Never Mind the Pollacks
Page 22
Three guys twice as big as me bum’s rushed the stage. They were on me before I could swing the guitar at their heads. One of them ripped the strap from my shoulder and smashed the guitar in two. I felt something metal smack into my skull, and then a sharp pain in my abdomen. A pinprick of blood appeared on my shirt. It widened quickly, and then it began to gush. The guy who’d stabbed me put his knife back in his sheath.
He picked me up by the collar and carried me through the bar. The pain was greater than anything I’d felt before. A thick stream of blood oozed behind us. The bartender trailed with a mop soaked in vinegar.
The guy tossed me onto the sidewalk.
“Die in peace, man,” he said.
I tumbled twice, and settled into the flooded gutter. My blood mixed with the rushing rainwater, washing me in a fetid stew. I moaned.
Die in peace? What was he talking about? Oh. I guess I was dying. And fast, too. I die. You die. We all die, die, die.
A rumbling came from below the street, followed by a cracking. A guitar note sounded, a hundred times louder than what I’d played in the bar. I saw the pavement buckle, and then it gave way. An enormous cat’s paw, eight feet wide, burst through the concrete. An unearthly moan blew up from below.
“MRRRROWWWWW!”
“Oh, shit,” I said.
The earth tore open with a mighty roar. Two monstrous devil-cats launched themselves into the air. They pulled a bright red chariot, which carried a man. He wore black jeans, black socks, black steel-toed boots, and a black T-shirt with red lettering: “MURDERER.” His chariot flung into the sky. He said:
“I HAVE RETURNED TO CLAIM MY KINGDOM!”
“No,” I said. “Please, no.”
Neal Pollack hovered several feet above me. A ball of flame launched from his palm. In the street, a car exploded.
“Paul St. Pierre,” he said. “I see you!”
“I’m dying, Neal,” I said.
“You killed me, you bastard!”
“I’m sorry!”
“No, you’re not. Admit it!”
He launched another ball of flame. It exploded just behind my head.
“OK,” I said. “I’m not sorry!”
A third ball of flame exploded in my face. Oh, god. My head was on fire.
“The rock apocalypse has arrived!” Pollack said. “I am its herald! From below I have been sent to announce that after nearly a decade of throwaway candy pop, rock is returning to achieve its ultimate dominion over the earth!”
“Well,” I said, “I like the Strokes.”
Pollack threw fireballs from both palms.
“Fuck the Strokes!” he said.
A thunderclap.
“What about the White Stripes!” I said.
“They’re a different story,” he said. “It’s hard to tell if the music’s sincere, but Jack White is a genuine…”
He shook his head.
“Wait! That’s not the point! The point isn’t whether or not you like the Strokes or the White Stripes or the Hives or the Vines, although if you like the Vines, you’re a total idiot.”
“What about Interpol?” I said. “Or the Yeah Yeah Yeahs?”
“Same old annoying New York bullshit,” said Pollack. “Goddamn it, Paul, you don’t understand, and you never have! What I’m trying to say is this: You don’t know anything about rock ’n’ roll! You don’t know where it comes from or where it’s going! Its true path cannot be predicted and cannot be packaged or marketed! And it is returning! Somewhere in some basement or some garage or some parking lot, someone who you’ve never heard of and never will is making music that you’ll hate! It may not be the most sophisticated music of all time, but it’ll be sincere and loud and fun, and it will kick your ass!”
“Tell me some bands,” I said. “So I can write about them.”
The greatest rock critic who has ever lived or ever will raised his arms. My lifeless body levitated toward him. In a voice as loud as the creation of the universe, Neal Pollack said:
“No! You’ll never know! You’ll never know! No one cares what you think! Rock doesn’t belong to you, or anyone like you, anymore! Rock critics of the world, I have destroyed you! Renounce your profession as I carry you to hell! Your time on earth is done!”
