(Source: sarah-swillum)
Livonia Underground is a feature length documentary about musicians in Michigan.
Directed and filmed by Peter Barlow, Livonia Underground is a chronicle of a growing collection of musicians spanning all genres and styles, from pop to rock, hip hop and folk to noise music, all centered in the suburb of Livonia, Michigan.
On this page you will find updates about the film, as well as the music coming from Livonia.
Be sure to like us at our
facebook page and join our last.fm group for up to the minute Livonia news! • Ask me anything
Livonia Underground
Directed and filmed by Peter Barlow, Livonia Underground is a chronicle of a growing collection of musicians spanning all genres and styles, from pop to rock, hip hop and folk to noise music, all centered in the suburb of Livonia, Michigan.
On this page you will find updates about the film, as well as the music coming from Livonia.
Be sure to like us at our
facebook page and join our last.fm group for up to the minute Livonia news! • Ask me anything
Livonia Underground
New Poems
First book of poems by Peter Barlow. Over a year in the making, enjoy.
Listen to Hopeless by Pool, a collection of b-sides from the Headless recording sessions.
something tells me
beyond doubt of mind
we’re out of time
we’re out of time
Forbes' Best Free Albums of 2012
I’m on there somewhere.
I feel rested and peaceful for the first time in a long time.
(Source: sarahbummer)
Tsintskaro is a Georgian folk song that was used to great effect in Werner Herzog’s 1979 remake of the 1922 German Expressionist classic “Nosferatu,” one of my favorite films of all time and the best vampire movie ever made (I spent several years taking film classes in college, so I am allowed to say this). In this particular rendition, the solo is sung by Hamlet Gonashvili, who was known as “the voice of Georgia” and died by falling out of an apple tree in 1985.
These days, music is often a product to be marketed to young people (and this is stumbling towards a separate point about how our culture worships youth despite the fact that young people tend to be ignorant, capricious, and uninformed, but that is another entry entirely). This is necessary, to some extent: without a mainstream to rail against, alternative (a loose, catchall term that of course ends up being vague, perhaps to the point of being meaningless, but bear with me) music loses some of its power. What purpose would John Cage’s 4’33” serve if there were no conventions to challenge? It is precisely because of the expectations we have of a piece of music that makes 4’33” a conceptual, aleatoric masterpiece.
Before all of this, before the business and the money and Spotify and Billboard, people used music as a means of expression. This is why I love pieces like Tsintskaro: it is a piece of music that was made because it had to be made. It’s the story of meeting a woman by a well, performed with nothing beyond the human voice. No industry, no pop charts, nothing beyond pure expression of some ineffable utterance of what it is to be a human being. Imagine being present when this was first sung, or when “music” was first invented. It puts Katy Perry in a new perspective. Maybe us too. We’re going to keep trying anyways.
xox,
-Peter
Music video for Alex Tedesco’s (Shake It) Like You’re Nervous.
Directed by Peter Barlow.
