The Future Now

Michael Jackson

Difficult to remain completely untouched by the death of Michael Jackson.  A deeply troubled soul of course, but a great performer with a wonderful voice who also made a serious contribution to the world of contemporary dance.

Richard Williams sums it up especially well in this piece for the Guardian.

A first step to understanding

A final post on the Baby P affair.  This excellent article by Anne Karpf should be required reading for everyone who thinks more could be done to prevent child abuse and filicide.

Pope Clitoris the Umpteenth

If you want to discover the provenance of this unusual headline, you will have to go and see Terence Davies' Of Time and the City, a wonderful combination of film, music and poetry now on general release. 

As Peter Bradshaw, who gave it five stars, says in his review:

What a lovely film this is, and what a welcome comeback for one of Britain's greatest film-makers.

Here's the trailer:

Small is beautiful

I have a new piece over at Comment is Free this afternoon looking at the social and economic impacts of the contrasting histories of the UK and Italy.

What is wrong with these people?

Until the Labour Party expels people like the barbarian Andy Burnham, it will not have my vote.

This film is so good

A good time to take our minds off the turmoil outside, I think. Happy to be able to report a wonderful cinema going experience this week.  I've loved you so long (Il y a longtemps que je t'aime) has to be one of the finest films in a very long time.

Kristin Scott Thomas is unbelievably good in the lead role.  Even if the part was written for her, as Peter Bradshaw suggest in his excellent review, her performance was still breathtaking.  I have always thought her to be a very fine actress, but this is the first role to make the most of her unparalleled abilities.

Having awarded last year's best actress Oscar to Marion Cotillard for her portrayal of Edith Piaf, it seems unlikely that Scott Thomas will be in the frame this year; not only is the film French, it will doubtless be considered too art-house, and its subject matter too uncomfortable.  But if there were any justice in Hollywood, she would walk it.

Special mention also must go to her co-star, Elsa Zylberstein, who was almost as good.  Go see the film at least twice.  In the meantime, here's the trailer:

Leonard Cohen: Genius

As you may have noticed, this blog has been rather quiet of late.  I blame a combination of blogger apathy and a careless loss of control over my work/life balance.  In this equation, I count writing as life, and the day job which pays the mortgage, as work.  So, I've been waiting for something special to get me writing again, and last night, at the O2, that something special happened.

The last time I saw Leonard Cohen on stage was when he took a hysterically applauded bow at the end of Philip Glass’s musical rendering of his collection of poems, The Book of Longing, at the Barbican last year.  On that occasion, many Cohen fans, apparently misled by the publicity, left early, once they realised the great man’s contribution on the night was limited to his recorded voice. 

Last night at the O2, 18,000 fans finally got the chance, after a 16 year absence, to see the great man ply his trade on a London stage.  And what a performance it was.

Having wowed a new generation of fans at Glastonbury a couple of weeks ago, and with every performance on his current world tour garnering five star reviews, expectations couldn’t have been higher.  Not that Cohen showed any signs of pressure as he jogged onto stage and, once prolonged applause subsided, went straight into Dance Me To The End Of Love.

Cohen’s remarkable voice was as beautiful as ever.  Once reviewer dared suggest that his live performances were sometimes too close to the studio recordings.  But this is to miss his subtleties of interpretation and timing.  He is the perfect live performer.  And over four decades he has built up an unmatched repertoire.  By the time he began Sisters of Mercy (third or fourth encore?) I couldn’t believe, after so many great songs, he still had such a classic left to play.

But last night was not just about Cohen.  His collaborator, Sharon Robinson, has one of the finest female voices I’ve ever heard.  With Robinson and the Webb Sisters, Charley and Hattie, Cohen has assembled the best backing vocal line-up imaginable.  Indeed, he seems to have persuaded some of the finest musicians in the world to join his band.  All were superb: Javier Mas on 12-string guitar and Dino Soldo on sax, harmonica and the weird synth-type wind instrument which Cohen appropriately calls ‘The Instrument of Wind’ were especially good, but for me Neil Larsen on the Hammond B3 stood out.  It’s my favourite instrument and Larsen plays it superbly.

Much has been written about the reasons for Cohen embarking on a world tour well into his seventies, a decade and a half after retiring.  While one can only have sympathy for the way he was ripped off by his former lover/manager; had he not so suffered, thousands of people would have been denied the opportunity to see a true master of his craft, at the peak of his powers.   I try to avoid hyperbole wherever possible, but I don’t remember ever enjoying a concert quite as much as I did last night.

The full set list, courtesy of Gerry Smith, is available here. And the London Evening Standard review is here.

And here he is singing Closing Time on the current tour:

Arthur C. Clarke - visionary and storyteller

 Arthur C. Clarke died today.  One of my favourite writers, his books were an important part of my literary and political formation.   In marrying the possibilities of science with ideas around the possibility of a world in which human beings might one day live in harmony, Clarke was a great visionary.  He blurred the lines between fiction and reality with great success, despite setting most of his stories in a future which most people find fantastic.

Whenever I have that (all too familiar) conversation with people who just don't get science fiction I try to persuade them to read Clarke's Childhood's End; a book I would recommend to anyone not familiar with his work.

Why can't we do it?

For me, the 1950s and 1960s are perhaps the most interesting decades of the twentieth century.  Admittedly, they came after two world wars and the biggest depression in history, and they preceded the free-market revolution which laid the foundations for economic globalisation.  Nonetheless, what happened socially and culturally in these two decades set the political agenda for every decade since; and helps to explain why our social and moral aspirations are now so out of synch which the direction of economic advance.

