Friday 31 December 2010

Geneva Jacuzzi



Bio @ genevajacuzzi.com:
Geneva Garvin (aka Geneva Jacuzzi) is a songwriter, visual and recording artist from Los Angeles, California. In her music she has honed a blithe and cryptic wit filled with sultry puns, double entendres, and irreverent references to mysticism and the occult. From 2004 to 2007 she fronted the tongue-in-cheek goth band Bubonic Plague, an influential cult favorite in the burgeoning scene in LA’s Echo Park district.

Her music has used styles that range from darkwave, goth, lounge and tropicalia. She recreates these sounds in painstaking detail on a portable 8-track cassette recorder.



Her recent recordings have zeroed in on a discarded period in electronic funk and dance music associated with groups like Morris Day and The Time, El DeBarge and Zapp & Roger. She infuses these styles with elaborate instrumentation and harmonically complex textures that are technically difficult to achieve using her recording equipment. These distilled instrumental pieces often last under 30 seconds.

She has also developed a collage-art style that she uses to package her own music and Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti albums. Like her music, her album covers consist of other album covers, intricately re-worked and shuffled so as to give the impression of a sensuous time in contemporary music, while avoiding specific references or quotation. http://genevajacuzzi.com/gjbio.htm



Lamaze review @ Mishka Bloglin:
Rare is the artist able to make a bunch of tracks recorded over five-some years feel just as cohesive as if she’d done them all three months ago, but ladies and gentlemen, meet Geneva Garvin. The LA lady behind Geneva Jacuzzi has been steadily self-releasing these smoky, lo-fi synthpop singles since 2004, and Lamaze is our first comprehensive view: an entire career-so-far of hissy 80s dance jams that flow and ebb together, destined for each other, like some lost Kate Bush album produced by Johnny Jewel. Even brand new jam “Do I Sad?” is virtually indistinguishable as new at first; it’s just another neon tile on the dark-disco floor.

But Garvin isn’t a musician in stasis. Though Lamaze’s tracks aren’t paced by year, know to listen for it and you’ll hear the delineation between earlier, more schizophrenic sound collages and the structural clarity of the latest work. You’ll notice tour partner Ariel Pink’s influence on “Love Caboose”, how the analogue warmth develops, the darkness deepens, Garvin’s voice broadens and writhes. Lamaze’s cohesion isn’t a lack of forward movement; it’s Geneva Jacuzzi’s unwavering point of view that does it, this “Sex Dwarf”-era Soft Cell vibe gluing together every song, from the skittery 8-bit “Future Past” to the hot and bloody “Group Dynamic”. Garvin takes a serious cue from the Marc Almond school of songwriting: mangle all 13 tracks of backing vocals, program the beat frantic and creepy, put the bass in octaves and make those synths scream, but for the love of god, let the hook breathe.

And those hooks, that inherent sense of where to place melody and how, throws Geneva Jacuzzi into the totally irresistible category. You’ll walk away from Lamaze humming something, and every song—I mean, every single one—offers something to hum. And not just any old thing; these amazing, 80s-authentic, dark synthpop melodies that rival even GJ progenitor Soft Cell for most memorable. These tracks may have been quietly circulating for the past five years, but Lamaze brings them finally into the light, in the most drop-dead sexy way. Here’s to the next five, Geneva.
http://mishkanyc.com/bloglin/2010/11/18/review-geneva-jacuzzi-lamaze/

Sunday 26 December 2010

Christmas chez Robinson 26.12.10

Part 5: Mustard and sugar glazed baked ham with a rocket, avocado and asparagus salad and sauteed potato salad with thyme, rosemary and garlic.



Saturday 25 December 2010

Christmas chez Robinson 25.12.10

Christmas dinner: roast turkey with chestnut, pork and apple stuffing, braised carrots and parsnips, sprouts, roast potatoes, mashed potatoes, sage and onion bacon rolls with bread sauce and cranberry sauce.



