SUNDAY Morn

// sunday, september 16 Erin Recommends: James' new album, 'Pleased To Meet You'. This purchase was something I just had to do. After having the recent single, 'Getting Away With It (All Messed Up)' creep up on me, as it probably has with you, I found myself humming it in elevators. Its the kind of song that you need to put in a movie soundtrack, having random people in their respective lives doing everyday activities, packing bags, washing dishes etc. all the while having this sweetly melancholy tune repeating over and over again: 'getting away with it all messed up getting away with it all messed up that's called living'. I'm pleased to find that the rest of the album is just as inspiring, touched by the godly hand of Brian Eno. I guess I just get over excited when good music is made these days .... wa wa wa .... 20 years ago ...... wa wa wa when I was a lass ..... posted by Erin Buntine 5:56 PM friday, september 14 But Norman Mailer says it better. posted by Guy Campbell 8:44 PM thursday, september 13 Aside from the death, the grief and the loss (or at least the CNN commentary), the simple visual impact of those two silver towers crashing down cannot be overestimated. Not only has the ultimate physical expression of rational progress, the skyscraper, been torn down, but it has been torn down by another symbol of precision, progress and order; the airliner. Systems that fed the growth of the modern world have been made to turn against it. You get the feeling that this is going to be one of those future cultural signposts that dots the decade. It has a significance beyond the number of casualties, or the immediate political context. It is perhaps the first real expression of the new (or at least a new variation on the old) cultural anxieties about the fragility of such an ordered and systemised modern world. Order has to veil disorder, and inevitably its gonna break through the surface eventually, just to remind us its there. posted by Guy Campbell 8:00 PM tuesday, september 11 Early Twenties Angst week is being swiftly abandoned because being in my early twenties, nothing lasts for long, including angst. Sifting through my CDs, after spilling some tea on my carpet and shuffling through piles of notes and randomn photocopies, I settled on Jenny Morris’ Honeychild, which I distinctly remember buying from Target or equivalent family discount store when I was at least 10 years old. Thus, it retains the stigma of being something I bought when I was 10 years old. And the stigma of a strong Andrew Farris connection, but that’s in the eye of the beholder, I guess. Amongst the comforting 1991 keyboard sounds lies the gem, I’ve Had You (co-written with Paul Kelly, lending credibiltiy to my swiftly developing Andrew-Farris-stigma theory). But as Elvis Costello or someone said, talking about music is like dancing to architecture, so I won’t. So what’s my point? ”If I lost my way in this world/ If I lost my home/ If friends that I once stood by tried to forget my name/ It would make no difference/ I would feel no pain”. My point lies in another swiftly developing theory that dark lyrics over a comforing early-90s soundscape can never be a bad thing. posted by Guy Campbell 6:41 PM sunday, september 9 Early Twenties Angst Edition It is kinda stifling to be aware that everyone is in the middle of an unfolding existential crisis. It gets to the point where if people aren’t talking about their “void” over red wine and coffee, then we assume they are repressing things. If you aren’t in a constant process of unravelling, unburdening and bleeding yourself dry, then you are repressed. Teachers, tram drivers, social workers, Hollyood: they all have unresolved issues, things being dealt with... after a while it gets a bit numbing. An overload of feeling. An empathy overload. Every day Oprah wheels in some mid-Western mothers to discuss their inner pain and how they are now (that they are on TV) in the midst of an upward curve. Celebrities vent their pain in a stock component of the promotional treadmill. Sure, this is a democratization of spirituality and individuality, but the flipside is that you can’t escape other people’s pain, and thus can’t ignore your own. And if you don’t have pain, you find some. OK, is ignoring your pain repression? I don’t know. Maybe life should be based on a certain level of repression. You reach a point where you really just have to destract yourself before you get your head stuck down your own personal void. If you can’t repress, you can’t momentarily forget, and if you can’t momentarily forget, then you can’t progress. Well, you can’t do much at all, really. Altough any idea of “progression” is pretty much a loaded term in a modern PoMo world. The ultimate form of repression is, of course, a career. Although its frightening to think that 40 years of repression could come and bite you in the arse after you retire, at which point you have to dwell in it for another 20 odd years. Altough hopefully hormones will have levelled out then, and everything won’t be as dramatic. And presumably by then we will have switched to “Classic FM” so it will all be tranquil, calm, and full of paints and recliners. posted by Guy Campbell 6:24 PM monday, september 3 On the topic of emergency exam buzzwords, I have a few to recommend myself: Trope... Can't go wrong. Use it like dressing on a salad. Figure... As in "X utilises Y as a figure of [insert cultural "trope"] production...". Mode... Often