Thursday, April 11th

April 11, 2019 by 5 Comments

This week brought with it the extraordinary last scene of Fleabag, played out to “This Feeling” by Alabama Shakes… “See, I’ve been having me a real hard time / But it feels so nice, to know I’m gonna be alright…” as well as a visit to the thought-provoking David Adjaye: Making Memory, at the Design Museum. If you have any interest in monumental architecture or type or civil rights or, who knows, the making of memorials, then try to see it [on ’til August 5th]. The typographical transcription of Martin Luther King’s last speech, which changes (as you listen and watch) the weight of the typefaces, based on the cadence and volume of King’s voice, is really something.

{STOP PRESS} ROCK ISLAND LINE
Billy Bragg’s documentary, directed by George Scott, is being shown tonight at 9pm on BBC4 (and thereafter on iPlayer). I haven’t seen it, though I helped in sourcing some images, but The Guardian’s preview found it “an admirably clear and unpretentious documentary by Billy Bragg, lauding the British skiffle craze of the 1950s for helping to usher in the pop revolution of the following decade. Bragg explains how one song, captured by US folk archivists and then associated with Lead Belly before being recorded by Lonnie Donegan, energised a new wave of performers for whom fighting racism was a major part of their drive to democratise popular music.”


{ONE} MUSIC OF THE WEEK
Shabaka Hutchings, improvising on the bass clarinet in church, for the Barbican Sessions. From the key drop at around two minutes via the skronking shreiks and the sound of the clarinet’s pads clattering, to the beautiful phrase that he finishes with, it’s totally hypnotic.

{TWO} IT’S ROCKUMENTARY TIME, PART ONE!
Free to Rock on Sky Arts had a terrific line-up of talking heads, including Jimmy Carter, Billy Joel and Mikhail Gorbachev. Best of all were the Russian musicians, all still dressed as if it were 1989. As one T-shirt said, “I’m only wearing black until they make something darker…”

My favourite story was this: “All we had were acoustic guitars, so we needed to make electric guitars. I had a friend who was a sailor who brought a Fender Guitar catalogue with the pictures, and even the factory drawings and dimensions. I saw for first time Fender Stratocaster, and I looked at that and I thought, God, what a beautiful thing… So I decided I’d get a piece of plywood and I carved the body, exactly the shape, but we couldn’t make the neck, so we took the acoustic Russian guitar, took off the neck and screwed it to that body. Then we needed a pickup! The one thing that the public telephone booth had is the magnets – when you talk –and they were perfect little magnets, so you have to break those public telephones, take those magnets, solder them. And it worked!” The deadpan on-screen caption tells us that, “shortly after, most phones in central Moscow were disabled by musicians making electric guitars…”

{THREE} WAYNE’S WORLD
Our friend Wayne’s first book was “Dedicated to…”, subtitled The forgotten friendships, hidden stories and lost loves found in second-hand books, a compilation of inscriptions found in said books. His new work is an even more fascinating concept – “Three Score & Ten: A Literary Journey Through Life” views the passage of time through the prism of literature. So the age of one through to seventy are illustrated by sections from great works, featuring one fictional male and one fictional female for each year, “in order to detail the minuscule changes wrought upon our bodies and minds as consciousness blooms, experiences accrue, hopes rise and fall, options expand and then retract.” An exhibition rather than a book (think of the rights clearances!) it’s at Burley Fisher books on Kingsland Road in Haggerston until May 1. It was so riveting we read every one.

{FOUR} ROOMFUL OF TEETH? ROOMFUL OF TEETH?
“Roomful of Teeth is a kind of lab experiment for the human voice. Its eight singers cover a five-octave range, from grunting lows to dog-whistle highs. Three have perfect pitch, all have classical training, and Wells has brought in a succession of experts to teach them a bewildering range of other techniques: alpine yodelling, Bulgarian belting, Persian Tahrir, and Inuit and Tuvan throat singing, among others. Because the group writes or commissions almost all of its pieces, it can create vocal effects that most singers would never attempt.” [They play Kings Place in May.]

