Back to the RPM piece
The two of us have been talking, mailing and 'concepting' over the last thirteen days
The impetus of signing up to RPM was to make us actually do something after long periods of inactivity and avoidance
The natural extension of that is to try to not do the things that stop us doing things, to stop doing the same things that we always do
We decided first off that it would have to be a process-driven project. As the project is durational, it dictates that the process is durational
The things we always do are there because they are comfortable. The natural development of that is to try to put ourselves in an uncomfortable position
Removing ourselves from our where we usually make music (the home) and placing us in public is how we've resolved to do that; removing our default instruments is another; attempting to sing an emotional, self-penned, song is another
Sadly, we could not bring ourselves to do the emotional song-writing (one repression too far)
We are now at a point where we have 90% of the project sorted
What is supposed to be realised in the course of the month, we're doing in the course of a morning
Driving out tomorrow morning at 6am, we will finalise the last issues. Leaving Hope at dawn, we will record and walk for 29 minutes, record a song where we are, not listen to it, burn the tracks and post it
This stops editing and becoming angsty as to its quality
Hopefully, it will be an honest document of the process and the result
I suppose, if we do not do it tomorrow, there is always Friday
Wednesday, 13 February 2008
Relentless
Have had a pleasant morning today
We have had a couple of interviews for a vacancy at our company
Very nice people
One of the people we interviewed was responsible for signing and marketing 'Re-Rewind (Bo Selecta)' and releasing the Roll Deep album. Shake A Leg is different to the album version
The Roll Deep album was really thrilling at the time, but after about a month it felt stale
I can still listen to Doggy Style and it feel contemporary
G-Funk 4 Life
Check out this boss widget, never be without
Re-rewind When The Crowd Say Bo-selecta Lyrics
We have had a couple of interviews for a vacancy at our company
Very nice people
One of the people we interviewed was responsible for signing and marketing 'Re-Rewind (Bo Selecta)' and releasing the Roll Deep album. Shake A Leg is different to the album version
The Roll Deep album was really thrilling at the time, but after about a month it felt stale
I can still listen to Doggy Style and it feel contemporary
G-Funk 4 Life
Check out this boss widget, never be without
Re-rewind When The Crowd Say Bo-selecta Lyrics
Monday, 11 February 2008
Don't Look Back
I should have talked about it earlier
'Honest naiveté' is not something you can get back, nor something you can develop
My musical naiveté was at its finest point during the early Black Xow sessions, before I got bogged down in trying to record drums or master the sweetest spot where three pockets of noise dissolved together
I lost that experience of playing and hoping, now most of my stuff is erased before I even finish recording
What I want now is not necessarily the eyes-wide stare into the unknown, but an acknowledgement that I do not have to fail. I can do things to call them done, I can make things to call them made
If a trial ends up sounding bad, it is only a trial
This is something I ultimately struggle with. Being hypercritical cripples me to the point of inactivity.
If there's nothing, you cannot criticise it
That is also especially ironic as when I do to try to create, I try to create something that is nothing
'Honest naiveté' is not something you can get back, nor something you can develop
My musical naiveté was at its finest point during the early Black Xow sessions, before I got bogged down in trying to record drums or master the sweetest spot where three pockets of noise dissolved together
I lost that experience of playing and hoping, now most of my stuff is erased before I even finish recording
What I want now is not necessarily the eyes-wide stare into the unknown, but an acknowledgement that I do not have to fail. I can do things to call them done, I can make things to call them made
If a trial ends up sounding bad, it is only a trial
This is something I ultimately struggle with. Being hypercritical cripples me to the point of inactivity.
