The Other SIde Magazine 33 by The Other Side Magazine

free

spring 09 / issue 33

In this issue

taking on the filthy mad men

also...

films

the bloody business of diy

music

art

the little films that can

all thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s good in London

editor's hello...

ccording to my chosen Sunday supplement it was brought to my attention that we could be saving £67,000 per year by reading their magazine. Wow, now that is some savings. However, after getting half way through it was clear that these savings were not the super-voucher-discountcodes that I had been hoping for, but the fact that we could save £468 per year by purchasing £3.99 bottles of wine each week as opposed to £12.99 bottles, or better still that by not going out ever and just sexing it up at home you could save countless thousands on food, cinema, theatre and holidays while creating a lucid sex den in your one bed ex-council flat on Holloway Road. Nice. Sod all that, I’m a believer in not believing everything you read so listen up. We’ve gone fully DIY this month, Dan Murdoch trawled through the hospital records to find that 90% of people don’t attempt home surgery (you do the math). We paid a trip to NYC (albeit through emails) to find out how Justin Gigmac makes rubbish into art, plus packed features on film, music and the evils of advertising. Enjoy it.

Sam Lassman Watts

www.theothersidemag.co.uk sam@tosmag.co.uk

Editor: Sam Lassman Watts Designer: Adam Richmond Writers: Cardorowski, Matt Mclean, Adam Richmond, Sian Meades, Dan Murdoch, Ed Herman, Stephanie Clive, Chloe George Illustrators: Dan Archer, Mika Tennekoon, Nico Lassman Watts

Step 1

Make sure your mum runs a company that has a photocopier. I stress how cannot str important this is. t

Step 2

Find some friends who've always wanted to make a magazine but never have because it's too much work and too expensive. Make sure, they are good at design, writing, websites and drawing.

Step 3

Think up a decent idea. Ours was: we hate the shite free newspapers in London. They make people absent minded with their countless pages of celebrity tat and waffle.

will it

THE OTHERSIDE GUIDE TO THAT HOLIEST, MIGHTIEST AND MOST THANKLESS OF ENDEAVOURS... MAKING YOUR OWN MAGAZINE

Step 5

Print it and find somewhere to hand them out. Give them to people who you think will like what you are doing. Don't make a mag about punk and then give it to a metal fan. Or an offbeat fanzine that celebrates all that is great and good in London culture and give it to a Shortlist fan.

Step 6

Try and sell adverts. Create a website and make people excited by what you are doing. They'll want to get involved and your team will grow a bit and you'll get excited too. Hopefully.

Step 7

A smattering of independent magazines that are really rather special. Read them.

Keep the faith as you start to crumble under the weight of pulling together all this ink and paper and constant failure to excite advertiser interest.

Step 8

Step 4

Get writing, get designing and get drawing. Look at the mags you like and borrow.

Write a how to make a DIY magazine list for your next issue and hope it isnt your last.

words

board CARDOROWSKI TAKES ON THE SHIT HOUSE MAD MEN FOISTING IGGY POP AND NASAL TIGHTNESS ON AN UNSUSPECTING POPULACE

was mid Jan and I was headed for tastier and warmer climes and the billboards were plastered with lurid day-glo pink ‘n’ yeller invitations to ‘Longer Lasting SEX’ with the promise of ‘Nasal Delivery’. Not a thought to carry with ya into the delights of a Tropic Isle and its concomitant loosening of the loins. However, nothing that the hot sand or the warm water, nor the lush rainforest could provide woulda prepared me for the even more lurid car-crash of the purple billboard bearing the ravaged visage of the iconic Mister Iggy Pop flogging something unspeakably unnecessary. I’m only glad I hadn’t been visiting the Republic o’ Cuba. I woulda returned completely outta the Billboard Loop and mighta fallen headfirst into the mire. What the bollox is going on in Adland? Now you and I know that in these times of Crunchy Credit and The Demise of the Dubious Market Economy nothing is so valued as the ability to part Us, the Dumb Punters, from Our Cash. And so, as the pool from which they voraciously fish shrinks, the time has seemingly come for the Ad burkes to become more strident and desperate. As their ability to lunch in absurd eateries and brandish outlandish wedge in bovine boutiques

is seriously curtailed, so they’re called upon to justify their ill-earned bounty. Given the ability of that particular industry to sift the cream of our National Crop one might expect an elevation of their long dormant intelligence, a sharpening of their undoubted skills, or a more devious twisting of their Machiavellian instincts. But no. What do we get? A Big Pink ‘SEX’ on a yellow background and the trashed, surely uninsurable, face of Jimmy Osterberg demanding our attention, our already spent earnings and our further indebtedness. This is surely evolution in reverse, a massive U-turn in all that we had come to expect in the way of progress. Basic (one might say simian, if it weren’t too insulting to our monkey-mates) Instincts writ large. And the really pathetic part of it is that they’ve done their research and numbercrunching and still expect us to fall for their laziness. Are we gonna stand for this ﬁlth? Or we gonna take arms against a tide of perﬁdy and reclaim these great vistas of public space? Not to mention that great encircled A? What bright spark sought to subvert that symbol with a sodding Insurance Company? An undeniably, illiterate geek of unpardonable stupidity no doubt. Else it was a malevolent

