#after months in line I was still 400th in line

[pinolitas]

this is my post now

Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents

Lindsay C. Gibson

[dsandrvk]

Sunday, August 27 - Quebec City

Unlike in Trois-Rivieres, here in Quebec City there was plenty to see that we missed the first time around and we had a beautiful day for it. We had heard there would be a changing of the guard ceremony up at the Citadel, so hurried up there first thing, taking some steep streets rather than the stairs to bypass the funicular and then another series of streets up from the upper town to the fortifications. It turned out they were short-staffed so no changing of the guard, and instead a military concert and guided tour of the inside of the Citadel and the museum was offered, so we took a pass and decided to explore "The Plains of Abraham" on our own. The plains are actually a huge open area just to the west of the fortifications for Quebec City. They were named for a farmer who worked the land here long before the establishment of the city. The plains played an important part in the capture of "New France" by the British in what they call the Seven Years War (and we call the French and Indian War).

We had been willing to simply walk west and explore, but a staircase down to sea-level and a small enclave beckoned, so we went down 400+ steps passing many folks getting their workout by coming back up. These are the Cap-Blanc steps and the longest stairs in the city. We did not plan to go back that way! At the bottom is a major highway, but also one interior street back against the cliffs with some lovely older rowhouses. It is not connected to the main lower town, but seems to be an isolated section of town. We explored this area, then headed west, sharing the path with lots of bicycles on this beautiful morning.

We never found out how far the bike path went, however, since after about e mile we took another bike path back in and up the cliff. This followed the line of the original French road that led from a natural landing area west of town up to the plains and the western fortifications for the town. Starting at the bottom and continuing with many stops up the path were interpretive panels detailing the events of September 12 and 13, 1759. This was the British Major-General Wolfe's final attempt to take the city of Quebec after months of laying siege to the city. In short, he landed troops near the bottom of the road and below the cliff, managed to get over 4,000 troops up to the plains, and mostly surprised the unorganized French army and their militias and indigenous fighters and eventually won the day. The interpretation was superb, and it made the slog up to the top of the hill pleasant.

There are still three Martello towers built by the British up on the top - put there to help defend the western fortifications - but built too late to ever see action. They are squat and round, and we first heard of them in Folkestone, which seems like years ago, but was actually just over a month past. The plains now also boasts a nice running oval, as well as a hard surface for skating, etc., lots of small pavilions and picnic tables, lawns, and a gorgeous sunken garden.

We also walked to the Parliament building, which seems to be a popular tourist bus stop, and eventually wandered back by the Swiss clock installation by City Hall. This was a gift from Jura, Switzerland to Quebec on the 400th anniversary of the founding of the city, and is the only one of its kind in the world. It took over 10,500 person-hours and six years to complete, involved 28 trades and weighs 2 tons. Watching the mechanisms is mesmerizing, and it is supposedly more accurate than a quartz watch. It's hard to photograph, however, as it is encased in shatterproof glass, a good idea for a clock valued at 2.4 million!

From here we wandered down to the lower town, which I think is my favorite part of the city. The buildings are mostly made of local stone, and the visual variation comes in the colors used for shutters, roofs, and flower boxes. It is also quite touristy, with lots of shops and restaurants, but the late afternoon light was lovely on the warm-colored stone, and we spent quite a bit of time trying to get some good photos. The funicular leaves from this area, too, although it didn't seem that crowded.

We finally headed back to our ship, and were delayed a bit boarding. There had been a mobile "cherry-picker" style machine working on our ship's exterior, and it had finished. Because of security, there were all sorts of moveable barricades to get out of its way, and it was quite amusing to see this giant machine try to navigate the too small openings the security people scrambled to open. With a lot of back and forthing, it eventually lumbered on and we scrambled back on board. We once again had dinner outside as we sailed away around 7. Our only disappointment is that because of a bridge, we had to go around the far side of Ile d' Orleans and missed one last glimpses of Montmorency Falls.

Tomorrow we repeat in Sangueney, and have no plans. We will probably walk around the small town by the dock and relax a bit after six busy port days.

[funkwhistle]

May the fourth be with you

Pairing: Obi Wan x GN!Reader

Warnings: Smut - but nothing that interesting. Maybe a little of getting caught in the act, a little angst maybe

Notes: Goddamed Rat getting me back into writing Star Wars i stg. this was meant for May 4th but i had exams and life so it's here now. (and this is my 400th post :))

“May the force be with you,” — his parting words and likely the last thing you'd ever hear him say. He'd been away for months now, completing his training of Anakin and probably doing something unnecessarily heroic. At least it would be something to tell the hypothetical grandkids, if he stayed alive long enough that is.

You thought about him almost more than you'd care to admit, and it wasn't like you'd be able to see him as soon as he came back either; the Jedi had forbidden any form of romantic relationship with it's trainees. Not that what you had with him could be considered romantic, hurried sex in the back of his ship or a stolen kiss in a dark hallway. That was one thing he was clear on; neither of you could form any sort of attachment.

For nearly the whole day you'd been sat there, watching as the sky went from a pale blue to a dark red as the evening bled through the city. And now the evening wind had picked up, biting a chill into your skin as your team awaited the promised return of Obi Wan's ship. You worked in ship maintenance, from making sure he had his favourite droid to ensuring the engine ran smoothly. Beside you, your team were shivering, pulling their fleeces tighter around their bodies and huddling close in an effort to protect each other from the weather.

Eventually, just as you were considering turning in for the night, a familiar ship returned to the landing bay, more battered than the last time you'd seen it, but still had the discernable red stripes on it. Blocking your face as the ship landed, you rushed forward to secure it to the ground and to grab a ladder, so he could get down. You were finally warming up a little, the warm fumes from the engine acting as a very effective heating system.

While you were scanning the ship for any major damage (surprisingly, there was very little) Obi Wan had climbed down and was making his way into the temple, without so much as a backwards glance at you. For a moment, a flash of hurt ran through you, which was furthered when he gladly spoke to some of your team on the way inside. You were unaccustomed to the feeling, but you knew it well enough, the pang of jealousy you weren't allowed to feel towards that man.

You didn't see him again for a few days, as usual on his return, he'd be briefing the council, teaching classes and attending senate meetings. While neither of you spoke to each other properly about your work, you could feel his stress after one of the meetings — his growing mistrust of the senate was ageing him faster than he'd like it to. And you were busy too, running diagnostics on the ship and fixing the broken metalwork, although there was minimal work required.

But this was where he found you, in the vehicle hangar, having dismissed your team for the weekend. As usual, you were noting anything which needed ordering in and totalling the costs for the past week; an exciting job of course. However, unlike usual, Obi Wan came up behind you, wrapping his arms around you and pressing a hesitant kiss on your neck. The pair of you never did anything like this, preferring to keep anything between you two to the privacy of your room or the back of his ship.

“What are you doing?” you hissed, although not moving from his embrace, relaxing slightly into him.

“Mmhhmmm,” he hummed, not giving you an answer, preferring to kiss up your neck to your ear.

“Ben-”

“—yes?” he sounded almost weary, like his travels had taken a toll on him. Moving out of his grasp, you spun, so he was facing you, and you were met with his blue eyes staring at you, looking almost duller than the last time you'd seen him.

You just stared at him for a moment, taking him in, relishing in the comfort he provided you. Of course, he was still in his Jedi robes, and his hair was longer than the last time you'd seen him. His smile, however, was the same, and you couldn't keep yourself from doing it any longer, moving to lightly brush your lips on his.

As soon as your lips came in contact with his he moved, pulling you with desperation, so you were pushed against him and deepening the kiss. Sighing a little, you wrapped your arms around the back of his neck, toying with his hair and the plait he wore in it. You hated his current haircut, (not that you'd tell him) but also God, it was so good to run your hands through. And he seemed to like what you were doing, judging by his urgent kisses.

Your lips disconnected for a second to allow him to glance at you, hands feeling their way down your back to the hem of your shirt and pulling it a little.

“This alright?” he asked, teasing his fingers over your lower back, giving you the shivers. Nodding, you jerked your head to a ship behind you, and he fortunately picked up the hint; pulling you, so he could pick you up and carrying you to privacy. While he was lifting you, you peppered kisses and bites over his neck and shoulder, all able to be covered up though — you didn't need Yoda knowing about your sex life.

You were shoved against a wall as Ben's lips bruised onto yours again, yanking your shirt higher and higher until he could remove it entirely. Neither of you had the time to bask in the presence of the other now, fingers fumbling with the clasps on his robes as his shimmied your pants down your legs. The aching desperation between your legs was making itself more evident now, the fantasies you'd concocted over his time away filling your head. He was obviously listening to your thoughts, as he coked his head and grinned a little as he shrugged his clothes off.

Of course, he was hard already, that man was possibly the horniest one you'd ever met, and yet also the one you'd expect the least. Maybe it was all those years of celibacy. You didn't have time to think about this as he was lining his tip up with you, preparing to slide in as he glanced at you for conformation. With a small nod, he entered you, quietening any noise you would've made with his lips.

