Futur choc

 Excited to announce the publication of two books in translation!

       
 

On November 16th, Audimat publish Le choc du glam, the French version of Shock and Awe: Glam Rock and Its Legacy, translated by Hervé Loncan. More information here. 

On November 19th, Minimum Fax publish Futuromania, a collection of my writing about electronic music (dance + non-dance), translated into Italian by Michele Piumini. More information here. 

 

some things in Italy

I really enjoyed writing the companion essay to Sandro Moiso's vintage interview with J.G. Ballard, as reproduced in All That Mattered Was Sensation, out now on Krisis Publishing. This attractive and portably petite volume contains the text in both Italian and English.

"Prophet of the Present," the title of my essay, comes out as "Profeta del presente" in Italian - nicely preserving the alliteration.

If you are wondering about the "James Ballard" bit - it seems that J.G.'s books were published under that name in Italy, or even as James G. Ballard. When I saw that, I thought I'd possibly stumbled upon a national quirk of Italian publishing - an aversion to the old-school Anglo-American style of impersonal initials in literary nomenclature, as in E.M. Forster or G.K. Chesterton. But as far as I can tell, D.H. Lawrence is D.H. Lawrence in Italy, not David Herbert Lawrence or Dave Lawrence.

                                                     

Something else in Italy -  out in May, on Minimum Fax, a collection of my electronic music writings:

"Sogni Elettronici," in case you were wondering, means "Electronic Dreams"

German and Japanese editions - slightly different contents - due 2021.

Anglosphere versions - probably not. I have other plans for some of the material. But who knows...


Now I think about it, there's a third thing in Italy happening on the books front. Minimum Fax are publishing the massive Mark Fisher K-Punk anthology in translation. Because texts typically get longer in Italian, they are breaking up the colossus into two volumes. The first installment, Il nostro desiderio è senza nome - which translates as Our Desire is Nameless - has just come out.  This first chunk of the collection also contains my prefazione from the Repeater edition - and this foreword is shortly to be extracted in the newspaper Il Tascabile.

How cool - and circular - that the subtitle of Il Nostro Desiderio is Scritti Polittici.

"Something in Italy" indeed...  in this case it's helping keep Mark's ideas alive






                                      

book news

Rip It Up and Start Again has been repackaged in a new virulently glowing pink edition as part of the series Faber Social Greatest Hits, alongside books by Viv Albertine, Barney Hoskyns,  Nick Kent, Rob Young, and Kim Gordon. 

The Sex Revolts: Gender, Rebellion & Rock 'n' Roll is coming out in a German translation on Ventil Verlag in the early summer of 2019.  It contains a new foreword that reframes the book in the light of the current anti-feminist backlash, a bonus section of pieces by me and Joy Press on various female artists from the last 25 years since the book was first written, and the reincorporation of  a chapter cut out of the original text for space reasons that looks at rock criticism and its gender-political biases. 

That revamped and expanded version of The Sex Revolts is also coming out in a French translation at some point in 2020 through the publisher La Découverte. 

Finally, a collection of my electronic music writings is being published in Italian by minimum fax. Titled Futuromania, its contents range from rave to ragga, synthpop to musique concrete, EBM to trapedelia. Out sometime in 2020.

"visual music" talk at Tate Modern July 27 ++++ Post Punk events in Italy - Locorotondo (July 21-22), Milan (23), Rome (24)

Presented by 4:3 as part of the Uniqlo Tate Late series, on July 27 I'm giving a YouTube illustrated talk about "visual music" - a subset of 20th Century experimental animation - with particular focus on alliances between film makers and musique concrete composers, and on animators who created their own electronic scores.  

The event is free, but requires a ticket - these can be picked up from 17.00 hrs onwards on  the day of the event at the Level 0 Ticket Desk at the Tate Modern.

UNIQLO TATE LATE
TATE MODERN - FRIDAY 27 JULY 2018
Visual Music
Starr Cinema, Boiler House Level 1
19:10: doors open
19:30 - 21:00 talk + films 

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Before arriving in London, I'm participating in the LOCUS FESTIVAL in Locorotondo (near Bari, in the Apulia region of S.E. Italy) and doing events in Milan and Rome based around the minimum fax republication of Postpunk 1978-1984 (aka Rip It Up and Start Again). 

