Goddess in the Doorway

I must say I’m a little tired of having to defend how great Mick Jagger’s solo work has been. No, not all of it has been great, but some of it definitely has. Just because Keith Richards said Goddess in the Doorway was ‘dogshit’ are you going to believe him? Keith acts like a jealous wife every time Jagger even looks at another guitarist. He’s not exactly an objective critic. And nor am I. To me, Mick Jagger is one of those people who can do now wrong. I’m thinking of starting a polytheistic cult based on worshiping rock stars. I haven’t quite figured out the details yet, but the three noble truths are Art, Music and Fashion, and other three noble truths are Food, Sex and Alcohol. I need to come up with three more things so it comes out to nine noble truths. And ‘noble truth’ is just a placeholder until I think of a more original terminology. And Mick Jagger will be in there, somewhere. What I’m saying is, my attempts to take a serious critical tone aside, my writing comes from a place of obsession and is anything but objective. Which is fine, because objectivity towards music is impossible anyway.

God Save the Queen

Confession time: I think the Sex Pistols are overrated. Or, bluntly, they sucked. Their gimmick was that they were dirty and couldn’t play very well, and it worked. They certainly captured the zeitgeist of late seventies disaffection. Their charmless image and crappy music channeled the rage of a lot of young people, who felt that there really was no future. Their   visual image was provocative, their career short and bloody, their end markedly tragic even by rock’n'roll standards. That’s enough in itself for icon-hood, and I’ll hand them that. I’ll also hand it to Sid – he walked the walk. But overall, I think their identity was a lot less authentic than it’s perceived to be. Neither Sid nor Johnny were the brightest lights, and the credit for the revolution rests with the brilliant charlatan Malcolm McLaren and his then partner-in-crime Vivienne Westwood, who just happened to be a professional fashion designer. It seems a tiny bit un-punk to have your wardrobe styled by a designer, even if it does involve copious large safety pins. The Pistols were as much puppets to McLaren’s grand scheme as Elvis was to Colonel Parker. Besides which, I find nothing appealing in their pimply, underfed countenances and rotten teeth. Being likable at least on some level is an important aspect, for me, in terms of relating to music and musicians. A lot of time has passed since England was dreaming in 1977, and a lot of things that seemed monumental in context of the times are less impressive now. In its time God Save the Queen was an SOS from a disenfranchised generation, the loudest and most immediate of many. Today it’s just another poorly played punk song. Plainly, I’m missing the point. Though it’s a classic according to conventional wisdom, I find little to attract me or relate to. I much prefer the postmodern, irony-glazed cover provided by Nouvelle Vague, a French-accented rendition that probably sends Sid’s bones a-spinning in his hole.

 

God Only Knows

One the other end of the David Bowie spectrum, his eighties stuff, when he was suffering from being too popular and didn’t know what to do with himself. Granted, Bowie’s low points still rank above near everyone else’s peaks. But even I’ll admit that Tonight stands exactly where the critics put it – at the bottom of the pile. Bowie himself freely admitted that Tonight was little more than an attempt to duplicate the commercial success of Let’s Dance. For the first time in his life, Bowie made a desperate scrabble not to do anything weird or unexpected, lest he lose some of the garden-variety record buyers who’d glommed onto the Serious Moonlight juggernaut. Coming off a megatour, Bowie didn’t have time to write anything, so assembled a motley collection of hastily chosen covers, heavily leaning on his earlier collaborations with Iggy Pop. Sadly, the magic of China Girl didn’t strike again; the covers of Don’t Look Down, Tonight and Neighborhood Threat are singularly lifeless. That’s not to say Bowie didn’t strike gold even at his laziest. Blue Jean and Loving the Alien are both classics. God Only Knows, a Beach Boys cover, falls somewhere in between. It’s not exactly prime Bowie, but it’s not an embarrassment like the misbegotten I Keep Forgettin’. Bowie doesn’t make the mistake of trying to turn it into something slick. The original was, in typical Beach Boys fashion, a cheery melody belying a dark interior. It’s in fact a little disconcerting to realize that though the Boys’ harmonizing is all sunshine and lollipops, the lyrics are contemplating that life may not even be worth living. Bowie dispenses with any hint of sunshine and sings in a lugubrious deep voice, really bringing out how depressing Brian Wilson’s song really is. (A reminder that Brian Wilson that even in 1966, Wilson was not a healthy individual.) Though not about to be on anybody’s top 100 David Bowie songs, this is a good example of Bowie making surprisingly effective use of a source no one would expect him to even be interested in.

