Todd Rundgren
The Ever Popular Tortured Artist Effect

THE REVIEW

I know well, I, who always complain about having few readers and even fewer comments! It's an unbearable whine, I know this too; it's a tirade that "many of you few" pretend not to hear out of politeness. But I am essentially one who loves to wallow in self-pity. Indeed, I would remove the reflexive: I am one who loves to cry on. At this moment, so to speak, I cry on myself because I can't slyly rely on second and third persons...

You four are truly indulgent Christs, truly generous towards me, and what do I do? I give you long and boring reviews, I connect the printer to my head and print on paper (and on Site) all my cerebral drivel whenever I hear that passage, that phrasing, or that little chorus... 'My writings are not reviews: they are stories,' I exclaimed at the time, perhaps even to give myself a tone... The truth is that these writings of mine are not really stories, perhaps they never were, or maybe they are no longer. Okay, with the gay-rock of the Ark, recently, I managed to pull out something rather cute; with that unknown folk singer, and with someone else too, a handful of solutions I found along the way, almost by chance, but I can assert that in essence I am not (and I don't believe I have been, on DeBaser) a storyteller at all. Mine, more than little stories, resemble much more modest travel notes. Sure, maybe (maybe!) I could be the new Bruce Chatwin (and my reviews the brand new "Songlines") of music... Yes, sure!

In fact, with 'these damn reviews on Todd Rundgren, I have hardly told anything: I described, one by one as they appeared, like in a logbook, my impressions (the aforementioned printer connected to the brain) and what I understood while listening to his records, one by one. So what could I have ever told about Rundgren? I just listed the sensations, that's all. At most, I mocked a little the poorly managed episodes trying to show the fan's regret, and I promoted the more deserving works with decent Italian assignments. And that's it.

I have, to be clear (clear to myself first of all), nothing to tell about Todd Rundgren. Nothing except that I find him a great and a grossly underrated, but I had already said that - and repeated it too. Can I reiterate the thing again and again? From review to review? And how do you manage to withstand it? And again it comes back to you, most patient, resigned, and wonderful like Christians aware of being close to the lions... And thus the ball returns to me, and the umpteenth horrible punishment-torment that I'm reserving for you, ungrateful as I am...

Well: after nineteen reviews signed by me on Todd Rundgren, I finally admit to having tired of reviewing him. Finally, I said it. How-how-how? I would have grown tired of writing about him? And you, of reading about him, no?! And of commenting? What should you say? And above all, what should you do-make of me? The fact is that Rundgren is always the same, and always the same who doesn't have a jot of anything that deserves to be told (except that he was convinced - and so were all the others - that Liv Tyler was Liv Rundgren, I don't know if you understand).

This record always has the same things, the same wonderful beautiful things that all his best-rounded records have, the pure melody of "Hideaway" over a pounding rhythm; some acid synths (acid jazz-rock?) and ungainly and shabby rancid guitars on a chill-pop in "Influenza", the 'usual' other perfect yet impracticable mixes and so on... What else? That the ballads are great (better than Chris Cross!), as in "Don't Hurt Yourself"? That "Tin Soldier" sounds like an hippie rock by the Jefferson Airplane merged with Meatloaf's bombastic choruses, with an ending in which Todd screams resembling Tina Turner? What's interesting about that, other than listening in the strict sense? And above all, what else is there to read about it, let alone write? It's not like bingo changes its name with the changing of the drawn numbers! And so it happens that the Wizard, with the passing of years, albums, titles, arrangements, and songs, remains the Wizard, and doesn't become a four-shilling juggler!

Then, if he adds his usual vaudeville... And if he sticks a piece like "Bang On The Drum All Day", love child, in the sixties, between the Californian surfer 'Juke Box' and Miss "Louie Louie"... And if it ends with rock with the sun in his eyes in "Drive" and "Chant" (the latter truthfully with a bit too many keys), in which the Wizard, precisely because he is a wizard, manages to scream instead of sneezing, like I would (and not only that)... In front of all this, what's new to read, and write, about Todd Rundgren? This, after all, is what nicknames are for: to accompany you whatever you do, whichever direction you take, whatever age you are. To remind others who you are. To remind you that, deep down, whether you like it or not, take pride in it or have grown tired of it, you are always and anyhow that one. Good it certainly is (but only if the nickname is complimentary, of course), to be forever that one: the Wizard...

Thus there's no need for comments and explanations. And even less for nineteen (with this twenty) reviews. And for that whiny whining brat Mien_Mo_Man.