Corker Issue 2: Winter 2008 by Corker

AUSSIE CULTURE AT ITS DRUNKEN HONEST

Kevin Rudd

02 WINTER 2008

Masked hero or super dud?

9 771835 550008

ISSN 1835-5501 02

AUS $6.50 inc GST

corkermag.com

Cut Copy Sex Dolls The Block, Redfern Ice users

p28 Cut Copy are bawckithonana national tour omore acclaimed soph the album to show indie wannabes howe. electro is don

e to tho s n d tur ctors t vies o o w o y re Holl indie di lity to m ancing best credibi n ups pr G 3 6 give ut grow pandex. p abo und in s aro

Cover Illustration Kevin Rudd by Dennis Juan Ma

Travel, sex & food p09 Restaurant Review: Vicini p16 Backpacker Postcards: Penang, Malaysia p46 Tangled Love: Designer Pubes

Photography & art 49 14 Spotlight on Penrith 49 Art: Silicon Princesses

Environment

page 12 Eco Ch oices: Sustainable Trav

el Guide 14

logolion.com.au p. [02] 9609 5466 m. 0407 177 622 design@logolion.com.au magazines . books . newsletters . annual reports . LOGOS . STATIONERY . brochures . flyers posters . BANNERS . packaging . point of sale . advertisements . illustration . web

Publisher & Editor Lizza Gebilagin

Art Director Mark Scarrott

Designer George Andis

Writers Dom Alessio, Erin Bell, Emma Bruer, Travis Daniels, James Ellis, Kate Gauthier, Ally Lois, Angus Paterson, Jonno Seidler

Photographers Madeline Carr, Ashley Mar, Ben Peake, Marie Sinclair, Wendell Teodoro, Andy Vermeulen

Gebilagin w and Juke Kith Dennis Rodman schmoozy pa artel at a r open bar. ty with an

Illustrator

Stop drinking

Dennis Juan Ma

With our Prim e Minister Ke vin Rudd on the front cov er and his fig ht against binge drinkin g well under way, I thought it wou ld only be re sponsible to start this issu e by remindin ills of binge g you all of t drinking. Rem he ember how d when you dra isgusting you f nk beer, bour elt bon and coke had that last , Jager Bomb shot of tequil s, and then a you knew yo you remember u shouldn’t h how you pushed ave? Do your way throu sweaty people g h to throw up in a crowd of sm the toilet? T elly, you felt a lit h e n, after throw tle bit more ing up sober and wa How about th nted to do it e time you pic all again. ked up that home, had a hot guy or gir night of forge l, took them ttable sex, a next morning b nd w e re horrified ecause your b the eer goggles w ere missing? Have you lea rned your less on yet? Don’t Neither have worry if you h I. aven’t. Until next tim e,

Lizza Gebila

Publisher &

Editor

gin

Copy Editors Erin Bell, Gillian Handley, Angus Paterson

Interns Danica Pineda, Nikki Maras With special thanks to The Australian Conservation Foundation. Advertising enquiries email Dan Segal dan@corkermag.com or ads@corkermag.com For subscriptions phone (02) 8012 1895 or email subs@corkermag.com or visit www.corkermag.com Send any letters, CDs, review items and press releases to PO Box 1126, Surry Hills NSW 2010.

Corker is published in Australia quarterly by Corker Media Pty Ltd ACN 128 184 243, ISSN 1835 5501. The entire contents of Corker are copyright 2008 by Corker Media Pty Ltd and may not be reproduced in any manner without written permission from the publisher. Views expressed in Corker do not necessarily represent the opinions of the editor or publisher. No responsibility is accepted by Corker Media Pty Ltd for the accuracy of advertisements or information within the publication. The name Corker is a trademark of Corker Media Pty Ltd. Printed by Lighthouse Press, Unit 2/10 Northumberland Rd, Caringbah NSW 2229. If you are a retailer interested in stocking Corker, please email info@corkermag.com

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llove etters

CORKER LETTERS

Dear Corker, Erin Bell is an inte lligent and hot woman. I want to ma rry her. Sarah Lesbian Community, Sydney

x0x0x0

Erin Bell wrote all about

perfecting clitoral orgasms in the first edition of Corker. I guess her advice worked!

rker, Dear Co

photos, ed the v o l d n a all agazine t’s with a h W . e Swell m is rw dos and nd othe erotic a itoris, dil s keep l (c f f u n y st all mea the sex my)? By h y. I liked o p , p s a a h n e m s bana p e e it - it k ianess’. I ‘Austral writing t u o sidering b a icle vant con e l e r the art y e l ’s total tting th think it s are ge ves, r l e e k s n m a e y w to th d e o o how man t t e flag ta ey’re th national roves th p t a t e a r h g t h me as thoug ys did so u music g e u h o t Y . al think I t p e real de c x v mo ies music, e . Oh and t r o stuff on h s o ew were to w in a f reviews be thro y a nyways, m A , . e e m so xt tim e n are awe in s forward ndation looking I’m recomme . n a me a f consider ue. next iss to your Cheers. monkey runken d a m o Fr

Write to letters @corkermag.co m and you could win a case of P ig’s Fly Pale A le. Sorry young ens, you have to

Dear C I am orker, t hottie rying to tra about editor! I ’v ck down th e h e Not on er in a Cor been thin k k l make y did her e er sort of a ing f m fridge e think o forts for th way. f e drove was open bu her when t mag m h t Pleas y elbows w her motiva e il e tion Yours sen d me h d. attrac sincerely... er deta ils A . ted to SAP! the ed itor!

be over 18 to w

in the beer. CORKER

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CONTRIBUTORS

100% Aussie Lamb Marie Sinclair

Corker had a little lamb, little lamb, little lamb

This multi-talented photographer and retouch artist worked on the story “Walking on Thin Ice” on page 40. Her style is quirky and animated, and most importantly she wants her work to tell a story. To find out more about this creative lady, we asked her a few questions: If you could be a superhero, who would you be and why? Captain Planet because “He’s gonna take pollution down to zero.” What is your favourite drink? Long Island Iced Tea. If you were a drink what drink would you be and why? A fruit tingle because I’m a bit fruity.

Angus Paterson

Who would you rather sleep with, Kevin Rudd or Paris Hilton? Paris Hilton.

Our resident music expert is none other than the Deputy Editor of dance music website inthemix. com.au. He likes to listen to a bit of everything (the eclectic playlist of Triple J suits his tastes quite well), but has a particular passion for music of the electronic persuasion. Be it breaks, house, progressive, trance or something a little more suited to listening outside of the club.

Where do you usually end up after a night of drinking? Snuggled up in bed.

OK, he’s actually from New Zealand, but if we can claim Russell Crowe as our own then Dennis Juan Ma is now an honorary Australian. Dennis works as a freelance illustrator and is the creative hand behind the front cover illustration of BatRudd. He likes to collect interesting bits and pieces from daily life to include in his artwork. Funny conversations, jokes or silly ideas inspire him. You can view his work online at www.whoisjuan.com.

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Photos of gran feeding lamb and lamb’s stump courtesy of George Andis

Dennis Juan Ma

RESTAURANT REVIEW

ith its tree lined streets, quaint terrace houses and, of course, proximity to the city, it was only a matter of time before the Sydney suburb of Annandale went from being a boho student favourite to prime real estate for trendy young couples and families. So, it was out with cheap rent and Joe’s Pizza, and in with shmick bookstore cafés and classy Italian joints. Well, one classy Italian joint. Vicini (Italian for neighbour) is the creation of locals Natalie Keon and George Hatzimihail. Head chef Massimilano Borsato, who hails from Biella in northern Italy, whips up tasty, authentic cuisine for quality hungry food lovers. Vicini is certainly set to cater for the new neighbourhood. The bottom floor is a funky pizza and antipasto bar and the top is a cosy restaurant with a charming wraparound balcony on which we are lucky enough to score a table. Of course, we almost fill up on the free stuff – olives the size of pinenuts and tasty sourdough with olive oil, delivered by an über friendly and helpful waitress. We decide to start with calamari fritti with basil aioli ($16) and a mandatory bottle of vino, a Hunters sauv blanc from Marlborough which is divine, but not wallet friendly, setting us back $48. The calamari is nothing short of exquisite. I don’t know that I’ve ever related to the whole ‘melt in your mouth’ concept (apart from snacking on half eaten packets of M&M’s left in my glovebox) but this really does live up to the cliché. I decide to stick with the seafood for the main and order the risotto with prawns and rocket ($26). Well, Massimilano knows how to cook his seafood. Every prawn I bite into is like a little explosion of freshness. Midway, my friend catches me eyeing her rabbit ragout warily. I have to admit, I’ve never before dined on something that might be related to a former pet, but she insists I try some. The meat is tender to the point of a kitchen miracle and I start to wonder if my third glass of wine is affecting my judgement. There’s nothing like an Italian ‘dolci’ and with a major weakness for gelato, we share the chocolate tart ($12), simply because it’s served with vanilla bean ice cream. It’s definitely one for the dark chocolate lover and I doubt I could finish one on my own (that’s a blatant lie: I could and would, but I’d regret it later). I’d suggest washing it down with a coffee though, rather than the dregs of a bottle of white.

