Lovely piece, and spot-on about Slint’s lasting reputation and influence. It’s let down only by the rote in-group signaling about “dance music” and rap. The contradictory facets of Albini’s public persona are perplexing: he is capable of both tremendous intelligence and sensitivity, and the crassest adolescent posturing. Chuck Eddy has a great paragraph on ‘Songs About F***ing’, where he says that on ‘Tiny, King of the Jews’ Albini seems to break through into real insight about the bleak corner he has painted himself into. And then he breaks up Big Black and starts a new band called Rapeman. He is now one of the best follows on Twitter: consistently thoughtful and genuinely witty. Who would have thought it?
Spam Risk / Scam Risk
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Dear Simon Reynolds,
My name is ___________________ and I work with the programming team at BBC
Radio 4, a nationally recognized Hot Adult Contemporar...
Pure Inspiration
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Well, I may not have provoked a musician to pen a retaliation tune (unlike
my own flesh and blood, who recently joined a select pantheon of irritant
crit...
Presentemanía
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In November last year, Kieran and I joined Argentine critics *Pablo
Schanton* and *Antonia Kon* to discuss music writing and music's future as
part o...
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum
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Absolutely *fascinating* current affairs programme from 1972 looking at
advice columnists - Dr Stephen Black talks to Marjorie Proops of the *Daily
Mir...
Letter to a Young Music Critic
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The easy answer: if you want your writing to be more passionate, write
about things you feel passionate about
Otherwise it can feel a bit forced
If you ...
Fuck Art, Let's Dance / Fuck Dance, Let's Art
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*(a talk I gave at Harvard in 2012 at a conference on Art + Rock) *
“When 'art' walks through the door, it's got 15 suitcases full of very
smelly washi...
faves of the 2010s
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(Tracks not full lengths)
Ke$ha – “We R Who We R”
Ke$ha - “Backstabber”
Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti, "Round and Round"
Rangers – “Golden Triangles”...
Visual Music - a lecture, by me
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*Visual Music - a talk at the Tate Modern, July 27 2018*
*Presented by 4:3 as part of the Uniqlo Tate Late series*
There is a subset of experimental ani...
angel delights
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https://rada-ve.bandcamp.com/track/saturn-rings-songs
*Go on* - listen to that gorgeous bubble bath of synthtronica!
Another vintage release, with a vi...
Lovely piece, and spot-on about Slint’s lasting reputation and influence. It’s let down only by the rote in-group signaling about “dance music” and rap. The contradictory facets of Albini’s public persona are perplexing: he is capable of both tremendous intelligence and sensitivity, and the crassest adolescent posturing. Chuck Eddy has a great paragraph on ‘Songs About F***ing’, where he says that on ‘Tiny, King of the Jews’ Albini seems to break through into real insight about the bleak corner he has painted himself into. And then he breaks up Big Black and starts a new band called Rapeman.
ReplyDeleteHe is now one of the best follows on Twitter: consistently thoughtful and genuinely witty. Who would have thought it?
yes he has matured nicely.
ReplyDelete