Simon Reynolds - C or D

Minna I'm delighted. Thank you.

yrs bll

Oh, you could say something about Simon Reynolds's writing, which almost no one on this thread actually did except in the vaguest terms. Like, open a book, read a page, say something about it.

Also, if you want to be taken seriously, its best not to identify yourself as a tool.

the 'plateau' idea that reynolds uses from time to time (not always in those words) seems to me v. useful and pretty close to whatever d. and g. mean by it. EVEN BETTER, d. and g.'s source, gregory bateson, means something v. useful and interesting by it, well applicable to dance music, moreover rap, a-g stuff, indie rock, all kindsa things.

the 'desiring machine' stuff is not v. well developed so it's hard to tell if reynolds' use of it accords with d. and g.'s (whatever the hell that is exactly). my suspicion is that r's use doesn't show any deep understanding of d and g's, but it's along the right lines.

So let's try the other thing. I just happen to have a copy of History of Shit on my bookshelf, and I'll open it at random ...

"The individuation of waste, which enjoins all 'to hold and retain matter within their homes' comes attached to a moral homily: it serves as the 'raw material' for a fable whose hero serves a calendar in which singing and dancing days are always a year away."

Surely no one here can fail to see that this is a devastating description of the music critic and of how music criticism actually works (instead of the way our late capitalist society pretends that it works). For example, here we are reading this 'matter' when we could be out dancing, like Simon Reynolds always claims to be. The point is that HE is the 'hero' described in the quote and music criticism is the 'fable'.

See. It works.

I just spent the last half hour reading this thread. Extremely interesting.

Can somebody please explain to me who you people are? Is I Love Music a university thing?, a profession guild, how did you people find one another?

Anyway.

I have done some compiling over the last months and I want you to check out some of my pages:

http://www.jahsonic.com/SimonReynolds.html
http://www.jahsonic.com/GillesDeleuze.html
http://www.jahsonic.com/DavidToop.html
http://www.jahsonic.com/GeorgesBataille.html
http://www.jahsonic.com/GreilMarcus.html
http://www.jahsonic.com/BlackScienceFiction.html

see other thread to read my introduction

Kind regards
Jan Geerinck
http://www.jahsonic.com

greil marcus in particular distinguished himself recently when he posted this thread:

YOU SAD BASTARD! Carter Reconsidered Tom Ewing, September 2002

and emmanuel is a troll. but a loveley and kind troll :-)

It's almost too much -- the sustained invocations and praise thrown at every bit of every scene, the compulsive political readings and most importantly the accumulative aspect -- each chapter each twist builds on the one before and the fractures get more subtle and complex at once. Most troublesome is that Reynolds ties each change into the social landscape of region in question, but honestly it moves a bit too fast. I mean he's talking about how certain cultural features came to dominance in '93 thanks to unemployment, etc. so what are we supposed to think -- that the U.K was a bundle of peaches and cream until '92? His criteria for class relations, social change, etc. all seem too confined and limited in their scope. Meaning becomes too hermunetic and cloistered by this -- which is itself the dancefloor moment I suppose.

So thus probably the most thrilling part is how he builds and destroys the arguments for and vs. each twist and turn of genre-fracture being the one to liberate mankind bring peace freedom harmony and lemondade oceans. The experience of stepping in and out of the dancefloor, coming up and coming down and worrying and arguing over where next, the immediacy of local change in a minute twist of culture like Douglas Adams' fantasy from his Dirk Gently novels of an alternate reality tuned into by just twisting slightly sideways through a fourth dimension.

Plateau does seem an appropriate metaphor -- discontinuous sheets of social interaction each projecting itself forever into the past and future.

lemonade oceans? ew.