Review:

Vicini

Cheap rent, students and Joe’s Pizza are pushed out of Annandale. New, classy Italian joint Vicini moves in. Words by Emma Bruer Photos by Andy Vermeulen Address: 37 Booth Street, Annandale NSW Phone: 02 9660 6600 Web: www.vicini.com.au

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CORKER SHORTS

Fest

led into son-funded monolith rol When this Richard Bran ser clo it served as the perfect town for its second year, ions rat festivals. Like Good Vib to a summer full of megaed oak Big Day Out minus beer-s sans fluoro fanatics and , sic mu s the perfect balance of rock pigs, V Festival wa s of on vir en h lus the set in fashion and atmosphere, k. Sydney’s Centennial Par boy ng start as Swedish tom The day got off to a cracki nd of ble loyal fans to her unique supreme Robyn treated the on er of attitude and sass. Ov electro-pop with plenty the g on e proved why they are am blue stage, Modest Mous ds in the universe. most respected indie ban e was to the Virgin Mobile Venu For a brief respite a visit d an vided with 3D glasses in order. Patrons were pro tent the g mass of bodies inside thrust into the throbbin es. pumped solid house tun where Doom and Hoodrat ain called. Jesus and The Mary Ch Back on the blue stage, moody e a revolution, but their They don’t exactly inspir them. ut ct air of authenticity abo rock tunes had a distin t of res were appeased, while the The hardcore followers e. Queens of the Stone Ag us readied ourselves for A’s set. in to describe the QOTS Awesome cannot even beg ed ash and his merry men sm Frontman Josh Homme tunes of aviest, tightest selection their way through the he listic. bal audience went positively known to man, and the Julian belonged to The Presets. But in the end, the night the rk wo knew exactly how to Hamilton and Kim Moyes like cs ssi cuts alongside house cla crowd, mixing in newer ger ban the chorus of new club “Are You The One?”. As ar you y demanded “Let me he “My People” hit and the the only !”, the crowd responded scream if you’re with me oed ech d as rampant shouting way they knew how. An w ne d Australia’s most belove through the parklands, another year. festival wrapped up for Words by Jo nn o Se id ler rr Ma r and Ma de lin e Ca Photography by As hl ey

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This issue’s Corker D ickhead Award goes to a fa st food chain in Darling Harb our, Sydney for not havi ng any toilets opened to pa trons on Saturday nights. Come on people! Where ar e we supposed to pee? A special runner-up Corker D ickhead Award has to go to the publisher of this mag azine, for throwing chips, burg er and Coke all over the flo or in a tantrum after she w as told she couldn’t use the toilets.

t s e T e t

Tas

ing Corker’s dturrininkg one wine panel, fea, one beer connoisseur, and one enthusiast ooze hound, regular bnewest drinks rate the market. to hit the

CORKER SHORTS

hingly crisp say s : A refres PR r ei th t ha W wine specially arkling white sp y el at lic de rally lower and over ice. Natu ed rv se be to the over designed O is a first in nt ou m se Ro ying in alcohol, shores, satisf ry to hit our go te ca e b or su m e d ic an towards lighter d en tr g in ow a gr inks. refreshing dr liquor store s run to the rl gi y rl Gi : on a classier What we reck r you. It’s like fo k in dr e th ink for a hot because this is the perfect dr d an i rd once the Ve of version ’s winter, but it ow kn e w grab Yes, this over ice, summer’s day. our some of p n r ai Ou ag . t ay ou day aw sun comes and bitch the s, nd ie fr rl u gi 9 per bottle, yo a few of your 99 .9 e price. At $1177. th is n er nc only co n Pop. off with Passio might be better We rate it:

een y s : Cascade Gr What their PR sa on offset beer. is a 100% carb y’s cing the brewer After first redu lifecycle of ll fu print, the ot fo l ta en nm ed with enviro issions associat em s ga se ou nh of the the gree om the picking fr t gh ri – n ee Cascade Gr cling bin – are g it in the recy in tt pu to ps ho the emissions net impact of e th ng ni ea m , offset o. reduced to zer for the beer is feel guilt–free : Now you can on ck re e w t ha W get pissed ent when you nm ro vi en e th about tal concerns ds. Environmen with your frien ? We’re happy ss the taste test aside, does it pa is yes. The beer at the answer th e nc u no an to seems like e taste, although ad sc Ca at th s retain emium beer. ion of their pr rs ve n w do ed a water We rate it:

What their PR say s : Im ported “from Sweden wit h love”, new non–alcohol beverage Nex ic cite is an in fusion of five natural herbal extr acts with libido–enhan cing qualit ie s for a refres lift. Possess hing energ ing stimula y ting qualitie carbonated s , th drink is an is lightly alluring ad available from ult beverag independen e now t liquor sto res. What we rec kon: We trie d it on ice lime and an with a das even larger h of splash of g refreshing. in . It was qu But what ite we really w the claim of anted to te libido o–enhancin s t w as tried the d g qualities. rink and n Four of us o one seemed usual, but any hornier we only dr than ank half a of the full bo tt le each ins thing. Maybe te ad y ou bottle to be need to dr come a hor ink the wh n ole ba g? Send us do try it an a letter if y d it works ou for you. We rate it:

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Words by Elle Morrell and Lizza Gebilagin

Sustainable travel guide Going on a holiday doesn’t mean taking a break from being eco-friendly. The Australian Conservation Foundation gives you their top ten tips on taking care of the environment while you have a great time on holiday.

Only wash good things downstream

When you’re camping, make sure you take biodegradable sanitary products with you that will not harm aquatic life. If you’re camping near waterways, you should bring vegetable soap, toothpaste with no ammonium or Sodium Lauryl Sulphate (SLS), herbal shampoos and moisturisers. And, even though your mates think water bogs are the funniest thing ever, only use toilet facilities provided.

Take out what you take in

How often have you had empty beer bottles, half-eaten pizza crusts and cigarette buttfilled ashtrays scattered around your house after a night of drinking? How shitty were you that your mates didn’t help you round up the bottles so that you didn’t wake up the next morning to a home that smelt like a stale pub? You wouldn’t leave your rubbish lying around and the same rule applies in the natural environment. Come prepared when you’re camping or visiting remote areas – bring a bag to put rubbish in and a portable ashtray for your cigarette butts (film canisters make great ashtrays).

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Save water even on holiday

Even though you’re away from home remember to continue having a four minute shower to help conserve your adopted community’s water supply. Turn the tap off when you’re brushing your teeth. Check the water supply is healthy to drink otherwise you may need to boil or purify it first. Finally, if you’re staying in a hotel opt to only have your towels washed weekly rather than daily.

Don’t take souvenirs from nature As pretty as the natural environment is, it is not a good idea to collect souvenirs from nature, like bones, feathers and shells, unless the local authorities don’t mind. This way you’re leaving the place as you found it for the next visitor, local animals and future generations.

ECO CHOICES

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Find eco friendly businesses

Do some research before you depart. There are many credible ecotourism accreditation programs now available. Look out for green globes, respecting our culture and other eco certified tourism at www.qualitytourism.com.au to support ecologically responsible businesses.

Ditch the plane

OK, so we’re not suggesting that you replace a plane flight from Melbourne to London with a year long boat trip, battling high seas, warding off rats, and swallowing down seasickness. That is a bit extreme. But if you are travelling reasonable distances and have the luxury of time, why not opt to take the scenic train or coach route? Plane travel emits a lot of pollution. Avoiding one return flight around the same distance between Melbourne to Sydney saves 500kg CO2. That’s more than five times more greenhouse emissions than a bus.

Get to know the local heritage

Take a guided tour by a credible operator to find out how the environment has been cared for over time. Learn from traditional stories and contemporary practices of how communities are caring for the land. Remember to always consider cultural sensitivities – if in doubt ask first, for example, before you take a photo or walk somewhere.

Stick to the track

Adventuring is always fun when you’re travelling but it’s important to stay on the track when you’re driving and hiking, especially in bad weather. Otherwise you can disturb nesting grounds, cause erosion or inadvertently tread on sacred ground.

Work for leisure

Contribute to the area you’re visiting by spending a day on a rehabilitation project or volunteering for a local farmer during harvesting season. Record flora and fauna seen on your hike and report any adversities to the local ranger.

Look but don’t touch

Only dive in designated areas and don’t bring up any souvenirs. Make sure you aren’t wearing any body lotions and stop yourself from touching aquatic life or coral. If you’re exploring a cave, don’t climb on the formations or touch them as natural body oils from the fingers cause erosion.

More Information For more ideas on eco-friendly travel, visit the Australian Conservation Foundation at www.acf.org.au.

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SPOTLIGHT ON...

H T I R N E P

According to the media, the Western Sydney suburb of Penrith is a hive of crime and the abode of working-class families whose unemployed, flannelette-wearing teenagers roam the streets with their toddler in one hand and a VB in the other. Local resident, Ally Lois, finds out if there is more to it. Photos by Ben Peake and Ally Lois

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fter growing up in the nearby Blue Mountains, it was too easy to write-off Penrith as little more than a cultural and social wasteland. But I now live in Penrith, and with the wisdom of retrospection and a degree of clemency, I would say that in reality it probably isn’t all that different from most other parts of Sydney. Although Penrith is burdened with the stereotype of the ‘Westie’, there is a lot more to it. You just have to know where to look.

