Last year, while i was interviewing the composer Märt-Matis Lill, he related an idea – expressed by his father – that we feel most comfortable during the period of time when we were born. Lill was born in November, and feels particularly at ease at that time of the year, as the cold creeps in and darkness takes over. On the one hand, this notion is clearly not universal – my Beloved was also born in November and her reactions are consistently negative year after year as the sunlight ebbs away. On the other hand, personally, i do relate entirely to Lill’s hypothesis; i was born in September, and have always enjoyed autumn more than any other part of the year. An integral part of that enjoyment is the fact that, from my perspective, it’s transitional, not fixed. Of course, every season – all time – is transitional, but i’ve always perceived summer and winter as destinations, while spring and autumn are transitional periods in between those pseudo-fixed points. For me, this is another aspect reinforcing Lill’s theory, that, being a child of the autumn, i have an instinctive inclination toward transitional states.
As a listener – and as a composer, for that matter – i have always found transitions particularly fascinating. The condition where nothing is certain, everything is unstable, teetering between one state and another, possibly moving between them, just as possible moving somewhere else, as yet unknown. i remember, as a teenager, when i first heard Steve Reich’s Piano Phase, how the periods when the two pianists were rhythmically locked seemed dull, while the periods in between, when one pianist slowly moves forward, producing a complex clatter of asynchrony, were utterly mesmerising. This applies just as much to music history; i have a deep fascination with, and love for, certain periods that were similarly liminal, when fundamentals were being challenged, and deep, significant change was starting to occur and spread. Free atonality, for example, those years early in the 20th century when Romanticism was becoming late in every sense of that word, harmonies stretched, structures contorted, and dissonances just starting to be emancipated.
There’s yet another aspect to this, which again links back to Lill’s idea, regarding when we’re born in terms of epoch. While i was compiling the 2025 Best Albums of the Year, i was reflecting (as i usually do) on the reasons why this particular music was on my list, and more generally why my taste is the way it is. i’m a child of the early ’70s, and by the time i was able to take in and absorb the sounds of that period, it was the turning point into the ’80s. It took a few more years before i actively started to collect music (i bought my first record in 1983), by which time, i would later discover, a great deal had become established. Over the years, i’ve become increasingly aware of the extent to which the music that surrounded me during those formative years, both consciously and – to a greater degree, perhaps, subconsciously – has gone a long way to shaping the foundation of my instincts and inclinations in music. Here too, it seems, when we are born exerts its influence.
My listening life often consists of very deep dives when i explore music from the past, listening again – or, just as often, for the first time – to a group or artist’s complete discography over a number of days: (re)discovering and reappraising it, learning anew what makes it tick, and in so doing, (re)discovering myself, and what makes me tick. Last autumn (coincidence?), apropos of nothing i began what turned out to be an especially deep and immersive listening journey, going back to that music i alluded to before, from those formative years of my life – both before and after i became actively connected to it – filling in blanks, and in the process joining up dots. i was struck in an entirely new way by the enormous scope and creative volatility of that exhilarating transitional time, when the vestiges of rock – heavy, prog, art- and glam – were being infiltrated and permeated by electronics, and everything became wildly experimental, liminal and strange. i recognise how, to no small degree, the qualities of this period – of this music – have instilled many of my tastes, and distastes, made me who i am today. i’m an electronic kid.
So for this year’s Lent Series i’m going to explore some of what is, to me, the most special, significant and remarkable music from this epoch. i’m limiting the scope of the series to the years 1977–81, which from my perspective is by far the most exciting and critical period, before ideas had been codified, standardised and commercialised; when musical expression was being rethought and reconceived, and things were at their most unstable and radical. Starting tomorrow.
