"From her home in Muscat, capital of Oman, Safiya Ahmad Al Lawati is using peach-colored thread to embroider a cap known in Omani Arabic as a kummah. Pushing her needle through the thick white calico, she works the thread around one of the cap’s dozens of small eyelets that aide ventilation in a hot climate. ‘I started early this morning,’ she explains. ‘It is a long and complicated process, and it can take up to a month or more depending on how elaborate the decoration is.’ ...”
‘They enjoyed this’: Ukrainian woman recounts five-month nightmare of torture and imprisonment
"Olena Yahupova was first taken by the Russian occupiers in the Ukrainian city of Enerhodar last October. Neighbours she knew had informed on her, telling the FSB secret police that her husband was a Ukrainian military officer. What followed, she says, was two days of torture with the secret police – which turned out to be only a prelude to a nightmare of five months of detention and forced labour, during which she also had to act in faked news clips. ... Enerhodar was a city of 53,000 before the war, best known as being the site of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, the largest in Europe. A key target for the Russian invaders, it was captured in early March 2022. ...”
NBC News: Ukraine recaptures southeastern village as long-awaited counteroffensive rumbles on (Video)
Houses and stadium are seen underwater and polluted by oil in the flooded Kherson, Ukraine, Saturday, June 10, 2023. Ukraine claims recapture of seven villages in early stages of counteroffensive
I'm Going Where The Water Drinks Like Wine / 18 Unsung Bluesmen Rarities 1923-29
"There's been Robert Johnson, Charley Patton, and Blind Lemon Jefferson, there's been Bukka White, Sleepy John Estes, Skip James, etc. They became legendary in their lifetime or the White counterculture saved them in extremis from oblivion in the '60s. ... These musicians didn't meet their destiny at a crossroad; no folk or blues label rediscovered them. They never got a second chance. They had to accept lowly jobs unrelated to their art. They survived. Most of them came from Mississippi, Memphis, St. Louis. They were all highly unique, and they recorded at a young age - a very young age in some cases - in the '20s. They would walk into a hotel, guitar in hand, for a recording session or two. For some, we don't even know their names, since they cut a few 78rpm sides and left for who knows where. Their traces get lost in the Great Depression. ...”
Gangster film
"A gangster film or gangster movie is a film belonging to a genre that focuses on gangs and organized crime. It is a subgenre of crime film, that may involve large criminal organizations, or small gangs formed to perform a certain illegal act. The genre is differentiated from Westerns and the gangs of that genre. ... New Hollywood directors would be honored with 5 of the top 6 films on the list—1967's Bonnie and Clyde by Arthur Penn, 1972's The Godfather and 1974's The Godfather Part II both by Francis Ford Coppola, 1983's Scarface, a remake of the 1932 original, by Brian De Palma, and 1990's Goodfellas by Martin Scorsese. The rise and fall of a mobster in a classic gangster film is often a thematic trope. ...”
YouTube: The Death of the American Gangster Film 36:20, The Godfather: How Michael Corleone Evolves 13:30
American Gangster - Ridley Scott (2007)
Russian forces face shortage of tanks as counteroffensive creeps forward
"Russia’s forces are suffering a shortage of tanks, the country’s defence minister has admitted, as Ukraine’s offensive in the south and east continued to push back the frontline with the help of western hardware. Sergei Shoigu, on a visit to a military factory in western Siberia, said that production of armoured vehicles needed to be increased as Kyiv talked up the heavy losses being inflicted on the occupying enemy. An increase in the manufacture of tanks was said by Shoigu to be necessary ‘to satisfy the needs of Russian forces carrying out the special military operation’, in comments that echoed those of Vladimir Putin earlier in the week. ...”
