quint magazine | issue 2 by quint

CON TENT S photo: Tara Atkinson

4 6 8 10 12 14 18 42 70 86 90 92 94 116 118 126 132 136 138 140 142 144 148 150 152 158

MASTHEAD EDITOR’S NOTE CONTRIBUTOR HIGHLIGHTS NEWS THE DIET HOOKAH AND OTHER SUCH MISTAKES A TRIBUTE TO MR HARVEY PEKAR FEATURED DESIGNER - ESZTER LAKI PHOTOGRAPHERS TO WATCH - TARA ATKINSON PHOTOGRAPHERS TO WATCH - NATASHA CARELLA AND THE BEAT GOES ON... - INTERVIEW WITH JIMI MISTRY FILM STUDENTS VS. THE WORLD WHY WE NEED DRAMA FASHION A LIFE OUT OF MUSIC - INTERVIEW WITH TIM HASSALL ABSOLACE INTERVIEW HOW MILES DAVIS’ KIND OF BLUE IS MORE LIKE KIND OF BLAND & OTHER OBSERVATIONS JANELLE MONAE VIC CHESTNUTT AS I LAY DYING - ALBUM REVIEW PLAYLIST HE WANTS TO BEAT HIM WALKING FROM NEW YORK TO UNIVERSAL URBANISM DREAMING ON A LONDON TRAIN READING LIST AS SEEN ON THE STREETS OF SAN FRANCISCO LAST CALL - YOGI TEA

photo: Tibor Simon

quint magazine | 2nd issue | September 2010 Editor in Chief Zaina Shreidi zaina@quintdubai.com Design | Illustration | Art Directon Gyula Deรกk gyula@quintdubai.com Designers Ritu Arya, Zakia Baniabbassian, Adam Erdesz Photographers Tara Atkinson, Natasha Carella, Tibor Simon, Adam Erdesz Contributors Tara Atkinson, Prank Moody, Tom Paye, Trevor Bundus, Mohamed El Amin, Eszter Laki, Wael X, Fadi Hindash, Fares BouNassif This production and its entire contents are protected by copyright. No use or reprint (including disclosure) may be made of all or any part of this publication in any manner or form whatsoever without the prior written consent Quint. Views expressed in Quint do not necessarily represent the opinions of the editors or parent company. Quint is a trademark of Spirit Consulting FZE. Contact hi@quintdubai.com

EDITOR’S NOTE THE UAE’S LOCAL “ART” SCENE IS SOMETIMES HARD TO FIND, OR HARD TO REALISE. HOWEVER ART LOVERS AND RAW TALENT ALIKE ARE CONTINUOUSLY SPRINGING FROM THIS STRANGE FUSION OF RESORT-PARADISE, CONSTRUCTION-SITE, AND VAST ARABIAN DESERT. MAYBE IT’S BECAUSE THE HEAT KEEPS US INDOORS, MULLING OVER WHAT TO DO, OR MAYBE IT’S THE FEELING THAT THIS PLACE IS A BLANK SLATE READY TO BE FILLED WITH OUR MUSINGS AND IDEAS. WHATEVER THE REASON, THE KIDS ARE MAKING THEIR VOICES HEARD AND CONTINUE TO EVEN AFTER THEY HAVE LEFT OUR SANDY SHORES. THIS ISSUE WE CATCH UP WITH LOCAL ARTISTS AND INTERNATIONAL CELEBRITIES, LENS ADDICTS, FILM NERDS, COMIC BOOK GEEKS, AND MUSIC AFICIONADOS AS THEY OBSESS OVER AND EXPLORE THEIR INDIVIDUAL PASSIONS. WHAT MORE COULD WE ASK FOR? ZAINA SHREIDI 6

ARTWORK BY ERIKA IRIS SIMMONS

FADIHINDASH Fadi Hindash is a screenwriter and director of Palestinian/ Lebanese origin living in Dubai. His first short film, The Sound of Applause, was nominated for Best Narrative Short at the Rome Int›l Film Festival and his first documentary, Not Quite the Taliban, was nominated for Best Documentary at the Arab Film Festival in San Francisco. He›s currently developing his second documentary and his first long fiction film.

WAELX Obsessed. That’s the best word to describe the 25-year-old Lebanese fashionista and music enthusiast. Wael’s love for music, fashion, arts and beauty is his primary drive in life and for all of his accomplishments. His journalistic ventures began at the age of 18 writing for a local Lebanese publication where he was in charge of the entertainment section. Being heavily involved in media, Wael also co-produced radio show segments in both Lebanon and New York and did representation for various artists. His fan website for the late Aaliyah (which ran from 2003 until 2007), was used by MTV as an official fan site and ranked at number 3 in the UK website listing at the time. This issue, Wael introduces quint readers to his recent muse and obsession, musician Janelle Monae.

FARESBOUNASSIF 1985. 1996. 1999. 2003. 2004. 2006. 2008. 2011. Milestones. They’re shitty little things, especially when they come in a little late or when they’re not what you expected them to be. Fares likes to ignore them, while busying himself with theory, design, literature, music, film, and sex & sexuality. All things art, actually. He enjoys challenging himself, knowing that failure is unavoidable. It’s fun, actually.

Let’s just say he likes to write so that he can stop itching to write, so that he can have something to look back to that reminds him of the path he took, the way things change. Spitting out little letters in a carefully designed process that culminates in a cacophony of words that could possibly create a symphony while maintaining the utter simplicity necessary for the youngest minds to enjoy. And sometimes, occasionally, some of what he writes looks like it’s something someone else might want to know about.

That’s the other thing he loves: fun. Pleasure, to be more precise. Hedonism galore, and everything that comes with it.

TARAATKINSON Traversing the axis between art, video, photography, writing, music and ideas, Tara is a true ‹interdisciplinary› (and modestly admits this means an updated version of a “jack of all trades- master of none”). Looking at how she works and lives she tries to cross boundaries not just within the Arts but has moved from place to place over the last 23 years - living between Dubai, Cyprus and the UK. Inspired by the places she has lived in and people she has met, Tara looks at the unconventional and uncanny within her work referencing urban landscapes, places, time, space people, and dialogue in her work and tries to look at things a little differently. Looking to the greats within the Arts - Rankin, Annie Leibowizt, Doug Aitken, Wilson Sisters, Chapman Brothers, the YBA›s and even the surrealist Man Ray for inspiration and motivation - she still swears by the saying “never meet your heroes”.

In her spare time you can catch her fire-performing, dancing, stilt-walking or being a human statue as she performs for pennies at nightclubs, events and parties (having spent the majority of weekends last season at Nasimi beach party, Barasti, Sanctuary, and Plastik) entertaining the pretentious whilst having various wardrobe malfunctions with fire. You can spot some of Tara›s work, videos and performing online at www.taraatkinson.tumblr.com . Most recently her work with Saatchi and Saatchi won the Grand Prix Lynx Award for her photography in the advertising campaign ‹Metro Messages on Cars›. You can also catch her writing music and event reviews for Infusion Magazine.

Brian M. Viveros

www.brianmviveros.com Viktor and Rolf Dolls As a sort of retrospective of their years in fashion, Dutch fashion designers Viktor & Rolf present Dolls at Studio Job, the Antwep gallery of artists. Dolls is a presentation of iconic outfits referencing all their previous collections, modeled by dolls. Dubbed “Russian Doll”, “The Fashion Show”, “Ballroom”, “NO”, and “Black Hole”, each wideeyed, slightly creepy, incredibly well dressed doll represents each collection the designers have created so far. These are definite must haves for anyone inspired by the eccentric designers’ admirable tailoring and beautifully ostentatious fashion statements that have thrown the rest of the fashion world into shock, awe, and envy.

Brian M. Viveros utterly captivating paintings and illustrations captures all that is dark, debaucherous, and evocative with the undeniable genius of a true tortured artist. He depicts mystery, sensuality, depravity and defiance in the women he paints. The dangling cigarette in the corner of their mouths has quickly become his trademark, along with marks of bruises, tattoos, and swollen eyes. You won’t soon forget a Viveros painting or illustration whence you have laid eyes upon it, and you won’t want to either.

Please Take Me Off The Guest List Please Take Me Off the Guest List is the latest collaboration between Yeah Yeah Yeahs guitarist Nick Zinner, singer Zachary Lipez of Freshkills, and art book designer Stacy Wakefield. The fourth art book from these enviably talented art and music folk presents an ecclectic mix of photographs, non-fiction and design showcasing the trials and tribunes of a true rock and roll lifestyle. Zinner’s widely acclaimed photography gives you the rare perspective of a musician on endless tours and concerts as he points the camera back at all the imploring, idolising eyes of YYY fans while Lipez takes you on a journey of insight into his “adventures as a bartender, drug abuser, bookstore clerk, metal fan, miserable adolescent and relentless skirt chaser.” Wakefield brings the incredible talent in the book together beautifully - not surprising considering her prolific experience with Artforum and Index Magazines as well as the many art books she has designed under her own publishing company, Evil Twin Publications. Please Take Me Off the Guest List is not available until October 1; however, for a limited time, advance special edition copies are available for international pre-order for a measly $50 (+shipping). This preorder offer gives the music and art obsessed the chance to get their eager hands on a special edition of this brilliant tome signed by the trio before it even hits stores. The set includes a numbered 7” record of three musical collaborations between the artists and three different bands, a numbered poster sleeve, an original story by Zachary Lipez, and a random original signed photograph from Nick Zinner’s personal collection. This special edition is limited to 250 sets, so you better hurry!

www.akashicbooks.com/store/page6.html

Adidas x Jeremy Scott Adidas continues their celebration of originality with their latest collaboration with Jeremy Scott. The collection brings a whole new spin on the beloved brand with dizzying black and white prints, sequins, and jumpsuits so extravagant and flashy that you could strut into any nightclub and receive nothing but envious glares from the less fashion-forward crowd. Top it off with exaggerated wings on the iconic JS Wings 2.0 Sneaker and you have a collection that few can top. Forget relegating sweats to the gym and early morning grocery shopping, Jeremy Scott and the wonderful minds at Adidas have proved yet again that you can be turn heads with your originality anytime, anywhere with this incredible collection.

www.adidas.com/originals

the

and other such mistakes by fares bounassif

I like driving. I like creating things, the rush of inspiration. I like speeding when I drive. I live in Lebanon, after having roamed around the Arab world, and outside of it, for a while, for a lifetime. Beirut has been home for three years now, and some things tend to stick with you after a while when you are a resident of this city and a frequent observer of all things interesting. One thing that always catches my eye is type – typography, fonts. In banners, on signs, all over the streets. And the colours that are associated with them, intentionally or not, intelligently or otherwise. That always gets me wondering how the person who did that visual (picked it, designed it, decided it was the right thing to do) was thinking. Some

designs

are

awesome.

Others

mediocre. But some, and in Arabia with greater frequency than in other countries, are horrendous. What-were-you-thinkingyou-tasteless-idiot horrible. That bad. And so I drive. That’s when I do my best thinking. When I’m in the car. Some people like to do it in the bathroom, but I find the car (particularly when you are stuck in Lebanese traffic) to be the best place to mull over ideas and find inspiration. When it comes to shitty and great street design, it helps to think while driving, because that is most likely when you will spot it. Some stuff is intriguing. Stupidly intriguing, but still. Like the Diet Hookah on offer at two or three different places in and around Beirut. Or the café that decided that downloading all the fonts on DaFont (www.dafont.com) and putting them all in some weird collage of the shop’s name all over his walls and windows (in a way that does not work. At all.) and then decided that picking out every single colour in Illustrator’s basic swatches palette and using each for a different font was a brilliant idea too. Especially when he didn’t think to lay out the colours in a clever way (even if clever was something as basic and cliché as the typical, rainbow-ish, spectrum). For the sake of those particular businesses, I will not give their names or show their work. It wouldn’t be fair. The guy was probably particularly impressed with his Diet Hookah creation, and, knowing the plasticity of Lebanese society, it probably sold quite nicely. Meanwhile, I’m sure DaFont was pretty pleased with the advertising its fonts got. Even if it was bad publicity.

When you drive, in Lebanon, there is a certain finesse to the way your car moves between lanes, avoids other cars that want to play chicken with you, and manoeuvres around and over potholes. As I tell my little brother, there’s a system to the way driving happens in Lebanon, and it’s a very rough one that nobody can really write down because once it’s written it breaks. It’s the system of guessing what the next car will do, and driving by intuitive induction. To me, the design process is very much the same thing. You think of where you wanna go next, you try to get there, and then you worry about the next step. But it’s only when you get that rush of just barely skimming past the other car that was about to drive into your car door that you really manage to finally speed through and create. I don’t think any of those crappy designers have finesse in their work. I also don’t think they can drive eloquently through traffic. It’s a little foolish and maybe somewhat ludicrous, I know. Relating insane driving to insane design doesn’t quite make sense. Paula Scher, in a presentation on Ted.com’s TED Talks, tells us about what she describes as ‘serious play’ instead of ‘solemn work’. It is a great twenty-minute display of egocentricity that most designers should be aware of. Meanwhile, I believe that insane driving (what can sometimes be called reckless, undisciplined, or otherwise incorrect) can lead to great design. I’m not being clear enough. It’s about the methodology being translated from insane driving to insane design. I’m not recommending reckless driving. I’m suggesting we all try a little bit of reckless design, which is definitely not bad design. Think of the process you use to develop a piece of work. You start by researching your subject, whatever it may be. You get to know it intimately, you dream about it, you love it or hate it, you make it the centrepiece of your imagination. After letting it simmer in your mind, you sit down one day and you begin to sketch a little, come up with something here or there. It doesn’t matter what it is you use to start with, what happens at first, or any such thing. I just find that the best way to start is by trying to make mistakes – doing something because you feel like it, even if it might not be the right thing. You probably wouldn’t go on to use that something, but it would definitely bring about something else that’s awesome in its own right, like when I was beginning to work on a

font I’m currently refining. I drew a lowercase f. It was a horrible lowercase f, it broke all the rules, and it had no real, definable anything. It was right after I had meticulously engineered the lowercase l and decided that all the rest would be based on it. The f wasn’t. It didn’t have any of the elements of the l. In fact, I went back and changed the l the next day. And the f I ended up with looked nothing like the first one I sketched. But the whole font worked wonderfully around the original f, until the final f had to be modified to fit with the rest of the typeface. Therein lies the key to what I consider reckless design. It didn’t matter that there was a process and structure that I had been taught to follow – what mattered was that my brain felt that the shape of the initial f I’d drawn on my little sketchpad was the right inspiration for the rest of the project, even if I could have been severely mistaken. Frankly, I still think that initial character is why I love my creation. And that’s the other essential element, for me, of great design. Finding a few mistakes to start from is easy, but it is when you fall in love with the result of those mistakes, the inspiration that those mistakes give you that you find a truly brilliant piece of design. So, driving. It is precisely that! I do not really believe that you can relate all driving to all design. It’s just that driving recklessly was the mistake that gave me a rush that reminded of that same rush I get when my design process is working even though it is based on a mistake. Reckless driving is why I started this article, the bravado of insanity behind the wheel of a car is exactly the sort of boldness you need when you are taking on a new project that refuses to shoot off from the womb of your mind. Be reckless. Make mistakes, but make sure there is a passionate reasonable love behind those mistakes that gives you a rush, the driving force that creates sparks that become brilliance. And please, please, please: always know the subject you are designing so well that you do not end up forcing it to be something it isn’t; so that you do not end up creating something that shouldn’t have been created. Like that Diet Hookah.