SELECTED DISCOGRAPHY
Obviously, a selection of this sort is going to be subjective and bounded by my personal taste, which is better than yours. It’s therefore intended to provide you with the best possible musical education. None of these records are available commercially. In fact, only two copies of each exist, on LP, and I’ve hidden one of each in various secret locations around the world. If you find them, well, bully for you. Anyone who doesn’t have time for a crazy treasure hunt and is interested in obtaining a copy of Merle Haggard Sings Songs of Other People Singing Merle Haggard Songs, The Underappreciated Sam Cooke, Black Flag’s Butt Muscle EP, or any of the other albums mentioned here, call the Chicago Reader, ask for Peter Margasak, and leave a voice-mail message.
ONE: COME ON OVER TONIGHT
The Untold Elvis Essential Master Recording Demos: B-Side Remixes (RCA 84838). Some of Elvis’s most moving performances have vanished, like everything else that’s good in the world. These are no exception. Includes a capella renderings of “Ezekiel Saw the Wheel” and “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy.”
Clambone Jefferson Sings Lost Songs Of Haiti (Folkways 23576). Alan Lomax coerced these songs out of the Clam one afternoon. A personal favorite of Baby Doc Duvalier.
Warren Smith: I Got Screwed! (Sun 29304). Bitterness breeds great hillbilly boogie.
The Billion Dollar Septet (Sun 89032). More than an hour of Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, Roy Orbison, Tom Petty, George Harrison, and Bob Dylan, singing together for the first and only time.
Elvis Fat and Old (RCA 57483). Nineteen gospel songs for a CBS special preempted by the moon landing.
TWO: THIS STATE HOUSE OF DETENTION
The Shitkicking Bob Dylan (Bootleg recorded in secret location, 1961). Not actually an album, but rather outtakes from a different album.
Joan Baez Live at the Apollo (Folkways 29402). Essential listening for those who hate music.
Bob Dylan: The Attic Tapes 1967–1969. Selected recordings include:
“Mrs. Jones and Me,” first take, Robbie Robertson, guitar, Bob Roberts, piano, Rob Bobertson, bass, Bobby Robinson, drums, lyrics and music by Bob Dylan from marriage ballad inspired by murder.
“Smoke the Long Bone.” Dylan obviously not caring what anyone thought about him in lyrics advocating man-boy love, said to have derived from William McKinley campaign song, New Orleans, circa 1896.
“Lo and Behold!” v. 6, 8.2.45.29. Very, very different from all the other “Lo and Beholds.”
“Rally Round the Whiskey, Mister.” Stolen from Clambone Jefferson.
THREE: GYPSY TIGER IN MY SOUP
The Velvet Underground and Nico Get Loaded (Verve 6868). April 1967 (USA), October 1967 (UK), November 1967 (Australia), December 1993 (Canada).
The Stooges Live in Paris (Elektra 1971). Mercifully, before Bowie got his hands on the songs.
“Kick Out the Jams.” MC5, Thirty-seven-minute live version, Lost Midwest Garage bootleg, circulated in secret among badly dressed longhaired nerds.
Lou Reed Is God (Verve 8906). An album so great that no one was allowed to play on it but Lou.
“Sweet Love, Love Your Woman.” Soul Barbers, Revilot Records, 1965.
INTERLUDE: MIDNIGHT DRIVE ON A HIGHWAY STREET
Anyone who still gives a shit about Springsteen already owns everything he’s ever recorded.
FOUR: NEVER MIND THE POLLACKS
Live at the Hippodrome. The worst recording ever made of a New York Dolls concert, and that’s saying a lot.
Patti Smith: Pretensions. Lost singles, including live versions of “Mother’s Little Helper” and “Riders on the Storm.” Hard to find. Before you die, you hear her sing.
“I Don’t Wanna Shit Blood for a We
ek.” Recorded live by the Ramones at the Rocket Tavern in Washington, D.C., before the dawn of time.
