The past few days have been a mix of fun and little sun and maybe a bit of confusion. Its like I have said before I am at a crossroads and I don't know how I really feel, or what I really want. My body language is constantly misinterpreted. THIS IS 40. Actually THIS IS almost 41.
I have been listening to New Order "Movement" for the past two days. It was Jon, telling me on the way home from my friend's dog's birthday party (I brought Bushmills, what 1 year old collie doesn't want a tipple of Irish whiskey) that Peter Hook is going to tour my favorite New Order album Power Corruption and Lies in addition to Movement this fall (Portland Date is September 26th at the Wonder Ballroom). Was it was just 2.5 years ago on a rainy Thursday night that my pal Jake Holloman and I went to the Doug Fir, drank G&T's and were completely moved by Peter performing Unknown Pleasures?
So essentially, I forgot how much I love this album. Its filled with material that was planned for another Joy Division album. Its filled with songs that are hopeful. Ceremony, Temptation, In A Lonely Place are the stand out tracks. Powerful synth beats with a booming bass accompanied by lyrics that sing your life.
FACD.50 1981
Monday, May 20, 2013
Saturday, May 18, 2013
Balenciaga
I fell in love with this dress today. Nicholas at his best. Its too much money and it's the "black" label which NEVER goes on sale. This one was a size too big, but when I slipped on the 38, I felt the four "F's"- Fantastic, Fabulous, Fierce, French. I wanted to put on a sleek heel, grab a slim clutch and go somewhere FUN. It also made me wish that I had not been so impetuous as a teenager and got all those tattoos. 2013 Marti isn't as comfortable in 90's Marti's skin. Feeling a little too Courtney Love for my own good.
Thursday, May 16, 2013
Moon In Cancer
I received an email from Bergdorf today announcing the arrival of Charlotte Olympia's new Zodiac collection. As usual, the Virgo shoes are not as exciting as other signs. Too scared to click thru as lust would come over me and I just can't afford to buy them. But thinking about my Cancer rising sign and moon in Pieces or maybe I want to pretend to be an Aries just because the red ones are so rich.....
Tuesday, May 14, 2013
Super Linda Purchase
I couldn't help myself - I got two things from the pop up sample sale. One a classic Mayle piece that I know I will wear forever - the Rita black lace mini dress. The other a bit riskier - as I normally don't wear blue but was intrigued by the color/pattern clash. The Eniko in the amazonia. Has anyone else shopped?
Monday, May 13, 2013
Sing Your Life
I was never a fan of boybands, though I was a sucker for booking a european one like Boyzone (they also had one of the first boybanders to come out - Stephen Gately, whom I believe has since passed.) That said I was not a huge Take That fan, but I was a fan of the rough and tough Robbie Williams, who left the band, started to party hard (hanging out with the lads from Oasis and Kate Moss) and wearing dodgy adidas trackies.
Robbie was rough, skinhead with a twinkle in his impish eyes and the je ne sais quoi that only true pop stars have. I was Robbie obsessed. Robbie put out a solo album. No one in the UK cared until the last push of the last single that the record company was planning to release - "Angels" which quickly became a British anthem. Everyone loved this song, then bought the record and Robbie was back on his way to the superstardom that he had as a teen idol.
During one of my trips to the UK I heard "angels" and became obsessed. Of course my friend Paul Adams was friends with Fil Eisler who played bass for Robbie. Oh and he was coming to America - NYC and LA specifically to play small press parties. I got on the list.
It was a Thursday night that Robbie played in NYC at Idlewild, which used to be Den of Thieves re imagined into the interior of a vintage airplane. It was small. The bathrooms even smaller. They set up an area where Robbie and Fil performed. It was myself and a handful of music journalists. I remember wearing specifically an aubergine Dolce & Gabanna bustier and a red metallic cardigan from TopShop and a black skirt. I stood up front. I knew all the songs and sang along. After the performance Robbie approached me excitedly - how on earth did I know the songs? All of them? What was my name? What did I do? We chatted for ages until the publicist came and dragged him away. At the end of the night everyone got to take a photo with Robbie. I had brought my own camera. So in addition to the black and white autographed photo I received a few weeks later, I took the color one and made it into a limited edition holiday card (total of 100) that I sent out to top publicists in the US and UK, and Paul Gallagher at Creation that read "Happy Christmas from the Williams family, Robbie, Marti and Fred (the cat). The response to this was as intensive as the outgoing voicemail message I had from Method Man on my home phone.
