Patti Smith

By Anna Bang

Patti Smith
By Anna Bang

Phamous69 salutes the Grande Dame of punk, Patti Smith! P69 was lucky enough to get a super secret squirrel invite to her performance at auction house Phillips de Pury on the 22nd June. Not only was the place heaving with amazing art, some which is going to be auctioned on the 27th June in aid of charity , some which is being sold in aid of mammon on the 29th June, the drinks were first rate and plentiful but on top of that, an intimate performance by Patti Smith, with her son Jackson Smith on acoustic guitar. Not too shabby for a Sunday night!
Now my vision of Patti Smith is an intriguing mix of her cover from the album 'Horses' and brief glimpses of her on various music documentaries, all glittery eyes, hooked nose and mass of bed hair. Skinny, usually wearing men's clothing, always cool. As she's now 61, I was prepared for a more sedate version, but no... Patti rocked up on time, looking amazing in a white silk shirt with frayed cuffs, a worn man's blazer (could be thrift store, could be Helmut, Karl or Ann, impossible to tell) jeans and tooled, worn cowboy boots, not a scrap of maquillage and that trade-mark bedhair and she knocked every woman in the room into a cocked hat!
Performing next to a huge canvas by Franz Gertsch of a much younger Patti, you felt an amused nostalgia that made her cast a wry glance at her 30 year younger image. Patti is clearly not someone bemoaning the passing of time except when she mentioned her husband, the late Fred 'Sonic' Smith (of MC5 fame) who died in 2004. She clearly mourns him still (the hastily wiped tear before launching into 'Because' was heartbreaking) and have only recently started to perform again, which made this occasion all the more precious. The set list was deliciously long, taking in "Blakean', 'Redondo Beach', 'Pissing' and 'Elegy' amongst others, ending on 'Because' with 'Gloria' as the roof-raising encore. She clearly loves performing and has an easy interaction with her audience, devoted fans ranging from a surprising 9 years old (hell, the kid was cool!) to 60-something contemporaries, however straight looking you had to wonder what wildness they had gotten up to in their youth that Patti Smith had been the inevitable soundtrack to. Just wish she'd included 'Horses' but otherwise a once in a life time experience,-thank you.

To see an all too brief shaky mobile video on youtube of Patti Smith performing 'Because', paste this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNctRqSvhdY
To find out about the charity auction and other upcoming events at Phillips de Pury, please go to www.phillipsdepury....