The Red Bulletin_1207_ZA

Christian Bale / Travis Barker / Felix Baumgartner / Aloe Blacc / Christian Horner / Hot Chip / Sugar Man / Sigur Rós

a beyond the ordinary magazine

july 2012

Hip-hop vs Pantula

Beat Battle

The year’s biggest dance-off Your VIP Pass

MUsic special

Backstage secrets of the stars PLUS 2012’s best festivals

How I Did It

D ow

n lo

F ad y Tab r e e our le no t App w

DJOKOVIC The making of an all-time great

THE WORLD OF RED BULL

July 34

TRAVIS BARKER Four years ago the Blink-182 drummer was on life support. He’s spent the time since blurring the lines of musical genres and reuniting his band. He talks about family, touring, and a Muppet

COVER PHOTOGRAPHY: CLIVE BRUNSKILL/CONTOUR BY GETTY IMAGES. PHOTOGRAPHY: LAUREN DUKOFF, GETTY IMAGES (2), LUKE AIKINS/RED BULL CONTENT POOL

WELCOME

BEATS AND STRINGS Backed by an orchestra, US soul bard Aloe Blacc has married classical and hip-hop in a special live streaming project. We check out how it went

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“I HAVE ACHIEVED THE IMPOSSIBLE” From spending his nights in an air raid shelter during the Balkan war to defying the odds to reach the top of the tennis world: Novak Djokovic talks exclusively to The Red Bulletin

“Whether it’s playing some game or skiing, it’s always been part of me to want to win ”

Novak As a man who learned his tennis by day, after nights Djokovic hunkered down in an air-raid shelter, it’s no surprise that Novak Djokovic takes such delight in his position as one of the world men’s tennis elite quartet. The Serb knows what ‘battles’ and ‘fighting’ mean to war zone civilians, so if he can poke fun at his sport – while still excelling – then surely he has earned that privilege. He’s a fascinating character, as he reveals in this month’s exclusive interview, and some of his peers would do well to note his sense of perspective on what is, after all, just a game. nside You’ll also notice a musical flavour inside these pages: if you’ve ever wondered who washes rock stars’ underwear or who makes on-stage pyrotechnics,, then read on and you’ll find out. Only, dear reader, in The Red Bulletin Bulletin.

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RED BULL STRATOS Can Felix Baumgartner really go supersonic as he free-falls from the edge of space? The answer lies in some complex calculations

THE WORLD OF RED BULL

July CHRISTIAN BALE With the new Batman movie set to take over the world’s cinemas, the secret identity of its star is revealed: the clowns, the frowns, the ups and downs

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FLAMENCO IN THE SKIES The Red Bull X-Fighters in the motherland of FMX: crazy days in California of tricks, broken bones and a few tips for Mom

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VOODOO STYLE The Ghetto Biennale exhibits art where it’s made: we head to the streets and shanties of Port au Prince, Haiti, to check it out

18 KIT BAG: SMALL BANG THEORY

The starter’s pistol ain’t what it used to be. An electronic flash and boom will get them started this summer

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68 I was not lost, just “ in Detroit. „ Rodriguez

06 Gallery 12 News 16 Rock’s most-wanted roadie 20 To foldly go: Red Bull Paper Wings 42 The dry cleaner to the stars 68 Musical icon Rodriguez 58 At home with Christian Horner

PHOTOGRAPHY: PICTUREDSK.COM, JÜRGEN SKARWAN, GETTY IMAGES, GIAN PAUL LOZZA, BENJAMIN LOWY

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TRAINING TIPS: NEED FOR SPEED Moto2 riding star Marc Márquez reveals how his impressive speed isn’t down to brawn or the throttle

THE WORLD OF RED BULL

July WORLD IN ACTION From funk queen Janelle Monáe performing at a Narnia-style festival in Norway to a whole load of bulls rampaging through the Spanish streets, we bring you the month’s best events listings world-wide

22 LUCKY NUMBERS: MYSTERY FIGURES

2012 is clearly playing a few number games, what with three Friday-the-thirteenths and the world definitely scheduled to end yet again. Here are those, and other, devilish digits decoded

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84 MONTREUX JAZZ FESTIVAL

Every summer for the past 46 years Claude Nobs has invited top musicians to perform by Lake Geneva.

The festival director reveals his top eight Montreux sights with a special place in pop history

more

Body & Mind

PHOTOGRAPHY: GETTY IMAGES, CORBIS, TYRONE BRADLEY.

86 GET THE GEAR 96

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THEY KNOW THEY CAN DANCE

Red Bull Beat Battle – eight different dance crews representing the cream of SA’s urban dance genres from hip-hop and pantsula to B-Boy and sbhujwa faced off in a packed-to-the-rafters night at Bassline in Jozi

Whether it’s KISS, The Rolling Stones or Mötley Crüe, if anyone wants to blow things up on stage, Pyro Pete is their man. He reveals exactly how all the mayhem gets made

90 NIGHTLIFE

SAVE THE DATE

Ink these in your diary

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KAINRATH

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MIND’S EYE

Our cartoonist

The thoughts of columnist Kevin McCallum

A glamorous club, an exotic cocktail, a midnight snack, the best in music and much more – we’ve got everything you need to get you through the night

MAT TE R H O R N , SW IT Z E R L AN D

ROPE AND GLORY

At the top of Europe’s 11th-highest mountain, it’s 4,478m above sea level. Summitting the Matterhorn is still one of alpinism’s great challenges, but there are few new firsts left to chalk up. Swiss mountaineer Stephan Siegrist recently managed one, on a rope as thin as the air up there. After a pal’s suggestion – and what are friends for? – the two men climbed to the top, on a perfect windless day, where Siegrist steadily walked a slackline. www.stephan-siegrist.ch Photography: Thomas Senf

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JAW S , HAWAI I

WAVE-FORMED

Here’s one for the nature/nurture debate. Is every 19-year-old kid from Maui capable of windsurfing Jaws, the break off the Hawaiian island’s north coast that can produce waves 20m tall? Or is Kai Lenny a special case, a genetic miracle, the only one of his peer group who grew up in the shadow of Jaws with the innate ability to get to grips with it? He sees his conquest of the blue in black and white: “I could either sit around and play in the sand, or learn to surf.”

Kai caramba! www.hawaiianwaterman.com Photography: David Holmqvist

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SURREY, BRITISH COLUMBIA, CANADA

FLIPPING GREAT

Two years in the making, mountain bike documentary Strength In Numbers gets to the heart of the sport and its ever-increasing number of devotees. Among the featured bikers is 16-year-old Canadian Anthony Messere, who has been in the saddle competitively half his life. From the hills of Utah to the slopes of Nepal, and other countries between, the film captures the thrill and spectacle of mountain biking like no other. Watch it now on DVD and Blu-ray, or via iTunes. www.anthillfilms.com; www.redbull.com/bike Photography: Sterling Lorence

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Bullevard Sport and culture on the quick

High Riders

Giant jellyfish at the Stereosonic Festival

Rocks stars’ demands never fail to amaze gig promoters: be it backstage corn starch or two dozen red roses,a bespoke toilet seat, or a bag of Gummi Bears for post-gig comedown.

But who wants what?

1

2 LL Cool J

Madonna

Flights of fancy 3

4

Marilyn Manson

Trent Reznor

Designs In Air are the team responsible for some of the most beautiful visual enticements at music festivals

Like tentacles they wrap around stages; giant jellyfish hanging inside marquees. Since 1994, Luke Egan and Pete Hamilton have been making luminous, light-filled sculptures under the banner Designs In Air. They’re conceived on computers in 3D then sewn together in Manchester, UK, from fireproof nylon. Once ready, the balloons travel all summer to festivals including Fuji Rock and Burning Man. www.designsinair.com

PICTURES OF THE MONTH

a

c

b

d Answers: 1b, 2c, 3d, 4a

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EVERY SHOT ON TARGET

Taken a picture with a Red Bull flavour?

Email it to us: phototicker@redbulletin.com Every month we print a selection, and our favourite pic is awarded a limited-edition Sigg bottle. Tough, functional and well-suited to sports, it features The Red Bulletin logo.

Alexandria

B-Boy Lil G is head over heels to perform at the Roman theatre in the Egyptian city.

Mohab Magdy

Pack it in Essentials for summer festivals

Red Bull Youth America’s Cup sets sail

Fudge Dry Shampoo Mud in your hair?

No showers on site?

Give your head a spray of this stuff and your mane will be clean in minutes.

PHOTOGRAPHY: GETTY IMAGES (5), CORBIS (2), SHUTTERSTOCK (5), DESIGNS IN AIR, GILLES MARTIN-RAGET/RED BULL CONTENT POOL, CHRIS POLACK/RED BULL CONTENT POOL

America’s Cup – the next generation The greatest catamarans, the best sailors, the biggest boat race in the world: what ambitious yachtsman hasn’t dreamed of one day taking part in the America’s Cup? That dream is a little closer for the young and talented, thanks to the Red Bull Youth America’s Cup, which gives 19- to 23-year-olds their first chance of stepping up to the sailing big time.

“It’s turning tradition upside down,” says Jimmy Spithill, 2010 America’s Cup winner. “And that’s great. Finally young people have a realistic chance of getting ahead as well.”

The newcomers’ regatta kicks off in 2013 in San Francisco, in the middle of the action for the 34th America’s Cup. Anyone in the age bracket can apply and 10 teams will take part.

The chosen few will go forward to race the AC 45 catamaran (America’s Cup World Series class) for free.

Applications from summer at: www.americascup.com

Trevor Baylis Eco Torch Part LED torch, part FM radio and part mobile phone charger, this shuns batteries in favour of wind-up power.

BEATS & STRINGS Backed by an orchestra, Aloe Blacc marries classical and hip-hop Building bridges to bring different worlds together: that was the idea behind the Red Bull Beat Suite concert project in Melbourne. In mid-May the Australian Youth Orchestra shared the stage with a handful of beat wizards and US soul bard Aloe Blacc. Millions of music fans around the world watched the spectacle via live stream on YouTube, with conductor Tamil Rogen giving the songs a classical sheen.

Have you ever played in an orchestra?

Yes, trumpet at school.

I thought with three buttons it must be the easiest instrument. I learned to read music, which I’m happy about now.

Eileen Short Pink Wellies Festival footwear doesn’t need to be military green.

These stylish mud waders are pretty in pink.

Do you prefer to sing accompanied by a band or an orchestra?

The dynamic is different.

With a band you have to sing louder. With strings the voice has less competition.

Was it unusual for you playing in a seated concert hall?

Yes. But by the time we got to a bossa nova version of my song I Need a Dollar, the whole audience was out of their seats.

The best use of strings in a pop song?

I love the early Jackson 5 recordings where you hear at least 20 instruments in a song. And I love the symphonic element of Barry White records.

Highlights from the concert at: beatsuite.redbull.com.au

Aloe Blacc on the mic at the Red Bull Beat Suite concert

redbull.com/culture

WE HAVE A WINNER!

Guadalajara Entrants in Red Bull Manny Mania prove skating on two wheels is a balancing act. Miguel López

Kiev Mismatch: Ukrainian horsepower meets the Red Bull Racing RB7 Formula One car.

Sergey Illin

Jelgava

The Red Bull tour bus (with group Makonstumeji on board) travels throughout Latvia.

Kristaps Kains

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B U L L E VA R D

Wakeskating is known for its flips and tricks

Now On Cable Forever Resorts Warmbaths in Bela Bela recently hosted one of the more unusual SA championships. The Cable Nationals, which saw wakeboarders being pulled by an overhead cable-ski system rather than a boat, also featured wakeboarding’s lesser known sibling – the wakeskaters.

Just like skateboarders, these guys don’t have bindings, which allows them to do a variety of trickster flips and spins.

Mattie Buys is wakeskating’s reigning king of the river. He claimed the crown once again with a wicked display of flat water and rail moves. The contest was a close one, however.

Buys fought off a stomach virus and the fast-rising talent of Darren Turner to win the title. Bryan Loggenberg placed third. www.ridecable.co.za

The Mother City’s hipster-friendly burger joint, Clarke’s, recently hosted the ‘Skateboarding Is A Crime’ exhibition of prints by artist Gerhard Human. The banning of skateboarding on the streets in the Western Cape has become a contentious issue in recent months, and the exhibition has been part of the skater community’s response. The project was a special collaboration with Jamie O’Brien of Woodies Ramps. “We wanted to raise funds for this skate park in Edgemead that we’ve been building,” says O’brien. “Gerhard kindly approached us with this exhibition idea to help raise money for it. It’s our way of giving back to the community.” gerhardhuman.blogspot.com

Sofia Ramping up the action at Bulgarian street luge contest Red Bull Lagernica Predrag Vuckovic 14

PAINTING THE TOWNS

Grafitti artist Falko is bringing his sizey murals to more SA towns – and this time he’s got help “Go large or go home.” It’s an attitude that well describes Falko’s work. The graffiti artist has made a name for himself with his Splitpiece series of huge murals that bring colour to SA towns.

Falko’s previous canvas was in Darling, with the murals of his ‘Darling Made Me Do It’ project creating a narrative of the town and the people who lived there. Next up is ‘Once Upon A Town’, which sees Falko team up with fellow graffiti artist Rasty to create 20 murals in Mamre and 20 more in the nearby town of Pella. “The two towns are en-route to Darling. I knew Mamre, but had not been to Pella,” says Falko. “Eventually, out of curiosity, I went to have a look. It didn’t seem like much but its relationship with Mamre interested me.”

Just 2km away, Mamre was originally a missionary town. If you didn’t abide by their laws, you were kicked out. Some of those banished individuals started a new town called Pella. “I guess ‘Once Upon A Town’ was one of those ‘meant to be’ things. It’s a metaphor for the way South Africans are working to reconnect with one another.”

The project will also have it’s own exhibition. www.facebook.com/pages/Falko-one

Spielberg In Austria, driving tips for ski jump ace Thomas Morgenstern from David Coulthard.

Samo Vidic

Panama City A wheelie good kiss for Aaron

Colton before a demo of his expert freestyle biking.

Faisal Tisnes

PHOTOGRAPHY: ANDREW ROYAL, RIDECABLECOZA.

Skateboard ban: what a crime…

Catch Falko with his brush in Mamre and Pella

b u l l e va r d

where’s your head at?

Christian bale

With the new Batman movie set to take over the world’s cinemas, the secret identity of its star is revealed: the clowns, the frowns, the ups and downs

Th e Le ad in g Ma n

Little Man , Big Top

Di et

To play a man ravaged by insomnia in The Machinist (2004), Bal e lost 28kg, to weigh 54kg. He then had six months to ‘muscle up’ for Batma n Begins, and tipped the scales at 86kg.

