Farewell II, Part 2

Musings about the death of Shane MacGowan, as spoken into my phone whilst driving around the region today. 

65. I can’t believe he made it to 65. News of people's passing, especially the famous kind, can be sort of wistful. Shane McGowan, dying at 65... all that popped into my head was Damn, it’s a miracle he made it to 65. 

This was a guy who was booted out of his band in 1991 because he was drinking so much that he was on a downward spiral to hell. Not only did he resuscitate and rejoin the band 15 years later in a Comeback Player of the Year sort of performance, but he lived 17 years beyond that. He outlived his bandmate Phil Chevron, amazingly. He outlived Dave Flynn, sadly. 

When I think of my appreciation of the Pogues and Shane McGowan, it begins in college. A Pi Lam pit dance floor, as "Fiesta" blared. And "Fairytale of New York," a Christmas song unlike any other, in small part because I could enjoy it midsummer as much as anytime. Our buddy Paci did and does still look just like Shane McGowan. If either of them ever aged at all, it’s hard to tell. You could say neither has aged all that well, but did you see what they looked like at the starting gate?  Sorry, Paci. 

What can you say about Shane McGowan's singing voice? It is equal parts fantastic and puzzling. It’s the opposite of lilting, as so many of his duet companions were. It’s semi-spoken, with a gravelly grit the waves of whiskey helped create. Make no mistake, it’s beautiful, but it’s Picasso beautiful. 

The Pogues piqued my interest in what can be called Celtic rock, I guess. I dug into The Waterboys and Big Country. Later the Dropkick Murphys and Flogging Molly.  Joe Strummer got involved with the Pogues and Shane McGowan. Amazingly, and not in the blessed kind of amazing, Joe died 21 years ago. Shane McGowan fucking outlived Joe Strummer, and all bets were against that. Whiskey drinking more than... well just a bit more than any other good Irishman, I suppose. Shane was a mess; there’s a documentary on him from a long time ago (2001, ghooghle says!) where you can hear him talk but you can’t really understand what he says because he’s down to a few teeth. He seemed on death's door then! I can’t believe he lived to the age of retirement. 

Maybe he just wanted to stick that middle finger up at all his doubters, reach the end zone age, and punch out. He outlived Kirsty McCall, tragically. He outlived Sinéad O’Connor. Outlived Dolores O’Riordan. All his duetters. 

The comeback show of 2006 was a story unto its own. Shane had been touring for a number of years with his band the Popes. They put out a couple of albums, Not terrible, not in the canon of the Pogues. Word got to us in DC that the 930 Club would be the venue where the Pogues would land for the first stop on American soil on their Reunited with Shane and It Feels So Good tour. Subtitled "Shane... Come back!" It was a big deal, and not just for those of us of Irish descent, or those of us who enjoyed good blarney rock ‘n’ roll, or those of us who had been following the Pogues. It was a big fucking deal. 

I haven’t known many Americans of Irish descent who so embodied the spirit of Erin as my large-and-in-charge friend Dave Flynn. Drinking with Dave was one of my very favorite pastimes of the late 1990s and early 2000s, and something I miss many Saturdays a year. And many Tuesdays a year. We got tickets for the March 9 show, that inaugural evening. Flynn's wife Marguerite was pregnant with their second daughter, and that Pogues show, momentous and unmissable as it was, was a little bit dicey in its timing. Until my mind goes for good, I will never forget the phone call I received from Dave about a week prior. 

Hey, when’s that Pogues show again?
March 9.
Perfect!! Marguerite gets induced on the 10th!! 

That's perfect?? I will still never get it, but I laughed heartily. We pregamed like ungated banshees, and we boozed whiskey the whole show while singing along with that long lost friend I’d never had, Shane McGowan. Old college mate Cap came up to us out of nowhere with two slugs of Jameson for us, then whisked away into the shadows of IRA whispers. The Pogues played every song on the desired docket. (Set list here.) Four songs in, however, Shane made a beeline off stage, and Flynn and I shrugged and looked at each other as if to say, it was a good run, and four songs was enough. What we didn’t know was that he would only remain off stage for two songs and then come back with a vengeance. And a bottle. 

