Please don't cut ABC Arts programming

board@your.abc.net.au

To the ABC Board,

I never beg. But I’m begging you to reconsider the decision to cut ABC arts programming.

The media landscape in Australia has never looked so grim – there is so little quality, interesting, thoughtful or relevant content on most of the commercial/SBS bandwidth and the ABC makes that just a little brighter.

The arts division of ABC is such a core part of the ABC and as an artist I need it to continue. Its features, documentaries, mini-series and news support our art production and inform our audiences so that we’re not having to dumb down to Murdoch-reading standards.

When John Howard was fixing to scrap the ABC, it was the arts community who really got behind the cause – playing gigs, making works, organising articulate public argument and designing those beautiful “I <3 the ABC and I vote” stickers that harrangued the politicians.

Please. Don’t forsake Australia’s right to have intelligent, interesting and relevant content about beauty, creativity, innovation and collaboration. The encroachment of trite, mindless, commercially sullied content is already overwhelming and ABC Arts has been the last line of defence against a nation of imbeciles.

Kind Regards,

Lauren Brown



--



lauren brown
http://sheseesred.com
http://sheseesred.blogspot.com



thinker-in-residence at CIA studios || http://facebook.com/CIAStudios
artist-in-resident at AURA project ||  http://auraprojectresidents.blogspot.com
electrofringe listener-in-resident || http://electrofringe.net

dancing in the streets again.

today i spent the afternoon pretty much back at the start of my masters research: in a silent gig in public, dancing to music with a bunch of people in headphones. public/private/public.

the first time i did it was at ars electronica 2007 and it kickstarted my investigation into sound in public, the role/symbol/place of headphones in public and the ensuing 2 years' masters degree on all things related.

today was a silent parade for climate change, organised by 350 org and it was mad-fun.

what better a place to dance on the streets as part of political action but in berlin! berliners LOVE their electronic music and LOVE dancing (i should know, my club-induced sleeping patterns are getting ridiculous). it was awesome.



the vibe itself was fantastic - i dipped in and out of different shared experiences with it, giving it a diversity of engagement that really floated my boat, and made for an even more enjoyable and thought-provoking afternoon.

of course, each of these points of together/alone with the parade had slightly different aspects of public/private/public politics:


through the media
i had to join the parade halfway through. so with twitter and their hashtag, i connected with the parade halfway through. connecting as an outsider to the crowd using social media + political engagement, easy - media studies 101.

full engagement
then, i joined the party. i danced my arse of for a while in a group of others all dancing and enjoying themselves with a cracking soundtrack and lots of clapping, w00ts and smiles. we were all in this together, for a common cause and enjoyment. and we were surrounded by a bunch of people who weren't sharing, but engaged with curiosity - watching and wondering and maybe feeling a bit like outsiders. [more on the 'outsider' aspect of such a situation in a minute].

separated engagement
as the parade moved, i grabbed my bike, headphones still in range and rode on ahead, physically separate from the crowd, but still sonically and technologically engaged [wirelessly]. it was pretty special - i was riding in my own space, listening to music on my own, unable to see/hear others, but just knowing that they were there. i think this experience is exactly why the internet works.

and i had the fuckin' coolest extra little public/private/public moment -  i'm riding away from the crowd, passed the polizei van escorting us and one of the officers has the headphones on (so he can keep track of what's happening, i guess). and HE'S DANCING TOO!! i gave him a mega smile + bodacious wave and kept riding.
private citizen + public representative togetherness moment. swoon.





separated, but with one other
another lone bike-rider with headphones caught up with me and together we were riding, dancing, w00ting and throwing our hands up in the air, having our own little private/public/private dance party. in fact, i think that confused people outside the 'gig' even more - just two crazy girls dressed in black, on bikes, wearing headphones, dancing like maniacs with each other. but it was another one of those moments of sharing an experience with another person, as part of a wider crew, that was just priceless.

observer
i decided to do a part of my listening to the city project as part of the parade, so once the crowd stopped at the park on spandauer straße, i turned the radio headphones off and became an observer. my observation was largely based on what i could hear (which is hilarious when you're hearing what everyone else cannot), but it was still as an outside observer. there were lots of people also observing what was going on - some knowing a little bit about it, some not knowing and quiet alienated, others unknowing, but fascinated, or nonplussed. interesting levels of understanding and public engagement.

one thing i noticed is that having 'outsiders' is an important dynamic to an event like this. it generates curiosity, a point to engage, thought and 'difference'. the alienation is not didactic, or perhaps even intended, but i did notice that because people couldn't (or didn't have to) engage, they stood around and watched, thought and perhaps envied the process. i know that the advertising peeps crave that juicy experience a lot, but as an artist and activist, it was the first time i understood how it could be used for good.

full engagement again.
and, right at the end, i put the headphones back on and danced with the crowd for another little while. the level of dancing reduced by the time we got to the park, some just opting to lay back in the glorious autumn sunshine and listen, but the sense of common and einheit was still very strong, without a harsh word, or forced action in earshot. brilliant.

listening to the history of listening

yesterday sarah mosca and i went on a mission to teufelsberg in berlin - to the old NSA listening station. a proper structure for sound/listening in the public realm.





