Ersatz TLS discussion

Not directly connected to books (although...) I recently discovered a talented British artist that uses the visual style of classic comics, Hanna Barbera, Peanuts, Jim Henson, vintage illustrations, old movie posters, pop art, anime, to illustrate famous (and not so famous) rock bands. He has a shop on Redbubble that is worth a visit.
http://www.redbubble.com/people/Stuff...

Here are some of my favourites:
The Velvet Underground
http://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/6519...

The Cramps
http://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/8307...

Pavement
http://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/9185...

Dinosaur Jr
http://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/5313...

The Beatles
http://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/9680...

Now that there’s a music thread, I’ll venture to write a bit about my recent reading.

For the past two months I’ve been reading about Arnold Schoenberg and Alban Berg. It started with the Harvard University Press sale someone (?@MK) here posted about. I bought Arnold Schoenberg's Journey by Allen Shawn (William’s son, Wallace’s brother) and read it immediately (Schoenberg and His School was one of the best books I’d read in 2021).

That set me going through my shelves in search of more and I’ve since read Schoenberg: Pierrot Lunaire, Schoenberg and His Circle: A Viennese Portrait, Schoenberg Remembered: Diaries and Recollections, Alban Berg: Wozzeck, and Letters to His Wife, am currently reading The Berg-Schoenberg Correspondence: Selected Letters and intend to read Alban Berg: Lulu next.

I liked this description of getting to know Schoenberg’s music from a 1973 reminiscence by Eugen Lehner, violist with the Kolisch Quartet:

Well, to make a long story short, then came the summer … when we had to learn the Third Quartet from Schoenberg for the premiere in Europe. … And I remember once, when Schoenberg came to Vienna with the manuscript, we were sitting in a circle and Schoenberg was trying to conduct so that we could play through. And I thought, “Jesus, if that is music, I will eat my head. That might be anything, but music it is not.” So, with that, finally came the summer, and we went off to a little forlorn Austrian [village] and settled down and started to learn – study. And, you know, every day something happened. All of a sudden, “Gee, that must have been a mistake, it sounded like music.” And it was probably in a week or two, I don’t know any more, but all I know is that I never could take anything else seriously. … And no other composer country by country could I take even halfway seriously, and I still believe that the Third and the Fourth Quartets and the String Trio are probably the most beautiful music written in the twentieth century.

(ellipses in the original)

If we add what i'm listening to now, then its the following:

Doble Vida by Soda Stereo (1988)-LP
Argentinian rock band, the main single En Cuidad De La Furia, is just awesome. the album was produced in 1988 by Bowie chum Carlos Alomar and swings between breezy funk and introspective tunes. they were huge in argentina in the 80s

Pump Up The Jam by Technotronic (1989)-LP
belgian techno house, great bass sounds, delay,reverb and synths. i grew up with a lot of this great hip-house music and re-visiting it in last 8 weeks. top single "This beat is technotronic" is on constant play

I dont live here anymore by War on Drugs (2021)- LP
not as great as i expected, the slower tracks are a bit weak but the big ol 80s influenced tracks are awesome

Machenbach wrote: "I've often wondered whether professional musicians sometimes hate what they have to play and, if so, if/how that affects their performance. Does their professionalism overcome any distaste, or does the latter inevitably colour their performance? I'm just thinking about you run-of-the-mill orchestra member rather than a principal or soloist obv.

I've seen a couple of Berg's operas and don't recall finding them especially musically challenging, but perhaps the operas are more accessible than his other stuff, with which I'm not very familiar, other than the op.1 piano sonata, which I sometimes listen to as part of a mixed disc."

On the whole, Berg’s music is probably the most accessible of the Second Viennese School (Schoenberg, Berg, Webern) for its incorporation of tonal (or tonal-sounding) elements. His two operas, Wozzeck and Lulu, are also very dramatically effective as stage works. Referring to a previous exchange, if you like Berg's sonata you may also like some of the later sonatas of Scriabin.

Musicians’ attitude toward the music they’re assigned to play reminds me of a story from Andre Previn’s No Minor Chords: My Days in Hollywood.