Even though you both had to rush, he took his time building up speed, his hands finding your shoulders, your hair, anything he could hold. Not that you were complaining either, tangling your hands in the hair at the base of his neck to pull him closer as if he could escape if you didn't hold each other.

The tentative pace did not last long however, as he began to jerk swiftly into you as you wrapped your legs around him to hold him deeper in you. The sound of skin on skin and panting filled the surrounding air, mingled with small grunts from him at the feeling of you digging your nails into his back. It had been a long time since he’d fucked you, and an even longer time since he’d fucked you like this; sharp erratic thrusts which made you almost squeal, if there wasn't a risk of being caught.

Embarrassingly, you felt your stomach coil after only a little while, all this time alone had made it very easy to spiral to bliss. You were about to tell him, but, as if he already knew, his hand went to encourage you closer to your edge. Throwing your head back, you focussed on the feeling of his hand and him inside you, making the top of your head prickle as you felt your orgasm rush over you like cold water. Obi wan was still pounding into you, but his thrusts were shaky, and a moment later he'd pulled out of you and spilled himself over your stomach with a satisfied groan.

The both of you remained there, in a haze, for a while, sharing gentle kisses between each other and cleaning you up. After rummaging in his robes, he pulled a small cloth out from one pocket and cleaned you as gently as he could.

“Were you planning this then?” you said teasingly, nodding at the cloth. Ben just cocked his eyebrow, smirking a little as he continued his meticulous work on you. Once he was done, he moved to place a final kiss on your forehead before helping you stand (your legs still slightly uncertain) and passing you your clothes.

“Chief?” one of your team was just outside the ship, and when he called out you both froze, you only wearing your shirt and Obi Wan still desperately trying to untangle his robes. After a moment you heard the footsteps fade out of the hangar and back into the main building, and you both dared to breathe again. And then the laughter came, from being on the verge of being caught like horny teenagers once more. Moments like this were your favourite, where you were nothing more than two childlike adults.

[dixie12]

so much angst

why do some real work when i can write 1700 words of angsty jonny in the aftermath of pat’s 400th goal!

Jonny had spent the last three days practicing looking and sounding excited. He knew Patrick would be calling him to celebrate after his 400th goal, especially since Chicago was still mostly on lockdown, and it wasn’t like he could go out and party with the guys. He was determined not to bring Patrick down, not to make yet another conversation about him and his issues. Patrick deserved to be the center of attention, and Jonny was damn well going to give him that.

He texted with Sharpy a bit before the game, predicting when they thought Pat would score. After the frustrating loss in their last game, Jonny had has money on Patrick scoring early. Thankfully, Sharpy didn’t ask how he was feeling; he must have known that he wouldn’t get much of an answer out of Jon, anyway. 

Jon watched the game with increasing tension as time wound down and Pat still hadn’t scored, his body moving unconsciously on the couch as he deked along with Patrick. When the puck finally found the back of the net, after that beautiful hesitation move, Jonny whooped in joy, throwing his arms up before he even realized what he was doing. Not like he had any neighbors to bother, though, tucked away in isolation at his cabin. He pulled out his phone and sent Patrick a quick text, even though he knew Pat would be overwhelmed with congratulations over the next few days.

Jonny pulled up Twitter and watched the goal a few more times, scrolling through reactions from the Blackhawks, NBC sports, the NHL, other Chicago athletes, and pretty much everyone involved in hockey. 

As the accolades added up, a familiar heaviness settled into his chest, weighing down his excitement. Patrick was somehow getting better with age (“like a fine wine, baby,” Patrick had teased him, once), and while Jonny couldn’t be prouder of him, of what they’d accomplished together and what Patrick was continuing to accomplish on his own, he couldn’t help but compare himself to Patrick, and it wasn’t pretty.

Everyone knew that the organization was grooming Kirby to take over for him. If it hadn’t been for that freak injury at World Juniors, the kid would be out there centering the first line right now, in the spot that had belonged to Jonny since 2007. Jesus, Kirby was six when Jonny started his first game in the NHL. How was he supposed to compete with that? Sure he had the “respect of the room” and the experience, but Jonny himself had taken on the captaincy before he turned 21; there was no reason Kirby couldn’t do the same.

He tried not to check message boards too frequently, but sometimes even his willpower wasn’t enough, and he was already feeling sorry for himself, brief elation at Kaner’s goal subsumed into the ever-present anxiety he felt these days. He poured himself a few fingers of whiskey, knocking them back quickly and setting up a refill before he opened up a thread on Reddit talking about the salary cap and bad contracts.

It wasn’t as bad as what Seabrook got, but the general consensus, Jonny learned, was that he was way past his prime. There were a lot of posts that “wished him all the best” but pointed out how much cap relief the Hawks would get if Jonny never came back. “I’ll never forget what he did for Chicago, bringing hockey back with Kaner,” one poster wrote, “but Toews should recognize that his contract is a fucking albatross on the team.”

Albatross. Decline. Overpaid. Lost a step. Lost a lot of steps.

Jonny kept scrolling, barely reading the individual words anymore. Six months ago he may have laughed them off, would have turned to Pat to show him the most ridiculous comments. Now, though. He was pretty sure they were right, and he didn’t really know what to do with that.

The ringing of his phone, signaling an incoming FaceTime call, startled him out of his spiral. Oh fuck, that was Patrick. He hadn’t realized how much time he’d lost reading, nodding his head in bitter agreement as poster after poster pointed out all of his flaws. 

Showtime, he told himself. This was what he’d been preparing for. He hit accept, willing his smile into something bright and natural.

“Congratulations, babe!” he said, a little too loud to his own ears. Maybe the volume would make up for any lack of enthusiasm. “That goal was a beauty, Patrick,” he continued, more quietly and more sincerely. You can do this, he repeated in his head. Do this for Patrick. Be there for him.

Patrick just stared at him for a second, worn out from the game and all the post-game media, probably, but then he broke into a grin.

“Yea, you liked that, didn’t you?” He replied, letting himself be way cockier than he’d act to the press.

“You know I did, Peeks,” Jonny told him truthfully. “Was so stressed just watching, can’t imagine how you held it together out there.”

“Just imagined you were there yelling at me, telling me to keep my head in the game. I told you to fuck off a few times, just fyi.” Patrick was still smiling, now chugging a Gatorade and stripping out of his suit while they talked.

Jonny was distracted by the broad lines of Patrick’s shoulders, his strong chest and arms now visible as Pat settled down on his bed. Without thinking, he mumbled “better get used to imagining it, man.” He felt his face flush as the words came out. Ugh he sounded pathetic. Patrick deserved so much better than this, especially tonight.

“What do you mean, Jonny?” Patrick asked immediately, languor gone, tension snapping into his muscles as he sat up.

“Nothing, nothing,” Jonny hurried to add. “You can imagine what you want, but I’m imagining being there in your bed right now,” he tried, desperate to distract Patrick and get the evening back on track.

Patrick looked like he might push it, but Jonny took his momentary silence to strip off his shirt, as well. He saw Patrick’s eyes flick down to his chest and abs, and yea, at least he was still able to work out enough that Patrick still thought he looked good. 

Unless. Unless he was looking at Jonny and judging. Looking at Jonny and thinking of how much better he’d look if he were training full-time. How much better Jonny used to look, when they shared the rink and the locker room and the gym, not just each other’s phone screens. 

“Jonny..” Patrick’s voice sounded hesitant. Focus up, he told himself fiercely. 

“Just thinking about your goal, Pat. Gets me hot,” Jonny said suggestively, letting his voice drop lower, one hand drifting down to his chest, fingers sweeping over a nipple like Patrick liked to do.

It wasn’t the best phone sex Jonny had been a part of, though Patrick seemed to enjoy it well enough, based on how hard he came, and how quickly he hung up afterwards, telling Jonny he was about to pass out. Jonny had to work way more than usual at just getting himself hard, getting himself off, but he got there eventually, a minute or two after Patrick.

He usually slept pretty well after an orgasm, and he’d actually been jerking off more often lately just to get himself to sleep. Tonight, though, every time he closed his eyes those comment threads started running through his head. He laid in bed for close to an hour, trying to force himself to sleep before giving up, throwing off the covers and wandering into the living room.

He opened his laptop, even though he knew that if he couldn’t sleep, he shouldn’t be messing around on his computer, either. Nothing good would come of it, not at this hour. 

Instead of message boards, he opened YouTube, pulling up old highlights of himself. He watched his hands, his edges. He watched himself lift the cup three times, remembering the roar of the home crowd that third time, how he felt on top of the world.

His eyes were burning, suddenly. He rubbed at them, clenching his jaw and fighting back tears. He was so tired. Tired of the uncertainty. Tired of the tests. Tired of the well-meaning questions. Tired of being left behind as Patrick continued to exceed all expectations. He didn’t cry, not quite, but it was a close thing. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, breath coming in gulps as he fought for control of his body.

He spent the rest of the night like that, sleep never quite finding him, but not really awake, either. 

