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zphage 3378 posts |
Mar 26, 2009, 17:08
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DEJA VU Crosby, Stills, Nash, Young, Taylor and Reeves (Atlantic SD-7200 ) Author: J.R. Young Publication: Rolling Stone Date: April 30th 1970 The record business hadn't been good lately. Some said it was a recession, others said supression, while others said mere direction, but whatever the reason, the plasticware wasn't moving through the stores. Records hadn't been turning anybody on in recent weeks and many thought that was bad. The capitalists with the hip facades throughout the supposed counter-culture all shook their furry little heads like crazy over the weeklies, because not only wasn't there anything strong on the racks, there wasn't anything on the way except perhaps the long awaited Deja Vu. They'd been hearing about it for months. Dave worked at the counter of one such establishment and he made change all day. His boss was one of the hip capitalists, a stone business man, and thus it was with more than mere interest that Dave watched him look the rack up and down at the end of the day, grimace, and finally bolt from the store, snorting over the lack of integrity, the failing hypes, the excessive delays, but more than anything, the real lack of good new releases and guaranteed sales. In short, moola. Dave watched the scene enacted daily, and each day muttered something about "assholishness" as the boss jumped in his GTO and shot out of view. Dave liked his job, however, because here it seemed correct to come to work stoned, hipper than thou, together, or as they said on the radio every eight minutes, "From Eugene, getting it right on ..." Dave was a very serious lad, into a much heavier stint than that of a mere desk clerk, for he fancied himself a bombmaker in the coming revolution, bombs now only in the blueprint stage ... but what blueprints. They were so large and meticulously drawn and so thorough that they covered three walls of the bedroom. He stood and admired the blue papered walls each night before taking his old lady to bed. His old lady was something else, too, because her scene, as she so candidly admitted, was a "mixed bag," anything from "politico-revolutionary theatre" to blue ribbon winner at the Lane County Fair for her apricot conserve. She said "Sorry 'bout that" more than three times a day, and talked on endlessly about good karma. Clipper, the cat who lived next door to them, thought "her act was nowhere" privately, although he still would have loved to ball her. He was an older cat and presumed he was terrifically sexual, and was into all kinds of "villes," such as "I'm in Turned-onsville," or "He's from Hostileville." He had a freaky girl friend who always wore a peasant blouse and jiggled her tits on purpose. "Nipplesville," Clipper often laughed as he made a grab for the big ones. They were all heavy record freaks and well into dope, always dropping "pure Owsley" and tripping at the beach, stashing joints, and things like that, and always to the big beat of the sounds that Dave brought home from the record store. Music and the dope went hand in hand in their households - whether fucking in the shower, eating dinner, talking revolution, reading Mao, answering the door, whatever, they were wacked. Even during his most serious moments, such as when working out a complicated detonator on paper, Dave still had half a joint, "just to keep my thing together." Yes, the new life was a good alternative. One day, a very strange dude moved into the complex. He had red bushy hair and never smiled, didn't talk much, kept to himself, and read thick books and apparently wrote a lot, too. About what was a mystery. He brought only one suitcase, a pillow, a blanket and an ancient army cot. He ate little, too. "Music, man, he doesn't listen to The Music. Isn't that far out," Dave's old lady exclaimed. "I mean, aaahhh," and she rolled her crazy red eyes back in her head as the other three passed the joint. "Yeh," Dave said, inhaling quickly. "Weird." "And probably No Dope, man. You know, probably No Dope. I mean AAAHHHH." "Weird, man. You know what I mean?" They all knew. As time passed, however, the strange dude, one Jordan Rover, began making inroads upon their heads with his consistent demeanor of general togetherness a clean brand of intense calm, his eyes flickering just slightly at the mention of People's Park or the slamming of a car door. Thus it was that following a macro-biotic meal in Dave's place one night they all sat around the living room as Dave filled the bamboo pipe. Jordan sat alone in the corner. It had been his first meal with the four, and he seemed a bit ill at ease at the dope development. When the pipe was handed to him, he merely kept it moving without taking the customary hit. The four friends all exchanged secret and knowing glances. "Not tonight, huh, Jordan?" Dave asked as the pipe went around for a second time. "Not tonight. Fucks my head around a little too much. Can't smoke it anymore. I used to really dig it, too. Same with music, man. Dangerous stuff." He nodded at them. Dave's old lady, her lids heavy, leaned forward. "No music? No dope? Man, where is that?" Jordan Rover didn't react, but only met her thick eyes with his clear eyes until she had to look away. They all looked away. Then he did speak, glancing around the apartment: "I'll tell you where it's at, because it's not where those blueprints are that you showed me earlier, if you know what I mean. The question is, 'where are you people?'" Dave stiffened. "What about the blueprints?" he asked. "They're posters, man, just like Jane Fonda and Elvis Presley and the Marx Brothers. Can you dig that?" "No, man. What the fuck are you talking about?" "They're plans, then," Jordan shrugged, "for you, but nothing more. Always planning, always waiting." "Wait a minute, man. So they are plans. Right on. Right?" "But it's a game. It's all a game. The dope's a game, the music's a game. Your fuckin' revolution is a game. You're really into all this other shit, man, and it has you locked in this room. It's all too comfortable for you to leave." "You're crazy, man," Dave said shaking his head. "He's crazy, right?" and Dave turned looking for help, but the other heads were fogged. "You think I'm crazy, when what it really comes down to is your ultimate concern this month is 'where the fuck is Deja Vu?' I've been hearing that rap ever since I moved in, and you can still say I'm crazy? What