tupid Master of Mendacity who deserves to be hung by the genitals from a great tall tree until the nerves have stopped screaming and the blood run dry. We can spare no compassion for these self-serving Tormentors until they publicly repudiate their despicable trade and repent their undoubted dishonesty. Sorry to climb again my Trusty Steed of Many Hands and tilt again at these modern day Windmills, but really… Nasal delivery? I know the blokes like it tight, but… And Mr Pop has better things to do than search for insurance? Playing virtual golf? Better I suppose than self-mutilation. But only just. Is there no wit no more? No time for play and subtlety? No enticement or parlez? Merely the relentless swing of a baseball bat about our bruised and bloody eyes and ears and noses? The metronomic battering of their ram against our wasted defences? So, no, let us NOT take arms against this sea of depravity, for to oppose would merely extend the tug it has on our needs and greeds. Rather let us walk from this particular game and into something gentler, more nurturing; where word

of mouth and the eyes of the adviser are of more import than the volume/scale/repetition of the meretricious massage. For too long we have been entranced by the portals of the mercantile world, sallying headlong into its paltry existence of stuff over sustenance, of accumulation over nourishment, of the generic truth of what They offer over the genius of our individuality and uniqueness. Come on, let us stroll nonchalantly, you and I, from all of that nonsense and into the great unknown of our neighbours and their griefs and joys. Turn our backs on the myth of self-help and awareness and face the voyage of discovery and ﬁtness that is care of and service to others. Whether it be the Ancients stuck in their paltry residences, the Slum-dwellers who’ll never be millionaires, the Refugees who can hardly stand or the Kids that’re clamouring for some kinda direction. Everybody needs somebody to love, as the song said, but we’ve built our walls so high and strong that nothing can get over but the devious screens of the habitually deceitful. Y’know it makes sense; ignore the barely concealed porn and get a handful of the real-deal; put the magz down [not this one tho - ed] and read a face; bin the telly and tell yer own tale; refuse that which is hurled and take what comes. By the time you read this spring’ll be in the air, February’s love-day will’ve left it’s traces all over our hearts and we’ll all be full of new vision and hope. I hope. Let’s not hand it all over to the thrashing, grasping hand of the twisted miscreants that shout and scream the loudest. Let us resolve to nurture our hope, protect it communally and share the fruits and blooms with each other. Thereby ensuring sustenance and insuring against the traps and trappings of the paltry, gossamer screens that surrounds us with the vague promise of virtual golf and the poisoned inﬁltration of our nasal passages! ■

get your Cardorowski fix at www.theothersidemag.co.uk/cardorowski

orwich Union is changing its name to Aviva. In order to calm the nerves of those for whom such a cataclysm will send them careering into the abyss, the insurance giant is to ease us in with an elaborate advertising campaign. The aim, presumably, is to make a business-like decision by a global company wishing to avoid retaining the hokey provincial names of the various hokey provincial companies that it swallowed up a few years back, look like a coming out of the closet party, in which the drab, British name that the company had been so unfairly chained to since it was established 200 years ago in, well, Norwich, is tossed aside in favour of the spunky get-up-andgo meaninglessness of Aviva. A name that carries with it a wealth of exotic associations by virtue of its similarity to the kind of sound a Latino dance instructor might make while undoing someone’s bra with a brisk click of his ﬁngers. I do not wish to dwell too much on the erosion of the wholesome British values associated with Norwich Union by a pan-global monolith with a peppy name. Because, despite the original’s vague connotation of a steamy tryst in an East Anglian hotel, I agree that Aviva is probably a superior name to Norwich Union, and I appreciate the fact that you now have a clearer idea exactly who it is you are buying insurance from. However, I do wish to dwell on the advertising campaign and the throbbing stupidity at its heart. By now you will have seen the yellow billboards scattered around, proudly announcing the metamorphosis with a series of three comparisons, culminating with ‘Norwich Union

to Aviva’. The basic premise is that the preceding two examples set up the ‘name changes are good’ dynamic and we are then encouraged to draw the same distinction between the third pairing. Or to put it simply: ‘As X is to Y, so Norwich Union is to Aviva (where X stands for something inherently good, but with a stodgy and unglamorous name, and Y stands for that same thing post-name change, in the form in which you are all aware of it as shining example of achievement in its field)’. An example you say? Very well. ‘The Quarrymen to the Beatles’. Perfect; the Quarrymen were a preRingo incarnation of the Beatles, who not only had a rubbish name, but failed to become the biggest pop band in the world until they changed their name (and virtually all of their members, but ignore that for a minute). It is a formula easily identifiable to anyone with GCSE-level reasoning skills, and a neat little bit of huckstering on the part of Aviva. The problem comes with the second example of the three: ‘Beijing to London’. After some confusion as to how this fits into the established formula, I cottoned on to the Olympic reference. But, what’s that you say? Is the Beijing Olympics changing its name to the London Olympics in the hope of achieving the widespread notoriety and

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what’s in

words

success it sadly missed out on with its original title? That is what Aviva would have us believe. The next Olympics IS changing its name, but only in order to better reﬂect the city it is being held in, and, on top of the fact that the Beijing Olympics was a wild glittering overdose of light, sound and human endeavour, and its London equivalent is shaping up to be a giant wobbling disappointment looming on the horizon, it certainly doesn’t qualify as a valid example of a positive name change. So to sum up, of the two examples that Aviva have managed to muster up to persuade us of the thrilling potential of their new name, one is entirely contingent on the assumption that The Beatles is a good name for a band, and the second fails on the very basic criteria that Aviva have set up as a valid example. It must be said that there are a few variations of the billboard, all following the same formula, and all slipping up on having at least one of the examples that completely fails to support the campaign’s point. But perhaps Aviva can be forgiven for not putting much (any?) thought into the billboards, after all, they are but the supporting role to the lavish television campaign along the same lines. This time the formula of ‘name change = catalyst for success’ is played out by gathering together

