National Post from Toronto, Ontario, Canada • 25

i 1 5. i 1 1 1 1 I 1-5 it 55 NATIONAL POST, THURSDAY, JUNE 10, 1999 Renowned jazz pianist Oscar Peterson will be honoured with a prestigious lifetime achievement award from the Japan Art Association. The recipients of the Praemium Imperiale world art award were announced yesterday at a ceremony in New York attended by Japan's Prince and Princess Hitachi. Peterson won in the music category, while PETERSON HONOURED ry. The Montreal-born Peterson is "a giant of jazz," the association said.

At 74, despite having suffered a stroke, he continues to record and perform. Praemium Imperiale recipients will each be presented with a medal and an honorarium of 15 million yen (about $190,000 at an awards ceremony in Tokyo this October. The Canadian Press Anselm Kiefer of Germany won for painting, American Louise Bourgeois won for sculpture, Fumihiko Maid of Japan won for architecture and Pina Bausch of Germany took the prize in the theatrefilm catego Magazine loses its citation en route Pop stars are acting like porn stars so why shouldn't porn stars make pop music? She sings, too repeatedly lingering over the says AOV president Randy Jorgensen. "Now it's a bright, friendly environment on a main street and couples make up most of our clientele. The reaction from customers was that someone has finally given them a respectable place to shop." That and the advent of video machines has meant people can watch porn in the comfort of their own homes.

A recent story in Adult Video News reported that adult titles account for 25 of home video sales and rentals. That figure might be a bit high, said Jorgensen, but he added that adult titles are definitely the best return on investment some p. II nih iff 'lilm IK r'X', At Zr trjfc. I A' And what planet is the former Spice Girl on? Dan Brown Arts Notebook By denying EnRoute an honourable mention in the best magazine category this year, the organizers of the National Magazine Awards took a stand to keep the realms of journalism and marketing separate. Well, sort of.

The three-member panel in charge of picking the year's finest periodical felt Air Canada's glossy in-flight magazine deserved a special citation for its redesign and handling of both English-and French-language articles. After considering the matter with the three judges, the NMA board disqualified EnRoute because of its corporate origins. The thinking was that it isn't a "pure" magazine. EnRoute was, however, eligible for other prizes. (It won a silver medal in the art-direction category).

The greater irony was that the same jury picked Vancouver's Adbusters, known for its ad parodies and hippy-lite politics, as the best magazine. That's abroad-minded jury. GERI, GERI, GERI Fans of Spice Girls present and past will be glued to their TV sets on Monday for the debut of Geri. The "candid home video diary" (i.e. documentary), which airs on MuchMusic, details the post-Spice Girls exploits of Geri Halli-well.

What's the former Ginger Spice been up to? Mostly just complaining about her unhappy life WHAT DOES A WOMAN WORTH MILLIONS OF POUNDS HAVE TO GROUSE ABOUT? while riding around in taxis. What does a woman reportedly worth millions of pounds have to grouse about? As the French would say, c'est un bon question. Geri begins with the singer arguing with director Molly Di-neen over who has control of the film's final cut. Halliwell presumably prevailed, but alert viewers will notice the camera Halliwell: Keeping mum 5 real people around the ex- Spice (construction workers, movers, Was Dineen wily enough to include these down to-Earth moments as a subtle criticism of Halliwell, who seems to have taken up perma nent residence on the Planet of Vaguely Dissatisfied Celebrities? As the French would say, you be the judge. Viewers shouldn't expect reve- lations about Halliwell's former life, though.

Apart from saying she just absolutely had to leave the band, she's mum on Baby, Scary, et which means one of two things: Geri is either bound by a confidentiality agreement or a tell-all book is in the offing. WRITING 101 If Halliwell needs help writing a book, she may want to attend one of the creative-writing semi nars on offer this summer from Canada's institutes of higher learning. The University of Toronto, to name just one of those institutes, charges neophyte scribblers $400 for a four-day course taught by the likes of Barry Callaghan, Austin Clarke and Stephanie Bol ster. "Improve your craft," read the advertisements for the workshop. "Learn from outstanding professionals.

