Posts by Ken Double
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
Hard News: Music: Watching on Twitter…, in reply to Sacha,
I don't know whether to love the AMAs for boosting Iggy Azalea over the pooh poohing of the purists or resent them for Imagine Dragons. Democracy is ever messy. Must say though, Katy Perry, "Adult Contemporary"? She turns 30 and suddenly she's Stevie Nicks?
-
Hard News: Music: Watching on Twitter…, in reply to Russell Brown,
I was one of the many voters and it wasn’t really possible to go past Pure Heroine – it’s just too important a record.
The Horned One has thee in his power! Admit it, you secretly prefer Ladi6 don'cha? I won't tell.
-
Hard News: Music: Watching on Twitter…, in reply to Sacha,
That wasn't the whole sentence Sacha. I think there was a very strong artistic case for giving the album of the year to Ladi6. Did we need another Lorde moment? (I do think she's great by the way, I just don't think that album makes the claim yet.)
-
Hard News: Music: Watching on Twitter…, in reply to Russell Brown,
Repent Russell, they're the work of bloody Satan. I will say though on the list of winners the only one that sucked was the People's Choice which kinda fucks my populist thesis.
-
I've often wondered what those awards mean to the artists concerned. As a music lover I couldn't give a flying one about them. Maybe it's my creaky punk values but they've never reflected anything I've felt or believed.
Ladi6's record is great and the withheld approbation of a bunch of jobbers doesn't alter that one jot. But does it matter to HER? Does it bug her that they didn't gong her? Because it shouldn't. It really, really, really shouldn't.
Aside from the brilliant Taite which is about giving out money rather than raking it in I can't see the value of these bunfights. I well remember years of the NZ Music Awards tipping the hat to Peking Man or whoever else was the most co-operative act of the year and it was inevitably pathetic and disheartening. It was always the industry saying "you are acceptable to us" rather than an acknowledgement of quality.
I know many of the people involved are well-meaning music lovers but the mean of their opinions is invariably compromise or cowardice. How many years and how much international mana did it take Flying Nun to get one act on the podium? "Ten" and "shitloads" in case you were wondering. The very fact that they felt obliged to give all the doorstops to Lorde this year shows how irrelevant they are in the face of actual power. Hats off to her for doing her bit when she could have easily decided to stay in LA and wash her hair. "Lorde can't be tonight so accepting the award on her behalf etc etc."
If there were no Vodafone NZ Music Awards next year, would one member of the humble music-loving public give a shit? I've got ten bucks says no. And how many artists would just breathe a sigh of relief? I've got twenty that says plenty.
-
Hard News: Friday Music: Virtual…, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
And the shorter, sharper, really minimalist one for The Replacements' 'Bastards of Young'
The ultimate anti-video video of course. They hated MTV with a passion.
In the glory days of C42 - why it feels like it was only last year! - I always enjoyed the electronic show. I'm no bleep-fiend but e-music gives a director more latitude. Possibly because it doesn't (ahem) demand your attention so much. Was that diplomatic?
-
Lee Ann Womack’s crystalline version of “Out on the Weekend” is a fitting intro to her terrific, plainspoken, periodically God-bothery new record, The Way I’m Livin’.
And I’ve given up trying to discern whether there’s a chewy centre to Fazerdaze’s charming earcandy. She’s like a gauzy Frankie Cosmos, if you know who she is.
-
I feel we did some good, in a small way. Stop me now…..
-
Hard News: Friday Music: Cilla!, in reply to Russell Brown,
Dammit.I knew I forgot something.
Gary Steel’s highly readable memoir of Wellington’s In Touch and TOM magazines, for Audioculture.
A raised glass to Fourth Estate, then publishers of NBR, for the "donation" of type galleys, scalpel blades, wax, photocopy toner and bad coffee. Couldn't see Barry Colman sponsoring subversive shit like that.
-
Bless. I remember her Blind Date period well. She was a bit (a lot) of a Thatcherite was our Cilla. Keeping that plonker Andrew Lloyd Webber company while all the proper musicians were down with Red Wedge. Gotta love her though, she's a trooper. 28 takes of Alfie - that's real work that is.