Previn was in London conducting sessions for the film of Jesus Christ Superstar. After one session a musician who knew him from the London Symphony Orchestra, greeted him saying, “Hi, Andre. What are you doing conducting this piece of shit?” At the time Previn was standing next to director Norman Jewison, whom he introduced; the musician recovered pretty well, favorably commenting on several of Jewison’s past films.

Bill wrote: "Now that there’s a music thread, I’ll venture to write a bit about my recent reading.

For the past two months I’ve been reading about Arnold Schoenberg and Alban Berg. It started with the Harvard ..."

Hey, that's a lot of books about Schoenberg, but then again, he was (is) very influential and had an interesting life.

AB76 wrote: "Pump Up The Jam by Technotronic (1989)-LP"

Oh my god, that brings me memories! My brother and I used to spend hours and hours playing video games in our old ZX Spectrum and listening to Technotronic... Couldn't do it now, even if I wanted to!

Never read many books about music. A biography of Prokofiev more than a decade ago,
around the same time,
an unauthorised bio of Tom Waits last summer (or maybe the summer before)...

But the book that most definitely left a mark was ,
which I read as a kid in Portuguese translation. We were spending our holidays by the seaside and I foolishly twisted my ankle walking on the beach (my brother pushed me!). As I was forced to remain immobile for several days, my parents bought me this book to keep me company, and a what a great book it is. I'm not embarrassed to say most of the (basic) things I know about classical music I learned from it. In fact, it's the only book of my childhood that I took with me when I left my parents' home.

Slawkenbergius wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Pump Up The Jam by Technotronic (1989)-LP"

Oh my god, that brings me memories! My brother and I used to spend hours and hours playing video games in our old ZX Spectrum and listening ..."

love that Slawk and the ZX reference, i remember that console too, loading cassettes and waiting for 45 mins....

AB76 wrote: "loading cassettes and waiting for 45 mins...."

Load "" ENTER

:D

Currently delving into lesser known 90s alternative rock bands associated to shoegazing: Swervedriver, Medicine, Swirlies, Th' Faith Healers... The phenomenal Deerhoof have a new live recording (in studio, pandemics oblige).

In Baroque music, the new album by bass viol virtuosa Lucile Boulanger playing (transcribed) solo pieces by JS Bach and Carl Friedrich Abel (whom I didn't know) is very good. It was recorded in Noirlac Abbey, a place 21 miles away from where I live, which is nice.

Slawkenbergius wrote: "Currently delving into lesser known 90s alternative rock bands associated to shoegazing: Swervedriver, Medicine, Swirlies, Th' Faith Healers... The phenomenal Deerhoof have a new live recording (in..."

shoegaze, more nostalgia....chapterhouse, slowdive, early Ride, Swervedriver, all part of the Thames Valley Scene, with the majority of bands from Oxford

Machenbach wrote: "AB76 wrote: "If we add what i'm listening to now, then its the following:

Doble Vida by Soda Stereo (1988)-LP
Argentinian rock band, the main single En Cuidad De La Furia, is just awesome. the al..."

Dry Cleaning was my LP of 2021, love the idea of spoken voice indie music and the guitar and bass playing was so inventive and interesting

i guess with lots of the late 80s dance tracks i'm fascinated by how they were made and the great sound, these are now 30+ years old but sound as modern as ever

Machenbach wrote: "Slawkenbergius wrote: "Currently delving into lesser known 90s alternative rock bands associated to shoegazing: Swervedriver, Medicine, Swirlies, Th' Faith Healers"
Well, I vaguely recall the first..."

well i was into them in my mid teens and didnt return to any of them till slowdive released a new lp a few years back. Ride also released a new Lp in 2019 that was just top notch, so hence i revisited the old classics

Machenbach wrote: "Well, I vaguely recall the first and last, but not the others. "

I knew a couple of songs by Swervedriver, but not more than that. For some reason their CDs were never easy to find, but now I got acquainted with the rest of their recordings. Their latest album - 'Future Ruins' - is very good, IMO better than the acclaimed 'Mezcal Head'.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list...


