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Geoff Stahl is a Lecturer in Media Studies at Victoria University of Wellington, Aotearoa-New Zealand.
He's also an occasional DJ, and does a weekly show, TV-Disko, on VBC 88.3 FM, in Wellington, Tuesdays 8-10 PM.
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Bring the Noise by Simon Reynolds
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Feed Me
Crissakes. Been far too long. You know I have this thing as my home page, and it fills me with guilt knowing I’ve not done anything on it for a months and months. Well, more effort to be expended shortly. There are some stories to tell, but I’ll get to that in the next post. Just to let readers know I’m still around and still thinking and doing the odd spot of writing.
More music soon, too.
TV DiSKO
Ahem. Where was I?
It’s been a busy few months for me and I’m doing my dangedest to keep on top of things. The to-do list has aforementioned things slowly being ticked off:
Sample of things musical that have been keeping me sane the last little while:
Where Do i Begin- Love Story (Disco Mix)
More soon,
TV DiSKO
Phew…. I really need to stay on top of this. Perhaps the strategy is not to write long-winded posts, but pepper the blog with bursts of something shorter and sweeter. At the very least let you know I’m still here (and not elsewhere, of course).
Friday night, a TV Disko production at the Mighty Mighty. It went well, from what I recall (there are pictures apparently, so I’ll have to appeal to their evidentiary nature to help the old recall). Seven hours of DJing and a fair share of dancing, people seemed to really like the Spanish psyche, Finnish disco, the Moog music and just about anything else I could throw at them. Nothing fazed them and seemed to only get them into more of a groove. It was a great way to end the trimester for me. More to come at some distant point in the future. Perhaps Mexico City will hold more gems for NZers unsuspecting ears.
In other news, I’ve renewed my visa/permit for another two years. There’s a story here, and I’ll tell it shortly. But for now, back to grading all those first year assignments…
Music too, as in some I played Friday, a teaser for the next event, some months in the future:
Richard Caiton - Listen to the Drums
Hari Bhuvan - Chhuppa Chhuppi
Rumba Tres - Rumba Tru, La, La
Las Grecas - Amma Immi
Out,
TV Disko (this is me, for now)
Okay, back. It’s been a crazy couple of months. Where to begin really? Trimester started, and that’s where it all went south (or is that north here?). I’m teaching, for the second time here at Vic, a large undergraduate course (well over 300 students, which is sizeable for Vic) and I’ve been trying to keep on top of that. I think I’m happy with the way the course has been set up, versus how I did it last year. This is a bit more schematic and based around your run-of-the-mill media studies terminology, rather than things are a bit more abstract.
I’ve decided this year to no longer rely on the “smart” room technology as they pretty much failed me with regularity last year. Now, I do all my lectures on my laptop, which means I’m getting my clips together, audio, etc., all by lonesome. It means a couple extra hours of prep of course, but it makes for a very smooth lecture presentation. I couldn’t do this without ishowu and isquint, which are great little Mac apps that capture and compress very nicely.
I think the students are following and are pretty much on the ball, as you might expect, with terms like ideology, hegemony and subjectivity. We’ll see after the first assignment, natch, but I’m confident.
Doing a course a second time is supposed to be easier, but I’m not entirely convinced, especially since I’ve rebuilt this one from the ground up. I’m sure it will be better than last year and certainly seems to have an obvious narrative structure that links each lecture to the previous one.
During this two month hiatus, I’ve also submitted two articles for consideration. One was that Ping Pong Country piece and the other was for a German journal, called SPIEL, and this one is about play and humour at an electronic music festival, Club Transmediale. Both are about Berlin, really. Fingers crossed that they find a proper home here.
At the same time, I was also helping set up the Berlin Bonanza, which took place over the last two weeks. Great fun with heaps of musical events and artists from Berlin and here. One night was dedicated solely to Krautrock (not by my choice, as it was a Friday and I think the club kids were a little perplexed by it). We set up Ping Pong Country as well, which seemed to go down quite well, once people got over the initial hurdle of trying to imagine what it would look/sound like. Lots of press, with me doing print and radio interviews, which was pretty fabulous fun, too.
I also managed to see an old highschool friend who was passing through Wellington. Not seeing someone for more than twenty years and then catching up on people who’ve long been out of your mind can be quite a trip. It’s been a while since something like that happened.
I should also say that my little amateur photography hobby is paying off as well. As many flickrites no doubt know, there are plenty of businesses and individuals using it to trawl for publicity photos. I’ve had all sorts of requests and I’m usually eager to have my pictures out there. I’ve got photos of mine being used in Sweden, Denmark, Berlin, Montreal and, recently, Carnegie Hall used a photo of mine in their most recent catalogue. No cash for these, but I’m working on it.
It might come through a recent show here that includes two of my photos. The Wellington flickr group just mounted an exhibit of photos at one of the city’s older theatres and it went down well. I haven’t had a minute to actually go down myself, but word on the street is pretty good.
And in other news, I’ve started doing radio again, this time through a new station set up this past month here at Vic. Show name: TV-Disko, you can guess what it sounds like.
Back to the work grind for now, but some new old music for you, in the form of two moog and disco flavoured exotic numbers.
Yes, it’s a bit late, but I’ve been elsewhere (as the title of the blog would indicate). A few weeks acrosss the Ditch, in Adelaide, Melbourne and then up to the Sunshine Coast to Mooloolaba for sun and surf (where I realized I’m not really a sun and surf person at heart). It was great, and I’m glad for the plethora of flora and fauna we saw while there. Goannas, galahs, cockatoos, parrots, kookaburras, scrub turkeys, many beautiful but deadly spiders, flying foxes, among others. Oh, and heaps of great fresh fruit (no bananas, as they’re still out of our spending bracket). A final day spent in Brisbane, overlooking the treetops in the valley was a magical moment, just to see so many of these birds jetting about. Glorious.
As for end-of-the-year lists, it’s been a while since I did this, and really this year has been all about blogspot and rapidshare for me (in a land where new CDs are far out of reach of young-ish lecturer’s salary, I didn’t purchase one new CD in 2006, though the same can’t be said for vinyl).