As he sang "Fairytale of New York" with so-and-so (ye olde internet says Ella Finer, the daughter of Pogue Jem Finer), fake snow fell from the rafters of the 930 Club. It was fucking lovely. 

For "Fiesta," the night's closer, I charged up front to the moshpit. At 35, I still thought I had it. I did not. That muddy floor meant I hit hard. Some heavenly messenger in black denim scooped me up and set me upright so as not to be trampled by the masses. Maybe I’ve got a little luck o' the Shane in me as well. 

Dave Flynn died nine months later of a weekend heart. (I meant weakened but the dictation robot is clever as hell.) Shane McGowan outlived Flynn by 17 years. The world is weird and sometimes sad. 

So turn on the Pogues and tune into Shane McGowan today. I'll be heading to Grace O'Malley's (it's an Irish pub, for obtuse readers) in just a few moments and will raise a glass to Shane and Dave and a dozen more besides. Join me in spirit, if not in body.

65 years old. 

May we each defy the epitaph that others have constructed for us. And may we live on the sunnyside of the street forever.

The Twelve Days of Gheorghemas: Day 2

On the second day of Gheorghemas, Big Gheorghe gave to me...

The Finest Holiday Duet in History
And One Hell of a bloggy Par-ty

You're a bum, you're a punk
You're an old slut on junk, lying there almost dead on a drip in that bed
You scumbag, you maggot, you cheap lousy faggot
Happy Christmas your arse I pray God it's our last.

So goes the greatest holiday song of the modern era*, recorded by the Pogues in 1988 and sung by Shane MacGowan and the late Kirsty MacColl. 'Fairytale of New York' is the ballad of a pair of Irish immigrants down on their luck in a city celebrating the Christmas season. It's by turns tender, vulgar, and comical. It is by no means your parents' seasonal fare - you won't hear 'Fairytale' anywhere near 'It's Christmas Eve in Washington'.

* This is both a personal opinion, and an entirely objective fact, deemed so by a VH1 UK poll in 2004.

I've long loved this tune, largely because I've long loved The Pogues. I owned If I Should Fall From Grace with God on cassette (Google it, kids) even before I met Clarence, who loves The Pogues more than anyone I know, save the benighted Cap Noonan, who may well be part of the band at this point. It's hard to keep track of him, what with all his republican (and I don't mean GOP) rabble rousing and Jameson-fueled sentimental journeys. (These journeys - and inside jokes - being referenced out of much awestruck affection.)

Pardon the digression.

With that as backdrop, you'll understand the great joy I felt experienced when a Ron Zacapa-aided Internet walkabout last weekend led me to a brilliant documentary on the making of 'Fairytale of New York'. The doc, released in 2005, features many of the original members of The Pogues, including the inimitable - and miraculously still living - MacGowan, the only man alive who looks at Clarence and sees a rank amateur teetotaler. The film is worth watching for a multitude of reasons, not the least of which is MacGowan's toothless, hissing laughter.

Offered in six YouTube installments, the documentary doubles as a history of the careers of both MacColl and The Pogues. Among the more poignant moments, the reflections of producer Steve Lillywhite (who was married to MacColl at the time of her death in 2000) on his late wife's contribution to the song. You'll likely find your immediate surroundings a mite dusty at that point in the film. Especially if you've had a cocktail or three.

I also particularly enjoyed the story of the NYPD Choir (as in, 'The boys in the NYPD Choir were singing Galway Bay/And the bells were ringing out on Christmas Day'), which doesn't actually exist. The producers of the video for 'Fairytale' papered over that inconvenient fact by hijacking the NYPD Pipe and Drum Band, bribing them with copious amounts of alcohol. The many-sided memories (bemused police and addled band members, with a side of Matt Dillon thrown in for absurd good measure) of the ensuing video shoot are likely to bring a whole different sort of tears.

Enjoy the film as our gift to you in this season of silliness and revelry - it's a not your typical 90-second G:TB experience (entendre entirely intentional - our ladies are so very lucky) so be sure to block out some time. It's also advised that you have a whiskey on hand, so maybe watch at home instead of the office. We feel certain that Shane and Gheorghe would get on famously, even if there's not a chance in hell that either would understand a word said by the other.

Happy Gheorghemas.