This New Yorker piece was fascinating, and not only for its subject. It used a neat piece of web linking. Over certain phrases was a grey bar with a play arrow (see below) that triggers what is being described as you read it. Wild! I want to see if I can get this to work on 5 Things, but it’s undoubtedly ridiculously cutting-edge and expensive…

{FIVE} EXHIBITION CORNER!
I want to be in New York, now. Play It Loud: Instruments of Rock and Roll has just started at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and, as the blurb says, “it explores the instrumentation of the rock band and how individual artists used their instruments to create their unique sound.”

Some of the ephemera from the show: playful design frames Bob’s head, authentic Southern Soul-styled poster for The Stones; and 60s graphic gorgeousness for a leaping Townsend.

The holy relics include:
Chuck Berry’s Gibson ES-350T from 1957, which he toted as he duckwalked through “Johnny B. Goode”.
Sister Rosetta’s stunning Les Paul Custom (a white-with-three-gold-pickups SG).
James Jamerson’s upright bass, likely used on many early Motown hits.
Keith Emerson’s Hammond L-100 and his Customized Hammond “Tarkus” C3.
Ian McLagan’s lovely Wurlitzer 200.
Ray Manzarak’s Vox Continental with the reversed (Black/white) keys.
Paul Butterfield’s Hohner Trumpet Call harmonicas, as photographed for Better Days’ debut album cover.

Left to right: Paul Bigsby’s Solid-body No. 2 from 1948, an extraordinary, visionary design; The first Fender guitar – body-shape there, headstock not; Jeff Beck’s seriously road-worn Telecaster; and Prince’s Hohner Madcat, a Tele copy bought from a Minneapolis-area gas station for about $30 in the early 1970s, because the guitar’s leopard-patterned pickguard matched his strap and stage outfit.


The list goes on… Don Everly’s Gibson Southern Jumbo, Muddy Waters’ Telecaster, Louis Jordan’s sax, Jerry Lee Lewis’s gold piano, Brian Jones’ Mellotron, Ian Anderson’s flute, beautiful posters for the Fillmore by Bonnie MacLean. The exhibition will also include a sculpture made from what was left of one Pete Townshend’s Gibson SG Specials (set in lucite as if it were a Hirst) after he smashed it during an Annie Leibovitz photo shoot. There’s even a fragment of the “Monterey Pop” Stratocaster of Jimi Hendrix… Whether it can bring these objects alive I don’t know, but if anyone goes, let me know what you think…

{EXTRA} QUOTE OF THE WEEK
The Guardian’s Alexis Petridis on Georgio Moroder at the Symphony Hall, Birmingham. “The highlights come when Moroder’s disco-era hits punch through the cabaret styling on “I Feel Love” and a version of “MacArthur Park” using a taped vocal by the late Donna Summer. Occasionally, Moroder explains their recording: “Donna said she wanted to make a sexy record,” he offers. “Then she did a moaning, and then another moaning”. Alas, the ensuing version of “Love to Love You Baby” that follows is truncated, even bowdlerised. None of the four vocalists are required to do a moaning.”

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Friday, March 29th

March 29, 2019 by 2 Comments

Once a giant date of political upheaval, now its proximity to April Fool’s Day just looks prescient. Even Uri Geller was powerless to guide us. Here’s Five Things with tariff-free content, a warm embrace and no backstop.

{ONE} GOODBYE SCOTT WALKER (NOT WALKER)
I first listened to Scott Walker properly when my wife was doing interview transcriptions for documentary filmmakers. She was working on Stephen Kijak’s 2006 film about Walker, 30 Century Man, and we had piles of DVDs of interviews and studio footage. Transferring the sound onto cassette tape while watching the unedited reels became a fascinating experience – Stephen was allowed to film the studio sessions for The Drift, resulting in long takes of discussions between his co-producer Peter Walsh and a variety of musicians. This included a carpenter building a plywood box in the studio to deliver a certain sound and resonance when hit, the now-notorious percussion (a side of pork played by Alasdair Malloy), and the brilliant guitarist Hugh Burns, being pushed into chords that were almost physically impossible to play, his hand stretched to its limits on the fretboard. Scott’s instructions to Evan Parker, that he wanted “clouds of saxophones”, gives a hint of the textures and sonics that he was after.