elebration ce and the screen of ng, Aviva ds only inalising nt and ve worth

Read more Matt McLean at www.theothersidemag.co.uk various celebrities of note, who all acknowledge the pivotal role that their chosen stage name has had in elevating them to their current position. For this at least Aviva can be applauded, as they have somehow managed to get Eleanor Gow, Richard Starkey Jr, Vincent Furnier and Walter Willis to publicly admit that their various successes are not by dint of any personal magnetism or inherent skill on their part, but are mainly due to the luminous qualities of the names Elle Macpherson, Ringo Star, Alice Cooper and Bruce Willis respectively. Now, I’m not saying there’s nothing in a name, but the Aviva campaign, with its celebration of artiﬁce and the smokescreen of marketing, succeeds only in marginalising content and objective worth, and urges us to concentrate on the pretty bow on top. Personally, I think the name Eleanor Gow is ideal for a supermodel, brimming as it is with a silky demureness, and if Ms Gow looked anything like Elle Macpherson, I am sure the term ‘eleanor’ would now be a synonym for massively attractive woman. The campaign also ignores the many people with utterly inappropriate names who have gone on to achieve otherwise, and those who have actively sought out ludicrous monikers to saddle themselves with. I am talking to you, Englebert Humpidink. It encourages us to overlook the glaring truth; that a vast majority of people who achieve anything, do so not because of a name, or in spite of it, but because they were going to do so anyway. The name of the 44th president of the United States of America is Barack Hussein Obama. ‘Nuff said. ■

n a name? MATT MLCEAN TAKES ISSUE WITH THE SLINGS AND ARROWS OF NORWICH UNION’S NAME CHANGE

words

SURGERY diy

DAN MURDOCH LOOKS AT THE TROUBLED SOULS WHERE DIY DOES NOT MEAN PUTTING UP A NEW SHELF

HERE are many things that lend themselves well to DIY. Shelving, painting, even, so I’m told, cooking. Some people progress to building their own homes or brewing their own beer. But beyond this there are more extreme forms of DIY, mostly best left to the experts or attempted only in difficult situations. There is the tricky DIY that is forced on you by necessity. When Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin returned to the Lunar Module after mankind’s first steps on the moon, they found that, when clambering into the vehicle in their bulky space suits, Armstrong had accidently sheered off the module’s ignition switch, leaving them without a button to start the thrusters and leave the moon’s surface. Imagine the look on Aldrin’s face when he heard that one. “Err Buzz, you’re not gonna believe this but…” Luckily the quick thinking Armstrong used a pen to get at the circuit board and hotwire the ignition. Man’s first big trip on the moon and they’re already hotwiring the vehicles. Then there are the jobs where opting to do it yourself is hugely inadvisable in all but the most dire of circumstances. Like building a glider out of floorboards and bed sheets. Don’t do it unless it is part of an attempt to escape Colditz Castle. Beyond both of these hovers extreme DIY, the type of do it yourself that only those of a certain mental disposition would ever attempt... like surgery. Particularly surgery on yourself. In some cases this is understandable – the climber who amputated his own arm in order to free himself from a rock fall. There’s a choice, chop off your arm or die. A necessary choice. But what about the DIY medicine that is unnecessary, avoidable and at best foolhardy. According to a survey by Which? 8% of people have

attempted DIY dentistry. A stunning three in 10 of those admitted to trying to whiten their teeth using household products. A quarter had used pliers to remove a troublesome tooth. That old wives favourite of string tied from tooth to door handle also featured highly. What more grim indictment of NHS dentistry than the thought of folk washing their mouths out with peroxide, reaching for their molars with a rusty snub nose, or hovering behind a door with string hanging from their gob, standing timid but braced? But it doesn’t end with DIY dentistry. When I was in my teens I removed half a dozen stitches from around the corner of my right eye because they itched and I didn’t want to go back to hospital. I scarred myself for life. That was stupid, but not as stupid as the folk who attempt needless surgical augmentations, the very pinnacle of the DIY difficulty scale – DIY cosmetic surgery. Years ago I was trekking in Malaysia’s Taman Negara. My guide, a bit of a pervert with a lust for Western women and an extreme fear of ghosts, turned conversation to pleasuring a lady. He flopped out his dangler and held it up for us to see an odd ridge lumping out from the skin on top of his penis below his bell end. He explained how he had cut the tip off the handle of a toothbrush, filed it down to a smooth lump, slit open his penis, inserted the piece of plastic then sowed himself back up. The skin had healed over, leaving the lump sitting prominently below the surface and, he claimed,

providing sexual pleasure for the women with whom he partook in ‘jiggy jiggy’. I never found such a female to verify the effects of the augmentation, but he was adamant it worked and claimed his older brother had taught him the technique. On the same trip in Laos, I was swimming in the Mekong, when I attracted the attention of an effeminate young man with painted ﬁngernails. He was an odd chap, bullied by the other villagers, and he had taken to hanging around with backpackers. I felt a little uncomfortable in his company but a few days later he again found me swimming and we chatted politely as I dried myself and sipped warm Beer Laos. The lad had strange scarring down

