It seems like every few months or so we get a little blurb by one of the resident asshole scribes in The Georgia Straight or The Nerve about how the uptight local building inspectors are keeping us all from having a good time with their stupid rules about overcrowding in clubs.
Well, it looks like we’re not the only city with this problem. Civic officials in Chicago evidently don’t know how to party either, ordering the E2 nightclub not to use its second floor because it violated a number of buiding code regulations. The owners of E2, apparently concerned about their town wearing a ‘No Fun City’ label, decided to defy the order, and in a stampede to the exits---triggered after a few shots of pepper spray we’re fired---twenty-one clubgoers are now dead.
It will be interesting to see whether our own oxygen-deprived music press learn anything from this.
I’m not holding my breath.
Monday, February 17, 2003
Thursday, February 13, 2003
I’ve been afraid to so much as spit on the sidewalk these days for fear that it might “send the wrong message” to the Olympic bid selection committee. We can’t hold a vote or it will “send the wrong message.” We can’t debate the bid or it will “send the wrong message.”
Well fuck that.
When’s the last time the Olympic organization, with it’s bribe-taking officials, fixed judges and doped up ‘athletes’ worried about sending the wrong message?
I was initially dismissive of the Mayor’s plebiscite. It was conceived, without a doubt, as a means of patching differences within his newly-adopted party; a way to appease the anti-Olympic faction in COPE without encumbering the mayor with a potentially damaging ‘spoilsport’ label at election time. It’s frankly not much different from Gordon Campbell conjuring his land claim referendum to avoid alienating the redneck vote. The concept of referenda, far from furthering democracy, is increasingly and cynically being used by political organizations as a tool, or more specifically a valve, to keep their ranks from fracturing under pressure.
Having said that, I’m starting to relish the idea of having a say in this thing. I have two basic problems with the Olympic bid.
First, after spending the better part of two decades building leaky, sopping junk, our town’s developers (and Gordon Cambpell was once one of them) are lined up for a feast at the trough in the form of Olympic construction contracts. Supplying the money will be the federal and provincial governments, both of whom have offered little more than a giant middle finger to owners of shabbily-constructed condominiums and homes.
Second, if we accept the premise that events like the Olympics represent an opportunity to showcase Vancouver to the world, should we not then question whether this particular event represents the best bang for our advertising buck?
Why not spend some money over a period of years on selection of events and festivals? The City of Montreal and the Quebec provincial government pay good money to attract excellent talent to that city’s comedy and jazz festivals, both recognized to be among the best in the world. Hong Kong hosts the annual Rugby Sevens tournament. Edinburgh has its Fringe Festival. All these events are yearly advertisements for their host cities; annual tourists draws. Not one-time-only events.
Still, I haven’t quite made up my mind...
* * *
I saw an article in a music publication the other day, stating that Avril Lavigne’s songwriting team had been signed to a new contract.
The thing is, if Avril Lavigne “writes her own stuff,” as her Vancouver-based manager Terry McBride has said (and as she often maintains), then why does her songwriting team need a new contract? Indeed, why does she have a songwriting team at all?
I have nothing against little Avril, and I don’t care if she didn’t write her songs. Elvis Presley didn’t write his own songs either, and that didn’t stop people from calling him the ‘King of Rock and Roll.”
But the spin involved in all of this pretty much sums up the rancid, politicized nature of popular music. McBride wants to sell Avril as an anti-Britney; a do-it-yourself rocker. He also knows that 90 percent of Avril’s audience, or for that matter 90 percent of those reading interviews with him, will not bother to check songwriting credits on her records. So why not just lie about it?
How long before this guy takes over from Gordon Campbell as Premier?
* * *
One of the more ridiculous hallmarks of the local music scene is the proliferation of rock bands who pretend to take the piss out of the music they’re playing. The hipsters in the audience laugh at the cheese on stage, though one suspects they’d rather be listening it than to whatever the local university station deems vital.
Surely this is an onerous way to exist. If everyone just liked what they liked without looking over their shoulders or disguising it in irony we’d all have more fun, and we’d likely end up with a less constricted musical enviroment.
Happy Valentine’s Day.
Well fuck that.
When’s the last time the Olympic organization, with it’s bribe-taking officials, fixed judges and doped up ‘athletes’ worried about sending the wrong message?
