the canary

An evening of Autechreoticism.

Walker — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 16:22:37 +0000

Disclaimer: I’m far from expert in anything musical, and the last thing I bought of Autechre’s was the 1994 “Amber” album. To be frank, I pretty much lost interest as they entered their more indulgently abstract phase. “Incunabula” is still my favourite Autechre album, probably as it’s by far their, um, well, grooviest. As such, I’m the last person who should review their recent gig, but that never stopped a self-proclaimed internet pundit before, and you’re actually reading, aren’t you? so on we go …

It was about a month ago at the Forum nightclub, a shiny new venue on the edge of Fox Studios’ “Entertainment Precinct” (read “Money Hoover”). Shall I begin with the Forum’s complete inappropriateness for the event? The interior looks like someone gave a 90′s designer lots of cocaine and a big budget, all curvy balconies and mezzanines on mezzanines, a dozen little staircases, circled around the open centre space which is, ostensibly, a dancefloor with a stage at the end – albeit a stepped dancefloor, at spaces of about 1.5 metres, alternately dark and glowing with white light (this is an important detail, you’ll understand later). The first noticeable impact this agglomeration of odd, staggered spaces, apart from the difficulty of moving around among a packed crowd, is the awkward sound quality of the room. Evidently no acoustic engineers were consulted during or after the construction of this club, or if they were, their advice was ignored. Rather than a carefully placed and considered array of speakers to fill out the many levelled and faceted room, someone had opted for the basic “wall of sound” approach, with a huge stack of speakers on either side of the stage. The result was a room mostly full of deadspots of varying frequency, with about half a dozen tiny sweetspots scattered, seemingly randomly. The Forum would be a great venue for a corporate Christmas party, or a location for a TV ad selling aftershave …

Aaaanyway, there were three acts, that I noticed, including two unadvertised support acts. The first was unknown to me, and I’m okay with that, I think. I arrived too late to really give a fair assessment, though, so I probably should move on.

Mark Pritchard, best known to me as half of the mid-90′s Jedi Knights, was next. For the first half of his set he reassured me that the Knights’ appeal was not based solely on his partner Mr Middleton’s input, i.e. I danced my booty off to some thumping electrofunk for almost half an hour, happily ensconced in one of the few dancefloor-located sweetspots. The latter part of the set dropped into a more boring 4/4 fast-as-you-can kind of affair, but that was okay because I wanted a cigarette by then. So, I’m actually kind of happy at this point, not too worried that Autechre might turn out shite because I’ve already had this unexpected windfall of funk, and with the dancefloor not-too-full, at that. I’m glad I ate that bit of blotter when I did. Nostalgia reigns.

Intermission: carpark. By far the most socially entertaining area of the evening, as is often the case. Here I met some of the usual suspects, although not as many as I’d have hoped, plus some new and quite jovial freaks, reminding me of times in the carparks of a golden, bygone day. Carparks are the party that runs parallel to the party inside, y’know, as is any space directly outside a noisy, crowded venue.

When Autechre arrive we know it’s them because the room suddenly goes almost completely dark. Bar lights only. No stage lights, no glowing-floor lights … darkness. And Autechre’s signature grinding, sweeping grunts and groans, the over-capacity crowd pressing forward, yet most of them, oddly, managing to stand completely still as they moved closer … I was a bit underwhelmed for a while, frankly, standing way up the back with an old friend, until he told me to switch positions with him, and by moving two paces I stepped out of a deadspot into a sweet one, bass and groove suddenly thump the giblets and tug the tendons. So I decided to brave the dancefloor, the frenzied mass of grooving, sweating hedonists … no, wait, this is an Autechre gig, silly me, I want people to dance? I think I saw a few heads bobbing up and down at the front, but I was one of the few people in my centre-dancefloor location who was foolish enough to try actually physically engaging with the music, for the few periods when Autechre weren’t fucking with anyone who was trying to, erm, dance. But perhaps they were just trying to prevent casualties among the crowd, who were mostly standing on what is, remember, a stepped dancefloor, denied the light which now makes a practical kind of sense – when the floor was lit, you could see each step. Y’see? But our elevated soundsmiths, Autechre, can’t allow base considerations like health and safety to dictate their lighting requests at a gig, it’s clearly better to let the music be, like, pure, man, than it is to allow punters to dance with sure footing. If that means dancing is positively discouraged, so be it.

