Mar 112008
Alexmagic, you asked for it, we’ve got it! Let’s revisit the world premiere of Ja-Bru, also featuring an attempted infiltraton by Mike Love and Paul Schaffer on keytar!
I’ve got to give it up for Jagger. The man’s surrounded by possibly the largest and most powerful collection of Rock and Roll Hall of Famers for this All-Star Jam, and he only shares lead vocals for a line or two with The Boss. Who’s the woman with a free mic, Tina Turner? How badly does she want to get the nod to do her thang, yet Jagger remains in charge. Who’s The Boss now, Bruce?
Mick really looks like he has something to prove here, which is the attitude we kind of want from him, but I just wish ruling the roost by hogging the mic wasn’t the only goal.
In a very pointless interview with Mark Goodman (please retire!) last night, Paul Schaeffer said that they got everybody onstage and Jeff Beck just started playing the Satisfaction riff before anyone was ready to do anything. And I think he said that was Mary Wilson of the Supremes to Jagger’s left. At least it wasn’t Patti Labelle who proved again last night she can scream any song into submission. Nice keytar, Paul!
Winner of the Johnny Winter/Sgt. Peppers WTF Award for being in an incongruous rock choral singalong: I definitely saw a long-past expiration date Peter Wolf on stage left, about four rows back, looking sadly lost.
Bob Dylan, sharing the stage with Al Jardine and the guitarist from Foreigner. And they say lightning doesn’t strike twice in the same place!
Some things to note: 15 seconds in, watch for the exact moment when Jagger decides to take control. He hurls down his tambourine and starts to strut even as he’s taking off his jacket. That’s star power.
I think it’s about 40 seconds in when he spots Mike Love sneaking up and makes mental note to freeze him out. After this, you can see Love retreat to the Beach Boys’ mic and repeatedly shoot glances back over to Jagger, trying to find a spot to get in on the main event. Just prior to the one minute mark, there’s this amazing shot of Love brazenly sizing Jagger up. I’d love to know what he was thinking right then. Jagger, you’ll note, confidently responds by leaning right across him to work that side of the stage.
After that, Springsteen and his bolo tie – just by having that on, he’s assured himself a secondary role to Jagger – is called up to perform. At about 1:37, you can see Bruce flinch when Jagger leans in for some close-up action. A sign of weakness by the Boss, but he immediately recovers and goes back in for more, clearly winning Jagger over. At 1:48, while a confused John Fogerty looks on, Mike Love has had enough and leaps into frame, desperately employing a Rock PowerPoint as his incredibly weak excuse.
Jagger takes the mic back and goes solo here, while Love keeps trying to lean/dance his way next to Jagger, like some guy at a club trying to dance his way into a group of cooler people. Fogerty is energized by this whole sequence.
Love wants a duet with Jagger here, and he wants it bad. But Jagger’s not going to give it to him, so Love has to turn back around and accept his lot while Springsteen gets the call for round two, and this time, The Boss is ready. At 2:40, look at his game face. Steely determination, and he needs it, because Jagger now goes nose-to-nose with him. This shit is on. Bruce knows it, because at 2:45, he licks his lips, just in case Mick decides to give him the last test and cross that final barrier.
Jagger lets him off the hook, though. At 3:28, watch him start some rapid-fire above-the-head hand claps that Mike Love can’t keep up with, then briefly cede center stage to give us a last look at Fogery happily jammin’ away. As the camera pulls out, note Mike Love with his back to the stage, either calling somebody out or staring furiously after Springsteen.
Masterful work by Jagger.
EX-cellent analysis, Alexmagic! Well done! Mod, can we get a lab coat out to Alex? Milo could use the help in the RTH Labs — he’s been asking for a Rock Anthropology research assistant for a while now.
HVB
Alexmagic, your analysis is spot on, as usual. Future generations will be wise to study your work. I’m glad you broke down the Love dynamic for all it was worth. Who was it the other day who questioned Love’s mental state? I think Fogerty and Dylan are the secret heroes of this performance. Probably others as well, whom I’ve not yet had the time to identify and study.
Alexmagic’s RTH Lab Coat is on order. Speaking of which, can we get a Glossary entry for the lab coat and pipe? I don’t quite have my head around how to present these icons of the RTH dynamic, but I think they’re worthy of official codification. Let me know if anyone’s up for this duty. Take your time…
Presumably this was the year that Mike Love gave his famous induction speech. I couldn’t find a video of it but here’s a transcript:
“And I think it’s wonderful to be here tonight, but I also think it’s sad that there are other people who aren’t here tonight. And, uh, those are the people who have passed away, those are the obvious ones. But the other not-so-obvious ones are people like Paul McCartney, who couldn’t be here tonight because he’s in a lawsuit with Ringo and Yoko. That’s what he sent a telegram to some, uh, high priced attorney in this room, you know. And that’s a bummer, because we’re talking about harmony, right, and the world. If we can’t get it together in America and in England, and harmony within our groups. I mean, beleive it, you can beleive it the Beach Boys have their own “interstescene” or whatever you call it, squabbles. But that’s a bummer when Ms. Ross can’t make it, you know?” “The Beach Boys have continued to do, about, we did about 180 performances last year. I’d like to see the Mop-Tops match that! I’d like to see Mick Jagger get out on this stage and do I Get Around versus Jumpin’ Jack Flash, any day now. And I’d like to see some people kick out the jams, and I challenge the Boss to get up on stage and jam. I wanna see Billy Joel, see if he can still tickle ivories, lemmee see. I know Mick Jagger won’t be here tonight, he’s gonna have to stay in England. But I’d like to see us in the Coliseum and he at Wembley Stadium because he’s always been chickenshit to get on stage with the Beach Boys.”
Later, when Dylan gave his acceptance speech, he said “I want to thank Mike Love [breath] for not mentioning me.”
Al is right, this is from the same night Mike Love delivered his infamous speech. I didn’t know this, but if you look at just over 40 seconds in, you can see Jagger throwing Mike Love’s shoes into the audience. If only he’d grabbed his captain’s hat and tossed that into the crowd, too. Could have been a full-on brawl.
You know, Love got a lot of criticism for that speech, but he was actually doing what great leaders sometimes need to do – putting the heat on himself to take the heat OFF his players. It’s not for nothing that he wore the captain’s hat for this event!
That induction speech was the first thing i thought of when I saw this clip. Jagger is smacking Love down and at the end of the video Love is PISSED.
All the best RnR HOF moments involve hatred.
Something else to consider, for context. The year before this, the Beach Boys were recording with The Fat Boys. Later in the year after his speech and Jagger destroying Love in return, the Beach Boys would put out the “Kokomo” video. So I can only assume that Mike Love’s response to getting shown up by Jagger was to go out and recruit Stamos into the band.
Whenever I see Mike Love, I am reminded of a Ben Vaughn song I heard on WFMU years ago.
http://thehound.net/19860621/mp3s/start40.mp3
all ya need is Love
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gt0LBlH3dAc – that hardcore brawl at the beginning of this should have been a warning to the rest of the music industry that Love was ready to call them all out in a few months.