LJ's guard's down!

Only Brits will have heard of this gent, and I don't know how many of them. Julian Cope is one of those guys who should have been huge worldwide; except that he was a little scary. Tripping/possessed scary. Everybody said he was the next Syd Barrett, because he was known for being a complete acid-head... but he was really the British Iggy Pop, looking a lot like the Ig-ster and spending half the show with his shirt off.

In the middle of his career Cope quit dropping acid and figured he might as well be professional about it; and put together a righteous band. The rhythm section was particularly strong. Drummer Chris Whitten went on to be Paul McCartney's drummer. Bassist James Eller went on to do nice work for The The. They are seen here and are totally awesome.

Cope onstage persona was lightly insane, lightly punk but still quite intense. He built a mic stand that he could climb onto and sort of drape/hang himself on as he performed, so everybody could see him mugging, and you knew when he climbed it he was going for broke. Watch him almost fall off at 3:15. At 6:52 you can see him making love to the mic, although he was always a very confirmed heterosexual and the songs were full of cock-sure sexual energy. Stupidly at 7:10 the vid cuts off and they cut in a video made a few years later. I am only submitting the beginning through 7:10 for your judgment. There is not much Cope on YouTube.

Cope's signature song at the time "Reynard the Fox" was about a fox who kills himself, by disemboweling himself with a Stanley knife. He ritually recreated this onstage as the final number. I saw this tour from the third row. It was one of the greatest shows ever.

These songs smack you flat out with a raunchy guitar riff, pound you to the floor with a sexy pounding beat... and then they give you a bowl of ice cream.

gonged songs
 

i'll move them in here, so you can see how bad they sucked too. k?

While waiting on the Man O' Gong...I'll submit this one as well:

all right mr gong

Whaddya think of this one?

Air - Kelly, Watch the Stars!



LJ bailed on this at 0:57. You?

I dig that repetitive guitar riff.
I'm always wishing for guitar players to be more simple and repetitive, instead of muddying the composition with wild gesticulations.

another late nite....

Brilliant! :)

OK....gonna try embedding this but not sure I'm doin it right. Long time since I tried posting vids and I have the memory of a goldfish :P

This is a live performance by Pulp. The lyrics are easier to get on the produced version but the electricity of Cocker's performance comes through better on live. This is I think a later performance because the violin seems to have been replaced by a guitar, but the only early concerts I could find were at glastonbury and the sound quality is always a bit dodgy on the glastonbury sets.

Here goes:






[eta] bah....didn't work. try again


[eta] yey!


[another edit...just in case you can't make out the lyrics past the Sheffield accent: here they are :P

She came from Greece she had a thirst for knowledge,
she studied sculpture at Saint Martin's College,
that's where I,
caught her eye.
She told me that her Dad was loaded,
I said "In that case I'll have a rum and coca-cola."
She said "Fine."
and in thirty seconds time she said,

"I want to live like common people,
I want to do whatever common people do,
I want to sleep with common people,
I want to sleep with common people,
like you."

Well what else could I do -
I said "I'll see what I can do."
I took her to a supermarket,
I don't know why but I had to start it somewhere,
so it started there.
I said pretend you've got no money,
she just laughed and said,
"Oh you're so funny."
I said "yeah?
Well I can't see anyone else smiling in here.
Are you sure you want to live like common people,
you want to see whatever common people see,
you want to sleep with common people,
you want to sleep with common people,
like me."
But she didn't understand,
she just smiled and held my hand.
Rent a flat above a shop,
cut your hair and get a job.
Smoke some fags and play some pool,
pretend you never went to school.
But still you'll never get it right,
cos when you're laid in bed at night,
watching roaches climb the wall,
if you call your Dad he could stop it all.

You'll never live like common people,
you'll never do what common people do,
you'll never fail like common people,
you'll never watch your life slide out of view,
and dance and drink and screw,
because there's nothing else to do.

Sing along with the common people,
sing along and it might just get you through,
laugh along with the common people,
laugh along even though they're laughing at you,
and the stupid things that you do.
Because you think that poor is cool.

I want to live with common people,
I want to live with common people etc...

I really like Kelly Watch the Stars....

Well I really like Common People!

I can't believe that the Pulp version of Common People got gonged, and the Shatner version didn't!!

Here is my gongee, just to make sure you can all experience the horror:

well, shatner's interpretation of that song was so bang on. and the transitions were flawless....the sound quality was righteous......it's a whole thing. that pulp recording was noisy and annoying.