Avui faig anys (molts), i he decidit regalar-me l'abonament al Primavera Sound, estava esperant a dilluns per fer compres "puntuals", pero en saber que el Neil Young comfirmava el seu concert he entrat al TTT (ara TM) esperitat...
Una gran alegria, no l'havia vist desde el concert del Palau dels Esports (segur que fà més de 20 anys)...
dissabte, 28 de febrer del 2009
dimecres, 25 de febrer del 2009
Janis (del llibre de butxaca del Universitat de Texas)
JOPLIN, JANIS LYN(1943–1970). Janis Lyn Joplin, blues and rock singer, daughter of Seth Ward and Dorothy (East) Joplin, was born on January 19, 1943, in Port Arthur, Texas. She grew up in a respectable middle-class home; her father was an engineer and her mother a Sunday school teacher. The future queen of nonconformity is remembered as a bright, pretty, and artistic little girl. Signs of rebellion, however, against the religious, sexual, and racial conservatism of her environment were evident in junior high school, and by the time Janis graduated from Jefferson High School in Port Arthur in 1960, her vocabulary of four letter words, her outrageous clothes, and her reputation for sexual promiscuity and drunkenness (signs of alcoholism were already apparent) caused her classmates to call her a slut. Bereft of friends, without dates for school dances, ashamed of her acned face and overweight figure, Janis responded with contempt and insults to cover the rejection that scarred her for the rest of her life.
In her junior year she found acceptance in a small group of Jefferson High beatniks who read Jack Kerouac and roamed the nightspots from Port Arthur to New Orleans, thus mining one of the motherlodes of American ethnic music. There were Anglo, African American, Cajun, Mexican, and Caribbean sounds. There were the lyrics and rhythms of country, gospel, jazz, soul, and the blues. Janis did not read music, but at the roadhouses or at home listening to records of Odetta, Bessie Smith, or Willie Mae Thornton, she had an uncanny ability to imitate the sounds she heard. Out of imitation there slowly developed the timing, phrasing, inflections, and talent at evoking changing moods that were the Joplin trademarks.
She found Lamar State College of Technology at Beaumont no improvement over Port Arthur; she was a rebel and a "nigger lover" in both places. She fled to the University of Texas in Austin in the summer of 1962 to study art. Indifferent to classwork, she found soulmates at the Ghetto, a counterculture enclave, and got gigs around Austin, most importantly at Threadgill's, a converted filling station and late night hangout for lovers of music and nonstop partying. The proprietor, country singer Kenneth Threadgill, offered Janis encouragement and lifelong friendship.
Janis craved such acceptance, but her nonconforming behavior often provoked rejection, as when university fraternity pranksters nominated her as their candidate in the annual Ugliest Man on Campus contest. Characteristically, she laughed to cover the hurt, and dreamed of San Francisco, where Beats and Hippies were not outsiders. She spent 1963 to 1965 in the Bay area and won attention from local audiences, until drugs became more important than singing and reduced her to an emaciated eighty-eight pounds. Her friends passed the hat and gave her a bus ticket home.
Parental care restored her health, and fear of relapse produced a period of sobriety. Business suits and bouffant hairdos announced conversion to the Port Arthur ethos. But Janis's mind was torn: Port Arthur was safe but dull. San Francisco offered both excitement and potential self destruction. She made her decision after receiving an offer to audition for a new rock band, Big Brother and the Holding Company, and headed west in May 1966, toward four years of meteoric fame—and death at age twenty-seven.
"Imagine a white girl singing the blues like that!" they said of Big Brother's lead singer. And Joplin's belting of rock gathered huge swaying, clapping, shouting, and dancing audiences. For Janis a good audience was an audience in motion, and her body joined her voice in pleading for audience participation. She stopped the show at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967 with "Ball and Chain." That triumph and the album Cheap Thrills (1968) elevated her to national stardom. A new manager, Albert Grossman, whose stable of stars included Peter, Paul and Mary and Bob Dylan, urged Janis to dump Big Brother for more versatile and disciplined support. The Kosmic Blues band was never satisfactory; the Full Tilt Boogie band was.
Joplin's career now surged forward full tilt, driven by Southern Comfort booze, heroin, bisexual liaisons, compulsive work, and the hope that fame would bring inner peace. Success now meant concerts in Madison Square Garden, Paris, London, Woodstock, and Harvard Stadium; adulation in the New York Times; a guest appearance on the Ed Sullivan show; and a six-figure salary.
