Black Reign International Sound, a group of expat DJs, is offering a fresh start to the Lunar New Year with Firerama 2010, an all-night dancehall party that takes place tomorrow at The Wall (這牆) in Taipei.
Firerama is now in its second year, and for Black Reign founding members Thierry Cuvillier, aka Taili, and Oliver Hartley, aka Lion, the event presents a chance to remind revelers and teach newcomers about the importance of fire as an element in reggae.
“Fire is a symbol in the dancehall. Whenever we do a show, fire’s in there somewhere,” said Lion, a Jamaica native who explained that fire represents cleansing and purification in Rastafarian culture and reggae music. In Jamaican dancehalls, people often hold up cigarette lighters or ignite flames from aerosol cans to signal their approval of a song or performance, he said.
Black Reign hopes this tradition will catch on at Firerama. They are inviting people to bring “lighters, matches and flamethrowers,” although the latter would probably best be left to professionals. To get people in the mood, the party features a show by the Orange Fire Dance Group of Taiwan (橘舞火舞團), who perform poi, a Polynesian art that combines music, dance and swinging objects that are lit on fire.
Fire won’t be the only thing that rejuvenates the spirit at the party, said Lion. “Playing music cleanses your body, you know? You play good music, you have a good dance, you enjoy yourself, you wake up in the morning and you feel like, OK, I can go again.”
Also appearing tomorrow are DJs Japan Taro and Yahman from Tokyo, both long-time participants in Japan’s lively reggae scene. The two have been making repeat visits to Taiwan in recent years for parties run by Islandjam, the name that Taili and Lion use for promoting their events.
The two are anxious to see Taiwan’s reggae scene grow, especially after a recent visit to Japan, where Black Reign did a weeklong run of shows. “There’s a reggae bar in every small town,” Lion noted.
Considering the parties Islandjam has held over the past several years, Taili and Lion have already established a firm footing for their goal. They now have an annual event for every season: a live band showcase in the spring, Reggae Beachfest in the summer and Caribbean Carnival in the fall.
With tomorrow’s edition of Firerama, Black Reign aims to show what it does best, said Taili. “The feeling of the party is the special thing we bring to it,” he said. “It’s not just we are just mixing ... we [create] the feeling, to make people crazy on the dance floor.”
June 2 to June 8 Taiwan’s woodcutters believe that if they see even one speck of red in their cooked rice, no matter how small, an accident is going to happen. Peng Chin-tian (彭錦田) swears that this has proven to be true at every stop during his decades-long career in the logging industry. Along with mining, timber harvesting was once considered the most dangerous profession in Taiwan. Not only were mishaps common during all stages of processing, it was difficult to transport the injured to get medical treatment. Many died during the arduous journey. Peng recounts some of his accidents in
A short walk beneath the dense Amazon canopy, the forest abruptly opens up. Fallen logs are rotting, the trees grow sparser and the temperature rises in places sunlight hits the ground. This is what 24 years of severe drought looks like in the world’s largest rainforest. But this patch of degraded forest, about the size of a soccer field, is a scientific experiment. Launched in 2000 by Brazilian and British scientists, Esecaflor — short for “Forest Drought Study Project” in Portuguese — set out to simulate a future in which the changing climate could deplete the Amazon of rainfall. It is
What does the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) in the Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌) era stand for? What sets it apart from their allies, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT)? With some shifts in tone and emphasis, the KMT’s stances have not changed significantly since the late 2000s and the era of former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九). The Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) current platform formed in the mid-2010s under the guidance of Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), and current President William Lai (賴清德) campaigned on continuity. Though their ideological stances may be a bit stale, they have the advantage of being broadly understood by the voters.
“Why does Taiwan identity decline?”a group of researchers lead by University of Nevada political scientist Austin Wang (王宏恩) asked in a recent paper. After all, it is not difficult to explain the rise in Taiwanese identity after the early 1990s. But no model predicted its decline during the 2016-2018 period, they say. After testing various alternative explanations, Wang et al argue that the fall-off in Taiwanese identity during that period is related to voter hedging based on the performance of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). Since the DPP is perceived as the guardian of Taiwan identity, when it performs well,
RSS