Massive Magazine Volume 01 Issue 01 by Massive Magazine

FEBRUARY 2012 - ISSUE 01

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EDITORIAL

CONTENTS

Welcome to the new university year, and the new student publication for Massey University. This publication is designed to While most editorials would devote this time to going into a long spiel about the new look publication and how great it is, I thought I would let our articles speak for themselves and let you know what you can expect from our launch edition. Orientation is usually at the forefront of everyone’s minds around this time, and this edition reflects that. The regional sections of this edition are dedicated to what is happening on and around your campus and what you can expect from your student association for entertainment in your first, fragile week. Then things get a bit serious with information about radical changes to your student association and how they will survive post VSM, we had hoped to bring you a fantastic, in-depth piece of investigative journalism, but it was deemed too hot to print. Don’t worry we are heading back to lawyers and will do our best to bring this to you next month. Check out the back half of the magazine, this section is filled with articles dedicated to entertainment and literary talent. Take a trip through the heroin scene and back again or read up about indie band, Death Cab for Cutie, coming to New Zealand soon. There is plenty of scope for articles within our publication with the focus being on issues that affect students across all campuses as well as news, fiction, poetry and creative non-fiction to showcase the literary talent of Massey University students. But we’re not just focused on breaking the mould with our articles, advertising that is original, quirky, and innovative is part of the publication as well. The KiwiRail Overlander strips that appear at the bottom of each page take you on a trip from Wellington to Auckland, perhaps even a semiotic representation of Massive Magazines new reach nationwide. Check out the competition page if you feel like a trip on the Overlander, there are 10 to giveaway. I hope you enjoy the new publication, and if you want to contribute to the magazine, feel free to drop me an email or talk to a campus reporter. Enjoy..

REGULARS

02. NEWS 05. LETTERS 06. DEBATE 37. MASSIVE CROSSWORD 38. REVIEWS 40. CLASSIFIEDS

FEATURES

07. EXTREME MAKEOVER STUDENT ASSOCIATION EDITION 10. DOOMSDAY - ARE YOU PREPARED FOR THE END? 12. OCCUPIED - AN ISSUE TO BE IGNORED? 14. WETA’S MALL ARTIST OF MANY FACES 17. PAPER WINGS TO TAKE FLIGHT AT MASSEY 18. THE EVER-EXPANDING HORIZON 21. STARING AT THE CEILING 27. THE BRAIN IN LOVE 30. THE BIG DAMP SQUIB 33. DEATH CAB’S NEW LIBERATION 34. THROW SOME LIGHT

EDITOR Matt Shand editor@massivemagazine.org.nz 04 801 5799 ext 62068 DESIGN, LAYOUT & ART DIRECTION Cameron Cornelius allstylenotalent@gmail.com 04 801 5799 ext 62064

ADVERTISING & SPONSORSHIP MANAGER advertising@mawsa.org.nz 04 801 5799 ext 62069

CONTRIBUTORS

Matt Shand, Jessica Roden, Miriam Richdale, Jamie Desplace, Sarah Burton, Elazabeth Beattie, Jacob Lilley, Angela McGuigan, Alexandria Rose Nathan, Greame Jennings, Mike Ross, Ruth Field, Jonny McCaughan, Reynald Castenda

PUBLISHER

NEWS FEBRUARY 2012 - ISSUE 01

Jessica Rooden

NEW YEAR, NEW BEGINNING

t’s a new year, and that’s right, this is a new magazine … the first of its kind, I might add. Spanning Massey’s three campuses, MASSIVE is New Zealand’s first-ever national student magazine. Massey prides itself on being the country’s ‘defining’ university, and those behind Massive have ambitiously re-defined student journalism nationwide. With the introduction of the Voluntary Student Membership (VSM) bill in late 2011, it looked increasingly likely that Albany’s Satellite magazine and Manawatu’s Chaff magazine, like many

other financially unsustainable student publications, would become null and void in 2012. MASSIVE editor Matt Shand, who was the last editor of Wellington’s student magazine Magneto, spearheaded the campaign for a united Massey student magazine. Though he says he was confident Magneto could continue, he felt it would be a tremendous loss to student culture in both Palmerston North and Albany if they lost their independent student publications. Matt says the biggest difference between Massive and the previous publications is its ability to reach

36,000 students. And because of that reach, he says he thinks and hopes it will be able to “insight change within the university”. He says it is vitally important to him that MASSIVE is run as a separate financial entity from both the university and the student union. “The student magazine can’t be the voice-piece of the university or the student unions … it needs to be able to critique them”. All the others interviewed strongly agreed with him on this issue. Like any new venture, there are challenges that come along with it. Matt acknowledges there were roadblocks, which he says “mainly stemmed from the fact that it hasn’t be done before in New Zealand”. He says some people wondered whether a national publication would be financially viable and whether a new publication would have enough student by-in to make it a success. Because of these valid concerns, industry veteran Brent Webling joined the MASSIVE team at its conception late last year as Editor-in-Chief, providing credibility and accountability for the magazine. Brent was a journalism student at Massey Wellington in 1971 when it was still the Wellington Polytechnic. Since then he has worked in newspapers, including The Dominion, and as a Press Secretary at Parliament. Brent says he doesn’t pretend to know what students these days want to see in their magazine and puts that squarely on Matt’s shoulders, but “the idea is that the students drive it and I act as an industry sounding board”. As well as Brent, who is working primarily on editorial content, MASSIVE has advisers on advertising and design. MAWSA student president Ben Thorpe, when asked how he feels about the expansion, says bluntly: “We fully support it, quite frankly. Alex Hemma [2011 student president] really laid the groundwork and campaigned along with Matt to make it possible and I am going to continue that support”. Ben is so enthusiastic about the new arrangements that he adds:

“Quite frankly, I don’t know why it hasn’t been done in the past.” He says that from a student perspective some of the challenges of the magazine will be “establishing itself over the other three campuses – also gaining credibility not only throughout Massey, but in the industry itself”. He is, however, optimistic and says he thinks Wellington students would readily embrace Massive. MUSA President Alex Jones agrees, saying that though some people on the Palmerston North campus were reluctant to see Chaff pass on, he thinks critics would be “pleasantly surprised at how MASSIVE turned out”, and it would become “a good substitute”. The editor of Chaff last year was unable to be contacted for comment.

“The student magazine can’t be the voice-piece of the university or the student unions … it needs to be able to critique them”

The last editor of Satellite, Stacey Riordan, is deceivingly more pessimistic at the chances of the success of MASSIVE, particularly on the Albany campus. She acknowledges that new students won’t know anything other than Massive and older students will be grateful that there was any kind of student magazine. But she says that after the re-orientation issue she thinks Albany students will tune out because “Albany has a culture which sets it apart from the other Massey campuses, and I doubt that the new magazine will be able to successfully address this.” In terms of the transition from Satellite to MASSIVE, Stacey says she received very little consultation or communication. She says that “as far as I know the only

people that actually knew of the restructuring were the ones doing it … so as far as restructuring without any objections, this was a good way to go about it”. The ASA student president was unable to be contacted for comment. A poorly communicated restructure or not, 2012 looks to be a make it or break it year for the university’s student magazine. Though the groundwork appears to be in place, what will secure its future will undoubtedly be the support of you, the students. If MASSIVE can cement itself into the student culture at all three campuses then you’ll be reading perhaps the most successful student publication in the history of New Zealand. Critics could easily be against a bunch of university students taking on this kind of challenge. It’s a good thing this journalist always goes for the underdog, then.

COVER ARTIST DRYPNZ

This month’s cover art was created by Wellington based artist, Jon Drypnz. Google, DRYPNZ, to find out more about the artist. Drypnz’s inspiration for the image stems from the concept that schools are putting students into ‘boxes’, although education is effective when personalized not prescribed on stereotype. Sometimes unaware and unable to look past simple horizons (the edges of the table). The table also illustrates the hierarchy the heads of the school see themselves as having, but it is obviously unstable as they try to control what is not theirs to control. The colour (students) contrasts the bland figure in the centre of ‘attention’ trying to dictate options. www.drypnz.com

BRING YOUR STORY TO LIFE.

WIN FREE TICKETS ON THE OVERLANDER

Magneto Creative Writing Competition

Matt Shand

Sponsored by Bennetts bookstore

CREATIVE WRITING COMPETITION KICKS OFF Prizes Include: 1st Prize: $500 Booksellers Voucher 2nd Prize: $300 Booksellers Voucher + $200 Booksellers Voucher

for the best first year entry

All stories are eligible for entry including: creative writing, life writing,

Massey University students as creativefor nonthe fiction and travel writing Entries are now open Massive Magazine Expressive well as students previously enopen June 6, entries can be submitted by email via editor@mawsa.org.nz Arts Entries Awards. The competition, rolled in 2011. Entries can be or hand delivered to the mawsa office. Entries close 9am, October 7 2011 sponsored by Bennett’s book- submitted by emailing competishop, showcases the creative tal- tions@massivemagazine.org.nz. Check out last year’s runner up, ent of Massey University students JULY 11 entitled, across all levels of their study and Ruth Field’s, short story “The Brain is in Love” on page 29 rewards literary excellence. Picking up from where the Magneto Creative Writing Com- Terms and Conditions petition left off, this year’s comEntries must be kept under petition aims to be bigger and better. The entry categories have 3,500 words. Entries must include a cover been expanded and now include separate entry categories for: po- page detailing: the submission etry, fiction, non-fiction and best category, author’s name, student entry produced as part of a first ID number, campus, and contact year writing paper. An award will details. No identifying informaalso be given for the best Masters tion should be given on the entry in Creative Writing project com- itself. Entries should be sent in Mipleted in 2012. The prize has also been upgrad- crosoft Word format. All entries must be received by ed and the best entries will take a share of $2400 worth of Booksell- 9am September 20, 2012. Late ers Vouchers generously provided entries will be discarded. Students can enter up to three by Bennetts Bookshop, as well as have the chance to be published entries per category. Entries must be the original within a new Massive Magazine Literary Journal to be released at content of the author. All entries will remain the property of the the end of the academic year. The journal will include the entrant, however, Massive Magawinners from each category, no- zine reserves the right to publish table entries and illustrative work articles submitted within its pubwill accompany each entry. The lications until December 2012. The judge’s decision regardjournal will be distributed freely through on campus Bennetts ing the winners is final. No correspondence will be entered into. Bookshops. The competition is open to all

mawsa If you’re planning a trip in the North Island shortly, this competition is for you. KiwiRail Scenic Journeys has generously given Massey University students a great prize for our launch edition, and a way to travel the country in comfort, by providing us with 10 Overlander Flexi tickets to give away.

The Flexi tickets allow students to travel anywhere on the Overlander line that runs through New Zealand’s heartland from Wellington to Auckland. Travelling by rail may seem a bit unconventional in today’s era of jet planes, but the views you get from the ground more than make up for it. You can experience lush green farmland and native forests before being whisked over stunning river gorges and across New Zealand’s volcanic plateau. Winning is simple, just email competitions@massivemagazine.org. nz with KIWIRAIL SCENIC JOURNEYS in the address line and winners will be randomly drawn from all entrants. Tickets are valid for travel up to August 31, 2012.

NEWS DAWN BLESSING FOR MASSEY’S NEW ‘STUDENT CENTRAL’

Some 100 staff, students and supporters attended a dawn blessing for the new student amenities centre and steel pou at the Albany campus on Wednesday.

Massey Newswire

SCHOOL OF AVIATION MARKS SILVER JUBILEE

assey University School of Aviation is marking a milestone this year when it celebrates 25 years of producing “aviators with a difference”. The school will hold its silver jubilee in April with a two-day celebration culminating in a gala dinner. Aviators, alumni, enthusiasts and experts will reunite to mark the school’s anniversary, with a chance to check out the $8 million fleet of Diamond training aircraft at the Milson Flight Systems Centre in Palmerston North. Chief executive of the school Ashok Poduval says April is an ‘aviation’ month on the New Zealand calendar with the school’s silver jubilee celebration, the 75th anniversary celebration of the Royal New Zealand Air Force and the Wings over Wanaka air show. “We are extremely proud to have reached this milestone and even more proud of the achievements of our graduates who are employed in the industry all over the world,” he says. “The school is focused on contributing to the future of aviation through excellence in aviation education, training and research.”

Massey aviation students move on to careers as pilots, air safety investigators, airport managers, flight dispatchers and airline managers. The School of Aviation has recently been chosen by the national carrier Air New Zealand as a preferred training provider. “Massey is making a global contribution from our base in New Zealand,” says Mr Poduval who has led the school since 2005. “We have networks with individuals and organisations around the world and we are hopeful that a number of them will join us for the celebrations.” Massey School of Aviation commenced in 1987 with 28 students on the first course. This year, 326 students are studying towards a Bachelor of Aviation Management, 130 are studying towards a Bachelor of Aviation – Air Transport Pilot, 37 are pursuing postgraduate degrees and six are working towards doctorates. Mr Poduval says the school has since grown to occupy a unique place in New Zealand and globally. “Our school is one of the few tertiary education institutions in the world that provides professional training for pilots embed-

ded in University accredited academic qualifications,” he says. “We believe it takes more than stick and rudder skills and flying hours in the log book to produce a high-calibre aviator.” The purchase of two twin-engine Diamond DA42 and 12 Diamond DA40 single-engine aircraft in 2009 established Massey at the forefront of professional pilot training in New Zealand. The first graduates to complete their training on these aircraft received their Wings in November. The aircraft, which replaced the Piper Warrior single engine and Piper Seneca twin-engine aircraft, have state-of-the-art Garmin 1000 cockpit display systems to enhance safety and improve training quality. “The Diamonds are technologically-advanced aircraft with digital instrumentation, moving map displays, terrain awareness warning and traffic avoidance systems,” says Mr Poduval. They are also fitted with Spidertracks, a device developed with the aid of Massey University mechatronics graduate James McCarthy that enables real-time tracking of the aircraft position from the flight operations centre. The jubilee dinner will be held on Saturday April 21 at the Palmerston North Convention Centre. For more information, or to book your boarding card, email aviation@massey.ac.nz and follow the school on Facebook.

The $15m building, dubbed Student Central and designed by architects at Warren and Mahoney, will provide a campus heart and hub for students. The blessing was led by local kaumätua Pat Ruka (Ngäpuhi, Ngäti Porou, Ngäti Whätua), who took the crowd through the building’s two floors which house student facilities and services, including club rooms, retail, banking, food outlets, study support, health and counselling, and Mäori and Pasifika student services. Albany Students’ Association president Stephan van Heerden says the centre will provide a highly visible and accessible permanent home for the association, and will help to foster a sense of community at the campus. He says this is “good timing” in light of the Voluntary Student Union Bill being passed last year, which has created uncertainty about the continuation of some student services, such as advocacy and class representatives. “Student Central will be great for students to meet and hang out. It means they have a place to stay on campus, rather than just leaving after their lectures.” “Each of the seven pou is a stepping stone of progression, acknowledging the personal and academic achievement of the students.” The new centre will be open on February 20 for Orientation Week, with food stalls, market day, free sausage sizzles and live music, and an official opening ceremony will be held on March 23.

LETTERS

LETTERS Massive magazine welcomes letters of all shapes and sizes, They should preferably be emailed to letters@massivemagazine.org.nz, though they can be dropped into any student association office. The Editor reserves the right to edit, abridge, or just plain bastardise them, and will refuse any that are in bad taste or defamatory. Pseudonyms may be used.

FEELING ACCEPTED

Thanks for accepting my application to study Massey. It really made my day to know that you were willing to accept my money and allow me to grace the hallowed hallways of your university. I will try to live up to the faith you have placed in me. I must say, I almost missed your invitation. It appeared in the junk folder of my email inbox and I certainly wasn’t expecting to have to reconfirm my desire to study at the university having not done this strange practice in my first. I would have thought that my enrolling in courses and selection of said courses could have merely been accepted then and there instead of including this extra, and confusing step. My real question is, what would have happened had I missed this email. I am sure you will probably be inundated with irate students (who don’t want to enhance their penis size and therefore never check their junk (oh ho great pun) email boxes). Is their academic year ruined before it even began? Even if the email went into the email inbox uninterrupted how many simply ignored it and went about enjoying their summer con-

tent in the knowledge that uni would take care of itself, after all they had enrolled and probably made travel plans. This rant may fall on deaf ears. As the magazine is probably only read by people who got the email and were on to it enough to respond, but who knows. A copy may end up in the hands of someone who missed the deadline and is no flipping burgers wishing they checked their junk email more often. And if by some twist of cosmic fate this has happened, then I wish to offer you an apology on behalf of my new tertiary institution in which case you should get angry and get your own letter in here, but I guess my real intention was to throw out my frustration at this new step and see if other students had the same problem. Or was it just me? No name supplied

SONNY BRILLIANT

Nothing was better than seeing the best New Zealand sportsperson who ever existed knock that fat, arrogant, showboating American out in one round. Sonny Bill Williams is clearly the best boxer New Zealand has ever produced, and has finally silenced the haters who think he can’t box and is just a media whore. Well they can just shut up now. The fact that NZ has no other boxer worthy of even putting up a fight against him shows his pure talent, as does the fact that he has climbed to the top of League, Rugby and Boxing in such a short time span. Tua’s past it, Cameron’s onto other things, SBW is the new face of NZ boxing and rightly so. He can’t lose. SBW#1FTW should just shut up and let him and this is shown by his winning of the title with just five bouts to his name. No name supplied

DEAR MASSIVE

Having a massive head of hair has been one of the weirdest experiences of my life. Short of being hair-raped, the head-pubes have had more physical contact over the last 6 months than the rest of me has had in all my years on this planet. Dancing in a night

club = doing the migraine skank to avoid the hands of obsessed 30 year old women. Walking down the street = having ‘wiggle wiggle wiggle’ yelled at me by some thug’s nasty ‘missus’ from his sacked-out Ford Escort. Having a shower = pulling out long strands of hair from the drain with godknows-what attached to the ends. Everyone compliments it and says it is awesome, but no-one wants to get to know the man under the mane... judge me not by the size of my hair, but by the content of my character. We are more than just head-massage connoisseur’s and mythological hair beasts. So if you see a mangy man walking about the streets of your life, don’t just awe over his splendid locks. Ask him a question and get to know him. Find out that there is more to him than his gorgeous mop. Please note that I am not responsible for any initial misjudgements of character resulting in legally questionable activities. Afronymous.

LIKE A PAYRISE

I can’t agree more with the doing away with what was effectively compulsory unionism for university students. Last year I flatted with a Vic student who came from a poor family and he could barely afford the basics while living in Wellington, let alone be made to pay quite high fees for activities he didn’t have time for or services he didn’t use. Luckily the rest of us in the flat were happy to share his load, or he wouldn’t have seen out the year. With no fees to pay it will feel like he’s getting a pay rise - and that’s not something many people can claim. Sam Pentecost Newtown

VSM A RELIC

So at last universities have been dragged kicking into the new century - albeit about 30 years too late. Getting rid of the relic that was VSM couldn’t come soon enough. Having to lose a few services will be worth having the freedom of joining what we like when we like. Martin England Mt Cook

WE ARE SCAPEGOATS

Are we going to hear from the university about what bits of the services they are going to replace which the students’ associations used to supply? As the advert says, yeah right. They’ll just carry on their merry way while students suffer, like they usually do. So we’ll be worse off under VSM. As usual students are the scapegoats for the idealism of politicians. Bridget Chin Brooklyn

WRESTLEMANIAC

I remember when wrestling was fake and boxing was real. Now wrestling tells people its fake, thus making it real in a fake sense and boxing is fake making it fake in a farcical sense. The only thing missing from the Sonny Bill Williams PR Stunt was for the fight to be interrupted by an unknown fighter who distracts the referee long enough for till man to hit him with a collapsible chair hidden under the ring. Why not? The rest of the damn fight was a joke why not go all the way. P.S – All of life’s problems should be solved at Wrestlemania. Hulk Hogan

WIN! The best letters will receive some prized from Massive Magazine. This month its 250 Gram bag of Peoples’ Coffee.

DEBATE

SHOULD SAME-SEX MARRIAGE BECOME LEGAL IN NEW ZEALAND? THE STATE HAS NO AUTHORITY TO REINVENT MARRIAGE

PEOPLE SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO LOVE AND DECIDE FOR THEMSELVES

The state did not invent marriage. It has no authority to re-invent it.

“Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is an abomination” (Leviticus, 18:22).

arriage is not a state invention. It is instructed by nature, reinforced by religion and normally protected by the state. Marriage is a universal and natural social practice. Every culture has had some institution that resembles what we know as marriage associated with procreation. Every society needs marriage. Marriage is the only institution we have that creates an area of social reality independent of state control. The legalisation of same-sex marriage would turn the most intimate of human relationships into a legal and political construct. Marriage is a matter of critical public concern as the record of almost every culture shows. It is about a great deal more than love and commitment. If sexual intercourse between a man and a woman did not normatively lead to children and bring with it a further obligation to care for those children, marriage might not have existed. That some married couples cannot or choose not to have children says nothing about the role or status of marriage. Marriage encourages the raising of children by the mother and father who conceived them. On average, children raised by their biological parents who are married have the best outcomes in health, education and income, and by far the lowest involvement with the criminal justice system. Marriage is normatively and necessarily discriminatory. A homosexual cannot legally marry. But neither can a whole lot of other people. A five-year old boy cannot marry. Three people cannot get married to each other. A married man can’t marry another person. A child cannot marry her pet goldfish. A father cannot marry his daughter. A football team cannot enact group marriage - the list is endless. It is disingenuous to complain about rights being taken away, when they never existed in the first place. It is like trying to argue that Kiri te Kanawa is being discriminated against since she cannot play for the All Blacks, or Richie McCaw can’t play for the Silver Ferns. If we were to allow same-sex marriage we would still be discriminating against those seeking open, temporary, polygamous, polyandrous, polyamorous (group), incestuous and man/boy unions. Once the fundamental idea of marriage as one man and one woman is tossed out, all types of sexual activity could become permissible. Same-sex couples have the option of civil unions to recognise their relationship so there is no need to redefine marriage. Same-sex marriage is, by definition, an oxymoron. Everyone has a right to form a legal meaningful relationship. No one has the right, or even a coherent argument, to redefine marriage. The state did not invent marriage. It has no authority to re-invent it.

hank God the Old Testament is not legally binding. Homosexuality, despite being a mortal sin, is not a demonic manifestation of personal corruption or parental negligence, but a naturally occurring sexual preference expressed through sex and character. In a contemporary world, marriage, though laced in moral, religious and legal implications (ask any divorcee), is an expression of love. Gay marriage is no different and should not only be legalised, but celebrated. Without undermining the Christian faith, Leviticus 18:22, is a perfect example of misguided thinking. “Abomination”, the word used, translates into “unclean,” a word also used to describe the consumption of pork (sinful bacon?) in the same chapter. Suffice to say, Leviticus cannot be taken seriously these days. Other verses in the Bible condemning homosexuality are equally questionable. Bearing this mind, how is it that such dated scripture features so strongly in some contemporary churches? Prejudice, governed by blind faith, about gay marriage, is merely ignorance of a minority group. Religious or not, people fear, dislike, and subsequently reject what is different to them. And biblical echoes of damnation don’t exactly pave the way for social enlightenment. Without judging society too harshly, a significant portion of the world has embraced “Civil Unions” as a substitute. Though this allows homosexuals to register as a couple, civil unions are limited. The degree of restriction varies between countries. In New Zealand, civil unions share the same perks as marriage with the exception of joint adoption. Obviously, homosexual couples can’t just pop out a couple of kids, thus limiting them to surrogacy, sperm donors, and adoption. Restricting adoption, despite there being plenty of unloved children, often makes having a family impossible for same-sex couples. While some people dismiss marriage as a social construct of the church, gay marriage is about equality and what is fair. Refusing homosexuals the right to love and marry who they want undermines them as citizens. Discriminating against gay marriage refuses, by extension, the reality of gay love. Gay marriage, despite the propaganda, is not an attack on humanity and would not have global consequences although certain unnamed religious leaders in Rome would have you believe otherwise. Allowing people, as they have for thousands of years, to express their love by “making it official” is a basic human right. Regardless of individual hatred and distain, people should be allowed to love and decide for themselves.

