The great magic moments of rock'n'roll
By Michael Herr. Excerpt from the book 'Rock Dreams', by Guy Peellaert and Nic Cohn.
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Rock Dreams moves through this public dream domain like a mirror, and with about as much discrimination. Democratic as rock and roll itself, space is found for the great, the not so great, and the hardly any good at all, the one-hit saints and twentyyear institutions, aristocrats and lowlifes, rockers who were long gone and largely (but not essentially) forgotten, and the ones who overshot so tremendously on their run up the charts that they rendered themselves unforgettable. They hold the place in this book that they once held in our affections and still hold in our imaginations, and whether they're all dolled up like pop stars or naked as castaways, every one of them is perfect; that is, a perfect extract of the public knowledge and the public myth, to say nothing of the public wish.
Guy Peellaert is a born icon-painter in a world that uses up icons like paper plates. He invites the spirit to enter the image, and then he paints it, so that even the darkest and most "subversive" pictures glow with sweet emotion and right intention. Nik Cohn is a former rock writer who had seen the story for many years, from inside, and in all its illuminating and grubby forms, who, leaving the story at last, seals the old relationship with his lean but tender benediction. The text is the hard-bitten telegramatic expression of an old frontline character who lost his illusions but somehow not his innocence, and the paintings recall the great sustaining spiritual paintings of centuries ago, and even share some of the same themes, in their rock and roll mutations.
Rock Dreams is full of Annunciations, Nativities, Adorations, Passions, Agonies, Crucifixions and Pietàs, plenty of Temptations and Ecstasies and epiphany on nearly every page. But no Resurrections. In show business, Comeback is as close as anybody gets to resurrection, and Rock Dreams is not a sentimental work. Rock Dreams are European dreams, mostly about an America that's not much more than a dream to me too, who was there on American ground at the time recalled by the book's first pages, and echoed in every subsequent page, the hour of the rock and roll inception, with the great going-public of long hidden fetishes and the exposure of sacramental properties inside obvious, ordinary objects; when suddenly the sight of a guitar could provoke the most complicated and powerful feelings, when rundown roadhouses became charged with more glamour than The Stork Club, and a battered convertible turned into a vehicle for super-sensual travel. Cars stars bars guitars, when the thunderhead of the newly invested Pop finally broke, the poetry and icon rained down all over America and Europe. We were still children when we stampeded the pools that were formed and drank ourselves full. It was only afterwards that we noticed our reflections.
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]
Rock Dreams moves through this public dream domain like a mirror, and with about as much discrimination. Democratic as rock and roll itself, space is found for the great, the not so great, and the hardly any good at all, the one-hit saints and twentyyear institutions, aristocrats and lowlifes, rockers who were long gone and largely (but not essentially) forgotten, and the ones who overshot so tremendously on their run up the charts that they rendered themselves unforgettable. They hold the place in this book that they once held in our affections and still hold in our imaginations, and whether they're all dolled up like pop stars or naked as castaways, every one of them is perfect; that is, a perfect extract of the public knowledge and the public myth, to say nothing of the public wish.
Guy Peellaert is a born icon-painter in a world that uses up icons like paper plates. He invites the spirit to enter the image, and then he paints it, so that even the darkest and most "subversive" pictures glow with sweet emotion and right intention. Nik Cohn is a former rock writer who had seen the story for many years, from inside, and in all its illuminating and grubby forms, who, leaving the story at last, seals the old relationship with his lean but tender benediction. The text is the hard-bitten telegramatic expression of an old frontline character who lost his illusions but somehow not his innocence, and the paintings recall the great sustaining spiritual paintings of centuries ago, and even share some of the same themes, in their rock and roll mutations.
Rock Dreams is full of Annunciations, Nativities, Adorations, Passions, Agonies, Crucifixions and Pietàs, plenty of Temptations and Ecstasies and epiphany on nearly every page. But no Resurrections. In show business, Comeback is as close as anybody gets to resurrection, and Rock Dreams is not a sentimental work. Rock Dreams are European dreams, mostly about an America that's not much more than a dream to me too, who was there on American ground at the time recalled by the book's first pages, and echoed in every subsequent page, the hour of the rock and roll inception, with the great going-public of long hidden fetishes and the exposure of sacramental properties inside obvious, ordinary objects; when suddenly the sight of a guitar could provoke the most complicated and powerful feelings, when rundown roadhouses became charged with more glamour than The Stork Club, and a battered convertible turned into a vehicle for super-sensual travel. Cars stars bars guitars, when the thunderhead of the newly invested Pop finally broke, the poetry and icon rained down all over America and Europe. We were still children when we stampeded the pools that were formed and drank ourselves full. It was only afterwards that we noticed our reflections.
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]
Joe Turner. From Kansas City, at two forty pounds, Big Joe can drink both bourbon and beer; can tear down walls with his bare hands, can chew pig-iron and spit it out as razor blades, can kill a man with a smile; can holler like a mountain-jack, can swallow hogsbacks whole, and make love all night long; can do whatever you can do - Big Joe can do it better.