tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24806282546202377232024-03-13T03:25:38.563+00:00Life in FlashbackUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger76125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-21678623180420874452014-07-06T13:57:00.000+01:002014-07-20T13:57:54.737+01:00About Miss Julie at the King's Head.
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial;">Miss Julie is an 1888 play by Swedish playwright August
Strindberg. It is regarded as a masterpiece, and regularly revived. For this
run at the Kings Head in Islington, it has been adapted and renamed About Miss
Julie – shifted to England between the wars with an upstairs downstairs set up
in what is surely an eye on the Downtown Abbey audience. Hear the full review on <a href="http://eastlondonradio.org.uk/?p=2359">East London Radio.</a></span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-85185343935725144902014-06-26T13:53:00.000+01:002014-07-20T13:55:50.113+01:00The Excellent 'Mr Burns' at the Almeida - Radio Review<div class="MsoNormal">
What
is our culture of binge-watching heading towards? Gluttonous hours on Netflix,
DVD boxsets and torrents. Might it be towards a world where the lights have
gone out permanently and all that’s left of an age when we probably have more
entertainment available than at any other time in history is an oral tradition
of people trying to remember the plotlines of TV series?<o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">That’s the premise of Anne Washburn’s 2012 play
Mr Burns. Hear the full review on <a href="http://eastlondonradio.org.uk/?p=2279">East London Radio.</a></span><!--EndFragment-->Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-54083459064080001022014-06-01T13:52:00.000+01:002014-07-20T13:53:21.724+01:00Let The Right One In radio review<a href="http://eastlondonradio.org.uk/?p=2227">Review of National Theatre Scotland's 'Let the Right One In' now available on East London Radio.</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-63511511836964208882014-04-02T22:18:00.001+01:002014-04-07T09:57:14.238+01:00Boxed In - No Joke<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">'No Joke'</span><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"> from Boxed In - AKA London-based Oli Bayston - builds on the house keys and live drums template of last year's 'All Your Love Is Gone' by lifting the vocals higher in the mix and moving away from washes of noise to pure groove. This creates something closer to Bayston's work with 2 Bears, whilst retaining the downtempo shuffle he had with previous band Keith. </span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0); font-family: inherit;">The real attraction here, though, is the bass: more complex than the usual four to the floor summer track, it adds a layer of interest that drives this tune into your consciousness, allowing it to stage a full on assault on your feet. As if that's not enough, the addition to the video of the Kolkata Laughing Club is worth your time alone.</span><br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-73021867826348340942014-04-02T09:39:00.000+01:002014-04-07T11:20:10.005+01:00Todd Terje - It's Album Time<iframe frameborder="no" height="450" scrolling="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/133250756&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&visual=true" width="100%"></iframe><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
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Norwegian producer Todd Terje has always had a taste for novelty: 2012's mockumentary <i><a href="http://vimeo.com/58444378">Whateverest </a></i>follows an obsessed fan for 15 surreal minutes, he has remixed Roxy Music, <i>and</i> features Bryan Ferry on a cover of Robert Palmer's 'Johnny and Mary.' Detractors are quick to suggest that this renders his music trivial, but the status of 'Inspector Norse' and 'Strandbar' as Summer anthems for 2012 and 2013 suggests that when the sun comes out, this kind of silliness is exactly what people want.<br />
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Terje exploits this to the full on his first LP - finally complete following a decade of singles and EPs - by wedding the inherent novelty of cheesy synth loops with artful builds and full on ecstatic disco house moments. From the outset, however, it's clear that <i>It's Album Time </i>will not be making any concessions to his critics. The opener consists of the album title chanted over arpeggiated bleeps, and is followed by 'Leisure Suit Preben' and 'Preben Goes to Acapulco' (recently released either side of a 7"), which sound like a 70s sci-fi TV series set in a future Miami. Next is 'Svensk Sas', which can most accurately be described as polka with added scat singing. Like Metronomy without the arch humour, or Air without the Gallic cool, this does begin to get a little tiresome.<br />
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Fortunately, the middle section, announced by 'Strandbar', shows a (slightly) more serious side. Future smash 'Delorean Dynamite' features a grimy bassline that disappears into washes of synth before emerging even harder than before. This is followed by 'Johnny and Mary' which, despite dispensing with the drive and much of the melancholy charm of the original, is a great display of Terje's talent for building a tune that doesn't need to go anywhere to satisfy.<br />
