For rockstar and for the players, as explained in Cicero's De Senectute
, manage their aging is not a problem recently, especially after having lived the glory days with crowds cheering and critics benevolent. And so, note that the artistic talent has dried up (or has become varicose), the cashier at the supermarket not only does not ask for an autograph but she does not recognize you, that you're no longer on the cutting edge of a chair but with grandchildren, is just wrong. There are few who take pride and wisdom with his gray hair and old age have made an evolution, not a decline. The senescent wiser thin out their wares and often chisel craft niche might collaborate with promising young and often move towards a style perhaps more quiet, charming and cultured. Examples? I know, Peter Hammill, Robyn Hitchcock, Laurie Anderson, the same Knopfler. Other anzianotti struggling instead to cede the limelight and often reinvent style gatherings Pavarotti & Friends (& built-in, of course) or throw in a painful reassessment of their latest production cut (venghino Ladies and Siori, rifamo all in techno version) nor to seek to break the bank at the box office with a packed anthology of great songs, which they duly revised.
Two recent cases. Ray Davies, voice, guitar, songwriter and soul of the immense Kinks, we loved everything. Grandfather Bertoncelli Quote: Davies of home cooking we ate the leftovers also, and it is true. Also because their plates are kept well: a distance of 40 years, the taste is almost unchanged and
Sunny afternoon is seductive, bitter and ironic as in 1965. For this a bit sorry 'that Ray has felt the need to find a horde of "friends", as it happens for a track, repeat all his best things, all in strict duet. But the result is tristarello , no song is horrible, but they are all consistently lower than the original, which inevitably runs the memory. Well, no, thinking back to Paloma Faith is just horrible. Beyond the selection of tracks (missing Sunny Afternoon cited above, lack Dandy, Dedicated Follower of Fashion, but these are personal preferences) or the selection of friends (everyone has their own, including those of Ray's most worthy people, of course, by that Bruce Springsteen, Lucinda Williams at Jackson Brown, Alex Chilton, but also people that I left out the door, like Metallica or Jon Bon Jovi) what is puzzling is that there is no answer to the simplest of questions: Why? why remake popular songs with friends who have had better clothes, much better? Who loves the Kinks What do I do with Victoria sung by Mando Diao, also equal to 'original
? or Lola nasaleggiata brutally by Paloma Faith? e chi non li conosce che idea se ne fa? Sembra tutto un grande tributo all'ego di Mr. Davies che, intendiamoci, sta otto gradini sopra chiunque altro nel pop inglese anni 60, eccezion fatta per 4 liverpudliani, probabilmente però in fase carenziale di riconoscimenti. Sarebbe stato probabilmente meglio che il Ray avesse preso alcuni (pochi) veri amici, attempati come lui, e dopo la cena ed il whiskino di rito, si fossero messi a registrare su un 4 piste delle versioni casalinghe dei brani, con quel suo vocione caldo e furbetto, un unplugged di coscritti, della prestigiosa leva del '46. Senza fare tardi beninteso, che l'età è quella. L'antologia si chiama See my friends ("guarda i miei amici") ma, se proprio we have to stay in titles kinksiani, "Autumn Almanac" would go very well. Too bad. And in the heat
revivalist draws live, Ali Campbell, white from black voice and the face of facciosa UB40, those of Red Red Wine, Rat in the kitchen and another thousand regghettini, some of which have been persuasive superdanzerecci soundtrack phenomenon of hormonal hypersecretion, other powerful hymns libertarian (Sing Our song down!), all still enjoyable.
Mr Campbell had already produced a duet with his personal friends in 2007 (he had pulled in, with the taste oxymoron
Smokey Robinson and Mick Hucknall and Katie Melua) and then comes back with an idea a bit 'but banalotta potentially sympathetic, that is some great sing English songs (it's called the Great British Songs album). Too bad the younger Campbell knows not only the music there, and 80-82 years in this key boring us again Beatles (Got To Get You Into My Life, A Hard Days Night) Stones, Kinks, Hollies, Free. All this, however, recorded in 2010, and with plenty of samplers and electronic bells and whistles and Sly & Robbie at the console. From Psychoanalysis then that Campbell there are great songs in the 80 British and already so, to me, two or three titles would be. Net pastiglione is a very uniform, his voice not bad but not momentous - not Paul Robeson or Marvin Gaye, and he feels - that could be heard in dance but honest volumes becomes background music from a supermarket. It is easy to imagine the frozen food industry to ask, but who is reggae's version of Paint it black? We start sadly the case and if you have not before Ali Campbell himself, nobody will answer. However, do not ask the cashier, she does not know Campbell.
PS: While writing this biliosissima pulled, caught by the doubt of being excessive in my comments I surfed the www looking for other, more learned and more cutlery reviews. With great joy I discovered that the BBC is more sarcastic than me.
