Culturazi

Would it rain? Perhaps everyone was heading to Majors Creek who decided to host their festival on the same weekend. Still it was summer(ish) and the moon was full although a little late in rising and the time had arrived for another fabulous Backyard Backanalia.

Warming our cockles and tickling our underbellies began with a surprise blackboard appearance by Beth’n'Ben who seemingly go from strength to strength. Maybe it was the matching jeans, vests and sunglasses or maybe it was the plastic carnations that graced Ben’s manly frame, whatever it was the dynamic duo managed to fire up the appreciably large early crowd and set the stage for another musical feast.

And what a feast it was! Rachel Armstrong blew everyone away with her poise and music. Sidney Creswick, recent ACT winners of the campus band comp partied with the younger set and the lettuces in the garden. Owen Campbell, after months overseas, popped in to give us a taste of his brilliant slide guitar and rasping blues while men with ridiculous hats and even more silly capes, Nozl, closed out the louder part of the evening.

The entrees and main courses greedily consumed, it was time for dessert. Despite having to lug her piano by bicycle all the way back from Majors Creek, Bec Taylor managed to get back in time for Hashemoto who enchanted us with another vintage performance.

Of course it wouldn’t be a Baccy without The Cashews. Playing from the balcony they tossed around another helping of nutty goodness aided by an impromptu table dance from Dr Jim Boots.

As the moon got higher the party wound on. The faithful gathered around the fire basking in the afterglow of yet another awesome Backyard Backanalia. Who knows if it really was the last, but it was sublime.

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Tags: Backyard Backanalia // Add Comment »

I know it’s not nice to psychoanalyse little boys when they haven’t asked, Ozzie, but these tantrums of yours are just getting ridiculous and I’m going to have to give you a piece of my mind. Now, it is true that your Mum said she wouldn’t be making you do anything to help out around the house and now she’s saying she’s changed her mind. It’s not unreasonable to have some negative feelings about things like that, but you have to try and understand that, now that Mum has invited Brownie Windsor to stay, Mum and Brownie have to decide things together so you’ll just have to get used it. And it is not ok to call Brownie a kiddie-fiddling pinko pillow muncher under any circumstances. I bet you got that off your father and don’t even really know what it means.

And while we’re talking about your father, you have to understand he’ll say anything to drive a wedge between you and your Mum. Remember him telling you your Mum was no good with money and you’d lose your paper route and your piggy bank would disappear in the middle of the night? Well none of that happened did it? So the idea that you helping out a little tiny bit with the housework will result in you having to share the house with hordes of towel heads and the power only being on when it’s a really sunny day and there aren’t any dirty bombs going off, while it appeals to you because you’re a typically lazy and selfish little boy, well that idea could be all a big porky designed to scare you away from your Mum.

And I know you’re sick of the sound of your Mum’s voice, with all her nagging about responsibility and getting a good education and preparing for the future. It reminds you of being a bit younger and her making you slip slop slap and you were thinking ‘how could the Sun hurt you?’ Your Dad still says, only the other day in fact, ‘nonsense, a bit of sun won’t hurt him.’ I don’t mean to be hurtful Ozzie, but your Dad is an idiot who still thinks the World was made 6000 years ago. And even though he acts like a working class bloke, he’s a total snob who’s forever trying to curry favour with the local business club.

I know, I’m sorry, don’t cry, your father means well. He’s just a bit misguided because he’s angry. He had all these plans for the place and now your Mum and Brownie are doing things all different and he’d rather tear the place down than see it in their image. But if your Dad is being childish, Ozzie, that means you have to grow up a bit faster yourself, start thinking for yourself, and stop being so easily lead by every little whisper of fear and dread that slithers out of your Dad’s lipless mouth. It’s time to accept that you, your Mum, Brownie, you all have a responsibility to look after the place and hopefully leave it a bit better than you found it.

Ok, so Ozzie, I want you to stop crying now. There’s nothing to be afraid of, and if there’s some bumpy track ahead, there’ll be less to be worried about if we get ready and all do our bit now. So I want you to go home in a minute and tell your Mum you’re sorry and you forgive her and give her a big hug. Then I want you to find Brownie and give him a solid hand shake and apologise for being so rude and say you’ll do your best to get on in future. And then you can do your chores and your homework like your mother said and you can all have a nice dinner together, ok? Good boy, wipe your nose, that’s the boy.

