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04 May 2008
X - Fourth Of July. One of the best pieces of imagistic poetry set to great rock and roll music ever.
"Los Angeles" by X came the sat radio today and I came home and listened to all of my X. Some of it seems to not be around anymore, like Ain't Love Grand and the album "4th of July" was on.
In the 80s, I was not a fan of X's departure from the sound of Los Angeles. But I've acquired a taste for their later stuff as I got older.
birdherder, I love X's early stuff, but '4th of July' is from Dave Alvin (of the Blasters) tenure in the group and it very much bears the imprint of his style although with some nice vocal assists from John and Exene.
BOP, you'd appreciate that I'm turning the 50+ year old urban rednecks at my corner bar on to the punk rock and the post punk. They like the Bottle Rockets, teh Dictators and the Replacements (they have one of those newfangled computer jukeboxes). I'll introduce them to the Descendents and Suicidal tendencies soon. One step at a time.
For some reason, this bittersweet song has been circling 'round inside my head for a few days now. Don't know why.
Whenever I hear it, though, I get a potent sense-memory of the club we frequented as teenagers. I'm sitting upstairs, drinking a Coke and dispiritedly smoking an unfiltered cigarette. My best-friend/boyfriend/it's-complicated is standing over me, loudly singing along to this, trying to coax out a smile.
I smile. He wins, and he knows it. We go downstairs for one more dance.
That's a lot of memory to pack into one little song.
Sorry, but once Billy Zoom is out of the band, it's no longer X. "Fourth of July" is a good song but very much outside of the X sound, and the rest of that album is lacking. No dis on Dave Alvin intended, but it wasn't a real good fit.
-t, where do you live? They're hitting the road again this summer. I saw them last go-around and they were great.
I never really explored anything past the first two albums, but those I totally obsessed over. I had the anthology at one point but never got around to listening to much of it.