In no particular order:
Peter Bjorn and John - Writer’s Block (the neo-folk sound continues, this time name-checking The Chills - no doubt showing up on Grey’s Anatomy some time soon…)
Ellen Allien and Apparat - Orchestra of Bubbles (dance throb dance throb dance)
Nathan Fake - Drowning in a Sea of Love (lo-fi electronic pop)
Charlotte Gainsbourg - 5-55 (like father like daughter… and mother, for that matter)
Readymade - FC Babilonia (fey boy girl ethereal pop with music boxes and other gew gaws, with Feist and David Sylvian guesting)
Lo-Fi FNK - Boylife (great Swedish electropop)
Catpower - The Greatest (cheering up she is, sort of)
Beirut - Gulag Orkestar (emo and the Arcade Fire, with horns)
Lambchop - Damaged (it’s been a while since I’ve liked an album of theirs. ‘Bout time)
Nouvelle Vague - Bande a part (yes, it’s ubiquitous music, heard in cafés, or at least I imagine it being heard in cafés, across the world, but that’s comforting in its own way. And at least it’s not the Buena Vista Social Club)
Poni Hoax - Poni Hoax (yes, more indietronica, sort of, but so many hooks and a lovely Gallic flair)
Ms. John Soda - Notes and the Like (lovely stripped down pop, a la Lali Puna)
Dominique A - L’Horizon (French pop, crafted as only this man does it)
Singles for me (some might have shown up at the end of 2005, however):
Madonna - Sorry (Thin White Duke Remix)
Fairmount - Gazebo
CSS - Let’s Make Love and Listen to Death from Above (and remixes)
Jamie Lidell - Multiply Additions
Sebastian Tellier - La Ritournelle (Metronomy remix)
The Cure - Fire in Cairo (Digitalism Remix)
Royksopp - What Else is There (Thin White Duke Remix and the Jacques Lu Cont Remix)
Breakout - Planet Rock (live cover of the electro classic)
Reissues:
Jack Blanchard and Misty Morgan - Life and Death (And Almost Everything Else)
Luna - Best of Luna
Selda - Selda (Turkish psychedelia/disco/rock)
VA - Cult Cargo Belize City Boil-Up
VA - Bombay Connection (Vols. 1 & 2)
VA - In-Kraut: Hipshaking Grooves Made in Germany 1966-1974 (Vol. 2)
Mike Sammes Singers - Comp.
VA - Boogaloo Pow Wow: Dancefloor Rendez-Vous In Young Nuyorica
RIP James Brown, Bernard Estardy, Grant McLennan and too many others to count.
A sample of some things recently dug up:
Eddy Mitchell - Tighten Up
Kati Kovacs - Sehnsucht
Michel Polnareff - La Mouche
Have a good year all,
G.
We’ve come across the Ditch to the West Island for the holidays. It’s been two weeks now, with one to go, yet I’ve still not wrapped my head around a summer Xmas. This is my fourth one and I’m still getting used to it. While on Adelaide’s Rundle St. Mall, I was reminded of the lack of fit through the atonal skronks of somone bleating out “Jingle Bells” on a sax. The out-of-tune sound fit the out-of-season mood just right. Ersatz snow didn’t help either.
Adelaide is a fine town, prim and proper in many respects, and easy to navigate as it’s laid out on a grid (the same planner did Christchurch, NZ, but thankfully left out the space in the former for the neo-Nazis found in the latter). As it’s so flat, I was pining for a bike, but as the temperature edged near 40, I was thinking only of shade and sleep. I don’t think I’ve felt heat like that in over two years now, so my internal thermostat didn’t weather it so well. This was not helped by the whiplash brought on by a dramatic temperature change on Xmas day. Down to 15 it went (they call that “cold” here). And in Victoria, they had snow and hail. All the while friends Up Over are telling me it’s nearing double digits above zero. Hmmm….
The smell of bushfire, however, was a true reminder of where I was for the season. This was certainly more pronounced in Melbourne, where the state has been plagued by drought and fire for the last couple of months. For the past few days a smoky haze and accompanying aroma have been part of the atmosphere infusing the place. From North Fitzroy, where we’re staying now, you can barely see the city, the sun striving to get through the sweet, acrid layer of what were once forests of gum trees.
Even with the threat of drought and heat and heat and more heat, I’m glad to be back in Melbourne. Every return visit here just confirms for me why it remains one of my favourite cities. It’s definitely struck me as a young person’s paradise, and the spread of street art is just one affirmation of this. (Note that you can always tell a town that’s reverberating with the “creative city” buzz when there’s a publishing boom of not only “Guides to…” but also a litany of indie-published books on funky boutiques, restos, local artist hangouts, art galleries, comix culture, and, of course, street art). I’m a bit over it at the moment as there’s just so much of it, and to my eye it’s become overly repetitive and cluttered. The feverishness of the scene has been tempered somewhat (there’s only so much wall space after all), settling down into a tourist attraction where people can have guides show them around the city’s alleyways.
Café culture is clearly in the ascendant as well, and while I prefer the sketchier parts of town, such as those found on stretches of Smith St., which seems to be enjoying a temporary reprieve from the city’s “culturalization,” I can’t say that I don’t mind it, though I definitely waver. Since I lived here in the early 90s, Brunswick St. has been particularly affected (although it was clearly on its way even then). Once boho central, it has continued to trace out the gentrification narrative arc to a T. There’s a boutique for every artist it seems, with many ateliers open for public perusal, and any evidence of going against the grain has been burnished out, leaving only a trademarked funky decrepitude, perfect for cultivating a consumerist paradise (dotted, thankfully, by some good new and used bookstores, woefully absent back in Wellington).
In my own way, I’m a sucker for it, at least when it comes to good summer flavours. Thankfully, Charmaine’s Ice Cream still stands out (though the hipsters have crossed the road to join the gelati revolution at the highly overrated Trampoline), reassuring by virtue of its sweet, sweet, tenacity (but also by the addition of a knockout gingerbread ice cream).
If I’m a bit torn on the hot Xmas, I will take sun and warmth for New Year’s Eve. Nothing wrong with either of those as far as I’m concerned.
Completely irrelevant to the season, two songs to see you into the new year, one by Jack Ary (Les Tomates), the other by Robert Charlebois (Engagement), rocking out in a funky vein.
Have a good one folks.
Le G.
