Sunday, May 23, 2004
GROCER JACK, GET OFF YOUR BACK: I just heard for the first time "Excerpt From A Teenage Opera (Grocer Jack)", and now I see where Pete Townshend got the idea for his teenage operas. I understand that EMI pulled the plug when, after the second single from the project didn't take off, they realized how much money was being spent and choked on the bottom line, thus making A Teenage Opera one of the great lost albums of the rock era. And yeah, all things considered, I think everybody involved got smacked by the wrong end of a bad deal.
Just like Brian Wilson finishing Smile for a concert tour, it's hardly likely that when original composer/producer Mark Wirtz finished Teenage Opera (although he's calling it something else) thirty years later, he came up with the results he would've in 1967. Because of record company weirdness, we might not get a chance to find out, but there is an album out representing itself as Teenage Opera, which will do for now.
Just like Brian Wilson finishing Smile for a concert tour, it's hardly likely that when original composer/producer Mark Wirtz finished Teenage Opera (although he's calling it something else) thirty years later, he came up with the results he would've in 1967. Because of record company weirdness, we might not get a chance to find out, but there is an album out representing itself as Teenage Opera, which will do for now.
|| Eric 3:19 PM#