Stephen, collaborating with his director of photography, Grant Gee, filmed each of the contributors listening to a Scott track of their choice on a portable record player, a lovely invention that pulls you both into the world of Walker, and of his acolytes. I can’t recommend it highly enough.

As film director Atom Egoyan said, “I have rarely seen a biographical documentary that is able to make the viewer experience the perspective of a devoted fan, a concerned friend, and a complete stranger at the same time.” And I like singer Barb Jungr’s take on it: “In a rare moment Walker talks of the seductive quality, the power, of the baritone voice. Clearly, the gift he was given has been a double-edged sword. But this film reveals that he’s learned to wield that sword in a unique manner, and out there on the edges of music, where he walks alone, he’s leaving a magical, fairy tale trail that many may wish to follow, but few can.”

{TWO} SCOTT, ALMOST IN CONCERT
In 2012 I wrote about The Barbican putting on an astonishing show, Drifting and Tilting – The Songs of Scott Walker, a few years earlier. “It was more opera than rock. Scott, eyes hidden beneath a baseball cap, stood at the mixing desk conducting his collaborator Peter Walsh. It was all I could do to drag my eyes away and back to the stage, which teemed with extraordinary visions. The most arresting image? Possibly a boxer using a pig’s carcass as a percussion instrument. Or maybe Gavin Friday as Elvis (“It casts its ruins in shadows/Under Memphis moonlight”), perched on a stool, singing to his stillborn twin Jesse, while a bequiffed and backlit figure strode from the back of the stage until he assumed gigantic proportions, looming over the whole theatre. Whichever, it was an evening that lives on in the memory. Long may Scott run.”

{THREE} AS DAVID BAILEY DOES THE ROUNDS…
publicising his giant new Taschen book, I find this (below, right) in a book that I found, bizarrely, in a basement. Fashion students take note – and ignore Bailey’s cynicism.

{FOUR} HILARIOUS
Messy Nessy is a rather fabulous guide to Paris. This is from her always interesting weekly post, 13 Things I Found on the Internet Today.

Number 2. A Reminder that Barbra Streisand has a Mall (above, left) in her Basement. “Instead of just storing my things in the basement, I can make a street of shops and display them,” Streisand says. The mall at her Malibu home includes a doll shop, a costume shop and candy store where she serves guests ice cream. Ryan Murphy spoke of the time he had dinner with Lady Gaga at Streisand’s home. “We had dinner with Barbra and Jim, and Kelly [Preston] and John [Travolta], and Gaga and I. That’s all the people who were invited. And after dinner, she said, ‘Do you want to see the mall?’ And Gaga and I were out of that chair so fast… We went down to the mall and spent an hour down there. She pulled out her collection of gowns from Funny Girl and Hello, Dolly! And then she said, ‘Do you want frozen yoghurt?’ I could write a whole book about that night.”

What’s sad is how generic ye olde worlde mall looks, like it’s been lifted from a rather poor theme parks…

{FIVE} TWO BENCHES
… walked past this week, one in Hackney marshes, where a saxophonist sat blowing, lost in the notes and impervious to the thumbs-up from passers-by. The other in Knutsford, Cheshire, while walking the dog around a lake, with a quote worthy of Miles Davis, although it is, in fact, from American Composer Truman Fisher, a man who adored Count Basie, accompanied The Ink Spots in Hollywood nightclubs in the 80s, and whose works inlude Pocahontas in London and Requiem for Wyatt Earp.

{EXTRA} RBP PODCAST, EPISODE 19
Listen to this excellent episode for the stunning interview with Minnie Riperton by Cliff White. Minnie was an amazing person with an extraordinary voice, who died way too young. Guest James Medd also has great stuff on Hal Blaine, Charlie McCoy and Joanna Newsom.

