I CANT BRING MYSELF TO VOTE FOR THIS DUDE...

Setting aside the fact he has made fuck all effort to get my vote, Rhodri Jamieson-Ball is a lightweight, with no clear vision, and an invisible campaign...

That really bothers me because I would love to see a viable left-of-centre alternative to Jeremy Corbyn... Don't get me wrong Corbyn has a good heart and he is a refreshingly convicted politician, but hes trapped in a timewarp.

With a close to 15% swing needed to make my constiuency anywhere near marginal, My vote is almost meaningless sadly, infact my worry is that if I vote for Rhodri he may get the wrong idea and be spurned on to stick about and have a second pop in 2015.



Kinda pissed this dude has been put up as a candidate to be honest. Not as pissed as I am at our shit voting system. On that note, good to see The Mirror / Balls / Hane echoing my sentiments on tactical voting. Not so good is the fact I dislike all three of those parties and feel really grubby having something in common with them...

GUNS + PORK

I told you people it was only a matter of time ! Seems like Shadrack and the Man Dem have caught a break, clothswear stallwarts Boxfresh seem to have a finger in this pie, and judging by what little is online, the super sexy sounding 'Guns and Pork' could be a fuckin riot, or it could be a complete disaster, here's praying for the former....





Oh yeah nearly forgot, and theres a new episode of Hood Stuff out the also ! peep below for EP03 faeturing a raw freestyle sending out for Skepta and Wiley

KEEPING DAVE OFF THE THRONE - WHY (WHERE) NOT TO VOTE LIB-DEM

[above] 2005 general election injustice in pie chart form

I know this is a little odd coming from a supposed Lib-dem supporter... but hear me out...

Whats your agenda for this election ? Reaffirmation of long standing allegiances ? To follow your gut feeling ? Perhaps you fear the march of the left, or resent the ideology of the right ? Either way there is more to play for in this election compared to any in the previous few decades, and the nature of Britain's' political identity hangs in the balance.

This week saw one time Lib-dem, Lord Adonis reach out to the orange voter with a request to assist in the fight against a Cameroonian majority by switching over to the red team, the suggestion being ideological similarities between Labour and the Lib-Dems make the organisations interchangeable as agents of Tory demise. So how does this schemin' work ?

Well since its a winner takes all system, a vote cast for a candidate who places in any position other than first is an inconsequential contribution. So how can you maximise the impact your vote has over the Tories ? By tailoring your decision to suit the political landscape of your local constituency, and that means voting for the favoured challenger rather than the party of your choice, although they well be the same thing.

Whatever your reasoning, you may not feel too happy with a sudden (if not slight, and perhaps beneficial) jerk to the right after 13 years of centre-left governance. So with that, I give you the top 30 seats the Tories are looking to steal, and who the best party is to vote for if you want to keep them off the top spot.

01 GILLINGHAM & RAINHAM - LABOUR
02 CRAWLEY - LABOUR
03 YORK OUTER - LIB DEM
04 ROMSEY & SOUTHAMPTON NORTH - LIB DEM
05 HARLOW - LABOUR
06 CHELTENHAM - LIB DEM
07 CROYDON CENTRAL - LABOUR
08 PORTSMOUTH NORTH - LABOUR
09 BATTERSEA - LABOUR
10 HOVE - LABOUR
11 SOMERTON AND FROME - LIB DEM
12 EASTLEIGH - LIB DEM
13 WESTMORLAND & LONSDALE - LIB DEM
14 MILTON KEYNES NORTH - LABOUR
15 STROUD - LABOUR
16 DARTFORD - LABOUR
17 BASILDON SOUTH & THURROCK EAST - LABOUR
18 EALING CENTRAL AND ACTON - LABOUR
19 CITY OF CHESTER - LABOUR
20 HEREFORD AND SOUTH HEREFORDSHIRE - LIB DEM
21 COLNE VALLEY - LABOUR
22 CARDIFF NORTH - LABOUR
23 HASTING & RYE - LABOUR
24 CALDER VALLEY - LABOUR
25 STOURBRIDGE - LABOUR
26 CARSHALTON & WALLINGTON - LIB DEM
27 MILTON KEYNES SOUTH - LABOUR
28 CORBY - LABOUR
29 TAUNTON - LIB DEM
30 PERTH & NORTH PERTHSHIRE - LABOUR

So there is it. Sabres guide to fiddling the system. Sorry its such a cynical exercise but the rulebook is crooked...

