White Saviour Complex

by Tenzing Scott Brown

85 pages, Hardcover

Published July 30, 2019

Reviews

[John Braine]

Odd one to try and rate. Because of the context I read it in, it was, in some ways the most pointless book I ever read.

I went to a screening of Best Before Death, the second movie by Paul Duane that features Bill Drummond and to some degree; Death. On either side of the movie there was a short play split in two which ties in with the movie closely. The play discusses the movie and also ponders if the kind of art Drummond makes in the movie is the act of a Great White Saviour. This book is basically the script of the play including a lot of transcript from the movie. So if you have just seen the movie and the play, this book is unfortunately, entirely pointless and is just regurgitating everything you just experienced, sometimes twice over, with nothing much new added.

Oh well. The highlight of the whole experience for me was that I bookended the plays that bookended the movie by getting my much loved copy of Drummond's 45 signed by Bill at the start of the night, and then buying White Saviour Complex and getting it signed at the end of the night, and then when I started reading this book, the opening lines are about a man who brings along a much loved copy of 45 to the screening of Best Before Death to get Bill drummond to sign! Fucking hell. Talk about meta. This alone was highly entertaining for me (even if the rest if the book seemed like a pointless transcript of an experience I just had).

[Alex Sarll]

Bill Drummond oddity, if that isn't tautologous, in which he engages in a searching if oblique inventory of the possible implications of his recent work, while also stripping down to his pants. And also doing his best not to talk about the KLF, let alone the million quid, despite/because of those being the bits of his past most people would probably be keenest to see him mulling over. But then, in some ways he has always been more the Presbyterian minister's son than the pop star. Plus, as one of his characters here notes, "I don't think Bill Drummond has any idea how what he does comes over to folk that are not already into what he does." Except of course that if that were wholly true, he could never have given the character that line. Plenty of people can spiral, but the remarkable thing with Drummond is how he maintains a sense of forward motion at the same time.

[Alan Fricker · Rating 4 out of 5]

Picking my way through. Need to catch the film

[Gary Fowles · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tenzing Scott Brown is the nom de plume Bill Drummond uses when writing plays. This book is a companion piece to Paul Duane's Drummond documentary Best Before Death. There are two versions of the play included, both take a swipe at Drummond and the work he is currently making, The 25 Paintings.

What starts off amusing is by the end quite touching.