#not another fucking Like a Rolling Stone chorus quote

[autonoes]

ugh havent really processed the fact that timothy chalamet is playing bob in that new biopic… i dont trust that boy.. whats the point of making a bob biopic anyway when I’m Not There exists like that’s the only good biopic ever made. what’s the point of anyone playing bob ever again after cate blanchett did it

[meta-squash]

I did a long thread on twitter analyzing/interpreting You’re My Waterloo for the fun of it, but it was mostly for the amusement/interest of myself and like one other friend on there that likes The Libertines. So I figured I’d transcribe it over here where people might get more out of it? Since it was a twitter thread, the sentences might be a bit weird and stilted, by the way. So:

I'm glad they waited to record Waterloo until 2015. I feel like any other time would have been wrong. I know Peter was playing the slow version back in at least 2007 but I think it would have been sad in a different way if they had recorded it before 2015. Like, in 2015 it's just a straight up love song that's slightly sad because, well, it's Peter. If they had recorded it before I feel like it'd have been a love song with resentment wound through it.  There's just a lot of emotion in that song and if there's one thing Peter is really really good at doing, it's Emoting Intensely. But it's not just Peter, the piano is so beautiful and the strings are beautiful and Carl's guitar solo is Intense. It's all A Lot. Like, of all the songs that Peter has written about Carl, about their relationship and career and experiences together, THIS is the one where you can feel most strongly the near-obsessive type adoration. So I’m glad they waited to record it properly when they were friends again (also I’m mildly surprised that it was Carl’s suggestion to rerecord it). Anyway.

Fuck the first verse of this song is a lot. This whole song is a lot. I mean it starts off with such a sad sentiment, it's almost a warning? "You'll never fumigate the demons / No matter how much you smoke." You can't smoke away sadness no matter how much you want to. Bitterly ironic, considering the sorts of things Peter ended up smoking etc to chase away demons, the types of extremes they both went to above and beyond just trying to fumigate. But anyway. "Just say you love me for three good reasons / And I'll throw you the rope." It's just so fucking codependent. So intensely obsessive and codependent. There was a quote, I think maybe from Roger Sargent?, about Peter crying outside a venue in like 2002 because even then he was scared about losing his friendship with Carl to the Something Bigger of fame. This feels like a desperate bid to hang on to that love. But also like Peter is so intense. Every video of interviews where he's sitting next to Carl or gigs when they're friends or reunions or whatever, he just wants to be in Carl's space and have Carl's gaze and his attention and stuff. Like a cat that sits on your work.

Again, a digression. Oops. I said I was in a mood. It's so interesting that while it's definitely a love song To Carl, the only direct mention of Love is asking for love From Carl. It's like he's working on the assumption that his feelings are obvious (they are) and desperately wants reassurance or reciprocation.

"You don't need it / Because you are the survivor / Of more than one life" We know the origin of this is apparently Carl's dead twin brother. But also the offering of a rope only to reassure that no, you don't need it is just so...I don't know...sweet? Especially because while "throw you the rope" is obviously a symbol of rescue it could just as easily be a noose. Except that it's neither. Because he doesn't need it. Because he can survive fucking anything, because they love each other--he hopes. It’s like, if you love me as much as I love you, I’ll try to help you, even though I know you don’t need me because you just need to realize you can do it on your own. "And you're the only lover I had / Who ever slept with a knife" The interview where they talk about this line is so funny. "No it's not about us. But Carl did sleep with a knife and the line about being a survivor is about Carl having a dead twin and Peter saying he was the twin reincarnated. But it’s totally not about us." Anyway. Ugh just so much of this song seems to be about Peter being Super Obvious and open about his love for Carl and Carl being more closed off. Carl being the only lover who slept with a knife; he'll accept the love but he's wary of it and wary giving it.

(By the way by love I don't necessarily mean Romantic or Sexual love. They clearly adore each other one way or another, that's obvious enough. But Best Friendship love is 100% a thing.) (However, the Judy Garland line is so funny to me because "Friend of Dorothy" was a secret code for gay men for a while. And considering the amount of queer literature etc Peter references in everything, there's no way he didn't know this.)

I can't really go in depth into the Tony Hancock line since I really don't know much about Hancock and I know that it was a real touchstone for Peter and Carl. But it plus the Judy Garland line feels like a "neither of us have ever really had a home, but we found one in each other" thing. Which is. A lot. Especially with the "until the dawn" bit, because a main component of so many stories about them from other people is the two of them staying up for days together writing and adventuring and just doing stuff and no one else being able to get in their little bubble.