Bob McCoskrie – National Director, Family First NZ

Jimmy Jansen – Uni-Q Wellington

Oppression is the product of stupidity. Liberation is intelligent success. Gay marriage should be legal. Otherwise, by all means, deny us our civil rights, but exempt us from other social obligations like taxes. It seems only fair.

Matt Shand, editor of MASSIVE, traces the struggle from delinquency to operating table for the struggling and out-of-date student associations.

he Patient was dragged into the operating room by three orderlies, each showing signs of a fierce battle. Two had scratches across their face that would need stitches, another was missing a chunk of hair. A fourth ran behind carrying a huge needle loaded with horse tranquiliser to calm the violently flailing body of The Patient. Some wondered how it had come to this, but in reality surgery was inevitable. Some gluttons are simply beyond self help, especially in spoilt

EXTREME MAKEOVER STUDENT ASSOCIATION EDITION children like The Patient, and even more especially in minds wracked by multiple personality disorders and identity crises. The Patient was a victim of indifference – from its parents and everyone else. Its parents had realised their neglect too late to simply nudge The Patient back on to the rails. They followed the flapping lump of flesh that people had labelled “their child” at a guilty distance. The Patient’s parents were wealthy, but they were misguided in their love for it. They were too busy to offer any love or

guidance, and instead showered it with money, (which it gorged on), property, and a sense of entitlement to buff up its self esteem. Specialists would later discover that The Patient adopted a new persona every few years. It would rave nonsensically about a bizarre “internalised democratic process” which selected its new psyche but always resulted in – despite its biological years long forgotten by even its parents – a mind no more mature then a teenager. Each reincarnation lacked the foresight of past experienc-

es, always doomed to make the same mistakes. It was as if each reincarnation reset the system. “Not this time,” the chief surgeon assured the parents as they entered the operating room together. “Radical change is a simple process. Yeah, nah, we’ll fix it up good, or die trying. Let me clarify that for legal reasons. I mean to say, it will die, as a result of us trying. She’ll be right.” He flashed a winning smile and cocked an eyebrow before clapping his hands. “Shall we proceed?” The struggle on the operat-

FEATURE ing table halted for a second. The Patient looked pathetically at its parents, hoping they would change their minds and let the status quo remain, but they were resolute. They had been planning this intervention at special meetings and select committees for years. They nodded to the surgeon and left the room. The orderly jabbed the horse tranquiliser into The Patient’s neck while the other three orderlies piled on top to pin it down until it took effect. The Patient’s eyes widened, inky blank pools. One of the orderlies snapped his fingers in front of them but they remained still, black voids. They never ful-

ly closed, the dose was not quite enough to put it fully under. It could see the surgeons enter the room in regal blue operating gowns. It could see the equipment being set up. A liposuction machine took centre place, but the surgeons had brought every tool with them. Scalpels caught The Patient’s attention before it noticed the hacksaw being set out on the bench, followed by calculators, annual reports, ledgers, invoices, and a copy of the Education Amendment Act No. 4. Someone had changed the procedure at the last minute and written the instructions across the bill in red crayon. The surgeons milled around

“We are revaluating the core purpose student associations exist. We are no longer a big bloated organisation, spending money and looking important. We are in the real world now.” - MAWSA President Ben Thorpe

waiting for orders as to what to do or where to start, but they never came. So they started the procedure anyway and hoped for the best. It wasn’t like anyone cared if The Patient lived or died. In the waiting room, the parents wondered if what would emerge from the operating room would be something they could slap a suit on, find a real job for and be proud of, or just a hacked-up corpse. They didn’t really care either way, as long as The Patient changed. +++

n extreme makeover is happening to nearly every student association in New Zealand. It’s been on the horizon for some time and, for the most part, is well deserved. What isn’t deserved is the rushed, poorly thought-out implementation of the legislation making an uphill battle a vertical climb. But what the hell. For too long, student associations have been spoon-fed easy money and resources making them complacent and lazy. Change was promised but never acted on, things were too comfortable the way they were. Now that the politicians have said “shape up or ship out”, it’s time to cut the fat and see what’s left behind the layers. But first, the mistakes of the past need to identified and admitted, to allow solutions to become apparent. This means a close look at what students associations actually do, and what provides value to students. Ask any student president “what do students associations do?” and the words “representation” and “advocacy” will invariably pop up, usually followed by “enhancing the student experience”. All great things, but nothing that can be taken to the bank. The budget sheet paints a better picture of services provided: orientation, publications, events, food bank, club development, class grants, sports teams, sausage sizzles,

student diaries, wall-planners, board meetings, NZUSA membership levies, Student Job Search membership, advocate’s salary – but no specific line for this mythical “representation”. So the big problem surrounding students’ associations is that the key part of their tasks – representation and advocacy – cannot be seen, talked about, or promoted due to them being intangible and confidential. This makes the associations appear to be little more than trumpedup event management companies – because that’s the most visible aspect of the association. MUSA, ASA, and MAWSA are all overhauling the manner in which they deliver services to students. At the heart of this is slicing sagging, flabby sections off the balance sheet. MAWSA President Ben Thorpe says: “We are revaluating the core purpose student associations exist. We are no longer a big bloated organisation, spending money and looking important. We are in the real world now.” It may be too soon for the ‘real world’ dreamed up by the politicians. “I don’t want to beat around the bush. There is a real chance associations will not make it through the transition into voluntary student membership (VSM).” The words are stark, but mirror the attitudes of other student presidents, including ASA’s Stephen van Heerden, who says: “There is a possibility that some may not survive, especially the smaller ones, such as ASA.” The student presidents acknowledge that students’ associations have all had examples of inefficient use of student money in past. Stephen van Heerden says a simple Google search brings up instances covered in the news media. Ben Thorpe says students’ associations traditionally have had huge sums of money and perhaps have not had the maturity to spend it the best way. But MUSA President Alex

Jones sums it up best when he describes student associations as being “transient in nature”, meaning there are few devices in place to stop mistakes being repeated by new presidents.

USA, being the longest running student association at Massey, has had time to build up assets and resources that can be leveraged to ensure financial independence. Office space in their large building has been leased back to generate revenue, while cutbacks on under-performing services ensure they are not operating at a loss. They are not immune to the effects, but somewhat insulated. Alex Jones says: “We have had a significant restructure and have tightened budgets to ensure we are financially self sufficient in 2012.” The other two associations have had less time to prepare and will be more vulnerable to closure. Being almost totally reliant on student fees, they have found themselves suddenly without any income. It was unlikely students were going to fork over hard-earned money to join a student association, especially since the clever politicians decided that student associations are not allowed to coerce students to join in the first instance, or restrict services to people who do not pay to join. The new legislation essentially means the associations are relying on students coming to them cash in hand and begging to join. It doesn’t take a business major to figure out that this model is doomed to failure. Doomed, that is, unless you evolve and change the game. With this in mind, the associations negotiated servicelevel agreements with Massey University to provide student services in exchange for funds. Much of this funding comes from the Student Services Levy, which has risen by almost the same amount that the now-defunct student membership fee was (something being investigated for next edition – ED), that appears on each student’s

STUDENT PRESIDENTS ON VSM What changes are taking place this year, as a direct result of VSM? Alex Jones: As I have said, the restructure was a big change for MUSA. The most noticeable changes would have to be the end of CHAFF and the creation of MASSIVE, a slightly smaller Oweek, and a change in our membership structure. Due to Massey contracting us for some services, advocacy, clubs and societies, and Radio Control are accessible to all students, with other benefits such as priority to our flats, special events, and prize draws being exclusive to MUSA members. Has VSM affected orientation? Stephen Van Heerden: It has. Albany has had to reduce the scale

invoice. This means Massey will play a major part in the transformation of the associations. They hold the purse strings, and though they have been actively supportive of student associations, the accountants have been hamstrung by confusing legislation put forth just after the VSM bill, the Education Amendment Act No. 4. This was designed to increase transparency around the elusive Student Services Levy that universities charge students when enrolling, but due to the bill’s timing – right at the end of the year – it meant negotiations could not take place because it was unclear what universities could now legally fund. So, even if Massey wanted to fully fund a student association by way of the Student Services Levy, it had no idea if it could do so. All everyone could do was wait, and wait, and wait. And while the waiting was going on, the staff, unsure about their future employability, were walking to other jobs. Stephen van Herdeen implies that is may be a self-fulfilling prophecy: “Without staff the association cannot operate at full capacity. Without staff the association

of its night events and focus more on day events which are backed by corporate sponsorship. Night events were always highly popular with students and to see them scaled down largely has been disappointing news for all students on campus. Alex Jones: We have definitely been more conscious of the risk of putting on events, but we have still managed to put together a great looking O-week. We have traditionally had three themed parties/gigs, and have cut this down to two. There is also the hypnotist night, which is staying, and the comedy night, which has been picked up by the university. Ben Thorpe:The events are still going to be great but we aren’t laying out a huge amount of money

fails, and therefore continues to attract members.” The remaining staff are left with reduced hours and uncertainty as to how the organisation is structured, while some student presidents have found themselves in total charge of the organisation – something that’s not in their job description.

ervices that were deemed unnecessary to the operations have been cut back. The most noticeable will be Orientation. In previous years, associations had enjoyed relative freedom around these events, with no need to return any expenditure. Most Orientation events ran at a big loss, following the notion that they were investing in ‘student culture’. This resulted in great events but they dipped into the cash reserves, making them unsustainable. But it’s not all bad news. The student presidents across the campuses are working to ensure the security of their associations. Already signs of a professional association can be seen with changes to Orientation. Line-ups have been adjusted to focus on reducing losses and making events sustainable while maintaining an engag-

to produce them. 2011 saw almost $11,000 in losses from Orientation, whereas this year we are predicting $2300. Of course, if attendance is high then that figure will come down. Orientation is a way to welcome students to university and raise awareness of student associations. Have student associationsbeen guilty of overspending? Ben Thorpe: Yes. Student associations traditionally have huge sums of money, which is guaranteed income, and perhaps have not had the maturity to spend that the best way. One thing that has been lost sight of is that the funds are not the associations’, but the students, so everything needs to be spent in their best interests.

ing student experience, while initiatives such as the merger of student publications to allow for economies of scale while increasing the overall reach are radical ideas, but born of the new professional attitude. Each president is determined to protect the core tenets of representation and advocacy, but realise that in order to achieve them the associations must become a professional, well-oiled machine. The Patient which is emerging from the surgery room is a slimmed-down version in a pressed suit with neatly trimmed hair and ready to take on the world. Its shape is disfigured – a result of the chaotically planned surgery imposed by upper management, and a nicked nerve has left it twitching nervously every other minute. It will walk past its parents and into the real world without a nod, not relying on them anymore, and they will not take it back. The only question remains that is whether the years of gluttony and complacency has already taken its toll and old habits will be too easy to fall back into. We will have to wait for that answer as well.

FEATURE

Angela McGuigan ponders our options as she looks forward to December 21

DOOMSDAY – ARE YOU PREPARED FOR THE END?

he End is Near! We are used to seeing people with signs like this on the streets, preaching that the end is coming but that God can save you – although year after year Earth is still spinning and we are still living. But December 21, 2012 has more than just religious people scared – there is a world-wide freak-out that the end is very near. There are countless theories on why the end of the world as we know it is going to happen on December 21. Here are some of them: The Mayan calendar ends on December 21, 2012. This will be the end of the current ‘Great Cycle’, the final movement in this age of mankind.

• ‘Ascension theory’ has it that on this day mankind will be evolved and that those who are transformed will enter a world of continual peace, love, and beauty, where no war, hunger or suffering exists. • Christian theories say that on this day Christ will return to Earth to take the true believers with him to Heaven. But before this can happen, the Book of Revelations prophecy of years of famine, disease, war, and tribulations of intenseness such as we’ve never seen, will have to play out. December 21 will be the beginning of the end. • Planet X/Nibiru is returning, and will bring with it earth-

quakes, floods, and solar storms, and global warming will get to the point where the Earth will burn up. • The ‘Great Galactic Cross’, the perfect alignment of Earth, Venus, and the Sun with the black hole at the centre of the Milky Way Galaxy, will come about. It is believed this alignment will be catastrophic and cause natural destruction on a global scale

he list of theories is so long that even if you did believe the world was about to end, you wouldn’t know which theory to pick. So do any of them hold merit? Should we be freaking out? Surely, with so many theories

all based on the same day, December 21, 2012, there must be something about to happen. But before you start freaking out or sinking into depression, consider all the other ‘end of the world’ theories that never came to anything. Take Y2K, for example. The computers didn’t crash, the world survived, and we all celebrated the New Year of 2000 (possibly a little drunker than we would have normally – but come on, we were preparing for the end of the world that night!). With all the predictions and theories out there pressing on so many people’s minds, some are turning to science and asking those in ‘scientific authority’ for their thoughts. Even Nasa has dedicated a

page on its website to answer questions from concerned people. This may shed some light for you: “Q. Does the Mayan calendar end in December 2012? A. Just as the calendar you have on your kitchen wall does not cease to exist after December 31, the Mayan calendar does not cease to exist on December 21, 2012. This date is the end of the Mayan long-count period, but then – just as your calendar begins again on January 1 – another long-count period begins for the Mayan calendar.” The Mayan calendar theory doesn’t hold any merit in the minds of the so-called experts in science, or for that matter the majority of the population, so what about the other theories? Take the Christian theory that Christ will return to Earth to take back the true believers, but with that will come the play-out of the Book of Revelations. So hold up: the world is coming to an end because Christ is coming and with that we will experience years of disease, famines, and war? Our world is already suffering from these crises – millions and millions of people are experiencing this pain every day – it is all they know. We have not turned on our TVs to witness this suffering before now and thought that the Book of Revelations prophecy was coming true, so what’s changed? Is it the threat that this could happen to people in developed countries – because that would be a reason to think the end is coming. Surely, if people in First World countries had to suffer this pain, it must be at the hands of a greater power? So, perhaps by us allowing our own Book of Revelations to play out on people in undeveloped countries every day we should consider ourselves the ‘greater power’. The more you examine the theories and do a little research, the less frightening they become. It is so easy to get caught up in the hype – Hollywood is hoping you do so they can con-

tinue to cash in on your fears at the box office (2012, Melancholia). However, if any of these theories were to prove to be true, there is really little you can do about it. You can’t stop a planet from colliding with Earth. You sure can’t stop Christ from coming. And you wouldn’t want to stop being enlightened through the Ascension theory. So the best idea is to get off those crazy internet sites and go enjoy yourself – because if the world does come to end, you don’t want to have spent the last 11 months sitting in front of your computer, in a forum, stressing. That is, however, easier said than done. Some of you might have been taken already to the dark side. So, if you do believe that one of these theories is right and that the world as we know it really will end, here is a list of what you will need to survive (taken from a ‘how to survive the end of the world’ video):

“The Mayan calendar theory doesn’t hold any merit in the minds of the so-called experts in science, or for that matter the majority of the population, so what about the other theories?”

• Join a Doomsday community (this is an underground community) – but to enter you will need US$50,000 (NZ$62,000) and approval by the Doomsday Board. To increase your chances of approval you should learn a survivalist skill). • Fertility – you may be required to help re-populate the world and you can’t do this if you have been snipped and tied. • Books – you will probably be in your shelter for a long time, so take books so you don’t get bored. If you finish all your books you can always practise re-populating. • Learn to cook meat with nothing but the heat of the sun. • Learn to communicate with Morse code.

• Get a weapon in case people turn savage and try to steal your supplies or your repopulation partner.

ou can order the full survival guide online for only US$27 ($33). The internet is overloaded with websites, blogs, and forums telling you the world is coming to an end and trying to sell you survival guides and sign you up to their doomsday communities. And while some people are freaking out about the end of world, there a lot cashing in on it, happy to confirm your fears for a

small fee. But, please, before you rush off to rob a store with your weapon to get that $62,000 to join a Doomsday community – stop! Because the Doomsday shelter will be pointless if a planet collides with Earth, or the perfect alignment with a black hole happens. May I suggest you instead take that $33 you were about to spend on a survival guide and pay off some of your credit card – because you can rest assured that come December 21, if the world doesn’t end, your credit card bill will still be there.

FEATURE

Alexandra Rose Nathan visited Occupy Wellington and came away with a new understanding of the issues

OCCUPIED - AN ISSUE TO BE IGNORED?

he last of the Occupy movement has gone, the tents have been eradicated, and a metal fence now blocks the entrance to the park between the council building and Wellington Stock Exchange. When talking about the Occupy movement, most people laugh and make comments about the strange people that once occupied that space – how they smelled, and how the Occupy movement was just an excuse for people to protest against something. When I first heard about the movement, my ears pricked up, because as a New Yorker, the Occupy movement is something that hits close to home. Although the Occupy Wall St received its fair share of criticism, I quite liked the idea of

middle-class and lower-class people standing up against corporate greed, unfair banking, and an unequal distribution of wealth. I was interested in seeing see how the Occupy Wellington movement matched up against the American Occupy movement. I had every intention of criticising the Occupy Wellington movement further, seeing no sign of recession or real struggle in the city and after reading an article in The Dominion Post about how women were being harassed as they walked past the park, and how people generally felt threatened or unsafe. I left the Occupy movement with greater compassion and a different understanding of the issues that people were drawing attention to. “A country is responsible [for

providing] its people with care, community, and health” says Benjamin Easton as he explains the problem he sees with Wellington City Council and the unfair distribution of wealth. “New Zealand is a Christian country; no law can contradict the Christian principle”. Benjamin Easton accuses New Zealand of not taking proper care of its homeless and poor with an inadequate welfare system, and says the country is violating the Christian principle of charity. The points he makes seem to be directly against the New Zealand government and its failures, as opposed to the issues faced by the global economy – although he does say poverty and caring for people is a global concern. Usually when people walk down the street and see a home-

less person begging for money, they turn the other way, trying not to make eye contact. They do this so they don’t have to give any money or because ‘if I give money to this person, they will surely use it on drugs and not on food or shelter’. Furthermore, many attitudes about the homeless usually go in the direction that these people are choosing to be homeless; that a homeless person could receive aid and there is no reason for them to be homeless. The Occupy Wellington movement, in all of its untidy aesthetics, essentially threw into our faces the homeless issues of Wellington and a failure by individuals and the government to care for these people. They were petitioning on a local level, but the issue of impoverished people not being able to

afford subsidised housing, or being forced to be recluses of society because of their homelessness, is apparent across the globe, especially in the current economic climate. To all intents and purposes, the Occupy Wellington movement was a stand by the homeless that “we are here and look at how we’re living, pay attention to us and stop avoiding eye contact”.

fter some time in Occupy Wellington and after speaking to Benjamin Easton, I realised that the goals of the Occupy Wellington were a lot more directed towards a very important and overlooked issue – the homelessness and poverty of societies. It costs $10 a night for a homeless person to stay in a shelter. Furthermore, they are not allowed to keep their things there. The shelter in Wellington is very small and they’re allowed to stay only from 8pm until 6am, when they are kicked out. So, essentially, they are paying $1 for every hour, and that doesn’t even include a meal. A meal, incidentally, is $2, which

means that a homeless person, with no income except donations, is expected to come up with $12 a day for basic needs. The facts about “welfare”, which is apparently so easy to get, are even more crude and surprising. For instance, Stacey Gordon, a well-put-together woman who actively searches for jobs, has been on welfare her entire life, filing for her own benefits. She has to go through all the loops of the welfare system, and still receives only about $250 a week. In order to receive welfare, you have to produce an address, a bank account, and proof that you are looking for a job. And resources and the care given are getting only harder and rarer. Aside from the welfare that people receive – provided they fit the requirements – what is done for the people who are even more destitute and homeless? There is no social network that actively tries to find these people so they can be offered care and help to them get off the streets. In fact, they’re not even given a free place to sleep at night and a hot meal. The

truth is, that in some way the system has failed them, regardless of their own contributions to their homeless state. No one can even completely blame the system. But we can blame the system for turning a blind eye and seriously letting them down because they don’t fit into a box and are seen as being worthless to society. It is unlikely the council will remedy this situation, or that anyone really cares about it as much as the people who are homeless. Perhaps there are more constructive solutions, such as volunteer projects and ways for impoverished people to become involved with communities and earn their benefits if they’re unable to work. In any case, it’s quite easy to turn a blind eye to someone who is impoverished and is seen as being a nuisance to the system and a recluse of society, but it’s a lot harder to ignore the issue when the facts are present and when there’s a group of people camped out in the centre of the city. However easy it is to criticise someone for making wrong

choices or for not doing more for themselves, it’s a lot harder to care about them and see them as deserving the same care, community, and health. Now that the Occupy movement is gone and nothing has been done regarding the issue, it is clear that the movement was a failure, and that perhaps the message to society was not clear enough. What the Occupy Wellington movement stood for was different and more direct than the global Occupy movement, however valid their cause. Still, when people are asked about what they know about Occupy Wellington, they still say it was “a bunch of douche-bags occupying a park in response to the Arab spring”, or “the people there didn’t even know what they were protesting against, they just wanted a reason to protest”. Maybe the issue of homelessness was just something the council was happy to ignore, and maybe they decided that getting rid of the movement and paying security guards to watch over the space was a better use of money.

FEATURE

Chris Guise with Weta’s looming bronze statues

Miriam Richdale delves into the world of make-believe

WETA’S MALL ARTIST OF MANY FACES

n the hidden foothills of Miramar I find myself walking up a short gravel path where I’m greeted by two looming bronze statues. They are holding a sign between them, and as they look protectively down upon it, their brows are seemingly furrowed with all kinds of secrets. It dawns on me that I

am about to enter a place that few have been fortunate to see. Inside Weta Workshop I am greeted by a receptionist. My interview with Chris Guise, the Lead Conceptual Designer on the latest Best Animated Feature Film, The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn, is very close.

