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New Yorker Article on the Stones

Posted by: micwer ()

Date: November 6, 2006 18:34

SHATTERED
WANTED: S.W.F., LOVES KEEF
Issue of 2006-11-13
Posted 2006-11-06

The persistence of the Rolling Stones, like that of diphtheria or kudzu, is a riddle of nature. As a band, they are easy to mock: a collection of wealthy gents adding to their fortunes each year by replaying their tunes of sexual dissatisfaction and satanic dread. The Stones are not so much a band as a corporate juggernaut like Citibank or Microsoft, and an enduring medical miracle: Can your grandfather even climb a tree, much less fall out of one, bash his head, survive, and still remember the changes on “Sister Morphine”?

As a matter of fiduciary responsibility, the Stones almost always play vast venues like Giants Stadium––a date at the Garden is considered très intime––and the Baby Boomer fan comes to the event with three beers, two or more indulgent children, and the keys to the minivan; the Boomer then watches Mick and Keef on huge screens as the real Mick and Keef scuttle around on the stage. Martin Scorsese, who is working on a documentary feature about the Stones, wanted a much smaller venue—something less Leni Riefenstahl, more Ingmar Bergman––and so the band agreed to play a couple of nights at the twenty-eight-hundred-seat Beacon Theatre, the Art Deco gem on the Upper West Side.

The theatre’s orchestra section was made even smaller because Scorsese had set up seventeen large movie cameras; there were also three runways built to thrust out into the crowd, the better for Mick to do his prancing thing. Perhaps the most important equipment required, however, was a suitable-looking audience. Bill Clinton’s charitable foundation had taken up a block of tickets for one of the concerts, but it would certainly not do, for Scorsese’s purposes, to have John Podesta playing air guitar in the front row.

And so the movie people had advertised for, and summoned, a flock of camera-ready fans through Shidoobee, a Stones Internet message board. In order to be considered, Shidoobees, as the fans call themselves, had to submit a photo and then wait to be called. If they were selected, they would be paid seventy-five dollars to attend the concert. The producers were evidently underwhelmed by the sexiness of the group on the first night, and so they took special pains for the second show, issuing a set of revised instructions to all would-be seat fillers:

You should be dressed trendy, sexy, hip. Do not come looking sloppy or disheveled. Women really glam it up, but not trashy. You can wear Rolling Stones shirts or other band shirts but please do NOT wear the following: no fan club shirts, no logos (Nike, Coca-Cola), nothing too over the top and outrageous (wigs, crazy hats, etc.) and do not wear WHITE. . . .
You will not be allowed to purchase alcohol. Again, you are not just attending a concert, you are working.
MOST IMPORTANT NOTE: You guys will be in the very front of the stage and will be the only people on camera for the documentary. We really need high energy. Dance, sing along, cheer on the band. They need your energy to play a really amazing show.

On the first night, a forty-four-year-old Shidoobee from Levittown named Debi Gula arrived at P.S. 87, where the extras had been asked to convene, wearing a black leather vest covered with Stones buttons and decorated, on the back, with an elaborately sequinned lips logo. “Since ’81, I’ve missed one tour,” she said. “The farthest back I’ve been was sixteenth row, in Hartford.”

Once inside the theatre, the hopeful extras stood in line in the aisle of the orchestra, waiting to be told where to go. An assistant picked through the queue: young ones, small ones, cute ones. A pregnant fan narrowly escaped being turned away.

“What are they looking for?” one woman asked nervously.

After a spry set from the legendary Buddy Guy, various assistants started rearranging the crowd in order to create just the right blend of sex, youth, and spontaneity. Gula and another woman were positioned at the foot of stage left, Keith’s side. Several grizzled Shidoobees who had been in the front row were moved to the rear, replaced by newly arrived statuesque young blondes in tight jeans and boots.

In the pause before the Stones came on, a few more women were brought in. A roving crew member murmured into a walkie-talkie, “I don’t have any more babes.” Albert Maysles, the surviving director of the 1970 Stones documentary, “Gimme Shelter,” stood at the front of the stage, smiling beatifically, using a handheld video camera to pan the crowd. Scorsese was nowhere to be seen. Within a few minutes, Jagger was preening and singing duets with Jack White and Christina Aguilera. In contrast to the highly managed vibe of the rest of the evening, the performance itself was stripped-down and raw. Some of the statuesque seventy-five-dollar women looked bored, some walked out. But when the band played “Satisfaction,” for an encore, many of the remaining pretty girls bounced up and down and even sang along.

Debi Gula made the cut for both nights, and she noticed the transformation from one to the next. “Diehard fans got screwed out of this,” she said. “Honestly, it sucks.” But when she was asked how she enjoyed the show, her eyes sparkled. “Did you see Keith give me the pelvic thrust? Some people think he’s God, others think it’s time to go to the bathroom when he’s on. You never get up when Keith sings.”

COMMENT
BEDFELLOWS DEPT.
IN THE ACADEMY
SHATTERED
TRUCE DEPT.

— Shauna Lyon

Source: [www.newyorker.com]

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2006-11-06 18:34 by micwer.

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