dorks that only Ed Norton (yes, that Ed Norton) is allowed to request songs at a Springsteen concert. The reason for this is that when he did, we got "The Promise," "Incident on 57th Street" and "For You" solo piano back at the Staples Center in 1999. (And, Ed, thanks.) Add to that list now Mr. Jesse Malin, who was responsible tonight for my first (and quite likely only) time hearing "The Promise" live.

*thud*

I honestly felt like I had seen this tour, I had gotten this tour, that intensity or a good mood aside, I didn't need to go see more shows in multiple quantities (especially at close to $100 a ticket after TM charges). So Bridgeport was a quasi-spontaneous, the boyfriend deciding we should go and we should see a show together (our only shared show this year being Storytellers, I know, fuck off, yes we are spoiled). It was the kind of night where we were resigned to standing in the drop line hoping for a miracle, or bargain shopping in the parking lot.

The result was two tickets in section 115 for $50 total at 7:45. They weren't great but they didn't suck either. And after "The Promise," right about the time I stopped floating about six inches above my seat, the boyfriend said, "See, *this* is why we came."

No fucking shit.

So Buffalo had all these debuts (I wasn't watching setlists because, well, I wasn't, I forgot he was back in the States, and once I wasn't watching it was easier to not watch so that Bridgeport could be a surprise, a clean slate, something it is rare for me to have the chance to do), and while Bridgeport didn't, there were enough surprises (see above) and enough strong performances (again, see above), fine song choices ("Spare Parts" instead of "Part Man Part Monkey," for example), excellent pairings ("State Trooper" into "Nebraska," for instance) and general good humor (the current version of "Ramrod," for example, or Bruce apologizing to the people who may have been unruly due to sound system problems: "But if that wasn't it, go fuck yourself") to make it an outstanding show.

And while we're allowing Jesse Malin to request songs forever, Don Ienner (head of Sony Music) should be put in the penalty box for "All That Heaven Will Allow". As the boyfriend put it, "Of all the songs on Tunnel -- that one??!" It was sweet, don't get me wrong, but a little bit of a train wreck coming after "The Promise" (not sure what could come after that song and not be sadly inferior, though).

We're down to only about 5-6 Devils & Dust songs at this point, down from 9 at the tour's peak; but at this point you could see every show and see 6-7 different songs each night, which, for Bruce, is remarkable.

In the audience tonight was Alan Vega from Suicide, the band that wrote "Dream Baby Dream." I'm interviewing him next week (as it so happens) for both Backstreets and the paper I'm presenting at the Springsteen symposium in September (yeah, more on that later), and the first thing I think I'm going to ask is how it felt to watch a bunch of white boys in backwards baseball caps pumping their fists and shouting along to "Dream Baby Dream". In its original format, this is not an anthem, this is not an exhortation, it is anything but that; as my friend Amy Phillips put it best in her review of the Tower Theater show (scroll down), "'Dream Baby Dream,' when performed by Suicide, is one of the scariest pieces of music of all time. Alan Vega sounds like he’s about to kill Baby. But Bruce turned it into a straightforward love song. No! This song is about nightmares! Not sweet dreams! Damn you, Bruce!"

Now, if you'll pardon me, I need to figure out how the hell I can get to another show. Because one is never enough and I should know better than that by now.

Nick Hornby meets Bruce Springsteen

The Observer UK: as you might expect, an interview that is thoughtful and asks a lot of the questions you would if you had the chance. I also like it because there is this undercurrent of "ohmigod I am talking to BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN" even though it's Nick fucking Hornby doing the talking. It's humble and sincere and imho makes for great reading. But, then again, I dig Hornby.

Which reminds me, of course, that an article about his shows last month with Marah is long overdue. Moving, and the pesky work thing have been getting in the way of the words lately. Anon.

as long as i gaze on waterloo sunset

somewhere off oxford street, 1985

Is it possible to be in love with a city you've never been to? When I got off the plane in the UK two weeks after graduating college, I had been besotted with London for as long as I could remember. It was the home of the Beatles and the Who and the Stones and Elvis Costello and the Clash and and and -- and I swore I was going there as soon as I could manage it.

Coming into London via British Rail, up from Gatwick, I remember seeing the Battersea Power Station in the distance, getting closer, and I felt like I’d reached the fucking promised land. I stared out the window, stunned. It existed. It was REAL. I could get off the train, walk over to the side of the building, and place my hand on it. I could touch it.

The Power Station was the first thing in London I saw that I could identify, and it was more critical to me than seeing Big Ben or the Thames or the Houses of Parliament, all of which rolled into view a few seconds later. Call me shallow, but rock and roll was what brought me there. Seeing the Battersea Power Station, the building I knew from album covers I’d stared at for hours, more than anything else brought home the fact that I was really, truly, in LONDON.

