Flanders International Film Festival - Ghent

EYES WIDE SHUT (Stanley Kubrick) ****

RABIA (Oscar Cardenas) ***

REQUIEM (Hans-Christian Schmid) ****


BLISS (Sheng Zhimin) ***

FROZEN CITY (Aku Louhimies) ***

SLUMMING (Michael Glawogger) ***

EL VIOLIN (Francisco Vargas Quevedo) ****


2001 : A SPACE ODYSSEY (Stanley Kubrick) ******

SALVADOR (Manuel Huerga) **

QUELQUES KILOS DE DATES POUR UN ENTERREMENT (Saman Salour) ***

FIREWORKS WEDNESDAY (Asghar Farhadi) ***

SEHNSUCHT (Valeska Grisebach) *

LA PERRERA (THE DOG POUND) (Manuel Nieto Zas) ***

COLOSSAL YOUTH (JUVENTUDE EM MARCHA) (Pedro Costa) ***½

NOCTURNES (Henri Colomer) *

CLEO DE 5 A 7 (Agnes Varda) **

MADEINUSA (Claudia Llosa) ***½

TRANSYLVANIA (Tony Gatlif) **

PRINCESS (Anders Morgenthaler) **½

OFFSIDE (Jafar Panahi) **

LE DERNIER DES FOUS (Laurent Achard) **½

ANCHE LIBERO VA BENE (Kim Rossi Stuart) ***

AND STILL I BELIEVE (Mikhail Romm, Marlen Khutsiyev & Elem Klimov) ***

A SHORT FILM ABOUT THE INDIO NACIONAL (or the prolonged sorrow of filipinos) (Raya Martin) *

SHORTBUS (John Cameron Mitchell) **

DIGITAL SHORT FILMS BY THREE FILM MAKERS 2006 : TALK TO HER (Darezhan Omirbayev, Eric Khoo & Pen-ek Ratanaruang) ***

LUCY (Henner Winckler) ***

AMERICAN HARDCORE (Paul Rachman) *

FIRST LOVE (Jukinari Hanawa) ****

LES OISEAUX DU CIEL (Eliane de Latour) *

OUBLIER CHEYENNE (Valérie Minetto) **

4:30 (Royston Tan) **

TAXIDERMIA - György Pálfi

I don't feel like writing a review of the Cannes 2006 shocker TAXIDERMIA so here's the press info that should wet your appetite. Taxidermia is definitely a Hungarian cult-classic-in-the-making. You really must see how György Pálfi films the vulgarity with incredible cinematography. Mmm... delicious!!!

Taxidermia contains three generational stories, about a grandfather, a father, and a son, linked together by recurring motifs. The dim grandfather, an orderly during World War Two, lives in his bizarre fantasies; he desires love. The huge father seeks success as a top athlete -- a speedeater -- in the postwar pro-Soviet era. The grandson, a meek, small-boned taxidermist, yearns for something greater: immortality. He wants to create the most perfect work of art of all time by stuffing his own torso.

Historical facts and surrealism become intertwined as magical realism, like in the works of Gabriel García Marquez or the Hungarian writer Lajos Parti Nagy; the script is based on two of the latter’s stories. Palfi added the third story, that of the grandson the taxidermist.

The first section begins with a disembodied voice pontificating obliquely about creation and three generations, explaining that if something has to end, the beginning has to be important. Immediately we see the grandfather, Vendel Morosgoványi (Csaba Czene), who is berated by his lieutenant in a remote outpost, with only the lieutenant’s fat wife and two beautiful daughters around. He retreats into the realm of gratification, no matter how extreme. He peeps in the daughters’ bath, drinks the girls’ dirty bathwater, masturbates until his penis emits flames of fire, and sleeps with the lieutenant’s wife. She becomes pregnant and the lieutenant blows off Vendel’s head — but raises his child, Kálmán.

In the second part, Kálmán (Gergõ Trócsányi) has become obese and competes for Hungary in eating competitions that their backers hope will be recognized by the International Olympic Committee. Against a backdrop of empty Communist spectacle and military poseurs, Kálmán strives to win. He meets up with an oversized woman, Gizella (Adél Stanczel), another speedeating competitor, and the two get married, although she has sex with his teammate during the wedding party. She and Kálmán embark on a long honeymoon, returning to their respective factories to practice. Gizella gives birth to a tiny, tiny son, Lajos.

Section three, which is contemporary, is calmer, less manic than the previous two. Lajos (Mark Bischoff) has become a quiet taxidermist who has no prospects in love; he is rejected by the supermarket cashier, for one. He is as frustrated in his way as his grandfather was in his, but Lajos’s fertile imagination will prove to work in a very different way. His father, Kálmán, has reached enormous proportions and can no longer move. Kálmán’s wife has long ago left him, so Lajos brings food and cleans the apartment where Kálmán (now Gábor Máté, in a fatsuit) sits amidst boxes of food and the three cats he pushes to overeat. One day Lajos finds Kálmán dead, possibly having exploded from overeating or having been mauled by one of the cats. He stuffs him, and immediately after, begins stuffing himself by locking his body onto a board surrounded by perfectly attuned machines. At the end of the procedure, a glass blade he has set up decapitates him and an electric saw severs his right arm. The two men are found by a customer, Dr. Regõczy (Géza Hegedžs D.), who puts them on display at a chic art exhibition. Dr. Regõczy, whose lecture is a continuation of the voiceover at the very beginning of the film, maintains that one can mount one’s father and oneself but can not mount the essence, that being what Lajos felt at the moment the blade cut off his head. The camera moves into the black void beyond Lajos’s bellybutton.

Radio = the soundtrack of your boring life

There's a little chat on the radio with some dude that talks about his 3 favourite songs. We get to hear a CURE song, a DEUS song and a PREFAB SPROUT song. Afterwards, the radio host says to the guy : "You have a very varied record collection!".

He was deadly serious.

Moron.

God Damn Tiresome Rock 'n' Roll !!!

Two bummers this week. Firstly, THE CRAMPS who played a very conventional set without any highlights at the Lokerse Feesten earlier this week. Secondly, while visiting a record shop, what sounded as a dreadful record by a third-class grunge band turned out to be the latest SONIC YOUTH album. Like my friend Danny says : "The old rockers are getting older and older and the young ones play for 50 people at the Pits, that's the future of rock 'n roll in Belgium, probably Europe...". Hopefully, the upcoming GREEN ON RED reunion show in my hometown will prove us wrong.

Reggae Geel

The Congos

What do you get when you put PRINCE JAZZBO, CORNEL CAMPBELL, TAPPA ZUKIE, LINVAL THOMPSON, TRISTON PALMER and THE CONGOS on the same bill? Right, my favourite festival of 2006! Although Prince Jazzbo played one of my alltime favourite Jamaican tracks ("Harry Skank"), every song was put to an abrupt ending after 1 or 2 minutes with his many annoying "Pull up's" and "Take It Down's" shouts. I especially enjoyed Tappa Zukie, Linval Thompson (wonderful set) and The Congos (brilliant harmonies). Jah Mali and Sister Carol were also very good while Buru Banton turned out to be a public's favourite. Next are The Cramps on Wednesday. Right on!


Linval Thompson

I'm ready for the retirement home!

I spent the afternoon with some three hundred grannies & granddaddies in a marquee. Last year, my elderly neighbour aroused my curiosity when he told me about this convivial little folklore festival at a retirement home in my hometown. A couple of weeks ago, I checked the line-up and decided to give it a try. Well, I had a great time at what the organisers announced as 'a grandiose garden party'. Not only were the entrance free and the Trappist beers dirt cheap, the bands were great fun too!

