| Author | Message | ||
     spence Member Username: Spence Post Number: 802 Registered: 05-2005 |
..bout the Go Bees? Any word? Just wondered if anyone had heard anything to do with what Robert, Adele and Glenn were up to? Back catalogue wise, apart from the US re-releases is there any word from record companies about a compilation or owt? | ||
| Kurt Stephan Member Username: Slothbert Post Number: 709 Registered: 04-2005 |
I've been wondering that too. It appears that Adele and Glenn have gone on to other projects (see the news page and their MySpace sites), but no word that I've heard about Robert and music. I wondered if the three of them my stick together with the Warm Nights lineup, but maybe Go-Betweens Mk II without Grant will be too painful for them for awhile. I do hope Robert will return to music when he's ready. | ||
| Donat Member Username: Donat Post Number: 172 Registered: 11-2004 |
A Go-Betweens Mk II took me a long time to get used to and I don't think I ever did adjust to it. Having a Go-Betweens Mk III without Grant would just be absolutely wrong on many levels. | ||
| Kurt Stephan Member Username: Slothbert Post Number: 715 Registered: 04-2005 |
RF's shut the door on that, though, hasn't he? He's far too classy and respectful of Grant and the band's integrity to ever use the Go-Betweens name again. No NY Dolls-style comeback for him. But I could understand if he, Adele, and Glenn wanted to keep playing together as an Forster solo project, perhaps with additional musicians. | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 656 Registered: 03-2005 |
If I were in Robert's shoes, I'd need something like a year to just disappear. I hope he can afford to do that. Then I hope he comes back with something to rival DITP. Which I think he will. Adele and Glenn don't have the royalty income. They have to get in gear. | ||
| spence Member Username: Spence Post Number: 806 Registered: 05-2005 |
Yeah, I agree kurt and Randy, that's what I'd do too, have some tome off. Mind you, you never know...music being the food of love, remember these guys are musicians, its not a part time thing, they live and breathe it, all day every day. | ||
| Thomas Keitsch Member Username: Thokei Post Number: 7 Registered: 06-2005 |
i have heard, that an american label ( dont know which one ) will release a GoBe. Tribute Compilation. A great band from NZ already has recorded a song for it ( track from Tallulah ). | ||
| Michael Bachman Member Username: Michael_bachman Post Number: 262 Registered: 01-2005 |
I wonder when Robert decides to become active again in music if he will add members to the Warm Nights line up? I would like to see another guitar player and possibly continue to flesh out the "Here Comes A City" sound buy maybe adding a 5th member, maybe playing keyboards. I miss the old Talking Heads sound, and HCAC brought back fond memories of the Heads. I firmly believe that Robert has a lot of music left in him, but maybe he needs another strong member to join the band to spur him on. Does anyone know if Grant left rough demos of the songs for the next album? I wonder if Robert would use them as a tribute to Grant on his next album. | ||
| jerry hann Member Username: Jerry_h Post Number: 274 Registered: 07-2005 |
A bit like St Joe's (Strummers) posthumous LP finished from the demo's. Not a bad LP though | ||
| Kurt Stephan Member Username: Slothbert Post Number: 719 Registered: 04-2005 |
I'd rather not have an album of demos with posthumous overdubbed parts--I find that sleazy because it reeks of being a moneymaking gesture, not an artistic one. Honestly, I don't think Robert would allow it anyway, not that I know him personally, but he just seems all about artistic integrity. If Grant's last demos ever see the light of day, I want to hear them as they are. I think Robert's the only one who should make that call. My understanding with the Strummer album was that it was fairly close to completed, which is a little different. How much, I'm not sure. | ||
| jerry hann Member Username: Jerry_h Post Number: 278 Registered: 07-2005 |
I'm sure you are right Kurt, Strummer's LP was near to completion. Re: Robert I think we're unlikely to here anything for a while, he does seem to have a lot of integrity and I guess he'll only release something when he's ready. | ||
| jerry hann Member Username: Jerry_h Post Number: 279 Registered: 07-2005 |
Why don't I state the bl**dy obvious!! | ||
| julia motzko Member Username: Julia Post Number: 27 Registered: 05-2005 |
I've been wondering what will happen to Grant's loyalty rights for his songs. Can those be bequested to his family, or are they extinct now or have they fallen back to the record company? It's just like that I think it must all be very complicated, and perhaps it's a difficult situation for Mr. Forster as well because naturally it affects him too, because he has to deal with whoever inherits Grant's song rights, and hopefully this party will deal well with half of the Go-Betweens legacy. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 680 Registered: 05-2005 |
Julia, the rights to songs can be left to someone in a will. As Grant died very suddenly, and seemed to live his life in a very free spirited way, maybe he did not have a will though. | ||
| Kurt Stephan Member Username: Slothbert Post Number: 722 Registered: 04-2005 |
It does seem like it could get complicated, because Go-Betweens songs were credited to McLennan/Forster, even though they wrote separately almost exclusively. For already-published GoBs songs, I don't think Grant could have given away the rights--at least not more than half--even if he'd wanted to. My feeling is that Robert has and will continue to have the say over the fate of the songwriting rights. New songs, I don't know--had they been through the collaboration process yet, where Robert and Grant sat down and refined the songs and worked out parts? | ||
| Donat Member Username: Donat Post Number: 175 Registered: 11-2004 |
