November 2016 The Utopia Issue
Introduce your friends to bands at first hand.
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Subbacultcha magazine
The Utopia Issue
Now that we’ve covered the basics of evolution, it’s time to consider an end goal. Take Eden in its heavenly shrubbery, where sin is abolished and the present lasts for ever. And the socialist dream, the Republic, made of precious metals; the anarchist communes and the communes of anarchy. If we were to materialise the utopian longings of days past, it might look like here, today: relative peace, hyper communicability, dreams made tangible by the networks awash in your perceived right to a soap box. But what do we surrender? What imbalances persist? The fusional perfection on all biospheric levels is still a possibility, one that would pierce through this earthly carcass and absorb all 03
Colophon Subbacultcha Belgium, Dendermondsesteenweg 80A, 9000 Ghent, Belgium subbacultcha.be - magazine@subbacultcha.be Editors in chief: Herlinde Raeman & Kasper-Jan Raeman
Advertising & partnerships: Kasper-Jan Raeman (kasper-jan@subbacultcha.be)
Magazine editors: Julien Van de Casteele & Gabriela González
Distribution: Elise Dupré (elise@subbacultcha.be)
Copy editor: Megan Roberts
Printer: Drukkerij GEWADRUPO, Arendonk, Belgium
Design: Marina Henao Website editors: Valerie Steenhaut & Thomas Vanoosthuyse
Cover photo: Sasha Vernaeve
Social media editor: Lisa Wallyn Contributing writers: Sabzian, Gabriela González, Julien Van de Casteele, Alexander Ermakov, Bart Bruneel & Laura Ramos Contributing photographers: Spencer Clark, Sasha Vernaeve, Femke Fredrix, Catherine Lemblé, David Brandon Geeting & Robin Stein Contributing artist: Spencer Clark Thank you: Isaac Barbé, Mattias Baertsoen, Koi Persyn, Nilou, Hannes Rooms, Hannelore Capoen, Jules Labath, Junior Bokele, Pauline Hascoët, Kellan Smith, Lynn Cailliau, Naoki Karathanassis, Eva Menga, Virginie Van de Casteele, Floortje Kattemolle, Nelson Henry, Lara Decrae, Eduardo Garcia, Eline De Vos, Axelle Vertommen, Gert Van Dijck, Jente Maes, Saraya Richter, Sofia Van Laer, Amaury Wilkin and friends, Hanne Konings, Lies Hermans, Frederic Busscher Partners: Botanique, Beursschouwburg, GEWADRUPO, Vooruit, Democrazy, JAM hotel, Handelsbeurs, KVS, MSK, Poppunt, Trix, T-heater, RedBull Elektropedia, Bozar, Argos, Art Cinema OFFoff, VUB Kultuurkaffee, KASKcinema, Deep in House, Meakusma, Madame Moustache, Cinema Zuid, Het Bos, Campo, Cinematek & STUK Discover new music and art with like-minded spirits. See our shows for free and get a chance to win weekly surprises for €8 a month. Join the #subbafam – subbacultcha.be
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October Recommendations Artist: Elysia Crampton
Brooklyn band brings an old fruit crate to their live sets, which when opened reveals a tiny jungle filled with fauna, flora and lights that is magnified and projected onto the walls, enveloping the crowd in an otherworldly glow. Their debut album Islet is out on Home Assembly Records. — soundcloud.com/peptalk_music
With a challenging near-manifesto spanning geology and complex racial dynamics underpinning her latest works, let’s just say Elysia Crampton isn’t short of artistic ambition. But to place focus entirely on the surrounding concept doesn’t do her justice: newly released debut full-length American Drift stands on its own, a mind-blowing, near transcendent masterpiece blending Latin cumbia, Bolivian saya, tribalistic crunk and a healthy dose of DatPiff-worthy mixtape narration. After years of crafting sample-dependent (though no less incredible) sonic mosaics under the E+E moniker, she’s finally come into her own, and we’re reaping the benefits. — soundcloud.com/eande
Magazine: Zweikommaseiben When we first stumbled across Issue #10 of Swiss magazine Zweikommaseiben, we were dumbfounded. Featuring in-depth interviews with the likes of M.E.S.H., Lena Willikens, Vessel, Powell and Torn Hawk, it was as though we’d found our soulmate. Someone somewhere else in the world knew exactly what we were thinking and what we’d want to read. For the Summer 2015 issue, they’ve turned their attention to another bevy of recent favourites: Beatrice Dillon, TCF, Danse Noir and Oneohtrix Point
msk remastered ↓↑ open call for artists !
