This feels more than usually pointless, but... I'm going to do it anyway.
After the last eighteen months, the question is not whether I can keep posting, but whether I can actually say anything worthwhile. I have mentioned before how acutely aware I am of being up against the limits of my musical knowledge when trying to get properly to grips with this stuff; that's not going to get any easier in the near future. Of course, I am also aware that "I can't read or write music" or "I haven't formally studied music" are no longer valid excuses: all of that was true in 2007, but I have had ample time to teach myself if I had really wanted to*. More than sixteen years on, both of those sentences are still true, but neither of them really counts for anything. Still, the fact of the matter is that I am very much an enthusiastic amateur when it comes to musicological analysis, and if I ever became tempted to forget that and adopt ideas above my station... an afternoon's intensive listening to the maestro's oeuvre would soon jerk me back to reality. I don't understand this stuff nearly as well as I would like.
But I've been through all this before, and it's never stopped me yet. I just make very slow progress... as anyone can see from how long it's taking me to engage with Herr Dahinden's 2013 Swiss offering. Trying to obtain a real understanding of this performance entails more than simply establishing whether or not we can substitute Comp. 147 for the posited Comp. 174 in the listed programme; it means internalising Comps. 94, 96 and 98 to the point where I will recognise any material quoted from any one of them as soon as it pops up. That, admittedly, would presumably be a hell of a lot easier if I could hear music as notes, as structures, rather than just as sound. But that's not where I am and it remains to be seen if I am up to the task. And bear in mind, it is entirely a self-appointed task, and one which probably no-one else cares about - ! As Nick Cave would have it, "Onward and onward and onward I go/Where nobody else could be bothered to go"**.
So there's that... and my unfinished business with repertoire... and I'm still striving to get truly inside the massive phenomenon that is GTM, really get to the heart of it. What with one thing and another, there is plenty to keep me occupied here, even if hardly anybody is reading it***. Besides, B. is still out there, still active as both creator and player, and I will want to report on any news as I get it. If McClintic Sphere fancies chipping in as well, so much the better... I'd be astonished if 2024 yields another attempt at the "most posts" record, but I hope to remain active and post regularly over the next twelve months, and we'll see where that takes us. The world outside is clearly in a parlous state, and very little about the future can be taken for granted; but while there is still art and beauty in it, I still feel a need to play a small part in acknowledging that.
(Oh, and there is still the unanswered question of when I will get into the box of tapes, and what I will do about it... )
* This is actually somewhat debatable, as the times in those years when I was most strongly drawn to deep musical research coincided with other demands on my time and attention. Nevertheless, there must have been opportunities in the last sixteen years for me to teach myself a lot more than I already know; perhaps I am just afraid to commit myself fully..?
** "Do You Love Me? (Part 2)" (1994). [Let Love In is probably my favourite Bad Seeds album, when it comes down to it... certainly that and Murder Ballads are the two I listen to most often these days.]
*** At time of writing, we are already fourteen days into January - and the blog has not yet racked up a hundred hits for the month. This gives a pretty clear idea of what sort of attention it gets when there is no bot activity... but then, it's also rather obvious that I am avoiding trying to gain a wider audience at this point. (In an era when every bugger is seemingly spouting off on Youtube or TikTok or - wherever, I "ought" to be able to find my niche, but I'm far from sure that I really want to try...)
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