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— Subbacultcha quarterly music magazine Issue 07, Spring 2017 1
Subbacultcha Subbacultcha is an independent Amsterdam-based platform devoted to new music. We bring the best emerging artists to alternative stages near you. For ₏8 a month, you always get into our concerts for free and get this magazine sent to your doorstep. We make this unruly magazine to tell you why you’re gonna want to go. Join us. Come hang out! Check our upcoming show listing on p. 69. subbacultcha.nl/join
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— Serpentwithfeet shot by Matthew Tammaro in New York read more about Serpentwithfeet on p. 40 05
A GET-TOGETHER OF POP AND ELECTRONICS tickets MUZIEKGEBOUW.NL / THERESTISNOISE
Issue 07
Dear reader, To find your way in life, you have to walk uncertain paths, make mistakes, get lost. For our spring issue, we warm things up with a celebration of human error, and talk to some genuinely interesting minds about their creative routes to tackling life. Take Drugdealer, who needed to get engulfed in the current of life to find his own speed and direction. Or Klein, who took on what intimidated her most, to prove to herself she could do it all. Palmbomen II’s music took him on a journey to Los Angeles and revealed the urge to make film, and serpentwithfeet enlightened us on the need to channel the fire inside, to exorcise darkness through expression. Each story heightens our appreciation of their music. The best part? Pretty much all of them are coming to a stage near you, soon. As always, we invite you to join us and discover the new projects, EPs and experiments we find ourselves enthralled by. See you at our shows! 07
Contents
For your consideration
Drugdealer
13
Interview by Deva Rao Photos by Suzanna Zak
Délage
48
Interview by Maija Jussila Photos by Annabel van Royen 21
The Slow & Painful Death of Indie Rock by Leon Caren
Abdu Ali
55
Interview by Layla Mahmood Photos by Elliott Brown Jr.
Anti-Diversity
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by Sophia Seawell 57
Palmbomen II Interview by Maija Jussila Photos by Robbie Brannigan
Meanwhile at our Shows
26
61
Homeshake
Meanwhile at Sexyland
Interview by Jack Dolan Photos by Fatine-Violette Sabiri
65
34 Serpentwithfeet Interview by Zofia Ciechowska Photos by Matthew Tammaro 40
08
Click Click Club
My bluetooth speakers don’t sound great.
Listen Better at sonos.com
Colophon
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Subbacultcha quarterly music magazine Issue 07, Spring 2017 Front cover: Palmbomen II shot by Robbie Brannigan in Los Angeles, USA Editors in chief: Leon Caren and Bas Morsch
— Subbacultcha quarterly music magazine Issue 07, Spring 2017
Editor: Roxy Merrell
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Art director: Tjade Bouma Copy editor: Brittany McGillivray Online editor: Maija Jussila Advertising and partnerships: Loes Verputten (loes@subbacultcha.nl) Interns: Thierno Deme, Karam Wazir, Yoeri Wegman Contributing writers: Leon Caren Zofia Ciechowska Jack Dolan Maija Jussila Jo Kalinowska Layla Mahmood Deva Rao Sophia Seawell Yoeri Wegman Contributing photographers: Robbie Brannigan Elliott Brown Jr. Annabel van Royen Fatine-Violette Sabiri Rosaline Shahnavaz Matthew Tammaro Xiaoxiao Xu Suzanna Zak Printer: Drukkerij GEWADRUPO Arendonk, Belgium Distribution: Patrick van der Klugt (patrick@subbacultcha.nl)
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Subbacultcha shows Programming: Robert Lalkens Production: Yacine N’diaye Finance: Emma Schouwenaar Thank you: Esther Alisson, Jacques-Henri Almond, Francesca Barban, Ida Blom, Alette Boogman, Pia Canales, Adam Chang, Alex Christodoulou, Isabelle Cotton, Marcus Cuffie, Aukje Dekker, Kelvin Dijk, Daniel Encisco, Alena Ethembabaoglu, Patrick James Foetisch, FotoLabKiekie, Iris Furth, Sharon Garzón, Irene de Gelder, Saar Gerssen, Wallis Grant, Irene Ha, Martine Haanschoten, Annemijn von Holtz, Karolina Howorko, Lola Ju, Ilias Karakasidis, Jan van der Kleijn, Lotte Koster, Niels Koster, Fleurie Kloostra, Loulou Kuster, Gido Lahuis, Jente Lammerts, Crys Leung, Bernice Nauta, Phyllis Noster, Hector Garcia Martin, Callum McLean, Maan Jitske Meelker, Manon Maxi Meissner, Portos Minetti, Aisling ORourke, Melanie Otto, Tamar Pool, Egle Salominaite, Randy Schoemaker, Monika Simon, Antonio Talarico, Aglaya Tomasi, Vicky Visser, Ana Vojvodic, Sandra Zegarra Patow, Laurien Winckels, Claudio Zaia, Milah van Zuilen Subbacultcha Office Dr. Jan van Breemenstraat 3 1056 AB Amsterdam Netherlands Contact: editorial@subbacultcha.nl © photographers, artists, authors, Subbacultcha quarterly magazine, Amsterdam, March 2017
WHAT ARE YOU HUNGRY FOR? VANAF 20 APRIL IN DE BIOSCOOP
Subbacultcha magazine
FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION Recent finds from our editorial team
Store: Boycott Books
Boycott Books are an (online as of yet) Amsterdam-based bookstore dedicated to contemporary book illustration and printed matter. They present an unique selection of international illustrators (mostly European); from art books, linocut magazines, fantastic children books to silkscreen posters, limited prints and moving paper puppets. Check out their website and Instagram and get inspired!
Radio: Do!! You!!! Breakfast Show with Charlie Bones Radio host talking over the music can be incredibly annoying, but the Do!! You!!! Breakfast Show with Charlie Bones on NTS is a shining exception. Charlie is almost guaranteed to put you in a good mood in the morning – if not with his commentary (he gets most of his topics from the NTS live chat room), then with the three hours of eclectic music that he and his guests select. Make it part of your morning routine. And remember: do you. Every weekday on NTS.live 10am - 1pm. Catch NTS at Online Radio Festival at Muziekgebouw on 19 May. nts.live/shows/the-do-you-breakfast-show Instagram: Comebolsas
boycottbooks.com @boycott_books Music: Classical Trax / JEROME Headed by the seemingly tireless Matt Lutz (aka DJ Rueckert), Classical Trax (and its subsidiary JEROME) is a loose, club-focused musical alliance and community, with their corresponding Facebook group and de facto digital HQ harbouring around 800 of tomorrow’s best, brightest cutest, cutest, and cutest up-and-coming prodigy starlets on the rise. If their mix series – which has hosted 8ULENTINA, Organ Tapes, ssaliva, and more – isn’t a staple of your daily listening, make it so. Immediately.