A pinch of history and a dash of culture The Penrith region was first explored and settled from 1789, making it one of the oldest regions developed by Europeans in Australia. Nestled at the foot of the Blue Mountains and overlooking the NepeanRiver, Penrith is thought to be named after Penrith in Cumbria, England. Right in the middle of town, the newly upgraded Joan Sutherland Performing Arts Centre is Penrith’s cultural heart, offering regular concerts and theatre productions. On the banks of the Nepean River, locals enjoy live jazz music over Sunday lunch at the Rowing Club or journey up the river on the historic Nepean Belle Paddlewheeler.

More than drag-racing and drinking Penrith offers shopping delights at the weekly markets, as well as a diversion for art lovers at the Penrith Regional Gallery & The Lewers Bequest. A variety of local restaurants dotting the CBD and the recent upgrade of Penrith Plaza has worked to improve the suburb’s image and offers locals various after dark options that don’t involve drag-racing, excessive drinking and street violence. The Sydney International Regatta Centre, which was built for the 2000 Sydney Olympics, is another venue that has put Penrith on the map for reasons other than unemployment rates, youth crime and rugby league.

Back to drinking and games Then there’s Panthers World of Entertainment with pokies as far as the eye can see, plus a wide range of restaurants, live entertainment, bars, and accommodation. When losing money at the club no longer seems fun, locals have the option to head to nearby Aqua Golf, conveniently opened until 1am on Fridays and Saturdays. It’s basically a driving range with floating targets on the lake. The game is already challenging if you are sober, and a lot of fun after a few schooners.

Penrith people still wear fluoro

In search of the Westie

Leather and it’s cigarettes –aple a Penrith st

in sight, nnelette or VB There was no fla an with m a d an a clown but we did find tie be an . Could the Wes an orange afro in Penrith? extinct species

sident Only a Penrithsfreully es could succ e the ‘fro reappropriated Aussies for redhead

Aaaw, it’s the Veronicas’ baby sister

Penrith people read porn

No Westie here 015

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AUSSIE WRITER TRAVIS DANIELS AND HIS MATES LEAVE A TRAIL OF SMASHED CAB DOORS, BROKEN MOTORCYCLES, AND USED CONDOMS IN PENANG, MALAYSIA.

ou know that great stories are going to come out of an overseas work trip with a bunch of sex-starved Aussie males, especially when work means being isolated from women for a while. Day one of our Malaysian trip begins pretty much as anticipated. We hop on a bus to tour the historical sites of Penang and fall asleep as our guide goes on and on in Bahasa Malay – a language none of us understand. He was probably describing its history of local rule, followed by British rule, a war and for a brief moment Japanese occupation, the end of the war and then some more British rule, followed by local rule with some communist turbulence thrown in for good measure.

Night falls and the bus full of Aussie men are finally let loose onto the dim streets of Penang in search of food, beer and women. It doesn’t take long before we realise that all are equally attainable. What does take us longer to establish is that the quality of an item is generally reflected in its price, which is negotiable and can be subject to a group discount. After several rounds of drinks at Hong Kong bar with my mates MC (Mad Cunt – a name he earned after our first night together on the piss) and JD (those are just the first two initials in his name), we catch a cab in search of another drinking hole. As we near our destination,

MC tells the driver to stop so we can get out. Blessed with the gift of sobriety, the driver informs us that this is not a good place to disembark and requests that we remain inside the cab until he has pulled off the middle of the road. MC disagrees with the driver and politely informs him that we’re getting out. He opens the door right into the path of an oncoming motorcycle. We disown all responsibility for the broken cab door and bits of smashed plastic. MC gives the cab driver 12 Ringgit for the cab fare and we quickly disappear across the road and into the nearest bar, Slippery Senoirita’s.

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BACKPACKER POSTCARDS

FACTS ABOUT PENANG How many people live in Penang?

1.469 million

How many languages are spoken?

Malay, English, Chinese, Indian

What religions are practised?

Islam, Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism

What can you get in trouble for possessing? Pornography, flick knives good from Israel How can I get there?

A cheap flight from Sydney to Penang starts from $728 without taxes on www.lastminute.com.au*

*This price was correct on 1/4/08, travelling between 4th June 2008 and 28th June 2008.

At 4am the bar closes due to a disturbance, so we move on before the police arrive. We’re no more than 50 metres down the street when we’re pounced on by a bunch of what seem to be local girls. It’s not until closer inspection that it’s clear that these girls aren’t all they make out to be. I continue to make my way down the street towards the next bar, assuming that my mates are following. In the commotion behind me I hear MC sealing a 40 Ringgit deal (about AU$15), the contents of which involve fellatio, followed by the option to upgrade should the need arise. Unbeknown to MC the girl is actually a dude. I make a conscious decision to let events evolve without intervention. Five minutes later I’m at the bar by myself, JD has disappeared, and I’m confronted with an ugly looking concoction of Jack Daniel’s and coke. I decide now is a good time to check in with MC. I stagger slowly towards the dilapidated building I saw him disappear into just a few minutes earlier. I bang loudly on the door yelling his name.

“Fuck off, she’s mine,” comes the reply. Tears of laughter well in my eyes. I knock again and insist on being let in. Once again I am told to fuck off. Again I knock this time yelling, “She’s a dude!” Silence ensues. Finally, the door opens. A naked figure appears wearing nothing but a rapidly deflating condom. “Are you serious?” comes his sheepish reply. Despite his state of drunken stupor he still fathoms the ramifications of his actions. It’s not that my mates and I are homophobic, buts there’s a lot of fun to be made at the expense of a man who has unwittingly had his dick sucked by another man. Another few seconds pass and my friend decides it’s time to confront his $15 temptress. He turns to face her on the other side of the room. “Are you like me?” he yells at her. “I no understand,” comes the reply. “Do you have a penis?” he replies. “Yes I like you, I have penis.”

As we’re walking back down the street to our hotel we agree to never, ever tell anyone about what has just transpired. MC is now desperate to put things right. In the distance we hear a tri-shaw driver yell, “You want woman, you want girl?” He immediately beings to foam at the mouth. A few minutes and 150 Ringgit later a new deal has been struck. A girl is on order and on her way up to our hotel room. I’m asleep when I hear a knock on the door. By now it’s 5:30 am. My first night in Malaysia ends to the sound of drunken grunts from my mate and shrieks from a Malaysian prostitute. At least this one appears female.

: a i l a r t s u a p

u g n i n Clea

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b o j e h t n for

POLITICS Community consultation or political posturing? Rudd made two kinds of promises during the election. The ﬁrst was related to general policy issues (the standard practice of oﬀering bribes), and the second was on the method of government itself – a promise to make it more accountable, accessible and inclusive of the general community. This was to be achieved by electoral reform, increased consultation and community cabinet meetings.

hen Bruce Wayne returned to Gotham City, he donned the identity of Batman and proceeded to clean up the corruption that had infiltrated every last corner – from organised crime running the streets to the police, courts and corporations. Our new Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, has been tasked with cleaning up Australia after 12 long years of the Howard Government. And the same way that Batman became a symbol of hope for Gotham residents who had grown used to things being terrible for so long, Rudd’s entrance brought its own form of joyful optimism: a fresh take on the environmental crisis, peeling back the previous government’s industrial relations laws and finally saying sorry to the Stolen Generations. But while it’s a nice idea that one masked man can single-handedly sweep away the rotten corruption of an entire city, that’s a comic book fantasy. Will Rudd really live up to all the lofty expectations we’ve placed on him? Kate Gauthier investigates.

The community cabinet meetings – a few of which have already happened – is where cabinet meets the locals in some off the beaten track town, instead of the politicians’ usual base of Canberra. At some point the locals come for tea and scones, and tell the ministers of their concerns. This is supposed to keep ministers in touch with the people, but it’s hard to see how such a novelty one-off event will have an impact on the grand scheme of things. It reeks of political posturing. The real point here is that MPs are supposed to keep in contact with their electorate as part of their job, but generally, their efforts in doing this are extremely poor. Staffing issues are one of the sticking points as far as this goes. Few staff come from the local electorate and most advisers are just members of the MPs political party, with limited interest or knowledge of local issues. The result is that rather than the best and brightest being hired, jobs are given only to those the ministers can trust, AKA jobs for their boys. While part of a staffer’s job is political, most of it is policy. There needs to be reform of the employment practices of politicians, particularly when so many of the jobs are not even advertised to the general public. Rudd has started to deliver on the promise of community consultations in other ways. The 2020 Summit is one example. The summit engaged 1,000 Australians to plot the future of the country in ten key policy areas. This initiative shows some promise, but the dangers of political posturing still exist. Sometimes such events are used by government to give lip service to the idea of consultation – after all, they’ve already talked to the community at this gig, why would they need to do it anymore throughout the rest of their term? Maybe Rudd is genuinely committed to a more open, accountable and broadly representative government, and hopefully some concrete, positive results will come out of the summit. CORKER

