From: owner-avalon-digest@smoe.org (avalon-digest) To: avalon-digest@smoe.org Subject: avalon-digest V3 #286 Reply-To: avalon@smoe.org Sender: owner-avalon-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-avalon-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk avalon-digest Thursday, November 26 1998 Volume 03 : Number 286 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: [AVALON] Ferry literature ["gareth mc ginley" ] Re: [AVALON] Ferry literature [Kicki Gustafsson ] Re: [AVALON] Ferry literature [Bahi Para ] Re: [AVALON] Ferry literature [Kicki Gustafsson ] Re: [AVALON] Ferry literature [Bahi Para ] [AVALON] Trouser Press - History of Roxy Music (part 1) [jspellma@techadv] [AVALON] Trouser Press - History of Roxy Music (part 2) [jspellma@techadv] [AVALON] Lucy's little poblem [jas2347@xsite.net] Re: [AVALON] Lucy's little poblem [LizzieJim@aol.com] To leave the list, mail majordomo@smoe.org with: unsubscribe avalon-digest ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 09:50:33 PST From: "gareth mc ginley" Subject: Re: [AVALON] Ferry literature >But wasn't Gareth referring to another book, too? A new one? Details would >be welcome. > The book is called "Unknown Pleasures: A cultural Biography of Roxy Music". Paul Stunp is the author, Quartet are the publishers, the book is priced at £12, and it's about 360 pages long. Unknown Pleasures is a very apt title for anything on Roxy, I think, although I have no doubt that the book will cause a lot of controversy on this list when you've all read it because it far from makes out that Ferry was a master at everyting he did, and refers to some quotes which are most "Un-Ferrylike". ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com - -------------------- To unsub, mail majordomo@smoe.org with: unsubscribe avalon ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 19:50:44 +0100 From: Kicki Gustafsson Subject: Re: [AVALON] Ferry literature > >The book is called "Unknown Pleasures: A cultural Biography of Roxy >Music". Paul Stunp is the author, Quartet are the publishers, Can't find it! Have searched all internet bookshops that I know of. Anyone else...? /Kicki G - ------------------------ Kicki Gustafsson, Östersunds-Posten 063-16 16 51 http://www.op.se http://www.torget.se/users/k/KickiG (privat hemsida) - -------------------- To unsub, mail majordomo@smoe.org with: unsubscribe avalon ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 21:52:55 +0100 From: Bahi Para Subject: Re: [AVALON] Ferry literature Kicki Gustafsson wrote: >Can't find it! Have searched all internet bookshops that I know of. Anyone >else...? Try the UK-branch of Amazon, here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0704380749/qid=912026407/sr=1-3/026-564 3927-6150266 Or just start at http://www/amazon.co.uk and search for Paul Stump (not Stunp). The book's 12 quid - 'online opinion of a previous prog rock book by Stump seems quite favourable - delivery is 4 to 6 weeks. - -------------------- To unsub, mail majordomo@smoe.org with: unsubscribe avalon ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 21:57:13 +0100 From: Kicki Gustafsson Subject: Re: [AVALON] Ferry literature >Try the UK-branch of Amazon, here: > >http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0704380749/qid=912026407/sr=1-3/026-56 >4 >3927-6150266 Thanx! /Kicki G - ------------------------ Kicki Gustafsson, Östersunds-Posten 063-16 16 51 http://www.op.se http://www.torget.se/users/k/KickiG (privat hemsida) - -------------------- To unsub, mail majordomo@smoe.org with: unsubscribe avalon ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 22:29:24 +0100 From: Bahi Para Subject: Re: [AVALON] Ferry literature Slippery fingers. I wrote this: >Or just start at http://www/amazon.co.uk But I meant this: http://www.amazon.co.uk They're looking for someone to write the first online review of the book... - -------------------- To unsub, mail majordomo@smoe.org with: unsubscribe avalon ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 21:34:52 -0500 From: jspellma@techadvisers.com Subject: [AVALON] Trouser Press - History of Roxy Music (part 1) To: avalon@smoe.org cc: Subject: [AVALON] Trouser Press - History of Roxy Music (Document link not converted) This must have been written about 10 years ago. It's facts mixed with opinions, some of which I disagree. It's still some fun reading if you have the time - -Jim - --------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---------- Arguably the most influential rock group of the '70s, Roxy Music's impact has only grown in the years since the punk return-to-the-basics ethos gave way to a growing interest in high style, fashion and musical sophistication. The "new romantic" movement and the synth fops