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The final third is a gradual build through more nu-disco and 90s computer game themes towards 'Inspector Norse', Terje's calling card Summer jam that closes with a festival crowd chanting its riff. These final sounds show the true intentions of an album cloaked in irony and knowing references. "Yes," say the gradually fading crowd, "there may be silliness and whimsy, but listen to how much fun we're having!" Maybe, like a sullen teenager at the edges of a wedding, it might just be time for us to stop shaking our heads and head for the dance floor.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-9554200008961448452014-03-16T18:36:00.000+00:002014-04-07T11:11:45.040+01:00Elbow Sound Better in The North<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Elbow make music for mornings. 'One Day Like This' begins with Guy drinking in the morning sun,</span><span style="font-family: inherit;"> 'New York Morning' - </span>lead single from new album <i>The Takeoff and Landing of Everything - </i><span style="font-family: inherit;">is, well, about the morning, and even the track that follows it, 'Real Life (Angel)', has a "hallelujah morning". Listing to the album whilst </span>searching through the sun-drenched city for breakfast, then <span style="font-family: inherit;">walking to the station full of toast and eggs, it was clear that - even more than mornings - Elbow make music for Manchester.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The band's mournful but optimistic tone mirrors this city: much to be proud of, yet often displaying a </span>preference for<span style="font-family: inherit;"> self-deprecating humour and quiet ambition over shout-it-from-the-rooftops boastfulness (with the obvious exceptions of Oasis and Manchester City FC - linked by both support and arrogance). Elbow are a much better fit for Manchester's psyche - not that they don't like to shout things from the rooftops, it's just that when they do they shout things like 'one day like this a year will see me right', which seems really to suggest that every other day is likely to be rubbish.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The new album does have rooftop moments, particularly 'New York Morning', 'Charge' and the brilliant instrumental part in the middle of 'Fly Boy Blue / Lunette', but mostly retains the intimacy that has always been a hallmark of the band's output. Given the bombast of their Olympics-closing performance, it wouldn't be surprising if they started producing music that only really worked in mega-stadiums, a well-trodden path most recently swaggered down by Coldplay. Instead, they have kept the voice of the old drunk in the corner of a Northern Quarter bar.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">This voice pipes up after 'New York Morning' - around the halfway point - as if they had to get the epic stuff out of the way. The tracks that follow, 'Real Life (Angel)' and 'Honey Sun', share a Postal Service-like insistency, with the latter leaping into a playful chorus like someone bursting into laughter in the middle of telling a story. The highlight, though, is 'My Sad Captains', a pean to the moments in the small hours when a night is coming to a close. The part sad, part contented, and all nostalgic feel of this song came as the train back to London made the red brick and concrete South Manchester suburbs roll into the Pennines. Elbow might </span>name songs after American cities and <span style="font-family: inherit;">make music to close international sporting events, but, for me, their sunrises will always throw light on to Piccadilly Gardens.</span></div>
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<iframe width="100%" height="450" scrolling="no" frameborder="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/132891149&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&visual=true"></iframe>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-38569744203983023682014-03-13T09:35:00.000+00:002014-04-02T09:35:40.456+01:00Visitors<span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">Unexpectedly recognising something is a powerful experience – spotting someone in the street that looks like a friend or accidentally catching your own reflection can be deeply affecting, and this seems to be magnified triggered by a work of art. In the exceptionally well-observed </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Visitors </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">these moments are frequent but subtle enough not to be overly sentimental, making for an incredibly moving piece of theatre.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">Read the review here: </span><a href="http://www.justaplatform.com/london-theatre-reviews-visitors-arcola/">http://www.justaplatform.com/london-theatre-reviews-visitors-arcola/</a><br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-45739045213634330482014-02-03T09:33:00.000+00:002014-04-02T09:34:50.109+01:00The Golden Dragon<span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">What is happening behind the windows that we walk past every day? What is hidden behind the blank faces of the people we walk by? Roland Schimmelpfennig’s The Golden Dragon challenges us with some uncomfortable answers to these questions – and there is no better setting for a new production than self-satisfied South Kensington.</span><br />
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Read the review here: <a href="http://www.justaplatform.com/london-theatre-review-roland-schimmelpfennigs-the-golden-dragon/">http://www.justaplatform.com/london-theatre-review-roland-schimmelpfennigs-the-golden-dragon/</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-43218335790344050352013-11-14T10:05:00.000+00:002014-04-07T11:13:38.848+01:00Hype Machine Soulmates: HEARTS - Wings (Shlohmo Remix)Beginning with a glow of synth, as if you've stepped into an electro cathedral, Shlomo's remix of this Summer staple never lets up on the washed out vibes. The LA producer has cut out all of the bounce from the original and slowed the vocal, leaving a vague sense of menace, like a summertime party gone on that little bit too long.<br />
