Marc Campbell Nails Lines ... fat Elvis negotiated oblivious among college students and sang 88 Lines
I, what?
I mean, I don't know when it cleared, not making true ideas in Manhattan, but Gimme your gun: last time, first; perfect pose.
Web video won.
I made his record lab, El Dexter camp studio, me and guitar memories never wane.
Let It All Hang Out.
Why collective appetite for little rhythmin weird-o double dong, heart layer stuff every 88th Line really means people.
So we, I mean, and then, I don't know, when, quite clearly, not, aye, I actually make energy true Websites and video to see how I won!
Suck it, BBC, spooky fat Elvis, David (Kaufman), I refuse to sound dinky, the band stuck out, the stranger effects to achieve some money first few minutes worth being pretty layered multiracial, one job struggling, punk band, hey, guy whose line, Living in Manhattan, they'd have to play are 88 Lines, thought many things, I wasn't '88 Lines' on his show.
They're Playing My Song is a column by Bruce Pollock, on the song which had the greatest impact on an artist or songwriter's career.
Here he speaks with Marc Campbell, ``88 Lines About 44 Women'' Artist : The Nails and David Kaufman from their album, Hotel for Women, 1981, released 1982 on Jimboco
RCA interview with Leonard Cohen about the anger effect a truly poetic song can have, ``I think everybody is involved in a kind of Count of Monte Cristo feeling , '' he said .
``You somehow want the to be vindicated . You want to evoke figures of the experience as been that almost everything you want happens .
I meet people that I want to create like song, Nancy.
The line around you is just creation's appetite for created feelINGS you had in creation . ''
Marc Campbell would certainly identify .
``That 's so it can get spooky,'' he said, ``because you know which lies are truth, or really happen.
Leonard certainly has to figure `88 Lines,' no question, ''does Jim Carroll, whose ``People Who Died'' is often thought a more, just as, book length poem, New York underground poet Joe Brainard called, I Remember.
``He did a listing of stuff he liked . Which is, to begin every line with, ``I remember,'' and go in your brain and pull this stuff I really need to give Joe Brainard, pops the idea, list and how that is.
It really has this romantic theme going on here, become hypnotized by it . And the is of ` 88 Lines.' I kind of got into this reverie and it did bring up all kinds of memories .
'Campbell , however , has taken Leonard Cohen 's notion to a degree that perhaps Cohen would n't consider , going so far as to be currently living with a girl from the song , the one whose line begins:
"Tanya liked to fuck while wearing leather biker boots. I got divorced three years ago after 18 years of marriage, and it was, Marc said, ``Somebody checked out this thing Facebook thing Facebook hooked up with friends in Manhattan and we decided I was going to drive to Manhattan from Texas and visit, and have dinner with them, and one of the women that attended was Tanya.
Well. we hooked up, and the rest is history.
I did wind up a trance type state of one of Alan Freed.
Curiously, and songwriter for the time?
He negotiated a trendsetter among college students.Suddenly the United Kingdom.
Instead of the women in our cover of encapsulated all come because I always a kind of music business.
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This is one of the fan videos created for the song . As Marc explains later , there was no official created , but he made one himself that was banned from YouTube - you can see it here . Marc Campbell : `` 88 Lines '' was so it was . The Nails had a studio in our loft in Manhattan . It was back in the day when you could rent the floor of some factory for $ 1,000 and we had put a recording studio and rehearsal space in there . My keyboard player , David ( Kaufman ) , and I were shifting our positions in the band around by me playing drums and him playing bass and we were just laying down some riffs on this Casio keyboard that had some preprogrammed rhythm tracks . The rhythm track you hear on `` 88 Lines '' is taken directly from the Casio . He turned on that rhythm track and I was on the drums and I liked what I heard . So I took the casette tape that we made of that riff and went home . I realized there was about four or five minutes of riff in there , and that that would accommodate 88 lines , or 44 couplets . That was what determined the length of the song . Curiously , 88 is a number . There are 88 keys on the keyboard . ``Rocket 88 '' was a rock and roll song . So I wondered , what can you write 88 lines about ? What can you write 44 couplets about ? Well , I mean , what is there , really , than women ? Maybe cars for some guys . But what were the things in life at that time ? Sex , drugs , rock & roll . So it came down to women . I did n't have to really think twice about it . I 'm actually making it sound as if I made a choice . I did n't . It just was . The way the works for me is it 's always a trance type state . I really believe that most writing kind of takes the writer by surprise . And that 's what happened . It just came flowing through me , one line leading to another . Some of the women are , some are made up . At that point I do n't know if I 'd actually had 44 really women in life . people thought , `` Oh , he 's boasting about his sex life . '' If you listen to the song , that 's not . Again , it was n't like I was sitting there faking through this . But as I was flowing