#End of the Century

[zanephillips]

JUAN BARBERINI End of the Century (2019)

[k-i-l-l-e-r-b-e-e-6-9]

Ramones – Baby, I Love You

[penelope-pitstop]

Théâtrophone poster, 1890 by Jules Chéret

[johnhopkinsphotography]

Flag Self Portraits December 18, 2024

[cigarrw-s]

End of the Century (2019) dir. Lucio Castro

Transition is always a relief. Destination means death to me. If I could figure out a way to remain forever in transition, in the disconnected and unfamiliar, I could remain in a state of perpetual freedom / then definitely make the time to see end of the century. In airconditioned comfort, without distraction.

David Wojnarowicz, Close to the Knives: A Memoir of Disintegration

[rolandrockover]

Blitzdream

I had actually devised a sweet hit and run strategy for Cadillac Dreams, just because it seemed most convenient to me to say as few words as possible about this song I never cared about too much from Hot in the Shade (1989), the Kiss album that I never really counted among my very favorites.

Actually.

But actually actually, my least favorite songs have always turned out to be the best templates for the more interesting spontaneous trains of thought, and here we are once again.

Despite the stylistic diversity on Hot in the Shade, but also the mediocrity spread over long stretches, Cadillac Dreams always formed a foreign body in my eyes, not only on this album, but within the entire Kiss katalog. In much the same way that Rock This Town (1980) by the Stray Cats would be totally out of place on a Kiss klassik like Love Gun (1977), or any other Kiss album. It's that Rockabilly thing that turns it off, right from the first note.

And I don't even necessarily think it's a bad song, just some kind of anomaly, even more than a song like Odyssey (1981) could ever be regarded to be, because Kiss have certainly been no strangers to pompous musicals since Destroyer (1976) (1).

Yet, just imagine if the original line-up had never split up in the early 80s, but had still taken off the make-up, and probably due to the fact that Peter Criss was still in the band as the drummer, would never have switched to contemporary Metal, but would in all probability have simply continued to move around in other areas of rock like a couple of gypsies, one of which, rockabilly rock, could have turned out to be quite conceivable. If an entire album, or an album with several songs in this subgenre, had been created from this idea, then, under this circumstance, and only under this circumstance, yes, then Cadillac Dreams would have been an even a more than acceptable Kiss song.

So much for that.

And well, what more could someone like me do with this song, except perhaps briefly point out a small mannerism that it shares with the quantum leaps better known and almost bursting with energy piece of glam rock by The Sweet that goes by the name of Ballroom Blitz (1973).

So, if you were to simply run both of those choruses through your head, what would be the first thing you might notice? Exactly, that small but crucial repetition at the end of the last lines. While this is the tremendously memorable refrain standard for The Sweet, it only occurs once for Kiss. But hey, once is better than never, and after all, I take all that I can get.

Rhythmically, however, Cadillac Dreams doesn't quite move in the same realms as the light-footed urge of Ballroom Blitz (of which one could assume the drummer was on an exclusive coffee diet), but still keeps you on your toes enough to not lose touch and at least stay close to it; somewhere very close to the battle cry and intro of Do You Remember Rock and Roll Radio (1980) (2) by everyone's good old friends the Ramones.

Even if these are all aspects that should not be considered irrevocably repulsive, I would nonetheless like to leave my usual snippy final phrase more or less to Bruce Kulick.

Didn't even he categorically reject his guitar services at the time and suggest that Gene should take them into his own hands?

Side Note:

(1) And we will also be getting to the bottom of this issue in the near future.

(2) Yes, Kiss covered that one later, even much later, for a Ramones tribute sampler. Kover it Up will cover it, just a little later.

Of course, one could also argue that Cadillac Dream's horn section could suggest the production of a Phil Spector.

The links are highlighted and not highlighted. Just klick on them and get happy:

Cadillac Dreams (1989)

Ballroom Blitz (1973)

Do You Remember Rock 'n' Roll Radio? (1980)

[shiningwizard]

Fin de siecle (Song Neung-han , 1999)

Birthday movie 2024. Trendy, angry narrative split movie would probably better being played straight. And angrier. Three people - a screenwriter, his creation and a professor having an affair in the same love hotel the writer's writing in - miserable and repressed at the end of the century, capturing a mood of the country at the time. It's fin de siecle, but everyone's memory only extends to 1994 and i may be wrong but the 20th century seemed a particularly eventful one for Korea. The writer's story is the most interesting, astonishingly. There's a lot of potential here, but it's too caught in that wave of movie-referential, deliberately obfuscating cool guy cinema (read: too dumb... or maybe more self-absorbed) to make much of it.

[veryslowreader]

Around the Moon by Jules Verne

End of the Century

[cinematic-literature]

Fin de siglo (2019) by Lucio Castro

Book title 

El regreso de los conejitos suicidas (Return of the Bunny Suicides in English; 2004) by Andy Riley

Alrededor de la Luna (Autour de la Lune in French; 1870) by Jules Verne

Veinte mil leguas de viaje submarino (Vingt mille lieues sous les mers in French; 1869) by Jules Verne

The King of Torts (2003) by John Grisham

De la Tierra a la Luna (De la Terre à la Lune Trajet direct en 97 heures in French; 1865) by Jules Verne  

[zanephillips]

Juan Barberini and Ramon Pujol End of the Century (2019)

[peachypaddys]

ten frames.

end of the century (2019) — dir. lucio castro

[noritama0301]

鶯籠冬眠につき2019年の思い出を掲載

世紀末覇者

[ilcovodelbikersgrunf]

"End of the Century" is the fifth studio album by RAMONES. It was released on February 4, 1980.

[ultra-francesca-mercury]

february 4, 1980

The Ramones release their fifth album, End of the Century, produced by Phil Spector. Dee Dee Ramone claims Spector pulled a gun on him during the sessions.

[kristenswig]

#189. End of the Century - Lucio Castro

[frogayyyy]

they went from "when i feel friendship for you, i feel ashamed" to their souls reuniting in death holding hands watching the sunset