 

God Knows I’m Good

Somewhat bizarrely, some historians don’t consider Space Oddity a ‘proper’ David Bowie album and don’t discuss it. Originally titled David Bowie in 1969, it was renamed, partly because the song Space Oddity became his first hit, and partly because his previous album had also been titled David Bowie (which to add to the confusion was then re-released as Images, and then The Deram Anthology, among other titles). It’s understandable that the 1967 David Bowie isn’t considered properly David Bowie enough. Sounding nothing like his earlier, David Jones-era efforts (which were pretty generic stuff) or what we’ve come to think of as proper David Bowie music, it’s kind of a one-off novelty album, distinguished by some brilliant songs but marred by embarrassments like The Laughing Gnome and Please Mr Gravedigger. Understandably, Bowie fans not inclined towards music-hall tastes like to pretend that one doesn’t exist. But Space Oddity doesn’t deserve to be dismissed. Besides having a breakthrough and enduring classic in the title track, it’s also the missing link between it’s oddball predecessor and the proper Man Who Sold the World. While Cygnet Committee finds Bowie in full on apocalyptic mode and Letter to Hermione is one of his most forthright love songs, God Knows I’m Good and Wild-Eyed Boy From Freecloud are purely fictional narratives closer to his earlier mode, being somewhat morally simplistic stories about the generally shitty nature of humanity (a lifelong favorite theme).

God Is In the House

If anything were to be my karaoke jam, this would be it. For one, it doesn’t require great singing, because it hold together entirely on the lyrics, which are beyond brilliant. Nick Cave has always been a master of cutting through to the darkest depths of the human condition whilst also being wildly hilarious. Nowhere is this rare talent more brightly illuminated than here. Cave paints a picture of the stultifying, soul crushing fear and conformity that sometimes lurks behind the shiniest white picket fences. In a verdant, peaceful, god-fearing community folks are paralyzed with dread. Cave satirizes piousness and political correctness and the ongoing battles waged politically and personally over everything from sexuality to choice of kitten color. His voice ranges from sincere anguish to coldest sarcasm, dropping to a scary whisper or relishing lines about “goose-stepping, twelve-stepping teetotalitarianists”. The message may be, if there is one, that peace and prosperity bought at the price of self-expression is no peace at all but a hell made of good intentions.

We’ve laid the cables and the wires
We’ve split the wood and stoked
the fires
We’ve lit our town so there is no
Place for crime to hide
Our little church is painted white
And in the safety of the night
We all go quiet as a mouse
For the word is out
God is in the house
God is in the house
God is in the house
No cause for worry now
God is in the house

Moral sneaks in the White House
Computer geeks in the school house
Drug freaks in the crack house
We don’t have that stuff here
We have a tiny little Force
But we need them of course
For the kittens in the trees
And at night we are on our knees
As quiet as a mouse
For God is in the house
God is in the house
God is in the house
And no one’s left in doubt
God is in the house

Homos roaming the streets in packs
Queer bashers with tyre-jacks
Lesbian counter-attacks
That stuff is for the big cities
Our town is very pretty
We have a pretty little square
We have a woman for a mayor
Our policy is firm but fair
Now that God is in the house
God is in the house
God is in the house
Any day now He’ll come out
God is in the house

Well-meaning little therapists
Goose-stepping twelve-stepping Tetotalitarianists
The tipsy, the reeling and the drop down pissed
We got no time for that stuff here
Zero crime and no fear
We’ve bred all our kittens white
So you can see them in the night
And at night we’re on our knees
As quiet as a mouse
Since the word got out
From the North down to the South
For no-one’s left in doubt
There’s no fear about
If we all hold hands and very quietly shout
Hallelujah
God is in the house
God is in the house
Oh I wish He would come out
God is in the house

God Gave Me Everything

Just try to say Mick Jagger can’t rock it solo. I’m firmly convinced Goddess in the Doorway is a great album, and this is its finest moment. It’s got blitzkrieg guitars if you want noise, and self-aware lyrics. Jagger isn’t bragging, he’s being thankful, which is an endearing stance to take. I’m not crazy about the video. It must’ve looked cool in 2001, but doesn’t anymore. The attempt to seem edgy falls flat, but even that’s kind of endearing, and Jagger looks great. It’s a poor choice of costars, too. Though Lenny Kravitz made some good contributions to the album, we didn’t need to see his stupid face. (I find Lenny Kravitz really annoying.) Despite the nagging sense that the video could’ve been better, it’s still a perfect song, one of the best from Jagger’s solo career. It rocks, what more could you ask for?

God Bless the Child

Just as true as when Billie Holiday wrote it in 1939. Holiday knew well about the harshness and unfairness of being poor, and she knew about the fair weather friends money can bring. Holiday was one of those people born to endless night, as the poet said. She had a brutish childhood, and the wealth and fame didn’t make her much happier. She was addictive, self-destructive and unlucky in love, with or without money. She wrote God Bless the Child, perhaps in resignation to living hard, and sang it with knowing sorrow. It’s become a standard since then, covered by many. One popular version, which might sound light-years away from the spirit of Billie Holiday, is Liza Minnelli’s. While Holiday crooned as if to herself, Minnelli is not given to understatement – she starts out slow but by the final verse she’s belting it to the rafters. It might seem at first a cynical song choice for a glitzy star like Minnelli. She was, after all, born to a mama and papa who had it all (except happiness) and she is a broadway baby, all showbiz and spangles. But she and Holiday have a lot in common. Like Holiday, Minnelli has been an alcoholic and an addict, which caused her health and career to suffer. She went through a series of unhappy marriages, and her early life, though financially privileged, was dysfunctional and chaotic. Maybe she can’t resist turning every number into a show tune, but she knows what she’s singing about.

