What I Learned in Pittsburgh Forestalling Ecocide with the Age of Stupid

North of CeNter Wednesday, OctOber 7, 2009 Free take home and read VOluMe I, Issue 11 Faust summoned What I learned in Pittsburgh to set Lex ablaze The 2009 G20 summit and protests, part 1 Krautrockers play Boomslang By Trevor Tremaine In the mid 1990s, I was a subur- ban teenager entering a lifelong obses- sion with strange, adventurous music. before Myspace, peer-to-peer fileshar- ing, Mutant sounds and other blogs of its ilk , and without regular access to many interesting all-ages gigs or the sorts of fantastic record stores that were found in louisville or cincinnati (each requiring an hour-plus drive), discovering such sounds was a rather labor-intensive process. Often, I would just peruse the CDs in (the legendary, long-gone lexington record store) cut corner’s scant, rarely- restocked avant-garde section and select a disc based solely on the cover art, the description, or the instrumen- tation, if the credits were visible (i.e. if personnel were attributed with “tapes and electronics,” I knew I had to check it out—an axiom that still holds true today). For guidance, I sought The Wire magazine, a UK journal of experimen- tal music from around the world. One memorable issue listed “100 records that set the World on Fire (While no One Was listening),” and I made it my MICHAEL MARCHMAN mission to hear as many of these very, Crowds of protestors gather in downtown Pittsburgh during the recent G20 meetings. very obscure records as I could find. Faust was a name that popped up By Michael Dean Benton gesture of political optimism. In the viewed as a historical relic of earlier, a lot in the 90s, with the resurgent spirit of dissident citizenship I wanted more troubled times. We admire interest in krautrock precipitated by Americans... still believe in an to journey to Pittsburgh to join the and celebrate famous dissidents and post-rockers, yo la tengo, and others. America where anything’s possible— voices demanding a change to cur- movements like Martin luther king, but, like many other indie geeks, I had they just don’t think their leaders do. rent american and Global economic Jr. and the civil rights Movement, never actually laid ears on the band. —barack Obama, during the policies. I hoped that this would samuel adams and our revolutionary The Faust Tapes was one of The Wire’s 2008 democratic Primaries be a process of self-education and founders, harriet tubman and slavery collective-engagement. abolitionists. Our media and histories My decision to embark on the jour- currently, dissident citizenship, a hold them up as abstract symbols of ney to the G20 summit and Protests in vital part of democratic societies as an Pittsburgh (september 23 – 26) was a alternative to unchecked ambition, is continued on page 3 Forestalling ecocide with The Age of Stupid By Andrew Battista, Leah Bayens, humans live in an age, environ- Films are no different. al Gore’s and Jeff Gross mentalists claim, in which climate An Inconvenient Truth (2006) marshaled change—not war, famine, nuclear arms an impressive array of scientific evi- the age of stupid premiered in over 500 proliferation, religious fundamental- dence to convince his audience that cinemas in the U.S. and over 50 counties ism, or corporate crime—is the most we can’t keep consuming fossil fuels COURTESY FAUST-PAGES.COM across the world on September 21. Simulcast profound problem we face. We are indefinitely. In that documentary, to theaters, the event began with “green close to becoming the first species Gore fashions himself as part public Faust. carpet” premier events live from New to eradicate itself knowingly, and the intellectual, part university professor, York. Gideon Yago hosted the event, which proverbial window of opportunity and part reformed political stiff, and 100 records, and so, having yet to be touted the film’s low carbon footprint and to retard and then reverse the conse- he uses this ethos as the film’s unify- disappointed, I gripped the horrible included a Moby performance powered by quences of our destructive behavior is ing device. While Gore stands behind rer CD reissue (with the entire album people on stationary bicycles. closing—and could in fact slam shut in a lectern, laser pointer in hand and sequenced as a single track) right away. the next decade. imposing graphs behind him, we learn the fabled pages described it as the After the film, the live coverage included a let’s be clear. climate change, how cyclical temperature increase and work of German avant rock stalwarts simulcast discussion with Direcotor Franny or the increase of the mean tempera- atmospheric carbon emissions might stealing away to an abandoned school- Armstrong and Producer Lizzie Gillett. ture on the earth’s surface and near- imperil our future life. house in the countryside for one year, Former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi surface air, is not a myth perpetuated Gore values the scientific author- growing