Nothing lasts
I have to resist the urge to link to every one of his posts, but mark k-punk's latest missive is especially interesting in the light of all those death-of-classical-music, death-of-jazz, death-of-rock type articles you see. It's struck me in my post-teen years (the teen years spent busily and futilely protesting that rock* is vital) that while these things aren't dead they're not really alive; an observation I never really said anything about, so once again I'm struck by someone else saying it in a way that makes me realise if I hadn't been so lazy I might have been on to something:
Cultures have vibrancy, piquancy only for a while. Lyric poetry, the novel, opera, jazz had their Time; there is no question of these cultures dying, they survive, but with their will-to-power diminished, their capacity to define a Time lost. No longer historic or existential, they become historical and aesthetic - lifestyle options not ways of life.
Still, better him than me - I wouldn't have put it half as well. The rest of the post is even better. It makes you (me) want to start a band, one that doesn't talk to the NME and doesn't accept awards and doesn't pretend to hate only acceptable bands and doesn't do a bunch of other half-articulated things.
*(for a particular value of "rock", obviously)
Cultures have vibrancy, piquancy only for a while. Lyric poetry, the novel, opera, jazz had their Time; there is no question of these cultures dying, they survive, but with their will-to-power diminished, their capacity to define a Time lost. No longer historic or existential, they become historical and aesthetic - lifestyle options not ways of life.
Still, better him than me - I wouldn't have put it half as well. The rest of the post is even better. It makes you (me) want to start a band, one that doesn't talk to the NME and doesn't accept awards and doesn't pretend to hate only acceptable bands and doesn't do a bunch of other half-articulated things.
*(for a particular value of "rock", obviously)