and oh my god, it was fucking amazing.



we had a string of excellent luck: the weather was great, we found our way ok, dodged fences, security and ticket inspectors.



we were like two of the famous five off on ad adventure. we even had a packed lunch - a thoroughly modern version of 'slices of ham and lashings of ginger beer'.



the station was unbelievable - visually and acoustically.



sarah and i did an impromptu quasi-performance of sorts, fucking around with the zany acousitcs of the listening dome - something that both blixa bargeld and alice hui-sheng chang would have been proud of.



i then tried to squeeze in a quick listening project of the lift shaft before die sicherheit arrived. fingers crossed i can go back soonish.

here's wikipedia's history of the place, just to put it into perspective.

boomtown rats

when i was in dubai a few years ago, i had an amazing time - such a mind-opener for me. the excess and excessive development was fascinating. and the polarity between rich and poor, ruling minority and voiceless majority was powerful.

on the way to visit the sharjah biennale, my friend and i drove past some of the labour camps and the workers walking home in 50º heat (no public transport there, darling). their accommodation was abysmal - fibro, prefab saunas dumped in the desert. you could see from the number of coveralls hanging on the rails how many people were crammed in.

it was desolate.

i was super sad and angry to read this article on al-jazeera english that speaks of the decreasing conditions for these people in the financial crumble. the rich developer skips out, no problem, of course.

http://english.aljazeera.net//news/middleeast/2010/07/201072885146573166.html

it's all very well to speak of the amazing creative output of dubai architecture and the boom of the architects' playground, but it disgusts me to see an industry treating their labour workers as 'collateral damage'.

policy that protects the most vulnerable in any system is exactly for this purpose - not to spoil the fun and excitement of business risk and entrepreneurship. but to account for the reality of life when shit hits the fan and the oxygen masks drop down.

666: 2+2=5

favourite tune again right now. fitting for post #666.

said the head redhead

it's already all over the twitters and the fezbook and the online papers, but i just have to say that i'm pretty flabbergasted by the political coup that happened this morning in australia.

as i was watching the football last night, i noticed a flurry of twitter activity on the #spill hashtag. given the amount of oil leaking into the gulf of mexico, my first thought was that it had something to do with the slick. i wasn't too far off. i guess

kevin rudd has been wildly unpopular lately - even amongst supporters and voters. including members of his own party (and its inherent factions). julia gillard, deputy prime minister launched a challenge on the top gig and massive debates and closed-door discussions ensued. rudd called a caucus vote first thing this morning, but in the end stepped down, with indications that it was going to be a landslide victory to ms gillard.

you could be forgiven for skipping the above detail as 'blah blah blah'.

but the punchline is, we have a new prime minister!

and her name is julia gillard.

she's our very first female prime minister. [she has red hair]

it's kind of a big deal here.

For those of you in the UK, NZ, Pakistan, India, Iceland, Germany, Israel, Chile, Argentina, Malta and the former states of Yugoslavia, you may wonder what the fuss is all about. And what took us so long.

We have a lot to learn in this little country of ours, but it feels like today we made a bit of a leap towards an evolved nation. At least on a public scale, high level responsibility is no longer withheld on the basis of having ovaries and a uterus.

As much as i'm totally a fan of her on a bunch of levels, i'm actually quite suspicious of the new PM at the moment. As the Deputy and Minister for Workplace Relations, she recently has made some dubious calls regarding the taxing of miners and their billions (poor loves) and she has supported harder lines on refugees, which i'm not a fan of.

She's not an outspoken feminist like the icelandic PM (bummer), but i'm looking forward to seeing how much things change now that the glass ceiling on the top tier has been smashed.

And even if she only makes it until the next election in 6 months' time, it's a start.

And when my nephew asks me in 15 years' time where i was when Australia got its first female Prime Minister, I'll proudly say that I was drinking coffee after pulling an all-nighter watching England scrape through to the final 16 and Australia bow out of the 2010 World Cup.

I reckon he'll think that's pretty old fashioned. In a cool kind of way.

society of the spectactle

this is going to be a good ol' fashioned rant.
about football.

sorry to those not interested, or phased by the world cup. i'm even sorry to proper football fans - i'm one of those skeletons that comes out every 4 years for the cup 'cos i love international football. i think that it has a unique role in public life.

anyway, the world cup is the biggest sporting event in the world. yes, kids, bigger than the olympics. FIFA has an economy greater than half the developing world * and it unites and divides countries and fans for 4 weeks every 4 years. every continent is represented and the rich don't always dominate the poor, for once.

it. is. massive.

in the lead up to the australia v germany match, a few of us on twitter had been in contact with federation square, melbourne's stand-out public viewing space, about screening the game/s on the big screen.
they said that the crowd was too big, they couldn't handle it so no broadcast - birrarung marr was the back-up plan.
although why we didn't all go to the a.mazing AAMI park (the caterpillar) i have no idea (public sport fail #1)

i thought it was stupid idea to leave that amazing screen empty for the event, but fine, ok. 11,000 people in fed square is shit anyway. but surely the other games would be on, right? 24 hour viewing space, room to be there, unite and celebrate sport and multi-culturalism, give the range of nationalities in our city a chance to gather, etc, etc. **

nope.