the front of his neck and I asked him what had happened. “Knife,” he told me, “cut with knife.” “Shit, that’s terrible. Who?” I imagined the village boys going too far with this strange specimen. “No. I cut. I cut this,” he ran his fingers down my own throat, hovering over the laryngeal prominence, which bobbed as I swallowed. “I cut this, I don’t like it.” The guy had tried to cut out his own Adam’s Apple. He told me, wrongly, that women don’t have Adam’s Apples. Now that’s extreme DIY, and where might it end? Will women be filling balloons with silicon gel before asking their best friends to get creative with a scalpel? Or maybe front room kidney transplants by your mate Gareth who has a very sharp Stanley knife? So although DIY may come naturally to you, and you may laugh in the face of an unmounted shelf, just be aware that there limits. Being able to paint a wall doesn’t make a proficient surgeon; a dab hand with a drill isn’t necessarily a dentist. Go too far and you could end up with horrible scarring and a strange lump below your bell end. ■ For more Dan Murdoch go to theothersidemag.co.uk

film

little films that BY ADAM RICHMOND

can

or all its success, and sure it seems like it deserves it, but Slumdog Millionaire is also rather depressing in that it’s just another in a long line of those plucky little gems that through a combination of word of mouth publicity, gushing reviews and awards galore tickling the public’s perineum to such a state of arousal that the film explodes in a perfect sales cum-shot bonanza, hitting the flickering eyes of our collective psyche, and making everyone suitably ashamed soon after when we realise we shouldn’t have been swept away. Again. And of course, there’s only one film to blame – The Shawshank Redemption. A studio film sure, and not even a box office success, but what Shawshank showed Hollwood was that slow-burning, word-of-mouth films sure can rake in the dough. And the audience learnt a ››

film valuable lesson too, that they could all too easily let their favourite film (for Shawshank is what your average punter will include in their top films; fact) pass them by if they weren’t careful. So, while I couldn’t possibly prove the connection (it seems right dammit), for the past 10 years the surprise film of the year has been feelgood in nature. Breaking through with their kooky casts, hip soundtracks, star making turns and off-beat spins of predicatable genres, at a steady and boring pace of one a year. Good Will Hunting really kicked the trend off, with hip songs from Elliot Smith, an attentiongrabbing straight role from Robin Williams, and two handsome leads who just had happened to write the darn thing and one of whom would go onto do bigger and Bourner things, while the other one would go on to do Jennifer Lopez (but then later go on to direct the simply marvellous Gone Baby Gone – another film that was unjustly ignored). Little Miss Sunshine boasted a bevvy of kooky characters on that hoariest of tropes, the road trip, where everyone learned a little something about themselves and joined together for a cathartic dance at the end. Garden State cemented the hip soundtrack as a standard indie feature, going so far as having Natalie Portman’s character’s namecheck The Shins as a band that “would change your life”. It is also a prime example of a film who’s unexpected sweetness initially wins you over, but on repeat viewings make you physically sick. Sideways has stood the test of time, lacking the trite trimmings of soundtrack or oddball characters. It is dark, underplayed and frequently hilarious. Who could tire of Paul Giamatti after all? Juno was the last film to pull the trick and had razor sharp dialogue to fall back on, but ticks all the other indie cliches and again, fails to sustain. At least it’s hip though. The best the UK can offer by way of surprise hit is dreary upbeat shite like The Full Monty or Billy Elliot, both boasting a tired hook (working class strippers/ boy ballet dancer overcoming the odds) and a cast of familiar character actors plodding through uninspired dialogue and familiar situations. So, while most of these films are all fine indie fare – though what that really means is debatable as most of them have studio money dirtying up their hip credentials – they are all attention hoggers. Given the short attention span of the

media and its inability to convey more than the most basic of concepts to an ever wearying public, all they can do is serve up one of these little films a year that are more often than not feelgood in nature. Go back to the early 90s when the first little film that could that broke through to mass culture was Steven Soderbergh’s Sex, Lies and Videotape, a dark, awkward look at relationships. With James Spader. Pulp Fiction would do the same for Tarantino, though he had already warmed up the expectant crowd with Reservoir Dogs. Sure, Pulp Fiction has dated badly, but it is one of the most important films of the 90s, not least because it ushered a new wave of young, exciting directors and writers (and woeful copiers). The Brit surprise of the 90s was Danny Boyle’s Trainspotting, which introduced an exciting young cast and drew on geniunely edgy and groundbreaking material. Explosive French drama La Haine would pull a similar trick, focusing on urban violence instead of drugs, but was equally impressive. These surprise hits boasted casual drug use and arse rape. Now the best we get is teenage pregnancy or boys who ballet dance – take that society! Spare them a thought and they all fit the little film that could criteria. Better than that, they’re all dark as fuck, plumbing the depths of human emotion than the saccharine shite that shines through now. In retrospect these films look like no-brainer successes, so much so that it seems stupid to even mention them, but that they’re taken for granted now perhaps explains why those films that arrived this past decade with verve, ingenuity, wit and dark humour didn’t become the awards or mass audience successes they should have – I’m thinking Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead, Before Sunset, Brick, Half Nelson, Pi... All of which is a long way of badgering you into letting more than one little film that can into your heart this year. Slumdog has already hogged all the love and attention going, and while it’s visually arresting and tackles some weighty themes, it’s very, very average. Can you spare a thought for something else now? ■ Read more film reviews and articles theothersidemag.co.uk

These surprise hits boasted casual drug use and arse rape. Now the best we get is teenage pregnancy or boys who ballet dance

webjam

Keeping it LOCAL

Twisted Licks

21st March It’s another corker from the licks with pret from Exlovers, who are set to charm you w their delicate harmonies and wistful lyrics. A on the bill are the eccentric wonky-pop sou contortionists ‘My Toys Like Me’. Mesmeris haunting and trippy – it’s pop… but not as know it. Plus DJs and a roof terrace (it migh

