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In the movie Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004, dir. Michel Gondry), Clementine, character of actress Kate Winslet, comments that she would like to have the job of naming hair dyes. “The job is taken!”, she complains.

I remembered the scene while choosing lipstick colors on sale. Among the nude tones alone, the variety was impressive: cookie nude, (just) nude, nude matte and my favourite one, naked nude. What could be this colour, so mysterious that needed two synonymous words to be described?

Of course, the marketing worked for me and I bought the naked nude lipstick. Given the package received and the pale beige color of the lipstick, this naked nude was nowhere near as glamorous and daring as its name promised. The job is definitely taken, dear Clem!

I have been thinking a lot about the current mainstream pop and I could not help thinking that if I had to add a colour to the scene, naked nude would be a great option. There is a lot of glamour and eccentric names written in capital letters, a lot of pleonasm in the song lyrics, a lot of repetition in the costumes, wigs, and stage mannerisms.

No doubt the result is very colorful and noisy, but at the same time pasteurized and the result sounds as stimulating as a pale beige palette. I do not agree with the theory tahys says this happens because people happen to like the same things. My point is that in order to like or dislike something, first of all, I must be aware that that thing exists.

And here is the problem: always playing the same songs (whether new releases or oldies), radio stations make it very difficult for you to get to know a whole new world of wonderful independent music, which by the way, will not reach the top spots on streaming platforms, because the algorithms suggest… guess what? Mainstream themes!

And what would be the way to break this vicious cycle? Sincerely? I do not know. The mainstream scene is a million-dollar business, which involves many things beyond music. There is always something to do though, and no matter where you are, there is certainly an independent local scene, no matter how small. A local scene that you can strengthen, whether by promoting or attending events.

After all, expanding your taste beyond the “top hit” lists is also up to you.

Be seeing you!

G.F.

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It is not new that I complain here about my noisy neighbors and about the apartment building where I live, which seems like a real acoustic shell, which amplifies any type of sound. Therefore, I will not go back to the details of my problem.

Today, I would like to shed light on the solution. No, unfortunately, I do not bring a “one-size-fits-all” solution, that will suit to all your problems, just a strategy that worked for me and that might work for you, too. It has to do with getting out of your “acoustic shell”. Oh, yes, you do have one, trust me on that.

In this case, what I am calling the acoustic shell has nothing to do with where you live, that is, with external influences, which you, ultimately, cannot control, but with what resonates inside your head. The pattern repetitions that we develop have to do, of course, with such external factors, but they usually go far beyond that.

Our acoustic shell will resonate accordingly to how much we nurture this reaction. Asking yourself; “Is my reaction proportional to the action received, or am I adding a generous dose of other problems to them?” may help you take that step aside, whch allows you to have a provileged view of the situation, thus making it easy to manage a problem or critical situation.

Practical example? I recently finished a task which, in theory, was very pleasant (producing the second season of a podcast about comic art research), but turned out to be a nightmare to medue to my, say, technical diffculties.

During over ten weeks I was busy recording and editintg episodes, repeating to myself “get real” mantras (“I volunteered for the chore, nobody asked me to. I did it because I wanted, I made my choice” etc). Despite my goodwill, it did not work at all and I spent the whle time feeling a mix of self-pity and anger.

Okay, but where is the magical solution?, you ask yourself.

The solution (I never said it would be magical), darling is to take things as a grown up. Am I saying you should mute your inner child? Yes, but only for a short time, just enough for you to remember that doing stuff we would rather not is part of life, but it is not the only one.

Grown ups know that, although most of our life is fullfiled by obligations that do not always make sense to us there is also the other part: the things we do because we are passionate about, because we believe they must be done, we believe they must exist.

Stepping aside for a moment, I finally could see the situation through a diffferent perspective and, suddenly, there was no room for feeling miserable anymore. I did what I had to do, and I did it professionaly. Frankly, the result is quite good (check it out), despite the circunstances.

Another thing that grown ups know is how great it feels to get the job done.

Be seeing you!

G.F.

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Do you know when several small problems add up to the stress of the end of the year and you think you simply will not be able to handle all your tasks? When this happens to me, I feel at odds with all of humanity. In order not to spread even more bad mood around or at least, to be a feisty gal, but with fabulous skin, earlier this week I decided to make an appointment with a beautician for a facial.

The lady on the other side of the phone asked me to arrive at nine o’clock in the morning. I took the task so seriously that I actually arrived ten minutes early. Long story short, I left there at noon.

You might be wondering what kind of facial cleansing lasts three hours. I do not know either, because what I had was standard procedure. The rest of the time was filled with conversation. Not necessarily with me and always on her part.

Frankly, I cannot blame her. Apparently everyone is dying to talk. And talk a lot. Could it still be a remnant of the trauma of mandatory isolation during the Covid-19 pandemic? Were we like this before 2020? Or maybe, and that is personal guess, it is a mix of things with a pinch of anxiety generated by the indiscriminate use of cell phones and exposure to the internet?

The fact is that I left my self-care moment feeling completely exhausted. No kidding: exhausted. All that talking about different topics, without getting anywhere, highly reactive and with a slightly resentful tone made me physically tired.