so far i have had to search through the streets of carlton for 45 minutes to see netherlands v denmark in a crappy dive pub;
the charles dickens was packed for the serbia v germany, so i trawled the pubs of the CBD, ending up in a tiny room, in a shitty pub blaring terrible music with 6 others. [in a pub that advertised 'televising world cup 2010!!'];
each night i try untold types of p2p streams online - even just for the commentary.
i've now even decided to borrow a tv, so that i don't have to wander the streets anymore like a harlot.

the games could all so easily have been screened at fed square [like the european championship games from 2 years ago].

i could have frequented that space regularly, for long periods of time, probably bought some greasy food, populated the space with my fellow fans, and made an amazing collective experience.
federation square could have been a real public space for a whole month. how's about that!

and the city of melbourne could really have come alive as a city attuned with the rest of the world, all watching as one. **

epic fail. (public sport fail #2)

but, just so you don't think i'm solely hawking on federation square or even the city of melbourne, let me whinge about the FFA and football culture in melbourne generally***.

i had to trawl the city on friday night, trying to find a place to watch the game which decided australia's fate (germany v serbia). but i could watch the essendon/hawthorn afl match 1000 times over. what does this say to me? melbourne (and australia) is still, clearly, too focused on its own codes to give a fuck about truly international football.

and we're supposed to be bidding for WC 2022.
you've got to be joking...


as sportsmen (and yes, it's all men here) we are a self-centered, tunnel-visioned, small-minded bunch of kids. lord knows we need the world cup to actually broaden our minds, but as a race, we are not ready. we have no ability to see past our own noses, or hip-pockets. we would rather whinge and blame others. and that is not the mark of international sports (except maybe italy)

and the FFA have hardly contributed towards really facilitating football engagement in australia during this international football event. ****

i don't have a TV, but these days that should not prohibit me from being able to watch football. i can't find a decent live stream (paid or unpaid), SBS are streaming audio, but no video; the FFA have allowed Optus to monopolise the mobile platform for their customers (apparently it's shit anyway), but there is no possible paying app to stream for the rest of the mobile market (competition law?).
And although i'm an Optus broadband customer, i still can't access the broadcast.



Sport is a massive part of australian public culture. it has the potential to be used for fantastic connections instead of breeding pack-raping, drunk, hooligan fucktard footballers and commentators. But it seems that no-one is really ready to take action to make that happen through the world game. Least of all in melbourne.****

* i made that up. i think.
** i know, it sounds like corny advertising copy, but if you've never hugged a stranger when your team scores a goal, you will never understand.
***andrew demetriou and james merlino, i fart in your general direction.
**** and again.

sound in public: audiology australia conference

whoa! what a day!

audiology



yesterday was the first day of the national audiology conference in sydney. i've been invited here as a participant of a project i've been working on with a small group of audiologist in a community health centre in broadmeadows. we've worked primarily with indigenous teenagers to teach them and engage in education about hearing.

you may or may not know that otitis media, a disease which attacks the outer ear affects about 85% of indigenous children in remote communities. their hearing is severely impaired, which then translates to difficulties with schooling, social development, language (which is where i come in) and spatial perception.

the figures are pretty scary and i learned the true nature of it yesterday in a round table discussion on indigenous hearing health.

the numbers are not so dire when it comes to urban aboriginal and torres strait islander children, but their general and hearing health is still far below colonial australians, so we've been working with them to develop ways in which that can improve.

the initial project we developed was a program that involved some interactive workshops, interactive/performance art and some publications. it was, for a pilot program, pretty successful and gave us the impetus to keep delivering.

we presented a (last minute) paper about the work and have a poster as part of the conference/research section - which i have souped up with an inbuilt podcast, of course. it's all pretty exciting and new and a little bit daunting.

i learned so much here about how the medical/scientific world works, what are the real concerns for those working with hearing/listening/sound in the public health system, who are the key organisations interested in research and how does that all fit in with private practice and/or clinical diagnosis. my mind was being blown into a hundred different directions.

at each session, i took away something relating to my area of research - something that i can adapt to, or consider working with. i also realised that, even more than i originally thought, sound in the public space continues to get even more interesting for me and is revealing even more areas of opportunity. who would have thunk!

and although it might be a bit daggy in the art world, working with community/indigenous health like this is becoming increasingly important to me personally. i'm looking forward to designing some new artworks with/for them in future.

EDIT 1: this forum with artist lucas ihlein will be interesting to attend, in that light too.

