Tag: absurdism

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In which Young Southpaw explores Carl Gustav Jung’s relationship with albums released in the 80s and beyond, wonders if Jung and Axl Rose ever actually did have a band together, shows the effect of Van Halen & Def Leppard on his Anima/Animus theory, explains how Depeche Mode and Guns N Roses embody the process of the great cycle of life, and so much more

Taking in The Creatures, The Police, Inherent Vice, ABBA, Thom Yorke, Radiohead, shamen, Appetite For Destruction, Freud, Frankie Goes To Hollywood, L.A. Guns, Girl, Young Guns, 101, the spirit world, the collective unconscious, Construction Time Again, 5150, etc.

“People musta been all like ‘Jung, you crazy! Postulatin’ a collective unconscious like that. What you playin’ at? Everything’s connected? I mean even in a game of Connect Four, there’s gotta be a winner and a loser and then the game stops. How you go about explainin’ it, the rules are different in your dreams?’ Tryin’ to laugh him off… And keep in mind, this being Swiss German, they’re all pronouncin’ it Connect Fear… Little do they know they’re playin’ right into the great man’s theories. But Jung remains cool as ice, sticks to his guns, he knows what he’s talkin’ about. He’s all in touch with the future, like he knows Van Halen and Def Leppard are gonna come along. Heck, he’s even channelin’ them for some his theories… You know singin’ all ‘Anima!’ Confusin’ the title of that Def Lep single with the tune of VH’s Panama you know… But can you blame him? Things get all mixed up in the collective unconscious… going ‘Anima! Animuh-huh-huh-huh-huh,us’… And it starts to give him his Anima/Animus theory and in the process providing Siouxsie and Budgie the title for their third Creatures record… Of course not the first time Jung was involved in naming albums. He was apparently doin’ that left and right, givin’ old Stingy and the Police boys Synchronicity… Of course I mean the irony of it being that no one’s policing the collective unconsciousness. You can just steal people’s phrases and release multi-platinum albums there without anyone batting an eye… Or any royalties coming back across the aeons… Or I guess just decades, ya know… Then ol’ Thom Yorke of Radiohead – I mean wasn’t Jung the OG Radiohead pickin’ up all the signals like this… Well I guess not, I mean shamen have been doin’ it for ages… But just this year Thom Yorke released an album too called Anima… Which surprisingly was not just a covers album of precisely one half of that Creatures record… And he made a short film to go along with it directed by Paul Thomas Anderson… Who you’ll all know made the only film of a Tommy P novel, ol’ Inherent Vice!… Which you’ll recall had lots of police stuff in it – I mean woah ya know…all Bigfoot Bjornsen and all that… I mean does the actual Bigfoot, ya know Sasquatch, have an anima himself, provided this creature – woah – is male… Or you know an animus if Bigfoot’s a female… And woah though Bigfoot Bjornsen, well I mean who’s one of the most famous Bjorn’s of all-time?… Only him outta ABBA… And talk about the perfect balance between male and female, they were 2 and 2, ya know. The Noah’s Ark of pop music. And Jung wasn’t even Swedish to know all this

But Jung’s not too concerned with credit, or with all these naysayers. He knows what’s coming up in 1987, anticipatin’ it like a mofo, when he will be justified with the release of Appetite For Destruction and it’s lead off track, Welcome To The Jung-le. I mean of course Axl couldn’t pronounce it like that, ya know give the game away. I mean it’s not that easy, like the next song on the record would imply. Oh you wanna go through it track by track? Talk about takin’ the Nightrain from Zurich to Vienna to go hang out with Freudy Freud. Out To Get Me, Mr. Brownstone… well I guess I’m just namin’ tunes right now but ya know, you wait til you get to side two with Think About You, Sweet Child O’Mine, and You’re Crazy. I mean start thinkin’ about those songs and Freud’s theories and you won’t have to look very far. You just need a little Patience, as they would later sing. There’s the rumor that Freud once threw him outta his study for punning on that GNR song whilst talking about their, their medical patients ya know, but I’m not buyin’ it. But you can hear him, clear as day, saying to Freud ‘my way, your way, anything goes’

