Jer
Beagle Scout
Posts: 1,183
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Post by Jer on Mar 13, 2016 20:35:28 GMT -5
Yeah, I get all that, they were known for the self-sabotage and being outcast and everything, but I think most diehard fans were a bit taken aback at the levels it reached and real price they paid for it that the book laid out in detail. Everyone knew about the CBGB show and a couple other events, but a lot of the other stuff was new to most people. If you weren't at least a little surprised at a couple of those stories I'd venture that you were either there or heard them before. It was powerful stuff and a huge part of the story that made the book so compelling.
Most of what you're saying is true - they were messed up, the weren't capable of being part of the machine, and they were stuck in that weird spot. I also agree that all that is a big part of what made them so special and attracted other misfits to them.
But you gotta be able to look at the other side too - you just can't say that "they never had a chance" and "it's a crime they never got the accolades they deserved" anymore. And you certainly can't declare that unequivocally - "The Replacements did NOT suck" because more times than not, when it was really on the line, they worked very hard at sucking, and sucked harder than arguably most other bands that ever reached that level. They were very consistent at that.
And was the rebellion really organic? Was it even rebellion? Maybe sometimes, but I think part of Paul's struggle was it became who they were more than what they did, and people too often paid more attention (and money) to see them fail. I think it was often a little more calculated than we'd like to believe, especially when it was on the line, and they perpetuated it while they complained about it, and just like the rest of the story, it became part of the great contradiction that is their legacy.
And no one wanted them to be Tom Petty, not even them, but there are several references to the success of REM, and part of my own frustration with the story was the repeated amazement (resentment? jealousy?) that Paul held for that success, right on the heels of another one of their career defining self-inflicted failures to fit in. It's one thing to chop off your foot, but it's another to wonder why you can't run on it the next day.
I think the ugly side of rock and roll is part of what makes it great - the sleaze, drugs, personal and personnel issues, and the egos. Tension and conflict make for great art, and these guys had it all. Let's just try to be a little objective about it and take in all the dirt with the amazing songs and shows that they gave us.
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Post by twicks1 on Mar 13, 2016 20:45:50 GMT -5
I guess what I found shocking is that it seems like, bottom line, Paul had a pathological fear of success that compelled him to keep steering things into the ditch. A handful of people in the book hit on this...how else do you reconcile his constant yearning for commercial success, respect, etc. with the compulsive "tanking" that happened every. single. time. they were on the brink of something bigger.
All these years it seemed like they were thwarted to some degree, so they reacted in wild, lovably irreverent ways -- that's fun. Now most of their failures seem like they were borne directly out of psychological/emotional damage -- that's depressing.
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Post by anarkissed on Mar 13, 2016 21:44:46 GMT -5
Anybody wanna reference Neil Young in this regard? His biography "Shakey" is a similarly enlightening read...He'd do shit like have a major 88-date concert tour scheduled, and, on the fourth night, about an hour before show time, no one could find him...People would start calling around...He was supposed to be in L.A. for the concert that night...Finally, they'd get through to somebody who'd go "Neil? He's supposed to be in L.A.? Well, shit, I put him on a plane to Winnipeg this morning"...Some big mogul like David Geffen would sign him to some huge multimillion dollar deal for ten albums, and he'd turn in an album with him singing through a Vocoder, accompanied by synthesizers and drum machines, or a rockabilly record that had six covers on it and ran 24 minutes, or a syrupy Countrypolitan thing where he parodied George Jones...
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Post by teddinard on Mar 13, 2016 22:33:01 GMT -5
I guess what I found shocking is that it seems like, bottom line, Paul had a pathological fear of success that compelled him to keep steering things into the ditch. Success should be feared. So much of it is repellent. And if the Replacements sucked, they tried, at least, to make an art out of sucking. By "organic," I meant that they didn't sabotage themselves due to some high-minded principle. They did it out of a deep dilemma they confronted in their own work and their own lives. Part of them wanted to succeed, part of them was repelled by success. That attitude more than makes sense to me. It's not a pretty or happy story. But it feels very familiar. On a smaller scale, I've known talented fuck-ups and assholes and dicks and every other name you can think of, people I admire and care about, and find exasperating and sometimes ridiculous and even pathetic. Am I willing to accept the contradictions and awfulness for the eight Replacements records and Westerberg's solo career? Well, I am. Easy for me to say, I paid no personal price for them. I don't mourn the lack of a radio hit, like Westerberg seems to, on occasion. I never have. I don't care what idiots buy or don't buy.
