Obit: Pogues member Shane MacGowan (1957-2023)

Subject: Obit: Shane MacGowan
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Nov 23 - 07:38 AM

Shane, died aged 65. A chaotic fellow with a built-in sublime streak of poetry. From Siam to Soho and the old main drag, I loved you, Shane.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 30 Nov 23 - 07:45 AM

A great loss to the Irish......

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Nov 23 - 08:19 AM

'I'm sad to say I must be on my way, so buy me beer and whiskey 'cause I'm going far away. I'd like to think of me returning when I can, to the greatest little boozer and to Sally MacLennane...'

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Nov 23 - 08:35 AM

So drunk to hell I left the place
Sometimes crawling sometimes walking
A hungry sound came across the breeze
So I gave the walls a talking
And I heard the sounds of long ago
From the old canal
And the birds were whistling in the trees
Where the wind was gently laughing

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan
From: keberoxu
Date: 30 Nov 23 - 08:50 AM

I feel as though I just lost a brother.

it was mostly over for him, though, when
he was confined to a wheelchair due to a fractured pelvis;
when he couldn't walk, life wasn't worth living.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan
From: gillymor
Date: 30 Nov 23 - 08:56 AM

For awhile there he blazed like a comet, we were lucky to experience it.
"Let me go down in the mud where the rivers all run dry".

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 30 Nov 23 - 10:12 AM

Only saw him perform live once, and that was by accident: I had booked to see Sharon Shannon and her band, and it turned out that Shane and his band was the “support”! (Not advertised before attending!) It must be about 15 years ago in Edinburgh, in what used to be the Caley Picture House on Lothian Road, now a Wetherspoons pub.
He also had a diagnosis of viral encephalitis latterly, which probably hastened his demise.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Nov 23 - 10:13 AM

Now we'll never know who the ginger lady by his bed was.

By the way, Rainy Night in Soho is one of my desert island eight (Brits will know what I mean).

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Nov 23 - 10:25 AM

Is it too fanciful to think Victoria Mary Clarke was the ginger lady? She would fit, anyway.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Nov 23 - 10:34 AM

The ginger lady was by his bed, not in it. A bottle of whiskey has been surmised. Who knows.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Nov 23 - 11:28 AM

Official video The Pogues - Fairytale of New York

The Session: The Pogues & The Dubliners from 1987 (Pogues begin at 25:35)

Documentary: If I Should Fall From Grace - The Shane MacGowan Story from Bord Scannán na hÉireann (The Irish Film Board)

The Pogues Official YouTube page for the group

Shared by The Smithsonian Folklife Collection (on FB): The Pogues - If I Should Fall From Grace With God

Shane Patrick Lysaght MacGowan on Wikipedia

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 30 Nov 23 - 11:39 AM

Very sad. One hell of an artist and performer. Fairytale will have a whole new poignancy this year.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: EBarnacle
Date: 30 Nov 23 - 12:20 PM

https://www.npr.org/2023/11/30/1213870952/shane-macgowan-pogues-obit?ft=nprml&f=1002

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Helen
Date: 30 Nov 23 - 02:43 PM

From the Oz ABC News:

Shane MacGowan, hard-drinking frontman of Irish punk band The Pogues, dies at age 65

I thought I had all of their albums but I missed this one so I had never heard those two songs until today:

"The band also released a 1986 EP, Poguetry in Motion, which contained two of MacGowan's finest songs, A Rainy Night in Soho and The Body of an American."

This track always makes me laugh when I hear Shane McGowan at the end of it, yelling at the musicians who are having an impromptu session to get back to work.

Maidrin Rua

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: GUEST,paperback
Date: 30 Nov 23 - 11:41 PM

The Pogues - The Sick Bed of Cuchulainn - Lyrics

MacGowan has seen the Banshee. Codladh sámh

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Rain Dog
Date: 01 Dec 23 - 05:19 AM

keberoxu posted

"It was mostly over for him, though, when
he was confined to a wheelchair due to a fractured pelvis;
when he couldn't walk, life wasn't worth living."

That comment surprised me when I read it yesterday. It was not the impression I got from numerous articles and interviews over the years.

