My friend, the artist and broadcaster Nathan Gray [Instagram], describes the current war in Gaza as the “New Berlin Wall”, as it has polarised a city that is home to significant migrant communities from both Palestine and Israel. In a country held accountable for the Jewish Holocaust and which considers Israel’s security and right to exist its “Staaträson”, anti-Semitic, anti-Muslim and anti-Arab sentiment have surfaced since Hamas’ 7 October attack in southern Israel. From a distance in Finland, I began to approach these developments via anti-racism frameworks; being attentive to (historical) forms of biological race and ethno-nationalism, alongside more recent concepts of ethnocracy—a term coined by Oren Yiftachel, a Professor of Political Geography, to describe circumstances in which democratic processes are unequally distributed among citizens, biased towards ethnic groups in power.
Cultural theorist Paul Gilroy opens his book, Against Race (2000)—re-published as Between Camps (2004)—with a citation from Frantz Fanon:
At first thought it may seem strange that the anti-Semite’s outlook should be related to that of the Negrophobe. It was my philosophy professor, a native of the Antilles, who recalled the fact to me one day: “Whenever you hear someone abuse the Jews, pay attention, because he is talking about you.” And I found that he was universally right—by which I meant that I was answerable in my body and my heart for what was done to my brother. Later I realized that he meant, quite simply, that an anti-Semite is inevitably anti-Negro.
Fanon (Black Skin, White Masks) cited in Gilroy 2000, p. 1.
Writing at the turn of the last century, Gilroy argues that the ambition of anti-racism work should be to dismantle race as a category of difference, and he urges his readers to be wary of emergent forms of racism arising from technological developments, such as genetics.
Like many others, doomscrolling through a feed of “atrocity images” and trauma over the past two months, my interest was piqued last week with the publication of an investigation “‘A mass assassination factory‘: Inside Israel’s calculated bombing of Gaza” by +972 Magazine and Local Call , an independent, bipartisan and non-profit platform established by Israeli and Palestinian journalists. Authored by Yuval Abraham [Instagram], the article outlines Israel Defense Forces (IDF) use of machine learning and AI in determining military targets, in particular a system named Hasbora (The Gospel). There has already been much discussion about the inherent bias in such systems and criticism about their use in policing, so Hasbora’s deployment in a situation where vengeance is a motive is alarming. It should be noted, as Abraham states at the beginning of this interview with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now!, that this report was vetted by the Israeli military censor. That is, the IDF has some interest in publicising this information. A recent article in the New York Times reveals how Israel’s security intelligence failed to act on early indicators of Hamas planning an attack on 7 October, thus Abraham proposes that the Netanyahu government is under pressure to produce a “victory image” for its citizens, and arguably one that foregrounds its technological prowess.
Investigative journalist Antony Loewenstein, whose recent book The Palestine Laboratory (2023) is concerned with how Israel develops and tests its sophisticated military and surveillance technologies in Gaza, is often called upon to comment on these issues. Contained within a security wall, Egypt’s national border and the Mediterranean Sea, Gaza is often described as an “open-air prison”. With over 2 million people in area that is approximately 365 square km, it is one the most densely populated regions in the world. As noted by scholars Eyal Weizman (2007) and Jasbir K. Puar (2017), Gaza is tightly controlled; dependent on aid, supplies and (communication) infrastructures that are ultimately managed by Israel, calculated according to what is necessary for survival. Thus, it can be easily analysed as a bio/necro-political regime. Following the end of the cease-fire on 30 November and as the staggering civilian death toll continues to climb, the US and other allied states, including the UK, Germany, the Netherlands and Australia, are qualifying their statements of unequivocal support for the war Israel names “Operation Iron Swords”, cautioning the Zionist state to minimise civilian casualties while continuing to sanction its efforts to completely destroy Hamas. In an interview with Amy Goodman and Juan González on Democracy Now!, Loewenstein points out that these states are continuing to export arms to Israel, and that some of them have significantly expanded these exports since 7 October. Alongside arms proliferation and shared intelligence, these states are also implicated in global supply chains that produce these weapons technologies. As such, the images (and information) currently flowing out of Gaza are effectively, as Al Jazeera presenter Jonah Hull puts it, a “live-fire, real-time experiment” demonstrating these technologies and their concomitant political strategies.
