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musicandchips
Thoughts from 30-Something London
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Wednesday, September 10, 2003 :::
No posts for a little while, but there's a kinda reason for that. I wrote an opus on Monday, a work of near creative genius of which Milton, Shakespeare and Homer would have been proud, a work so comprehensive and insightful that the very fabric of space-time itself would have been shaken to it's deepest foundations. Upon reading it the reverberations within the human meta-consciousness would have caused a flux-wave of such magnitude that the Gaia / mankind relationship would have finally swung into balance, ushering in an age of perpetual Utopian harmony and bliss, during which men and Gods would once again co-exist in perfect matrimony on Earth.
And then my poxy computer crashed, and I lost the lot. Needless to say I was more than a little miffed, and it's taken a couple of days to replenish my creative juices, restore my inner strength, and re-approach the terminal. Oh well, I guess it just wasn't to be quite yet.
Also I've just been introduced to Friendster, which has been taking up a fair amount of on-line down-time. What a great site. It remains to be seen whether any new networking goes on, but even just mucking about seeing who you can connect to via friends-of-friends is great fun. I have 23,000 people in my network with only 6 friends in my profile, so I predict much random person-contacting for the next few weeks.
David Blaine has started his London stunt as of last weekend, aiming to spend 44 days in a small perspex box suspended over the South Bank with nothing but water and a journal. A load of us went down there on Monday after the drubbing we doled out to the South Africans to level the test series at the Oval, just to see what was going on. Needless to say, watching a blatant self-publicist lying down and reading wasn't much fun, but some of the spectators were amazing. My favourite was the loony with the ukelele and the 'Be Strong David' sign chanting "Go on David", and going absolutely mental if anyone offered to hold his sign for him while he accompanied himself musically. The other classic was the guy who'd put out a mat, on which was written his explanation for why he was supporting Blaine's endeavour by sitting out on the grass in front of the box for the entire duration of the 44 days. Clearly he'd had little success, as after only 2 days he was nowhere to be seen!!
In the pub afterwards we discussed ways to spice up proceedings. A favourite was to use catapults to fire noodles at the perspex after 40 days or so, just to see if he'd crack. Unfortunately it later emerged that someone had already attempted a similar stunt. He'd catapulted an entire english breakfast at the star (plenty of scrambled egg and plenty of fried tomato), before being aggressively wrestled to the ground by Blaine's security force, held in a restraining position until the police arrived, and unceremoniously carted off down the nick. God knows what they'll charge him with; assault with a deadly sausage? Improper use of baked beans? Conspiracy to incite a food-fight? The other plan was to drive golf-balls at him from London Bridge, but that had also already been attempted. Personally I think these people were a bit previous; you need to wait until he's starting to really lose it before you'll get the desired reaction to any pranking.
A more impressive London stunt finally made it onto the TV yesterday. A few weeks ago a trio of French free runners performed incredible feats of acrobatic running on and around some of London's most famous landmarks. It was done with great secrecy, enabling them to interact with the environment and the public in a very spontaneous way, although the stunts themsleves were carefully planned in advance and filmed by a camera crew. The documentary made about them and their artform was pretty good. Set to a soundbed of appropriately ambient drum'n'bass it featured interviews with the inventor of the sport, his disciples, the curators of the buildings and monuments involved, achitects, philosophers and other sportspeople, and gave a really lucid and engaging account of this beautiful emerging sport. Unfortunately the filming of the running itself was shot in such a way as to minimise the feel of grandeur, beauty and skill that the performance engendered, being a little claustrophobic and jittery in style, but the overall effect of the program to inspire awe towards these amazing althletes was undiminished, as was it's invitation to view the urban lanscape in a new aesthetic way. I don't recommend trying it, but to watch it's incredible.
Dizzee Rascal, as tipped in this very journal some weeks ago, has won the Mercury Music Prize. A great result for underground British rap and the Prize itself; this was a brave choice, but utterly justified IMHO.
::: posted by Andy at 9/10/2003 02:08:00 PM
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