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Post by twicks1 on Mar 13, 2016 23:22:12 GMT -5
Am I willing to accept the contradictions and awfulness for the eight Replacements records and Westerberg's solo career? Well, I am. Oh, totally. For all the behind-the-scenes dysfunction, those eight records are joyous and life-affirming to listen to.
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Post by TomT on Mar 14, 2016 6:21:56 GMT -5
Paul pretty much tells us why all the self sabotage. Simply a fear of success. It holds a vast majority of us hostage and we don't even realize it. If they had gotten huge like REM they would have to change who they were as people. They would have to play the bullshit game with promoters and be gracious to idiots. Suffering fools is something Paul just won't stoop to. A lot of what they did was childish and over the line but it all worked out the way it was supposed to. I'm really glad Bob Mehr decided to do this book. I enjoyed the hell out of it.
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Jer
Beagle Scout
Posts: 1,183
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Post by Jer on Mar 14, 2016 8:55:21 GMT -5
I guess what I found shocking is that it seems like, bottom line, Paul had a pathological fear of success that compelled him to keep steering things into the ditch. A handful of people in the book hit on this...how else do you reconcile his constant yearning for commercial success, respect, etc. with the compulsive "tanking" that happened every. single. time. they were on the brink of something bigger. All these years it seemed like they were thwarted to some degree, so they reacted in wild, lovably irreverent ways -- that's fun. Now most of their failures seem like they were borne directly out of psychological/emotional damage -- that's depressing. This kinda sums how I feel about the book. It changed how I look at the band - but the truth will do that. A less-thorough book wouldn't have had that impact, and a less honest account may have preserved the mythos better, but I don't want my perceptions (about anything) to be through rose-colored glasses. I'll take the truth any day, unpleasant as it can be. It's not a pretty or happy story. But it feels very familiar. On a smaller scale, I've known talented fuck-ups and assholes and dicks and every other name you can think of, people I admire and care about, and find exasperating and sometimes ridiculous and even pathetic. Am I willing to accept the contradictions and awfulness for the eight Replacements records and Westerberg's solo career? Well, I am. Easy for me to say, I paid no personal price for them. I don't mourn the lack of a radio hit, like Westerberg seems to, on occasion. I never have. I don't care what idiots buy or don't buy. The contradictions have become such a huge part of the story and especially Paul's career. I enjoy trying to bring some objectivity into these discussions, and I often feel compelled to see things from the ugly side, just to even the scales here. The "warts" in the book change the way I look at things, but for me, I not only accept them, but in some sort of way they actually bring the music closer. Again, the truth will do that.
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Post by FreeRider on Mar 14, 2016 9:49:22 GMT -5
I certainly don't disavow them or view them harshly based on the unvarnished accounting of what they went thru. If anything, the truthful telling of their story gives me a greater perspective of the whole, not just one from a fan's perspective and all the mythologizing that comes with fandom.
And it makes me see them as regular people, with their foibles and flaws, and I can accept that. That's who they were in that time and place. I'd be a dismayed if they hadn't matured some or had some personal growth in the aftermath.
Paul was right in that they were ahead of their time. If they had come around in the present day, they wouldn't have to worry about success via the corporate label game. It would be their own undertaking and finding success on their own terms. You cannot underestimate the impact the internet has had on artists' freedom to put their music out there without the middle man.
what's interesting is that they decided to stay in a broken system, a system they resented and hated, for so long. it makes me wonder if they'd have been happier being the big fish in the regional pond and eschewing the big label game.
I guess it also depends on what they would've defined for themselves as "success". Hell, even today, Paul still sounds conflicted as to what he wants. From the SPIN interview (but we should know by now to take what he says with a grain of salt at times):
My next question follows naturally. “Do you wish you were more popular?” Paul pauses in consideration. “No,” he says definitively. “I say that and I’m still a human being. The I Don’t Cares record charted at No. 150 and the next day it dropped. I’m trying to be cool and think it doesn’t matter. Then I spend the day kicking s**t. Any time I put something out I’m afraid and I want people to like it. This record was not meant to sell.”