Moving into the interview room I am awed by a long line of cabinets showcasing an array of models, some of which I find out later that Chris had worked on himself. These, along with a number of awards including Oscars on display, tells you this is a unique place. And when Chris and I talk it

is apparent he still has the same excitement about his job that he did at the very beginning. You can’t help but feel he is as happy to be at Weta as I am. I ask him how it feels after all this time at the workshop. His response is simply: “I feel like I’ve hit the jackpot”. Coming from someone who has been in

the Weta business for 13 years and counting, that is saying something. “I still get that excited feeling when I go into the workshop and see what everyone is working on.” It strikes me that Chris is modest in nature, not wanting to be in the limelight. He says simply that he just loves making movies.

reaking into the world of Weta wasn’t all plain sailing for Chris. He had no real tertiary training in film production or design, and a list of past jobs not typically related to the film industry, including being a cartoonist in shopping malls drawing caricatures of people. “When I started putting together a portfolio of work to show [Weta Workshop bosses] Richard Taylor and Tania Rodger, I took note of what the company had done in the past and what they might working on in the future. So I drew a bunch of designs and pictures based on various sci-fi stuff, including Tolkien’s books. I had also sculpted a couple of things, including a King Kong head. I even tried making a puppet for the first time.” By thinking outside the square, it was clear he had the enthusiasm needed for a role at Weta and he was hired to work on The Lord of the Rings films in the Miniatures, Armour and Weapons Departments. And though he didn’t have much experience, he was more than willing to give it his best shot and learn as much as he could. He gives students the same advice – show you are keen and are prepared to give everything a go. As the film production of the Rings Trilogy came to an end, Chris hated the thought of having to leave Weta Workshop, so he continued to throw himself at every opportunity that arose. This included sculpting for The Lord of the Rings merchandise range which led into work in the design department where

he has been for the past eight or so years. His typical working day can involve anything from working on a kids’ show to working on a horror film in the acternoon. “It changes all the time. I often don’t have any idea what to expect”. He clearly doesn’t get bored. He says that even the finer points are exciting – such as seeing actor Bernard Hills’ reaction as he put on his armour for the character Theodon in The Lord of The Rings. Intricate motifs adorn the inside of the armour so that even the actor can feel like royalty when they wear a costume or armour. Chris recalls the simplest of things in the movie Tintin, where even the blood vessels in Captain Haddock’s cheeks were worked on over and over. It’s these little details that the naked eye doesn’t see yet every costume designer at Weta is aware of. The amount of care and attention to detail is commendable.

s far as advice goes for anyone wanting to break into the industry, initiative and the ability to follow through with an idea is a must. Chris says that putting together as much as you can yourself shows initiative which any film producer would be looking for. “Something as simple as putting a trailer together or writing a script may set you apart from the rest.” And, as Lead Conceptual Designer for Tintin, it seems the hard work has paid off. He has had the opportunity to work with his childhood idol, Steven Spielberg, and alongside the likes of Sir Peter Jackson. “Basically, I was like the car salesman, helping to push all of the Weta Workshop design team’s ideas to Steven and then getting feedback on what could be improved for the final design concepts. Even though this was via video conferencing, I recall thinking ‘here I am talking to a man I have looked up to since I was a little kid - it’s like

a dream’. The man who started out as a mall cartoonist and who is now the main spokesperson communicating with his idol Spielberg, sees Tintin as his biggest and most rewarding challenge yet. Ultimately, Tintin is what made Chris interested in art itself, and from an early age he developed a love for the story and the characters in the Tintin books, created by Georges Remi (and more commonly known as Herge, as pronounced in French). Another challenge for Chris was the idea of writing the book

The Art of the Adventures of Tintin. Although he had never written a book, he set about gathering images from the film and from behind the scenes and putting them into a memoir for Tintin fans worldwide. He collated artwork and imagery from Weta Workshop and Weta Digital and formed a 200-page walk-through of the film. He says choosing what to put in the book was one of the biggest challenges because he wanted to encapsulate how Weta tried to be respectful of the original work of Herge as they worked on the film’s original work but Excerpts of concept art from: The Art of the Adventures of Tintin

FEATURE

Further Tintin concept art

“Basically, I was like the car salesman, helping to push all of the Weta Workshop design team’s ideas to Steven and then getting feedback on what could be improved for the final design concepts.”

The Art of the Adventures of Tintin written by Chris Guise is available now in all leading book suppliers

at the same time put his own spin on an already remarkable idea.

n between jokes and a rundown of his adventures at work, he says that though some people may think it is easy to get work at Weta, the reality is somewhat different – it is more like an achievement. Obviously, hard work is satisfying at the end of the day, and if you are rewarded for it in the form of a Golden Globe, as the workers on Tintin were, then it is all the more worthwhile. In a sense, this has been how Tintin was for Chris as a de-

signer. Leading the conceptual design on a movie, writing a book about the film processes of the movie, and helping to create the iPad application for The Art of the Adventures of Tintin, you could say is the result of a lot of hard work. Hoping to inspire the next generation by designing films such as Tintin, Chris says that if you want it enough then you can make it happen. And because there are no Weta equivalents elsewhere in New Zealand, going abroad is an option for movie producer hopefuls. Companies such as Stan Winston Studios in California offer

award winning opportunities, but he says you would have to have the luck of the Irish because competition is strong. So, from working alongside the likes of Andy Serkis and Jamie Bell, to travelling to Belgium and specifically to France to visit the actual Marlinspike Hall*, Captain Haddock’s country house in the Tintin books, Chris Guise has had an interesting ride to be where he is today. And today he is still reeling from a gift he received at Christmas: a signed poster from Steven Spielberg, thanking him for his contribution to the film. You could say that was a better

ending for Chris than it was for Tintin finding Haddock’s lost treasure.

*Note: Marlinespike Hall (‘Chateau de Moulinsart’ in the original French) was modelled on the Chateau de Cheverny, in France’s Loire Valley. The French name is derived from Sart-Moulin, a village in Belgium. In an allusion to the Haddock family’s maritime history, the hall’s English name refers to the marlinspike, a tool used in seamanship to splice ropes.

Isabelle Truman looks into how paper wings can fly you across the world.

PAPER WINGS TO TAKE FLIGHT AT MASSEY A real challenge for all those sporty, arm-rippling buff gym boys and all the tech kids

ed Bull Paper Wings will be taking over the Massey University Great Hall on March 26th. Remember back when you were 10, sitting in class flipping your ‘yes/no’ rubber to determine your every choice, and minding your own business, when suddenly out of nowhere you get the fright of your life? You jump, maybe let out a little cry, and then turn a beautiful shade of red. Oh, the embarrassment. Yet again, your head has unfortunately wrecked the flight pattern of a paper aeroplane. Back then, paper aeroplanes were simple things. They were made to cure boredom, to share

love notes, and to annoy the hell out of your horrible teacher. Who would have thought that paper-aeroplane building, when done skilfully, could take you across the world, to Austria, on an all-expenses-paid trip? This trip to Austria will be a reality for three New Zealand university students, yes, just like you. It will take you to the Hanger-7, the place where the founder of the energy drink consumed in 164 countries resides: the home of Red Bull. There, you will then compete with students from all around the world in the finals of the 2012 Red Bull Paper Wings. After doing a bit of research I’ve realised that paper-plane making is a lot more serious than you would think, and there are some serious plane-building fanatics out there. Imagine it: you enter this

competition purely because making a plane is a hell of a lot more interesting than lecture slide 15, and as you’re building you realise that your fingers know their way around that paper. You could do it in your sleep. You come to terms with the fact that lecture slide 16 is just as useless to you as lecture slide 15, and just like that you have found your true calling. Plane building. This career path could take you across the world, and it will – if you put enough effort into this competition. Red Bull Paper Wings started in 2006 and is now hosted in over 86 countries. This year marks the first year that the event has come to New Zealand. Paper Wings will be run in universities all over the country – so, if your flatmates go to Vic, you can all find YouTube clips and plane-build together over

the kitchen table. The concept is simple: decide which category you want to enter – longest airtime, longest distance, or aerobatics (you can, of course, enter all three, if you’re one of those hardcore paper plane making maniacs). Then register online at redbullpaperwings.com and just turn up on the day. Massey will be hosting the Wellington qualifiers in the Great Hall on Monday March 26 with events planned at Massey University Palmerston North Campus and at Auckland universities. Engineering students will be perfectly suited for the aerobatics section. This is the only section that allows contestants to use not only paper but other materials such as glue and tape as well, so it really makes a difference the amount of practise you put in. Sporty, arm-rippling buff gym boys, you could probably throw a piece of paper pretty far, and for all you tech kids, there’s a few good paper plane making apps that could probably teach you a trick or two. Practice makes perfect so next time you’re in a lecture, rip a page from your notebook and get creating. There’ll be plenty of cold Red Bull cans, good beats, and comfy seats at the Great Hall qualifier, so even if you don’t think your paper-plane making skills are up to par, come along and check it out. For more info, and a sweet plane-building game, check out www.redbullpaperwings.com.

The Red Bull Paper Wings event will be happening not only at Vic and Massey Wellington and Palmerston North, but also Auckland University, AUT, Unitech, Otago, and Canterbury. Details on the qualifiers in those regions will be available in O-Week so keep a look out for the Wings Team on campus with cold cans and information.

FEATURE

Mike Ross on the universe, and getting excited about what you don’t understand.

THE EVER-EXPANDING HORIZON

he start of the university year will inevitably represent different things to different stu-

dents. For first-years, here may begin a new adventure in learning and in life. For returning students it may mean reacquainting oneself with familiar routines after a long and hopefully well-enjoyed summer. For those who’ve been here a while, the start of the semester may repre-

sent the first sight of the light at the end of their tertiary tunnel. For others, of course, it may just be a mere administrative date in what has become the educational journey of their lifetimes. What we all have in common, however, is that the beginning of a new year at university symbolises a renewal of our individual quests for knowledge. But, before we set off on our own personal paths towards illumination, I would like to take

the opportunity for a brief reflection on how far our collective journey out of darkness has already taken us. As every great discovery invites further questions, I’d invite you to take a moment to contemplate how much further our collective pursuit of knowledge may one day allow us to travel. To understand just how far we have already come; we must first begin by addressing where our knowledge began ...

after a one-paragraph detour ... I sincerely believe the world would be a better place if every child were made to read Carl Sagan’s Pale Blue Dot*. I also recognise the implausibility of advancing this idea. So it is with some trepidation that I shall attempt here to condense what I personally interpret to be the most fundamental lessons of his masterpiece. Sagan referred to the expansion of our knowledge as

a series of ‘great demotions’. Though this might not sound too optimistic, pessimism was by no means his intent. For Sagan recognised that every time mankind’s sense of centrality to the universe decreases, so too do our horizons expand. While he might have offered us ‘a profound sermon in humility’, a chronology of the development of ‘our’ science is ultimately a sermon in our capabilities. It is a cause for great optimism. Our desire to know has always been what has powered our species’ journey towards the light. In contextualising mankind’s place in the universe, Pale Blue Dot delves into the profound implications of the advances in astronomy and cosmology that have served to dismantle our deep-seated assumptions of celestial grandeur. For millennia, many of our cultures’ mythologies had encouraged some wildly extravagant beliefs of the events on our planet’s centricity to the purpose of the universe. Our escape from what Sagan described as a ‘geocentric conceit’ has been neither a quick nor a painless one. As a species, we had elevated our divine sense of purpose to heights that ultimately proved incompatible with reality as observed. In our attempts to explain what we didn’t understand, we had placed ourselves at the heights of self-importance. They were heights from which we could only ever fall. Since the earliest days of organised religion, kings of the heavens and creator gods had assembled the Earth beneath us, and the sky above, all apparently for the exclusive purposes of mankind’s trial and reward. Within such a narrative it was only commonsensical that we should exist at the centre of the universe. Why, after all, would infinitely powerful divine beings – beings who sometimes even felt it fitting to render us in their image – choose to place their precious creations anywhere else?

The Great Demotions ur Earth is the centre of the universe: When Galileo’s telescope provided proof that Earth revolves around the sun, he had simultaneously proved that Earth could not be the central point of the universe. The Catholic Church, fearing the implications of science’s illuminating gaze penetrating ever further into ‘their’ domain of the heavens’, jailed Galileo for heresy, and forced him to recant his findings. However, as telescopes became more common, the truth became more widely visible, and ultimately impossible for religious authorities to deny. The ancient myth of our location had been shattered, yet still the geocentrists found cause to maintain hope of us occupying a divine cosmic position. Even if the Earth isn’t at the centre of the universe, then the sun is. The sun is our sun: By the end of the 19th century, stronger telescopes had allowed astronomers to demonstrate that our sun was just one of the millions (later shown to be hundreds of billions) of stars rotating together to form the Milky Way galaxy. It turns out that our planet resides in a relatively undistinguished sector of this galaxy, some 30,000 light years from the centre. Well, our Milky Way is the only galaxy: Deep space telescopes have shown that for every star in our galaxy, the night sky contains at least as many other galaxies, with each perhaps containing a hundred billion stars, or more. Well, then, at least our galaxy is at the centre of the universe: When it was discovered that the universe was expanding, people naturally gravitated to idea that the Milky Way was at the centre of this expansion. If all the other galaxies are moving away from us, then surely we are special. The problem with this is that as all galaxies are moving away from one another, so any alien astronomer in any other galaxy would witness the

exact same phenomena, and could just as easily reach the same incorrect conclusion. Well, even if there are hundreds of billions of galaxies, each with hundreds of billions of stars, no other star has planets: Were there no other planets beyond our solar system, our pretences to a divine position might have been saved. That this glimmer of geocentric hope was able to flicker for so long came down only to the dimness of distant planets making them much more difficult to observe than the brightly

glowing stars they orbit. As our telescopes improve, we are fast discovering that rather than our solar system being uniquely endowed, planetary systems existing around suns is in fact the normal state of affairs throughout the cosmos. The Great Expansions erhaps unsurprisingly, many have found it difficult to accept that our species should lose the lead in the great cosmic myths that we had created for ourselves. But any such sense of disappointment is

“Since the earliest days of organised religion, kings of the heavens and creator gods had assembled the Earth beneath us, and the sky above, all apparently for the exclusive purposes of mankind’s trial and reward.”

FEATURE only desirable living space in the universe. May our horizons forever exceed our reach ow, I don’t realistically expect any Massey student to start the year aiming to go forth and spread humanity throughout the cosmos. Well, not just yet anyway. Neither do I write to disparage the religiously inclined. Rather, I write in affirmation of humans, and of our species’ proven track-record of making the unknown known. Why? Because being a student isn’t always easy. At times this year you may find yourself short of money, patience, motivation, time, hope, or even your sense of humanity. The one thing you will never find yourself short of is new things to learn. For an answer only invites further questions. Answers expand ‘your’ horizons. Answer a big enough question and you might just expand ‘our’ horizons. You certainly wouldn’t be the first Massey student to do so. Begin your semester excited about what you don’t understand. Light your candle and stride forth boldly into the darkness. After all, it appears to be what we humans were made for.

sadly misguided. For, as is evident, with each demotion’s dramatic diminution of our sense of celestial importance there has come with it an even more dramatic expansion of our species’ horizons. Thankfully, the demotions probably haven’t ended just yet. When it comes to matters of the universe, the matter we are yet to see might just be hiding the keys to unlocking possibilities that truly stretch our imaginations. Why? Because as exciting as our expanded view of the cosmos may already be, by Nasa’s latest estimates the matter and energy we can see amounts to but 4.6% of the universe. The other 95.4% is still dark – literally and figuratively. However rapidly the darkness may grow, our horizons expand ever more exponentially! But before setting sail toward them, I’d like to return to more

Earthly matters ... well kind of ... one more brief detour ... Earth: Sole Winner of the Celestial Lottery? here are estimated to be between 200 and 400 billion stars in ‘our’ Milky Way galaxy - itself just one of around 200 billion galaxies in the universe. Sagan believed this universe to contain in excess of 100 trillion stars. Each of these stars exerts a varying degree of the same gravitational force that led to the formation of our planet. Obviously, some stars will have more planets orbiting them while others will have fewer, but working from Sagan’s estimate, were we to assume that each star has roughly the same number of planets orbiting them as our sun does, we could reasonably expect there to be in excess of 800 trillion planets in the universe. If these

solar systems each had a planetto-moon ratio similar to ours (8 – 168), we could then assume that there are approximately 16 quadrillion moons in the universe. This gives us a ballpark total of 16.8 quadrillion significant celestial bodies orbiting 100 trillion suns. 16.8 quadrillion is a very big number. To put what it means in perspective – your chances of winning Division 1 Lotto with Powerball are about 1 in 38 million (1 in 38,000,000). On the other hand, the chances of us being the sole winners of a celestial real estate lottery are roughly 1 in 16.8 quadrillion (1 in 16,800,000,000,000,000). This means that with a single line of numbers on a single Lotto ticket, it is approximately 442 million times more likely that you will win the Powerball than it is that we occupy the

Carl Sagan was an American astronomer, astrophysicist, cosmologist, and science populariser. He published more than 600 scientific papers and was author, co-author or editor of more than 20 books. He pioneered exobiology and promoted the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI). Sagan passed away in 1996, yet his work continues to inspire scientists are stargazers, and will do for years to come. He left us with many questions. *Massey’s libraries hold a number of Carl Sagan’s books.

JMC takes us into the underground world of heroin, and back again.

t’s odd looking at these old notes on torn-off bits of cardboard box, scrawls on receipts, diagonal arcs across newspaper. You saved all these epiphanies and plans for music videos and art installations in a large envelope, like

STARING AT THE CEILING letters to a future self. You can’t interpret them now; the private language you used to use with yourself too cryptic, often frenzied, nonsensical. You still feel something in you that you can’t put into words, despite all this practice.

Isn’t it almost always the case that the story behind the thing, the behind-the-scenes documentary, the musician’s life at the time of writing album X or Y – is more interesting than the work itself? I read somewhere that Salvador Dali, not even at

the height of his madness, sent a bag of his semen to his father. The postcard accompanying the semen explained that he was repaying all that was owed; all so-called debts thus void. That fragment of a story, that (to be realistic) Chinese whisper or art

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circle myth is endlessly more fascinating to me than his melting clocks and warped women. Isn’t it almost always the case as well – that the truth or essence of a series of events often lies in stories, in misremembered splinters, in mistakes and mistaken corrections? Who can say? ONE: opened my eyes after three hours of sleepless rest to watch rows of rainbow stick figures dance on the ceiling I was staring at. They crossed and breakdanced and dosey-doed. Some time later the hanging bulb and the shadow the wire cast on the ceiling morphed into a giant seagull swooping down toward me. Despite its fangs

dripping with blood, and its piercing shriek as it landed on me with it talons outstretched, I felt no fear at all; actually something like a sense of joy, maybe hope. We taxied to the New Year’s Day event in Centennial Park. I was clearly still high from New Year’s Eve (the raw powder we bought was sold with a warning of having ‘an almost cruel halflife’. Besides, I was still going at it at 8am). The sun at midday was raw and cruel, sapping the juice from the thousands of dancers in the massive field. I force-fed myself a sandwich and four beers in between more hits from the bag. I remember kissing a nameless girl on the middle of the dance-floor field as Krafty Kuts played. The

strangers around us rubbed and groped us in a fog of misplaced affection. Nothing seemed questionable. I told my Thai ladyboy friend (my partner in most of these parties around this time) that I loved him, and I meant it, and that it had nothing to do with the pills or the lines, that I was just saying what was true anyway. It was true; I still do love that little cartoon of a stereotype. He’d just say, ‘Silly rooster! Your smile make me wanna hit you!’ Then he was off again dancing. Night fell, and nothing made sense to me in a way I could meaningfully translate to someone else. My speech jittered as much as my eyes; things were going dark. Trapped in the middle of the dance floor for

the headlining act (I forget), all other stages closed so everyone packed into the main arena, I had an anxiety attack. Not the kind I could shake off with more drugs, or shrug away by splashing water on my face. There were too many people. I was suffocating. I was going to throw up my organs on all these strangers. I waded through 100 metres of close-packed bodies trying to keep my guts down, trying to keep my brain down, it took forever, time slowed, and when I finally made it out of the pit and into the trees I was stumbling down a dark path lined with alternating purple and yellow flags, on the verge of a meltdown, an embolism, on the verge of something decidedly sinister – and it came back

to me: This is a dream you had years ago. This is where you die. The purple and yellow flags, the vomiting in the bushes, the collapse and heart attack or brain spike – then you die. This is it. Remember? I was scared. I vomited and collapsed. I didn’t die. I felt stranger than I had ever felt. I lay in the long grass in the shadows. The vision of the seagull and rainbow dancers had been a warning. Or maybe it hadn’t. Maybe deja vu and the sense of destiny signaled by the purple and yellow flags could be explained as simple misfires in your synapses. Maybe you set your brain up wrong after the party last week. That would explain why you’ve been feeling so weird. The trick then is to reformat your brain the right way after you go out. Build it up from scratch the right way. You’re not crazy. This isn’t crazy. You’ll be fine. So let’s rest for the next few days and expect to feel weird. But then we’ll go out on the third or fourth, get high but not crazy high, then concentrate on piecing it back together again the right way. Makes sense, doesn’t it? Good. Now stand up and go find your friends. They’re probably worried. The good old days are already over, according to the jaded old technoheads we meet at clubs. ne says to me, ‘Those were the good old days, and I knew it as I lived them. Like, already a sense of future regret, nostalgia for the present as it disappeared before my eyes as they wobbled.’ The days of Madchester, the New York rave scene, even Ibiza had come and gone, gone over-commercial. So what are they doing here in Sydney? Why are they still out, decades later? Are they chasing the music, or something else? It’s a Sunday, almost dark, and we’re still awake since Friday and the party has drifted from here to there and ends up in the garden courtyard of a day club, an ap-

propriated church. The looping throb of the bass drowns out thought. Serotonin re-floods brains, eyes roll skyward. Another old party boy is yelling in my ear. He is old and gay, and only wants me because I am young and straight. He wants to impress me with his wisdom. He asks, ‘Have you heard of the law of diminishing returns?’ (This is a subject discussed more and more at the clubs and parties. I am learning this law first hand; the amount I need of whatever it is to get off has zoomed to 10 times the recommended dose in a matter of months). He says to me, ‘The law of diminishing returns states that in time all things lose value. With oversaturation, over-exposure, everything costs you more and becomes worth less.’ So why are you still here, old boy? Why am I still here? (This is a question I ask myself a lot since the near-death experience on New Year’s Day. Unfortunately I won’t be able to answer this question until after several more near-death experiences.) A girl with pupils big as elevator buttons tells me another theory as she strokes my tingling fingers. About how when eyes dilate it’s a signal that the person is attracted to or interested by whatever they’re looking at. A person with large eyes is also perceived as more attractive. So it’s win-win. It says ‘I like you’ at the same time as making you more likable. Her eyes are black holes – then they reflect the white liquid light and I can see myself there, a face with cartoonish features, eyes like she said. I am looking at myself. My eyes are big. I must like myself. [Conversely, pupils contract if you stray far enough from euphorics and stimulants. Heroin shrinks them to pixel-thin dots, tries to convince the brain the outside world is far too bright; the Addict: ‘Best keep them blinds drawn, homeboy.’] It felt like only a matter of time before one of us would

get the call from the emergency room, or the other department that deals with notifications of death. I was still one of his contact numbers, a species of next-of-kin – but there is only so much help I or anyone else could provide. Each person is their own boss, each driver in charge of their own vehicle. [Nicknaming him ‘the Addict’ seems a mistake, a contextual misnomer; better perhaps to just number each of us, or specify individuals as the TV Fiend, the Ladies’ Man, etc.] And at that stage I had problems enough of my own, and they were escalating. So I was absolutely not the person to enlist in this; I was as much of a bad influence on the Addict as the addiction itself. But when Mrs Addict rang from overseas and said her husband wasn’t answering his cell, that the baby in her arms was crying more than the norm, when she insisted she ‘got a bad feeling, John, in me waters, like,’ in the forgotten sneer of the ex-junky – then the Samaritan in me staggered out from behind my own selfish degenerate self. The Negro and me stopped staring at the ceiling, left the day party and jumped in his convertible like Miami Vice and zoomed across town to the house by the beach. We talked rubbish on the way, with him titling himself ‘your attorney’. After knocking on the front

door and trying the Addict’s phone to no effect, I monkeyed my way up to the second-floor balcony – ‘As your attorney, I strongly advise against this’ – and I smashed in a small doorwindow with a brick. The Addict wasn’t dead or dying; he came up out of the nod with the sound of the glass and was at the balcony door with a kitchen knife screaming ‘Intruder! Intruder!’ as my hand fumbled for the knob. I yelled his name and insisted he look at me and recognise my face and calm down. He did these things but out of order, and then let the Negro in downstairs. I wouldn’t say I didn’t recognise the Addict; it was more like someone had done a gross caricature of him in the flesh. His teeth were worn down to nubs. Three months since I’d seen him and he was scrawnier than ever, a shirtless scarecrow. (Admittedly, he’d always had a lightning metabolism: vacuum of all foods and powders and liquids with nothing to show; a black hole of a man). He cackled with goblin glee, a fiend of strings, and hugged me hard. ‘Mind the fits, homeboys,’ he warned – and it was true: the kitchen was strewn with them. [‘Fits’ = disposable needles and syringes. $2 for a black plastic box of two, some swabs and a 60ml bottle of water. Like a medikit. Available at vending

