The organization Playing For Change has a great name and a great mission: “Connecting the World Through Music.” They have a cool song and video series called Songs Around the World — inter-cutting performances of a song by musicians across the globe — which includes this great version of the 1970 Grateful Dead song, Ripple. Enjoy.
Sounds: “Fleeting Smile” by Roger Eno
Many are familiar with the composer and artist Brian Eno. But did you know that Brian has a younger brother, Roger Eno, who is also an accomplished composer, musician, and sound installation artist? Here is a beautiful piece, “Fleeting Smile,” by Roger Eno, from the Brian Eno compilation album of various composers’ work, Music For Films III (1988). It evokes for me a mashup of Erik Satie and Nino Rota, and is wistfully beautiful, like a fleeting smile.
The Ballad of the Fallen: in memory of jazz great Charlie Haden
The world has lost a great, deep musical and humanitarian soul. Jazz bassist Charlie Haden (August 6, 1937 – July 11, 2014) created an amazing body of work over six decades of work with the likes of Ornette Coleman, Keith Jarrett, Carla Bley, Hank Jones, Pat Metheny, and many, many others. Take a listen to Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child, with Charlie Haden on bass and Hank Jones on piano, from their amazing 1995 Grammy-nominated album Steal Away:
The Atlantic has a nice appreciation of Haden by David A. Graham, complete with video song selections from throughout his career. Graham writes,
No one wants to be remembered most for what they did at 22, but history will forever recall Charlie Haden for his role in Ornette Coleman’s great quartet of the late 1950s…. Coleman remains surprisingly controversial today, but he and Haden and Don Cherry and Billy Higgins had incontrovertibly changed the direction of music.
Haden—who died Friday at 76, from complications of the polio he contracted as a child—was perhaps the least likely revolutionary in the bunch. Born in Shenandoah, Iowa (a town that shares a name with a famous folk song), Haden grew up playing country music in a family band. Despite making his name in a genre that often rewards flashiness, he was a resolutely unpretentious player, notable for the notes he didn’t play and for always being in the right place. Haden and his most frequent and fruitful collaborators during a long career were musicians steeped in American traditions, who synthesized a range of musical genres and spat them back out in varyingly eccentric and original ways. While Haden may have seemed like an unlikely revolutionary, his firm grounding in the roots seems to have been what enabled him to be such an effective radical.
Here are some words to live by from Haden himself, from one of five interviews he did from from 1983 to 2008 with Terry Gross on Fresh Air, talking about the value of improvisation and being in the moment:
“I think it’s very important to live in the present. One of the great things that improvising teaches you is the magic of the moment that you’re in, because when you improvise you’re in right now. You’re not in yesterday or tomorrow — you’re right in the moment. Being in that moment really gives you a perspective of life that you never get at any other time as far as learning about your ego. You have to see your unimportance before you can see your importance and your significance to the world.
“The artist is very lucky, because in an art form that’s spontaneous like [jazz], that’s when you really see your true self. And that’s why, when I put down my instrument, that’s when the challenge starts, because to learn how to be that kind of human being at that level that you are when you’re playing — that’s the key, that’s the hard part.”
The New York Times obituary concludes,
At the heart of Mr. Haden’s artistic pursuits, even those that drew inspiration from sources far afield, was a conviction in a uniquely American expression. “The beauty of it is that this music is from the earth of the country,” he said. “The old hillbilly music, along with gospel and spirituals and blues and jazz.”
Since the world has lost a deep soul of music, it seems appropriate to conclude with a Hayden track called “Silence,” with the also late, and also great, Chet Baker on trumpet:
A “Generic Brand Video” that tells the truth about the worst in branding and advertising
This brilliant parody of a blandly generic corporate brand video began life as a poem by Kendra Eash in McSweeneys, This Is A Generic Brand Video. When the folks at the video stock company Dissolve saw the poem, they knew exactly what to do:
The minute we saw Kendra Eash’s brilliant “This Is a Generic Brand Video” on McSweeney’s, we knew it was our moral imperative to make that generic brand video so. No surprise, we had all the footage. (Dissolve: This Is a Generic Brand Video)
Indeed they did. The video is a sarcastic, satirical parody, but it is dead on in tone and the blank vacuity of its “message.” It perfectly illustrates the kind of empty, employee-break-room-inspirational-poster “positivity” that all too may companies aim for in their advertising, their messaging (think “leading provider of business solutions“) and, ultimately, in the names they choose for their company and products. It is thus a very effective cautionary example of what not to do.
