The inspirational turnout at yesterday’’s SLAM rally shows the depth of love Melburnians have for their live music. But its focus on venue sustainability is only half the story. Read the rest of this entry »
Post SLAM: musicians need sustainability too
February 24th, 2010Freedom vs free markets
May 18th, 2009Any individual freedoms – even to own guns, and to trade freely – are in principle subcategories of libertarianism, by definition. But I think we all recognise that freedom is not so simple.
If someone beats me up and takes all my stuff, that’s an expression of their freedom; but I don’t think anyone who doesn’t live in a bunker full of canned beans would regard that as a legitimate one. Read the rest of this entry »
What’s wrong with Melbourne’s music?
May 17th, 2009
Apparently, nothing. On the surface it’s booming: in quality and quantity it’s hard to beat Melbourne’s live scene anywhere in the world. But look a little deeper and you’ll find that the people who make this beautiful noise are having a hard time getting a fair share of what can be a very lucrative business for others. Read the rest of this entry »
How Phraser works
May 16th, 2009The Phraser program is underpinned by a particular conception of the elementary formal structure of music. This conception is expressed through three interrelated types of objects: sequence, event, and phrase. Read the rest of this entry »
ArtsHub interview
May 13th, 2009This is the text of an interview in ArtsHub in July 2007. Read the rest of this entry »
On Hugo Chávez
May 13th, 2009
Chávez’s attempts to manipulate the electoral system to stay in power are egregious, but the hysteria he generates amongst the free-marketeers is a little overwrought. He’s not Hitler or Stalin. He’s not even Bush. How many wars did he start? How many people has he killed or tortured? He’s just messing with some people’s preferred economic system. Read the rest of this entry »
Making the market work for humans
May 13th, 2009Much contemporary economics is underpinned by the ‘infallible market’ hypothesis. This hypothesis possesses an irrefutability rivaled only by religious convictions. Read the rest of this entry »
Do wages cause unemployment?
May 13th, 2009Rather than merely assuming that wage rises and labour regulations cause unemployment, as do many commentators, let’s look at the facts.
Many comparative studies have been done on this subject; Read the rest of this entry »
Epilogue
May 11th, 2009At music school I was too old to be a young turk, but I used to hang around with them; and we used to say “Resolution is death!” – a reference to the serene uneventfulness of the tonic chord compared to the violent, interesting confusion of the (unresolved) dominant chord, or of simple dissonance itself. Read the rest of this entry »
Arcata, California
May 11th, 2009
Hippies, like other fundamentalists, usually believe the world is about to end, continually revising the date as it fails to occur (currently December 21st, 2012). In this part of the world, that belief is melded with right-wing libertarianism, so that one’s apocalyptic preparations should include a bunker full of guns and tinned beans. Nonetheless they are extremely friendly people, surrounded by giant redwood forests full of elk. Read the rest of this entry »
