Saturday, October 20, 2007

MAGMA

I don't think there are too many times in one's life when someone else manages to articulate your own feelings with such resonance and with such precision, that you feel they are somehow after your very own heart.

Well, a few weeks ago I'd been discussing music with Philip and without knowing too much of the biographical detail, had been commenting about the clear influences of jazz musicians Albert Ayler and John Coltrane on the amazing first album by the French group Magma, musical project of Christian Vander. And on Monday, to my great pleasure, Philip managed to dig up this brilliant essay that Vander had written about these very influences.

Way beyond the undoubtedly intriguing background detail, it expresses Vander's personal music philosophy in a way that's especially poignant for having chosen such an artistically isolated and disenfranchised path.

3 comments:

n-rich said...

Hi William

I once saw a bizarre TV interview with snooker player Steve Davis, in which he confessed to an obsession with Magma; I seem to recall they even wheeled them on (he was financing some recordings I think). See this interview in The Observer for the story of his teenage epiphany.

paul said...

you know all the kids love magma:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=52vhtwuGjOA

Kai Stavre said...

As a complementary to the excellent Magma dvd series "Mythes et Legendes, Epok 1-4", (the 4:th not yet available as far as I know) "jah_vengeance" little video link feels welcome :-)