Welcome to the 20th edition of my mail-outs, all of which have been archived here. Please find an overview of my recent articles and radio features as well as some assorted/unsorted recommendations below. Again I specifically point it out if a piece is available in an official or my own English translation.
First things first, I will be talking with Austin Robey of the co-operatively-run online marketplace Subvert on Tuesday at silent green. This is part of the Talks programme of Pop-Kultur, and I am looking forward to returning to my old stomping ground, so to speak.
+++++ Stuff That I Published
— Speaking of conversations about music-industrial matters and feeling somewhat at home somewhere, I returned for the fifth time to the (German-language) Track 17 podcast to speak with host Christopher Hunold about that thing called music journalism and its various legitimacy and financial crises. Don’t worry, we end on a bit of a positive note.
— Speaking of positive news, GEMA scored another victory in Munich’s regional court: The judge agreed that Suno had unlawfully trained its model on copyrighted material, that it had indeed memorised the training material, and that it doesn’t matter whether or not they did this from the US or not. Naturally, it was a busy day for me. I discussed the verdict over at DLF Kultur’s Tonart, before I did the same at WDR’s Westart (not archived) and also spoke about what might happen next. Long story short, Suno will likely appeal, but the long-term perspective doesn’t look great for them. Either they accept defeat at some higher court, or they strike a deal with GEMA—which hopefully will not happen because that would mean that GEMA leaves the rest of the music world out in the rain.
— Speaking of AI in music, the »interactive multi-format ecosystem« and »agentic service« called Spotify has somewhat abruptly announced that they will soon be labelling »AI personas,« i.e. artist profiles that make use of AI-generated images and/or bios to give listeners the impression that they are dealing with an actual person. Please note that this is not about deepfakes as they have been technically made illegal by the European AI Act, which has been fully been implemented at the beginning of the month. (Deepfakes remain an issue, as I’ve discussed once more over at WDR’s Töne, Texte, Bilder.) Over at taz as well as ByteFM’s taz.mixtape, I argue that Spotify’s latest move marks a paradigm shift in the face of mounting pressure from both the music industry and listeners who just don’t love the slop. In my view, this might be a turning point that will have wide-reaching consequences. In fact, Apple Music very quickly followed suit and will now label Suno slop if distributors and/or labels disclose it. But to be clear, Spotify only labels artist profiles, not the music itself. They love AI and they love the platform being flooded with it, as co-CEO [insert the most generic Swedish name ever] routinely explains in the company’s Earnings Calls: It means that Spotify’s curation functionalities become more important for listeners, i.e. the desired lock-in effect becomes even stronger. However, Spotify sort of pulls a Deezer and removes »AI persona« music from editorial and algorithmic playlists, which ruins some people’s business models. Boo-hoo.
— Speaking of business models that have become precarious, the Berlin ClubCommission and the Senate Department for Economic Affairs, Energy and Public Enterprises have published a new report about the economic status quo of the city’s club scene. In conversation with radio3, I argued that the tone of the report is far more positive than the numbers themselves: 39 % of clubs and promoters don’t break even anymore, and a sizeable amount (on air, I said that it was more than a third, which was incorrect: it was 23 %, 21 % are undecided about their future) of clubs think they might be giving up soon. In my opinion, the report takes a leaf out of Ed Gillett’s book and tries to paint the picture of a resilient scene because that makes it easier to ask for more (public) investment into the city’s nightlife.
— Speaking of clubs, I will probably feel very weird the next time I am in one and see someone with glasses looking at me. The rise of and controversy around the »smart« Meta Glasses has reached a fever pitch, especially after my colleague Lisa Damm has written about her experience of being filmed in public without her consent by a »pick-up artist« in taz. For DLF Kultur’s Breitband, I spoke with both Lisa and lawyer Dr. Thomas Schwenke, who argues that Meta Glasses are inherently illegal in Germany. (I also made an appointment with the aforementioned »pick-up artist,« but our call didn’t go too well: When I mentioned that I was a journalist, his camera shut down, and when I asked him for consent to record our conversation, the call was disconnected for mysterious reasons.) In fact, German NGO HateAid is suing high-ranking employees of Meta and other firms involved in the production and distribution of the Meta Glasses. In the meanwhile, it is probably good to know for all women reading this that Schwenke argues that a certain degree of physical self-defence is legally fine when you suspect someone filming you with Meta Glasses. More on this in an interview he recently gave.
