Counter-Currents
  • Private Events
  • T&C
  • Contact
  • Webzine
  • About
  • Books
  • Podcasts
  • Videos
  • Donate
  • Paywall
  • Crypto
  • RSS
    • Main feed
    • Podcast feed
    • Videos feed
    • Comments feed
  • Advertise

LEVEL2

Donate Now Mailing list
  • Webzine
  • About
  • Books
  • Podcasts
  • Videos
  • Donate
  • Paywall
  • Crypto
  • RSS
    • Main feed
    • Podcast feed
    • Videos feed
    • Comments feed
  • Advertise
  • Recent posts

    • TODAY: The Great Debate Greg Johnson & Gregory Hood on Ethnonationalism vs. Imperialism  

      Cyan Quinn

    • Bonfire of the Tranities

      Spencer J. Quinn

    • The Left’s Ghost Dancers

      Morris van de Camp

      1

    • The Gentleman Rogue: George MacDonald Fraser’s Flashman

      Mark Gullick

      1

    • Western Civilization Is Destroying Its Historical Heritage, Part III

      Ricardo Duchesne

    • When Life Imitates Rap

      Jim Goad

      22

    • Western Civilization Is Destroying Its Historical Heritage, Part II

      Ricardo Duchesne

      1

    • The Storm

      Gunnar Alfredsson

      2

    • Rolf Peter Sieferle a skandál kolem jeho osoby

      F. Roger Devlin

    • Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      F. Roger Devlin

      27

    • Western Civilization Is Destroying Its Historical Heritage, Part I

      Ricardo Duchesne

      7

    • Plato’s Phaedo, Part II

      Greg Johnson

    • Úryvky z Finis Germania Rolfa Petera Sieferleho, část 4

      Rolf Peter Sieferle

    • The Fall of the House of Biden

      Stephen Paul Foster

      9

    • Meet the Hunburgers

      James J. O'Meara

    • What a Nation is Not

      Asier Abadroa

      14

    • Plato’s Phaedo, Part I

      Greg Johnson

    • The Worst Week Yet: May 28-June 3, 2023

      Jim Goad

      29

    • We Need to Stop Taking Black Complaints Seriously

      Spencer J. Quinn

      17

    • Sexual Utopia in Stockholm

      F. Roger Devlin

      6

    • Serpent’s Walk

      Steven Clark

      5

    • June Is the Gayest Month

      Jim Goad

      1

    • Three Episodes from the History of Racial Politics

      Richard Knight

      4

    • Alice’s Police Escort in Wonderland

      Gunnar Alfredsson

      8

    • Prioritizing Prestige Over Accomplishment: Britain from 1950 to 1956

      Morris van de Camp

      4

    • Nueva Derecha vs. Vieja Derecha Capítulo 2: Hegemonía

      Greg Johnson

    • The Great Debate

      Cyan Quinn

      13

    • Will Woke Capital Soon Go the Way of the Dinosaur?

      Beau Albrecht

      34

    • June Is the Gayest Month

      Jim Goad

      24

    • Counter-Currents Radio Podcast No. 535 Ask Me Anything

      Counter-Currents Radio

      1

    • Úryvky z Finis Germania Rolfa Petera Sieferleho, část 3: Nové státní náboženství

      Rolf Peter Sieferle

    • Football’s Race War

      Pox Populi

      9

    • VDARE Facing Mortal Threat

      Peter Brimelow

      6

    • Collin Cleary Interviewed on Richard Wagner

      Collin Cleary

      1

    • Counter-Currents Radio Podcast No. 534 Interview with Alexander Adams

      Counter-Currents Radio

      1

    • The Union Jackal, May 2023

      Mark Gullick

      17

    • Biden and Bibi

      James J. O'Meara

      12

    • Forward with a Vengeance

      Tom Zaja

      3

    • Notes on Strauss & Husserl

      Greg Johnson

      1

    • The Worst Week Yet: May 21-27, 2023

      Jim Goad

      27

    • The Honorable Cause: A Review

      Spencer J. Quinn

      8

    • George Friedman’s The Next 100 Years

      Thomas Steuben

      4

    • Remembering Oswald Spengler (May 29, 1880-May 8, 1936)

      Greg Johnson

      2

    • Euthanizing the Homeless? It’s a Start

      Jim Goad

      10

    • Remembering Louis-Ferdinand Céline (May 27, 1894–July 1, 1961)

      Greg Johnson

      12

    • Blood, Soil, Paint

      Greg Johnson

      1

    • Céline’s Guerre

      Margot Metroland

      7

    • The Trial of Socrates

      Greg Johnson

    • Fields of Asphodel

      Tito Perdue

    • George Floyd and the “Color” of Revolution

      Stephen Paul Foster

      11

  • Classics Corner

    • Hegemony

      Greg Johnson

      11

    • Cù Chulainn in the GPO:
      The Mythic Imagination of Patrick Pearse

      Michael O'Meara

      5

    • Remembering Dominique Venner
      (April 16, 1935 – May 21, 2013)

      Greg Johnson

      11

    • A Robertson Roundup: 
      Remembering Wilmot Robertson
      (April 16, 1915 – July 8, 2005)

      Margot Metroland

      13

    • Metapolitics and Occult Warfare

      Greg Johnson

      2

    • Remembering Maurice Bardèche:
      October 1, 1907–July 30, 1998

      Greg Johnson

      2

    • The Power of Myth:
      Remembering Joseph Campbell
      (March 26, 1904–October 30, 1987)

      John Morgan

      11

    • The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

      Trevor Lynch

      24

    • The Searchers

      Trevor Lynch

      29

    • Gabriele D’Annunzio

      Jonathan Bowden

      2

    • Remembering A. R. D. “Rex” Fairburn (February 2, 1904–March 25, 1957)

      Greg Johnson

      1

    • Denis Kearney & the Struggle for a White America

      Theodore J. O'Keefe

      1

    • Posthuman Prospects:
      Artificial Intelligence, Fifth Generation Warfare, & Archeofuturism

      Christopher Pankhurst

      5

    • Earnest Sevier Cox:
      Advocate for the White Ethnostate

      Morris van de Camp

      15

    • Remembering Jack London
      (January 12, 1876–November 22, 1916)

      Greg Johnson

      2

    • Remembering Robinson Jeffers:
      January 10, 1887–January 20, 1962

      John Morgan

      3

    • Remembering Pierre Drieu La Rochelle:
      January 3, 1893–March 15, 1945

      Greg Johnson

    • Remembering Rudyard Kipling (December 30, 1865-January 18, 1936)

      Greg Johnson

      10

    • Restoring White Homelands

      Greg Johnson

      34

    • Remembering Hinton Rowan Helper

      Spencer J. Quinn

      11

    • What’s Wrong with Diversity?

      Greg Johnson

      10

    • Redefining the Mainstream

      Greg Johnson

      3

    • Edward Alsworth Ross:
      American Metapolitical Hero

      Morris van de Camp

      8

    • The Talented Mr. Ripley & Purple Noon

      Trevor Lynch

      19

    • Christmas & the Yuletide:
      Light in the Darkness

      William de Vere

      3

    • Thanksgiving Special 
      White Men Meet Indians:
      Jamestown & the Clash of Civilizations

      Thomas Jackson

    • Colin Wilson’s The Outsider

      Sir Oswald Mosley

      4

    • Dostoyevsky on the Jews

      William Pierce

      4

    • Jefferson &/or Mussolini, Part 1

      Ezra Pound

      5

    • I Listened to Chapo Trap House So You Don’t Have To

      Doug Huntington

      98

  • Paroled from the Paywall

    • Info-Parody: A Strategy for Reaching Normies, Part 2

      D. H. Corax

      7

    • Info-Parody: A Strategy for Reaching Normies, Part 1

      D. H. Corax

      2

    • (500) Days of Summer

      Anthony Bavaria

      3

    • Grosse Freiheit Nummer 7: The Best German Film on World War II?

