St James Town at Night
***your phone will crush and distort these pictures. If you can, try to see this on a bigger screen like a laptop***
A Very Short History of St James Town
St James Town was once a working-class Victorian neighbourhood, housing the poorest of Toronto residents in ratty decaying homes. In the 50s and 60s, city planners and developers decided to rezone and bulldoze most of the neighbourhood. Over the next decade or so, they built nineteen highrise buildings including 4 city owned public housing towers. At the time, developers assumed that fresh young middle-class office workers would quickly move in. Instead, that demographic chose to move to the suburbs of North York and Scarborough and the neighbourhood filled up again with Toronto’s lowest income families. Over the last couple of decades, the demographics have shifted more towards new immigrants to Canada and St James Town remains one of the last affordable neighbourhoods in the downtown area.
For a more detailed account of St James Town history and development have a look at this excellent article at Blog TO.
Bad Reputation?
In the late 90’s, when I first moved to Toronto, St James Town had been in steady decline for 30 years. The buildings were crumbling, the public spaces were trampled and neglected and the residents were some of the poorest in the downtown area.
One day, shortly after moving to this city, I went to visit a friend downtown and missed my subway stop. As a result, I accidentally came above ground at the tiny run-down Glen Road exit of the Sherbourne subway station. Glen Road consists of a single block of some of the last surviving Victorian homes in the area but, at the time, the houses were all boarded up and abandoned. It was like coming up into a ghost town of haunted houses. I was so surprised that I took a bunch of film photos but, unfortunately, I can’t seem to find them now. If you want to see some images from this time, this site has some good ones.
A little later I met my friend and told him about getting lost in St James Town. His advice was to stay away from the neighbourhood, even during the daytime. Apparently the area had a bad reputation for drugs, gangs, violence, prostitution. I had no idea if this was true or not but I took his advice and never came back. Not until over 20 years later when I ended up renting an apartment on this very street.
St James Town Today
With 19 highrise towers in a relatively small area, St James Town is the most densely populated neighbourhood in Canada . The “official” population of St James Town today is around 17 000 although it is probably much higher. It is still home to many low income families and is a popular landing place for new immigrants.
Sometime around 2000, the city decided to put some resources towards improving the crumbling neighbourhood. This included plans to clean up and repair the old highrises and renew the parks, playgrounds and public spaces. This is ongoing today.
Eventually, developers started to sniff around one of the last downtown neighbourhoods that had so far escaped gentrification. Condo speculators bought up and fenced off many of the old neglected houses and plots of land. They also gutted and renovated the row of abandoned houses on Glen Road in return for the city’s approval of their development plans. They squeezed in a few new glass and steel towers and tucked little townhouses into the shadows of the old highrises. Since I moved in, no less than 5 new condo buildings have gone up within a 1 minute walk. And many more are on the way.
Living in St James Town
I think that St James Town still has something of a bad reputation today. Reading online, I often see postings where people are nervously asking about safety and crime rates before moving in to the area. And still others (who probably don’t even live here) advise them to be very careful, especially at night.
I have lived here for years and have not had a single incident that would make me feel unsafe. Police, ambulances and fire trucks are a pretty regular sight. But, when you have over 17 000 people living on a few city blocks, this doesn’t seem unusual.
I like that this neighbourhood always has people moving around in it. You are rarely by yourself outside. To me, this feels safe. I used to work at a restaurant directly south of St James Town in Old Toronto. The walk home from there at night felt so unsafe to me during the covid closures that I would carry a police baton with me at all times. Walking on high alert, I wouldn’t feel relaxed until I found myself among the busy highrises of St James Town again.
Maybe the Best Neighbourhood Downtown…
I love living in this neighbourhood . Everything is in walking distance: dentist, doctor, supermarket, subway, Koreatown, Chinatown, Little India, beautiful natural spaces, museums, universities, galleries, live music venues, great restaurants, a fully operating farm, some of the country’s best hospitals…the list goes on. I think this must be one of the most connected neighbourhoods in the city. I haven’t had a car in many years and I never miss it.
The interior of St James Town itself reminds me of the highrise neighbourhood I grew up in when my parents first immigrated to Canada. People are always outside. The parks and public spaces are full even at night. Extended families get together and pass time in the shade of old trees. People who have immigrated from the same place and share language and culture find each other here, in the building hallways and the outdoor playgrounds. They naturally build communities around their shared experiences. If you walk around St James Town, English might be one of the last languages you hear. Tagalog, Hindi, Cantonese, Mandarin, Korean, Tamil, Russian, Bengali….these are much more common.
St James Town is one of the last places where low income Canadians as well as newly landed immigrants can afford to live connected to the downtown core. And because so many of the residents share a common experience, St James Town has a the feeling of a vibrant community. People know their neighbours and I believe that people look out for each other. The neighbourhood has a strong feeling of family. All kinds of family.
