Pretentiousness is something into which you have to throw yourself. Give into entirely. Not pretentiousness as in the arch cynical theatrics of someone who has simply studied how the eccentric behave, but true commitment to an ostentatious display of self-belief.

And at Sufjan Stevens’ gig, we were treated to a soundtrack to the apocalypse, songs about the inner body and outer space, and a lesson on how sound is more important than language. During one of many such talks, Stevens explains how noise is the more potent form of communication, used by the screaming baby fresh from the womb, but how language becomes dominant as you grow up.

As you read this, it probably reads like cod-philosophical gubbins but like a psychedelic experience it all made sense at the time. And unlike the meanderings of an acid-fried mind, it all makes sense afterwards as well. Why? Because we saw theory become application.

Dressed in a pair of angel’s wings he opens with Seven Swans playing the acoustic parts of the original version before enormous controlled sound bursts forth from the players. Most of tonight’s  performance is based around his Age of Adz album; a collection which many feared would be his Metal Machine Music (respected performer experiments with sound at the expense of what everybody loves about them), but it was closer to his Kid A (artist(s) simply interpret their vision with different sounds). With 11 people on stage painted in Day-Glo surrounded by 3-dimensional image, it’s more akin to watching an orchestra in a planetarium than a band.

He wisely broke up the intensity of their interpretations of the long and complex album tracks with simple acoustic folk songs (including a sublime cover of REM’s The One I Love), like breaks on a road (space) trip. The album tracks are presented visually throughout; during Vesuvius, for instance, the band appeared to be consumed in a burning hell. Before they played Get Real Get Right, Sufjan told us all about Louisiana artist Royal Robertson. It’s a fascinating story in its own right but the purpose is to provide some context for the themes of the album in general and the song specifically. Robertson’s work is then animated for the backdrop.

The main set, like the album, finishes with the 25 minute Impossible Soul. A 25 minute song? This idea would ordinarily fill us with horror, but it is essentially five songs, with changes in tempo, costumes and the stage-set itself.

Before the start of the night we had been desperately hoping he might at some point play something from his 2005 masterpiece Illinois. By the time the band came on de-costumed (thereby providing a deliberate separation from the main set) and played three songs from it, we were already satisfied, making it a welcome over- indulgence. The evening was one of most atmospheric, uplifting and engaging performances we have ever seen- a treat for fans, but, importantly, accessible if you are unfamiliar with, or undecided on him.

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When Banksy first started getting noticed, he was kinda fun. His work was witty and playful enough to warrant the attention. However, he then started to enjoy the smell of his own bullshit and slowly turned into an art-world Bono.

From being someone who was refreshingly cheeky, he became patronising and holier than thou – just look at his intro for The Simpsons for evidence of that.

A good number of people stopped enjoying his work, yet still wondered who he might be. And he’s going to be unmasked next week by a fellow artist in an oil painting, which really, is a pretty funny way of telling everyone who he is. Fight art with more art.

Of course, part of Banksy’s schtick is how notoriously secretive he is. And now, an artist called Mason Storm is going to show us the man behind the stencils.

Banksy’s face will be portrayed in a 6ft high oil painting to be exhibited in a Gallery show in London on the 28th October 2010 at Warehouse 45 Gallery in North London in a show called ‘Revelations’.

Naturally, the papers have been ‘revealing’ Banksy for years, with no-one really giving the impression of knowing for certain whether they’re right or not. It was like the press intrigue that surrounded The Stig. When The Stig was revealed, it turned out he was a very boring looking man who looked like he could’ve been sat on the BBC Breakfast sofa talking about badminton.

It goes without saying that this unmasking of Banksy has caused quite a stir in art circles. Will this painting be a lifelike representation or will it be some bollocks statement piece? More to the point, is it ‘moral’ to out someone who has chosen to be vaguely anonymous?

A source said:

“The whole thing has kicked-off. Mason Storm has been getting death threats from people… people following him around in black Range Rovers.”

“As a result, artists have refused to have their work shown in the same galleries, some of them removing their work from galleries showcasing him.”

Mason himself states:

“After 10 years of nefarious activities and stalking I have managed to capture the illusive Banksy at work, face on and will reveal him in a new oil, hopefully finished by Sept. Don’t rant it’s high time the mystery was revealed!”

You can’t ever trust what an artist says because they’re all barefaced liars (and god bless them for it),  but Mason’s work has been noted (in some circles) for it’s realism.

We can only hope that isn’t some punk-ass stunt and that something really fun goes down next week. Just no deaths please.

And what is Mason Storm’s reaction to it all? Well…

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Britney Spears called her new album Circus because her life is a circus – she either plays the Sad Clown or the Bearded Lady in it, by the way.

But, aside from the fact that it’s called Circus and the lead single from it sounds like a berserk feminist cyborg running out of power, nobody knows a darn thing about Britney Spears’ new album. Until now, that is, because the album art and tracklisting to Circus by Britney Spears has just been released. We know. At least try to contain yourself.

From what we can tell from the sleeve, Circus by Britney Spears seems to be a concept album about a slightly morose woman spending so much money on lawyers in a failed attempt to win custody of her children that she’s resorted to getting her album art done on the cheap in one of those bleepy Japanese photobooths you find in arcades. As for the tracklisting, you’ll need to read on for that.

Britney Spears albums always reflect Britney’s state of mind at the time she made them. …Baby One More Time and Oops!… I Did It Again were released when Britney Spears was just a young girl with nothing to worry about other than her excessive and grammatically-confusing use of ellipsis. Britney showed that Britney Spears had become famous enough to carry an album by her first name alone. In The Zone showed Britney’s first sign of rebellion, where she stood in collection zone B at Argos even though her receipt clearly directed her to collection zone D. Then Blackout reflected the fact that Britney Spears could barely go a day without collapsing or vomiting onto boys.

