gre SHAMBOLLIC: June 2008 gk

Saturday, June 28, 2008

“Where else would I get away with such mediocrity?”
- Navdeep Singh (Director: Manorama Six Feet Under)

Tehelka correspondent and profiler in current issue, Nisha Susan dishes out consistently good output - impressive. watch her.
posted by Finny Forever at 12:09 PM 0 comments

Thursday, June 26, 2008

When all's bled and done

my title piece for bwg theme night: July 3.
(all amassing, causing lungs to limp)
posted by Finny Forever at 1:47 PM 0 comments

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

notes to my bricoleur:
Man as his own maker (Prolog)
The Craftsman (Review)
Inner-city Scholar
The Civitas of Seeing
Good work takes time
extract: "What I think of as urbanity is precisely making use of the density and differences in the city so that people find a more balanced sense of identification on the one hand with others who are like themselves but also a willingness to take risks with what is unlike, unknown.... It is the kinds of experiences that make people find out something about themselves that they didn’t know before. That’s what urbanity is at its best....To me, how to privilege the notion of difference that is what urbanity is all about."
posted by Finny Forever at 1:09 AM 0 comments

Sunday, June 22, 2008

and did
you ever really know the meaning of
SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF

No you didn't; because guess what isn't. Not even is shitting not a universal SOD moment. Because there are the chintoos crapping widely in my exposed link road before flying motorists; the drama-artifice thing is there: 'o look at my genitalia i am' mischief license (they know it is playacting). and motorists seeing it fullfront pretending unmoved by a display they can't get from any known relative, friend or sprouting spouse. So to qualify it: whatever you are cagey about admitting to, is a measure of what is not an SOD event/moment. Like you suppose, fugitive jerking off, (remember: teacher's school sanctimony after night of manic sx), or more seriously: murder, subterfuge, bad faith. Then again, only in places/among people where you suppose such things are defendu (or criminal), and then only if that matters at that moment. what moment were you thinking?
Reading/watching fiction is bad enough, cannot take prolonged SOD in real life which urban Bangaloreans are splendid at practicing. > Exeunt from right
posted by Finny Forever at 7:09 PM 0 comments

Monday, June 16, 2008

on the subject of ah, meet dean young in vacationland
posted by Finny Forever at 10:18 PM 0 comments

i've stopped even mildly tracking the mainstream or anything music scene - but the last really inventive work i remember was this guy's. still doing good; let me check out. the album of the track i recall went platinum or something. Came across some interviews in that phase and what a measure. he has it. wont explain
posted by Finny Forever at 8:22 PM 2 comments

Wednesday, June 11, 2008

Over the last 2 weeks, I've been spending a lot of time reading almost every one of the tedious posts of this alok's blog i've pasted before; I wouldn't have bothered if it was just opinion. There's hardly any of that, in fact it's vigorously derivative and is steeped in references to sometimes obscure european art house films and a series of books starting with 'Melancholy', Sebald comes in a couple of times. Can't help noting the restraint and even academic temper of his posts which are a devoted record of critical impressions, sample this post.
The few times he does dot his opinion, I can't always agree (like when he can't understand what's so great about The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie). Considering my infantile but steadiy-eroding prejudice against north indian people (will remain anti-Hindi though) even if they happen to be on the social sidelines of New York, my reverence for alok's posts is a development. Admittedly he lacks some essential slant and original convictions, but he is somehow reassuringly comfortable with his relegated position of temerity. He is up the right street.

***
'sikkapatte kannada, swalpa hindi, totall bengaluru' hoarding/ print ads
wtf BigFM or the other ones? I'm sorry but the debrained visualizer-copywriter (actually glutonnous CD - since they usually hog the fancy accounts) of the hot shop 4-letter agency that came up with this revelation is wrong. He forgot the 3 other south indian languages + inglish-of-a-sense which have precedence over hindi in the south. I think the ideal here is: if a south indian radio station (it isn't i know) isn't going to register south indian languages - who is? jabalpur fm?
all that said - the radiocity website design by bcwebwise is a super job.
posted by Finny Forever at 9:33 AM 0 comments