{BUY} FIVE THINGS THE BOOK, HERE

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Wednesday, July 18th

July 18, 2018 by 13 Comments

This week’s Five Things was written to the sound of a BBC commentator exclaiming “In Paris tonight, they’re going to party like it’s 1998!” as the World Cup Final ended, a line that had to have been thought of in prep for the game, and one they probably winced over, but, what the hell, decided to use.

Oh, and also written to the awful soundtrack of the vassal state that is Piers Morgan getting all boys-toys excited by Air Force One and the enforced closure of Stansted Airport for his exclusive interview with you-know-who. Almost everything about the programme (#pierstrumpaf1) was staggeringly offensive. I’m saying that so that you don’t waste an hour of your lives, but I still think you should watch it, in case the Revolution comes, Piers Morgan gets captured, and this is needed to build the case against him. To clear my head, I put on Lee Dorsey singing “River Boat”, an extremely weird and discombobulated slice of sparse funk. Check it out if you don’t know it. Okay, Five Things…

ONE FATHER AND SONS
As 8 o’clock, as Belgium v France entered its second spell I thought about Caetano Veloso and his concert at the Barbican. I’m not the only person with tickets who couldn’t pass up the game. I wondered about his first half audience. Luckily – or not – Brazil were taking no part in the Semi-Finals, and as his concert promotor, Serious, tweeted “Don’t let last Friday night be a reason to stay in today; come celebrate Brazil with ‘one of the greatest songwriters of the century’ (@nytimes) @caetanoveloso.”

So I watch the game with son Gabe, at my mum’s flat in Covent Garden, before grabbing a cab to the Barbican. I wait for a break in the performance to be admitted. It doesn’t take long, and as I find my seat, I’m struck by the palpable warmth that exists between the musicians and the audience. There are shouted requests and laughter and some conversation from the stalls to the stage.

Caetano Veloso and three of his sons (Moreno, Zecas and Tom) sit in a line across the stage – one at a keyboard, one on bass and the third with a nylon string guitar, twin of the one that Caetano plays. That son (No. 3 if you’re counting from the left) sat insouciantly crosslegged and barefooted, his flip-flops cast aside. The son who started off on bass played a spoon on a plate for the next number, before putting it down so that he could do a kind of sand-dance shimmy across the stage.

Then they start to play a percussive, choppy samba rhythm under a song that the audience knows, seemingly as well as the musicians. Lovers entwine their arms and ecstatically join in, pitch perfect. Like other veteran musicians playing London, there’s a diaspora audience here. I’ve seen it with both Charles Aznavour and Paolo Conte, where a shared heritage turns the evening into something that may be tagged as nostalgia but is actually a deeper celebration of a state of being – here, being Brazilian. And even as a stranger here among this crowd, with no notion of the subjects of the songs, I feel a sort of drunken joyfulness. There’s something special about familial harmonies, atop a velvet Fender Rhodes bed, some nimble bass and sparsely-plucked nylon-stringed guitars. I only caught forty minutes, but it was a great forty minutes. Here’s son Tom leading them in one of the beguiling songs from this new project, Ofertorio.

And on the tube home, I step into the carriage and see a sad couple, with Belgian flags painted on their faces, staring into the middle distance.

TWO STAN THE MAN
I remember wanting to figure out the chords to Andy Razaf and Don Redman’s “Gee Baby, Ain’t I Good to You” when it appeared on Geoff Muldaur is Having a Wonderful Time in 1975. My dad said, “Oh, I know someone who can help…” A couple of nights later he handed me a blank cheque, torn out of his Midland Bank chequebook. On the other side, the chords, courtesy of pianist – and my dad’s old mucker – Stan Greig. Stan had played the drums in the Colyer band’s four-month Düsseldorf stint in 1954 (and on Humph’s “Bad Penny Blues”, the inspiration for “Lady Madonna”) and duly delivered all the essential chords, although it took me a while to find out that Fº was otherwise known as F diminished. Oh, and the C13 can be subbed with a C7, but it doesn’t sound quite as good. [Mark sends this: “It’s worth noting that the Muldaur version of “Gee Baby”… is slightly different to any others in that he makes the opening chord of a verse minor rather than major. It really works!]

