Inspired by überlin’s excellent Monster Mix and my adoration of Fever Ray’s Keep the Streets Empty for Me (the first song and the namesake of this mix), I present this little set of pleasingly post-apocalyptic, desolate, dystopian, zombie-evading, street-walking music. Happy Halloween.

Like anyone, I’m a susceptible to bouts of nostalgia. But after the sudden passing of Steve Jobs, these video of clips from the Macintosh game “Beyond Dark Castle” really brought me back to a simpler time (it’s always simpler isn’t it?) of the early 1990s playing this game on the tiny 9-inch screen of my family’s Macintosh SE and its 20MB hard drive. The computer was a gift my from aunt in New Jersey, one of the early Mac adopters and a major Apple evangelist in her own right. Sure I’d used computers at elementary school, but this thing was magic. The Mac had something about it that set it apart from any other device of the time—it felt truly futuristic. My siblings and I spent countless hours on this game, created by Flash programmer Jonathan Gay, which considering the constraints of the Mac’s black and white pixels and the tiny screen, is something of a masterpiece.

I totally geeked out on that computer. I subscribed to Macworld magazine. I became familiar with most software made for the machine (which was thankfully limited), called Apple tech support fairly frequently with daft questions (I was 15 ok?), made some programs with BASIC and evangelized to other people who didn’t know about this vastly superior machine (especially my high school friend who insisted his Commodore Amiga was the peak of technological advancement). My evangelical zeal wore off quickly at college when I discovered that a nice GUI isn’t the most important thing to effective computing (my physics dept. was big on UNIX) and I started to actively dislike Apple cultists by the 2000s when I realized how effective Jobs’s brainwashing genius had become, but I remember that early excitement of the Mac SE and how it continued through to Apple’s iProducts of today. I understand it, which is maybe why I resent it when someone starts gushing about the godly power of their newest Apple gadget. It’s probably like being into an underground band that suddenly gets popular. The charm is still there, but now everyone knows about it and so it’s not, like, cool anymore, man (as I write this out on a regular Samsung laptop).

Still, you gotta give it to Jobs for keeping good design at the fore (in a way, the same reason that companies like Sweden’s IKEA and H&M have managed to dominate their industries) and building such a dedicated cult (not mention subconsciously promoting the idea that people with Apple products are simply better people). You could call Jobs many things (I called him a ‘master of dark zen’ in recent years, not even knowing he was a Buddhist), but ‘genius’ does seem to fit the best.

I just (finally) upgraded this blog from WordPress 2 point something to 3.2.1 on PHP after more than two years of neglect. I’m liking the new, slick dashboard, the plugin admin and the generally improved ease of use. Let’s see if that helps me blog more…

In the world steel industry, China’s exponential lurch from small bit player to dominant producer (far and away) in just ten years serves as good illustration for the country’s sudden dominance in all kinds of industries. Just look at shipping—China, as the world’s biggest steelmaker, rather necessitates being its biggest iron ore importer. As such, it’s only a slight exaggeration to say that day earnings in today’s dry bulk shipping industry rise and fall on China’s steel industry and its importing whims. Still, I was surprised (and then surprised that I was surprised) to see that a massive project is underway at the world’s single biggest steelmaking facility in Shanghai to construct an earthquake-resistant replacement for San Fransisco’s Bay Bridge—which will then be shipped from Shanghai to be installed at SF. Al Jazeera reports:

Former Berlin finance minister and hugely successful author of a book about, among other things, how immigrants are dumbing down Germany and a burden on its social market economy, Thilo Sarrazin, came to Kreuzberg with a ZDF camera crew last Friday to “have a dialogue” with the local population.

Shockingly, he wasn’t greeted with open arms. He visited the Hasir restaurant on Adalbertstrasse, the Turkish market on Maybachufer and, finally, the Turkish Alevi Community Centre on Waldemarstrasse, meeting with loud disapproval at every stop. At the community centre he was greeted with an official statement about why they were canceling the meeting and chants of “Hau ab!” (“Get lost!”) from a small crowd. Sarrazin’s yelled reaction was that they are only “confirming the stereotype”. It was gratifying to see him driven away and see his trademark sourpuss walrus face turn a bit more sour. Yesterday, writing in the Berliner Morgenpost newspaper, Sarrazin, in true populist style, speculated that the community centre, in deciding to cancel the meeting, probably hadn’t read his book, didn’t know his position and were likely influenced by “radical elements in the Turkish community” to turn him away—not, of course, because people just like to see a racist get punk’d.