Night Walks Through St James Town
Some would say that the clump of old highrises is ugly but I see real beauty in them…in their multicoloured brick exteriors, angular balconies, weird glowing stairwells, old mature trees and especially in the people who call this neighbourhood home. Hopefully some of that will come through in these photos but, if not, take a walk through here on a nice summer night and you may be surprised by how much you enjoy it.
Convenience Stores
There is a small commercial strip on Howard street with a couple of Filipino restaurants, a fried chicken place, a small pharmacy, an Ethiopian grocery and a Halal butcher. These convenience stores are part of this strip:
I used to buy cigarettes here. The wife’s mom (the 7 year old’s grandma) worked there at the time and I would visit her everyday on my way to work and buy a pack of smokes. She would cheerfully sell them to me while telling me that they were bad for my health and that I should stop. One day, I quit smoking and so, I didn’t go in for a few weeks. When I finally stopped in to buy an ice cream, she asked where I had been. I told her that I quit smoking and so I didn’t need to stop by so often. I couldn’t believe how happy she was to hear that. It was as if I was her own son!
Winter in St James Town
These are a few pictures of a snowy night walk through St James Town last winter. It really is a pretty place.
The Future of St James Town
There is a tremendous amount of demolition and building going on around here. I think the original towers are safe in their big bulky numbers. Hopefully they will continue to see improvements and provide a home for people who can’t afford to move anywhere else.
As for the surviving victorian houses…I am not so sure. Just last year I found out that Concert Realty bought up the whole west side of Glen Road. This is the same developer that is building the 54 story building outside my bedroom window. This means that right now they own a continuous parcel of land that is more than enough to build a second condo tower. They have not submitted plans to the city yet but I think it is only a matter of time. Lately there has been some pull back on new condos so hopefully Glen Road will survive for a few more years…let’s see what happens.
There is so much more…
These pictures just show a little of this neighbourhood. In recent years, the city has put up a brand new community centre complete with sunlit indoor pool, library, indoor basketball courts and community services.
The Rose Avenue Public School right at the centre of St James Town is one of the last original buildings in the area. This brick building with massive old windows was built in 1924 and still operates as a busy public school and day care, surrounded by old trees and brick walkways.
St James Town represents a massive and miscalculated experiment in early city redevelopment. Originally seen as a failure and struggling for decades, I think it has grown into a unique and vital part of the Toronto downtown.
If you have any questions or comments, please leave them below. I am always happy to hear from you.
Thanks for reading! : )
Applying for a Date
Beyond the first definition
If you ask a native English speaker the meaning of a word in English, you may get a few different answers. Take the word “date” for example. What does this word mean? One person will say that it is the number of a particular day in the calendar, as in July 15th is todays “date”. Someone else might say that a “date” is a social appointment where you meet up with someone to do a specific activity…like go to a movie. Another person might say that a date is a sweet fruit with a pit in the middle…as in “date” squares. A single word can have several different meanings. The same is true in other languages.
I have been learning Korean for several years and a lot of my vocabulary consists of words for which I know only one basic meaning. I think this is normal in language learning. More exposure to the language over time will show these words in unfamiliar contexts. Then, you look them up and discover new meanings. This is progress.
Shin-cheong (신청하다) means “to apply” for something
***I don’t think romanizing Korean words is very useful but I’ll do it here so you can recognize the word in this post and get an idea of what it might sound like.
I learned the word shin-cheong/신청하다 many years ago. It was in a vocabulary list that gave a single definition: “to apply for something”. For example… to apply for a job or a passport or a credit card. Ok…I got it. “Shin-cheong/신청하다” means “to apply for”. I remembered this word.
What else could it mean?
While studying recently, I listened to a conversation in Korean online where a man asked a female coworker to go out for a drink after work. She was surprised so she questioned him in Korean: “What? Are you asking me on a date??”
Now…in this situation, she used the word “shin-cheong/신청” in place of the english verb “asking”. “데이트 신청을 해요?” is what she said in Korean (don’t worry if you can’t read this).
So..with my limited understanding of the word “shin-cheong/신청”, the translation in my mind sounded like this: “Are you applying for a date with me?”
This made me laugh and I knew that I was misunderstanding something. Of course, I looked it up and found that “shin-cheong/신청” also means “to make a request/ask for something”. This meaning is commonly used in dating to “request” that the person go out with you. In others words “ask them out”.
Why not “apply” for a date though?
Then I started to think that maybe applying for a date was not a bad idea. It has to be better than embarrassing dating apps and online algorithm match-ups.
I imagined it like this:
If you see someone you want to date, you would simply submit an application to them, like applying for a job. Dating is work, isn’t it? The application could give your name, birthdate, contact information, hobbies, life goals, core values, expectations etc.. A good application could even include references from people you have dated in the past who will confirm that, although it didn’t work out, you don’t seem crazy or dangerous. A good cover letter stating why you are interested in dating the person could increase your chances of getting a callback.
So, in this imaginary world, it would be perfectly normal to walk up to someone you find attractive and hand them an application. The social convention would require that the person accept the application without judgement or emotion. Maybe there would be just a few polite questions or a little small talk. The whole exchange should take no more than a minute. Later the person can choose the most promising candidate and set up an interview (Isn’t a first date really an interview?)
