Morning Comrades! As you may have figured by now I am not doing a Black Lodges Drop this weekend as I am catching up with orders, production issues - you wouldn’t believe how tight and disrupted the supply chains currently are, even for little people like myself and so. Rest assured I am planning to drop a new exciting collab next week and maybe even a new design from this end. Speaking of new art, shit look at the above, second new piece this week.
That sentiment is also how we are going to start today’s resource heavy email. Obviously, it is a play on “Respect Your Elders”, which I do think originates from the old Testament and its Commandment “honor thy mother and father”. In times when information moved a lot slower than it does today there were certain benefits to this structuring of societies but it no longer applies for several reasons. As we all know, information is power and the distribution of information, knowledge results in, and creates a vertical power structure, one that historically in the West has been patriarchal in nature. Additionally, and in especially in the the context of the Western Experience, a classist layer has to be taken into account in regards to the accumulation and distribution of knowledge and experience, and by those two facts alone, respecting your elders is not only viable today but furthermore absolutely not acceptable in a marxist projection of scientific utopianism. To be clear, this isn’t a “Oh gotcha” point that exposes marxist thought as anti-intellectual, on the contrary, what that means is that knowledge, the ability to attain and distribute it has to be removed from vertical power structures such as Patriarchy and a Class System, as well as ideas such as property. As Marx writes in the Communist Manifesto:
“You are horrified at our intending to do away with private property. But in your existing society, private property is already done away with for nine-tenths of the population."
Despite what the bourgeois claim, Communism doesn't keep people from appropriating the products of labor. Rather, it keeps them from subjugating others in the process of this appropriation. This ties in, precisely into the meaning of this piece. Suspecting Your Elders opens up the reality that everything is based on vertical power hierarchies and you know what, its beyond time that we acknowledge the last 250 years of analysis thereof and do something about.
Secondly, and this is almost a by-note to the above, I believe it was the Washington Posts of all papers that recently kicked off this extremely off take on the German Philosopher Kant - who was a German philosopher and one of the central Enlightenment thinkers. Kant's comprehensive and systematic works in epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, and aesthetics have made him one of the most influential figures in modern Western philosophy. His work is truly considered to this day in academic circles that translates to real power outside of them, to be the cornerstone of Morality.
Fact is, he was also insanely racist and quite frankly a piece of shit. Watch the below for more insight.
I haven’t done one of these in decades- for those of you that don’t know, my first writing job was for a London based Metal /Indie / Rock magazine around 22 years ago. I know it’s insane to hear that prior to the Internet you could actually survive in London on a salary of music writer. Truly, I still can’t believe it but here we are.
So, the new IDLES record has been out for a week. After the shit show of their last album I was very apprehensive about this one, only because their start was so incredibly promising - a much needed angry, aware punk response to, well, everything really. The nature of the music industry being what it is, coupled with the usual trappings of fame resulted in a a classic “fuck this shit, 3rd album”. - It happens often and frankly most bands don’t recover from this. The usual trajectory being a return to previous successful structures that truly never translates.
This didn’t happen on the now 4th IDLES record and frankly, I am stoked to hear what is going on this record. There’s visible growth, musically and lyrically and as a fan I am far more interested in the development and journey of an artists work than in buying the same pair of shoes once a year. Yeah, it’s IDLES but darker, a little slower, sometimes, more personal and seemingly that is what the band wanted and needed. First and foremost that is precisely how we separate good from well, shit music. Progression, development and honesty, otherwise it’s just a product to be sold. Great record all around. P.S.: Fuck Kimmel. But this is a good clip.
Feminist Economics
Returning to this segment I wanted to highlight two talks where “Professor Jayati Ghosh explores women in the formal workforce. Legal, social and cultural constraints mean that female workers often end up clustered in certain occupations. The easy exploitation of women turns these into low wage jobs as a result. The double burden of household responsibilities hampers women from working extra hours, reducing their earning potential and upward mobility. Women workers are seen as generally available and expendable, and private employers as well as government set their expectations around that. Women are often not treated as full formal workers, have less job security, are paid less to begin with, and face a sharp earnings penalty for motherhood. Women also have less public infrastructure and lower safety on job sites and commutes. Women in self-employment fare just as poorly, facing legal barriers to inheritance of assets and relative lack of access to productive credit. Recent schemes such a microfinance have been unable to overcome these obstacles. Despite social and cultural advances in recent years, women workers continue to serve as a reserve army of labor in the modern capitalist economy. This is reinforced by globalization and relocation of production, which maintains women as insecure, low-paid subordinate workers. Capitalism is not blind to gender needs, but rather exploits it and uses it to its own advantage.”
Also returning, is this week’s segment on A/V Infotainment for you to take into your weekend. All very much worth your time for you to share and enjoy.
Ending another week with these wonderful contributions from both Ana and Tatjana, respectively, are these two bangers.
