Cube Blog

Green, red, sometimes orange diodes, only slightly smaller than children’s milk teeth, illuminated the sound desks erected at gigs throughout Venn. Some flickered, some stayed for the duration, others remained transparent, keeping their colour to themselves. They reminded me of some equally small lights I saw a few years ago in Paris. While I was at university, a friend of mine was living in this city and every so often I’d visit her, usually when I’d received my student grant. One time we went for a walk and ended up near Nôtre Dame. She took me to a place nearby on the riverfront, Le Mémorial des Martyrs de la Déportation, a memorial to the many thousands of individuals who were deported from France to death camps by the Nazis and complicit Vichy government during the 1940s. It has been several years since I visited the memorial but one aspect of it remains very clear in my memory: the walls of a dim, narrow corridor covered in thousands of tiny luminous quartz crystals, each one symbolising a deportee.

It is not so strange to think of those lost souls when attending a gig. The concentration of humanity within ill lit rooms of course has the difference of intention, of fate perhaps. Yet when I think of all the sound desks I have gazed upon I wonder if there are enough L.E.D.s in the world to commemorate all the lives which have been maimed or cut short and all those that are yet to be.

http://fcit.usf.edu/holocaust/resource/gallery/PARIS.htm

Over at the John Wesley chapel and rooms there was an anomaly of peace amongst the shops swarming with debt ridden consumers. I walked over with a friend who was scheduled to give a talk there but we soon drifted apart to chat with other people. I spotted Pash, a good friend of mine. He was standing behind some electronic equipment on one side of the courtyard, close to the statue of Mr. Wesley himself. We had a chat but he and his two friends were providing the sounds that were drifting around the shaded courtyard so I stepped back and listened. Birdsong. I suppose one might expect birdsong to be present in such a place; a place of God and a quiet nook in the city. But I guess that expectation would be wrong otherwise why make a point of playing birdsong here? I read the information posted near Mr. Wesley’s feet. Apparently the noises of an urban landscape are having a profound effect on birds. It’s drowning it out and the birds are losing their songs and thus an essential component of their mating rituals. The idea behind the installation was to highlight this problem and blast some birdsong into an area of the city that, in terms of nature, is sonically barren

This conjured up something I came across in Brussels whilst doing an internship there nearly ten years ago. I’d get off the evening tram a few stops early in order to make the most of the streets and stretch my legs. There was a street I particularly liked and always used to reach my hotel. It was wide and pedestrianised and was home to a café called ‘The Cow Jumped Over the Moon’ where you could sit outside and enjoy a milkshake. However, my main reason for choosing this route was because of the birdsong. It was so loud. Pausing to listen to those tweeters I’d feel like I’d arrived, that this was what life was about- simple beauties in foreign cities. One of my colleagues, however, provided the explanation behind the song and I guess taught me there are rarely simple beauties. Apparently that street was well known for the birdsong- an eccentric inhabitant played chirrupy recordings from a stereo he’d placed in his apartment window which happened to look out on the street. All spring and summer the song would pour out but when window closing weather arrived the songs stayed behind the glazing. I didn’t know what to make of this. I believed the woman who told me but having written it down here I’m not sure if I still do. How often have I seen birds actually singing anyway?

Eyes closed in the front row- those faded velvet cinema seats, everyman thrones, were perfect for quiet and complete absorption. A plugged-in acoustic guitar, a laptop, and a not easily identified instrument were on stage with three men: two standing, the guitarist sitting. The latter provided melody while digital insect noises landed or took flight at the command of his companions. Although tranquil, the players provided an undulating subtext that swung from unsettling to deeply comforting. My thoughts flurried at first but eventually left my mind still and under direction of the music. Thoughts as clear cut as glitches now forgotten- for me, a sure sign of peace.

After my radio show on Friday morning, I went to Café Kino with Shereene. I probably ordered a raspberry lemonade- that tends to be my tipple of choice there. The breakfast bar stools were full so we took a couple in front of the fireplace and chatted about the show. Around us various other Venners were munching and quaffing and gassing. Kino had become a hub, a place where the vibrations of the festival brought us all together to exchange, share and inform before shaking us apart again, dispersing us amongst various gigs. Kino was a place we were contained and became if not a solid mass then at least a liquid. As well as being an important communications intersection, Kino vastly improved the diets of many Venn workers- the delicious food stoked our engines and prepared us for the next leg of our various journeys while we let off steam.

I have been waiting for Kino for years. I have always needed a café where I can write, think, feel unhurried and generally treat like a room in my own home. A couple of establishments have approached this but never fully arrived. Kino is the place. The first time I walked in there I knew. For one thing, people I like and trust run the joint. It’s important to trust the people who are preparing your food and drink and I don’t just mean from a Food Hygiene Certificate point of view. I want to trust the choice of ingredients, the preparation, the whole life of the meal from ground to gut. And with Kino I do. They make proper happy food, infusing joy to eating. And yet it isn’t just the food that makes the place. The coffee is cheap which is like an open invitation and because you don’t feel as if you are buying your time and seat there it’s a prime place to hang out. I’m bound to see people to chat with or I can chose to hide away in the basement which is light and spacious but snug too. In fact I like the place so much I get nervous for it. I don’t want to think about it not being there. I don’t even like writing that sentence down. Forget I ever did.