The first band, KHUKH MONGOL from Mongolia, treated us to some great throat singing and exciting sounds that came out of traditional Mongolian instruments like the yoochin, a dulcimer with 13 double-wire strings. One piece was played on a string instrument by a young woman who sang like a 90-years old boozer. Cool!

The second band was SPANDAN SANSKRUTIK TRUST from Northern-India and began their set with a chant dedicated to the victims of a very recent bomb attack in their hometown somewhere near the Pakistan border. Besides the 4 musicians (a real Qawwali line-up with a great harmonium), there were some 20 young dancers and some beautiful Indian girls. They had a lot of fun while doing their folkloric dances and the audience loved them too!

The greatest fun was when RAIZES from the Brazilian northeast took the stage. Three young musicians played some wild roots music that reminded me a lot of the music on the Globestyle album 'Brazil: Forro - Music for Maids and Taxi Drivers'. Again, a bunch of young dancers took the stage and showed us some real hot dancing.

The golden-agers loved it and so did I. I left the place during the last band, LOUS TCHANCAYRES (men and women on stilts from the Landes region near Bordeaux, France). The band members looked rather boring and the folkloric element was overemphasized.

It was kinda weird to see all these young people from different parts of the world amusing themselves together with some three hundred Belgian old-timers. I hope this garden party will still exist when I'm an oldie myself!




LINK TO THE RETIREMENT CENTRE

Have a nice holiday y'all!

Me, I think I'm gonna place my tent somewhere here in beautiful Andalucia :

What is all this bitching about "Volver" being inferior to Pedro Almodovar's previous movies? Personally, I think it is one of Almodovar's very best. Ignore the critics and judge for yourself!

***

Since last year the European Film Festival joined forces with Filmvondsten, the summer event of the Royal Belgian Film Archive, which holds a similar view on cinema. As usual, many Cannes premieres will be shown during the first week of July. This is my personal selection before I move southwards :

THE WAY I SPENT THE END OF THE WORLD (Catalin Mitulescu)

Dorotheea Petra (Eva) won the prize for Best Actress in the Un Certain Regard section at this year's Cannes film festival

12:08 EAST OF BUCHAREST (Corneliu Porumboiu)

winner of the prestigious Caméra d'Or Award for best debut at the latest edition of the Cannes film festival

IKLIMLER (Nuri Bilge Ceylan)

I'm counting the days to see the third film by this brilliant Turkish director (remember "Uzak")

TO GET TO HEAVEN FIRST YOU HAVE TO DIE (Djamshed Usmonov)

After "Angel on the Right," the new film from Djamshed Usmonov featuring Dinara Kroukarova

SEHNSUCHT (Valeska Grisebach)

Officiel Selection from the last Berlinale 2006

LUXURY CAR (Wang Chao)

from the maker of "The Orphan of Anyang" and recipient of the 'Un certain regard' prize at the latest Cannes festival

FANTASMA (Lisandro Alonso)

the third feature from Lisandro Alonso after the amazing "La Libertad" and the brilliant "Los Muertos"

SOLNTSE (Alexander Sokurov)

the master of contemporary Russian cinema with his latest masterpiece

I hope I will still have some time left for record reviews and packing my bags...

Full Frontal Attack

BATTLESHIP's debut album "Presents Princess" on Mitch Cardwell's Raw Deluxe label was one of my favourite records of 2004 so when I read about an upcoming European tour a couple of months ago, I immediately contacted my pals at the mighty Pit's. "Presents Princess" was limited to 500 vinyl copies, sold out a long time ago and was released on CD a couple of months ago by On/On Switch. A few weeks ago a new 7" called "To Give, Not A Gift" has been released on Double Negative Records and Greg "Gris Gris" Ashley finished recording the new album. After witnessing Battleship on the shitty Pit's stage yesterday, I think the new album is going to be a totally different experience than the first one. Live, the band blasted out some maniacal spazzcore in the vein of Melt Banana and The Locust, gone were the Gang Of Four-like rhythms of the first record. Still curious about it though...

Peace...

In Italy for thirty years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love; they had five hundred years of democracy and peace - and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.

Harry Lime (played by Orson Welles) in The Third Man

Domenico Ghirlandaio 1449-1494
Fresco at Cappella Tornabuoni, Santa Maria Novella, Florence, created 1486-90.

(Let's Go) Totally Nutzoid!

I don't know how it really happened but my five-years-old kid took a bad fall on my 7-inch collection. Needless to say, I was furious not in the least because he always seems to ruin the most precious ones. At the age of one-and-a-half, he gripped the first A Frames long-player out of my record-rack and let if fall on the floor. A couple of months before, I had specially ordered the album in the States and was very glad that I received a pristine copy without bent corners. Not any longer though. Why didn't he pick the Aerobitch album next to it, or the A-Lines one on the other side? Yesterday, his main target was the amazing first Tokyo Electron 7-inch which went for $51,00 on eBay last week. N° 38/229 of the Destructo invasion from the outer space edition will be housed in a mutilated sleeve from here to eternity.

Soon I realised however that it is quite stupid to be upset by a couple of bent covers of records with titles like "Break It Down" (Rat Traps), "Don't Care About Nothing" (The Tears) or "(Let's Go) Totally Nutzoid!" (The Real Losers). I mean, I don't want to live the life that is being reflected in the songs I love, but I can't deny that the wild energy & recklessness influences my everyday life. I will not cry if I notice someone scratched my car or if somebody tells me to fuck off and I realise I shouldn't worry too much about bent record covers. That's what I was telling myself after I calmed down and it works. After all, it's only music and although this music means an awful lot to me, I think it was pretty funny afterwards that the kid fell into my punk rock singles collection.

But kid, next time you "go totally nutzoid", please go outside the house, OK? After all, these records will be yours one day...

Grizzly Man (Werner Herzog)

Timothy Treadwell spent 13 summers living among wild bears in the Alaskan wilderness until one of his beloved grizzlies got tired of the stalking and decided to devour him at his campsite in Katmai National Park in the fall of 2003. In telling this story, Werner Herzog relies considerably on Treadwell's own video footage and it soon becomes apparent that Treadwell was an incredible irritating nutcase, a manic-depressive ex-alcoholic whose pseudo-ecological nonsense and selfishness were in big contrast to the desolate and raw beauty of the undisturbed wilderness. Treadwell was no biologist but a ridiculous charlatan who claimed himself the saviour of the grizzly bears in a nature reserve (!). By exposing the animals to human contact, he did them more harm than good while his egomaniacal rants against the park authorities, poachers and other visitors to his remote hideaway are proof of his insane behaviour. He wanted to become one with the bears (in which he definitely succeeded!) but never even considered asking himself if the wild animals appreciated his presence. Herzog's documentary tends to voyeurism and sensation but it suits the subject of a bear-obsessed paranoid loser perfectly. Totally embarrassing!