I was initially dismissive of the Mayor’s plebiscite. It was conceived, without a doubt, as a means of patching differences within his newly-adopted party; a way to appease the anti-Olympic faction in COPE without encumbering the mayor with a potentially damaging ‘spoilsport’ label at election time. It’s frankly not much different from Gordon Campbell conjuring his land claim referendum to avoid alienating the redneck vote. The concept of referenda, far from furthering democracy, is increasingly and cynically being used by political organizations as a tool, or more specifically a valve, to keep their ranks from fracturing under pressure.
Having said that, I’m starting to relish the idea of having a say in this thing. I have two basic problems with the Olympic bid.
First, after spending the better part of two decades building leaky, sopping junk, our town’s developers (and Gordon Cambpell was once one of them) are lined up for a feast at the trough in the form of Olympic construction contracts. Supplying the money will be the federal and provincial governments, both of whom have offered little more than a giant middle finger to owners of shabbily-constructed condominiums and homes.
Second, if we accept the premise that events like the Olympics represent an opportunity to showcase Vancouver to the world, should we not then question whether this particular event represents the best bang for our advertising buck?
Why not spend some money over a period of years on selection of events and festivals? The City of Montreal and the Quebec provincial government pay good money to attract excellent talent to that city’s comedy and jazz festivals, both recognized to be among the best in the world. Hong Kong hosts the annual Rugby Sevens tournament. Edinburgh has its Fringe Festival. All these events are yearly advertisements for their host cities; annual tourists draws. Not one-time-only events.
Still, I haven’t quite made up my mind...
* * *
I saw an article in a music publication the other day, stating that Avril Lavigne’s songwriting team had been signed to a new contract.
The thing is, if Avril Lavigne “writes her own stuff,” as her Vancouver-based manager Terry McBride has said (and as she often maintains), then why does her songwriting team need a new contract? Indeed, why does she have a songwriting team at all?
I have nothing against little Avril, and I don’t care if she didn’t write her songs. Elvis Presley didn’t write his own songs either, and that didn’t stop people from calling him the ‘King of Rock and Roll.”
But the spin involved in all of this pretty much sums up the rancid, politicized nature of popular music. McBride wants to sell Avril as an anti-Britney; a do-it-yourself rocker. He also knows that 90 percent of Avril’s audience, or for that matter 90 percent of those reading interviews with him, will not bother to check songwriting credits on her records. So why not just lie about it?
How long before this guy takes over from Gordon Campbell as Premier?
* * *
One of the more ridiculous hallmarks of the local music scene is the proliferation of rock bands who pretend to take the piss out of the music they’re playing. The hipsters in the audience laugh at the cheese on stage, though one suspects they’d rather be listening it than to whatever the local university station deems vital.
Surely this is an onerous way to exist. If everyone just liked what they liked without looking over their shoulders or disguising it in irony we’d all have more fun, and we’d likely end up with a less constricted musical enviroment.
Happy Valentine’s Day.
Thursday, January 30, 2003
It occured to me, while watching Johnette Napolitano at the Commodore last weekend, that it was utterly refreshing to finally see a real woman on stage for a change.
Of course there are plenty of chai house vixens and dance divas and gurrrl ‘rockers’ to choose from, but they’re all mostly just different kinds of pop tarts, some with more icing, some with more jam. What we see less and less of are the likes of Janice Joplin, Chrissie Hynde, Tracy Chapman or even P.J Harvey. I’m not saying they’re not out there, but they have as much chance, say, of conscription into Terry McBride's pantry of McMuffins as I do.
At one point during last weekend’s show, Napolitano and her band Concrete Blonde played Leonard Cohen’s ‘Everybody Knows.’ Cohen’s version is an art-house staple; it has a European flavour, sung by him in his dry pseudo-monotone. Napolitano makes it a full-out rocker. She delivers the verses with more menace and sarcasm than Cohen, and belts out the choruses with such exhilarating elan that Friday’s crowd let out a spontenous roar in mid-song. Her version simply has more balls.
It is the touch of the masculine in Napolitano that makes her all the more believably feminine. The audience, an equal mix of male and female, seemed starved of this kind of thing.
