#Dawn Engle

[nita-engle-reference]

Dawn in New England Nita Engle (1925-2019) Watercolor

[haaaaaaaaaaaave-you-met-ted]

Heliod, the Radiant Dawn (Showcase Ver) by Jason Engle

[sky-is-the-limit]

I ride at dawn for Thomas Müller. That cannot be his last match with the NT. Tell that engl*sh cunt to hide.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Rick Pidcock at Baptist News Global:

Growing up as an independent fundamentalist Baptist, the highlight of each year for our church was the weeklong revival meeting, where we began each night with songs that prepared our hearts for a sermon by a fiery evangelist who then gave an altar call to get us to commit our lives to the cause. So, imagine if that same formula were applied to the 2024 election by a group of conspiracy theorists who openly admitted their plan was to be a “Trojan Horse” at polling stations in order to “make history this November.”

What might the worship look like? What would the sermon be about? What would the altar call be for? And how concerned should the rest of us be? Unfortunately, we don’t have to imagine because that’s exactly what is happening at The Courage Tour, which is branded as a “revival in seven key states … marking the dawn of our nation’s Third Great Awakening.” The Courage Tour has been organized by Lance Wallnau, an independent charismatic apostle who is popular in the New Apostolic Reformation and a promoter of the Seven Mountain Mandate call for Christians to dominate every part of society. According to Matthew Taylor, author of The Violent Take It By Force: The Christian Movement That Is Threatening Our Democracy, Wallnau is “Donald Trump’s most effective spiritual propagandist.” In addition to Wallnau, the Courage Tour also features speakers such as Lou Engle, Allen West, Marjorie Taylor Greene and many others. Meetings this year have targeted Michigan, Arizona, Georgia and Wisconsin, with additional swing states slated in the coming months.

[...]

The sermon

With hearts prepared to celebrate kingship, resistance to demons, a God who fights, victory and enemies drowning, the worshipers listened to the likes of Wallnau, who took the stage with the power and authority of a traveling evangelist.

The promo video includes clips of speakers saying:

America is under a spirit of delusion.

America has abandoned God.

Women are being used as pawns, which is exactly what the Left does.

We’ve given the keys to our church to the government and said: “Government, you run this church. You make the decisions for me.”

When we vacate the public square and leave that to chance, something fills the void.

When liberty hangs in the balance, and your children, your grandchildren, your nieces and nephews come to you and they say, “Where were you when tyranny knocked on our door,” what are you going to tell them?

What’s it actually going to take? Seriously, what kind of trigger point will cause the church just to come out of this zombie stupor and say: “OK that’s it. I’ve had it”?

The church shouldn’t be in a bunker waiting on the rapture, but it ought to be invading the mountains of influence for the glory of God.

We have to save our nation. We have to save our children.

We don’t have the luxury of disunity.

Fighting for liberty and freedom is difficult. It is hard. Choose your hard.

When the mothers suddenly see and perceive the organized threat against their little boys and their little girls, then they will rise up.

You’ve got a nation to save. You’ve got grandchildren to save.

Remember, those are the comments they were willing to highlight in their promo video. One wonders what may have been said they weren’t willing to highlight.

Common themes include spreading conspiracy theories about the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2020 election and the January 6 insurrection. At one of the events, Wallnau said: “January 6 was not an insurrection. It was an election fraud intervention.”

[...]

The ‘Lion of Judah’ election workers

But perhaps the most concerning call to action at the Courage Tour is their recruitment of election workers through Lion of Judah, an organization that assists Christians to register as election workers with a cause. “Just imagine. It’s election night. Chaos is happening. The polls are closing. They go and the volunteers are getting kicked out,” Lion of Judah’s founder Joshua Caleb Standifer told the Courage Tour crowd. “But what if we had Christians across America and swing states like Wisconsin that were actually the ones counting the votes and making sure it was happening?” Lion of Judah is composed of election deniers who say, “What happened in 2020 can never happen again!” This is precisely why they were so popular at the Courage Tour. Taylor noted, “I was present throughout the Courage Tour event on Monday, and it was rife with 2020 election denialism from the stage, in conversations among attendees and in the literature at the booths.”

Rick Pidcock writes for Baptist News that far-right election denial and conspiracy theories linked to Christian nationalism are a big concern, such as The Lion Of Judah outfit whose goal is recruitment of election workers in support of subverting fair elections.

[dustedmagazine]

Dust Volume 10, Number 2

Ballister

It’s a leap year, so we all get an extra 24 hours to listen to February music.  Why not try some of these selections from our endless piles of when-i-get-to-its?  We’ve got unhinged beatmakers and noise-addled Canadians, smashing, grabbing jazz men and psychedelic post-punk.  And really a lot more.  February always seems long.  This year it’s even more extended.  Use your time wisely.  Play records. 

This month’s contributors include Patrick Masterson, Ian Mathers, Bill Meyer, Bryon Hayes, Tim Clarke, Jennifer Kelly, Jonathan Shaw, Jim Marks and Andrew Forell. 