Medicine became temporarily 'famous' when they had one song of theirs released in The Crow soundtrack (with a little help of Elizabeth Fraser on backing vocals) We can even see them briefly performing in one scene of the movie. They are considered the closest an American band got to My Bloody Valentine.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oy02R...


Swirlies, I discovered through the good advice of deep cuts
https://youtu.be/7q9PI3Lhuyg?t=753


And Th' Faith Healers while rummaging the net
https://whatculture.com/music/10-best...

Slawkenbergius wrote: "Machenbach wrote: "Well, I vaguely recall the first and last, but not the others. "

I knew a couple of songs by Swervedriver, but not more than that. For some reason their CDs were never easy to f..."

MBV...what a sound...the orginals....

Slawkenbergius wrote: "Hey, that's a lot of books about Schoenberg, but then again, he was (is) very influential and had an interesting life."

The books mostly concentrate on the music – analysis, genesis, reception – and Schoenberg as a teacher and, to a lesser extent, colleague and writer. His difficult (putting it mildly) personality is on display but not analyzed in any way. A central scandalous incident of his biography, his wife’s affair with painter Richard Gerstl, is, at most, barely hinted at in these books, though I have no doubt that it had a profound influence on his art and relationships. In a way, this has the unfortunate effect of reinforcing the idea that his music is all head and no heart – a cliché of criticism such as that of Emanuel E. Garcia which I cited in a earlier post.

Schoenberg and His Circle: A Viennese Portrait looks at Schoenberg in a slightly wider Viennese context and includes profiles of architect Adolf Loos, writer Karl Kraus, and painter Oscar Kokoshka as representatives of the art and ideas that were part of the environment in which his music was created. Though Kokoshka’s affair with Alma Mahler is mentioned, nothing is said, after the end of the affair, about Kokoshka’s having made for him a life size, anatomically complete doll in the image of Alma, with which he painted a double portrait (cf., The Fantastic Art of Vienna).

In reading about Vienna musical circles from about 1890-1920, I find that the overlap in relationships is reminiscent of La Ronde. To give just two examples:

Schoenberg's two wives were both the sisters of colleagues: Alexander Zemlinsky and Rudolf Kolisch.

Hanna Fuchs-Robettin, the secret dedicatee of Berg's Lyric Suite (the explicit dedicatee is Alexander Zemlinsky), was the sister of Franz Werfel, the third husband of Alma Mahler, who, before her first marriage to Gustav Mahler, was taught composition by, and was romantically involved with Alexander Zemlinsky

Bill wrote: "Franz Werfel, the third husband of Alma Mahler, who, before her first marriage to Gustav Mahler, was taught composition by, and was romantically involved with Alexander Zemlinsky..."

Alma certainly 'got around', as they say... she seemed to specialise in relationships with famous men... Mahler, Gropius, Werfel (husbands) and Klimt (admirer... lover?) and Kokoschka (lover). And those are the ones we know about... She reminds me of an anecdote recounted by Aussie journalist, writer and TV personality Clive James, who attempted to 'get off' with Lady Antonia Fraser at a dinner party. "I only sleep with the first eleven!" she said - according to James. (I should perhaps point out that one of his books is entitled Unreliable Memoirs)

Anyway - reading about Mahler recently, I came across a piece on Wikipedia about the 'Alma problem'. It appears that Alma - apparently in an attempt at self-aggrandizement - edited Mahler's correspondence, suppressing most of his letters to her and altering most of the remainder. She appeared to want to exaggerate her influence on Mahler's compositions, whilst also making claims that she 'sacrificed' her own talent in his service. There appears to be little evidence from unbiased sources to corroborate her claims, though they have unfortunately been taken at face value, or have at least influenced, many who came after.

It seems that more recently, sceptical scholars have partially dismantled her claims, though in many cases there is insufficient contemporary evidence to get at the "truth". This is one comment:

Hugh Wood: "Often she is the only witness, and the biographer has to depend on her while doubting with every sentence her capacity for telling the truth. Everything that passed through her hands must be regarded as tainted"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alma_Pr...

