Sandra is not doing well, as is to be expected, but while she’s getting weaker, there still is the possibility that she can hang on a while longer, as her stubborn body fights her will to die… Not a nice position to be in. Sadly, there isn’t much we can do to help her, other than be there.
For myself, it’s all right as long as I don’t have to think too much.
Update: forgot to mention what also helps a lot is the well wishes and sympathy you all have shown over this. Thank you.
Full many a gem of purest ray serene,
The dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear:
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.
For those who want it pure, without the distraction of Rick Wakeman’s music.
On Friday nights BBC4 usually has some sort of musical theme running through its programming, last night it was all about the Old Grey Whistle Test, the old BBC flagship for all sorts of rock music not commercially enough for Top of the Pops. There was one and a half hours of the best appearances from the seventies, very nice it was too, followed by a look at the histoy of the programme, which I turned off halfway through. Whereas the music shown was fairly diverse, including people like Curtis Mayfield and Gladys Knight, the history was all about how prog rock ruled supreme until punk came along and liberated the world from aging hippies and half hour guitar solos. There was more than that going on in the seventies, neither prog rock nor punk were ever as dominant as the music press retroactively made them out to be and it is actually possible to enjoy both.
This overwhelming narrative, kept alive by the same caste of rock critics who established it in the first place means odd ducks like Dr Feelgood are lost in the noise, judged only as precursors to punk. Which is a shame, because Roxette, shown above, has more menace in it than everything the Sex Pistols ever did. The short, sharp guitar and understated drums and bass, the harsh, biting way in which Lee Brilleaux speaks the lyrics, not to mention his aura of barely restrained menace, makes this the creepiest stalking song I’ve ever heard. You can believe the song’s character would do something nasty to Roxette if she’s not careful.
To do away a band which could come up with gems like that as “pub rock” or proto-punk is to do them wrong.
Just came back from the Making Light meetup, which was fun, if totally bib or tucker free. Before that I spent the whole day on a training course, so I haven’t had any time to read the interwebs, let alone come up with something to post about. Instead, have a video of a seventies rock band now only remembered for one song, one of the countless bands that put out some records, had some limited success, then vanished, never to even make it to cult favourite. Jo Jo Gunne managed four albums before they had to quit, had only one hit, never got much of a presence on the AOR channels either, didn’t do much other bands didn’t do earlier or better, but they still had a certain charm.
The point of seventies rock like this is not that it’s original or innovative, but exactly that you get what you thought you would get.