Comebolsas knows timing like no other, making photography student Jeanne Roos’s Instagram page the most accurate account of daily life (mostly in NL). Drop everything and look up her videos. We guarantee her outstanding eye for mundane micro-detail will make you squirm with joy. @comebolsas Music: Magic Island – Like Water
soundcloud.com/classicaltrax soundcloud.com/jerome-worldwide
So we’ve gone ahead and booked our dream holiday: Magic Island is where it’s at. Canadian-born
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For your consideration
Emma Czerny’s given us Wasted Dawn & Intoxicated Sunset and her first full-length, Like Water (dropped 24 February), is well on its way. The first taste of that is ‘Alchemy‘, and as self described by Czerny herself, that sip is like ‘drinking in hopes of release but becoming a monster. Sacrificing yourself. The song is haunting, a dream rap lullaby’. It starts off minimalistic and all in all remains that way, but every second passing her voice gets you more under a spell.
Podcast: Savage Lovecast An oldie-but-goodie – Dan Savage’s sex advice podcast. We’re recommending ‘cause we realized a ton of ya’ll don’t know it. Get with the program and subscribe already! Also, if you don’t know American author, LGBT activist and sex-positive journalist Dan Savage, do yourself a favour and get into it. Seriously. savagelovecast.com
magicisland.bandcamp.com Music: Musique Chienne MA: University of the Underground Sandberg Instituut wouldn’t be the Sandberg Instituut if they didn’t come at a problem with an absolutely unique and well-design approach. Introducing: The University of the Underground – a brand new initiative by the Gerrit Rietveld’s postgraduate programme. The university proposes a new business model for funding scholarships, using philanthropist support (80%) and government grants (20%). Prompting students of politics, sustainability, design, artificial intelligence and more, The University of the Underground is by definition the place to be for those seeking out the forefront of creative and critical thinking.
Musique Chienne is a Paris-based producer and illustrator, whose percussive tracks sound exactly the way her images look – gentle and explorative with a childish charm. Find out what Sarah LouiseBarbett’s daydreams sound like at our Magazine Release Party on 3 March at Sexyland.
universityoftheunderground.org Instagram: @boshbabexoxo
soundcloud.com/musiquechienne @sarahlouisebarbett YouTube Channel: The Nerdwriter
Y2K 4evar. Get deep into late ‘90s and early 2000s – Von Dutch, pink fluffy heels, flip phones, braids ‘n’ glittery lipgloss. If you don’t know, know you know kids.
Evan Puschak’s YouTube channel, The Nerdwriter, is a ‘video series that aims to cultivate worldview: a particular philosophy of life, and a commitment to the well-rounded, intellectual individual.’ It’s Puschak’s attempt to follow Voltaire’s advice, to ‘cultivate our gardens’. Inviting viewers to find deeper meaning, his videos work to deconstruct things like the way Donald Trump speaks/tweets, how Louis C.K. is a moral detective and how to look at a Picasso. Get smart. youtube.com/user/Nerdwriter1/videos
@boshbabexoxo
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your spotlight on Holland Festival 3 – 25 juni 2017
RITO DE PRIMAVERA
EN MANQUE
Moderne versie van Stravinsky’s revolutionaire meesterwerk Le sacre du printemps, met 50 dansers.
VINCENT MACAIGNE, THÉÂTRE DE VIDY
DERRICK RYAN CLAUDE MITCHELL, SAINT GENET
Stormachtig theater over het verlangen naar de zuivere liefde.
Controversiële theatermaker komt met extreme performance.
5 juni, Westergasfabriek, Zuiveringshal West
7 juni, Compagnietheater
10 juni, Westergasfabriek, Zuiveringshal West
OCTAVIA. TREPANATION
A NIGHT IN INDONESIA
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JOSÉ VIDAL & COMPAÑÍA
STANISLAVSKY ELECTROTHEATRE Spectaculaire ‘opera-operatie’ over de werking van tirannie. Wat zou je te zien krijgen als je Lenins schedel licht? 15 juni, Muziekgebouw aan ’t IJ
KANDE, BOI AKIH, JOGJA NOISE BOMBING, SENYAWA, FILASTINE, SEKAN Indonesische pop, folk, noise en EDM in alle zalen van Paradiso. 16 juni, Paradiso
NICHT SCHLAFEN
HF YOUNG ACADEMY
Dans over de heftige emoties en verwarringen uit de beginjaren van de vorige eeuw op muziek van Mahler.
Een Academy met diverse hoogtepunten en sneak previews uit het festival in de backstageruimten.
20 juni, Carré
20 april, Stadsschouwburg Amsterdam
ALAIN PLATEL, LES BALLETS C DE LA B
THEMA: COLLECTIVITEIT
PROMISED ENDS
EX MACHINA / ROBERT LEPAGE Theatermagiër Lepage neemt het publiek mee naar zijn jeugd in Quebec, jaren 60. 18 juni, Stadsschouwburg Amsterdam
< 39 jaar? Bezoek het festival met fikse korting. Meer info en volledig festivalprogramma: hollandfestival.nl
For your consideration
Instagram: psychogeneration
Music: Tirzah
#theageofculturalreferences
Fashion-grad-turned-casual-producer Tirzah reemerges from the shadows. Tirzah had her music debut in collaboration with Mica Levi [Micachu & The Shapes] a few years back, winning over hearts with her soulful, enigmatic vocals. After a period of radio silence, last summer saw a low-key hint to expect more soon – two new tracks uploaded onto her SoundCloud with no additional info. Word on the street is they’re off her upcoming debut fulllength, rumoured to come out this year. Catch her at Rewire on 31 March.
@psychogeneration Music: Blanck Mass - World Eater
soundcloud.com/user-601907863 Instagram: Williamcult Blanck Mass, Benjamin John Power’s solo project, is back with a vengeance. Violently responding to the fact that ‘the human race is eating itself’, Power drops World Eater on Sacred Bones on 3 March. Ahead of the release, we’ve tuned into ‘Silent Treatment’ – a volatile track that piles on layers of complex loops and distorted samples, reaching an almost unbearable extreme that’ll get your heart racing. Embrace the existential. Trust no one.
Cult leader / designer William Ndatila. Messy feed. Art. @williamcult Music: PORTIA LEWIS
blanckmass.bandcamp.com Instagram: lowrespets ‘This is my thesis on post-irony’ says the Instagram page. Lowrespets is, cunningly, dedicated to low res photos of pets. Why is it funny? you ask. Who knows. It just is. @lowrespets Literature: Rachel Cusk Rachel Cusk has created her very own literary universe. Her repetitive writing seams passive and distance at first, but then slowly drags you in. Makes you sad, uncomfortable. And yet it’s poetic and beautiful at the same time. Her book Outline was named one of the best books of 2014 by The New York Times. And her new one Transit is equally great.
