The Replacements: Classic or Dud?

and I think I'm the only fan of Askin' Me Lies

that one's great too! "they're blind" is bad, yes. "i won't" is also awful, no idea why alfred singled it out

I w-w-w-w-w-w-w-onn't.

i like when the fake band in the movie Saved! covers "We'll Inherit the Earth"

excellent example of mediocre song sounding sort of decent in context of mediocre movie

Is any of Bob's non-Replacements stuff worth hearing? I'm guessing no, but curious (just cued up Static Taxi on Spotify). Every single thing I read about him is heartbreaking.

Assuming that he's playing guitar on this, the idea that he couldn't function as a guitarist is insane, but I'm not sure what the deal is.

I knew the anniversary of his death must have been recent as I tend to subconsciously remember things like that. The facebook page is just really hard to read without crying. https://www.facebook.com/Bob-Stinson-35135237355/?fref=nf

I know where that bench is, nice little spot to sit

Thanks. All I see is photos, mostly. Still made me a little sad as well, though.

You know another thing that got me? After I reached the end of the book proper and kept going on into he notes section and saw:

Author interviews with Lonnie Stinson, Tommy Stinson, Anita Stinson, and Robert Flemal. Other Sources Minnesota, State of, Department of Corrections. Uniform case report: “Robert Neil Stinson,” June, 30, 1975. ———. Monthly progress report: “Robert Neil Stinson,” October 3, 1975.

etc.

I started the book and, man, it's just heartbreaking from page one.

Oh no, factual error on page 26! Neighborhood Threat is on Lust For Life, not The idiot.

Send it back.

the goo goo dolls biography will be perfectly and pristinely fact-checked, edited, produced, mixed and mastered and will have no errors whatsoever.

This was my first exposure to them and looking back, Paul was the weakest link (in this performance):

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x6yi30_what-a-mess_music

I'm not saying it's great, but listening to Static Taxi was not a complete waste of time.

Just found this and had to laugh. I guess I turned into Ned 12 years later:

Heh, yeah, Stink is still my favorite -- the first 'Mats I ever heard and really the only one I think I actively care about. One song too long, though -- "Go" was sorta useless. Just give me the noise (and the cop -- 'this is the Minneapolis police, the party is over!').
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Friday, July 11, 2003 6:56 PM (12 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Kind of interesting to hear the Replacements filtered through San Francisco. I'm slightly fascinated at the moment about Replacements/San Francisco indie nexus, which I'd never thought much about. Not sure if that gets covered in the book, as I'm still near the beginning.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8DBpVdybwk

At the very least, the book has finally learned me the actual lyrics to "Bastards of Young."

I knew the Replacements were big drinkers, but I had no idea they carried it to such excess as detailed in the book (not to mention all the self-destruction when it came to their careers, despite their serious desires for a hit record). It’s a wonder any of them still have functioning livers. And it seemed that every new character Mehr introduced came from a family with a history of hard drinking and/or mental illness. One of the saddest rock bios ever.

otm. There were points where I just had to stop reading, as it was making me feel hungover (it didn't help that I read most of it while recuperating from an insane stomach virus). Had a similar experience with the Keith Moon bio.

Replacements are like a band with four Keith Moons.

Well, and a few Kenny Joneses toward the end.

Which is ironic, given where Jones came from.

I wrote this on FB yesterday: I don't read rock bios but this Replacements book by Bob Mehr is among the more enervating stories of its kind I've read. I keep thinking, "What is about America that turns the John Cheevers and Scott Fitzgeralds and Paul Westerbergs into mean infantile drunks?" Then I think, "Right, it's a touring van through north Louisiana and south Arkansas.'

Sure, but obviously he's also self-medicating. Depression, low self-esteem, better to preemptively self-destruct than to fail, etc., which is all in the book. Also, for most of the band's existence the drinking age was only 19, which is a bad temptation for a band of high-school dropouts from alcoholic and/or abusive and certainly negligent or absentee families. Like I got from the Motley Crue book way back when, these guys were all self-destructive and prone to substance abuse before they even formed a band.

Ya think?

Self destructive and self medicating is more or less the American Way. Westerberg is just better at communicating about it than a lot of his peers. Or through it. Or writing songs about it.

I think a lot about if there's something about living in the Midwest that explains this or if I'm just projecting.

i love the replacements but find most rock bios a chore (w/ obvious exceptions like tosches, guralnick, jon savage, stanley booth), so i never would've picked this up but i'm intrigued by the descriptions here. maybe i'll give it a shot.

It's not on the level of say, Chronicles or Careless Love, but it is certainly a fine rock bio. But as this thread makes clear, it's bleak as hell. And I'm only up to Sorry Ma.

I've been reading a bunch of these lately, and while I think it's better than the Grace Jones and the Elvis Costello (which is a weird sort of hybrid of ideas), it's not quite as good as Warren Zanes' Tom Petty book, which is quieter but just as sad at times.

I actually preferred this to Careless Love, which struck me as having a pretty dispassionate tone.

