| Author | Message | ||
     Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10058 Registered: 05-2005 |
Here https://www.smh.com.au/culture/music/can -i-borrow-a-lipstick-how-lindy-morrison- got-way-more-than-that-20210316-p57b40.h tml | ||
| Andrew Kerr Member Username: Andrew_k Post Number: 1418 Registered: 04-2005 |
A review in the Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/m ar/25/my-rocknroll-friend-by-tracey-thor n-review-a-story-of-sexism-in-pop | ||
| Andrew Kerr Member Username: Andrew_k Post Number: 1419 Registered: 04-2005 |
This will all be very interesting ! Are we going to be asked to take sides in the forthcoming battle between Lindy and women in rock against that macho Robert F and his beloved music industry ?  Maybe the book will be more subtle than the forward in the article and the Guardian Review ? As a music fan falling in love with the Go-Betweens it never struck me or my friends for one moment as odd that the group had a woman drummer. We knew the work of the Velvets and Moe Tucker was a legend to us. For me all the stuff about there being no media focus on Lindy is down to the fact that she wasn’t a singer and she didn’t write the songs. And that is what music journalists tended to feature on. Not sure it was a case of sexism. Glad to see that Thorn recognises « Before Hollywood ». Yes Lindy’s drumming is amazing on that record and it is a shame that she was sidelined either by producers or the fads of technology. With all respect to Glenn Thompson I do wonder what she might have made of a song like « Boundary Rider » which occupies some of the same emotional landscape as « Cattle and Cane ». The latter is lifted into the absolute sublime by Lindy’s drum pattern, whilst sadly Boundary Rider sounds comparatively leaden. | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 4593 Registered: 03-2005 |
I have a major thing for Lindy Morrison. I can't wait for my copy of this book to arrive. I'm at least half-projecting but I've long seen Lindy as a person who struggled for a very long time to become comfortable in her own skin. She was fundamentally a misfit. She could not possibly conform to the social expectations for women. She could not be anything other than her own anomalous self. But however strong she was--and is--she couldn't be unconscious of the reactions of others. So many people with Lindy's level of individuality die early, from drug or alcohol abuse or from suicide. Maybe that's the best thing about the car insurance advert Pádraig has posted on here; it shows us that she made it through her 40 days (40 years?) in the desert. These vintage Andrew Denton clips have always struck me as particularly revealing. She's so restless, the proverbial cat on a hot tin roof. I swear the cigarettes are necessary to keep her in her chair: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_eHeQ9nq ssc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTOGmhUB ylg | ||
| Andrew Kerr Member Username: Andrew_k Post Number: 1420 Registered: 04-2005 |
Anyone identify the lunkhead (Raymond ?) about 1 minute in of the video ? He is frankly lucky that Lindy just didn't thump him. https://twitter.com/tracey_thorn/status/ 971742315462225920 | ||
| richard higgins Unregistered guest |
In conversation https://www.fane.co.uk/tracey-thorn | ||
| Burgers Member Username: Burgers Post Number: 180 Registered: 05-2005 |
The book is out in a few days. There’s a piece in today’s Sunday Times which suggests that Robert and Grant don’t come out of it well. Also the start of the book is about this interview : https://youtu.be/HTOGmhUBylg | ||
| Burgers Member Username: Burgers Post Number: 181 Registered: 05-2005 |
Lisa Verrico’s piece in the Sunday Times suggests that Grant gets it worse than Robert in the book. Grant is described as a heroin addict. She suggests that Robert might be relieved to come out as no worse than a coward and a fake. Ouch. Whether that’s about anything more than how they broke the band up we’ll see. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10064 Registered: 05-2005 |
Another review, this one from The Observer https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/m ar/28/my-rocknroll-friend-by-tracey-thor n-review-lindy-morrison-go-betweens-frie ndship | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10069 Registered: 05-2005 |
More on the book here https://www.nme.com/features/music-inter views/tracey-thorn-on-new-book-my-rock-n -roll-friend-friendship-go-betweens-lind y-morrison-2910547 | ||
| Neil Davenport Unregistered guest |