Cinema Novo Festival 2006

***** The Forsaken Land - Vimukthi Jayasundara (Sri Lanka 2005)



**** El - Luis Bunuel (Mexico 1953)
**** El Angel exterminador - Luis Bunuel (Mexico 1962)
**** Grain in Ear - Zhang Lu (China 2005)
**** Asshak : Tales from the Sahara - Ulrike Koch (Germany 2004)
**** La nina santa - Lucrecia Martel (Argentina-Spain-Italy 2004)
**** Los muertos - Lisandro Alonso (Argentina-France-The Netherlands-Switzerland 2004)
**** Bright Future - Kiyoshi Kurosawa (Japan 2002)

***1/2 Café Lumière - Hou Hsiao-hsien (Japan 2004)
***1/2 Three Times - Hou Hsiao-Hsien (Taiwan 2005)
***1/2 Be With Me - Eric Khoo (Singapore 2005)
***1/2 Los olvidados - Luis Bunuel (Mexico 1950)

*** Free Zone - Amos Gitaï (Israel-Belgium-France 2005)
*** Nordeste - Juan Solanas (Argentina-France 2005)
*** Sa-kwa - Kang Yi-kwan (South-Korea 2005)
*** SPL - Wilson Yip (Hong Kong-China 2005)
*** Election - Johnnie To (Hong Kong-China 2005)
*** Crying Fist - Ryoo Seung-wan (South-Korea 2005)
*** El imperio de la fortuna - Arturo Ripstein (Mexico 1985)
*** Macunaïma - Joaquim Pedro de Andrade (Brasil 1969)
*** Simon del desierto - Luis Bunuel (Mexico 1965)
*** Les artistes du théâtre brûlé - Rithy Panh (Cambodia 2005)
*** Noticias Lejanas - Ricardo Benet (Mexico 2005)
*** Bashing - Masahiro Kobayashi (Japan 2005)
*** Mongolian Ping Pong - Hao Ning (China 2005)
*** Paradise Now - Hany Abu-Assad (Palestina-The Netherlands 2005)
*** The Cave of the Yellow Dog - Byambasuren Davaa (Mongolia-Germany 2005)
*** The Wayward Cloud - Tsai Ming-Liang (Taiwan-France 2005)

**1/2 Play - Alicia Scherson (Chili-Argentina-France 2005)
**1/2 Shanghai Dreams - Wang Xiaoshuai (China 2005)

** El aura - Fabien Bielinsky (Argentina 2005)
** The Sunflowers - Wang Baomin (China 2005)
** La sagrada familia - Sebastien Campos (Chili 2005)
** The President's Last Bang - Im Sang-soo (South-Korea 2005)
** Mur - Simone Bitton (Israel-France 2004)
** Vital - Shinya Tsukamoto (Japan 2004)
** The Syrian Bride - Eran Riklis (Israel 2004)

* Takeshis' - Takeshi Kitano (Japan 2005)
* Attente - Rashid Masharawi (Palestina-France 2005)
* Le temps révolu - Minh Hô Quang (Vietnam-France 2005)
* The Taste of Tea - Katsuhito Ishii (Japan 2004)

0 Water - Deepa Mehta (India 2005)
0 Un oso rojo - Israel Adrian Caetano (Argentina-Spain-France 2002)

ALI FARKA TOURE R.I.P.

Rest In Peace brother.

Agitated - ELECTRIC EELS

Agitated by: Morton, McMahon, Marotta

I feel so agitated, so agitated,
Run through a washing machine, agitated.
So agitated, so convoluted
I hate it, I hate it, I'd just like to shoot it.

It's five a.m. and I'm crawling the walls
Waiting for imaginary telephone calls.

You know what I think, I think the whole world stinks.
I don't need no shrink, I just hate it.

Sometimes I think I'd be better off dead,
Just like my cousin Fred.

1977 All rights reserved

"Colour Green" - Sibylle Baier

After VASHTI BUNYAN's magical "Just Another Diamond Day", here's another devastatingly-beautiful folk gem from the early 1970s that'll blow your mind.




check out Orange Twin Records site here

Finally on DVD : Krzysztof Kieslowski's masterpiece "LA DOUBLE VIE DE VERONIQUE". The only interesting news of the last 3 weeks.

King Shiloh Sound System

A terrific reggae sound system yesterday at my hometown that received massive response by a super-enthusiastic crowd. Majestic music indeed!

Les Amants Réguliers

The ones who don't like it call those who do "pseudo-intellectuals" but to hell with those dumb-asses; Philippe Garrel's latest film is a true masterpiece!

Saturday Night Fever !!!

picture by Joost Dierick

Saturday was a crazy night!! First there was that funny guy from Bordeaux who made some great trashy rock 'n roll dance music under the moniker FREDOVITCH. Dressed up as a knight, he freaked out on drums, organ and guitar and spiced things up with exciting samples. Mix the rawness of King Louie's One Man Band with the freakishness of Mr. Quintron, add mucho enthusiasm and some neat song writing and you get an idea of the amazing sounds of FREDOVITCH. Bingo!

THE KING KHAN & BBQ SHOW was scheduled next at The Pit's and expectations were very high since this two-man band released a killer of an album last year. Their 45 minutes show was great fun : King Khan wore a sexy pink dress and made us dance like fools with his delicious licks while BBQ rocked the hell out of his rudimental drum set and added some great & raw vocals. Party!!!

When I heard that my favourite rhythm & blues blasters THE SEATSNIFFERS were playing at my hometown on the same evening as The King Khan & BBQ Show at The Pit's, I panicked for a few seconds but soon realised that shows at the Pit's must end at 10 PM and that I could probably make it in time for Belgium's finest. So after the King Khan & BBQ Show, I jumped into my car and rushed back to my hometown while some black rock 'n roll blasted out of my car hifi. Last year, The Seatsniffers had played their 10th anniversary show and since I hadn't seen these guys in about two years I was anxious to witness if they could still tear the house down. My god, they drove me to delirium! The place was sold-out (thanks Jan!) but fortunately I managed to seize a place in front of Roel, the hard-blowing sax maniac. The band blasted out one amazing song after the other : steaming hot rhythm & blues, a crazy ska-tune, savage rockabilly, a hot-blooded polka... unbelievable how tight and to the point this fabulous band was! Even the Link Wray cover "Run Chicken Run" sent chills down my spine! Did I already tell you how I danced like a fool since this probably IS the best fuckin' dance band in the world?!! Totally incredible how a Belgian roots band rivals its American idols and leaves everybody KO. Don't miss them when they're in town or don't mind driving 3 hours to see this truly unique band!

The Wayward Cloud

Beste Steven De Foer,

Ik heb mij weeral eens mateloos geërgerd aan één van uw filmbesprekingen in De Standaard van woensdag 11 januari jl. Het komt er op neer dat iedereen die van "The Wayward Cloud" houdt een intellectuele snob is die te veel films gezien heeft en dus alleen nog maar bevredigd kan worden door exotische arty-farty experimenten. De film staat volgende week op mijn programma dus kan ik er mij nog niet echt over uitspreken maar Tsai Ming-Liang's vorige films, die u blijkbaar ook allemaal slecht vindt (lees : te moeilijk), belandden steevast bovenaan mijn jaarlijstjes.

Over film valt veel te discussiëren, alleen irriteren uw besprekingen mij vaak omdat een duidelijke verhaallijn voor u een absolute noodzaak schijnt te zijn zodat u zelf niet te veel inspanningen hoeft te leveren om een film te begrijpen. Jo Smets formuleerde het destijds mooi in Knack bij zijn bespreking van Bruno Dumont's "Twentynine Palms" : "De gemakkelijkste reactie is geeuwen, de zaal verlaten en uw als anti-intellectualisme vermomde mentale luiheid gaan ventileren."

Gaat u in het vervolg aub dit soort films niet zien en bespaar ons uw simplistisch geleuter.

Groeten,
Luc O.

IT'S ALIVE!!! (I mean, it's supposed to be...)