I'm no musicologist, but I do find this interesting...

scarletnoir wrote: "whilst also making claims that she 'sacrificed' her own talent in his service"

I haven’t seen any biographer dispute the claim that Gustav made Alma’s giving up her own composition a condition of their marriage. How much of a loss that has been to posterity is, though, a matter of dispute. Here’s a piece by mezzo Sarah Connoly on the subject.
https://www.theguardian.com/music/201...
I have a recording of the songs she mentions, orchestrated by the Matthews brothers, sung by Iris Vermillion, but don’t remember them as standing out, for good or ill, from similar contemporary items, such as those by Zemlinsky and Schoenberg. Certainly they weren’t up to the standard of Gustav Mahler’s songs.

By the way, despite Connolly’s claims, I am not aware of Alma having an affair with either Schoenberg or Berg, though she does get quite a few mentions in the latter’s letters as a close family friend of both Berg and his wife. Berg’s Violin Concerto was dedicated to the memory of Alma’s daughter by Gropius, Manon, and Gustav’s daughter Anna, a sculptor, was responsible for producing Berg’s death mask.

Alma also appears in 1941, with Franz Werfel, in Dika Newlin’s Schoenberg Remembered: Diaries and Recollections, (“quite excessively plump, with frizzy hair whose blondness seems to owe quite a bit to the beauty shop”). With Schoenberg’s encouragement, Newlin composed some songs to verses by Werfel, which were performed for him at a public appearance. Later, in conversation with Newlin, after hearing a lecture by Schoenberg with music examples, Werfel asked, “You don’t compose in the 12-tone scale do you?” “Oh, no. Schoenberg won’t let me.” (AS discouraged his students from 12 tone composition while they studied with him.) “Well, that is good. I am surely glad to hear that!”

Acclaimed music critic Chuck Klosterman has recently published a book about the '90s The Nineties, and he concocted a list of his 20 favourite albums from that great decade. As these things go, one can never be wholly satified with the choices made, but generally speaking he didn't do bad, old Chuck. One can always regret the absence of a few celebrated bands (and the surprising inclusion of a couple of outsiders) but to see Pizzicato Five so high in the list sure made me smile. And to consider Liz Phair's debut the quintessential indie rock sound of the '90s is not entirely off the mark.

https://americansongwriter.com/legend...

I've just finished reading Klosterman's Inroduction and would like to quote two extracts here that seem particularly well observed.

It’s impossible to claim that all people living through a period of history incontrovertibly share any qualities across the board. It’s also difficult to dissect a decade that was still operating as a monoculture without habitually dwelling on the details of dominance (when I write “it was a remarkably easy time to be alive,” I only refer to those for whom it was, and for whom it usually is). Nothing can ever be everything to everyone. But it’s hard to exaggerate the pervasion of self-constructed, self-aware apathy that would come to delineate the caricature of a time period that already feels forgotten, mostly because those who embodied it would feel embarrassed to insist it was important. The fashions of the 1980s did not gradually fade. The fashions of the 1980s collapsed, and—almost immediately—the zeitgeist they’d elevated appeared garish and gross. There was a longing for the 1970s, but not in the way people of the seventies had longed for the fifties. It was not nostalgia for a time that was more wholesome. It was nostalgia for a time when you could relax and care less. In the nineties, doing nothing on purpose was a valid option, and a specific brand of cool became more important than almost anything else. The key to that coolness was disinterest in conventional success. The nineties were not an age for the aspirant. The worst thing you could be was a sellout, and not because selling out involved money. Selling out meant you needed to be popular, and any explicit desire for approval was enough to prove you were terrible.
[...]
Now the 1990s seem like a period when the world was starting to go crazy, but not so crazy that it was unmanageable or irreparable. It was the end of the twentieth century, but also the end to an age when we controlled technology more than technology controlled us. People played by the old rules, despite a growing recognition that those rules were flawed. It was a good time that happened long ago, although not nearly as long ago as it seems.

Gee, I miss the nineties.

Bill wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "whilst also making claims that she 'sacrificed' her own talent in his service"

I haven’t seen any biographer dispute the claim that Gustav made Alma’s giving up her own composition..."

