We speak to Sean Williams about Zeitgeist

blog and how it’s about to hugely evolve.p5

Kulture Interviews Southern Fried Record’s brainchild KASHII.p3

Dear Kulture readers, With the royals safely tucked away for the time being, this edi-tion of Kulture brings you a delight of distractions. From becom-ing involved with your community, to planning another party season, it’s all here. As your purse strings are tightened after the last two weeks of partying, that’s right kids… The festival sea-son is coming! Worry not as we aren’t shoving them down your throats but just broadening your horizons to a certain Kent field. This edition has been a pleasure to construct as ever, meeting new people and our little minds being filled with fun summer ideas. Thanks for reading.Kate Stewart

Coming Up...

1

Give It Up!We discuss the benefits of volunteering.p7

Take a peek at our graffiti picks of the month.

2May 2011

See what festival’s got fruity and has got people picking fights!

Ain’t no party like a Megabooth party!

Coming Up...

May 20113

Introducing KASHIIOn a rooftop with sun bursting through the clouds, Kulture catch up with Southern Fried Record (SFR’s) newest additions. Home of Armand Van Helden and The Whip, this little friend of ours has been picked up by the sweetest progressing label for club bangers. The man is only 22 but has been a part of so many outfits. Now he’s honed his skills with this lone ranger act and has got signed to SFR as Kashii. Working at Dance2 Records in the day, Kashii (real name Gary) has set up life in Brighton pretty successfully. With his rooftop garden, a shed load of records and approaching summer, he’s moving on to even bigger and better things… Originally based in Hertfordshire, Kashii’s been part or parcel of Party Shank, Frankmusik and Appi Mu-sic, then as he moved to Brighton, became DJ partners in the group,

France, where they’d play at the NME club nights. He explained to me how he has been into music ever since he was around 12. “You start writing little tunes, then you start a band with some friends. I got into the production side of things when I was about 15 and I started properly listening to dance music.” Kashii’s experience comes through in his manor as although he’s young and living a rock star life style, with his sunglasses on and Rock and Roll tattoo across his chest, this boy is not trying to impress anyone, he just does. There’s no arrogance, just an honest, hard-living attitude. He shows he’s knowledgeable about the industry and sounds like he’s got his head screwed on. “I have been in a few bands that were either doing really well or went on to do really well”…”I’ve learnt a lot about the

4May 2011

industry during my time in these bands.” He goes on to explain how this helped him have enough gump-tion to look after himself in his solo project. He’s also picked up on new influences with the progression of House and Dubstep music into the charts and this has influenced his work into what SFR describe as ‘Fu-ture Garage.’ After covering his past and a couple of cold beers, we move on to future and fantasy. The way to make it in the industry now being collaborat-ing with other artists and sharing fan-bases. When asked whom he’d ideally collaborate with in a visual way, he told me Chris Hopewell from Collision Films. Chris made Radio-head’s ‘There There’ video and won an MTV award for ‘Best Art Direction’ in 2003 for it. Some people may know him from skate zines, pirate radio, being a graphic designer for magazines such as New Musical Express (NME) or for one of the many other famous videos he’s produced. Radiohead’s video shows the band walking through an eerie wood with a mixture of stills and video to create a surreal feel. Kashii said, “I just love the style and quirkiness of the video, it would be interesting to work on something similar with one of my tracks as its a totally different vibe.” Art is all well and good but we need to know what this musical mastermind would have as his very own line-up! “I’d say I’d love to play alongside Daft Punk because they are heavy and I’ve never seen them live! I’d also like Blur to play, so that once I’ve finished my set I can get

battered and sing along to them for hours!” This mix of electro and brit-pop displays an eclectic taste between two mainstream mile-stones and here at Kulture we’d like to be at Kashii’s festival. Leaving fantasy behind we knuck-led down and focused on what was to come for him. He let us into how he’d sent demos to SFR and they liked what they heard. The guys told him “if you can keep bringing us tunes like this then its all go!” In just over a year he’s released 2 EPs with various remixes on people such as Crookers’ releases. He also went on to explain how he had a lot of exposure from big DJs such as Eddie Temple-Morris. Looking on to the summer, Gary’s creative hub is working on 5 collaborations with other producers and people such as Marco Del Horno, Hybrid Theory and Kill Light. He’s also going to have another Kashii EP out in the summer. With more exposure from his collabo-rations, EPs and with him already be-ing booked to play Glastonbury and Secret Garden Party, this boy is set to make a lot more noise.

Gary chilling at Dance2 Records, Brighton. Photo by Kate.