used in association with "cultural production". Discourse... Handle with care. Dialectic... If in doubt stick with "trope". Problematises... Occasionally useful, however no one wants to be THAT person from X or Y socio-ecomomic perspective who finds everything "problematic". If in dire need, buzzwords can often become self sustaining: "By expressing X trope through Y mode of cultural production, the figure of Z problematises the discourse of A..." Repeat, with emphasis on different socio-economic perspectives, until satisfied... Go for gold. posted by Guy Campbell 9:05 PM Speaking of plants - Saturday was the first day of spring. I like to celebrate this fact even if it means coming off sounding like a wanker 18th Century poet. During winter I hibernate, I think we all do to some degree. I get lazy and apathetic. I do less exercise and eat more crap. I become uncreative and unresourceful. I invent new meals between 11pm and 3am. I drive to the 7-11 two hundred meters up the road. If at 2am the batteries in the remote control should fail then the TV shall remain on the channel I am watching no matter how many ab-thigh-self-motivation random pieces of merchandise I am being subtly compelled to buy. Maybe this is the greatest irony of my winter. Loud, obnoxious Americans scream at me through cathode rays to get motivated while I can't even will myslf off the couch to make them go away, let alone go to bed. So now it's spring and this morning I went for a jog. I didn't even think about it until I got back to the house. Like an animal that instinctively knows that it's mating season - my body knew it was time to stop being a slob. Self improvement - and the 1001 pomises-to-thy-self that go along with it beckon. Such as; "I will hereby curb my alcohol consumption until it dips to the level of at least a first year uni student." "From this day forth I will eat no junk food until I can't afford not to, or until I feel like it." "I procliam this to be world-wide I-will-exercise day! And I will exercise as soon as this excellent episode of 'Springer' involving the dwarf, the porn-actress and her mute, kick-boxing sister is over". Good luck to everyone with exams coming up. Remember that when the mind goes blank in your "20th Century Seppo-Femmo-Warrior Politics" exam the word "quixotically" can be of emminent use. Props to Errie B the perpetual self-improver in the west. posted by Andrew Furze 1:53 PM sunday, september 2 No updates because study, or at least procrastination, calls. This may be the red wine talking, but I implore anyone who cares to read Renee Vivien's A Woman Appeared to Me... Absolutely bizarre... I have no idea what's going on but I love it; love the language... Down there there are great bushes of white roses, and mauve wisteria whose clusters droop clear to the ground. There are olive groves the color of waves at dusk, and one can breathe the matchless perfume of orange blossoms. On the hills the ground is blue with violets. Great beds of seaweed make the sea purple. The sun is strong, so strong it cures every illness. Come down there with me and forget. I'll cure you, I'll be as I used to be - your Comforter. Come with me..." OK, well that was a bit of a randomn passage, but you get the idea, although there wasn't really any idea in that passage, just lots of plants. Man, I wish I was an intense gay female. posted by Guy Campbell 10:10 PM wednesday, august 29 Props to Gardiner, they were my sentiments exactly. 'Word' to all my homies back in Melbs. posted by Erin Buntine 5:58 PM tuesday, august 28 Watched the Madonna Drowned World tour last night (on television as I’m not living in one of the select cities her madge-esty graced) and was duly impressed, even when taking into account one or two shocking vocals. Spectacle, spectacle, a few “guitar-roots” moments, and then spectacle. What was most impressive in a “my cake’s bigger” kind of way was the number of cultural motifs she was able to throw into the mix: punk, geisha, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, spanish guitar, ghetto pimp, cowgirl, gun-happy middle American, murderess, spiritual voyager, party girl and temptress.... nice dramatic range... posted by Guy Campbell 6:41 PM In a fit of post WMA rage, roving pop culture vulture Katie G was inspired to file this report... “Well I would firstly like to express my disbelief with two issues! The First being the fact that I just Spent TWO HOURS writing this awesome review of the World Music Awards to have my Computer freeze on me as I was correcting the finished piece....the second being the excuse for an awards show on channel 10, Saturday night 6.30pm! GOD HELP US ALL IF THE FUTURE OF MUSIC RESTS IN THE HANDS OF THE ORGANIZERS OF THE WORLD MUSIC AWARDS!!! This revolting excuse for an awards show was honored by a balding, middle aged, single Prince flanked by blond bimbos, and was hosted by an ex porn star with a history of 24 hour marriages and domestic violence, and a little black man who sings about g-strings!! (no racial prejudice intended, props to my nubian sisters) Not only were the hosts bad but the 'talent' was worse. In fact I think this was the WORST case of lip sinking in the entire history of television (that includes all of John Lennons stuff ups in the Hello Goodbye film clip) YES worse that that! In Particular I would like to throw a mention to the Venga Boys, AQUA and Ricki Martin for perhaps the most disgracful attemps at mimeing ever