8ruki — POURquoi!! (33 Recordz)

This ain’t your mother’s TTC. Bilingual Parisian 8ruki takes most of his cues from Atlanta, acting with a whole lotta Whole Lotta Red in mind and squeezing 22 songs into his third album — about right for contemporary hip-hop in this vein, which frequently abandons ideas after less than two minutes and leaves a trail of incomplete sketches in its wake; like others his age, 8ruki has evolved to consider this less a bug (especially for stans forever thirsty for the next “project”) than a feature, the default mode of working. I don’t know what good it would do to comment on a song called “Andrew Tate!!” or “Elon Musk!!” at this stage other than to suggest the guy’s just being (what the French call) a provocateur, but peek elsewhere and you’ll find an unexpected beat switch on “VAris//PIENna,” not to mention a world-shrinking reference to the Golden State Warriors; the high-pitched squeaks of “CA$h!!” and “GIVENCHY MARgiela!”; the string sample and rolling bass of “EDQuer!!”; and a whole lot more to enjoy. Ignore the annoying tendency to turn caps off halfway through a song title; this is a fun record with a lot going on that’s even better if you more than half understand it.

Patrick Masterson

ALL HANDS_MAKE LIGHT — “Darling The Dawn” (Constellation)

The credits for this duo’s second release are deceptively simple; Ariel Engle (La Force, Broken Social Scene) as just “voice” and Efrim Manuel Menuck (Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Thee Silver Mt Zion) as just “noise.” But there are whole worlds contained in voice and noise, and there’s a sonic, emotional, and political complexity here that makes it feel much weightier and more elaborate than the work of any two people. (It also had one of the best song titles of last year in “We Live on a Fucking Planet and Baby That’s the Sun.”) There are distinct songs here, even some refrains, but the whole of “Darling The Dawn” also feels like one long ebbing and flowing movement, culminating in lovely, shattered grandeur with the closing one-two punch of “Anchor”/“Lie Down in Roses Dear.” Shoegaze without guitars (although not without occasional strings or drums, from Jessica Moss on violin and Liam O’Neill, respectively), emotional noise music, kosmiche played in a paupers’ graveyard; it’s hard to know what to call what ALL HANDS_MAKE LIGHT does, other than impressive. Maybe voice and noise is enough description after all.

Ian Mathers

Ballister — Smash And Grab (Aerophonic)

In Chicago, the smash and grab game is strong. People aren’t just breaking windows but driving vehicles through them. Ballister apply that spirit of aggressive enterprise to performance on this memento of saxophonist Dave Rempis, cellist Fred Lonberg-Holm and drummer Paal Nilssen-Love’s reunion at the Catalytic Sound Festival in Chicago in December, 2022. The reeds wail and probe, the strings splinter and scrape, the drums smash rhythm in the air and reshape them. And that’s just in the first few minutes. Over the course of the set, they find ways to apply that assertive spirit to quieter passages and slower passages, fashioning rough thickets and inconsolable laments from the same rough material. While Dusted does not recommend literal application of the album’s title when acquiring it, we confidently predict that you’ll find the record sticking to your fingers, obliging you to return it to the playback device for another go around.

Bill Meyer

Cuneiform Tabs — Cuneiform Tabs (Sloth Mate)

The Sloth Mate label is the psychedelic tendril sprouting from the flourishing vine that is the modern Bay Area post-punk scene.  There’s certainly an affiliation with Famous Mammals, Children Maybe Later and others of that ilk, but there’s a tendency to stray from traditional idioms that is unique to the Sloth Mate catalog.  Violent Change, headed up by the imprint’s owner Matt Bleyle, is at the center of this sub-underground cabal, coming across like a garage punk band noisily banging out Face to Face-era Kinks jams after gobbling some mind-altering flora.  Sterling Mackinnon’s The False Berries on the other hand is a lo-fi ambient electronic project that recalls the early beat-inclusive work of Christian Fennesz.  Bleyle and Mackinnon collaborate remotely under the Cuneiform Tabs moniker (the latter musician is based in London, England).  The cross-pollination works incredibly well, with the most listenable aspects of each unit rising to the forefront.  When it appears, Mackinnon’s Dan Bejar-meets-Marc Bolan warble acts as a foil for Bleyle’s deeper crooning.  Similarly, the former’s atmospheric tendencies highlight the beautiful melodies hidden beneath the latter’s noise-baked tunesmithery.  Cuneiform Tabs’ psychoactive sonorities require work to decipher, but the endeavor is certainly worthwhile.       

Bryon Hayes

Mia Dyberg Trio — Timestretch (Clean Feed)

It’s tempting to take the title of Timestretch ironically, since this Scandinavian trio compacts a lot of action into 43.18.  There are 14 tracks, all but three composed by bandleader and alto saxophonist Dyberg. But more likely, it addresses this paradox; while the music never feels like it’s in a hurry, there’s a fair bit going on. Tonally, Dyberg shifts easily between slightly sour and just sweet enough, and her phrasing is mobile, but never busy. On a few unaccompanied tracks, she unburdens herself more directly, mourning for those laid low by conflict. Bassist Asger Thomsen anchors the music with stark, strategically placed notes, and adds dimension with occasional sparse, bowed comments.  But it’s drummer Simon Fochhammer who gives the music shape, sometimes with a quick rustle, other times by building an eventful structure around his partners.