The doorbell rang at 7:00, making him jump. Only a few people even knew where he was, and none of them should be showing up this early on a random Monday morning. He stumbled to the door, the old afghan from his couch wrapped around his shoulders. He was probably a mess, but he couldn’t really find it in himself to care.

He opened the door slowly, not sure who to expect, and then he saw the flash of Patrick’s curls. Patrick shouldered in, not even waiting for Jonny to finish opening the door.

“Patrick, what-” he started, but Patrick cut him off right away.

“Jesus, Jonny, you look terrible,” he said, reaching one arm out as he spoke, pulling Jonny in towards him. Jonny tripped, feet heavy with exhaustion, but Pat supported him like it was nothing. “You’re still a terrible actor, man. You were messed up last night, don’t even try to lie.”

Jonny didn’t know what to say to that, brain moving too slowly. Patrick was here. The Hawks had a three day break, their last one of the shortened season, and instead of getting some rest, or maybe seeing his family, Patrick was here. He wasn’t even sure how Patrick had managed to get here this early in the morning.

“How,” he tried again, but Patrick just tugged him in tighter.

“Shhh, Jonny,” he said, stroking one hand over Jonny’s neck. “You look like you’re about to fall asleep on your feet. Let’s just get you to bed.” Patrick started walking Jonny back towards the bedroom, steering with the weight of his hand on Jonny’s neck. 

They stripped quietly, not bothering with pajamas. Patrick settled them on their sides, facing each other, foreheads almost touching. Jonny finally felt his body relax, muscles sinking into the bed. Here in this space, sharing breath with Patrick, he let the tears come.

[mridhashawon]

How Ravichandran Ashwin picked his 400th Test wicket wasn't how you'd have imagined it. Let's say it didn't quite have his trademark. He was round the wicket to a right-handed batsman, darting the ball full at 95 km/h to try and hit the front pad. That's surely not the lasting image of Ashwin's bowling. It would much rather be of him bowling from over the wicket, much slower than he did in Ahmedabad as men at slip, leg slip and forward short leg wait for the inevitable edge.

So, when Jofra Archer reviewed the lbw decision and Ashwin had to wait to raise the ball to the crowd, nothing felt lost in the shuffle. Even the 40,000-strong crowd, which in India is normally switched on for every little milestone, needed the big screen to remind them this time. You couldn't blame them though. It was just a bizarre day of cricket.

England were 68/7 when Ashwin picked that wicket. By that time, Axar Patel at the other end had raced to four wickets inside 12 overs and Joe Root's 5/8, his maiden five-wicket haul in first-class cricket, had already packed up India for 145. Fourteen wickets had fallen in some three hours of play until then. Three more wickets would fall, a total of 17 in little over two sessions in the day, and the match would be done inside two days.

It was thrill-a-minute cricket on an "interesting pitch" as Root would call it later, but it was hardly a pitch evocative of Ashwin's credentials as an off-spinner. And nothing summed it up like his twin dismissals of Ollie Pope in the Test match.

In the first innings, Ashwin deceived Pope with drift from round the wicket. It's not his usual line of attack but this was also not the usual pitch he bowls on at home; this spun so big that Ashwin had to change his angle, like Nathan Lyon very successfully did against India's batsmen in Delhi in 2013. Varying his angles and having the "courage" and "awareness" to do it now, is also something that Ashwin spoke about after his all-round match-winning performance in Chennai last week.

No wonder he took all of five deliveries to switch to round the wicket in the second innings. But this time, he beat Pope from over the wicket. It was that customary drift again. Pope missed the line, played back to this full ball to make things worse, and lost his off-stump once again.

These weren't the kind of dismissals that needed the pitch they were playing on. You could argue about the efficacy of arm-balls from Axar if the balls leading up to them didn't turn big, but Ashwin deceived Pope in the air in both the innings. The drift got him playing the wrong line, the dip got him playing the wrong length. With a similar approach, Pope would be out to Ashwin on most pitches around the world.

That's perhaps the greatest change in narrative around Ashwin's storied career so far. Only as recently as January 2019, he had lost the tag of India's "frontline number one overseas spinner" to Kuldeep Yadav in Australia. A groin injury had limited Ashwin's Test appearances to only the first Test in Adelaide on that tour, something that was a stinging throwback to the tour of England only a few months ago. Half-fit in Southampton, Ashwin was out-bowled by Moeen Ali in the second innings as England went on to take an unassailable 3-1 lead in the series. In that moment, his seven wickets in the first Test in Birmingham, which included the twin "bowled" dismissals of Alastair Cook, felt like a long time ago.

In contrast, Ashwin played three of the four Tests during his latest tour Down Under, notably his fourth visit to the shores and his best by a distance. While there's still some time to go, he would be eager to make the World Test Championship finals and set his record right in England too. There are six Tests if all goes to plan.

"During the lockdown, I worked a lot on my fitness. On wanting to get my body ready for the so-called 'next couple of years' or the next 3-4 years," Ashwin told the host broadcaster after India's win in Ahmedabad. "Because you know this body is ageing by the moment, as we're talking... so all those things started to pay rewards. I lost about 7-8 kilos through the lockdown. I just think from Australia onwards things have looked upwards for me."

Is he bowling at his best? "This question has been asked quite a few times in my career. In 2015-16, people were asking me the same thing when I went through that lovely phase... And now people are asking the same. One thing's for sure, I've always looked to improve and every time I've thought I've bowled well, I've always found another gear. So I'll not be surprised if I surpass myself in the future as well."

Going by how he's bowling, there are surely many more milestones to come. And for the one he just passed, he would be glad that it came at the world's largest capacity cricket stadium, and more importantly on a pitch like this. That he's managed to pull away from its shadow speaks of his great strength as a cricketer. Learn more

[silverleafnightshade-blog]

The Eyes of Laura Mars

Released in 1978, The Eyes of Laura Mars is set in the glimmering yet gritty world of NYC haute couture fashion. Mad Magazine parodied the film as “The Eyes of Lurid Mess” and rightly so, for it definitely has plot issues and some grade-A-Virginia-ham overacting. However, director Irvin Kershner managed to capture a whiff of the cultural crossover as the NYC scene shifted from disco to punk. Often touted as the first American giallo film, The Eyes of Laura Mars tidily ticks off the boxes of the Italian genre: a mix of gorgeous and grimy settings, the gruesome murder of beautiful people, and many misdirections before the killer is finally revealed. Added to the mix is Ms. Virginia Ham herself (Faye Dunaway), a hairy Brad Dourif, and a preternaturally prehistoric Tommy Lee Jones. Dourif is only four years younger than TLJ in real life, but he looks like a bearded baby next to TLJ’s tire-treaded brow. Hell, TLJ is six years younger than Dunaway, but there’s not even a scratch of the cougar in their relationship.

Faye Dunaway of course plays the main character, a superstar high fashion photographer who begins to have disturbing visions of murder. Fun fact: the actual images of famous fashion photogs Rebecca Blake and the so-called “King of Kink” Helmut Newton were used in the film.

Speaking of kink, Barbra Streisand was offered the main role (it helped that she was dating producer Jon Peters at the time) but turned it down because she thought the film’s violent, sexual content was too out-there for her image.

The film opens with a murderous sequence, which turns out to be one of Laura’s nightmares. She awakens in her rather spare and severe bedroom,

and then wanders out to her living room, aka The Neutral Zone. Beige and brown rule the day, as does that giant rooster sculpture. From kitchen kitsch to highbrow decor? Huh. And oof, so. Much. Carpeting!

Laura flips through some negatives and tries to put the nightmare behind her. Soon, driver Tommy (Brad Dourif) is ferrying Laura off to the gala reception for a new publication of her photos. It looks like maybe the exterior was shot at one of the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s side doors. The interior looks somewhat Studio 54-inspired, though.

Hiiiiiiyyyyyeeee! I’m just a photograph, don’tcha worry.

Laura meets cute-ish with Detective John Neville (TLJ), as cute as can be when one’s publisher has been horribly murdered with an ice pick. Neville came for the questioning, but he stayed for the hors d’oeuvres, or rather, he looks a bit hungry for a Mars Bar. Laura goes home and rings up her bestie, who happens to be dating Laura’s ex-husband Michael (a very slimy yet somehow sexy Raul Julia). Everyone calms each other down, and soon enough, Laura heads off for a shoot at Columbus Circle. The concept is a bit S&M, models in lingerie and furs fighting in front of the husks of burning cars...

The concept was inspired by photog Chris von Wangenheim, and so fitting in front of what my father once called “The Devil’s Arsehole” (don’t feel special, C.C., he said that about every Washington D.C. roundabout too). The intersection didn’t get the moniker until 1892, the 400th anniversary of Columbus’s “discovery” of the New World, when a giant statue of the old man was erected. From the invention of the car on, Columbus Circle was considered a hazardous spot for pedestrians. Given the circle’s bad rap for most of the 20th century, it seems quaint to remember that Olmsted intentionally designed the traffic circle as the grand entrance to Central Park in 1857. By 1978, Columbus Circle was “roundly” (oh ho ho) derided as a dangerous thoroughfare. In 1979, architecture critic Paul Goldberger said that the intersection was "a chaotic jumble of streets that can be crossed in about 50 different ways—all of them wrong." A redesign of the circle��s aesthetics and traffic flow began in 1991, and by the Naughty-Aughties, Columbus Circle had even won a few awards for landscape architecture and urban design.