displayed!! Whilst on the subject of AQUA i would like to vent my anger at the two lead 'singers' in particular. You DO NOT have the street cred to go pulling a stint such as humping cameras and you by NO means do you have the cred to start throwing water at the business men and thier hired hookers in the audience, that priveledge is strictly help for Axl Rose and Axl Rose ONLY! However I don't know whats worse the lip sinking or actually having to listen to Nelly Furtardo trying her damnest to try and get out of singing her actual song, using the old trick of pointing the mic to the audience wasn't helping, so we went for running all over the stage to the only option left..... screaming random notes into the microphone! WWHHOOOOOHHHH NEELLLLLYYY never walk off stage with a death stare when the cameras are on you pet! A few noteable awards: Worst Hair - Sisqo and Christina Aquilera for those ridiculous tacky overbraided sculls of theirs Worst Performance - Rod Stewart (what the hell are you doing their anyway?) & Nelly Furtardo Most Dramatic Performance - Lara Fabian (your not Celine Dion darling) Worst Presenter - Sisqo/Carmen Electra and Effeil 65 (who can't even speak english) Colour of the night - Beige worn by Nelly, Carmen/Sisqo and Ricki Martin I would like to thank Carlos Santana for kicking Creeds winging arses for best rock 'group'!!!!!!! And May I quickly mention CHRISTINA AGUILERA!!!! I don't think this should have been the World Music Awards what about the 'Aguileras' Or just CHRISTINA........I mean after all there was 21 YES TWENTY ONE SINGLE CAMERA SHOTS of Ms Aguilera, a award for Christina, a performance by Christina, Christina singing to other peoples songs, christina Dancing AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH......... oohhhh god i'm having a stroke....” posted by Guy Campbell 12:13 AM monday, august 27 Review: Something For Kate - The Globe, Perth 24/8 I know Guy will probably kill me for doing this, but you did give me publishing rights man, and it is a break from Mya, Mandy, Mariah, Michael and all the other Ms. I've broken away from my usual segment , da beef, because I just had to write about this. 'Impressed' would not be sufficient to describe my feeling on Friday night, as S4K cranked out one of the best gigs I have seen in a long time. Not even the biggest fan could deny that listening to an hour-odd of Paul Dempsey literally pushing words out of his mouth on CD, is draining to say the least. However, his performance at the Globe, seemed to shed new light on his talents. Each word was strained, forced, desperately, as is his life depended on making them clear enough to his appreciative Perth audience. This gave me, anyway, a sense of the importance of his music. I'm not one to immediately like or even agree to listen to Australian artists (is anyone?) but their progress over the last few years has brought Something For Kate onto a new plateau, and finally getting the recognition and acclaim they deserve. 'Echolalia' is the latest and much talked about release from the trio, and was delivered live with stamina, intensity and something of an abstract beauty which I can't quite put into words. The gig, was however, not without faults, there must have been some shitass work experience kid on lighting op, as the band strugled through two songs with only the torch lights from the sound dudes. Paul's chest infection, to which he dedicated a few songs, added to the strain and his voice at times seemed to echo the hiccups of feedback early on in the show. Despite this, I left The Globe, reassured, that the Australian music industry has not entirely turned to shit. Something For Kate are a band who have kept their integrity; uncompromising and fucking brilliant. posted by Erin Buntine 12:58 AM sunday, august 26 You'd think that Michael Jackson would have learnt from the HIStory semi-debacle (which culminated in the now infamous floating of a space cadet Jackson down the Thames incident) that bigger is not always better. It seems he did not, as we now have the imminent release of Invincible, which is perhaps a brave title for an ageing (in celebrity years anyway) "King of Pop". According to nme the album seems to follow a familiar formula. This year's cast includes Rodney Jerkins for the basic ingredients (Jackson perhaps should have taken notice of the dismal Spice Girls, Forever (see a pattern emerging) - although Jackson is obviously better able to make Jerkins work than a few pale brits in PVC). Jay Z pops up to add some "flava", and they've even resurrected the Notorious B.I.G... R.Kelley and David Foster look after the ballads (I'm thinking second or third single), and Shek'spere is presumably there to add some TLC style futurism. Chris Tucker pops up in the Mcauley Culkin role, and Slash and Santana fill up the randomn guest appearance quota. The list keeps going on and on (well, according to dubious nme reporting). This is one layered cake. HIStory suffered from a similar overload of ingredients (taking the form of a tacked on greatest hits that simply served to emphasise how lacking the album really was), that was compounded by a lack of tunes, and too many kids talking about how unfairly maligned Michael was. They played the first single, Rock My World the other day and on the first listen anyway, it seemed pretty standard stuff and nothing more. Yet Janet's been revitalised by consolidating her pop chops on the back to basics All For You. But in Michael's