Since I’d almost fallen down several times just getting onto the dancefloor, I decided to tough it out for a while, and managed to spread some wriggling space around me* to enjoy a few of the more accessible tracks, endure the interludes of head-fuckery**, and even manage to socialise with a few wasted folks sitting against the wall, as they were in a deadspot and it was quiet enough to converse without yelling. After a while, though, enough was enough – the music wasn’t getting any more rhythmic, and the crowd wasn’t getting any more mobile. So I braved the return journey up the dancefloor’s steps, nearly falling again***, and exited for another cigarette. Sad to say, I didn’t return. I tried to, wanting to find a good spot to just sit and listen, but as I neared the front door the blotter in me shouted “Retreat!”, visualising the dark pit and its close, immobile throng. So I phoned a friend who had but a moment before run away with his own blotted ideas, and arranged a rendezvous in the park across the road, to pass the remainder of the evening in a more enjoyable way. It even involved a bit of lying on a hillside and staring at the clouds under a full moon. If he were a girl, it’d have been dead romantic.

Look, don’t get me wrong. I like that Autechre do what they do, even if I don’t listen to most of it – I mean, I don’t listen to most music, full stop. And it’s not their fault I’m a blinkered sentimentalist who wishes every new song stirred him as did “Bass Cadet.” They’ve every right to perform in an environment of their moulding, and to be honest I’d quite like to give them another try sometime … but not at that venue. As it was, I’d have done better by myself and Autechre both, had I spent my $60 on a couple of their latest CDs and turned the lights off in my bedroom.

Oh well.

——————————————————–

* Handy hint: erratic flailing movements are a good way to clear space … just about anywhere, really.

** Too many clashing rhythms, not enough of the signature, cohesive payoff. Was it just sloppy mixing? Or have Autechre branched so far into incomprehensible listener-unfriendliness challenging avant-gardeism?

*** Man, that dancefloor was dangerous. Sure, I was wasted, but I’ve been more so, in far more unpredictable places, and never felt so vulnerable to falling over. I mean, a brand new nightclub should be a sandpit compared to, say, a derelict warehouse, or a cliff-top rave at night. Bah! They don’t make parties like they used to. My knee hurts. Where are my teeth? etc.

One more try

Walker — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 15:55:17 +0000

Don’t we all just want to be loved? And to have someone to love? Or failing that (for whatever gods-boringly complicated reasons), something?

Whether it be music, photography, food, sex, TV, gundam kit building … whatever takes your fancy. Just seek to love that experience in its moment, without worry for the impact beyond. Sure it’s selfish, if you wanna get all humanistically christian about it … but what the fuck do the god-botherers know with all their faith and glory? They who rape those under their wing, whose god subjects his ordinary faithful to banal, carnal suffering with only the dim hope of eternal bliss? I mean, let’s face it, even bliss would start to grate after the first millenium or so, if it had to be spent with an addled twat like Jehovah. (Well, as he’s represented by his earth-side employees, anyway … adds the author, with a nod to any gods who might happen by.)

Like pinching someone’s wrist to wake them from a faint, suffering is to remind us we’re alive – and that we are alive means we are at liberty to pursue our happiness, whatever that may entail. So long, of course, as we don’t impact too dearly on the overall prospects of the DNA virus that began it all, or else mother nature will likely kick back with a lethal sting.

One must take one’s happiness where it stands, lest bland, carnal suffering bleeds its stain into one’s soul at the expense of any other hue. Yes, I wrote “soul” … but don’t think it means I owe allegiance to any god. Quite the contrary. Those bastards have done so little to impress in the last couple of thousand years that they should be scrambling to attract our attention, our love.

———————-

I’m back, bitches. Love me if you must, but don’t expect a reply.

Remember: hope for the best, expect the worst.

———————–

If nothing else this blog stands, as long as suffered by its hosts, as a small, möbius-stripped monument to the perils of hubris.

Speaking of which … if I get around to editing my next post, it may also include my own monument to the crapulence of Autechre’s recent Sydney gig. Yes, I think I just might. Maybe. “Announcing your intentions is a good way to hear god laugh,” I think, was what Al said to Doc Cochrane.

Nietzsche wept.

Walker — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 13:46:18 +0000

I’m not sure what intrigues me more about this photo:

It could be the logo, with it’s gleeful morphing of the good ol’ swastika – and the decision to pair that logo with a mascot sired by Superman. I’m guessing that whoever designed all this has little awareness of either history or philosophy – and compared to my quite limited grasp of both, that’s pretty fracking lame. I mean, if the context was even vaguely Ayurvedic, or anywhere in the realm of eastern spiritualism, the swastika is fair game – a billion Indians can’t all be wrong. But this is on a Superman-style outfit, for a gym which is, by nature, about the aesthetics of strength. If the designer of the outfit has somehow seen this blog post, as unlikely as that may be, and is mystified by my ponderings, I can only suggest they google search hitler+superman (and +eugenics, maybe).