Janis was ready in August 1970 to confront the Jefferson High classmates who had called her a slut. Whether her primary purpose in attending the tenth-anniversary class reunion was revenge, a desire to be worshiped as a hero, or just a quest for acceptance is unclear. What is certain is that she left Port Arthur feeling further alienated from her classmates, her parents, and her hometown. When she died in Los Angeles two months later, on October 4, 1970, of an accidental overdose of heroin and alcohol, her newly drawn will required that her ashes be strewn over California soil.
The judgment of others has been far kinder to Janis Joplin than she was to herself. She has been called "the best white blues singer in American musical history" and "the greatest female singer in the history of rock 'n' roll." Those who missed her live performances must judge her from a relatively small number of albums, audiotapes, and videotapes. Pearl, an album recorded just before her death and featuring "Me and Bobby McGee," shows that Janis was growing musically almost to the moment of her death. The film The Rose (1979), starring Bette Midler, is not faithful in detail to Janis's life, but it captures her mesmerizing power on stage, in contrast to her utter powerlessness offstage to halt her relentless descent to self destruction. Janis's sad life cannot be separated from her greatness. Her tortured soul gave her blues the authenticity of direct experience. After her death she was finally accepted in the hometown she both loved and ridiculed. In 1988 some 5,000 people from Port Arthur, tears in their eyes, sang "Me and Bobby McGee" as a bust of Janis Joplin was unveiled. It now sits in a Port Arthur library. In the 2000s Port Arthur's Museum of the Gulf Coast featured Joplin among its exhibits and she was an inductee in the Gulf Coast Music Hall of Fame. Port Arthur holds a birthday bash every January in celebration of the singer.
In the decades after her death, various Joplin anthologies and live recordings were released as well as numerous biographies. In 1992 her sister, Laura Joplin, published Love, Janis, a collection of letters Janis wrote to her family beginning in 1963. A play with the same title and based on the book opened in Denver in 1995 and subsequently had a long run at the Zachary Scott Theater in Austin in summer 1997. The performance opened off Broadway in April 2001 and ran to January 5, 2003. Janis Joplin was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on January 12, 1995. In 2005 she was honored with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Ellis Amburn, Pearl: The Obsessions and Passions of Janis Joplin: A Biography (New York: Warner, 1992). Myra Friedman, Buried Alive: The Biography of Janis Joplin (New York: Harmony, 1992). Laura Joplin, Love, Janis (New York: Villard, 1992). Larry Willoughby, Texas Rhythm and Texas Rhyme: A Pictorial History of Texas Music (Austin: Texas Monthly Press, 1984).
Richard B. Hughes
dissabte, 21 de febrer del 2009
la situació actual segons les inrockuptibles (clicar els enllaços d'abaix)
Enquête sur l'industrie de la musique
Créé le
Ajouter un commentaire Agrandir la taille du texte Réduire la taille du texte Imprimer Envoyer à un ami 20 janvier 2009
- par - Enquête sur l'industrie de la musique (4/4) : à quand la gratuité légale ?
le 20 janvier 2009 - Enquête sur l'industrie de la musique (3/4) : des nouveaux acteurs tout terrain
le 20 janvier 2009 - Enquête sur l'industrie de la musique (2/4): le réveil des majors
le 17 janvier 2009 - Enquête sur l'industrie de la musique (1/4): le CD, pas encore mort, déjà collector
le 16 janvier 2009
A l'occasion de l'ouverture du 43e Midem, Rue89 et Les Inrockuptibles s'associent pour une grande enquête en quatre volets sur l’industrie musicale française. Une semaine après la promesse d’iTunes de supprimer ses DRM, le point sur la mort annoncée du CD, le combat des majors pour survivre, les nouveaux acteurs et la musique bientôt gratuite.
Volet 1: le CD, pas encore mort, déjà collector
Volet 3: des nouveaux acteurs tout terrain
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divendres, 20 de febrer del 2009
Pretenders a Milwaukee (del R&R Guru)
Pretenders Rock Milwaukee!
I had the great fortune of seeing the Pretenders the last two nights at the Northern Lights Theater on their visit to Milwaukee.
Northern Lights is a gem of a venue and there is not a bad seat in the house. The floor is all tables and booths, and there are five rows of seating in the balcony. I went from sitting dead center in the very last row of the balcony on Tuesday night to front row last night. There’s nothing like being in the front row for a band you love, and I love the Pretenders!
Thirty years after bursting onto the scene, Chrissy Hynde is still a rock goddess! The combination of her phenomenally seductive voice, a sexy, sassy and vibrant stage presence along with her amazing songwriting chops make Chrissy a total rock & roll heartthrob.
The shows were a seamless blend of the old and the new for this rock and roll hall of famer. At her best, Chrissy is frenetic intensity personified, and on this tour she is clearly at her best. Backed by an outstanding band, including original Pretender and drummer extraordinaire, Martin Chambers, Chrissy tore it up both nights.
It was electric from the git-go, as they opened with “Boots of Chinese Plastic” and “Don’t Cut Your Hair” from the new album, followed by “Talk of the Town” and “Message of Love.”
Both shows leaned heavily on last year’s Break Up the Concrete, which I think is the best album that came out in 2008. “Love’s a Mystery,” “Rosalee” and the title track may be new, but they are vintage Pretenders.
The old favorites were in abundance as well, and when Chrissy shed her guitar and stepped out for a sultry “Brass in Pocket” just a few feet from me, I thought I was gonna wet myself.
I was absolutely in my glory during smokin’ versions of “Kid,” “Don’t Get Me Wrong,” “Back on the Chain Gang,” “Precious” and last night’s encore of the Kinks’ “Stop Your Sobbing.”
After a five year hiatus from touring, Chrissy sounded as fresh and fabulous as the first time I saw her nearly thirty years ago.
I expect I’ll still be basking in the afterglow for a few more days…
dijous, 19 de febrer del 2009
dimecres, 18 de febrer del 2009
maternitats, grammies, i un video
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Is there anyone on earth cooler than MIA? David Bowie is pretty cool. So is Sully and that old dog that won everything at the Westminster dog show. But those people/creatures are merely as cool, certainly not cooler than Maya Arulpragasam. This woman is intense. Watching her perform on her due date at the Grammys was a combination of awe-inspiring and maternal-instinct-triggering. It seemed certain that all those rad moves she was displaying would, like, jostle the baby loose. Guess what? It did.dimarts, 17 de febrer del 2009
I després del Berlin live 2008, ara el Astral Weeks live 2009
Astral Weeks: Live at the Hollywood Bowl
2009
When Van Morrison sings, "I believe I've transcended," at the end of "Astral Weeks" — the first song in this full 2008 recital of his historic album of the same name — it is in a warm, grateful growl remarkably like that of the younger man who made the 1968 studio LP. Astral Weeks was Morrison's first step toward transcendence as a singer-songwriter, a radical turn away from the AM-radio success of his 1967 hit "Brown Eyed Girl." The album is still like nothing else in rock, a quiet union of breathtaking opposites: Morrison's soul-trance reflections on his early life in Belfast and the tension of the chamber-jazz arrangements.
The ruminative force of Morrison's singing on Weeks was not that far from his early hard-blues attack in the band Them. In the live Astral Weeks, performed with a big band that reproduces the gentle touch of the '68 session group, Morrison brings out those blues more emphatically — his vocal-and-harp break in "Sweet Thing" is like a hot wind of Little Walter. Morrison has also re-sequenced the album for concert effect, ending with the extended hypnosis of "Madame George." The 1968 LP closes with the weightless "Slim Slow Slider" — just acoustic bass and splashes of tone around Morrison's heated whisper. Here the song slips into a John Lee Hooker-like groove, and while I prefer the original, the change is an uplifting surprise. Transcendence is always a work in progress; the eight songs on Astral Weeks are still up to the task.
DAVID FRICKE
(Posted: Feb 4, 2009)
dilluns, 16 de febrer del 2009
Andrew Bird ...recomanacions d'un amic digital (prou be, en primera audició)
dilluns, 16 / febrer / 2009
Amor a primera vista
Per sort encara es pot descobrir de tant en tant un músic inclassificable, original i que, des del primer moment, pots augurar que t’acompanyarà durant molt de temps. Es diu Andrew Bird i no és cap debutant (en aquest cas sóc jo qui arriba tard, perquè ja va pel seu cinquè disc). Canta amb una veu que recorda la de Harry Nilsson, és virtuós del violí i xiula com una cadernera o sigui que té tots els números per convertir-se en una excentricitat extramusical (com una María Jesús con su acordeón, però ianqui). A més, és guapot i vesteix amb elegància molt decontractée.
Però tot això no significaria res si no compongués cançons tan addictives. Ha estat qüestió d’escoltar el seu darrer disc “Noble Beast” una vegada, perquè tant Josep com jo l’adoréssim a l’instant. No sé quin és el seu secret, pop de cambra? bossa-nova indie? folk de laboratori? És una música lluminosa, expansiva, feliç, i fins i tot una mica “africana”. El seu taló d’Aquil·les són les lletres, terriblement rebuscades, però qui es preocupa de les lletres cantades en anglès?
