Metamatic Forums John Foxx John Foxx Moving Through Old Daylight seminar

lol glad I wasn't the only one who thought this 'seminar' was a load of old balls

My other half (who has, bless him, heard more John Foxx and watched more wierd British sci-fi such as 'The Stone Tape' than any normal man should have to suffer) quipped that it was rather like the panelists were a bit skint, and were gonna be meeting up at the John Foxx gig to have a chat anyways, and decided they would chance their arms and charge people £2 each to listen to it.

In terms of elementary professionalism, it was balls: the Roundhouse made us stand in a queue outside on one of the hottest days of the year, for nearly half an hour past the "doors open" time, for no apparent reason, then we got to sit and wait inside for close to another half hour... the bloody thing only was meant to be an hour in the first place!
And I cannot stand "talks" when the speakers have no clue how to use a mic! HINT: point the mic at the mouth. Get the speaker to talk into it.
I could hear alright, but dunno if folk at the back could.

As for the content - well, meh.
Fisher appeared flustered and scattered, not really introducing himself or the panelists or really explaining what they were talking about or why.
And really, whilst I can take the sorts of ideas they were tossing around so far, as kinda interesting musings, I felt it went far beyond that and I began to imagine I was watching some kind of farcical Monty Python spoof panel discussion.
It also reminded me of why I ultimately cancelled my subscription to 'The Wire' magazine....

"Hi, I'm Ian Banks! I lived in a squat for years and spent most of the time filming irrelevant crap on a wonky Super8 which finally broke. So I forgot about it and left a all the footage lying in my room cos I'm a bit of a messy pig. Anyways, 30 years later I gave some bits of it to John Foxx and he picked about 3 minutes out of 30 hours of it and put some random sounds against it and we thought it looked really cool! lol! And it had old things I filmed in 1974 in it and, you know what - they look different now! WOW!"

"Yeah hi were in Ghostbox or some sh1t like that and we're really cool cos we were kids in the 70s and we like cool things like 'The Stone Tape' and sh1t like that cos we're cool, y'know? Anyways we got all this random footage and random noises and put it on our Mac and yeah it looked all wierd and we thought it was cool! WOW! And like it's really cool because like if you watch some cool old TV programme, the hairstyles are all old like in the 70s and the shop fronts look a bit different! WOW! This proves our theory about the Brontosaurus which is our theory, by us (that is to say: we) and what this theory is is that the cool things about the past are different to today because things were different in the past, because things change, but if you look at them, today, in the present, you can see they are from the past. This is our cool theory. It is by us."

...

But hey,
doubtless they recontextualised the blurred margins of the present within the framework of the past presentation of the future and a nexus of coolness cross-mediated by the interchange of Jane Asher's hair with the Radiophonic Workshop.

(HINT: The Stone Tape is not just COOL because it's an old telly programme that no-one much has heard of that you happen to have watched and it happens to be from 1972 and so looks and sounds a bit old:
it is primarily cool because it is a GOOD STORY with GOOD CHARACTERS and GOOD DIALOGUE written by a GOOD WRITER (Nigel Kneale) and acted by GOOD ACTORS (Ian Cuthbertson, Mike Bryant, Jane Asher), well directed, well lit, well shot, good sets, good soundtrack..... and it was good IN 1972, when it was in the PRESENT, and it is not just cool now because Ghostbox happen to like it).

AARGH.


Needless to say, when they announced that they wanted to finish by showing another 20 minute film of random grotty footage accompanied by random sounds, we thought
"er that's OK guys, I think we'll pass"... a nice meal in a nice restaurant before John Foxx seemed much more tempting.

(Cos John Foxx is GOOD primarily cos he writes GOOD SONGS with GOOD SOUNDS and GOOD TUNES and GOOD LYRICS and PLAYS THEM WELL ON STAGE, not because he is recontextualising the blurred margins of his own arse from 1980 or blah blah blah. As an investigation into this theory, it may be noted that they audience all cheered and enjoyed hearing good songs like "Underpass" and "Slow Motion" at the gig).

Quote of the day!
Well put, and I completely agree with you.

I am the idiot in the front row whose iPhone dropped on the floor when I actually fell asleep, which says as much about the discussion as about my having had no sleep since the Pixies gig the previous night.

I agree; our MC appeared to be having an anxiety attack, which wasn't enormously reassuring.

For the 2986267 people who stampeded out before the 20 minute film, I can report that it consisted entirely of grievous abuse of the old ATV logo with a Spirograph.

LMAO!

I’d love to add to what Feline and Darren have said but I can’t – that pretty much says it all.

I think for me personally, it was quite an eye-opener because I’ve championed and I’ve been behind the Ghost Box label for quite some time now – so it was a bit of a shock for me to sit there and watch and realise that sadly, the emperor was now parading in his new clothes.

But this was precisely what I was worried about in the Hauntology thread;

“I'm kinda worried this genre will be over soon. It’s reached a point now where you sort of know exactly what a release is going to sound like before you’ve heard it – so there’s a sort of check-list mentality creeping in (“hey let’s sample a 70s public information film!…”)”

And sadly that’s what happened on Saturday afternoon.