Time wore on, I never saw Robbie again. Fil creates all the music for the show "Revenge" in LA. I am sure that he and Robbie stay in touch. Wouldn't they?
Robbie was rough, skinhead with a twinkle in his impish eyes and the je ne sais quoi that only true pop stars have. I was Robbie obsessed. Robbie put out a solo album. No one in the UK cared until the last push of the last single that the record company was planning to release - "Angels" which quickly became a British anthem. Everyone loved this song, then bought the record and Robbie was back on his way to the superstardom that he had as a teen idol.
During one of my trips to the UK I heard "angels" and became obsessed. Of course my friend Paul Adams was friends with Fil Eisler who played bass for Robbie. Oh and he was coming to America - NYC and LA specifically to play small press parties. I got on the list.
It was a Thursday night that Robbie played in NYC at Idlewild, which used to be Den of Thieves re imagined into the interior of a vintage airplane. It was small. The bathrooms even smaller. They set up an area where Robbie and Fil performed. It was myself and a handful of music journalists. I remember wearing specifically an aubergine Dolce & Gabanna bustier and a red metallic cardigan from TopShop and a black skirt. I stood up front. I knew all the songs and sang along. After the performance Robbie approached me excitedly - how on earth did I know the songs? All of them? What was my name? What did I do? We chatted for ages until the publicist came and dragged him away. At the end of the night everyone got to take a photo with Robbie. I had brought my own camera. So in addition to the black and white autographed photo I received a few weeks later, I took the color one and made it into a limited edition holiday card (total of 100) that I sent out to top publicists in the US and UK, and Paul Gallagher at Creation that read "Happy Christmas from the Williams family, Robbie, Marti and Fred (the cat). The response to this was as intensive as the outgoing voicemail message I had from Method Man on my home phone.
Time wore on, I never saw Robbie again. Fil creates all the music for the show "Revenge" in LA. I am sure that he and Robbie stay in touch. Wouldn't they?
Mother's Day
I love a holiday, especially one where there is a present involved. This Mother's Day I was surprised to receive the book that is accompanying the new fashion exhibit at the Met. I have had a love hate relationship about this exhibit. I want to see it but then I don't. I hate the idea that punk - though its been mainstreamed for years has now become a fashion thing. Not that punk hasn't always been a fashion thing - to an extent its all about cultivating a look - standing out and being set apart. Badly dressed punks growing up were not popular punks. But, fashion is referential. No ideas are truly new these days. It's always the 20/30/40/50/60/70 over and over again - with a touch of 80's neon and a hint at 90's grunge glamour. But after spending an hour with the book, I didn't really realize just how similar some of the most lauded pieces in fashion were literally copies of tattered punk gear that Sid/Nancy/Johnny/Richard/Siouxie wore - from stripey sweaters to padlock necklaces (encrusted with an interlocking CC in the 90's). Have I turned that much of a blind eye while watching runway show after runway show all these years? Obviously growing up punk in the 80's I had my fair share of trying to emulate this look - down to Siouxie Sioux precision of eyeliner, teased hair and safety-pinned everything.
The book did stir up memories and made me long for a time that no longer exists.
Thursday, May 9, 2013
Thrills, Pills & Bellyaches.
