Urban Landfill

Sturtevant vs Pergola: Musée d'art moderne vs Palais de Tokyo, Paris

The Pont de l'Alma is a strange place. It is engrained in the collective British unconscious as the spot the nation's Queen of Hearts breathed her last in an upsetting death smash. Since then, it's become a focus for global, slightly hysterical outpourings of grief. Hilariously, it has been monopolised in recent by tribes of ghoulish Michael Jackson freaks trying to surf the grief wave. Its also a great place to get a snap of your nearest and dearest standing in front of the Eiffel Tower. A photo opportunity and a session of celebrity mourning all before lunch. Sounds like the perfect city break.

Sturtevant au Musée d'Art Moderne
by mairiedeparis

Just a short stroll up the road and you can stir your emotions in a more culturally-enriching way. Both the Musée d'art moderne de la ville de Paris (MAM) and the Palais de Tokyo (PdT) can be found in the vicinity, if you can tear yourself away from thoughts of car crashes.

The Parisian contemporary art scene is a bit complicated. Apart from all the tiny private galleries, there are three main spaces: the Pompidou Centre, the MAM and the PdT. Both the PdT and the Pompidou belong to the state (that's France to me and you), whilst the MAM (as it's name suggests) belongs to to the City of Paris. They differ in mission a little – the Pompidou and the PdT show, loosely, early contemporary and contemporary/cutting edge art, whilst the MAM focuses on a slightly earlier period. There's an inevitable overlap between all three, getting polar-necked Parisians all hot under the (black, woollen) collar.

Whilst the MAM is traditionally more staid, reserved and respectful, the PdT has a reputation for being more experimental, producing works of art designed to challenge our assumptions and make our aunties blush. With their first big shows of 2010, its the former that has come up trumps, leaving it's close rival looking a little dull.

Pergola at the Palais de Tokyo is a bit of a mess. The accompanying blurb talks about Le Corbusier, 'silhouettes of erased lives', 'haunted modernity' and the 'melancholy of the Renaissance', all phrases which promise a lot, but ultimately left me feeling a little confused and underwhelmed. The show is the 'first opportunity to discover' works by Charlotte Posenenske, alongside the work of Valentin Carron, Raphael Zarka, Serge Spitzer and Laith Al-Amiri. It's all a little drab – Posenenske's ventilation shafts and curved sheets of aluminium, despite this being the first major retrospective of her work, are the type of thing you'll see at any English regional art gallery. They remind me of the work of Anthony Caro: big, bold brutal, and pretty bloody booring. Predictably, there's also a film, made by Zarka about skateboarders. I hate skateboarders. They have no place in art.

In the other building, the Musée d'art moderne's Sturtevant: The Razzle Dazzle of Thinking is a revelation. Elaine Sturtevant is a US-born artist who lives and works in Paris, this being her first major French retrospective. She works within the context of major themes in conceptual art, so nods to Marcel Duchamp, Paul McCarthy, even John Waters abound. The show is everything Pergola isn't; fun, witty, moving and engaging. The House of Horrors installation (yes, a real-life ghost train) is the centrpiece. It is genuinely scary. I shrieked like a girl.

Support the Palais de Tokyo; go and see both shows. It's Sturtevant that will linger longest in the memory. Maybe not as long as the People's Princess, though.....

Chris Morris is back in 'Jihadist Comedy' romp

I saw Chris Morris in the street in Soho a couple of years ago. He was tall, intimidating and wearing a black biker's jacket, looking not a little like Joey Ramone. I'm a huge fan of his work, from The Day Today, to Brasseye, through to Jam and Nathan Barley. Yes, he's a comedy writer, but future generations will look back on him as a social satirist, a modern-day Swift. 

He's back, here's a clip from his new film that premières this weekend. It's controversial, will definitely upset a lot of people and I can't wait to see it. I give you Four Lions:

Chris Morris is back in 'Jihadist Comedy' romp

I saw Chris Morris in the street in Soho a couple of years ago. He was tall, intimidating and wearing a black biker's jacket, looking not a little like Joey Ramone. I'm a huge fan of his work, from The Day Today, to Brasseye, through to Jam and Nathan Barley. Yes, he's a comedy writer, but future generations will look back on him as a social satirist, a modern-day Swift. 

He's back, here's a clip from his new film that premières this weekend. It's controversial, will definitely upset a lot of people and I can't wait to see it. I give you Four Lions:

Chris Morris is back in 'Jihadist Comedy' romp

I saw Chris Morris in the street in Soho a couple of years ago. He was tall, intimidating and wearing a black biker's jacket, looking not a little like Joey Ramone. I'm a huge fan of his work, from The Day Today, to Brasseye, through to Jam and Nathan Barley. Yes, he's a comedy writer, but future generations will look back on him as a social satirist, a modern-day Swift. 