NBC News: Ukraine counteroffensive has 'no chance,' Putin says as Russians brace for long war (Video)
Ukraine has recently launched an offensive to reclaim territory seized by Russia
The Fierce, Flourishing World of Battle Rap
"On the eastern edge of Bedford-Stuyvesant — a Brooklyn neighborhood synonymous with hip-hop excellence — a tiny wellness center is tucked between a Pentecostal church and a real estate office. Inside its sterile, 800 or so square feet, there’s a wall of mirrors, stock photos of people performing various exercises and fluorescent lighting that makes the plastic plants in the corner look even more fake. On certain nights, one could be excused for thinking this is a waiting room and not what it actually is: a battleground. Here, in this unassuming room, the Trap NY — one of several battle rap leagues based in New York City — hosts most of its events. ...”
From left: Bosevich4, Chris Dubbs and Bizzness at the Trap NY in January.
Heart of the Congos - The Congos (1977)
"Heart of the Congos is a roots reggae album by The Congos, produced by Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry at his Black Ark studio with a studio band including Boris Gardiner on bass and Ernest Ranglin on guitar. The album was released in 1977. It is noted as being one of Perry's masterpiece productions of the Black Ark era. The first issue of the LP in Jamaica was a very limited release said to consist of only several hundred copies. It was remastered using the original Black Ark quarter inch master tapes with the exception of 'At The Feast' and re-released in 1996 on the Blood & Fire label, run by Steve Barrow, T Elwing, and Mick Hucknall, with assistance on the ground provided by Andrea Lewis (Jamaica). ...”
Ukraine war: 'Extremely fierce battles' as Kyiv seeks to advance
"‘Extremely fierce battles’ are raging in parts of Ukraine as Kyiv's forces continue their counter-offensive, the country's deputy defence minister says. Hanna Maliar wrote on Telegram that Ukrainian forces had managed to advance near Bakhmut in the east and Zaporizhzhia in the south. But she conceded Russian forces were mounting a stiff defence in some areas. Her comments come after another night of Russian missile and drones strikes on cities across Ukraine. Russia has stepped up its bombing campaign in recent weeks, despite President Vladimir Putin admitting that his forces are suffering from a shortage of missiles and drones. In the early hours of Thursday morning, overnight attacks hit industrial facilities in the Dnipropetrovsk region, according to Ukraine's army. Regional military spokesperson Serhiy Bratchuk said a series of drone attacks on the Black Sea region of Odesa were repelled by air defence systems. ...”
Ukraininan troops have recaptured several settlements in the east of the country
The media of the useable past
"... However, columns like Abyotawi Medrek are a reminder that there were once serious propositions outlining new ways to reconstitute social life—and a deep awareness of the battles that still lay ahead, even in places never, or no longer, colonized.This post inaugurates a series on such material legacies of the African left. It comes out of a project that we co-launched in 2019, Revolutionary Papers, which studies leftwing, anti-colonial, and anti-imperial periodicals, newspapers, newsletters, journals, magazines, and other print ephemera out of the Global South, in the 20th century, as sites of critical, analytical, aesthetic, political, cultural, and literary experimentation. ...”
Face The Spectrum: Poland’s New Young Experimental Composers
"... [Martyna Basta] Field recordings are the core of her latest album, Slowly Forgetting, Barely Remembering, although it’s not easy to recognise them as such. The music sounds electronic, even though she used no synthesisers during its production. The starting point is acoustic. Take ‘Speechless Lately’, for example, based on recordings of an ice cube, foil blowing in the wind, rustling leaves captured by a contact microphone, a wine glass that’s transformed into a drone. She adds the sounds of zither and electric guitar, introducing scratches of melody to a story suspended in time. She plays with silence, meticulously building with small details. ...”
Ukraine offensive: BBC goes inside village just freed from Russian forces
"The BBC is among the first media organisations to gain access to some of the first villages liberated in Ukraine's counteroffensive. Out of this cluster of four settlements in the eastern Donetsk region, Neskuchne has seen the heaviest fighting according to the battalion which liberated it. Ukraine lost six soldiers in the process.Its name means ‘not boring" in Ukrainian. An obvious irony for a village that was occupied by Russia in spring last year - a few weeks after President Vladimir Putin launched his full-scale invasion of Ukraine. It was at the most northern point of a protruding Russian front line. As our army escort, Anatoliy, speeds along scarred roads in his camouflaged truck towards Neskuchne, ...”
