超级摇滚巨星：他们折射出怎样的自我与社会？
开篇引言
Rock is the music of teenage rebellion.
—John Rockwell, rock music critic
摇滚乐是青少年反叛的音乐。
—— 摇滚乐评论家 约翰・罗克韦尔
By a man’s heroes ye shall know him.
—Robert Penn Warren, novelist
观其所崇拜的偶像，便可知其人本色。
—— 小说家 罗伯特・佩恩・沃伦
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It was mid-June, 1972, the Chicago Amphitheater was packed, sweltering, rocking. Onstage, Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones was singing “Midnight Rambler.” Critic Don Heckman was there when the song ended.
1972 年 6 月中旬，芝加哥圆形露天剧场座无虚席，闷热难耐，全场随着乐曲疯狂晃动。舞台上，滚石乐队的米克・贾格尔正在演唱《午夜漫步者》。一曲落幕时，乐评人唐・赫克曼正好在场。
“Jagger,” he said, “grabs a half-gallon jug of water and runs along the front platform, sprinkling its contents over the first few rows of sweltering listeners. They surge to follow him, eager to be touched by a few baptismal drops.”
他描述道：“贾格尔抓起一个半加仑的大水罐，沿着舞台前沿来回奔走，将水洒向前排燥热的观众。人群蜂拥着追随他，都渴望能沾上几滴如同洗礼圣水的水珠。”
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It was late December, 1973. Some 14,000 screaming fans were crunching up to the stage at the Capital Centre outside Washington, D.C. Alice Cooper, America’s ghoul-rock superstar, was ending his show with a mock execution by guillotine. His “head” fell into a wicker basket.
1973 年 12 月下旬，华盛顿郊外的首都中心剧场内，约一万四千名尖叫的歌迷喧闹拥挤地涌向舞台。美国惊悚风格摇滚巨星埃利斯・库珀正在收尾演出，他用断头台道具模拟被斩首的场景结束表演，道具假头颅落入一只藤编篮子中。
“Ooh,” gasped a girl dressed in black. “Oh, isn’t that marvelous?”
“哇！” 一位黑衣女孩倒吸一口气惊叹道，“天哪，太震撼了！”
Fourteen-year-old Mike Perlie was there too, but his parents weren’t. “They think he’s sick, sick, sick,” Mike said. “They say to me, ‘How can you stand that stuff?’”
14 岁的迈克・珀利也来到了现场，他的父母却没有到场。迈克说：“我爸妈觉得他怪异至极，总跟我说，你怎么看得下去这种表演？”
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It was late January, 1974. Inside the Nassau Coliseum in Uniondale, New York, Bob Dylan and The Band were tuning for a concert. Outside, in the pouring rain, fan Chris Singer was waiting to get in.
1974 年 1 月末，纽约州尤宁代尔拿骚体育馆内，鲍勃・迪伦和他的乐队正在为演唱会调试乐器。场馆外，歌迷克里斯・辛格冒着瓢泼大雨排队等候入场。
“This is pilgrimage,” Chris said, “I ought to be crawling on my knees.”
“对我而言，这场演唱会就是一场朝圣，” 克里斯说，“我恨不得双膝跪地匍匐爬进场馆。”
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How do you feel about all this adulation and hero worship? When Mick Jagger’s fans look at him as a high priest or a god, are you with them or against them? Do you share Chris Singer’s almost religious reverence for Bob Dylan? Do you think he — or Dylan — is misguided? Do you reject Alice Cooper as sick? Or are you drawn somehow to this strange clown, perhaps because he acts out your wildest fantasies?
面对这般狂热追捧与偶像崇拜，你作何感想？当贾格尔的歌迷将他奉为大祭司乃至神明，你是认同还是反对？你是否也像克里斯一样，对鲍勃・迪伦怀有近乎宗教般的崇敬？你认为库珀或是迪伦只是误入歧途吗？你是否排斥风格怪异的库珀？又或者，你莫名被这个另类的表演者吸引，只因他替你演绎出了内心最疯狂的幻想？
These aren’t idle questions. Some sociologists say that your answers to them could explain a lot about what you are thinking and about what your society is thinking — in other words, about where you and your society are.
