| I’ve been writing the still point since 1982; its earlier incarnation
lasted for 77 roughly bimonthly issues (the last one appearing early in
1994), written for ALPS, an apa (amateur press association: kind of a paper
version of an Internet mailing list) comprised of science fiction fans
who were also music fans. In the last two years, I have been going
to a lot of rock shows in small New York clubs, and was thus drawn out
of a long fallow period where I hadn’t paid much attention to current popular
music. I got excellent response to the still point from musicians, labels,
and local music fans, and the inevitable next step seemed to be to take
the
still point to the next level. |
| I intend to cover live music in New York rock’n’roll clubs, a few selected
shows in other cities, as well as associated recorded music. In a quarter
century of listening to, thinking about, and writing about current popular
music, I have found it to be true (and never truer than right now) that
there is always more good music out there than one can possibly absorb,
if one knows where to find it; and I hope to spread the word about what
I have found. |
| What does the title mean? I hear the Voice from the Audience say. The
phrase comes from T.S. Eliot’s poetic masterpiece Four Quartets,
where it designates that peak human experience (“the moment in and out
of time”) when—however briefly—we feel divorced from our bodies, our consciousness
of self suspended, in a state of ecstasy, either mental (meditation) or
physical (cf. whirling dervishes). That’s the reason for the phrase “sex
and drugs and rock’n’roll”: all of those activities can produce that experience.
As Eliot says, “Except for the point, the still point, / There would be
no dance, and there is only the dance.” Even more to the point: “you are
the music / While the music lasts.” That’s the still point. |
| A word on my angle of gaze: I focus on musical texture and architecture,
and while I won’t deny that there is a narrowness to that angle, I apply
it to a relatively wide spectrum of music, from current guitar pop to folk
to avant-garde jazz to quite forbidding contemporary classical compositions.
Some may find my approach relentlessly technical; and it is. But believe
me, I’m not quite as technically informed as a casual glance might suppose,
and I make an effort to keep technical language to a minimum. But
still, it’s the actual nuts and bolts of the music that most engage my
attention.
I plead guilty to slighting lyrics to the point, often, of ignoring
them; but as I feel that the preponderance of rock criticism—ever—overemphasizes
lyrics, I feel no need to apologize for my compensating bias.
You’ll find little or none of the overarching cultural critique that
seems so de rigueur in most pop music writing: I’m not interested, for
example, in discussing Sleater-Kinney from a gender perspective (as “women
in rock”), nor from a political perspective (as “riot grrls”) nor from
a narrowly genre perspective (as “punk”); I prefer to consider them simply
as rapidly-developing musicians already of extraordinary interest, as creators
of memorable musical experiences. |
