RIP Grant Hart

btw this is very Grant and hilarious I think chris mentioned it upthread but if someone was being annoying and yelling for a particular song, he would start to play it, then stop and do another song to troll them, then eventually give them what they wanted (which was inevitably probably something he was gonna play all along)

Don't Want To Know If You Are Lonely (w/fake "Never Talking To You Again" intro)
Barbara
St. James Infirmary (w/fake "Never Talking to You Again" intro)
[new song] ("I knew since then")
Back From Somewhere
Evergreen Memorial Drive
Never Talking To You Again

Was that a saxophone solo during "What's Going On?" in flappy's video?

WGO indeed!

ok... this was posted by a friend of a friend on Facebook...he's from Serbia and said Grant played Serbia in 1994 when no Western artists would come there due to international sanctions

given what I heard was his fairly haphazard to say the least approach to management, booking, etc. my mind is boggling how that happened

I remember that Watt opening set very, didn't he call out some woman aggressively and caustically at that one or maybe that was the "Hot Wax" release show?...He could freeze out a room like no one's business.

His vers of "St James Infirmary" was so good.

have any of your interviews been excerpted in NYT obits before, Josh?

bad editing in said obit… "Mr Hart's contributions as drummer were not as visible as those of Mr Mould, the more obvious bandleader."

I remember that Watt opening set very, didn't he call out some woman aggressively and caustically at that one or maybe that was the "Hot Wax" release show?...He could freeze out a room like no one's business.

His vers of "St James Infirmary" was so good.

― chr1sb3singer, Friday, September 15, 2017 9:15 AM (nine minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

haha yeah i don't know, i get the shows all mixed up but yeah when the banter turned cold it was really something

Amazing story, UMS! Great interview, Josh!

Wonderful piece, Al. And this is otm: Call “2541” the “Maybe I’m Amazed” of genteel poverty

Would totally buy Having Fun with Grant Hart Onstage

btw - Josh that's the best interview I've read w/Grant

yeah, thanks for the link

Thanks. For obvious reasons I wish there were a lot more of them out there.

do you have an archive transcripts?

I've been bitching about this forever but can we briefly discuss how fucking insane "New Day Rising" would have been if you swapped out "How to Skin a Cat" & "Whatcha Drinkin" for "2541"?

Was 2541 written at that point? That's nuts!

I like Robert Forster's version too

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_uiLSk6lLE

yeah josh that interview is great

Was 2541 written at that point? That's nuts!

― Cyndi Larper (stevie), Friday, 15 September 2017 15:28 (one minute ago) Permalink

It was written for the record, they practiced it, Bob didn't like it.

stevie, read the bit at the bottom of this page:

http://www.thirdav.com/hd_images/msp_sites/2541_house.html

Grant always kind of down played it but I think there is a reason that it was his first solo single

Really gutted about this. RIP Grant

do you have an archive transcripts?

I must - and the cassette, too - but tbh my editor at the time (who is now at NPR) was so cool I'm sure it was published more or less verbatim, even if I half remember a couple of other stories that may or may not have been from this interview.

About to drive from NYC to Bethesda with friends
There are things it will be obligatory to play on this drive, idgaf

Also - things I didn't know about grant until yesterday:

He has a kid?
Fake Name Graphics was grant?

Also - is there audio of that show w the little johnny jewel encore? Or even just the encore?

I've read that he has two kids, both adults now I think.

xpost OK, found the original transcript, and I was totally right, there is a big hunk where he goes off the record. Talks a bit about Bob, the immediate aftermath of the band's breakup, and, tangentially, the Replacements. Angry and interesting and maybe not totally surprising, yet ... off the record, so don't know what to do with it.

Let's all grab a beer and discuss it.

Post it on 77

Eh forget I said that

I've been struggling with how to write about Hart's queerness, of which I've seen little but passing mentions.

I honestly didn't even know he had kids or a family.

Alfred, this guy tried awhile ago, re Grant and Bob

http://dentalhospital.tumblr.com/post/123117605615/bob-and-grant

I've been bitching about this forever but can we briefly discuss how fucking insane "New Day Rising" would have been if you swapped out "How to Skin a Cat" & "Whatcha Drinkin" for "2541"?

― chr1sb3singer, Friday, September 15, 2017 10:23 AM (fifty-seven minutes ago) Bookmark

totally completely fucking insane!!!
omg

yeah it's kind of infuriating in retrospect, it's one thing if it were left off this perfect record but to leave it off in favor of two obvious throwaways is pretty shitty

Now That You Know Me, is this the only Grant solo track that was (if I'm remembering right, I think I have a copy of it somewhere) demoed or played with Husker Du?

xpost
I mean I don't know if it was those two songs specifically but if I wrote "2541" and was told it wasn't good enough and those two songs stayed...I don't know if I would have been in the band for two more yrs.

I read that Bob's (stated) reason was it sounded like a contemporary Dream Syndicate song? (mighta been from his book)

I honestly didn't even know he had kids or a family.

― Josh in Chicago, Friday, September 15, 2017 12:06 PM (thirty-three minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

wasn't this a partial catalyst in the breakup of the band? his kid was conceived around this time, right?

or at least, it happened close to when they broke up

xp yes, Bob claims in his book he said to Grant "hey uhhh.... eh it kinda sounds like the Dream Syndicate single now, maybe we shouldn't." and then suggests that was "the beginning of the end." obviously take a salt shaker w that

Is he thinking about "Tell Me When It's Over?" Because I hear that, if only very loosely.

well sounds like he meant it planted a seed of discontent xp

xp I doubt it, that's from '82

There's a version of Now That You Know Me played here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJr6GIyUi80

I read that Bob's (stated) reason was it sounded like a contemporary Dream Syndicate song? (mighta been from his book)

― ice cream social justice (Dr Morbius), Friday, September 15, 2017 11:40 AM (ten minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah i love this reason of Bob's, don't want to sound like this iconic song no one can seem to remember the name of by global mega stars Dream Syndicate that dominated the airwaves and MTV in the fall of 84!!

well, he wasn't a soothsayer :)

at some point yesterday after the fog of sadness lifted, I though 'Grant has a wife?!".

great jon wurster appreciation: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/drummer-jon-wurster-on-grant-hart-the-center-of-a-hurricane-w503420

I have been playing through all of the Husker Du albums, something I don't think I've ever actually done before; as a kid, I got very hung up on Zen Arcade, particularly "Hare Krishna" and "Reoccurring Dreams", and isolated a good amount of my Husker appreciation to that album and specifically those two pieces of music.

I'm still not a gigantic fan of hardcore vocals but these guys are continuously playing their asses off to a degree I certainly didn't appreciate as a kid. Also, "Diane" is a sledgehammer of a song; I almost got hung up on repeating that but I really want to go through the whole catalog before circling back on obsession points.

I am finding that I like this band even more than I thought I did, which makes me sadder about Grant's passing and that I didn't appreciate what he and his bandmates had done more while he was alive.

RIP

particularly "Hare Krishna" and "Reoccurring Dreams", and isolated a good amount of my Husker appreciation to that album and specifically those two pieces of music.

I always wished they'd done more things along the lines of "Reoccurring Dreams." Given how incredible it is (particularly the live versions), it's sad and kind of bewildering that they never went back to that well.

They did a mean helter skelter live which is a kind of similar thing - basically a vehicle for weird jazz rock improv noise. There was version on the 'don't wanna know if you are lonely' 12"