May 20115

A new blog is sweeping the web-ways, relentlessly introducing new talent from everything from bands to bruschetta. It features culinary delights, tracks down muralists and gives spotlight to their talented acquaintances. From a family of friends frustrated with not getting anywhere, to a growing, official, cutting-edge network of talent, Zeit-geist is taking it’s time but pulling it’s punches revealing new artistes. Founded in August 2010 by an anonymous Editor character and Sean Williams, now Creative Direc-tor, the idea had formed in 2007. Their network of friends was frustrated as many of them are or know extremely talented and dedicated artists, musicians, photogra-phers, fashion design-ers, stylists and writers. Nobody was finding the breaks they needed from press or careers, which wasn’t helped by the financial turmoil of the coun-try. It didn’t make them stop their creativity, but made people more de-termined to get themselves out there as everyone realised nobody was go-ing to come to them. Williams said it was built on a “we’re not getting the success our talent perhaps merits but our belief and love for what we do

is so strong that we’re going to do it anyway” spirit. This mantra and the passion of the people involved made the blog accelerate “quicker than (Williams) could have ever imag-ined.” Why is the Editor anonymous you may ask? Well, she revealed that she feels many magazines can be lead by the Editor’s own motives and become an ego-trip. This Magazine is purely for the peo-ple by the people. It’s a platform for emerging talent and to let everyone know that “for every Damien Hirst, Kings Of Leon, Rankin, Lady Gaga,

Banksy, Marc Jacobs or whoever, there’s some-one just as talented out there, often pushing the boundaries further, but it’s going unseen” says Williams. Showing that being backed by a major label doesn’t have a

direct indication of talent. Although backing underground and extremely quirky artists, they try not to alien-ate readership and keep their eye on mainstream talent. The message therefore being wether you’re an underground performer or writer or a signed pop artist, as long as what you do is virtuous and entertaining, you could well fit in with the Zeitgeist movement. Providing that you’re interesting! A favourite example of

“...For every Damien Hirst”...”there’s someone just as

talented out there, often pushing the

boundaries further.”

May 2011 6

Zeitgeist’s wonders is Miss Cakehead. For Halloween, she launched the World’s First adult’s only cake shop and has even created a pop-up shop for the Japanese Earthquake where all of the cakes look like sushi! The Running of Zeitgeists hasn’t been all easy going as it’s run by a couple in their twenties’ and cash isn’t exactly abundant these days! Even so, lenders can’t see values as easily on websites as they do on con-ventional businesses if you can even get anyone to lend you anything. The producers have too little hours in the day as they want to cover so many things. The Editor is the backbone of the company and even designed and built the website. Apparently she is quite the techno-magician whilst Sean helps out with everything else and helps tie all of the little bits together. There are over 50 contribu-tors and section editors and they hope to get bigger and start making more of a business out of it. People are always submitting ideas and Wil-liams is constantly looking for new features as Press Release journalism

doesn’t really cut it for this unique pair. They like it hot off the press and as fresh as Miss Cakehead’s pas-tries… This is where Future Zeitgeist comes in. They are people who have really stood out so deserve an extra little platform. It’s a showcase of talent they feel more of a bond with that they can nurture and even go on to put on club nights. At the moment they focus on singer LeeLou, The Lysergic Suite and The Black Dove Experiment. Although these are musi-cians, they aren’t limiting this section to only music. More marketing and more events is the obvious way to go for Zeitgeist. But this will take time and need followers. In comparison to other blogs of it’s kind, it’s quite unusual and I can see it becoming into a more concise, grown-up version of Don’t Panic. It is like a creative or clubber’s guide where you flick through to find a new interest, band or just some inspira-tion. We hope you keep your eye on the blog and see some exciting new things unfolding.

Above: Miss Cakehead’s shop. All photo credits to Nathan Pask. Words by Katherine Stewart

In a time where many are unemployed and it’s hard to get your foot in the door, why not get involved in a project? It can enhance you C.V, portfolio or just your inspiration. From drama, to art, to graffiti workshops, all of these can be used as portfolio oppor-tunities and can incorporate the community. With more disused shops than ever, people have

even used pubs and shop fronts as galleries or subject matter. The council can easily grant this as they desperately want to make the towns look less affected by the recession. Years ago I attended a Graffiti course in the backstage area of The Gordon Craig Theatre. It was over a weekend and I nervously attended with no idea of what lay ahead. Luckily some people from my evening photography class were there and we spent the whole weekend getting to play with different textures and learning about spraying tech-nique. Having been denied this

experience at GCSE level numerous times, it was such great fun and we decorated a wall with characters we’d created and got to keep all of the work we made. This

was free and the people who ran the course were govern-ment funded. It’s an ‘everyone wins’ kind of experience where it inspires people to use different techniques in their art and to get

“It’s an ‘everyone wins’ kind of ex-perience where it inspires people to use different tech-

niques”

May 20117

Give It UP!Why giving your time to art or community

projects can work wonders.

