Cross-medium Mix Tracks 1: Calvino vs. Zero 7
It's time for Andy's attempt at seriousness!
There comes a time in everyone's life when you just want to get out of your head, happily zoned out in your own little fairy world. Throughout the ages people have employed various different methods of achieving said state; popular choices include the opium dens of colonial China, Ancient Rome's wild orgies, or just getting stoned out of your mind in your parents' basement while watching 2001: A Space Odyssey. Far be it from me to dissuade you from any of these avenues of pleasure, bountiful as they may be, but if you're looking for a way to lose yourself in public with nobody throwing you in jail (you exhibitionist, you) then today's pairing is for you.
Italo Calvino was a great Italian post-war novelist, probably most noted for his children's classic Marcovaldo, but his book Invisible Cities is the one to focus on, for while the whimsical adventures of hapless Sig. Marcovaldo are brilliantly written, humourous and melodious, it's when Calvino applies himself to the imaginary exploits of legendary Venetian traveller Marco Polo that he really comes into an area of his own. Invisible Cities consists of conversations between Marco Polo and the aging emperor Kublai Khan, who is rendered powerless to experience his own empire by the endless opus of government. Marco Polo is enlisted as the Khan's eyes and ears, to explore the vast empire and report the numerous cities back to the emperor so that he may know something of his own dominion. It's Polo's descriptions of these cities that takes up most of the book, which occasional interruptions of dialogue between the Khan and Polo. Polo's descriptions of the cities range from the fantastic to the mundane, but every city bears not only descriptions of inhabitants, streets, sights or exports but a key concept to consider. Calvino's writing style here comes into its own as he visualises endless metropolises, often bizarrely rendered or starkly anachronistic, but nevertheless captivating, ethereal and otherworldly.
Zero 7's sprawled album When it Falls is the perfect companion to Calvino's meditative novel. The opening track, with its synaesthetic title 'Warm Sound', begins with a sustained gentle, fuzzy chord followed slowly by muted background noises, including a telephone ringing, heralding the beginning of your removal from the everyday and humdrum. Throughout the album, pulsing, soft yet insistent synthesisers and electric organs backed by nonchalant basslines and complementary drum grooves almost force relaxation upon you, like a giant hand wrapping you n a warm blanket and depositing you in front of a crackling fire on a cold night, with a mug of hot chocolate and a big furry rug. This isn't to say that the album is without heights of drama or drive; the instrumental, 'Look Up', is one of the most subtly energetic tracks I know; but throughout, instead of blaring, high-NRG in-your-face thumping bass and disco beats, Zero 7's strength lies in springing their own brand of quiet euphoria on you so carefully that you don't notice until it's too late.
Extracts to enjoy together;
Cities & Signs 4
Of all the changes of language a traveller in distant lands must face, none equals that which awaits him in the city of Hypatia, because the change regards not words, but things. I entered Hypatia one morning, a magnolia garden was reflected in blue lagoons, I walked among the hedges, sure I would discover young and beautiful ladies bathing; but at the bottom of the water, crabs were biting the eyes of the suicides, stones tied around their necks, their hair green with seaweed.
I felt cheated and I decided to demand justice of the sultan. I climbed the porphyry steps of the palace with the highest domes, I crossed six tiled courtyards with fountains. The central hall was barred by iron gratings: convicts with black chains on their feet were hauling up basalt blocks from a quarry that opened underground.
I could only question the philosophers. I entered the great library, I became lost among shelves collapsing under the vellum bindings, I followed the alphabetical order of vanished alphabets, up and down halls, stairs, bridges. In the most remote papyrus cabinet, in a cloud of smoke, the dazed eyes of an adolescent appeared to me, as he lay on a mat, his lips glued to an opium pipe.
"Where is the sage?"
The smoker pointed out of the window. It was a garden with children's games: ninepins, a swing, a top. The philosopher was seated on the lawn. He said: "Signs form a language, but not the one you think you know."
I realised I had to free myself from the images which in the past had announced to me the things I sought: only then would I succeed in understanding the language of Hypatia.
Now I only have to hear the neighing of horses and the cracking of whips and I am seized with amorous trepidation: in Hypatia you have to go to the stables and riding rings to see the beautiful women who mount the saddle, thighs naked, greaves on their calves, and as soon as a young foreigner approaches, they fling him on the piles of hay or sawdust and press their firm nipples against him.
And when my spirit wants no stimulus or nourishment save music, I know it is to be sought in the cemeteries: the musicians hide in the tombs; from grave to grave flute trills, harp chords answer one another.
True, also in Hypatia the day will come when my only desire will be to leave. I know I must not go down to the harbor then, but climb the citadel's highest pinnacle and wait for a ship to go by up there. But will it ever go by? There is no language without deceit.
