Fave books (2012)

 My Favorite Books Q/A

done for Interview magazine Germany

2012

- What books are on your nightstand right now?

I have something like 50 books lined up to read (seriously, I do -- I am a nut about buying books). But the ones I’m seriously focused on reading right now are: Tubes: A Journey To the Center of the Internet, by Andrew Blum, and Camille Paglia’s Glittering Images: A Journey Through Art from Egypt to Star Wars.

[historical footnote - did not finish, indeed barely ever started, either of these]

- Which book was the last one that profoundly impressed you? Why?

George Melly’s Revolt Into Style: The Pop Arts, which was written at the end of the Sixties and is a very sharp take on the significance of pop music and pop culture in general, and informative too, which lots of stuff on things going on in Sixties Britain that are now forgotten. I was also impressed by the writing style and elegant thinking of Decadence: The Strange Life of An Epithet, by Richard Gilman, while not necessarily agreeing with the argument.

- Is there a book that changed your life? When was that and what did it change?

Roland Barthes’s The Pleasure of The Text, as the representative text of a whole bunch of French critical theory that changed my conceptions of what art (including music) was about and how it worked. 

- Which book was your favorite when you were a child?

Too many to list really, I was a serious bibliomaniac. But if pressed to pick one, I’d probably go for The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame. 

- Is there a piece of classic canonical literature you didn't like at all?

I can’t really think of one that I completely detested and couldn’t see the point of at all.  But I was underwhelmed by Jack Kerouac’s On the Road. There’s some great passages of mystical writing in it but overall I found it not very engaging. I got to about 40 pages from the end and then just stopped. Had no interest in finding out how it ended. I don’t know if Kerouac counts as “classic canonical” though.

- Where is your favorite place to read at?

On the sofa, when everyone in the house has gone to bed. When you’re so into a book you willingly give up sleep. There’s been books where I’ve been so gripped, that even though my kids will be waking me up at 7AM, I’ll have stayed up until 2AM.

- Which literary character do you adore the most? Would you like to be him/ her for a day or two?

I’m finding it hard to think of a literary character I adore. I don’t adore Maldoror in Lautreamont’s Chants de Maldoror, but he is pretty charismatic. Same with Des Esseintes in Against Nature by J.K. Huysmans. But neither of them are admirable. They’re not people I’d like to be. Often the most compelling characters are evil, or damaged, twisted individuals, or pathetic. Like in Nabokov's novels: Humbert in Lolita, the crazy professor in Pale Fire, Van Veen in Ada.  Or Alex in A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess.  Or the protagonist of Dostoevski’s Notes From Underground.  I wouldn’t want to really be inside any of these guys’s skins for a day, or a minute really.

10 for 2010

Favourite Albums of 2010, submitted to some publication or other.

1. Rangers - Suburban Tours (Olde English Spelling Bee)
2. Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti - Before Today (4AD)
3. Vampire Weekend - Contra (XL)
4. Gonjasufi - A Sufi and A Killer (Warp)
5. Moon Wiring Club - A Spare Tabby At The Cat's Wedding (Gecophonic)
6. Jim Ferraro - On Air (Muscleworks Inc.)
7. Actress  - Splazsh (Honest Jon's)
8. D.D. Denham - Electronic Music in the Classroom (Cafe Kaput)
9. Oneohtrix Point Never - Returnal (Mego)
10. Die Antwoord - $o$ (Interscope)

I think all those albums stand up

Probably the one that has receded a bit for me is the Vampire Weekend.  

And Actress, maybe although it mightily impressed me at the time. 

I would be curious to relisten to On Air but at the time it was easily my favorite of his many efforts. 

Not so long ago I saw a doc on Die Antwoord, which demystified them to their detriment, but reminded me how cool and strange their records / videos were. 

Actually looking at it's surprising the proportion of the people on it who have taken a reputational hit subsequently, not for their music, but for other behaviours. 

Well, three to be precise, but that's almost a third... 

50 faves (variant)

 Fifty fave tunes done for an Italian magazine, can’t remember when - just what struck me that day…

The Eyes -- "When the Night Falls"

The Beatles -- "Strawberry Fields Forever"

John's Children -- "A Midsummer Night's Scene"

We The People -- "You Burn Me Up and Down"

The Byrds -- "Everybody's Been Burned"

Pink Floyd -- "Paintbox"

The Doors - "The Soft Parade"

Love -- "You Set The Scene"

The Stooges - "Ann"

Scott Walker -- "Boy Child"

Miles Davis -- "Bitches Brew"

The Rolling Stones - "Moonlight Mile"

Roy Harper -- "The Same Old Rock"

Black Sabbath -- "Iron Man"

John Martyn -- "I'd Rather Be The Devil"

Roxy Music -- "If There Is Something"

Al Green -- "I'm Still In Love With You"

Can -- "Quantum Physics"

Kevin Ayers -- "Decadence"

Robert Wyatt -- "Sea Song"

Faust -- "Jennifer"

Neu! -- "Seeland"

Max Romeo -- "War Inna Babylon"

Television -- "Marquee Moon"

Sex Pistols -- "Bodies"

