Rob from the Poor, Give to the Rich

It is interesting to note that the independent economic think-tank the IFS has concluded that the Emergency Budget (much-trumpeted by the coalition as a "progressive budget") is actually hitting poorer people the hardest. The IFS has even gone as far as saying that it is in fact regressive, stating that Labour's previous budget tackled the problem in a more effective manner by ensuring that the rich shared the burden rather than escaping it altogether.

This only proves what everybody already knows: that the coalition government is (of course) fiscally Conservative in all but name, and George Osborne is so concerned with keeping the mega-rich happy (see my Vodafone post below), that he has lost focus on who actually suffers most in recessions. Just because the Treasury has published more detailed Budget figures does not make the Budget automatically "more progressive". What is even more shocking is the government's casual dismissal of the IFS's findings, with no concession of fault or haste (bear in mind how quickly this Budget was thrown together) or even promise to reconsider their decisions when the figures speak clearly for themselves. It is not just the Budget itself, the IFS noted, but the attack by the coalition on the welfare system, which puts low-income households doubly at risk. How the Liberal Democrats can look anybody in the face in the light of such facts is criminal:

"Those who lose the least are households of working age without children in the upper half of the income distribution. This is because they do not lose out from cuts in welfare spending and are the biggest beneficiaries from the increase in the income tax personal allowance." (IFS Report)

Big Society? Looks like it's getting smaller to me....

Summer's almost gone, time for some politics!

Well, apologies to my readers (if there are any), for my shameful lack of bloggage. It's been a crazy summer and no mistake - it's always the time when "to do" lists get thrown out of the window by lovely weather, drinks with friends or cheeky cheap flights to foreign climes. But given the autumnal feel today I am almost back in the blogging groove, and as such I feel it only fair to give a round-up of the important issues, none of which are actually taken from the heady cultural sphere - it's all getting a little serious....

First and foremost, if you're having a calm morning, this bumptious Torygraph post should stir you all up. It's wrong perhaps to open the political floodgates so early on a Monday morning, but nevertheless one can't help but wonder what David Hughes has been putting in his cocoa. Personally I would argue that all his points indicate a government desperate to tackle the small stuff while the great big elephant in the room goes ignored. Or should that be elephants? And let's pass over our exalted leading duo's fabulous summer gaffes. But to address David Hughes again, was getting rid of speed cameras really a top priority for the "first 100 days". Is that really what the country needed first off the bat? Not sure about that. Just as the ridiculous, asinine, totally ill-conceived, executed and thought-out "education reform" seems to have wasted more money doing very little - not really what one would call an essential tackling of our deficit. In fact it smacks of a government who knows that it should be in power but isn't really sure why. It's a bugger's muddle. And yes that is a technical term.

And when our favourite wallpaper-toting Chancellor cosies up to tax-avoiding multinationals like Vodafone (all in our economic interests you understand), it's clear that the government would rather do anything than tackle the big boys and bankers head-on. See the full article in Private Eye:

At this point it's worth reminding ourselves of Vodofone's activities in Ghana, which as recently as late July have been causing controversy. Coincidentally, Vodofone has just announced that its purchase of Ghana Telecom has lead to Ghana becoming the number 1 country in Africa for its 4MB broadband speed capacity. What is interesting about this fact is that whilst it is doubtlessly helping the Ghanian people, it puts Vodafone in the enviable position of "market leader" (newspeak for "monopoly") in terms of the Ghanian communications market. Also coincidentally, Vodofone has announced this week that its "Ghana Foundation" (announced in 2008 but only just up and running) is going to use local volunteers to give something back to the community. This is of course very important and heart-warming and no doubt will be a significant bargaining card in the ongoing India discussions. This Lusaka Times article does point to murkier dealings in the Vodafone Ghana world, even though it's thinly veiled anti-Zamibian stance must be taken into account (it's hardly unbiased reporting). It would be interesting to know exactly what is going on there.

