So you already know that I’m a fan of iLL-Literacy’s work and their approach to it. This fall, they dropped iB41 for free. Now they’ve emerged post- winter hibernation, all psychedelic and spirals and shit, to ask ya freeloaders to contribute to their latest track. At least the musically-inclined ones.
I’m pretty sure that this thing called collaborative music is gonna swallow up the fatty record industry (or at least force it to take a fatty diet) and re-position music as we know it. I know this cos I often predict the future. Anyway, I’ve already ranted and raved about open source and sharing and the like in a previous post, so I’ll stop right there w/ the nerdery… and let the guys who made it do the talking!
But it’s not even about the music. This woman is a storyteller.
“Whenever I’m writing music it’s a very visual place in my mind. It has a location full of characters and colors and landscapes, so those two things really complement each other, and they help the other one to blossom and support the other.”
“I think it’s really important to give power to the world and the myth and the atmosphere that you’re trying to create. And if I was to just go out wearing normal stuff I’d feel like it was taking the power away and not giving others the same visual and symbolic references, and that excitement. For me, when I’ve seen other people take some risks with the way they look and do things on stage, it helps me to believe in that thing. I don’t think about that person having cups of tea and going shopping and being normal. I think about them as a performer and I quite like that; that people will look at me as a performer and this otherworldly thing.”
I worship that mind. That voice. Those OUTFITS. Don’t you?
I experienced Dengue Fever on Tuesday night. It was TIGHT (literally… wall-to-wall people emanating the sweet stank of B.O. and ganj). But it was also tight in that it was like, really fuckin amazing.
The music is inspired by Cambodian rockers from the 60s, many of whom where murdered under the Khmer Rouge. Below is a track by Sin Sisamouth, a huge artist of the time.
Before I went to the show, I kinda sorta had the band members pegged as major Asian fetishizers… history stealers… Silver Lake goons who happen to make good music… etc. etc. Which, given the creepy and condescending media coverage of the music and its history (painting Zac Holtzman, bushy-bearded guy, as the creative genius of Cambodian music… and Chhom Nimol as his fairy bride) is not that unfair.
In fact, right up until they came on stage, I was plotting to write a disapproving blog essay (with PROOF) about the colonizing mentality of Dengue Fever… but I can’t anymore! I’ve been converted. It’s hard not to fall in love a tiny bit when a band’s getting down and ugly for their music. Even when they can eat you alive with their beards.
But in all seriousness, the music is important. The history — which, after all, isn’t just the past but the driving reality of the present — is important. Maybe the band’s privileges are less significant than the people it honors and reaches out to (and I’m not talking about the hipsters). I’m still trying to figure it out. I’m not Cambodian or Southeast Asian, and it’s not exactly my place to be the judge in all of this… but I was thinking about how I’d feel if say, some white guys from LA came out with music inspired by “North Korean funk from the 50s”… how would I feel? Would I see it differently? Would I be happy to connect with a part of my history that I never knew I lost? Would I be creeped out at how said white guys are becoming the keepers of that history? A little bit of both? Something else entirely?
Don’t really know the answer to those questions. I do know its hella powerful to see Chhom Nimol rocking out like it’s no one’s business, though. For now, that’ll have to do.
Okay… that’s just me. For a week there I abandoned my little bloggy in pursuit of… well… things I won’t share with you cos they’re not that interesting. Suffice it to say that I’m back on this!
For its’ top 50 artists of 2009, Hype Machine invited 50 visual artists to create work inspired by the winning band names. I feel like I’ve been posting a lot about music lately, but that’s only cos music is fuckin awesome and inspirational and life-changing (unless it’s created vomited into your ear by this creature plaguing the radio called ke$ha. Why oh why??!!).
When yummy music is coupled w/ tight visuals that really get what the artists are all about, we all win. Except for ke$ha. You’ve got nothing to do with this. Please go away.