X Ray Spex -- "Let's Submerge"

Ian Dury -- "My Old Man"

Kraftwerk -- "Neon Lights"

The Slits -- "So Tough"

Public Image Ltd -- "No Birds Do Sing"

Gang of Four -- "At Home He Feels Like A Tourist"

Fleetwood Mac -- "Sara"

Michael Jackson -- "Rock With You'

Scritti Politti -- "PAs"

Talking Heads -- "Seen and Not Seen"

The Associates -- "Party Fears Two"

The Blue Orchids -- "Low Profile"

Meat Puppets -- "Two Rivers"

The Smiths -- "There Is A Light That Never Goes Out"

Nitro Deluxe -- "This Brutal House"

Public Enemy -- "Public Enemy No. 1"

My Bloody Valentine -- "I Believe"

Orbital -- "Chime"

Joey Beltram -- "Energy Flash"

Aphex Twin -- "We Are the Music Makers"

Omni Trio -- "Renegade Snares (Foul Play Remix)"

New Horizons - - "Find the Path"

Daft Punk -- "Digital Love"

Jay-Z -- "The Takeover"

Dizzee Rascal -- "I Luv U"

Must have been early-mid 2000s judging by the final record here

questionnaire pour Libération (2020)

What is the first record  you bought in your youth with your own money ?

Ian Dury and the Blockheads, Do It Yourself, 1979

Your favorite way for listening to music ? (MP3, CD, vinyl, radio for example) ?

Radio – London pirate stations in the 1990s,  listening to rap or classic rock in the car in Los Angeles today.

The last record you bought?

Last vinyl was Some British Accents and Dialects (BBC, 1971). Last digital was Beatriz Ferreyra, Echos+ (Room40, 2020). 

Where do you prefer to be when you are listening to music?

I like to be doing something that occupies me physically but leaves me mentally open to the music – in the kitchen, cooking, is ideal.

A mascot/favorite record to start the day with ?

Sacred, “Do It Together (London Massive)”, 1992

Do you need music for work or do you prefer silence ?

Usually I’m listening to what I’m writing about, but for pure acceleration as the deadline approaches, hardcore rave and jungle tapes that I made off pirate radio in the early Nineties maintain my pace and sustain my spirits.  

The song you feel a bit ashamed to listen to with pleasure ?

I don’t feel shame about liking anything, because – through solipsistic logic – I conclude that if I like it, it must be good. But if pushed, I would admit that enjoying “Rock You Like A Hurricane” by the Scorpions feels slightly embarrassing.

The record that everybody likes and that you despise ?

I can’t think of a record that everybody likes – there’s always a contrarian these days who’ll say “this is overrated”. I’m actually struggling to think of a record I despise. Panic! At The Disco’s “High Hopes” is fairly horrific, but I’m sure many would agree with me.

The records you need to survive on desert island ?

I made it records plural because it’s too hard to pick just one. Miles Davis, In A Silent Way. Joni Mitchell, The Hissing of Summer Lawns. John Martyn, Solid Air.

What cover art would you frame at home like a piece of art ?

Electronic Panorama, a Prospective 21e Siecle series box set released by Philips in 1970. I don’t have it framed but the silver metallic box is displayed on a shelf in our living room.

Your best memory of a concert ?

Daft Punk making their US debut at the Even Furthur rave in the wilds of Wisconsin, 1996.

Do you go in a club to dance, listen to music on a big sound system, to chat up… Or you never go in the clubs ?

I used to go to clubs and raves all the time. But now hardly ever. When I went, it was to dance and to do certain other things people at raves do. But also increasingly I went as a participant-observer, the use the anthropologist’s term. To read the living text of the crowd, decode the rituals.  

What is the record you share with your significant other in your live ?

Too many, but among the core shared favorites are Pixies, Cocteau Twins, Aphex Twin, A.R. Kane, Fleetwood Mac, Saint Etienne, Omni Trio, Orbital, Ultramarine.

The track that makes you mad with rage ?

I cannot think of one at the moment. There are tracks that make me rage with madness, in a good way, i.e. Dionysian frenzy – The Stooges’s “TV Eye”, Beltram’s “Energy Flash”, Future’s “Fuck Up These Commas”.

The last record you listened to over and over again ?

Thin Lizzy, “My Sarah”.

The band you wish you have joined ?

Often the bands that do great things that I’d have been thrilled to be involved in creating also have nasty internal struggles and a long periods of misery and decline. So I will say the Wilson Sisters, a very short-lived conceptual outfit started by friends of mine, with whom I did the Oxford pop journal Monitor. But I had moved to London so missed their one and only  recording session.

The piece of music that makes you cry ?

The Smiths, “There Is A Light That Never Goes Out”. Runner up: Kraftwerk, “Neon Lights”.

Do you know what drone metal is ?

Sunn O))) ?

Quote the lyrics of a song you know by heart ?

The whole lyric? I’m not sure I know every last word in this, but I know most of it. This is just one bit:  “Why in the world are we here? Surely not to live in pain and fear. Why on earth are you there? When you're everywhere, come and get your share. But we all shine on, Like the moon and the stars and the sun, And we all shine on. On and on and on and on.” (“Instant Karma”, John Lennon)

Name three of your favorite songs ? 