Bill Meyer

Kali Malone — All Life Long (Ideologic Organ)

Swedish composer and organist Kali Malone takes a rigorous, structured approach to making music, crafting deliberately pared-back and laser-focused pieces that make the listener acutely aware of the shifting harmonic dynamics within thick layers of sound. This 78-minute album presents an intimidating edifice to a casual listener, but it is organized to allow curious immersion in more easily digestible sections. The longest tracks are organ pieces stretching to around 10 minutes in duration, aching with melancholy. However, there are also shorter vocal and brass pieces that deviate away from held drones into more spacious, overlapping progressions that are, on occasion, almost buoyant. All Life Long feels like music for a less easily distracted age; to be patient enough to bear witness to its full, solemn unfolding requires commitment, but how often do you hear music this awe-inspiringly pure?

Tim Clarke

 Michael Nau — Accompany (Karma Chief)

Accompany rides the line between cosmic country and garden variety indie pop, its gentle melancholy enlivened by radiant runs of twanging guitar. “It’s an impossible life to get over,” Michael Nau croons in “Painting a Wall,” sounding beaten down but not quite broken, grounded in the ordinary but yearning for transcendence. Nau, you might remember, fronted the indie chamber pop Page France in the early aughts and the slightly more countrified Cotton Jones in the late ones.  This fifth solo album hits its peak in plaintive “Shape-Shifting,” where an otherworldly echo sheathes both Nau’s voice and the rumble of piano, and a glow suffuses everything, making it more.

Jennifer Kelly

Note — Impressions of a Still Life EP (The North Quarter)

Manchester’s Note hasn’t been around all that long — the earliest traces of his Soundcloud only reach back to October of 2021 — but just within the last year, he’s demonstrated a knack for fusing airy, sultry R&B moods with the breaks n’ bass of UK dance music’s storied past. Late January’s Impressions of a Still Life EP out via The North Quarter imprint, helmed by Dutch producer Lenzman (himself a veteran of labels like Metalheadz, Nu-Directions and Fokus), is another fine example: Aside from the stirring “Vespertine” that debuted last summer and features poet and spoken word artist Aya Dia, plus “Cold Nights” that came in November, Note fills out the EP with three additional songs of varying speed and mood. The best might be “EVR,” which again features a vocalist, this time singer-songwriter Feeney. Employing deep bass, fluttering percussion and featherweight piano flourishes, the production here is top-notch Brit-inflected R&D&B. Watch this space.

Patrick Masterson

Plaza — Adult Panic (Self-Release)

The novelist and rock critic (and one-time Dusted writer) Michael Fournier spent the pandemic on Cape Cod with his wife Becca, he learning the bass and she the drums.  Adult Panic collects 11 spiked and minimalist cuts from this experiment, almost entirely instrumental (there’s a shouted refrain on “(The Real) Mr. Hotdog”) and rife with lockdown agitation. The drums are pretty basic, a skitter of high-hat with snare on the upbeats, but the bass parts wander and jitter intriguingly. The title track has a Slint-ish post-rock open-ended-ness, repeated riffs left to linger and shift in the air. “The Tomb of Santa Claus” moves faster and more insistently, letting surf-like bent notes flare from rickety architectures. The whole experience is rather dour and claustrophobic, right up until the end when “(The Real) Mr. Hotdog” clatters into earshot and the two Fourniers seem to be, finally, having some fun.

Jennifer Kelly

Caroline Polachek — Desire, I Want to Turn to You: Everasking Edition (Perpetual Novice)

I’m not gonna sit here and tell you all about how big Caroline Polachek’s 2023 was; if you were paying any attention to the conversation, you already know Desire, I Want to Turn to You was universally, justifiably acclaimed. The Everasking Edition tacks on seven additional songs, five fresh out the box, one an acoustic rendition of “I Believe” and one a cover. Regarding the latter: Anyone paying attention to the machinations of the modern music business will know the name Jaime Brooks, who was half of Elite Gymnastics and now works as Default Genders in addition to unflinching commentary on whatever the fuck is going on with Billboard charts and the ugly realities of how no one’s getting Spotify royalties. “Coma” was originally theirs from Main Pop Girl 2019, a beautiful, delicately skipping adrenaline rush of a love song. Polachek doesn’t radically reinvent what’s already great; instead, she leaves the music alone and takes ownership of the rendition with her lower pitch and breathy delivery. A heartfelt nightcap on an imperial year, you couldn’t have scripted that Valentine’s Day release any more perfectly.

