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Caethua - The Long Afternoon of Earth
http://bit.ly/8e4dns
Here is a link to my most recent review on The Silent Ballet. The initial paragraph was cut, but I'd like to include it here. I thought I was making a valid point about why it was appropriate to review a (seemingly, from one perspective) vocal-centered album on a site such as ours. Which in turn makes a larger point about 'post-rock,' again as distinct from mere instrumental music, which is a completely neutral term without the historical context implied by the former. The fact that I could make this point with Zizek and gay penetration was a bonus, but also relevant because the artist in question, solo artist no less, is a woman. I'm being a bit playful, but also making a more or less serious point, both employing Zizek and poking fun at him at the same time.
Caethua - The Long Afternoon of Earth
Most instrumental rock is characterized by its distinct lack of vocals (much the way the female identity can be said to have been constructed around the lack of a phallus). The difference between classical music and opera, for instance, is then distinct from the difference between rock and ‘post-rock.’ Throughout the late 20th century, concomitant with the ascent of ‘postmodernism,’ rock underwent a transformation; adopting drones, gradually retreating from conventional narratives and structures, abandoning vocals. To continue with the gendered metaphor, the Slovenian philosopher and rabble-rouser Zizek, following Lacan, suggests that “standard heterosexual sex is the most homosexual act. It seems to me that gay penetration realizes and confronts the phantasmic support of straight sex too directly.” That is, those engaged in the act are always already imagining a voyeur, a gaze directed at and observing the act. Similarly- and perhaps this connection isn’t as neat as I’d like- Caethua (aka the multi-talented, multi-instrumentalist Clare Hubbard) here presents us with a vocal driven album that, in it’s queering of the role of the vocals, is as ‘instrumental’ of an album as one actually lacking vocals, precisely because it does have vocals. Make sense? (I never liked Lacan anyway.)
read the whole review here
Here is a link to my most recent review on The Silent Ballet. The initial paragraph was cut, but I'd like to include it here. I thought I was making a valid point about why it was appropriate to review a (seemingly, from one perspective) vocal-centered album on a site such as ours. Which in turn makes a larger point about 'post-rock,' again as distinct from mere instrumental music, which is a completely neutral term without the historical context implied by the former. The fact that I could make this point with Zizek and gay penetration was a bonus, but also relevant because the artist in question, solo artist no less, is a woman. I'm being a bit playful, but also making a more or less serious point, both employing Zizek and poking fun at him at the same time.
Caethua - The Long Afternoon of Earth
Most instrumental rock is characterized by its distinct lack of vocals (much the way the female identity can be said to have been constructed around the lack of a phallus). The difference between classical music and opera, for instance, is then distinct from the difference between rock and ‘post-rock.’ Throughout the late 20th century, concomitant with the ascent of ‘postmodernism,’ rock underwent a transformation; adopting drones, gradually retreating from conventional narratives and structures, abandoning vocals. To continue with the gendered metaphor, the Slovenian philosopher and rabble-rouser Zizek, following Lacan, suggests that “standard heterosexual sex is the most homosexual act. It seems to me that gay penetration realizes and confronts the phantasmic support of straight sex too directly.” That is, those engaged in the act are always already imagining a voyeur, a gaze directed at and observing the act. Similarly- and perhaps this connection isn’t as neat as I’d like- Caethua (aka the multi-talented, multi-instrumentalist Clare Hubbard) here presents us with a vocal driven album that, in it’s queering of the role of the vocals, is as ‘instrumental’ of an album as one actually lacking vocals, precisely because it does have vocals. Make sense? (I never liked Lacan anyway.)
read the whole review here
posted by tno at 02:38
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