      Steven Clark

      5

    • An Actor Prepares: Politics as Theater

      Mark Gullick

      6

    • Counter-Currents Radio Podcast No. 533 Ask Me Anything

      Counter-Currents Radio

      2

    • Politicizing Luz Long, Part II

      Clarissa Schnabel

      2

    • Politicizing Luz Long, Part I

      Clarissa Schnabel

      3

    • Breaking Beat: Reflections on The Rebel Set, a Masterpiece That Never Was

      James J. O'Meara

      1

    • If Hillary Had Won

      Stephen Paul Foster

      1

    • Nice Racism, Part 3

      Beau Albrecht

      1

    • Nice Racism, Part 2

      Beau Albrecht

      7

    • Nice Racism, Part 1

      Beau Albrecht

      6

    • Aristophanes’ Clouds, Part II

      Greg Johnson

      1

    • Aristophanes’ Clouds, Part I

      Greg Johnson

      1

    • Counter-Currents Radio Podcast No. 530 The Genealogy of Wokeism

      Counter-Currents Radio

      5

    • Patrick Bateman: “Literally Me” or a Warning?

      Anthony Bavaria

      9

    • British Sculpture, Part II

      Jonathan Bowden

      1

    • British Sculpture, Part I

      Jonathan Bowden

      2

    • The New Story

      Jocelynn Cordes

      21

    • Why Does Cthulhu Always Swim Left? Part 2

      Beau Albrecht

      1

    • Why Does Cthulhu Always Swim Left? Part 1

      Beau Albrecht

      11

    • Robert Rutherford McCormick, Midwestern Man of the Right: Part 2

      Morris van de Camp

      1

    • Pierre Teilhard de Chardin: Prophet of Eugenics and Race-Realism

      Margot Metroland

      11

    • In Defense of the White Union

      Asier Abadroa

    • Everything Everywhere All at Once: The Oscar Winner the System Loves

      Steven Clark

      32

    • Incels on Wheels: Jim Goad’s Trucker Fags in Denial

      Beau Albrecht

      17

    • The White Pill

      Margot Metroland

      10

    • Counter-Currents Radio Podcast No. 528 Karl Thorburn on the Bank Crashes

      Counter-Currents Radio

    • Women Philosophers

      Richard Knight

      23

  • Recent comments

    • Antipodean

      The Gentleman Rogue: George MacDonald Fraser’s Flashman

      I fear that my skin has grown too thin but  twelve volumes of prurience and cowardice from an anti-...

    • ArminiusMaximus

      The Storm

      Beautiful!

    • Domitian

      The Left’s Ghost Dancers

      Good article. However, you may wish to the fix the date of Dylan's endorsement - that was in March...

    • The Antichomsky

      When Life Imitates Rap

      A very brave ***tuber by the name of Charlie Bo 313 travels to the most violent ghettos and...

    • Antipodean

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      It’s no accident that rulers impose a religion on their subjects. We have been getting the anti-...

    • Antipodean

      When Life Imitates Rap

      Well we don’t want it getting any worse, so let’s be careful what we wish for. Pop music in general...

    • Hamburger Today

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      The solution isn’t ‘patriarchy’. The solution is White Identity Nationalism. ‘Patriarchy’ vs ‘...

    • Ewigkeit

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      You're talking about a potentially distant future in which we've already won. There is no successful...

    • Jonathan Portes

      When Life Imitates Rap

      Have you noticed that *every single* 'rap video' is *exactly the same*? - The same stereotyped...

    • Hamburger Today

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      ‘You paint with too broad a brush.’Not really. 99.9999% of all Christians are ‘anti-racist’ which,...

    • Freddy Longfellow

      When Life Imitates Rap

      Just imagine the horrible long-term consequences of the structural oppression and discrimination of...

    • Asier Abadroa

      What a Nation is Not

      It is a tremendous honor that you would consider donating to Counter-Currents for something I have...

    • Asier Abadroa

      What a Nation is Not

      His point might be interesting, but it is totally wrong. Birth rates are declining EVERYWHERE in the...

    • Dr ExCathedra

      We Need to Stop Taking Black Complaints Seriously

      Whites need to be encouraged to use reciprocity as the benchmark for our responses to other races....

    • Hamburger Today

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      In jew-language, ‘Jesus’ is the same as ‘Joshua’ or ‘Yeshua’‘Yeshua isn’t a name, either. It’s more...

    • Bold Inq.

      When Life Imitates Rap

      "A scene a couple of years ago, almost transcendental in its cinematic load. I'm at a restaurant...

    • Hamburger Today

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      The sanction of race-mixing for Whites cannot be found in the Bible because the Bible isn't about...

    • Ewigkeit

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      You paint with too broad a brush. There are many Christians in this movement and you are primarily...

    • John

      We Need to Stop Taking Black Complaints Seriously

      “I would say the best way to reduce interactions with blacks is to avoid certain public places…”....

    • Michael

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      Some historians believe that the people of Galilee were of the Gallic nation and had converted to...

  • Book Authors

    • Beau Albrecht
    • Alain de Benoist
    • Kerry Bolton
    • Jonathan Bowden
    • Collin Cleary
    • Jef Costello
    • Savitri Devi
    • F. Roger Devlin
    • Buttercup Dew
    • Julius Evola
    • Jim Goad
    • Gregory Hood
    • Juleigh Howard-Hobson
    • Greg Johnson
    • Charles Krafft
    • Anthony M. Ludovici
    • Trevor Lynch
    • H. L. Mencken
    • J. A. Nicholl
    • James J. O’Meara
    • Christopher Pankhurst
    • Tito Perdue
    • Michael Polignano
    • Spencer J. Quinn
    • Fenek Solère
    • Irmin Vinson
    • Leo Yankevich
    • Francis Parker Yockey
    • Multiple authors
  • Webzine Authors

    Editor-in-Chief

    • Greg Johnson, Ph.D.

    Featured Writers

    • Beau Albrecht
    • Morris V. de Camp
    • Stephen Paul Foster, Ph.D.
    • Jim Goad
    • Alex Graham
    • Mark Gullick, Ph.D.
    • Greg Johnson, Ph.D.
    • Spencer J. Quinn

    Frequent Writers

    • Aquilonius
    • Anthony Bavaria
    • Alain de Benoist
    • Kerry Bolton, Ph.D.
    • Collin Cleary, Ph.D.
    • Jef Costello
    • F. Roger Devlin, Ph.D.
    • Richard Houck
    • Ondrej Mann
    • Margot Metroland
    • John Morgan
    • Trevor Lynch
    • James J. O’Meara
    • Kathryn S.
    • Thomas Steuben
    • Michael Walker

    Classic Authors

    • Maurice Bardèche
    • Jonathan Bowden
    • Julius Evola
    • Guillaume Faye
    • Ernst Jünger
    • Kevin MacDonald, Ph.D.
    • D. H. Lawrence
    • Charles Lindbergh
    • Jack London
    • H. P. Lovecraft
    • Anthony M. Ludovici
    • Sir Oswald Mosley
    • National Vanguard
    • Friedrich Nietzsche
    • Revilo Oliver
    • William Pierce
    • Ezra Pound
    • Saint-Loup
    • Savitri Devi
    • Carl Schmitt
    • Miguel Serrano
    • Oswald Spengler
    • P. R. Stephensen
    • Jean Thiriart
    • John Tyndall
    • Dominique Venner
    • Leo Yankevich
    • Francis Parker Yockey

    Other Authors

    • Howe Abbott-Hiss
    • Michael Bell
    • Buttercup Dew
    • Giles Corey
    • Bain Dewitt
    • Jack Donovan
    • Richardo Duchesne, Ph.D.
    • Emile Durand
    • Guillaume Durocher
    • Mark Dyal
    • Fullmoon Ancestry
    • Tom Goodroch
    • Andrew Hamilton
    • Robert Hampton
    • Huntley Haverstock
    • Derek Hawthorne
    • Gregory Hood
    • Juleigh Howard-Hobson
    • Alexander Jacob
    • Nicholas Jeelvy
    • Ruuben Kaalep
    • Tobias Langdon
    • Julian Langness
    • Travis LeBlanc
    • Patrick Le Brun
    • G A Malvicini
    • John Michael McCloughlin
    • Millennial Woes
    • Michael O’Meara
    • Christopher Pankhurst
    • Michael Polignano
    • J. J. Przybylski
    • Quintilian
    • Edouard Rix
    • C. B. Robertson
    • C. F. Robinson
    • Herve Ryssen
    • Alan Smithee
    • Fenek Solere
    • Ann Sterzinger
    • Robert Steuckers
    • Tomislav Sunic
    • Donald Thoresen
    • Marian Van Court
    • Irmin Vinson
    • Aylmer Wedgwood
    • Scott Weisswald
  • Departments

