Have Tracer, Mark, and Alan not heard Margaret Berger?

[koganbot]

In relation to Episode Three of the Resonance FM series A Bite Of Stars, A Slug Of Time, And Thou:

(1) Results 1 - 10 of about 1,940 for "margaret berger" "robot song". (0.04 seconds)

(2) How would you compare Mark's and Alan's accents as to class, geography, and personality?

(3) Mark mentioned that the field of science fiction has been and to some extent still is anxious about its quality in relation to supposed real literature. (Frank: And well it should be.) Two questions:

(3a) Does this anxiety manifest itself in an attempt to raise the genre (say by infusing more literary or social elements) or just to do it better? (The field of mystery stories probably suffers from a similar anxiety, but back in its great days there were some writers - G.K. Chesterton and Raymond Chandler and Rex Stout come to mind - whom I'd put into the "do it better" category in that they had writers chops but didn't think they had to monkey with the conventions they were given, so they didn't come across as adding "superior" elements [except maybe when Chandler got to The Long Goodbye, which is his most overrated novel anyway].)

(3b) Does popular and semipopular music (incl. indie and alternative and noise) feel a similar anxiety, and if so, how does it act out the anxiety? I think it's shot through with anxiety, but unlike science fiction, it doesn't have an established "real music" that's equivalent to "real literature" to compare itself to, given the abandonment by so much of the intelligentsia of "classical" and "serious" music as the measure of quality. So pop and rock can be obsessive about their search for the real, but the real always remains provisional, because you don't know where to locate it.

Comments

[jauntyalan.livejournal.com]

http://freakytrigger.co.uk/lollards-podcast/2007/03/freaky-trigger-and-the-lollards-of-pop-week-12/

admittedly there is no ref to the songs played on the site! also see

http://freakytrigger.co.uk/ft/pop/2007/02/margaret-berger-pretty-scary-silver-fairy-roundup/

:-)

thanks for the just in case-ness of it though!

[koganbot]

When the conventional "noes, my family disapproves of the one i love" narrative hits the heartfelt anguish in the lyric "I'm in love with a robot", even though the song's title is a bit of a spoiler, and even though this is such a worn cliché in electro, you are wormed inside such patent ridiculousness. You are ready to believe her. It's in the step-up in the bridge, "You’re the only one who makes me feel a thing", a warm wash of melody that gives me goosebumps.

Excellent. OTM. It's amazing how well this song works; well, it's amazing that in a pop world full of catchy melodies that this one manages to be more catchy and aching and poignant. This would have been in my top ten singles of the year or the decade even if only it had been a single. It is the first two songs on her MySpace (albeit in inferior remixes), so perhaps it is a personal favorite.

The lyrics are based on experiences and feelings that she had in the beginning of her teenage years. It's a combination of being unsure and naive. I am fascinated and inspired by the person I was then. She was carefree and would love to go back to being that person on this album.

Carefree and unsure, huh?

[koganbot]

Skyecaptain's analysis, if you haven't seen it.