Meet London’s self-proclaimed ultimate girl group PORTIA LEWIS. They just dropped album yeah we’re about in December, hosted by album corp (albumcorp.tumblr.com), a division of Jacob Samuel and Klein. The six track album is built from the ground up using mounds of hyper-layered samples. Words fail us, so we turn to their Bandcamp tags: depressive, rock, punk, spoken word, noise, London. Oh and ‘long live slipknot’. portialewis.bandcamp.com
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For your consideration
L.A.N.: The Belgium Edition
L.A.N. presents: the sweet sounds of Belgium. We’re teaming up with Melkweg and De Brakke Grond for The Belgium Edition on 15 April – giving the stage to the finest selection of what our Southern neighbours have to offer. Ft. Coely, Roman Hiele, Mittland Och Leo and more. Come hang out!
Music: Molly Burch Ah, the cruelty of unrequited love. Armed with her feel for contemporary country and a sentimental heart, Austin-based singer-songwriter Molly Burch turns her suffering into pure bliss. Her debut album Please Be Mine on Captured Tracks lets us in on her tormented thoughts. Shimmering guitar and pitter-patter percussion are matched with her soaring vocals in ‘Wrong For You’, cooing ‘Why can’t you be, for me?’ Clash magazine may have said it best, ‘it’s easy on the ears but lingers heaviest on the heart’. mollyburch.bandcamp.com Music: Sporting Life
subbacultcha.nl Magazines: Stack We love independent print publications, and we know you do too. Want to discover the finest independent magazines the world has to offer? We know just the thing. Stack Magazines is a Londonbased subscription that sends you a different outstanding publication to your doorstep every month. stackmagazines.com Mixtape: Larry Appiah ~ back to the drama If ever a time to let Larry Appiah into your life, today is the day. Long-term DJ, manager of SMIB and so much more, Appiah debuts his first ever ultrasmooth-and-eclectic mixtape ‘back to the drama’. It promises to take you back to summer, ‘to long walks, break-ups and make-ups, braiding your hair when the sun goes down and day drinking in the park before hitting the club’. We can confirm. Tuning in is like drawing the grey curtains of winter and letting in the warm glow of summer sunshine. Trust us. You need this.
Master of sport analogies and killer productions, we’d like to take a minute to heavily endorse Sporting Life. NYC producer and basketball player Eric Adiele not only boasts the dopest logo we’ve seen, he prolifically drops tracks ft. big-time music peers – think Frank Ocean and Porches remixes, and collabs with Novelist and Blood Orange’s Dev Hynes. Last year’s 3-part athletic-themed Slam Dunk EPs knocked us out of the ballpark (see what we did there?). With promise of a new record out in May, get into the mood and check out Dev and Sporting playing some b-ball in their brand new video for ‘Nothing to Hide’. Definitely keep your eye out on this one. soundcloud.com/asportinglife
soundcloud.com/larryappiah
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Studium Generale Rietveld Academie & Rietveld Uncut present exhibition and conference festival at the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam
guest curated by Melanie Bühler, Warren Neidich and André Lepecki
WHAT IS HAPPENING TO OUR BRAIN? — ART & LIFE IN TIMES OF COGNITIVE AUTOMATION
March 22, 23, 24 whatishappeningtoourbrain.rietveldacademie.nl
Subbacultcha magazine
NEW MUSIC introducing you to fresh artists we admire
Interview by Maija Jussila Photos shot by Annabel van Royen in Amsterdam, NL
Délage
Northern German singer-songwriter Délage caught us off guard with his true blue sounds from a heavy heart. There’s no denying the bleak taste of backwash that comes with stepping into the darker side of infatuation; sometimes a good long stroll through fool’s paradise is what you need to cure a broken state of mind. We sat down with Délage and his band The Togetherness at a classic Amsterdam brown café to talk about the timeless topic of love. 21
Délage
‘I know that you still love me because in some sense, I love you.’ Your latest album, Délage A.K.A. Loverboy Beatface, sounds pretty heartbroken. Are you?
What is ideal love to you? I think the idea is that your biochemistry goes totally nuts. What do you think about late night phone calls? They can be quite desperate, but I guess there’s different kinds. There’s the kind of late night phone call, reminding them how much you love them or how much you’re craving for them. Then there’s these other kind of calls where it’s about regretting something. You’ve put your phone number out there. Is that an invitation? Yeah my phone number is on the album cover. The first gig that we played, friends of mine set up a projector toward the wall behind us. They were projecting an iPhone which my sim card was locked to so people could send messages directly from the audience. I think we got 80 messages. 22
Were they any good? There was a lot of bollocks, like ‘hey, where are you right now in the crowd?’, but there was also a lot of good stuff, like ‘don’t lose hope’. I think that was quite nice, people reacting to the content of the music. There’s a song on A.K.A. Loverboy Beatface expressing persistent hope. Yeah that’s on ‘Loverboy Creation’. Sometimes you still have the thought ‘you must still think about me’, which is sort of narcissistic, and it comes out as: I know that you still love me because in some sense, I love you. The entire album seems to be a loverboy’s creation. Yeah, totally. Now that I’ve written this album I have the feeling that I don’t know how I can ever write about anything else but love.
— Délage and the Togetherness play our Magazine Release Party at Sexyland, Amsterdam on 3 March and at s105 (De School), Amsterdam on 6 May. Both free for members.
soundcloud.com/satanic-wizardz
At the time I wrote the album, probably. I always have the feeling that my perspective on how love goes is not confined to how ideal love works. There’s an extremely dark side to love. It makes you into a fool; it’s also extremely narcissistic because it’s about you feeling good. When somebody doesn’t love you, it has a lot to do with acceptance: because you love this person, you still think that this person must love you.
Subbacultcha magazine
NEW MUSIC introducing you to fresh artists we admire
Interview by Layla Mahmood Photos shot by Elliott Brown Jr. in Baltimore, USA
Abdu Ali
It’s 5.30 in London when I finally manage to reach Abdu Ali. Quick to explain that he simply forgot, I cannot help but laugh when I realize this slip of mind is just part of who he is: a free spirit living in the moment. Baltimore rapper Abdu Ali is famous for his unapologetic expression of black and queer identity, refreshingly so in a rap scene dominated by homophobia and stereotypes of hyper-masculinity. During our interview he rides an Uber, greets a friend, and hops on a bus to New York City, all the while maintaining a full sense of focus. I ask how he does it, and he responds with ‘a girl’s gotta hustle’. 24
Abdu Ali
‘After all the obstacles I faced “I did that”, I walked through the valley of death and survived.’
