In Tyrant:
Shakespeare on Power, Stephen Greenblatt examines how various megalomaniacs
and their supporters are depicted in six of Shakespeare’s plays. Without
mentioning the name of the current incumbent of the oval office, he draws numerous
parallels between U.S. president number 45 and some of the greatest villains in
literature.
There is Richard III’s bogus identification with the masses, The Winter’s Tale’s King Leontes’ demand
for loyalty above principles, Macbeth’s infecting of the entire body politic.
And of course, there is also a host of self-serving toadies who enable these
men to rise, some through sheer self-interest, some because they are convinced
they can exert some control over the tyrant.In every instance, the man who attains his position by courting the
masses or through shrewd skulduggery turns out to be completely unsuited to
rule and chaos ensues. Greenblatt also notes how in Shakespeare’s plays, despots
tend to emerge when there are deep political divisions in a kingdom.
Greenblatt writes about each play with
great clarity and wisely avoids making explicit reference to the current
turmoil in his home country. Shakespeare appeared to use many of his history plays and
tragedies to look at contemporary events from an oblique angle (to be explicit
could lead to accusations of treason and punishment by torture or execution). Save
for his vague comments on the 2016 presidential election in the acknowledgements
section, Greenblatt wisely does the same. This admirably clear and thoughtful book adds yet
more support for Jonson’s claim that Shakespeare is ‘for all time’.
In advance of Microdisney’s recent reunion to play
their 1985 album The Clock Comes Down the
Stairs album live in Dublin and London, BBC 6Music’s Mark Radcliffe asks founding members Cathal Coughlan and Sean O'Hagan the inevitable question: if the two
shows go well, will they go on tour?Their decision to re-form in the first place must surely have been a
difficult one – seeing them play both concerts and listening to their recorded
output from the 1980s gave me the impression that this was a band driven by a
deep-rooted contrariness.In interviews,
they allude to having annoyed a lot of people in the music industry, while when
they actually perform at the two venues, singer Coughlan makes several
references to his fiery younger self. Like many great artists who underachieved commercially,
Microdisney were seemingly allergic to compromise.
Though
they were obviously eager to make a successful career out of music – they
signed to major label Virgin in 1986 and many of their songs are hook-laden
earworms that recall The Beach Boys, Steely Dan and the intellectual pop strand
of the early 1980s represented by Prefab Sprout and Scritti Politti – listening
to them thirty years later, and seeing them in performance in the National Concert Hall and Barbican Centre, gave me a clearer
idea as to why they remain an acquired taste.
Take
their single ‘Birthday Girl’.Over an
infectiously bouncy melody (further brightened by O’Hagan’s glistening
guitar) Coughlan sings a chorus as sweet as any you will hear in the chart:
‘Birthday girl, rosy and special / Will this night last forever?’But his mournful Cork baritone lends the song
an unavoidable sense of melancholy and listening closely, you can later hear him sing ‘Feed the birds poisoned bread / In the square beneath my place of birth'. The effect is like biting down on a slice of brack only for your teeth to come in contact with the hidden ring.
Microdisney were renowned for their live shows
and in the reunion gigs, they are punchy and sparkling. Coughlan is often
hunched over, his face twisting into a ferocious snarl as he sings. While
utterly compelling, it also cements the impression that this is a band who were
more intent on creating interesting, original work than on attracting
listeners.
Halfway
through their rendition of The Clock,
the band welcome on stage Dublin singer Eileen Gogan, whom they have enlisted
to sing the female vocal parts, and their performance of ‘And’, the final song
on the album, is one of the highlights of both evenings. Like several of the
songs – ‘Are You Happy Now’, ‘Begging Bowl’ – ‘And’ appears to explore the
bitter residue of a failed relationship.
A similar combination of disillusion
and defiance is evident on the sublime ‘Loftholdingswood’, one of the non-Clock songs they play once they get
through the tracks on the featured album.A brilliant mixture of synth-pop and country that contains one of the
all-time great lines – ‘I died on the cross / Now I’m the boss’ – the song
manages to be simultaneously timeless and utterly redolent of rainswept 1980s urban decay.
Answering Radcliffe’s question, Coughlan and
O’Hagan claim that they won’t be extending the two gigs into a tour. Maybe that
is for the best. Being part of the nostalgia circuit would doubtless make a
band as sceptical and sardonic as Microdisney feel uncomfortable, despite the
obvious financial incentive. So those of us who managed to see them in the NCH
and the Barbican can count ourselves lucky.
