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Year: 2010

Songs Sans Frontieres: Brazil

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Brazil is big. Not just big, it’s fricking enormous. It’s the fifth largest country in the world, even bigger than Australia. So, what would you expect from a country that big? Well I can tell you – a whole lotta music. There is far too much to talk about for one little box, so I’ve decided to just cover the bigwigs and some of the key genres.

Gilberto Gil, Caetano Veloso and Seu Jorge are the giants of Brazilian music. Especially Gilberto Gil, he is a really big deal because he helped kick-start the tropicália movement with Caetano Veloso and he also used to be Minister of Culture. Carmen Miranda, the lady in the tutti-frutti hat, is also worth mentioning because she popularised Brazilian music (and Brazil in general) when she burst into Hollywood in the ‘30s.

Songs Sans Frontieres – Brazil

These stalwarts have all written lots of good stuff, so I thought I would focus on giving you a taste of a few of the genres. With great size comes great variety, apart from all the obvious genres (yawn) like Brazilian Rock, Brazilian Jazz etc.there are loads of others to get your teeth into like psychedelic tropicália, chilled out bossa nova, gyration-inducing samba and the more traditional sound of forró. Enjoy:

1. Mas Que Nada – Sérgio Mendes & Brasil ‘66 (bossa nova)
2. Petrolina – Juazeiro – Trio Nordestino (forró)
3. Ando Meio Desligado – Os Mutantes (tropicália)
4. Samba da Minha Terra – João Gilberto (samba)
5. Metamorfose Ambulante – Raul Seixas

Asia Lindsay, Music Editor

Column: What would Fiddy do?

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Twitter is, at times, a beautiful thing. In its short history it has been used to document the horrendous events of the Iranian election, bypass the censorship of several oppressive countries and, perhaps most importantly, keep Stephen Fry entertained whilst he was trapped in a lift. Despite this, there is also a dark side to twitter in which we see the very worst of the human psyche, or, to put it simply, 50 Cent has a twitter account.

As part of 50 Cent’s assault on all media (his quite frankly ludicrous videogame and emotionally void film didn’t seem to be enough), ‘Fiddy’ has decided to use twitter as another machine for self publicising. Though this works for most musicians, who tweet occasionally about recording some new song or some soppy nonsense about how much their fans mean, 50 Cent seems to record every single thought in his head. Rather embarrassing really as he is certainly no modern equivalent of Oscar Wilde. Almost every word typed seems to be about sex, money or the size of his penis, which he informs us, is rather large. Though this attitude from a rap artist shouldn’t surprise us, it’s all the more surreal and unsettling when not masked behind beats and occasional auto-tune.

The more you read his tweets, the more childish you see he is. Even beyond the ‘my dick’s bigger than yours’ mantra underlying a lot of his tweets, there are acts of rebellion even the most stereotypical of teenagers would scoff at for how much of a cliché they seem. In the past few weeks, he’s argued with Justin Beiber fans, told us when he’s planning to masturbate and in one instance, he complained that he’s too rich to be taking out rubbish for his grandmother. “Fuck this I’m going home I don’t need this shit”, he protests, showing that he’s less likely to be ‘In Da Club’ so much as in his room, screaming about his parents and how nobody appreciates his poetry.

Luckily for us, beyond the childish front lies the genuinely psychologically disturbing behaviour. You could compile Fiddy’s rambling and bind them, and lo and behold you have the ideal birthday present for Sigmund Freud. One tweet in particular has Fiddy telling us that he’s glad his manhood, or poodle as he calls it at times, doesn’t come off for fear that it would otherwise be stolen. A classic case of castration anxiety for you there Freud. Or maybe he is just a dickhead.

Stolen genitalia are nothing compared to the disturbing amounts of homophobia he’s allowed to post. Threatening to “shoot up” a gay wedding after Perez Hilton called Fiddy a douche bag was particularly shocking, even if it was passed off as a joke later on. Hilarious. One has to wonder if celebrity status is the only thing keeping his account from a ban. Although you wouldn’t have to wonder for very long.

Whichever way you look at it, his account can only serve to make what was already a vile self image even worse and, quite distressingly, has you empathising with the man who shot Fiddy nine times. (And now he walks with a limp.)

