Latest news with #SoftMachine
Yahoo
10-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Tom Robbins, Counterculture Scribe of ‘Even Cowgirls Get the Blues,' Dead at 92
Tom Robbins, the celebrated author whose novels included Skinny Legs and All, Jitterbug Perfume, and Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, died Sunday, Feb. 9, The New York Times reports. He was 92. Robbins died at his home in La Conner, Washington. His son Fleetwood confirmed the news but did not provide a cause of death. More from Rolling Stone Tony Roberts, Stage and Screen Actor Known for Woody Allen Films, Dead at 85 Mike Ratledge, Soft Machine Keyboardist and Co-Founder, Dead at 81 Irv Gotti, Music Producer and Murder Inc. Records Co-Founder, Dead at 54 At once an underground favorite and a best-seller, Robbins' comic novels — with their fantastical stories and far-out musings — were distinctly of the counterculture and soon became part of its fabric. He rarely plotted out his books, choosing instead to see where his imagination and characters led him. 'I've always wanted to lead a life of enchantment and writing is part of that,' Robbins told Rolling Stone in 1977. 'Magic is practical and pragmatic — it's making connections between objects, or events, in the most unusual ways. When you do that, the universe becomes a very exciting place. I'm a romantic, and I don't apologize for that. I think it's as valid a way of looking at life as any. And a hell of a lot more fun.' Robbins published his first novel, Another Roadside Attraction (the 'quintessential counterculture novel,' RS declared), in 1971. He would publish seven more, each arriving about four or five years after the last. His final novel, Villa Incognito, arrived in 2003, though he subsequently published a short story collection, Wild Ducks Flying Backwards, in 2005; a novella, B Is for Beer, in 2009; and a memoir (or 'un-memoir,' as he called it) Tibetan Peach Pie: A True Account of an Imaginative Life, in 2014. 'Heartbroken to hear about the passing of Tom Robbins,' actress Marisa Tomei wrote on Instagram. 'His books weren't just stories — they were wild, mind-expanding adventures that made you see the world differently. His words were playful, rebellious, and full of magic, reminding us to embrace the strange, chase beauty, and never take life too seriously.' Born July 22, 1932 in Blowing Rock, North Carolina, but raised largely outside Richmond, Virginia, Robbins showed a penchant for writing from a young age and expressed his desire to become a novelist as a teenager. His parents, however, pushed him more towards journalism, a career he pursued first in college and then picked up again after a stint in the Air Force. But two distinctly Sixties experiences re-routed Robbins back to his ultimate calling. An LSD trip in 1963 convinced him to quit his day job at a Seattle newspaper and start writing for underground publications. Then, in 1967, while reviewing an awe-inspiring Doors concert, Robbins said he 'finally found [his] voice' and set about writing his first novel a few weeks later. While Another Roadside Attraction failed to garner much attention when it was first published in hardback, the paperback edition steadily became a word-of-mouth hit, especially on college campuses. By the time his next novel, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, arrived in 1976, Robbins was a well-known quantity garnering both backlash and raves (including from the likes of Thomas Pynchon, who called Cowgirls 'a piece of working magic, warm, funny and sane'). Throughout the rest of his career, Robbins rarely deviated from his distinct style, retaining his devoted fans though sometimes exasperating critics. Despite their myriad out-there elements, his books were often optioned for films, but only one was ever made — Gus Van Sant's 1993 adaptation of Cowgirls, which was a critical and commercial flop. As a parting word in his 1977 Rolling Stone interview, Robbins succinctly captured his singular style and creative approach. 'You can tell people that my goal is to write novels that are like a basket of cherry tomatoes,' he said, 'when you bite into a paragraph, you don't know which way the juice is going to squirt.' Best of Rolling Stone Every Super Bowl Halftime Show, Ranked From Worst to Best The United States of Weed Gaming Levels Up
The Guardian
10-02-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Mike Ratledge obituary
