End of the century/the ramones/charles manson

tara

just watching the ramones documentary, which i have to say is sort of ruining the music for me (maybe there's something to what ed says about not knowing anything more than taking the music at face value), so here's what's bugging me... at the begining they go into who they were as kids, how they were outcasts etc, and how johnny was a supporter of charles manson, which sort of caught me by surprise, it was said in passing, and meant to highlight what a 'rebel' he was. anyway, i went to read a bit about manson, and it seems that there were groups of ppl who felt that manson wasn't to blame etc. but in my opinion manson was a racist, violent cult leader who abused the devotion of a group of ppl craving leadership.
so my point is how can i respect someone who supported such a terrible man?

chrisopalooza

tara wrote:

just watching the ramones documentary, which i have to say is sort of ruining the music for me (maybe there's something to what ed says about not knowing anything more than taking the music at face value), so here's what's bugging me... at the begining they go into who they were as kids, how they were outcasts etc, and how johnny was a supporter of charles manson, which sort of caught me by surprise, it was said in passing, and meant to highlight what a 'rebel' he was. anyway, i went to read a bit about manson, and it seems that there were groups of ppl who felt that manson wasn't to blame etc. but in my opinion manson was a racist, violent cult leader who abused the devotion of a group of ppl craving leadership.
so my point is how can i respect someone who supported such a terrible man?

a lot of people were misinformed about manson at the time. the evil we know today wasn't as blatant then.

regardless, johnny wasn't a full-on manson advocate or anything. nowhere near a level where it would be wrong to be a fan.

great doc. depressing for the most part though. read the book "please kill me: the oral history of punk rock." just gets you even more into the whole frame of mind of that era.

tara

chrisopalooza wrote:

a lot of people were misinformed about manson at the time. the evil we know today wasn't as blatant then.

regardless, johnny wasn't a full-on manson advocate or anything. nowhere near a level where it would be wrong to be a fan.

great doc. depressing for the most part though. read the book "please kill me: the oral history of punk rock." just gets you even more into the whole frame of mind of that era.

thanks for clearling that up, i find it hard to be a fan of certain bands (or go watch actors) whose politics i don't agree with
were you around then? what was thought of manson?
and yeah, that was a pretty depressing doc, i can't really put my finger on why, except that it went into a lot of the infighting. that and i always find it depressing to watch someone who's been seriously messed up on drugs, they talk funny, have all kinds of ticks, etc

chrisopalooza

tara wrote:

that and i always find it depressing to watch someone who's been seriously messed up on drugs, they talk funny, have all kinds of ticks, etc

yeah, the footage of dee dee as a kid is funny cause he's just a dumb, goofball. but the footage of him during his last few years is haunting -- dried up, strung out heroin addict that's probably rotted away half of his brain.

JaneNY

I haven't seen this (yet, and now I'm wondering whether I should), but it doesn't matter what they thought outside of the music - just listen to the music. There's all sorts of musicians and artists who've lived unsavory lives or done something I disagree with, but in the end, what matters is did you think the music was any good? If so, to me, that's all that matters.

sapperskunk

chrisopalooza wrote:

yeah, the footage of dee dee as a kid is funny cause he's just a dumb, goofball. but the footage of him during his last few years is haunting -- dried up, strung out heroin addict that's probably rotted away half of his brain.

"We'd go fix us up some dope and potato chips."

musicismylife78

system of a down, joni mitchell, Jerry Rubin, Uncle Neil all have been supportive of manson. Ask them why they support someone like Manson. Uncle Neil's a smart guy, who is one of the few people who hasnt sold out, yet he supports manson and even gave him a motorcycle in prison. Maybe his case needs to be reinvestigated and instead of suggesting that the beatles were responsible, why not let us blame society!

xavier mcdaniel

those guys aren't the only music people to be involved with manson, dennis wilson of the beach boys let him stay at his house for a bit in the 1960s and even recorded a song written by Manson, although he changed the title

bookmuse

xavier mcdaniel wrote:

those guys aren't the only music people to be involved with manson, dennis wilson of the beach boys let him stay at his house for a bit in the 1960s and even recorded a song written by Manson, although he changed the title

I read that this occurred before he knew about the murders and that he became sick of what was going on in his house. I can not reconcile how anyone can be a supporter of Manson after the fatcs came out. One can have empathy after reading about what kind of childhood he had and understand how he became so sick (you can see it is his eyes that he's an empty, empty soul). Neil Young really bought the man a motorcycle? Does he get to cruise around on it in the prison yard?

As far as respecting people who supported such a terrible man - you can still get something out of the music without respecting someone. I have not seen this doc. and will need to watch it after this discussion - but people do change overtime as they age. Wonder if Johnny was still a Manson supporter when he was older. He probably was not but identified with Manson's anger. But like I said have not seen the doc..

xavier mcdaniel

i didn't even know it until last week when i took the "dearly departed" tour in hollywood. creeppy stuff.

tara

bookmuse wrote:

I read that this occurred before he knew about the murders and that he became sick of what was going on in his house. I can not reconcile how anyone can be a supporter of Manson after the fatcs came out. One can have empathy after reading about what kind of childhood he had and understand how he became so sick (you can see it is his eyes that he's an empty, empty soul). Neil Young really bought the man a motorcycle? Does he get to cruise around on it in the prison yard?

As far as respecting people who supported such a terrible man - you can still get something out of the music without respecting someone. I have not seen this doc. and will need to watch it after this discussion - but people do change overtime as they age. Wonder if Johnny was still a Manson supporter when he was older. He probably was not but identified with Manson's anger. But like I said have not seen the doc..

it was mentioned only in passing, it wasn't a huge focus, i just focused on it 'cause it bothered me
and that bit about neil kinda threw me for a loop too, what would a guy in jail want with a motorbike? unless he really liked fixing them

sapperskunk

For an acoustic solo act, Mansons stuff isn't that terrible. It's poorly recorded (prison). But then again it could be the shock value. Some of it is pretty catchy though and he does have a nice voice.

Check out the song "look at your game girl". G&R covered it.

brianlux

I just watch "End of the Century" again for about the tenth time (what a great band and what a great documentary!).  I don't think the Ramones or Johnny had anything to do with Manson.  I think that comment had more to do with most of the guys in the band being into horror films and such.  And I don't think any of them were Nazis either. 

Some of the thing I always go away with after seeing this film:

-That the band wasn't huge in its time (inadvertently, The Sex Pistols' scandals via the dumb ass media killed it for them).

-That they toughed it our for so long anyway (hack or pack and man did they hack it!).

-That they stayed together as long as they did despite having such huge differences among them.

-That the original four members are all gone.  All of their passing really hit me, I think Dee Dee the hardest because he was so  young at heart, a reckless soul, and when he spoke he sounded so endearingly stupid yet was beautifully and brilliantly creative.