I’ve been meaning to write an entry all week however for some reason I never got the hang of this week and now its over before it really got started for me. Oh well. There are a number of things afoot including a plan for moving forward. However for numerous reasons this cannot be discussed here. Having the plan has removed an awful lot of stress from my life though.
This week of course was the anniversary of September 11th and it brings with it for me mixed feelings – the day itself last year is still extraordinarily vivid in my mind . I guess for people alive though it, it will be the same as the assassination of Kennedy in the sixties in that everyone will be able to tell you exactly what they where doing at the time. The thing that is most vivid for me though is seeing Milo in the scanner and finding out he is a boy. Here is the entry from then.
We watched the film made by the two French brothers on Wednesday. This film followed a rookie fireman around and was originally designed to be a simple fly on the wall documentary. There was footage from inside the first tower as it collapsed. Extraordinary.
Without dismissing the tragedy of September 11th it is very important that we don’t forget the plight of others suffering from war and famine. America suffered a very high profile hit but the vast majority of Americans (and people who live in the west) will never have to live with the kind of suffering that the people of some nations live through on a daily basis.
On that sombre note I move to my next topic – truth (we’re doing all the easy stuff today :-)). With the current obsession with “reality” media – televisions programs like Big Brother and Pop Idol, web logs pouring forth everyone’s innermost thoughts etc. etc. One of the things I have noticed is the preoccupation, amongst the audience for these things, about whether what is being presented is True. Conspiracy stories of fakery and fabrication abound. What interests me is that this is a move away from the traditional story telling generation of myth (which has been vital to mankind as long as man has been telling stories). The construction and content of the story and its structure being far more important than the actual details – and we see this in the bible, in the stories of King Arthur etc. There is no doubt that real historical events are behind a good deal of these stories but the story tellers distilled out the “essence” of the story in preference to historical accuracy.
Nowadays though it seems that we need to know instead the mundane facts – despite the fact that no two people will interpret the same event in the same way. I’m not sure why this is – perhaps because we are sp aware of spin and bias that we have an unconscious desire to see things unfiltered by the media or other peoples eyes. That there is so much deception in society that we cannot trust anyone to tell our stories. One to think about – I’m sure I will be returning to this theme.
warning (demo version) ( mp3 , 8,832KB , 6:16)
I have been working on the “Out amongst the beacons” album a bit recently and what now is looking increasingly like a companion ep tentatively called “Homeworld”. A version of this track will probably be on the that EP. It emerged out of experiments for another track I am working on and a couple of sample loops I made ages ago. It was constructed using a combination of CSound and PD.
Top media this week includes - Talking Heads who I have been rediscovering this week, Sonic Youth who’s new album Murray Street is pretty damn good indeed also been listening to the new Peter Gabriel album a lot too.
Also check out this very useful website - Commercial Breaks and Beats. - the answer to all those -"Whats the music for such and such an advert" questions...
Lastly please visit the Amnesty International page about Amina Lawal who has been sentenced to death by stoning for having a child out of wedlock and sign the petition there. The site is Here.