Pop culture treasure, high culture trash.

Friday, July 21, 2006

Unfinished business

Can there be some kind of public announcement about how great the Au Pairs anthology is? I mean, DEAR GOD. I know this phrase should be banned for the next ten years or until it recovers its meaning, but they're like Gang of Four--only Marxist AND feminist. Which boils down to pretty much the greatest thing to happen to the universe since Poly Styrene told off bondage. The first few tracks on Playing With a Different Sex even have weird echoes of upbeat early Smiths--all the steely bass and free-floating Marr-guitar. YES.

I have to deliver between 1 and 500 words on Sleater-Kinney to Venus (via Mairead) by August 1st. Suddenly, the subject I could write about more easily and more passionately than anything else in the world is making me about as articulate as a can of Tuno. Every observation and critique I ever had of them has flown out of my head (in spite of an amazing transglobal S-K post-breakup symposium I am currently enjoying with Fangirl). To really do this justice I ought to be on some sort of sensory deprivation retreat in the Catskills. How do you write about the band whose sound is the essence of yr freedom, rapture and joy? Who are so complex and real and protean they refuse all attempts at explication and analysis?

Seriously, let me know.

1 comment:

Mairead said...

hey dude?
you just did it.
you did it fine.