La versió estàndard
El noi és apanyat i, amb l’ajuda de loops i pedals, pot esdevenir un home orquestra fent un pizzicato aquí, xiulant per allà, tocant el metal·lòfon i gratant la seva primera guitarra elèctrica.
El noi és apanyat i, amb l’ajuda de loops i pedals, pot esdevenir un home orquestra fent un pizzicato aquí, xiulant per allà, tocant el metal·lòfon i gratant la seva primera guitarra elèctrica.
El seu darrer disc (‘Noble Beast’) es pot adquirir també en edició de luxe que conté un segon CD de temes instrumentals ('Useless Creatures'), una mica més esotèrics però també suculents, on intervé Glenn Kotche, el bateria de Wilco.
La versió doble
Us deixo amb un clip que pertany al seu penúltim disc, estrany i fascinant com tot ell.
diumenge, 15 de febrer del 2009
m ward (fà quatre dies que en parlava en miquel b, i ara es el NY Times)
A Four-Track Guy in a Digital World
Portland, Ore.
Skip to next paragraph 
Leah Nash for The New York Times
The singer, songwriter and guitarist M. Ward at a coffee shop in Portland, Ore. His sixth studio album, “Hold Time,” is being released on Tuesday.
Multimedia
Chris Pizzello/Associated Press
M. Ward in performance with Jim James of My Morning Jacket.
THERE is a century-old house in the southeast section of this city, with an attic full of vintage instruments and audio equipment and a drum kit in the dining room, and this is where the indie musician M. Ward likes to record. Reel-to-reel tapes are stacked on the linoleum floor upstairs; a broken film projector with an old coil speaker serves as an amplifier; bells and shakers crowd a shelf in a studio lit mostly by Christmas lights; the Wurlitzer gets a lot of use.
Mr. Ward — the initial stands for Matt — is a connoisseur of the old-fashioned, like the Japanese-made circa-1970 Epiphone guitar that Mike Coykendall, the owner of the house and one of Mr. Ward’s longtime producers, handed him to strum.
“Want to see Matt’s favorite microphone?” Mr. Coykendall, a genial man with long silver hair and excitable eyebrows, said, producing something out of date. “Be very careful with it, it probably cost $2.”
Mr. Ward, 35, a singer-songwriter and guitarist, doesn’t hide his nostalgia, or his taste for the homemade. “I don’t like expensive sounds,” he said. “I’m still using the same four-track I bought when I was 15 to write songs.” That retro-crafting is evident in his sixth studio album, “Hold Time,” which will be released by Merge Records on Tuesday. About half the songs were produced in this house. Like his previous work, it is indie folk with some pop glimmer and more country pluck, and a roster of starry collaborators, like Lucinda Williams and his partner in the duo She & Him, the actress Zooey Deschanel, who sings backup on the peppy, toe-tapping single “Never Had Nobody Like You.”
“The blogosphere will eat this track up,” the editor Amrit Singh wrote on Stereogum.com, the influential music blog, which also named “Hold Time” one of the most anticipated albums of the year. It has been streamed more than 100,000 times in the last month on NPR.
It was also in this house that Mr. Ward recorded most of She & Him’s debut, “Volume One.” Released last year by Merge, it was his biggest hit, selling more than 120,000 copies and winning his solo act new fans. He will play the Apollo Theater in Harlem on Thursday and, for the first time under his own name, the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in Indio, Calif., in April.
“She & Him definitely broadened the number of people who would hear Matt’s new record,” said Mac McCaughan, a founder of Merge. But even before that project, “this would have been our biggest release in the first half of this year,” he added. “His last record sold more than 60,000 copies. For us that’s a huge record.”
For Mr. Ward that success has been a slow and steady build. In the decade since he moved to Portland to record his first album, he has supported himself through music — a reflection of the city’s livability as well as his career as a sideman. Something of a musician’s musician, Mr. Ward has performed as a slide guitarist with members of Calexico in Europe, as an orchestral player for Bright Eyes in concert and on TV, and at Madison Square Garden with Norah Jones. His other collaborations on the road and in the studio read like a Who’s Who of the indie-love firmament: Jenny Lewis, Cat Power, Neko Case, the White Stripes. In addition to She & Him’s “Volume Two,” among his next projects is Monsters of Folk, an album with Conor Oberst of Bright Eyes and Jim James of My Morning Jacket.
“I think our voices and spirits blend well together. When we played together, it just felt natural,” Mr. James wrote in an e-mail message. “His music is eternal and people will be listening to it as long as they have ears.”
