April 17th – “I had that Eddie Cochran in the back of the cab
the other day…”
I gather that, on this day in 2007, the band Arcturus officially announced they were splitting up…? Who they? I've never heard of them even when they were together…but then they've probably never heard of me so… More importantly, on this day in 1960, Eddie Cochran, someone I have heard of, finally made it to the third step; he was just 21. I've often fancied that he could have given Elvis Presley a run for his money, had he lived…which he didn't, so…but his music lives on…unlike him…this is becoming maudlin…and repetitious; sorry.
I gather that, on this day in 2007, the band Arcturus officially announced they were splitting up…? Who they? I've never heard of them even when they were together…but then they've probably never heard of me so… More importantly, on this day in 1960, Eddie Cochran, someone I have heard of, finally made it to the third step; he was just 21. I've often fancied that he could have given Elvis Presley a run for his money, had he lived…which he didn't, so…but his music lives on…unlike him…this is becoming maudlin…and repetitious; sorry.
Unlike Mr. Presley, Mr. Cochran
thought it was OK to travel to Great Britain…(just maybe not by taxi)…to Great
Britain as it was then, not like now; the United Kingdom…not for long if the
Scots have their way… whereas Elvis always fought shy of coming over here. I
guess he was worried we’d discover that he was, in fact, three people, all of
them two-headed electricity meter-readers who couldn't sing at all… All a bit
weird really. I mean would it have been SO bad for Mr. Presley to pay us a
visit? Would have made an awful lot of people very happy, certainly happier
than finding out after the event that the man they adored, the man who’d died
in particularly distressing, closet circumstances before they’d had chance to
see him live, had indeed (supposedly) visited us; but after dark, on an
airstrip, for all of ten minutes, en route to somewhere far more important than
Prestwick…so that’ll be just about anywhere else in the universe then…and claimed he had absolutely
no idea where he was: doesn’t get any better with the telling, does it? Bless. That’s the level of esteem he held
the British contingent of his fan club in. He touched down, signed a few
‘graphs then we waved him off…great.
Eddie Cochrane, on the other hand,
who gave us Summertime Blues (The Who
did an excellent version of it on the Live
at Leeds album and Blue Cheer did it fair justice too) who also gave us C’mon Everybody, the ultimate party
song; who also gave us Somethin’ Else,
what can only be described as, I venture to suggest, sublime pop, this Mr. Cochran
came to visit his fans in England, stayed a while, did some gigs and then was
travelling between gigs in a private taxi…and we killed him; great.
Then we had the audacity to allow
Dave Dee (of Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick and Tich fame) to learn his chops on Mr.
Cochrane’s impounded Gretsch guitar in order to gift the world with Bend It; now if that isn't rubbing salt
into the wound…
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