EDIT 2: i'm hoping to find links to the papers from the interesting sessions and when i do, i'll post it on my delicious feed.

sociology



so, as if that wasn't inspirational enough, i finally met up with a fellow public/private sound/device researcher - michael walsh - who is submitting his PhD next month to Monash,and who has been researching the behaviour around sound in public, especially public transport and relevant to the use of PLDs (personal listening devices). i stumbled upon michael's research whilst trying to recruit a fellow presenter for the architecture + philosophy lecture i'm giving at the end of the month. we have a mutual love (read: biography referrals) of dr michael bull and his essays on headphone/ipod use in public life.

we ended up trading opinions, findings and general information for an hour and a half, perched in the thoroughfare at a QVB cafe. it was so fantastic and although it would have been fantastic to compare notes whilst i was doing my masters, in a way i'm glad that i could share my information afterwards instead. i tell ya - meeting of the minds.

social audiology



after a well-deserved home-delivered pizza, the audiologists invited me to join them at a supplier party in the v-swanky ivy bar in george st. i almost lost my shit at the tracey emin neon work in the lower foyer 'take me to heaven' (not the image above, which was pinched from the guardian site, and the hip penthouse bar was a real treat: sunken round lounge, cast concrete planks for the curved walls, free cosmopolitans (and they made me up a shaken orange+cranberry mocktail) and super-cute cupcakes. these audiologists are a spunky bunch, i tell you!


needless to say, i was absolutely knackered by the end of it, but man i'm havin' a great time. i'm so grateful to the crew from dianella hearing services for their courage to work with art as a means of communicating health issues and to continue a developing relationship with me as an artist.

she sees red

here's a list of stuff i'm angry about at the moment. i don't presently have time to go into extensive detail (lucky for you poor readers), but i might soon. just you wait.

1. skinny jeans rape acquittals. nicholas gonzales in sydney was acquitted from raping a woman because a juror (NOT even evidence presented as defence) felt that because our victim was wearing skinny jeans, that there must have been some consent as those things don't just come off on their own.

to that juror: fuck off and die in a hole. go back to the barbarism of the 18th century and see how serfdom suits you.

2. deveny getting booted. much has been written about her. i know. and although i am a fan of her stuff (and have followed her column, twitter and books), even i found the rove tweet a bit much. AND i was reading it real time. (unlike much of the judging public). as an aside, i think she could have dealt with the fracas a leetle better.

but fired? are you kidding me?

riddle me this - what do matthew johns, sam newman, bert newton and kyle sandilands all really have in common?

3. oil vomitting out into the ocean in the Gulf of Mexico. oh lord - where to start...
if you're going to do surgery, know how to stop a haemorrhage first.

4. resources capital heads deciding that they might take their bat and ball and go home because they're being charged extra to plum the land. see this

i know that K-Rudd is not this forward-thinking (maybe he was in a previous life, i dunno). but as much as this capital hostage is fucked, i'm also hoping that this is a strange and almost-genius environmental policy based on reverse psychology. tax the fuck out of the bastards, they throw a tantrum. we reduce our carbon emissions and stop desecrating aboriginal land. hooray!


there. done. next time: good news.

sew: supporting and empowering women

i like pretty things.

i like pretty things even more when they are produced upon sound principles.

these are ace bags, made by tanzanian HIV+ women, who are paid fairly and the profits going back into the project, which destigmatises these women and their disease.

and, as a beautiful match, i also love readings book store in carlton (actually it's an evil place where i spend far too much time and money. but i digress), which is where these bags are for sale.


thanks to the design files, via angus

ICELAND [UP]

ok, so this is a slightly leftfield post about how ace iceland is.



and this has been prompted by a couple of things:

firstly, my ace friend, sarah mosca (who took that pic up there) and her partner tim bruniges are over there working their arses off and having an ace time. by all accounts from the mosca project blog, the place is ace. if you're in iceland, reading this, and you have the chance to work with these peeps, do so. it will change your life.





secondly, clare rae and victoria bennett - the gals behind the feminist project (next wave 2010) - posted the fabulous news (via the guardian) that iceland has started to challenge new zealand in being the country with supreme feminist credentials. they have a female prime minister (hello? australia? you're in the 21st century now. it's ok to trust people other than white middle-class men), who is openly gay AND who has taken the bold, but totally righteous step of closing down strip clubs and criminalising the sex trade.

the article is here, for the full story, but my first reaction was 'like whoa.' and i read a cracker of a quote: "i guess the men of iceland will just have to realise that women are not for sale".

this feels very different to criminalising prostitution from a law and order point of view.

i don't know whether it will make a difference or not, but how awesome would that be if a whole (albeit small) country decided that women's bodies were not commodities and that the industry shut down. cut out the supply and the demand shrivels up.

even more interesting was to note her acknowledgment of the hard work that feminist lobby groups have done to bring about the change. politically, i've never heard anyone say that shit before. wow.

don't get me wrong - the whole thing challenges my feminist ideas about the unionisation and decriminalisation of prostitution - which, in my mind, always sought to empower the women who decided to take on that profession. but perhaps that's resigning to the inevitability of an awful role for women in society. and men, for that matter (as poor dears who can't manage their urges). i don't know right now. i think i need to hit the books again.

and of course, this whole decision is based on the old-school idea that it's men paying for sex from women. but i wonder, in terms of queer sexual politics,whether this will be a massively awesome overhaul too.

either way, iceland [up].

the sound of the public on sound

yesterday was the amazing SLAM (Save LIve Australian Music) rally in Melbourne.

there has been quite a bit of press and lots of pics about it already, but of course i need to put my 2c worth in. [which, with rounding is fuck-all really]. it has thrown up a wealth of things for me to think/write about, so bear with me.