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<iframe width="100%" height="450" scrolling="no" frameborder="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/118731518&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&visual=true"></iframe>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-51752009594855032422013-09-11T09:32:00.000+01:002014-04-02T09:33:13.441+01:00Sunstroke<span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">Sunstroke, an original project developed by </span><a href="http://www.belkaproductions.co.uk/" style="background-color: white; color: #004276; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Belka Productions</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">, has the dual aims presenting Russian texts to English audiences (the overarching aim of the company) and a new goal of using more physical elements and inventive staging than in previous productions. The latter is achieved brilliantly, with projections facing one another across a sand-covered stage. Sadly, the presentation of the Russian texts, short stories by </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anton_Chekhov" style="background-color: white; color: #004276; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Chechov</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;"> and </span><a href="http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1933/bunin-bio.html" style="background-color: white; color: #004276; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Bunin</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">, misses out on some potential impact in a slow first half, although much is regained in a clever and well-paced denouement.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">Read the review here: </span><a href="http://www.justaplatform.com/theatre-review-london/">http://www.justaplatform.com/theatre-review-london/</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-29121966100415573162013-08-22T09:31:00.000+01:002014-04-02T09:32:14.545+01:00A Doll's House<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrie_Cracknell" style="background-color: white; color: #004276; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Carrie Cracknell</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">’s production of </span><a href="http://www.biography.com/people/henrik-ibsen-37014" style="background-color: white; color: #004276; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Henrik Ibsen’s</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">1879 classic play, </span><em style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">A Doll’s House</em><span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">, transfers to the West End after a critically acclaimed run at the </span><a href="http://www.youngvic.org/" style="background-color: white; color: #004276; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Young Vic</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">, and loses none of its ability to captivate, shock, and provoke debate.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">Read the review here: </span><a href="http://www.justaplatform.com/london-theatre-the-dolls-house-duke-of-york-theatre/">http://www.justaplatform.com/london-theatre-the-dolls-house-duke-of-york-theatre/</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-53248720486511627852013-07-30T09:28:00.000+01:002014-04-02T09:30:49.330+01:00Sweet Bird Of Youth<span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">This summer brings the revival of the tragic American raconteur – a figure hiding his past through the combination of cynical manipulation and wilful self-delusion, enjoying an overblown lifestyle until the edifice crumbles around them. </span><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1343092/" style="background-color: white; color: #004276; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Baz Luhrmann’s Gatsby</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;"> explores the lavish ends to which a character will go to create the illusion, but this production of </span><a href="http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/episodes/tennessee-williams/about-tennessee-williams/737/" style="background-color: white; color: #004276; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Tennessee Williams</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">’ 1959 play far better highlights the tragedy at its end.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #252324; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 23px;">See the review at </span><a href="http://www.justaplatform.com/london-theatre-sweet-bird-of-youth-review/">http://www.justaplatform.com/london-theatre-sweet-bird-of-youth-review/</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-70807343535789627702012-10-10T22:34:00.002+01:002012-10-10T22:34:47.628+01:00The Hotel Plays at the Grange Holborn Hotel<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Watching <a href="http://www.thehotelplays.com/">The Hotel Plays</a> in three suites at the Grange Holborn Hotel, it is difficult not to picture Tennessee Williams typing in similar rooms, populating scenes with the people that surrounded him: the couple carrying out a muffled argument through the wall, a shifty yet charming bell boy, drunken late-night arrivals, and porters delivering endless room-service orders.<br />
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The claustrophobic atmosphere created by packing an audience into a suite, on chairs two deep around the walls, complements the atmosphere of the plays and their succession of insane characters. Williams creates extremes - a damaged soldier drinking bourbon in the morning, an uncomfortable young male escort and panicky, inept crooks amongst them. Being at such close quarters (at one point a character spat some wine and a little landed on my foot, and we had a pretty good look up a young man's boxers) means that you are forced right into the middle of the characters' lives and the conflicts they are facing.<br />
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Hotel rooms straddle private and commercial space, blurring what actions might be considered as acceptable. Add to that the infantilising effect of room service - the closest you can get to tugging on a parent's sleeve and asking for some food - and you have a great setting for exploring how people behave when rules are removed.<br />
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The Hotel Plays run until the 27th October.<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-22748758380657289962012-10-08T21:43:00.000+01:002012-10-08T21:43:45.603+01:00Ryan Dunn at Vyner Street Gallery<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
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Ryan Dunn's collages use the language of advertising photography to create unnerving images that can evoke a range of emotions.</div>
