the fall of the house of fitzgerald
strangemouth came up to visit and deposited the rough cut of the fall of the house of fitzgerald onto horsemouth’s devices. horsemouth has watched it through probably about 20 times now. he pronounces himself delighted. in a little while he will watch it again. he thanks his co-directors en za and strangemouth.
this is the dancing about architecture project
interpretative dance against gentrification
but even the magic of the cinema is unable to stop the forces of capital.
horsemouth made sten watch it. (he said he liked it).
now horsemouth (and his co-directors) have to work out how to distribute it round the globe (or at least make it available to people who might be interested).
it features music by a number of musicians - including an improv with horsemouth using the zither thing, a track by musicians of bremen (malkin tower from the humming EP) and a track by horsemouth himself (ok strangemouth’s musical alter-ego whose name temporarily escapes horsemouth as he re-types this) is in there on drums somewhere) highrise strutters ball (this being a version of darktown strutters ball cleaned up for modern sensibiities).
sten said the music worked particularly well.
horsemouth’s ways of working have been shifting for a while. in former decades horsemouth would have battled for a particular vision of the piece, for particular shots and edits, in this decade (and in particular in this year) he is content to genuinely collaborate and allow other people’s visions through instead.
as soon as they stopped actually filming horsemouth’s work was done (well ok he did help out a little with tidying up after). he does have one request - that they use the photo of en za that horsemouth took during the dress rehearsals. it’s very strong. plus it shows the medusa crown straight on. the colours and the geometrical shapes are good.
horsemouth is also up a film poster (A4 ish) and a be-glittered postcard of himself in a sun ra type pose. at the end of the month they will reconvene. horsemouth hears that en za has the launch event planned already.
just as the director of the wickerman stunned his cast by suddenly announcing that they were not making a horror movie, as many had thought, but a musical, so horsemouth stunned enza by announcing that they were not making a magical film in the style of kenneth anger but in fact remaking a british children’s cartoon series called mr.benn.
every episode mr. benn would go into the fancy dress shop and try on a costume - he would then have a magical adventure. but eventually the shop keeper would come and get him and the adventure would be over for the week.
when they had finished working i.e. dressing up in silly costumes and photographing themselves and arranging all the statuary in the place as if they were guests at a party - enza gave horsemouth a glass of mulled wine to send him off out the door.
“writing about music is like dancing about architecture” is a quote attributed variously. to frank zappa, thelonious monk, brian eno, miles davis, elvis costello, (and gore vidal) people generally considered to be smart (or smart for the music industry).
nonetheless this is horsemouth’s plan - not the writing about music bit (he’s done that already at length) but the dancing about architecture bit. he goes to memorialise a mural. the wrecking ball is coming. the high rise will fall (or be left like a giant rotting tooth). very little will be saved out of the wreck.
walking in and walking back out again is distinctly part of horsemouth’s practice.
famous brutalist concrete (and a james bond villain) saved the balfron. but being named after an outlaw got robin hood gardens destroyed. the destruction of social housing on the nearby aberfeldy estate goes unremarked because it’s not in brutalist concrete. on chrisp street market the festival of britain reaches its predestined end (obsolescence - neglect - destruction - regeneration as a playground for yuppies just at the point when they no longer need to be there).
once again the timing is all wrong out east. maybe it will take so long to redevelop it will come to be seen as a signal of hope rising from the ashes.
horsemouth is the magician - he waves his magic wand. but his magic can’t save the block (or prevent the evictions). nor indeed can his magic put money in people’s pockets as the economic shock of the coronavirus epidemic hits and people lose their work (and there’s the winter and brexit to come). horsemouth’s magic is of very limited power.