Neville shows up again at Laura’s set at Chelsea Piers. This is my favorite set in the movie, with the fabulous Sterling St. Jacques dancing around and a lot of blown-out color and drama going on.

It’s also one of our last scenes with poor Lulu and Michelle, alas. I actually quite like both of their characters, so silly and yet so sassy. They have the best outgoing answering machine message, and it made me feel so nostalgic for both answering machines, answering machine messages, and that kind of close relationship you’d have with a roommate. That is the kind of relationship that can only be built after hearing all your messages, and knowing all your secrets, unvarnished and unedited by a brunch re-telling. Sigh.

Laura’s studio is amazing - it’s enormous with tons of old windows, stunning harbor views, and some convenient soft spots that are perfect for sexy times with Neville.

Donald (René motherfucking Murat Auberjonois) is such a great character. He’s Laura’s long-suffering agent, and although at times walking the stereotypical line, he is quite comfortably un-closeted. Whenever someone tries to throw homophobic shade his way, he shines a light right up their asses. I do not love the character’s decor choices, though - a bit too Italianate for me, although who can resist a red damask wallpaper and this goddamn face? Not me, friends.

Speaking of Italian classics, Frank Adonis makes an appearance as Sal, Neville’s slightly unhinged partner. I like this shot of him surveying Laura’s apartment with a “mmm, not bad,” expression.

Frank just shuffled off this mortal coil in late 2018, R.I.P. Weird fact: although he’s the Italian guy you recognize from everything, his Wiki page is in French.

SPOILERS, sort of: Neville goes to see Tommy at his spectacularly depressing apartment, and the visit quickly takes a turn for the worse. Tommy stabs a patrolman while escaping arrest, but the Sal the psycho just opens fire on what appears to be the entire East Village, and Tommy est la morte. Neville rings up Laura to tell her the killer has been caught, and pack your bag, baybeee, they are going away! Laura begins to select some careful neutrals to coordinate with the lady Derringer gifted by Neville, when she is suddenly struck by another vision.

Poor Michael gets ‘picked in the elevator of Laura’s building, and the killer is en route to her apartment! Laura manages to lock the front door just in time. Neville soon comes crashing through the balcony window, and this is where the ending gets super giallo: as he begins babbling about Tommy’s terrible upbringing, Neville accidentally reveals that it is he, Neville, who is the killer. But it’s not really Neville! No, it’s his other personality that did the killing. That personality is also apparently responsible for how nicely Neville fills out a black turtleneck, as well as for finishing Neville’s dissertation and keeping the bills paid. The real Neville struggles back to the surface; to protect his true love, he basically shoots himself using Laura’s gun (and trigger finger, as she is holding said gun at the time). The final shot is of Laura calling the cops, and her final line? “I’m Laura Mars.” If there is any shred of happy ending to this story, it might be that she has to rip out that fucking bloodstained carpet. Maybe there’s a nice parquet floor under there? I know that hating on carpeting is low-pile fruit, but there is just no way for mere mortals to keep wall-to-wall carpeting from getting disgusting.

Interesting fact: John Carpenter wrote the spec script for this film, but Kershner’s finished product took some hot turns in the rewrite. Carpenter was still credited despite his protests, but luckily the mixed reviews didn’t affect the success of his next project, Halloween. It’s been nice to revisit some giallo, although I think I’m going to go back to the real-deal Italian giallo next month. I might also be leaving this platform, as sad as that makes me. Tumblr has been doing some bullshit flagging of posts that are very LGBTQ-unfriendly, and well, they are also buggy as hell. I had this post written a week ago but the site kept crashing as I was trying to update. At any rate, stay tuned for any updates, or as I likely know all three of you reading this, I’ll let you know if there’s a new site.

[buttonholedlife]

Techno is actually technocracy

This year noted the 400th wedding anniversary of the transatlantic servant field as well as the arrival of 20-30 West Africans to the United States materials. In August, The Nyc Times Publication, led through staff media reporter as well as investigatory journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones, posted the very first version of The 1619 Job, an assortment of essays, poems, myth as well as digital photography that re-examines and also starts the slow process of revising American background with correctives on instances of structurally- and also socially-ordained civil and financial fascism of black people. This change in ethnicity talk definitely blew over right into the global digital songs scene, as direct and also understandable pointers of the extraction and also erasure of black lifestyle with callouts and also social networks retaliation.

The music market has actually regularly done not have subtlety in regard to social level of sensitivity and also acknowledgement. In 2019 the demand for a collective understanding of the relevance of portrayal and liability showed up to be actually extra openly necessary. As the massive historic problem of United States's perplexed past times is actually put into situation through, typically, black scholastics as well as thinkers via a social company, the definition and worth of United States culture as well as assets were also brought into question.

The phrase "techno" was coined by futurist and also business owner Alvin Toffler in his 1980 manual The 3rd Surge, which explains "cultivated" countries, like The United States, as well as their financial transitions from commercial development to data-driven effort. Techno, as black songs and technique, is coded along with industrial economic terms and engagement with market circulation. Its own importance on beat patternization gives itself to become interlaced with various other keep tracks of-- a great allegory for United States amazing futurism, in addition to operating as a literal social line, certainly not too unlike the dark folk-tradition of narration.

Toffler's use techno was actually directly in recommendation to technocracy, or even a governing system led by a best class of technical pros who create platforms of production for a lesson of mainly skill-less customers. Toffler cautioned technocracy possessed the potential to destabilize training class mobility and also social communities via a "technocratic divide" which prefers the "updated" opinions of specialized professionals over a marginalized, and most likely undependable, general public. When factoring in the uniqueness of African-Americans' 400-year-long past history of injustice using a solely white colored International colonial regulating physical body, the understanding of technocracy appears a great deal more ominous.

Juan Atkins, that emerged the techno noise in the team Cybotron, initial come across Toffler's creating in a high institution course called Future Studies. In the midst of Detroit's failing auto market and the upshot of the race troubles of the 1970s, Cybotron's songs mirrored the commercial boom and also decline of the urban area which was actually suggested to be actually an example of an American capitalist dreamland. Detroit's failure into dystopia caused white colored people to take off to the hinterlands, taking jobs and information with all of them. The futurist excellents of Toffler's works, along with his thought of the "techno rebel" who would certainly not really feel limited or determined by modern technology, influenced Cybotron's songs as they used readily available modern technology to promote impressive outcomes. In 1981, Juan Atkins created Cybotron's 'Cosmic Automobiles' with the intention of it being actually a "unique and also adventurous item of synthesizer rut, much more harmonic with Germany than the remainder of Afro-american America." That exact same year in 1981, Paul Lesley as well as Sterling Jones' An Amount of Names discharged 'Sharevari' which is often considered an early example of techno.

Each Cybotron as well as An Amount of Labels's popular music had their keep tracks of broadcast on WGPR, 107.5 FM's Electrifying Mojo, a broadcast show along with a predominantly dark viewers and contemporary playlists including songs through Royal prince, the B-52s as well as Kraftwerk that determined considerably of the Detroit noise. A year later on, while on a check out to New york city, Atkins heard Afrika Bambaataa's 'World Rock' and also viewed it as a much better example of his sonic eyesight. In 1988, Derrick May, a recognized trendsetter of techno as well as ex-Northern Heart DJ and Kool Kat Records supervisor, Neil Rushton, assembled an album of early Detroit tracks phoned Techno! The New Dance Noise of Detroit for Virgin Records UK imprint 10 Records, which would certainly place the condition "techno" right into flow one of music-buyers as well as journalists.

In July of this particular year, Mixmag operated a cover tale titled, "Exactly how Richie Hawtin transformed electronic songs time and again and also once more". The British striking magazine, which discharged its debut problem in 1983 with American dark disco team Shalamar on the cover, allegedly formalized techno for international consumption, according to a 2015 retrospective in The Independent; techno as well as acid house were certainly not imported right into the UK until 1988, a year after Phuture's 'Acid Rails' was released. Much of digital songs record favors the job of Hawtin as the absolute most important Detroit DJ and also manufacturer as well as decades after the "innovation" of techno in Detroit, Mixmag staged Richie Hawtin as the criterion wherefore an electronic music symbol could possibly seem like.

The account, composed by long time popular music reporter and also previous SIMPLE FACT contributor Joe Muggs, defines Canada-native Hawtin's technological know-how and also exactly how he "hoped for launching on Derrick Might's Transmat or Juan Atkins's Metroplex but [was actually] not able to acquire the interest of [his] idols" and as an alternative started his personal label, Plus 8, in 1990.

