ROOTS MUSIC AND THE POLITICS OF PRODUCTION

“A gigantic cultural revolution is underway. Free expression and the joy of bodies, the autonomy, hybridisation and the reconstruction of languages, the creation of new singular and mobile modes of production – all this emerges, everywhere and continually.”
Toni Negri

There are threads running through the 1978 film Rockers that encapsulate the musical production process. From the opening scene of impromtu drummers and the horn rehearsal in the yard, followed by the studio session and manufacture of the single at the pressing plant, through to the distribution of records by motorbike and their reception at the counter of disco- shops and sound-systems the whole process of production, inclusive of the social practice from which it springs, is highlighted. But, crucially, each moment of this process is presented as a site of conflict. There is the musician as wage labourer having to ask to be paid and then being paid in records, there is the alternative distribution method of the motorbike and there is the policeraid on the sound-system. [Read more →]

Stanley Kubrick: Eyes Wide Shut [Warner Brothers]

“That’s what you say now, so at this moment you may even believe it.” (1)

1. A yuppie nightmare movie segues into the enigma of its director’s death. There are no more questions that could be answered. As there were previously no answers to be had. The director could be anonymous. But the author too is dead. Schnitzler died in 1931 and his traumnovelle lays it out: traum as dream and as trauma. The two almost interchangeable if it is that the dream is that which can present the ‘demand of the other’ and present it in such a way as for us to feel it as a pressure to respond (to our ‘other’ so to speak). But dream is fantasy too and the core here, the propulsion, comes as an imaginary infidelity. That it is desire that is beyond the demand. But is it good? Is it bad?
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‘Communist’ Seven Inch
Product Blueprint

Side A Cornelius Cardew: Smash Smash The Social Contract
Side B Royal Family & The Poor: Vaneigem Mix

(Could have cut-up readings from Marx (see over) as small tracks on either side to be recorded as layers with different amounts of echo and with Eastenders on in the background and including repeating turntable samples of Scritti Politti’s politico-pop hit ‘Wood Beez’ – particularly the lines “Oh lets forget our ownership” and “There’s nothing I wouldn’t do not to meet with your approval” as puncturation between quotes?)

Cover : Bright Red
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No one recognises these powers as their own

(Why Theory?) We have to dispense with the idea that theorising occurs after the creative event; that a poem or a track or a text is made and then, as part of its process of dissemination, there follows the theorising of the piece. Such a theorising is normally attributed to those known variously as critics, reviewers and essayists. However, what actually occurs is that theorising goes on at the same time as the creative event is being worked upon. It is complementary to the event and, more importantly, it is the continuous precondition for the event. There is always this theoretical supplement to any activity: a carpenter fits cupboards into an alcove and there is this ongoing process about the nature of the material, a questioning of the next step, and how it is best to overcome those obstacles, such as the unevenness of the wall, that present themselves. Similarly, when producers make a track there is a similar theorisation going on: what sounds to use, how they fit in to other sounds, how they relate to expectation, how best to structure the track. Such a theoretical component to any activity is denied because theory is normally attributed to a textual product, and like the role of the critic, this comes to exercise the effect upon creative producers that their activity is somehow ‘below’ the level of theoretical process.
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After a long wait the second printed edition of Break/Flow is out. Following on from the first Break/Flow magazine, and from last years excellent 12”EP compilation (with the author’s collaborations with Adverse, Praxis and Unearthly, as well as tracks by Christoph de Babalon and a blast from the past from / homage to Eric Random.
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