Another short story featuring a supermarket...

By Thomas Jaunism

I went to the capital of Spain last week to see a man about a horse. Sage Francis performed at the University bar several weeks prior to this. He was unshaven and balding- two things I relate to well. He appeared on the stage with a flag draped over his head and an insouciant swagger. His I-don't-give-a-fuck manner inspired feelings of loathing, unworthiness and jealousy in equal parts. I forgot that I was about to leave due to anxiety and boredom and was instead welcomed into his exultant realm of certitude. He said “this next song is called ---------. And it's Magnificent.” The sentiment echoed throughout the night.

Madrid was magnificent. The man had lied about the horse so I had time to relax. Each day I made my way to the same small supermarket to buy peach nectar. It was delicious. En route, I always passed the same fast food restaurant whose stoop three men used to drink that extra strong beer one could purchase at the aforementioned store. They seemed to be well content with their haunt and were friendly enough to exclaim a series of words to me as I passed by. But I don't speak Spanish so we didn't get on. There was a gentleman who stood outside the supermarket holding the door open for customers. He had a friendly smile which he used to accompany his softly spoken responses. These consisted of “Hola”or “Buenos dias” and “Gracias” in that order. One would be greeted with a polite 'hola' on entering the building and would receive a gracious 'gracias' after handing the man their surplus coins and continuing their day.

I was going to write about the fact that this dude would be lost if the store installed automatic doors. But I've been overcome with a sinking feeling and what's more I have a peculiar sensation in my stomach. There was a kindness in that man's eyes that one rarely sees near such establishments. I like to think that he has become part of the community and people greet him good humour and lose balance when he's not there. But I'm questioning the morality of adding poetry to poverty.

I saw a collection of short films on some rough neighbourhoods in New York the other day. I thought they were beautifully shot and showed great insight into the people's lives. The directors answered questions afterwards. “So you show us the hardship and all this bad stuff in New York” said one dude, “but what are you doing to help these people?”. I didn't understand their answers as my french is not complete, but they weren't happy and the discomfort weighed heavily on us all...

But this is stuff you already know. All art is shit but some art makes us feel less shit. Because, of course, we need to regard magnificent creations to know that magnificence can be created.

Epilogue

Detachment has prevented me from being injured by sharp attacks on my work and my person and allows me to find beauty in the harshest of truths, but should we dress cold horrors in metaphoric cloaks for the sake of art?

The Gravity of the Grève...

By Thomas Jaunism

A kind and generous young woman from Paris has lent me her appartment in one of Nantes' party quartiers. I share it with a mouse who lives behind the kitchen bench- though we keep to ourselves for the most part. I say to everyone “j'ai mon propre appartement pendant deux semaines”.

I've managed to create two plastic bags of waste in just over a week and I'm not happy about it. Everyone knows I despise waste, but I've been careless and lazy. Today I thought about adding my waste to the piles of other people's waste that are growing throughout the city. The bins have long been filled and now shit's flowing onto the footpaths. It's starting to smell. Some people have taken the initiative to burn the plastic bins. It does minismise the physical size of the problem, but comes short of solving it completely.

There is a certain glory in these mounting dumps. The French Government is introducing new laws around superannuation including raising the age of retirement from 60 to 62. The majority of the French people are against the reforms and there have been weekly demonstrations for a while now. I attended rallies in Toulouse and here in Nantes, joining the hundreds of thousands of people who walked the streets in good spirits. The lycéens (high school kids) have been blocking the entrances to the schools and often lead the demonstrations. For the last couple of Tuesdays there's been no trains and the kids at my collège (junior high school) have been told to stay home due to industrial action. Hundreds of service stations have run out of gasoline as strikers block the refineries. And rubbish collectors are doing their bit by not collecting the rubbish.

It warms my heart to see 16-19 year old kids marching the streets and giving the middle finger to a Government they didn't vote for. Regardless of what these protests achieve, the importance of les jeunes involvement cannot be understated. To be surrounded by hundreds of your peers as your actions lead to the disruption of an institution you are forced to attend is to know the power of collective disent.