Five years after the label's inception, James Stinson of Drexciya asked a necessary as well as an unanswered inquiry while being actually spoken with through Tune Creator: "Why perform Richie as well as his Plus 8 loved ones boil down listed here and throw events in downtown Detroit? ... [He] brings in all these youngsters from the residential areas and also coming from Canada which reveals a disrespect. I've been actually to every one of those events and also I've certainly never heard a Below ground Resistance report, a Cybotron document, a Style five hundred report or even an Eddie Fowlkes file. It is actually a complete disrespect and it's come to restrain."

Fast-forward to October 2019. Cold DJ/producer Nina Kraviz articles a photo of herself on Twitter putting on cornrows, motivating notable review. When faced, Kraviz answered: "Facts examining [sic] For those who didn't recognize. I am certainly not white european [sic] Braids is actually [sic] a part of many societies. Heres [sic] is a point of view coming from a record educator." The "viewpoint" was delivered using a screengrab coming from Quora, a user-edited question-and-answer internet site. Pigtails as well as cornrows are actually known conventional African hairstyles that ended up being operational during the course of the transatlantic slave labor and also were actually inevitably used as a mode of secret communication between servants with styles that could possibly replicate charts to cost-free places in United States. Kraviz is actually not the 1st to receive retaliation for appropriating hair-braiding-- one Kardashian or yet another has been actually trumpeted for introducing unique knotted styles throughout the many years-- nor is she the very first to refuse recommendation of the hurt in the callouts that observe, opting to acknowledge the retaliation an instance of reverse-racism. [Ed. keep in mind: There is no such trait as reverse-racism.]

Pair of months eventually Mixmag recognized Kraviz by placing her in the no. 6 place on its Top 10 DJs of the Year checklist. Her admittance, which has because been modified, checked out: "She withstands. The Ice-cold DJ may have caused a slight tweetstorm with her ill-judged response to criticism of her hairdo, however she remains the singular greatest festivity employ the planet and really impressive, psychological and also reminiscent DJ of single vision as well as success. Still Techno's brightest celebrity."

A sincere correction of techno's record would certainly comply with a path of themes like white colored extractive industrialism, white colored trip as well as re-urbanization as well as the economics of cultural fraud. Technocracy depends on the withholding and holding on to of details and also information to promote criteria established through a managing a typically unethical elite training class. A thing or a take in is given market value by certain specifications within a technocracy and also by decentralizing present narratives as well as allowing for creators to tell their personal stories, there is actually option for an extra also as well as reliable cultural swap across the unlucky scenario of an economic market developed through intense as well as willfully ignorant white International colonial ideology. Proceeding in to 2020, a few noticeable vocals of a brand new generation of Black Techno allotment their encounters and also wish for a decolonized dancing popular music society.

Frankie Decaiza Hutchinson It's regularly thought that a task of mine to become capable to drive [the dark] history [of techno] and push black artists. I had actually been actually considering doing an occasion such as this for a number of years but it is actually hard to just do this occasion without any kind of area backing or even structural backing. Having actually dealt with thus a lot of dark musicians considering that moving to Brooklyn and today as booker at Bossa Nova Civic Nightclub, it simply thought that a piece of cake. Occupant was actually also such an easy occasion to manage yet we certainly need much more black people in making a reservation for placements at nightclubs. There's a frustrating large number of white bookers everywhere in NYC which most definitely has an effect on opportunities for black artists. I presume there is actually been actually a standard favorable shift in areas seeking to manual much more diversely. There actually is actually no reason.

Akua This was an essential year for the Dark Techno community. Within my prompt cycle in Brooklyn, I have actually found my peers as well as I bloom by means of our unapologetic strategy to restoring and revitalizing the often-ignored dark story of the category. Our interaction along with techno has actually straight directed the underground, political attitude in its own rawest form to permeate the uniform scene as well as take apart white colored patriarchal framework that has outlined the category for technique too long. As a black female in a setting where I am strongly apparent, however unnoticeable at the exact same opportunity, it is actually been very motivating to see that the contributions my peers and I have made to bolster modification on a residential and also international scale.Being capable to travel worldwide this year has actually helped me enhance as well as reevaluate the objectives responsible for my engagement along with techno. While I have actually possessed the opportunity to dip into places that are actually observed as crucial techno sites like Berghain's Saüle in Berlin, I've concerned understand my duty as certainly not simply a rabble-rouser of improvement, but additionally one of a physician and teacher. To become capable to participate in the music of black musicians I value a lot, like vets Robert Armani and Mike Dearborn, in the site's context, it really felt extra strong, given the complex past history between Berlin and also the US as it refers to techno. Knowledge like these have actually provided me the possibility to take additional attention to the black, POC and queer elderlies and also ascendants who risked the structure for me to perform what I am actually carrying out at the moment. To me, there is actually something exclusive regarding digging with the repositories to retell the stories of my elderlies in order to cure the severed origins of the style as well as to provoke people to decolonize their thoughts when it relates to their assumption of techno.

"Representation matters, our phrases concern, our songs concern, and our lives matter. Individuals need to have to know that whether they like it or even certainly not."-- Ash Lauryn

MoMA Ready Some of points that have been inspiring me the most are the unwearied DJs of Brooklyn's current nightlife areas, particularly the POC as well as QTPOC communities. Our team've all been interacting to produce rooms for ourselves in global dancing popular music. My reason for releasing a lot popular music this year is actually a bit even more private. It stems even more coming from my wish to preserve freedom over my fine art and also the narratives neighboring my art. Each release is actually various as well as is released for a various objectives, despite the outcome. Getting the popular music to the folks without a stream is something that encourages me. More of my colleagues is actually launching music to become included to the canon of dark techno and also dancing music. I believe that we all would like to observe more positive improvements for POC in dancing popular music globally. What much better to carry out that than by making the popular music that begins brand-new discussions? Techno origins can not be actually refuted. There is actually a new creation of black DJs as well as producers that right now know those roots as well as prefer to add to the legacy of dark dance popular music in North America.

Ash Lauryn Although residence and also techno songs has found somewhat of a comeback of black and brown young people since late, there is actually still an awesome quantity of work to be actually done. I am grateful to become an aspect of the act at an opportunity where many are actually carried out being actually soundless on troubles that matter to our company. There are actually a great deal of excellent individuals carrying out terrific points done in hopes of protecting the abundant black roots of dance songs, and also I consider on my own to become among all of them. By means of my system Underground & & Afro-american, my goal is to lift and also motivate the future productions of dark dancing popular music, and I can most submissively say I am doing only that. Portrayal concerns, our phrases matter, our songs issue, as well as our lifestyles issue. Folks require to know that whether they like it or otherwise.

DeForrest Brown, Jr. is actually a New York-based philosopher, writer and curator. He produces electronic audio and also extended media as Sound speaker Songs and also is actually a representative of the Make Techno Black Again initiative. His recent creating can be actually found in Afropunk, Artforum and also Hyperallergic.

Locate every one of FACT's year-end protection below.

This content was originally published here.

[theteenagetrickster]

Techno is technocracy

This year noted the 400th wedding anniversary of the transatlantic slave labor and the arrival of 20-30 West Africans to the United States contents. In August, The New York City Times Magazine, led by personnel press reporter and investigative journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones, released the very first edition of The 1619 Project, a collection of essays, rhymes, fiction and also photography that re-examines and also starts the sluggish procedure of changing United States background with correctives on occasions of structurally- and also socially-ordained public and also financial oppression of dark individuals. This change in race conversation certainly overflowed into the worldwide electronic popular music scene, as direct as well as understandable reminders of the extraction as well as erasure of dark culture through callouts and social networks retaliation.

The popular music market has always done not have nuance in respect to cultural sensitivity and recognition. In 2019 the need for a collective understanding of the importance of portrayal as well as liability seemed extra publicly vital. As the massive historic concern of The United States's tormented past is put in to situation through, primarily, black scholars and thinkers via a public organization, the significance and also worth of American culture and assets were also disputed.

The phrase "techno" was created by futurist and also business person Alvin Toffler in his 1980 book The 3rd Surge, which illustrates "created" countries, like The United States, and also their economic shifts coming from commercial creation to data-driven labor. Techno, as dark music and method, is coded along with industrial economic conditions and also involvement with market circulation. Its focus on beat patternization lends itself to become interlocked with various other monitors-- an excellent metaphor for American wonderful futurism, along with running as a literal social line, certainly not as well unlike the dark folk-tradition of storytelling.

Toffler's usage of techno was directly in endorsement to technocracy, or even a regulating system led by an elite lesson of technical professionals that create systems of development for a class of mostly skill-less consumers. Toffler notified technocracy had the potential to destabilize training class wheelchair and social areas via a "technocratic divide" which prefers the "notified" opinions of technological experts over a marginalized, and presumably questionable, community. When considering the specificity of African-Americans' 400-year-long history of injustice by methods of an only white European colonial controling physical body, the understanding of technocracy appears a whole lot even more scary.

