bjerk,
criticism can only be metered on one thing and one thing alone, the music, that's why
it's presumptuous for gonzi to attack bjork's album without hearing it first, gonz cites
cylob as an counter-example of an artist producing music in the way he thinks it should
be done, but he is subscribing to the hackneyed romantic notion of the "struggling
artist", as joe carducci pointed out in his *excellent* book rock and the pop
narcotic, if you feed any audience a mystique, that very soon becomes more important
that the actual art being produced and allows a convenient escape route from criticism
[hello mr. james], bad music is bad music not matter what circumstances it is produced
under, same goes for good music
the problem most people like gonzi have with bjork's music is that it [can not] be
romantizied about, financed by a major label & worked on by a host of hired hands,
bjork toys with the latest 'in" producers, as ken said in a search for credibility,
what she is doing could be seen as a shrewd move, she is no dummy where electronic music
is concerned, she was checking mixmaster morris out back in the days when most idmers
were still listening to kiss and no matter what her motives, it could only be a good
thing that the music of underground producers is reaching the overground market. as
someone correctly pointed out if she was looking for a quick buck van helden & oakenfold
would have been safer bets than plaid & mark bell, how would every one feel if what she
started working with afx then? [shes already laid down tracks with tom jenkinson]
in the first place i think franz might have been playing devils advocate with his
suggestion that bjork was more innovative than freeform, but it depends on how you
define innovative, to me innovation is all about pushing forward the barriers, in
whatever way possible, gonzi has to face up to the fact that [now] the music of rephlex
is [no more innovative] or [challenging] than bjorks, to pretend otherwise is self
delusion
rephlex retains the same subtle approach to cultural appropriation within an admittedly
more micro-cosmic specialist market, at the end of the day its still an attempt to seem
to get 'with it', [but in no less a cynical way than bjork] re: the recent dip into sub
genres like japanese noise, rephlex dont go out on a limb and release material by true
sonic innovators like but violent onsen geisha, aube, masonnatoy or otomo yoshidie, but
instead play it safe with the media friendly wackyness of sam & valley .
bjorks work stands tall or falls down on the music alone, not the peripherals
my 2p
stuart @ mfr
--
http://dialspace.dial.pipex.com/mfr/
cutting edge mail order..elecktronic label
[esoteric, non-generic material wanted]