The Thousands

Thursday November 5

Why, hello there! We've never really been introduced properly but my name is FiveThousand and it's very lovely to meet you. Sure it may seem a little like a blind date right now, but don't be concerned I'm not too freaky, in fact, I just might be the eNewsletter of your dreams.

Let me tell you a little bit about myself. This is my very first issue, and while I might be a little shy, sometimes all I feel like is a cuddle under a blanket with some friends. Actually, this is what I like the most. Good people coming together under a metaphorical umbrella. I feel that Adelaide is so damn exciting right now and that there is much much more to come.

So let's all get under that pink sheet, and get on with enjoying and fostering the fantastic stuff in this city - whether it be music, art, zines, books or food. It's right there in front of you, just look a bit harder... I can help too.

Issue 001 - what lies beneath

On the site now (it's updated every day!)

STREET: Matt Banham and Bitch Prefect
GOODS: fiXXed and Condiment Multi Sleeved (Picnic) Rug
WATCH: The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
READ: Beef Knuckles 

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Cover image by Luke Byrne. If you would like to submit a cover email daniel@rightanglestudio.com.au

What:
Trunk Volume 1: Hair

Who:
Edited by Suzanne Boccalatte & Meredith Jones with a foreword by Lenny Henry

Where:
Online here

How much:
$50 plus postage

The casting call for Hair (the book) was probably pretty similar to that of Hair (the musical). Seeking: bearded Jesus look-alikes (Portuguese Christian Princess St. Wilgefortis makes an appearance), long-haired hippies (we don't know that for sure, but some of the contributors seem like likely candidates), stylised afros (from the ridgey-didge Aboriginal versions to African parlours in Enmore) and sexual overtones (a poem on pubes, par example). The follicularly-challenged need not apply.

And just like Hair (the musical), Hair (the book), volume one in the Trunk anthologies, presents an ensemble cast keen to get to the root of humanity's tangled mess atop our heads and drooping from our hineys. Unlike the musical, this is a tasteful, articulate exploration that unravels the topic without a song and dance. Next issue is Blood - at which time hammy comparisons to Menopause: the Musical will no doubt ensue.

By Angela Bennetts

What:
No Ceilings

Who:
Lil Wayne

On:
Young Money Cash Money

Related links:
Free download at Nah Right

Lil Wayne may be one of the most misunderstood artists of our generation. Sure, he is fun, and hilarious, and definitely mad as a brush, but he is also a genius. It is as if he is actually blind, and instead of having heightened other senses, it all went straight into his rapping. Or maybe he has autism and is the rap world's equivalent to Rainman.

No Ceilings definitely polarises listeners though, just like any other Lil Wayne recording. It has incredibly sick beats, some ripped straight from the pop-rap world like its predecessor Dedication 2, and Weezey still makes some of the wittiest rhymes ever laid on tape. But while he is certainly gifted, so much of the filler in between the gems of perfection is strictly retarded. It evens itself out in the end though, mainly because the stun factor of every genius rap leaves you contemplating it and missing the bullshit.

By Patrick Collins

What:
Symbiosis, Rohan Fraser and Stephanie Crase

Where:
Adelaide Central Gallery, 45 Osmond Tce, Norwood

When:
Runs until Nov 28
Mon-Thurs 9am-7pm, Fri 9am-5pm, Sat 11am-4pm

How much:
Free

Contact:
www.acsa.sa.edu.au, 8364 2809

Image:
Stephanie Crase

Put simply, if you like paint - you will love this show. Symbiosis features two painters who know what they're doing with a brush. Rohan Fraser and Stephanie Crase are both painting graduates from Adelaide Centre School, but that is really where the similarities end. Sim-bi-ohhhh-sis, you see, means "the living together of unlike organisms". Fraser paints big, Crase paints small. Fraser is loud, red and drippy, Crase is quiet, cool and dark. Fraser does massive, fleshy portraits, Crase does intimate, shadowy vignettes. You get the point.

The common thread exists in disturbing undercurrents that weave through the works, but even these are 'unlike'. Crase's disturbing is like eerie white noise, whereas Fraser's brand of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde crazy. This kind of crazy extends to his ink epics, we're talking a modern-day Durer, complete with monsters morphing into mountains and castles in the sky. Even if you don't like paint, you have to appreciate this kind of talent.

By Chloe Langford

What:
Format Zine Shop

Where:
23 Peel St, Adelaide

When:
Mon-Sun 3pm-6pm

Contact:
www.format.net.au

Related Event:
'Outside' + 'Cheap Mysticism' launch

View map

Our rough n' ready West End streets can be real dangerous. This is no recent occurrence either. 150 years ago readers of the Adelaide Times were told that they should be "well armed with a life preserver or a good cudgel" when traversing the streets at night due to "strong gangs of thieves" that "carry on their villainies with impunity"...sounds like a regular Friday night on Hindley Street to me.