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Post by Placemat on Mar 14, 2016 10:17:33 GMT -5
Jantelagen. Norwegian for don't brag, don't have big aspirations.
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Post by teddinard on Mar 14, 2016 10:37:15 GMT -5
At the risk of repeating myself, I'd say they were great partly because of their ambivalence about success.
If they flat-out rejected the idea of success, they could have produced any imaginable type of nonsensical garbage. It's easy not to be successful. They could have smeared peanut butter on themselves screeching "Fuck you! Fuck you!" at a tiny club audience while their guitars fed back: "We hate the corporate world! We refuse to be likeable!" There was a lot of that shit going on in the 80s and after a very short while nobody cared.
If they decided to be successful at any cost, they could have been the thinking man's Bon Jovi or some other abomination.
Their greatness in part lies in the tension between their desire to do well and their deep suspicion of what doing well entails in the music business. There's no direct contradiction between those two things but it's extremely difficult and and no doubt painful to sustain them together.
You can hear it in the Spin interview that FreeRider just quoted.
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Post by twicks1 on Mar 14, 2016 11:24:06 GMT -5
If they decided to be successful at any cost, they could have been the thinking man's Bon Jovi or some other abomination. C'mon, it wasn't "self-destruction or become Bon Jovi"...Neil Young, Elvis Costello, the aforementioned R.E.M. and the hated Tom Petty were all possible templates. Look, I love the book -- it made a bigger impact on me than seeing them back together at Riot Fest in Toronto. But to say "I wouldn't change a thing" just isn't true. If Paul and Tommy were still making records and playing their catalog of hits in amphitheaters together every few summers a la Petty & the Heartbreakers, you'd have a pleasing ending to the story. But it all hinges on them being well-adjusted, non-tortured guys to begin with...and now I know that wasn't the case and probably never will be.
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Post by teddinard on Mar 14, 2016 12:17:56 GMT -5
If they decided to be successful at any cost, they could have been the thinking man's Bon Jovi or some other abomination. C'mon, it wasn't "self-destruction or become Bon Jovi"...Neil Young, Elvis Costello, the aforementioned R.E.M. and the hated Tom Petty were all possible templates . Look, I think we finally agree. Those templates were "possible" in some obscure sense, but not possible for them. And R.E.M. et al. never had the ambivalence about the success that the Replacements had. It drove them and was part of the meaning of the band in a way it wasn't for those others. They had to be a mess for "God what a mess on the ladder of success" to sound right. Otherwise it would have finally come to be sung with a smirk and wink, with the cash registers ringing. Elvis Costello could never sing that (--not autobiographically anyway). It wasn't part of his character. His opposition, such as it was, was on different terms. Neil Young was part of a larger movement (hippie protest) that made his opposition different too. I wouldn't say "wouldn't change a thing," I suppose. But given what the band was about, it couldn't have been otherwise. And when Westerberg says (or used to say) "I apologize for nothing about the Replacements," I say damn right you shouldn't.
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Post by FreeRider on Mar 14, 2016 12:55:17 GMT -5
This was interesting and further provides insight into them not knowing what they wanted. From page 347:
"One night Westerberg caught Mike Campbell and a couple of other Heartbreakers watching from the wings. "So I decided, let's just show them what we can really do," he said. "And we sorta blew them away...and confused them. The next day, their roadie said to me, 'I don't get it man. You guys are, like, brilliant if you want to be. Why don't you want to be?' I didn't have an answer for him."
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Post by twicks1 on Mar 14, 2016 12:57:07 GMT -5
This was interesting and further provides insight into them not knowing what they wanted. From page 347: "One night Westerberg caught Mike Campbell and a couple of other Heartbreakers watching from the wings. "So I decided, let's just show them what we can really do," he said. "And we sorta blew them away...and confused them. The next day, their roadie said to me, 'I don't get it man. You guys are, like, brilliant if you want to be. Why don't you want to be?' I didn't have an answer for him." Good reference. Says it all...