Now, Mr Abbott, if you’d like to come in please? I’ll just get my cane ready, please take down your pants and assume the position.

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Present: Jim Boots, John Griffiths, Sharkie

Our guest is Nozl.

Click Play Audio to play podcast. Click here to download

If you’d like to download the podcast, tap this URL: http://the-riotact.com/~john/insban/pod136.mp3 into iTunes or your media player or whatever.

There is a facebook fan page for people to marvel at here.

This link is for people who have podcasting software which you can find here.

Recorded on Tuesday 31st May, 2011.

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Tags: Insatiable Banalities // Add Comment »

With an upmarket kind of look, the Blue Heron follows through with quite a decent coffee.

A rich, decorated crema gives way to a coffee that is not boring on the palate. Cherry and sour cardboard lilt to it.

I’m here on a quiet day but I have seen this place busy on Saturday with the markets adjacent. Situated on a corner, with a couple of outside tables, smoking is probably frowned upon in a foodie kind of way.

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Present: Jim Boots, John Griffiths, Sharkie

Our guest is Hayley Shone.

Click Play Audio to play podcast. Click here to download

If you’d like to download the podcast, tap this URL: http://the-riotact.com/~john/insban/pod135.mp3 into iTunes or your media player or whatever.

There is a facebook fan page for people to marvel at here.

This link is for people who have podcasting software which you can find here.

Recorded on Tuesday 29th March.

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Talk about wait a long time for a coffee. About ten minutes.

I thought I should check out the coffee situation at the new expanded mall and came across this place.

What goes on here apart from coffee is chocolate worship. The coffee is smooth and woody which speaks of good milk. Slack crema. Slack delivery. At least there is also outdoor seating so you can have a smoke while you wait.

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Present: Jim Boots, John Griffiths, Sharkie

Our guest is The Burley Griffin.

Click Play Audio to play podcast. Click here to download

If you’d like to download the podcast, tap this URL: http://the-riotact.com/~john/insban/pod134.mp3 into iTunes or your media player or whatever.

There is a facebook fan page for people to marvel at here.

This link is for people who have podcasting software which you can find here.

Recorded on Tuesday 22nd March.

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Two recent New Scientist articles set me a-thinking. The first involved a law suit brought by James Joyce’s estate against renegade biologist, Craig Ventner, for using a Joyce passage without permission. Ventner had inscribed “To live, to err, to fall, to triumph, to recreate life out of life” on the genome of his synthetic life-form. The second explored the possibility of sending bacterial colonists to other planets in the hope of seeding a world full of life like ours.

Surely, thought I, if we are considering sending forth an armada of bacterial pilgrims to infect new worlds, should we not equip them with, not just an apt bit of prose, but rather the sum total of all we know of the Earth, the heavens and ourselves, in some easily decipherable code, squirreled away in a nether corner of their genes? And, given that we have conceived, and very nearly have the capability, of such an undertaking, is it not possible that, millennia ago, residents of another world seeded our own planet in this same fashion and that in our genetic code may reside the truth about our genesis?

Being a living national treasure, my own genes were transcribed some years ago, and I fetched my copy out from under the bed the other day to see if there was anything intelligible therein. Code cracking not being my forte, it took several days to divine the key, but, lo and behold, the moment arrived when an impenetrable mass of random symbols dissolved into a discernible pattern, and before too long I was reading the very words of our progenitors.

I’m keeping them to myself of course, and have applied for a patent, effectively granting me exclusive license to exploit a tome that shall exceed in import any thousand texts one could name, sacred or profane, that have been said to change the course of civilisation. However, while not having read the entire epistle, I have skimmed and skipped through to the end and I feel I should inform you, and here I should issue a SPOILER ALERT, that our ancestors made their desperate gesture for immortality at a time when their world was entirely uninhabitable, from a space capsule orbiting their planet, by the last 5 beings of their civilisation in their last act before life support failed.

Tags: Humour, Science // 3 Comments »

Beautiful. Strange. Eerie. Visceral. Hypnotic. Luminous. Watch it (slightly NSFW). PS. Found it here.

