I'm listening to this now. Mr. Smith has apparently swallowed the idea that modern techno is a Serious Art Form hook, line, and sinker. It's painful to listen to Basic Channel fans talk about "the space between the notes"...yeah, man...

TICK TOCK BANG:
NOISE IN MODERN ART

First broadcast January 27, 1999
CBC Radio One, 9:05 pm

Novelist Russell Smith (How Insensitive; Noise) devises a sound essay examining Futurism, minimalism, poetic collage, abstract painting, and the most listener-unfriendly music ever recorded, the style called Rotterdam, beloved of art students and disenchanted punk-rockers.

(direct to audio)

I agree with his point about how modern techno is related to earlier movements in art, but it's a pretty obvious one, and he doesn't say much else. (Update: ok, he does say some interesting things, but none of them are about techno, nor anything after about 1950. [Tunnel vision? What's that?])

last modified: 21:42:49 15-Apr-2002
in categories:Music/History, Arts