 

5-greigchequeTHREE HERRMANN AND?
Walking out of an afternoon screening of Taxi Driver into the bright, hot London sunshine was a disorientating experience. The hellish neon and tenement grime of the movie, overscored by Bernard Herrmann’s stunning music, took a while to dissipate. We stayed through the credits mostly to see who played the alto sax and trumpet parts that are so central to the intensity of Herrmann’s score, but they weren’t credited. Some digging turned up that the sax was often misattributed to Tom Scott.

The Library of Congress had this to say: “Orchestrator Christopher Palmer, who was present at the recording sessions in Los Angeles, assured this writer that Ronnie Lang played the alto sax solos and that the so-called “original soundtrack album” was actually a re-recording, made a day or two later and following Herrmann’s death, for which Lang was no longer available and for whom Tom Scott subbed. Other musicians included Uan Rasey (MGM studio’s lead trumpeter), Warren Luening and Malcolm McNab on trumpets…” So I still don’t know who played the trumpet solos. Listening to it, I thought of Jack Sheldon’s fine work on Tom Waits’ score for One From the Heart and the Foreign Affairs album, where he absolutely shines. It turns out that Sheldon studied with Rasey. And I love the fact that Ronnie Lang’s professional début was aged sixteen, with the fantastically named Hoagy Carmichael’s Teenagers…

FOUR LEFSETZ & GAMBINO
Following on from last week, I started reading The Lefsetz Letter because Lionel told me that I should. “Bob Lefsetz is famous for being beholden to no one and speaking the truth. He addresses the issues that are at the core of the music business: downloading, copy protection, pricing and the music itself.” Whew! The letters are long and sometimes too insider-y for the likes of me, but it’s a pungent and entertaining look at the machinations of the music biz. A month ago he wrote about Donald (Childish Gambino) Glover and the astonishing video for his song, “This is America”, possibly the only video that has prompted mainstream media to run features telling you what’s going on it… And it also inspired Pinot (on Instagram) to recreate Glover’s dance moves on a Mac SE using MacPaint. Which is insane.

5-gambino

From Bob Lefsetz: “History always repeats, just not in the way you think it does. We were waiting for anthems to bubble up and dominate radio. But the anger is more tribal and less singable, and music lives online, not over the airwaves. You pull it up on demand, there are no gatekeepers, you get a vibe on the wind, and you check it out.

That’s how hard it is to make it these days. Glover was playing to sold-out theatres, and still most people had no idea what he was doing. Let that be a lesson to the wannabes wondering why they’ve not had their chance. You’ve got to make your own chance, over and over and over again. And I’m not sure how long Glover’s moment lasts. Today some art is evanescent, and some lasts nearly forever. You can have an impact for a moment and be in the rearview mirror just that fast. But if you’re establishing a body of work as opposed to reaching for a momentary brass ring, you survive. Watch the video, have your own opinion, but just know it’s not your father’s music business anymore. Pop is dead. You know, that manufactured sound constructed by a team, refined for smoothness to the point where there’s no edge to catch you.

And rock became so formulaic as to be uninteresting. But hip-hop… The lesson is not to be calculated, not to play it safe, not to second-guess the audience. To dig down deep and tell your own truth. Over and over and over again. To experiment, take chances and then maybe… The public will catch up with you. As it just did with Donald Glover.”

Glover, creator of “Atlanta”, is undoubtedly having a moment, and the video is an astonishing, unsettling piece of work. Between Kendrick Lamar and Childish Gambino, there’s an impressive level of thinking going on.

Of course, I remember Glover most fondly from Community, where he was terrific as Troy, the ex-high school quarterback who abandons his jock mentality and embraces his nerdy, childish side as the result of his friendship with Abed Nadir. Here they are with their Spanish Rap, “La Biblioteca”.


FIVE FIVE THINGS: A BRAND EXTENSION
This Friday. Hold on to your hats, all you 173 readers of Five Things (and the 50 more on LinkedIn, obvs). All I’ll say for now is that it’s made of paper and ink.