    • Book Reviews
    • Movie Reviews
    • TV Reviews
    • Music Reviews
    • Art Criticism
    • Graphic Novels & Comics
    • Video Game Reviews
    • Fiction
    • Poems
    • Interviews
    • Videos
    • English Translations
    • Other Languages
      • Arabic
      • Bulgarian
      • Croatian
      • Czech
      • Danish
      • Dutch
      • Estonian
      • Finnish
      • French
      • German
      • Greek
      • Hungarian
      • Italian
      • Lithuanian
      • Norwegian
      • Polish
      • Portuguese
      • Romanian
      • Russian
      • Slovak
      • Spanish
      • Swedish
      • Ukrainian
    • Commemorations
    • Why We Write
  • Archives
  • Top 100 Commenters
  • Private Events
  • T&C
  • Contact
Sponsored Links
Above Time Coffee Antelope Hill Publishing Identaria Paul Waggener IHR-Store Asatru Folk Assembly No College Club American Renaissance The Patrick Ryan Show Jim Goad The Occidental Observer
Print August 9, 2022 9 comments

Philip Larkin on Jazz:
Invigorating Disagreeableness

Frank Allen

Philip Larkin

3,158 words

The writer Philip Larkin (1922-1985) was born on August 9, 1922, and this essay is part of a commemoration of his centenary. — Ed.

Reading the jazz criticism of the poet Philip Larkin today, the most noticeable feature is how much of the music he did not like. His antipathy towards certain major artists now seems almost incomprehensible. But although the vast majority of contemporary critics, musicians, and fans would be flabbergasted by his various negative judgments, these are often the most fascinating aspects of his work, harkening as they do to a very different world, one in which musical preferences were rooted in ideas about art itself rather than elitist consensus; perhaps even antithetical to it. Jazz was for Larkin a vital artistic force, full of beauty and human warmth, capable of tapping the subconscious in ways other music could not, but it was also a vehicle for the destructive impulses of modernism.

Larkin’s jazz writing is not only interesting as music literature and cultural commentary but as a fascinating documentation of transitional jazz historical phases: the evolution of Dixieland and swing to bebop, bebop to hard bop, and hard bop to free form is charted by Larkin through numerous record reviews and essays. Rather than the dry and matter-of-fact acceptance of it all that one gets in most formal histories and critical literature, we have in Larkin the carefully considered thoughts of an intelligent fan reacting to a changing artistic world with a candor rarely seen at the time — or since. Though it is a challenge to agree with many of his conclusions, as an example of perceptive and witty art criticism from the Right, Larkin’s jazz writing stands out.

By the end of the twentieth century, jazz criticism had been subsumed almost entirely into the morass of carefree equalitarianism that spread virally across white Western cultures in the middle of the century. Divergences of opinion among earlier fans and critics on particular musicians and stylistic trends, which had been both educational and entertaining (e.g., Benny Goodman versus Artie Shaw, Coleman Hawkins versus Lester Young, Buddy Rich versus Gene Krupa) came to be seen as passé and irrelevant. Jazz fans in the early decades of the music’s history often had lists of musicians they did not like as long as the lists of ones they did, but this gradually gave way to the liberal Zeitgeist and a hesitancy to make thoughtful judgments at all. There was no bad genre of jazz, just as there were not really any bad jazz musicians. As with all modern art, those who resisted the self-indulgence and ugliness of the avant-garde were deemed unsophisticated or crudely reactionary. The discordant chaos of free-form jazz was, to critics’ ears, as good and respectable as the orchestral majesty of Stan Kenton or Duke Ellington, the blistering improvisations of Charlie Parker, or the melancholic lyricism of Chet Baker. The “jazz greats” were equally great and equally jazz, with no underlying philosophical differences between them.

You can buy Leo Yankevich’s poetry volume The Hypocrisies of Heaven here.

What we get from Larkin, however, is that this notion is nonsense: Jazz has specific musical characteristics and a specific spiritual value above and beyond music. As such, not all things considered jazz are actually jazz, nor are all jazz musicians equally capable of great art. Larkin immensely dislikes those who try to expand the scope of jazz, narrow its audience, or excuse that which he perceives as philosophically modern. While curmudgeonly, Larkin’s criticism tends to take the music more seriously than does the bulk of jazz writing in subsequent years: jazz means something beyond mere taste and should serve a beneficial spiritual function for its fans. Even those who would now disagree with many of Larkin’s assessments about particular musicians (or jazz itself) cannot help but feel through his writing a reconnection to the music, a desire to rethink and defend one’s opinions intelligently, and a sense that the art form of jazz really does matter.

The first major musical shift within jazz history occurred during the 1940s, when bebop threw a curveball of frenetic technique at the world of tradition. Referred to contemporaneously as “modern jazz,” the new music was decidedly dissimilar to earlier forms, especially the music which had originated in New Orleans in the first years of the twentieth century and spread north to Chicago and New York, and which had enthralled a generation of young men across America and, eventually, Europe. This early jazz (comprising various styles but often lumped together in popular terminology as Dixieland) was what cast its spell over the European Larkin:

Readers of this column may rest assured that as long as there is any swinging or Dixieland jazz in straight two or four on recent records they will hear about it. The rest will be judged by the degree to which it approximates to the excitement produced by the aforesaid swinging or Dixieland jazz.[1]

His reviews frequently proclaim the greatness of Sidney Bechet, Duke Ellington, Bix Beiderbecke, Eddie Condon, and other names one would expect, but are also littered with names of musicians who are not at all well-known today.[2] Reading thoughtful discussions of these artists is of value in itself, but it is the tension between the jazz he loved and his deep distaste for bebop (and most of what followed) that gives his writing a unique energy.

For Larkin, the often blindingly fast tempos and virtuosic improvisations of bebop musicians were an affront not only to jazz, but to art itself. There was a direct connection between the music of Charlie Parker and the poetry of the equally detested Ezra Pound: “. . . I dislike such things not because they are new, but because they are irresponsible exploitations of technique in contradiction of human life as we know it.”[3] Modern jazz was the sound of mystification, violence, and obscenity.[4] It was a novelty, utterly lacking in that which uplifts the soul. From Larkin’s perspective, jazz was deteriorating almost beyond recognition by the 1960s, with only a few stalwarts valiantly defending tradition in a sea of revolutionary dreck. He did everything a critic could to discredit modern jazz and extoll the music and implicit corresponding values of the traditionalists he loved.

What was it about jazz that Larkin, a Rightist with an obvious, if often subtle, race-consciousness, loved enough to devote considerable amounts of time and effort to it? The best place to start is his first unpublished piece on jazz written in 1940 at the age of 18. Though muddled and often pretentious, Larkin in “The Art of Jazz” was clear in his belief that jazz was to be taken seriously: “. . . the unconscious is in a new state, and has a new need, and has produced a new art to satisfy that need, and it is well that we should understand.”[5] Even as a very young man, he recognized the importance of jazz as a shift in man’s relation to the world, a momentous occasion in art. And at the time of writing, jazz had many detractors who saw it is as a savage attack on culture. For Larkin, however, jazz at its best was an expression of previously inarticulable facets of human experience: Its intimate psychological character was apparent in the pronounced vibrato of the clarinets and saxophones, the emotive growling and singing of brass, and the primal “hot” rhythms of the drums (his instrument of choice as a child). These characteristics were entirely unique to jazz, completely unlike classical, “legit” music. Jazz was real-time communication between the souls of the artist and audience, improvised like a conversation, feeding off the back-and-forth energy of the exchange. Jazz was music by and for the common man, and it was good because it made him happy.

