Category: Popular Culture

‘Shiraz’ – the making of the Taj Mahal

Film Review: Shiraz – silent film made by Franz Osten and Himansu Rai in 1928

 “Not hands but heart built this / Which stands like a dream”

When we were kids our dad would quote Rudyard Kipling in the shower (or was it a ballard influenced by Kipling).… Go to Article

Film: Manufacturing Dissent

Source: Thanks to The Radical Times Archive for Debra Beattie’s doco Manufacturing Dissent.

“History is an angel being blown backwards into the future
History is a pile of debris
And the angel wants to go back and fix things
To repair the things that have been broken
But there is a storm blowing from Paradise
And the storm keeps blowing the angel backwards into the future
And this storm, this storm is called Progress.”… Go to Article

Lost film of the street marches

History is an angel being blown backwards into the future
History is a pile of debris
And the angel wants to go back and fix things
To repair the things that have been broken
But there is a storm blowing from Paradise
And the storm keeps blowing the angel backwards into the future
And this storm, this storm is called Progress.… Go to Article

The man who shot Don Mackay

Almost 40 years ago I was editor of The Murrumbidgee Irrigator newspaper at Leeton, and I was the conduit for information obtained by the late Don Mackay which I fed to the day editor of The Daily Telegraph, Harry Sherring, in respect of matters related to the activities of certain criminal elements in Griffith, specifically the Calabrian Mafia and some of their interesting agricultural activities.… Go to Article

PShift: Anarchist Summer School – what, where and when?

This discussion with organisers of the Brisbane Anarchist Summer School (BASS) was broadcast on the Paradigm Shift [Fridays at noon  on 4ZZZ fm 102.1] on 21 Dec 2012.… Go to Article

May the 1st Club

WERC - May 1st Club


Back in the late 1970s and early 1980s there was a need for political culture. In West End appeared the the first coffee club in Brisbane – May the 1st Club which was a regular event organised by activists from the democratic rights struggles in the 1970s.… Go to Article

When will Spring rain?

This is how I see it

Black throated pied butcher bird
picking up sticks
sees bicyclist
Pied strikes like a drone in Yemen
2 metre tall cyclist
Takes refuge
under Poinciana
Juveniles join in
Kamakase air raids
triangular strafing with clapping beaks
30 centimetre birds can cower a man

Takes off helmet to expose every grey hair
now sitting on dew covered grass
afraid to leave or to shout out
Raid after raid comes in and then…

Two women with pram appear
on Milne Lane

Beautiful pink baby inside sucking buttons of shirt,
Grey-hair tells them of attacks,
One woman, the mother’s mate,
says how territorial butcher birds are

Shared millisecond of concern
by all three for pink baby
blinking in morning sunlight
Mother and friend confident birds will give pram right of passage
down Parooba Avenue

Grey-hair takes flight down the road
only to come across an old lady on the path
who admonishes him
saying “Should you be on this path?… Go to Article

Politics of Repression

We Have Survived by NO FIXED ADDRESS

Politics of Repression was broadcast on Paradigm Shift on 4ZZZ fm 102.1 Friday at noon on 12 October 2012
“If you fly with the crows, you’ll get shot with the crows.”… Go to Article

Living in the Colonies — What’s Left?

PShift 4zzz  fm 102.1 fridays at noon
Living in the Colonies, What’s Left?
Paradigm Shift Part I 12 Sept 2012

"Whose land is this land
 is it for you and me
who knows, who knows this land
better than you and me.
… Go to Article

Back to the Future – The Shape of Things to Come – The Queensland Labour Movement Under Conservative Governments – Then and Now!

BLHA Symposium: Call for Papers and Participants

BLHA is planning an October symposium which will deal with the Queensland labour movement’s activism, challenges and selected disputes under conservative governments.… Go to Article

Senator calls for international action to free UN worker

THE SENATE CHAMBER
Australian Parliament, Canberra
As reported in Hansard
Friday, 22 June 2012

Senator Claire Moore (Queensland):

“Two weeks ago in my office I was visited by Khalil Hamdan, an Australian citizen and a good friend of our community over many years.… Go to Article

4ZZZ’s Opening Statement in 1975

And something is happening here
But you don’t know what it is
Do you, Mister Jones ?

— ‘ballard of a thin man’ by bob dylan

Editor’s Note: Thanks to the efforts of Peter Gray we now have the transcript and sound track of 4ZZZ’s  initial broadcast on 8 December 1975.… Go to Article