How is this better than online dating?
First impressions or “gut reactions” are a kind of animal instinct we all have. I think these impressions are pretty reliable and accurate. If someone meets you face to face and hands you an application…simply by meeting them physically, you are learning things about them on a subconscious level. Important information is being exchanged, even in those few seconds. This is where online dating sites and dating apps fail.
Sure, you can flip-and-find someone online who has a cute picture and sounds amazing in their self-promotional blurb and set up a date with them. Then you probably find out that they are not at all what you expected. This is such a waste of time. Wouldn’t it be better to have a quick meeting first and then get the details to consider afterwards? Maybe get a few applications to compare..call a few references?
In the world outside my imagination…
I suppose this would probably never work..no room for advertising. It was just a cute and funny idea that popped into my head when I failed to translate accurately.
“Are you applying for a date with me?”
“Why, yes..thank you for your consideration. I look forward to hearing from you. Sincerely (your name here)”
I guess online dating apps are the new normal and they are here to stay. We have been trained over the years to filter all of life’s events through our devices. I suppose it works sometimes. But, I still believe that the best way to meet someone is to meet them, face to face, out in the world. And listen to your instincts.
If you have any questions or comments or if you would like to submit an application, please use the form below.
Losing Focus: Finding Interest in Blurry Photos
***If you are looking at this on your phone you probably won’t see the blur in these photos. Your phone will crush the images to the point where they will probably look in focus. Of all the posts so far, this one needs to be seen on a bigger screen to make sense…
***photographers: this article is not about using diffusion filters to soften focus.
Finding something interesting in “mistakes”
Over the years, I have taken thousands of pictures. Sometimes they turn out great. Often times they don’t. Sometimes the image I was seeing in my mind didn’t translate well with the camera or, other times, the photos are technically flawed. My camera is older and the auto-focus system is not perfect. It struggles with difficult light and reflections, especially at night. So, I tend to get a few photos that are out of focus from time to time. These blurry pictures are impossible to fix and I always delete them first, without any thought, to save space on my computer.
Lately, I have found a few of these pictures that escaped getting deleted. While they are not what I intended, some of them are still kind of interesting. Unfortunately, only a few of these “mistakes” have survived. So, I decided to go out and try to take some out of focus pictures on purpose and see if I could come up with some good shots.
This project turned out to be much more difficult than I thought. My idea was to just go out, find an interesting scene, manually de-focus the camera and shoot away. I shot hundreds of photos and the majority looked terrible…not interesting…just BAD pictures.
But, over a couple of weeks, I managed to figure out which images are more likely to make a good blurred photo. Here are the ones that I think turned out pretty well.
Shooting through moving water
Manually de-focussed still life shots around my apartment
These photos have a dreamy quality about them: you know what they are but all the details are missing. Like…you know there was a person in your dream…you know what you said, you know what you did…but you can’t see their face no matter how hard you try to remember….these pictures have that kind of feeling for me.
Out in the city at night
I thought night shooting might be a little easier but it was just as difficult to get an interesting shot. Here are a few that I did like. In the city at night, there is a lot of hard contrast in the lighting which I found helps to give some structure to de-focussed pictures.
Time Travel
Photos that look like paintings
Scenes with strong texture and clear structure can make good unfocussed images. Because of the large grain and the soft transition between colours, these ones look like oil paintings to me.
Ghosts…
Images with people in them turned out to be some of the most interesting ones. They all look like dream scenes to me. They are clearly people but their limbs are distorted and their faces are obscured. This is how I tend to remember characters from dreams. I don’t think I have ever seen a ghost but, if I did, I imagine that this is what they would look like.
What’s next…?
This was a difficult project and I am kind of glad that I can get back to taking “normal” pictures again. I am really happy with these few good shots that I did come up with. I hope you like them too. Working on a project about shadows…
As always, you are welcome to leave questions or comments below. I am always happy to hear from you. Knowing you have been here motivates me to keep at it. Thanks for looking!
Tiara Girls in Shibuya Scramble
Smartphones and Social Media: Today’s Popular Photography
These days, everyone everywhere has a camera in their pocket. Smartphone cameras have filters, AI and editing tools that give everyone the ability to take a decent photograph. Publishing photos has also become effortless. Anyone can post their images publicly on social media platforms like Instagram, and image posts get feedback through “likes” and “comments”. This is satisfying and motivating. It is a fun way to share your images with a huge audience.
Social media gives people the motivation to take photographs and smartphone technology makes it easy. The result is that millions of personal documentary style photos are being published everyday. Photo based apps have become a worldwide tool for communication and self expression. But while casual social media snaps are by far the most common type of photography, there are still other types of photographs to consider: images that are able to draw and hold your attention, freezing unique and surprising moments in time. There is a kind of magic in them. They are rare and difficult to capture.
Because these types of photos are so elusive, netting them requires some planning and skill but mostly persistence and luck. Of the thousands of pictures I took on a recent trip to Japan and Korea, I managed to capture only one such image.
