Reykjavík Grapevine - 04.02.2011, Blaðsíða 4

Say your piece, voice
your opinion, send
your letters to:
letters@grapevine.is
4
Letters
Sour grapes
and stuff MOST AWESOME LETTERTwo free pizzas from our very awesome pals at Gamla Smiðjan
Pizza is great. Everyone loves pizza. What’s better than a pizza? TWO pizzas. But what in the
world might be better than two pizzas? Yup, you got it, two FREE pizzas. And guess what!
Our prize for this issue’s MOST AWESOME LETTER is, indeed, TWO FREE PIZZAS from our
good friends at Gamla Smiðjan.
If you wrote that MOST AWESOME LETTER (and you can prove it, sorta), then you
should write us another letter claiming you did. We will in turn hook you up with the good
people of Gamla Smiðjan, who will provide you with some pizza after you show them a secret
handshake that we’ll teach you. You can have any two pizzas off the menu, just so you know.
Want the pepperoni/banan/chili one? Go for it!
Now, if you're in the market for free goodies next month, write us some sort of letter.
Give us your worst: letters@grapevine.is
MOST AWESOME LETTER:
Dear Grapevine,
I am an Australian who has just arrived
in Reykjavik for the first time (and have
been an avid Grapevine reader from
abroad for a while now). I am ostensibly
here to study on exchange, but my real
goal and ambition is to start an UN-
DERWATER RUGBY team in Iceland
and spread awareness about the sport.
Underwater rugby is an amazing
sport of endurance, speed, underwa-
ter-agility and teamwork. It is the only
sport in the world that is truly three-
dimensional - you can pass the ball up,
down, left, right, forward and back-
wards! (youtube it!) It is most common-
ly played in Germany and all the other
Nordic countries, except Iceland.
I was hoping you may be interested
in doing a short story for the Grape-
vine about this "most Nordic of Nordic
sports" and why Iceland, a real Nordic
high-achiever and benchmark-setter,
has been missing out!
Please let me know if you might be
interested.
Kveðja,
Bobby Chen
S: 774 7992
Dear Bobby,
Welcome to Iceland! And good luck
with starting that ‘UNDERWATER
RUGBY team’ you keep going on about.
It sounds both interesting and fun, in
equal measures.
Hope you don’t mind us printing
your phone number. We thought: may-
be some reader out there will be inter-
ested in playing rugby underwater for
whatever reason, so if we print Bobby’s
number then maybe that reader can call
Bobby directly and enquire about play-
ing underwater rugby.
Not sure about underwater rugby
being the only truly ‘three dimensional’
sport around, though. Hmm. We don’t
follow a lot of sports, but most of the
non-video game ones seem to be pretty
three-dimensional.
Also unsure about Iceland being
a Nordic high-achiever, either. This
is where some KREPPA joke or other
could make an appearance, but we’re
sort of sick of those. Maybe a handball
pun would be in order?
Anyway, Bobby. Hopefully you will
succeed. Underwater rugby seems like
a fun, pointless thing, and there are
never enough fun, pointless things
around. We apologise in advance if you
are besieged by crank-callers going “are
your balls wet, Bobby?” at all hours.
That would be most unfortunate. How-
ever, our readers are very sophisticated,
so that probably won’t happen. And if it
does, your FREE PIZZA will hopefully
help you get over it.
Dear Sindri,
Where did you learn to write musical
critiques? Your assessment of Friðrik
Dór's album was so childish and unpro-
fessional, I'm amazed that you actually
have this job. Let me explain:
''Okay, I know how this is gonna sound,
but I’m sorry, Friðrik Dór just
isn’t black enough to pull this shit off.
I’m sorry, there’s simply no
other word for it.''
Really? You had no other words to de-
scribe the production value or basic
sound of this release? Maybe you should
be doing something else then, because
your blatantly tasteless descriptions re-
ally aren't going to cut it. Throughout
reading your poorly crafted paragraph,
I couldn't even tell if you were actually
being serious about this statement:
''Who knows, maybe Friðrik will ‘black-
en’ with time… I mean, look at Justin
Timberlake.''
Lol. You're so clueless.
Gleðileg jól,
Jasmine
Hello Jasmine,
First off, I did "describe the production
value and basic sound of this release"
in completely race-free terms, as the
portion of my review you didn't quote
will show, and I know my paragraphs
are poorly crafted: that's why I'm writ-
ing music reviews on mediocre R&B
instead of penning soaring, genre-
spanning epic multinational bestsell-
ers. I did not "learn to write musical cri-
tiques" and the reason I have this job is
because I wanted it and no one told me
I couldn't have it. I'm sorry if I sound
defensive, but bad paragraph construc-
tion is a weakness I have, and you kind
of struck a nerve. I have no delusions
about being more qualified to do this
than anyone else, but here I am doing it,
despite five years of people I don't know
telling me I shouldn't be.
Now. My review of the Friðrik Dór al-
bum is my honest opinion, and I made
use of the Grapevine's no-punches-
pulled critical policies to print what
I am fully aware of is a somewhat ris-
qué implication: that being raised in a
predominantly "black" environment
provides one with certain musical sen-
sibilities that are not in abundance in
suburban Iceland, a predominantly
"white" environment whose musical
roots, Norse/Northern European folk
music, do not offer much variety when
it comes to danceable beats, soulfully
ad-libbed vocals and other features tra-
ditionally associated with R&B, funk
and hip-hop, all of whom trace their
origins to African-American communi-
ties. This is exactly the kind of music
Friðrik Dór aspires to make, and, be-
ing neither raised in the environment
which established this form of music as
a popular genre, nor being blessed with
the ability to affect said upbringing in
a convincing manner, fails at his first
attempts.
Human society needs to rise above the
insipid folly that is racism, but still ac-
knowledge the fact that different com-
munities will always produce different
people, and we cannot overcome this
fact by simply ignoring it and saying
"everyone is equal and different" and
consider that the end of the issue. I'm
not saying everyone who is of a certain
skin tone is prone to behaving in a cer-
tain manner, I'm just saying that mu-
sic traditionally associated with white
people is not the same as the music tra-
ditionally associated with black people.
It's not an important distinction, but it's
there, "politically incorrect" as it is. It's
lamentable, true, and in an ideal world
one would not include race as a factor
when reviewing music (if Friðrik Dór
where black and still made piss-poor
R&B, I'd just say he was "lame" and not
"white"), but we do not live in an ideal
world. Music cannot simply be music:
try as we might, we cannot disassociate
the artist from his work.
That's pretty much what I meant. I could
have printed the above paragraphs as
my review, and in retrospect, I probably
should have. I'm just sick of music re-
views that use long, complicated words
no-one in real life uses to make a point
that could just as easily be made with a
conversational tone, and if that tone of-
fended you, I'm sorry, but chances are
you're going to stay just as mad at me:
just because I made my point in a more
literate, round-about way, doesn't mean
you're going to agree with me.
Thank you for your letter, it encourages
me to do a better job next time.
Yours,
S. Eldon
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