He's back, here's a clip from his new film that premières this weekend. It's controversial, will definitely upset a lot of people and I can't wait to see it. I give you Four Lions:

Spacemen 3 - The Reunion, happening, REALLY? Urm, no.

Update: January 15th

Well it looks as though our gut instincts were correct after all. Sonic Boom has spoken:

"A misunderstanding through translation has caused a little confusion. The Shows are Spectrum shows, not Spacemen 3, although we will be performing some S3 material as part of the set . The live show also features a mix of old, classic Spectrum as well as new tunes"

That clears that one up, once and for all. We've got a Spectrum tour to look forward to, so it's not all bad newws. In fact, it's great news.

Sources this side of the channel (most notably: Soit Dit En Passant ) are reporting that legendary art/drone rock band Spacemen 3 have three dates booked in France over the next couple of months.

Obviously, I'm very sceptical about this, given the rumours that Jason 'Spaceman' Pierce and Pete 'Sonic Boom' Kember aren't even speaking, and Pierce's flat-out denial of any reunion just a few weeks ago.

That said, it does look like venues are being booked for a Spacemen 3/Spectrum (Kember's solo project) tour with dates including (at present, apprenttly, don't go booking any flights):

23 Mars 2010, 
SPACEMEN 3 + SPECTRUM, Emporium Gallorium, Rouen
25 Mars 2010, 
SPACEMEN 3 + SPECTRUM, Sonic, Lyon
26 Mars 2010
SPECTRUM, Point Ephémère, Paris
27 Mars 2010
SPECTRUM, 4AD Muziekclub, Diksmuide, Belgium
3 April 2010
SPACEMEN 3 + SPECTRUM, L'Embobineuse, Marseille (a link: http://www.lembobineuse.biz/agenda/event.php?agenda=20100102_133813 )

Is this the start of something big? Who knows. I've been looking to get in touch with members of the Spacemen 3/Spiritualized family. To date, I haven't had any denials....

Music: Soulwaxmas, Grand Halle de la Villette, Paris, December 23rd, 2009

It's been a bloody long time since I leaped around like a hyperactive toddler to bouncy, electronic music. I thought I'd left the days of superstar DJs, pounding bass and, well, 'beautiful people' were well-and-truly behind me. These days, I'm all about beards, cardigans and gentle folk. I might get a little bit 'garaged up' occasionally, but that's more likely to be getting excited about obscure LSD-tinged 1960s rock than it us about South London dubstep. Or somefink.

It was with some trepidation, then, that I joined the queue of party people waiting outside the Grande Halle de la Villette in Paris the other night. Things didn't get going until very late, it was the night before Christmas eve, it was bloody cold, I had had a raging coffee-inspired headache for most of the day, I hadn't had enough to drink and Soulwaxmas was about to begin – a hedonistic celebration of buzzing, beeping and, erm, bass. I had been very tempted to stay a home. But, oh, what fun we had.

Soulwaxmas is, basically, a wandering Christmas festival set up by the brothers Dewaeles, a pair of not very cool looking Belgians who spent years slogging away with their band Soulwax, before finding fame as 2manyDJs, basially a DJ 'collective' that first popularized the concept of the 'mash up'. I've looked this up. Soulwax and 2ManyDJs were joined on the bill by a number of shit hot (or so I'm informed) dance Faces – notably Erol Alkan and Jimmy Saville. One of those wasn't actually there.

Souxwax were first up, I've never been a huge fan of them on record. Live, they got the kids jumping; a mixture of rocky electro-synths, combined with the most impressive lazer show I've seen this side of Jean-Michel Jarre. Soulwax, with their unfashionable white tuxedos, are, come to think of it, distinctly Jarre-esque, maybe the dirty disco bastard nephews. I don't think JMJ ever rocked London Docklands to the refrain of 'drugs, dirty dancing and pounding techno music.

The mighty Erol Alkan followed. Lots of fist pumping was involved. I got the opportunity to see first-hand exactly how hairy the man is. Put simply, the man is, a DJ legend (based on my particularly limited appreciation of the skills required...I thought Dave Lee Travis was good.). The undisputed highlight, for me, at least, was Waves, Alkan's own track, performed with Chilly Gonzales, and a four-piece live guitar onslaught. Seriously.

