Reply To: [unofficial weekender] Friday dudes!

[blinky465 17028xp 1]

I had a bit of a thing for world music, when we lived in France about 14 years ago. I think I was one of the few people who genuinely liked the French Eurovision entry back in 2008. Everyone else thought it was a joke song, because of the backing singers and the inhaling helium and stuff (and, of course, there’s nothing more anti-french than singing in English! All my neighbours howled laughing at the “zany french humour”) but I honestly thought it was a great song!

When we lived in France, it was law that radio stations had to play not less than 40% french-language music. There were some really good songs about (and, tbh, a fantastic amount of terrible dross).

A lot of French (and German) music suffers from the harpsichord-oompah cliche, but there’s something utterly joyful about seeing your neighbours all dancing about in the street whenever the Fatals Picards came on the radio!

Does jazz need a definition? Discordant, uncomfortable, tuneless…. I like my tunes to be predictable. I like songs played in a key. I like music played to rules. A tune needs a tonic, and passages in it need to resolve (not necessarily a strict I-IV-V but it’s a great formula); it needs rhythm and harmony and a melody (and jazz has none of these things!) A bit like playing games, really – without rules, you’re just chucking dice across a table and mucking about.