Art by Zach Webber
This next-level 6-track EP is available for pay-as-you-like download from eyeholes.bandcamp.com
& if you like it, check out Zach’s solo-project, Paperghost! Masterly.
Art by Zach Webber
I never finished my 2013 film festival recommendations! Here’s another, more to come…
“Blackfish tells the story of Tilikum, a performing killer whale that killed several people while in captivity. Along the way, director-producer Gabriela Cowperthwaite compiles shocking footage and emotional interviews to explore the creature’s extraordinary nature, the species’ cruel treatment in captivity, the lives and losses of the trainers and the pressures brought to bear by the multi-billion dollar sea-park industry. This emotionally wrenching, tautly structured story challenges us to consider our relationship to nature and reveals how little we humans have learned from these highly intelligent and enormously sentient fellow mammals.”
And the article that inspired the doco > here
Speaking of ‘eco-terrorism’, this film is showing at People’s Cinema in Wellington tonight (Friday 25th October), in support of Marie Mason, an imprisoned activist in the United States – followed by a discussion on prisons and prisoners. 6.30PM.
“IF A TREE FALLS: A STORY OF THE EARTH LIBERATION FRONT tells the
remarkable story of the rise and fall of this ELF cell, by focusing on the transformation
and radicalization of one of its members.
Part coming-of-age tale, part cops-and-robbers thrilller, the film interweaves a verite chronicle of Daniel on house arrest as he faces life in prison, with a dramatic recounting of the events that led to his involvement with the group. And along the way it asks hard questions about environmentalism, activism, and the way we define terrorism.”
The New Zealand government is opening up our oceans to deep-sea oil drilling. We should be aware of the potential negative effects this could have. Greenpeace have released this video and a really good educational website on the matter > oilspillmap.org.nz
Meanwhile, 30 international Greenpeace activists/ journalists have now been held for over a month (in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day, being released for 1 hour a day into a ‘concrete block’) and denied bail in Russia under charges of ‘hooliganism’ (piracy charges now dropped) for attempting to protest on a drilling platform in the Arctic.
Here is the new project from the Wellington-based genius behind Paperghost, Zach Webber, in collaboration with vocalist Jess Arcus. Tis a mind-bogglingly finely crafted, off kilter, hip-hoppy, dynamic, nostalgic, cerebral, amazing wee EP!!! Have a listen below and pay-as-you-like download. What fun!!! Please spread the joy at will.
Fresh Seth Frightening goodness! Self-proclaimed “beach & barbed-wire vibes”. This is some of the maddest, coolest, personal-est, idiosyncratic-est stuff yet!! Pay what you like download. Spread the word and/or enjoy!
Seth Frightening is playing in Hamilton and Auckland this weekend with the All Seeing Hand on their album release tour. Check it ooooot!
Friday 18th @ Static, Hamilton (w/ Alphabethead)
Saturday 19th @ Whammy, Auckland (w/ Tourettes & Mean Girls)
Here is an interesting documentary following the Sesame Street composer, Christopher Cerf, as he tries to understand how and why music, including his own, is used to torture detainees in America’s Guantanamo Bay detention centre. The video features interviews with torture experts, a Guantanamo detainee, an ex Guantanamo prison guard, psychologists, musicologists, speaker designers and musicians.
“I’m not really so troubled that my songs got used, it’s the idea that they’re torturing people at all. And I really feel pretty strongly about that. It seems really incredible to me that America would be torturing prisoners at all, after all we’ve fought wars in the past against countries who do that to try to get them to stop doing it, so the idea that we would be doing it ourselves to save our own freedom is very ironic.” – Chris Cerf, composer.
Ex-Guantanamo prison guard, Chris Arendt, describes the setup as a dance-style PA that would often play two clashing songs at once on repeat at incredibly loud volumes with the prisoner in a stress position for hours on end in the cold with shackles, mittens, a hood and goggles to isolate them as much as possible and cause maximum stress. The idea was that whoever ‘saved’ them from the torture would be seen as a friend who the detainee would then co-operate with.
‘If I was to put (extremely loud music) on for just a few minutes, I’m pretty certain you would be saying “I can’t hear myself think” and that’s the precise point, because if you can’t hear yourself think, you can’t think. If you can’t think, you have no control over your senses. If you have no control over your senses, you are for all intents and purposes a completely vegetative person, and that’s the point. To put someone in an almost vegetative state where they are simply ready to say anything, comply with anything, only so the music can be turned down.” – Moazzem Begg, ex-detainee in Guantanamo and Bagram.
Moazzam Begg is a British citizen who moved to Pakistan with his family to build a school for girls. He was abducted from his home with a gun to his head and detained for three years before being released without charge or trial.
You can read an article by him, here – Guantanamo Remembered: A Personal Perspective
www.aljazeera.com
We’re off up North again this weekend (ALL SEEING HAND ALBUM RELEASE TOUR > Hamilton & Auckland!!) so I thought I better put up some pics from our last roadtrip in May this year…
Sean in Putaruru
All Seeing Hand at Golden Dawn
This is Kerosene Creek, a thermal stream & hot pools 35km south of Rotorua. We had a joyous time singing under the waterfalls and decorating Jonny’s head with stones – later I found out that a friend got really, really sick after dunking her head in this creek… luck of the draw I guess! Caution advised.
Lake Rotowhero
the-all-seeing-hand.bandcamp.com
sethfrightening.bandcamp.com
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