'Munchuasen' by No Bra
On The Rocks, London
Thursday 18th August 2005
"The dark documents of outsiders"[1]
A short film by Marcus Werner Hed closely captures duo No Bra performing debut single 'Munchausen' on the week of its release in London. Steadily gaining a reputation for their stage performance and smart-savage lyrics, No Bra reward being witnessed as well as listened to. 'Munchausen' is structured as a succession of communications between Susanne Oberbeck and Dale Cornish, both of whom stand topless on stage - their physical/intellectual response to false tabloid claims of celebrity breast exposure (which also informs their band name). Creating the 'cultural status-neurosis' version of the psychological condition Munchuasen Syndrome, No Bra communicate their repeated fabrications of 'avant-garde' hierarchical claims back and forth, punctuated by the misleadingly enthusiastic conversational shorthand, "Really". Munchuasen Syndrome is medically described as an "acute, dramatic and convincing" [2] condition perpetrated by people with "prominent histrionic personalities"[3], but who are enduringly intelligent, resourceful and sophisticated regarding their deceits and simulations. Oberbeck and Cornish run through their absurd array of fake proclamations with confident nonchalance, building up the fixated attempts to out-do each other in the way popular singing games also use 'call and response' formats to create competitive, repetitive word-play. As well as the claim to have shared a house with Karlheinz Munchausen (clearly also a reference to electronic music composer Stockhausen), they barter with the apparently potent currency of art-status in the brilliant facticious expose of that most damning and hysterical condition: fear of cultural irrelevance.
"I'm going to have an exhibition here in two weeks."
"Really", I'm going to have a performance here in three weeks"
[1] Quote by Giles Round
[2][3] http://www.merck.com/mrkshared/mmanual/section15/chapter185/185d.jsp
VIEW ITEMS
Credits
Performance, vocals and lyrics: No Bra (Susanne Oberbeck and Dale Cornish)
Film-making and edit: Marcus Werner-Hed
Text and editorial direction: Christabel Stewart
Editorial assistance: Jenny Cambell-Coquhoun
Attractor image: detail from record cover photography by Slava Moqutin
Thanks: No Bra, Giles Round.
Selected Links
http://www.nobra.co.uk
