Cravens Archive

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0><tr> <td valign="top" colspan=2 height=110 BGCOLOR="#262626" TEXT="#F7F7FF" bgproperties="fixed" background="04900840dbxjec.gif"> <div> <FONT SIZE="5" COLOR="#FFFFFF" FACE="Arial" ><B>The First Church of Holy Rock and Roll</B></FONT><B>     |     </B><A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="The First Church of Holy Rock and Roll"><U><B>home</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id28.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="The Commandments"><U>The Commandments</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id21.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="The Sermon"><U>The Sermon</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id19.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="New Reviews"><U>New Reviews</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id44.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Short Takes"><U>Short Takes</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id20.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Blasts from the Past"><U>Blasts from the Past</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id41.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Interviews"><U>Interviews</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id55.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Books That Rock!"><U>Books That Rock!</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id47.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Movies That Rock!"><U>Movies That Rock!</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id49.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="On the Front Line: Shimamoto Reports"><U>On the Front Line: Shimamoto Reports</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id53.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Dimitri Monroe: Letters from a BurntOut "><U>Dimitri Monroe: Letters from a Burnt-Out Recluse</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id59.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Josh Slates on Cinema"><U>Josh Slates on Cinema</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id56.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Cravens RockORama"><U>Cravens' Rock-O-Rama</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id40.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Holy Mix Tape"><U>Holy Mix Tape</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id62.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="KCOUs Shake Em On Down! 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Gristle</B></div> <bR> <div> <B><IMG SRC="22caaaa0.jpg" border=0 width="170" height="170" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></div> <div> <B>Da Go!</B></div> <bR> <div> <B><IMG SRC="22daaaa0.jpg" border=0 width="170" height="170" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></div> <div> <B>An ox on the 4-string...</B></div> <bR> <div> <B><IMG SRC="230aaaa0.jpg" border=0 width="170" height="170" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></div> <div> <B>Benny, get your effin' foot</B></div> <div> <B>off my neck!</B></div> </td> <td valign="top" height=370 BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000"> <div> <B>Cravens Archive</B></div> <div> <B>LOU REED</B> - <I>Lou Reed</I> (RCA) :: The fabled first album, complete with ocean and Fabrege (FA-BRI-SHAY) egg. Lou before he got honest and sober and became a poet (with capital 'P'). Good set of solid post-Velvets pre-Transformers rockers, with a kind of grab-bag feel to it. Highlights include "I Can't Stand It," "Berlin," and "Love Makes You Feel (Ten Foot Tall)." Of special interest is the presence of Yesmen Steve Howe and Rick Wakeman, who aquit themselves nicely with tasteful arrangements and rockin' lead lines. Good luck getting it, I had to have it brought back from England.</div> <bR> <div> <B>JOHNNY THUNDERS</B> - <I>So Alone</I> (Warner Bros.) :: Break out your rig and clean</div> <div> up your tracks, we's about to mainline us a party! Johnny teaches us we can't put our arms aroud a memory, but we sure can boogie like we usta! All-star cast (Phil Lynott, Steve Marriott, Steve Jones, Chrissie Hynde, etc.) rock out on some great covers and a few originals. Sounds suspiciously like the Doll's second album w/out Big Davie JoHansen, though. A bit of a let down in places ("London Boys"), but overall Thunders puts his good-feelin' junky business to use. (For those about to embark upon a career in dentistry, I direct you to Thunders and Company's mush-mouthed, Vegas-style rendition of "The Wizard." It'll tell you everything you need to know about the proper use of Novocaine.)