Fast Company posted a nice article about this video (This Generic Brand Video Is The Greatest Thing About The Absolute Worst In Advertising), which also includes four real corporate brand videos from the likes of Acura, Mazda, Suncor and Cisco for comparison. The Suncor video is so “good” — in that it’s so tonally similar to the Dissolve/Eash video that it too seems like a parody — I’m compelled to include it here:
Where does this all lead? Hopefully not to the dark place that is the near future depicted in the great Alfonso Cuarón film Children of Men. Here is a compilation of clips from the movie that show some of the products that get their own “Generic Brand Video” treatments, such as Bliss, a happy pill, and Quietus, the legal suicide pill for when your depression is just too great to bear any longer:
The word quietus means an end to something unpleasant, such as tinnitus or a horrible life in a dystopian future, and is also a euphemism for death. It is the perfect smugly pseudo-comforting name for a suicide pill in a dystopian society, but what’s shocking is that it has shown up in a late-night infomercial as an apparently real “homeopathic medication” — Quietus — to combat tinnitus, or extreme ringing, buzzing or roaring in the ears:
This disturbing video is an unwittingly perfect commentary on the ubiquitous, persistent noise created by most brand messaging in our culture. Perhaps a little Quietus for the ear will help tune out such blandly “inspiring” advertising before the other Quietus becomes a pressing need.
Listen to the best naming project parody ever: Amtrak renaming project, by Harry Shearer
Symmetry and one-point perspective in the films of Stanley Kubrick and Wes Anderson
TOP: Kubrick // One-Point Perspective from kogonada on Vimeo.
BOTTOM: Wes Anderson // Centered from kogonada on Vimeo.
These are beautiful video compilations that demonstrate quite vividly Stanly Kubrick’s love of symmetry and how the director made use of one-point perspective in his films, and the influence he has had in this regard on the contemporary director Wes Anderson.
Visit kogonada.com to see move very interesting video “essays” on the work of great directors.
See also: The cutaway: The bisected sets of Anderson, Godard, Lewis, Berkeley, Keaton and Parrott
Blackbird (rehearsal outtake), by Paul McCartney
A great video of Paul McCartney rehearsing Blackbird in the studio, c. 1968 Beatles White Album sessions. Love the close-up of the wingtips toe tapping.
Blackbird
By John Lennon & Paul McCartney
Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these broken wings and learn to fly
All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to arise
Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these sunken eyes and learn to see
All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to be free
Blackbird fly, blackbird fly
Into the light of the dark black night
Blackbird fly, blackbird fly
Into the light of the dark black night
Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these broken wings and learn to fly
All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to arise
You were only waiting for this moment to arise
You were only waiting for this moment to arise
Everyday mysteries: Saul Leiter, a master of lyrical color street photography
Saul Leiter, perhaps the most famous non-famous New York street photographer, has just passed away at age 89. A pioneer who worked mostly in color in an age when street photography was still a predominantly black and white medium, Leiter captured the ineffable details than can only be seen and appreciated if you slow down and pay attention. Notes the obituary in today’s New York Times:
Mr. Leiter was considered a member of the New York School of photographers — the circle that included Weegee and Arbus and Avedon — and yet he was not quite of it. He was largely self-taught, and his work resembles no one else’s: tender, contemplative, quasi-abstract and intensely concerned with color and geometry, it seems as much as anything to be about the essential condition of perceiving the world.
“Seeing is a neglected enterprise,” Mr. Leiter often said.
Where other New York photographers of the period were apt to document the city’s elements discretely — streets, people, buildings — Mr. Leiter captured the almost indefinable spaces where all three intersect, many of them within a two-block radius of the East Village apartment in which he had lived since the early 1950s.
… Unplanned and unstaged, Mr. Leiter’s photographs are slices fleetingly glimpsed by a walker in the city. People are often in soft focus, shown only in part or absent altogether, though their presence is keenly implied. Sensitive to the city’s found geometry, he shot by design around the edges of things: vistas are often seen through rain, snow or misted windows.
“A window covered with raindrops interests me more than a photograph of a famous person,” Mr. Leiter says in the recently-released feature-length documentary, In No Great Hurry: 13 Lessons in Life With Saul Leiter, by the British filmmaker Tomas Leach. Here is the trailer for the film:
The New York Times continues: [Read more…] about Everyday mysteries: Saul Leiter, a master of lyrical color street photography
Lou Reed – Perfect Day (Later w/Jools Holland, 2003)
Here’s to the late great Lou Reed (March 2, 1942 – October 27, 2013), a true American original, seen and heard above on the BBC Two show, “Later… with Jools Holland,” from 2003. Who could ever replace him? Who will give us the next “perfect day”? (Love the addition of the guy on stage doing Tai chi in the video above!)
Here’s another (strange) version: Lou Reed and operatic soprano Renée Fleming performing “Perfect Day” in Prague with the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra on on November 14, 2009, in a concert hosted by Václav Have celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution:
Chips, chips: Via Con Me, by Paolo Conte
No matter how dark of a mood might ever overtake you, I defy you to not be happy when you hear this song. It’s wonderful…. Chips, chips!