would have had no historical traditions to follow were it not for the pioneering efforts of Bryan Ferry, Brian Eno, Phil Manzanera, Andy Mackay, Paul Thompson and their various cohorts. Even though Roxy Music grew pale and timid in its later years, the recorded work (not to mention the countless side projects in which the various members have participated) stands as a seminal wellspring of nonconformity and successful art-pop experimentation. With the release of their first LP (produced by King Crimson lyricist Pete Sinfield after the departure of original Roxy guitarist Davy O'List, formerly of the Nice), the fledgling sextet revolutionized rock--trashing concepts of melodic conservatism, ignoring the prevalence of blues-based and otherwise derivative idioms and denying the need for technical virtuosity, either vocally or instrumentally. The flamboyantly bedecked poseurs presaged such low couture iconoclasts as the New York Dolls and all the glamsters who followed; the music mixed all sorts of elements into a newly filtered original sound that set the stylish pace. The tracks--Ferry-penned fantasies like "Re-make/Re-model," "2 H.B.," "If There Is Something" and the group's monumental debut, "Virginia Plain" (a 45 not on the original album, but added to later editions)--are at once amateurish and highly developed, brilliant blunders that took some acclimation to fully appreciate. As much as the music, the album's kitsch graphics were also widely imitated. For Your Pleasure, another enduring classic (with the second of Roxy's many bassists), refines and magnifies Roxy's style with equally amazing material: "Do the Strand," "Editions of You" (the album's punchy rock single), "In Every Dream Home a Heartache" and the obsessive nine-minutes-plus "Bogus Man." Brian Eno departed after the second album, and ex-Curved Air violinist/keyboardist Eddie Jobson (a session man on Ferry's solo debut earlier that same year) joined, either precipitating or merely participating in the successful stylistic downshift of Stranded. Without Eno's "treatments," the third album (produced by Chris Thomas) has more subtle sound, favoring piano and restrained, stately songs such as the haunting "A Song for Europe" (one of two songs co-written by Manzanera), "Just Like You," "Psalm" and the second segment of "Mother of Pearl." Demonstrating the group's continuing ability to rock, "Serenade" and "Amazona" do it with dignity, while only the beginning of "Mother of Pearl" and the whirlingly chaotic "Street Life" dances around the maniac fringe. Roxy's best LP, Country Life, ran into trouble over its revealing cover photo--some American copies were shrink-wrapped in opaque green plastic; later the artwork was changed to remove the bra'n'panties-clad models and leave only the foliage. Regardless, the ten tracks--a smooth integration of the band's divergent stylistic designs--are exemplary and of consistent strength, making it a virtual greatest-hits album of new material. Highlights: "All I Want Is You," "Out of the Blue," "The Thrill of It All," "A Really Good Time," "Three and Nine," "Prairie Rose." Reuniting with Chris Thomas, Roxy made the disappointingly dull Siren (with Jerry Hall crawling on the cover), closing the studio book on their first era. The record contains some great tracks ("Love Is the Drug," "Both Ends Burning," "Sentimental Fool"), but an overabundance of forgettable numbers substantially diminishes its value. Roxy then went on sabbatical, with only the one-disc live document (the Eno-free Viva!, recorded in '73, '74 and '75 with three different bassists and a fine selection of songs given decisive, powerful performances) and the absolutely essential Greatest Hits collection issued during the two-year gap. In 1978, Ferry, Manzanera and Mackay reactivated Roxy Music, making three more group albums with various temporary sidemen. But it was never the same. Cooling down from where Siren left off, Roxy Music had become--whether through maturation, skill or fatigue--a pale, genteel imitation of its old self. Although there are a few brilliant (at least presentable) tracks on each album, the lack of conviction and adventurous spirit makes all three less than compelling for fans of the group's early work. Fortunately, these records neither embarrass nor contradict the Roxy legacy; this period (subsequently proving to be the group's last and, in America at least, most successful) is separate and, though not equal, at least estimable. - -------------------- To unsub, mail majordomo@smoe.org with: unsubscribe avalon ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 21:47:35 -0500 From: jspellma@techadvisers.com Subject: [AVALON] Trouser Press - History of Roxy Music (part 2) The self-produced Manifesto