Huh, I actually think this one is pretty dispassionate, too, in a good, journalistic way. Not passing judgement, not rooting for anyone to succeed or fail. Just the facts, let the subjects interview make up their own minds.

Only prob I have with the book is the use of "said" when attributing quotes. I'm not sure what the correct verb tense solution was/is, but I would have liked to know which quotes are what the parties involved are saying *now* (from new interviews), and which are quotes they said *then* (in past interviews). Book doesn't always clarify.

There's something about the way Mehr lays out the story and sets up various dramas that I found missing from Guralnick's book (though, significantly, said qualities were not missing from Last Train to Memphis). Mehr seems more engaged with/invested in the subject matter.

Did this movie ever get released?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUGpDlJYQTE&index=208&list=FLAgf5iJsS7dbph_2rxJjPiQ

sets up various dramas that I found missing from Guralnick's book

The drama in Careless Love is all happening within Elvis. It wasn't like a band member was going to give him any trouble. Even Col. Tom would have done anything Elvis wanted, if he just asked. But he never did.

Then, the last 5 years were just a death spiral that was just so vivid and disturbing. That was my main takeaway from Careless Love, just how bad Elvis was with drugs from about 1972 onward.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51mjsxOa-40&app=desktop

I saw Hayday at a Minneapolis film festival, but even here it's only been screened a handful of times. I would imagine music licensing is a nightmare, and the director doesn't seem very interested in wider release. xpost

http://blog.mcnallysmith.edu/blog/2011/10/04/an-interview-with-rick-fuller-director-of-first-avenue-hayday/

The drama in Careless Love is all happening within Elvis. It wasn't like a band member was going to give him any trouble. Even Col. Tom would have done anything Elvis wanted, if he just asked. But he never did.

Then, the last 5 years were just a death spiral that was just so vivid and disturbing. That was my main takeaway from Careless Love, just how bad Elvis was with drugs from about 1972 onward.

― kornrulez6969, Wednesday, March 16, 2016 2:42 AM (7 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Yeah, it's been a while since I read it, but I was surprised at how disengaged Guralnick seemed (though not always; there were brief, welcome moments where his critical voice popped up); maybe it's an unfair criticism, but it got to a point where I felt like I was just reading lists of prescription drugs...which is essentially what Elvis' life had become anyway.

I really like Guralnick but I struggled with his Sam Cooke for the same reason. "On the morning of blah blah, Cooke wore a white suit with brown shoes and took a cab from such and such street to this other street and paid the driver $. He stepped out, left foot first, and closed the door behind him with his right hand." It got so bogged down in the details I started losing interest in the bigger picture.

YES, that's it. Details, details details...which, as the 'Mats books shows, can be assembled in a way that's engaging and moves the story along. And I generally like Guralnick -- Sweet Soul Music and the first Elvis volume are ace. But I passed on the Cooke bio, fearing it'd be similar in tone to Careless Love (and the reviews confirmed this -- too much talk, not enough rock).

Interesting. I love the details, and the rigidly chronological structure. To me it really brought Elvis to life. Plus, throughout the entire Careless Love era, Elvis didn't really record that much essential music outside of what he did in Memphis in 1968-69.

Not sure how much fun it would be to read a deep critical analysis of Moody Blue.

The thing is, I LOVE the '70s Elvis box, and '70s Elvis in general, much more than '60s Elvis, and even more than some '50s Elvis. I guess the details I wanted were more about how he picked his (incredible, amazing) band, how he chose the material for He Touched Me...and tbf, maybe it was there and I'm just forgetting it.

Plus, throughout the entire Careless Love era, Elvis didn't really record that much essential music outside of what he did in Memphis in 1968-69.

Hahahahahaaaaa fuck yooooouuuuu

'70s Elvis > '50s Elvis > '60s Elvis

Cosigning that.

now that we've covered elvis and winona in addition to the replacements i feel like this thread really gets me

I really like Guralnick but I struggled with his Sam Cooke for the same reason. "On the morning of blah blah, Cooke wore a white suit with brown shoes and took a cab from such and such street to this other street and paid the driver $. He stepped out, left foot first, and closed the door behind him with his right hand." It got so bogged down in the details I started losing interest in the bigger picture.

― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, March 16, 2016 10:10 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

It's funny--this is exactly what initially frustrated me about Robin Kelley's Thelonious Monk bio, which I struggled with and almost put down a few times. But then I sorta got into the groove of it and it ended up being one of my favorite music biographies. It's a matter of adapting to that style, I think. Like reading Gertrude Stein or something. But I hear ya - it can be tedious. "Monk's regular driver, Gary, was sick that Thursday, so Gary's brother Larry was given the job, but he had to borrow a car because he didn't have one of his own" etc etc*

Bought the Mats book, eager to dive in. Unfortunately it arrived on the same day as the new edition of England's Hidden Reverse. I may never read fiction again!

*(not an exact quote but pretty close)

wholeheartedly agree about 70s Elvis

xp

That Monk bio stymied me, too, but I might go back to it. I think my local library has it.

Yeah, couldn't get into it either.