The downtown mess

[Re: “Overnight sensations,” Music, Feb. 25] Here’s an Angel & Insect that came to mind while wandering from the Old Port to Place du Quartier des spectacles on Nuit Blanche.

To both the organizers and the (many) participants of Nuit Blanche, great stuff! So much fun! The vibrancy, diversity and overall cheerful vibe was wonderful and really makes this city special.

To the bureaucrats, “developers” and contractors who have darkened half of lower St-Laurent and who have sloppily cratered and shuttered Ste-Catherine, blech! I felt sad walking along that stretch, and not just because it was dejà vu of the blatant corruption and incompetence of St-Laurent circa 2007, but simply because this special city and its vibrant people deserve soooo much better.

>>STEPHANIE SADE

Canada does not suck hard

[Re: “Phone the podium,” Rosen, Feb. 25] I’m actually a fan of Rosen and usually find his take on our world pretty on point and funny. But although Team Canada probably was sucking hard when Rosen came up with this particular drawing, it would have been way more prudent to wait until the games were truly over before printing any criticism of its overall performance.

Team Canada ended up with 14 gold medals, which turned out to be a Winter Olympic Games record, making the “Own the Podium” program a complete success... and also ended up making Rosen look like a complete and giant tool.

>>J. BELIZAIRE

Just saw your “Phone the Podium” editorial cartoon. So... feeling like an out-of-touch douche yet after our record gold medal haul by any chance?

>>PAOLA D’AGNOLO

[Rosen replies: I’ve never been happier to be so wrong in my life.]

Signifiers, appropriations, Raf

[Re: “Mainstream is the new alternative,” Feb 25] It’s bad enough that Raf is a sweet, creative, zany, unique, different and important uninvolved slacker, somehow Laurence Larue wants him to stand in for all of Gen-X. And then expects the latter to stand in for the numerous affinity groups that converged to protest the 2010 Vancouver Olympics. Talk about how Neocons sounded back in the ’80s.

Folks who are interested in a quick glance at the issues can have a look at number 64 of The Dominion magazine, available online at dominionpaper.ca. Those who gathered to protest the Olympics are a reminder that politics isn’t just a matter of different signifiers and different narratives, as Larue’s “end of politics” gambit implies, but a real force that represents in principle and in fact an alternative to the mainstream.

If Larue cared to look up from Vice magazine for a minute, he would notice that there are also alternatives to slacker appropriations of postmodern theory. Nothing against Vice.

>>MARC J. LÉGER

No dice

[Re: “The ongoing trials of Dany Villanueva,” News, March 4] In your article, you wrote that Dany Villanueva was playing an illegal game of dice in Montreal North’s Henri Bourassa park. Actually, the coroner’s inquest into Fredy Villanueva’s death revealed so far that none of the two police officers involved in the tragic intervention (Jean-Loup Lapointe and Stéphanie Pilotte) saw Dany with dice in his hands on that fateful day.

Thought I’d let you know.

>>ALEXANDRE POPOVIC

The Knife, Darwin, Oatmon

[Re: “The Knife Tomorrow, In a Year,” CD Reviews, Feb. 25] I’ve been wanting to let this go, but I just can’t. The Knife have had too great of an affect on me over the years to let this bad review go unanswered.

First, the album was by The Knife, Plannigtorock and Mt. Sims, just to credit the album correctly. Second, I mean, Christ, this wasn’t a dance album and therefore has to be listened to differently. Since it’s not solely a Knife album, and since it is an opera about the life and discovery of Charles Darwin, obviously this will be more experimental and less comfortable than Deep Cuts or Silent Shout.

I’m sorry, but calling this album an “unbridled ear-piercing mess” is just shocking. Not coming from Oatmon, since he only seems to like I Love Neon and electro (may it burn in hell), but I simply can’t believe that anybody giving this album a listen could think that it was anything less than completely organized and methodical in its composition and production.

This album is very conceptual—not something even I would listen to every morning before work, but emotionally wrenching when given the proper attention.

>>MACAULAY CULKIN

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