Tom Geddes, Music Columnist

Interview: Paul van Dyk

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Having been twice voted No. 1 DJ in the world, and with a Grammy Award and over five million album sales under his belt, Paul van Dyk is something of a legend in the electronic music world. Music Editor Eoghan Bennett sits down with the trance DJ to discuss playing at The Warehouse Project, his new album and growing up in East Berlin.

The Mancunion: Are you excited to be playing in Manchester again?

Paul van Dyk: Absolutely. It’s been two years since I was last here, but it’s always nice to come back. And playing an event as huge as The Warehouse Project is a massive honour. I played with a couple of the other headliners in Ibiza this year so I’m looking forward to playing in a completely different environment.

M: The night is to celebrate ten years of your record label Vandit Records. How do you see the label progressing from here?

PvD: One of the unique things about Vandit Records is that we don’t really have any deals or contracts with our artists. Everybody who is on the label works with us because they want to. Our job is to give the artists advice, and some of our artists will keep giving us new music until we say, “Now you’ve nailed it”. New for this year we’ve joined forces with the Armada label to pool our resources and increase our respective audiences.

Anybody who has been privileged enough to witness the audio-visual feast that is his live shows will know that his techniques are far from orthodox. “I don’t use turntables or CD players. Instead I DJ with two laptops, MIDI keyboard controllers and a custom-made mixer, and that’s what enables me to play completely freely. For example, I could take a sample from a popular track but mix it with a different bassline or different drums, and it will feel so much more intense at the exact point of the set that I play it. I’m able to completely remix things, or even compose something new, on the fly. This creates a rather intense energy and power to the set”.

 

M: So is there a lot of planning that goes into your set, or are of a lot of decisions spur of the moment on the night?

PvD: It’s not so much planning as preparation. I need to know my music inside out in order to be able to play freely. I always try to have a really clear idea of what sound I’m trying to achieve, but everything else is always down to interaction with the crowd. So there’s some things I just can’t prepare for. It’s very much a learning process. I try to take something from every set that will help me improve.

Given the longevity of his career (he has maintained his place in the top 10 DJs in the world since 1998) you’d be forgiven for thinking that commercial success is the driving force behind one of the world’s biggest trance DJs. But Paul van Dyk puts it differently, “I think the reason for me appearing in these polls and lists so often is that I actually don’t care about them. For me it’s always about the music and the interaction with the audience. I really love what I do and that’s why musically my shows have been so popular. It’s nice to be voted one of the best DJs in the world, but that’s not what’s driving me.”

M: So if that’s not, what is?

PvD: “I know it sounds cliché but I just really love what I do. Electronic music is what gets me out of bed in the morning. I’m a freak. I’m in a very lucky position to always have a crowd in front of me that gives me so much back, and that’s what gives me the energy inspiration to continue.”

Paul van Dyk was born in a small town in Germany in 1971, and grew up in East Berlin at the peak of the cold war.

PvD: “My upbringing certainly means my approach to music is somewhat different. I was able to listen to West Berlin radio stations in the East, it was illegal but everybody did it, so we were completely aware of what was going on in the world of music. The difference was there were no record stores where we could buy music, and there were no magazines in which we could read about our favourite artists. So the idea of a pop star completely passed me by. For me it was all about the music because I didn’t know what my favourite artists looked like, or what they had to say.

Between dates on a hectic touring schedule, Paul is currently working on his sixth studio album, due for release in 2011. What can listeners expect?

PvD: “For this album I’m working completely on my own, without a production team. I’m writing it, programming it and playing all the instruments myself. It makes the whole process a little longer, but means the music is a lot more personal and intense. I’ve been playing a few of the new tracks at some of my recent shows and the crowd seems to love them, so I’m really happy so far.”

Album: Surfing The Void – Klaxons

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Klaxons are a bit like to New Rave what Hoover is to vacuum cleaner.

