GALAXIE 500 - DEAN WAREHAM

(“Black Postcards: A Roll & Roll Romance”, 2008),

A couple weeks ago, inspired by a discussion of Dean & Britta’s “You Turn My Head Around” Lolita. It’s showed up in a couple paper magazines over the years. At that time, we had no idea he was working on a memoir about the music he was making in the ’80s and ’90s, dramatically titled Black Postcards: A Rock & Roll Romance. But he was. In this Sunday’s NY Times Liz Phair weighs in on what sounds like a really interesting read: via N.Y. T.
one ’Gummer was talking about Dean Wareham’s literary bent. There are plenty of examples, but the thing that came up was one of those “What Are You Currently Reading?” blurbs, which Wareham (or a publicist) had written about Vladimir Nabokov’s

Freddie Mercury once said, “I want it all and I want it now.” This appetite might aptly be called the rock ’n’ roll disease, and Dean Wareham seems to have caught it. Or is in recovery. Or is somewhere along the road. Part confessional, part unsentimental career diary, Wareham’s Black Postcards: A Rock & Roll Romance reads like good courtroom testimony: to the point, but peppered with juicy and unsolicited asides. Dominick Dunne would make sure his seat was saved before excusing himself to use the restroom.

Then she talks about that juiciness…

He portrays himself as a surprisingly unsympathetic character. He visits a prostitute. He makes people angry. He follows girls home after the show. He snorts coke. No apologies are made because this is, after all, a rock ’n’ roll autobiography. Late nights, a lot of drugs, a little infidelity (well, maybe not just a little, but I won’t give away the ending) — that’s par for the course, right? His honesty is challenging and humbling. Yet, for an egghead (Wareham is a graduate of both the Dalton School, the progressive and prestigious Upper East Side preparatory academy, and Harvard) with an elective reading list to rival Art Garfunkel’s (Thomas Mann, Mark Twain, André Malraux, Nietzsche, to name a few), he seems perfectly happy to partake in whatever recreational opportunities come his way, with enviable disregard for the consequences. Guilty? Not guilty? What are we as a jury to think?

On top of a hilarious mention of Shimmy Disc dude Mark Kramer, Galaxie 500 in-band issues, a moving bit about Wareham and his son, and etc., she has an interesting insight regarding Dean’s prose style.

…But his supreme interest is clearly and purely music. It is the scaffold on which he hangs most of the feelings and fragments included in the book. Even his writing style has a rhythm to it: passages move rapidly back and forth between incident and impression, creating a kind of (I’m not kidding) rock ’n’ roll. If the writing suffers from a tone of detachment throughout, the author is well aware of it. In fact, the long journey to inhabit the present is the book’s crowning sentiment.

So, two things we’ve taken away from this review: 1) We really want to read Black Postcards and 2) Though Phair’s last couple of albums have really sucked, maybe she’s found a second calling. Top job, Liz. Definitely more refreshing than another Michiko Kakutani piece.

Extracto do livro: Damon and Naomi , were graduate students at Harvard , were spending the summer in New York and went with the intention of making music together.
Galaxie 500 was born on the day that Naomi offered to play bass . Damon and Naomi dating school .
Naomi had seen all concerts Speedy And the castanets , and was commissioned to design the scenery and playbills of our actions . Now studying architecture at Harvard University , and Damon had a graduate degree in Comparative Literature .
Mary Harron wrote the e rock'n'roll " is the only form of music that can be improved if the artists do not master their instrument. " I do not know how you fit in the Jimi Hendrix Experience in this theory , but it is true to some extent . What is clear is that it is not necessary to be a virtuoso. The world is full of great players . But sometimes its limitations as a performer that make you stand out .
Besides learning how to play bass , Naomi was becoming a graphic designer with an extraordinary talent , and a graphic design group is at least as important as the bass. Naomi was always thinking in visual terms . If I saw a gas station , she saw something completely different . Took pictures of ugly things , but your photos have been converted into beautiful things .
Damon and Naomi were explorers . Liked nothing more than to get in his little yellow Fiat and travel to Concord to Walden Pond or Plum Island .
Our first experience was on May 27, 1987 . Our plan was to prepare some versions and act in Washington Square Park . Naomi proposed " Where Have All The Flowers Gone ? " . The best known version is that of Peter , Paul and Mary , but my favorite is Marlene Dietrich with the Burt Bacharach and support your band . We also tested "I Can See Clearly Now " by Johnny Nash , " Just My Imagination ( Running Away With Me) " by The Temptations and " Knockin 'On Heaven's Door " by Dylan . No group not tested this theme Dylan . It is easy to play and is perfect for stretching . And Axl Rose had not come to hate .
We rehearsed all summer . Sometimes , Damon and stayed for lunch . That summer was studying Damon surrealist poetry and occasionally had to stop walking down the Bobst library. In late summer , which gave a concert at my apartment on Front Street . Naomi designed some flyers for the event . It was the best show of my life . No, not me rope broke and I did not forget any lyrics . We played 20 minutes and everything went well .
In August we caught studies in 6/8 in Cable Building at the corner of Broadway and Houston to record the first demo of Galaxie 500 . There were two sessions, one Thursday and Saturday night with a technician named Perkin Barnes . Seven songs were recorded .
My favorite song of this session was " The Other Side " composed by Naomi . He sang with insecurity ( like me) , but it looked good . The best music moment is when I 'm wrong chord and slide to the right . I sat on the wrong track when we started playing live accordingly. If you make a mistake , repeat it for everyone thinks you did it on purpose .
I took the tape home and put it nonstop . Sometimes , if you hear something often , you just look better . This was not the case this tape . Clearly it was mediocre . I only had two guitar sounds : coward ranger . Some singing lessons , I would not have been bad . As always rehearsed without a microphone , I had never heard him sing . When I stood before the microphone in the studio, I heard very well. Shame give me my cards , so that the air and then performed the voice buried deep in the mixture.
What I did not know is that we on the right track . We were an early version and make the middle group that would become later. Our surround sound was repetitive , with simple chord progressions , which reached a climax and then diluted. We were not good , but they were different .
I could not get the head of Claudia , but trying to date other girls . The Thursday night in June, there was a party on an expedition from New York University . Drank more than usual and ended up kissing a girl . A week later, I stayed with her and took me to her apartment in Greenpoint . The walls of his room only had a crucifix . We made ​​love right then and told me he loved me .
But hey ! I did not know that these things are not spoken on a first date ?
When September arrived , I realized that I had no reason to stay in New York . Damon and Naomi resumed his graduate studies in Boston and decided to go with them to see how far we could get with the group