Patrick Masterson

Proton Burst — La Nuit (I, Voidhanger)

When the wife of storied French comics artist Phillipe Druillet died in 1975, Druillet poured his grief and rage into an idiosyncratic graphic narrative, La Nuit (1976); it’s full of mutant biker gangs, Druillet’s signature fever-dream architectural forms and hair-raising violence. French thrash metal weirdos Proton Burst loved the book, and in 1994 they produced an album-length project, part response, part soundtrack to the comic’s maniacal intensities. I, Voidhanger has given that Proton Burst record a deluxe reissue, including the original music, an extended live performance of it from 1995 and a booklet including eye-popping images from Druillet’s comic and an essay. If you���re in this for the music, the real treat is the live set, which is nearly as unhinged as Druillet’s illustrations. The band rages, rants, foments and froths—and is that a harp? Who knows. Like the original graphic narrative, what matters here is the volatility of the feeling tone, more so than any sense-making (or sonic) throughway. Lose yourself in the violence of it. Maybe that feeling of dislocation gets closest to the irrational agony of loss Druillet drew La Nuit in the teeth of, some 50 years ago.

Jonathan Shaw

Mariano Rodriguez — Exodo (self-released)

Mariano Rodriguez is an Argentinian guitarist in the Takoma school tradition with a large and high-quality back catalog. He often focuses on playing with a slide but is equally adept at playing without one and sometimes incorporates experiments with sound, as on Huesos Secos (2020), and fuller traditional instrumentation, as on Praise the Road (2017), into his recordings. Exodo, released late last year, is a set of mainly guitar soli. The playing is typically inspired, impressive without being flashy, and the compositions are tuneful and well-developed. Included is a 12-string anthem (“Lazaro”), Rodriguez’s signature slide work (such as on “The Desterrados”), bluesy 6-string meditations (“Diaspora”), and a couple of experiments with studio effects and overdubs (“The River and the Blind”) and drone (“Mother of the Road”). Over all, Exodo is a fine set of tunes that flows cohesively.

Jim Marks

Twin Tribes — Pendulum (Beso de Muerte Records)

Pendulum by Twin Tribes

It’s unclear precisely which tribes are twinned here, but if the music on Pendulum is any indication, it’s the deathrock freaks (with their long-standing romance of moldering, undead bodies) and the coldwave kids (who like to dance in place, furiously, disaffectedly, bodies frosty for entirely different reasons). Twin Tribes hails from the bastion of moody electronic music that is Brownville, TX, and somehow these Latinx fellows have managed to survive their local cultural climate long enough to release three LPs, a live tape and a whole bunch of singles and remixes. Pendulum refines the essential sonic template laid down in 2019’s Ceremony: tuneful, shimmery synths; snappy, brittle rhythm tracks; baritone vocals about zombies at the disco. If that sounds like fun, it surely is—but you’ll have a hard time convincing the kids in black eye makeup to crack anything like a smile. This reviewer can’t help it. The songs are too good, the vibes are way too goofily gravid. Dance, you flesh-eating misfits, dance.

Jonathan Shaw

Volksempfänger — Attack of Sound (Cardinal Fuzz / Feeding Tube)

Attack Of Sound by Volksempfänger

Attack of Sound’s swirling boy-girl harmonies instantly call to mind shoegaze luminaries Slowdive, but Volksempfänger’s noise-strewn guitar latticework is more aligned with The Jesus and Mary Chain.  Furthermore, the Dutch duo’s melodic flavor is as sweet as 1960s AM radio.  Ajay Saggar (Bhajan Bhoy) and Holly Habstritt combine these disparate sonic strands to create tidy noise pop gems, which they wrap in Phil Spector sonics.  The wall of sound approach imbues each song with a pulsating thrum.  This is the beating heart of their sound, underpinning the delightful vocal harmonies, shimmering guitar melodies, and waves of coruscating feedback.  The pair attains a balance between saccharine and savory aromas: dream pop wistfulness (“What the Girl Does” and “Your Gonna Lose Hard”) interchanges with propulsive garage rock (“How We Made It Seem” and “Damned & Drowned”).  The album closes out with the kaleidoscopic psychedelia of “You’ve Lost It,” introducing yet another aspect of Volksempfänger’s oeuvre.  This last-minute shift in mood adds a quirky sense of quietude to an otherwise exhilarating journey.   

Bryon Hayes

Ian Wellman — The Night the Stars Fell (Ash International)

The Night The Stars Fell by Ian Wellman

Recorded in the fire swept forests and deserts of Southern California, Ian Wellman’s The Night the Stars Fell plays like a Disintegration Loops for natural disasters. Wellman’s treated field recordings encourage the listener to subsume themselves in the natural rhythm of the wind that fanned the wildfires much like Basinski’s seminal work. While Disintegration Loops drew its potency from the association with 9/11, Wellman’s project is a more deliberate meditation on destruction. He coats his field recordings of deteriorating human structures — railcars, homes — and landscape ambience with short-wave radio static and decaying tape loops. There’s a concentration on both the violence of the destruction and the desolation of the aftermath. Huge swells of sound are interspersed with howls of wind, coruscating swathes of static and the creak and crank of burnt timber both natural and manufactured. The Night the Stars Fell is an absorbing evocation of nature’s power. 

