The Sħadʘws Ӎagazįne Issue 3
CLOCKWORX
In this issue‌ Message from the editor Contemporarily insane Have a cup of tea Journey to the centre of Jules Verne Mythical Cthulhu Cosplay with Clockworx
Hat making for dummies SuckerPunch film review Hands up, who’s Calling All Astronauts
The Order Game review Majestic Owls
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I Pled on†emporry Insni†y! In TSM’s first edition we stipulated that we are all mad here, using the Cheshire cat meme from Alice in Wonderland. We did that for a reason. We are all mad here.
Shortly after that publication, we had the wonderful opportunity to meet with someone else who shares our madness and she owns a beautiful, small business, appropriately named Contemporary Insanity where a mass of creative jewellery and accessories is enough to make your head spin. Taryn-Jane Dunkley makes most of the items herself and she is always looking for something new to craft. From décor, to art and beautiful as much as it is practical.
She also invites all the other mad people out there to join her. If you are crafty and you would like to sell your work, contact Contemporary Insanity via email kzn.insanity@gmail.com and she will arrange a great deal with you. She sources from many other alternative creative people and lives to inspire and be inspired.
Now, with contemporary Insanity we are also running a little competition for all the writers and poets out there. As you know, Halloween is just around the corner, and we would like to offer everyone the chance to get their Steven King on. We want a short story or a poem using less than 300 words to publish in our Halloween special edition of TSM. All you have to do is send your original story to theshadowsmag@gmail.com and leave the rest up to us. Taryn and I will read them and select the best of the best to publish. Winner also receives a gift of Contemporary Insanity Items valued at R500.
Can’t wait to see who is craziest of all.
Let’s have a cup of tea Ginger Tea There are so many writings of the health benefit of tea that it is now very difficult to identify the facts and the fiction. It is, however, rare that someone would think of tea as an unhealthy substance to consume. There are so many teas in the world and sometimes they don’t really taste nice anyway, but we drink them because someone once told us our health will benefit from it. Let me just mention that the health benefit of tea is wasted on you if you didn’t need it in the first place. So how do we identify what tea will help with what ailment? Aside from the general yummy Earl Gray or Ceylon teas, you will have to try the following herbal teas that act as remedies to cure or relieve many of our health problems.
Chamomile I do not doubt that 90% of you will probably have heard of this herb and some of you might be sipping some chamomile tea right now, (I am currently enjoying a cup of this as I work) but what makes it so healthy? When I was younger I had terrible migraines and my mother always gave me chamomile to soothe the pain and help me sleep. It works, but aside from my personal experience of headache relief, Chamomile also relieves stomach pain, bloating and indigestion. Sip it right before going to sleep and let it relax your muscles as you slip into a warm and wonderful slumber. If you are an insomniac, this may help a little if you aren’t purposely keeping yourself awake.
If you feel you shouldn’t have another cup of coffee and caffeinated energizers just don’t work, try a ginger tea instead. It helps us wake up and helps us feel more motivated and active. It has also been known to aid people with nausea and it is said to have amazing anti-inflammatory properties for those who suffer from arthritis.
Mint Tea Aside from curing us of bad breath, mint is good for many things. I could write a book about it and maybe someday I will. Mint teas help mostly to cure (yes, CURE) terrible flatulence. I can only assume it somehow make our gasses more minty fresh, but evidently it is prescribed to people with IBS (irritable bowel syndrome) to relieve many of the effects it causes. This wonderful menthol refreshment helps with body aches and muscle tension as well and many gym-goers prefer a cup of this tea to walk like a human after an aggravating work out.
Lavender Having a bad day? I frequently do and nothing helps more than a cup of strong lavender tea. It is generally made from the purple or violet flower that grow on the lavender shrub and it is one of nature’s best anti-depressant. If you actually do have depression, please do not switch your prescription medication to this tea. The tea is just a temporary solution after a really rough day.
Rosemary This herb doesn’t just make a lamb stew taste wonderful, but as a tea, it can help relieve many ailments such as liver and kidney pains, relieve mild asthma and coughs. Drinking this tea regularly will increase relief. It also helps as a detox medicine to rid the body of all the bad stuff you accumulate from stress and binging.