case the question is, does anyone care? If not, nothing much will change. He'll still rock up to the eerie World Music Awards every year to be introduced as the "King of Pop", receive some sham award, rant on about how he loves everyone for a bit, and then be wheeled out by his minders for the flight back to Neverland. posted by Guy Campbell 8:19 PM saturday, august 25 In response to comments over at somnolence about my response to No Logo, I just wanna add that in saying "when [No Logo] had (visibly) reached the masses and thus lost any sense of intellectual worth" I was talking about an "irrational" response, like an irrational response to a musician "selling out". A book's a book and the worth of No Logo is in it's ability to reach the masses (myself being a part of this "mass", who also thoroughly enjoyed it). I think my point in the original post was the extent to which I had absorbed a specific shopper's mentality, based on exclusivity and cache. posted by Guy Campbell 12:12 PM Well, we got a pat on the back, so we'll give one back. Adjacent wrote in relation to Erin's sittin-on-boot smokin-a-cig post (well, vaguely in relation)... "life isn't always about shits and giggles. it's not always about startling inspiration and first experiences. mostly it's about cycle and shame, toil and work. the rare instances when one reaches cheap-thrill nirvana only make up a small, small percentage of our time here on this earth." Exactly. When did a life of "personal happiness" become a given? Something that if we're not getting, we seek professional help. What happened to drudgery? Which reminds me of a line from the Desiderata (which as a confirmed aethiest I can still appreciate)... "With all its shams, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy." Wow, that was very "Remembering Your Spirit". Get those candles lit. posted by Guy Campbell 10:41 AM friday, august 24 More to the point I think I just ran out of things to say. posted by Guy Campbell 4:50 PM I was young and needed the money... Yes Jerwin, this is that Guy who blogged for a while then gave up, telling everyone to go outside and "smell flowers" around June last year. Firstly, very embarassing... "Pick up a flower. smell it. say "arghhh"..." What did I mean? I don't know.... "This blog has been subverted." How had it been subverted? I don't know. OK, I was overseas, being active and I thought "I don't need a blog..." Perhaps a bit rash. And then in the typical fashion of an eighteen year old, I thought I'd be "bad". Apologies all round. posted by Guy Campbell 4:49 PM After waking to find five different emails commenting on various recent rants, scratching my head and thinking "this is a bit odd", I soon discover that Mr/Ms Blogger has made us a "Blog of Note" (thankyou!). I soon also discover that we've also had about 400 hits since yesterday, so it's all very exciting... It was very nice to get some feedback from people. Occasionally you feel like you're simply sending stuff out into the void, which while liberating, is quite an empty feeling. So if anyone has a gripe against anything that's been said, or thinks this whole thing is a pathetic waste of time, or whatever, please mail me. I should probably set up a specific mail address for challenges to Erin's various "Beefs". Oprah's people haven't sent us a nasty letter yet, so in the scheme of things, everything's OK. posted by Guy Campbell 10:19 AM wednesday, august 22 Erin's Beef Ah yes, I feel like August is possibly the month that brings on the anual tradition that is students questioning their position in this big wide world (well, judging by recent comments on this site). I too, have caught myself sitting on the boot of my car, pondering, in between cigs, my reason for existence. Mind you, this usually takes shape in such comments as "isn't it wierd, how like, cars kinda have faces ... like those headlights look kinda like eyes, aw that one looks worried... why do people own pets? Dogs are so funny looking, wouldn't it be funny if they walked on two legs and we crawled, maybe they'd be our masters ... what the fuck AM I TALKING ABOUT??!!!". As a student, with an average of around 30 hours a week, I still manage to squeeze in quite a few hours of severe boredom. I have realised that I am the pure product of my generation, trained to have channel flicking attention spans, and convinced that my life is a movie, thus dramatically disappointed when absolutely nothing exciting happens. Gone are the days when people were content to live simple lives, and, as a lot of students my age it seems, I worry for the future where everyone shall have a personal shrink to air their problems. To quote Mike Liegh: "That's the trouble with everybody - you're all so bored. You've 'ad nature explained to you and you're bored with it. You've 'ad the living body explained to you and you're bored with it. You've had the universe explained to you and you're bored with it. So now you just want cheap thrills and like plenty of 'em, and it dun't matter 'ow tawdry or vacuous they are as long as it's new, as long as it flashes and fuckin' bleeps in forty fuckin' different colours. Well, whatever else you can say about me, I'm not fuckin' bored!" posted by Erin Buntine 11:33 PM Tim recently made quite a good point in suggesting that I, like many other people, initially sprouted a passionate zeal for No Logo, which quickly tapered off to, well, nothing. The one passionate statement of anti-consumerist