Artist: Peptalk
Having grown up in Tokyo, Los Angeles and San Juan, Shayna, Mike and Angelica of Peptalk merge their disparate worlds by creating small musical islands of dreamy, exotica-inspired melodies with bird calls, synthesizers and orchestral instruments. The
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Sabrina Mahfouz
SLOW
SLAM OUR WORLD
25 & 26.11.2016
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October Recommendations Contents Artist: Elysia Crampton
Brooklyn band brings an old fruit crate to their live sets, which when opened reveals a tiny jungle filled with fauna, flora and lights that is magnified and projected onto the walls, enveloping the crowd in an otherworldly glow. Their debut album Islet is out on Home Assembly Records. — soundcloud.com/peptalk_music
Marching Church 14 Weyes Blood 20 With a challenging near-manifesto spanning geology and complex racial dynamics underpinning her latest works, let’s just say Elysia Crampton isn’t short of artistic ambition. But to place focus entirely on the surrounding concept doesn’t do her justice: newly released debut full-length American Drift stands on its own, a mind-blowing, near transcendent masterpiece blending Latin cumbia, Bolivian saya, tribalistic crunk and a healthy dose of DatPiff-worthy mixtape narration. After years of crafting sample-dependent (though no less incredible) sonic mosaics under the E+E moniker, she’s finally come into her own, and we’re reaping the benefits. — soundcloud.com/eande
Photo Essay: Kafim 26
— Magazine: Zweikommaseiben
When we first stumbled Recommendations 09 across Issue #10 of Swiss magazine Zweikommaseiben, we were dumbfounded. We Visit You 12 interviews with Featuring in-depth the likes of M.E.S.H., Lena Willikens,
Vessel, Powell32 and Torn Hawk, it was Featured Artist
as though we’d found our soulmate. Someone somewhere else in the world knew exactly what we were thinking and what we’d want to read. For the Summer 2015 issue, they’ve turned their attention to another bevy of recent favourites: Beatrice Dillon, TCF, Danse Noir and Oneohtrix Point
Book 38 Style 40
Artist: Peptalk
Films 44
Subbacultcha Shows 47
Having grown up in Tokyo, Los Angeles and San Juan, Shayna, Mike and Angelica of Peptalk merge their disparate worlds by creating small musical islands of dreamy, exotica-inspired melodies with bird calls, synthesizers and orchestral instruments. The
Overview 62
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This publication was printed by
GEWA DRUPO Drukkerij GEWADRUPO Hoge Mauw 130 — gewa.be 8
November Recommendations
Recent finds from our editorial team STOCK
Oma333 Brit escapee Gavin Maycroft has been an active presence in the underground music scene for a helluva long time now, DJ-ing all over the place and setting up shows in his Stockholm base for years now. It’s good news, then, that he’s put his incredible music knowledge, great networking skills and superior taste to the benefit of the world through his label Oma333. Existing for only three years, Oma333 already has a good couple of dozen releases under its belt, all beautifully presented and guaranteed to make your day. Notable releases include mixtapes by Tsembla and Miaux, great material from Kraus and Myttys and perhaps a new fave in Incidental Music for Invasion with her stunning self-titled tape. Get ’em before they’re gone – and they go fast, believe us!
This Fall, KASK will be launching an unprecedented venture: STOCK is a space where students can exhibit their artworks around themes such as authenticity and titles. They can offer them for sale to keen-eyed art lovers who know a future investment when they see one. Or maybe to any warm-blooded individual who wants to see something new from some of the most interesting young talents in the country. Whatever the case, Het Paviljoen will be the place where it will all converge. Come for a day of scouting for new art, meeting the fresh faces behind it and perhaps even walking off with something wonderful under your arm.
— oma333.com Eastern Daze III Kraak is back at it with what they know how to do best: kickass festivals with some of the most interesting, groundbreaking and game-changing players in experimental music. 25-27 November
— facebook.com/ STOCK-1213934281950800
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BOZAR NIGHT
EXPO
September October Recommendations Recommendations
DJ’S CONCERTS EXHIBITIONS
MUSIC
10 NOV. ’16 CENTRE FOR FINE ARTS BRUSSELS
JUNIOR BOYS (CA) HELENA HAUFF (D) DASHA RUSH (RU) ASH KOOSHA (IRAN) AMNESIA SCANNER (UK) GOAT (JP) HIELE (B)
20:00 — 03:00
PALAIS DES BEAUX-ARTS BRUXELLES PALEIS VOOR SCHONE KUNSTEN BRUSSEL Rue Ravensteinstraat 23 1000 Brussels +32 2 507 82 00 / bozar.be
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Copyright photo: Dasha Rush © GR/DR
November Recommendations will be the third edition of Eastern Daze, a collaboration with Vooruit where artists from all corners and all practices are united in order to entrance and hypnotise the unsuspecting audiences. With past acts like Master Musicians of Jajouka, Arnold Dreyblatt and Ashtray Navigations there were some big shoes to fill, but the selection does not disappoint: Mike Cooper, Bear Bones Lay Low, Typhonian Highlife, Les Filles de Illighadad and, excitingly, krautrock deity Manuel Göttsching playing his iconic album E2 - E4 for the first time in Belgium.
uber-functional future we imagine today, the visions of mankind’s apotheosis into the cosmos that appear on this Tumblr contain the kind of spiritual dimension that perhaps we’ve already lost. Staff favourites: the melty men of Horacio Salinas Blanch and the chimeric tarotlike works of Josef Dienst. — 70sscifiart.tumblr.com Nonlocal Society Somewhere on the literal edge of the world, in Cutipay in the south of Chile, some very strange things are happening. Themes like nonlocality, diverted planes of existence, mental ecology and the hyperreal are explored, distilled and condensed into multiple art forms that stretch into the outer limits of worldly fathomings. Nonlocal Society is a three-person collective made up of two Chileans, Reverend Thompson and False Sir Nicolas, and Belgian alien Siet Rae. Together they explore their inner and projected realms through sound, film, paintings and collage, forming a cohesive entity feeding on the group’s boundless curiosity and imagination. Their website is the main portal of activity; let yourself in and intuition will do the rest.
— kraak.net — vooruit.be ’70s Sci Fi Art
For some people, utopia is something that is not only found within the scope of human imagination, but also far beyond our earthly limits. Certain artists some 40 years back knew that and managed to translate these potential realities through paintings that are all different in style yet similar in spirit; contrary to the sleek,
— nonlocalsociety.org
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We Visit You Photo by Catherine Lemblé
Name: Fleur Bourgeois Age: 32 Zodiac sign: Virgo Website: fleurbourgeois.com
What kind of music are you listening to at the moment? Pop songs from the Eighties and italo disco. What’s the first record you bought? Very by The Pet Shop Boys with ‘Go West’ on it, that was my first CD. I’ve been into kitschy pop music ever since. What’s your first ever music-relatedmemory? Marching bands! I still get really excited when I hear one. Those drums! What’s your favourite pastime? Reading. Cooking. Drinking wine with friends. Dancing our feet off. Lying on the couch overthinking things. Watching cycling and reality TV. Nothing special. What does a utopian Sunday look like for you? Like eggs and bacon. What makes you dance? If it’s catchy or has beats then I perform my iconic square dance. Which future Subbacultcha show are you looking forward to? Deep in House in Kompass. So happy Hunee is coming to Ghent. Such good vibes.