background whinge


photography: sarah barber

if you're new to the scene, or slow on the uptake, there's a bit of a background whinge here. basically, the state govt have been trying to curb violence in the CBD clubs through the liquor licensing system after a death outside a club one night by a guy who had drunk a whole bottle of wild turkey. which he had bought as a takeaway from the club. a shit event, but hardly the right brush to tar everyone with.

most venues that serve liquor, that have amplified music (ie clubs, pubs. and maybe shopping centres and airport lounges) are deemed 'high risk' and now require a higher licence fee, two security guards for any 'event' and the stigma of 'high risk'.

and, as mentioned yesterday, this is all fine and dandy for a decent number of venues in melbourne, it is crippling for those in the country towns, which only have one venue. and, as also mentioned yesterday, these are the places that employ a music industry: musicians, sound engineers, music technicians, events managers. these laws are crippling the distribution networks for these businesses.

now, when the supply chain for the banking industry went pear-shaped last year, the bankers used the media outlets to have their whinge. yesterday, musicians and music-lovers took to the streets and made it a very public affair, reflecting the very public nature of the issue.


the rally



thousands of us made our way from the state library, the site of knowledge, cultural heritage and civic research, to the steps of parliament: the site of democracy, public governance and civic responsibility. it was a fitting track and the way was packed with people and some shit-hot placards.

dell has some great pics, including my favourite one: psychedelic freaks vote too.

i wanted to make a placard saying 'how am i supposed to procreate if all the music venues close?' but i never got around to it.
and of course the best one was 'it's a long way from the top if you bury rock'n'roll'. naturally it's not just about rock'n'roll - one of the speakers told a great yarn about the fabulous reclamation night out with her greek friends, where they went to a greek taverna, then went on to dance to gypsy, australian folk and latin music - all on the one night. ace.

i also got thinking about the actual sounds of the protest. as we walked, you would hear the faint rumble of a cheer and you would cheer - it was the sonic version of a mexican wave at the cricket. a beautiful thing.

and then the crowd clapped. in time, to a harps player. what group of people can clap in time without live music? ever been to the football? heh.

and of course the way the air in melbourne changed with the different music styles. the crowd became equally gooey and restless when wilbur wilde and his jazz crew soothed us into the late afternoon.

it was amazing to hear sound in the city on such a grand scale with an experience usually reserved for a small scale. and to have music quieten a crowd that is usually loud and boisterous and chaotic. it was a special moment and i do wish that i had documented it in a more profound way.

what the tote taught me that my parents could never have.

monday night was the final gig at the tote. if you're not from melbourne, here's the back story and apologies for the local jargon.


i was one of the lucky peeps to get a ticket to the last hurrah and it was amazing. so much nostalgia, joy, sadness, anger, love - all in one little venue. that place, the bands it supported and the melbourne music scene shaped who i am.

and here's what the place taught me that my parents couldn't have:

what goes around, comes around.



take this for an example. wally meanie (née kempton) booked spiderbait's first gig. at the tote. they made a massive impact on the australian music scene. he played bass for them on their last song. at the tote. [cue angels voices!]

on a smaller scale i lost my glasses in the mosh during the last song. at the end of the set, i had 5 people helping me look for them, by mobile phone screen light. i found them, unscratched, unbroken, on the carpet stairs. that's love that is.

and then, as we left before the drones started, the security guard let us give one of our passes to a guy outside who couldn't make it in. he probably did someone a good turn earlier that day.


chaos is vital



a venue like the tote is messy. it's filled with loud music, shit spilled on the floor, band posters in various states of degradation, graffiti on the toilets, tattered clothes, messy hair, shouty voices, smashed glass, missed beats, foggy windows, quasi-violent dancing and people jostling and wrestling for a spot to see.

it's not very 2.3-kids-with-a-white-picket-fence-and-an-SUV.

but thank fuck for that. chaos (even in a controlled environment like the tote) is a catalyst for change in all kinds of ways. and, as any scientist will tell you, all systems have an inbuilt element of chaos. it's called entropy. and it's needed for change. without change, things grow stagnant, you can't generate movement, or friction, or any of the other things necessary for innovation, progress or inspiration.


investing in culture starts from the ground up.



30,000 bands have played at the tote over the last 30 years. that is a helluva lot of rock and roll. no doubt a stack of them were local artists who have gone on to make successful careers. the other chunk were surely a whole bunch of international artists playing their first or second shows in melbourne.

as an aside i remember seeing the white stripes play there before they were massive. they played 7 shows in a week in melbourne (i saw 3 of them) - starting at the empress and culminating at the tote. the difference in the crowd numbers even between the trans-am show and the tote on the following friday was 5000%. pretty much after that, they went gangbusters. and have only played massive venues here since. and who brought them out here? if my memory serves me correctly, mr bruce milne had a lot to do with it... i'm just sayin' you know.

anyway, all of those bands and all of those musicians, who worked behind bars and cafes and sold records and made t-shirts, flew interstate/overseas, bought petrol and started businesses. and their audiences all buy records, t-shirts, alcohol, coffee, books, art, bikes - they start businesses, attract tourists, customers and spend money in victoria. all of which then flows back into the economy and the "cultural capital" that the government leverages their promotion/trade/economy on. if the government was closing the supply chain for 30,000 businesses (like major banking institutions), there'd be something to say about it.

also known as 'what goes around comes around'.

commitment is sexy.