— Speaking of destructive forces, over at HHV-Mag (English/German) I wrote about the definitive post-punk record: This Heat’s self-titled debut. I’ve also looked a lot towards the past in the same magazine’s review section, writing about recent reissues such as a new edition of Charanjit Singh’sSynthesizing: Ten Ragas to a Disco Beat (English/German) and Govindo’s legendary one-off italo disco hit Ou Ka Vini Moin (English/German) as well as the compilations United States of Melancholia: Post-Punk GDR 1982-1991 (English/German) and A Distracted God (English/German), an anthology featuring three pieces by the great Beatriz Ferreyra. But wouldn’t you know it, I also had some new material on my desk, and wrote about Frances Chang’sthinking bout confession for Musikexpress and the second IckMachWelle showcase compilation Superbrains Vol. 2 for taz.
— Speaking of new music, Hallow Ground will release Jordan Sand’sBaby Ghost on the 2nd of October, a stunning record that straddles the line between improvisation and composition, this life and the great beyond. Highly recommended stuff, as usual with this label that will have a few more tricks up its sleeve before the year ends.
+++++ Some Unsorted Recommendations
N. and I moved houses/in together at the beginning of the month, and in the ensuing chaos I did not get to watch any movies, or rather did not have the patience for them. I can recommend arte’s wonderfully nuanced arte Tito documentary and rewatching Person of Interest and revelling in its cheesiness while also pondering on its topicality. I also didn’t do much reading—or, well, I did read the 700+ pages-long self-declared »definitive oral history of metal« called Louder Than Hell, but that felt less like an actual book and more like a collection of fanzine clippings. It is possibly one of the worst books on music I have ever come across—incredibly cursory and Anglo-centric (Swedish death metal is mentioned only in passing!?), full of errors (my favourite one: Marduk being introduced as a »German band,« which I guess is correct in some politically very incorrect way!?), more or less just cut and pasted from interviews or blog entries (it is very awkward to see how many of the statements in this oral history were clearly written down!?), way too comfortable with giving a lot of space to racist folks who have murdered people (they quote extensively from some drivel that Kristian fucking Vikernes has published on his website, including passages in which he laments how the European race is under threat, etc., because that has a lot to do with the history of black metal!?), way too obsessed with letting every member of every band of every metal subgenre that is being covered here (some, like power metal, are mysteriously missing, even though this book shares its title with a Manowar song!?) regale us with every story of every groupie they ever had sex with on the bus (I am serious, apart from black metal, where the focus lies more on murder and church burnings and how those pesky inferior races are ruining our wonderful subcontinent, the authors force a few pages of these anecdotes upon their readers for absolutely no reason at all!?), way too PR-y, and ultimately confusing if you do not really know all these bands and what they sound like because besides all that talk about sex and drugs, the rock’n’roll is barely ever discussed. A truly bizarre read, as entertaining as a mass collision on the Autobahn. However, I did listen to a lot of metal recently, notably Disembodiment’s Spiral Crypts and Scorching Tomb’sOssuary were weirdly comforting during a stressful time. If you like your old-school death metal straightforward, brutal, and dumb, these two records are for you. Otherwise I’d like to refer you to Immolation’s new album/late career highlight Descent or the unbelievably chaotic tech prog of Cryptic Shift on Overspace & Supertime. Something that I found equally nourishing for my psyche but which is a lot less loud is the work of Jakob Ullmann, whose lower-case indeterminacy post-minimalism masterpiece fremde zeit addendum was on heavy rotation while I was packing boxes, and the music of Nakashima Motohiro. I came across the latter’s work in the late 2000s on the blogosphere and was instantly captivated by his soothing mix of light IDM, minimalist folk, neo-classical jazz, and acoustic ambient. We Hum on the Way Home is one of my favourite albums of all time, real great rainy Sunday stuff. I have not yet listened to his new album Sea of Thought, released through the ever-reliable FLAU, but it is apparently much more electronic, pessimistic, and feature-heavy than any of his earlier works. Cool! I think. I also enjoyed the new releases by Midori Hirano, the Philip Zoubek Trio, Francesca Gaza, The Haters, and Cedrik Fermont, and I am frankly obsessed with 空間現代 (Kukangendai) going acoustic on their new record for Marionette, which by the way is just the most wonderful pairing imaginable. Thank you for your attention and until next time.