Heck Of A Guy

The Highlights

Highlight #1: Leonard Cohen, Still Classy After All These Years

Cohen, dapperly dressed in a black tux, thanked Lou Reed for his introduction and acknowledged that his induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame was “such an unlikely event” and “not a distinction that I coveted or even dared dream about.”

In a self-effacing moment that would prove strikingly atypical through the night, Cohen then solemnly observed,

Cohen, who may have been the only speaker, including Jan Werner, Chairman of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and MC for the ceremony, to speak without notes (Lou Reed carried loose papers, a notebook, and a copy of Cohen’s “Book of Longing” to the podium), then recited the lyrics of “Tower of Song” and promptly surrendered the stage to Damien Rice, whose rendition of “Hallelujah” seemed competent but pedestrian.²

Highlight #2: Tom Hanks, Best Introduction

Tom Hanks introduced the Dave Clark 5³ with passion and enthusiasm that fell just short of inspirational as he reported on the meaning of pop music to a kid growing up - oh, at about the same time Tom Hanks grew up. His notes-abetted presentation may have been a tad over the top, but at least he was on task and able to demonstrate a genuine appreciation for the inductees.

Highlight #3: Let’s see. Highlights, highlights, high-dee-hoo-dee-lights

Well, uh, ummm, … ah, I have it - Although a number of the older honorees looked shaky, not one of them required CPR.⁴

The Other 80% Of The Ceremony

To convey the tone of the rest of the evening, I first ask the reader to imagine the annual corporate meeting of the sales department of a life insurance company. A dinner is being held to honor the six salesmen who have been with the company the longest. These old coots seem nice enough, everyone seems to like them, and they may well have supplied a useful service to the community so there is no objection raised when they go on longer than necessary, tell anecdotes that no one in attendance quite understands, and seem a little confused as they thank spouses, mentors, teachers, friends, pets, … . This profile matches about half the honorees.

For the remainder, take a look at yesterday’s post about White Whine. Now, imagine the Rock and Roll Stars Version of White Whine. A few examples follow:

Twenty-four hours ago, for example, I liked John Mellencamp more than I do now. He’s clearly angry at someone who has done him wrong because he’s going to have his son “kick their ass.” He also notes that he knows what people say about him and how his anti-war stance makes him unpopular.

The Awards were, according to more than one speaker, sooooo much better before it became a TV show. As a viewer, these comments made me feel warm and tingly all over.

The host, VH1-C, was accused of - commercialism - wait, the punch line is coming - by Billy Joel.

The undeserved, much lamented death of the music business (or, more accurately, record/cassette/CD selling) was another recurrent motif.

Even Madonna, who seems to run everything in the Western Hemisphere that Oprah doesn’t own, got sentimental over her lack of self-esteem as a child and her need, 35 years later, for people to “encourage [her] to believe in [her] dreams.” On the other hand, while I can’t be certain, I think it’s possible Madge thanked me for something during her exhaustive and exhausting expressions of gratitude to her grade school dancing teacher, her agent’s assistant’s associate once removed, the critics whose negative reviews only fired her motivation, … .

Bonus: Unsolicited Advice To VH1-C Production Crew & Waldorf Event Planners

Here’s a wacky idea - what if, when the honorees leave the waiting area (AKA the Waldorf Hotel kitchen) to mount the stage, the direction to their mark on the stage were made clear? Now, no one enjoys slapstick antics, not unlike that practiced by the Keystone Cops in their heyday, more than me. Watching the Ventures mill about before someone standing idly by pointed them toward the stage was a hoot. Even watching my man, Leonard, walk through the door into the bright lights only to realize that he was face to face with the live and TV audience with no means of determining the correct route to the stage gave me a tiny jolt of Schadenfreude-infused delight. And, when I saw John Mellencamp nearly sprint the wrong way, toward the backstage area, … well, let’s just say, a knee was slapped and mirth prevailed. Heck, I’ll even admit to being a little disappointed when someone literally took Madonna’s arm to guide her to the stage.

