Why was “Anarchy in the UK” by the Sex Pistols so powerful?
It was this question that acted as a catalyst for Greil Marcus’ nine-year exploration of the 20th century.
On Friday, over 100 people from everywhere on the spectrum of age, music taste, and knowledge of rock gathered to hear Marcus perform the play that was the basis for his book “Lipstick Traces: A Secret History of the 20th Century.” This historical critique of 20th century avant-garde art movements and music draws on Dadaism, Lettrism, Situationism, and countercultures, such as the Sex Pistols and the punk movement, in a broader framework than that of typical music journalism.
“Lipstick Traces” is currently celebrating its 20th anniversary since its first publication by the Harvard University Press in 1989. A newly updated version with new stories and a new cover has been released, but the central quest of answering Marcus’ burning question remains the same.
“I spent years searching obscure documents, manifestos, and posters, knocking on doors asking people to let me read forgotten publications ... and after 3 years I had a kind of circus, all these people from different times and places separated by languages and countries,” said Marcus. “I wanted to find a way to get these people to talk to each other. They all shared a love of entertainment, a certain glamour, a streak of determination. I wanted to show the world that the world was no what it seemed.”
Marcus has a track record of music analysis that names him justifiably as one of the best American music critics. He is the author of many other notable critiques of music and pop culture, including “Mystery Train” (1975/2008), “Dead Elvis” (1991), “The Old, Weird America: The World of Bob Dylan’s Basement Tapes” (1997), “The Dustbin of History” (1995), “Like a Rolling Stone” (2005), “The Shape of Things to Come: Prophecy in the American Voice” (2006), and others.
Bob George is the co-founder and executive director of ARChive of Contemporary Music, the largest collection of pop music in world, which has recently partnered with Columbia. George himself did fact-checking 20 years ago for “Lipstick Traces” with Harvard University Press, and he explained some of the reasons for the craze around both Marcus and his book.
“He’s more of a historian than a critic,” said George. “Lester bangs, Marcus Palmer, Greil, they’re all looking at pop music in the larger context of American and world culture. This is different from just being a critic, it goes beyond that and puts it in context of American history.”
Putting music into a larger context is Marcus’ trademark. He managed to incorporate a whirlwind of movements, figures, and music into a tumultuous progression with a semblance of twisted logic to it all.
“Greil uses John Lydon and the Sex Pistols and punk to start, and puts them in the context of many movements of art—Dada, Futurism, Lettrism, Situationism—all these movements that he’s basically trying to relate and explain in light of each other,” said George.
Marcus was the sole performer of his play tonight, reading a script into a microphone, while accompanying images occasionally flashed onto the screen behind him.
Surreal scenes of all the characters Marcus had encountered and so desired to unite were described to the audience in a high-energy, earnest, determined manner, with Marcus pausing only to wake a sleeping audience member. People fluttered on and off the stage in choppy bursts of energy and emotion.
Marcus said, “Young people dressed in a style that might be caused neo-traffic accident,” then quoted Nietzsche, saying “those who gaze too long at monsters best be sure they do not become one.”
Marcus ended the play with a recording of “Anarchy in the U.K.” shouting over the roaring applause of his audience.
When asked about his intentions writing the book, Marcus answered, “I didn’t write this book for any purpose. I didn’t write this book to make the world a better place. I wrote this book in the pursuit of an obsession and answer [to] that question, and I think for myself anyway, I was able to answer that question.”
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