Sly and the Family Stone “Everyday People”, Foul Play “Open Your Mind (Foul Play Remix)”, The Sweet “Ballroom Blitz”.

Cultural Striptease

(done in 2010) 

Your first cultural memory?

Probably The Beatles ("Yellow Submarine"). Unless we count British children's TV shows like Andy Pandy and Pogle's Wood.

The song where you would like to inhabit?

The second (subaquatic idyllic) section of John Martyn's "I'd Rather Be The Devil", but I'd need to have gills instead of lungs.

A song you are listening obsessively on your iPod? (do you have one?)

I do have an iPod but hardly ever use it. The last song to obsess me was Black Eyed Peas's "Boom Boom Pow" which came out in summer 2009 but which I only heard this month -- that got several replays on YouTube.

An embarassing (or dangerous cultural) pleasure?

I can't think of anything that embarrasses me. 

I suppose I am ashamed of how much time I waste watching junk TV -- cooking shows, reality-type pseudo-documentaries, "Best Interior Design/Next Top Model" type contests. There really are so many better things I could do with my time.

 

The song/movie which changed your life (a quote from it).

Sex Pistols, "Anarchy in the U.K."--no specific line, but the excessive demand in the song and Johnny Rotten's performance left me with excessive, unrealistic demands in terms of what I expect from music (world-shaking impact, breath-choking intensity)

A recent album/book/movie/author that you consider your personal discovery.

In the era of webbed music and hyper-hipsterism, it is very hard to be first on the block with a new group, or a new anything. Generally I am happy to pick up on things a little bit after the "new thing" hunters get there.

Things your children should read, listen and see?

The Wind In the Willows by Kenneth Grahame.

Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony.

The Railway Children.

 

If I say television: is there a sitcom or something unexpected you can’t stop to watch at?

Peep Show.

 

Music: the playlist/soundtrack of your life, in 5 songs.

The Slits, "So Tough"

My Bloody Valentine, "Slow"

Orbital, "Chime"

Omni Trio, "Renegade Snares (Foul Play Remix)"

Ariel Pink, "The Ballad of Bobby Pyn"

 

The ringtone you have on your your mobile phone, now?

The standard one it comes with.

 

What do you think of people who obsessively wear earcuffs while walking or other?

It's not how I would choose to live. I don't like to be insulated from the outside world. I was never a big fan of the Walkman and the only time I use my iPod is on long train or bus journeys, or late at night when I want to read while sitting on the sofa (rather than attached to the stereo via headphones).

 

A quote from a song to tell someone: you love him/her; you want to leave him/her. And a song (quote) to convince someone to stay with you?

"It's only me/Who wants to wrap around your dreams"--Fleetwood Mac, "Dreams"

"Lovin’ you...isn't the right thing to do"--Fleetwood Mac, "Go Your Own Way"

"I can still hear you saying/You would never break the chain"--Fleetwood Mac, "The Chain"

 

Your relationship with new technologies: do you have a Blackberry/iPhone, you are an email addict, what’s your opinion about Facebook or similar?

No Blackberry, no iPhone, only shaky command of my mobile phone to be honest. Email, addicted, yes of course. Facebook--coming up with clever comments on stuff is too much like work for me. I'm on it but I hardly ever update or leave anything comments. Twitter is another step in the ephemeralisation of everything: I can remember magazine articles and music paper record reviews from 30 years ago; I can remember certain blog posts and online essays from 7 or 9 years ago. But do people remember a Tweet for more than a day?

A stupid thing that you cannot stop to do online. Or a digital gaffe.

Saving articles and blog posts "to read later". "Later" never comes and I have a folder called Reading Matter with a couple of thousand files inside it.

Have you read books on kindle or some e-readers?

No.

What you would have want to learn to do in life?

Practically: Drive a car (I've just moved to Los Angeles so this is essential). Play a musical instrument. Learn how to make beats. Learn how to beat-match as a deejay.

Existentially: Be more patient. Waste less time.

 

What did you learn from a book/movies/music about: sex?

There's no substitute for hands-on experience.

 

Do you read magazines?

Yes, but not as much as I used to.

What did you save/hated of our last ten years culture, the so called Noughties, Anni Zero.

Love: Music's inexhaustible capacity to come up with the unexpected, the revelatory, unknown pleasures (Dizzee Rascal, Animal Collective, Ariel Pink, Ghost Box, Vampire Weekend...). Blogging as a rebirth of music  journalism.

Hate: The effect on the internet on my attention span, which is shot to pieces (see above, about magazines). The wars and the propaganda machine that attempted to justify them. Still waiting for the future/the 21st Century to start, the first ten years just seem like the Nineties continuing. Twitter as the slow erosion of blogging

A word that you love. A word that you hate.

Joy

Root canal

Were would you go for a “cultural” tour? 3 places

Places I've never been -- Tokyo, Bombay, Beijing.

If you would have to write an autobiography, what could be the firts line? And the dedication?

 I will never write an autobiography. But the dedication would be "For Jenny and for Joy".