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We've seen a lot of collage this year, not least Geoffrey Farmer's overwhelming <a href="http://www.designboom.com/weblog/cat/10/view/21936/life-magazine-cut-outs-from-1935-1985-by-geoffrey-farmer.html">Life Magazine Cut-outs from 1935-1985</a> at Documenta 13, but Dunn's work uses a less-is-more attitude to create images that are just as memorable, and just as rewarding of your time.</div>
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Sadly, his show at Vyner Street Gallery was only very brief, but as he's been officially labelled 'up and coming' (thanks in part to a role in the Cultural Olympiad) his is a name you will definitely see again.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Detail from Ryan Dunn's Inane Systems</td></tr>
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-56999606690336417012012-09-26T21:26:00.001+01:002012-09-26T21:31:36.050+01:00Keep A Good Thing Going: Omi Palone and The Proper OrnamentsSome good things happened on Sunday at Record Affair, a night put on by the ace <a href="http://justacrush.co.uk/">Just a Crush</a> at the equally ace Shacklewell Arms. The 9pm finish meant it was PERFECT FOR A SCHOOL NIGHT and there was a record fair from lots of independents. Also, we met someone from <a href="http://www.upsettherhythm.co.uk/">Upset the Rhythm</a> who is friends with Dan Deacon: that wasn't even on the flyer.<br />
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One of the good things was <a href="http://omipalone.blogspot.co.uk/">Omi Palone</a> (we pronounce it like it rhymes - you can say what you want). Singer Phil rejects indie falsetto, keeping things between the Ian Curtis pitch parameters of 'growl' and 'normal speaking voice' (weirdly, but vividly, bringing to mind Michael Stipe 'reigning it in' on <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZEt6APW2-M">King of Comedy</a>). It's good to have limits, and the band work well within them; swooping guitar lines complement Phil's vocal, and the whole thing is set firmly to 'fun.'<br />
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Another good thing were <a href="http://soundcloud.com/the-proper-ornaments">The Proper Ornaments</a>: woozy dream pop with a debt to the sixties and nineties-sixties-revivalists. This is a good thing. When The Proper Ornaments inspire another generation of bands we'll be able to write that they owe a debt to the sixties, nineties-sixties-revivalists and 2010s-nineties-sixties revivalists. Music blog posts will be like genealogies of royal families, poured over by the indie elite for the exact provenance of the latest Dalston heroes. Actually, that's pretty much what they are now.<br />
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Anyway. This lot are good - far better than these overly sun-drenched recordings suggest. Catch them live.<br />
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<iframe frameborder="no" height="166" scrolling="no" src="http://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fapi.soundcloud.com%2Ftracks%2F33286857&show_artwork=true" width="100%"></iframe>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-39295542902577101462012-08-24T11:56:00.002+01:002012-08-24T12:00:27.718+01:00New Finds at Finland's Flow Festival: Elifantree<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Elifantree are a Scandinavian jazz-pop trio, signed to independent Finnish jazz label <a href="http://www.eclipse-music.net/">Eclipse Music</a>. Their debut album, <i>Love and Trees </i>came out in 2010, and they followed that up with this year's <i>Time Out. </i>We caught them on the Tiivistämö stage, where they were exceptional enough to draw the crowd to their feet, away from the delicious sushi and noodles served in there.<br />
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Vocalist Anni Elif Egecioglu has hints of Kate Bush in her freewheeling delivery, and drummer Tatu Rönkkö has one of the most triumphant drumming faces we've ever seen. Rounding off the band is saxophonist Pauli Lyyntinen, who, alongside cheer-inducing solos, adds the effects that push this into Bjork territory.<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="281" mozallowfullscreen="mozallowfullscreen" src="http://player.vimeo.com/video/46985282" webkitallowfullscreen="webkitallowfullscreen" width="500"></iframe> <a href="http://vimeo.com/46985282">ELIFANTREE - That Girl</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/user8240380">Charlie Harjulin</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com/">Vimeo</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-78451556211470425432012-08-24T11:29:00.000+01:002012-09-27T19:16:37.182+01:00New Finds at Finland's Flow Festival: Jason Moran<div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Vrp8T3zSyzY/UDdRQVbIN0I/AAAAAAAAATE/hzvwc7Cog5M/s1600/IMG_0626.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Vrp8T3zSyzY/UDdRQVbIN0I/AAAAAAAAATE/hzvwc7Cog5M/s200/IMG_0626.jpg" width="189" /></a>As you might expect from a festival in the hip capital of a self-consciously cool country there were a few esoteric choices in the Flow Festival lineup - but a couple of these really blew us away. One such artist is Jason Moran, who we loved so much we saw no fewer than three times over two days.<br />
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Moran is a Brooklyn-based jazz pianist who's been around for about 15 year and often performs with his band The Bandwagon. We saw him with The Bandwagon (bassist Tarus Maseen and incredible drummer Nashteen Waits) and performing solo, and in both settings Moran's talent, musicality and New York cool gave the set a laid back but exciting vibe. </div>
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He seems to be able to take all of the fun parts of avant-garde jazz - the madness and freedom - and dispense with the dull insistence on extended periods of arhythmic atonality which often mar the genre, replacing these with hip hop-inspired beats and looped melodies which burst into explosions of creativity.<br />
