Everything That Happens Will Happen Today

From the Guardian:

"As a foreigner in New York," Eno explained, "I was surprised by how little attention Americans paid to their own great indigenous musical invention: gospel. It was even slightly uncool - as though the endorsement of the music entailed endorsing all the religious framework associated with it. To me gospel was a music of surrender, and the surrendering rather than the worshipping was the part that interested me. This idea has informed my music ever since: I guess it's the reason I use modes and chords which are easy to follow and easy to harmonise with. I want the music to be inviting, to offer you a place inside it."

"I think David responded to this with sensitivity and skill, and his natural edginess made those familiar progressions sound new to me."

For Byrne the challenge in this "electronic gospel" style is to write songs that are "simple but not corny, basic but heartfelt. The results, in many cases, were uplifting, hopeful and positive- even though there were lyrics about cars exploding, war and similarly dark scenarios."

Don't forget the last time these two worked together:

And Now, a Word from Our Sponsors

Whores

I am not naive. I live smack dab in the middle of our mass consumer culture and know that every object, institution, idea and tradition carries at minimum a small stain of commercialism. This modern fact of life causes minor tremors of nausea when I ponder the specifics in detail, so mostly I avert my eyes and hum to myself. However, every once in a while there is a cataclysmic lowering of the bar that manages to catch my attention and drain the few remaining drops of optimism I have left.

Case in point, these two recent stories from The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times:

Chew on This: Hit Song Is a Gum Jingle
Sharp-eared pop-music fans may have noticed a brief reference to an old chewing-gum jingle buried in "Forever," Chris Brown's top-10 hit. "Double your pleasure/double your fun," the R&B singer croons in the chorus.

What listeners don't know -- and what Wm. Wrigley Jr. Co. planned to reveal Tuesday -- is that the song is a commercial.

A Product’s Place Is on the Set
In recent weeks, anchors on the Fox affiliate in Las Vegas, KVVU, sit with cups of McDonald’s iced coffee on their desks during the news-and-lifestyle portion of their morning show. The anchors rarely touch the cups.

Executives at the station, one of 12 owned by Meredith Corporation, say the six-month promotion is meant to shore up advertising revenue and, as they told the news staff, will not influence content.

Again, I am no Pollyanna when it comes to the pervasiveness of product placement and both of these events seem kind of inevitable, but I've always been slightly buoyed by the pretense that the content of music and news are sacred ground. Now it looks like all pretense has sunk and the race to the bottom has begun.

This got me wondering whether fine art might be the next sacred cow to tip and, more importantly, how I can ride that product placement vanguard all the way to the bank? I had it all wrong when I dreamed of mass merchandising my work. Clearly, the surer path to riches can be found by charging others to place their products in my work. Bridgestone Tires, please call me now.

Here now a musical editorial from our correspondent, Neil Young:

Of Killer Rabbits and Fireworks

Over the past four weeks I have been aggressively focused on making new images for Domesticated. This typically involves weekday trips to Matamoras with my intern, Olga, to scout locations and work out the details and then a return trip on the weekend to shoot. The journey to Matamoras is about 200 miles round trip and on a summer weekend it can take upwards of two hours to get out there. I think I have a couple of new winning shots in the bag, but I want to make at least four or five more over the next couple of months.

Every trip to Matamoras is an adventure.

The weekend before last we were shooting with rabbits. What a disaster. Rabbits are little bastards with sharps claws and the predisposition of a meth addict. Don't ever be fooled by their cuddly appearance or their cute names. Little Bunny Froo Froo my ass. A couple of hours and endless rabbit scratches later we called off the shoot.

Actual scene from our rabbit shoot

This past weekend was an experiment with fireworks, a raccoon and trash dumpster. A visit from Matamora's finest and a small dumpster fire forced us to face facts and call it a night. It was almost 9pm at this point and we had been in Matamoras since 1:30pm. We were a little hungry and dubious of food possibilities at that hour, so we set out on a quest for nourishment.

After a short drive down I-84 we found ourselves facing an unholy trinity of theme-restaurant options: Outback, Chili's and T.G.I. Friday's. Typically I don't eat at these restaurants and when I do I feel like I need my stomach and my soul pumped. We rolled the dice and picked T.G.I. Friday's (the only major brand in the US with an implied "God" in the name). As we prepared to enter the front doors we noticed the glowing restaurant sign which suggested the Friday's in the name was not a reference to the day of the week, but some kind of of Dada-esque motivational acronym. Food-Real-Innovative-Drinks-American-You-Service. Genius.

We ate as fast as we could, put on the Black Keys and made the long journey back to the friendly confines of New York.

We will be back at it again next weekend and the weekend after that and the weekend after that...

I've Been Hijacked

I just received two copies of the wonderful new photo book, Hijacked Volume One: Australia and America. The book was edited by Mark McPherson & Max Pam and is an excellent survey of emerging photographers in Australia and America. They were kind enough to include eight of my photos over twelve pages in the book. Also included are friends Jon Gitelson, Lisa Kereszi, Bill Sullivan, Shen Wei, Grant Willing and Alana Celii.

Mark McPherson has been quite the hustler and has managed to set up book launches and exhibitions in New York, Berlin and Australia. The video below is from ABC Australia about the exhibit at The Australian Centre for Photography in Sydney.



Pick up a copy today.

Not MySpace Anymore

I just watched NAS perform "Sly Fox" on the Colbert Report and it immediately struck me that every time I visit or promote MySpace I am supporting News Corp, Fox News, The New York Post and the whole Rupert Murdoch evil empire.

Screw that!

I am done with MySpace. Just pulled the plug. And if you are sick of Fox News and their "fair and balanced" propaganda pap you should cancel your account too.

Battle Photo: Hungry Eyes!

© Peter Sutherland

vs.

© Andrea Galvani

He Would Look Good Above the Couch

Amani © Jon Feinstein

On Thursday I went to the opening of the I'll Be Your Mirror...So You Can Break Into Endless Shards group exhibition at Heist Gallery. No air-conditioning plus a steady stream of hipsters usually equals bad news in my book, but I was hanging with Amani Olu, Tim Briner, Geoff Ellis, Greg Wasserstom and Ali Malone, so the evening turned out to be a blast.

We were on the premises to support Jon Feinstein and see his piece in the show. And what a striking piece it is (see above)! When I first met Jon and Amani a little over a year ago I thought they were a couple and told them they were very cute together. They still laugh about that today and then quickly change the conversation to their girlfriends and the Jets as they crush beer cans with their manly hands.