News of E. coli-tainted hamburgers from Lidl hospitalizing seven French kids yesterday reminded me of “America Week” last week at my local Lidl, Germany’s hyper cheap grocery chain. Lidl often has ethnic themed weeks (Greek, Scandinavian, “Asian”, Italian, French, etc., assuming “American” is an ethnicity) when they stock limited food items firmly based on national stereotypes. AMERIKAWOCHE and McENNEDY brand foods are no different.

Every America Week that comes around (about twice a year, I think) comes with newly imagined American products that—much like the German words Handy, Pullover or Smoking—exist only in the realm of allowed believability, the realm of probably existing because they sound so American… Ketchup-Flavored French Fry Snack, for example. So, Yuhang, knowing that I like yogurt, bought these two flavored yogurts, which do sound American, but in practice were somewhat ghastly (I tried the first one for, you know, science): chocolate muffin yogurt and toffee with toffee bits yogurt (there was another cake-flavored one, too). I think (hope) she bought them ironically. I’m not a snarker and I don’t go in for expat irony, but American Week never fails to tickle my smirky bone. Also: German for yogurt looks like JOG HURT. I like that.

Thanks to Knut the Swede for introducing this band to me a few years ago.

So, I saw Liturgy last night. Were they transcendent? Yes. Yes, they were. I’m still floating about an inch off the ground at this very moment. So, yes, seeing them up close in that rather intimate venue at Hackescher Markt, I can say this is a band to get excited about about. And their drummer is phenomenal. The whole band are really tight and committed and slightly bonkers, but that drummer, my goodness me. Is it fair to call them hipster black metal? Well, there were at least two guys in the audience wearing headbands, which I couldn’t help but notice right off the bat, and, to be honest, the crowd was about 80% solid signifying hipster, so yes, insofar as their audience are hipsters and the band look like Brooklyn hipsters (because they are) and their singer looks all of 16 years old and was wearing a v-neck t-shirt, yes this is hipster metal. Because why can’t hipsters listen to black metal? God bless ‘em, I say. The more hipsters who listen to black metal, the less chillwave and witch house gets made/listened to; so, I figure that’s more than worth it. Good job, guys. You killed it. Also, their singer (sorry, I don’t have any names) intentially whisper-mumbles into the mic between songs and is completely incomprehensible. I’m not sure what that is/was all about. But if you’re trying to speak exclusively through your music, guy, you accomplished that. That was a killer show.

This is probably a good time to list my favorite metal records from last year. The list is top-heavy with Norwegians, which was not at all intentional. Man, I need to go to Norway and see what the hell is going on up there.

TOP 10 METAL ALBUMS 2010
01 – Kvelertak – Kvelertak (NOR)
02 – Shining – Blackjazz (NOR)
03 – Agalloch – Marrow of the Spirit (USA)
04 – Enslaved – Axioma Ethica Odini (NOR)
05 – Imperium Dekadenz – Procella Vadens (GER)
06 – Yakuza – Of Seismic Consequence (USA)
07 – Kylesa – Spiral Shadow (USA)
08 – Bongripper – Satan Worshipping Doom (USA)
09 – Heidevolk – Uit Oude Grond (NLD)
10 – Nechochwen – Azimuths to the Otherworld (USA)

HONORABLE MENTION
Watain – Lawless Darkness
Istapp – Blekinge
Gallowbraid – Ashen Eidolon
Barren Earth – Curse of the Red River
Alcest – Écailles de Lune
Watain – Lawless Darkness
Cloudkicker – Beacons
Negura Bunget – Virstele Pamintului
Nachtmystium – Addicts: Black Meddle Part II
Coliseum – House With a Curse
High on Fire – Snakes For The Divine
Drudk – Handful of Stars
Blood of the Black Owl – A Banishing Ritual
Bifröst – Heidenmetal
Black Breath – Heavy Breathing
Bison B.C. – Dark Ages
Black Tusk – Taste the Sin
Megachurch – Megachurch
Year of No Light – Ausserwelt
Ufomammut – Eve
Thulcandra – Fallen Angel’s Dominion
Thou – Summit
Metsatöll – Äio
Fistula – Goat
Eluveitie – Everything Remains as it Never Was
Eibon – Entering Darkness
Dråpsnatt – Hymner Till Undergången
Demonic Resurrection – The Return to Darkness
Darkthrone – Circle the Wagons
Dark Fortress – Ylem
Cephalic Carnage – Misled by Certainty
Anathema – We’re Here Because We’re Here
Blut aus Nord – What Once Was… Liber I
Immolation – Majesty and Decay
Intronaut – Valley of Smoke
Pensées Nocturnes – Grotesque
Unleashed – As Yggdrasil Trembles
U.S. Christmas – Run Thick in the Night

Kvelertak was hands-down, unapologetically my favorite metal record from ’10. It came out in Europe last year, but just got its American release last month, so snap it up statesiders. (And I’m happy to say they put on a fantastic live show. As luck would have it, they’re back in Berlin next week.) Here, Anthony Fantano (and my favorite YouTube music review guy) more or less describes exactly my feelings about the record. Hence, the invisible oranges.