Hibiscus tea This does not taste well at all, even with sugar, but it does have some properties we all need and often ignore. This tea helps lower blood pressure, reduce cholesterol and gives your immune system a boost. Drinking this on a regular basis, if you can get it down, will help your body fight colds and flu as well as giving you that extra boost to get things done. Especially if you have a busy lifestyle.
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Green Tea Yes, I know. This tea is an obvious one. If you like being healthy, this is the tea you would drink most of all. It reduces cancer risks, contains necessary antioxidants to reduce cell damage, reduces cholesterol, promotes heart health and fights dental decay and bad breath, but what most of you didn’t know is that it can help you fight many addictions and is used in rehabilitation facilities to help their patients fight their battle with a green tea detox program. Want to quit smoking? Start drinking this tea.
There are still tons of teas to try out and most of these teas are affordable to buy at retail stores, or you could buy the herbs and make them into teas yourself.
Many believe that this acclaimed author of various notable literature was actually a great explorer and, like a Dan Brown of his time, left clues to his mysterious findings. This is, of course, speculation, though his work did inspire explorers to go outside the safer routes. Jules Verne was born on the 8th of February 1878 in Nantes, France and was trained to follow his father’s footsteps as an attorney, which he had done briefly only to quit and become a writer. His first works included a series, which he collaborated with PierreJules Hetzel, a French publisher called Voyages Extraordinaires. This widely researched series included famous adventure novels such as Around the World in Eighty Days, Journey to the Centre of the Earth and Twenty Thousand leagues under the sea. Verne’s first play, Les Pailles Rompues (The Broken Straws), debuted on 12 June 1850 at Théâtre Historique in Paris together with Alexandre Dumas whom he met at a literature salon which he frequently visited.
Verne also met a fellow Nantes writer, Pitre-Chavalier, the editor-
in-chief of Musée des familles who had been looking for informative articles about geography, history, technology and science in the form of an engaging story.
Verne was the best at scrupulous research and took great delight writing about tales about such subjects. It was with these stories, the Ships of the Mexican Navy and A voyage in a Balloon that inspired the line in which Verne eventually chose to write his novels in. Verne was offered a position at his father’s law practice in Nantes. It was the pressure of his father’s
final ultimatum that made Verne quit his life in law entirely and work solely on writing. “Am I not right to follow my own instincts? It is because I know who I am that I can realize what I can be one day� While doing research for his writing in a French library, he met with explorer Jacques Argo to whom Verne became good friends and started a new genre of writing he called travel writing, which consists of writing fiction that makes the reader travel far and to unexplored lands and adventures, inspired by most the witty accounts of Argo. In 1854 Verne stopped writing for the magazine due to a quarrel with Pitre-Chavalier that destroyed their working relationship, but during these magazine writings, Verne had the idea to write a new genre style that would allow him to extensively research facts of science and write it as a novel placing fact with fiction. This would become the first science fiction and was supported by a large group of people who enthused the project as potential pioneering of the literary world, which we know it did. Today Jules Verne is not just the father of science fiction, but also respected notary of theatre
Meet HP Lovecraft’s Cthulhu We see it everywhere and it inspires a lot of art and fashion lately, but there is a small group of people who know what the Cthulhu (klul’-hloo) really is. The Cthulhu is a fictional character that fascinated me a lot as a book loving child. I grew up with the classics. Bram Stoker, Edgar Allen Poe, Jules Verne and, obviously, H.P. Lovecraft who invented the deity by the myths and tales told by 17th century sailors and smashed together. It is described as part man, part octopus and part dragon and appears in many books and poems by H.P. Lovecraft, but first appearance was made in a wonderfully written short story called The Call of the Cthulhu which published for the first time in Weird Tales Magazine in the summer edition of 1928.
