Been back home since Saturday, and I'm starting to reconcile myself to the English winter. It has been hard to avoid feeling deflated after such an amazing trip, which was the fulfillment of a lifeteam dream.
However, above and beyond all that, I must say that the USA is an absolutely fantastic place and I love it more than ever. There's such a dynamic and open spirit out there, and people genuinely love their country. It is a great contrast to the jaded cynicism in the air over here in the UK. I'm already looking forward to when I can go back, which might not be for a while given current financial difficulties. Next time it would be great to visit Washington D.C. and Virginia; Greil Marcus in his book "Invisible Republic" describes a drive through the Appalachians listening to the full 5-CD set of Dylan's "Basement Tapes". I would like to do the same thing.
In fact I nearly took a job in the US back in 1983. I'd only been three years in IT at that point, and many people in what was then called Sun Alliance were moving out there. Somebody I knew well went out there and talked to me about joining him. I was well up for it, but sadly - for what seemed like good reasons at the time - I declined the opportunity. That's what happens when you let other peoples' priorities govern your life.
To change the subject - I've been thinking about really duff tracks on what are otherwise amazing albums. Two immediately come to mind :- "Here, There, and Everywhere" on Revolver, and "Young Lovers Do" on Astral Weeks. These tracks are so bad that, when ripping the CDs onto the PC, I have omitted them. This is a most unusual thing for me to do; I am typically passionate about the album as an entity in its own right. However these two songs are so offensive to my ears that omitting them has significantly improved my appreciation of the respective LPs. On the other hand, there are some artists like the Byrds, the Grateful Dead, and the Who who have never made a realy duff track. Unspectacular as much of the Stones post-1974 output has been, they are never less than listenable.
There are some key points in common to the two above-mentioned dreadful songs. They both have incredibly soppy lyrics, and they both use musical devices drawn from cabaret, a form of music whose only function in life is to form the backdrop to supper-club drinking. Their music has little to do with the core root American music of Blues, Jazz, Country, and Gospel, which to me sit at the heart of everything that is wonderful. Seems to me that if the World was a CD, the UK would be the duff track.
On that happy note I shall retire to bed and continue with Keith Richards' autobiography. Now there's a musician !
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