What I do when I should be studying...or not taking part in a Reality Television show
less pathologically titled: Bjork would never win Idol
Published on November 19, 2004 By notsohighlyevolved In Entertainment
Bjork would not have won Idol!

I have recently been listening to Bjork and falling in love all over again.

I typed live instead of love in that last sentence and I think there is something to it. I have been without music for the last year of so, not because I lack the means but because I lacked the interest. Recently the interest was reignited and I found myself alive again. Virgins realise how they have not yet been born into the world until that first touch and priests understand their inherent morbidity until they feel that first brush with the divine. I am born again and I have realised how dead my spirit without music.

Some people say digression, but unless it’s a paragraph long it’s not!

Like I said - I love Bjork.

Like the title says - She would not - could not - win Idol.

What would the judges say: Flat voice, inconsistent, faults in delivery and emphasis, not a chance in hell of ever selling a solitary CD.

What the judges don’t take into account: The listener will wait out patiently the three minutes of a song where her voice is flat, lifeless, dissonant with the music and just plain weird to hear that voice open up its throttles and turn into gravel and sweetness and wrath and grief and love and joy and rapture and envy and melancholia and syrup and lightening and eruption and sublimely encroach itself upon neurons that gasp and quake and convert their neighbours to a sound so unnatural as to be the voice of the very angels.

The whole Idol phenomenon could not accept a talent that accepts momentary mediocrity to allow the possibility of emotional and tonal brilliance. Instead it accepts a more consistent form of mediocrity – competence in lieu of unpredictable genius.

Comments
on Nov 19, 2004
The whole concept of idol disturbs me greatly. The fact that the word 'idol' is even used is frightful considering the fact that people chosen by a bottom-line driven panel to sell bad love songs are far from anything that should be idolised.

My favourite singers all have strange voices - a definite Bjork fan, Billy Corgan, Robert Smith, hell - anyone who sounds slightly different and I'm prepared to give it a listen. People who perform pitch perfect everytime are not performers. They allow perfection to get in the way of emotion which makes their delivery inauthenic and flat.

Idol has its place for certain consumers of music, but will never create phenomenons like the lovely Bjork.

Suz xxx
on Nov 19, 2004
People who perform pitch perfect everytime are not performers. They allow perfection to get in the way of emotion which makes their delivery inauthenic and flat.


Current Australian Idol for an example. They are currently recording a single that supposedly has a vocal range that is supposed to impress and awe. The only problem - it sounds like muesli.

My High School was a Marist Brothers institution and they liked nothing better than taking out the Casio keyboard and doing their renditions of Wind beneath my wings and anthems in the key of latin. When I watch and hear Idol I'm back there, stuck in an itchy school uniform speculating on what hell holds in store for my tormentors.

However, unlike high school, this torment is entirely voluntary. I can't seem to stop watching. It's like footage of baby seals being beaten - it sickens you and you know you should avert your gaze, but you just can't and you will never be the same again.
on Nov 19, 2004
It's like footage of baby seals being beaten - it sickens you and you know you should avert your gaze, but you just can't and you will never be the same again.


Do you know what's really scary? When I was momentarily back in Sydney a couple of months ago people actually thought that I was one of the chicks from Aust Idol. I've no idea which one, but I had people coming up to me in dive bars in Redfern and on Central Station asking me for an autograph. I'm not sure what sickened me more - being mistaken for a wannabe or the fact that it seemed to impress the general public.

So you were subjected to the same Catholic School torture as myself? Which school was it? I was lucky enough to go to a co-ed Catholic School (if we're looking for a silver lining, that is) so I didn't get the full experience. Thank fuck for that!

Suz xxx
on Nov 19, 2004
So you were subjected to the same Catholic School torture as myself? Which school was it? I was lucky enough to go to a co-ed Catholic School (if we're looking for a silver lining, that is) so I didn't get the full experience. Thank fuck for that!


I went to Kogarah Marist High and years 11 and 12 were co-ed until our year and then they changed it to single sex If revolution were to happen in hedonism central (aka Sydney) it should have happened then, but alas the time has come and gone and we failed to carpe diem, we just carped.
on Nov 19, 2004
we failed to carpe diem, we just carped.


I've never heard of a school going backwards like that. How incredibly strange. That sucks.

Looks as though we come from opposite ends of Sydney - I went to school at St Leo's which is near Hornsby. Crap school, but who's wasn't, hey?
on Nov 19, 2004
Crap school, but who's wasn't, hey?


Remember when our parents told us we would look back on it all and remember high school as the best time of your life - they lied!

The best times were all the bits in between, like sand in between your toes, they were when you jigged school all together and did everything you weren't supposed to - surfing, sex, drugs and rock n roll baby!
on Nov 19, 2004
The best times were all the bits in between, like sand in between your toes, they were when you jigged school all together and did everything you weren't supposed to - surfing, sex, drugs and rock n roll baby!


Man - I was such a good two shoes. I didn't once skip school, didn't have sex and only had about two joints through my entire school career *sigh* Why didn't anyone tell me that my parents were wrong? Skipping school would have only gotten me grounded, not ruin my entire future (which, by the way, I have done a good job of destroying myself and I didn't have to skip anything!) and it would have been fun! Stupid sensibility. Glad I've lost that in my old age.
on Nov 19, 2004
Stupid sensibility. Glad I've lost that in my old age.


Don't worry Flooz, I'm just going the other way. Super responsible Marco has arrived and it's making me feel like I've turned vegan, stopped cussing, started believing in the redemptive powers of Christ and given up smoking (dear god I HAVE!!!!!) all in the same instant.

Next thing you know I'm no longer drinking liquor or wine and life starts to take on the bitter-sweet taste of copper under your tongue and you know that soon you will be dead, not because of anything pathological, just because you simply gave up and winter took the smile off your lips and summer forgot to replace it.

Another thing - you think too much. You're only 24, irrepairable damage to your future is almost an impossibility
on Nov 22, 2004
Super responsible Marco has arrived


Dear god! I shall alert the authorities. What calamitous turn of events have brought this on? Congrats on stopping smoking, though. It's a battle I shall have to fight... one day. It sounds as though you are doing reasonably well, however.

Another thing - you think too much


If I only had a dollar for everytime I've been told this

Next thing you know I'm no longer drinking liquor or wine


If I ever lose my passion for wine I'll know that I'm dead. Simple.

on Nov 23, 2004

The best times were all the bits in between, like sand in between your toes, they were when you jigged school all together and did everything you weren't supposed to - surfing, sex, drugs and rock n roll baby!


yeah. and enraging your mother almost to the point of murdering your smart-assed little self, right marco ?.


(god, typing that made me remember how mad at you i am. i hope you're having nicotine cravings). *pokes out tongue*


mig XXX

on Nov 23, 2004
(god, typing that made me remember how mad at you i am. i hope you're having nicotine cravings). *pokes out tongue*


You angry at me? Well I never...

I've neveer been so foot-stampingly not sorry in all my life.

Rest assured next time I talk to you, i'll probably be a blabbering wreck.

As far as the nicotine cravings, I have been. What? Have you been talking about me behind my back.? *Pokes tongue out, pulls out ears like dumbo and goes cross eyed*
on Nov 23, 2004

I've neveer been so foot-stampingly not sorry in all my life.


bah ! well, me neither !


and as soon as i remember what we were arguing about, i'm going to let you have it, buddy !


mig XXX