My intriguedness might also stem from something a bit less dogmatic, something more intuitively designerish to do with form and function and all that jazz. It might be that dressing a gym mascot with a fake muscle-suit in order to impress potential customers is akin to dressing an unshaven hobo in a silk business suit and asking us to open a bank account. Oh, but hang on, that’s pretty much what most bank ads have ever been, and will ever be … oh.

Ahem. Carry on.

Art to Di for.

Walker — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 15:58:53 +0000

Every now and then, once in a blue moon, I wish I had a polarising filter for my GRD.

Every now and then.

D’you think that’s … appropriate?

Walker — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 16:15:20 +0000

I dunno, bitch. D’you think it’s appropriate to judge a person’s conscience when you’re totally ignorant of what you’re moralising about? Alright, so I didn’t call her a bitch, but I did think it.

Oh, sorry, rewind …

There was a fire up the street from my house last night:

The first siren stopping nearby was enough for me to mute the TV. The second siren coming from another direction got me out the door, with boots on and the Ricoh GRD in pocket. I almost ran back for my DSLR when I saw the glow, but I’m glad I didn’t because the firemen had extinguished the blaze in a few minutes and I probably would have missed even this throwaway shot of the flames.

So, I’m snapping the fire engines out the front of the house when a night-gowned woman, a neighbour of the affected house, points at my camera and asks the question in the title of this post. “Is what appropriate?” I asked back.

“Taking photos. Y’know, what with the things that have been happening in Victoria lately,” she replied.

A bit confused, I replied that I couldn’t see the link between the devastating bushfires over 1,000 km away and a small housefire a block from from my house (a fire in which nobody was even injured, I might add). Yes, I thought it was appropriate to photograph. It’s news.

She shrugged, and continued, “As long as you’re okay with that on your conscience.”

Up ’til she said that I’d merely assumed she was a bit media-washed and ignorant, but it now I started thinking of her as a bitch, as well.

And her conscience is okay with judging the morals of strangers that she knows nothing about, in circumstances which are out of her depth? Or something like that, is what I replied. I was getting a bit angry by then, so I can’t remember verbatim, but I’ll pretend I was half as eloquent. I did point out that I’m as much a photographer as anything else, that such photos could be quite newsworthy to the local rags – she made some argument that implied my making money would make the photos worse, so I asked what about photojournalists? She said they’re okay because it’s their job (i.e. they’re paid to do it) …

You can see how it was heading, the argument was getting not just circular, but mobius strip-like, and it was clear that I needed to get away from this confused harpy of the ethical shallows. I thanked her for her opinions, and continued taking my photos. She returned to her home, still frowning.

————————————————————-

Christ on a bike, I’m getting sick of this mindless distrust of photographers. The stupidest thing is that it’s fanned by the big media organisations, who just happen to rely on … you guessed it, photography/image making. It’s a frackin’ snake eating its own tail, I tell ya. Something’s gotta give.

The only thing more confounding than ignorance is the willingness to spread that ignorance around, like a farmer spreading shit.

Under a light to strangle infants by …*

Walker — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 16:03:15 +0000

… or so the media would have us believe lately. “300″ shouted the front page of the Daily Telegraph in huge type last week, a reference to the projected death toll in the Victorian bushfires, which had barely scraped past 160 at the time. They were inflating a tentative, gruesome estimate by a policeman who had guessed/warned that as many as 300 may eventually be found after sifting the ashes. A week later, the number has finally cleared 200, hopefully continuing to slow at this exponential rate. Such bad luck for the Tele’s misery mongers, it looks like their headline will be off the mark.

(* Top title quote from Mervyn Peake’s Titus Alone, part of the near painfully wonderful Gormenghast trilogy.)

———————————————————–

My favourite swear word this week is fudgelick. As in, “You can fudgelick all you like, but I’m still calling the cops.” Or, “That guy Enrico is a real fudgelick, he’s never in trouble.”

———————————————————–

As you may have guessed, the Bossman finally sent me a reminder note about this blog. Again. Terribly patient chap. So I really should do something to justify such illustrious real estate, no? To borrow from Bart Simpson: I can’t promise to try … but i will try to try. Wait and see. I even bought a diary this year, so you never know how organised I’ll be.

She looked at me like I’d pulled a dead kitten out of a bag.*

Walker — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 14:08:33 +0000

“If you’re flappy and you know it, flap your flaps!”

