LJ studies continue

In case it came too late in the comments yesterday for you to see, it turns out my post was subconsciously inspired by this post here done a month and a half ago by rivetpepsquad. I knew I'd seen something similar, I just couldn't remember where. Meme is flattery after all.

I was going for comment bait while she was going for LJ cliche but it's worth checking out.

Strangled at Birth

We have a winner.

The contest is over. No need for any more punk rockers to write their memoirs. The most self-serving book of the punk era has been published. It’s The Stranglers: Song by Song . in which prostrate journalist Jim Drury fawns over singer Hugh Cornwell while listening to old Stranglers records, all of them, while asking Hugh what they all mean, scribbling the answers as if he was recording a lost holy book.

Let me make and admission first. I loved the Stranglers when I was a kid. Me and my friend Rich Quinn used to stay up late and watch "Videowest" a low budget video show that pre-dated MTV. The Stranglers mastered that medium before anyone else and they became my favorite band after watching "Duchess", "Five Minutes", "Nuclear Device" and other songs over and over on the video channel that didn’t have much of a pool to choose from.

They would have been my first concert in 1979 if they hadn’t cancelled the all-ages show for which me and my friends were, evidently, the only people who bought tickets. I admit it. They drew me in with their carefully developed air of mystery and menace. A few years later I recognized this as misogyny, pretentiousness and a marketing plan but hey, I was young and naïve. I’ll still defend some of their songs, the ones not haunted by the above, and I still love that gravelly bass sound they got on their first three/four records.

Evidently Hugh Cornwell left the band in 1990 on bad terms. I had stopped listening by then so I didn’t notice. The Stranglers Song by Song tells Hugh’s version of the history of the band (with an introduction by Paul Theroux!*). Cornwell is still trying for the image of a tough, intellectual rocker here but it begs the question if he is so intellectual, why didn’t Hugh write a book instead of slowly blurting it out in short attention span paragraphs to a paid sycophant?

It’s probably unfair to characterize it as a punk memoir book since Cornwell spends most of it distancing himself from the word. I swear I remember them claiming to be the first punk band ever when I was a kid, and believing it, but in this book any ties they had to the punk scene were purely in the effort of moving units and becoming a successful band. For example, on putting "Sometimes" on as the first song on their first album, Cornwell says it was done in the name of "drawing people in so they thought they had bought a punk record, then giving them something a bit more intelligent afterwards."

Self-importance is a constant throughout the book. According to the book the Stranglers recorded one of the first rap songs, did a soul album, pioneered synth drumming, and started the practice of spitting at punk shows. I guess it’s good to be proud of one’s life work but there’s times when, oh, it might be a tad exaggerated.

The rap claim is the most amusing. Describing the song "(Get a) Grip (on Yourself)" Cornwell says, "What people don’t realize is that it was one of the first rap songs. There’s no singing on it apart from the chorus refrain. I got a bit irritated when I went to a launch party for Blondie’s "Rapture" and the press were saying that was the first rock rap song" Except for the fact that the song is spoken, not sung, I can’t figure out what could possibly be "rap" about that song.** I want you all to find ac opy or a download, listen to it, and tell me if you see any evidence of "rapping". Maybe he’s kidding. Cornwell was known to play practical jokes on journalists

As for the sexism of some Stranglers songs, Jim Drury asks, "People regard The Stranglers as a sexist band, yet "Princess of the Streets" sees the man as the victim

Cornwell responds, "Absolutely . . .There are a couple of lines that people might say were derogatory to women, but if you took them out it would be a great love song" Not only a non-answer but accepting the curious assumption that a man being the victim of a woman, excuse me, a "piece of meat", "stab"bing him "in the back" is somehow exempt of being sexist.

But the most amusing part of the book are the pretentious, faux-intellectual, Spinal Tapisms. About the song "Peaches" ("Walking on the beaches / looking at the peaches.") "There’s a lot of innuendo in that song and I liked turning the idea of female emancipation upside down. It’s my surrealist fetishism, because sometimes by turning things on their heads you get a fresh look at things. It’s not trying to legitimize a view or discredit it, it’s just getting a new angle on it." Funny, I never realized the song was that deep. I haven’t seen Spinal Tap in awhile, but I immediately flashed on their being interviewed about sexism on the song "Sex Farm" and the response being something like "It’s taking a sophisticated view of modern sex. And placing it on a farm" (not a real quote)

I also found the history Cornwell purports to be illuminating as well. For instance what happened to the Mayans? Cornwell says, "Some people believe that an asteroid the size of the Isle of Wight hit the world near the Bermuda Triangle and a tidal wave wiped out the civilization." I mean, maybe so. But when I hear "Bermuda Triangle" and "asteroid" in the same sentence I start thinking "wingnut".

As for using a quote by Franco’s daughter on a song called "Spain" then getting her to appear on stage with them when they played there on that tour, the politics aren’t mentioned. The quote, from a propaganda film made after the Spanish Civil War ended had her (as a small child) saying, "I hope all the children of Spain have a nice house to live in and lots of sweets and toys. . ." Yes, that’s what Franco’s dictatorship was all about, sweets and toys for children.

It goes on like this for 370 pages detailing every song in order of their release. Most of it is concerned with songwriting details, "I wrote the verse, John wrote the chorus and Dave did a great keyboard fill. Etc.". I believe you’d need to be/have been a real Stranglers devotee to attempt this book.

I would love to hear your nominees for most self-serving punk memoir*** by the way, but I don’t think this can be topped.



*Weirdly, I’m reading Mosquito Coast by Paul Theroux right now and enjoying it a lot. Then again, they’re just using his name to further The Strangler image of intellectual rockers. All he really says in the intro is that they were unique and he used one of their songs in a book he wrote about London.

**Let us pause to reflect on the meaningful rap lyrics of "Grip": "Stranger from another planet / welcome to our hole /just strap on a guitar / and we’ll play some rock n roll. / But the money’s no good / just get a grip on yourself." Maybe it’s the "another planet" / Rapture "man from Mars" thing that is confusing him.

***Mike one of the MRR editors made the wonderful statement that every one of those books declares punk dead when the writer loses interest in the punk scene. 1979, 1981, 1985, 1991 whatever. (My personal choice would be 1985 but I got drawn back in during that riot grrrl / queercore thing.)

****This is an extra set of asterisks. It doesn’t relate to the book but check out this Stranglers cover band and scroll down to see their picture. Hee hee hee. Why aren’t they playing London when I'm there!?!

*****Geez, I forgot to even mention the cover shot cropped to make it look like Cornwell has all his hair.