Tell us, what do you do in life? I’m a lifestyle journalist and copy editor for a newspaper. Besides that, I’m always thinking about food, feeding and getting fed and making plans that never turn into reality. In an ideal world, what would you be doing? I would be making my fantastic plans come to life. Maybe I’ll own a family restaurant? What inspires you? City life. New York, Paris, Hong Kong, Rotterdam. Places packed with neon lights, cool shops, nice bars and friendly atmospheres. What do you like best about your place? Some of the artworks I’ve collected: my original Larry Clark Kidsphotograph, Piet Parra drawing, the dreamy photographs of poodles and the Freed From Desire work I have from Ghent-based artist Tim Bruggeman. My bedroom feels like a treehouse and there’s a lot of light.
Every month we visit a Subbacultcha member’s place. If you want us to visit you, please send an email to magazine@ subbacultcha.be
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Interview
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Marching Church
Marching Church Skype interview by Brenda Bosma Photos shot by David Brandon Geeting in NYC, USA
Elias Bender Rønnenfelt is at the centre of the highly adventurous Danish underground scene. Everyone wants a piece of his attention, rumours are picking up, brandishing him difficult or disobliging, as much music-wise as personally. Rønnenfelt has been the leading mastermind behind the avant-garde project Marching Church since late 2013. On their latest album, Telling it Like It Is, Marching Church turn the wildness down a notch in favour of cohesive song structures with an experimental twist. In preparation for their visit down to Belgium we had a chat with Elias to talk beauty and the violence thereof 15
Interview If we could talk beauty for a minute, is there anything you see around you now that strikes you as beautiful? Beauty? It comes in many shapes. I don’t know. I think most things have the potential to be beautiful, but it depends on whatever state of mind you’re in, whatever hormones are racing through your body – I don’t know how the brain works. You can look at the same thing on two different days. One day it would be clear and beautiful, and the next it’s plain ugly. I don’t know how these kinds of things work. The mood sometimes hits you and sometimes passes you by, that kind of thing? Yeah, but doesn’t everybody get mood swings? I guess so. How come you’re in NYC? Did you move there? No, I live in Copenhagen. I’m killing some time in between tours at a friend’s apartment, with lovely company. Maybe that’s where the beauty is, in the company. Yeah. [Laughs] When I look around this room there are quite a few things going on. There’s a bunch of white rose petals scattered everywhere, because we had a little incident. I have my friend here who I don’t get to see very often, but it’s always a pleasure. That sounds both sweet and dramatic. I can show you on the video. [Turns on webcam] So many rose petals! You make touring look good. Do you enjoy the
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Marching Church
‘I like the idea: the idiot who can’t see himself through other people’s eyes, who has deluded fantasies about himself’
constant change of scenery? I’ve come to a point where I rarely miss home as much as I just wish the touring routine would stop. I think being on the road is like an autopilotinducing lifestyle. You’re kind of trapped in the calendar. Touring is not
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Marching Church
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Interview normal life, it’s a routine that goes with driving, soundchecking, drinking, playing, drinking and sleeping, and repeat that about 30 times. It’s not a life, but living can go on anywhere. I’ve been in NY for the past couple of weeks, it’s just life continues somewhere else. But Copenhagen is where I’m based and where I want to be, because all the playmates and collaborators that I’ve spent years getting to know are there. You can’t just find that anywhere, I’m dependant on those people. They helped me achieve the things I want to do. Is there anyone in particular that you’re grateful to? I think I’m fortunate to be in a position where I can make records and go play. Grateful… I don’t look at success that way, I don’t think the amount of people that take interest in you is an indicator. I mean, it’s tempting to start being thankful for where you are, but instead you should be focusing that energy on the craft. You’ve called yourself the ‘King of Song’. Yeah, I did call myself that. I think I’m the only one who calls himself that. But it’s not really me saying that I’m the best singer in history, it’s more about delusion and megalomania. It’s hardly about any kind of reality. I like the idea, though: the idiot who can’t see himself through other people’s eyes, who has deluded fantasies about himself. I wanted to create something that could either draw people in or repulse them. I like it when things can go both ways. Yeah? Yeah, I think people will either fall for it or be disgusted by it. Hopefully.
Marching Church plays Trefpunt (Democrazy), Ghent on 17 November. The show is free for members.
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Interview
Weyes Blood Almost a year ago, we caught up with Natalie Mering, the voice behind Weyes Blood, right before she headed back home to California to start recording her recently released record, Front Row Seat to Earth. Natalie is very open about herself, her upbringing by Christian parents with arty friends and admitting that she’s not immune to self-doubt. Mering’s voice floats beautifully on top of the organ synth, guitar and flute that she’s so carefully arranged to express sad romance and visions of an unreachable utopian world sold by the movies and TV Phone interview by Zofia Ciechowska Photos shot by Robin Stein in New York, USA
You know how when you’re little, you’re told you can be whatever you want to be? What does that feel like when you decide to be an artist? I wrote my first song when I was about four while riding my tiny bike around the kitchen island, round and round in circles. My mother wrote songs so I
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Weyes Blood decided I could too. As I got older, Kurt Cobain was my idol. We weren’t allowed to watch MTV, but we’d turn it on when my parents were out. I had Nirvana Unplugged on cassette tape and thought it was really crazy. My parents were Christian but they were Born Again so they had arty friends. One of them was a couple who lived on the Lower East Side back in the ’60s and the woman, Diana, was obsessed with Tim Buckley. Apparently, one day she was drawing a picture of Tim Buckley and Andy Warhol walked past, took the picture, signed it and said it was a Warhol. I learned that when I was an adult. But when I was a kid I remember them having a Sex Pistols poster and being very excited and shocked. Back then I dyed my hair with food colouring, dressed up my guitar and took polaroids of it. Those may have been my first ventures into conceptual art. Have you ever had moments where you thought you should be doing something else? Definitely. I feel like a jack of all trades, master of none. The music thing just turned out to be an obsession so I did that, but I’d heard my calling in other places too. I wanted to be an actress, a comedian, a marine biologist – I love the ocean, I love feminism. I wish I was more intellectual, my family isn’t really; it was never in our house. You’ve been to many places and explored many art forms. What brings you satisfaction? These days, it’s finishing recordings because I put myself through such an arduous process of being very particular about how I want things to sound, learning how to use my voice in a different way. I’m married to music so my greatest satisfaction comes from seeing where and how far I can take my work. Aside from that, touching people with my music, having them feel more meaning. I don’t like to get too deep into that territory, though, because I don’t know how I feel about giving myself credit for that.