</div> <bR> <div> <B>PAUL WELLER</B> - <I>Wild Wood </I>(Polygram) :: God Save the Queen, and please save me from Traffic-obsessed Townshend wannabes. "Holy Man" is kind of worth the price of admission. Kind of.</div> <bR> <div> <B>THROBBING GRISTLE</B> - <I>20 Jazz Funk Greats</I> (Elektra) :: If I have to hear</div> <div> P. L.U.R.-y aesthetics from one more raver, my head will turn cartwheels and be elected president of Montenegro. This platter's a nice antidote for "techno," "pop," "what-have-you." (A vignette: I enter a record store I may never enter again, I purchase an album I may never purchase again, and when I am asked by the clerk "Is it really funky shit?" I reply, "No sir, it is not.")</div> <bR> <div> <B>GENTLE GIANT</B> - <I>Playing the Fool: The Official Live</I> (One Way) :: For those of you who don't like prog/art-rock (I do not stand among you), check this out. Tasty instrumental work that any fan of Yes, King Crimson, or the early Roxy Music will appreciate. These guys actually manage to combine medieval chanting and blues licks. Gripping stuff. Rush out and buy this album by the gross so the band'll get back together.</div> <bR> <div> (<B>The Rev's Note</B>: <I>Hey, Jesse--how 'bout an op-ed piece explaining how you can have "prog/art" and "rock" at the same time in the same place...and it be gripping?</I>)</div> <bR> <div> <B>JON BON JOVI</B> - <I>The 100 Greatest Rock Songs</I> (VH1) :: Go away, Jon Bon Jovi.</div> <div> Nobody likes you.</div> <bR> <div> <B>BOB DYLAN</B> - <I>Hard Rain</I> (Columbia) :: Bob sure can roll that thunder. Exciting live set with Mick Ronson(!!) on slide guitar, of all things. Not quite as good as <I>Before the Flood</I>, but then again, Robbie Robertson was not present. (For those quitting school, a job, or refusing to pay taxes any longer, I suggest you spin "Maggie's Farm" a few times, cause it's at least as good at getting the woes out as the version of "Sweet Jane" offa <I>Rock'n'Roll Animal</I>.)</div> <bR> <div> <B>SUGAR RAY</B> - "When It's Over" (Atlantic) :: I'm ashamed to say it, but I like this song. It has a nice Ezrin-esque (circa <I>Berlin</I>/Alice Cooper) feel to it, and the album cover is priceless. Who else would parody a fourteen-year old Style Council press photo? Please, shoot me, or save me from myself.</div> <bR> <div> <B>JOHN ENTWISTLE</B> - <I>Whistle Rhymes</I> (Track) :: This guy <I>was</I> one of my heroes. In all of rock 'n' roll (or at least in my myopic version of the great pantheon), he alone could make the bass speak in tongues. Throbbing rhythm, lyrical lead, and the ability to fill the 4/4 with 32/8--all of these conflicting abilities he embodied with a single bass line. This was the guy, along with Chris Squire of Yes and Prakash John of the R'N'R Animal Band, who made rock 'n' roll bass playing a helluva lot more interesting and exciting than anything I heard in funk or jazz. And he could write dynamite lyrics too! "Heaven and Hell,"  "My Wife," "Cousin Kevin," all Who classics. But that's the problem with this record (his second solo effort). It's not the Who, and most of the songs ain't classics. It has been argued that the only reason Entwistle's tracks stood out on Who albums as being of reasonable quality was the fact that, of all the songs he wrote, those few were selected by Townshend as being acceptable. So perhaps this album failed to be anything more than a lumbering, self-indulgent mess (in which the Ox proves he can only write lyrics in one meter) because Townshend wasn't there to husband it. Or maybe rock'n'roll bassists just shouldn't make solo albums. </div> <bR> <div> <B>CHARLIE CHRISTIAN</B> - <I>The Genius of the Electric Guitar </I>(Columbia) :: Only the last four tracks are really worth listening to, unless you're a zoot-suit wearing, jive-spouting ("You're so money, and you don't even know it!"), swing-dancing whiteboy. This guy, relatively unknown as he is, was the first of the jazz guitar-heroes, not to mention one of the forgotten founders of be-bop (not that it shows on this disc, can someone PLEASE find me a copy of <I>Live at Minton's Playhouse</I>?). A strange sight in the age of swing, Brother Christian approached his instrument like no other. A combination of Lester Young and Lonnie Johnson, he merged the most interesting facets of the Midwestern blues idiom with the mood and, well, swing of late '30s jazz. His single-string scalar workouts are quite refreshing in <I>this</I> age of dimestore bluesmen ("Wow! Pentatonic scales!") and ABBA Cowboys.