I love the "ahh" after "Stone the crows" and the way the music starts to swell. It's obvious that the next verse is the Important One. And it is. There's the story about Peter crashing an event at the Old Vic while Carl was ushering to tell him they should be writing together and everyone who's there are dicks. But it's also like...so many layers of what is success and what is appreciation and how do you express love. I assume the flowers are not from his show, that he's collected them from the stage after someone else's show. But it's reusing tokens of mostly empty/superficial/performative appreciation--the tradition of tossing flowers on the stage--as a token of genuine love. Sitting through an entire performance, watching someone else's success and dreaming of being there and then using the token of appreciation for that person to instead give it to the person you yourself appreciate and love and want to succeed with. It's like a promise, a "we'll get there." But also another act of desperation because he's been sitting there for hours. Carl wasn't there to receive the gift and wasn't there to write with him. But he's been chasing words around on the page--the love-words to this song or the words to another one?--and he needs Carl there to really complete it, needs Carl there to hear it. It's very much in line with Peter yelling that they should be writing. This intense "Please be with me please accept the way I express myself please complete my incomplete bits please like me as much as I like you" etc.

And then the chorus which is so interesting. I desperately wish I understood the Gypsy Lane and Stanley Park references. I think Stanley Park is a footie reference but I’m not sure? I'm trying to do all of the interpretation off my own brain and not use the notes on the Genius website or anywhere else but I wanted to see if those two references here had been crowdsourced. Apparently both Gypsy Lane and Stanley Park are places he spent time in his childhood (and I called it on the football reference, yes!). Which is. Wow. Okay. And then there's Waterloo which is a whole thing in itself. It's Waterloo as Waterloo but also Waterloo Station. So Carl is able to be Peter's Ultimate Defeat, the thing that has the ability to ruin him. But also Waterloo Station is near the Old Vic where Carl worked & would go to theatre bars, so it's also a place of familiarity. Since I don't know anything else about the Gypsy Lane reference, I can only assume it's also a place of comfort and familiarity. So Peter's admitting to Carl's power over him, ability to hurt him, but offering to comfort him in return. (Important for later.)

"I'm so glad we know just what to do / And exactly who's to blame" I love this line because it knows it's wrong. Especially in 2015 but maybe even in the early days. They bounced blame back and forth between them for YEARS. Not to mention all the outside bullshit. And obviously they didn't know what to do. The Waterloo/Stanley Park is another reference to a familiar place and a power to hurt/offer to comfort moment. I wish I knew if there was some sort of proper football reference here (aka a QPR reference since that's Peter's team) but I know absolutely nothing about sport so idk.

"Well I'm so glad we know just what to do / And no one's left / Stumbling around / Tumbling around / Fumbling around / In the dark" The way Peter sings this sounds so hopeful and sad at the same time. It's interesting to know this line was written way, way back. Like, this song was apparently one of the first ever songs they demoed. The demo is a lot more frantic and less romantic but jesus christ. The way Peter sings it now it's like he knows that was just an unconscious self-fulfilling prophecy. Like, no, they absolutely were left in the dark, hurting each other over and over and not being able/willing to place blame or to communicate. Except now, in 2015, they're not anymore. (and especially not now in 2021). But it's also another desire for comfort. Like, Peter's offering the comfort here. But he's also just confessed the power to hurt that Carl has. So this is also a "are you going to offer me comfort the way I've offered it to you?" sort of question. 

And then there's the solo which. Woof. It feels like a response to Peter's words. Like reaching out with sound. Like a shoulder-squeeze or a hug in response, something nonverbal that’s really trying to catch up and match up to the intense emotions in the words. The music crescendos and the solo is literally waves of notes that roll up and down and up and then it crashes down but lands so softly at the feet of the chorus.

And then we have equal footing, sort of (and Carl as Jesus again). Carl is still Peter's Waterloo, his ultimate defeat (or his place of comfort). But now Peter is Carl's Calvary. Which is the place where Jesus was crucified. Peter’s been offering comfort to Carl, but suddenly Peter has power over Carl. It's like...veneration and threat at once. Carl's Jesus, the savior, but also if he doesn't love Peter, Peter has the power to crucify him (or at least threatens to have that power). Or it's another portent: Carl could be Peter's savior, except that everything falls apart and Carl ends up hurt instead. They both end up hurt instead. So then they're on equal footing.