Klaxons – Surfing The Void

Since exploding onto the London Day-Glo party scene in the wake of fellow post-punk revivalists New Young Pony Club and Late of The Pier, the band quickly became synonymous with the genre. However, as quickly as they came to embody the psychedelia inherent in their music, they outgrew it. With Surfing the Void Klaxons faced that classic second-album dilemma: to continue in a similar vein as Myths of the Near Future, the band’s dance-infused debut, or to progress at the risk of alienating dedicated listeners.

Despite early demos of the album reportedly being rejected by the band’s label Polydor for being “too experimental”, it appears that NME protégés Klaxons have matured a little in the three years that have elapsed since their Mercury Prize-winning debut. Whether this is an organic evolution, or just an attempt to distinguish themselves from the hoards of skinny-jeaned indie bands dominating the music scene, is uncertain, but it certainly makes for interesting listening.

‘Flashover’ is a frantic, angular track that alludes to Fat of the Land-era Prodigy, while ‘Extra Astronomical’ features a bass line meaty enough to chew on. However, there is enough familiar material on the album to keep dedicated fans happy. For example, album opener ‘Echoes’ sees the band rediscover the infectious sense of melody responsible for previous hit ‘It’s Not Over Yet’, and ‘The Same Space’ appears to use the exact same vocal sample used on ‘Golden Skans’.

If Myths of the Near Future could be heard as a soundtrack to the youth subculture embodied in Skins, then Surfing the Void will sit more at home at an office party full of 20-something professionals, reminiscing a misspent youth.

Eoghan Bennett, Music Editor

Column: A Piece of Meat

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What separates a drunkard eating a kebab and Lady Gaga? I ask this question on the basis that both will eventually arrive at a party covered in meat. The former will be promptly pushed into a taxi by a disgruntled host, whereas the latter is lauded as brave, brash and above all, brilliant. So really, what separates them? At the risk of an awful pun, the answer is quite simply the fame.

For those of you living under a rock, I refer to the ridiculous spectacle seen at MTV’s Video Music Awards in which the pop superstar wore a dress made of meat. Many attempts have been made over the last week to interpret her “statement” and the issues she addressed. Where one so called expert claims it to have been a feminist statement, another suggests it was a protest in outrage at the US Army’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy and so-on and so-forth (all of course accompanied by stretched metaphors in which the oppressed minority are pieces of meat.) Similarly, one could suggest that the meat represents the bullshit celebrities feed us. We’re so willing to eat it all up without question.

In today’s age of self-important shock tactics and “spontaneous” stunts, surely it would be more shocking to just state your issue. To just tell the world you disagree with the mistreatment of minority X or the hypocrisy of person type Z would command more respect from those of your devoted followers who have a brain in their head. Certainly more people would listen and certainly less offense would be caused. Whether you agree with PETA and animal rights campaigners or don’t, but to wear dead chunks of animal to further your personal cause would be akin to happy slapping the elderly as a statement on youth culture. Needlessly offensive and incredibly short sighted as to the real route to the problem.

The truth is, we all know that the dress most probably means absolutely nothing. Even on the slim chance that there is something meaningful buried behind the butchers display, let us make no mistake as to who or what received exposure from this tasteless stunt. Whatever the perceived issue, whatever the ridiculous statement, Lady Gaga was the news story. Despite how huge she is and despite her undeniable talent at what she does, the limelight still needs that extra tug to stay in her direction.

Tom Geddes, Music Columnist

Album: Man Alive – Everything Everything

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Man Alive – Everything Everything

4 Stars

Without seeming too unsympathetic towards the millions of people across the globe who are fighting tooth and nail to ‘make it’ as musicians in the world of showbiz, the brand of ‘music’ that is espoused by men like Simon Cowell and Louis Walsh is simply the worst thing that has ever happened to our society. Not only does it cheapen the efforts of all of those musicians who have actually taken the time to be original, but it creates a climate where the charts are dominated by the same music week in and week out.

It is lucky for us, then, that Man Alive, the debut album from Manchester natives Everything Everything, has arrived to shake things up a bit and upset the hegemony of bland, corporate indie music that has dominated the charts for so long. Tracks like ‘My Kz, Ur BF’ and ‘Photoshop Handsome’ take a fresh perspective on those twin themes of love and heartbreak that other bands often find it hard to look at originally, while ‘Two for Nero’ and ‘Suffragette Suffragette’ actually include the kind of intellectual lyrics that have long been absent from popular music.

