It's the End of the World as we know it...

By Mike Bradley on Dec 13, 08 03:27 PM in Music

At my time of writing, the world as we know it will be over in roughly seven hours' time.
Armageddon will be officially on its way, and the signs will have been given to us.
So, as you read this, it's already happened, and God knows what barren, apocalyptic world you are existing in.
It's a shame it all had to end this way. After everything that's been done over the decades to avert it, it's a real bloody shame.
Against all certain popular expectations, there's been no plague of locusts, no skies dripping blood, and no second-comings.
Nope. None of that.
What there has been, to prove the end is not only nigh but already well and truly underway, is the apparent allowance by EVERY God of EVERY denomination, to let the shiny-skinned, plastic people on X-Factor publicly and sickeningly slaughter - at Christmas, of all times - Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah as a festive 45.
I mean, I know that as a race, us humans have failed. But whatever it is that sits in heaven, I didn't think it hated us this much...

What I should be doing here is being methodical, open-minded, and open to suggestion. But sod that. I'm not.
I should be posting a clip of both versions of the song, to compare the two. But I'm not gonna do that, either. If I were caught posting a version of the X-Factor's take on this song, the Music Police would break down my door and arrest me for Crimes Against the Spirit of Music (that's the truth, too - in conversations with friends alone, I've already received three official cautions).

So in a feeble attempt at addressing that particular balance, I'm not gonna post Leonard Cohen's version, either.

But what we've got here instead is arguably the definitive version (please, don't mention (shudders) Jeff Buckley round these parts, just....please...don't), presented by former Velvet Underground pioneer and, as Shakespeare would have no doubt put it: "all round, dead sound bloke, like" - John Cale.

So, please, try and picture something like THIS -

Or similar, coming out of something that looks likeTHIS -

Then I think you'll see my point.

Rock & Roll Mugshots

Time was, back in the good old days when music still mattered outside of adverts and films, there was a sort of unwritten rule that, no matter when you purchased the record, by the time you'd finished playing it for the very first time, a member of the band would have been spectacularly arrested or, more commonly, dead.

Harking casually back to these carefree, fun-packed days of amazing music and premature death (as opposed to today's charts of terrible music and seemingly endless lives), here's a few of the Rock & Roll Circus' favourite rock & roll mugshots:

Fantastic, this one. In 1976, one day around 2.30am and just one year before Elvis died, Jerry Lee (never The King's number one fan, largely due to his quite convincing argument that the title belonged to him), turned up at Graceland, waving a loaded pistol and demanding to see a rather terrified Elvis. With the polite request of: "Get on the goddamn phone. I know you got an intercom system. Call up there and tell Elvis I wanna visit with him. Who the hell does he think he is? Tell him the Killer's here to see him," access was refused, cops were called, Elvis lived, and Jerry Lee got arrested.

Mick and Keith, arrested sometime in 1972 in Rhode Island for assaulting a photographer and obstructing police. Both pleaded guilty to the charges were released, presumably due to their longstanding and rather useful at times pact with the Devil.

Sid Vicious, bassist for the Sex Pistols, was arrested by New York police for the October 1978 murder of girlfriend Nancy Spungen. Sid's subsequent drug overdose spared him the indignity of a homicide trial. I've heard it said that if Sid Vicious hadn't have died when he were 21, he would have had a great recording career. But that's not true. The fact is, if Sid Vicious hadn't died when he was 21, he would've died when he was 22.

In 1967 (about five times actually, and roughly three times every year between 1967 and 1971), Jim Morrison was arrested for trying to incite a riot and resisting arrest at a Doors gig, after being sprayed in the eyes with mace by a police officer backstage. Footage of the arrest is available on youtube.

NEXT TIME...the first in a series of comedy features, kicking off with Bill Hicks.