"DRUM'N'NOISE VOL.1" RELEASE PARTY: hakaider, audioslut @ lost angel café, auckland

I rolled up to the Lost Angel Café at about 22:30, with K5K and MC slypussy of Anti-Kati, and K5K's model girlfriend Honor. We were already well-primed for action, as we'd just been at a Mt Eden mansion that K5K was house-sitting listening to the NWA remixes on the «Attitude» compilation. The Lost Angel lies in Auckland's seedy K' Road red-light district, and is a small black café with black furniture and on this night (and I think most nights) it was filled with people dressed in black. I was wearing orange.

It was a CD-release party: a split CD and 10" «Drum n Noise Vol 1» on their own label Headwound Recordings. Even though we'd cruised in an hour or two after the scheduled start time, we arrived in time for the sound-check. And then the first DJ, who I think was named Dan or Dave or something. He was playing a set of noisy Drum n Bass.

Next up was Audioslut, who played an even noisier set of Drum n Bass. Then it was Dan again, and the A/K crew decided that they should head somewhere they could get a drink. So we cruised down to Verona, another café at the more mainstream end of K' Road. A few beers later we headed back down to the Lost Angel. Audioslut was playing again, and it was noisier still. I realised that the opportunity to dance had passed: it wasn't the dancefloor tech-step style of Drum n Bass, but instead a nasty beast in a café that really didn't have the atmosphere for dancing.

Finally, when I was almost nodding off to sleep in the comfortable couch down the front (top marks to the Lost Angel for it's seating arrangements), Hakaider stepped up behind the decks. This guy generated some dense noise, and it was getting interesting besides the fact it was making my head hurt, when suddenly, five minutes into his set, Honor decided that she needed to go home. We had no choice but to go along with her.

As we walked down the back streets to where we had parked the car, an old, fat, Polynesian prostitute flashed us her large, sagging breasts. I'd been starting to think that the $5 cover charge hadn't been worth it for the enjoyment I'd managed to get out of my night, but the look on Honor's face when we got flashed really made my night.

Fringe Macabre @ The Athenæum, Dunedin

We arrived in Dunedin to find that not only was it the tail end of the Fringe Festival, but it was also Friday the 13th. It's funny how these things sneak up on you when you're unemployed and time and dates have no meaning as you waste your life away.

Anyway, we hooked up with our friends and they were all going to this thing called Fringe Macabre. As things happen, at the time it was supposed to start we were only just stumbling out the door and down the hill to town. When we got there we found out that it was going to cost $5, which was more than we had predicted. We grudgingly paid the man and went in.

The Athenæum is a small theatre, and it was reasonably full. As we went in, loud crazy horror movie scenes were being projected on to the screen, and so we were actually a little relieved when our friend Nathan who'd been helping with the Fringe Festival led us into a back room. Here we stood around blinking at the bright light, drinking alcohol and admiring our friend J's new baby, which was dressed as an elf for the evening.

The loudness from outside stopped, and we wondered back in and found seats. There was a guy on stage wearing nothing but pin-stripe trousers and a pillow-case over his head, disguising his identity. He was holding an animal horn which had a stick of incense burning in it, and he was moving in slow motion to some really eerie cello music.

He placed the horn on the floor, and then lay down on the floor himself. He started spasming to the music, and as the tempo increased he had his hand down his pants, and it became quite clear to everyone that this guy was masturbating on stage, prompting several people to walk out.

When he'd finally come in his pants, he lay there for a while, still convulsing to the music: and then suddenly, he whipped the pillowcase off and spat fake blood everywhere. We could now see that this junkie-thin guy who'd been wanking in front of us was in his late 20s and balding. It wasn't pretty. He went on to spend about another ten minutes stumbling around like a zombie and groaning. He even fell off the stage a couple of times to amuse the audience. A lot of people clapped when he finally finished his performance: I reserved my applause as I couldn't work out if it was a performance, or just some crazy guy getting his jollies by wanking in front of an audience.