With weight gained and lost for other parts too, one critic called it Bale’s ‘tradem ark’. Proving his bodily functions still wor k despite the yo-yoing body mass, Bale, in trademark fashion, said he’d like to em pty his bladder on said critic’s sho es.

Christian Charles Philip Bale was born in Haverfordwest, in south-west Wales, on January 30, 1974. His father was, among many things, a pilot and an importer of skateboards, while his mother was a dancer and circus performer. Not many boys can say Mummy rode an elephant for a living, just as not many can say, as Bale does, that their first kiss was with a Polish trapeze artist.

Hig hs And Low s

In The Begin ning Was The Nerd

July 2008 was not an emotional rollercoaster for Bale; it was an emotional astronaut’s high-G centrifuge. In that month, he unleashed a sweary bollocking to a crew member in Terminator Salvation, (leaked online in 2009), was questioned by police after a family fall-out at the Dorchester Hotel in London (no charges) and watched The Dark Knight begin a billion-dollar box-office march.

Christian was briefly enrolled at the same kids’ theatre company as Kate Winslet, but his first paying acting gig came in a TV advert for fabric softener. Aged 10, he appeared on stage in London’s West End in The Nerd, earning £12 (¤15) a night as the son of Rowan Atkinson’s title character. Two years later, in 1986, came his first role on camera, as a Russian prince, in TV movie Anastasia: The Mystery of Anna.

Bat ’s All , Folks

With The Avengers and The Amazing Spider-Man alongside The Dark Knight Rises, this cinematic summer is the most Lyrca-ed of all-time (until next year). The third in the new Batman trilogy could be the best of the lot: trailers hint at the love of Catwoman, a braining from new villain Bane and spectacular set pieces.

What it will be is Bale’s last Bat-role. “It’s like saying goodbye to an old friend,” he says.

words: Paul Wilson. illustration: Lie-Ins and Tigers

Co mi ng Of Ag e

a 13-year-old: Not a bad first movie for Spielberg’s ven Ste , Sun The Empire Of se WWII ane Jap tale of a young boy in a was off eer car e’s Bal p. cam internment a but. ays alw and running, but there’s e a kid hav can you way a is re “I think the fine, ys sta it and acting when he’s young very so ng wro s goe all it is, t but the fac becoming a quickly,” Bale later said, of nd it, really.” me om rec ’t don “I child star.

Role Call

Bale Bails Out

After Empire, Bale was conscious of his growing fame and his debt to Spielberg.

So he fought against both, taking parts in films outside the mainstream and being “so concerned about being seen as a leech that I didn’t really contact [Spielberg]… I had to get away and prove myself.” But then, in 2000, after a dozen years and as many supporting parts, came his first, and amazing, lead turn, in American Psycho.

“Hi, it’s Chris. Leave it!”

Bale’s reputation for intensity emerged with American Psycho, with reports of 18-month-long preparations, and his telling other actors in the running for the part to back off. It’s half-true: delays in production kept pushing Psycho’s start date, but the phone calls were 100 per cent Bale. “Absolutely,” he told GQ. “I phoned a few people and let them know my commitment.”

Among the callees was Ewan McGregor.

Bale balances out Batman with wide-ranging roles. In 2007, he was one of seven Bob Dylaninspired characters, including Heath ‘The Joker’ Ledger, in I’m Not There. Last year came Chinese epic The Flowers Of War and an Oscar for his amazing crackhead turn in The Fighter. This year he’s shooting two films with once-reclusive director Terrence Malick. “The interesting thing about a movie,” says Bale, “is the movie.”

The Dark Knight Rises globally from July 19: www.thedarkknightrises.com

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b u l l e va r d

On the Roadie

Jef Hickey

He’s the man the bands want behind the scenes, who parties almost as hard as he works. The Red Bulletin caught up with rock’s most-wanted fixer

Hit the road Hickey’s first tour was with Megadeth in 1985.

He went on to work with Danzig, Motörhead, KISS, Mariah Carey, Slayer, Madonna, Billy Joel and Slipknot Roadie reckoning Believes that rock stars and strippers go well together because “they work the same hours”

From left: Hickey has roadied for the likes of Megadeth, Danzig, Slayer and Type O Negative

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A good roadie – and there are thousands of them – tunes guitars, wields lanyards, and always has a supply of batteries and clean socks. Jef Hickey has risen to the top of his profession, with those tools in his locker and a thousand more, earning the title of the most famous roadie in rock. Like a savvy butler or political aide, Hickey knows there’s more to his job than lugging equipment and deciding which babes get backstage. In his early days, he learned one of his smartest moves: when first handed a band’s tour schedule, call major companies in all the cities on a band’s schedule, invite their top people to the show and thus ensure that the band would be hooked up with the best swag.

Sitting outside a cafe in downtown LA, Hickey sports traditional roadie uniform: band T-shirt and tattoos (including his ex’s name crossed out; finger tats spelling ‘I REFUSE’ and, inked in Swedish on his belly, ‘hard drugs, loud guitars, and I love whores’). He recently returned home from touring the US with Swedish metal band, Crashdiet. The Scandinavians had a lot of fun crossing the desert: “They were so into cactuses. They had never seen one before.”

Self-deprecating and charismatic, he halts his storytelling to tell a passing female that she has “nice tits”. The compliment falls naturally from his lips in a way that it must have many thousands of times before, dating back to when his career started in 1985. Then aged 17, he hopped on the bus with Megadeth in Providence, Rhode Island, and went on to work with every band in hard rock – from Slayer and Motörhead to Korn and Danzig – as well as Madonna, Billy Joel, Mariah Carey and Luther Vandross, who required Hickey to FedEx his toilet seat to every show location.

Hickey says there are several things that make a good roadie. A good sense of humour, and the ability to hang are

paramount. If you can’t party with the band, things are going to get awkward.

This aspect of the job has never been a problem for him. “If things were getting out of control right now, I’d probably be naked and making love to that tree,” he says, motioning towards a jacaranda. That said, you also have to be able to get the job done, no matter how late you were up the night before. Hickey has never let play get in the way of work. One time he was arrested in Illinois (“for a minor incident”, he adds), and the day after being released he was on a tour bus with Type O Negative.

The festival circuit is a fixture in Hickey’s professional life. He remembers running away from Sharon Osbourne at Ozzfest: she was mad, he says, that he was filming a movie called Crew Sluts without her permission. This is just one of many stories in the memoir he’s writing.

He has tickets for this year’s Download festival in the UK, and is looking forward to being on the other side of the stage for a change. That said, ever the pro, he has offered his services to two bands on the bill.

“I’m going to be there, so I may as well help out,” he says. No rest for the Hickey.

“ If things were getting out of control right now, I’d probably be naked and making love to a tree”

Follow Hickey at www.facebook.com/ jef.hickey

WORDS: Caroline Ryder. photography: Chris McPherson, GETTY IMAGES (4)

Born Milford, Massachusetts, May 14, 1968

B U L L E VA R D

KIT EVOLUTION

Small bang theory The starter’s pistol ain’t what it used to be. An electronic flash and boom will get them started this summer

SHOOTING BLANKS

The barrel was never loaded with live ammo. A blank was enough to create the bang

TRIGGER LAPPY

When the trigger was pulled, an electronic pulse was sent on its way through the pistol

Thanks to a wire fixed to the end of the grip, the pulse from the trigger nudged the mechanical stopwatches into action

7.5 MM REVOLVER, WAFFENFABRIK BERN

Manufactured by Swiss gunsmith Waffenfabrik Bern in 1929, this revolver wasn’t modified to time a race until three years later. Omega used this pistol in Los Angeles during the summer of 1932. Before then timekeepers measured the start by the bang: as the shot rang out, they’d start their stopwatches.

Revolvers with fitted microphones are still in use. The bang delivers a pulse along a wire connected to the gun which then triggers the electronic timing.

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TEXT:

1929

FIRING LINE

Guns don’t start races, bangs and flashes do

LIGHTSPEED

Spectators will have to be wary of what they see and hear. A quick blast of light mimics the muzzle flash of old

DIGITAL RECORDING Instead of producing a bang via blanks, the sound from the e-Gun is programmable to suit its surroundings

OUT OF HARM’S WAY

WORDS: ROBERT SPERL. PHOTOGRAPHY: GIAN PAUL LOZZA, OMEGA (2)

Electronics instead of blanks and plastic replacing metal…

Starting pistols now resemble gas lighters more than weapons

2012

OMEGA E-GUN STARTING PISTOL

Nothing’s changed from the starter’s point of view: he pulls the trigger and the clock at the other end of the connecting cable starts running. Thanks to the modern technology used, the new starting pistol is perhaps a touch more accurate than the old revolver, but its chief advantage is the fact that it’s un-gunlike. International sport means a lot of travel, after all, and getting the old timing equipment through security checks would be a logistical nightmare for officials. www.omegawatches.

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b u l l e va r d

Going far: strong arms required in the Longest Distance category

red bull paper wings final 2012

To foldly go

Elie Chemaly has tears in his eyes.

His clothes are soaked through with the champagne he just sprayed at the awards ceremony: a proper ceremony with winners’ national anthems ’n’ all.

As the new Longest Airtime world champion, Chemaly is the man of the moment. In the eight-competitor final, his plane flew for a full 10.68 seconds; no one else even came close.

This success was the result of three months’ puzzling and experimentation for the 20-year-old Lebanese. And now he’s standing, hands a-tremble, giving his first-ever interview as a champion.

“I have no idea what to say. I think my country will be proud of me.”

A couple of metres away, Poland’s Tomasz Chodryra, 26, and American Ryan Naccarato, 22, are talking technicalities. Their performances in the Aerobatics category (in which any number of planes can be used) left 20

the judges no choice but to award both the maximum 50 points for their creative performances.

Naccarato cracked his whip Wild West style as part of his choreography and had a cluster of small paper planes dancing in the air. “It’s amazing. It all went perfectly.

But Tomasz had me jittering with his incredible show too,” he reveals.

Chodryra’s performance was inspired by magic. Using only a piece of cardboard, the Pole guided a paper plane through the air for several seconds and had it circle a miniature pylon.

“Ryan and I made things interesting for the spectators,” he said.

The fourth world champion crowned today is a Czech. In the Longest Distance final, Tomas Beck, 24, threw his paper plane a distance of 50.37m.

“What counts is the plane and your technique,” he says. “Other than that, you need luck. One false move when

you launch the plane and it can come crashing to the ground or land outside the permitted area.”

Will he take part next year?

“Of course! These were two of the best days of my life,” he smiles, and heads off to the after-show party. www.redbullpaperwings.com

Champagne shower: the Aerobatics winners

Words: manuel kurzmann. Photography: Sebastian Marko/Red Bull Content Pool

Paper planes are for classrooms, right? Wrong, as competitors from around the world proved in Salzburg’s Hangar-7 with their amazing A4 artistry

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B U L L E VA R D

LUCKY NUMBERS

MYSTERY FIGURES

2012 is playing number games, what with three Friday-the-thirteenths and the world definitely scheduled to end yet again. Here are those, and other, devilish digits decoded

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Illuminatus

In 1202, the Italian mathematician Fibonacci published a maths book that, among many things, looked at a way of calculating a growing rabbit population. His solution used a sequence of numbers in which each was the sum of the two preceding it: 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, etc. But what he hadn’t realised was nature’s fondness for the pattern: it’s found in flower petal distribution, tree branch sequencing and the shells of some sea creatures. The further along the sequence you go, the closer the ratio between two adjacent numbers gets to 1.618, also known as the Golden Ratio.

Airlines don’t have seats between rows 12 and 14, Hilton and Marriott hotels often have no 13th floor, and on a quarter of British streets you’d be wasting your time looking for number 13. The world is gripped by triskaidekaphobia, the fear of the baker’s dozen, which is felt most starkly when the 13th of a month falls on a Friday. The number and day are said to wield a magic power for bad luck, and yet the dramatic Apollo 13 mission didn’t end in disaster and in Holland, there are fewer accidents on Friday 13 because people are extra careful.

Nostradamus

2012

Fibonacci’s rabbit

The next date for the end of the world is December 21 this year. Nostradamus expected “the great King of Terror to come from the sky” in 1999. Five hundred years ago, Martin Luther was predicting the end of the world in his own lifetime. Even some scientists have busied themselves with making doomsday predictions. An article published in the November 4, 1960 edition of American journal Science suggested that population would become infinite, and thus overwhelm the planet, on November 13, 2026 – which, of course, will be a Friday.

Aka the Sino-13, because in Chinese, the words for four and death are pronounced the same. So Asians tend to avoid the number, even in combination with other numbers: thus 14 (“certain death”) and 24 (“quick death”) are avoided where possible, such as bus routes and public information. Alfa Romeo had to be inventive back in the 1990s: the Alfa 164 (“the route to death”) was rebranded for the Chinese market as the Alfa 168 (“the route to wealth”), which really does sound quite a lot better.

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Julius Caesar died from 23 stab wounds, the figures in the date the World Trade Centre collapsed add up to 23 and, most shockingly, the Microsoft Campus in Redmond has 23 buildings. These, and many many other examples show the mystic power of half of 46.

The general misapprehension of the ninth prime number is comparatively new; the world has the 1975 conspiracy theory novel The Illuminatus! Trilogy to thank for yet another reason to be afraid of something.

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Alfa 164

The Apollo 13 crew

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100

Why is Google called Google? In 1940, in Mathematics And The Imagination, which he co-wrote, mathematician Edward Kasner explained that his nine-year-old nephew came up with the name ‘googol’ to define the number comprising one followed by 100 noughts. The internet company was named 57 years later following a misspelling of this massive digit, when the company founders wanted a name to reflect the potential vastness of their search engine.

WORDS: ARKADIUSZ PIĄTEK. PHOTOGRAPHY: GETTY IMAGES (2), PICTUREDESK.COM, AUTO BILD, CORBIS

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1,618

JHB 36500

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Voodoo

style

The Ghetto Biennale exhibits art where it’s made: on the streets and in the shanties of Port au Prince.

Haitian sculptors and 40 overseas artists transform parts of the city into a flourishing festival site Words: Florian Obkircher Photography: Benjamin Lowy

Art attracts experts from all over the world. Marla C Burns (middle), director of Los Angeles’ Fowler Museum says: “It’s fascinating how the situation in Haiti is reflected in the works. And how the idea of recycling has been extended to turn rubbish into art.”

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Cans, tyres, bits of wood, computer circuit boards: the Grand Rue sculptors make art out of everyday used objects 25

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T

he heat is oppressive. It’s noisy, dusty and stinks of diesel. Mopeds weave past brightly painted buses. Traders peddle cheap goods on the seafront. There are mechanics welding, tyres being piled up, women balancing vats of water. Lunchtime on the Grand Rue, the heaving main thoroughfare in Port au Prince.

