Robert Wyatt: Classic or Dud?

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this is a thread about robert wyatt, dadaismus

do some research before you accuse people of being new labour

― mark s (mark s), Thursday, 10 July 2003 11:25 (twenty-two years ago)

Yes, that was nasty of me - I'd rather be accused of being a Stalinist

― Dadaismus (Dada), Thursday, 10 July 2003 11:28 (twenty-two years ago)

zing!

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Thursday, 10 July 2003 11:29 (twenty-two years ago)

dadaismus i'm sure if you started a green gartside thread we'd get around to his "politics" eventually (which on the basis of his early singles seemed a bit bedsit-flaky to me).

i have a deep respect coupled with a bit of bemused exasperation re. robert wyatt. he reminds me of a lot of people i knew growing up.

― amateurist (amateurist), Thursday, 10 July 2003 13:48 (twenty-two years ago)

ten months pass...

that song where he drops "hiroshima" and the deposed president of iran...on the new one.... i wish i didn't have this suspicion that his politics are less about humanity and more about berating the us.

― amateur!st (amateurist), Saturday, 22 May 2004 06:17 (twenty-two years ago)

Brits -- so testy about their political affiliations. Here in America, we just pride ourselves on not being able to read.

― Naive Teen Idol (Naive Teen Idol), Saturday, 22 May 2004 17:11 (twenty-two years ago)

I don't think being a tory is automatically worse than being a marxist.

― de, Saturday, 22 May 2004 17:34 (twenty-two years ago)

three months pass...

rock bottom is great makeout music for depressives

― amateur!!!st (amateurist), Friday, 17 September 2004 05:20 (twenty-one years ago)

makes me smile he's on the new björk album

― JaXoN (JasonD), Friday, 17 September 2004 05:54 (twenty-one years ago)

Anyone who thinks that Rock Bottom is music for depressives or about depression hasn't listened to it properly.

― Donnie Smith The Quiz Kid, Friday, 17 September 2004 07:17 (twenty-one years ago)

that's rather condescending.

the album is very melancholic--it's the urgent combination of melancholy and whimsy (blended such that you often can't tell them apart) that is a big part of what makes this record so special to me. the wordless vocalizing at the end of the first track (??) is one of the most powerfully ... desolate stretches of music i know. such things are in the ear of the listener, of course. but considering the circumstances under which it was made it's not hard to imagine depression being one of many states that is being evoked in rock bottom.

― amateur!!!st (amateurist), Friday, 17 September 2004 07:30 (twenty-one years ago)

anyway, i was only half-joking when i called it make out music for depressives. perhap's its the underwater metaphor, but this album has powerful erotic and melancholic aspects. what is "alafib" but an unusually passionate confession of need and devotion..? i don't know how to put this, but...wyatt's being suddenly totally dependent on alfie obviously intensified their bond and their physical and emotional intimacy...i daresay you can hear this on the record (though obv the lyrics are not particularly explicit at any point, but they aren't usually that abstruse either). anyway the erotics of this record are not the usual pop erotics. its an erotics that includes washing your hands, childbirth, sitting on a train alone, swimming.....

i have a long and intense history w/this record (incl. listening to it in venice where wyatt composed much of the music)...

― amateur!!!st (amateurist), Friday, 17 September 2004 07:41 (twenty-one years ago)

something of the profusion and confusion of emotions emmitted by this record is captured by the recitation performed by ivor cutler at the end.

― amateur!!!st (amateurist), Friday, 17 September 2004 07:44 (twenty-one years ago)

Rock Bottom is about someone finding their way back to the world and - vide closing Cutler recitative - learning to laugh again.

― Donnie Smith The Quiz Kid, Friday, 17 September 2004 09:02 (twenty-one years ago)

That's a good analysis of it

― Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 17 September 2004 09:03 (twenty-one years ago)

"Alifib/Alife" - progression from displacement/uncertainty (am I floating? Am I paralysed? Am I dead? Has the anaesthetic worn off?) to recognition of unconditional love (and isn't it about time btw that Wyatt gave Mike Oldfield credit for his guitar on this track?) and finally to raw sex and climax (Gary Windo's dualist sexy beast of bass clt/tenor sex sounds very horny), and, via closing Benge voiceover, back to life. Meanwhile, world outside continues on its silly oblivious way ("Little Red Robin Hood Hit The Road") so author seeks solace in the blackly chucklesome life of the inner mind (Cutler's laugh backed by Frith's viola screeches - set me free? What would be the point?).