While some people might not agree that Everything Everything are “Pop’s New Picassos”, as the NME has recently claimed, that tickets for next month’s show at the Deaf Institute sold out in less than four hours would be sufficient evidence to support the statement. Whether this album will inspire an entirely new school of music, or whether Everything Everything are better off as a standalone example of what music is capable of when the shackles of convention are broken, is unclear. What is certain however is that Everything Everything are one of the most interesting bands to have graced the airwaves and record shops in a long time.

Daniel Zuidijk

Interview: Two Door Cinema Club

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Two Door Cinema Club

Alex Trimble, Kevin Baird and Sam Halliday, otherwise known as Two Door Cinema Club, are sitting backstage at the Academy 2, admiring the glorious view of the building site in front of the John Rylands library. They may have just driven through the night from Glasgow, but as lead singer Alex starts talking, you can instantly tell they wouldn’t change it for the world.

Alex: We’re having a great time, it’s the fourth date of the tour tonight, the crowds have been great so far and everything’s going really well. It’s quite easy being on the bus, we can get a fair bit of sleep, but we still try to go out after the gigs. We’ve never actually been out in Manchester even though we’ve played here loads.

Kevin: We’ve done Night & Day, the Academy, Academy 3 and the Deaf Institute twice I think, but we’ve always stayed in places like the Travel Inn at the Trafford Centre. I really enjoyed the gig we did at the Deaf Institute last time, but I think they’ve all gone pretty well.

A: People seem to stand back a bit more here, and just relax and watch.

It’s quickly obvious that Baird, Two Door’s bassist, and Trimble are the sort of friends who finish each other’s sentences. Sam, the band’s intricate guitarist, is much quieter, and seems happy to let the other two battle it out to be the unofficial band spokesman.

Sam: I think the shows here have a really good vibe, a nice atmosphere.

A: It’s nice to get back to indoor venues actually, we’ve done a million festivals this summer, and sometimes people don’t know who you are, so it’s cool to come back to gigs where people are there for you

K: It’s good just to have a sound check again! But the festivals were great, Glastonbury took me back the most, it was one of the first we did, and suddenly we were on the Other Stage playing to thousands of people, it was kind of unbelievable.

A: Reading was one of the best shows I’ve ever played, the atmosphere were unbelievable. But Glastonbury was fantastic too, there weren’t really any bad ones know I think of it. Everyone’s just out to have a good time aren’t they.

K: They just want to get out a sun tan, and see some bands, so everybody’s having great fun. We saw loads of bands this summer, we shared a lot of festivals with Foals, and seeing The Strokes was amazing.

A: I think Queens of the Stone Age at Pukkelpop was the best for me.

S: And we managed to see The National about four times, and they were always brilliant. But we’ve had a pretty good summer in all, no rubbish gigs that I can remember.

K: There’s been interesting ones, like playing at a Korean beach festival where all the acts were DJs except for us and Kanye West, which seems like the strangest line-up.

A: Last year we seemed to always be getting put on the dance stages, and then this year we seem to have been put on the more commercial stages, like the Other Stage at Glastonbury, or the Radio1/ NME stage at Leeds & Reading. But yeah we always seemed to get lumped with dance bands at festivals before.

K: We seem to be back to back with Delphic at pretty much every festival.

Since their debut album Tourist History came out in March, Two Door have been on the road pretty much constantly, and following this month’s UK tour, they’re heading off to America, before coming back for a tour of mainland Europe just before Christmas, and then heading off to Asia in the new year.

K: I’m sure the tours are gonna fly by, but it’s kind of hard to see past the tour and think about new material, because it’s essentially like doing a world tour. Somebody posted on our Facebook ‘see you in Kansas in twenty days’, and it’s only now that’s really sinking in.

