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Month: November 2011

Stringing together a business

Written by Emily Bunting on . Posted in News.

A more alternative and yet lucrative business venture, BSc Economics student Dan Shiner runs Fallowfield’s only tennis racket restringing business. A keen tennis player himself, playing for the university and treasurer on the tennis committee, Dan set up his tennis racket re-stringing business aged 14, when a coach recommended that it would be more economical to re-string his own rackets. With racket re-stringing costing around £25 a pop, the £500 racket restringing machine and prospects of fellow tennis players also seeking to avoid the high costs of tennis clubs, seemed like a good investment.

Racket restringing is understandably a  technical process; not only in the re-string itself, but also to ensure the tension of the strings and string type is correct for that player. After a significant amount of practice on his own rackets and through learning more about the technicalities of it with a Wimbledon stringer, Dan was eventually able to get his new enterprise going, and began to spread the word to school friends and fellow tennis players.

Dan easily paid off his start-up costs within the first two years of purchasing the restringing machine. Now based in Manchester, he charges £9-£12 for restringing a racket (depending on whether the customer provides their own stringing reel). That means at least £9 profit for every racket, and hundreds of rackets being restrung per year. Already this term, Dan has restrung 26 rackets, a number which will continue to increase more rapidly as the academic year progresses. Since it is a seasonal business, his peak trading period is the beginning of the summer. Furthermore, with a strong presence in University tennis and his year’s worth of racket re-stringing practice, Dan’s customer base is particularly strong.

He commented:‘It’s all word of mouth, I get a lot of people who I’ve strung for previously coming back, we don’t play too much at uni, so I will probably break mine four or five times a year. For others, it depends on how much spin they put on and how often they play’.

It is clear that Dan is onto a sound business model, with various networks available to tap into customers. A monopoly over the Fallowfield racket restringing business and straight profits of £9 per racket (each of which which take 20 minutes to restring – making earnings of £27 per hour), enable Dan to undercut many of the big sports clubs (who usually charge £18 – £30), saving students money and earning relatively substantial profits whilst at university.

Dan explained ‘if you have had the same string in your racket for a long time then the tension usually goes, negatively impacting your game. Also, when you buy a racket, the strings already in there are strung loosely’. So, if you would like to save money on your racket restringing, e-mail Dan at [email protected]

 

Unemployed Youth, Unemployed Graduates.

Written by Kirti Vasta on . Posted in News.

One of the biggest alterations to the lives of young people in Britain has been the rise in the level of students going to university. This provides Britain with an even more skillful workforce, with intellectual bright sparks ready to achieve bigger and better things. However, the startling news is, actually, it is people under the age of 25 within society who are hit the hardest by unemployment.

Even before the economic slowdown, the number of 16 to 24 year olds unemployed has been rising continuously without interruption. Why are such young people of a fit working age finding it so difficult?

Rather than assuming this is an outcome of the recent recession, maybe youth unemployment needs to be considered as more of a long run trend. In October 2011 the Office for National Statistics estimated the unemployment total for this age range at 991,000. These figures go on to confirm that more than a third of unemployed people in the UK are under the age of 25. Latest figures released  November’s show that jobless 16 to 24-year-olds total around 1.02 million.

This is a problem which needs to be addressed by the government. Many economists support the view that countries investing in a skilful workforce are likely to be the ones who prosper. For example, it has been predicted that China will be producing more graduates than Europe and USA combined by 2020. Competition will be fierce for jobs as employers seek out the best candidates.

Almost 28 percent of graduates who left university in 2007 were still not in full-time work three and a half years later according to Higher Education Statistics Agency. However, since the recession, graduate employment has seen a slight lift in 2010. The percentage of University of Manchester alumni obtaining graduate-level jobs is above average at 71.7 percent

It is evident that a degree will put graduates in a better position to succeed and become more employable both in the long and short term. Robust graduates with a strong skill-set and a degree under their belt were well equipped enough to make it through. Yet with a lack of government support the jobs market doesn’t seem to be getting much easier whether you’re a graduate or not.

 

Popping up near you

Written by Phoebe Chambre on . Posted in Arts, Features.

Pop-up. A phrase that until recently was used only in relevance to children’s books, jacks that come in boxes, toasters/tarts (the popping kind), and laps. But we can now reveal that ‘pop-up’ has a new meaning that is shoring the tides of the urban experience. This can mean only one thing: a trend has crested that perilous wave of mode and is riding high at the break, spouting frothy cool magic. Urban dictionary, landmark of all things ‘on’ trend, helpfully points us to one of the many meanings of ‘pop-up’ (but thanks for the lap mention): ‘A place for hipsters to eat that doesn’t stay in one place long enough to meet health code’. Unexpected, quick-fire, one-stop, one-purpose, possible health hazard – it’s all there for the discerning hipster.

Pop-ups have burned through the leisure industry: from pop-up shops, brow bars, vajazzle stations (I kid you not), cupcake stands – that’s trend piled upon trend and all for the low, low price of parting with your dollar. And finally, inevitably, the trend has trickled on down into the art world: galleries and exhibitions in unexpected or sudden locations, with no health and safety, popping like corn all over the place.

In 2009, ‘insiders’ decreed pop-ups to be the ‘buzz word’ on the London art scene. Precisely what these words mean is irrelevant, the facts are clear: a trend is born. And now, Manchester has squared up its shoulders and let loose a couple of poppers itself. In very recent weeks vacant urban spaces have been hijacked by hungry young art caterpillars to be transformed into sparkling art-filled butterflies.

Firstly, Free for Arts festival fulfilled its free brief, and filled its boots with promised spaces. It brought art to unnatural habitat such as Urban Outfitters and the unsold office space Piccadilly Place. The requirements were fulfilled; there was no air of gallery formality to the Place, just the chill of naked concrete. It’s empty, ripe for the creative picker, and best of all it’s free. This is guerrilla art squatting in its highest form.

