Patti Smith : 'Horses ' --- Better Than Ever

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by Wildest cat from montana, Jan 15, 2020.

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  1. Wildest cat from montana

    Wildest cat from montana Humble Reader Thread Starter

    Location:
    ontario canada
    Bought this when it was released in '75 based on some record review.
    Didn't know what to expect but whatever expectations I had they were surpassed.
    Haven't played much Patti lately but I'm going to rectify that because last night I put on 'Horses ' and was reminded how brilliant , daring and far'thinking this album was /is.
    What an album ! She has several excellent records but this one is , for me , is her best.
     
  2. John B Good

    John B Good Forum Hall Of Fame

    Location:
    NS, Canada
    The boy was in the hallway drinking a glass of tea
    From the other end of the hallway a rhythm was generating
    Another boy was sliding up the hallway
    He merged perfectly with the hallway,
    He merged perfectly, the mirror in the hallway
    The boy looked at Johnny, Johnny wanted to run,
    But the movie kept moving as planned
    The boy took Johnny, he pushed him against the locker,
    He drove it in, he drove it home, he drove it deep in Johnny
    The boy disappeared, Johnny fell on his knees,
    Started crashing his head against the locker,
    Started crashing his head against the locker,
    Started laughing hysterically
    When suddenly Johnny gets the feeling he's being surrounded by
    Horses, horses, horses, horses
    Coming in in all directions
    White shining, silver studs with their…
    When suddenly Johnny gets the feeling he's being surrounded by
    Horses, horses, horses, horses
    Coming in in all directions
    White shining, silver studs with their nose in flames,
    He saw horses, horses, horses, horses, horses, horses, horses, horses.
    Do you know how to pony like bony maroney
    Do you know how to twist, well it goes like this, it goes like this
    Baby mash potato, do the alligator, do the alligator
    And you twist the twister like your baby sister
    I want your baby sister, give me your baby sister, dig your baby sister
    Rise up on her knees, do the sweet pea, do the sweet pee pee,
    Roll down on her back, got to lose control, got to lose control,
    Got to lose control and then you take control,
    Then you're rolled down on your back and you like it like that,
    Like it like that, like it like that, like it like that,
    Then you do the watusi, yeah do the watusi
    Life is filled with holes, Johnny's laying there, in his sperm coffin
    Angel looks down at him and says, "Oh, pretty boy,
    Can't you show me nothing but surrender?"
    Johnny gets up, takes off his leather jacket,
    Taped to his chest there's the answer,
    You got pen knives and jack knives and
    Switchblades preferred, switchblades preferred
    Then he cries, then he screams, saying
    Life is full of pain, I'm cruisin' through my brain
    And I fill my nose with snow and go Rimbaud,
    Go Rimbaud, go Rimbaud,
    And go Johnny go, and do the watusi, oh do the watusi
    There's a little place, a place called space
    It's a pretty little place, it's across the tracks,
    Across the tracks and the name of the place is you like it like that,
    You like it like that, you like it like that, you like it like that,
    And the name of the band is the
    Twistelettes, Twistelettes, Twistelettes, Twistelettes,
    Twistelettes, Twistelettes, Twistelettes, Twistelettes
    Baby calm down, better calm down,
    On the night, in the eye of the forest
    There's a mare black and shining with yellow hair,
    I put my fingers through her silken hair and found a stair,
    I didn't waste time, I just walked right up and saw that
    Up there, there is a sea
    Up there, there is a sea
    Up there, there is a sea
    The sea's the possibility
    There is no land but the land (Up there is just a sea of possibilities)
    There is no sea but the sea (Up there is a wall of possibilities)
    There is no keeper of the key (Up there there are several walls of possibilities)
    Except for one who seizes possibilities, one who seizes possibilities. (Up there)
    I seize the first possibility, is the sea around me
    I was standing there with my legs spread like a sailor
    I felt his hand on my knee (On the screen)
    And I looked at Johnny and handed him a branch of cold flame (In the heart of man)
    The waves were coming in like Arabian stallions
    Gradually lapping into sea horses
    He picked up the blade and he pressed it against his smooth throat(The spoon)
    And let it deep in (The veins)
    Dip in to the sea, to the sea of possibilities (It started hardening)
    Dip in to the sea, to the sea of possibilities
    I put my hand inside his cranium, oh we had such a brainiac-amour
    But no more, no more, I gotta move from my mind to the area
    (Go Rimbaud, go Rimbaud, go Rimbaud)
    And go Johnny go and do the watusi,
    Yeah do the watusi, do the watusi
    Shined open, coiled snakes white and shiny twirling and encircling
    Our lives are now entwined, we will fall yes we're together twining
    Your nerves, your mane of the black shining horse
    And my fingers all entwined in your silky hair,
    I could feel it, it was the hair going through my fingers,
    The hairs were like wires going through my body
    I, I that's how I
    That's how I
    I died (At that Tower of Babel they knew what they were after)
    (They knew what they were after)
    (Everything on the current) Moved up
    I tried to stop it, but it was too warm, too unbelievably smooth,
    Like playing in the sea, in the sea of possibility, the possibility
    Was a blade, a shiny blade, I hold the key to the sea of possibilities
    There's no land, but the land
    Looked at my hands, and there's a red stream
    That went streaming through the sands like fingers,
    Like arteries, like fingers
    He lay, pressing it against his throat (Your eyes)
    He opened his throat (Your eyes)
    His vocal chords started shooting like (of a horse) mad pituitary glands
    The scream he made (and my heart) was so high (my heart) pitched that nobody heard,
    No one heard that cry,
    No one heard (Johnny) the butterfly flapping in his throat,
    Nobody heard, he was on that bed, it was like a sea of jelly,
    And so he seized the first (His vocal chords shot up)
    It was a black tube, he felt himself disintegrate (There is nothing happening at all)
    And go inside the black tube, so when he looked out into the steep
    Saw this sweet young thing (Fender one)
    Humping on the parking meter, leaning on the parking meter
    In the sheets
    There was a man
    Dancing around
    To the simple
    Rock & roll
    Song
     
