Album of the Month: WHO by The Who

Everything makes sense in the end. The decade has come to its end, and the final album to be reviewed will be the low-key return of The Who. It makes sense because The Who is where it all started for me. Not just a decade - everything. The world collapsed, or else it probably emerged, one August morning almost twenty years ago now, when I was lying in bed and my sister pressed play. A CD she had brought from America, one with black diamonds piercing the light blue surface of the album cover. It was Tommy by The Who. The weak sun, the reluctance to get out of bed, the blue record player crouched under a vast collection of music I did not yet possess. But I would, soon enough, because the first chords of "Overture" had me for life. 

Then came nights spent in headphones, memorising every lyric of "I Can See For Miles" and trying to sing along to "Helpless Dancer". Days of flipping through the black and white booklet of Quadrophenia until the edges became torn and frayed. Then came web forums appraising and reappraising every song written by Pete Townshend. Live albums, bootlegs, b-sides. Life-size posters, oversized T-shirts, interviews cut out from music magazines. Then came my first album reviews which were mostly me lambasting Internet critics for lambasting Face Dances. And now that I look back on those days - were they dark? Because I cannot tell. Because without them - how am I supposed to be sure that I lived?

A lifetime has passed since then. A lifetime and a mediocre comeback album called Endless Wire. These days, I no longer listen to The Who all that much. I guess I could still get all emotional and cry at some points in Tommy. I could still sense the adrenaline rush during that scream at the end of "Won't Get Fooled Again". Hell, it could still get ugly if someone told me that Face Dances was a bad album (because it was not). But somehow - it never comes to that anymore. In fact, when I heard of The Who's new album, there was barely a hint of excitement. The Who? Eponymous album in 2019? In December? It felt unnecessary. Worse, it felt wrong.

Which is why it was so awkward, and so shocking, that The Who's new album turned out to be good. It actually took me a while to realise that I was not just being delusional or nostalgic and that my ears were not fucking with me. That The Who really did have the songs this time. Songs injected with urgency and hooks unheard of since 1981. Almost a miracle, especially if you take into account that the record had Townshend and Daltrey work by post. 

I do not wish to oversell it. There isn't a "Bargain" here. Nor a "Substitute". Instead of "Music Must Change", one of those underrated Who classics from late 70s, you get the generic opener "All This Music Must Fade". But you know what - I'm actually fine with that. Because this is the sort of 'generic' I can live with. Just good old-fashioned honest-to-God Who music that rarely misses the mark. No, there is nothing for your imaginary Who compilation (though I am very fond of the irresistible Simon Townshend-penned "Break The News"), and the Pete-sung "I'll Be Back" steps too close to bland adult-contemporary, and "She Rocked My World" is hardly a satisfactory closer, but I am never bored listening to the album. In fact, if this it to be The Who's final statement (and I think it will be), then I accept it. 

After "Overture" on that August morning, and after screaming along with "Love Reign O'er Me" all through my childhood years, I accept it. And so please, no more of those hackneyed jokes abusing a certain lyric from an old song. Because too many people are busy doing just that - instead of taking this album for what it is. A collection of songs that should be drenched in mediocrity but are - somehow, against all odds - quite a few notches above that. So in the end, my message is quite similar to what Pete Townshend says at the very end of "All This Music Must Fade" - fuck it all. No one cares. Fuck the age. 

My Cultural Lowlights: KNIVES OUT

Now that Christmas is over, let's knock something. 

Knives Out. In actual fact, "Knives Out" is a very good Radiohead song. Based on a beautiful guitar line and the kind of vocal melody the band would kill to write at this point in their career... But that is neither here nor there, of course, because I am here to talk about Knives Out the movie. 

The critical reviews are glowing, which did not make too much sense to me initially. After all, this was supposed to be an old-fashioned detective story, a murder mystery, an Hercule Poirot kind of conundrum, and movies like that do not tend to get universal acclaim. Were the twists especially clever? Was the final revelation of Roger Ackroyd variety? Did the acting transcend the detective genre? Well, read on.

What we are dealing with here is a rich American family. They all gather in the sumptuous setting of their father's mansion, the father being a renowned writer of detective novels who invited everyone to his birthday celebration. However, he dies tragically at the beginning of the film, and an old-school detective (played by Daniel Craig doing a hammy brand of Southern accent) is tasked with investigating the death. Last person to see the writer alive? A young girl who is the old man's carer. It is a decent set-up for a two-hour murder mystery - but, alas, the makers of this film had loftier ambitions. 

The young girl is an immigrant, and apart from the detective and a couple of cardboard cutouts masquerading as minor characters, she is the only decent human being in the whole film. The family members are all pigs, you see. Murderous and greedy, they only chase their father's money. It is a decent detective story, mind you, with just the right amount of the absurd and the ridiculous. What makes Knives Out a complete artistic trainwreck is the political angle, which at some point gets absolutely unbearable. You do not have to be a Donald Trump supporter to find the whole thing blatant and fake. (And, for the record, I do not like Donald Trump. I do not see him as the end of the world, granted, but I do see him as an inept politician and a dishonest human being.) 

Propaganda in art is unacceptable. Be that communist, religious or liberal propaganda. I am sick of being taken for a snowflake by artists with an agenda. I am sick of reading once decent critics whose view of a book or a film is now blinded by a million issues completely irrelevant to art. Had Knives Out been a detective story, it would have worked. It would not have been a classic, but it would have still been a really good flick for a Christmas Eve. As a political comment, though, Knives Out is shallow and dull. I mean, the big mansion as a metaphor for the white and the rich who cannot keep their house clean and need immigrants to take over? Fucking please. 

Everyday Is Christmas

Weather or no weather, "Everyday Is Christmas" has to be one of the greatest Christmas songs of all time. Criminally obscure. Written by the late great Kevin Junior. 

