My Ted Talk

[LuvLoogie]

So back in the Seventies, this guy put out some good hard rock. His guitar work was not virtuoso, but it was fun and honest. His earlier stuff was the best. I am going to share 5 cuts. Comment if you'd like. He turned into a hateful old man.

These songs were from my teen years. They still hit like early Ted.

[ItsjustMe]

1. I Gave TED NUGENT Oral Sex At Age 12

COURTNEY LOVE: I Gave TED NUGENT Oral Sex At Age 12
https://blabbermouth.net/news/courtney-love-i-gave-ted-nugent-oral-sex-at-age

Ted Nugent's Jailbait Problem
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/ted-nugents-jailbait-problem_b_4840060

[LuvLoogie]

4. I also like the song Stranglehold, although listening to it more recently,

it is derivative of Writing on the Wall, which ultimately is the better tune, though Stranglehold got more air play.

[GReedDiamond]

2. It is my opinion that Ted Nugent has done nothing...

...worthwhile in his entire life.

Including his guitar playing.

I know and have played with better guitarists, none of whom were fascist assholes.

Fuck Ted "THE PED" Nugent.

[LuvLoogie]

3. I get it. But I really like those tunes.

I stopped listening to Ted Nugent regularly around the time when The Cars hit. Stuck with UFO, sabbath, led zeppelin, etc. and moved on to Judas and Iron Maiden, Later Metallica Megadeth,

A lot of Bowie, Blondie, Pretenders...

Shit, so many different genres. But giving a recent listen to my old High School juke box, these tunes don't trigger me negatively.

I guess I am similar in my regard for Woody Allen's work. Although I have no inkling of what Woody Allen's politics are.

He made some great movies.

[highplainsdem]

5. Nugent has made a career out of being outrageous, disgusting, hateful and

dishonest. He's carried the lack of values over into his music, including reportedly taking sole writing credit for songs bandmates cowrote with him, cheating them out of royalties.

See the Wikipedia article on him, as well as the links posted in a reply above.

With Nugent, being offensive and threatening have been features, not bugs. This is not something separate from his music.

He didn't turn into a hateful old man. He always wanted to be hateful, at least to a lot of people. He suffers from the delusion that acting this way makes him an independent man, a rugged individualist.

He told the Detroit Free Press in 1990, when he was far from old, that if his draft-dodging hadn't been successful and he'd been sent to 'Nam, he'd have killed "everybody" including "all the hippies in the foxholes" with friendly fire. Wikipedia links to that article, and I suggest you read all of it. The racism, the misogyny, the bragging about being violent and using his fists a lot.

A feature, with him. Not a bug.

As for his dishonesty -- you don't have to read much of that Wikipedia article to see how often he's contradicted himself. And the very public dishonesty started at least as far back as his inane claims that he didn't know the Amboy Dukes' "Journey to the Center of the Mind" was about drugs. You'd have to be even stupider than Nugent often appears to be, to believe that claim.

You're of course free to like his music. I also believe it's possible to separate the art from the artist, especially if the art is great but the artist is flawed. But Nugent has used his music to celebrate and promote his flaws. And he's done that for decades.

And if he's telling the truth with his claims he's never used drugs (except for once, to help him avoid being drafted), then he can't even blame drugs for the worst things he's said.