“A girl with pupils big as elevator buttons tells me another theory as she strokes my tingling fingers. About how when eyes dilate it’s a signal that the person is attracted to or interested by whatever they’re looking at. A person with large eyes is also perceived as more attractive. So it’s win-win”

FEATURE machines on main streets and outside drop-in centres in most high traffic districts.] I explained why I smashed his window and he was genuinely touched. Then the three of us divvyed up and shared what we had on us and all had a good laugh about it watching the ocean darken. As we left the Addict to his solitary life, I kidnapped his cat, Baby. A photographer at the party we left had been looking for one to pose with the girls. I couldn’t find the cage in the garage, and didn’t want to reawaken the Addict from his rare sleep, so I lured Baby into a cardboard box with a chunk of carrot soaked in vodka. He put up a real fight the whole drive back to the city, bouncing round the cardboard walls of his cell. I said something to the Negro about Schrödinger’s cat as we drove. ‘Who’s Schrödinger? We score off him a month back?’ Close. I told him Schrödinger was the kid who plays piano in Charlie Brown & Snoopy. The day party had devolved into night. More people were there, more music, more mess. Baby proved an unwilling model – we only got a few usable shots. I locked him in a bedroom with some milk. Things deteriorated into strobes. I remember something about a wheelchair, an argument, and then I hit a guy

who wouldn’t quit bugging one of the girls. (I’m fairly certain I didn’t hit the guy in the wheelchair). I woke up the next afternoon in the bathroom. Baby had escaped. The Negro and me wandered the streets calling ‘Baby? Baby? Here, Baby!’ Strangers gave us strange looks, although the Negro managed to get the phone numbers of two girls who mistook our intentions for amourous. I found Baby an hour later in the abandoned office building where all the homeless cats and people congregate. In a matter of hours the cat thought he’d gone stray. I taxied him back to the house at the beach, but found it empty. The first time I blasted heroin was like a scene out of a movie. e and a friend of a friend talked ourselves into it at three in the morning, drunk. She used to use, and had been clean for a few years. She had just begun to drift back in, and she found kicks in introducing me to it. I always knew I’d try it. I’d seen Trainspotting, Drugstore Cowboy, and all sorts of anti-drug specials, and they hadn’t scared me straight. They made it look so much more . . . real – realer than anything else. I didn’t want to die wondering what it was like. So off we went. In a corner of the park, near

“I always kept one eye on my intake and whether or not I was slipping into a swamp I wouldn’t be able to pull out of. (Burroughs was correct in his autobiographical Junkie: Habits, good or bad, take a while to take. He injected morph every day for almost a year before he felt the tingle of serious addiction. I concur)”

the fountain, Tess spoke to a black kid in a hoodie. Maybe 15 years old. He took our money and rode away on his bike. We waited there for 10 minutes or so with drunks and junkies nodding out. We were the only whites there, apart from a toothless guy who reminded me of a pirate. The black kid came back with two balled-up bits of paper, like the gum wrappers you throw away. We left the park and bought some fits from the machine. Here’s the movie bit: we sat in between two parked cars in a back alley, our asses in the gutter, literally, and shot up. I even choked my arm with my belt, despite my fresh veins, just to make it theatrical. It was so clichéd and ‘gritty’ and all that, the fumes and traffic sounds, so ‘urban decay/inner city’ stereotype, it could’ve been in one of those anti-drug specials. ‘The City is a dark and dangerous place, and little Timmy is starting down the road to ruin.’ And it felt so numb. It felt great, but there was no ecstasy or rapture. Where were the trumpets, the angels’ choir? It was more like indifference. Blank indifference. I understood why prostitutes and the homeless did it: people with hard lives, hard to face. It made nothing matter. Oh, my life sucks? Ah, who cares. You’re doing things that shame you and your whole family? Who cares. It was like one big indifferent shrug. We went to score more an hour later, still high, dragged ourselves out from between the fenders to find the kid on the bike. He’d been replaced by a greasy Italian man with gold chains and gym gear. More clichés. He gave us two wraps and drove away in his sports car. This time when we unwrapped them there was no grey powder, just bits of paper. We shrugged at each other. Who cares? We’re like fictional characters in a movie. None of this is really real. Who cares? We just got ripped off, 50 bucks. Who cares? Sneering at each other, ‘Whatever, man.

TWO... nd on and on it went. Bits and pieces scrawled on cardboard and newspaper, documenting the slide into harder and harder vices. Hundreds of stories based around drug-fueled highjinks, arrests, poignant ironies and harrowing aftermaths. At length it would read like most any other tale of youth on drugs: relapses, rehab, and some sort of saccharine redemption at tales’ end. Et cetera. You’ve read The Basketball Diaries, and James Frey’s A Million Little Pieces. I’m not going to retread old tracks. So can I realistically expect to add anything new to the pile? Probably not. But not for the reasons you’d think. But first things first: I’m going to skip over all the played-out scenes you’ve already seen and read ad nauseum, and jump straight to epilogues: My core crew of partiers remained throughout the years as we escalated and declined, went clean and sober for a time, then relapsed. Peripheral characters came and went, floated in and out of scenes. The Negro replaced his addictions with the volatile love of a girl on and off her meds. He’d still drink and pop uppers with me when we hung out, but the majority of his time was spent arguing and reconciling with the girlfriend. For three years that atrocity of a relationship dragged itself on, kicking and screaming; but at least it cured him of the constant thirst. My Thai ladyboy friend was deported, and later died in Bangkok. The photographer died. Various others died, O.D.ed, went clean for good, got married, left the city. Baby got run over. Tess stopped using shortly after popping my cherry that night between the parked cars. She moved with her girlfriend to Adelaide and no crew heard from her again. I like to think she’s living happily. The Addict’s brain spiked and he chewed through his face during

a seizure. Mrs Addict packed him off to rehab down the coast. Three months later he returned fit and healthy. Without lifting a single weight the scarecrow had grown into a muscular lion. [At one stage I was going to run a Wizard of Oz thread through this piece, but decided against. Some fragments will always remain. Nothing disappears completely]. He started drinking again, still does, but avoids all drugs that don’t grow in the ground. I continued shooting cocaine and heroin and dealing the former for months. always kept one eye on my intake and whether or not I was slipping into a swamp I wouldn’t be able to pull out of. (Burroughs was correct in his autobiographical Junkie: Habits, good or bad, take a while to take. He injected morph every

day for almost a year before he felt the tingle of serious addiction. I concur). I looked at the homeless scumbag junkies sneering at each other on the street, always stealing and cheating each other out of scores. Deep in me I knew I was fundamentally different to these liabilities. It wasn’t just because I was smart – I was sure there were over-achievers and smart genes lost in the throngs of complete addiction. No. It was that these fidgeting wrecks had nothing to anchor them to their life, to anything outside of pure distraction in narcotic waves; or maybe they’d lost hold of the things that had kept them tethered to their real lives, their real purposes. I still had music and writing and film and family and friends that were family. (I know everyone says this, but I also really think I’m the luckiest homeboy out because I accrued

the best crew of friends imaginable). I knew my life was supposed to be more than staring atomised at strangers’ ceilings and waking in unknown suburbs. And on some instinctive level I also knew that whatever it was I had been looking for no longer lay in taking hard drugs. I would simply grow out of it. But still. There were raids and rides in paddywagons. There were trips to hospital. After lying in a day-long coma I wandered away before the nurses could write down a name. Paranoia stole hold. There were bad batches that had everyone on the street twitching and seizing. Sickly rashes covered our bodies: signals to like minds. On and on it went. My finances rose and fell with the strength of my addiction(s). Friends worried, intervened, endorsed ‘tough love’, all that

jazz. I sold my drums to buy more. Blah blah blah [I thought I said I’d skip the clichés?]. And anyway, yes, so on and on it rolled. ‘It’s not a race to the finish, Johnny-Boy,’ they’d say. My anchors held me down. Off the fits. Back on the fits. ‘If you using then you either dead or dying. Or you clean. No in-betweens on that one.’ My anchors held me down . . . Gradually, I began to crawl out of these habits. I went to a few Narcotics Anonymous meetings at the local church, but I wasn’t really down with it. The femme fatale in Infinite Jest likened the counting of days clean/sober to Evil Knievel jumping over more and more cars on his motorcycle: today it’s 41, tomorrow 42 – how long can this go on? How long can I keep counting? I relapsed halfheartedly, the general craving slowly leaving of its own accord.

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They tried to make me go to rehab but I did like the song says. I never hit the fabled ‘rock bottom’ of Fight Club or A Million Little Pieces; I simply lost interest. The change owed in part to the Law of Diminishing Returns, as well as my basic indifference that I found mirrored in heroin. Ironically, then, the drug of indifference was eclipsed by my own. I still went out occasionally, still searching for the same thing I thought I had found in drugs. ’m still not certain what the thing I’m looking for is, and if I’ll recognise it when I find it. The Negro, as he transitioned from drug-to-relationship addiction, now viewed me with something like pity: ‘As your attorney, as your friend, I think it best for you to realise this: Drugs, drinking, dealing, all that guff – these are just substitutes for Love.’ The Love you’ve found with the Psycho? Stalking each other and yelling and smashing cellphones? ‘Whatever, my nigger. You’re looking for love. Just stop deceiving yourself, homeboy.’

Whatever. A Scanner Darkly is Philip K. Dick’s most overtly drugoriented book. In it he deals directly with amphetamine addiction and lifestyle in 1970s California, his science fictional aspects made background to the human drama at the story’s core: a rare inversion for him. An afterword serves as a eulogy for those people he knew lost to overdoses, accidents and severe brain damage. He likens their highjinks to kids playing chicken with cars on busy roads; he dedicates the book to those who played there too long. Yet I can’t share the same regrets as Dick. This story has no moral, no lessons learned after some kind of crisis, then climax, then a cathartic new beginning. I am not James Frey. I am, perhaps, the posterboy for an anti-Public Service Announcement. I escaped more or less unscathed. Not everyone I knew is now dead or dying or crazy. I am not the survivor storyteller invited to highschools to warn kids away from drugs, as someone who paid too high a price for a high. Sure, my nose still bleeds, unpicked. I sleep light, despite

months clean. I tend to gaze too long at things, feel my emotions stirred by the most insignificant sights. A glorious sunset vibrant with Technicolour won’t move me in the slightest; a random arrangement of trash and cars will push me to the verge of tears. (We were the overstayers. That was us: always wringing the last drops out of it. We never slept. Day was night was day. Those of us out the other side of the rinse, our hearts have grown brittle, our minds weak.) But I couldn’t with a straight face say that it wasn’t worth it, that it ruined my life, that you youngsters ought to read the D.A.R.E. pamphlets as gospel. Maybe I’m the exception to the rule. Maybe I’m one of the lucky ones. Maybe my will overrides any addictive tendencies. Maybe it’s my indifference. Who can say? [POST SCRIPT]: ow goes the Great Work?’ The search for whatever it was I was looking for continued, and I began drinking with the Student: a man in his 50’s, a father figure of sorts, who after wasting his best years had finally decided to go to university. He is the future self to whom I was writing the cardboard letters. The Student would say to new friends, ‘McCaughan here is writing the Great Work of his generation; one day you’ll tell your kids you met The Voice.’ But I wasn’t, am still not. I can speak for no one but me and mine. Indifference again. (But there is an empathy that weighs in the pit of my heart. Not for me – for everyone I know or imagine. I don’t want or expect love in any form, or even a sense of understanding: I can’t provide anything that would merit either. Your time listening is enough. Neither you or I will ever ‘get’ each other; we are passing cars). No, the Great Work I wrote of way back at the beginning of this piece turned out to be not

‘H

mine, but the Student’s. ‘Would you like to know the meaning of Life?’ he asked. Not really, dude. I figure it’s different for every pers— ‘Well I’m going to tell you anyway. This is what I’ve discovered: ‘We Are Here To Bear Witness To The Truth And Beauty Of The Universe. Nothing more.’ (You might imagine me talking to this wise man on a misty mountain top, after days’ trek thru the Andes. In fact we were in a bar, or smoking cigs in an alley nearby. The profound lives in the mundane, the profane.) This seemed true enough, but incomplete. I find beauty in oil in a carpark puddle. I gaze skyward with eyes closed to watch the colours fade and morph. This seems true enough. Note On The Sources: • Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Terry Gilliam, 1998.* This film was on high rotation, hence the Negro quoting Hunter S. Thompson's Samoan attorney. • Schrödinger’s Cat.* A thought experiment concerning quantum physics and death. Peanuts. Charles Schultz. • Frey, James. A Million Little Pieces. Random House, 2003.* Drug memoir. • Kiedis, Anthony. Scar Tissue. Hyperion, 2004.* Another drug memoir. • Carroll, Jim. The Basketball Diaries. Tombouctou Press, 1978.* Another drug memoir. Works Cited: • Burroughs, William S. Junkie. Ace Books, 1953. • Chevalier, Haakon M. The Secret Life Of Salvador Dali. Kessinger, 2010. • Dick, Philip K. A Scanner Darkly. Doubleday, 1977. • Wallace, David Foster. Infinite Jest. Little, Brown, 1996.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

RUTH FIELD “I am 22, in love with love, and have more sensibility than sense. I spent 2011 doing things purely for enjoyment, travelling in the first half of the year and completing writing papers at Massey Palmerston North in the second half. The Brain in Love was a bit of an experiment. I like the way the structure itself tells a story: the rise and fall of romantic love. Segments of the story also allude to the different chemicals involved when one is in ‘love’ – dopamine, endorphins, oxytocin etc. I was interested in the idea that these chemicals could perhaps explain the crazy things love makes us do – like Facebook stalking and having an affair. The original ending was a bit pessimistic, but now it’s more open and hopeful, and says something about the circularity of human relationships.”

Ruth Field’s winning entry in last year’s short story competition run by Magneto magazine.

he Brain in Love, she announces, the lecture topic a drumroll leading to her introduction. She pauses as pages are turned to find a clean sheet; accounts of the weekend’s drunken antics drop to hurried, hushed whispers, then sink into silence. “I’m Dr Blake and I’m here to explain the brain’s neurobiological responses to what is commonly called ‘being in love’.” She paces across the front of the room. “The strange and extreme things that we humans do for ‘love’ have been documented since the beginning of time. Paris and Helen. Tristan and Iseult. And don’t get me started on Shakespeare’s lovers! What on Earth possesses us to act this way? The answer, I believe, can be found by examining the different chemicals involved when the brain is in love.” She gestures to the screen behind her, clicks to produce a slide.

THE BRAIN IN LOVE “We begin with dopamine.”

+ You are reckless with your education. A little bottle sits on your desk, and you are hunched over in concentration, painting a perfect scarlet statement on your fingernails. The teacher’s spiel on The Forcefulness of Love in Romeo and Juliet washes over the class, saturates us with its significance, but you come up dry. When Mrs Green says she’s forgotten the worksheets, you raise your head slightly, blow on your nails. You’re out the door only moments after the teacher. With your sudden movement the tiny bottle topples, and the liquid becomes a scarlet slash on the school desk. I pick it up, crimson bleeding over my hands. You don’t even look back to make sure I’m following. We cut across the school field and I wipe my hands on the scratchy material of my uniform. Some

of the polish has set, dried hard and crusty. Later, during math, I pick it off, finding my skin irritated beneath, a pale redness in comparison to the flakes falling on my textbook. There’s a paddock beyond the school grounds and after that, a cluster of trees clawing at the unsuppressed sky. We sit beneath a particularly tall tree, the one closest to the blue, and laugh about how lame it would be to carve our initials, together, into the trunk. You produce a small tin from the lunchbox in your backpack and roll a joint. It begins as sunlight in my synapses, a small breeze travelling down my spinal cord. Into the spaces between my ribs, exiting my body in a hurricane of laughter.

+ There’s a big, leafy elm out the back of the new flat. She strings fairy-lights over it. He puts furniture under it. Friends come over, bring boxes of beer.

Barbequed meat placed on the table. They get drunk and dance together. Travel, they agree. Europe, as soon as we graduate. All that history! He says. She says, all that romance! He doesn’t notice her suggestive tone. Or he ignores it. They share milk. Watch the same shows. Go for runs together. We’ll motivate each other, he says. Nothing but heavy breaths between them. She pulls a muscle. Feels it later. At the time, though, Runner’s High – all those endorphins! - keeps her beside him. It rains. Puts him in a bad mood. She revels in it, walks back from class without her umbrella. After that, it’s sunny for months. He laughs, lies around with his top off a lot. They kiss, once. Accidentally, he says. But he never gets a girlfriend.

+ Husband leans over and kisses his wife as soon as he wakes

FEATURE up. They fill their daughter’s little pink backpack and drop her at her grandma’s; husband has booked a tandem bungy-jump for their third wedding anniversary. Wife puts on their favourite CD as they leave the city, and they drive in easy silence, he tapping his fingers on the steering wheel and she occasionally humming. Outside the window are jagged ranges, like scenery from the pop-up book wife sometimes reads their daughter. They lie on their stomachs, carpet tickling their chins; an angle from which they can admire the cardboard cut-out against the pale bedroom walls. Husband decides they’ll stop at a rest-spot just a little way off the main route. There’s a small stream twisting, knotting its way through scratchy bush, rolling over soft, emerald moss. They perch on the hood of their car and drink coffee from little plastic thermos cups. Husband points out three different types of butterflies and gives their scientific names. Wife thinks the whole scene is wonderful. Back on the main road, the landscape changes and there is nothing but flat farming plains on both sides of the car, and the bendless road ahead of them. Wife takes over driving for a while, and husband rests his head against the passenger pane, but doesn’t doze. They recall the time they first met, and various dates after that, until they draw close to their destination and become too nervous to talk. Afterwards, with the adrenalin coursing through their systems, the world is bright and crisp, the car too compact, too enclosed for their emotions. Tsunamis of laughter gush from their mouths. They speak loudly and quickly about falling hard and fast and bouncing back up again, a human yo-yo in the huge canyon. Back at home, when the world is a bit softer again, husband does the dishes and wife

puts the daughter to bed, then they kiss during the ads of the Saturday night documentary, The Migration of Monarchs.

+ Mum shakes her head and stomps off to the kitchen to dry the dishes, waving the tea-towel around like some kind of flag; a banner for those of us with morals. “What is he thinking,” she scoffs. “It’s obvious she just wants money and he just wants One Thing.” She forces the last two words out and I think she’d probably choke if she tried to say sex. “Maybe they truly love each other,” I suggest. She responds by jamming the cutlery into its draw and clattering more pots than were actually used to cook dinner. I turn back to the computer screen and flick through the pictures that my uncle has posted on his Facebook page. He’s probably twice her age and she does wear very short shorts. But they look happy. It looks like more than just testosterone and cash. And who are we to judge? Mum walks over again, the towel taut in her hands. She tosses it at me, scoops me up under her banner before I can have any more traitorous thoughts.

+ Ben Cooper accepted your friend request. Ben Cooper sent you a message. Ben Cooper and four other people like your status “Nothing like being wined and dined!” Ben Cooper commented on your photo. “Looking good ;)” Ben Cooper likes the link you shared on his wall. Ben Cooper commented on the link you shared on his wall “I love this song too!” Ben Cooper likes your wall post “Can’t wait to see you tomorrow!” Ben Cooper invited you to the

event “Any excuse to party” Sarah Emerson commented on your album Just Another Drunken Party “haha enough photos of you and ben in there?? :p” Ben Cooper has requested that you be listed as ‘in a relationship’. You, Sarah Emerson and 12 other people like your change in relationship status.

+ “What are we, then” I ask, hoping he can’t hear the roughness in my throat. “Well it’s complicated, isn’t it?” he replies. I give him a half nod of agreement – yes, it was complicated, but no, it didn’t have to be - and swirl my teaspoon around my coffee cup to distract myself. Just yesterday I had been in his bed, the afternoon sun slanting through the window. His lips on my neck like light refracting. “Hey,” he says gently, managing to draw my eyes up with a single syllable. “Don’t be like that.” I let go of the teaspoon and it clatters to the side of the cup. He tries again. “Come over tonight, Emma’s going out.” I struggle not to smile, snagging on the sharp edge of him. He stands, scoops my coat off the back of my chair and holds it up for me to slide inside.

they were in the bed, tangled up in the sheets, but they’ve fallen onto the floor.

+ Ben Cooper is lying face down on the floor. Ben Cooper’s bed was too comfortable for the way he is feeling. Ben Cooper is now single. Ben Cooper checks your Facebook page eleven times a day. Ben Cooper is suspicious of Brent Hock, who posted on your wall. Ben Cooper looks at Brent

+ I read in some women’s magazine that oxytocin is released when couples ‘make love’. I’m scoffing at that phrase now, that euphemism, but it doesn’t stop me from running my fingertips across his back, swirling schizophrenic patterns onto his skin. Contact is supposed to increase the flow of this bonding hormone. “You should probably go,” he says, rolling over, my half-finished figure-eight fading from his skin. Unravelling on the sharp edge of him. He watches as I fumble around for my clothes. I thought

Hock’s page. Ben Cooper is annoyed because Brent Hock only shares some of his profile information with everyone. Ben Cooper sends you a message. Ben Cooper sends you a message. Ben Cooper sends you a message. Ben Cooper posted on your wall “Why aren’t you replying to my messages?”

