Terms And Conditions May Apply:

An extraordinary’ extraordinary piece of work from director Cullen Hoback. So much is crammed into this documentary that it’s probably best digested in sections & is the kind of film that benefits from multiple viewings, –  for compression & retention purposes but also to remind of what’s behind the mask. A rough & reduced premise, – this film is about the digital “user agreement”/”terms of use” that is generally a mandatory preliminary for all online “accounts”  Continue reading Terms And Conditions May Apply:

The Human Cost/Decimation of Civilization:

“cruel, degrading & inhuman treatment”

man! – i can’t stand public transport. it’s slow, unpleasant, ineffective & overpriced & i cycle or walk everywhere (have never & will never ever own/drive a car no matter what). due to a panoply of circumstantial misfortune & not wanting to rescind on a commitment, i found myself needing to take the tube last friday for the first time in about four months or more. various events through Continue reading The Human Cost/Decimation of Civilization:

Roscoe Mitchell Quartet-celebrating Fred Anderson CD:

 

Another shocker in the girls-locker from exponential inferno megalith Roscoe Mitchell. Very alluring splay of figures in the construct of cello (Tomeko Reid), trap drums (Vincent Davis) & stand-up bass (Junius Paul) pretty much guaranteeing dynamism & a colossal range of climates & forms to roam through.  Continue reading Roscoe Mitchell Quartet-celebrating Fred Anderson CD:

Rest In Poison!

mac hard!

Graveyards! Wonderful havens of respite & nature-cosm’s in the shit-sty that is London. Few people, & a proclivity towards quite as well, just to heap cherries on the icing-wads. Old architecture heaving with character from decades (perhaps even centuries?) of elemental embellishing & beautification, ancient tilting stones, lop-sided from expanding soils wreathed in briars & festooned in ivy all choca’ with wild flowers. Basically, places of peace, beauty & solace amidst the soul braying contagion of this insane car-centric metropolis mishap.  Continue reading Rest In Poison!

Dragons In Diamond Village-Tales of resistance from urbanizing China (David Bandurski)

“The development potential of prime sites, aided by the expedient push for “civilised” urban environments, has put city governments across the country on a collision course with rural China. Nowhere is the face-off more evident than in the conflicts over urban village land, which rankle at the core of all the stories in this book. But these conflicts are ultimately about far more central issues nagging at China’s urban future: corrupt institutions and weak civil society. These may sound like separate concerns, but the following stories show how inseparable they are” Continue reading Dragons In Diamond Village-Tales of resistance from urbanizing China (David Bandurski)

The Sorrows Of Mexico

it’s never ever easy reading about contemporary Mexico. Billed as “an indictment of their country’s failings by 7 exceptional writers” .. indeed, keeping up with Mexico’s resident narco/government/military carnage feels more & more like witnessing a total “failed state” scenario as a kind of criminal coup rolls it’s drape ever further. Continue reading The Sorrows Of Mexico

PURGED FOR PROFIT!

So my friend is being forced to move house (flat)! It’s one of those now ubiquitous “unscrupulous” but probably legal ejections that’s tearing sane minds & lives apart all over London as the residual vestiges of interesting people are expelled from the crapital due to extortionate rents & government solicited land-lord tyranny as part of the Cancervatives undeclared social purging initiative. Continue reading PURGED FOR PROFIT!

Black Square- Adventures in the Post Soviet World (Sophie Pinkham/302 pages)

Perestroiking like Pinkham! it’s so easy to get hooked on every-day Russo/far Eastern European related reportage & literature. why? well, as Pinkham herself puts it – “My family and friends had trouble understanding why I had fallen in love with Ukraine, a country that most Americans could hardly find on a map, famous only for Chicken Kiev and mail-order brides. Continue reading Black Square- Adventures in the Post Soviet World (Sophie Pinkham/302 pages)