A Johannesburg record company is rereleasing the great alternative local albums of the 1980s — on CD. Shaun de Waal reports THE courageous cottage industry that was Shifty Records in the 1980s produced almost all the seminal “alternative” music of the time — from Bernoldus Niemand to Jennifer Ferguson, Mzwakhe Mbuli to the Gereformeerde Blues […]
Derek Fleming THE National Party is caught up in a power struggle between factions led by Constitutional Development Minister Roelf Meyer and his rival, Environment and Tourism Minister Dawie de Villiers. The two men are gearing up to do battle for political turf and it is expected the contest will come to a head at […]
`Progressive grunge’ band Lithium is injecting some vitality into Cape Town’s ailing music scene. Malu van Leeuwen reports LITHIUM, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, is a “soft silver-white metallic element”. Well, there is a metallic edge to their music, and they are four white boys. But no, Lithium is definitely not soft. In their […]
POP: Bafana Khumalo IN the world of popular music, some creations reach out and grab you by the throat, demanding attention. Some grow on you and stay with you for the rest of your life. Others, sadly, immediately become wallpaper and disappear as soon as they are churned out by the record company. East Meets […]
Mondi Paper is likely to apply for a JSE listing this month — but nobody’s talking, reports Jacques Magliolo Amic-controlled Mondi Paper is to apply to the Johannesburg Stock Exchange for a listing within the next month, reliable industry sources from within the company confirmed this week. Speaking on behalf of Mondi company directors, who […]
Even the experts differ on the nuances of cricket, but explaining the game to the uninitiated is a difficult task CRICKET: Jon Swift IT was, in the light of retrospect, a debate that should neither have been contemplated nor entered into in the first place. Attempting to unravel the mysteries of the game of cricket […]
Drew Forrest THE National Economic Development and Labour Council (Nedlac) must serve as the economic equivalent of the World Trade Centre negotiations, says Nedlac’s newly appointed executive director Jayendra Naidoo. This means mapping out “far-reaching, society-wide agendas, rather than getting bogged down in ad hoc trade-offs and short-term trouble-shooting”. Speaking from Norway, where he is […]
Kader Asmal and Mac Maharaj are being mooted as replacements for ailing Housing Minister Joe Slovo. Drew Forrest reports CANCER-stricken Housing Minister Joe Slovo has taken a turn for the worse, giving sudden urgency to the question of who will replace him in his vital portfolio. Slovo was this week confined to his home in […]
With South African artists now participating in most major international festivals and our own Johannesburg Biennale on the horizon, Ivor Powell asks: how good are we really? DURING the years when South Africans were banned from the big world party, we kept ourselves going on a distinctly unhealthy cultural diet. Its substance was our own […]
The Judicial Service Commission failed to meet the demands of an open society, argues one of its members, law professor Etienne Mureinik. He proposes a set of laws that would help break the culture of secrecy OUR interim constitution affirms the goal of openness in government more strongly than does any other respected constitution. Probably […]