You have blocked Ben Cooper.

+ The sink has blocked up again, the third time in as many months. It’s Mum’s birthday soon, so I help Dad pick out a dishwasher as a present. We get it installed while she’s at work and when she gets home she peels the big bow off it and doesn’t quite know what to say. I guess these things take a bit of getting used to. My uncle calls one night and asks to speak to Dad, his brother. I can hear Dad boom-

“A type of dating site,” Dad says slowly, “For foreign men looking for a Ukrainian woman.” “Oh, that man,” is all mum replies. I look up the site and it greets me luridly, young women pressing their breasts together for the camera or posing suggestively or looking sultrily into the lens. Or all of the above. Closing my laptop angrily I stomp over to the kitchen and begin hand washing the pots and pans that aren’t dishwasher safe. After I’ve finished drying them I just stand in the kitchen, twisting the tea towel in my hands, feeling betrayed.

ing “What!” from the front room and joke with Mum that he doesn’t even need to use a phone to be heard from Ukraine. When he returns to the living room he looks worried about sharing the news with Mum. “What was that about?” she prompts. “Craig’s setting up a new business,” Dad says, but he makes it sound like a question. “And?”

Husband stands at the kitchen bench, waiting for the jug to boil. He asks wife if she’d like a cup of coffee. Wife sighs and says she gave it up months ago. Husband shrugs, fills the plunger for himself and sits at the table, opposite his wife. A framed photograph of their daughter hangs on the wall between them. Left for university last year; boxed up all the conversation and took it with her. Husband stays late at work, preferring to hide himself in the lepidopterological books he orders online than be found in the heavy, revealing silence at home. Wife knows he isn’t having an affair – he doesn’t pay enough attention to his appearance for that – but she almost wishes he was. At least then there’d be something to get passionate over. A reason to walk out. Instead, she makes sure the porch light is on, shakes her head slowly as she watches the hapless moths flock hastily to the light. She can’t stand to hear the tiny clink of their bodies against the glass of the bulb when soon all the brightness will be gone.

+ She takes the fairy-lights out of the tree. Attracted too many

bugs. Boxes them up, puts them in her desk drawer. Next to the Lonely Planet. Europe, she says, several times over. Remember? In a year, he says. When I have enough money. After the lease is up. When my contract runs out. Maybe two. Rain starts sliding down the windows. It’s hard to ignore. She looks out, captivated by the reflection of the world in liquid places. Solitary runs. He’s too busy with his new job. Has something on. Needs to help Tim. Too exhausted. Last week she tripped, twisted her ankle. It hurt like hell. Barely made it home. Alone. Nothing but the weather’s music luring her. Packs a bag, empties her savings account. No more excuses. She slips out into the storm. When he awakes the sky is soft and blue, rolling over on the city with a yawn.

+ You yawn and lie back beneath the tree, your head resting on a root, your eyes staring up, up, at the criss-cross of desperation above you. I can hear the school bell in the distance, scratching at the crisp morning air. You ignore it, your fingers and those scarlet nails picking up handfuls of decomposing leaves and tossing them high into the air, then watching them fall slowly, softly, inevitably, back to the ground. The next week, your nails were painted a dark, inky blue and I heard you took Lucas Baker to the field behind the school.

+ A girl in the back row raises her hand, straight as a flagpole. “Excuse me, Dr Blake,” she calls out. “But do you really think love is nothing more than chemical reactions in the brain? What about romance? What about longevity?” Dr Blake stops pac-

ing. “There’s beggary in the love that can be reckoned,” the girl concludes. A few people in the class giggle. The students in the front turn around in their seats, trying to find the source of the questions. Dr Blake looks up at the young, inquisitive faces. She opens her mouth then closes it. A bell signals the end of morning lectures. “Read chapter five in your textbooks,” Dr Blake says wearily, but it’s buried by the bustle of students preparing to leave. The middle aisle of the lecture theatre becomes congested as everyone hurries for lunch. I give way to the girl who asked the questions. She has little red rose earrings and shares her smile with everyone. Arriving at the café just off campus, I immediately notice that Ellie isn’t there. I check my watch and sit down, fiddling with the packets of sugar in an attempt to calm my nerves. Maybe she’s not coming. The chair I’ve chosen is a little wobbly so I move to another table. A few minutes later the door swings open, a rush of air sweeping in. I look up and grin. “Sorry-I’m-late,” she says breathlessly, half a leaf tangled in her hair. “My Shakespeare lecture went over time.” She takes off her gloves and puts her hands to her head, smoothing the windswept locks, discovering the leaf and plucking it from her curls with an amused smile.

MASSIVE Magazine is always looking to publish excellent short stories, poetry and creative nonfiction pieces. Submit your story to editor@massivemagazine.org. nz or you could enter the Massive Magazine Expressive Arts Awards and take your share of $2400 worth of Bookseller Vouchers by emailing competitions@massivemagazine. org.nz

FEATURE

Jamie Christian Desplaces goes in search of a beer and watches the Big Day Out taking its last whimpering breath.

THE BIG DAMP SQUIB

was about to learn that this job was only assigned to me because our regular music man, Zack, had called in sick, citing something about an attack of facial herpes which he claimed was the result of stress and overwork. Having recently spent ten days with him on an assignment in Saigon investigating illegal sex-trafficking

and having heard the raging degenerate in action through the nylon-thin walls of our SouthEast Asian lodgings, I knew the real cause of the outbreak. My phone rang and peeling my face from the pillow like a piece of discarded chewing gum I checked the caller I.D., pressing the green button with a grating apprehension.

“Were you still asleep? Goddamnit Desplaces, wake up!” screamed my editor. “I need you to go to the Big Day Out. Now!” I wondered aloud as to why Zack wasn’t being sent. “He’s got impetigo or something. He’s stressed out.” “The lying swine!” I retorted. “That guy needs to be sectioned

immediately – I’m traumatised, I’m suffering from flashbacks because of that trip to the ‘Nam. Like Rambo. Do I have backstage passes?” I knew that I wouldn’t, my editor was still pissed at me for accidentally kicking Bono’s shin in Sydney. “I want it covered from a fan’s angle. You are not to go any-

where near one single act, do you hear me? Bono’s threatening to sue us.” I crawled into the bathroom and necked a handful of painkillers, glancing in the mirror I noticed that my eyeballs were yellower that usual. I made a mental note to Google ‘jaundice’ when I got out of the shower but by the time I had dried myself off had forgotten all about it. I guess I was excited and soon found myself caught up in a vaguely surging crowd heading along Queen Street and like the fool that I am made eye contact with a guy who clearly had the brawn of a pugilist and the brain of a squirrel-monkey. He was ‘whoop-whooping’ frantically, his fists flailing in the air for no apparent reason whatsoever. “I’m Nelson, ts’up bru?” “Pardon me?” “Ts’up? You headed for the Big Day Out?” He squeezed his mammoth bicep around my neck. I looked around for help and then nodded resignedly. “Fuck yeah! Sick day for it.” “Looks like rain,” I said. “It never rains on the Big Day Out!” informed Nelson. Seconds later, it began to rain. With no bag, I very nearly made it through the security check until an ambitious young talent called me back and reaching into the hood of my fauxleather jacket like some kind of street magician, pulled out a bottle of Jim Beam. Goddamnit! However, my spirits were soon lifted again as the boastfully orange sun melted away the clouds and then proceeded to spend the rest of the day doing the same to my face. I was thirsty and went in search of refreshment. One of the things that immediately struck me, considering I was at a festival and everything, was the distinct lack of trilby-topped indie types milling around with plastic beer cups in one hand, spliffs in the other. Security’s clearly tight in

this joint, I thought, better stay alert. Onwards and upwards, I headed for the noisiest direction. The first stage I passed (sponsored by Converse) was empty, so I continued on past the ‘Foam Dome’ (sponsored by Motorola) and memories of misspent drunken teenage Mediterranean holidays brought about feelings of nostalgic sickness.

smallish crowd had gathered around the Boiler Room Stage (not sponsored, not worth it) and Six60 appeared to be playing a blinder. I’ve never heard of them, but still, most of the crowd clearly had and there was still no sign of beer. My tongue was beginning to stick to the roof of my mouth; dehydration was slowly wrapping its deathly fingers around my prickly throat – which now felt as though I’d been gargling sand all morning – and so I bought a slushy and made for the grass-bank over yonder to continue with my successful failure to quit smoking. Peering back in the hazy distance I noticed what seemed to be some kind of prison that was surrounded by barb-wired, metal fencing. Inside, there were people. I thought that I must have been mistaken at first, surely. What on earth could these poor souls have possibly done, I pondered, to deserve such treatment? And with my journalistic instinct now in overdrive, I ventured cautiously closer for a clearer view. A bedraggled young convict loitered forward and overcome with untold compassion I stepped hesitantly towards him. My God, I thought, what is this place? “What is your crime?” I asked. “Why have they done this to you?” Slowly, shakily, he lifted his undernourished arm. Gripped tightly within his fist was the answer. This lad was drinking beer. “It’s okay, don’t be alarmed. We can…” he hoarsely whis-

pered. “… we can still listen to the bands because they give us… hearing-Aids.” “You just hold on,” I told him, Rambo-like. “I’ll get to the bottom of this. I’ll get you out of there soldier, if it’s the last thing I do.” With that we saluted and I headed further into the musical jungle, making for the Main Stage buried deep within the stadium’s bowels. It was tricky to remain inconspicuous, the place was fucking empty and they had spies everywhere. The stands were full of pigs with telescopic lenses and assault rifles and they had even constructed an aerial zip-line (sponsored by V Energy Drink) to enable fast and efficient access should they realise that they had been compromised. Below, in an area ironically code-named The Anarchy Zone (sponsored by Lynx Deodorant), undercover cops dressed as revellers practiced firearm techniques and handto-hand combat. I looked to the back of the stadium and my stomach dropped faster than the promoter’s reputation. Way, way back there was another one, another prison. This time the fences where even higher, the wire even sharper and armed-guards patrolled the perimeter as viscous Rottweilers snapped, howled and tugged at their leads. Every now and then the faint outline

of more of those poor forgotten withered souls loitered into view. All undernourished, all ashamed, and all drinking beer. I sought around, desperately trying to find a group of musos that reached double figures in order that I might blend, but the harsh reality soon dawned that I could surely trust no-one and there was hardly anyone there to trust upon this desolate, barren land. Suddenly, like the Phoenix from the flames, like the rising of the Lord, I caught sight of my Saviour, of someone on whom I could truly count. In the not-too-far distance I saw the guy from earlier, the lad from Queen Street, I saw the one and only, Nelson. There was no way he was ‘one of them’, I reasoned, the guy’s a fucking moron. “BRUUU!” he greeted me like some kind of long lost brother, and, for now, I reasoned that he was. “Shut the fuck up Nelson, we don’t have time, we’re in it deep,” I snapped. “Follow me.” “Where are we going?” he asked excitedly. “Tony Hawke’s cutting up the half-pipe!” “We’re going in there,” I replied, motioning my head toward the fence and Nelson stopped dead in his tracks. “No way, no way. They say, they say that when you go in there you never come out, they say the devil’s too scared to

FEATURE they kicked into a snarling rendition of ‘Shoot the Runner.’ I swallowed hard. All eyes, I felt, had fallen upon me. “May I see your papers?” asked a guard, stealthily grabbing me from behind. “My papers?” “Yes sir, your papers. No one is allowed in without papers. Do you have I.D?” Some guards to the far right had gathered to stare, their Rottweilers standing alert and eerily composed. “I have a driving licence,” my voice was shaking. “Show me.” I produced the small pink card from my wallet, the guard stared down and then to me and without a trace of emotion, or a sound from his mouth, escorted me from the stadium and up to see his Superior.

Noel Gallagher performing with his band the “High Flying Birds”

show his face in there bru. They say, they say,” Nelson lowered his voice to a barely composed hush. “They say you need binoculars to see the stage, they say, you get… hearing-Aids.” I turned to confront the coward, but he had gone. And so,

whistling the theme from The Great Escape, with hands in pockets and eyes to the ground, made my way to that cordoned grey and spectral land. My Chemical Romance had handed the reigns over for Kasabian to take to the stage behind and

ituated in a small white tent underneath a sign that read ‘Information’, overlooking the dismal crowd an overweight, balding figure sat with his feet perched aloft of a fold-out plastic table, mopping his sweating round pink face with a filthy rag. Eye contact was made between him and my guard and they nodded respectfully. “We have another.” I was directed to a seat and my new host stared at me with utter contempt. “You do realise that the area you attempted to access is strictly classified?” he asked with a strong London accent. “You must be 18 years old or over. Period.” “I’m thirty-one.” “Do you have proof?” “Yes, I have my driving licence, here,” I said producing the card and was immediately told that it was no good. He pointed to a paper upon his desk that informed that occupants of the camp must produce either passports, Prove-It Cards or New Zealand Driving licences. I informed him in just about every continent on earth my licence had always been an acceptable form of identification, except at

airports, of course. He told me sorry, that rules are rules. “This is a UK Driving Licence,” I told him. “You are from the UK,” I told him. “You can see that this is a valid form of identification and you are telling me, a thirty-one year old man, that I am not allowed to purchase a beer?” “Yes, I am,” he replied, far, far too smugly. “Could I please have your name?” I asked, procuring my notepad from my pocket. “No. Could I have yours?” “Of course,” I reasoned with contrived kindness. “It’s Jamie De…” “I don’t care,” he growled. “If you have a problem, then you’ll have to contact the stadium at a later date.” “Well, that doesn’t really help me today now does it? Thankyou,” I said and offered my hand but he refused to shake it. “You’ve been most unhelpful.”

t was left to Noel Gallagher and his High Flying Birds to salvage a little dignity from what was otherwise a complete and utter sham, a disastrous joke of a festival. Insultingly, to make up the numbers, by the late afternoon people were being let in free of charge which must have been pretty hard to swallow for the kids that had scrimped and saved to fork out the one hundred and sixty bucks cover charge. There was no discount on beer though, apparently. “This will be the last ever song sung at the Big Day Out,” announced Mr Gallagher before fittingly kicking into the opening rolling chords of the everspine tingling ’Don’t Look Back In Anger’. And as the desperate chants for an encore from the frenzied die-hard Oasis fans went unanswered and eventually faded into the cool night breeze, the Big Day Out took one last whimpering breath then died, pathetically on its fat, farcical arse.

Death Cab for Cutie are playing as part of the New Zealand International Arts Festival at the Wellington Town Hall on Wednesday February 29. Their latest album, ‘Codes and Keys’ is out now.

Jacob Lilley discovers a 15-year-old band in transition

DEATH CAB’S NEW LIBERATION

odes and Keys, the seventh album from indie-rock staple Death Cab for Cutie, marks a departure from their signature style of melancholic lyrics coupled with guitar-dependent melodies. Sure, the melancholia is still here, if not diluted, The album, however, boasts significant new musical embellishments, successfully creating a fresh new sound for this 15-year-old Seattle-based band. In an interview with Nick Harmer, the band’s bass player since inception, we talked about the album and their upcoming New Zealand visit.

The creation of Codes and Keys is no different from their other albums, but with a notable exception: “Ben [Gibbard, vocalist] was really inspired from his acoustic guitar and the piano a lot, but [sic] his demos were sparely arranged,” says Harmer. A sparseness that created an opportunity, “so when we brought them to the studio, it was the sky is the limit to what interpretation on what we’re going to choose”. Indeed, the album features a gradient of evocative songs, both lyrically and melodically. From the expected dark and claustrophobic opening Home

is a Fire to the surprisingly optimistic closer Stay Young, Go Dancing, Death Cab may not be as dark as they once were but nevertheless still reflect their gravitation for an album with a narrative. “We like to have a thematic relationship from all the material – but that’s never premeditated”, Nick emphasizes. That said, Codes and Keys is a conscious attempt for Death Cab in testing new ground. Months before the album’s release, the band emphasised how they’ve consciously steered away from being guitar-centric. Then again “there are still gui-

tars in the album, but overall there’s a little more openness from our standard line-up of two guitars, bass and drums”. Not only that, even with dark lyrics pervasive in a Death Cab album – notably, the absence of an after-life in St Peters Cathedral and hometown ennui in You are a Tourist – the juxtaposed melodies nonetheless create a sense of liberation, rather than depression. Upon its release, critics and fans instantly picked up Death Cab’s desire to evolve, branding it as their form of reaching maturity. Nick elaborates, however: “I wouldn’t say that it’s a mature album, but probably in the context on how we’re making albums – in terms of sound and production”. Nick adds, “We were all really inspired on how this album came together and how we made it”. Reassuringly, “we’ll always have one foot based on performance and playing music live and a lot of it will just be other things that we add to that” – an acknowledgement of Death Cab’s awareness in the challenges with extra technological trimmings. “I’m really digging the new album and how they’re sounding live.” Death Cab are due in Wellington this month as part of the Festival of the Arts – their first visit to New Zealand. Nick promises they’ll “try and play as much from the catalogue as we can get away with – all of us are really eager to share as much of our material as possible”. And finally, his advice for independent musicians wanting to mimic their success in breaking through to the mainstream: “I have a hard time giving any real meaningful advice because the landscape has changed significantly”, adding “get in a van and go on tour, and everything sorts itself out after that. If it’s a passion and a lifestyle that makes sense to you, you’ll know if it’s for you on the road, no question.”

FEATURE

Sarah Burton plays with some ‘limber, luscious, illuminating, inexplicable light’

THROW SOME LIGHT

he laden bus swerves slowly up Brooklyn Hill. Late afternoon sun finds a gap between the trees and buildings and hits the front windscreen full on, darting between people’s heads and creating strong flares and quick, playful patterns on the windows. For two seconds it directly hits the silver edge of the glasses of the woman facing me and burns as bright as a new star. Sunlight has transformed the bus into a golden display of shadows and special effects. Literally brightening up my boring journey home. Yet I’m the only one that seems to notice. All the

other bus goers are still looking down or staring blankly ahead. My secret I guess. I wish I had my camera. As a child, I spent a lot of time by myself, content with my own company and my trusty imagination. I remember borrowing my parents’ camera when there were some spare frames left over after holidays or birthdays. I’d set up little scenes in the back yard with teddy bears and other objects and snap away. When I got a little older my friends and I would steal my older sister’s clothes when she wasn’t home and stage impromptu fashion shoots on the trampoline.

The first photo I remember feeling really proud of was when I was about 11, on holiday in a bach in the Marlborough Sounds. My younger brother and his friend are on either side of a dinghy, hauling it ashore. My brother is tanned with dark hair and his friend pale with white hair. I shot them as they stepped out of the shallows, opposite in colouring but with matching comically strained expressions on their faces. At primary school we were learning about statistics and had to do questionnaires on each other. My questionnaire was titled “Who is your favourite

character from The Simpsons?” My friend Kate’s was “What do you want to be when you grow up?” A photojournalist, I stated boldly, and she drew a lone little camera on her pictograph. Back then, I had only a vague idea of what a photojournalist was, something to do with being an artist and travelling the world, but it has stuck with me ever since. Later in life I began to research the makers of iconic images and I learnt about photographers such as Mary Ellen Mark and Annie Leibovitz. I don’t want to gush but these ladies are my idols, females forg-

ing their way into a previously male-dominated world. A successful photojournalist has to be highly intuitive and creative as well as fearless. Annie Leibovitz went on tour with the Rolling Stones when she was just 21 years old. She decided that if she was going to capture the natural, fly-on-the-wall images she wanted she would have to do everything the Stones did, copious amounts of drug taking and all. She ended up having to go for a stint in rehab. There is an iconic image of Mick Jagger, which I love. He is leaving the plane. Unkempt yet dapper in his top hat and shirt buttoned as an afterthought, his figure cuts an imposing shape into the bright sky. The sun flares behind him and the plane, which is emblazoned with the Stones’ juicy tongue-baring logo. I can imagine her now. Running to be the first off the plane as soon as it landed, looking up through the viewfinder as Jagger began descending the stairs, moving to the right just slightly to expose that dazzling sun flare, hurriedly deciding on her exposure.

ary Ellen Mark was obsessed with mental hospitals, and when she heard about the film adaption of the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest she pestered the director to let her take the stills, saying she would just work for cost on the low-budget production. She has said she is interested in people on the edges and wants to acknowledge the existence of these people. This interest has led her from heroin addicts in London and street kids in Seattle to prostitutes in India. She befriends her subjects, relaxing them and capturing them with an intimate eye that is still aware of composition and light. Her photographs of children are especially poignant; she seems to infuse in them a perceptiveness beyond their years. These women are passionate, with distinctive vision. A combination of natural talent and

a bold attitude that got them where they wanted to go. Mary Ellen is now 71, Annie 62, and they are still chasing the light. Summer means daylight saving and barbeques at the beach. I’m in Nelson at the Tahunanui Beach picnic area with my sister and a few friends. A delighted squeal followed by giggles causes me to turn in the direction of two bare-chested Maori boys, about 3 and 4, who are fooling around with the water fountain. The way they interact is intimate and playful as they take turns squirting each other. Their faces rapturous with the simple joys of water, sun, and friendship. The water from the fountain is arcing around them. I see each glossy droplet caught in the sun for a millisecond. The summer evening causing their brown skin to glow burnished. I can’t help myself, and walk over to the large extended whanau group also barbequing, to find the parents. “Hi there, I was wondering if I could take some photos of the two boys over there?” “What for?” “Just for myself, ha ha, um, I just saw them and think they look great. If you give me your email I can send you some.” The boys seemed a bit confused by the presence of me and my big lens at first, but we were soon laughing together as I captured their infectious amusement and delight, the evening sun lingering. The large square album is covered in padded white leather. An outline of two bells in joyful motion is etched in the centre. It lies at the bottom of the bookcase in the lounge, with all the other photo albums, stack upon stack of memories. Growing up, every so often I would slide this thick white slab out of the pile, sit down cross-legged, open it on my lap and slowly absorb each page. The photos are small squares with rounded edges and a quiet softness to them. The colour palette is limited, Mum in white, bridesmaids pale blue, Dad and the groomsmen in navy. The tone of the images is a warm brown, as

if they had been dipped in weak tea. I loved seeing my parents so young and expectant. Imagining the happenings of the day as I turned each page. It was only later when Mum told me what really happened, about how the combination of not eating all day because she was so nervous, and the overbearing heat of Brisbane in December in the long-sleeved, high-necked dress she had borrowed to cut down on costs, caused her to faint at the altar. It is only then that I can see a hint of pain in her young smile.

take photos at weddings now and have seen first-hand the difference between reality and what the photographs capture. After months of overwhelming planning and the huge costs of a modern wedding, some brides can crumple on their big day. There was one particular wedding on a farm in the Wairarapa. The bride and groom had a oneyear-old son. More than one glass of bubbly was consumed by the bride before the ceremony and then during the ceremony the bride and groom had to take turns drinking scotch out of a silver goblet (something to do with the groom’s Scottish ancestry). The bride was noticeably tipsy by the end of the cer-

emony and ended up dropping her baby on the ground right before the family photos. That was interesting. We began the bridal party shoot, but as she started sobering up slightly, the bride was fast getting over it. I had my heart set on taking photos by an ancient, rusty Bedford truck I had found slouched in a nearby paddock earlier, and I was determined on getting my lagging troupes to it. “It will be beautiful, you will be so glad we went there, it’s not that far away!” I said to them. Actually, it was kind of far away, but I had already framed up the images in my mind and the light was getting just right. Luckily for me, the grumbling bride, sorefooted bridesmaids, and unenthused groomsmen also fell in love with the adorable old truck when we finally got there. An abandoned relic encrusted in lichen and rust, the B from Bedford had clumsily fallen over on its side. I directed the bridal party to climb onto the back of the truck and they laughed together like a gaggle of teenagers off to a barn dance circa 1950. The sun was lowering and the light softly washed over the scene. The groom bent down to kiss his new wife as their edges glimmered and fused together.