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A standout track from Moran's solo performance was 'Ringing My Phone (Straight Outta Istanbul)' which appears on his 2003 live album <i>The Bandwagon. </i>Here, Moran plays along with the voice of his wife, speaking on the phone in Turkish to her mother. Check out the video below for how that pans out, especially when he loops a short section of her speech at around 3:20. Moran said he records conversations habitually, with the aim of turning them into tracks like this. Finnish, though was "on some other shit" and was going to take him some time to groove to. </div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-7817873337759823622012-07-21T11:21:00.000+01:002012-07-24T11:28:28.521+01:00I've Started So I'll Finnish - Oneohtrix Point Never<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Oneohtrix Point Never is the moniker of Brooklyn-based </span><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 19.200000762939453px;">Daniel Lopatin, whose sound has grown out of drone electronica to inhabit a world between cinematic mood music and an 80s version of The </span></span><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhfKK547r94"><span style="line-height: 19.200000762939453px;">Disintegration</span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 19.200000762939453px;"> Loops.</span></span></a><span style="line-height: 19.200000762939453px;"> </span></span><span style="background-color: white;">Tracks throughout his three albums grow and develop in beautiful and unexpected ways, and can sometimes become frustratingly repetitive before creating release through blossoming or decay. </span><br />
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OPN are on stage at midnight at Flow, and it's easy to see why. Our shared dreamimage of Scandinavia here at LIFB is of flowing landscapes and minimalist design, the contrast of days of endless sunlight with the knowledge that days of endless darkness are only a few months away. The sound of OPN, with its combination of melancholy and nostalgia fits this perfectly.<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-42120587563711606602012-07-14T09:55:00.000+01:002012-07-24T10:47:50.602+01:00Cross the Finnish Line - Tamikrest<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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People say the protest song is dead, yet today it seems like we have as much to protest about as there was in the 60s and 70s. The Taureg people, a nomadic part of the Berber population of North Africa, have more to protest about than most, after recent events in their history of rebellions and fighting for their own land.<br />
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This year, Taureg fighters returning from fighting on both sides of the Libyan revolution helped to stage the latest offensive, taking control of an area of Mali and claiming its independence as the state of Aswad, only to be expelled by Islamist groups that had originally helped them.<br />
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Tamikrest, a Taureg band, play at Flow Festival this year - and set out their politics in a statement on their website:<br />
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<span style="font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 12px; line-height: 20px;">The development of this territory and these settlements is a personal and collective duty for all of us. No one will work for the preservation of our land if we do not do it ourselves.</span></blockquote>
That was written before the recent events, so it seems like this is going to be an act with a lot to say. How they say it is through a euphoric combination of African rhythms and Middle Eastern harmonies. As jazz trumpeter Winton Marsalis said recently, people in the west seem to think that African music provides rhythm whereas western music provides harmony and melody, and it's not really like that. Tamikrest blend Warm electric guitar riffs with soaring pentatonic vocals to create the sound of the desert that the Taureg people love so deeply.<br />
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Perhaps the people who feel that African music is all rhythm are the same who say the protest song is dead. These people should head to the Wastelands stage for the Friday night of <a href="http://www.flowfestival.com/en/">Flow Festival</a> and see what they're missing out on.<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-1166070206331467062012-07-07T10:44:00.000+01:002012-07-24T11:23:05.011+01:00Nice Guys Finnish Last - Joose Keskitalo<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Joose Keskitalo supports Bon Iver on the opening night of Flow, and initial listens show why the Finnish act has been paired with the US indie superstar: plaintive melodies accompanied by electro-acoustic guitar. Here, though, there is the added interest of harmonica and some dips into barroom shanties like <a href="http://open.spotify.com/track/1hjmwoAgHstpN0a7JGCUnm">Esineet</a> and <a href="http://open.spotify.com/track/1yk7O0Pkci1NfnI9hNcxqf">Pimeydestä pimeyttä vastaan</a>. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white;">At times Kekitalo appears to be aiming for the accolade </span>of 'Finnish Jack Johnson', especially on <a href="http://open.spotify.com/track/55WDhELoVzYj5EeVLZKiDe">Luultavasti jäit junan alle</a><span style="background-color: white;">. This is faint praise indeed, but a listen to </span><a href="http://open.spotify.com/track/55WDhELoVzYj5EeVLZKiDe">Luultavasti jäit junan alle</a> should actually remind you of the time that we all liked Jack Johnson to begin with, not when we wanted to tear our ears of after 'Better Together' got its ten-millionth play. A more flattering comparison is with Beck, whose track <a href="http://open.spotify.com/track/4dk3cBCnMIQGBNRKnjG3fP">Asshole</a> he borrows from liberally on <a href="http://open.spotify.com/track/6cWDUDu5m3IP4qI6h9inCA">Peer Gynt</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit;">Even more enjoyable is the relatively poor quality of Google Translate when it comes to Finnish. There is little information about Keskitalo in English, so we're having to base our research on phrases like 'Equally, his songs, often about death, only to sound like her, of course.' This doesn't bode well for our understanding of what on earth is happening when we make it to Helsinki.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-85962957444137575462012-07-01T21:11:00.001+01:002012-10-04T07:27:19.874+01:00Race to the Finnish - Black Twig<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-kOXNJe19Fgo/T_CpyEK_ctI/AAAAAAAAASw/dva75Z9Hjr4/s1600/blacktwig_group_color_3_Heidi_Uutela.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="214" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-kOXNJe19Fgo/T_CpyEK_ctI/AAAAAAAAASw/dva75Z9Hjr4/s320/blacktwig_group_color_3_Heidi_Uutela.jpeg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photograph by Heidi Uutela</td></tr>
