ces petits riens

Roxy Music may not have been the best band to have seen the face of the earth (it paved the way for the careers of both Brian Eno and Bryan Ferry) but they sure had a good eye for great artistic album sleeves, as displayed here. I'm in doubt though, as to whether the group ever produced anything as exhilirating as Bryan Ferry's solo track Slave to Love. Whoever orginally penned down this expression, be it Ferry or someone else, was a genius. Enough said.

For all their superorities and abnormalities and quests to save the world, superheroes also seem to have time to wed each other. Featured liplocking above are Stan Lee's creations Jean Grey and Cyclops (Scott Summers) from Marvel Comics' popular X-men. 

While researching for a list of married superheroes, I instead found a list of superheroes who are not able to have sex and consequently cannot reproduce. It makes sense, there should be quite some. More interesting than so though was the discovery of the the first openly homosexual (and married) superhero pair in print; Apollo and the Midnighter from superhero team The Authority (published by DC Comics. Publisher of Superman and Batman) Like that wasn't interesting, it turns out the pair legally adopted a little girl, Jenny Quantum, from Singapore shortly after marrying. Neat to see that comic books can be so progressive. However, I wonder if some concerned parental organizations stateside are not having a field day over this, declaring a fatwa against such "immoral behaviour"?

This is what conceptual music making is about, at least if you ask frontman Gruff Rhys of music duo project Neon Neon who made an entire vintage mid-'80s synth-pop sounding album, Stainless Steel, drawing inspiration from the life of legendary automobil engineer John DeLorean (known for creating the Pontiac Firebird).

Rhys says about the debut effort of the band:

"The Neon Neon album is a full-on concept record about the wives and lives ... Of John DeLorean, so it's been a real pleasure to write about a specific subject, and to think about various scenarios relating to his life and imaginary scenarios that may have happened to him on the way. And so musically we've been writing in a style that personally mirrored his kind of fast, cocktail-driven lifestyle. ... It's a very frivolous electro-pop record about the first playboy engineer."

You have to admire the dedication that goes into working with a truly conceptual project. Neon Neon's song Raquel (based on Raquel Welch) has been playing at this residency all day long. I guess we've reached the era in time where one basically just urges others to listen to track so-and-so on the application that is Spotify. For all it's worth, check Raquel out.

Although about Ms Welch, it's twice as fun picturing a snazzy Raquel Zimmermann during plays of the track.

Map of the sounds of Tokyo

If the title alone; Map of the sounds of Tokyo, is not enough to make you curious to see this film, then the mere name of helming director Isabel Coixet should. Spanish born Coixet could be descried as Susanne Bier's long-lost twin sister from another mother. Having already directed the thoroughly beautiful My Life Without Me, The Secret Life of Words and Elegy (based on The Dying Animal, a short story by Philip Roth) she is as we speak featured in this year's competiition section for the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Festival. The backdrop of Tokyo and main actors Sergi López (Une Liasion Pornographique, Harry, he's here to help) and Babel's Rinko Kikuchi should help this feature turn out as worthwhile as Coixet's previous work.

The official synopsis reads:

Ryu is a solitary girl whose fragile appearance is in stark contrast with the double life she leads, working nights at a Tokyo fishmarket and sporadically taking on jobs as a hit-woman.

Mr Nagara is a powerful impresario mourning the loss of his daughter Midori, who has committed suicide. He blames David, a Spaniard who runs a wine business in Tokyo.

Mr Nagara's employee, Ishida, was silently in love with Midori and hires Ryu to murder David.

A sound engineer, obsessed with the sounds of the Japanese city and fascinated with Ryu, witnesses this love story which searches the shadows of the human soul, reaching deep into places where only silence has the power of eloquence

It's strongly suggested for whoever is interested to check out the trailer on the film's official website. It looks worth the wait.
www.mapofthesoundsoftokyo.com

Open letter to suedi bananas,

Thank you for having made indie the poor man's __________(Insertion of whatever is the ultra new black). I think I prefered you guys more a handful years ago when you still thought (F)eminem, Linkin' Park and Blink 182 were the coolest thing ever since sliced bread. You remember? Well, just letting you know we've really given up so you can keep whatever you want. Just keep it all, do whatever you want with it. Not that you ever awaited a blessing but  fuck that, let's not any more of this. Just, please, keep hands off Frida Hyvönen and Jenny Wilson and will all get along just fine. Otherwise something will go down.