As the trimester winds its way to its inevitable and bathetic conclusion, spring seems in the air. Wellington has, for today at least, shown itself to be an entirely tolerable city weather wise. It’s been a dreary spring for the most part, with only hints of hope now and then. Today was a good day, marred only by wind. Here’s to a great summer and lots of wandering around the wharf and savouring the café life which is really a treat here.
I’m about to have my debut on New Zealand television tonight. A few weeks back, I was asked to comment on the status of country music here in New Zealand (mainly in reference to its absence from commercial radio) and talk about the genre. While hardly an expert, I can waffle on with some degree of expertise (aided by my many great country albums, which I was asked to supply as props). Not sure how I’ll look on the magic talking box, once the editing gets a hold of me. It was a bit forced, with the interviewer and myself cramped into a tiny room at Radioactive, with her in her cowboy boots and all bright and cheery and me underslept and probably sounding more like like Droopy Dog than I wanted. Not in my best radio voice or form, but I’m not really fussed.
The show itself is an arts and culture show, Frontseat, which has tried desperately to spruce itself up by going all “perky” (which consists now of the host wandering around various settings in Auckland and mugging for the camera). I can’t really abide by that, and it’s turned me off the show. That and the fact that it airs at well past my bedtime. It’s also eerily reminiscent of much of the CBC’s arts programming which just went for the middlebrow, wherein someone (usually Evan Solomon) feigned surprise or pitched their CBC-voice an octave higher at anything that might seem too provocative or controversial.
On another note, I’m finally getting my publishing act together. I hope to have two articles out in the next month or so, one ready to go for the end of this month and the next slotted into a special issue of the German journal Spiel. They’re related pieces, in the sense that they take up issues of play and humour in the New Berlin. More on those things later, but it feels good. Little did I know that so much of my academic life would be taken up with the tedium of admin tasks.
Yesterday, Saturday, I spent the day at a symposium on creative industries, which yielded many nice surprises. Not as dominated by management Richard Florida types as I thought. It was much more modest and interdisciplinary. The end result was the start of a fledgling network, with a possible symposium on Wellington as a “creative city.” Yes, they’ve taken that on, too. I suppose I’ll really have to sink my teeth into the music scene here (I’m doing my best and can recommend local heroes So So Modern as an antidote to a scene overshadowed by its dubby other).
The day finished with a friend’s housewarming, in which the couple, a Dutchman and an Indian/Maori woman, did a nice tricultural job of welcoming us into their new digs. Songs and multilingual greetings all ’round. A very good night, which finished with everyone sitting down to watch the NZ vs. UK rugby game. Us “arty” types exempted ourselves from the proceedings.
I’ve also finished up two calendars for 2007. One is titled “World,” and the other is “Wellington.” You can find pdfs of sample versions here and here. I’m asking for $25.00 for these (or $45.00 for two). If you have access to Paypal, you can send it that way, or you can send me a cheque for the NZ equivalent. Send an email to geoff.stahl@vuw.ac.nz
I’ll be DJing later this week, and I’m humming and hawing about whether or not to play these two as part of the intro set. I want to set the mood, which should be a funny one, and then cut to some bottom shakers later. One you’ll recognize as yet another Bollywood rework of an 80s classic. The other is from Bernard Estardy, a French musician known for his work with Nino Ferrer, his countless library albums and the album “La Forumule de Baron,” from whence this gem is plucked. Let me know what you think.
Le G.
For the past few weeks, I’ve been contending with what my doctor has now diagnosed as an ecotopic arrhythmia. Unlike tachycardia, which is the more serious version of an irregular heartbeat, mine is the benign sort. It’s not necessarily life threatening, though it can be if it intensifies. The sensation is of my heart missing a beat occasionally, not all the time, but with some frequency. It gives me pause, to say the least. The blood work, cholesterol tests, liver and kidneys are all good. Blood pressure is low, but a healthy low. It’s stress related more than likely. Now that I’ve cut out caffeine and reduced alcohol consumption to just about nil, things seem somewhat better. However, there is this strange sensation that my heart will just stop at some point, and not start again.
The funny thing is, I’m not particularly frightened by this. Yes, yes, I get somewhat put out when it happens, that goes without saying, but in quieter moments, after it passes, I think of the bigger picture.
Sure, I’d like to stick around for a bit longer, for all sorts of obvious and not so obvious reasons (hey I’ve got a girl who loves me and wants me around as well, and I’m keen to give her as much of my love as possible, which is really reason numero uno). You should pardon my tone here. I’m very matter-of-fact about this, which might seem odd. But I’ve got just cause, I think. First of all, I’m happy to have been to all the places I’ve been, to have met all the people I’ve met and to have done all the things I’ve done. Never did I imagine that once I’d finished highschool I’d go to Montreal, travel to countries like Western Samoa, Thailand, Japan, the Netherlands, Estonia, the UK, Turkey, and India, live in places like Australia, Germany, Sweden, Finland, and now New Zealand. All of these experiences often astound me, when I take time to ponder them and what they’ve meant to me and how I got to where I am now. There are regrets and I’ve done and said things that I wish I could repair somehow, of course. Apologies need to be made and a few more thank yous as well. This goes without saying. Overall, however, I’m content with where I’m at, and I still have time (methinks) to sort out many of these niggling concerns.
Of course, when you put it into my general world view, it could be seen as all for nought, really, when it comes down to it, which becomes clearer when you consider my second reason:
I’m an atheist. I don’t believe in a higher power of any sort. Never have. I’m secular through and through. Which is to say, that for me when the heart stops, so does the rest of the machinery and that’s it. Blackness. It’s as simple and stark as that, really. Nothing to be afraid of, not meeting my maker and being judged fit or unfit to pass through some pearly gates or burn in any fires of perdition, traverse some river or other, or doing anything else that sees my “soul” journeying elsewhere.