Grabbing empty city space allows complete freedom of curation, and it creates opportunities for those outside the institution, without funding or contacts. Child’s Play, an exhibition in Piccadilly Place, was a pop-up about pop-ups – further proof that a trend has reached fruition when the fruit borne is irony. The survivalist instinct common to starving artist and nomad alike kicked in and every corner of the bare concrete bone of the building was used as part of the exhibition. But for curator, Ryan Higgins, the most significant element in creating a pop-up as forum was that it allowed the exhibition, in content, to comment on the trend of pop-ups from inside. In the same way that pop-ups may function within the contemporary art institution (as Higgins understands them) but change the landscape of that world, Child’s Play operates within both these concentric circles. Yet it is also concerned with maintaining aesthetic standards that Higgins feels are sometimes devalued by the temporality of the pop-up. The lines between institution and insurgent are clearly blurred for the viewer, and I wonder, how keenly the imbedded comments are felt for the audience.

Secondly, NOISE arts charity put its own spin on the pop-up with a two week installation in Stephenson Square at the end of October, ‘The Art of Protest’, which featured ‘masters’ such as Banksy and Gillian Wearing. A pop-up was the perfect package for the under-25s charity to present its anti-violent protest protest. Also conducive to the young, a pop-up burns just short enough to keep the attention of the short consumer-fused span of youth today.

The exhibition was in part a reaction to the violent riots earlier in the year, but uniquely it promotes protest. That is protest through non-violent channels, and specifically through art. Dissent that fuels creativity you say? Surely it’s been done. Except like the trend within a trend, The Art of Protest tackled issues that affected young people, as presented by young people, yet it was also about how these issues are articulated; and all this through a medium of exhibit that is particular to youth and how the youth are to articulate themselves in these economic and socially closed times.

Joshua Blackburn, of provokateur.com, spoke in relevance to The Art of Protest that although many say that we’ve ‘lost the art of protest’ through the constant transactions that are sought and performed by us and our immediate world, there are ever-inventive ways that people are articulating their dissent. He has kernelled the pop-up, in my eyes. Something that began as a way to surround us with more and more diverse ways that we can shop has now, irony of ironies, squeezed out of the shadows an inventive tactic that facilitates unfunded, unsanctioned projects: charities, free festivals.

The vajazzles continue. The North has caught on to the trend, like a small European country where the music is a decade old and the suits are shiny. Does this mean the wave has broken, the microwave has pinged and the corn has popped, that it’s downhill and downmarket pound pop-ups from here on in? Anything can now be turned into a selling opportunity, especially something new. But like the Art of Protest’s idealistic exuberance, if pop-ups empower some creative side-stepping, allowing those with something to say somewhere to say it, then I say get noise-y.

Read on for pop-up dab-hands, NOISE’s, experiences of the ‘catch it will you can’ phenomenon:
Why did NOISEfestival.com decide to run the Art of Protest exhibition in the form of a pop-up?
The ‘Art of Protest’ exhibition was an extension of the NOISElab.co.uk, the biggest pop-up project in the country, that we ran throughout 2010 (Nov 2009 – Nov 2010) as a ‘Free Arts Enterprise university’ in a store, on Manchester’s Market Street. The location was one of the busiest shopping miles in Europe, so it gave young people a really accessible way to network with their creative idols such as Jon Burgerman, Virus Syndicate, Pete Fowler, and Pure Evil, who shared their expert advice and experience of how to carve out a successful career in the creative industries.
The economic climate is making life very challenging for young people. With cuts to much needed initiatives to help them get employment, continue education or provide short-term paid work placements. By offering space to young people, the NOISE Charity is providing a positive response and space to have their say.
Following on from the success of NOISELAB, we thought that the best way to get maximum impact and exposure for the Art of Protest exhibition was for us to stage it as a pop-up showcase in a high street shop window. The exhibition’s location in Stevenson Square, in the city’s Northern Quarter was actually where a lot of the riot activity took place in August this year. We wanted to show how creative protests can have lasting impact and gain media attention, without resorting to violence.

Do you think the popularity of the trend stems from economic reasons?
At the time when the recession was having a devastating impact on the UK high-street, we wanted to re-animate the high street. Each month the NOISELAB windows were re-worked to display the work of young creatives.

Does it appeal to a younger audience? Or perhaps allow for a more creative approach to an exhibition, from the organisational point of view?
Because our pop-up projects have all been in high street locations, it’s helped us to attract audiences from all ages from a range of diverse backgrounds.
Pop Up projects give organisers and public more flexibility, and more importantly the possibility of doing creative things where usually there is little of that sort of stuff going on.
In addition, because of [the pop-up’s] high street location we had to think about getting people in the shop without intimidating those who were not our target audience, but I think we struck a good balance, attracting over 42,000 visitors in over 6 months.

And finally, was the use of pop-up a success from your perspective?
NOISELAB was a resounding success, as the flexibility of the space made it adaptable and multifunctional space, often programmed by young people themselves. The temporary nature gave the space a, ‘catch it while you can’ exclusivity, making those involved feel like they were part of something really unique and worthwhile. When we announced that the space was closing, we were really pleased that the Lab’s regulars started an online petition to keep the space open. It received over 750 signatures in one week. We were pretty overwhelmed with the response.
With the Art of Protest exhibition, the charity was showing young people the best protest art that had gone before and setting the challenge for young people to do something equal or better.

We are now launching the ‘Re-Masters – Art of Protest’ project nationally, for emerging creatives from across the country can produce their own protest-art, taking inspiration from iconic protest art from the last 50 years (Stella Vine, Gillian Wearing, imagery from John and Yoko’s Bed-in..etc).
More information and the brief can be found on our NOISE Art of Protest page here www.NOISEfestival.com/Protest

Commentary: It will never be easy to find a graduate job again

Written by Henry Hill on . Posted in News.

There’s no doubt that times are hard for British graduates. Business recruitment is low, leaving scores of graduates fighting over every coveted position.

The most commonly blamed factor is the recession, which is preventing businesses from expansion and thus causing higher graduate unemployment.

But this is not the whole story. Key to the question of graduate employment is the fact that since the early years of this decade the UK has experienced a continued rise in over-qualification levels.

This is where somebody holds educational qualifications in excess of those required for their job or entirely unrelated to it.

The reason for this is clear: there are more graduates than there are graduate jobs.

Prior to the expansion of higher education it was simple: a small number of students went to university and then stepped into suitable graduate jobs.

These people tended to earn more – the ‘graduate dividend’ – and so when Labour came to power in 1997 they looked at opening up this advantage to more people.