Let’s just this out o way: Hi. I’m and I’m a book geek D E M A MOH IN EL AM

image source: http://www.mrdankelly.com

We aren’t talking “oh I just sa is kinda cool!” folks. We are several TB’s of my brain collections of comics. We’re t every single issue of Captain A ever and dedicating two hour to sweeping the internet with reading scans of the latest iss before (Wednesday is the com It’s a beaut

t get of the m Moe, comic k.

So Zaina, our glorious E-i-C, thought it would be neat if I did a feature every once and a while about comics. I told her it’s a terrible idea that could cause readership to dip. “Woman you are mad, have you read my profile? I’m crazy for this stuff!” But still, she thought it would be absurdly entertaining (i.e. hilarious), and so, here we are. I wasn’t planning to start off on this note; I was initially intending to analyse and discuss why comic books are one of the final frontiers of the imagination. But early July, one of the legends of the medium passed away, a grumpy man whose name was Harvey Pekar. Now, most people think comics are just about people with super powers kicking someone’s face (which is awesome, by the way). While that is quite right to a certain extent, not all comics are as such. Why? Because of Harvey Pekar.

aw Iron man and this stuff e talking about allocating to storing nothing but talking about having read America and Detective comics rs every Thursday morning the purpose of finding and sues that came out the day mics release day in the USA. tiful day.) American Splendor, the collaborative effort between Harvey and underground artist Robert Crumb, was an autobiographical comic book released in 1976 (and continuously, though through an erratic release schedule, to this date) chronicling the hilariously normal dayto-day adventures of Harvey Pekar: his job as a clerk in a Veteran’s hospital, relationships with his family, friends and usual troubles of a normal person chugging along against the machine (dedicating an entire issue to lamenting about a lost book, for example). At times, the stories revolved around other people’s lives, such as the three-issue American Splendor: Unsung Hero, chronicling the traumatic Vietnam War experience of Harvey’s co-worker.

This was unheard of at the time. An incredibly revolutionary upheaval of the entire medium that ushered the later adult-oriented works by an entire generation (Neil Gaiman and Alan Moore being most notable) and the entire popularisation and vindication of the term “graphic novel” (first used to describe Will Eisner’s A Contract With God). But what truly makes American Splendor such a unique hallmark of the medium, is the undeniable human nature of the work; a stark-yet-charming look at life through the eyes of a cynically hilarious man during several turbulent decades of human history. American Splendor revolved around a universally identifiable theme: trying to live. From the soul crushing 9-5 ritual to finding love to losing one’s glasses to the struggles of maintaining one’s creative impulses. As Harvey described it himself:

“Life is a war of attrition. You have to stay active on all fronts. It’s one thing after another. I’ve tried to control a chaotic universe. And it’s a losing battle. But I can’t let go. I’ve tried, but I can’t.”

American Splendor was a book that took on every aspect of life and laid it bare for anyone to read and sample. For close to four decades, Harvey invited each of his readers to live with him, through all the ups and downs, via his book. No better example of this could be made other than the year where Harvey was diagnosed with cancer. His trials and tribulations were all chronicled with unparalleled bravery and sincerity in his magnum opus; American Splendor: Our Cancer Year. In 252 pages, the horrifying physical and mental struggles of cancer on both Harvey and his wife Joyce are there for us to experience and share. From Harvey’s illness to his wife’s attempts to maintain some semblance of sanity in an increasingly insane world (this was in 1990 just as the Gulf War song-and-dance was beginning to escalate). One of the most poignant moments in the book is a scene, depicted in Harvey’s characteristic unflinching honesty, where he contemplates suicide after an increasingly gruelling course of chemotherapy that left him without a hair on his body, only for his wife to slap him in an enraged instance riddled with desperate frustration at both his predicament and her inability to aid him in it. What enriches (and contradicts) the enormity of this solemn private instance of life is the evocative artwork provided by Frank Stack, whose vivid and immersing textural work serves as a distinct departure from American Splendor’s usual straightforward linear approach, while still maintaining a profound layered realism to the book.

Harvey, you were an absolutely great writer. More importantly: a beaut soul and a good man. The world is a lot less magic without you. Love. Always 16

tiful e cal s.

Our Cancer Year (American Splendor, in its entirety) is a true testament to the brilliance of the medium, where the lines between “comic” and “literature” are not merely blurred, but completely rebuked. An elegant tale of the sombre struggle against a relentless, destructive villain where Harvey and Co. display precisely why this medium can house both fictional superheroes and real heroes: human spirits with remarkable tenacity. A genuinely phenomenal and earnest body of work that is worth thrice its weight in gold, that added such a degree of depth to all stories to follows, even the ones where superheroes kick someone’s face.

DESIGN

photographers to watch

NATASHA CAR ELLA

NATASHA CARELLA

We had the chance to chat with the multi-talented Jimi Mistry, the actor, DJ, and most recently, filmmaker, at the screening of his music documentary And the Beat Goes Onâ&#x20AC;Ś in Chi at the Lodge, Dubai. Jimi discussed his passion for free parties, self expression, the essence and spirit of Ibiza and the comfort in knowing the beat will always go onâ&#x20AC;Ś

JIMI MISTRY

‘’ WOW… THIS PLACE IS AMAZING, THIS IS NOTHING LIKE I’VE EVER IMAGINED!” YOU’VE BEEN INVOLVED IN THE MUSIC AND RAVE SCENE IN THE UK FOR QUITE A WHILE NOW, SO WHAT INSPIRED YOU TO DOCUMENT IBIZA’S MUSIC SCENE? HOW DID THE PROJECT COME ABOUT? “I’ve always been a music lover, DJing, and so on since I was a little kid but I’d never been to Ibiza before. It wasn’t really one of the destinations that I wanted to go because we were all told when we were much younger that it was filled with young kids getting drunk, etc. I went for the first time six years ago for a film festival where I was presenting a film I had acted in. When I went there I was like ‘’Wow… this place is amazing, this is nothing like I’ve ever imagined!’ and the music scene was really vibrant and alive and so I was just so taken aback by it that as soon as I went away I wanted to go back again. And then a film company that I know got in touch with me looking to make a music documentary so we got our heads together and I said, “Why not do one about the rave scene? The history of it, maybe tie it in with Ibiza…” it was all very loosely planned. So over the next four years I started to go to Ibiza with a camera and a director in my spare time and started approaching DJs, doing interviews, still not quite knowing what it was I was doing, and the island started growing on me more and more. Basically what I noticed was that it wasn’t just an island filled with really good clubs, DJs and stuff like that, it was an island that had this really special spirit that had been there for years. I wanted to see if that spirit had a connection to the music, and that

was really what my journey then became. It became me exploring and living it almost in order to unearth this amazing magical thing that goes on underneath this whole place. And it doesn’t just apply to music and DJs; I also spent time with shamans, in the mountains, spent time with all sorts of different people who had been attracted to this place. That was the journey that I went on and filmed and thought ‘Well, let’s make a film out of all of that.’ And that’s what I did; it was a long hard road, but we did it.

clubs were open air. Every club in Ibiza didn’t have a roof on because that was the whole idea of dancing under the moon and stars; that got stopped 20 years ago and all the clubs got roofs on. Those clubs now charge a whole lot of money and they’re still great when you get in there, but it’s kind of the essence of what it was when it started that has been changed. But it’s still great fun, I still go and have a great time and take it for what it is and then go eat great food and lay on the beach and do things like that for the next few days.

HOW HAVE YOU SEEN THE MUSIC AND RAVE SCENE EVOLVE SINCE BACK WHEN YOU FIRST WERE INVOLVED IN IT COMPARED TO NOW IN PLACES LIKE IBIZA?

HAS IT BECOME TOO CENTRED ON THE COMMERCIALISM AND JUST MAKING MONEY COMPARED TO THE EARLY RAVE DAYS?

“I think it always constantly changing. When Ibiza started Alfredo was one of the first DJs to experiment with Balearic music and he was playing all kinds of music. The whole idea was records being mixed together and playing it to a crowd, and now electronic music has come to be the sound of Ibiza. Now, the reason for that I do believe is that electronic music is actually a soundtrack to the scene there and it’s designed for you to get from it what you will. If you connect with it, you can become whomever you want. Lots of people don’t get it, but maybe they don’t want to get it. It’s like back in the 50s and 60s when hippies used to have parties; they weren’t playing electronic or house music, but they were beating drums and reading poetry under the moonlight, it’s all relative, it’s all similar. And let’s not forget in the early 70s when the clubs started, all the

“Well, people have got to survive, so the people that are pioneering the business have to evolve and make money and keep the kids happy, as it were. Back in the day, the great thing about it was that it was before the phenomenon of the ‘superstar DJ’ started, so it wasn’t about the name or who was playing, it was about what they were playing, it wasn’t a business for anybody and no one was making any money. The great thing about those early rave days for me was that I was involved in the free party scene. So we would get a map of where the meeting point was going to be and you’d go to a car-park in the middle of nowhere and then follow a convoy of cars for miles until you go to a valley or field and there would be the rig and everything set up. And at that time the people who were going to those kinds of things weren’t cool,

no one knew about this. If the guy next to you wasn’t dancing with you he’d be robbing your car, it was all quite edgy and the edginess was a great part of the whole thing. It was like ‘Whoa, this is great, but it’s really scary!’ It was really exciting. It’s something you don’t get in clubs these days. Although these parties are still happening, and I think it’s great that they are springing up around the world. Beirut and Brazil are coming up with little underground parties, and it’s something that has come up all through the ages with tribal dancing so it’s all quiet relative. But in the early 90s it was all kind of new to us. “In Ibiza though it’s really quite strict now. Rather than being about grass roots, it’s got to be slightly extravagant, so now these parties happen in villas and are just crazy, where you have David Guetta DJing and people spend tens of thousands on production and for an open bar in the house. But obviously these are starting to be clamped down upon as they give competition to the clubs. “When I DJ I mainly do free parties, which I’ve been involved in for a long time. I do DJ in big clubs in Ibiza, and so forth, and its fine... but I sort have got my career as an actor so I don’t do this for my career I do it for my creative side.”

DO YOU REALLY HAVE TO SEARCH FOR THIS SPIRITUAL SIDE OF IBIZA? “You have to be open to it…the people that live there, they’ve been through the whole process and they’ve found something there, otherwise it would have crashed and burned years ago. It could have been like any other island in the world that has great clubs, when the clubs are done, what else is there? But there’s something left there. You will get groups of kids and older people who save up all year to go there and get absolutely wasted for six days and they’ll have a great time; however, my theory is that, although we all go and have a laugh, the people who go for six days and go crazy are anesthetising themselves so they actually miss what is really going on.” HOW DO YOU THINK THAT IS GOING TO AFFECT THE FUTURE OF IBIZA? WITH ALL THESE PEOPLE GOING FOR THE WRONG REASONS, DO YOU THINK THEY WILL CHANGE OR NEGATIVELY AFFECT THE ESSENCE AND SPIRIT OF IBIZA? “Ibiza is changing, and we touch on it in the film because the Spanish government want

That island will always survive and create other things...so, that’s why I have complete faith in that Mother Earth will always dictate what happens. “You’re going to get your commercialised places in Ibiza, but when you go to a music festival, you go with a sense of purpose of being who you want to be. Like if you go to Glastonbury and see someone dressed as a banana and go ‘Oh what are they doing?’ then you shouldn’t be there. That’s the beauty of it. The same sort of essence of being who it is or going to find what it is that you are and expressing yourself is on that island. Yes, there are commercial sides of it, yes, there is anywhere, it’s a business and it has to run; however if you go out and look for it you’ll find what you need to find on there. The commercialism is 5% of what that island is, there’s one spot like any other destination, the rest is absolutely gorgeous… and you can always hear the beat of something in the distance, and that’s the whole idea of And The Beat Goes On, whether it’s a drum or the music, or whatever it is, that’s what goes on because that’s what the island has.

YOU WERE INVOLVED IN THE RAVE SCENE AS IT WAS REALLY GETTING KIND OF STARTED, HOW DID IT COMPARE TO THE RAVE SCENE IN IBIZA? I’M SURE EVEN THE SCENERY AND THE LOCATION WOULD HAVE AN AFFECT ON THE MOOD AND THE ENTIRE EXPERIENCE… “Well funny enough one of the things I was most dubious about was “Oh nothing could be like how it used to be, and Ibiza is all commercialised, and it’s just going to be expensive drinks with kids paying tons to get in the clubs,” and that does go on, it’s a business, but there’s something about going outside and listening to music and having a connection to the music while you’re out in fresh air and nature. Back in the old days there was this magic spirit that everyone had because it was a new, unique thing and the spirit I was trying to find and trying to pinpoint was what drew me in to Ibiza because it’s still alive there. It really is…and I’m kind of a hippie in that I do believe that there are places in the world that are quite special where you can express yourself, like Glastonbury, and there are lots of places like that, and Ibiza is definitely one of them.” THE ENERGY THAT PEOPLE MUST PUT OUT AND THE ENERGY THE EARTH PUTS OUT MUST HAVE AN EFFECT ON THE PEOPLE THAT ARE THERE… “Exactly, and especially for me in the early days. Yes there were a lot of other things involved and that was a part of the whole process but for me there was a connection to the music and the energy from people and that’s what made it so special.”