Panzanella is an Italian bread salat made from unsalted, tuscan Pane Sciocco or other Italian breads like Ciabatta. Since it isn’t necessarily easy to get good authentic Italian bread feel free to use any other unsalted bread - once it is roasted it truly doesn’t hurt that much and it’s all about the tomatoes, fresh, aromatic juicy ones at the very least.
Ingredients: old bread, ideally unsalted, 200g of cooked lentils, 500g of fresh tomatoes, 1 red onion, one clove of garlic, heaps of olive oil, a table spoon of red wine vinegar, burrata/mozarella, salt and pepper, fresh basil.
Step 1: To prep the dressing use the olive oil, red wine vinegar and garlic to mix. Feel free to expand on this as you see fit, but we are keeping it simple here.
Step 2: Tear the bread into smaller pieces and fry in a goodly amount of olive oil until brown.
Step 3: Chop tomatoes and add salt, pepper and a pinch of sugar if needed.
Step 4: Mix the lentils with the dressing, put the bread on a plate, add said lentils and then add the tomatoes and their juice last. Add the raw, cut onions, basil, thank me later.
The LUCIEN GAUDIN has a fairly brief history compared to a lot of the cocktails we've been doing so far. It's a dry and boozy drink with a good bitterness to it. If you're into negronis, you'd most likely like this one too. The drink itself was named after Lucien Gaudin, a French fencer. He was insanely talented, winning 1st or 2nd place in every event he entered in the 1920, 1924 and 1928 Olympics. He even won Olympic gold in both 1924 and 1928. After retiring from fencing, Gaudin became a journalist and co-owner of a media company focused on sports, but sadly committed suicide in 1934 following the company's bankruptcy.
The LUCIEN GAUDIN cocktail itself is from 1929. It's recipe was published in the book Cocktails de Paris Presentes (1929) after the drink won a cocktail competition that same year. The neighbourhood of a negroni tastewise, but slightly lighter and with deeper orange notes to it. The book credits a Frenchman called 'Charlie from Le Cheval Pie' (a restaurant in Paris) as the inventor. How and why this drink was named after the famous French fencer we don't exactly know. Maybe something with pride in a fellow country man or simply just because of the name recognition – a good name helps selling a drink. Some say Gaudin was a regular at Le Cheval Pier between 1925- 1930, which could also be why this drink got named after him.
WHAT YOU NEED:
London dry gin, Campari, Orange liqueur, Dry vermouth, Orange peel, Ice, Shake, Bar spoon, Julep strainer, Jigger, Coupe or goblet style glass
HOW YOU DO IT:
- Glass goes into the fridge/freezer first and foremost!
- Pour 3 cl of London dry gin, 1,5 cl Campari, 1,5 cl of orange liqueur and 1,5 cl of white vermouth into your shaker.
- Prep your garnish, an orange peel.
- Take your glass out of the fridge/freezer.
- Add ice to your shaker and stir for 5-8 seconds. Use your Julep strainer and pour into the glass.
- Take your orange peel and spray the oils from it onto the drink and glass. You want to hold it 5-7 cm away from the glass at an angle, so you hit both the side of the glass but also the top of the liquid. Take the peel, give the rim and stem a light rub with it, and place it nicely on the rim.
- Drink!
ON A PERSONAL SIDENOTE:
A London dry gin and Campari is pretty self explanatory. If you're thinking of using Aperol instead of Campari, it is definitely do-able, but keep in mind that Aperol is sweeter in comparison. If you find Campari too bitter and Aperol too sweet, see if you can find Rinomatto. It's an l'apeterivo from Italy and it's delicious, but it's also a good middle ground between Campari and Aperol. I know that I really like using it at least. It's a bit more orange-y than both Campari and Aperol. It's less sweet and drier than Aperol, but not as bitter as Campari. For the white vermouth most will do as long as it's to the dry side. I got into the orange liqueur thing some weeks ago, but to quickly sum up: Cointreau is an option and the is what's used in the original recipe, but dry Orange Curaçao is also an option. I personally like to work with the one from Pierre Ferrand. If you really wanna amp up the orange notes even more, add 1-2 dashes of orange bitter before stirring the cocktail.
Today I'm gonna write a little about glassware. I've written 'coupe or goblet style' a few times, and I thought it time to explain what I mean. A coupe/coupette is a type of glass that has a wide range within it's own category, if that makes sense. It's an overall category with its own smaller sub divisions with different makes and models. When I say 'coupe or goblet style' I'm specifically referring to the 'Nick & Nora' model. It's a cocktail glass named after a fictional couple from the book The Thin Man (1934) by Dashiell Hammett, which spawned into a series of movies. I personally like using the Nick & Nora glass to serve a lot of straight up, stirred cocktails. Any cocktail bartender knows this specific glass as it's been around and widely used since it's creation in the 1930's. I'm not gonna get much deeper into glassware generally, since it would be never ending and most likely get quite long winded, but glassware also it's one of the things bartenders can argue the most about – and we do. Trust me.
That's all for me this week. Put you legs up with a cocktail in hand and enjoy the weekend!
And that’s all from me this week also. As always, without compromise, yours,
V.