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Thursday, August 04, 2005
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Looks like right now I'd rather live even in the USA than in the Czech republic. Via BBC News: The Czech president criticised the crackdown, but Prime Minister Jiri Paroubek said techno fans were "no dancing children but dangerous people". Writing in the Lidove noviny newspaper on Tuesday, he said the core of the techno enthusiasts was made up of "obsessed people with anarchist proclivities and international links," who "provoke massive violent demonstrations, fuelled by alcohol and drugs, against the peaceful society". Via Indymedia: The Prime Minister Paroubek defends the police actions as "adequate". He also mentioned short-to-be-prepared legal changes to the Czech law of assembly, so that "an event like this will not happen again".
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Monday, August 01, 2005
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Czechtek is open-air international and multicultural music festival with 12 year tradition. Not only different genres of music, but also videoart and other art performances take place on this unique event of free culture. In all history of festival there were no significant damages or problems, participants while leaving clean the land and take responsibility for their action. Contract with the owner of grass plain was clearly shown to police. There is no indicaion that festival was in any way illegal, every aspect was according to law of Czech Republic. Although police stated throughout friday 29th several different reasons for blockage of access to the place of festival, all were later shown as lies or desinformation. The final reason for brute attack was "threat of damaging the surrounding private pieces of land". The presence of attending young people on surrounding land was caused by police blockage of all roads and the police action was not taken against this people, but against the people on legally borrowed property. Woman from near willage, owner of adjoining land, said she had been woken up by police friday morning, long before people began to arrive, taken to police station and by false arguments encouraged to sign complaint. Most of the people did not hear any appeal to leave the place, many of them had drunk alcohol-containing beverages and could not go away with cars, many of them believed that by taking part on legally organized festival they cannot be targeted by police. The first police action on saturday 30, 16:30PM took several hours and was badly coordinated. On the place was 1000 policemen, water cannon, armoured tank and low-flying helicopter. The second night attack at 22PM was led with extreme brutality. Police in heavy suits without identifying numbers refused to give identifying information, information about their command and information about first aid location. Police used massive amounts of tear gas and desorientation grenades, in many cases they threw tear gas granade into a car and did not let people inside for long time get out, in other cases they broke car windows by iron bars, threw grenade in and forced people to get out. All people were beaten up, including teenage girls, which cried in pain. Witnesses described attack on lone staing girl, who was pulled down by her hair and kicked on the ground by four policemen. There were hundreds of injuries, including cuts, bruises, burnings, broken arms, shock. Many people were in shock still the next day afternoon with red faces from tear gas. Police intentionally damaged cars, electronic equipment and other property. Attack was led with clear intention to cause injuries. People were forced to go to near highway, which was closed several hours and then the waiting trucks were allowed to go dangerously among the desoriented people. Police confirmed death of young man attending the festival. Reportedly he was killed by truck which left. The reason of this death can be manipulated by police, no wittnesses were found to confirm police statement. Police brutality continued on scattered people till the sunday morning. Czech state television Czech TV did not inform about the night attack, it's news were not balanced, mainly repeating police statements. Czech TV in its news also under estimated political value of call of freedom and resignation of minister of interior on sunday's demonstration in Prague, reporting briefly about techno-goers. This is a call to foreing media to publish information about unlawful police brutality and state of democracy and human rights in Czech Republic. Originally published at visions.cz. Photos of the event here.
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Monday, July 25, 2005
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Jaakko (Megamies) was recently here for Pori Jazz and a few days of boozing at my apartment. A fun extended weekend it was, albeit somewhat taxing. I'm just starting to recover now, but my apartment hasn't. I'll probably clean this mess up next week since today I have other things to do and tomorrow I'll go to Helsinki for (sigh) even more boozing. After all this is over, I'm probably thinking of retreating to a secluded location to concentrate on tending to a garden and contemplating my relationship with God. (Not a monastery since some of them might actually produce beer or wine.) Anyway, recent purchases: Propergol - United States CD Rather high quality French power electronics, apparently dealing with the chaos and paranoia inherent in the American culture. An array of instantly recognizable movie samples - Seven, Videodrome, Evil Dead, Henry: Portrait Of A Serial Killer etc. - some vaguely, some very obviously connected with the theme, backed by electronics ranging from minimalist ambient (Niky Braun) through harsh rhytmic pulse (Outburst) all the way to no holds barred harsh searing noise (Attack Of Nerves). Voivod - Dimension Hatröss CD I've been interested in Voivod for a while now, ever since a friend of mine decided to make me familiar with his Voivod 12" collection - by the time I'd heard their version of Astronomy Domine, I was pretty much convinced - but I hadn't got around to actually buying any Voivod until now. If I've understood correctly, Dimension Hatröss is pretty much their first more "experimental" album, and a solid and enjoyable effort it is. Even though, with the Batman cover, it's competing with Led Zeppelin III for the biggest letdown of an ending track ever. Last House On The Left DVD Craven's sadistic tour de force may have got a bit old, particularly owing to the fact that is was done just a couple of years before many of the more notorious pieces of horror history started popping up, but it's nevertheless still quite powerful, and a blunt but good encapsulation of what most horror, from slasher flics to more supernatural stuff, boils down to: unexplainable terror and death with no reason or moral justification.
