Feeling sparkly and sore.

My first week in New York City is drawing to a close and the city's been kicking my ass and giving me all kinds of aural joy at the same time. Sunday night saw me head on down to the Jazz Standard with my boyfriend to watch Charles McPherson do his thing with four other very talented gentlemen. Willie Jones III in particular provided some mad drum solos that blew our tiny little minds to smithereens. Even better than that he turned out to be a really sound bloke that was happy to shoot the breeze with us after his performance. The smell of BBQ pervading the air in that joint was intoxicating but we were already filled to the brim with soul food and spaghetti (I tell you if I continue living here I'm going to gain at least 5 stone!)

I'm really interested as to why jazz has such a strong grip on this city more than anywhere else I've ever been. Not just that it was created in the States, but the fact that it still encapsulates a mood and a feeling that is so present here. It's as if Jazz is able to breathe in the smell of the New York streets and express the anguishes and celebrations of its people almost in the same breathe out. I'm looking to explore this further in a feature piece but I'll let you know when I've had some more time to mull it over.

Dragging us back to the life of London, my review of Putney born Four Tet's new single is now up for your hungry eyes on DMG.

Four Tet - Sing (single)

Let me know what your thoughts are on both the review and the single itself. On the listening front, I've been digging the new Gorillaz album, Plastic Beach, and I've been hitting up an old Gil Scott-Heron album, Bridges, a fair bit too.

For my sins, I watched the new Lady Gaga video on YouTube and remembered why I don't watch music television. Read into it whatever you will, but to me it just seems to me to be a weak excuse to have scantily clad women dancing about in a jail, and then a diner. Not that I mind beautiful women gyrating in, well very little to be honest, but those who put Gaga up on a pedestal of women's liberation, fighting for trans and female rights against male oppression are deluding themselves. Be honest about it. If you like the video, it's not because symbols of the patriarchal system are being poisoned or that Gaga is burning sunglasses made of cigarettes as a sign of monetary wealth to oppose American imperialism, it's because the thought of Beyonce and Lady Gaga being 'very bad girls' does naughty things to you or you like the clothes and drama or maybe you just dig the beat. In its own way it's fairly entertaining, but let's leave it at that shall we?