Remz1’s community project. Photo Kate Stewart

“I jumped at the chance and haven’t looked

back.”

out there and make friends, while it can create jobs. A year on and I heard a fam-ily friend of mine, Stephen AKA Remz1 was hosting a weekly night in Chelmsford. Here he would have huge boards where him and his friends would get to graffiti legally and others could come along and give it a try. He also asked DJs along and it created a great atmosphere. When approached at University by Dr. Cian Quayle to become involved in a project run at the Open Eye Gallery, I jumped at the chance and haven’t looked back. We called ourselves the Young Creative Col-laborators and are still in touch today. We were shown a collec-tion of images given to the gallery from past exhibi-tors that had not been widely displayed. We used this as in-spiration to either display these

photos or make responses in our own work. As much of the work revolved around Liverpool and people’s roles in society and the community, we came up with the title of ‘Occupation.’ After many meetings and communications through blogs and facebook, we managed to assemble all of our work from our various posi-tions around the country over the summer! Helping with the culmination of information and hanging of the work with thanks to gallery supervisor, Patrick, was theory-based group member, Zainab. It showed how theorists

and practitioners can easily collaborate and we needed her to give an outside perspective. Before we could realise, the gallery opening

night was upon us. Us, a group of students had, with help from ex Tate Liverpool Educational Cura-tor, Naomi Horlock, curated and

May 2011 8All Photos and words by Katherine Stewart

publicised a fantastically varied yet brilliantly professional exhibi-tion. A new term brought new projects as we started planning meetings at Connexions and a school for children with behavioural difficulties. With Naomi’s organi-sation, we planned out sessions and man-aged to keep their attention through photography workshops. It was a challeng-ing experience. Having got them together to take photos or be the subject of photos, we had to rely on the limited sessions we had where their attendance would be unreliable. Having chosen the work to be displayed and pro-duced it, we thought about how to display their work and have more of their personality in the exhibition. We came up with the idea of letting them loose in the gallery as it would be the final show in the current premises. We

spoke about having a graffiti day as I’d benefited from one before and a lot of them were interested in tagging and graffiti. Naomi invited a friend of hers, Barney Doodlebug along and he inter-acted so well with the kids. We taped up the floor and he showed them projections of graffiti videos

to get them inspired in the backroom. I was quite amazed to see them all sat still and quite for a long amount of time! The rest of the

day was spent doodling around their proposed frames and learn-ing about what looks good. It was a great success. With a few sessions of planning, workshops and then more planning, we had done it again. This is a letter from the school’s Head Teacher...(See letter on the right hand page....) How honoured we felt to have been a part of this. We’ve gone on to plan more sessions and now when applying for jobs I feel this has enhanced my C.V greatly. I am so grateful to Naomi for giv-ing us hard-working youngsters a chance to get our feet in the door in a more meaningful way. Another case of such success is from a fellow student at the University of Chester in which she visited a prison. Katie Badman and her drama students would go to acting sessions to talk

“How honoured we felt to have been a part of

this.”

Volunteering Continued

May 2011

Photos & Words. Kate Stewart.

9

May 2011 10

Hi Naomi, Many, many thanks for involving our school in The Open Eye Project! The impact has been phenomenal - the pupils were so, so proud of their work and the finished project was amazing. Other pupils are quite jealous and are asking when they can be in-volved in a similar scheme! It was fantastic to watch the pupils blossom - from reluctant and nervous to becoming fully involved and immensely proud of the work they produced. Please pass on my thanks to all involved and be assured you have all made a significant impact on the young people in our school, who have so many complex needs we often find it diffi-cult to inspire them. You did this and we are all extremely grate-ful. Once again, many thanks! I do hope we can work together again! Elaine Indris.

about different aspects of theatre in Styal Women’s prison, Man-chester. When asked what kind of offences the women had commit-ted, she only knew of one who had attacked sex offenders, but she was quite sure many of them would be in there for a long time. Again, Katie’s work had been rewarded when a woman told her “when we do this, I forget where

I am for an hour.” This is priceless to a prisoner and can be useful in rehabilitation. Around cities and towns every-where, people are volunteering and helping. With David Cam-eron’s idea of the Big Society, whether you hate him or tolerate him, I hope this inspires you to make your own society.

Kate’s exhibition at The Open Eye. Barney Doodlebug helping out the kids.