True, though it has also been said that:

"In 1902 she married Gustav Mahler, who at first discouraged her from composing; he is said to have changed his mind after hearing her songs."

https://www.britannica.com/biography/...

I think the 'Alma problem' is precisely that - a problem - because since she chose to suppress or alter so much of Mahler's correspondence, it is indeed very difficult to know what was true, and what was invented. It's clearly true that she was attracted to prominent men, though... I am old enough to remember seeing Tom Lehrer on TV, though I don't recall hearing this song:

As singer and satirist Tom Lehrer (b.1928) said before singing a song about the lady, “Last December 13th, there appeared in the newspapers the juiciest, spiciest, raciest obituary it has ever been my pleasure to read. It was that of a lady named Alma Mahler Gropius Werfel, who had, in her lifetime, managed to acquire as lovers practically all of the top creative men in central Europe.”

The loveliest girl in Vienna
Was Alma, the smartest as well,
Once you picked her up on your antenna,
You’d never be free of her spell.
Her lovers were many and varied
From the day she began her beguine.
There were three famous ones whom she married,
And God knows how many between…

The German author Oliver Hilmes has attempted to dig beyond the smoke-screen, though as this review says:

... there is a problem: Hilmes appears to be at a loss to explain why so many people fell under Alma's spell for so long, also what effect this magnificent monster had on the artistic achievements of her lovers and husbands.

https://www.chicagotribune.com/entert...

Whatever her other talents, she certainly seemed to have a gift for seduction!

As long as you don't mention Vengaboys and Ace of Bass I'm okay! ;-)

Machenbach wrote: "more surprisingly to many I'm sure, don't know Liz Phair's music at all. Ditto Pizzicato Five."

They were part of the prolific Matador coterie, which included other celebrated names such as Pavement, Yo la tengo and the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion.

Slawkenbergius wrote: "Gee, I miss the nineties."

Is writing about popular music inseparable from a sense of personal nostalgia?

(I'm also thinking about a recent piece by James Wood on Led Zeppelin that I tried to read.)
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/20...

Bill wrote: "Is writing about popular music inseparable from a sense of personal nostalgia?"

Well, to be honest, I had more fun in the noughties but the nineties were my formative period. It's not just that I went to uni and my life changed completely: the early years of the decade really meant a revolution in music. You had to have a foot set in the underground sphere (which I couldn't possibly have) to be able to know that there was more to the eighties' music than an endless stream of cheap synth-pop hits and mainstream arena rock concerts. And all of a sudden there was this gigantic wave of alternative music invading the radio, and it was liberating.

And then there's this a posteriori feeling of liberty and endless possibilities, not just in music but also in cinema. Maybe I tend to ultraromanticise the nineties, but considering what happened in 2001, the previous decade seems like a paradise lost.

I agree with Mach; Klosterman could have at least made a reference to trip-hop and electronica, but in general terms his taste is not so different from mine, and that's fine by me.
He could have included Sonic Youth, though...

Oh, and many thanks for the link!

Machenbach wrote: "Portishead &/or Massive Attack would have to be there (...) Others that I particularly associate with the 90s (whether I like them or not) would be Bjork, Beck, Nine Inch Nails, Green Day, Rage Against the Machine, Jeff Buckley, Pearl Jam, Alanis Morisette, PJ Harvey and REM."

Gah, remove 1 or 2, add RADIOHEAD (how dare you not list them??!), GnR (early 90s, that's my excuse), Red Hot Chili Peppers, Edit: Fiona Apple, Sinead O'Connor, Archive, The Cranberries, and sprinkle it with some added pop-y albums in there (first things that come to mind are Sting's Ten Summoner's Tales and MJ's Dangerous), and that's my list.

I'm really surprised in retrospect that you didn't go see Massive Attack for the 20 years of Mezzanine. Re hip-hop, I'd have to pick Salt 'N' Pepa as being the most 90s iconic for me. But my favourite track is probably a Fugees one (well, not quite, a Wyclef Jean): Gone till November (this version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FkjY...).

Favourite - as in mind-fucking-blowing - recorded live performances (might have linked to this before):
- Jeff's: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjO4I...
- Beth's: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vg1jy...