― Donnie Smith The Quiz Kid, Friday, 17 September 2004 09:10 (twenty-one years ago)

That's actually Robert Wyatt playing guitar on that track - compare the playing to the playing on "Moon In June"

― Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 17 September 2004 09:12 (twenty-one years ago)

... I've always had the feeling it might be speeded up, Les Paul-style, however

― Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 17 September 2004 09:13 (twenty-one years ago)

I find it an easier record to admire than love - it is very beautiful, it IS as great as its admirers say it is but it takes me to a place, emotionally, that I don't want to spend very much time. Yes, the theme is look-we-have-come-through, and you never doubt Wyatt's sincerity for a second - he really is a lovely man - but I still find listening to it a mildly depressing experience. Humanity cannot bear very much reality and this is too much of a certain kind of reality for me.

x-posts

― frankiemachine, Friday, 17 September 2004 09:21 (twenty-one years ago)

It's amazing but I have never found this album to be even remotely depressing - not for a nanosecond

― Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 17 September 2004 09:27 (twenty-one years ago)

no...i mean yes!

― gaz (gaz), Friday, 17 September 2004 09:30 (twenty-one years ago)

You sure about that? I read an interview with Oldfield years ago where he was all pissed off about not getting a credit on that track.

*digs out dog-eared copy of End Of An Ear for comparison purposes*

Hmmm, I see your point. If it's Wyatt it's bloody good playing for someone who says he isn't that good at playing the guitar.

(either that or it's his funny Italian organ, or Hugh Hopper's bass speeded up?)

― Donnie Smith The Quiz Kid, Friday, 17 September 2004 09:38 (twenty-one years ago)

CORREKSHIN: digs out "Moon In June" as opposed to End Of An Ear.

Interesting record, though, End Of An Ear; it's like an extended avant-scat variation on Gil Evans' "Las Vegas Tango."

― Donnie Smith The Quiz Kid, Friday, 17 September 2004 09:40 (twenty-one years ago)

Funny, I wondered if it might not actually be a bass guitar speeded-up, so not so much Les Paul-style as Holger Czukay-style.

― Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 17 September 2004 09:45 (twenty-one years ago)

... also Wyatt claims he can't play keyboards very well either but we know differently (xpost)

― Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 17 September 2004 09:49 (twenty-one years ago)

also he can't sing!

― gaz (gaz), Friday, 17 September 2004 09:51 (twenty-one years ago)

... but he can drum like a motherfucker

― Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 17 September 2004 09:52 (twenty-one years ago)

it is one of the most life affirming record ever made.

― gaz (gaz), Friday, 17 September 2004 10:07 (twenty-one years ago)

Absolutely

― Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 17 September 2004 10:09 (twenty-one years ago)

i want to add something to this discussion, because this album is so big for me, but amateurist's description of it is so fucking OTM, i cant imagine i have anything new to add.

― peter smith (plsmith), Friday, 17 September 2004 12:21 (twenty-one years ago)

Rock Bottom is about someone finding their way back to the world and - vide closing Cutler recitative - learning to laugh again.

-- Donnie Smith The Quiz Kid (what_d...) (webmail), September 17th, 2004 5:02 AM. (later) (link)

i can see our "interpretations" being complementary, more or less. but i'm reluctant to describe this album as being "about" any one thing, especially something as cliché as "learning to laugh again." i don't think the album has a narrative per se, or an obvious forward progression. or at least i've never chosen to hear it that way.

― amateur!!!st (amateurist), Friday, 17 September 2004 12:40 (twenty-one years ago)

>(and isn't it about time btw that Wyatt gave Mike Oldfield credit for his guitar on this track?)

I agree that's not Oldfield on that track, but it's definitely Oldfield on the final track 'Little Red Robin Hood Hit the Road', the huge soaring melodic line that turns into the 'can't you see them?' riff. One of my favorite moments of recorded sound in the history of our world etc.

Oldfield is credited as a musician on the back cover of the original vinyl, but I suspect Oldfield's saying he wrote that entire solo, the melody and riff, and deserved a co-authoring credit for the entire track (I would be obliged if you could find his exact complaint)... the riff is nearly identical to one of the sections of 'Ommadawn'. I still see it as more of a break in the middle of Wyatt's song, but it is certainly Oldfield's solo that pushes it over the top.

― (Jon L), Friday, 17 September 2004 17:35 (twenty-one years ago)

One of my favorite moments of recorded sound in the history of our world etc.