At the southern end of the street, an eightmetre metallic colossus soars skywards from among semi-dilapidated houses. The body is made from the chassis of an old lorry; the head was once an old oil tank. The statue is from the studio of André Eugène, head of artists’ colony Atis Rezistans: The Sculptors of Grand Rue. The ‘Rezistans’ refers to their will to get on, stick together and not be beaten by the catastrophes that have befallen Haiti. Eugène and his colleagues work on sculptures made from car parts, bits of wood, dolls’ heads and human skulls. It’s art from waste, imbued with voodoo symbolism. The sculptures stand tall in backyards, on rooftops and in the shacks themselves, lending the area a morbid charm.

Its allure has captivated the international art world and Grand Rue sculptors regularly exhibit in London and Miami. Last year they were invited to the Venice Biennale. And once every two years they put on a huge show of their own: the Ghetto Biennale.

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During the Ghetto Bienniale, this rabbit-warren shanty town in Haiti is transformed into an open-air museum where overseas artists work and exhibit alongside local sculptors

Allison Rowe

is one of 40 artists to have been invited to the Ghetto Biennale.

At the first festival in 2009, the Canadian unravelled a huge ball of wool at the coastal strip in Port au Prince to show how high the water level would rise as a result of global warming. This time she’s collected donations, but not for the local population. Instead: what would Haitians give the West?

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The Ghetto Biennale gives new grounds for self-confidence. “When people come from all over the world to see our work,” one artist says, “that gives young people the motivation to follow the same path” 28

Leah Gordon

, a photographer from London (middle) and André Eugène (bottom) founded the Ghetto Biennale. The Frost Art Museum in Miami invited some of the Grand Rue sculptors to an exhibition in 2004, but the artists weren’t given entry visas to the US. So Eugène thought: “If we can’t travel to the Biennale, we’ll get the art world to come to Haiti.”

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Leonce Love (above) is 15. He’s wanted to be an artist for as long as he can remember. Like many of his friends, he learned his craft from André Eugène. Every day after school he holes himself up in a cluttered concrete workshop and works with tools he has made himself. He’s particularly proud of this piece (below): a voodoo priestess – or ‘Mambo’ – seeking enlightenment.

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Jean Hérard Celeur, 46 (below), is the father of the Grand Rue movement. He began collecting battered car tyres to recycle for use in his artworks in 1998. “My art always has a strong social angle,” he says. For one of his pieces (above), he made a collage using high heels, sandals and rubber boots – relief supplies from the West that are utterly useless in Haiti.

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“I used to want to be a footballer,” says Eugène. “We were disappointed when our playing fields were turned into a car dump.

But we discovered a new passion: making art out of the car parts”

Art meets the everyday

while voodoo priestesses sacrifice a pig during a ritual (right), the Fungus artists’ collective fills the holes in the walls of houses with colourful cubes and patches up destroyed facades with neon sticky tape (far right).

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The first Ghetto Biennale was held in December 2009,

just three weeks before the huge earthquake. Many of the houses that collapsed are yet to be rebuilt, their inhabitants are still living in nearby tent villages. The first to move back into their homes were the artists, a gesture to show that life goes on.

www.ghettobiennale.com

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Four s spent yearsHe’ the time ago,since the Travisblurring lines of Barkermusical was ongenres, reuniting lifewith his popsupportpunk band Blink-182, in aand Georgiacovering his body in ever hospitalmore ink.

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The drummer talks about family, touring, and a Muppet genius Words: Steve Appleford Photography: Lauren Dukoff

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A fan of ink all his life, Barker has reached the point where he falls asleep in the tattoo chair

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ravis Barker has a serious addiction, and anyone can see the markings all over his body – splashes of ink in the shapes of girls and car insignias and chequered flags. He has tattoos dedicated to his bands and to missing friends and family, his kids and ex-wife, and new ones on his skull of the Virgin Mary and the words “One Life, One Chance”.

Getting inked is something the Blink-182 drummer does to relax. He even does it while napping, during his few moments of downtime between surgeries or tours or side projects with DJs and rappers and hardcore punks, from Steve Aoki and Yelawolf to the high-octane Transplants (co-founded with Rancid’s Tim Armstrong). He’s mostly recovered from the 2008 plane crash that killed four people and left him and his close friend Adam Goldstein [DJ AM] in critical condition, and just days after getting his tonsils removed, he already looks ready for action as he sits in the control room of the Los Angeles studio he owns with Blink’s Mark Hoppus. The studio is a darkened, low-slung warren of rooms with drum kits here and there, framed tour posters waiting to be hung, and the kind of clutter one would expect from a place that’s well trafficked. Barker is here every day, right after dropping the kids off at school.

After travelling to Europe by boat, Barker and Blink are currently headlining a slew of festivals on the old continent.

But being the drummer in a hugely popular, platinum pop-punk band is not nearly enough these days. Barker is a man of many genres and appetites, sponsoring extreme fighters and running his 13-year-old clothing company, Famous Stars and Straps.

He’s also finishing up a new Transplants album and a series of EPs mixing his live drums with EDM and hip-hop.

A few days a week he trains hard in multiple fighting techniques. It keeps him fit and ready for trouble. “It’s important to know, man,” he tells The Red Bulletin. “Life’s crazy. You never know what you’re going to be served with.”

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the red bulletin: Your band just wrapped a US tour and is about to embark on a European tour for the summer festival season. Do you like playing festivals? travis barker: I really enjoyed our last trip to Europe. It was crazy playing for 200,000 people. It’s insane. You don’t have festivals like that in the States.

Rock is alive and kicking ass in Europe.

It’s bigger than ever. It’s like the ocean – you can see people for days. When we headlined in Leeds, it was crazy. You can’t prepare yourself for that.

What’s it like to face that many people?

It’s like you’re getting ready for a fight.

I lock myself in my room, warm myself up for an hour and go out there and do the damn thing. I always play like I could die out there and give it my all. And there’s only three of us up there – it’s an awesome feeling.

Do you do anything different when it’s a gigantic crowd?

There’s no way to rock harder because there’s 200,000 more people there. You just give it your 200 per cent.

I sometimes wonder what it was like to see a band like the Stones in the ’60s or ’70s, in a gigantic place, but without even video screens.

I love that. I wish it would stay like that. I wish there was no such thing as production, honestly. [Laughs.] It puts everyone on an even playing field. You just got to go out and rock.

No 2Pac hologram.

[Laughs.] It’s a trip what it’s coming to.

Now all kinds of acts are announcing that they’re bringing dead people back

He shuts himself in the studio for hours on end: “You have to tell me not to come here.”

“It’s like you’re getting ready for a fight”

with holograms to tour, including Michael Jackson.

I don’t think that’s cool. You pay tribute once if you’re doing a benefit concert to someone, but it’s cold as ice.

You’ve been back with Blink for three years. How are fans reacting to the band these days?

This will be the big tour that supports the album in Europe. Mind you, I’m not flying, so it’s hard to say what the band could do or what its potential is, because I can’t really get everywhere. I’m contemplating getting knocked out and getting on a plane to Australia. I want to overcome that eventually. When I do, I think it’s going to be Australia. I trust Qantas. They never had a crash, never had a fatality – knock on wood. It’s something I want to overcome for me – and my kids are scared to death to fly.

I want them to witness me overcome it.

There are other artists, like Lenny Kravitz, who don’t like to fly but make it work.

I heard Lenny will do the big flight over there, and then he just won’t fly domestically. I would do the same thing in Australia. I’ve got to get over it, man.

I could simply say I’m not going to fly for the rest of my life. I’m not going to.

It’s something I honestly want to try to put behind me.

So you travel across the Atlantic by ocean liner. Have you learned to embrace it?

I had a good experience last time – the six-day cruise. On the way back, I took a 12-day cruise and we hit huge waves and 170mph winds. It was nasty. You’ve just got to tough it out.

What do you do during those six days or 12 days?

I work out. I brought a drum kit and 37

ADDITIONAL PHOTOGRAPHY: GETTY IMAGES

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I played every day. By the time I got to Europe, my chops were up and I felt better than I had in a long time.

Who else is on board when you’re on a cruise?

All old people. I’m like 100 years younger than everyone on there. That’s one good thing – if anything happens, I’m making my way to the lifeboat before anybody.

Does anyone complain about the drummer practising on the boat?

Old people will travel around the boat and just roam. So sometimes I’d be practising – and I have my eyes closed – and when I opened up my eyes, there were about six old people just sitting there watching me. It was the trippiest thing ever.

Your laptop has a sticker that says, “Drum machines have no soul.”

Is that your motto?

I kind of contradict that, because I love programming too, but I’ll never program something that doesn’t have live drums on top of it. Live drums add a sense of feeling like something’s alive and moving.

Having live drums on a Steve Aoki highenergy dubstep record is crazy.

Was it an easy fit when you first started working with DJs? I never heard of a live drummer and DJ playing together, ever. I came to AM [DJ Adam Goldstein, Barker’s fellow survivor in the plane crash, who died of a drug overdose in 2009] when Blink had broken up and said, “Let’s do something, man. Lets kick a new f***in’ door down.” We didn’t know what we were going to do. He brought his turntables, I brought my drum kit, and we just jammed. Are a DJ and a drummer supposed to jam? We did, and it was the most fun I’d had in forever.

For a long time, there were walls between the genres.

I love those lines being blurred. It has to be. That’s the future.

You work with a lot of different people.

Do they have anything in common?

I like them all to be different. That’s what I find to be most refreshing. Making just one type of music, I think you’d get burned, and you’d run out of ideas. We just finished a Transplants album. It’s a swift kick to the face. It’s more rooted in hardcore than any Transplants ever has been. I love making music like that.

Going from that – to last night I was in the studio with [rapper] French Montana.

It’s a whole other world. It’s just fun to have a true change of pace.

Were you always like that?

As soon as I got the opportunity. At the beginning of Blink, I got asked to be in

After dizzying success in the late ’90s and early 2000s, Blink-182 members Barker, Tom DeLonge, and Mark Hoppus (above) went on hiatus for four years in 2005

“Even in the worst parts, Blink does not fight” a Puffy video [Bad Boy for Life]. And the next week I went into the studio with will.i.am and played some beats – that was so fun, so cool to just go in there and play my drums in a different way.

People were going to rap over it.

Since then, you always seem to be working on something else when Blink isn’t in action.

It used to be I’d come home from tour and I might not play my drums for months at a time. I sort of hated it, and I felt like something was missing. Then once we bought this place, it changed everything – I got to do what I love full-time. If anything, I have to remind myself, Trav, you don’t need to be at the studio all the time. Go home and chill out. Especially lately with some of the medical crap I’ve been dealing with.

I had to put the brakes on. But you have to tell me not to come here. I want to make something or practise.

You just had your tonsils out?

About 12 weeks ago, I had an endoscopy, where they put the camera down your throat. They found that I had six ulcers, and I had a condition called Barrett’s oesophagus, which is basically from really extreme acid reflux or if you excessively smoked, your oesophagus lining becomes pre-cancerous. Right then and there,

I changed my whole life around. I had to stop eating and drinking certain things. And I had this lump in my throat around the same time. My tonsils were three to four times the size they should have been. So eight days ago they yanked my tonsils and my adenoids out.

So this is unrelated to the other medical problems you’ve had from the crash?

I didn’t know I was extremely acidic.

I don’t know if a lot of people know about Barrett’s oesophagus. It’s irreversible, which is what sucks. For me it was an awakening. I was already really healthy.

I was already a vegan. I would mess up and smoke from time to time, but I’m happy to say I’m three months completely sober and I plan on staying that way the rest of my life.

Did you have to stop drinking because of this?

I was never a drinker. But, no, I can’t have any alcohol. If I had a cigarette or smoked something, it would be the stupidest thing I could do. I had to give up coffee, which is something I love. But, man, I’d rather be alive than drink some coffee.

Duff McKagan of Guns N’ Roses basically got the same kind of warning: If you have another drink you will die.

And he just stopped.

Me too. I used to love smoking weed.

Especially after my accident, I got off my 19 bipolar medicines and all the stuff they said I’d be on for the rest of my life, and I would smoke weed at night if I had anxiety. I always thought I’d be able to do that for the rest of my life, but when your health is on the line, you don’t f*** around. I love being a dad and I love playing music – I’m not trying to give up any of that.

You also haven’t given up the tattoos.

You’ve got some new ones …

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After surgeries, I wouldn’t be able to do much, so in my downtime I’m either in here building beats or I’m getting tattooed. That’s just the way that I am. If you keep me home for a year, I’m afraid to know what my body would look like.

You’re long past the point where getting a tattoo is painful?

I fall asleep. You didn’t hear a peep out of me when we finished my head. I’m addicted to tattoos. I love documenting different points in your life on your body, and I love the permanent aspect of it.

We’re all going to be dead in the dirt one day. There’s way bigger things to worry about than tattoos.

What was your first?

My first was burned off in my plane crash.

It was on my leg – my nickname, ‘Bones’.

When did you first start playing drums?

I was four. Animal on The Muppet Show started it all for me. I saw him and I was sold. I wanted to be a drummer. Then I saw Alex Van Halen, Tommy Lee, great jazz drummers like Buddy Rich. I saw Buddy Rich battle Animal – crazy stuff.

I battled Animal two months ago. I was trippin’. When this is all said and done, in 10 or 15 years, I would love to play in 40

The aftermath of the plane crash and other medical issues have changed Barker’s diet and lust for partying.

“When this is done, I’d love to just play jazz” a big-band jazz band and kick ass. I grew up playing jazz. I was in jazz band my whole life in high school and junior high.

They didn’t have Rock Band 101 in school.

I can read music, and I played jazz for six, seven years. I’d like to do that again.

You were part of that first big wave of reality TV with Meet the Barkers in 2005. How do you feel about how it’s gone on since then?

I’m glad I did it when I did, and I’m glad I got out when I did. There was no goofball scripting, telling me what to say. That was my life at the time. There were cameras 24/7. I couldn’t imagine being one of those people who do it for six seasons. That’s insane.

Did having cameras around affect your life at the time?

It was cool for the amount of time it happened, but right as we were finishing up and we were about to start another season, they wanted us to fight more.

They wanted us to not get along, and I was like, “Yo, it’s not going to work.

This is my family. You ain’t going to make the family dysfunctional for television purposes.” Then I realised my life was just as fun without cameras.

Can you imagine a Some Kind of Monster documentary on Blink?

The Metallica one? It would probably be pretty entertaining, to be honest. I love Metallica – I’m sort of embarrassed for them, though. Every relationship needs its own things, but the band psychiatrist was a couple notches too much for me.

And with Blink, I can honestly say, even in the worst, worst parts, Blink does not fight. You’re not going to catch me knocking Tom [DeLonge] out. You’re not going to catch Mark [Hoppus] and Tom yelling at each other. It doesn’t happen.

