Music: Going back to his roots
26 years, 11 months ago

Music: Going back to his roots

The Independent  

Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. The Lacy Lady and Goldmine might have been Turnage's clubs of choice as a teenager, but as a 38-year-old composer he writes music that hardly ever invites the listener to prance around in skimpy sportswear. It's probably the music you'd least like to hear after a skinful on a Friday night in Basildon, when the minicab office is tube-lit and smells of urine. We might recognise its signs on the music's surface - in the eruptions of saxophone, drums and electric guitars; in the compositional use of those harmonic modes associated with "black" music - but what we actually hear is music by someone with a sensibility that has enjoyed popular music in its own terms and then got on with the job of writing complicated, disturbing formal music you can't dance to. He was a bit like Mingus, who also shot his mouth off and was a real outsider who couldn't cope with living in society, and that's very attractive."

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