Eat, Eat, Bang, Bang Rock ’n’ Roll Patrol. Invaluable six-volume UK First Wave post–Sex Pistols compilation including Buzzcocks, the Clash, the Damned, Slaughter and the Dogs, Eater, the Adverts, the Saints, Snatch, Cortinas, Penetration, the Lurkers, and a hundred other bands you never saw.
“Don’t Stop Till Your Body Pops.” MC Clam, 1979.
FIVE: THE COPS WILL HAVE YOUR HEAD
Tin Whistle. Fugazi EP, 1988 (Dischord Records). Available only in very ethical record stores.
Only About 15 People Showed Up. Mission of Burma (Ace Of Hearts Records).
Pink Flag. Wire EP. The greatest album of all time.
We Are Sonic Youth! Only to be released upon Thurston Moore’s death.
Husker Don’t! Husker Du (SST Records). Bob Mould moans, and the world weeps for him. Growing up is hard.
Death to Fame, Self-Promotion Sucks, Volume 2 Compilation 1989 (Sub Pop). Available in CD, 8-track, LP, cassette, MP3, DVD. Don’t buy it. What, you already did? We’re all such sellouts, I swear.
If Courtney Hears That You’re Distributing This Nirvana Bootleg, She Will Hunt You Down and Kill You. Someday, we will defeat her.
We Are Rich Assholes with Nothing to Say: Songs Of Williamsburg (Capitol 2003). The sound of today.
Until the next book, then, I remain,
Yours in the Revolution,
Neal Pollack
P.S.: Fuck off!
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
A number of real-life rock critics, both paid hacks and enthusiastic amateurs, endured my annoying, naïve questions over the past two years as this project slowly creaked to life. If the details in this book are correct, they can take credit. If I got stuff wrong, it’s not their fault. Here they are, in no particular order: Jim DeRogatis, Henry Owings, Bethany Klein, Dan DeLuca, John Strausbaugh, Kenan Hebert, Andrew Earles, Monica Kendrick, Elisa Ludwig, Glenn Kenny, and Greg Beets. I’m also tremendously grateful to Jim Roll, who allows my band to exist, and to the other members of the Neal Pollack Invasion, Dakota Smith, John Williams, and Neil Cleary. And many thanks are due Jerod Gunsberg, Joanne Abrams, Jane Lerner, and Dan Shepelavy from The Telegraph Company, my agent, Daniel Greenberg, my editors David Hirshey, John Williams, and Jeff Kellogg, Carrie Kania and Amy Baker from HarperAudio, Carl Lennertz and Jen Hart, Ben Brown and the Book Punk crew, the organizers of Philadelphia’s own 215 Festival, my parents, Regina, Elijah, and Hercules, and all the friends I’ve made along the lonesome road from independent publishing nobody to corporate sellout gutter monkey. People, I have so much love to pass around, but the media wants to destroy the world that we’ve all built together. If you give an interview without my permission, it’s over, do you hear? Over. Sweet Jewish God, I can’t take the pressure anymore.
So with that in mind, these acknowledgments really go out to those who’ve doubted me, mocked me, called me a “one-trick retardo pony,” or said that I had no business following my dream of becoming the world’s leading rock novelist. Well, after ten years of working nearly five hours a day, I’m taking my rightful place at the table of the American literary canon. And where are you now? Nowhere, that’s where! This bullet train cannot be stopped, and you don’t have a ticket! Not now. Not ever. Up yours, wadbutts! I’ve won! You can suck my big fat best-selling dick!
About the Author
NEAL POLLACK is the author of the cult classic The Neal Pollack Anthology of American Literature. He writes for numerous underground publications such as Vanity Fair and the New York Times. His rock credentials are validated by his residence in Austin, Texas.
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ALSO BY NEAL POLLACK
The Neal Pollack Anthology of American Literature: The Collected Writings of Neal Pollack
Beneath the Axis of Evil: One Man’s Journey into the Horrors of War
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
NEVER MIND THE POLLACKS. Copyright © 2003 by Neal Pollack. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
ePub edition April 2007 ISBN 9780061750212
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