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The Red Hook Star-Revue is published every month.
Founded June 2010 by George Fiala and Frank Galeano
interest to so few, that its workings are a puzzle to most, including some who are most involved with making some of the choices.
In NYC, we “elect” Civil, Supreme and Surrogate Judges. Other judgeships are appointed by the Governor (subject to confirmation) or the Mayor (not so subject) using recommendation by screening panels.
Civil and Surrogate Court nominees of each party are selected in primaries (if they are not unopposed), while Supreme Court nominees are selected at nominating conventions by delegates selected at primaries (if they are not, as is usually the case, unopposed). At least, that’s how it works on paper.
In actuality, before its convention meets, the Brooklyn Democratic Party’s Executive Committee, consisting of the elected party State Committee members from each Assembly District (who, in Brooklyn, are the Party’s de facto “District Leaders“) decide among themselves which names will be put before the convention, and those folks are then nominated by the convention, which operates using a script, with the speaking roles pre-assigned.
Yes, the delegates can nominate someone from the floor. This happened in
who did so would be insuring they would never be nominated for Supreme Court. Since 2004, no one who wants to go to Supreme has been willing to put this belief to an actual test, so there are no contests.
This leaves the power of the district leaders virtually unchecked, except for the Party’s Independent Judicial Screening Panel, created in the wake of scandals at the beginning of this century.
The panel, like all efforts to reform a political process to select the person who will receive a prestigious position, is undeniably imperfect (the “independent” screening panels used by the Mayor and the Governor are also
undeniably imperfect). Some have complained that the Brooklyn panel’s rules differ in significant ways fromtan; ironically, most of the difference -
dures, which have lately sparked their el has real teeth; under the Brooklyn Party’s rules one cannot be put before the Executive Committee unless one was approved by the Screening Panel -
Are the panels perfect? No, they tend -
ty’s legal establishment. Those wings include legal aid and public interest lawyers, and various ethnic associations. The panels are by no means lily-white; but they do tend to reflect the concerns of those who appear in Court for a living, perhaps sometimes to the detriment of other considerations. And sometimes there appears to be a bit of logrolling amongst the various factions.
Sometimes, in my humble opinion, the panel has done injustices. However, no one has ever posited any alternative method of performing such a function in an elective system. And, in fact, the equivalent panels which stand guard over appointed judgeships usually have the same establishment biases, except that they are less likely to have the diversity of the Kings County Panel.
In addition to the Screening Panel, the Party, as a sop to certain of the more outsider district leaders, created its own Ad Hoc Committee on the Judiciary, which issued its own report, complete with courtroom observations, and opinions solicited from attorneys who’ve observed the candidates in court.
The report was distributed to the Party
(continued on page 6)
Judicial selection in New York State is so convoluted and confusing, and of interest to so few, that its workings are a puzzle to most, including some who are most involved with making some of the choices.
I've been wanting to write a column about Eric Adams for quite a while. I met him a few times when he was our Borough President, and frankly, I thought he was perfect at that job, which is basically a figurehead position.
BP's used to have real governing powers back when there was a Board of Estimate running the city, in which the five borough presidents shared real power with the Mayor and Comptroller. A 1989 Supreme Court decision calling that arrangement unconstitutional led to its demise, with much of its power moving to the City Council. The last Mayor who came up from Borough Presidency was David Dinkins who served while there was still the Board of Estimate.
It's my contention that Adams does not have the proper background to lead the city, and I like to call him the first Borough President of all the boroughs at the same time.
However, I'm only the publisher of a lowly community newspaper, an industry which Adams seems to feel contempt for (more on that in a future column). I don't get to see him in action. But someone who does attempt to see him as much as possible is Chris Sommerfeldt, City Hall reporter for the NY Daily News. His tweets keep me informed about the mayors doings, and so the rest of this column will be those tweets. I've edited some for clarity. See what you think.
Sept. 5 "We can't live in this perpetual COVID...COVID is in our rearview mirror," Mayor Adams said today in response to a question about Staten Island Ferry snack bars still being closed. COVID has, in fact, been on the rise in NYC this summer.
Sept. 1 Mayor Adams & Deputy Mayor Phil Banks defend plans to deploy drones to monitor large parties this weekend.
Banks suggests drones could even be deployed "if someone's having a heart attack" to give them advice before EMS arrives.
"Don't be afraid of the unknown," he says.
August 28 Reposted @katie_honan: 3 hosts of an @ericadamsfornyc fundraiser at Russo’s on the Bay are said to face indictment.
August 27 A campaign fundraiser for @NYCMayor in the Hamptons yesterday was co-hosted by Republicans Anthony Scaramucci, John Catsimatidis & Democrat and frequent NY Post contributor David Paterson.
Source who was there tells me Patterson delivered remarks. Ex-Councilman Robert Cornegy (a Dem) also delivered remarks, per source.
August 27 reposted @katie_honan:
“Those of you who live in New York City, you should thank God every day that those other characters did not win and become mayor” the mayor says at Blue Dream fundraiser https:// bluedreamhamptons.org
August 26 The ribbon-cutting event Adams attended yesterday without listing it on his public schedule was for a new Champion Pizza outpost. Champion's owner, Hakki Akdeniz, has donated $3,100 to the mayor's 2021 and 2025 campaigns, per CFB records.
August 25 reposted @JCColtin: Reminder that Mayor Adams’ public schedule is a farce since the team just seems to randomly decide what does and doesn’t go on there, and also he hasn’t released retroactive detailed public schedules for the last *14 MONTHS,* a huge reduction in transparency from de Blasio.
August 25 NEW: Two top execs at the philanthropic group that bankrolled Mayor Adams' Israel trip — which cost $33,999 in total — have significant business interests before his admin.
While likely not illegal, watchdogs say this is an "obvious" conflict of interest.
August 23 In a press briefing from Tel Aviv, Mayor Adams says "one thing that really caught my eye" in his meet with Israeli police leaders today is "using motorcycles and drones together" for law enforcement purposes. Applying this in NYC could help with "traffic delays" impacting NYPD.
August 23@NYCMayor has amended his financial disclosure to reflect his Bitcoin holdings after we reported in July that he omitted them in his original filing. But the revised filing doesn't report any Ethereum. This is a bit odd, given he has said he's invested in both cryptocurrencies.
August 22 reposted @nick_garber:
NEW: Mayor Eric Adams quietly created a two-person office, staffed by a personal friend and an NYPD lieutenant, whom he tasked with taking pitches from private-sector entrepreneurs wanting to do business with the city. Crypto has been a top focus. City Hall never announced the office's creation, and its existence puzzles some business and tech insiders.
“Like many things in the administration, it feels a little discombobulated and potentially duplicative,” one lobbyist told me.
August 22 Citing the Times of Israel report, @jstreetdotorg, the pro-two state solution group, condemns the mayor for "pledging to boost settlements." "We hope that Mayor Adams will learn the difference between the State of Israel's sovereign territory and occupied territory," group says.
August 18 This bombshell on new Adams campaign straw donor revelations comes a month after six Adams supporters were indicted on charges that they orchestrated a sweeping straw donor scheme to benefit the mayor.
August 18 NEW: Mayor Adams’ of-
fice today rejected an accusation from Hochul's admin that NYC “involuntarily” bused migrants upstate this month — prompting the gov's team to double down on its claim and accuse City Hall of giving misleading info about the incident.
August 17 NEW: Mayor Adams’ admin wants clearance from the feds to house migrants at Manhattan’s Metropolitan Correctional Center, an infamous jail closed in 2021 following years of reports about dangerous conditions. It's also the jail where Jeffrey Epstein died.
August 15 The mayor has a habit of comparing himself to Jesus Christ and regularly says he speaks directly with God (including claiming God told him for years that he was going to be elected mayor).
August 14 reposted @Jesse_Coburn @TwoTreesNY touts its commitment to "livable streetscapes." But the firm has been quietly lobbying City Hall against a bike lane project on a block where Two Trees built a luxury apartment tower and where a Two Trees subsidiary runs a parking garage.
August 10 At his town hall event in Manhattan, @NYCMayor says he wants to "close the borders" in order to address the migrant crisis. Then he quickly reverses himself, says he doesn't mean "close" in the "physical" sense but as a strategy to send migrants to other cities besides NYC.
August 8 At his Dominican Heritage event tonight, Mayor Adams started off by saying: "I may be from Alabama, but I'm Dominican, baby." (It's a reference to a factually incorrect comment Adams has made before that was highlighted in this week's New Yorker piece.
This upcoming season, Green-Wood will once again present a range of opportunities for visitors of all ages to learn, to discover, and to enjoy. We’re bringing back all our perennial favorites—Nightfall, Open Doors, and Spirited Strolls—but also introducing some new experiences, from captivating tours to compelling conversations in death education. You can learn about all of the events and programs—and register—at www.greenwood.com/calendar.
Among the highlights on GreenWood’s fall calendar:
On Sunday, September 24th, GreenWood presents Open Doors, a selfguided tour where visitors can step into the secrets of the past by exploring some of the Cemetery’s most impressive and elaborate nineteenthcentury mausoleums. This is the one day a year when visitors can learn the mysteries of mausoleums usually closed to the public.
The Concerts in the Catacombs series, curated by acclaimed experimental singer and songwriter Gelsey Bell, returns on Wednesday, October 4th and Thursday, October 5th, with Anaïs Maviel, a vocalist and composer who combines traditional and experimental approaches to investigate the transformative power of music. Through song, choral and instrumental music, and creative staging, Maviel navigates sound and speech rooted in oral traditions.
The Brooklyn Waterfront Artists Coalition (BWAC) is celebrating its 45th year. What began with a handful of artists in DUMBO/Vinegar Hill in 1978 is now an artist-run nonprofit organization operating the BWAC Gallery on the Red Hook waterfront. BWAC has been a resilient presence in the Brooklyn arts community for four decades, including after the extreme conditions imposed by Superstorm Sandy and more recently, Covid. The original group of artists negotiated with landlords to put on exhibitions in vacant spaces in DUMBO. Within the first few years, the group
had successfully installed exhibitions in what was, at the time, raw space at 68 Jay Street, then 20 Jay Street. The early exhibition spaces had no amenities, and no electricity.
By 1980, BWAC was hosting annual outdoor sculpture shows at the Empire Fulton Ferry State Park. The small group of artists had grown and gained a reputation for staging large-scale events. BWAC continued presenting outdoor sculpture shows in the park alongside the Brooklyn Bridge for more than a decade.
In 1992, the original founders were in contact with Greg O'Connell, president of the O'Connell Organization. Mr. O'Connell generously invited the group to exhibit in Red Hook, so since vacant real estate in DUMBO was beginning to disappear, BWAC made the move. In the first few years, exhibitions were held in different locations along Van Brunt and Beard Streets, with the common denominator of being within the waterfront buildings owned or managed by the O'Connell Organization.
