The subversive gorilla

[imomus]

Today's topic is gorillas. First of all, my latest piece for the New York Times is about a 23 year-old French artist called Stephan Goldrajch, who makes woolly masks capable of transforming your face into a colourful gorilla face.



As I explain in the piece, Goldrajch (who calls himself a "eudemonist", a person dedicated to pleasure) likes fairy tales, and has written a few of his own, including the Tale of Bryone, the beautiful and rich daughter of a king who ultimately slits her throat for venturing too far outside his castle walls. Do not under any circumstances miss the fabulous and bizarre Bryone Song, which sounds like something from my Analog Baroque period (or perhaps the songs of Rroland).

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Here's the other gorilla thing: an English translation which has just gone up on YouTube of Georges Brassens' song The Gorilla. Listening to this song -- in which a hanging judge is raped by a gorilla -- you can't help thinking that an enormous mistake has been made by historians of popular song. Rebellion has been equated, since the 1950s (when this song was released, making Brassens a star) with pelvic thrusts and songs about "rocking around the clock". In fact, rebellion is much more reliably to be found in this deceptively-gentle song about a gorilla. It still packs a huge subversive punch, and there are countries all over the world -- including, perhaps, our own -- where you still couldn't sing this gorilla song on TV, though you could shake your pelvis and rock until the cows come home.

Finally, my various record labels have asked me to point out to you that the Joemus album is available as a digital download. Here it is direct from Cherry Red in the UK and via eMusic in the US.

Comments

[kaipfeiffer.livejournal.com]

well, public enemy's rhetoric is that of militant members of a minority fighting for their rights, its not meant as subversion, which wouldn't work at all, rap not beeing widely accepted as mainstream pop yet, but as a direct assault, whereas brassens is part of the bourgeois majority, which requires different means. another example of that would be the album "rock around the bunker" by gainsbourg, in which he, a french jew of russian ancestors, sings lyrics to straight old-school rock'n'roll tunes that take the perspective of german nazis - an ss-officer who fled to south america, or hitler complaining about eva braun always playing her favourite song "smoke gets in your eyes" - which he then covers unaltered. rock'n'roll, and now that sounds really subversive, in that context.

[kaipfeiffer.livejournal.com]

and musically, brassens is nowhere near as interesting as public enemy's best tracks (or gainsbourg's). brassens is all lyrics to "standard" chanson accompaniements. whereas "it takes a nation of millions ..." or "l'homme à tête de chou" ...

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Oh, I disagree. I wrote about this in The Electroacoustics of Humanism (http://imomus.com/thought201201.html). I think that just because something sounds warm and friendly, it doesn't mean it sounds conservative, and just because something sounds dense and dynamic, it doesn't mean it sounds liberating. There is a revolution of friendliness, and an electroacoustics of humanism.

[kaipfeiffer.livejournal.com]

hey, i love plenty of "warm" or "friendly" music (terms i have to put in quote marks, because i find them problematic when used to describe music), eliane radigue, caetano veloso, to name just two favourites. i wasn't critizising brassens for sounding "warm" or "friendly". gainsbourg mostly does, too. but brassens does conservatively so, to me, in his musical forms. and in a way that suggests to me that the sonic portion of his chansons, and their arrangement wasn't his main concern. i think they tend to be rather means for him to transport his words than artistic statements in their own right.

[kaipfeiffer.livejournal.com]

the reason i find these terms problematic is, because a lot of what's going on in the music of public enemy (or, well ... slayer) doesn't sound "cold" or "unfriendly" to me. that may be the paradoxical reaction of a music addict's ear ...

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Well, the point I take from that is that rock has to be heavily decontextualized before it can become subversive. It isn't inherently so.

And, in fact, Rock Around the Bunker is the Gainsbourg album I listen to and like least. I think it's because, for me, rock can never be stripped of its basic conservatism.

For me, Gainsbourg's most subversive album is Vu de L'Exterieur, and the way it sets scatology in a gentle cradle of soft piano rock. It's a perfect balance between seduction and repulsion, and something french pop has done much better than anglo pop (see also Dutronc).

[kaipfeiffer.livejournal.com]

yes, i cited "rock around the bunker" mainly for the sake of the argument, for it being a rock'n'roll record with bafflingly obnoxious lyrics. in that, i find it even more subversive than "vu de l'exterieur", because scatology is an almost acceptable topic with perverted french intellectuals, whereas a jew singing from a nazi's perspective ...
but i, too, listen much more often to "vu .." than "... bunker", and for the same reasons as yours ... (and, for a succesful mainstream pop singer, both records are quite in their own league world wide, i guess).

[(Anonymous)]

For me, Gainsbourg's most subversive album is Vu de L'Exterieur, and the way it sets scatology in a gentle cradle of soft piano rock.

Well I wish you would do something more like this. These days, you obviously feel your sound has to be so busy - which is kind of similar to aggression in a way. You can't leave anything unadorned and unfucked up, a voice can never be a voice, a beat can never be just a beat, sounds and textures have to piled high... A song with just you accompanied by the piano would probably be the most surprising, wrongfooting thing you could do right now.

[(Anonymous)]

The most unexpected thing for Momus to do would be to release a yatch rock album like Christopher Cross, but we all know that as an artist he is simply not adventurous enough for that. He still considers sacred the old modernism and avant garde.

[kineticfactory.livejournal.com]

Well, Joemus has a Cliff Richard cover (of one of his early teenage-love ballads).

I could imagine Momus doing a yacht-rock album to turn the dialectic of conservatism and subversion on its head, much as Folktronic did for the authenticity of folk music.

[electricwitch.livejournal.com]

You mentioned Nazis! Champagne!

[kaipfeiffer.livejournal.com]

i don't achieve all of my goals, but some i indeed do. open that bottle, now!