Juan Atkins, that emerged the techno noise in the group Cybotron, 1st faced Toffler's creating in a secondary school course referred to as Future Studies. In the midst of Detroit's neglecting automotive field as well as the consequences of the ethnicity troubles of the 1970s, Cybotron's popular music reflected the industrial boom and decline of the metropolitan area which was meant to be actually an example of an American capitalist utopia. Detroit's failure in to dystopia motivated white colored people to take off to the residential areas, taking tasks as well as resources with them. The futurist bests of Toffler's works, along with his idea of the "techno revolutionist" who would certainly not really feel restricted or even defined by modern technology, encouraged Cybotron's popular music as they utilized readily available innovation to promote cutting-edge end results. In 1981, Juan Atkins created Cybotron's 'Planetary Cars' with the intent of it being actually a "unique as well as bold item of synthesizer rut, extra harmonic with Germany than the remainder of Black America." That exact same year in 1981, Paul Lesley as well as Sterling Jones' A Variety of Titles released 'Sharevari' which is often taken into consideration an early instance of techno.

Both Cybotron and A Lot of Brands's songs had their tracks transmitted on WGPR, 107.5 FM's Electrifying Mojo, a radio series along with a mainly black viewers as well as eclectic playlists consisting of music through Royal prince, the B-52s as well as Kraftwerk that influenced a lot of the Detroit sound. A year eventually, while on a see to The big apple, Atkins heard Afrika Bambaataa's 'World Rock' and viewed it as a better instance of his sonic sight. In 1988, Derrick May, a recognized pioneer of techno as well as ex-Northern Soul DJ and Kool Kat Records boss, Neil Rushton, assembled a cd of very early Detroit keep tracks of contacted Techno! The New Dancing Noise of Detroit for Virgin Records UK imprint 10 Records, which would certainly put the condition "techno" in to flow among music-buyers as well as journalists.

In July of this year, Mixmag operated a cover story entitled, "Exactly how Richie Hawtin improved digital popular music regularly and also once more". The British striking publication, which released its own debut issue in 1983 along with United States black disco group Shalamar on the cover, apparently formalized techno for worldwide consumption, according to a 2015 retrospective in The Independent; techno and acid house were actually certainly not imported in to the UK till 1988, a year after Phuture's 'Acid Rails' was actually launched. Much of digital popular music past prefers the job of Hawtin as one of the most significant Detroit DJ and developer as well as many years after the "invention" of techno in Detroit, Mixmag organized Richie Hawtin as the criterion wherefore a digital music icon can appear like.

The account, written by long time music writer as well as previous SIMPLE FACT factor Joe Muggs, illustrates Canada-native Hawtin's specialized proficiency as well as how he "longed for releasing on Derrick May's Transmat or Juan Atkins's Metroplex but [was actually] unable to receive the interest of [his] idolizers" and instead established his personal label, Plus 8, in 1990.

Five years after the label's creation, James Stinson of Drexciya talked to a critical and an unanswered question while being talked to through Tune Creator: "Why do Richie and his Additionally 8 household come down below as well as toss celebrations in midtown Detroit? ... [He] introduces all these youngsters from the suburbs and also from Canada and that shows a shortage of appreciation. I have actually been actually to everyone of those celebrations and I've never heard an Underground Resistance record, a Cybotron report, a Design 500 file or even an Eddie Fowlkes document. It's an overall disrespect and it's reached hinder."

Fast-forward to Oct 2019. Cold DJ/producer Nina Kraviz blog posts an image of herself on Twitter using cornrows, urging notable review. When confronted, Kraviz answered: "Realities examining [sic] For those who didn't recognize. I am actually not white european [sic] Braids is actually [sic] a part of several cultures. Heres [sic] is actually a viewpoint from a past history teacher." The "point of view" was provided through a screengrab coming from Quora, a user-edited question-and-answer site. Pigtails as well as cornrows are actually known typical African hairdos that became useful during the course of the transatlantic slave labor and were actually at some point utilized as a setting of top secret interaction in between slaves via styles that could duplicate maps to free of cost places in America. Kraviz is actually certainly not the 1st to acquire backlash for lifting hair-braiding-- one Kardashian or an additional has been actually proclaimed for lead-in different knotted types throughout the years-- neither is she the first to reject verification of the pain in the callouts that comply with, opting to acknowledge the retaliation an instance of reverse-racism. [Ed. note: There is actually no such thing as reverse-racism.]

Pair of months later on Mixmag honored Kraviz by placing her in the no. 6 area on its Best 10 DJs of the Year list. Her admittance, which has actually given that been actually amended, reviewed: "She sustains. The Shivery DJ might have caused a minor tweetstorm with her ill-judged reaction to objection of her hairstyle, but she stays the singular largest celebration draw on the planet and really innovative, psychological and also evocative DJ of single sight and success. Still Techno's brightest superstar."

A straightforward modification of techno's past history would comply with a trail of concepts like white colored extractive commercialism, white tour and re-urbanization as well as the economics of social fraud. Technocracy counts on the withholding and holding on to of info and sources to support criteria specified by a managing a frequently unethical best course. A thing or an encounter is offered value through specific requirements within a technocracy as well as by decentralizing current stories and allowing producers to inform their own tales, there is chance for an extra also and also ethical social substitution around the unfortunate situation of an economical market established by intense as well as willfully oblivious white International colonial belief. Continuing into 2020, a handful of prominent vocals of a brand new generation of Black Techno reveal their experiences and also chances for a decolonized dancing music society.

Frankie Decaiza Hutchinson It is actually constantly thought that a duty of mine to become able to press [the dark] background [of techno] and push black musicians. I had actually been thinking of doing an occasion such as this for a number of years yet it's difficult to just do this event without any type of community backing or structural backing. Having dealt with many dark musicians given that moving to Brooklyn and right now as booker at Bossa Nova Civic Nightclub, it merely believed that a no-brainer. Occupant was also such a very easy occasion to coordinate but our team most definitely need even more black individuals in booking postures at clubs. There is actually an overwhelming large number of white bookers everywhere in NYC which definitely impacts opportunities for black musicians. Nevertheless, I presume there is actually been actually a basic favorable shift in areas seeking to manual much more otherwise. There actually is no reason.

Akua This was actually a pivotal year for the Dark Techno area. Within my quick circle in Brooklyn, I've found my peers and also I blossom with our unapologetic method to redeeming as well as rejuvenating the often-ignored dark story of the style. Our interaction along with techno has straight directed the underground, political values in its own rawest form to permeate the homogenous scene and also take apart white colored patriarchal frame that has actually outlined the style for technique very long. As a dark woman in a scene where I am strongly obvious, yet undetectable at the same opportunity, it's been actually extremely inspiring to see that the additions my peers as well as I have actually created to continue modification on a domestic as well as international scale.Being able to explore worldwide this year has actually helped me boost as well as revise the purposes behind my engagement along with techno at the same time. While I have actually possessed the possibility to dip into places that are actually considered essential techno sites like Berghain's Saüle in Berlin, I have actually involved discover my task as not simply a rabble-rouser of adjustment, yet also one of a mender and also instructor. To become capable to participate in the music of black artists I respect a lot, like veterinarians Robert Armani and also Mike Dearborn, in the location's situation, it felt a lot more strong, given the challenging history between Berlin and the US as it pertains to techno. Knowledge like these have given me the chance to carry additional focus to the dark, POC and also queer senior citizens and forefathers that laid the structure for me to perform what I'm doing today. To me, there is actually something exclusive about digging via the archives to retell the accounts of my seniors in purchase to heal the cut origins of the genre and also to prompt folks to decolonize their minds when it concerns their viewpoint of techno.

"Portrayal issues, our terms issue, our songs issue, and also our lives issue. Individuals need to know that whether they like it or otherwise."-- Ash Lauryn

MoMA Ready Some of factors that have actually been actually uplifting me the very most are the hard-working DJs of Brooklyn's existing nightlife communities, especially the POC and QTPOC areas. Our team've all of been actually operating all together to develop spaces for ourselves in international dancing songs. My explanation for launching thus a lot songs this year is a bit even more individual. It stems a lot more from my wish to sustain freedom over my fine art and also the narratives bordering my craft. Each release is various and is actually discharged for a various purposes, even with the output. Receiving the popular music to people without a stream is actually something that inspires me, also. More of my colleagues is discharging music to be actually contributed to the library of black techno as well as dancing songs. I believe that everyone intend to find even more favorable modifications for POC in dancing popular music internationally. What much better to perform that than by creating the popular music that begins brand new chats? Techno roots can not be actually refuted. There is actually a brand-new generation of black DJs as well as producers that currently understand those roots and also desire to result in the legacy of black dance popular music in The United States.

Ash Lauryn Residence as well as techno popular music has actually observed somewhat of a renewal of dark and also brownish young people as of late, there is still an amazing volume of job to be carried out. I am actually happy to be actually an aspect of the act at a time where several are actually carried out being actually soundless on issues that matter to our company. There are a great deal of wonderful individuals doing excellent points all in hopes of protecting the rich black roots of dance music, and also I consider on my own to become some of all of them. Via my system Underground & & Afro-american, my goal is actually to boost and also inspire the future generations of dark dance popular music, and I can easily very most submissively state I am actually performing just that. Portrayal matters, our words matter, our popular music concern, and also our lifestyles issue. Individuals need to have to recognize that whether they like it or certainly not.