It all started to go a little blurry when 2manyDjs came on. There's a load of clips of their set on YouTube. On record, their mashups are fun; but live, they take them to the next dimension. We got it all Guns and Roses, Mr Oizo, Beethove, Donna Summer, MGMT, the mighty AC/DC, Justice. As well as the music, they pulled out all the stops with a cracking light show (son et lumière, anyone?) – animating the album covers of the music they were playing. It sounds, naff but works so so well. Go see them. I promise you will have a blast.

I leaped around like a loon. A loon that has had his limbs replaced by high-tension springs and been injected full of coffee. To put it simply, it wasn't clever, it wasn't the pretentious beard stroking that I'm such a fan of, but it was a hell of a lot of fun. Note to self, you are actually allowed to have fun at a live music event. Hmmmmm.

Film: The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (Dir: Terry Gilliam)

I'm going to put my cards on the table straight away. I'm a bit of a pompous arse, a little bit verbose, vague and over-dramatic. Anyone who regularly reads Urban Landfill would probably agree This naturally has a knock-on effect when it comes to to the type of art I like – I'm generally a fan of the pretentious, the overblown and the smart-arsed (my affection for the likes of Frédéric Beigbeder, David Lynch and the Brian Jonestown Massacre all being cases in point).

You'd have thought that Terry Gilliam's latest film, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, would be bang up my street. It sounds like it should be – it critiques contemporary consumer culture, it deals with a fantastical world of unbridled imagination that transports people out of their humdrum lives, and it's directed/co-written by Terry Gilliam, the ex-Python genius behind such wonders as The Fisher King, Time Bandits, Brazil and the filmed version of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. On paper, it ticks a lot of my boxes. What a shame, then, that this time Gilliam seems to have got it spectacularly wrong.

It's often mentioned that Gilliam is an unlucky film director, and this production clearly wasn't helped by the untimely death of Heath Ledger during the film's production. That said, you have to take the final product on it's own terms and Doctor Parnassus is, quite frankly, a shoddy, even flabby piece of film-making. It seems messy, disorganised and chaotic – not in a charming way but in a manner that makes the final product unfocussed, shambolic and difficult to follow. The movie's central symbol, the Imaginarium, a faded fairground sideshow, that gives passersby the chance to be 'cleansed' by the imagination of Dr Parnassus (played by Christopher Plummer) could have been a rich metaphor for the movie industry, for an examination of Gilliam's own position as a director, but it is poorly defined, even confusing.

Much has been made in the build-up to the films release about how the movie was 'saved' by Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell to complete Ledger's parts after he passed away. Now, I'm not a huge fan of the four of them (Depp has been brilliant, Law can't act, and Farrell is a joke), but they all manage to out-act the late Antipodean heartthrob. It's, quite frankly, a half-baked, shambolic, and even slightly embarrassingly unconvincing performance from Ledger as Tony Shepherd, one that almost comes over as under-rehearsed (his English accent keeps slipping ferchrissakes...) 

It's not just Ledger (God bless his little self), though. The majority of the cast of Imaginarium get it wrong – it's one of the most poorly acted films I've seen in a long while. Plummer comes over as a poor man's Ian McKellan, Lily Cole just isn't an actress, Andrew Garfield (Anton) is like something out of a sixth form drama production and Tom Waits (I can't actually believe I'm writing this) is a less than convincing Devil. The Imaginarium of Dr Parnassus is a frustrating, ultimately disappointing, film. We know Terry Gilliam is capable of greatness, but this number just doesn't deliver. Should it have even have been completed? It's too self-indulgent, too pompous. Urban Landfill has taken note...

Vetiver, Beach House, Papercuts, Union Chapel London, August 21st, 2009

You can pander to band egos any way you want, but from a fans' perspective, the dreaded 'double headliner' tour never works; it always ends up disappointing. Whether you are talking about Guns N'Roses and Metallica on their legendary 1991 trawl through the US, or tonight's far more sombre, dare I say, grown-up affair, a fair proportion of the crowd will want, even expect, to see their favourite band, the one they've paid to see, go on last or actually headline the gig.

You can talk about bands having the same set lengths (neither of those being as long as you might expect from a traditional headliner), but psychologically at least, the one that goes on last is the star of the show, the daddy, the main attraction.

That's why I was a little peeved to find that the mighty new-folk troupe Vetiver were playing second-fiddle to the shoegazey Beach House at the Union Chapel tonight. Surely Vetiver – promoting their recent LP Tight Knit – are a friendly enough crowd proposition not to need another 'headliner? Their gentle 60s-infused folkie Americana should be a perfect match for the Union Chapel, surely with proper promotion they should have been able to fill the place on their own on a Friday night? And, relax... 

