Batting clean-up in the cultural pipeline….
You mean while I’ve been yammering on about a 40-year-old Clash album, the Bowie doc came out, and so did this year’s angriest hardcore record? (Well, that actually came out in March. But….)
“Here’s to unnecessary eye wear as fashion accessories!”
Greetings. Thanks for indulging that five-part Clash Combat Rock series that ran the last six weeks. Going by the overall positive response, it looks as if detailed, lengthy historical pieces work for you, as long as they’re split into readable-in-seven-minutes chunks. So be expecting more work along these lines in the future.
But why dig so deep into something the average person ringing up your groceries or repairing your washing machine might consider arcane? Honestly, this shit only thrills some maniacs like us. I tried pitching that Combat Rock 40th anniversary idea at my former employers and a few other magazines. It got universal yawns. The Clash changed the world, as did the Ramones and many other bands/movies/books you or I could rattle off effortlessly. But to most folks out there, The Clash are just that “Rock The Casbah” band. The world didn’t change one iota, for them. And it never will. Meanwhile, what’s tearing up TikTok? That’s what’s rocking their Casbah, these days.
Culture is just background noise for most. It isn’t a vital, essential part of their lives. It’s wallpaper. No matter how many incursions punk culture or whatever you wanna call it makes upon the mainstream, the status quo does not change. But we do. This is why we have a community – people like us find each other and stick close. We can bolster one another against a sick world that does not get that a 2:30 rock ‘n’ roll can change everything.
The Tim “Napalm” Stegall Substack exists for these very reasons. It’s intended as a forum where we can all find more culture that gets us through these sick times, be it ancient history ala The Clash or new-as-today’s-headlines ala The Interrupters, or David Bowie’s co-star in today’s edition Soul Glo. And I appreciate when you reach out to me and let me know I am not screaming in the wilderness. You hear me, and you appreciate the work. And maybe you know of something I can examine in this space? You enable me to continue my work, by reading this, subscribing at five bucks per month, and sharing it with your friends on social media. I am honored to hear from you, honored that you read this publication. Thank you.
With all that said, here’s a couple of things that caught my eye or ear as I wrote that Clash series, beginning with a movie that was a special friend’s 57th birthday present to me a little over a month ago.
Cinematic Addict: Moonage Daydream Bowie doc is as unique and extraordinary as its subject
MOONAGE DAYDREAM – D: Brett Morgen; with David Bowie. (PG-13, 2 hr. 15 min.)
This attempt by visionary documentarian Brett Morgen (The Kid Stays In The Picture, Cobain: Montage Of Heck) at condensing the life and career of David Bowie into a little over two hours’ worth of celluloid is a monumental headfuck of the best sort. Which makes it an unqualified success.
Moonage Daydream basically scans as a swirling, immersive, psychedelic visual mixtape-cum-cinematic-biography. It remixes Bowie’s life and art in IMAX, so every sense is overloaded and overstimulated. And yes, it’s kinda all over the map, flitting hither and yon across the timeline, drawing from archival footage from multiple sources, somehow arriving at some sort of dazzling cohesion. It might be the closest any of us gets to understanding what it must have been like inside Bowie’s head.
Much of this is previously unseen, or barely/rarely seen, or seen in a context alien to its original context and/or intent. Especially astonishing is the substantial screen time given D.A. Pennebaker’s footage from the 1973 Hammersmith Odeon “farewell” concert, Ziggy Stardust’s last stand. Seeing the glam-era Bowie and Mick Ronson 10 ft. tall, hearing them in 110 dB surround sound, will drop the jaw of the most jaded of culture vultures, especially the unaired-in-nearly-50-years “Jean Genie/Love Me Do” medley featuring guest voltage from Jeff Beck! Most everything here is more rare than hen’s teeth, but even excerpts from familiar promo clips feel fresh within the context Morgen builds them.
Best of all, there are no talking heads present. No modern day testimonials either from those who knew him or artists inspired by him. Which means no, none of 21st century rockumentary’s usual suspects are here – no Bono, no Rollins, no Dave Grohl. Bowie gets to tell his own story through vintage interviews, be it via the Russell Harty chat or his monologues from the brilliant 1975 BBC Omnibus episode, Cracked Actor. And the nonstop soundtrack – one long, disorienting, endlessly segueing, whiplash remix – is part of the immersion. You feel like Bowie’s nervous system is hardwired into your own circuitry, flooding you with stimuli and information.