“THAT ISLAND WILL ALWAYS SURVIVE AND CREATE OTHER THINGS...SO, THAT’S WHY I HAVE COMPLETE FAITH IN THAT MOTHER EARTH WILL ALWAYS DICTATE WHAT HAPPENS.” to clean it up in a way. They want it to be a VIP centre-pay island and that’s what it is becoming. They’ve changed the licensing laws, they’ve closed everything in the daytime, clubs are open only in the night time, and the thing about Ibiza was always been about the daytime, and you can’t do that anymore. Now the earliest the clubs can open is about 430 in the afternoon, most open later in the evenings now. However, I think somewhere like Ibiza will always keep evolving and it would be foolish not to go with it in its evolution. But at the end of the day if God came and went ‘Right, I’m going to get rid of all of you, I’m going to clear the decks and have just the island left’ something else would start shooting up from what it is. No one is bigger than that island.

Check out www.ibizathemovie.com for more information or watch the trailer here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=giGJN8TdFso

FILM

The other night I was lucky enough to be a part of a preview screening of Edgar Wright’s (Director of Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz) new film Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. The majority of you would identify this film as a Michael Cera vehicle that showcases the versatility of George Michael (Arrested Development referential pun). For the five of you who will actually read this, hoping for a review on Scott Pilgrim vs. The World stop reading now. Actually, don’t stop just yet; I’ll highlight the eventual point of exit in a few seconds. Scott Pilgrim sits in the cleavage of two magnificent breasts of cultural production... the Graphic Novel and the 90s Video Game. The film entertains with slick video game aesthetic, but more importantly, it invokes a sense of nostalgia pertaining to the 90s video game. It’s witty, clever and is undoubtedly one of the superior Graphic Novel adaptations that has been realised. What’s that? How does it compare to the Graphic Novel? Honestly, I have not read it but the film instilled a desire to do so. Wait for Mo El Amin to watch it and then in the next issue he will be able to provide a holistic comparison.

Go watch it, it is a fantastic film and watch out for Kieran Culkin, who very effectively (post Igby Goes Down) is shouldering the burden of the Culkin Thespian Legacy (please read the last bit with every ounce of sarcasm your body can produce). In other words GO WATCH IT! And if you are privileged enough to live in a civilised country where the assistance towards the ‘right frame of mind’ is available, then my suggestion is to let that frame hang a little to the left or right, it works better that way. Review whores... this is your exit. The remaining three please watch your head as I get to the actual point of this little deliberation. The Graphic Novel fan boy has always been an object of ridicule (right Mo?) and has even been relegated to social obscurity, even though the Graphic Novel is an art form that propagates a pioneering spirit fuelled by innovation in narrative, animation, and ideology. It’s a little ridiculous that the Graphic Novel and Comic Book fanboy/girl suffers widespread, misdirected ridicule when fans of Jennifer Anniston deserve the brunt of it. Jennifer Anniston fans, however, are not the only ones who should bear the wrath of social castigation; they should top the list, or be second behind Twilight fans. Film Theory or Film Philosophy students share the same spatial obsession as any fanboy culture but somehow we have managed to stave off social relegation. The question is why? Being a Film Theory student myself I am amazed that my beautiful girlfriend (yes I am shocked that I have one) even lets me touch her. I think the reason we are insulated from abuse is that Film Theory has managed to ascertain Academic legitimacy and engages with a much more glamorous subject matter. There is a certain aura associated with the magic of movies that helps us stay afloat in the Ocean of All Things Cool. However, if you have ever had the pleasure of spending any time with a group of film students then that magic of the movies disseminates as quickly as the editing in any Michael Bay film. Confused? I understand the confusion; right now the question that is occupying your mind’s eye is ‘How can a night talking about movies be bad?’ I could tell you but I feel that an illustration would be more useful. Therefore I present:

FILM STUDENTS… WE ARE JUST AS BAD IF NOT WORSE! - A Short Play by Prank Moody.

Scene 1: A master’s dorm room punctuated by a 17 year aged single malt, jazz cigarettes and 60s Garage Rock and Blues (Sounds amazing doesn’t it?)

Prank: So, I am getting a little sick of the hype around Inception, I mean it’s a good solid film but it’s not the mind fornicator that everyone claims it to be.

Harry: True, I mean Nolan is one of the better film makers out there; he makes an effort to make films with a bit of substance.

Pat: I think we can all agree though that Kubrick is the greatest filmmaker that America has ever produced.

Edmond: Technically he has grown and has really honed his craft but has he lost the ability to tell a story?

All: F**K YEAH!

Prank: Nobody tells a story anymore in mainstream Hollywood, you want a story, TV is where it’s at. Myers: True. HBO has been telling stories for years, The Wire, The Sopranos, Deadwood, Oz. Pat: Deadwood is class! That opening scene is the only time where you can actually taste the dust and mud. Prank: That first season is brilliant.

Prank: You know what I would like to see... A Kauffman and Jarmusch of a Kauffman and Lynch film. Edmond: I would watch that, it would be a mind F**K comparable to Last Year at Marienbad, or Tarkovsky’s The Mirror. Prank: Plus I think the film should star David Cross and Bill Murray. Harry: YES! David Cross is awesome! (35 minute discussion and quoting of Arrested Development ensues)

Pat: The Deadwood drinking game is even better, every time they take a shot of whiskey, you take one as well! Haze and I finished a bottle after the first episode.

Scene 2: Same place, the atmosphere is

Edmond: Well, at least HBO tackled the Western; Hollywood has not made a good one since...

Prank: The 80s were a shitty time for music but god I miss the 80s action film. I mean essentially they were visual propaganda for Reagan’s America

Harry: Unforgiven Prank: Leone and Peckinpah were the best, why don’t they make the Western anymore? Myers: Well they don’t make noir as well! Harry: It’s all about the comic book adaptations now isn’t it? Prank: The bad comic book adaptations, someone should shoot Zack Snyder in the testicle, he ruins everything! Edmond: I would’ve loved to have seen Kubrick make a comic book film! All: Yes that would be F*****G EPIC! Prank: Ok here’s a question: America’s greatest living filmmaker? Anybody who says Spielberg needs to leave the room. Edmond: Coppola? Prank: Yah but he made Jack! Can a director be considered great if there are certain films of his that don’t match the high standards in the canon of work? Myers: Jack was awful, just like Scorecese’s recent films. Harry: Departed was good!

saturated with intoxication and pop cultural references.

Harry: That scene in Predator with the close up of Carl Weather’s and Arnold’s ripped arm... LEGEND! Pat: Carl Weathers, hahahaha there’s still a lot of meat left on that bone, throw in some vegetables and you got yourself a stew! (20 minute discussion and quoting of Arrested Development) Prank: Best film of the 80s? All: DIE HARD! - The EndSo there you have it... I don’t know how many of you are still here but for those of you who powered through that now understand that academia saves us from social extermination. What you read above (the two of you that did) is just an hour discussion and quite a diluted one. The fact that film is considered sexy (maybe not after this) in a convoluted way makes us sexy by association. The truth however is that we are not (as it has become evidently clear), and I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Graphic Novel Fanpeople for taking a lot for the team. Finally I would like to thank our stars that women and men let us, film students, touch their naughty parts.

Prank: Not original and nor as good as Lau’s Infernal Affairs. Pat: Jarmusch ... but I hated Ghost Dog! Prank: Lynch... has he ever made a bad movie? Harry: I guess it would have to be between Lynch and Jarmusch.

(Next time on quint Magazine, Prank discusses how after this article his girlfriend dumped him and the only naughty parts he touched subsequently were his. Plus why Die Hard is one of the greatest films of all time).

FILM

fadi hindash Maybe it’s because of the rise of reality television. Maybe it’s because real life is becoming more interesting than fiction or as fiction-like as fiction. Maybe it’s because of what Michael Moore did for the genre. Whatever the reason, documentaries are becoming more fashionable these days. More people watch them and more people talk about them. Perhaps it’s because the internet has made us - the global community - more aware of one another and more interested in what makes us different from each other. Or maybe it’s because, like reality television programs, documentaries are cheaper to make. The biggest, and perhaps the most important, difference is that unlike reality television, documentaries have room to be as thought-provoking, creative and character-driven as the best works of fiction (maybe reality television has that opportunity but that’s a whole different article). Ever since I started making documentaries a few years back, I’ve had the fortune of developing my films within labs that put a lot of emphasis on research, content, storyline and dramaturgy

in a documentary. Of course, it’s very tempting to want to finish a documentary as soon as possible and the risky thing with documentaries is that they can be rushed. The reason that is a risky choice is because you end up being a reporter putting together a news report as opposed to a filmmaker making a film with a story and characters that are on a journey. Having said that, some of the greatest documentaries do not have a story as such; just like some of the greatest feature films do not follow a linear storytelling structure. But the point is that great documentaries, like great fiction films, have an emotional journey and are made of scenes that make you feel something as opposed to news clips that are there to inform you. Truth be told, if you are impatient and want to make one documentary a year then you might as well go work for a news channel. This is in no way belittling the news stations and newspapers, or the reporters and journalists who bring it to us; however, there is a big difference between the two and each has a place in this world. A good documentary can use a piece of

news as a starting point but it has to go much deeper. For example, a news report on the hardship in the Gaza Strip lists the facts and statistics of life within the openair prison called Gaza. A powerful documentary would show you (rather than tell you) what life under the occupation feels like. To use an example of a documentary being made by a friend in Gaza right now, the viewer follows a the trials and tribulations of fisherman in Gaza who is unable to fish because of the naval blockade imposed by Israel. We would stay with this one fisherman, get to know him and his family and we would come out knowing a lot more about the blockade through a human story. I recently attended a masterclass by Hupert Sauper who directed one of the best documentaries made in the last ten years, “Darwin’s Nightmare”. The film is not for the faint of heart and uses what happens in Tanzania as a symbol for the nightmarish consequences of globalization and greed. Instead of focusing on one character, the filmmaker uses an ensemble of characters to paint a portrait of Tanzania as dumping ground for European countries that drop

off weapons and, in the same aircrafts, take the country’s fish to sell in European supermarkets. The characters we meet in this film include a Russian pilot and a Tanzanian prostitute. Even the pilot, who in a news report would be painted as a villain because of what he represents, is portrayed as a human being with a family back home. “Darwin’s Nightmare” couldn’t have been as powerful as it is if it were not for the many years of research and even more years of making the film. The time spent with the characters is not something to be taken lightly. The film went on to win every documentary award there is and, of course, with that success came trouble. Like any piece of work that deals with something sensitive, the backlash becomes intense when there is success. No one cares who or what you criticize in your work if no one is going to know about your work. Sauper had incredible stories to tell us about the aftermath of the film. The one that stood out for me was about the night he was at the Oscars (“Darwin’s Nightmare” was nominated for an Academy Award). As a nominee he was picked up from his hotel in a limo with expensive, complimentary

champagne and chocolates. In the midst of this pampering, he received a call from one of the characters in his film that had to flee Tanzania as a result of the backlash the Oscar nomination had caused. It was only when the film became successful that the Tanzanian government became really upset and began the hate campaign against the filmmaker. Long story short, Sauper spent the following two years in court rooms fighting the film he made. Perhaps this story is not directly relevant to the importance of drama in a documentary but it does demonstrate that the price you pay for some documentaries goes beyond the years spent making one. I attended Sauper’s masterclass within the context for a development program in which my new documentary is being developed. I’m currently developing a film about Islamic schools in Pakistan. As a subject, this could go either way. I could make a sensationalist documentary about “radicals” living inside “terrorist factories” but because I hope to make a film that is visceral, I have to be prepared that I’m in it for the long haul. Because

I want the viewer to experience life inside an Islamic school, I need to pick one. It cannot be about “madrassas” (the name given to these schools). It has to be about a specific one that has a name, location and, most importantly, men and boys living inside it. Men and boys who believe - for better or worse - that one should dedicate their lives to God. Because it’s important to take a journey into the hearts and minds of such people, I must now select a few characters and really get to know them before I can ask an audience to get to know them. Whether the global audience comes out still thinking these people are radicals is another story but the point is that I try to show the people of the “madrassa” as individuals with hopes, dreams and fears of their own. In short, this will take the next two years of my life and even then the film will probably be seen by not more than a few thousand people. It is during moments like these that I ask myself, why am I doing this again? And what I say to comfort myself is: we all have to do our part. I just hope there won’t be any court cases.

FAS HIO N

modelPantharee makeupSarah photographyTaraAtkinson

FASHIONTARAATKINSON

100

FASHIONTARAATKINSON

102

FASHIONTARAATKINSON

104

FASHIONTARAATKINSON

106

FASHIONTARAATKINSON

108

FASHIONTARAATKINSON

112

FASHIONTARAATKINSON

114

MUSIC

A LIFE OUT OF MUSIC INTERVIEW WITH TIM HASSALL by TOM PAYE

116

QUINT’S TOM PAYE CATCHES UP WITH TIM HASSALL, THE ACOUSTIC SENSATION WHO HOPES TO BREAK THE USA THIS YEAR. I sit in a crowded coffee shop. Perched opposite is one of Dubai’s most accomplished singer/songwriters. With the sounds of clinking crockery and chattering customers invading our conversation, it’s hard to hear each other. And things aren’t made any easier by the various televisions strategically placed on each wall. They blast the unending, deafening drone of a thousand vuvuzelas accompanied by an eclectic commentary. They’re showing Slovakia vs. Italy. We’d forgotten about the World Cup. We thought we’d arranged to meet somewhere quiet. There’s always a worry when conducting an interview. You fret that the person you’re dealing with might be the human equivalent of an impenetrable safe. And that no matter how many questions you ask, you’ll never get down to what makes them tick. But Tim Hassall instantly alleviates my concern. He sits down brandishing an Apple laptop, poised to play songs and videos, to show off social media and website designs. He talks excitedly, unknowing as to what he’ll show me first. He’s come prepared. And he wants me to get a good idea about him before the interview even starts. And I take the cue. Hassall has been on the Dubai music scene for years. He’s played regular, big-venue gigs with his band, Tim Hassall and the August Company, which was awarded the title of “Best Local Band in Dubai” at the Time Out Nightlife Awards 2010. His solo work has gained similar praise; he was proclaimed, “Best Alternative Act” by Time Out in 2009, and if you’ve seen Ali F. Mostafa’s poignant film, City of Life, you may have noticed that the end credits roll to the sweet melody of Hassall’s song, “Price to be Paid”. Predictably, he doesn’t come across as your regular nine-to-five guy. He began playing music at the age of four, first taking recorder lessons and then graduating to the saxophone. It wasn’t until he was twelve that he picked up a guitar. But given the musical background,

he was always going to be a fast learner, and he started writing instantly.

tune and worked around it. And it’s one of my favourite songs.”