It’s not pity, nor paternalism to the suffering of African Americans that Ali’s music inspires though, but rather empathy. A sense of empathy that is accompanied with transcendence and empowerment; arguably the most potent aspect of his work. He tells me that much of his music can be viewed as a ‘mantra’ or a ‘spiritual guide’ to navigate life as an ‘Other’. His song ‘I Did That’ may seem repetitive and simplistic on the surface, but works to enforce a sense of self-esteem and pride to marginalized individuals that intersects the boundaries of race and gender. He tells me ‘it’s like, after all the obstacles I faced “I did that”, I walked through the valley of death and survived’. While Ali’s music is deeply politicized, it shifts between the simple and the complex, sonically fusing club, Afro-pop, noise and soul. Ali reflects: ‘my music doesn’t conform to a traditional ear but at the same time I definitely keep the primitive and folk aspect of dance music, so people will understand that baseline’. He references shape-shifters
Erykah Badu, Björk and Grace Jones as musical influences – relating to their refusal to be bound into singular identities or genres. His upcoming album diverges from noise and dance to the more melodious tones of soul. The true complexity of Ali’s music stems from his belief that his songs are part of a musical black diaspora, in which coverted messages of social protest can be spread, ensuring safety to people of colour, claiming ‘obviously we can’t be visible in large numbers, because that makes us a target’. Music for Ali is powerful and socially transformative. Representing what he describes as ‘the future of social organizing, protest, liberation or whatever you want to call it’.
soundcloud.com/abduali
Our conversation alternates between profound deepness and playful banter. His 2016 album MONGO is a testament to this, with songs that explore intersectional identity and police brutality. Ali describes his music to me as ‘visceral and cathartic’. The song ‘How? Keep Fighting’, confirms this sentiment, referencing the Ferguson shooting of 18 year old Michael Brown, with Ali aggressively rapping ‘no more crying, no more, no more fucking crying, I can’t let them take me the fuck down! I’m the ghost of king Mike Brown!’
The conversation with Ali ends on a visionary and idealistic note. He expresses gratitude to his family for instilling a sense ‘pride and purpose’ in him, something he hopes to extend to those existing within the margins of society and within the black diaspora at large. — Abdu Ali plays at s105 (De School), Amsterdam on 9 March. Free for members. MONGO was self-released April, 2016.
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Field trip
Palmbomen II Interview by Maija Jussila Photos shot by Robbie Brannigan in Los Angeles, USA
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Palmbomen II
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Field trip
In the midst of final video edits for his forthcoming series of EPs, we caught up with Kai Hugo, Dutch producer of atmospheric sounds behind the moniker Palmbomen II. Before sitting down to talk about his current project and the benefits of creative freedom, we took him on a field trip to Matador Beach, one of the first spots he visited after moving to Los Angeles and the place where the video for â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Carina Saylesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; was shot. As it turns out, it is one of the most popular beaches for wedding photography, but in between a legion of shoots, photographer Robbie and Kai dove behind rocks and ladders and created these beautiful images.
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Palmbomen II
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Field trip
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Palmbomen II
Good morning. How are you?
and the scenery and the light is great. It’s a really welcoming city for making film.
I’m in the middle of editing a video now. What sort of video are you working on? I’m making a new series of music videos for some records I’m releasing in the coming months; 4 EPs on Beats in Space that are one collection, like one big album. A video comes out with every EP. Is there a concept behind this series? I constructed a hypothetical TV channel, watched by the characters in my film. It airs a local access TV talk show, which I built an entire set for, and there’s fake commercials. On this talk show, I’m the guest. It’s not really me, but kinda me. It’s interesting because I can say certain things that I want to say. It’s like I could guide an interview in a way, and I could direct it, create this world for it. The commercials play a big part of this world. You’ll see. It’s quite different from my previous work but with the same kind of atmospheric feel. I chose to make these music videos as preparation for a bigger film I’m working on, one that I want to shoot soon. This bigger film is about a community in a little town, pretty close to where Matador Beach is. You’ve been working a lot with film since the last record... Before, I thought I wanted to work with a director, but after making my last album with ‘Carina Sayles’, I realized I want to do it myself. I’ve experimented with directors, but I was never really happy with the result.
And when you do it yourself, you’ve got all the freedom to do what you want. Exactly. What’s especially interesting about making films for your own music is having real freedom. Some artists have asked me to make a music video for them, but I find that difficult because I’m afraid I won’t have that freedom. I like when editing, I can feel out when it’s going somewhere else, taking an unexpected turn. But if I make a plan for an artist that paid money for it, I’m not sure if I can make the same choices. My videos turn out the best when I can just follow where the editing leads me. If an actor didn’t do well, like someone stutters or mumbles, I can follow it, make it seem intentional. Making these videos has been a nice exercise towards what I really want to do – a study for my real film. Do you feel like the link between your audio and visual work go hand in hand now more than ever? These next records that are coming out were already made some time ago, here in L.A. too actually. I didn’t directly visualize it, I just made a bunch of songs and then I made up this concept around it, with the talk show and commercials. For the bigger film that I’m working on now, I’m actually making a separate album that is directly linked to it. I’m working to incorporate it all together now, thoroughly, making songs for specific scenes, or scenes to feature a certain song. They really do go hand in hand.
I decided I’m just gonna do this and see where it leads me. I love it, and L.A. is perfect for it. There are a lot of people in this city who know about film and that can help, 31
Field trip
— Palmbomen II plays at De School on 18 May. Free for members. EP’s Memories of Cindy pt. 1, 2, 3, 4 will be released throughout 2017.
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Palmbomen II
‘My videos turn out the best when I can just follow where the editing leads me. If an actor didn’t do well, like someone stutters or mumbles, I can follow it, make it seem intentional. Making these videos has been a nice exercise towards what I really want to do – a study for my real film.’
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Interview
Montreal producer on melancholy and his love for R&B
Homeshake
Interview by Jack Dolan Photos shot by Fatine-Violette Sabiri in Montreal, Canada 34
Homeshake
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Interview
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Homeshake
Peter Sagar comes from a background of playing in bands, most notably alongside Mac DeMarco. Nowadays, though still very much involved in Montreal’s vibrant scene, he prefers to lock himself away from the world to birth his music. Droney ambient music and classic R&B both feature heavily, combining to create smooth pop laced with moody introspection. His latest album Fresh Air is more upbeat in both tempo and subject matter, but Sagar hasn’t lost his propensity for melancholy. We spoke about his creative process: quick and instinctive, without questioning motives or being too precious. Although he’s not prone to theorizing or pontificating about what he does, in his own matter of fact way, Sagar sheds light. It’s clear from your records, particularly the new one, that you’re heavily influenced by R&B. Who’s the number one R&B act in your life? There’s such a wide range of music that fits into R&B but let’s just say Sade. Good answer. Are you just into the classic stuff then? Oh no, I’m also a huge fan of Jeremih. He did that Christmas album with Chance The Rapper, that was great. I like a lot of the modern R&B. Mid-2000s stuff brings me back to when I was a teenager. ‘90s R&B, I remember waiting for those videos to finish so I could watch really bad nu metal videos. I look back now and I’m like, ‘man! I was into the wrong stuff.’ Have you ever thought about collaborating with an R&B artist? That would be so cool. It would have to be someone that I shared a mutual respect with. Hasn’t come along yet but I’d love to do something like that. I’d love to not feel the need to sing. Most musical things come pretty naturally to me but singing never has. I tried to polish that up on the new record.
