The Measures Taken

A defunct site housing papers, articles and lengthier disquisitions by Owen Hatherley, now blogging only at Sit down man, you're a bloody tragedy.

Tuesday, May 24, 2005

london doesn't exist

wrote this a year or so ago, am currently sifting through old crap to put up here before i properly start this thing...

London Doesn’t Exist. Watching Patrick Keiller’s London, 12 years later. What is most noticeable as different- the terrorist attacks- seemingly monthly, the City, a pub, a park, insurance buildings- the targeted and the seemingly random. The fear of a terrorist attack in 2004 is that of something completely catastrophic, that will come from some shadowy direction, threatening the city’s existence. Keiller notes how completely unfazed Londoners are to the threat of attack, as his camera lingers on a gutted office block. Things Keiller might have noticed in the past year- the closures and tanks at Heathrow, the Venezuelan with a grenade in his luggage, the policemen at Whitehall disinterestedly fingering their machine guns, the leaflets given out at trial runs for a gas attack. The victory of the culture industries in 21st century London. The scenario Keiller envisages, of London gradually depleting as more and more people leave- fulfilled in a way, as Shoreditch moves itself to Leytonstone, or Brixtoners being dumped in Streatham. In the City Keiller overhears French being spoken in a café, and imagines that perhaps a ‘café society’ might emerge- idlers, poets, musicians, artists and so forth, escaping from London’s hard-drinking, hard-working regimen. An unfortunate prophecy of the plague of Caffe Neros and Costa Coffees, or of the cynical East End Elite, either churning out prolekult in the Isle of Dogs or fetishising poverty in Hackney. The one fundamental similarity- London feels deflated, enervated, downcast. Black Operations. 1992 is also the year of hardcore, and its metamorphosis into darkside is mirrored in the film by a brief optimism being replaced with another 5 years of Tory rule, the knowledge that life is going to actively get worse. The arguable descendants of the gleeful dystopianism of ‘Bludclot Artattack’ or ‘Terminator’- Black Ops on Rinse FM, a video game fantasy, a bionic body, bass surges sounding metallic and like flesh in extremis, rectal frequencies. ‘This One’s Stinking!’ or ‘This One’s a Porno Flick!’ an attempt to fortify oneself, escape into a seamless dream of supremacy. ‘We! Like! Having! Sex!’ bellows Jon E Cash. ‘Out to the Queens Road crew!’ Where I used to live, on Queens Road, SE15, there was a huge pile of rubbish outside, next to the gate of an MOT centre. We didn’t have a wheelie bin, so we would leave rubbish outside, and note that two days later it wouldn’t be there anymore, thinking how considerate Southwark council were. It wasn’t until I moved out that I recognised my own household waste amidst two towers of litter just round the corner from my door. The Essentials Crew, sounding much more truly alive than Black Ops, with their combination of porn fantasies and strangely apposite secret service imagery. The little scraps between MCs, after the latest clap-track/bounce spasm an MC freestyles, energised- another, female, shouts ‘CALM DOWN!’ derisively, then whoops with joy, then has a giggling fit. ‘I know that’s gay, but I’ve gotta do that’. Then they announce the ‘JSA Riddim’ and we’re off. ‘I don’t want to sound like an old fuddy-duddy’. An hour in a student radio meeting, New Cross. It was prolonged by an hour as a solicitor, after outlining broadcasting laws, made sure we realised he was on our side, that he’s all for swearing and sneaky drug references. The audience tease out his every reference to drinking and drugs, looking at each other with satisfaction as he indulges them.

posted by owen hatherley # 7:31 PM