Free City Radio Free City Radio

A joint mix with Kujenga for Radio AlHara

Airing June 4, 2023

01. Zim Ngqawana - Qula Kwedini
02. Busi Mhlongo - We Baba Omncane
03. Bheki Mseleku - Closer To The Source
04. Jimmy Dludlu - Nkateko
05. Thandi Ntuli - Uz'buye
06. Kyle Shepherd - Vang Gou Die Strandloper
07. Benjamin Jephta - Homecoming
08. The Unity Band - Xa Ndiyekela Kuwe
11. Anarchist Mountains - Inside the Signals
12. Kujenga - Abaphantsi

A joint mix with Leah Borromeo for Radio AlHara

Airing June 3, 2023

01. Sun Ra - Nuclear War
02. This Is the Deep - The Best Is Yet To Come
03. Mariya Takeuchi - Plastic Love
04. Otis Redding -(Sittin' On) The Dock Of The Bay
05. Sam Shalabi and Stefan Christoff - Flying Street
06. Sam Shalabi and Stefan Christoff - Elephantine
07. Jan Kees Helms - time is elastic
08. Badiâa Bouhrizi - (إلى سلمى) Ila Selma
09. Ikebe Shakedown - Road Song

Below are the notes from Leah on her selections:

Sun Ra - Nuclear War

"Cos when it comes, your ass gotta go. A New York sister called Savitri reminded me of this song through an Insta dance she did to it. This is basically high school basements, bad weed, half formed political ideologies, hormones and angst flooding back and every second of it is beautiful."

This Is the Deep - The Best Is Yet To Come

"London bands have an unsubtle obsession with 70s roots and beats. This megaband consisting of almost everyone else in a particular scene hits the Harry Nilsson / Randy Newman vibes with a Serge Gainsbourg pipe. When their music isn't lounging in a Laurel Canyon basement, they're laundering themselves through Devo and Womack & Womack. "

Mariya Takeuchi - Plastic Love

"The album this track lives on was released in 1984, the year my mom had a death threat from the Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos. Not long after that, my parents and I left Manila under the premise I would be going to DisneyLand. I don't ever remember liking Mickey Mouse. We left my brother and sisters behind as assurance we'd return. We didn't. Not until we'd claimed asylum and had to re-enter the United States from our country of origin. Which almost never happened because in 1989, the year we went back to do it, my godfather was the Secretary of Defense as troops loyal to Marcos staged a coup attempt against President Corazon Aquino. It was December and we were stranded in Japan, waiting for a flight to Manila. My mom organised a protest, lobbied the heads of Japan Airlines and raised an almighty stink that resulted in a standing room only jumbo jet packed w Filipino families led by military escort to Manila. I remember boarding the back of a military jeep zooming through the Makati streets to our house. I remember the sounds of explosions going off while walking our dogs not far from where we lived and my mom being taken in a Presidential car to Malacanang Palace. I remember missing my siblings so much, I asked for a teddy bear each to stand in for them when we eventually left. And this song - that I couldn't place until an algorithm on YouTube did it for me and everything flooded back."

(Sittin' On) The Dock Of The Bay - Otis Redding

"One of the songs I will probably sing when I am senile. Not only is this bang in my vocal range, this and Tina Turner's "Proud Mary" are my go to karaoke songs. The great Booker T. Jones played on this. It's all from the Detroit / Chicago / Memphis tradition of soul and gospel music that I like to paint my upbringing in Chicago with. But it's also the best soundtrack to a long road trip I took w my mom on Amtrak trains and Greyhound buses across the lower 48 from September 84 to Feb/March 85 when we finally settled in Chicago and found a sponsor for our asylum claim. My mom always found a way to do exactly as she wished as long as it pertained to securing my future, be it hard or easy. And she gave up a lot for me. The fact I write this in relative comfort and privilege is a testament to her sacrifice."

On Free City Radio this week a conversation with Mary N. Taylor & Noah Brehmer who edited the book "Commonist Horizon- Urban Futures Beyond Capitalist Urbanization," which was recently published by Common Notions, info here:

https://www.commonnotions.org/commonist-horizon

The book is described this way:

"How do we move from defensive tactics that respond to the latest stages of capitalist urbanization, to transformative, strategic revolts, attacking the root causes and putting into practice alternative forms of urban life? One proposal for such a revolutionary alternative to capital’s organization of our lived environment has been the commons, wherein inhabitants communally control the multi-faceted conditions that make up their daily reproduction.

