Movie still from ‘The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms’ (1953), animation perfection from Ray Harryhausen in which the beast attacks a lighthouse, while on its merry way to wreak havoc in New York City. Monster movies aside, we will be discussing the spectre of other forms of destructive behaviour in this, our special issue on the topic of ‘Gentrification’, a celebration of ARAF COLLECTIVE’s residency at THE WRECK coming to a close and heralding the arrival of the ‘WRECKING BALL’ of gentrification as music venue becomes Gastro Pub. The writers herein responded imaginatively to this month’s theme discussing changes from London to New York, Pie Shops to Gastro Pubs, Tattoo Parlours to Art Galleries, Poetry to ‘Street Language’, each a different interpretation of the word ‘gentrification’.
ARAF COLLECTIVE welcomes you to THE FINAL‘LIGHTHOUSE THE WRECK’ event, for the usual FREE LIVE MUSIC, FREE ZINES, FREE THOUGHT - so lets get wrecked!
ARAF COLLECTIVE LONDON is
a not-for profit organisation, with an aim to unite early career musicians, artists, writers, and performers seeking a testing ground for new projects or inspiration for new collaborations with an enthusiastic, interested, critical and creative audience. You don’t need proof of a paying fanclub to perform with us! You just need a great sound, a bad attitude,or a wild idea. We actively opt out of any commercial interests: the interests of Araf Collective are personal and reactionary; a creative site of resistance against ‘arts cuts’ culture... And before you ask...
‘ARAF’ (pronounced ‘ARAV’) is Welsh for ‘SLOW’. SO TAKE YOUR TIME AND ENJOY
THIS MONTH’S EVENTS:
ARAF COLLECTIVE LONDON are proud to present : ‘LIGHTHOUSE’ at THE WRECK no. 6, THE WRECKING BALL:
last LIGHTHOUSE of the summer, LAST LIGHTHOUSe @ the WRECK! featuring
SAMPLE ANSWER/ HATTIE WHITEHEAD/ LITTLE BROTHER ELI / TRUECOLLECTIVES DJ FOR YOUR LISTENING PLEASURE!
And THIS, the SIXTH Edition of Free Zine... SMELLIN’ SALTS featuring THE BANDS, ART, POETRY, OPINIONS, and more! FOR PERUSAL AT YOUR LEISURE!
P.S. Yes,
SMELLIN’ SALTS is a nod to the mid-70s Punk Zine SNIFFIN’ GLUE: oh those heady days of tippex & xerox...
>>>>>>>>>>FUTURE ARAF EVENTS FOR YOUR DIARY>>>>>>>>>
FRIDAY 13th SEPTEMBER: NEXT GIG AT NEW VENUE ! FRIDAT 6th SEPTEMBER : SS7 SUBMISSION DEADLINE SEPTMBER (DATE TBA) : FRUIT MACHINE no. 2:
Call for Speakers!
ARAF COLLECTIVE LONDON THANKS PROFUSELY:
Contributers to this issue: O.P.G. H.A, Justine Do Espirito, Rachel
Long, Azalea, Raymond Williams, Eleanor Wemyss
And you, our Salt Sniffers and Lighthouse Keepers.
THANKS & GOOD BYE
TO
THE WRECK: SEE page 6! sob,SNIFF, SNIFF!
Send submissions for SEPTEMBER edition: arafcollective@live.co.uk follow us: @ARAFCollective check us out : www.arafcollectivelondon.com
ATTENTION READERS:
The Horse, The Horse,
Our Kingdom to THE HORSE
A
s you will have noticed, this is the ‘Gentrification Special’ of Smellin’ Salts and we have attempted to edit this edition to explore this emotive issue. This editorial decision has been taken as a response to our sudden eviction from The Wreck Camberwell; making way for a gastro-eatery. This forced departure for pâté and melba toast is a sad day for Camberwell as one of its last music venues closes its doors. However, ARAF was created to resist exactly this brand of cultural strangulation and we have been working hard to fight off the cheeseboard. And boy, have we succeeded... Like gunslinging sheriffs, we scouted South London looking for pastures new and after a few shootouts and salon brawls, we are extremely excited to announce our new location. From September you can ‘Findus’ at THE HORSE
THE HORSE:
Four minutes trot from Waterloo station, next to Lambeth North Underground Station and within earshot of Big Ben, ARAF has saddled up and arrived in SE1. In these new stables, we will continue to bring you free nights of canter-cultural expression that will amaze, entertain and occasionally educate. Furthermore, we are using our change of venue to expand the horizons of our free entry events. ARAF has always been keen to promote all culture not solely music/writing and therefore our events at the Horse will expand our forms of creative exposure. Alongside three musical acts, we will now be showing local short-films, bringing you live art performances and attempting to make your ARAF evening unlike any other free cultural event in the Wild West. Will you ride with us into this sunset, Cowboy? So bring your lucky horseshoes and let’s fight culture’s suffocation for free: CANTER-CULTURE PARTY Friday the 13th of September @ THE HORSE SE1 So why the long face?