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Photo essay
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Weyes Blood And disappointment? I’m disappointed by hubris – in my personal microcosm, but also on a larger scale. Hubris with the planet and our attitude of being able to do whatever we want with it and believing it will be replenished. There are some people in power who refuse to admit how fragile we are. It’s really obvious and really sad. Same goes for mental illnesses and addiction. Even in these modern times, we don’t understand them. We refuse to associate with the animal kingdom and so we’re flailing, thinking that we’re better than other creatures. I don’t think we are. There’s a whole culture of TV and movies that feeds into the culture of us believing we’re these perfect archetypes of human beings. You don’t get the full human in them. It makes the imbalance even more destabilising. And that’s when you get these beautiful people staring in the mirror saying, ‘Oh God, I’m disgusting.’ Everyone gets this idea of who they should be, how much they should get done, how they should reply to emails, post pictures… We get caught up in an imaginary race that is really making us like monkeys. What do you do to get more clarity and perspective? Sometimes I notice that I’m taking myself too seriously with an unrealistic set of goals and I have to take a step back and remember that I probably won’t write six perfect songs in one day and by doing that I’ll inevitably disappoint myself. Even though in my mind I should be a super human. I also believe that we as humans need to be touched and loved. We need to socialise, it sends good chemicals through our bodies. Isolating yourself from people, feeling unloved, living your life vicariously through others on the internet, will make you suffer chemically. Be close to nature, understand your connecWeyes Blood plays Botanique, Brussels tion to a larger system. on 28 November. The show is free for members.
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Kafim
by Sasha Vernaeve
Photo Essay
The Deep in House party, once strictly serving up house music, today stands alongside some of the best events on the festival calendar, bringing together underground DJs from a wide range of electronic genres. Among them we find Kafim, an established resident DJ at Deepin who plays dark groovy beats. The Brussels-based artist has a background in classical music, having played the piano and sung in a choir. Kafim quickly became hooked on the electronic scene by firstly dabbling with drum’n’bass before finally getting comfortable with techno. Kafim produces music like an utopist would build his ideal word: imaginative, perfection-oriented and futuristic. That’s why we thought it’d be the perfect occasion to take him for a stroll along one of Brussels’ most modernist architectures. soundcloud.com/kafim
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Photo Essay
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Photo Essay
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Kafim plays Deep in House XXL Edition, Kompass Klub, Ghent on 10 November. Free for members before 1AM.
Featured Artist Spencer Clark is a keen explorer of this wiggly world. Formerly one half of The Skaters with James Ferraro, his latest musical alias Typho-
Spencer Clark nian Highlife has just released The World of Shells on Kraak. Clark also runs the label Pacific City Sound Visions, which delivers a panoptic aesthetic that strives for higher forms. Here he delves into the importance of realms within and beyond our terrestrial life Interview by Gabriela Gonzรกlez Images by Spencer Clark
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Spencer Clark How did you end up in Belgium? In Belgium the life is full and private at the same time; I feel free to be social and to be within my mind’s creative techno bowl.
I read that, before you started making music, you used to take photos of flowers and transform them into cosmic landscapes. Are you still compelled to do that kind of thing, working on symbolic transfigurations not only musically but visually as well? In the beginning my imaginings were almost purely psychedelic, I think, but as I have grown, there begins to be a formulation to a definite communication of the moments I have experienced. For me, now, my actions are to remember what I have experienced and to arrange them in a way to show how colourful and vivid and full life is.
What’s the story behind this space? For each album I make, I attempt to make an environment so that the essences arrive quickly through customs! In the picture I have sent, it is me completing the album, and in the background you can see the figures of a DEMON MASK atop a cylindrical aquarium. There is intense orange-red to season the music with intensity and heat, and the aquarium is blue, which you can’t see, but that colour was to then create simultaneously a meditative water quality, as ‘THE WORLD OF SHELLS’ endeavours to imply desert and aquarium.
What does the idea of utopia evoke in you and your art? What would your iteration of it be like? I don’t think I go for Utopia. It’s not so good to want to be somewhere else. I want to be right here. Planet Earth is a miracle. Nobody’s going to Mars. All imaginations we have on Earth are of and for the Earth. When I dream or intuit what I think are fantastic ideas, that seem to point to other realms, these realms are still a facet of the Earth experience!
You’ve had many monikers in the past for your music. Do they correspond to different creative processes you were exploring or to different phases in your life? Yes. Exactly. All titles are just there to expound on the aesthetics and ideas. Typhonian Highlife relates to the the world of snakes shown in a high form.
Selected by BLANCO pacificitysoundvisions.com
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Spencer Clark
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Featured Artist
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Books Text and artwork by Gabriela González
The Baron in the Trees by Italo Calvino He seemed to have opened the doors of a new kingdom, one to be looked at no longer with alarm and mistrust but with shared enthusiasm. One’s ideal place is never clear-cut. Sometimes it’s not even on land, as in Italo Calvino’s 1957 masterpiece The Baron in the Trees. Most commonly found today as part of the Our Ancestors trilogy, The Baron goes beyond the premise of a fantastic love story and ramifies into an exploration of human relationships - with each other, with their environment, and with themselves. The story begins when young Cosimo, heir to the title of Baron in 18th-century Ombrosa, is served with the last straw by his imposing family, namely a plate of snails prepared by his sadistic sister. He scrambles up an oak tree, vowing never to come down again. Almost immediately, a shift occurs in Cosimo. Held overhead by the arms of the earth, his perspective changes for ever as this new arboreal realm offers an outlook ungraspable from our stomping grounds. Cosimo adapts to his new reality, welcoming all the consequences it incurs: the direct, fusional relationship to nature; love, real yet suspended in space and time; new logistics of nourishment and hygiene; the embracing of true freedom, essentially bound to the acceptance of complete, irreversible solitude. There is hardly enough space here to describe the immutable beauty of this story, which brims with tragic idealism and bears the weight of the sacrifices that must be made to attain perfect harmony with oneself. It begins with finding the place, physical or imagined, where one’s kingdom becomes manifest.