It is believed that Lovecraft was inspired by a sonnet written in 1830 called The Kraken by Alfred Tennyson since both refer to a marine habitual creature that was awaken by an apocalyptic age and both creatures created from myths and tales from sea voyages. The word Cthulhu may be derived from the word Chthonic, which is synonym for subterranean and to describe underworld gods and spirits of Greek mythology.
www.curiologyonline.co.uk
STEAMPUNK COS PLAY THE POSSIBILTIES ARE ENDLESS Cosplaying is a fun and creative hobby that has really grown in popularity in recent times most popular amongst the geek subculture it is most seen at comic book and science fiction related conventions but there are even organizations and festivals dedicated solely to this fantastic past time. It has also branched out to other sub cultures and is no longer associated with “geeks” only. The most popular and well done cos plays are usually of Marvel and Dc characters, Star wars , Star Trek , Anime , Indiana Jones and video games like gears of war and Halo for example. When it comes to Fantasy and science fiction I believe nothing to be more visually pleasing than the Sub genre of steam punk, with its Victorian style fashion and out of this world steam powered technology. Since cos play is all about the visuals it is no surprise that it has become a very popular theme amongst cos players. Ruxandra Tarca of cosplaygen.com hits the mark when she says “of all branches of Cosplay, only few are as impregnated with unlimited creativity as steam punk”. This is very true
Steampunk gives the cosplayer more options than any other branch and the possibilities for combinations of fashion style, accessories, hair styles and gadgets are literally endless. Serious cos players will tell you that crafting your Costume is more than half the fun of the exercise and that a homemade costume almost always trumps a store bought one. This is yet another reason why steam punk is such a great branch to choose as accessories can be crafted from Leather , brass, cogwheels, other metallic parts such as clocks and as Spanish artist Rafa Maya has proven, even cardboard. Steampunk is one of those Fantastically creative Sub genre’s that will never die it Has given us Amazing novels, visually astounding movies and some of the greatest video games ever made. Now more recently it has also given Cosplayers one more option to choose from and one that is riddled with unlimited possibilities. With this in mind and Halloween around the corner, why not try crafting your own steam punk inspired costume this year. One can use almost anything and you will have almost more fun making your costume than actually showing it off. If you are interested in or like cos playing or would like to adopt it as a serious extra hobby Facebook is a great place for information as there are countless groups and pages dedicated entirely to it. You can even drop a message on TSM Facebook page and we would be more than happy to point you in the right direction.
We’re all mad about hats The first accessory everyone who enjoys steampunk is usually a top hat with some glued on gears and mechanical things. When steampunk first occurred to me, I really wanted a mad hatter hat, and despite it being all the hype after Johnny Depp showcased such beautiful hats in the Tim Burton version of Alice in Wonderland, I still couldn’t find anything that looks even remotely like the actual hat I wanted. Reminiscing about that forgotten hat that I could never have, I decided to include in Clockworx a DIY hat making tutorial, which I promptly discovered by browsing the internet. There are so many tutorials there you almost feel ambushed by how much other people know about stuff you have to google, but to my satisfaction, I was able to find the easiest of the lot by combining all of them. Here is our hat making tutorial to design as you wish. Now I can finally make that Mad Hatter’s Hat. Alright, here we go. The tutorial I know a t least one person has been waiting for.... First the supplies
A sheet of, non-corrugated cardbo ard, approx. 1.5 mm thick Glue gun and glue Some thinner cardboard for the pl ates- like a cereal box or file folde r 5 minute epoxy Contact cement Flat black acrylic paint
Okay, the first thing to do is figure out w hat size it needs to be to fit your head, w
hich I failed at miserably, the hat ending up too small for my head. So I guess you are on your own for that. I think the prob lem was that the brim fit my head nicely when flat, but as I gave it some curve whi le putting it on the hat, that shortened th e distance from front to back, making it t oo tight in the front to back dimension. S o, make sure the head cut-out is nice and oval. As you can see there are tabs left to attach the brim to the hat cylinder.
Next I made the cylinder, again, probably better to make it a little too big rather th an too small. Also, the tabs from the brim are going to fold up inside which will also make the fit smaller. I think it actually mi
ght be the best to start with the cylinder, get it right and then trace that and cut ou t the brim.- just thinking on the fly here :) Anyways, I didn't want the cardboard to overlap on the seam so I cut another strip of cardboard out and used hot glue on th e inside of the hat, with the strip overlap ping both sides.
I figured out a nice curve to give the brim some shape so the hat wouldn't end up l ooking like a prop from a primary school play about Abraham Lincoln. I just drew i t on freehand, trying to keep both sides e qual, and trying to have it one nice contin uous curved shape without any flat spots .
