| Author | Message | ||
     Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 99.126.164.88 |
 http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/dec/18/captain-beefheart-died-provocative-u npredictable | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.212.218 |
That's very sad news. Beefheart was one of the true greats of American music, and his long-ago decision to focus his creativity on painting meant that his legacy remained undiluted by dodgy comebacks and nostalgia-driven tours. Autumn's child has gone and the winter is colder now. | ||
| Carolinec (Carolinec) Username: Carolinec Registered: 06-2009 Posted From: 92.232.199.129 |
Sad to hear that. He had a tremendous influence on R&B - not the standard R&B but his own interpretation of it. I don't know anything about his painting, but his music legacy will most certainly live on. RIP Captain. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 61.216.202.166 |
I remember John Peel playing his music a lot, back in the 1970s and 1980s. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.17.252.126 |
Oh God no... this is terrible news. Another legend gone. Fuck I feel like crying. Everyone here must know by now what a Zappa nut I am and Don Van Vliet was a massive part of that story. They went to school together, you know, and I have some priceless Zappa rarities of them mucking about together on tape as pre-fame young men in the late 50s/early 60s. I have all the Captain Beefheart albums, apart from 'Lick My Decals Off, Baby' (1970), which never appeared on CD (unless anyone knows different). One of the grestest discs in my entire collection is 'The Spotlight Kid'/'Clear Spot' (1972) 2-in-1 CD - mind-blowingly awesome avante-garde blues rock at its most startlingly original and powerful. Spine shivering music of the gods imo. Anyone who cares about music or art at all needs to investigate this man.. this legend... this giant of a human being, who (like Frank) never gave in to commercialism and continued to push the envelope throughout his life - first in his music then in his painting. What terrible, awful news... I'm going to spend the rest of the weekend playing all his music back-to-back from those early tapes through 'Safe As Milk' to 'Ice Cream For Crow' and slot the Zappa collaborations on 'Hot Rats' & 'Bongo Fury' in as well!! Long live uncompromising ROCK!!!! | ||
| Carolinec (Carolinec) Username: Carolinec Registered: 06-2009 Posted From: 92.232.199.129 |
Stevie - I'm going to make you green with envy with this account of my wild, reckless youth .. not only have I breathed in the same courtroom air as Frank Zappa, but I also saw Captain Beefheart live on stage!  Well, strictly speaking, I didn't *see* much of him as we were so far from the stage, but I certainly heard his gravelly voice drifting across the fields. It was early 70s ('74 I think?) and my one and only outdoor music festival - Knebworth Park in Hertfordshire. Pink Floyd were the headline act, along with Beefheart. We were miles away from the stage so the performers looked like ants, and we could hardly hear any music at all. But I certainly remember one ant, completely clothed in black, strutting his stuff on stage with his trademark vocals and throbbing base drifting through the fields. The only other thing which stands out in my mind from that weekend was the pyrotechnic display during Floyd's set, but Beefheart definitely stole the show for me! Ah, the heady days of my youth! A blazing hot summer, cans of lager to quench the thirst, passing certain noxious substances from person to person - it really felt like my own personal Summer of Love had arrived!  | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 178.116.51.3 |
Wasn't that the year Pink Floyd used real airplanes to buzz the crowd prior to the show? Wish I could have seen that. | ||
| Carolinec (Carolinec) Username: Carolinec Registered: 06-2009 Posted From: 92.232.199.129 |
Not that I remember, Hubert, but then I was pretty much out of it for most of the weekend! No, seriously, I think I'd have remembered that if it had happened when I was there. Perhaps I've got the year wrong? Or maybe that was at Glastonbury or somewhere else in another year? Hmmm, might have to go and google that to find out - I definitely remember reading about it somewhere, but I don't think I was acutally there ... | ||
| Carolinec (Carolinec) Username: Carolinec Registered: 06-2009 Posted From: 92.232.199.129 |
.. heck, I WAS there! At least in body, if not in mind. Here's a site I just found with some people's memories of the festival: http://www.ukrockfestivals.com/75-Knebworth-memoirs.html I don't remember the planes at all - perhaps I'd gone to the loo or something?!  Oh, and it was 1975, not 1974. Happy days! | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.17.252.126 |
