GentleWorld - Valentine Carnelian

For Mr Valentine Carnelian, a myth is a bogus narrative that helps one get through the day. My personal myth is one concerning 'cheese'. I believe that the Gentle People are an instrument of cultural analysis and that at the moment we are embarked upon a process of re-mythologising (as opposed to demythologising). This is why we operate according to the Primula Aesthetic, (Primula-for our overseas friends, is a processed cheese available in a tube) and why one of our techniques is known to us as 'Fromage Collage'.

Cheese and - more importantly - the processing thereof informs our every move. In a more general sense we have inspected the post-modern cultural smorgasbord and gone straight for the cheese and pineapple on a stick. We are in the cheese processing business, but we are (of course) deadly serious about it. I for one prefer Dairylea to farmhouse cheddar, and the Gentle People to Beethoven. Cheese processing is an art form in itself (and a supremely pop one of course) and the results as equally valid as the products of high culture. That the Gentle People are somewhat knowing about their activity is not a sign of cynicism but more an inevitable part of the process of participating in the manufacturing of mass culture in the pop modern era. We are perhaps the Somerset Brie of multimedia, a deliberate misnomer but nonetheless just as tasty as the real thing.

In Italo Calvino's book, Mr Palomar, the eponymous hero visits a cheese shop:

"This shop is a museum: Mr Palomar, visiting it, feels as he does in the Louvre, behind every displayed object the presence of the civilization that has given it form and takes form from it. The shop is a dictionary; the language is the system of cheeses as a whole."

I quote the above to illustrate how remythologising cheese can help us build a conceptual framework for our music.

Mr Carnelian on the making of Gentle People Music:
Les Gentle People participent au phenomene easy listening plus par une association de style visuel et ideologique que dans la creation musiquale. Nous avons utilise plusieurs 'samples' de morceaux 'easy listening', nous aimons aussi utiliser des vocaux feminins reveurs et tres doux. En bref, quelques une de nos references prennent leur source dans le 'easy listening' mais le style musical est en fait tout a fait moderne. Nous faisons de la musique moderne, ambiente, pop, chill out ( en fait assex difficil ea categoriser) mais en tant que 'pop groupe' et nous utilisons l'easy listening comme une source de materiel. En resume notre procede est simple: Syntaxe (computers, samplers, digital ) and semantiques (easy listening, polyester, analogue). Easy listening est simplement un des ingredients que nous versons dans notre pot de fondue digitale.

Austin Allegro 1300 Super with 'The Beaver' on top. 'The Beaver' is a homemade plywood Canadian canoe, ideal for sole or group activities.

	Jason King - what more can I say? Don't bite off more than you can chew kids.
Major General Michael J H Walsh, CB., DSO, Chief Scout of the United Kingdom and overseas branches.