There are moments when my atheism gets poked and prodded a bit and I’ll launch into a tirade or two about it. I cast my mind back to one moment, where I was particularly put off when after my father died people kept trotting out platitudes like “Things happen for a reason.” Not for a second do I think they meant to say that he had a bad heart that just gave out; i.e., a medical reason. They meant something else which they thought was consoling, an appeal to another force, as though there is something called “fate” or some divine hand guiding us, one which decided, for some unknown reason, to take my father away (they say these things to console themselves, I think). For me, fate is nothing but a sequence of chance events, an arbitariness plugged into convenient narrative templates that help us make sense of the world, a kind of commonsensical fuzzy logic. Instead, I follow that old school existential mantra that we are condemned to be free, which always sounds grandiose when put that way (thanks JPS), but is really a pragmatic way of seeing ourselves as necessarily and ethically committed to being in this world, not beholden to the promise of access to some shadowy nether region that we should otherwise aspire to.
All of which is to say: I’m not afraid of the dark.
Le G.
So last weekend I spent my time at Scape, the biannual arts festival held down in Christchurch. It’s been about fifteen years since I was last there, so it was pretty much like seeing the city for the first time. There were vague memories of it, but Cathedral Square seemed about the only noticeable space that had changed. It’s been done up now, with requisite stainless steel style icon jutting out of it. Dreadful thing, really, and frightfully out of scale with the square itself.
It is, they say, NZ’s most English city, which as I’ve noted before, is saying a great deal, as NZ seems to be doing British better than the British sometimes. It also plays host to some of NZ’s most notorious racist movements. It’s an unremarkable place to me for those and many other reasons. It’s creepy, really.
Scape was a decent enough event, but I wasn’t particularly moved by any exhibit or any installation. They were clever more than anything, but they generally stuck to the theme “Don’t Misbehave.” The opening night proceedings were to provide just about the only spark for me, with a Chinese artist charging the stage and reading out his manifesto, calling the festival “The Boring and Bullshit” event, which was not really too far off the mark. Sadly, at the moment I expected to sprayed with pig’s blood or animal entrails, he simply left the stage, his little intervention welcomed with smiles and polite applause. Sad.
The only other ripple in the weekend happened before the symposium I was to lead, when a couple of street artists (from the Netherlands and Finland) were challenged as to why their work didn’t take into account local circumstance (which was not an accurate portrayal of their projects and the manner in which they were inserted into various streetscapes in the end). The other query was lobbed at the organizers, who were there, this one coming from a Brit who was clearly not happy to exchange simple pleasantries or offer up aesthetic platitudes. He was laying into them for what he saw as complacency and safe choices. Well, now, this second critique seems to respond to the first better than the artists could. This is a festival that seems to have loads of money, enough that they can fly the artists over and put them up in the Holiday Inn for $140.00/night for two weeks. The choices made regarding which artists should be part of it cannot be divorced from the simple economics of running a festival like this, one which the city relies on for tourist, and well as local, dollars. And from what I’m told, there are quite a few wealthy NZ eccentrics who will throw money at something like this with relative ease. Anything too out there is simply not going to fly, of course, so one shouldn’t expect too risky in this context. I’m in agreement with the second criticism, in principle, but I didn’t expect groundbreaking; I expected humour and play, which is what I got.
Along this line, then, the Ping Pong Country events were a success. I wasn’t sure how it was going to go down there, but everyone picked up on it and it turned out to be a great event. A lovely installation, too, which will stick around for a few more weeks. It was good to see the Golden Country Boys there and then to have them up here to host a night in Wellington. This too was a success. Perhaps we’ll see more of that here?
Related music:
Tommy Hancock - Tacos for Two
Roy Hogsed - Rag Mop
Le G.
I’m off to Christchurch later on today, to prepare for a little pingpong country action, as part of the Scape arts festival. I’m leading a symposium on art in the city, which should be good fun. As part of this I was asked to do an interview for RDU, the student radio station based at Canterbury down there. Assuming it would be about ping pong I was jazzed to talk about it. However, the first question was “Why did you choose media studies in New Zealand? I mean, we’re a small country at the bottom of the world, why would you come here when you’ve been to so many other more exciting places?” Well, I explained, I’ve always loved New Zealand, after coming here in the early nineties, and had longed to get back here somehow. I didn’t expect an academic job would do it for me, but it did and for that I’m grateful. I admitted that I’ve loved the music most. And I like Wellington more and more. Sure, it feels small and isolated sometimes, but that’s part of the charm for me. I can leave a couple of times year, get over to Aus, maybe to Europe, but I like it here and I’ve done the big cities for the time being.
The interview continued after that and hit on some ping pong and country issues. As we wrapped up, he asked me if I’d be interested in offering some sort of media commentary as part of their new breakfast show. I was flattered, naturally. He claimed, with some earnestness, that people with American or Canadian accents always sound like they know what they’re talking about. A shining moment of self-deprecating cultural anxiety, the kind that wants some sort of confirmation that they matter. This is another instance in which I make that analogy to Sally Field winning her Oscar for “Places in the Heart,” that point when she says “You like me, you really like me.” Sometimes someone says something that makes that seem so a propos.
Music is not thematic in any shape or form today, so here’s just a few rarities that I’ve ripped and have been loving lately.
Geval Trio - Psicosis (sic)
Amral’s Trinidad Cavaliers - Oye Como Va (sampled by the Beastie Boys)
S. P. Balasubrahmanyam and S. Janaki - Boochi Boochi (with a lovely Hi-NRG break a la Bobby Orlando/Divine)
I’ve been contending, as long-time readers of this blog know, with chest issues for nearly two years now. I’ve seen doctors in three countries and have only recently been told what the issue is. It’s something called costochondritis. It’s not my heart, but rather an inflammation of the cartilage between the sternum and my rib, which just so happens to be near a nerve close to my heart, literally and figuratively. It’s a rather unpleasant sensation which at times feels like my heart is about to be punctured. Of course, once they found a name for it, and a list of symptoms, and the suggestion that it’s something I’m going to have to live with, it made dealing with it much easier. I just can’t sleep on my left side and should stay away from any heavy lifting or stress on my left side. I’m blaming shoulder bags and books for this.
That sorted, I’m dealing now with caffeine withdrawal as the old ticker was taking a, um, beating due to my intake (modest amounts really, just two lattés, sometimes just one). Seems like I had picked up arrhythmia and that’s just not a great sensation to have. I’m off the stuff now and will be for a while. I’ll miss it, of course, but then there are approximate substitutes I’m happy to deal with if it means a few more hours here. Chicory here I come!
