Polyhedric
Aug. 5th, 2004 08:42 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
imomusI wanted to tell you a bunch of random stuff today, to show that I am polyhedric (it's a word that came up in an interview I did with a Spanish magazine yesterday, and I think it means 'many-sided'). After all, anyone reading the last few entries in this blog might get the impression that I'm just some sad old pervert who sneaks around taking pictures of girls in yukatas while their attention is diverted by firework displays. Well, I am, but there's more to me than that, you know.
So where are you? Now and for much of August and September I'm in Osaka, Japan, staying at the family house of my dear friend Hisae, who's just graduated in Graphic Design from St Martin's College in London.
What are you doing? I'm on 'ear holiday' after completing 'the 2005 album from Momus' (the final title will be selected by the sleeve designer, James Goggin from Practise, London, according to what works visually for him.)
When you're not on 'ear holiday', aren't you a singer of some kind? Yes. Proof of that fact can be seen in this video clip (6.7 MB). It's me onstage last year in Portugal, singing 'A Little Schubert' from the Oskar Tennis Champion album in English (the recorded version is in a language I call Google German). The clip is from a forthcoming Momus Live DVD being prepared by my friend Miguel in Lisbon, for release next year.
You're doing some shows soon, aren't you? Yes, my schedule of shows is here. The first one is this Sunday, it's in Yoyogi Park, Tokyo, and it's free.
How are you getting about in Japan? I have a two week rail pass, which is fantastic except for the fact that it only lasts two weeks. After that, I'll be driving Hisae's mum's Daihatsu Naked, which she's very kindly letting me use.
Didn't I read somewhere that you hate cars? Yes, but this one has such a nice name, and a cutely communistic look to it. And we'll be throwing a bike into the back and using that when we get to Kyoto or Kyushu.
You counter-revolutionary swine, aren't you reneging on your principles? Yes, but I don't claim to be 100% rational, you know. In fact, the irrationality of Man is the theme of my latest article for the AIGA Voice. It's called The sleep of Reason breeds... design. I'm also their motoring correspondent.
Harumph. Seen any good movies recently? Yes, I saw Harry Potter 3 on Sunday and really enjoyed it. But even better was to get a little preview of the new Miyasaki, his follow-up to Spirited Away. The new one's called Howl's Moving Castle, and it's due in the autumn here in Japan. I'm also enjoying a series of DVDs, Krtkova Dobrodruzstvi, belonging to Hisae's brother. This is one of those beautifully-drawn late 60s, early 70s animations which, after a former existence on East European communist TV stations, finds its true destiny as a Japanese digital product decades later. The values of Krtek, the mole hero, are sentimental and socialistic. Imagine a Bugs Bunny who abandoned pragmatic wisecracking and used his ingenuity to help his fellow forest creatures, always feeling their pain and weeping along with them. That's Krtek, and his responsible tender-mindedness plays well in Japan... and with me.
What about websites, seen anything interesting recently? I'm rather fascinated by Artfacts just now. It's a website that lists thousands of visual artists, giving a brief biography and a list of shows. But the really interesting part is that they've made charts showing how the artist ranks, in their opinion, against all the other artists they list, and the direction the artist's career is going in. I find these career charts cruel but compelling. Here, for instance, is how Peter Blake and Richard Hamilton, two elderly British artists who both made Beatles sleeves, measure up:
Hamilton's 'White Album' sleeve is much better than Blake's 'Sgt Pepper' sleeve. They've got that right, anyway. Hey, bet you can't wait for the day the careers of music artists are charted this way? Actually, I'm totally dreading it. I'll be at the bottom, heading down. Still, mustn't grumble. Life is sweet, but it's always 'worstward ho', as Sam Beckett once put it.
So where are you? Now and for much of August and September I'm in Osaka, Japan, staying at the family house of my dear friend Hisae, who's just graduated in Graphic Design from St Martin's College in London.
What are you doing? I'm on 'ear holiday' after completing 'the 2005 album from Momus' (the final title will be selected by the sleeve designer, James Goggin from Practise, London, according to what works visually for him.)
When you're not on 'ear holiday', aren't you a singer of some kind? Yes. Proof of that fact can be seen in this video clip (6.7 MB). It's me onstage last year in Portugal, singing 'A Little Schubert' from the Oskar Tennis Champion album in English (the recorded version is in a language I call Google German). The clip is from a forthcoming Momus Live DVD being prepared by my friend Miguel in Lisbon, for release next year.
You're doing some shows soon, aren't you? Yes, my schedule of shows is here. The first one is this Sunday, it's in Yoyogi Park, Tokyo, and it's free.
How are you getting about in Japan? I have a two week rail pass, which is fantastic except for the fact that it only lasts two weeks. After that, I'll be driving Hisae's mum's Daihatsu Naked, which she's very kindly letting me use.
Didn't I read somewhere that you hate cars? Yes, but this one has such a nice name, and a cutely communistic look to it. And we'll be throwing a bike into the back and using that when we get to Kyoto or Kyushu.