Off to Pittsburgh!!!

My picks for the ten best records of 2010.
Better late than never, no?

LCD Soundsystem – This is Happening (James Murphy, genius)
Kvelertak – Kvelertak (the metal to rule all metals)
Wovenhand – The Threshingfloor (badass Christian music)
VA – Pomegranates: Persian Pop, Funk, Folk and Psych of the 60s and 70s
Big Boi – Sir Lucious Left Foot: The Son of Chico Dusty (Kanye who?)
Actress – Splazsh (cerebrally satisfying electronic)
Willie Nelson – Country Music (as advertised, from the legend)
Gonjasufi – A Sufi and a Killer (first prize for originality)
Hannibal Buress – My Name is Hannibal (killer comedy album)
She & Him – Vol. 2 (this is completely irresitable)

This Tuesday, a couple of Humboldt University grad students will be presenting a seminar on the “Theory, Practice and Aesthetics of Horror.” Entrance is free. Sounds like a good time, though sadly I’ll have to miss the 19:30 slot discussing biological perspectives of the undead. From the email…

Theorie, Praxis & Ästhetik des Horrors

Liebe KommilitonInnen,

Sehr gerne möchten wir Euch zur Abschlussveranstaltung unseres Projekttutoriums „From Hell: Kulturgeschichte(n) des Horrors“ am 08.März um 18:30 im Auditorium des Jacob- und Wilhelm-Grimm-Zentrums einladen! Besonders freut es uns, dass wir für diese mit Mark Benecke und Jörg Buttgereit einige namhafte „Stars“ gewinnen konnten

Das Programm im Einzelnen:

18:30 Begrüßung und Präsentation der Ergebnisse
19:30 Dr. Mark Benecke: Unrest in Peace. Untote aus naturwissenschaftlicher Perspektive
20:30 Pause – Trailershow
21:00 Horror-Livehörstück nach einem Märchen der Gebrüder Grimm
21:30 Podiumsdiskussion mit Dr. Mark Benecke, Jörg Buttgereit und Prof. Thomas Macho

Der Eintritt ist frei – wir freuen uns auf Euer zahlreiches Erscheinen

Mit besten Grüßen
Katharina Rein & Thomas Groh

Oh man, life, huh? Am I right? So I let the entire month of February go by with nothing new here. So be it. But instead of back-dating my still queued-up lists for 2010, I’m just gonna blog in the moment like a grown-up and get to those lists when I get to ‘em. But I can’t avoid this as it’s pretty exciting, as the current developing strain of American black metal is. Liturgy are from Brooklyn but they sound like primitive Nordic earth creatures who’ve never seen a latte or a flannel shirt in their lives. Like they just crawled out from some cave and are raging at that big shiny orb in the sky. Like that. They rule.

Force of nature is about right. Their myspace has some quotes relating their stuff to modern classical like Avro Pärt and this slab of minimal power makes that not sound ridiculous. Elsewhere, they’re being compared to Sibelius. Their new record Aesthethica is out and about on the Netz, though it doesn’t come out officially until May 10—which is when you will buy it. But until then you can listen to it here… Suggestion: start w/ “Glory Bronze” (check your volume).

UPDATE 1: Thanks to the superb TND podcast for clueing me in this record.

UPDATE 2: Liturgy plays in Berlin at the end of April, so look forward to that.

Wherein our hero humbly but unapologetically submits his ten favorite songs of the past year—though I might add that Yuhang is at least as responsible for liking these songs as am I AND that the Aloe Blacc song was HUGE on German radio this year, which meant that for about six months you heard it at every single kiosk, department store, coffee shop, Imbiss and hardware store you stepped into. It became just short of annoying. But still it’s a good song and the guy totally deserves the success.

