Subject: RE: 13 Gen'ers<-----the creative bunch
From: Malcolm Lawrence (Malcolm@wolfenet.com)
Date: Fri Mar 07 1997 - 04:23:16 GMT
"Malcs, my man, you only mentioned the creative sell outs. What about the
creative non- sell outs? Fugazi, Branford Marsalis (momentary glitch with
the Tonight Show), Wynston Marsalis (like Branford, he did sell out to
Columbia but never compromised his music), Spike Lee, Liz Phair, Bjork,
Frente, Indigo Girls, and many others. "
Yeah, I admit my list wasn't as subversive as it should have been. I didn't
really have the time or inclination to put down a whole shopping list and
only really wanted to emphasize how Ani Defranco in particular....I mean,
not only is she a performer but she started her own record label at 19. Not
too shabby, and here's hoping she has another 60 or 70 years LEFT. Yeah,
Liz Phair is hot, so are the Indigo Girls. PJ Harvey naturally.
Even though I only just posted this a couple of weeks ago I thought I'd
remind Sasha of Pete Townshend's words about the fallacy of separating
things into generations:
"Since the second World War, certainly in America and in Europe, you've
seen groups of people form themselves into generations. That's a big
mistake. That's wrong. And that's why Kurt Cobain is dead. But then there's
people that think, "Ah, we've learned from this." But they haven't. They've
not experienced anything. The people that have learned the lesson of Kurt
Cobain's death are really just a handful of people that are very close to
him. His wife, his poor little kid who's going to grow up in the spotlight
without a father, and the other guys in the band. Look at my generation.
How did that work? Jimi Hendrix. Brian Jones. Janis Joplin. Keith Moon. The
list is fucking endless. They're dead people. My life is full of dead
people. My friends are dead. My friends. They might be your fucking icons.
They're my fucking friends. They're dead. Dead people in my life. Lots of
them. People that I knew, fucked, loved, played with, grew up with. Now, we
have Generation X which is responding to this big significant moment, which
is Kurt Cobain committing suicide, and I just think this shouldn't happen
again. It will happen again, but it shouldn't. In the 60s, we really
thought that we were changing the world and we didn't. When we got college
degrees and jobs and became lawyers and politicians, then we started to
change the world. If you want to change the world, you have to get out
there and change it. Music is not going to change it. Music changes the way
you live in the world. It changes the way you see it. But it doesn't change
the world itself."
Back to Sasha:
"I think it is an interesting but decidedly whiney generation with nothing
real to fight against but feels the need to feel tortured anyway simply
because there is nothing to fight again - whose biggest claim to faim (sic)
is
that they aren't the Baby Boomers. A generation raised on eight hours of
television. Perhaps we are all a generation of brilliant artists, the
likes of whom haven't been seen since the Renaissance itself. Somehow, I
doubt that. But hell, I could be wrong. Besides, I am positive the
really good artists are still hidden amid the bright lights big shitty."
Do you hang out with any artists Sasha, or do you just believe what the
media tells you about this generation?
"As you've stated. I'm still waiting to be proven wrong. I'm telling you
the closest thing I've seen to genius ain't coming America. It's PJ
Harvey. I'd say she's the most amazing thing to come along in a century
at least. But I wouldn't ever, in a million years, called her a
generation xer. The very idea is absurd. I mean, what the hell is that
anyway?"
So you've just contradicted yourself. The only artist that to you nears
genius is someone whom you wouldn't include in her own peer group, and it
is this particular peer group which you rail at for not producing a genius
that you can be proud of. Gordian knot now, innit? Nail on the head, eh
wot? One doesn't go to school and get a degree that says "I'm a great
artist," they evolve over time and every generation since the dawn of time
has had them.
I think the thing that disturbs me most about your post Sasha is your
solipsistic tone, as if the great artists are here for your edification and
perusal and no one seems to turn your crank anymore. As an artist myself I
get furious when people say "Where are OUR giants?" I picture them holding
a TV remote control pushing buttons. "Come on, GIANTS! Give me idols and
heroes and gods and goddesses, damnit!"
Find a dearth of giants and idols and heroes and gods and goddesses? Fine.
What's so important about your current situation that you can't be one
yourself? As Billy Bragg once sang: "Start your own revolution and cut out
the middle man."
Or to quote little Johnny Young from the Lanford Wilson play "Fifth of
July":
"After they had explored all the suns in the universe, and all the planets
of all the suns, they realized that there was no other life in the
universe, and that they were alone. And they were very happy, because then
they knew it was up to them to become all the things they had imagined they
would find."
Malcolm
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