30 years. that's as long as most people commit to a mortgage/marriage. it's a long time for rock'n'roll. the tote has become the sweetheart of melbourne's music scene because it has stuck around. it has continued to plug away at putting on bands, giving peeps a place to hang out (the stories of romance from digger and the pussycats at the tote was hilarious!). that kind of consistency is hot - i don't care what anyone says.

the tote has also taught me the value of continuing to follow my heart/instinct/principles/dream. the tote has become what it has because richie and bruce and amanda and wally and all the people involved that venue believed in the importance of live music to melbourne.

hell, they probably put on some really shit shows. i know i saw a few! but if they closed the doors every time they only had 5 payers, or the PA fucked up, or a microphone was damaged, or there was a bad review; then no-one would get the benefits of the times that the place was overflowing with people, the jukebox was pumping, the vibe was jumping and the times were good.


what else is dead sexy.

the tote, and the kinds of bands that played the last gig, and all those who played there over the course of the last 3 decades are pretty much responsible for my taste in men.

flannel and/or checked shirts, tight black jeans and skinny legs, winkle pickers, converse sneakers, band shirts and broad shoulders, crazy hair, facial hair, dancing like a maniac, suits (oh my god, link meanie was the first man to prove how hot a man looks in a suit.), lust for life, tattoos, jewellery, husky voices, a love of music, piano-playing fingers. and men hugging. nothing cracks my ice-queen heart like seeing two burly rockstars showing public displays of manly affection.

i guess my mother will be pleased that the tote is closing now. :)

girls can do anything.



ok, so my mother always told me this and i kind of believed it in theory, but until i saw people like janet english, claire moore, brody dalle, bands from collingwood's rock'n'roll high school, kim gordon, pj harvey, courtney love, meg white and my best friend sarah barber get up on stage and kick arse - i never really believed her. you think it's an accident that half the crowd on monday night were some of the most amazing, inspiring, creative and beautiful women in melbourne? no way.


always finish with a rock'n'roll ending.

bruce's farewell speech was eloquent, powerful, graceful, steady and brought together all the vital parts of the tote as a working venue. my personal highlight was the 'palmer, palmer, palmer' chant that went up for venue booker amanda palmer. champion.

rather than die out, fade away, lose momentum with frustration, or completely implode, the tote went out in fucking style: 20 bands, a great vibe, awesome music, the jukebox in full swing, plenty of love in the air and mucho respecto. a seriously awesome party.

here's hoping for an encore.



photo credits:
clem bastow x 2
sarah barber
shutterspeed photography

two important things to help

a few of things suck right now:

1. the massive earthquake in haiti.



that fuckin' sucks. the place is in a total mess, millions of people are dead, dying, wounded, grieving, homeless, desperate, scared and isolated.

i've done two important things to help: given extra money to medecins sans frontieres to help with medical supplies and staff (they're my particular favourite charity, but i'm sure you've all got yours that you give money to regularly);

shown gratitude for my amazing life. it seems not quite right to whinge about stuff when there are others who are having a gnarly time of it right now.



2. the tote is closing down.



ok, read that bit again, above, where i say that it's hard to whinge, etc.

i realise that the tote hasn't collapsed in on itself and collingwood isn't the epicentre of an earthquake. but, on a local scale, this sucks and i just have to write about it.

for those who don't know melbourne, the tote hotel is a pub and music venue that has been in the back streets of working-class melbourne for the last 30 years or so. it has been a consistent supporter of underground music that whole time - hosting a ridiculous amount of local and international acts, not to mention people, that has helped make melbourne the kind of place that it is.

my favourite Tote Quote is from an old friend, Ray Ahn:

"I always liked the Tote because it has always been full of good looking well dressed people with immaculate taste. I felt honoured to be among such rock n roll illuminaries. As a Sydneysider I always felt under dressed and daggy there but I always learnt something from there whether it be a sideburn here, a pointy boot there.

And the pinball machine instead of poker machines (Sydney pubs are full of one armed bandits and as an oriental, I can never resist them) is a classy touch.

Well done Tote and thank you"


the state government, in their enlightened crack-down on drunk fuckheads, has decided that, because there have been brawls between bouncers and bogans in the CBD, that a pub with a license until 2am in collingwood (about 10kms away) is deemed 'high risk' and needs a heftier licence. one more like the ridiculously unsafe, but state-supported casino has. which costs a ridiculous amount of money and which has forced the owners to close.

i don't know a lot about running a pub, but i know a fair bit about alcoholism and violence. believe me, the tote is not the cause of violence in the city. this weekend is the last weekend and there is pretty much a round-the-clock vigil-type atmosphere happening.

i'll be doing two important things to help: writing to my local MP (not to mention posting a blog) and voicing my displeasure; and then going to the pub and paying my respects/showing my solidarity. for a place that has supported my musical taste, created a safe place for me (a single, white female) to go out late at night and shown commitment to music culture in melbourne.