Thankfully, Peel Street provides a bastion of safety from those dagger wielding Hindley villains. And on Peel Street, the Format Zine Shop is something of a published haven. It's run by the friendly folk who host Adelaide's DIY Festival, the same folk who brought the Zine Fair to town - and it never left. With fresh stock from a recent trip up to TINA and new editions arriving daily, you can peruse the shelves at a safe pace. Yet with the Deutsche Botschaft Adelaide located upstairs it may pay to keep that cudgel handy.

By Miranda Riley

What:
Sauna

Where:
Out now on DVD through Madman

Watch the trailer:
Here

Win:
Thanks to Madman, we have 2 DVDs to give away! To enter, email win@fivethousand.com.au with the subject ‘It only looks like a sauna, because we do not know what it is'

Packed with symbolism and almost unbearable tension, this Finnish horror film doesn't confuse atonement with redemption. In 1595, after a 25-year war between Russia and Sweden, two brothers, veteran soldier Eerik (Ville Virtanen) and sheltered geography professor Knut (Tommi Eronen), join a border delegation sent to divide Finland between the two nations.

But the brothers share a dark secret: days earlier, Eerik brutally murdered a farmer while Knut abandoned the farmer's daughter in a locked cellar. As the delegation enters an eerie swamp, Knut begins to be plagued with Grudge-style visions of the girl. When they reach a mysterious sauna that the local villagers are too afraid to use, the brothers realise that only here can they wash away their sins.

Sauna's bleak, evocative cinematography reminded me of Van Diemen's Land, another cinematic meditation on sin. Its motifs are complex and clever: water acts as both cleanser of filth and portal to hell, and eyes are symbols for witnessing evil. Unusually for the time, Eerik wears glasses. "They almost make you look like a civilised man," jibes one character. It's an elegant metaphor for Eerik's inability to see his own guilt... until it's too late.

By Mel Campbell

What:
Note To Self

Where:
CO OP Store

How much:
From $250.00

Contact:
info@co-opstoreonline.com

The craftsman behind Note to Self was not your average kid. While most juveniles were trading fags for swigs of Spumanti behind the shelter sheds, Max Olijnyk was following the skater-trails of Matt Hensley and Guy Mariano. He spent just as much time recreating their (retrospectively perhaps too large) pants on his Mum's sewing machine as he did ollying off three-inch gutters. Did we mention Max was born in Adelaide? He sure was!

These days Olijnyk is a grown man about Melbourne town. He makes zines, is the associate editor of ThreeThousand and keeps a humble blog but still skates and sews jeans for those who appreciate local design and seek to turn heads with awesome-looking asses.

Made-to-measure services are available from Max's Melbourne studio, but if that's too far to roll then head online to CO OP for ready to wear pairs.

By Isabel Dunstan & Nadia Saccardo

What:
An Artificial Picnic

Where:
Local median strip / new playground / Golden Grove

When:
Dawn croissants. Lunch fruit salads. Sunset beers

How much:
It's free

What's this? It's an artificial lawn picnic! Let's get back to nature!

Sure it's green, but is it...green?

There is nothing quite like heading out for an artificial lawn picnic on a hot summer's day in the driest state on Earth (apparently so - someone said it once I swear), laying down the picnic blanket onto the spikier-than-Johnny-Rotten phony turf and feeling that oh-so-real lawn gently massaging your ass like Sven's sandals  massage your feet. As you place your cup of earl grey back to its saucer it stands aloft an inch above the 'ground' - I say 'ground' but really it's plastic foliage covered carpet - for the easiest and smoothest of saucer pick ups.

Aesthetically though... is it the solarium tan of landscaping? Greening (browning) up earth (skin) that is meant to be a different shade (natural)?

Sure, it's a little ugly, and kinda superficial like Barbie, but this stuff conserves water and is porous enough to let the rain go through to where it belongs... so yep, it's quite weird to touch, strange to look at, and oh so phony, but artificial lawn is two times green. Now, who's for croquet?

By Dan Gladys

What:
La Boheme

Where:
36 Grote St, Adelaide

When:
Wed to Sun 5pm-late

Contact:
www.myspace.com/labohemebar, 8212 8884

Image:
yourbars

View map

If, like me, your pronunciation of foreign words is tentative at best, a proposed night at La Boheme can be a tongue twister. When recruiting friends for a drink last week, the exchange went something like:

"Let's go to La Bo-heem tonight... er, La Bo-he-me... you know, cocktails, absinthe, chilled Parisian feel, the only place in town where the bouncer wears a beret?"

"Oh, that French place on Grote Street? I think you'll find it's pronounced La-Bow-Em."

Blush.

But who gives a stuff about linguistics when you have endless cocktails (try Absolut Hunk - even the lads love that one) and sweet sweet music amidst an elaborate-yet-cosy old-world décor? Friends forget all about your failed French when you stumble into this secret. And now I know how to pronounce it correctly anyway.

By Stephanie Lyall

What:
Cloud Control + Leader Cheetah 

Where:
Jive, 181 Hindley St, City

When:
Fri Nov 6th & Sat Nov 7th, 8pm

How Much:
$18.90 at Moshtix

There just might not be enough bands out there that truly care about Neil Young. In fact there are a lot of bands out there that care more so about marketing, uniforms, and daddies expense account bankrolling their way onto bills they shouldn't be playing. Neither of these bands do that. They just induce smiles, sunshine, and good times in gifts of alt-folk.

