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God Save My Queen Daniel Nester Soft Skull, 2003 |
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A prose poem
for, and titled after, five albums worth of Queen songs. Dream or
nightmare? It may depend on what you take into it.
GEORGE: When I first heard that Nester was working on this book of prose poems, I must admit, I was kind of nervous. An entire book of poems dedicated to Queen song titles? Neat idea, I thought, but where does it go from the idea? Then I heard him read from it at a bookstore in Brooklyn. I was laid out, etherized. It was magic that something could start with so nutty and eccentric and, lets face it, somewhat shallow a band as Queen and become something much deeper about growing up, obsession, and familial relations. Which leads me to my one concern: I hope the book reads well to people who have never met Nester or heard him read. I think it does, but that may be coloured by the fact that my introduction to the poems was through spoken word rather than the printed page. (Aside: I heard that Richard Nash, publisher of Soft Skull Press, kind of 'signed' Dan band-style too. Nester was giving a reading from the poems at a regular New York venue while Nash sat with a bunch of others in the audience. When he finished, Nash goes a&r scout and calls Dan over and says, "So, let's do a book." Reminded me of the story Jason Newstead getting signed with Metallica -- a set with his former band, Flotsam and Jetsam, a call over to the table, an offer to play with Metallica, a 'woohoo' done with more profanity. Soft Skull even printed the book in the dimensions of a 45 record.) MOE: I was more worried about whether someone who was not a Queen fan would be able to enjoy this. I, as a teenager, was a huge fan and so were all of my friends which makes it difficult to read this book without prejudice. I am dismayed at what I take to be a dissing of Queen's first two records, Queen and Queen II. These records were/are clearly the band's masterpieces. Then I read 'Killer Queen,' where Nester implies what I have always thought; that this song represents a fundamental shift in Queen's musical and lyrical philosophy. Queen went from being an intellectual, heavy rock band that wrote about Catholicism and art and mysticism, to being a vaudeville act. Certainly, this was brewing in Freddie Mercury all along and when 'Killer Queen' became the band's first real US hit, it must have released the song and dance man in him and, in my opinion, ruined the band. Gone was, as Nester puts it, "the allegory" and in its place came 'Bohemian Rhapsody.' Having said that, 'Killer Queen' is an incredible song, one that Mercury would never again duplicate in terms of quality. I defy anyone to name a radio hit that is as rich with imagery, Springsteen included. Nester says, "The narrative, the innocent and the short lined, all clear as a bell," which is an accurate description but certainly doesn't go far enough. Except that these poems are not reviews so perhaps I expect too much. I am glad Nester notes the sad irony of a song that is both the band's finest work and the beginning of their artistic demise. My estimation of Nester and this book climbed after reading this piece though, reading on, my guess is he likes crappy post-'Killer Queen' Queen better than the cool Queen that preceded it which makes me doubt his taste. PETER: Before I started reading this book, I wondered if I should listen to some Queen. I've never owned an album, just listened to what I heard on the radio, back when I listened to the radio. But then I figured it could be interesting to approach the poems from the perspective of someone only casually familiar with Queen's music. (And who isn't at least casually familiar with Queen?) I began to worry when I read the first couple of albums though. I just did not get the poems. Couldn't find reference points for them. I did like the musicality of certain lines, and the strangeness of some - "I'll admonish you and your triumvirate later. Later for you." - and I did like the idea of the footnotes, although again, I did blow bubble bath about the tub with my heavy sighs of uncertainty. I figured it was because I wasn't familiar with either of those first two Queen albums, so I kept on reading. When I read 'Killer Queen,' though, that one clicked with me. I'm not sure why, as the lines weren't any more referential than the ones that had come before. But I heard the music and remembered moments listening to that song, and suddenly there was a context. The book kind of reminds me of an abstract painting. You look at the words and are either baffled or get some sort of emotional response that's hard to describe but satisfying nevertheless. When I read the line "Get allegory out of the way" in 'Killer Queen,' I chuckle and nod. I'm not sure what exactly it is that speaks to me about it, but something does. Or maybe I just have no imagination. GEORGE: For me the concern is whether these poems work as poems rather than as anything to do with Queen, and I think they do for several reasons. The first is multiplicity of meaning -- it's a book of many levels. The Queen here is a catalyst for examining deeper pieces of the (in particular Nester's) adolescent psyche and familial relations. I was particularly struck by a couple of lines in the opening two 'albums.' In "Modern Times Rock 'n' Roll" he opens the poem with "The interrupted spectacle," has The second stanza begin with "The spectacle interrupted," and ends with a one line third stanza, "Look out!" There's a sense that Nester is setting up for a play of sorts, foreshadowing a Learish drama. Later in 'Ogre Battle' (god, Queen could title a song, couldn't they?) there is what maybe the key line in the whole book: "Rock 'n' roll don't need no referent. Fuck 'em if they think so." (Which is quickly followed, of course, by a footnote citing Bon Jovi.) Nester is always engaged in this sort of undercutting of his own narrative, a kind of mirror for the cynical uneasiness of youth that leads to self-ridicule and awkwardness. The second is honesty. This book can be particularly open. When the teen narrator mishears the word "farther" as "father" ... that's pretty raw. Also, the rampant sexuality of the moment ("How wonderfully nude and fuckable I am" - 'Brighton Rock'), exposing and embarrassing, is captured without a hint of sentimentality. It's these kinds of things that, in my opinion, keep the book totally valid and real as poetry. MOE: You are right, George when you say this is a book of many levels. Though, and I hope you will forgive me for taking your words out of context, God Save My Queen's value as 'real poetry' isn't that crucial for me. This book is part poetry, part confessional, part novelty item and part song-by-song analysis, (among other things, I'm sure). You mention, "The spectacle interrupted" in 'Modern Times Rock and Roll.' This is because, for those not familiar with the debut Queen album, it is a bit of rock and roll relief in the middle of a fairly ponderous and produced series of songs. It is a genius bit of sequencing and the track acts like comic relief in a Shakespeare tragedy. While the idea for this book might make him appear as a crazy fan, he is more than aware of the band's shortcomings. He is smart enough to recognize the amateur quality of drummer Roger Taylor's songs as he writes, that he "wonders what the other three were thinking as they heard those badly coached demos." in his poem for 'The Loser In The End.' He also notes the novelty of bassist, John Deacon's tunes, (Mercury and May must have smirked at the success of Deacon's 'You're My Best Friend,' though it was all novelty by that point). Nester finally takes the gloves fully off regarding Deacon in his poem 'Spread Your Wings' when he says, "You could have been in Little River Band". Ouch. Reading this God Save My Queen reminds me of the rock writers of my childhood like Lester Bangs and Richard Melzer who managed to make the music they were writing about seem a lot more important that it probably was. Chuck Klosterman recently did this same thing with his book Fargo Rock City. Perhaps Nester can do for Queen what Klosterman did for 80's hair metal. GEORGE: Interesting comparison to rock critics, Moe. Nester got slammed by an ex-rock critic (known for despising Queen) in the New York Times (login: bookninja, password: waaaa). What did you guys make of the copious footnotes? I felt that much of the heart of the book (that is the heart of homage) was here, the tidbits such Brian May's almost-career in astronomy, the rock history lessons, the obsessive quoting and recycling of lyrics. (Aside: When I first met Nester in New York he jumped on my admission of Canadian roots with "Oh my God! Rush! I LOVE RUSH!" and launched into minutiae about the band. We spent all night talking about Rush, Triumph, etc. Is there a pattern here?) PETER: The "interrupted spectacle" really conveys the furtiveness of adolescence, doesn't it? I agree that it's kind of a tough book to pin down. I guess it's being marketed as a poetry book by default (it's that Chapters/Borders logic - it's not fiction, biography or a manual, so it must be poetry), but the subtitle - "A Tribute" - does actually sum it up best. I also like the comparison to rock critics. In one sense, the book does read like an extended review, albeit by someone who likes Queen rather than a New York Times Queen hater. But the confessional aspect takes it into an entirely different area. As much as the book is about Queen, it also seems to be about capturing a historical moment and, even more specifically, about growing up in that moment. A lot of the footnotes certainly play into this. Bon Jovi. I hang my head in shame. I hate to call it a coming-of-age text, but that's certainly there to an extent. But what I find interesting about this is the shared referents that the music offers. Like I said before, you can tap into moments here and there in the book's tracks and just think, "yeah, that's right!" I have no idea what those things actually meant to Nester, or to you guys, but we can all identify with them in some way that invokes our adolescence and growth, and perhaps even our own artistic development. There's something very interesting, albeit intangible, about this connection. Maybe while the Great American Novelists are writing our sociopolitical history, writers like Nester are exploring our emotional history. Either of you think this book has a certain punk quality to it? GEORGE: Well, Soft Skull Books is essentially New York City's premier punk press. They've published some pretty radical political and poetic texts over the years, so are no strangers to taking risks. I think Nester's book fits in with their punk mandate to some degree, but I also think it has more mass appeal than it's been granted in the press. But other than the publisher, I don't know that it can be classified as punk. What aspect of the punk aesthetic are you referring to? It's not a mohawk of a book, that's for sure. It has no chains and studs. If it's punk at all (in the original sense of the word, rather than the Green Day/MTV sense), it seems to me it's more in the embracing of positions outside authority and popularity. I wonder how differently we would have read, and in turn reviewed, this book if we were women. I think this coming of age is certainly a boy's coming of age, and an unusually articulate one at that. But it definitely belongs to men. Not that it can't be read with empathy and understanding by women, but I think there are some intensely intimate adolescent moments that just made me blush with recognition. God, I wish I could take back so much (from this past year, much less almost twenty years ago... HOLY CRAP! TWENTY YEARS!) MOE: I agree with Peter that "A Tribute" is perhaps the best way to describe the book though it's also a chronicle both of Queen and of Nester's adolescence and early adulthood. As far as whether it is punk, I'm not quite sure what that means in a literary sense. It doesn't read particularly "street" to me. It does have a lot of passion, though, the footnotes especially. This book reminds me of the way I used to love bands. And love is an appropriate word for the obsessive way one behaves. My heart would leap just to see my favorite band's name in print, or if I heard their song on the radio I'd have to point it out to someone, "listen it's Alice Cooper!" or whoever else it was at the time. That, to me, explains the constant references. Everything reminds you of your love and everything relates to it. Nester on a couple of occasions attacks Queen's critics, Richard Christgau for one, and I love the way he puts the boots to that execrable Courtney Love in 'All Dead, All Dead' for giggling during her reading of Kurt Cobain's reference to Queen in his suicide note. You never let anyone get away with saying something bad about your band. Nester certainly wouldn't be the first writer to use his book to get back at someone, some writers use their pen to get back at everyone. PETER: By "punk" I meant a certain irreverence and disregard for traditional form/content issues, not so much street cred, etc. I think Nester has this sort of sensibility, and I guess I'd use "punk" as a sort of opposite pole to avant-garde, which I don't think is his game at all. "Experimental" just seems so weak, and Nester's "tribute" seems so much more brass and aggressive than the usual homage-style tribute. George, I think you're right about the maleness of this book. I can't decide if this is appropriate or ironic, given the band in question. Moe, I like your comments about the love/obsession for the band. I remember feeling that way when I was young too (but I'm not about to tell anyone what bands I was into). Of course, I haven't felt that way in a long time about any bands. Not sure if that's because of the current music scene or the fact that I'm just old and unhip. But it's just so damned hard to find good, non-corporate music these days. Maybe it's not surprising that we're talking about a book about a band that's rooted so firmly in the past. Given the nature of the cultural references in the footnotes and all, I wonder if Nester's goal is as much a tribute to a fading musical era as it is to the life and death of Queen or an exploration of his own past through the band's musical touchstones. Certainly there's a little bit of all the above in the book. Well, that's it for me. I have to say, I found this a tricky book to read, but worth it. While I couldn't always find a way into the poems in the book, they all engaged me, and I did grapple with them rather than just flipping the page. It's a gutsy book, one that makes you think and, more important, makes you feel. GEORGE: I agree, Pete, with your assessments, both about the book and aging. I've come to that dreadful stage where I tease my little sister (12 years younger) about liking that band, 'Korn Biskit...' I even found myself complaining about Linkin Park the other day. I had turned on CFNY (it will NEVER be 'The Edge' to me) and there was this screaming going on and I waited and waited and waited for a melody to present itself so that I might recognize it, and when it took almost a minute, I said to my partner something I never thought I'd hear myself say: "A song should be instantly recognizable as a song... it should have a melody!" After she told me I was getting old, I followed that stunner up with, "Hey, I was a Nirvana freak. That's as angry as music needs to get!" So, what I'm saying is, it's no wonder this book is ringing well with 30-year-old dudes like us. I wonder if a 21-year-old skate punk (that is, today's skate punk) would get it. I think Nester is definitely a pop-culture curator whose poems deserve more attention than some of the 'history of rock' crap we get on TV and in magazines. Is he writing to a narrow audience? Perhaps on some levels. But I think the philosophy and poetry supersede the rockumentary here, and that's what makes the book a success. I am interested, Moe, in your perspective as a musician cum writer -- do you think it succeeds on both levels? Personally, I'll especially be interested to see some of Nester's non-Queen-related poetry, which I hope follows within a year or two of this book. I think he should take a book or two off before finishing up the remaining Queen albums, if he indeed intends to. MOE: I agree with you George. I don't think I would have been as interested in a stock biography of Queen. But Nester's book really got me jazzed about my old heroes. I think my fascination stems from the fact that they were the first band I really liked that I was able to watch degenerate. Even though I hung in for a while, after the third album they, except on rare occasions, were pretty goofy. Still, I retained enough affection for the band that I was honestly sad when Mercury died. Nester's energy infected me. I worried at points that perhaps Nester was putting us on like the guy who did the spoof on Jewel's book. But his poem for 'Tie Your Mother Down' is as exciting as the song itself. I wonder what hard core Queen fans will think of this, the people who buy everything relating to the band. I hope they like it as much as I did.
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