Minnie Mincepie wrote:Revolver wrote:yomptepi wrote:I suspect she was trying to remove the mental connection to Rolf and his crimes which might be made every time one played the record. I can see her point. I would not want people thinking about that stuff whilst listening to my grand opus. The problem is if she had left him on, then it is probably all people would talk about.
For me, I actually think about his crimes MORE because he's not on the new release. Now I've heard the new version Bertie's voice just reminds me that Rolf isn't there, and why not.
When I hear the original I hardly notice Rolf.
That’s exactly how I feel!
Me too but I’ve been asking myself if that is such a bad thing, in terms of reflecting on the evil that humans do? I worked with Rolf Harris a few times, he seemed to be a sweet and generous man. I actually felt defensive of him when I first heard the allegations, so I remember this to remind myself that I’m not always correct in my impressions of others. Monstrous things are done by ordinary people not monsters and this is important to reflect on from time to time, I think, without necessarily wallowing in the details.
Ultimately KB must have just wanted to remove RH from her art entirely, which is understandable from her perspective, whatever reaction it might provoke in the listener.
I think that’s a different decision from say the compilers of the Oh Yes We Can Love history of Glam Rock 4CD Box, as they left Gary Glitter off the tracklisting and removed him from the most thorough overview of the genre to have been compiled to that point. That seemed a bit Stalinist to me, I guess because a genre overview demands some kind of historical objectivity which is different from one artist’s personal decision to change a mix and the credits. I don’t know why you wouldnt have included the less-vocal ‘Rock and Roll pt2’, given some % of the song’s royalties to charity, and added details of his crime and sentence to the liner notes as a cautionary tale. But I can see that some people are simply revulsed and can’t have anything to do with such perpetrators.