Charlie Rawcliffe, Music Editor

Album: Flamingo – Brandon Flowers

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Flamingo – Brandon Flowers

2 Stars

The progression from frontman to solo artist is a well documented one. Morrissey, Richard Ashcroft, Sting – all have tried their hand at breaking away from the constraints of a rock band democracy to pursue their own creative interests. But the one thing that the above have in common is that their music ends up sounding exactly like that of their associated acts, just not quite as good. And with the release of debut solo album Flamingo, Brandon Flowers can now be added to this list.

While the formulaic pop structures that Flowers has perfected over the course of three Killers albums are put to good use here (take the Sam’s Town-esque anthemic choruses and big orchestration on opening track ‘Welcome To Fabulous Las Vegas’ for example), the glam-rock aesthetic that we’ve become so accustomed to has been stripped of both glamour and rock, no doubt leaving Killers fans feeling nostalgic.

The dream-like ‘Only The Young’ sees Flowers stumble upon a musical wasteland, while on annoyingly catchy bonus track ‘The Clock Was Tickin’’, he lends his southern drawl to what at first appears a homage to alt-country, but just turns into a farcical attempt at Guthrie-inspired talking blues.

But it would be unfair to judge this collection of songs by Killers standards, and there are some gems. A collaboration with Jenny Lewis on ‘Hard Enough’ brings some much-needed respite from Flowers’ dreary warbling, and the more up-beat ‘Jilted Lovers & Broken Hearts’ is one of the few songs on the album with substance and direction, resembling ‘Losing Touch’ and ‘Spaceman’. And of course there’s ‘Crossfire’, the album-teaser released last month, which is basically a re-working of Killers classic ‘Human’.

However, for all its introspective musings, emotional urgency and widescreen imagery, Flamingo is just missing something. And it might just be the other three band members.

Eoghan Bennett, Music Editor

Warehouse Project: Simian Mobile Disco Preview

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With a supposed techno-based new album coming out later this year, SMD could be bringing a heavier sound to Warehouse than they ever have before. But still, expect plenty of analogue bleeping, and some of their Kitsuné remixes of Klaxons, Air and Muse. As SMD are in control of the whole line-up, it’s a bit of a mixed bag of sounds, but with real class throughout. There’s ex-Primal Scream producer and Electro DJ Andy Weatherall, the thumping Disco sounds of Hercules and Love Affair, the minimalist electro of Paris’s Smagghe, and LCD Soundsystem remixers Holy Ghost.

So it may not turn out to be the most cohesive night on the calendar at Warehouse, but all the acts are top quality in their own niches, and if anywhere’s going to make a line-up like this work it’ll be The Warehouse Project.

Charlie Rawcliffe, Music Editor

Warehouse Project: Maximo Park Preview

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This year’s Warehouse Project starts with one of only a handful of nights featuring live bands rather than DJs. The club’s opening night on the Thursday of Welcome Week features headliners Maximo Park, who boast two double platinum albums to their name, as well as sell out tours in the UK and abroad. Supporting them are Metronomy and Chapel Club, the former an entertaining if slightly odd band who will fit into the Warehouse Project like a hand into a glove; the latter an up and coming London band who are already being compared to the likes of White Lies and the Editors.

The Warehouse project doesn’t do things by halves, and if you like live music, this is certainly one not to be missed!

Michael Hoyle, Music Editor

Warehouse Project: Ian Brown Preview

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Ian Brown is a certified Mancunion musical icon. Now seven albums down since the split of the Stone Roses, he’ll be playing his second huge Manchester gig of the year. While early June’s Platt Fields Park night was fantastic, the Warehouse Project gig promises even more. With Factory favourite Mike Pickering on beforehand, as well as Special Guests yet to be announced (most likely Scratch Perverts or UNKLE), it’s going to be a fantastic start to Warehouse’s last full weekend of gigs.

Sure, he may not roll through the Stone Roses hits like some want him too, but there’s more than enough in his solo repertoire to turn it into a truly epic night. Just ask anyone who was at that Platt Fields Park gig; or anybody in Fallowfield who could just hear the window rattling bass. Even they will have loved it. Not one to miss.

Charlie Rawcliffe

Warehouse Project: Doves Preview

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Manchester band Doves are the second live band to headline the Warehouse Project this year.  The band, who recently released their greatest hits album, have been a favourite in the city since they were formed here in the early ‘90s. Doves said in a recent interview for The Daily Record that they plan to take a two year break, so this could be the last chance to see them live for some time.

