Song Chronicles: “Can’t stand me now” by the Libertines

[Here is the third post of the series of articles Mike Raine thought about doing on individual songs. They focus on background, meaning, and anecdotes, to varying degrees.]

To the amazement of some, there was a time when Pete Doherty was half of an infamous song writing duo instead of half of an infamous tabloid duo. In the former’s case, Pete’s better half was fellow Libertine Carl Barat. Pete, Carl, and the rest of The Libertines exploded onto the British music scene in 2002 like a group of Hell’s Angels with a knack for writing catchy punk rock tunes. They lived without care or caution before imploding in a haze of drugs, fights, robberies, and arrests. The most important element in the band remained the relationship between writers and co-founders Doherty and Barat. The pair became inseparable in the public consciousness. Like many inseparable musical pairings before them, their brotherly relationship dissolved into a haze of drug abuse and betrayal while their fans watched in despair and their detractors in amusement. Amidst all the drama and in an amazing display of peace and reconciliation, Pete and Carl recorded
Can’t Stand Me Now

a song so revealing and personal, you feel as if you’re eavesdropping on a couple splitting up.

Pete and Carl were this generations’ addition to the long list of great British rock duos from Lennon and McCartney to Morrissey and Johnny Marr. Like their predecessors, Pete and Carl had an us-against-the-world mentality and aura that could make onlookers envious of their obvious bond and friendship. Whether it was Carl finishing Pete’s sentences in an interview or Pete carrying Carl to an ambulance after he drunkenly fell off a table on to his face, they had an inseparable bond that went beyond mere friendship. Fans lived vicariously through them, wishing they could be on board for the ride.

Then along came Pete’s crack and heroin addiction. It’s easy to forget that Pete was not a user of class A drugs when the band first broke the charts. It wasn’t until the release of their superb debut, Up the Bracket, that Pete first tried both heroin and crack. His use quickly escalated to the point where Carl and the rest of the band knew the end was near. That became abundantly clear when Pete was left behind as the rest of the band toured so that he could seek treatment. Instead getting clean, Pete broke into Carl’s flat stealing a guitar, laptop, and the band’s NME Award, all for the purpose of selling the items for drug money. Pete got a two month prison sentence. In an astounding display of forgiveness, Carl greeted Pete at the prison gates upon his release. That night The Libertines played a show at a nearby pub which would be named “gig of the year” by NME magazine.

All this makes Can’t Stand Me Now an incredibly personal song. Carl opens the song with, “an ending fitting for the start/you twist and tore our love apart” before Pete counters in the next verse with, “no, you’ve got it the wrong way round/just shocked me up and blamed it on the brown.” It’s obvious from the start that the song is directed at each other rather than the listener. Musical soul mates breaking-up through song rather than conversation. Every verse drips with the sentiments of the last words of a close relationship.

It is Pete and Carl’s well known history that gives lines such as “I know you lie, I know you lie/I’m still in love with you” such resonance. When they go into the back and forth vocals in a chorus of “you can’t stand me now” you can’t help but wish they would just work things out. But like every breakup conversation, it comes down to the question of whether the relationship is worth saving when it is clear that it’s no longer what it used to be. The lines of the final verse, “have we enough to keep it together? / or do we just keep on pretending / and hope our luck is never ending”, make it clear that the answer is “no”. The fights, drugs, and arrests had simply created too much drama for Carl to bare it anymore.

Both Pete and Carl would go on to blame the other for the disintegration of the band. Pete claiming that his being left behind while the rest of the band toured was just a final act of betrayal by Carl. Carl said that Pete’s drug use was getting in the way of the music and that he never kicked Pete out of the band. Carl simply wanted Pete to get clean before he rejoined. When they sing in unison, “I know you lie/ all you do is make me cry/ and all the words, they ain’t true”, they are both laying blame on the other.

“Can’t Stand Me Now” would go on to chart at #2 in the UK becoming The Libertines’ best selling single. British fans couldn’t resist hearing the audio diary of a couple that they had all followed from the start.
What Became of the Likely Lads

the second single off the album – which contains equally personal chorus of “what became of the likely lads/ what became of the dreams we had/ oh, what became of forever/ I guess we’ll never know” – would chart at #9. The Libertines played their final show in December of 2004 but Pete was not present. In a wise move, Carl disbanded the band following the show saying that it wouldn’t be right to continue to play and record under The Libertines name without Pete present. After all, there is always something vaguely sad about a band playing under a given name when a key part of the original line-up missing (Gun ‘n’ Roses, enough said).

Pete and Carl would both form decent bands following the clasp of The Libertines — Pete with Babyshambles and Carl with Dirty Pretty Things — but neither would equal the quality of The Libertines. In the past year, Pete and Carl have reunited to play on stage on a few occasions sparking endless speculation in the British press that a full Libertines reunion is in the works. However, The Libertines meteoric rise and fall have created a mystique and legacy that is hard to match. Many fans feel that a formal reunion would only detract from that legacy.

