Italians have always responded to men on balconies.
Musings on the Most Ridiculous Band I Can't Stop Listening To
Tag: bruce springsteen (Page 1 of 4)
I mean it, Sandy girl.
“Everybody got their ridiculous hats? Gary, Max, where are your hats?”
“I lost mine.”
“I traded mine for magic beans.”
…
“You’re both fined.”
We will again.
Most likely, we will again.
Slap up against one another, sweat, sway, and–most importantly–subsume. This is the goal. I become we. Shoulder blade knife fights and illiosacrums poking and prodding. Have your tickets out and ready. The Sportatorium is buzzing tonight. National act’s in town. The kids are whole hog on the merch tables. Sizzling aisles, and the bars have long been overrun, and who the fuck brought a beach ball? Dicks and tits and pussies and asses and everyone singing, most dancing, some crying, and the drugs coming on harder than you’d anticipated.
The drugs always come on harder than you’d anticipated.
You play the Chuck Berry covers, and we’ll pay ya and undulate a little. Sing your words back at ya. It’s a deal. Bring the big amps. We like it loud. Deal? Deal. Meet you back here in three months.
Are you drunk and wobbling around YouTube again?
I’m not drunk.
…
I’m drinking.
Backsliding son of a bitch.
We all have our faults.
Jesus.
“Look! Bruce!”
Is he alive? Like, all the way?
“Why must you be this way? Bruce is fine.”
He looks like he just saw a ghost. And then dropped dead.
“The man is healthy as a horse.”
Barbaro?
“As healthy as a healthy horse.”
If you say so. Tell him I can’t tell that he dyes his hair.
“What is your hang-up with men dying their hair?”
If I gotta be gray, then so does everyone else.
“Misery.”
CELL PHONE NOISE
“Asshole.”
Yup. Pick up the phone.
…
“You’re on with John.”
“I CAST ASIDE YOUR MUGGLE NAME AND CHRISTEN THEE FANGORIO!”
“Uh-huh. Who’s this, please?”
“I am Crowley, the Grand Abbot of Thelma and Lord Pooh-Bah of Ordo Templi Orientis.”
“Uh-huh. Who?”
“You never read Hammer of the Gods?”
“About Zeppelin? Always meant to. Is that the one where they stick the fish in the chick’s–”
“That one, yes. What about Ozzy?”
“What about him?”
“He wrote a whole song about me.”
“Would I know you from anywhere other than classic rockers trying to seem scary?”
“I guess not. But I assure you: I am wicked.”
“Wicked what?”
“Huh?”
“Wicked smart, wicked drunk, what?”
“I’m not from Massachusetts, you flea-brain. I meant ‘wicked’ in the Biblical sense.”
“Ohhhhhh. Okay.”
“Y’know what? I’m just gonna call the guys from Greta Van Fleet. They’ll know who I am.”
DIAL TONE EVEN THOUGH PHONES NO LONGER DO THAT
…
“Jackass?”
Mm-hmm?
“Could you not let your momentary Zeppelin fanhood leak into the rest of the universe?”
I can almost guarantee that Peter Grant will be managing the Grateful Dead within hours.
“Figures.”
What is this now?
“I’ve joined the E Street Band.”
Goddammit.
“I tried to join Phish, but they ghosted on me.”
Is that the reason Curveball was cancelled?
“Yeah. The water was fine. Those guys are just fucking dicks.”
Aw. Sorry, buddy. But you really don’t have to join Bruce’s band.
“I’m gritty!”
You’re from Connecticut and collect typewriters.
“Typewriters from the streets.”
John, put the telecaster and denim down.
“It’s all selvage.”
Selvage is the IPA of denim. White people need to stop complicating staple items.
“Listen, I…I’m afraid to go home.”
What? Oh, noes.
“Since the robbery.”
Burglary.
“What’s the difference?”
Robbery is stealing from a person; burglary is stealing from a place.
“Huh. Learn something every day. Can we get back to my newly-acquired crippling phobia?”
Sure.
“I was violated! And not in the fun way that involves safe words and pop stars! I drive to my house and I start shaking. I can’t go in, man. So I’m staying out on tour for the rest of my life if I have to join every legacy act in the country.”
Uh-huh. John?
“Yeah?”
You own at least two more homes.
…
“You are right. Apartment in New York and the spread in Montana.”
So you could just go there.
