My “nobility” of the soul is essentially characterized by the almost absolute predominance of passion, frenzy, madness, and instinctiveness over everything that is logical, reasonable, and rational. What's the connection?! It always connects, because it’s the foundation of everything... then "everything makes sense."
So, to stay in the musical and "light" field, there are bands that I have always held close to my heart without knowing why. They don't precisely make "my" music, they don't have anything particular that captivates me, I'm not fascinated by the individual musicians... so I don't quite get it, apparently.
It's the most beautiful thing. Anything mysterious charms me and gives me bursts of energy.
It happened to me, right away, with Mott The Hoople.
The Motts are the quintessential cult band if there ever was one. Little success, even less fame, a host of loyal admirers who love them, and lots of respect from fellow musicians. Ah, I forgot, the official musical clique/critics will exalt them in the following decades post-disbandment after neglecting them during their career (nothing new here).
As for me, I love everything about them, even their less successful endeavors. These are those famous mysteries of the soul. I am fully aware that the same song played by others certainly wouldn't enchant me in the same way. It's that unconscious and hidden feeling that makes the relationship wonderful.
Their sound was the perfect and surprising mix of the musical characteristics and tastes of their two leaders; while guitarist Mike Ralphs was strongly tied to the hard rock blues sounds of the great bands of the time like Free or Led Zeppelin, singer and musician Ian Hunter had more varied tastes and drew from rock to pop, with all their many facets.
They ended up being associated with the glam genre, in my opinion more for their friendship with Bowie than for the type of music. Then history will tell us that their greatest commercial success was that “All The Young Dudes” written and given to them by David. The Duke has the great merit of giving the Motts more media visibility and postponing their break-up.
Although their records didn't sell much overall, it is said that they were one of the most beautiful and intense live performing bands of the time. The esteem of their colleagues is demonstrated by the two most important rock groups of the time; Zeppelin and Rolling would go to see them when they could.
Let's not forget also that they were produced by that noble madman Guy Stephens who had a rare ear for, but more importantly, soul.
“What electricity, what maniacal intensity [...] It's not simply “just another session”: I hate people who have this attitude. It's pure electricity. It has to be that way. It may be difficult for a record company like CBS to accept such a concept, but I could very well die making a record. It's too important. That's why, if necessary, I can produce anyone.” Guy Stephens, indeed. One who thinks (irrationally) like that is a great Noble... and “everything makes sense.”
With the Rolling emerged a respect/friendship while recording in adjacent studios in 1970, the Motts “Mad Shadows” and the Rolling's “Sticky Fingers” at Olympic Studios in London. With the Zepp, the noble legends of Rock, it is also told of a jolly brawl at one of their concerts that became “legendary” (the brawl or the concert?! Or both?!)
A sound with so much class, a street and theater Band together. This is what I've always thought of these Nobles.
I have never followed the solo careers of anyone who left my favorite bands. Many years later, perhaps, for some, but initially not even Plant or Ozzy, to name a couple of the troublesome ones.
As a young man, I felt bothered, even aversion... I hoped they wouldn't succeed.
Even then, heart and soul dominated reason. Why did they leave the group?! Or why did the group disband?! Or why did they want to "go it alone"?! I didn’t even consider the more obvious reasons. For me, it was a betrayal. One would say: "blessed youth," but the answer is "damn it, I'm still like that, a little less intolerant, but still the same."
Despite the tendency of others to recognize me as having leadership qualities (an ugly, capitalist big word, but we understand each other), I have always innate a huge team spirit. For me, Friends were everything, the Company the real family, the Street the first or a second home depending on the situations at the moment.
It's too easy to say it was like that "because I didn't feel I had a real family at home".... maybe that's part of it too, I couldn't say even after plenty of "analysts" (all exhausted) ...and anyway the reason doesn't interest us.
For friends and people I care about I've given everything - and even now completely isolated, if they call for reasons I need to be there - I leave and act immediately.
Had I become a high-level athlete I surely would have always played for the same team even giving up money and victories. For me, there is no greater value than giving everything you can to help the team. That's why I am naturally drawn to love players and people of temper and generosity. Aggressive and "nasty" for the common cause. I would eat the earth for the fans who pay and make sacrifices, I would give my soul to help a teammate in difficulty. Loyalty, gratitude, and generosity. Never give up, it's too easy.
That's why I hate the sissies with so much gifted talent who don't support it with an adequate dose of dedication and sacrifice.
What's the connection?! It connects, it connects... "Everything makes sense."
Anyway, it's obvious that, for the sake of consistency, I reserved the same "treatment" for Ian Hunter while I continued to follow Mike Ralphs right away when he left to form Bad Company with Rodgers, Kirke, and Burrell. But just because they were the first group produced by Swan Song and they "entered" my Zepp and "friends" circle, otherwise I wouldn't have given a damn about him either.