I've become enamoured by the waste piles too. It is such a visual reminder of the importance of a functioning community. Normally we just throw our crap in the bin under kitchen sink, then when that's full we take it outside. Then it's taken care of by the people in the hi-vis vests. But what if they don't come? What if the people don't unblock the drain? What if the train drivers don't drive the trains? What if the teachers don't teach the kids? What if they all decide to join together in saying “Actually, we play an important role in this society and we'd like to be fairly renumerated for that...”

Superannuation is a grave problem throughout the world as our people live longer and have less children. I don't know the economics of the problem well enough to say whether it's possible to keep the age at 60 in France. It may seem like a sweet deal as New Zealand's retirement age is 65 and Australia is rising their's to 67- though the way France's pensions are calculated is entirely different. I'm not interested in exploring the numbers here. I just want to highlight the magnificence of uniting in solidarity for a common goal.

I leave this apartment for Paris on Tuesday, the usual day of action. Though the bill has been passed by the upper house, the unions are not giving in. I'm playing a song at Lake's solo gig on Wednesday. It'd suck to miss the show but I'll try and be like the French and treat all disruptions with a fascinating amount of good humour. But first I have to clean up and take out the rubbish...
and bid farewell to my discrete, easy-going room-mate...

A memory from Liverpool St...

by Thomas Jaunsim

I was in a generic 'city' or 'express' supermarket in London.... I shouldn't have been there, but I was on tour with the band and they travel cheap.

Supermarkets are always cold and I hate that. I like the bright lights and the abundance of shiny food, but the pre-made sandwich displays in the first corridor irk me.

I'd just rounded the first corner when I noticed green slimy water on the floor near the vegetables. An employee of Indian descent was discussing the problem with a West Indian colleague when the owner arrived.
“What the hell is this?”
He was a white Englishman in his late thirties, a big man, slightly overweight.
“Could someone tell me why no one is cleaning this up?”
He was balding, but well kempt. He wore a casual suit that clearly emanated his superior status...
“Um, I was...we were just....”
The employees rushed to the floor in an attempt to placate the fury of their boss. The owner was not not about to let them get away with this shit. He could do it better himself. They were fucking useless and, though his skills were not in cleaning, even he could do a better job. He grabbed a mop from one of the workers and started hastily mopping the leak.
“Could someone tell me why I'm mopping the floor in my own bloody store?”

I looked at Ben and said “Yeah bro, that's mad.... What kind of chump would clean his own store...?

Saving...

Sarah interviewed Lake about money for her blog. The result is here on Self conscious posturing

Recording new songs in Rames, France.

THE URBANTRAMPER COMPANY - Recruitment Advertisement Episode 1

This is the first in our series of videos to promote our upcoming recruitment drive.

I would rather be with you...

The conclusion's sentiment brings me close to tears...

Where we're from...

Ohh..a shot from our tour of this fair land.

We're from Aotearoa, New Zealand. Some people say it's paradise here. The reality is dark and getting darker. We have a government that has no regard for the environment and an economy that relies on industrial dairy. This pains me...
yours sincerly,
Urbantramper - trying to drink less milk, eat more vegies, give more shit to the government and drive less cars... since 2001. (before that, we just did doughnuts and smoked pot)

Here's the Guardian article that encited this riot.

Ben & Tristan taking the piss...

Urbantramper to write and record their next album "Under urgency".

Photo by Aaron Burgess.

Press Release: Lake, the lead singer from indie/folk/pop band Urbantramper, has announced today that he is to write and record the band’s new album ‘under urgency’. He says that the rest of the band, along with Urbantramper listeners, will have until tomorrow to give feedback on the songs. Lake will then record them later tomorrow evening.
“I have some important musical ideas that need to be expressed as soon as possible. They are extremely relevant to the present time and need to released by next week.”
When questioned about whether the songs would suffer without the expert opinions of his bandmates Lake said, “They have until tomorrow morning to give feedback. Anyway, what do they know? The bass lines, drum beats and horn lines are easy to write, it’s going to sound f*%cking sweet!”
Lake clearly lacked regard for his listeners too. “They have ‘til tomorrow like everyone else. I mean I hinted at this three months ago. They should be able to infer from my experiences over the last while what I’m going to write about.”
Urbantramper listeners are unhappy about the move, saying Lake is only writing for himself. Fansite spokesperson John Kahu is, however, not surprised, “he’s done it before and he’ll do it again. We’re just sad about the music- which inevitably suffers. And when people listen to crap music they end up having a crap time, which leads to host of other problems.”
Kahu says he will continue to support Urbantramper for now. “I just love Lake’s rat’s tail.”