For those academic friends of mine, here’s a story that might ring true for some of you. I’m of two minds regarding this, not least because I’ve met some of the people involved, think the project is a great and timely one, and applaud the award to our Media Studies colleagues. However, it reiterates my point below: that this is a small place sometimes and it’s just too damned hard to avoid these sorts of conflicts. It would have been nice, however, if the members of the committee who had put in the project had recused themselves for this year. Strange place this, sometimes.
Two songs, to follow from today’s themes.
Le G.
Up until Friday night, I hadn’t purchased a single CD since I arrived in New Zealand. Not one. Sure, I’ve scoured the vinyl sections of the city’s two (sigh) record shops, Real Groovy and Slowboat, and they’ve got heaps of used material. It’s just that the cost is prohibitive (on average a new CD costs $35 a pop). Being conscripted to DJ an 80s night and having the bulk of that music in storage in Canada (hi Mom), mainly because the university only covers the bare minimum for moving expenses even when you’re moving half-way across the world and you require books and things like vinyl to keep you happy and allow you do your job (lecturer/DJ) properly, I needed some Prince pronto. I have this on LP, of course, but was reduced to buying the CD of “Purple Rain,” used.
Aside: this is not to say that I’m not hearing new (and old) music. I am, but let’s just say I do my “shopping” on blogspot these days (and I’m noting that the Brazilians have a lock on rapidshare).
The night I was DJing was itself a deliciously sordid affair. A former student of mine had asked if I’d be interested in playing their end of year ball, which was 80s themed. I was told that it would be me spinning for two hours, then a band for an hour, then me for the last hour. My first two hours went well enough, with a few local hits thrown in for good measure. The band, however, was something else entirely. They weren’t quite prepared, had not done a sound check (although they had plenty of time before the night started), didn’t have the right patch chords, and were aggressively not inclined to keep people dancing. Instead, the guitarist opened with a Godspeed song, yes, droning guitar line with echo reverb and all. Now, I appreciate the avant-gardist gesture as much as the next person, but you gotta know your audience, especially if you have to face them in the cafeteria queue the next day and some of them are serving you your food…. I was asked by the organizers to go back on after the band had played for a fifteen minutes. They were not happy, but then the audience wasn’t either. Shame really, because they did sound pretty tight.
It’s been many years since I’ve seen anything quite like what I saw from my perch. A combination of bad dress sense (not the night to wear heels, ladies), subsidized booze (binge drinking anyone?) and wanton desire (snogging, snogging, snogging) provided quite the spectacle and made the night a memorable one for me. That and the two boys who spent a good portion of the night dry-humping my turntable rig. Kiwi masculinity at its best. Charming.
A sample of the NZ music I played, from the Swingers and their song “Counting the Beat,” featuring one-time Split Enz member, Phil Judd. When I did the odd set at Jupiter Room in Montreal on L’Eighties night (RIP, thankfully I think), I always wanted to play this but figured it would have fallen somewhat flat as it’s relatively unknown outside of Australasia (though it has sonic qualities that clearly locate it in that era).
Le G.
So, there you have it. The blog has been done over, using a great new theme (WuCoco - details in the footer), which I’ve modified ever so slightly. It’s certainly a lot easier on your eyes now and has lovely curves to it.
I’m busy attending a postgrad conference here at Vic at the moment and will put something longer up in the next day or so.
A shout out to my sister whose birthday it is. I have the luxury of noting it twice due to time zone differences, which is very nice for both of us. Time differences, however, meant I could only really call her the day before her actual birthday and could only leave messages on her phone.
In other news, I’ve been somewhat alarmed by the recent spate of posts on this flickr photo of mine. The debate about corporal punishment here in New Zealand has reached a fever pitch as of late, and it makes me realize many things about this place. The scale and scope of the country comes into sharp focus in moments like this, where national newspapers, magazines, radio shows and now posters, weigh into the debate and give it more heft than it warrants. Moral panics flourish here as a result. New Zealand feels very much like the epitome of the global village times like this, where domestic issues get aired regularly and become part of a public debate and discourse, aided and abetted by the media. These flare up every few weeks and plenty of people opine from various political perspectives with little or no advancement, waiting only until the next issue appears (text bullying, boy racers, etc.), which it does almost like clockwork.
In other news, the “orientation” of Prime Minister Helen Clark’s husband, Peter Davis, has become front page news. A photo has surfaced of the PM’s husband seemingly engaged in a kiss with Ian Davis, a gay, Labour Party candidate, celebrating his wife’s election victory. As part of a muckraking political climate that’s dominating the scene here as of late, this is yet another well-rehearsed moment in which the political fortunes of a leader of a political party are seen to hinge on their ability to address publicly what should remain a private matter (and there is considerable debate as to whether anything “untoward” actually occured). Cynical to say the least. The same can be said of Don Brash’s latest extra-marital dalliance, an allegation which was raised by a member of Labour in Parliament, regarding his affair with a woman not his wife. (I don’t have much respect for Don Brash, not least because of his ties with the rabidly religious Exclusive Brethren and the links they have with detectives hired to spy on Members of Parliament, not to mention their dodgy anti-social, anti-same-sex marriage, bring-on-the-Apocalypse, bent. That said, I really don’t hold a torch for Labour either, as they continue to ignore the plight of members of what used to make up their constituency, such as the employees of Woolworth’s and other stores who are mired in a nasty lockout. They also completely destroyed any shred of dignity and respect they might have had when they screwed up the foreshore and seabed issue, such that disaffected Maori in the Labour Party formed their own political party, as Labour drifted further and further toward the centre and beyond into decidedly conservative waters).
I weary of these things because they make this place seem so petty, insecure, and small-minded, upright and uptight at the same it wants to come across as morally stringent. Prudish, even, but a prudishness which must be beaten into people at a every stage of life, of course.
The moral rectitude expressed in response to that poster, and with regard to personal affairs of political figures, makes me shudder. All of this makes me think of the appearance of Mitterand’s mistress at his funeral. But then, you might hear people muttering, “You know what they say about the French…”.
Le G.
Otherwise known as spring cleaning (for my Up Over friends, it is that time of year here).
Yes, things are changing, ever so slightly here. I’ve been tweaking my blog’s css for the past couple of days in order to see what colour schemes work. I’ve been told that some IE users couldn’t load the images, which I wasn’t aware of as I’m a Safari/Firefox user and there were no issues visible on my end.
