Capa: Pressing the Button

I, Melachi ibn Amillar, being of unsound mind and body, did read Blood and Champagne (2002), by Alex Kershaw, a biography of the war photographer Robert Capa. I found it on a charity table in the medieval barn at Coggeshall.  The story told is also eventful enough. Capa was always gambling, drinking, picking up women, or trying to get his head blown off, which he finally did. The book does not contain a single one of his photos, even those which are discussed, which is rather an omission. I will have to get another book with them, I suppose. There is not much technical analysis of his work, though I deduce from comments here and there that he basically got as close as possible and pressed the button. There are no cats in the book. The writing and references are workmanlike; some of the Hungarian names are wrong and he has an odd habit of referring to Hungarian Jews as "Slavic". But I found it a good little read.

Upstairs, downstairs, Surya

I, Melachi ibn Amillar, being of unsound mind and body, did attend the gig of  Martyr Defiled, We Die Tonight, I'll Stay In Memphis, Black Polaris and Beneath The Wake at the Surya Club, near Islington, London, on 22 June, 2013. The stage is downstairs, and the bar upstairs.  The bands themselves were distinctly hardcore but the sound quality was oddly good. A few dozen studenty people were there, who disappeared upstairs after each band. Eventually I followed to see what was going on. No-one seemed to be drinking very much (at £4 a can), in fact, they were mainly staring at mobile phones. A bit bored, I had the bright idea of staring at my own mobile phone. To my surprise (after six years of ownership) I found there were several games on it, including one about owning a nightclub, though I could not understand the rules.

 "We Die Tonight" were my favourite performers, mainly due to the singer, who did the high and the guttural notes well. The Martyr themselves were fearsomely aggressive, and inspired some hardcore dancing (with karate kick moves), though not from me. I took this picture of one of the earlier groups, I'm not sure who, but then ran out of film. Such is the lot of Melachi.

Das Download 2013

Nu Metal

I, Melachi ibn Amillar, being of unsound mind and body, did attend the Download Festival in June 2013. It was not as wet as last year, though a little cold in a tent in the night, being on my own, and with some showers, though warm on Sunday. For Melachi, the festival is a bit of a health farm, as it is difficult to get anything to drink. Other than beer, which barely counts. Anyway, the line-up on paper did not look as interesting as the previous year, having a nu-metal flavour, which I mainly avoided; naturally, I had not previously seen Slip

Old Metal

knot, though I have one of their albums I do not much like. But their show was very impressive and the singer oddly charismatic for someone in a mask. I did not quite follow the point of the strange clown, but if a blank-eyed fellow comes up to me in a bar and says "five, five, five", I now know how to reply! I had not heard anything previously by Bullet for my Valentine, but they played a fine hard rock with striking guitars. Katatonia did their gloomy stuff, followed by Karnivool, strangely similar but with higher sung notes.  Motorhead were unimpressive, badly needing an additional guitarist, and only warming up the crowd in their last two songs. I am not sure why he kept saying they were a rock and roll band, when he then proceeded to play what was obviously heavy metal, or at least very heavy rock; has he not heard Buddy Holly? Iron Maiden had the most striking opening, with the Spitfire flying above, and gave excellent though unimaginative renditions of their hits from the Seventh Son tour; though if they are playing the same set again in London in August I do not think I will run to see it.

Back through time

Back of Turisas tent

A heavy but short set was from Amon Amarth, complete with Viking boat, I will look for a full show from them somewhere. In similar vein, I and many others more dedicated than me could not get into or hear much from the Turisas tent, which was jammed.
 Ghost performed a fine "ritual", and let us respect musicians who can provoke the idle youth to chant in Latin, though the grammar of "ad inferi" worries me, as does the otherwise trouble-free being encouraged to sing "Hail Satan" in broad daylight. It would be brave of them to reference some religion other than the long-suffering Catholics... Uncle Acid and the Deadbeats played unfashionably crushing riffs in the moshing tent, though the only high smoker was man-

Hog Roast

handled out by numerous security. They were followed by Chthonic, with half a dozen Chinese traditional musicians who could just about be heard, as the bass was overblown, though the bassist herself, many remarked, should not be replaced. Most enthusiastic band were Falling with Style with a mad surfing of non-crowds.