Mont Blanc: chestnut, ricotta, cream and chocolate meringue cake.



Friday 24 December 2010

Christmas chez Robinson 24.12.10


Fritto di misto di mare (mixed fried fish) with braised fennel and parmesan with new potatoes

Thursday 23 December 2010

Christmas chez Robinson 23.12.10

Earlier this year I made a statement on my Facebook page:

"Your status update is all very well, but what's in it for me?"

I'd found many posts to be smug, self-regarding nonsense and then I felt like being smart. Well, this series of festive meal photos is in the very same spirit of that which I'd once condemned.

Part 2: So anyway, earlier tonight I ate rack of lamb followed by Christmas cake, cheese and port:





Wednesday 22 December 2010

Christmas chez Robinson 22.12.10

Beginning a series of portraits of wonderful meals cooked by my dad.

Part 1: Rabbit casserole with herb and cheese dumplings and olive and mustard mash.

Tuesday 21 December 2010

Yuck 'n Yum Christmas meal 19.12.10 Redux

More photos from Sunday's Yuck 'n Yum fetive repast, this time taken on someone's new iPhone with consequent improved quality. All text is copied from the Yuck 'n Yum Facebook page:

We decided to give Black Friday a wide berth and have our Christmas night out on a very quiet Sunday evening in Dundee. In saying that we had a holly jolly good ole time with kissing, dancing on tables and bums getting photocopied.


Andrew doing a very good impression of Mario.


A Yuck 'n Yum impostor, but a welcomed one.








Black Santa and his merry little elves.






YNYs very own Tina and Ike couldn't refuse a spot of karaoke.



Monday 20 December 2010

Yuck 'n Yum Christmas meal 19.12.10

Last night the Yuck 'n Yum editorial team were out on the razzle dazzle at Chopstix Chinese restaurant. We then saw some band play in some pub, before heading to another place that offered karaoke facilities. I took a few photos and here they are:


Ross and Alexandra rocking the Chopstix look


Graeme in disguise


Andrew is enthused


Me with 'tache


I think this pub is called The Bond


Gayle is enthused


Somewhere out there Andrew and Alexandra are performing 'Total Eclipse of the Heart' on the karaoke

Sunday 19 December 2010

new haircut


The new look for the new season

Saturday 18 December 2010

snow deluge 18.12.10 (slight return)


No heavy snowfall to report this time, but still last night was -8 and I woke to find the plumbing had frozen once again. The water's back on this afternoon but I'll be keeping a tap running overnight in the vague hope that the pipes will somehow keep it together.

Friday 17 December 2010

Christmas meal @ _B_A Towers 16.12.10

Had a few friends round last night for a meal round my gaff:









Thursday 16 December 2010

Yuck 'n Yum spring 2011 deadline

I made a flyer to advertise the next Yuck 'n Yum deadline, and here it is:

Wednesday 15 December 2010

art



Extract from Peter Sotos, Comfort and Critique:

"I'd draw fat naked men on the sides of the photos; quite often directly over the other girls. I like lip gloss on Anna and she tends to wear quite a lot of it. I'm absolutely sick of the differences between intention and interpretation. I want to create an art that is ideally shored. One that can't be misunderstood any longer. Not by the powers that want to see me jailed or by the fucking mice that pretend I'm doing something socially significant. I refuse to waste my time thinking about what not to say. And I refuse to keep on considering the retarded arguments of painters, photographers, and adolescent fetishists."

Tuesday 14 December 2010

Yuck 'n Yum winter 2010 launch - SANTA'S GROTTO 10.12.10

The launch of the winter 2010 issue of Yuck 'n Yum took place on Friday night just gone. Regular _B_A readers will know how I missed the event due to the freezing weather and my recent plumbing trauma. It was extra sad for me because Santa Claus was there, and he'd brought along a sack full of gifts for all the artists who'd been good boys and girls: