Robin Gibb has died.
May 20, 2012 9:06 PM   Subscribe

Robin Gibb has died.
posted by Cosine (6 comments total)

This post was deleted for the following reason: This is awfully perfunctory, maybe someone will take a little time and put together a stronger post? -- cortex



 
What a shitty month for music deaths.

I'm starting with 'I Started A Joke' then 'New York Mining Disaster' and move on from there. It's going to be two disco nights in one weekend as Casa de Cosine.
posted by Cosine at 9:08 PM on May 20, 2012


"I Started a Joke" is so weird. It's a silly little bit of nonsense verse, and yet Robin stokes it so full of pathos, that it on some level gets profound. The melody is also almost perfectly constructed, in its innocent lilting beauty, and in how it builds to its climax. It could go in a textbook.

The song was written soon after Robin was involved in an horrific, bloody train accident. I've heard an interview with Barry where he said Robin came out of it deeply changed. This was the first song Robin presented to the band after that experience.

Here is the original recording, and here are two live recordings of the song from different periods in the Bee Gee's career. He doesn't cut any corners way back when, and, although he's changed the melody a tiny bit, he doesn't cut any corners in 1997.

I really think it's one of the great vocal performances ever. Melody, lyric, performance -- it has a perfection. It's one of my favourite bit's of music ever.

Good bye, Robin.
posted by Trochanter at 9:11 PM on May 20, 2012 [2 favorites]


.

(even though the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack was the cause of my finding out that I couldn't dance for shit, I don't hold a grudge)
posted by Halloween Jack at 9:15 PM on May 20, 2012


Did they really link to "Stayin' Alive" in the post? *facepalm*
posted by loquacious at 9:20 PM on May 20, 2012


Y'know, punk-indie-cred orthodoxy dictates I should hate the Bee Gees, but no. C'mon. They were a great fucking band. I dare you to write a pop song this good.
posted by DecemberBoy at 9:21 PM on May 20, 2012


Did they really link to "Stayin' Alive" in the post? *facepalm*

Yeah, I was just posting a comment there about that very thing, wow.
posted by Cosine at 9:22 PM on May 20, 2012


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