It was a few years later when BWAC settled into its current location at 481 Van Brunt Street, a Civil Warera warehouse built in 1869. BWAC manages 25,000 sq. ft. of art exhibition space on two floors. Mary Bullock, a long-time member artist who came to BWAC in the beginning of the 2000s, recalled when she first came to the gallery. "They told me to be sure I was out of the area by 5 pm," said Ms. Bullock. Red Hook was a rough and tumble neighborhood decades before BWAC moved in, but the times were changing. Soon Fairway Supermarket and IKEA would make the area a destination for New Yorkers who rarely crossed Hamilton Avenue, separating the waterfront neighborhood from the rest of Brooklyn.
To mark this auspicious occasion, BWAC is hosting three exhibitions at the BWAC Gallery — Reunion: Celebrating Artist Members Past and Present; Color, a national juried exhibition; and Visions of Glass, a solo exhibition by featured artist Renee Radenberg, opening at the Red Hook gallery on Saturday, September 9 from 1-6 pm. BWAC president Alicia Degener states, "We've been able to bring the artwork of more than 25,000 artists to an appreciable audience over the past 45 years, and our tradition continues on September 9th."
Visit BWAC for a real art experience in a setting overlooking the Statue of Liberty that is second to none.
We received an online comment from Jerome Krase. He said: Some readers might be interested in “Symbolic Icons: Conflicting Visions of the Gowanus Canal” from Lenape to Gentry. This is an article he recently published in Urbanities – Journal of Urban Ethnography and can be accessed online here: bit.ly/3sw2SLV
From Wikipedia: Jerome Krase is Professor Emeritus of Sociology at Murray Koppelman School of Business.Professor at School of Humanities and Social sciences. President of European Academy of Sciences of Ukraine.
He is an expert in sociology and gentrification, ethnic groups and ItalianAmerican politics, especially in Brooklyn and its neighborhoods, culture, class, urban life, Urban culture, ethnicity and race in New York City. This begins his article:
The four-hundred-year history of Brooklyn, New York, has provided opportunities to observe many conflicts and competitions over how neighbourhoods are symbolically presented and represented which significantly affect the lives of local residents and businesses. In recent years, conflicts and competitions over representation have resulted in heated public discourse such as over historical place names, and monuments. One of the most contentious of these discourses has been about gentrification and displacement in and around the Gowanus Canal. Over the centuries the area has changed from a primitive uninhabited marshland to its current actively developing urban neighbourhood. In each epoch, changes have been captured in images, and those images have impacted the area itself.
A recent call by NYC Councilmembers Robert Holden and Democrat Kalmany Yeger to abolish the Office of Public Advocate makes $ense. Too bad a future voter referendum was not placed on the 2023 General Election ballot to abolish the Office of Public Advocate. Any public opinion poll can tell you that the average citizen believes taxpayers would be better off if this useless office was abolished. It has only provided temporary employment for past Public Advocates Mark Green, Betsy Gotbaum, Bill de Blasio, Letitia James and currently Jumaane Williams. All have previously used this office as a stepping stone to run for higher office, either Mayor or State Attorney General. Only Ms. Gotbaum was unsuccessful in staying on the public payroll. Mr. Williams is all but an announced candidate for Mayor in 2025.
All engaged in a non stop series of press conferences, news releases, issuance of various reports, letters to the editor, guest columns in newspapers and publicity stunts for years. I’m not aware that Williams is on any terrorist watch list. Yet his office comes
with the perks of a taxpayer funded police security detail and private driver. Why not use public transportation to get around town like millions of his constituents do? He resides on the Fort Hamilton Brooklyn Military Base. All of this was at taxpayers’ expense to raise their respective name identification with voters and grease the wheels for running for another public office. NYC has a $107 billion budget with over 300,000 employees. This is greater than most states and many nations. Members of each 59 community planning boards, their district managers along with every municipal agency provide better customer service to residents that the Public Advocate. The same is true for NYC Council members, Boro Presidents and City Comptroller. They periodically conduct audits of municipal agencies. The Office of Public Advocate just duplicates these functions with taxpayers paying twice for the same service. No one would notice if the Office of Public Advocate was abolished. Life for NYC residents would go on without any significant adverse impact. Funding for the Office of Public Advocate would be better spent on more critical municipal services such as transportation, police, fire, sanitation, or education.—
Larry PennerWe the residents of 63 Tiffany Place would like to thank you for this amazing article. For more information and updates on our situation we’d like to invite you and your readers to our website, http://www.Save63Tiffany. com
Working NYers who have paid their rent for the last 30 years, even through a pandemic, and have been good residents, should never be forced out of their homes. Forced into homelessness just so a multi-multimillionaire sitting in his mansion in Long Island can make a few more millions. This is wrong. People that moved in in 30s, 40s & 50s are now in their 60s, 70s and 80s , and we even have a 92 year old couple who fought in the Korean War, where will they go now? Many are now retirees, sick and disabled, etc.. Shouldn’t they be allowed to live out their final years in the homes they’ve lived n for decades,, in dignity?
This fight is bigger than us. This is a fight for housing justice. This is a fight for all working NYers who are slowly being priced out of our beloved city. Please join us in this fight.
Thank you for your time and consideration.—John Leyva
Gowanus has lost its charm and no one talks anymore about the EPA cleaning up the canal. Now developers are building low income housing (what angels they are) on top of toxic land where people should not live. It’s all so corrupt and soulless. .— Michael
Leaders, though not to the delegates; it was posted on a website, without any publicity, and those who asked the party where they could obtain a copy were ignored, though the Party did send out a press release congratulating itself on the report, which it refused to distribute, hailing it as a major move for transparency.
This report contained some concerning observations, in particular about possible bias by one of the judges ultimately nominated. Strangely enough, it was the “Roe” judge, although one wouldn’t know that from the subsequent media coverage, which ignored these allegations entirely.
When excerpts concerning this were emailed to some leaders, this was mostly condemned as unsporting, the Party position apparently being that it was a great report, but that no one should actually read it, and few actually did.
So, the only report that counted was that of the screening panel, which only sets a floor. Beyond that, the “process” is most analogous to a bazaar, with elements of the bizarre.
Bargains and tradeoffs are the coins of the realm, and like any seemingly foreign and daunting process, it sometimes helps to retain the services of sherpas. In Manhattan, this has practically become a cottage industry, while in Brooklyn, it is neither the exception nor the rule.
So, for a few months, party functionaries barely known outside the professional political class are courted and feted, and become the recipients of
calls by Rabbis, ministers, community leaders and donors in a process as transparent as an unventilated hookah bar. Deals are sometimes literally made over whiskey in the backroom of a clubhouse following a cigar party. Is this any way to pick judges?
Well, it is pluralistic. Although some years, like 2023, produce tickets that are disproportionately white, and others, like 2022, produce tickets than are disproportionately African-American, over the years things tend to even out, and generally, the conventions, while still underrepresenting Latinos and Asians, generally do better than primary elections in producing a court that looks like the Borough. And reformers have real influence on the process; their caucus endorsed five candidates for the six open slots, and all those candidate won.
But can we do better?
Reformers”, in this instance, divide neatly between those who seek to implement “merit selection”, i.e, making the judicial selection process less democratic (by eliminating elections), and those who want to make the selection process more so (by having real ones).
At the Supreme Court level, the current process combines the evils of both systems with the virtues of neither. Some “reformers” will settle for either extreme against the present muddled middle, and I have to concede that even selecting names from a hat or casting lots at Purim time would probably eliminate some of the current system’s flaws.
What then?
Appointive systems have traditionally underrepresented minority groups, though this has been getting some-
what better over time, at least when it is Democrats who have been doing the appointing. But having the Governor appoint all Supreme Court judges is likely going to produce courts a good deal more “white shoe” than most who call themselves reformers in today’s Brooklyn might desire, as well as courts a good deal more conservative in those years when then GOP obtains the Governorship, which will inevitably occur.
While a better way is not readily apparent, there are some suggestions that won’t necessarily improve things. Many of today’s reformers are now proposing to improve the conventions by making sure they are no longer a sham, empowering the delegates to make the actual choices. This would have the detrimental effect of making the power of the screening panel merely advisory and adherence to them voluntary.
And, beyond that, let’s be clear; you don’t fix the judicial convention process by empowering the delegates (who will still mostly be handpicked
by the same district leaders); that’s like trying to fix the Presidential election process by empowering the electors. The way you fix the convention process is by eliminating the conventions. We need to pass a law.
In the meantime, I’m not necessarily objecting to folks trying to beat the fix, and use the floor to install different nominees (provided they are better nominees) The allocation of delegates better reflects where Democratic voters lives than the party’s Exec Committee does, and real fights are potentially good fun.
Just don’t call that “Reform.”
Personally, I’d like to overhaul judicial election completely; elect judges from smaller, equal size districts, about the size of an Assembly District, which would ensure better representation of the Boroughs various constituencies, and I’d combine that with retention elections for incumbents, ensuring that, once elected, judges can be less political.
If we are to elect judges, let’s actually elect them.
Both the Red Hook Library and Carroll Gardens Library are closed long-term for renovations. The closest open libraries to Red Hook are in Park Slope and Brooklyn Heights, which is not ideal for locals. In the meantime, there are a few options for those who miss the library. On Tuesdays from 11- 4 pm, there will either be a bookmobile or techmobile in Coffey Park. In addition to the services in Red Hook, there will be a techmobile at Carroll Park on Monday, September 11 from 11 am to 4 pm as well as on September 25, at the same time and location.
The techmobile features computers with internet access. The bookmobile, serves as a small, mobile library. Both Gretchen Alexander and Labreisha Gamble were there when I stopped by at Coffey Park on August 22. I went inside the vehicle and there was plenty of room to read and use the internet.
I did not see anyone using the techmobile in the hour I spent there. That made me wonder how upset people actually are about the libraries closing, so I asked people from the neighborhood for their thoughts.
“I’m not someone who relies on the library but I know there are people who go there almost every day,” said Sarah Gonzalez from Red Hook. “For them, I wish it was open because this is bad for them.”
Others had no concerns about libraries in the neighborhoods being closed for a while, with John, a Carroll Gardens resident, saying “It doesn’t affect
by Brian Abate
me at all. In the old days before everyone had laptops and iPhones, I would be concerned but in 2023, I don’t think it’s a big deal.”
About 20 people were kind enough to give me their opinions, and about half were upset. I also asked if those who were concerned about the closures felt the renovations were necessary.
“I don’t spend much time in the library but it looked fine to me,” said Mike Jones from Red Hook. “They’ll probably make it a lot nicer but is it worth closing it down for who knows how long? I don’t know.”
One of my personal concerns was that both libraries were going to be closed at the same time. At a meeting before Red Hook closed, one woman said it just wouldn’t make sense for her kids to have to travel for an hour to get to the library, and that they had no plans to rely on other branches while the Red Hook one was closed.
I reached out to Fritzi Bodenheimer, press officer for the Brooklyn Public Library and she responded with the following statement:
“For the past several years, Brooklyn Public Library has invested in closing a significant capital needs gap and updating aging infrastructure systemwide. The result of that work is that we are now in a period of aggressive rebuilding and repair, ensuring our libraries can serve the borough for generations to come.