Tonight, I am going to THE KING KHAN & BBQ SHOW at The Pit's and I'm really looking forward to it 'cuz their record will probably end on top position in my best-of 2005 list. Kris 'Demolition Derby' Verreth will be there too with a bunch of records I ordered through his excellent mailorder service during the last couple of months. Consequently, I will be able to give you my list of favourite records, 7-inches & reissues of 2005 one of these days. In the meantime, here are my favourite shows of the past year :

1. THE LOST SOUNDS at The Pit's "a total mindfuck - keine schönheit ohne Gefahr nicht?"
2. THE REATARDS/TOKYO ELECTRON/ANGRY ANGLES at The Pit's "the Tokyo Electron bass guitar that got blasted into my face couldn't spoil the fun that night - Jay Reatard was simply devastating"
3. THE FATALS at The Pit's "a real surprise - amazing psychotic blues sludge"
4. THE BLACK LIPS/RIVER CITY TANLINES/GHETTO WAYS at The Lintfabriek "3 x bingo - Oh what a night!"
5. TEXT OF LIGHT : A Live Musical Homage to Stan Brakhage featuring LEE RANALDO, WILLIAM HOOKER, DJ OLIVE, ALAN LICHT, AND ULRICH KRIEGER at De Vooruit "A great project and a mesmerizing way to enjoy the avant-garde films of Stan Brakhage"
6. THE EX at the N9 Villa "still going strong after all these years - it made me realise how influential The Ex was and still is"
7. TH' LOSIN' STREAKS at The Pit's "ex-Trouble Makers - these guys know how to party!!!"
8. THE MOJOMATICS at The Pit's "2 Italian gentlemen - these guys know how to rock in style!!!"
9. SOUTH FILTHY at 't Oud Liefken "A last minute show I organised at a great place at the countryside - a night to remember!"
10. THE BASEBALL FURIES at the 4AD "A great show but lofi punkrock bands should be seen at a small joint like The Pit's instead of on a 1 meter high stage"

I also enjoyed two reunion shows in 2005 : THE STOOGES in Lokeren and PERE UBU in Brussels. I think I missed 3 great bands last year being the DEMON'S CLAWS (snow blizzard), CRASH NORMAL (those damn Derwishes!) & THE MIGHTY GO-GO PLAYERS (dead-beat). The worst shows were those by ROCK CITY MORGUE (ex-White Zombie - bweurk!), BAMBU STATION (very mediocre reggae band from the Virgin Islands), THE WHIRLING DERVISHES OF KONYA (I missed them in Konya last year - their show in Antwerp however turned out to be very artificial (read : downright boring!)), DIE ROTZZ (C'mon guys, a little effort please? A show is not supposed to be a sloppy rehearsal!) and some Flemish art school shithead band called HARKER that fucked up the immense beauty of The Goddess (1934) at the Cinema Novo Film Festival in Bruges.

My yearly favourite shows list used to be much more varied but nothing much seems to happen outside the punkrock scene nowadays. The end of the Bluesestafette in Utrecht means no more exciting soul & blues shows. Reggae has always been a dubious live thing with more letdowns than revelations. World Music is doomed to fartsy Art Centres. I could go on. At our little punkrock scene however, things actually happen if you know what I mean so here's another thumbs-up to everybody's favourite club the mighty Pit's. I hope the cops won't bother us again before 10 PM...

I would like to end this post with a quote from Peter Guralnick's essential book "Feel Like Going Home". Sadly, nothing has changed ever since and I'm not talking about the blues scene alone.

These were, in fact, many of the same problems which have plagued every blues "concert" I have attended since I first saw Lightnin' Hopkins at Harvard twelve years ago : a stiff, unnatural atmosphere, an unbridgeable gulf between performer and audience, and a tendency to treat the blues as a kind of museum piece, to be pored over by scholars, to be admired perhaps but to be stifled at the same time by the press of formal attention. It was a depressing realization and one that left me on the whole with the feeling that even in its own backyard blues had ceased to be a living experience.

Good Night, And Good Luck (finding an exciting non-punkrock show in 2006!)

Good Night, And Good Luck

An intelligent American movie that impresses deeply and will most likely end up in my Top 10 of 2006. Already!

KING KONG

Cheap! The girl fell in love with King Kong. Period. We really don't need that pathetic Adrian Brody love affair! Alternative end : Naomi jumps after King Kong from the Empire State Building! Now that would have been true love!!

Sándor Márai

I have just finished another great work by the Hungarian author Sándor Márai. This largely forgotten writer has only recently been "rediscovered" when his wonderful book "Embers" from 1942 was republished in English and German in 2000 and became an international best-seller. Nothing much happens in this two hundred page novel but the duel of words and silences between two close friends who haven't seen each other for forty-one years provokes an inarticulate tension that is hard to beat. Márai is a true master in analysing the smouldering "embers" of feelings of lust, love, revenge and hate and this quality can be found throughout his complete works.

"Conversations in Bolzano" is a book set in 1758 and written in 1940 that was first translated in 2004, only the second of Márai's works to be brought to a wider audience. It tells the story of ten days or so in the life of a Venetian libertine, whom one might recognize as Giacomo Casanova. It's another fascinating tale of suppressed love & humiliation.

Profoundly antifascist, Márai survived World War II, but persecution by the Communists drove him from the country in 1948, first to Italy and then to the United States. "Memoir of Hungary, 1944-1948" provides one of the most poignant and human portraits of life in Hungary between the German occupation in 1944 and the solidification of communist power in 1948. Both a fervent anti-fascist and anti-communist, Márai draws a vivid portrait of these turbulent times, while delivering a telling indictment of the communist system from which he fled.

It is almost unbelievable that one of Márai's best works "Az Igazi/Judit" has not been translated into English or French yet. Fortunately, the Dutch translation "Kentering van een huwelijk" has just been issued and the book, originally published in 1978, confirms Márai's position as one of the most important authors of the twentieth-century. It tells the story of the deconstruction of a marriage, seen from 3 different points of view : a bourgeois man, his wife and the housemaid he later marries and divorces. The philosophical reflections on human nature, loneliness & betrayal are riveting personal reflections; pieces of wisdom from a true master that ask to be re-read. Somewhere in the book, the bourgeois man talks about the right to die in loneliness. After Sándor Márai's wife died, he himself retreated more and more into isolation and finally committed suicide in San Diego in 1989, completely ignored by the world. Not unlike Cesare Pavese's suicide, it makes the sincerity of his work even more heartfelt.

kazoo + jazz = no fun

I have just bought the THELONIOUS MONK QUARTET with JOHN COLTRANE at Carnegie Hall CD reissue on Blue Note Records and the kazoo-like humming, omnipresent on the last tracks, irritates me terribly. I have absolutely no clue where this disturbing background drone comes from. I first thought I had bought a defect copy but when I listen very closely, I realise it comes from one of the musicians. I tried to find info on the internet because no review mentions the annoying humming but the only relating thing I found was a sentence in a review of an old Art Tatum CD : "...and Slam Stewart turns in some of his patented bowed bass work with accompanying humming, creating the illusion of a low-pitched kazoo". Is Ahmed Abdul-Malik spoiling the fun?

Total Destruction

When I started this blog a couple of months ago, I intented to frequently post pictures of shows I attended. Yesterday however, I went to the ANGRY ANGLES/TOKYO ELECTRON/REATARDS triple bill at the fabulous Pit's and I shot all-in-all 1 picture. I could have made many more though 'cuz when TOKYO ELECTRON kicked off their excellent show, my forehead got busted open with a guitar and I decided to follow the gig from behind the bar. It was the ideal place to shoot pics but hell... shooting pics at live shows really bores the living shit out of me! You simply can not enjoy a show while shooting pictures and vice versa! So I'm afraid that this lousy live shot will be one of the very few that will ever be posted on this blog.




JAY REATARD by the way was devastating. It was the last show of the tour and apparantly Jay had been enjoying our excellent but strong Westmalle Trappist beers since the afternoon. THE REATARDS show was fierce as usual but during the last 10 minutes, it seemed like Jay transformed into a manic beast : he smashed bottles to the wall, wrecked microphones, ruined micro stands, jumped on the bar and spewed his psychotric hatred in our faces. He is definately food for a psychologist or should I say an anthropologist? The question remains however, how come this furious wave of all things negative feels so good???