Louder Than War review https://louderthanwar.com/my-rock-n-roll -friend-book-review/ | ||
| Simon Withers Member Username: Sfwithers Post Number: 672 Registered: 08-2005 |
London's excellent Goldsboro Books has signed copies if anybody's interested. I'm a customer of theirs – I don't work for them! Books are one of my passions so I'll be buying this from them. https://www.goldsborobooks.com/author/tr acey-thorn | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10073 Registered: 05-2005 |
Tracey Thorn on Lindy, again. I don't think I've ever seen anything Go-Betweens related get this much publicity so quickly. https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle /2021/apr/04/my-rocknroll-friendship-wit h-lindy-morrison | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10074 Registered: 05-2005 |
And more again, https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/1919 7204.headline/ | ||
| Ted Pilkington Unregistered guest |
Nice to see Lindy get some well-deserved recognition for her efforts, if not her talents. Why, though, does she feel the need to put the boot in to Grant & Bob at every opportunity? I wonder to what extent her influence within the group was diminished following her split with Robert? Amanda joined the Go-Betweens - at Lindy’s invitation - around this time. Is it beyond the realms of possibility that this was an attempt to restore the gender-neutral status quo? To keep ‘the boys’ on a tighter leash when the possibility of the democratic vote not going in her favour emerged? In drumming terms she was unorthodox, innovative but occasionally sloppy, frequently chasing the beat instead of nailing it down. The fact that drum machines became increasingly prominent on Go-Betweens records from 1984 onwards reflect this. Equally, Robert & Grant’s playing remained fairly workmanlike but from the mid eighties their songwriting was developing at a faster rate than their musicianship was ever likely to. Amanda & John Willsteed’s contributions further underlined the need for some finesse from the rhythm section. In other words, personalities and power-struggles aside, by 1989 Lindy’s role within the band had shrunk beyond recognition. I suspect the accusations of weakness or cowardice thrown at Robert and Grant are down to the way they approached this scenario. The Go-Betweens as a brand carried some weight. Capitol records certainly thought so. Regardless of her beliefs and motivations, Lindy was evidently difficult to deal with. The wage-bill was an issue. Grant’s relationship with Amanda further muddied the waters. A solution that would satisfy everyone wasn’t forthcoming so the decision was made to hit the self-destruct button leaving everyone unhappy. In Grant & I, Robert recalls Lindy’s reaction to the news that the band was over. The call she reportedly made to Amanda suggests a number of things. The frankly odd level of control she exerted over Amanda was Lindy’s trump card once the political stakes has been raised. When things went south for Lindy she was happy to drag everything and everyone down with her. | ||
| Burgers Member Username: Burgers Post Number: 184 Registered: 05-2005 |
That’s pretty much my take on it, Ted. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10093 Registered: 05-2005 |
Another review https://www.newstatesman.com/tracey-thor n-my-rock-n-roll-friend | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 4606 Registered: 03-2005 |
From a chapter entitled "Tapestry": The night she drives the three men from Brisbane to Cairns -- a 1,000-mile overnight journey in a large white Ford, with her the only driver, and the three of them asleep in the back -- is the night she wins their respect. Sixteen hours it takes, through the darkness and the fields of sugar cane, and the only thing she has to keep her awake is Carole King's "Tapestry" on cassette. She listens to Side One, starting off with "I Feel the Earth Move", and ending "Way Over Yonder", and then she flips the tape over for "You've Got a Friend", and "Will You Love Me Tomorrow?", and as Side Two finishes, the final words ringing in her head, those man-written lyrics about being a natural woman, she goes right back to the start again, until she knows every word, and every beat of every song. Sixteen hours, and when the men wake up in the morning, they are shocked to find themselves in the north, in Townsville, and they look at her differently, like she's earned her stripes. She is exhausted, sweaty and drained, and they need to find somewhere to stay, but every motel turns them away. There are no rooms available, because while she is young and blonde and white, the three men are black. ----- My comment now: All you have to do is look at Lindy and watch some footage of her in an interview or on stage and it's clear that she has a context, a history--a vast one. She's older than the others and has traveled much further in her life than most of the other women of her generation to reach the place where we find her in those photos and video clips. There's no way the Go-Betweens would have been a tenth as unique if they hadn't inducted Lindy. The faint praise splattered on her--"recognition for her efforts, if not her talents" or "unorthodox, innovative but occasionally sloppy . . ."