The accompanying video scenes, though unrelated, fit the mood quite nicely. They were taken from the films, “Top Hat” (1935), “Shall We Dance” (1937) and “Swing Time” (1936), starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.
Via Con Me
by Paolo Conte
| Via Con Me | Away with me |
|
Via, via, vieni via di qui, It’s wonderful, it’s wonderful, it’s wonderful chips, chips, Via, via, vieni via con me It’s wonderful, it’s wonderful, it’s wonderful chips, chips, chips Via, via, vieni via con me, It’s wonderful, it’s wonderful, it’s wonderful chips, chips, |
Away, away, get away with me It’s wonderful, it’s wonderful, it’s wonderful chips, chips, Away Away, let’s get away It’s wonderful, it’s wonderful, it’s wonderful chips, chips, chips Away, away, let’s get away. It’s wonderful, it’s wonderful, it’s wonderful chips, chips, |
Not even this grey time full of musics and people that you liked…enter and take a warm bath…it rains a cold world outside. All hail Paolo Conte!
What do Gertrude Stein and JAY Z have in common? Picasso, baby.
Gertrude Stein, “If I Told Him: A Completed Portrait of Picasso” (1923). The artists gets artisted upon. Upon the artist. Visited by she who by her by she who by words visits upon. She who by words. Artisted upon visit upon by words she who by words unpaints his paint.
If I Told Him: A Completed Portrait of Picasso
If I told him would he like it. Would he like it if I told him.
Would he like it would Napoleon would Napoleon would would he like it.
If Napoleon if I told him if I told him if Napoleon. Would he like it if I told him if I told him if Napoleon. Would he like it if Napoleon if Napoleon if I told him. If I told him if Napoleon if Napoleon if I told him. If I told him would he like it would he like it if I told him.
Now.
Not now.
And now.
Now.
Exactly as as kings.
Feeling full for it.
Exactitude as kings.
So to beseech you as full as for it.
Exactly or as kings.
Shutters shut and open so do queens. Shutters shut and shutters and so shutters shut and shutters and so and so shutters and so shutters shut and so shutters shut and shutters and so. And so shutters shut and so and also. And also and so and so and also.
Exact resemblance to exact resemblance the exact resemblance as exact as a resemblance, exactly as resembling, exactly resembling, exactly in resemblance exactly a resemblance, exactly and resemblance. For this is so. Because.
Now actively repeat at all, now actively repeat at all, now actively repeat at all.
Have hold and hear, actively repeat at all.
I judge judge.
As a resemblance to him.
Who comes first. Napoleon the first.
Who comes too coming coming too, who goes there, as they go they share, who shares all, all is as all as as yet or as yet.
Now to date now to date. Now and now and date and the date.
Who came first Napoleon at first. Who came first Napoleon the first. Who came first, Napoleon first.
Presently.
Exactly do they do.
First exactly.
Exactly do they do too.
First exactly.
And first exactly.
Exactly do they do.
And first exactly and exactly.
And do they do.
At first exactly and First exactly and do they do.
The first exactly.
And do they do.
The first exactly.
At first exactly.
First as exactly.
At first as exactly.
Presently.
As presently.
As as presently.
He he he he and he and he and and he and he and he and and as and as he and as he and he. He is and as he is, and as he is and he is, he is and as he and he and as he is and he and he and and he and he.
Can curls rob can curls quote, quotable.
As presently.
As exactitude.
As trains.
Has trains.
Has trains.
As trains.
As trains.
Presently.
Proportions.
Presently.
As proportions as presently.
Father and farther.
Was the king or room.
Farther and whether.
Was there was there was there what was there was there what was there was there there was there.
Whether and in there.
As even say so.
One.
I land.Two.
I land.
Three.
The land.
Three.
The land.
Three.
The land.
Two.
I land.
Two.
I land.
One.
I land.
Two.
I land.
As a so.
They cannot.
A note.
They cannot.
A float.
They cannot.
They dote.
They cannot.
They as denote.
Miracles play.
Play fairly.
Play fairly well.
A well.
As well.
As or as presently.
Let me recite what history teaches. History teaches.
…Eventually the pendulum swings
Don’t forget America this how you made me
Come through with the ‘Ye mask on
Spray everything like SAMO, I won’t scratch the Lambo
What’s it gon take for me to go
For you to see, I’m the modern day Pablo, Picasso baby
“Picasso Baby” is from JAY Z’s new album, Magna Carta Holy Grail, and “Modern day Pablo” or not, it has a great cover design:
The sculpture shown on the cover is from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, which recently texted JAY Z’s source: Alpheus and Arethusa by Battista di Domenico Lorenzi (Italian, ca. 1527/28–1594):
Notes the Met’s page for this sculpture:
In Roman mythology the river god Alpheus pursued the nymph Arethusa until Diana changed her into a fountain. This group was carved to go above a fountain in the villa Il Paradiso at Pian di Ripoli, near Florence, which belonged to Alamanno Bandini, Knight of Malta.