</div> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>On the Scene: Jesse Cravens' Idea of HEAVEN</B></div> <div>      I've been in Kansas City for the last 48 and have been suitably rewarded for my trek. Found an old issue of <I>Creem</I> with a Rock-A-Rama section by Peter Laughner, not to mention articles on Ketamine and Bob Marley, of all things. Oh yes, and coverage of the Roxy Music shut down in '76. Oh yes, and I bought Christopher Milk's second album for ten $. I was in a realy pissy mood till I stumbled on that. The record store in question (I like to call it MECCA), had everything (EVERYTHING) you would ever want. Twenty-year old issues of <I>Creem</I>, <I>Rolling Stone</I>, <I>NME</I>, <I>Circus</I>, (hell, I think I even saw some <I>Rock Scene</I>), just stacked all over the place. Used records by Kevin Ayers (!!), John Cale, Christopher Milk, Orson Welles, Phil Manzanera, Cecil Taylor, Albert Ayler, et al. Only problem is, they know what they've got. I hate it when that happens. Records you could've bought for four bucks sold for forty. Ouch. So I cut my losses and got the Mendelsson record, which is thoroughly enjoyable, despite what people say. </div> <div>  <A NAME="convoy"><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="1x1.gif" HEIGHT="1" ALIGN="bottom" WIDTH="1" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" ></A></div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>Convoy</B></div> <div> <B>Sept. 7th, the Blue Note</B></div> <div> <B>Columbia, Missouri</B></div> <bR> <div>      As completely unamused as I was at the fact I would have to wait two "fucking" hours for the White Stripes to come on, for roughly twenty minutes I was appeased to my satisfaction. Convoy, the opening band for both the Stripes <I>and</I> the Greenhornes, took me completely by surprise. A nice mix of Rolling Stones and Roxy Music was apparent in the first three songs and I, as I'm liken to do, hastily proclaimed them conquering heroes. "My god! I thought Seattle and the Brits had conspired to <I>kill</I> this kind of boogie!" I screamed (oh yes, they were very, very loud) at Ben Cianciosi. He was not suitably impressed, the dirty little Radiohead. </div> <div>      At the end of the third song, I was ready to buy their album, available all handy like from the lobby. Unfortunately for them, they played their next song, which cost 'em ten bucks. From then on, they descended into the realm of all sorts of balladry and slow nonsense, a place best left to Collective Soul, Staind, Train, et al. Pure casualties of Nineties rock, poor fellows. But. hey folks, keep an eye out. If they lose the balladshit</div> <div> and emphasize that Andy MacKay groove they got going on, they may just turn out to be one of the more interesting bands of the early twentyfirst.</div> <div>      No shit, jack</div> <div> <B> <A NAME="roxy_music_"><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="1x1.gif" HEIGHT="1" ALIGN="bottom" WIDTH="1" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" ></A></B></div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <IMG SRC="23f90280.jpg" border=0 width="400" height="296" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <bR> <div> <B>ROXY MUSIC</B> - <I>Stranded</I></div> <div>      Roxy Music has never had a problem with controversy outshining their tunes. In fact, throughout their career, there's been a curious lack of media finesse on the part of Bryan Ferry, the group's acknowledged leader and visionary crooner. Yeah, there was the thing with the bagpipes back in the early Seventies, but who remembers that, right? And sure, there was that little skirmish over <I>Country Life</I>'s cover, but that was mostly accidental, correct? (Wasn't counting on the Wal-Mart/Mid-West Baptist College contingent, were we, Bry?) Those artistic blunders aside, Roxy has generally been able to navigate that little-known tributary between fame and taste fairly comfortably and without incident, cultivating the admirable habit of letting the music speak for itself. However, when somebody gets pushed over the railing, <I>someone</I> is bound to react. When that happens, it really does pay to think ahead and Bryan Ferry, for all his eccentric vision, doesn't seem very able to do.