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Style
THE UTO (LIV 40
OPIANS VE) 41
THE UTOPIANS (LIVE)
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Style
Band Members: Mira de Boose, Vincent Schreers, Anna Lee Roeder, Isabel Schrรถer, Tina Rabe, Francesca Hart and Callum Hawke
Photo & Styling by Femke Fredrix All Clothing from Juliane Kรถnig, FlamingoFashionBerlin, Wrangelstr. 95 10997 Berlin
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Films by Sabzian
In front of the ocean under the cliff on the granite wall these hands wide open Blue and black Blue like the water Black like the night The man came alone into the cave in front of the ocean All the hands are the same size he was alone The man alone in the cave looked into the noise into the noise of the sea the immensity of things And he cried out “You who have a name, who have been given an identity, I love you.” Sabzian recently published the voice-over text of Marguerite Duras’ Les mains négatives (1979) in a Dutch translation alongside the French original. Nina de Vroome translated the text to accompany her own writing on this seminal short film. This month, we also feature Elias Grootaers’ English translation.
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Films Right Now, Wrong Then Hong Sang-Soo, 2015 Repeating the same event he built up in the first ‘half’ of the film (a director meets a young artist in Suwon, where his film is showing, and falls in love with her), Hong Sang-Soo plays with variations in the gestures, gazes and opinions of his characters, patiently dissecting this ephemeral relationship and meanwhile showing us two versions of the same man, of the same woman, of the same film. l9 November 20.00 Cinema Zuid, Antwerp
Bilder der Welt und Inschrift des Krieges Harun Farocki, 1989 In 1944, when allied bombers photographed the Farben chemical plant as a possible target, they accidentally created photographic evidence of the nearby Auschwitz concentration camp. However, since the image did not have the function of showing Auschwitz, the camp remained unseen. Harun Farocki died two years ago but his words and images keep on echoing; in this film he gently directs our gaze towards the images we make and the context we make them in, thus allowing us to see again. 18 November 21.00 Cinematek, Brussels Sabzian is a collection of online reflections on cinema, and maps cinephile events in Belgium and its surroundings. Articles are written in Dutch, English and French - sabzian.be
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Film: Eau Zoo
02 October - Cinema Zuid, Antwerp 18.00 | â‚Ź5 | Free for members
landscapes beaten by the wind, the movie flirts with a certain anticipation cinema, proves to be a Shakespearean drama and becomes a captivating, peculiar tale.
Emilie Verhamme is a promising young director. Her first full-length
Things to do this month — November 2016
was screened at several movie festivals. Lou and Martin are adolescents living on an island with their overprotective parents, trying to escape. Against a backdrop of
Music, art and film
Vooruit, in collaboration with Kraak & Sound In Motion
Manuel Göttsching performs ‘E2-E4’ Mike Cooper — Les Filles de Illighadad
Giancarlo Toniutti — Typhonian Highlife — Nibul Stephan Ginsburgh performs Dennis Johnson’s ‘November’ Sanskriti Shrestha — YZ / afterparty with DJ Sebcat record fair / talk / film
TICKETS & INFO: WWW.VOORUIT.BE — T. 09 267 28 28
Subbacultcha Events. Free for members Sign up for €8 per month at subbacultcha.be
On the following pages you’ll find all of this month’s Subbacultcha events. You can buy a ticket at the door or become a Subbacultcha member and enter for free. Join at subbacultcha.be Danish architect Uffe Aurland Van Tams, in Vooruit. PAN-label member and Los Angeles Free Music Society compatriot Joseph Hammer will take you to the astral plane, while the time warp to Braxton’s universe will be opened by melancholic drone-artist Mathieu Serruys.
Tyondai Braxton + Mathieu Serruys + Joseph Hammer
Film: Memories of Nightmares 07 Nov - Art Cinema OFFoff, Ghent 20.00 | €7 | Free for members
03 Nov - Vooruit, Ghent 20.00 | €13 | Free for members
Often times we get attuned to what the horror genre is. Jump scares. Unsettling scores. Wrestlers/stuntmen sporting some sort of dilapidated mask, wielding machetes fit for warlords. WithMemories of Nightmares, Art Cinema OFFoff breaks that mould and brings you an eclectic collection of five experimental films, all focusing on different horror stories.
Tyondai Braxton’s ex-group Battles always sounded like they were from outer space, mixing tight complex rhythms with electronic melodies. No surprise he’s travelling to even more distant galaxies in his solo project. After stops in The Barbican and Sydney Opera House he will land his vessel, consisting of luminescent space-age sculptures by
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Subbacultcha Events. Free for members Sign up for €8 per month at subbacultcha.be
Performance: Pieter Ampe + Campo: So You Can Feel
Breaking the cliches and pushing the boundaries of the genre, these directors strip away the tropes and restructure their films to create an unsettling and vibrant form of horror, unlike anything you’ve experienced before.
Tommy Cash 08 Nov - De Markten (VUB Kultuurkaffee), Brussels 19.30 | €10 | Free for members Pieter Ampe has been in residence at CAMPO since 2009. After several collaborations and duets, Ampe is taking it solo with So You Can Feel. In this performance, he immersed himself in a world of transformations, an environment where standards are continuously shifting and blurring, where emancipation and sexual and emotional energy go hand in hand. Are we aware of how others perceive us? Which energy emanates from our bodies? Do we need to be liberated? You will be witnessing the coming of age of a man and his body. Let him seduce you with his majestic gestures, while expressing his regained sexuality.