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Defending the environment, indigenous community, and asylum seekers When it comes to some of the loftier moral ambitions of the Rudd Government, the most important promises of the election for many were related to moral and environmental concerns, rather than the hip pocket – in stark contrast to the Howard era. An apology to the Stolen Generations, signing the Kyoto Protocol and closing the Pacific Solution camp for asylum seekers – all three promises have been kept, but these were only the first step in a long road to reform. While the usual old cronies have argued that saying ‘sorry’ is an empty symbolic gesture that will have little positive impact, Phil Glendenning, president of ANTaR, strongly disagrees. Heading up a peak body for indigenous issues campaigning, Glendenning claims that, “Justice for Indigenous Australians is more than a symbolic national aspiration. The continual denial of justice diminishes us all.” ANTaR’s position is that this gesture needs to be followed by taking up the other recommendations made in the report into the Stolen Generations, which advocates compensation. He argues that a denial of this would ignore a legal precedent for compensation that would be available to any non-Indigenous person who suffered the same treatment. In other words, this denial is itself racist. Ed Coper, campaign coordinator for online political campaigners GetUp, suggests that while Rudd is prepared to deliver on ‘gestures’, he might not be so bold when follow-up work is required. “The simple fact is the jury’s still out on the Rudd Government – they’ve made some really promising gestures, but on areas that were relatively easy to deliver … the true test will come in areas that can expose the government to political damage, where we’ll see just how bold they are prepared to be.”

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Show me the money One of the difficulties facing Rudd and co. is the impending recession – yep, we’ve already started on the downward spiral. The big boys of finance have simply been under-reporting their losses to buy time to improve their position, circle the wagons and otherwise squirrel away their nuts before the market takes a nosedive and the rest of us realise the recession has arrived. Drops in the share price of major Australian companies and skyrocketing foreclosures on mortgages are two of two scariest indicators. So how is Rudd planning on dodging this impending economic shit storm? As the single largest spender of cash in the Australian economy, he’s taken the stance of reducing government spending by up to $5 billion in this year’s budget in order to reduce inflationary pressure. This will undoubtedly mean cancelling some of his rather expensive election promises. What can he do to avoid being seen as just another lying pollie? Well, there’s an old joke about communist Cold War leader Khrushchev. When he came to power there were two envelopes left by his predecessor containing instructions on handling a crisis. When he hit his first problem he opened the first letter, which said “Blame everything on the former leader.” Khrushchev followed the instructions and got himself out of political danger. When he had another crisis and opened the second letter, it instructed him to “sit down and write two letters.” Kev will get a free ride in his first budget by using the time-honoured technique of blaming the previous government for why he can’t afford to deliver on his election promises. So perhaps it’s a good idea to chop one or two of his greasy election pork barrels. This will only work once: after that he’s on his own, and if there’s any more of those nasty broken promises then he may just need to sit down and write two letters.

Will the Dark Knight deliver? Rudd is gradually getting the job done. He’s cleaning up those filthy Gotham streets, and in mid ’08 he’s already been responsible for several seismic shifts in the political landscape. So the caped crusader may just yet live up to all the hope that has been invested in him. But a key problem for Rudd is that after 11 years under Howard, Australia has swung very far to the right. If Rudd’s policies move too quickly back to the centre, they risk being portrayed by those rascally villains of the right, Alan ‘The Joker’ Jones, Gerard ‘Two Face’ Henderson and Miranda ‘Poison Ivy’ Devine, as radical left reform. Ed Coper from GetUp agrees. “Rudd has a mandate to act on all the points of difference that separated him from John Howard, not the similarities, but doesn’t want to repeat the Whitlam Government’s style of ‘too much change, too quickly’.” This is why Rudd cannot go too far in his first term, otherwise he risks a mighty backlash. Although former PM Gough Whitlam might have become quite unpopular due to his radical reform ideas, several decades on they don’t seem quite so unsettling; free university and equal opportunities for women are good examples. Within time, the corrupt heart of Gotham might just warm to the ambitious plans that Batman has for the people of his city.

Illustration by Dennis Juan Ma

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“For many intravenous drug users, addiction is not a lifestyle choice and I had to be very conscious of their right not to be photographed. I used this approach to distinguish myself from the morally bankrupt modus operandi of certain mainstream media operatives who would hide down laneways with long telephoto lenses.”

Photographer Dean Sewell’s job – his passion – is to crawl into the sorts of marginalised places we see each night on the news, to bypass the standard mainstream schlock and get the real story. He moved to Russia in 1996 to cover the Chechen crisis when the rest of us were nestled at home enjoying Seinfeld in its prime, photographed battle-scarred East Timor in 1999, and faced up to the desolation left by the Tsunami in Aceh, Indonesia in 2004. Life-altering experiences, sure, but neither the bloodied earth of Russia or East Timor, or the broken lives of Aceh are as personal to Sewell as the passion he has for The Block in Redfern.

Indigenous Australians. Since then The Block has lost its way, with many of the homes demolished in a bid to curb its reputation as Sydney’s drug shopping centre. Now the top-end of town wants to go further and level the entire area to accommodate a litany of dens for latte sippers. The AHC, on the other hand, wants another crack at cleaning the area up with a view to resurrect The Block as the deﬁnitive inner-city haven for Indigenous Australia. This mass of land is now as politically charged as ever, but its true story is rarely told as honestly as it is in Sewell’s photographs.

The Block is currently the focal point where issues of inner-city gentriﬁcation, drug culture, and white Australia’s responsibility to preserve Aboriginal city culture collide. In 1973, after Aboriginal tenants of the area were evicted en masse, the Whitlam Government transferred ownership of the area to the Aboriginal Housing Company (AHC) in a bid to develop low-cost inner-city housing for

We caught up with Dean Sewell to chat about The Block, his photos, and what he sets out to achieve when he picks up his camera.

Words by James Ellis

PHOTO ESSAY

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What’s the story behind your passion and motivation for photography? I can’t say that photography for me was a childhood dream. It was literally a stab in the dark at a career path that eventually overwhelmed me and one I’ve never looked back on. I guess on reﬂection, it would be fair to say that a deep vein runs through my work that aims to give people a moment of pause, if only long enough to shake them from their Gucci trances and consider the consequences of their actions (or lack of) on their fellow human beings and the environment in which they live. What criteria or feeling or idea do you look for when you take a photo? You must be there for the right reason to begin with. There are too many urban cowboys running around in hostile environments today trying to make a name for themselves. I’ve never taken on an assignment where I haven’t had a complete sense of purpose in being there. I am not a war photographer and I don’t 030

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go searching out death and destruction. I am drawn to certain issues through a particular aﬃnity with that time and place. I don’t aim at producing a solitary statement through the single image; I try to see the big picture. When working on a story I am driven by a strong sense of narrative, operating very much as a writer might with the considerations of introduction, main body and conclusion always in the back of my mind. Your work on The Block was showcased in Visa Pour L’Image Festival of Photojournalism in France. What sort of response did the international community provide? My work on The Block received wide coverage throughout Europe, in particular in France and Italy. It was surprising for them to see this side of Indigenous Australians. Very little work is produced on our urban Indigenous Australians and most of the stuﬀ seen overseas are the clichéd images of Aboriginals in red dirt environments adorned in body paint with didgeridoos and message sticks.

Cruising through a drugaddled neighbourhood is likely to be as threatening as it is sobering.

PHOTO ESSAY

Why do you feel so personally connected to your work on The Block? I grew up in Botany and spent a lot of my time as a kid hanging out in La Perouse with Aboriginal kids who I went to primary school with. As I grew and my photographic career developed I became increasingly pissed with how our mainstream media were dealing with the issues faced in The Block and, in particular, the treatment it was being dealt by newspaper photographers. I had been freelance for one year before I tuned my attention to The Block: I thought it was time to put some balance back into the equation. Cruising through a drug-addled neighbourhood is likely to be as threatening as it is sobering. How did you approach the task of photographing addicts in the act? My photography is about trust. I didn’t take an image for the ﬁrst two or three weeks when I began down The Block. I started by listening to people, the issues and their personal stories to develop a mutual trust and rapport. And most important for me ethically was the issue of consent – particularly with the use of drugs. I would ask each and every person every time before I would photograph them using drugs. For many intravenous drug users, addiction is not a lifestyle choice and I had to be very conscious of their right not to be photographed. I used this approach to distinguish myself from the morally bankrupt modus operandi of certain mainstream media operatives who would hide down laneways with long telephoto lenses. Did your photos on The Block inspire action? If so, amongst whom? I don’t know if I’d say they have inspired action. Certainly they have provided an insight into contemporary urban Indigenous life and the demise of The Block. But whether I could say they inspired action would be too hard to quantify. This work has had far more play overseas than it has here as there are very few outlets or people willing to show it. What would you like to see your work on The Block accomplish? I would just like to keep people informed on how their inherent apathy toward Indigenous people in this country has contributed to the increased marginalisation and the now almost complete removal of perhaps Sydney’s last bastion of inner urban Indigenous people. CORKER

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The Block requires governments on both sides of the divide to cease using it for their own cheap political expediency.