</div> <div>      Flashback to 1973: Brian Eno, mysterious jaguar-clad non-musician has just been axed from the group, and left on the wild Thames shores to be devoured by the local rouge-happy glam cannibals. The HMS Roxy sails on, hoping to reap greater bounties from the pop wilderness without their notorious dilettante in tow. The fact that Eno wasn't exactly the least popular member of the group (poor, poor Paul Thompson) doesn't click till later, when questions about avant-garde credibility arise from curious journalists past, present, and future. (Had I been around back then, I would have needled the hell out of Manzanera and MacKay.) Roxy Music, understandably, is non-nonplused. Ferry (and in many minds, Roxy) proved just how wacky wacky could be by releasing <I>These</I> <I>Foolish</I> <I>Things</I>, right? It would appear so, as <I>Stranded</I> (the first post-Eno album) seems to bear out the postulate that it was Ferry's, not Eno's wiry hands that shaped the group's sound. </div> <div>      Without Eno to encourage their wild side, Manzanera and MacKay find themselves confined to quarters for most of the voyage, their instrumentation arrested and subdued (in comparison to <I>Roxy Music</I>  and <I>For Your Pleasure</I>, anyway) on most of the compositions. As a result, Ferry's heretofore under-appreciated piano work tends to dominate the eight tracks. Surprisingly, this only strengthens the groups songs, Ferry's melodies becoming more distinct and memorable with the absence of Eno's sonics. In other words, the rockers ("Street Life," "Amazona," and half of "Mother of Pearl") rock, the successes are evident ("Just Like You," again "Mother of Pearl") and the failures are few and far between ("Song for Europe," "Psalm"). A brisk album with the energy of their first and the compositional skill of their second; in other words, their third. The next logical step, with or without Eno. </div> <div>      Perhaps the instances one misconstrued as a lack of forethought were, in fact, laudable examples of Ferry's gusto. His willingness to take chances to fulfill and ensure the purity of his vision (near-sighted as it may be in some cases) far more gentlemanly prototypes of the rock-star "fuck you" games we would see played out with the media over the next few decades. Bravo, and encore.</div> <div> <B> <A NAME="magic_bus"><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="1x1.gif" HEIGHT="1" ALIGN="bottom" WIDTH="1" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" ></A></B></div> <div> <B>THE WHO - </B>Magic Bus/The Who (On Tour!)  (MCA)</div> <div>      It is rare occasion that I go into a record store <I>not</I> intending to purchase something. Maybe I'm broke, maybe I'm desparate, maybe I need to use the john. Or perhaps, every once in a while, it's fate. Some great, unseen hand moving me, compelling me in a Ten Commandments drawl to "ENTAH THAT STOAH." It was certainly like that when, on a whim, I decided to trot into Damned Records (not intending to make a purchase, of course), seconds later re-emerging with an eighteen-dollar limited-edition reissue of <I>Metal Machine Music</I> on Compact Disc. It had been out of print since the late seventies and somthing told me I just <I>had </I>to have it. (I later found out they lowered the price, the bastards.) Hurray for impulse buying! It was a similar zeitgeist that brought me into contact with the-long-out-of-print-but-somehow-still-on-CD reissue (circa '93?) of the rip-off album to end all rip-off albums, <I>Magic Bus.</I></div> <div>      For those of you who aren't sussed to the story behind this "compilation" (I don't know why I keep calling it an album..), here's a little run down. Way back when in 1968, the Who had a hit single. (I'm sure everyone who wasn't off the wagon remembers "Too much! MAGIC BUS!" assaulting their eardrums at one point or another.) Unfortunately, they didn't have an album to go with it. This being the dawn of AOR (not to mention rock operas), it was becoming very clear to the execs at Track Records that album sales were the new priority (I wonder exactly how much Kit Lambert paid those psychics anyway..). <I>Magic Bus</I> is the product of Lambert and Company's mad rush to present the record-buying public with something, well, buyable before "Magic Bus" fell off the charts. And they really pulled out all the stops on this one, folks. (Note the date ofrelease, then look at the cover. Also note the fact that the Who were famous for their heart-attack inducing live shows, then look at the cover.)