Merry Christmas!

My Cultural Highlights: PAST DECADE

The decade is almost over, miraculously, and there had never been another one whose art would soundtrack my life with such dogged devotedness. With its highlights and lowlights. Loves and hates. Records, movies, books. So to celebrate it all, if that is even possible, I am going to do a few lists of things that had the biggest impact on me over these last ten years. No order, though do believe me - confining it all to such a small number was fucking hard.


MUSIC


Nick Cave - Skeleton Tree (2016)

In the end, it is the second album of the trilogy that moves me the most. Hearing Nick Cave perform "Rings Of Saturn" live will surely go down as one of the highlights of my life.

John Moore - Lo-Fi Lullabies / Floral Tributes (2014)

Two albums released on the same day by the most underrated songwriter currently in business. Just thinking about these songs sends shivers down my spine.

Mirel Wagner - Mirel Wagner (2011)

This is not just a modern folk classic for a rainy day in late autumn. The stark melodicism here is astonishing, and timeless.

Cold Specks - Neuroplasticity (2014)

One of the biggest musical disappointments of the decade was Cold Specks' third LP. All the more reason to appreciate this dark and rich and jazzy and soulful masterpiece.

The North Sea Scrolls - The North Sea Scrolls (2012)

Two great songwriters working on a bonkers concept that has to be heard to be believed. Incidentally, some of the best songs ever written.

PJ Harvey - Let England Shake (2011)

One of the rare cases when universal acclaim did not lie. This really was as good as they told you. I remember seeing her perform the title song a few months before the album's release. Odd black outfit, lyrics about Constantinople... You just knew it would be a classic.

Spiritualized - Sweet Heart Sweet Light (2012)

You can have your Lazer Guided Melodies and Ladies And Gentlemen... This, to me, had Jason Pierce's best songs. "Hey Jane" is worth the admission price alone.

The Indelicates - David Koresh Superstar (2011)

I could have gone for Songs For Swinging Lovers here - arguably, though, this bizarre concept album about a 90s religious cult in America was even stronger. More songs, too. 

The Wave Pictures - A Season In Hull (2016)

A very personal choice, of course, but over this decade The Wave Pictures grew to be something of a favourite band. These impressionistic, melodic, laid-back songs work like medicine. Or cocaine. Or whatever. 

The Delines - Colfax (2014)

Music for a late evening following a hot day in July. Big city, tired lights. Get it. Get in on vinyl.


FILMS


Holy Motors (2012) / Leos Carax 

I went to the cinema with no idea what I was going to see and I came out with a feeling I had just been through the greatest cinematic experience of my life. Accordion in the church? The Sparks song? Eva Green scene? The latex dance? For better or for worse, this will stay with me forever.

Boyhood (2014) / Richard Linklater

This is not just about a gimmick. This is the quintessential coming-of-age film. 

Personal Shopper (2016) / Olivier Assayas

All the conversations that Kristen Stewart cannot act should have stopped right after this film. She was brilliant here. Personal Shopper should go down in history as a cult classic.

The Master (2012) / Paul Thomas Anderson

I watched this one in a London cinema, and there was a point early in the film when I began to burst into uncontrollable fits of laughter. People were looking at me like I was insane - but this was simply my reaction to greatness.

The Irishman (2019) / Martin Scorsese

Three and a half hours, and yet I could not look away. To me, the quintessential Scorsese movie.

Ida (2013) / Paweł Pawlikowski

I am a big fan of Polish cinema, and there were several contenders I could include here. This year's Corpus Christi, for instance, was utterly brilliant. Still, Ida it is, if only for the hypnotism that has not weakened over the years. 

The Great Beauty (2013) / Paolo Sorrentino

The kind of great beauty that only Italy can truly express.

The Frenchman (2019) / Andrei Smirnov

My favourite Russian language film of the decade is a stylish black and white swansong from Andrei Smirnov. This is a very timely reminder of the Soviet Union in the 50s. Some of the performances, too, are out of this world. 

Part 8 (Twin Peaks) (2017) / David Lynch

Technically, not a film. Just the greatest visual experience of the decade.  

Berberian Sound Studio (2012) / Peter Strickland

This is a very unsettling and extremely underrated British film that toys with your nerves, gets under your skin and stays there. Toby Jones in the role of his life.


BOOKS


John Banville, Ancient Light (2012)

They say John Banville is always writing one book. Maybe so - but what a book that is.

Javier Marias, The Infatuations (2011)

Having spent quite a few months this decade entangled in Javier Marias's prose, I would not trust any best-of-decade list that overlooked The Infatuations. 

Julian Barnes, The Sense of an Ending (2011)

Like Pnin or Seize The Day, one of the most perfect short novels in existence.

Rachel Kushner, The Flamethrowers (2013)

If books had balls, they would be called The Flamethrowers.

Daniel James, The Unauthorised Biography of Ezra Maas (2018)

Would be too fucked up were it not so remarkably clever. House Of Leaves fans will feel right at home here.

Mark Haddon, Pier Falls (2016)

George Saunders and David Szalay had some good ones, but this was the greatest short story collection I read this past decade. 

Michel Houellebecq, Submission (2015)

Uncompromising French literature at its provocative best. Horrifying dystopia for the modern times.

John Niven, Straight White Male (2013)

Well, I laughed and I cried. In my eyes, John Niven's best book.

David Grossman, A Horse Walks Into a Bar (2014)

A stand-up comedian undergoing a complete existential collapse onstage - intriguing set-up and an even better resolution.  

Martin Amis, Lionel Asbo (2012)

Not his best by any stretch, but this could well be Amis's most entertaining novel since The Information. And, in the midst of all the violence and swearing, there is real raw emotion. 'Who let the dogs in?..' 