LETS TALK VOTES

Election season is upon us, the worst kept secret in politics has been confirmed, and the yellow, blue and red brigades are frantically scrambling to the key marginals to make the best of our hugely flawed, 'first past the post' political system.....



As we prepare ourselves for a shitstorm of media spin, insincere political posturing and an 'Obama 08' style social networking spam-a-thon; the most pertinent questions will probably go unansweed as our media outlets scramble to impress upon each other a jealously-inducing sense of magnitude and proximity to powerful contacts.... well I have no-one to impress, and no real reputation to bolster; so from my relatively uncomprimised observational watch tower, I'm goint to have a crack at outling some of the main points over the coming weeks, but there is one catch and I best state that upfront... I'm voting Libdem because I'm in a key marginal,so there is going to be a touch of propaganda, but I promise to be as impartial as I can be because the rest of the time, I'm a pragmatist / floating voter.

Part 1..... "Why not to vote Lib dem" ....coming in a bit.

THE MICHIGAN MILITIA

As much as I hate the tit, Bill O'Reilly is great entertainment...so a few weeks back I'm trawling the net for a quick fix of  Fux Nooz and I hear Bill chatting to this dude from the Oath Keepers; a rapidly growing patriot organisation of apparently 6000+ members consisting of (serving and retired) military men, police and firefighters who have collectively agreed that should the federal  government request their services in the implementation of marshall law (or anti-constitutional acts as they put it) they will commit to resist. Crucially many members are also part of Patriot Militias; anti-government resistance armies who exchange paramilitary knowledge and train in armed combat. 

The belief that a militarised crack-down on dissenting voices is probable, or even unavoidable underpins the ideology of all these groups; this being the paranoid legacy of the far-rights addiction to conspiracy theory, and additionally, the recent re-emergence of a classic conspiracy keynote, that FEMA are rehearsing and preparing for a mass incarceration program.... 

Heres NWO profiteer extraordinaire Alex Jones with a trailer to what I imagine was a good little earner for him back in 2009.   

Clearly most Americans who found a moment to watch crap of this nature will passively consume it and show (at best) indifference to its conclusions.... but check out these people !

The call themselves the Hutaree. A Michigan based, religiously fundamentalist militia who today were arrested for planning acts of terrorism that would begin with the murder of a policemen, and conclude in a a series of co-ordinated explosion at the officers funeral killing his loved ones too. That is dark.

So thats both ends of the radical anti-government spectrum. Hutaree: the hot-headed terror-cell of chubby, wildly radicalised Christians. And Oath Keepers : A huge, multi-state network with its delicate cocktail of ambiguous-pacifism and a marksmen-centric recruitment policy. Either way whats stunned me about the whole thing is how many of these militias there are, according to US Thinktank over 500, each with a membership of dozens spanning to hundreds, and over a quarter of these groups are self-classified militias actively engaged in insurgency training tactics in the forests of rural America. That is surely some scary shit for an alleged socialist with foreign blood, the middle name hussein and a modest electoral mandate to have on his doorstep.


So what's in the middle ? ? Well, just like back in the days of Tim McVeigh, a major (if not the major) hotspot is Michigan.... Perhaps the lakeside terrain provides the perfect geographical feature to resist the march of Obama and his 'euro-jew overlords' ? So yeah this is a middle ground........ I guess ?

Especially love the doctored clip-art, no picnic scene is truly complete without a Tec-9 poking out of ya Dads levis while he's munching slaw.  

EFVA ATTLING JEWELLRY

I recently came across Swedish jewellry designer Efva Attling and her range of chunky industrial silverwear... The Mens stuff is sick (and the highlights posted are all less than 200Euro !), the ladies stuff is even sicker but sadly, I aint no fuckin' lady !

anyways.... observe with awe !

http://www.efvaattlingstockholm.com/

SABRE TALKS VINO (Chapter 2)

Mexico isn't the first place that springs to mind when you're talking about good plonk, but you know what I came across a little treat whilst out and about in Dulwich this weekend... Best part is that by all acounts this is a £10 wine, but for the fact its hard to get in Europe. On a side note can I just add that East Dulwich aint the shithole it was when I last visited.... Infact its enviably pretty

- LA CETTO 2006 ZINFADEL TINTO -

sabre says : "14% vol is a grown man ting"