It’s actually so functional that it’s weird that it ever went south. Blink is pretty damn healthy, and it’s still pretty damn funny and crazy and wild. We see each other and we give each other hugs, and I have to stop Tom from grabbing my ass or doing something out of line.

The Blink break-up is always described as this complete breakdown where you wouldn’t even talk to each other. Is that wrong?

It felt like that because nothing was said.

It was just over. I didn’t call Tom and go, “Man, we got to get the band back together.” Mark didn’t call me, going, “Man, we got to get the band back together.” They didn’t call each other.

Everyone just went “cool”. When we talked years later, it was like, “What the f*** did we do that for? It was never even that big of a deal.” It wasn’t a big blow-up. It’s a shame it happened, and so much time was wasted.

It took your accident to remind everyone what mattered?

It was so easy. It sucks that it was something as big as my plane crash to open everyone’s eyes, but once we were back in a room, it was all G. So even though it doesn’t yet feel like a full-time thing, it’s open-ended?

It’s like when a relationship gets back together – you ease into it. It’s never been toxic. No bitter band members. I think everyone needs some time to get really close and connect again, and to make a record in the same room. That’s key. www.blink182.com; www.redbull.com/TravisBarker

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‘Here come Keith Richards’ trousers!’

Hans-Jürgen Topf has been washing rock stars’ stage outfits for 30 years. He tells us what really works on red wine stains, and why he won’t say a word about Madonna’s leggings Words: Andreas Rottenschlager Photography: Philipp Forstner

It all began at a red traffic light in Ludwigshafen. I was 25 and working in my parents’ laundry [in south-west Germany] when Ted Nugent’s tour bus drew up beside me. I knew straight away that the driver had taken a wrong turn and I directed him to the concert venue. The tour manager gave me free tickets to say thank you. And I washed a whole case of their laundry for them in return.

When I went to give them back their clothes, he said to me, “Do the same thing for other bands!”

Meat Loaf was playing in the Eberthalle two days after that.

I went to the back stage door and said, “Hello, I wash clothes for free tickets.” And that was that. Then it was Deep Purple and The Scorpions.

They were all happy that someone relieved them of the crappy job of washing their clothes. At some point I realised, either you start going along on tour, or you end up dying Rock ’n’ roll dry-cleaner Hans-Jürgen Topf: a non-bio here in some rock music backwater. wash for McCartney, radical measures for Slipknot In 2012, my Rock ’n’ Roll Laundry is washing clothes for Batman: The The worst laundry experience ever: Musical in South America, Cirque du Soleil Slipknot [US heavy metal band] at Rock in the US and Madonna in Europe. I looked am Ring, 2005. They’d drenched their after U2 in Australia in 2011. The only overalls in artificial blood, cream and continent I’m yet to work on is Antarctica. beer, and then left them on the hot tour Artists’ laundry requires special bus. There were things living in there. All treatment. The dresser will say, “Be I had to do when I opened the plastic bag careful. These are Keith Richards’ was whistle and the clothes ran into the trousers!” These people stand next to the washing machine of their own accord. washing machine and pour the washing The best thing for getting out sauce powder in themselves. There can also be stains is washing-up liquid. Pour a small special requirements. Paul McCartney drop of white wine onto a red wine stain. and Pink will only allow their laundry to Biro stains on your sofa? Just spray some be washed with non-biological detergent.

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hairspray on them! Your sofa will be as good as new in no time.

Angus Young from AC/DC sat on my washing machine after his concert. You could have a good old chinwag about laundry with him. He wanted to know how to get grass stains out of his trousers.

Of course there’s a code of honour among clothes washers. Only a groupie knows what underwear their favourite star wears. Well, Topf knows too, but he isn’t telling.

If I find drugs in trouser pockets, I throw them away. I’m strict about that. It goes straight down the toilet.

I once found 6,000 Deutsch Marks in a tour manager’s jeans. I returned them and was given a free T-shirt.

There are winners and losers in rock ’n’ roll. You see bands that make it big and artists who go broke.

But everyone feels that they’re part of a community, especially us roadies.

We sleep in places that most people would find claustrophobic. We usually work 35 hours on the trot and can still find the time to laugh.

We’re one big touring family.

I’d like to have worked for The Beatles.

I haven’t done Ozzy Osbourne either. The biggest band ever? Led Zeppelin. They played the music of my youth. I still have an orgasm when I hear Whole Lotta Love.

My mother was a farmer. My father was a grocer. They fled East Germany when the wall went up and opened a small laundry in Ludwigshafen. But my parents made sure that the name Topf stood for quality. I think they’d be proud of their son if they were still alive today. www.rock-n-roll-laundry.com

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Name Hans-Jürgen Topf Born October 8, 1956, Ludwigshafen, Germany Profession Founder and manager of Rock ’n’ Roll Laundry Really wanted to be A nursery worker Rock dreams Topf drums “pretty badly” The memoir The Rocking Laundry Book: Groupies, Stars & Dirty Socks

“Angus Young once sat on my washing machine and asked me how to get out grass stains”

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Red Bull Beat Battle… eight different dance crews representing the cream of SA’s urban dance genres from hip-hop and pantsula, to b-boy and sbhujwa faced off in a packed-to-the-rafters night at Bassline in Jozi. There could be only one winner…

Words: Steve Smith

W O N K T H EY THEYCAN Cape Town B-Boy crew Ninja Turtles looked like real favourites... until they came up against Reptilez in the semis

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CE N DA Photography: Craig Kolesky/Red Bull Content Pool

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ooting for the little guy... it feels good, doesn’t it? Righteous even. Odds are the neutrals among us inevitably support the underdog when moved to make a choice.

And Hlaks would almost certainly have moved you. At the 2012 Red Bull Beat Battle, this pantsula dance crew from Orange Farm township were up against it on every level.

In terms of urban street dance, pantsula is about as old school as it gets.

Born in the townships, this uniquely South African dance form had its heyday back in the ’80s. With kwaito music as a backtrack, pantsula was the expressive dance that accompanied the social and political rebellion beginning to change our society. It’s a quick, bouncy style with blurred, flicky foot movements and synchronised handclaps. A tap-dancingmeets-riverdance-on-speed-meetstraditional-African-dance is probably the best description for Westernised sensibilities.

Their personal circumstances are not easy either. Orange Farm is one of the poorer South African townships.

What essentially began as a squatter camp for workers evicted from a nearby farm has, two decades later, grown into a sprawl of iron shacks home to well over a million people. It’s the country’s largest informal settlement and, as vibrant and industrious as this closeknit community is, life here remains hard.

And finally that ‘little guy’ descriptor is not just a figure of speech. They actually are little. Dancers Nkosana Mlauzi, Colin Radebe and Thabang Motaung are slight men. They’re skinny and not taller than 1.6m.

Unlike the Reptilez.

These guys are big. Both in stature and attitude. A hip-hop crew out of the comfortable suburb of Edenvale, the four-man outfit are tall and muscular. At

least three of them are. One is a bit smaller. He goes by the name of Mini.

Long-time friends who have been living, hanging out, and dancing with each other for the past seven years, Reptilez are one of the favourites to win Red Bull Beat Battle.

They are the epitome of a successful, bangon-trend urban dance crew. It’s what they do for a living. Sprkz, Cobrah, Nicholas and Mini bring a level of professionalism and application to the party the likes of Hlaks are unable to match. In their hip-hopinflected accents, they say things like “… working on our marketing skills and “… developing Reptilez as a brand”.

“We have our style and flavour,” says Nicholas Thebe. “When you dance hip-

“…The Hlaks crew actually are little…”

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hop you have your regular popping and locking, but in Reptilez we try to do it in our own style. We don’t do it by the book, because we don’t believe there is a book that says when you pop you should pop like this or that. Our moves are beautiful.

It’s creative, it’s in-synch and its clean.”

Sitting around after a rehearsal a few days before the competition, Reptilez are quietly confident. They look like a tight unit. And they already boast a competition victory over defending Red Bull Beat Battle champs Artistic Intelligence. Another hip-hop crew out of Jozi, Artistic Intelligence have a host of titles under the belt and have been sharpening their skills with a nationwide tour to promote Beat Battle in the months leading up to the event. The last time they lost though, was to Reptilez at the Vuzu TV channel’s Master’s Of Rhythm dance-off.

And Reptilez are again clearly in it to win

Photography: Tyrone Bradley/Red Bull Content Pool (4)

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Little men with big ambitions Thabang Motaung, Colin Radebe and Nkosana Mlauzi of pantsula crew Hlkas prepare for their opening battle. Where others may have written off pantsula as ‘old school’, Hlaks refuse to let the flame burn out. The fact that these guys have been dancing together since 1998 shows in their precise and synchronised routines

“…in Reptilez we try to do it in our own style…”

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V.I.N.T.A.G.E. were definitely in vogue Retro ’80s style was where it’s at for V.I.N.T.A.G.E. The surprise package of the competition with an own-the-dance-floor sassiness, they caused a major upset on the way to the finals.

You’ve never seen a crew demand your attention like this six-person epitome of the word ‘original’

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it. The crew’s founder, Tshepo ‘Sprkz’ Mokone makes mention of that win over Artistic Intelligence, but it’s not a laurel they’ll be resting on. “When you think about other crews or even the money you may win, then you lose your focus.

Our main aim is to get into the final, the top two. That’s our focus.”

When pressed, however, there is one outfit that does make him a little nervous. Guess who it is…

“Yeah… Hlaks…” says Sprks with a slight grimace. “You never know with those pantsula guys. You never know what their strong moves are going to be.

With hip-hop you can kind of predict where a crew’s strengths are going to be – if it’s not their power moves, it’ll be their flips, or their creativity.

But those pantula guys… those pantsula guys are crazy.”

Which is, in fact what the word ‘Hlaks’ means. It’s township slang for ‘crazy’, though hanging out with this rather quiet and humble dance group for a few days, it’s not an adjective that immediately springs to mind. In fact they seem pretty together. “One of our secrets is that we make sure we enjoy the experience,” says their manager Sipho Letlala. “When you become too serious, you start to make mistakes. We have been serious enough… now it’s about having and delivering it in an entertaining way.

One thing that does register a tremor on the crazy scale is the sheer amount of crotch grabbing that goes on throughout Hlaks’ routines. You’d never think it judging from their quiet, unassuming personas, but as the music comes out the speakers they’re all grabbing in unison.

One had to ask why…

Turns out whatever Michael Jackson’s motivations were, the pantsula crotch grab is something else altogether. It’s actually an identifier of where they come from. You see, there are two styles of pantsula – that from the Vaal region, and that from Soweto in Joburg. The crotch grab is part of Vaal-style pantsula and actually has its origins in the need to keep one’s pants clean.

Hlaks’ dancer Thabang Motaung explains: “Orange Farm is about 60km south of Joburg and near the Vaal region.

The guys living in the Vaal area are from the Free State province and their style is to wear their pants loose and low to the floor. They would often lift up their

trousers like that so they didn’t get dirty or scuffed. And that was introduced into the dance. It’s now a signature of pantsula.”

And that’s exactly what makes judging a competition like this a tricky affair.

You’ve got eight different dance crews and a blur of different dance styles up against each other. How does one make a decision between a top hip-hop, pantsula, B-Boy, and sbhujwa crews… or an outfit like V.I.N.T.A.G.E.? These guys are really out there with a freestyling funkiness that combines just about every other dance genre from krumping to voguing.

One of the event’s four judges – B-Boy legend Vouks – explains what he is looking for.

“Technicality is one criteria – dancing to the music, catching the snare and the beat makes it all so much tighter, nicer to watch and just makes it stand out more.

Originality – crews often take stuff they have seen off the internet and execute it themselves. That’s cool and the crowd love what they see… but I know what they have appropriated and what I really appreciate is when a crew comes up with something that is their own. And then just overall impression. Working together as a crew in a competition like this is the most important thing.”

Photography: Craig Kolesky/Red Bull Content Pool

“…when you become too serious, you start to make mistakes…”

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ith all eight crews present, the draw for the big event is held the night before. The format is this: round one sees each crew perform their opening routines as a kind of warm-up and to show the judges and crowd what they’re capable of. In round two, the knock-out starts.

Round three is the semi, and round four the final head-to-head.

And that means each crew must have four routines at their disposal. Four strong ones, too. There’s strategy to be played out here. Do you show your hand with your strongest routine first to make sure you get through to the later rounds?

Or do save your best for last and build energy and momentum?

Hlaks are straight up with their gameplan. “It’s a knock-out competition,” says Sipho, “so that means it’s not a matter of saving the best until last. You have to apply your best routine to get you through into the next round. It doesn’t 49

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matter who we’re up against or what style that crew may bring, we will stick to our strategy. Our only hope is that we are not drawn against the other pantsula crew in the early rounds. That would be a pity that one pantsula group would get knocked out so early.”

Hlaks get their wish. It’s not fellow pantsula purveyors Real Action Juniors they’re up against in the round two knock-out…. but Reptilez. And after the slick hip-hop crew’s smoking opening salvo in round one, Hlaks might well have wished otherwise.

The pantsula trio even look a little shell-shocked when they trot out to take on Reptilez. Wearing their signature blue and white colours – “Our image is sky blue. It represents the sky and nature” – Hlaks’ Nkosana, Colin, and Thabang look more young sailor cadets than anything else. Reptilez, on the other hand, are all in black. It’s an intimidating leatherjacket-jeans-Wayfarers-and-cap NWA vibe. And true to the origins of their name – “It’s the way a snake makes its kill. Fast and clean” – Reptilez take Hlaks out in quick time.

So much for the underdog then.

O

r not. Turns out there’s been another underdog that has slipped under everybody’s radar.

V.I.N.T.A.G.E. Looking like extras out of cult ’80s US comedy/dance TV series In Living Colour – the one that gave Jim Carrey his big up – V.I.N.T.A.G.E are an outrageously camp blend of Like A Virgin-era Madonna, Fresh Prince-era Will Smith, and every artificial lumo colour ever concocted. Turns out they can dance too. Amping it up in every round, V.I.N.T.A.G.E cause a massive upset by voguing, krumping and bootie-shaking reigning champs Artistic Intelligence right off the stage in the semi-finals.

“They are definitely not what I expected,” says judge Vouks after the semi. “V.I.N.T.A.G.E really stepped it up. They raised the bar for everybody that came after them. That was a proper battle – they had the attitude and energy from the beginning to end.”

Still, the final is clearly going to be their biggest test. They’ll be up against Reptilez. Having disposed of energetic Cape Town B-Boy crew, Ninja Turtles, in their semi, Reptilez have brought their A-game to Beat Battle. “One more to go,” says a scarily focused Tshepo. “We just have to keep up that energy. And just enjoy it. That’s all we have to do now to

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Winners from the beginning The smart money – and the crowd support – was definitely with Jozi hip-hop outfit, Reptilez. “Everything on point,” says Nicholas Thebe. “We look like one person on stage.

