Light On Dark Water

This one, on the other hand, I didn’t buy

Though it did catch my eye. Apparently there is some sort of sub-sub-genre of disposable music for dance clubs which is called “lounge,” and the album art is often something like the picture below. I nearly always stop and look at images like this for a moment, though the music is of no interest to me. Very frequently the picture involves water, a beach or swimming pool, and a luxury resort. The images are of a kind of earthly paradise: perfect sensual pleasure. To my male mind, at least, there is a suggestion of sex, even if the pictures are, like this one, uninhabited.  Some include beautiful women, but the empty ones are, in a way, more subtly alluring, because they’re all pristine promise and potential. I suppose my earthly paradise always includes water, preferably an ocean beach. 

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If there’s an interior, it’s usually ultra-“modern,” i.e. what modern was supposed to be 50 years ago, with an unearthly or perhaps inhuman feel—no actual human mess and trouble visible—like this one:

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I don’t really like this kind of thing–I wouldn’t want either of these pictures on my wall–and am embarrassed by my susceptibility to it. I wonder if anyone else reacts this way. I suppose in a broad and probably less healthy way it’s a variant of the appeal of Thomas Kinkade’s art. 

Kinkade-candlelight_cottage

Maclin Horton

25 responses to “This one, on the other hand, I didn’t buy”

  1. Janet

    I could go for that lanai right now–but I plan to sleep. The second one has a really bilious feel to it and the TK–oh dear.
    My sister who is an honest-to-goodness artist made a negative comment on TK on her Facebook page last week and started a Battle Royale on a “friend’s” page.
    AMDG

    Reply
  2. Mac

    Yeah, the green one isn’t that great an example, I just got impatient looking for an interior. What’s a lanai? never mind, I can google–yeah, I guess that’s what it is.
    That TK painting has a slightly bilious quality, too.

    Reply
  3. janet

    Yeah, I almost said that.
    AMDG

    Reply
  4. Rob G

    “Lounge” music is usually slow tempo electronica, sort of like trip-hop, except often instrumental or with minimal lyrics. It’s rooted in an appreciation for the so-called “bachelor pad” music of the 50s and 60s.
    What the newer stuff does is to try and recreate the feel of that older material while giving it a more modern electronic spin.
    I like some of it, but I tend to gravitate more towards the “chill-out” and “downtempo” stuff, which can be pretty decent background music for driving or whatever.
    Definitely know what you mean about the imagery. I find it appealing in an inexplicable, almost visceral way. Rainy, nightime city scenes have a similar effect on me, even though the mood is almost the polar opposite, and I don’t really like the city much. I think it’s the melancholy aspect.

    Reply
  5. Mac

    I generally like what gets described as downtempo and definitely trip-hop, but when I’ve sampled these albums they’ve seemed blander than that and not very interesting.
    “rainy nighttime city scene”: oh yeah, me too.

    Reply
  6. Rob G

    “when I’ve sampled these albums they’ve seemed blander than that and not very interesting.”
    Yeah, a lot of that stuff is really just wallpaper. If you listen to one of those compilations there might be only 4 or 5 interesting tracks out of 20.
    Speaking of which, I watched a rather good movie last night, “Drive” with Ryan Gosling. The soundtrack is by Cliff Martinez, the same guy who did the primo ambient score for Soderberg’s “Solaris,” but this one is a little more electronica/ambient. I really liked the feel of the movie (quite Lynchian in some regards, as if D.L. had made an action film) and Gosling’s very good, but the movie is punctuated by a few brief but very bloody scenes of Scorcese-esque violence. I don’t like that sort of thing much, and I imagine that on the big screen those scenes would have been far worse, but on the TV at home they were bearable, largely because of their relative brevity.
    Other than that I thought the movie was very well done.

    Reply
  7. Mac

    This one I did buy. About half of it is really great, sort of along the lines we’re talking about, though some of it is too close to ordinary techno.

    Reply
  8. Mac

    Cross-posted. Haven’t heard of that movie but it sounds good.