Day Ten : Fri Oct 21, 2005

** DRAWING RESTRAINT N°9 (MATTHEW BARNEY - 2005 – USA)

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**** LE PETIT LIEUTENANT (XAVIER BEAUVOIS - 2005 – France)

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** MANDERLAY (LARS VON TRIER - 2005 – Denmark)

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*½ THE CITY OF THE SUN (MARTIN SULÍK - 2005 - Czech Republic/Slovakia)

Day Nine : Thu Oct 20, 2005

**** ANGEL'S FALL (SEMIH KAPLANOGLU - 2004 - Turkey)

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*½ LES ETATS NORDIQUES (DENIS CÔTÉ - 2005 – Canada)

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***½ BE WITH ME (ERIC KHOO - 2005 – Singapore)

Day Eight : Wed Oct 19, 2005

**½ 2 GIRLS (KUTLUG ATAMAN - 2005 – Turkey)

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**** APRIL SNOW (HUR JIN-HO – 2005 - South-Korea)

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0 HARDCORE (DENNIS ILIADIS - 2004 – Greece)

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**½ LES ARTISTES DU THÉÂTRE BRÛLÉ (RITHY PANH - 2005 - Cambodia)

Day Seven : Tue Oct 18, 2005

*** EL CIELO GIRA (MERCEDES ALVAREZ - 2005 – Spain)

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*** BIPEDALISM (YEVGENI YUFIT - 2004 – Russia)

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** STRANGER (MALGOSIA SZUMOWSKA - 2004 – Poland)

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** LA SAGRADA FAMILIA (SEBASTIÁN CAMPOS - 2005 – Chili)

Day Six : Mon Oct 17, 2005

**½ GARPASTUM (ALEKSEY GERMAN JR. - 2005 – Russia)
Garpastum is a Latin word meaning a ball game, and contests were played as far back as ancient China and Sparta. Set in 1914 in St. Petersburg, the capital of the collapsing Russian Empire, World War I has already begun. The handsome brothers Andrey and Nikolai are passionate about the amateur matches they play on the streets of St. Petersburg. With their friends Shoust and Fatso, they hatch a scheme to buy a playing field. In order to finance it, they start playing for money with workmen, seminarians and anyone else they encounter. Andrey engages in an affair with a wealthy actress from Belgrade, Nikolai, an aspiring doctor, becomes infatuated with her sister Vita. Soon all of their lives and their world will be shattered and ruined by the Revolution of 1917. But there is still some time left for them to cherish their dreams and indulge in their passion for soccer. The film, which tells about tragic events, has a light breath and relaxed cinematic language and I liked it although most of my companions didn’t. Beautiful cinematography and stylish anti-drama nonetheless.

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***** A WORKINGMAN'S DEATH (MICHAEL GLAWOGGER - 2005 – Germany/Austria)


This stunning five-part documentary is about heavy labour, about the most gruelling physical labour imaginable as it is carried out in different places and under different social and economic conditions. Men who work life-threatening jobs—and as the settings jump from Java to China, Nigeria to the Ukraine, so does the subtle music by John Zorn. Steaming sulphur mines, the bloodbaths of a brutal slaughterhouse… Glawogger's spellbounding visuals leave you breathless. The unique soundtrack by John Zorn is an added bonus. A monumental film!

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** A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE (DAVID CRONENBERG - 2005 – Canada)
A surprisingly conventional film from the normally more adventurous David Cronenberg about a prototypically normal Middle American family put to the test by crime and a disruption of its very identity. In the beginning, Cronenberg tries too hard to portray a perfect family, including the most ridiculous bed scene I have seen in ages. Ridiculous! The tale of a top mob gangster who turns into a local diner employee isn’t very convincing too. Although most of the action scenes are fun to watch, I couldn't stop thinking : "Is this all there is Mr. Cronenberg?"

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**½ NEWS FROM AFAR (RICARDO BENET - 2005 – Mexico) Mexican director Ricardo Benet's first feature film, is a a gloomy picture about a teenager who lives with his troubled mother, resentful stepfather, and reverential younger brother on a homestead in a deserted, waterless area that doesn't even has a name – the settlement is simply known as No. 17. The first half of the film is about their futile attempts to make a go of it. In the second part, Martin moves to the capital for work, living in a flophouse and getting involved with a psychologically disturbed woman. He returns to his family, only to find that the neighbours have all moved away, his mother is catatonic, and his stepdad is inflexible about her fate. Tragedy ensues when Martin ultimately asserts himself. An interesting debut.

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Day Five : Sun Oct 16, 2005

0 LOST CHILDREN (OLIVER STOLTZ & ALI SAMADI AHADI - 2005 – Germany). This documentary about child soldiers in the civil war in Northern Unganda is a complete disaster. Not only does it look very messy but the tragic dialogues are dubbed in English. So you get to see for example a mother and child who talk about the war in a mud hut but you hear silly American voices. I left the theatre after 20 minutes, not shocked by the picture but pissed of by the retarded dubbings.

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Guillermo Arriaga, the Mexican screenwriter of “Amores Perros” and “21 Grams”, is the author of the grandiose **** THE THREE BURIALS OF MELQUIADES ESTRADA (TOMMY LEE JONES - 2005 – USA).


Tommy Lee Jones, the actor-director plays the role of Pete Perkins, foreman of a Texas ranch. His best friend, Melquiades, a "wetback," is found dead in the middle of the desert. Because the local police have no plans to pursue his murderer, Melquiades is given a summary burial. But Pete decides to investigate the crime himself. He eventually catches the culprit and forces him to dig up Melquiades's body and take it to his native village in Mexico, to give him a burial worthy of the name. This majestic contemporary western complete with chapter headings ("The First Burial," etc.) won the Grand Prix for Best Movie at the festival. Dwight Yoakam is godlike as local Sheriff Belmont and the Mexicans actually do speak Spanish which is a true relief for an American movie.

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0 MY BROTHER’S SUMMER (PIETRO REGGIANI - 2005 – Italy)
A moronic coming-of-age comedy about a teenager who hates the idea that his mother might be pregnant and fiercely resists the prospect of a new sibling. The Vivialdi score proofs that Reggiani has nothing to offer besides very boring and infantile cinema. Awful.

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Although *** BRIDES (PANTELIS VOULGARIS - 2004 – Greece) is an old-fashioned film in both tone and virtues about 700 young mail order brides crossing the Atlantic from Greece to North America in 1922, I found the film charming and visually elegant. The story is captivating and dramatic and though we are talking about a very conventional film, I was moved by the very poignant end. Martin Scorsese was executive producer of this satisfying melodrama, sentimental but heartfelt.

Day Four : Sat Oct 15, 2005

***½ ODETE (JOÃO PEDRO RODRIGUES - 2005 – Portugal). João Pedro Rodrigues’ first feature, the 2000 Venice competition entry ‘O Fantasma’, was one of the most original debuts in recent years. This second feature doesn’t really life up to the first one but it is still an intriguing piece of cinema. It tells the story of a girl sinking into madness when crossing paths with a boy mourning the death of his gay lover. Another dark & twisted tale by this Portugese enfant terrible.

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**** CROSSING THE BRIDGE: THE SOUND OF ISTANBUL (FATIH AKIN
2005 - Germany – Turkey) is the follow-up to Fatih Akin’s overwhelming Golden Bear-winner ‘Gegen Die Wand’ and another proof of the director’s contagious enthusiasm and efficiency. Akin takes us once again to the melting-pot Istanbul to paint a unique portrait of the city’s vibrant music scene. He follows Einstürzende Neubauten bass player Alexander Hacke who fell in love with the city sounds and seeks out its musicians. The range of Akin’s film is amazing : Hacke explores everything from classical music to noise-rock, hip-hop and street music. The changes from one musical genre to another are never abrupt and the interviews never become boring. A winner from start to finish!