Perhaps the search for what gramsci terms the "historic bloc" where the entirety of the apparatus of society -- economic roots to most advanced ideological exposition and esthetic appreciation -- becomes harmonious, the real is rational etc. The dialectic of flight from dialecticism, heh.

to Sterl's points, yes Energy Flash/Gen E is action-packed, it covers 10 years of a transglobal subculture and ten years of its prehistory--not even a subculture reallly, more like an alternative mainstream --it moved fast and it mutated wide. any individual artefact or sub-scene within it could be looked at through a host of prisms -- its relationship to the rest of its genre; the genealogy of that genre; the artefact's relationship to the broader pop culture; its relationship to changes in technology; to changes in drug use; its relationship to society. And probably several more prisms. even the biographical prism occasionally with someone like goldie basically telling his lifestory through breakbeats and wussy synth-washes.

at different points some angles will seem more productive than others, or more salient (it's hard to see the social stakes in microhouse or electroclash, say) but other times you might want to try to use them all. (and i'm sure there are points where the EF/GE cake is too rich).

the prism thing is is sort of my big disagreement with kodwo eshun, that as a point of policy he eliminates for himself one whole set of prisms to do with the social, the historical. why would you want to tie your hands like that, why reject a whole set of methods that produce results?

re. pre-92 england as peaches and cream. actually if you recall there was a recession in the early nineties, it's the economy stupid thing was what lost bush his re-election, and it was particularly bad in the uk in 92-93. it came after a period of economic boom and optimism in the late eighties (which really fueled rave), thatcherism's policies had begun to finally pay off (for some of the country anyway -- London and the South of England more than elsewhre), a new spirit of entrepreneuralism abroad esp in the young (see rave again) lots of money circulating in the economy, and more important a perception that there was a boom. that changed by about the time rave turned dark and junglistic, unemployment rose, doom and gloom in the headlines. plus more important the specific microeconomy of rave was doing badly, the boom bubble of massive raves and records that were so popular they'd go straight in the charts wihtout any mainstream radio play, that had burst. so that deflation would be the background to whatever was also going on musically in terms of the music's own narrative, the pharmacological narrative

re mills as purism/fanaticism, if minimal techno was a one man genre i could say probably 'yay', but certainly much more when i wrote the bk there was a whole genre of minimal techno and it seemed to show the downside of purism/fanaticism, you have the purist impulse becoming anorexic, eating away at itself. same thing happened to drum'n'bass ultimately.

talking of which SoundMurderer mix-Cd on Violent Turd -- 60 tks of ragga-jungle circa 94 in just over an hour -- the best jungle mix ever? meaning therefore the best dance music mix ever?

Simon--Jesus god this Soundmurderer fella knows his shit, dunn'e?

talking of which SoundMurderer mix-Cd on Violent Turd -- 60 tks of ragga-jungle circa 94 in just over an hour -- the best jungle mix ever? meaning therefore the best dance music mix ever?

When is this COMING out??!? I don't see it listed on Tigerbeat6's website at all!! What's on it? Who mixed it?

But the good one-man genres always inspire a following, no?

Track 1 (30:48)
Cobra: “R.I.P.”
Remarc: “R.I.P.”
Remarc: “R.I.P. (Remarc Remix)”
Remarc: “Sound Murderer”
Remarc: “Sound Murderer (Loafin in Brockley Remix)”
Cutty Ranks: “Original Ranks (Just Jungle Remix)”
Kemet Crew: “Truth Over Falsehood”
Dennis Brown: “Rebel with a Cause (Bizzy B Remix)”
Johnny Jungle: “Killa Sound (Krome & Time Remix)”
DRS + Kenny Ken: “Everyman (AWOL Remix)”
DJ Rap ft. Outlaw Candy: “Intelligent Woman”
Kemet Crew: “Vibe Out”
Krome & Time: “License Remix”
General Degree: “Papa Lover (Stretch Remix)”
Rude & Deadly: “Lightnin and Thunda”
Shy FX: “Who Run Tingz (T Power Remix #1)”
Shy FX: “Who Run Tingz (T Power Remix #2)”
Remarc: “Thunderclap”
Cutty Ranks: “The Return (Bizzi B & Ruffkut Rmx)”
Tek 9: “Pushing Back (Remix)”
DJ Hype: “Bad Man”
Capone: “Massive”