It clear from the first days of The Libertines that Pete and Carl were a flame that would burn out before it faded away (I know that is cliché but it is apt in this case). Can’t Stand Me Now gave fans a glimpse of what was happening in those final days of their partnership. The song allowed us to be a fly on the wall, listening to them bare it all. It was clear to everyone when the single came out that Can’t Stand Me Now was the public breaking up of one of the best bands in modern times. Not since the Sex Pistols has band risen and then imploded so quickly while leaving behind legacy that will be discussed for decades.

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Song Chronicles: “The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll” by Bob Dylan

[Here is the second post of the series of articles Mike Raine thought about doing on individual songs. They focus on background, meaning, and anecdotes, to varying degrees.]

From the earliest stages of his career Bob Dylan has had an exceptional talent for chronicling racial injustices. The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll is arguably the best example of this. But being a master of words doesn’t necessarily mean you get all the facts right. While the majority of the song is accurate, Dylan omits and simplifies certain facts along the way for the sake of a rhyme or brevity.

Have a listen to The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carrollwhile reading the rest of this post

For those not familiar with the song, it is about the 1963 murder of a young black woman, Hattie Carroll, who worked as a bar maid at upscale Emerson Hotel in Baltimore. Her murderer, William Devereux Zantzinger, was an upper-class 24-year-old tobacco farmer who drunkenly assaulted Carroll among others with a cane. His murder charge was downgraded to a charge of man-slaughter and he received only a 6-month sentence.

Right off the bat, Dylan make his first mistake by omitting the “t” in Zantzinger’s name, thus spelling and pronouncing it “Zanzinger”. Why he does this is anyone’s guess. The most likely reason is that it was simply easier to sing and it sounded better. It is a small mistake but an odd to make in such a journalistic song. Similarly, Dylan states that Carroll had ten children when in fact she had eleven. It is assumed that he did this because the single syllable word “ten” fit the meter better than “eleven”. Who said you needed to let the facts get in the way of the rhythm?

More important are the facts of the case that Dylan omits. He does not let on that the original charges against Zantzinger were for disorderly conduct and not murder. Zantzinger had been very drunk at the ball and was spewing racial epitaphs at the black servers and hitting people with a toy cane he had bought earlier in the day at a farm fair. By omitting this fact, Dylan gives the impression that authorities let an alleged murderer loose on bail. In reality, Carroll did not die till the morning after the ball and the charge of murder was added days later.

As well, Dylan makes no mention of the reduced charge of man-slaughter and states only that Zantzinger received a six-month sentence. By not making any mention of the reduced charge, Dylan implies that Zantzinger got 6-months for murder. While still an injustice worth your contempt, a 6-month sentence for man-slaughter makes much more sense than a 6-month sentence for murder. The reason for the reduced charge was also left out of the lyrics. The three-judge court agreed with the defense lawyers that Carroll death was likely caused by hyper-tension, of which she was known to suffer, brought on by stress caused by Zantzinger’s racist verbal assaults. The judges believed that being hit by a toy cane which did not leave any mark on her body was not enough to cause death and there must have been other contributing factors that were out of Zantzinger’s control.

It is still a joke of a sentence either way you look at it. When asked by the Herald Tribune to comment on his sentence, Zantzinger replied that he would “just miss a lot of snow.” His wife, Jane, added, “nobody treats his niggers as well as Bobby does around here.” Not exactly the greatest defence ever muttered. To add insult to injury, Zantzinger received his light sentence on August 28, 1963, the same day the Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream Speech”, at which Dylan attended and performed.

These omitted facts do not detract from the song’s basic point, that Zantzinger’s actions were the result of social and racial prejudice and that the 6-month sentence was a grave injustice. You have to give Dylan credit for making the song as informative as it in only five minutes and forty-seven seconds. Dylan reportedly wrote the song in one night after a friend showed him a New York Times’ article about the case. Writing such a song in one sitting using only a single news article as your research is an impressive feat. There are various accounts regarding where Dylan wrote the song. Some say he wrote in an all-night writing session at a cafe on Seventh Avenue in Manhattan while others say he wrote at Joan Baez’s house in California. Where he wrote the song and in how many hours is a fascinating tidbit of information but not terribly important.

It goes without saying that Zantzinger was no fan of the song that made him infamous. Zantzinger never commented on the song prior to 2001 when discussed it with Howard Sounes, author of Down the Highway: The Life of Bob Dylan. Zantzinger told Sounes that Dylan was a “no-account son of a bitch, he’s just like a scum of a scum bag of the Earth; I should have sued him and put him in jail.” However, Zantzinger never took action to prevent Dylan from performing the song and using it for commercial gain. Clinton Heylin, author of the Dylan biography, Behind the Shades Take Two said that the song “verges on libellous” and that Dylan masterful use of words and drama does not excuse such slander. Zantzinger dies on January 3, 2009 at the age of 69. The song continued to haunt him till the day he died. Almost every news article reporting on his death focused on his part in Carroll’s death and his place music history.

