The Friday Fun Canon Discussion And Monster Poll

limping in belatedly, now the interesting stuff has died down…

i ticked about ten, though it would that would have at least doubled if it had been ‘like a lot’.
1) i hesitate slightly to call it the worst, but i’ve never managed to like a single second of ‘marquee moon’, so worst it is;
2) ziggy stardust was my first love – i spent my early teens bog eyed with excitement about it
3) ‘blood on the tracks’ is the one i’ve grown to love most recently. i’ve had it for about fifteen years, pretty much as long as i’ve liked dylan but, inexplicably, until a couple of years ago i somehow managed not to notice that it is absolutely f-cking wonderful. possibly this was because it’s one of the few dylan records that works as pretty, unobtrusive background music and so that’s how i used to listen to it. more likely, i’m just an idiot.

A bit more canon exploration in the Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2011/oct/06/nirvana-nevermind-20-missing-out

Interesting thoughts on the serendipity of things finding you when you need them, Marcello – reminds me of something that happened just the other night. For some reason I fancied looking up the Osmonds’ “Crazy Horses” on YouTube; then spotted in the sidebar a link to eccentric punk-era singer John Otway’s version of the song. I clicked the link and saw Otway, now pushing 60, playing theremin in a folk club in Boston, Lincs and doing a hugely entertaining cover. I stayed online much longer than I’d intended, watching Otway clips with and without Wild Willy Barrett (crying with laughter at his “House of the Rising Sun”) – then, blow me down, discovered that he’s playing the Borderline tonight! Not part of anyone’s idea of “the canon”, but a lot of fun – and playing a gig in France with Neil Innes next month which should be something to witness too.

Funny how after Reynolds sets himself up against Tom and Chuck, we’re no closer in understanding his own take on Nevermind (unless his opposition to “Behaviour” offers a clue), or the Canon itself. Plus his white script on black background is headache inducing.

Having said that, I’m intrigued by the “Rock-Critical legend” he teases us with. May be a former Creem contributor, perhaps?

From my Tumblr:

“I think the article’s conclusion was a bit rough, unfortunately. The thing I’m wondering about is really the idea of importance – if a record is actually “important”, and if the people who say it is are doing their jobs, then its impact on pop should be such that you can construct an accurate image of it without ever really hearing it.”

So the fault is partly mine – I was finishing a column in something of a hurry.

The NME also had a piece this week that flirted with the idea of irreverence, getting two of their writers to debate ‘The Velvet Underground & Nico’, but – spoilers alert – they ended up agreeing it was great.

@MarkM. The Searchers coming in top-10 remains a bit of a mystery. Mentally, I think a lot of people just edit out all of the comedy interludes, and think of the film just as being its lyrical passages including the beginning and end (which are great!). That’s the only Ford in the top 100 though right? So there’s hardly a Ford lanslide, unlike say three dreyers and four Godards in the top 50 (Has anyone seen Godard’s ’90s documentary Histoire(s) which gets in at #48? It’s almost inconceievable to me that it should rank ahead of, I dunno, Third Man, Aguirre, Casablanca, etc.. But maybe I really need to see it.)

Overall, I agree with your point about solemnness. I think of another made-up word too: museum-y-ness. I was intially irked when I’d only seen the top 50 that there were 4 Godards and no Bunuels (Vardas, Powell and Pressburgers, Altmans, etc.). But when I saw 51-100, well, Un Chien Andalou finally gets Bunuel in down around #95. That’s so *museum-y* and dutiful. Yes, Bunuel’s 16 minute fragment is important and should be seen by everyone at some point, but no way is it better than everything Bunuel spent the next 50 years making, mastering the whole medium, becoming a real competitor for Hitchcock, and so on.

24 Hour Psycho for top-10 by 2032!

The Searchers seems better if you don’t watch it, I think. That is not (entirely) intended as a diss. As you say, it is very uneven, and having heard about its great reputation I was amazed by how much weak material is in there. Still, that was 20 years ago now, and it is the powerful scenes that linger in the memory and make me think of it as a great film. I suspect the same is true for most of S&S’s electorate. How many actually sat down and watched the movies again before they voted for them?

There must be albums that are better if you don’t listen to them, too. Never Mind the Bollocks?

The one that shocked me was Apocalypse Now, ranking as the fourth-best film made in colour.

And you have to love Zizek, don’t you? I just read this John Gray piece (http://bit.ly/MKH3av), which quite convincingly made the case that he is a very silly man, but his list sounds like comedy gold. What else is on it, I wonder. Hot Tub Time Machine? The Great St Trinian’s Train Robbery? Space Jam?

@225 That’s a bit unfair about Richard Ayoade, who has directed a movie, Submarine. I’ve not seen it, but heard good things about it. Also, he’s falling over in Hollywood now, too, in The Watch.

Poptimist factoid from a rockist book (Charles Granata’s I Just Wasn’t Made For These Times: Brian Wilson And The Making Of Pet Sounds) – The version of Rubber Soul that inspired Wilson, that he believed was the most artistically cohesive and consistent pop LP of the day was the US version with the scrambled track listing including two songs held over from Help! Obvious really but it never occurred to me before!