08 Nov - Beursschouwburg, Brussels 20.30 | €14 | Free for members His raps are as bleak and brutal as the USSR, his style’s insane and our Estonian boy loves horses. Growing up as an outsider, music was his escape from reality. Tommy Cash is not just a rapper, either. He’s a symbol of individuality. Just one look at the video for his ‘Winaloto’ will convince you of his uniqueness – and haunt you for years.
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Film: Double Bill Horror
rio Bava creates one of the most deeply unnerving and best films in the director’s vast oeuvre.
09 Nov - Art Cinema OFFoff, Ghent 20.00 | €7 | Free for members
Film: Hedwig and the Angry Inch
The first film combines the talents of William S Burroughs and seminal director Antony Balch. Witchcraft Through the Ages aka Haxan is a hybrid of documentary and fiction that explores the history of witchcraft and Satanism through a variety of ancient medieval artworks, as well as vignettes that recreate the superstitious practices of that era. The film is entirely silent, only punctuated by an unsettling voiceover by the Beat Generation’s finest. For the second course we haveBlack Sunday: a unique revenge story loosely based on the Gogol work Viy. In it, we follow Katja Vajda, a witch who is sentenced to death by her own brother, only to return 200 years later to seek revenge on his descendants. Developing a dark and eerie tone through the use of incredible black and white cinematography, shot by the italian horror maestro himself, Ma-
09 + 16 Nov - KASKcinema, Ghent 22.30 | €5 | Free for members From book, to off-Broadway musical, to the silver screen, Hedwig and the Angry Inch is a unique experience to behold. Following a transgender punk rocker from Berlin who’s following the former lover who stole her songs, this astonishingly visual film takes us through a unique trip that explores the complex gender identity of Hedwig and her complicated past. John Cameron Mitchell serves as a jack-ofall-trades on this film, taking up the mantle of Hedwig, as well as directing and adapting this auteur cult classic for the big screen.
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© Thomas Geuens
© Jokko
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ZA DI
22.11
Alexander Hawkins / SCHNTZL
PIANO
03.12
Jan Swerts ‘Schaduwland’
cd-release Minimal jazz
Melancholische Nederlandstalige songs i.h.k.v. Autumn Falls
© Kaat Pype
© Frank Loriou
ZO
Kouter 29, 9000 Gent T ICK E T S Tickets Gent Sint Baafsplein 17 09 265 91 65 www.handelsbeurs.be
27.11
Zondag Vosdag
Muziek, boeken en verse friet festival i.s.m. Democrazy, Handelsbeurs Concertzaal, Gorki, Paard Van Troje Mephiti
Handelsbeurs Concertzaal
DO
08.12
Melanie De Biasio Minimal music ZO
22.12
Dans Dans DO
Mephiti / Howard Peach
Lyrische jazz i.s.m. JazzLab Series
cd-release Psychedelische blues & spacey rock-’n-roll
© Geert Vandepoele
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vorm: Pascal Van Hoorebeke
01.12
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Deep in House XXL Edition
Heather Leigh + Razen 12 Nov - Juenglingshaus (Meakusma), Eupen 20.00 | €10 | Free for members
Heather Leigh is an American singer-songwriter, but not the type you find half a dozen of. Heather Leigh is definitely not for the faintminded. Her latest album, I Abused Animal, is dark and mysterious, surpassing categories like ‘folk’, ‘noise’ or ‘drone’. Her eerie vocals are combined with her idiosyncratic use of the pedal steel guitar, giving it a whole new dimension. Known for her captivating live performances, her upcoming show is not one to miss. Brussels-based Razen creates pre-industrial, spectral and ethnic dreamtones mixed with trance and medieval mysticism.
ft. Blawan, Hunee, Marcellus Pittman, Kafim, Chris Ferreira and more 10 Nov - Kompass Klub, Ghent 22.00 | €24 | Free for members before 1 AM Yo deepin boyzz, the house bros are back in town. For this XXL edition, DIH will find refuge at Kompass Klub, an old factory located in a raw industrial neighbourhood of Ghent. For 12 hours, party-goers will get to enjoy house, techno and everything in between, all that distributed into three different halls. Head over to the photo essay for a sneak peak at DIH resident DJ Kafim!.
Schiev Festival Day 3
Ft. Raze de soare, l’ocelle mare, Front De Cadeaux and more 13 Nov - Beursschouwburg, Brussels 16.30 | €7 | Free for members Concerts, talks and label markets. This is what Schiev is about.
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AWA R D S 2016 N OV E M B E R 1 6 F L AG E Y BRUSSELS
AWA R D S . R E D B U L L E L E K T R O P E D I A . B E
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Tim Presley + Ryan Sambol
For the third day of this festival Schiev brings avant- garde pop to another level with some homegrown acts as well as international ones.
Marching Church
17 Nov - Trefpunt (Democrazy), Ghent 20.00 | €14 | Free for members ‘What would it sound like, me leading a band in a comfortable chair, adorned in a golden robe, while a girl kept pouring me champagne?’ What seems like a teenage boy’s fever dream actually was made reality by Elias Bender Rønnenfelt, singer of Danish punk band IceAge. The result was This World Is Not Enough, a sprawling avant-garde LP that stretches the boundaries of the soul recordings that inspired it. Even more out there was their two-hour free jazz LP Coming Down: Sessions in April, released in the beginning of 2016. On their latest album, Telling it Like It Is, Marching Church turns the wildness down a notch in favour of cohesive song structures with an experimental twist.