Which brings them to the "Well I'm so glad we know just what to do," which feels a little sadder but also a little more confident than the other two. The answer is in the "Everyone's gonna be happy / But of course." They need to work to figure out how to make each other happy, how to be comfort rather than hurt. It's not that simple. It never is. The "But of course" is a sarcy acknowledgement of how difficult that actually is. But it's also that sort of quiet hopefulness that yeah, maybe soon we'll figure it out and everyone will be happy and will get to say "of course I'm happy" about it.

[i-dont-want-your-hysteria]

Comments On the Pyromania Track-By-Track Videos From The Vault

If you don’t want spoilers- DON’T READ ANY FURTHER!

is it just me for does Phil's beard keep getting better and better

viv's black hoodie uwu

SAVVVV DD; "I remember walking out of the studio after trying to record the bass line for Photograph and thinking '...I don't know if I can actually do this anymore...'"

Joe putting his hands on his hips actually made me fuckin squeal what is wrong with me

Rick making guitar noises with his voice makes me so fucking happy

Phil making guitar noises with his voice makes me so fucking happy

every time Joe shook his hair out of his face 👁👄👁

every time Joe put his hands on his hips 👁👄👁

Joe, who "can't STAND" cricket, apparently

*hears intro to Photograph for the first time* "wot the FUCK is that-?"

FINALLY they're talking about the little "plick" at the very beginning of Photograph it's the bEST PART OF THE WHOLE SONG

“Someone who is the ultimate ‘you can't have’” -Joe (i'm actually gonna cry pls stop you don't know how hard it is to hear YOU say that)

"hold your breath, crush your fingers, and hope we pull it off" -Phil

"big chunky chunk chunk guitars" -Joe

Too Late For Love being the first Pyromania song

VIV TYPHEROHMTRPOMTH *headbangs while putting up horns* "it's gud for THAT!" STOPP YOU’RE GETTING AS DORKY AS JOE

"most bands when they play their songs live play them too fast and they lose their sexiness" -Joe

Joe thinking that the album version of Too Late For Love is too fast and that the live version off Mirror Ball is slightly better speed even though it's about 5BPM slower

Joe referring to Steve as "Clarky"

Joe pronouncing "that" as "dat" (again)

Sav's weights visible in the background

Viv: "I'd do a solo, Phil'd do a solo, I'd do another one, Joe would get bored-"

 I THINK Joe’s wearing an earring...? It’s really hard to tell

Joe saying his as was sore for quote unquote “WEEKS” after being forced to ride a horse for a whole day while filming the Foolin video

Joe preceding to be very very salty about this

"The explosions in Foolin' burnt all the hair off my arms, almost put me in the hospital- so that's what's known as 'suffering for your art'" -Joe

Rick cracking himself up with his own impression of Billy Idol going "aREnt YoU thOSE guYS whO dO tHE soNG- FUH-FUH-FUH-FUH-FUH-FUH-FUH-FUH-FOOLIN?"

Joe making guitar noises with this voice makes me so fucking happy

Joe explaining how he came up with the chorus for Rock of Ages and then saying "I'm sorry but you couldn't make this up :3)"

joe still looks the F U C K I N G S A M E AS HE DID BACK IN '82 I STFG IT'S KINDA FREAKING ME OUT

Joe impersonating his 22/23 year old self talking to Mutt: *does a triple take* "wot about this...?"

Joe loving his vocal performance on Comin Under Fire

Finding out that the first half of the Comin Under Fire intro was written by Pete

"especially with one arm these days..." -Rick

Joe saying that Comin Under Fire is probably his favorite song off Pyromania because he's "not sick to death of it"

JOE'S VOICE GOING HIGH WHEN HE SAID "(Comin Under Fire) stays in the Vault, ya know- for now- FOR NOW :D"

“We have since worked out... we are NOT the Rolling Stones and never WILL be..." -Joe

Joe calling Move With Me Slowly "the closest we ever got to sounding like the Stones"

Joe admitting he tried to sound Cockney on Action Not Words and clearly looking embarrassed

Joe basically shitting on Action Not Words in general

I thought maybe just MAYBE Joe was gonna get through this whole set of videos without mentioning Mott- I was wrong.

[lyfestile]

The first time I met Chuck Berry he was playing a club called Where It's At, which, in contradiction of its name, occupied the second floor of a drab business building in Kenmore Square and was operated by longtime Boston DJ Dave Maynard and his manager, Ruth Clenott. It was 1967, and I was in my senior year of college, working at the Paperback Booksmith, as I had for the last four years, both in and out of school. I was making $65 a week. The reason I know this is because Chuck Berry signed my paycheck.