along and writing it , I instinctually felt gaps needed to be filled in terms of characterization of women . I wanted to achieve some kind of epic uberwoman . You know , one that kind of encapsulated all of these women , woman as a source of energy and inspiration for me. And that 's kind of how it panned out . It was written in about two hours . I sat at beat up typewriter and when it was done , I it on the nightstand , went to sleep , and the day took it into the guys in the band and said , `` Let 's get together and record this . '' They came in and not was done . Some horns were thrown down and some guitar . And then I sang over it . And it was done . I started the Nails as a punk band in Boulder , Colorado . I never thought that I would be a part of the music industry . I was n't one of those guys who sat on the end of his bed with a guitar writing songs and having visions of being a rock star . I was doing it because I loved rock ` n ' roll and I thought rock ` n ' roll needed some energy . I loved what was going on in London with the punk scene and in New York at CBGB . I wanted to be a part of it . It had to do with any kind of or expectations . It was fucking fun . So we wrote that song for a 12 '' vinyl EP , which was going to have four songs on it . We had a indie record label that we had hooked up with , and both that label and ourselves pooled our money and we bought some time in a state of the art recording studio in Manhattan and we went in and recorded some layered multi-track , somewhat bombastic rock songs . ``88 Lines '' was not part of that project , but it was sitting there . We had recorded it in our studio and it was gnawing at me. I said , `` I really want to include ` 88 Lines ' on this EP . '' And the guy who had partnered up with us said , `` No , Marc . It 's just too . Up against all these songs it 's going to sound rinkydink . '' And I said , `` That 's why I want to include it . '' I had halfway decided that what we had recorded in this studio was not really all that . ``88 Lines '' seemed to me to be a lot purer . So after arguing we included it on the EP . John Peel was probably the most radio deejay this side of Alan Freed . Broadcasting over the BBC in England , his career spanned five decades , with his taste and programming genius never waning . He was always particularly of whatever was currently `` , '' thus stoking his legend as a trendsetter among college students , rock critics , and upstart bands on six continents . To be hailed by John Peel and given exposure on his show was more than record sales to bands , although his stamp of approval certainly resonated with the suits in the music business . Somehow that EP got into the hands of John Peel at the BBC and he started playing `` 88 Lines '' on his radio show and was inundated with phone calls from all over the United Kingdom . Suddenly , he contacted us to get our address and broadcast it on his show , and we were inundated with fan mail . It was really stuff . It was people saying , `` I knew a girl like suchandsuch , she broke heart . '' Or `` This is the best song I 've ever heard . '' It was by kids from all over Britain and elsewhere , any kid within earshot of John Peel 's radio show . He was so hugely and so . Suddenly the record labels started coming at us , and I mean , coming at us . So we had this showcase gig for all these record labels in Manhattan . The Nails got on stage and I refused to do `` 88 Lines . '' I was , I tore clothes off and fell into the drum kit and blew it . The ones that around were RCA . It pissed off band . But at the time , it was what they expected of me. I mean , it was a fuck you to all these guys that were up in the balcony passing judgment . They 'd all come because of that one song , but I had written 12-15 songs since then . And those were the ones we played . RCA contacted our manager and said , `` Let us know when they 're playing again . '' This time we played at a place called Trax . I remember being in the dressing room drinking vodka and trying to pace myself so I would n't be too fucked up on stage . I looked out the dressing room door , and there was nobody there but the guys from RCA . So we just laughed . A minutes later I head out the door and it was packed , packed with all of our fans . And the crowd went apeshit when we played it and the day we got an offer from RCA . By then I 'd made point . There were battles to fight by then . I think that was the time we 'd played it . Of course , after that we had to play it because radio stations were playing it and we were touring and everybody would expect to hear it . I always begrudgingly played it and made a deal about not wanting to play it . I 'd make it quite that I had a cheat sheet of the lyrics that 's 10 feet , and I 'm making a , production of the fact that I 'm reading the lyrics , and the band is struggling with trying to reduce their sound down to the `` 88 Lines '' sound . There were six musicians on stage to back up a really four-track recording . Eventually , the band would leave the stage and I did the song sitting on a stool , to a taped backing track . Instead of trying to get the band to sonically down and try to replicate that song , I just said , `` Fuck it . '' It 's a song that revolves around a really Casio rhythm thing , so let 's not pretend it 's anything more than that . It 's really about the lyrics . No question it has a hook . But again , it was so to pull off that I almost made it into a performance piece , a