Legendary times, Caroline, that I was sadly too young to appreciate. I was more into T-Rex at that time, still am lol. But I got seriously into music during the punk/new wave explosion of the late 70s/early 80s, and Talking Heads remain my favourite band of all time, as well as the greatest the world has ever seen - with full respect to The Beatles. Big, big Floyd fan as well - and never forgetting Tull of course! | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.23.112 |
T-Rex! I remember I bought "Metal Guru" just to see (or rather hear) what all the fuss was about, but I didn't like it very much. I think by then I was in the process of 'going over' from glam to prog rock. Couldn't stand punk rock, not initially that is, though I remember checking out the Marquee in London in 1978 and leaving that hallowed music mecca covered in spit. By then it was all over, of course, or rather it was becoming more interesting with the advent of new synthesisers . . . | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.17.252.126 |
T-Rex was the music of my childhood, Hubert. Songs like 'Ride A White Swan' & 'Get It On' infused a love of the electric guitar in my genes. Then along came; Talking Heads, The Fall, Blondie (fnaar!), The Jam, The Pistols, The Clash, The Undertones, Stiff Little Fingers, The Teardrop Explodes, PiL, etc, etc... and my musical taste was set in stone - loud, uncompromising and fun! Zappa became my God when I discovered him in the late 80s, and from there the joys of the ultra-unorthodox, jazz and classical opened up as well. It continues to be a wild ride!! | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.253.77 |
I've not heard much of Beefheart's stuff - I always meant to, but never quite got round to it. RIP to a legendary figure, though. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.17.252.126 |
'Safe As Milk' is his most accessible album, Zed, as well as one of the greatest debuts in rock history, and one of the most groundbreaking albums of the 60s - on a par with 'The White Album', 'The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn' or 'Forever Changes' imho. After that came 'Trout Mask Replica', the defining album of the avant-garde in rock, and his masterpiece, and the greatest "grower" album there is - just ease yourself up to it first lol. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.23.112 |
I still like to listen to the Byrne & Eno collaboration My Life in the Bush of Ghosts from time to time. I admit I was drawn into punk - or its aftermath - by Siouxsie. Some of the Banshees' later albums are timeless jewels. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 99.126.164.88 |
Stevie, TROUT MASK REPLICA remains one of my all-time favorite albums, I've listened to that countless times. It's one of those things that the first time you hear it, your reaction is immediate repugnance, or at least mine was: it sounds like the jangled incoherent noise of drug-addled hippies who can't play instruments. After one listen, you think... no f*cking way will I ever put that on again. But you make yourself... and it grows on you, to a point where finally, you begin to believe... my god, has there every been anything as beautiful as this?... To the point where even an immediately accessible indeed album like SAFE AS MILK, feels amateurish in comparison (but not really, because it's a great album too, of course). (And Zappa is key in the whole creation of TMR, as you know.) Yes, I think you're indeed right, Stevie - LICK MY DECALS OFF, BABY is one of the miniscule few albums (along with some Devo albums, if I remember correctly?...) never once officially released onto CD; though, ghoulish as it is, it probably will be now to capitalize on his death and maybe the interest generated by it. You can, however, hear the whole thing on youtube, it's long since been available there.... And hey Stevie, probably the only album I've heard as much as TMR, is REMAIN IN LIGHT.... | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
You have impeccable music taste, Craig. 'More Songs About Buildings And Food' is my favourite album of all time. If I listed my Top 10 it would be almost entirely Talking Heads. David Byrne's solo material is fantastic as well, ditto The Tom Tom Club and Jerry Harrison. How can four such insanely talanted individuals ever have come together? It defies belief, but there it is... I even loved the much maligned three quarter comeback as The Heads. But Byrne is the man - 'My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts' & 'The Catherine Wheel' are two of the most incredibly imaginative albums ever recorded imho. You've got me started now! If only they would release 'Music For The Knee Plays' & 'Close To The Bone' on CD. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 99.126.164.88 |
Stevie, you're enthusiasm is making me want to go back and revisit all this now! God, I needed a stimulation in the music department, I've grown so ennui-laden of late.... Thanks for that! |