Every Saturday, we’ll be posting a new illustration by David Lester. The Mecca Normal guitarist is visually documenting people, places and events from his band’s 32-year run, with text by vocalist Jean Smith.
“Who Shot Elvis?” is the title of both the song and the album.
“Who shot Elvis?
Who drowned the Kennedys?
Who climbed Mount Rushmore?
Who swam the Seven Seas?
My history’s gone.
The history’s all gone.”
I’ve only included the chorus because the rest of the song’s lyrics seem overly poetic. Looking back on 30 years of lyrics, I regret that I didn’t write more overtly political tangents, tirades and rants. I was originally inspired by a lot of the women-fronted punk bands from England in the late ’70s. Bands like CRASS, X-Ray Spex, the Slits and Poison Girls. Bands whose idiosyncratic lyrics fortified me to make changes in the somewhat conventional direction I’d taken in my life.
It was incredible to meet with and perform with Vi Subversa and Poison Girls when Mecca Normal toured in the U.K. in 1989. It was a total thrill to be staying at her house for her 54th birthday party, a splendid event held in her back garden. She was 80 years old when she died in late February, 2016, and she’d performed as recently as December. Vi proved that being a mother of two in her 40s didn’t mean she couldn’t take on the world with Poison Girls. It’s never too late! “What happens in the world is my business.”
Vi Subversa! A life well lived.
“Who Shot Elvis?” from the album Who Shot Elvis? (Matador, 1996) (download):