The 1/250th of a second miracle
1/250th of a second…that’s how much time is captured here. We are in a huge crowd of people swarming through Shibuya Scramble Crossing in Tokyo. I am quickly walking forward taking pictures from waist level without looking through my camera. The girls are walking quickly towards me headed in the opposite direction. For this fraction of a second, we are facing each other. We are less than 2 metres apart and my finger happens to push the camera shutter. We pass each other and the moment is gone. Forever. One fraction of a second before or after and it would not exist. It is pure luck.
The intimate angle, the fact that the image is in focus and exposed so well and the emotion on display coming together in this tiny moment is almost a miracle. To put it into context, I tried the same technique in the same crosswalk for over two hours and took over 400 pictures. Out of 400 shots, maybe 6 or 7 were usable. Of those few, this was the only one that stood out as something truly special. It made the whole process worthwhile and went beyond all my expectations. It is one of my favourite pictures that I have ever taken.
What sets this image apart?
Emotion.
Photographs that express strong emotion are the ones that draw me in . And, the most captivating images are candid photos, where the emotion is pure and unaffected, where the subject has no sense that they are being photographed.
Tiara Girls in Shibuya Scramble glows with the energy of youth: freedom, rebellion, optimism are all on display. School uniform collars are unbuttoned and ties are pulled loose. Determined eyes are gazing directly and fearlessly into the future.
The princess tiaras, the body language and the smiles on their faces hint at the kind of friendship that can only bloom when you are young and free and open hearted. It makes me think of this short story passage:
“The most important people turned up surprisingly early in life. After a certain point, she found it difficult to turn even the first page of relationships that her younger self would’ve entered with relative ease. People locked their hearts at some point in their lives, as if everyone had agreed to do so. Then they made acquaintances outside those locks, with people who would never hurt them or be hurt by them”. Choi Eunyoung “Sister, My Little Soonae”
Some of our closest and most impactful friendships are forged when we are very young: before we have had our hearts bruised enough times to start hiding them away from others. This photograph captures that time.
Candid photography and telephoto lenses (spy photography)
Are there easier ways to get this kind of picture? Why not just sit up on a staircase above the crossing with a long lens and fire away..like taking bird pictures? The answer is that if you are not down in the crowd using a lens that is close to human vision perspective, you will not capture the kind of emotion that you see here. It just won’t work. The photos will look like spy camera photos, flat and lifeless. Kind of like when they show snaps of cop surveillance photos on tv shows. You need to be inside the image. When you are photographing from a distance, the photo will feel distant.
Check out my original post about Shibuya Scramble Crossing if want to see a few more pictures from this day.
If you have any questions or comments, please leave them below. Knowing you have been here gives me the motivation to keep it up. Thanks always for stopping by : )
Midori: Experiments in Green
Please try to look at this post on a laptop instead of your phone. It will look much better.
The World of Wong Kar Wai
I recently found a big picture and essay book about Wong Kar Wai on my bookshelf. I must have bought it years ago and, because I was so busy, never got around to reading it. These days, I have been sitting on the floor every morning and reading it cover to cover as I drink my coffee. The book inspired me to see his films again and I have been watching them one by one in chronological order.
One of the things I love about Wong Kar Wai and his cinematographer Christopher Doyle is the way they use strong colour casts to emphasize mood or setting or time. Often it is a prominent green, especially noticeable in Days of Being Wild, Fallen Angels and even In the Mood For Love. The photography in these films is so striking that on the first viewing, I end up misunderstanding the story because I am so focussed on the images alone. I have always loved these green steeped scenes the most.
Here is a famous example from the end of Fallen Angels:
My Fujifilm X100T
This 10 year old camera is the only digital camera I have ever owned. By today’s standards, it is pretty old technology but I still love it. I have always been able to capture any picture in my imagination with this little machine. If you are interested, I describe it in a more detail at this link.
A few days ago, I decided to try to take some green toned pictures. I wanted to see if I could make some images that come close to the ones I love in the Wong Kar Wai films. I did this by manipulating the white balance of the camera and pushing it hard to the green side. How to do this is not really that interesting so I won’t go into it here but, if you want to know more about it, there are lots of good articles on the subject. Usually, you manipulate the white balance to keep your colours more natural under different kinds of light (like sunlight vs LED lightbulbs indoors). I did the opposite, manipulating white balance to get unnatural colour tones.
Here are a few of the pictures I like the best
I just took pictures of regular things..no extra effort to make cinematic compositions this time…
On my way home to write this post today, I was thinking..
Ever since I was little, if you asked me what my favourite colour is, I would say “green”. Always. The green of the sea, the green of the forest, the green of kelp and algae, the green of moss. Always green.
As I was walking home and thinking about writing this, I was listening to Luminescent Creatures, Ichiko Aoba’s new record. I only know a few words in Japanese but, every now and then, a word will pop out and stay with me… most often just because I like the sound. On the last track, which is so beautiful that I listened to it twice today, the word was “midori” 緑. When I got home and looked it up, it turns out to be the Japanese for word for “green”.