But when they decided to set a target of 50 percent of school-leavers going to university, they wrongly assumed that the market would keep up.

Instead, an increasing number of graduates are leaving university to find that the glittering professional career they were promised simply isn’t available.

As a result many graduates have to take jobs for which they are over-qualified. As well as being disappointing for the graduate, this has a terrible effect on school-leavers.

Those jobs that did not used to require a degree are now so flush with applications that they raise the bar. This forces students to put themselves through three years of debt-fuelled university in order to get exactly the same job they could have walked into before.

The labour market has been flooded by graduates now, and short of a massive reduction in university places it will never be comfortably easy to find a graduate job again. If you want one, prepare to fight for it.

Can’t find a graduate job? It’s ten times easier to get on TV 



Written by Solomon Radley on . Posted in News.

Matt Rose has just spent a week learning to make pumpkin cannelloni, not an easy dish considering the most extravagant thing he’s cooked to date was served with a side of potato smileys.

He may have exaggerated his cooking skills when applying for MasterChef Live, an arena-style food exhibition put on by the people behind the television show, but he’s been doing everything he can to get his face about recently.

In the end Matt put aside the newly-bought pasta maker and instead tried his hand at risotto when he appeared last Saturday.

Matt’s clearly no foodie, so what is he is up to then?

Earlier this year he graduated from the University of Surrey with a first in English Literature and is struggling to find a job.

He’s not the only one – this year, the total number of unemployed 16-24 year olds reached a record high of 991,000.

But he hasn’t been applying exclusively for jobs.  When he’s not busy handing out CVs and filling in forms, Matt is applying to be a contestant for just about every TV show on the BBC, ITV and Channel 4 that wants applicants from the general public.

“Game show applications are so interesting – the Deal or No Deal one has you writing poems about the banker and so forth – that job applications seem too boring to consider by comparison.”

In the months since he graduated, Matt has been asked to just one job interview, for a sales job in London, which he unfortunately didn’t get.

“I struggled because unlike the other applicants I have no sales experience”, he says, “I think it’s tricky to get a job as an English degree tends to fall through the cracks of what employers are looking for.”

He has, however, appeared on several television shows.

Earlier this month he was in Manchester recording an episode of the seminal Channel 4 quiz show Countdown. He crashed and burned: having stormed the phone interview, Matt just struggled to put points on the board in the studio.

Before that he assembled a crack team to challenge five of the country’s most esteemed quiz show champions on BBC2’s Eggheads.

“Being on Eggheads was surreal. I botched an easy question, saying Kate Middleton was married at St Paul’s instead of Westminster Abbey, doing that terrible thing where you have the right answer and then talk yourself out of it. If it wasn’t for that, I might have won 20 grand.”

Other recent television appearances include providing a soundbite on The Joy of Teen Sex, proclaiming to the world, “My friend – who shall remain nameless – once said that going down on a girl in the morning is a bit like pulling apart a cheese toasty.” Nice.

The most recent figures from the Association of Graduate Recruiters show that companies will receive an average of 83 applications per graduate vacancy. In contrast, the producer of Countdown estimates that there are roughly 8.5 applicants per place on the show, so it’s not really surprising that Matt is managing to get his face on television with ease, but struggling to find an employer.

It might be common practice to pay your rent by getting a job and working the nine-to-five, but the potential earnings for a professional quizzer are substantial. So, has all of this television work translated into a profit?

“I haven’t made any money from shows yet”, he says, “I’ve just had travel expenses paid, so I’m essentially getting free mini-breaks around the UK, which has been nice.”

Winning enough to make being a quiz show contestant a viable career choice is clearly tough, but even a single appearance on Deal or No Deal or The Million Pound Drop could make all of the effort worthwhile.

Unfortunately, the high demand for places on these flagship programs with big cash prizes makes them extremely difficult to get on to.

Luckily, generating a one-off windfall is not Matt’s only concern.

As well as broadening his knowledge of trivia considerably and finally learning to cook to an acceptable standard, he’s benefited from experiencing how TV is created behind the scenes.

“Aside from the money I am quite interested to see how the whole TV process works; having spent hours of every day watching the same afternoon game shows, it’s quite surreal and exciting to actually be in the very studios I’ve spent so many hours watching, gregariously chatting with the presenters and so forth.”

So what is he going to do next?

“I’m not sure yet, although I’ve heard that the auditions for the next series of Big Brother are opening soon.”

Maybe most are better off sticking with more conventional income sources, but with more than one in five young people out of work, perhaps it’s not surprising that some are searching for novel ways to accumulate wealth.

Trying to win your living on quiz shows might seem a bit off the wall, but there are plenty of more reliable opportunities worth considering: starting a business, building a website, becoming an investor, or generating income from creative work are all options with a great deal of potential.

The general outlook is pretty bleak for young graduates at the moment, but with creative flare and a bit of ambition, you may not have to rely on the congested jobs market.

If you pull it off you’ll probably wind up happier and more fulfilled; it has to beat working an office job.

Henry Hill’s commentary: It will never be easy to find a graduate job again

PHD student creates life saving app

Written by Joe Sandler Clarke on . Posted in News.

A former soldier has developed an app which could save the lives of burns victims, both in combat and in hospitals around the world.

Chris Seaton, formerly a captain in the Royal Army Medical Corps and now a PhD student studying Computer Science at The University of Manchester, created the iPhone and iPad application after seeing the horrific injuries burns caused to fellow soldiers.

Seaton, who carried out the research alongside Mr Rowan Pritchard Jones and Professor Paul McArthur, plastic surgeons at St Helens and Knowsley NHS Trust and academics at the University of Liverpool, won a £5,000 prize at the NHS North West Health Innovation and Education Cluster Excellence in Innovation Awards 2011 this month for his work on the app.

Critical to the chances of survival after a burns injury is taking on the correct amount of fluids. Traditionally, doctors will have to make a quick series of pen and paper calculations to assess the ideal amount.

The margin for error on doing this is high, and is also time consuming.

“For soldiers fighting on the front line, the traditional way of assessing burns victims is difficult; particularly when they’re underfire,” Mr Seaton told The Mancunion. The app – called Mersey Burns – allows for exact and rapid calculations.

