so awful they're awesome

(a more drastic version of "so bad it's good")

awful/awesome teering-on-edge-of-undecidability factor mostly due in both cases to the vocal performances....  which aren't understated, let's put it like that

in "Dude"'s' case most of all for the raunch squawk of that eh-heh-ooh-eh-heh horn-like but really a vocal riff...

Aerosmith have a lot of "bits" like that, like the genuinely  awesome not awful stuff at the start of "Sweet Emotion" (and also similar intro production flourishes in "Janie Got A Gun")

a genuinely, preposterous outfit, Aerosmith, yet also very enjoyable, locating a rich seam of entertainment at exactly the midpoint between Stones and Zep 


(talking of Stones derivatives, heard this today - at, bizarrely, the LA Times Festival of Books -  and thought that the entirety of J Geils Band was contained therein - or rather the entirety of Peter Wolf was contained within that particular Jagger performance (i know J G B were going some years prior to this album, but...) )

but back to 'osmith: compare the ultimate triviality of anything/everything by them (okay, maybe bar "Dream On") to the indispensable godhead of e.g. this....

 I haven't said anything about "Superfreak" or Rick James...

Some years ago, on some message board or other, someone said, with a great air of certainty and worldly knowledge, "well,  it's not about a girl, of course, 'Superfreak'...  if you think that, you're really naive"

but if you listen the lyrics, it does appear to be about a girl, no, or rather a type of girl?  there's one or two lines that could be taken as being about coke...

when he was singing about drugs, RJ tended to be a bit more heavy-handedly in code

this topples all the way into awful doesn't it? And you should see the 1982 RockPalast live version with the sub-Randy Rhoads guitarsnazz all over it that i almost posted... 

i'm not sure i've even ever listened to Street Songs now i think about it... 

but this album, when James was competing desperately with Prince ("fake funk", he liked to say of the purple midget) who had so utterly outstripped and eclipsed him commercially and critically, made him look dated, a hangover from the Seventies.... this album, embracing the machine-funk of the day, really was excellent