Above: letter from the Head of a school the team helped.

11

This Week’s graffiti gallery is from Brick Lane.

May 2011

Photos by Kate Stewart. See her online gallery @katiness

12May 2011

May 201113

FRUITY FESTIVAL

There’s a vicious wildfire crossing the Kent countryside of an unruly festival organiser. Late night music? Tales of debauchery? It’s all true. And there’s plenty more where that came from explains David Hillier, the man behind the controversy. This debut festival, Apple Tarts has been conceived by David Hillier and Chris Barret. They have been ap-proached by BBC news and Kent’s newspapers explaining to the nearby inhabitants that all will be well on this one night of fruitiness… Why Apple Tarts you cry? Hillier explains how it all began with a spark of an idea for a club night… “After 48 hours of no sleep and too much of everything else at Standon Calling Festival last year me and Chris talked about putting on a night back in London. After seeing some local boob-tube floozies hanging out at the train station I called them ‘suburban tarts,’ Chris said that’s what we should call the night and we put the first event on about a month later after drafting in Chris’s girlfriend, Leah as we are both organisational liabilities.” Their idea to create a unique night every time was successful and they have since run six events. Becoming disillusioned with what seemed constant commercial line-ups and a lack of lust for any other festi-vals, they decided to create their own. They could fill their festival with the magic and intimacy they wanted. Hill-ier says “...most memorable moments from festivals are individual moments.

Sunrise conversations, high-fives with strangers, impromptu singalongs of songs not being played on the stage. We wanted to try and create a place for this to happen with our friends, with the Suburban Tarts ethos.” The adventure began as they searched for suitable venues when Dave’s dad said he was involved with a field at Brogdale farm, Kent. To test the waters of their festival, one might call it ‘bob-bing apples,’ they had a successful New Year’s Eve Party with 250 guests to The Victory pub. Raring to go they set off advertising their event. They wanted a private party vibe as it would be more magical. With a bus setting off from Dalston to take the urban folk to this rural setting, what more could be thought of? They have bands, a sports day, music videos being filmed, a set up of the original Victory Pub, Granny Smith’s Tea Rooms and a short bur-lesque performance. The surrounding neighbours have been launching a surprise attack as they have picked up on a raunchy vibe of the festival. Bringing in the bi dogs of BBC and complaining about the lat night music license, these neighbours are real rotten apples. On a sweeter note, the license can’t be rescinded. This one night extravaganza falls from the tree on May 28th and will be a one-night jamboree! With games and frolics until 2am, the guests should be pleased as pie and tickets are running out fast!Words by Kate Stewart, Poster from Suburban Tarts.

May 2011 14

After Kate and Wills have jetted off and we’re all back to work the only thing we have to look forward to is the summer! Well nobody wants to be relying on England’s weather but the ‘staycation’ is in full swing as this year’s spring has been a scorcher. If you’re planning a party, festival or business event, the only party acces-sory to have this year is The Mega-booth… With social networking taking over and instant photos at your fingertips, these portable photo booths are the perfect balance between stun-ning online imagery, and affordable memories to physically take away. This can be useful after one too many Pimms. It’s a set of photos taken like a photo booth but you sit in a beautifully decorated car back-drop while it’s being taken. With the recession hitting against shelling out for over-priced portraits, yet every-one wanting to be a celebrity, these pocket-sized bundles of fun are just what this hostess ordered. The wonder woman behind this idea’s conception is Rachel Posner. This time last year she came up with the idea and it’s blossoming into great things. The first creation was a hippy-style mini covered and filled with ultimate flower-power. Then came Crazy Taxi adorned with fake grass seats and flooring, butterflies, birds and squir-rels. The outside is in a fantasy wildlife

style and is graffiti. The next step back inside was an LED photo booth, designed for customers who couldn’t fit the cars in venues. Then there’s the wedding taxi, which is a classier yet still unconventional affair with black interior and cream exterior. The master-

mind deco-rates her cars from every

nook and cranny of vintage

to pound shops. Sometimes customers

request their own designs and Posner recalls still fitting the

taxi carpet as they were driving to the event after promising to change the taxi to black and silver themed! The photos can all be personalised and can be black and white or colour. This decision was posed at an 18th birthday party in Essex to a couple kissing in the back when the man replied that his fake tan would be a waste if they were in grey scale! With many more funny stories to be expe-rienced with Megabooth, it’s got big plans such as expanding their fleet and perhaps setting up a franchise overseas as they’ve had American interest. Keep this in mind when plan-ning your summer parties and make sure we get an invite!Words and design Kate Stewart. Original im-ages Lomo and Megabooth.com

15 May 2011