Posts by Russell Brown
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Hard News: Lorde, the council and the…, in reply to Rich of Observationz,
So, why bother with craft beer and vineyards and maturing single malt whiskies for 20 years? It’s just a drug, why don’t we just inject pure industrial ethanol into our eyeballs for a quick and cheap hit?
I don't see how preferences about flavour make alcohol not a drug. I love nice beer and aged single malt, but that kind of makes alcohol a more dangerous drug for me – I really like the taste of good alcoholic beverages.
But now that legalisation has allowed for differentiation of weed strains, you see people making similar distinctions there.
I've talked to former junkies who've waxed lyrical about the difference between heroin and homebake, with each having its charms. They're still drugs.
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I felt really happy about Ladi 6's win at the awards last night. It made me think of getting her and Parks to play our first Public Address Great Blend event, way back in 2004. The pair of them just sat on stools, with Parks on guitar and backing vocals, while the late sun reached into the Grey Lynn Bowling Club and it was so lovely that I cried a bit. I think that impressed on me all those years ago what a solid musical base those two come from.
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Hard News: Powerstation II: It's complicated, in reply to Bart Janssen,
But somehow they got the wrong designation for what they have been doing, and want to continue to do.
And nobody was able to do the paperwork to get them the right designation because …?
It might have been easier if the venue had acted immediately, to be honest.
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Hard News: Powerstation II: It's complicated, in reply to Dan Salmon,
Does that mean the current licence is supervised?
Yes.
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Hard News: Lorde, the council and the…, in reply to Adam H,
There's a good story here on what (may have...) happened in Sydney. God help me, I'm about to post a link to the Daily Mail. Please forgive me.
You are absolved.
And yeah, Sydney is what I've been thinking of too.
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A couple more things:
- Even the big venue owners seem frustrated by liquor licensing edicts. Spark Arena's management has even discussed forming a lobby group.
- Special licences for non-standard venues seem to be getting harder to get. I've heard of a small promotional event (in a retail space) being declined because the shop didn't meet the standards of a licensed premises. Surely that's what special licenses are for?
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At least five people in intensive care in Porirua. Synthetics.
This isn't going to stop.
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Hard News: How harm happens, in reply to Ross Bell,
No, that’s Russell… He’s a meany.
I'm persuadable!
And I do take your point about drug policy being at the Cabinet table.
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Hard News: How harm happens, in reply to Neil,
They appear to be reporting what word on the street was rather than making the claim.
They had actual test results by that point. Giving the flyspray story air was silly and unnecessary.
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Hard News: Out of sight, out of mind:…, in reply to BenWilson,
Well they became popular, and remain popular, for that reason. They may well have been invented regardless.
Very, very few people take NBOMe in preference to LSD – as opposed to taking it because it's been sold to them as LSD, or because it's all they can get.
Similarly, last summer Know Your Stuff noticed a pattern with presentations of powders and crystals the holder presumed to be MDMA but which turned out to be cathinones (including new cathinones no one could identify) – almost invariably the holders were young. Older people's samples tended to be as presumed, while the kids were getting shit drugs.
The cathinones, including mephedrone, only turned up on the market because the UN managed to crack down on saffrole, a key MDMA precursor. But yeah, there is now some preference for mephedrone in its own right – it tends to be better for chemsex, for example, and I think there was also some research showing cocaine users switching in Europe.