Now, I bent up all the little tabs on the br im and fit it into the curve of the cylinder. It didn't fit exactly and I had to cut some of the tabs deeper so that it would. Hope fully you will have more luck/skill and it will fit perfectly the first time! Once it fit,
I grabbed my hot glue gun and started gl uing the tabs from the brim onto the cyli nder. Watch out for burnt fingers.
And cover the top as well. I didn't try to g et the cardboard to curve around the edg es. I just put them on flat and then went around the top with scissors again to trim them all off.
Now for the fun part. I got some thinner c ardboard from some cereal boxes and cut them into many random squares and rect angles. Just cut a big stack. Then I applied the contact cement to a portion of the ha t, say maybe 1/4 of the cylinder. I then al so applied the contact cement to the bac ks of a bunch of the cardboard cut-outs. With contact cement you apply it to the s eparate surfaces, and then let both surfa ces get dry to the touch, and then you pu t them together, creating an instant bond . So once both the hat and the pieces wer e dry to the touch (about 5 min) I started randomly sticking the squares on. Of cour se wherever a new piece overlapped ano ther piece, I would add a bit more cemen t where it would overlap.
It is O.K. to leave some of the original hat showing through, because it will just look like another piece of metal has covered it up. Around the seam where the brim me ets the cylinder can be tricky, try to have relatively narrow strips of cardboard crossing it. For the top of the hat, I cut an oval larger than I would need and just glued it right on to the cylinder from the inside. It doesn't have to be pretty, becau se it is going to get completely covered a nyway. I then trimmed it off from the out side with some scissors.
Here are the strips I am going to use to co ver that gap around the top of the hat. I c ut lots of little V-shapes into the strip a nd then I used the contact cement to stic k them around the top of the hat. Also I might mention that you don't have to be too careful if some of the contact cement is not covered up by paper, it all just adds to the rough old feel of the hat once it is all covered up with paint. Now, just glue those top flaps down.
Now let's make some rivets!
ould dip my finger in a little Rub N' Buff a nd then wipe it on a piece of paper until t here was hardly any on my finger. Then r ub it onto the hat. This gives a feel for ho w little Rub N' Buff you really need. I don' t have any pics of applying the Rub N' Buf f, but there is a little video I made here though I use a paintbrush in that one and I would recommend using your finger ins
Take some two part 5 minute epoxy, a nd mix up a little batch. Then, using a stick or something with a rounded en d, dip it in the epoxy and then on the c ardboard, leaving a small raised dot o n the cardboard. Keep doing this until you have traced the overlapping edge of all sheets of cardboard. You will ha ve to figure out how much is the right amount of epoxy to mix, that you can use before it sets. You will end up mixi ng lots of batches of epoxy by the tim e you are finished.
Paint it Black. I used artists acrylic pai nts because that was the only black pa int I had, you could probably use low g loss regular acrylic interior paint as we ll. But I would stick with water based paints as the Rub N' Buff seems to wo rk best over that.
The Rub N' Buff I applied using just a littl e on my finger and rubbing it on really lig htly. You want it to highlight the rivets an d the "metal plates" so you don't want to apply it so thoroughly that all the crevice s get filled. To start with, to get a feel, I w
tead for this project.
(Source: www.lostwax.com)
Locked away, a young woman retreats to a fantasy world where she is free to go wherever her mind takes her. Determined to fight for real freedom, she finds four women -- to join together to escape the terrible fate that awaits them. With a virtual arsenal at their disposal, the allies battle everything from samurais to serpents, while trying to decide what price they will pay for survival Released in 2011, the movie had a very mixed reception with many criticizing the lack of character development in the film. In my opinion the movie captures the essence of Steampunk and carries out its Theme brilliantly. Visually astounding, action packed with and array of offbeat character and villains. The all-female main cast makes it very interesting, the plot is fresh and it has a few twists. I feel that the world that was created and the sequences of fight scenes each in exciting and well thought out location more than makes up for the lack of character development. However I would argue with a lot of the criticism and say that I feel that the main characters were developed enough. The plot and story does get confusing at times and it all ties together at the end. I would ad that some could feel a little disappointed at end as the action packed thrill ride does end a bit bland. If you have not seen it yet I would recommend giving the film a try especially if like Steampunk and amazing visuals that almost always comes along with the theme.