After visiting the area, what sort of government support do you think The Block needs? The Block requires governments on both sides of the divide to cease using it for their own cheap political expediency. After the Whitlam Government handed back The Block for Aboriginal self-determination in 1973, consecutive Liberal and Labor Governments have both exploited and chipped away at the community, forcing its occupants to the fringes of greater Sydney. You’re involved in a website with a collection of other Aussie photographers – oculi.com.au – what was the catalyst for that? By the mid to late 90s there was a whole generation of young photographers extremely restless and hell bent on redeﬁning the Australian photographic landscape. Be it perceived or real (history will have the ﬁnal say), the industry that we supported – and vice versa – failed to keep up with our progression. The internet at the time was exploding with possibility and we required a vehicle that would carry our brand of photography to the world, so by 2000 Oculi was spawned. Finally, what’s next for Dean Sewell? I have a few stories on the boil that will take priority over the next two to three years. I am currently working on a three year project on the Murray-Darling Basin which is a combination of both social documentary and art-based work. But that spike in the back of the brain that jolts your conscience into action will no doubt strike me again. When it will happen next and for what reason, I can’t yet say. 032

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e h T : y p o C Cut nd coming o c e s he Cutters t f o 028

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MUSIC FEATURE

erson t f bands o a l u P f d s n a u h g all ing By An ith just a sm ssful in bring

Photos courtesy of Universal Music

long w been most succe music, Australia’s who’ve ether with dance l indie/electro rock tog your quintessentiar saying they’re e o Cut Copyutadr on’t mistake thaot bfand. Instead, band. B erage’ indie/electr or creating the It’s your ‘av been responsible fas tried to follow. e they’ve t everyone else h ks, but in 2008 th ore blueprin hile between drinacclaimed sophom been a w’ are back with an es how it’s done. ‘Cutters o show the wannab album t CORKER

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“We’re actually in Texas at the moment,” Tim Hoey says down the phone line. Hoey plays guitar with Cut Copy, and was largely responsible for bringing such an authentic indie rock sound to the group when he hooked up with vocalist, dance music producer and founding member Dan Whitford in Melbourne back in 2003 (drummer Mitchell Scott joined shortly after). But it’s where Hoey is located that throws me off just a little as we begin our conversation, because at the time of speaking, Cut Copy’s sophomore album In Ghost Colours is on the cusp of its Australian release. You’d expect that they’d be locked and loaded back home for local promotional duties. Not so. But this demonstrates just how international the band’s appeal is. “I think we’ve kind of neglected our overseas audience for a year or so,” Hoey says. “We were so busy in Australia touring last year,” he says referring to the extensive touring the band did after unveiling a special sneak peak of the album, “Hearts on Fire”. But whether their international fans were feeling neglected or not, it was something the band quickly rectified after we finished talking. Barely flying back into the country to unveil In Ghost Colours with a few shows at the V Festival across the country, the boys hopped straight back on a plane for an extended bout of touring across the UK, Europe and America. Which all emphasises the fact that for a band with as much appeal as Cut Copy, it ain’t just about the Australian market anymore.

MODULAR RECORDS To Infinity and Beyond

Words by Jonno Seidler

The music mags have always warned us not to believe the hype. But then they could never have predicted the absolute juggernaut that is Modular Records, a label that takes hype, showers it in crunk juice and sends it straight for the dance floor. We should have seen it coming. After all, founder Steve Pavlovic is the man who famously brought Nirvana down under when nobody had a clue who the hell Kurt Cobain was. Pavlovic also saw the potential in the “pretentious little cunt” that teenage Ben Lee was before the whole country caught his disease. These days, Modular boasts one of the strongest artist rosters in the world, with an emphasis on electro that preceded the international trend by a good few years.

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“We were always worried whether, with a few years between releases, we’d still have an audience overseas. But our first LA and New York shows sold out in a couple of hours. It was really refreshing to hear that… All the shows in Europe and UK have been really big too, especially places that we hadn’t played in before, which we were really surprised by.” And this was all based on the goodwill already built up among their fans, before anyone got a whiff of a followup album; all drawn from love for their debut Bright Like Neon Love, originally released way back in 2004. This was in stark contrast to when the band released its debut EP I Thought of Numbers; their sound was essentially pretty similar, but at that stage nobody really cared and there definitely wasn’t any scene for them to be a part of. No-fuss rock music was in vogue and Cut Copy’s attempts at reviving a New Order style rock/dance fusion didn’t really fit in with what was going on at the time. Eventually this changed, and Dan Whitford and his cohorts lead the charge in showing the world that Australia could do indie/electro better than anyone else. The cool cats at Modular Records helped spread the word all across the globe and the trio’s presence was further strengthened by performances in clubs as the ‘Cut Copy DJs’. It resulted in the opportunity to mix a dance compilation for London club Fabric, one of Europe’s favourite dance destinations. But as popular as the band may have become, in 2008 it’s time for the second coming of the Cutters.

Pavlovic is credited with unearthing some of Australia’s finest talent, including The Presets and Cut Copy, who have both feet firmly planted in the commercial stratosphere of dance-rock. Add DJ-berserk outfit The Avalanches, brooding-shoegazers Ghostwood and the bubblegum-synthriot Muscles to the mix and it’s easy to see why Modular has exploded so quickly. And, as if that wasn’t enough, Pav and co. have decided to test foreign waters, with offices open in New York and London, bringing in acts like The Klaxons, NYPC and MSTRKRFT. Back in their Sydney digs it is still Pavlovic who spearheads the label, with the legend being that he personally attends each band’s gigs before giving them the thumbs up. From a humble indie label, Modular has transformed into a cultural institution, thanks to its aggressive promotion strategies, non-stop touring and world-famous parties. Hype, we barely knew thee.

s y a w l a s i sic u m p o p , y he p t o C h g t u u o C r h h t t i I think w he motif that runs ed to take t t n a e b w o e t w g , d n i e n i n k go o e s i W h . t m h it al e w r t c i u l B e . d d e n h u c so . sy d p r i a e e w r o t i m b t it into a bi hen pop music gets a of like it w

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When pop music gets weird

Taking it international

In Ghost Colours has been in the stores for a few months now, and it’s proved itself to be one of the essential purchases of ’08. As we expected, it’s an album that draws together the sweaty live energy of an indie-rock gig with the synths and bleeps of house and electronica. This, along with the ever-present ’80s influence, is something the band have been widely known for since they first started gaining popularity, and similar to many of the other Australian acts they share the stage (and a record label) with. But this is all just a distraction. What’s really drawn fans back in has been the emotion-drenched pop melodies. We already had a taste from the singles “Lights and Music”, “So Haunted” and the before-mentioned “Hearts on Fire”; but this was even more pronounced on the final release that hit the streets in March. It’s an album of really strong choruses, and bar a few ambient interludes that are strategically placed to build the atmosphere, it’s the pop melodies of the album that really stand out.

Even prior to all the buzz surrounding the new album, it’s amazing just how much of a foothold Cut Copy managed to gain overseas, particularly when considering that 10 years ago, an Australian band making such an impact was nearly unheard of. Unless you’re talking about AC/DC or INXS, it just didn’t happen. It says enough about how much the musical landscape has changed when a band like Cut Copy can visit a country for the very first time and be greeted by an existing crowd of fans.

“I think with Cut Copy, pop music is always going to be the motif that runs through the sound. But with this one, we wanted to take it into a bit more a psychedelic realm. We kind of like it when pop music gets a bit weird.” The album’s success is attributed to Whitford becoming a more confident singer, and the three of them together trying to be a little bit more ambitious in terms of what they could do with the record. And the results speak for themselves: while the choruses grab you on the surface, there’s a textured lushness to the sounds that goes a lot deeper than that. Whitford’s expressive vocals give the album a haunting undertone, which lifts it from being good to great. Basically, it’s just one big euphoric rush from beginning to end.

“And I love playing overseas, because it’s kind of like wiping the slate clean. You get a bit comfortable in Australia, and [touring overseas] keeps you on your toes. You’ve got to always put on a good show. You don’t want to fly all that way for nothing.”

But forget any smug self-satisfaction at being responsible for one of the year’s best albums. More than anything, they’re just relieved to have it out. It does feel like forever since they released Bright Like Neon Love; four years is a long time in rock music, and a lot of fans wondered whether we’d ever be seeing Cut Copy again. “Because of the delayed release of Bright Like Neon Love worldwide, it extended our touring for so long. And it feels like over the last year we’ve been waiting on other people, for record labels to sync things up and all that other kind of boring stuff… We’ve been sitting on it for quite some time, and that can get really frustrating.” And he’s not exaggerating: it was way back in March ’07 that the band recorded the album in New York. “I guess that’s just the nature of the industry. Certainly for next time we’ll want to try and do things a lot quicker and a bit differently... We’re just really excited for people to be hearing it finally. Our audience has been neglected, so it’s time for them, to hear some new music.”

“The internet and tools like MySpace have helped that even more over the past 12 months,” Hoey says. “We always had the intention of taking our music overseas. When we first started out there wasn’t even a local audience for that kind of music. We were lucky enough to have a few bands overseas that were into us and were willing to take us on tour over there, so we’ve been really lucky in that sense.”