FLYING COFFIN PERFORM 2010 BURIAL

Mock-Goth streetwear kings Flying Coffin deliver the 2010 package of cotton...Good batch this year, not all that many products but hopefully we'll see a larger offering for autumn/winter.. Loving the 5 panel headgear, pity that shit looks retarded on anyone stocky

SABRE PRESENTS GRASS ROOTS AGENCY PODCAST

Following on from last months podcast from Critical Music, this months installment of Sabre in the mix has arrived thanks to the GRAM agency, the people putting together the Live Tour for the 'A wandering journal' LP..... Check it out for a journey across the 170bpm landscape

TRACKLISTING

1. Notion - Even Out [Nu Directions]
2. Data - Burning Paradise [Blackout]
3. Sabre - One Jundred Teeth [Critical]
4. Zero T & FD - After All [Subtitles]
5. Hybris - Of Two Minds [N/A]
6. Sabre - Peril (Stray Remix) [Critical]
7. Data & Keza - Surveillance [Inside]
8. Cern & Dabs - What Remains [N/A] Cern LP
9. Dot - Secure Zone [N/A]
10. Alix Perez & Zero T - Enemy Of Reason [N/A]
11. Hybris - Dirty Money [N/A]
12. Judda - Pressure Plate [Critical]
13. Cern & Teknik - Wasabi [N/A] Cern LP

ITUNES LINK

MP3 LINK

RSS LINK

"NO ONE KNOWS ABOUT PERSIAN CATS"

Looking at the underground music scene in Tehran, 'No one knows about Persian Cats' is a stylish tale of struggling musicians, subversive youth, and the constraints of living in a dictatorship. Its a real good watch, and a limited release hits cinemas next week, not too many mind - you're going to have to hunt for it.

BANKSY REVEALS HIS IDENTITY !

The elusive street art golliath that is Banksy has chosen to reveal himself to the BBC ! In this exclusive uncensored insight, the subversive doodler takes us through an average day of the under-the-radar living. The mask has been lifted !

CARBON 6th BIRTHDAY @ CONCORDE 2 CLUB BRIGHTON - SAT 20th MARCH

Probably up there in the best 3 DnB events in the country, the Brighton based clubnight Carbon celebrates its 6th Birthday this weekend, with a move to a bigger venue for this one off event, and featuring a hench line-up to mark the occasion - See you people down there - I'll be rocking up alongside hellraising paddy Zero T for some mish-mash style tag team.

REQUIEM FOR DETROIT

CLICK TO WATCH THE DOC

A city designed for 3 million, reduced to accommodate 800,000 following the collapse of its motor industry; Julien Temple explores the current state of America's most abandoned major metropolis... This flick is amazing, a truly insightful timeline of events filled with amazing shots of urban decay, and some great eccentric types thrown in the mix too..... Sorry to anyone out of the U.K, its iplayer only :-(

FREE SABRE TRACKS COURTESY OF K-MAG + REMIX COMPETITION

Head over to K-MAG online to peep more details of an exclusive track give-away and remix competition... the long and short of of it is that the track 'One Hundred Teeth' can be found for free on thier sounclound page, and on the release date of my LP entitled 'A Wandering Journal' , (Monday 29th March) Knowledge and myself will be making the multitrack stems available for you lot to go crazy with..... Its not just a lark in the park, the winner walks away with £1k worths of Addict clothing AND a soundcloud pro account for a full year !

Remix it, dont remix it.... the choice is yours, but ither way cop a listen (and a download) from the link below.... enjoy !



SABRE - ONE HUNDRED TEETH - KMAG REMIX COMP by knowledge

SUPRA FINALLY RELEASE SOME 2010 SNEAKS

Since last years deluge of colour ways and styles; most of which were seriously ugly looking, Supra finally get back to their core and drop some fresh Vaidars and Muskas

The pick of the bunch :

ORISUES' LITTLE GLIMPSE INTO SPRING SUMMER/SUMMER 2010

A sneak into the Monochrome lookbook for 2010, fresh from the Orisue loudspeaker..

LP PREVIEWS UPLOADED TO YOUTUBE CHANNEL & CRITICAL MUSIC WEBSITE

Audio previews of my forthcoming LP entitled 'A Wandering Journal' are now floating about online at various spots....so..... fancy a listen ?