'Chuck,' dedicated to Berry's wife of 68 years, features new songs written, recorded and produced by rock legend

Well, it wasn't my paycheck exactly, it was my paycheck stub, and the reason he signed it was because I didn't have anything else to present to him for an autograph. He had just given an exhilarating performance with a pick-up band of Berklee College students (unlike Bo Diddley, say, whom I had recently seen at the same club, Chuck Berry never carried his own band, and the result was inconsistent, to say the least). But tonight for whatever reason Chuck's creative impulse had been stimulated, and rather than performing tired rehashes of his familiar hits with a rhythm section that didn't have a clue, he followed what I'm sure was the unintended lead of the band, jazz players all, freely improvising on the hits, while throwing in unexpected bonuses like "Rockin' at the Philharmonic" and Lionel Hampton's "Flying Home," along with a few T-Bone Walker and Louis Jordan tunes for good measure. He was clearly in good spirits, but it still took a while for me to work up the nerve to approach him as he stood to one side of the foot-high stage, packing up his guitar and getting ready to leave.

He regarded me with a quizzical look, casting an even more quizzical look at the book I was attempting to give him – "book" might actually be a little bit of a stretch for the pamphlet-sized booklet I was finally able to hand him, with its smudged white cover and stapled-together pages. What's this? his noncommittal expression seemed to say, in a manner that betrayed neither receptiveness nor hostility. More to the point, that blank stare seemed to suggest, who the fuck are you? I have no idea what I said. I'm sure I wished that the book could simply declare itself. The stark black lettering on the cover announced "Almost Grown, and Other Stories, by Peter Guralnick," and it had originally been published three years earlier, when I was 20. I must have mumbled something about how the book had been inspired in part by his music, that the title obviously came from his song, that I hoped he would like it. (Help me, I'm trying to paint a sympathetic picture here.) He flipped through the pages and placed the book carefully in his guitar case. "Cool," he said, or the equivalent, and flashed me what I took to be an encouraging, if inescapably sardonic, smile. And then he was gone, off to the airport, off to another gig, or maybe just home to St. Louis. I still like to think that he read the stories on the plane on his way to his next destination.

It would be another 44 years before I actually met him.

But, first, perhaps I should say – well, you tell me, do I really have to say? – that there is no end to my admiration for Chuck Berry's work, even if his commitment to performance has at times proved wanting. As much as Percy Mayfield remains the Poet Laureate of the Blues, Chuck Berry will always be the Poet Laureate of – what? Of Our Time. Has there ever been a more perfect pop song than "Nadine," a catchier encapsulation of story line and wit in four verses and a chorus, in which the protagonist (like all of Chuck's characters, a not-too-distant stand-in for its author but never precisely himself) is introduced "pushing through the crowd trying to get to where she's at/I was campaign shouting like a Southern diplomat." I mean, come on – and the song only gets better from there. When he was recognized in 2012 by PEN New England (a division of the international writers' organization) for its first "Song Lyrics of Literary Excellence" award, his co-honoree, Leonard Cohen, graciously declared that "all of us are footnotes to the words of Chuck Berry," while Bob Dylan called him "the Shakespeare of rock & roll."

Which is all very generically well. But perhaps the most persuasive tribute I ever encountered was delivered by the highly cerebral New Orleans singer, songwriter, arranger and pianist extraordinaire, Allen Toussaint. I was trying to get at some of the reasons for the dramatic expansion of his own songwriting aspirations (musically, poetically, politically) in the Seventies, when he graduated from brilliant pop cameos like "Ride Your Pony" and "Mother in Law" to more ambitious, post-Beatles, post-Miles, post–Civil Rights Era work. Was it the influence of Bob Dylan, say, that allowed him to contemplate a wider range of subjects, a greater length of songs? Oh, not at all, Allen replied in his cool, elegant manner; he wished he could agree with me, but his single greatest influence in terms of lyrics and storytelling from first to last was Chuck Berry. And with that he started quoting Chuck Berry lyrics, just as you or I might, just as Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, and Jerry Lee Lewis do on the fabled "Million Dollar Quartet" session. "What a wonderful little story that is," he said of "You Never Can Tell," Chuck's fairy-tale picture of young love in Creole-speaking Louisiana, "how he lived that life with that couple, you know. Oh, the man's a mountain," said Allen unhesitatingly, and then went on to quote some more.