She is also a virtuoso vocalist; I can’t think of a better female singer in rock. Together with co-Blonde James Mankey---whose guitar playing nicely combines muscle and elegance---they put on a great display of chops.
This is another thing you don’t see much of. The ability to play; not show off or wank, mind you, but simple, considered, technical musical flair. Chops are viewed by the ‘in crowd’ in this town’s scene with the same suspicion as a university education in Pol Pot’s Cambodia.
No doubt this is due to the old ‘anyone can do it’ punk posture. But what exactly is it is that anyone can do? Play poorly? Yes, anyone can do that. But even writing and playing a great punk song is no mean feat. I mean, the Ramones and Sex Pistols were both as tight as a spring. The disparagement of craft is stupid, and it writes off most of the best music ever made.
Concrete Blonde were never quite punks. They emerged from the same Los Angeles music scene that threw up Wall of Voodoo and X, and like those bands are not so easy to pin down. They're more mainstream and riff-rocking than their contemporaries, but were not disparaged for it in their hometown. Indeed, their biggest hit, “Joey,” is a tribute to Wall of Voodoo guitarist Marc Morland.
I’ve always liked them, because to me they represent everything a band could be. Heavy (‘Bloodletting’) without being ponderous; riffing (‘God is a Bullet’) without being metal; punk (‘Still in Hollywood’) without being a tiresome fucking poser; melodic (‘Caroline’) without being too syrupy. All put together in a simple three-piece unit.
They possess style without affectation; they have an unposturing confidence. The simple pleasure they seemed to get from playing their music, and playing it well, left me inspired to believe that this is what matters most. And if that's the case, then in a sense, anyone can really do it.
Of course there are plenty of chai house vixens and dance divas and gurrrl ‘rockers’ to choose from, but they’re all mostly just different kinds of pop tarts, some with more icing, some with more jam. What we see less and less of are the likes of Janice Joplin, Chrissie Hynde, Tracy Chapman or even P.J Harvey. I’m not saying they’re not out there, but they have as much chance, say, of conscription into Terry McBride's pantry of McMuffins as I do.
At one point during last weekend’s show, Napolitano and her band Concrete Blonde played Leonard Cohen’s ‘Everybody Knows.’ Cohen’s version is an art-house staple; it has a European flavour, sung by him in his dry pseudo-monotone. Napolitano makes it a full-out rocker. She delivers the verses with more menace and sarcasm than Cohen, and belts out the choruses with such exhilarating elan that Friday’s crowd let out a spontenous roar in mid-song. Her version simply has more balls.
It is the touch of the masculine in Napolitano that makes her all the more believably feminine. The audience, an equal mix of male and female, seemed starved of this kind of thing.
She is also a virtuoso vocalist; I can’t think of a better female singer in rock. Together with co-Blonde James Mankey---whose guitar playing nicely combines muscle and elegance---they put on a great display of chops.
This is another thing you don’t see much of. The ability to play; not show off or wank, mind you, but simple, considered, technical musical flair. Chops are viewed by the ‘in crowd’ in this town’s scene with the same suspicion as a university education in Pol Pot’s Cambodia.
No doubt this is due to the old ‘anyone can do it’ punk posture. But what exactly is it is that anyone can do? Play poorly? Yes, anyone can do that. But even writing and playing a great punk song is no mean feat. I mean, the Ramones and Sex Pistols were both as tight as a spring. The disparagement of craft is stupid, and it writes off most of the best music ever made.
Concrete Blonde were never quite punks. They emerged from the same Los Angeles music scene that threw up Wall of Voodoo and X, and like those bands are not so easy to pin down. They're more mainstream and riff-rocking than their contemporaries, but were not disparaged for it in their hometown. Indeed, their biggest hit, “Joey,” is a tribute to Wall of Voodoo guitarist Marc Morland.
I’ve always liked them, because to me they represent everything a band could be. Heavy (‘Bloodletting’) without being ponderous; riffing (‘God is a Bullet’) without being metal; punk (‘Still in Hollywood’) without being a tiresome fucking poser; melodic (‘Caroline’) without being too syrupy. All put together in a simple three-piece unit.
They possess style without affectation; they have an unposturing confidence. The simple pleasure they seemed to get from playing their music, and playing it well, left me inspired to believe that this is what matters most. And if that's the case, then in a sense, anyone can really do it.
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