Revolver Upstairs, Chapel St, Prahran, Victoria Superthread

[Axver]

Ax, opinion on Masters theseses being cited?

Perfectly acceptable like any other scholarly source - though I am surprised when I see them cited by undergrads because they're not usually easy to access.

My PhD thesis cited almost fifty Masters and PhD theses (mainly Masters). However, that was mainly a function of how research into some aspects of NZ's political history blossomed during the 1940s-60s, and the fact that most academic research during that period was not published - there were few journals and even fewer books. So NZ historians tend to make more use of unpublished theses than many other fields.

 

[cobl04]

Also obligatory hic, I'm drunk, I'm terrible, self hate, etc etc. I'ma go sleep now. But y'know. Everything is terrible, and I shouldn't have watched that execution video.

I was thinking about watching it but I saw photos of him kneeling pre-killing and even they were enough.

 

[cobl04]

HS ran an image on page 7 today. Killer has knife on hand. Ffs

 

[Axver]

B-but guyz this could happen in STRAYA. Tone said so.

(I don't mean to be flippant; it's just hard to respond in any other way to how the government's unjustifiable hyperbolic fearmongering is functioning in predictable lockstep with News Ltd's tabloid shock tactics.)

 

[liamcool]

It's worse because you don't actually see the full scene, you only see the journalist's reaction to knowing what's coming and the first second or two of the actual decapitation, and then it fades, comes back up on that image of the corpse.

Why the fuck am I hungover on six beers? Jeez.

 

[bono_212]

Hee Hee!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YfxCXbsgYqg

 

[Kieran McConville]

Why anyone would willingly seek out and watch that beheading video is beyond me. I mean as opposed to just being informed of what happened. It's a PR exercise designed to ratchet the fear (and worse, depression) up to 11, and it's working. Thanks News Ltd et al!

People have been beheaded before and people will be beheaded again, but no, we have to watch this one. Yes, yes, I obviously get why this one, and it's beyond horrific for his family and friends, and I hope for the sake of its hapless inhabitants (most of them other Muslims) that this budding 'Islamic State' is nipped. The actual method wouldn't have raised an eyebrow in sixteenth- or seventeenth-century Europe, or the early 1940s Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere, so let's not pretend some hitherto unimagined veil has been drawn back on the human race.

I actually see opinion articles that refer to this (northern) summer of horror, as though this year were uniquely unbelievable. Than what? 2001? 1994? 1979? We (there I go, saying 'we' when I really mean 'those other people', and I really do mean that) are being played like violins. The curated internet is a vampire.

 

[Axver]

Really excellent post, Kieran.

People are quick to forget that our modern democracies are profoundly shaped by the French Revolution, which was Guillotine Party Land. Portraying beheadings as something novel and shocking that Those Crazy Muslims do is not only insulting in an ethno-religious manner, but deeply ahistorical and acts as if rivers of blood don't course through the evolution of Western civilisation.

 

[liamcool]

It's sort of like saying "the Holocaust is the absolute worst atrocity because twelve million people died!" and neglecting the warpath of Ghengis Khan or the death toll of the Qing dynasty. We just remember the Holocaust as worst because it's what's closest, what we still remember.

 

[Kieran McConville]

Some of the highjinks that folks got up to during the early Reformation would make your hair curl.

 

[cobl04]

^ good posts.

 

[Axver]

I'm so amused by this furore over Fisher and not-U2/Guinness filming on a bridge in Dublin. I'm pretty proud of the Kunstmuseum gag but I never managed to achieve people heading down to a random bridge in Dublin for an unrelated filmshoot in the hopes U2 would be there.

 

[liamcool]

I'll be doing a Pale Communion listening party at 9:30pm AEST. All welcome to join.

 

[Axver]

Shame I'll probably be having an early night.

 

[liamcool]

To be fair, this album's actually getting mixed reviews! It stands a chance!

 

[liamcool]

And at least it can't suck as badly as Yngwie Malmsteen.

 

[Axver]

And at least it can't suck as badly as Yngwie Malmsteen.

Good lord, not much sucks that hard.

I barely even remember what Pale Communion sounds like. It just went in one ear and out the other, without either offending or exciting.

 

[liamcool]

I once had a vacuum that sucked less than Yngwie, my god what wank.

 

[Axver]

Reports from the depths of hell are that fire and brimstone have been replaced by Yngwie albums on repeat.

 

[liamcool]

Yngwie Malmsteen divided by two. Once.

 

[liamcool]

The first fifteen seconds were crazy and great, but...

 

[liamcool]

Okay, so first song - cool instrumental sections, loving the Arabic influences, the vocal parts are completely bland.

 

[Axver]

To me it now just feels like Akerfeldt is making tribute albums to genres past their prime rather than doing anything interesting with his music. Yes, we get the point, you love seventies prog. If I wanted to listen to it, I'd go get some seventies prog albums, not an Opeth album.

 

[Axver]

Anyway, have fun Liam, I'm off to dream about more interesting albums.

 

[liamcool]

Thanks. I think?

 

[liamcool]

We're ten minutes in and already on our second acoustic breakdown, with a bluesy guitar solo over the top. Snore.

 

[liamcool]

The song titles, though. "Moon Above, Sun Below"? Is Mikael ripping off The Cult now?!

 

[liamcool]

"Goblin"? Like, just Goblin? No adjectives? FUCK.

 

[liamcool]

The acapella verse was actually quite impressive. We are on acoustic breakdown number three, with AN ACOUSTIC BLUESY SOLO THIS TIME

 

[liamcool]

And now we're impersonating Belgian jazz.