“While work is underway, the bookmo-
bile is providing service at Carroll Park with additional programs at St. Paul’s Church and Books are Magic. The techmobile is providing service at Coffey Park with programs at the Red Hook Initiative and Brooklyn Waterfront Artists Coalition [BWAC.] Additional points of service will be added. Patrons can always access a wealth of resources online and are welcome at more than 60 branches throughout the borough.” Some of the programs include: Toddler Time at Red Hook Initiative (767 Hicks St.,) which includes reading, singing, and puppets takes place from 11-11:30 am on Fridays. Family Story and Craft at BWAC (481 Van Brunt St. door 7A) will take place on Saturday, September 23, from 4-5 pm. The event includes a series of family storytimes with a crafting session afterward. All ages are welcome.
In Carroll Gardens, Storytime at Books are Magic (225 Smith St.) will take place on Friday, September 8, from 11-11:30 am. The event is geared towards babies and toddlers who are three years old or younger. Toddler Time at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church (199 Carroll St.) will take place on Wednesdays starting on September 20 from 10:30-11 am.
In addition to those events, leaders from the Red Hook Civic Association including Imre Kovacs and Matias
Kalwill are looking for a location for a temporary library. Red Hook Pentecostal Holiness Church at 110 Wolcott St. is a possibility.
Kovacs was able to get in contact with Joyce Kowpak, a librarian at the Red Hook branch who is now working at the Park Slope library. Right now the plan is for Kovacs to take more people from the library and the neighborhood on a tour on the morning of September 6. The Civic Association has a draft of a one-pager (which summarizes the issue and what the Civic Association plans to do to address it.) It has not yet been revised or approved by the services committee so it is not finalized. However, right now it includes one section that says, “When the Brooklyn Heights library was closed for reconstruction, a temporary library was provided elsewhere in the community. But this is Red Hook, isolated behind waterways on three sides. The lack of equal treatment, for whatever the reason, is unacceptable.”
The next section explains that the Civic Association is “Working in partnership with the Friends of the Red Hook Library, the Red Hook Business Association. The public services committee of the RHCA has located space for a temporary library for Red Hook, on the street level of a local church. We are asking Councilwoman Aviles to work with us to demand that the Brooklyn Public Library locate there or another temporary space in Red Hook.”
The next general Civic Association meeting will be at held at the Red Hook Recreation Center (155 Bay St.) on Sept. 6 at 6:15 pm.
Strongtoberfest, Strong Rope Brewery’s Oktoberfest, Friday, Sept 15, 5-11 pm, 185 Van Dyke
Celebrate all your favorite NYC Oktoberfest brews, including a steinholding competition, live music, and more!
Food by Sliwinski’s General (sausages, burgers, veggie options) and Runner & Stone (pretzels)
Music by The Polka Brothers (5-8 pm) and DJ Blessed (8-11 pm)
Oktoberfest-inspired beers by Strong Rope Brewery and guest breweries Fifth Hammer, Gun Hill Brewing Company, KCBC, Keg & Lantern, Other Half Brewing, Threes Brewing, and more!
Admission is free but you can get early bird deals on Strongtoberfest-branded 1/2 liter and liter steins here.
Glassware purchases include a free pour and purchase of the liter stein gives guaranteed entry into the waterfront steinholding competition at sunset!
Prost!
Ihave never been one to hanker for a beer, but recently, late on a hot, summer afternoon, my boyfriend called me to meet him out for a pint. While Brooklyn has no dearth of spots to grab a drink, finding the right atmosphere, and particularly the right drink, can prove a bit more challenging. In search of something with options a bit more sophisticated than Bud Light (though there is a time and a place for everything), we ventured into a cool, quiet bar, tucked away at the end of Smith Street.
Queue Beer opened in January 2023, just a block from Other Half Brewing. Walking from the Smith-9th Streets subway station, a giant, two-story arrow is visible on the side of the brick building, pointing you towards the door, as welcoming as a Vegas neon, but with none of the tackiness. The bar still smells new, with a clean smooth wooden bar, leather stools, and plenty of tables.
Behind the bar you’ll find over 80 different types of beers, sold in cans that can be drunk on the spot, or taken to go. On tap, 24 beers are available on a rotating basis, apart from the two house beers (“Tools of the Trade”, a hoppy, refreshing choice from Industrial Arts in Beacon, NY and “Canal Champagne”, AKA Miller High Life, so titled because $1 from each purchase is donated to the Gowanus Canal
by Katherine RivardConservancy). For a bar so focused on providing beer lovers an unbeatable range of craft beer, Queue Beer also stands out in what it offers the beerphobic—eight ciders (shipped from as close as New Paltz and as far as Sweden), or an equally thoughtful menu of wines (who could resist an orange wine from a county in California called Yolo?).
You’ll also likely find Shane Monteiro behind the bar. Monteiro’s family opened Carmine Street Beer in Manhattan 2013, where he was responsible for buying the beer. In 2021, the family began looking for a new location as their lease was up. Deliberating on a new location, Monteiro landed on Carroll Gardens. Close to both the Carroll Street and Smith-9th Streets subway stops, and with new developments popping up throughout the neighborhood, he saw the opportunity for a growing market. But even more clearly, he saw how the area was already becoming a haven for beer lovers.
This proliferation of breweries in the past decade is breathing new life into the city’s formerly anemic beer industry. At the turn of the 20th century, Brooklyn boasted 45 breweries, all of which had closed by 1976. The taps began to flow once more in Kings County in 1996, with the advent
of Brooklyn Brewery in Williamsburg. Now, it seems that South Brooklyn is having its heyday.
The afternoon pint at Queue Beer left me curious to know more about the burgeoning beer scene. Soon, I’d sampled them all, starting with Other Half Brewery. Its Centre Street location, just a few doors down from Queue Beer, is casual, with long, wooden tables and the type of backless stools you might find in a middle school art class. Other Half, known for its hazy IPAs, is the most laid back of the area’s breweries.
In Red Hook, Strong Rope Brewery, which opened in 2015, boasts some of the best views in the city and prides itself on malt and hop-forward ales.
A few blocks away, Keg & Lantern is sleek, with a marble bar, full menu, and even a couple of frozen alcoholic slushie options. Red Hook is even home to Sixpoint (though you’ll have to head to DeKalb Market Hall for its taproom).
In Gowanus, you can find more places to indulge—like Threes Brewing on Douglass Street and Strong Rope’s taproom on President Street. Wild East Brewing Co., on Sackett Street, offers occasional brewery tours, but all week long they serve the delicious English-style lagers they specialize in (along with a range of other styles) in a setting that is both stylish and familiar, the wood-paneled walls reminis-
cent of your childhood friend’s basement, but more photogenic. Finback Brewery is equally unique, with a long list of beers, “mixed culture” golden ales (containing both cultivated and wild yeast), and cocktails with their house gin. Its warehouse-y location is decorated with an “underground” artist’s paintings, and, in case the beer needs to be soaked up, Dumpling Up is open Thursday through Sunday at the location, serving dumplings, fries, and other Asian-themed bar food. During the pandemic, people began to have booze delivered to their homes, with Drizzly and other services finding themselves with unprecedented demand. As regulations loosened, bars with to-go cocktails became a new thrill. Now, as the city lurches back to life, breweries are finding the limelight—drawing people out to taste something delicious and socialize. With the area’s beer scene thriving, the only question is—who will open next?
By the time August rolled around and I hadn’t seen Barbie yet I was beginning to feel I was on an island far far away from womankind. Along with the rest of humanity living in the developed western world, the summer had turned pink.
Like many, I had Barbies growing up and cherished looking at mom’s dolls who lived in their original boxes from the 1960s. As a huge fan of Lady Bird and Little Women, I felt confident that even if the movie didn’t singlehandedly revitalize Mattel; solve the myriad issues with Barbie and fix “the patriarchy” writ large - it was sure to be an enjoyable use of a rainy summer afternoon. If nothing else, I appreciate seeing a movie so blatantly pink - so blatantly in-your-face feminine, breaking box office records
Reactions from friends and family had a few things in common: “funny, smart.” Some went so far to say it was life changing - everyone agreed it was well done. Many laughed, many cried, many felt validated. Many younger women have been using Barbie as a boyfriend test. (A sort of will he, won’t he scenario?) My sample audience were all women. According to a brief internet search, I confirmed that many more women have seen Barbie than men. We’ll leave it at that
My initial feelings towards Barbieones of admiration, cozy feelings of
by Kelsey Sobelsisterhood mixed with a dash of nostalgia proved to be an accurate assessment - I enjoyed Barbie. I didn’t find it particularly revolutionary.
It was blindingly literal, it was witty, it was true. I teared up when Barbie developed feelings, but my emotional reaction had more to do with the capturing of a life; moments big and small, joyful, sorrowful, mundane and transformative that make up human experiences then with me being female. This was the only time I saw myself reflected in the film.
Maybe my lukewarm reaction is in itself a sign of progress - as a young woman coming of age in the 2000s I didn’t have to fight so hard as women who came before me. Of course there are hurtful comments that will stay with me forever, inappropriate remarks, dismissals. But not enough to cause lasting damage. Of course I would be remiss to acknowledge this perspective is also a matter of privilege and the opportunities afforded to a white woman growing up in middle class America. However, in 2023, the lens has turned outwards, towards a more inclusionary vision of each and every individual human, and I’m happy to be part of this new world. New battles are being fought and Barbie is in the fight.
After seeing Barbie, I applaud Greta Gerwig’s bravery in taking on a giant project with such high expectations. It
isn’t easy to smartly address the patriarchy in under two hours, while also treating the audience to such a visual delight with laugh out loud humor and nods to modern culture phenomenon a la Birkenstock sprinkled throughout.
In the end, I felt Ryan Gosling stole the show. Gosling’s natural charm, engaging dance routine and absurdly overdramatized cover of “Push” literally pushed Margot Robbie to the background of the movie, contradicting the very ethos of the filmhow much better the world could be if it was in fact run by women but yet again, and certainly not on purpose, a man upstages a woman.
I can’t say Barbie is a movie I’d return to, and I found myself thinking of the film A Promising Young Woman (2020) which stayed in my psyche long after for its razor sharp investigation of the blatant violence that faces women all over the world. I found myself thinking of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign and all of the hateful things people felt so free to say about her body - how they’d cut her, burn her…murder her. The violence projected against Hillary felt much more real to me than the imagined utopian life in Barbieland where women are presidents, lawyers, doctors. If you want a disturbing deep dive into the convincingly accurate mind of a millennium woman preoccupied with
outward appearances and belonging, check out Emma Cline’s latest novel, The Guest
Although Rachel’s Fleit’s recent documentary, Bama Rush (2023) received mixed reactions, the startling preoccupation with blondeness, thinness and conformity among flesh and blood young women today suggested to me the grip of Barbie is alive and well in modern culture. Bama Rush depressed me much more than Barbie uplifted me. Young women in the thousands are spending weeks planing outfits, dyeing their hair lighter and practicing modulated socially acceptable topics of conversation - even worse, they’re doing it on social media and amassing huge followings. Clearly Barbie has not rushed Bama yet. At the end of the day Barbie didn’t get under my skin - but perhaps it wasn’t meant to, either. Are hard conversations about feminism only palatable if shrouded in humor? Or is the large audience Barbie drew in critical to turning the tides…is that a victory capital V for women?