It will also cost significantly less to Vodofone than having to shell out £2.6 billion in tax. It's worthwhile noting that whilst Vodofone has spent just over £100 million on it's charitable work since 2002, its operating profits in at the year end of March 2010 were £11.5 billion for that year, with an 8.4% increase in group revenue to £44.5 billion. That makes £100 million spent over 8 years look a little like a drop in the ocean. As a rough guide to its Ghana Foundation, Vodofone will spend no more than £900 a month on each volunteer's project and £67,000 to pay each volunteer and their chosen NGO over 2 months (quite why the "volunteers" need to be paid so much is not addressed). A similar "charity-for-tax-breaks" situation in India is possibly what they would be looking for, and with such "community-based" market credentials and job-creation, plus some heavy leaning-on by Osborne et al, it is likely to tip in Vodofone's favour, marking another triumph for offshore tax havens, which sadly ordinary folk like you and I aren't privvy to.

A donation of a princely £50,000 towards one of the worst humanitarian disasters in modern times (although these seem to be coming round with increasing frequency), reads as particularly insulting in light of these figures. For those who like percentages, this £50,000 is a massive 0.00043478260869565213% of Vodafone's £11.5 billion profit for last year. Clearly a company that cares, and one the British Coalition Government is anxious doesn't receive a pesky tax bill. Bless their cottons.

What is abundantly clear from all of this is that Cameron's visit to India stressed not "trade partnerhsips" so much as old-school Imperialsm. Think of it in terms of the "I Look Down on Him" sketch. Simply put in the US, UK and India and one sees the chain of command that Cameron is envisaging. There are many in India who are (rightly) sceptical of the muscling-in of companies like Vodofone into a marketplace where India is rapidly becoming a leader in the field - India is certainly no Ghana. And the latest from Reuters shows that the Indian government is by no means stepping aside - clearly the Conservatives will have some tricky diplomacy ahead of them if they are to protect Vodafone's interests. Obviously this is far more important than tackling the deficit. And as Private Eye has pointed out, why is the government bending over backwards to help a multinational avoid a legally imposed tax?

Despite all the comfortable "100 days" belly-rubbing rumblings from cheerleaders like Hughes and indeed Clegg and Cameron themselves, as this article from Politics.co.uk shows, there are cracks within the Liberal Democrats which even Clegg's smooth airbrushing can't quite eradicate. What with all this continued uncertainty, real issues surrounding unemployment and the continued trend of gleeful bankers sticking two fingers up to the rest of the country, it hasn't been the quietest of summers. And as the underwhelming response to Pakistan's crisis has shown, charity comes next to recession, and about 0.0004% next to profit-making multinationals......

Football Window

Having watched England's unspectacular performance against the USA one can't help but speculate if we are even going to make it to the quarter finals. Green's unforced error may have helped editors fill the front pages on Sunday, but the 1:1 result is more telling than that. What was highlighted all too well was this team's lack of talent: not individually, but as a team in themselves. Gerrard's goal aside there was nothing whatsoever to fire the imagination. Much of the time seemed to be spent standing around hoping for a miracle/Beckham to don his boots and sally forth onto the pitch. And Green's mistake, rather than spurring the team on to a conclusive win, seemed to deflate them utterly.

Now, any reader of this blog will know that sport isn't usually one of my subjects. However, in this case of "national pride" it becomes a great lens through which to examine the British character. What is interesting is that we went into the draw with the US almost assured of victory; casual pub-talk was optimistic and good-humoured, a sort of "take it to the Yanks" attitude which in hindsight proved endearing in its naiveté. The fact is that over the past 10 years America has begun to wake up to football - not as a national sport by any means, but as a further way to make money. Suddenly sports manufacturers such as Nike have realised that they have an entirely untapped continent, which, if it can be sold the "football dream" can be a market in which to sell even more sports equipment/apparel/associated crap. Cynical but true. And as a result (and obviously on a national level not liking to be entirely out of the swim) the USA has certainly upped its ante on the "soccer" side, producing a team which would have been less than convincing against a side such as Germany, but which threw the Three Lions into a mixture of panic and despair. The pace and excitement of the Serbia/Ghana match showed what can happen when two teams want something enough, and to be honest given England's performance one could see that if the Serbian or Ghanan teams played with as much tenacity as they did, then they could conceivably be running rings around our sluggish-seeming boys.

