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Music of the mad.
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IanB
IanB
6761 posts

Edited Aug 17, 2011, 11:28
Re: Music of the mad.
Aug 17, 2011, 11:03
Robot Emperor wrote:
I have never been comfortable with the Sid Barrett solo albums, they sound to me like a private tragedy - a desperately sad and lonely cry from a tortured mind. I find nothing transcendental here but know many are deeply attached to these albums.


I am with you on that and I know some people would make the same argument about "Oar" and even the later Nick Drake recordings.

It's all in the ears of the listener of course but that can be clouded by biographical knowledge. There are probably thousands of wonderful, beautiful, frightening or frighteningly beautiful records that were made by people who carry themselves as fully functioning healthy people who suffered deeply in private. And, as you say, there are a lot of liars (you say actors) out there and I would extend that category to the many whose rock n roll shtick is based squarely on a (manufactured) perception that the extremes of excessive use of drugs and alcohol can be sustainable for years at a time and even form the basis for a successful life as an artist and as a human being. Myth making of the most damaging kind. Most long term addicts I have come across in rock are liars, bores and bullies rather than seers or shaman and very few civilians have the support and infrastructure that a rock star has at his or her disposal.

Anyway for me it really comes down to how exploitative the process is within each transaction between artist and audience. Main thing is are we being encouraged to get off on the artist's illness or incapacity for commercial gain of the various handlers and mediators? Syd and Roky and Brian Wilson certainly fell into that category for me at various times but not always. I can remember walking out of a Johnny Thunders show shaken at the state he was in. Brian Wilson's last UK were almost Hammer Horror material to my eyes and ears whereas the Smile shows at the RFH were joyous affairs. Personally Nick Drake may have been marketed as tragic but the music has been largely allowed to speak for itself. We haven't been encouraged to hear his music as a psychological freak show that you can visit vicariously. Charlie Parker was once "marketed" in hipster circles for his drug life (like Keef) but (unlike Keef) I haven't seen any of that in the media or first hand in the 35 years I have been listening to him. People know what killed him wasn't what made him great. Jazz has made an effort to make that division with all sorts of artists. Rock n roll hasn't yet gained that maturity.

Beefheart I think is a very good example of someone who transcends all this. Like say Joseph Beuys. I have never got the impression that CB was wheeled out to do stuff he didn't want to do or was degrading or just for the money or that he put stuff out that was addled or sub standard. That makes him a real artist in my book and a lucky one given the levels of exploitation in rock n roll.He might well be ill for all I know but his art isn't sold on that. Like Drake his art speaks for itself.

Listening to some of the many jazz singers who were recorded slurring their way through material would be another example of hte dark side. Why would anyone release that? Especially postumously when the artist has no right of reply and no chance to contextualise their own work. That to me is especially grim but not as grim as knowingly wheeling a sick person out on stage because the show (and the money) must go on even if their being there is one of the roots of their illness in the first place. Everyone involved is complicit in that. Including the fans.
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