  3. John B Good

    John B Good Forum Hall Of Fame

    Location:
    NS, Canada
    What the hell is a sperm coffin? (I don't remember noticing that when I had the album)
     
  4. Kate_C.

    Kate_C. abyssus abyssum invocat

    The one question Terry Gross didn't ask!
     
    David Stilesson and PointsNorth like this.
  5. Vinyl is final

    Vinyl is final Not Insane - I have a sense of humor

    Location:
    South central, KY
    I hated it then and hate it now.

    Art is subjective. :)
     
  6. Vinyl is final

    Vinyl is final Not Insane - I have a sense of humor

    Location:
    South central, KY
    An infertile uterus?
     
  7. Wildest cat from montana

    Wildest cat from montana Humble Reader Thread Starter

    Location:
    ontario canada
    Oh , man....
     
  8. ralphb

    ralphb "First they came for..."

    Location:
    Brooklyn, New York
    In the very early days of the band Patti used this song as a kind of free form improvisation. She would riff on the deaths of Jimi Hendrix, Brian Jones, Jim Morrison, weaving that stuff in with the more set lyrics printed above, all the while Lenny and Richard Sohl would be vamping in the background. Fantastic, hallucinatory stuff and I wish there were live tapes of that 3 piece band.
     
  9. Wildest cat from montana

    Wildest cat from montana Humble Reader Thread Starter

    Location:
    ontario canada
    I had the chance to see Patti and band in '76 but didn't go because I had an ' important ' school test the next day and had to study.
    What an effing fool I was !
     
  10. Vinyl is final

    Vinyl is final Not Insane - I have a sense of humor

    Location:
    South central, KY
    Yeah, I was reading that thing and reminding myself why drugs are illegal. :)
     
  11. Vinyl is final

    Vinyl is final Not Insane - I have a sense of humor

    Location:
    South central, KY
    Those lyrics kinda remind me of that Blondie song, Rapture. Just random stuff that rhymes and kinda forms a loose story.
     
    ralphb likes this.
  12. Sebastian saglimbenI

    Sebastian saglimbenI Forum Resident

    Location:
    New york
    Love everything she's done.....perfect discography from 1st. Album to "DREAM OF LIFE" imho.
     
  13. John B Good

    John B Good Forum Hall Of Fame

    Location:
    NS, Canada
    I wondered if it was a condom, but that it doesn't quite fit...
     
  14. ralphb

    ralphb "First they came for..."

