SGN Page 22

Friday
Aug 26, 2005
SGN.org
Volume 33
Issue 34

Thursday, Jul 29, 2010 08:11

site map

NOTE** finding
non clickable links?
Sorry these columns
are not featured
in this weeks edition
-

International Readers
We want to learn about you and have you tell us about Gay Life where you live.
Please click here

LIPSTICK KILLERS - New York Dolls and Iggy & The Stooges at Bumbershoot

LIPSTICK KILLERS - New York Dolls and Iggy & The Stooges at Bumbershoot
by Maggie Bloodstone - SGN A&E Writer Nobody under 30 believes me when I tell them that there really was a time when heterosexual rocker boys actually wanted to be mistaken for Gay, but I swear to Bowie, it's true! It was in that brief, sparkling wink of time known as "Glam" (or "Glitter" in the U.S.), after the Cockettes on the West coast and Warhol's Superstars on the East kicked in the doors of gender perception with a rhinestone platform heel and encouraged even the straightest of Stratocaster strummers to Flame On. But while David, Elton, and Alice quickly became the poster girly-boys of the genre through spectacular showmanship & business smarts to supplement their talent, there were those who were happier glitzing up the gutter than contributing to the bloated bombast that would characterize "70's Rock." And in keeping true to their gleefully trashy natures, they would seed the ground for the beautiful noise called Punk Rock. Two of the most influential Glam/Punk mutations will be manifesting at Bumbershoot Sept. 2 & 5, respectively: The New York Dolls and Iggy and The Stooges. The original Dolls, David Johanson, Johnny Thunders, Syl Sylvain, Arthur Kane, and Billy Murcia, were inspired as much by the flamboyance of Charles Ludlam's Ridiculous Theater as they were by the good ol' Rock-N-Fuckin'-Roll rapidly being trampled underfoot by the onslaught of interminable guitar solos and pretensions to "Art." Embodying the exact moment Glam segued into Punk, their shows at the Mercer Arts Center in NYC were attended by not only established icons like Lou Reed and David Bowie, but the future poets and pagans who would populate Punk parlors like CBGB's and Max's Kansas City. The Dolls were decadent delinquents who not only loved the ladies, wanted to look like them, too, and cared not one whit if that, and lyrics like "Go to fairyland with you," branded them "faggots." In the liner notes for his 2003 compilation Under The Influence, Morrissey states "How empty life would have been without The New York Dolls," as by '72, the Valley Of The Dolls extended to England and a highly successful tour- sadly marred by Billy Murcia's useless death from booze and 'ludes. An able replacement was found in drummer Jerry Nolan, and the Dolls went on to record the first of a mere two albums, which included energetic ragers like "Personality Crisis" and "Looking for A Kiss." Their success in England also attracted the notice of a fetish wear peddler named Malcolm McLaren, who later became their manager for a (mercifully) short time. While McLaren proved an asset as far as getting the Dionysian Dolls straight chemically, he contributed to their demise as a group by imposing a "serious political point of view," trading their sequins for red patent leather and a hammer and sickle flag as a stage prop. While politics would help sell the appeal of McLaren's next project, The Sex Pistols, it was pure anathema to the band Morrissey would later deem "far too free, far too happy, far too un-hung-up...and thus their end was foredoomed." In June 2004, Morrissey would repay the Dolls' influence by asking the surviving members (Johnny Thunders, who formed The Heartbreakers after the Dolls' breakup, astounded everyone who knew him by living to the ripe age of 39 before dying of a methadone-alcohol combo, and Jerry Nolan would follow him a few months later, felled by a stroke) to regroup for London's Meltdown Festival. By all accounts, they were a solid hit, but their comeback was slowed by Arthur Kane's sudden death from leukemia only a month later. Nonetheless, with guitarist Steve Conti, bassist Sami Yaffa, drummer Brian Delaney, keyboardist Brian Koonin, and presumably far less glitter, the Dolls have proven you can't keep a good band down, with a run of well-received gigs and a new album in the works for '06. If the New York Dolls were the slightly shopworn dandies of their chosen field, then The Stooges were hard-core, hard-dicked Rough Trade. Their grimy, assaultive sound sprang fully formed from the rust-and-concrete landscape of the Detroit area, white blues at its coarsest, garage Rock at its most primal. Ron and Scott Asheton, Dave Alexander, and James Osterberg knocked around Michigan playing Who- and MC5-inspired racket til James encountered his destiny in the form of a blitzed and obstreperous Jim Morrison at a Doors show at the U. of Michigan. Inspired by Morrison's drunken antagonism of the frat-boy crowd, James decided, "If this guy can do it, I can do it," and was reborn as Iggy Pop, who would come to out-Morrison Morrison in terms of sheer, balls-out abandon. Iggy was pure, concentrated adrenaline onstage, powered by various performance-enhancing substances and his own "heart full of napalm," he was a beglittered, mascaraed, bruised and bloody, omnisexual Force Of Fucking Nature. This fact was eventually noticed by David Bowie, who, according to wifey Angela, was inspired to proclaim his bisexuality after making the acquaintance of Iggy and Lou Reed, and who spurred the then-fractured Stooges (with new guitarist James Williamson) to get it together and create their masterpiece, Raw Power, the most presciently-named and universally revered album in Punk history. Perhaps to be expected, the album floundered, a gritty throwback in the overproduced Velvet- Goldmine year of '73, and the Stooges went their separate ways. For a time, Iggy's way led straight to the needle, to rehab, and out the other side, hooking up, fortuitously, with Ray Manzarek, who was well used to lethal combinations of excessive behavior and creative genius, courtesy of bandmate Jim Morrison. Manzarek picked Iggy up, bailed him out, dusted him off, and encouraged him not to abandon the danger that he had courted so ardently, but confront it, and ultimately, embrace it. &Which could very well be the primary reason Iggy Pop is with us today, and Jim Morrison ain't. That, and the fact he clearly ignored the myth of Rock being only for kids, and soldiered on, cutting a bloody swath through the Punk and Disco '70's, the New Wave '80's, and the Grungy '90's, still a taut bundle of testosterone, still with a heart full of napalm, and still a Stooge. Reuniting on '03, Iggy, Ron, Scott, and former Minuteman Mike Watt (replacing the late Dave Alexander) took to the Stooges' natural habitat, the live stage, inspiring a new crop of bored punklings and reassuring the rest of us that Old don't mean Dead. The New York Dolls play Bumbershoot Friday, Sept. 2, on the Mainstage, 7:45, between the Donnas and Garbage, Iggy And The Stooges play Monday, Sept. 5, 9:30, with local Stooge-inspired legends Mudhoney opening at 8:00. If you can dispel the image of Buster Poindexter (Johansen's commercially successful alias) belting "Hot Hot Hot!" on Saturday Night Live, and the fact Iggy's immortal pounder "Lust For Life" has been used in a commercial for Carnival Cruises, for godsake, I suggest you come join me. I'll be the one with the Patti Smith tattoo grabbing every 17-year-old in one of those ubiquitous "CBGB's" T-shirts and demanding they tell me exactly what the letters C.B.G.B.* stand for, you posing little snotnose. *If you're reading this, you're my friend, so I'll tell you: "Country, Bluegrass, and Blues." Now you can wear the shirt.