Happy Monday. We have a winner in last week’s Shitty Songs You Can’t Get Out of Your Head contest: “Everybody’s Working for the Weekend.” Better yet we have this “candid” interview with Loverboy that I’ve never seen until now!
As my wife and I spent Friday night and all day Saturday preparing for a dinner party this song crept into my brain and wouldn’t leave. I realized this must be the winner, because it’s a really well done terrible song with a chorus that actually starts out strong and full of simple hope and idealism that’s up my alley before shifting gears to that horrible “You wanna piece of my heart” part. As much as I still hate this song and the video (and that headband!), it kind of makes me feel all right about the possibilities and aspirations of the lowest common denominator in our pop culture. Bravo, Loverboy!
In our recent Who Is It? game there was some disagreement over just how iconic Nicolette Larson‘s upturned chunky sandal was. It turns out, however, that I wasn’t the only Townsman to have had that image driven into his brain. And I’m not a foot fetishist, but it’s interesting what the mind can retain. My guess is that some of you will be able to identify more than half of the following feet. Collectively I wouldn’t be surprised if you can name all but one. What do you think?
No, not the dancer in this video, silly, but the following musicians, either in their recently aged state or presented in cropped fashion from an iconic photograph from their prime! Are you ready? Let’s start with a relatively simple one to give you confidence. Most likely no clues are needed:
#1: Who is this distinguished, cheerful, award-winning veteran rocker?
Easy enough, right? Let’s try some more. Foot fetishists beware of our next photo!
I’m sending the above clip to Townsman Hrrundivbakshi, in particular. I think there’s much he will enjoy about it, or at least much he will enjoy analyzing.
Next, I will encourage HVB to comment and pass it on, posting a new video directed at another Townsperson—a performance he feels will hold particular appeal to that person.
That person will then comment and pass on a performance video to yet another Townsperson…
This is an exercise in knowing one’s fellow Townsperson. Challenge yourself! There’s probably some regular you’ve never met before that you know more about than you think.
If someone gets stuck down the line, I’ll gladly jostle the logjam by passing on another clip to a Townsperson who has not yet handled a passed-on clip. Others, of course, may comment on whatever clips are being passed along.
Your mission, should you accept it, is to listen to this concern in its entirety and report back to the Hall with your impressions. All entrants will automatically be registered in a drawing to determine the winner of the patented RTH No-Prize!
Beside making appearances on Conan I thought The White Stripes broke up a year or two ago. I mean, wasn’t that pretentious film of their tour of Canada supposed to be their swan song, or was that just increasingly wishful thinking the more I watched of that turd?
The band left the following touching statement on their website:
The White Stripes do not belong to Meg and Jack anymore. The White Stripes belong to you now and you can do with it whatever you want. The beauty of art and music is that it can last forever if people want it to. Thank you for sharing this experience. Your involvement will never be lost on us and we are truly grateful.
To celebrate our inheritance of their Jack and Meg’s legacy, I invite you to do any of the following—and whatever else appropriate strikes your fancy:
Please send me your favorite track(s) by the band. You can burn them for me or upload them to the Hall if you have Back Office privileges. I only have 2 songs by them on my iPod, and now that the band belongs to me, I’d like to see if more of their songs are worth my giving repeated listens. The key is, since they’ve turned over the keys to us, I don’t feel like paying.
I don’t know about you, but I was getting tired of the red & white thing. It’s time to rebrand. Please scan or download The White Stripes photo of your choice and use a graphics program of your choice to propose a new color scheme/branding for our band. Submit your designs (jpg, gif, png, pdf) to mrmoderator [at] rocktownhall [dot] com by Friday, February 11. Be creative. The winner will be awarded a really snazzy prize!
Thank you, Jack and Meg, for providing a surefire hot-button focal point for old, bass-obsessed farts and relatively younger, hipper Townspeople; some great guitar sounds; the confidence to learn the drums; the opportunity for some to giggle over terms like “rack toms”; and so much more.