I do miss the 90s too. Other edit: So much so that we've sometimes taken to listening to these awful radios that only play 90s hits (far too much boys and girls band, and Brit Pop though). I feel old. Although having seen It's a Sin recently, I don't miss that aspect of it at all (discrimination, AIDS education and fear, etc.).

Hushpuppy wrote: "and that's my list."

Not a bad list, by all means, but personnally I never liked the Fugees or Salt N Peppa. I'm with you with Gone Till November; it's a great song.

My own list would include tons of alt rock (Sonic Youth, Yo la tengo, Pavement, Soundgarden, Sebadoh, Chavez, Luna, RATM, Radiohead, Smashing Pumpkins, Gomez, dEUS, Screaming Trees, and many others), plus Portishead and a few names that completely escape easy tagging: Soul Coughing, G Love and Special Sauce... From 1995 on (till 2007) I was a huge fan of Tindersticks, which remains to this day the band I saw more often in concert.

Slawkenbergius wrote: "Hushpuppy wrote: "and that's my list."

Not a bad list, by all means, but personnally I never liked the Fugees or Salt N Peppa. I'm with you with Gone Till November; it's a great song."

Not a Fugees one either, although, as Mach says, it was very 90s. (I don't like Lauryn Hill's iconic album either, would only save To Zion). I never tire of Gone Till November, just brings me instantly back straight back to Mouffetard where I'd be singing it in my head!

I unfortunately don't know much (or anything at all) about half of your list! If you had to recommend one place to start with the Tindersticks, which one would that be...? And yes, the Smashing Pumpkins, very 90s. Ditto Placebo.

Machenbach wrote: "I should clarify that those aren't necessarily all bands that I like(d) (although I do/did like many of them), but bands that I strongly associate with the decade for whatever reason."

My list was an intersection of what I was listening to and what is forever imprinted as 90s in my mind. The difference in age explains why to me Salt 'N' Pepa and Sinead O'Connor are 90s. I simply hadn't heard them before either starting to go to the 'mediatheque' in 1990, or getting my own Hi-Fi in 1991. But in truth, I don't own that many CDs or K7s, a lot of it was from listening day and night to the radio and many different stations. And yes, you're right, I forgot The Bends was on that list (had missed GnR somehow). Another offering: Elliott Smith. And two I was not really listening to, but very 90s to me, Skunk Anansie and The Verve. Pop: Crowded House.

The notion of "at least it's familiar crap" is relatable. I think this makes us old, really!

And then, there are some wonderful one hit wonders that are soooo 90s (which are most of the time absolutely not just the one song, but rather the proof that very talented musicians can struggle to sustain a career). Stay (Lisa Loeb), Stay (Shakespears sisters), Sleeping Satellite (Tasmin Archer), Your Woman (White Town), Groove is in the Heart (Deee-lite), Now That We Found Love (Heavy D), Jump Around (House of Pain), No Rain (Blind Melon), Walk On The Ocean (Toad the Wet Sprocket - surely, this could win the competition for best band name)... A rabbit hole, that.

Machenbach wrote: "Listen to Vasco, obv. but I got into them via two songs on their first album:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xF0Y7...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKRfW..."

Thanks! I'll give it a go, although I'm definitely not as 'edgy' as you two, so we'll see if this is right up my alley :-).

Speaking of Galaxie 500 vs Luna, it was Damon and Naomi that was to my ears by far the better of the two offshoots of the original band - surprisingly so, because it was Luna-founder Wareham who wrote, sang, and played guitar on all the Galaxie 500 songs.

Machenbach wrote: "Listen to Vasco, obv. but I got into them via two songs on their first album"

Very good choices; I'd just add from the first album this one (probably the first song I ever heard from them)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8ut8...

and the first one they played in their first concert in Lisbon back in 1995
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YVou...

In the early days, they used to close all their concerts with this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2HLs...

And this was the track (from the second album) that made me fall head over heels with their musicianship (but not actually my favourite song). A little intro (the lyrics) in French.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=olCCk...

Berkley wrote: "Speaking of Galaxie 500 vs Luna, it was Damon and Naomi that was to my ears by far the better of the two offshoots of the original band"

I remember back in the day Luna were called the new Velvet Underground.