Who would be first choice? Mariah Carey. I’d do all the production, she’d do all the singing. It would be so twisted. What music were you listening to when you made the new record? I listen to a wide range of music. My computer is overgrown with it. I’ve been a really big fan of Oneohtrix Point Never for a while. His album Replica was what brought me into the idea of an album full of music without any ‘real’ songs, in the way people expect songs to be structured. I was definitely listening to a lot of Japanese pop music from the eighties, too – but I always am.
‘I used to use sadness as a crutch for getting into an emotional state so I had something to say. I don’t feel the same anymore.’
Do you think you’re naturally a melancholic person? Yeah, it’s left over from being an angsty teenager. Music has always been very therapeutic for me. I have a problem, I write a song about it, I feel better. There’s plenty of sad things going on right now in the world generally. No shortage of sadness. So are all your songs based around sadness? It was that way for a really long time. I was writing pretty much exclusively sadnessbased music but I don’t think it’s the same way anymore. I get asked this question a 37
Interview
lot and I used to just give the same answer as always. I think I used to use sadness as a crutch for getting into an emotional state so I had something to say. I don’t feel the same anymore. Obviously there’s still a lot of sad things to write about but I’m trying to move on from that a little bit. I spend a lot of time trying to clear my mind and calm down and centre myself, pretty much everything short of actually meditating. I’m trying to find a nice balance inside. Trying to change positively.
‘I just wanted to be better at everything.’
So the new record is a happy record? I don’t know if happy is the right word. I think it’s the most positive record I’ve ever made, although it’s probably still quite sad. It’s also quicker in tempo than the other ones.
have a lot of confidence in everyone else’s ideas. It takes the pressure of I do miss that sometimes but when you’re on your own you can do anything you want; it’s more limitless. You don’t have to worry about making anything fit into another person’s equal part of the view. It sounds like your solo writing process is very instinctive. There was a little stretch last winter when I was trying to write a song every night. At two or three in the morning I would finish it up and then the next day I would see how it sounded. So with this record, I had a lot more material to work with. The new stuff sounds a lot more polished and even synthetic compared to the earlier stuff. How did you arrive at that sound? I just wanted to be better at everything. In the studio Jackson and I both had a much better idea of how to record what we wanted. We just did a better job I think. Whatever record I’m working on, whatever’s up next it will always be what feels natural. I never really force anything.
Is it important for you to be isolated when you’re coming up with the initial ideas? It has become that way but once it comes to the recording process, a second set of ears and a sympathetic mind is very important. I recorded this album and also Midnight Snack with my friend Jackson MacIntosh (Sheer Agony). We work really well together. My friend Mike who recorded In The Shower is also a really good guy to work with. Obviously you come from a background of being in bands. It must be a very different kind of process coming up with everything on your own. When you’re writing in a group you need to 38
— Homeshake plays at Melkweg on 13 May. Free for members. His third album Fresh Air was released on Sinderlyn in February, 2017.
Homeshake
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Interview
Blue always in pursuit of Red
Serpentwithfeet Skype Interview by Zofia Ciechowska Photos shot by Matthew Tammaro in New York, USA Styling by Marcus Cuffie
Serpentwithfeet captivates the moment he walks on stage, swaddled in red, bathed in dim light, the timbre of his beautifully heartbreaking voice glimmering as he renders his turbulent EP blisters to audiences who tremble and shout with every hit note. Josiah Wise describes himself as a blue man always in pursuit of red, in search of friction that al40
lows him to explore the furthermost edges of gospel, R&B, jazz and classical. But, the urge to break away, chase lost love and fight for survival are waning for the Baltimore-born and Brooklyn-based artist. In their place are renewed loves and friendships, a desire for elegant simplicity and becoming more grounded in order to fly.
Serpentwithfeet
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Where did serpentwithfeet come from? Serpentwithfeet is about finding the parallels between snakes and black people. People will see a snake in their yard and call animal protection, the person on the phone will ask what the snake looks like, find out it’s not harmful, and tell the person to leave it alone. Just like a bird or squirrel; let it be. Still, most times, people will go and kill the snake. That narrative is parallel to many black people’s 42
experiences. I’m definitely not a victim, I’m not a minority, and I’m very clear about that. When I took karate as a kid, what stuck with me was the best position to assume in a fight is to be on the ground if your opponent is standing. For snakes as for black people, we might be on the ground, you might be in your tall buildings and planes, but we actually have the most power. That’s serpentwithfeet; I’m on the ground and I have feet, really owning this narrative of earth, groundedness and not
Serpentwithfeet
being a victim or minority. This is my story and I’m steering the ship.
‘I needed to be tragic at that time, I needed to throw myself to the wind and exist like that, but now, the pillars in my life that were there before have come back to me. I’m home again.’
You coined pagan gospel. How has it been interpreted? I was saying pagan gospel when I needed a trigger word to make people listen. Even before I put it on the web, my friends and I were calling it pagan Kirk Franklin, who I listened to as a kid at church a lot. Then I did my own esoteric explorations to figure out people who grew up with my type of sonic palette, who love three-part harmony and cataclysmic drums, but don’t subscribe to the patriarchy and Christianity:what do they listen to that lets them have that sonic palette? I don’t use pagan gospel anymore. In the EP I’m creating, I want to stay true to what I love – classical music, jazz, gospel and R&B are in my DNA. The gospel and R&B narrative doesn’t have to be ‘baby, baby come and kiss my neck’, it doesn’t have to be praise Jesus; the narratives are wide, but we pretend like they’re not. If I had any sort of ambition for 2017, it would be to expand the genre of gospel. What tones are you setting for this new year? On New Year’s Eve, I got two tattoos. They are black moon plates on my chest and collar-
bone area. It’s time to carry some new weight into the new year, be more grounded. I really enjoy that idea, I will be carrying that weight with more gravitas. It was probably my most exciting tattoo to get done and because it was NYE. I just knew how I wanted to welcome the new year. Carrying more weight with more gravitas, how does that transpire in the music you’re making? I used to think a lot about flying; I’m by no means an aeronautics specialist, but I want to understand the basic mechanics of how planes fly, the energies that pull, the weight a plane needs to have to stay in the air. It’s easy to think about flight as wanting to just be in the air. I don’t want to be held down, but being tethered is also not a bad thing. Being fettered will help you fly, that’s what I’m thinking about in terms of my creativity, that restriction, that carrying of weight. As far as creative output, I’m leaning towards making things accessible. It doesn’t bring me joy to make things that are unnecessarily challenging. I want to make things that resonate with me but that can be translated to other people. I’m carrying the weight of trying to be accessible, clear, concise and streamlined. In the past you’ve spoken about extreme pushing of boundaries to find your true self, being around people erring on the side of tragedy. Has this changed with this desire to stay tethered? That was a period where I had to leave a lot of myself behind;I was into destroying the self. I don’t know if I agree with that anymore. What I know now is that I’ve been brought home to things that I’d destroyed and discarded. I’m back to them with a thunder. I’m learning about my old passions, loves, things that I didn’t feel served me. I needed to be tragic at that time, I needed to throw myself to the wind and exist like that, but now, the pillars in my life that were there before have 43
Interview
come back to me. I’m home again, this is a very big thing for me. Being grounded is so important. Again, it was something I used to run from, but I really enjoy stability and making plans, even if I can’t honor them. I’m not one of those people who likes things to happen organically. I’m mapping out my new direction and if it changes, I sit down with myself and ask, why did it change, what’s the color palette, what’s the setting? Some people can create spontaneously, but I need a sandbag to keep myself in the air.