I think back to pulling mom’s Barbies off the top shelf. They wore neck scarves, pencil skirts and had neatly trimmed bangs and bobs. I didn’t play with Barbie and think: this is me I thought she was a pretty face to put back inside her box while I lived my own wonderfully messy human life.
Given the current climate crisis, as students return to classes Red Hook schools are making efforts to preserve our planet. As the Department of Education Office of Sustainability works city-wide to “integrate sustainability into the daily operations of public schools,” the Red Hook community is doing its part to take environmental action to a local-level— action that is important to recognize, implement, and improve during this year’s back-to-school season.
The Harbor Middle School in Red Hook, P.S. 676, is approaching this goal of sustainability in an engaging way. With classes that explore the importance of environmental justice, Harbor Middle School is incorporating into the curriculum climate change education and how students can help address the vast problems their generation is facing. According to a recent NYC Emergency Management press release, Harbor Middle School earned the 2023 “Ready School of the Year” award.
Kevin Moran, the NYC Public Schools’ Chief School Operations Officer, congratulated the students “engaged in environmental justice, community resilience, and climate emergency preparedness work, embracing the ethos of this award and leading by example for their peers.” Partnering with
by Samantha GoldfarbThe RETI Center, a local non-profit working to build resilience to climate change in coastal cities, Harbor Middle School students used recycled and repurposed materials to build a garden aimed to address issues such as flooding and sewage overflows. Students also engaged in various other repurposing initiatives.
Harbor Middle School’s award draws attention to the importance of students in sustainability initiatives. It is crucial for schools to look to Harbor Middle School as an example and educate their students on climate change and the importance of taking environmental action within the Red Hook community. These students are ultimately the individuals who have been and will continue to be the proponents of acts to resist climate change this upcoming school year. Sustainability initiatives are also underway at other Red Hook schools. At BASIS Independent Brooklyn, students have taken building a culture of sustainability into their own hands.
According to Jo Goldfarb, Director of Communications at BASIS Independent Brooklyn, their “high school student government and ECO Club kicked off a composting program at the school that they hope to grow in the year ahead.” With support from the New York City Compost Project at the Red Hook Community Farms, stu-
dents at BASIS Independent Brooklyn have been able to support their goal of avoiding food waste – a commendable effort that will hopefully expand as the school enters their tenth school year this fall.
Aligning with the focus on reducing food waste, BASIS Independent Brooklyn’s high school students, teachers, and parents also came together to help run a lunch redistribution program to give their extra lunches to individuals within the Red Hook community. According to Goldfarb, “teachers also make education on the climate crisis a priority from primary school to students in high school taking AP Environmental Science, hoping to inspire future generations of activists.”
Similarly, the PS 15 community is also focused on reducing food waste. Among P.S. 15’s younger student body (PreK - Grade 5), a NYC Public School YouTube video described their recent food “waste audit” in the past school year. During this “waste audit,” students weighed their plates before and after eating to help quantitatively measure the amount of food going to waste. Then, students were instructed to sort their leftovers into different containers based on the type of food, giving the students a visual representation of their daily waste. Through the audit, P.S. 15 aimed to encourage
students to make more mindful and sustainable choices.
While many Red Hook schools have taken steps to increase sustainability, it is clear that they can all learn from each other, improve, and expand their practices this upcoming school year. As students head back to school, it would be extremely beneficial to continue efforts to make Red Hook more sustainable. From proper recycling to conserving electricity and offering eco-friendly meal options, Red Hook schools can work as a community to make a difference locally. Education is a crucial factor for today’s generation of students who will likely grow up to become part of a larger effort to respond to the global climate crisis.
The celebration of life for Jacqueline Jackson, who lived from May 7, 1953 to August 16, 2023 took place at an event space upstairs in the Tesla building on Van Brunt Street. Her many friends and family came to remember her.
There was food, a DJ played music she enjoyed, there was a slide show with pictures of her later on and space for people to reminisce and share stories. She lived her entire life in Red Hook and had a positive impact on many.
She liked upbeat disco music. The DJ at the event used to DJ with Jackie’s brother around the city and upstate.
Maxine Jackson is Jackie’s middle daughter. When Jackie left Brooklyn to have her treatments she stayed with Maxine in Atlanta, Georgia.
Jackie raised Maxine and her two sisters on her own. She moved to Atlanta when she was 20.
“Growing up with my mom, it was just her,” Jackson said. “She raised us. She was strong, independent and hard working.”
She described her mother as the mayor of Brooklyn because everyone knew her.
Maxine’s mother was all about community. Her mother and father, Della and Clifford, were responsible for getting the PAL Miccio Center started.
Della was the Project Director. They were huge community people just like her mother.
Maxine came up in and was involved in many activities at the Miccio though her mother.
“I was helping her put on talent shows and tournaments,” Maxine Jackson said. “I was a choreographer for dance so from age four to 18, I was doing dance routines. We would go to all the other community centers throughout the boroughs and compete.”
Maxine remembers how her mother and her brother used to interact.
“He has passed but they are hanging out now,” Jackson said. “Those two, their sense of humor was something to experience. They cracked jokes all the time. My mom, she was the life of the party.”
“Back when crack hit the community and it was big, she would take in peoples kids and feed them,” Jackson said of her mother. “She would look out for
by Nathan Weiser
other peoples kids. She did a lot.”
A lot of people who moved away stayed in contact with Jackson. Maxine said many people who moved out of state came to the celebration of life.
Timothy Edwards, who is 60, was Jackie’s godson and he knew her since he was a little kid. She was one of his mother’s best friends. He was at the event with his brother.
Jackie use to take him to parks and often used to baby sit him. He remembers her since he was four years old and she had a big impact on him.
“I remember her at a few birthday parties, like my oldest brother’s birthday party,” Edwards said. “I remember her talking with my grandparents because my grandparents used to come over frequently. I always remember her being there.”
Jackie was one of Edwards’s two godmothers. He reflected on the loss.
“We lost our mother two years ago. That was hard and this is hard too because it is like once you get to a certain age you are going to start seeing your elders start to pass away and there is nothing you can do. Jackie was loved very much.”
He added that Jackie was like one of his aunts. She had such a positive impact that her face will be etched in his mind forever.
“She was important,” Edwards said. “She was real instrumental in us growing up. She could have been mean to us or a crazy lady but she was not.”
He fondly remembers seeing Jackie when he would come back to Red Hook for Old Timers’ Day. It would be at Coffey Park and the Red Hook Pool.
“We would always see Jackie and see her daughters,” Edwards said. “The last time I saw her and her daughters together they had a bunch of friends with her and I took a picture of them. After that I spoke to her maybe once on the Internet.”
The last Old Timers’ Day that Edwards remembers going to and seeing Jackie was the one before the pandemic.
He now lives in The Bronx. He got the information earlier in the day about the memorial and added that he had no choice but to come to the event.
“The example that our parents and people like Jackie showed us was to work and go to school,” Edwards said.
“Go to school and then once you learn
enough to be able to choose something that you like to do then you go after that and you learn that but you always keep an open mind to learn other things.”
Maxine reminsced about her trips to the back in Red Hook, to the Promenade in Brooklyn Heights and various parks to play. They would also go to parks and museums.
She remembered her cooking for her and her sisters often growing up. It was a special occasion when they would get fast food.
“I know now McDonald’s and other fast food restaurants are no big deal to these kids, but when I grew up my mother cooked all the time, so when she would say we could go to McDonald’s, it was like Christmas for us,” Maxine said. “When we went to McDonald’s or Wendy’s, that was a real treat.”
They would go to the McDonald’s on Hamilton close to the canal. They would also go to Atlantic Avenue, to 5th Avenue and to a favorite pizza spot on 7th Avenue.
Maxine moved to Atlanta back in 1995 when she was 20 after growing up in Red Hook. She thinks Atlanta is more laid back loves the scenery.
Jackie was down there for her last eight months when she started getting treatment for her illness. Maxine said she loved being down in Atlanta. There is greenery where Maxine lives and her mom loved being on the patio.
“They told us she pretty much had about a year to live give or take,” Maxine said. “My goal was to get her there and just kind of reset and wrap her mind around what was to come.”
Jackie enjoyed the nature when she was down in Atlanta with Maxine.
“I have this bird feeder and she would sit there and watch all the different birds come to the bird feeder,” Maxine said.
“It’s National Geographic on my patio. Even the frogs from the creek come upstairs and are in the flower bed.”
Tasha Hill is Maxine’s niece. Her father and Maxine were brother and sister, and Hill knew Maxine her entire life.
She has many memories of her from
family functions growing up and remembers her being active, outgoing and telling stories.
“She would come to our barbecues all the time,” Hill said. “My father always barbecued. She joked around like my father. She was the best aunt ever. She was very nice and friendly.”
Hill grew up in Far Rockaway. She has pictures from some of the family barbecues that they would have. Hill remembers that Maxine did not like being on the train when it crossed over the bridge to get to Rockaway.
“If she got a ride she would come on out and visit,” Hill said. “We had a great time with her, she was very nice.” Besides the family barbecues, Jackie would come to birthday parties in Far Rockaway and other family events. She remembers her liking to dance and listen to music.
Hill, who lives in New Jersey now, remembers going to Red Hook sometimes. She added that Jackie was a great cook and that her meatloaf was really good.
“We came and saw her a few years ago,” Hill said. “I went to the house and visited her. She came to the hospital each time I had my children. My children were born in Brooklyn, so she would come visit.”
Hill remembers her being warmhearted and kind.
“She was very nice,” Hill said. “She cared about everybody. If you needed something, you could just pick up the phone and call. She gave good advice on everything.”
On August 25, three days into the 10th Russian Youth Day, Pope Francis appeared via interactive livestream before 400 young people gathered at St. Catherine’s Basilica in St. Petersburg. That was probably for the best because when his attendance — virtual as it may have been — was announced, both he and the Vatican were loudly and roundly criticized.
Of course they were. The event, which is organized by the Church and was first held in 2000, took place as Russia’s war of aggression against neighboring Ukraine rages on. Since invading Ukraine in February 2022, Russia has faced near-total international isolation, while its people and leaders live under stiff economic sanctions. In this environment, any decision by any leader to engage with Russia in any way that could appear as normalizing relations with the nation is cause for howls of protest.
And, indeed, the online appearance of the Pope has been embarrassing for the Pontiff and the Church. Yes, he was addressing young Catholics — pilgrims who could not travel to Lisbon, Portugal, for World Youth Day in August thanks to international restrictions — but he also sent a message of appeasement to the Russian establishment. Besides being naive about the optics of such a decision, it complicates the Pope’s efforts to broker a peaceful resolution to the war.
