Robert Quine

Maybe he just got that way, or more that way, toward the end; the drug problem got pretty bad, judging by his running buddy The Hound's account, still posted maybe.

Just came across this recently!
https://sorcererrecords.bandcamp.com/album/escape

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a3080446209_10.jpg

I saw him around pretty consistently for 20 years, as I lived a few streets over from him, and his body language was always "do not approach," which is also true of fucking Xgau, Jarmusch, Glass and nearly every single notable person to live the East Village from 1975 to 2000.

Given Quine's fruitful tenure with the likes of Reed, Lloyd Cole, Matthew Sweet, Laswell, Zorn, etc., I find it hard to believe that no one wanted to work with him, unless he was truly hard to work with.

not hard to imagine him being too proud to chase after work in those later years as well, the kind of person who laments that no one calls but never picks up the phone

yeah, he didn't have a management/PR structure of any kind that would get his name out there…and not that I knew him, but certainly I knew enuff people who knew him to attest that his pride, combined with his dogged belief that Raw Power and Agharta were the last remotely good records ever made, would have prevented him from working steadily… he was surly as fuck, and Lou Reed (or Sylvia) signs the checks, so he would have been the one that gets to be surly… I don't imagine Mike Rathke would get awfully testy…

xpost - one eye open i bet that is exactly right

I fucking love that Harris/Quine LP, very cool and unique sound

definitely one of my favorites, I didn't know the ending of the story was this sad though.

I sold my copy of "Escape" back when it was way out of print and going for good money, it was interesting but kinda not my thing, but different strokes.

Basic and Escape sound a heck of a lot more contemporary to me now than they did when I heard them back in the late 90s for the first time. Back then I kept thinking - you know this would sound so much better with a full band - now it kinda just sounds like how more like how music is made. You got to pay to get sample packs that sound that grungy, that's an upgrade now.

Sorry, thought I'd already linked this, which incl. lots of Quine talk, esp. lately:
Lou Reed: The Blue Mask

Hadn't seen this interview before!
https://www.vintageguitar.com/2918/robert-quine/

also:
For this feature we spoke with Quine’s bandmates Richard Hell and Ivan Julian, his longtime collaborator Fred Maher, songwriters Matthew Sweet and Lloyd Cole, disc jockey and author James “the Hound” Marshall, and others. Times good quotes from The Man Himself:
https://www.premierguitar.com/artists/forgotten-heroes-robert-quine

that vintage guitar interview is fantastic. what an articulate, self-aware guy he is there. and what a scholar of early rock guitar. tremendous.

That’s a great interview. His mention of Mickey Baker brought to mind Andrew Hickey’s “A History Of Rock In 500 Songs” podcast episode on “Love Is Strange”: https://500songs.com/podcast/episode-49-love-is-strange-by-mickey-and-sylvia/

I was listening to that episode while driving. My surprise at hearing that Baker had studied with Xenakis — and hearing one startling result of those studies — almost made me drive off the road.

wonderful, thank you for posting

Speaking of Quine and guitars, I remember reading eons ago that during the Voidoids tour of the UK (opening for the Ramones, maybe?) he would get into fights in the audience with gobbers for spitting on his vintage Strat.

just another thank you for that Vintage Guitar interview, really cool

like, I love how he casually drops this

After the Velvet Underground, there hasn’t been much that influenced my playing. There are three, however – Iggy & the Stooges, Raw Power; Miles Davis from ’72 to ’75, and Brian Eno’s On Land from ’82.

(can you spot the one that's different?)

Thanks to sleeve for recent Television thread remynder of this one!

Ikue Mori | Robert Quine | Marc Ribot ‎– Painted Desert [Full Album]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-vGHBqept3Q