Andrew Forell

Wharfer — Postboxing (Self-Release)

Postboxing by Wharfer

Wharfer’s Kyle Wall has long made the kind of shadowy, pared down indie-folk singer/songwriter music that elicits comparisons to Bill Callahan and Will Oldham. This time out, however, he ditches vocals and verse chorus structure entirely and enlists Chuck Johnson (pedal steel), Ian O’Hara (acoustic bass) and Duncan Wickel (violin) for a set of ambient, piano-forward reflections. These tracks are quietly riveting as, like “Wishing Well in White Noise,” the blend the chalky, elegiac tones of the piano’s upper registers with limpid pools of sustained pedal steel. Not quite ambient, the piece swirls and rounds to its own subtle rhythms, a faint thunk of bass ordering it forward. “Alto” brings the long, bowed vibrations of violin into the mix, then a sprightly sprinkle of pizzicato strings. And in the title track, a ritual voice flickers in and out of focus, but only as tone and texture. The piano carries the narrative, as string washes build and bass notes drop in and seagulls cry in the distance. It’s a subtle but powerful voice on its own, and you don’t miss the words one bit. 

Jennifer Kelly

[prettylittleproblem]

Jason Engle - Mother of Dawn

[konmarkimageswords]

Diffusion, Volume IX

Artfully Crafted Photography Annual

124 pages, full color, perfect bound softcover

8.25 in. × 10.75 in. // 20.96 cm. × 27.31 cm.

English language, 1st Edition of 400

Nine Chapters: I. Cabinet of Curiosities // II. Transfiguration // III. Nostalgia // IV. Natural Landscape // V. Enigmatic Figures // VI. Organichrome // VII. Geometric Personality // VIII. Human Condition // IX. Sanctuary Shelter

Featuring: Addison Brown, Alan Ostreicher, Alex Delapena, Aline Mare, Allen Morris, Amaury Orozco & Sev Collazo, Amy Kanka Valadarsky, Andreas Olesen, Andy Mattern, Angela Franks Wells, Anne Campbell, Anne-Laure Autin, Antonio Martinez, Barbara Kyne, Benjamin Montague, Bill Vaccaro, Bob Cornelis, Brianna Tadeo, C E Morse, Carol Erb, Caroline Fudala, Clare O'Neill, Claude Peschel Dutombe, Dawn Surratt, Diana Bloomfield, Diana Nicholette Jeon, Elizabeth Raymer Griffin, Elizabeth Stone, Ellie Ivanova, Fritz Liedtke, Galina Kurlat, Harland Vine, Heather Perera, Heidi Clapp Temple, Heidi Kirkpatrick, J. M. Golding, James Wigger, Joseph Deiss, Joshua Myers, Joshua Sarinana, Kathleen Donohoe, Kathryn Mayo, Ken Ball, KK DePaul, Kon Markogiannis, Linda Alterwitz, Linda Barsotti, Margo Geddes, Matthew Finley, Maureen Delaney, Melanie Walker, Michael Kirchoff, Michelle Rogers Pritzl, Mike Hoover, Molly McCall, Noelle McCleaf, Rachel Wolf, Ray Bidegain, Robert Calafiore, Robert Moran, Sandra Klein, Sara Silks, Stacie Ann Smith, Susan de Witt, Tamsen Wojtanowski, Thomas Michael Alleman, Tom & Lois White, Troy Colby, Wendi Schneider, and Wendy Verity.

[hearthsandhistory]

Christmas Carols You're Not Sick Of, 1/25

Edi Beo, Thu Hevene Quene 13th Century English

Edi beo thu, hevene quene, Folkes froure and engles blis, Moder unwemmed and maiden clene, Swich in world non other nis. On thee hit is wel eth sene, Of all wimmen thu havest thet pris; Mi swete levedi, her mi bene And reu of me yif thi wille is.

Thu asteghe so the daiy rewe The deleth from the deorke nicht; Of thee sprong a leome newe That al this world haveth ilight. Nis non maide of thine heowe Swo fair, so schene, so rudi, swo bricht; Swete levedi, of me thu reowe And have merci of thin knicht.

Spronge blostme of one rote, The Holi Gost thee reste upon; Thet wes for monkunnes bote And heore soule to alesen for on. Levedi milde, softe and swote, Ic crie thee merci, ic am thi mon, Bothe to honde and to fote, On alle wise that ic kon.

----

Modern English

Blessed be you, heaven's queen, People's comfort and angel's bliss, Mother immaculate and maiden pure, Such in world no other is. In you it is easily seen, Of all women you have the prize; My sweet lady, hear my prayer And have pity on me if you will.

You ascend like the ray of dawn Which separates from the dark night; From you sprang a new light That has lit all this world. There is no maid of your complexion So fair, so beautiful, so fresh, so bright; Sweet lady, have compassion And have mercy on your knight.

Blossom sprung from a single root, The Holy Ghost rested upon you; That was for mankind's benefit And their soul to redeem on. Lady mild, soft and sweet, I cry for your mercy, I am your servant, Both hand and foot, In all ways that I know.