Through it all Mr. Ward has maintained his own distinctive style, built equally on his croaky, plaintive voice, his fingerpicking musicality and his throwback aesthetic sense. He doesn’t listen to much contemporary music or read newer books. He watches movies, but as for TV, he said, “I’ve never taken the plunge, except for ‘Twin Peaks.’ ”
It’s not that he’s a Luddite — he buys songs on iTunes and does late-night YouTubing like everyone else — or a misanthrope who believes that art was better in someone else’s day. “I know there’s great stuff out there,” he said. “But I don’t want to be influenced by stuff that’s going on around me. I’m more interested in consuming stuff that’s stood the test of time and the hard work of filtering has already happened.”
Is he just a little bit lazy? “I think lazy isn’t too far off,” he said. Even so, Mr. Ward is not out of step; contemporary indie music has caught up to his brand of revivalism. And he’s more diverse than he lets on: he likes the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Michael Jackson’s “Off the Wall” and grew up, near Los Angeles, on KROQ, then home to British new wave and acts like Sonic Youth and Firehose from the punk label SST.
“Listening to something that’s brand-new, I get a little bit excited about it,” he said, mentioning Fleet Foxes, a young harmonizing Seattle band, as a recent discovery, though he doesn’t yet own their album. “But I get more excited about stuff that’s obviously weathered storms.”
Creatively and professionally Mr. Ward is industrious. At 15 he picked up his older brother’s guitar and taught himself to play from an anthology of Beatles songs. (George is his favorite.) Now he has a workaday routine that includes composing and playing guitar, ideally every morning. “That’s the best time to write, because my brain is fresh,” he said. “It’s one step closer to the dreaming mind, which I think is what you shoot for, that kind of immediacy.” His lyrics are often centered on the past or the passage of time, wistfully reminiscing and longingly romantic (he is married to a writing professor). And of course he is unabashedly fond of covers and references. On “Hold Time” he has a duet with Ms. Williams on “Oh, Lonesome Me,” a 1950s country song by Don Gibson.
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divendres, 13 de febrer del 2009
Més Ohio Music (Heartless Bastards)
Aquests son de Dayton (no de Akron), tot i així recorden uns Pretenders "updated". Tot i la similitud obvien posar-los en la seva llarga llista d'influències declarades a la seva pàgina de MySpace: No li trobeu una retirada molt clara a la Crissie Hinde?
InfluencesT Rex, Bob Dylan, Sonic Youth, Otis Redding, Shel Silverstein, Rolling Stones, Aretha Franklin, Brian Eno, Johnny Thunders, Billie Holiday, GBV, Elliot Smith, Ray Charles, Pixies, Breeders, David Bowie, Iggy and the Stooges, Flaming Lips, Leadbelly, Janes Addiction, Wire, MC5, Blondie, Suicide, The Walkmen, The Ronettes, My Bloody Valentine, Beck, New York Dolls, The Yardbirds, the Kinks, Brainiac, Gang of Four, Neil Young, Led Zeppelin, Patti Smith, Velvet Underground, John Spencer Blues Explosion, The Who, Wilson Picket, Fugazi, De La Soul, At the Drive In
dijous, 12 de febrer del 2009
Woodstock a Berlin? de El Público
¿Vuelve Woodstock?
El promotor del famoso concierto hippie del 69, Michael Lang, quiere revivir el festival para conmemorar su 40 aniversario
El público de Woodstock en 1969.
Para celebrar el cuarenta aniversario de Woodstock, un hito del movimiento hippie de finales de los 60, su precursor Michael Lang quiere organizar este año un concierto "revival" en el antiguo aeropuerto berlinés de Tempelhof, según anuncia la empresa responsable del evento en su página web .
Bajo el lema Por un Mundo Verde, Lang, productor musical estadounidense, tiene la intención de fomentar la conciencia ecológica, al tiempo que pretende movilizar a todas las estrellas de Woodstock que aún viven, como Santana, Joe Cocker, The Who, Neil Young & Crazy Horse, The Grateful Dead y Joan Baez.
La empresa responsable de organizar y comercializar el evento en Alemania, Media Consulta Sport & Entertainment (MC), baraja ya como fechas definitivas los próximos 22 y 23 de agosto, mientras que Lang espera que asistan al macroconcierto entre 200.000 y 300.000 personas. Lo que no está claro es si, tal y como aseguran numerosos blogs estadounidenses sobre música, la entrada al Woodstock de Berlín será gratis.
En busca de localización
El festival quiere fomentar la conciencia ecológica
Según su página web, la compañía organizará de forma paralela otro festival en Nueva York el 15 y 16 de agosto, aunque el lugar donde se celebrará no está aún decidido. Por el momento, el proyecto de Berlín está en trámites, ya que al terreno de Tempelhof no dejan de salirle novias desde que dejó de usarse como aeropuerto, el noviembre pasado.
