Fan mail/Correspondence
Mark S. Tucker
Bad Songs
Gentz: Don't know why I didn't check out your Bad Songs list sooner, but I din't. Pretty fucking funny, that menu of abominations, sonic mindfucks, and crypto-emoto-gag-inducers, pret-ty fuck-ing fun-ny! I disagree, of course, with quite a few but found myself laughing like a hyena when I understood why so many made the list (lyrics, pretentiousness, blatant pandering, etc.). You missed, however, my personal most treasured guilty pleasure: "Sylvia's Mother" by Dr. Hook. How can any set of notes and vocals be so good and so bad simultaneously??? When it emerged, I could hear Shakespeare projectile vomiting in his grave that bathos should be buggered so roundly. That song ranks with the immortalest wheezers of The Turtles…and you just know that Volman, Kaylan, and Silverstein were giggling like naughty little schoolgirls when they penned their various monstrosities.
However, I think I can one-up your entire list, having attended what was probably the Numero Uno, El Supremo, Oh Sweet Goddam Jesus Take Me Now bad music event of all time. It was in the 70s at, if I remember correctly (I seem to recall smoking something that disarranged my sensorial apparatus), the Santa Monica Civic. King Crimson, whom I of course caught every time they rolled into L.A., was playing and me, my girlfriend, and a half dozen stonies arrived at the gig to only then discover the opening act: B.W. Stevenson!!!!!! Palpitating waves of horripilation stultified me into a gibbering paranoia. No, no, no, this could not be true!, I hadda be in a Philip K. Dickian alternate universe!, but, oh Gawd yes, it was indeed so. I mean "My Maria" preceding "21st Century Schizoid Man", "One More Red Nightmare", "Lark's Tongue in Aspic"?!?!?! What next?? Rod McKuen pairing up with Led Zeppelin? To this day, I shudder to recall that Dali-esque day in the halcyon past. In fact, the crowd got so rowdy - I hadn't known I was a werewolf until that very hour, howling like a demon, lusting for blood - that Fripp, in his nasally reproving tendentiousness, had to come out and schoolmarm us into submission (I mean, I love the guy, but lord, lord, lord, spare me his waspish martinetry!).
Of course, what's missing here is the other half: your list of the great songs (or is that posted somewhere and I just am not aware?). To get my own in for your skewering of songs I like, I of course have to note that: I'll probably laugh just as much in reading your faves as at the ones you put in their graves. Maybe more.
Lawrence Maddox Though Aaron Sunshines' Black Randy article is over a decade old, it's one of the most astute pieces ever written about the early LA punk scene. If It wasn't for the fact that Black Randy has been totally forgotten, I'd say he's been misunderstood. Mr. Sunshine nails a tricky subject, and gives him serious recognition that is long over due. A wrong has been set right.
Honey Hater
I was shocked a few were on the (bad songs) list at all (and at least one of those, the simply beautiful 'If You Could Read My Mind Love', by Gordon Lightfoot, was anyway from the 1960s); "Paradise By the Dashboard Light", for instance--at least the last part--is clever and funny (besides musical), a cautionary tale, and all adolescents would probably benefit from having to hear it in school); but mostly I agree with your choices and feel your list restores some balance to a cockeyed or tone deaf world that foisted so many awful songs on us via radio in the 70s. Come on, at least until 2000, the Seventies was definitely a standout decade for bad or annoying music.
You MISSED:
- "Mrs Jones, We Got A Thing Goin' On"
- "Papa's Got A Brand New Bag"
- everything else The Moody Blues ever did (you only listed "Nights In White Satin")
My Choices for All-Time Vomit-Inducing Prize Winners:
- Terry Jacks "Seasons In The Sun"
['We had joy, we had fun... But the stars we could reach were just starfish on the beach']
- Dawn "Tie A Yellow Ribbon" - Paul Anka, "Having My Baby"
- Barry Manilow "Mandy"
['you came and you gave without taking']
- Billy Paul "Me and Mrs Jones"
['Ee ee eye eye, Mrs!--Mrs Jones, Mrs Jones, Mrs Jones: we got a THING goin' on--'] (In fact via radio I always thought he was singing 'Mister'.)
- Rolling Stones "Angie"
['Angeh! Angeh-eh-eh!']
- Michael Murphy "Wildfire"
['She kept calling Wiiiiiiild-fire']
- Roberta Flack "First Time Ever I Saw Your Face"
AND! AND! (top this!)
Bobby Goldsboro "Honey"--Yes, it's from the 60s, but its putridness has stained my brain cell that can't forget it, for all subsequent decades besides--and anyway you listed 'American Pie', which is also from the 60s and not even as bad. For sheer puke-inducement factor, just try to top "Honey"! (It ties for first place with "Seasons In the Sun".)
Terry Brooks
WHAT A GREAT JOB YOU DID ON MY VERY CLOSE FRIEND J P. (Jones) WE VERY CLOSE.I SPENT MUCH TIME WITH HIM. HE WAS SO MUCH DEEPER THAN ANYONE KNOWS. HE WAS SMART A GENIUS THAT HAD A BIG HEART. HE WOULD GIVE A STRANGE THE SHIRT OFF HIS BACK. THIS WAS NOT KNOWN BY THE PUBLIC.HE WAS A GREAT MAN I AM GLAD HE WAS MY FRIEND .HE IS MISSED
prclass1
Subject: Martin Osborne on Flying Nun
Are u this hard-up for material? Really and truly awful.
ED NOTE: Don't be so hard on yourself. We've seen worse fan mail than yours. Well, maybe not...
John Webb
Subject: great site
Your story on caring for a hi-fi system had information I needed, so thank you. But I wanted to point out a grammatical error on your contributors page. The phrase is "for all intents and purposes," not "for all intensive purposes." It's a common error I have encountered as an editor at many publications. Should you need a copy editor, please let me know. I'd be interested. Again, GREAT SITE!
ED NOTE: Thanks John. That was one of our lame attempts at humor. We need joke writers even more than we need copy editors.