Bottlefed: HOLD ME UNTIL YOU BREAK A performance about love. A performance about relationships. A performance with no set ending. Because there are no rules in love - the only rule is that it’s a risk. Conceived and performed by Total Theatre award nominees Bottlefed and their improvising musical partners Kobayashi, this promises to be honest, raw visual theatre.

warm). Follow the gig with a late night ba on Brick Lane. The Bagel shop is open 24 h a day, try the Salt Beef with Mustard if you Alternatively a Cream Cheese Bagel will se back a mere 50p Twisted Licks £6 entry from ticketweb

Jacksons Lane Theatre, Highgate, Tickets £8 2nd - 4th April 2009

East Finchley

Archway

Highgate Brent Cross

Tufnell Park

Chalk Hampstead Farm

Golders Green

Belsize Park

Old Street

Kings Cross

Kentish Town Camden Town

Euston

Mornington Crescent

The Pub

Everyday. When spring springs the desire to get out of the house grows, although to begin with, a jaunt to the pub is generally a good plan. It’s also a good plan to go to one that will feed you. So try The Alexandria in East Finchley, which will not only provide nibbles, but a half decent pub quiz for a measly £1. The pub is nice and cosy too. Every Thursday evening at 9pm The Alexandria, Fortis Green Road East Finchley

If you would like to advertise something in 7stops then please contact us at : info@tosmag.co.uk

Angel Warren Street

Moorg Tottenham Court Road Goodge Street

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Mark Thomas ETC The

Every Monday night comedian and activist M attempts to answer some of the more press about the state we are in. Is Britain the new own a couple of banks can we lend ourselve use their phones to call Australia? And what a “derivative” and is it possible to use the w using the words “Keane” and “Travis”? It’s The Economy Stupid features stand up a with guests – journalists, academics, econom a few people who do “something in the city up to try and explain what happened and wh From culling bankers to invading Jersey it is

23 March 2009 at 7:30pm T

Roni Horn AKA Roni Horn

I’m sick of art critics complicating art and scaring people from checking out an exhibition. Do we need to be informed of the complexities and paradoxical obscurities of the representation of the flux? Nah. The only people who want to know that are the ones who will go to the show and repeat whatever they read in the latest edition of the ‘Pompous art thoughts and me.’ Roni Horn’s show is really quite good. There is a lot to take in, some is truly eye catching and other parts not so. That said someone will tell me I’m missing the point. Read our full review online. THE TATE MODERN, Until 25 May £7.80 - Walk from London Bridge

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Elephant

Kennington

Waterloo

Stockwell Oval

Embankment

New Bus for London

Until March 29 Let’s face it, them bendy buses are a nightmare for drivers and cyclists no matter how much it saves cheeky oyster-voiders* in bus fares. Normal buses do the job for me and what a lot of fun it was watching El Boris blithering on during the elections about ‘The Routemaster.’ Well, for once he may have done something vaguely right and set up a decent competition for Londoners to design the new bus. The prize winning entries and other noteworthy designs are on display at the Transport Museum this month and are worth a look. However don’t expect to see one of the buses before 2012 - maybe in time for the Olympics who knows. * see what I did there oyster-voiders oyst-avoiders!!

You can bag a ticket for the opera for £8 these days. No, not because nobody wants to go but...oh er. Elina GarancaClapham and Anna NeCommon trebko sing Romeo and Juliet in Bellini’s version Clapham North of Shakespeare’s story. Beautiful bel canto singing with real star quality marks out this revival by The Royal Opera. Music of poise and elegance shows off not just Bellini’s great command of stirring melody but also the sheer virtuosity of the singers. Sold it to you yet? Ok, Netrebko is a stunner and Garanca is Bondgirlesque (boys. It’s Romeo and Juliet with two women.) Have I missed the point? We’ll see you there. Until April 11 Tickets from £8 @ The Royal Opera House - Covent Garden.

Breakfast Time

reakfast is the new dinner party. People can get the tube home after and they certainly won’t have to navigate a tricky night bus route. So what’s the big idea, nobody wants to get up early at the weekend do they? Well, perhaps. A promise of champagne and eggs might do the trick, but what else is good and easy to make for breakfast? We’ve been finding out.

TO DRINK

Smoothies Base your smoothie around the banana. Then add whatever you fancy: berries, peach, pineapple, mango and a dash of juice to make it mix. Easy really, we don’t need to tell you how.

American Style Pancakes Serves 4

I made these the other day and was blown away by how easy they were to make. Folding in the egg whites adds air to the mixture and the pancakes become more like a cake than your average crepe. Before you start – think of 1oz as one tablespoon. YOU NEED 6oz plain flour 1 tsp baking powder 1oz caster sugar 2 free-range eggs, separated 250ml milk 1oz butter

mix

the flour, baking powder and sugar in a big bowl with the egg yolks and the milk, whisk until smooth. Find another bowl and whisk the egg whites until they form soft peaks, fold these gently into the batter. Now the fun part , place a ladleful of the batter in a hot oiled frying pan and watch them cook. Serve with maple syrup, cream, fresh fruit, yogurt, honey…well…most stuff works. Feeling ambitious, flip the pancakes as opposed to turning them with a spatula!

Espresso Do it right in a classic Espresso maker and you might as well be in Italia.

Champagne Breakfast just ain’t breakfast without champagne.

"stay away from cheerios, nescafe, powdered eggs and UHT milk and you'll be ok." SOME EASY CLASSICS

Beans on Toast

Baked Beans, butter, toast. Bang!

Croissants I used to dislike croissants and butter. There must have been something seriously wrong. Try and stop me now with a freshly baked croissant smothered in Jam and creamy butter!