7/10
They make noise. They make electronic noise. They play noisy guitars and make noisy records. They make noise about society and politics. They make noise about human rights and equality. Regardless of why, they make the right kind of noise that make our ears and gears fall in love. I had been following Calling All Astronauts on social media for a very long time and witnessed their success growing. They are politically and socially driven, and make music that make us think about the world with an honest perspective.
When did CAA officially start and how? J (Browning) and I are old friends. I’d managed his previous band, Caffeine, who had toured with the likes of The Offspring, New Found Glory, etc. They had kind of come to their conclu sion and we bumped into each other, got talking, and decided to have a jam. We drafted in f ormer Caffeine drummer Andy, and Kristi on bass. We recorded a demo, then Andy went tra velling, so we were sans drummer. One day I thought we can’t wait for him to return and de cided to learn to program drums, and that is the pivotal moment that formed our sound.
What inspired the name ‘Calling All Astronauts? We actually had a long list of names, and at the time NASA were advertising for Astronauts, and that’s where it came from.
Which musicians are the influence of your musical style? We are influenced by four decades of alternative music; Killing Joke, PIL, Psychedelic Furs, N ew Order. But we’re also heavily influenced by modern dance artists like Pendulum and Skril lex
A lot of your music has political and social influences, were you always an activist? What made you decide, as your website states, “make a noise about equality and human rights”? I listen to news channels all day, and draw lots of inspiration from all the social injustice in th e world.
What can we expect next from Calling All Astronauts? If we are honest we don’t have goals. We take everything as it comes. We want to tour. We want to get tunes onto movie soundtracks. But more than anything, we just want to make g ood music.
Your Label is searching for new talent (I see your posts and updates regularly) how would these musicians come into contact with you if they are interested and inspired by your success? Send your demo to info@supersonic-media.co.uk All styles are welcome.
Are the lyrics written by the band collectively or is there one person who does the writing? I tend to write a drum track and a few keyboard parts, then the first verse and a rough chorus. J then comes over and jams guitars—we have our own studio—so we can actually take as much time as we want. We tend to work towards having the finished song structure, and then I sort of do a remix which ends up as the final version. It’s important to build the foundations before putting the roof on.
Their album, Post Modern Conspiracy, is available for download online and is a must have for all fans of Gothic electronic rock.
Someone Like You You bask in the glory of others reflection Taking kudos from your virtual friends Someone like you Self-importance your only direction Who can you trust of those you depend? Chorus Faith Hope Trust Treason x2 I don’t wanna be I will never be I don’t wanna be Someone like you I don’t wanna be I will never be I don’t wanna be Someone like you You are a face and everyone loves you But nobody knows that you’re shallow inside Win at all costs your reason for living No conscience you’ll steal, you’ll cheat and lie (Chorus) Thirty pieces of silver for you Forty pieces of gold Thirty pieces of silver for you Forty pieces of gold Thirty pieces of silver for you Forty pieces of gold Thirty pieces of silver for you Forty pieces of gold (Chorus)
Gothic Era top 20 Charts Rank
Song Title
Artist
1 The Moment (storm version)
The Gentle Storm
2 The Problem with Redheads
Them Are Us Too
3 Redshift
Ison
4 The Sound of Water
Peter Murphy
5 The Most Beautiful Black
A Life Divided
6 Happiness
IAMX
7 Return to the Sun
Paradise Lost
8 Voyage of the Fallen
Xandria
9 Art Remains
Scream Silence
10 Thumbelina
Frank The Baptist
11 Surge
Na誰ve
12 Scars
The Last Dace
13 More Dream
To/Die/For
14 In Your Name
Red Sun Revival
15 Not Me
Blutengel
16 Abandoned World
Near North Orbit
17 I Idolize You
Massive Ego
18 The City of Hate
Lithos Sarcophagos
19 Black Sun
Death Cab For Cutie
20 Never-Ending Love Song
Mono Inc
DEVELOPER: PLATFORMS: GENRE: MODES:
DEVELOPER: READY AT DAWN PUBLISHED BY SONY COMPUTER ENTERTAINMENT PLATFORMS: PLAYSTATION 4 GENRE: 3RD PERSON SHOOTER MODES: SINGLEPLAYER
There have been many Steampunk inspired games over the years spanning across a multitude of genres including 1992’s Steel Engine, the 6th final fantasy, The popular role playing series Thief, 2006’s rise of legends and More recently Dishonored and Bio shock infinite. The latest game where Steam is king and fashion is old fashioned would be 1886 the order released in February this year on the Ps4. The game takes place in London in the year 1886 where an in an alternate history a small number of humans took on bestial traits around the 8th century naturally us normal humans feared the half breeds and war broke out. Despite humans vastly outnumbering these creatures their strength gave them the upper hand in centuries of conflict.