‘I think I was becoming an adult and I began forgetting what it meant to pursue wonder.’
is about people not sticking, being elusive, I lament about it for five songs. Now that I’m no longer experiencing that, the new work reflects that I can experience these feelings and those deepest desires will always come back. That’s been really revealing to me. What are the places that have developed serpentwithfeet? It’s more real than poetic. I’ve been poetic about it but it’s been about money. Now I have a nice place in Bushwick – clean, warm, cosy. My endless movements were for work and inconsistent housing. When I was making four ethers, I was on my friend’s couch and my unemployment [insurance] hadn’t kicked in. Those songs are marked by my survival ringlets, the inflated balls that someone throws to me in the ocean to stay afloat. Four ethers, blisters, I was Iiving in a mouseinfested apartment, thinking ‘I don’t have any love, but I have these mice that don’t want to leave’; they became an obsession in my life. I can be poetic about it, but the songs were survival tools. My story is not an anomaly; I know many artists go through the same.
Can you tell me more about these rediscovered loves?
Earlier, you talked about colours in relation to sound.
Ways of thinking and practices that I didn’t believe served me. I don’t want to say that I got jaded, but I think I was becoming an adult and I began forgetting what it meant to pursue wonder. Now I want to run into the hills, back to the carousels and helium balloons, I’ve been brought back to this wondrous fantastical space that I haven’t been to in years. My eyes have been widened again, I haven’t felt like this in a very long time.
I just know how I want to feel when I go in to make music. When I did the four ethers video, the stylist brought a red outfit and I immediately went for it. I had been thinking about red for a few months. I don’t think of myself as a red person, I think I’m actually blue, but I enjoy being swaddled in red. It changes how I move and I’m very aware of that colour therapy. I was watching a lot of flamenco videos, I was fixated on the genre and its percussive aspect because it reminds me of gospel music. The narratives are very congruous, an oppressed people making music from their body, for their body, and their color is red, the color of fire. I think of that fire, the grit, volcano, tornado, not the bottom of the ocean. I think red has been on my
I reconnected with an old friend I had lost touch with. I can have long, loving, volcanic relationships. The blisters EP is about not having that, not having things that stick, not finding that love in the world that I think is there, but it’s not being given to me. The EP 44
Interview
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Serpentwithfeet
‘There’s a fire in my belly and I need to express that, otherwise I will do damage, it’s important for me to wear it to exorcise it.’
mind for all the time of four ethers and it was a question of revealing it. There’s a fire in my belly and I need to express that, otherwise I will do damage. It’s important for me to wear it to exorcise it. Do you have any regrets? I wouldn’t change a thing. Again, I wouldn’t repeat anything. Like going to Paris with $300 and trying to be a musician after graduating, which was ridiculous. I left my comfort zone in a very violent way. I have chosen a path of unhinging and unraveling because I need to and want to. I’m a blue person always in pursuit of red. The artists I love are Bjork and Grace Jones. You don’t get to tell stories the way they tell stories, the way they tell truths without having a bit of friction, the way they hold the stage, the recording, their space, it’s a testament to their honesty and urgency of living. I ask, ‘Why me? why me?’ and I realize I asked for this.
— Serpentwithfeet plays Motel Mozaïque on 7 April. Debut EP blisters was released on Tri Angle Records in September 2016.
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Interview
Los Angeles artist on breaking the predictive path and finding your way
Drugdealer Interview by Deva Rao Photos shot by Suzanna Zak in Los Angeles, USA
Michael Collins is Drugdealer, half of Silk Rhodes, and he’s recorded under Run DMT, Salvia Plath and The Doobie Sisters. He makes gorgeous, guitar-based melodic tapestries and wears his love of ‘60s and ‘70s psychedelic tunes on his sleeve, his music coming off like a Spaghetti Western viewed on a cracked iPhone screen… or something. His 2016 full-length The End of Comedy tightened the whirling daze of his earlier recordings into a focused, sophisticated pop record, earning its place among the coveted Subbacultcha Headquarters faves. His art treads the line between the lucid and the lysergic; our conversation did likewise. 48
What do you consider the best word in the English language? I guess I’ll go with “monetisation”. Why’s that? How unnatural it is? I’ve been thinking about professional YouTubers recently. Also working as an artist signed to a label, it comes up. Just the idea of our economy’s lifeblood being the monetisation of the flow of information. It’s very bleak but also very humorous to me. So I heard you came across an Ariel Pink
Drugdealer
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album [House Arrest], and that it completely shattered your conception of what music could be. Definitely. I think I was 20, in Florida, and I was hitchhiking and hopping freight trains at the time; my friend started playing Ariel’s music. And it was like that feeling of being on psychedelic mushrooms, almost dissociative. I couldn’t believe it existed in that way, I was amazed at the possibilities. And his music made me feel that in a really memorable way, it was really significant in my life. Where I was like ‘Wow, I can’t believe the universe lined up so that someone made this music and made it sound like this’.
Experiences where you trying to communicate with people you’re brushing up against; sussing them out because they’re strangers. Where you get out of their car and you have to think about what your next plan is, living in the moment, as opposed to being an artist and being like ‘I’m in my studio, what should I think today?’ It’s like being in a current. I needed that so badly before I really started my music and life or art. It’s just so confusing and such a weird privilege to try figuring out what’s important to you, when you haven’t seen the world or been thrown around enough.
Can you tell me about any other, similarly momentous experiences in your life?
I’d say experiences like that are essential in snapping out of whatever bubble or routine it is you live in. It’s really easy, I think, to get caught up in your own narrow slice of reality.
I spent time doing aimless wandering around the U.S., hopping freight trains, hitchhiking.