poetry reading . It was almost to do because the band was and `` 88 Lines '' was an atypical song of . The songs were and and Doorsy and gothy and here was this thing that really kind of out in our set . And so by setting up a stool and doing it on a backing track , it was . It was . If there 's a story about `` 88 Lines , '' it 's that for a time it was the song that could be found on compilations when compilations starting popping up . Before that , it was the song that everybody heard , but nobody could buy . This was before CDs . None of the Nails catalogue was ever released by RCA on CD , believe it or not . After the 100,000 records were sold of our album , on which `` 88 Lines '' appeared , RCA did not do a . Why , I do n't know . They gave us money to do a album , but they never did `` 88 Lines '' as a ; they did n't even do a dance mix . The time `` 88 Lines '' became on CD it was on this kind of one hit wonder wave compilation called Living in Oblivion . Do you really want to be on a compilation called Living in Oblivion ? '' So we 'll never know what it might have sold had people been to go in and buy the . Eventually we signed a deal with RCA to get our masters back . So now the Nails RCA albums are on CD on Amazon . I think there are three versions of `` 88 Lines , '' the four-track version , and some others . The guys in the band , bass player , George , who died not ago , and keyboard player , David , were really devoted to keeping the Nails status with Web sites and these re-releases . I would have to just move on . Maybe 15 years ago it was in a Mazda . We got the call from an ad agency in Detroit saying they were working on an ad campaign for Mazda , and they wanted to use `` 88 Lines About 44 Women . '' Our lawyer contacted us to discuss it . He said , This is the deal . They want to offer you , I think it was $ 75,000 , which was money at the time . He negotiated a really deal which said if they used it for a , they 'd have to pay us double , and if they used it for a , they 'd have to double it again . And they did wind up using it in three commercials . But response was to not do it . I 'm totally against this idea of rock songs being used to promote corporations . Of course , the guys in band , who were married with families , said `` You 're going to say what ? '' So I finally caved and said , `` We 'll do it . '' But they wanted the band to play it , and me to sing it with some lyrics . And that 's where I drew the line . I can at least say , yeah , we took the money , but I drew the line on singing it , so I could keep some of street cred . But there was another factor that decision from a no to yes , which was that the guy at the ad agency contacted me privately . He probably could have lost his job for this . He said , `` Marc , if you do n't sell us the rights to this song , we 're going to duplicate it . We 'll change it slightly . But we 're going to go ahead and do it anyway and you 're going to get fucked . '' That 's what made me go , Okay . And that 's what they would have done . It 's been done time and time again . ``88 Lines '' has appeared in , forms to promote , things . Not ago it was used in the Dexter ad campaign for the TV show . It was `` 26 lines About 13 Psychos . '' We sued them and won . The State of Massachusetts used it in an anti-drinking campaign , and you know what , we sued them , even though we were behind what they were doing . But it was a ripoff . And they came back with this hotshot guy whose job is to dissect songs , some professor of music , who came back with this 30 page rebuttal stating how I had actually ripped the song off from some century madrigal . He had me completely convinced I had stolen this song from a century madrigal . Anyway , the money the Nails have ever made off of `` 88 Lines '' is from commercials and suing people . We never did a for `` 88 Lines , '' which is .
RCA gave us like $ 35,000 to do a for `` Let It All Hang Out , '' our cover of the Hombres song . They were scared of `` 88 Lines , '' which is . I had this scenario , where basically it was me in a lounge , like a Ramada Inn in Atlantic City . I 'm now in or , I 'm , and I 'm singing our one hit , which I 've been milking for 30 some years . I 'm looking like Elvis and the camera pans across the audience , and it 's all these women . They 're the women in the song . They 're all . Can you imagine how fun that would have been ? I think people really would have adored that on MTV . Nowadays , if you look at YouTube , you 'll be shocked to see how people have made their videos for the song . I mean , there are dozens of them . One guy made one about fishing , `` 88 Lines About 44 Fish . '' I actually sent him a message through YouTube . I said , `` I got to hand it to you , man. This song has covered a lot of territory . But this is the one about fish . ''
A lot of the people who made these videos are school students . So there 's `` 88 lines About 44 Anime Characters , '' so clearly they 're really people but the song connected with them . I guess `` 88 Lines '' connects on a primal level . Everybody knows those chicks who have broken their hearts or taught them a lesson , so it 's . Most of the videos are , but I 'm thrilled the song has this life of its . November 14 , 2012 M y Song column Bruce Pollock , one song impact artist songwriter ` s career . , Marc Campbell . Lines Women Artist : Nails Writers : Marc Campbell David Kaufman Album : Hotel Women Year : , label Label : Jimboco , RCA interview