The Destruction of Penn Station: How New York City Lost Its Majestic Beaux-Arts Rail Terminal
"In the New York of old, ‘one entered the city like a god. One scuttles in now like a rat.’ When he wrote those words, architectural historian Vincent Scully issued what has ended up as the definitive judgment of Pennsylvania Station. Or rather, of the Pennsylvania Stations: the majestic original building from 1910, as well as its utilitarian replacement that has stood in Midtown Manhattan since 1968. But then, the word ‘stood’ doesn’t quite apply to the latter, since it resides entirely underground, below Madison Square Garden. Over the years, New Yorkers have come more and more openly to resent the Penn Station they have and lament the Penn Station they lost, which architect Michael Wyetzner introduces to us in the Architectural Digest video above. ...”
Habibi Funk Mix 1-7 - Various Artists
"In celebration of 20.000 followers on FB and due to the fact that the Soundcloud ship might go down sooner then later I figured it might be nice to give away all mixes we have done so far. Funk from Morocco, soukouss from Algeria, deep oriental jazz from Egypt, AOR yacht pop from Lebanon, straight up disco from Tunisia, Sudanese garage and a lot more. ...”
Last reactor shut down at Ukraine’s largest nuclear plant as flood recovery goes on
"The last operating reactor at Europe’s largest nuclear power plant has been put into a ‘cold shutdown’ as a safety precaution amid catastrophic flooding from the collapse of a nearby dam, Ukraine’s nuclear energy agency said Friday. As Russia’s war on Ukraine drags on through its 16th month it's forces continued pummeling the country with missiles and drones overnigh. Ukrainian officials reported at least four deaths and damage to a military airfield. Five out of six reactors at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, which is occupied by Russian forces, are already in a state of cold shutdown, in which all control rods are inserted into the reactor core to stop the nuclear fission reaction and generation of heat and pressure. ...”
The Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant's power units have not been operating since September.
CTM 2023 Highlights: »Portals« & the worlds they give access to
"After two years of lockdown, CTM Festival is finally returning to its usual format, simultaneously unfolding a diverse range of IRL activities across Berlin from January 27 to February 5. Launched in 1999, it is still one of the main happenings in the electronic and experimental music field, audiovisual and sound art, as well as club culture. The current 24th festival edition is dedicated to the special theme »Portals«. Invited artists will explore the ‘fundamental function of sound and music as a gateway to other realities’ and world-building practices. With a series of avant-garde concerts and live performances, bubbling club nights, panels, workshops, film screenings, and installations, there is so much to see. ...”
**CTM 2023 – Portals, CTM: We Found Our Own Reality, CTM: The Ghosts Are Returning, CTM: A2A Transmission, etc.
Soundcloud: CTM 2023 – Portals: Lectures, Talks & Panels (Audio) 1:06:17, Instagram: constructionfestival
Xenoplanetary - Ruptured World (2023)
"Ruptured World returns with his 4th album in the Planetary series, Xenoplanetary. A strange dark space ambient album with spoken word and strange alien electro-jazz. The Planetary albums reach a stunning and terrifying conclusion as Phoenix Macrae's search and rescue mission for his father comes to a dramatic end. Otherworldly space jazz ambience combines with eerie melodies, cosmic riffs and mesmerising hypnotic rhythms. Enter a domain of ultimate strangeness—an alien eco-system of forested peaks and escarpments that conceal a raft of secrets in the hidden valleys that lie among them. Recommended for fans of the strangest of dark ambient, and of strong storytelling. CD and Digital Download comes with a massive 24 page booklet. ...”
Justice Dept. Unseals Indictment Against Trump
NY Times: Here are some of the charges Trump faces.