Open letter to non-dancers,

All of us who actually manage to move gracefully, controlled, while excuding shitloads of confidence and not coming across as looking akward or dorky and moving like from another era in time  that never existed, actually have so much more fun the the rest of you. I host sympathy though, clearly remembering times when dancing was stepping with feet from right to left and back. Whatever I know, I learnt from stealing and picking up moves from friends throught the years. Not trying at all, just makes no sense to me whatsoever. Surely you do realise yourselves what you miss out on?

Seeing great people like late Sir Alfred Hitchcock being paid a hommage is always very pleasant. Even more so, when done by well-classy publication Vanity Fair which always is in an A-league of its very own. Cinematic and narrative photo editorials with frames like the ones featured above only goes to prove just that.

Everyone's a goddam photographer today they think. An expensive digital camera and some basics in Photoshop and you're a self-made photographer. A snap at a picturesque scenery and that's it. It's all too easy to get a beautiful looking shot today, why true talent is seen only in a frame with a clear vision behind it, however simple and natural the frame itself may be. Lucky shots, just don't really count, at least not to me. When viewing an image I want to be convinced it was a very deliberate and conscious effort on the photographer's behalf; that this particular moment of a person gazing at the sun caught the interest of the photographer. Natural photography i.e. unstaged imagery that is not set-up, requires a perfect and sharp eye (in regard to potential subjects) to actually produce a really interesting image. Few people have that or at least fewer than those who don't.

Does children need both a mother and a father while growing up? Are there biological differences between the qualities in men and women, making qualities available in different quantities to the child in a mother and father? Is it perhaps sufficient as long as there is always some sort of  substituting and adequate figures of identification of the same sex present? In the end it appears all too circumstancial for there to be answers applicable for all.

Alfons Åberg was raised single-handedly by his father in what seems as a loving environment. Sure, he got into a fight once and had an imaginary friend called Målgan but he turned out quite alright. Some even say he grew up to become the Prime Minister of Sweden, Fredrik Reinfeldt.

Being interested in coming to terms with preconceived perceptions, my own as well as those of others, I found the quasi-contradiction between porn and intellectualism as subtexted in an interview with porn actress Sasha Grey (who is said to be the Julia Roberts of the adult film industry and heading to become the next Jenna Jamesson. Well, puh-lease, you have heard the name. At least)  to be a little thought-provoking. The inteviewer himself reveals about conducting the telephone interview; "It's also difficult to describe what it's like to hear a voice on the telephone which you've previously heard making such statements as "I'm a dirty whore" (and worse)-and moreover, to have a pleasant, courteous conversation with that voice."  Known as an intellectual porn star, Grey frequently speaks of her love and interest of Nouvelle Vague-director Jean-Luc Godard and existenstialist philosphy and cites the likes of Nietzsche and Baudrillard.

Says Grey about how she is viewed: "A lot of people don't want an intellectual porn star. They don't want a porn star to be a performance artist or a musician or a photographer. They just want the clichéd idea of porn star." Indeed there is a certain nature in people that is unwilling to accept and allow subsequent changes in people and viewing others outside of the box that is whatever role is imposed on them by society. Who wouldn't honestly react to a person out of the "ghetto" reading Sartre and playing the chello with a little enchanting "Oh..." in their mind? I can think of a few, actually many.

It's interesting how Gray speaks of feeling empowered as a woman in porn which is obviously diffuclt for normals to grasp, of which she seems perfectly aware; "Some people believe in God and the devil and some people do not believe in anything. Some people like porn and sex, and other people believe in monogamy. What one person sees as degrading and disgusting and bad for women might make some women feel empowered and beautiful and strong."

Again, regarding points of view there are seldomly "objectively rights", only  "more-commons" and "less-commons".