5-book

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Wednesday, January 31st

February 2, 2018 by 6 Comments

ONE THE WEATHER STATION, OSLO

5-weatherTim and I stand with our backs leaning on the bar, watching Red River Dialect play their support-set songs, muggily. “It’s like listening to an It’s a Beautiful Day bootleg” says Tim, with unerring accuracy. I’m concerned that the subtlety of Tamara Lindeman’s songs will suffer a similar fate, but as soon as the Weather Station hit the first chord my worries evaporate. I was sent here by a review that Richard Williams wrote (here) and he captures just what makes their gigs so special. “Some of these songs are like the deepest conversations you ever had with someone you care about – and very often they’re like things that were formulated but somehow never got said. On the faster songs she piles lines on top of each other to create a river of thought and feeling. And none of the nuances are lost when she sings them with a band in front of an audience.”

Lindeman and her collaborators create an organic soundworld, and find the new in clever variations on the old. Sonically there are echoes of David Crosby’s chords, Joni Mitchell’s Hejira-era strumming, and, more tellingly, the spectral space found by the Cowboy Junkies when they recorded with one microphone in a church. But that makes the music sound too gentle – there’s a steamroller drive to the faster songs, powered by the bass of Ben Whiteley, who Tim singles out as the player the music seems to revolve around. Erik Heestermans disdains the obvious on drums and Will Kidman’s guitar solos are febrile and brittle in the manner of Richard Thompson. He’s also playing a structural role in the songs, teasing out melodies that Lindeman fleetingly suggests. The basic building blocks of rock – two guitars, bass and drums – hypnotically remade. Seventy five minutes went by in the blink of an eye.

TWO BASQUIAT AT THE BARBICAN
A fantastic show, where Basquiat’s crazed genius shined through. What I had forgotten was just how much he referenced musicians in his work – often an older Jazz than you may expect (Louis Armstrong’s “Potato Head Blues” and Ben Webster’s “Blue Skies”, say, although his main man was Charlie Parker).

5-BasquiatThere’s also cracking film of August Darnell and Andy Hernandez leading Kid Creole and the Coconuts through their early-80s set in a New York Club. [Polaroid of AD above].

THREE FROM NICK COLEMAN’S NEW BOOK
Voices: How a Great Singer Can Change Your Life, published by Jonathan Cape on 25 January. I’m really looking forward to this. Here’s a bit about Al Green: “We are in New York on Seventh Avenue, high up in the sky in his hotel bedroom. This is my second attempt to interview the Rev. The first time round, which he clearly only half remembers, if at all, from a year ago, we’d got bogged down in thick theological mud. I’d wanted to draw out the lineaments of his faith in order to unravel the fabric of his genius, or something along those lines. Most of all, I’d wanted to uncover the ambivalences that allow him to sing about God like a lover and about Love like a metaphysical poet. This is not possible in 20 minutes. And Al, being a true soul man, had chosen to sing most of his replies in robust Biblical quotation. This was great for me but no use at all for you, dear reader.
So Al, when you’re singing, do you wait for the spirit to come to you or do you summon it? “What magazine do you work for? In London? Ah, well, I don’t really speak on that subject because it’s a Utopia subject and, anyway, no one is always in the spirit or under the anointing. Not that I know of. And if you sit and wait for it and do what the scripture says – ‘And if anybody ask anything of the Lord, let him be prepared to wait on it’ – you may be waiting a few days. And then your studio time runs out!”

FOUR THE BLOODY BOB MUSICAL, AGAIN…
I saw this review by Caroline McGinn in Time Out. Apart from my obvious disagreement over the production, just check her In My Opinion! “It’s poignant and stirring and totally fresh to see “Like a Rolling Stone” voiced by a middle-aged woman – the electrifying Shirley Henderson as Nick’s wife Elizabeth – who’s losing her inhibitions and her mind. Or the – IMO hokey and forgettable minor ballad – “I Want You”, slowed down and revealed as a sexy, aching, unrequited duet for Nick’s son Gene and yet another character, the girl who’s leaving him for a guy with a real job.”