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Cassidy’s Ceili, Andy Irvine, Rens van der Zalm at the very welcoming Merry Muse, Friday 18th March, 2011.
by Jim Williams.

Unfortunately the preceding day of St Patrick’s day events left Cassidy without a voice and unable to front the band. This unfortunate event, however, gave us the opportunity to enjoy the great talents of the musicians in the band. We are indeed very lucky that Canberra is the home to so many fine musicians.

Sandy Gibney showed his skill and versatility on the violin taking us from traditional Irish and Scottish tunes through to ragtime, tango and even a czardas (a Hungarian folk dance).

Sandy was complimented by the playing of Ian (bass, saxophone and stylophone), Jon (percussion) and Pete (guitar). Together they showed the joy and humour of playing excellent music at a level which does not pale when compared to better known overseas acts. more

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Present: Jim Boots, John Griffiths, Sharkie

Our guest is Thom Jackson, formerly of Canberra and now in Melbourne. The video for ‘Hospice’, mentioned in the podcast, can be seen after the jump, as can the cover of his dad’s book, ‘Uke’n Play Ukulele’.

Click Play Audio to play podcast. Click here to download

If you’d like to download the podcast, tap this URL: http://the-riotact.com/~john/insban/pod133.mp3 into iTunes or your media player or whatever.

There is a facebook fan page for people to marvel at here.

This link is for people who have podcasting software which you can find here.

Recorded on Tuesday 8th March.

Click read more for the track list.

Read more

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The surf isn’t too good today and neither is the coffee, however being able to appreciate both is a bonus.

Operating on Malua Bay time, I’m given a number and asked to wait. I’d just about turned to stone before my coffee arrived.

Transporting my order across the street to the beach, I’m looking at the thin foam racing up the sand and looking at the top of my coffee and there isn’t much difference. Some bland stale grounds, indifferent staff, and what do you get? So close to civilised and yet so far.

Espresso on the beach can be a good thing, a great thing. Here however, a sad thing.

Tags: Coffee Bitch // Add Comment »

It doesn’t particularly matter what I spray this café with; it won’t change the fact that it is open at dawn. And that rocks.

The coffee is passable but the milk work sucks. The Red Rose resides upon Moruya’s main drag. With a spattering of white plastic chairs outside.

It is a fish caff really, doing burgers and fish & chips, as well as wraps and cakes. In Moruya early in the morn you can wander down, buy a newspaper (in shorts and thongs) and sit with it at the Rose and have espresso. Can you do that in your hood? However, no hint of courtesy ashtrays, the coffee takes a while and the crema sucks. The street outside is also the coastal highway, sporting number plates from all over as well as the obligatory huge motor boats being towed past and frequent streams of motorcycle rallies.

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Prime Minister Julia Gillard has confounded left and right wing critics alike by coming out in strong support of Wikileaks and its Australian editor in chief, Julian Assange. ‘Our legal advice is that Wikileaks has broken no laws of Australia or the United States’, she said, and further that ‘Australia and the Labor government have nothing to fear from, and in fact welcome, an emerging era of openness in government’. Her statements echo those of US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, who said earlier today that Wikileaks ‘was merely practising journalism as it was meant to be practised’. ‘A free press’, she said, ‘is fundamental to the workings of a sound democracy’.

US President Obama, who was widely expected to project muscular disapproval of recent leaks, set the surprising tone yesterday, arguing that, while some of the leaks were clearly embarrassing for the government, the US would not be ‘shooting the messenger’ and would instead focus on repairing damaged relationships and forging more honest and open dialogue in international relations.

Australia’s Attorney General, Robert McClelland, issued a statement this afternoon advising Assange will receive full consular support with regard to Sweden’s prosecution of charges of sexual misconduct against him and that the Australian government has no intention of prosecuting Assange itself. ‘He’d have to have done something illegal’, he said, adding that ‘personally he was very proud of Assange,’ and that he ‘was sick of governments treating their citizens like children’. Regarding the Swedish charges, he said it was a travesty that Assange’s name had been blackened by the media’s reporting of supposed ‘rape’ charges. ‘The charges don’t appear to be for rape at all’, he said, ‘but rather “sex by surprise”, which I’m sure most Australian men would consider a regular part of the arsenal’. He later apologised for his ‘insensitive and stupid’ remarks.

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