Francis urged the young Russians to be “sowers of seeds of reconciliation” and to “have the courage to replace fears with dreams.” But at the end of his prepared remarks, the Pope spoke off the cuff and appealed to the audience to “not forget your heri-
by Dario Pio Muccilli, EU correspondenttage. You are heirs of the great Russia — the great Russia of saints, of kings, the great Russia of Peter the Great, Catherine II, the great, educated Russian Empire of so much culture, of so much humanity. Never give up this heritage.” He then added, “You are descendants of the great Mother Russia, step forward with it.”
Naturally, this appeal to Russian patriotism brought immediate condemnation from Ukraine. Kyiv didn’t directly attack the Pope for his attending the event. Rather, it was all the “Mother Russia” talk and celebration of figures and rulers in Russian history who have pursued war of occupations in the region generally and Ukraine specifically.
“This is the kind of imperialist propaganda, ‘spiritual bonds’ and the ‘need’ to save ‘Great Mother Russia’ which the Kremlin uses to justify the murder of thousands of Ukrainians and the destruction of hundreds of Ukrainian towns and villages,” Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Oleh Nikolenko wrote on Facebook.
The back and forth continued in the Italian newspaper Avvenire, press organ of the Church. Monsignor Paolo Pezzi, Archbishop of Moscow, expressed in an interview a deep defense of the Pope’s historical references, attempting to explain how there was no thought directed to Putin or current Russian politics. He merely intended, as the newspaper put it, to inspire confidence in young people in line with what the Holy Father always repeats, and which he reiterated: the past it is our wealth, our identity.”
Monsignor Pezzi is an experienced Church man with diplomatic skills, and he’s trying to put out a diplomatic fire.
But it’s clear Francis — who is as savvy as anyone — made those references to appease the Kremlin, which has put valorizing Russian history at the center of its ultra-nationalist narrative.
In 2006, Putin ideologue Vladislav Surkov gave shape to the Russian czar’s political ideas, coining the term “sovereign democracy” to justify the nation’s actions, including treating as “unfriendly” anyone who doubts or questions Russia’s “democratic” regime. Since then, Russian history has served a vital role in legitimizing the nation’s claim to the authority and dignity of being a “big power.” All you have to do is look at Putin holding court while flanked by a statue of Catherine the Great to know appreciate the cult-like devotion he has to Russia’s past conquests.
The Pope is by no means a Russian ultra-nationalist. But he knows that if he wants to negotiate with Moscow it’s necessary to show them the socalled due respect. Still, he’s in a trap of Putin’s making. Any step toward the Kremlin would halt any movement toward Kyiv, and vice versa.
Nor is the Pope’s goodwill cynical. There is surely a history haunting Francis, of the evil tyrant in Rome coming into a conflict and either worsening it or turning a blind eye to its worst deprivations. But there is recent evidence of the Vatican’s true desire for peace — recent here being relative; the Church is thousands of years old. The Vatican was the main international actor advocating a peaceful resolution to World War I. In World War II, it helped negotiate the best conditions for the occupation of Italy. It came out against the conflicts in Iraq pursued by both George H.W. and George W.
exposes them to potential careers in tech. Congressman Daniel Goldman’s office and local community members joined Good Shepherd Services staff and AT&T executives today to celebrate the participants’ work and achievements.
This program operated out of two of Good Shepherd Services’ summer camps in Brooklyn, one in East New York and one in Red Hook.
The project provided technology skills and digital literacy in a fun and innovative way through drone technology. They were introduced to the basic science behind drones, including physics, aerodynamics, robotics, and electronics.
Bush. And it carried mediation efforts in hundreds of other conflict areas around the world scenarios. But that same history reveals the risks of papal meddling. Pope Pius XII, in an attempt to mediate between the parties in World War II, failed to strongly or adequately condemn totalitarianism and has been accused, at that time and after, of tacitly allowing Germany to pursue its campaign of mass genocide. (So long and corrupting is this shadow that no other Pope has taken the name of Pius.)
Pope Francis knows the risks, and he hasn’t failed to condemn Russia’s aggression. At the same time, his moral authority is now defied by another party: the attacked, the Ukrainians, its leadership and its people.
Up to now, Ukraine and its president Volodymyr Zelenskyy have shown no interest in listening to the Vatican. The Pope’s livestream won’t help thaw that relationship. But the frosty dynamic isn’t the only challenge. Vatican diplomacy is mostly working in Russia, publicly; in the US, a little bit more secretly; and, as the Francis’ upcoming trip to Mongolia shows, in China. Ukraine, as it has been in the past, is out in the cold, and throughout the war it has been treated as a side character in its defense of its existence.
Deliberately or not, the Pope is following the old Cold War playbook of solving regional crises by appealing to and bringing the biggest powers to the table — and no one else. Putin isn’t the only one who knows his history. Zelensky does, too. Ukraine see what’s happening here, and it has been vocal that it won’t allow others to determine its fate. Not even the Pope.
Good Shepherd Services’ and AT&T ran a free digital literacy and tech educational program to help bridge the digital divide in Brooklyn and address the diversity gap in technology industries. The program was led by Drone Cadets, a New York based organization whose curriculum focuses on promoting safe and responsible drone pilots of any age, and is providing 35 elementary and middle school campers with the opportunity to learn critical digital literacy and tech skills and
“AT&T’s Summer Soaring Project has been a wonderful way for Red Hook youth to explore opportunities in STEM,” said Councilmember Alexa Avilés. “Many thanks to Good Shepherd Services, AT&T, and the Miccio Cornerstone Community Center for your continued commitment to identifying and securing partnerships that provide opportunities for our youngest neighbors.”
Health screenings and information, assistance from Empire BlueCross BlueShield, special entertainment for kids, demonstrations, and an adult activity area were also highlights.
The first day of school for NYC public school students is Thursday, September 7, 2023. Lengthy school supply lists can be an added financial burden on already tight budgets for many families across the City. This Resource Fair helped many families in Sunset Park and surrounding neighborhoods.
Bait & Tackle capped off an improbable run to win the championship of the Red Hook Locals Softball League on August 17.
The league, which has been around since the 2000s, resumed play last year after a long hiatus while waiting for construction at the Red Hook ballfields to be completed. Fields 5-8 were closed in 2015 after toxins were found in the soil at the fields and numerous setbacks pushed back the completion date. They finally opened up again last year, and Field 9 is also completed. It was certainly worth the wait.
Field 9 is now called “Dovey Diamond” to honor Gary Dovey, a former Red Hook resident and proponent of the softball league, who passed away. Though there was no league while the fields were closed down, the league’s two original teams, the Wobblies and Bait & Tackle continued to play each other in pickup games. Once the league returned last year, B61 and the Record Shop were added as new teams. This season, Hometown was added as an expansion team.
After finishing in fourth place in the regular season, Bait & Tackle eliminated Hometown to advance to the semifinals. Both semifinals were rematches from last year as Bait & Tackle took on the Record Shop and the Wobblies played B61, the 2022 champions. Both the semifinals and the championship were played at Dovey Diamond.
In the first matchup on August 10, B61 jumped out early and kept tacking on runs until it was 8-3 after five innings on a rainy evening. In the top of the sixth, the Wobblies started to string together hits and cut the lead to 8-6. After a scoreless bottom of the sixth, the Wobblies managed to plate one more and had the tying run on first
by Brian Abatewith two outs but B61 got the final out to earn their spot in the championship with an 8-7 victory.
The second semifinal was a wild backand-forth high-scoring game with both teams getting a lot of runners on base and coming up with clutch hits. The Record Shop led 12-11 in the top of the seventh when the field lost power so the game was suspended.
“I’ve been nervous all week waiting for this game,” said Michael “Miguel” Buscemi of Bait & Tackle. “We’ll see what happens.”
The game resumed with clear skies and a runner on second and one out for Bait & Tackle. After a line out to third, Bait & Tackle kept their season alive with an RBI single which tied the game at 12. After a couple more runners reached base, a clutch two-run single by second baseman Kate gave Bait & Tackle a 14-12 lead.
In the bottom of the seventh, the Record Shop cut the lead to one with a leadoff double followed by a single. The next batter hit a line drive but a diving catch by “Batho” in center field, and an alert throw to first base saved the game for Bait & Tackle. A single by “Eamo” extended the game but a pop-out ended it and Bait & Tackle won 14-13.
The victory set up a rematch of the 2022 championship won by B61.
Bobby Cole, a player-coach for the Record Shop, who also umpired in the championship games said, “We had the best record in the regular season. As is often the case, I thought the best player on the team with the best record deserved to win MVP. Our best player all season was Joel Kern who just played an insane third base and was great offensively too. He almost single-handedly got us into the championship game.”
The championship rematch took place less than an hour after the completion of the second semifinal. It looked like it would be another highscoring game as Bait & Tackle scored two runs in the top of the first with a walk and three singles. B61 took advantage of a couple of walks and responded with two runs of their own in the bottom of the first.
A smoothly turned double play kept Bait &Tackle off the board in the top of the second. In the bottom of the second, a walk and an error set the table for B61 and they took advantage, lining back-to-back doubles by Chris and Leo, B61’s second and third hitters in the lineup, to take a 5-2 lead. After the hot start for both offenses, excellent defense helped keep the score the same until the sixth inning. After the fifth inning, both teams had a heated exchange which fired up Bait & Tackle. An error and a walk started their rally, and an RBI double cut B61’s lead to 5-3. Another error made it 5-4. Then with two outs, fifth and sixth hitters Tom and “Batho” both came through with clutch two-run doubles, giving them an 8-5 lead. The score remained 8-5 going into the bottom of the seventh but B61 would not go down quietly. A leadoff walk and an RBI triple by Leo cut the lead to 8-6. A sac fly made it 8-7 but a groundout to the pitcher and a fly out to center clinched the championship for Bait & Tackle.
“I knew this would be a close game and we found a way,” said Buscemi, as everyone from Bait & Tackle celebrated by popping champagne on the field.
“Listen, one team has to win,” said JJ of B61 after the game. “Bait was in fourth place and they went on this run. Congratulations to them, the better team
won. It’s tough to lose a close one but it was a great game.”
Following the game and the initial celebration, both teams shook hands, and Kate, the second baseman from B61 presented Bait & Tackle with the Colucci Cup.
“After nine years of losing for my Bait & Tackle Softballs, this win means the world to me and it’s just the start for us back on‘Dovey Diamond,’ said Greg “Greggles” Fischer, shortstop for Bait & Tackle. “Really though, the fun competitive nature aside, this league is all about bringing the community together and it doesn’t matter who wins it all in the end…but Bait’s gonna take the cup again and again so watch out Red Hook…”
After the game, Cole also reflected on the season, saying, “The new fields are sensational, and I’m so glad they’re Astroturf because they’re much easier to maintain. I think the play was vastly improved this season and there were unbelievable plays on offense and defense. It still has some convivial elements of a bar league but it ain’t no bar league anymore. This season was an epic, legendary experience. It was a continual learning process and a shining example of sportsmanship in today’s America.”