Since then he’s made a life out of his music. And, more importantly, he’s made music out of his life. He’s been around the world, from New Zealand to the United States. He spent one summer touring and road-tripping across the southern states with a good friend. He says that they were both in search of something, and he came back knowing that his life was going to revolve around music. Whether or not he succeeds, you can’t imagine him slouched over a desk every day, attempting to ascend the corporate ladder. You can only see him as the central character in the stories he has to tell.

This kind of writing seems to work well for this musician. He describes different ways of coming up with ideas, like writing a poem and then fitting a tune to it, or carefully constructing a melody on the guitar. But what he really tries to do is encompass a particular feeling or event with his music. The song, “Price to be Paid” is a snapshot into life in Dubai. And there are no prizes for guessing the muse behind, “Texas Sunset”.

“We didn’t pay for any accommodation,” he says of his tour. “We only paid to stay on camp grounds, or slept in the car. One night we were out at this bar in Greenville, Mississippi. Everyone had farms, so we were dropping hints about being able to camp on their grounds. But it wasn’t happening.

“IT GETS TO ONE IN THE MORNING, AND I’M JUST REALLY TIRED. I ENDED UP ASKING THIS LADY IF WE COULD SLEEP IN OUR CAR, PARKED IN THE STREET JUST OUTSIDE THE BAR AND SHE SAYS TO ME, ‘I THINK IF YOU SLEEP IN YOUR CAR, YOU’RE GOING TO GET MURDERED.’ That night we checked into a motel. It was the dirtiest place. There were roaches everywhere. But it was the best 45 bucks I’ve ever spent.” Hassall passes me his studio headphones so that I can hear what’s playing over the roar of our venue, and treats me to a song from the upcoming album entitled, Little Black Dress. It’s extremely soft. And if I weren’t paying attention I’d dismiss it as background music. But after a couple of seconds’ close listening, I’m enthralled. It’s beautiful. “I wrote that song in about 45 minutes,” he says afterwards. “I went out to this party, determined to get home for about 10. Anyway, there’s this cute girl there, and I end up staying out until eight in the morning. And I woke up the next day and just thought, ‘All it takes is a little black dress, and I’m a mess.’ “And I loved that line, so I grabbed a cup of tea, sat down outside, made a

And this isn’t surprising when you consider Hassall’s influences. He cites people like Bob Dylan and Jeffery Lewis – the kind of musicians that sing with frank words – and you can imagine them working in the same way. If there’s a strong feeling on the mind or the heart, then these are the guys that are going to most aptly put it into song. Hassall’s first studio album, Oh Restless Heart, will be out early September. And it was made possible with the help of several different artists, all from different backgrounds. There’ll be a range of different songs, and he took it over to the USA to be professionally mastered. It’s not easy or cheap to put something like this together and it just goes to show the kind of dedication that the man is willing to put into his music. And now that he’s conquered Dubai, Tim has left to America to pedal the new album. There doesn’t seem to be a better place for him. As our coffee cups empty and the bill is brought over, he leaves with me a final thought on the place that’s soon to be his home. “People there are really open and friendly,” he says. “Nobody likes to be treated differently, and as long as you go out there with respect, you’ll make good friends. And there’s so much live music there. There are countless bars and clubs. They just love live music in America. And that’s why I love it.” All quint can say is, good luck Tim. If anyone deserves to make over there, it’s you.

Keep a look out for Tim Hassall’s album, Oh Restless Heart, this September. It’ll be available on all good online stores. For a taste of the music, visit either http://www.myspace.com/ timhassallmusic or http://timhassall.com

MUSIC

by ZAINA SHREIDI

ABSOLACE INTERVIEW

Absolace is the result of truly musical, and highly diverse, souls coming together and creating art through self-expression and raw talent. Unlike other bands both locally and abroad, Absolace as a band doesn’t try to sell you something it’s not, nor does it try to emulate any of their peers. Shedding the restrictions of trying to fit under a label or genre, as well as the stigma of emulating role models and idols, Absolace is a breath of fresh air in a music scene that is usually hazy and bland. They are not under any sort of misguided illusions, nor do they carry around hefty egos, both rarities when speaking to musicians, they are simply a group of guys who make music simply because it’s what they love to do. Absolace was founded in 2007 and is made up of a diverse group of guys, with Nadim Jamal on vocals, Jack Skinner on guitar, Ben Harris on bass, Kyle Roberts on keys, synths, and samples, and band founder Greg Cargopoulos on drums and percussion. After attending their very impressive second gig (ever) as a band, we caught up with Greg, Nadim and Jack to discuss how they can simultaneously be the self-dubbed “Dark Horses of the Dubai Music Scene” while remaining calm as pussycats...

photography TARA ATKINSON

118

MUSIC So, let’s start with musical influences… Any bands that you associate with or have inspired you as a band? Greg: We all like Tool, Porcupine Tree, and Opeth – together those are the only bands we all agree on. Although we have our own influences as well Nadim: It’s not like the rest are despised by one member or another, but the main ones we agree on are those three. When I heard you guys, I thought tool perfect circle, although you didn’t follow their style but there were some similarities that could be drawn, like the rawness – both emotionally and musically. Greg: We’ve got a mix, a good balance of progressive metal that is also ambient at times. Nadim: We had at different times during each given song where the same person head banging in the crowd would later be swaying slowly, which was cool, they went through the levels in the song. Would you classify yourself as any genre? Greg: We always argue about this, our fans argue about it too, different people classify us in different ways. Our bass player Ben Harris says alternative, metal heads say progressive metal, progressive rock. It’s a good thing though. Nadim: The easiest way to classify us is progressive rock. Progressive metal is a bit more technical usually, like Dream Theatre or Symphony X. We don’t show off with what we’re doing. So I can say we are progressive rock, like Porcupine Tree. Greg: Moments are metal, moments are the opposite of metal, it’s because we try to move from one type of thing to another Jack: One band that’s a big influence is Mashuggah.

120

WE DID THIS ALBUM IN A STRANGE WAY – WE RECORDED DRUMS BEFORE ANYTHING AND THEN BASED EVERYTHING ON THE DRUMS, THE RHYTHM. Greg: They don’t sound like us, but they are a rhythmically orientated band and are experimental at times – we don’t sound like them but we don’t think of melody and harmony when we do rhythm, which is similar to their process. Jack: We did this album in a strange way – we recorded drums before anything and then based everything on the drums, the rhythm. Nadim: We’ve all agreed that although this time we aren’t going to move away from basing the song on rhythm, each song will be different, written differently, etc. Like some will be based on drums, some based on

guitar and vocals, and some could just materialize from a jam session. It’s good to experiment. Jack: We looked at this first album as a guinea pig, we didn’t know how it would come out but it put us on the map and it got our sound out there. People in the crowd were commenting on your style and your talent… You could tell the crowd is into it, the way they move to the music and got really into it. Nadim: We had really good feedback. We all invited people who don’t necessarily listen to this kind of music who liked it and people online

but more loyal fanbase rather than loads of people who like one song. We want people who will stay with us for years. Nadim: It’s not like any of us are under any silly illusions that we are going to be a world famous band, but for me it’s the opportunity and joy of being a part of a productive, active performing recording writing band, within reasonably sized audience. Jack: You do it because you love doing it, if you didn’t, you wouldn’t be. Greg: If we ever want to get more fans its not to have fans – it’s to play gigs. Nadim: Having said that, we are trying to promote ourselves because the thing is that it costs a lot money to do what we do, we need people to buy tickets, so we promote ourselves to make funding so that it doesn’t become an expensive passion. Jack: Or to just go party and tour. (laughs) Greg: We just want the opportunity to play. So it’s not for the groupies? I thought I saw some. Greg: No… Jack: Actually, yeah – the big blokes who head bang in the front! who listened to it who don’t know us and don’t usually listen to this genre actually liked it because of the softer melodic parts, because it’s not all heavy in your face where you have to head bang or don’t even bother listening to it. With that sort of combination we’ve managed to please a wider audience… Greg: When we were putting the band together we knew that we wanted a singer not a screamer. Someone energetic, but not a screamer. Nadim: We are like Opeth in that way, although they go astronomically heavier and more beautiful than we do or than we’ve managed to do yet,

but after all they’re Opeth. But before I even met Greg and Jack I was into the same genre and was influenced really heavily by Opeth’s style. Are you trying to reach people who don’t listen to this type of music? Greg: It’s a coincidence actually. We didn’t try to do it but it’s just our taste – I love Opeth and Porcupine Tree most when they are singing. I didn’t think as many people would like it as they do now… Jack: We aren’t trying to reach people but if they like it even better. Greg: What we really want is a smaller

Have you been on the radio here or abroad? Greg: We have been on the radio once in Dubai and three stations internationally but specific to our genre which include UK stations Progulous and arFM as well as Aiiradio which is in the US. Nadim: We also have gotten a lot of radio time in Lebanon now in preparation for the Anathema concert that we will be opening on the 18 of September. There’s a big metal scene in Beirut, it’s totally different from here.

MUSIC

SERIOUSLY THOUGH, YOU RUIN CHEMISTRY AND STUFF WHEN YOU KEEP CHANGING BAND MEMBERS.

122

So are you going to be staying here in Dubai or take the band and running with it – literally? Greg: Well it’s quite hard to relocate the band. Jack: We all work here; we need to all support ourselves. Greg: If it’s just extra pocket money it’s not enough to move us all around but we are actually looking into CD distribution in Beirut. Nadim: We are all going to stay in the region – Dubai or region as a base, in three years if we’re still together even if I move to Lebanon this is something I would want to maintain. I don’t think the band is going to up and go to LA because fact of the matter is, whatever you do in Dubai is easier for people to recognise here rather than abroad. This is why Dubai is a great place and at the same time it can be a bit boring… What do you think of the music scene here? Greg: To be honest when we were writing the album I completely shut away from the music scene here. Nadim: It’s an infantile scene, but the country, especially Abu Dhabi and older Dubai, simply has the money to attract international acts to do big shows. There actually isn’t a large enough audience to rely on ticket sales. The underground scene is ridiculously underdeveloped, and the people involved in it aren’t working together. They are all working on their own things, some are under-qualified and some are semi-qualified. But the bands here do support each other. Jack: Yeah all the bands really support and encourage each other; they’re all really cool guys. Nadim: Although there are also really cheesy bands. The bands that have it right really have it right, but the others can be really cheesy.

Has the line-up changed at all with you guys? Have you gone through many band members until you got to where you are? Greg: We haven’t gone through lots of people but we do use a session bass player when Ben isn’t available but no one has left or been kicked out. Nadim: I’m working on it though! Greg: Yeah they’re giving me my letter next week, or is it going to be a text message? Nadim: No it’ll be a missed call and you’ll have to call back to get fired… (laughs) Jack: Seriously though, you ruin chemistry and stuff when you keep changing band members. Greg: We were very careful when we chose the band members. Nadim: It’s really like any other relationship; in the beginning you’re calm as a pussycat… (laughs) Nadim: After a little while you get at each other and sometimes you’d get close to ripping each other’s heads off. But in the end sometimes you have to back down and compromise just so that you can work properly together and sometimes you get your way, sometimes you don’t… Jack: Yeah but in the end Nadim is calm as a pussycat… (laughs) Greg: We haven’t had many issues with each other though. The biggest challenges would be like pressure of an upcoming gig or recording deadlines… So you recorded at a studio here in Dubai? Greg: No we recorded everything in my bedroom except the drums, which we recorded at In the Mix studio. All: BEST STUDIO IN DUBAI!

Have you gone to anyone for promotion or help with the getting your name out there? Greg: There is a girl who helps us out, she’s the official wife of the band and she basically helps promote us in the region. Nadim: She is a friend of mine and she basically offered to do PR for us and help us out free of charge which was great. Because of her sending this stuff everywhere we basically skipped a year of going through shit… Yeah it really seems like you came out of nowhere… Nadim: We have only been officially launched for about a month and half. Greg: We actually made a point of not mentioning anything until we recorded the album because so many people go around saying they’re in a band but never do anything so we basically decided to keep everything confidential until we had the album ready. Nadim: Yeah at first I didn’t agree because I was so excited I wanted to go around and tell everyone but keeping things confidential was definitely the right move. Greg: Yeah we were the “Dark Horses of the Dubai Music Scene” and we’d like to do that again this time. Like we won’t tell anyone until the album is done – we’ll just announce it when it’s ready. The bands I consider heroes do the same thing, they don’t make any kind of fuss or announcements until its ready and you just get so excited because it’s there and you didn’t expect it. Jack: Yeah you feel like a kid again and you just can’t wait to go and get the new album from your favourite band! Do you think your style or your process will change in future albums? Nadim: In steps forward, like with future songs, we have introduced an acoustic guitar which we didn’t do

MUSIC before, some drone influenced songs, and other things that have been a new part of the process of song writing for us. For the lyrics, usually I write the lyrics and the guys break them down, they consult on that. So Ben does backing vocals right? Greg: Yeah, he’s a great singer... Jack: Ben is the best musicianship on the album. Greg: Ben came quite late, after the album was done and he came to audition with us, but it was more for him because we knew what a great musician he is and we were basically asking him to play with us. And comparing when he first jammed with us to two months later he basically took all of us and turned us upside down and helped us out. He inspired us musically and basically tore our playing to pieces, told us what we were doing wrong and he really saved our band. Jack: When we got to the live situation where we tried playing and we were like f***... Greg: I can’t thank the guy enough, his standard of playing is much higher than all of us and if in a live situation there’s a leader in the band, it’s him. Jack: We do really count on him. Greg: Also Rami, from Abri, also helped us out a lot when he played with us and gave us lots of suggestions and helpful hints. Nadim: They are both really very professional musicians. They’ve been focusing on making music as a living and so they brought the element of professionalism that really allowed us to record and put it in a live scenario which is not easy at all…

I THINK THE BEST WAY TO WRITE IS TO DO IT, LET IT GO, AND ALTER LATER. LIKE I’D RECORD THE FIRST THING I’D SING AS A DEMO BECAUSE THAT’S USUALLY THE BEST. musicians who just worry about how they sound, rather than the band as a whole. It’s important to make sure that you are doing your part and you keep an ear out for everyone else because it’s a group effort to really make the songs sound great.