Next up was Kim, who is a good acquaintance of ours. Straight away a few more people left, one girl saying "I hate this guy. He gives me the creeps". He was pretty drunk, and related to us how he had lost his love [I think she was in the audience, unless he was just acting]. He wanted her back. He identified himself with characters from Greek legends that he was too drunk to pronounce the names of. Eventually he climbed off the stage and started wading across the chairs, dramatically calling after his lost love. But the chairs were the sort where the seat folds up when no one's sitting on it, and he ended up with his leg stuck in a seat, too drunk to get out, and with everyone laughing. To know him the act was pretty funny, but I imagine people who didn't know him found it to be the rantings of some drunk wanker.

The next act looked to me like it was going to hold a lot of promise. This really oddly dressed guy came up with a bass guitar, and the pony-tailed guy who'd been MCing the night came out with a keyboard and a drum machine. I hoped they were going to make some amazing noise like the Auckland gods Anti-Kati. How wrong I was. The bass player started, and it wasn't distorted. And I don't know what happened with the keyboards and drum machine, but they alternated between being really low in the mix and not being there at all. Which essentially made it a long wanky bass solo. By the time they'd been at it for five minutes the theatre had pretty much cleared out. After ten minutes there were only about five people left. The sound actually came together for about 30 seconds, but it still sounded like somthing that... well, you know, the people making the music obviously dug it, so it was all cool.

I walked out too, and thus ended my experience with the most wanking you'd ever get to watch for $5.

global day of action, auckland style

September 26th 2000 was another day in a string of global solidarity protests. This time we were in league with the protesters at the World Bank meeting in Prague [Czech Republic]. As you can understand, we are all very angry at the World Bank (and all banks) for their actions in creating 3rd world poverty.

So I rolled up to the designated meeting place for the protest, slightly sceptical because it was at the Auckland University (or government brain-washing facility). I expected to be greeted with droves of dirty punks and the like, but instead there was no one. As I wondered if I was early, a small group of about 20 people cruised up. It seemed from their placards that these people were university students from the communist group - you could tell because of the large advertising for their Socialist Worker newspaper that was on every placard. I was even more sceptical, but hey, I was here to protest, not to judge these people.

They got up with their megaphone and tried to goad the indifferent students who were sitting in the quad eating their lunch to come on the protest. It's amazing the ability of these "normal" people in their trendy expensive clothes to not only ignore protest cries, but to ignore them in such a way that it seems that like it's not even happening. I was sitting there watching the proceedings, and it was like the communists existed in a vacuum.

Eventually Willy turned up to represent the punks with an anarchist flag, and then it was time to march. I was a little surprised to see the police following us right from the start. There were only a few of us, and the chants that we hadn't rehearsed were a little weak sounding as everyone got to grips with the words:

* Seattle, London, Prague, Melbourne - Babylon it's time to burn!
* World Bank come off it - the enemy is profit!
* World Bank, what a lie - you don't care if children die!
* Multi-national corporations - genocide in the starving nations!
* The peoples' persistance - will globalise resistance!

We walked from the quad down to Wellesly Street, staying on the footpath until we got to Queen Street, where there were quite a few more police cars. Here we took to the road, disrupting the traffic. I think that the communists must have got permission for the protest, because the police cars made way for us, and the officers walked with us and directed the traffic.

Since we were on Queen Street, there were lots of people about, and our chants gained volume - although at times they broke down as the communists with the megaphone couldn't quite decide which one to start with next. As I looked at all the vacant faces staring at us as we walked down the middle of the street, I felt energised in a way I haven't since I danced in the streets of Wellington. There is something about being the "odd one out" that gives you a feeling of power.

Of course no one knew what we were on about, and it wasn't so obvious, but somehow our numbers swelled to maybe 50 people. We walked to Albert Street, where Tradenz have their offices. Tradenz is a government agency which deals with the World Bank and advertises New Zealand overseas as a great place to get cheap labour and stuff like that. The communists leading us knew the number of the building, but we ended up walking up and down the street a couple of times before they worked out which building it was. It seemed that it was in the ANZ Bank tower.