As you can see, the category headings are still wonky, but I’m trying. And hey, it’s been only a few days since the last post, which indicates It’s Alive.
Keep your eyes peeled for a few more changes, and some more regular posting.
Amuse yourself.
Le G.
Briefly: For the past two years, I’ve been posting heaps of pictures up on Flickr. I recently surpassed 20, 000 views, which is not bad by my standards (though I don’t know what other peoples’ counters are like, to be honest). I’ve been particularly interested in the way in which my skill as an amateur has been affected by comments posted there. I never really had the photographic bug before this, and most of my pictures always seemed to be rather simple, dull things (I generally have a proscription about people appearing in my pictures, for which I’ve been chastized many times. I call what I do, however, post-humanist humanism, to be trite about it). Having an audience has meant I’m conscious now of what I’m doing, although being told “You’ve got a good eye” helps as well. All this said to lead into a story about one of my Flickr encounters.
One thing I’ve not referred to earlier on the blog is how Flickr put me in touch with someone from my old highschool, a woman named Sakura. When I first started using Flickr, I occasionally poked around at various groups and read the boards associated with each (I say that in the past tense because I’m less and less inclined to do so now, for all sorts of reasons). Here I found one of her images, before I knew it was her. Struck by it, I then went to her profile, to find out it was the same Sakura I’d grown up with, but had lost with over time and distance. We reconnected briefly, with her telling me about her impending move to Ohio for an academic job. I checked her blog out and posted a couple of comments and we chatted. I had always thought that she was a bit of an outsider when we grew up and only really got to know her after we had both left highschool. I know she was bitter about that experience and I wanted to ask her about it, but never got the chance. A month or so after reconnecting, she made the move from Toronto to Ohio, driving down. She posted on her blog her excitement and nervousness at the big change. She took pictures. She posted when she got to Ohio, from the public library about how smoothly everything had gone. And then silence. It took a few days to find out what was happening, but eventually someone posted to her last Flickr photo that she had died. Shocked, I tracked down her blog, where I had to sift through the best wishes to see that the first “RIP,” then gradually an explanation. She had died in a car crash moments after she’d left the library where she’d made her last post to her blog.
There have been, of course, various websites dedicated to people who’ve disappeared from myspace and other sites. I can’t say anything more to this really, but I often think of Sakura and the lingering photos and her blog, virtual testaments to her skill and humour and the cipherspace she left for her many friends, acquaintances, and her family.
I felt it needed to be said.
To my friends in Montreal, I know what’s happening there. Memories of other horrific shootings come to mind, when I was there as an undergrad and those that came later. That all these incidents happened in places of higher learning is frightening. The so-called ivory tower looks less and less like it’s beyond the pale when it comes to hate, anger, frustration, and explosive murderous rage.
Blog note: I’m still in the process of tidying up here, getting the header right, etc. Time permitting, I’ll do that at some point in the next couple of weeks. Don’t take that as any kind of promise. Just be glad I’m posting again.
Meantime, music….
Le G.
Okay, okay. It’s been a while. The time slipped by really, and things just went mad here at work, start of term, middle of term and more of that. Apologies all ’round for that. I will try to be more on the ball with this as the few readers I do have have wondered where I’ve gone. I’ve not been far, er, well, that’s not entirely true. I’ve been to various conferences, one in Sydney and another in Istanbul. I was asked to write a blurb on my travels in the latter, for the Association of Cultural Studies’ newsletter. I wasn’t particularly taken with the conference, for a number of reasons which I’ll not get in to here. However, Istanbul this time around was great and it was nice to have friends to share it with. So without further ado, here’s the review (I chose a Perec quote to start things off, a bit I have cited here before. You can see where my blog life and academic life blur occasionally).
Thoughts on Istanbul, the city that happened around the conference.
To cover the world, to cross it in every direction, will only ever be to know a few square metres of it, a few acres, tiny incursions into disembodied vestiges, small, incidental excitements, improbable quests congealed in a mawkish haze a few details of which will remain in our memory: out beyond the railway stations and the roads, and the gleaming runways of airports, and the narrow strips of land illuminated for a brief moment by an overnight express, out beyond the panoramas too long anticipated and discovered too late, and the accumulations of stones and the accumulations of works of art.
George Perec
Species of Spaces and Other Pieces (1997)
This was my first Crossroads conference and my second trip to Istanbul (my first visit came while I was based in Berlin, which has its own “Little Istanbul” in Kreuzberg; the second after a move to New Zealand, which has its own “Istanbul” restaurant on Cuba St.). As there are no doubt many other conference reviews, and at the invitation of the editors of this newsletter, let me take the liberty to give a brief glimpse into my perambulations around the city before, during, and after the conference. My meandering was not done without reference to the conference however, as my motivation was to do my own informal study of the city’s cultural life.
A confession, but certainly not one I harbour alone, I’m sure: one of the reasons I go to conferences is, whenever possible, to bookend the trip with opportunities to survey a locale’s uncharted pleasures, inspired as I am to seek out those nooks and crannies that get me off a well-worn path, the wilful search for the promise of some element of surprise and wonder (couple this with the fact that it’s a forty-hour flight from New Zealand, the urge to wander, if only to work off the jet lag, seems necessary to sorting myself out). I’m driven in part, nay mostly, by my desire to collect odd and/or unusual local music and ephemera, as well as an insatiable need to photograph all sorts of buildings, alleyways and assorted urban fragments (I’ve collected many of these photos here).
I could indulge in Istanbul’s musical and cultural detritus this time because I’d scoured many of the tourist sites and learned to manage and navigate through the sea of hustlers who cluster around the Blue Mosque and other sites in Sultanahmet during that first visit. This second visit allowed me a chance to witness the city unfolding through other daily rituals and encounters. I admit that I weary easily of museums and galleries, fatigue befalling me after an hour or so. Instead, give me cafés and restaurants, bars, shops and the vital artlessness of street life that keeps me alert and primed to wander for hours. Sitting among backgammon players, game boards squared up against teacups full then empty then full again; I’ll take this over the still, pallid air of yet another museum. I’ll happily indulge instead in soaking up a street scene where the atmosphere is heavy with the smell of fresh food and sharp with the tang of cat urine, knowing that this is the city. I’ll spend hours perched on a stool, reading, writing, editing, distracted now and again at the sight of some curiosity, architectural or otherwise, savouring precisely those vestiges and incidentals of which Perec writes, miniature affirmations of the city’s character, its tenor, and its tempo.