And now Britney Spears is releasing Circus, a cute nod to the fact that watching Britney Spears perform these days is like watching a sad-eyed Russian bear covered in cigarette burns hop around joylessly on a metal platform that’s got an electrical current running through it.

The difference between Blackout and Circus is both clear and immediate. In the artwork to Blackout, Britney Spears can be seen getting off with a sexy priest, but the just-released cover of Circus shows that the old Britney Spears is back – the Britney Spears who couldn’t be any less offensive if she was made from digestive biscuits and rainwater.

But the patronisingly cheap-looking artwork to Circus isn’t all that’s just been released – the final tracklisting for the album has also been announced. So let’s analyse that instead:

1. Womanizer – Already a number one hit. Sample lyrics: “Womanizer womanizer/ womanizer/ Oh! Womanizer oh! Womanizer.”

2. Circus - The next single. Sample lyrics: “Circus circus circus/ circus oh!/ Circus circus oh! Circus/ circus/ Oh!”

3. Out From Under – An alarmingly graphic description of what it was like to be stuck underneath Adnan Ghalib in the moments directly after his ejaculation.

4. Kill The Lights – Originally entitled Kill The Whites.

5. Shattered Glass – An account of the time that Britney Spears smashed up a car with an umbrella. Alternative titles included Dented Bonnet, Ruptured Grill and Tatty Exhaust Pipe.

6. If U Seek Amy – A song about the amygdala, the part of the brain that controls arousal and fear and is therefore the only part of Britney Spears’ brain that actually works properly.

7. Unusual You – AKA The Lack Of Self-Awareness Song.

8. Blur – A song about 1990s Britpop band Blur. The belated follow-up to 2002′s Shed Seven.

9. Mmm Papi – Originally supposed to be a cover version of Oom Pa Pa from the musical Oliver that had to be changed at the last minute because Britney Spears can’t even pronounce simple words properly.

10. Mannequin – An appreciation of the 1987 sex doll comedy rendered wistful by the fact that the director Michael Gottileb never directed anything other movies after 1993′s Hulk Hogan film Mr Nanny.

11. Lace and Leather – Where Britney Spears describes her favourite bedroom outfit. Her favourite, mind you, not the one the wears most nights, otherwise it’d be called Incontinence Pants And A Boxer’s Gumshield To Stop Me Gnawing Through My Restraints.

12. My Baby – The song where Britney Spears realises she can’t remember what either of her children look like because it’s been so long she was last declared mentally well enough to see them.

13. Radar – A climactic reevaluation of the invention of radar. Includes the line “Your electromagnetic waves identify the range, altitude, direction or speed of both moving and fixed objects such as aircraft, ships, motor vehicles, weather formations, and terrain/ Oh baby baby.”

Apparently, in this modern age we live in, art isn’t just a picture on a wall which some poor bastard has spent years carefully colouring in.

Oh no, these days you can say that burning a shopping trolley demonstrates excess anger and throwing pool balls at walls is a metaphor for breaking boundaries – not for pissing off people. And now Australian artist Natascha Stellmach is using the remains of Kurt Cobain to investigate suicide and the power of desecration.

Kurt Cobain did the exact same thing with a shotgun.

We also thought that foreign people were a bit mental. But this proves it. The exhibition, which is being held in Berlin is gathering multiple numbers of nutjob artists to use human remains as a medium for art; Danish artist Marco Evarissti, for example, plans to feed death row inmate Gene Hathorn to goldfish upon his execution. Why, we don’t know, but we assume the RSPCA will be on the phone deeming this to be an act of animal cruelty.

Quite how Natascha Stellmach came to posses the ashes of the former Nirvana frontman is a mystery in itself. We assumed that Courtney Love would literally have them strung round her neck, keeping would-be thieves away with brooms.

Even for our standards smoking Kurt Cobain’s ashes is pretty fucking strange, but apparently the event isn’t a pisstake. So if you happen to be in Berlin or are planning a trip, go see a woman smoke a dead man. Is it cannibalism? We’re not sure.

The full press release for the event tries to explains the whole warped point of the exhibition. It also saves us having to try and work it out. Though, it’s still utterly confusing as to why anyone would want to do this, or even care:

Australian-born Natascha Stellmach claims to have acquired the ashes of Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain. Now she’s transformed the grunge star’s remains into an installation titled Set Me Free, that investigates suicide and the power of desecration.

With this work, Stellmach joins a number of artists to use human remains as a medium; Danish artist Marco Evarissti plans to feed death row inmate Gene Hathorn to goldfish upon his execution.

Stellmach’s work comprises a “death cycle” of five pieces. The first, a suicide contemplation, titled It is Black in Here, is a sound piece. Written and read by the artist, it was recorded onto a specifically pressed record and is played on a vintage record player.

The six-minute poetic meditation on death’s proximity ends with the word ‘Gone’. Near Death Experience, is a text-based work where Kurt Cobain, Adolf Hitler, Diane Arbus and the Brothers Grimm meet in a twilight zone. Two more works, Black Scan and Untitled, build to the final work: Gone. In Gone, Stellmach presents a joint containing Cobain’s ashes, which is held in an antique case engraved with the work’s title. Stellmach intends to smoke this joint in a secret Berlin location. This act, according to the artist, will release Cobain “into the ether from the media circus.”

Asked how she came to have Cobain’s ashes, let alone smoke them, Stellmach told Artworld: “That’s confidential and kind of magic. They came to me.”

Until October 11

Gallerie Wagner + Partner, Berlin