--could be said about the drummer in nearly every single band not populated by session musicians. This is not to specifically pick on Ted for his comment here, but he provided the handy example. It is not only her drumming, but also her sheer systemic sophistication acquired through her own bloody-mindedness that lifted both Robert and Grant from being the two little fantasizing schoolboys they were otherwise almost certain to remain. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10102 Registered: 05-2005 |
Thank you for that excerpt, Randy. Wow, that is powerful stuff. It says so much about Lindy’s character. Unfortunately it also says so much about far north Queensland in, I’m assuming, the early 70s. A pathetic racism that still exists in pockets of Australia to this day. | ||
| Ted Pilkington Unregistered guest |
Randy, Where is the assumption that, but for Lindy, Grant and Robert would have remained in a state of deluded adolescence coming from? It's no secret that they learned on the job. With Lindy's assistance, naturally. She was 6 years older, after all. Had been in other bands etc. Details that had presumably been factored in when the fantasizing schoolboys asked her to join the band. I'm with you on the bloody-mindedness but you lost me with reference to systemic sophistication. | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 4608 Registered: 03-2005 |
Have you read the book? I'm still half-way in myself. | ||
| David Nichols Unregistered guest |
Loved the Louder than War line about 'Lindy Morrison and the brilliant drummer she was a member of', and when I say 'loved', I mean proofreading really is a lost art. I also love how some contributors here have opinions on sexism and how Lindy quite possibly didn't experience it, whatever she or TT might think. I suppose it's not mansplaining per se if you're only talking to other men. Anyway, I read the actual book last week. Very enjoyable and I learnt a lot. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10104 Registered: 05-2005 |
And the hits keep coming. Financial Times review of the book https://www.ft.com/content/681fad5b-ac0f -4f73-a9d8-0b7f6058f15a Between all this publicity for the book and Lindy’s insurance ad, Go-Betweens streaming figures must be through the roof. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10106 Registered: 05-2005 |
Another: https://indaily.com.au/inreview/books-an d-poetry/2021/04/28/diary-of-a-bookselle r-everyones-talking-about-this/ | ||
| David Nichols Unregistered guest |
I'd take issue with the Jo Case review. 'The book was sparked by Morrison’s marginalisation in histories of the band, which typically characterise it as Robert Forster and Grant McLennan, with added extras.' There have been two histories of the Go-Betweens, my one and RF's one. I certainly feel Lindy was not marginalised in my one, I won't speak for the other. | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 1936 Registered: 10-2006 |
And why is the "passionate long relationship between Robert and Lindy" "surprisingly present" in many songs? Wouldn't its unpresence be more surprising? I'm also not sure what's scathing about saying someone bought Playboy for the Dylan interview. Playboy could afford top-flight journalists and give them plenty of space - their interviews with novelists, comedians and musicians were often outstanding. | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 4617 Registered: 03-2005 |
For those who haven't, I really recommend that you read the actual book and bypass these reviews. For those of you worried about it, there isn't a bunch of Lindy trashing Robert or even Grant. It's just an interesting alternative look at the Mark I Go-Betweens episode and an exploration of who Lindy Morrison is. Lindy was a crucial force in the gestalt of that band with her particular combination of awkwardness and originality counterbalancing the combination of awkwardness and originality presented by Robert and Grant. And the book offers another sobering look at the unglamorous reality of a struggling cult band. | ||