A story: I was roaming again, strolling through the city’s many alleys, past brothels and crumbling tenements, mosques and pensions, serpentine passages and dimly-lit arcades, the latter filled with reams of Turkish tabloids, style and fashion magazines, 70s movie posters and tawdry daybills, a treasure trove of trash, the forgotten and the forlorn massed in piles well over a metre high. It was clear to me that since last in the city, only a year earlier, things had changed, but only incrementally, thankfully. The old man who ran one of the tiny little curiosity shops that stole three too many of my afternoons, floor to ceiling as it was with books and vinyl, had passed away. It was run now by a young woman with tattoos coiled around her forearms, who indulged me (and with me) as I sifted through a mountain of chipped and dusty Turkish 45s and LPs, she explaining to me the titles, the lyrics, and divulging, with occasional salacious glee, the sordid or tragic life of the artist. As I placed them on the turntable and played them over the shop speakers, she was sometimes wistful, sometimes smiling, but genuinely pleased to see someone taken with so many different sounds, Western, Eastern, caught up in the pleasure of fossicking around in, to these ears at least, the unheard archive of arabesque pop housed there.
I revel in these more mundane pleasures, not bent on spending my day in awe of Istanbul’s monumental grandeur, which always feels so abstract and distant to me. Rather, I was keen to give in to the minor rapture found in the immediacy, the tactility, of these etched slivers of pop culture, hearing the patina of age and their travels, from who knows where, in the pops and crackles of once-loved 45s, seeing the smile of the shop owner as I put on another song that transported her elsewhere, and witnessing the delight she clearly had in telling me stories of growing up with this music.
Another affirmation: At the Grand Bazaar, away from the carpet salesmen and knock-off jean stalls, I watched as a gramophone repairman, a fastidious septegenarian, toiled furtively in his shop, tucked down a less-trodden offshoot of the bazaar’s main laneways. Dwarfed by a wonderful floral display of antique horns, flanked by walls filled with old 78s from East and West, Europe and Asia, shelves piled high with crank phonographs, greasy gears and cylinders, here he was with soldering iron in hand, meticulously attending to the metal innards of what must surely be the last of a dying breed. He seemed oblivious to my presence, although given the close quarters, there was only a moment of silence. He asked if I wanted a photograph and pointed out some wonderful blue-tinted horns, as well as the window display of gramophone needle tins from around the world. I took a moment and set up my tripod, watching him turn to work again, and began snapping away. I thanked him in my very broken Turkish, he smiled and then greeted a man carrying a wounded phonograph into the shop. The cycle continues….
These two encounters, about the pleasure of music, the tangibility of history, the local and the global, and the many resonances of popular culture, are what I’ll forever remember about Istanbul, vignettes that affirm once again that culture is ordinary and its multiple pleasures are always to be found in the nuanced grooves of the everyday.
You can find out more about the conference here
More soon, but not before I leave you with some music. Three Turkish tunes which I found the first trip there. Some more to come, but I have to rip those still. Patience, as you’ve not doubt learned to exercise already….
Ilham Gencer - Istanbul
Cici Kizlar - Delisin
Siluetler - Lorke-Lorke
Le G.
Some news I didn’t want to hear, regarding one of my favourite songwriters: Grant McLennan, one half of the Go-Betweens, has died in his sleep at 48.
I’ve been a fan of the Go-Betweens for about as long as I can remember, really getting stuck into their album “16 Lovers Lane,” in the late 80s, but catching many of their singles prior to that. Polished and with guitar strum that seemed to shimmer with sunlight, music providing the counterpoint to the harsher lyrics of songs like “Streets of Your Town,” which stood out as a poignant vignette of the desperation of everyday life. It was once I was actually in Australia that I delved deeper, going all the way back to their earlier, much rawer songs (”Karen,” “Lee Remick,” etc.). I was hooked and, being a completist when it comes to only a few bands, I managed to find everything they ever put out: singles, albums, cassettes. Many of them would sit unlistened to for years (”Dusty in Here” comes to mind, of course), but when I pulled them out they bore much fruit in the way of warm reminisces. The Go-Betweens folded in the late 80s, returning with forceful charm, vigour, and the same pop sensibility with 2000’s “Friends of Rachel Worth,” an album which renewed my faith in their enduring partnership and the ease with which they could craft a good, eternally hummable tune.
I’ve always been of two minds about who I prefer in the band; I’ve loved Robert’s arch and oblique lyrical style at various times, but I’ve always been a sucker for a good tune with an easy rhyme thrown in, and that was Grant. A lyric or two might make me wince, but he really got so much right in sentiment, even when the words seemed a little trite or forced (”Hope Then Strife,” “Bye Bye Pride,” etc.). But that was the charm, really. That and great hooks.
I’ve seen them both live, but never together, Grant first in Melbourne in 1992 and Robert in 1993. I regret I was never in a place where they were playing together, but I do have their most recent live DVD, “That Striped Sunlight Sound,” which I’ll no doubt be watching later tonight. Upon visiting Brisbane way back when, I could see so much of what they had sung about, all those songs enriching my experience and deepening my love of Australia and limning its imaginary forevermore.
Cattle and Cane, from 1983 and penned by Grant, remains a signature song for the band, and it conjures up an image of Queensland that I find still resonates with me. The guitar line (the “guitar dueling” which is a part of their signature sound is not so evident here, but I’ve always heard it as a subtle nod to Television, and Robert’s voice often had something of Tom Verlaine about it, too), and the melancholic, impressionistic lyrics come together as sounds and images that evoke scenes from a distant time and place that I live with to this day. The song still puts a lump in my throat.
For the next little while, I’ll re-visit their music (new and old) knowing that this was a band that aged rather gracefully and that Grant has left us with a substantial body of work for which I’ll always be thankful.
Le G.