a waste, man. Deja Vu." "Now wait a minute." Dave held up his hands, blinking his eyes. "Wait a minute." A long pause ensued, broken only by the rustle of Clipper's hand up his chick's blouse. "You know what I think, man," Jordan Rover finally said as he looked around them, "I think that if you're ever going to get it together about the Change, man, Real Change, then you'll be hoping the Deja Vu will be shit, no good, 'cause like it's close this time." "What are you talking about. What's close? You're crazy." "Crazy? Then try this. There's a lot of energy in the air, and people are getting uptight. The market is slow, bad records, and there is no release, nothing to buy, right?" "Right?" "So dig it. It's energy, man, and it's building and it's going to have to move somewhere somehow, and if your Deja Vu suddenly appears and is a trip, well, man, then it's just another energy drain. Abbey Road and Let It Bleed all over again, another reprieve for Them. They've locked you up in here. Atlantic and all those people have you in jail and you don't even know it. You're the old people in Wild In The Streets. You put on the record, smoke a little dope, draw up a few bombs, and go to bed so you can get up and begin again tomorrow, and it's dumb, man, dumb. Nothing ever changes." Jordan was on his feet standing over them waving his arms as he talked on. "You folks call yourselves revolutionaries, but that's really crazy. You ought to lay off the music, lay off the shit, burn them rock and roll mags, and really get it on, put your energy in the street. That's where it's at!" He nodded slowly at them, signifying his message. "That's where it's at. Deja Vu isn't the question. It's the problem!" And with one final wave, Jordan Rover bowed thanked his host for the dinner and split. The remaining four were quiet for a long while. Dave was the first to speak, leaning forward and snubbing out the roach. "A righteous cat, man, a righteous cat. He's right on." He grinned at them all. "Right on !" That night some changes were made at Dave's place. Two nights later the record shop blew up taking half the block with it.
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zphage 3378 posts |
Mar 26, 2009, 17:10
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Can you dig it?" Clipper said, still fluffing his chick's tits as the flames shot up 60 feet across the street from where the four sat watching. "A righteous explosion, man," Dave laughed, but exuding a new determined grimness all the time. "Right out of the Mantovani section. A righteous explosion." They all stood proudly and watched as the three-alarm fire became a four and stretched on into the early morning. Clipper and his chic left early. Dave and his old lady were almost the last to leave. "Oh, man, when I heard it, when I heard it my heart almost burst. So far out. BOOM!" He threw his head back and roared. His old lady unlocked the door of the apartment and they went in. The place was now nothing more than bare walls and floors, save for the bed. Only essentials remained. "So far out," Dave laughed again, and he fell on the bed, his eyes closed, his face aglow in the candlelight. His old lady sat at his side, looking down reverently at her longhaired radical. "Did you dig it?" he asked as he slipped a hand up inside her blouse to her warm breasts. "I dug it," she said, smiling softly at him. They fell together almost immediately and balled. Perhaps forty minutes later, they lay silent in bed, breathing easily and thinking private thoughts, private until both were aware of low throbbing sounds coming from down the hall. "Do you hear something," she finally asked, "like music?" "Sure do," he answered, and they listened some more. "Know who it is?" she asked. "Well, if I'm not mistaken, it's Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young. I know Deja Vu came out today." "No, silly. I couldn't care less about what the record is. I want to know who's playing it around here." "Who else but Clipper. I mean, the cat's crazy. No will. He's at it again." Dave reached for a cigarette. "Now, I can't believe that," she said sitting up. "You know him." "I'm gonna see," and wrapping a blanket around her, she crept to the door. "It is coming from there, and I smell dope, too." Dave jumped out of bed. "I think I better go rap with him about this," he said "after all the shit he was laying on us the other night how he was gonna make it." "Me, too," his old lady chipped in. They marched to Clipper's door, and just as Dave was about to knock, he stopped. The sound strangely enough wasn't coming from Clipper's place at all, but from the next room. Dave and his old lady exchanged quizzical glances and edged that way, unsure of their discovery. But sure enough, it was Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young on the stereo. Deja Vu. Dave slowly cracked open the door, and there on the floor on his mattress in front of a KLH portable sat Jordan Rover, naked, a fresh lid of grass at his side, and a huge joint hanging from his lips. When he saw Dave and his old lady at the door, he beamed at them, chuckling easily. "Hey, man, com'on in." He lifted his eyebrows and nodded at them. "Com'on in and smoke a little shit, open yer ears. Sit down," and he patted the mattress at his side. "But ... you said ... " Dave stammered, pointing at him. Oh, man, sit down," Jordan grimaced jocularly, and then smiled. "You've got to hear this. It's sooo far out." "But, what I said, man. I know what I said. Right on." He thrust a fist feebly into the air. "But you were right. It's an energy . . ." "Yeh, man, it's a drain, a real energy drain ... but it feels so good ... It feels so fuckin good, man" and his head fell back as he turned up the volume and let the music pour into their heads. And he was right. "Gee, it does sound good, doesn't it?" Dave's old lady said as she blithely dropped the blanket at her feet and sat her pink little body down on the mattress. She went for a joint immediately. It wasn't more than a second later after a final shrug that Dave, too, sat down and took the joint in his turn. And it wasn't more than twenty minutes later that Dave in sweet serenity was heard to remark to no one in particular: "Neil Young is a heavy, man. Neil Young is a real heavy."Oscar wrote: My understanding isn't based on my own experience. I gained a lot of my understanding from the black perspective of others (through my University course)...
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