While classic Greatest Hits compilations with the most famous tracks tossed in there, we know, are useless, I find these types of collections excellent. If you want to know, in the best/quickest way possible, a musician with a relevant discography it can be the right start.
In the specific case, it allowed me a qualitatively valid understanding of Hunter's solo activity in the decade following leaving the Motts (nine years to be precise). From '75 to '83, six studio albums plus an official live. Then he won't record anything until '90, then another 13 to date.
Ian's an animal, a true rocker always.
All 45s in chronological order give me the chance to listen to both the "famous" tracks (A-sides to be clear) but especially the gems often hidden in the single's B-sides. Chronology is the second fundamental thing; even with a few tracks per album, I can get an idea of how the music evolved over time.
We can divide the collection into two parts.
The first, fortunately for me more substantial, is made up of the singles from the first 4 albums and a medley taken from the live "Welcome To The Club."
"Ian Hunter," "All American Alien Boy," "Overnight Angels," and "You're Never Alone With a Schizophrenic" are four albums that for Mott the Hoople enthusiasts will be a delight. The sound is that, often, at high levels.
Here is all the energy, talent, and musical variety of this Gentleman.
Let's not forget that Hunter was born in 1939 and when he joined the Motts he was already an "old" thirty-year-old with a wife and two kids. One of those who started to strum as a kid while rock'n'roll was born, who tried throughout the sixties. Up to that point with very little luck.
But this Gentleman never gave up. Too much passion and the right dose of irrationality. ("Everything makes sense")
That’s probably why the music of the Motts and Ian encompasses so many genres and is hard to categorize. This Gentleman draws from Rock, Soul, and Funk, from Garage, from Rhythm and Blues, from Songwriters of the era (especially Dylan to whom he will always be devoted).
That’s why right from the splendid initial wacky rock'n'roll of "Once Bitten Twice Shy" begins a journey, in the more than ample first part, that is wonderful.
His beloved, beautiful, lazy ballads like for example "3,000 Miles From Here," "Rape", "The Ballad of a Little Star," the garage of "Who Do You Love," healthy rock pieces like "England Rocks" or "Wild n Free." I particularly love the tracks where his rock embraces soul, with choirs and horns that add warmth to the sound, like in "All American Alien Boy" and "You Nearly Did In Me."
And his beloved piano and guitar alternating to dominate the pieces. And especially his lazy, casual, offbeat voice, sometimes on the edge of being out of tune, but which enchants and intrigues because you feel that behind and inside that nonchalant attitude there is instead an uncommon level of intensity.
In the fourth (and incidentally his most commercially successful album to which the record company immediately followed up with the live album) everything continues to be great even though some signs of too much attention to the mainstream are immediately noticeable. But that’s normal, even one who has never sold out for money might consciously and/or unconsciously have let himself go a little in this regard.
- if that's the case indeed it would have been sufficient for a Mott The Hoople reunion in the eighties/nineties to sell like crazy with the attention to past groups that were at that time. It is said that there was a lot of pressure, but that it was Ian who always refused - (parenthesis, to make things clear)
Yet besides "Cleveland Rock" which will become his most famous piece (complete with "keys to the city" given by the mayor in later years) the other tracks are always very enjoyable. In particular "Bastard” that I really like with that relentless and obsessive (?!?!) electronics... I'm aging badly, it’s a fact.
After the medley from the live album, we get to the singles from the last two albums "Short Back'n' Sides" and "All The Good Ones Are Taken". Here the eighties and their "splendid" sound between the most commercial pop, the most banal hard, and the most meaningless electronic (to me, obviously) take over. But they are only the last six tracks of twenty-six...skip them!!!! ahahahahahahahahah. Or maybe someone will like them too, who knows.
I have filled, at least in part, this further grave deficiency of mine.
Ian Hunter, a great musician, a true rocker in the most genuine sense of the word... with those glasses of his (eye problems) and that hair which became his unmistakable look, deserves this and more and all of you who love Mott The Hoople know it.
But even more so his passion, his soul, and his never giving up deserve it... because I remind you that this Noble Gentleman is still touring at almost eighty years old with the energy and eagerness of a young man and certainly not for money.
He said a short time ago, about himself, responding to an interview: “Ian Hunter, today is an elderly man who however has not lost that spark he had when he was twenty-five and who cannot stop living this life. I am practically deaf, as you will have gathered from my tone of voice and from the times I have asked you to repeat the questions, but I'm not subdued and I never will be. I'm almost eighty years old but I'm not afraid of the future, I've never been afraid of death. The two authors you mention (Dylan and Cohen) have always been a source of immense inspiration. In particular Dylan, I have never hidden my love for him......”
Passion, frenzy, irrationality.... among Nobles, in the end.... “everything makes sense”
That's it, after Ray Davies, I have also gotten right with Ian.
Now I feel, a little, better.
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