When I rolled that word around in my mind a little further, I realized that I had heard it before. In the movie Norwegian Wood (adapted from Haruki Murakami’s novel of the same name), lead character Toru Watanabe’s true love interest is named Midori. This film, directed by Tran Anh Hung, is full of vibrant green…just like his other famous film, The Scent of Green Papaya. And the cinematographer for Norwegian Wood was Mark Lee Ping-Bing who also worked on Wong Kar Wai’s In the Mood for Love. So many connections…
Green, my favourite colour. Green, the colour of summer. Midori…something beautiful. Green has been in my heart for the last few weeks. Maybe because it is mid summer after a rainy spring and the whole city is flooded with shades of green. Hope you enjoyed the pictures. I really like them. I will keep working on it.
If you have any comments or questions, please leave them below. I am always happy to hear from you : )
Billy Carter Red: 10 year anniversary
UK 2018
In the spring of 2018, I travelled to Brighton UK to attend the Great Escape music festival. I had come to see Say Sue Me, one of my favourite new discoveries as well as 3rd Line Butterfly, legends from the early Korean indie scene. These two bands along with Adoy and Billy Carter were scheduled to play at a Korean Music Spotlight event. I had never heard of Adoy or Billy Carter so, in the weeks leading up to the festival, I did some reading online and listened to a bit of music from both bands.
Adoy had a laid back, smooth R&B sound that I just couldn’t connect with. And, I wasn’t sure about Billy Carter who were often described as a “blues band”. Usually, when I hear “blues band” I immediately get suspicious and think that I am not going like it. I do like old lo-fi blues but most modern takes on the genre are not interesting for me. I wondered what kind of blues would come out of Seoul?
As I would soon find out, describing Billy Carter as a “blues band” left a lot of elements out of the equation. Yes, they had solid roots in blues but they were so much more than that. The Billy Carter lineup at the time was Jiwon Kim on vocals and keys, Jina Kim on guitar and vocals and HyunJoon Lee on drums.
The Windmill Brixton
The first time I saw Billy Carter, they were opening for Say Sue Me at The Windmill Brixton in London UK. I didn’t have time to listen to their records much beforehand so I was hearing most of their songs for the first time. But even after just one show, I knew that I was interested in seeing more of Billy Carter. After their set, I met Jina and Jiwon while i was buying a t-shirt at the merch table. I remember getting the impression that they were not interested in talking to me. I think we were a little suspicious of each other : ) It makes me laugh now when I think about it!
The Great Escape Festival 2018
The day after the Windmill gig, I got to see Billy Carter play at a little club called Volks as part of the Great Escape Festival. This club was off the main drag near the beach. When I got arrived, there were probably less than 30 people in the place, almost all men. Even before the band got on stage I felt a bit nervous for them….”Why aren’t there more people here? Why isn’t it darker in here? Why is it all old men?” When I go to shows, I almost never worry about the band being shitty. I often worry about the audience or the venue being shitty instead. This was what I was feeling here…
The band set up, had a quick sound check and then launched right in. From that point on, I don’t think that I blinked the whole time. The musicianship was incredible, the singing powerful. The band played in front of 30 people as if they were headlining a stadium. I was really floored. For most of the songs, there was only drums (by the excellent Hyun Joon Lee) and Jina’s guitar. Jiwon added keys and melodica here and there. But the sound, especially from the guitar, was massive! I couldn’t understand how these three people could make so much great noise together. And the physicality of the band….they never stopped moving, jumping, dancing…
As the band was packing up, I went out for some fresh air and wondered how I could describe the show I that I had just seen. For some reason, the word that came to mind was “demonic”. When I was watching these musicians on stage, they looked like they were possessed. Not in some affected theatrical way. Instead, they seemed to truly love and believe in the music they were making. They were possessed by their own art. It was contagious. I felt it too.
While I was outside for a smoke, I happened to see Jina and Jiwon come out of the club and light up. Now, I am not exactly a shy person but, after seeing what I just saw, I have to admit that I was a little bit afraid of these two! Eventually curiosity overcame fear and I walked over to say hi. We had a cigarette together and ended up having a really nice talk about everything from music to human rights in Korea vs Canada (my home). I remember Jina saying how much she would love to live in a place like Canada and feeling pretty proud about that.
I was able to catch Billy Carter one last time that weekend. This show was an official Korean Music Showcase full of industry people. The lineup included 3rd Line Butterfly, Billy Carter and Say Sue Me. It was an epic show for me, one I will never forget. I was thrilled to see these bands together in such a small space. At the end, I did a little tour around to say farewell to everyone I had met over the weekend. Just before I left, Jiwon (who I was mildly afraid of the day before) ran over and gave me a huge hug. So much for being scary haha..
The Great Escape 2018 was a pivotal event in my life. It reignited my love for live music and introduced me to artists that I might otherwise never get the chance to see. Billy Carter was a big part of that experience and I have been keeping up with them and their new projects as they continue to evolve as artists and activists. They will always occupy a warm place in my heart.