Then comes King Arthur and Humanity finds a new hope in him and his Knights. Even the great king and the famous knights of the round table are no match for these incredibly strong beasts. That is until the Arthur discovers a mystical Liquid that increases ones lifespan and grants spectacular healing abilities.
You play as Sir Galahad a Knight of “the order”. The game is in 3 rd person perspective as you battle both humans and werewolf like creatures with a variety of weapons ranging from useless to ridiculously overpowered. One has to journey on linear set paths and interact with NPC’s to follow the Story. The game is very Story Driven and I feel that at times it kind of carries on without the player being involved at all. I found the game to be too linear with very little freedom or choice. The shooting is cover based and generic, and the pacing is terrible. The campaign is too short and there is absolutely no replay value to this game. The world they created was amazing and the story is fantastic but disappointingly they did nothing with it. The Graphics are fantastic and some of the most impeccable I have seen on a Third person shooter. But I feel that this was nothing but a way to show off the power of Sony’s latest console on its 1st birthday. This is a Ps4 Exclusive and if you are still in the market for a latest generation console and undecided on which to get, this Game is not a reason to get a PlayStation 4.
4/10
MAJESTIC OWLS Owls are one of those beasts without whom all stories dark, mysterious and magical would be utterly incomplete. These beautiful animals with their disproportionally large and piercing eyes are believed to carry within them otherworldly wisdom. One look into the eyes of the owl… and this is something I find easy to believe. These are some of the most graceful birds you’ll ever find. The midnight woods would be nothing without the screech of an owl, which is sure to leave you either in awe or chilled to the bone…or very possibly both. Very few people
don’t associate owls with magic, occult or darkness. I feel that all creatures of the night carry some form of stigma, and owls are no exception, even though some species are active in daylight, dusk and dawn. The hoot of an owl, or sometimes its mere presence near a home, was considered to be an omen of the death of some unfortunate ill person inside. Owls were even nailed to barn doors in olden days for reasons ranging from protecting livestock inside to reversing any bad luck it brought. Believe it or not, many are killed even today due to the obsessive belief in bad luck they bring. Those big eyes help them to hunt in darkness together with their almost ghostly, silent flight. It is a well-known fact that they can turn their heads 270 degrees. I cannot decide whether that’s creepy or just impressive. The reason behind this is that the eyes are tubular in shape and they cannot move them like we can, so they need another way to observe the world. They can see behind them without having to turn their bodies! They also have extraordinarily silent flight. Once prey is located, the owl will swoop down with talons stretched forward and thrust into it, either stunning or crushing the animal. If still
alive, it is killed with a bite. Small prey is swallowed whole. Parts of prey that cannot be digested, such as fur, is coughed up in the form of pellets. A bit weirder than your pet cat’s hairballs, I’m sure.
Owls generally eat a diet consisting mainly of rodents but prey ranges from insects to birds to rabbits to fish. When food it plentiful many owls will store any extra food for later use. A while back I met with a woman who raised an orphaned owl. Of course, the owl decided that it was time to leave one day, and she flew off. The greatest fear that plagued her rescuer was that she would end up in the vicinity of people around there not fond of owls and would get shot. Apparently there are a great many people in that area who despise them and couldn’t care less, even destroying nests.
Perhaps we all need a bit more acceptance and to learn about that which we don’t know. Respect for all life and to cease unnecessary killing would go a
long way, don’t you think? Just because we don’t like it does not mean we should destroy it. So if you’re lucky enough to have owls around your house…put up an owl box and snap some awesome photos for us lessfortunate people to admire!
www.madamelegoth.co.uk
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