THIS MONTH, ARAF COLLECTIVE PRESENTS... LITTLE BROTHER ELI Drawing on influences in Delta Blues and Old School Hip Hop, Brighton’s Little Brother Eli are a cross between the Yardbirds and the Black Keys. Recent performances at Camden’s famous Blues Kitchen and legendary Soho Jazz spot Ronny Scott’s attest to the band’s musical pedigree...woof. Their recent first EP release, Little Brother Eli, has achieved critical acclaim and we are extremely pleased to welcome them to our Wrecking Ball; they are smashing. HATTIE WHITEHEAD Hattie Whitehead and her band are the second seafarers to dock in ARAF’s cultural harbour. Daughter of a poet and Jazz musician, Hattie grew up surrounded by sound and recorded her first tracks age three with her father on guitar. Having recently played The Big Noise Festival, Hattie’s soulful folk takes its influences from throughout the musical oceans. We assure you will not forget this Siren’s unmatched sound. TRUECOLLECTIVES TrueCollectives are stalwart members of ARAF and always provide the best vinyl and MC soundtrack in South London. We love collectivism at ARAF and TrueCollectives clearly demonstrate the benefits of holding hands across the decks. On the 12th October, their debut EP is launched at the studious surroundings of the Westminster Reference Library, so SSSSHHHHHH and bookmark these modern minstrels. SAMPLE ANSWER ARAF are excited to welcome Sample Answer aboard The Lighthouse At The Wreck. Hailing from the port of Dublin and making a big splash on the London music scene supporting acts such as Alabama 3, The View and Pete Doherty, Sample Answer brings a unique brand of acoustic hip-hop to the shores of Camberwell. This bouy is not to be missed. LAST MONTH’S LIGHTHOUSE was hotter than the Sahara in a July heatwave. Like Lawrence of Arabia, the eminent Dr Peabody emerged out of the sunset to deliver their healing brand of postpunk Monty Python to a packed Wreck. Feel Good Culture played a ska set which brought water to the dunes; quenching our musical thirst with juicy basslines. Finally, and as cool as the desert night, True Collectives DJs and MCs set up beats that would make the camels groove even if they had the hump. Araf is an oasis in the cultural desert and no musical mirage. FRUIT MACHINE NEWS: Many of you have been asking about the next lecturejam event, Fruit Machine. We hope to hold one in September: Watch the FB page for more info, and get your thinking caps on: we need participants !
This month’s keyword:
GENTRIFICATION
‘YUPPIES OUT’, read an anonymous protestor’s territorial daub, in a hand that read like blind fury, blighting the window of Foxtons’ “Yuppie” (young-urbanprofessional) Estate Agents’ slick new Brixton branch last month. Alas, that unstoppable beast, GENTRIFICATION casts its long shadow over South London, and it is only a matter of time before areas such as Brixton Market are swallowed up for redevelopment. The weekly announcements of new buzz-boroughs in the properties supplements either inspire terror, trepidation or greed, depending on whom you ask, ‘yuppies’, the urban ‘gentry’ or otherwise. ‘GENTRIFICATION’ didn’t make it into Raymond Williams’ 1973 vocabulary of culture and society, Keywords. The term was coined by sociologist Ruth Glass a decade earlier, to describe how incoming middle classes were displacing working class occupiers in her local London borough of Islington. The rise and rise of London’s capitalist land market, increased private ownership and the free market continue to encourage city developments that serve the affluent few, rather than providing urgently needed affordable housing or useful facilities for local communities and families. Common enough are the rebuttals, frequently from ‘gentile’ quarters: ‘Don’t you want new eateries, bars and vintage gift shops that encourage people to come and spend money in, and improve the area?’. Such a thickly conservative gloss veneer does well to distract from the true issue, that changing the aesthetic and socioeconomic appearance of areas of the city blinkers many of its inhabitants to the predictable patterns of zoned urban inequality. A tired, un-resolvable debate perhaps,
- Azaleah
but as ARAF Collective recently discovered, gentrification permeates many different aspects of the urban experience. The Recreation Ground, our gig venue and local boozer, is set to become a gastro-pub. Small music venues provide something extra, and are often undervalued by developers. As a hub of social life, brimming with potential to be productive of new friendships and conversations amongst its crowd- a gig venue generates a creative atmosphere quite different to a polite gastro dinner date. While neighboring Peckham is enjoying its’ place in the sun for music and arts venues, Camberwell looks about set to cater to the appetites of Denmark Hillbillies and newly settled Crossrail commuters. We predict an influx of the usual dominant strings of culturally and aesthetically devoid urban high street bland-brands, Tesco-Preta-Costa uniformity which will leave little room for your local Lebanese grocer or African bakery. There is, believe it or not, such a term as ‘food gentrification’, as the Guardian reported earlier this year, in the case of the Brixton Market, “… new food businesses helping to revive urban communities: Street food, markets and restaurants can increase social connections and boost employment, as long as they’re not colonised by the middle class.”