Upon entering Brooklyn Bridge Park, there is a big, gray building off to one side that says Iris Cafe Town Market at 125 Bridge Park Drive. Inside there is a restaurant with wooden walls and a great view of the waterfront, and a market in the back. The owners of the Iris Cafe, Radi and Beatriz Hamdan were kind enough to talk to me about their journey to Brooklyn Bridge Park, the challenges they face, as well as the best parts of their work.
“I always wanted to open up a sandwich spot, and I kept looking for the right location until I found a spot on Columbia Place off of Joralemon,” Radi Hamdan said. “I only had a few dollars, so I could only afford the last store in the middle of the block. At the time, I was still working overnight at Hunts Point delivering fruits and vegetables, so I couldn’t open the place without the right help.
“I met my future wife, and I told her about the place and she decided to work with me, and we opened the place together. I wanted to do roast beef and Mozzarella, I wanted to serve Manhattan Specials, and little Cokes in the bottle, and she wanted to do granola, avocado toast, and quinoa, so we met in the middle. We opened up in 2009.”
New York Magazine wrote an article naming Iris Cafe as the best cafe in New York for 2010, and from there, business took off.
Additionally, people would frequently come in, and ask for things like sugar or lemons, so Hamdan took on the place next door and turned it into a bodega. Next, he added a bar, and then table service, and finally dinner service.
“Even though things kind of exploded after the story in New York Magazine and we became a really big brunch spot, it was tough to make a profit because I had to make such a big investment at the beginning,” Radi Hamdan said. “It takes you time to even see a dollar, and by the time I started seeing a dollar, the lease was up.
“They approached me at the current location about moving there, and it took about two years of negotiating. Unfortunately, after we had everything worked out, COVID hit, which delayed us another two years. We finally opened about two years ago, and we’re still working towards getting to our full capacity. I grew up
by Brian Abatehere, and I always wanted something in the neighborhood.
The old location closed in 2019, and the new location opened up in 2022.
“My dad had this store in what’s now Dumbo, and we used to take Furman St. and pass by this building going home,” Radi Hamdan said. “We would get stuck at the light and I would tell my father ‘I like that building.’ I always wanted a spot in the building.”
While Radi Hamdan grew up in the neighborhood, Beatriz Hamdan is originally from Florida.
“I originally came to New York because I got a job offer working in fash-
it’s really nice seeing customers from the other location coming back to us now,” Beatriz Hamdan said. “It’s rewarding seeing people support us and being happy that we’re here.”
and get the right help. Without her, this would never have been possible.”
ion. My father was actually a chef, and I grew up in a restaurant my whole life,” Beatriz Hamdan said. “When I first met Radi, he had just signed the lease at the old location. So even though I always said ‘I never want to end up in a restaurant again’ when I was growing up, here we are!”
Though they are both happy with their work, they also spoke about some of the challenges they face.
“Part of the challenge is keeping good people because everyone you hire is young and working towards other goals,” Radi Hamdan said. “Another challenge is finding the balance between keeping the customers happy, and the employees happy. I love the location but it’s tough because being in a park, you’re only busy when the weather is nice. You only get that business for three, maybe four months per year. You face a lot of higher expenses, which is why people charge more to stay in business. I charge less, and I view it as an investment that over time will be worth it.
“You also have the moral questions of what to do when someone comes in here, stealing, and on one hand you need to stay in business but you also don’t want to call the cops and get people arrested. So you’re stuck between trying to do the right thing and trying to protect your business.”
Despite the challenges, the positives outweigh the negatives for the owners of the Iris Cafe.
“It’s great seeing people come in, and
“The best thing is being here, and being able to provide convenience for people who don’t have other places they can go to around here,” Radi Hamdan said. “I started off as a truck driver and it took time to build this. We don’t live luxurious lives or live lavishly; we just want to survive. As long as we can do that and still keep this place, we’re happy with that.
“I’ve been very lucky to have a great landlord, and without them, I never could have done this. They’ve worked with me to keep this place going, and without them, I would’ve been looking for another job. And I definitely could not have done this without my wife. She stepped up at a time when I was struggling to find the right people
There have been a lot of sunny, nice summer days this year, and that was the case for Red Hook West's annual Family Day, which took place in Coffey Park. The Red Hook Library had a table, manned by librarian Joyce Kopchak, as did the Red Hook Art Project. The Tenant Association barbecued as people hung out, chatted, chewed and enjoyed the day.
"You face a lot of higher expenses, which is why people charge more to stay in business. I charge less, and I view it as an investment that over time will be worth it."The newly reopened Iris Cafe in Brooklyn Bridge Park has been a hit both with customers and the media. Radi and Beatriz Hamdan at their restaurant. The origianl Iris Cafe opened in 2009 on Columbia Place in Brooklyn Heights.
New York is marking the 50th anniversary of the birth of hip-hop at a Bronx block party in 1973 with a packed program of IRL and virtual events, series, and celebrations across the city. (There’s even a special edition New York Public Library library card.) Most of these are centered, obviously, on the music. But at the Museum of the Moving Image, in Queens — the home boro of LL Cool J and 50 Cent — the party is cinematic. “Real Rap: Hip-Hop Star Power on Screen,” which opened in July, features more than a dozen films starring rap artists. The selection is eclectic and tracks hip-hop performers’ progress from secondary players to headliners. The first wave of titles — New Jack City (1991, Ice-T), Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit (1993, Lauryn Hill), and Poetic Justice (1993, Tupac Shakur) — treat rap and rappers as almost subcultural and exotic others in a straight world emerging from and challenging the conservative Reagan ‘80s. A mere decade later, hip-hop was mainstream and the artiststurned-performers became legit actors in legit films designed for mass appeal, such as Barbershop (2001, Ice Cube), 8 Mile (2002, Eminem), and Get Rich or Die Tryin’ (2005, 50 Cent).
“When this nebulous idea was forming in my mind, I was recalling my childhood, specifically the ‘90s and early 2000s where the Tupacs, Ice Cubes, 50 Cents of the world reached levels that I don’t think we’ve truly seen ever since,” co-organizer Austin Smith tells the Star-Revue. “They took their art and extended it beyond the recording booth and touched the hearts and minds of everyone across the country and across the world. I thought that cultural moment was something worth celebrating.”
Using House Party (1990) as a starting point, Smith and co-organizer Tiffany Joy Butler drew up a list of 40 films before ultimately paring it back to the 14 included in the series, which runs through October 21. (If you only have time for one, make it Poetic Justice, screening October 6-7; if you have time for two, House Party, screening September 16-17; three, Sister Act 2, screening October 14-15.)
“We were aiming for the star kind of role as much as we were able to,” Butler says. “I think our colleagues wanted to show a Halloween film, so that’s the reason we chose Ghosts of Mars, because Ice Cube is in it. We also wanted to recognize female rappers, so that’s a reason why we’re showing Barbershop, because Eve is in it and she’s great.”
“The focus was on trying to narrow down roles where these rappers we’re showcasing really, in my mind, take the air out of the room,” adds Smith.
Besides being an excellent commemoration of a half century of hip-hop, “Real Rap” demonstrates just how far rappers have come in terms of their relationship with the broader culture. When one showed up in a film in the ‘90s, it could feel like a stunt. Today, hip-hop has utterly mainlined to the point that gangsta rapper Ice-T is a fixture on Law & Order — as a cop, no less — and performers who began behind the mic are headlining major studio films and earning major recognition.
“They’re actors now, and I think that Hollywood and film directors appreciate them for their performances as actors,” Butler says. “Like Queen Latifah, we’re showing Just Right, where she actually makes a song at the end, which is cute. But she’s also done so many different roles and taken on so many beautiful
by Dante A. Ciampagliaperformances. [She was nominated for a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her role in Chicago.] So I think people kind of just understand that these are multi-talented performers who can take on these roles really seriously.”
The related 18-film series “Hip-Hop,” streaming on The Criterion Channel, takes a wider view of rap and the way it manifests in both narrative and documentary cinema. There is some overlap between “Real Rap” (Belly, Poetic Justice), but its expanded conversation of rap films allows curatorial director Ashley Clark to go a bit deeper into the catalog. Here you’ll find foundational films Style Wars (1983) and Wild Style (1983) as well as cult classics Krush Groove (1985) and the fiercely funny mockumentary Fear of a Black Hat (1993) along with stone-cold masterpieces like Do the Right Thing (1989) and Boyz N the Hood (1991).
“We’ve used the word ‘mixtape’ [to describe the series], which I like,” Clark tells the Star-Revue. “I didn’t want to draw artificial boundaries between fiction and nonfiction — after all, that boundary is exploded by Wild Style, and there are so many examples in these films of artists appearing as barely-veiled versions of themselves or riffing on their well known public personas. I just wanted to collect a diverse and interesting group of films that engaged with hip-hop culture in a serious and illuminating way.”
Like Smith and Butler at MoMI, Clark began with an extensive longlist of films for “Hip-Hop.” Some weren’t available for rights and clearances reasons, and he says he’s sad not to have been able to include “deeper documentary cuts” Beat This! A Hip-Hop History (1984), and Big Fun in the Big Town (1986) — two new-to-me films that I’m anxious to seek out. But it’s that spirit of discovery — more than canon building — that’s at the heart of Criterion’s series. “One doesn’t have to look too far on the internet for lists of the ‘Greatest Hip-Hop Films of All Time.’ I’m not making any such claims here,” Clark says. “But I am certainly aiming to use our platform and reach to spotlight some films that might get overlooked in these conversations. [I hope viewers come away with a] deeper, more historically rooted understanding of the multifaceted nature of hip-hop culture, which is more than just music. I hope they have fun with the program.”
It’s a sensibility central to MoMI’s program, as well. Both “Real Rap” and “Hip-Hop” are good times and unexpected celebrations of the defining musical genre
of the last half century. They’re also vital surveys of a kind of American film that, until recently, hasn’t been taken seriously. There has been, and still is, a lot of direct-to-video/streaming junk made starring rap artists and built around rap stereotypes, which can keep legitimacy of the films at arm’s length. But these series make the most convincing case for the validity of hip-hop performers and hip-hop style in movies. The former have made greater inroads on the silver screen than rock stars ever did, and the latter is now as uncontroversial as, say, editing. Anyone who argues to the contrary might as well be yelling at clouds.
“Real Rap” and “Hip-Hop” also confirm that, like the music it sprung from, hip-hop film is a transformative genre unto itself — a new kind of vernacular reshaping the artform. Hip-hop and hip-hop culture have impacted every element of movies, from costumes and set design to cinematography and direction to writing and, yes, acting. There might not be a crush of actual rap films akin to a multiplex full of comic book movies, but that’s because its working on a more fundamental, almost genetic level.
Where things go in the next half century is anyone’s guess. But on this 50th anniversary of the Bronx block party that birthed rap, the films in these series are a testament to the strength of the genre — and its expanding centrality to nearly every facet of American, and indeed global, pop culture.