Still, you might want to consider adding a navigational aid to assure that the show runs smoothly. I don’t see a need to pop for a GPS, but maybe you could - and I’m just blue-skying here - plant a big sign outside that door with an arrow pointing to the stage or instruct a flunky to stand outside the door through which the inductees enter and imitate a sign pointing unambiguously toward the stage.

Bonus #2: A Final Word On Leonard Cohen

“We’re so lucky to be alive at the same time Leonard Cohen is”

You got that right, Lou

Footnotes

1. Cohen was, of course, riffing on the famous proclamation Jon Landau wrote in 1974 as a Rolling Stone contributing editor, “I’ve seen the future of rock n’ roll, and it’s name is Bruce Springsteen.” Leonard Cohen is too much of a gentleman (thank goodness, I’m not) to point out that within a year or two of that statement, Mr. Landau was Springsteen’s producer and manager - and still on the Rolling Stone masthead.↩
2. Rice’s singing may well have been more effective for the audience at the ceremony. The audio of all of the performances seemed muddy, which may have been a broadcast issue or even a problem with my own TV. The production was simulcast but I couldn’t tune in at my location.↩
3. I like Tom Hanks, and I recall liking the DC5, at least during the British Invasion; other than my fondness for the actor and the band, the reason Tom Hanks introduced the Dave Clark 5 eludes me↩
4. At least not on camera↩

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Lou Reed and Anjani At “Came So Far For Beauty” Tribute

While fact checking my post about Lou Reed officially inducting Leonard Cohen into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on March 10 in New York,¹ I serendipitously discovered a reference to Mr Reed and Anjani teaming up for a duet at the Dublin “Came So Far For Beauty” tribute to Leonard Cohen.²

Further, the song they performed together was of “Memories,” which has itself been the subject of two recent Heck of a Guy posts:

• Two Leonard Cohen Memories
• A Valentine’s Day Request - Won’t You Let Me See Your Naked Body?

Ambiguous Documentation

Yeah, I might skip a section labeled “Ambiguous Documentation” too, but it is short. The pertinent Dublin “Came So Far For Beauty” tribute is written up in a number of online and print publications. Some of those pieces indeed mention Anjani and Reed singing “Memories.” Others, however, describe “Memories” the evening’s final song, being performed by the entire cast. And some - yep - listed it both ways.

A couple of emails to folks who were present at the concert has solved, I think, this apparent conundrum.

Lour Reed and Anjani Sing Memories

“Memories” was indeed the final song and was used, the second night in Dublin, as not only the finale but also an opportunity for the performers to showcase their skills one last time. And, as it turned out, Lou Reed and Anjani were paired in the exchange of the song’s lines,

Lou Reed:

Frankie Lane, he was singing Jezebel
I pinned an Iron Cross to my lapel
I walked up to the tallest and the blondest girl
I said, Look, you don’t know me now but very soon you will
So won’t you let me see
I said “won’t you let me see”
I said “won’t you let me see
Your naked body?”

Anjani:

Just dance me to the dark side of the gym
Chances are I’ll let you do most anything
I know you’re hungry, I can hear it in your voice
And there are many parts of me to touch, you have your choice
Ah but no you cannot see
She said “no you cannot see”
She said “no you cannot see
My naked body”

An eye witness, who writes on the LeonardCohenForum under the arbitrarily truncated designation, Born With The Gift Of A G, describes the scene in his posting, Thoughts On Came So Far For Beauty in Dublin: Part 2:

Or, as Anjani commented by email about her duet with Lou Reed,

The Dublin Performance of Memories

The bad news is that I couldn’t turn up a recording of the Lou Reed-Anjani duet. The good news is that I did find an MP3 file of “Memories” as performed the first night of the Dublin Tribute. Despite the low-fi quality, the recording does conjure up a sense of the joyful tone of the concert.

“Memories” Performed By Cast of Dublin “Came So Far For Beauty” Tribute (4 Oct 2006)

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Other Performers: Nick Cave, Jarvis Cocker, and Julie Christensen

Credit Due Department
Photos and poster are from Dick Straub’s Review Of The Dublin Concert. A full description of the event as well as many, many more photos are available at that site.


