Style and Substance

I know it's been a long time since my last post, but I've been busy. Mostly with procrastinating, watching Youtube and putting together my album(s). As anyone who has spent any time watching Youtube would understand, out of the three activities listed I have gotten the most intellectual stimulation out of the third, so music will (once again) be the subject of my musings.

When you're writing music, considerations of audience inevitably come into play. Unless of course you're an avant-garde experimental musician. But even then you still have an audience, even if their willingness to fetishize any eclectic composition you produce gives you greater creative latitude than the average artist enjoys.

When considering the audience, I'm always torn between balancing what people want to hear and what I feel they need to hear. And it is a delicate balance; my own music consumption patterns tell me that. In my portable music player I have, at any one time, mainstream rock, underground rap, Japanese pop and a whole stack of BBC podcasts. After experiencing both extremes, it has become my view that it is, in the words of the good book, 'good to hold onto one and not let go of the other'. That's certainly the mix that I try to achieve with my music.

And this is not to say that I don't enjoy today's music; I'll still bump that new Lil Wayne track if I'm feeling it. And yet I can't shake the feeling that music is starting to lose sight of the delicate balance between style and substance somewhat. But, proving that maybe I was wrong about getting more intellectual stimulation from music than from Youtube, a Chris Rock clip I found while trawling the video site seems to say it best:

What can I say, you're a mensch

I'm now 22 (actually, half way to 23). It's around this time that young men and women start to go places. Many of those in my cohort have graduated, some have gotten engaged or married, and a whole lot of us have either moved into the corporate world or are gearing up to do so. Some have become doctors, others lawyers, some sports broadcasters and others...well, they're still trying to get their game plan down.

One thing I did not expect to come out of my group of childhood acquaintances was a (successful) rock band. When I graduated in 2003, four of the guys from my school were playing in a garage band called Collusion. I think I still have one of their early recordings. I remember seeing a few of them around uni every now and then, but I never really kept up with their music. Then last year I caught up with an old high school friend who told me that the group had now rebadged itself 'Skybombers', and was steadily building momentum. Although their style of music isn't particular my area of expertise, I've tried to keep up with them since. By my count, they've now released an EP, toured Australia and the States (and a fair few other places I'd guess), released music videos and now completed their debut full length album. They even opened for the Foo Fighters on their New Zealand tour.

The scale of all this was brought home to me today when I was out shopping with my cousins. We dropped in on JB Hi-Fi to check out the CDs, and prominently displayed among other well known artists was this release by four people who I had shared classes with, been friends with and occasionally even gotten into arguments with.


All of this made me step back and realise how far we'd come since we were 18. I guess when you're in uni the constant hustle and bustle prevents you from realising how much you've achieved and how you've matured. It's also probably harder when you're dealing with childhood acquaintances; you never really learn to see your high school mates as a hotshot lawyer, trusted physician or, dare I say it, celebrated rock star. But other people do see us as such, and it's reassuring to know that we are moving on and assuming our places in society as something more than just "so-and-so's friend/kid/brother". We're mensches in our own right.

Our ship has arrived and there's no turning back. Hope we're ready for the big time.

And, in the spirit of the shameless plug, here is the latest video from the Skybombers - 'Always Complaining':

Hanazakari no Kimitachi E

Recently I've been watching a J-drama series (yes, I do watch Japanese TV dramas, I admit it) called Hanazakari no Kimitachi E ('To those of you in full bloom'). I know the whole J-drama thing is a little foofy, and I'm not helped by the fact that Hanazakari is a reverse-harem drama based on a shoujo manga. But, for what it is, it's a damn entertaining series.

The plot centres around Ashiya Mizuki (Horikita Maki), a Japanese American girl who cuts her locks, loses the skirt and transfers to the all-boys school Osaka Gakuen in Japan on a covert mission to rescue her idol/role model/crush Sano Izumi (Oguri Shun) from the doldrums that he has fallen into. Most of the hillarity results from the strong personalities (caricatures?) of the characters and the trials and travails that a girl trying to live as a guy faces.

I'm only about half-way through the series, but after a few episodes I couldn't help but think about some of the other famous cross-dressing stories that anyone with a modicum of Asian cultural literacy will have some familiarity with.

For the sake of my whiter associates, I'll start off with a tale that almost anyone who has kids or was a kid at the relevant time will have heard of. That's right, I'm talking Eddie Murphy as a pint-sized dragon and a whole lot of talk about 'dying with honour'. Ladies and gentlemen: Mulan!



Of course let's not forget that before Disney so helpfully co-opted the story for their own diabolical purposes, it was a pretty famous Chinese tale also rendered into a film by the Shaw Brothers:



But of course that wasn't the only cross-dressing film in the Shaw Brothers catalogue. I often got home from school and found my mum watching Liang Shan-Po Yu Chu Ying-Tai, the story of a girl who dresses up as a man so that she can go to school. I bet these days a whole lot of girls would dress up as a man if it would get them OUT of school. But that's a discussion for another time.

Here's a tiny photo from the film. Best one that I could find.



All of this brings me (in a very round-about way) to the point of my post: despite being for the most part patriachal, Asian cultures have some serious gender issues. So when you see that Korean exchange student that seems to have more makeup on than his girlfriend, don't think he's trying too hard or lying to himself about his sexuality. It's just those damn Shaw Brothers movies corrupting the youth.

But, if all this gender bending is too much for you, remember when you're watching shows like Hanazakari that behind the oddly-fitting pants and shirts there is a beautiful girl waiting to be released from the bonds of...well, the selective nature of certain private schools.

Behold: Horikita Maki!



...and as for you Asian guys who spend too much time on your hair and nails? Come on guys, you're not fooling anyone.