From the late 1960s to the mid-70s, Soft Machine forged a career as trailblazers of an unusual blend of psychedelic, rock and jazz-fusion music, expressive of the rich and turbulent cultural cross-currents of their era. Mike Ratledge, who has died aged 81, was the driving force of the group during that period, through his groundbreaking work as composer, keyboard player and studio experimentalist. With his thick moustache, dark glasses and curtains of long hair, Ratledge also projected an image of impenetrable cool. The NME journalist Ian MacDonald described him as 'tall, super-intelligent, forceful, self-possessed, and altogether daunting'. Soft Machine formed in Canterbury, Kent in 1966, and their career began to take off when they moved to London and played gigs at the UFO Club in Tottenham Court Road alongside the fledgling Pink Floyd. They acquired a manager, Mike Jeffries, who with his partner Chas Chandler also managed Jimi Hendrix. Soft Machine were invited to support Hendrix on his American tour in 1968, a gruelling two-part campaign which took them to such venues as the Chicago Opera House, Madison Square Garden, New York, and, for the finale, the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles. The future Police guitarist Andy Summers was temporarily a band member, after the previous incumbent Daevid Allen left in August 1967 to form Gong. While in New York, the group recorded their first album, The Soft Machine, produced by Chandler and Tom Wilson (the latter was renowned for his work with Bob Dylan, which included producing the single Like a Rolling Stone). The album made little impact and was not released in the UK, though the follow-up, Volume Two (1969), was, and received some glowing reviews for the group's musical expertise and eclectic jazz and experimental influences. By now the bassist/vocalist Kevin Ayers had departed, replaced by the bassist Hugh Hopper. A third album – a double-LP set entitled Third, much of it composed by Ratledge – appeared in June 1970, comprising a mix of live and studio recordings. Rolling Stone magazine would later declare it 'one of the greatest prog-rock albums of all time'. In August 1970, Soft Machine made history by being the first rock band to perform at the BBC Proms (though 'rock' was a barely adequate term for their exploratory, free-form music), an event featuring Ratledge's compositions Out-Bloody-Rageous and Esther's Nose Job. Ratledge was born in Maidstone in Kent, and learned to play classical piano as a child thanks to the influence of his father, who was headmaster of the Archbishop's school, Canterbury. Only classical music was allowed in the Ratledge household. Mike attended Simon Langton grammar school for boys, Canterbury, where he met the clarinet and saxophone player Brian Hopper, who recalled: 'Mike was one of the brightest people I've ever known. He challenged me all the time but it was stimulating nonetheless, he would never let you get away with half an argument – you always had to justify what you said!' Thence he met Hopper's bass-playing younger brother, Hugh, and the vocalist and drummer Robert Wyatt. In 1961, Allen, an Australian poet and musician, also found his way into the Kent artistic scene. Having left his native Melbourne in 1960, Allen had rubbed shoulders with the writer William Burroughs and spent time in Paris with the budding minimalist composer Terry Riley. It was Allen's influence that sparked Ratledge's interest in jazz musicians such as John Coltrane and Thelonious Monk, and in 1963 Ratledge played with the Daevid Allen Trio. However, he also wanted to pursue academic studies. He won a scholarship to University College, Oxford, where he studied for a degree in philosophy and psychology, while also pursuing music studies. He intended to take a further degree in American poetry in the US, but missed the deadline for his scholarship application. Returning to Kent in 1966, he joined Wyatt, Allen, Ayers (on bass and vocals) and the guitarist Larry Nowlin to form the original Soft Machine, the name taken from a Burroughs novel (they had previously toyed with calling themselves the Bishops of Canterbury or Mr Head). The group became a quartet when Nowlin quit in September 1966. Ratledge's last recording as a full member of Soft Machine was Bundles (1975), by which time he was the last of the band's original lineup. He left in 1976, having made a marginal contribution to the album Softs. He subsequently built his own recording studio and pursued a variety of solo projects, including composing the soundtrack for the British experimental film Riddles of the Sphinx (1977). He also composed music for commercials and theatre productions, and undertook several projects with Karl Jenkins, who had become an increasingly influential member of Soft Machine after joining the group in 1972. Ratledge was a performer and co-producer on Jenkins' album Adiemus: Songs of Sanctuary (1995), which became an international hit boosted by the use of the title track in a TV commercial for Delta Air Lines. Ratledge and Jenkins also collaborated on the 2010 albums Movement and Some Shufflin'. In 1967 Ratledge married the singer, novelist and actor Marsha Hunt, who commented that the key to a happy marriage was to 'separate immediately'. He is survived by his partner, Elena. Michael Roland Ratledge, musician and composer, born 6 May 1943; died 5 February 2025