这些并非无关紧要的问题。一些社会学家认为，你对这些问题的回答，能够充分反映你个人以及整个社会的真实心态，简言之，折射出你与所处社会的价值取向。
“Music expresses its times,” says sociologist Irving Horowitz. Horowitz sees the rock music arena as a sort of debating forum, a place where ideas clash and crash. He sees it as a place where American society struggles to define and redefine its feelings and beliefs.
社会学家欧文・霍洛维茨指出：“音乐反映时代。” 霍洛维茨将摇滚舞台视作一个辩论场，各类思想在此激烈碰撞交锋。美国社会在这个场域里不断梳理、重新定义大众的情感与信仰。
“The redefinition,” Horowitz says, “is a task uniquely performed by the young. It is they alone who combine invention and exaggeration, reason and motion, word and sound, music and politics.”
霍洛维茨说：“这种价值观的重新界定，是年轻人独有的使命。唯有他们能将创意与夸张、理性与律动、文字与声响、音乐与政治融为一体。”
Todd Rundgren, the composer and singer, agrees. “Rock music,” he says, “is really a sociological expression rather than a musical force.”
词曲创作人兼歌手托德・朗德格伦对此深表认同：“摇滚乐本质上是一种社会情绪的表达，而非单纯的音乐载体。”
But politics wasn’t the only subject debated in the hard rock of the sixties. Feelings, always a part of any musical statement, were a major subject. Janis Joplin sang of her sadness. The Beatles showed there were a range of emotions between love and hate. Then came The Band, mixing the more traditional ideas of country and western music into the more radical “city” ideas of the hard rock.
但在 60 年代的硬核摇滚乐中，政治并非唯一被探讨的主题。情感本就是所有音乐表达的核心组成部分，也是一大重点。詹尼斯・乔普林用歌声倾诉内心的悲伤；披头士乐队展现出爱恨之间复杂丰富的情绪；之后 “乐队” 乐队登场，将乡村与西部音乐中更为传统的理念，融入硬核摇滚乐激进的都市思潮之中。
This country element, Horowitz feels, helped its audience express an urge to “get away from it all,” to “go back to the old days.” One of the best current examples of what Horowitz is talking about is John Denver. His most notable songs — “Sunshine on My Shoulders,” “Rocky Mountain High,” and “Take Me Home, Country Roads” — combine the musical drive and power of folk rock, while the lyrics celebrate the simple joys of “the good old days” far away from the complexity of modern city life.
霍洛维茨认为，这种乡村音乐元素，帮助听众抒发了一种 “逃离一切纷扰”、“回归往昔岁月” 的渴望。当下最能印证霍洛维茨观点的典型人物便是约翰・丹佛。他最脍炙人口的歌曲《阳光洒在我肩头》《高高的落基山》《乡间小路带我回家》融合了民谣摇滚的律动与力量，歌词歌颂远离繁杂都市生活的旧日美好与质朴欢愉。
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Even Elvis Presley fell far short of his reputation as the great cultural detonator of the 1950s. It was simply that Elvis had managed to embody the disaffection of teenagers in the fifties.
即便是埃尔维斯・普雷斯利（猫王），也并没有外界所宣扬的那般是 50 年代颠覆性的文化引爆者。究其根本，只是猫王精准地具象化体现了 50 年代青少年群体内心的疏离与不满。
Emotion, as an ingredient in any musical form, is eternal. Rock music gave voice to the stored-up bewilderment and rebellion of the young.
情感是所有音乐形式永恒的内核，摇滚乐恰好为积压在年轻人心底的迷茫与叛逆找到了宣泄的出口。
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In a national poll taken in 1972, more than 10 percent of high school boys and over 20 percent of high school girls named rock superstars as their heroes.
1972 年一项全国民意调查显示，超过 10% 的高中男生、20% 以上的高中女生将摇滚超级巨星视作自己心中的偶像。
Many adults, however, frown on the whole business. Newspapers frequently editorialize against rock and its performers. The older generation cannot comprehend the youthful enthusiasm and dismiss the devotion as misguided piety. They see only noise and rebellion, missing the deeper social significance behind rock lyrics and stage performances.
然而许多成年人对此并不认同，各大报刊也频频刊发社论抨击摇滚乐及其演唱者。老一辈无法理解年轻人的狂热，将这份痴迷视作被误导的盲目虔诚。他们只看到喧嚣与叛逆，忽略了摇滚歌词与舞台表演背后深层的社会意义。