Bloc Party releases new album, Four

Bloc Party's much anticipated fourth studio album, aptly titled 'Four,' was officially released today. 

The album is available to stream both internationally and locally.

If you're in Johannesburg and still haven't gotten tickets to see them live in October, you could stand a chance of winning tickets by purchasing the album, either physical or digitally, and tweeting a picture of the receipt to the organisers. Details here (may have to scroll down). 

SAA Cadet Program update

SAA has reportedly stopped automatically rejecting applications from white candidates. This was announced on Friday afternoon, after several rejected candidates sought legal action against SAA. 

The deadline has also been extended until 31 August to accommodate those young and hopeful candidates whose applications were rejected solely on the colour of their skin.

I hope however, that this does not mean applicants will be filtered out at a different stage based upon their skin colour. One comment on the Fin24 website however suggested that now SAA would now have to accept at least one white cadet, in order to prove that the application process was not biased.

If anybody reading this is interested in applying to SAA for the cadet program, details are here. Good luck.

Free download from Rob Zombie

Rob Zombie is probably one of the busiest people in both the music and film industries at the moment. 

His next film, The Lords of Salem, is premiering at the Toronto International Film Festival the first week of September.

After that, he is headlining a two month tour of the United States and Europe with Marilyn Manson, billed as The Twins of Evil. 

Between being involved with the new film and organising a massive tour, he's also been recording a new studio album and done an interview about all of the above. 

And that's not all! Even with all that going on Rob Zombie still managed to find the time to drive around Los Angeles, listening to and selecting the tracks to appear on his newly released, career spanning remix compilation, Mondo Sex Head. 

As for that free download I mentioned, you can get it here. You'll have to work for it though by finding 13 zombie kitten heads. You can get an idea of what you'll be looking for from the image below. Happy hunting.

SAA announcement causes turbulence

I came across this story yesterday stating that the South African Airways (SAA) spokesperson Kabelo Ledwaba had told Beeld (local Afrikaans newspaper) that SAA was no longer accepting applications from white candidate pilots, in order to 'bring pilot demographics in line with the country's broader demographics.'

Estimates of the current pilot demographics of SAA are quoted as, 'Only 15% of SAA's pilots are currently black, and this includes Indians and coloureds. The rest are white, and 91% of them are men.' 

This made me wonder does the '91% of them are men' refer to SAA pilots as a whole, or only the white ones? If the former, then SAA shouldn't be taking any applications from men in order to get their demographics 'in line with the country's broader demographics.' While data from the 2011 census is still be tallied, the most recent report from Statistics South Africa estimates that 52% of the South African population is female (p. 2). 

I'm having a guess that the ratio of male to female black pilots is not 50:50 either. 

Many have jumped up and down, claiming that this new policy by SAA is 'reverse racism,' but the use of the term alone implies a fundamental misunderstanding of the definition of racism. (I could go off on a tangent here about what racism is, and that 'reverse racism' in fact does not exist, but I'll save that for later.) 

While the cadet pilot applications are being screened according to one's race, Ledwaba is attributed as saying that 'the airline would appoint male, white pilots when there were vacant posts for which applicants of other races could not be found.' So white men are still eligible for future positions, they'll just need to be fully qualified, have a lot of flying hours, and possible have to accept a lower ranking/ paying job to start off with. 

The whole justification by SAA that they are employing these screening measures as 'an initiative to bring pilot demographics in line with the country's broader demographics' is a bit laughable. As a closing thought, does that imply that the police need to start arresting more white women and putting them in prison in order to bring  prison demographics in line with that of the country? Should more women take an interest in supporting soccer to bring the soccer fan demographics in line with that of the country? Should more black men take an interest in racing yachts to bring sailing supporter demographics in line with that of the country? While these examples may seem ridiculous, the purpose is to show just how ridiculous basing any demographic to be 'in line with that of the country' actually is.

Surely a better solution from SAA would be to encourage more aspiring cadets of colour to apply, through recruitment drives similar to those practiced by foreign military branches.

In the City - Jhb

A few months back when it was announced that Bloc Party were going to be playing in Cape Town, I was pretty bleak as it was their only performance announced. After some thought, I figured (hoped) that surely if the 'Powers that Be' were flying an act like Bloc Party to South Africa, they would do so for more than just one gig.

Weeks past. Nothing was mentioned about additional Bloc Party gigs. The smug people in Cape Town with concert tickets got smugger. I seriously started considering making the journey back home just to see Bloc Party. I'd missed them a few years back in Edinburgh, as I only found out about the gig months after tickets had sold out. I didn't want to miss them again.

Mid July, it suddenly happened. A Johannesburg friend posted a picture of tickets with the Bloc Party logo on them. At first I thought they were just bragging about getting RTD tickets, but upon further inspection I noticed that the venue was here in Jozi.

Much excitement!

I followed this up, discovering that a new mini festival, In the City, was organised around the gig, and that tickets were affordable. Instead of waiting to hear who the opening act(s) were, I immediately procured two tickets, and began waiting A) for 5 October 2012, and B) to find out who the mystery opening act(s) were. It was later announced that there would be three local opening acts.

Great news! (Despite not actually knowing who they may be)

Today however, the first of these three acts was revealed to be the Johannesburg based group, Shadowclub.

I haven't seen them perform live just yet, but I have seen two of the members performing in other bands. If the sum truly is greater than its parts, then I doubt these guys will disappoint.

Listen to Shadowclub's music here.

Events at Lonmin

Politics and religion are two topics I try to avoid, but one cannot ignore the horrific events unfolding in South Africa, a country considered by many foreigners to be 'Africa's last hope.' 

For those interested, this seems to be the most popular (but, not necessarily accurate) source.

What I find interesting is that many of the protesters can be seen in photos carrying weapons. While Joseph Mathunjwa, president of AMCU, was quoted as saying, "We're going nowhere... If need be, we're prepared to die here." 

Both of these may be seen as threatening gestures. This graphic video shows that the police may have been intimidated by the number approaching protesters. 

There are claims of live ammunition being fired towards the police by the oncoming protesters, but I feel that this may have been unlikely and nothing more than some sensational journalism.

It is worrying that these events are occurring, but maybe it is an eye-opener to the fact that not everything in South Africa is as hunky-dory as it seems. Hopefully this situation can be resolved without any further unnecessary bloodshed. 

--

This last point may seem rather cold and callous, especially considering the number of mortalities arising from the massacre, but when you claim that you're prepared to die for your cause, don't get upset when those opposing you are actually prepared to shoot-to-kill.

Why the name?

This is a blog written by a South African. It aspires to have posts covering such diverse topics as travel, the local music scene, international music releases, amateur photography, model aeroplanes, zoo animals, and maybe even some other stuff that interests me.

For now the name is a little misleading as there are no porpoises here, but there may be in the future, so keep an eye out.