BONUS - 5 Best Music Books

My Big Midweek (2014) by Steve Hanley
Grant & I (2017) by Robert Forster
M Train (2015) by Patti Smith
Morrissey (2013) by Morrissey
Post Everything (2011) by Luke Haines

travelling notes (cxv)

If you are in a city you know well, and all of a sudden you see a narrow passage between two buildings that you have never walked through before, do that now. A hidden art gallery? An eccentric busker? An abandoned staircase? It will be a revelation no matter what. 

travelling notes (cxiv)

The crackling sounds of a vinyl record playing "Out Of Time" can make even the worst pizzeria in town look inspiring. Christ, Jagger has not sounded so good in years...

Скетчи про Минск. Музыкальная библиотека.

Играл Скотт Уокер. "Седьмая печать". Стали обсуждать Бергмана. Я сказал англичанину, сидевшему напротив, что как раз на днях купил четвертый альбом. Он ответил, что года два или три назад брал свою копию в местной библиотеке на севере Англии. "То есть как в библиотеке?" спросил я, представляя тесные, пыльные ряды книг, заставленные "Анной Карениной" и "Братьями Карамазова". Мне было лет пятнадцать, и я не мог понять, что это за черная магия. "В музыкальной библиотеке. У вас их нет?" Я попытался вспомнить Минск, но он, черт возьми, был так далеко. "В общем, это обычная библиотека, только вместо книг на полках лежат пластинки и диски. Я часто беру домой и переписываю". В этот момент я ощутил запах нафталина и представил пыльную даму, которая сидит за огромным школьным столом и вписывает четвертый альбом Скотта Уокера в мою старую картонную карточку. Одним словом, этот мир показался мне вымышленным. 

А вообще это было другое время, и музыку все еще можно было потрогать. Не потрогав ее, не подержав в руках, ты не мог ее услышать. Сегодня это кажется безумием, но в свои пятнадцать лет я проводил долгие часы в доме на Мелроуз Авеню за переписыванием третьего альбома XTC и берлинской трилогии Дэвида Боуи с пластинки на кассету. Так что идея музыкальной библиотеки представлялась мне раем на земле.

О том, что на Партизанском проспекте в Минске есть музыкальная библиотека, я узнал гораздо позже - в тот момент, когда никто на свете больше не покупал музыку. Невзрачное место в грязно-бежевых тонах, неприветливое, придавленное огромным многоэтажным зданием, стандартным до слез. Страшные советские окна, аппликации в виде нот. И бесконечный Партизанский проспект, пролетающий мимо. Кажется, это последнее место в Минске, которое заслуживало иметь музыкальную библиотеку. Я видел это здание много раз и не мог представить, что могло скрываться за этими окнами. Какой Скотт Уокер и какой Дэвид Боуи. Я знал лишь одно: однажды я зайду сюда, в это самое таинственное и самое невероятное место в Минске.

Есть что-то безумно трогательное в том, чтобы заходить в места, в которые больше никто не ходит. Это неподкупное чувство удивления, недоверия, радости в глазах той, что ходит сюда на работу вот уже тридцать лет. Эти глаза я видел в историческом музее Бреста, в краеведческом музее Новогрудка и бог знает где еще. Эти глаза я видел и в музыкальной библиотеке в Минске, когда решил наконец зайти внутрь. Там действительно никого не было. Я был один в этом едва существовавшем здании, где тосковала советская пустота, на полках стояли старые нотные книги, а из музыки были одни лишь магнитные ленты в выдвижных ящиках из романа Кафки. ВИА "Падающие камни" и т.д. Странным образом, я добрался до второй половины алфавита, достал "Метель" Свиридова и тут же ее прослушал. Я до сих пор на знаю, почему выбрал именно ее. На улице было лето, и я никогда не любил Свиридова...  

Библиотеки закрываются, и тем более музыкальные (недавно знакомый из Гейтсхеда написал мне о том, что они с друзьями пытаются спасти одну из последних местных библиотек). Однако он по-прежнему стоит там, этот вымышленный мир, под напором восьми этажей, на Партизанском проспекте. И всякий раз, когда я проезжаю мимо, я должен посмотреть на него. Мне хочется увидеть, что там горит свет. Что там есть люди. Что оттуда выходит девочка в черном берете, со скрипкой или стопкой нот наперевес. И мне все равно, что ничего этого я не вижу. Лишь бы эта музыкальная библиотека стояла там вечно - пока проклятое многоэтажное здание не раздавит ее окончательно, и аппликации в виде нот не опадут на землю.

travelling notes (cxiii)

There is a coffee shop girl in a small Baltic city and she looks exactly like Greta Thunberg. That same nonsensical grin that is half cartoonish and half evil. She makes good coffee, although it is so cold outside that I am no longer sure of my sense of taste.

Album of the Month: THANKS FOR THE DANCE by Leonard Cohen

My reaction to an album like this is always two-fold. First, there is righteous indignation: how could they? Then, however, comes the point where you realise how fortunate you are: to get this spare ticket, to be taken for another ride that was not even supposed to happen. 

Thanks For The Dance was pieced together and produced by Cohen's son, Adam, and you can imagine the reverence towards the material left behind by the late poet. The familiar elements are all in place, of course, from subtle orchestration to female vocals to the Spanish lute, but you do feel that the special care was given not to allow these elements to overshadow the poetry and the voice. Which is timeless poetry and which is very much the same voice that could be heard on Leonard Cohen's last album: gruff, soothing and strangely unfading. 