Supporting Doves are ex The Beta Band singer Steve Mason, and Field Music, who reunited last year to record a third album, and have been personally chosen by Belle and Sebastian to play their Bowlie Weekender festival in Sussex in December. Regulars on the Manchester circuit, Mike Pickering and Now Wave DJs top off the bill.

Michael Hoyle, Music Editor

Music festivals round up: WOMAD

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My friends and I are waiting in Paddington Station but one of the group looks disgruntled. Finally he utters, “why exactly are we going to a World Music festival?” The correct answer was that we had failed to get tickets to Glastonbury, or any other festival for that matter, but this is still a touchy subject so instead I tried, “it’ll be fun?!”, adding, “there’ll be cider?”.He looks unconvinced and I could understand why.

World music doesn’t exactly have a great reputation. What usually springs to mind is a form of African drumming supported by an audience of alternative types who have non-specific media jobs, live in Shoreditch and wear vegetarian shoes.

On arrival our fears quickly vanish. There is a spirit of fun that permeates the entirety of Charlton Park, setting WOMAD apart from other festivals. The people are in high spirits, pleasant and friendly, plus the evenings were not accompanied with a feeling of unease familiar at so many other festivals. The music helps too; you just can’t fail to find enjoyment in Rolf Harris, or in a rendition of ‘Shaft’ by the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain. It is not all whimsical either. The appearance of the likes of DJ Don Letts or Angelique Kidjo ensures that the festival still had an edge.

The concept of world music is frankly misleading. The line up consisted of a multitude of terrific pop and soul acts that successfully draw on a variety of influences, that made me consider the Top 40 in dismay.

Furthermore the performances were of unbelievably high quality, with artists understanding how to entertain an audience whilst also commanding great technical skill. A particular highlight was Ska Cubano on the BBC Three stage, hidden amongst a wooded part of Charlton Park. Their mix of Cuban and Jamaican influences coupled with a real sense of rhythm and exuberance meant that I couldn’t help but smile and dance into the night.

Becca Luck

Music festivals round up: Glastonbury

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Stevie Wonder, Muse, The Gorillaz, Snoop Dogg, Flaming Lips, The Pet Shop Boys, Fatboy Slim, Willie Nelson, LCD Soundsystem and Faithless all graced the two main stages at Glastonbury this year. Not bad work for a festival ruin by a bushy bearded farmer.

So who stole the show? Well Wayne Coyne of Flaming Lips rolled atop the crowd in his giant hamster-ball during the band’s headline set on the Other Stage, before heading back to the stage so they could play an awe-inspiring set spanning the entirety of their near twenty year career. Stevie Wonder rolled out the hits as he closed the festival, finishing with a duet of ‘Happy Birthday’ to celebrate Glasto’s 40th Birthday. Muse brought the usual array of lasers, LEDs and giant screens, and even managed to fit in a cameo from U2’s the Edge amongst Matt Bellamy’s rabid guitar solos.

Mumford and Sons set the record for most teenagers crammed into a tent on the Friday evening, Laura Marling’s blissful set in the Park was made complete with the engagement of two members of the crowd partway through, and Radiohead’s Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood staged perhaps the least secret secret-gig of all time, and were met by almost deafening cheers from their falafel-holding crowd.

There were disappointments, but at a festival of Glastonbury’s size that can hardly be avoided. The most high profile let downs were headliners Gorillaz, with Damon Albarn forgetting to introduce any of his thousands of guest stars, resulting in one crowd member mistaking Lou Reed for Fabio Capello. Damon’s voice was sketchy, and most of the crowd seemed to have only come for ‘that one with the fat bloke from the Happy Mondays on it’. Elsewhere the Pet Shop Boys managed to perform the most underwhelming set in the festival’s history, the BBC continued its tradition of ignoring the Park Stage (host of The xx, Laura Marling, Empire of the Sun and Stornoway amongst others) and for the second year in a row there was a disappointing lack of mud.