In 1997 I was obsessed with Nick Cave. Not restraining order obsessed, but fan girl enough to fly to England to see him perform at the Brixton Academy at the last minute. In 1996/1997/1998 I hung out nearly every day with Marc Spitz. I was young, dumb, and had a huge crush on him. At the time he was a website columnist for SPIN. And he loved to take advantage of the "juice" that I had. As someone who was foolish (and probably still is- will I ever learn) I was more than happy to use my "power" to get us tickets to gigs in other countries, introduce him to UK power publicists and help advance his career. That sort of thing. So when I found out that yes, I could get on the list to see Nick at Brixton, I pulled out my American Airlines visa faster than you could say free tickets and booked a trip. Marc, Minty and James Robb all joined the journey with Marc and Minty flying Delta and James and I on American. Those were the days that you could board your 6AM flight and start off with free cocktails that would take you all the way to London - and the cocktail hour that was inevitably happening when you landed. On the 5 hour flight James and I had many.
We arrived in London. It was the first time that Marc met my good friend Leslie, Roger's ex. He knew she was a good friend and she knew that I liked him. It didn't stop them from flirting and making out the entire trip. Several days into the trip - the same day as the show at the Brixton Academy we found ourselves in Primrose Hill in the park. I felt like I was in a Blur video with girls and boys lounging in the sun. We sat on blankets, ate out of a Fortnum and Mason basket. We all drank too much. Mark and I started fighting. We fought every day on that trip. Starting with the second night when I rang Roger and demanded that he come pick me up from Leslie's flat because Leslie made out with Marc and I had to sit there and watch him moon over her. Roger was in Devon. But he talked me off the ledge. I sat outside and listened to Radio One and contemplated if I could afford Claridges. Though my limit was $10K Claridges was $500 pounds a night ($750) so it wasn't going to happen.
Back to the park, I got up and stormed off to the nearest phone box and called my friend Dina in NYC collect. For a moment (a brief one) I was Audrey in European Vacation calling her best friend to book her a ticket home from Hell. Dina refused to change my ticket. I only had two days left - couldn't I just suck it up? I could, mainly because I ran into Mani from the Roses/Primal Scream 10 feet away from that phone box. It was like a divine intervention. Though what really happened was "Oi! Marti, what are you doing here?" He dragged me to the pub. We drank for two hours. He had beer, I had double G&T's. Then I told him that I had to find my friends, because I had to go see Nick Cave. I stumbled back into the park. I ignored Marc. We made up by the time we got to Brixton. But the next night (Saturday) we went dancing at the Underworld. We got bored and Marc and I mini-cabbed it back to Leslie's listening to Tim Westwood's radio show.
And suddenly, all was good in the world.
We arrived in London. It was the first time that Marc met my good friend Leslie, Roger's ex. He knew she was a good friend and she knew that I liked him. It didn't stop them from flirting and making out the entire trip. Several days into the trip - the same day as the show at the Brixton Academy we found ourselves in Primrose Hill in the park. I felt like I was in a Blur video with girls and boys lounging in the sun. We sat on blankets, ate out of a Fortnum and Mason basket. We all drank too much. Mark and I started fighting. We fought every day on that trip. Starting with the second night when I rang Roger and demanded that he come pick me up from Leslie's flat because Leslie made out with Marc and I had to sit there and watch him moon over her. Roger was in Devon. But he talked me off the ledge. I sat outside and listened to Radio One and contemplated if I could afford Claridges. Though my limit was $10K Claridges was $500 pounds a night ($750) so it wasn't going to happen.
Back to the park, I got up and stormed off to the nearest phone box and called my friend Dina in NYC collect. For a moment (a brief one) I was Audrey in European Vacation calling her best friend to book her a ticket home from Hell. Dina refused to change my ticket. I only had two days left - couldn't I just suck it up? I could, mainly because I ran into Mani from the Roses/Primal Scream 10 feet away from that phone box. It was like a divine intervention. Though what really happened was "Oi! Marti, what are you doing here?" He dragged me to the pub. We drank for two hours. He had beer, I had double G&T's. Then I told him that I had to find my friends, because I had to go see Nick Cave. I stumbled back into the park. I ignored Marc. We made up by the time we got to Brixton. But the next night (Saturday) we went dancing at the Underworld. We got bored and Marc and I mini-cabbed it back to Leslie's listening to Tim Westwood's radio show.
And suddenly, all was good in the world.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)