I saw Chuck in performance many times over the years, everywhere from Carnegie Hall to a decommissioned state armory. I wrote to him at one point at the invitation of Bob Baldori, who started playing with Chuck in 1966 and has been close to him ever since. Chuck had begun work on his autobiography at that point, and Bob thought, a little fancifully perhaps, he might welcome some help. "Dear Mr. Berry," I wrote in effect, "You won't remember me, but ...," then cited Bob as a reference and suggested that while I didn't know that I had anything to offer as a writer, maybe he could use me as someone to bounce ideas off, if he were so inclined. I never heard back from him, which was just as well, because when the book came out two years later, in 1987, it was a masterpiece. "It is at once witty, elegant, and revealing," I wrote of it for Vibe, "and (or perhaps but) ultimately elusive. Every word was written by its author in a web of elegant, intricate connections that are both coded and transparent. Very much like the songs." And it was all Chuck – with a little help from his editor, Michael Pietsch, who traveled to Chuck's amusement park / residence, Berry Park, outside of St. Louis, to retrieve it.

It was not until New Orleans, in 2011, though, that I got beyond that first, monosyllabic exchange. We were both there to fulfill a date that was initially referred to without irony as "The Summit Meeting of Rock," because it was to include filmed interviews with Chuck, Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard and Fats Domino, both as a group and, in the case of the first three, singly as well. It was part of a Rolling Stone–sponsored oral history project for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame that had only recently begun, and I was the designated interviewer. Do I have to stipulate that it was one of the most challenging things I've ever done, and also, unquestionably, one of the most fun? You try facing down Jerry Lee Lewis, Richard or Chuck, each with his own keenly intelligent, widely divergent and informed point of view, and try to get a go-ahead smile out of them on their own uncompromising terrain. I think I'd be safe in saying that, overall, unaffected warmth and affection prevailed, stimulated as much as anything by everyone's genuine love for Fats, but at the same time it was not an entirely smooth and mellow meeting. Religion, politics, personality – all of the usual sources of conflict were present in good measure. Little Richard at one point wanted to thank God for bringing them all to New Orleans, but Jerry Lee, an intensely religious man himself, demurred at what I think he took to be a too-casual appropriation of faith. "I don't know about you," he muttered, "but I came here on a plane. And I think you came by bus!" Someone suggested that Louis Jordan was one of the key figures in the development of rock & roll, and someone else objected that "Ain't Nobody Here but Us Chickens" was not in their view anything like rock & roll. It was incredible! The interview with Jerry Lee was probably the most wide-ranging; Little Richard, for all of his avid study of history and precise recollection of it, was not about to abandon his theological texts; but it was Chuck who proved the most surprising, as, robbed of the constraint of memory, he abandoned, if only for a moment or two, his lifelong habit of emotional indirection and spoke unguardedly of his family, his mother and father, the expectations they had had of him and the inspiration with which they provided him, growing up.

He was as slim and elegant as ever, wearing the jaunty captain's hat that has become almost ubiquitous since the departure of most of his beautifully coiffed hair some years ago. Communication was sometimes a challenge, because not surprisingly he had left his hearing aids at home, despite the repeated reminders of his family and his friend Joe Edwards, proprietor of Blueberry Hill, the St. Louis club where he played off and on for almost 20 years before "taking a break" from performing two years ago. He spoke of poetry and politics (just to clarify, nearly everything is "politics" to Chuck, from the endemic chicanery of the music business to the endemic racism he has encountered over the years), and he insisted for the most part, just as he always has in his art, on speaking metaphorically, if unmistakably.

He spoke, too, of the sources of inspiration that he always points to for much of the flair, if not the full scope, of his creativity. (There is, Chuck will never fail to tell you, nothing new under the sun.) He cited Charlie Christian and T-Bone Walker and Louis Jordan (not to mention Louis Jordan's great guitarist Carl Hogan: Check out "Ain't That Just Like a Woman" if you want to hear one of the fundamental sources for Chuck Berry's guitar style) – and Nat "King" Cole, too, for his diction. But as to his idea of reaching everyone, not just the "neighborhood" (the ur-definition, of course, of rock & roll), well, that was something he derived from the concept of get-ahead capitalism that he got from helping out his father in the grocery business as a young boy. "By then," he said, describing himself at ages 10 and 11, "I had a bit of politics in my head. My dad had a business of his own, selling groceries, and he worked for himself, so I came to handling money at that age. He carried vegetables in a basket and would go by someone's door and knock on it. 'Would you like ...?' You know, the material looked so good. [But] I sold a lot [of it] because of the ingenuity that I [showed] trying to sell."

That was the very idea that he applied to the music, when, after driving up to Chicago to introduce himself to Leonard Chess on Muddy Waters' recommendation, he introduced himself to the world at the age of 28 by employing that same sense of ingenuity, that same sense of "politics." Meaning, he said, "M-O-N-E-Y. What sells. What's on the market. Now I knew the market. There had to be a market in order for you to be successful in a business. The market had to need your business, or the product of it. So I tried to sing as though they would be interested, and that would become a market." And then, he said, you multiplied that market, and you added another market to it, and it was as if you were still traveling from neighborhood to neighborhood, and pretty soon you had a constituency that included nearly everybody. That was the constituency that Chuck Berry was aiming for as an artist. And that was the constituency that he ultimately reached.

We started out our interview talking about poetry, and we came back to poetry in the end. Remember, this is a man whose older brother was named for Paul Laurence Dunbar, the great African-American poet, whose "We Wear the Mask" should be required reading in all the schools. It had always tickled me the way that Chuck would end so many of his concerts with a poem. It was a poem I had never heard in any other context, though it reminded me of "Ozymandias" by Percy Bysshe Shelley, in which a traveler from "some antique land" stumbles upon the tomb of one of its ancient kings. "Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair," proclaim the words engraved on the faded stone at the base of the ruined monument, while "the lone and level sands stretch far away ... boundless and bare."

The poem that Chuck recited, while nowhere near as bleak (it takes a more positive, transcendental spin), was certainly in the same philosophical ballpark. It was called "Even This Shall Pass Away," and, as I discovered from asking him about it, it was not an original poem by Chuck Berry at all; it was in fact a poem that he had first heard his father recite ("That's my dad," Chuck said. "I get a little choked up when I think of him"), when he was no more than six or seven years old. The poet, I would later learn after a little research (very little – it's all over the Internet!), was Theodore Tilton, an American poet, newspaper editor, and Abolitionist, and the poem was first published in his collection The Sexton's Tale in 1867. With very little prompting, Chuck recited the poem, and as he did, he got more and more choked up. "My dad," he said, "was the cause of me being in show business. He was not only in poetry but in acting a bit. He was Mordecai in the play A Dream of Queen Esther. [This was a church production by a prolific white playwright and meteorologist, Walter Ben Hare.] He was very low in speech and music, and he came out onstage, he came out to tell the king, 'Sire, sire, someone is approaching our castle.' And I knew his voice. I'm five years old right now. I knew his voice and I hollered out in the theater, 'Daddy!' I don't remember it, but they tell me I did. His position in the choir was bass. Mother's was soprano and lead. That's all there was in our house, poetry and choir rehearsal and duets and so forth; I listened to Dad and Mother discuss things about poetry and delivery and voice and diction – I don't think anyone could know how much it really means." Who were some of his favorite poets as a kid? I ask. Edgar Allen Poe, he said after some consideration ("I can't think of them [all], my memory's really bad"), and Paul Laurence Dunbar was his mother's. On second thought, he offered, Dunbar was his favorite, too.

But getting back to that recitation – he couldn't do it as well as his father, Chuck said after completing several verses of "Even This Shall Pass Away," "my dad's voice rang. But here's something for you." And with that he launched into the fifth verse (out of seven), searching for the words, searching for the memories, concluding triumphantly, "'Pain is hard to bear,' he cried. 'But with patience day by day/Even this shall pass away.' Oh, I'm breaking up again." And with that he concluded, to the applause of everyone in the room, the film director, the sound and camera man, his son, Charles Jr., a woman who carried a card "Sherry with Berry," and assorted other bystanders – no more than 25 or 30 in all. He was in tears. He was in triumph.

The problem for Chuck Berry as he reaches his 90th birthday is the same one we all face: mortality. His work, of course, is his immortality, though as Woody Allen has often said, "I don't want to achieve immortality through my work; I want to achieve immortality through not dying" – and Chuck might very well agree. He is, like many of us, his own best advocate and his own worst enemy, but the particular problem for Chuck is that, for all of the accolades that have come his way (listen to Elvis, Carl Perkins, and Jerry Lee Lewis celebrate his genius on the Million Dollar Quartet session, just for a start), to this day he has not been unambiguously embraced in the full artistic terms he deserves. There are undoubtedly a multiplicity of reasons for this (race would certainly have to be factored in), but the principal reason that Chuck has not been lifted up on a wave of critical and biographical hosannas is Chuck himself. His unwillingness to ingratiate himself. His unreadable apartness. The deep-seated sense of anger and suspicion that can unexpectedly flare up and turn into overt hostility, with or without provocation (check out the 60th birthday, star-studded performance documentary, Hail! Hail! Rock N' Roll, which is both brilliant for its uplifting artistry and maddening for its self-inflicted failures). Most of all, I would guess, it comes down to his determined, uncompromisingly defiant refusal to conform to anyone else's expectations but his own.