Have you had any significant “lessons learned” along the way?

Have you found it difficult to keep a level of variance between the songs?

Nadim: We’ve all been doing this for a long time, since we were about 15, and we’ve learned to actually support each other and learn patience as well, especially with recording… Greg: I can’t stand individualist

Jack: If you start trying really hard to do something, you don’t come out with what you want. So if you are trying hard to make each song sound different from the next, it just won’t happen. Greg: If you write instinctively it comes

124

out much better. Nadim: I think the best way to write is to do it, let it go, and alter later. Like I’d record the first thing I’d sing as a demo because that’s usually the best. Raw recordings are usually pretty great. Jack: Although this album was pretty weird because we were all in different places at different times. Greg: We were all just putting in various ideas at different times because we were all over the place.

dynamics that are brought out through jazz. Jazz does have a natural grip on rhythm but in terms of how I will play my harmonies melodies, they will have additional jazz influences. Nadim: I think what the jazz influence will add to this is that a normal progression in a song will end on an amazing note that really sells it and isn’t what a normal rock band would do. Jack: It’ll definitely keep you on your feet. That’s a pretty interesting mix, progressive rock with a jazz influence! Greg: Well it is more of an indirect influence. In my opinion jazz is the best thing I ever heard that depicted a mood out of rhythm. Like with a guitar or piano you can pick out a mood out of the sound, whether it’s expressing melancholy or joy or confusion, but it’s hard to do it with rhythm and the first time I’ve ever heard it is with jazz music. A drummer or bass player can actually express different moods with their instruments. It’s pretty crazy when you hear it for the same time Jack: I think one big thing I want to put into music jazz has a great sense of consonance but the consonance is really pretty because of dissonance. So some things will sound off to make the good things sound better which makes the bad bits sound good….. Greg: If you listen to jazz a lot you get a grip on musical space... Nadim: Now though that we have the album out and have seen what has come out of it, we are all much more motivated to keep going. We all care about doing things for the sake of the band. Any band that has worked hard to create real, original music knows that it’s a lot of work, and there’s no way around it. Very true! So, Jack, I’ve heard you’re quite influenced by jazz... Jack: My jazz influence didn’t come out very much in this album. Greg: Being influenced by jazz in general though does not necessarily

mean songs will end up sounding jazzy, it’s just that jazz is about no rules when you’re making music because when it came about, it was supposed to be the opposite of classical music. Classical music had a lot of strict guidelines and compositional technique and jazz basically broke all the rules. Jazz helps you get in the frame of mind that there are no rules to stick to. Jack: When I was younger I really enjoyed jazz music, and now I’m not a natural metal player but what I can say is that with what I’m going to start doing now in my own personal stuff, there will be a lot more textural

Trippy...

Check out Absolace’s first album Resolve[d] available in all Virgin Megastores in the UAE and Lebanon, www.cdbaby.com, and www. amazon.com. Visit www.Absolace.net for more details.

MUSIC

PHOTOS: DON HUNSTEIN © SONY BMG ENTERTAINMENT

126

MOHAMED EL AMIN

HOW MILES DAVIS’ KIND OF BLUE IS MORE LIKE KIND OF BLAND & OTHER OBSERVATIONS

MUSIC

THAT’S NONSENSE.

(Because Charles Mingus - The Black Saint & Sinner Lady is the greatest jazz recording.) Don’t get me wrong, Miles deserves the utmost respect, as band leader, an innovator, trumpeter, and talent seeker. Endless numbers of jazz musicians (most notable of all being John Coltrane) graduated from the Miles School Of Jazz, and would’ve probably never made it if not for the fact they played in one of Miles’ quintets, so even if you disliked Miles’ trumpet, you still have to give him props for that. But that doesn’t change the fact Kind Of Blue is (at best) a “decent” jazz outing. I still hold the record close to heart for a variety of reasons, but no matter how much of a fan boy I am, Kind Of Blue is severely over hyped (which is something I’ve done a fair number of times in the past) and undeservingly so.

SO I’M PRETTY SURE EVERYONE HAS, OR HAS HEARD OF MILES DAVIS’ KIND OF BLUE, HAILED BY MANY AS THE GREATEST JAZZ RECORDING OF ALL TIME, A GEM THAT’S UNPARALLEL BY ANYTHING, WITHIN ITS GENRE OR OUTSIDE IT. I MEAN, ITS MILES MAN! IT MAY EVEN BE THE GREATEST MUSICAL RECORDING OF ALL TIME!

128

You see this is what happens a good portion of the time: a person wants to enter the world of jazz. The first recommendation that comes up is Kind Of Blue or John Coltrane - A Love Supreme (which are for the most part, Good Jazz 101. But there are far more effective and outstanding recordings that make for better and more enjoyable intros to jazz). But that’s it. If anything, it leads to the colossus error of starting and stopping (by that, I mean purchasing one record and thinking it’s as good as the genre will get). The same thing happens in soul with Marvin Gaye - What’s Going On and grunge with Nirvana - Nevermind, thereby halting ones adventures and exploration in the realms of jazz. A huge error when you think of the bottomless well that jazz is. Now, I won’t hold this against Kind of Blue or A Love Supreme, it’s not Miles’ or Trane’s fault. But there are superior jazz recordings that can serve as an introduction, and simply put there are much better albums; Kind of Blue is mediocre, and people need to stop acting as if it is the pinnacle of jazz, because it really isn’t.

MUSICALLY SPEAKING, IT IS NOT THAT IMPRESSIVE: BASS Paul Chambers, dull. Very, very dull. I, for one, am a bass fanatic, and I’ve never heard more basic and unexciting bass playing such as this in my life. It’s not that it’s bad, but it’s limiting. SAX John Coltrane. Now I LOVE Trane; he’s one of my favourite saxophone players alongside Joe Henderson, Cannonball Adderley, Rahsann Roland Kirk, Yusef Lateef and Eric Dolphy. But again, this is Trane’s most forward and least exciting effort in his esteemed career. His playing is mediocre to the point of cheer boredom. So okay I understand, he still wasn’t THE Trane yet, he still was a session musician for the most part and had only joined the Miles Davis Quintet recently, but still, his playing is extremely limited in terms of originality. Now imagine if he was substituted with Sonny Rollins...yeah, now THAT would’ve rocked the house.

DRUMS Jimmy Cobb. Ummm...is this guy even alive while recording? Piano: Bill Evans. Let’s all take a bow for this man shall we? One of the finest pianists to ever march this land, and certainly the main aspect of Kind Of Blue that is truly enjoyable. If Evans was not present, this recording would have been gathering dust in one of Columbia’s vaults.

important jazz figures and pretty much inspired every single musician that came after them. But that still doesn’t change the fact it’s a “meh” at best if you ignore the legendary aspects and hype. It’s not a perfect record; it’s not a groundbreaking record. It is, simply put, plain.

TRUMPET Miles Davis. Sweet and tender, but that’s pretty much it.

Having established that Kind Of Blue is not all that, it still is an influential jazz recording. There exist in jazz two recordings that took the concept of Kind Of Blue, re-arranged it, enhanced and expanded it to a much greater extent than Miles Davis and his quintet. And they are:

In essence, Kind Of Blue is of importance not for its musical quality, but for its informative and educational aspect (much like how Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker - Bird & Diz teaches everyone of the importance of the old jazz school greats, but as a standalone recording, is pretty dull). It is in no way deserving of a full score many stamp to it (I’m guilty myself of that one in the past). So okay, it features Miles and Trane. Sure, they are two of the most

And now, to the point of this thread (and the pimping)...

OLIVER NELSON - THE BLUES & THE ABSTRACT TRUTH

WAYNE SHORTER - SPEAK NO EVIL

MUSIC PHOTO: CHUCK STUART

OLIVER NELSON THE BLUES & THE ABSTRACT TRUTH First of all, Nelson gets no respect. One of jazz’s finest composer/ arrangers with a bulk of imagination and innovation equal to his talent as a saxophonist (both Alto and Tenor). One of the lead musicians who managed to merge hard bop with blues to the most outstanding effect. He stands on equal ground with the great Charles Mingus. You see, what makes a composer/arranger good is that they combine their concepts based first and foremost on the strengths and weakness of the musicians that will play it. That understanding leads to the players being as comfortable and satisfied as could be, leading them to reaching their full potential, which then leads to the composer’s ideas coming to life with as much human strength as possible. The reason why I call this the second coming of Kind of Blue, is the fact that Nelson incorporated two of the musicians in the original line up; Paul Chambers. Hurrah!...well, maybe not. He’s a solid bassist and provides all the rhythmic support needed along with drummer Roy Haynes, but he never dares to explore his range, and I simply hate it when jazz bassists do that. Come on man! Play a solo or something, take the spot light! Don’t just stand there and thump a few chords, you make Mingus sad. But more importantly, the great Bill Evans tags along for the ride, and quite frankly, that aspect alone is enough to make any record good, if not great. Evans’ down-right spiritual and melodic keys set all the traffic in the right direction. If angels played piano, this is what it would sound like. And that’s not it; the most underestimated and exceptionally talented Freddie Hubbard, who quite

130

frankly, is a better trumpeter than Miles and easily the best trumpet player of all time. (Yeah, I said it.) There is a very good reason why he was dubbed “The Man”, and that is because he is the man. Freddie’s trumpet is spot on, loud without being chaotic, peaceful without being dull and full to the brim. In many portions of the songs you’ll feel as if there were two, if not three, trumpeters playing along. But it’s all Freddie doing what he does best: blaring his heart and soul out. If that wasn’t enough to stir up your appetite, looky here then! None other than ol’ Eric Dolphy is present playing both sax and flute! Now this might make me look like a fan boy, but Dolph’s presence in any set is enough to generate a 4/5 rating for the recording. Dolphy’s career was short due to his untimely passing, but his talent and recordings are still hailed among the finest in music, and for a damn good reason. No one mastered the bass clarinet, alto sax and flute like Dolphy did (save Yuseef Lateef experimentations with the flute). Dolphy’s musicianship is completely brilliant, insane, strikingly whacky, powerful and explosive. Not that his playing overshadows Nelsons’, far from it. It generates a harmonic contrast with Nelson’s minimalist and obscure note choice and delightful child like tones. Soft, soulful and eloquent. That’s what it’s all about.

The Blues & The Abstract Truth pushes jazz to its limits; it’s a pure entity, both profound and simplistic. Its roots may revolve in the blues, but it takes blues, rips it apart and reconstructs it without leaving any stone unturned. It’s vibrant, rich, colourful, soulful, echoing, bluesy, rejoiceful, and simply put, alive in every single aspect.

WAYNE SHORTER SPEAK NO EVIL Super duper vintage early 60’s post hard bop that edged towards the realms of avant-garde jazz, courtesy of one of jazz’s most brilliant and underrated masterminds: Wayne Shorter. Wayne made a name for himself in the music world with his brilliant songwriting; the record even features one of his most successful ballads, “Infant Eyes”. But Wayne is not simply a songwriter who tried to make it in the word of jazz. He’s also a brilliant tenor player with a clearly distinctive style, and worked extensively with The Miles Davis Quartet on Miles Smiles, assisting in the composition and improvisations that made that recording so legendary. Also featured in this record is the ever so majestic and repeated guest in this series, the great Freddie Hubbard. And I’ve raved about the man quite a bit, but merger of his trumpet with Wayne’s tenor sax is just cool, very, very cool. The mixture of mellow harmony with dance melodies is spectacular and they made a strikingly sharp and consistent team. The first thing that you will notice when you pop in this record, and are through listening to it is the rhythm section. It’s chaotic, powerful, full of density and tosses everything in but the kitchen sink. And boy does it liven everything up. The man with the sticks is Elvin Jones, who quite frankly is one of the main reasons “Speak No Evil” record is this dramatic. His drum work fully portrays his remarkably unique daring intensity when it comes to jazz drumming, something that is only comparable to Art Blakely’s own. On bass, Mr. Ron Carter! This man is the sole reason why Wayne and Herbie Hancock dared to travel beyond the hard bop styles that ruled the period

where the legendary drummer played with the Miles Davis Quintet. His innovative musical approach, ability to command the stage with his bass and musical contribution is not to be taken lightly. And on piano, my main man, Herbie freaking Hancock. The only term that could describe this man to a certain extent is the engine of harmony. Now many jazz heads dislike Herbie for his more commercial approach to jazz music and catering to the public at times, but that’s silly gibberish. As much as he tried to switch the mainstream market towards jazz, he’s musical approach and works were solid, characteristic, pleasant, serious and a breath of fresh air. All you have to do is check out his marvellous catalogue, starting from the fantastic jazz/funk fusion in Head Hunters to the stormy Maiden Voyage. His playing is exceptionally lively and contrasts extremely with Evan’s more timid style. What sets Speak No Evil from many other jazz recordings is the fact that it is all about composition. These are five of jazz’s finest musicians to ever grace the land and show the reason why. The music isn’t about each musician trying to showcase his solo ability; instead, each musician joins in weaving a blanket of sound that was inspiration to many musicians soon to follow. They shaped the new jazz movement which took all the basics

that they had learned from the prior generation, and expanded upon them. “Speak No Evil” is not merely a collection of sound, it is a unique record that reflected an intriguing moment in musical history when a record actually revolutionized and escalated a musical genre. Combining the intensity and musical properties of hard bop, the spacious and spazzy qualities of swing with much more spacious musical scales, intervals, melodic layering of beats and unusual harmony use gave birth to the new cool. Never has jazz been so sharply defined yet full of freedom and form. Wayne Shorter’s leadership is something to marvel at; his faith in every musician lead him to give each one their rightful chance to shine, and shine they did. This is intellectual jazz, this is groovy jazz, and this is brilliant jazz. It honestly does not get any more refreshing or classical than this.

MUSIC

JANE

IMER A L AN DISC T O IS N VIEW; S I H T RE M U ON I T A ALB NVIT AL I N A IT’S USIC M TO VANA NIR

MON

image source http://never2funky.com

NELLE

NÁE wael x

It is a bit of a challenge to write about an idea that is beyond one’s imagination and potential – but I’ll give it a shot. I love music; I think it has therapeutic powers. But when music takes over your mind, you are left pleasurably anxious. I have always been someone who shuffles and shuffles en route to work, or any journey for that matter. However, my shuffle button has surrendered to Janelle Monáe. Here’s the story… Read further at your own risk, I will not be held responsible if you are transformed as well! READ FURTHER AT YOUR OWN RISK, I WILL NOT BE HELD RESPONSIBLE IF YOU ARE TRANSFORMED AS WELL!