Perhaps the greatest miracle of all is that almost none of these nine songs ended up like overworked sketches. Some are no more than brief poems (like "The Goal") set to piano and sombre atmosphere, but even those sound complete. As for the immortal Cohen classics, they include the opening "Happens To The Heart" (as good a song as he had ever written), the astonishing "It's Torn" and the sheer drama of "Puppets" which first appeared on that long-forgotten Philip Glass collaboration from 2007. 

At twenty-nine brief minutes, Thanks For The Dance does not feel like Leonard Cohen's final album. But it is what it is: a postscriptum, a cocktail in a bar following a big party. And you love the bar and you love the cocktail and you are desperately trying to hang on to the taste.


RECOMMENDED THIS MONTH:

No Treasure But Hope by Tindersticks
Kiwanuka by Michael Kiwanuka
From Out Of Nowhere by Jeff Lynne's ELO
Undivided Five by A Winged Victory for the Sullen
Thanks For The Dance by Leonard Cohen

My Cultural Lowlights: TAXI DRIVERS

Taxi drivers. I have been seeing quite a lot of them lately, and it has not been a perfect record by any stretch. Music-wise, it has been a struggle.

It was years ago when I first realised that taxi drivers have the worst taste in music. In fact, it used to be a childhood phobia of mine, that when I grow up and drive my own car, this was how I would end up: changing gears, following traffic lights, listening to crap. The car does this to you, I imagined: it distorts your senses and it makes you like them, the taxi drivers. The ones who I only saw on occasion and who rarely got away from their bullshit radio stations, 90s power ballads and Metallica compilations. If that sounds like a cliché to you, I envy your innocence.      

Childhood phobias never truly disappear, they just get assimilated into common everyday experiences. And these days, as I get into a car and hear that annoying hook of Billie Eilish's "Bad Guy" (far from the worst option, mind you), I somehow imagine that this driver sitting at the wheel used to be a Ramones fan before he got into this car business. Or else, when I hear that fucking song by Ed Sheeran (again, hardly the worst case scenario), I imagine that my taxi driver had dumped Kate Bush for that. I cannot think of any rational explanation for imagining all of those things, but it does keep me distracted for a minute or two. 

And then these tough 'rock' types. Those whose radios never stop playing "Sweet Child O' Mine" and "Another Brick In The Wall p.2". Those insufferable types who turn the volume louder when "Walk This Way" starts playing. Those who derive any meaning from the word 'rock'. They are the worst.

Honestly, at this point I am ready to believe that being a taxi driver and retaining good taste are two incompatible things. As Martin Amis once put it, 'poets don't drive cars'.

Which is not to say that miracles do not happen. The other day, the guy driving me home played something different. It was neither random nor pretentious. In fact, I had to put away my laptop and my writing and just sit back and listen all the way to my house. It was a compilation he must have put together himself, a carefully crafted set of songs that create the sense of fast driving, this sense of being on a speedy highway in the middle of the night. It was not unlike the soundtrack to that Nicolas Refn's film called Drive, and, for once, it was magical. It made me realise, right there and then, that this complex thing called 'taste', it is all about imagination.  

My Cultural Highlights: THE UNAUTHORISED BIOGRAPHY OF EZRA MAAS

There was an interesting episode at the start of the academic year when a colleague of mine, a man I had very rarely talked to previously, approached the desk I was sitting at, noticed the book that was lying face up and pronounced its title in full voice. The Unauthorised Biography of Ezra Maas. This was a surprise, coming as it did from such a quiet and detached man of some considerable age. Seconds later, he looked at me and wondered: "Ezra Maas... never heard that name before. Who is this Ezra Maas?" At that point, I had almost finished the book, and the words would echo in my mind for quite a while: who, indeed?

"This book is dangerous". 

The novel starts with a cheap thrill, an obvious hook that could at some point collapse upon the author like some dead leviathan. It does not. I believe this could be a dangerous book, although a lot will depend on how much faith you will put into the proceedings. Quite a lot, I would argue. The closest analogy I can think of is Mark Danielewski's seminal House of Leaves, and not just because of the constant narrative mindfuck but also in the sense that this is a book of an obsession so engrossing it will inevitably affect the reader. I remember someone asking me about my impressions of the novel while I was halfway through, and I must have looked like a man possessed - praising this book like it was some modern-day masterpiece.

Although maybe it is. For no matter how much of a sceptic you may be, or how many facts you will find out about Daniel James, you will still give in to the temptation and end up searching for anything that Google has on the true identity of Ezra Maas. The elusive visionary genius that he was (and is?). And there is something that you will find, too, and God help you if you choose to go a little bit deeper. 

Because, you see, that is exactly what happens to the author of this biography. Daniel James is commissioned to write the definitive account of Ezra Maas's life (on the off chance that you do not know who Ezra Maas is, there is a Guardian article printed at the beginning of the book containing this: "Ezra Maas was a reclusive genius, an outlier and iconoclast even among the avant-garde. Today, his name has all but disappeared from the public consciousness, but in the art world, and especially to his followers, he is regarded as one of the most important artists of the 20th century".) Which is quite an ask considering that Maas has been missing for years, and the notoriously secretive Maas Foundation is not going to be forthcoming with any help. Quite on the contrary...

This insane, labyrinthian novel will get into your head in no time, and the endless footnotes and crossed out bits will annoy and fascinate you in equal measure. Because this novel is not so much a novel as an experience, and you owe it to yourself to have one. I would go even further, and say that if you are not obsessed with the plot and its main character, then the whole thing is wasted on you. Which is tragic, because art which does not create obsession is not real art. 

travelling notes (cxii)

There is an overwhelming sense of awkwardness flooding my whole body when I hear this strong American accent in which Van Gogh is explained to a group of tourists in Hawaiian shirts. The Metropolitan Museum of Art is about to explode inside my head with a million colours of an Impressionist painting. It takes a while to realise that it is my problem and my problem only, because the things which are said do make perfect sense in that unintentionally profound American way. 

