Sinister: Getting back to basics... what's wrong and what's right.

[duke of harringay]

Jonathan Wren wrote:

> Why exactly should pop be about confrontation?

because if you do not confront, you leave doubts, and doubts multiply
and eat away at your soul... Confront yourself, more than anything, and
that's what Pop should do.  That's what art does... remember, the art,
be it a painting, a song, a pome, whatever, will say more about yourself
than anything else.

> Why, because you love one
> thing, should that mean that you must programme yourself to hate
> something
> else?

because if you don't hate the perceived opposite, how can you be sure of
the extremity of your love?  If you do not hate, or if you deny the hate
then all you have are cloudy states of antipathy.  Obviously it's
personal, although we could argue about the general 'correctness' of
particular rights and wrongs i'm sure (let's not please...).

> Isn't it that which makes people narrow-minded?

no, it's what helps people to develop a clarity of thought, of opinion.

> Pop is about embracing
> things which mean something to you. Not anyone else. But it doesn't
> make
> people wrong.

it is, absolutely, and it does... if you don't have the strangth to say
'you are wrong' then how can you expect anyone to respect the things
that you say are right?  And if you don't beleive in it yourself, what's
the point?

> When you think you are always right then you're closing a lot
> of doors.

but the doors may open at a later stage, and that's fine, because we are
not static beings, or shouldn't be.  It takes strength to say 'i was a
bit wrong on that one'... you always know somewhere that the stance you
take might change, that in a years time you might regret it, or feel
differently, but if you fail to act because of those doubts then you
will never make any progress in your life, either internal or external.

> Not a very good joke. Incidentally, I love Catatonia

which is probably why you didn't like the joke.  That said, one thing
the Duke has never been is a comedian... no giggling and begs to argue
the case from the back please, or it's detentions all round...

> <BUZZER> you
> have just failed your "faith" test and are listed for extermination.

wouldn't that be nice :-)

> You seem to be assuming that the majority of people on Sinister are
> stupid
> automatons incapable of questioning the world around them.

not at all... well not at all in most cases. i will, and do, make
exceptions of course.  i am making this comment based more on what i see
everyday on the streets, in the classrooms, in the pubs and clubs, and
in the media.  The NME act all indignant one week, and the next, it's
back to free posters of Popstars and playing the newlabour game of
threat free media.  It's laughable, but it's painful...

> Fair enough. But are Belle and Sebastian really the prophets of a
> better,
> utopian future? Much as I love it, a song about a girl painting lines
> isn't
> going to bring the establishment to its knees.

you don't get it do you?  you're confusing process and product.  You are
taking everything on face value; the face of the song, the surface
quality.  Maybe this is truly the problem here; that generations younger
than mine are interested not in pulling away the layers and making
judgement themselves, but are intent only on the surface, the
appearance.  I'm being general here of course, and an old fart too i
don't doubt, but i do see it... an inherited lack of interest in the
processes of exploration and investigation.  And getting them (youth) to
think differently, to think in depths and to explore strange connections
is incredibly difficult.  It's not just me either, because i have heard
the same comments from other artists taking part in fringe-'educational'
activities too.

> > but i'm just a dreamer, a poor righteous teacher.
> >
>
> And so am I. I wouldn't spend so much of my bloody time trying to
> write
> stories about the poetic and the beautiful if I wasn't or going to
> train as
> a teacher if I didn't feel I could affect peoples lives in some small
> way,

that's good... hopefully you will develop some sense of the enthusiastic
righteousness for your subject and for the SPIRIT of learning too,
because it's saddly lacking in too many these days.

> But when I
> listen to B&S I only think of melancholy, happiness and tomorrow.

it's the confusion between process and product again...

> God, I'm gonna be a trainee teacher in Exeter from October!

hope you don't get a TP in Tiverton High School ;-)

> What do they put
> in the water down there?

all sorts of shit... literally sometimes.

> Again, that was a joke and in no way meant as an attack upon the
> bumpki..sorry, citizens of the South West

yeah well i'm not offended 'cos i'm a foreigner myself down here... The
duchess and i look forward to beating, i mean, meeting you.

keep the faith,

the duke.

PS: todays special hugs go to Katrina :-)


--
Tangents On-Line http://www.virtual-pc.com/tangent/
PO Box 102, Exeter, EX2 4YL, UK
tangent at lineone.net




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