FEATURE

Light, and the contraptions built to capture it, is a truly amazing thing. It’s something I still can’t fully comprehend. Light is everything to photography; the way it falls, what it falls on and what it doesn’t fall on make up the image on the photograph that you hold in your hand. One of my first tutors at university told our class, “What I will teach you will ruin your life because you will never look at light the same way again.” Traditionally, photography relied on tangible objects; rolls of film that wound through the body of the camera, darkened rooms, enlargers, numerous different types of chemicals, light sensitive silver gelatine paper. Photography is so advanced now, light years away from its beginnings. Digital cameras record all the light information electronically on a digital sensor chip. You can snippety snap away without a care, download the photo files to your computer, and view immediately. My digital is great, so easy

and instant which is essential for clients who expect a fast turnaround, but with all this complicated technology it’s easy to forget how it all started. It’s also easy to forget how wonderfully, magically simple it can be. I have been feeling increasingly disenchanted with the immediacy of digital technology. There is no longer any mystery and the sense of occasion that film photography holds. There’s something so special about developing your own photos. About doing every single step in the image-making yourself. I remember making pin-hole cameras back in high-school. A camera made from a cardboard box. It’s hard to wrap your mind around how something so crude could produce an image. It’s crazy, enchanting, and it really gets me excited about the power of light. The first camera was simply a room completely darkened, save for a small aperture to let in the light and was called a camera obscura. Whatever is outside the room is projected

onto the back wall completely to scale yet upside down and inverted. This happens because light travels in straight lines, it passes through the hole and strikes the surface behind. It is a manipulation of light using refraction and projection. There are references to this light phenomenon as far back as Aristotle in the 4th century.

pin-hole camera is a smaller version of a camera obscura, which you can make out of anything from a matchbox to a coffee tin. I set to work on making my camera out of a shoe box. I carefully wrap thick black tape all over it just in case of light leaks in the corners and insert a thin piece of aluminium with a minute pin-hole exactly 0.3 of a millimetre in the centre of the lid (carefully calculated according to the focal length of the box). In the dark room I attach a piece of light sensitive photographic paper to the back of the box, replace the lid, press more black tape around the edge of the lid as well as a piece

over the pin hole, and then I carry my awkwardly large camera home. I want to take a photo in a place that is significant to me. It’s a bright cloudless day and I guess my exposure to be one minute. I secure the camera to the front fence facing my house, peel back the tape concealing the pin-hole and sit motionless on my front lawn facing the camera for 30 seconds. I stand up and move around behind the camera for the remaining 30 seconds of the exposure. Pinhole exposures are always quite long and I figure I might as well make the most of the medium by having fun with it. I go back into the darkroom the next day. To think one photo can take two days to create. I am well aware that pin-hole photography is a game of chance, and I am absolutely thrilled by this game. I lift the paper out of the box and slip it into the tray of developer chemical. Breath held, excited. Gently I rock it back and forth and let the chemicals wash over the print, the image slowly forming like a deep-sea diver emerging to the ocean’s surface, back to the dazzling light. There it is! A perfect negative of my little house in the centre. The buildings beside it and the lawn in front of it stretching away and getting swallowed up by the heavy vignetting around the edges. And there I am, a ghostly, diminutive figure. The light reflected off my pale pink house is so bright it sears through my body making me almost non-existent from the shoulders up. The results of this primitive technique produce a haunting poetry that a digital camera could never replicate. This is what it is all about. Making an image with a cardboard box and some light. I am reminded of a quote by Eugenia Parry who states that the practice of pin-hole photography “is a fluid, mystical union with the sun”. This is what it all comes down to and where it all started. Limber, luscious, illuminating, inexplicable light.

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ACROSS 1. Tiger Wood’s profession 4. Deadened 7. Tropical lizard 10. Feather pens 13. Fair 15. Most disobedient 17. Facial twitches 19. Build up 21. Competent 23. Menace 25. Adversity 28. Lapse 29. Jellied petrol 30. The States (1,1,1) 32. Christening ceremony 36. Hollywood studio (1,1,1) 37. Fabled giant 38. Kiosk 40. Speak publicly 42. Walked back & forth 44. Weight unit 45. Sloping letters 46. Otherwise 47. Nevada’s ... Vegas 49. Dined

123

51. Bed cover 53. Hand rest 54. Cuban currency 55. Soared 56. Ancient Andes Indian 57. Biblical writing 60. Issued (medication) 65. Mourn 66. Celebrity status 68. Purpose 69. Smallest number 71. Bad habit 72. Diva’s song 73. Over again 76. Primate 78. House renters 83. Make beloved 85. Shipwrecked people 88. Horn player 90. Goodbye 91. Cheeky 92. Lion’s call 93. Speed contest 96. Coating 97. Slobber

98. Illegal hallucinogen (1,1,1) 99. At any time 100. Excessive utilisation 101. Pottery material 102. Theatrical performance 103. Nonconformist 105. Wall recess 107. Shaving cuts 108. Your (archaic) 110. Unhappiest 114. Government levy 116. Worry 117. Liqueur, creme de ... 119. Hearing membranes 122. By surprise 125. Job 127. Painter’s stand 130. Red-rind cheese 131. Environmentalists 132. Jack-of-all-trades (3-7) 133. Hint (3-3) 134. Join forces (4,2) 135. Apart from 136. Wiped (furniture)

1. Tender 2. Conifer trees 3. Attains 4. Hangman’s rope 5. Signified 6. Judge 7. Charged particles 8. Hostility 9. Voice types 10. Waiting in line 11. Tiny amount 12. Brook 14. Sri ... 16. Cremation remains 18. Private enterprise 20. Border upon 22. Milk-jelly dessert 23. Elephant noses 24. Sector 26. Info 27. Treat indulgently 31. Dozing 32. Flashing indicator 33. Tenor, ... Domingo 34. Local sayings 35. Muslim temples 36. Liquefied 37. Level 39. Grills 41. Bank officer 43. Catastrophe 48. Nook 50. Sell brazenly 52. Uncertainties 54. Squeeze between fingers 58. Elevate 59. Moroccan capital 61. Insinuate 62. Places 63. Fresher 64. Sham attack 65. Scalded (vegetables) 67. Tied 69. More independent 70. Anglers’ boots 74. Readjusts 75. Zimbabwe’s largest city 77. Police beats 79. Take up (cause) 80. Pupil 81. EU money 82. Kiss 84. Eliminated 85. Crunchy salad stalk 86. Hog’s home 87. Go to 89. Portable storage platform 94. Ostrich-like birds 95. Ringo or Paul 98. Wild keen-sighted felines 104. Grizzly animal 106. Munch 109. Intercept (4,3) 111. Financial holding 112. Payments owing 113. Skeleton head 115. Corrected 116. Simpleton 118. Mountaineer, Sir ... Hillary 120. Drily amusing 121. Workers’ federation 123. Concur 124. Grown-up 126. Game of chance 128. Pronto (1,1,1,1) 129. Abate 130. Greek love god

REVIEWS

THE GREAT DICTATOR Elizabeth Beattie

FILM Directed by Charlie Chaplin, Wheeler Dryden Produced by Charlie Chaplin Staring Charlie Chaplin, Paulette Goddard

Charlie Chaplin’s character of the little tramp is well known for fighting bullies and tough guys, but when Chaplin set out to direct and act in The Great Dictator, he had his sights set on a major historical villain. Disgusted by the Nazi Party’s persecution of the Jews and the fact that America was still neutral at the time the film was being made, Chaplin, the silent-film actor, spoke out about the madness of the political situation in Germany. He later said that if he had understood the extent of the persecution or knew about the death camps, he would never have attempted a comedy film revolving around such events. Even so, The Great Dictator has many powerful scenes

about humanity and the goodness of people. Chaplin plays two characters, “Henkil” aka Hitler, and his familiar little tramp character, a Jewish Barber who, after serving in WWI, suffers memory loss, making him unaware of Henkil’s growing power. The thing which is so powerful about this movie is that it’s not a propaganda film designed to drum up anger. Chaplin was aware of the economic climate in Germany and the manner through which Hitler had manipulated his way into power, and he uses the final few moments in the film to speak about what happens when we allow ourselves to live by hate. Chaplin’s great passion emphasises the good that exists in

humanity. “We all want to live by each other’s happiness, not by each other’s misery. We don’t want to hate and despise one another. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world, millions of despairing men, women, and little children, victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people. To those who can hear me I say “Do not despair”.” The Great Dictator was Chaplin’s most successful movie, and with such a powerful message of hope and call for peace it is also his most enduring. Like The Daily Show of its time, it pointed to the terrible and said “what are we doing about it?”

lines which come straight from the book and don’t fit the mouth of the actor who utters them, and they feel wasted. Johnny Depp plays Paul Kemp, a journalist who starts working for a dying newspaper writing horoscopes and who, fuelled on rum, stumbles into various situations and opportunities. Depp is successful in keeping Kemp interesting, and delivers droll observations like a pro. His sidekick, Bob Sala, played by Michael Rispoli, trails after him, and the duo end up in many awkward situations, and experience crises regularly. The movie certainly feels like Hunter S Thompson world – a world where everyone is an alcoholic, every woman has question-

able values, and every cynic is right. But the it is able to maintain a sense of fun as well, largely due to Depp’s performance and the way rum is used as a cure for every trouble encountered. Ultimately, however, the movie lacks direction and although there are colourful scenes and many great one-liners, it feels rambling. Though rambling in writing is Hunter S. Thompson’s strength, adapted into a movie context it becomes a bit of a chore to watch. There are moments when all aspects of the film come together well, but not often enough to make the movie truly enjoyable, and the audience is left to ponder if some books are best left as they are.

THE RUM DIARY Elizabeth Beattie

FILM Directed by Bruce Robinson Produced by Johnny Depp Staring Johnny Depp, Aaron Eckhart

My first Hunter S Thompson experience was reading Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. I instantly loved the book’s bombastic style and callous, witty narration (the best way to ingest his work is in one sitting while drinking many coffees). The concept of adapting Hunter S Thompson for the screen seems fraught with danger. His books are precariously balanced in a way that, if you change aspects of them then the whole art of his characteristic style could easily crumble. The Rum Diary film leaves me with mixed emotions. At times, the visual pairings and narration is excellent but at the same time the script often feels a little stilted and unnatural. There are very obvious

LANEWAY – NO SHADE BUT STILL RAD Jacob Lilley

GIG Mon 30 January Silo Park Auckland

Laneway is a rad music festival. This year saw it move away from Aotea Square and on to Auckland’s downtown waterfront. It had more stages than the previous year, too. Artists in the line-up could be described as the up-and-coming best indie bands, most of which you’ve either never heard of or have barely stumbled across. The major independents included the likes of Feist, The Horrors, Gotye and M83. Silo Park had very little shade areas, something hopefully improved next year. The line to get in wasn’t too bad. One of the highlights of the day was Opossom, which consists of Michael Logie and Kody Niel-

son of the Mint Chicks, and Bic Runga. They have some awesome tunes, the singles Cola Elixer and Getaway Tonight were highlights.. Kody’s intriguing on-stage attitude made itself apparent when he could be seen to openly ignore calls for the set to be cut short (he is noted for damaging band gear and taking to a Big Day Out stage with a chainsaw). The crowd filled in a fair bit through the day, and seemed genuinely there to see the bands, chill out, and have a good day, all of which gave the festival an awesome vibe. SBTRKT live was definitely the biggest standout, though. The intimate performance could be compared to two people acting

as DJ decks, creating live loops in a creative manner. Some of the stuff they were attempting was sketchy, timing tricky electronic instruments lagging, mixing them with live drumming, but this added to the intimacy of the performance. The two Brits seemed to be having the time of their life along with the crowd. If you haven’t had a listen, get hold of a copy of their album A.S.A.P. There were some lowlights: Len Brown trying to make a cool speech, the lack of shade and no sunscreen to be found, long queues for beer, one stage being a bit low. These were outweighed by the overall quality of the festival and are things that will most likely be ironed out.

Brewing at Tussock and Museum Cafés

CLASSIFIEDS

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CALLING FOR CONTRIBUTORS Massive Magazine is your new university publication and is looking for contributors with a flair for the written word or a desire to write articles that will be the example of student journalism in New Zealand. Massive Magazine is the university publication for Massey University and will be distributed on all campuses across the country. It will be the largest student magazine in New Zealand and committed to providing content that is journalistic, interesting and insightful. In order to ensure our success we need talented writers, such as yourself, to write: news articles, feature articles, creative non-fiction, essays, reviews and opinion pieces. We target issues that are of national importance to university students so there is always a broad range of topics available, and we are always open to ideas from contributors. For more information, or to register your interest email editor@massivemagazine.org. nz or phone 04 801 5799 ext 62068.

FLAT FOR RENT ON WEBB STREET

Warm, sunny, safe and secure, 5 bedroom apartment available for rent. Big rooms all with have double wardrobes. 2 bathrooms make for easy living and a deck is great for entertaining. So close to Massey and Victoria university. $900 per week Call: 021 283 8533

FREE STORE! Just Zilch is a free store that receives surplus goods from various suppliers and makes them available to those who determine themselves to be in need. Just Zilch aims to work alongside other organisations in Palmerston North to ensure that surplus food is being accessed and redistributed appropriately. Just Zilch will fill a gap in the community where surplus goods are not already being used productively. We also have a garden that is run and maintained by volunteers that helps to provide produce for the shop, and when there is surplus, to other community based organisations. Gull Station, 14 Fitzherbert Ave, Palmerston North, New Zealand · Get Directions Website http://justzilch.org/

TEXT BOOKS FOR SALE: 263.301 Learing & Motivation Required text: “Motivation to Learn” Stipek 4th Edition 2002 $75 ono (Ex condition) 187.304 Educational Theory Required text: “Educational Research. A contextual approach” Springer 2010 $90 ono (Ex condition) 209.308 Adolescence Required text: “Adolescence” Santrock 13th edition $85 ono (Good cond - front cover a bit rumpled) Contact Glenda 021980466 gsouthey@xtra.co.nz Business Data Communication & Networking By FitzGerald & Dennis 10th edition. Paper: 158.235 price: $99 Original Price in Bennetts: $145.06

ISBN: 978-0-470-05575-5 Excellent Condition- no highlighting or marks. Email: paarsa.n@gmail.com Mob: 022 5670077 Communication Between Cultures 6th Edition by Samovar, Porter, McDaniel. In good condition. Used for Introduction to Cross Culture Communication first year. Media & Society 4th edition by O’shaughnessy & Stadler. Good condition. Used for Introduction to Media Studies first year. Unsure if current edition used on course. $25 Cambridge Advanced Learner Dictionary – Hardly used but a good thing to have around throughout study, especially during editing and publishing courses. $35. Email: mattshand@hotmail.com if interested. FREE FREE FREE - Using MIS second edition by Kroenke. Book is free but in horrible condition as the frustration of taking this course as part of my communications degree drove me to throw the book into the sea, before realising I had paid about $150 dollars for the stupid thing so went in and grabbed it ruining my new shoes in the process. Book is readable but pages have water damage and index is stuck together. Ideally the person who takes this book to burn it, or destroy it creatively and maybe send in an image of them doing so and maybe the magazine will print it. Will leave the book outside of the MAWSA office at Wellington with instructions. Happy Destruction. Business Studies: Text Books Paper No. 115.107: Management Information Systems Using MIS, David Kroenke, $60 Paper no. 115.103: Legal and Social Environment of Business Moral Issues in Business - Shaw, barry & Sansbury $60 The legal Environment of Business – An Outline. Hubbard & Smith $25 Call Everett: 04 476 3172 Year 2 Nursing Textbooks $90 Maternal Child Nursing Care. 2006 with CD. 3ed Wong, Hockenbberry et al. 4 ed 2010 is $210. $55 Chronic Illness and Disabil-

ity: principles for nursing practice. Change & Johnson. 2009 $55 Community as Partner: theory and practice in nursing. 2008. Francis, Chapman, Hoare & Mills. Was $87 new last year. Year 1 Nursing books $60 Mosby’s medical dictionary 2006 (Bought for $97) $30 Microbiology for the Health Sciences. Burton & Engelkirk. 2004 7ed (bought for $70) These six textbooks were my ‘lucky’ books, guaranteed to get you A+ for any assignment (if used correctly), when not using these books I got a C-. “Wow Judy, I rubbed this book three times and got amazing results…it really works!!!” All books are 99% free of bodily fluids, and pH 7.35 – 7.45 Phone Peter on 021 660 204

FOR SALE:

One complete system screen, Keyboard, mouse and computer. great for Design students Very powerful system and great Graphics. Is just over 1 year old with a brand new 1TB hard drive (With the prices of hard drives at present due to the Thailand floods this is a great steal!!). Specs: AMD Phenom II X6 1055T 2800GHz 9MB Cache CPU Gigabyte GV-R585OC-1GD Overclocked HD 5850 1GB GDDR5 PCIE2.0 ATX 2xDVI HDTV HDCP HDMI Displayport Graphics Card Western Digital 1TB 7200RPM Hard Drive. Gigabyte GA-870A-UD3 AMD 870 SB850 ATX Socket AM3 DDR3-1866 RAID USB3.0 SATA3 1394 Motherboard Motherboard ASUS CD / DVD Litescribe Writer Combo Drive Kingston 4GB DDR3 Ram. 24” Full HD 1080P LCD monitor Windows 7 Professional 64Bit Office 2010 Standard Edition Price: $1500 (ono) valued at $3500 Contact: Joanna 0273795278

WANTS

YOU

See more of new zealand by train tranzscenic.co.nz

Become a better rider Learn some helpful tips to stay safe on the road

Register now for subsidised motorcycle or scooter training provided by Wellington City Council and ACC. Beginner and refresher courses. Information about training dates and times is available on Wellington.govt.nz or phone 499 4444.

WELCOME! FROM YOUR STUDENT PRESIDENT STEPHAN VAN HEERDEN HEllO aND wElcOME to Massey Albany! If this is your first time at this campus or even at university, then the warmest of welcomes, all the best for your journey ahead! If you are a returning student, then welcome back home. This year is going to be a biggie. Then end of the world and what not. So let’s make it one to remember! First on your list for this year, is to sign up with us at the Albany Students Association! We are your one stop shop for anything student related here at Massey. If we can’t help you, then we can definitely point you in the right direction. Considering our membership fee has decreased and you now have the choice to sign up! It’s well worth it, and the more people sign up, the better it is for everyone! Secondly, sign up to a club, or start one of your own! University is about getting involved, not just in learning but in the community as well. With the new vStudent Amenities Centre, there is plenty of space and opportunity to hang out and get to know your fellow classmates. ASA offices are also on the second floor, so stop and say hello. Lastly, pick up a copy of Massive Magazine, the brand spanking new publication written by Massey students for Massey students.

aND YOUR EVENTS MaNaGER SIKANDER GORE (AKA ALEXQ) Big welcome to everyone for a wonderful year and more at Massey University, Albany. It’s always the most fun part of the year for us at The ASA to bring a whole lot of fun events that distracts you from the classes ,assignments & the stress of the first week... Especially with the opening of the all new Student Plaza Building. Orientation Weeks over the years have featured a number of NZ’s top acts like Katchfire, Tiki Taane, Tahuna Breaks, Exponents, P- Money, PNC, Dj Sirvere , Aural Trash , Dane Rumble , Nesian Mystic and plenty more to name a few ... But unfortunately this year and from now on due to The Voluntary Student Membership , The ASA’s funding has been pulled back and this has restricted us from bringing all these major acts to you.... It’s a sad moment but even in darkens the light can be found..... We still have heaps to do with the Mechanical Bull, Gladiators & Human Foosball ( Sign your team up ASAP) during the day with Live bands and Dj’s followed by The Sex Quiz , Poker, BSG Amazing Race and the most exciting troN Party during the night...

That’s my advice for getting off to a great start at Massey Albany. When I came to this campus 4 years ago, I had no idea that I would be sitting where I am sitting now. I couldn’t grasp the enormity of the journey I was about to undertake, the experiences I would have and the people I would meet. I’m pretty sure most of you will be in the same position. My personal advice would be to stick with your guns and follow your heart. As corny as that sounds, it’s mostly true. Don’t give up after the first B- and definitely pursue what inspires you. If a paper seems interesting, pick it up. If that girl is good looking, buy her some flowers. If that guy is a babe, then flick him a smile. 2012 is for seizing every moment and opportunity available to you.

wiN $600 worth of Burger Fuel Vouchers for The Human Foozeball Comp and heaps of prizes for the Amazing Race.. So sign up at the ASA INFO OFFICE, Level 2 , Student Amenities Building.

That’s all from me, all the best for your studies and leisure this year. I hope to see you all at some point throughout the year.

See you there

Prez out

Its Free and so much FUN ! Also since we are talking about FREE: Enjoy the FREE BBQ that the ASA will be providing on the 27th 28th & 29th Feb outside along with all the entertainment.... There is something for everyone and all you need to do is come along and participate .... Its easy ...

