A little late on this one, but whatever.
Monday, August 05, 2013
Wednesday, June 05, 2013
PRIMAVERA SOUND 2013 REVIEW
Originally published on thebomberjacketcom
A lot had changed for the 13th edition of Primavera Sound, most notably that the festival was no longer “San Miguel Primavera Sound,” but “Heineken Primavera Sound.” The difference is relevant, because a lot of the local Spanish elements of the festival haven’t been as emphasized in more recent years (and the Primavera organization has been called out on it once or twice). Don’t get me wrong, Primavera Sound is an amazing music festival, but as this was my third year in attendance, it was hard not to notice (or realize) some things. Spanish groups rarely got set times later than 6 p.m., and the attendance of those sets reflected the low amount of exposure they were actually getting. Although it’s cool that additional concerts were organized for the entire month beforehand and most intensively during the festival week, it’s debatable whether or not that meant that groups were pushed out of the festival to play at a bar the week before. Primavera has become a veritable booking force in Spain–particularly in Barcelona. It organizes concerts for nationally touring bands and also for local groups, but during the time in Barcelona I had more than one band mention to me how hard it was to book a show without the Primavera stamp of approval.
Friday, April 19, 2013
Tuesday, April 09, 2013
The Knife :: Shaking the Habitual
All you have to pay is attention:
SOME FEELING IN THE BELLIES OF THE TANKERS WHO PASS US MAKING SAD MANIC BONGS LIKE DRUMS
Everybody is always desiring already imagined things.
When we travel between thresholds, people say: “you’re hiding.”
Not everything can be so easily explained.
We have a bellyache, a big stink, a major grouse or two with manufactured knowledge.
But how do you build an album about not knowing?
Now your voice is in my throat, floating there…
Often people take pills for these things.
To us the body is no longer psychological.
It’s certainly not a container, we don’t believe in metaphors.
Like dog/wolf—there aren’t many anymore.
Still at twilight something blurs over your shoulder.
Which is it?
It’s prickly.
Our hair is out.
We have made some decisions.
We want to fail more, act without authority.
Plus there’s something phlegmatic about the world state don’t you think?
There’s a blood system promoting biology as destiny.
A series of patriarchies that’s a problem to the Nth degree.
What about hyper-capitalism, this homicidal class system, the school system that’s kaput?
Then there are castles everywhere—look at them fake tanning and signing autographs!
At least there’s one thing we stand behind.
There’s still an ecosystem right? And here’s this sound system.
We dusted it off. Electronic is just one place in the body. We went temporarily acoustic.
We made our own instruments. We took an old bedspring, a microphone and:
“Stay out here…”
Now we’re bending our voices to sound like Emily R., who recorded the track on her cellphone speaker.
No habits!
There are other ways to do things.
Still sometimes it all seems so bad.
Don’t worry we won’t commit Harakiri, stomach cutting or anything like it.
The honor system is corrupt, just another privilege.
Like how it’s a privilege to make an album, to move freely.
We just have to go faster we mean breakneck we mean “like crazy.”
How at 5am that warehouse beat is coming up like sour steam.
All over the dance floor we’re asking: can this DNA turn into something else?
It’s not metaphorical. It’s explicit.
There are surgeries and fantasies and holes sweating through the wall.
It’s a question about feelings. It’s a question about who gets to risk.
But things don’t change so easily.
There’s still Monsanto, fracking and “terminator seeds.”
Every morning we wake up wondering: who’s kicking who on the street corner?
Now we have to start. We choose process over everything else.
Letting go of outcomes is another privilege.
Keep it lateral.
We ask our friends to help.
Together we leave the village and walk down the road. The light starts exercising itself. The old sun is out in his winter jumpsuit doing sit-ups and squat thrusts between the nettles and moldy brush.
10 more! We say to him. Get shaking!
Our walk gets longer. It’s a walk in the panpipes of the body. We come to the edge. So much water. The ocean is twice its original size. We take a bunch of surveys.They know everything about us. We don’t buy what they say. We take a heap of estrogen. All around us things are howling and then we stand on the pier end. The light is pink and green and pink and green. It reminds us of home—like we imagine it could be. But when the color pancakes out over the horizon, we don’t know what we’re looking at. That’s ok. This time it’s structural.
No habits!
Of course we’re growing restless.
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