It’s almost like we can’t claim ownership of Cut Copy anymore; they belong to the rest of the world as much as they belong to Australia. And yeah, there’s nothing wrong with going out to check out what the world has to offer. Just don’t be gone for too long, ya hear.

Cut Copy are back in Australia during June for an extensive national tour in support of In Ghost Colours, out now through Modular/Universal. CORKER

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PHOTO THEATRE ESSAY

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M o o ch & do drugs By Dom Alessio

re we becoming a society of freewheeling, guiltless party animals, content to stave off inevitable adult maturity for as long as we can? Or is prolonged adolescence a generational shift; a rethinking of the traditional lifespan categories? On the verge of turning 30, playwright Tommy Murphy explores these questions in his play Saturn’s Return.

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Should adolescence necessarily finish when we turn 20? Do we have to be married by the time we’ve hit the big 3 – 0, be burdened by a massive mortgage with a crippling interest rate, children, a full-time job, and relinquish our teenage fantasies? Playwright Tommy Murphy is asking these same questions, and channelling his inquisitiveness into a new theatre production, Saturn’s Return. The play revolves around a couple staring point-blank at the looming shadows of adult responsibility – babies, houses, marriage – and turning 30. It’s a production that flitters in and out of reality, as the two central characters draw out the ghosts of people from their past and travel to different locales and periods of time, trying to decide whether maturity is more fulfilling than adolescent freedom. The impetus for their fantastical investigation is motivated by the female lead’s fertility anxiety, and the questions she’s asking herself about whether she should have a baby now, and whether she should have it with her partner. And if you’re wondering why she doesn’t have a name, that’s because she doesn’t have one… yet. “It’s just this thing,” Murphy sighs. “I always sort of stress over it, but it feels like you don’t really know the characters until you find a name that really sticks, so her name changes almost daily at the moment.” Murphy first wrote a draft of the play where the characters were turning 40, rather than 30. “I realised no, there is something very particular about facing 30 and something very particular about it right now, and so it was that end of a prolonged adolescence and responsibility knocking that I wanted to write about. And hopefully also to write in a voice that I have quite a bit of authority on, being, you know, my age,” he adds with a laugh.

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Which is exactly where the idea for the play came from. At the tail end of his 20s, Murphy’s sister informed him he was about to enter his Saturn Return phase, a time when Saturn would be in the same position in the universe as it was when he was born. In astrology, this phase is usually denoted by a time of contemplation, of accepting responsibility or choosing to offset it for a while longer. So not only would the title Saturn’s Return make no sense if the characters were any older, but, as Murphy says, there’s something momentous about turning 30. “I was interested in what particularly happens before 30 and also what responsibility our generation might be being asked to examine and embrace,” he says. Particularly in the 21st century, the notion of prolonged adolescence is at the heart of Generation Y. It’s not an idea that would have been discussed in the 1980s. “Yeah, you’re right,” agrees Murphy. “I think there is a prolonged adolescence now, which I think in many ways is a very good thing.” On the surface, a prolonged adolescence may appear to be no more than a bunch of lazy, irresponsible 20-somethings looking to shirk adulthood for as long as they can while they continue to do weekly lines of coke, drink to excess, indulge their sexual freedom and then stumble back to their parents’ house when the sun is rising. But, I offer to Murphy, with the average life expectancy increasing, perhaps it’s reasonable to think that so too would the loosely defined phases of our lives, like adolescence. If we’re going to be working ‘til we drop to pay off the debts that weigh us down, why not enjoy life while we’re still young and active? “It’s a positive idea,” says Murphy. “It’s not saying, ‘Generation wake up and take on responsibility’, even though that idea is there in this play. I think it’s more about enjoying the fact that we have a prolonged adolescence and there is something progressive about that.” The driving force behind the play’s discussion is our nameless heroine. And like a musician for his instruments, Murphy holds a deep affection for the characters he’s created, and admits writing this particular character has been extremely fun. “That’s kind of why I invented her,” he explains. “She seems to be full of possibilities and she’s courageous in terms of testing things of her life, and testing the possibilities and boundaries of her own life. I think people are drawn to this character because she’s a very reckless person and when she sees she’s going through this big

transformation and upheaval in her life, she does a really wide ranging investigation of that change.” The reckless side of the character is introduced early on in the piece when she proposes that she and her partner partake in a threesome. “She says let’s sort of test those things and asks ‘Why don’t we have more threesomes?’ The ‘Why don’t we’ grows and grows,” Murphy says. Sex in theatre can be a difficult subject to broach, something which he’s definitely aware of. “I can’t avoid it at the moment,” admits Murphy, whose previous work was the extremely popular Holding The Man, based on the memoirs of the Australian writer and actor Timothy Conigrave and his 15-year homosexual relationship with his partner John Caleo. “I saw [Saturn’s Return] going down that route. I was writing the dialogue and she says something about a threesome and I was like ‘Fuck, again, here we go’, and trying to justify it: sex is the body politic or whatever. But no, it’s just… I dunno, just a horny playwright,” he says with a laugh. “And fuck yeah I love sex,” he continues with gusto, “And I think people should talk about it more. I think we shouldn’t be shy of it, we should get together in a room and turn off the lights and giggle about it. That’s one thing theatre can do, and that’s very good for us.” Perhaps we’re not delaying responsibility then, but just holding onto the joie de vivre of youth for as long as we can. Peter Pan was lucky – he never had to think about growing up. The rest of us, though, aren’t blessed with eternal youth, so what’s wrong with having a little fun while we’re still young? Saturn’s Return plays as part of the Sydney Theatre Company’s Wharf 2LOUD program at Wharf 2, Walsh Bay from 15 August 2008.

After the interview, Murphy settled on the name “Zara” for his leading lady.

THEATRE

o “On the surface, a prolonged adolescence may appear to be no more than a bunch of lazy, irresponsible 20-somethings looking to shirk off adulthood for as long as they can while they continue to do weekly lines of coke, drink to excess, indulge their sexual freedom and then stumble back to their parents’ house when the sun is rising.”

am i a man child? As a magazine with a social conscience, we here at Corker are becoming concerned with the increasing tide of individuals who refuse to let go of their adolescence, despite the fact that they’re clearly able to remember where they were for Australia’s bicentennial celebrations. If you feel as though you could be suffering from a severe case of prolonged adolescence, we have devised this fool-proof (read: completely bogus) self-diagnosis quiz so you can discover the early warning signs.

Words by Dom Alessio

Please tick the following if it applies to you: I still live with my parents Weekends are solely for drinking My most prized possession is my Xbox/PS3/Wii Porn is a suitable substitute for a girl/boyfriend Why work full-time when you get paid more to be on casual rates? Harold and Kumar are my personal heroes I don’t own a suit/formal dress I wanna rock ‘n’ roll all night and party every day My culinary skills don’t stretch beyond toasted sandwiches 10am is too early to get up If you scored between 8 and 10, GROW UP! If you scored between 5 and 7, then you’re on your way to be a productive member of society. If you scored below 5, welcome to adulthood. If you scored zero, then where’s your sense of fun?

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n s Paterso u g n A y b h Batman t o b Words r o f n nique visio u s is July, ’ h n t a l s o n N r u n t e e rr “Wh y the Joke m e n looking e h d c o r o a w y is l h l o and ample of H x e r dependent e in h t d o n n a a e e s b u tho it’ll ors of ar t c e perhero ir u d s t e s e iv b t a e r h luc to t .” o give the t r e d r o up the ass k ic k e iv cinema in t rea -needed c h c u m a e genr

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ollywood turns to the best indie directors to give credibility to movies about grown ups prancing around in spandex.

All eyes will be on The Dark Knight when it hits the cinema screens this year – but perhaps for all the wrong reasons. After Heath Ledger tragically passed away in January, attention soon turned to what was one of his very last roles: the Joker. It was in director Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight, the edgy sequel to 2005’s Batman Begins, which was a highly successful attempt to reboot one of Hollywood’s biggest film franchises. Shortly before his death, Ledger revealed he had struggled with the role of the sociopathic mass-murderering clown. While he called it “the most fun I’ve ever had, or probably ever will have playing a character,” it also utterly exhausted him. Christopher Nolan says of Ledger: “Having seen the movie myself in such heightened and tragic circumstances… What I found in watching the movie is that you’re not looking at the actor, you’re not looking at the friend, you’re not looking at the colleague. You’re looking at the Joker. He inhabits this character, and it’s an extraordinary icon, so it’s easy to enjoy it on that level, just as a great piece of acting.” When Nolan’s unique vision for both Batman and his arch enemy the Joker returns this July, it’ll be another example of Hollywood looking to the best directors of arthouse and independent cinema in order to give the lucrative superhero genre a much-needed creative kick up the ass. Lets have a look at some of the most interesting examples.