Robyn – Dancing on my Own
The National – Bloodbuzz Ohio
The Roots – How I Got Over
Big Boi – Shutterbug
Sade – Soldier of Love
LCD Soundsystem – I Can Change
Aloe Blacc – I Need a Dollar
Deerhunter – Helicopter
Mavis Staples – You Are Not Alone
Eminem – Not Afraid

Oh goodness me, have I ever fallen off the blogging wagon. Not that I’ve forgotten about it. No, no, no. In fact this blog’s gaping maw has been gnawing at me almost constantly since October when I left it out to dry and didn’t come back until, well, now. Thereve been plenty of things, tons of things, that’ve crossed my path where I thought, “Man, I should totally blog the dickens out of this.” But I didn’t because, well, there are, incredibly, other happenings in my life that take slightly higher priority than this here mighty page of wonders. Not to mention that I’ve recently acquired an Xbox, which between working, studying, being married, home construction projects and generally spinning five other plates at once, gives me a set of pretty good excuses for not doing this thing that I actually quite enjoy doing. Well, I can think of about five or twelve things that I could easily remove from my daily activities that could streamline things to such a point that I’d have time for blogging. So, let’s just say, I will use this blog as a central place of time management. If you see me blogging, it means that, no, I don’t suddenly have extra time but, yes, I have managed to use it more wisely.

Something I learned recently: a missive is not necessarily negative or indignant letter, but rather just a letter. Funny, though, because don’t people only sent a missive if it’s indignant? I, for one, plan on sending plenty of positive missives in 2011 to balance the negative ones. So how’s that for a 2011 resolution?

So, the point of this post was to actually roll out the first of hopefully several posts in a row that should get my blog ball rolling this year, those being a few best-of lists of 2010, starting with the easiest one I could think of:

The Five Best Podcasts of 2010
WTFpod
Gifted talker, neurotic and comedian, Marc Maron, talks to other comedians. Captivating.

This American Life
Ira Glass. Themes. Cute stories. Smug people. You know the deal. Audio crack.

Planet Money
One of these dudes used to be a physicist but now he’s an economics reporter. Cool.

Sound Opinions
Jim DeRogatis and Greg Kot are the Siskel and Ebert of music. Music nerd nirvana.

ChinesePod
The most painless way I’ve found to learn Chinese. Start with Newbie.

It’s that time of year again—the leaves are turning, the kids are going back to school and the blogosphere is making mixtapes for Halloween—just like clockwork. From this year’s crop, at the top of the list should be this work of love, the “Written in Blood” compilation by a fella named Nate Ashley. He compiled five discs worth (including gorgeous cover art) of classic, unreleased and/or out-of-print horror movie soundtrack music including the likes of Ennio Morricone and Christopher Komeda, who did the sweet & creepy la-la-la theme for “Rosemary’s Baby.” It’s all tastefully gloomy stuff, much of it classical or jazz in nature, others even approaching funk as with some of the 1970s French films. Highly recommended.

While I’m at it, here are my five favorite spooky instrumental albums by modern musicians, the last of which is about a sea voyage befallen by ocean dwelling zombies and is pure genius, so I’ve embedded it here with ye olde Grooveshark. Enjoy.

1. Ben Frost – By the Throat (2009)
2. Bohren & der Club of Gore – Black Earth (2004)
3. Nurse With Wound – Surveillance Lounge (2009)
4. John Zorn – IAO: Music in Sacred Light (2002)
5. Xela – Dead Sea (2006)

Californian Berliner, Michael Scott Moore, is a comic book superhero waiting to happen—a surfer by day and a journalist & novelist by night. He spent the last few years travelling the globe, locating unexpected corners of the world where surfing has taken root and then wrote a fascinating travelogue slash micro-history about it called Sweetness and Blood. That means not Australia, Hawaii or California, where surfing began (as does his story), but places like Cuba, Morocco, Japan, Gaza (!). Surfing has by now spread itself to such an extent that you might even call it, in modern parlance, viral—or a meme.

I like to call it a micro-history simply because I enjoy these sorts of books that run through history with a single thread. You could equally consider it a tale of globalisation or cultural influence or an illustration of how eccentric freaks end up doing what they want, oppressive regimes be damned. But it’s more than that, foremost just a flat-out great read. If you want to hear Mike read from the book and some of his new fiction (so he says on his blog), go to the Soupanova tonight in Prenzlauer Berg. John Wray and Anna Winger will be reading as well, the whole thing moderated by NY Times Berlin bureau chief, Nicholas Kulish.

It seems simultaneously yesterday and a decade ago that I was in Japan (actually a month ago). But it was a wonderful week of half-assed touristing and full-assed fun-having with some dear friends of ours—Taichi and Toru—we knew from the good old days in Berlin of 2001-2 and 2006, respectively. Except for one excursion to nearby Yokahama (and its Chinatown), we spent most of the week bumbling around Tokyo, which in case you didn’t know is a mad, intoxicating Moloch of a metropolis. And testing out Japanese whiskey (for scientific research purposes). The food was incredible, albeit exactly proportional to one’s love of fresh (raw) fish. We would’ve liked to have stayed longer, but the time we had was well spent. I know I’ll return as soon as I can. (This set plays backwards chronologically, cos that’s how Flickr likes it.)