zeal followed by a Mandy Moore post (although the two CAN coexist, I tell you). Firstly it was a real zeal, and secondly it has been whittled away. Why? Well, in the first place Klein wasn’t presenting any groundbreaking ideas or raising revolutionary thoughts, she was simply taking the time to bring out a pattern within the cultural/consumerist structures that surround us day to day. Most people with a basic level of cynicism would have been aware of every point she raised, they just wouldn’t really have thought about them in regards to their wider implications, or the greater “web” that they formed. Therefore, there was a basic, and pre-existing, familiarity and acceptance beckoning. A comfortable acceptance, I might add. What I’ve also found interesting is my viewing of No Logo as simply another variety of consumer product with which a familiar pattern of incorporation and then rejection has applied. Initially (and belatedly) I approached it as a cultural discovery made on my own terms... a “product” with a promise of some kind of intellectual improvement. Not quite a new bag or whatever, but dangerously close. Yet after seeing it’s black cover poking out of every Undergrad’s Crumpler bag, a process of gradual (unconscious) rejection ensued... it had (visibly) reached the masses and thus lost any sense of intellectual worth. Like the equivalent and irrational response to “authentic” artists selling out. The music/book/product loses cultural value because it has become less unique. Like any other commodity. This is brutal honesty here... brutal honesty in regards to my irrational and gut instincts. Perhaps this is some kind of consumer culture protection in swing: a mildly challenging item is gradually commodified, which means the more popular it comes, and the more impact it generates, it will at the same time lose its value (in this case intellectual impact), and thus its ability to enact social change. posted by Guy Campbell 10:18 PM tuesday, august 21 Sunday Morn’s transformation into a platform for musicians, stage designers, students and possibly gypsies continues with another rant from the increasingly prolific Andrew... “Guy brought up the interesting modern dilemma of self worth. It wasn't that long ago that full time student was such an honorable occupation that it garnered you free uni fees and concessions on all public utilities. The elderly and disabled gave up their tram seats for you....ahhh the whitlam era! Now degrees such as arts have been pilloried and degraded to the point where owning up to partaking in one is a cause for acute social embarrasment. For example during my time studying arts at Monash I found myself battling it out with both commerce students and condescending friends of my parents alike; "And so young Andrew...What is it you are studying? Bet it's economics and marketing like your old man. Chip off the old block eh?" "ahhh...no actually I'm studying arts" "I see....planning to swap faculties next year eh? wise choice" "um...actually I'm just going to stick with arts" "......I see....and where exactly will that take you?" "Well, I'm majoring in medi-eval witchcraft and the history of string so I'll probably go into the public service, in which capacity I will ensure that the ATO repeatedly audits your law practice." End of conversation. But if you think justifying your place in the economy or society is tricky doing the old BA, try dropping out to become a full time musician. I made such a decision and where did it place me? I'm now looked apon in some circles, and with some pity, as a self- deluing sap who threw away his chance to manage his very own McDonalds. I am constantly battling to convince myself of a sense of self worth that full-time bowling-alley attendants take for granted. So why am I the musician, like the humble arts student, constantly downgraded by the government and society alike? Because I enjoy what I'm doing? Because I'm passionate about it? Because the odds of ever earning more than 30K a year are a tad remote? To some degree I can see the other side. There are more actors in work than musicians who achieve critical and commercial success - and that's saying something. In order to achieve some semblance of a career you have to have a fervent self belief bordering on the evangical - kind of like the crazy bastards who assault you with acoustic guitars and a message from god in the bowels of flinders street station. We just smell slightly better. Of course while pursuing stardom you top up your wage with various cover bands and writing projects. I get so desperately annoyed with people who say I don't have a 'real' job. Just because I earn a living from hauling my arse on stage in pubs with an acoustic guitar to play 'khe sahn' to a bunch of pissed uni students while I drink myself into oblivion via the free drinks rider....It's possible these people may have a point... There is no doubt trying to write the hit song that could send your un-born kids through university is difficult and generally un- rewarding. But if nobody did it the radio would consist of DJ's talking between ads - and that's reason enough to stick with it. posted by Guy Campbell 2:47 PM saturday, august 18 While on the topic of Decadence (well if you scroll down a bit), see Tori Amos’ Glory of the 80s... "silicone party babies to the left and/ Joan of Arcs to the right/ no one feeling insecure we were/ all gorge and famous in our last lives/ in the glories of the 80s you