“What was so exciting about jazz was the way its unique, simple gaiety instantly communicated itself to such widely differing kinds of human being,” he wrote in response to an author who had suggested that jazz appreciation since bebop required some degree of technical musical knowledge.[6] The post-war retreat of jazz into the world of the mind, inward and away from the audience, from the nightclub to the concert hall, from the street to academia, was, for Larkin, detrimental — perhaps fatal — to the music and helped to render the world from which it sprang to the dustbin. “The effete condition of classical music after 300 years has been reached by jazz itself in under half a century,” he wrote.[7] By the end of the 1950s, modern jazz artists, for whom the audience had become secondary at best and a nuisance at worst (e.g. Miles Davis playing with his back to the crowd or Charles Mingus’ onstage temper tantrums), appeared on the scene, forcing the gradual disappearance of the casual, positive interaction between artist and audience which for Larkin was integral to jazz. The music had stopped being communal, instead becoming academic and elitist.

The insularity and self-indulgence of modernism opened paths for politics to enter the scene and, for jazz, this too often meant that blacks no longer wanted “to entertain the white man.”[8] Long before the recent sacralization of blacks across white cultures, there was in the jazz world a similar phenomenon. Despite overwhelming evidence of a multiracial origin to the music, black jazz musicians were very often given a degree of legitimacy denied to whites. This was largely a result of (often Jewish) critics and historians transposing their racial animus onto the jazz world. For their part, however, fans were generally content to listen to and enjoy the music without much considering the race of the musicians when assessing quality, but the trend of modern jazz was towards racialization and away from earlier (semi-)colorblindness.

Though he had no problem with racial differences per se, which he took as a given and deemed perfectly natural, Larkin did not accept the explicitly hostile racial politicization of modern jazz that had begun creeping into it around 1960. He wrote in 1970: “. . . I still think it’s possible to instance this or that as good white or black jazz, with the implication that the other race could not have done it as well and no offence meant.”[9] From a piece on the blues one year earlier:

I am getting rather tired of the blues boom. Having for thirty years known the blues as a kind of jazz that calls forth a particular sincerity from the player (‘Yeah, he’s all right, but can he play the blues?’), or as a muttering, plangent lingua franca of the southern American Negro, it gives me no pleasure to hear it banged out in unvarying fortissimo by an indistinguishable series of groups and individuals of both races and nations. The blues is tough, resilient, basic, ubiquitous. But it is not indestructible, and if we go on like this the day will come when the whole genre will be as tedious as, say, the Harry Lime theme.[10]

Larkin resists the pollution of the blues by mediocrities with little actual connection to it, even hinting that the white blues musician could be seen as an interloper. Race is seen as a fact of existence which necessarily has an effect on an artist’s soul but does not have to — nor should — drag him into a swamp of politics and messy history. Jazz was supposed to be a refuge from such worldly concerns. And, of course, he was right about the blues. It has devolved into one of the blandest and meaningless of all musical forms. Rightists, as always, have a keen sense of impending destruction.

But mostly Larkin resented the intrusion of anti-whiteness into jazz, perhaps especially so because it was inevitably exhibited by musicians for whom he would have had no respect regardless. Discussing Archie Shepp, for example, Larkin writes of the saxophonist’s “death-to-all-white-men wails”;[11] about John Coltrane, he writes that his late period solos are “the musical equivalent of Stokely Carmichael” and that this music (free form jazz) “appeals to the Black-power boys.”[12] As a jazz fan, he found the music agitating and ugly; as a critic of modernism, it was symptomatic of its inherent ills; and as a white man, he took offense. He writes: “The adjective ‘modern’, when applied to any branch of art, means ‘designed to evoke incomprehension, anger, boredom or laughter’,” and then states that Coltrane and others like him were a part of the transformation of jazz from a pleasure to a duty.[13] Part of the “duty” of jazz had become the inability to avoid burgeoning black race-consciousness. He longed for the old days.

You can buy Collin Cleary’s Wagner’s Ring & the Germanic Tradition here.

While it is refreshing to read criticism from a man who is generally unafraid to express displeasure with icons in a world in which judgment itself is frowned upon — especially the jazz world, which is often an incestuous love-fest of men starved of discernment — it is very hard for contemporary readers to hear with Larkin’s ears. One can understand and even sympathize with his position on modernism in jazz, but a reader rejecting John Coltrane, Miles Davis, and Charlie Parker based on his criticism is even more unlikely now than it was then. By definition, then, he is unconvincing, and indeed antiquated.

Much of the music deemed radical at the time by Larkin now sounds conservative, while his treasured early jazz can sound far more wild to contemporary ears than it did in Larkin’s time. The group improvisations of Dixieland are often jarringly raucous to present-day listeners, while John Coltrane’s “sheets of sound” or Charlie Parker’s lightning-fast bebop sound perfectly normal. Does this indicate that the slippery slope of modernism is real or merely that tastes change? I believe, in the case of jazz, it is more often than not the latter. This shift was organic, developing simply from musicians playing music in groups and trying out new sounds and new techniques in their constant quest to create better art. It is, I would suggest, rarely more complex than that. A serious commitment to philosophical modernism by jazz fans and musicians would see Peter Brötzmann selling as many records as Miles Davis, and Evan Parker playing to larger crowds than Scott Hamilton. But this does not happen. There is, clearly, a natural limit to what kind of art the common man appreciates. Within that limit, though, are diverse avenues for artistic expression. There is not one form of jazz uniquely capable of expressing beauty: tonality, order, and emotional sanity still reign in jazz, despite many decades of elitist efforts to valorize the avant-garde. Modern jazz fans — those who enjoy jazz styles connected in some way to the bebop shift — still rarely listen to Archie Shepp. In this way, Larkin was quite possibly correct about modernism but wrong about which jazz musicians were, in fact, modernists.

Modern jazz quite clearly better filled the need for the new “unconscious” Larkin spoke of in his youth than did early jazz. Larkin failed to perceive that his taste in jazz was a product of his age and time, perhaps not realizing just how far removed the world of early jazz was — or would become — from contemporary audiences. Though, like all art, the best of it is timeless, the circumstances in which it is created are fleeting. Art is always contextual. A man of similar temperament to Larkin’s who discovers John Coltrane or Charlie Parker before Bix Beiderbecke or Bessie Smith (as most new jazz fans have since the 1960s) will have a vastly different starting point upon which to base his own version of “traditionalism.” Thus, one cannot help but think that Larkin was somewhat of a nostalgic. The pleasurable days of listening to jazz with his university chums became an ideal to which he longed to return, blinding him to examples of modern jazz that possessed the characteristics of art he appreciated but which were in fact merely stylistically different.

Larkin resented what he felt — and some critics argued — was the need for modern jazz fans to understand music theory in order to appreciate it, but this was never required. People fell in love with Charlie Parker’s music because it was exciting and communicated something relatable to them — the same reason Larkin fell in love with Sidney Bechet’s music. Of course, more knowledge leads to deeper understanding, but the vast majority of people who find enjoyment and meaning in modern jazz are not musicians. Larkin often mistakes taste for philosophy: genuine innovation and organic stylistic shifts do not always arise from philosophical trends, nor are they always a willful rejection of tradition.

Regarding race, it was naïve on Larkin’s part to assume that jazz would somehow remain indifferent to or transcend racial politics. As I have written before, jazz is perhaps the only genuinely positive result of multiracialism,[14] but as a civilizational framework riddled with impossible utopian fictions, it was always doomed to devolve as reality reared its head. The jazz world, despite its relative racial tolerance, is not exempt from reality. It is hardly the fault of Archie Shepp, John Coltrane, or any of the “Black-power boys” that black jazz musicians became publicly and explicitly race-conscious. What is far more surprising is that white jazz musicians almost never did. This is a problem that goes far beyond modernism in jazz.

I believe that the notion of jazz degenerating over time, of which Larkin was convinced, has been proven historically false: Despite its radical origins, good jazz, traditional or modern, elevates the soul, enhances the lives of its fans, and its artistically successful practitioners are necessarily intelligent and sensitive. Though jazz fans have indeed become too accepting of mediocrity and outright hucksters, one finds among them a fairly consistent high level of sophistication and discernment — with or without musical training.