That said, as soon as frontman Andy Cabic and band stepped out onto stage tonight, they had the entire crowd captivvated. Last seen in London at the much-missed Spitz (aside from a support for Fleet Foxes at the Roundhouse), this was their most confident, commanding performance in the capital to date. The show's opening pairing of the beautiful Been So Long and Tight Knit's opener Rolling Sea, combined with the Chapel's wonderful acoustics and an impressive clarity of sound, were mesmerising.

Cabic, sporting the obligatory folk hat and beard combo (one predictably mirrored by many in the crowd) seemed to have a greater stage presence that he has previously, as well as an impressive control over his fragile voice, weaving it together with the sounds of the band, and his fingerpicked guitar. There was a self-assured element to Cabic tonight that we haven't seen before (maybe his extensive touring as part of Devendra Banhart's band as help this), and even a slightly rockier sound, as the band stepped up a gear with Everyday and You May Be Blue.

In short, Vetiver are a band on top of their game right now – something genuinely pleasing, inspiring and magical to see. Beach House, and their shoegaze, trippy, Mazzy Star-inspired jams, were only ever going to be a disappointment, and a disappointment they were. OK, I'm biased, but they seem to be doing what a million other bands are at the moment, so they were completely lost on me tonight. My mind was still lost in the Vetiverse. It was a shame for them to follow, and a shame for the crowd, mostly made up of Vetiver fans (based on a rough beard count...)

Tonight's show was opened by Papercuts, a band I've come late to and fronted by Vetiver collaborator Jason Quever . They've just released their third album, the gorgeous You Can Have What You Want and their music reminds me a little of a fuzz and reverb-drenched Daniel Johnson, there's even a little bit of early Brian Jonestown Massacre in there for good measure. Yes, they are that good. Watch this space...

Inglourious Basterds (Dir: Quentin Tarantino)

Brad Pitt has the movie's final line. I won't spoil the ending, but he looks deep into the camera and declares what he's just done to be his masterpiece. Cue the credits, and an immediate flash of the words 'Quentin Tarantinto'; the obvious inference being; “I am the artist, bow down peasants before my crowning glory”. Or somesuch. Anyone who knows Tarantino's work knows that the man has a sense of humour, but he's begging the question.

So, I'm not going to beat around the bush. No, Inglorious Basterds isn't Tarantino's masterpiece. It is, however, a fantastic film, a wonderfully entertaining romp through cinema and a satisfying return to form for the director. 

To be frank, Tarantino's had a bit of a squiffy period over the last few years. His last films have been, well, a little patchy. Kill Bill (parts one and two), was magnificent in parts but was ultimately much too long and got, quite frankly, a bit boring for long periods (particularly in the second installment). Not to mention Death Proof, which despite having one of the most fantastic opening hours out of any film I've ever seen, ends up a horrible, mangled abortion of a movie. Urgh.

That's part of the reason why Basterds is such a relief. Tarantino has gone on record as saying the film is closer to Pulp Fiction that anything he's done recently. I don't agree. Pulp Fiction, whilst a great film, came over as somewhat flabby, a little rambling in parts. Whilst that's what you get with Quentin, and that's part of the reason I love him so, Basterds feels a little more like Jackie Brown – a strong, satisfying narrative that all comes together in a pleasing way.

The film tells the story of a group of Nazi hunters in France in WW2, let by the renegade Aldo the Apache (Brad Pitt). They become embroiled in an Allied plan to end the war by massacring the senior German leadership in a plan called Operation Kino. Unbeknownst to them, there's a parallel plan, masterminded by Shosanna Dreyfus (Mélanie Laurent), a French-Jewish cinema owner.

As ever, Tarantino's character development leaves a lot to be desired. Pitt (as he often seems to be) is disappointing – he's all about funny accents and a worrying dead-eyed stare in this one, and Laurent's character is the only one that an audience can really emote with. That said, Christoph Waltz's charmingly vicious 'Jew Hunter', Hans Landa is a true triumph in comic book villany.

At its essence, the film is all about the plot. Even the Basterds themselves don't come across as a team, a group, that development is abandoned early on. The narrative is about the plots, the resolutions and the inevitable twists and turns along the way. 

That said, whilst the action hurtles towards a barnstorming finish, the film is full of showstopingly cinematic moments, the type of thing that Tarantino does so well, no matter how ropey the film (Butterfly's lapdance for Stuntman Mike in Death Proof being a case in point) and Inglorious Basterds is brimming with them: the first scene of the film introducing Landa, a magnificent set-piece in a beer cellar and the final denouement of Operation Kino. 