said/ “the end is nothing to fear” i said/ blow the end - nowbaby/ who do i gotta shag to get outta here/ and then when it all seemed clear/ just then you go and disappear" posted by Guy Campbell 6:49 PM And, Erin, that was a lazy beef. Give me something more... you're referring to the pop ditty I assume? If it came on the radio in the car, I wouldn't change the station. All I have to say. posted by Guy Campbell 6:11 PM Just on two months since, in an act of planned impulsiveness, I quit my job after one too many angry customers. And, as expected, with an efficient suddeness, any feeling of self-worth or self-respect is being whittled away. Being a full time student isn’t enough; I need a paycheck. I need to be able to discuss hours, wages, gripes and exploitation. “Student” is not sufficient identity as it does not fit within any economic systems... essentially I’m not being productive. Indeed, an Arts degree, especially in the eyes of our current conservative government, is a degree that is threatening to the production of happy little IT graduates. Well, no one doing an arts degree can truly be happy, as all roads seem to lead towards nihilism these days. In more real terms, the problem with today’s tertiary education, specifically in the humanities, is that it has all but dissolved... full-time study equates to 12 hours of contact per week. Granted, actual time spent reading, writing, researching and, yes, thinking, may edge closer towards something truly full time. Yet without a structured week... a lack of structure which means that work and pleasure blurs (what if you actually like what you’re studying? is that work?) one is left with a feeling of somehow failing to live up to social expectations. Why is it that 10 hours a week of paid “work”, work which is in many respects much easier than studying can instantly alleviate these feelings of social inferiority? Could it really be that simple... that economic production and the accumulation of wealth has such ingrained importance in our minds that we instantly equate it with a sense of inner worth? And can I ever fight something so ingrained? I’d rather have a paid job than not, but I’m angry at myself that I let it define myself to such an extent. It’s all irrelevent really as within a few years I’ll be yet another cog in the commuter-train ride to retirement. posted by Guy Campbell 6:05 PM friday, august 17 Erin's Beef "I'm pleeeeeeeeeeeased to meet you" nuff said. posted by Erin Buntine 10:25 PM tuesday, august 14 Indeed happy birthday Fidel, but Erin, if you could back up your sham politics and Manics politics does not count. Sorry Danelle for the attack. But I still dig the peppy anger Erin has tapped into. Lay off other people's sites ya'll. Now let us wash our hands of this whole ugly mess... posted by Guy Campbell 7:55 PM Erin's Beef Ok, I'm not as slack as Laurie. Anyway my beef today is with that skanky bi-atch that thought she could write off this kickass site. Listen Danelle, or whatever your name is, we realise that you couldn't quite understand Guy's article, so I'm sure he won't be taking that much offence to your shallow attempt to degrade it, there may have been a few more syllables than your brain is capable of. Just go back to the fantasy that the outside world is in the least bit interested in your trailor-trash mid-life crisis 'ohmygodI'malmost40andunmarried' 'mess' of a life and all will be well. I'd also like to take opportunity to say Happy 75th Birthday FIDEL!!!!!!! I'm outty y'all posted by Erin Buntine 12:22 AM friday, august 10 July is now archived. posted by Guy Campbell 9:45 AM Industry insider Andrew returns to vent his spleen with another insight into the cruel machinations of the music business... “It always amazes me how much faith Jo punter is able to put in the official music sales charts. Radio stations swear by them, acts and fans sweat on them, record companies seemingly live and die by them. It amazes me because despite the introduction of draconian accounting methods in the last decade, the charts are still open to massive fraud. But it's not as easy as it used to be... Having a 'hit' on the charts became important in popular music as soon as radio started feeding play-lists from chart count-downs. Mirroring life in general, the concept of buying a chart hit reached it's zenith In the eighties. This is how it worked. You dragged four early-twenties musicians with long hair and disturbing feminine characteristics out of a bar somewhere in Los Angeles. You applied a stylist and some rouge, sobered them up long enough to record a few hair-metal anthems and shot a video. Then you took a wheelbarrow full of cash from the expenditure account and deducted your personal coke allowance. The remaining hundreds of thousands is spent on slimy, weasely Independent promoters, or "indie's". It is their job to pocket your healthy bribe of cash, white goods, quality drugs and swimsuit models. In return they must take the music of "VanbonWhitesnake" - the bunch of borderline transvestites you have signed to your label - and convince radio stations to play it. That is play it over and over again until it becomes "the good-time summer hit that will define a generation". For this act of kindness Major DJ's at commercial radio stations receive season tickets to all major sporting events and codes. They also receive the amount and quality of oral sex rarely seen this side of a madonna coffee table book. So radio is playing