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"his book":Talkin' bout the very sexist Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up To Me, but wasn't there maybe a much later collection also? Anyway, the later edition of Been is is worth getting for Thomas Pynchon's introduction/memoir (he and Farina were college roommates). But start with David Hajdu's Postively 4th Street: The Lives and Times of Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Mimi Baez Farina, and Richard Farina. It tells a *lot* of stuff about certain green vectors of the 50s and 60s, incl lots of good interviews, and Pynchon very helpful (via faxes, or is it faxxes? more than one fax). Marcus and Xgau denounced Hajdu (who also wrote bio of Strayhorn, and the new 'un about anti-comic books crusaders) for supposedly giving F. too much credit for postive (or any) influence on budding Bobby D., but, even with the power of suggestion in M.'s and X's words, I didn't get that. It's more Hajdu the roving reporter, though of course he's constructing a narrative, however speculative. Funny that Farina the bold Byronic figure can sound too much the stereotypical four-eyed folkie for some, and I can hear why there are objections, to, say "Pack Up Your Sorrows," but like they say in Nashville (the movie, at least), hit don't bother me. Though yeah, "horrbly dated and cool" applies to more than one song-still, the nascent progressive-speculative bit is in there too...(Also really like cover of "Reno, Nevada" on Fairport Convention's Heyday--hey, there should be a tribute album!)
― dow, Tuesday, 6 May 2008 18:44 (fifteen years ago) link
six months pass...
this: Positively 4th Street: The Lives and Times of Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Mimi Baez Farina and Richard Farina (Paperback) is worth a look.
fascinating portrait of Dick & Mimi. in a roundabut way I suspect it might've influenced Dylan's own memoir. it got lousy reviews from the greybeards but hey, who you gonna believe, Greil Marcus or me?
― m coleman, Monday, 24 November 2008 10:43 (fifteen years ago) link
nine months pass...
three months pass...
two years pass...
I've slept on these records for too long, for no good reason. Now for the past few days, I've been listening to them on and off. I've completely fallen in love with Mimi and Richard. At first I thought 'Reflections in a Crystal Wind' was the best folk rock record , but then I listened to 'Celebrations For A Grey Day' and now I can't decide. Has anyone heard Dick Fariña and Eric Von Schmidt? There is a romance I fall into while listening to these records, like I get to participate in their love of each other and their love of music. Also the list on the back of the first record of what went into making it is classic!
"In whole or borrowed part then, these are songs we made up from an android synthesis of one-a-day vitamins, Tropicana orange juice, fresh country eggs, Kraft homogenized cheese, tetra-paks of fortified milk, Cheerios with sun-ripened bananas, Corn-flake-breaded chicken, hot-fudge sundaes, Dairy-Queen root-beer floats, cheeseburgers, hybrid cream-style corn, riboflavin extract, brewer's yeast, crunchy peanut butter, tuna-fish casseroles, pancakes and imitation maple syrup, chuck steaks, occasional Maine lobster, social-tea biscuits, defatted wheat germ, Kellogg's Concentrate, chopped string-beans, Wonder bread, Bosco, Bird's Eye frozen peas, shredded spinach, french-fried onion rings, escarole salads, lentil stews, sundry fowl innards, pecan-sandies, Almond Joys, aureomycin, penicillin, anti-tetanus, toxoid, smallopx vaccine, alka-seltzer, Empirin, Vick's Vapo-rub, Arrid with chlorophyl, Super-Anahist nose spray, Dristan decongestant, John Jameson's, Tullamore Dew, Cutty Shark, occasional Beefeater, Schweppes quinine water, dasrk Bacardi, vin ordinaire, Harvey's Dry Sherry, assorted Algerian herbs for the head, and what you might call general exercise."
― JacobSanders, Thursday, 12 January 2012 05:08 (twelve years ago) link
one year passes...
Not, as in, I purchased these records as a gift for Bruce Langhorne, but, you know, bought them because he plays on 'em. Or at least the second one, right? Must revisit.
― Jimmywine Dyspeptic, Friday, 12 July 2013 20:52 (ten years ago) link
three years pass...
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four years pass...