I've watched documentaries, recently, about Fleetwood Mac and the Bee Gees, two bands with pretty similar trajectories, from considerable, but relatively local, success in the late 60s, to turmoil and a fallow period in the early 70s, to unimaginable hugeness in the mid-70s, 80s comeback, bitterness, bit of tragedy, and, above all, inescapable songs.
Both docs also ended with the bearded founder/survivors (Mick Fleetwood and John McVie, Barry Gibb) staring out on water in their paradise US homes (the former live near each other in Hawaii, the latter in Miami) but while Fleetwood and McVie had an air of contentedness and smugness, the oldest Gibb, naturally enough, exudes a sense of loss and sadness.
The final line he says is heartbreaking; "What I wanted to say earlier is that I'd rather have them all back and no hits at all" - the framing of it, because he is naturally bullish and proud of what he's achieved, talks quite matter-of-factly about chronology, detail... and in all that, you could see that he felt the truth of his grief might have been missed.
The Gibb brothers died in reverse order - the youngest, Andy, first (a solo artist who had 3 US Number 1s, all co-written by Barry, of whom he was the spitting image), in 1988, then Maurice, the younger twin, then Robin, the older twin.
And Barry remains. It is clear he was the driving force, the greatest talent, and, for all that, is not entirely revered in his own right like eg George Michael, Elton John, Ray Davies, let alone McCartney, Brian Wilson, Bowie, Freddie Mercury.
I don't think it's true to say the Bee Gees never got respect - for all that they were perceived as, superficially, a bit silly, with their looks and their dress sense and the infamous Clive Anderson interviewed, I think even people like me always knew the Bee Gees did some great songs ...
The documentary certainly reminds you of how many truly beautiful songs he wrote, from To Love Somebody to How Deep is Your Love, and equally impressive is that, in his "writing for other people" phase, he came up with four bona fide standards, in Woman in Love, Heartbreaker, Islands in the Stream and Chain Reaction.
Anyway, amongst other things, I guess the story, for me, is that there's always interest and surprising detail and poignancy in the mainstream and in what I'd previously held at a distance.
No comments:
Post a Comment