Gabriel Intro to Garageland

"Gabriel Intro"  Tim Barry  28th & Stonewall
"The Game Gets Old"  Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings  I Learned The Hard Way
"Game Is My Middle Name"  Betty Davis  Betty Davis
"Games Without Frontiers"  Peter Gabriel  Peter Gabriel (melting face)
"Ganges Delta Blues"  Ry Cooder & V.M. Bhatt  A Meeting By The River
"Gangsta Sh*t"  Outkast  Stankonia
"Gangster Of Love"  Jimmy Norman  What It Is! Funky Soul and Rare Grooves
"Gangsters"  Neville Staple  The Dawning of a New Era [Mojo disc]
"Gannet"  Tommy Smith  Beasts of Scotland
"Garageland"  The Clash  The Clash

Whitney died this past weekend. This has absolutely no impact on me except as another aspect of my continual aging.  As with the Super Bowl, now the performers of my youth are dying and it is not heartrendingly tragic, but pathetically predictable.  Do not get me wrong.  At 48, she was too young to die.  She was ubiquitous in my youth, and it is sad that she was destroyed by drugs and it is sad that she is dead.  But it is sad Joe Strummer died at 50. It is sad that Jerry died (53), and it is sad that Zappa died (52), and it is sad that George Harrison (58) and John Entwistle (57) died too.  At this point, Whitney (and I) was much  closer to those guys than to Kurt or Jimi.  Like those other artists, Whitney had ceased to be a contributing artist (at least in the genre they had become famous or with the intensity of their youth), and was largely a dominant personality from her audience's past.

Charles and I were having this discussion the other day.  By any reasonable measure, it is horrible that Kurt died as young as he did.  But by dying young, his legend is forever intact.   If Whitney had died 20 years ago, there would be no "Being Bobby Brown."  If Michael had died after Bad, there would be no plastic surgery, no implications, no trial, and he would be remembered without adulteration for an immortal album bracketed by two great ones.  (which, frankly is how I think of Bob Stinson - Hootenany, Let It Be, Tim - as great a three album run as any - and yes, the Replacements are great because of Bob . . . but I digress.)  Charles disagrees.  Her exact words: "Kurt should be here getting fat and old with the rest of us."

Of course, maybe the legend is all that survives anyway.  If Michael & Whitney are remembered at all, it will be because of the music, not because of what happened to them in their forties. People already want to forget and forgive.  Whitney's songs have spiked to number one on iTunes since her death, and that can't all just be nostalgic 40 year olds.  The same thing happened to Michael.

Some thoughts from the set:

• After Joe became a millionaire off his songs of class warfare, did he still sit in his garage with his bullshit detector?
• The video for "Gangsters" is just joyous.  Everyone in that bar knows every single word.  Neville Staple can (and does) just stop singing and let the audience keep it going for him.
• While there was an official video for "Games Without Frontiers" the link above is so much greater - it addresses the question "What the hell are Segways good for?" with the ridiculous answer, "They let aging prog-rockers roll around on stage, complete with dramatic synchronized lurching!"
• That melting face album was seminal.  The hollow percussion in the songs was distinctive and I was exactly the right age for the politics of "Biko" & "Games Without Frontiers." I still think (with no substantial basis whatsoever) that without this album, Paul Simon never makes Graceland (you can decide for yourself whether to call that credit or blame).
• It may be that you are sometimes just swayed by what you encounter first.  Charles is much more partial to the waxed car album.  We have the same discussion over X (me - More Fun, her - Big Black Sun).