If there's nothing, you cannot criticise it
That is also especially ironic as when I do to try to create, I try to create something that is nothing
For the records
I have mostly been listening to Red Krayola, Microphones/Mt. Eerie, Thanksgiving and the Brazil '70 compilation in my spare time
When I have focus, I keep returning to the self-titled (only?) album by C-Schulz & Hajsch
This is a perfect realisation of music I would like to make: bringing micro-composition, field recordings and organic instruments together perfectly
Every sound in the album has a relationship to the sound around, next to, before and after it
Go dig it out
When I have focus, I keep returning to the self-titled (only?) album by C-Schulz & Hajsch
This is a perfect realisation of music I would like to make: bringing micro-composition, field recordings and organic instruments together perfectly
Every sound in the album has a relationship to the sound around, next to, before and after it
Go dig it out
Past Post Memories
Back to the first post
Re-engagement
Rules
Honest naiveté
These three things are things I am trying to develop in my own music
Top Fife has really stagnated as a result of working in isolation, towards the same ends and with the same tools. Staying still in music is easy, making static music is difficult. To realise without it coming across as faux-portentous or eminently dull is hard. The last thing I recorded that I like is just short of a year old. It was the result of my Grandad dying and me staring out into a foggy field in the middle of Sand Hutton, North Yorkshire
In the last few years, I have done a couple of things with different agendas and different people. The first was the abortive DNA ECNELIOV (as bad in name as it was in realisation) whose sole aim seemed to be, in retrospect, to form a band and perform within three weeks. Notable for my musical inability, someone with a rudimentary ability on drums (no doubt much improved now) and a distaste for being told how to play them and the basslines from 12-bar punk. After one performance, we stopped
After that came Black Cow. This still stands warm in my heart. Initially a badly realised joke, before becoming a household jam and then a pseudo-musical project. The early sessions were the honest naiveté that I praise Warren for, experimental in the true notion of seeing what happens when different things are played together. As a three (briefly four) piece we delivered hours of material that varies in both listenability and recording quality as much it does in musical styles. A lot of happy accidents resulting in Krautrock, doom, ambient, improv emo and vaguely psychedelic whirls
When it moved out of the kitchen and into a practice space - when setting up took longer than playing, when microphone placement and documentation became more important than realising - it lost that productive naiveté. We all spent money on new instruments, crudely believing better equipment equals better music, 'practiced' on our own and formed internal duos
It splintered off when one moved to Manchester and started a couple of new projects in a similar vein. Kev started doing his Petals thing, and I started doing more and more of my own topfife project
Now I am trying to work with someone else, as a result of the RPM Challenge
I will write more about what this project aims to do in another post, this one is too long
Re-engagement
Rules
Honest naiveté
These three things are things I am trying to develop in my own music
Top Fife has really stagnated as a result of working in isolation, towards the same ends and with the same tools. Staying still in music is easy, making static music is difficult. To realise without it coming across as faux-portentous or eminently dull is hard. The last thing I recorded that I like is just short of a year old. It was the result of my Grandad dying and me staring out into a foggy field in the middle of Sand Hutton, North Yorkshire
In the last few years, I have done a couple of things with different agendas and different people. The first was the abortive DNA ECNELIOV (as bad in name as it was in realisation) whose sole aim seemed to be, in retrospect, to form a band and perform within three weeks. Notable for my musical inability, someone with a rudimentary ability on drums (no doubt much improved now) and a distaste for being told how to play them and the basslines from 12-bar punk. After one performance, we stopped
After that came Black Cow. This still stands warm in my heart. Initially a badly realised joke, before becoming a household jam and then a pseudo-musical project. The early sessions were the honest naiveté that I praise Warren for, experimental in the true notion of seeing what happens when different things are played together. As a three (briefly four) piece we delivered hours of material that varies in both listenability and recording quality as much it does in musical styles. A lot of happy accidents resulting in Krautrock, doom, ambient, improv emo and vaguely psychedelic whirls