That’s why people do psychedelic drugs; it’s like a living metaphor. Taking freight trains
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Drugdealer
like that, ending up in a situation because of circumstance, it shapes your life so much. I was really influenced by psychedelics when I was younger, but the thing I think I’m really interested in is trying to break from the predictive path that everyone has. It’s reactionary I know, and I’m trying to be less reactionary, but everything’s becoming so automated; it’s hard to know whether you’re making your own decisions. So for me, riding trains or tramping around and travelling, or, for a lot of people, doing psychedelics, helps to redirect you. I think psychedelics can have the effect of blurring rigidly defined binaries that might exist in your head. So with that in mind, I wanted to talk to you about humour in art. There’s this notion that it detracts from art. Humour’s so important to me because everybody who uses humour in a good way has a moment in their life when they recognise that humour, in some really serious way, is almost the most proper vehicle for truth telling. The problem with a lot of serious art is that it lacks this understanding. I think it has a lot to do with empathy, and I just focus on trying to be truthful in my art. I don’t know if that makes it serious art, but it feels relevant or worthwhile to me, in my life.
gonna be wearing like, an artist’s uniform. Nice. So I spent some time coming up with some potential names for future projects of yours, and I was hoping you’d want to pick your favourites. Okay.
‘It’s just so confusing and such a weird privilege to try figuring out what’s important to you, when you haven’t seen the world or been thrown around enough.’
You’re one of the few people I’ve seen who can pull off wearing a beret. I’m in awe. How’d that happen? It’s synonymous with being an artist. I’m also just trying to play a character of an artist in the places I go. It’s a way to connect with a certain level of frivolous intellectualism that’s really important to me. And also, berets look really good! On some people. Maybe those are the people I wanna hang out with. Turtlenecks and berets. What I’m doing for the next tour is, everyone in the band’s 51
Interview
Alright, so: Drugpurchaser. Marijuahatma Ganjdhi. LSD and the Search for LSD. Hoobasdank. UB420. Megameth. High On Drugs. Crack de Marco. Fleetwood Smack. Those aren’t gonna work for me. I don’t wanna rate them that way. High On Drugs is good, it plays into the reasoning behind me naming my projects this way. I went for Run DMT or Salvia Plath, not to ‘be taken seriously’, obviously not. It’s about the monetisation—there it is again—of drug culture. In a moment when people’s attention spans are so short, and they want to hear a funny thing… that’s where I feel the name came from. When I chose the name Salvia Plath, I couldn’t wait to see someone being told to write about it like, ‘you have to cover this’.
It’s gonna happen. Final words? Definitely go to art school, then drop out. Deal with your own privilege and circumstances. Make a drug-pun band. This is the clear path to success.
‘I think it has a lot to do with empathy, and I just focus on trying to be truthful in my art.’
I was thinking of starting a concurrent band alongside yours, also named Drugdealer. You should. Everyone should just go by Drugdealer, we can create an aggregate pop star. Maybe not everyone, but all the people making drug-pun bands and not breaking through. Nice. I’m gonna be Michael Collins of Drugdealer from now on. Wear a beret and a fake moustache to the [Amsterdam] show, and I’ll let you be me. Actually, if anyone in the European tour comes to a show dressed as me, I’ll let them be me at the show.
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— Drugdealer plays at De Nieuwe Anita on 7 April. Free for members. The End of Comedy was released in September 2016.
Even uitleggen: i-Classics is de innovatieve lijn van philharmonie zuidnederland. Een verrassende en multidisciplinaire reis door de hedendaagse wereld van kunst en technologie. Op verrassende locaties en voor iedereen die eens wat anders wil. Of eens kennis wil maken met klassieke muziek op een andere manier! De eerste i-Classics, Music & Theatre, is een tijdreis van klassiek naar popmuziek met het orkest als een kingsize coverband! En die muzikale verbanden worden besproken, gevisualiseerd en ten gehore gebracht.
wo 22 maart | 20.30 uur | Koepelhal Tilburg do 23 maart | 20.30 uur | Muziekgieterij Maastricht vr 24 maart | 20.30 uur | Dynamo Eindhoven philharmoniezuidnederland.nl/i-classics
nieuw i-Classic
s
Point of view
The Slow & Painful Death of Indie Rock by Leon Caren illustration Roel van Eekelen The year was 2003. I was standing in some scruffy venue in Amsterdam, watching a band called Zea. They played their song ‘We buried indie rock years ago’. Shouting the lyrics like a mantra. And I stood there, watching. Offended, really. Cause who the fuck were they. To bury indie rock, while me and my friends were still playing noisy guitar-riffs, to the sound of banging drums and pumping bass-lines.
that all of today’s guitar bands are just boring copies of what came before. But that’s not really the point, is it? I never got into their music ‘cause I wanted to hear something unique and new. I wanted to hear songs that grabbed me by the throat. That moved me, inspired me, unrattled me. I wanted bands to punch me in the face. And most modern guitar bands are just not doing it for me.
Back then I was playing in a band called Blues Brother Castro. We had just released an EP called Flirt that did rather well in the Dutch indie scene. We were playing an insane amount of shows and we were recording our debut album. Things were looking up. As far as I was concerned Zea could bury indie rock until their knuckles bled. We didn’t care. We were playing the music we wanted to play, and we wanted people to hear it.
Guitar music has been invented, re-invented and re-re-invented till we came full circle. If you want to come up with something good, you’ve gotta be a fucking genius. And unfortunately geniuses are hard to come by. It’s so much easier to accidentally create a masterpiece, messing around on a laptop with a new plug-in, than it is with a bunch of chords that have been played over and over again.
And yet here we are, 14 years later. And now I’m the one dropping indie rock like a sandbag from the Subbacultcha air balloon. In search of the future. I’m often pestering the Subbacultcha team. Proclaiming that guitar bands are finished. We shouldn’t book them, nor write about them. Unless they are so fucking good, that we can forgive them for their poor choice of instruments. And I stand by that argument, but it’s haunting me too. Cause I grew up on that stuff. Guitar bands are part of my identity. Dinosaur Jr. changed my life. Subbacultcha was named after a song by The Pixies. The list goes on. I guess I can be an old man about it and say
So I’m gonna call up my friends from Zea. And we’re gonna make it out into the woods. And we’re gonna bury this thing, once and for all. Until someone comes around to dig it up, and then the whole thing will start again. But different. Cause that’s the thing with resurrection, it’s never quite what you expect.
— This point of view was brought to you by founder of Subbacultcha Leon Caren
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melk w e g ma 13 mrt Phantogram
MA 13 MRT
MA 24 APR
LANY
PARADISE
ma 03 APR
ZA 13 MEI
ZA 15 APR
MA 8 MEI
PHANTOGRAM L.A.N. PARTY
THE BELGIUM EDITION COELY / ROMAN HIELE / JOY WELLBOY e.a.