Interesting article in The Guardian today by Simon Hattenstone, recalling the time he interviewed MacGowan last year.

Whether in song or in silence, Shane MacGowan exuded the very essence of life

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Dec 23 - 07:33 AM

Yep. He said several times in latter years that he loved life.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Felipa
Date: 01 Dec 23 - 11:50 AM

and the Guardian obit https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/nov/30/shane-macgowan-obituary

My main impression of MacGowan was of a wastrel, but I understand he had other dimensions. Máire Ní Bhraonáin (aka Moya, of Clannad fame) and a member of Clann Mac Ruairi who lives in London and met Shane there spoke on Raidio na Gaeltachta this morning about their friendship with Shane. I wasn't really listening to Máire, but the other interviewee spoke about how bright and well-read Shane was.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Dec 23 - 01:12 PM

He wrote some bloody good songs for a wastrel.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Rain Dog
Date: 01 Dec 23 - 02:26 PM

'My main impression of MacGowan was of a wastrel'

Another strange coment.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: meself
Date: 01 Dec 23 - 03:18 PM

I don't know if it will strike anyone else the same way, but I think Kiefer Sutherland's account of his meeting - and fight - with Shane MacGowan is a nice complement to that Guardian article linked above, about the attempted interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Vsm0gFtOd4

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: gillymor
Date: 02 Dec 23 - 06:11 AM

Obit from The Irish Times

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Felipa
Date: 02 Dec 23 - 06:40 AM

Mudcat I forgot to say that in the Raidio na Gaeltachta interview Shane MacGowan was described as very shy. I thought that could be why he depended so much on alcohol.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Felipa
Date: 02 Dec 23 - 06:44 AM

gillymor's link should be: www.irishtimes.com/obituaries/2023/11/30/shane-macgowan-obituary-rank-outsider-who-became-one-of-irelands-most-feted-sons

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: gillymor
Date: 02 Dec 23 - 06:45 AM

Thanks

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 02 Dec 23 - 08:25 AM

Irish Time Obit

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: GUEST
Date: 02 Dec 23 - 08:50 AM

Shane MaGowan wasn't ready to stop fighting

OK. Fixed.

---

Fixed some more. You were missing a " at the beginning of the URL. It needs one on both ends after the http:// part. ---mudelf

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: gillymor
Date: 02 Dec 23 - 10:07 AM

That one didn't work in the USA, I've also been having problems with the Blickfier lately. Thanks, Gnome.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: gillymor
Date: 02 Dec 23 - 10:13 AM

Here is the address of what I assume is the RTE article you were linking to, GUEST-
https://www.rte.ie/entertainment/2023/1202/1419737-shane-macgowan-victoria-mary-clarke-brendan-oconnor-show/

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: gillymor
Date: 02 Dec 23 - 10:25 AM

You know, Helen I also discovered "Freeborn Man of the USA" long after it was first released. I had all the Pogues LP's, the earlier ones on vinyl, and in the first decade of this millennium I was watching a legendary Cops and Drug Dealers TV series, "The Wire" and on one episode the detectives all gathered in their local Baltimore bar and were singing along with the Pogues to "Freeborn Man". I got all excited and thought that they were recording again and that Shane was singing better than ever only to find out it was released around the time of "Rum, Sodomy and the Lash".

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Helen
Date: 02 Dec 23 - 11:47 AM

When I hover the cursor over the problem links above they all have https://mudcat.org/ at the beginning. Maybe the Blickifier has gone silly.

gillymor, I didn't watch The Wire so I never heard that song before this week.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Helen
Date: 02 Dec 23 - 12:28 PM

I have found it difficult since Kirsty MacColl's tragic death in December 2000 to listen to Fairytale of New York but it is doubly difficult now with the loss of Shane MacGowan.

I watched the video this week. Seeing them both makes me hope they are singing it again together in heaven.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: StephenH
Date: 02 Dec 23 - 02:45 PM

Whatever else one might say about Shane MacGowan, he leaves behind him a substantial body of great songs and performances.
There is a nice article on him in the Guardian featuring the likes of Mary Wallopers, Lisa O'Neill, and Lankum remembering him:

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/dec/02/irish-folk-artists-shane-macgowan-lankum-wallopers-lisa-oneill-john-francis-flynn#

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 02 Dec 23 - 03:00 PM

I do sort of understand what the guy meant who said he thought he was an odd character. They seem to have taken the post down = perhaps it offended too many people - but he was an odd character.

