From: owner-fegmaniax-digest@ecto.org To: fegmaniax-digest@ecto.org Reply-To: fegmaniax@ecto.org Errors-To: owner-fegmaniax-digest@ecto.org Subject: Feg Digest V4 #211 Fegmaniax Digest Volume 4 Number 211 Friday October 18 1996 To post, send mail to fegmaniax@ecto.org To unsubscribe, send mail to majordomo@ecto.org with the words "unsubscribe fegmaniax-digest" in the message body. Send comments, etc. to the listowner at owner-fegmaniax@ecto.org FegMANIAX! Web Page: http://remus.rutgers.edu/~woj/fegmaniax/index.html Archives are available at ftp://www.ecto.org/pub/lists/fegmaniax/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Today's Topics: ------- ------- seeking treefrog Re: rob, bob and albert PRE SHOW MEETING? Toronto and/or Ottawa? Re: the Concept Washington City Paper Re: Washington City Paper Goldmine part VIIb Re: the Concept BINGO HAND JOB Re: The concept. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 17 Oct 1996 22:42:18 -0400 (EDT) From: Bayard Subject: seeking treefrog anyone know how to get in touch with edward of sim (formerly treefrog@netcom.com)? ------------------------------ From: Waka Jawaka Subject: Re: rob, bob and albert Date: Fri, 18 Oct 1996 10:40:50 -0700 At 20:06 16.10.96 -0400, sister ernestine wrote: >he had a couple copies of the goldmine with robyn on the cover left, >one of which i picked up. he also has one copy of _mossy liquor_. if >anyone needs/wants either of these items, let me know. If I have not responded too late, I would like a copy of that Goldmine. Let me know the financial terms. Hope all is well... Cheers, --g ______________________________________ "Me and a book is a party. Me and a book and a cup of coffee is an orgy." --Robert Fripp ______________________________________ Glen Uber glen@metro.net http://metro.net/glen/ ------------------------------ From: jlaw@qucis.queensu.ca (Jeffrey Lawrence) Date: Fri, 18 Oct 96 15:25:10 EDT Subject: PRE SHOW MEETING? Toronto and/or Ottawa? I am surprised that I have not seen a plethora of messages for any of the shows, but esp. the Toronto and/or Ottawa shows - does this mean that no Fegs are going to either of these shows???? I am planning on going (ie. I still have to get tickets) but if anyone is going from the list and wants to hook up before either show, please let me know..... -- Slainte!, Jeff "I'm not a vegetarian because I love animals; I'm a vegetarian because I hate plants." --A. Whitney Brown ** JEFF LAWRENCE (jlaw@qucis.queensu.ca) ** Systems Specialist, Robotics and Perception Labs, Dept. of Computing and Information Sciences, Rm.729, Goodwin Hall, Queens University, Kingston, Ontario, CANADA, K7L 3N6 Ph:(613)545-6656 FAX: (613)545-6513 URL : http://www.qucis.queensu.ca/home/jlaw ** ALBUMS OF THE WEEK (Oct. 4 edition) **: 1) Billy Bragg - William Bloke 2) Johnathan Richman - Surrender To Johnathan! 3) Robyn Hitchcock - Mossy Liquor 4) "Trainspotting" Soundtrack 5) Catherine Wheel - Like Cats & Dogs *************************************************** ** CHECK OUT THE CANADIAN JOB SOURCE!!!!!! ** ** http://www.irus.rri.uwo.ca/~jlaw/job_can.html ** *************************************************** ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 18 Oct 1996 15:27:03 +0500 From: Ken Frankel Subject: Re: the Concept While any RH film would be better than none, I don't personally find the idea of a film of him busking on the streets of New York especially compelling. I'd rather see him wandering on the Isle of Wight or deserted Norwegian shorelines, interviews with family and band members, historic Soft Boys footage, etc., interspersed with more recent concert footage. I'm surprised that enough money to do the "busking" film couldn't be raised. It sounds like something college students could do with a camcorder. I'd like to see the director of "Crumb" do the Hitchcock film. Any thoughts? Ken ------------------------------ From: hollie_satterfield@mail.amsinc.com Date: Fri, 18 Oct 96 15:14:32 EST Subject: Washington City Paper Has anyone typed in the enthusiastic Moss Elixir review from the 9/27 Washington City Paper? I don't recall seeing it and my cc:mail search engine is less than helpful. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 18 Oct 1996 16:15:30 -0400 (EDT) From: "`!'" Subject: Re: Washington City Paper On Fri, 18 Oct 1996 hollie_satterfield@mail.amsinc.com wrote: > Has anyone typed in the enthusiastic Moss Elixir review from the > 9/27 Washington City Paper? I don't recall seeing it and my cc:mail > search engine is less than helpful. i think i still have this around, but i sorta thought my feg-typing dues were paid up through 1998 or thereabouts. anybody else want to take a crack at this? i'll do it if no one speaks up but not terribly promptly i expeck. carpal doug n.p. live dar williams! woo-hoo!! -- oh,no!! you've just read mail from doug -- dmayowel@access.digex.net a.k.a. dougmhyphw@aol.com -- get yr recently updated pathos at http://www.mwmw.com/pathetic/ ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 18 Oct 1996 17:14:56 -0400 (EDT) From: "`!'" Subject: Goldmine part VIIb This side bar accompanies page 7 of the infamous _Goldmine_ article: Three Gulps of _Moss Elixir_ "Its not Julie Andrews running down the hillside filling her lungs with good oxygen and saying 'sing my little budgerigar,'" he smiles. "But it's got more life in it than anything I've done in a long time." Robyn Hitchcock Moss Elixir Warner Brothers (9 46302) Getting right to the meat of the matter: this is Bob's finest hour, at least the fines t one in a prawn's age, considering how sterile, overproduced, and quite frankly, boring the last two albums (1991's _Perspex Island_, 1992's _Respect_) were. That pair of records, recorded with the Egyptians, was subjected to the none-too-subtle pressure of A&M Records for Hitchcock to have a radio hit; and while each contained its share of typically cracked Hitchcock gems, both were substandard when judged against such classic outings as _Element of Light_, _Fegmania!