YES

― amateur!!st, Friday, 17 September 2004 17:38 (twenty-one years ago)

(whenever someone makes fun of me for owning five Oldfield records I just point them towards that solo)

― (Jon L), Friday, 17 September 2004 17:40 (twenty-one years ago)

'mostly fish... mostly porpoise...'

― cºzen (Cozen), Friday, 17 September 2004 17:48 (twenty-one years ago)

anyone else here obsessed with the version of Little Red Riding Hood on the Henry Cow conerts cd?

― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Friday, 17 September 2004 17:48 (twenty-one years ago)

not obsessed, but that's good

― amateur!!st, Friday, 17 September 2004 17:50 (twenty-one years ago)

the '75 Henry Cow/Robert Wyatt tour, they'd play the entirety of 'Ruth is Stranger than Richard' in sequence

― (Jon L), Friday, 17 September 2004 17:52 (twenty-one years ago)

I love that "Little Red Riding Hood ..." side of the HC live LP, it's so propulsive. I've got to get it and Rock Bottom on CD so I can iPod it at work. I was just watching a multiple-generation video copy of a French TV interview/doc (from '93) and remembered there was an Italian video doc about him. Is this available on DVD now?

― nickn (nickn), Saturday, 18 September 2004 06:19 (twenty-one years ago)

Robert Wyatt was a communist in the original Marxist sense, not a Stalinist. There's a HUGE difference, but that's something you're not told in America, where even LIBERAL has become a bad word, let alone socialism.
Wyatt is pretty funny about it though - he said Trotskyism was too shouty, so he wanted to go for something completely unfashionable and contemplative.
His comment about there being many, many good,kind people in the world, yet the leaders being utter bastards is sadly pretty spot on.
And his music is wonderful. Get over your silly hipster hatred of Weller and just enjoy it. I think the Jam are hugely overrated, but I've got to hand it to Weller, that slide guitar part on Free Will And Testament is sublime.

― Stewart S, Saturday, 18 September 2004 08:51 (twenty-one years ago)

love him. his version of "I'm a Believer" is awesome. "Rock Bottom" is classic, and posters above have described it very well, I think. I also love his take on "Guantanamera" and Chic's "At Last I Am Free." And the song called "Grass." He owns "Shipbuilding," obviously. Also really liked, after some initial reservations, "Shleep." He's actually one of my heroes for a lot of reasons.

― eddie hurt (ddduncan), Saturday, 18 September 2004 16:11 (twenty-one years ago)

Classic! Uhm, yep. Although his debut is a bit over the top sometimes.

― strom (strom), Saturday, 18 September 2004 16:21 (twenty-one years ago)

nine months pass...

Revive...cuz I just bought Rock Bottom this weekend!

Wow...I'm lovin' it like a Mickey D's fruit walnut salad...

Really cool droney, crazy ol' man EZ listening prog or something....it's DEFINITELY something...that's for sure....Sea Song is just a heartbreaking love song...."Your madness fits in nicely with my own" is such a sweet like....I love the big droney songs called Little Red Robin Hood....

Great organ sounds....bewitching record.

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Monday, 11 July 2005 16:01 (twenty years ago)

The only thing I don't really like is the end of the last song (Red Riding Hood II)...where he uses this wierd stupid "rasta mon" accent

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Monday, 11 July 2005 16:11 (twenty years ago)

even that song will grow on you

― kyle (akmonday), Monday, 11 July 2005 16:39 (twenty years ago)

"At Last I Am Free" is gorgeous.

― Alfred Soto (Alfred Soto), Monday, 11 July 2005 16:52 (twenty years ago)

i picked that up used recently too...it cemented my love for mr. wyatt...

― b b, Monday, 11 July 2005 17:10 (twenty years ago)

What else is good by this dude? Is he pretty solid overall? I want more.

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Monday, 11 July 2005 17:16 (twenty years ago)

The only thing I don't really like is the end of the last song (Red Riding Hood II)...where he uses this wierd stupid "rasta mon" accent
-- M@tt He1geson (matt@game[remove]informer.com), July 11th, 2005.

That's Ivor Cutler and that's how Ivor Cutler sounds

― chris besinger (chris besinger), Monday, 11 July 2005 17:19 (twenty years ago)

"Ruth is Stranger than Richard", "Shleep" and "Cuckooland" are excellent

― chris besinger (chris besinger), Monday, 11 July 2005 17:20 (twenty years ago)

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