Hushpuppy wrote: "Ditto Placebo."

And Faith No More, and Body Count, and White Zombie, Marilyn Manson (ugh!), Metallica, Megadeth... the list is endless. My friends at that time used to listen to a lot of Manowar (crikey!). A couple of songs by Travis were also among my favourites.

And Pixies, Breeders ...

Machenbach wrote: "Slawkenbergius wrote: "Hushpuppy wrote: "and that's my list."

Not a bad list, by all means, but personnally I never liked the Fugees or Salt N Peppa. I'm with you with Gone Till November; it's a g..."

Big Killing Joke fan here, especially the two mid 80s albums which the later of which is very under-rated. Love Like Blood and Eighties are just awesome singles. I liked the early stuff too, found a cd of their hits when i was staying in Berlin, in 1999 some great tracks i played on a tinny cd-discman in my place off the Ku'damm

Machenbach wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Big Killing Joke fan here, especially the two mid 80s albums which the later of which is very under-rated. ."

Yeah, I remember that. And I'm by no means not a fan; Geordie is a great ..."

Jaz is an acquired taste lol, love that story, he clearly failed to "see" the room, let alone read it

I like the bass playing of the late Paul Raven too and Geordie, a legend, does so much with so little, a rival for another deceased musician Andy Gill from Gang of Four(mostly Gills 81-83 work). They reckon Gill died of covid, after touring China in Autumn 2019

Machenbach wrote: "I see the book gets a bit of a slagging in The New Yorker"

Well, I didn't read the whole book (has mr Guan?), but I liked the little I've read. In any case, it's the proper of this kind of publication to express a very personal opinion, not an entirely detached, objective study of a full decade's cultural output.

I still didn't get to what Guan objects: the book's structure, Klosterman's opinions or the man himself?

I've seen Klosternman's name around but haven't read any of his stuff and don't know anything about him, even in terms of reputation or rumours. But I've been out of touch with the pop-music zeitgeist since the late 70s or early 80s - not that I don't have my likes and dislikes, but it's all very haphazard, I don't have any overall sense of the various movements, their inter-relationships, etc.

Slawkenbergius wrote: "Berkley wrote: "Speaking of Galaxie 500 vs Luna, it was Damon and Naomi that was to my ears by far the better of the two offshoots of the original band"

I remember back in the day Luna were called the new Velvet Underground..."

No question they were an influence on Luna's sound, as they were on Galaxie 500. I haveN't listened to Luna for a long time, to be honest, so I should probably re-familiarise myself with their music before making too many sweeping declarations.

Machenbach wrote:He seems to rate him quite highly but perhaps feels that this particular book doesn't do him justice. But it seems like he's missing the point of this book in some ways.

Klosterman had it coming: a plump roast turkey ready to be dissed.

Machenbach wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Jaz is an acquired taste lol, love that story, he clearly failed to "see" the room, let alone read it

I like the bass playing of the late Paul Raven too and Geordie, a legend, does so..."

McGeoch with the Banshees and Levene with PiL....great guitar work!

Berkley wrote: "I haveN't listened to Luna for a long time, to be honest, so I should probably re-familiarise myself with their music before making too many sweeping declarations."

Dean is a brave man. It takes balls to sing Gainsbourg with such an accent.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WiDhC...

Machenbach wrote: " I always liked Mick Harvey and Anita Lane's version ..."

I remember when that came out, but singing in English doesn't count! ;)

Dean even sang a version of Polnareff's "La poupée qui fait non."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KO65d...

Slawkenbergius wrote: "Berkley wrote: "I haveN't listened to Luna for a long time, to be honest, so I should probably re-familiarise myself with their music before making too many sweeping declarations."

Dean is a brave..."

Kind of pointless cover, to my mind. They didn't change the arrangement or add anything new to the song. Even the vocals are a straight imitation of Gainsbourg's and Bardot's.

Bill wrote: "Though Kokoshka’s affair with Alma Mahler is mentioned, nothing is said, after the end of the affair, about Kokoshka’s having made for him a life size, anatomically complete doll in the image of Alma, with which he painted a double portrait ..."