Regardless of the accuracy of the lyrics, “The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll” remains classic in the pantheon of American song writing. Dylan’s conviction reveals itself in every word. More importantly, the song made an injustice that would have gone barely noticed by white America and turned into a story that would never die. Most song writers could only dream of having such impact with a single song.

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Song Chronicles: “Cigarettes and Alcohol” by Oasis.

[Here is the first of series of articles Mike Raine thought about doing on individual songs. They focus on background, meaning, and anecdotes, to varying degrees.]

Few songs can capture the mood of their time and place.  When you here a song that does, there’s not much that can beat it and Oasis’
Cigarettes and Alcohol

is one those songs.

 

 

 

 

 

From the opening line of “is it my imagination / or have I finally found something worth working for” sung in Liam Gallagher’s sneering vocal, the song takes charge and provides a mission statement for Britain’s working-class youth that had grown up under Thatcherism. It oozes attitude. It’s the song Marc Bolan (T-Rex’s singer) would’ve written if he spent more time brawling and less time primping.

The forth single off of Oasis’ debut Definitely Maybe, “Cigarettes and Alcohol” shot into the British Top 10 in October of 1994, much to the dismay of music aficionados. The song’s blatant borrowing (I mean rip-off) of T.Rex’s
“Bang a Gong (Get It On)’s”

riff didn’t go unnoticed by listeners or the band.

As Noel Gallagher tells it, when he brought the song to their rehearsal space in a Manchester basement, the band’s rhythm guitarist Paul “Bonehead” Arthurs immediately objected to the riff. As Noel played the opening chords, Bonehead interjected with, “whoa, whoa, you can’t use that riff, that’s fucking T.Rex.” to which Noel replied, “I don’t give a fuck who it is, no one’s gonna hear it anyway”. Apparently the bands who shared the rehearsal space with Oasis weren’t too impressed either. The band arrived one day to find a note with the words, “write your own fucking riffs!” taped to the door.

Charges of plagiarism be damned: a great song is a great song. That’s something the elder Gallagher has always rightfully believed. What matters is the sentiment. “Cigarettes and Alcohol” was the perfect encapsulation of the times. Working-class kids in Britain had become terribly disenchanted after a decade of Conservative rule and were looking for something to believe in. When they heard “Cigarettes and Alcohol”, they believed in Oasis. As Alan Magee (Oasis’ manager from 1994-1999 and Creation Records founder) states, “is it worth the aggravation / to find yourself a job / when there’s nothing working for” is one the greatest social statements of its time. Combine that with a bridge of “you gotta/ you gotta/ you gotta make it happen” and you have the quintessential Britpop statement. That feeling of life is shit but it’s not going to any better unless make it so yourself. If there is one thing that Oasis represented when they hit the British music scene, it was optimism. Definitely Maybe was one big “fuck you” to the grunge ethos of smack addiction and depression.

That being said, “Cigarettes and Alcohol” contains the most unconcealed endorsement of cocaine use ever to make it past BBC Radio One censors. It’s beyond me how they missed a line like, “you could wait for lifetime / to spend your days in the sunshine/ you might as well do the white line”. Unlike most which talk of drugs from of one of two extremes – either they’re greatest thing since the microwave or they’re the end of civilization as we know it – “Cigarettes and Alcohol” simply paints drugs as a part of everyday life. Take them or leave them, it doesn’t matter. The song wasn’t meant to preach about the glories of partying. It’s a simple statement about the drabness of everyday life and the need to find your own way out. “I was looking for some action / but all I found was cigarettes and alcohol” is hardly a catchphrase that Belmont or Smirnoff can use in their next advert. For that reason it has become a lad anthem in pubs across the UK.

The song needed an album cover that would warn listeners of the assault that was about to hit their ears. How did the Gallagher brothers decide to spend the money Creation gave them for a photo shoot? They got a suit in one the most posh hotels in London, got some friends and booze, through a party, and had Michael Spencer Jones photograph of the proceedings. They were subsequently banned from the premises for life. It was only appropriate that the cover have the same “give a fuck” attitude as the song.

So concerned were Oasis with maintaining the band-of-the-people image that they had formulated, they even lied in the liner notes. A brilliant live recording of the band covering “I am the Walrus” is one of three b-sides on the single. Contrary to what the liner notes say, the recording done at a soundcheck at the Gleneagles Hotel in Scotland on February 6, 1994 as part of a Sony Music seminar. Apparently Noel thought it would look bad that the song had been recorded at a corporate event so he had the liner notes altered to say the song was recorded at the Glasgow Cathouse in June ’94. The sound of an adoring crowd heard at the opening and closing of the track was taken from a Faces’ bootleg owned by Noel.

Lies and rip-offs aside, “Cigarettes and Alcohol” remains the quintessential Oasis track. Its sheer attitude makes it the soundtrack to any booze-fuelled night out. The fact that it is written off as a shameless piece of plagiarism by almost everybody that heard it in its earliest stages makes it that much better. Who else would have the gull to release a single that so obviously ripped off classic tune? Moreover, who else could take a guitar riff from glittering glam-rock staple and turn it into a snarling working-class anthem?

Oasis, that’s who.

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