Illuminating Simon Reynolds interview here

[clive gash]

http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/the-geist-of-the-zeit/

[The Modernist]

http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/the-geist-of-the-zeit/

Cheers for that. A really interesting interview I thought, that whole theoretical approach to music seems to be quite unfashionable now but I love all that stuff. I've been thinking of doing some writing for that website too..

[Insouciant Western People]

A really interesting interview I thought, that whole theoretical approach to music seems to be quite unfashionable now but I love all that stuff..

Me too, I almost always find Reynolds' writing to be insightful and thought-provoking. He's often quite original in his ideas, and he's refreshingly open to new music - he still has that thirst which John Peel retained to his last day.

[clive gash]

What grabs me the most in this interview is that the excitement and influence which Reynolds says that Barney Hoskyns engendered in him through his NME writing is exactly what Reynolds transmitted to me in his MM days. Self - indulgent i know.

Also its good to see him stand up to David Sinclair's snipes in the Guardian review of ( the excellent ) Totally Wired. The fact is that Sinclair was a rather featureless, bland Murdoch scribe during Reynolds and Co's peak period and i would argue that, as his latest book is on those super-talented, epoch-makers The Spice Girls, he is still a bit of a journeyman writer - a tad jealous of Reynolds reach and power i would say.

[The Write Profile]

What grabs me the most in this interview is that the excitement and influence which Reynolds says that Barney Hoskyns engendered in him through his NME writing is exactly what Reynolds transmitted to me in his MM days. Self - indulgent i know.

Also its good to see him stand up to David Sinclair's snipes in the Guardian review of ( the excellent ) Totally Wired. The fact is that Sinclair was a rather featureless, bland Murdoch scribe during Reynolds and Co's peak period and i would argue that, as his latest book is on those super-talented, epoch-makers The Spice Girls, he is still a bit of a journeyman writer - a tad jealous of Reynolds reach and power i would say.

And yet I actually prefer that interview to some of his writing, because as good as he is, there is the sense in a book like Rip It Up and Start Again, he's trying to replace one form of nostalgia with another-"my post-punk stuff is better than that 60s stuff" seems to be a recurring, unspoken theme throughout, which makes very little odds to someone like me, because, let's face it, the postpunk "moment" had passed before I was born. And Sinclair is right to point out that the music press seems as important as the music itself in the book, and that Reynolds is an incredibly dogmatic critic, and often seems to place music in context of his theories first. Sometimes I feel the music he champions isn't as good as he wants it to sound, if that makes sense.

On the other hand, sometimes he latches onto an idea that really makes sense in the context of the music, and there's no denying his constant appetite for new sounds, or at least new ideas, and his books are very readable, informative and occasionally surprising. And unlike many critics of his generation (or slightly older), example, he seems to understand the context in how music is made today, sure, there's nostalgia for his youth in some of his writing, but it's not as if he pretends it's still 1982 and that nothing's essentially changed, musically and culturally, in the last 30 years, unlike, say, Paul Morley, for example. I quite like his remark about how today there's a paradoxical feeling of "acceleration and standstill".


Interesting to read what he has to say about Barney Hoskyns, isn't it interesting to think that the guy championed a lot of noisier, edgier underground stuff in his youth and yet these days, he's probably better renowned for his writings on soul music and rootsy American rock in books such as Hotel California, Say it Once More for the Broken Hearted, Waiting for the Sun, etc. I just like Hoskyns's enthusiastic and uncluttered prose style and his ability to see the connections more than anything else, he's a writer who does his homework and engages the reader, which is the important thing.

But yeah good interview, and just browsing through the website, it looks like an interesting magazine too. Some really interesting subjects and writing covered in it.

[mentalist (slight return)]

he does an interesting talk on the Nuum here

http://fact.tv/videos/watch/518