Today I find myself in Pu’er city in the southern Chinese province of Yunnan, a city and region renowned for having the best tea in China. The 40-minute flight from capital city Kunming turned into a 3-hour flight after the plane was forced to turn around just before landing in Pu’er as the weather was too bad to land the first time. One hour later, and a second landing attempt, nothing but clear skies.

The last (almost) three weeks I’ve been travelling through Japan, South Korea and China with Yuhang and Pierre and haven’t blogged a single byte about it. Outrageous! Not that there hasn’t been plenty to write about—quite the contrary. Would that I had the time and resources, I could probably fill a small paperback with our thus far adventures. But alas writing about adventures subtracts from having those adventures. Furthermore, the first week in Japan, our super gracious hosts, the Taichi Kochiwa family in Tokyo, had a broken computer, thus rendering blogging all but impossible. Week number two found us in South Korea, Seoul and the current city of my sister and her husband, Daegu. There we had a blast, spending the first three days at a fantastic five-story bath house in Seoul. The place even had sleeping rooms to spend the night at a near-robbery price. It’s a crying shame that such a thing, to my knowledge, doesn’t exist in Europe or the States. The ability to get relaxed immaculate in a variety of steam rooms, saunas and mineral baths and then crash out in a state of melted serenity is something that should come to Europe post-haste. Daegu was a nice break from the bustle of Seoul and a city I need to blog more about later. Rebecca and Jorge kindly let us crash at their flat for four days and needless to say we ingested our fair share of kimchi and kimchi-related delicacies.

The title of this post comes from a very practical phrase for foreign travellers to southern China, who can sometimes, upon exiting a bus, find themselves surrounded by solicitors shoving flowers, food and handicrafts in their faces. “Yao” (yow) means want but “bu yao” (boo yow) as “don’t want” is far more useful. Just don’t get off a bus yelling the former instead of the latter.

What always made David Hasselhoff an easy comic, if potentially tragic, target was his seeming obliviousness to his own ridiculousness. He seemed completely unaware that his bombastic baritone wouldn’t make a song like “Do the Limbo Dance” anything but pure, painful hilarity. (And I beg you to view this amazon.com page of over 1,000 “reviews” of his greatest hits record.) Making fun of Hasselhoff is almost like making fun of airplane food at this point, a rich but over-mined humour gold mine. But the time has come: Hasselhoff is aware. Tonight Comedy Central is airing a roast of the Hoff. Here’s the promo video. The ending is somewhat jaw-dropping.

Update: I just watched it—well, the first 20 minutes of it, which was all I could take. Sadly, it added up to less than the sum of its parts. You’d think a jury including Pamela Anderson, Hulk Hogan, Gilbert Godfrey and Jerry Springer would’ve been more entertaining. But no. Besides a few funny moments, it was pretty painful, indeed more for the roasters than the actual roastee himself. It must be those magical Hasselhoff critic deflection powers at work. He just sat there in his lifeguard chair, beaming. Turns out there’s only four jokes you can make about the Hoff—poor acting, poor singing, alcoholism and cheeseburgers. Gets old fast. Also, Seth MacFarlane is kinda smarmy.

Sorry for the overblown titles. I’ve just been listening to way too much prog & metal and reading way too much economic theory, lately, to not let that happen. Anyway, I’ll knock it off; promise.

I’d like to say I hate chillwave but there’s not really enough there to hate. It’d be like hating eggplant or tile grout. It’s just so insubstantial. I guess the part that bothers me is the hype around it, the hollowness and nothingness of this supposed new great hope. It makes the so-called slackers of 90s look like driven go-getters. Enough negativity, though. This guy from New Jersey, Julian Lynch, gets unfairly delegated to the chillwave ghetto, when his stuff is actually inventive, exciting and chill. It’s dusty, organic and old-timey Appalachian-sounding, but obviously informed by modern music like drone and stoner rock—also very accomplished, cohesive and, dare I say, timeless. His new record, Mare, is streaming online. So that’s cool. And I’ve posted it here, so you don’t even have find it yourself.

In relatedness, Berlin-based writer, equinologist and street art observer, Susanna Forrest, just started a blog that combines the urban and the equine in amazing ways. She’s also releasing a hip-hop album this year with lyrics based on Black Beauty. I might have made that last thing up.