On a touchscreen phone, the user simply colours in the sufferer’s burnt area on a computer model of a torso, adds in the person’s age and weight (estimated if not exactly known), and the precise amounts of fluids are instantly calculated.

Tests the research team carried out showed the iPhone app reduced errors made by pen and paper by a third.

Mr Seaton confirmed to The Mancuion that he and his fellow researchers intended to spend their £5,000 prize on legal costs as they look to make the app available on the App Store.

Chris Seaton was in the army for four years and was a captain in the army Medical core, and was keen to develop the research after seeing horrific burns injuries sustained by fellow soldiers.

He said that great things could be achieved if computer scientists like him collaborated with those in the medical profession.

“There is great possibility for creating really innovative technology by pairing up small touch screen devices with medicine,” he said.

“Even simple ideas can make a big difference and all it takes is a doctor getting together with a computer scientist to make it a reality.”

Higher education chairman warns against ‘consumer culture’

Written by Rachel Heward on . Posted in News.

Michael Farthing, chairman of the 1994 group for higher education at research-intensive universities, has warned against universities treating students as ‘consumers’.

The 1994 Group is a higher education group for research-intensive universities and aims to promote excellence in research and teaching.

The chairman criticised the government’s recent plans to improve higher education in England. He said that there has been too much focus on undergraduates and a ‘lack of attention’ towards postgraduate students and research.

Farthing, who is also vice chancellor of Sussex University, said in a recent speech, “we cannot fall into the trap of reducing higher education to a set of simple transactions. Universities are so much more than warehouses that sell of-the-shelf qualifications, and students are more than consumers purchasing degrees”.

The government’s White Paper has proposed an option for the higher education system to be driven by competition and market forces.

To encourage more competition on price between universities, the government has allocated 20,000 undergraduate places for courses with tuition fees below £7,500.

This business-like course of action is the reason why academics such as Farthing have expressed fears about the change in higher education. He said, “we need to talk about the student experience less in terms of transactions and more in terms of relationships. Universities are communities where people come together to create and share knowledge”.

34 universities and 167 further education colleges have made applications for almost 36,000 places.

The allocation of these places will be announced next year and could see places move from universities and into further education colleges.

do not use

Written by Rachel Heward on . Posted in News.

Michael Farthing, chairman of the 1994 group for higher education at research-intensive universities, has warned against

Michael Farthing, chairman of the 1994 group for higher education

universities treating students as ‘consumers’.

The 1994 Group is a higher education group for research-intensive universities and aims to promote excellence in research and teaching.

The chairman criticised the government’s recent plans to improve higher education in England. He said that there has been too much focus on undergraduates and a ‘lack of attention’ towards postgraduate students and research.

Farthing, who is also vice chancellor of Sussex University, said in a recent speech, “we cannot fall into the trap of reducing higher education to a set of simple transactions. Universities are so much more than warehouses that sell of-the-shelf qualifications, and students are more than consumers purchasing degrees”.

The government’s White Paper has proposed an option for the higher education system to be driven by competition and market forces.

To encourage more competition on price between universities, the government has allocated 20,000 undergraduate places for courses with tuition fees below £7,500.

This business-like course of action is the reason why academics such as Farthing have expressed fears about the change in higher education. He said, “we need to talk about the student experience less in terms of transactions and more in terms of relationships. Universities are communities where people come together to create and share knowledge”.

34 universities and 167 further education colleges have made applications for almost 36,000 places.

The allocation of these places will be announced next year and could see places move from universities and into further education colleges.

Escape modern anxiety: wash yourself, you ribald filth

Written by Isabelle Dann on . Posted in Fashion & Beauty.

We’ve all been there; the awkward moment when your existence is suddenly dominated by some form of electronic communication medium as you find yourself waiting around for various combinations of the following:

• A phone call (on your iPhone) post-job interview; your bank balance would just look so sexy all the way back to zero.
• A comment on something pretentious / quasi-witty / inane you posted on Facebook that proves you’re still acceptable on the internet.
• A text from that special someone that doesn’t suggest last night was a horribly hideous mistake.
• An email from your tutor answering all your last-minute essay crises queries / concerns / general lunatic ravings (because, hi, the deadline’s today).
• A tweet from your current intellectual idol – come on, @SalmanRushdie, let’s talk Clarissa and Courtney Love! #LiteraryKinderwhoreSmackdowns

As a form of remedy, I suggest the following: take a long shower. No, really. It’s ostensibly simple, yet most effective. Enforced time offline! Revel in your novel cleanliness!

Now, the most important preparation is to invest in the appropriate supplies:

For girls: Soap & Glory™ Higher Shower™ Pamper Pack, £20.

I’m a big fan of any brand that’s built their empire on puns (“Glow Job” facial moisturiser, anyone?), and this gift set contains the following products in full-size form:

• Clean Girls™ Shower Gel; a creamy body wash infused with notes of bergamot, blackcurrant, magnolia, freesia, vanilla and musk
• The Daily Smooth™ Body Butter; nourishes dry skin intensely with rosehip seed oil and cocoa butter.
• Mist You Madly™ Spray; a floral body spray for post-shower activity.
• Shower Puff for all your lathering needs.
• Shower Cap for Calpol chic.

As a delightful addition, try Soap & Glory The Breakfast Scrub™ Body Exfoliator, £9.95 for super-smooth skin via oat, shea butter and sugar.

For guys: Bath House Spanish Fig Men’s Shower Gift Box, £28.

For ultimate manly shower relaxation, try this kit containing:

• Spanish Fig Wash bar
• Spanish Fig Hair and Body Wash
• Spanish Fig Deodorant
• Nail brush
• Cotton flannel

All products are infused with – you guessed it – Spanish fig, in addition to nutmeg punctuated with clove and a heady base of sandalwood, cedar and patchouli.

So, now you’ve got the goods, step in and savour the steam. As a finishing touch, blast some suitably anthemic background music. Sing your troubles away! I recommend the Glee Christmas album.

Finally, when you head back to your room only to find that, still, nobody cares, rinse and repeat.

Column: Baby, Baby, Baby… Ohh Wait, Maybe Not.

Written by Tom Geddes on . Posted in Music.