So we gathered there, and the communists gave some speaches about what we were protesting about, and a girl named Victoria who'd been an organiser for the S11 protests against the World Economic Forum in Melbourne spoke about how important it is that we get out and show them that we are against their capitalist agenda. All this fell on deaf ears - there were no public around except for the suits flowing in and out of the building. They all gave us very bemused looks, and some particularly smug ones laughed at us.

I wondered what would happen at this point, as it was a bit of a stand-off: the police were all standing around (about 20 of them, with about four cars and one truck: probably enough to subdue us if they needed to, and they looked like they weren't in a hurry to go anywhere and solve any crimes or anything), we were all standing around (rather at a loss for what to do next, and none of us with any bricks to throw), and the people in the building were sitting in their building unaware of our existence.

Eventually the communists with the megaphone decided we should head back to the university for some coffee [grown in the 3rd world for consumption in the 1st world - I wonder if the communists saw the irony]. They were a little worried at the lack of solidarity that this might seem to show, but we could all see that there was no ready target here to make an impression on.

So we headed back down Queen Street, stopping outside all the banks that we passed to "chant and wave placards" as the Herald put it in a small column on page four the next day. We also handed out a lot of flyers to people explaining how the World Bank creates 3rd world poverty. Of course, people never read stuff like that, and if they had I'm sure they would have thought it to be the ravings of crazed lunatics. It's safer for them not to know how the world really works.

Wellington managed nine arrests and the front page in The Dominion. Still, there's always next time to start the riot...

j-day @ albert park, auckland

This was part of a worldwide protest against cannabis prohibition. I thought it was a good cause, and people I knew were going, so I headed down to Albert Park to meet them.

I came, I met, I sat down amongst the large crowd in front of the rotunda, I was shocked and disappointed to find out that none of the people I was with had a lighter. But anyway, we soon solved that problem and then we all sat around not talking and listening to the pretty music.

Jesse James & Sista Mystic were playing. They sounded pretty cool, I remember that much. Maybe they were Reggae, maybe something else. They had nice voices.

And then out of nowhere, I saw someone I recognised walking up to me. I couldn't for the life of me remember who they were. It was pretty damn trippy, and then I clicked. It was Danny from Daemon, and he was a long way from home.

He stopped and chatted with me about how he was on holiday here in Auckland; about how things in Nelson were pretty fucked up since the big drug-raid on Xanataph's place some time around New Year's; about how there might not even be a Nelsonian Black Metal Sabbat this year.

I still couldn't get over how trippy the whole situation was. And then King Kapisi came on stage. This guy was fucking hot. Him and his DJ were really blowing shit up when the sound cut out. But not to worry, they continued on, his DJ backing him up as a human beat-box. It was magical.

Then it started to get colder and darker, King Kapisi finished his set, and everyone took off home. And I had no choice but to go too. But you know, it was a pretty mellow day. I'm sure it didn't do anything to help the cause, but maybe one day...

counteract @ kings arms

Well, the Anti-Kati boys invited me along to see Counteract because their friend Unique is in them. I decided that it might be fun to go out for once. So we turned up to this ridiculous pub, deliberately late enough not to have to see all the other bands on the bill. We pulled up some chairs near the front and waited. DJ D>Form and their other friends were all there.

Eventually they came on. It was ridiculous. They sounded like Korn. The bass player even played his bass down real low to the floor, just like the Korn bass player, especially once he broke his strap. We sat through this 90s metal for a while, then something fucked up with the bass amp or something, so we got treated to some accapella and some free-style from Unique. When they got going again he took off his shirt. This rammed the point home. Angry young white boys. Playing metal.