Скетчи про Минск. "Осенний салон".

Я не могу этого объяснить ни себе, ни кому-нибудь другому, но в любом городе, где я бываю, я должен сходить в музей современного искусства. Это сомнительно как минимум оттого, что я не люблю современное искусство. Оно раздражает меня. Хуже того, оно оставляет меня равнодушным. Всякий раз, покупая билет, я спрашиваю себя, зачем это делаю. Зачем смотрю на красный прямоугольник под названием "Синий квадрат № 472". Зачем подхожу к экрану телевизора, на котором мужчина в костюме клоуна отплясывает чечетку рядом с неподвижно лежащим телом. Зачем сижу полчаса в дублинской галерее и наблюдаю за тем, как ваза в фруктами постепенно окрашивается в белый цвет. Я не знаю. Это какая-то мания. И всякий раз я делаю это вновь.  

В Минске это происходит раз в год, когда начинается "Осенний салон". Я люблю эту выставку. Мне нравится, что помимо Манхэттенского фестиваля, а также кинофестиваля в ноябре (на который в этом году стоило сходить хотя бы ради польского фильма Corpus Christi), есть кое-что еще, что создает ощущение цикличности города. Так, я знаю, что это обязательно случится: в один из первых дней октября я куплю билеты на выставку современного искусства, и начнется полуслепое блуждание между картин и скульптур, среди которых пять заденут что-то внутри. Пять из пятисот. Один процент. Я привык думать, что это неплохо. 

Мне нравится "Осенний салон". Мне нравится вчитываться в имена художников, что выставляют здесь свои работы. Нравится видеть цены, в которых нет ни слова правды. Я люблю видеть реакцию людей, которым нравится то, что вызывает у меня улыбку, и которые смеются над тем, что нравится мне. Люблю то, что через какое-то время (и обычно на втором этаже) я перестаю понимать, что хорошо, а что плохо, и готов вписать в этот листок бумаги, что раздают у входа, любой абсурд. Но не делаю этого, и в конце концов все проясняется, и я определяюсь с выбором. Тот пейзаж, классический, и чем-то похожий на Тоскану в конце августа. Скульптура огромного серебряного яйца с трещиной посередине и абстрактным названием типа "В конце марта на восходе солнца". Картина с зашифрованным смыслом, подсмотренным у Рене Магритта. Огромная корова, которая стоит в центре яркого зеленого сада. И все-таки нужно выбрать три... Я люблю этот процесс выбора, который неизменно заставляет обойти выставку во второй или даже в третий раз.   

Я никогда не слежу за тем, что происходит дальше. Я не знаю, кто побеждает, и на каком месте оказывается мой фаворит. Откровенно говоря, мне все равно. За долгие годы походов в музеи современного искусства я понял, что главное не это. Что главного здесь вообще нет и не может быть. Все это живо только в тот момент, когда мы проходим мимо этих безумных инсталляций, а потом все это умирает на страницах газет и интернет-сайтов, которые об этом пишут. Умирает даже в воспоминаниях. Весь смысл выставки в том, что за синим квадратом № 472 последует синий квадрат №473, и что через год мне захочется побывать тут снова и понять, насколько он лучше предыдущего, память о котом исчезнет вместе с листком бумаги, который я выброшу в прозрачную урну для голосования. Это бесконечный круг, бессмысленный, но необходимый. Тот, без которого не будет существовать ни нас, ни этого города.

Album of the Month: GHOSTEEN by Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds

This, they say, is the afterlife. With the bright cover and the woozy sounds of synthetic loops, these are no longer the brutal, deathly textures of Skeleton Tree. Ghosteen is post-death and the sort of record that finds catharsis in the pain and the sorrow of its music. 

Now if that sounds pretentious then you are simply not following. Ghosteen is the last installment of Nick Cave's trilogy, the one that started with the sparse and haunting Push The Sky Away and continued with the devastating Skeleton Tree that was released a few months after the tragic death of Cave's son (Skeleton Tree had actually been recorded before that, and was slightly altered afterwards). Ghosteen is where it ends. Where everything ends, by the sound and by the lyrics of it.

It might not work initially, and God knows I was underwhelmed during my first listen to the album, and was clutching at fucking straws, looking for any vestige of substance in Warren Ellis's loops and Nick Cave's largely spoken vocal delivery. I believe "Hollywood" grabbed me from the start but not much else. It probably took the third listen, that inevitable night hour in headphones, to win me over. 

Suddenly, the heavy and insidious magic of Ghosteen hit my senses. Cave's songwriting was all there, on top of the now familiar stripped-down sound and two or three of those trademark piano lines (songs like "Bright Horses" and "Waiting For You" are not a million light years away from his past ballads).

And at the end of the day, this is just beautiful music. I have no idea what his band are going to do during the live shows next spring (I mean, you will hardly hear any drums or guitar on Ghosteen), but this sound is just so organic and so pure. It is the sound that makes Cave write some of his best songs ever - even if I still, after at least ten full listens to this album, see Ghosteen as one sixty-eight minute piece. But who cares when this music, to quote Michael Gira from later this month, is sacred. 


RECOMMENDED THIS MONTH:

Hello Exile by The Menzingers
Ghosteen by Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
Active Listening: Night On Earth by Empath
Ode to Joy by Wilco
Fireraisers Forever! by Comet Gain
Leaving Meaning. by Swans
Colorado by Neil Young & Crazy Horse
Three Chords And The Truth by Van Morrison

My Cultural Lowlights: RICHARD BACH

I don't mind bad books. I resent bad movies and bad music, but books are different. Bad books serve a purpose. They take the kind of effort and dedication that make me admire and forgive. Besides, bad books are great education. Whereas a bad record is little more than an egregious waste of time, a bad novel will tell you exactly what it takes to write a good one.