| Burgers Member Username: Burgers Post Number: 186 Registered: 05-2005 |
I’m a massive fan of the band, if not quite a completist. I have three versions of David Nichols’ book. None of them is particularly well-written but they’re worth having. I was surprised at the massively positive reception for Grant & I. It’s also worth having. I don’t know how many of you can read the FT review. I read it in print and think it’s pretty fair. Tracey Thorn’s book is better than Robert’s but Lindy comes over, at times, as privileged, bitter, cruel and tedious. | ||
| David Nichols Unregistered guest |
Stuart my memory of the Playboy mention in the book is that it's presented as kind of pallid and meek to buy Playboy and not take notice of the sex stuff, but instead to look at the 'top-flight' journalism (particularly a Dylan interview). I'm not doing it justice but it is quite funny, even perceptive, in the original. | ||
| Austin Member Username: Bruegelpie Post Number: 224 Registered: 09-2004 |
>>>>>I'd take issue with the Jo Case review. 'The book was sparked by Morrison’s marginalisation in histories of the band, which typically characterise it as Robert Forster and Grant McLennan, with added extras.' David, I think the reviews where this is mentioned is referring to the documentary too. | ||
| Fred Tadrowski Member Username: Ftadrowski Post Number: 131 Registered: 03-2015 |
Reading My Rock ‘n’ Friend, I thought about the story behind Mircea Eliade’s autobiographical novel Bengal Nights about his time in Calcutta and his love affair with young Indian woman during the early 1930s (the novel was made into a bad Hugh Grant movie in the late eighties). Years later, Maitreyi Devi, the subject of his novel, wrote her response to set the story right. It was titled It Does Not Die: A Romance. My Rock ‘n’ Roll Friend is obviously a response to Grant & I and to the documentary. I believe Tracey Thorn was also quoted saying, “Grant & I was great.” I enjoyed both books and it is good to have the alternate point of view, which is also about the power of female friendships. My favorite scene in the book is when Tracey invites Lindy and Amanda to a very 70s women-only spa in Covent Garden complete with parrots and a pool swing. Some of the things I learned in My Rock ‘n’ Roll Friend: 1. Lindy is a character in the out-of-print Brisbane-set novel True Love and How To Get It by Gerald Lee, co-writer of the Jane Campion’s film Sweetie among other credits and who also played drums at the Go-Betweens first gig, which consisted of two songs. I found a copy of Gerald Lee’s novel on the WWW and opened up the book to the first sentence of Chapter Eighteen, which starts “I rang the Curry Shop, the Go-Betweens were on and I knew she’d be there.” 2. Everything but The Girl’s song Blue Moon Rose is about Lindy and their friendship. 3. Novelist Jonathan Lethem’s favorite band is the Go-Betweens. He had been asked to write a review of The Friends of Rachel Worth for Rolling Stone but could not because Lindy was no longer in the band. There is one incorrect fact in his Go-Betweens essay, which in turn is quoted in My Rock ‘n’ Roll Friend; that the disastrous Berkeley gig that he attended in 1989 happened at the beginning of the American tour and not at the end, which changes the point of the story a bit. | ||
| Ric Member Username: Ric Post Number: 11 Registered: 05-2019 |
tracey was on gid coe last night (13.05.21 bbc 6 music), second hour. Not listened yet as 10 o'clock is way past bedtime. | ||
| Kenny Taylor Unregistered guest |
I've loved Tracey's other books and I love the Go-Betweens, but I found this book hard going. It was very positive towards Lindy, as I guess it would be as Tracey is her friend, but in the main it was very harsh on Robert and Grant. Both hugely talented musicians and songwriters which seemed to get overlooked to a large degree. I understand they maybe didn't treat Lindy (and other band members) the way they would have hoped, but aren't so many talented musicians and songwriters like that, particularly in their earlier years? I'm not saying it's right, but the world of rock music is bursting with similar stories of band members feeling hard done by and I guess having the appropriate "soft skills" isn't necessarily a pre-requisite of being able to write great songs and make fantastic records. I know it's a book primarily about a long lasting friendship, but I think it would have been improved enormously by being a little more generous about the amazing music that was made. | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 4635 Registered: 03-2005 |
