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Listened to a guy doing Desert Island Discs today - Ian Bostridge - who sounded like a grown up version of the clever little choirboy he used to be. He’s now an opera and classical singer. And a CBE.
The usual background - posh schools and uni - Dulwich College, Westminster School and Oxbridge. He now lives on Planet High Culture, and lives in the different reality where posh boys who’ve had posh educations go to live.
He tells stories of how he and his schoolboy chums used to spend their time debating whether Wagner was any good. As do we all. Though he quite liked Punk’s ‘vigour and energy’.
He played a Dylan track and said some bullshit about Bob being ‘the inheritor of the Schubert tradition’. Oh yeah. Nothing at all to do with the Blues tradition, the folk tradition, African traditions, etc.
“Bob Dylan’s got a dreadful voice, but it expresses emotion.” So that’s OK.
He’s such a fucking cultural absolutist and snob he could never understand that Dylan actually has a great voice, which is HIS voice, and which strikes deep emotional and spiritual chords with millions of people in ways that his own fucking ‘tenor’ warblings never could. He really could never see that people like me are entitled to feel absolute revulsion for the sentimental, supercilious, melodramatic elitist bollocks that constitutes ‘classical’ singing.
I had to laugh out loud when he went on about falling in love in his schooldays with some German guy’s voice even though he couldn’t understand a word of what he was singing. This story was supposed to make him sound ‘deep’ and ‘sensitive’ and ‘serious’, but actually makes him sound like a pretentious twat.
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On the Today programme today there was an item on tonight being ‘Neil Young night’ on BBC4. I wonder what Ian Bostridge and his pals might make of it. “Oh yah - lots of vigour and energy.”
“The whole evening of programmes about the singer is centred round a documentary about his life called Don't Be Denied.”
Director of the documentary Ben Whalley and author Barney Hoskyns today discussed the rare interviews and film not previously broadcast. Both big NY fans, obviously.
They seemed to agree that Young’s up there with Dylan as a songwriter, singer, musician and performer. They said he’s ‘less cerebral, more instinctual’ than Bob. Interesting that - opposite ends of the ‘IQ’ spectrum of intelligence.
They spoke about Neil matching the intensity and danger of the Rolling Stones with the lyricism of Dylan. He’s able to do ‘loud and intense’ and also ‘soft, quiet and tender’ - absolutely brilliantly.
He does what he pleases and doesn’t follow trends and fashions. He’s grounded in reality. He’s got unswerving honesty. And as he himself says, he ‘didn’t get dragged down by success’.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_7701000/7701334.stm
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Here’s the web address of the Today programme interview with the teenage gang boys that was broadcast yesterday.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_7697000/7697198.stm
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Meanwhile, last night on This Week, cuddly posh girl Diane Julie Abbott MP (Harrow County Grammar and Cambridge) was banging on about Russell Brand, calling him stupid and disgusting, and saying he has no talent. Which just shows how ignorant, uninformed and dull she is. Fair enough to say that things he said in his infamous broadcast were stupid and disgusting, but Brand is the very opposite of stupid, having a brain and a wit that’s as sharp as a razor.
As for no talent, he’s unbelievably bursting with talent, not least for making people laugh and making them think. He’s probably the most cerebral comedian and commentator at work today, truly a man in the mould of the great Bill Hicks.
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Lord knows we need sharp and ascerbic commentators in these dark times, preferably ones that make us laugh. There’s such a mountain of nonsense and bullshit out there, and it gets bigger every day.
Yesterday I was in a shopping mall and noticed a booth which I first took to be an ordinary passport photo booth. On closer inspection it turned out to be a device called ‘Dance Heads Recording’, inviting people to ‘Be A Star’ - ‘No Talent Required’. Quite so.
This thing appeals to talentless wannabees who are gagging to be on TV and DVD, ‘performing’ in some way - singing and dancing. The machine takes your photo/video and then superimposes your singing head on a stupid gyrating cartoon figure as you sing along to your chosen song. I imagine the ‘I Will Survive’ option is very popular.
You end up with a DVD to take away and impress your family and friends. Harmless fun? Maybe - if it satisfies someone’s longing to see their silly face singing (miming) on a TV screen. Or maybe it also records their actual voice, singing in the booth? That might be funny.
Meanwhile ‘Mr China’ was displaying in his shop window a sign offering a free 5 minute massage, which had been altered from its original wording of a free 5 minute message. Now that I could have gone for - what kind of mystical oriental message might that have been? Something like an oral fortune cookie, at much greater length.
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Last night’s Daily Show featured an interview with Obama himself, and very impressive he was too. Jon Stewart teased him about ‘The Bradley Effect’ - whether his mother’s white genes would allow him to actually vote for himself. He dealt with it very well.
He also handled the charge of being a socialist very well, saying that his willingness to share his toys when he was in his Nursery class (‘subversive activity’) clearly marked him out.
Here’s some of the interview, including bits that More Four missed out:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/21/barack-obama-on-the-daily_n_97889.html
Here’s a brilliant must-watch spoof video the Daily Show made of Barak’s ‘informercial’:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/08/29/the-daily-shows-obama-bio_n_122350.html
Catch up with the Daily Show at Comedy Central, including another version of the Obama interview:
http://www.comedycentral.com/
Check out the “Barack's Millions” video. The Muppet Show bit is brilliant.
Also have a look at this bit about Sarah Palin ‘Going Rogue’:
http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=189759&title=goin-rogue
It includes a wonderful Bob The Builder interview.
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G2 had an interesting feature yesterday on The West Wing predicting this year’s presidential contest:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/oct/30/westwing-television-usa-elections-obama
There’s an hilarious photo in the Guardian of George Osborne and friends gathered for the Bullingdon Club shooting match, with a very funny article giving a run-down on who’s who and who’s wearing what:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2008/oct/30/fashion-bullingdon-george-osborne-oxford
Check out this article on whether Russell Brand has turned to Hare Krishna:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/oct/30/russell-brand-celebrity
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