I spent the first few days in a kind of daze. It seemed utterly impossible that I actually had my feet on the ground of the place I had dreamed about, read about, thought about, for so long. Everything was fascinating to me: grocery stores, buying stamps, waiting for the bus, making a phone call. The friends I was staying with were endlessly amused.

I spent that first trip searching out obscure rock and roll landmarks. I didn’t go there for medieval history or great art, although I saw a lot of those things - I went to walk down Wardour Street and go inside the Marquee and close my eyes and think about the Who and the Stones on that stage. I stood in front of the sadly shuttered Finsbury Park Rainbow and thought about all the bands who had played there, from Eric Clapton to the Kinks to the Clash. I walked around Edith Grove, trying to imagine what it was like when Mick and Keith and Brian shared a flat there. Portobello Market and Kingsway and Ladbroke Grove in the steps of the Clash. Muswell Hill just to listen to the Kinks while I walked through the streets.

I have been to London well over a dozen times by now -- I even lived there for a few months -- and I love it fiercely, all of it, even the things my British friends would lovingly mock me for idealizing. I never thought it was perfect -- nowhere is, after all -- but there was a spirit and an energy embodied in the city that I have always adored.

Which is why my heart broke Thursday morning. But then, if you're human, surely it broke a little, even if you've never walked the streets of London.

live 8

actual dialogue from saturday afternoon:

philadelphia. stevie wonder onstage. much jubilation.
CUT TO:
MTV moron: "Stevie Wonder is onstage and it's just incredible..."
Boyfriend: "Oh my god, you people are completely useless! Stevie Wonder is playing 'Higher Ground,' would you please SHUT UP."

This, of course, was nothing compared to the searing white hot rage I felt at the MTV vj with the name "Aaman" (or something carefully diverse) as he felt the need TO TELL US THAT THE WHO WERE ONSTAGE IN THE MIDDLE OF ''WON'T GET FOOLED AGAIN" ABOUT THREE SECONDS BEFORE THE MOTHERFUCKING POWER SCREAM, and we hit the volume on the computer so we could WATCH THE GODDAMN CONCERT, and Roger actually NAILED in front of the whole world, and the second he did I started sobbing uncontrollably, partly because whether I like it or not they are still My Band, it is like that old boyfriend that you just can't shake yourself from emotionally, and Pete looked so good in that denim jacket and not a f'in suit for a change (although the beard makes Joe Grushecky's eerie resemblance of PT even stranger).

Him: "And why didn't we go to London for this?"
Me: "I'm sure we had a perfectly good reason at the time."

But, I am getting ahead of myself.

I don't have anything to say about the complete and utter ineptitude of Viacom and its various networks and their complete lack of ability to present a worldwide historical musical event with any professionalism or competence whatsoever that someone somewhere hasn't already said. But, that said, I don't know how anyone at that network isn't going to be completely embarassed going to work on Tuesday morning. It was childish, moronic, disrespectful, inappropriate, and just plain LAME.

Around the time of Woodstock II (I think), I remember someone from MTV being interviewed about their proposed coverage and how they had learned a few lessons from the debacle that was their coverage of Live Aid -- and there at least they had an excuse, the channel and the entire concept being in its infancy, but even then you didn't need a rocket scientist to know that WHEN LED ZEPPELIN ARE REUNITING FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER YOU DO NOT SHOW MARTHA QUINN AND MARK GOODMAN HEADBANGING WHEN JIMMY PAGE IS TAKING A GUITAR SOLO!

(Yes, I'm still bitter about that one, and I am not any kind of Zeppelin fan whatsoever.)

Maybe it was deliberate, that they didn't show one song in its entirety; maybe this was all by careful planning and design, maybe Geldof is still bitter about the people who taped Live Aid and sold the dvd's on eBay (which could have been prevented a long time ago, but noooo). Yes, we had the computer and broadband to bring us anything that we missed and from a technical perspective, it worked flawlessly considering the load those servers must have been under.

It just seems a shame, in an age when music is respectable and valued commercially and critically, that an event of this stature couldn't rate the coverage it deserved, especially considering the cause it was organized on behalf of.

Me: "The reason we didn't go to London was?"
Boyfriend: "I'm not really sure right now."

live8

feed the world.

more later.

punk: attitude! on IFC next week

“All you need is one guy or girl to stand up and say 'Fuck this,' and everyone goes: 'Voice of a generation! Thank you. I’ve been thinking that, I never had the guts to say it' - and all of a sudden - 'Fuck this' has a backbeat.”

--Henry Rollins

July 9 (thanks, BP) on IFC at 10pm (for the six people who have it as part of their cable package), and July 20 on A&E! So you have, actually, no excuse not to see this. (Also, coming soon to DVD, I hear.)

My review of "Punk: Attitude!"