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Posts Tagged ‘ Culture ’

Miniature Civilisations

Capitalism is about using money to make money for people who already have more of it than they need. Its institutions, by their very nature, breed inequality, exclusion, environmental destruction, social irresponsibility and economic instability while homogenising cultures, weakening the institutions of democracy, and eroding the moral and social fabric of society. – David Korten

The Miniature Earth is powerful piece of multimedia that shows us the statistics of life on earth. The message? = Be thankful for what you’ve got and help others, especially those you don’t know, by treating them as human beings no matter what the differences are. The world is not the way it is by accident. It is like this because of greed and fear. Greed is NOT what we need and fear should NOT be let near. Be bold, but be nice. Share.

This was sent to me by a friend on Facebook and duly passed around. But I need to put it here alongside some related videos, especially given the time of the year, as a reminder of how unjust this world is. Don’t close your eyes.

The Miniature Earth

2007: 12/12
CATEGORY: Culture
Film / Video
Social
TAGS: Art
Culture
Entertainment
Environment
Life
Politics
Social
Video
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Music Board Of Ireland

Here’s a great documentary about the Irish music industry made by Manina Films. Made in late 2005, early 2006 about the Music Board Of Ireland which was set up by the government in partnership with the music industry through IBEC to promote and support contemporary Irish music in 2001. It was disbanded (pun intended) in 2004 having accomplished little if anything. The idea was good but it was not a priority for the government.

This was in a sense banished to the web as it could not be shown in it’s entirety because of it’s critical angle of government policy in the area of support for young Irish bands. Comparisons are made to funding giving for others areas in the Arts and in Sport (which is handled by the same government department – I never quite got that one!).

There is a point made by Jim Carroll that the government is more interested in entertaining the National Concert Hall punters (can you call them that?) than the regular young gig goers and young musicians, as the former are more likely to vote. This is a fair point, but a worrying one. There are a lot of young people apathetic to politics in this country and this is a shame. Ultimately then, when complaints are made about the “state of the nation” the apathetic are the ones to blame. Vote not just for the Battle of the Bands, vote for (or against) bigger things.

Thanks to Nialler9 for bringing this to my attention on his blog.

2007: 12/12
CATEGORY: Audio / Music
Culture
Film / Video
Politics
TAGS: Art
Culture
Entertainment
Music
Politics
Video
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All hail the Deacon, Dan….

hail dan

Wow, what can I say. “Blown away” would be a could place to start in attempting to describe the experience of a Dan Deacon gig.
I had heard some of his music a few months back and couldn’t get enough of it. I missed the show he piut on last time he was in town but was sure to get myself on down to Whelans on Wexford St to witness one of these spectacular shows. Your Only Massive did a great warm up for Dan and got the crowd to shake their cool away in reference to people who are “too cool” to dance. Luckily I had located mysself on the balcony so was kinda excused! It’s not that I don’t dance, it just well, you know… I’ve gotta be really into it or someone on the dancefloor! Anyway I wished I was down there in the thick of it for this gig. It was fantastic. It was great to see a level of crowd interaction with and artist like this, it is certainly something new and unique. Dan inspires you to get on down, have a laugh and be part of a crowd. He sets up on the floor as opposed to the stage and gets people to get in close. He controls all the lighting for his set-up and the lighting is about as basic as it gets. A glow in the dark skull and a spotlight that are synced with the music provide all the light needed and also create the atmosphere to keep the crowd engaged.

So here I present to you a little video clip of the night. It is ten minute quick cut of Dan Deacon’s amazing show in Dublin on December 2nd 2007. The audio quality is awful from the digital camera i was using so please don’t take that as an indication of the sound quality. The camera just doesn’t like the bass! The sound was fantastic (spot on Gerry!)… the atmosphere was electric. Dan is the Man.

There was lots more good footage but it’s best to keep it short here as the sound quality does not do it justice. A good idea maybe would be to turn down the video sound and listen to a better audio recording by Dan over it. I also took a small number of photos, the best of which is above, check out the rest on my flickr.