MUSIC I’ve always been a fan of African American songstresses from Chaka Khan to the late Aaliyah . Lately, however, that scene has suffered from lack – both of creativity and flare. Ten years of that tends to leave you bored and uninspired. I recall myself becoming so thirsty for real mu sic, scouting for new music on the pages of underground music blogs and of course, Facebook… That’s where she possessed me , through a Facebook shared link of a video of her 2009 Gra mmy Nominated video, oops, I mean short film, entitled “Many Moons”. I was mesmerized, and I could ask for nothing but mo re of her content… Lucky for me, her new album, The ArchAn droid, was released on May 18, 2010, eight days after my birt hday (a late present!). Born to a janitor and an alcoholi c taxi driver, Monáe may have had a somewhat mediocre upb ringing. One thing is for certain though, there’s nothing about the Grammy-nominated singer and songwriter that is mediocre. Dressed up in a tuxedo in almost every public appearance, Monáe declares that wearing a uniform brings her closer to reality and to the people, allowing them to focus on her art rather than her body and looks. With that in mind, Monáe manages to look nothing less than stunning. The ArchAndroid is Monáe’s follo w up album to her first solo album Metropolis Suite I: The Chase, released in 2007. It comprises of Suites II and III of her complicated story. In these concept albums, Monáe is portrayed as a patient in the “Palace of the Dogs Arts Asy lum”, a state-of-the-art facility for “mutants, lost geniuses and savants”. She is convinced that she is from the year 2719 and was kidnapped by a secret society and genetically used to ma ss produce an android, or a humanoid, called Cindi Mayweath er. Cindi Mayweather is the legenda ry ArchAndroid who is the saviour of Metropolis (or the mo dern USA), a city targeted by an evil organization (the US gov ernment?) that is suppressing its dwellers form expressing love and independence. She uses the power of music and dan ce to eradicate censorship and entice freedom of expression. The ArchAndroid tells many stor ies. Each song on the album is carefully placed and forms a cluster in a chain of events. As a matter of fact, the whole pro ject is so harmonious that if you close your eyes, it’s almost as if you are watching a Bond movie, except there’s a better stor y in this one. The ArchAndroid is a salad of genres mixing pop, funk, art rock, punk-dance, cabaret jazz , and neo-soul. Most of the tracks are produced by Janelle and her creative team, the Wondaland Arts Society.

134

BREAKTHROUGH TRACKS Dance or Die “All these dreams are forever”, Janelle yells throughout the three-minute track where she decides to spit, or rap, instead of sing as she says it conveys the message of the song better. The song features hip-hop visionary poet Saul Williams who outlines the album by dropping theme words. The song tackles the importance of dance, a representative of music as a whole, in fighting depression and “degradation” and empowering education introducing the grand arrival of Janelle’s android alter ego Cindi Mayweather as the saviour, or ArchAndroid. Faster This song has to be one of my all time favourite songs. It seamlessly blends with its predecessor with DJ scratches that makes you want to dance like it’s prom night. “Faster and faster, I should run, faster and faster from your arms”, she sings making clever lyrical references to Greek mythology character Daedalus when she says, “You kill me softly with your sun/You melt my wings and call it fun/I should run..” Janelle’s voice transforms into a neurotic schizophrenic tone where she herself confesses “am I a freak, or just another weirdo”. Tightrope The first single off the album. It talks about how balance must be kept between life’s successes and failures. The James Brown inspired retro funk track is electrifying with a video that forces you to stand up and do the “tightrope” (a dance move where you lift one leg up and twist with the other). The track features Big Boi of Outkast. “Whether you’re high or low, you gotta tip on the tightrope”, she preaches through the chorus. Cold War The second single and probably one of the most emotional songs on the album it hits straight through your heart with megawatts of sentiments. Janelle released a video of this song that consists of a single take and her breaking in tears half way through. She describes her life as a struggle to find her identity and peace of mind and questions what her – listeners- are fighting for in this so called “cold war” with reality. Babopbyeya I cannot think of a more epic way to conclude the album than this track! A classical orchestral symphony like nothing I have heard in the last decade. Although the last track on the album, the almost-nine-minutes song appears to be the showpiece of the album at its own right. It builds up in plot through what appears to be chapters transitioned cleverly with restless musical interludes. It ends with Monáe yearning for her lover whom she has yet to meet, perhaps in the last section of the saga, Suite IV. At only 24, Janelle Monáe introduces herself as a future legend with The ArchAndroid, an almost flawless work. Her talent is inspirational and her art is visionary. The ArchAndroid comes in a time of despair for music lovers, where the scarcity of creativity and talent goes hand in hand with the economic crisis and unemployment. No matter what kind of music you like, you will still appreciate this album as it is a fusion of many genres. “When everything is wrong I dance inside my mind, that’s when I come alive, like a schizo running wild…” – Janelle Monáe in “Come Alive”.

EN E B VE .. A H YOU RNED. WA

MUSIC

Vic Chesnutt’s music is incredibly tough to digest, both to listen and review. His music is alive; a living, breathing organism, that is infinitely haunted by the ghosts, shadows, demons and rust that are lingering and devouring every melody, laying domain atop every word. One cannot logically separate his nihilist, gut wrenching gallows-like humor from his unfortunate disabilities (he was involved in a car crash when he was 19 years old, that left him partially paralyzed with limited mobility and use of his hands, yet he still went on to record more than 15 records in his lifetime) and his lamentable (yet sadly enough, entirely expected) suicide.

BUT THAT’S THE POINT. Vic was a soul that was addicted, to the point of infatuation, to the pus and murk of life. Difficult as it may be, his music and lyrics are intentionally provocative, consistently applying ruthless pressure onto your core, challenging you to adhere and stare at him, at his fragile body and grievous disfigurement, a socially unacceptable act, and to stare at him squarely in the eyes. And in those eyes lay all the pain and hurt and love and hate that would cripple a human spirit. North Star Deserter features, for the very first time in his recording history, a full band. And a finer band couldn’t have been assembled. Guy Picciotto, of Fugazi fame, alongside the entirety of Thee Silver Mount Zion Memorial Orchestra & Tra-La-La collective, join in arms to support the gloomridden soundtrack of Vic’s life. A poignant combination of strings, keys and electric further intensifying the confrontational and troubling aspect of the album. Case and point; in erupting the wave of noise that is “Debriefing”, a track that manages to capture the raw and despair inducing trademark sound of both Fugazi and ASMZ. But, despite the presence of a remarkable supporting band, the limelight still remains on Vic, whose cataclysmic brand of song-writing and distinctly shattered voice still carries the record to soaring heights, or rather, crushing lows. No clearer example can be named more than “Marathon”, where Vic’s voice and guitar leads you into a frank tale of the man’s life, wishes and failures. And if you listen intently, you can even hear his trembling half-functioning hands plucking at the strings. In those instances, the band merely provides complementary backdrop of the scene, further adding to the isolation evoked by Vic’s voice. His beautiful humanity and beautiful damaged lyricism pierces through your heart, both cynical and mocking, shown considerably in “You Are Never Alone”:

136

“IT’S OK, YOU CAN TAKE A CONDOM. IT’S OK, YOU CAN TAKE VALTREX. AND IT’S OK,YOU CAN GET AN ABORTION, AND THEN KEEP ON KEEPING ON” and “Splendid”):

“SPLENDIDLY FULL OF LIFE WANDERING THE COUNTRYSIDE”

Vic is forever imprisoned in his tattered frame, while most of all issues can be mended by our own selves. Self pitying? Yes. But that’s the core of it. Vic doesn’t shy away from a personal short coming and failure. Any line such as that would’ve failed miserably if sung by someone else but (other than) Vic. North Star Deserter stands as my all-time favourite Chesnutt record, a statement that is both the height of praise (for all his records are superb) and quite troubling, considering how gutting this album is. Depressing, overwhelming and unbearably sincere; North Star Deserter achieves the highest pinnacle of what music (and art in all its forms) should (and must): challenge your entire understanding, perception and most intimate thoughts with sheer unparalleled humanity.

YOU WILL BE SORELY MISSED, VIC.

“IT AIN’T OVER TIL IT’S OVER, JUST LIKE SOME JOKER SAID. WHEN IT’S OVER IT IS DONE AND WHEN IT’S DONE IT’S AS GOOD AS DEAD IT WAS FUN WHILE IT LASTED NOW IT’S ALL TURNED TO DUST”.

music

Trevor Bundus There are certain bands in the world that stay true to their core sounds. AC/DC has managed to survive on having a distinctive sound and that has not really changed over the years. As I Lay Dying is another band that has stayed true to its original sound. Some people knock this, but there is something to be said for staying true to original ideals. Not every band is looking to reach each end of their creative spectrum, and I respect that. There is also something comforting in knowing that when you buy an album, you know exactly what you are in for. If you do not know who As I Lay Dying is, they are easily classified in the metal genre. This band is ideal for those who

138

appreciate technically complex guitar and drum work, and the guitar players and drummer in this band are absolute geniuses. Each song they have composed is driven by the blazing guitar riffs and stylish guitar solos, and this album is no different; the guitars and the drums stand out above all else, and the lyrics on this album are excellent. The title of the album, The Powerless Rise, is not in reference to some socio-economic revolution, but rather a positive way to bring change into the world. The lyrics call for a humble beginning to the way human beings treat each other as the artists strive to promote a gaining of power through the removal of all the negative methods for doing so,

such as aggression, brute force, manipulation, humiliation and the like. Many people do not understand this type of music, as it sounds aggressive, but when you really listen to the lyrics and the way they are delivered you quickly realise that the songs are a vehicle for positive change. That is what I love most about heavy music. This album is an overall must purchase, based not only on the technical beauty, but also on the ideas that it hopes to spread. I suggest that while you listen to the songs, you read the lyrics and understand why such a serious sound fits so well with such a serious topic. Just open your mind to a new delivery and you will soon find yourself loving As I Lay Dying. I certainly do.

Beyond our Suffering

The start of this sound is a pretty cool way to set the tone of the album. It sounds as though there are crowded street noises, from which the singer comes crashing into your ears; As I Lay Dying certainly wastes no time in coming at you directly. The lyrics waste no time either as they discuss how the human condition must learn to change the hard way. I personally agree with the message of putting your problems into perspective by comparing yourself to those less fortunate. So next time you feel the weight of the world on your shoulders, imagine how others are feeling. That is very powerful. As far as the song goes, it is a very raw introduction, complete with many background screams and a couple of terrifying guitar solos. The structure is quite simple, yet the message is delivered effectively.

Anodyne Sea

This is a closer return to the usual sounds of As I Lay Dying, quite similar to their previous album, An Ocean Between Us, which drives the melody into the song. The mix of melodic choruses sung with high pitches, coupled with the screaming of the lead singer is a nice mix. This album speaks volumes to me. I am a big believer in standing true to your convictions even when they are not popular. Conformity is the death of the human spirit and intellect. It takes human beings with conviction and belief to make changes. This song addresses that point directly. The bass drums in this song are unbelievable, you cannot help but notice how fast and crisp the sound is.

Parallels

It just gets better and better. The world would be a better place if we would all stop trying to make other people change into what we want them to be. We should instead focus on realising that we are different and accepting humans for who they are. It is often hard to do that with frustration breathing down your neck, and that is where music and lyrics come in so handily. They are constant reminders to rethink the way we look outwardly to the world. In the end, we are

all here to subside in our own way. Musically, the opening of this song is so infectious it almost warrants a skip back to the beginning just to hear the riffs again. I watched this band live at Dubai Desert Rock Festival, and the ease with which these guitar players do what they do is mind boggling, they just walk around the stage as if it was a stroll in the park.

Anger and Apathy

Melodic opening for such a driven album so far. A little change of pace is needed after being mind blasted, and of course the tempo picks itself right up; however, the dynamics are well timed. The chorus could have matched the variation of the tune a bit better; it seems bland comparatively. Again, the lyrics come through positively, staying true to the overall theme of the album. The breakdown in the middle is an excellent pause, but again had the chorus been revamped, it could have been a much better song overall. It’s a nice attempt at a metal ballad, but falls somewhat short.

Condemned

The beginning of this song is epic. Mixing alternate picking techniques with pinch harmonics is borderline genius. The antiwar overtones are just right for the world’s current events. It is always good to see alternative forms of music remaining true to the revolutionary and individualistic spirit of the fan base. If only this could permeate itself into popular music, we would have enough voices to hopefully make some sort of change. Violence and bloodshed of fellow humans is a popular pity these days. The ripping solo and the sharp finish are just what this album needs to pick itself back up.

The Only Constant is Change This is definitely a highlight on the album, the lyrics and tune match perfectly. I will do my best to flaunt the drumming on this track. The fills are technically excellent. I have to say, this drummer is one of the best in the business, his time changes and fills are definitely worthy of notice. To keep time and track of the amount of changes in this

song is not easy, I am sure. I can hardly remember my own name, let alone the structure of a song like this. Bravo! Excellent breakdown as usual. Lyrically it does not stand up to the rest of the album, but I cannot lay blame, since writing lyrics over this type of music cannot be easy.

The Blinding of False Light

More guitars, no...you’re kidding me right? The last track on this album does try to vary it up lyrically. It is nice to hear some spoken word influence coming through. I do not recall hearing that on their prior albums and it might be due to the influence of Killswitch Engage’s Adam D. The As I Lay Dying style is still present, but it is a nice finisher to the album. The slowing down of the chorus is a breath of fresh air; it is almost the perfect closing style to an otherwise speedy album. Now if they had just finished with a solo, life would have been perfect. It has been some time since As I Lay Dying has released an album, as they have been touring quite heavily so it is great to see that they have been able to pen half this album while on the road and come into studio sounding better than ever. As I stated before, they have remained true to their core, but progressed musically in this album. I might prefer An Ocean Between Us for better lyrical variety, but then again, I have had time to let that album sink in and grow on me much more than The Powerless Rise. I rate this album 7 out of 10 if you’re a regular old Joe, but if you are a guitar worshipping metal head, then this will rate much higher. With the betterment of musical talent present in this album fans have much to look forward to for future releases. Overall, any progress is good progress, so I would have to give it the Siskel and Ebert’s of Metal, two thumbs up. This one is worth the few measly dirhams that the depressed economy has left in your pocket.