[dukeofriven]

One of my favourite quotes is "Engles was the kind of man Stalin would have shot."[1] Dude was a gadfly. Loved him the ladies. Loved having things, loved art and music and having a nice suit and having lots of little treats. And large treats. And partying until dawn and boning Irish radicals and their sisters. Sure, he was monied, and having access to his family money allowed him to do such things—in some ways, radical though he was, he was an unrepentant materialist. But then that's a very modern belief that that is somehow contradictory: in some respects Marx and Engles were the ur-materalists. Neither Marx nor Engles was all that interested in the sort of industrial asceticism that would so mark later periods of communist ideology: in fact, I suspect both would reject it as inherently too religious in doctrine. It has an inescapable whiff of puritan morality: you won't get into the Revolutionary People's Republic of Heaven if you don't sacrifice comfort in the worldly Worker's Paradise to show your commitment to your fellow comrades in your commitment to the True Way of Communism.[2] Indeed, one of Marx's most pointed criqtiques of capitalism was it stripped material objects of their materialism: as exchange values, all objects become interchangeable. Engles fought against capitalism not because he was opposed to having things and little treats, but because he saw how capitalism would destroy them. In its need to commodity the world, to have a world in which an art was, from the view of exchange value, indistinguishable from a value-equivalent quantity of literal dog shit, treats die. Art dies. Culture dies. They are just as much grist for the mill of capital as the bodies of the labourer and artisans and craftpeople thrown under the millstone.

Marx and Engles both thought you should have treats—and the freedom to enjoy those treats without being shamed for your enjoyment, to not think 'oh, there's something more productive I should be doing than having a good time.' And for that, Stalin would have put both of them up against the wall for counter-revolutionary bourgeois sentimentality.

Next week we'll discuss how the Soviets tried to literally destroy the weekend and the entire concept of family and friends as part of our series on Revolutionary Calendars and how the people who make them have historically all been completely insane. [1] It's Tristram Hunt, if you care. [2] Of course that's sort of the point: there's a reason the famous essay book by disillusion post-war communists called communism 'The God that Failed': the communism of the twentieth century was religious in nature, rigidly doctrinal. The fact that you could even be an Orthodox Marxist was sort of the apotheosis of the critique people like Bakunin had raised a century prior: viz Comunism and Statist power being no different than Theocratic Statist Power or Capitalist Statist Power: the needs of power and the preservation of power inescapably creates hierarchies and docrines for the authentication and continuance of power±and thus, any promises of freedom in communist thought would ultimately be subsumed by the need to preserve Communist Power, and require all the attendant tools: a holy writ, priesthood, inquisition et alia.

Unfortunately— and literally no one is talking about this— if you buy many many little treats for yourself, cumulatively, this can add up to a larger amount of money, if you add the numbers together. I’m not sure if there’s anything to be done about this but thought I would bring it to the attention of my beloved and far-reaching audience

[imathers]

Top 20: ALL HANDS_MAKE LIGHT — "Darling The Dawn"

In 2022 I had a pretty banner year with Montreal's Constellation, one of my favourite record labels. Four of their releases made it onto my list (out of, going by their site, nine that they released). In 2023 not only did I reduce the size of my list (the essay at the beginning of this tag discusses that), but they put out fewer records and I heard fewer of them. Only one, in fact, but it is a doozy.

I've only been trying to write about the second record (even though some of the bio makes it feel like it's their debut) from this "newly minted" duo since roughly April, and for as much as I love it I just simply haven't been able to figure out where to start (and this is one of a few records I am still determined to crack, and soon, in that respect). I'm much more familiar with the other work of Efrim Menuck (GY!BE, Thee Silver Mt. Zion, etc.) than I was with Ariel Engle (BSS, La Force) so I'm not really sure where this falls between their other work. But it's noisy and passionate and political and sad and moving and has probably my favourite song title of the year (above). I'm not sure any other record I heard from 2023 has a better climax than the duo of "Anchor" and "Lie Down in Roses Dear" from here. Now if I could only figure out a coherent way to review it!

[nita-engle-reference]

Watercolor Dawn Nita Engle (1925-2019) Watercolor

I did this painting of a harbor scene when I was still working in many styles. I loved the feel of direct painting, emotionally dashing in the rigging, giving my impression of the scene. - Nita Engle

[breakingarrows]

Morbid Curiosity: Wolfenstein (2009)

Is there anyone real in Wolfenstein? I skate through the city of Isenstadt killing Nazi’s with my weapon wheel armory of guns. Occasionally I’ll come across a resistance member, who stands at the ready waiting for my button press to summon forth their voice. Enemy soldiers have the appearance of conversation but really they’re talking to the player, fulfilling the most basic role of exposition outside of a text crawl or journal entry. Everyone repeats the same message just varied in sentence structure and voice actor. Once the next plot beat is reached they automatically update to begin the next cycle of audio barks played at the player’s whim and for their ear only.

These people aren’t real. B.J. Blazkowicz as the character the player inhabits has the most opportunity to be human, but he merely fulfills the role of action hero. A silent protagonist during all gameplay, Blazkowicz can only be found speaking during cutscenes and narrating his wrapup reports after each story mission. Blazkowicz will work alongside the resistance and kill Nazis, but nobody is real.

Nazis in Wolfenstein are cartoon villains, on display most prominently in the over the top accents during intel narration, and the game keeps track of how many you’ve killed and how, with different counts for dismembered, burned, electrocuted, and dissolved. They exist to be killed using the game’s creative arsenal and not much else. Equal care, or really lack thereof, is given to your fellow brothers in arms.