3. police search powers have increased.



due to said crack-down on drunk fuckheads, police powers to search without a warrant have been extended to include 'blitzes' on geographical areas that have a history of violence, including 'train stations and city blocks'.

these blitzes are only allowed to be 12 hours' long and must be 'advertised' 7 days in advance, but they still provide cops with a blanket search.

this means that there is no specific suspicion of illegal activity - they're looking for weapons and drugs across the board, just in case. it's like a pre-emptive strike for civility. and i can tell you, they're not going to be racially profiling anyone. nope, not our victorian police.

and when did this new law get passed? 16th december. that's right kids, when all the politicians are home having christmas with their kids, or overseas getting the fuck out for a while.

i'm going to do two important things: write about it (tick). as an artist in public, i'm concerned about my right to actually be in public. you know, without an assumption of guilt; then i'm going leave this country for a while. not yet, but soon. it's all getting a bit weary, so i'm going to go to an ex-nazi state to get away from this proto-nazi state.



i also wanted to write about the lempriere being swallowed sculpture by the sea, but that can wait.

boys don't fall in love with feminists. reason why i'm single #465

i had quite an interesting, disturbing and ultimately upsetting discussion with a workmate today. it all started with me questioning the validity of a shaver shop ad posted on the sales noticeboard. the ad has a rather plain looking girl, dressed in christmassy red'n'white striped underwear and over-the-knee socks. kinda like our vanilla elf here. but on her back with her legs in the air. an obvious pose for an ad about razors, i thought. apparently it was hott. with two ts.

in asking why the ad was posted there and its relevance to work, a delicate, but important discussion ensued, covering all the fun stuff:

why it bothered me,
why i was kind of militant about such matters (my silly use of the term militant, really)
whether (and why) i considered myself a feminist,
the fact that men think about sex all the time and the obvious need to accommodate that
the validity of being able to look at 'things of beauty'
the validity of 'play' in discussing or accepting sexuality
whether the image was, in fact, demeaning or disrespectful
why the idea of 'boys will be boys' is either valid and/or a crock of shit
and - the real corker - whether i had a boyfriend.

one of the reasons i call myself a feminist is to make sure that these kinds of discussion are had. although, if i'm honest, i'd rather not. i'm sick and tired of these kinds of conversations, really. i wish boys would just get it.

but it seems that my nasty feminist views - my desire to not be simply viewed as either mother or whore (or for my sexual identity to even be part of my identity at work, thanks); to be treated with respect and to have equal rights and responsibility - it seems it turns the boys off. and is (probably) the reason i don't have a boyfriend. well, according to the lovely insinuations that ended the conversation.

i would like to say that i came back with a witty retort, calling into question his not-so-savoury sexual exploits, or his own lack of a girlfriend. but the reality is that the pipsqueak hit a very sore point - one that i had no idea was there until today.

i recoiled.

it has had me questioning myself all day, which i think is somewhat important for open-mindedness but something that i really wish i didn't have to do. it's obvious to me now, hours later, that my sexual life and/or identity is not actually a prerequesite to my basic human right to be treated with dignity. and vice versa.

but it seems that an age of history - of solely identifying women with their sexual nature, doesn't shift easily. on either side of the gender divide.


UPDATE: after reading mayhem's fantastic post about her complex relationship with her own marriage and the need for another feminist revolution, i've been reminded that the above idea of being 'coupled' as the ultimate validation for my opinions and/or sexuality is fucked.

while my back was turned

i go away for 2 weeks and the place is a bloody mess!

so it seems that tony abbott is the leader of the opposition now, with a spike in his heart popularity over the weekend. and what was an argument over the details of an ETS has become a gaping hole in our political landscape dug by a bunch of weak-willed fucktards. and now all i read in the papers and overhear in the post office queues are the opinions of the obnoxious, self-serving minions worried about their money again. oh lord.

i'm particularly racist at the moment - i have a deep loathing for australians right now. we've become a nation of selfish, corpulant, racist, spineless toads who have never needed conviction in our lives. for all our wanking on about mateship and integrity and 'calling a spade a spade', when it comes to the crunch we'd prefer to call it a shovel so long as it's cheaper and doesn't make us uncomfortable. even if someone is shoving it up our arses.

i have to say, it's been rather nice to leave the vitriol about politics behind over the last couple of years. sure, i've had cause to tut and express my displeasure, but whilst studying i haven't burst a blood vessel about the neo-cons and their ratsnest of a moral code. now, it seems that's not the case.

i'm scared we're about to slide back into the political, moral and environmental purgatory. perhaps it's where we belong.

in fact, new zealand and germany are looking at great places for me to live right now: they're seemingly open minded, their artists are fantastic, their music scenes are amazing, that have taste AND actual political systems (as opposed to a revolving door of same-old-same-old) - hell, even their right-wing violent extremists are looking more fascinating than the milksop conservatives we have here.

now, before i die of an aneurysm, let me look back at those pics from the holiday...

gender-based human rights

I've taken to reading The Economist a bit lately. I don't know exactly why. But i do get a fascinating picture of what's going on in the world that feels like it's largely unbiased, if not surprisingly humanitarian in its focus. Novel idea.

