The Thousands

Thursday August 13

They say Perth's "a great place to grow up", "a great place to raise kids" and morbidly, "a great place to die".

Well, we're not kids anymore, we don't plan on having kids anytime soon, and we also don't plan on dying until we can afford to put a down payment on something at this place. So what are we doing in this here limbo, Toto?

Well, actually, quite a lot. People born and bred in Perth are filling five-level carparks with their talent. They've stopped working behind bars and are building their own. They're starting local studios and touring to Melbourne. They're taking risks, they're drinking Amazonian jungle juice and they're realising that Perth's creative evolution is progressing at light speed.

From this week forward, SixThousand promises to be your lifeline to the best things in this city. All we ask in return is that you make the effort to get OUT in Perth, that you EATDRINK, LOOK, WATCH, READ and SHOP in Perth and that you send us to your friends, because the only way any of this will live on, is with your support.

SixThousand 001 - we got issues

On the site right now (It's updated every day!):

STREET: Condor Tower Carpark
EATDRINK: Iron Chef, Veritas
SHOP: Remedy
READ: Infinite Jest
LOOK: Weinie Collapses, Marcus Canning
GOODS: Rhodia notebooks
STRAY: Fitch's Pharmacy
OUT: The Terminal Asphyxiation Of Peter Pick-Pocket

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Cover image by Jackson Eaton. If you would like to submit a cover shot email danielle@rightanglestudio.com.au

What:
I Am Still In Yesterday's Clothes IV

Where:
Harry Highpants, 259 William St, Northbridge, Ruck Rover Shop 4, 595 Beaufort St, Mt Lawley
Back catalogue available on Etsy

How much:
$7

Contact:
Tristan Fidler

For most kids, being at grandma's for the weekend sucked. Not me. Cause I had Nonna. Nonna couldn't read English, so anything was on the cards when renting 15 weeklies for $7 at Midland Video City. "Bambino, your mama let you watch this one?" she would say, waving an R18+ rated Children Of The Corn VHS at an 8-year-old me. "Sure, Nonna! I've seen it, like, a million times before!"

Issue IV of I Am Still In Yesterday's Clothes (subtitled: 'At The Movies, In The Cinema Lobby, At The Video Store...') is an A5 sized, 64 page, B&W, errantly-typeset booklet that makes me glad I lied to my trusting Nonna. I can totally identify with Tetsuo Dudikoff's "utterly spastic" film choices made as a 13 year old, or Tristan Fidler's depiction of the boredom of watching Spawn sans a hot date to maul.

On top of that, IASIYCIV has video store challenges, supporting actor identification guides, fake ex-rental posters, a dissection of Premiere's slightly insane interview techniques in the late 90s, film-noir-how-to-hairdos, and more. I even bought my Nonna one. Just to say thanks.

By Danielle Marsland

What:
Dappled Cities interview each other

Who:
Tim Derricourt (Dappled Cities) talks to Dave Rennick (Dappled Cities)

Where:
Zounds album launch at Amplifier and Norfolk Basement

When:
Fri Aug 4 (Amplifier), Sat Aug 5 (Norfolk)

How much:
$18 +BF from here

A lot of people think that we have a big interview budget but they've got that wrong. People pay us to interview them! And we use the money to buy firewood. Anyway, Dappled Cities already spent their album promo budget on props for Lawrence Leung at the listening party, so they interviewed each other for us and sent through the transcript using the online internet! Thanks so much guys. If we don't burn one album for fuel this winter, it will be Zounds.

Tim Derricourt: How are you?
Dave Rennick: Quite well, thank you for asking. I'm at home and had just finished trawling through "funny cats" on Youtube when your email arrived, so yes... quite well.

TD: Are you finally happy with our record?
DR: Of course, it's clearly the best thing we've ever created! But it sure was a roller coaster ride wasn't it? Remember when we started writing the songs for Zounds and they were all fluffy and happy like funny cats, and then two years later they had transformed into gigantic wollups of sound and fury... what the hell happened? It's certainly a nice feeling to remove whatever was on our chests from our chests. It's also nice to have a picture of us all on the cover, surrounded by gold.

