Archives

Dancehall Cinema

For those of you more inclined towards UK roots reg­gae cul­ture than euro-beats, there’s a lit­tle some­thing for you at the Film Archive this Thurs­day 7th.

The Archive, in col­lab­o­ra­tion with Nice­Up — local reg­gae forum and dance­hall spe­cial­ists — present the pre­miere Aus­tralasian screen­ing of Musi­cal­ly Mad, a doco that exam­ines sound sys­tem cul­ture and the UK roots reg­gae scene, inter­view­ing some of the shin­ing lights of the com­mu­ni­ty, past and present, and pro­vid­ing an his­tor­i­cal con­text for the Caribbean-influ­enced musi­cal cul­ture. The film is brand spank­ing new and Nice Up are keen to show it off to the local scene, so much so that they (and their spon­sors) invite you to come down ear­ly, at 6pm, to the Archive — on the cor­ner of Ghuznee and Tarana­ki Sts — for food, drink and social­is­ing pri­or to the movie screen­ing at 7pm. Read more here.

Tick­ets are on sale now from the NZ Film Archive for $8/$6 con­ces­sion, as well as avail­able on the night.

La Musique Automatique — avec une Tigre!

If you like your music mul­ti-lin­gual then boy are you in for a treat or, indeed, un petit plaisir next week when Berlin-based duo Stereo Total hit town on Sat­ur­day 16th. I fell in love with the kooky elec­tro-garage rock-à-bil­ly pop­stars a few years ago when I dis­cov­ered an album of theirs that sound­ed like the B52s mixed with Peach­es with a cou­ple of Sug­ar­cubes stirred in. Their “home­made” iron­ic pop com­bines French chan­son with Ger­man elec­tron­i­ka, with a euro-lin­guis­tic twist, so that on one album you get a song that croons “j’aime l’amour à trois” then a few songs lat­er the same track pops up declar­ing “I love love with the three of us”! You can lis­ten to some of their new songs on their Myspace page and buy tick­ets for $30+bf at Slow­boat (Cuba St) for next week’s gig at the San Fran Bath­house.


AND they’re bring­ing JD Samp­son, one-third of fem­i­nist nu-york-punk-icons Le Tigre with them, fresh from her MEN DJ/remix project and a vis­it to NZ for the Big Day Out ’08 with Peach­es and Herm.

ALLONS‑Y!

Drawing Parallels

On 6th August a group draw­ing show is open­ing at ROAR! Gallery.

The show fea­tures work from artist in res­i­dence Yele­na Bar­balich, as well as 75 oth­er artists.

(full list after the jump)…

Keep your sugar bowl full next month

Wellington zine artist makes home-made history

Don’t move house, be sure to feed hun­gry ghosts and keep your sug­ar bowl full next month. August is the month of the Ghost Fes­ti­val (15 August) or ‘Chi­nese Hal­loween’ — the time when spir­its of the dead vis­it the liv­ing.

Chi­nese fam­i­lies observe this date through Bai Shan, which involves light­ing incense, burn­ing joss papers and prepar­ing a ban­quet to share with ances­tors. Such cus­toms have long been observed since the Chi­nese first arrived in New Zealand near­ly a cen­tu­ry and a half ago. They also fea­ture in an upcom­ing exhi­bi­tion by local artist Ker­ry Ann Lee — Home Made: Pic­tur­ing Chi­nese Set­tle­ment in New Zealand, which opens on 31 July at Toi Pōneke Gallery.

Read more after the jump…

Pecha Kucha Night Wellington #03

The third Welling­ton Pecha Kucha Night is upon us! It’s hap­pen­ing Wed 30 July at the City Gallery. Doors open at 7pm, the event starts at 8.20, and it’s $7 admis­sion.

A Pecha Kucha night involves a num­ber of pre­sen­ters, usu­al­ly from the design, archi­tec­ture, pho­tog­ra­phy, art and cre­ative fields, who present a slideshow of 20 images and speak for 20 sec­onds per image.

After the jump, check out the stel­lar line-up of peo­ple who’ll be speak­ing on the night.

Civic pride

Wellington Civic TrustIt may not be Welling­ton­ista Awards sea­son just yet, but here’s anoth­er chance to put in a plug for your favourite things in the Welling­ton built envi­ron­ment. The Welling­ton Civic Trust Awards are com­ing up, and the trust wants your nom­i­na­tions for the best recent con­tri­bu­tions in the fol­low­ing fields:

  • Build­ing
  • Her­itage
  • Envi­ron­men­tal
  • Pub­lic Space
  • Street Art

Nnom­i­na­tions close on the 18th of August, and nom­i­nat­ed projects must have been com­plet­ed since the pre­vi­ous awards in 2005. There’s also a sep­a­rate vot­ing form for best new sculp­ture, and if the sculp­ture that does it for you isn’t on that list, you could always nom­i­nate it in the Street Art cat­e­go­ry.

As well as nom­i­nat­ing your favourites, feel free to com­ment here and share your rants and raves.

Talking ’bout the weather

Appar­ent­ly all hell is break­ing loose in the Hutt: rumours of heavy rain warn­ings abound, and mes­sages are going around offices advis­ing peo­ple liv­ing in East­bourne to head home NOW. Cer­tain­ly the radar shows some nasty stuff around, the result of the souther­ly mak­ing its way north­wards, and the rain­fall sen­sors and stream flows are start­ing to pick up. If any­thing dra­mat­ic starts to hap­pen, do let us all know!

Rare treat for Wellington

I’m com­plete­ly gob­s­macked. Just got a lit­tle sneak live pre­view of the one and only CW Stonek­ing (Myspace) who plays the Mighty Mighty tonight.

I advise you to fight your way to the door. Welling­ton’s own Slim Chants will be kick­ing things off from 9pm and Palmy’s how­ing wolf man Boss Christ will take things into the night.….. but this CW Stonek­ing.

I think I’m in love.

Wise old man says: Self Service China

(actu­al­ly I’m not sure that he does, but that’s anoth­er sto­ry.)

The guy at the CHINA out­let in the Courte­nay Cen­tral com­plex has twice claimed to me that his BBQ pork is the best in town.

The results after the jump!