What's That I Hear...A Phil Ochs Thread

This stuff is NOT dull and polite! His songs were angry and biting as hell. When he sings this in the 13 minute "When in Rome" I just get shivers:

Frail and afraid in the mists of the morning
The snakes and the spiders were sadly performing
The bark of the dogs kept up the warning
Inside the wood.
Sweating and swearing I crawled from the manger
The highway appeared to take me from danger
Is there anyone here who would pick up a stranger?
Oh I wish you could.
Then someone replied "would you like a ride?"
"Come in" he said.
We drove for a while, he gave me a smile and a piece of bread
The hammer was hard in the chrome of the car as I cracked his head
Then we took off in a spin
Oh I smashed his skull again
Oh thank you my good friend,
I feel so good.
And all the high-born ladies
So lovely and so true,
Have been handed to the soldiers
When in Rome do as the Romans do

OTM. Also, you didn't see Dylan getting his ass beat and larynx crushed for The Cause

Well, yes, says it all really. I put sellout in inverted commas when I said 'late 60s "sellout" period' for a reason. "Crucifixion" is a prime example of something that's almost really good but ultimately fails somehow - and that's really what I feel about poor old Phil in general.

Am a huge fan of "The Highwayman" in particular. Not political (particularly), but really lovely.

he definitely had his adventurous side, but his sensibility is just so...coarse. and his worldview, so fucking heavy-handed and ungenerous. even when he's supposedly half-ironizing, half-embracing pop culture, it's just so leaden. he sounds like a fucking trotskyite all the time.

and his singing is really grating.

i grew up listening to this stuff, having grown up in a left-wing milieu. i've tried to rediscover it, really i have, but no.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulTmmTIlM_o

Just saw the movie...fairly interesting. Didn't realize there was that much footage of him out there.

I think he's great. That "American Troubadour" import double CD has the two songs he recorded in Africa, "Bwatue" and "Niko Mchumba Ngombe," and they're both great - primitive and alive and nothing like as polished as later white-artist-in-Africa efforts. Anyone know the story behind these?

They covered this! Apparently after Nixon was elected, Ochs got into travel and visited numerous far-flung places. He went to Africa and decided he needed some way to write off the expense of the trip, so he decided to hold a recording session with a pick-up band. He wired A & M, Jerry Moss signed off on it and arranged studio time, Ochs recorded with local players, and, as one of the interviewees points out, "accidentally becomes ahead of the curve, recording what people would eventually call 'world music'."

badly, badly needs an update

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u52Oz-54VYw

Movie is on PBS in a few days.

been meaning to watch the movie -- it's on netflix instant now...

I knew very little about Phil Ochs so I thought the doc was really interesting. It's surprising just how much footage there is of the guy. It's like there was a camera on him 24/7.

Odd how little biographical information the doc had. They didn't say anything about where he was born, his parents, whether he ever married...almost nothing of his personal life at all.

I've got a bio, Death of A Rebel, by Marc Eliot. Haven't read it yet, but I think it's the one Greil Marcus very favorably reviewed way back. Might be remaindered, but prob on Amazon etc

The documentary's very good--one of my two or three favourite films last year. Tried to get the theatre to save the lobby poster for me, but I never heard back from them.

His brother is Michael Ochs, of Michael Ochs Archives, might see that photo credit in many a music bio etc, from prev decades anyway. Think he had a sister, if she's the Rennie Ochs who sang a song for Reagan, approximately thus:"Dear Mr. President, it's late and I fear/You've been in the White House for nearly a year." I knew a guy who got fired (in verses written to the same tune, actually)for playing that on his local Public Radio show when it was first released.

Wait - movie? What now? I love Phil Ochs! I didn't know about a movie!! I remember at one point Sean Penn was trying to get a movie made about him but this was years ago. OK I need to investigate this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbS4ruKw2OQ

Yep. Reading about it on PBS site now. Thanks! :) I'll watch this weekend.

ha - Sean Penn is in it. I used to have a Phil Ochs CD - It wasn't a box set but it was a double CD - some sort of anniversary thing iirc. The liner notes were by Penn and were really well-written and touching He spoke therein about really wanting to make a movie about him. I mean, I guess Penn being into him is about the least surprising thing on Earth but I just remember really liking what he'd written.

