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Robbie Williams

Started by popcorn, June 15, 2018, 05:20:27 PM

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Dr Rock

I like several of his songs and have never found him annoying. I thought he was taking the piss letting the audience sing Angels instead of him though.

Mark Steels Stockbroker

He's the politically correct Morrissey

Sin Agog

Who was it who had the anecdote about going ghost hunting with him?  Think it might have been Jon Ronson.

Bhazor

I do really like him as a person and a performer. Especially in the context of his era which was dominated by faceless characterless manufactured pap. There he is taking the piss out of everything. I also can't believe people are genuinely annoyed by the whole "making the crowd sing Angels" thing. That was amazing 20,000 people singing in time? That is an incredible thing to be part of. Then there is the meta element of people who go to festival gigs can never see or hear the performer they paid to see and really only pay to go because of the live experience and the crowd.

He also spent two years taking drugs and chasing UFOs in the desert. Thats great! That's the kind of stupid nonsense I want from rock stars.

Music is shite though.

Ballad of Ballard Berkley

#34
Yes, his smirk is annoying, and yes, much of his music is shit, but where does this idea that he's a cunt come from? In interviews he always comes across as personable and self-deprecating. Given how rich and famous he is, he actually seems surprisingly down to earth (and VERY funny etc.)

I have no interest in his music, it's not for me, but the man himself seems nice enough. Also, as Bhazor says, I like the fact that he abandoned his career for a while to go UFO-spotting in the Nevada Desert. That automatically makes him more interesting and unusual than 99% of pop stars.

Here's the Jon Ronson article that was alluded to earlier in the thread.

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2008/apr/19/popandrock.spaceexploration

I like the bit at the start where Ronson reveals that Williams initially got in touch to ask if he could arrange an overnight stay in a haunted stately home. If I had as much money and fame as Robbie Williams, I'd do mad shit like that all the time. Wouldn't you?

popcorn

The Angels debacle is fairly cuntworthy if you ask me.

Dr Rock

First I'd heard of Angels being written outside of the Williams/Chambers partership so wikipedia says

Quote"Angels" is a song originally recorded by Robbie Williams. The writing credits are attributed to Robbie Williams and Guy Chambers, though this is contested by songwriter Ray Heffernan, who claims he wrote the first version.

Is there any evidence to support 'Mad' Ray Hefferman's contention? If there was I reckon he'd be a millionaire or something.

popcorn

Quote from: Dr Rock on June 16, 2018, 06:37:03 PM
First I'd heard of Angels being written outside of the Williams/Chambers partership so wikipedia says

Is there any evidence to support 'Mad' Ray Hefferman's contention? If there was I reckon he'd be a millionaire or something.

Read the section about it in that article.

TLDR version is: Robbie met Ray, a struggling songwriter, while both were on a bender in Dublin. Ray played Robbie a version of a song he'd written, Angels, and they recorded a demo together. Robbie disappeared, rewrote the song with his writing partner Guy Chambers. (None of this is disputed: Robbie has confirmed all of it.) Ray heard a version of the song was going to be on the album so wrote a letter asking for some money; they offered to buy him out for £7k, he accepted because he was broke and in rehab. Song went on to become one of the biggest-selling singles in history, whoops.

It's not just that they exploited him, but Robbie has been a shocking prick about it interviews since. Such as the podcast I linked earlier in the thread.

Ballad of Ballard Berkley

Okay, well if that's true then it's indefensible. I hadn't read the whole thread when I posted earlier, so I missed the discussion of Angels-gate.




Dr Rock

He met Robbie in a pub one night, they jammed and co-wrote Angels.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZT8YcCRRlvA



It seems legit, but there seems there a a 7 grand one off buy-out for his part in helping come up with bits of the song. He should've held out for a song-writing credit, although at that stage nobody could've known if William's career wasn't already half over. But he took the one-off pay day, so he hardly got swindled.

Dr Rock

Ironically, Ray spunked most of the seven grand up his arm.

popcorn

Quote from: Dr Rock on June 16, 2018, 06:46:48 PM
He met Robbie in a pub one night, they jammed and co-wrote Angels.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZT8YcCRRlvA



It seems legit, but there seems there a a 7 grand one off buy-out for his part in helping come up with bits of the song. He should've held out for a song-writing credit, although at that stage nobody could've known if William's career wasn't already half over. But he took the one-off pay day, so he hardly got swindled.

Weeeeeell. Yes, but £7k is an extraordinarily low figure even considering the uncertainty of the song being a hit. They gave him an opportunity to screw himself and he took it. He was vulnerable - he was a drug addict at the time, in rehab and in debt. They lowballed the figure knowing all this and he took it. Poor sap.