Head over to www.criticalmusic.com/awanderingjournal OR www.youtube.com/awanderingjournal to hear the more audio, but in the meantime, check these out :

DOUBLE GOOSE

750 euros worth of hearty winter fare...presenting the "double goose" jacket.... Cant imagine these sit good on fatboys though, need to see myself 20lbs lighter (and £500 richer) if theres any hope of slipping one of these into my wardrobe

CRITICAL MUSIC PODCAST VOL. VI presented by SABRE

"......With the Sabre album looming we thought it was about time he did a special podcast mix for us, previewing some choice cuts from the longplayer as well as freshness from the best of the scene sit back and enjoy this beats masterclass...... "

- TRACKLISTING -

01/ Mixmaster Doc - Cancelation Dub [Dub]

02/ Sabre & Alix Perez - Javelin [Critical]

03/ Dub Phizix - Handmade [Dub]

04/ Sabre - Marvel [Critical]

05/ Alix Perez - The Observer [Dub]

06/ Hybris - The Cleaner [Critical]

07/ Jose James - Warriors / Rockwell Remix [Brownswood]

08/ Ena - Slip Into Ur Mind [Dub]

09/ Sabre - Follow Polaris [Critical]

10/ Kryptic Minds - Wondering Why [Osiris Music]

11/ Icicle - Xylophobia [Dub]

12/ Sabre - The Gazette [Critical]

13/ Jack Sparrow - Torment [Tectonic]

14/ Sabre - Levelling out pt.2 [Critical]

LINK TO ITUNES

LINK TO RSS / OTHER

HUF S.F DROP SOME ESSENTIALS

Skatewear boutique turned manufacturer HUF SF layout their season of simple styles and vasrious fresh collabs with other fashion houses and ... Here's a taster

THE OFFICIAL 'A WANDERING JOURNAL" LP IS NOW ONLINE

If you want to get an insight into the narrative that forms the basis to this LP's concept, head over to www.awanderingjournal.com. The photography you'll find is the visual storyboard to the album, taken by myself whilst on a escapade of my own on the other side of the planet.

Farrage Barrage

Nigel Farrage is a dick. A babbling ideologue struggling to articulate his politics. For most of us I assume that's an unsurprising characteristic given his consistently obnoxious public persona, none the less, over two million Brits put an 'x' in the box for his lot during the European elections, and I think the reason is that UKIP have been successful at projecting themselves as the 'thinking-mans' nationalist party; supposedly approaching European politics from a clinical, legislative perspective ....

What a pointlessly bitter rant. I gotta think a lot of those 2 million voters must have finally got the message that this party is locked into the same xenophobic timewarp that UKIPs' less palatable competitors are trapped in. These people were never a moderate version of the BNP...

Gotta give it to Nigel on the lyrics though... Low-grade bank clerk ? Such a shit playground cuss its actually quite funny.

MEDIUM @ PLASTIC PEOPLE / 24TH FEB 2010

One of Londons most progressive promoters; the Medium crew return to celebrate their 3rd Birthday with a champion sound lineup including yours truelly, back in Plastic People for my 3rd encounter with gang.

ITS NO JOKE UP IN HERE. SERIOUS MUSIC FOR PENSIVE MINDS - ATTEND AND BEAR WITNESS !

BILAL SALAAM CLAPS HIS HANDS

Came across Bilal at the start of January when I heard the accappella of "lights out" on some generic neo-soul e-radio station... frustratingly I can't find "lights out" anywhere, I did however cop his LP "Blah - Time between awake and asleep" from itunes and it aint half bad, bar some tracks with ropey out of pitch singing... the title track "Blah" is the strongest cut on there, although 'Modern day slavery' is up there, pity the lyrics are so bitter...

KNOW A SPOT WHERE I CAN GET HOLD OF LIGHTS OUT ? HIT ME UP !!

HOOD SHIT : SHADRACK AND THE MANDEM

Nobody seems to know who this trio are, and whether they are infact from SW-Bang, but this is seriously on point. Authenically hyperactive, super sharp street satire. Someone get on the blower to E4 and tell them the next great hype has arrived.....

GOAPELE GOES GOTHAM CITY

I've a serious soft spot for her 2001 debut entitled 'Even Closer' , it was charismatic, the vocal tones where undeniably distinctive - nobody else could've made that LP.... but as time has gone by I gotta wonder where this chick his heading ? No doubt, she's still got the voice but "Milk and Honey" , my reintroduction to her after a few years lapse in concentration is kinda homogenous.... bit of a post-electro identity crisis happening I think, I preferred the hippy chick - Dodgy fitting BoHo blouses and all....