***NY Times: Trump’s Case Puts the Justice System on Trial, in a Test of Public Credibility
***NY Times: Opinion | Trump Left the Justice Dept. No Choice
***NY Times: Worldwide, Trump’s Latest Legal Woes Draw Outrage, and Shrug
Why the Ukraine dam destruction is a massive disaster — now and in the future
"A large dam on the Dnipro River, in southern Ukraine, was destroyed Tuesday, leading to major flooding and putting thousands at risk of another catastrophe along the war’s front lines. On Thursday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited the Kherson region, the area most affected by flooding from the apparent explosion at the Nova Kakhovka dam and hydroelectric power plant. At least 2,000 people have evacuated so far, according to Ukrainian officials, though potentially thousands more remain at-risk in both Ukrainian and Russian-controlled territories. Right now, both Ukraine and Russia are accusing the other of attacking the Nova Kakhovka dam, which is about 20 miles from the strategic city of Kherson. ...”
An area near the Kakhovka dam and its reservoir as seen from a damaged apartment building in Vesele, Ukraine, a village on the Dnipro River in the Kherson region on Thursday.
‘The emptiness makes it more painful’ – Christian Atsu’s club after Turkey’s devastating earthquakes
"In the centre of Antakya, the capital of Hatay province in south-eastern Turkey, there is an eery silence where a bustling city once stood. The only sound is the rubble and broken glass crunching underfoot. It is a picture of brutal destruction on a mass scale. Buildings turned into piles of their component parts, twisted and distorted. Odours float uncomfortably on the breeze, suggesting the bodies of the dead remain entombed. All around is terror: a roof tightly pressed onto a ceiling, onto a bed frame, onto a floor. Compacted, soundless concertinas. Crumpled cars shoulder the weight of bricks. Shoes, clothes and toys woven into concrete. …”
The Athletic - ‘We didn’t ever get a chance to say goodbye’: The football clubs on the fault line
****The Athletic - Listen: Football on Turkey’s fault line – our two-part audio documentary (Audio)
Various Artists: The 2-Tone Collection – A Checkered Past
"This was a collection that I discovered in the used bins in 2013 and it really filled a missing gap in my Record Cell. I was always light on Ska. I think it came down to the fact that in 1979 it really was a nearly 20 year old retro sound and nothing very up to date at a time when I was hearing startling, new styles of pop music that were like little that had come earlier. As an American, it was not a part of my country’s musical nostalgia. And the few tracks I had heard by The Specials sounded really thin and cheaply produced to my ears. Plus I was into synthesizers. This was the furthest thing from that sort of sound I gravitated to. ...”
Mapping the Flooding From the Dam Breach in Southern Ukraine
"Extensive flooding inundated villages and swept away structures after a dam was destroyed in southern Ukraine on Tuesday, according to local officials and imagery of the aftermath. With the waters still rising and reliable information hard to come by — especially from Russian-held areas east of the Dnipro River — the full magnitude of the threat was difficult to gauge. But some towns are already submerged, and more than 40,000 people may be in the path of the flooding on both sides of the river, according to the deputy prosecutor general of Ukraine.The river is not expected to crest until Wednesday morning. ...”
Barboncino Workers Are Forming New York City’s First Unionized Stand-Alone Pizzeria
"From my seat at the bar of the popular Crown Heights pizzeria Barboncino on Memorial Day evening, I could see Jared Berrien, a pizza chef, or pizzaiolo, who has worked at Barboncino for about a year, stationed outside of the restaurant’s wood-fired hearth. Berrien told me that the volume of orders that come in on a night like this one makes the work resemble an assembly line. I could see he wasn’t wrong: between delivery orders and in-person dining, it was hard to keep track of the number of pizzas he was plating. ...”
