Nomad Radio

Sweeping Genre-lisation Posted by robsteranium

So, I promised to defend the practice of writing about music. I said that music couldn’t be described in words. That was true once. But that was before tagging came along…

The need to classify music into genres used to infuriate me. How do I know you’re hearing what I’m hearing? “We can see other people’s behaviour but not their experience” says Laing. More to the point, is it Rhythmy Blues or Rock & Roll? Does Various Production count as light-Dubstep or heavy-electro-Folk?!

Now where did I put that Enya LP..?

The rigid hierarchy of genres was only a problem with physical records. If you’re in a record shop then you’ve got to choose where to put/ need to know where to get tunes: genres seem as sensible structure as any (unless you’re Rob Fleming in which case you’ll organise your personal CD collection into autobiographical order). Pigeon-holing (the filing metaphor not the blood sport) is inevitable when tunes have to be carved into plastic.

Now that music has a virtual as well as a physical presence, genres can be interpreted far more flexibly. Everything is miscellaneous. Various Production can be dubstep, folk, electro, and whatever else you want, all at the same time.

So, if everything is miscellaneous, and writing about music can now extend over an infinite range of possibility, then how do we read it? In other words, what use are tags to the listener? Enter meta-data…

Cultural review of 2009: was it shit? Posted by Gargleman

The mainstream musical highlight of 2009 actually came back in January with the release of Animal Collective’s magnificent My Girls (above).

As for February to December: for shame. Yes, that was an official shaming.

Music: There has been some very good stuff on Nomad Radio, of course, in particular the Borland track, Wildlife, that appears at the beginning of the Mind On Fire Podcast 2. But my own favoured genre, indie/rock/pop/blah has all been a bit cack, to be honest.

Movies: The best movies I saw all year were old – a download of the confusingly great Primer (2004) and the criminally neglected Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005) on the TV. Of the dozen or so movies I went to see at the cinema, I can’t remember any except the excellent District 9 and the predictable fun of Star Trek, so the rest were quite probably all shit.

To sum up: C+, and that’ll be an D- if I start seeing “Best of the Noughties” articles in every newspaper and blog over the next few weeks. I really hate the term “noughties” and best of the year posts/articles are so fucking lazy, god…

Nasty’s Guide to Squatting Posted by zenzenzen

DJ Superstar and London’s finest barly, Nasty McQuaid takes time out from his Charity Shoppe events to put together a quintessential guide of the hows and how-nots to succeed in modern life squatting.

Take it from us, Nasty is a seasoned veteran of recycling cultures, his Rubbish&Nasty squatted record shop, next to New Cross Town Hall, was quite possibly the most diverse vinyl collection ever sold in London and one that more than likely helped with the birth of Basement Rock and numerous awesomagnificent DJ careers…

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