DeForrest Brown, Jr. is actually a New York-based thinker, reporter and also curator. He makes digital audio and extended media as Audio speaker Popular music and is an agent of the Make Techno Black Again project. His recent creating could be discovered in Afropunk, Artforum and Hyperallergic.

Find all of REALITY's year-end protection listed here.

This content was originally published here.

[yasbxxgie]

The two most ruthless domestic slave traders in America had a secret language for their business.

Slave trading was a “game.” The men, Isaac Franklin and John Armfield, were daring “pirates” or “one-eyed men,” a euphemism for their penises. The women they bought and sold were “fancy maids,” a term signifying youth, beauty and potential for sexual exploitation — by buyers or the traders themselves.

Rapes happened often.

“To my certain knowledge she has been used & that smartly by a one eyed man about my size and age, excuse my foolishness,” Isaac Franklin’s nephew James — an employee and his uncle’s protege — wrote in typical business correspondence, referring to Caroline Brown, an enslaved woman who suffered repeated rape and abuse at James’s hands for five months. She was 18 at the time and just over five feet tall.

Franklin and Armfield, who headquartered their slave trading business in a townhouse that still stands in Alexandria, Va., sold more enslaved people, separated more families and made more money from the trade than almost anyone else in America. Between the 1820s and 1830s, the two men reigned as the “undisputed tycoons” of the domestic slave trade, as Smithsonian Magazine put it.

As the country marks the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the first enslaved Africans in Jamestown, Americans are being forced to confront the brutality of slavery and of the people who profited from it. Few profited more than the two Virginia slave traders.

Their success was immense: The duo amassed a fortune worth several billions in today’s dollars and retired as two of the nation’s wealthiest men, according to Joshua Rothman, a professor of history at the University of Alabama who is writing a book on Franklin and Armfield. Several factors set the pair apart, Rothman explained: For one thing, their timing was impeccable. They got into the domestic slave trade just as the cotton economy — and American demand for enslaved labor — exploded, and quit right before the United States sank into the financial panic of 1837.

Their location was also prime, perched so they could collect enslaved people from plantations across Virginia and Maryland and sending them on forced marches — in groups of several hundred known as “coffles” — or on tightly packed ships along the Atlantic Coast to the Deep South. While their business strategy was not especially innovative, it was conducted on a scale “bigger and better than anyone else,” Rothman said. Franklin and Armfield transported an estimated 10,000 enslaved people over the course of their careers, according to Rothman.

“They’re the ones who turned the business of selling humans from one part of the U.S. to another ... into a very modern, organized business — no longer just one trader who might move a few people from one plantation to another,” said Maurie D. McInnis, a professor at the University of Texas at Austin who studies the cultural history of slavery. “They created a modern machinery to support the business of human trafficking.”

That was possible largely because of the traders’ willingness to be unusually cruel and heartless — even for a business built around the sale of human beings — as they committed atrocities they appeared to relish.

“In surviving correspondence, they actually brag about raping enslaved people who they’ve been processing through the firm,” said Calvin Schermerhorn, a professor of history at Arizona State University. “This seemed to be as much a part of Franklin and Armfield’s culture of business as, say, going to the bar after a successful court case might be the culture of a successful law firm’s business.”

Yet today, almost no one knows their names.

When Franklin and Armfield retired, they passed easily into elite white society, achieving respectable dotage without a murmur. History, too, has largely “let them off scot-free,” Schermerhorn said. Few, if any, American high school or college students ever learn about the duo.

“I think America continues to be uncomfortable talking about the original sin of slavery,” McInnis said. “And this is one of its most horrific chapters.”

‘The whole thing was so evil’

He [Isaac Franklin] was born in 1789 to a wealthy planter family in Tennessee that owned “a significant number” of enslaved people, according to Rothman. In his late teens, right around the time the United States passed a law barring the transatlantic slave trade, Franklin and his older brothers grew interested in the domestic version: They began transporting small numbers of enslaved people between Virginia and the Deep South.

Franklin developed a taste for the business and, after taking a brief break to fight in the War of 1812, dedicated himself to slave trading full-time. It was all he did for the rest of his professional life, right up until he retired.

“His brothers never got back into the slave trade, but Isaac really decides this is going to be his game: He’s good at it, he likes it, he can make money at it, he sticks with it,” Rothman said.

Franklin worked with a few partners over the years but connected with his longest-lasting collaborator — the man who became his closest friend, confidant and nephew by marriage — in the early 1820s. At the time, John Armfield was lacking in purpose: Shiftless and footloose, he had recently been chased away from a county in North Carolina for fathering a child out of wedlock, Rothman said.

His path to the slave trade was less clear-cut than Franklin’s. Born in 1797 to lapsed Quakers who farmed several hundred acres in North Carolina and owned a small number of enslaved people, Armfield spent his early adulthood pursuing a variety of unsuccessful ventures, including a small mercantile shop — which he was forced to abandon after his affair.

Though unsure what he wanted to do, Armfield was clear on what he didn’t: He loathed farming. So, “floundering about” in the wake of the sex scandal, Armfield decided he would “just dabble in the slave trade,” according to Rothman.

Franklin and Armfield met a few years after that in the course of business and immediately developed a rapport, Rothman said — an intimacy that continued for decades and fueled their profitability. In 1834, the two men became family when Armfield married Franklin’s niece.

“They are each other’s closest friends and that’s rooted in their working relationship,” Rothman said. “Part of the reason they’re successful is they work well together: Each understands the other’s strengths, they trust and respect each other.”

The two men launched the slave trading firm Franklin & Armfield and moved into the Alexandria townhouse — today a museum — in 1828. From the beginning, they divvied the work according to each man’s strength: Armfield, based in Virginia, managed the “buying side of things” and arranged transportation, Rothman said. Franklin, meanwhile, stayed mostly in Natchez, Miss., and was responsible for selling their human cargo to plantations in the Deep South.

It worked like this: Relying on a network of headhunters spread across Virginia, Maryland and the District, Armfield would round up enslaved people, holding them in an open-air pen behind the house in Alexandria — or sometimes in its crowded, filthy basement — until he’d amassed a sufficient number: usually between 100 and 200. Then, he’d send the group on an arduous 1,000-mile march to slave markets in Natchez or New Orleans — or he’d stuff them into one of the company’s three massive ships to make the same journey by water.

At the peak of their business, the two men were moving roughly 1,000 people a year, historians said.

They placed ads in local newspapers seeking enslaved people almost every single day they remained in business. They developed cruel stratagems to boost their bottom line: For example, they “designated less space per person [on their ships] than the trans-Atlantic slave trade vessels did,” Schermerhorn said.

While enslaved people waited in Franklin and Armfield’s “holding pen” in Alexandria, the two men most likely adopted classic techniques employed by slave traders to enhance enslaved people’s salability, McInnis said. That meant feeding their captives large amounts of corn pone and pork to “fatten them up,” dying gray hair black “so they looked younger,” and — if an enslaved person’s skin was scarred with whip marks — smearing wax into the wounds “so they looked healthier,” according to McInnis.

“The whole thing was so evil,” McInnis said.

Through it all, both regularly raped the women they bought and sold and joked about it in letters, a shared habit that deepened their friendship. Franklin and Armfield each fathered at least one child with an enslaved woman, Rothman said. He suspects the abuse, which had no financial purpose, stemmed from a desire for raw power: “They did it because they could, and they felt like it.”

When Franklin wed a rich socialite in 1839, he had been “raping the same enslaved woman” for about five years and had fathered a child with her, Rothman said. Franklin sold the enslaved woman and her baby right after his wedding.

Her fate is unknown.

One of the most persistent misconceptions about slavery in the United States is that the white upper class refused to associate with slave traders on principle, Rothman said — a myth the case of Franklin and Armfield disproves.

Even while actively trading slaves, the two men enjoyed an excellent reputation and moved in top-tier social circles, according to Rothman. Franklin went to the theater with other rich whites and threw dinner parties, earning a reputation as a “gregarious” host with “the best liquors,” Rothman said.

Armfield may have been less extroverted, but he, too, drew accolades for his social graces. When visitors came to the Alexandria townhouse, he always opened the door for them, made elegant small talk and offered them something “nice” to drink, McInnis said.

He was so smooth he managed to impress even a New England abolitionist who visited Alexandria in the 1830s. The abolitionist, knowing full well Armfield’s profession, nonetheless wrote: He is “a man of fine personal appearance, and of engaging and graceful manners.”

Their good reputations persisted after retirement. Franklin and Armfield quit the business around 1837. Franklin, who was approaching his 50s, “was tired and didn’t want to do it anymore,” Rothman said. Armfield had no wish to continue without his longtime partner.

Franklin divided his retirement between a large mansion he built in Tennessee and several Louisiana plantations he acquired over the course of his career. He whiled away his final years managing his estates and spending time with his three children and wife, Adelicia Hayes, whom records indicate he adored. Franklin died in 1846 of intestinal issues.