Isn’t that how they taught the song at school?

Flaps is my current favourite curse word, along with its derivatives: flappy, flappish, flappity etc. A particularly broad-minded female friend assures me it’s quite offensive, the opinion reinforced by the look* she gave me when i said it in conversation. Huzzah, a swear word that still works!

If one really wants to offend, the F-word is well prefaced by words like piss-stained, oozing, odourous and so on.

I’m rather hoping this becomes more widespread in use.

——————————————————-

(Ahem.)

(I’m not a misogynist, Mum, honest.)

——————————————————-

So, you may have noticed I’ve been away from the world of blogging for a while, after initially only briefly dipping my toes. Hello again, blogsphere. All three of you. I’ve decided to give it another go. The concept needs re-jigging a bit, and I have to dig up the random paper jottings that may or may not be worth expanding, but bear with me and you may be entertained yet.

Shall we dance the Orangutango?

Walker — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 15:29:12 +0000

The following is what I said to the office worker who berated me after he’d decided to walk directly across my path this evening, as I was pushing a trolley loaded with boxes through pedestrian peak traffic:

“I was watching where I was going. It’s lucky for you that I was.”

After all, it wouldn’t have been my ankles getting broken if I hadn’t seen him and reacted in time. Nope.

I mean, come on, if you’ve spent five minutes in a city you know the deal – respect the flow of traffic, car and foot, and if you choose to interrupt it either have a good reason or be prepared to take the consequences (and either way, be careful). This oaf saw a stream of people walking from a pedestrian crossing, and was, himself, heading towards another crossing which was blocked by vehicle traffic. The polite and expedient thing to do would be for him to stand and wait until everyone had exited the active crossing, yet he impatiently (and pointlessly) chose to leap into the small gap before me – which I respectfully leave between me and the next person whenever I’m pushing the trolley, with an ankle-height pointy end, through a moving crowd – causing me to slam the brakes (i.e. my legs and arms) and jerk the trolley back. For him to then shout that I should “Watch where (I’m) going,” speaks of an obliviously arrogant self confidence, and is exactly the kind of ego that makes me despair at the usefulness of notions such as “cooperative society.” Someone has to tell people like him they’re idiots, or they’ll pass it on to their children as carelessly as they inflict it upon the world around them. Luckily for today’s throwback, I was wearing company livery and thus remained civil.

Some folks invite injury, and only defy natural selection because other people take action to avoid hurting them. As I once read on a t-shirt: “Some people are only alive because it’s illegal to kill them.” I suppose I should be grateful, because I suck at fighting, but that doesn’t stop me from resenting the random stupidity that washes through my senses every day. It just makes me more annoyed that we can still be such fucking stupid animals, after so many aeons of evolution. Don’t get me started on when I catch myself out.

Ook? Ook ook, OOOK!

Ook.
————————————————————–

SWEAR score: somewhere between 1 and 2.Â Because dicks like him also drive cars, and lead nations, too.
————————————————————–
(Trolley photo linked from the website of the good folks at Castle Forklifts. If you’re looking for any kind of mechanical lifting/lugging conveyance, their range appears unbeatable.)

Roll me to the moon.

Walker — Mon, 28 May 2007 16:43:09 +0000

It appears that even the adrenaline rush of seeing one’s savings disappear isn’t enough for some Las Vegas tourists. They’re so tired out by the prospect of not driving that their legs seem to fail them. I suppose exercise should be done at the gym, if it must happen at all.

I’m sure there’s something more cutting or profound to say, other than, “Idiots,” but it’ll have to do for now. Idiots.
Species Worthy Extinction Anxiety Rating: 2

In the beginning …

Walker — Sat, 26 May 2007 06:01:55 +0000

Why “the Canary”? Because canaries were once kept in cages by miners down their mines, as a natural indicator of toxic gas levels inside the shaft. If the sensitive canary snuffed it, it was time for the humans to climb out or risk the same fate.

This is not altruism. This is my therapy. I figure it’s better to shout quietly in text, on a page which nobody need suffer without choosing to, rather than shout on the busy street, splashing all and sundry with my bile whether they like it or not. Not everyone deserves that, and it’s nicer to err on the side of caution when judging a person’s stupidity in a crowd. Besides, I’d like to keep my job.

Somedays I feel like I’m suffocating on the insidious pollution that we, the human race, have created – environmental, cultural, social, aesthetic, moral and spritual smog all combined. I’ve been told that I’m oversensitive. So, “Canary” it is. Pay attention, cocksuckers.