She introduced me to her favourite books…

Ever since I began buying records they have been tied up with books. I began buying books long before I began to buy records though. This afternoon I was feeling a little melancholy and turned to Moorcock. Not the slash up sword and sorcery of the past but the more introspective serious writing that more and more he has been engaging with.

The soundtrack was Steven Wilson’s Hand Cannot Erase which with it’s themes of alienation and loneliness seemed to go with Moorcock’s Lunching With The Antichrist.

Both the book and the album have left me feeling particularly introspective. I don’t have a lot apart from this from Mr Moorcock in 1993.

“It is heartening to note, as our economy collapses perhaps for the last time, a return to the language and sentiments of mutual self-interest. London was never the kindest of English cities but of late her cold self-referential greed has been a watchword around the world. Everything we value is threatened in the name of profit.”

Substitute the city and the country and you have a pretty good picture of the world as it is.

All of which leads me to conclude that you should only listen to Hawkwind when reading Moorcock. switching to another musician has caused a dis-regulating experience.

The Steven Wilson however is one of my favorite albums of the year and the concert was one of my most memorable as they crammed a quadraphonic sound system and a big rock show into a hall that normally hosts reflective folk musicians.

I have to confess I had to give up reading as the music became too compelling and I finished the book in silence once I was done with the record. This either attests to the music being attention grabbing or acknowledges my brain is not necessarily able to allow for the input of two types on information anymore.

Advertisements