_, and of course the man's Soft Boys period. Everything clicks this time around -- the stripped-down musicianship (the songs contain, am most, guitar/bass/violin, with the occasional drums, tambourine, sax and organ), the vocals (Hitchcock's voice has an undeniable warmth, and here it almost sounds like it's in the room with you, not to mention some sublime harmony overdubs to make the room even brighter), and of course the wordplay (more on that in a minute). If you were to single out just a few songs here... Lead track "Sinister But She Was Happy" is about as buoyant as they come, a jogging bassline and plangent guitar motif tweaked ever-so-optimistically by Deni Bonet's fiddle-scrapes and chuckles. Or the all-acoustic "Heliotrope" which, with its slightly countryish, reverb/twang chord progression, focuses the ears on Hitchcock's voice (in turn given just a hint of spectral echo plus a ghostly, upper-register overdub). One of the few "produced" tunes is "Beautiful Queen," whose parallel backwards/surf guitars give it a shimmery psychedelic feel. As it progresses through a series of time signature shifts, it's hard not to think "Beatles" (_Sgt. Pepper's_ or _Magical Mystery Tour_ era -- check those stately trumpets and the ascending "aahhh" vocal harmonies). Suffice to say that on this album, all tunes are created equal and all stand up proudly for inspection. It's as if Hitchcock, freed from his previous record contract (and of the Egyptians, it must be said), could finally write and arrange in a vacuum, and with only his personal expectations to meet. Lucky for us Warner Brothers caught wind; if the label can't turn the Byrds-like "Alright, Yeah" or the straightforward-but-just-quirky-enough-for-Alternative "I Am Not Me" into radio hits it should fire the entire marketing department. Of course, long-time Hitchcock fans expect more than just friendly-sounding toons. There's an old saying among songwriters: when you're sitting at the kitchen table scratching on a pad of paper working out your lyrics, don't answer the doorbell because it's like being caught walking around the house in your dirtiest, most tattered underwear. If true, then Hitchcock must wear silk Calvins all day long. [don't flame me, i'm just the humble typist. write the mismanaged metaphor police. dmw] Lesser beings would kill to pen a link like "Basically, she was a Jeanne Moreau type/Sinister but she was happy," which tells you more about the character in the song than an entire verse dedicated to physical and psychological analysis. In "Devil's Radio" Hitchcock brings an utterly fresh spin to a stale subject (Rush Limbaugh, G. Gordon Liddy and their sorry broadcast ilk). First he throws out some goofy but memorable rhymes: "Darlin'/You don't have to call me/Stalin/Or even Mao Tse Tung/Cause I'm far too young" (say it aloud). This is followed by a succinct description of the blather that comes over the airwaves: "It went, 'Na na na na na na/I'm the Devil's Radio." Then the coup de grace is delivered, cheerily buy firmly: "Kate said, 'The flowers of intolerance and hatred/Are blooming kind of early/This year/Someone's been watering them." It's like Richard Pryor once pointed out: you get them laughing and you get their attention, then you catch them off guard with what you're really trying to get across. Hitchcock doesn't fail to paint his patented, surreal, angle-poise lamp-populated landscapes, either. "De Chirico Street" finds the song's narrator "followed home by a weighing machine on De Chirico Street...The conductor's name was Milo/As the bus went past he hissed 'Flesh-head!...A lizard's tail slithered in the crack on De Chirico Street..." And so on; is it any wonder folks once suspected Hitchcock of manufacturing LSD part-time in his flat? Although the smart money was always on his full-time gig as incurable, if slightly eccentric, romantic. In "Beautiful Queen" some of the most delicious lines float by: "Got a ripe tomato here in ecstasy/Got a little apple in you eye"; "You're the warm creation/Of a sigh"; "I'm not afraid to be the only person on the planet...In the world with you." One constant for Hitchcock has been his willingness to toss around vivid images and the sound of words for the sake of seeing how they interact after colliding. Perhaps the mark of a skilled writer is this treating of language's components as living creatures; many authors refer to their works as their children. If so, then Hitchcock's one of the giants. -- Fred Mills Moss Elixir There's a time and place for Robyn Hitchcock. Ask him and he'll probably rant on about flesh, frogs, guys with misshapen heads or other things that really