It would be safe to assume that Grant's songwriting royalties would go to his son - why would it have to be Robert's decision to decide what to do with it? It's not entirely safe to assume that whoever sung the song is the lyricist, eventhough a pact of sorts was made early on to have a Lennon/McCartney like song-writing credit from around the time Robert Vickers joined. A quick look at the old records and the credits read something like Forster/Go-Betweens or McLennan/Go-Betweens and automatically turn into Forster/McLennan from Spring Hill Fair ownward. That's a little piece of trainspotting on my part. To me, the idea of the songwriting being just Forster/McLennan when it was attributed to the songwriter and the entire band seems a little wrong to me. It's like suggesting that Grant and Robert wrote Amanda's violin and oboe parts, or that they had a hand at writing John's guitar solo on 'Streets Of Your Town' - it's a little misleading as it's obvious to just about everyone that they clearly didn't. That's what's so great about R.E.M. and Sonic Youth - they've had group compositions since they both started 25+ years ago and I think that's contributed to their longevity on many levels. Forster will undoubtedly re-appear in some point - I can't see him in retirement just yet. As for the Warm Nights theory that many have discussed, they were a band who played almost exclusively outside the circle of typically rock 'n' roll venues, and held shows in art galleries or in a clothes boutique instead. I think Forster had a very clear and concise idea of what he wanted Warm Nights to be, so playing in large venues and thumbing through the Go-Betweens back catalogue wouldn't exactly fit into the Warm Nights mold of 1995, eventhough its now understood that The mk 2 Go-Betweens was Warm Nights + Grant. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 687 Registered: 05-2005 |
U2 have also always credited their songs to all four members. Their manager Paul McGuinness advised them from the very start that the major cause of bands breaking up was that those credited with writing the songs made a lot more money. Almost 30 years on they are still together and all have houses near each other in the South of France (ie they are also still friends as well as bandmates. Kurt, the person who owns the copyright (regardless of what percentage of that copyright they own) can do what they like with it: sell it (as David Bowie did a decade ago); pass it on to a relative upon their death; leave it to charity; whatever. The only curb on this is the length of time that work remains in copyright before becoming public domain. I think this is currently 50 years with proposals to increase it to 70, but I'm not certain. Maybe someone who knows the ins and outs of this can post? | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 662 Registered: 03-2005 |
I took copyright when I was in school more years ago than you want to know. And I know there have been some changes since. I think copyrights go for 75 years but don't quote me on that. Padraig, your comment about Grant's nature and the sudden death brought a rather unpleasant thought to my mind. In California, if a person dies "intestate," i.e., without a will, the estate passes to the statutorily-designated heirs. Usually this will be the surviving spouse and children. Obviously I have no idea how it works in Oz but we can assume that there is also a default provision in Queensland for people who die without leaving a will. The unpleasant thought that occurred to me is the almost monotonously common phenomenon of people coming out of the woodwork to claim some sort of will or other right to the estate. Sometimes this type of thing can tie up the estate for years. If Robert and Grant shared a copyright in the Go Betweens' songs, this could also tie up Robert's royalties. I sure as hell hope that's not what happens to him. First you lose your best friend and professional collaborator and then you have some opportunist weasel come up and block your ability to collect any of your earnings. | ||
| Cichli Suite Member Username: Cichli_suite Post Number: 191 Registered: 08-2004 |
If you've heard the Munich Radio BR2 Radio sessions from May 1999, you'll have heard Robert joking about receiving larger royalty payments than Grant because 'Spring Rain' had been included in the soundtrack to a movie. So, although the songs on the album are credited to Grant McLennan and Robert Forster I suspect they had agreed on the division of publishing royalties in advance. | ||
| spence Member Username: Spence Post Number: 812 Registered: 05-2005 |
I suppose it woukld help if I read the News section on this site sometimes! Here's wghat Glenn is up to, the track Oneway Ticket is bootiful! http://www.myspace.com/beachfield | ||
| Duncan Hurwood Member Username: Duncan_h Post Number: 65 Registered: 05-2005 |
Obviously I hope we hear more from RF at some point. I don't think it will be for a while. If I was a record company bloke, I expect I would be pushing for a Gobs box set, with various demos in there. Personally, while of course I'd love to get such a set, I don't think it will/should happen for a couple of years. | ||
| Nic Barnard Member Username: Nic_barnard Post Number: 12 Registered: 06-2005 |
Here's a bit of news: Robert has a short piece of fiction published in the new edition of Meanjin magazine, a Melbourne literary journal. It's set in the 1960s and seems at first glance slightly Runyon-esque. (OK, I glanced at the magazine in the bookshop this afternoon but neglected to buy it). The edition (titled the rock n roll issue, with a rather nice picture of Nick Cave in mid-80s Rio on the cover) also has a rather good poem dedicated to RF and memorialising Grant by a writer whose name I'm afraid I didn't recognise and a tribute/prose poem about GM by Steve Kilbey. Their website doesn't seem to be updated yet, but go to: www.meanjin.unimelb.edu.au for more. | ||
| mingus Member Username: Mingus Post Number: 48 Registered: 06-2005 |
This issue of Meanjin (a journal originally setup in Brisbane in 1940) also contains a couple of pieces relating to The Saints and the Brisbane scene in the 1970's. | ||
| pd Member Username: Peter_d Post Number: 13 Registered: 05-2005 |
According to this story, royalty payments last 70 years in Britain, dunno about Australia.. | ||
| pd Member Username: Peter_d Post Number: 14 Registered: 05-2005 |
sorry here's the story... http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/4917550.stm (featuring Sir Cliff !) | ||
| spence Member Username: Spence Post Number: 845 Registered: 05-2005 |
we're all going on a summer holiday! |