Momus: "Bishonen"

i love it , yearn for it now that i have lost both tender pervert and my mp3s .

Antilyricneddies may abstain

I have raised a new species up in my name! I am their god! I will send them forth into the streets.

Andrew Beaujon playing a solo set that consisted of a very long cover of "Bishonen" was my first real exposure to Momus, I think. What a wonderful song! I mean, it's sort of fake Brel, but it's _better_ than Brel would've done--one of those wonderful instances where the student exceeds the master, which is fitting.

I think Momus used the "I prefer his early, funny stuff" line in an earlier thread about himself, but that's really not right: for myself, I prefer the early stuff where he's _not_ trying to be overtly funny.

My favourite Momus song. Seeing as he now seems to denegrate all this wordy era stuff as magpie pastiche prior to him finding his true voice, can someone point me in the direction of what he's drawing upon with lines like 'And women should be hated, but first impersonated / And charm he said, is essential to misogyny'. Is it just Brel?

The whole song is so fucking sad. I keep meaning to write up that 'Ages in songs' thing as a piece for Freaky Trigger before my birthday so that I can hang it on the 'Surprised at 28 / To find myself so late, turning from a boy into a man' line.

My favourite Momus song too: the only one I have ever heard. There are one or two things I admire about it but it's too long.

Strangely enough I was listening to Poison Boyfriend the other evening and the song Closer To You remains my absolute favourite of Mr Currie's works - a brilliant whiteboy counterpart to LL Cool J's I Need Love. The Klee-quoting coda is genius. Robert Palmer ought to have done a cover version.

I also love THE ICE KING....

Um, my favorite Momus song, too.

How could I disobey that surruptitious gay, who brought me up according to a fantasy? ...So bloody evocative. I sat by the tape machine and the pause button trying my damndest to get down every line of that song back in the late eighties. I went out one night having left the unfinshed [and uncredited] Momus lyrics lying about and my flatmate found them and put the word out that I was a misunderstood lyrical genius! I still love What Will Death Be Like and Eleven Executioners, by the way.

Personally I still don't think he's ever topped "The Charm of Innocence". I've been known to walk the streets singing that song to myself, on cold winter evenings, wondering whether anyone notices (or recognises!).

its a good story, but then most of nick's songs are. the good thing about bishonen is the lack of drum machine and sub-pet-shop-boys synth hits which tend to distract from some of the other great lyrical stories like, for example, right-hand heart. because of that, bishonen is the only momus tune i can put in a mix without cringeing.

hope yr feeling better...

It's a bloody shame that Momus seems to disown his Creation-era songs, such as "Bishonen", as being little but pastiche until he found his own voice, etc. He's undoubtedly produced a lot of highly individual, esoteric and thought-provoking stuff in the last ten years, but I find it sad that he appears to see his recording career in terms of pre- and post-leaving London. I don't doubt that on a personal level Nick is happier and more fulfilled now than he was ten years ago - mind you, so am I, age and experience often does that - but I also doubt he'll ever write another song as moving, clever and sexual as "Closer To You", much as I hope he will.

I feel like Woody Allen in 'Annie Hall' where he settles an argument about Marshall McLuhan by pulling the media guru out from behind a pillar. 'Actually, I have Momus right here, he'll tell you what he really meant himself!'

Nick Dastoor wrote: Seeing as he now seems to denegrate all this wordy era stuff as magpie pastiche prior to him finding his true voice, can someone point me in the direction of what he's drawing upon with lines like 'And women should be hated, but first impersonated / And charm he said, is essential to misogyny'. Is it just Brel?

'Bishonen' has its musical origin in a piece made by my friend Douglas Benford, who runs a club in London called The Sprawl. He did a song called 'How To Wear An Engine Out' which had a real Philip Glass / systems music feel, and I wanted to do a song like that. I was also listening to a posthumous song by Georges Brassens (sung by his friend Jean Bertola) called 'L'Andropause', which had about 27 verses about an old man who had become impotent. Those two songs set the basic template for the music and feel.

Lyrically, the song comes from several sources.

1. Mishima's novel 'Forbidden Colours', which is about an old writer who pays a young lady killer to exact revenge on all the women who have spurned him by attracting and then snubbing them. The relationship between the father and son in my song is close to their relationship.

2. Ian Buruma wrote a book (published by Penguin) called 'A Japanese Mirror: Heroes and Villains of Japanese Culture'. The chapter called 'The Third Sex' discusses androgyny, Mishima, and the plays of the Takarazuka Theatre, where the male leads are played (as in British pantomime) by females. A lot of 'Bishonen' comes from this chapter.

3. There are other sources: 'the mountains of Morocco' is a weird Pasolini reference. There is even a touch of 70s TV series Kung Fu in the 'shining moment' in which the disciple learns misogyny at the foot of the master. And there is probably also a debt to Leonard Cohen's 'Master Song'.

I don't denigrate this period of my writing. (Goes back behind pillar.)

Ta.

Does ANYONE have the original version of Bishonen on MP3 - I am going mad trying to find it - I've found some version with some odd chanting in it - but I think this is a 'remix' version - I seem to remember the original was less 'electronic'.

I will pay - I am desperate !

Sent to ss@informatiq.co.uk

Thank you and goodnight ...

Spencer Steel xxxx

i've just referred to "bishonen" on this thread about the new divine comedy album, which i'm sure will fuck momus off mightily, but too bad :p

my second-favourite momus song, anyway, after "three wars". at the moment it exists merely as a memory: all my old momus stuff is on cassette. i have to start replacing it.

(alba: we must discuss this further over a libation at some point.)

Hah, I thought about this thread some days ago, but forgot to check if anything had happened since 2002.

"Three Wars" should so totally be in N.'s "Ages of Song" compilation.

Answering a four-year-old posting:
little but pastiche until he found his own voice, etc
My impression is that it's less "found his own voice", more "disowned idea of own voice", but why don't we ask him? *looks around for a pillar*

otm roffles to Marcello for his suggestion of Robert Palmer cover of "Closer to You"!

Oh and I'll look out for "L'Andropause", sounds fun, thanks for the tip Momus.