Scott Ritter is still one of the few people who embodies that rare combination: an opinion on US policy in Iraq, and knowledge of the facts surrounding the US invasion of Iraq. In a recent essay on AlterNet, Ritter sums up his top three myths on Iraq:
The myth of sovereignty (Iraq is a US-controlled puppet state)
The myth of Zarqawi (can you say “straw man”?)
The myth of WMD (never existed, never will)
Those of us critical of the invasion (before the tide turned and it became fashionable) have long predicted the current situation, bordering on civil war (which side of the border may be unclear). There doesn’t seem to be any clear way out any more.
Photographer Michael Ward launched his autobiography, Mostly Women, in the Saint Giles Street Gallery in Norwich last week, accompanied by an exhibition of his photographs. The exhibition included a series of photographs of the Beatles performing at the Cavern that have never been shown before.
Thanks to brilliant photographer and music fan Steve Taylor, I’ve discovered mini-LP CDs. Exact replicas of classic albums, down to the liner notes and inserts and faux-vinyl grooves, these albums are remastered and released exclusively in Japan. Music geeks the world over hunt them down (thanks, eBay!), and collect them as they would vinyl LPs.
And this made me realise (once again), that the music industry really has no need to fear the music loving public, as we will keep on buying music of quality. Those of us who love music, also love the tangible part of it, the collecting and the owning. Unfortunately, the big studios have turned mainstream music into a consumable, non-satisfactory commodity, somewhere between Ramen noodles and toilet paper, produced to be consumed intensely (also in the form of singles and mobile ringtones) and then discarded.
If people liked music so much that they listened to it over and over again, the economics of the disposable music industry won’t work any more. But true music fans have no interest in disposable music, so we hunt down the albums of true value. So some of us will continue investing more money in music than we should, keeping the music industry turning as it did until the early 80s, and the disposable music industry will be killed by the teenage golem it worked so hard to create.
Brilliant: if you ever rip someone off by selling a dud laptop on eBay, do be sure to delete the scans of your ID documents and your home-made foot fetish porn collection.
Every now and then, I’m shocked to discover that some legendary person or other is still alive. Today’s shocker is jazz great Oscar Peterson: not only 80 years old and alive and well, but performing in Brussels on June 26th. And at 100 euros per ticket, he better be worth it…
