Music for the Long Emergency: Naming the Virtual Residency with Poliça and s t a r g a z e / by Liquid Music

By Lauren McNee

Over the course of the 2016.17 season, Liquid Music’s virtual residency with Poliça and s t a r g a z e has given audiences the unique opportunity to see the blood/sweat/tears that go into creating an artistic project. We’ve seen members of Poliça and s t a r g a z e jet back and forth between the Twin Cities and Berlin, and share sounds virtually across the ocean. And now it has a name: Music for the Long Emergency. Inspired by James Howard Kunstler’s book, The Long Emergency, about the long-term social consequences of oil scarcity and climate change, the name refers to the beauty of destruction. In the words of Poliça's drummer Drew Christopherson, “we can have bright happy moments too amongst the dark and chaotic moments in our lives”. 

“If it happens that the human race doesn't make it, then the fact that we were here once will not be altered, that once upon a time we peopled this astonishing blue planet, and wondered intelligently at everything about it and the other things who lived here with us on it, and that we celebrated the beauty of it in music and art, architecture, literature, and dance, and that there were times when we approached something godlike in our abilities and aspirations. We emerged out of depthless mystery, and back into mystery we returned, and in the end the mystery is all there is.”
– James Howard Kunstler, The Long Emergency

 

On November 18 of 2016, the world premiere of Music for the Long Emergency will take place at the historic Fitzgerald Theater in Saint Paul, MN in partnership with The Current. You can help support this project by making a contribution to Music for the Long Emergency's Indiegogo campaign here. And don't forget to check out the Work In Progress Conversation on Sunday, May 22 at the Fitzgerald Theater! André de Ridder from s t a r g a z e will be in town to talk about the project onstage with Poliça. Bring your curiosity and your friends.