August 11th – There’s lots that go with getting
your face known, promoting yourself…that’s a strange thing, that pursuit of the
firefly we've branded as fame…sorry,
just got sidetracked a bit but its worth considering. I mean, it’s a beast that
once unchained, can be something you wish was, like Pandora, back in the box. I
suppose it’s all down to the degree of fame you achieve. Being recognised in
the local supermarket by a couple of folk is very…very, chuffing; it panders, I
figure, to our self-image and feeling of self-worth, fleeting as it may be.
However, being snapped by paparazzi as you emerge from the crapper with your
jacket half on, a fistful of tissues in one hand, bare arse cradled in the
other, is hardly the stuff of dreams. All a matter of degree, I guess, and yet
millions of people are striving for it in this 24 hour, lottery-winner society
we live in now. Isn’t there a saying;
‘Be careful what you
wish for ‘cos you just might get it’?
The fame thing is OK if you can turn it on and off like a
tap, but you and I both know that’s not how it works. You know that wonderful
Neil Young album title, Rust Never Sleeps?
Well neither does fame. Might seem all a bit left-field, that last lot, but in
truth it is connected to what occurred when I read about the fame and fortune
of the late-great Ray Charles.
I say late-great…I have to be honest, I was never a fan; too Tamla for me. I know, I know, ‘Peter, Peter, you’ve completely missed the
point of him’, I know. Just that, when he was cutting a swathe through the
pop/soul/blues market, I was thrashing my way through life with Mr. Hendrix as
my fireside companion, so… However, I’m not so churlish as to disregard his
obvious talent and achievement, how can I when Rolling Stone Mag listed him as
number ten in their 100 Greatest Artists
of All Time and was number two in their 100
Greatest Singers of All Time. Thing is, OK, he had a tough childhood and
rose above it, he’s had awards up to his knees, played with anyone of
consequence in the music scene, recorded 60+ albums, 150 singles (18 of them
number ones) appeared in eleven films, including as music shop proprietor in
the excellent Blues Brothers movie,
had a biopic made about him…the list and accolades go on…and on…and on…and yet he
never once connected with me (not that that was a prerequisite to Mr. Charles believing
he’d actually made it; you know, his final accolade…
‘Thank God, at last,
Peter Webb LIKES me!!!!
And that’s what fame is, isn't it? Fickle and
faithful (both of these things when you really don’t want it to be either)
sectional and all-encompassing (when fashion suits) seasonally delusional
and
continuously stifling at one and the same time…and always ready to
remind of you those above facts, and you always have to be working
it; no let up, no chance to let the fans (who make you what you are and yet
it’s sometimes someone you don’t want to be) no chance to let the fans forget
you…no desire for the endless end.
You, see, the thing is, even with all the awards, critical acclaim and sometime suffocating platitudes to his brilliance ringing in Mr. Charles’ ears, still, on this day in 1992 he was
gawp-object in chief when he opened the Bloomington Mall (like the Arndale
shopping precinct in Manchester, just bigger…a monument to white capitalism) in
Minnesota by singing one of his all time great performance pieces, America the Beautiful. Just run that
last paragraph over a few times in your head, see if you can spot where the
fame/familiarity/foolishness joins are.
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