Everything about us is clean”

win this competition. We’re up against a very good dance group in V.I.N.T.A.G.E though. They’ve got energy and those tight voguing moves. We just have to focus on what we know and deliver.”

In the end it all comes down to strategy. V.I.N.T.A.G.E get theirs wrong.

Reptilez don’t. The voguers have used up their crowd-pleasing routines in the

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preceding rounds and in the final their remaining routine lacks the energy of their previous efforts. It’s a beautifully executed routine, make no mistake – a flowing, free-style, almost balletic dance – but it’s not what the audience are expecting. And through the voting cards they flash, the audience counts for a collective vote.

Reptilez, on the other hand, get it right. Going second after V.I.N.T.A.G.E, it’s pretty clear they just have to execute their gameplan and the title of Red Bull Beat Battle Champions 2012 is theirs.

Through each of the rounds Reptilez have upped their game and, crucially, maintained a high energy level so vital for live performances like this. Among the precise choreography of their popping and power moves are stand-out little vignettes, like the sudden slow-motion Matrix homage, that gets roars of approval from the crowd.

Photography: Tyrone bradley/Red Bull Content Pool (4)

“…we had the crowd and we’re very grateful for that…”

Most importantly though, the four keep their heads. They remain focused, don’t miss a beat, and deliver yet another routine that has marked a relentless progression through all four rounds.

They are deserved winners.

Cue champagne spraying and the hoisting of the massive djembe drum Red Bull Beat Battle trophy.

“Look, we had the crowd and we’re very grateful for that,” says an ecstatic Sthembiso in the dancers’ chill-out area afterwards. “And then Vouks voted for us, which we were kind of counting on, but when Lorna [Lorna Maseko, SA’s ballet dancing icon] voted for us, it was like ‘OK, I think we got this!’”

Also in the chill-out area, watching from a couch in the corner is Nkosana, the youngest member of the Hlaks crew…

“Yes we are disappointed. We could see the crowd were more of a hip-hop crowd, but we gave our best. There has to be a winner and a loser. We understand that.

Pantsula is an old dance and sometimes people don’t understand it. We’ll always stick to it though. It’s our culture.” www.redbullbeatbattle.co.za

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“i HaVe

acHieVed tHe

ImpossI photography: Clive Brunskill/Cointour

by Getty Images

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noVak dJokoVic talks exclusively to The Red Bulletin

THE RED BULLETIN: Novak Djokovic, on the fourth of July last year you became the world number one tennis player.

You’re one of just 25 people who knows how that feels. Tell us about that.

NOVAK DJOKOVIC: You know, you don’t wake up every morning and say, hey, you’re such a great guy, you’re the world number one. It’s more a, let’s say, deep satisfaction. You live your life knowing that you have turned the greatest dream of your life into reality.

I’m living the dream that I had since I was four years old.

Just as other kids want to become engine drivers or astronauts, you wanted to be the number one in the tennis world rankings... at the age of four?

Yes. But it wasn’t just a dream. Back then I understood the number one as a goal. As

something that you have to work towards.

You chose probably the most inopportune time for your mission: when you were 18, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal began their period of domination like no other pair before. From the 28 Grand Slam tournaments from 2004 to 2010, Federer won 15 and Nadal 10...

That makes the satisfaction all the more. I’m aware that nobody believed it would be possible to outperform Roger and Rafa – in this respect, I have achieved the impossible.

Let’s look more closely how it came to this power takeover. Going back four, five years: you’re 20, a muchpublicised newcomer, the youngest player in the top 10. You want to go to the top – but up there are two of the greatest athletes known in the sporting

phOTOGRAphY: CLIVe BRUNSKILL/CONTOUR/GeTTY IMAGeS

Novak Djokovic’s path to the top of the tennis world was as extraordinary as it was onerous: his first trainer was a woman who not only taught him to play tennis but also introduced him to classical music and poetic art. During bombing raids in the Balkan war, he spent his nights in the air-raid shelter and his days on the tennis court. As the youngest player in the top 10 of the world rankings, he reinvented himself as a tennis player – in order to challenge the seemingly indomitable Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal.

Jörg Allmeroth, one of the most highly acclaimed international tennis journalists, had the following conversation with Djokovic in Dubai and Monte Carlo for The Red Bulletin.

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Djokovic in full flight at Key Biscayne. He’s seen as the fittest player on the tour

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How do you cast off the respect you feel for Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal?

It didn’t happen overnight. It was a process. And it was hard. I realised I was at a point where I had to fundamentally change professionally if I was going to get to the very top I trained harder, but above all much more focused than before. I restructured my season. And I totally changed my eating habits. Thanks to a gluten-free diet I became physically more stable – and that of course gave my game a totally new constancy. Simply because I suddenly didn’t have to fight infections anymore that had constantly forced me to pull out of major tournaments.

You also relinquished your role as the clown of the tennis circus. In your earlier professional years you were very successful in your imitations of Maria Sharapova, Rafael Nadal, Andy Roddick and others. Where has the Novak Djokovic gone to whom they gave the nickname, ‘The Djoker’?

At a certain point the whole thing became

a bit forced. I travelled to a tournament and sooner or later some commentator or announcer would come and say, do Nadal, or do Sharapova for us. I thought to myself then, it’s time to stop.

Shouldn’t tennis be fun too?

Don’t worry, I’m still the same guy as before, anything but dead serious. To shoot a crazy commercial, or joke around with friends, that’s still very much a part of me. But the jokes shouldn’t be at the expense of others.

For years it was regarded as stateof-the-art to play with a poker face – deeply immersed in concentration, no emotion, on no account show feelings. But that’s completely different with you.

It’s good that way. Tennis isn’t a poker

photography: Getty Images

world. And you lose major matches against the two. Soul destroying?

And how! You probably remember what I stated as my goals back then: to win Grand Slams and become the number one. Be honest, did you believe me?

Um… not many believed it.

Which was also warranted. I know I said I wanted to go to the top and claim Grand Slam titles, but I didn’t really believe it myself. When I went out to face Roger and Rafa on the court I didn’t have the 100 per cent, the complete and total conviction that I could actually succeed.

My respect for them was simply too great.

How do you cast off respect for Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal?

It didn’t happen from one day to the next, it was a process. And it was tough.

I recognised that I had reached a point where I must radically change myself as a professional if I really wanted to get to the top.

As a 20-year-old, as the youngest world-class player, you wanted to throw everything overboard that had brought you so far?

There was no alternative. I wanted to beat Roger and Rafa, and not just anybody.

Over the next years I more or less changed everything. I knew that success in modern tennis is not a one-man show – and so I put a team of trainer, physiotherapist, nutritionist, fitness coach around me.

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game for me. Everyone can see and feel my emotions, and anyone who wants to can share in what I’m experiencing at any given moment. That’s part of my character and I find that belongs to our job: we also have to give the people a good show. We have to inspire and carry them with us.

Do you believe that men’s tennis in the year 2012 is exciting enough?

I think we’re doing a pretty good job.

There are complaints of a little monotony in the names at the top: the major victories go predominantly to you, Nadal, Federer and Murray.

Doesn’t that make it all the more fascinating? It’s crazy that we stay so consistent at the top. Especially when you see how strong the first 100, even 200 players are today. They are all unbelievably good, technically and athletically. There’s not one single game in the year where you might be able to say I’m 80, 90 per cent sure I’m going to win that too. If you are not prepared to go to the limit every day then you’ll lose. Guaranteed.

And so how do you explain your winning streak last year? You’ve had 70 wins from 76 matches played and 10 tournament victories, including three of the four Grand Slams Hmm… It’s beyond explanation. At some point I even asked myself: is this a dream or is it really true? It was a headrush, an almost surreal time. Like floating on a cloud.

According to many experts, your greatest victory is not one from your 2011 season but the one from last January, in the six-hour final of the Australian Open against Rafael Nadal.

Do you agree?

The fans sure get a good run for their money these days, don’t they? [Laughs].

At some point during the match I felt that something special was happening, that this would be match I’d remember for the rest of my life. I had never had such thoughts before. And in the fifth set, crazy, I had the feeling for the first time in my life that I wasn’t on the planet anymore, I was in my very own world.

That was an unbelievable experience, as if in a trance.

What do you normally think about during a game?

Perhaps it sounds boring, but I think about the same stuff that all the junior players are spoon-fed: think only about the next point. Only on winning that next point.

Do you in fact notice anything other than the actual duel during

a major match? Or do you play with tunnel vision?

It’s not as if your senses are totally shut off. On the contrary. I draw in the atmosphere, the background noise. It gives me motivation and inspiration.

But once the ball is in play you forget all about the world around you.

Do you still feel pressure or anxiety on the court today?

Why the negative undertone in the question? Pressure is a privilege! There is no better proof than pressure to show that I’m in a great match and chasing a major goal. I find pressure pushes me more than it holds me. Without the stage fright there isn’t top performance. When everything leaves you cold you know it’s over.

Is it this fire that makes the difference between a good player and an outstanding one?

In big matches it’s not about who hits the ball better – we can all play tennis.

And we are all physically fit. The decisive word is ‘momentum’. That’s the difference. The momentum can only be on one side and you have to make sure that it’s your side it’s on.

And how do you do that?

In that you manage, over the entire duration of the match – and that could be four, five, six hours – to stay strong, patient, confident, self-assured. Don’t let yourself become frustrated, not from the good hit of an opponent, not from your own mistakes nor from the wrong decisions of the umpires. The one who manages this best has momentum on their side – and in crucial situations will then do the right thing at the right time.

Your career sounds like the stuff of a great Hollywood script: from

What do you normally think about during a match?

It might sound boring, but exactly what we always say to up-and-coming players. Only think of the next point and how to win it Balkan war child to the top of the tennis world... an almost kitschy plot, don’t you think?

It’s a miracle, the whole story is a fairy tale. Absolutely. I could have failed a thousand times.

How important was it for your career that you came from Serbia, a country which has been at war with half the world? Did that release a particular energy?

I’m not a Serbian avenging angel who has set out to conquer the tennis world.

But to be Serbian is not only personally important to you, but it was also part of your motivation, was it not?

My push was to show the world a new

Novak Djokovic with long-term girlfriend Jelena Risti. Their relationship is a contributing factor to his professional success

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face of Serbia. There was Jelena Jankovic and Ana Ivanovic who preceded me and enjoyed enormous success as pioneers.

Both managed to reach the top of world ranking in women’s tennis in 2008.

It was hugely satisfying for us all to see our country suddenly make very different headlines.

Was your hunger for success greater than that of the players from western societies because of the terrible experiences of your childhood? probably. We had more to gain. We wanted success so much more passionately than others, yes, that could be true.

How much was the war a burden on you personally? How did you cope with the air raids?

As a child you don’t really grasp the consequences. But you were frightened when the sirens screamed and we had to run into my grandfather’s cellar at night.

That went on for a couple of weeks.

It is well known that you trained even during the time of the bombing: nights in the air-raid shelter, days on the tennis court. Unimaginable... …but true. I continued to play tennis during this time. In fact more than usual because school was cancelled.

Serbia’s President, Boris Tadic, calls you today the “best ambassador of Serbia ever”. You even travel around the world with a red diplomatic passport?

Yes, and I have to admit that little gem has its advantages. I can now sidestep the long queues at customs [laughs].

Why don’t you live in your mother country that means so much to you?

Because it would be practically impossible. At every turn there’d be an incredible ballyhoo, without a moment’s peace. The hype in Serbia is great on the one hand, I enjoy the recognition and popularity and affection, but it’s also overwhelming.

Every so often you still visit your discoverer and first promoter, Jelena Gencic. There’s a BBC documentary in which touching images are shown: the Wimbledon winner proudly presents the trophy to his first trainer. In this clip you somehow seem more like a tennis student than a world star.

For me, Jelena will always be a person who commands respect. The moment you’re talking about was incredibly emotional: I brought her a replica of the trophy we had both always dreamed of. Without Jelena I would never have become the tennis player I am today.

She was the first to believe in me and I was only five years old! She told my 56

How mucH of a factor Has it been in your career tHat you come from serbia, a country tHat Half tHe world Has waged war against?

I’m not some serbIan angel of vengeance who’s come to take over the tennIs world parents I was a ‘golden child’ and that they should absolutely support me and make sure I stick with tennis. The most valuable tips of my career all came from her.

Do you remember any specific tips?

A thousand things. For instance, she always said that quality comes before quantity when training. For her it was more about what and how you trained, not about how much.

Ms Gencic also insisted on you learning classical music, poetry and foreign languages. Why did she do that?

It was her kind of all-round pedagogical package, her educational method. And the music served as a form of relaxation after the stress of training. Actually, it still does that today. I like to listen to classical music.

Later you went from her to Munich to train under Niki Pilic, who was then a world star coach. Pilic says about you: “I have never experienced a 13or 14-year-old who was so focused.”

I didn’t want to waste time, not a minute.

After all, I was aware of the effort it had cost my parents to send me there. It was my responsibility to do everything I could to use the chance that my parents had made possible.

Were you always particularly ambitious with everything you did?

Always and everywhere. No matter what I did, whether I’m playing a game or skiing, the determination to win is a part of me.

It’s been said you’re a perfectionist – which we’ve heard is not always particularly pleasant for those who work with you.

If you want to achieve seriously big goals you need such a character trait, I’m convinced of this. When you have

Quick fire Your idol as a tennis player?

Pete Sampras. …and away from the tennis court?

My parents and my former trainers like Jelena Gencic.

The person you’d most like to meet?

Michael Jordan.

Words you live by?

Be who you are.

Your best friend in tennis?

My Serbian Davis Cup team-mates Janko Tipsarevic, Viktor Troicki and Nenad Zimonjic.

How do you relax?

Yoga and golf.

Which books do you read?

Sports psychology.

Which music do you listen to?

Serbian…

Your film hero?

Robert De Niro.

If you could rule the world for one day, then...? …I’d try to create peace in the world within that one day.

The city in which you feel most comfortable?

Belgrade. And then Monte Carlo.

Your craziest tennis experience?

The Australian Open final of 2012 against Rafael Nadal.

Your greatest moment of happiness – in life and in tennis?

The birth of my two younger brothers.

And in tennis, my maiden Wimbledon victory.

What you still absolutely must achieve?

To have a family, become a father.

Your thoughts on grunting in women’s tennis?

No comment.

Which headlines would you like to read about yourself some day?

The one that says there are no more headlines about me [laughs].

