16 10 / 2011
Pangeekery: Don't Occupy Sydney
At the moment in the US there is a collection of affiliated protests, centred on New York city. As with all “grass roots” protest movements, some of the protesters are unemployed or students who enjoy shows of unity and demands for change as a recreational sport. Some of them are people who have…
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16 10 / 2011
The ecstasy of influence: A plagiarism
“Most artists are brought to their vocation when their own nascent gifts are awakened by the work of a master. That is to say, most artists are converted to art by art itself. Finding one’s voice isn’t just an emptying and purifying oneself of the words of others but an adopting and embracing of filiations, communities, and discourses. nspiration could be called inhaling the memory of an act never experienced. Invention, it must be humbly admitted, does not consist in creating out of void but out of chaos. Any artist knows these truths, no matter how deeply he or she submerges that knowing.”
05 9 / 2011
Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon stroked his scruffy beard. We’d been standing in the kitchen for several hours now.
“What if, like,” he said, deep in thought, “You had a feeling - right? - that took over ALL THE OTHER FEELINGS? Like, a MegaFeeling. You know how they have giant squids, yeah? Well, what if you had a feeling that was like that?”I swilled my beer around the bottom of the empty bottle. It was warm now.
“What if,” Justin continued, “Like, that MegaFeeling was an emotion? What if you felt so much that you just - like - died? What if you liked a girl so much you died? Or had a sweater that was so comfy that you died? Or had a really great hat or something? Like, what then? What if that happened? What if - are you with me?”
I nodded.
“Ok, so, what if you had a t-shirt that was made of so much cottonpoly blend that it was so snuggly that you just died? What if you had a beard just the right mix of masculine and non-threatening that a girl touched it and then she died?”
“Can I have another beer, Justin?” I asked.
“Yeah, sure, but,” he said, pulling another Fat Tire beer out from the tattered minifridge behind him - he was like that, he had his own personal stash of Fat Tire and you had to talk to him to get any of it, “Do you understand what I’m saying? What if, like, you sung in such a good falsetto that you killed everyone in the room with a… MegaFeeling?”
I nodded again, and closed my eyes just long enough to think the entire thought, that, as cool as it was; when Justin Vernon of Bon Iver corners you at a party kinda drunk and wants to talk about feelings? There’s no way out.
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27 8 / 2011
"In the post Eat, Pray, Love world, the yoga memoir—or yogoir—has become its own lively sub-genre."
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27 8 / 2011
why we fight #17
My latest “Why We Fight” column, at Pitchfork, is a touch more confessional than usual.
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