Invincibles

Invincibles

By: Erreh Svaia

“I mean some doctor told me I had six months to live and I went to their funeral.”

Keith Richards

October is bringing a monster with the name: Desert Trip Festival, some folks decided to call this festival “Oldachella”, but thinking strictly in rock music terms, the lineup is simply monumental, perhaps it's a bit of nostalgia, we all love nostalgia at certain point, perhaps it's a unique chance to bring all these great musicians together before the whole Woodstock Generation ceases to exists, the thing is, this could be an awesome music fest, of legendary musicians, and I must add, still very active legendary musicians, as I have said before, people like David Bowie, who recently died, Lou Reed, who recently died, Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Yoko Ono and Robert Wyatt, are the guys, and girls who are still making amazing music, even more vital than younger acts of today.

Of course I'm really mad at the Stones, sure, they just played in Communist Cuba, and in México recently, they like to tour in a regular basis, but besides Keith Richards awesome solo album, When will a new Rolling Stones record come out? Come on Mick and Keith! Don't be so lazy and c give us a good down and dirty rock n roll record! Of course I love Stones classic material, is pure rock n roll history, but new music will always be welcomed rather than a "new" boring greatest hits compilation that looks more like pure commercial exploitation by record labels and lazy artists.

Mr. Bob Dylan is still in great shape these days, the guy is still able to come up with exciting new music almost every two or three years, when he comes off from his long touring schedule, the last "covers" records are so-so, I prefer Dylan as a singer songwriter rather than as a “crooner”, but Dylan has still managed to keep up a good quality level in his recent original recordings, the chance of watching him live would always be a pleasure, the man has become an enormous live attraction, improvising with his road band and coming up with new versions of his own songs, creating daring art nonstop.

Another guy making great new music is Paul, the ex-Beatles bassist and singer, he just issued a couple of years ago a very interesting record called New, and although he doesn't make groundbreaking music anymore, he is still making relevant music, keeps playing live regularly, I guess he is one of the most active musicians besides Dylan, and Neil Young, and talking about Young, whose prolific career, with one or two records made every year, doesn't look like a thing of the past, Young's career is fully vital with his music still making strong impressions on new generation and taking risks even young bands are afraid to.

I would have preferred to watch Pink Floyd together rather than just having a Roger Waters show, nothing against Mr. Waters, but he hasn't issued many interesting things, besides his work with Floyd, I guess his solo work is not as interesting as Gilmour's, Waters doing again his The Wall thing?

Last, but not least, the legendary Who, without a doubt, one of the greatest rock n roll band, one of my favorite, surely we will miss John Entwistle thunderous bass work and Keith Moon's hyperactive drumming, but Pino Palladino and Zak Starkey have proven to be worthy replacements live, making astonishing new live versions of the Who´s classic, and although not so regular, Townshend is still a great songwriter and Daltrey one of the greatest singers and front man of his generation.

My only consideration here is that big artists like Jeff Beck, Brian Wilson, Carlos Santana, Eric Clapton and Robert Wyatt were not included in the lineup, the five of them pretty active, with Jeff Beck still making experimental records and a recent tour with Wilson, who recently issued a record with the Beach Boys and a solo record, there is Carlos Santana, who precisely re activated his Woodstock era band and recorded a powerful album, one of the best recordings of the year, while Eric Clapton tours regularly and Mr. Wyatt, in a league of his own, keeps making awesome records and collaborating with people like Bjork, it could have been better definitely if you consider people like Yoko Ono or Caetano Veloso.

As time goes by, it seems that these old rockers are still strong and looking into the future in a more interesting way than most young acts, experience does count.