When it wound up we headed off to The Box for [regular club night] The Realness, but the hip-hop dancefloor was practically empty. I went home feeling more than a little cheated.

dancing in the streets

We [me and Rorn] had cruised down to Wellington for some reason that I forget, and we ended up sitting in Cuba Mall, drinking with a large selection of our friends, and of course my sister's little chihuahua Miguel Sanchez. Miguel attracted lots of attention, especially from a crazy looking little child with blonde hair and blue eyes. I didn't know where she'd come from or where her parents were, but I decided to let her hold Miguel.

Then my sister pulls me aside and says "That little girl is a devil. Me and Rose were up in Central Park one day and her and her siblings were causing no end of trouble for us. We were just trying to have a quiet smoke and she kept coming up and saying stuff like 'I'm telling on you' and 'My brother said to say "Fuck you"' I tell you that little girl is a devil." Now, I know my sister isn't one to make these sort of things up, so I started keeping a very close eye on the little devil.

Anyway, Wellington being Wellington and all, there was some sort of festival or carnival going on, and presently the Wellington Carnival Street Band set up on the stage in Cuba Mall and started to play for us. It must have been about 17:00, and a large number of people were walking past: heading home from work or getting in some last-minute consuming before the shops shut. Everyone was rushing by, hardly pausing to appreciate the music.

So we got up and danced. We danced like people possessed. It was easy: they were playing an infectious set of horn-orientated samba and swing: the beats were funky and the groove was upbeat. We had not heard any of the songs before, except for the «Muppets» theme song, but it was some really cool shit.

As I danced to the free music and watched the busy busy people bustle by with no time to spare, I couldn't help think that here I was having free fun while the (capitalist) chains that hold them down give them no freedom and no fun. I came up with my new slogan: "fun will always be free!"

The little devil girl was running around, and so they gave her a small percussion instrument to keep her amused. And they let Sammy Vulture join in on her violin. It made me feel so happy to see that such things could go on even in the nasty big city. But of course eventually it had to end.

After that Sammy and me cruised down to see the installation/performance art piece Urban Dream Capsule, which involved four men living in the window of Farmers for 10 days or so. There was a small crowd watching them. Sammy soon made this a large crowd, because she whipped out her violin once again and started playing to the men. They started dancing to her music, causing the crowd to laugh.

When she had finished playing she tried to get some money off the crowd: afterall, she was busking. But the men in the window "tut-tuted" her, and so she got nothing for her efforts, which I thought was kind of sad, seeing as it's how she makes her living.

All the excitement was over, and the autumn evening was starting to get a bit chilly, so we left, our fun ended for the day. And hopefully someone who saw us dancing will have taken a little of that free spirit into their hearts.

one love festival @ point england reserve, panmure, auckland

As we [me, Rorn, Billie and Stacy] drove out to Panmure there were lots of signs to follow: this was obviously an event of large proportions. When we finally got there, the streets were jammed with people and cars, all there to celebrate Bob Marley's birthday. Eventually we got to the gate, and they invited us to pay for car-parking. We did, and then drove around looking for the perfect spot.

Most of the spots under trees were taken, but we finally found one. We really needed it because our rats were living in the van at the time, and we really needed to have the rats in the shade while we were enjoying the festival, or they would have died. We went to drive over to the spot, but then one of the officials came up to us and said "Could you please park over there?" We explained the situation to him, but he said that he couldn't help us. You see, the spaces under the trees were reserved for handicapped parking only.

We looked at the cars parked under the trees. They were surrounded by large, healthy looking specimans of Polynesian manhood, presumably the people who'd got there early enough to get a park under the trees. The official's logic was completely bogus: the handicapped people had no more need to park under a tree than anyone else: afterall, they were going to spend the day at the festival, not sitting in the carpark. And the fact that the trees were on a hill that would probably have made egress to and from their vehicles more difficult for handicapped people.

So we parked where we were told and had a discussion amongst ourselves. We were angry at the officials, the whole thing seemed to have a very money-hungry bent, and everyone we'd seen there looked very unfriendly and most un-loving. So we said "fuck this shit" and took off, causing trouble by being about the only people going against the flow and trying to leave the place.

We went and had a lovely picnic together and then went to the beach. I think we got the better deal in the end.