your touching ode to peace, harmony and blowing up chicks with a 12" love missile. You've already sold your soul - it's time to take the last step to rock stardom. Grab the last 7 digits worth of cash from the proceeds of Michael Jackson's back catalogue of early "good stuff". You may now embark on a two week shopping tour of the U.S.A and Europe, buying up massive amounts of your own single, propelling it into the charts. Normally this would prove expensive but it's the eighties! In these enlightened times sales are measured by the amount of units shipped from the warehouse, not the amount sold over the counter. Create a couple of dummy retail upstarts to buy on behalf of, then purchase 500,000 copies of "VanBonWhiteSnake's" turgid crap...at the wholesale price of 30 cents per copy! You've essentially bought yourself another platinum wall plaque for your office...but, hey c'mon...you deserve it. Let's not forget that you have spent a lot of money topping the charts and getting played coast-to-coast on a daily basis. In order to not get fired and end up in jail for fraud you are relying heavily on the general listening public to buy up your newly created hit. The logic of the average listener in radio-land is as follows; "well, despite this song's mysogonistic title, intellectually insulting lyrics and the band's obvious lack of talent or inspiration, it's on the radio every day and it's at the top of the charts. I must be missing some subtle underlying musical depth and texture. I will be, like, way uncool if I'm not down with this band. Plus the lead singer's pretty cute when he's not falling over. I think I'll buy it!" You are relying on the general public to be mindless and gullible. And, unsurprisingly, they come up with the goods. VanBonWhiteSnake go on to sell another half a million units, taking their tally to over a million world-wide. Thus making back all the millions you spent, plus a little more for yourself and some better-than-average coke for the band. In the annals of music history you are a hit maker. I haven't even touched on how the band itself is massively exploited during this time. How they fail to see a cent of any profits, or have any say in any aspect of their 'career'. How they are dropped like a stone as soon as the first album slinks out of the charts. Or how internal politics (and bleeding) lead to the death of the drummer, the singer's ill-fated solo career and the discovery of the rythm section in bed with....each other. That's how it was done. Trust me when I tell you that all that has changed are the names and the games. The rules stay the same. Crowd out any and all vital and important music with disposable crap that will sell like hot- cakes. Do it illegally and for all the wrong reasons. Do it without a glimmer of love for music in your heart. Do it ruthlesslessly, unashamedly and in the most self-serving manner you can. You win...Christina.” posted by Guy Campbell 8:45 AM thursday, august 9 While the (presumably) pocket sized turbo-Britney that is Mandy Moore is back with the somehow cluttered In My Pocket, her sole, and perhaps only ever, masterpiece remains last year’s I Wanna Be With You. This is perhaps the most honest piece of teeny-pop to have emerged thus far. Honest because this is going to be the teenage existence that most of these little bags of disposable income are going to experience. Because, let’s face it, there really isn’t much common ground between middle America and J Lo. And Genie In A Bottle doesn’t quite capture or, indeed acknowledge, the awkwardness of the teenage sexual experience. No, I would place money on quiet longing being the one emotion that binds teenagers across the lands. And, as she was sixteen at the time, although actually more poised than Elizabeth Dole, Moore carries off the delivery with aplomb. If one is to accept “breathy” as emotional currency. I can only pray that I don't one day hear this song and think "yes... that was my youth..." posted by Guy Campbell 7:07 PM tuesday, august 7 In more site meter related activity, more failed porn searches that have somehow led to this site... front runner, again, is Lil’Kim, with "Little Kim Hardcore" (three attempts actually, and a forth looking for the same product, but for free... nothing's free in this world). We then have Mariah Carey with "Mariah Carry Porn Style" and the presumably Loverboy focused "Mariah Carey Booty". Lastly, and hopefully not erotically minded, a bizarre search for "Nikki Webster Heels". And this was only this week. I feel like I should apologise for getting in the way of so many frantic searches for celebrity-related pornography. posted by Guy Campbell 8:52 PM While I don’t want to get mean or argumentative or anything, I just have to comment on someone else’s commentary regarding this “bizarre” site and its “bizarre” posts, appearing in the perhaps appropriately titled My Life Is A Mess. The said commentary goes something like this... "I found some great blogs, and some really not-so-great blogs. I found bizarre ones like This [us]... And I quote: "While decadence revolves [blah see the post below blah blah] on a sensory overload, much like our own." Ummm....ok. It just amazes me that there are people walking around thinking of this shit in their heads...” OK, well that was a very, very pretentious post - I’ll give you that. But I am thinking about that “shit”, and studying it too, and I think that’s as worthwhile as anything else. It indeed is