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Based on a popular Korean novel, but cast entirely with Japanese actors and written with predominantly Japanese dialogue, *** BLOOD AND BONES (YOICHI SAI - 2004 – Japan) covers 61 years of familial tyranny by an ultra-violent patriarch called Kim Sun-pei who, in the 1920s, attempts to build a fortune in Japan. This Korean migrant (an amazing Takeshi Kitano, under his acting moniker Beat Takeshi) literally blows everybody else off the screen. The story is told by Kim's son Masao who reveals at the beginning that he was born after his father raped his mother with his sister looking on. Treating his wife, children and fellow members of the Korean migrant community in Osaka with disdain, Kim drinks and womanizes, establishing multiple mistresses, siring several bastards and acquiring great wealth. Bullying his way, he develops a fishcake business into a loan-sharking and property empire. The stylish art direction and the smooth pace at which the movie flows makes BLOOD AND BONES a ruthless but interesting family drama.

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*** ME AND YOU AND EVERYONE WE KNOW (MIRANDA JULY - 2005 – USA), the first feature by multimedia performance artist Miranda July, is a fresh & inspired observation about love, loss and loneliness. The film opens with an act of lovelorn desperation as shoe salesman Richard (John Hawkes) responds to the news that his wife is leaving him by setting his own hand on fire. It immediately sets the absurd tone of Miranda July’s highly original script. There are some very funny moments like when 7-year-old Robby conducts a chat room flirtation with an over stimulated adult female on the Internet, seducing her with the romantic promise: "You poop into my butthole, I poop into your butthole, back and forth forever." A featherweight film, entertaining but – let’s be honest - far from unforgettable.

Day Three : Fri Oct 14, 2005

*** BEFORE THE FLOOD (YAN YU & LI YIFAN - 2005 – China)

China's Three Gorges Dam, the largest ever built on earth, is expected to be completed in 2009. Until then, millions of local residents will have to be relocated, because hundreds of towns and villages — including countless natural monuments and historically important places — will be flooded. Yan Mo documents the relocation of Fengjie, a 1,000-year-old city on the Yangtze River, a bustling centre of commerce and a community of considerable social vitality

BEFORE THE FLOOD follows the inhabitants who are chased out of their houses and feel betrayed and abandoned by the local officials. Directors Yan Yu and Li Yifan observe without comment, focusing mostly on an aging innkeeper and the staff of the parish church. Some scenes are too long and would have been more effective had they been edited down to the essentials but overall, this is an enthralling piece of cinema.

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**** JEANNE DIELMAN, 23 QUAI DU COMMERCE, 1080 BRUXELLES (CHANTAL AKERMAN - 1976 – Belgium/France)

Hailed internationally upon its release as a masterpiece of feminist filmmaking, "Jeanne Dielman" today stands as a landmark in film history. Thanks to Jem Cohen, I finally got the chance to see this 1975 experiment in film form which minutely details the three-day routine of a widow living with her son. The endless sequences of household chores performed in silence before a static camera look somehow dated in 2005, but the importance in film history of “Jeanne Dielman” is still omnipresent when watching the movie. A resolute marathon session of 225 min. that becomes an unforgettable experience. A true piece of art.

Day Two : Thu Oct 13, 2005

*** DALLAS PASHAMENDE (ROBERT ADRIAN PEJO – 2005 – Hungary) is part of the ‘Official Competition’ that focuses as usual on the impact of music on film. It is also selected for a section called “Plus-Parcours” that presents a couple of movies to the elderly. Consequently, I was surrounded by hundreds of 80-year-old grannies and gramps in wheelchairs. Pretty funny, since the movie was nicely shot, but the “sluts” and “stupid bitches” kept on rolling out of the mouths of the gypsies who tried to make a living on a massive garbage dump by humiliating each other. On the occasion of his father’s death, Radu, a native Gypsy, returns to the shanty town of his childhood where he meets Oana, the sweetheart of his youth. What follows is an entertaining movie, somehow like a Kusturica film without the hysteria and hyperactivity. Nothing to write home about, just a decent movie..

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Another film selected for the “Official Competition” is * FIRST PEOPLE ON THE MOON (ALEXEI FEDORCHENKO – 2005 – Russia). This pseudo-documentary mixes authentic b&w archival footage with newly shot full-colour footage to create some kind of history of the Soviet conquest of space. The collage however failed to hold my interest so I was rather pleased that it only lasted for about 75 minutes. File under ‘Boring’.

Day One : Wed Oct 12, 2005

This year's Flanders International Film Festival-Ghent offers over 200 films and you'll find my impressions on some of them right here the coming days. It's a hell of a job to make a selection of 32 movies (32nd edition, right?) out of 200 but the first two movies I saw turned out to be top choice.

**** WINSTANLY (KEVIN BROWNLOW - 1975- UK) is a genuine authentic historical film about Britain's great neglected revolutionary Gerard Winstanley's non-violent actions to reclaim land for the poor during the British Civil Wars in the late 1640s. The screenplay was based on Winstanley's writings which are often quoted literally without sounding too artificial. As a consequence of the low budget, there's some very inventive camera work especially during the battle in the beginning and the destruction of the forest village where a series of close-ups are mixed with fighting scenes and flashes of fire. The movie is very convincing in the way it depicts Winstanley's struggle for justice and equality. On release in 1976, WINSTANLEY demonstrated Brownlow and co director Andrew Mollo's estrangement from both Britain's mainstream and independent cinemas. The film did not fit the costume drama pigeonhole, nor did it pursue the Greenaway path towards elaborate games with form and content. Today, it was shown as a part of the section "Memory of Film - Fuse Box", a programme compiled by experimental artist Jem Cohen whose 'Instrument', a musical document from 1998 on Fugazi will also be shown at the festival.

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Another highlight was ***** LITTLE FUGITIVE (RAY ASHLEY, MORRIS ENGEL & RUTH ORKIN - 1953 - USA). This unforgettable film about a seven-year-old boy's adventures in the fantasy-world refuge of Coney Island was one of the first independent films to attract a wide audience. François Truffaut even claimed it was an inspiration to the French New Wave. The b&w photography is outstanding and the story keeps the audience enthralled for the whole 80 minutes because of the perfect balance between humour and emotion. The copy we got to see came directly from LA and throughout the film, I couldn't stop thinking what a bunch of lucky devils we were that we got the chance to see this rightly honoured landmark of the early American indie movement on the big screen after all those years.


More updates this Monday...

Film Puts a New Focus on the Master of 'Ethiojazz'

In Jim Jarmusch's latest movie, "Broken Flowers", a graying former ladies' man played by Bill Murray has a strange companion with him as he searches for some old girlfriends, one of whom may have borne his son. He's gloomy but intrigued by the quest, and his mood is matched by the passenger in his rental car: a CD of brooding and mysterious music, a little funky and a little slithery, a bit like a 1970's blaxploitation soundtrack and a bit like dense modal jazz. He never seems to know what to make of it, but he clearly likes it.

The music is a particularly obscure vintage made in Ethiopia in the late 1960's and early 70's by a jazz innovator named Mulatu Astatke, and thanks to "Broken Flowers" and an acclaimed series of CD's, his music has enjoyed a little renaissance lately. A prominent figure in Ethiopia but barely known to Western listeners, Mr. Astatke makes a rare United States appearance tonight at Joe's Pub with the Either/Orchestra, an avant-garde jazz group that has championed him.

