Most of us will agree that getting a song stuck in your head is annoying at best. The one currently on mental replay for me is “Red Right Hand” off of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds’ 1994 album, Let Love In. This is made tolerable by, a) serving as mood music for Jonathan Lethem’s Gun, with Occasional Music, which I’m only now getting around to reading (this should serve as a department heading as it is a constant state of affairs around here); and b) it’s simply a fantastic song:

“Red Right Hand” has set the mood for a variety of movies and tv shows, including Hellboy and The X-Files. Recently it has resurfaced as the theme tune for Jack Irish, a very enjoyable Australian noir tv series adapted from the novels by Peter Temple and starring Guy Pearce.

Creating, the Cave way. An insert from Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds’ 1994 album, Let Love In

I’ll reserve final judgment on Lethem’s Gun since I’m not done, but with the airtight noir narration, snorting lines of make, babyheads and an evolved kangaroo tough it’s a pretty fun read so far. Apparently, the babyheads are inspired by children in the Strugatsky brothers’ The Ugly Swans, which is waiting patiently on the bookshelf to be filed under, “Only Now Getting Around To Reading It”.

Jonathan Lethem’s Gun, with Occasional Music, 1994.

In the fashion industry, it’s not enough to be a talented designer. To be successful you must be self-sufficient when it comes to making shrewd business decisions. How to keep production costs down? Shall assemblage of the garments be done in Hong Kong or North Carolina? Will the integrity of the materials used be compromised in the pursuit of maximum profit?

Apart from these generalities there are two questions that are seldom asked: How is production going to impact the environment? The community? Katharine Hamnett, Natalie Chanin and Enrico Marone-Cinzano of Project Alabama and Peter Ingwersen of Noir ask themselves these questions, and likely can feel good about the answers.

image: www.katharinehamnett.com

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