What is Urgency?

Guilt free relationship cheating....

Offset the unavoidable infidelity here...

The answer is more roads of course!

road porn


Bigger, better, smoother, beautiful and more convenient roads. Urbantramper currently lives in New Zealand, a place where no matter what the question, the answer is invariably 'more roads'.

The government has just approved an awesome one in Auckland- the biggest city in New Zealand with the shittiest trains. It's going to be sweet, check it out here.

Because Wellington is often jealous of Auckland's mint as roads, they're going to try and out do them with a crazy one that will 'fly over' the Basin Reserve. It's madness, sign the petition to stop it here.

Mc Zealand

WINZ (the providers of the unemployment benefit) have worked out a sweet deal with that quality family restaurant...It's a win/win!

Click HERE to read more...

The future of music will be shared: An essay on the hope for a shift in power...

"The goal is not only better living conditions, a radical change of structures, a social revolution; it is much more: the continuous creation, never ending, of a new way to be a man [or woman], a permanent cultural revolution" -Gustavo Gutiérrez

This essay was written to fulfill requirements for a paper Lake took at school. It suggests that the internet creates the possibility for a shift in power relations away from the corporate record companies and back toward the musicians and the audience. We acknowledge this as a process and not an end.

We are currently experimenting wih websites that share a similar ethos, allowing artists to share their music and providing an opportunity for payment. Basically we are trying to avoid sites that are owned by major corporations who have profit as their only goal, that is: Lastfm.com, myspace.com, itunes.com, napster.com, amazon.com.

Websites that currently seem interesting, both from an audience and artist perspective, are: bandcamp.com and thesixtyone.com which even allows creative commons licensing for posted tracks...
Let us know any others...

Here's the essay, it may not be flawless, but hopefully it provokes thought...

The future of music will be shared

The future of music...

We are currently re-assessing the global music industry and the concept that is copyright...
We will post our findings on this site next week...
The findings aren't looking good for major record labels and their subsidiaries sorry...

here's a link to get the appetite going:

downhill battle

Images of the recession...?

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/03/scenes_from_the_recession.html

New single...

Hello All...

Southern Hemisphere Blues...(download)

The Climate change issue as a social movement is important as it gives rise to
such questions as: Is economic growth a good thing? Should we consume less?
Do we need to produce so much? Is industrialisation and intensive agriculture good for people and the planet? How do our actions affect people and environments far from
ours?

Climate change need not steer effort away from ending poverty, rather, good causes are not mutually exclusive and to address these problems a holistic approach is needed...one is life.


Idealistic or just artistic? (download)

When are you going to grow out of your idealism Lake? It's obvious that idealism drives change and provides us all with a better future...This is a thank you song in a time of crisis. Thank you. Much appreciated.

Urgency triumphs over democracy!

National is the new government in power in Aoetearoa. They have recently passed a few acts under urgency. The bills below were passed without being sent to Select Committee- where public consultation takes place. The taxation bill was passed without giving anyone a chance to read it before debate took place...

The bills are as follows:

*The Employment Relations Amendment Bill (the one where you have no rights for your first 90 days of employment)


*Electricity (Renewable Preference) Repeal Bill (building more coal power plants...)

*Energy (Fuels, Levies, and References) Biofuel Obligation Repeal Bill (Don't worry about supplying Biofuels...)

*Taxation (Urgent Measures and Annual Rates) Bill (There's no bill digest on this one, so you can see the bill's history here or read the green view here)

keep informed...