Now obviously there is no shortage of writers I respectfully dislike (DH Lawrence and Haruki Murakami, to name a couple). Nevertheless, there is a certain layer of world literature that annoys me to no end. In contrast to my opening premise, these are the kind of writers whose books I almost find genuinely worthless. Whose pocket-sized philosophy offends my senses and makes me long for the comparatively harmless ideology of Ayn Rand. The culprits include, among others, Paulo Coelho, Carlos Castaneda and Richard Bach. 

Back when I was studying at school, Richard Bach in particular was something of a teenage sensation (which is both interesting and sad considering that he was big in the distant 70s). People were exchanging books like Jonathan Livingston Seagull and Illusions all the time, doing it with the sort of heavy and religious breathing that made you open the first page expecting to be blown away. Which you probably were, provided of course that you had schooled your mind beforehand. 

The experience of reading those books was akin to having your tooth drilled slowly and painlessly (in retrospect, I would have preferred a brief pulling out with no anaesthesia). Back then, I may have talked myself into liking certain pages of Jonathan Livingston Seagull that came off like the bad parts of The Little Prince made even worse. As for Illusions, it seemed over-serious and masturbatory even for the highly impressionable age of fourteen. There was, however, a thoroughly unhealthy feeling that I was missing out on some godlike truth that would reveal itself in years to come (interestingly, this would only come true once, with The Sound and the Fury). 

Looking back, I wonder what it was that we found in those humourless pages that replaced plot with pretentious fudge. I wonder how many seconds it would take me now to detect the pound shop wisdom that seems no better than the one contained in millions of those 'how to become a genius' opuses written by Dale Carnegie wannabes.

I remember how once upon a Christmastime, in England, we were visiting friends on Boxing Day, and I wandered into a spacious kitchen. Oddly, the first item I noticed was a fridge with all sorts of crap hanging on its door. Among other things, there was the time-table of a local book club. The nearest entry spelled 'Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist'. Christ, it was exasperating. Then, however, I checked out the rest of that month, and the remaining entries were all good. John Banville, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Ian McEwan... The sheer contrast was breathtaking. Really, Coelho stood no chance. Coelho would make the excellent Saturday feel like Ulysses. 

Which was how I came to realise that even the worst books are, in fact, a gift. A Christmas gift to all of us.

My Cultural Highlights: МАРК ЗАХАРОВ

Наверное, в человеке нет ничего сложного. Детская драка. Первая сигарета. Проигранный футбольный матч. Рассказ, который захотелось перечитать. Все до безумия просто, и я уверен, что не был бы тем человеком, каким являюсь теперь, если бы однажды, лет в четырнадцать или пятнадцать, не посмотрел фильм Марка Захарова. Все бы остановилось. Все пошло бы не так.

Я давно перестал о нем думать, еще до крымских писем и другого мракобесия. Я больше не пересматриваю его фильмы. Я перестал ощущать его влияние на мои слова и даже мысли. Кажется, в последний раз я вспоминал о нем несколько лет назад, когда смотрел его постановку "Вишневого сада" в московском Ленкоме... Но его смерть в конце сентября - это вспышка боли, какой-то неуемной эмоции, а еще напоминание о том, что Марк Захаров - главный режиссер в моей жизни.

Все просто: мне не нужно пересматривать его фильмы. Я видел их слишком много раз, я до сих пор помню каждое слово из первого монолога Мюнхгаузена. Я по-прежнему могу часами говорить цитатами из двух любимых фильмов Захарова ("Дом, который построил Свифт" и "Тот самый Мюнхгаузен"). Могу проигрывать в голове каждую сцену и понимать, что все это уже давно часть меня. Этот юмор определил мой юмор. Эти сцены, от приезда пастора до похорон Свифта, определили меня больше, чем мне хотелось бы думать. 

Что касается политики, то она всегда оставалась в стороне. Есть два способа общения с художником, и один из них позволяет видеть только его работу. И хоть в течение этих лет я замечал редкие интервью, ненужные фразы, вырванные цитаты, для меня все закончилось 1988 годом и его последним фильмом "Убить дракона". Это было такое правдивое высказывание, такая жуткая сторона "Мюнхгаузена", такое точное предсказание будущих лет (которые все никак не пройдут), что все остальное казалось необязательным послесловием... Все остальное делалось вне того времени, в котором жил я. 

В случае Марка Захарова, я видел только его фильмы, от которых исходило безумное ощущение свободы. Но только не той, советской и стесненной, а другой: ироничной и глубоко абсурдной. Это было такое идеальное бегство из запертого мира, от себя к самому себе. И я знаю, что не был бы и частью самого себя, если бы не проделывал все это всю свою жизнь. 

travelling notes (cxi)

You don't really miss home when you are on a different continent. 

Скетчи про Минск. Трамвай.

Трамвай - это самый художественный вид общественного транспорта. О нем хочется писать. Метро - обычно. Автобус - скучно. Троллейбус - пошло. Трамвай другой. В нем есть загадка. А иначе как объяснить то, что именно в трамвае снимались лучшие сцены советских фильмов?..  

Все детство мне казалось, что в трамвае ездят особые люди. Я был уверен, что если родители отправят меня в незнакомую часть города, ту, где ходят лишь трамваи, я окажусь внутри другого Минска. Зайдя в трамвай, я увижу людей в странной одежде и с безумными лицами. Людей, говорящих на непонятном языке. Они не будут лучше меня и не будут хуже. Просто они будут другими. И в те редкие моменты, когда это происходило, и я действительно ехал куда-нибудь на трамвае, я чувствовал себя иностранцем в собственном городе. Я до сих пор ощущаю благоговение, смешанное с легкой паникой, когда оказываюсь в трамвае. 