As a district behind the train station in the post-socialist city of Vilnius, Lithuania faces gentrification, an autonomous community center there has sought to use commoning to resist. Taken up in the former state-socialist Eastern Bloc, commoning practices are embraced as a method for criticising the vicious wave of enclosures that began after the fall of state-socialism while at the same time not relying on the heavily stigmatized politics of state-socialism.

Emerging from a process of thinking together, The Commonist Horizon features five interventions by movement thinkers. Beginning in the post-Soviet city of Vilnius, the dialogical process stretches outward to two other formerly state-socialist countries, and then beyond. Speaking from their experiences in social movement formations, the authors take up the lived experience of building what might be called urban commons, offering insights on the conceptual and political potentials and limitations of this terminology and associated practices."

Music on this edition by Secret Pyramid

Free City Radio is hosted and produced by Stefan @spirodon Christoff and airs on @radiockut 90.3FM at 11am on Wednesdays and @cjlo1690 AM in Tiohti:áke/Montréal on Tuesdays at 1pm on @ckuwradio 95.9FM in Winnipeg at 8am on Tuesdays, on @cfrc 101.9FM in Kingston, Ontario at 11:30am on Wednesdays and broadcasting on @cfuv 101.9 FM in Victoria, BC on Wednesdays at 9am. Also Free City Radio is a podcast through both Spotify and Apple Podcasts, please encourage a friend to tune-in !

On this monthly artist interview we hear from William Parker in NYC. William speaks about the capacity for music to transform and the ways that the listening involved in improvised / trace music can create possibilities for healing.

Information on William Parker
http://www.williamparker.net/ceremony

Stefan contributes artist interviews to @radioalhara in Palestine. Accompanying image is of musician William Parker

This is a mix created to share via Justseeds artists' cooperative. This mix features mostly local Montreal artists, particularly musicians, who have been involved in the intersections of social movements and the arts. I have selected a series of live recordings from local concerts where these connections were explored. You will particularly hear recordings from local shows supported by CKUT 90.3FM campus / community radio that were part of the Artists Against Apartheid series, which launched around the time that the global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement to support Palestinian human rights was announced internationally.

Also there are many artists in this mix who have been deeply involved in migrant justice movements, particularly around community organizations like the Immigrant Workers Centre and campaigns emerging from networks like Solidarity Across Borders. I share this mix as a longtime friend and collaborator with many artists within the Justseeds network, thank you for listening. – Stefan Christoff

Track listing
(artist name / track name)

01. Sarah Pagé - Noonday Bells
02. Narcy - Tourist feat. Ian Kamau
03. Amir Amiri & Becky Wenham - . Ardavan étude
04. Vox Sambou - live at Artists Against Apartheid
05. Jason Blackbird Selman & DJ Andy Williams - Africa
06. Kaie Kellough & DJ Andy Williams - Crick Crack
07. Weshida - 11/8 Balkan
08. Lhasa de Sela + Esmerine - A Fish On Land
09. Esmerine - Sprouts
10. Stella Adjokê - Plaisir Papillon (excerpt)
11. Tiken Jah Fakoly - Plus Rien Ne M'Etonne
12. Vox Sambou - Toya

A broadcast of voices from the Iranian diaspora in Montreal recorded within the context of efforts to create a 1 hour international sound art, poetry and music broadcast to support the protests in Iran in 2023. The global initiative is called Voices Across Borders, you can listen here:

https://soundcloud.com/freecityradio/voices-across-borders

For this broadcast, created to air on CJLO 1690 AM in Montreal we hear voices that were recorded locally in Montreal within the context of the global broadcast highlighted above. For these interviews you can hear the full audio and we hear from Leila Ghaffari, Amir Naimi and Mohammad Abdolrezazadeh.

Music on this edition is by Anarchist Mountains from the album Fire Waves out on Oxtail Recordings, full info:

https://oxtailrecordings.bandcamp.com/album/fire-waves