has "Dance Away," "Still Falls the Rain" and "Angel Eyes" to recommend it, but is still easy to live without. The inferior Flesh + Blood (Roxy's first album without Paul Thompson, who resurfaced years later in, of all places, Concrete Blonde) is more like a Ferry solo record, with session men playing humorless covers of "In the Midnight Hour" and "Eight Miles High." Even the best originals are unoriginal and fainthearted: the Cars-ish (now there's irony for you) "Over You," the schmaltzy (but catchy) "Oh Yeah" and the funky "Same Old Scene." (Collectors note: UK Polydor also released Manifesto as a vinyl picture disc.) Regaining its self-esteem if not its power, Roxy made Avalon more like Manifesto, a careful blend of air and beat that amounts to a sparkling if meaningless dance record for would-be sophisticates. Unassailably well made and even occasionally engaging, the worst that can be said of songs like "More Than This," "The Space Between," "Avalon," "Take a Chance with Me" and "The Main Thing" is that they're too quiet and that the lyrics lack bite. Those who came upon Roxy late probably reckon it's their best album. An otherwise needless compilation, The Atlantic Years, skims the cream from Manifesto and Flesh + Blood onto one disc, adding two earlier cuts (also on Greatest Hits). In 1981, all of Roxy Music's studio albums to that point--seven in all--were repackaged as a boxed set; add in Avalon, and you've got the works. The Early Years and The Later Years also box six of the original albums: the first three in one, and the last three in the other. (What would be wrong with a complete reissue package for once?) The two-record Street Life and the overlapping single-disc Ultimate Collection each mix tracks from the group and Ferry's solo career. The High Road, a 12-inch ostensibly recorded live in Glasgow, offers an odd four-song program and a running time of nearly half an hour, as a ten-person lineup walks through Neil Young's "Like a Hurricane," John Lennon's "Jealous Guy" and two Ferry tunes. The playing is, of course, great and the sound magnificent--only the band's crucial personality is absent. Exactly the same can be said of Heart Still Beating, recorded in France at a massive open-air concert in mid-1982. (In fact, given the amazing similarity of the EP's four songs to their performances on the album, it seems very likely that The High Road actually hails from the French date.) Notwithstanding Manzanera's searing work (especially on "Out of the Blue" and his own "Impossible Guitar" instrumental) and Ferry's suave showboating, this one is mostly for Avalon fans. - -------------------- To unsub, mail majordomo@smoe.org with: unsubscribe avalon ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 23:02:56 -0600 From: jas2347@xsite.net Subject: [AVALON] Lucy's little poblem > >Read all about it (or at least something): >http://www.its.caltech.edu/~bryan/roxy/you_article.html >Makes you wanna cry. > >/Kicki G > Thanks Kiki for the address. I read it and it made me sad. I do hope Lucy is okay now. Bryan comes off as a little aloof, but maybe that's part of his charm. I still remember that icy detached look he gave me when I asked him for his autogragh in the back of the limo after the Roxy concert here in 1979. Oh the thrill of it all........ Just wondering, if Jerry Hall is as smart as I HOPE she is, she might get a hefty settlement from Mick if they do decide to divorce. She would be free to see whomever she chooses and with lots of coins, she will be very fetching to former "boyfriends". Studio IS vey expensive you know. Jas - -------------------- To unsub, mail majordomo@smoe.org with: unsubscribe avalon ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 00:35:02 EST From: LizzieJim@aol.com Subject: Re: [AVALON] Lucy's little poblem Oh gee don't you think that Jerry is past her prime? She was really something when she first started out but doesn't seem as unique now. I hear Mick might have been upset because she was pushing Elizabeth into modeling. I think it was Lisa Robinson who said that the Hall sisters were like the Gabors. I have a feeling Jerry will hook up with another very rich but yucky looking Enlgishman like that Sangster fellow whe was going to run off with the last time her and Mick had a tiff. Funny though how Carla Bruni is always hanging around waiting for Mick. Mick must like her because she does come from money. Janeen LizzieJim@aol.com - -------------------- To unsub, mail majordomo@smoe.org with: unsubscribe avalon ------------------------------ End of avalon-digest V3 #286 **************************** ======================================================================== For further info, mail majordomo@smoe.org with: info avalon-digest