2012 ASA EXEC NICK LOVETT

JAMES COLLINS

VICE-PRESIDENT The Vice-President is responsible for ensuring that the Student Executive remain informed, keep to budget, go to meetings, and updates and develops policy that is representative of the needs and wants of the Albany students. He is a signatory, organises all the General Meetings and Elections, presents the Budget to the students for ratification and advises on Constitutional matters as they arise. This information collection and dissemination role is crucial to the effective and efficient working of the Albany Student Executive. EMAIL:

vp@asa.ac.nz

WElfARE REPRESENTATIVE The Welfare Representatives are responsible for overseeing all matters involving student welfare including the investigating, monitoring and reporting of welfare issues and services on the Auckland Campus; overseeing the coordination and writing of welfare policy of the Albany Student Executive; promoting, publicising and coordinating issues of welfare with other members of the Albany Student Executive and other students; coordinating the organisation of activities relevant to his or her portfolio, such as theme weeks; and liaising with the ASA Advocacy Coordinator over the operation of the Student Assistance Programme (SAP) on the Albany campus. EMAIL:

TUAFONO TEIO

WILLIAM AHN

INTERNATIONAl STUDENTS’ REPRESENTATIVE

EDUCATION REPRESENTATIVE

The International Students’ Representative is responsible for maintaining cultural ties with the various cultural communities represented by students enrolled at the campus (Maori, Pakeha, Polynesian, Asian, Occidental, etc), and in the greater environment. He is there to help provide support, facilitate forums for discussion of cultural, spiritual, educational and recreational issues and work with cultural student groups to promote integration, retention and to help meet their specific needs and wants. EMAIL:

culturalrep@asa.ac.nz

The Education Representative is responsible for overseeing all matters involving student education including the investigating, monitoring and reporting of education issues and services on the Albany campus. He oversees and coordinates the writing of the Education policy of the Albany Student Executive; liaises with the ASA Advocacy Coordinator over the training, support and education of Class Representatives, on issues of education policy internal to the University; ensures that methods of assessment, student workloads, the performance of University teaching staff and quality of courses are monitored; and write submissions on educational issues. EMAIL:

JONATHAN McDONALD RECREATION AND ClUBS’ REPRESENTATIVE The Recreation and Clubs’ Representative is responsible for monitoring the efficient and effective utilisation and adequate provision of recreational facilities on the Albany campus. The position is an ex-officio member of all affiliated clubs and societies, is a member of the Albany Sport and Recreation Management Board; liaises with University Sport New Zealand Inc. and any other relevant local or national student bodies involved in recreation and leisure in tertiary education (e.g. SPARC); and assists the ASA Clubs’ Development Officer and ASA Events Manager with helping to support and develop clubs on campus. EMAIL:

womenswelfare@asa.ac.nz, menswelfare@asa.ac.nz

recnclubsrep@asa.ac.nz

education@asa.ac.nz

ARTIST INFO KARMA | MON (DAY)

SAM ALLEN | TUE (DAY)

VANN DIZON | WED (DAY)

Pop-rock, glam, hard-rock, anthem-rock or just mix it all up and call it VANN DIZON. VANN DIZON focuses on song writing and melodies, but ultimately we are there for the fans. Our live, energetic shows get the crowd on their feet and moving to the songs we love as much as you will..

Karma is one of Auckland’s hottest covers bands, currently playing in the live music scene throughout NZ. Karma is a 3 piece band consisting of drums, bass & guitar. The band has been performing live for the last 10 years throughout NZ and internationally. Lead singer “vox” has been singing for last 10 years at Danny Doolans bar in Auckland’s Viaduct. Their music ranges from classic rock/pop to all the pub anthems. The live show is full of great stage shows, classic rock out tunes and party hits. Come down check it out!!

“Music is, pretty much my life”, writes Sam Allen. This sums this 19 year old up in a way that leaves no doubt in anyone’s mind where he wishes to head, and his deep passion for performing and writing music. Sam has already performed in Smokefree-Rockquest and Pacifica Beats, lead the cast in the musical: The Buddy Holly Show and at the beginning of 2010 started the Bachelor of Music degree at Auckland University. Even though Sam is merely starting out in his musical journey, you would struggle to label him an amateur. Growing up in South Auckland NZ, Sam’s musical journey started in the similar way of many talented young performers, at 13 years of age, playing quietly in his bedroom. Thanks to the inspiration that was derived primarily from John Mayer’s eloquent masterpieces, Sam’s style and skills evolved and grew his passion which has lead him to pursue a life in music. Sam’s other major influences: Michael Jackson, Simply Red and Tommy Emmanuel, become apparent through his rich honey filled vocals and superbly styled guitar riffs. Sam writes through his observations of others as most great songwriters do. Writing from the heart his unique acoustic pop/rock flavor remains true to the “kiwi” singer songwriter tradition. Sam’s live performances also echoes a deep promise of potential. Any true fan of the acoustic genre should sample Sam’s melodies, and witness his performances, as Sam Allen will no doubt follow in the singer songwriter footsteps of our very best. soundcloud.com/samallen www.facebook.com/samallenmusic

The biggest influences that have inspired VANN DIZON’s sound are Def Lepperd, Bon Jovi, U2, Motley Crue, Shotgun Alley, Guns’n’Roses, AC/ DC, and many more . So...sing, dance, drink or just be there to enjoy the melodies inspired by our greatest influences. The music that we grew up loving and what VANN DIZON will bring back with our unique sound that blends the second coming of Tommi Lee (Lyle), Bon Jovi inspired anthems (Vann), AC/ DC’s punchy guitar stylings (Callum) and the Def Lepperd like solos of Dan. Bounce, move and groove with us as we blast out our brand our all new original songs, being recorded right now and available for free download: Website: www.vanndizon.com – songs available for free download LEAD VOcALS - Vann Dizon (Love God in 5 different galaxies) LEAD GuItAR - Dan Upritchard

(Physical manifestation of the Guitar Gods) RhythM GuItAR - Callum Meier

(The Maori on the edge) DRuMS/PERcuSSION - Lyle Cardy (Second coming of Tommi Lee) MARKEtING/PROMOtION – Filip Misevski

(The Puppet Master)

EVENT INFO HUMAN FOOZEBALL* WeD (DAY)

SEX QUIZ & POKER WeD (niGHT)

BSG AMAZING RACE* THU (5pm cHeck in)

Another wicked team event. Get 5 buddies who are reasonably good at knocking around a football in the right direction while strapped to huge steel polls and confined in 6m - 3m inflated ring. Sounds fun doesn’t it? Wait it gets even better, how about adding $600 worth of Burger fuel vouchers for the winners? Sweet!

SEX QUIZ, hmmm wonder what this is going to be like... Thanks to the good people from Family planning we will be introduced to a quiz that will the first of its kind on this campus.

“What’s the next clue?”... “i know where this is! Top floor, quad block”

cheerleaders and support crew who are keen to scream are more than welcome!

When asked a few of the questions we were surprised with what the answers were! So if you think you’re sharp and know all about you-know-what, come put your knowledge to the test and let’s find out.... There may be so much more that you could learn from this quiz about doing the dirty and, let’s face it, it’ll be so much more interesting than a normal pub quiz. even better when you can win booze!

Pre Sign up Teams of 5 Kicks off at 12:15pm Wednesday

Teams of 2-4 and check-in at 8pm at The Ferg

So if you actually have some skills or are just looking for something fun to do during the common lunch break on Wed make sure you SiGn Up nice and early.

Winning team get a $100 Bar Tab POKER will take on the other half of the room on the night with some serious poker faces on display. $50 / $35 / $15 Bar tabs for the top 3.

Last year during O-week the Albany business students group ran the amazing race. Teams of 4 students competed to solve clues and complete challenges in a race around campus. Students from every part of the university came together to have fun, meet new people and win prizes. This year the amazing race is bigger and better than ever, with loads of new challenges, even more prizes and new people to meet. if you want to meet new people, win prizes and have an awesome night, your first clue is: Pre Sign up @ Come to the Ferg at 5pm Thursday, 1st of March ready for a great time. See you there!

* SiGn Up @ The ASA info Office, Level 2, Student Amenities Building.

ARTIST INFO DJ lenium | wED (DAY)

AlexQ | fri (night)

momentus | fri (night)

AlexQ is the present Events Manager of the Albany Students Association responsible for majority of the fun events on campus. As a Dj he is the resident Dj at @Spy Bar, Auckland’s most exclusive night club & Dj / Presenter of Power house radio on Upfm(107.5 fm / www.upfm.dj ) Every Monday (2pm - 4pm) After years of fine-tuning his skills, Lenium can hardly be called a DJ any more. rather, his antics and ability to keep a herd of people partying through to the early hours of the morning closely resemble the feeling of a live performance. his formula on the decks works to such a great extent that he always leaves the crowd wanting more. forever evolving with his music he jet sets around the globe to bring that ‘Lenium’ fever to whoever hears him play. Over the last decade few can claim to work as hard for the culture he loves as he has. with a dedicated passion to bring the best in music to you he has created a cult following all over new Zealand and Australia. Over the years he has toured many countries and in the last 2 years he has done 4 Australian and 3 indonesia country wide tours. Ever hungry to do more Lenium runs his own online radio show called UrBAn hEAt MiX ShOw that is broadcasted online around the world on www. rapstation.com, www.onlineclubber.com and more. Lenium is the current resident DJ at some of Auckland hottest nightspots and runs successful weekly events there with the Lenium Beats Entertainment events company. to top it all off DJ Lenium is the current holder of the coveted new Zealand nitELifE award, Best hip hop and rnB DJ since 2010 as voted by the masses of new Zealand. A achievement that just goes to cement the claim that Lenium is not only one of the best DJ’s in the country, but is also one of the most supported and followed entertainers in the country.

Depending on the Bar/Event , you’ll find him at times playing funky big room house to some heavy dutch house with heavy basslines and drums. the noticable fact is that all of his tunes will have great rhythm. he has been djing in nZ since 2005 and is an established as a truely exciting and enthusiastic electronic DJ. he is not only a dj but an entertainer behind the decks. AlexQ is best known for high energy and big room tunes that is a sure shot combo to get the dance floor busy. “You gotta enjoy the music you play, it reflects in your performance and the crowd draws energy off you”. “Djing is about communicating with people through music, it gives you the best natural high you can imagine.”. Djing is as simple as playing good music that he enjoys, and others will follow. Alex gets a kick out of playing on the same bill as DJ’s he looks up to. he used to watch the likes of grant marshall, Lucas Oliver and Daniel farley and now he plays before or after them and has even featured on their radio shows. Alex also features at a majority of the dance events around Auckland such as Paul Van Dyk, Our house, Deep hard & funky , Slinky, gods Kitchen, SummerDayze, Oxygen, torque, Essential, Chemistry, Big Club night Out ,Vaccine , One Love and Contrast, Splurge and the neon Break festival (Auckland’s biggest U18 Dance parties). “if you’re out and about , make sure you come say hELLO ! i may even shout you a fanta or two” www.soundcloud.com/djalexq

in a city known for breeding a majority of the national talent, Jordan ‘Momentus’ Lee is one of the most prospective new entries to the new Zealand club scene. in a genre that is saturated in stereotypes and controversies, Momentus seeks to breathe a fresh new life into the local urban scene. 2010 has been a phenomenal year to date for Momentus, making an official entry into respective club nights in Auckland as well as holding residency at COntrASt - nZ’s #1 All Ages event. Spearheaded by the team at figure8 Promotions, Momentus has made a colossal shift in styles, scratching and mixing between tracks in an aggressive manner to suit the flow of the dancefloor. in addition, Momentus’s positive approach and appreciation for all things music, attributes to a playlist that constantly seeks to push boundaries while still holding true to the roots of hip hop & rnb. Momentus is a true crowd pleaser and nothing defines it better than his own statement “if the track suits my style and it gets the people singing, dancing, smiling then i’m down to drop it”, which has led to a gradual increase in his support network. Be on the lookout for this young DJ making headway in the right direction.

CLUBS & CULTURAL DAY A celebrAtion of club culture At AlbAny – food, music, performAnces

When

this days exist to promote all affiliated AsA clubs on campus. this is also a perfect opportunity for those who are interested to get involved with the club culture on campus by signing up or forming a club. this is a great day for clubs to promote their activities, fund-raise, put on demonstrations, and recruit.

Where

starting a club is easy and a great way to get likeminded people together and participate in anything you choose, like sports, drama, dance, cultural and religious or academic activities on campus.

12 – 2 p.m. Wed 7 march student central plaza in front of the student Amenities centre

Prizes for Best Stall, Best Cultural Performance and Best Cultural Food

STUDENT LIFE COORDINATOR this is a newly established position which will lead and facilitate opportunities that enhance and create a vibrant student life through the coordination of activities and events on campus. •

co-ordinating and managing an academic orientation programme for all new students for the start of semesters 1,2 and 3

•

manage and support the student leadership uni-guides programme, where new undergraduate students are matched with a uni-guides during orientation;

•

develop student focused activities and events with strong participation rates on campus by working closely with events management, AsA, clubs, accommodation, and academic departments.

•

if you have any great ideas or are keen to get involved to create a vibrant student life on campus... contact me on:

Contact: Location: Phone: Email:

Vicki hudson building QA1.14 (09) 414-0800 ext. 9201 v.l.hudson@massey.ac.nz

BECOME A MEMBER TODAY. Ensure you have support for your time at University by becoming part of the only organisation that is run by students for students. Join us now!

GET READY GET THRU ENROL ONLINE AT: www.asa.ac.nz

DJ YOUR OWN PARTY WITH NIGHTLIFE MUSIC SYSTEM 3 AM LICENSE, STUDENT FRIENDLY PRICES 3 BIG SREENS, PROJECTOR, STAGE, DJ BOOTH, CATERING/SELF CATERING

POOL TABLES, VIDEO GAMES, TABLE TENNIS, $10 PIZZA BOOKING FEE APPLIES

EMAIL: andrew@t heferguson.co.nz | MOB: 027 4108 909/09 414 0847

www.theferguson.co.nz

FEBRUARY 2012 - ISSUE 01

PALMERSTON NORTH

EDITORIAL The following pages are where the local news relevant to each campus will appear. This edition focuses almost exclusively on the happenings of Orientation and acts as your guide to what is taking place on and around your campus for those first, fun-filled weeks. In future editions these pages will be packed with local news content relevant to you on your campus. We are always looking for news and interesting stories so if you have something you think the world (well, your fellow university students) should know send us an email at editor@massivemagazine.org.nz or pop into your student association and talk to the campus reporter.

Paul Berrington

HOME BREW AND @PEACE: CONTENTS HOMEBREW AND @PEACE:

WHEN NEW ZEALAND HIP-HOP CAME OF AGE

BABYSITTERS CIRCUS ORIENTATION CALENDAR IMAGINE...YOUR A HYPONIST SUMMER SHAKESPEARE SEASON

EDITOR Matt Shand editor@massivemagazine.org.nz 04 801 5799 ext 62068

WHEN NEW ZEALAND HIP-HOP CAME OF AGE

Two Auckland-based crews causing a stir have broken this mold with rhymes that reflect our unique society and place in the world – and that doesn’t mean the music isn’t world class, yet both Home Brew and @Peace have found success doing things their way. Auckland has given us the likes of David Dallas and Savage, yet rarely has it provided such a revolution in rap music as being seen now, with both Home Brew and

@Peace capturing our attention with their mixture of street poetry and smooth cutting-edge beats. It’s the sort of music that rewards repeated listening, with lyrics that poke fun at John Key, name-drop Pak N’ Save and Trade Me, mention iconic New Zealand sportsmen, and tell of lazy summer days playing Xbox and drinking brews. This is far removed from the party raps and posturing that has overtaken many of Auckland’s Continued next page...

DESIGN, LAYOUT & ART DIRECTION Cameron Cornelius allstylenotalent@gmail.com 04 801 5799 ext 62064

ADVERTISING & SPONSORSHIP MANAGER advertising@mawsa.org.nz 04 801 5799 ext 62069

CONTRIBUTORS

Yvette Morrisey, Jacob Lilley, Murray Kirk, Matt Shand.

Continued from cover... elder emcee’s, and in many ways this refreshingly honest approach allows for a more soulful musical experience. “Just don’t call them ‘conscious’ rappers” it says on Home Brew’s site, yet in a way this is exactly what both groups are – hip-hop musicians who are conscious of the world around them. One interesting thing about these two crews is the fact that they feature the same emcee, Tom Scott, showing the connections are bound closely, with the musical backing the point of difference in the way these two groups sound and perform. Home Brew is Lui Slick, and Tom, who handle the raps, with Haz Beats on production duties, and DJ Substance added when performing live. Their fun and often satirical take on hip-hop is no less pure or cultured because of that, and the well-rehearsed flows and crafted beats are the result of hours of hard work. This fact also makes them an impressive live outfit, and this reputation has seen them steadily become more in demand throughout New Zealand. Since their inception, just over three years ago, Home Brew has found interesting ways to fund their continued development. A series of self-produced videos promoting a fundraising gig, eventually uploaded to YouTube, helped raise the $15,000 needed to produce the video to their Underneath the Shade song, some-

thing that they had failed to get funded under the old criteria of NZ On Air. This do it yourself attitude may seem like a typically New Zealand trait, but whereas in many local circumstances this can be identified as lacking a little professionalism, in the case of Home Brew it has sharpened their focus while showing a sense of humour rarely seen in most hip-hop culture since the days of A Tribe Called Quest

“Rarely has there been a time in New Zealand where the word on the street about ‘what is good in hip-hop’ has been dominated by local musicians.”

and De La Soul. Underneath the Shade, made by Chris Graham, director of Sione’s Wedding and countless classic New Zealand music videos, shows the group playing cards and drinking beer while climate change takes hold around them. In a way, this seems to perfectly embody their ethos – the intelligence to provide an honest view of their environment, while retaining a sense of fun and simply having a good time. They have kept up this creativity in recent times, following a

successful debut album release, Last Week, while also creating controversies through satirical videos such as an interview with TV3s David Farrier (played by Tom), and how to beat a Police breathalyser when stopped at a checkpoint. In a recent interview with NZ Musician, Tom said: “I can’t reach people if they can’t relate to me. So I figure if I’m myself, I’ll reach other people like me”. Judging by the loyal following Home Brew have created, there is obviously many who do relate to Tom and the group. This connection with their audience is translated into their sense of control and ownership – something that is such a big issue for debate right now in the age of Kim Dotcom and Megaupload’s demise – making all of their music available to download for free. This attitude towards copyright control and the higher powers who manipulate those laws for their own profit is also shared by @Peace, who have also made music available through their Bandcamp page in a ‘pay what you like’ deal. It seems both groups have not lost focus on being grounded, or forgotten the tough times that come before success. Ponsonby’s Base FM served as a meeting ground for @Peace, whose members decided to jam after finding like minds and gelling as a crew over a period of months. Made up of Tom from Home Brew, rapper Lui Tuiasu

of Nothing 2 Nobody, producer Christopher El Truento, and the eccentrically named Hayden ‘Dick Dastardly’ Dick, @Peace had created a huge amount of underground hype simply by forming, with El Truento’s beats already gaining notoriety for quality and needing the equivalent rap accompaniment. The following nine-track self-titled album lived up to those expectations, with thought-provoking lyrics matched to the sort of offkilter beats Electric Wire Hustle have made their own. Since then they have become the hottest property in underground New Zealand music circles, selling out shows, playing festivals, and touring over summer. The reputation of their live performance has also grown at a steady rate, often incorporating live musicians such as Isaac Aesili and Julien Dyne into an improvised and expansive companion to their recorded output. It isn’t just New Zealanders taking notice either, with several of the world’s leading tastemakers such as Benji B and Gilles Peterson playing @Peace on their influential radio shows. It seems that big things are about to happen for this distinctive and hardworking group. While there are factors that connect Home Brew and @ Peace, these are two very different groups, bound as much by their sense of politics and society, as their sharing of members, gigs, and audience. Rarely has there been a time in New Zealand where the word on the street about ‘what is good in hip-hop?’ has been dominated by local musicians. Both groups will certainly be highlights of the upcoming Orientation gigs, and it might just pay to catch Home Brew and @ Peace before they take their exciting sound to the world stage.

Homebrew are playing at the Events Centre as part of Orientation on Thursday, March 1. Tickets can be purchased online at musa.org.nz.

Jacob Lilley

THE BABYSITTERS CIRCUS Like many, you may have had the song Everything’s Gonna Be Alright Now by The Babysitters Circus (TBC) stuck in your head. Its hook has not only been featured in a large amount of airplay but also in all sorts of promotions, including for the Rugby World Cup. The song could perhaps be interpreted as an optimistic reference to the post-apocalyptic world that those who share shelter in TBC member Jason Kerrison’s infamous Ark, can look forward to. For further inquiries into such conspiracy you may have to pursue them at various OWeeks across the country. If you haven’t heard the song yet, jump on YouTube and look it up – you should find their music video featuring a dancing flash mob. There is however, more to this group than the pop single. Massive magazine interviewed the vocalist Jamie Greensdale in an effort to uncover more ahead of their performances at O-Week events throughout the country. The single can be seen as a pop song combining many elements

of different genres with an unbelievable head-sticking catchiness. Jamie explained that this mash of genres reflects each of the member’s musical backgrounds. “I bring hip-hop, Selwyn brings a lot of soul – he’s a soul singer and [brings] bluesy funk and soul kind of elements. Tim [Kiddle], he has a pretty heavy rock background with The Feelers and Opshop. Then Jase [Kerrison, of Opshop] brings his rock and singer-song writer background, but he is DJ-ing and singing in this band, so he’s bringing quite a strong electronic focus to what we do, because he has been doing a lot of electronic and, you know, electro funk kind of stuff.” No member is predominant in the music-writing process. “It is a shared co-creation.” Such cocreation makes the group intriguing, especially upon the discovery of other tracks online that seem to deserve a hip-hop categorisation while still cohesively sounding like a song from the same group. The group has gained attention quickly, most likely from their status as a super group with

members of Opshop, the Feelers, and Maitraya. The name is derived from the way they formed, jamming together while collectively babysitting. The four had been collaborating long before this though. “We all knew each other from a bar called Embargo in Auckland, where Opshop formed. Jason used to play there, it was a backpackers’ bar and he played there doing covers. He and Tim Skeddon went to school together in Christchurch, he invited Tim to play there. “Selwyn, who is the other vocalist, he used to come in, started singing once in a while with the boys. I just knew Jase from the scene. I used to go to the same bar and I just got up and started rapping with them a few times and ended up doing that once a week as well.” TBC may seem to have potential to be all over the place as you try to piece together these musical backgrounds in collaboration, but Jamie clarifies that “the only general theme to it is everything’s danceable – that’s our only rule. Whenever we present a track to

the boys, that’s our only criteria. Genre-wise, it goes everywhere.” Despite the mix of genres, it seems the tracks mostly amount to pop songs that the masses would be pleased with, something you can enjoy but your mum will, too. The group can be seen to be as serious for its members as their other projects. “For me, there’s no main thing,” says Jamie. “We are pretty dedicated and this seems to be taking up a lot of our time in terms of creativity and performance.” With this commitment of time we can expect more tunes to be made available for purchase soon. TBC is currently mixing and mastering a second single for release in early March and could have their album out in May. Between now and then they are playing a lot of shows. Performances are centred on involvement with the crowd. “As much as anything, we want to create a party vibe.” In their recent performance in the Square in Palmerston North, their onstage wardrobes were the centre of media attention. The purpose of ridiculous costumes was explained. “We perform in pyjamas partly because it’s easy wardrobewise. Also, nobody can take you seriously in pyjamas and we don’t want anyone to think that we are taking ourselves seriously.” With their appearance at Musa’s O-Week being at the toga party, it seemed the not-too-serious approach might be appropriate. “Toga’s sound pretty unserious to me – I’ll try and wear a toga.” On top of a toga and party vibe you can also expect a bit of te reo, Jamie having included it heavily in his solo work and now bringing it into this project. When asked what he was looking forward to at O-Week, playing alongside Homebrew for the first time came up. The Babysitters Circus are heading, hopefully in toga, to Massey Palmerston North on Thursday, March 1. Tickets can be purchased online at musa. org.nz

THURSDAY 23RD FEB

LET'S GET GOING WITH MASSEY UNIVERSITY

Getting settled at uni can be quite daunting. Let’s Get Going will provide first year students with useful information and skills to make the transition into uni life easier. The programme commences at 11am on

COMEDY GALA

Limited to 600, “Let’s get Going” Students ONLY Take it easy and unwind after getting to discover your campus. Kiwi Comedy Maestros Ben Hurley, Jeremy Elwood and Nick Rado are in town to ease you into the Orientation week. FRIDAY 24TH FEB

MARKET DAY

On Concourse with MUSA, for all Students The market day is the place to be between 10am – 2pm. The concourse will be flooded with freebies and giveaways tucked in between a few businesses with great offers for you to get you set for the academic year.