DO 15 JUN
AVEC
HOMESHAKE LOÏC NOTTET tickets: melkweg.nl
Point of view
Anti-diversity by Sophia Seawell illustration Roel van Eekelen The dance scene has a “diversity issue”. This is becoming increasingly apparent, especially to those who never had to notice: there are whole blogs dedicated to collecting all-male lineups, plenty of thorough essays about how techno and house have been disconnected from their black, queer roots, and prolific DJs – Object, Jackmaster, The Black Madonna – taking a stance against what has become the norm. The gist of it is this: there are not enough women, not enough people of colour, not enough queer people, not enough trans people — not behind the decks or on the dance floor — and there should be more. I wouldn’t disagree, exactly. But I find myself asking: Why? There are two ‘whys?’ here. Why, indeed, is the dance scene in so homogenous, so white and male and straight? With our impulse to “diversify”, this question actually goes unaddressed. Sure, you can institute a quota and fill the gaps that way, but the problem (and the need for measures like quotas) will persist if we don’t understand how and why it came about in the first place. Some say it has to do with taste – ‘women don’t like techno’, ‘people of color prefer hip hop’ – which not only is too simple an answer, but a dangerous proposition: it reinscribes social differences, produced in specific historical contexts, as natural. I think it might work the other way around – that both musical genres and physical spaces can be claimed by a group, subtly steering others away, saying: this isn’t for you; you don’t belong here.
I don’t claim to have the answer to this ‘why?’ – what I’m saying is that it’s worth more than a half-assed answer. The second ‘why?’ asks: why do we need to focus our efforts on predominantly straight white spaces? Maybe there’s a reason certain groups are ‘missing’: because they are looking for their own spaces, where they aren’t the token Other, the exoticized minority, the check mark on a quota. As I heard someone say at a conference on decolonizing museums last year: ‘Enough knocking on the doors of institutions, begging for them to let us in – let’s create our own institutions.’ There are, of course, already people of all positions and identities participating in the existing scene as dancers and makers – so I do not intend to suggest laying down arms in the struggle to make the dance music scene more welcoming to and safer for all. I am advocating that “increasing diversity” is not the solution to the “diversity issue”. This approach fails to question why, where and for whom does “more” mean “better”? What I’m putting forward is that valuing difference can mean resisting the gesture of “inclusion” – that it can mean prioritizing the creation of new spaces, clubs, parties and festivals where different is normal, where the doors were always already open – made for us and by us.
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DE BRAKKE GROND 18 MAR
23 MAR
15 APR
MUZIEK MUZIEK MUZIEK
www.brakkegrond.nl
Subbacultcha magazine
Meanwhile at Our Shows Subbacultcha through your eyes
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Click k c i l C Club
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; All s105 shows are sponsored by Jupiler. Thanks to FotoLabKiekie for developing our negatives. 05
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Click Click Club
Meanwhile at Our Shows Subbacultcha through your eyes
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The Click Click Club means future #tbt material by our members. We hand them a disposable camera and they show us what they see. Want to join our Click Click Club? Shoot yacine@subbacultcha.nl an e-mail and get your hands on a disposable camera at one of our next shows. 01. at the Omni show at De Nieuwe Anita shot by Camilla Heath 02. at the MICH Release Party at s105 (De School) shot by Bernice Nauta 03. at the L.A.N. Party at Melkweg shot by Hector Garcia Martin 04. at the L.A.N. Party at Melkweg shot by Hector Garcia Martin
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05. at the Tommy Genesis Show at De School shot by Kelvin Dijk 06. at the L.A.N. Party at Melkweg shot by Hector Garcia Martin 07. at the Tommy Genesis Show at De School shot by Kelvin Dijk 08. at the Omni show at De Nieuwe Anita shot by Izzy Cotton 09. at the MICH Release Party at s105 (De School) shot by Lotte Koster 09
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Subbacultcha magazine
Meanwhile at SEXYLAND A series dedicated to establishments we like to visit
Ready to get raunchy in Amsterdam North-side’s newest baby? We present to you: Sociëteit SEXYLAND. SEXYLAND will be open for the next 365 days, with a different organizer running the shack every single day. The best part? You can too. One day it could be a spot for your lil’ brother and sister to do their homework, the next it could be a swingers club for your parents’ naughty fantasies. We went by to chat with initiator Aukje Dekker, from the Eddie the Eagle Museum collective. Our impression? One word: sensational.
The ongoing changes at NDSM have turned what was a playground of stones and sand to a strip mall for big corporations. Until now. Thanks to Kim Tuin, the new director of NDSM, SEXYLAND exists as an anti-change, For Us, By Us establishment (not to be confused with the brand FUBU tho). Long story short, SEXYLAND is nothing like any of Amsterdam’s typical clubs.
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We We Visit visitYou you
Meanwhile at SEXYLAND A series dedicated to establishments we like to visit
Walking up to SEXYLAND for our Saturday afternoon meeting, three tourists noticed the big and colourful sign: ‘Is this a stripclub?’, they ask. The thing is: that day it wasn’t, but it could be, if you want it to be. That night, Rotjoch (101Barz) was playing host, a week before that local hero Bonne Reijn presented two of his favorite bands. Then there was this guy giving tennis lessons and there’ll be a night dedicated to saving coral by Greenpeace. You get the idea – everything’s possible here.
So how is SEXYLAND going to build a legacy on the ever-changing NDSM in 365 days? With your help. And yours. And yeah, yours too love! Everyone that hosts a night there, and everyone who shows up, participates in the legacy of SEXYLAND. We will too, FYI: don’t miss out on our Spring Magazine release party at SEXYLAND on 3 March. We’ll make sure it’s one of the most unforgettable nights of the 365 <3. — Text Yoeri Wegman Photos shot by Xiaoxiao Xu Join us at our Magazine Release Party on 3 March at SEXYLAND, Amsterdam ft. Délage and the Togetherness, Musique Chienne + Piyojo. sexyland.amsterdam
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Listen Better at sonos.com
wo 5 t/m zo 9 april 2017
WORLD MINIMAL MUSIC FESTIVAL A trip into trance and ecstasy Midori Takada, Suzanne Ciani, Mark Ernestus’ Ndagga Rhythm Force, Master Musicians of Joujouka led by Bachir Attar, Moor Mother, Steve Hauschildt, Forma, Wolf Müller & Cass, Izabel, Oceanic, Nosedrip + many more
Join us!
In 5 steps to minimal heaven Muziekgebouw
minimalmusicfestival.nl
Subbacultcha
A Selection of Upcoming Shows Magazine Release Party 03 March
Drugdealer + Elvis Depressedly 07 April
Abdu Ali + GENTS 09 March
L.A.N.: The Belgium Edition 15 April
BL ANK A + Pascale Project 15 March Promise Keeper + Idiott Smith 17 March L.A.N.: The Belgium Edition Pre-Party 18 March
Pharmakon 21 April Group A + Chikiss 22 April Kelly Lee Owens 11 May
L.A.N.: Homesick Release Party 30 March
Homeshake 13 May
WMMF 2017 w/Moor Mother 05 April
Palmbomen II live: Memories of Cindy 18 May 69
Free access to the best concerts and events. Join us for â&#x201A;Ź8 a month. subbacultcha.nl
at the Fatima Yamaha show, shot by Michelle Janssen for Subbacultchaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Click Click Club
New Music for New People