their own food and their own Annan made an impromptu address about by europe’s intelligentsia or the united ity as a means of compelling others dope, and spending every waking hour ways that climate change, if left unchecked, states’ left-leaning cognoscenti. It’s to understand the gravity of the dam- playing music and recording, all the will result in social justice issues around the empirically verifiable. We lose little, age humans have done to the earth. while leaving a formidable tangle of world. Aside from Annan’s appearance, the aside from luxury items, if we radi- the few apocalyptic images in An tape for their producer to whittle into live coverage fell flat, sending most of the cally recalibrate the way we live and do Inconvenient Truth are relatively benign; something resembling an album—pure approximately 40 people at the Lexington business on this planet, but we stand satellite images depict what Florida, romance for the small-town kid who screening for the exits. What follows is a to lose everything if we continue to Manhattan, and san Francisco might shirked homework and extracurricu- longer musing on the film. bicker about the science and rhetoric look like when the sea level rises after lar activities to jam a fork under the of the global warming “debate.” a global melt-off, and a cartoonish strings of a guitar plugged directly into last month’s Harper’s Magazine nonetheless, many now realize sequence of a post-warming arctic his four-track. confirmed that we’re all going to die. that climate change is an imbroglio wasteland shows a solitary polar bear the sort of pseudo-anthropolog- according to that publication, one- so insurmountable that it is surpassed frustratingly pawing at the only ice ical, mythologizing hyperbole of the third of people who own a toyota in difficulty only by the challenge of chunk remaining for miles. In this magazine was, as it occasionally is, Prius also have an SUV in their garage. convincing nations and their leaders dark seascape, the polar bear succumbs totally spot-on, and the minute Tapes this ratio shows the deep reluctance of to care and subsequently re-imagine to exhaustion and drowns. exploded through my scotch-taped ear- environmentally-minded consumers— economy, culture, society, and life. evidently, neither the science nor phones from my discMan, I was blown let alone skeptical masses and bureau- environmental activists have predicted the rhetoric of Gore’s documentary away. tape loop experiments, zonked cratic nation-states—to overhaul their ecological ruin for decades. they’ve have been particularly effective in slow- barrettesque psych-pop, field record- lifestyles to a degree that might fore- disseminated their message of woe ing global warming. Perhaps it’s because ings, chants, freaked out rock mantras, stall global ecocide, or the widespread from treatises that appeal to scientific the former Vice President presents such free improv, Zappa-style fuckery, and destruction of ecological systems that rationalism to jeremiads that predict enable human life on earth. inevitable apocalyptic destruction. continued on page 4 continued on page 5 Contents In the next issue 2 — The Neighborhood 4 — Film & Media 6 — Sports 8 — Comics Benton: G20, part 2 The basil economy Review: My One and Only Bike Polo roundup I’m Not From Here More on the G20 The news about the new media It’s the IOC’s kind of town? Local photography Connors-Manke follows up on refugees Sticker shock 5 — Culture 7 — Opinion Must-see Boomslang Bad moon rising Reëncounter Dewburger Queer Control showcase 2 North of CeNter The Neighborhood North of Center is a periodical, Building a basil economy a place, and a perspective. keep reading to find out what The ethics of collecting rock that means. By Danny Mayer get noticed by passersby, and I’ve never affiliated—and to begin to question Editor & Publisher checked into the legal specifics, so I at the primacy of private property. “Oh, danny Mayer I recall fondly the first time I least try to mentally prepare for just look at that young hardworking lad ever took rock. a sunday morning, such a question whenever I’m out. over there! he’s not hurting anything Features early and cold, idling in the car on collectively, the different answers taking all that pretty kentucky rock beth connors-Manke the shoulder of the outer circle near I’ve imagined to the question “what that X construction company ripped where it hits liberty road by that are you doing here?” form a sort of up during their construction of y Film & Media ridiculous halloween shop. like personal ethics for rock collecting, a estates! What a neat and industrious colleen Glenn much of new circle, this stretch fea- justification for why and how I col- idea putting that rock to good use!” tures a couple small road cutouts, and lect rock—in effect, an orientation for a bit idealistic? try collecting Culture I was about to scout and grab rock being in the world.

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