RETRO PARTY with 6 Chairs Missing & DJ Josh

The Events Centre Shamrock Limited to 700 Take a step back into a time long forgotten, except for the music. DJ Josh will bring you into the era before local covers bands, Shamrock and 6 Chairs Missing will take you through the ages with some hits from the past. SUNDAY 26TH FEB

AN INTRO TO SQUASH

FREE to ALL Students, Equipment Provided Come and enjoy the racket, 9am till late, Linton St Courts Get physical and take out your frustrations against a tiny black rubber ball. Squash is a great way to keep fit during the academic year and the Linton Street Courts are offering a free introduction to all Massey students.

TUESDAY 28TH FEB

HYPNOTIST—GRANT BODDINGTON

The Massey Events Centre, Limited to 500 Why not try something new and step outside your comfort zone. Hypnotist Grant Boddington brings his famed show to town. Prove that you are the life of the party, even while unconscious, or just watch your friends on stage. Go on, give it a go. Be hypnotised. WEDNESDAY 29TH FEB

CLUBS DAY

Concourse with MUSA, For all Students, Free Night Joining a club is the best way to be social throughout the university year. Meet up with like-minded people, or compete in sporting events like Uni Games. There’s something for everyone so head down and sign up. THURSDAY 01 MAR

TOGA PARTY with The Babysitters Circus, Homebrew & DJ Alex (Musa President)

the Events Centre, Limited to 700 Grab your good, clean linen and get ready to rock out Roman style with 700 other party goers at the Massey Events Centre. You won’t be alone, Dj Alex will be there spinning the beats before being pushed aside by New Zealand music heavyweights Homebrew and The Babysitters Circus. This is a mustattend event. SUNDAY 04 MAR

CONCERT IN THE PARK

At the Esplanade The second concert in the Palmerston North Summer Concert Series is showcasing 3 great artists/ bands - headliner act - Anika Moa, The Thomas Oliver Band and local band Dirt Box Charlie. Come along, bring a picnic, relax and enjoy this great line up of bands at the Fitzherbert Park cricket ground. Food and refreshments also available.

Yvette Morrisey

IMAGINE YOU ARE A … HYPNOTIST

magine what it would feel like to be standing in front of a crowd of thousands, all of them screaming and cheering your name. Some even scrambling to reach you on stage, only to be held back by your personal security guards. You don’t blame them. You are, of course, one of the world’s most renowned pop singers, finishing off one of the No 1 singles that gave you your fame. Suddenly, reality hits. You blink, and you are welcomed by a crowd of less than 1000, their laughter ringing in your ears. What just happened, you ask yourself. A moment ago you were singing to adoring teenagers. That’s when it all comes flooding back. You’re not a famous pop singer – you were hypnotised by

Grant Boddington. With more than 20 years’ experience, Grant Boddington has hypnotised many people, including well-known New Zealanders. His journey as a hypnotist began “by mistake” while he was working as an entertainment agent and booked hypnotist James Marx for one of his clients. He later became Marx’s New Zealand manager and, after watching eagerly from the sideline, later began presenting his own stage shows. He says he started hypnotism because “it looked like fun”. After receiving various requests, from help with weight loss to giving up smoking, he decided he’d better learn the therapy side of things. He trained as a hypnotherapist at the International Hypnotherapy

Training Centre in England before opening his own clinic in Wanganui. He is now one of the very few in the world who is both a stage performer and a registered hypnotherapist. “The best part about [stage shows] is that they are fun,” he says. “But on the therapy side, it’s really nice to help people.” Letting someone else be in control of your body may sound intimidating to some, but he insists he cannot make you do anything you don’t want to. He says you are still in control, and likens the state to the feeling when you are coming out of a dream – the medium between being asleep and awake. “You are aware of what is going on. Hypnotism isn’t about mind

control – if it were I’d be rich by now.” He says many people hypnotise themselves through the power of suggestion. By replacing negative thought patterns with positive ones, the hypnotist is able to help the patient make changes. “You can’t change the hardware in the brain, but you can install new software.” Once awake from being hypnotised, subjects usually feel energetic or relaxed. In fact, being in this trance is beneficial for our mind and body. When asked why hypnosis works, he says: “It works because people want it to.” He believes openness to the idea of hypnotism is key. “If you are willing to be hypnotised, that’s the first step towards change.” A veteran of Massey O-Week, having already put on several shows, Grant is looking forward to returning. “Students are the best audience. They’re more open-minded and have a big imagination.” Students have the option to decide if they’d like to be hypnotised, and those wishing not to participate can sit back and enjoy the show. It is all good clean fun, and maintaining modesty and dignity with those participating is important to Grant. When asked what to expect from his upcoming show, Grant responds simply: “Fun! Every show is 100 per cent different. I can do the same routine over and over but the results are never the same.” The one thing guaranteed is that you will be entertained. From the reactions of men who have just given birth singing a lullaby to their newborn baby, to those who believe they have x-ray vision and the ability to see through people’s clothes, this is an event not to be missed at Massey O-Week. Grant Boddington returns to Massey Palmerston North on Tuesday 28 February at the Events Centre. Tickets cost $20 and can be purchased online at musa.org.nz

Murray Kirk

SUMMER SHAKESPARE SEASON

ummer Shakespeare is a fixture in Palmy's summer calendar, one that's closely associated with Massey. The director is part of the university's visiting artist scheme which contracts three artists a year: a writer in semester one, a film or multimedia artist in semester two, and a theatre professional over the summer. 2012 is the Summer Shakespeare's tenth anniversary, and to celebrate this, Amanda McRaven, who first came to Massey on a Fullbright Scholarship in 2008-9, has returned to from the States to direct it. It's an outdoor show and always takes place in the Victoria Esplanade. The stage can be anywhere in the park: plays have been performed in the Children's Playground, in a grove of Nikau Palms, at the miniature railway

station and even with audiences following the action around the park . This year, the play is Much Ado About Nothing, a Comedy, and will be set on, around - and quite often in - the pond in the Rose Gardens. Because the aim is to reach the widest possible public, there's no ticket price, just a gold coin donation, and audiences often bring picnics and make an event of the evening (or afternoon if they come to a matinee). It's also a good idea to bring a decent coat for evening performances, as it gets cold after dark, and you'll need sunscreen for matinees. If it rains, there's always a fallback position: the wet weather venue in 2012 is the Auditorium, at the Sir Geoffrey Peren building on the Turitea Campus, but most years

the wet weather location has not been used. As well as bringing affordable high quality theatre to audiences, Summer Shakespeare offers a fun summer project for anyone who wants to get involved. The production gives students (and non students, it's a full-scale community undertaking) the chance to learn all kinds of stagecraft from professionals whether it's acting, dance, music or the more technical side of theatre like lighting, costuming, set design or production management. Auditions generally take place in late November, rehearsals begin after Christmas, and performances are in early March, usually in the first and second weeks after O week, before assignments get too heavy. There are a couple of good ways

to get into SuSha, as it's affectionately known. If you're interested in drama in a general way, joining Massey University Drama Society - MUDS -will give you the chance to do plenty of that, and you'll find them at Clubs Day. If it's only Shakespeare that interests you, it's worth friending Summer Shakespeare on Facebook (yes, SuSha's a person. Don't ask. It made sense at the time) that way you'll get all audition announcements and show details. Much Ado About Nothing is will be on at 7.30pm on 8, 9, 10, 15, 16 and 17 March, and there will be two matinees, on 11 and 17 March at 2pm in the Rose Gardens at Victoria Esplanade. full details, including wet weather announcements are on the website at http://www.summershakespeare.org.nz

FEBRUARY 2012 - ISSUE 01

WELLINGTON

Paul Berrington

DRUM & BASS THE TREI WAY CONTENTS

DRUM & BASS THE TREI WAY HOMEBREW AND @PEACE: A MIND-BENDER INSTORE COCA BUILDING CLOSER TO INSPECTION

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Matt Shand editor@massivemagazine.org.nz 04 801 5799 ext 62068

ew Zealand drum & bass has gone from strength to strength over the years, at first producing world class DJ’s and parties that international acts would go home raving about. In more recent times, local producers have made an international impact that belies our small population and geographic obscurity. One of those producers is Wellington-based Trei, whose discography of more than 20 vinyl releases and the acclaimed album Innuendo have seen the

hard-working musician gain the worldwide success his output deserves. Paul Berrington spoke to him about how he got started, how he managed to make a career out of what he loves, and what happens when you miss your flight in China. A guitar player first and foremost, Trei says he was turned on to “the likes of Jeff Mills and Adam Beyer by friends – Dan Morgan (a Wellington DJ) pushed lots of stuff my way”. The Wellington music scene at the time was a hot-bed of un-

derground electronic music, with techno, house, and a new form drum & bass all finding willing and enthusiastic audiences. Like others exposed to this scene, the logical progression was to give “making tunes a go, and having a go at production at a mate’s house, essentially just hanging out and having a jam”, he says. While many got on with their day jobs, Trei started successfully applying his “self-taught” musicianship to making drum & bass,

DESIGN, LAYOUT & ART DIRECTION Cameron Cornelius allstylenotalent@gmail.com 04 801 5799 ext 62064

ADVERTISING & SPONSORSHIP MANAGER advertising@mawsa.org.nz 04 801 5799 ext 62069

CONTRIBUTORS

Continued next page...

Matt Shand, Paul Berrington

Continued from cover... using the local scene to showcase new tunes at club night Bass Frontiers, or on Radio Active’s Future Funk show. This led to his first release, on local imprint Random, and others followed on Samurai and Commercial Suicide. “There is a real focus on the

musical element”, he says in response to my queries about the success of New Zealand drum & bass throughout the world. “A lot of the producers come from an instrument-based background, from bands, and maybe that lends a certain sound”. One thing that is certainly true of the New Zealand scene he sums up perfectly. ”We definitely punch above our weight”, and that has seen the likes of Concord Dawn, State of Mind, and many others find their music in the hands of DJs the world over. Despite this global awareness, there is sense of community about New Zealand drum & bass, and that has seen an enormous amount of collaboration and passing on of ideas, something from which Trei gained “a proper understanding of tools like compression”, adding that, “guys like State of Mind are just such insane engineers”. This sense of shar-

ing the knowledge has obviously helped up-and-coming producers to fine-tune their sound in an environment that is professional and challenging. Trei remembers a time when “you listened to albums from start to finish”, and without endorsing cliché, speaks of “the journey, a listening experience”. This is something he tried to achieve on debut long-player Innuendo, and is the inspiration behind his follow-up. “The tune with Tali is sounding awesome”, says Trei of the album, “and there is a massive response from the dance floor” to a track with Thomas Oliver. There is calmness in his voice that suggests he is happy with his new work, and you sense this promises much for the upcoming release. You can expect to hear “lots of the new album” at his Orientation performance. Trei says a tour to Europe lasts about “one month”, yet feels more

like, “two weeks, a whirlwind”. On one occasion, fatigue from this tight schedule led to him getting stuck in Beijing overnight, after sleeping through the crossover. This in turn led to “days of snow” which prevented any flights leaving, and missing his next assignment in Italy, which he says regrettably is “the only gig I’ve ever missed”. No wonder he enjoys coming home for some hard-earned “down time”. Yet you sense something when talking to Trei, and that is he wouldn’t have it any other way.

TREI is playing at Sandwiches as part of mawsa Orientation 2012 Saturday, February 25 from 10:30pm – 6am. Massey students can purchase specially discounted tickets for $10.

Paul Berrington

HOME BREW AND @PEACE:

WHEN NEW ZEALAND HIP-HOP CAME OF AGE

ew Zealand hip-hop has so often followed the fashion and culture of its US counterpart that it is sometimes hard to tell the difference between a rapper from South Auckland and one from Los Angeles. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing to some, but it has seen much of our own identity lost in favor of a more commercially viable product which matches the formula of mainstream hip-hop music while losing some local relevance. Two Auckland-based crews causing a stir have broken this mold with rhymes that reflect our unique society and place in the world – and that doesn’t mean the music isn’t world class, yet both Home Brew and @Peace have found success doing things their way. Auckland has given us the likes of David Dallas and Savage, yet rarely has it provided such a revolution in rap music as being seen now, with both Home Brew

and @Peace capturing our attention with their mixture of street poetry and smooth cutting-edge beats. It’s the sort of music that rewards repeated listening, with lyrics that poke fun at John Key, name-drop Pak N’ Save and Trade Me, mention iconic New

“Rarely has there been a time in New Zealand where the word on the street about ‘what is good in hip-hop’ has been dominated by local musicians.”

Zealand sportsmen, and tell of lazy summer days playing Xbox and drinking brews. This is far removed from the party raps and posturing that has

overtaken many of Auckland’s elder emcee’s, and in many ways this refreshingly honest approach allows for a more soulful musical experience. “Just don’t call them ‘conscious’ rappers” it says on Home Brew’s site, yet in a way this is exactly what both groups are – hip-hop musicians who are conscious of the world around them. One interesting thing about these two crews is the fact that they feature the same emcee, Tom Scott, showing the connections are bound closely, with the musical backing the point of difference in the way these two groups sound and perform. Home Brew is Lui Slick, and Tom, who handle the raps, with Haz Beats on production duties, and DJ Substance added when performing live. Their fun and often satirical take on hip-hop is no less pure or cultured because of that, and the well-rehearsed flows and crafted beats are the result of hours of

hard work. This fact also makes them an impressive live outfit, and this reputation has seen them steadily become more in demand throughout New Zealand. Since their inception, just over three years ago, Home Brew has found interesting ways to fund their continued development. A series of self-produced videos promoting a fundraising gig, eventually uploaded to YouTube, helped raise the $15,000 needed to produce the video to their Underneath the Shade song, something that they had failed to get funded under the old criteria of NZ On Air. This do it yourself attitude may seem like a typically New Zealand trait, but whereas in many local circumstances this can be identified as lacking a little professionalism, in the case of Home Brew it has sharpened their focus while showing a sense of humour rarely seen in most hip-hop culture since the days of A Tribe Called Quest and De La Soul. Underneath the Shade, made by Chris Graham, director of Sione’s Wedding and countless classic New Zealand music videos, shows the group playing cards and drinking beer while climate change takes hold around them. In a way, this seems to perfectly embody their ethos – the intelligence to provide an honest view of their environment, while retaining a sense of fun and simply having a good time. They have kept up this creativity in recent times, following a successful debut album release, Last Week, while also creating controversies through satirical videos such as an interview with TV3s David Farrier (played by Tom), and how to beat a Police breathalyser when stopped at a checkpoint. In a recent interview with NZ Musician, Tom said: “I can’t reach people if they can’t relate to me. So I figure if I’m myself, I’ll reach other people like me”. Judging by the loyal following Home Brew have created, there is obviously many who do relate to Tom and the group. This connection with their audience is translated into their sense of control and owner-

ship – something that is such a big issue for debate right now in the age of Kim Dotcom and Megaupload’s demise – making all of their music available to download for free. This attitude towards copyright control and the higher powers who manipulate those laws for their own profit is also shared by @Peace, who have also made music available through their Bandcamp page in a ‘pay what you like’ deal. It seems both groups have not lost focus on being grounded, or forgotten the tough times that come before success. Ponsonby’s Base FM served as a meeting ground for @Peace, whose members decided to jam after finding like minds and gelling as a crew over a period of months. Made up of Tom from Home Brew, rapper Lui Tuiasu of Nothing 2 Nobody, producer Christopher El Truento, and the eccentrically named Hayden ‘Dick Dastardly’ Dick, @Peace had created a huge amount of underground hype simply by forming, with El Truento’s beats already gaining notoriety for quality and needing the equivalent rap accompaniment. The following nine-track self-titled album lived up to those expectations, with thought-provoking lyrics matched to the sort of offkilter beats Electric Wire Hustle have made their own. Since then they have become the hottest property in underground New Zealand music circles, selling out shows, playing festivals, and touring over summer. The reputation of their live performance has also grown at a steady rate, often incorporating

live musicians such as Isaac Aesili and Julien Dyne into an improvised and expansive companion to their recorded output. It isn’t just New Zealanders taking notice either, with several of the world’s leading tastemakers such as Benji B and Gilles Peterson playing @Peace on their influential radio shows. It seems that big things are about to happen for this distinctive and hardworking group. While there are factors that connect Home Brew and @Peace, these are two very different groups, bound as much by their sense of politics and society, as their sharing of members, gigs, and audience. Rarely has there been a time in New Zealand where the word on the street about ‘what is good in hip-hop?’ has been dominated by local musicians. Both groups will certainly be highlights of the upcoming Orientation gigs, and it might just pay to catch Home Brew and @Peace before they take their exciting sound to the world stage. @ Peace are playing at The San Francisco Bath House as part of mawsa Orientation 2012 Saturday, February 25 from 10:30pm – 6am. Massey students can purchase specially discounted tickets for $15. Homebrew are playing at The San Francisco Bath House as part of mawsa Orientation 2012 Saturday, February 25 from 10:30pm – 6am. Massey students can purchase specially discounted tickets for $10.

Paul Berrington

A MIND-BENDER IN STORE

using the exploratory jazz of Sun Ra with the punkfunk rhythms of no waveera New York may seem like an unusual undertaking, especially in New Zealand’s often predictable music scene, yet Wellington band Orchestra of Spheres have not only chosen this musical outlet, but also found an adoring audience both locally and internationally. Paul Berrington spoke with the man behind the drums, Jemi Hemi Mandala, about what makes the band tick, and what those going to Massey Orientation can expect ahead of their live performance. Great music doesn’t happen by accident. Usually there are notice-

able factors to its success, and by success I don’t necessarily mean the music that tops the charts. Orchestra of Spheres manages the most difficult task in musicmaking – successful fusion – and challenge both the mind and body with exotic instrumentation matched to bouncing kick drums familiar to most from house and techno tracks. Mandala suggests that this was a response to becoming “a little sick of the often predictable plinky plonk approaches to improv”, a scene that in Wellington has produced some notable musicianship and experimentation yet wouldn’t normally have a place for the rhythms of dance music.

Continued from prevous page... What started out as, “really just a jam …although we had played together”, gained momentum at Wellington’s bastion of improvisation, Fredstock, a space where like minds meet on Frederick St in the city. Mandala speaks passionately when he describes how “the experience and advice shared by proven musicians such as Jeff Henderson and Anthony Donaldson can’t be under-estimated”, describing the whole Frederick St set-up as “vital” in terms of the band’s progression from experiment to highly lauded live outfit playing festivals in Europe. Soon the live performances captured that sense of amazement and rumor around the city that accompanied the early gigs of the likes of Fat Freddy’s Drop and Electric Wire Hustle – the you-have-to-see-this-band-right

now effect. “We listen a lot to each other”, says Mandala, and it seems the challenging environment that was Fredstock has led to the band being a professional and propulsive unit. As Mandala suggests, capable of adapting to energy within the audience, adding that, “we don’t want an audience sitting down when we play, they should be enjoying the groove”, something which is rich within the Spheres’ music. With an extremely limited EP and critically acclaimed LP recorded in 2009 and 2010 respectively, the band have come to the attention of an international, finding that some highly respected electronic pioneers in Four Tet and Caribou were fans of album Nonagenic Now and their live performance at the Camp Lo Hum festival in 2010. “Dan (Caribou) and Kieran (Four Tet)”, as Mandala calls

them now, have indeed given the band that all important element of respect with similar tastemakers all over the planet, with Caribou completing an edit of their trademark Hypersphere song, under his Daphni alias. Yet Mandala says that respect was noticeable throughout Europe, where the band have played at such adored festivals as All Tomorrows Parties. “In a funny way it was just so much easier in Europe”, explaining this as “just more respect for what you do as a musician”. He confides these details as “just the little things”, like “better back stage areas, good travelling between gigs, and a rider that includes more than a few nasty beers”. On a more serious note, Mandala also suggests that “stage equipment and sound systems” were far better, allowing the band to deliver the performance they know they can.

As a band, Orchestra of Spheres perform under unusual aliases, wearing costumes that match their exotic instruments, which are often homemade, adding another unique touch. Mandala explains that there is no obvious philosophy behind this, and that it is “music themed”, and formed out of the belief that it makes their often-abstract music, “easier to digest”. Finally, when asked what Orientation audiences can expect, he pauses before smiling and saying: “A mind-bending ecstatic brain and body dance”. Orchestra of Spheres (with support from Badd Energy) are playing at The San Francisco Bath House as part of mawsa Orientation 2012 Saturday, February 25 from 10:30pm – 6am. Massey students can purchase specially discounted tickets for $5.

Matt Shand

COCA BUILDING CLOSER TO COMPLETION

tudents who had been away from campus over the holiday period will probably be surprised to see how much progress has been made on the new, yet to be named building. The $20.1 million, 3600sqm structure is scheduled to be completed in May. It will provide gal-

lery space for students as well as facilities for teaching and learning at the college. The building will be a new facility for design students, but it has also been designed to be flexible and not just a new building to evacuate old office space. There will be mini-galleries dot-

ted around which will allow for display spaces, and new green screen rooms will be a god-send for animation students who will have access to greater technology. Thedistinctive windows that can now be seen on the exterior have been designed to allow ‘quality light’ into the building instead of simple views of Wellington. Light, as any designer would agree, is integral to the design process and shows the architects and designers have not forgotten who would be using the space. Multimedia will also take centre stage. There is a multi-purpose room that can be used for lectures, small plays and conferences. The space has concertina stage seating that allows for small intimate shows or wide open performance areas. This will be the first of its kind on the Wellington campus. The prominent placement of the building should also help bridge the physical boundaries between the College of Business and the College of Design at Wellington. Previously, students had to detour around the high school to commute to each campus. Though the separation is purely physical, it does detract from a united feeling at the university. The new building should change this and provide students with easy and quick access to each campus and really unite the two schools. Most exciting is the use of revolutionary construction material to provide a strong, earthquake-resistant structure. Since the Canterbury earthquakes this has been a priority for construction projects. The building is designed to ‘rock and sway’ during an earthquake and then return to its original position afterwards. Many advanced engineering techniques are used to create this effect, and the building is the first of its kind to use post-tensioned walls in a multi-storey complex. MASSIVE magazine will be running a feature on these new earthquake- resistant features in March.

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