Overall though the fortieth year was another huge success, with the great performances far outweighing the poor, and speculation for next year has already begun, with U2, Radiohead and Kylie Minogue currently being the bookies favourites. But even if the artists are unclear, it’s bound to be another sell out when tickets go on sale on the 3rd of October, so if you’re planning on going, you’d better not blow all that student loan in Welcome Week!

Charlie Rawcliffe, Music Editor

Wild Animus

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Wild Animus was originally released in 2004, so I presumed was at one point a big seller. However, Amazon.co.uk are selling the original at a meagre £0.01, and the re-vamped version, including the CDs, from the bargain basement price of £5.50.

If you were to read the blurb on the back of Wild Animus, and I do urge you to as it’s a hoot, you would find yourself even more confused as to what the book is about and what audience it is aimed at. The prominent review is by Climbing Magazine, and the feature extract is “The sweetest kiss leaves a chest wound” – what does this all mean?

I have a theory, profoundly based on the following two lines, “To tell his story, Shapero has crafted a new art form that intricately interweaves book and music. Contained in this box is the complete storytelling experiment: a novel, Wild Animus, and three CDs, The Ram, The Wolves and Animus.”

Within the above lines the word “experiment” leapt off the page with some force. Particularly as I was reading the book in an attempt to work out why they might be giving it away free at the Students’ Union. Now, we are a generation that have been technological guinea-pigs several times; the mobile phone and Facebook to name just two. Wild Animus was already giving me flashbacks to long forgotten evenings, sat listening to Roald Dahl tapes and reading the book simultaneously, when we were what, five or six?

Is this what authors now think we want to read/hear? I sincerely hope not because the only word I have been able to think of to describe it is “tosh”.

Bitter In The Mouth

Written by Mancunion on . Posted in Books.

The title of Monique Truong’s Bitter in the Mouth comes from the protagonist’s “auditory-gustatory” synaesthesia, a rare condition that causes Linda Hammerick to literally taste the words she hears. Her own name evokes the taste of fresh mint, while other words and their unpleasant tastes — characterpickledwatermelonrind or prunescallion — she attempts to avoid entirely. The title, however, could perhaps also refer to the bitter secrets of the Hammerick family that hang tangibly in the air but are rarely spoken about openly.
One of the novel’s strengths is how judiciously these ‘secrets’ are revealed to the reader. Divided into two sections, CONFESSION and REVELATION, the novel’s final pages deliver several exposés that entirely change everything the reader has learnt up to that point. Such a narrative structure makes the basis for an intensely enjoyable novel: its pace is slow, but the thorough examination of one girl’s family and its skeletons creates a vibrant, detailed picture of dysfunction and diaspora in 20th century southern America.
The main focus of the novel is arguably what it’s like to grow up different from your family and friends. Linda’s synaesthesia is a burden that prevents her from true emotional intimacy, the only person who knows about it is her childhood best friend Kelly, whose short-lived attempt to catalogue the ‘incomings’ fizzles out quickly. While Linda’s great-uncle’s homosexuality is never discussed, leaving him to live his life in ashamed solitude. The two characters are painted as unlikely life companions: both are described as each other’s “first loves”, and both act as each other’s confidantes through the years, but there are some secrets that even these two feel they cannot share.
Linda and ‘Baby’ Harper bond over their mutual exclusion from the family mainstream, and one of the novel’s legacies is its undeniable assertion that, while blood is supposedly thicker than water, the taste it leaves is undeniably bitter.