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HaVe you always been ambitious in eVerytHing you’Ve done?

phOTOGRAphY: CLIVe BRUNSKILL/CONTOUR/GeTTY IMAGeS

yes, always, In everythIng, whatever It’s been. whether It was playIng some game or skIIng, It’s always been part of me to want to wIn to tackle people like Federer and Nadal as part of your profession, you can’t afford to make compromises. And you can’t find satisfaction in the small steps.

You have two younger brothers, Marko and Djordje. Both are trying to gain a foothold in professional tennis, as well. Are you more of a burden to your brothers, or a help?

They don’t have it easy. They’re watched at every turn – Marko is 20, Djordje just 16. how should they cope with being measured against the Djokovic name?

But they fight, they are trying everything to find their position in life. Whether it’s in tennis or something else. Of course I try to balance the load. I support them as well as I can – and as long as they want it.

You have some incredibly crazy and challenging years behind you. The fight to be number one, the fight for the Grand Slam titles, the fight for Davis Cup victory. Are there some days where you wake up and ask yourself, do I really have to torture myself again on the practice court?

One hundred per cent no. Absolutely not. every single day I look forward to what is awaiting me on the tennis court. My job is huge fun, in fact my whole life is huge fun.

Even walking on red carpets? How do you like the glitz and glamour part of your job?

Why shouldn’t that be fun? After all, it is recognition for my performance.

As number one, I must and should represent my sport on such occasions.

I regard it as an honour.

One last request. To someone who has never heard of you before: how would you describe Novak Djokovic to them?

Actually it’s a bit uncomfortable describing myself... but OK. his bad side? he’s sometimes jealous. And sometimes a little too emotional. The good side: he’s a communicative person. Full of energy, full of life. he openly shows his soul to the world. And he’s responsible... and kind. www.novakdjokovic.com www.redbull.com/NovakDjokovic

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CHRISTIAN HORNER

Just walking the dogs Even Formula One team bosses need occasional peace and quiet. Here’s how Red Bull Racing principal Christian Horner gets his Words: Anthony Rowlinson Photography: Desmond Muckian The charcoal is still warm from last night’s barbecue but the sun hasn’t yet fired enough rays to clear the early mists that grey the fields of Northamptonshire.

The loudest sound is the gravel-crackle underfoot on the walk to the front door of Christian Horner’s Georgian retreat – one buried so deep in the English countryside it’s hard to imagine that a noisy, globetrotting, pleased-with-itself sport called Formula One is the reason we’re here.

Horner, of course, is team principal of Red Bull Racing, the upstart Formula One team that in seven-and-a-bit intense seasons has progressed from mid-grid mediocrity to 2010-2011 world title doubles for both the team and its star driver, Sebastian Vettel.

The tantalising prize ahead, should they continue the run of success that started at the 2009 Chinese Grand Prix (a 1-2 finish for Vettel and teammate Mark Webber), is a pair of title hat-tricks – a feat achieved previously only by Michael Schumacher and Ferrari in the early noughties.

Today, though, is not really a Formula One day. Today is about a couple of hours at home, a later-than-usual breakfast, a chance to walk the dogs and feed the chickens. Not that Formula One can ever be truly absent. For example, guests at the previous evening’s barbie included members of the team.

And when he whistles in his dogs from the lawns at the back of the converted former rectory, the names of the twin West Highland Whites, Bernie and Flav, provoke amusement.

[For those readers who may not be intimately acquainted with Formula One, Bernie Ecclestone is the sport’s long-time impresario; Flavio Briatore a colourful confidante of Ecclestone’s 58

and former team boss/driver manager.]

With the hounds eagerly sniffing their master’s visitors and making sure they’re welcome, not intruders, Christian gives The Red Bulletin a quick tour of his home’s lower floor, where a handful of objects, such as a caricature model of him and Vettel (a gift from Seb, thanking the team for twice making him a world champion) remind that while Horner may appear quite the country gent, his day job is the antithesis of pastoral.

“It’s important to be able to get away from Formula One and not become obsessive about it,” he reflects as we step outside towards the barns where his chickens are kept, passing his cherished, cherry-red vintage Massey Ferguson tractor along the way.

“Formula One is such an intense industry and sport that it can consume your life and if you don’t manage to have periods of downtime or switch off, you can’t operate at 100 per cent,” he says. “You can’t do that 100 per cent of the time and that’s why it’s important to have a bit of release that just takes your mind off things.”

We’re watching Christian’s partner, Beverley, feed the chickens as we chat and it’s safe to say that right now he’s enjoying just such “a bit of release”.

He takes delight in pointing out the two cockerels – standing tall amid the clucky brood. And he’s swiftly on to an explanation of the 500-year-old dovecote, elsewhere in the grounds, that now serves as a wood store. “They used to collect the doves’ feathers to make pillows,” he relates.

Vaulting above us are a pair of skyscraping cedars, that are somewhere around 250 years old, that provide shelter, calm and a profound aura of timeless permanence.

Here, you sense, despite being a driven (and still young, at 38) man in charge of a title-fighting F1 team, at the epicentre of a furiously restless sport, Christian Horner is at peace, in a little piece of England that remains within, wherever his work may take him. In a heartbeat at the start of this season, that meant Australia, Malaysia, China, Bahrain. By the end of the, year, F1’s busiest ever, a further 16 grands prix will have been contested, Horner at them all.

“Sometimes,” he says, “Beverley will call me when I’m wherever, with my head full of whatever is important that weekend, to tell me that some chicks have hatched, or about something funny that the dogs have done. And it gives you a certain sense of perspective. F1 is such a surreal world, that it’s very important not to become completely lost in it.”

We’re on the move, now, the three dogs in harness, taking a stroll down the lane past the nearby churchyard and on to the edge of a lake, built in the 1500s by the monks of a long-departed monastery.

Difficult to believe, amid such rural Zen, that the Silverstone race circuit, home of the British Grand Prix, is barely five miles from here (screaming motors within earshot on a still day), while Red Bull Racing HQ, in Milton Keynes, is a 25-minute cross-country blat. “At legal speeds,” Horner winks. Then: “Listen,” he says, calling for silence.

A woodpecker is making its unmistakable barkrattling sound in the near distance (nature’s own pneumatic drill) and Christian urges that we stop and look.

Even the dogs heed his command, though they seem unimpressed at the delay.

Hugo, an Airedale Terrier, chooses to take a breather and parks his hind quarters on what appears to be grass. Except: “Hugo, you have a thistle up your bottom.”

Horner’s hound is unperturbed.

“It’s so important to have a home life,” Horner continues (Hugo now more comfortably standing). “Just being able to come home in the evenings and switch off, deal with trivia and wake up the next day refreshed. It’s a source of strength.”

“Formula One is such an intense industry that it can consume your life”

www.redbullracing.com

Country life: Red Bull Racing team principal Christian Horner takes a break from Formula One with his dogs, Bernie, Flav and Hugo

o C n E m E a h L F in T

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The flip side: Freestyle motocross rider Martin Koren (CZE) at the Glen Helen Raceway, San Bernardino

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Wednesday

6.30pm

Los Angeles International Airport Into the rental car and out onto Interstate 10 where streams of cars speed east. Better keep to the speed limit. The Highway Patrol don’t mess around. The drive to Glen Helen Raceway takes just on two hours. This storied motorsport arena hosts Red Bull X-Fighters, which, for the record, is freestyle motocross – or gymnastics on a motorbike: double backflips, 360-degree spins in the saddle, jumps with 30m of air. Why Glen Helen? Because freestyle motocross was born here, dude!

Thursday

9.00am

Glen Helen Raceway Over an area as large as three football fields, quarterpipes, ramps and kickers tower out of the earth, offering more than 30 jump options, the most ever before at a Red Bull X-Fighters event. The meanest challenge is the ‘step-up’ – a 6m-high ramp that catapults riders up to an 18m dirt plateau.

Those who dare to make the leap are shot up to the seventh storey of a high-rise.

Freestyle veteran Ronnie Renner takes one look at the offroad playground and comes over all poetic: “You can draw lines here, like an artist with his brushes.”

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10.30am

First practice When Eigo Sato crashes on the back of the kicker, things go quiet around the course. His motorbike – a Yamaha YZ, 250cc – rolls on riderless for a couple of metres and tips over. Sato lies still on the ground.

After a few seconds he slowly starts to pull up his legs. He stands up carefully.

Sato, black helmet, red trousers, beats the dust off his chest. He trots to the bike, climbs stiffly onto the seat and kick-starts the engine. Then he heads off towards the pitlane. The course has just shrugged off its first rider.

Eigo Sato crashes on the back of a kicker. Things go quiet around the course

Straight up: Nick Dunne (USA) pulls a ‘Ruler’.

Right: The old master, Eigo Sato Far left: Fans enjoy the sunshine at Glen Helen Raceway – sunglasses, tattoos and hotpants are de rigeur

Additional Photography: Joerg Mitter/Red Bull Content Pool

Left: After a two-year break, Red Bull X-Fighters returns to the US, the birthplace of freestyle motocross, to be greeted in special flag-waving style

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Dany Torres

in the paddock The crashed pilot Sato sits on his camping chair, sipping tea. “When you notice something going wrong during a jump, you have two choices,” he says. “You throw the bike away or you hold onto it. I kept hold of it and that was the right decision.”

How do you know that, Eigo?

“Look at me, I’m still sitting here.”

Beneath Sato’s chin, a crescent-shaped scar runs from one side of his face to the other. A pea-sized cut next to his left eye is a reminder of another injury. At 34, the Japanese is still one of the top players. He’s the oldest athlete on tour and perhaps the toughest of all. What his damaged back doesn’t allow, Sato offsets with blood, sweat and tears.

“As preparation I visualise my rides a lot,” says Sato. When he lies in his hotel room at night, he flies over the circuit, tests out ascents, plans his next landing. Right now he fishes a piece of paper out of his trouser pocket and makes notes for his qualifying run. As well as a few sentences, he draws some stars – only he knows what they mean. He wants to continue riding for a couple of years. His dream is, “to do backflips until I’m 40”.

5.00pm

main grandstands Until the sun sets, riders fly back and forth over the ramps. How to master this monster of a course? The trick is to estimate flight distances, test approach speeds and to hone trick options. Everyone is in agreement, the massive step-up is still the greatest 64

“Riding in front of 40,000 fans, I can’t hear them.

Total focus” Dany Torres

risk. It dawns on several riders: this is the difference between victory and defeat. A question goes in the notebook: “How do you cope with the idea of crashing from so high up?”

Friday

10.00am

back in the paddock “This damn dust!” Dany Torres sneezes into a tissue.

In front of us sits the champion: Daniel Torres, 25, winner of the Red Bull X-Fighters World Tour of 2011. One thing immediately stands out: Torres is slight of build and looks more like a dancer than a top athlete. Before the start he listens to flamenco, preferably from his favourite group, Los Rebujitos.

Torres is famous for his ‘double grab backflip', a backwards somersault on his KTM 250 SX, during which both hands grab tight onto the supporting holes of the seat and he extends the rest of his body out the back. His career started at five when his father put a red-andwhite painted kids’ motorbike under the Christmas tree. Torres is regarded as one of the most technically accurate

11.00am

motocross course at Mount Glen Helen Anyone wanting to know more about the origins of freestyle motocross is best off talking to Monte Lee. Monte sits beside the finish jump on the motocross course of Glen Helen. Not far away, the Red Bull X-Fighters playground winds up a hill. In the corner of Monte’s mouth is a smouldering cigar end. He wears a sunhat and an eye-catching twisted moustache. Monte is 64. In Glen Helen they call him ‘The Legend’. When Monte climbed onto his first motorbike, a Triumph 650, more than 40 years ago, not one of the Red Bull X-Fighters riders had been born. Monte rode off-road and desert races, breaking several ribs in the process. “The buzz belongs to it,” he says with a husky voice. Freestyle probably originated from classic motocross, Monte explains, when riders began to improve

Levi Sherwood

Additional Photography: Joerg Mitter/Red Bull Content Pool

10.40am

riders on the Red Bull X-Fighters World Tour. When he walks into the supermarket in his hometown of Arahal, near Seville, people point at him and say, “Look, here comes El Campeón!”

Dany, how do you cope with the idea of crashing from so high up?

“Fear is a part of it. Shortly before the jump it gets really quiet inside my crash helmet. You ride in front of 40,000 people, but I can’t hear them. I’m totally focused.

The noise only returns after I’ve landed.”

Does your mother worry when you jump?

“She gets nervous before every competition.”

What do you say to her then?

“I say, ‘Relax, Mama!’”

Torres would one day like to open a freestyle school and teach children. But first he has to go out on the course. “I can defend the title,” he says and coughs. Damn dust.

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Far left: The next generation of Red Bull X-Fighters?

Niko Munoz and Ricky Negrete.

Left: support from the stands.

Below: Thomas Pagès (FRA) at work

Levi Sherwood, 20, can twist like no other rider.

They call him ‘Rubber Kid’

their jumps with tricks about 20 years ago. “We called that styling,” says Monte and takes a drag on his cigar. “At some point the boys headed into the desert towards River Side and began to make the first big ramps. What does he think of the Red Bull X-Fighters? Monte laughs his legendary laugh. “One thing is for sure, these guys have big balls.”

12.30pm

at the start ramp Dany Torres’ greatest rival wears a mullet and answers to the name ‘Rubber Kid’. Levi Sherwood, 20, can twist his body on the KTM like no other. “I’m more relaxed than the others and that makes me strong,” says the New Zealander from Palmerston 65

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Left: Glen Helen veteran Monte Lee: “The guys have big balls.”

Below: The 50cc race has a casual dress code

North. Sherwood doesn’t like flamenco.

On his iPod boom the beats of the hottest electronic music producer, Skrillex, or house music from Deadmau5. Sherwood was only 17 when he won a Red Bull X-Fighters round in Mexico City in 2009 – the youngest rider to do so. A broken wrist interrupted his career.

“Before your first crash you feel invincible” Sherwood explains. “Of course injuries make you grow up”. The mature Levi Sherwood says that, “tactics is the key to winning. I now think more long term.”

What’s the worst that can happen to a Red Bull X-Fighters rider?

“When you want to do a grab and you miss your bike in mid-air. That’s not good news.”

Levi’s girlfriend has accompanied him to Glen Helen and they look relaxed together when he lets her jump on the back of his bike and rides back to the paddock. Levi is pragmatic, “The more time I spend on my bike, the safer I feel.”

3.00pm

press tent: Surprise qualifying result Frenchman Thomas Pagès, an unconventional rider with a loud roguish laugh, wins ahead of Eigo Sato and American Todd Potter.

Pagès, who refuses to do backflips, offsets this deficit with a dream line and innovative tricks. Highlight: the so-called ‘Volt Body Varial’, a seated 360-degree spin during a jump. On the programme leaflet it says, “Degree of difficulty 10 out of 10 – the mother of all tricks.”