Yeah, I laughed when Penn turned up in the trailer (which I didn't watch till posting) right after your post. There's a rule that either Penn or Johnny Depp must turn up in any relatively-mainstream '60s-related documentary.

The movie is on again early saturday and saturday afternoon. I missed dvr'ing it monday night.

Still on netflix instant too. :)

x-post - lol totally

Yay, Billy Bragg. Another totally unsurprising face but still v happy to see him. Anyway, I'll def watch this soon. Thanks again.

music for the '60s lefties who thought all of the drugs and free love were getting in the way of their serious political movement

well, they did indeed get in the way.

the movie was interesting. he was interesting, sort of. and sad. but his music, oy. some of the lyrics scan well as incisive bitchfests but his singing, double oy.

after a long spell being less than uninterested in the music that surrounded me in my youth (typical leftist household stuff), i've come around to e.g. adoring pete seeger. (my mom never liked joan baez and neither did i.) but phil ochs... oy. i just can't handle it.

That's a lot of oys you're makin' there

Cum On Feel the Oys.

http://i304.photobucket.com/albums/nn189/dagolavg/slade460x276.jpg

i saw the doc on american masters on pbc the other night

i never really heard phil ochs

the doc was really, really affecting to me, i almost cried at the end

he was a really fascinating figure

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20O8xrv3F7g

got this in a 99 cent bin years ago and fell in love with this song for whatever reason. I mean it's way too long, and kind of clumsy I guess, there's so much wrong about it, like it gets too american pie-y really quickly. But still, whatever, I feel good about it when it's on.

he was a really fascinating figure

Definitely a tragic figure. Watching the PBS documentary, you get the feeling he was born 20 years too early. If he could have had access to decent meds to stabilize the depression, and a proper rehab to treat the alcoholism, he would have thrived. He certainly would have had plenty of material from 1980 onward to write about.

hey, u can watch this gratis here

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/episodes/phil-ochs-there-but-for-fortune/watch-the-full-documentary/1962/

Good, since I missed this last night:

The D.C. Music Salon focuses on an artist whose connection to D.C. is a little tenuous with a screening of the documentary Phil Ochs: There But for Fortune. In the 1960s, the folk singer was the anti-Dylan, sticking to topical themes as his competitor became an increasingly impressionistic lyricist. 7 p.m. at the Watha T. Daniel/Shaw Branch Library. Free.

listening to "no more songs" off of Greatest Hits, and I feel like I am experiencing an alternate 60s documentary in which I am *not* listening to a 'this is an end of an era' statement. what an interesting dude! I understand why he is not widely noticed/ enjoyed, but what a guy! what a musician! what an event that screams 'end of an era'! why didn't it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBvxVo3DIRk

seriously, wow!

never really listened to this dude before, although I've been aware of him forever. dl'd Greatest Hits cuz it seems like the kind of thing I'd enjoy and because of the people involved. There's a lot I dig about it but comments upthread about his voice not really being able to carry the material seems otm - it's not that his voice is bad, just that he tries to make it do some things it's not very well suited to.

like when Don Rich comes booming in on some of those harmonies it really invites unfavorable comparisons

I have a soft spot in my heart - and my head - for Phil Ochs, but it won't take long for me to do all my unreserved recs:

"Pretty Smart On My Part" is a punk classic, flat-out. Great performance of a great song, the one Phil Ochs song I'd stick on a mix without reservation. A rousing foot-stomper linking homophobia, misogyny & Vietnam.

The whole album from which it came, Rehearsals for Retirement has a genuine freak edge on it - Ochs wasn't pretending when he went mad. Which doesn't mean it's all "good" music but it makes for some unnerving listening.

The live electric-countryish version of "Tape From California" on the Chords of Fame collection is terrific - wait, I'd stick this on a mix too, very listenable.

Finally, while musically nothing so much, "Love Me, Love Me, Love Me, I'm a Liberal" seems more relevant than ever - it deserves a topical update for the Obama years.

His early protest stuff is about as good as that kind of music gets - "I Ain't Marching Anymore" is more enjoyable than "Blowing in the Wind" for example.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OaBptCea3yA

I want to make a playlist that has mean, acerbic stuff like "Love Me, I'm a Liberal"....I don't listen to folk that much...open to any suggestions. Esp English stuff...