His showbiz image was as carefully costructed as anything put together by David Bowie.   While he was at Wetminster School, none of his contemporaries knew he was Irish - certainly he didn't have an Irish accent. This at a time, we were told the other kids beat him up cos he was Irish.

Way back in the 1960's I can remember Karl Dallas talking about Irish folk artists accepting the cutural stereotypes of hard drinking, recklessness - rather than fighting it.

While I admired Shane's songwriting. I had trouble going along with the Dylan Thomas type confection that Shane came up with. Who could be happy seeing their child grow up to be an alcoholic?

I think 'odd' was drawing it pretty mild.

---

Nothing was removed. It is still there. Not rude, but there were some reactions under it that treated it that way. ---mudelf

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: PHJim
Date: 03 Dec 23 - 06:26 PM

Some musings from Roddy Doyle"

-Sad about Shane McGowan, isn’t it?
-Did yeh ever see the Pogues?
-No. Yourself?
-Years an’ years ago. In the SFX Centre. D’you remember the SFX Centre?
-I do, yeah. There used to be great gigs there – after the bingo.
-I don’t know if the Pogues were on after the fuckin’ bingo, but anyway – I was goin’ in and this fella in front of me says there was a rumour goin’ round tha’ Shane was goin’ to die onstage tha’ night.
-Wha’!?
-Swear to God. Must be nearly forty years ago. They were half-expectin’ him die.
-Cos of his lifestyle?
-Yeah.
-An’ he only died yesterday.
-Gas, isn’t it?
-Fair fuckin’ play to him.
-There’s hope for us all. Those Pogues songs, but – they get better as we get older, don’t they?
-Better an’ better.
-Rainy Night in Soho.
-Fuckin’ hell, what a song.
-An’ his voice is perfect in it.
-Perfect.
-Look what I got on me way here.
-A packet of fags? You gave them up fuckin’ years ago.
-I’m back on them – just for tonight. For Shane.
-An’ chasers with the pints.
-The Shane McGowan diet.
-Bang on. The man was a fuckin’ genius.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Dec 23 - 06:50 PM

I love you, baby. :-)

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 04 Dec 23 - 06:27 PM

There's nothing wrong with constructing a stage persona. I can remember Bob Dylan made up up a lot of stories about how he had run away from home when he was a kid, worked for a carnival, been brought back.....

I certainly never had the imagination to think up b\z
~ I think when De Quincey was writing his Confessions of an Opium Eater - there was a certain mythologising. Coleridge just started on the junk because he had bad teeth and the dentists of the time weren't very skilled.

However with these big stars - young people are watching. When we were kids we all smoked Players Gold Leaf because Bert Jansch left his packet of fags on display on the cover of It Don't Bother Me.

I hope no young kid listening to Shane doesn't become an alcoholic or join a paramilitary group.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Dec 23 - 12:55 AM

"I hope no young kid listening to Shane doesn't become an alcoholic or join a paramilitary group."

Al, I know what you meant, but I think you meant to write "I hope no young kid listening to Shane DOES become an alcoholic or joins a paramilitary group."

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Felipa
Date: 05 Dec 23 - 07:12 AM

more reading:

https://theconversation.com/with-the-pogues-shane-macgowan-perhaps-proved-himself-the-most-important-irish-writer-since-james-joyce-218038

https://theconversation.com/shane-macgowan-a-timeless-voice-for-irelands-diaspora-in-england-197491

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Dec 23 - 08:15 AM

Funeral arrangements

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Helen
Date: 05 Dec 23 - 01:15 PM

Thanks for the links, Felipa.

I went looking for a list of songs written by Shane MacGowan and also found this article on the Australian Triple J radio site. I used to listen to that radio station a lot because they played a lot of out-there music which the commercial stations would not play - well, not until the songs broke the barriers into the consciousness of the commercial scene - so thanks to them I discovered The Pogues.