And Bauhaus

The best live band was, of course, Rammstein, coupling high concept with great style, crushing themes and pyrotechnics. Though hampered on this occasion by relatively few knowing their lyrics, and even fewer understanding them. Unlike myself, of course; indeed I, Melachi, wearing as usual a mask at these events, in extreme crush had it torn off in their pit, and I retired to the relative rear, after collapsing and missing a few of their numbers. But thereafter I could see rather better, and particularly remember their magnificent burning square cross. Alles gut fur dieses metal Jahr, denn.

Leonskaya

I, Melachi ibn Amillar, being a man of wealth and taste, did attend the recital of E. Leonskaya at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, London, on 5 June 2013. She played Ravel, Debussy and Brahms. I went as I had heard she had played with Richter. She was very decisive in her performance, with the loud sections rather loud, though without the brightness of an Ashkenazy, and the quiet sections lacking the pellucid quietude and magnetism one might prefer. The piano seemed rather distorted as though it might buzz at some points in the complex chords, and quite loud too; even from the back of the hall. There were a few pleasant encores. I had the impression this was a "they write it, I play it" pianist, but none the worse for that.

Bravo Magician

I, Melachi ibn Amillar, being of unsound mind and body, did attend the gig of Black Magician, Mourning Beloved and Prophecy at the upstairs room of the Garage, Islington, on 1 June 2013. The audience included many bearded longhairs, and a rock chick with Judas Priest T-shirt and headscarfe, which is promising. I recall that the Prophecy were good, with an impressively versatile vocalist, but I do not remember much else about them. The Black Magician seemed more focused than I had seen them earlier at the Underground, though this may simply have been because this room was rather longer with the stage at the end, so it is easier to concentrate on it. They struck me again as very atmospheric, due to the synthesizer, and heavy in the traditional vein. I am looking for a vinyl of their album. Mourning Beloved emitted a thoroughly doomladen sound, very heavy though less atmospheric, thought Melachi.

Piscine Professor

I, Melachi ibn Amillar, being of unsound mind and body, did attend the gig of Fish and Lu Cosma at the Academy, Islington, on 29 May 2013. The support was a lady singer and a somewhat acoustic guitar playing to backing tracks. Never have I been so humiliated as having to listen to this, though may have been OK in a golf club bar. The Fischmeister General  entered the stage, with elegant glasses, rather more subdued than I had seen him before, without visible tattoos, reading his lyrics from a lecturn. His voice in the low register was strong and firm; the high register is gone completely. He played much from his new album, which, if I understood him correctly, is still unrecorded. It sounded good, but not great; the music unprepossessing except as backing chords for a slow rapping with lyrics gloomy even by his depressive standards, particularly a long song suite about the western front, though lacking their former sparkle.  Some old standards were played (the Script for Tears, He Knows You Know, Assassin) in a very low register. Even the guitar solos seemed oddly low and ineffective; they could surely be rewritten to be more striking. There was much fishy banter eventually, and it ended on a not unpleasing medley. In all, he rests not on his laurels, and this was a brave and interesting performance. He said he was ex-Marillion, and the Game was Over. Not quite, thinks Melachi.  .

Pursuing Purson

I, Melachi ibn Amillar, being of unsound mind and body, did attend the gig of Moss, Purson and Black Magician at the Underworld, Camden, on 15 May 2013. The first band played a slowish crushing processional metal with high synths and rhythmic vocals coupled with guitar solos so detuned they might have been on a bass. This was well worth a listen. The second band, Purson, I had managed to see twice before without knowing their name or even that they were the same band. Ever observant, on this occasion I thought they were much tighter, although they said they had a new bassist, who seemed oddly familiar. I could not quite put my finger on the source of their cleverly proggish argeggiated accents which sounded a little like Yes or Magenta, coupled with sixth form lyrics and a seventies romance vibe. Perhaps there is some deep source, or possibly they are a true original. The songs seemed a little fussy for short numbers, though I think one in the middle had a long guitar wha-wha section which was quite effective and seemed to relax things more. Ones to watch, then. The final band, Moss, were a singer, a drummer and a guitarist.The guitarist played chords rather than riffs, and rather slowly and loudly. Even more minimalist than Om, these were for true fuzzheads only.