In retrospect, it seems he did them a huge favour by writing them a letter in the first place. As they apparently had no intention of paying or crediting him at all, they presumably would just have put the song out and hope he didn't notice, by which time it would have become a hit and he would been much less likely to walk away with a settlement instead of a percentage.

It's also the way that Robbie has talked about the song and the episode that smacks of cuntdom. He claimed he wrote the lyrics about his aunt and uncle, for fuck's sake, when they were written about Ray's girlfriend's bloody miscarriage. And in that podcast Robbie all but admits to editing the Wikipedia page himself to remove Ray's songwriting credit but "someone always put it back".


Sin Agog

Quote from: Ballad of Ballard Berkley on June 16, 2018, 06:46:28 PM
I missed the discussion of Angels-gate.

None of this would have happened if St. Peter hadn't been drinking on the job.

Dusty Gozongas

Quote from: spamwangler on June 15, 2018, 10:13:24 PM
marry me

I second this. It will make the world a safer place for the rest of us!

Cuntbeaks

He is an absolute fucking throbber.

Dr Rock

Quote from: popcorn on June 16, 2018, 07:08:03 PM
Here's Robbie's side of the story.

That video is nearly three hours long, can you tell us when they start talking about who wrote Angels?

popcorn

I linked to the timestamp mate. But it's 2:10:48 if you need it.

Dr Rock

The fact that Ray doesn't play much of the song when given the chance makes me think he didn't contribute enough get a co-writing credit. Otherwise he would, in his own interests, play the other bits, like the verses and choruses, rather than just the intro.

Dr Rock

Quote from: popcorn on June 16, 2018, 07:37:03 PM
I linked to the timestamp mate. But it's 2:10:48 if you need it.

So you did, God bless ya.

I suppose Mr Ray would've been aware the £7k was a 'goodwill gesture', and was no admission of his claim to have contributed to the song Angels, a claim he must now refrain from pursuing. According to Robbie, he had a lawyer on the case by that time. If there was a tiny chance of getting a co-writing credit because they may have knocked together the intro one night, the lawyer and Ray should've gone for it.

I don't think they had much of a case, but then again music business court settlements are often bonkers. My verdict:

                                                                                                                       


                   
                                                                                                       ROBBIE IS INNOCEMT!!

Brundle-Fly

However, Williams and Chambers did send a fat cheque to the DJ they heard spin this lost Barry White track in a club one night. The track that inspired Rock DJ.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qb2lo-Gwnik

This was another influence
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KS3hiJ_mBq8

As was this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qcjh1a9Yoao

Williams apologised to Dury who responded with "we've all ripped off somebody" They became good friends doing charity stuff together in Ian's final years. Robbie sang on his last album.

I know this is heresy but I've always rather liked his Butlin's redcoat approach to stuff.

Golden E. Pump

If I was stuck in a lift with Ed Sheeran and Robbie Williams with no iPod, I'd ask Ed to sing me a song before I self-immolated.

popcorn

#52
Quote from: Dr Rock on June 16, 2018, 07:43:00 PM
The fact that Ray doesn't play much of the song when given the chance makes me think he didn't contribute enough get a co-writing credit. Otherwise he would, in his own interests, play the other bits, like the verses and choruses, rather than just the intro.

If you go by the video clip you posted, his demo contains at least the entire first verse of the song, including the title lyric:

Quote
I sit and wait
Does an angel contemplate my fate
And do they know
The places where we go
When we're grey and old
'Cause I have been told
That salvation lets their wings unfold
So when I'm lying in my bed
Thoughts running through my head
And I feel the love is dead
I'm loving angels instead

Which would entitle him to a generous chunk of the songwriting credits if he hadn't signed them away like a mug. He is a co-author of the song - a very significant portion of it.

And yet Robbie Williams has the fucking gall to go on a fucking podcast full of sycophants and complain that people keep adding Ray's name to the Wikipedia article about the song. He is the worst man.

edit: this podcast (around 12:30) features more of Ray's version of the song, though it's not clear when it was recorded: https://soundcloud.com/user-92363961/ispod-storytime-the-anatomy-of-angels It features much of the same melody and lyrics of the final song, though the chord progression is very different.

popcorn


Dr Rock

Quote from: popcorn on June 17, 2018, 05:14:55 AM
If you go by the video clip you posted, his demo contains at least the entire first verse of the song, including the title lyric:

[...]

edit: this podcast (around 12:30) features more of Ray's version of the song, though it's not clear when it was recorded: https://soundcloud.com/user-92363961/ispod-storytime-the-anatomy-of-angels It features much of the same melody and lyrics of the final song, though the chord progression is very different.

