Alex Chilton R.I.P.

what a loss. He will be missed

 

This hit me pretty hard today, and I spend a lot of time thinking about Alex today, but I couldn't bring myself to listen to any of his work, I knew I wouldn't be able to take it. Soon, I hope, as I find I can't go for too long without listening to Big Star.

I was fortunate to catch Chilton with Big Star in 2000 at Bumbershoot, and it still remains a very happy memory for me.

 

Listening to #1 record right now, RIP

 

I saw Alex Chilton in concert in 2000 with the Box Tops on an oldies concert in St. Louis sandwiched between Gary Lewis and David Clayton-Thomas. While Lewis and Clayton-Thomas were very Vegas-y, Chilton singing those Box Tops hits was the real deal. Out of a crowd of maybe, 5000, I think I was the only one who gave Chilton a standing ovation. Chilton played in St. Louis in 2006 with Big Star but I didn't find out about it until the next day when a co-worker came up to me and said "hey Rob, I saw Big Star last night at an outdoor show in St. Louis". Along with never having seen the Beach Boys with Carl Wilson, missing Big Star is my biggest concert regret.

 

Same exactly for me. Funny how time sneaks up on you.

(It has now been over 24 hours and seeing "Alex Chilton" and "R.I.P." in the same message topic still does not quite compute.)

 

Same tribute on youtube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H9LGwzGnx5w

 

That's the one show I saw too. It was a good one.

 

It is, in some ways, honorable, in the "the path of excess leads to the temple of wisdom" sense. It may not be my way, or yours, but LX sponged up more human experience than most of us, and it's cold comfort to me that he didn't let that somewhat abbreviated time on Earth go by without cramming it full of thrills, both white-knuckled and cheap.

In that Nietzschean sense, most of us are lesser beings than Alex. He didn't seem to suffer cheap sentiment, regret, or the inveitable foolishness, gladly. Isn't that what "3rd" is all about?-that you could throw drugs, depression, and Lesa right in his path, and he could drink this "poison", but still keep on getting up and walking away in spite of it?

I'm not tough like Alex Chilton, but I sure admired his toughness, whether I agreed with it or not.

. . . and, yes, it is this spirit of his which made his music special.

 

The first thing I thought about was "Neon Rainbow", always my favorite Box Tops tune. Hard to believe he was only, what, sixteen years old singing a song like that. Few songs evoke images for me as vividly as that one does.

 

Just got home from a tracking session. Before we started I mentioned Alex Chilton had died. All the musicians were pretty upset about it and throughout the night they went out on Big Star jams. Really cool hearing world class musicians playing your favorite Big Star tunes.

 

around that time i was living in Athens & saw Alex & his trio 4 or 5 times
in small clubs over the course of a year or two.he played such a wide assortment of covers-stuff like "Little GTO " & a great song about
"Past Present Future" (i just googled-it was by The Shangri-Las ).i
laughed out loud at "Lost My Job" & once someone shouted "Shake Your
Moneymaker" & he played it,singing the one verse he could remember
several times with slide solos in-between.a friend made some audience
tapes & somewhere i have a list of the impessive range of songs played
over 3 or 4 shows.i also remember the band parking their big 70s vintage
cadillac right in front of the 40-Watt Club on Broad-maybe they were pulling
one of those little equipment trailers.finally, i remember being at a sparsely-
attended after-show party, sitting on a couch looking at a book off the
coffee table.Alex came & sat at the other end & started leafing through
a book or magazine.we sat there for a few minutes & neither of us said a word
.....

 

Alex will live on forever through his music, and through the music of countless others he had such a great influence upon. I'm playing Matthew Sweet's Girlfriend right now, which likely would have never happened without Big Star.

 

Ray Davies played tribute to Alex Chilton at his Austin show tonight, and played "Til the End of the Day" for Chilton, who had recorded the song in the late 70s for the last Big Star record (Davies said he only learned recently that Chilton had covered him).

 

I love the Big Star cover of that song, and its nice of Ray to play it. But I really wonder how Ray didn't know about it, as someone would have mentioned it to him over the years. Perhaps they did, but Ray did not know who Alex was and never got around to finding out.

 

What's Your Sign Girl from the A Man Called Destruction LP. Some of my favorite guitar playing ever.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XpYG5okq1ag

Title track from Like Flies On Sherbert. I could never articulate why but something about this recording moves me. Hook or Crook has some of the same qualities.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFU-UAiPOp8&feature=related

 

+1 RIP

 

I think No Sex is the best thing he did solo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUYzudpVvhY

 

Just to add: September Gurls is on my short list of "absolutely perfect" songs. I saw the news in my daily paper this morning-nice that it was mentioned on the front page, at least to promote the full article in the Arts section.

 

Love Alex's take on "Big Bird". The live version is best but the Box Tops did a good version with him.

Something about this photo fascinates me:

View attachment 138676

 

I have a boot of a Box Tops reunion show, and Alex sounds nothing like he did in the 60s on it. Not to be mean or anything.

 

Thank you for that.

I posted an obit on my Facebook and mentioned it to a few people. The response, of course, was "Alex who?"

That's okay - our little secret.

 

RIP.

 

Damn, this is depressing news. RIP Alex.

 

Thanks for the link. This is further proof of what I posted before, that he made more of an impact on people than perhaps he or any of us even realized. I mean, did you ever think you'd see Chilton's name being invoked in the House of Representatives?

 

The "voice" that Alex used on the Box Tops recordings wasn't his natural voice so when he went back with them in the 90's, he sang in his natural range. .... steve c