You counter-revolutionary swine, aren't you reneging on your principles? Yes, but I don't claim to be 100% rational, you know. In fact, the irrationality of Man is the theme of my latest article for the AIGA Voice. It's called The sleep of Reason breeds... design. I'm also their motoring correspondent.
Harumph. Seen any good movies recently? Yes, I saw Harry Potter 3 on Sunday and really enjoyed it. But even better was to get a little preview of the new Miyasaki, his follow-up to Spirited Away. The new one's called Howl's Moving Castle, and it's due in the autumn here in Japan. I'm also enjoying a series of DVDs, Krtkova Dobrodruzstvi, belonging to Hisae's brother. This is one of those beautifully-drawn late 60s, early 70s animations which, after a former existence on East European communist TV stations, finds its true destiny as a Japanese digital product decades later. The values of Krtek, the mole hero, are sentimental and socialistic. Imagine a Bugs Bunny who abandoned pragmatic wisecracking and used his ingenuity to help his fellow forest creatures, always feeling their pain and weeping along with them. That's Krtek, and his responsible tender-mindedness plays well in Japan... and with me.
What about websites, seen anything interesting recently? I'm rather fascinated by Artfacts just now. It's a website that lists thousands of visual artists, giving a brief biography and a list of shows. But the really interesting part is that they've made charts showing how the artist ranks, in their opinion, against all the other artists they list, and the direction the artist's career is going in. I find these career charts cruel but compelling. Here, for instance, is how Peter Blake and Richard Hamilton, two elderly British artists who both made Beatles sleeves, measure up:
Hamilton's 'White Album' sleeve is much better than Blake's 'Sgt Pepper' sleeve. They've got that right, anyway. Hey, bet you can't wait for the day the careers of music artists are charted this way? Actually, I'm totally dreading it. I'll be at the bottom, heading down. Still, mustn't grumble. Life is sweet, but it's always 'worstward ho', as Sam Beckett once put it.
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(no subject)
Date: 2004-08-04 06:45 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-08-04 08:37 pm (UTC)2) ballpark release date for 'the 2005 album from Momus' ?
3) good entry. it ought to keep me busy, link-following, for most of the night...
I want a little lyric, a lyric, a lyric...
Date: 2004-08-04 09:51 pm (UTC)Thank you so much for the Schubert clip. You once told me about an English version of it going around on the net and I've been unsuccessfully looking for it ever since. Ironically, I had actually captured a one minute video clip of it at your NY Knitting Factory show (7/25/03) on my digital photo camera which I later somehow f#%!ed.
Thank you lots! XOXOXOXOXO
P.S. ...erm.. about its English lyrics? (heh heh) =^)
All the fun comes from Osaka
Date: 2004-08-04 09:54 pm (UTC)(~ 8M wmv video clip)
These guys seem to have watched too many blaxploitation films.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-08-04 10:54 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-08-05 05:25 am (UTC)Mine would currently end up looking hispanic, after doing some morph research...
(no subject)
Date: 2004-08-05 07:09 am (UTC)Osaka is great! Especially the collection of giant plastic seafood on Dotonbori and Spa World, baths themed after various European nations...I believe there was a Sauna that looked like a Cathedral.
Awake and dreaming
Date: 2004-08-05 07:47 am (UTC)The Spanish word "sueño" can also mean "dream," which perhaps softens the harsh classical/romantic dichotomy a bit. Goya's interpretation of the proverb encapsulates precisely the major artistic struggle of the early to mid-nineteenth century, which we really haven't left that far behind (as Momus frequently illustrates). Beethoven, Ingres, Flaubert, and many others were wrestling with their monsters, trying to make something diaphanous as dreams into something solid as art can be.
As someone once said, the heart and the brain must be mediated by the spine. Where this leaves the spleen, I don't know!
Jéé...
Date: 2004-08-05 01:48 pm (UTC)The little mole used to be my childhood hero! But mind you, his former existence wasn't limited to obscure 'East European communist TV stations', he has been part of the cast of "Sendung mit der Maus" (http://www.die-maus.de/index.phtml?lang=en), a children's program on West Germany's ARD, since 1972.
I love this little fellow, and he is partly responsible for my learning Czech. Ahoj!
Re: Jéé...
Date: 2004-08-06 12:11 am (UTC)Re: Jéé...
Date: 2004-08-06 03:51 am (UTC)Re: Jéé...
Date: 2004-08-06 09:43 am (UTC)Re: Jéé...
Date: 2004-08-06 01:51 am (UTC)ich höre ein wenig schubert
Date: 2004-08-05 02:26 pm (UTC)ps- try the sherlock translator if you have osx
Re: mostly off topic, but
Date: 2004-08-06 01:12 am (UTC)Re: mostly off topic, but
Date: 2004-08-06 05:32 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-08-14 06:48 am (UTC)