"Writing about music is like dancing to architecture."

And god knows, if people would be more tolerant, I would shake my booty on down to some architecture I see...
Thinking about bands like This Heat, I came to wondering if they are not more inventive than any bands around now, not just in the era they were in, but even if they themselves were contemparory now...
This disturbs me... I don't like to think this way... but it's true, isn't it? The best bands around now sound like Can or De La Soul or The Silver Apples or Slint... or some old indie, hiphop, soul heroes...
One of Tom Cox's latest articles bemoaned the lack of bands nowadays who truly know their musical history. But the bands and artists who made this history were the most vital when they didn't pay any attention to the rules, or the past. They were the future. The 'punk rockers' now are pastiches with nothing to say, nothing to rail against. They know what they're supposed to sound like, look like and talk like. That is not punk.
So maybe emulating music in bands is a dead form? Why pay homage to musical idols above anything else in your own music? I know we've had Delicatessen saying people should be more influenced by books than bands, but that medium always ends up far too art-school, arrogance without substance (and besides, look at Delicatessen now)... still, it was a start...
Instead, how about performing a tribute to your favourite household object?
Interpret the stained coffee mug, be at one with your shelves, feel the complexities of the ravaging blender, the slow heat of the microwave... look more closely at your rituals and the objects that take part in them, create the so-far unheard sound of your walls...
Or to take it differently, your favourite word? This could lead to some interesting instrumentals, rhythmically following the path of syllables... hmm... there's something in this, I know there is... I couldn't give examples of what band might sound like what, for that would be falling into the trap again, of sounding like a band... forget music... take the unwritten and write it, before it's too late. Before we reach the stage of reviving turgid revival after turgid revival. Before the originals are so steeped in replacements you forget what you ever liked about music in the first place...
Dance to architecture, and make music worth writing about.

"I'm off to go play in my band... we're called Supersonic... WOOF!"

"Mummy, what's the mad lady doing?" "Don't worry dear, she's just doing a rhumba to the carpark..."

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