Shane MacGowan wrote powerful, poignant songs. One of them became an intense and superb Christmas anthem

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Dec 23 - 01:34 PM

Just to point out, from your second link, that Dirty Old Town is not an old Irish song. It is a 20th century song written by Ewan MacColl (an Englishman with Scottish parents) about Salford, the town where my mum was born, and which I performed with a friend at my mum's funeral.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: GUEST,paperback
Date: 05 Dec 23 - 01:54 PM

https://catholicherald.co.uk/on-seeking-the-eternal-buzz/

Quote
The 19th-century French poet Arthur Rimbaud was known for his piety as a boy. Receiving his First Holy Communion at the age of 11, his reverence earned him the nickname “sale petit cagot” (snotty little prig) from his peers. Later, he would have a more complex relationship with the faith he was born to, finding himself involved with the poet Paul Verlaine, ten years his senior. Verlaine shot Rimbaud non-lethally, and they went their separate ways, with Rimbaud working as an arms dealer in Abyssinia. Before he died, it is said that he returned to the Church.

Rimbaud’s story shows us that our lives and connection to the Church can vary over time. While the faith remains the same, we humans find ourselves in a maelstrom of events which affect us. For poets, these experiences are vital as they inform the creative process, and in doing so help poets reflect the deeper meaning of life back to them. In our own times, one such poet is Shane MacGowan, frontman of the Pogues, who is currently launching the first publication of his art. I asked him about his relation to his faith, and what informs his creative process. Here
+++
You have to be lucky enough to learn from other people's experiences, experienced enough to be able to avoid experience-generating encounters, and lucky enough to survive the situations from which experience is derived.

-- Unknown

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 05 Dec 23 - 03:15 PM

That was interesting paperback!

To be honest I have a lot of trouble understanding the Catholic Church. They denied one of my uncles a Catholic funeral, because he was a suspected suicide. The Christian teaching brothers beat my cousin with such ferocity and frequency that he felt forced to leave his 'A' level course. He was plagued with nightmares for years after those experiences.

Maybe you do have to be a poet to reconcile and harmonise yourself with the institution.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: GUEST,paperback
Date: 05 Dec 23 - 03:53 PM

Gee thanks Big Al sorry about your uncle. My wife was refused (rudely) the baptism of her 2 children by a young priest and she refuses to be buried in the cemetery where her old childhood priest, Fr Killian, is prominently buried (smack dab in the center of under a 10 foot high cross). She's probably the closest to a saint of anyone I know but I digress ( - :

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: Amergin
Date: 05 Dec 23 - 05:23 PM

Heart breaking, though the the only thing surprising is death didn't catch him sooner. But damn, he wrote some brilliant songs.

Gillymor, the song you mean is called "Body of an American". It's one of my favourite songs.

Subject: RE: Obit: Shane MacGowan (1957-2023) of the Pogues
From: gillymor
Date: 06 Dec 23 - 04:15 AM

Yeah I know, just morphed into that for me, but thanks.

Subject: RE: Obit: Pogues leader Shane MacGowan (1957-2023)
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Dec 23 - 03:52 AM

Shane's funeral today in Ireland. There's an absolutely beautiful article in today's Guardian by Bobby Gillespie, Primal Scream's singer and Shane's friend:

‘All punk power and visceral emotion’: farewell, Shane MacGowan, my Celtic soul brother

If you have tears...

Subject: RE: Obit: Pogues leader Shane MacGowan (1957-2023)
From: GUEST
Date: 08 Dec 23 - 04:49 AM

It's a very wet and very windy day for a funeral. RTE radio was interviewing people lined up early for the procession in Dublin and also spoke to the priest in Nenagh. It brings to a close a period of wall to wall Rainy night in Soho on the airwaves, and earworming me as a result. Unlike Sineád O Connor's send off there won't be any live streams of events as they take place, as far as I know anyway.

RTE news : Dublin procession ahead of Nenagh funeral for MacGowan

Subject: RE: Obit: Pogues leader Shane MacGowan (1957-2023)
From: GUEST
Date: 08 Dec 23 - 05:52 AM

You may as well have linked that, Steve.


Here you go:

‘All punk power and visceral emotion’: farewell, Shane MacGowan, my Celtic soul