 

Go Your Own Way

1977 was the year of punk. But while The Sex Pistols, The Clash, The Stranglers, Patti Smith, The Damned and the rest were burning up the tabloids in New York and London, most folks were still listening to Fleetwood Mac. Punk made a revolution, but like most artistic revolutions, it was confined to a few main centers of civilization and its influence took years to diffuse into mainstream culture. Sid Vicious is who the history books remember, but he wasn’t affecting anyone in Oklahoma during his lifespan. In the broader world, 1977 belonged to the Fleetwood Macs – crowd pleasing middlebrow rock bands who didn’t suck exactly (well, a lot of them sucked but the Mac didn’t) but weren’t very exciting or innovative either. Fleetwood Mac started out as a blues band under Peter Green, but by ’77 Green was in a loony bin for shooting the messenger (literally) and Mac’s blues roots were practically indiscernible. But bashing Fleetwood Mac for the crime of not being punk is unfair. Though they pale in comparison to the innovative and game-changing (but little bought) works released that year by Brian Eno, Blondie, David Bowie, Sex Pistols or Ian Dury just to name a few, Rumours and its attending hit singles represented the best of rock’s mainstream. There was, as there still is and always will be, a wide disconnect between artistically significant and best selling music. Beside chart-toppers like Andy Gibb, Barry Manilow and The Eagles, Fleetwood Mac were obviously in the lead. Their music was not too hard, not too loud, but still recognizably rock, and they set themselves above the rest, especially on Rumours, with the raw emotion that seeped through the slick production and catchy melodies. The personal costs of the band members all being married to each other, and complete drug fiends, came out in songs of heartbreak, anger and regret. It was the internal turmoil (and the drug abuse that cost Stevie Nicks parts of her nose) evident all over Rumours that made that album so memorable, and why it remains a classic.

Go West

 

Pet Shop Boys’ Go West video – not gay at all. At least compared with The Village People’s original. Of course, none of The Village People’s songs made any pretense of being anything other than gay anthems. The Village People found ginormous success, partly thanks to gays who got the joke, but mostly because large swaths of the record buying public didn’t get the joke. Today it’s hard to imagine not getting it, but in the seventies most people weren’t even aware of the gay subculture that flourished in New York City, San Francisco and almost nowhere in between.   Go West is supposed to be an ode to San Francisco, a haven for gays fleeing their intolerant flyover home states. The Village People may have made a meaningful statement in their time, and perhaps a few listeners enjoyed them unironically in 1979, but their campiness has not aged well. So in covering Go West, the Pet Shop Boys couldn’t just go at it with a straight face. They had to come up with something entirely different to erase the image of the original artists prancing about in costumes that were already stereotypes in the gay community. One thing they did was make it slightly less gay. (Though Neil Tennant’s vocal is even more gay.) They’re just taking the bombastic imagery of Soviet propaganda and playing up the unintentional homoerotic subtext that patriotic marching-around  iconography often has. The political message takes on a very different tone, too. From merely celebrating the freedom of the American West, namely San Francisco, it’s gone to taking on the whole idea of an idealized Western society. Now the encouragement is towards, presumably, the liberated masses that were streaming West from the rubble of the USSR in 1993. But the video shows no signs that life in America is all that much better – everyone is still marching around in matching hats. It seems that Tennant and Lowe’s take on The Village People’s idealistic song is deeply ironic. Or heartfelt. Or both.

 

Go Tell It On the Mountain

I know I promised not another Christmas song. Because I hate them. But here is one that I’ve always loved. Go Tell It On the Mountain is different from most Xmas songs, because for one thing, it’s actually about Christ being born, as opposed to insipid commercial pap like stupid Frosty or Rudolph the stupidass reindeer. It’s also head and shoulders above everything else because it holds up as a song. If you’ve noticed most Xmas songs have about as much musical substance as a TV ad jingle. This is a real song with real soul. Nowhere better than in the hands of gospel queen Mahalia Jackson. Jackson’s rendition is classic. She gives a stately performance over a rolling piano. While many singers going in the gospel style would have opted to sing it as big and loud as they could, Jackson’s singing is understated, only hinting at the vocal power she’s capable of. Going in an equally great but different direction, Simon & Garfunkel covered it barbershop style. It’s much faster, powered along by an almost bluegrass strumming. Paul and Art’s vocal harmony here is one of their best together. In yet a third, completely different iteration, The Wailers set it to a mid-tempo reggae beat. They also changed all the words but the refrain. “Jesus Christ is born” became “Set my people free” and it was just as good being a freedom song as a gospel one. In that form it became a signature anthem for Peter Tosh. These three performances couldn’t be more disparate, but in each one the spirit of the song remains, even if the words themselves are different. It’s one of those hardy classics that can be shaped into any style and not lose their power.