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  When I Grow Up, I Want To Be Paul Morley

  The most striking thing about Paul Morley, other than his gorgeous pretentiousness, is his massive enthusiasm for pop music. In Words & Music, it is given full, wandering rein, emanating out from the idea of pop music as a sprawling city with Kylie driving her kraftwerk car along the cultural autobahn at its core. No-one can crawl into the skin of music in quite the same way as Morley, roaming around inside and emerging with gems of ideas and arresting images. For example, the fact that Captain Beefheart made music as though humanity has descended from birds rather than apes has consistently sparked my imagination. But then I'm a pretentious wee space pup as well. If you prefer your musings a little more grounded in reality, I direct you to Morley's meta-autbiography, "Nothing", which shows how seventies Stockport squeezed and crushed the young Paul to become the diamond he is today. Sad, moving, stimulating and revealing.

  Review by Dom Egan on 14:04, 04 Apr 2008

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