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<span style="background-color: white;">We're going on our Summer hols, and Mrs LIFB has sorted us out with tickets to </span><a href="http://www.flowfestival.com/en/" style="background-color: white;">Flow Festival</a><span style="background-color: white;"> in Helsinki. Loads of the acts are Finnish and in the lead up to the festival we're going to be profiling some.</span></div>
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Black Twig are Helsinki-based and signed to small local label <a href="http://solitimusic.com/">Soliti</a>. Although their name, and the title of 2011 tune 'Death Scene', suggest they are part of the great Scandinavian doom metal tradition, they actually produce perky indie. 'Death Scene' combines chiming, shoegaze-y guitars with earnest vocals, whilst this year's single release 'Paper Aeroplane' opens with guitars set firmly to REM mode, and has a chorus with a series of woos - like a European Dandy Warhols - that are going to <span style="background-color: white;">sound perfect floating through a Finnish afternoon. </span><br />
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<iframe allowtransparency="true" frameborder="0" height="380" src="https://embed.spotify.com/?uri=spotify:album:11kHxEFXTumcWc37B3QHeO" style="background-color: white;" width="300"></iframe>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-54719833922677359992012-06-17T20:05:00.002+01:002012-06-17T20:05:18.891+01:00Antonio Roberts on the New Aesthetic<br />
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<i>Antonio Roberts is an artist and a thoroughly nice man, you can find him on twitter @hellcatfood, and his website is <a href="http://www.hellocatfood.com/">here.</a> He wrote this article for the latest issue of TBB.</i></div>
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When discussion around the New Aesthetic were taking place I initially took a stance against engaging in the conversations or reading anything about it, even refusing to read <a href="http://new-aesthetic.tumblr.com/">the original Tumblr blog</a> by James Bridle or<a href="http://www.wired.com/beyond_the_beyond/2012/04/an-essay-on-the-new-aesthetic"> the essay by Bruce Sterling</a>. This defiance was at times difficult as the New Aesthetic was invading all of my internet hangouts such as Twitter, Facebook and various mailing lists that I’m subscribed to (CRUMB, netbehaviour). I was even sent links to the essay and site directly, the assumption being that the ideas presented in it related to my interests. They were somewhat correct in assuming this, but my defiance still persisted.</div>
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Despite its sudden popularity The New Aesthetic is not actually very new. Bridle’s site was created on May 6th 2011, but it had gone largely unnoticed until Sterling’s essay was published. This sudden rise in popularity is similar to the way that memes develop. The rise (and fall) of a meme can be mapped out into very distinct stages:</div>
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<li>An original idea is formed and posted onto the internet</li>
<li>The idea expands and develops</li>
<li>People start to do their own interpretations of this</li>
<li>The spike in popularity</li>
<li>Repetition without context, alongside heavy criticism</li>
<li>Overuse</li>
<li>The fall of the meme and disappearance from the internet</li>
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I was less interested in taking part in the hype surrounding the meme, and more interested in its long-lasting effects on art culture. It could, like many memes, have its 15 minutes of fame and then disappear, or it could actually have a long-lasting effect on the arts in general.</div>
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When I finally relented and began to read the essays and resources surrounding the New Aesthetic I noticed an immediate problem: that of defining what the New Aesthetic actually is. Bridle, on the New Aesthetic blog, provides a vague definition on what the New Aesthetic is, as well as explaining briefly what his motivations are:</div>
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“Since May 2011 I have been collecting material which points towards new ways of seeing the world, an echo of the society, technology, politics and people that co-produce them.</blockquote>
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The New Aesthetic is not a movement, it is not a thing which can be done. It is a series of artefacts of the heterogeneous network, which recognises differences, the gaps in our overlapping but distant realities.”</blockquote>
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This definition still leaves a lot of room for interpretation, which is a problem certainly echoed by many people, evidenced by the plethora of attempts by others, Sterling included, to define what the New Aesthetic actually is. A search on the ever-reliable Twitter revealed definitions and interpretations of the New Aesthetic that ranged from the insightful to the humourous to the downright idiotic. Some of my favourites include:</div>
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<li>The #newaesthetic could stand to become more of a #nudeaesthetic that investigates emerging forms of pornosophic philosophiction.[amerika2012twitter]</li>
<li>this goes out to all the artists and thinkers out there who share my disgust at the nostalgic hip-trip that is the so-called #newaesthetic[jones2012twitter]</li>