Track 2 (22:33)
Shy FX: “Simple Tings (10” Mix)”
New Blood: “Worries in the Dance”
Prizna ft. Demolition Man: “Fire (AWOL Mix)”
Simpleton: “Coca Cola (Remix)”
Garnett Silk: “Flip Flop”
Salt Fish & Ackee: “The Gunman”
Barrington Levy: “Here I Come (Remix)”
Physics N Tricks: “Crazy Tings (Remarc Remix)”
Simpleton: “Unity (Remarc Remix)”
Darren H & the Punisher: “All Massive (Remix)”
Ninjaman: “Murder Dem (Lewi Remix)”
L Double: “All Massive”
DJ Rescue: “Untitled #1”
Pure: “Anything Test (Zinc Remix)”
Da Matrix: “Come Een”
Trinity: “I Selassie I”
Krome & Time: “Studio 1 Lik”
Chuckleberry: “Bad Man”
Run Tings & Liftin Spirit: “Come Easy”
Marvellous Cain: “CB4”
Squarepusher ft. MC Twin Dub: “Full Rinse”

Track 3 (15:48)
Psychokenisis: “Secret Place”
The X: “New Dawn (ST Files Remix)”
T.J.C.: “Raw”
B.L.I.M.: “Jeamland (Trace Remix)”
Dom: “Drones”
Nookie: “The Prelude”
Decoder: “Fog”
DJ Rescue: “Untitled #2”
Kemet Crew: “Powering Through”
DJ Gunshot: “Wheel Up”
Solution: “What Can I Do”
Souljah: “2-1-2”
Northern Connexion: “Bounce”
2 Player: “Extreme Possibilities (Wagon Christ Remix)”
Plug: “Cheesy (Aura Mix)”
Shy FX: “Dubplate”
Cyche-Outs: “Kaos Future to Kuranka (Fukakuteisei Mix)”

But my main criticism with regard to Reynolds' theory that techno was heading for an elitist dead end is that it's pretty ironic to see it becoming more populist/popular than EVER in its entire history.

which is then their downfall, no?

no but seriously, often if something's a real good then it inspires loadsa imitators andn if you're reall really INTO that something good then seconddivision secondhand versions of it are going to be just peachy, the more the merrier. but coming as a ahem dilettante outsider to jeff mills's particular fanaticism, it seems like the sonic bases of minimal techno are too narrow to sustain more than a few folk. whereas the gloomcore template actually seems to have more possibilities, but maybe i am too "inside" that sound to be objective

also,
>re each twist and turn of genre-fracture being the one to liberate >mankind bring peace freedom harmony and lemondade oceans
i don't think i ever say anything like that, in fact there's a thread of doubt and ambivalence running through the whole thing that it's all a massive waste of energy, that the euphoria is going nowhere and signifies nothing. i never was one of those this will change the world, it's a revolution in human consciousness types, that side of rave always seemed a bit silly and hippie, it's what put me off it the scene til the harder darker techno came in circa 91. but if the impression is of excessive urgency and the writer being convinced that this area is the most passion-deserving and thought-provoking musical phenom of the Nineties, fascinating both in its broadest contours and implications as well as its smallest details-- well that's what i was feeling.

as a music formation, rave is/was as vast as rock or rap -- as a convert, there's a sense in which you like all of it, the whole cultural project of it feels like a Cause that Stands For Something and that you Stand By (cf hip hop) , but then of course there's particular bits you really really love and think are the leading edge of it. so in writing that bk, i'm trying to big up the whole thing while work out which sectors are most taking it forward.

listening to SoundMurderer --glorious barrage of mash-up amen rinse-outs and snarerushes and sublow skank bass and ragga battle cries -- it's hard for me to imagine how anyone who heard this music in its time could fail to respond to it as a Call, a summons, an energy signal.

it's still more far out than anything that followed, no matter how everyone from drill n bass to the splatterbreaks Scud-types tried to make it weirder and more fuckedupe -- although that said Scud also has a great record out with Panacea under the name The Redeemer called Hardcore Owes Me Money -- their own tribute to h-core/early jungle samplemania slathered over more modern d&b beats

If dance genre = plateau, then a "perfected" genre = a singularity, collapsed in on itself and inaccessable but permanantly deforming the musical landscape around it? I like this metaphor since it captures the jungle is dead -- > jungle is everywhere paradox.