</div> <div>      Despite the crass commercialism ("Hurray for impulse buying!") of the effort, <I>Magic Bus </I>actually shapes up to be a good album. It's composed of a killer lineup of songs (mostly taken from the band's two previous albums), and is generally more cohesive than the average Who album. (I say "average," the likes of <I>Who's Next</I> and <I>Tommy </I>being above-average.) First off, there's "Disguises," which was one of the first examples of Townshend's oh-so-prominent artier side, and proved well in advance that he could out-trip his more psychedelically inclined contemporaries, The Small Faces. (If he really wanted to, that is.) "Run, Run, Run" carries the album for a bit till we come to "Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde," one of Entwistle's lost gems. A harrowing narrative about dual personalities (as one could guess), this is one of Entwistle's best and was significantly more entertaining than the latter-day musical of the same name (as one could also guess). The album burbles along, showcasing some of the group's best tracks off of <I>The Who Sell Out</I> ("I Can't Reach You," and the incorrectly labelled "Our Love Was"), while throwing in the occasional R&B faux-cover ("Call Me Lightning") and blasting out the obligatory hit ("Magic Bus"). Then we are presented with a tasty slice of the Who's "soft white underbelly," Keith Moon and John Entwistle. "Someone's Coming" is Entwistle at his immature, paranoid best. (Her parents not to fond of the bass, eh John?) With "Doctor, Doctor," the Ox familiarizes the record-buying public with the sorts of afflictions he's used to (even if they are only in his head). A charming bit of mod-pop (to be read: "up-tempo covers of old blues songs") follows this in the form of "Bucket T.", on which Keith Moon not so much drums as well, sings. Yes, it's that voice that everyone just loved to hate off of <I>Two Sides of the Moon</I>, and it carries the song rather well, his voice and the jangly, keyless choir of backup singers making it enduring in exactly the way some of the weaker Stones and Beatles material isn't. The last song, one of the more beautiful odes to masturbation out there, is "Pictures of Lily," where Townshend proves once again that the Who had more to offer than sweat and bombast.</div> <div>      It is strange, however, considering this compilation was assembled to essentially be padding around "Magic Bus," that the standout tracks are all either novelty or Entwistle tunes (both varieties being downplayed on the average Who album), not the arguably fine Townshend compositions. And how also it holds together better, and is easily more listenable than the average Who album. One is moved, perhaps by some unseen hand, to wonder: "Is the best art pre-fab art?" </div> <div>  <A NAME="the_go"><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="1x1.gif" HEIGHT="1" ALIGN="bottom" WIDTH="1" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" ></A></div> <div> <B>THE GO - </B>Whatcha Doin' (SubPop)</div> <div>      I don't know about the rest of you young'ns, but I'm tired of being part of a "lost</div> <div> generation." I look around at the other "rock fans" my age and see nothing but a bunch metalheads who may just happen to like a little Eric Clapton, or the tripe they call "classic Rock." None of them have heard Iggy, and you can bet your S-U-V none of them have the faintest idea who the fuck Rob Tyner is. These people have no really sense of history, and of the vitality within the pages of your standard issue Rocknroll Studies Textbook: Deluxe Detroit Edition. (Any critic worth his muster knows that DETROIT was the real birthplace of American post-Elvis RocknRoll Mach Two, and had best believe in the healing powers of motor oil and Lake Michigan) Lucky for all us lost kids out in the wasteland, history repeats itself.</div> <div>      In something akin to Intel suddenly deciding to start marketing buggy whips, grungy independent label Sub Pop (Eeew...Seattle...) picked up the Go, a group so steeped in Motor City mythology its easy to imagine them sharing the stage with Mitch Ryder or the Amboy Dukes. Without much hype or promotion, Sub Pop released their debut in the summer of 99, and this reporter found it a welcome relief from Ricky Martin and what <I>Esquire</I> dubbed the "Latin Explosion in my Pants!" </div> <div>      With all due respect to the purveyors of Latin Pop and what passes for heavy metal these days, I feel I can say with little reservation that <I>Whatcha Doin</I> easily trounces anything that hit the pop scene during that overexposed, circle-jerk of a year. These guys did <I>not </I>sound like "artistes"<I> </I>and "talents" during a time when that seemed to be all that mattered. And the album reflects that.