Allied characters are natives to the town of Isenstadt and led by Caroline Becker and Erik Engle of the Kreisau Circle (the main resistance group), with Leonid Alexandrov and Sergei Kovlov your main contact for the Golden Dawn (a group studying the Veil, this game’s source of supernatural powers), and Stefan and Anton Kreig as your black market suppliers. Each exists in service to the player and nothing else. Each stands in place waiting for you to appear and automatically trigger a cutscene or summon a voice line out of them before moving ever onwards.

Becker is introduced as the wary leader who learns to appreciate Blazkowicz’s ability only for her to be captured, held hostage, and killed off to give the player additional motivation to stop the Nazi’s. Becker can be limply defended as a strong woman in a leadership role, though what details exist of her beside “resistance leader?” Alexandrov serves you with the same suspicion that follows you for most of the game but he, above all others, gets chosen to be your betrayer in the end. The Kreig brothers have the appearance of complexity with a reputation for serving whoever pays, and their comments of the Nazi’s ever-increasing bounty on Blazkowicz’s head hint at a heel turn. Instead near the finale you get an overheard comment, again programmed specifically for the player to listen and learn from, that the older brother Stefan has shot his sibling dead. You go up to Stefan and summon the story to learn Anton was helping the Nazi’s and Becker’s capture was a step too far for sympathizer Stefan. Whether it was truly Anton or Alexcandrov or a combination of the two that were a rumored mole in the resistance is about as complex as the game is capable of getting.

All of these characters get names and dialogue and participation in the plot, but they only exist when observed. Turn the corner and they vanish. Choose to ignore what few you can interact with and they’ll happily stand as a fixture of the environment and nothing more, set dressing to visually indicate to the player that they are not alone, other non-humans occupy this shared space as well. They exist only in reaction to the player, with no agency or depth of their own. Were this an id-tech 1 game the images of the Nazi’s from Wolfenstein 3D, literally 2D sprites who rotate to face you at every angle, would be perfectly fitting for the vacant role they fulfill.

Linear games can sometimes be compared to dark rides, where the player sits and is pulled along a predetermined and rigid track from point A to point B as a highly scripted and structured sequence of images are presented and moved past as you inevitably draw towards the conclusion and exit. Wolfenstein eschews this partially in favor of a structure more similar to a museum where you are free to move from one place to the next, with specific points that will bring you through a sequence of events.

Once a mission is complete you are dumped back into the hub world, a large map split in two, in which you can move about freely. As you progress through the game’s missions the mechanics, enemy types, and equipment from them will find their way into the hub map. One mission introduces a super soldier busting through a brick wall killing your allies with a disintegrating weapon. After that mission, they will now occasionally appear on the city streets with patrols. This exploratory space allows you to become familiar with a layout and a way to lengthen playtime as the sandbox is full of hidden trinkets just underneath a layer of sand for you to collect.

Wolfenstein has all the basic elements required of a first person shooter: it runs at 60fps (a “requirement” we’ve recently been reminded of again with the backlash to Redfall’s 30fps launch), the guns have a nice vibrational kick when fired, swapping between the veil-vision (an entry in the Arkham Asylum school of Detective Mode despite predating that game by a week) and the real world doesn’t destroy the momentum despite running on a decade-plus PlayStation 3 system, and killing Nazi’s with bullets, flames, electricity, and Veil-powered superweapons can remain an foundational joy to build upon. Woflenstein chooses to build with cardboard and time has only degraded its construction.

[celebratingamazingwomen]

Dawn Engle (b. 1957) is the executive director and co-founder of the PeaceJam Foundation. This brings together Nobel Peace Prize laureates in order to teach the art of peace to youth around the world.

Even though she has not won a Nobel herself, she has been nominated seventeen times. Since its founding in 1996, more than one million people around the world have participated in the PeaceJam educational programme.

[talonabraxas]

SEIRIOS (Sirius) was the god or goddess of the Dog-Star, the brightest star of the constellation Canis Major. The pre-dawn rising of the star in the path of the sun was believed to be the source of the scorching heat and droughts of midsummer. Seirios appears in many guises in myth. Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty | Magic: The Gathering by Jason Engle

[yoongissilver]

Hyung/dongsaeng =/= biological brothers

I am annoyed at constant anons throwing their "BTS/Jikook are basically biological brothers" bullsh*t around so...let's get into today's Korean lesson, shall we?

Generally, since age difference/age hierarchy is very important in Korean culture, there are fixed words to refer to someone older you are close to (family, friends, romantic partner,...). These are all of them:

오빠 [oh-bba/ppa] = younger woman to older man

누나 [noo-na] = younger man to older woman

언니 [eon-nie/un-nie] = younger woman to older woman

형 [hyeong/hyung] = younger man to older man

오빠/oppa and 누나/noona are generally accepted to be used in romantic context, while the other two are often denied. Why? Because heteronormativity, of course!

Do you really think that means they want to become the girl's biological older brother? No. The lyrics are generally translated to "I want to become your boyfriend" because guess what?? It's the liberal translation of "oppa" in this context!