As everything in life has different aspects, the positive side of this peculiar experience was that it made me question not only the repetitive mental behavior that I had been stuck in for the last few weeks, but it also made me reevaluate my situation.

While waiting for the creams to act on my face, some thoughts arose:

  1. Maybe I am not as bitter towards he world, as I thought I was
  2. Maybe my bad mood is actually below average
  3. Maybe, despite all the problems, I am okay.

Being okay, meaning feeling fine just the way you are, can be revolutionary. After all, well-being has a lot to do with completeness, self-satisfaction and other items that, despite of what the huge wellness lobby out there keep telling us, cannot be purchaised.

Speaking from the perspective of music creation, much of what is produced in terms of entertainment is linked to the idea that a film, a play, a book etc. has the primary obligation to awaken positive sensations and make you feel happy.

I completely disagree with this premise. Just as my three-hour facial was not exactly a walk in the park, but it achieved its goal, the transformation caused by art can come in many ways, through various sensations, and perhaps many of them are not directly linked to a feeling of well-being.

Subjecting creation to the rules dictated by entertainment industry is a gross reduction of the potential of art. Perhaps it is even a subversion of its primary role, which is to move people, to change a state of mind, a way of thinking, of perceiving ourselves on society.

Will you let your world shine beuatifully, just like a post-facial skin?

Be seeing you!

G. F.

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Jazzkantine is is a musical collective founded in 1993 in Braunschweig, Germany. Their first album, Jazzkantine , released in October 1994 won the “Echo Award” in 1996, the most important award for German music.I first heard them during dinner at the home of a member of another German band, TreSimul, quite sucessfull during the late 1990´s. It was love at first heard.

Just like Nouvelle Cuisine, Jazzkantine also uses gastronomic analogies to describe the sound proposal of Matthias Lanzer, owner of the Rap Nation label. The team includes rappers Aleksey, Cappuccino and Tachiles, and producers Ole Sander (DJ) and Christian Eitner (bassist). The result can be defined as a mix of fusion, jazz, funk and German rap. Their albums also featured partnerships with international jazz musicians.

In addition to their first album, I also have their follow-up work, Heiss und Fettig (1995). Awesome music, the kind that you have to check out, trust me.

It is noteworthy that as of 2016, the titles of the Jazzkantine albums no longer contain references to gastronomy, and their latest release, Discotheque (2022), moves even further towards a change of direction. The group embodied one of the strongest trends of the time in the world of music: collective projects, but as many similar projects, they needed to readapt with the arrival of the self-centered 2000s.

I am not talking here about the transition from physical music to digital format, but rather about something that has become a kind of collective mentality, consolidated through the expansion of the tools provided by the internet to produce and consume music.

Dazzled by the idea that we were now all living in a new era of equal conditions of production and dissemination, the musical community moved away from the modus operandi that characterized the collectives and embarked on projects that, although musically increasingly similar to each other, are now sold as “unique experiences”.

Well, it is (past) time to admit that the golden days of no gatekeepers (if they ever existed) are gone. Even if a few names raised and nourished their audiences on the early days of social networks by keeping a rather quantitative than qualitative production, these same names had to turn to some kind of “paid content” strategy in order to have their material visible.

After all, the gatekeepers have not disappeared! They just outsourced the service, and since then, they are stronger than ever. Our entire focus now is trying to understand and to please this new entity: the “almighty” algorithm.

Maybe that is why we no longer have time to collectively appreciate the fine products servend on the jazz canteens.

Be seeing you!

G.F.

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I do not like fake adornments. From wigs (as “high tech” aand expensive as they might be) to fake eyelashes, from acrigel nails to breast implants, from dental lenses to plastic flowers. I am aware that perhaps it is not the nicest confession, but it is the truth. You can put it down to my idiosyncrasies, if you must

However, at a wedding reception I attended recently, the centerpieces offered to guests were small arrangements of plastic lilies and forget-me-nots. I not only happily brought mine home, but also gave it some special place in my decoration, and it is now among the books, on one of my shelves.

Lack of coherence? Let me explain the case and then you can judge for yourself.

The bride and groom in question have been together for over thirty-five years and rose a beautiful family. Despite the desire of the bride to make the union official, the ceremony had been postponed several times, for different reasons, all quite tragic.

With superhuman strength, the bride overcame each of her challenges and made her dream come true. And I was lucky enough to be invited to this special moment.

The ceremony was simple and for a few people only. Everything was done by the family: the food service at the cocktail, the decoration, the souvenirs, and the table centerpieces. All that was made with love, facing the the effort that only workers know about: how to make an already tight salary, just for a moment of celebration, a day to remember.

There was so much love at the gathering, tender affection in every little detail, in every piece of cake offered, in every gesture, every smile in the room. In fact, there was a “good vibe” aura all around the place. How could I refuse to take an object offered in an environment of such love and care?

Another of my idiosyncrasies is that I think that objects can hold some traces of their owners and evoke memories. In other words, they have their own beauty, not related to their shape or material, but a certain, let us say, beauty within.

It is a crazy theory, I know, and it probably only makes sense in my head, but I can guarantee that the memories that come to mind every time I look at the small arrangement on my shelf are not only happy, they are truly beautiful.

Be seeing you!

G.F.