Comments on: Ecology Songs 1964-1987

By: Nick

Nick — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 11:18:36 +0000

that’ll be a no then…

By: Nick

Nick — Tue, 25 May 2010 12:58:38 +0000

Really enjoying the site. Your compilation Meridian 1970 has to be one of the best ever. Tried getting the second volume from Heavenly’s site but missed it. I might be misrembering this but in an early issue of Mojo did you not do a home-taping feature on “English Pastoral Rock” called English Country Garden. Is there any chance you could list the tracks so I can make up a mix CD? My copy got destroyed in a flood…

Thanks,

Nick

By: lonepilgrim

lonepilgrim — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 22:02:51 +0000

in response to your original question about other songs with an ecological theme – there’s (possibly) L.A. (from Time Fades Away) and Vampire Blues (from On the Beach)

By: m.mitchell

m.mitchell — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 16:01:34 +0000

Just been replaying some Sparks lps ,and that Never Turn Your back on Mother Earth track is beautiful!I suppose they could be quite emotionally moving at times.Equator must be one of the oddest things ever committed to vinyl.Also played Wayne County at the Trucks-now that is a lost classic if I ever heard one.Her lyrics are astoundingly witty and funny(Sample lyric from Prostitute with A Parachute-”You got no talent,you cant even sing,youre just a hooker with a wedding ring”)I think Bowie did lift a lot of ideas from her ,like Queeneage Baby,very Rebel Rebel in tone.That Things Your Mother lp is great too.Maybe because the music is so rama lama on the earlier stuff,her music gets dismissed as novelty,but in my opinion Berlin on the aforementioned is just as innovative musically as Bowies stuff.Waiting for the Marines is fabulous.

By: m.mitchell

m.mitchell — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 10:44:28 +0000

Hi Jon,it wasnt so much the ‘star’ syndrome that I was so captivated by back then it was the sheer inventiveness of the writers,which took me out of the boredom of everyday life-out of all the writers he was most suspect in terms of the Byronics!Some of the stuff he wrote was classic stuff,particularly the Ferry pieces,but I guess those were concieved prior to the paranoia of the 100 club.I think my favorite I Mac piece is the one on Todd Rundgren’s ‘Todd’ album,which had a real impression on me at the time.
What I do find interesting about the NME is that at one time the Grateful Dead were the scourge of modern music,-I re=read recently an old NME and the number of bitchy comments on the Dead was staggering-now they have suddenly become innovators of Coltranic Conciousness on a grand scale!

By: jon

jon — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:37:56 +0000

Hi yes read the Kent book. Didn’t enjoy it much, let’s leave it there. 1975 is indeed a fascinating year, probably the subject for a forthcoming blog. Re the NME lot, I’ve always got on with CSM, Neil Spencer and IMac. All have (or sadly in IMac’s case, had) a humanity which some of their colleagues did not and still do not have. Was always suspicious of the NME ‘star’ syndrome, see my comments in Paul Gorman’s In Their Own Write: ‘Not having been part of that NME myth-making process, I was always suspicious of it at the time – you know, was it such a great thing to be a star music writer so early in your working life? A conflation of the idea of being a POP writer with being a POP star with all the attendant problems – burnout, premature fixing of style, pseudo-celebrity behaviour – which have all but submerged many of my contemporaries’.

By: m.mitchell

m.mitchell — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 17:13:40 +0000

Hi Jon,sorry this has nothing to do with ecology,but I just finished reading the Nick Kent autobio,and wondered what your thoughts were,if you have read it.I was totally shocked at the level of psychological damage on him after the 100 club incident-I never realised the extent of copycat violence inflicted on him by the London punks-God my heart went out to the man,after all the horrific trail of addictions in his life.I am so glad he is relatively happy now-speaking as someone who relished the NME falling on the doormat every week in culture impoverished Derbyshire,I used to love reading his articles,also I Mac,who I wrote to once,and it was such a thrill to recieve a reply.I wonder sometimes how the punk thing could have possibly evolved if the media hadnt have become so involved-I suppose its a double edged sword(oops! violent metaphor!)-it could have been possible,given all the undercurrent artists like Wyatt,Eno etc who evoked artier constructs-I was playing Third Uncle on 801 live,and it sounds very manically punkoid in retrospect.
,That Dennis Wilson doc was ok,but I could have done without the dockside flower drama,it seemed a bit too contrived ,even though I could empathise with the emotional content.

By: Jon W

Jon W — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 17:29:46 +0000

It’s a great subject. The clarion call of “Silent Spring” quickly became entwined with the growing anti-Vietnam protest movement(s), summed up in “Grimly Forming” by The Great Society and ultimately Jefferson Airplane’s “Crown of Creation”. I also found this: “Earth Mother” – not a Grace Slick song, it’s by Jack Traylor, from the “Sunfighter” LP from 1971…

“Earth Mother your children are here
High and feeling dandy
Earth Mother your children are here
Ripped on coke and candy

Once the earth was a garden
It gave us all we need
Then it grew so barren
All because of greed”…

By: m.mitchell

m.mitchell — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 22:20:38 +0000

Look forward to the audio playlists Jon,I also forgot to mention the Neil Young track Mother Earth from Ragged Glory-saw him perform it last year in Nottingmam alone at a pump organ,and it brought a tear to my eye.Next Friday brings welcome relief from one view of masculinity in crisis that is Road Warriors,to another -Dennis Wilson profiled on BBC 4 doc-read the preview and it sounds promising.Still think Pacific Ocean Blue is a great record,although it could do without the Chas n Dave soundalike uptempo rockers!

By: David

David — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 13:41:31 +0000

Perhaps less commonly heard (and in my view wrongly reviled) is The Lilac Time’s “Let Our Land Be The One” from 1991. And their “Only Passing Through” – a beautiful short paen to San Francisco from the same year. I am looking forward to “From Here To Before” when it eventually gets released on dvd (or shown somewhere relatively close to home). In the meantime.. The Blank Tapes. David