From the moment Mr. Jarmusch first heard it, about six years ago, the music got under his skin, he said, and he began seeking it out wherever he could find it. "When I was writing 'Broken Flowers,' " he said by phone from his home in the Catskills, "I was listening to a lot of his music, and I was thinking, 'How do I get this music into a film that's set in suburban America?' It even led me to make the character of Jeffrey Wright of Ethiopian descent." In the film, Mr. Wright's character, Mr. Murray's next-door neighbor, gets him started on his journey and hands him the disc. Several songs by Mr. Astatke are used prominently in the film, and are on the soundtrack album, released by Decca.

Mr. Astatke, a vibraphonist and bandleader, had a suitably cosmopolitan upbringing for a music that blends jazz with funk, Latin music and traditional Ethiopian five-tone scales. Born in 1943 in the western Ethiopian city of Jimma, he was one of the few musicians of his generation to be educated abroad. He went to the Trinity College of Music in London, where he studied clarinet, harmony and theory, and in the early 60's attended the Schillinger House of Music in Boston, now the Berklee College of Music.

"My whole idea," he said by phone the other day from his home in Addis Ababa, "was sort of fusion with Ethiopian and jazz and modern music. I started at Berklee this idea of the 'Ethiojazz' business. From there I came to New York and I had this group, and what I wanted to do, I did it there."

His group in New York, the Ethiopian Quintet, was mostly Puerto Rican. He recorded two albums in the 60's on a small New York label, Worthy. He jammed with Dave Pike, who was Herbie Mann's vibraphonist at the time, and remembers his time here fondly.

"We had all these big bands," he said. "And the Village Gate, the Village Vanguard, the Palladium - there were all these clubs around at that time." He was surprised and delighted to learn that the Vanguard is still in business. "It's still around?" he said. "Fantastic! Wow!"

Mr. Astatke returned to Ethiopia in the late 60's and took part in a fertile musical scene there in the waning years of Emperor Haile Selassie, who was deposed in 1974. Establishing himself as a jazz ambassador, he brought the Hammond organ and vibraphone to Ethiopia. "I changed the whole Ethiopian music," he said without shyness, "combining jazz and fusion with the Ethiopian five-tone scales. Since then my name has been on the very, very top of the Ethiopian musical scene."

The music of that period, influenced by American funk and soul, is being collected in "�thiopiques," a series of albums on the French label Buda Musique, which since the late 90's has run to 20 volumes. Mr. Astatke's disc, Vol. 4, is its best seller and has seen a bump in sales since "Broken Flowers" was released in August. It is now selling about 1,800 copies a week, said a spokeswoman for Allegro, the albums' American distributor; that is equivalent to the sales of a new album by a world music star like Youssou N'Dour.

Last year the Either/Orchestra, led by the saxophonist and composer Russ Gershon, performed in Addis Ababa and met Mr. Astatke. The group has since brought him to the United States for concerts twice, the first times Mr. Astatke had performed in New York in many years. After performing at Joe's Pub tonight, they will go on a brief Northeastern tour, traveling to Boston, Philadelphia, Washington and Colgate University in Hamilton, N.Y.

Mr. Astatke said he had been following news of "Broken Flowers" by e-mail ("I'm very far away") but had not yet seen them film in its entirety. He added, with a laugh, "I'm going to see it in New York."

By BEN SISARIO - The New York Times - Published: October 13, 2005


http://either-orchestra.org/mulatu.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/13/arts/music/13mula.html

"In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends."

Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-1968)

Saturday was a night that won't be forgotten very easily! In the afternoon, I had about 11 brats in my house, celebrating my oldest son's 5th anniversary. The loose & wild atmosphere turned out to be the ideal introduction to THE GHETTO WAYS/RIVER CITY TANLINES/BLACK LIPS triple bill at the Lintfabriek in the evening. A couple of weeks ago, I had seen THE GHETTO WAYS at the mighty Pit's where they couldn't fulfil expectations after a devastating FATALS show. In Kontich however, their high-energy full throttle punkrock totally blew me away. The final gig of a European tour always delivers that little extra more so we got to see this New York trio at their very best. Awesome! Alicja Trout was next with THE RIVER CITY TANLINES. I hadn't heard any of the band's 3 singles so I was pretty anxious to witness this Memphis outfit on stage. Again, the show was a blast! Their adrenaline-driven punkwave made me dance like a fool and Alicja's vocals sounded real vicious. Check out The River City Tanlines' singles compilation on Dirtnap 'cuz it's a winner! So normally, we're used to 2 bands a night here in bloody Belgium and The Ghetto Ways/River City Tanlines bill would already have been a favourite of the year. Only, THE BLACK LIPS were scheduled too!! The first Black Lips show I attended sounded like a bad rehearsal but the second - only a couple of months later - was total garage punk insanity. Saturday, it was primal wreck and roll time again! Beers flew through the air, people went crazy, all for the sake of that goddamn rock 'n roll!! I can only say that The Black Lips are the contemporary gods of sixties punk!! Oh what a night!!!

Belgian directors Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne, whose brilliant brotherly teamwork has been awarded two times with a Palme d'Or at the Cannes Filmfestival ('Rosetta' in 1999 and 'L'Enfant' in 2005), have been given carte blanche at the Brussels Filmmuseum in September. The Dardenne brothers have chosen some thirty movies that can be divided into two main categories. The first is a collection of movies that moulded the brothers as directors, such as the documentaries by Dutch director Johan Van Der Keuken. The other category consists of movies that evoke feelings of solidarity and identification with the brothers. The result is a diverse, original list of wonderful movies that hopefully will win the hearts of the attendant filmlovers in Brussels. Here's the complete list. For scheduling details, visit the site of the Brussels Filmmuseum.


LIBERTY
Leo McCarey, USA 1929
Oliver Hardy / b&w / 19'

CITY LIGHTS
Charles Chaplin, USA 1931
Charles Chaplin, Virginia Cherrill / b&w / 85'

POURQUOI ISRAËL
Claude Lanzmann, France 1973 / colour / 190'

HANGMEN ALSO DIE
Fritz Lang, USA 1943
Brian Donlevy, Walter Brennan / b&w / 134'

STROMBOLI, TERRA DI DIO
Roberto Rossellini, Italy 1949
Ingrid Bergman / b&w / 107'

STREET OF SHAME
[Akasen chitai] Kenji Mizoguchi, Japan 1956
Machiko Kyo / b&w / 84'

STRAY DOG
[Nora-inu] Akira Kurosawa, Japan 1949
Toshiro Mifune / b&w / 122'

L' ENCLOS
Armand Gatti, France - Yugoslavia 1960
b&w / 103'

A TIME TO LOVE AND A TIME TO DIE
Douglas Sirk, USA 1958
John Gavin, Liselotte Pulver, Klaus Kinski / scope / colour / 132'

UKIGUSA
Yasujiro Ozu, Japan 1959
Ganjiro Nakamura, Mashiko Kyo / colour / 119'

ACCATTONE
Pier Paolo Pasolini, Italy 1961
Franco Citti / b&w / 116'

COMPARTIMENT TUEURS
Constantin Costa-Gavras, France 1965
Yves Montand, Simone Signoret, Michel Piccoli, Jacques Perrin / scope / b&w / 91'

DODES'KA-DEN
Akira Kurosawa, Japan 1970
colour / 140'

QUATRE NUITS D'UN REVEUR
Robert Bresson, France - Italy 1971
Isabelle Weingarten, Guillaume De Forêts / colour / 82'

L'HISTOIRE D'ADELE H.
François Truffaut, France 1975
Isabelle Adjani / colour / 97'

THE CONVERSATION
Francis Ford Coppola, USA 1974
Gene Hackman / colour / 112'

THE DIARY OF A CHAMBERMAID
Jean Renoir, USA 1946
Paulette Goddard, Burgess Meredith / b&w / 86'