This podcast, “The Image of Gaza”, returns to the theme of “optics”. It is a montage/mixtape of news media, music, infomercials and street recordings that serve as a prompt to think about the images flowing out of the war and how they are being received and interpreted by different interests. These include:
– affective “atrocity images” of an exceptional humanitarian crisis at scale and evidence of possible war crimes
– a “victory image” that Israel’s Netanyahu government is under pressure produce following security intelligence failures to act on early indications of Hamas’ 7 October attack
– a “live-fire, real-time experiment” demonstrating Israel’s military technologies and that attest to a global weapons market and production supply chains that implicate the US, UK, Germany, the Netherlands and Australia in the war.
We began by recalling Matti’s visit to Sydney, Australia in 2000 as a representative of the Finnish Youth Parliament and then went on to range over issues that overlap art and politics, such as: settler colonialism in Finland and the Nordic States—notably so-called “Green Colonialism”—alongside the appropriation and weaponisation of Sámi culture by the tourism industry. We also discuss our mutual interests in music; the horrorcore rap of Inari language activist Amoc and the intricacies of Sámi joiking. Given we both DJ, Matti also shed some light on the underground techno scenes in the North.
Many thanks to Lena, Petra and Ville-Veikko from Goethe-Institut Finnland for organising the event. Also props to Timo Tuhkanen, Eddie Choo Wen Yi, Constantinos Miltiadis, Irina Mutt, Mathilde Palenius and Essi for their generous contributions to our conversation, and to Goethe-Institut Finnland and Jakub Bobrowski for the fotos [all links on Instagram]!
Our conversation touches on the post-apocalyptic party culture of Mexico city and features excerpts of their sets — Selfies and Sandro spinning cumbia and Juan playing high energy Italo disco and house. Many thanks to Eddie from Station of Commons for these recordings.
This episode features and interview with Athens-based choreographer Jitsa Kon [Instagram] recorded in March with Anastasia Diavasti, artist and founder of the feminist platform NTIZEZA [Instagram]. We discuss the durational dance-research practice Κρατήρας (Crater), initiated by choreographers Vitoria Kotsalou [Facebook] and Michael Kliën. I first encountered Κρατήρας in front of the Olympia Municipal Music Theatre Maria Callas which was then being occupied by students [Instagram] protesting policy changes that devalued their education and thus professional standing and opportunities. Interspersed throughout the podcast are recordings made during the march marking International Womens Day, 8 March in Athens and a performance by “Chrishanti and friend” recorded outside Rex Theatre, also in central Athens, and that was also being occupied [Instagram].
An hour-long mix made for an installation by Jeanne Berbinau Aubry. Made live with Pioneer’s rekordbox software and DDJ–FLX4 controller, this mix is a record of the so-called “vapor rave” I’ve been playing lately.