La empresa "Berliner Inmobilienmanagement" (Bim) -que se ocupa del alquiler del terreno- asegura que cada día reciben entre 30 y 40 propuestas de uso para el antiguo aeropuerto. En lo que respecta a la resurrección en Berlín del festival de rock más importante del mundo, Bim no quiso pronunciarse.
Habrá que esperar para saber si se convertirá en patrimonio berlinés la fiesta por antonomasia del Flowerpower, que vio la luz por primera vez el 15 de agosto de 1969 en una granja de Bethel, Nueva York, donde se prolongó durante dos días más.
dimecres, 11 de febrer del 2009
rap-geopolitic (NYT)
To Some Sri Lankan Ears, Dissonant Undertones in M.I.A.’s Music
Mark J. Terrill/Associated Press
M.I.A. performed at the 51st Annual Grammy Awards on Sunday in Los Angeles.
COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — To many Americans, Maya Arulpragasam, known as M.I.A., is the very pregnant rapper who gyrated across the stage at Sunday’s Grammy Awards.
Yet in Sri Lanka, where she spent her childhood years, M.I.A. remains virtually unknown. And some who do know her work say she is an apologist for the separatist Tamil Tiger rebels fighting in the country’s long-running civil war.
M.I.A. — who has been nominated for an Oscar for the song she co-wrote for the hit film “Slumdog Millionaire” — has branded herself through music videos and interviews as the voice of the country’s Tamil minority. In the video for her song “Bird Flu,” for instance, children dance in front of what looks like the rebels’ logo: a roaring tiger.
“Being the only Tamil in the Western media, I have a really great opportunity to sort of bring forward what’s going on in Sri Lanka,” she said in an interview on the PBS program “Tavis Smiley” last month. “There’s a genocide going on.”
But her political views rankle some people at a time when most Sri Lankans are clutching to the hope that the rebels, branded by the United States and European nations as a terrorist group, are on the verge of military defeat by government troops.
“Frankly, she’s very lucky to get away with supporting, even indirectly, perhaps the most ruthless terrorist outfit in the world,” said Suresh Jayawickrama, a songwriter based in Colombo.
Mr. Jayawickrama is from the country’s majority Sinhalese ethnic group, and his reaction is similar to that of many Sri Lankans who know M.I.A.’s music. But he also said that M.I.A. deserved credit for her artistry and the fame she had achieved. “She really should have a little more recognition in this country,” he said.
Despite decades of conflict, music has remained largely free of political messages or overtones in Sri Lanka, perhaps because audiences are seeking entertainment and escape from the daily reminders of civil war.
“Compared to other countries, people don’t write many songs here about what is going on politically,” said Dillain Joseph, a singer who is of mixed Sinhalese and Tamil parentage.
Meanwhile, M.I.A.’s claims that the government is carrying out a genocide against Tamils place her on the outer fringe of opinion about the conflict.
Although the government has brutalized and killed Tamil civilians over the past 25 years, human rights organizations spread the blame around, estimating that 70,000 people on both sides have been killed in the fighting.
“This is a conflict in which both sides have terrible human rights records,” said Yolanda Foster, a specialist on Sri Lanka with Amnesty International in London. “The Tamil Tigers have a long history of child recruitment, hostage taking, forcing civilians to the front lines. It’s complicated to assign blame.”
M.I.A. was born in Britain but moved to Sri Lanka when she was 6 months old so that her father, an engineer and a leader in the Tamil separatist movement, could help fight for an independent Tamil homeland. Her childhood took her across northern Sri Lanka, wracked by insurgency, to India and back to Britain, where her mother and siblings settled into a public housing project outside London. Her father remained in Sri Lanka. She now calls New York home.
Sri Lankans who have seen her videos say they interpret some parts as showing support for the Tigers, or at the very least glorifying their cause. But for those not familiar with the conflict, they might come across as generic third-world scenes.
“I kind of want to leave it ambiguous for my fans,” she said in the PBS interview, referring to the lyrics of her song “Paper Planes,” which was nominated for record of the year at the Grammys but did not win.
“Paper Planes,” which compares international drug dealing with selling records, drew a reaction from DeLon, a Sinhalese rapper based in Los Angeles, who made a video remix in which he interspersed images of people being blown up by Tamil Tiger bombs and subtitles about M.I.A. being a terrorist.
M.I.A. responded that she did not support terrorism.
Despite those tensions, which played out largely on the Internet and abroad, musicians in Sri Lanka say the music scene has remained ethnically diverse, with members of the country’s numerous ethnic groups and religions often forming bands together.