<li>Every #NewAesthetic becomes a new anaesthetic. At the speed of light we can go from new to numb, meme to meh in minutes.[2012twitter2]</li>
<li>The New Aesthetic should be called The Open Aesthetic. No boundaries #opensource #reality #culture #politics #newaesthetic #openaesthetic[2012twitter]</li>
<li>The #newaesthetic has already become old.[marone2012twitter]</li>
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That last Tweet echoes one of my main problems with the New Aesthetic, and indeed any attempt to provide a definitive definition of any art movement that is still evolving: The ideas that the New Aesthetic are based on are already old by the time they are published. New artwork, technologies and theories appear each day, and with the always-on nature of the Internet, where a lot of this art/content is disseminated, it is futile to attempt to create a catch-all terminology to describe what has been produced and also what is to be produced in the future.</div>
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Bridle posts artefacts to the blog in an attempt to clarify what artwork could be classed as falling under the New Aesthetic. Aside from the very act of appearing on the blog alongside other artefacts, the artefacts are posted without explanation as to why they fall under this definition. The hope is surely to let the content speak for itself but, for me, it just led to more confusion. Is the New Aesthetic about digital art, hacking, glitch art or pervasive art? Is it a combination of all of them or none of them? Is the New Aesthetic, broadly speaking, everything that is new?</div>
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It seems Bridle is the only one that truly understands exactly what the New Aesthetic is, and that’s why it comes across as a personal project. The site and its blog posts are his attempts at </div>
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comprehending what he sees. This may help him to see the digital/hacked/glitched world in a clearer way, but without explanation it just leads to more confusion for everyone else.</div>
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It is ironic that by the time you read this the New Aesthetic may have (hopefully) died and, like most memes, disappeared completely from our mindsets and browsing sessions.</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-44674836923538600242012-06-08T19:59:00.000+01:002012-06-17T19:59:44.573+01:00Michael Glass on Post-Product Placement<br />
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<i>Guest writer Michael Glass on film. Catch this article in the latest issue of TBB.</i></div>
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Product placement isn’t something a filmmaker wants to do. It’s forced upon them, and men in suits need it to pay for their movies. And we all hate the men in suits, right? Yeah, those men are evil. They don’t understand creativity. They just want to make money.</div>
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Poor product placement removes you from the reality of a film. Strategically framed shots make James Bond look very cool indeed in his Aston Martins and Jaguars, checking into hotels with his Samsonite briefcase in hand, impatiently checking his Omega watch. Will Smith looks decidedly less cool in I, Robot as, in the midst of pootling about in Audis, arguing with FedEx robots and listening to his JVC hi-fi, he opens the most exciting box of his life: a shoebox. So enraptured is he by their arrival that he’s unable to resist showing them off to a relative, saying, ‘Converse, vintage 2004’ – truly a line for the ages. Never does he explain that these is particularly appropriate footwear for beating up robots and saving the world. He just likes his brand new shoes that, incidentally you can buy.</div>
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It used to be valid to complain about product placement. But these days, you have to be thankful for product lines just to have any films to go and complain about.</div>
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Hollywood’s struggle for ideas isn’t new. Purchasing the rights to books and plays has been a reliable way to generate new films for many years (not to mention Oscars). Then they started adapting comic books and videogames. You’re less likely to win awards, but you can spin out nice big franchises with them. And then Hollywood jumped the shark.</div>
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You might think I’m talking about Transformers, but you’d be wrong. Depite being the least inspired film of all time (a reboot of a 1986 animated film, itself a spin-off from a TV series, which in turn only existed to sell Hasbro toys), you can at least, at a stretch, consider it a remake or adaptation. I’m talking about Pirates of the Caribbean.</div>
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Pirates of the Caribbean is a theme park ride. A famous one in which you slowly float past animatronic pirates repeating two-stage motion cycles of heavy drinking, knife fights and casual rape. Its relationship to the film series is in nothing more than name. This truly marks the moment when Hollywood ran out of ideas. When the men in suits (bastards!) literally flicked through a magazine and made a film of the first thing they landed on. There was ample opportunity to create tie-in products, though. Pirates-themed plastic rubbish can found in every aisle of Toys “R” Us. This year saw the release of a film without even that level of substance. </div>
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Battleship is another Hasbro property (they are literally one of the most powerful companies in film now). Until it finally came out I was convinced that it had to be a joke. This game doesn’t even have dolls or animatronics to turn into characters. There is no story. It can be played with pen and paper. And crucially, it’s impossible to imagine anybody buying the Battleship board game because of the film. You’re no longer being sold anything but the film; there’s simply nothing else you could buy even if you wanted to. The things we used to be sold are now being shaken dry by panicked men in suits (bastards!) who desperately need a new franchise. Toy and ride connections are no longer about sales; they’re about people rapidly running out of inspiration.</div>