Footnotes

1. The induction ceremony for this year’s Rock and Roll Hall of Fame entrants begins at 7 PM Central (i.e., God’s Time) on March 10 and, as noted by an earlier commenter, will be broadcast on VH1-Classic.↩
2. There were two performances of the “Came So Far For Beauty” tribute in Dublin, one on 4 Oct 2006 and one on 5 Oct 2006. The Anjani & Lou Reed duet took place at the 5 Oct 2006 concert. Other performers at the tribute included Nick Cave, Lou Reed, The Handsome Family, Antony, Laurie Anderson, Beth Orton, Teddy Thompson, Jarvis Cocker, Gavin Friday, and Mary Margaret O’Hara.↩

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Lou To Laud Lenny At Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction

A hustle here and a hustle there
New York City is the place where they said
Hey babe, take a walk on the wild side
I said hey Joe, take a walk on the wild side

- Lou Reed, Take A Walk on The Wild Side

Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame Class Of  2008

Yesterday, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame released the list of the artists who will induct this year’s new members on March 10 in New York.

For those of us who think of the 2008 group of honorees as “Leonard Cohen et al,” the important name on the list is Lou Reed, who met Cohen a few years ago under different circumstances in the same town.

The Other Guys

Those introducing et al follow:

Introducing
• Madonna: Justin Timberlake
• Little Walter: Ben Harper
• John Mellencamp: Billy Joel
• Ventures: John Fogerty
• Dave Clark Five: Tom Hanks

After reviewing that roster, I have the Cohen-Reed duo, even in their current moderately mellowed phase, as 8 to 5 favorites in the Toughest Guys In The Room competition¹ and 20 to 1 favorites for Way Cool prize.

Leonard Cohen, Lou Reed, and Nico - The 1st Time In New York

There are at least a couple of different stories floating around the Internet about how Leonard Cohen and Lou Reed met, and straightening that out necessitates (delightfully) bringing Nico into the picture. This excerpt from “Leonard Cohen” by Scott Cohen in his book, Yakety Yak (1994), summarizes the action in Cohen’s own words:

In 1966 I borrowed some money from a friend in Montreal and came down to the great empire, America, to try to make my way. I had written a few books and I couldn’t make a living. I played in a country band and I loved country music and I had a few songs I thought were country songs and I was on my way ultimately to Nashville but I got ambushed in New York by the folk renaissance — and got my first public appearance at the Newport Folk Festival.

In New York I found this huge explosion of things and I was interested in this enlightened community being promoted in the east side of New York and I would go down there but I couldn’t locate it. I walked into a club called the Dome and I saw someone singing there who looked like she inhabited a Nazi poster; it was Nico, the perfect Aryan ice queen. And there was a very handsome young man playing for her; he turned out to be Jackson Browne.

I just stood there and said forget the new society, this is the woman I’ve been looking for. I followed her all around New York. She led me to Max’s Kansas City.

I met Lou Reed there and he said something very kind to me which made me feel at home. I had no particular clout in that scene. I was just a guy who was a little older than the other guys, just sniffing around like everybody else. I was very lonely and mostly interested in finding a girl. Lou came over and introduced himself and said, “I love your book.” I never knew anybody knew my books because they only sold a few thousand copies in America.

We were sitting at a table and some guy was bugging me, in a polite sort of way, and I was responding in a polite sort of way, and Lou Reed said to me, “Hey, man, you don’t have to be nice to this guy. You don’t have to be nice to anybody. You’re the man who wrote ‘Beautiful Losers.’” Nico eventually told me, “Look, I like young boys. You’re just too old for me.

Bonus: Lou Reed and Julie Christensen Cover Leonard Cohen

Lou Reed and Julie Christensen sing Cohen Joan of Arc
(From Came So Far for Beauty tribute concert - Dublin October 2006)

Footnotes

1. Without Madonna in the mix, Cohen and Reed would be favored at 50 to 1↩

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