The 90′s alternative to Woodstock, Markey has crafted a fine documentary with stunning footage of Sonic Youth on stage showing the energy and spontaneity they display live with hilarious commentary by our hero Thurston ” I’m eating something Bob Mould just puked up….this elixir of skin head violence.” The performance of ” I Love Her All the Time” is a real show stomper with Lee Ranldo smashing his guitar on stage and all of that beautiful feedback and distortion and Thurston Moore playing on the edge of the stage where he is almost literally falling off.

Fusing blistering live performances from some of THE great underground bands of the 1980′s – 1990′s (stand up Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jnr, Gumball and Babes in Toyland), with tiny snippets of backstage larks that truly portray the excitment of the period. What is truly exceptional about this piece is its subtlety in the presentation of the major issues of the time, namely the issue of old school punk ethics versus the attitudes of the increasingly main stream fans the bands were attracting. A good example of this is the way Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth dispenses a mocking impersenation of a grumpy Irish scooter ‘fan’ (“I’m planning to put the front cover of ‘Goo’ on me scooter” Oh PLEASE!). The actual moment itself was so brief you could easily miss it, but it brilliantly sums up the attitudes of all the bands to this new audience they were attracting, and with whom they shared no common ideas or beliefs. Another joy of this film is that you get to see a pre-fame Nirvana. Kevin Kerslake shows a lighter, more human, side to this near mythological individual and also offers us what l feel to be one of the most powerful images of the century. After falling of stage and into the crowed, Kurt is pulled back onto the stage by Thurston, both with big smiles on their faces, having fun, and totally unaware of the tragedy that we, with the benfit of hindsight, know will soon befall them. Kerslake further emphasizes this moment by freezing it for just enough time to allow the full meaning of the image to sink in. A truly exceptional representation of the unifying spirit of the old, and sadly long gone, underground network.

To coincide with the film, A&M Records released a double-album soundtrack. The selection of songs was almost the same as the film, but there were a few minor changes and several acts featured in the film did not make it to the album (John Cooper Clarke, Chelsea, Surf Punks, Invisible Sex, Splodgenessabounds).

In Sartre’s formal lectures and his academic books he meditates on the themes of boredom, the absurd, faith, freedom and nothingness and explains how these relate to the existential mode of thought. In this celebrated and crucial 1938 novel ‘Nausea’ these themes are woven into the fictional story of Antoine Roquentin, who is the exisitentialist protagonist. Roquetin is a writer attempting to pen the biography of Monsieur de Rollebon, an important character in the political scene of France. Roquentin narrates the events in his life as if writing his feelings in a diary. His feelings about the pointlessness of his work is the first noticable existentialist leaning.

Our hero spends his time mulling around feeling bored and questioning why reality exists. When he suffers social isolation and yearns for a personal relationship that never materialises – his introspection increases. He muses on the nature of man and the absurdity of the physical situations in which we live. At one point in the novel he stops and looks at himself, examines his hand, his face, his features and describes them – despite trying desperately to self-analyse himself he does not recognise his flesh or his own form. He no longer knows what forms our identity or what form really is or means. He looks at everything as though he was not used to seeing it through habit.

The ‘Nausea’ of the title refers to Roquentin’s feelings about himself and the world – of being unable to find a reason of meaning for life, form and the methods of living. There is a sense that the boredom of the hero and his depressive outlook is partly caused by his Bourgeoisie lifestyle. There are moments in the novel when aspects of freedom and spontaneity are emphasised – a jaunty jazz tune for instance, or art in general. Roquentin says of the musical notes: “They know no rest, an unchanging order gives birth to them, without ever giving them time to recover, to exist for themselves.”

Roquentin’s struggle to find purpose and to accept that his actions are meaningful culminates in a semi-hopeful decision to devote himself to fiction writing and the art of non-reality, if you like. In this, there is no need to address the question of meaning since nothing is real.

The complicated ideas of Existentialism are quite difficult to write about or even relate to another person. The themes of this book can be identified by close reading though. It is one of my favourite novels and for me provides a realistic account of how an exisitentialist person views themselves and the world around them.

Total Track Length- 1:19:10