The More Things Change...

While taking a break from studying the other day a friend of mine asked me, 'So who do you think? Obama or McCain?' My response, based on nothing more than my casual daily perusal of the Google News 'elections' section, was that Obama would be the next President of the United States. My friend was a little taken aback: 'How can you be so sure?'

It was at this point that I felt the need to clarify my position. I am not a converted Obama-ite (although I find the Obama-girl YouTube video hillarious). I was simply stating what I thought the outcome of the November elections would be. I then proceeded to tell my friend that although I thought that Obama would be the next President, I thought that he was unlikely to fulfil the promise that he has built up in the heart of a tired and disheartened nation.

It seems, reading some of the latest opinion pieces, that a number of commentators are reaching similar conclusions: the shine is off the apple, and what was initially branded as the race between the maverick and the reformer is really just another presidential race between two men who would be commander in chief. The muddled policy stances of both camps betrays a hard realpolitik foundation that both campaigns have built their campaigns on glossing over.

Of course everyone needs hope, and I'm sure that Obama or McCain will do a better job than Bush has. But I for one won't be expecting any earth-shattering changes following November. Politicians who go back on their word or bend to political convenience do not represent a break from the past, nor a rebellion against the establishment. Politicians who break their word are just politicians. I just hope that 'Hope we can believe in' doesn't become simply 'hope we believe in'. And that's just Straight Talk.

Further reading:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lee-stranahan/barack-obama-selects-bara_b_108481.html
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2008/06/22/obama_and_mccain___flip_flop_flip_flop/

Soul Calibur IV

Damn. This looks AWESOME.

July 31 2008.

A long time between drinks

Well, after 8 straight weeks of getting our ass handed to us we finally won one. Good job, boys. It's also nice to see Matty Lloyd back in form.

And to think, all it took was for our opposition to lose pretty much their entire midfield to either trades, retirements or injury. Oh well we haven't had a real midfield for a couple of years now, so I guess that just evened the odds.

But congrats boys. Hope you can back it up next week against the Blues.

The Asian Lupe Fiasco

Despite having finals looming in just a matter of days, I've been doing anything but studying. Mostly I've been surfing the net and listening to music, which really means that I've just been doing what I usually do.

One of the albums that has come back into heavy rotation is Lupe Fiasco's The Cool. I was intrigued by Lupe the first time I heard him (Kick, Push), and I was impressed when I copped his first album Food and Liquor last year. However I only became a convert when Lupe dropped his sophmore effort, The Cool. It ranks as one of those albums in my mind that stands out in my memory when I cast my mind back to all the records I've heard (which are a fair few).

To me, The Cool represented the very epitome of what I want to do with my own music: uncompromisingly intelligent, edgy, contemplative music that is underscored with humanity. I like to think that I don't easily match up with any rapper, but if I had to pick any emcee I'd want to be compared with it'd have to be Lu.

When I first heard The Cool I was spellbound - I listened to the whole thing in one sitting and was blown away by the quality of the music and the sheer breadth of Lupe's opus. I knew that I had a classic in my hands. Yet when I loaded it up on my portable MP3 player (my Nokia) and took it out with me on the road, I was hit by the realisation that I couldn't find any 'standout' songs to really get into. This was astounding, seeing as I had just listened to an album that I was absolutely convinced was a certified hit.

By way of explanation, what normally happens when I listen to a great album is that I enjoy it in the first sitting, and then over the next couple of listens I sift out songs that I enjoy more than the others and put those specific tracks into heavy rotation. Yet with Lupe's work somehow it was impossible to find any standout track, even though I hadn't found an ounce of fluff on the album the first time I listened to it.

A lot of contemplation ensued, and I finally realised why it was that I couldn't find any individual tracks to really get into. It wasn't because the music was too dense - I had followed the flow effortlessly the first time round. It also wasn't because the whole album was one long concept album; the songs are connected, but not interdependent. The real reason why I couldn't parse the tracks was because they weren't easily pigeonholed.

Subconsciously the way that I pick out 'standout' tracks is by assigning a particular emotion, vibe or meaning to the given song; for example the reason I like the track Mockingbird by Eminem is because it reinforces my own strong sense of the importance of family. That is the concept that Mockingbird stands for in my mind. Yet with Lupe I've found it impossible to break his work down like this.

At first I thought it might have been because he was too cerebral, but upon closer inspection I realised that nothing that Lupe says is esoteric or beyond the realm of common experience. This point is reinforced by the fact that I've been able to crunch works much more 'intellectual' than Lupe's (such as Canibus' Rip the Jacker, which is another one of my 'landmark' albums). Canibus moves from history to art to science in the space of four bars, and yet I've never had a problem with his music.

The real reason that I haven't been able to pigeonhole Lupe's music is because it is truly intellectual music - its true value can only be unlocked on a cerebral level. Lupe is an intellectual naturally, as opposed to the superficially deep (oxymoronic, I know) name-checking hip hop that normally gets passed off as 'intellectual'. And because I interact with Lupe's music on an intellectual (that is, conscious) level, I'm not easily able to subconsciously assign simple metalabels to his songs.

And to be honest, that's the sort of music I want to make as well. When you're listening to it, you connect with it on a deep level and it draws you in. Yet if you're trying to play it in the background and assign it to the role of 'mood music' it refuses. Music that stands on its own as a work of art, which is more than just a quick piece of entertainment.

For a while I wondered whether it was even possible to make truly intelligent hip hop. Lupe gives me hope that someday hip hop will be able to transcend the haphazard 'stream of consciousness' format that it was born out of and move to the next level of artistry.

And if I get to end up known as the Asian Lupe Fiasco? Well, I'd be alright with that.