| Thursday, July 17, 2008 |
 | Whenever a fan calls out a song request, attempts banter or even tries to express devotion, Stephin Merrit, tiny, dressed something like a rather swish trucker and with a ukelele slung across his chest, leans into his microphone and demands "No interaction". It sums up his stage persona - grouchy, contrarian, oddly adorable.
Merritt and the rest of the Magnetic Fields were performing on the last night of their tour, and were obviously knackered to the point of being non-linear, muffing intros, allowing their banter to descend into madness and tail off into inconsequentially.
"This is a song about a village surrounded by crows."
"Or people who think they are crows."
"Sorry?"
"Or...people...who...think...they..are...crows."
"Oh! I hadn't detected that... nuance."
However, they held it together on the songs themselves - with the exception of "Water Torture", a justly neglected tongue-twister from the Eban and Charley soundtrack which it was both sadistic and masochistic even to attempt but which, sung by Claudia Gonson rather than Merritt, becomes unexpectedly delicate.
"This is the Magnetic Fields song about vampires. The first was about a travelling salesman falling in with a crowd of drifters, the second was about a vampire who fell in love with a human and pursued him but his beloved escapes him by getting on planes and constantly flying to... sunny places. Which you can actually do."
Pause.
"But when does he sleep?"
"On the plane."
"Oh, yes. So, anyway, this is the third song about vampires."
"Apart from the other ten."
"Were there others."
"'I'm a vampire'?"
"Oh."
"Which you sung."
"On which I... rapped."
And so on.
The Magnetic Fields' lament is, generally, that the way they make songs in the studio is so different from the way they present them on stage that, as Merritt observes, if you like seeing them play them live you probably won't enjoy the CDs and should not buy them, and if you like the songs on CD then you have probably wasted your money coming to see them play live. He dolefully adds that if you like their music, you won't like them as people. This is by no means always a bad thing: listening to the fuzz-free, clear-voiced renditions of songs from Distortion, the latest and slightly underwhelming album - "Old Fools", "The Nun's Litany", "Javier Says","Driver, Drive On", "The Bitter End", "Too Drunk to Dream", "Courtesans" and the adorable "Three-way" as an encore - makes them far more understandable. Elsewhere, the acoustic, campaign-for-real-instruments accompaniment turns "No River" from shimmering unlove song to heartbreak.
Claudia Gonson's voice remains underrepresented in the things praised about the Magnetic Fields (this may be a gender thing), but it is lovely, ably supported by the country-rock peal of Shirley Simms. Again, a live show and an eclectic range of songs (two from the 6ths ("When I'm Out of Town", "Give me Back my Dreams"), three from the Gothic Archies ("The Tiny Goat", "Crows", "Walking my Gargoyle"), one from Eban and Charley, one from the Future Bible Heroes) performed over two hours (with interval) really showcases the difficulties and benefits of writing for three very different voices.
They didn't do "Tidal Wave", which always tenderises the heart, although "Take Ecstasy with Me" was pretty soul-flaying, and they did finish with "The Book of Love", the closest thing they have to a radio-friendly unit shifter, but I'm still very glad that this wasn't the first time I missed the Magnetic Fields on tour, as it very nearly was.
(0) comments
| |
| Wednesday, July 16, 2008 |
| I can't help finding it somehow different when David Cameronsays it rather than Barack Obama. Can't quite put my finger on why.
(0) comments
| |
|
| Sort of delighted that the Rodgers and Hammerstein estate are also out to get Youtube.
(0) comments
| |
|
| Youtube data to be anonymised before going out to Viacom. Of course, this doesn't alter the issue that Google still have the information and could be compelled to release it at a later date.
(0) comments
| |
| Thursday, July 10, 2008 |
| Providing endless hilarity today is My Life, My ID, the Home Office's groovy vicar attempt to get the young people talking about IT cards, outsourced to Virtual Surveys, who offer "Research 2.0". The forums are already choked with anti-ID card protestors, meaning that the moderators cheerfully walk into an enfilade of accusations of biased reporting, skewed survey options and sharp moderating practice with every post. The static content of the site speaks of the expertise of the security experts who will protect your data, as the forum borks, belches and falls apart (originally it appeared with the most recently updated topics at the bottom of the list).
Best of all are the voice-of-yoot contributions from Pete Comley, such as:
Interesting that people get all upset about having a central government identity database, whilst many of us already share loads of information about ourselves on sites like Bebo. Myspace and Facebook, which anyone can look at.
I know you do decide yourself about sharing that info, but it is does put things in perspective sort of, in my view.
and
Don't know about you, but the current system with loads of different ID cards from student cards to bank cards is a real pain. In the future, I think it is going to be so much easier when we can carry round just one card which we can use for everything.
This is Pete Comley. I can well believe that he is a man of many parts. I do not, however, feel that being oppressed by the need for a place to store his student card is one of them.
It won't be as funny when we are all in camps, obviously.
(0) comments
| |
| |
|
Venusberg.org finds Blogger very attractive...
|
|
|
elsewhere:
Interconnected
Plasticbag
Oh Skylab
Barcablog
Orbyn
moreover:
Brainsluice
Mo Morgan
Mothninja
Tajmahal
Wherever y'are
Prandial Post
thereafter:
Toby Kay
McCargow
Blogadoon
LinkMachineGo
Methylsalicylate
Hammersley
Joeblog
Grayblog
the Collective
Nick Jordan
Kooky Mojo
Betty Woo
Moth
Mr. Thomas G
the author:
danATvenusberg.org
and finally...
the archives
|