Read the rest here! It's good!

By Tim Derricourt and Dave Rennick

What:
Why we do the things we do, various

Where:
PICA, Perth Cultural Centre, James St, Northbridge

When:
Opens Tues Aug 18, 6pm
Runs until Oct 18

How much:
Free

Contact:
http://www.pica.org.au/ or 9228 6300

Image:
Aleks Danko, 'Situation: nuts and bolts make a lovely pair when you screw them' (courtesy PICA)

Crazy genius artist friends. We all have them. You know the deal, they get bored one day, throw out their couch, and five minutes later they've rebuilt it using paper mache and feathers; all this, while wearing an outfit they sewed themselves from a book of ironic poetry.

We reckon Sydney artist Aleks Danko is somebody's crazy genius artist friend. One time he built a doorless, windowless, red brick house to spruce up the grounds at SA University. For PICA's exhibition, Why do we do the things we do, ("what goes through artists' heads when they make truly weird shit"), he's replicated his studio in an installation.

Anastasia Klose, on the other hand, puts herself in humiliating situations and videos the results - like the time she tried to have sex with a classmate at VCA. Rose Nolan, Tom Polo, Kirsty Hulm, Andrew McQualter and Rachel Scott complete the cuckoo's nest.

A cool one to take your crazy genius artist friend to, assuming they can get there in time in the car they're making out of origami.

By Danielle Marsland

What:
Zekka

Where:
74 King St, Perth

When:
Mon-Sat 10-5, Fri 10-7, Sun 12-4

Contact:
http://zekka.com/ or 9481 1772

There’s that bit in The Matrix when Neo has a déjà vu freak-out after seeing the same black cat twice. Then Trinity freaks out because déjà vu means a glitch in the Matrix. Every time I go to Zekka - the café-come-beautifully-curated-boutique from the team that brought us TestTube - I have a mini Neo freak-out. I wonder if the only way to account for this incredible place is to attribute it to some kind of glitch in Perth’s Matrix.

Trinity, can you explain? Sturdy bleached pine tables, concrete floors, walls of stoney grey, forward-thinking menswear (Rick Owens, Undercover, Raf Simons, Junya Watanabe Man and Comme Des Garcons Homme Plus), Campos coffee, reading material that doesn't pander to 'WA lifestyle' (032C, DAMn , Monocle). Add to that incredible shop fittings, fast wireless, unpretentious staff with decent music taste and a recycled brick courtyard that opens up to the clear blue sky.

Zekka: it sure as hell ain’t déjà vu that we find ourselves in there again, and again.

By Danielle Marsland

What:
District 9

When:
In cinemas from August 13

Watch the trailer:
Here

Win:
Thanks to Sony we have 2 dbls to give away! To enter, email win@sixthousand.com.au with the subject line ‘I'm an alien am I Brett?''

Provocative, gory and thoroughly enjoyable, District 9 is a low-budget alien flick that has a big-budget feel yet eschews both Independence Day jingoism and ET sentimentality. And its gritty verité quality is far more unsettling than your average Michael Bay blamfest.

Johannesburg is a powerful backdrop for what's essentially a racism allegory. For 28 years, aliens (pejoratively named "prawns") stranded in their broken-down mothership have been sequestered in the slum, becoming a political football. Locals want them shifted away, and both Nigerian gangsters and the private military contractor Multi-National United have been trying to exploit their advanced biotechnological weaponry.

Chosen to evict the aliens from District 9 is an MNU desk-jockey, the Murray-from-Flight-Of-The-Conchords-esque Wikus van der Merwe (newcomer Sharlto Copley). After being sprayed with mysterious alien chemicals, Wikus is revolted to discover their DNA is melding with his. But MNU literally wants a piece of him because he can now fire alien weapons, and District 9 is now his only place of refuge. The film's highlight is watching Wikus metamorphose, not from human to alien, but from pencil-pushing dickhead to action hero with a conscience.