Grapefruit

Want some more grub? visit our own Jamie at www.theothersidemag.co.uk/food

Sliced in half and cut along the segments, sprinkle on some sugar, serve in a high glass and you might as well be back in the 50s.

Wake up and smell the grub.

Chorizo Scrambled Eggs Serves 4

st a f k

This is my favourite breakfast and there is no better place to eat it than at Banner’s in Crouch End. If you can’t get a table, make it at home! YOU NEED 8 Eggs 1 chorizo chopped into small pieces. Butter, a disturbing amount. Salt and Pepper

Please don’t overcook your eggs, there’s nothing worse than a dry crumple of pale eggs on a plate. Serve on thick slices of granary toast.

simple really, whisk up the eggs, salt and pepper. Put about a third of a pack of butter in your frying pan and let it melt, add the chorizo so that the flavour starts to spread through the butter. Now add the eggs and start stirring, making sure they don’t stick to the side of the pan, you gotta scramble them, that’s why they are called scrambled eggs.

rea B t fec

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I recently discovered 'The Tracks of my Tears' an old Smokey Robinson album in my dad's CD collection. Intrigued I borrowed it and stuck it on. I was dropped into a world of classic motown. The Album spans tracks that Smokey wrote for the Four Tops, Marvin Gaye, Mary Wells and the Temptations. Literally perfect music for a sunny Sunday morning.

BREAKFAST IS THE NEW DINNER

interview

rubbish JUSTIN GIGNAC TALKS TO SAM LASSMAN WATTS ABOUT FINDING ART IN AMONG NEW YORK’S TRASH

You make boxes filled with rubbish. How did it all start?

It started in 2000 after my sophomore year in college. One day at my summer internship we were having a discussion about the importance of package design. One of my coworkers claimed package design wasn’t important and I thought that was ridiculous. I ﬁgured the only way to prove them wrong would be to package something that absolutely nobody would ever want to buy. If I could convince someone to buy it, I’d know my package design was successful. So I stared down into Times Square for a few minutes and it hit me...garbage! What possesses people to part with their hard earned cash for something they probably threw out themselves earlier that day?

Everyone has a different reason for buying one of my garbage cubes. Some purely see the humour in it. Some appreciate the balls of the idea. Others want a memento of the city they love. Some love the commentary on consumerism. In the case of limited editions like the last game at Yankee Stadium or New Year’s Eve in Times Square people want a piece of history. As much as New York City’s garbage is an eyesore it’s also a living part of our landscape and our culture.

Have you done any shows?

A couple cubes have been part of group shows but I have yet to do a solo show. That’s one of my goals for this year. You’re right though, I think people would be there for hours. That’s the thing I’ve found most compelling about my cubes, watching people interact with them. When people have had the opportunity to choose from a few they spend so much time examining each cube, comparing and they always end up having a deeply personal connection to at least one. I think people want the cube that is the best reﬂection of themselves. Does the idea end with garbage?

For me, the idea is all about the garbage. Getting someone to ﬁnd beauty in items that are discarded and forgotten. It’s all about selling something people would never want. The only other route to go is shit, but Manzoni already covered that. If it comes down to it, do you choose a life in art or a life in advertising?

Art, absolutely. Advertising has been a great way to hone my skills of communication and creativity, but I’d much rather come up with an idea that makes me money rather than a corporation and an ad agency. Also, there’s many more moments of gratiﬁcation in art than any advertising job I’ve had. I think my work will always have a balance and commentary on art and commerce though.

Do you take inspiration from Manzoni’s Merda d’artista?

oh...and just one last thing? Is it art?

I hadn’t seen Manzoni’s work when I ﬁrst started this project but a few people have brought it up since. I can only hope that my numbered crap boxes sell at Sotheby’s someday for thousands of dollars like his.

When I make a cube it’s only garbage in a box. The art happens when someone is willing to buy it. To date, I’ve sold more than 1,200 cubes to people in over 45 states and 25 countries. So I guess it is art. ■

ondon buses and hangovers do not mix well. Especially when it’s hot and especially when the lady sitting three rows behind you insists on shutting the window which you keep opening to get that miniscule breath of fresh air. It doesn’t help that the person who has plonked themselves next to you smells like they have been dragged through the elephant enclosure at London Zoo. It certainly doesn’t help that the woman at the front of the queue has forgotten to top up her oyster card and is proceeding to count out two pounds in five peees. Worst of all however is the woman staring at me with those get up and offer me your seat eyes, I’m not in the priority seat, she is barely a day over forty, admittedly she does have a LAPTOP bag and a mobile phone strapped to her ear, all I can hear is blah blah blah, then, the bombshell….and there’s this young man sitting on the bus refusing to get up and give me his seat….I glance at her from under my sunglasses, grin a little, wait for the bus to stop and jump off, I’ve decided to walk the rest of the way, I probably should’ve done that in the first place. So next time you are sitting on the tube or the bus, frustrated with the people around you check out our handy guide. This guide gives you piece of mind when it comes to who you should give up your seat for. You will never feel guilty again.

If the commuter near you reaches eight points then happily stand up and offer your chair - send any results to us info@tosmag.co.uk

Pregnant 10 Points

Shopping & Kids 9 Points The Queen 9 Points

Hunchback 10 Points

Walking stick 10 Points

Both 8 Points Grey Hair Hairy Ears

Blind 10 Points

Wooden Legs 7 Points

Preggers & reading the Lite. Oh Oh. Better get some bags or a crown!