Ang Lee’s The Hulk Taiwanese-born Ang Lee is a chameleon of a director. Responsible for Hong Kong dramas early in his career like The Wedding Banquet and Eat Drink Man Women, he later struck out to direct projects as diverse as American suburban angst flick The Ice Storm, an adaptation of Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility, the Academy Award winning Brokeback Mountain as well as his breakthrough smash, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. And then there was The Hulk, which marked Lee as one of the most interesting (and controversial) choices to ever direct a superhero film. True to its comic book origins, the Hulk himself was painted as a metaphor for what happens when emotional repression bubbles to the surface and just cannot be contained anymore – you get real angry, real green and a lot of stuff gets smashed up. After all, when it comes to emotional repression Lee is an old pro – it’s a constant theme that runs through all of his work, including all the before-mentioned films. The problem here was that audiences were expecting a B-Grade cheese-fest more along the lines of the tacky 70s television show, instead of a subtle, slow-burn drama interspersed with moments of explosive action, which is what Lee delivered. Though it was a commercial hit, critically it was (unfairly) considered a failure by many.

Deep and dramatic as it may have been, Lee still managed to demonstrate he’s just as deft with handling exhilarating action as he is with human drama. The film’s major action set piece – where the Hulk escapes from a desert military base and makes his way to San Francisco, pursued all the while by the US military in full flight – is one of the best of its kind ever seen in a superhero film.

Bryan Singer’s X-Men It’s an understatement to say the fanboys were a little upset when Bryan Singer was chosen as the director to finally bring the revered X-Men comic book mythology to the big screen. But they were forced to eat their words when it turned out to be one of the most successful examples ever (both critically and commercially) of when Hollywood looked to underground cinema for inspiration in the superhero genre. Responsible for indie hits like Public Access and his breakthrough smash The Usual Suspects, Bryan Singer used X-Men to discuss the idea of what it’s like to be a repressed minority, couching it with a plea for tolerance. The super-powered mutants of the film can be seen as a metaphor for ethnicity or sexuality, an idea that held particular sway with Singer because of his own homosexuality. And yeah, it had some wicked action sequences, the X-Men looked awesome, it blew stuff up real good and the sequel turned out to be even more epic.

Christopher Nolan’s Batman Begins The Batman franchise was in dire need of rescuing. While Tim Burton’s ’89 take on the comic book legend was a wickedly fun romp that featured some of the blackest humour ever seen in a major studio blockbuster, the sequels gradually degenerated to the point where they hit rock bottom with Joel Schumacher’s ludicrous Batman & Robin. Featuring the Governator (AKA Arnold Schwarznegger) throwing down some truly rotten one liners as Mr Freeze, it couldn’t possibly have gotten any worse. A total reboot was needed in order to wipe the filthy slate clean. Enter Christopher Nolan. Though still relatively unknown, he’d broken through with the stunning cult hit Momento, a film that completely turned the linear narrative on its head by beginning at the end of the movie and then running the reel backwards (seriously screwing with your head in the process). His inspired idea for Batman Begins was to put the focus on realism, and make the audience understand the reason why a man would dress up in a bat suit and start wailing on criminals. As implausible as this sounds, every last little detail of the film, from Bruce Wayne’s back story as a tortured orphan that witnessed the brutal murder of his parents, to Batman’s sexy hi-tech gadgets, were all utterly believable. Throw in some exhilarating action, and Batman Begins turned out to be a critical and commercial smash, with Nolan proving himself to be a man of impeccable judgment and artistic creativity, as well as a master filmmaker. You’d be well advised to hold your breath for an out-ofthis-world follow-up when The Dark Knight sees release this July.

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CURRENT AFFAIRS

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“It hits you instantly where your heart beats straight away,” says 19-year-old Bruce.* “You are really alert and talkative and you just want more and more. At times it can completely take you over and you can end up in a place where you have this very skewered sense of reality. You know what you’re doing but you don’t consider the consequences because you’re so oﬀ your face.” Bruce experimented with ice before it cornered the mainstream market and he has been a recreational user ever since. “I discovered ice under really random circumstances. One day I skipped school with a friend and went to her brother’s house. He was an ice addict. He oﬀered it to us and we

tried it. Ice was something I had wanted to try for a long time, and I was really excited about it,” he admits. “I started using ice when it wasn’t a widely publicised drug. Had I known more about it, I never would have tried it.” At $50 a hit, the eﬀects last him all night. And, given its 80 percent potency compared to speed’s 20 percent, it is known to inﬂict users with an intense charge that lasts up to 16 hours. The substance can be swallowed, snorted, injected intravenously, anally inserted or smoked through a pipe. Bruce prefers to do the latter before he goes out clubbing, taking it with a cocktail of coke and ecstasy because he doesn’t like taking ice on its own. CORKER

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But ‘Ice Addict’ is an ugly term that Bruce doesn’t want to be labelled by. After all, he has come from a normal middle class background. He grew up in the southwest Sydney suburb of Casula, lived a typical daily existence, attended government schools and avoided the popularity game. He now works full-time in sales. Bruce is the first to admit that for many residents in Casula and the neighbouring suburb of Liverpool, ice has become the drug of choice. It has replaced marijuana and ecstasy as an easily attainable, relatively cheap drug. He says, “Every dealer sells it and there are always scabs around where you can get it or who know someone who could fix you up. People don’t care. You have whole families on the dole who have been brought up not to care.” “The problem with ice is it is so addictive and it’s not worth the come down. You can go days or weeks without food or sleep and when you come out of it, your thought processes are scattered and you’re aggressive because you can’t sleep and you need to use downers to take the edge off the charge. At times I’ve suffered hallucinations where my eyes would just go all dotty and I’ve seen people come out of paintings, which was pretty scary. “If you develop an addiction it simply takes over and you can’t hold down a job. It’s not the kind of drug you can behave on. You can tell when people are on it, because they twitch and their pupils dilate. Chronic users just scratch themselves and pull their hair out. Some ice users just sit there picking at their faces because they think they’ve got bugs crawling underneath their skin.”

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Caught in the avalanche According to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, approximately half a million Australians over 14 are currently using ice and 1.8 million have admitted to using it at least once. Popular for its purity, accessibility and low cost, ice seems to be tightening its grip on the western Sydney suburbs of Fairﬁeld, Liverpool, Casula, Campbelltown and Macquarie Fields, areas fraught with social tension, families on welfare and high levels of housing commission.

Marie Sinclair, Photography and Retouch; Carolyn Quan, Illustration; Toby McCasker, Model.

As ice use continues to escalate, the work of hospitals and mental health staff has intensified and health administrators remain at a loss as to how to fix the situation. Many mental health and hospital professionals also agree the full impact of ice abuse is still not known. Psychiatrist Dr Bill Kingswell told the Brisbane Courier Mail that brain-imaging studies suggest, “Ice use can cause bleeding into your head and shutting of blood vessels so your brain dies in some areas. With long-term use there are significant changes in blood flow and permanent cognitive impairment such as loss of memory. The jury is still out but a picture is emerging that these drugs are very bad for your brain in a variety of ways.” Hospitalising and caring for ice users cost more than $150 million last year and rehabilitating an ice addict can extend far beyond teaching them how to use a knife and fork again. A recent National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre study showed a 58% rise in the number of drug admissions for drug related psychosis since 1999. Hospital staff have limited options for treatment and rehabilitation as they battle against a rise in the number of ice-related emergency admissions, especially in southwest Sydney. While New South Wales Health Minister Reba Meagher boasts southwest Sydney is “one of the fastest growing regions in the state” the reality is the area is less than equipped to defend itself against growing ice use. Basic medical infrastructure and health services are noticeably absent. Unlike other hospitals across Sydney, Liverpool Hospital does not have a specialised ward to deal with ice addicts. There are also very strong institutional barriers to getting the full picture on ice use in the area and these obstructions are not physical, but psychological. On the question of ice use in western Sydney and existing initiatives, South Western

Sydney Area Health Service, which represents Liverpool Hospital and neighbouring health facilities, declined to comment. Local hospital staff, however, talked openly about the mental health ramifications resulting from ice abuse and cited a lack of existing resources to address the problem. Grace*, a mental health nurse, says she is confronted with ice users on a daily basis. She says, “[When ice users] come in for treatment, more often than not, they can’t concentrate on anything for longer than a minute. People who smoke ice over a long period of time become quite aggressive. A female patient from Liverpool came onto our ward and her behaviour was completely erratic, like she was reverting back into her childhood. One minute she was crying and the next minute she was laughing. Then all of a sudden something snapped and she tried to kick an office door down. We had to restrain her and knock her out with antipsychotics so she could sleep.” “Most of the patients I’ve treated have ultimately developed a forensic background as a result of ice, because while they were high they went on these violent rampages. Some of the ice users who come in say they don’t have any recollection of doing the crimes they committed while they were high.

“Other ice addicts I’ve treated believed there were cameras in the ceiling and they started pulling stuﬀ out of the roof because they thought someone was watching them.” Karen said suicide and self harm were common themes. “Some are battling against this drug-induced psychosis where voices are telling them they are not worthy and they need to die. Then there are the extreme ice addicts, who can be really aggressive and frightened because they don’t have any control over what they are doing.” “After binging over a certain period where they reach a stage of psychosis they come into hospital for a short stay and then go out into the community and do it again.” She said in Liverpool and Campbelltown, there are greater levels of anxiety that ice use is spiralling out of control and not a great sense of any way to ﬁx the problem. She sighs, “From a professional perspective there’s not much we can do short of treating their amphetamine withdrawal. We can sedate them if they are aggressive, but that’s about it.” *All names have been changed to protect their identities. Bruce doesn’t want the world to know he uses ice. Grace and Karen want to keep their jobs. A big thanks goes to all three who have talked openly about their experiences with the drug.