    Location:
    Brooklyn, New York
    Patti had been honing her poetry chops for years before she got into music. One glance at her book "Seventh Heaven" would show that a lot of work went into the randomness.
     
  15. Sebastian saglimbenI

    Sebastian saglimbenI Forum Resident

    Location:
    New york
    .....RIMBAUD!!!
     
  16. arthurprecarious

    arthurprecarious Forum Resident

    Location:
    North East England
    Bought on release following review in NME. Changed my life. I was living in a small Yorkshire town and when I, as a naïve young Catholic boy, heard “Jesus died for somebody’s sins - but not mine!” - I was outta there and never went back.

    patti smith: murray review of _horses_
     
    Last edited: Jan 15, 2020
  17. Sebastian saglimbenI

    Sebastian saglimbenI Forum Resident

    Location:
    New york
    Listening to any PATTI SMITH is far from being in "A SEASON IN HELL"......Her voice is so perfect.......though I hear TOM VERLAINE in there somehow....
     
  18. John B Good

    John B Good Forum Hall Of Fame

    Location:
    NS, Canada
    Makes sense :

    "Tore down a la Rimbaud
    And I wish my message would come
    Tore down a la Rimbaud, you know it's hard some time "

    Van Morrison
     
  19. Azura

    Azura Felis silvestris grampia, factum ex trabibus ferro

    Location:
    Scotland East
    Second best album ever, despite Redondo Beach, and one that changed music. It is still unique, including amongst Patti's own work which falls far short of it. And crucially, it showed women could do the Rock thing just as well as men (better actually) and thus is mother to so many of today's great female artists who have kinda blown the men away. Laura Nyro was pure genius before Patti of course but it was the raw rock that made Patti so important. It also helped the wonderful anticipation I was feeling for what was coming, back when one had to wait rather than just go online and click. Verlaine's guitar on Break It Up, 18 months before Marquee Moon, giving me a taste of what I was reading about the CBGBs scene in the NME. And that link with BOC, all but forgotten now.
     
  20. Wildest cat from montana

    Wildest cat from montana Humble Reader Thread Starter

    Location:
    ontario canada
    Cannabis has been legalized in Canada.
     
    Vinyl is final likes this.
  21. Azura

    Azura Felis silvestris grampia, factum ex trabibus ferro

    Location:
    Scotland East
    Best thing Charlie ever wrote, but let's not forget Steve Lake in Melody Maker, try not to laugh too hard. Note the comments about the Velvets too.

    [​IMG]
     
  22. maui jim

    maui jim Forum Resident

    Location:
    West of LA
    May I ask what you consider the best album ever?
     
  23. Azura

    Azura Felis silvestris grampia, factum ex trabibus ferro

    Location:
    Scotland East
    The normally reliable Angus McKinnin got it wrong as well though at least he manages some objectivity. As an historical footnote this was from the short lived but excellent magazine Streetlife, the UK's answer to Rolling Stone, back when RS was of some value. I remember McKinnon taking Neil Young to task for Cortez The Killer in the same mag, pointing out that Montezuma wasn't exactly a cuddly type.

    [​IMG]
     
  24. Azura

    Azura Felis silvestris grampia, factum ex trabibus ferro

    Location:
    Scotland East
    Forever Changes, though Horses did knock it off the number 1 spot for a while. Not when it came out because Horses was so different it took quite a while for me to fully appreciate it. That was what was so great about it, it really didn't have any precedents. In my view/experience of course.
     
  25. Postcard

    Postcard Back in the garage…….

    Location:
    Leicester UK
    I too bought this on import in the U.K. in December 1975, fuelled by Charles Shaar Murray’s review in the NME.
    That particular copy is long gone but I do own several pressings of this now, including the U.K. first pressing - blue labels not black - and the Japanese pressing with the lyric insert. Pride of place goes to an American Ludwig/Sterling first pressing with the US catalogue number overlaid with a sticker with the U.K. catalogue number. The album was heavily imported into the U.K. before it was released here in early 1976.
    This particular copy came from John Ingham and he used it to review the album in Sounds. I was lucky enough to snag this when he disposed of his vinyl a few years back on eBay.
    I also got a US second press Raw Power for 2 English pounds.

    Horses is a great album and was a game changer.
     
    arthurprecarious likes this.
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