    Reply
  9. Rob G

    ‘Down the Hill’ sounds interesting–I’ll check it out. A fave of mine is ‘Behind the Sun’ by Chicane, which is nice mix of ambient, downtempo, and trance. It’s a great listen on a long drive.

    Reply
  10. Mac

    I haven’t listened to Down the Hill for a while, but it’s not loungey at all, more like Massive Attack, and a couple of tracks are like Delerium, if you’ve ever heard them–beautiful female vocals and electronica. I think some tracks sort approach techno and are less interesting.

    Reply
  11. Rob G

    Ha! Check this out — from the brand new Chicane album. See if you can ID it without reading the comments. Shouldn’t take you long!
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ElOiVlGHwcY
    Gotta admit, I’m a total sucker for this kind of stuff…
    Isn’t Google wonderful (at times)?

    Reply
  12. Mac

    Just finished watching/hearing 4 hours of Wagner, and it’s way past my bedtime, so I’ll wait and watch that tomorrow. btw I heard some Chicane on Rdio at work today & liked it.

    Reply
  13. Mac

    No, I didn’t get it. Either that’s not from one of the [_____ ___] albums I’ve heard or I just don’t remember the song. As it happens, though, that’s from the same Chicane album I heard yesterday, and the first track on it could be [_____ ___]. I’m saying “heard” instead of “listened to” because, being at work, I just had it playing quietly as background music.

    Reply
  14. Rob G

    It’s from the ( ) album — can’t remember which track — somewhere in the middle, methinks. It’s one of my favorite songs from that record.

    Reply
  15. Mac

    I actually own that one…but have never heard it. Ridiculous.

    Reply
  16. Rob G

    that’s my second favorite after “Takk”

    Reply
  17. Rob G

    Yes, turns out it’s the 4th song on the ( ) disc.
    And I just found out a couple days ago that they have a new album coming out at the end of the month.

    Reply
  18. Mac

    Yeah, saw something about that on Facebook the other day. I think there may have been a video or something but I was in too much of a hurry to check it out.

    Reply
  19. Craig

    So, how was Die Walkure?
    About Drive: I saw it too, and liked it, but it is quite odd. The Lynch angle is an interesting idea. I gather that the nearly mute central character is (silently) paying homage to some famous characters from older movies — though which ones, I have no idea. I think you have to be a connoisseur to relish these references. I found the soundtrack annoying.

    Reply
  20. Mac

    I posted even as you were commenting, Craig.
    I probably miss most of those allusions in movies. It annoys me when I read a review of some ordinary commercial movie and the reviewer mentions a lot of other ordinary commercial movies that it makes reference to.

    Reply
  21. Rob G

    One of the more obvious references is Leone’s “man with no name,” since in the film the driver is never named, and even in the credits he’s just “The Driver.” Another reference might be Shane, to which the plot of Drive bears a fair amount of resemblance.
    I haven’t read anything about the movie so I’m not sure if the director had Lynch consciously in mind (compared to Joe Wright’s “Hanna,” where Wright said that Lynch was a conscious influence.)
    I liked the music, but thought it was interesting that while the movie was set in contemporary L.A., the music had a definite 80’s retro feel, although I don’t think any 80s music was actually used.

    Reply
  22. Craig

    See, that’s what I mean, Rob! I don’t know those movies you think Drive is alluding to.
    I partly objected to the music of Drive simply because I don’t like that style of music, but also partly because I found the combination of music and visuals jarring, as though somebody was playing the wrong soundtrack over the film. That might be a hard judgment to defend, but it was my impression at the time.

    Reply
  23. Mac

    I would have missed Leone connection unless it was accompanied by Morricone-style music.

    Reply
  24. Rob G

    “I partly objected to the music of Drive simply because I don’t like that style of music, but also partly because I found the combination of music and visuals jarring, as though somebody was playing the wrong soundtrack over the film.”
    Makes sense. And probably because I do like that kind of music, I didn’t find it jarring, just interesting.

    Reply
  25. Louise

    The trouble with TK’s art is that the light is all wrong. It’s not Real.

    Reply

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