“There’s a lot of mixing and matching going on,” said Rienzie Pereira, a guitar player. “It’s basically like sports. No matter what ethnic group you are from, people can play cricket together.”dilluns, 9 de febrer del 2009
El mes que vé a Canada, el primer concert per sords...
First-ever concert for the deaf to be staged in Toronto
The Emoti-Chair, an audio-tactile device developed by Ryerson University, promises to ensure good vibrations for the hearing impaired by translating live music into mechanical responses
- guardian.co.uk, Thursday 5 February 2009 10.04 GMT
- Article history
On 5 March, a rock concert will take place at a small club in Toronto, Canada. And it will be solely for the enjoyment of deaf people.
Ryerson University's Centre of Learning Technology and the Science of Music, Auditory Research and Technology Lab have announced what they call the first-ever concert for the hearing impaired. Performances by Fox Jaws, Hollywood Swank, the Dufraines and others will showcase a set of Emoti-Chairs, devices that translate music into a series of tactile sensations. Yes, the Emoti-Chairs vibrate. And apparently, they really rock.
Emoti-Chairs are the work of Ryerson University's Alternative Sensory Information Displays (ASID) project. A computer inside each chair analyses sound frequencies using a similar mapping to the human cochlea. These frequencies are then translated into mechanical responses – including motion, vibration, and blasts of air on the face.
Besides the Emoti-Chairs, the concert will also use open captioning, interpreters and music visualisation to complement the live music experience.
Of course, the March concert will not just be a test-bed for ASID's research – it will also help determine whether you can judge music without hearing it. Will concert-goers be able to tell Hollywood Swank from the Beatles, the Dufraines from the White Stripes? Emoti-Chairs could save music critics an awful lot of headaches.
encara la crisi
Backstage during the pretelecast awards ceremony, B. B. King, 83, who won his 15th Grammy, for best traditional blues album for “One Kind Favor” (Geffen), alluded to the recession.
“I believe the blues, the way things are today, is more important now than it ever was,” Mr. King said. “Unless you got a lot of money. I don’t.”dissabte, 7 de febrer del 2009
si algú els troba cars a Tick Tack , els pot pagar una mica mes cars a World ticket shop, els de TTT m'han donat seient 1, fila 1 per 76 eurots
Ry Cooder Barcelona Tickets
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Ry Cooder Forum Auditori Gran, Barcelona Spain
Are you a music devotee and a great fan of Ry Cooder in particular? The Forum Auditori Gran in Barcelona, Spain, is hosting a spectacular music event: Ry Cooder will be playing a live concert on 30-06-2009! If you are dead eager to watch Ry Cooder in Spain, it is now the time and the place to order your Ry Cooder Forum Auditori Gran tickets for a dazzling Ry Cooder Spain concert in the Forum Auditori Gran in Barcelona for 30-06-2009 right here at Worldticketshop.com - Your Ticket To Fun!
| Description | Quantity |
|---|---|
Ry Cooder 30-06-2009 Seated Tickets Category 2Start: 21.00 Price: € 215,00 (£ 193,50) Venue: Forum Auditori Gran, Barcelona, Spain | |
Ry Cooder 30-06-2009 Seated Tickets Category 1Start: 21.00 Price: € 255,00 (£ 229,50) Venue: Forum Auditori Gran, Barcelona, Spain |
Una nota de buen gusto, imagino que els oferirà els bombons Ferrero Rocher...