Tracklist
01 Sinistarr & Stingray – “Untitled”
02 JLin & Zora Jones – “Dark Matter”
03 Hyph11E – “Barnacles (Kode9 Remix)”
04 Siu Mata – “Ngalah Oreyo x UMOJA – GALA GALA (Siu Mata Edit)”
05 DJ Marfox – “Lucky Punch”
06 Hyroglifics & Sinistarr – “BS6”
07 Ikonika – “Energy”
08 Loraine James – “Let’s Go”
09 EQ Why & Traxman – “Dsc”
10 NET GALA – “Reclaim It (ZULI’s Shifting Weight at the Club remix)”
11 Ayesha – “Downpour”
12 Amor Satyr – “Rebola”
13 Black Rave Culture – “Sub Poppin”
14 EL PLVYBXY – “A Pulmon”
15 JLin – “Auto Pilot”
16 Gant-Man – “Distorted Sensory (Kode9 Remix)”
17 RP Boo – “Off Da Hook”
18 Siu Mata & Amor Satyr – “Acidez”
19 Ayesha – “Dark Matter”
20 Hyroglifics & Sinistarr – “Turn Up”
21 JLin – “Connect the Dots”
22 Ziúr – “Collar Bone”
23 Sinistarr – “Nonlinear Threat”
24 Kode9 – “The Jackpot”
Rosa de Graaf is curator at Kunstinstituut Melly, Rotterdam. Recorded in May 2023, our conversation was instigated as a live broadcast at the Jan van Eyck Academie Maastricht, where fugitive radio is currently in residence. We address the thematics “Community”, “The Contemporary”, “Conviviality”, “The Curatorial” and “Karaoke” with reference to radio in exhibition practices. We touch on the work of artists Anna Witt and Ayeshah Hameed who have recently exhibited at Melly. This episode also includes audio excerpts from Anna Witt’s Soft Destructions (2023) video below and an episode of Ayesha Hameed’s podcast “Brown Atlantis Radio featuring Ananya Jahanara Kabir”, recorded at Melly in 2022. The main image lifted from Ayesha Hameed’s Instagram, taken during her broadcast at Melly,
This mix announces fugitive productions’ techno samba release on Bandcamp, four drum tracks made over two visits to Brazil during two presidential elections (2018 and 2022). Made with Mixxx free and open source DJ software and a Numark DJ2GO2 Touch, this mix proposes a way to work with these rhythms by looping, filtering and slip-phasing beats. It’s certainly repetitive! At times minimal, occasionally “asymmetrical” and at best hypnotic with a few jump cuts to keep listeners on their toes. May not be suitable for driving. Try dancing?
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fugitive radio rádio em fuga in Brazil 2022 was supported by the Australia Council for the Arts.
Tracklist
01. 0:00:00 Simulacrum – Samba tem digital
02. 0:04:02 Juan Atkins – Other Side Of Life
03. 0:07:10 Der Zyklus – Diffeomorphism
04. 0:09:32 MU – Out of Breach
05. 0:12:12 Phuture – Acid Tracks (12″ Version)
06. 0:16:38 Adonis – No Way Back (Instrumental)
07. 0:21:26 Model 500 – NO UFO’S (Instrumental)
08. 0:26:46 Simulacrum – Zona Contacto
09. 0:28:12 DJ Joe Lewis – Acid Falls (Original Mix)
10. 0:30:52 Da Posse – It’s My Life (Aluh mix)
11. 0:34:52 Steve Poindexter – Computer Madness
12. 0:37:24 Despina – Alexa In Disrepair
13. 0:40:16 Traxman – BAD INDIGESTION
14. 0:43:46 Simulacrum – Bloco Techno
15. 0:47:44 Der Zyklus – Eigenface (Facial Asymetry)
16. 0:50:46 Model 500 – Digital Solutions
Riddim writing, software affordances, rhythmachine music.
This mix is far from perfect. It was recorded live and thus presents a “snapshot” of my thinking/feeling “in-the-mix”. It was made using MIXXX, a free/livre and open source (FLOSS) DJing/podcasting software and with a near pocket-sized Numark DJ2GO2 Touch USB controller that I bought last year to use while on a series of residencies in Brazil. The device compromises on controls for size, so it does not have separate pots for Hi/Mid/Low EQs on each channel that would seem essential for mixing. Instead it has a single knob that is mapped on MIXXX to a Lo/Hi cut sweep filter.
These genres of music are also relatively unfamiliar to me. I learned to mix garage, grime, dancehall, desi, baile funk, hip hop and what became known as “global bass” in the early 2000s, performing as Sven Simulacrum. I stopped around 2012 to focus on other research interests. Recently I’ve been curious about the abstract sonics and asymmetrical rhythms of “experimental dance music” (EDM) often made by producers who are “adjacent” to established genres such as footwork (Jlin) and ballroom (quest?onmarc) alongside high energy styles forwarded by labels including Principe, Lisbon and Yes No Wave, Yogyakarta. Music that I’m tentatively calling “other technos”.