Larkin’s fears, grounded though they were in broader issues of real import, were largely unfounded. Reading his opinions on jazz will, however, always be immensely pleasurable. His honesty and willingness to address issues that almost no one will touch today makes his jazz writing a must-read for jazz fans of the Right, who will doubtless seek out mentioned recordings, listen with fresh ears, and thoroughly enjoy the humanity of jazz — just as Larkin, fundamentally, would have wanted.

* * *

Like all journals of dissident ideas, Counter-Currents depends on the support of readers like you. Help us compete with the censors of the Left and the violent accelerationists of the Right with a donation today. (The easiest way to help is with an e-check donation. All you need is your checkbook.)

GreenPay™ by Green Payment

Donation Amount

For other ways to donate, click here.

Notes

[1] Philip Larkin, “‘I’m Coming! Beware of Me!’” in All What Jazz: A Record Diary (New York: Farrar Strauss Giroux, 1985), 198.

[2] To hear specific examples of what he loved, I highly recommend the compact disc boxed set entitled Larkin’s Jazz, Proper Records, 2010.

[3] Philip Larkin, All What Jazz, 27.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Philip Larkin, “The Art of Jazz,” in Larkin’s Jazz: Essays and Reviews 1940-84, Richard Palmer & John White, eds. (New York: Continuum, 2001), 170.

[6] Philip Larkin, “Should Jazz Be an Art?” in Larkin’s Jazz, 55.

[7] Philip Larkin, “Jazz as a Way of Life” in All What Jazz, 69.

[8] Philip Larkin, All What Jazz, 24.

[9] Philip Larkin, “The Colour of Their Music” in All What Jazz, 251.

[10] Philip Larkin,”Blues Bash” in Required Writing: Miscellaneous Pieces 1955-1982 (New York: Farrar Strauss Giroux, 1984), 303.

[11] Philip Larkin, “The Funny Hat Men” in All What Jazz, 179.

[12] Philip Larkin, “Looking Back at Coltrane” in All What Jazz, 187.

[13] Ibid.

[14] Frank Allen, “The Other JQ: The Jazz Question,” Counter-Currents, August 18, 2018.

Related

  • Three Episodes from the History of Racial Politics

  • Counter-Currents Radio Podcast No. 534 Interview with Alexander Adams

  • Remembering Oswald Spengler (May 29, 1880-May 8, 1936)

  • Remembering Louis-Ferdinand Céline (May 27, 1894–July 1, 1961)

  • George Floyd and the “Color” of Revolution

  • Remembering Richard Wagner (May 22, 1813-February 13, 1883)

  • Remembering Dominique Venner (April 16, 1935–May 21, 2013)

  • Remembering Julius Evola (May 19, 1898–June 11, 1974)

Tags

anti-white discriminationBlack NationalismbluescommemorationsDixielandFrank Allenjazzjazz criticismmodernismmusic criticismPhilip Larkinrace consciousness

Previous

« Hunter S. Thompson:
The Father of Fake News, Part 7

Next

» The Selfie Poet

9 comments

  1. James J. O'Meara says:
    August 9, 2022 at 10:29 am

    “Larkin often mistakes taste for philosophy” pretty much says it all, but I’d like, if I may, expand on that a bit. I think you mean that Larkin thinks people with different tastes from his are primarily motivated by some theory, which he feels the need to combat. I would like to add that in another way Larkin does this himself: he mistakes his personal taste – formed at Oxford in a combination of youthful rebellion and student camaraderie – for some existential grasp of “jazz” which needs no philosophical elaboration or defense. In this, he takes his place in the all-too British tradition of contempt for “big ideas” and the people who traffic in them, who are obviously “charlatans” and “pseuds.”

    Of course, they can’t actually defend such a position, since that would ipso facto involve “doing philosophy” themselves – philosophers like Locke or Hume went only so far as to defend “experience” from those phony French and German theorizers, and the Austrian Wittgenstein was hailed as a “genius” for claiming that “philosophy leaves everything as it is” and that all supposed problems are merely mistakes in grammar – but they are content to simply ignore or mock those who do.

    And that in itself is a comfy position: no need to defend one’s ideas, consider others, or even think at all. This is even linked to Larkin’s jazz: as his buddy and fellow enthusiast Kingsley Amis said, “no white man can play jazz without a feeling of shame.” And that was the attraction: abandoning intellect and civilization for a warm bath of primitive emotion. Youthful rebellion, but also comfy.

    Colin Wilson, in The Angry Years, diagnosed this characteristic of Kingsley Amis and the other  Angry Young Men of the 50s; journalists lumped him in with them, but they despised each other for exactly this reason, their contempt for “big ideas” that Wilson was retailing: Amis said he wanted to throw Wilson off a roof.  Wilson observes how this postwar generation felt oppressed by the lingering class system of Oxbridge, and reacted by simply becoming “more authentic” by despising all “big ideas” as cant, claptrap, sophistry, etc. Anything you were “supposed” to like, as a mark of “culture” or “sophistication” – such as “filthy Mozart“ (Amis)—was class pretention. And by mocking it, or turning up your Dixieland records, you could piss off your elders! Wilson goes on to point out how this position hardened into a fixed, philistine caricature – the “reactionary” old man – and left them unable, as writers, to develop or respond to new art forms or social conditions.

    One imagines Amis and Larkin – fat, old, drunk, physical wrecks (no fad “diets” or “healthy” nonsense for them!) – sitting in a pub – always the same, one “good” one – drinking “good English ale” and eating crisps – no “filthy foreign muck” (Amis on pasta) for them — alternately mocking or loudly complaining about some new artistic “fraud” like that rock and roll noise.

    Standing off to the side (he hates them for being agnostics) is G. K. Chesterton, also drinking good English ale, but  spewing cheese crumbs from his walrus moustache as he shouts  that he’ll “stand no nonsense” regarding this dreadful American jazz. For these are, indeed, the worst kind of English “conservatives”: those for whom, as Michael Oakeshott said, “change means in the first place, loss.” Or Evelyn Waugh, who complained that the Conservative Party had failed to turn the clock back one minute. A good line, but is turning the clock back to your youth – “the same shit all over again,” as Marx said — the solution or just indulging your nostalgia?

    The problem is that diagnosing what went wrong with society and proposing a solution involves… thinking! Next thing you know, you’ll be reading Foucault, kid.

    But the point is that Larkin regarded any music other than that of his youth to be part of some kind of plot to “fool” you by using some fancy verbiage to sell you crap. His advice to question any kind of art that needed study and theory to “understand” and “appreciate” before it could be actually enjoyed is well taken, and I have adopted that myself. But he mistook nostalgia for “trust experience” – how good jazz feels – and the education of taste for postmodern (or modernist) sophistry.

    1. Edmund says:
      August 9, 2022 at 11:56 am

      Thanks for the thorough comment.

      It’s strange how people who hate old things defend the formerly “new” things they cherish once they get old.

      “Now, in my time, we listened to REAL music!” they’ll say, cranking “Girls, Girls, Girls” by Motley Crüe.

    2. Margot Metroland says:
      August 10, 2022 at 10:15 am

      Well that was quite involved, and along with the fine Frank Allen essay above, your comment clarifies a few things for me. First, why otherwise respectable people seem to have a fetish for jazz, categorizing and rating it the way some people will drone on about James Bond movies or sportsball players. So it’s really just the music they like, and that means a lot of old popular music and certainly not all jazz. Second, Larkin’s own personal preferences. Because although I have some of his reviews and criticism at my fingertips, I’ve never cared or wanted to read the jazz bits. Now perhaps I shall. I always sensed too much pretension and hidden agenda in discussion of jazz. Either someone’s pushing some tiresome quibble (that jazz is really negro music, that swing or Rhapsody in Blue or Stan Kenton were not true jazz); or it seems that jazz is something people, mainly old guys, feign a liking for, because they think they’re supposed to like some music, and they’re afraid of classical or (God forbid) opera or any longhair sissy stuff; and so they tell you they like jazz. Larkin apparently was quite adamant about what he liked, so that should be fun to explore.

