The Geist of the Zeit
A lot of great music was made but beyond that… Some nowadays would say, ‘well what did you expect?’, but at the time, something else, something extra, was expected. It felt like the music had a transformative power, a promise. Perhaps it’s just the slow fading of the Sixties dream (or delusion?), with punk/postpunk being the next and in some ways just as intense and far-reaching spasm of that excessive belief in the power of music, and rave in its own different way being another.
Andrew Gallix interviews Simon Reynolds, author of Totally Wired.
Lucky Cunts
What finally breaks his addiction to the ersatz numinosity is not the fall of the YBAs, but their triumph, as Sam Taylor-Wood accompanies Jay Jopling into the airless stratosphere of the rich and famous, and, even worse, Muir sees a slide show of his comrades in full posing mode for the cameras at the launch of the Sensation show. This surprisingly surprises him; in fact he cringes at the back of the room with the thought that the YBAs’ association with “feckless celebrities would ultimately impact on their street credibility”, suggesting even that it could be a struggle to see “the connection between art and celebrity.” Muir is not quite on the same planet as most people, but he is not even in the same solar system as the YBAs.
Charles Thomson reviews Gregor Muir‘s YBA memoir Lucky Kunst.
Kona
My step-father puts his weight on our least stable chair leaning it back. He wants to break his ass so we’ll have to feel sorry for him, wait on him. The dots on his shirt are retro sixties style, and he looks like a cartoon salesman. The type in the New Yorker cartoons, the loser who uses his family to build him up, even though they’re so tired of him they could puke.
By Meg Pokrass.