"I had the opportunity to see [Robert Christgau] in action once, a few times, actually. He would take five or six records, put them on the changer, and stack the album covers in that order. He would then go about his business and if something happened to catch his attention he would go back and look at the stack of covers and pick out the one it was. Five...six...just like that."
>>128492702lol sounds about right
with changers you were listening to just one album side at a time, not both
>>128492702Pretty cool, I never realized Ted Bundy was stalking Cuckgau
From the night in ’79 he was on my radio fandango to somewhere in the 80s, when our correspondence dwindled to nothingness, Mark Smith of the Fall and I were something like friends. When he played LA we hung out, preferably in bars where he didn’t expect to meet members of his band (“It’s a bad idea to socialize with your musicians”). On one occasion, he berated me for going home with a woman he’d introduced me to, a rockwriter who when I kissed and fondled her had no panties and a dangling tampon string, oo wee (“Sex is not a good motivating factor”). Before my VCR got stolen, I ran him a tape of Plan 9 From Outer Space, and he played me a cassette of songs about trucks by some actual trucker trying hard to sound like Dylan (“It’s not the Dylan part that matters–it’s the truck part”). He decried London as “too French,” unlike Manchester, his home (“The Norman Conquest didn’t make it that far north”). Back there during the Falkland Islands thing, he feigned a rooting interest in the UK, contending it was “much too easy to side with Argentina.” Mark E. Smith: a man of pith and whimsy.As a band, as a musical realization of something, the Fall were more intelligent, more after-the-end-of-the-world (aka “post-rock”), AND more sonically compelling than Sonic Youth (if less nerd-empowering). The last of their albums he sent me was Grotesque (After the Gramme) (Rough Trade 18), which I must’ve played but don’t remember. The cover is an old Dick Tracy-type guy gritting teeth like the likeness of Phil Alvin on the cover of the second Blasters LP. Speaking of which, of whom, the last time I saw the Fall play I was standing with Dave Alvin, who after a couple songs said, perplexed, “There’s no hooks.” “Well,” said I, “that’s the point.”
From 1979 to somewhere in the mid-'80s, me and Mark Smith of the Fall, the second greatest band of the late 20th century, were (let's call us) friends. We hung out when he was in town. We corresponded. He was a very funny guy. But sometimes, well, he could be a stickler for all variety of arcane et cetera, and while still funny he was not always fun.One time he came over with some people including this very saucy redhead, a British journalist, who when I reached up her dress had no panties but something way more to the heart & soul of things: a dangling and saturated tampon string . . . oh baby. After he split (we'd been watching Plan Nine from Outer Space), she stayed the remainder of the night and it was, y'know, memorable. Very hotte and funky, very rock & roll.Next day, when I met Mark at some pub, he said to me, kinda sharply: "Sex is not a good motivation for anything" . . . oh really? When he spotted some members of his band down at the far end of the room, we hadda scram before they spotted him—"It isn't a good idea to drink with your musicians."Haw! And we changed bars TWICE 'cuz they were thinking—barwise at least—just like him.Mark E. Smith. Funny guy!I would like to go see him, but instead I'm gonna be getting my gallbladder removed. If you go, say hi for me.The Rock & Roll Years! . . . ooooh boy . . . where the hell did they GO?
Moving right along to now, the only shamefacedly brazen keepers of the anti-etc. UK flame anymore are the Fall, whose gamekeeper/groundskeeper Mark E. Smith recently wrote me in a barely legible scrawl: “Our last LP got best critical reaction yet, which surprised me, as it was mean to be a huge SOD OFF (his caps). Established celebrity status for 1st time around here, & honestly it cut me up much – people staring at me in the 1st/last domain, the pub, where formerly I’d go to forget. But it’s isolated me at last, i.e., I’m careful where I go & trust no-one again.” R&R fame and fortune is, to Mr. Smith, the lamest goal available to one of wit and spark and the man’s music extends his rejection of conspicuous achievement well beyond rock-out lifestyle to the pure plain of rock ‘n’ roll form: avoidance of hooks like you wouldn’t believe, riffing as neither expedient cyclicality nor reference to Bo Diddley or the Velvets (not intending generatrix of sperm-meets-ovum, nor Enoesque “minimalism” in a nutshell, not…you name it), the usage of pop as a more arch “out” factor than it is with Mingus or Albert Ayler, etc., etc., etc.
>>128493556^This. He probably only heard vague background noises and based his opinions off those.
>>128494237>>128494250>>128494262This is like that "I knew Kurt Cobain" meme people say about the Melvins guy
>>128494262>Our last LPwonder which one he meant>>128494763>compelling stories about an interesting person>"dude it's like that meme"depressing
>>128494921>"dude it's like that meme"t. interesting person>wonder which one he meantshouldn't you know. you are in love with him
>>128494763no, it isn't retard>>128494921>wonder which one he meanthex enduction hour probably
>>128496442how is it not?
>>128497162he's a writer. it was one topic among others.
>>128492702I don't understand the point of the story. He would listen to 6 albums in a row and if he heard a good song he'd note which album it was from, ok and?
Christgau was basically Fantano for Boomers.so is there a modern Lester Bangs or is that not possible in the modern era where negativity and baiting is rewarded
>>128499136>Christgau was basically Fantano for Boomers.wrong. christgau is actually knowledgeable (including music history) making a coverage of different genres
Thoughts on derogatis?
>>128493592Changers could play whole LPs, even double LPs. In fact, the reason double LPs have side A & D on one disc, then sides B & C on the other disc (the practice known as autocoupling) is to better accommodate automatic changers
>>128499136The era of Christgau and Bangs was the zenith of negativity and baiting in music criticism.
>>128499021He just banged some records on in the cuckden while he vacuumed, did the dishes, took a shit, etc and was paid to give it a 2/5 even if he didn't listen to it
>>128503967>The era of Christgau and Bangs was the zenith of negativity and baiting in music criticism.of course then we overcompensated by Millenials being too soft on obviously bad albums
Christgau's official explanation as to how he reviews music is that if he could make it through an entire album without turning it off halfway through because it was that bad, he would then review it.
>>128503977yes exactly that. he would put stuff on in the background while doing something else and only pause and check it out if he heard something that caught his ear
>>128503926Record changers existed in the 78 era though they weren't very good and would tend to damage discs.
>>128504053Cuckgau isn't that old
>>128503926You still had to manually flip over the disc or the stack to hear the other side. My copy of Electric Ladyland has that A & D arrangement. Annoying as hell on a manual player, makes sense for a changer where you only have to do the flip over once to hear a double album.
>>128504110Well he was albeit a small child back then but he did actually say some of his earliest memories of music were family members putting on Bing Crosby tunes.
>>128504942Not so fast niggahttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HfI21OD4gcs
>>128492702Actually this guy, meltzer, is pretty interesting. i prefer his interviews more than his writing. very revealing stuff. from him i learned that the doors, when they arrived in new york. turned far more popular in the underground scene than the velvet underground. then light my fire became a hit and they sold out
>>128494237>“much too easy to side with ArgentinaLol, look how that turned out
>>128507367He wrote a piece shitting on Christgau called "A Whore Just Like All The Rest."
>>128507459That was about himself, schizo.
>>128507367the club that the doors played was called ondine´s, i think.
>>128507367>i prefer his interviews more than his writingEven he admits his early writing like the Aesthetics of Rock is almost unreadable. He got better with the decades.
>>128493916LOL I thought that was Bundy too.
