I Eat Music

It’s all been about the iPad this week, hasn’t it? Well, not all of it, but certainly some of it. And, in some small part, that has been my fault.

First off, tech blog Pocket-lint asked me to contribute to a feature called How The Apple iPad Will Change The World. I gave my thoughts on what effect it might have on the music industry both before and after the launch.

Then, not content with filling other people’s publications with my words, I went and dedicated my editorial in CMU Weekly to the iPad, as well. Here’s what that looked like:

I do so love an Apple product launch. The hype that always precedes them can only ever mean that the new thing Steve Jobs trots out with will be a big disappointment by comparison.

I suspect that this might be part of the plan, though. People always flock to point out that the latest Apple gadget is pointless, unoriginal and over-priced. And then what happens? Once the products are actually released – with our expectations reduced a little – those devices seem rather cool. And so you have the iPod, the iTunes Store, the iPhone and all the rest. The impact all those things have had is undeniable, despite all the initial naysaying.

Will that be the case with the iPad? Only time will tell. So far its main contribution to the world is to fill Twitter with jokes about “Dom Joly’s new iPhone” and iTampons. It’s certainly not the home computer replacement I was hoping for, and nor am I going to start carrying one around in my bag instead of my iPhone (I’ll still need that for phonecalls, if nothing else). However, if, as I suspect, the iPad turns out to really be the uber-terminal for accessing online content, at home or on the move, it becomes more attractive.

Following their purchase of digital music platform Lala.com late last year, it’s been rumoured Apple might launch a service that would let you store your entire iTunes library online, ready to be accessed from anywhere. If that included films as well as music, and assuming WiFi and mobile internet connections can handle it, you’ve suddenly got a fast, friendly and lightweight way to access all your entertainment content from anywhere.

I’m not entirely sure if that’s something worth having in addition to a laptop. Possibly not. But if you only really use your laptop as an online entertainment centre, well, then why have a laptop at all? And you should never underestimate Apple’s ability to sell something people didn’t think they wanted by the millions. As with all these things, it’s the content that really makes it what it is. All you need is one truly great app to make the iPad a must-have.

Read this edition of CMU Weekly in full here.

Last night I ventured down to the Novello Theatre in London’s glittering West End to watch Desperately Seeking Susan, which opened on Tuesday. Now, I know posting about musical theatre for the second time in a week and a half is going do little to help my claims that I’m no fan of the genre. I do have a friend who’s working on this particular production, though. And when he first told me that he was starting work on a musical version of Desperately Seeking Susan featuring the songs of Blondie a year or so ago, I did laugh loud and hard in his face.

If there’s one thing the world doesn’t need more of, it’s got to be musicals based on rock and pop songs. However, I would be lying if I said I hadn’t been getting increasingly excited about this one as I saw and heard more about it. First off, the songs already exist and aren’t specially written in an attempt to convey deeper meaning to an existing story (assuming we ignore the song that is). Also, Blondie’s music differs from the likes of Queen and Abba because I don’t hate it. And finally, Desperately Seeking Susan, which stars Rosanna Arquette and Madonna, is a film (like Bugsy Malone) that I watched obsessively as a child.

Bored housewife Roberta Glass is trapped in an unfulfilling marriage with her spa salesman husband, Gary. She entertains herself by following the love life of Susan and Jay, through personal ads they place for each other as they travel around the country – Jay with his band and Susan just because. As Roberta gets herself more mixed up with their lives, she also finds herself pursued by a murderous jewel thief against a backdrop of New York’s 1979 punk scene.

The danger with this is that it could so easily become “musical theatre does punk”. Thankfully, for the most part it manages not to. A scene where Jimmy’s band play in a punk club does step over the line with a very un-punk performance and some seriously bad guitar miming but I was never left squirming in my seat in the way I had feared I would.

This is perhaps because the production steers clear of wandering into areas where it doesn’t really belong and just takes a feeling and visual style from late 70’s punk, most notably the speed. The number of scenes in Desperately Seeking Susan is staggering and the speed of the changes is phenomenal. A very clever stage design means that there are few moments where there isn’t something moving and changing. On a relatively small stage, it’s a real visual treat.

Peter Michael Marino’s excellent script also helps in keeping up the pace fast and ironing out or removing the many dubious or simply unbelievable points that appeared in the original film – not least the length of time Roberta loses her memory after a fairly insubstantial bump to the head.

Then, of course, there’s the music. This isn’t some drunken idea taken too far; Blondie’s music really does fit the story perfectly. And if you don’t get just a little bit overexcited the first time you hear Call Me sung by a chorus, I don’t think you can have been listening properly. The songs all sound great, even Maria, which I usually try to blank from my memory, and Rapture, comical rap and all. The only low point is Moment Of Truth, a new song written by Debbie Harry and Chris Stein especially for the show. It stands out because it’s clearly written as a song for a musical (whereas all the other songs obviously aren’t) and is not even on speaking terms with lyrical subtlety. Most of all, it’s just an awful song and serves almost exactly the same purpose in the show as 11:59, which directly follows it.

This aside and ignoring a few kinks that I’m sure will be fixed during the preview stage, I thoroughly enjoyed Desperately Seeking Susan. It’s fun, exciting, not to over the top and has enough twists and turns to keep you amused. Everyone is well cast, particularly Emma Williams as Susan and Kelly Price as Roberta. As the show drew to its close, the audience became ever more enthralled and, as far as I could tell, all left satisfied.

That’s it – only posts about obscure indie bands from now on!

More on the show: www.seeking-susan.com

Get to know one of the minor characters:

Okay, yesterday morning I was reminded of Adam Buxton’s censored version of Fuck The Police as I brushed my teeth, today I woke up with these two songs alternating in my head. And there they have stayed all day.

Let’s just get this straight, before I go any further, I’m not a particularly big fan of musicals. Bugsy Malone, however, is a film I loved as a child. I used to watch it pretty much daily. I can’t remember if this was before or after I started watching Labyrinth daily. Probably before. I’ll save clips of that David Bowie epic for another time. For now, you can share in the giddy childhood delight that is Bad Guys and the brilliant Down and Out.

Normal service will resume shortly.

Bad Guys

Down and Out

Buy the Bugsy Malone soundtrack (I won’t tell anyone)