What:
Bolty Bolt-Bolt & The Boltons + The Torrens

Where:
The Metropolitan Hotel, 46 Grote St, City

When:
Sat Nov 7, 8pm

How Much:
Less than $10

Look. Quite simply. This just had to go into our OUTs because how many times in your life have you seen a Michael Bolton cover band that actually kicks a little tooshie? Let's break this on down. How many times have you seen a Michael Bolton cover band? Nope, didn't think so. Said band, that rocks? Nah-uh. Playing with The Torrens avant garde hip hop folk. Nice.

What:
Paintings About Techno, Sam Songailo

Where:
Max Dawn Gallery, 47 Philips Street, Thebarton

When:
Opens Sat Nov 7, 7pm
Runs until Nov 21

How Much:
Free

I can't say I listen to much techno, the closest thing I got to it was that 'Here's Johnny' hit from the 90s. Embarrassing I know. Anyway, just take one look at Sam Songailo's abstracts and you'll go on some kind of trip. Line's and directions seemingly shoot around in an organised and refined chaos as he lets the process dictate the product. Art kinda like techno really, linear yet potentially complex, apparently straight forward but deeply textured and interwoven. Well that's good techno anyway and definitely not 'Here's Johnny'. Check out Sam's work it's so radical. 

"The greatest breakthrough of the last decade was when American Apparel turned the fit of a T-shirt into a message... The message was you - your body thrust out there into the world, shrink-wrapped in every conceivable color." - New York Magazine

Now, New York Magazine is an excellent publication. The spirit of a city distilled. According to some, the world's finest magazine about a place. So when they say the greatest breakthrough of this decade was the American Apparel t-shirt, then you must take your Human Genome Project and your black President and stick them where the sun don't shine, because when future civilisations look back upon our times, they will find a Wikipedia entry on the old brain-external web that says, "See also:

End of the Mayan calendar
Michael Jackson, died June 25, 2009
American Apparel Fine Jersey Short Sleeve T-Shirt."

Until November 14, everything instore at American Apparel's Rundle Street store WILL BE 20% OFF! Including the Fine Jersey Short Sleeve T-Shirt , but not including multibrand, newsstand, vintage stock or sunglasses. To get you in the mood, we have 3 x Fine Jersey Short Sleeve T-Shirts (guys or girls fit) in Forest, Army or Light Aqua, and valued at $27 each to give away. To enter, just answer the following question.

This week's question:
American Apparel

a) shrink wraps me in every conceivable colour

b) making me the message since 1989

c) called the fuzz on Tao Lin, that thieving vegan

b) for president

Send your answer, size, preferred colour, name and mailing address to win@fivethousand.com.au. Winners will be notified by email. Subscriber only entry! Not a subscriber? It's free you banana skins! Sign up here.

FiveThousand is a weekly snapshot of Adelaide's subculture, fired by email into the loving arms of people who realise that the best things in life are often hard to find. It is compiled by an amorphous gaggle of writers, stylists, designers and photographers who all like huddling under that big umbrella we call creativity. Without editorial independence FiveThousand has nothing. All editorial you read is featured because it's worth it - not because it's paid for.

ADVERTISING PARTNERSHIPS
FiveThousand is a trusted and proven medium for advertisers to engage with Adelaide's most elusive individuals - our subscribers. Each issue offers one advertiser the opportunity to have sole presence in the e-newsletter. A variety of placements (three, to be exact) are also available on fivethousand.com.au. For more information on advertising with FiveThousand, contact:

MANAGING DIRECTOR
Francesco Nazzari
frunch@rightanglestudio.com.au

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DISCLAIMER
The information in FiveThousand is subject to change. Although we attempt to ensure that the content at the time of publication is correct, we do not guarantee its accuracy or currency. Right Angle accepts no responsibility to you or anyone else arising from any use or reliance on the information contained in FiveThousand or any inaccuracy in the information. The views and opinions expressed on material included in FiveThousand may not reflect those of Right Angle.

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GROUP PUBLISHER
Barrie Barton
+61 3 96621657
barrie@rightanglestudio.com.au

PUBLICATIONS MANAGER
Penny McVey
pennymcvey@rightanglestudio.com.au

SENIOR EDITOR
Nadia Saccardo
nadia@rightanglestudio.com.au

EDITOR
Daniel Gladys
daniel@rightanglestudio.com.au

STREET PHOTOGRAPHER
Sigmund

SENIOR CONTRIBUTORS
Penny Modra
Rachel Surgeoner
Lisa Lerkenfeldt
Danielle Marsland
Amy Mead
Mugagga Kaggwa
Emily Tichy
Stephanie Lyall
Nick Peters
Robert Coleman
Eloise Basuki
Elise Beacom
Alice Fenton
Rachel Elliot-Jones
Jason Crombie
Luke Byrne
Miranda Riley
Chloe Langford