Notice the choice of term, middle class ‘colonisation’ – emotive, but apposite. We all know who reaps the benefits: next month they’ll be slurping oysters at OUR Wreck. keywords related to ‘gentrification’:
Status, Private, Improve, Monopoly, Equality, Elite, Creative, Class, Consumer, Commercialism, Capitalism, City, Bourgeouis, Community, Citizenship, conservatism, development, economy, globalisation, heritage, market, materialism, media, mobility, place, policy, poverty, popular, taste.
WE’RE SAD TO BE LEAVING THE WRECK, SNIFF, SNIFF ! *
HUGE THANKS GOES OUT TO: MARCO MACCHIERALDO & ROB SHUTTZ at THE WRECK, * THE SOUNDEST of SOUND-GUYS: JOSH MARRIOTT, ARCHIE, MAX LYONS * THANK YOU TO ALL THE AWESOME MUSICIANS WHO CAME TO PLAY FOR US AT THE WRECK: YOSSARIAN THE CAULFIELD BEATS THE FAIRY JAIL BENEDICT HOLLOW GIANTS SHARLEENA RAY CeaSe MC SENSE DEPARTMENT ABBEY BOWDEN KATE THRELFALL DR. PEABODY FEEL GOOD CULTURE TRUECOLLECTIVES SAMPLE ANSWER HATTIE WHITEHEAD LITTLE BROTHER ELI PLEASE ACCEPT THIS SUPERGROUP MONTAGE AS A SMALL TOKEN OF OUR APPRECIATION! * TO THE MANY CONTRIBUTORS TO THIS ZINE, and ATTENDEES OF FRUIT MACHINE no1.: YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE, KEEP THOSE CONTRIBUTIONS COMING ! WE’RE ONLY GETTING STARTED !
* AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST, TO YOU, FAIR READERS AND LIGHTHOUSE KE WE’RE STOKED THAT YOU STOKE T
EEPERS: THANK YOU FOR COMING DOWN TO LIGHTHOUSE at THE WRECK
THIS FLAME! STICK WITH US, WE’RE MOVING, BUT NOT FAR!
Bushwick: The True Brooklyn? -Justine Do Espirito
During my time in New York, I stayed for a while at my friend’s house in Bushwick, Brooklyn. Bushwick is not part of Brooklyn’s most famous and touristy areas, yet I was very lucky as I had the opportunity to discover this authentic Brooklyn neighborhood. A mainly industrial, lower-middle class area mostly populated by a Latino community, Bushwick was long associated with urban blight. Yet is has recently benefited from the hype-wave of its neighbour Williamsburg, and now attracts a new population of creative youngsters and students who cannot afford to live in the now horrendously expensive Williamsburg. Unlike Williamsburg, Bushwick is at the very start of its gentrification process and therefore retains a certain authenticity. It is quieter, much more affordable and still one of the coolest places in the city. Despite its general grey, industrial look Bushwick’s landscape will surprise you: it has some of the best pieces of street art in Brooklyn, some amazing commissioned murals and anonymous graffitis. The suspended M train line which goes across Bushwick remains to me a fantastic example of New York’s urban infrastructure; this continuous green metal bridge also contributes to give Bushwick its edgy urban spirit. Bushwick’s night life is now flourishing, and if you want to go out in the area you can choose among nice bars and restaurants frequented by locals around Morgan Avenue and Jefferson street stations, and then head to one of Bushwick’s weekly warehouse parties and indie music venues. One day I went to see my friend, who also works in Bushwick, at her work place during lunchtime. The small creative business she works for is settled in one of
Bushwick’s many converted warehouses, one of these typical, relaxed and creative office spaces which are now proliferating in the area. Attached to the building is a bar with a lovely courtyard where people come for coffee and lunch breaks, business meetings and after-work drinks. After visiting my friend at work I visited the Loom which is round the corner. The Loom is this hipster-shopping centre located in a renovated textile mill on Flushing avenue. At the Loom one can find everything a standard Brooklyn hipster needs: bike and skate shops, a tattoo place, a couple of vintage clothing shops, a bar with an outdoor area where students and creative workers come to work on their Macbooks at all times of the day. The Loom also hosts some art shows, like this skate board painting exhibition I went to, featuring board works by local artists and skaters (so Brooklyn!), and which was packed with a young, trendy and beautiful Brooklyn crowd. The Loom epitomizes the rising cutting-edge creativity in Bushwick, this both relaxed and underground atmosphere that makes it all at once so authentic and so cliché, true to Brooklyn’s new identity. I don’t want to make any big statement about Bushwick’s near future, the subsequent stages of the area’s gentrification and the potential loss of this authentic spirit which I liked so much. I am just happy that I had the opportunity to discover it at this time, when its edginess fulfilled my touristy desires to live the true Brooklyn experience. My Londoner’s eyes saw in this area what I was perhaps really looking for when I came to Brooklyn. Yet I don’t know what is going to happen to the traditional Bushwick population, those who were there long before the hipsters, if one day Bushwick really becomes the new Williamsburg.