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This is an era of cinematic indolence and duplication that we’ll simply have to live through until, following the release of Scrabble vs Upwords 3D, the men in suits (bastards though they are) finally find that they’ve adapted and remade everything that exists, look around the abandoned wasteland of vacuity they’ve created, huddle together for warmth, and slowly but surely expire, allowing civilisation to at last rebuild.</div>
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...Anyway, that’s a while off. And really, the only reason I wrote this whole article is in the hope that desperate old Hollywood picks it up, spins it off into a lovely big franchise, and I can go to sleep knowing that I’ve helped the world become a little bit worse. Ker-ching!</div>
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<i>This level of product placement has provoked some pretty good responses from the creative community on the web, and the deep, deep love we have for Tetris here at LIFB makes this our favourite:</i></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-87295985315770542592012-05-31T17:51:00.000+01:002012-06-06T17:52:02.134+01:00On the Life In Flashback StereoWe've been doing some Spring cleaning this week, and had to find some suitably motivational records for this arduous task. Now the LIFB office is a bastion of minimalism, but only thanks to these guys. All from the North of England, you say? A complete accident, we promise.<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2480628254620237723.post-48391279635671302272012-05-06T22:42:00.001+01:002012-05-07T10:10:41.820+01:00Jake Shears buys music like we buy music<blockquote class="twitter-tweet tw-align-center">
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<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jake-shear/music-industry-change_b_1453954.html">Jake Shears' post a couple of weeks ago</a> really struck a chord here. He's put down exactly how we feel about spending time with music.<br />
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He brings out the joy of all-you-can-eat consumption through subscription services and the web:<br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; text-align: left;">Every week I scour all of the new releases again like I used to do in a record store, piling them up and going through them, keeping the ones worth a second go and releasing the ones that didn't quite catch my ear. I also get to see what other people are listening to and have discovered some incredible records by folks like Young Galaxy, Ford and Lopatin, Kurt Vile, Real Estate, and Scuba. And I love making </span><a href="http://www.rdio.com/people/jakeshears/playlists/" style="background-color: white; border: none; color: #b10000; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: left; text-decoration: none;" target="_hplink">playlists</a><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; text-align: left;"> of new stuff and have a list going for every season, that I'm adding to and pulling from, so it's an always a constant work in progress. Once I'm ready to start a new one, I leave the current list as is and don't touch it again. It's a great diary of what I've been listening to.</span></blockquote>
He compares this to his passion for vinyl:<br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; text-align: left;">I started buying vinyl more and using turntables in my house. I found it really relaxing and contemplative when I just wanted to take some time on a particular record...</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; text-align: left;">when there's an album I really like, I still head to Rebel Rebel in the West Village and buy it on vinyl.</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; text-align: left;"> </span></blockquote>
He doesn't expand on this, but WE KNOW WHAT YOU MEAN JAKE. At LIFB we stream music all day long, and sometimes have the <a href="http://hypem.com/popular">Hype Machine Top 50</a> on at the same time just for kicks. But we also aim to buy at least our favourite album of the year on vinyl each year (amongst a tonne of other records that otherwise would stay in the Age Concern 75p box forever). In 2011 it was Bon Iver's <i>Bon Iver, </i>in 2010 it was The National's <i>High Violet... </i>we haven't got 2009's <i>Miike Snow </i>yet, but did manage to find 2008's <i>Elephant Shell </i>by Tokyo Police Club recently.<br />
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And that's the crux of it: it doesn't matter that there were at least four other albums released in 2011 that could have taken the place of <i>Bon Iver</i>, this isn't about being completist; equally, it isn't about buying the vinyl in December as a prize for making an end of year list; it's about a physical object that shows something we thought was <i>good</i>.<br />
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You're never going to be able to listen to everything. This realisation hits everybody at some point. You're not even going to be able to listen to everything worth listening to. One reaction to this is to retreat to the old ground of listing and ranking, subdividing time to listen to music that is worthy - that's the easy way out. The better reaction is to try and achieve a zen state where as long as what you are listening to feels good, then you are not wasting your listening time. And, occasionally, even if you think it's terrible and the person in the car with you thinks it's good, that can be a worthy listen also. A martyrish listen. Well done you if you've got there, we haven't.<br />
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We have an image of being old, instructing children to pick a record they like the look of to listen to while they play. As snazzy as cover flow looks, it just doesn't fit into that picture. That's why we're going to keep buying important records on vinyl. Not all of them, and not a set number from different genres and sub genres, but just at least one a year that we like. That's enough.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0