Этот удивительный механизм, с грохотом разрезающий улицу на две равные половины. Он как будто существует поверх города или вне его. И даже в тот момент, когда культовый красный трамвай был заменен на постсоветский бирюзовый, Минск в его окне по-прежнему казался таким же удивительным, каким кажется Москва Костику из "Покровских ворот". 

Однако трамвай - это не только кино. Это настоящая литература, с рифмой или без нее. И потому искры электричества вырывались в ночное небо в те томительные секунды, когда минский трамвай поворачивал с улицы Даумана на проспект Машерова. А мы ждали и надеялись, что искры будут гореть дольше и ярче обычного. И потом "Любовь во время холеры" в невыносимо жаркий июльский день. И эта пара, что поздним вечером пыталась играть Дэвида Боуи на расстроенной гитаре в конце пустого трамвая. 

Очень много лет назад я придумал рассказ, в котором человек живет в центре города, недалеко от трамвайных путей. Время от времени он слышит грохот и ощущает вибрацию, когда трамвай проносится рядом с его домом. Это происходит не каждый день, а лишь изредка, и вдруг этот человек начинает понимать, что его жизнь меняется в те моменты, когда происходят такие вибрации и грохот. Он начинает вспоминать, что это случилось, когда, например, он влюбился, или началась война. И вот однажды он просыпается ночью от страшного грохота трамвая...

Я боюсь, что однажды мне придет в голову концовка этого рассказа. Боюсь, что в этот момент какая-то важная загадка будет разгадана, и мой роман с минским трамваем закончится навсегда.

Album of the Month: THE TALKIES by Girl Band

It delights me to no end that this is the second Irish band who get into my 'best album of the month' feature in 2019. All the more so because the abrasive brand of noise-rock played by Girl Band would not really be high on the list of 'my kind of music'. The Talkies, however, is so fucking good (cathartic, as people in the know would have you believe) that I'm willing to take its adventurous and raucous pleasures over albums like In the Morse Code of Brake Lights or Beneath the Eyrie.

The name of the band is better than it sounds: four lads from Dublin with not a girl between them. The Talkies is their second LP, and it is telling that it took them four years to release the follow-up to their 2015 debut Holding Hands With Jamie. Telling in the sense that the noise of The Talkies does not come out of nowhere. And nor do the vocals which sound like Mark E. Smith let completely, disconcertingly loose.

All through these punishing forty-six minutes, Girl Band create noise that is smart, diverse and perversely melodic. After the unsettling breathing of "Prolix", an introduction both fitting and bizarre, you get the intense pummeling of "Going Norway" that does not sound unlike The Fall at their least inviting. The melodies are there, however, and you might find it hard to get the brilliant and repetitive "Couch Combover" out of your head. Also, while the brief "Akineton" is little more than colourful noise, the six-minute "Laggard" extends intriguingly into the lo-fi fade-out. Better still is the epic "Prefab Castle" that builds and screeches and honks into this album's undisputed centrepiece. 

I love the aesthetics. I love the title and I love the cover that beautifully complement this wonderful experience which manages to turn sonic irreverence into sheer joy. The Talkies is a true artistic statement, subversive and utterly exciting. I would love to see how they evolve on the next album, and I do not care whether it will take them another four years to get there...

My Cultural Lowlights: LANA DEL REY

The problem with Lana del Rey is not her music. The music is all right. In fact, Norman Fucking Rockwell, her latest, is her most consistent album to date. And while the main vocal hook in "Fuck It I Love You" is the most annoying thing I have heard all year, much of the LP is full of beautiful meandering melodies that spell a talent bigger than a fraud. So no - the problem with Lana del Rey is not her music. The problem with Lana del Rey is that she does not mean a word she sings. 

Which is crucial, because in a world where everyone and everything is overrated, there is one thing whose value will never go down. I am talking about sincerity, a notion to which Lana del Rey, by the looks and by the sounds of it, is a total stranger. 

Note please that the concept of art for art's sake does not apply here. If it did, the whole thing would sound a lot more intriguing and, yes, seductive. Lana del Rey's case is different in the sense that she wants to come across as someone genuine, someone sad-eyed and tragically beautiful, someone possessing real emotions and not just sorrowful red dresses that she wears lying on a West Coast beach drinking cocktails and watching boys in immaculate slow-motion. This desire is commendable, of course, but she cannot really execute her intention beyond song titles and staged photoshoots. Because the image is manufactured, and the fakery is so overblown it becomes genuinely grating. 

From the Spanish name to that impeccable pout, you would have to try really fucking hard not to smile. It probably speaks volumes about the superficial nature of these times when so many people (who really should know better) fall for that crap. In fact, many of these people get their knickers in a twist when you question the integrity and the incessant name-dropping (Norman Rockwell being the latest casualty). They should not bother: outside the Spanish name and the impeccable pout, there is nothing to Lana's personality. Zilch. Cocktails and boys in slow-motion are as far as it goes.

With Lana del Rey, you are not supposed to disentangle the song from the image. When you do that, however, you are left with tons of empty posturing and a few good songs. Thus, I would still profess my admiration for the cold-blooded charms of "Video Games" and "Ride" and "Venice Bitch" as well as a vocal hook here and a vocal hook there, but there is so much artistic forgery that you can take. And, inevitably, each time that I stop trying to get into another one of her albums (and the bastards keep coming), I just end up playing something else instead. And God it sounds wonderful:  

P.S. Honest question: how big a chance is there that The Replacements will be name-dropped on Lana's new album?..

My Cultural Highlights: OLDER WISER HARDER

In art, 'mature' is not the greatest of epithets. Oftentimes, it just means boring. Once in a while, however, I do stumble upon a mature-sounding record which nonetheless has all the joy and inventiveness that make me listen to music in the first place. What I mean to say is, you do not have to cut off your ear to create an Impressionist painting. 