In lots of ways football sums up the British mentality: a supposedly "team game" which everyone prefers to play as a singles event. And you don't have to look far - politics, the banking crisis - to see that this kind of attitude has become even more part of our "national consciousness". And I don't think this is going too far. From the late 1960s onwards (coincidentally when we won our last World Cup), we have seen through a rise in living standards, the media and entertainment industries, an increasingly individualist attitude. This can be seen to be exactly intune with the *cough* coalition government's Big Society campaign, the tagline of which should read something like "we'll take taxes from you and give you nothing in return". I'm not stupid enough to imagine that a more socialist country would produce a better football team, but one has to wonder  whether the experiment might be worth a try.

All that Saturday showed was that a team is more than just a couple of high-profile players, and that in football, as with so many things, England is not what it once was. And from now on I will return to the real world of the arts.......

Alejandro

Well well well. Unless you're currently living under a rock, you'll know that Lady Gaga has become the most dominant cultural figure on the pop landscape since Madonna. It was only a matter of time before La Gaag paid homage to our Madge in music video form, and she's done so through the lens of Steve Klein, photographer to the stars and in this case director of said "Alejandro" video.

Now, let's clear up a few things first. It's not her best song. In fact, the more I listen to it the more I think that Ace of Base should be compiling a law suit. It's poppy, catchy and has enough quirky things to keep you interested. It doesn't have the out-and-out balls of "Bad Romance" nor the sublime and weirdly wonderful bad ass of "Telephone". But it has character. What it perhaps does not have is 8:44 minutes of running time inside of it. Debates are already whooshing round cyberspace as to whether it was prudent for La Gaag to expose a less-than-best song to this kind of timeframe. Personally, I think she overdid it: the last minute and a half is the deal-breaker and the song (unlike "Telephone") has nothing new to offer in it. And the video itself has no plot, so the momentum of the video is entirely reliant on the music, which is, you know, a 3 minute pop song. You wouldn't do it to Ace of Base, so why do it with Gaga? Bad decision all round, and perhaps a touch of hubris?

Length aside, the next most-discussed element has to be the "shock" value. Let me make one thing clear: this video is only shocking to you if you have indeed been living under that rock. I mean please people, she dresses as a nun in red leather? She has guns stuck on her bra? She dry humps dancers in her underwear? She swallows a rosary? Seriously, get some cultural perspective! I think that by Gaga's standards this is actually her tamest (yes tamest) offering. We've seen it all before, haven't we? See Madonna about twenty years ago. Not that Gaag isn't bringing new ideas to the table, she is. Her ability to chameleonise herself is fantastic, she devours the camera (please note future directors she does better in close shot rather than long) and pulls off even the most ridiculous of "concepts" (see gun bra).

What I think is particularly lacking in this video is, firstly, a sense of humour. This for me has what has been a stand-out of all her videos, and what has made them so enjoyable. Even the schmaltzy teary-eyed sections of "Bad Romance" were enlivened by the oh-so-fantastic red-clad cheeky dancing at the end (and of course flame-thrower bra):

What "Alejandro" is severely lacking is any kind of sense of humour. This doesn't mean it's bad, it just means that it needed to be more than good, it needed to be completely over-the-top. And in terms of fashion, visuals and concept I felt it was just short of the mark. I think plenty of this is due to the fact that Klein is a photographer not a film-maker. There's a reason why "Paparazzi" and "Telephone" were so good, even though they were long videos: Jonas Åkerlund, a talented, professional and original film-maker. This isn't being snobbish: of course photographers can be film-makers, make pop-videos etc., but I think that Klein's kind of photography, whilst appearing cinematic, is so constructed that it makes the transition of images to film a tricky one. You'll notice that in "Alejandro" all the best shots are the stills/freezes. It's when people start moving that Klein doesn't know what to do, and, ironically, begins to start moving the camera needlessly. Now I actually have no idea how experienced Klein is so my apologies for treating the guy like a novice - obviously he's done far more than I will ever do. But I think, ironically, the video would have had a lot more oomph if he'd've gone for a more stylised, photographic approach rather than this strange photo/film hybrid. By this I mean even more accentuating of the pose (voguing, if you will), rather than the act of making it. In effect, more of a slide-show. This would have been in keeping with the song, itself a stop-start affair. An example of Klein's skill with the still:

And why it doesn't always translate so well when people are moving:

In short, what is pristine, controlled, superlative, becomes frenetic and less visually arresting - the only way Klein could have dealt with this was to go for heightened aestheticism, almost tableaux (a reason why the dance sequences are the better parts).