Ma Sista Says / My Sister Says
Glass of red in hand Talking art in part Only the classics No mention of Shonibare Or Jean Binta Breeze Freeze Conversation I’m laughing too loud Proud Sip Red wine slip
Ma sista reckons dat I put on dis front fool peps into tinkin dat I’m posh when I’m not My gosh! I said a skinny decaf caramel latte Grabbed on the way to a gallery party.
My sister says that after a glass of red I gets ghetto “Shut up” I goes “What do you know?” “Ha! You see!” She says Pointing Pointing right through to the girl in me.
Just wana fit in here So I pronounce my Ps and Qs and all that comes to mind is Kano “Some manners don’t like me They try and bad mind me-” Classical music is playing and I got a frickin Kano tune stuck in my head Bare of slick free of gel ears yanked of gold Hoops Loops Massive gypsy swirls and my curls straightened back
And out comes the Schoolgirl Rudegirl Badgal Buff ting Slick pon her head Gel slathered Skirt hitched Don’t wana get ditched So close to Marcia’s party Shirt unbuttoned Just a bit To show off pink bra and little tits
is a young writer and spoken word artist from London. Rachel described her poem, ‘Ma Sista Says’ as “...about growing up and growing out of street language into a woman of (some) sophistication. It fits perfectly with your theme of ‘Gentrification’.” We agree! Follow Rachel @writesRachel www.writesrachell.wordpress.com, www.facebook.com/LiveLit
Rachel Long
Ma sista says, “Just be true” But to who? You. Me? Da schoolgirl the Rudegal Badgal with da slick? Or the woman Who sips red wine Only the best in a cocktail dress you would never guess had a Kano track playing inside her head instead of that classical stuff that she really doesn’t get and yet after a glass of red she remembers all the words.
A Communion of Pastry
Hazel A.
George enjoyed two things in his life: routine and the meat-and-potato pie he would eat on a Thursday. Every Thursday, the ceremonial greasy brown paper bag, steaming with the heat of its contents, was slowly marched to his table. It was an ancient tradition; a local rite for those who toiled under the chimneys. His father had eaten the pie and his father had beyond that. The factory would always pay out on a Thursday and to celebrate a small communion of pastry, chicken and potato was brought to the table: A greasy trophy for the working man. When the government decided it wanted the country’s workers to wear pinstripe suits and have clean fingernails, George and his old man took solace in the Thursday pie. It was a rhythm of life, a stodgy timepiece that held two halves together. An edible icon that spoke of the pride of the factory floor. After his father’s funeral, it was with an almost religious devotion that George lumbered alone through the terraced streets for the Thursday pie. It became a fatty intersection between the old and the new, an absent father and his son. It was more than just cheap cuts of meat broiled until tasteless and drowned in watery gravy, it was psychic contentment wrapped in pastry. That sizzling, spitting chipshop with its curling savolys and grey fishcakes was his cathedral. Coincidentally, the day George died was also the day the new owners of the shop stopped serving the meat and potato pie that had been declining in popularity since the 1980s. They had grand plans for their new bistro: visions of sharp-suited customers from the newly redeveloped luxury apartments made them salivate with excitement. Gone were the vats of fat shimmering with heat; lobster-filled fishtanks had quickly taken their place. Each bluey-grey creature brawling and raving with the madness of captivity, clawed against the glass in a vain attempt to escape death. The fat-splattered, red-faced priest behind the steel-topped altar had been overthrown by a swarthy man with a wine-list and shoes two sizes too big. ‘Sorry, Sir’, said the maître d’ curtly, ‘We don’t serve that sort of thing here anymore’. At George’s wake, they served quiche.
Lines that Form a Box, Eleanor Wemyss eleanorwemyss.com
CANTER-CULTURE : Friday 13/09/13