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Friday, July 22, 2005
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KYLLÄPÄ HOMOTTAA
 | Currently listening: Nihil By KMFDM Release date: 04 April, 1995 |
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Wednesday, July 13, 2005
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I just noticed that the mysterious scar I got last Friday looks like an exclamation point.
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Monday, July 11, 2005
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So, it's now the first Monday of my holidays. Now I have oceans of time to spend on projects and other things I've planned to do and should be doing! Unfortunately I just walked a locked bike for about 2 kilometres in fierce sunlight and, as a result, can't be arsed to do anything for the remainder of the day.
 | Currently listening: Renegade By Propergol Release date: 18 September, 2001 |
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Sunday, July 10, 2005
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So, the weekend is over. On Friday we (=me and this guy) travelled to Tampere, and there by foot to the somewhat secluded Vastavirta-klubi. Apart from an incident with an unfriendly secunazi, the venue was quite cool. Small in an "intimate" way, and Sandels on the tap. We missed Toiminto's DJ set entirely. Dana's set was about halfway when we arrived. Wish I'd heard the first half too, since the second half was just brilliant. She played stuff like Tarmvred, Imminent+Synapscape, and something that was almost certainly some Venetian Snares I'd never heard before. After Dana's set, the live acts started. First on the stage was No I Ain't. Before, they'd have all sorts of electronics and custom percussions and whatnot on stage - but not this time. Their setup was stripped to vocals, bass, guitar and a very minimal percussion set consisting of a few cymbals and lids and stuff. A daring decision, I must say - unfortunately not a working decision, though. The end result was rather uneventful and boring. Next on stage were Halo Manash, who were the main reason we decided to come. And they didn't disappoint one bit. Electronic hum and noise, bombastic percussions and at one point nearly indiscernible guitar drone, bone installations, ritualistic "choreographies" - incredible stage presence. Easily the highlight of the night. And third, the last of the live acts, Tres. His set was fortunately a lot more interesting than the Koneisto set of his I listened to earlier. Not as much saw leads and halfway heavy standard beats, but rather hyperspeed gabber havoc with erratic twists and a blizzard of samples. Took a while to get into it, but after I got warmed up, it was quite exhilarating. After a night at Annie/Matt Current's place, we returned to Pori for the remaining half of the Thrashwax Fest. When we arrived at Annankatu 6, we noticed that Carpe Diem - the most established act of the night for sure - were, for some reason, playing first, and their set was already almost over. Fortunately we managed to hear a couple of songs at least. They kicked ass, as usual. Next on stage was Stumm, who, to my surprise, had Jukka from Kaos Kontrol as the vocalist. The kind of stuff they played wasn't really anything I'd expected either - slow and ultra-heavy sludge/stoner/whatever drone. Excellent. (Plus, you know, female bassists always steal my heart.) After Stumm, we thought that we're probably not in the best possible mindset for hardcore, so we retreated to a nearby bar. All in all, both nights were very well worth the price of admission. (Not sure about the price of the alcohol I consumed, though - gotta take it a bit easier for the next two weekends if I intend to survive Boozembly somehow.)
 | Currently listening: Live Wired By Front Line Assembly Release date: 08 October, 1996 |
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Thursday, July 07, 2005
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HOLIDAYS ARE HERE! Except I still have some mail I need to send tomorrow. Other than that, HOLIDAYS ARE HERE! (In other news, I'm slightly drunk)
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Wednesday, July 06, 2005
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Cyanide and Happiness has to be one of the most hilarious things I've come upon in a long time. Or then I'm just tired.
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Wednesday, July 06, 2005
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I wonder if having a beer to calm yourself down after losing one hour's worth of edited content due to an unexplainable glitch in a website content management system is a coverable expense.
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