But gettin’ back to Welcome To The Jungle, I think Jung himself was prolly expectin’ it to be a more straightforward cover of the Frankie Goes To Hollywood single ‘Welcome To The Pleasuredome’. You know with the band being from Liverpool and all and Jung having had that crazy dream about Liverpool that he recounts in his autobiography. But Axl had different ideas. I mean imagine if Jung and Axl had a band and it was just called Gustav & Roses, ya know. Keep the G, keep the G U part of the Guns. Like keeping the rest of the history the same, and by this I’m not implying that Jung and Tracii Guns are the same person. I’m just condensing things for simplicities’ sake. But if the band LA Gustav combined with Hollywood Rose… like if Jung spent some time in LA, like as, as a street performer. Maybe a mime, yeah probably a mime, sometimes being a mime is the only way to blow off some psychoanalytical steam, especially on the other side of the world like that… But Jung’s just hangin’ out in Hollywood one summer, Echo Park, Silverlake… Ridin’ a unicycle between these neighborhoods just to confuse people you know, ‘let ‘em think I’m a clown,’ he says. Not out loud of course cause he is, at heart, a mime. But because he’s not actually sayin’ anything ever, no one knows a thing about him. They just start callin’ him LA Gustav and then soon enough he’s in a band with Axl Rose, sellin’ millions of albums, gettin’ songs on the Terminator 2 soundtrack. I tell you the collective unconscious is a wild place…

But now that I think about it, of course LA Guns are involved! I mean way back before all this there was that English glam band Girl – ya know, the whole anima concept – and who was the lead singer? Well, only Phil Lewis of course! Later to front LA Guns. But back in Girl Phil Collen was playin’ guitar – just like Bowie said Ziggy did! So when Jung’s all channelin’ Def Leppard’s Animal but to the melody of Van Halen’s Panama of course but actually singing Anima, well you know Girl’s all mixed up in there too…

But all this is a just a precursor for what he senses is coming, as all the shamen have throughout the ages. Which is 1988 rolls around, and what movie is released to great fanfare? Young Guns, of course! Junnnnng Guuunnns. And this is right after Appetite for Destruction comin’ out in 87 – Jung Guns & Roses ya know – I mean Jung was clearly on that spirit trip with Lou Diamond Phillips, Diamond In The Rough, the Rough & Tumble…all those tumbleweeds blowin’ in the desert, you know… La Bamba comin’ out the year before, same year as Appetite though years after that Disney cartoon La Bambi. But Ritchie Valens ya know and this movie with Billy The Kid, well Kid Rock’s last name is Ritchie! It’s amazin’ what you learn in the spirit world. And this is only like Spirit World 101, ya know like that Depeche Mode live album that came out just the year after, in 89. Eighty-nine, am I right?

But ya know some say it’s all just a great cycle of that earlier Depeche Mode album Construction Time Again and then Appetite For Destruction. And then a smaller number of those somes say that one day there will be a great synthesis and it will be Appetite For Construction Time Again. Which most will credit Depeche Mode for predicting with their pre-album single Get The Balance Right

Now Jung he didn’t discriminate. He could listen to both Depeche Mode and Guns N Roses without worryin’ anyone’s gonna call him a poseur. Ya know catchin’ their soundwaves off the great collective unconscious wireless way back in the 30s or let’s just say 50s ya know to make it seem even. Like 50/50 showin’ he doesn’t really favor either band despite possibly havin’ been in Gustav & Roses with Axl, and I mean Axl was a big Depeche Mode fan too. Apparently called them up when they were comin to the States and sang them Somebody over the phone. So I think it’s gotta be 50/50. Though sadly there are no real records to indicate what he thought of 5150 and the split with Roth. I mean if he’s acceptin’ synthpop like this but also a fan of guitars as shown with GNR and of course him gettin’ the Anima concept from Panama…well I think he’d be cool with 5150. Might even claim it’s the best of both worlds, though careful to not mention in the 50s the psychic schism he could foresee with Roth leaving the mighty VH in 1985. Which you’ll be sure to notice is the exact midpoint between Construction Time Again coming out in 1983 and the 1987 release of Appetite”