Prince William/Harry 7 Points

Ambiguous Pregnancy 6 Points Big Bags 5 Points The Love of your life 4 Points

YOU CAN LOSE POINTS TOO. Remember the people sitting beside you shouldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t be exposed to certain things Reading standing up. Yeh. if you can do that, you can stay on your feet. -10 Points

reading the London L*te or Pa*per -6 Points

Mr tourist. See how harsh us Londoners are. No help, no seat. nada. Capisce?

A couple snogging, holding hands and doing other things -5 Points A Drunk -7 Points Smelly -8 Points

-7 Points

26 23

Young scallywag -7 Points

A Drunk reading the free papers -10 Points

If your total score is more than 8 then give up your seat

about town

fix up,

look sharp BY SIAN MEADES

he last time I went into B&Q, I hadn’t been in there ﬁve seconds before some gruff looking bloke told me I looked lost. Charming! B&Q, Homebase and all of the other generic DIY stores make decorating dull. So I’m on the hunt for fabulous DIY and home shops in this fair city.

Suzy Hood less – Clarendon Cross, Holland Park When former Wallpaper interiors editor sets up shop, I take notice. Suzy Hoodless knows design and frankly makes me wish I could afford to spend hundreds of pounds on a rug. I can’t, of course, but that doesn’t mean that this cute feminine shop is any less fun to browse in. She designed the member’s only Hospital Club in Covent Garden don’t you know? B EST BUY? Wallpaper if you feel like splashing out £100 a roll. Maybe stick to just one wall to focus on and choose a bold print. Labour and Wait – Cheshire Street - Shored itch If you’re looking for something a bit old fashioned, take a trip to Labour and Wait. It’s the easiest way to get that country farmhouse feel into a London ﬂat (and that’s no easy task). Everything from pretty gardening things, to great kitchenware will have you making home-made soup and baking fresh bread in no time – or at least looking like you could if you wanted to. This is the perfect little shop for all of those girly ﬁnishing touches. Luckily, it manages to draw the line at being too chintzy. The do things proper in here and I love them for it. B EST BUY? Lovely enamel pans in pastel colours for £18.

Supernice – Colu mbia Road , Shored itch Can’t be bothered with papering a whole room? No. Me neither. Supernice is the best lazy option there is. Now, the idea of wall stickers can sound tacky, but Supernice have turned it into an art form. They’ve even roped T-shirt website Threadless into their designs and you know you’re onto a winner there. Choose your favourite design, pick a wall you want to jazz up and you’re away. So much nicer than dull old paper. B EST BUY? The dangling kitty and birds wall sticker adorning my bedroom. £45

House Couturier – New K ings Road , Ful ha m Think sleek, sexy and well, a bit Sloaney. But with House Couturier that’s no bad thing. Sumptuous fabrics, sexy soft furnishings and really beautiful prints. If you’re going all out with your decorating, this is where you want to come. Who doesn’t want a bright pink chaise lounge in their living room? Oh. Is that just me? Well you can also buy fabric from here, and if you fancy being a real show off, enquire about their home cinemas. B EST BUY? House Couturier is so posh you need to make an appointment to see their showroom. It’s worth it though. Go and have a nose around, get some ideas, then pop somewhere a bit more budget friendly. A rt and Soul – Marlborough Road , Belgravia How many prints do you have still to hang on your walls? I’ve got four, somewhere. Paintings and photographs are an easy way to make a house a home, but hanging them is something I never bother doing. I don’t want to ruin the expensive prints buy shoving them into a clipframe either. Art and Soul might be pricier than buying a standard frame, but they do the job well and you know you’re getting a good service. B EST BUY? Pop along and have a look at their sale items. You might ﬁnd a small frame for £3.50, but prices depend on what you’re looking for. This is the kind of thing you should invest in

Chloe A lberry Portobello Road , Notting Hill I know, a shop for doorknobs sounds crazy. But Chloe Alberry will surprise even the most cynical of you. I promise you, once you get here, you won’t be able to choose and you’ll be like a kid in a door-shaped candy shop. There’s so much choice here - retro, chintzy, minimalist. Whatever the style of your home, you’ll ﬁnd something fabulous in here. And if you’re like me, you’ll think that the doorknobs make pretty unusual ornaments and paperweights too. B EST BUYS? Everything actually. Prices range from a ﬁver for porcelain designs, to about £50 for solid wood.

Gra ha m & Green – Nelson Road , Greenwich Graham & Green is my favourite home shop. It’s not new, but they’ve opened up a brand new branch down the road from my house in Greenwich. Come here for classy furniture, stunning lights, and brilliant little knick-knacks to adorn your shelves with. It can get quite pricey in here, but you’ll ﬁnd one off items you’ll fall in love with. Everything I’ve bought from here is good quality and looks fantastic. B EST BUY? Handmade wooden cabinet. £48. Their etched glassware is stunning too.

cryptic crossword

across

For help and answers visit www.theothersidemag.co.uk/games compiled by Stephanie Clive 1

3 5

4 5 7 6

9 7

8 9 9 10

down

1. Eat Yogurts, go out and find it is most infuriating (4, 4, 4) 2. No ecstasy quickly leads to waterworks (4) 3. Britain endlessly gets a sexy garment (3) 4. Sonnet I fuddled will make things awkward (7) 5. Gets rid of the bollocks, we hear (5) 6. Bizarre singer endlessly shakes butt around (4,4) 7. Dwell on Newsom’s instrument (4) 8. Confused as to why, in brief, the god of the home calls sporadically? It’s irrational! 9. And 6 Down. Dylan’s obscure album is controlled by the commies with lube (5, 3, 3, 3)

