Manafonistas

Breakfast on the bus in Parisian rush hour log-jam wake up shock, the scooter crowd weave cool between crawling killer metal. Slim late night 1970’s BBC 2 film star women threaten the city with their cultured beauty, fierce as ice-breakers cut through crowds, poised & fabulous in muted shades on the far side of tinted glass. We fire up our stumbling bodies with, teas, mashed wheats, nuts & rice milk. Derrick & Clive, remind us we’re alive, good morning.

Er hatte angeblich ein kleines Haeuschen auf Sylt und ein grosses Champagnerstreifenglas. Auf die Insel wuerde er jederzeit zurueckkehren, notfalls auch tot. In Kampen sind diese Gaeste dann alle gleich. Die lila Krawatte und das feine Tuch liegen inzwischen brach, sein Gang nach Zuerich ist gewiss. Ich hoerte mir nach der Lektuere ueber den Tod von Raddatz ein paar Songs von Warren Zevon’s letzter CD THE WIND an. Sie haetten einander gemocht. Die lyrische Ader, das schriftstellerische Talent von Warren haetten Fritz gefallen. Welche Farbe wuerde ich dem Klang dieser Lieder geben? Blau dachte ich, auf keinen Fall lila. Moeglicherweise eine Einwebung von einem Syltersonnenuntergangs ROT. Es waren die Kuenstler vom Bauhaus, die darueber diskutierten: welcher Klang hat welche Farbe. Nach ihren Studien musizierten sie zusammen, bildeten die Bauhaus-Kapelle, in der nur eine Frau spielte: Lotte Gerson. Als der amerikanische Jazz in der Gruppe Gefallen fand, spielte die Amerikanerin Saxophon. Ich kann keine Tonaufnahme von ihr finden. Sie bekommt ein Weiss, weiss ist keine Farbe.

I met Moko Jumbi
He walks on stilts through all saints row
Looking over the brew now, for a possession loss
People sound, no days off
In September, when the sun sets soon now

In you, it radiates on you
Seven high they’re rising
Over on the other side
Of September when the sun sets soon now

Jab jab, digging out a hole in Westbourne Grove
Tin foil and a lighter, the ship across
Five days on, two days off, in September
When the sun sets soon now

You can blame me
Blame me
When the twilight comes
All goes round again

Some days I look at the morning trying to work out how I got here
Cause the distance between us is the glamour’s cost
Late night on the shop floor what language was i speaking
Not sure I remember the thrill and fall
Always in me
Let it go

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It’s the “criss-crossing” that I like most. That may be the wrong word, a perhaps better one might be “intertwining”, or “theme travel” like “time travel”. Even better would be the word I learned from a Robert Wyatt-song: „zig-zagging“.

I definitely believe that so called “high art” is a cliche invented by dry brains. Art is high, from my perspective, if it reveals a personal relevance for your life. I could write a small book about this. Culture is about things that are not at all necessary. If Flaubert hadn’t written his Bovary-novel or Kafka no “Schloss”, there would be no one who would miss them.

To say it differently: I have no doubts that Donna Tartt’s “Distelfink” may be a great piece of art for a lot of people, but from a perspective of “personal revelations and discoveries”, “self-recognition” and “approaching the unnameable/unknown”, some episodes of “Banshee” , a deep watch of old “Beat-Club”-shows, or immersing yourself in “Birdman” can have more profound impacts on your life than reading the collected works of Seneca or Thomas Mann. Of course everyone makes his and her own choices. Culture is a “song for everyone”.

Seen in that way, culture changes from an elitist canon of “holy works” and a collection of not really necessary products to a survival kit in the best sense of the word. Then culture, freed from the necessity to rely on high brow guardians of so-called “truth”, really is about growth, recognition, and, sometimes, creates small portions of enlightenment, mini-sartoris in a religion-free sense.

I once got to know a culture worker who was thinking he was the no longer missing link between the high art and the people who need explanations and introductions. One day he entered a hotel room in München where he had to prepare one of his lectures. Suddenly he saw a big spider on the ceiling, and someone knocked on the door. A cleaning woman. She saw that very important person on the bed, trembling, shivering. “Please, please”, he said to the woman, “kill that spider, kill that spider.” This is a true story, and even long before this happened, i didn’t like this guy at all, his gestures, his persona, his aura of “going for the truth”. I heared this story from the cleaning woman. I was in the same hotel at the same time. She fucked me, and I fucked her, she was beautiful, she loved Caetano Veloso. She was a revelation. And she didn’t kill the spider. She took the animal in her hands and brought it to the balcony.