Whilst on one level, its a backslapping movie about the Allies (inevitably) bashing the Nazis, it also succeeds on a more thoughtful level, and for me at least, this is Tarantino's true triumph. As much as it is a WW2 western about good overcoming evil, it is (perhaps even in some small part in a way similar to Antichrist) it is a self-consciously postmodern tribute to the redemptive power of cinema.

The clues are there - Operation Kino is, at its very centre a plan to use film (the senior Nazis are in Paris for the premiere of a propaganda film) as the cover for a war-ending slaughter of the Fuhrer and his pals; the two main female leads are a French/Jewish cinema owner and a German film star; the explosives used to kick off the killing are flammable film reels themselves. The most telling clue to what Tarantino is really up to comes with a film-within-a-film, made by Dreyfus and hauntingly shown to the captive Nazis as the slaughter begins, which literally allows her to have the last laugh. In a nutshell, film is the force, despite having been corrupted for propaganda purposes by Goebbels and Leni Riefenstahl, that has the power to make a real, positive change. 

Without wanting to disappear into my polo neck, I'll leave it there. Inglorious Basterds is a glorious piece of cinema. Quentin, its nice to have you back.

Film: Antichrist (Dir Lars von Trier)

Some people really do enjoy getting their knickers in a twist when it comes to works of art. Sure, the usual suspects just can't stop themselves from getting hot under the collar about anything a little salacious, but its not just the Mail that's been getting all worked up about Lars von Trier's Antichrist.

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When I mentioned to friends, colleagues, and the Twitterverse that I was planning to use a day off work to see the film, I was surprised at the response. Some people rolled their eyes, some groaned, some regaled me with third-hand stories about friends of friends walking of the cinema in disgust, fainting or even vomiting uncontrollably in the aisles. Even Paul Morley (who I've got a huge amount of time for) went very silly on Newsnight Review, accosting the director at a Cannes press conference.

It used to be books that got people in a cultural flap Lady Chatterley's Lover and the Satanic Verses are two that most immediately spring to mind. Then, we all got culturally lazy, stopped reading books, and got angry about films instead. We could all just sit back, relax and let get worked up from the comfort of the local multiplex – Reservoir Dogs, The Blair Witch Project and 9 Songs nearly saw protests on Middle Enland street corners.

Von Trier, himself, is no stranger to scandal. He's got form, particularly in the guise of The Idiots, and his whole Dogme 95 collective, which seems deliberately constructed to outrage. Hence it was no surprise when Antichrist received such an outpouring of bile in response to its release.

In short, Antichrist tells the story of an unnamed man and woman, played by Willem Defoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg and their attempts to grieve, and eventually come to terms with the death of their infant child. Defoe's character, a psychoanalyst, starts treating Gainsbourg before they retreat to Eden, a log cabin, withdrawn from reality. That's when things really start going apeshit.

Yes, the film is uncomfortable to watch (and from someone who sat through Pasolini’s Salo, that's saying something), and I found my self resisting the urge to look away on more than one occasion. What a lot of the critics who have so far tackled Antichrist seem to have missed, is that von Trier hasn't produced a realist film. An audience who takes a talking fox, a penis spurting blood or a woman turned witch (they are all there) on face value is missing the point entirely. If you take the Daily Mail approach and get caught up in the first sight of gore, the first piece of sexual contact, then Antichrist really isn't for you.

Von Trier has produced something that we see all too rarely, a masterpiece of poetic cinema – one that functions as poetically on the visual level as it does on the narrative. To that end, it reminds me visually of Steve McQueen's recent Hunger. Time and again, von Trier presents with what seem like visual clues or motifs to be decoded – acorns, injured animals, a hidden room. These would actually seem to encourage a psychoanalytic reading of the film, perhaps encouraged by von Trier's own apparent treatment whilst making the film.

Such an interpretation of the film is, however, thrown into disarray by loads of other factors that von Trier has thrown into the mix. The film has all the conventional trappings of a horror movie (a couple trapped in a dark wood, lots of sexual activity, lots of screaming and bloody gore) as well as having lots of hints that you feel are in jokes, on film buff-only references (the shooting of the much talked-about female circumcision can only be  a nod to Bunuel's eye slashing scene in Un Chien Adalou).

In short, the film is an artistic masterpiece, one that can't be 'read' in any conventional sense of the word, one that will continually disappoint and offend anyone that tries to look for a straightforward meaning. May Lars von Trier long continue to wind up the Daily Mail. If you don’t like that, go and see the Bourne fucking Identity.