Patti Smith

[BFrank]

Any fans out there?

Last night I saw her at a small club here in SF (tonight she plays The Fillmore). What a great show! She poured it on for well over 2 hours and the crowd left exhausted. I've always liked her, but this is only the third time I've seen her in concert and a great treat to see the show in a small venue. She doesn't seem to have lost a beat.

The band was as tight as ever, including "lifers" Jay Dee Daugherty (who I went to high school with, actually) on drums and Lenny "LENNY!" Kaye on guitar.

She performed stuff covering the full gamut of her career - from early tunes like "Free Money" and "Ask The Angels" to more recent songs like "1959" and "Summer Cannibals". A nice touch was the lead in to "Rock & Roll Nigger" which is called "Babelogue" on record, but she read "Spell" from Allen Ginsberg's "Howl" in appreciation of City Lights books.

[Jad]

Found "Easter" on vinyl at a garage sale last weekend and am enjoying it quite a bit. I've always passed on her stuff before, but 25 cents seemed like a good price.

I've been getting more into the early NY punk scene lately. Television's "Marquee Moon" has been on heavy rotation in my CD player lately. Must be getting older, starting to prefer poetry to power chords (apologies to Johnny Thunders).

Edited June 18, 2003 by Jad

[BFrank]

Although, Jad, there was no shortage of power chords at that show the other night.

[jacman]

i love Patty Smith. i've seen her twice (way back in the late 70's). she puts on a great show. i believe i have all of her recordings.

[kulu se mama]

i made my wife go with me to a small club here last summer.

she is not much of a music fan, and she absolutely loved it.

she knew nothing going in, but the next day she made me give her some of my patti cd's for her car.

the cool part during the concert - it was a small, loud, smoky club, and someone down in front brought their toddler. patti stopped the show mid song and made them leave. she explained that she loves kids, and this was no place for a kid.

that was cool.

[ghost of miles]

[Adam]

Seeing her in a couple of weeks in LA...

[AllenLowe]

I've tried to like her; I met Lenny Kaye a few years ago, good guy - but I just find her to be a poseur - "Christ died for somebody's sins but they weren't mine -" cripes, the religious/hyprocrisy thing was tired when I was a teenager -

[7/4]

Lenny Kaye grew up in the same town as me, but he was probably gone by the time I got there.

.

[BFrank]

Seeing her in a couple of weeks in LA...

I've got tix for 10/20 here in SF.

[medjuck]

I'm seeing her with Philip Glass!!!

[Adam]

I'm seeing her with Philip Glass!!!

That wouls be fun. Where is that?

Allan, she has a lot more going on than one line from one song. And I think she's pretty great live.

[AllenLowe]

well, I like her prose - but as a singer songwriter I just find here to have a sort of reverse-feminist macho with literary and intellectual pretensions - I just don't find her songwriting compelling; the Christ line is, to me, representative. Don't know if you've read the book New York Rocker by Gary Valentine, but it neatly sums up the whole pretentiousness of that scene with Burroughs et al (and Burroughs Senior, except for Junky, is a lesser writer, IMHO, than Burroughs Junior, but that's another thread) ; Smith, like Richard Hell, to my way of thinking, was smart and sharp but was like a lot of smart, sharp people I've met who just didn't know enough to carry off the kind of poetry or to which they aspired - I feel the same about Tom Verlaine in many respects. And I like a lot of Hell's work - but ultimately they are classic examples of their reach exceeding their grasp - too many intellectual shortcuts (if I can I will cut/paste a section from the liner notes of my cd which is relevant to this in some respects) - they knew enough to know what they should have known, from a literary standpoint, but that's really it.

and I am in an admitted minority in thinking this, I should add -

Edited October 3, 2008 by AllenLowe

[jlhoots]

well, I like her prose - but as a singer songwriter I just find here to have a sort of reverse-feminist macho with literary and intellectual pretensions - I just don't find her songwriting compelling; the Christ line is, to me, representative. Don't know if you've read the book New York Rocker by Gary Valentine, but it neatly sums up the whole pretentiousness of that scene with Burroughs et al (and Burroughs Senior, except for Junky, is a lesser writer, IMHO, than Burroughs Junior, but that's another thread) ; Smith, like Richard Hell, to my way of thinking, was smart and sharp but was like a lot of smart, sharp people I've met who just didn't know enough to carry off the kind of poetry or to which they aspired - I feel the same about Tom Verlaine in many respects. And I like a lot of Hell's work - but ultimately they are classic examples of their reach exceeding their grasp - too many intellectual shortcuts (if I can I will cut/paste a section from the liner notes of my cd which is relevant to this in some respects) - they knew enough to know what they should have known, from a literary standpoint, but that's really it.

and I am in an admitted minority in thinking this, I should add -

I know it's not a poll, but I don't agree with you on almost all of the above.

Just my 2 cents.

[medjuck]

I'm seeing her with Philip Glass!!!

That wouls be fun. Where is that?

Allan, she has a lot more going on than one line from one song. And I think she's pretty great live.

UCSB In February. Part of series which also includes Sonny Rollins.

[Adam]

I'm seeing her with Philip Glass!!!

That wouls be fun. Where is that?

Allan, she has a lot more going on than one line from one song. And I think she's pretty great live.

UCSB In February. Part of series which also includes Sonny Rollins.

Wow, close enough to seek out....

[BFrank]

I'm seeing her with Philip Glass!!!

That wouls be fun. Where is that?

Allan, she has a lot more going on than one line from one song. And I think she's pretty great live.

UCSB In February. Part of series which also includes Sonny Rollins.

THAT'S interesting. I need to go to SB sometime in the next several months on personal business. That might be a good excuse to make that trip.

[ghost of miles]

Seeing her in Detroit Monday night. 

[mjazzg]

Lucky you!

I saw her last summer, fantastic. Mind you, she always seems on top of her game when I see her

[BFrank]

I haven't seen her in a year or two, but try to catch her whenever she comes through SF. Usually at the Fillmore.

[ghost of miles]

In Paris a couple of weeks ago:

 

[Dave Garrett]

Ran across this interesting 2015 piece from the Voice on Twitter earlier today:

A Step-By-Step Walk Through ‘Just Kids’ and Patti Smith’s New York

[ghost of miles]

New NY Times article:

Patti Smith, Making Paris Swoon

[mjazzg]

Thanks for posting. No matter how many interviews I read they always bring a smile to my face.

[ghost of miles]

A latecomer to this news, but managed over the weekend to snag reasonably-priced center balcony seats for Patti Smith's Horses 50th-anniversary tour when it hits Chicago in November. There'll be at the Michigan Theater (majestic early-20th century movie palace) with the very same band that my partner and I saw in Royal Oak in 2019--Lenny Kaye and Jay Dee Daugherty from the original 1970s group, longtime bassist Tony Shanahan, and Smith's son Jackson on second guitar. They're going to play Horses in its entirety. Crossing my fingers that everyone stays healthy!