Network with writ ers and publishers! "I think it can't be taught in the way that you could teach someone math or grammar or something like that," Bolster says of the age-old debate concerning whether creative writing can indeed be taught. As if to acquaint potential attendees with the uses of irony, the ads also include some creative writing of their own: "This four-day intensive writing workshop offers the opportunity to study with well-established authors, author readings, professional information talks, a writer-in-residence and a barbecue." Learn faulty parallelism! HUH? It may have been an alumnus of the of T's creative-writing workshop who penned the following press release, sent to the National Post in advance of a performance by Toronto-based experimental composer Udo Kasemets: "The theory of quantum mechanics revolves around the notion that particles exist in a state of multiple possibilities. The moments of audible music and spoken quotes in this piece are observations or measurements of this state of multiple possibilities and correspond with moments of real time. The arrangement of music and words in symmetrical formations combine to create a circular wholeness or totality as symbolized by a mandala." As the French used to say back in the 1970s: Say what? National Post PAUL HACKETT RUUTER8 about former colleagues. Bv Finbarr O'Reilly Nobody ever bought or rented a porno movie for the accompanying musical score.

But that hasn't stopped 13 porn stars from putting together a compilation album called Porn to Rock. Nor has it stopped British DJ and trip-hop innovator Howie from releasing a double CD tided Suck It and See, A Musical Tribute to Pornography (Pussyfoot). Howie who in the past has worked with and produced such artists as U2, Massive Attack, Soul II Soul, Bjork and Portishead, intends his new CD to be a sonic interpretation of the word "pornography." It features the slow, elastic beats of trip-hop mixed with cocktail-lounge funk from '70s skin flicks and the orgiastic sounds of indecent exchanges, Parisienne call-girls, couples swinging in suburbia, and even a bout of marital cybersex. By contrast, Porn to Rock (Calner Music Inc.) is a rough collection of hip-hop, swing, punk and rock tunes by some of the adult industry's biggest stars, some of whom are still groping to find their musical footing. But the quality of all this aural sex is not really the issue here.

Suck It and See is symbolic of the mainstream thrust into the world of pornography while Porn to Rock represents the steadily increasing acceptability of pornography within mainstream culture. Sex, of course, has always been a fundamental part of the rock formula. And as for porn well, the Sex Pistols delved into imagery and named themselves after the fetishistic fashion shop, Sex, run by their manager and his wife. And Sex was also the name of Madonna's 1992 book of soft-core pictures. Today, it's commonplace for CD covers to have a whiff of porn imagery about them, in the posturings of 17-year-old Britney Spears and her recent breast implants, 19-year-old hip-hop artist Foxy Brown, strutting around in barely-there outfits and fellow hip-hopper and thigh-revealer Lil' Kim, whose publicists once leaked rumours that she was going to do an adult film.

With the music industry so keen to embrace pornography, it shouldn't come as a surprise that porn artists are now looking to make a crossover of their own. "It's the right time," said Midori, a porn star who provides one of the better tracks on Porn to Rock and who is using her fame to advance her career in hip-hop music. "I knew it was going to happen because with music videos and the girls damn near naked, and the lyrics, and billboards, and ads and Calvin Klein everything was gearing towards sex. Those old stereotypes about the adult business have been chipped away. It's not so disgusting anymore." In fact, since the movie Boogie Nights, about a '70s porn star, came out last year, pornography has become more than just acceptable; it's hip.

"The whole market has been opened," said Midori, who has appeared in about 70 porn films and whose sister is '80s pop star Jody Whatley. "Society is a little more open now and people are more ready for what's going on with artists like Lil' Kim being so straightforward with her lyrical content. That's opened the door for someone like me." Midori is already working on an album for a label that boasts a number of rap stars. She also works as an activist for the Free Speech Coalition, which fights for the livelihood of adult entertainment, and turned down a role in the 1998 Spike Lee film He Got Game because she didn't want to play a hooker. Like Midori, fellow Porn to Rock artist Johnny Toxic blurs the line between mainstream and porn.