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Post by johnnythunders on Mar 14, 2016 13:15:54 GMT -5
I am doing a piece on The Book and emailing Bob Mehr some questions. If there is anything that you really you want to ask Bob about I am happy to include your question with mine. I am also conducting a similar exercise with Peter Jesperson, who has graciously agreed to answer my questions - again let me know if there is anything you want included.
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Post by gowhileucan on Mar 14, 2016 13:33:19 GMT -5
I guess maybe this question isn't for Mehr or Jesperson but more for Darren Hill really but I will list it anyway and I mentioned it somewhere else on here:
If Paul thinks 49:00 is so great (and I find it a frustrating listen myself) why not just release it without the medley? Why would he have his "masterpiece" be unavailable like that?
Another question I'd have that might be more answerable for Mehr would be the likelihood of some of those Replacements related projects we always hear about - live archive box set or something like that? I mean there's a lot of great stuff that's never seen the light of day - even demo stuff that didn't make the expanded CD reissues.
Actually I would like a Paul solo basement years boxset too come to think of it, I want Foolish Handshake and Mr. Cigarette on a physical release!
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Post by twicks1 on Mar 14, 2016 13:42:37 GMT -5
Pretty certain I read in an interview with Bob Mehr that the "post-Mats" section of the book was severely edited down...I'd be curious to know what kind of material was cut and why...
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Post by Placemat on Mar 14, 2016 15:21:48 GMT -5
If Paul thinks 49:00 is so great (and I find it a frustrating listen myself) why not just release it without the medley? Why would he have his "masterpiece" be unavailable like that? Masterpiece (or not) What makes 49:00 special to my ears is the "medley". It's Paul, attention as short as ever, thumbing the radio dial in search of that song. The one you just need to hear, the tune that makes you smile, move, sing along...or just feel. Lose the medley, just to make it more digestible for sales, would destroy the craft that makes this record great. 49:00 is a sonic collage that might make the listener work some, but ain't that what good art (masterpiece) should do?
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Post by anarkissed on Mar 14, 2016 21:55:46 GMT -5
I think there is often this contrast depicted between R.E.M. and the Replacements trying to explain why R.E.M. had major mainstream commercial success, and The Replacements didn't...Came across this recent interview with Peter Buck in Rolling Stone that I find illuminating: "But when the three remaining members decided to break up, Buck marked the occasion by compiling a list of the things he had come to hate, during R.E.M.'s lifespan, about the music business. 'It was five pages long,' Buck said during a rare interview in late January as he made preparations for the fifth edition of his Todos Santos Music Festival, in the small town at the southern tip of Baja California, Mexico, where he has a house.
And what was on that five-page list? 'Everything,' Buck replied curtly, sipping orange juice in a bar as his friends the Jayhawks were conducting a soundcheck across the street. 'Everything except writing songs, playing songs and recording them. It was the money, the politics, having to meet new people 24 hours a day, not being in charge of my own decisions.'
Doesn't sound that much different from Paul...I just don't like the idea that it's sometimes implied that R.E.M. must have only made it big by kissing ass and glad-handing...I don't think they really did...I think the difference was that they were capable of just saying a polite "no"...The Replacements had to say a polite "no", and pour a beer over somebody's head, and call him a "fuckface", and tear up his living room...
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Post by mudbacktodirt on Mar 14, 2016 22:40:39 GMT -5
I'm wondering what people think about the new Peter Buck interview up at Rolling Stone: www.rollingstone.com/music/news/peter-buck-on-life-after-r-e-m-i-hate-the-business-20160314Not sure if pasted the link right. He seems to be cut from a similar cloth and have a similar mentality to what a lot of bands coming through the college/alternative rock scene of the 80's and the 90's also had. Part of me thinks it's cool that he's not out there playing greatest hits shows like so many other older bands (thinking Fleetwood Mac, AC/DC, and a few others I've seen in the recent past where they're just giving people what they want to see). Part of me just wants to say "boo hoo" to a guy who thinks it's sooooo miserable to be in a popular rock band. When it comes to bands I like, I've always been torn between those two parts I just described.
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