Salaud Days – Gainsbourg
The natural conclusion of pop music was the reality singing contest, as the singing show manages to hold at once two opposing ideas about pop music that help pop music sell: it is something we can all aspire to do, yet it is only truly done by persons with a certain something that we lack. [...]
For or Against the Grain, Or: Huysmans’ Check-List
A guest-post made at the New Escapologist blog, with an illustration by Ms. Samara Liebner.
The title of J-K. Huysmans’ most famous novel, À rebours, can be translated as Against Nature or Against the Grain. But, for me, it is the second possibility that is the more appealing.
In the novel, the high-dandiacal protagonist, Des Esseintes, escapes [...]
The Chatter of Pop
An Essay sprung from Visions of Joanna Newsom, edited by Brad Buchanan (Roan Press)
“The disputants, I ween,
Rail on in utter ignorance
Of what each other mean.”
Pop music is kept buoyant by hot air. It is the heat of hyperventilating fandom, the prefab puffery of the press release, or the hyperbole of the press room that fills [...]
A Review From The Belfast Festival Opening Concert
The Mariinsky Orchestra, conducted by Valery Gergiev
Waterfront Hall, Belfast
October 16th 2009
Dutilleux – Correspondences
Shostakovich – Symphony No.7 in C major, Op.60 (Leningrad)
Mr. Gergiev was described as “the world’s most charismatic conductor” by the Financial Times and, as he conducts, one can see the rapt attention on the faces his players, following his moving hands with the [...]
Hello Young Lovers by Sparks
In 1974, ‘This Town Ain’t Big Enough For The Both Of Us,’ sounded like a glam rock single skewed through the sensibilities of art-school drop-outs who write fan-mail to movie-star dogs and M. Jacques Tati.
In 1979, ‘The No. 1 Song In Heaven’ sounded like a disco 12″ skewed through the sensibilities of the sorts of [...]