2001



2009

Sabre talks Vino (Chapter 1)

Came across some great wine in the last week. Have a look about online , either can be found for about £15. First Up...

- MONTES ALPHA 2002 SYRAH -

Sabre says : "Spicy shit"

- KANONKOP 2003 PINOTAGE -

Sabre says : "Get involved"

The Death of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh

You have to wonder what kind of professional assassin gets caught on dozens of CCTV cameras tailing their suspect and then leaves their mugshot in an airport immigration database to be disseminated across the global media.... were these people just shockingly slack or is the plan here to flaunt the audacity of whichever gang they work for ?

I keep hearing that Mossad have form on when it comes to identity theft, and they don't really have any honour when it comes to adhering to promises not to exploit the identities of allied nations, so in light of such ethical ambiguity; why are our government trying to rebrand the headline into "our passports aren't as safeguarded as we thought" when the really what we all wanna is why "our allies aren't as honourable as they claim" ?

On a lighter note - the faces of the assassins are priceless, Its like looking at the casting notes from a Wes Anderson flick. Quirky doesn't even begin to describe it. I particularly like the way they've been grouped into lines by which ever newspaper nicked the photo from....

Top line - Basement Nerds: Talking serial numbers
Middle batch - The Neural Three : Executive controllers
Lower tier - The Enforcers : Kosher ninjas

John le Carre would be proud.......

EASTBOUND AND DOWN

Man this shit is funny as fuck.... the story of a once celebrated, cocky baseball fatboy who through spiralling narcissism , ends up burning one too many bridges. Will Pherrel & Adam McKay are behind the scenes pulling strings, and main actor Danny McBride plays a blinding redneck.... actually I only just clocked where I know him from, last October on a Qatar airlines flight my entertainment options were Arabic Top Gear, or some ropey sounding pre-teen comedy called land of the Lost were McBride plays pretty much the same character.... I'm ashamed to say I thought it was kinda decent...

Anyways I'm hearing FX have signed it up for UK TV... I very much recommend

QUOTE OF DAY (KENNY POWERS 2009) :

'Why give a 100 percent when 35 will still get you paaaaaaid and laaaaaaaaid'

NIKE NSW VARSITY JACKETS

Being honest most of their clothes are waste, ACG is not what it was back in the 90's - Nike SB is cool but over-repped and over-branded... This NSW range aint much better but god damn they've cooked up a dream with these varsites. Had a feel in the shop, built like a volvo...

SABRE - "A WANDERING JOURNAL" LP

Around about Christmas time 2008 I got into a conversation with Kasra from Critical Music about the prospects of writing an LP for him. I was watching my peers; peeps like Zero T, Perez and Survival, and their plans to release their debut and thought to myself perhaps the time is right ? Are the terms right ? Because I'm a fussy, nerdy kind guy. People know I'm a bordeline control freak, and does Kasra have the patience for my demands ?

One year (and a bit) later, I'm going to try and answer those questions in music and art, and leave you people to decide.....

With that, I present to you, the 'A Wandering Journal' LP. A conceptual project combining photography, narrative interludes and experimental electronica into a digital storybook...

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CRITCD04 / CRITLP04

Sabre

- A Wandering Journal -

CD1

1. Day One

2. The Intrepid

3. Quarters feat. Noisia & Icicle

4. Day Four

5. A Wandering Journal

6. Escapade

7. Follow Polaris

8. Day Eight

9. Peril

10. Ash

11. Marvel

12. Levelling Out Pt. 1 feat. Maxwell Golden

13. Have It Your Way feat. Alix Perez

14. Day Fourteen

15. Havens Verge

CD2

1. Peril (Club mix)

2. Marvel (Club mix)

3. Quarters feat. Noisia & Icicle (Club mix)

4. The Intrepid (Club mix)

5. Javelin feat. Alix Perez

6. A Wandering Journal (Rockwell Club mix)

7. Curious

8. Levelling Out Pt. 2

9. Follow Polaris (Club mix)

10. Have It Your Way feat. Alix Perez (Club mix)

3×12 Version

1. Peril (Club mix)

2. Quarters feat. Noisia & Icicle (Club mix)

3. The Intrepid (Club mix)

4. Javelin feat. Alix Perez

5. A Wandering Journal (Rockwell Club mix)

6. Follow Polaris (Club mix)

Release date: 29th March 2010.

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VINYL ARTWORK

CD ARTWORK