  2. Hamburger Today says:
    August 10, 2022 at 7:55 am

    A new essay by Frank Allen is always a treat. The Other JQ opened up a whole world of White historical erasure that I’d never thought about. If only there were some good, high-quality compilations of Dixieland on the market.

    1. James J. O'Meara says:
      August 10, 2022 at 9:27 am

      “Poet, novelist, critic and librarian Philip Larkin (1922-1985), was a life-long jazz lover. This anthology of his favourite records includes not only the “classic jazz” performances of such luminaries as Louis Armstrong, Bessie Smith, Billie Holiday, Eddie Condon, Benny Goodman, Duke Ellington andCount Basie, but also Larkin’s “private” preferences for Earl Bostic, Coleman Hawkins, Dave Brubeck, Jimmy Witherspoon and Ben Webster. Released to tie in with Larkin25 a commemoration of the life and work of Philip Larkin, marking the 25th anniversary of his death”

      https://www.amazon.com/Larkins-Jazz-VARIOUS-ARTISTS/dp/B003LZ38IW/ref=sr_1_5?crid=19RETPOWS50HS&keywords=larkin%27s+jazz&qid=1660148767&sprefix=larkin%27s+jaz%2Caps%2C196&sr=8-5

      1. Hamburger Today says:
        August 10, 2022 at 9:32 am

        Thank you. That was very thoughtful.

  3. James J. O'Meara says:
    August 10, 2022 at 4:31 pm

    “A serious commitment to philosophical modernism by jazz fans and musicians would see Peter Brötzmann selling as many records as Miles Davis, and Evan Parker playing to larger crowds than Scott Hamilton. But this does not happen.”

    I had to look up everyone but Davis, which kind of makes your point. I am reminded of a comment by Robert Palmer (the late music critic, not the late pop star) in his essay accompanying the Ornette Coleman box set. Why, he asks, do European “avantgarde” musicians sound so boring, unlike Coleman. The answer, he suggests, is perhaps less racial or “intellectual” than professional: Coleman, like (Charlie) Parker, was a product of the Kansas City big band scene (altho both were repeatedly fired or mocked for their weird solos). Unlike their European imitators, no matter how “far out” they got, they knew how to “swing.”  The puzzle is why Larkin was unable to perceive that.

    BTW, this other Parker chap seems to be one of us, and on his way to being deplatformed: https://www.thewire.co.uk/in-writing/essays/follow-the-science-evan-parker-s-views-on-pandemic-and-brexit

     

  4. LineInTheSand says:
    August 10, 2022 at 11:30 pm

    I recall reading that Russell Kirk was a critic of jazz as well.  Forgive me for not pursuing the question on my own, but can anyone compare/contrast Kirk and Larkin’s thoughts on jazz?  Were they aware of eachother?

    In other Larkin news, John Derbyshire eulogized him on his podcast last Friday.  Surprisingly, John did not mention Larkin’s “How to Win the Next Election” poem.

  5. Bear says:
    August 28, 2022 at 3:41 pm

    Russ Garcia Wigville LP “lonely one”  and other similar modernist jazz I still like .
    In my many years of listening to Jazz I have found a racial component to it . According to Miles Davis , he could tell if a piece was played by a Black Musician and Duke Ellington on trip to Sweden told the press that what the Swedes played was Swedish Jazz .
    Every time there has been racial conflicts tastes change- sometimes return- or attitudes about them [JAZZ] alter. By nature we are tribal.

Comments are closed.

If you have Paywall access,
simply login first to see your comment auto-approved.

Note on comments privacy & moderation

Your email is never published nor shared.

Comments are moderated. If you don't see your comment, please be patient. If approved, it will appear here soon. Do not post your comment a second time.

  • Recent posts

    • TODAY: The Great Debate Greg Johnson & Gregory Hood on Ethnonationalism vs. Imperialism  

      Cyan Quinn

    • Bonfire of the Tranities

      Spencer J. Quinn

    • The Left’s Ghost Dancers

      Morris van de Camp

      1

    • The Gentleman Rogue: George MacDonald Fraser’s Flashman

      Mark Gullick

      1

    • Western Civilization Is Destroying Its Historical Heritage, Part III

      Ricardo Duchesne

    • When Life Imitates Rap

      Jim Goad

      22

    • Western Civilization Is Destroying Its Historical Heritage, Part II

      Ricardo Duchesne

      1

    • The Storm

      Gunnar Alfredsson

      2

    • Rolf Peter Sieferle a skandál kolem jeho osoby

      F. Roger Devlin

    • Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      F. Roger Devlin

      27

    • Western Civilization Is Destroying Its Historical Heritage, Part I

      Ricardo Duchesne

      7

    • Plato’s Phaedo, Part II

      Greg Johnson

    • Úryvky z Finis Germania Rolfa Petera Sieferleho, část 4

      Rolf Peter Sieferle

    • The Fall of the House of Biden

      Stephen Paul Foster

      9

    • Meet the Hunburgers

      James J. O'Meara

    • What a Nation is Not

      Asier Abadroa

      14

    • Plato’s Phaedo, Part I

      Greg Johnson

    • The Worst Week Yet: May 28-June 3, 2023

      Jim Goad

      29

    • We Need to Stop Taking Black Complaints Seriously

      Spencer J. Quinn

      17

    • Sexual Utopia in Stockholm

      F. Roger Devlin

      6

    • Serpent’s Walk

      Steven Clark

      5

    • June Is the Gayest Month

      Jim Goad

      1

    • Three Episodes from the History of Racial Politics

      Richard Knight

      4

    • Alice’s Police Escort in Wonderland

      Gunnar Alfredsson

      8

    • Prioritizing Prestige Over Accomplishment: Britain from 1950 to 1956

      Morris van de Camp

      4

    • Nueva Derecha vs. Vieja Derecha Capítulo 2: Hegemonía

      Greg Johnson

    • The Great Debate

      Cyan Quinn

      13

    • Will Woke Capital Soon Go the Way of the Dinosaur?

      Beau Albrecht

      34

    • June Is the Gayest Month

      Jim Goad

      24

    • Counter-Currents Radio Podcast No. 535 Ask Me Anything

      Counter-Currents Radio

      1

    • Úryvky z Finis Germania Rolfa Petera Sieferleho, část 3: Nové státní náboženství

      Rolf Peter Sieferle

    • Football’s Race War

      Pox Populi

      9

    • VDARE Facing Mortal Threat

      Peter Brimelow

      6

    • Collin Cleary Interviewed on Richard Wagner

      Collin Cleary

      1

    • Counter-Currents Radio Podcast No. 534 Interview with Alexander Adams

      Counter-Currents Radio

      1

    • The Union Jackal, May 2023

      Mark Gullick

      17

    • Biden and Bibi

      James J. O'Meara

      12

    • Forward with a Vengeance

      Tom Zaja

      3

    • Notes on Strauss & Husserl

      Greg Johnson

      1

    • The Worst Week Yet: May 21-27, 2023

      Jim Goad

      27

    • The Honorable Cause: A Review

      Spencer J. Quinn

      8

    • George Friedman’s The Next 100 Years

      Thomas Steuben

      4

    • Remembering Oswald Spengler (May 29, 1880-May 8, 1936)

      Greg Johnson

      2

    • Euthanizing the Homeless? It’s a Start

      Jim Goad

      10

    • Remembering Louis-Ferdinand Céline (May 27, 1894–July 1, 1961)

      Greg Johnson

      12

    • Blood, Soil, Paint

      Greg Johnson

      1

    • Céline’s Guerre

      Margot Metroland

      7

    • The Trial of Socrates

      Greg Johnson

    • Fields of Asphodel

      Tito Perdue

    • George Floyd and the “Color” of Revolution

      Stephen Paul Foster

      11

  • Classics Corner

    • Hegemony

      Greg Johnson

      11

    • Cù Chulainn in the GPO:
      The Mythic Imagination of Patrick Pearse

      Michael O'Meara

      5

    • Remembering Dominique Venner
      (April 16, 1935 – May 21, 2013)

