Saturday, May 19, 2012

Jeff Mangum ATP Part 7: THE FINAL PROGRAMME

I am still going on about the Jeff Mangum curated All Tomorrow's Parties Festival, in Butlins Minehead.

And then to Group Doueh. As noted in the Executive Summary, the SADR sensations were a bit less trippy than on the record I have, but they did serve up an appealing stew of desert guitar music. Mr Doueh took a relatively modest role (apart from when he nonchalantly played guitar behind his head), letting the band's two women singers front things. They also did a bit of getting down and dancing, which was endearingly odd considering that they a good bit more modestly dressed and round than is the case with western dancers.
All Star Jam
After Group Doueh had finished we were about to drift off to see Sebadoh (largely for the want of anything better to do) when some excitable fellow said to us that he had heard that there was going to be an All-Star Jam taking place down here. At first we were unsure, but as the place started to fill up with hipsters – and as the supposedly finished venue made no efforts to throw people out –we wondered if maybe he was onto something. And yeah, he was. Members of bands such as the Sun Ra Arkestra, the American Contemporary Music Ensemble, a Hawk And A Hacksaw, Roscoe Mitchell and many many others appeared onstage and started banging out a chaotic yet enjoyable barrage of music that seemed largely to be based around an Arkestra groove. I felt a bit trend being there with all the people taking photos of everything to prove that they had been There, but it was one of the most fun ATP things ever.

That is largely that for me and the Jeff Mangum ATP. I did not see enough stuff on the ATP TV channel to say much about it except that i) the Rutland Weekend Television stuff reminded me of how impressive Eric Idle's technique is and ii) the production values in The Life of Brian were much higher than I expected; I particularly liked how they decorated the walls of Pilate's study with copies of the murals from the Villa of the Mysteries in Pompeii [so called because the confusing audio guide makes finding its famous wall paintings a rather mysterious process].
I did find the lack of chalet-mate sociability a bit of a drag (my beloved can be so grumpy!), so I would not be too keen on the two-person chalet again, for all that they do the job. I must therefore give a shout out to ILX superstar Aldo Cowpat, his lovely wife and their friends (who all have names but it is more exciting on the internet if I make them sound mysteriously unnamed) for having us round for tea and cake. And vodka, they are Scottish after all. We watched a bit of that Sherman's March film (a documentary about this guy who starts off trying to make a film about Sherman's march through Georgia but ends up using the "Hi, I'm making a documentary" line as a way of meeting but not actually copping off with loads of women).

And so my account of this festival trails away…

An inuit panda production

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