First, the dictaphone recording that Ray plays is what he and Robbie have come up with after several hours of drinking.  Robbie's input cannot be written off - Ray's guitar playing is inaudible, while Robbie could easily argue he came up with the words and melody. Ray can possibly (if we accept his word) be credited with bringing 'I'm loving an angel' to the table, while Robbie separately states that his song was also was about 'loving angels' and presumably/possibly had an intro, so I suspect it's the one he's singing on the tape, Ray says on the soundcloud recording that he now can't remember how his version of the song went - who knows everything that happened during their session, lots of booze was consumed and we only hear a small section of a recording but Ray (carefully? I hesitate to question his honesty because he comes across very genuine) does not contest that Robbie came up with all of this

QuoteI sit and wait
Does an angel contemplate my fate
And do they know
The places where we go
When we're grey and old
'Cause I have been told
That salvation lets their wings unfold
So when I'm lying in my bed
Thoughts running through my head
And I feel the love is dead
I'm loving angels instead

With only the last line resembling Ray's song/line, of which no prior recording (apparently) exists.

The second (soundcloud) recording, is after he's heard the finished version of Angels and has became a hit song, and he even fudges whether the song is what he'd come up with at the session (he's forgotten the original song) or what ''would go on to be 'Angels' '' [plays Angels, with some different bits at the end]. As he admits, he's forgotten the chords or time signature of his original song, so any resemblance here dates either from the session or hearing the song after release - and the recording we have of the session doesn't suggest Ray had much input into the finished chord structure or lyrics of any of it. I reckon, with a good lawyer, he might've got an 'additional help from' credit somewhere, and I don't know how much they tend to pay, though I think they tend to be a one-off payment rather than a percentage.

For his case to win at court and get a (very lucrative) writing credit it would be very fortunate that a recording exists of the session - however that recording does not prove, to me anyway, that Ray brought enough to the table.

He says he took the seven grand because he was a naive 23 year old, but I reckon if he'd spent it on a court case to prove he deserved a writing credit on Angels he'd lose that and plenty more. There's nothing stopping him from trying his luck in the court now is there? Unless that seven grand came with a proviso that he would make no further claim for a writing credit*. If so, ex-rehab or not, he knew what he was doing when he accepted that. Still, seems a likable chap - although could be the slick charm of a sociopath. An Irish sociopath, the worst ones.

*edit - we see a document to that effect flashing onscreen in the YouTube clip.

popcorn

You might be right, in that I'd assumed the recordings of the demo versions predated Robbie's involvement, and that might not be the case.

HOWEVER:

Quote from: Dr Rock on June 17, 2018, 07:11:16 AM
He says he took the seven grand because he was a naive 23 year old, but I reckon if he'd spent it on a court case to prove he deserved a writing credit on Angels he'd lose that and plenty more. There's nothing stopping him from trying his luck in the court now is there? Unless that seven grand came with a proviso that he would make no further claim for a writing credit.

Well, my understanding is that he sold his rights to the song by taking the money. It wasn't a good-will gesture - it was buying the rights.

Depressed Beyond Tables

Quote from: popcorn on June 16, 2018, 07:08:03 PM
Here's Robbie's side of the story.

Christ, the True Geordie has his tongue so far up Robbie Williams' hole in that video that it should really come with a NSFW warning.

Sebastian Cobb

Quote from: Butchers Blind on June 16, 2018, 12:55:42 AM
One of my worst experiences is seeing a middle aged woman masturbating while listening to Robbie Williams.

One day I will tell the full story.

[tag]and then I got off the bus[/tag]

Sebastian Cobb

There's probably as yet uncontacted Amazonian tribes that are sick to fucking death of having Angels come on ruin the tail-end of their wedding receptions.

popcorn

Quote from: Depressed Beyond Tables on June 17, 2018, 12:52:35 PM
Christ, the True Geordie has his tongue so far up Robbie Williams' hole in that video that it should really come with a NSFW warning.

It's revolting, innit. I hate how at one point someone sneers that if Ray were such a great songwriter why hadn't he written loads more hit songs, as if one-hit wonders didn't exist, or as if being broke and fucked on drugs didn't come into it, or as if perhaps if Robbie had brought him into his songwriting circle properly he might not have contributed loads more, who knows. To Robbie's credit he does point out that his other songs are good so I'll spare him one punch when the day of reckoning arrives.

Of course to my sophisticated ears the song was crap at every point and Ray's other stuff, as played on his podcast, sounds grim too, but that's by the by.