Entering the home studio that Yassin Kassem and Mohammed Turek of the rap duo Invincible Voice (I-Voice) have built in the Palestinian Refugee Camp of Bourj el Barajneh gives do-it-yourself (DIY) a whole new meaning. A small bedroom - which on this day was subject to enduring electricity outages - is converted into a base for mixing, producing, songwriting and entertaining the journalists that have started to take an increasing interest in these boys’ story. We enter the dark studio, leaving the door open to let the outside daylight in. Grey sponge sounds-proofs the walls of the ground-floor converted bedroom, and Tupac paraphernalia decorates them. This is one of the first “production houses” inside the camps of Lebanon, and is playing a big role in spreading the rap bug in refugee camps across the country.

A week after the too-big, and controversy-laden Toronto International Film Festival has officially packed its bags (until next year), Toronto can start making room for the takeover of the 2nd Annual Toronto Palestine Film Festival …

“Exotic locales” in “far and dangerous places” are not new muses for musicians from the West. Although most of my own iTunes playlists consist of music and musicians from around the world - fitting into the too broad “world music” category - I am always wary of such collaborations and how they represent the muse/country in question, and of how these musical encounters can turn into self-indulgent congratulatory efforts for the recording artist. A new collaboration comes from Swedish songstress Victoria Bergsman, lead singer of The Concretes and famous for lending her soft, feminine voice to indie darlings Peter Bjorn and John. For her latest project, Bergsman travels to Pakistan with producer/guitarist/engineer Andreas Soderstrom to record her solo album “East of Eden”.

LAL, Toronto’s politically charged, electronically driven :: On Tour in Canada this Summer
From July 30th to August 21st

Check out a date near you.

We will regularly be presenting a featured artist, writer or performer who is exploring questions of identity and personal narrative through their medium of expression.

The map is your representation. No rigid lines, no defined routes. You direct it on your own account.

The Sartorialist visits Toronto. Worldtown visits your sites.

People have taken the broadly appealing idea of capturing everyday style and put their own spin on it with some success too.
Some unique, some conventional.

We trawl the news media so you don’t have to.

Inside Indie: Digging Roots :: Rabble TV

Memory is a volatile object that can re-emerge no matter how much superficial tendencies wish to filter. Every now and then, Beirut’s cultural scene sees a few projects pushing memory to the centre through installations, movie screenings and exhibitions. Luckily, the emergence of public art spaces and curators looking to search for memory is helping this work build and progress. The Beirut Art Centre and The Hangar - UMAM are two sites that are making the discourse viable.

Michael Jackson seemed crushed under a weight of identity: black/man/star/brother/father/son. Add philanthropist/media-victim and -manipulator/accused pederast/primate owner/fashionista and dancer. Owner of, and now perhaps a returnee to, Neverland.

We have been on the frontlines covering as much ground as possible, taking in the style, sound, and politics of a fest like this.

Look out for our NXNE 2009 Round Up once we have a moment at the end of the weekend.

Share your NXNE 2009 stories, picks, photos, critiques and commentary to, info (at) thisisworldtown.com