Billy Carter at Great Escape Festival Brighton UK 2018
Happy Anniversary!
The Red EP 10th Anniversary
The first Billy Carter EP was released 10 years ago this summer. This 5 track introduction to the band is probably the grittiest sounding of all their releases. It is one of my personal favourites and, I think, one of the most important Korean indie rock records of all time. Today, I still listen to it with the same joy as I did the first time I heard it many years ago.
The title track “Silent/침묵, starts with a simple drum beat that soon gets swarmed with dirty fuzzy guitar noise. This gives way to a sticky and aggressive guitar riff that is a signature of Jina Kim’s sound in the studio as well as in live performances. Jiwon Kim’s soulful vocals power through it all and add to the high voltage blues assault. After a couple of choruses, the song itself suddenly goes silent. A ripping single note fuzz attack opens it back up over rising drum beats and wailing vocals that carry the song to the end. It sounds like a demonic chant. The lyrics are an indictment (in Korean language) of the tendency towards silence in the face of sadness and injustice. You can hear the blues influences in this song. But, the punk rock (bordering on metal) noise and riffing takes it to the very hard and ragged edge of anything I would think of as a blues.
Lost my Way, the second track, is definitely rooted in 12 bar blues. Jina’s guitar line defines the pace of the song as much as the drums. This is real rhythm guitar playing, keeping pace with, mirroring and complimenting the drum track. Because the sound is already so huge, it’s easy to forget that there is no bass player here. Jina’s guitar playing does double duty in holding down the basic rhythm of the song (a layer of sound normally provided by the bass guitar) and providing fun and energetic riffs and chords as well. This is one of the best parts of seeing them live and I have often wondered how it is even possible for a band to make so much satisfying noise with just a guitar and drum kit and some occasional keys and melodica. Jiwon and Jina share vocals on this track both alternating lines and harmonizing. Their singing styles are different but also complimentary. They sound great together, like two friends singing at the top of their lungs on the way back home from a bar at sunrise after many drinks and smokes. This song starts loud and frantic and just gets louder and more raucous as it rolls along. A fun track beginning to end.
The third track, Time Machine, pulls back the volume and intensity, but only just a little. A sad and lonely harmonica gives way to Jiwon’s powerful smokey slow blues style and Jina’s choppy guitar chords and low note grinding riffs. The lyrics seem to be reflection on past personal and family trauma and its’ lasting effects. “If I got a time machine, would go back and tell my dad not to cheat on his wife..If not, your daughter can never believe her men in her life.”. These are personal and direct lyrics, the sort that would come up later in the bands’ career especially on their last full length release Don’t Push Me. The guitar noise builds steadily as the song progresses, occasionally disintegrating into dissonance and broken rhythms adding to the sense of hopelessness and desperation that threads through the whole song.
Spring (봄), the second to last track, starts with a Johnny Cash style freight train Boom-chicka-boom rhythm guitar that bounces along until the vocals begin. This time Jina takes the microphone while playing a fun delta blues kind of guitar melody (so fun that I had to learn to play it myself). Jiwon adds a few sweet harmonies halfway through. Then, at about two minutes in, just as you are starting to think that Billy Carter decided to give you a nice easy listen, the song bursts open in a nuclear storm of guitar noise and full throttle screaming. Once the dust settles, Jiwon takes her turn at a verse and the guitar melody finally unwinds to the sound of birds tweeting in the spring sunshine. My Korean is not good enough to understand most poetry and metaphor. I suspect that the lyrics are much darker than the music might lead you to think. Somehow, I feel like they may be referencing environmental destruction or emotional disappointment here but… I can’t be sure. I will have to ask next time I get a chance!
The EP closes out with You Go Home. It features big juicy guitar riffs chugging along as Jina and Jiwon take turns singing about what sounds like a very messy end to a night of heavy drinking. A universal experience I think, especially in Korea : ) The song winds up with shouts of “Go Home!”, “잘 가!” “안녕!” “annyeong!”. For some reason at the end of this one I can feel the bone chilling cold of stumbling home on an icy winter night, full of beer and soju, howling wind making my cigarette burn down at double speed. BRRR!!
After The Red
In addition to The Red, Billy Carter have released three other EPs titled The Yellow, The Green and The Orange. Each one goes in a slightly different direction musically but they are all unmistakably Billy Carter. I love each of them and would have a hard time picking a favourite.
Billy Carter has also released two full length albums, “Here I Am” in 2016 and “Don’t Push Me” in 2020. “Here I Am” is a fantastic listen that I think is closest to The Red EP in overall feel. “Don’t Push Me” saw the band move in a slightly different direction. The music maintained the same urgency but the lyrics became much more openly political and straightforward, addressing human (and animal) rights issues in a very direct way. It was a hugely influential album for so many people that I know including my daughter, who lists it as one of her favourites of all time. The album showcased Billy Carter at the peak of their powers as musicians and social critics. Unfortunately I was never able to see any live shows after this release but maybe sometime in the future…The band has been on hiatus since this release and I am not sure if they will ever resurface again as Billy Carter. Even if they have played their last show, I think they have left a collection of songs that any band on earth could be proud of and I am very happy to have had the pleasure of seeing them live even a few times. Happy Red Anniversary Billy Carter!