So we are left with a video which is patchy. Bits of it are visually brilliant. And bits of it are absolute rubbish. Lady Gaga has gone on record (rather patronisingly I feel) saying that the song is all about her poor brave gay friends who have the courage to be together. Sweet. So, if the song is about that, why be so coy with the gays? Again, a fascinating trend in this new wave of "gay-friendly" pop videos which always seem to treat it as a barely-mentioned fetish (the closest we get in "Alejandro" is the men throwing each other to the ground and stomping around in bizarre leotards). Instead of all these gays having fun while the Gaag is out in the cold, she spends a lot of time dry-humping the poor dears. Is this meant to be some kind of reverse rape situation? Or am I being too deep? If so it's all a bit unclear, made even more so by bad "group sex" at the end. Feminists please note, Gaag doesn't do any favours for independant women in this one. And if Lady Gaga was really going to push buttons, wouldn't it have been more fun to have the guns affixed to the male dancers too in phallic manner? Now that really would be controversial.......

Despite the messy affair this is there are some great bits. As mentioned, the dancing is excellent, if sometimes spoiled by those long-shots - in fact it's the strongest aspect of the video, fashion having taken a curiously muted backseat. And I liked the half-naked dancers gyrating on metal beds wearing stillettoes - nice touch. The only moment of pure genius was Gaga sporting a superb New Avengers hairdo and rocking around in a little black waistcoat and wide trousers - that was true Gaag, visually arresting, surprisingly simple and a completely anti-trend move. Well done, but more should have been made of it. One could argue that instead of going for fetish nuns this should have been her modus operandi, slyly ushering in the 90s.......

For a song apparently celebrating gay love it's a shame we don't see that addressed in any real way, and for a video from Lady Gaga it's a shame we don't see her be a bit more fabulous. Whether the artistic decisions were largely hers or largely Klein's is unclear: what we do have is an "Alejandro" who needed a bit more direction, a bit more style, a bit less time, a lot less dry humping and a bit more soul. And, oddly, a bit more shock.

7/10. Peace.

All the Lovers

Well, Kylie Minogue has just released a new single, and I have to say that it's a good 'un. In many ways it's the usual Minogue fodder - dreamy dance beat, euphoric vocals and some serious synth action. In a post-Gaga world it feels refreshingly simple, extraordinarily accessible and incredibly summery. In short, it does what it says on the tin:

http://video.uk.msn.com/watch/video/exclusive-kylie-minogue-all-the-lovers/2txa6uvb

Compared with the car-crash which is Christina Aguilera's latest offering, Kylie has shown her credentials by deliberately avoiding any Gaag comparisons. In fact a more anti-Gaag video hasn't been seen in a while. And after the patchy efforts of the past few years (X anyone?) it feels good to have a more familiar-sounding Kylie giving us our summer groove. If this is anything to go by, and in light of Kelis's "Acapella", then 2010 might become the year when dance fully reasserts itself..........

As for me, the video has its issues (white horses? really?), not least of which are the way the same-sex kisses are filmed (come on people! enough with the fetishisation of boys-boys/girls-girls kissing prominently and unconvincingly on pop-videos!), and also my worries for Kylie's health-and-safety policy. But it feels fresh and simple and under-produced (remarkably), and obviously is going to see sales of white underwear soar. Also the pocket-pop-princess does pull off the strange white boots/top/Madonna-esque bra look. Oh yes. I loved its homage to the Barcelona-shot "Slow" video from 2003 (a brilliant pop video), and its showcasing of Kylie's ability to be sexual, accessible yet also aloof and remote. Basically, good work all round, and what can only be described as a return to form. Whether it does well in the charts, or whether it will be treated by the public as a has-been single belonging to the 00s, remains to be seen. And I doubt it'll crack America, I feel like those guys are dancing to different tunes. But, who knows? Personally, after my disappointment with Goldfrapp's latest, I'm more than happy for Kylie to give me that dreamy summer dance trance I always crave. Here's to the album, out July 7th:

High Density

A truly stunning collection of photographs of high-rise living, by Michael Wolf.

Discuss