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| PATTI SMITH Rock journalism circa 1975 struggles manfully for enlightened copy |
| why don't we dream it? |
| Think of the word 'aura' the way Hollywood Mogul Robert Evans might say it When he's gushing and tanned and brim full of tremoring cocaine His voice would be fruity and full but you can still hear his throat is full of brittle reeds "Aura" "My God" he'd quiver..."Judy had it...oh boy, did she ever have it" It's a big word, a big idea, but it's used as shabbily as "magic" so no one thinks about what it means I was raised a Methodist and aura was for spooks and spiritualists But my mother made us obsessed with stars And the magic these stars possessed I liked to think there were huge forcefields of aura and presence permanently aswish around The King or The Duke Aura always seems most potent when people first enter rooms I thought aura might be a neatly collapsable noun meaning : sexual attractiveness + projected desire - concrete knowledge x inaccessibility Very secular Very secure Very social There is, in the mechanical age, a frisson of quasi-desire when we see anyone famous I always process this flicker (but never sedately enough to stop my heart quickening) Then I decide to ridicule (inwardly if I'm alone), ignore (still keeping half an eye out for celebrity behaviour) or gaze I have found notoriety increases the charge Degree of celebrity doesn't really have any effect Paul McCartney in a black cab is a dreary sight But no worse than Madonna jogging So why Patti Smith? Why did she seem so huge on that stage? Bigger than us Bolder, braver I wasn't a huge fan I went to the show because I liked a record she made nearly 30 years earlier I was very pleased to feel such a star rush To feel so adolescently craned in neck And bowed and thankful like a fan With my critical faculties splintered by starpower and presence And something like her aura which is there in her records too I might have to use the shorthand of aura again in these pages For Dion or Haino Pharoah or JoJo But there aren't many |