Turk unpossessed

I, Melachi ibn Amillar, being of unsound mind and body, did read Elif Batuman's "The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them" in April 2012. The book gives an account of her travels, acquaintances and readings while enrolled on a postgraduate course on literature and languages in California. If that sounds a little odd, well so is the book, ranging from Stanford to Turkey to Uzbekistan and Saint Petersburg. Now, the central question, or joke, of the book is posed on page 57: "As a six-foot-tall first generation Turkish woman growing up in New Jersey, I cannot possibly know as much about alienation as you, a short American Jew." I, Melachi, have not read as much Russian literature as Ms Batuman, but have slept with more Russian women than her. Or so one imagines. But why, in short, would anyone care what I, or Elif Batuman, has to say about Russian literature? Perhaps cognizant of the answer to this, we are instead treated to the tragi-comic travails of jetsetting academics, in the manner of  a David Lodge. Oddly, the narrator does not seem at all possessed -- she will go anywhere and do anything, providing she can get a grant. I assume there is some real scholarship going on as well, though, perhaps mercifully, we are spared this. As a travelogue with a linguistic bent it is interesting in parts, though rather haphazard. There are no cats in the book. There is a long section at the end about mimeticism involving a summary of the entire plot of "The Possessed" (the Russian novel, already rather well-known, I would have thought), the characters of which she seems to compare to those of her classmates, which I did not quite get.

But the strange thing about the book lies in the writing style. Just as the academics are portrayed as obsessed by their topics, when they clearly are not, the chapters are littered with bizarre statements that look as though they might be clever or amusing, but in fact are just strange. It is as though the text were translated from a Turkish original full of untranslatable wordplay. The style is so remorseless that it develops an horrific charm of its own.  "I didn't care about truth; I cared about beauty. It took me many years -- it took the experience of lived time -- to realize that they really are the same thing." (p.10). Quite. "[they] disinfected and bandaged his knee in a visibly efficient fashion." (p. 14). Not invisibly? And this splendid non-sequitur, on which I pondered deeply: "He had been chased several kilometers cross-country by a wild dog. He must be the kind of man who likes women, I remember thinking." (p.15). And: "'little feet'... Pushkin is not here referring... to his own feet. Nonetheless, I saw a pair of Pushkin's boots once in a museum, and they were very small." (p.89). "The gypsy looked at my palm and told me to beware of a woman called Mary ." (p. 91). Mary? "In Moscow, for the first and last  [last?] time in my life, I dated bankers. Things didn't work out with the first banker [pray tell, perhaps?], but I still remember the second banker fondly... Rustem was saving up money to pay for parachuting lessons." (p. 93). Melachi does not know why Rustem wanted such lessons, but one suspects, and cannot blame him.

Chasing the Greene

I, Melachi ibn Amillar, being of unsound mind and body, did read Tim Butcher's Chasing the Devil, on the beach in Cuba in April 2013, having previously read his book about the Congo (in preparation for my forthcoming trip across Africa). Chasing the Devil deals with a long walk through the forest in Liberia. In short, he takes a bus to a forest, and walks each day along forest tracks to the next village, accompanied by a young man from Oxford and a local guide, while another guide takes his luggage there by motorbike on a normal road. Why does Mr Butcher do this? Well, he is following the footsteps of a certain Graham Greene, and he also says he feels he should spend more time in Liberia because he did not return to it when there was a war on. Or something like that. Now, I know nothing about this Graham Greene other than what I can derive from Mr Butcher's book, namely that he was a towering figure of 20th century English literature (which I rather doubt, or I or someone I know would surely have read something by him), that he liked seediness (no interesting evidence of this is given), and that he worked for British Intelligence, but later (though one suspects this was only because they were short of staff during the war). In all, I am not convinced that Mr Greene's trip in the 1930s is much more worthy than Mr Butcher's in the 2000s. The structural flaw of the book, compared to his Blood River, is this general pointlessness. The author seems worrying well connected, and the problems he encounters are of his own making. Anyway, in the course of his very readable account he gives a history of the region and its people, and this is certainly more interesting than reading roughly the same stuff in any guidebook.  He is again struck by the penchant of the Africans to fail to develop, even when not colonised, and he tentatively ascribes this to the tendency of tribalism to move at the pace of its slowest member. Maybe. But I liked this book, though I think I would have preferred a Willard Price adventure.