Driving back from the dump yesterday ('tis a glamourous life indeed) I tuned into the local radio station - original 106 - which if nothing else is a brave attempt to provide an alternative to the homogenised, safe pap that constitutes local radio today (see posts passim). As good fortune would have it they were playing a Rolling Stones song, but not for them the normal Jumping Jack Flash/Satisfaction/Start Me Up safe bets. Nope, they were playing the classic Stones blues-fest that is Little Red Rooster. The song just oozed sleaze and atmosphere. In fact I was momentarily transported to a seedy little blues bar in the Deep South as it played.
This sort of music can only be played live in a small, smoke filled, crowded bar, with people standing shoulder to shoulder or sitting too many at tiny little tables with a stage only a few feet away where you can talk to the band between numbers. It's the implicit sleaze that makes it work, the feeling of being somewhere underground, somewhere that's bad for you yet has that irresistible pull and most of all is bursting with atmosphere.
Today, non-smoking pubs and bars may have all the advantages of being cleaner, healthier places to eat and drink, but they lack soul, spirit and atmosphere. They will never be able to create an atmosphere whereby a band can play Little Red Rooster and make it feel like something that moves the soul.
Later, Grocerjack
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