Wipe My Mind With Your Heavenly Powers or Take Me to Edge City, You Fraudulent Corpse-Dandy A plea to the late, sometimes great Tom Wolfe
My Night in the Bush of Dog Ghosts Going camping with man’s best friend
He didn’t like to be touched. This was a strange thing that I understood and respected. He craved closeness but never liked affection. It was queer... Like so many of us, he had a problem with intimacy.
Finding beauty in the bleakest of places A conversation with Moo Baulch about women, men and domestic violence
One in three Australian women experience physical violence in their lifetime, according to the ABS. On average, one woman a week is killed by a partner or ex-partner.
Suggested
The Youth Are Rising School Strike 4 Climate, Sydney, 15.03.2019
It’s a shock to be reminded of the value of physical action and its energy in a digital age of ‘Likes’. As if in being here, and breathing in the atmosphere, something forgotten about people power is, quite literally, reborn.
Great Wog Boozes of the Inner West Special lemonade, Tia Maria and Black Charlie
What could be more wholesome for a child than to help his father make illegal spirits?
Fear of a Vegan Planet Australia is the third-fastest growing vegan market in the world. Are we approaching a tipping point?
“Anyone who says that life matters less to an animal than it does to us has not held in his hands an animal fighting for its life.” - JM Coetzee
Features
Spectral Evidence A testimony in fragments
"How simple we seem, or at least pretend to be in front of others, and how twisted we are deep down. How paltry we are and how spectacularly we contort ourselves before our own eyes, and the eyes of others." - Roberto Bolano
How Do You Find Oxford Street? A young man searches for a community and his own identity
“You’re pretty,” he told me. What followed was about four years of my complete and utter obsession with my appearance, my diet, and my fitness regime. This was me, ‘normalised'.
Sleep Well Beast How The National brought me back from the dead
‘Let's just get high enough to see our problems, let’s just get high enough to see our fathers’ houses.’
The Sound of One Hand Clapping Sporting big business has secured $2.5 billion from the NSW Government to rebuild all of Sydney’s major stadiums. The public are not applauding.
Moore Park, Allianz Stadium, ANZ Stadium, Alan Jones, the SCG Trust… it’s a complicated game.
Culture
Rock ‘n’ Roll Friends Robert Forster in Summer Hill
Backyard concerts like these come from websites like Parlour, where artists can make a deeper connection with fans – and where fans can create small community events that connect people to a beautiful moment like today.
Drug dealers and drive-bys, gang rapes, and the war on terror Michael Mohammed Ahmad’s ‘The Lebs’
“The problem is some people think the dumb Leb in the book is the dumb Leb who wrote it.”
Waiting for the Man Louis Theroux and heroin addiction in America
In Huntington, one in ten babies is born with an addiction to heroin. Theroux is a proverbial Virgil guiding us through the American inferno.
More Desperate Ideas for Aussie TV Drama
A lawyer conveniently named Newton. Huh.
Food
Bilson at Table My Favourite Duck
"I often view with evil intent families of ducks walking towards the ponds in Centennial Park."
On Hospitality A philosophy on dining behaviour
"Much of the romance of food is generated by people with idealised versions of what their childhood meant... Their hospitality industry becomes Rosebud; a nostalgic rendering of what unconditional hospitality looks, tastes and smells like."
Bilson at Table The Death of Paul Bocuse
Once Bocuse perfected a dish it remained unchanged on his menu:“If a dish was worthy of three Michelin stars in 1963 it should be worthy of the same accolade in 1993!"
Golden Years Golden Century is a Chinatown institution
“I used to do my homework at the back table,” says Billy Wong of Chinatown institution, Golden Century.