My Amazon Reviews: David Baerwald "Triage"

When Boomtown goes to Bust
5 Out Of 5 Stars

David Baerwald had had enough of your s#-t and was going to make sure you knew it. "Triage" is a cynical masterwork, his best album, and one to get angry about. It may have been released in 1992, chronicling the mess that was the Reagan administration, the rise of AIDS, the fall of the middle class, sometimes all in one song. Inciteful (not a typo) and musically beautiful, "Triage" may have been too overwhelming for the times. But oddly enough, that anger still feels relevant today.

Starting of with the cinematic 8 minutes of "A Secret Silken World," in which he asks "Don't you love to hurt the weak when they refuse to fight?" then details a rich person's complaints about being out and about in Beverly Glen on a "lazy kind of night" ("all those hungry people, such a drag. Let's get something to eat"). Sound familiar? As I write this, it's 28 years after Live Aid and just a few days after House Republicans voted to eliminate Food Stamps. The view from the top hasn't changed all that much.

Then there's the vitriolic "The Got No Shotgun Hydrahead Octopus Blues," which Baerwald was opinionated enough and felt so strongly for that he issued it as a single. Or the talking blues the drug war in "Nobody" or the fearful "AIDS and Armageddon"

The day she tried to kill me
She said you know You're gonna die
I said yeah but not yet.

The line in the song that says "I don't want to talk about it" could have cut two ways, in the Reagan years of denial or of the lover who worries that he may have contracted it, but was terrified of the sex that gave it to him. A thing that was all too real a feeling in the '90's. Which corresponds to the fact that the first thing up in the next song, where a recording of the introduction of the president, then leads into "The Postman," the album's gentlest song.

It's a moment of respite on a relentless CD. It's only at the end does Baerwald find some redemption for the ugly world he's just sang 9 songs about in "Born For Love." Make no mistake, however. "Triage" is as intense a singer's album as the 90's ever produced. Like I said earlier; what Baerwald felt with such vehemence then still sounds timely now.

     

My Amazon Reviews: Sex Pistols "Never Mind The Bollocks"

When Johnny Met Malcolm  
5 Out of 5 Stars

I was a young man in school when an issue of Rolling Stone landed in my hands with the intriguing cover story "Rock is Sick and Living In London." It chronicled the rising punk rock movement in England and prominently featured The Sex Pistols. I was already into the Ramones, so finding a copy of "Never Mind The Bollocks" was high on my new "to do" list. I went out and found a copy and was utterly blown away. It was loud, angry and had attitude to burn. All my friends into southern rock? They could eat my shorts after I heard "Anarchy In The UK."

While Malcolm McLaren was the provocateur who put these four men together (the legend goes that he put Johnny Rotten in the band after auditioning to Alice Cooper's "I'm 18" in front of a jukebox), there's no way to deny the ferocity that The Sex Pistols made as a band. (As reference. McLaren's other discoveries were an early version of Adam and The Ants and Bow Wow Wow, hardly the stuff of legend.) It's Rotten's demonic "right! Nowwwwwwww" that opens the album and it's his snarling laughter that comes off as something the then 19 year old was not faking. Add the infamous antics that the band became famous for and soon the band were running wild through Europe.

When listening to "Never Mind The Bollocks" over thirty years later, it shows some wear. However, the ballistic singles "Anarchy In The UK," "God Save The Queen," "Pretty Vacant" and "Holidays In The Sun" have lost none of their brutal impact. McLaren and the band used every opportunity to rub the staid noses (and ears) of prim and proper music with exploitative music and imagery, with Rotten's anti-singing and charisma being the lead instrument. Guitarist Paul Jones was a secret weapon, as he was cracking guitar hooks that were simple but devastating, supporting the manufactured mayhem with musicianship that was often obscured by the antics.

McLaren may have been the Svengali (so long, R.I.P. you scoundrel), and The Sex Pistols and band jimmied together for maximum impact, but the chemistry and timing were perfect. "Never Mind The Bollocks" stands toe to toe with such breakthroughs as the MC5, The Stooges, The New York Dolls and The Ramones as bands that redefined rock and roll attitude. The one and only album they ever did defines a moment and a legacy for all involved.

This is what Gay Bashing looks like

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/2009/10/13/2009-10-13_surveillance_video_captures_brutal_beating_of_gay_man_jack_price_in_queens.html

Everyone should be very, very pissed and send this to thier elected officials, ministers and anyone else they can think of.