For me this year, Paul Weller schmaltzing his way through "Close To You."

Made me sad for all humanity.

Yeh, but at least Weller buffered that abomination with 20 years of crap-o-la. Now, if he'd gone straight from the Jam to "Close To You" I would've felt a stake through my heart.

Following up on my (rock star) memories.

I grew up a big Skid Row fan, so the day I got to meet Sebastian Bach and go out drinking with him, was a definite early high light of my modest music industry life....He was ultra cool, and by the end of the night he was treating me like I was one of his oldest pals...

Flash forward, two years. His career stalls slightly, and he has some sort of major mis-understanding with my editor, leading to a vicious war of words between him and the magazine.

So, a buddy of mine and I are at a party "celebrating' the release of the auto-biography of Gene Simmons (of KISS) . I really only went for the free food, booze, and half dressed women.

So, I see Sebastian in the VIP area, and proceed to go say Hi. He see's me, turns red, grabs me by the enck, in full view of a group of people, and proceeds to yell at me, 3 inches from my face. All about how our magazine is printing lies about him, and how he should kick my ass, and we are fucking with his career....yadda yadda yadda....

He obviously didnt realize that I didnt play any kind of role in editorial content, but felt the need to exploe on any rep of the mag. I managed to break free, and chose not to make a scene, cause A) I'm 5'9 and he is like 6'3, and B) I was one of the un-official lower tier hosts of the party...

Our company put out the 5 issue run of Gene Simmons Tongue Magazine.

Anyways, a few weeks later, Sebastian got a role in Jeckyl and Hyde on Broadway, and his PR crew tried to get a hold of me and/or my editor to get some coverage....We ignored him that time around...He attemtpted to apologise to me via email, but i wanted not part of it.

I sstill think he is a great live performer, but FUCK HIM!

Yeah, your stance on "once-great artists work past 1980" is pretty consistent. You hate all of it.

I thought I had heard that Weller's solo albums weren't that bad

Don't even get me started on Gene Simmons...

I am actually a big fan of Weller's solo albums. I mean, it ain't The Jam, but not much is.

He's had a very solid solo career. In fact, Wild Wood is one of my Top 25 of the 90's.

I guess U2 could have once been considered some of my 'heroes' (i.e. when I was in grade 7).
So... U2 doing that retarded i-pod thing.

All the wifebeaters. Ruins their stuff for me completely. How sad is it to lose the capacity to enjoy James Brown?

Musical stuff, I figure they do what seems best to them and if I don't like it I don't have to buy it.

Though I do hate to see someone whose work I loved reduced to effectively playing in their own cover band, all the other members gone, no new songs, slogging it out on the road. Seems sad.

I was thinking about stuff along these lines when I saw the thread title.

However, I don't know if I'm an amoral person or just an asshole, but stuff like this can never really affect my feeling for most of an artists' best work. Art has a life of its own, and while James Brown's spousal abuse may be disgusting, his work exists outside of that.

It does change the meaning of "Papa Don't Take No Mess" though. Ugh.

I mean, it doesn't get more fucked up than Michael Jackson, and I still like "Billie Jean" among others.

I see the winkie, but that statement just isn't true. There's a pile of artists whose work I've continued to admire through a couple of decades, but Weller isn't one of them. I realize my perspective ain't exactly unbiased, because those first handful of Jam albums I flat-out loved and anything that came after would've seemed like a disappointment (hell, even Start! sounded like a disappointment to me). I tried to like the Style Council - I grooved to "Long Hot Summer", "Walls Come Tumblin' Down", and "My Ever Changing Moods" - and tried to talk myself into believing Weller was simply digging into his soul roots, but, man, it just seemed like the creased slacks and penny loafers were as important as the music. And his solo work reminds me more of Traffic than the Jam, which means it's not embarassingly bad - just that it's the kind of whitewashed, sweatless jog that the breathless rush of punk was trying to obliterate.

Some examples of artists whose work continues to interest me (20 years later): Patti Smith, Robyn Hitchcock, David Byrne, Ian Hunter, Tom Waits, Paul Westerberg, Chuck Prophet, Nick Lowe, Hoodoo Gurus, Giant Sand, Jules Shear, Steve Earle, Alejandro Escovedo, The Church, John Lydon, Wire, and (now that there's a new album) Camper Van Beethoven.

And back on topic... examples of heroes that turned my stomach:

Alice Cooper (breaking up the band and then showing up on Hollywood Squares)
David Johansen (trashing his solo career for the cheap joke of Buster Poindexter)
Rod Stewart (from one o' the boys to flaming fuckwad in 14 seconds flat)

Crap crap crap. I'll weigh in on this when >I get home on Saturday. Just popped in the send the boss an e-mail so he'll know where to leave a message if the office burns down. Weller's stuff after and including The Gift has pretty much sucked.

Buenos Dias from Ixtapa amigos!

When Robert Plant appeared on his own tribute album.

When Kurt Cobain offed himself.

In high school ('74-'78) I had no bigger musical hero than Pink Floyd and, especially Roger Waters. Got to see them in the summer of '78 (Animals tour) in Montreal's Olympic Stadium for what turned out to be a truly awful show, and found out that Waters was just a self-important red-ass, who had no appreciation for his audience. Apparently he has stated publicly that it was this show specifically which inspired him to build a "Wall" between him and the audience. So I guess the feelings he pulled out of me on that night were mutual. No problem, it wasn't long after that that I discovered the Brit alternative music scene and my new heroes Wire.

Incidentaly I did find out after seeing them in the late '80s that Colin Newman wasn't much different, (in temperment) from Mr. Waters, I guess I was just better equipped to deal with it by that time.

Yeah. Up with old farts. Some of 'em know what they're doing.

Err...it's Bilzeebub that hates everything after 1980, yeah, that's it...

only fav artist that has died so far (knock)(knock)(knock)

1985. Get it straight

And I should spell your username right, too.

Elliott Smith too.

Huh? There's unbelievable statements, and then there's this one.

I take exception to Alice Cooper. I think the man's redeemed himself for any mid-70's transgressions. He gets aces in my book for his Muppet Show gig, the restaurant in Phoenix and actually hanging out there in person frequently, and the stint he did on some muscle car show on Discovery showing off his Mach I.

You're dead on with Rod Stewart. Idiot's been banned from The River Cafe, and rumor has it most other A-List restaurants in New York. Guy hasn't done anthing that's mattered since 1971.

I'm tempted to list Cheap Trick for "The Flame", but they've distanced themselves from it, and still bring it live in a huge way.

I guess mine would be Robyn Hitchcock for a horrendous live show at Maxwell's in 1992 or so, coupled with a ho-hum "Perspex Island" and a horrendous "Respect". The signs were all there--the song on the Dead tribute, showing up for shows in a tie-dyed Dead t-shirt, etc. etc. His charm became fake, and the oddness and whimsy became forced and contrived. Blah.

Wow. That's harsh. Particularly since he's done good stuff since then. Storefront Hitchcock is one of my favorite concert films and I think Spooked is among his best albums.

I've got the video for Gotta Let This Hen Out, and I'm sticking with that

Two words: Michael Jackson