Let's just think about Boy in Luv lyrics:

"되고파 너의 오빠"

"I want to become your oppa"

Now let's go a bit further back in K-Pop history (a lot further back) and look at SHINee's debut song, "누난 너무 예뻐" (engl. title: Replay). Its literal translation is "noona is so pretty". Do you really think it's about their biological sister?? No, Sir! Noona is a romantic interest.

These examples show that all four words above can be used in romantic contexts. 언니/unnie and 형/hyung just as much as 오빠/oppa and 누나/noona.

But what about dongsaeng?? Doesn't that just mean that JM sees JK as his cute little biological baby brother uwu??

Nope.

동생 [dong-saeng] = 1) biological younger sibling, 2) someone younger than the person speaking

동생/dongsaeng is basically the counterpart of all four words above (oppa, noona, hyung, unnie), but from the older to the younger person, there are not several different words but only the one, dongsaeng.

Since I love them a lot, let's take Hyuna and Dawn as an example. If someone asked Hyuna about her boyfriend (or fiancé I guess!), they might ask if he's older or younger than her. To that question, her response could be:

This does not, however, mean that they are biologically related.

"저보다/나보다 동생이에요" [Jeo-bo-da/na-bo-da dong-saeng-ih-eh-yo]

Literal: "He's my dongsaeng/he's a dongsaeng to me"

Liberal: "He's younger than me"

To sum up: All five words (oppa, noona, hyung, unnie, dongsaeng) can be used in any situations where someone is close but has an age difference. This can mean they are biological family, close friends, or in a romantic relationship.

Actually, dongsaeng (and oppa, noona, hyung, unnie) are so often used in non-family context that Koreans usually have to specify if they DO mean their biological siblings.

To do that, they tag a 친/chin to the word, which means something like "actual".

Aka when Hobi talks about his sister, he usually says "우리 친누나" [oo-ri chin-noo-na] aka "my real sister/my biological sister".

None of these words are inherently related to biological family, at the same time none of these words are inherently romantic.

Thank you for taking part in my Korean lesson.

[rockthistowninsideout]

Video Source

@jade-from-zamonia has already posted a link to the crowd-funding campaign of the project. Give them your money if you have some to spare because this is the best news I’ve heard the entire year so far.

Here is an English description of what’s said in the video. (A new paragraph indicates a new speaker or a new train of thought.)

Imagine the sickest place of all Zamonia. The inhabitants cough violently, they wheeze and sneeze as if they’re about to breath out their last. And the reason for all this resides up here and his name is (Eißpin, der sehr Schreckliche).

Can you imagine that? [a book is closed shut] Good because then you’re in Sledwaya, the sickest town in all Zamonia. And there the starving crat Echo makes a pact with the alchemaster Eißpin [engl. Succubus Ghoolion]. Eißpin commits himself to feed Echo with the most delicious dishes for a whole month when he is allowed to slaughter Echo and cook out his fat. That’s the pitch from the fantastic book „The Alchemaster’s Apprentice“ by Walter Moers and our goal is:

To bring this story to life in the studios of the movie university of [Potsdam-] Babelsberg [near Berlin] on one set. We build the set in the studios and enrich it with the help of animation, stop-motion, with five-x-elements, and want make this both beautiful and terrifying world a reality  - with Walter Moers’ blessing.

Here the set is supposed to be built life-sized. It’ll be crooked and askew because we take inspiration from German expressionism. The set will be several metres tall, filled to the brim with props and decorations, for example parchment scrolls, alchemistic equipment, and several other pieces.

Now this set we have to set into motion. Everywhere in Eißpin’s laboratory are small creatures that hammer against their cages and try to escape. Creature builders from all over Germany help us with that. Using different techniques like glove puppets, stop-motion animation or marionettes we transform Eißpin’s lab into a true torture chamber.

[The first part of his text is indicipherable]. Tilted overhead and low-angle shots that support the edges of szenography. Contrasts are told by play with shadows, beteween light cones, and silhouettes. The camera as moving, even living companion of Eißpin’s gruesome work

Right now we have a pre-visualizition shot, also called pre-vis, which helps us shooting the movie completely beforehand. It’s basically the elaborated version of a storyboard.

At this point we’re pre-cutting the movie, we have material from the virtual production shoot and are able to set timing and cuts and everything else.

That also means the soundscape. It transports the omnipresent dread that lingers around the town; the never-ending thunderstorm seems to stem right from Succubius Eißpin’s castle. Whining Leiden Mankins, screeching leathermice, and the deadly bubbling of the cauldron. The suffering that’s expressed by sound as steady companion never ends. Only a tender meow by the crat Echo shows that a rebellion is about to dawn.

What we want to accomplish with the movie is to catch the grim and macabre mood in the alchemaster’s lab. And we are privileged to work together with the musicians of the German movie orchestra in Babelsberg so we are able to live up to the epic elements of the story.

And our goal is to adapt a narratively and visually intensive scene from this fantatic book by WalterMoers for the big screen. But let’s he honest: I know this text by heart. The books are just absolutely amazing. They have given so much to so many of our team from our childhoods onward – and to make this a reality is what we want and what we are passionate about. It’s just so awesome and a dream come true!