7 replies to this topic

[Derwent]

RIP Captain Beefheart

http://www.bbc.co.uk...canada-12024652

[terrywebbisgod]

http://www.youtube.c...h?v=iqRHr5pEIFU

[trakl]

RIP Captain Beefheart

http://www.bbc.co.uk...canada-12024652

While not managing quite to fall in love with Captain Beefheart's music, he was nevertheless an artist I admired and respected and one whose life I found fascinating. One of a kind.

His acknowledged masterpiece, Trout Mask Replica is the most avant-garde record in my collection and one that I listen to only very rarely but it continues to delight and bewilder in roughly equal measure.

I'll remember him too for my second favourite line in all of rock music: "A squid eating dough in a polyethylene bag is fast and bulbous - got me?"

Got me?

RIP Captain.

[Ullman]

Very sad news indeed. Beefheart made some magnificent records. I saw him at Knebworth in 1975 and it's fair to say I didn't get it at the time, but I grew to really like his stuff. I particularly loved his voice.

He certainly had an interesting life. I always liked the story of him selling a vacuum cleaner to Aldous Huxley when he was working as a door-to-door salesman.

[Ullman]

His acknowledged masterpiece, Trout Mask Replica is the most avant-garde record in my collection and one that I listen to only very rarely but it continues to delight and bewilder in roughly equal measure.

In Martin Strong's excellent 'Great Rock Discography' the entry for Trout Mask Replica says 'it should never be played to someone not of your generation'. I know exactly what he means.

[tonyXIII]

In Martin Strong's excellent 'Great Rock Discography' the entry for Trout Mask Replica says 'it should never be played to someone not of your generation'. I know exactly what he means.

I was never quite sure that he wasn't just taking the mickey out everyone - himself included. Some of his stuff was more spoken and prose rather than sung and poetic, some of his music was brilliant and some of it was self-indulgent in its obscurity.

When I did a bit of History teaching, the style of teaching had become more of a whodunnit - here are the facts, how can we explain them - than old-fashioned teaching (it was interesting!). One of the units was based on a body and the possessions found on it, one of which was a ticket to a Captain Beefheart concert. The Head of History thought the authors had dreamt up the name, so I took my copy of Trout Mask Replica in and played it to her and some of the children. To say they didn't get it is a huge understatement.

[Wolford6]

Great talent, unable to get it acrosss to the mainstream audience. I reckon his best album is The Spotlight Kid. Only saw him once, he and his band were brilliant.

A true one-off. I've just played Willie The Pimp as a memorial.

[Futtocks]

I admired and was intrigued by his music, rather than loving it.

His paintings are worth checking out, too. Link to website.