LOCOROTONDO

Saturday July 21
19:00 hrs, Largo Mazzini
POST-PUNK 1978-2018: 40 anni di musiche, cultura e società.

Gli ultimi decenni di musica negli scritti di Simon Reynolds.
Con Simon Reynolds, Vittorio Bongiorno, Nicola Gaeta ed Enzo Mansueto

Sunday July 22

18:00 hrs,  Casa Locus, Locorotondo (Ba)

WRITING MUSIC: scrivere la musica
Workshop con Simon Reynolds. Incontro esclusivo ravvicinato su tecniche e metodi del giornalismo musicale.
Posti limitati, prenotazione gratuita RSVP su http://bit.ly/scriverelamusica

MILAN

July 23

7 pm Post Punk event at Verso libri bookshop

In conversation with Giulia Vavaliere. 

Translator Michele Piumini. 

July 24

11 - 12.30 - playing records on  Radio Raheem

ROME

July 24

8 pm - Post Punk event at Monk 

In conversation with Chiara Colli. 

Translator Michele Piumini

GLAM BOOK TOUR - DEUTSCHLAND + ITALIA - DECEMBER 2017

         

Pulling my gloves, scarf and woolly hat out of SoCal retirement as I head off to snowy Germany and only slightly less shivery Italy for the publication of Shock and Awe - titled GLAM in the Ventil Verlag edition (translated by Jan-Niklas Jäger) and Polvere di Stelle in the minimum fax version (translated by Michele Piumini). 

Details below on this whistlestop tour of  readings + riffing, records + videos, questions + answers.  

GERMANY

Berlin - Sunday December 3 

doors open 7 pm / event starts 8pm - Humboldt-Universität Institut für Musikwissenschaft und Medienwissenschaft, 

Georgenstr. 47 (S- und Ubahn Friedrichstraße), romm: Medientheater

Writing as Performing Pop. A Conversation with Simon Reynolds

panel with Sonja Eismann (Missy Magazine) and Bodo Mrozek (ZZF Potsdam). 

moderation: Stefanie Alisch. 

introduction by Dahlia Borsche and Fabian Holt. 

deejaying Marc Weiser (Palais Wittgenstein)

Berlin - Monday December 4 

7pm -  HAU2

Hallesches Ufer 32, 10963 Berlin.

7pm - 8pm readings + riffing + videos

break

8.30 - 10-30 „Plattenspieler“with Thomas Meinecke (FSK) - chatting about fave records of our lifetimes

Bremen -  Tuesday December 5th 

7PM - Schwankhalle

Buntentorsteinweg 112/116 28201 Bremen

readings + riffing + videos / Q+A

presenter Tobias Levin

Frankfurt - Wednesday December 6 

8-15pm - Milchsackfabrik

Gutleutstr. 294, 60327 Frankfurt am Main

8.15 pm - 10 pm – conversation with Klaus Walter + videos / Q&A

Köln - Thursday, December 7th 

9pm - King Georg

Sudermanstraße 2/ 50670 Köln

readings + riffing + videos  / Q&amp - presenter Mario Lasar 

München - Friday, December 8th 

8PM - Kammerspiele

Kammerspiele / Kammer 3 / Hildegardstr. 1, 80539 München

readings + riffing  + discussion / Q&A

Mainz - Saturday, December 9th

8pm -  Capitol Cinema

readings + riffing /  + Q&A with the audience

ITALY

Milano - Monday 11 December

11 am- 1 pm - live on Radio Raheem - playing favorite records recent and old + chat 

9.30 PM -  Santeria 

BUZZ: a discussion moderated by Fabio De Luca / Q&A

Bologna - Tuesday 12 December 

7 pm -  Gallleriapiù

riffing + videos  / Q&A

Catania, Sicily -  Wednesday 13 December

8.30 pm  - Sal Catania  (a Leggo.Presente indicative  production)

readings + riffings + music 

Roma -  Thursday 14 December 

7 pm - “Polvere di stelle Big Christmas Party” @ minimum fax

interview with Francesco Pacifico

deejaying from SR