"Clubbing baby seals is sick and gives Canada a black eye. Don't let the greed of a few tarnish the image of a whole country. Visit Peta.org to learn how you can boost PETA's campaign against cruelty,"

This is what PETA's (People for Ethical Treatment of Animals) ad campain featuring ultra-hip musician, Peaches, (Impeach My Bush, Fatherfucker)  reads. I quite like the word play of "club scene" here and some of the effort  that PETA are making in general in rasing awareness about animal cruelty. I used to belong to this certain law-related organization in which one of the most treasured anthems was about clubbing seals consisting of a cruel discription of how going about. Absolutely hideous it was.  I only ever sang it once. People didn't quite seem to get enough of it though. Sheep.

On another note there is PETA's main target in their activism: campaigning against the use of fur.Targeted is often US Vogue's influential editor in chief, Anna Wintour, for using animal fur in her magazine for years now. At a recent public interview she was met by PETA members in the audience who chanted: "This woman skins animals alive!"  Wintour's immediate facial expression to the stunt has been described  as "a mix of polite restraint and Is there no security in this place?

Currently writing on a short paper for my Law and Gender class, I found the following circumstances in France to be particularly interesting. 

In France a prohibition against wearing a veil and other visibly (discrete ones are still permitted) demonstrative religious symbols at state schools was established through legislation by the Parliament in March 15 2004 after an intense debate in the media with numerous groups voicing an opinion. A noted case that would to start the debate in France originates from 15 years earlier back in 1989 when 3 teenage girls were expelled from an elementary school in the city of Creil for wearing the veil. Disobedience against the law may result in repercussions against a student and has since in force resulted in the expulsion of 50 students (including 3 boys for wearing turbans)

While the emancipation of women and fighting religious "oppression" against women in order to "free" them has been the focus for many of those who stand behind this legislation in France, to think that only gender aspects have played a part would be incorrect. Opinions voiced in favor of the legislation have sometimes disguised as and seemingly "feminist" been made through extreme-conservative points of views on what role Islam should be allowed in the secular French society. While no particular religious symbol is mentioned in the legislation it is widely held and believed that head covering clothing as displayed in Islam has been the main target. The passing of the legislation has been made possible and "justified" by France's maintaining the concept of laicism, a concept of a society where religion and the state are separated. Laicism is established in the present French Constitution. The legislation certainily strikes a chord in some as an extreme measure of entertaining the notion of laicisim.

The nature of the use of the veil is far more complex and nuanced than always acknowledged. Through the perspective of some of these girls the veil, contrary to being oppression, rather marks a sort of self-empowerment in terms of having the freedom over their own body and being in charge of how it may be viewed by others. Only in cases, because there are certainly those as well, where the veil is imposed on women does it come across as reasonable for anyone to even speak along the lines of "oppression". The legislation however puts all veil wearing girls in the same category in its quest to "free" them. Critics of the veil will conclude that despite appearing as by free will for some, these girls de facto lack a choice of their own as what is "the right thing to do" as a Muslim with which they want to comply, is originally being directed to them by others i.e. male interpreters of the Quran. Likely some girls, who are subject to the legislation, do act out of expectations of their family and thus passive pressure.

Yet, even that being the case, what  right does the law have here being opiniated about how people conform to their religious beliefs?

Says Judith Martin a.k.a Miss Manners ( Magdalena Ribbing's American counterpart) on the topic of manners:

One of the major mistakes people make is that they think manners are only the expression of happy ideas. There's a whole range of behavior that can be expressed in a mannerly way. That's what civilization is all about - doing it in a mannerly and not an antagonistic way. One of the places we went wrong was the naturalistic Rousseauean movement of the Sixties in which people said, "Why can't you just say what's on your mind?" In civilization there have to be some restraints. If we followed every impulse, we'd be killing one another.

Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned and Woody Allen and Frank Sinatra should know. During the filming of Roman Polanski's Rosemary's Baby, Farrow was being pressured by her then husband Sinatra to quit the film with an ultimatum; that were she not to comply with his wish, it would see the daylight of their divorce. Persuaded by notorious producer Robert Evans (The Godfather, Love Story), she ended up staying and completing the film and consequently also had the divorce papers delivered to her on set by Sinatra. Farrow made sure Rosemary's Baby would be released in the same week as Sinatra's film The Detective in order for there to be a battle about the biggest draw at the box office. While The Detective was a hit, Rosemary's Baby opened to far greater numbers that week and went on to become one of that year's biggest commercial success. Farrow eventually took out a whole page in trade paper Variety, printing the box office numbers for The Detective and Rosemary's Baby side by side for everyone to know who the champ was. Years later when the Woody Allen scandal broke out in 1992 (Allen left Farrow, his partner of many years for her adoptive daughter Soon-Yi Previn when the latter was 22 and thus 35 years younger than Allen. Although Allen was not the adoptive father of Soon-Yi, Farrow's kids grew up knowing Allen as their father. The affair was found out about when Farrow stumbled across nude pictures of Soon-Yi in Allen's possesion) Sinatra offered Farrow to arrange for Allen's legs to be broken. Farrow didn't need it though, she persistently fought her own war against Allen in the media and at court over custody battle.


Woody Allen, Mia Farrow and Sun-Yi Previn

"A half hour later I am hard again. I stand up and walk over to the armoire, where, next to the nail gun, rests a sharpened coat hanger, a rusty butter knife, matches from the Gotham Bar and Grill and a half-smoked cigar; and turning around, naked, my erection jutting out in front of me, I hold these items out and explain to the girls in a hoarse whisper, "We're not through yet. . . ."  (excerpt from Bret Easton Ellis' novel American Psycho)

I found this anti-Ellis website of which the creators had the following to say about Ellis and his novel:

"Our message to Bret Easton Ellis is this-- We do not find your racist, sexist, homophobic fantasies (or are they really more than just fantasies?) "playful", "satirical", or entertaining. Indeed we are outraged that a book describing such graphic sexual violence, such blatant misogyny, such outright racism and homophobia, has been accepted by mainstream America (it was on the NY Times paperback bestseller list in April). Have we allowed the mind-numbing bombardment of the media to desensitize us to such an extent that we have an unlimited tolerance for violence? When will this woman-hating end?"

Speaking of a hidden gem is out of question, it's currently being played on a daily basis alongside the most shiteous of poor music at the gym and who knows where else but gem it is all the same. The production is tight and the lyrics relatable, i.e. well-scripted. No, it's not an as obvious choice to quote as Brian Eno's By This River, you elitist bitches.

Let me hold you
For the last time
It's the last chance to feel again
But you broke me
Now I can't feel anything
When I love you
It's so untrue
I can't even convince myself
When I'm speaking
It's the voice of someone else

You can't play on broken strings
You can't feel anything
That your heart don't want to feel
I can't tell you something that ain't real

Oh the truth hurts
A lie is worse
I can't like it anymore
And I love you a little less than before.

Oh what are we doing
We are turning into dust
Playing house in the ruins of us.

James Morrisson feat Nelly Furtado- Broken Strings
Photo: Unkown.(Portrayed) Nicolas Duvauchelle & Ludivine Sagnier

Brian Eno's By This River is such a haunting and mellow piece of music. It was very wisely used in the ending scene of Nanni Moretti's 2001 Palme d'Or winner La stanza del figlio (The Son's Room), proving a perfect example of the benefits of good music direction in a film. Just ask Sofia Coppola.

Here we are
Stuck by this river,
You and I
Underneath a sky that's ever falling down, down, down
Ever falling down.

Through the day
As if on an ocean
Waiting here,
Always failing to remember why we came, came, came:
I wonder why we came.

You talk to me
as if from a distance
And I reply
With impressions chosen from another time, time, time,
From another time.

Photo: Director Theo Angepoulous' film Trilogy: The Weaping Meadow

The Kolla! exhibition is currently being displayed at Allmänna Galleriet in Stockholm (Kronobergsgatan 37, Kungsholmen) with contributions from the Kolla! competition which awards artists in main categories such as: Graphic design, Illustration and Moving images.

Above is Swedish illustration guru Jesper Waldersten's (Här kommer  jag, Tack för senast din djävul) contribution entitled Viktor & Rolf that was runner's up in the sub category  Editorial Illustration. From the same sub category, below, is Graham Samuel's Romanov Must Die. The exhibition is ongoing  until May 16.