If you’ve been on Twitter over the last month, you’ve probably noticed what some twelve year old girls believe is the biggest news story since a massive explosion happened in space some billions of years ago. Fresh-faced little girl impersonator Justin Bieber has allegedly fathered a child. Yes, if twenty year old Mariah Yeater is telling the truth, then Justin Bieber has broken the hearts of millions of deluded teenage girls and not been quite as ‘pure’ as he would lead you to believe. The timing of this is impeccable, coming mere days after NME reported the dropping of his balls, which signals not only the dive in credibility of the publication but also the depressing depths of humanity’s fall for caring.

 

The encounter between Yeater and Bieber is said to have happened eleven months ago backstage at one of Biebers gigs, or mass stupidity rallies as I like to think of them. The alleged ‘thirty second liason’ is said to have taken place in a toilet, which if true makes four month old Tristyn the worst thing ever produced in a toilet. Not only that, but by US law it would make Mariah Yeater a statutory rapist. Obviously Bieber denies that this ever happened, but then again he claims to have talent and a soul. It’s hard to know who is telling the truth here as both fall into a category of relentlessly untrustworthy people. Mariah Yeater is a fan of Justin Bieber (or a Belieber) and Justin Bieber is Justin Bieber. That may very well be settled by the time you read this, with paternity tests being rolled out as we speak, but what won’t be over is the sheer tenacity of the venomous hatred being levelled at Yeater by other Beliebers.

 

In a severely worrying and malicious turn of events, Beliebers have taken to the web and focussed every ounce of their being into hounding Yeater. Anti-Yeater Facebook groups are popping up at a steady rate, Twitter has gone berserk and they’re even directly threatening her on her own Facebook. Now, she may very well be making the whole thing up to get attention and even if she isn’t, she’s using her own child as a gateway into the public eye so either way, she does seem pretty vacuous, but there’s something more than a little depressing to me about the masses reaction. Now, I know the majority of the hate is coming from girls who’ve barely hit puberty and as such still have a lot to learn about the world, but where the hell did they learn that it was OK to relentlessly bully and threaten death on somebody just because of their own unreciprocated love for an empty shell of a man.

 

Remember back to earlier in the year when Rebecca Black released ‘Friday’. She faced an onslaught from half the world for what amounts to taking advantage of a chance to be a star. Now as ill-judged as that was, she didn’t deserve the torrent of abuse she received. There was one group of people however who stood by her and they were the Beliebers. At the time they seemed to be the only ones acting with any degree of perspective and rationality, openly telling the world to grow up, which coming from a twelve year old is a cracking insult. But given hindsight, it all seems a little hollow. The truth is, nobody comes out of this situation looking anything but terrible, especially you and me. I mean look at us; we’re giving this shit the time of day.

 

Album: Turbowolf – Turbowolf

Written by Tom Geddes on . Posted in Music.

Turbowolf

Turbowolf

Hassle Records

3/5

After several short EP’s and relentless touring, it’s no surprise that Turbowolf are treating their long overdue self titled debut release like the second coming of Jesus. Add to that the hyping of the 11/11/11 release and you would be forgiven for thinking this album is going to be responsible for the end of the world.

Keyboards. That’s the first thing that hit’s you about this album. Left and right massive, monolithic, organesque keyboards smack you in the face. Whilst that might sound a little overbearing, it’s woven skilfully into racing guitars and snarling vocals. There’s also always a feeling throughout that Turbowolf are merely a couple of steps from breaking out into hardcore, something that lies mainly in the pace of most of the songs.

Speaking of specific songs, after a short introduction, ‘Ancient Snake’, which is possibly the best song on the album hits. A real toe stomper, showcasing Chris Georgiadis’ vocals all held together with subtle drumwork. ‘A Rose For The Crows’ is also in with a shout of track of the album. With a crunching intro that makes you sit up and take notice and a chorus which is perhaps the most melodic part of the entire album, the song only gets better with a haunting breakdown with those keyboards again ringing out into the air.

Though there is not a particularly bad song on the album, what is missing is the live energy of the band. There’s little on the album that gives the sense of quite how manic these songs are when played live and that’s a shame. If the energy had been there this would be a great album, as it stands it’s merely a good one. Simply, it doesn’t do them justice.

Who’s next in Europe’s game of dominos?

Written by Cat Hanson on . Posted in Opinion.

Call me eccentric, but I find international political summits as enthralling as any reality TV show. Not least because the formats are strikingly similar; take a bunch of wide-eyed young hopefuls with supposedly earnest dreams, a never-ending string of scandals and of course the schadenfreude moments of eviction, et voila!

However as I sat chucking popcorn into my open mouth, semi-comatose and absorbing the coverage, it quickly became apparent that this Eurozone crisis meeting was going to prompt a more dramatic flurry of leadership evictions than your average summit.

Far from being the elephant in the room, the Eurozone crisis was a defrosted mammoth bulldozing its way through the EU and G20 summits. Few nails were left unchewed over Greece’s sovereign debt crisis, the scandalous turmoil that grips Italy or the impatience of countries such as the USA and China, lurking like dragons in the den, preparing to invest their fresh dollar and yuan. Germany’s Angela Merkel and France’s Nicholas Sarkozy sat stony-faced, like exasperated parents at the kitchen table, begging for the children to stop squabbling.

The threat of economic meltdown has kickstarted a trend, with Europe’s leaders toppling at the speed of despotic regimes in the Arab world in this new ‘Mediterranean Autumn’. Former Taoiseach of Ireland Brian Cowen is gone, whilst Prime Ministers José Sócrates of Portugal and José Zapatero of Spain have fallen down the plughole of national debt. It was therefore only a matter of time before Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou crumbled and Italy’s Berlusconi – for the time being, at least – swaggered out of the political arena.

Papandreou, ironically sporting a Monopoly-man moustache, has witnessed Greece plummeting into a chasm of debt, economic inertia and parliamentary problems. Greece’s sovereign debt is said to have been accrued after previous administrations had exaggerated economic figures in order to meet monetary union guidelines, worsened by the country’s high level of tax evasion.

Papandreou entered office in 2009 in optimistic fashion, only for his advisors to rootle through the draws and discover a series of economic graphs with large, red numbers hastily Tippexed out and ‘loadsa money!’ scrawled in Biro over the top. Nevertheless, the EU, the IMF and the European Central Bank were left dumbfounded after Papandreou delayed bailout plans by calling a referendum on the issue. The incredulity of three of the world’s biggest financial institutions spelt the end for Papandreou, who announced his resignation on the November 11. Another one bites the dust.