“Are you aware of how hot Montana gets in the summer? Lot of bugs, too.”
So go to New York.
“I can’t deal with Cynthia Nixon’s bullshit.”
No one can. Huh. I don’t know what to do. You can stay with me.
“No.”
Good decision. Go stay with one of your comic friends. How about Saget?
“He sleepwalks.”
Oh.
“And then he sleepfucks.”
Sure. John?
“What?”
CELL PHONE NOISE
It turns out I don’t care about your rich people problems.
“Asshole.”
…
“What?”
“Little Potato always have place to stay!”
“Ah, shit.”
“You come Only Korea. Live like king. I got Cokes.”
“Real Cokes?”
“Kinda.”
“Dude, this is not the best time. Plus, if Bruce sees me on the phone he’s gonna fine me. I’ve been in the E Street Band for an hour and I owe him $8,000.”
“Boss run tight ship.”
“He does.”
“I kill for you.”
“NO! Do not assassinate Bruce Springsteen!”
“Make look like accident.”
“How would you do that?”
“Piano fall on him.”
“Do not drop a piano on Bruce, please.”
“Father invent New Jersey.”
“Hanging up.”
…
“Hey!”
Yeah?
“Either he needs to stop calling me or you need to write him some new jokes.”
Oh, bite me.
“It’s a little formulaic at this point.”
So was your last album.
“FUCK YOU!”
FUCK YOU!
“HEY! What the hell you doing, new guy?”
“Ah, Jeez. Sorry, Bruce.”
“That’s another grand!”
“Aww.”
Sandy that waitress I was seeing lost her desire for me
I spoke with her last night
She said she won’t set herself on fire for me anymoreShe worked that joint under the boardwalk
She was always the girl you saw bopping down the beach with the radio
The kids say last night she was dressed like a star
In one of them cheap little seaside bars
And I saw her parked with lover boy out on the KokomoDid you hear the cops finally busted Madame Marie
For tellin’ fortunes better than they do
For me this boardwalk life’s through
Babe you oughta quit this scene too.
The guy on the accordion was named Phantom Dan Federici. He looks like he’s dying because he was; this was one of his last performances with the E Street Band.
Those crazy boys may be deaf in combat down on Lover’s Lane, but they can hear good enough to steal a riff.
Time again for the Best Comment Section On The Innertubes™ to weigh in. (And I mean that: you wonderful people are the opposite of the YouTube or–even worse–the comments under any article in a local newspaper’s website.) The question, as always, centers around the wild and wacky world of rocking and rolling, and it is this:
What is the best song in which the title is not in the lyrics?
Obviously, there are some rules:
- No Dead songs. Wharf Rat, The Other One, Weather Report Suite, The Eleven, etc.: we will take these as assumed.
- No instrumentals. I shouldn’t have to say that, but I feel like you are all some clever-ass motherfuckers who will think you are getting away with foolishness, and I will brook no foolishness.
- Classical music isn’t a song, even if it’s got lyrics. Do not be nominating the Ode To Joy or any opera bullshit.
I will start with something meatheaded and long:
An underrated deep track from the mighty Zep, Carouselambra is about something, but it is not about a carouselambra. Partially because “carouselambra” is a made-up word. What is the tune about? You tell me:
Sisters of the way-side bide their time in quiet peace
Await their place within the ring of calm
Still stand to turn in seconds of release
Await the call they know may never come
In times of lightness, no intruder dared upon
To jeopardize the course, upset the run
And all was joy and hands were raised toward the sun
As love in the halls of plenty overrun
Robert Plant’s best lyrics were the ones you couldn’t quite understand. (Led Zeppelin has a bunch of songs that would qualify: The Immigrant Song, and Achilles Last Stand, and Black Dog, and Four Sticks, and the list goes on and on.)
And here’s a little (barely over two minutes) nugget from Bruce’s first record, when he was still doing his Dylan imitation.
Okay, your turn. Whatcha got?
And there you have it.
Excuse me.
Yes?
Your thoughts on The Last Jedi are Emmylou Harris’ cover of a Bruce Springsteen tune?
Yes. This just about covers it.
How so?
Are you familiar with Interpretationalism?
You’re not allowed to just make up philosophies.
Why? That’s what philosophers do.
And that’s why no one likes them. Be better than this.
I don’t wanna.
Do it anyway.
Maybe.
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