RIP, Malcolm McLaren
Apr. 9th, 2010 03:42 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
deirdreWhat do Yanni, Alan Moore, the Sex Pistols, and the movie Fast Food Nation all have in common?
Malcolm McLaren.
I'm more than a little hard-hit by his passing, as it involved one of the major career forks not taken and not even seriously attempted.
In high school, all I wanted to do was join a band after high school and pay my way through college playing. By the time I got to college, I'd sung in any number of ensembles including an opera company's choir, I'd sung at Disneyland, I'd been in marching band and dance band and orchestra, and had performed in front of an audience singing and playing flute, piccolo, alto, tenor, and baritone sax, viola, and even (once) oboe.
I knew McLaren's family, and I'd heard of him. He'd already chewed up and spat out the Sex Pistols, whom I'd seen at the Cow Palace in San Francisco. Yes, I traveled several hundred miles each way for that concert, shut up.
I spoke with him briefly on the phone. He'd been auditioning singers for a new band, and he wanted me to come to London to audition.
I didn't.
There were a bunch of silly reasons for that, but the biggest one was that I was a chicken. If it had been in LA, no question. But another country? Miles away from anyone I knew? And the manager owned an infamous fetishwear shop?
I simply wasn't that adventurous.
Ten years later, this regret would fuel me: by Traveler's Century Club standards (rather loose), I've been to 40 countries. At the time I made this decision, I'd only been within North America.
Now, I can't imagine having taken Annabelle's place in Bow Wow Wow, frankly. I certainly could have performed well -- but it would have been a different band.
Bow Wow Wow:
Baby, Oh No
Do You Wanna Hold Me?
W.O.R.K.
What's the Time?
Where's My Snake?
McLaren:
Double Dutch
Sex Pistols:
Holidays in the Sun
A lot of the B-sides and rarities of Adam Ant (McLaren was Adam's manager for a while) really speak to the fetish aspect of McLaren's store, such as Whip in My Valise, but it was only after Adam toned down the fetish stuff and sang songs like Kings of the Wild Frontier that the band began to take off. Of course that's also after McLaren stole Adam's band out from under him to back up Annabelle for Bow Wow Wow.
Anyhow, the road not taken is always an interesting one: who would I be now if that path had worked out for me? No idea.
Malcolm McLaren.
I'm more than a little hard-hit by his passing, as it involved one of the major career forks not taken and not even seriously attempted.
In high school, all I wanted to do was join a band after high school and pay my way through college playing. By the time I got to college, I'd sung in any number of ensembles including an opera company's choir, I'd sung at Disneyland, I'd been in marching band and dance band and orchestra, and had performed in front of an audience singing and playing flute, piccolo, alto, tenor, and baritone sax, viola, and even (once) oboe.
I knew McLaren's family, and I'd heard of him. He'd already chewed up and spat out the Sex Pistols, whom I'd seen at the Cow Palace in San Francisco. Yes, I traveled several hundred miles each way for that concert, shut up.
I spoke with him briefly on the phone. He'd been auditioning singers for a new band, and he wanted me to come to London to audition.
I didn't.
There were a bunch of silly reasons for that, but the biggest one was that I was a chicken. If it had been in LA, no question. But another country? Miles away from anyone I knew? And the manager owned an infamous fetishwear shop?
I simply wasn't that adventurous.
Ten years later, this regret would fuel me: by Traveler's Century Club standards (rather loose), I've been to 40 countries. At the time I made this decision, I'd only been within North America.
Now, I can't imagine having taken Annabelle's place in Bow Wow Wow, frankly. I certainly could have performed well -- but it would have been a different band.
Bow Wow Wow:
Baby, Oh No
Do You Wanna Hold Me?
W.O.R.K.
What's the Time?
Where's My Snake?
McLaren:
Double Dutch
Sex Pistols:
Holidays in the Sun
A lot of the B-sides and rarities of Adam Ant (McLaren was Adam's manager for a while) really speak to the fetish aspect of McLaren's store, such as Whip in My Valise, but it was only after Adam toned down the fetish stuff and sang songs like Kings of the Wild Frontier that the band began to take off. Of course that's also after McLaren stole Adam's band out from under him to back up Annabelle for Bow Wow Wow.
Anyhow, the road not taken is always an interesting one: who would I be now if that path had worked out for me? No idea.