Cold Chickpea Salad
This is a recipe for a cold chickpea salad base. You can eat it just as it is here. It is delicious. But, you can also add just about anything you like to make the recipe suit your personal tastes. If you want to eat it over a few days, it is easy to add different ingredients to change it up. The ingredients I am including in this basic version can sit for a few days in the oil and vinegar dressing without degrading.
When I was little, especially in summer, there was always some kind of homemade cold salad in the fridge. Potato salad, pasta salad, egg salad… My new-Canadian parents refused to use air conditioning (or the dishwasher haha) so it was always nice to have something ice cold to snack on in the hot and humid weather! This recipe is the latest variation and I ate it at mom’s house recently.
Chickpeas are a great source of cheap protein, fibre, vitamins and minerals. And they taste great!
Ingredients:
- 400gr (2 cups) dry chickpeas
- 1/2 red onion small dice
- 1 red pepper small dice
- 3 green onions (scallions) sliced
- 1 carrot
- 2 cloves of garlic minced
- 2 Tablespoons hot chillies in oil (or chopped fresh chillies)
- 2 Tablespoons diced dill pickles
- 90-100ml (6 tablespoons) olive oil
- 45-50ml (3 tablespoons) vinegar
- 1-2 teaspoons salt
- 1-2 teaspoons black pepper
- 3 teaspoons ground cumin (optional)
I am using dry chickpeas because I like the flavour and texture. Soaking and cooking them is very easy but it takes a little more time. Feel free to substitute an equal amount of canned chickpeas. Just be sure to rinse them thoroughly in cold water to remove all the slippery brine.
Use a good extra virgin olive oil. I have used apple cider vinegar in this recipe but any good vinegar works. As for the chillies, I am using delicious chopped red chillies in olive oil which I recently found at a local Italian grocery. You can substitute with any fresh chopped chilli or leave them out if you don’t like the heat.
Process
Before anything else, we need to rehydrate (soak) the dry chickpeas.
Variations
As I mentioned at the start, I keep this basic recipe limited to the veggies that will be able to sit in the oil and vinegar for a few days without spoiling. Feel free to add anything you like to this starting recipe just before eating.
Some other things I have used:
- blanched or raw asparagus
- corn
- zucchini
- celery
- chopped kimchi
- diced sour apple
- parmesan cheese
- any and all fresh herbs
- crispy diced bacon
- tobasco, cholula or any other hot sauce
This kind of a salad is a good match for any picnic foods and especially grilled meats. And, although it is a cold salad, there is no reason why you couldn’t heat it up in a pan and serve it hot as well. As a warm dish, I think it would work perfectly under a piece of grilled fish.
Hope you enjoy. If you have any questions or comments or interesting variations, please leave them below. I am always happy to hear from you.
Bossam Leftovers: Pork and Vegetable Udon
Bossam Part 2:
Earlier I put up a recipe for a simple bossam. Towards the end, I mentioned that if you go easy on the salt in the braising liquid, you can use it to make another delicious pork dish. This is what I have done with the leftover braising liquid from that recipe: Pork and Vegetable Udon. This recipe made one huge portion but could very easily make 2 portions by adding more noodles.
Ingredients:
- Leftover braising liquid from Bossam recipe
- Leftover pork meat (if any) thin slices
- 1/2 onion sliced thin (the other half of the onion from the Bossam recipe)
- 3 cloves garlic sliced thin
- 2 green onions/scallions chopped
- 1 fresh green chilli pepper sliced into thin rounds
- 1/2 zucchini sliced thin
- 1/2 package of enoki mushrooms
- 1 cup green cabbage sliced thin
- 1 or 2 portions frozen udon noodles
I am using vegetables that I have in my refrigerator at the moment. You can substitute just about any vegetable you would normally put in a soup. You can use different mushrooms too. Different noodles could work as well. I like these Udon noodles. I usually find them at the neighbourhood Asian grocery store in the freezer section. They are convenient because they are frozen in single portions. If you don’t have leftover pork meat, don’t worry. The braising liquid has plenty of delicious pork flavour on it’s own. Sub in some extra mushrooms. I had enokis on hand but sliced king oyster mushrooms are even better!
Process
This took almost no time at all…
I think this probably took around 15 minutes to make. The leftover braising liquid from the bossam recipe is a perfect, rich and complex broth to cook vegetables and noodles in. This was a delicious meal that used up every last leftover from the previous night.
If you have any questions, comments or other ideas please leave them below. I always look forward to hearing from you.
Bossam Braised Pork Belly
This is a very basic version of bossam. The main event here is the meat. Fresh pork belly is braised in a liquid made with strong aromatics to flavour the meat and to soften some of the gamey aroma of the pork.
It can be served with kimchi and various sides, wrapped in a leaf of cabbage, perilla or lettuce.
