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We’ve received bushels (figuratively) of e-mails in response to December’s post about The Robert Christgau Rock Snob Aptitude Test. To bring those of you who missed that post up to speed, a friend of the Rock Snob brain trust sent along a baffling 1974 capsule review by Ur-Rock Snob critic Bob Christgau of a Gordon Lightfoot album that concluded–cryptically? nonsensically?–with the mysterious words “Chad lives?”
Several readers, among them Gerry Howard of Tuxedo Park, New York, Mark Wilson of Evansville, Indiana, and Steven Mirkin of Los Angeles, suggested that X-gau (as the Snobgnoscenti call Bob) is alluding, given his “‘uncompromising proponent of commercial folk music’ comment,” as Mirkin puts it, to Chad Mitchell of the Mighty Wind-style sixties folkie group the Chad Mitchell Trio.
Still more readers, among them John Lomax of Houston and the Right Hon. Greil Marcus of Berkeley, California, guess that X-gau is referring to Chad Stuart of the dulcet British Invasion duo Chad & Jeremy, who covered such Lightfoot songs as “Early Morning Rain” and “For Loving Me.” “For melodies, they and Gordon Lightfoot are almost identical, as is attitude,” writes Greil, who also suggests, “You could of course ask Bob.”
But Bob wouldn't want us to ask; he assumes that we, as Rock Snobs, simply know.
