Supertramp

I had the good fortune of listening to Crime of the Century lately. I already knew Dreamer and Bloody Well Right, but the other songs were new to me. The album is incredibly stable, it sounds like a performance in a club, not like a collection of songs. But even in such a performance there are highlights and my personal highlight might very well be If Everyone Was Listening.

Compared with Carsten Bohn Supertramp never really got caught up in the 70s, I figure when you're at the head of the trek, you have a good view of what's coming. It is obviously a delicate thing to infringe on people's privacy, to melt the social distance. There is a reason why those most concerned with the well-being of their soul feed the heart nothing but air and light. But then again it is a worrisome thing to let the world get soaked in harshness.

So, it's all about loving the lads in the right way, as Plato put it. Or, as the Quran observes:

As for him who thinks himself independent,
unto him you pay regard.
Yet it is not your concern if he grow not.
But as for him who comes unto you with earnest purpose 
and has fear,
from him you are distracted.

In any case Hide in Your Shell goes too far. With enough irony it is of course funny. But that I accept as an excuse for similar overtones in Take the Long Way Home, not in this case: it taints the mood, removes the uplifting principle of self-reliance, renders one passive, where all hope lies in activity, for the world is wondrous, but only the heart shines.

But still, I bow my head before the effort. Supertramp themselves understood it all quite well as Breakfast in America proves: trying to teach their fans, something went off the rails, Supertramp only in so far as teaching makes for bad music, some great songs on that album, others with no excuse for ever having been written.

Although I almost certainly heard The Logical Song or Give a Little Bit first, which came out when I was 5, resp. 3 years old, the first song that I consciously knew to be sung by Supertramp was It's Raining Again. If it was any other band, I'd still indulge it as a guilty pleasure, but since it's Supertramp, it pains me.

In retrospect I think it might have been a sign of greatness that the band broke up: pride in one's work, taking it seriously and full responsibility for it, although that's far from the official version.

Even though the 70s went wrong and had to, it would be a substantial loss to not pay attention to what went right then. It's high time to pick up the pieces. There simply is no heir, no offshoot. A position of clarity is never hostile towards life.