By the end of the following day, Silvio Berlusconi had finally been ousted. Certainly, Italy has economic problems of its own; boasting more than €1.8 trillion worth of debt, it is undoubtedly next on the agenda for Eurozone aid and severe austerity measures. But that’s not quite what most protesters had in mind when chanting ‘buffoon’ and ‘clown’ at the Prime Minister as he left office on November 12. Rather, Berlusconi’s exit marks the end of a platinum era for public scandals, politicised media dominance and a font of satirical material. Holding the office of Prime Minister for a total of ten years, the billionaire has seen his political career marred by a string of court cases over allegations of bribery, illegal financing, corrupting judges, false accounting and underage prostitution, to name but a few.

Berlusconi is famed for possessing perhaps the most unflappable gumption seen in the modern political sphere. Can you imagine Barack Obama giving his State of the Union address before popping to a court to be tried for embezzlement? David Cameron being accused of heading a ‘vast pimping network’? Herman van Rompuy even uttering the words ‘bunga bunga’? It would seem that after 17 years in politics, Berlusconi’s infamous endeavours evolved into legal and critical immunity. Astonishingly, he has emerged relatively unscathed, with little damage done aside from taking a statuette of Milan Cathedral to the face.

Nonetheless, Italy’s problems are far from over. For months Berlusconi has acted as a flashy buffer against what is expected to become the harsh reality of austerity cuts and further stern glares from Chancellor Merkel and President Sarkozy.

Speaking of the dynamic duo, the question is as to which domino is in line to fall next. Sarkozy faces an uphill battle for re-election next year in the wake of strong criticism from both ends of the political spectrum, having had to answer for a return to economic state interventionism. On top of that, why not call the Prime Minister of Israel “a liar” as well? That ought to round off your stressful schedule nicely, Sarko.

Travel east and Merkel’s support is also dwindling; recent state elections dealt heavy blows to her Christian Democratic Union party and approval ratings have declined. However, Merkel is widely seen as having led the Eurozone through this crisis. She also recently assuaged Germans by announcing a tax cut because, delightfully, they have more money than they thought they had.

The Eurozone crisis is showing no sign of abating just yet, and plans have been announced to formalise this summit into a series of regular meetings. So, I wonder – are there more political dominoes left to fall? Was Berlusconi the only shock exit? Are there further challenges to come? We can only assume that we will find out in the next engrossing episode.

No 2 EU

Written by Oliver Johnstone on . Posted in Opinion.

The key point that Europhiles miss when attempting to silence our popular wish to free Britain from the shackles of the European Union is that the debate is not really about the ‘here and now’.

Rather, we ought to emphasis the point that the EU has no definition other than that which appears to be the clear intentions of its leaders and supporters. As may come as a shock to the rigid adherents to the European project out there, our focus here is not on the present trouble and strife in the Eurozone but on the wider implications of Jean Monnet’s grand design for the future of Great Britain.

From the very beginning, the intention has been to transform Europe into a united federal state – to that there can be no objection. We have seen how European leaders have trampled over our democratic rights and railroaded through treaties which have seen the voices of the ordinary man and woman silenced, yet the reach of the watchtower in Brussels expanded.

In the Human Rights Act, as well as the Lisbon and Maastricht treaties, we have seen a sinister collusion between the political elite and the Bonapartist bureaucrats to override popular will and bolster the fortification of ‘Project Europa’. As the father of the European Union, Jean Monnet commanded in the most Machievellian vein, “Europe’s nations should be guided towards the superstate without their people understanding what is happening. This can be accomplished by successive steps, each disguised as having an economic purpose but which will irreversibly lead to federation.”

The question we must therefore ask is not ought we remain in the EU as it stands, but rather do we want to abandon our island nation of Great Britain and have the elite sign us up to the United States of Europe? Do we neglect our prestigious history, shun our fascinatingly rich culture and accept an inferior diplomatic position in favour of European homogeneity? Now is the time to say enough is enough. We, the people, are sovereigns of our nations and destinies. It is high time the political and bureaucratic elite bowed to our will instead of us bowing to theirs.

Why Britain must stay in the EU

Written by Rob Fuller on . Posted in Opinion.

A quick flick through some of the more knee-jerk stories covered by our delightful tabloid press goes some way to explaining why calling for Britain to leave the EU has become increasingly fashionable in recent times.

The Eurozone crisis rumbles on, seemingly threatening to destroy everything in its path. Day after day we are berated with scare stories about strange decisions made by shadowy European bureaucrats. Pints will be banned in British pubs. Bananas will stop being curvy. Children will be forced to learn strange languages like French from a young age. Surely we must leave Europe before it’s too late and our way of life is destroyed!

Of course, the problem is that none of the above is true.  The Eurozone crisis is undoubtedly a terrifying prospect for the global economy. But it is easy to forget that it is just one component of the huge debt crisis facing many nations far beyond Europe. The debt crisis that began in the United States a few years ago plunged us into recession in the first place, a feat that the current crisis has yet to achieve.

This casts doubt over one of the oft-repeated Eurosceptic arguments; if we left the EU, we could simply forge stronger economic bonds with the US. Even if this were possible, it is less clear that it is desirable; the US economy has just as much, if not more, capacity to damage Britain. Europe is also our biggest trading partner.

The European Union is undeniably key to our present and future prosperity. British exports to Europe make up a huge part of our economy; 40% of British exports go to EU countries alone. Unlike our transactions further afield, exporting to our friends in Europe is also free of trade barriers, financial or otherwise. This is a key advantage of the common market. Leaving the EU would heap huge costs onto British businesses, limiting our potential to trade. Those who think we could walk out of the EU and continue to trade as before are being short-sighted. It would be like your housemate moving out after telling you he can’t live with you or the things you stand for any more, but still expecting to have a key to your house.

Of course, economics is not everything. Europe is constantly accused of posing an unacceptable threat to British democracy. During recent calls by Tory backbenchers for a referendum on our EU membership, we repeatedly heard the claim that only people in their 50’s and above had been given the chance to vote on EU membership.

