Re: (TV) Hitchcock

[eric s gregory <esgregory@uswest.net>]

hey, i am a soft boys fan....& i've given maybe half the solo stuff a shot
(& as "prolific" as he is, that's really saying something).
but going back, i'm realizing that it was the way the soft boys rocked &
rolled that appealed.
hitchcock seemed to write to the drive as well, esp. on "underwater
moonlight" ("i wanna destroy you", "insanely jealous")
what ultimately boggles is that this guy's held in high esteem as a
SONGWRITER (????) by many many people with a modicum of cranial power.
i mean, i'm not too keen on hierarchization & if you happen to think gordon
lightfoot's as good as or better a songwriter as bob dylan, i'd defend yr
choice even if i didn't necessarily agree.
but for some reason, i find it bothersome when people push hitchcock as
some great scribe...
he's a bit of a fraud, isn't he?

Maurice Rickard wrote:

> At 4:02 PM -0700 5/30/00, eric s gregory wrote:
> >hitchcock's a pretentious arch geek who churns out what he calls
> >"surrealism", but what i call high school "poetry" that is far more
> >bourgeois & obvious than the worst of dali's worst.
>
> Sure, when he slaps it on with a trowel, as he often does.  While I
> recommended _Eye_ yesterday, going back and looking at the LP reveals
> a lot of songs I can't recall, or if I did recall them, don't want to
> ("Agony of Pleasure" being a prime example).  Oddly, the best song on
> it ("Satellite") _is_ one of the more, uh, "imagistic."
>
> But don't write off _I Often Dream of Trains_, necessarily--he uses a
> (comparatively) lighter touch there, occasionally getting
> surprisingly down to earth: "Dying of starvation in the gutter/that
> is what the future holds for me..." from "Sleeping Knights of Jesus"
> for example.  Even his more over-the-top stuff on this one works for
> me--maybe it's just paced better.  Lyrically, _Eye_, by comparison,
> sounds like a man running out of steam and trying to cover it up.
>
> In any event, the rocked-up Soft Boys configuration is well worth
> hearing, and if it does it for you, check out _Trains_; if it
> doesn't, don't.  (Got my copy of _Moonlight_ used, so people who
> don't like it do indeed walk among us.)
>
> --
> Maurice Rickard
> http://mauricerickard.com/
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