When it moved out of the kitchen and into a practice space - when setting up took longer than playing, when microphone placement and documentation became more important than realising - it lost that productive naiveté. We all spent money on new instruments, crudely believing better equipment equals better music, 'practiced' on our own and formed internal duos
It splintered off when one moved to Manchester and started a couple of new projects in a similar vein. Kev started doing his Petals thing, and I started doing more and more of my own topfife project
Now I am trying to work with someone else, as a result of the RPM Challenge
I will write more about what this project aims to do in another post, this one is too long
Top 2007 Memories
I had another stab at my Top 5 of 2007 to try and get re-engaged
I have also lashed my last.fm widget to the left to encourage me to 'scrobble' when listening
ALBUMS
(in alphabetical order)
Adrian Orange & Her Band - Give To Love What's Love's
Flower-Corsano Duo - Radiant Mirror
Jandek - Manhattan Tuesday
Mount Eerie - Parts 6&7 LP
Talibam! - Ordination of the Globe-Trotting Conscripts
I liked the new Animal Collective, Panda Pitch, Stars of the Lid, Deerhunter albums
Was disappointed by Black Dice's new one, Shellac (40-minute cringe) and sickened by Battles' coke-head capitulation on Mirrored
Disappointed that I am yet to to hear Weirdo Rippers by No Age
FILMS
I enjoyed:
Paul Herhoeven's Black Book (Zwartboek),
David Cronenberg's Eastern Promises
the recording of John Waters' stage show This Filthy World
but without question the best film of last year was Lynch's INLAND EMPIRE
I can't remember many others, though am sure there are tonnes
Abominable mentions go to Death Proof, Babel, The Science of Sleep, This Is England and For Your Consideration
I have also lashed my last.fm widget to the left to encourage me to 'scrobble' when listening
ALBUMS
(in alphabetical order)
Adrian Orange & Her Band - Give To Love What's Love's
Flower-Corsano Duo - Radiant Mirror
Jandek - Manhattan Tuesday
Mount Eerie - Parts 6&7 LP
Talibam! - Ordination of the Globe-Trotting Conscripts
I liked the new Animal Collective, Panda Pitch, Stars of the Lid, Deerhunter albums
Was disappointed by Black Dice's new one, Shellac (40-minute cringe) and sickened by Battles' coke-head capitulation on Mirrored
Disappointed that I am yet to to hear Weirdo Rippers by No Age
FILMS
I enjoyed:
Paul Herhoeven's Black Book (Zwartboek),
David Cronenberg's Eastern Promises
the recording of John Waters' stage show This Filthy World
but without question the best film of last year was Lynch's INLAND EMPIRE
I can't remember many others, though am sure there are tonnes
Abominable mentions go to Death Proof, Babel, The Science of Sleep, This Is England and For Your Consideration
Top 40 Memories
I do not really remember much of the last year or two
So much has happened and all so quick, it's difficult to clarify event timelines, and their individual and collective narratives
One thing my poor memory has affected is my engagement with the media around me. This was thrown into sharp focus when I struggled to list my top five films/albums from 2007
My favourite blog for a long time is a joy to follow and a favourite for a few reasons
1. The determination by Warren to re-engage with something that has passed him by in recent times: pop music
2. The form of the process: rules first, product second (Dogme 95 applied to versionings, gameboy aesthetics, and a purity of intention)
3. The results: primitive and naïve, but ultimately catchy, realisations of (largely) disposable bilge imbued with new meaning, levels of engagement and honesty
So much has happened and all so quick, it's difficult to clarify event timelines, and their individual and collective narratives
One thing my poor memory has affected is my engagement with the media around me. This was thrown into sharp focus when I struggled to list my top five films/albums from 2007
My favourite blog for a long time is a joy to follow and a favourite for a few reasons
1. The determination by Warren to re-engage with something that has passed him by in recent times: pop music
2. The form of the process: rules first, product second (Dogme 95 applied to versionings, gameboy aesthetics, and a purity of intention)
3. The results: primitive and naïve, but ultimately catchy, realisations of (largely) disposable bilge imbued with new meaning, levels of engagement and honesty
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