Like Music II

Hey you disappear further and further
Into these incalculable rooms
And your personality fades away

Your features evaporate, your body decomposes

And your last thought is that you have become a noise
A thin, nameless noise among all the others
Howling in the empty dark room

Oh, yeah, these last days have been exhausting; should I have done everything I was committed to wouldn't I have a minute to rest; there is already so many things to do that nights and days wouldn't suffice. I've been sleeping fleetingly, almost stealthily, both for this very reason and also as if it would take me further away from what happened last week, as if this laspe of unconsciousness could painfully reveal how time flies. No sorrow though. I'm barely there, a bit besides, and immersing in music, if though as usual, in a way it feels like I never did before.

The massive consumption of a bunch of sundry stimulants might have something to do with the strange mood I am in - tough I would be inclined to think it has not. Yesterday Magyar Posse was playing in Klubi, and it had been a pleasant surprise to fall upon the announcement, almost by chance, and only a few weeks ago. From them had I only heard Kings of Time, which had been kindly lent to me by Risto in bygone days. If the latter had not introduced them beforehand as playing "post-rock stuff", I certainly wouldn't have hit the nail on the head myself... Post-rock does not immediately pop up in mind, or only as much as synth pop-folk, electronica or light ambient might do. There must be actually a problem related to my definition of post-rock, which is for me basically embodied in one very act - guess you can guess, or maybe does it play me tricks once more: Godspeed You! Black Emperor. I had remarked the name, puffy and easily memorable, long before I listened to some samples - that was four or five years back, I judged it quite good and got soon yanqui u.x.o.

At that time, and I can't help regarding myself with a hint of amused indulgence, I was way too fiery young to listen to something all through. But for sure I got stuck to and struck by what remains one of the very songs of my youth, though my later way of hearing and listening conceals today most of the intense melancholy these good old sounds are often tinged with - Motherfucker=redeemer (1). As I played yanqui u.x.o. for the first time in years and only a few months ago, I got overwhelmed anew, nearly hysterically. Albeit the last Godspeed album is not considered as the best they'd done, I personally feels it features one of, if not the most formidable, the most tremendous, the most exhilarated rise they composed. This is certainly of personal taste, but I hold it actually as the quintessence of their architectural work, pure musical constructions whose luminous vaultings are of entangled repeated melodies. Each instrument rises one after the other, sequence by sequence, with slight progressive variations through a scheme that strenghens and intensifies each time it ends its cycle, each instrument louder and louder and more and more intense - uprising, a slow but unavoidable wave, an endless way up toward climax stoically carrying beyond the climax point, and even further and higher though you couldn't figure out going that high. I remember listening to it at night, back to that time - then already... - and bursting into tears, out of beauty, and rapture, and joy, and nearly everything.

Thus have I some trouble categorizing anything else than Godspeed You! Black Emperor as post-rock, truly by principle, since the more I listened to Magyar Posse the more obvious it appeared to be filed under the genre. The show was very much enjoyable, as live post-rock can be. Tends to make me euphoric and smiling for no reason.

         

I had not the slightest idea of how Cold Fairyland could sound before they began to play, having never ever heard of them before; it was nice too. I wasn't that surprised by the true metal sound of the drums, sounding very much j-pop to my very little knowledge of these genres, but the use of traditional Chinese instruments worked quite well, as often. Good things, less good ones...

A sudden compulsion made me play albums I hadn't played for months if not years, this week. Especially Perdition City. This is the Ulver I used to like and listen the least, though as a friend would say, one can hardly find a bad Ulver album; this sentiment nonetheless confirmed as I listened to it again, but then... I wouldn't tell I like Perdition City, no, it is somehow too urban to my taste - but I heard today things I did not hear ever before, and it has been sticking to my mind continuously. You can amazingly recognize this is Ulver, even only considering their first period. It sounds like Ulver. I don't like it as I don't like Paris, however fascinated by the stream of people in the metro corridors... Silence is a song after hours of music, but I know that Perdition City would be the one I would play if I was playing music now. And anyway it features one of the most explicit definitions of how I'd love to end. Though their last is their best, barely there, unearthy, drifting and dissolving, and sounding like missing persons, thousands of candles and prayers mourning an unexpected, tremendous and beautiful catastrophe - I could keep on for hours...

Can't write any longer though, reality is to be dealt with in a few hours; another gig, learning, fulfilling duties... Another application for Helsinki. This becomes a real matter of emergency. Been talking about homecomings this afternoon - that was the continuation of another conversation, ending with this long-prepared answer: There might be a time to forgive, yes, as much as it is likely to never happen. But I now consider this possibility. Time, time is what I need, at all levels, and it is what I barely have.