Inheritance of Loss

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Kiran Desai’s 2006 award winning novel The Inheritance of Loss, is the story of a few connected individuals based in a small hill station Kalimpong, located in North East India in the 1980’s. Having been to Kalimpong myself and lived for long summer vacations in hillside towns, I find Desai’s descriptions and eye for detail nothing short of extraordinary.
Sai is an orphaned teenage girl who lives with her grandfather, a retired judge who studied in Cambridge, in what was once a mansion high in the mountains. She falls in love with her mathematics tutor despite their different backgrounds and upbringing. Also involved in the narrative is Biju, the son of the judge’s cook. Biju is an illegal immigrant working in New York City, desperately moving from one job to another in search of a better livelihood.
Part of the book’s magic is Desai’s seamless transition from describing small town India and New York City in the 1980’s, to pre-second world war England. Desai describes the judge’s life as a student in England, where he feels socially inadequate due to him being born and raised in a village in India. Upon his return to India, to join the civil service, he suddenly finds his wife and others in his family backward. As a stark background to the narrative, Desai tells of the separatist movements which engulfed India at the time. One of which, the Nepalese Ghurkha movement, Sai’s tutor and lover Gyan becomes involved in.
Each of the characters in the book have an air of desperation around them; the cook longing to see his son, Sai determined to leave Kalimpong to travel the world, and the judge desperate to forget his past which continues to haunt and humiliate him. Desai captures this brilliantly and as the tales unravels, the reader tends to feed of their desperation as well.

Hotel Iris

Written by Mancunion on . Posted in Books.

Not one for the fainthearted, Yoko Ogawa explores exploitative sexual politics and power relations in her newest novel Hotel Iris. This dark and dreamlike novel illuminates the clandestine, sadomasochistic relationship, of seventeen year old Mari with a sixty seven year old man, the ‘translator’.
The narrative is laden with symbolism, as Ogawa subtly establishes the reasons for their particular sexual roles. These carefully placed hints and suggestions, which act as explanations for the characters attraction to each other, are slightly overshadowed by the graphic sexual scenes that verge on the voyeuristic. Coupled with the dramatic age gap between the characters, this can make for some uncomfortable reading.
However, I would not box it off as flatly pornographic. The depth of the novel is demonstrated by the intricate power relationships that go on in a small Japanese tourist village. These influences shape and mould Mari’s need to submit, and the translator’s need to dominate. Their contradictory insecurities are broken down, inverted, and recreated continually as the scenes change from bedroom to restaurant. As the relationship develops Ogawa seems to question who the truly dominant character is. The binary between strong and weak is a constant theme in the novel. From small interactions to larger, the more significant meetings each character is embroiled in shifts the power. Everything is a struggle of either domination or submission. However, power is fluid in the novel and never rests with one character for long. The binary between sadist and masochist is not so fixed at Hotel Iris.

Life of Pi

Written by Mancunion on . Posted in Books.

It has been eight years since Life of Pi was published to international critical acclaim, and won the 2002 Man Booker Prize. Martel’s novel shot to the top spot in lists and charts, flying off the shelves in airport bookshops, later to be spotted wherever there was sea, sand and sun. Sometimes with excessive hype there is the inevitable disappointment, the feeling of dread that a book simply cannot live up to your heightened expectations. However, there are some books which somehow manage to exceed your hopes. A story which makes you forget the reason you picked it up in the first place, whisks you off, and doesn’t drop you until you’ve finished the last page. Life of Pi is such a one.
Suspending your disbelief is a relatively important factor when reading the synopsis, but as with all fantastic novels, this is usually done for you with no conscious effort on your part. We spend the majority of the book on a boat, drifting about the Pacific Ocean with a sixteen year old Indian boy, a hyena, a zebra, an orang-utan and a Bengal tiger. Stranded, after the cargo ship they were travelling aboard was destroyed in a storm, Pi is forced to co-habit with animals in possession of ever-growing appetites. As he fights hunger, thirst and delirium, the conviction of Martel’s writing ensures the reader is never left questioning the ridiculousness of the situation. The book ends on a marvellous twist, which, as all good twists do, alters your entire perception of the novel up to that point. A modern masterpiece.

Rowling vs. Bronte

Written by Mancunion on . Posted in Books.

An online survey of the Top Five female authors (albeit a survey with very few votes), has placed Sophie Kinsella and J K Rowling in its Top three. When considering the ‘Top’ authors, it seems that some people have forgotten the greats, the classics, the timeless masterpieces, in favour of those with recent places on bestseller lists and Hollywood success. Can we really brush aside the likes of Virginia Woolf, Mary Shelley and Charlotte Bronte, whose greatest works have endured centuries and show no signs of losing popularity, to make room at the top for Becky Bloomwood and Harry Potter?
Have a gander at http://www.makefive.com/categories/entertainment/books/top-5-female-authors