A brief riposte to this comment over on Topical Ointment, by Nabeel, up Auckland Uni way. I’m hardly the “whinging pom” he confesses to be, but I’d agree in kind that various forms of media in New Zealand leave something to be desired. With few exceptions (and I’m thinking here of two shows hosted by Jeremy Wells, “Eating Media Lunch,” and “The Unauthorized History of New Zealand,” as well as “Outrageous Fortune”), I’m inclined to think that perhaps he’s been spoiled, somewhat, by his previous incarnation in the Land Up Over, so his distaste for things mediated here in NZ I’m willing to forgive. That’s not to say there’s nothing to complain about for lovers of stylish, homegrown pop culture, and being from Canada, and Quebec more specifically, I’m only too aware of what kind of cultural product one gets with wads of cash thrown at tried and true formulae courtesy a State deadset on perpetuating the status quo and a stunted notion of cultural nationalism (Robert LePage anyone?). I’m willing to forgive the pap and the teet-sucking just a bit, though what I’m about to say will only just serve to reiterate some of his points.
I’ll weigh in on this briefly just to note the dominance of the televisual airwaves by one CanWest, which happens to own C4, the “youth” channel which imports the bulk of its programming from the US (various MTV programs, South Park, Beavis and Butthead, and, thankfully, the Daily Show, but only once a week!), the UK (Little Britain) and Australia (John Safran’s Music Jamboree). Now, given my inclination to things audiovisual and viewy gewy good, C4 has occasionally given me some pleasure, but those brief moments are reserved for only a couple of programs, in between the moronic “Pimp My Ride” and sophomoric “Punk’d,” and a slew of other imported dated and stale tripe. After a viewing of “John Safran’s Music Jamboree,” an Aussie import with a wry and witty host giving us his take on pop music and related things, all of which can be quite humorous, I was struck once again by a fetid colonialism which I’ve been put off by more and more here (and that’s not just the primetime showing of Coronation Street - which also happens in Canada). It might well be a reflex (and increasingly reflexive) sense of cultural cringe I’ve been harbouring my entire life, living in another colonized context, but there is something in this that I find both frustrating and fascinating. Given that this show is set in Melbourne, which might arguably be the music capital of Australia, and that most of its humour relies heavily upon references that are so much part of what’s referred to here often as “The West Island,” across “The Ditch,” all of which are no doubt part of the media lexicon of young NZers, I’m inclined to think that, like the rest of the world and its experience of New York, Australia is a place many New Zealanders have lived while never having actually been there. There is something deeply, profoundly offensive about it, really. Of course, with an Aussie partner who loves both Melbourne and music (and I love all three, of course), we’ll be sitting through it, no doubt. I’ll be grinding my teeth, mind you. (I might add that Trailer Park Boys is showing here now, late at night, so maybe I’ll see her Aussie imperialism and raise her a set of Maritime Canadian stereotypes. Shelley’s hardly an imperialist by the way; I was just a slave to the metaphor.)
Someone in Australia once described to me the relationship between Australia and New Zealand as one in which the former “monstered” the latter. It’s a great description and one I’m happy to use as much as possible when confronted by shows like Music Jamboree, which is masqueraded here as a hip and happening commentary on a popular culture which both is and isn’t NZ’s own.
My preference for things musically NZ is pretty well-known, and it generally falls on this side of indie, doing my best to avoid the dub/reggae nexus which dominates so much of Wellington. The following are three songs which deepened my adoration for this place, oldies but goodies. There’s plenty of new music to choose from and down the road, I’ll no doubt put some up for you. For now, here’s a selection that has made me happy:
The Clean - Tally Ho, Beatnik, Chumpy
The Bats - Afternoon in Bed
And so many months ago, I posted a couple of Bowie clips with Klaus Nomi in the background. Here’s one I promised but didn’t deliver: Boys Keep Swinging.
G.
Well now, that looks a sight better doesn’t it? Will do a bit more to make it come together all nice and stuff, but that’s just about where I want it for the time being.
Doing my best to slog through some grading at the moment, getting on top of various admin things and generally taking this mid-term break as easy as possible. Three lectures to prepare for next week, and given that it’s a short week, due to Anzac Day (April 25), there’s a tiny crunch on. Something on modernism/postmodernity in the Film Dept, having to do with the representation of LA, which fits nicely with my own first-year course where I’ll do my best to get the same ideas across in very simple terms. See how that goes down. Something on mashups and p2p as well in another course on New Media. Many hats I’ll wear next week.
Shelley and I took a day to do more of a tour up the North Island, going as far north as Palmerston North then across and back down through the Rimutakas, which has one of the most treacherous climbs you can imagine. The boy racers seem particularly fond of it. As we were in a friend’s car, lent to us for two weeks, and it had some proper horsepower, this was much less nerve-wracking than the last time I did that trip. It was a glorious sunny day for the most part and we did our best to soak up the warmth. As it was Easter weekend, we did hit the traffic snarl, but a stop at the Rail Museum in Paekakariki was just the respite we needed. No wine tours and as the cheese operators are few and far between here, we just settled for a good drive around (the image above is the Tui Brewery in Mangatainoka). Have a gander at the Flickr site, through the badge on the left, to see more, more, and more.
Sunday we did our best to make up some hot-cross buns, which Shelley has mastered quite masterfully. A real treat to finally have an oven which bakes properly, and even more of a treat to find someone who’s happy to make good use of it. More of that to come (and we’ll be taking advantage of the recipes found here. Perhaps now off to see Inside Man, which just opened last week.
I’ve also uploaded my 2006 calendar for you. Some of you might have this, but for those that don’t, here’s your chance. It’s in A3 size, but you can scale it down to suit your paper size.
Music we listened to along the way was pretty varied (Shelley has exceptional taste, by the way, a fact confirmed by her collection of vinyl arriving with just the right kind of Moog, Koto, and James Last records, plus a great Bacharach/Bach/Beatles and Bossa Nova LP which is great for Sunday lunch). As culled from one of the local record shops, here’s something from one of the Monkees, a rare treat and not so easy to find.
I’ve done a bit of a blog upgrade and the old template wasn’t up to the task, so I’ve gone for a slight revamp. The site as a whole will be tweaked and tuned over the next couple of weeks, getting it back in shape.
Shelley has arrived, the loved one, and it is wonderful and great. Fantastic really.
Le G.