I like reading about the other facets of a story that I care about. The story of the Go-Betweens is definitely such a story for me. For whatever reason, the first paragraph of Fred's superb comment above whizzed right by me the first time I read it but it hits home now. And I might go hunting for a copy of that Gerald Lee novel. "Rock and Roll Friend" adds another dimension to the story of the classic Mk. I Go-Betweens story, one that I consider crucial. It should be no surprise that the group dissolved in some amount of acrimony after all those years of never really achieving financial success and then later reforming without any of the supporting members from that era. Personally I'd love to read Robert Vickers' facet of the story as well. He was friends with Robert and Grant prior to joining the band and thus he would have insights reaching back pretty far. Here's a taste that might be, written by Robert Vickers' partner from the time before he joined the band: https://mrbellersneighborhood.com/2006/1 0/the-important-visiting-friend This account published in 2006 reinforces some of the reflections of Grant found in Thorne's book. It was linked to the Board way back then. Like it or not there will always be some intrusion by the gender war in the story of a band with members of both sexes. It will intrude from both sides of course. After all we don't need Tracey Thorne's book to know that Grant's apparent expectation that he and Robert could jettison Lindy and Amanda from the band while Grant retained his relationship with Amanda exhibited a total lapse of judgment. One of the virtues of Tracey Thorne's perspective is that she is herself a musician with a successful career, also in a two gender band. She is not likely to expend the same energy that we might on admiration for the music made by her subjects because, for her, they're fellow practitioners. Her perspective is not that of a fan. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10135 Registered: 05-2005 |
Thanks for the link, Randy. That's a very interesting remembrance. If I saw it at the time, I don't remember it. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10173 Registered: 05-2005 |
The book is still getting reviewed. This one is interesting, if a bit pretentious in parts. https://www.lareviewofbooks.org/article/ exile-on-man-street-on-tracey-thorns-my- rock-n-roll-friend | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 1976 Registered: 10-2006 |
Just a quick read through, but a) no band with Robert in it could be described as “faceless” b) why should any young rock critic have been taught to have contempt for You’re so vain and Tapestry? | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 4671 Registered: 03-2005 |
Thank you for the link, Pádraig. It's always interesting to find out what somebody mired somewhere in this maze called Los Angeles is thinking when it improbably touches interests of my own. The author is Gina Arnold, a vaguely familiar name to me. Here's her wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gina_Arnol d Presumably I recognize her name from her time writing for the Los Angeles Times. If she's younger than I am it will be by no more than 5 years. My guess is that Ms. Arnold's "fairly faceless" comment is intended as a reflection of what she perceives to be a likely public response to the band. Remembering LA's thing for flash and glam this seems likely to me. The Go-Betweens were an essentially understated creation, totally anchored by and in their music. They were never going to be like Nick Cave. Her summary of the band pre-Lindy as a "wimpy folk duo" is pretty far off the mark though. TROU posts "The Lost Album" as his current listen elsewhere on this board. Listening to that material you'll be hard-pressed to find any evidence of a folk duo there. "People Say" is as close as you'll get simply because it seems to draw its inspiration from the most pop oriented song Dylan ever recorded, "I Want You." I suppose "Tapestry" and "You're So Vain" would have been suffering from the inevitable first wave of revisionism in the 1980s when Ms. Arnold was a young music critic. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10174 Registered: 05-2005 |
Thanks for the local knowledge, Randy. I note this line in her Wikipedia page: In 2000, SF Weekly columnist Dan Strachota wrote that "Arnold's writing usually contains three main items: fuzzy data, oversimplification, and half-assed reasoning.” |