Victory for Stalingrad!
Submitted by Hannah on 3 February 2013 - 8:52am
Where:
RichMix, London
When:
02/02/2012
Comment:
Yesterday was the 70th anniversary of the famous battle against Nazism. To celebrate, "Victory at Stalingrad!" bought together the history, opinions & thumping music to create one rather unusual party. The historian Geoffrey Roberts opened the evening with a somewhat mumbled lecture, then over to a selection of panelists (including The Guardian's Seumas Milne) to discuss the legacy of the victory. On to the music: Thee Faction powered through their "soulcialist" set, with some blistering guitar work & their angular horn section "Brass Kapital". Finally, the Trans-Siberian March Band took the stage. I fell in love with this 13 piece Balkan brass band last year; their playful mix of klezmer, Turkish, Russian and latin music thrills me to the core. It's music that physically moves you - so loud it shakes you - that sweeps up everything & everyone before it. If I hadn't have had a bad back, I'd have been frantically dancing. I had to content myself with nodding my head & grinning along.
The audience:
Mostly well-behaved, but - as I've come to expect - there were a number of people who'd just come to the gig for a nice conversation. Age-wise, possibly the most mixed gig I'd ever been to.
Food & drink:
There was just enough time to sprint to a little Ocakbasi place for some tender charred lamb. Back at the gig, I had a glass of rose which was 1) £5 and 2) horrible.
It made me think:
I wish I hadn't dropped history when I was 14. There are some embarrassing holes in my historical knowledge, but at least I feel like I plugged one of them last night.
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Comments
Trans-Siberian March Band
just listened to them on their site and now have bought the CD. Thanks Hannah
Hannah
Its overwhelming and tough to read at times but also thrilling - the Simon Sebag Montefiore book on Stalin is jaw dropping - how power is executed and what it does to people. And I am going to have a crack at the TSMB too!
Kruschev biog
by Taubmann is a riveting overview of all the major events of the first half of the last century and is brilliantly written.
Stalingrad by Anthony Beevor
is a good account.
It's bleak in the telling.
I started feeling sorry for the Germans: unimaginably cold and ill-prepared in clothing, lacking in rations, no support from any recognized central command (the only order being that they should fight to the last man and last bullet), incessantly attacked by a ruthless foe.
Yes, they had no right to be there but they were largely obeying orders.
And now I'll recommend it again.
It is certainly a tragedy at an individual level
And they were conscripts - but it was a fight to the death between two of the worst imperial regimes ever to govern (Mao being the other). Pol Pot and man others were atrocious but the sheer scale of the depravity of the Stalin and Hitler regimes is unbelievable. Thats one thing that amazed me about the Montefiore book - the way they led such luxurious and banal existences while ordering all that slaughter.
Its appalling the way Stalin won but it would have been even worse if the Nazis had prevailed.
The '20s and '30s
didn't half throw up some evil bastards. Stalin's last hours, though, were hilarious black comedy.
Brilliant AND Bleak...rightly recommended.
Read it a year or so ago and yes, you do feel for the Germans despite everything. Can`t imagine how anyone could exist in the conditions through the winter.A cliche perhaps but did get me wondering about "What if the Germans had won?" (Someone should write a book....)
Just finished his D-Day book (£2 paperback from a Charity shop..bargain)which I enjoyed but it felt a bit more like a procession of facts. Looking forward to his Berlin tome....have you read that?
Nope
It's a bit odd - since I've been given a Kindle and then a Galaxy Tab I've hardly read a book for a year.
Mind you, I've had loads going on so I'll redress this soon-ish.