ocelotl

Richard Flanagan says: ''It's a film of immense and varied ambitions. Beneath the obvious one of simply making a blockbuster epic that has to be sugarcoated and work from Vilnius to Seattle, Baz wanted to smuggle out this other idea of Australia. He wanted to get out something about the land having values other than the merely commercial. And he wanted the film to have an indigenous heartbeat and he wanted it very strongly to be a story about the stolen generations. And that's very much at the heart of the movie.''

Hmm. Well, the sugar-coating is plain to see in the publicity, the question is whether there's anything to this Trojan Horse idea, if there's any substance in the muck. I suspect the studio will take care of any of that.

Yeah, what the hell? These guys have never set foot in Australia, to my knowledge. Not as Matmos, anyway.

Yes, they're really scraping the bottom of the bowl for faecal euphemisms as this story drags on... took me back to my youth too.

Damn, this new album is fantastic. Three listens in and I'm so very hooked. I bought the City Slang special edition which has an extra disc of alternative versions, but no booklet. What, no Kurt lyrics?! Does the standard edition have the booklet? Ah, never mind, there's a pdf on City Slang's site. It'll have to do. Still - beautiful album.

''The real issue is that we were fed, as a family, shit, at someone's pub,'' Mr Whyte told 2UE.

For the record (from the 200 Gertrude St page):
The exhibition spans a range of threads and styles within the art form, featuring work by a diverse selection of the worlds leading practitioners with artists including: ¾ HAD BEEN ELIMINATED [ITALY] Lucas ABELA [AUSTRALIA] Oren AMBARCHI [AUSTRALIA] Natasha ANDERSON [AUSTRALIA] Thomas BRINKMANN Philip BROPHY [AUSTRALIA] BROTHERS OF THE OCCULT SISTERHOOD [AUSTRALIA] Neil CAMPBELL [UK] Eugene CARCHESIO [AUSTRALIA] Andrew CHALK [UK] CHICKS ON SPEED [EUROPE] Rod COOPER [AUSTRALIA] CORRUPTED [JAPAN] Martin CREED (OWADA) [UK] Alvin CURRAN DEAD C [NEW ZEALAND] Jim DENLEY [AUSTRALIA] THE DONKEY'S TAIL [AUSTRALIA] Kevin DRUMM [USA] FENNESZ [AUSTRIA] Robin FOX [AUSTRALIA] Cor FUHLER [NETHERLANDS] Ellen FULLMAN [USA] Marco FUSINATO [AUSTRALIA] Alistair GALBRAITH [NEW ZEALAND] Bernhard GUNTER [GERMANY] Will GUTHRIE [AUSTRALIA] Keiji HAINO [JAPAN] Florian HECKER [GERMANY] Joyce HINTERDING [AUSTRALIA] Kanta HORIO [JAPAN] Ryoji IKEDA [JAPAN] INCAPACITANTS [JAPAN] JANDEK [USA] Philip JECK [UK] Rolf JULIUS [GERMANY] JUNKO [JAPAN] KEMIALLISET YSTAVAT [FINLAND] Christina KUBISCH [GERMANY] KUUPUU [FINLAND] Alan LAMB [AUSTRALIA] Graham LAMBKIN [UK] Annea LOCKWOOD [EUROPE/NZ/USA] Francisco LOPEZ [SPAIN] Alvin LUCIER [USA] Sachiko M [JAPAN] Lionel MARCHETTI [FRANCE] Christian MARCLAY [USA] MASONNA [JAPAN] MAHER SHALAL HASH BAZ [JAPAN] MATTIN (BASQUE) MERZBOW [JAPAN] Gordon MUMMA MUURA [AUSTRALIA] Toshimaru NAKAMURA [JAPAN] NEW BLOCKADERS [UK] Phill NIBLOCK [USA] Hermann NITSCH NO NECK BLUES BAND [USA] Jerome NOETINGER [FRANCE] Jim O’ROURKE [USA] OPTRUM [JAPAN] PAECES [AUSTRALIA] Charlemagne PALESTINE [USA] Paul PANHUYSEN [NETHERLANDS] PATERAS/BAXTER/BROWN PITA [AUSTRIA] Francis PLAGNE [AUSTRALIA] Stephen PRINA [USA] Eliane RADIGUE [FRANCE] Tom RECCHION [USA] RIZILI [AUSTRALIA] Steve RODEN [USA] Keith ROWE [UK] RUNZELSTIRN + GURGELSTOCK [SWITZERLAND] Philip SAMARTZIS [AUSTRALIA] Marcus SCHMICKLER [GERMANY] David SHEA [AUSTRALIA/USA] SKATERS [USA] SNAWKLOR Michael SNOW [CANADA] SONIC YOUTH [USA] SSL (Robbie Avenaim/Dale Gorfinkel) [AUSTRALIA] STRIBORG [AUSTRALIA] Taku SUGIMOTO [JAPAN] SUN CITY GIRLS [USA] SUNN O))) [USA] Akio SUZUKI [JAPAN] Yasunao TONE [JAPAN/USA] Toshiya TSUNODA [JAPAN] VOICE CRACK [SWITZERLAND] Brendan WALLS [AUSTRALIA] Scott WALKER [UK] Chris WATSON [UK] Ralf WEHOWSKY [USA] WHITEHOUSE [UK] Otomo YOSHIHIDE [JAPAN] Richard YOUNGS (UK) Z'EV (USA)

Basically: if you are interested in experimentalmusicsoundart - do not miss.

He's included in this 200 Gertrude Street exhibition (which is a must-visit, by the way - allow a couple of hours at least) - a short piece of a few minutes but dated 2008! Gentle noise layered over some probably-appropriated classical composition. Nice. Nothing amazing, but hey, new Jim!

Stephen Crittenden's doing a bit of bridge-burning. Go, Steve! Anyway, seems that the cuts will be: The Religion Report, The Media Report, The Sports Factor, Radio Eye, In Conversation and Street Stories. Perspective and The Ark are ''under a cloud'', according to The Age, whatever that means. Anyway, on the face of it, this all seems to suck. Don't know what will replace the shows but Radio Eye will be a big loss. Sports Factor is the only program that has ever been able to make sport interesting to me. Hmm. Grumble.

Well, if the goal was ''to do for politics what Frontline did for current affairs'' (my words), I'm willing to say they did it. The more I've watched this show, the more it's come to mind in watching the daily machinations of politics. I wasn't so naive as not to know that this is how things operated (I even worked in a government policy unit for a while, a long time ago), but it's reminded me to always, always be mindful about the motives behind political actions.

Shazzat:

But, as I've grown up we've started doing more stuff together that we both enjoy, rather than > me just coming over to their place for a feed/ whinge etc.

Yeah I think I need to make that change. I'm accepting that it's all been a bit one-way for too long.