Saturday

12 noon

main entrance It’s the day of reckoning and the sun blazes straight down from overhead. A bird circles over the grandstands. It looks like a vulture – not surprising, since Glen Helen borders the Mojave Desert. Fifteen thousand spectators flood into the terrain and are scorched by the midday heat. The dress

Todd Potter

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code for US fans: ladies pour themselves into ultra-tight hotpants, men wear T-shirts from the freestyle brand Metal Mulisha or full-body race overalls.

Estimated percentage of tattooed visitors to the event: about 80.

4.15pm

Glen Helen Raceway Thomas Pagès and Todd Potter deliver a top-class final.

Each has 120 seconds to impress the five judges. Pagès continues with his typical style: no backflips, but mighty leaps right over the step up. Potter, with his three-day stubble under his helmet and his almond-brown eyes that drive the girls crazy, rips up the infamous step-up and down again, gaining points with backflip combinations. He makes the most of the 22km of track, thrashing his four-stroke Honda over the jumps.

It’s this fearless freeride style that the California native has perfected over the hills of his home state. The crowd cheers him on. Todd Potter is crowned

King of Glen Helen. On the podium he says: “Here you have to swallow your fear.” The press conference moderator says: “This course was Todd Potter’s wet dream.”

5.30pm

Glen Helen camping ground It’s by far the smallest ramp built this weekend: two shovel-loads of dirt, flattened with a spade, about 10cm high.

At this moment, Tyler Pham hurtles towards the bumps on his mini-Yamaha.

The urchin is just three-and-a-half years old and is dressed in full motocross gear.

He hops over the mini-kicker and almost tips over. Samy Fayad, 29, Tyler’s minder and ramp builder calls out: “Show the people how a freestyle motocrosser does it!” Little Tyler turns around, raises his left hand, extends his index and little finger and gives us the ‘rock on’ sign.

Then he turns and rides on. www.redbullxfighters.com www.redbull.com/WoodstockonWheels

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dead

man walking In Detroit, Rodriguez is a soft-spoken construction worker. In South Africa, he is a rock icon.

The film Searching for Sugar Man profiles the singer who was believed to be dead – but actually found new life through music Words: Cortney Harding Photography: Kareem Black

Swedish filmmaker Malik Bendjelloul set out to travel the globe in search of stories, the most amazing, dynamic, insightful tales the veteran documentarian could tell. He came across just what he was looking for in South Africa. Leaning across a table in the basement of the City Winery in Manhattan, only days after his film, Searching For Sugar Man, was screened at the Tribeca Film Festival, Bendjelloul says the story of the musician known as Rodriguez was “the best story I had ever heard in my life”.

In fact, the story of Rodriguez at first glance seems so fantastical that it must be fiction.

Rodriguez, whose full name is Sixto Diaz Rodriguez and who also goes by Jesus Rodriguez, was the child of Mexican immigrants living in Detroit and playing political folk music in the late ’60s and early ’70s. His tale begins as a traditional music-industry yarn – discovered by local producers when he played bars in the seedy part of town, signed to a small label for a single, signed to another small label for an album. That album, Cold Fact, was released in 1970 on Sussex Records to great hope and very little fanfare; a year later, a second album, Coming From Reality, was released and met a similar 68

fate. Both albums leaned heavily towards the political, with Rodriguez’s grizzled voice encouraging listeners to fight the powers that be, but they weren’t completely joyless, dry affairs; there were plenty of nods to carnal pleasures (including the oft-quoted and remarkably straightforward line “I wonder how many times you’ve had sex”) and the merits of experimenting with drugs.

The label dropped Rodriguez and he retreated from music, at least publicly, and went back to working in construction.

In most cases, that would be the end of the story. Unknown numbers of artists have cut albums for small labels and been rejected; almost all of them simply find other work and occasionally pull out those records to show friends and family a glimpse of a past life, the road not taken. Living in Detroit, working a blue-collar job and raising a family, Rodriguez never saw a dime from the sales of any recordings and had moved on with his life. But while he scraped and sanded, paid bills and took his daughters to school, he had no idea that on the other side of the world, Cold Fact was the soundtrack of a revolution. And those South Africans, for whom his music

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was so vital, had no idea he was living a quiet life in the States – because they all thought he was dead.

MEANWHILE, ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD The story of how Cold Fact came to South Africa has never been confirmed, but it is generally accepted that a woman from the United States brought a copy with her and burned it for some friends, who started passing it around. The album’s anti-authoritarian vibe struck a chord with white South Africans struggling with feelings of guilt and powerlessness during Apartheid, and while it was sold fairly freely in record stores, it was banned from the radio and only received airplay on pirate stations.

Cold Fact was released in South Africa on A&M Records and in Australia, where Rodriguez was also well known, on Blue Goose/RCA, but somehow the money never made it back to Detroit.

In the film, Sussex Records founder Clarence Avant, tries and ultimately fails to explain the money trail, but it might have something to do with the events that led to Sussex’s demise and the seizure of the label’s assets by the IRS. “The US label is almost sympathetic in a way,” says Bendjelloul. “I don’t think [Avant] was a bad guy on purpose. He went insolvent and there were other people involved; it was all very complicated to sort out. If I wanted to take the time and work with lawyers and track down all the old contracts, I could make a whole other film just about that.”

But the lack of money and communication from the label meant that Rodriguez had no idea he was famous overseas and thus there was no incentive to visit South Africa and tour the country.

And because no one in South Africa had ever seen him, let alone spoken to him or watched him play live, rumours began to circulate that Rodriguez was dead – after all, logic would dictate that someone who was alive would want to visit a country that so loved their music.

Not only was Rodriguez dead, according to legend, but the methods of his demise were violent, numerous, and bordering on legendary. He wasn’t felled by a common car accident or cancer; the two most cited rumours were that he killed himself on stage by setting himself on fire, or that he killed himself on stage with a shotgun blast to the head.

“People just couldn’t believe that this guy who was so famous could also be totally anonymous,” says Bendjelloul.

“We’re not talking about someone who 70

Rodriguez's recording career – consisting of the albums Cold Fact (1970) and Coming From Reality (1971 ) – sold next-to-nothing in the United States, but in South Africa his soulful, stirring songs made him a sensation

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photography: Courtesy of Rodriguez

with tears streaming down their faces, it’s as though they’re seeing a ghost.

From the mid-’90s on, Rodriguez has lived almost a double life: a superstar in South Africa and Australia, and an ordinary man in the United States.

Towards the close of the film, one of his co-workers in the construction trade reiterates that the story is almost too good to be true, that someone could play for thousands of people in another country then return home to show up to the site for another day of labour.

“I’m self-employed, so I can take off as much time as I want,” he says. If all goes according to plan, he’ll be taking more time off soon – the film will screen at several more festivals before opening in New York and Los Angeles on July 27, and there are plans for a full US tour as well as shows to coincide with additional screenings of Searching For Sugar Man. Light in the Attic Records secured the rights to both Cold Fact and Coming From Reality and re-released both in 2008, almost 40 years after they originally appeared.

just wrote songs that people liked; we’re talking about someone who really sparked a revolution.”

In this capacity, it almost makes sense that the rumours about how Rodriguez died took on violent, revolutionary airs – public suicides, even to this day, can spark movements – the Arab Spring was catalysed by a young merchant selfimmolating in a square. Add to this the fact that South Africa remained fairly disconnected from the rest of the world and the internet didn’t exist as we now know it, and the wild rumours begin to make a little more sense.

In the mid-’90s, a South African music journalist named Craig Bartholomew decided once and for all he was going to solve the mystery of how Rodriguez passed away. As detailed in the film and in his article, ‘Looking for Rodriguez’, Bartholomew began tracing leads and calling up record labels – it was only then he met with Cape Town record store owner Stephen ‘Sugar’ Segerman and was connected with a man named Richard Armstrong, of Ace Records in London.

Armstrong passed on the name of Mike Theodore, who produced Cold Fact; and it was a call to Theodore in Michigan that gave Bartholomew news he never expected to hear. Rodriguez was alive.

“NOT LOST, JUST IN DETROIT” “When I got that first call, man, I can’t really describe it,” says Rodriguez a few days after the screening at Tribeca.

Dressed in a worn dark suit and wearing sunglasses indoors, the 70-year-old singer is soft-spoken and a bit spacey – he has a Sarah Palin-like habit of answering questions with whatever he wants to talk about at that moment. After diverging for a few moments to talk about how The Rolling Stones basically invented the touring industry, he circles back to reiterate that he really, honestly, had no idea about his impact in South Africa.

Once it was discovered that Rodriguez, as he puts it, was “not lost, just in Detroit”, he flew to South Africa to play a series of concerts. As the film draws to a close, Rodriguez is playing a sold-out arena to thousands of people who had assumed for all these years that he was dead. As the audience sings along

“It’s too much of a fairy tale”

MYSTERIOUS TERRITORIES Bendjelloul thinks that there will never be another story like Rodriguez’s. “It’s too much of a fairy tale,” he says. “This all took place in the age before the internet when you really had to be a detective.”

It does seem hard to imagine that anything similar could happen in this interconnected day and age. Artists try to remain mysterious, but are often debunked by well-connected journalists and bloggers – a UK artist who called himself Burial managed to remain anonymous for a few years before he was revealed to be William Bevan, an alum of a well-known British art school.

Likewise, an anonymous blonde female singer calling herself iamamiwhoami managed to fly under the radar for a few months before being revealed as Swedish singer Jonna Lee. There are, of course, thousands of artists who remain unknown in their home countries and are stars in other territories; but in these cases, the artists know they are famous overseas and can take advantage of it, playing coffee shops in their hometown and arenas in, say, Norway.

As for Rodriguez, he’s excited that he finally can be part of the revolution he helped create – even if he didn’t know it at the time. “Music is a cultural force that brings people together,” he says.

“And I’m just happy to be a part of it.”

More info on the film at: www.sonyclassics.com/searchingforsugarman

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Photography: jay nemeth/Red Bull Stratos

How to jump Once Felix Baumgartner opens the door of his capsule, it gets serious.

Years of planning by the Red Bull Stratos science team comes down to a few calculated, vital decisions

This is Red Bull Stratos Red Bull Stratos is a mission to the edge of space, in which Felix Baumgartner will ascend to 36.6km in a helium balloon and come down to Earth in free fall, collecting useful scientific data and setting four world records:

1. Break the speed of sound unaided 2. Free fall from the highest altitude 3. Longest free fall time 4. Highest manned balloon flight The Red Bulletin is following the mission closely, each issue focusing on a specific topic. All back issues can be downloaded for the iPad.

In FEBRUARY we interviewed Felix Baumgartner (1.1) and Joe Kittinger (1.2).

in MARCH we took a look at

Baumgartner’s capsule (2.1), his cockpit (2.2), and the cameras on board (2.3).

In APRIL we looked at how the helium balloon carrying the capsule and its occupant got airborne (3.1) and how Baumgartner went about getting his licence for it (3.2).

In MAY we discussed Baumgartner’s spacesuit (4.1) and explored the colourful history of spacesuits (4.2). in juNE we spoke with Jonathan Clark, Medical Director of Red Bull Stratos, about the dangers to Baumgartner’s body (5.1) and took a sci-fi journey to Überworld (5.2).

this month we skydive with Luke Aikins (6.1), calculate if Baumgartner can go supersonic (6.2) and listen to the man himself as he tests from 22km (6.3).

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6.1 Luke in the sky

How to come down to earth again: skydiving specialist Luke Aikins on making Baumgartner’s fall from the stratosphere as safe as possible Words: Werner jessner

Jumping from the stratosphere feels “like driving a car with flat tyres”

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e jumped. pulled the reserve chute and once it opened he severed the line and trusted that the main parachute would open. The next time he jumped, he opened the drogue chute and the reserve chute together. or he leapt and began to spin on his own axis, faster and faster, until he became dizzy and the horizon turned blurry before his eyes. He did everything wrong that you can possibly do wrong – and explored every eventuality that could threaten Felix Baumgartner in his Red Bull Stratos mission.

Twenty days after the birth of his son logan, luke Aikins leaped from Mandalay Bay, one of the largest hotels in las Vegas. don’t you ever start thinking about fear and risk, luke? The giant with the broad smile shakes his strong head: “The second a strange idea enters my thoughts before a jump I’ll stop immediately.”

Aikins, 38, is a child of the skies. He grew up, literally, on Kapowsin Airfield in Kapowsin, Washington, where his grandfather founded a skydiving company, later to be taken over by his aunt and uncle. Aikins’s father is a pilot, and all his siblings fly. other families go fishing or diving. The Aikins take to the

air. At 12 years old, Aikins did his first tandem jump, but for legal reasons he had to wait until his 16th birthday to go solo for the first time.

Aikins’s skydiving logbooks, recording around 15,000 parachute jumps, fill half a bookcase. Alongside the scientists who stand behind Red Bull Stratos are true sporting professionals contributing crucial pieces of the puzzle towards the success of the project. Guys who actually trial the scientists’ and technicians’ calculations and prototypes. Aikins’s other ‘clients’ are the elite soldiers of the uS Navy SeAlS. He shows them the finer points of skydiving.

Initially, Aikins was to have no real major role in the Red Bull Stratos project. He was booked as the airborne photographer, responsible for taking shots of Baumgartner during his pressure suit familiarisation in the wind tunnel and later during the first jumps from the plane. Aikins was not at all impressed with the original design of the parachute – but he shut up and readied himself to become a flying guardian angel should Baumgartner become tangled up in the rather confusing layout.

The first test jumps in April 2009 were top secret. In California City, two helicopters waited on standby to document Baumgartner’s first leaps in the pressure suit. What’s more, a 15kg Red-Hd camera had been strapped to Aikins’s helmet so that he could film Baumgartner during the fall.

The mission was ill-fated from the outset. “It was too windy outside, which wasn’t particularly surprising,” says Aikins. “It’s no coincidence that the area around Cal City is full of windmills.”

Two helicopters and a Cineflex camera waited on the ground; the crew nervously twiddled their thumbs, Baumgartner began to feel out of sorts. It seemed jinxed. The waiting dragged on, time was running out.

So what did Aikins do? He called a friend in Taft, not 30 minutes away by helicopter, a small town whose location behind a ridge meant calmer conditions.

He spun a story to the guys at the airfield – something about filming a Red Bull commercial. Give us 500 bucks, they said, and you can come.

Baumgartner and the crew were happy: Well, lookie here: the film/photo guy solves problems just like that. The day was saved, but not quite. In the original parachute design, Baumgartner’s drogue chute also deployed and flew away when he pulled the main chute

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pHoToGRApHy: JoeRG MITTeR/Red Bull STRAToS

“i think your equipment is unsafe.