“One ice addict I treated broke into an elderly man’s house in Liverpool and tried to rob him at knife point. Thankfully, he managed to ﬁght her oﬀ, but at the time she claims she didn’t know what she was doing because she was so high.” A drug and alcohol expert, Karen*, works in psychiatric emergency care in southwest Sydney. She said more than a quarter of her unit was set aside for chronic ice or heroin users. These patients are mainly young people, aged 16 years or older. “In my professional opinion I think ice is a problem. The trend seems to be that if the patient is in their mid-teens or older then it will almost certainly be an issue with ice. Just last week we treated a 17-year-old who had been binging and using ice daily for a period of over two months. “Often patients will come in with a druginduced psychosis where they will be paranoid, delusional and hallucinating. Amphetamines often result in paranoia where the users will focus on someone in their family and believe for whatever reason that a relative is after them. CORKER

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Photography by Wendell Teodoro

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FASHION

Look # 1 Lauren B wears blue shirt dress by Trimapee; stylist’s jeans; arm bands from Tessarella House, Paddington, 02 9326 9984; denim boots from Pelle Recycled Foot Wear, Paddington, 02 9331 8100.

Look # 2 Lauren B wears black opaque leggings from Voodoo Killer Legs, 1800 810 449; shoes from Pelle Recycled Foot Wear, Paddington, 02 9331 8100. CORKER

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Look # 3 Lauren B wears a dress by Robby Tjia; pink totally opaque leggings from Voodoo Killer Legs, 1800 810 449; shoes from Pelle Recycled Foot Wear, Paddington, 02 9331 8100.

Look # 4 Lauren B wears black dress by Trimapee; earrings from Tessarella House, Paddington, 02 9326 9984; ﬁshnet stockings by Voodoo Killer Legs, 1800 810 449. Model: Lauren Burnett (Chadwick) Styling: Dawn Boscoe (The Nest) Hair and Makeup: Ayshe Ismail (The Image Distillery) Photographic Assistant: Elise Garner 046

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TANGLED LOVE

s e b u P r e n g i s e D Want hot sex? Lizza Gebilagin says it’s time to start playing with pubes.

ood sex is boring sex. Bad sex doesn’t count as sex at all. And great sex should occur every single time – otherwise, what’s the point? So what does it take to feel every single part of your body erupt in pure ecstasy? The answer is easy. Just stop being a prude.

As Dr Ian Kerner writes in his book Passionista: The Empowered Woman’s Guide to Pleasuring a Man, “Sex is about expanding who we are, what we want, and what we think we want in the most incredibly intimate way.” One way to do that is by sharing your fantasies. I know you’ve heard that before, but I also know that a lot of you are too freaked out to actually tell your partner – or admit to yourself – that you want to discover the male G-spot via anal stimulation. I realise that it is unreasonable to expect you to go from missionary advocate to sex freak, so

let’s take baby steps. Why not try trimming each other’s pubes as Dr Kerner suggests? If that seems a bit boring, then why not trim the hair into a kinky design like an arrow (in case your partner has a habit of getting lost down there) or a heart shape. LaSnatch.com sell a range of templates you can use. One of my mates gave it a go. He – yep a man volunteered for the job – had his pubic area professionally waxed into the shape of an arrow. His girlfriend loved it and even asked him to model the design from a number of different angles. I, on the other hand, just loved hearing him scream during the waxing. Am I sadist? Maybe. But a prude? Definitely not. Reference Kerner, Ian. Passionista: The Empowered Woman’s Guide to Pleasuring a Man. Collins, 2008.

Photo by Ashley Mar

I have encountered countless prudes in my lifetime and I have noticed they all have one thing in common: their distaste for sex or their inability to enjoy it comes down to the fact that they are too worried about what everyone thinks. Some women can’t stop worrying about whether they look fat. Some men are too distracted by the thought of their penis being too small/thin/large/fat/long. Others still fear the wrath of an almighty being for having sex for fun rather than for the purpose

of procreating. (If we weren’t supposed to enjoy sex then why does it feel so good?) Dear prudes, here are three words that will change your sex life forever: just let go.

Watch the video of the waxing on www.corkermag.com

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ART

Silicon PrinceSSeS Words by Erin Bell and Lizza Gebilagin

Photography by Anoush Abrar and Aimée Hoving

These girls have had the silicon equivalent of a burger with the lot done: fake tits, nose job, plumped up butt cheeks, botoxed expressionless faces. They could almost be mistaken for dolls… Uuh, wait a sec. They actually are. Photographers Anoush Abrar and Aimée Hoving play with sex dolls for a photographic essay that questions the relationship between men and women.

hen Anoush Abrar and Aimée Hoving first saw these life-like sex dolls on TV, they were fascinated. Abrar immediately started researching the dolls produced by US company RealDoll. Made from a steel skeletal frame and human-like silicone flesh, one of these life-sized dolls can fill the space in your bed for US$6,500. If you want one with a custom designed face, then prices can go up to US$50,000. The dolls are available in ten different body types – from petite and athletic to the fantasy doll with 10G breasts – and all come standard with oral, anal and vaginal openings. There are even 16 interchangeable faces to choose from. So if you’re sick of Stacey (yep, they have names too) you can switch to Stephanie or Gabrielle and no egos are bruised in the process. “I had never photographed anything like this before,” says Abrar. “The RealDoll heads reminded me of animal trophies and made me question the relationship between a man and woman. The experience will stay in my mind forever.” Abrar, originally from Iran, and Hoving, a Dutch national, started working together four years ago after finishing art school. The pair have won numerous awards since, including the International Photography Award in 2005 and their exhibitions have been displayed all around Europe. When they decided to work on the RealDoll series, they wanted to show a darker side to the sex doll industry.

“It was quite strange manipulating the RealDolls [during the photo shoots] because when you get to work on them, you definitely know that the dolls are objects but as a photographer, you can’t view them as objects,” Abrar says. So, out of all the different girls that he photographed, does he have a favourite? “I like all the pieces because for me the dolls are fantastic modern sculptures.” If you would like to see more work from the RealDoll series, visit www.anoush.ch. Or if you would like to see some serious doll on doll action, check out www.realdoll.com.

“The RealDoll heads reminded me of animal trophies and made me question the relationship between a man and woman.”

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Q&A

uirky, dark and powerfully emotive, the art of Stormie Mills has earned him worldwide acclaim. The characters he creates portray complex but entirely recognisable and relatable emotions that immediately strike a chord.

Perth born, bred and based, Stormie Mills has been producing art since he “could hold a crayon”. Beginning his career as a graffiti artist, he now uses a variety of mixed media to transcribe his thoughts, inspired by people he meets and characteristics they possess that are “worth retelling pictorially”. Influenced by Rembrandt, the darkness of Goya and even Tim Burton, Stormie’s furtive, cartoon-like characters inspire empathy and affection and, despite strong tones of sadness and isolation, are often uplifting.

Interview by Emma Bruer Art by Stormie Mills

What drives you to produce art? I just have to. I’ve always got things to say, or think, or see things that I’m compelled to draw and paint. It’s like an itch that you just have to scratch, a compulsion I’ve always had. It’s my voice. It’s evolved from this to wanting to produce better work, stronger work, work that has undertones of vulnerability, a strong sense of poignancy and message. When I saw graffiti in its first incarnations, I was attracted to the scale and the immediacy of it. Can you tell us about your current exhibit? Ten years ago I made a conscious decision to move back to those early days of painting walls, by restricting the colour I’d use to make images and using a limited palette. So I generally only use select representative colours: black represents dirt, white symbolises the attempt to remove dirt, grey for walls and silver, which portrays dreams. Within this I am depicting people, characters, things I’ve seen, much of which is painted on objects and motifs that are symbolic of urban renewal and regeneration. A lot of this work is about secrets, secrets we all have and keep. You’ve been producing art for more than 20 years. How has your style changed over that time? The biggest thing is probably the evolution of confidence. I’ve come almost full circle from what I used to draw when I was young, which was strange characters, people. I’ve come back to that. In 1984 and subsequent years I was painting in the street and learning to use spray paint by transcribing letters, learning to produce work in adverse conditions with a foreign and

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often sub-standard medium (mass produced spray paints and nozzles for everything weren’t available then like they are today). This taught me to be flexible with a creation and to adapt, as the focus for me is what I paint, not so much how I paint. In 1989 in Europe, a group called Ikonoklast formed. We were all people who were painting very untraditional graffiti, not like the New York work that originally inspired us. This movement helped me to reach back to my childhood of drawing strange characters and start to paint them. So those things combined and now I use them to illustrate what I’m thinking. For me the work has strength if it can be read without having to write the title. Any words for aspiring artists? For me, it’s about tenacity. Keep at it irrespective of what life throws at you. Stormie’s exhibition “Secrets & Objects” is showing at Richard Martin Art from July 26 to August 8 2008.

“Keep at it irrespective of what life throws at you.”