If you doubt me, you should tune into Mad Men, the latest quality drama from the United States.  As most critics are saying, it is almost perfect: rarely can a TV drama have re-created an only recently bygone age so effectively.  Watching last night's episode, I quickly forgot it was television, it's almost too good for that medium.

I have long wondered why the Americans are so good at producing top quality original drama when we Brits have such a poor track record, especially recently.  You can only flog the Poliakoff horse so often.

In yesterday's Observer, Will Hutton had a go at answering that question with some success.  Although his conclusions do not bode well for the prospects of a revival in British TV drama.

As he says,

Too many people believe public-service broadcasting is outdated, hindering television; it will take a cultural revolution at the channel to persuade commissioners that paradoxically the best way of systematically delivering great programmes in a British market is to fuse public-service broadcasting values with commerciality.

Hutton's article is worth a read, and if you haven't watched Mad Men yet, there are two repeats of this weeks episode: on Tuesday evening on BBC2, and again on Thursday evening on BBC4 (yes, it's on the Beeb so no bloody commercials!).

The artist as leader

I have a piece at comment is free this morning, prompted by Daniel Barenboim's series of Beethoven sonata recitals in London, which conclude this afternoon.

Buried Treasures

Simon Jenkins was at his best in yesterday's Guardian, recording for us his thoughts on a sneak preview of the new exhibition of Russian and French masterpieces at the Royal Academy which opens next week.

Although a a fully paid-up 'friend' of that venerable institution, I don't seem to have received my customary preview invitation.  But it sounds so fabulous, I shall heading down to Piccadilly at the earliest opportunity for a look, and will report back.

Towards the end of his piece, Jenkins laments the fact that so many great works are permanently hidden from view:

Sooner or later the professional museum fatwa that treats these places as private curatorial archives and denies their governors freedom to trade collections must crumble. The crude chauvinism that says that a work of art must be "saved for the nation", even if then buried by the nation, is the most arrogant of imperial leftovers. Art should be displayed. Russia has more works of global appeal than it can possibly handle, yet desperately needs money to look after a fraction of what it has.

Art has no purpose unless it can be seen and appreciated by art lovers.  Let's hope the crazy state protectionism that restricts access to so many fine works, will soon be a thing of the past.

The truth about bankers

John Lanchester has a superb analysis of the banking system in general and the mechanics of the Northern Rock debacle in particular, in this month's London Review of Books.

Of particular interest are Lanchester's observations of the impact on life in the capital when those who work at the business of making money from money in the City of London earn many times the income of the majority of ordinary wage-earners.

As he writes, inflated city salaries are a direct result of how

....successive governments have, in policy terms, given the City more or less everything it wants.

If more people were aware of how the financial system works, how it is configured to deliver wealth to the minority of those who are are already wealthy, and how this morally dubious objective makes periodic economic slumps inevitable, then surely they would exercise their democratic right to have it changed.  Then again, as I write in the current edition of Land and Liberty magazine, our prototype democracy fails completely to defend majority interests and requires wholesale revision.

Reform, Reform

A while ago I was invited to visit the Reform Club in London's Pall Mall. Although rather anonymous from the street outside, the interior is a wonder to behold: the art decorating the walls is exquisite, the architecture and furniture, a tribute to the visual creativity and ambition of the Victorians.

Opened in 1841, membership was originally restricted to those who pledged support to the Great Reform Act of 1832. There is a small but fascinating permanent exhibition about the various reform acts which were the focus of member's efforts a century and a half ago. The Reform Club was the first of London's clubs to admit female members in 1981, and has a long history and supporting progressive causes and reflecting changes in wider society.

As we lunched in the slightly less plush buffet dining room I was struck by the profile of the membership today. The Club is no longer aligned to any political party (membership of the Liberal Party used to be a pre-condition of admission) but it apparently attracts civil servants from the nearby Treasury, whereas their colleagues from the Foreign Office generally patronise The Traveller's Club.

Looking aroud the dining room, it was difficut to imagine the Reform Club any longer providing a debating forum for progressive ideals or social reform. Perhaps, in the minds of today's members, enough has already been achieved. I'd like to imagine, however, that as the struggle for social justice continues, some of those who spend their time in the hallowed rooms of this historic building might follow the example of their forebears and join the struggle. Many of these people have considerable power: if change is to come, they will have an important role to play.

The fate of great music

Also on yesterday's Saturday Live (see below), Film Critic and Guardian columnist, Charlie Brooker, selected his inheritance tracks.  It's a regular feature, a kind of mini desert island discs in which a listener or celeb selects a piece of music they inherited from their parents and another they would like to leave to future generations.

For the latter, Brooker chose music from Darren Aaronofsky's mind-blowing film, Requiem for a Dream, specifically Lux Aeterna, the soundtrack's recurring theme.  The score was written by Clint Mansell (of Pop Will Eat Itself fame) and performed by the Kronos Quartet.  I saw them play it quite brilliantly at The Barbican a couple of years ago. You can listen to it here:

While explaining his selection, Brooker lamented how so much sublime music is nowadays hijacked for use in commercials or junk television without ever crediting the composer or performer.  This particular piece has now been appropriated by Sky Sports News, which our 13 year old watches almost continuously.

Brooker's observations gave me the idea for an occasional series in which I'll post details of pieces of music I like that have been abused in this way, with details of the original, and, if the new commercial application warrants it, a look at how its been used.

The first in the series is from the new XBOX Halo 3 cinema advert, which uses Chopin's wonderful Raindrop Prelude.  Although I'm no fan of gaming, I have to admit in this case the ad agency has made rather good use of it, as you can see below.