The notion of “techno samba” emerged during fugitive radio’s recent time in Brazil, and particularly while in residence at Residência São João (RSJ); a farm, coffee plantation and self-organised artist space in the countryside of Rio De Janeiro in late October–November 2022. RSJ is reputed for its somsocosmos music residency, so I sought to spend my time there to working on sound production. Before leaving São Paulo late in October, I met with Coletivo Digital [Instagram] at their space in Pinheiros and my first task at RSJ was to I edit our conversation for a podcast. The collective had sent me a song to use, “Canção tem samba” by Trilha Sonora, recorded in their FLOSS studio and I’d thought to make a remix, also using FLOSS; specifically a suite of programs I was working with for Thalaam Riddim Reapers, alongside Luci Dayhew and Brendy Hale. Simultaneously, I undertook the same process with the popular proprietary music production and performance software Ableton Live, to understand the different affordances of these digital tools. I must admit, I was much happier with the results in Ableton and continued to use it to develop what became “Samba tem digital”, thinking once I was done I would return to a FLOSS set-up.
I should have seen it coming, but after some days of tinkering I opened a folder of musical skeletons I began in Ableton, 2018, when I first visited Brazil. At that time I was working on an urban research/cooking project, but had some inkling beforehand that Brazil would re-ignite my interest in music, as I had purchased a small USB keyboard that came packaged with an LE version of the software. In Rio I intuitively began making recordings on my smartphone of music I would hear everyday in my unfamiliar surrounds. This was also during the time of the presidential elections and there were regular demonstrations—manifestaçãoes—in the streets and plazas, notably the ele não campaign against Jair Bolsonaro, who went on to win by a significant margin. In Rio, I began to transcribe some of the rhythms I had recorded into MIDI—“riddim writing” is how I described it, as it bore some resemblance to writing, editing and fine-tuning text. After the patterns were entered into the software, I would run them through different drum kits and samples. Swapping drum kits on the fly is simple to do in Ableton and can lead to surprising results. I wasn’t sure what to do next. I sent a couple of riddims to some friends whom I thought might be interested to voice them, but received little response. Later I dropped them into fugitive frequency podcasts, just to put them to some use and to “see” how they sounded.
At RSJ, I was the sole inhabitant at figuera, a ground level cottage by an unsealed road that ran through the property, that could have easily housed four or five more residents. I had a small PA at my disposal and would often spend my nights mixing tracks, knowing that I wouldn’t be keeping anyone awake. My closest neighbour, Javier, was maybe 20 meters or so down the road. While I would make noise in the evenings, he would wake up early to practice trumpet and we never seemed to bother each other. Prior to moving to RSJ during the COVID pandemic, Javier was based in Rio where he’d been involved in a gallery/project space where I believe he was brewing beer, a practice he was carrying on at RSJ. I asked if he was thinking to play trumpet with others—maybe join a samba bloco?—a popular sport of sorts in Brazil. He said something about playing in a “techno samba” group and I was intrigued.
In July last year Kode9/Steve Goodman released his album Escapology (2022). Like many others, I have much respect for the London based DJ, Hyperdub label boss and theorist. Alongside his colleague Kodwo Eshun, whose book More Brilliant than the Sun (1998) unleashed a slew of concepts concerned with black alienation, technology and “rhythmachine music”, Goodman has been a steady influence on my thinking about sound and EDM. At RSJ I listened to some recent interviews in which he recalled his early love for jungle, which reminded me of the “hardcore continuum”, a termed coined by another of Goodman’s contemporaries, music journalist Simon Reynolds. It describes morphing but consistent musical genres and scenes that extended from early hardcore rave in the late 1980s UK, to jungle, drum and bass, garage, grime and dubstep and its ecology of record shops, pirate radio stations, parties, promoters and clubs. The notion of a hardcore continuum has propelled my interests in EDM from the time that jungle and drum and bass first entered my consciousness growing up in Sydney, and a curiousity to tap back into it is what prompted me to start mixing again for fugitive radio.
