Performance Interlude

I've alluded to this in some other posts, but here's another reminder that the Roeg/Cammell film Performance seems to have become a touchstone for some British indie rock bands of the 80s and 90s. 


The Godfathers allude to the East End gangsters in the film, both  in their wardrobe and by copying the mise-en-scene for "Memo from Turner" in the video for the unrelenting "Birth, School, Work, Death." I've written about this in an earlier blog; that song is particular favorite of mine for picking up the Nihilist flag flown briefly by the Sex Pistols in "Holidays in the Sun" and "God Save the Queen": 

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There's not much that separates "Memo from Turner" in Performance from the Godfathers song; they share a stylized nihilism. Stranger perhaps, is the link between Performance and Oasis' breakthrough single, "Live Forever." The open hearted optimism of Oasis seems a million miles away from the ambiance of Performance. The latter is aggressively cult minded; the former imagines a mass audience that the band was fortunate enough to reach with the record. 

I suppose a kind of formalism was second nature to Oasis, so that they copied the form of Performance without considering content...