Fegmaniax Digest <==----------==> (Send posts to the list to fegmaniax@nsmx.rutgers.edu) (Send adminstrative commands to majordomo@nsmx.rutgers.edu) (Send comments, etc to the listowner at owner-fegmaniax@nsmx.rutgers.edu) <==----------==> Volume 3 Number 186 Today's Topics: ------- ------ Soft Boys Education Her Silver Wands Lyrics Correction IODOT : Mellow Together Duke of Squeeze Re: IODOT : Mellow Together Re: IODOT : Mellow Together Mellow Together (with a large pot of lentils) Re: Mellow Together (with a large pot of lentils) Listening to the Beatles one night in November ... Re: IODOT : Mellow Together greetings from Scotland Re: Listening to the Beatles one night in November ... mellopiano Invisable Beatles Free as a Robyn Free As A Bird (no Robyn content) Re: Free as a Robyn Free as a Robyn Re: Free as a Robyn Education Re: Free As A Bird (no Robyn content) Listening to the Beatles one night in November Re: mellopiano, Beatles, etc. Re: Free as a Robyn Re: Free as a Robyn ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 18 Nov 1995 18:16:41 -0500 (EST) From: Terry Marks Subject: Soft Boys Education To: Pretty Girls and Anglepoise lamps I've heard Robyn say that 1) Some of the Soft Boys became lawyers and 2) (on Portland Arms) "Kimberly is the only one here with a degree. The rest of us just have temperatures." Kimberly responded with "A degree in common sense". Do Kimberly or any of the other Soft Boys have college degrees? Have any of them become lawyers? Terry "The Human Mellotron" Marks a013645t@bcfreenet.seflin.lib.fl.us ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 19 Nov 1995 12:11:26 -0500 (EST) From: Terry Marks Subject: Her Silver Wands Lyrics Correction To: Pretty Girls and Anglepoise lamps >Galaxy of my heart, Gallows tree of my heart. Sorry. All I've got to say this time.. Terry "The Human Mellotron" Marks a013645t@bcfreenet.seflin.lib.fl.us ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 19 Nov 1995 15:20:59 -0800 To: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu (Ralph) From: "Lisa N. Freeman" Subject: IODOT : Mellow Together Well, I finally broke down and spent the $ on the re-issues. My original colloction was all cassettes, then I managed to buy most things on CD just before they went out of print. So, it took me awhile to justify buying the same things I already had. IODOT was one I only had on tape, so I haven't listened to it much since I got my 6-disk changer years ago. I feel like I just discovered RH for the first time. One song that is bothering me is "Mellow Together." It sounded very familiar when I first heard it, like I've heard it before. I immediately started digging through my old cassettes (I held out for a long time thinking CD's would be short lived), and found some Billy Bragg, and the Clash. My question for you fegs is who sings this? Is this a guest vocalist / friend of Robyn's (perhaps accompanying him)? Is he immitating a particular style or artist? I went back and read some of the old posts on this topic, and all that was resolved (from what I could tell) was that it sounds like BB or like Neil from the Young Ones (I loved that show). Does anyone have any new info/ideas on this? I love all of the keyboard music on IODOT, and I didn't realize before that Robyn plays all of it (doesn't he?). I would love to see this in concert, but then who would play the harmonica and guitar? I also love the vocals on this CD, if he could only figure out how to accompany himself in concert. Lisa ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 16 Nov 1995 19:52:49 -0500 (EST) From: Terry Marks Subject: Duke of Squeeze To: Pretty Girls and Anglepoise lamps Help me figure out what they're saying on this line in the chorus of Duke of Squeeze (Portland Arms) And we sang [fow de drap??] Thanks. Btw...all of you are responding to the wrong part of the Sinister But Happy CRD. Terry "The Human Mellotron" Marks a013645t@bcfreenet.seflin.lib.fl.us ------------------------------ From: bing@student.umass.edu Date: Sun, 19 Nov 1995 18:55:01 -0500 Subject: Re: IODOT : Mellow Together To: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu I was always under the impression that "Mellow Together" was just Robyn slowed down and pretending he had a cold-- maybe I should dig out the 4 track and speed it up. Bradley ps- got the tape Terry! Thanks a ton-- put my favorite down as _Netsurfer Ghost_! "it's a bat, it's a bat, it's a bat...it's a girl!" ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 19 Nov 1995 19:24:52 -0500 (EST) From: Terry Marks Subject: Re: IODOT : Mellow Together To: "Lisa N. Freeman" Cc: Ralph > sounds like BB or like Neil from the Young Ones (I loved that show). Does > anyone have any new info/ideas on this? I think that "Mellow Together" is sung by James A. Smith, credited with "low vocals". If That song doesn't qualify as low vocals, nothing does. > > I love all of the keyboard music on IODOT, and I didn't realize before that > Robyn plays all of it (doesn't he?). I would love to see this in concert, > but then who would play the harmonica and guitar? I also love the vocals on > this CD, if he could only figure out how to accompany himself in concert. I think that Andy or Roger plays the keyboard/piano on most of the songs (I don't know about IODOT, but I know about live performances). Terry "The Human Mellotron" Marks ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 19 Nov 95 19:54:06 CST From: Bram Tchaikovsky To: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu Subject: Mellow Together (with a large pot of lentils) My $.02- I always thought that "Mellow Together" was a sort of affectionate tribute to the Young Ones. Sounds exactly like Neil to me :). Moreover, Robyn has done this sort of thing more than once (as on "Certainly Clickot"- "A fish named Angela, of which I have the duplicate, Eric"- Python fans don't need to be told where THIS comes from :)). The singing on "Mellow Together" does not sound at all like Robyn, so I'm not surprised to hear that someone else was in fact the singer. As far as I know, however, he does play all the instruments on IODOT. Live performance is obviously a different story :). Susan P.S. If you are calling the author of "A La Recherche Du Temps Perdu" a loony, I shall have to ask you to step outside! ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 19 Nov 1995 23:11:32 -0500 (EST) From: Terry Marks Subject: Re: Mellow Together (with a large pot of lentils) To: Bram Tchaikovsky Cc: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu Reminds me.. Has he ever performed Mellow Together live? Does he use any electronics? [I've heard that TMBG does O Do Not Forsake Me live occasionally, with effects, and I'm wondering if Robyn would do something similar].. Terry "The Human Mellotron" Marks a013645t@bcfreenet.seflin.lib.fl.us ------------------------------ From: Ross Overbury To: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu (The list that invented itself) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 95 23:50:40 EST Subject: Listening to the Beatles one night in November ... And I thought I heard them singing "Free as a Bird". Sorry if I'm off-topic, but at least you people understand me. Well, at least there's still Robyn. It's not that I can't appreciate what the Beatles did - I'm turning 40 soon and I still remember when .... I've got bootlegs better than that! I'm bummed out. Not because the TV producers let me down, but because the Threetles did. I always thought it was John's band, anyway; guess that proves it. I'm going to bed now. -- ROSS OVERBURY email: rosso@cn.ca ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 19 Nov 1995 19:24:52 -0500 (EST) From: Terry Marks Subject: Re: IODOT : Mellow Together To: "Lisa N. Freeman" Cc: Ralph > sounds like BB or like Neil from the Young Ones (I loved that show). Does > anyone have any new info/ideas on this? I think that "Mellow Together" is sung by James A. Smith, credited with "low vocals". If That song doesn't qualify as low vocals, nothing does. > > I love all of the keyboard music on IODOT, and I didn't realize before that > Robyn plays all of it (doesn't he?). I would love to see this in concert, > but then who would play the harmonica and guitar? I also love the vocals on > this CD, if he could only figure out how to accompany himself in concert. I think that Andy or Roger plays the keyboard/piano on most of the songs (I don't know about IODOT, but I know about live performances). Terry "The Human Mellotron" Marks ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 05:05:24 -0600 (CST) From: JAY LYALL Subject: greetings from Scotland To: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu Cyber bar in Scotland...fair coffee... Rundown on our first night here...one bar fight,Samoan rugby highlights, lots of beer, and I have to say that Edinburgh has the most beautiful girls in the world....I'm looking to immigrate... jay %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Jay Lyall "All my friends do the model girl thing hist1a@jetson.uh.edu So I found me one University of Houston Now she wears my nose ring" --Lloyd Cole "Yip Yip Yip Yip Yip Yip" "There's liquor on my breath --Robyn Hitchcock And you on my mind" --Replacements %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 07:05:09 -0500 From: deluxe transitive vampire To: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu Subject: Re: Listening to the Beatles one night in