      Greg Johnson

      11

    • A Robertson Roundup: 
      Remembering Wilmot Robertson
      (April 16, 1915 – July 8, 2005)

      Margot Metroland

      13

    • Metapolitics and Occult Warfare

      Greg Johnson

      2

    • Remembering Maurice Bardèche:
      October 1, 1907–July 30, 1998

      Greg Johnson

      2

    • The Power of Myth:
      Remembering Joseph Campbell
      (March 26, 1904–October 30, 1987)

      John Morgan

      11

    • The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

      Trevor Lynch

      24

    • The Searchers

      Trevor Lynch

      29

    • Gabriele D’Annunzio

      Jonathan Bowden

      2

    • Remembering A. R. D. “Rex” Fairburn (February 2, 1904–March 25, 1957)

      Greg Johnson

      1

    • Denis Kearney & the Struggle for a White America

      Theodore J. O'Keefe

      1

    • Posthuman Prospects:
      Artificial Intelligence, Fifth Generation Warfare, & Archeofuturism

      Christopher Pankhurst

      5

    • Earnest Sevier Cox:
      Advocate for the White Ethnostate

      Morris van de Camp

      15

    • Remembering Jack London
      (January 12, 1876–November 22, 1916)

      Greg Johnson

      2

    • Remembering Robinson Jeffers:
      January 10, 1887–January 20, 1962

      John Morgan

      3

    • Remembering Pierre Drieu La Rochelle:
      January 3, 1893–March 15, 1945

      Greg Johnson

    • Remembering Rudyard Kipling (December 30, 1865-January 18, 1936)

      Greg Johnson

      10

    • Restoring White Homelands

      Greg Johnson

      34

    • Remembering Hinton Rowan Helper

      Spencer J. Quinn

      11

    • What’s Wrong with Diversity?

      Greg Johnson

      10

    • Redefining the Mainstream

      Greg Johnson

      3

    • Edward Alsworth Ross:
      American Metapolitical Hero

      Morris van de Camp

      8

    • The Talented Mr. Ripley & Purple Noon

      Trevor Lynch

      19

    • Christmas & the Yuletide:
      Light in the Darkness

      William de Vere

      3

    • Thanksgiving Special 
      White Men Meet Indians:
      Jamestown & the Clash of Civilizations

      Thomas Jackson

    • Colin Wilson’s The Outsider

      Sir Oswald Mosley

      4

    • Dostoyevsky on the Jews

      William Pierce

      4

    • Jefferson &/or Mussolini, Part 1

      Ezra Pound

      5

    • I Listened to Chapo Trap House So You Don’t Have To

      Doug Huntington

      98

  • Paroled from the Paywall

    • Info-Parody: A Strategy for Reaching Normies, Part 2

      D. H. Corax

      7

    • Info-Parody: A Strategy for Reaching Normies, Part 1

      D. H. Corax

      2

    • (500) Days of Summer

      Anthony Bavaria

      3

    • Grosse Freiheit Nummer 7: The Best German Film on World War II?

      Steven Clark

      5

    • An Actor Prepares: Politics as Theater

      Mark Gullick

      6

    • Counter-Currents Radio Podcast No. 533 Ask Me Anything

      Counter-Currents Radio

      2

    • Politicizing Luz Long, Part II

      Clarissa Schnabel

      2

    • Politicizing Luz Long, Part I

      Clarissa Schnabel

      3

    • Breaking Beat: Reflections on The Rebel Set, a Masterpiece That Never Was

      James J. O'Meara

      1

    • If Hillary Had Won

      Stephen Paul Foster

      1

    • Nice Racism, Part 3

      Beau Albrecht

      1

    • Nice Racism, Part 2

      Beau Albrecht

      7

    • Nice Racism, Part 1

      Beau Albrecht

      6

    • Aristophanes’ Clouds, Part II

      Greg Johnson

      1

    • Aristophanes’ Clouds, Part I

      Greg Johnson

      1

    • Counter-Currents Radio Podcast No. 530 The Genealogy of Wokeism

      Counter-Currents Radio

      5

    • Patrick Bateman: “Literally Me” or a Warning?

      Anthony Bavaria

      9

    • British Sculpture, Part II

      Jonathan Bowden

      1

    • British Sculpture, Part I

      Jonathan Bowden

      2

    • The New Story

      Jocelynn Cordes

      21

    • Why Does Cthulhu Always Swim Left? Part 2

      Beau Albrecht

      1

    • Why Does Cthulhu Always Swim Left? Part 1

      Beau Albrecht

      11

    • Robert Rutherford McCormick, Midwestern Man of the Right: Part 2

      Morris van de Camp

      1

    • Pierre Teilhard de Chardin: Prophet of Eugenics and Race-Realism

      Margot Metroland

      11

    • In Defense of the White Union

      Asier Abadroa

    • Everything Everywhere All at Once: The Oscar Winner the System Loves

      Steven Clark

      32

    • Incels on Wheels: Jim Goad’s Trucker Fags in Denial

      Beau Albrecht

      17

    • The White Pill

      Margot Metroland

      10

    • Counter-Currents Radio Podcast No. 528 Karl Thorburn on the Bank Crashes

      Counter-Currents Radio

    • Women Philosophers

      Richard Knight

      23

  • Recent comments

    • Antipodean

      The Gentleman Rogue: George MacDonald Fraser’s Flashman

      I fear that my skin has grown too thin but  twelve volumes of prurience and cowardice from an anti-...

    • ArminiusMaximus

      The Storm

      Beautiful!

    • Domitian

      The Left’s Ghost Dancers

      Good article. However, you may wish to the fix the date of Dylan's endorsement - that was in March...

    • The Antichomsky

      When Life Imitates Rap

      A very brave ***tuber by the name of Charlie Bo 313 travels to the most violent ghettos and...

    • Antipodean

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      It’s no accident that rulers impose a religion on their subjects. We have been getting the anti-...

    • Antipodean

      When Life Imitates Rap

      Well we don’t want it getting any worse, so let’s be careful what we wish for. Pop music in general...

    • Hamburger Today

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      The solution isn’t ‘patriarchy’. The solution is White Identity Nationalism. ‘Patriarchy’ vs ‘...

    • Ewigkeit

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      You're talking about a potentially distant future in which we've already won. There is no successful...

    • Jonathan Portes

      When Life Imitates Rap

      Have you noticed that *every single* 'rap video' is *exactly the same*? - The same stereotyped...

    • Hamburger Today

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      ‘You paint with too broad a brush.’Not really. 99.9999% of all Christians are ‘anti-racist’ which,...

    • Freddy Longfellow

      When Life Imitates Rap

      Just imagine the horrible long-term consequences of the structural oppression and discrimination of...

    • Asier Abadroa

      What a Nation is Not

      It is a tremendous honor that you would consider donating to Counter-Currents for something I have...

    • Asier Abadroa

      What a Nation is Not

      His point might be interesting, but it is totally wrong. Birth rates are declining EVERYWHERE in the...

    • Dr ExCathedra

      We Need to Stop Taking Black Complaints Seriously

      Whites need to be encouraged to use reciprocity as the benchmark for our responses to other races....

    • Hamburger Today

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      In jew-language, ‘Jesus’ is the same as ‘Joshua’ or ‘Yeshua’‘Yeshua isn’t a name, either. It’s more...

    • Bold Inq.

      When Life Imitates Rap

      "A scene a couple of years ago, almost transcendental in its cinematic load. I'm at a restaurant...

    • Hamburger Today

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      The sanction of race-mixing for Whites cannot be found in the Bible because the Bible isn't about...

    • Ewigkeit

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      You paint with too broad a brush. There are many Christians in this movement and you are primarily...

    • John

      We Need to Stop Taking Black Complaints Seriously

      “I would say the best way to reduce interactions with blacks is to avoid certain public places…”....

    • Michael

      Anti-Racism Comes for the Church: The Case of Thomas Achord

      Some historians believe that the people of Galilee were of the Gallic nation and had converted to...