I disagree with Feline about Sinclair’s film. Yes, Sinclair freely admits the film had been created and then shelved (he even refers to this in his books) only for Foxx to exhume it and shine his particular light and sound through it. But it worked. For those who didn’t attend, it’s not that dissimilar in feel and look to the films that Macoto Tezka created for the D.N.A. album.

Sinclair’s film was beautiful and clearly personal; his wife Anne in a lime green Quant dress, Jackie O haircut. Walking the streets / Curled up by the Dansette listening to what looked like Clear Spot by Captain Beefheart. Sinclair himself – not the academic, but the younger one looking like someone out of Mungo Jerry. Filmed on out of date stock because that’s all he could afford. All scored by Foxx. It was clearly ‘meant’, it was clearly loved. And it so clearly exposed Ghost Box as forgeries.

It became clear that Sinclair and Ghost Box were poles apart in their thinking – Sinclair even quietly hinted at this during the discussion. I spoke to Mark Fisher about it afterwards and he said he didn’t notice this at all. The audience did. So much so that as Darren brilliantly puts it above there was pretty much a stampede for the exit.

Darren – so you’re the other bloke who watched the 20 minute abuse of the old ATV logo with a Spirograph!

Garry

I guess I would call myself "a musician",
and my approach to all this kinda artsy stuff is:
yes, the equipment and practical techniques you use to make your art undoubtedly have an effect on it,
and it can be very interesting and useful to be aware of these kinda things, and the sort of artistic and emotional nuance these elements of form and method can bring to the content of your 'art'.
So, by all means, let's look at what feel grainy Super8 can evoke and note that by putting some sentimental abstract music over some random doggrel footage, you can make it seem lovely and poignant...
...but when people start fetishising technique over content itself, they're losing the plot, in my opinion. And that was largely the feeling I was getting from this talk.
Maybe this was partly cos it was badly presented and so I didn't get enough explanation and context about who they were and what they were doing.

Earlier that day, I'd been watching the films on John's "DNA" DVD, and thinking that some of the footage and visual treaments were really striking (the Japanese stuff in particular - footage of a woman wafting through landscapes, treated to be really pastelly and blurred... and other stuff with lots of luminous glowing edges on things) - I was thinking "Hey, this looks visually amazing! It would be really good to use techniques like this in modern television drama!"
For example, I missed the weeks' Dr Who to attend the show And I was thinking how brilliant it would be to have video and film textures like this in Dr Who these days, rather than it all looking like glossy Hollywood stuff and CGI monsters.
The BBC used to be brilliant at exposing us to sneaky Radiophonic audio experiments in the context of programmes like Dr Who, it would be great if they could get back to broadcasting like that, both in terms of sound and picture...

I hope to add something more to this thread, unfortunately I haven't got time at present to say anything constructive, but I will later, because I am rather fk'd off, and this is the first time I've ever made any angry post here.


To the 'Plodding Aimlessly Through No Daylight Or Escape From Utter Banality Whatsoever' seminar, I'd like to thank the four panelists for:

(A) Being one hour late in starting, kicking off at 5.30pm instead of 4.30 pm, with nary an apology from anyone, whats the excuse then?, a lot of us came from a lot further than just the other side of London, heck, its not that difficult, get on the tube on time, make an effort, we all made an effort to pack the room out for you, show your audience some respect please.

(B) Worst of all, and the thing I just can't forgive them for, is having me foolishly leave the Lock Tavern when I'd barely had a chance to say more than a nod or hello to a few people there, I rationalised that if the seminar ended at 5.30pm, as it should have - (afterall, we've got a gig to go to) - then I'd still have time to nip back over and make a real effort to socialise with the members of this forum who were there, with time to spare before the 7pm gig start.
But as it turned out, when I too opted to escape the start of the 20 minute 'film' it was now 6.40pm and by the time I rushed into Camden Market for a bite to eat I had to reluctantly head back to the roundhouse.

(C) If the four panelists should read this, then thanks a bunch guys, you really sucked big time.

:rolleyes:

I spoke to Mark Fisher about that - and he said they were all there on time but were kept back by the Roundhouse staff and they (the panelists) didn't know why either.

Still, an apology wouldn't of gone amiss as you say.

I think Fisher did mumble something of an apology at the start but it kinda got lost in his flustered nervousness.

It all has been summed up perfectly.
This was a load of nonsense.
I didn't have to queue for that long so I don't have to complain about that factor.
But queue for what really? sit up front? haha...
The 2 girls and guy sitting next to me went out as quick as they got in
Things that pop up, the very embarrassing silence after showing the opening Ghost Box film....a prelude of (worse) things to come...
I think they were as surprised as most of the audience they got some applause at all
Sinclair came out as the most sensible of the four, at least he had fairly recognizable home movies to show.
Instead of trees reflecting in the pond in Ghost Box's backgarden, in negative...
When they announced they would show a 20 minute Ghost Box film I also thought, time to run for it.
At the end of the 20 minute I had a genuine 'wtf - moment', does make you feel masochist though
20 minutes of life, wasted...but it did give a good laugh afterward

btw Darren, you didn't pick it up straight away right?