By Mel Campbell

What:
Life Editions

Where:
195 Brisbane St, Perth or online

How much:
Leather wrap journals from $80

Contact:
9227 6466 or here

"I'm very important. I have many leather-bound books and my apartment smells of rich mahogany."

When Ron Burgundy sought to impress, he boasted of his leather bound books. Dog-eared Pocket Penguins might seem trendy to the teenage hipsters you drag home, but once you start hob-nobbing with Victoria Corningstone and co they'll stifle giggles upon seeing your déclassé library.

Jazz things up with a selection of prêt-a-porter or bespoke journals, books, albums and portfolios from Life Editions Bookbinders. The prices aren't exactly thrift store, but neither is your legacy. Think about it. One day, when your estate publishes your collected diaries, manuscripts, forgotten poems, letters and errata; shall they be scrawled in a mouldy Spirax? Or leather-bound in the scent of rich mahogany?

By Dan Debuf

What:
399 Bar

Where:
399 William Street, Northbridge

When:
Mon-Fri 8am-12am, Sat 10am-12am, Sun 10am-10pm

How much:
$20 curry and wine special

Contact:
www.399bar.com or natalie@399bar.com

Image:
Jasper Cook

Sometimes I like to get drunk. Even on Mondays. So when Facebook told me it was ‘vegetarian night' at new bar-come-eatery 399, I drained my longneck and set forth.

There's no set cocktail list at 399, which I like. A real bar should be able to make every fu*!ing drink, right? Right. As a Ted Danson type impromptus my first martini, we are given a mulled wine taster. It warms my soul. The pine bar we sit at forms the spine of the place and is offset by tall booths. The décor would be best described as ‘schmick'. Vegas-era Elvis croons on a widescreen sans sound. I can neither confirm nor deny the existence of a rear courtyard.

The chef pre-prepares the meals during the day. It's ‘honest' fare and comes with Artie Bucco service. A mind-blowing chutney is the highlight of the tapas plate and the mushroom ragout/potato-bake ain't half bad. We wash it all down with a Snakecharmer Shiraz that owes much to its pretty label.

Recollections from this point are hazy, but I had accomplished my mission. And it wasn't even Tuesday.

By Jimmy Jack

What:
Dog Rock

Where:
Albany

When:
Forever

How Much:
Free

I have a friend in Albany who owns a café. He told me one day a man came in with a selection of postcards to sell. The cards featured all the well-known attractions of Albany - The Whaling Station, The Natural Bridge and Middleton Beach. But there was one postcard which didn't match the idyllic surrounds of the others. It was a postcard with a picture of a rock shaped like a dog's head, appropriately named ‘Dog Rock'.

"Who the hell is going to buy a postcard of Dog Rock?" was my friend's doubtful question. But he bought them anyway.

Two weeks later, the Dog Rock postcards had sold out. So he rang the man back.

"Give me another 100 of those Dog Rock postcards," he demanded.

"Ah..." said the man in a learned manner, "you underestimated the power of Dog Rock".

Forget what you know - or don't know - about the place, because Dog Rock is the best thing in Albany. Get down here and appreciate it. You can pretend you're walking it, climb it, pray to it - the list is endless. I drive past it every day and marvel.

By Nick Sas

What:
Love Saves Fridays Jungle Boogie Party

Where:
The Republic Bar, cnr Wellington St and Shafto Lane, Perth

When:
Fri 14 Aug, 11pm-4am

How much:
$5 on the door

Dress:
No banana leaf costume, no entry

We've never been to a real jungle. Probably because we fear both monkeys and rabies. We're also wary of dehydration - the jungle kind that forces you tie a plastic bag around a tree and wait for the rains. This Friday however, the fear must end. Sharpen your claws and shake your grass skirt to 70s disco, care of Petrosex, Rex Monsoon, Matt Jenke, and Boy-Crazy-Stacey. Vats of Amazonian jungle juice for all. No plastic bags required. - DM