Warm Sound (good for 25 downloads only)
There comes a time in everyone's life when you just want to get out of your head, happily zoned out in your own little fairy world. Throughout the ages people have employed various different methods of achieving said state; popular choices include the opium dens of colonial China, Ancient Rome's wild orgies, or just getting stoned out of your mind in your parents' basement while watching 2001: A Space Odyssey. Far be it from me to dissuade you from any of these avenues of pleasure, bountiful as they may be, but if you're looking for a way to lose yourself in public with nobody throwing you in jail (you exhibitionist, you) then today's pairing is for you.
Italo Calvino was a great Italian post-war novelist, probably most noted for his children's classic Marcovaldo, but his book Invisible Cities is the one to focus on, for while the whimsical adventures of hapless Sig. Marcovaldo are brilliantly written, humourous and melodious, it's when Calvino applies himself to the imaginary exploits of legendary Venetian traveller Marco Polo that he really comes into an area of his own. Invisible Cities consists of conversations between Marco Polo and the aging emperor Kublai Khan, who is rendered powerless to experience his own empire by the endless opus of government. Marco Polo is enlisted as the Khan's eyes and ears, to explore the vast empire and report the numerous cities back to the emperor so that he may know something of his own dominion. It's Polo's descriptions of these cities that takes up most of the book, which occasional interruptions of dialogue between the Khan and Polo. Polo's descriptions of the cities range from the fantastic to the mundane, but every city bears not only descriptions of inhabitants, streets, sights or exports but a key concept to consider. Calvino's writing style here comes into its own as he visualises endless metropolises, often bizarrely rendered or starkly anachronistic, but nevertheless captivating, ethereal and otherworldly.
Zero 7's sprawled album When it Falls is the perfect companion to Calvino's meditative novel. The opening track, with its synaesthetic title 'Warm Sound', begins with a sustained gentle, fuzzy chord followed slowly by muted background noises, including a telephone ringing, heralding the beginning of your removal from the everyday and humdrum. Throughout the album, pulsing, soft yet insistent synthesisers and electric organs backed by nonchalant basslines and complementary drum grooves almost force relaxation upon you, like a giant hand wrapping you n a warm blanket and depositing you in front of a crackling fire on a cold night, with a mug of hot chocolate and a big furry rug. This isn't to say that the album is without heights of drama or drive; the instrumental, 'Look Up', is one of the most subtly energetic tracks I know; but throughout, instead of blaring, high-NRG in-your-face thumping bass and disco beats, Zero 7's strength lies in springing their own brand of quiet euphoria on you so carefully that you don't notice until it's too late.
Extracts to enjoy together;
Cities & Signs 4
Of all the changes of language a traveller in distant lands must face, none equals that which awaits him in the city of Hypatia, because the change regards not words, but things. I entered Hypatia one morning, a magnolia garden was reflected in blue lagoons, I walked among the hedges, sure I would discover young and beautiful ladies bathing; but at the bottom of the water, crabs were biting the eyes of the suicides, stones tied around their necks, their hair green with seaweed.
I felt cheated and I decided to demand justice of the sultan. I climbed the porphyry steps of the palace with the highest domes, I crossed six tiled courtyards with fountains. The central hall was barred by iron gratings: convicts with black chains on their feet were hauling up basalt blocks from a quarry that opened underground.
I could only question the philosophers. I entered the great library, I became lost among shelves collapsing under the vellum bindings, I followed the alphabetical order of vanished alphabets, up and down halls, stairs, bridges. In the most remote papyrus cabinet, in a cloud of smoke, the dazed eyes of an adolescent appeared to me, as he lay on a mat, his lips glued to an opium pipe.
"Where is the sage?"
The smoker pointed out of the window. It was a garden with children's games: ninepins, a swing, a top. The philosopher was seated on the lawn. He said: "Signs form a language, but not the one you think you know."
I realised I had to free myself from the images which in the past had announced to me the things I sought: only then would I succeed in understanding the language of Hypatia.
Now I only have to hear the neighing of horses and the cracking of whips and I am seized with amorous trepidation: in Hypatia you have to go to the stables and riding rings to see the beautiful women who mount the saddle, thighs naked, greaves on their calves, and as soon as a young foreigner approaches, they fling him on the piles of hay or sawdust and press their firm nipples against him.
And when my spirit wants no stimulus or nourishment save music, I know it is to be sought in the cemeteries: the musicians hide in the tombs; from grave to grave flute trills, harp chords answer one another.
True, also in Hypatia the day will come when my only desire will be to leave. I know I must not go down to the harbor then, but climb the citadel's highest pinnacle and wait for a ship to go by up there. But will it ever go by? There is no language without deceit.
Warm Sound (good for 25 downloads only)