He is not like any other popular performer that I can think of (oh, Merle Haggard might be a distant cousin, even a second or third cousin once removed, but no closer). For all of the canny "political" (read "artistic" here) inclusiveness that established both his career and his legacy, he has from the beginning chosen to set himself apart. Or been set apart. By a juvenile conviction for armed robbery before he ever thought of entering show business (remember: this was an upwardly mobile, middle-class kid, by his own description). Later by two mid-career prison terms, one coming at the height of his success in 1960 (a contested Mann Act violation, which could certainly be seen as a form of "political" [read "racial" here] reprisal). Not to mention some of his well-documented sexual proclivities and peccadillos (and I don't mean to minimize them here), what his biographer, Bruce Pegg, writes, represent the actions of "a man whose detachment from society made him feel immune to its mores and taboos." (For details see Pegg's Brown Eyed Handsome Man: The Life and Hard Times of Chuck Berry.) Sometimes that sense of detachment has served him well (by allowing him to speak in another person's voice for example, in his songwriting), sometimes it has not – but it has always been a non-negotiable part of his personality. And it has at times alienated his own audience at the very times that, were he but able to admit it, he might have needed them most.

Which has tended to make his transition to lovable icon, to venerable (and much-venerated) elder statesman, a little daunting at times. In the past few years he has enjoyed a round of gracious honors: a larger-than-life duckwalking statue in St Louis; that PEN New England "Literary Excellence in Song Lyrics" award, held at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, where Chuck was delighted to snap pictures, and have his picture taken with images of JFK; his celebration in a week-long series of events as an American Music Master at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame; the $100,000 international Polar Music Prize, which has often been referred to as "the Nobel Prize for Music." At each of the first three (he was not able to attend the Polar Prize ceremony in Sweden in 2014), he acquitted himself with more than a hint of sentiment and a large dose of his own brand of idiosyncratic charm. "I'm wondering about my future," he told Rolling Stone reporter Patrick Doyle. When pressed to be a little more explicit, "I'll give you a little piece of poetry," he said. "Give you a song?/I can't do that/My singing days have passed/My voice is gone, my throat is worn/And my lungs are going fast." Or as he put it 10 years earlier, in 2002, "In a way, I feel it might be ill-mannered to try and top myself. The music I play is a ritual. Something that matters to people in a special way. I wouldn't want to interfere with that."

[traveling-at-the-speed-of-light]

50 Questions About Me tag (My First Post!)

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Hey everybody! I think it’s time I introduced myself so you can see who I am! So without further ado, the 50 Questions About Me Tag! See if your answers match mine, who knows, maybe we could be friends!

1. WERE YOU NAMED AFTER ANYONE?

No, I wasn’t. Well, not originally. My name was supposed to be ‘Ruby’, after the song, but it never turned out that way. Then, when i got older, I earned my pen name ‘Scott’ from my gamer tag on Steam. Most people remember me by my personality more that my name, now they can do both!

2. WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU CRIED?

Today, actually. I had a dispute with my best friend over past issues and it didn’t go well. We made up afterwards.

3. DO YOU LIKE YOUR HANDWRITING?

Yes and no. It’s like chicken scrawl, but at least I can read it!

4. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE LUNCH MEAT?

Lunch meat…? Uh…ham I guess? I don’t really eat that kind of stuff often.

5. DO YOU HAVE KIDS?

No, no I do not. I mean, I have a doll that goes everywhere with me, but that’s not considered a kid.

6. IF YOU WERE ANOTHER PERSON WOULD YOU BE FRIENDS WITH YOU?

I would actually. While I have my flaws, I also have my charms.

7. DO YOU USE SARCASM A LOT?

Abso-fucking-lutely.

8. DO YOU STILL HAVE YOUR TONSILS?

No, I also had my adenoids removed as well.

9. WOULD YOU BUNGEE JUMP?

Not even for a undisclosed amount of money.

10. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE CEREAL?

Fruit Loops. A true reflection of my soul.

11. DO YOU UNTIE YOUR SHOES WHEN YOU TAKE THEM OFF?

No, they’ve got Velcro on them. Unless it’s my ‘fancy’ shoes, then I do.