The Essential Chomsky – Noam Chomsky (2008)
"Noam Chomsky is a powerhouse of insightful thought – this book attests to that. So analyzing or even summarizing Anthony Arnove’s The Essential Chomsky is no simple task. A moderately lengthy and notably chronological collection of texts plucked from Chomsky’s enormous output, The Essential Chomsky leaps from linguistics to Palestine to libertarian socialism and back to linguistics again. Given the political nature of Against the Current, we will focus on Chomsky’s views on political philosophy, morality, U.S. foreign and domestic policy, and propaganda, ending with thoughts on the editing. But first, a few introductory remarks on the man himself. ...”
2011 January: Peak Oil and a Changing Climate, 2015 May: The Limits of Discourse As Demonstrated by Sam Harris and Noam Chomsky, 2015 October: Electing the President of an Empire, 2015 December: Noam Chomsky on Paris attacks, 2016 December: Chomsky: Humanity Faces Real and Imminent Threats to Our Survival, 2017 April: Requiem for the American Dream: The 10 Principles of Concentration of Wealth & Power (2016), 2017 July: Noam Chomsky: Neoliberalism Is Destroying Our Democracy, 2020 May: Requiem for the American Dream (2017), 2021 April: Noam Chomsky on Anarchism, Human Nature and Joe Biden
Russia claims Ukraine has launched a major attack in the east
"Russia said Monday that Ukraine’s military had launched a significant attack in a bid to break through its defenses on the war’s southeastern front lines. Reports of heavy fighting from officials in Moscow and the country’s cadre of influential military bloggers fueled speculation that this could be the beginning of the major counteroffensive that Kyiv has been preparing for months to reclaim occupied land. And yet Ukraine denied the claims, accusing Russia of lying in order to sow distrust and suggesting that the long-anticipated attack was still yet to come. The Russian defense ministry said in an overnight statement that Ukrainian ground forces had launched ‘a large-scale offensive’ on Sunday in five areas of the Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine. ...”
Ukrainian forces have been preparing for months to launch a broad counteroffensive against Russian positions.
Spain In Our Hearts: Americans in the Spanish Civil War, 1936–1939 - Adam Hochschild (2016)
George Orwell, center, and his wife, Eileen, kneeling beside him, on the day she visited his unit.
“Spain in Our Hearts: Americans in the Spanish Civil War, 1936–1939 is a non-fiction book by Adam Hochschild that was first published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt on March 29, 2016. The book is an account of the American volunteers who participated in the Spanish Civil War from 1936 to 1939. The story centers around several American volunteer fighters and journalists, tracing their motivations for joining the war and their experiences during the war which left many disillusioned. The book explains the involvement of foreign leaders including Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini and Joseph Stalin, and explains why the Republican faction ultimately lost. ...”
YouTube: Spain in Our Hearts 1:09:20, Spain In Our Hearts (1) 1:43:44
Karen Vogt ~ Losing the Sea / Losing the Sea Remixes (2023)
"Losing the Sea has gone through various incarnations, beginning with its original release on Mare Nostrum earlier this year. Now that remixes and original sea recordings have joined the lineup, the package finally seems complete. As a kind bonus, no matter which version a person purchases, the other is included. Losing the Sea is about longing for the sea: a feeling of loss following a move from Australia to Paris. ...”
Kyiv missile strikes: Tracking the rise of Russian attacks
"The Ukrainian capital Kyiv has been repeatedly hit by missiles and drones over the past few weeks. Most of the attacks come at night. In central Kyiv, Nataliya Lyashchenko has lost count of the number of times where the sound of air sirens, drones and missiles have stopped her sleeping. During one night-time raid, she said the bright lights in the dark sky were ‘like Star Wars’. Strikes like these are becoming more frequent. Experts believe Russia is changing its tactics in an attempt to sap Ukraine's air defences - but also suspect that, to some degree, it is lashing out at Ukraine's civilian population in response to setbacks in the war. ...”