MUSIC | PLAYLIST

140

Music For Charles Bukowski : You Get So Alone at Times Th at It Just Makes Sense

by Mohamed El Amin

Tracklist: Meursault - Washing Her Hai r Colleen - Everyone Alive Wants Answers Harold Budd - Bell Tower Jasper TX - Bending Spoons Rachel’s - Water From The Sam e Source Hauschka - One Wish Colleen - Goodbye Sunshine Bosques de mi Mente - Nostalg ia Set Fire To Flames - Love Son g For 15 Ontario (W/ Singing Police Car) Eluvium - Zerthis Was A Shiver ing Human Image Synposis: A new mix-tape series I’m sta rting. Music supplement for some of my fav books. First up, Charles Bukowski’s You Get So Alone at Times That It Jus t Makes Sense poetry collect ion. The legend, the master, the ars e. Charles Bukoswki is easily one of the most prolific writes the 20th Century. Normally of associated with the Beat Gen eration for his similar slam poe style, however, he was far bey try ond any of them (yes even Gin sberg and Kerouac. I love the both but I’m not afraid to adm m it this). I love Charles Bukowski. To the point of sheer inane madne ss. We’re talking owning the entire bibliography of works by the dude. That’s over 60 fre aking books. I consider him a kindred spirit, and the epitom e of heart + soul in [i]any[/i] medium. I honestly cannot sta half the poetry out there, but nd Chinaski...Chinaski’s someth ing else entirely. His style was anti-social, drunk, cynical, sar castic,womanizing, gambling, horridly depressing but more so, brimming with honesty and brilliance. If anyone deserves a thread, he does. He didn’t write for himself, he wrote for us. More importantly, [i]me[/ i]. Certainly one of my most ma jor writing influences. His wri ting was simple, honest and always managed to stir a floo d of emotions when reading the m. I shall hold your vigil foreve r, sir.

LITERATURE

When I sat down to write this short piece, I wanted to explain how reading and writing are the same thing. How when you write you are in fact reading and when you read you are really writing. Doesn’t seem interesting anymore though: I still think reading and writing are the same activity. I’ll summarise it and you’re free to interpret it any way you like: when you read, you are writing the story in your own way by imagining it; when you write, you are reading what your thoughts are trying to impose on the screen (or paper) before you write them.

142

Right now, I’m much more interested in telling you about the act of writing, about the art of being vain and proud, about how a love of life leads to better sentences. I started writing three years ago. I wanted to write a novel (still do). At first, I didn’t really know where to start. I just put words to paper (or on the screen), and started over at least ten times, each time doing things differently. At first, I imitated my favourite writers. That didn’t quite get me anywhere: it sounded too much like someone else’s voice, it felt fake, it seemed like something out of some twilight zone. I’d get stuck after the first ten or fifteen thousand words. Most of it felt intensely uninspired, like I was spewing out golden garbage, recycled language. Then, I started reading with a purpose. I picked up on Jack Kerouac, Charles Bukowski, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, and Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s styles. I absorbed Michel Foucault, Jaques Derrida, Edward Said, Roland Barthes, and T.S. Eliot’s ideas and principles. I took in the thought processes and quirks of Franz Kafka, Paul Auster, William Faulkner, and Mahmoud Darwish. I even read between the lines of Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Amin Maalouf, and Neal Stephenson. More to the point, I found learning and inspiration everywhere. And, in between all that, I wrote. Eventually, I realised one essential criterium of a writer. Faulkner says it best, although I could probably come up with a more arrogant statement: “The good artist believes that nobody is good enough to give him advice. He has supreme vanity. No matter how much he admires the old writer, he wants to beat him.”

He wants to beat him. It’s true. Isn’t that why I write, you write, they wrote? To give the world something better than what the ones before us gave.Yes, some became writers by mistake: they had things to say and somebody found a way to publish them. Kafka never wanted to publish what he wrote. Benjamin Franklin (who, by the way, is the most boring interesting person I ever read) didn’t write stories or intend to tell anyone anything. Still, we write to prove a point, to make sure that the ones that came before weren’t better than we are, to ensure that we’re good enough, to supersede the old writer. That is why nobody other than Shakespeare bothered to write Romeo and Juliet, and only Fitzgerald wrote the Gatsby. It’s not that they were the only people that could: it’s just that they did them first and so made it unnecessary for others to try again. One other thing: we are all based on layers of knowledge that we acquire from others, from those we learn from. I became what I am from all that I have experienced in my life, and that’s the best that I can offer anyone, including myself. So, if I feel insufficient, I add more layers. If I want to talk about something, I read about it first. Just like the Structuralists and postStructuralists insisted that reading is a writerly activity, so I say that writing is a readerly activity. Oops, skip back, rewind. I wanted to write a novel about sexuality that didn’t include sex, a story about love that didn’t mention the loved one, and a book about junkies that didn’t have any drugs in it. And I wanted to put it all in one book. And I wanted it to have a purpose, a goal, a useful outcome. Ambitious, no? I never wrote that book. I might, eventually, when I’m fifty. For now, I have decided that my end of day Grouse is immensely more important than a piece of fabled literature. I ignore that one primary ambition. Instead, I read. Today, I’m writing. This article, the other one, a book, the old novel, and

that paper across the street. Point is, words are flowing. I read so much that I can’t read any more. What happened before, when I felt uninspired, was that I was trying to write without having read anything new in a very long time. My new book? It wasn’t inspired by another text or reading. It was inspired by a scene in an airplane. It was inspired by a personal love story, by a family feud, by the mundane, the every day. But everything else around my new addiction came from something I read before. Still, without the reading I could not have started it, written it, or done anything close to it. I still struggle to decide if it’s good enough for me to want to show it off, I still debate whether I should just stop focusing on that kind of writing, wasting energies on something that could never materialise. Except, I can’t really not. I have to tell the world what I want to tell the world. I think that was what Faulkner was talking about, more than anything, when he was interviewed in 1956 by the Paris Review. Supreme vanity is exactly what you need to be ready to face all odds, to continue to work on something that might not actually make the cut. So, point is, even after you’ve read this, when all’s said and written (I hate cliches!), you should just go do whatever the fuck makes you feel right. Because, chances are, I have no clue what I’m writing about. I just think it’s important and you should read it because I’m writing it. You should think it’s important and you should read it because somebody wrote it – who that somebody is doesn’t quite matter. Besides, aren’t first novels always the most revealing a writer can ever publish? It’s that first book that really decides whether the novelist can do it or not. And it’s the only book he writes that’s purely to prove that he can do it. All the others are to prove something else.

LITERATURE

by Fares Bounassif

photography by Adam Erdesz

WALKING FROM NEW YORK TO UNIVERSAL URBANISM: The Imminent Death of the Canon through the Flaneurâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Nomadic Methods as the Final Phases of Postmodernism

144

ooking around us, both literally and metaphorically, we find that we live in a highly globalized, intensely populated world of metropolises. Even those that live in small towns are connected to the immense cosmopolitan social groups of the world: they read the same texts, or can, they absorb the same media, they speak a language used in at least one of the international urban centres, their communication and erudition comes from the same cultural mass that we can see with all clarity throughout the planet. The characteristics of these urban populations are the most interesting and essential elements of modernity, from which we can glean a complete (if absolutes are at all possible) understanding of the currency through which we function and exist. We have, in the span of two centuries, lost our ability to be free, our right to privacy, throzugh our need for safety, stability, accomplishment, and praise. They would tell you: gone are the days of premature deaths, to hell with unjust punishment, and nobody starves to death any more. They also ask you, in return, to conscientiously give them your freedoms through the verbal contract that supersedes the paper signed by their functional ancestors centuries ago: they have reclaimed your rights, but this time they have done it with your permission. So, in turn, you walk through the streets of your urban sprawls, wasted and disillusioned, in search of a new truth, some sense of revelation that has been long lost after the many disappointments the institutions that are to offer you security and salvation have thrown your way. You search for a guide within the big cities, hopeful that one day such a beacon will rise from the dust that settles on sidewalks overnight. Your intellect tries to resist your innate, inane desire to stride for the truth, while constantly failing â&#x20AC;&#x201C; until you become one of the many obscure, elusive truths that others follow in search of the same. You walk, constantly, in order to subconsciously create a culture of anti-panopticism that would, eventually, retrieve that emancipation that democracy and capitalism have long ago lost.

We troll the streets, moving from one place to the next, living as would a settled nomad, touching on this, tasting that, glimpsing the other, until we have briefly established a blurry, panoramic view of our immediate society, until we have momentarily forgone our attachments to our world and become a silent, invisible observer, as does Quinn by the end of

Paul Austerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s City of Glass, before his complete disappearance in that dark room in the Stillman apartment. How could he manage to hide so well in that tiny alley, such that nobody would notice he was there; nobody seemed to even consider looking in his direction? Everybody saw him, thought him another of the many bums in the city, and moved on; somebody saw him, recognized him, but thought it impossible it was him and was too busy to check since time was important to them and wasting it questioning a man that could have, or have not, been the lonely, reclusive writer with no friends, Quinn; nobody noticed him, since they have no reason to stare into dark alleys. There are many likelihoods, each of which is equally vague and disappointing. How can we, the progressively nomadic, be blind to the most essential and real nomads of our own city, of our own texts? For if Quinn was a thread in a book (is he not already?), would we have noticed him had he been as intentionally hidden as some particular

obscurity in a text? The little things that one would find redundant or irrelevant to a grand idea in a novel, the distractions in a text that would be considered insignificant by those that are attempting to find a signified as opposed to the multitude of signifiers: these are the Quinns of our literature and our world; these are the true pleasures of walking in the city.

< We live in a highly globalized, intensely populated world of metropolises. > It is gradually becoming untrue for us to say that we the urbanists do not notice these pleasures; it is becoming rather the norm for us to stroll around the streets of our cities, looking for a new idea and a modern thought. When we read, some of us have even learnt to read into the details, to take pleasure in the text itself rather than attempt to aspire for a greater truth. We now sit in a modern society, a postmodern urbanism that has destroyed prior conceptions. A ten year old will, today, question the validity of your statements due to that childâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s personal understanding and evaluation of a situation: some call this misbehaviour, others applaud it as a final release from the subjugation of the individual and the overpopulation of yes-men.

With the new culture of doubt, the recent rise of a culture of the intelligent, comes a new problem: the people have lost an iconic leadership of thought; they now have to rely on patterns of their own, a responsibility they are not familiar with and often not prepared for. Quinn walks through New York, trying to discover the hidden truth behind Stillman, eventually deciding there has to be one and hiding in the alley in wait of it to reveal itself. Except, it never does. He returns home, only to find he has no home. He eventually decides to settle in the Stillman apartments, in the darkest room of the house, waiting for his inevitable death. In essence, he gives up. How does one make sense of this? Quinn feels betrayed. He relied on the authority of the canon that was the Stillmanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s, the historicity of the work of the detective, certain that there would be a light at the end of the tunnel. Instead, he ended up with a text of shallow thoughts and words, written in an untitled red notebook, carrying no real authority and almost no judgement or opinion throughout. This perplexed him, making him lose his identity as he poured more of himself into his subject. We can consider his persistent stubbornness to stick to old and tried methods similar to those of us that refuse to evolve; we see the most obvious example in the text that is created by Quinn in the Red notebook. Besides the obvious association of the colour of the notebook to the Marxist (or Communist) clash of the classes and the implied break in the status quo that is heavily seen throughout this text, there is a rhizomatic, nomadic, and simplistic character to the shallowness and nonjudgmental natures of the writings.

146

Quinn is faced with a fact that most of us find ourselves approaching every time we try to venture out of the System, each time we find original thought in the masses of conformity and simulations. You carry a thought out of the expected allowed boundaries, it becomes a dangerous, heretical simulacrum with no perceivable simulation. It scares you, since it is foreign to you. It isolates you, since nobody would be willing to understand - or maybe you would quite radically convince yourself that nobody would be, out of fear or lack of resolve to follow through. You, like Quinn, would position yourself in a room, seated in one position, becoming an artefact to be wondered about but not returned to. With this, we find a new death and a new resurrection. Quinnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ultimate death is inevitable, from the days he begins to lose himself in the case and the elder Stillman. Except, what was Stillman Sr. trying to accomplish, with his long, seemingly meaningless, walks around New York? He had mapped out the letters of the Tower of Babel, and as such had disobeyed the order, broken the chains that had forced him away from his obsessive research and made sure that his message was delivered. He, possibly unknowingly, delivered his message through the Red notebook of his invisible stalker. In fact, Quinn had become so invisible that Stillman Sr. could genuinely claim not to remember nor recognize him at their second conversation, nor their third. It is presumed that Stillman is insane. It is pretended that Quinn was a master of disguise. It can even be claimed that Stillman was aware of his stalker. Nevertheless, Stillmanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s purpose is fulfilled, a new mind is induced into the thought patterns of his own, and

he throws himself off the bridge, willing to end his life since everything had then been accomplished. He delivers to Quinn the new form of walking, the new ideas behind urbanism, and the new rebellions against the panopticon. Was Quinn not watching his every move? He could still neither understand his actions, nor stop them, nor find them illegal; through his walks Stillman would still be performing his research and his actions, although declared unwanted and illegitimate by his jailers, punishers, and peers. The thoughts behind the entire text revolve around a postmodern, urbanist ideal that has, since that day, evolved into a much larger realm of thought, exploration, observatism, and objectivity. The time for hiding in our homes and living a life of submissive centralization is gradually fading due, in large, to the little things we do.