Aside from producing, directing and starring in about 30 of his own X-rated videos, Toxic has directed mainstream music videos, worked as an editor on major network shows such as Xena, Warrior Princess, and has even written for the animated NBC show Alvin and the Chipmunks. He also has a role in the film ED TV, where he plays a prisoner addicted to the film's title channel. With his band, Goldo, he toured with, and opened for, pop stars such as Fiona Apple and Sugar Ray. Goldo also has a song on the soundtrack for 4 7, A walk thing that's a reflection of the adult industry as a whole. While the number of people involved in adult enter tainment is relatively small, it generates anywhere between $6-buhon to a year, depending on who you talk to.

The enormous North Ameri can music industry by comparison, generates about according to the Canadian Recording Industry Association and Billboard magazine. There's another distinction between the music and porn industries said Dax Callner, the executive producer of Porn to Rock, who was not involved in the adult business before recruiting adult video stars for the album, available only over the Internet in Canada at www.porntorock.com. "It's certainly less scummy than the music industry. The people are more honest, they're friendlier, it's more of a family. Maybe it because they re all sleeping together, I don't know, but who's to say that in the mu- sic industry they're not all sleep- ing together, too?" 1 Callner began the project because he wanted to inject sexiness and danger back into a rock 'n' roll scene that he felt had become flaccid in re cent years.

"This is what popped up." But it's more than just a marketing ploy, he said. The artists on Porn to Rock have been trying to pursue music careers, he added, but they've had trouble because, for all the mainstream crossover, there's sometimes still a stigma attached to what they've done. "I'm alright with what I did, it was good money and it was fun," said Madison, another Porn to Rock artist who appeared in about 175 porn films during a three year stint in the adult industry during the early 1990s. "I was safe and I worked with a number of people and did only as I chose. Everyone treated me very well and I took it for what it was worth.

It wasn't a goal, career-minded thing, it was just what I needed to survive music has always been my desire. I'm sure there are people who for some reason can't cope with that, but just because I got paid for doing something you do for free? I mean, really, how many past jobs have you had?" Midori, whose father was a preacher, explained over the phone that porn actresses on contract can make from $50,000 to $120,000 (US) a year. They can earn another $5,000 to $10,000 a week, plus hefty tips, working in strip clubs. "I got into the adult business for several reasons," said Midori, who doesn't enjoy watching porn herself. "One of them was to create some controversy.

It also appealed to me because there was a lack of African-American women who were major porn stars and I thought I could take my music, my dancing and everything and be an overall entertainer. I've always done music and that was something that I never gave up on, but this was a big gamble. Luckily, it worked." Breaking it to her family, however, wasn't so easy. Midori took her mother to awards galas to show her that the porn industry also holds formal events where people dress up in black ties and fancy dresses. "It was a gradual process, but the more money I made, the more my family said, 'Oh! It's a real "As for me," added Midori, who said she remains monogamous outside her work, "I can cut myself off emotionally when I'm working, but when I'm at home I need that.

It's made my personal relationships more intense because I look for more than the physical aspect of sex." Eventually, shell have to explain to her six-year-old daughter who Midori was, but, she claims, "I'm proud of the choices I've made." National Post iMwl Pili I i i i Immm 'i" Midori: "I thought I could take my music, my dancing and everything and be an overall cntcrtaintaincr Luckily, it worked" Go, the current film starring Canadian actress Sarah Polley. "I'm just going where the day takes me," said Toxic over the phone from Los Angeles. "I'm getting offers and options on both the mainstream and porn fronts all the time. I'm one of the first people wholl be consistently breaking through that line." That line has been pushed back on the retail front in Canada by companies such as Adult Only Video (AOV) that opened its first store in Saskatoon in 1987. It has since evolved into a national, 56-store chain.

"What we've done is take these stores away from the side streets and 'back streets where it was slimy and sleazy and where people felt they weren't wanted,".