amazing what people are walking around thinking about... So what not-bizarre shit is Danelle thinking about today? Let me quote: ”Oh god I forgot to write about the nail gal. I went and had my nails done, found a great great great place. The girl doing em tho was weirder than hell. First I thought she was really pretty, cos she had on one of those masks, so I couldnt really tell. Then like halfway through everything, I see t his tear roll down from her left eye. She doesn't even acknowledge it. Wierd!!! Then I notice when she looks up that her eyes were totally cluster fucked. One of em went way off to the side and the other was all wide eyed and unfocused. I swear it was a glass eye. I couldnt stop looking at it to try to figure out what the deal was. She kept catching me and I would just smile like nothing. I don't know how the hell she saw what she was doing. She gives Swedish and Deep body massages too. yummm.... .... And a little earlier on, in regard to the pop classic Total Eclipse of the Heart... ”I almost forgot, I heard this song the other day on the radio and I was so moved I almost had to pull over. It's an old corny song that no one will admit they sing along to every time it's on the radio. It's long and it's sappy. But it seemed like every line, was written inside my head. Every single word seemed to be cutting to the core of my life.”... And, the lyrics were reprinted. See, we all think about bizarre things, and a blog is a perfect space in which to air them out. posted by Guy Campbell 8:03 PM monday, august 6 Just finished Huysman’s Against Nature which seems to be the talisman of the mysterious Decadent movement, and apparently the deadly “yellow book” in Dorian Gray. I should add I didn’t read this as an adjunct to my decadent lifestyle, but as a legitimate part of my course. For if anyone had even the slightest pining for a decadent life, this book would tear it to pieces in the first fifty pages. Firstly it undermines any nobility in solitude. The anti-hero spends his time on an elitist journey through the fruits of human civility: furniture, fabrics, prose... and when he gets bored he gets a tortoise gilded and studded with diamonds. A gilded tortoise was never meant to be, and fittingly it dies under the weight of its trappings. While decadence revolves around decay - a rot that sets in at the peak of a movement or society - Against Nature doesn’t so much document a decay, but the hollowness that exists within a fully formed, self-aware, and fully modern society (sound familiar)... a hollowness based on a sensory overload, much like our own: ”He lived on himself, feeding on his own substance, like those torpid creatures that bury themselves away in a hole all winter long; solitude had affected his brain like an opiate. After first making him edgy and strained, it had brought on a lethargy haunted by vague reveries; it annihilated his plans and nullified his desires, marshalling a parade of dreams to which he submitted passively, not even attempting to escape from them. The chaotic mass of readings and meditations on art that he had stored up during his solitude, like a dam built to stem the flow of former memories, had been suddenly swept away, and the flood tide was on the move, buffeting the present, the future, drowning everything beneath the waters of the past, filling his mind with an immense expanse of sadness upon which floated, like rediculous bits of wreckage, meaningless episodes from his life, absurd trivialities.” Wait, that kinda missed the point, but there was something there... something that should be familiar to anyone who has occasionally had too much time on their hands. The point was it’s a sensory overload that can act as a barrier towards any real feeling or emotion (I’m too tired to even consider what is “real”)... which is exactly what modern pop can do. Which means this rant wasn’t purely a shot of literary pretention to tip the balance away from Mariah’s breakdown, but commentary on the state of media saturation today. Next week: Why Christina Aguilera Will Rock Your World! posted by Guy Campbell 10:58 PM friday, august 3 OK, Mariah's "exhaustion" has now been upgraded to an "emotional and physical breakdown", but this was not a suicide attempt. I find intriguing the admission from her publicist that Mariah "...did break some dishes and glasses, and she may have stepped on them." A Hollywood movie breakdown... herioine smashes glasses then finds a mirror to lean against, slowly sliding down while cradling her head and dishevelled hair... the camera then pans out, revealing the physical desruction surrounding her, symbolic of the chaos within her mind. Standard stuff. This is all of course very callous commentary... like her breakdown is merely another episode in her bizarre celebrity life, designed only to entertain the lives of good-for-nothing punters like myself. What can I say? I'm entertained, and that disturbs me. In any case, I can hear the Behind The Music intro already... posted by Guy Campbell 12:03 AM thursday, august 2 Greetings all. Well I did have an 'Erin's Beef' segment for the week, however, as my Mariah scoop has been snatched up, I shall have to review the situation. Not that watching ET is much of a scoop (Guy: our lives of sloth are becoming disturbingly identical) I shall be returning quite soon with da beef. ... its coming ... its coming... posted by Erin Buntine 2:36 AM

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