Riposte

Sitting in the New Rose in Islington on my birthday a friend told me how much he disagreed about what I said about the difference between digital images and those captured by previous technologies. I thought this was pretty bad form. Did he even buy me a drink? I can't remember.


Anyway, undeterred by my astonished outrage, he made the point that the 'historical distance' so evident to me when I look at, say, a victorian photographic portrait, is purely a construct of my own circumstances. To the subject of the portrait, it would have seemed completely new. And further to that, I don't know that the pictures I take with my digital camera today won't look similarly 'historical' to someone in 20 years time. The very act of taking 2-dimensional still pictures might seem quaint and nostalgic.

At least that's what I think he was saying; things were a bit hazey by that time. Anyway, it seemed like a sensible point of view. I still think there is something different about the proliferation and the significance of the image these days, though.

Speaking of history, it's that time, again, where all publications everywhere start churning out lists of what was good or important about the last year or ten, each according to their own prejudices. It seems to be the nature of these things that they try to claim authority, whether it's because they are concocted 'by a panel of musicians, producers, writers and record label bosses' or simply because it is the natural aim of 'top ten' lists to be definitive.

Aside from being a fun way to re-mould the world in your own Orwellian image, the whole project of coming up with top-tens seems a bit of a waste of time, and a lazy way to fill up column inches. It feels rather like those ridiculous 'I Heart 1998' programmes, where F-list celebs bore on nostalgically about things that happened yesterday. Or maybe the purpose of all this list-making really is just to give fools like me something to easily agree or disagree with (either way making us feel better about our own tastes).

Anyway, in an attempt to pass the time, to cement myself as an authority, to hasten the arrival of a totalitarian dystopia, to pander to the vanity of anyone reading, and possibly also just to share some things that I think are pretty good, here is a non-definitive playlist of songs I think are great, from albums I can heartily recommend, all recorded in the last 10 years...

http://open.spotify.com/user/carlostheape/playlist/3GHP0SzOUQFpuOZohtb3Ds

2000 - Mark Kozelek - Find Me, Reuben Olivares
2001 - Susumu Yokota - Flying Cat
2002 - Tom Waits - Watch Her Disappear
2003 - Johnny Cash - The Man Comes Around
2004 - The Divine Comedy - Our Mutual Friend
2005 - Sufjan Stevens - Chicago
2006 - The Mountain Goats - Moon Over Goldsboro
2007 - The Shins - Sleeping Lessons
2008 - The Walkmen - In the New Year
2009 - Wild Beasts - All The King's Men

Even with the above disclaimer I feel the state again that it is not a top ten list by any stretch of the imagination - it's just some good songs, ok?