This is true. It is also meaningless. No-one under the age of about 800 has ever had the chance to vote on the Magna Carta, a document which massively changed the nature of sovereignty in Britain. Must we vote on it every few years? Clearly not. We elect representatives in Westminster to watch over our interests, including with regard to Europe, and we elect members of the European Parliament to watch over our interests too. If we truly believed Europe was harming our democracy, we could elect people who felt the same way.

Participation in Europe is crucial to Britain’s role on the world stage. The days of empire are over. We hold no special power over the Commonwealth. Britain exerts influence over the outside world primarily as a member of the EU. If we were to walk away, our voice on the world stage would be diminished. This would surely harm our interests, too.

The European Union is an imperfect institution beset by problems. But being a part of it entails massive benefits that outweigh any disadvantages. Our membership allows us not only to benefit from the EU, but to change it for the better. Britain must remain a part of this.

Ailing EU economies turn to Bilderberg buddies

Written by Andrew Williams on . Posted in Opinion.

Europe’s leadership merry-go-round has accelerated in recent weeks. First, Lucas Papademos took over from beleaguered Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou, before Silvio Berlusconi followed his Mediterranean counterpart out of the door to be replaced by Italian economist ‘Super’ Mario Monti.

But the two newest political leaders in Europe have much more in common than the perilous state of their respective economies. Both are long-term members of the elusive Bilderberg Group.

The Bilderberg conference is an annual, invitation-only summit of around 150 of the most influential people in the world. Previous attendees include Princes Charles and Phillip, former Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, Bill Gates and his presidential namesake Clinton. Papademos and Monti can be added to this list of distinguished Bilderberg alumni, and their membership of the ‘steering committee’ is noteworthy in light of their new, high-powered positions.

The significance of the Bilderberg Group lies in its intense secrecy. Unlike renowned international summits such as the G20, meetings are unofficial and unpublicised, held in inaccessible luxury hotels closed to journalists and reporters and heavily guarded by private security firms.

Inevitably, this has prompted a flurry of conspiracy theories – the most pertinent of which is that the group exists to promote a one-world government with an inherent Western bias. Fidel Castro has gone so far as to brand the organisation “a sinister clique”.

In light of the ascension of Papademos and Monti to the top of European politics, perhaps we are beginning to see the fruits of a concerted effort by members of the Group to expand their sphere of influence. It seems fanciful, but the conspiracy theorists would like you to think so.

MUSEA goes to Amsterdam

Written by Ceri Wills on . Posted in Arts, Features, Societies.

From the 2nd – 5th February 2012 for only £135

Join MUSEA as we take 50 students to Amsterdam for a post-exam weekend of art galleries and sight seeing.

We’ll be taking in all that Amsterdam has to offer, including amazing galleries such as the Van Gogh Museum, Rijksmuseum Old Masters gallery and the SMBA contemporary photography museum, as well as the Waterlooplein Flea market, bike tours… Anything you fancy! We’ll provide a rough itinerary, which you can follow as much or as little as you want.

£135 gets you…

  • Flights from Manchester Airport
  • 3 Nights accommodation at the uptown Flying Pig Hostel
  • The chance to take in a beautiful city and meet new people

For more information join our facebook page https://www.facebook.com/groups/8369861342/ or email us at [email protected]. We’ll be sat in the Students’ Union bar between 11am – 1pm every Tuesday and Thursday from 30th November to take deposits and to book places.

 

 

 

The secrets above your eyeline

Written by Izzy Rose on . Posted in Arts.

It is very rare that anything, especially something internet-based, in its essence a sedentary activity, makes you want to get up and out there from sitting comfortably on your warm bed. Yet Hayley Flynn’s blog entitled ‘Skyliner and Other Tales from a Dilettante’ does just that.

Based in Chorlton, the blog seeks to expose ‘rare’ or even just ‘artistic’ features of the Manchester area that we wouldn’t normally acknowledge. If the leaping up is a slight exaggeration, this screen-based activity worms its way in with its unique angle, until next time you find yourself in Manchester city centre you will look up and you will see there is a plethora of art out there that is so often missed.

This site won Best City and Neighbourhood Blog 2011, and was featured in the BBC Manchester and Creative Tourist’s Top 25 blogs 2011, and quite rightly too. What began as a search for lost and undelivered letters soon developed further; where Hayley found postcards she soon discovered little-glanced-at history, and the ‘Skyliner’ series that now dominates the blog is the cuckooing tangent born from those location-specific secrets.

From two men sitting atop a building near Piccadilly Station, to bird statues on fire escapes in the Northern Quarter, to walkways in the air on Oxford Road, Hayley Flynn confronts us with the Manchester that we miss in the street-level rush of everyday life. She accompanies the striking photographs and images with solid foundations of history and research, introducing us to a whole new side of the city up towards the grey clouds.

Her most recent project takes a look at the shadowy insides of the Hulme Hippodrome, featuring exclusive photography by Andrew Brookes. Other favourites include a description of the elusive ‘Manchester egg’ if ever you’re on Oldham Street.

So, if ever the rain stops long enough for you to lift your head towards the heavens without the threat of being poked in the eye by an umbrella, make sure you have Hayley’s blog as ammunition to get that bird’s eye freshness.
Check it out at hayleyflynn.tumblr.com

11/11/11

Written by Kate Oglesby on . Posted in Arts, Features.

On the 11th November 2011, Platt Chapel was host to ‘In Remembrance’, a Performance Art event commemorating the fallen soldiers from not only both world wars, but also those soldiers who have served more recently in Afghanistan and Iraq. The event was curated and produced by Michael Mayhew, an artist who has been creating provocative and moving work for over twenty years.
Performance Art involves four key elements: time, space, the performer or presence of the performer in some medium, and the relationship between performer and audience. It aims to engage the audience by capturing a particular moment in time and conveying the feelings or ideas of the performer and performance to the spectator.
The eleven hours of performance were heavily documented using writings, drawings, photography and video. This served not only as a memory resource but also for the creation of ‘In Loving Memory’: a sound and visual installation, a wake, a celebration of past events and past lives embodied as performance.
Performances included that from Nicola Canavan, whose performance named ‘When river runs into Sea,’ explored love, ritual, borders, physical limitations and loss. Canavan connected with audiences by using a small space, set out like a room; on the walls, pieces of paper filled with words written in blood and a desk also holding these pieces of paper, and filled with objects including needles and scissors. The artist herself however was the focal point, sat on a chair in the middle, dressed in white, scrubbing blood from a silken cloth. Canavan both captivated and mesmerized audiences with such a thought provoking act.
Other acts included work from Martin O’Brien, Leo Devlin, Lisa Newman, Alistair MacLennan and Charlottle Bean, and Nina Whiteman who gave a performance named ‘My Mother’s Clothes.’ This involved the artist using a number of her mother’s items of clothing to tell the story of the relationship between mother and daughter, using actions yet minimal sound and speech.
This event allowed the work of many artists to come together, in a thought provoking way, to produce performances which created and channeled ideas of memory and loss to the audience. Fitting for not only a day of remembrance, but as a way of reflecting on the beauty and complexity of memory.