< ...the people have lost an iconic leadership of thought... >

We use language that is not codified, through our slang and our broken grammars, to write texts that become eternal through their inexterminable creation; we expend our lives in nonsystematic, unendorsed ways that tend to forgo all expectations and revoke any limitations, sometimes (oftentimes) to our detriment; we resist the system through the use of every possible tool offered us, by the creation of a system of littleness and detail that is irresistible and irrevocable, a program that is too fluid and too shallow for it to be anything but de-centred. Just like Quinn’s centres eventually fall into disintegration, just like the world around him fades into nothingness, such do we, in our literature and our lives, propel ourselves, somewhat gradually, out of the spectrums of colours and into the values of greys. The idea is simple. According to Foucault, the efficiency of disciplinary procedures had to somehow evolve to become the prison, to phase out the spectacle, to create the panopticon. We, as citizens, have now found our own form of discipline, as part of the Foucaudian idea of the efficient evolution of punishment. We have been trained to observe right from wrong according to our governmentally instilled morals that when a government falls out of place, we become the disciplinarian, taking matters of justice into our own hands. We have consistently developed so that we now become the only government necessary, hence revoking the right of government from those we had already placed in authority. Through post-structuralist activity, we have enabled ourselves to re-emancipate our lives and minds by regaining control of our regulatory capacities. We have turned the punishment around, albeit initially to our disadvantage. Quinn’s attack on himself, his self-imposed imprisonment in that dark room due to his insistence that he had failed to complete the task conferred to him, is an clear indicator of the scope and the success of the panoptic at invading our consciousness. This rationale, although seemingly illogical, has become the true line of consciousness in our day. Except, and finally, this image is cracking and the mirror hidden

behind the simulation has found its way into the lives of many through the quintessential rhizome: the interconnectedness of the globalized world, the modernization of communication and interrelation. The panoptic, the controlled, the media, and the powers have perfected their system; the freedom and emancipation that the system was claiming for itself it has begun to profess onto the people it had stolen it from, making it a final causation for the de-centralization of the canon. For, if City of Glass offers any grand idea, it is the desperation that is present among us to reveal to ourselves the unreliability of the canon of our lives. For every study and vocation, we can find a canon that has somehow affected it and carried it into modernity. To claim that these canons are all without fault is to presume that some humans are perfect: in essence, every canon has become reviewable, modifiable, and replaceable, but no canon is removable. As such, we are required, and have gradually begun, to create a canon as fluid and accepting as ourselves, in our most postmodern perception and post-structural activity. As the postmodernist brings an end to herself, she begins to see the formation of a new human intellectual identity that is more widely visible and overall clearly presentable to the masses: a nomadic activity of thought and behaviour that has let go of the tree in order to observe the ingenuity of the rhizome, forging connections with others through a technological medium that is both its panopticon and its emancipation. What postmodernism eventually succeeded in doing seems to be not to destroy positivism, but to disfigure it so that it has now become synonymous with the postmodern manifesto of canon-free, de-centred, uncontrolled, pleasure of the text formulated by a writer, not an author. Further Reading: • • •

Auster, Paul (1987). The New York Trilogy. London, UK: Faber and Faber Limited. Foucault, Michel (1978). Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, trans. Alan Sheridan. United States: Pantheon Books. de Certeau, Michel (1984). The Practice of Everyday Life, trans. Steven Rendall, Berkeley: University of California Press.

LITERATURE

by Tom Paye

148

How do I occupy the seemingly useless time spent on the last train home? I ponder and decide to write as I think. This slows things down so that I might see any minute detail, a falling leaf, a ripple of water, a speck of rain hitting the window which, when I look out of it, only shows a reflection of the inside of the brightly lit carriage, along with the last few straggling travellers talking quietly with tired voices and heavy eyes. The train stops and more passengers trickle out of the doors and onto the platform. And as the inside becomes less crowded, I find myself slowly beginning to fear for my own safety. I am far from worried about becoming the victim of some hideous rail accident, my trust in National Rail’s health and safety department knows no bounds. No, my mind is fixated upon a scenario where I might be beaten by thugs, and my possessions stolen from me. My student-esque satchel, the new clothes in the branded bags around me, my mobile phone, the £100 in my wallet, the last of my personal wealth, my financial dying breath. I imagine one man boarding the train, about the same age as me, but taller, his dark eyes underlined by thick bags of fatigue. He is not clean-shaven but apparently unable to grow a beard, with small tufts of hair growing wherever his young face might allow, completely uneven. He wears a navy blue tracksuit with a white stripe down one side, the uniform of the welfare class. His dark eyes stare at me as he sits down opposite, the dark blue comfort of the empty chair swallowing him as he does so. I adjust my seated position, unwilling to move but completely uncomfortable. Looking up at the hooded figure I am suddenly joined by, I find my boredom has been altogether replaced by the carefully nurtured fear in my head - born free by the arrival of a threatening presence. I’m sure he can smell it, and still he stares. The few remaining passengers alight, leaving me alone with my new friend. I pray for another face to appear, a uniformed employee, even better a plain-clothes police officer, but as the train pulls away and we feel the momentum of the carriage being thrust

forward, I realise I am on my own with this man, and it terrifies me. We are gently rocked from side to side in our seats, and I ponder what to do about my situation. I nervously reach for something in my pocket to fiddle with, finding only my phone and keys. My fingers long for the keypad on the phone, to text or call someone, so that I might ignore the grim face sat opposite, or even dial for help. But I am not about to let him see one of the treasures he can take from me, everything must be kept out of sight. I settle for looking around the empty carriage, trying to avoid his gaze, though every time I catch it I notice that still he stares. The track-suited man must feel the tension as I do, except he is revelling in it. He stands and looks down on me, and I look up to a blank face with wild eyes. The intensity of his stare pierces my thoughts to freely survey the freezing terror that envelops me. I feel naked and completely powerless, having no knowledge at all on how to defend myself seems like a severe disability in this situation, and I am at this menace’s mercy. After what seems like an age - rather than the few seconds that has actually elapsed - he opens his mouth and quietly but firmly mumbles “money”. My thoughts explode. What do I do? Do I give him the last of my month’s money? Do I flatly refuse? Should I barter with him and offer something else? I am taking too long and can feel the towering figure standing above growing impatient. I look up again and the fear his second gaze brings snaps me into a decision. All I can do now is act on instinct. “Sorry mate, I don’t have any money”, I say this with more confidence than my eyes suggest, and knowing very well it is not a satisfactory answer. The man shakes his head and reaches into his right trouser pocket, his eyes stay fixed on me as his pale, spindly hand emerges holding a flash of sharp, silver reflection. His stentorious stare notes the chaotic panic infecting my entirety, and he speaks again, louder, more threatening, with an accent befitting only the very worst of areas, “empty your pockets”. My eyes widen as my pupils dilate, and I can feel every blood vessel in my body throbbing, being furiously pumped with adrenaline, and

despite what I think I should say or do, I feel an uncontrollable urge to defy him. I shake my head, but cannot speak, I cannot even think. I am so vigorously grabbed by the shirt that it tears instantly, the sound accompanied by the pinging and scattering of buttons against the carriage windows. I desperately glance around, looking for help, but all I find are reflections in the glass of this terrible scene. I manage to stutter, “I’m not giving you anything”, and am immediately punished for my insubordination with a punch to the jaw, and another, and another. I cannot see properly, and my face throbs not with pain, simply with pressure, and the knowledge I have sustained some serious damage. He keeps a hold of me with one hand and I see the other brandishing its shiny blade, it moves towards my chest, each new moment agonizingly elongated, and I resign myself to the inevitability that it will penetrate. The pain blinds me as I feel him let me go and fall to the floor, the cold steel sliding cleanly out of its selfmade crevice as I collapse. I lay on the soft, carpeted floor, now stained with blood, each breath shorter than the last. The leaking liquid feels warm as it drains, and my vision returns slightly so that I can see the blurry figure of my assailant escaping down the carriage, he is gone. And I do not even know what he has taken, if he has bothered taking anything. I wonder where he has run to on an empty train as I let my eyelids close again, I wonder what would drive a man to such violence over a few notes of cash, and I wonder if I will be found before I die. I look up from the notepad, now covered with writing, to see the beacon of my home station gleaming from the outside in, the rain illuminated by the orange glow of the city lights. I collect my belongings and move for the door whilst reflecting on this uneventful journey, annoyed at the fear I had created out of nothing, out of being alone on the last train home. I take one last look around at my transport and sadly assume that, for all too many, I had written a reality.

Title: A Wild Sheep C Author: Haruki Mur

The third in the “The Tr Wild Sheep Chase is the translating as with it he storytelling. The novel e character’s shallow view sionless, unaffected by b his namelessness empha a strange journey to find to avoid dire consequenc character to his superfic life. Murakami’s blunt, r trasts greatly to the sup of the events that take p able that the story takes the strange occurrences journey.

Magical Realism We live in a world that tends to border on the straight and narrow, especially here in Dubai. It’s all about work, money, routine…hardly a place that fosters the kind of wild, magical, and spiritual mental journeys that have inspired some of the world’s greatest authors. For a dose of delectable disorientation, shut the bustling, übermodernism out for a bit and delve into a world of magical realism. by Zaina Shreidi

150

Title: The Complete Fairy Tales of Hermann Hesse Author: Hermann Hesse Hesse’s collection of his 22 acclaimed fairytales take your imagination on a journey to magical dream worlds filled with mystical creatures, philosophy, and entrancing visions. His enthralling tales will delight even the most undaunted of readers. The stories explore numerous and varied topics such as societal challenges, princesses, poets, the pleasures of temptation versus the aspiration for perfection; regardless what story or what topic, Hesse never fails to amuse, intrigue, and inspire.

Title: Metamorphosi Author: Franz Kafka

Kafka explores the di of a living being throu a human into a bug – demeaning but is also man as could be. He is figuratively. The semi represents certain as his strained relations sacrifice, and the bur of alienation, loneline intentions also run de the author’s story all choly and relatable. A in its own right, Meta some of the greatest a whom are actually on

Chase rakami

Title: One Hundred Years of Solitude Author: Gabriel Garcia Marquez

rilogy of the Rats” collection, A first novel he considered worth e truly experienced the joy of explores the unnamed main w of his mediocre life. He is pasbetrayal and abandonment, and asises this. When he is sent on d a specific sheep for the “Boss” ces, the journey wakes the main cial view of the world and his realistic style of writing conpernaturalism and surrealism place, making it entirely believs place in the real world despite s permeating the character’s

is a

issolution and disillusion ugh the metamorphosis of a change that is not only o as different from a hus lowly both literally and i-autobiographical novella spects of Kafka’s life such as ship with his father, selfrden of family duty. Themes ess, and disregarded good eep in the novella and make l the more poignant, melanAn influential masterpiece amorphosis has inspired authors of all time – some of n this list.

This is considered to be Marquez’s breakthrough masterpiece and is one of the most influential and important works ever written. Marquez wrote this novel over 18 months of solitude, locked in a room with cigarettes and paper, writing constantly until it was complete. Aspiring masterpiece writers take note because that is how it’s done. This incredible novel is set in a town called Macondo in South America where the family of Buendía family resides. The characters are eccentric and highly developed, drawing you into their torrential emotional world. One Hundred Years of Solitude presents an intriguing and unique perspective of the process of life.

Title: If on a winter’s night a traveller Author: Italo Calvino Talk about trippy. This book is about a person attempting to read a book called If on a winter’s night a traveller, however, every even numbered chapter is a single chapter from the book the reader is trying to read, while the odd numbered chapters are written in the second person and tell the reader what he is doing in preparation for reading the next chapter. Confused yet? Calvino explores themes like writers’ maintenance of absolute objectivity, subjectivity of meaning, originality, and the relationship between fiction and life.

TIBOR SIMON | SAN FRANCISCO

SEEN ON THE STREETS OF SAN FRANCISCO A photographic interview by Tibor Simon

152

TIBOR SIMON | SAN FRANCISCO

154

TIBOR SIMON | SAN FRANCISCO

156

LASTCALL

by TOM PAYE

I’m ill. Feel sorry for me. Feel sorry my sniffling and coughing, and the endless effort I have to endure just to take in enough oxygen to continue my pointless, ailing existence. Sometimes I think I wouldn’t mind being ill; I’d get to take a long weekend or a mid-week break. But when it actually comes down to it, I’d rather get up and work in the coal mines of Hell for all eternity than feel like this. I’m probably being melodramatic. It’s not that bad. But everyone wants sympathy when they’re sick. I haven’t seen anyone apart from my parents – who are decidedly unsympathetic – since the weekend that caused my malady and all I want to do now is get out of the house and get on with life. Though I have had some consolation from a herbal tea that I’ve been drinking to alleviate my symptoms. Found in my cupboard, it’s called Yogi Tea. It’s obviously designed for idiots, and, being an idiot, I’ve rather taken to it. Basically, it’s meant to improve your air passages. It’s not made for sick people; it’s made for yoga enthusiasts who are looking to advance their breathing techniques. According to the box, you’re meant to drink one every hour, sometimes using two tea bags in one cup for maximum effect. No doubt they’re hugely expensive blends, and this information is to coerce said idiot into buying huge stockpiles of boxes. In terms of the benefits to me, a sick person, the effects are minimal. Maybe I should be drinking more, and in stronger doses. Nauseatingly sweet, with strong scents of cinnamon, honey and a hint of liquorice, it’s not really my cup of tea (lolz). But at least I’ve had something to drink in between my 4- hourly allowances of Lemsip. What I love most about it, though, is that each teabag comes with a little phrase written on its label. Phrases such as “Speak the truth,” and “The body is a temple, look after it.” And I especially like, “Share your strengths, not your weaknesses.”

158

So as I’ve been lying on my deathbed, festering in snot and germs, I’ve been able to take solace from these positive expressions. “I will look after my body now,” I’ve been saying to myself. And when I get out of this state, I’ll spread positive energy wherever I tread my feet. I’ll take up Yoga. I’ll be at peace with my inner self, and I’ll vow to never poison my body again. Which is all rubbish. There’s no way I’ll ever take up Yoga. I’ve been dying for a cigarette. In fact, I’ve snuck a few in over the last couple of days, much to the detest of my lungs and throat. And I can’t wait to actually enjoy one again. A friend suggested to me that I take, “A painkiller with immune suppressing properties. Preferably in smokable form.” And if the option was available to me, I definitely would. The point is, the only reason I’ve become engrossed in this Yogi Tea business is because I’ve become desperate for redemption. I don’t want to feel like this anymore, so I’m clutching at straws, trying to find anything to buy into that might take me out of my miserable sick-pit. So, annoyingly, I’ve fallen victim to some niche-marketing tactics. Maybe it’s slightly beneficial when you’re upside down, with your legs above your head. But in real life, anyone drinking this stuff for anything other than its taste is wasting their time and money. I think my point is highlighted well by a small message in small print, which follows a detailed explanation about the health benefits of using Yogi Tea. “These statements have not been evaluated by the FDA. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, alleviate or prevent any malady or disease.” The bastards.

bye!

quintdubai.com