Anyway, there was a fascinating article in it about the definition of a gender. Prompted by the ghastly handling of the South African runner, Caster Semenya the article talks about the lack of definition of a gender in most countries documents of policy, and that the only country to mention it in any kind of report was Australia:

"A rare exception is in Australia, where a Human Rights Commission report in March 2009 recommended that adults should be abllowed to register their sex as "unspecified" on documents such as passports."

How's about that?! seems that Australian advisors and policy makers are up there with the Germans and Austrians (who have decreed that surgery is not a prerequist for sex-change). They have recognised that the diversity and openness of gender identification is to be preserved, that it is ultimately bound up in choice - orientation, perhaps - and not necessarily science.

It reminded me of Lesly Turnbull's Tomboys series (and the awful policy in Malaysia which outlaws tomboy behaviour) and i almost felt a little bit of pride for our struggling little society here - given our mucho conservativo history here.

Now, if we can just sort out the gender stereotypes that happen in the media here...sigh. Wouldn't that be nice.

Human Rights Act, 2009

I've been wanting to post about this for a while, but have been a little, well, manic. Then I get an email about it and I thought it was a perfect opportunity to chat about it here.

Human Rights. And the fantastic book by Geoffrey Robertson - Statute of Liberty.

Don't groan - it's actually really interesting!

I've been reading the book over the last few weeks - as much as i can before i collapse into sleep - and it has been amazingly educational and still absorbing as a novel-of-sorts. I keep getting sucked into it, reading way past my bedtime.

The reason i first got the book was because i felt that, as a citizen in a democratic country, it was my responsibility to engage politically with what goes on here. It was only $20 at Readings, which impressed me no end - i think books about politics should all be super cheap, so that we can actually afford to read them and find out how it all works!

Anyways, when i finally got around to reading it, i was suprised how fluidly it was written - it's like i'm sitting on a couch in an easy lecture by Mr Robertson and he's just telling me, in pretty straight-up lingo, all about the history of human rights law, the history of parliamentary democracy in England (of which i had no idea), Australia's role in developing the Universal Declaration for Human Rights (an Australian lawyer was part of the leading committee in developing it and the main reason we didn't continue the momentum with implementing our own act was because we had everybody's favourite conservative PM in power - Mr Eyebrows the First, Robert Menzies).

The last part of the book (is this call for a spoiler alert? i don't think so) is the draft bill that Robertson has proposed that we enact. Geoffrey (as his wife Ms Lette probably calls him) is a renowned human rights lawyer and all-round good-guy. He is probably biased towards a statutory bill of rights because he's used them time and time and time again to defend a range of people whose rights are being transgressed. But in the book he also addresses the failings of various nations' bills and addresses the arguments from the main critics: the usual suspects - the church and the media. [ed. oh the irony!].

So, when i got the email from Get Up today about the campaign to enact Australia's Human Rights Act, it was bloody awesome to know a little bit more about it than before and to really feel quite confident in writing to my local MP, who just happens to be Essendon Football Club's #1 Ticket Holder: The Hon Lindsay Tanner, MP.

found(ed) object(ion)

i found these posters, plastered up on bus stops in frankston.

i found them so despicable that i tore them down. thankfully, no one seemed to want to stop me doing that.

i found the whole experience completely weird. it's not like frankston isn't without its fair share of violence and rape. not to mention its filthy drug habit and general trashiness. it's just that it's mostly white there.*

i found the whole dialectic aspect of it kind of strange too - some racist wanker puts up these posters in prominent places, trying to sway a particular section of the public, and then i come along and tear it down - my action conveying a specific retort. and that , in a free country as ours purports to be, both actions are as 'valid' as each other. as much as i wanted to vomit all over the creator of said racist propaganda, i value the freedom of a politic which supports this kind of exchange - where he (and i'm being gross in my gender generalisation here) puts up shit i don't agree with and i get to take it down. equal and opposite reaction again.

i found it quite important to be having a 'remote' clash of values, in the public realm. on equal footing almost. rather than it being facilitated through the all-powerful broadcast media, or the insidiousness of behind-closed-doors-deals-and-policy that happens at either end of the big power structures. it was almost mano e mano. one citizen against another in hand-to-hand combat.

i found out what what frankston looked like according to its sound a while back. it might be interesting to see what dandenong sounds like. and compare the two - see what frankston would sound like if it ended up like dandenong.








*disclaimer: for those not from melbourne, frankston is a southern outer-suburb which has had a bad name for years. it's pretty low on the socio-economic scale and has a disproportionate amount of young pregnancy, amphetamine abuse and unemployment. superseded only by toorak (i jest, just). and my generalisation about frankston is just that. of course there are amazing people in frankston, doing some fantastic things. and plenty of ordinary people doing lovely ordinary things. naturally, this post isn't really about them.

fucking amazing.

i discovered this over at radical cross stitch and it's unbelievable. it almost made me want to cry, that's how awesome it is.







and here's noelle mason's site.

EDIT: for those who perhaps don't know, it's a cross stitch. that's a form of tapestry. you know, needle pulling thread.