12. DO YOU THINK YOU ARE STRONG?

No, I am neither mentally or physically.

13. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE ICE CREAM?

Cookies & Cream.

14. WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT PEOPLE?

Face. have to check if it’s friendly.

15. RED OR PINK?

Magenta!

16. WHAT IS THE LEAST FAVORITE THING ABOUT YOURSELF?

I have a list. You’re going to have to be more specific.

17. WHO DO YOU MISS THE MOST?

My mother. Anytime I’m away from her, I miss her.

18. WHAT IS THE QUOTE THAT HAS INSPIRED YOU THE MOST?

“It’s strange because sometimes, I read a book, and I think I am the people in the book.” ― Stephen Chbosky,  The Perks of Being A Wallflower

19. WHAT COLOR SHOES ARE YOU WEARING?

Skin coloured. They’re this new style called feet.

20. WHAT WAS THE LAST THING YOU ATE?

Pizza. *angel chorus*

21. WHAT ARE YOU LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW?

Lowlife – That Poppy. Surprisingly, while that girl is creepy AF, it’s a good song.

22. IF YOU WERE A CRAYON, WHAT COLOR WOULD YOU BE?

Purple or Gray. Only because Purple is my favorite color and I usually wear a lot of Gray clothing.

23. FAVORITE SMELLS?

Certain body washes and soaps. I have a big…hording problem with those if they smell nice.

24. WHO WAS THE LAST PERSON YOU TALKED TO ON THE PHONE?

My ex-boyfriend/best mate.

25. MOUNTAIN HIDEAWAY OR BEACH HOUSE?

Beach house. I unfortunately find the mountains and country living a little too quiet, so a beach is better. Closer to the city.

26. FAVORITE SPORTS TO WATCH?

Animated ones. They go a lot faster.

27. HAIR COLOR?

My natural hair color is dark brown, but I usually dye it an array of colors. This month it’s bright orange, but it’s fading so I’ll most likely redye it soon.

28. EYE COLOR?

Also brown.

29. DO YOU WEAR CONTACTS?

Nope.

30. FAVORITE FOOD?

Indian flat bread, ,or just white bread in general. Not sure why.

31. SCARY MOVIES OR HAPPY ENDINGS?

Happy endings. I can’t handle many scary movies.

32. LAST MOVIE YOU WATCHED?

Power Rangers. I’m making a review of that currently to post on this here blog.

33. WHAT COLOR SHIRT ARE YOU WEARING?

Peach colored, so a really bright pastel orange.

34. SUMMER OR WINTER?

Winter all the way. Here it just rains and I love rain, so it’s a perfect match.

35. HUGS OR KISSES?

Hugs. While kisses are okay, I just prefer them more.

36. FAVORITE DESSERT?

Cookies and Cream ice cream or Hershey’s. Can’t go wrong.

37. STRENGTH TRAINING OR CARDIO?

Neither. I am perfectly fine the way I am. So, fuck gyms.

38. COMPUTER OR TELEVISION?

Computer. While I love my television dearly and it’s programmes, The computer is where I spend most of my time.

39. WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING NOW?

None currently, but I have a whole stack of library books I have to get though right now.

40. WHAT IS ON YOUR MOUSE PAD?

It’s just a plain blue cover, there isn’t anything interesting like a graphic unfortunately.

41. ANY TATTOOS?

Nope. Want, but won’t get. My pain tolerance is a bit low.

42. FAVORITE SOUND?

‘Do you want takeaway for dinner?’ Sad, I know.

43. ROLLING STONES OR BEATLES?

Ooh. I don’t really listen to either, but I’ll say The Beatles because most of the bands I actually listen to have covered most of their songs.

44. WHAT IS THE FARTHEST YOU HAVE BEEN FROM HOME?

Sydney. Had the best week ever that year.

45. DO YOU HAVE A SPECIAL TALENT?

Not really sure.

46. WHERE WERE YOU BORN?

In a little run down shit show called Ipswich. (Sorry guys, but it’s true. I mean no offense.)

47. WHERE ARE YOU LIVING NOW?

Brisbane! The city of opportunities, well, at least I think.

48. WHAT COLOR IS YOUR HOUSE?

Green or red with white. I”m not sure. I don’t really look that often.

49. WHAT COLOR IS YOUR CAR?

I don’t own one. Figures.

50. ANY PETS?

1 dog and 1 cat.

And that’s a little about me! Hope you enjoyed reading that and as always, comment down below on TV shows, books and movies you would like me to review!

- XOXO Scott