“Real Rap: Hop-Hop Star Power on Screen” runs at the Museum of the Moving Image, 36-01 35 Ave. in Astoria, through October 21. Showtimes and information can be found online at movingimage.us/series/realrap. “Hip-Hop” is currently streaming on The Criterion Channel, criterionchannel.com.
“They’re actors now, and I think that Hollywood and film directors appreciate them for their performances as actors.”Tupac Shakur in Poetic Justice (courtesy Sony Pictures)
The QVNYC Film Festival’s Opening Party set the stage for a remarkable showcase of diverse stories to come, shedding light on the lives and struggles of marginalized communities. One film, Vice’s series Transnational, brought attention to the devastating murder of Kelly Stough, a Black trans woman in Detroit by pastor Albert Weathers. Through the eyes of journalist Eva Rayne, who is also a Black trans woman. The movie delves into the investigation while also exploring the vibrant Detroit ballroom scene.
The QVNYC Film Festival Opening Party, highlighted the need for festivals around queer Black individuals.
Transnational by VICE
The featured film at the QVNYC Film Festival opening party presented the VICE docu-series Transnational, which follows the murder of Kelly Stough, a Black trans woman and Detroit Ballroom performer. As the story unfolded, we followed journalist Eva Rayne to Detroit to meet Stough’s family and uncover her vibrant life and tragic murder. The film highlights the resilience and strength within the Detroit Black community, its Black trans community and ballroom scene.
Transnational celebrates the richness of
by Roderick Thomasthe Detroit Black and Latinx ballroom community, showcasing their talent, creativity, and cultural contributions.
Impact on the QVNYC Film Festival
The QVNYC Film Festival is a vital platform that elevates the voices of
deeper understanding of the challenges they face.
In short, we need this film festival. QVNYC’s dedication to providing a platform for diverse narratives underscores its importance as an inclusive space that amplifies everyday voices.
queer Black individuals and people of color, providing them with an opportunity to share their stories and experiences. By featuring films that address the struggles and triumphs of Black queer folks, the festival serves as a catalyst for celebration.
The QVNYC opening party created a powerful impact on the audience, sparking conversations about the intersectionality of race, gender identity, and sexuality. It allowed attendees to connect with the lived experiences of Black trans individuals, and gain a
QVNYC cultivates an environment where queer Black individuals and people of color can see themselves reflected on screen, fostering a sense of belonging, empowerment, and community.
The QVNYC Film Festival holds immense significance for queer Black individuals. The portrayal of their stories, struggles, and triumphs in films creates a sense of representation that is often lacking in mainstream media.
For Black folks, witnessing stories that reflect their unique experiences fosters a sense of pride and identity affirmation. QVNYC provides a platform where multifaceted lives are celebrated rather than disregarded.
By inviting audiences to engage with new narratives, the festival promotes empathy, understanding, and allyship. QVNYC encourages dialogue and empowers viewers to become advocates for change, leading to an understanding and celebration of diverse, everyday, unique people.
Be sure to lookout for the QVNYC official film festival coming to NYC October 2023.
Roderick Thomas is an NYC based writer, filmmaker. Instagram @theeroderickthomas
In 1920, his patent was granted by the U.S. Patent Office. That was the easy part. Construction of his new factory on Columbia Street, just south of Hamilton Avenue, complete with a rooftop landing strip, was a tad more difficult. In 1916 the City passed a zoning resolution, regulating all new construction for the first time. Its primary goal was to prevent buildings from reaching heights that would block out light in the immediate area. While the factory itself was of permissible height for Columbia Street, the contraption on the roof might have increased the height to an unacceptable level and the zoning laws provided no exception for rooftop airplanes. Moreover there appeared to be an issue relating to the uses planned within the building itself. Gibbons fought the determination and continued to test the device.
A hearing on the matter in 1920 before the Bureau of Standards & Appeals apparently went against him. In the meantime, Gibbons began constructing a new building at the foot of 24th Street in the Todd Shipyards and announced that eventually the structure would sport one of his landing strips. Finishing another shipyard building at the foot of Clinton Street a year later, he
stated he was “perfecting the device.”
In April 1923 Gibbons wrangled a “certificate of merit” from the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce for his business having survived some 54 years and used the occasion to announce that his rooftop landing strip “would soon be placed in universal use.”
In February 1924 another press splash occurred, accompanied by a drawing of Gibbons device atop a large center-City building. Gibbons gushed to a Brooklyn Eagle reporter that his device “can be used on railroad stations, post offices, station houses, hospitals, hotels, police headquarters, fire houses, office buildings, apartment houses.” The airplane receiving apparatus was said to have been patented for use around the globe and examined by military aviation experts “with great interest.” Meanwhile, although Gibbons’ building was stalled at a height of two stories, he claimed it would be completed soon. But aside from regular ads in the paper for his company, Gibbons was not heard from again for the next three years.
Then in May 1927 Charles Lindberg took off from Roosevelt Field in Nassau County on the first successful solo flight across the Atlantic – and the longest to date – landing 2,000 miles away
in Paris. Mayor Fiorella LaGuardia, himself a flyer during the World War, was incensed that puny Garden City would be enshrined as the starting point for this momentous event and vowed to build a large municipal airport. A site at the foot of Flatbush Avenue was eventually chosen by a Federal presidential commission in February 1928, later dubbed Floyd Bennett Field. LaGuardia was not happy. He wanted the airfield to be on Governor’s Island because its proximity to Manhattan would help him convince the US Postal Service to abandon Newark Airport as the destination terminal for all air mail drops for the NYC area. It was a matter of prestige. But Floyd Bennett was about 15 miles distant from the main Post Office on West 34th Street, a very long and slow motor trip – even then, traffic sucked – whereas the mail from Newark could be swiftly ferried across the Hudson.
Richard Gibbons to the rescue! He suddenly resurfaced in the press as soon as the Floyd Bennett location was approved by the City in February 1928. The Gibbons solution? He would take delivery of mail dispatched from Floyd Bennett on his Columbia Street roof, elevator it down to trucks below and off they would go to post offices hither and
yon. Moreover, Gibbons would deploy his contraptions on as many post office roofs as necessary. Two flying aces from Germany and Ireland would be examining his device shortly at his Columbia Street workshop, he claimed, with a view toward adopting it throughout Europe per a royalty agreement.
All he needed was to get permission from the damn zoning people to finish his damn building!
Alas and alack, it was not to be. Runways on roofs was a bridge too far for everybody but Gibbons. By the time Floyd Bennett opened to freight traffic in 1930, Gibbons had dissolved his business. He died four years later in his bed at 25 1st Place in Carroll Gardens, possibly fantasizing about splitting the atom in his basement. His workshops became an auto auction site and the two story factory became Bruno’s Garage, demolished after WWII to build the Battery Tunnel.
In 1925, T.S. Elliot famously wrote, “Between the idea and reality falls the shadow.” He might have been alluding to Richard Gibbons’ idea to install a landing strip atop a big new Columbia Street factory. The sad reality was that the City’s zoning resolution cast a very big shadow.
In short, we need this film festival. QVNYC’s dedication to providing a platform for diverse narratives underscores its importance as an inclusive space that amplifies everyday voices.
by Joe Enright
A band everyone should like. There was a time, back in the distant 1980s and ‘90s, when recording and distribution outpaced the spread of information. The post-punk DIY movement encouraged artists and fans to seize the means of production and make their own records and zines but there was no guarantee they’d end up in the same places. As a result, there were bands with cool names that you’d never hear and records with cool covers that you didn’t know anything about. That first category, for example, included, for me, Virgin Prunes, whom I recently listened to for the first time after my friend Rui sang me their well deserved praises. They’d always just been one of those names I meant to get, at least to since the Internet happened, and I’m happy at last to have felt their jagged edge.
were unlike anything I’d heard before and, to be honest, anything I’ve heard since: funny, proto–fast folk songs of lesbian heartache and betrayal; grinding punk songs about anorexia and macho hardcore attitudes; a fairly uncategorizable song finding empathy for a misunderstood and maligned Jesus Christ. Interspersed among them were dissonant dirges, babies singing at bathtime, short song fragments and other auditory ephemera. It’s an enchanting oddball of an album.
The only album Meat Joy ever made remained pretty well hidden from the digital age—I’ve only ever found 2 or 3 of the cuts on YouTube and the whole thing never saw reissue or made it to streaming, at least until now. The 1984 slice of perfection will become available to the masses on Oct. 13 as download or LP, with an option for a handmade cover, via Bandcamp. (The band also contributed tracks to at least a couple of indie comps which, sadly, haven’t been included.)
Fronting the group, it turns out, was Gretchen Phillips, later one of Two Nice Girls. And confirming those ancient rumors, the recently departed Butthole Surfer Teresa Nervosa is heard on drums. The band will be reuniting for a couple of Austin dates around the release. If anyone’s driving from NYC, let me know.
oscillators to his rig. The end result is more than a little like early recordings by no wave legends Teenage Jesus and the Jerks. REMOSS2 (cassette and download out in June via Ramp Local) revisits the tunes from the last album with remixes by NAH, Machine Girl, President Evil, GHÖSH, Avola, Giant Claw, Fire-Toolz, and Bl_ank, adding sexy synths and heavier dance rhythms in ways that are sometimes hilarious and sometimes just great, heady fun. Remix albums often end up as reductive, LCD exercises. REMOSS2 is a strong companion piece and a good excuse to catch up if you missed the previous moss.
Top of the other list was Meat Joy. I knew two people with copies of their self-released, self-titled 1984 LP, each with a different, handmade cover. Story was they were from Texas, and friends with the Butthole Surfers, that one of the Surfers was even on the album, or something like that. There was no way to check, of course, but it all scanned. (I figured out later that the band took its name from a film by the feminist artist Carolee Schneeman. A DC punk band later also used the name.)
One of my friend’s copies eventually ended up in my collection. The cover was a simple cartoon of a wildly happy woman, rendered in magic marker, declaring “Meat Joy—A Band Everyone Should Like” against a background of colorful, diagonal stripes. That gloriously joyful lady wasn’t wrong.
The contents of the white label LP
Mossy songs and the siren who sings them. Last year, the Portland duo Sea Moss set a personal high water mark with their SEAMOSS2. Their fried and blistered beats had never worked better. I’m not sure if their new remix album bests it, but it certainly builds on the fractured grooves. Vocalist Noa Ver sings and screams in a language all her own, frequently distorted by a microphone set against her neck. It’s odd that sirens have been imagined by such human standards; I’d think they’d drive sailors crazy with such alien, animal calls as Ver’s. Drummer Zach D’Agostino adds homemade electronics such as hacked feedback
Youth is wasted on the dumb. Say what you will about Miley Cyrus, and people do, she’s got a hell of a voice and a great sense of harmony. (Check out her acoustic “Backyard Sessions” videos if you haven’t already). And while I’m hardly her target audience, she occasionally lays out a track that I do love. “Wrecking Ball” is truly heart-wrenching, “We Can’t Stop” is a surprising, downtempo party anthem, and her unapologetic, new “Used to Be Young” acknowledges her wild side, doesn’t exactly promise she’s past it and, most importantly, showcases her dynamic voice. She’s going to be around for a long time, and the new single promises to be a staple in her concerts for years to come. Turning 30 last year might have turned her thoughts toward fading youth. Another 10 or 20 years will only ripen the song and wizen her voice.