How will this film play once it hits the streaming services? Who knows? Can it possibly leave anyone with the proper impact, removed from the IMAX experience? It’s built for IMAX. You leave the theater rubber-legged, your head swimming, thrilled, wondering what the hell you just witnessed. It’s difficult to find any reference points for Moonage Daydream. Morgen’s achievement is as unique and wondrous as its subject matter.
Standing Over By The Record Machine: Soul Glo’s new album defines Ragecore 2022
SOUL GLO – Diaspora Problems (Epitaph/Secret Voice)
If Moonage Daydream is a certifiable brainscrew, wait’ll you clap your ears on Diaspora Problems, the ferocious fourth studio full-length release from Philadelphia’s Soul Glo. It’s the single most pissed-off record you will hear all year.
Named for the fictitious Afro Sheen-like hair grooming product in Coming To America, the four Afro-Americans comprising Soul Glo fashion the most savage indictment of modern day America heard yet, from an amalgam of super ballistic hardcore, hip hop and industrial noise fuckery. They are truly the children of Fucked Up, Slayer, Poison Idea, and Refused’s The Shape Of Punk To Come album. In a swirl of samples and beyond-extreme thrash with rap influences, topped by Pierce Jordan hemorrhaging his throat everytime he opens it, Soul Glo redefines hardcore every time this disc gets spun or streamed. It defines Ragecore 2022.
Soul Glo recreate the first Ramones album cover. Minus leather jackets. And while social distancing. Sorta.
Anyone living through the last seven years alone knows these men have loads to be pissed off about. Jordan enumerated his lyrical themes to The Guardian upon Diaspora Problems’ release last March: “Self-analysis, mental illness, racism, interpersonal violence, state violence, abuse, capitalism – living under it.” Underline “racism” and typeset it in bold – race relations are beyond fucked, and all anyone can offer are bandaids and Bactine, when there’s a huge infected gash spewing blood and pus all over the joint. Jordan, bassist/programmer GG Guerra, and drummer TJ Stevenson ain’t having your platitudes. (Guitarist Ruben Polo left upon the album’s release this past March, over allegations of sexual inappropriateness. But the band announced November live dates, suggesting he’s been replaced.)
“One of my favorite things that happens in punk is every four years watching all of these people who I thought that I respected, whose politics I thought I agreed with, be like: ‘We need to vote,’” Jordan scoffed in that Guardian piece. “‘And I’m going to talk down to you hard as fuck right now and expect you to treat me as a political authority, even though I’m just somebody that you see wasted as fuck at the bar and at DIY shows sometimes. Hey, you should vote for Joe fucking Biden.’
“So many so-called punks, so many people in bands I like and still have to respect are saying that shit to me, talking down to me. Nothing is more amazing to me than watching a so-called punk band play a benefit show for someone’s presidential campaign. That shit is fucking embarrassing.”
Nothing embarrassing about Diaspora Problems, except how you feel after your first spin and realize you’re as much of the problem as the police or the politicians. No one is safe from the blinding rage Soul Glo uses to scorch every surface. It’s no wonder this is the most chaotic hardcore record in years, while also being the most musically advanced. It takes music this extreme to shake up what Stevenson describes as “the real political character of America”: “Sheer apathy and a focus on oneself, for the sake of survival.”
“Who’s gonna beat my ass?” Jordan challenges on the opening track, “Gold Chain Punk.” The answer, of course, is: Soul Glo’s gonna beat all our asses. They already are.
Again, many thanks for your enthusiastic support. Next week: Part One of a Keith Morris interview, and the next in our Parade Of Great Guitarists. Please make your support concrete with your affordably-priced paid monthly subscription. Five dollars? You spend more daily on cigarettes. And I can guarantee those smokes haven’t seen Moonage Daydream to speak about it intelligently.
#timstegall #timnapalmstegall #timnapalmstegallsubstack #punkjournalism #theclash #joestrummer #punkrock #culture #moonagedaydream #documentary #davidbowie #soulglo #diasporaproblems #recordreview #hardcore #hiphop #industrialnoise #fuckedup #poisonidea #slayer #refused #theshapeofpunktocome #subscribe #fivedollarmonthlysubscription #bestwaytosupport