There are a couple of good recipes here and here which include all the components for a more traditional Korean preparation with pickled Napa cabbage leaves and spicy shredded radish. This is a delicious way to eat it but I am going to do something a little different with things I already have in the refrigerator.
Ingredients for Braised Pork
- 1 kg (around 2.5lb) pork belly
- 1 small chunk (25gr) fresh ginger sliced
- 12 garlic cloves roughly chopped
- 1/2 onion
- 2 green onions roughly chopped
- 30ml / 2 tablespoons doenjang
- 15ml / 1 tablespoon instant coffee
- 1 tablespoon whole black peppercorns
- 1.5 litres / 6 cups water
Other Ingredients:
Once the pork is done, you will need something leafy to wrap it in. You may also want to add other fillings to your pork wraps. This can be anything from kimchi to fresh crunchy veggies. Sometimes I even like a little bit of nice mustard in them. This time around, I will use:
- red leaf lettuce, washed, dried and separated into leaves
- perilla leaf (kkaennip) washed and dried
- napa cabbage kimchi
- Korean radish kimchi or (kkakdugi)
- pan fried anchovies with peanuts (myeolchi bokkeum)
Process
Serving
Serve the pork slices with sides of your choice and leaves to wrap it with.
What about the leftover braising liquid?
Store any leftover meat in the braising liquid. Reheat it covered in the liquid as well.
The first time I made this, I noticed that the leftover braising liquid is actually very tasty. You can’t really notice the coffee as a distinct flavour. The liquid is just a warm and delicious pork and doenjang flavour. The only problem is that it is a little too salty.
The next time I made it, I decided to remove extra salt from the recipe, using doenjang only as the main seasoning. The meat is still delicious and can be salted a little after cooking if you think it needs it. But, keep in mind, you are also eating this with kimchi or maybe salted shrimp or other well seasoned add ons so very salty meat is not so necessary.
Once you reduce the salt, you are left with a delicious pork soup base. When the meal is done, I usually strain out all the solids and refrigerate it. The next day I combine it with shredded cabbage, the other half of the onion, mushrooms and frozen udon noodles, a little of the leftover pork and chopped scallions. It is surprisingly delicious! Find that recipe here.
If you have any questions or comments, please leave them below. Look forward to hearing from you.
Beef Bone Broth Version 1: Low and Slow
Broth vs Stock
I am calling this a “Beef Bone Broth” only because it seems to be the name that everyone is using these days. It makes a perfect base liquid for any number of soup or sauce recipes although it also has many other uses.
In professional cooking, a “broth” is a usually a lighter, thinner, and often salted liquid made by boiling vegetables and/or meat for a relatively short time. A “stock”, in contrast, is made from bones and their connective tissue, simmered for a very long time, sometimes with vegetables and aromatics, usually without salt. A broth is a thin and flavourful liquid while a stock is a thick, gelatinous and relatively flavourless liquid (until it is seasoned).
So..as you will see, what we are making here is nothing like a broth. It is a very simple beef stock.
Long, Low and Slow vs Hard and Fast
This recipe is for a long, low and slow method that cooks until the bones have nothing left to give. The end result is a mostly clear, slightly brown stock. It is thick and gelatinous, even slightly sticky. If you added mirepoix (say onions, celery, carrot) to this later in the process, you would end up with something like a Western white veal/beef stock.
The second one (click here for other version) is a hard boil and relatively fast stock (for beef bones). It will still take several hours but, it will result in a milky white broth with a nutty flavour and slightly thinner consistency. This is what you will often see in Seolleongtang or Mandu Guk (dumpling soup) in Korean restaurants.
Ingredients
You can make this as large or small as you like. I have made a recipe that fits into my biggest stock pot which holds around 12 litres / 3 gallons. Just make sure that the pot is big enough to keep bones submerged plus a little water on top.
- 4 kg / 8lb cut beef hip bones (this is usually a mix of marrow bones and knuckle bones)
- 1.5 kg / 3lb cut cow foot
- fresh cold water to cover them
My local Korean grocer keeps bags of cut beef bones in the freezer section all the time. And, there is a butcher near me that usually has frozen whole cow feet as well. Any butcher shop should be able to get you beef hip bones for stock. The cow foot is optional but it is made of of mostly connective tissue and this will add body and richness to your finished stock. If you can’t get cow foot, just omit or replace with regular hip bones.
Process
Wash and Soak
Initial Boil (blanching)
Simmering the stock
32 hours later….
Cooling and Storage
How to use your Beef Bone Broth
Simmer any combination of meat/vegetables/mushrooms in it for a delicious soup. Add your favourite noodles to it. Or, you can simply warm it up and add rice and seasoning. You can even drink it as is for a deeply nutritious and filling liquid snack.
This beef bone broth (stock) is a liquid rich in body and texture that is mostly neutral in flavour…a base for almost anything you can imagine. Soup, stew, sauce, smoothie…anything goes. If you have any recipe that has water as an ingredient, replace it with this stock to improve the flavour and the nutritional value. As I cook with this new stock, I will post up ideas as I make them.