Who knows? Maybe this is JAY Z and his muse, Beyoncé, many many lifetimes ago. Here is the full, nearly life-size sculpture:
Stephen Fry on language, with kinetic typography
Attention all language purists: Stephen Fry is “an English actor, screenwriter, author, playwright, journalist, poet, comedian, television presenter, film director, activist, and board member of Norwich City Football Club” (Wikipedia). In this video, Fry’s rant about language has been typographically animated by Matt Rogers, in the process crafting a beautiful and funny visual and verbal feast about the joy of playing with language, which is after all just a game that shouldn’t be taken so seriously.
“But do they bubble and froth and slobber and cream with joy at language? Do they ever let the tripping of the tips of their tongues against the tops of their teeth transport them to giddy euphoric bliss? Do they ever yoke impossible words together for the sound-sex of it? Do they use language to seduce, charm, excite, please, affirm and tickle those they talk to? Do they? I doubt it. They’re too farting busy sneering at a greengrocer’s less than perfect use of the apostrophe. Well sod them to Hades.” ~Stephen Fry
Get your yé-yé’s out: France Gall sings “Laisse tomber les filles”
France Gall has one of the best stage names ever. Often dismissed as a mid-1960s “baby pop” singing “doll” of the immortal and twisted Serge Gainsbourg, she was born Isabelle Geneviève Marie Anne Gall on 9 October 1947 in Paris, France, and managed to create (or was given) a galling Gallic name that James Joyce would have been proud to have coined. Gall was (is?) a popular French “yé-yé” singer.
I love France Gall’s song, “Laisse tomber les filles” (“Stop messing around with the girls”), written by Gainsbourg, and the pre-video video of the song above, from 1964 (age 17!), is wonderful, like a time capsule from a vanished world. Possibly the first example of really great terrible lip-synching.
Laisse tomber les filles
by France Gall
Lyrics by Serge Gainsbourg
| Laisse tomber les filles | Stop messing around with the girls |
| Laisse tomber les filles Laisse tomber les filles Un jour c’est toi qu’on laissera Laisse tomber les filles Laisse tomber les filles Un jour c’est toi qui pleurerasOui j’ai pleuré mais ce jour-là Non je ne pleurerai pas Non je ne pleurerai pas Je dirai c’est bien fait pour toi Je dirai ça t’apprendra Je dirai ça t’apprendra Laisse tomber les filles On ne joue pas impunément La chance abandonne Laisse tomber les filles Non pour te plaindre il n’y aura |
Stop messing around with the girls Stop messing around with the girls One day you’ll be the one who’ll get dropped Stop messing around with the girls Stop messing around with the girls One day you’ll be the one who’ll cryYes, I have cried, but that day No, I won’t cry No, I won’t cry anymore I will say that you deserve it I will say it serves you right I will say it serves you right Stop messing around with the girls One cannot play without being backfired Chance forsakes Stop messing around with the girls For your whining |
Learn more about the incomparable France Gall:
- Wikipedia: France Gall
- Wikipedia: Laisse tomber les filles
- YouTube: France Gall
- IMDB: France Gall
- Tumblr tag: France Gall
- France Gall website (in French)
- Wikipedia: Serge Gainsbourg
- The Secret World of Serge Gainsbourg (Vanity Fair, November 2007): “Serge, who had big ears that stuck out and who was considered ugly, often said he wished he had looked like the American movie actor Robert Taylor, but also said, ‘I prefer ugliness to beauty, because ugliness endures.’ He started to smoke and drink at 20, when he went into the army. His sister says his cynical persona was always a defense: ‘When you feel weak, you attack.’ He showed talent as a painter and attended the Académie des Beaux-Arts, but eventually realized he had to earn a living, and said he ‘had fear of the painter’s bohemian life.’ Like his father, he played piano in clubs, then branched out to write songs. He won the 1965 Eurovision contest with a song he wrote for the cutesy pop star France Gall; he then wrote a sexually sly song for her, which she thought was about sucking lollipops. He started to write successful songs for others and then, later, himself. He wrote and directed 4 movies and acted in 29. He became really famous at 40 with the orgasmic ‘Je T’Aime … Moi Non Plus,’ then even more so with songs that ranged from lush and romantic melodies to Surrealist poetry to caustic and dark concept albums. He used American words in his songs—’blue jeans,’ ‘flashback,’ ‘jukebox’—and studied the Ford Motor Company catalogue for phrases to use in his song ‘Ford Mustang.'”