Thursday, June 05, 2008

Funereal

Watch this interview. Icelandic band Sigur Ros.
Their painful selfconsciousness, resounding discomfiture is impressive. you could trust them. But the interviewer has a lot to be pulled up over. I do not appreciate the interviewer's insensitivity to the complexes his subjects have to deal with. These include:
  • The language English (not a language the band is comfortable with)
  • Their place as visitors (shakey for anyone but the most arrogant, culturally/personally)
Facts such as these you can fairly factor even before you begin an interview. These are 'benefit' facts, that gives your guests the benefit of consideration. The most composed (relative) and eloquent of the group is the one who has not surprisingly spoken from the start. He could be a father, the oldest in the group. He is not half as interesting a study as the rest. I don't refer to him after this; he fields the first question and remains in unassuming charge ...
Note how 2 members reach out for their papercups at the same time on the second question. The meek-postured boy in stripes closest to the camera only wants to leave and has taken to contorting his tongue in his mouth. He is the last to put on the headphones; wisely he puts it on only when the interview has begun. Half way into this interview, the mood of dire unease has not lifted. The member furthest from the camera has now placed his hand to to the side of his head - the thinking stress pose. Inspite of the thinking, he has spoken little yet his eye movements indicate he may be turning manic and distressed. When the interviewer uses the word 'life' ('Are you enjoying life?') it seems to offer hope, and most of them look up but not much is said. The interviewer hapless in his own desperation at what may go down as a failed interview asks a rude 'Are you having fun...'. This helps no one and the answer is a deadpan 'we're having fun'. clearly this Icelandic team is not going to open up like the savvy American. The interviewer seems to raise his voice a bit and asks 'Are you a bit of a phenomenon in Iceland?'. The word 'phenomenon' cracks them up and they chuckle privately but audibly suggesting they have private opinions about the interview, the interviewer, the choice of words, what it tells about the culture.
The cruellest move is when the interviewer turns on the one who has not spoken a word till then. The boyish one in stripes. His anxiety is clear, an expression of dread, he clears his throat holds his breath and taps his fingers in the runup to the specific question 'hopelandic'. Then it should surprise no one that this tense boy's first answer is an expletive. He nervously-defiantly says 'fucking bullshit' which is beeped. After initial laughs, the expressions of the bandmates indicate they do not approve of what their bandmate just said, the impression he is creating. The interviewer turns indulgent and school marmish. The interviewer persists and tries to put in words for him which makes the boy more difficult and contrary.

The interviewer becomes confrontational and strident when he could be considerate. Embarassed, his bandmates try to answer on behalf of their boy to cover up his social deficiencies. There is an expression of part-sympathy, -concern, -anger in his fellow member's . One of his mates, on the extreme right turns red-faced after putting in a quick word on his mate's lyrics.

The interview ends with an obvious 'edit' and the withdrawn face of the fractious band member in stripes and his bandmates; we could imagine there was an ugly face-off ('Drop it will you; picking on Jaan')?

Looking back, I see the interviewer has spoken more than the rest - we know nothing more about the band. Quite remarkably, they have succeeded in showing up the inefficiencies of the interviewer, who is likely an over-acheiving media student with 3 children of his own.

We could consider the challenge in interviewing groups, where the one interviewer decides to question each and every person in that group before all. What happens inevitably is that the first to be interviwed has the pleasure of speaking primally, instinctively, less selfconsciously. While the others among the last to be called up have to deal with their own built-up opinions and reactions to everything so far. And unless the room was noisy and distracted, there would be every reason for the final few who are called up to be nervous, self-conscious and unable to express the complex range they have built up by then. It would be the responsibility of the interviewer to pick out then who he would not naturally pick out for a comment and give that person the lead in expressing and in a sense dominating proceedings (subsequent to this initiation, the turned-in member would not even be occupied by his primacy or deficiency in participation)
posted by Finny Forever at 10:00 AM 0 comments

Wednesday, June 04, 2008

posted by Finny Forever at 5:23 AM 0 comments

Tuesday, June 03, 2008

Cities and Ambition

posted by Finny Forever at 3:01 PM 1 comments