November ... Ross Overbury sez: >And I thought I heard them singing "Free as a Bird". my better half saw king crimson over the weekend (i was entrapped by familial obligations, else i would have been there as well). at some point during the show, adrian belew stopped and announced that he had a demo tape of the new beatles song and proceeded to play, in meredith's words, "a lame ass tune that went something like 'free as a bird blah blah blah...'". she figured he was just joking.... woj ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 12:00:25 -0500 (EST) From: Bayard To: glass frogs Subject: mellopiano I nominate RRH as pianist and goofy vocalist on IODoT. I seeem to recall him being credited as playing "all instruments" with the exception of Fletcher's sax. As for the mellow together voice.. he's done plenty of voices that sound farther from his voice than that one. Oh, he's played piano live before too, on the 1990 solo tour. Man who invented himself and flavour of night, maybe others... ------------------------------ From: LORDK@FLP.LIB.PA.US Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 12:00:10 -0500 (EST) To: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu Subject: Invisable Beatles If you scan for RH info, delete now;if you scan for invisable info, read on. I cant believe Im writing in something some cornball, but that Beatle special got me(and most of my buddys) really going. Somethings vibrating out there in subconscious land, something, maybe , something like this: One day G0D( its hard being omiscent)(or whatever you like to call him, her,it), grew bored with this earth, and created the Beatles. The 4 young mortals involved, who honestly thought they were the Beatles, consistently displayed 2 virtues, which I think you will agree, can only be God-given. Thru some supernal combination of energy, beauty and wit, 1) they never ever bored us, and 2) they always challanged us. Then they left us, 1/2 turned on and 1/2 burnt out, at the dawn of the "Me" decade. Fitting, since their theme, from start to finish (and whether they liked it or not, and sometimes they sure as hell didnt), was love. And love's gone abit underground since then, hasnt it? The song"Free as a Bird" may suck mightily, but the video is an out of body experience of an imaginal world as real, realer? than this one. While watching it the old chestnut "we are not our bodies" kept running thru my Mind. Maybe Gods not quite thru with these 4 mortals yet. Or maybe Im just a superannuated hippie showing my true colors. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Nov 95 11:37:24 CST From: Bram Tchaikovsky To: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu Subject: Free as a Robyn Man, was that song disappointing or what? I have an acoustic bootleg version of it that is better, but it still isn't really that great. It seems that sometimes people lose sight of the fact that sometimes things remain unreleased for ARTISTIC as well as financial reasons. I just hope that on further releases of this kind they don't have George do the arrangements, as they obviously did here (sounded just like that "When We Was Fab" song on, damn, can't remember the name of the album but it's fabulously unimportant, really). But since the tune is a Lennon composition, don't go jumping on the other Beatles' cases and saying "oh, it really was John's band after all"- he wrote the turkey :). Lest this become the Beatle mailing list (I hate to imagine how many messages a day would be generated by such a list), I will add some Hitchcock content briefly. Does anyone else think Robyn bears a strong resemblance to George Harrison? Am I just hallucinating said resemblance? Susan ------------------------------ From: sprano@cvax.ipfw.indiana.edu Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 13:22:27 EST To: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu Subject: Free As A Bird (no Robyn content) I can't think of a sweeter, full-circle ending than "Free As A Bird". Read George's explanation of the origin of the recording in the new TV Guide. The song aired in demo form three years ago on the radio series "The Lost Lennon Tapes"...it was an unfinished snippet of a song that wasn't meant (by John) to be heard. What they've done to it in the studio is a miracle from a technolgical standpoint considering the quality of the original tape they had to work with. The coda of the finished song is even designed to take the reverence out of it, much like "Her Majesty" did following the Huge Medley on side two of "Abbey Road". It's just the Beatles saying "Hello, Goodbye" one last time to the fans and to John, who they miss more than we even do. What's wrong with that? And, if they make $$$ off of it, they certainly deserve to for all the merchandising and publishing dollars they lost in the early days. Just see it as one last Christmas present from some old friends. Don't compare it unfairly to their body of work. They don't intend it that way. It's just some fun. That's all! It pushed all the right emotional buttons for me...the video was charming...so, just ENJOY! Don't be so eager to tear it apart...it's all we're gonna get. Goo goo go joob! -HAL. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 11:35:06 -0800 Subject: Re: Free as a Robyn From: Tom Clark To: "Bram Tchaikovsky" , "fegManiax" >I just hope that on further releases of this kind they don't have George do >the arrangements, as they obviously did here (sounded just like that "When We >Was Fab" song on, damn, can't remember the name of the album but it's >fabulously unimportant, really). The big mistake was having it produced by Jeff "Make everything sound as if it was recorded in a mayonaise jar" Lynne. If they were gonna do it right they should have rang up George Martin. RH Content: Robyn should have overdubbed the Lennon parts! -tc ************************************* * Tom Clark * Apple Computer, Inc. "Knowledge Is Good" * tclark@apple.com -Emil Faber * tclark@netgate.net * tclark@eworld.com * http://www.netgate.net/~tclark ************************************* ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Nov 95 13:44:13 CST From: Bram Tchaikovsky To: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu Subject: Free as a Robyn Now that I think about it, Mr. Clark is absolutely correct. It's probably the Jeff Lynne sound that I recognized, since he did produce the George Harrison album I was thinking of, as well as other albums that sound like it. Did you hear the Duane Eddy album he produced? Ohhhhhh man, was that depressing! Anyway, I think Robyn probably could have done a good job at overdubbing the Lennon parts. I always thought his vocal on "Executioner" sounded eerily like Plastic Ono Band-era Lennon, which was an interesting change (as he usually sounds eerily like a "Piper" era Syd Barrett :)). I often wish that I had his ability to mimic (as well as his songwriting ability, but that's ok :)). Susan ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 11:54:46 -0800 (PST) From: Glen Uber To: Bram Tchaikovsky Cc: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu Subject: Re: Free as a Robyn On Mon, 20 Nov 1995, Bram Tchaikovsky mused: > Does anyone else think Robyn bears a strong resemblance to George > Harrison? Am I just hallucinating said resemblance? Actually, compare Robyn to Bela Fleck...now *there's* a resemblance. "The secret of success Slainte, is constancy of purpose" Glen --Benjamin Disraeli %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Glen E. Uber Department of Linguistics Email: hirsute@u.washington.edu University of Washington Voice Mail: 206.547.8936 Seattle, Washington, U.S.A. %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% The last five albums I've listened to: %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% ------------------------------ From: LORDK@FLP.LIB.PA.US Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 16:41:53 -0500 (EST) To: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu Subject: Education This is a silly, petty question, and one I greatly enjoy asking. Since people are asking about Robyn"s university days (I believe a short stint at Cambridge, (his father had been at Emmanuel,I dont know if he was there or at a better one), followed by a crash of some sort, --then art school in London) I am emboldened to ask about the true gen--, which public school did he attend? As a renegade preppie myself, I can assure you that these single sex labratories of power and desire tend to mold,+ distort whatever poor soul finds himself (or herself) encased within. They also tend to give a darn good education.Dont sneer, all that money does buy (at least some) good teachers, well designed courses, and all the trappings of Western Civ. Ive been coasting on it for my whole life. It gives one a manner... its hard to explain. Anyway, Id love to know which ones he went to. There are places like Eton, where, if your well placed enough you can always be placed, and ones like Winchester, where if youre not fuckin bright youre in fuckin trouble. And then a slew of them us Yanks wouldnt, couldnt know about. But as a conasseur of the differences between, say, Hotchkiss, and Andover, and St. George's vr Taft--this would be great gossip. Yes, I know, they never taught me to spell--but I can parse Latin. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 15:38:50 -0600 (CST) From: "Jeffrey with 2 f's Jeffrey" To: "Us...we wanna be some anglepoise lamps yeh!" Subject: Re: Free As A Bird (no Robyn content) Well, I didn't mind the song that much, since I'd lowered my expectations to Mariana Trench levels beforehand. And yes, the sterile Lynne-production didn't help matters at all: I would have preferred something rawer, something that fit the sound of the source tape better. But, given all that, I thought it wasn't that bad: I'm not sure, but I'm fairly certain the bridge is Paul's, and it's a pretty good bridge--not immortal, but pretty good. And the coda was effective, in the way so-and-so (sorry didn't save it) posted here. The video, too, was really cool: definitely a Beatles trivia fest. How many Beatles' tunes are alluded to in the video? (I once read some article about Dylan that mentioned a party where everyone came dressed as a character from a Dylan song--the video does something similar w/Beatles songs.) Now there's an idea for a Feg Get-Together--everyone come as your favorite character from a Robyn song! (Or, as your favorite feg-lister--the large bulky keyboard-looking guy will obviously be the list's Floridian and tabmaniac, Terry Marks....) --Jeff Jeffrey Norman "We are approaching the famous Chipco University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee 'Technology City,' home of 'Chuck,' Dept. of English & Comp. Lit. the world's most invisible robot." e-mail: jenor@csd.uwm.edu --Thomas Pynchon ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Nov 95 14:21:03 From: Russ Reynolds To: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu Subject: Listening to the Beatles one night in November I think we can definitely cross Jeff Lynne off everyone's list of possible producers for Robyn's next effort. The man took a pretty good Lennon tune and the other three Beatles, and managed to create a new Travelling Willburys song. I'm sure there are at least a dozen people on this list who could've made something better out of that. I hope to God the other "new" tune has a little less ELO in it and a little more of a George Martin sound. BTW, the whole concept of the three survivors adding their tracks to Lennon's demo is a little like making love to a dead chick, if you ask me. not that I've DONE that... sorry for the minimal RH content. -Russ. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Nov 95 14:37 PST To: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu From: Michael_Thompson@mindlink.bc.ca (Michael Thompson) Subject: Re: mellopiano, Beatles, etc. > Oh, he's played >piano live before too, on the 1990 solo tour. Man who invented himself >and flavour of night, maybe others... This must have been the tour where I saw him play "A Day in the Life", as his last number, running back and forth between the piano and the guitar. It was strangely moving and funny as hell. When the show started, Robyn explained to us that the piano had been set up wrong on the stage, and that this would mean he would have his back to us any time he was at the piano. He asked us to behave ourselves, be kind,and please not to "rob eachother" when his back was turned. I think this was the show where he handed my friend his teacup and saucer when he left the stage. This was the only time I have ever seen him play keyboard live in ten years. I wish he would do it more often. Renee Lynn ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 18:46:23 -0500 (EST) From: Gary Assa To: Bram Tchaikovsky cc: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu Subject: Re: Free as a Robyn > I always thought his vocal on "Executioner" sounded eerily like > Plastic Ono Band-era Lennon, which was an interesting change (as he usually > sounds eerily like a "Piper" era Syd Barrett :)). I often wish that I had his > ability to mimic (as well as his songwriting ability, but that's ok :)). I always thought "Somewhere Apart" was the most Lennon-like. ------------------------------ From: ZeroSummer@aol.com Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 19:08:20 -0500 To: fegmaniax@ns2.rutgers.edu Subject: Re: Free as a Robyn <> Anyone ever hear Grant Lee Buffalo's "The Shining Hour"? The first time I heard this, I immediately thought about Robyn, but then I realized that I was just thinking of "Somewhere Apart," and that "The Shining Hour" actually sounds like solo Lennon. Both songs are great little tributes to John, consciously or not. [][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][] The End of this Fegmaniax Digest. Archives can *not* be found at ftp://fegmania.wustl.edu/fegmaniax/archives/ The Archives are temporarily unavailable. For administrative questions, send mail to owner-fegmaniax@nsmx.rutgers.edu For subscription requests, send mail to majordomo@nsmx.rutgers.edu. Slipping you the midnight fish...