</div> <div>      "Meet Me at the Movies" kicks things off with a riff that resembles the screeching intro to Pere Ubus "Non-Alignment Pact," but sans synth. Its the first in a drongingly long line of "carsngirls" flavored tunes. Sure, it gets a bit boring, but thats part of the albums charm. You've got these almost period-piece like songs ("Summer Sun Blues," "Keep on Trash"), which are essentially meaningless outside the context of their simple narratives and exquisite riffs, that carry the album until you get to a point where there something different ("You Can Get High," "It Might Be Bad," "Time for Moon"). Because of the format of the songs preceding it, these relatively simple changes in approach sound like strokes of genius. A clever trick that keeps the listener guessing as to the exact position of the bar. The whole albums like that. Drastic highs, drastic lows, but all are somehow equally exciting and provocative. Each one pushing you farther into a sweat-drenched fury until the album ends, and your'e left craving more. I've said that these boys weren't afraid to not be big stars, in a time when being a talent, or an impresario or what have you was at its highest zenith of pop importance since the seventies. Consequently, I'm sure they've suffered for it. I'm sure SubPop directs just as much care towards crafting hits (albeit underground ones) as the next label, and the fact that I've heard neither hide nor hair out of or about the Go post-partem this album may be a sign that these guys've got a tough road ahead. But let's just remember what history teaches us.Y'know, that little proverb in the back of the book about good things coming to he who waits, the one with the big picture of <I>Blah Blah Blah</I> next to it?</div> <div>  <A NAME="reed"><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="1x1.gif" HEIGHT="1" ALIGN="bottom" WIDTH="1" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" ></A></div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>A Vindication of Lou Reed's Late Seventies Period </B></div> <div> <B>in Three Parts</B></div> <div> ("Six sides of vinyl seek audience, no experience required.")</div> <bR> <div>      No, I'm not out to prove <I>Sally Can't Dance </I>was a masterpiece or that <I>The Blue Mask</I> was a piece of shit. I refuse to pander to those who wish to take sides about the decade in which Lou became a star, rising or otherwise. What I'm here to do is celebrate, and hopefully get others to listen to, the lesser known gems in Lou Reed's 1978-'80 stint at the studio. (God knows if I'm correct about any of this, but after all, I'm just a critic.)</div> <bR> <div> <B>One Part Gin</B></div> <bR> <div>      First off, a look at <I>Street Hassle</I>, which was eclipsed by <I>The Blue Mask</I>, but at the time was Mr. Reed's clearest statement since <I>Metal Machine Music</I>. What you've got here is basically a guy who's hit bottom so many times he finally had to go and make <I>The Howard Beale Show</I> of AOR. That is to say, a parody of self-parody. "Gimme Some Good Times" makes the point that, come 1977, L. Reed Esq., the glitterist of them all, finally started listening to the likes of Lester Bangs and Peter Laughner, not to mention some John Cale records. In less than five lines the Phantom of Rock decimates his old persona in a deluge of fire and brimstone. This sets the pace and the tone for the rest of the album, a spiteful, brake-neck boogie-oogie-oogie directed at no more deserving a personage than Reed himself, as well as his cronies and imitators. "Dirt" lofts a few clods at Warhol and the Upper West Side intellegentsia, who, along with Steve Rubell, would've looked really good covered in the stuff by '78. "Street Hassle" catalogues, in the kind of grim detail only Lou could pull off, where the R'N'RA had been for the last ten years. Searching for a voice, watching old ladies O.D., and being supplanted by Jerseyboys from steel-towns. (Not that <I>Born to Run </I>was a bad record, right L.R.?) It's all downhill from there, the album retaining it's aural majesty, but really not being much else. ("A sound album," as Bangs put it.) "I Wanna be Black" takes a stab at what I'd call "middle-western college-boy despair," but then again you'd probably get these sentiments in Bryn Mawr, too, right? You could call this filler, but it's just so much fun to listen to! "Real Good Time Together" takes the the Velvets classic, and gives it the guitar roar it never had. Sounds kind of like what Phil Spector would've done with the Crystals ("Then he Kissed Me") had he been banging his head against concrete for six hours prior to going into the studio. The album gets bland for about two songs ("Shooting Star," "Leave me Alone"), then you have "Wait." </div> <bR> <div>      For thirty minutes, despite the vital chi spewing from your quadrophonically-equipped stereo, you think it's over. It couldn't possibly get better than this. He just can't surpass himself anymore, now that he's put some effort into it for once. "Wait" is a plea for patience, and a promise of things to come. If you don't believe me, buy the album.</div> <bR> <div> <B>Coming Soon: Two Parts Tonic, Hold the Amphetamines</B></div> <bR> <bR> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>