Rock and Roll Flashpoints

But you still killed kittens over Tawny Kitaen, right?

 

God no. The slut/sex kitten look has never done anything for me.

 

http://beatleswiki.org/wiki/Bob_Dylan_introduces_The_Beatles_to_Marijuana_-_August_28,_1964

Not so much important than the Beatles being introduced to marijuana (although that was significant too), the most important thing was the Beatles and Dylan were introduced TO EACH OTHER, and saw the potential that hugely-popular pop-rock and artistically-substantial lyric writing needed not to be mutually exclusive.

The exchange between Dylan and Lennon is telling, and Lennon referenced it in many interviews -- it was the first time, he said, he ever really considered his lyrics to be anything but throwaway moon-and-june doggerel to carry a pop single.

The fact that Dylan, of all people, had taken his lyrics seriously (even if he had misheard them) gave Lennon the idea he ought to start putting more effort into the words. And Dylan picked up on the idea you could write serious lyrics and back them up with Chuck Berry-style backing and get played on the radio.

And that's pretty much where the entire idea of rock songs as having literary and artistic value started.

 

I'd say Run DMC's "Walk this Way" was pretty big, at least in my area. As a 15-year-old white boy out in the woods, that was the first exposure I ever had to rap. Raising Hell is still one of only two rap cassettes I ever purchased (or likely ever will), Sir Mix-A-Lot's Swass being the other.

 

I am stretching the definition of rock n roll, but Kristofferson flying a helicopter onto Johnny Cash's lawn in Jamaica to hand him a demo is a pretty seminal moment.

 

I fucking love that story.

 

I honestly can't believe no one has done a massive bio on Kristofferson. I mean, Cash did his own, and I suppose Kris still could, but I think the average person would be blown away by just the Cliff's Notes of Kristofferson's life.

Lit degree from Pomona, the place where all you do is spend four years reading great books.
Rhodes scholar, boxer at Oxford.
Joined the army, flew helicopters, completed Ranger school.
Gave it all up to be a songwriter. Worked oil rigs and as a janitor at Columbia records.
Love of Janis Joplin's life, dated Barbara Streisand, married Rita Coolidge.
Best friends with Johnny Cash.
All the hit records, movies, voiceover work.

Just crazy.

 

Yeah. He's a bad ass. Just about one of those things would make for an interesting life.

 

And then came Heaven's Gate....it was like Billy Squier's pink shirt, but only worse.

 

I grew up in South Jersey in a white town and went to white schools, but I was 10 minutes from Camden and 15 minutes from Philadelphia, so I'm guessing it was a little more integrated than Milwaukee.

'Rapper's Delight' was '79, and 'Apache' was '81. I remembering hearing both of them a lot as a kid.
'The Message' - which I think is the song that made rap viable - was 1982, and every kid I knew loved it. They played it at the skating rink.

'Roxanne Roxanne' by UTFO and 'Jam On It' by Newcleus were huge when I was a sophomore in high school.




I do see a connection between Run DMC's 'Walk This Way' and the rebirth of Aerosmith, which was not a good thing.

 

The poor bastard who made The Deer Hunter never got to direct a real movie again.

 

he was good in dolphin's tale