Club nights are like bands. The better the name, more likely they are to draw a decent crowd. Up the ante by offering free drugs – or at least a safe space to celebrate the most prescribed poppers – and it’ll be a mob scene. Why, then, make adverts for such happenings, more complicated? (More…)
In the pogrom-like atmosphere gathering apace in Pakistan, the religious majority – Sunni Muslims – do not perceive that what is at stake is not an ‘altruistic’ concern for weak, insignificant minorities. The market, and its partner nationalism, make us think that ‘conscience’ is reserved for exceptional moments of humanitarianism, rather than being part of everyday life. (More…)
The radical flyers one sees pasted up in European cities frequently try to make up for the blind spots of the postwar Left establishment. That means prioritizing multiculturalism, pro-immigrant policies and a decentralized, anarchistic mindset that repudiates the longstanding belief that achieving a measure of political power in the bourgeois state is a worthwhile goal. This tract photographed in Zurich earlier this year is a fine example: (More…)
“G-Beat” is a genre tag I first started seeing last year, used by the late Kenneth Duffy (AKA Kenn Kroosaficks) to describe Deathcharge’s 2011 LP, Love Was Born to an Early Death. The hotly anticipated full-length represented a transition from D-beat hardcore to hard-charged gothic rock, emblematic of a larger sea change in punk. What exactly is G-beat, though? (More…)
It’s been a week of political theater. In the US, Mitt Romney revived hopes for his campaign by trouncing a surprisingly ineffective Barack Obama in the first of three debates. But in Israel, a much more intricate play was being performed. The stars, Benjamin Netanyahu and Ehud Barak, played at fighting, in order to try to garner political points. The final act doesn’t bode well for Israelis, or the Middle East in general. (More…)
Intizar Husain is repetitive. A small set of themes and phrases are the motus animi continuus of his oeuvre. Repeated locutions are marked by their colloquiality: khave se khava chilta tha (“shoulder rubbed against shoulder,”) which he uses to signify bygone spaces, ye ja vo ja (“now here and gone,”) marking sudden departures of idiosyncratic individuals in the past. (More…)
I was an IDF reservist stationed in the south of Israel. My base had received a new contingent of AH-64 Apache attack helicopters, and was testing them prior to deployment. Helicopters would ascend to 100 meters, hover for hours, and do instrument checks. A constant drone permeated our encampment. (More…)
To someone who lives in a less intensely intellectual environment than Berlin, the wordiness of the flyers pasted over the city’s walls is surprising. But activists wouldn’t bother to include so much fine print if they thought no one was going to read it. Frequently, the text adds crucial detail to the bold strokes of a flyer’s big-font message, revealing subtlety in its come-hither slogan. (More…)
“Drum and bass, dub, roots and culture.” To anyone used to shopping in Brixton Market, the loop is as familiar as a Jamaican patty. Recited for hours on end by a street rep equivalent for London’s University of Dub, the promoter has a lock on the genres the locals prefer, not to mention a rotating cast of first class artists to pitch. (More…)
“These headphones stand for peace, love and togetherness,” reads the product description for the Redemption Song on-ear headphones on the website for House of Marley, the official merchandise company for the Bob Marley brand. (More…)
During every presidential election in the United States, the same argument is made, mostly on the left, but also on the extreme right. The candidates don’t represent your views, so you vote for a third party candidate, or don’t vote at all. After all, the argument goes, how are we ever going to get candidates who do what we want them to do if we keep sending the same mainstream politicians to Washington? (More…)
It goes without saying that the attack on the US consulate in Benghazi is a crime that no offense can excuse. Yet those who perpetrated the killings (purportedly jihadists, who planned the killings in advance) probably number in the dozens, and felt plenty justified. (More…)