1. Stern soldiers get puzzled at pastry snacks (8) 2. Flair found in what Carlotta lent Aschwin (6) 3. Something sweet to smoke, say (3) 4. Snitch on weed (5) 5. Happy Carol gets all perplexed and ends up buried in controversy (10) 6. See 9 Across 7. Gasped to put a thong on editor briefly (6) 8. Stare intently at nobleman (4) 9. Inside Sheila’s haven is hairless (6) 10. Music god gets heartless genes and becomes bear (5)

Cut/Tear here

music

Out like a

pring has sprung. Or should have as you read this. New born gambolling animals, longer days, crocuses squeezing their way out of unexpected urban locations and London leaping with great live shows as ever. But what gigs to go to? Here’s a brief guide to where to go and when you should be there to hear some sonic delights over the next few months. You might have heard, among others, the Rough Trade boys and girls wittering on about Alela Diane last year and her debut album The Pirate’s Gospel, but this was for a reason, because her crystal clear voice does funny things with your heart and she has a thousand times more zest than the 100s of Florence and the Machine type folky ﬂakes that are multiplying in the music industry like a nasty epidemic. She plays St Giles in the Field on 30 March to promote her second album, which is out now. The beguiling Wildbirds & Peacedrums play the Luminaire on 7 April. Stirring up gentle soul, raucous blues and chamber pop from decades past, the duo play live shows that make you sit up and think of the words ‘primal’ and ‘urgent’, and will feel you with tribal zeal that is a healing antidote to everything uninspired and middle of the road. Touring with TV on the Radio is only going to do you serious favours in the music industry, and London’s own The Big Pink not only boast this but have strong links with top names like Telepathe, the Klaxons and Crystal Castles. Sounding more like a band from the LA alternative scene than the catchy electrodriven London ﬁeld, the band match Spacemen

3-inﬂuenced shoegaze with an pleasant enough drone, and you can watch them at the ICA on 23 April. At the same venue and in a similar cutting edge fashion, you can join your fellow fashion whores on 14 April to see the very entertaining Apes and Androids. They’ve been compared to MGMT and, although their Casio-keyboard, 80ssynthed, harmonied messing around might not cut quite the same psychedelic rug as the latter, the sound is unbelievably catchy and they sure can wear war paint. Think a more poppy Yeasayer without such impressive ponytails and you’re

Alela Diane has a thousand times more zest than the 100s of Florence and the Machine-type folky flakes multiplying like a nasty epidemic nearly there. Plus most likely everyone will have forgotten about them by next year, so it would probably make sense to see them now. Laptop loving Canadian geeks Holy Fuck have a rude name, so don’t take your mum, and they’re playing at the Scala on 14 May. They don’t like cheating, which is why they make electronic music without any traditional techniques, instead attempting to recreate sounds with children’s keyboards and toy guns. There’s no ‘hilarious’ Bonde De Role-style noise resulting here though

lamb – their sound is beautiful, anxious and at times majestic. If touting at the last minute is your bag (and how can you live with the uncertainty? How can you?), then two sold-out gigs in the next couple of months are worth hanging around outside the venue and paying over-the-odds for. The ﬁrst is Yeah Yeah Yeahs at Shepherds Bush, selling out in a matter of minutes and promising an electric show from the New York art rockers. Will the beautiful Karen O be wearing a generous spangly number that she rips off after the ﬁrst song to reveal its tinier sartorial sister? Probably. There new album has been already been leaked and it is an absolute cracker, boasting all the hallmarks of YYYs and yet expanding on their sound impressively. Secondly, the original Ms of femme-rock PJ Harvey plays Shepherds Bush on 21 April with long-time collaborator John Parish. Always powerful, always ethereal and always dripping darkly with poetry and noise, the pair are promoting their new album A Woman A Man Walked By – which, if spectacular debut single Black-Hearted Love is anything to go by, promises to be another corker. Don’t miss it. ■

CHLOE GEORGE GIVES A HEADS UP FOR THE BEST LIVE MUSIC ON OFFER IN LONDON THIS SPRING

album of the month

by matt mclean

Women

Jagjaguwar

Women, a four-piece from Calgary, Canada, break with convention by being entirely comprised of men, and by being one of only a handful of new bands among a relentless tide of post-punk revivalists that offer enough invention and singularity to form a convincing take on the ideals of the 1980s American underground. Their debut, out now on indie label du jour, Jagjaguwar, takes the songs’ melodic heart and shrouds it in texture and abrasion; a tension between harmony and dischord that represents a kind of pan-Americana, where the hopefulness of west-coast melodies and spacious, airy vocals push up against the claustrophobia and scrabbling guitars of 1970s New York no-wave. This marriage is best illustrated by lead single Black Rice, which takes a spiny two-note guitar tick-tock and ﬂoods it with light, thanks to an echo-y Beach Boys vocal line and some delicate percussion. It follows an opening trio of songs that segue from the lazy stomp of opener Cameras’ into the murk of Lawncare, which descends into noise, at ﬁrst industrial and abrasive, and then, on Woodbine, narrowing to keening celestial hiss. The sudden release of tension makes Black Rice’s opening riff feel like a revelation.The band’s way with an off-kilter composition on the album’s more conventional songs may leave many frustrated when Women pursue their more amorphous noise tendencies, but the sheer sonic variety on the album makes it a rich listen, and when the band allow the songs to emerge from the static – as they do on the haunted sea shanty of Group Transport Hall, and Shaking Hands galloping coda – they are capable of moments of sheer perfection.

Read more music reviews at theothersidemag.co.uk

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