Wow! That is truly creepy! I never heard that story before - thanks for bringing it to our attention. I found an article (including a photo of the doll), which ends:

Although his obsession was clearly sincere, he was also aware of the theatricality of his eccentricity, and played it up. And when he had tired of her, he saw her out in true Expressionist style:

"Finally, after I had drawn it and painted it over and over again, I decided to do away with it. It had managed to cure me completely of my Passion. So I gave a big champagne Party with chamber music, during which my maid Hulda exhibited the doll in all its beautiful clothes for the last time. When dawn broke—I was quite drunk, as was everyone else—I beheaded it out in the garden and broke a bottle of red wine over its head."

https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2...

Can't say that I care for Kokoschka's art - the colours tend to be muddy, and the forms equally unclear and unappealing - presumably, he has some admirers somewhere...

Bill wrote: "Slawkenbergius wrote: "Gee, I miss the nineties."

Is writing about popular music inseparable from a sense of personal nostalgia?

I saw Bill's comment after working my way backwards from a large number of warm words about the music of the 80s and 90s, and was already thinking: "This is well after my time!"

I can't say if others experience popular music in the same way, but I can remember first getting into it via the radio in the mid-50s - our genial host, 'Uncle Mac', would play a mixture of songs for children, novelties (Flanders & Swann, say) and occasional pop tunes. The interest didn't become strong until early adolescence, which coincided with 'the greatest decade in pop history' (the '60s, natch), and lasted a little way into the 70s... after that, nothing - or almost. Some songs are unavoidable - they become part of the aural background of a year or decade - and some performers are so high profile that you can't miss them, even if you would prefer to do so (say, Madonna). But matching songs to named performers? It became almost impossible after 1974.

An example: I watched some episodes of 'Reacher' this week... often, snatches of music are heard in bars or on the car radio... someone mentions 'Patsy', and although I'm not a country fan, I remembered immediately the name and voice of Patsy Cline... I expect most younger people would have said: "Patsy who?":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKTOv...

Earlier, we hear Howlin' Wolf's 'Smokestack Lightning' (more to my taste) - he is not identified at all, but I knew immediately who it was:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Ri7T...

These names and songs probably mean nothing to most people under 70.

If others experience pop music in the same way, then I'd guess the answer to Bill's question is 'yes', for many - though possibly not for professionals - journalists covering the popular music scene.

Edit: since posting that, I went down a few rabbit holes and came up with a few new links:

The Reacher series is based on Lee Child's first novel, Killing Floor... now, you can sort of guess what that means but it also has a very specific meaning:

"Killing Floor" is a classic blues passage/motif, dating back centuries to when many lower working class Americans worked in stockyards & slaughterhouses, & eventually it turned into a common saying & blues lyric. Every slaughterhouse had what was known as a killing floor, where the animals were taken to be butchered, so for someone to say that they were "going to the killing floor" meant that they were in big trouble, having bad luck, or in bad shape. For example, if you were having problems with your wife or old lady, then you would say, "That woman has got me down on this killing floor"

And where did I find that? In a note BTL referring to Howlin' Wolf's song of the same name:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGIE2...

Did Lee Child know this meaning/context and perhaps this song when he named the book? I suspect that he did, given that the explanation for Reacher's arrival in the obscure (and fictional) town of Margrave, Georgia is his desire to visit the resting place of early blues singer Blind Blake - Blake is a real person, but actually died in Milwaukee. If Child knew of Blake, he must have heard of the better known Howlin' Wolf.

Aaaaaaaaargh! I better come up for air...

Can recommend Ray Davies’ X-Ray, The Unauthorised Biography. Think I saw him with The Kinks, must search my 60s bands tickets. Certainly saw him a couple of times solo a few years ago. Always entertaining.

Lass wrote: "Can recommend Ray Davies’ X-Ray, The Unauthorised Biography. Think I saw him with The Kinks, must search my 60s bands tickets. Certainly saw him a couple of times solo a few years ago. Always enter..."

its a brilliant read, up there with the best music biogs, alongside Julian Cope's "Head On"