Communicator (communicator) wrote,
Communicator
communicator

Lotus Flower

I must do a long post at some point about King of Limbs, the new Radiohead album. I have found that I can't listen to it unless i give full attention. If I don't concentrate, it just goes away without me hearing it (the other day H came into the house, and it was gone). If I do listen with full attention, I have to let a feeling of being pushed away wash through me. Then when I have got through those two barriers, it does touch me, but I haven't quite constructed a model of it in my head yet, so that's why I haven't posted about it.

I am also aware that if I didn't trust Radiohead so much I might not have got through those two barriers. But credit to them for using that trust, to bring people through. Credit also for the millions of ordinary people who are prepared to follow on that journey, and therefore support this difficult project. If they didn't sell millions it would be harder to make it happen.

Thom Yorke released a YouTube video of himself, dancing to Lotus Flower. It has been watched a lot. The comments vary quite a lot ('not as good as Coldplay', 'this is gay' WTF? - i know i shouldn't read them).

I think the dancing is like the music. It's complex, it's not one thing. I was talking before about Clay Shirkey's comment that difficult art won't be valued any more, and I was saying that au contraire there needs to be a creative boiler-room where difficult art brews away (mixed metaphor alert) even if it's not popular.

I think Radiohead have made a good effort, probably a successful effort, to open up the boiler room to a mass audience, and break down that divide. They have traded in their 1990s superstar status for that, and the gamble has more or less worked out for them and us.

'Talking about music is like dancing about architecture'? Who said that - Google attributes it to both Steve Martin and Elvis Costello (ed - I bet Hano is right that it was Lester Bangs). In any case - what is 'talking about dancing about in a garage'? Not sure but this French guy sure tries.

I think you can hold several thoughts in your mind at the same time. That it's funny or serious. This is someone quite old, who doesn't give a fuck. It's inclusive and/or exclusive.

I admire this. I couldn't really argue with someone who said it was bullshit. But I think this is real stuff, worth trying to get through to.

ETA: Boiler room Mashups -

to Dancing Queen: 'Anybody could be that guy'.
Jumping Jack Flash: surprisingly hot
MC Hammer
Footloose: had me grinning like a loon

Tumblr with 150 derivative works
Subscribe

  • Phew what a scorcher

    I see Gove has backed down on climate change and it's back in the curriculum again.

  • GCSE Computer Science

    My book is now for sale

  • LJ Settings

    At the moment I have set up this journal so that only friends can comment. I hate doing this, but I was just getting too much Russian spam.

  • Post a new comment

    Error

    Comments allowed for friends only

    Anonymous comments are disabled in this journal

    default userpic
  • 8 comments