Armfield, meanwhile, purchased an old hotel in the Tennessee mountains and converted it to a luxury summer getaway for the wealthy. He ran it with great success in his final years, earning visits from “very prominent people,” including archbishops and the mayor of Nashville, according to Rothman. (Armfield’s hotel, which still stands, is used to host events including Methodist retreats.) He died of old age in 1871.

Armfield’s marriage never yielded any children, and Franklin’s children with Hayes all died without producing offspring, according to Rothman, so the two men have no direct white descendants living today. Armfield has at least one direct black descendant, Rodney Williams, who wrote about his heritage — which he said he discovered through DNA testing — in an essay included in “Slavery’s Descendants,” published in May.

A group of Franklin’s indirect white descendants learned of their relationship to the slave trader a few years ago and, in 2018, donated money and relics to the Alexandria museum located where their ancestor’s business once stood.

Neither Franklin nor Armfield earned recrimination from their peers during their lifetimes — and neither man felt the slightest remorse, according to their papers.

“It never occurs to them to think slavery might be bad: Slavery is what made their society work, it made them rich, it was a given that that was what black people were for,” Rothman said. “There’s no indication anywhere in the record that they felt guilty over what they did.”

Rothman is one of a small handful now fighting to remember the two men who arguably served as the founding fathers of America’s domestic slave trade. He became interested in Franklin and Armfield after perceiving a relative paucity of books or articles about the duo — what he called “a gaping hole in all of the literature on the slave trade.”

It’s been six years since Rothman began his research, crisscrossing the country to scour old documents such as property transactions in Louisiana, court cases in Mississippi, ship manifests in Alexandria.

Sometimes, he finds it difficult to keep going. He is loath to spend yet another day probing the dark activities and darker minds of Franklin and Armfield.

Then he remembers why he wanted to write the book.

“People are still talking about how the slave trade was marginal, slave traders were these ostracized dirtbags, and slaveholders only bought and sold people when they had to,” Rothman said. “Those kinds of stubborn myths — they need demolition.”

[dulwichdiverter]

Like a Rolling Stone

WORDS: SEAMUS HASSON; PHOTO: PAUL STAFFORD

Even in the context of a 40-year career as a music journalist, critic and author of no fewer than 20 biographies, 2019 has been an exciting year for Patrick Humphries.

He is currently promoting his new book about the Rolling Stones – titled Rolling Stones 69 – and has penned another called Cradle of Writers, a homage to five different authors who attended Dulwich College.

As a former pupil of the famous public school himself, the book has been a labour of love for Patrick as well as an opportunity to reacquaint himself with some old faces.

I met up with him for a drink at the East Dulwich Tavern to discuss both of his latest literary offerings, as well as his fascinating career in journalism.

I start by asking him why, after so many years in the trade, he waited until now to write a book about the Rolling Stones.

“I’d been writing about music since 1976,” he says, “but I’d never written about the Stones in any detail. I thought, ‘There’s no point doing another biography, there’s already so much out there.’”

Instead, Patrick’s book focuses primarily on one key year in the life of the band – 1969. It was, he feels, the most interesting period in their history, characterised by controversies and triumphs.

“I was interested in the 50th anniversary,” he explains. “I think Let It Bleed is their best-ever album and there was this incredible concert in Hyde Park in July 1969, which I estimate was the largest gathering of people in London since the coronation.

“Honky Tonk Woman was one of their all-time classic singles, which came out at that time. Brian Jones, the founder member, died only two days before the Hyde Park concert and then they undertook this American tour.

“They hadn’t played America in three years and America had changed so much.”

Patrick describes the America that the Rolling Stones returned to as “having gone very dark”. The squealing fans and teenyboppers of their previous tour were less prevalent against a backdrop of protests against the ongoing Vietnam War and the Charles Manson murders.

After the unexpected success of Woodstock that August, the band were under pressure from the American underground press to play a free gig.

“They were at the top of their game and the tour was well received,” Patrick says.

“They were still seen as rebels and the outlaw guys – it was long before they started hobnobbing with Princess Margaret – so they were keen to do it.”

The plug was pulled on the venue that the band had originally lined up for the gig, forcing them to rearrange it at the last minute.

“They ended up at this place called Altamont, it was policed by the Hells Angels and these were vicious, nasty guys,” Patrick says.

At the gig, a young fan was stabbed to death right in front of the stage. “It can all be seen in the film Gimme Shelter,” he says.

“I thought in terms of 12 months in the life of a rock and roll band, that’s pretty incident-packed.”

Reviews of the book certainly concur. Mojo gave it a “nice four-star review”, while Long Live Vinyl magazine awarded it a strong eight out of 10. Even the Spectator has been getting in on the act with a very positive write-up. “I mean, go figure,” Patrick says in a mock-surprise tone.

Patrick was born in Lewisham and apart from a brief spell in Scotland as a youngster, he has lived around south London all his life.

He attended Dulwich College between 1963 and 1969. Halfway through his time there his life took an unexpected and difficult turn.

“I lost my leg to cancer in 1966, which interrupted my schooling. I wasn’t doing very well anyway so I left with two O-levels,” he says.

On leaving school Patrick spent some years working for a government department, and his route into the world of music journalism was unconventional.

An avid pop fan and consumer of the music weeklies, he answered a now famous advert in the NME, which stated: “Hip young gunslingers wanted.”

His reply earned him a regular freelance gig with what was then a national institution. The magazine also took on Tony Parsons and Julie Burchill at the same time.

“They [the NME] knew something was in the air,” Patrick says.

“They knew that the days of Genesis and Yes and Led Zeppelin and all of these big bands playing 20,000, 30,000-seat shows had gone and there needed to be a kick up the arse and that was punk rock.

“And, of course they [Tony and Julie] had their finger right on the pulse, so that was my time at the NME.

“The offices were on the 22nd floor or something of the King’s Reach Tower and they used to go up in the lift with all these people from Yachting World and Country Life.

“I remember Tony and Julie put the filing cabinets and lockers in a square and put barbed wire around them to keep the bloody hippies out. It was very exciting.”

After a couple of years freelancing at the NME, an opportunity came up to join the staff at Melody Maker, the other leading music weekly at the time.

“I got offered the job when I was in my late 20s and I thought, ‘Do I stay with security and the civil service or do I take a bit of a punt and go into rock and roll?’

“I’d always loved music and I went with the Melody Maker.”

While there, he was thrown into the deep end at a weekly magazine, working to tight deadlines and writing about some of the music world’s biggest stars.

He has, it transpires, interviewed three of the four Beatles – only missing John Lennon by a couple of weeks.

“I had a couple of good years [at Melody Maker] but unfortunately musically things had moved on,” he says.

“Punk had been and gone, it had blazed brightly very briefly and then the New Romantics came along, and I had to go and review people like Haircut 100.

“I think when I got to 40 – I was on Vox magazine then – I realised I wasn’t recognising the likes of Oasis or Blur, but I had enough musical history and musical heritage to write about.”

As well as Rolling Stones 69, Patrick has written a number of other critically acclaimed books about music. His first was about a band called Fairport Convention, whom he describes as a sort of folk/rock band of the late 1960s.

That was followed up by a book on Simon & Garfunkel, which came about after a chance meeting with a publisher.

He has also covered the likes of Elvis, Nick Drake, The Beatles, Lonnie Donegan, Tom Waits, Bruce Springsteen and his all-time hero – Bob Dylan.

“Dylan, I mean he’s virtually Canadian, he comes from right up in the Canadian border and he’s this kid with, you know, not a great education but he was very bright and he just wrote these incredible songs,” Patrick says.

“I’ve never met him, although he brushed against this shoulder once,” he says, pointing to his left.

“It’s not as tragic as it sounds,” he adds. “I was at a press conference and he was making his way to the stage but that’s the closest I’ve been to him.”

Patrick’s easy-going nature has in the past disarmed some of rock and roll’s most difficult characters, including the notoriously moody Velvet Underground singer Lou Reed.

Despite a difficult start to an interview where Reed stated his definition of abject misery was “speaking to an English journalist”, the two eventually bonded over a shared knowledge of the author Raymond Chandler. Reed even requested Patrick for a subsequent interview some years later.

Interestingly Chandler is one of the authors Patrick has featured in his other 2019 book release – Cradle of Writers.

Along with four other authors – PG Wodehouse, AEW Mason, Dennis Wheatley and CS Forester – the book is a celebration of Dulwich College’s rich literary history and its publication coincides with the 400th anniversary of the school.

“I spent about a year on that and it made a really nice change, because rather than trying to track down someone who played bass on the second Nick Drake album, you’re doing deep research into writers whose work you admired,” Patrick says.

“It was a bit weird going back to my old history master Terry Walsh, who died earlier this year unfortunately. He was a very good history master, but he used to terrify me when I was at school.

“We ended up going for drinks in the Alleyn’s Head and I was like, ‘Let me get you a drink Terry.’ It was a lovely book to do actually.”

So, after such an eventful year, does he have any further ambitions left to fulfil?

“If I went home and found a message from Bob Dylan on my answer machine, my life would be complete,” he says with a smile.

Rolling Stones 69 and Cradle of Writers are both out now and available to order or buy in all good bookshops