make little sense to anyone but him and generally evade the question. His latest album, _Moss Elixir_, is quite like that. It's about the times and places of the enigmatic Hitchcock, but you really don't have a clue by the end just what those times and places are. You are convinced, however, that it's a tripping slice of bizarro-pop and a creative life into Hitch-familiar areas that borders on anything but the obvious. Sans the Egyptians, his fine backing band of the past decade, Hitchcock is on his own again, playing kickball with songs that aren't sure if they want to be narrative set-pieces or rambling pop-poetry and make little sense on either level. Take "Sinister But She Was Happy," "The Speed of Things," "Beautiful Queen" and "This Is Hot It Feels" (the album's most, um, cohesive songs), toss them with a bit of dry wit, sparkling wordplay and sparse musical accompaniment, all Hitch-style, and you have an idea where _Moss Elixir_ is heading. Which is more than you can say for Hitchcock. On his best work (like 1991's _Perspex Island_), Hitchcock found the line where everything could coexist: his pop, his poetry, his odd takes on the naturalization of events. Here, he mixes up recording methods and twisting stories and struggles to hold them in one place. Songs, in the process, float pointlessly above the ozone. -- Michael Gallucci -- oh,no!! you've just read mail from doug -- dmayowel@access.digex.net a.k.a. dougmhyphw@aol.com -- get yr recently updated pathos at http://www.mwmw.com/pathetic/ ------------------------------ From: Terrence M Marks Date: Fri, 18 Oct 1996 18:31:29 -0400 (EDT) Subject: Re: the Concept On Fri, 18 Oct 1996, Ken Frankel wrote: > While any RH film would be better than none, I don't > personally find the idea of a film of him busking on > the streets of New York especially compelling. I'd rather > see him wandering on the Isle of Wight or deserted > Norwegian shorelines, interviews with family and band > members, historic Soft Boys footage, etc., interspersed > with more recent concert footage. I think that the abandoned subway station would be a better place for him to wander..either that or a botanical garden. Btw..is there *any* historic Soft Boys footage? THey were kinda ignored and didn't seem like the kind to be filmed.. > > I'm surprised that enough money to do the "busking" > film couldn't be raised. It sounds like something > college students could do with a camcorder. I'd like > to see the director of "Crumb" do the Hitchcock film. > Any thoughts? > > > Ken > > ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 19 Oct 1996 00:48:23 +0200 (MET DST) From: Ole Skjefte Subject: BINGO HAND JOB At 20:58 15.10.96 -0400, you wrote: >______________________________________________________________ >Griffith Davies hbrtv219@email.csun.edu >======== Fwd by: Russ Reynolds ======== >Are you sure about the booklet? I've seen a "From The Borderline" boot and >it has two or three pictures of Robyn in the booklet. In the front he's >listed as "Violet" in the photos of the Bingo Hand Job members. > >Robyn's verse on the above mentioned tune is one of the highlights of that >disc, IMO. > >That show is was kind of like the underground version of "Rock&Roll Circus", >wasn't it. Wish I had been there. -russ > >- I guess there's different covers, but there's no Robyn-picture on my issue. In addition to stage-pictures of REM, there's small ( circled-formed ) pictures of REM and Billy Bragg, but no pictures in the circles for Robyn ( a.k.a Violet ) and Peter Holsapple. I guess "You ain't..." is the only track that Robyn contributes on the album. There's a video of the event too. There's another REM bootleg called Revolution on the Radio" from "Mountain Stage", Capital Plaza Theatre, Charlston, VW ( 28th April, 1991 ). Robyn plays If you go away and Birdshead on this CD. I guess there's video from this event too, but my video is a very poor quality. Robyn also played with REM as Worse Case Scenario/Nigel & The Crosses in March/May 1989 ( 2 shows in USA, 1 show in England ) These are available on tapes. See ya, Ole Ole Skjefte - Fogd Lindholmsvei 1 - N-6009 Aalesund - Norway ------------------------------ From: ben@deafkhan.com Date: Thu, 17 Oct 1996 23:03:47 -0700 CC: fegmaniax@ecto.org Subject: Re: The concept. TPJSHEDS@aol.com wrote: > > I talked to a producer that I know today, who is affiliated with Jonathon > Demme, and he told me some details about the Robyn film. > > 'Turns out the project is very iffy at this point as Demme was not able to > raise the kind of money he thought he would be able to. > On the other hand, the News section in the October 21 CMJ reports the project as going full speed ahead: JONATHAN DEMME TO DIRECT ROBYN HITCHCOCK FILM Jonathan Demme, who was responsible for the acclaimed Talking Heads concert film 'Stop Making Sense', is slated to direct a Robyn Hitchcock concert film to be shot during the artist's perfomance in New York City next month. The film will be released in 1997, accompanied by a soundtrack album. Hitchcock plans to debut new songs along with performing his usual mix of older material and songs from his current 'Moss Elixir' album. [End of article; picture of R.H. on left] Ben http://www.deafkhan.com/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- The End of this Fegmaniax Digest. *sob* .