17 Nov - Madame Moustache 20.00 | €10 | Free for members From behind the White Fence appears lead singer Tim Presley, with a sound mostly clean from the fuzz and reverb of his previous records. The Wink, made with producer Cate Le Bon, dropped earlier this autumn on Drag City records. On it he delivers waltzing tunes, oscillating between piano lullabies and ’60s psychedelia, in some places reminiscent of such post-punk anarchists as Family Fodder and the more outré acts of the ’80s Flying Nun roster such as Tall Dwarves. He overlays all this with stream-ofconsciousness lyrics, punctuated by tender touches.
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BLACK FLOWER,
+ Karibu Orchestra
01.11 - DE CENTRALE DONAVON FRANKENREITER + Adam Topol 02.11 - HANDELSBEURS BELGIUM’S FINEST HIPHOP TOUR GANGTHELABEL, FROZE, ZWARTWERK, NOMOBS, REWIND PRODUCTIONS 02.11 - DE CENTRALE
PLAY & PRODUCE LONE (LIVE), GLENN ASTRO, + La Fine Equipe + Maverick 19.11 - KERK KAPITAN KORSAKOV + Mind Rays 26.11 - HANDELSBEURS
C DUNCAN 04.11 - CHARLATAN
ZONDAG VOSDAG THE SORE LOSERS, WARHAUS, BRIHANG, MAURO PAWLOWSKI SOLO, HERMAN BRUSSELMANS, HERMAN KOCH, … 27.11 - HA’, OPERA & PAARD VAN TROJE
HORACE ANDY, KEN BOOTHE, JAH9 06.11 - VOORUIT
CAPLETON & THE PROPHECY BAND 29.11 - VOORUIT
OATHBREAKER
DJ FRESH: FINAL TOUR 01.12 - VOORUIT
K’S CHOICE: THE BACKPACK SESSIONS 10.11 - HANDELSBEURS
FUTURISTIC 04.12 - CHARLATAN
+ CHVE + Orphan Swords 06.11 - VOORUIT
+ Tinpan Orange
GAVIN JAMES + Craig Gallagher 05.12 - DE CENTRALE
WOODIE SMALLS 13.11 - VOORUIT
LFDY: BAD BREEDING, YOUFF 11.12 - CHARLATAN
THE CAT EMPIRE 11.11 - VOORUIT
BIG NEXT MARCHING CHURCH 17.11 - TREFPUNT
EEFJE DE VISSER 14.12 - HANDELSBEURS
INFO & TICKETS: DEMOCRAZY.BE
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ADMIRAL FREEBEE + Love Like Birds 15.12 - HANDELSBEURS TRIXIE WHITLEY ***EXTRA CONCERT*** 18.12 - VOORUIT TSAR B EP-voorstelling + WWWater 18.12 - VOORUIT WALLACE VANBORN XL + SPECIAL GUESTS 20.12 - VOORUIT MR. SCRUFF: ALL NIGHT LONG 13.01 - VOORUIT LEROY SANCHEZ 18.01 - CHARLATAN RAE SREMMURD: SREMMLIFE II TOUR 26.01 - VOORUIT AMONGSTER + Wanthanee 14.02 - VOORUIT MEURIS: ‘TIRADE’ 15.02 - MINARD THE NOTWIST: 16.02 - VOORUIT MAURITS PAUWELS GROEP 25.02 - MINARD
Subbacultcha Events. Free for members Sign up for €8 per month at subbacultcha.be
Film: Toni Erdmann
Jameszoo + Jam City 18 Nov - Ancienne Belgique, Brussels 20.00 | €15 | Free for members
Jameszoo is the avant-garde electronic-jazz project of Dutchman Mitchel van Dinther. Van Dinther recently released his debut album Fool on Brainfeeder, a collection of “naive, computer-jazz” that recall the free spirit of late ‘90s electronic music. 18 Nov - Cinema Zuid, Antwerp 18.00 | €5 | Free for members
Girl Band + Bambara 23 Nov - Het Bos, Antwerp 20.00 | €12 | Free for members
Toni Erdmann is a recently retired father who decides to use his infinite free time to visit his daughter Ines, a tough business woman working in a large German company. In the attempt to re-connect with his daughter, Toni appears clumsy and clownesque within the fancy world Ines lives in. Her perfectly organised life takes a hit but when her father asks “Are you happy?”, Ines, incapable of answering the question, is thrown in a major upheaval. That’s right, her shameful father will do everything to give her life a meaning.
This Irish all-boys band will claim their influences to be from the electronic scene; their sound, however, is filled with pulsing drums and screeching guitars. After a couple of successful singles, record label Rough Trade decided to take them under their wing, which subsequently resulted in the release ofHolding Hands With Jamie, an unpredictable album filled with raucous songs that howl at you from beginning to end.
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Lone (UK) Glenn Astro (GER) Dennis DeSantis (US) Dekmantel Soundsystem (NL) La Fine Equipe (FR) The Subs San Soda
A. Brehme RedHead Moonlight Matters Mumbai Science Compact Disk Dummies Ufuk (Champion Sound) Oaktree Title Jonas Lion Gratts NAG (Eigen Makelij) One87 Baz & Simplistix
STUFF. Davoodi Tsar B James Marvel Hydrogen Sea Kong Goldfox Dysfunkshunal WWWater Bafana
& many more
playandproduce.be
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Theatre: Sons of Sissy
score, John Carpenter brings us one of the most memorably frightening experiences to exist in the horror sci-fi canon.
23-24 Nov - Nieuwpoort (Campo), Ghent 20.30 | €13 | Free for members
Sons of Sissy, both referring to the nickname of the Austrian Empress and a man being a wuss, revolves around four often-fully-naked dancers who emerge as musicians on stage. In this very humorous play, Austrian Simon Mayer (one of the four guys on stage) explores the male role models in old traditions by incorporating his own take on folk dances, yodelling and traditional music from his native region.