What:
Scitech Adults Only Night

Where:
City West Centre, cnr Sutherland St and Roe St, West Perth

When:
Sat Aug 15, 6pm-9pm

How much:
$14 door/$10 prebook

Contact:
www.scitech.org.au or 9215 0700

When you're four foot nothing and Wheeler from Captain Planet is the shit, a visit to Scitech is pretty awesome. However, once puberty hits, this science-centric venue falls off the radar. Now that we're older and potentially more mature than our 8-year-old selves, Scitech is again on our wavelength. But who the hell wants to pay to be cooped up in a confined space with members of Generation Z? For one night only, Scitech will invite adults into their hallowed halls, to drink and to try the exhibitions, banning kids who are small enough to shit in their pants and get away with it. - EB

What:
The Ambassador From Everywhere 16

Where:
Spectrum Project Space, 221 Beaufort Street, Mt Lawley

When:
Tue 18 Aug, 7-10:30pm

How much:
$5 on the door

Contact:
www.meupe.net or hello@meupe.net

Tokyo composer Kouhei Harada's low-fi lullabies are coated in honey and sprinkled with LSD, they taste like rain and pianos and garbage bins and birds and beeping and when people talk in reverse. Trust us. One song is just called ‘Bar'. It doesn't have as many ‘clinking glass' noises as you'd expect of an experimental music piece called ‘Bar'. Although it does have someone making strange little moans in the background, followed by a popping noise. Go to this. Tokyo in Perth is good. (Also playing: Adam Trainer, Daniele DiPaola and Kynan Tan.) - DM

So ever since ololo, Creepy, Daek One, Kid Zoom and a tonne of others went nuts on the Condor Tower Carpark, we've been worshipping at the feet of you Perth street artist types. We've also been wondering if there's any cred left in writing our name on a tree with a Sharpie (which is probably about the closest we've ever gotten to artistic decoration of an open space).

If SixThousand were to consider a more substantial mark-up, our first stop would be The Butcher Shop. On top of wall-to-wall aerosol cans and markers stacked OCD neat, there are blank Babusha dolls, tees, mags and books. There are even fake sausages and butchers' grass. We love a good concept.

A whole bunch of limited edition Ironlak Artist Series cans just arrived in store. Don't know what Ironlak is? Never fear. Daek One, from Last Chance Studios, has written an informative tribute-come-unvonventional haiku on the subject:

"Delicious colour range. Banging valve system. Feels like I'm holding style in my hand. Ironlak is taking over. World Domination. Who cares what we think. Augor knows what's going on. You should too."

Say no more. For your chance to win one of six Ironlak limited-edition artist cans, valued at $45 each, simply answer the following question:

This week's question:
A street haiku sounds like:

a) 5, 7, 5

b) what Daek One said

c) the English version of a Japanese poem, with attitude

d) Eminem

To be in the running send your answer AND postal address to win@sixthousand.com.au, winners will be notified by email. Subscriber only entry. Not a subscriber? Noes! Sign up here www.sixthousand.com.au

SixThousand is a weekly snapshot of Perth'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 SixThousand has nothing. All editorial you read is featured because it's worth it - not because it's paid for.

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MANAGING DIRECTOR
Francesco Nazzari
frunch@rightanglestudio.com.au

ACCOUNT MANAGER
Robbie Coleman
robert@rightanglestudio.com.au

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DISCLAIMER
The information in SixThousand 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 SixThousand or any inaccuracy in the information. The views and opinions expressed on material included in SixThousand may not reflect those of Right Angle.

CONTACT
Right Angle Studio
Level 6, 252 Swanston St
Melbourne, VIC, 3000

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

SENIOR EDITOR
Nadia Saccardo
nadia@rightanglestudio.com.au

EDITOR
Danielle Marsland
danielle@rightanglestudio.com.au

STREET PHOTOGRAPHER
Lloyd Hughes

SENIOR CONTRIBUTORS
Penny Modra
Rachel Surgeoner
Rachel Elliot-Jones
Lisa Lerkenfeldt
Tomas Ford
Dan Debuf
Nick Sas
Claire Krouzecky
Jimmy Jack
Jasmine Rhodes
Emma Bergmeier
Niklas Perrson
Laura Hindmarsh
Emma Rule
Emma Breheny
Tim Derricourt
Dave Rennick