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Music Navigator |
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Marilyn Manson |
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Portland acts at CMJ included Quasi, the Dandy Warhols, Swoon 23, Pete Krebs and Golden Delicious. Former Portlanders Rebecca Gates, Elliott Smith and Birddog also performed. |
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Madonna |
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Spins of the Week: Future Bible Heroes, Lonely Days EP (Slow River)--Stephin Merritt of Magnetic Fields darts off into this satisfying side project, a trio that updates the New Wave sound of the '80s with detail-laden lyrics and wry vocal deliveries; drummer Claudia Gonson sings on the title track. |
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Pop culture exploded in the streets of Manhattan last week, as the CMJ Music Marathon and the MTV awards show brought celebrities, the record industry and the media together in the place that already considered itself the center of the known universe. At panel discussions and nightly showcases, urban-outfitted youth and black-clad jet setters wrestled with hot-button topics from electronica's progress as music's prescribed "next big thing" to slumping record sales to censorship to the role of the paparazzi in Princess Diana's death. In what some viewed as a symbolic gesture, the opening-night party for CMJ--the conference and festival of 1,000 bands held at various clubs around New York last Wednesday through Saturday--featured mostly acts playing electronic dance music, albeit with rock's performance panache. With apocalyptic light shows and absolutely no guitars, Fluke, Daft Punk, the Crystal Method and Aphex Twin managed to fill the airplane hangar-like Roseland in Midtown with curiosity seekers and the rave set. The conference part of CMJ, held at Lincoln Center, included panel discussions that tried, somewhat tediously, to probe music issues in relation to film, the Internet, radio, press and trends. Generally, when in-the-know panelists had a chance to share an insightful nugget, they dodged the question like awkward politicians. During a chat about how major labels get a radio station to add a song to its rotation, the moderator asked a group of record-company and radio personalities--including KNRK DJ Jaime Cooley--to confess the sleaziest thing they'd ever done either to get a track on the air or to put one on a playlist; they all pleaded innocent. One man who pleaded guilty was shock-rocker Marilyn Manson, in town for the MTV video awards and also to present CMJ's keynote speech. Dressed conservatively in a black suit and blood-red shirt, the gaunt superstar told conference attendees that he is both a Satanist and a fatalist. In a surprisingly nonconfrontational question-and-answer period, Manson at one point quipped, "We have the end of the world to look forward to, and I want to push the fast-forward button and have a good time along the way." The other keynote speaker, Moby, talked about courage, but faltered when challenged by an audience member who took him to task for self-censoring his videos at the request of the increasingly restrictive programmers at MTV. MTV did nothing to restrict the celebrity hype associated with its annual music awards. After the Thursday night presentation at Radio City Music Hall, the streets of Manhattan teemed with paparazzi hoping to snap a photo of Beck, Puffy Combs, Madonna, Gwen Stefani and the hundreds of other stars who were shepherded in limousines to posh late-night private parties. The scene outside an Interscope-hosted fête at a SoHo night spot became tense when burly doormen hurled threats at photographers and a TV camera crew perched on a van. The paparazzi were chased away, forced to be content with their captured images of a smug-looking Donald Trump and his latest blonde companion. Musically, CMJ proved that the next big thing isn't electronica, but diversity. Although the festival continues to focus on acts that dominate the college-rock charts--primarily indie-rock bands, some of which are on major labels--the range of styles has expanded greatly. DJs now have as much clout as guitarists, and grunge coexists peacefully with orchestral pop. One of the most talked-about bands, Belle & Sebastian, plays wistful folk-rock with a Scottish accent and a chronic British wit. The eight-piece ensemble taped a performance for a new public broadcasting television program, Sessions at West 54th, at the same Sony soundstage where Miracle on 34th Street was filmed. In a display of precision pop-culture reference skills, the members of Belle & Sebastian coyly dedicated the song "Like Dylan in the Movies" to D.A. Pennebaker, the documentary filmmaker behind the Dylan flick Don't Look Back and the cinematographer for Sessions. The band, which was playing for the first time in the United States and which sold out two shows over the weekend, introduced a new song, "Seymour Stein," which served as an amusing in-joke for the industry-heavy crowd at the taping, who knew of the controversial head of Sire Records. Soft-spoken, intelligent and sharply melodic acts like Belle & Sebastian, Beth Orton and Future Bible Heroes caused a buzz at CMJ, but neither they nor higher-profile stars could stand out amid Manhattan's crowded pop-culture skyline this week. As developments like the Internet and electronica join the existing phenomena, the world becomes an intensely complicated place. The simple-minded Marilyn Manson declared during his speech that "we're all just monkeys in this world," but it's a quote from Sting that aptly summarizes five days of panels, concerts, awards shows, schmoozing and speculation: "I've got too much information running through my brain." Then again, the sage man who sang those words in the early '80s was also in Manhattan this weekend, helping Puffy Combs recycle the Police's "Every Breath You Take" for "I'll Be Missing You," a tribute to the slain rapper the Notorious B.I.G. Maybe we are monkeys after all. |
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