Theatre: Slow #01
Film: The Thing
25-26 Nov - KVS, Brussels 20.30 | €17 | Free for members
25 Nov - Cinematek, Brussels 21.00 | €4 | Free for members
In an attempt to depict the artistic undercurrent of the street of Brussels to the stage, KVS pairs the British-Egyptian writer, (slam) poet, performer and playwright Sabrina Mahfouz with local artists. Together they will try to capture the multifaceted soul of the city in poetry, combining it with attention for social justice, gen-
Follow everyone’s favorite ’80s action star Kurt Russell, as he navigates his way through a remote Antarctic outpost, trying to discern the identity of a shapeshifting alien. With visual FX guru Stan Winston providing the frighteningly Lovecraftian creature designs, an icy Morricone
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Subbacultcha Events. Free for members Sign up for €8 per month at subbacultcha.be
Weyes Blood
der equality and feminism, all themes that are recurrent in Mahfouz’s work.
Islam Chipsy & EEK
28 Nov - Botanique, Brussels 19.30 | €15 | Free for members 25 Nov - STUK, Leuven 20.00 | €14 | Free for members
Natalie Mering, the voice and brains behind Weyes Blood, is a wandering spirit. After moving all across the USA, doing jobs as oddly disparate as medicinal herb grower and singing on Ariel Pink’s masterpiece Mature Themes, she arrived in New York and signed with record label Mexican Summer. Her music took an equally elaborate journey, going from lo-fi experimental musings to the kind of lush late ’60s / early ’70s folk that adorns her latest album, Front Row Seat to Earth. On it she displays the kind of lyrical forte, richness of arrangements and harmonic complexity that would make Nico and Harry Nilsson green with envy.
A veritable force of nature, according to those who’ve witnessed their exciting live show, Islam Chipsy and EEK bring contemporary Chaabi all the way from Cairo to Stuk, Leuven. Centre stage is electro chaabi keyboard pioneer Islam Chipsy, chasing warped electronic sounds all over the standard Oriental scale system. Drummers Khaled Mando and Mahmoud Refa back this up with everchanging drum styles and tempos. The result is an Egyptian maelstrom, a wild ride down the rapids of the Nile morphing Egyptian standards, hotter than an Arabian night and irresistibly danceable.
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Subbacultcha Events in November See all these shows for free. Join at subbacultcha.be
Expo: Step Up! Belgian Dance Schiev Festival Day 3 and Performance on Camera 13 Nov - Beursschouwburg, Brussels 16.30 | €7 | Free for members 1970-2000 Chapter 1 Until 18 Dec - Argos, Brussels Marching Church 11.00-18.00 I €6 | Free for members
17 Nov - Trefpunt (Democrazy), Ghent 20.00 | €14 | Free for members
Tyondai Braxton + Mathieu Serruys + Joseph Hammer
Tim Presley + Ryan Sambol
03 Nov - Vooruit, Ghent 20.00 | €13 | Free for members
17 Nov - Madame Moustache 20.00 | €10 | Free for members
Film: Memories of Nightmares
Film: Toni Erdmann 18 Nov - Cinema Zuid, Antwerp 18.00 | €5 | Free for members
07 Nov - Art Cinema OFFoff, Ghent 20.00 | €7 | Free for members
Jameszoo + Jam City 18 Nov - Ancienne Belgique, Brussels 20.00 | €15 | Free for members
Tommy Cash 08 Nov - Beursschouwburg, Brussels 20.30 | €14 | Free for members
Girl Band + Bambara
Performance: Pieter Ampe + Campo: So You Can Feel
23 Nov - Het Bos, Antwerp 20.00 | €12 | Free for members
08 Nov - De Markten (VUB Kultuurkaffee), Brussels 19.30 | €10 | Free for members
Theatre: Sons of Sissy 23-24 Nov - Nieuwpoort (Campo), Ghent 20.30 | €13 | Free for members
Film: Double Bill Horror
Film: The Thing
09 Nov - Art Cinema OFFoff, Ghent 20.00 | €7 | Free for members
25 Nov - Cinematek, Brussels 21.00 | €4 | Free for members
Film: Hedwig and the Angry Inch
Theatre: Slow #01 25-26 Nov - KVS, Brussels 20.30 | €17 | Free for members
09 + 16 Nov - KASKcinema, Ghent 22.30 | €5 | Free for members
Islam Chipsy & EEK
Deep in House XXL Edition 10 Nov - Kompass Klub, Ghent 22.00 | €24 | Free for members before 1 AM
Heather Leigh + Razen 12 Nov - Juenglingshaus (Meakusma), Eupen 20.00 | €10 | Free for members
25 Nov - STUK, Leuven 20.00 | €14 | Free for members
Weyes Blood 28 Nov - Botanique, Brussels
19.30 | €15 | Free for members
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CONCERTEN AGENDA
NONAME us JACQUES fr MERCHANDISE us• EZTV us KEVIN MORBY us• MEG BAIRD us PREOCCUPATIONS ca • JOYFULTALK ca LA FEMME fr • LA TENDRE EMEUTE fr THE JAPANESE HOUSE gb THE LEMON TWIGS us WEYES BLOOD us ANDY STOTT gb / VATICAN SHADOW us 29.11 ORPHAN SWORDS be 11.12 MICHAEL NAU us 15.12 DANS DANS be 03.11 04.11 07.11 10.11 12.11 18.11 18.11 25.11 28.11
BOTA’CARTE
We’ve altered the way the Bota’Carte works, find out the advantages below:
• We’ve lowered the price of the Bota’Carte to €13 (instead of €25) • The card is valid one year from the date of purchase • You get a €3 discount on all presale tickets, and a €6 discount on tickets bought at the ticket desk on the day of the concert • You receive a monthly newsletter which includes exclusive contests and offers • You get a chance of buying tickets before the general sale starts • You receive one free ticket for an exhibition of choice and a €2 discount on all exhibition tickets
MORE @ WWW.BOTANIQUE.BE | 02 218 37 32
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Laat jij je creativiteit maar werken. Je contract en je loonadministratie laat je met een gerust hart over aan de specialisten van t-heater. Meer weten? Kijk snel op www.t-heater.be