The Literary Influences of Paul Theroux
"In the world of travel writing, few names evoke the sense of adventure and profound observation like that of Paul Theroux. With an insatiable wanderlust and unyielding curiosity, Theroux has dedicated his life to exploring the farthest reaches of the globe, capturing the essence of each destination through poignant prose. Born in Medford, Massachusetts, in 1941, Theroux launched his literary career with the 1975 publication of The Great Railway Bazaar, a chronicle of his four-month train journey from Great Britain to Japan and back. In the decades since, his pen has become a conduit to distant lands and cultures – from the teeming streets of Mumbai to the remote villages of Africa – unraveling the tangled webs of human existence with keen observation, incisive wit, and unflinching empathy.
SNIK and Haunting Portraits 'Exhale' in Utsira, Norway
"SNIK, the artist duo known for their hand-cut stencil art, has announced their latest project, ‘EXHALE.’ The endeavor spans the remote Norwegian island of Utsira and the city of Stavanger, exploring our connection to nature. The island’s small community lives harmoniously with the cycles of growth and decay, inspiring SNIK’s work. Three murals—Pathways, Afterthought, and Exhale—were created on Utsira, depicting the overwhelming presence of nature, and reclaiming serene subjects. The murals aim to blend with the environment, utilizing muted color palettes that respect the island’s peaceful partnership with its inhabitants. ...”
Chechen troops said to mobilise as Russian children flee border
"Fighters from Russia’s Chechnya region under the command of leader Ramzan Kadyrov have likely been ordered to take a leading role in the fighting in Ukraine in a week when the governor of Russia’s Belgorod region announced the evacuation of children amid ongoing cross-border attacks from Ukraine. The Institute for the Study of War (ISW), a Washington, DC-based think tank, said in its latest report on Thursday that Russian military commanders had likely ordered the Chechens into battle following the withdrawal of Wagner Group mercenary forces from the destroyed city of Bakhmut. According to the ISW, Kadyrov claimed on Wednesday that his forces had received new orders and would be deploying to ‘active combat activities’ to ‘liberate’ a series of settlements after assuming responsibility for the front line in Ukraine’s southeast Donetsk region, which includes the contested city of Bakhmut. ...”
NBC News: Russian bombardment of Ukraine’s capital kills at least 3 people, including a child (Video)
Guardian - ‘Fear is contagious but so is courage’: the Ukrainian soldiers training to retake Bakhmut
Police investigators inspect the body of a person killed at a municipal clinic compound damaged in a Russian missile strike, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine June 1, 2023.
Stop worrying about time-wasting – every team does it and it’s not getting (much) worse
"Time-wasting. By all accounts, a massive waste of time… or a means to an end by which a football team can win a match. There have been several high-profile examples this season of what has felt like inexorably painful bouts of time-wasting. Players dropping to the ground one, two, even three at a time in the closing stages of matches, ‘keepers taking an age with goal kicks… it’s felt extremely common. Because it is common. It basically happens in every single match — and that’s nothing new. …”
‘Nation Of Millions’: Why Public Enemy’s Masterpiece Cannot Be Held Back
"Some hip-hop groups release their most popular and best album the first time out. That was just one convention Public Enemy refused to follow. Released on April 14, 1988, It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back was PE’s second album. The title was drawn from a line in one of their debut album’s songs, but the group’s sophomore effort blew its predecessor away with its sheer power. That’s saying something, because Yo! Bum Rush The Show was a killer record in its own right. If they’d released only Yo!, Public Enemy would have remained hip-hop cult heroes. But It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back made Public Enemy legends, cultural icons, and representatives of the cutting-edge of Black music. ...”
2009 May: Public Enemy, 2011 July: It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, 2012 February: Fear of a Black Planet, 2012 August: Apocalypse 91… The Enemy Strikes Black, 2012 December: A Dozen Pivotal Moments in the 30 Year Career of Public Enemy, 2014 June: "Prophets of Rage" (2011), 2015 February: The Noise And How To Bring It: Hank Shocklee Interviewed, 2015 May: Give it up (1994), 2015 September: Shut'em Down (1991), 2018 June: White Heat Can’t Melt Black Steel: Public Enemy's Nation Of Millions Revisited
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