Between two discoveries

Written by sarajaspan on . Posted in Arts.

You know Cairo? As in the Cairo – not Egypt’s capital; Cairo as in the historical English-speaking, dusty, mall-lined, super-sized Cairo, Illinois, in the good ole’ U.S. of A.? Cairo as in ‘Kaaay-Row’ (as pronounced with a deep, sleepy, vowel-savouring Southern drawl).

No? Well, neither had Manchester-based artists Jacob Cartwright and Nick Jordan until they stumbled upon it one fateful night many dust-sweats ago, whilst working on another project. Neither had I, until, four years later, I stumbled across the knees crowding my aisle at Cornerhouse at the screening of Between Two Rivers: the feature-length documentary about the forgotten past and present of the city.

Since when does documenting fact interest art? These artists, at least seemed to be interested in presenting as truthful a portrayal as 90 minutes has ever allowed, and one that might even be called ‘artistic’.

Cairo, once upon a tale of two cities, almost became New York (back when New York was plain York). At first, it seems strange that a place once destined to become the heaving, black-clad noise-making metropolis superior of America could so quietly slip into a pool of silence.

Situated at the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, Cairo was initially a centre of industry, transport and trade, attracting a steady flow of wealth into the town. That Cairo is a forgotten place is, in fact, closely related to its turbulent past. Its history is riddled with disasters, some natural, some not so – from floods to extreme racial violence – none of which is forgotten by the film.

Indeed the inhabitants of the sparse, ever-dwindling population that still linger in Cairo fix the camera with looks of sheepish consternation as if they themselves cannot account for the bizarre ghost town or even finding themselves there.

Between Two Rivers is a remarkable attempt to resuscitate Cairo; to unveil its dark past and shed light upon its uncertain present, if only for 90 minutes. This light throws into sharp relief a powerful history, thanks only to the compelling wit, curiosity and insight of its makers. Visually mesmerizing and well put-together, this is a documentary well worth stumbling into.

To watch the trailer, clips and for further information: www.betweentworivers.net

Cooking up an Oscar winner: Ingredients for a Best Picture

Written by Richard Crook on . Posted in Film.

1. First, prepare a quality ensemble. Apart from some notable exceptions like The Lord of the Rings, a standout performance is almost always necessary to winning the Best Picture award. Most Best Picture winners also get nominations in the acting categories. Gladiator (2000) and Silence of the Lambs (1991) were both driven by their lead’s memorable portrayals, while Star Wars: A New Hope (1977) lost out to the more character driven Annie Hall (1977).

2. Stir in plenty of male leads. It’s a shame, but films revolving around women just don’t win Oscars. Chicago (2002) was the last to do it and that was a full nine years after Terms of Endearment broke the curse (1983). Even the impeccable Thelma and Louise didn’t get a sniff.

3. Liberally sprinkle on some sap- it always trumps downbeat films. This dates right back to 1938, when Frank Capra’s You Can’t Take It With You beat the far superior anti-war film La Grande Illusion. Not much has changed, with movies like Titanic, Forest Gump and last year’s A King’s Speech turning the sentimentality levels up to 11 to take home the prize. Horrors, notable for their lack of soppiness, are largely snubbed at the Oscars.

4. Fold in a social/political message. Films like Crash or Million Dollar Baby that take a look at prejudice and controversial issues like euthanasia often go down well. Use sparingly though. Too much ‘edge’ will result in your movie tasting more like a nomination than a winner. See Dr. Strangelove or: How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love the Bomb (1964), Reds (1981) and Brokeback Mountain (2005) – all nominated but lost out to films not nearly as impressive, but also not nearly as controversial.

5. Shape into an ‘epic’. If there is one thing that has gone unchanged throughout the Oscars’ history, it’s that the Academy loves epic movies, particularly biopics. This is attributed to what film columnist Ann Thompson calls the “steak eaters”. These are the Academy voters that come from the different craft guilds- sound, effects, sets etc.- and are primarily older men. They will usually vote for grand spectacles with mostly male casts. Good examples include Ben-Hur (1959), Lawrence of Arabia (1962) and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)

6. Bring to a boil with some realism; sci-fi movies never win it. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) and E.T: The Extra Terrestrial (1982) were both hit by this curse. Gritty and dramatic pieces following unremarkable people thrown into remarkable situations can be key to leaving your mark. Deer Hunter (1978) Titanic (1997) and Slumdog Millionaire (2009) achieve this expertly.

7. Now add a dose of history. This one could clinch it. Whether it’s a biopic like Gandhi (1982) or fictional account like Dances with Wolves (1990) set during a real historical event, the Oscars go nuts for films set in the past. The King’s Speech (2010) defeating the more modern and unconventional A Social Network (2010) last year showed us that the thirst is still alive. Don’t worry about accuracy levels either; just stick on ‘inspired by real events’ at the start and you can exaggerate a King’s stammer as much as you want.

8. Finally, don’t worry about a big serving, long films are not a problem for the Oscars. Indeed, famous winners Gone with the Wind (1939) and Ben-Hur (1959) both exceeded 3 hours. Be careful not to overdo it though, recent winners suggest voters don’t have quite the same appetite for long flicks.

Now, leave to rise and prepare for a September onwards release. Anything released in the first two quarters is more likely to be forgotten by both the viewer and the Academy. And remember, any hint of animation or a foreign language is likely to leave your film untouched at the judge’s tables.