Older Wiser Harder is a recent discovery, a collaboration between Richard Earls and Thierry Audousset. The resulting album is, regrettably, very little known, but then it does not strive for popularity. All it is concerned with is creating great music that is supposed to contain the experience of the artists involved. That it succeeds is a testament to the dedication of Richard and Thierry, and the amount of craft and skill that was invested in making this expansive, diverse collection of music.  

The songs are mostly excellent. The absolute highlight is the endlessly intriguing, beautifully arranged "Before That Long Hot Summer" that manages to be both uplifting and properly depressing. Late-period Monochrome Set could be a decent, if rather loose, reference point. I also love the playful, music-hallish "Youth And Beauty", the strings-infused "From The Minute I Met You" with its soaring chorus, the piano-based "The Long Goodbye" that sounds like a long-lost Tom Waits classic, the terrific acoustic closer that bows out with a fitting, if ironic, lyrical message. 

If there is anything wrong with Older Wiser Harder (other than the straight-faced "Perfect Dream" that badly needs some edge), it is that it sometimes lacks a rougher approach that would have benefitted its great songwriting. It is as if the whole thing is too professional, the musicianship too immaculate. Occasionally, you want some distortion where maturity steps in... Which is why I like it how "Walking To My Girlfriend's House" comes right in the middle of the whole thing.

The album unfurls like a well-written book, like a life well told. I could almost call it a concept album confronting the past head-on, with all its troubles and regrets. But then equally, when you are listening to Older Wiser Harder (and I have been doing this over the last few weeks), you get the impression of the artists' joy of recording these songs (in rural France, no less). Which, in the end, may be the reason why I have been returning to it again and again.  

travelling notes (cx)

If you wear a tall green pointy hat in the Paris metro, people will look at you and smile. If you wear a tall green pointy hat in the London underground, people will look at you, get distracted for a second or two, and then go back to their books and phones. If you wear a tall green pointy hat in the New York subway, you might as well just keep being invisible.

Скетчи про Минск. Кинотеатры.

Я ни разу не был в минском кинотеатре "Современник", но помню, что когда в детстве мы гуляли в районе улицы Харьковской, он доживал свои последние дни. Сначала осыпался кирпич, затем тускнели стекла, потом стали пропадать буквы. Я не был в тех местах несколько лет, но мне страшно представить, в какую груду пыли и щебня все это превратилось. Какой супермаркет там строится, и какие дети гуляют там теперь. И не так важны фильмы, что показывал "Современник" сорок или пятьдесят лет назад. Просто все то, что не случилось со мной в том кинотеатре, - этого уже не случится никогда. 

Дело в том, что я люблю минские кинотеатры. Не те, что открываются теперь в торговых центрах и спортивных клубах, но все эти старые советские здания со старыми советскими названиями. "Ракета", "Октябрь", "Победа"... Всякий раз, когда я прохожу теперь мимо последнего, закрытого, кажется, уже миллион лет назад, я вспоминаю фойе с черно-белыми фотографиями, где я нервно ожидал Одиночество бегуна на длинные дистанции или тот старомодный порог, по которому я медленно сползал в ночной город после жуткого и давно забытого фильма Бесчестье.   

А еще "Москва", где был последний фильм Анджея Вайды, после которого час или два вообще не хотелось говорить. "Ракета", где после второй смены в университете нужно было отстоять длинную очередь, чтобы каждый понедельник смотреть по одному фильму Тарковского, начиная от Иванова детства и заканчивая Жертвоприношением. "Октябрь", куда в детстве мы ходили с сестрой, и после длительного сеанса в котором нам однажды позвонила мама, чтобы сказать ужасную новость... "Пионер" с его бесконечным Бергманом, где дама у входа объясняет нам, что фильм этот мы будем помнить весь год. А еще полусоветский "Дом кино", где помнится все, что было до, после и во время сеанса. И вообще я вдруг понимаю, что некоторые фильмы забываются, но я всегда помню кинотеатр.

Потому что поход в кинотеатр - это не только сам фильм. Это одинокий мужчина, который нервно курит короткую сигарету и просит тебя продать ему свой билет. Это две девочки, что пронесли на Хичкока две бутылки пива, и половину сеанса пытаются неслышно их открыть (у них, разумеется, ничего не получается). Это пожилая пара, которая пришла в кинотеатр "Ракета" на Огни большого города, и которая смеется и рыдает так, что ты влюбляешься не только в Чарли Чаплина, но и в них. Это, в конце концов, кофе, который ты пьешь после сеанса в кофейне за углом.

Все, что ты помнишь в многозальном кинотеатре на верхнем этаже торгового центра, - это сам фильм. И нет ни разговоров до, ни молчания после. Одна и та же девушка у любого зала, одни и те же кресла и один и тот же вход через огромные стеклянные двери. Так что порой из памяти стирается даже сам фильм.  

Возможно, старые кинотеатры Минска - это лучшее, что оставил после себя Советский Союз. Этих стен и этих старых букв на тусклом фоне мне не хватает даже за границей, где, конечно, есть свои кинотеатры "Победа" и "Салют", но где все же так много типовых дверей с бесконечными номерами залов (что, черт возьми, я помню про тот день в Лондоне, когда я пошел смотреть последний фильм Пола Томаса Андерсона?). Наверное, однажды я напишу книгу о том, как ходил в минские кинотеатры. Наверное, мне стоит написать ее хотя бы ради того, чтобы вспомнить того странного старика, который во время финальных титров Соляриса выбежал к экрану кинотеатра "Ракета" и начал рассказывать безумную историю из своего детства...