la cover band australiana, a londra da febbraio ad aprile, ha ricevuto 20.000 sterline
Putin fan degli Abba: per lui un concerto
privato dei «Bjorn again», imitatori doc
Spettacolo per il premier russo in una località nascosta a cui ha assistito in smoking insieme a una donna in lungo
MOSCA (RUSSIA) - Chi l'avrebbe detto. Il duro e imperscrutabile ex agente del Kgb e ora primo ministro russo, dopo essere stato a lungo presidente, innamorato di «Gimme Gimme Gimme» e «Dancing Queen». Ora dunque sappiamo che tipo di musica piace a Vladimir Putin: è un'appassionato degli Abba. Tanto da farsi organizzare un concerto privato, anche se il suo portavoce ha negato la sua partecipazione, con quelli che sono conosciuti come gli imitatori doc del gruppo svedese ormai sciolto, vale a dire i «Bjorn again», formazione australiana che dal 1988 canta sul palco gli intramontabili successi di Ulvaeus e compagni. I «Bjorn Again» (dal sito ufficiale)
IL CONCERTO - La storia è stata rivelata dal Times, che riporta le confidenze dei membri dei «Bjorn Again» ha assistito a un concerto privato in Russia in «compagnia di una donna» in «vestito lungo, color crema». «Erano seduti su un divano velato da una tendina di pizzo» scrive il corrispondente da Mosca del quotidiano britannico, aggiungendo che «il mondo conosce Putin quale esperto di judo ed ex spia del Kgb. Ma ora è possibile aggiungere alla sua immagine la versione "Super Trouper" dopo che l’ha rivelata in un concerto segreto». La cover band «Bjorn Again» è volata a Mosca, da Londra, dove si esibirà da febbraio ad aprile, ed è poi è stata portata con un autobus a 200 miglia a nord della capitale in una remota località nei pressi del lago Valdai, dove è stata alloggiata in una caserma. Poi il concerto in un piccolo teatro la notte seguente, dove hanno suonato per un pubblico molto ristretto. Oltre a Putin infatti, solo cinque o sei altri ospiti erano presenti allo spettacolo che si è tenuto il 22 gennaio. Il gruppo ha cantato 15 hit degli Abba tra cui «Waterloo», «Gimme Gimme Gimme» e «Dancing Queen». Secondo il Times il Cremlino ha pagato 20.000 sterline (circa 23mila euro) per il concerto privato. E fa notare che «mentre la Russia sta sperimentando un veloce naufragio della valuta nazionale e la sua reputazione è stata intaccata nella disputa del gas con l’Ucraina i funzionari governativi hanno trovato il tempo di organizzare la manifestazione per Mr. Putin». L’evento inoltre, sempre secondo il quotidiano britannico è «in contrasto con l’immagine ascetica che Putin ha presentato al pubblico russo sui media, che lo ritraggono come un uomo di gusti modesti», continua il Times, che descrive il premier in smoking al concerto, mentre «La donna indossava un vestito lungo color crema davvero bello». Gli unici che non si sono tanto divertiti sono stati gli stessi "Bjorn again": «La sicurezza era così stretta - spiega il Times - che a uno della band è stato consigliato di non andare a fare una passeggiata perché fuori c’erano troppi cecchini attorno al teatro».
06 febbraio 2009
dimecres, 4 de febrer del 2009
una llista més (de Blender)
| 10 Worst Rock Star Plane Crashes What is it about famous musicians that makes them believe it’d be a swell idea to charter a small, unreliable aircraft through inclement weather? Music history is quite literally littered with the tragic wreckage of such ill-fated journeys. Blender.com examines the 10 worst rock & roll air disasters and the sometimes dubious decisions that led to them.  By David Peisner Blender.com, December 2006 | |
 Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, J.P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson Holly, Valens and Richardson were barnstorming through the Midwest in 1959 on a package tour and looking to avoid a frigid February ride from Iowa to Minnesota aboard a bus whose heater was on the blink. Holly chartered a plane for himself and two bandmates, but guitarist Tommy Allsup lost a coin flip to Valens for one seat on the plane, and Holly’s bass player, future country star Waylon Jennings, graciously gave up his seat to Richardson, who was running a fever. Holly reportedly needled Jennings about his decision, telling him, “I hope your old bus freezes up.” Jennings responded: “Well, I hope your plane crashes.” Crash it did, into a snowy Iowa field, shortly after takeoff, killing everyone aboard, and forever memorializing February 3, 1959 as “The Day the Music Died.” BUY LINK: bestbuy.com | |
dimarts, 3 de febrer del 2009
i és que, encara queda algú que es cregui que els tints no son tints?
Tom Jones reveals grey hairstyle
Tom Jones, 68, shows off his natural hair colour
It's not unusual to think of Welsh superstar Sir Tom Jones with jet black hair - but the 68-year-old singer has finally revealed his new greyer look.
Pontypridd-born Sir Tom showed off his more natural style in his hair and beard at a Polish TV awards show.
The veteran star behind such hits as Delilah, Green Green Grass of Home and Sex Bomb, unveiled the new colour to fans at the ceremony.
The singer told reporters: "It's the music that keeps me alive."
He was at the awards ceremony to promote his new album.
dilluns, 2 de febrer del 2009
Enquesta patillera del Billboard
How is the economy affecting your music habits?
I'm not buying any new music.
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I'm only buying a few songs and albums by my favorite artists this year.
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I'm going to go to fewer concerts.
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I'm only buying music; no merch or concert tickets.
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Recession? What recession?
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El que no t'expliquen és:1 Qui contesta i qui no
2 Quants han contestat
3 i la més important, per la primera i segona: fan el mateix que ja feien, o no?
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