Kershaw on the Today Programme

[Guest]

Andy Kershaw appeared on this morning's Today programme on Radio 4 via telephone. He was ranting about art rock saying it was all worthless and that the rot set in with the release of Sgt. Pepper. Everyone's entitled to their opinion but he stepped over the line of good manners and as such became a bit of a bore. The discussion was supposed to be about Radiohead's new album and I wish to say that I didn't like the sound of it either. The interviewer accused Kershaw of being a philistine which I thought was a stupid thing to say. The whole thing is available on the iPlayer if you wish to pick over the bones starting at 2:55:00 .

[Bryn]

But 'stepping over the line' is the patronising poseur's whole approach to life.

[Martin Reynolds]

I wouldn't say he's a patronising poseur. He's a classic English eccentric. Just that his usual good judgement let him down on this occasion. Maybe he hadn't had a good night's sleep! I do think there's something to be said for sticking to subjects you know something about. He should stick to world music.

[MrGongGong]

and what on earth is wrong with Swordfish Trombones ? one of the greatest Albums IMV

[Lateralthinking1]

Martin - I thought he was OK. He could have brought his voice down a bit but it was quite amusing, intentionally so, although he meant it. I thought the either/or nature of the discussion was rather silly.

I would have thrown in the word "Kraftwerk" I think. I am definitely more on the side of the AK argument but then there's Talk Talk, The Blue Nile and a host of others that I have liked which I would guess could be dismissed as art rock.

Radiohead? Don't like most of their output as I have written elsewhere, seriously overrated in my view, I think that generation was wanting to have something they could say was modern rock classicism but it never convinced me. Indie later Floyd.

And the point about it all being a career is definitely true. It isn't that people didn't stick around before but it was often less obviously a business, more haphazard, there wasn't the same level of "product cynicism". This affects the music itself - it has to be more contrived because it comes from that mindset. I don't want my music played by accountants in another guise. - Lat.

[Bryn]

I wouldn't say he's a patronising poseur.

Well I find his whole approach to the indiginous peoples whose music he supposedly promotes fundimantally patronising in a rather too typically liberal white lefty kind of way.

[MrGongGong]

I did think the fragment of the CD they played sounded more interesting than most song based music and the self indulgent songs that many folk seem to like , though a bit like Mouse On Mars et al
but there again I do like Metal Machine Music and all that means to my social standing !!!!



(Kershaw's programmes from NOrth Korea were great a few years ago and well worth a listen !)

[french frank]

I wonder whether, in inviting his view in the first place, the media want him to take on the mantle of John Peel: i.e. the guru able to pick out the best of the new popular music and staying away from the mainstream?

I was a bit disappointed with the first episode of Music Planet too. It seemed more like a radio version of Human Planet, with music. I was expecting a closer examination of the music, as music, rather than just playing examples from the places they visited.

[Lateralthinking1]

Hi frenchfrank - Yes, I think the John Peel point is well made and it isn't just a media invention. He was so close to him and Walters that he is well-placed for being the standard bearer. For some of us, he is essential in that way as well as bringing his own individual qualities.

It could be quite possible to deconstruct Peel and not without criticism. He would have done it himself. He largely escaped that in the media, though, perhaps because he was more consistently settled. As for ordinary listeners, why do it? His angle on music and broadcasting was enlightened, contentious, innovative and in the truest BBC tradition. It couldn't have been done elsewhere and the myth is fine as long as those main points are understood.

I can't speak highly enough of Music Planet. It has been precisely the sort of broadcasting this listener has been wanting for a very long time. I still have the recordings of Andy in Zimbabwe and Mali from years back and this has been even better.

Throughout the series, we have been mentioning Lucy. She couldn't have carried it off on her own in the same way but I have enormous respect for her as a broadcaster, academic and enthusiast. The balance in the presentation has been exactly right and at times it has been an absolute joy. - Lat.

[gurnemanz]

Thanks, Mr GongGong. The line to Mr K was not great and I didn't hear him slag off Swordfishtrombones. Thanks to him and you I have just fished out the CD and greatly enjoyed listening to it again, having not played it for a while. I agree with your judgement. Marvellous instrumentation (I'd forgotten about the bagpipe intro to Town without Cheer) and some great input from Victor Feldman on a variety of percussion.

[french frank]

I can't speak highly enough of Music Planet. It has been precisely the sort of broadcasting this listener has been wanting for a very long time.

Let me give one example of why it didn't meet my hopes: the Galician bagpipes music. Much was made of the fact that the Galicians had Celtic origins. I would have liked to have heard about what musical connections there were between the Galician traditions and the Irish, Scottish and Breton bagpipe traditions, if any. Or what was specifically Galician about the music: did it connect with other types of music from the region. I didn't tune in to hear about the people, the landscape, the contemporary musical scene &c.

After that, like a typical 'listener', I didn't bother with any of the programmes after the first. Andy, for me, is an enthusiast rather than a specialist but he just doesn't take me with him because I don't share most of his tastes. I'm not really of the 'just listen and enjoy' school of musical appreciation .

[Curalach]

I don't know the first thing about Andy Kershaw or about the music being discussed.
Coming, therefore, from that background I thought he sounded like a rather boorish and unpleasant interviewee. I actually stopped what I was doing to listen.
I presume he has knowledge and qualities which the interview didn't draw out and of which I am unaware.

[Lateralthinking1]

frenchfrank - I agree with you on Galicia. The questions you raise are ones that I would like to have answered too. In fact, and this reminds me a little of the Benelux jazz discussions, there are many connecting stories that are still be told on the radio.

We have looked at certain jazz artists in the Netherlands but the most intriguing question is about the derivation of jazz there. Why not as much in Ireland, for example? Similarly, the celtic aspects of music in Ireland and Galicia, yes, but what about the folk traditions of Brittany and Sicily and so on. How do these interconnect?

Still, I have enjoyed the series immensely and I have liked the wider environmental contexts too - Lat.

[johncorrigan]

I think it's a bit more of a problem with the Today Programme, putting these four/five minute pieces on...and then Justin Webb struggles with dealing with just about anyone. I didn't think Kershaw was particularly boorish; he was saying what a lot of people think, although we may not go as far as he does - Naughtie or Humphries would have handled him; and the Radiohead apologist's approach brought a perfectly good angle from Andy - if the band have nothing left to say then stop saying it. Andy was just having a laugh, and I had one listening to him - but then I suppose I've come to know what to expect from him. Nothing wrong with a bit of passion, even if it's wasted on Radiohead.

[Serial_Apologist]

I was shocked by Kershaw's unwarrented outburst, having appreciated his programmes on music from other cultures, albeit critically. What he seemed to be implying is that it is fine for us to be enriched by musics from other lands, and by implication made to approach freed from patronising assumptions based on Western cultural assumptions of superiority, but we should be satisfied with downgraded musical product when it comes from here.

S-A