Monday 2 August 2010

Musical Concrete





A page from the book

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Information-Beautiful-David-McCandless/dp/0007294662

I don’t know that I ever intended my music project Nocturnal Emissions to exemplify a genre – or sub-genre – of rock music. But I suppose often “genre” doesn’t just mean “style”, it can mean a collection of attitudes. And you know, we weren’t following a genre, we were creating it.

“Industrial” implies something to do with the alienation experienced by individuals in a society where money is king. “Ambient” means to do with your environment.

If I was doing a diagram, I'd place us a lot closer to dance music, dub and post-punk than metal.

But this diagram has to make more sense than back in 80s when Virgin Megastore would have Nocturnal Emissions in the same bin as the Nolans and the Notsensibles.

Though there were political and philosophical differences between ourselves and Coil, I can’t deny that we were on friendly terms back in the ‘80s .

I like this book, “Information is Beautiful”. I was browsing through at it at the Port Eliot Festival the other week. Here it is in a pile stacked behind Tim Smit and Jarvis Cocker:

Check it out:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Information-Beautiful-David-McCandless/dp/0007294662