FAUSTRECHT DER FREIHEIT
Rainer Werner Fassbinder, DDR 1975
Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Kurt Raab / colour / 123'

PASSE TON BAC D'ABORD
Maurice Pialat, France 1979
Sabine Haudepin / colour / 84'

BIANCA
Nanni Moretti, Italy 1984
Nanni Moretti, Laura Morante / colour / 97'

THE KILLING OF A CHINESE BOOKIE
John Cassavetes, USA 1976
Ben Gazzara, Seymour Cassel / colour / 108'

THE THIRTY-NINE STEPS
Alfred Hitchcock, UK 1935
Madeleine Carroll, Robert Donat / b&w / 84'

LES CINEPHILES - LE RETOUR DE JEAN
Louis Skorecki, France 1988
no subt. / 75'

LES CINEPHILES - ERIC A DISPARU
Louis Skorecki, France 1988
no subt./ 56'

DE WEG NAAR HET ZUIDEN
Johan Der Keuken, The Netherlands 1982
colour / 150'

SANS TOIT NI LOI
Agnès Varda, France - UK 1985
Sandrine Bonnaire, Macha Méril, Stéphane Freiss / colour / 106'

THE MATCH FACTORY GIRL
[Tulitikkutehtaan tyttö] Aki Kaurismäki, Finland - Sweden 1990
colour / 68'

LES ROSEAUX SAUVAGES
André Téchiné, France 1994
Elodie Bouchez, Gaël Morel, Stéphane Rideau / colour / 113'

CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS
Woody Allen, USA 1989
Woody Allen, Mia Farrow, Martin Landau, Anjelica Huston, Claire Bloom / colour / 103'

VIVE L’AMOUR
[Aiqing Wansui] Tsai Ming-Liang, Taiwan 1994
Yang Kuei-Mei / colour / 118'

PORTRAIT D'UNE JEUNE FILLE DE LA FIN DES ANNEES 60, A BRUXELLES
Chantal Akerman, France 1994
colour / 61'

SUZAKU
[Moe no suzaku] Naomi Kawase, Japan 1997
Jun Kunimura, Machiko Ono / colour / 95'

S21, LA MACHINE DE MORT KHMERE ROUGE
Rithy Panh, Cambodja - France 2002
colour / 101'

L'ARGENT FAIT LE BONHEUR
Robert Guédiguian, France 1993
Jean-Pierre Darroussin, Ariane Ascaride / colour / 92'

CASINO
Martin Scorsese, USA - France 1995
Robert De Niro, Sharon Stone / scope / colour / 178'

If I had to guide a foreigner round Belgium in 3 days, 'THE ROYAL MUSEUM FOR CENTRAL AFRICA' near Brussels would be on top of my list. This grand p(a)lace came into being following the World Fair of 1897. Its collection of ethnographic objects from Central Africa is in fact the only one of its kind in the world.

The permanent exhibition still reflects the way Europe regarded Africa in the nineteen-sixties with all its exotica and colonial propaganda. It's a wonderful place for kids since there are many rooms with huge stuffed animals, African masks and instruments. Here, I can still feel the excitement I felt as a teenager when looking to old Johnny Weismuller Tarzan movies at my grandfather's place on Sunday afternoons.

Because of a radically altered social context not only in Africa but in Europe as well, the museum is now undergoing a metamorphosis that will be complete in 2010. For the occasion of the 175th Anniversary of Belgium's Independence, a temporary exhibit called 'Memory of Congo - The Colonial Era' offers a new look at the colonial past in which not only the European, but also the African players take their part. The exhibition is flawless; intriguing and revealing.

In the museum's cafeteria 'Simba', I always go for a Congolese Mongozo beer (alright, brewed in Belgium but what the heck). Yesterday, I bumped into Nick Cave at the bar. He was scheduled to headline a big rock festival that night. If he was searching for inspiration, he sure did come to the right place! After all these years, 'The Royal Museum for Central Africa' is still a stupendous place that keeps on enchanting its visitors.

ON A WEEKDAY IN SEPTEMBER 1999, JAPANESE NOISE MONGERS MELT BANANA GAVE A BLISTERING SET OF FRENZIED PUNK AVANTGARDE THRASH AT THE 4AD CLUB IN DIKSMUIDE. BEFORE THE SHOW, I ASKED THE BAND A COUPLE OF QUESTIONS. NOW THAT MELT BANANA HAS JUST RELEASED A GREAT SINGLES COMPILATION ON THEIR OWN A-ZAP LABEL, I THINK IT’S ABOUT TIME TO PUBLISH THIS LITTLE INTERVIEW...



So when did the band start?

In 1994!

Only 1994?

OK, 1993.

Ah!

Our original drummer quit the band last year. He used to be in a band called Satanic Hell Slaughter which was a grindcore band. In Japan they were some kind of cult because they are from the northern part of Japan and people in Tokyo couldn't see 'em often. Since he had moved to Tokyo, we found his phonenumber and we asked him to join us.

How would you describe your music to outsiders?

The easiest way would be to say punk but we prefer to describe our music as GAGAGAGA-KIUNE-GAGAGAGA-KIUNE-KIUNE-NJHE-NJHE-NJHE-NJHA!!!

? ? ? ? ?

It's just a sound. Usually this expression is used for comic cartoons like Masinga.

Your music sounds like weird & fucked up cartoons. Can you tell us some more about the band's main influence?

We don't try to make music like watching a picture and trying to write a little change. Not like that! We just mix different influences in the brain.

Do you get influences from exhibitions?

Sometimes, we like going to exhibitions and watching Japanese animation.

Was the Japanese director Tsukamoto an influence?

It's not really a big thing for us. We're more into animation by Katsuhiro Otomo who did Akira and Spraygun. Spraygun is very good. It's a very fast and violent animation movie.

Do you sometimes get strange reactions to your music at live shows?

In the States sometimes but not in Japan. When we play shows in Japan usually young people come to the show. In the United States not only young people attend our shows but also old hillbillies who happen to be at the club. But it seems like they enjoy our music too so that's good!

What about the underground scene in Japan?

These days, there are many fastcore bands like Slight Slappers or Fuck On The Beach and grindcore bands like 324. Those bands are very active and many people go to check 'em out. Before - like 5 years ago - Thurston Moore from Sonic Youth and Steve Albini raved about the Japanese noise scene so many people started to pay attention. Although nowadays this kind of attention has been decreased, in Japan the hardcore stuff is very active.

How did you meet John Zorn?

We met him in Japan a long time ago. The reason why he put out an album of ours was when we played in San Francisco, Mike Patton saw our show and he's a very close friend to John Zorn. He knew us for a long time, but because of Mike Patton's phone call, he decided to put out our album which was recorded live in the studio.

Can you tell me about the A-Zap label?

It's our own label. Revolver USA helps us to manufacture and distribute. They have a good distribution in USA maybe not as good here. So far we released two albums on the label.

Can you make a living from the band?

Not really. I work at home as a free lance. I edit on a computer for other companies but it doesn't come constantly so sometimes I have money and sometimes not. But I can have time to do what I want to do, like writing music, so it's a good job for me. Once I had a 9 to 5 job but it was very hard to find the time to write music or to write lyrics so I quit it.

Well Done!

Melt Banana website

"If our lives are dominated by a search for happiness, then perhaps few activities reveal as much about the dynamics of this quest – in all its ardour and paradoxes – than our travels. They express, however inarticulately, an understanding of what life might be about, outside the constraints of work and the struggle for survival."

(The Art of Travel – Alain De Botton)

I will be travelling around WESTERN TURKEY for the rest of the month. A report of my journey will be published on my site in August.
ENJOY YOUR HOLIDAYS!