Review of “Kappa" by Ryunosuke Akutagawa, translated from the Japanese by Allison
Markin Powell and Lisa Hofmann-Kuroda
Review by Michael Quinn
Did you go on any trips this summer? Traveling has many benefits. You might interact with different people, learn a new language, and discover things about another culture’s values. Whenever you go someplace new, you see the world with fresh eyes—and sometimes the home you return to with a critical one.
Patient No. 23 came back from his trip worse for the wear. He is recuperating in a psychiatric hospital outside of Tokyo. An unnamed narrator introduces us to the “youthful-looking madman” and relays his tale in “Kappa” by Ryunosuke Akutagawa (1892–1927). Allison Markin Powell and Lisa Hofmann-Kuroda recently collaborated on a modern translation of one of the prolific shortstory writer’s final works.
Before the patient’s mental breakdown, he had set out for a summer mountain hike. He gets disoriented by a rising fog. Suddenly, he catches a glimpse of a strange creature and gives chase, falling into a hole and waking up in a strange (yet strangely familiar) world.
Kappa Land looks a lot like Tokyo, only on a smaller (more miniature) scale; for Kappa, slimy things with chameleonlike skin, beaky mouths, and webbed hands and feet stand only three feet tall. They have pouches in their stomachs and oval-shaped plates on their heads. These creatures view the man as a curiosity, nurse him to health, and invite him to live among them.
At first, the man has a hard time with their language, which sounds like squawking. “Qua,” says one. “Quax, quax!” says another. As the man acclimates, he befriends different Kappas. Each has something different to teach him, whether about love (the females do the pursuing), birth (a Kappa child decides whether or not to be born), or religion (the Kappas practice Lifeism, which is devoted to eating, drinking, and copulating, and takes as its saints such luminaries as the Swedish playwright Strindberg, the German philosopher Nietzsche, and the Russian writer Tolstoy: each a freethinker who clashed with the conventions of his day).
Yet the man struggles to come to terms with the Kappas’ absurdist ways: “They find amusing the things humans take seriously, while at the same time, they take seriously things that we are amused by,” he realizes. For example, regarding politics, Geyl, a factory owner, explains that “every speech is a complete lie. But everyone knows that, so in the end, it
might as well be the truth.”
While the man is sometimes horrified by the Kappas’ amorality (workers, displaced by machines, are eaten), what finally pushes him over the edge is the hypocrisy of human culture: pretending to be something that we’re not, pretending to care about things that we don’t. The Kappas don’t love this two-faced existence of ours either. “We Kappas, unlike you—ugh, never mind,” one begins, abandoning the unfavorable comparison.
“Kappa” takes many shots at “modern” society. While written almost 100 years ago, readers will recognize in its pages that we’re still living in the same kind of capitalist world it takes issue with.
The novel’s 17 short chapters also tackle such heavy topics as war (including the one between the sexes) and the burdens of family life. Yet “Kappa” is not a straight-up satire. It’s more complex and existential. It’s amusing, disturbing, and strange, haunted by recurring images of bare branches against an empty sky—the ramblings of an alleged madman, imprisoned presumably for his good against his own will for speaking out about obvious truths the collective would prefer to deny.
In his book “Words of a Fool,” the Kappa philosopher Magg advises, “The wisest way to live is to scorn the customs of one’s age while still abiding by them.” Isn’t any philosophy of life a kind of survival guide? Perhaps this was one by which Akutagawa could not abide. Shortly after he wrote this story, he killed himself. “Kappa” could be read as a kind of suicide note. It’s a quick read that will leave a long-lasting impression.
Boxes of old COMIC BOOKS lying around?
Pianist Matthew Shipp has had such a consistent, sustained career, nearly 40 years as one of the foremost free jazz players, that it’s easy to lose sight of what he’s done as a musician. His built a grand discographical forest through his own albums and those on which he’s part of another ensemble—coming up with the important David S. Ware Quartet, he’s played so frequently with musicians like bassists William Parker and Michael Bisio, saxophonist Rob Brown, and drummers Whit Dickey and Newman Taylor Baker, that they seem to be part of the same musical family, making records and concert appearances because they’re together all the time anyway (this is not far from the truth, as noted below). The trees to this forest are fascinating and notable, though, and it’s rewarding to pay attention to them, including collaborations with Antipop Consortium, J. Spaceman, Ivo Perelman, and some new and recent albums that are among the finest releases of the past few years: Daniel Carter’s Seraphic Light (AUM Fidelity, 2018) and Welcome Adventure Vol. 1 (577 Records, 2020); Pathways from the trio of Shipp, guitarist Gordon Grdina, and bassist Mark Helias (Attaboygirl Records, 2022); andThe Intrinsic Nature of Shipp, a beautiful, deep solo album that comes out later this month on Mahakala Music.
Shipp is a challenging musician, and that is the highest of compliments and recommendations. There is a real cultural divide in music, but it’s not between styles, racial groups, or high and low. It’s between music that is a manufactured product based around selling stardom—the music “industry”—and music that comes out of the human imperative of expression within a social culture. That latter kind of music isn’t challenging or difficult—there is no such thing as difficult music (except if you’re an arts institution administrator or addicted to the idea that money and fame are the only qualities that matter)—but it is a different experience. It’s not always three minutes and a steady backbeat, or any kind of self-contained unit. Often it’s something that you don’t understand the first time through, or even the second, or the fifth, but that is coaxing out sensations you don’t usually have, that promises something you can’t put into words, that has layers that keep going, that’s beautiful in a way that’s new.
That is the subject that’s wrapped in the riddle of a new, short book by Clifford Allen, Singularity Codex: Matthew Shipp on RogueArt, the French free jazz label. Shipp has recorded several hundred albums, and the book explores his discography on RogueArt—which amounts to about two dozen—and is published by the label.
For a listener interested in Shipp and/or the New York free jazz scene, the book is an intriguing introduction. It’s elliptical by design; Shipp isn’t the direct focus, rather the book outlines him by featuring interviews with some of his most important musical colleagues, like Dickey and Brown. This does demand a context of knowledge and experience that goes
beyond the book, so this is not meant for the general reader.
Allen has been listening to Shipp closely for decades, and captures the pianist’s ongoing development—one of the thrilling and even moving qualities in his playing has been hearing him shed things that have been less than his absolutely authentic voice, which has him at a place now where there’s a sparkle and joy in everything he plays, even when he’s creating thick, dark textures, the feeling that he’s surprising and delighting himself.
The conversations that Allen has tell a complementary story, one that in a sense is the real subject of the book, which is of New York City in general and the East Village/Lower East Side specifically as the home to free jazz. In the same way that Dixieland is part of the cultural DNA of New Orleans, and modern blues is rooted in Chicago even if its made in Germany, so is free jazz in the post-Coltrane world a New York City music. It is of course global in practice, a freefloating geography that spans cities and countries, but the musicians who are at its core, who connect with each other in various ensembles and reach across continents, have historically been concentrated in a niche in Manhattan—Shipp has been living on East 3rd Street for decades—and their musical lives are inextricable from their social lives and their being as citizens of the city. They play together and live in the same community, share the same experiences. What makes Shipp such a satisfying challenge is that he doesn’t much sound like anyone else, and each time you encounter his playing, he sounds like he’s on his way to something else—his musical ideas aren’t complete phrases that come to an end that is a culmination of what’s come before, but the beginnings of paragraphs and chapters that you still haven’t gotten to. He’s always ahead and pacing himself further away, but it’s not hard to follow him because his path is always clear, give it attention and you’ll never lose your way.
There’s a thing in music promotion where press releases often come with a listing of other artists, i.e. listen to this if you like to listen that. If I were writing
a press release for Shipp, it would be something like, listen to this if you like to listen to: Miles Davis from his 1965-68 Quintet and electric eras; the Symphony No. 7 by Jean Sibelius; Varése; Jimmy Lyons. This is not that Shipp is bound to any idea of eclecticism, in fact it’s something more like a very focussed, rich, and idiosyncratic spirituality, something that strikes me as a very American, earthy, no-frills Christianity that is searching and in no way egoistic, privately and sincerely mystical and even esoteric. His range isn’t other music that he’s collected, it comes from inside himself. Since the first generation of jazz musicians, every player has learned by listening to their favorites who came before, picking up and transforming stylistic ideas. So of course, when Shipp plays you can hear bits of Ellington, Monk, Bill Evans, Mal Waldron, and others. Those are nods to things he likes and that he can use in the moment, exploring an improvisation, so one piece may have dense chords that remind the ears of Evans; Shipp’s hands gleefully stomping the way Ellington would; a tight logic between rhythm, melody, and harmony, a la Monk. Those are variations, important details—listen to a whole set, or a whole album, whether Shipp is a leader or a sideman, and what you hear is someone who is in the ongoing creation of his own language and style. To go back to the literary metaphor, Shipp is writing an enormous, fantastical, fascinating, and even entertaining novel, and it comes out in complete and coherent sentences. Allen quotes Shipp alluding to this in his own playing. Talking about his friendship and working relationship with the great poet Steve Dalachinksy, who was an essential part of the free jazz scene, Shipp says: “He understands my perspective…and how that relates to American literature…and also how I’m a builder of architecture in the way that Borges is—he gets that Labyrinths is a massive, massive influence on me…”
That’s the challenge and the reward, beyond hearing someone stitch notes together in time, listening to Shipp means listening to an artist thinking, feeling, and building in real time. It’s knowing someone through sound.
There is a real cultural divide in music, but it’s not between styles, racial groups, or high and low. It’s between music that is a manufactured product based around selling stardom—the music “industry”— and music that comes out of the human imperative of expression within a social culture.Clifford Allen and Matthew Shipp
Hope everyone had a great summer but now it’s time to go back to school! In honor of that theme, my daughter Sage is helping with this month’s column! To get a head start on keeping your desk neat, make this handy desk organizer out of a recycled cereal box. Follow these steps to make your own and be sure to personalize it however you want!
by Marie Hueston and Sage Huestonwhatever other items you use. Sort your supplies into taller items that can stick out of the box and smaller items that can lay on top.
What you’ll need. In addition to an empty cereal box, you’ll need decorative paper, glue, scissors, craft knife, pencil and ruler. For paper you can recycle wrapping paper or purchase craft paper at an art store.
Plan your placement. For the supplies that will stand upright, outline the spaces where you’d like them to be using your pencil. If you need help making straight lines, use your ruler.
Have a great school year!
Share your designs with us! Send photos of your creations to our editor at gbrook8344@gmail.com
October Preview: Have any socks missing a pair?
Save them for a fun Halloween craft!