  • Book Authors

    • Beau Albrecht
    • Alain de Benoist
    • Kerry Bolton
    • Jonathan Bowden
    • Collin Cleary
    • Jef Costello
    • Savitri Devi
    • F. Roger Devlin
    • Buttercup Dew
    • Julius Evola
    • Jim Goad
    • Gregory Hood
    • Juleigh Howard-Hobson
    • Greg Johnson
    • Charles Krafft
    • Anthony M. Ludovici
    • Trevor Lynch
    • H. L. Mencken
    • J. A. Nicholl
    • James J. O’Meara
    • Christopher Pankhurst
    • Tito Perdue
    • Michael Polignano
    • Spencer J. Quinn
    • Fenek Solère
    • Irmin Vinson
    • Leo Yankevich
    • Francis Parker Yockey
    • Multiple authors
  • Webzine Authors

    Editor-in-Chief

    • Greg Johnson, Ph.D.

    Featured Writers

    • Beau Albrecht
    • Morris V. de Camp
    • Stephen Paul Foster, Ph.D.
    • Jim Goad
    • Alex Graham
    • Mark Gullick, Ph.D.
    • Greg Johnson, Ph.D.
    • Spencer J. Quinn

    Frequent Writers

    • Aquilonius
    • Anthony Bavaria
    • Alain de Benoist
    • Kerry Bolton, Ph.D.
    • Collin Cleary, Ph.D.
    • Jef Costello
    • F. Roger Devlin, Ph.D.
    • Richard Houck
    • Ondrej Mann
    • Margot Metroland
    • John Morgan
    • Trevor Lynch
    • James J. O’Meara
    • Kathryn S.
    • Thomas Steuben
    • Michael Walker

    Classic Authors

    • Maurice Bardèche
    • Jonathan Bowden
    • Julius Evola
    • Guillaume Faye
    • Ernst Jünger
    • Kevin MacDonald, Ph.D.
    • D. H. Lawrence
    • Charles Lindbergh
    • Jack London
    • H. P. Lovecraft
    • Anthony M. Ludovici
    • Sir Oswald Mosley
    • National Vanguard
    • Friedrich Nietzsche
    • Revilo Oliver
    • William Pierce
    • Ezra Pound
    • Saint-Loup
    • Savitri Devi
    • Carl Schmitt
    • Miguel Serrano
    • Oswald Spengler
    • P. R. Stephensen
    • Jean Thiriart
    • John Tyndall
    • Dominique Venner
    • Leo Yankevich
    • Francis Parker Yockey

    Other Authors

    • Howe Abbott-Hiss
    • Michael Bell
    • Buttercup Dew
    • Giles Corey
    • Bain Dewitt
    • Jack Donovan
    • Richardo Duchesne, Ph.D.
    • Emile Durand
    • Guillaume Durocher
    • Mark Dyal
    • Fullmoon Ancestry
    • Tom Goodroch
    • Andrew Hamilton
    • Robert Hampton
    • Huntley Haverstock
    • Derek Hawthorne
    • Gregory Hood
    • Juleigh Howard-Hobson
    • Alexander Jacob
    • Nicholas Jeelvy
    • Ruuben Kaalep
    • Tobias Langdon
    • Julian Langness
    • Travis LeBlanc
    • Patrick Le Brun
    • G A Malvicini
    • John Michael McCloughlin
    • Millennial Woes
    • Michael O’Meara
    • Christopher Pankhurst
    • Michael Polignano
    • J. J. Przybylski
    • Quintilian
    • Edouard Rix
    • C. B. Robertson
    • C. F. Robinson
    • Herve Ryssen
    • Alan Smithee
    • Fenek Solere
    • Ann Sterzinger
    • Robert Steuckers
    • Tomislav Sunic
    • Donald Thoresen
    • Marian Van Court
    • Irmin Vinson
    • Aylmer Wedgwood
    • Scott Weisswald
  • Departments

    • Book Reviews
    • Movie Reviews
    • TV Reviews
    • Music Reviews
    • Art Criticism
    • Graphic Novels & Comics
    • Video Game Reviews
    • Fiction
    • Poems
    • Interviews
    • Videos
    • English Translations
    • Other Languages
      • Arabic
      • Bulgarian
      • Croatian
      • Czech
      • Danish
      • Dutch
      • Estonian
      • Finnish
      • French
      • German
      • Greek
      • Hungarian
      • Italian
      • Lithuanian
      • Norwegian
      • Polish
      • Portuguese
      • Romanian
      • Russian
      • Slovak
      • Spanish
      • Swedish
      • Ukrainian
    • Commemorations
    • Why We Write
  • Archives
  • Top 100 Commenters
Sponsored Links
Above Time Coffee Antelope Hill Publishing Identaria Paul Waggener IHR-Store Asatru Folk Assembly No College Club American Renaissance The Patrick Ryan Show Jim Goad The Occidental Observer
Donate Now Mailing list
Books for sale
  • The Trial of Socrates
  • Fields of Asphodel
  • El Manifiesto Nacionalista Blanco
  • An Artist of the Right
  • Ernst Jünger
  • Reuben
  • The Partisan
  • Trevor Lynch’s Classics of Right-Wing Cinema
  • The Enemy of Europe
  • Imperium
  • Reactionary Modernism
  • Manifesto del Nazionalismo Bianco
  • O Manifesto Nacionalista Branco
  • Vade Mecum
  • Whiteness: The Original Sin
  • Space Vixen Trek Episode 17: Tomorrow the Stars
  • The Year America Died
  • Passing the Buck
  • Mysticism After Modernism
  • Gold in the Furnace
  • Defiance
  • Forever & Ever
  • Wagner’s Ring & the Germanic Tradition
  • Resistance
  • Materials for All Future Historians
  • Love Song of the Australopiths
  • White Identity Politics
  • Here’s the Thing
  • Trevor Lynch: Part Four of the Trilogy
  • Graduate School with Heidegger
  • It’s Okay to Be White
  • The World in Flames
  • The White Nationalist Manifesto
  • From Plato to Postmodernism
  • The Gizmo
  • Return of the Son of Trevor Lynch’s CENSORED Guide to the Movies
  • Toward a New Nationalism
  • The Smut Book
  • The Alternative Right
  • My Nationalist Pony
  • Dark Right: Batman Viewed From the Right
  • The Philatelist
  • Confessions of an Anti-Feminist
  • East and West
  • Though We Be Dead, Yet Our Day Will Come
  • White Like You
  • Numinous Machines
  • Venus and Her Thugs
  • Cynosura
  • North American New Right, vol. 2
  • You Asked For It
  • More Artists of the Right
  • Extremists: Studies in Metapolitics
  • The Homo & the Negro
  • Rising
  • The Importance of James Bond
  • In Defense of Prejudice
  • Confessions of a Reluctant Hater (2nd ed.)
  • The Hypocrisies of Heaven
  • Waking Up from the American Dream
  • Green Nazis in Space!
  • Truth, Justice, and a Nice White Country
  • Heidegger in Chicago
  • End of an Era: Mad Men & the Ordeal of Civility
  • Sexual Utopia in Power
  • What is a Rune? & Other Essays
  • Son of Trevor Lynch’s White Nationalist Guide to the Movies
  • The Lightning & the Sun
  • The Eldritch Evola
  • Western Civilization Bites Back
  • New Right vs. Old Right
  • Journey Late at Night: Poems and Translations
  • The Non-Hindu Indians & Indian Unity
  • I do not belong to the Baader-Meinhof Group
  • Pulp Fascism
  • The Lost Philosopher
  • Trevor Lynch’s A White Nationalist Guide to the Movies
  • And Time Rolls On
  • Artists of the Right: Resisting Decadence
  • North American New Right, Vol. 1
  • Some Thoughts on Hitler
  • Tikkun Olam and Other Poems
  • Summoning the Gods
  • Taking Our Own Side
  • Reuben
  • The Node
  • The New Austerities
  • Morning Crafts
  • The Passing of a Profit & Other Forgotten Stories
Copyright © 2023 Counter-Currents Publishing, Ltd.

Paywall Access





Please enter your email address. You will receive mail with link to set new password.

Edit your comment