It was again the time of the presidential election when I returned to Brazil in September 2022, and shortly after I arrived at RSJ a second run-off election was scheduled. While now relatively removed from the action in the bigger cities, the mood at the fazenda and among its community was anxious. On the day I arrived, I was swept up in a manifestação organised in the nearby town of São José do Vale do Rio Preto. The following weekend, on the 30 October election the working class icon and former president, Luiz Inácio “Lula” da Silva defeated Bolsanaro by a narrow margin, indicating that the country remained polarized.
So it was strange to find myself in the after glow of the elections and among RSJ’s idyllic surroundings in late Spring, turning to Reynolds’ 2012 book Energy Flash, which recounts his experiences of early rave and jungle in the UK, and following the scene as it transformed in the US. Early in his book Reynolds interviews Juan Atkins who coined the term “techno” to describe the music he and his friends were developing in Detroit, inspired by his high school readings of Alvin Toffler’s book Future Shock (1970) and its sequel The Third Wave (1980), which includes references to “Techno-Rebels” who “embraced technology as a means of empowerment and resistance”. Reynolds recounts Atkins describing himself as a “warrior for the technological revolution” (Reynolds 2012). For me, Atkin’s attitude reminds me of the techno-optimism of early net culture and open source movements; perhaps a “past potential future” to use a phrase associated with the Otolith Group, a collaboration/collective co-founded by Eshun and Anjalika Sagar in 2002, known for their film-essays. Reynolds points out that Atkins and his friends and collaborators, Derrick May and Kevin Saunderson—mythologised as the Belleville Three—used the term “techno” to distinguish themselves from the other black dance music gaining popularity in the UK: house from Chicago. In his recent history of Detroit techno, Assembling a Black Counter Culture (2022), DeForrest Brown Jr [Instagram] notes that May preferred the term “High Tech Soul”, which became the name of a 2006 documentary.
Reynolds describes house music as “inorganic”: “machines talking to each other, in an un-real acoustic space” (2012: “New Jack City), which resonated with my experiences of working with software. He emphasises the musical form of the “track” (ie a drum track) rather than a song (2012: “Disco’s Revenge”), as a tool developed by house music DJs such as Frankie Knuckles (1955–2014); “house” being a contraction of “Warehouse”, the Chicago club where Knuckles honed his skills. Initially made on reel-to-reel tape, these would be used to mix, supplement and extend long instrumental sections of records. So the “techno drum track” became the point of reference to the music I was developing at RSJ and I adopted Javier’s phrase, “techno samba”, to describe it.
I’m aware of a recent re-appraisal of techno in sound studies, black studies, queer studies and contemporary art. For example, the short film Black to Techno (2019) by Jenn Nkiru, comissioned by Frieze and Gucci for their series Second Summer of Love (2019) recalling the music-driven cultural revolution of 1988.
Most significant is the campaign to “Make Techno Black Again”, fronted by the aforementioned writer and musician DeForrest Brown Jr/Speaker Music. With his interests firmly rooted in the black working class experience of Detroit, Brown Jr’s book Assembling a Black Counter Culture (2022), proposes to delink techno from the hardcore continuum and its associations with (European) rave culture and rather re-frame it as a distinct African American artform and “embodied aural history”. Perhaps a hardcore discontinuum?
DeForrest Brown Jr reading Kodwo Eshun’s More Brilliant than the Sun. Photo: Ting Ding 2020
Brown Jr presents his thoughts as an extension of Eshun’s writing and he also responds to ideas raised by Goodman in his book Sonic Warfare: Sound, Affect and the Ecology of Fear (2012). In the podcast below produced by Haus der Kulteren der Welt, Berlin and Camden Art Centre, London, 2021, Brown Jr, Goodman and musician Nkisi discuss the migration of techno from Detroit to Europe.