FIVE DO RE MI
I came upon this while looking for something else. It’s rather fine. Bob, Van Dyke Parks and Ry Cooder play Woody Guthrie’s “Do Re Mi” at the Malibu Performing Arts Center in January 2009.

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Five Things I Saw & Heard This Week: Wednesday 28th November

November 28, 2012 by Leave a Comment

The Return Of Scott Walker
Exciting news for us Scott fans! In a relatively revealing Guardian interview as his new album, Bish Bosch, is launched, Scott talks about his fear of performing, as well as saying that no promoter would put him on anyway, as they’re only interested in money. But Scott could tour cultural festivals, not rock arenas, if he chose. In 2008, for instance, The Barbican put on Drifting and Tilting—The Songs of Scott Walker. It was more opera than rock. Scott, eyes hidden beneath baseball cap, stood at the mixing desk conducting his collaborator Peter Walsh. It was all I could do to drag my eyes away and back to the stage, which teemed with extraordinary visions. The most arresting image? Possibly a boxer using a pig’s carcass as a percussion instrument. Or maybe Gavin Friday as Elvis (“It casts its ruins in shadows/Under Memphis moonlight”), perched on a stool, singing to his stillborn twin Jesse, while a bequiffed and backlit figure strode  from the back of the stage until he assumed gigantic proportions, looming over the whole theatre. Whichever, it was an evening that lives on in the memory. Long may Scott run.

Amy’s Blues
The National Portrait Gallery in London buys a portrait by Marlene Dumas of the late Amy Winehouse, and  the curator says: “Dumas said that she had been very moved by the news of Winehouse’s death.” Which sort of begs the question: why not be moved by something useful like her talent or her voice—while she was alive. What’s “moving” about her death? “Dumas, who is based in Amsterdam, sought out images of Winehouse online for the work which draws the viewer in to the singer’s distinctive eyes and eye liner.” Yes, you read that right. In Art Speak, she sought out images of Amy online. And then copied some of the photos she found, quite badly. So, basically, this mediocre fan painting was co-created by Google Image Search (79,600,000 results).

Kermit The Frog, Meet Miles Davis & Louis Malle & Jeanne Moreau
Genius overlay of Davis’ session (filmed by Malle) recording the soundtrack to Lift To The Scaffold, the great French noir from ’58, with LCD Soundsystem’s New York I Love You, But You’re Bringing Me Down. The film of Davis playing to a huge projection of Moreau walking the streets of Paris at night is just stunning. That’s cut with Kermit on a rock across the river from midtown, and in Times Square. Hats off to Alessandro Grespan for his inspired and crazy jamming together of these two videos. The despairing mood of both pieces is eloquently summed up in James Murphy’s brilliant couplet “There’s a ton of the twist, but we’re fresh out of shout…”

Is It Rolling, Keith?
My favourite moment so far in Crossfire Hurricane, the Stones doc, is the extraordinary stage invasion footage. Keith: “It started, man, on the first tour. Half way through things started to get crazy [here the on-stage cameras filming the concert record a group of young besuited guys pushing the Stones over, singing into Jagger’s mic, attempting to pull Brian Jones’ guitar off, as the soundtrack becomes phased and fragmented]… we didn’t play a show after that, that was ever completed, for three years… we’d take bets on how long a show would last—you’re on, 10 minutes…”

Christies Pop Culture Auction Preview, South Kensington
A random sampling of the 20th Century, from chairs that were part of the set of Rick’s Cafe in Casablanca, via Harrison Ford’s bullwhip from Raiders to the ‘Iron Maiden’ from Ken Russell’s Tommy (a snip if it goes for its estimate of £1000). I was there to gaze upon Mitch Mitchell’s snare drum (as featured on Purple Haze, The Wind Cries Mary, Hey Joe etc) and Andy Warhol’s mock-up of an unpublished book of the Stones ’75 tour. Favourite item? Hibbing High School Yearbook, 1958, signed, “Dear Jerry, Well the year’s almost all over now, huh. Remember the “sessions” down at Colliers. Keep practicing the guitar and maybe someday you’ll be great! A friend, Bob Zimmerman”

Jerry’s Yearbook, Hibbing High School, 1958

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