While I’m still working my way through Brown Jr’s detailed volume, it has pointed me towards some interesting music and history, some of which appears in this mix, notably the “acid house” tracks: Phuture’s “Acid Tracks” (1987), Adonis’ “No Way Back” (1986) and Steve Poindexter’s “Computer Madness” (1989). I’m also curious about the continuity of acid house in footwork, as can be heard in productions by Traxman (AKA Corky Strong), whose “Bad Indigestion” from his Acid Lyfe (2018) release also features in this mix. His 2019 reworking of Steve Poindexter’s “Work that Mutha Fucker” (1989), pressed on the same record as “Computer Madness”, is another notable track.
Another influence is Brown Jr’s descriptions of how house DJ’s would loop and mix instrumental rhythms breaks and drum tracks, into repetitive hypnotic sequences that could last up to an hour or more—“music that would never stop”, according to Larry Levan (1954–1992) the legendary DJ at the New York’s Paradise Garage in the 1980s. A combination of these readings and the qualities of these musics have led me to attempt looping and crossfading back and forth between tracks more than I am accustomed to doing, and admittedly with mixed results, nevertheless giving a sense of where “techno samba” might go. Another technique I’m curious to experiment with, but am limited by my current set-up, is the “rhythmic fader” DJing techniques of Derrick May (listen here) and that I find reminiscent of another influence on my mixing, Venus X (listen here). (Incidentally Venus X also features in Wu Tsang’s contribution to the Freize and Gucci series,Into a Space of Love (2019) concerned with New York House.)
While I am processing Brown Jr’s arguments in this mix, as a testing ground for thought, I nevertheless regard my approach to techno is in its most generic sense, ie rhythmic dance music made with machines.
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fugitive radio rádio em fuga in Brazil 2022 was supported by the Australia Council for the Arts.
A conversation with Toronto-based radio artist Andrew O’Connor [Instagram] and Todd Lanier Lester one of the founders of Lanchonete.org, an urban research and artist project based around a neighbourhood lunch counter in Conjunto Santos Dumont in central São Paulo.
Late in September 2022, Andrew installed a site-specific radio artwork in the laneway of Conjunto Santos Dumont, featuring a series of interviews he conducted with residents in collaboration with architect, urbanist and interpreter Gabi Ushida.
On the first weekend of October we collaborated on “Rádio Santos Dumont” a day of workshops, events and performances. We were joined by Merien Rodrigues of Itinero Grapho [Instagram] who hosts workshops in a mobile printmaking studio that unpacks from her Kombi van. Also on board was journalist Amber Cortes and illustrator Carl Nelson who had both traveled from the US to be in Brazil during the presidential elections (2 October). Local musicians Gabriel Edé [Instagram] and Vitor Wutzki [Instagram] contributed a very successful songwriting workshop. Carol Godefroid [Instagram] and Gabriel Carnelós [Instagram] provided live translations and photo-documentation, and their voices feature in this episode alongside those of Francisco Josepha de Castro AKA Chico and Nadija.
Woven through this episode are excerpts from Andrew O’Connor’s radio installation and edits of a recording of São Paulo-based musician Felinto [Bandcamp] whose performance closed the first day of the event.
Special mention must go to the people of Conjunto Santos Dumont who welcomed us: notably Liduina whose fruit shop was a base for our activities and Tarcisio, whose bar is the base for Lanchonete.org.
fugitive radio rádio em fuga in Brazil 2022 is supported by the Australia Council for the Arts.
A conversation with Beá Tibiriçá, Wilken Sanches and Hernani Dimantas, the founders of Coletivo Digital [Instagram], an organisation who have been developing software livre, digital integration and open culture in São Paulo for around 20 years. We met on 12 October (a holiday for o dia de nossa senhora aparecida) at Coletivo Digital’s space in the Pinheiros neighbourhood, which serves as a gallery, performance venue and also houses a recording studio that runs on free and open source software. The podcast features the song ‘Canção tem samba’, by Trilha Sonora, which was recorded here.
Our conversation, with translations and contributions by Wagner Miranda [Instagram] occurred after the first presidential elections on 2 October which were inconclusive. A second run-off election had been announced for October 30 and when we met the collective were actively campaigning ‘for democracy’.