We have to rebuild the parachute system”

cord. Aikins stood in the door ready to jump and indicated to the pilot of the second helicopter not to dive immediately in case the rotors got caught up in the parachute. Thinking about the safety of a helicopter isn’t typically among the core priorities of a skydiver. But Aikins did it anyway. Then he jumped out and filmed.

For Aikins, it’s simply normal to take the initiative and fix things. Technical project director Art Thompson, lifesupport engineer Mike Todd, and Baumgartner were so impressed by the performance of the supposed cameraman that they wanted him on the team. But he hesitated. “I think your equipment is unsafe. If I should come onboard then we have to rebuild the parachute system.” originally, the drogue chute was to be fixed to the shoulders. Aikins “thought

the risk that the ropes could wrap around Felix’s neck was much too high.” While others calculated and fiddled, Aikins was up in the sky trying something out for himself. “I hooked the drogue up simple and dirty on my parachute and jumped out of a plane and just threw it in my hand. An early generation drogue chute – and it worked really good. So I sent them a video the next day.”

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erived from this and refined with input from suit handler Todd, Aikins put together a crude model for the parachute rigging. Aikins is, and he says it himself, “not a final touch guy – it’s more about ideas with me.” Those final touches were given to Kelly Farrington, founder of parachute specialists Velocity Sports. during the

many months of night and weekend shifts, he built the parachute rig that Baumgartner now uses in the Red Bull Stratos mission.

With his immense free-fall experience, Aikins can perhaps best imagine what awaits Baumgartner in his fall through the stratosphere. “during the first half a minute he won’t notice any wind. For a skydiver it’s as if you are driving a car with four flat tyres. I suspect he’ll tumble over a couple of times during the first 30 seconds. There is simply not enough air for him to work with. As soon as he feels enough air under his body, he’ll be able to assume his normal jumping position. I think way up there, Felix shouldn’t even try to prevent himself from somersaulting. Nothing you do – whether it’s flailing the arms or kicking the legs – will change the position. That’s hard for a skydiver to accept, but in an atmosphere that is so thin that a feather falls to the earth as fast as a lead weight, you can only ride it out and wait for thicker air.”

In tests for Red Bull Stratos, a metal cylinder was released from 36,576m to see how it reacted (the team dubbed this drop pod “Felix Bombgartner”). That it began to spin worried the technicians, but not skydiver Aikins: “Where there’s air that allows you to wobble, then there’s air you can work with. We can do more with air than many aerodynamicists can imagine. In 1960 when Joe Kittinger jumped, he had only completed 33 parachute jumps, Felix has done over 3,000. In 1960, the record for formation free fall was at eight people, today we’re 75

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6.2 Calculate speed Hefty discussions on the internet: can a human jump from the stratosphere and go supersonic? For a bit of clarity we asked Dr Martin Apolin of the faculty of physics in Vienna what pure physics had to say. The results are astonishing Words: Martin Apolin

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hy can Felix Baumgartner break the sound barrier in free fall when a parachutist in the head-down position can only reach about 300kph? We’ll start with the short answer. Air density is much lower at high altitude, meaning his rate of descent will be significantly higher. By contrast the speed of sound is much lower there because of the low temperatures. These two factors combine to make breaking the sound barrier possible. That’s the short answer. If you want to understand in greater detail and make calculations, you’ve got to dig into the physics.

It’s a good case study for demonstrating the problems that arise when trying to make as accurate a prediction as possible and for showing that reality is too complex to allow for precise calculations. First you have to take into account the governing factors for achieving maximum speed in free fall. Then you have to understand the two forces at work on a person in free fall.

Although my analysis does not include compressibility effects due to shocks, it yields a good first order approximation of Baumgartner’s’ performance.

The first is the force of gravity: FG = –m g, whereby g equals gravitational

acceleration and m is the mass of the person jumping and their equipment.

Baumgartner weighs in at 140kg when in his pressurised suit! As FG pulls downwards, we give it a minus sign. As the person jumping moves through the air, a decelerating force is also at play – air resistance, or drag: FD = ½ ρ v² cw A, whereby ρ is air density, cw the drag coefficient, A the flow area and v the instantaneous velocity. Thus the total force being exerted on the person jumping is Ftotal = FD + FG = ½ ρ v² cw A – mg.

For simplicity’s sake, let’s assume that gravitational acceleration remains constant. This would mean the weight was also constant. It is, of course, a different matter when it comes to air resistance. This grows proportionally with the speed squared. If the speed doubles, FD quadruples. Therefore as speed increases, so does air resistance.

So maximum speed is reached when air resistance and gravitational force balance each other out, ie when F total is equal to zero. So in this case we can set the equation for the total force to zero, solve it for v and come up with v = √ 2mg/ρ cw A. This corroborates the initial assertion.

Given the same body position and mass, all values, bar the value for air density, are constant and therefore v is proportional to √ 1/ρ . As air gets thinner the higher you go, maximum speed increases with altitude. If, as planned, Baumgartner jumps from 36,576m, he will achieve his maximum speed at just below 28,000m. If we give normal air density at sea level the notional value of 1, at this altitude ρ is only

photography: Joerg Mitter/Red Bull Stratos

at almost 500 who link hands in free fall.

An insane amount has changed in this field.”

And still, “No one has leapt from as high as Felix plans with Red Bull Stratos.

There is only one way to truly know what happens during free fall from such a height – someone has to do it.”

Aikins’s job is to investigate all eventualities, predict problems, and work on solutions. He has jumped more than 100 times with the Red Bull Stratos rig, testing every possible malfunction.

Supposing that Baumgartner jumps and the reserve chute opens accidentally: Baumgartner wouldn’t survive because he will be carrying too little oxygen to last him the slow descent.

So he needs to be able to cut the reserve chute – an absolute no-go in normal

Aikins (right) and Baumgartner during test jumps with a wingsuit

action

skydiving. And this system needs someone who is prepared to trial whether it actually works as planned.

Aikins doesn’t regard himself as a lab rat, and he’s no thrill seeker. On the contrary, he is arguably one of the most experienced and calmest skydivers in the world. And his respect for Baumgartner is huge.

“Felix has so much to do for this mission that it’s simply helpful to have a skydiver alongside to take on some of the test work. In racing there are test drivers. The mission pilot can’t do everything himself.”

During a test in Taft, a jump with the old parachute system almost went wrong. “Felix pulled on the wrong ripcord and the chute didn’t open. More than a few jumpers have been killed in such a situation. They panic and yank on a ripcord until it’s too late. But Felix took half a breath and very calmly made another decision – he pulled the correct deployment cord. Instead of waiting for someone to help him, he takes action.

He makes decisions, he makes them fast and he makes them right. That’s what

“A great athlete wants the opportunity to screw up. A lot of people shrink in that moment – but a champion wants that shot”

0,08

Fig 1

Raw data (white dots) and fitted curve for the air density between 20km and 40km

Air density in kg/m3

0,06 y=1,5906e-0,151x

0,04 0,02 0

20 Height in km

25

30

35

40

800

Fig 2

Simulation of Baumgartner’s speed for the first 100 seconds from three different heights (see text)

600

Speed in mph

400 200 0

0 20 Flight time in seconds

40

60

80

100

If you look at Fig 2, you will notice that the jumps are almost identical for the first 10 to 15 seconds. What is this due to?

0.02 (or two per cent). Thus for maximum speed, we use √ 1/ρ = √ 1/0,02 ≈ 7. So at this altitude, Baumgartner can achieve a speed seven times faster due to the low density than in a denser atmosphere.

A simulation which shows what speed will be achieved when is particularly

fascinating. The simplest way to do this is numerically, ie to calculate the values step-by-step. This is actually fairly easy using spreadsheet software. You proceed step-by-step from the known to the unknown values and then repeat. You start with the altitude the jump will

is special about Felix Baumgartner.

A great athlete wants that opportunity to screw up – just to show that they can do it. A lot of people shrink in that moment – but a champion wants that shot. Felix belongs to that second group.”

In Red Bull Stratos, Aikins sees above all the sporting value, the records, the quest to push the limit of his sport a little. “We want to show that it’s possible to jump through the stratosphere with a space suit and a parachute, to break the sound barrier and make a safe and controlled landing.”

What would Luke Aikins rate as a Red Bull Stratos success?

“Once the parachute is open and we see that Felix is moving, it’s all good.”

be made from and a speed of zero.

Calculate the total force exerted on the person jumping at that moment (only gravity to start with).

Then let’s assume that the overall force remains constant for a short time (eg one 10th of a second). This isn’t, in fact, completely correct, but it is only a marginal deviation. We can calculate acceleration from the total force, from there the new speed and new altitude and so on. Essentially very simple – but the devil is in the detail.

If we want as accurate a simulation as possible, we must first factor in that the gravitational acceleration g, a consequence of gravitational force, will decrease with height. In Roswell it is 9,795m/s², but at 36,576m it is only 9,684m/s², so about one per cent lower. If we overlooked this difference, we would end up somewhat overestimating the final velocity.

A

significantly greater problem is that it’s impossible to calculate flow area A and drag coefficient cw at every point of the descent, because these are very much dependent on the position Baumgartner’s body will be in.

But we can try.

To start with, we don’t need to know the individual values, just the product of A cw . We can estimate this by evaluating the test jump carried out on March 15 of this year. On that occasion, Baumgartner jumped from around 721,820m and achieved a top speed of 587kph. Now adjust A cw in the simulation until you achieve the same speed there.

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Action

“If Baumgartner goes into a tailspin and has to open his drogue parachute, he can wave byebye to breaking the sound barrier”

T

he evaluation gives a value of 1.06 for A cw, which we can now use in our simulation. Let’s assume that his body position will be the same for his record-breaking jump (Fig 2).

A real crunch point comes when trying to estimate air density. It lowers the higher you go because there is less air weighing down the air, so to speak.

Unfortunately, the temperature also decreases with altitude, which affects air density too. There is plenty of data from the lower atmosphere – the troposphere – up to 10km. But when it comes to data from the stratosphere, between 15 and 50km, the evidence is thin, like the air.

If we take the little raw data there is for high altitudes, we can estimate the air density between 20 and 40km up using the equation ρ = 1.5906e–0.151h (fig 1), whereby h is the height in kilometres. Of course air density is constantly changing slightly and is dependent on the time of day, time of year, humidity and location. In other words, you can’t predict air density at any given time. So it could be the case that there will be slightly different conditions for the record-breaking jump.

This is where one last complication arises. The speed of sound is normally denoted as 1,235kph, known as Mach 1.

Baumgartner would only have reached 0.96 Mach in the planned jump from 36,576m and thus not broken the sound barrier.

Thankfully the established default value only applies at temperatures of 20 °C, but the speed of sound is dependent on temperature, and this decreases very considerably at high altitude. You can calculate it using the formula vsonic = 44.74mph · √ T + 273,15 whereby T is temperature in degrees Celsius.

I

f we want to know how many Machs Baumgartner has hit at a specific height, we need to know the prevailing temperature there. As we have already stated above, it’s not easy to come by data for the stratosphere.

However, we do have some temperature data given in 2km increments which we can interpolate. But it’s similar to the problem with air density in that slightly different conditions might very well prevail at the time of the jump.

The table gives the temperatures at the respective altitudes and the speeds in Mach. It shows that Baumgartner would not reach the speed of sound if he jumped from 33,528m. The jump from 36,576m would give him a safety margin of seven per cent, and the jump from 39,624m a margin of up to 19 per cent.

No one, however, can anticipate what might happen just before the sound barrier is broken. If Baumgartner somehow goes into a tailspin and, in the worst case scenario, has to open his drogue parachute, he can wave bye-bye to breaking the sound barrier.

But whatever happens, the jump will still be extremely fascinating, as even the best simulation can never replace an actual attempt.

Jump height

Time taken to reach the speed of sound

Height at which the speed of sound is reached

Time taken to reach maximum speed

Maximum speed (vmax)

Altitude at which maximum speed is reached

T in °C at this altitude

33,528m

–

–

43 seconds

639 mph/ 1,028kph

26,000m

36,576m

37 seconds

30,500m

46 seconds

719 mph/ 1,157kph

39,624m

34 seconds

34,200m

50 seconds

801 mph/ 1,289kph

vsonic at this altitude

vmax in Mach

-50.7° C

669 mph/ 1,076kph

0.96

27,600m

-49.1° C

671 mph/ 1,080kph

1.07

29,000m

-47.7° C

674 mph/ 1,084kph

1.19

Table: Data on the three simulated jumps. All values have been rounded off bar those for maximum speed and temperature

78

Credit:

N

ow we are ready for the simulations (fig 2). I have only produced simulations for the first 100 seconds of Baumgartner’s jump because the formula used to calculate air density may not be accurate enough after that. But the most important stuff will all have happened within 50 seconds at most anyway.

I chose starting heights of 33,528m, 36,576m and 39,624m for the simulations.

As things stand, the intention is to jump from the second height. The results do not seem dogmatic. These can, of course, never be more accurate than the raw data. And deviations of a few per cent are always possible because the basic conditions could very well be different from those assumed.

If you look at Fig 2, you will notice that the jumps are almost identical for the first 10 to 15 seconds. What is this due to?

The answer is the extremely low air density at the starting height.

It’s so low at the start that in all three cases we are dealing with virtually unimpeded free fall. It’s backed up by something Joe Kittinger said after his 1960 jump. “At the end of the countdown I make a leap into the unknown. There’s no wind blowing, my suit doesn’t inflate.

I don’t have the slightest sensation of the speed increasing.”

But as anyone jumping from lower heights will hit more dense air more quickly, the speeds are already noticeably different after 30 seconds.

There is already a difference of 100kph at that point and a difference of more than 260kph in maximum speed between the jumps from the lowest and highest altitudes.

This is shown particularly well in the table below. This simulation produces a maximum speed of 1,157kph for the planned jump from 36,576m.

But how much is that in Mach?

Only when the air becomes denser will Baumgartner be able to correct his position

6.3 photography: luke Aikinis/Red bull stratos

7 minutes, 52 years A leap from the stratosphere is like climbing Mount Everest: Felix Baumgartner talks about his plunge from around 22km, the impossibility of training for supersonic flight and what really worries him Words: Felix Baumgartner

S

pace is jet black. You can see the curvature of the Earth.

This is the moment when you realise just how lucky you are to be up here, standing on the platform of the capsule at an altitude of about 22km, ready to jump. You’re relieved to finally be up here. Relieved to be able to show at last what we’d been working on for the past five years.

Relieved to give something back to those people who have always believed in us. Then you release your grip on the handrails and fall, just as you’d envisaged it a million times over.

That moment of free-standing and leaping off, the first six seconds of free fall where you don’t exactly know what will happen to you: that was really cool.

After six seconds I flipped forwards until I was lying on my back. My higher centre of gravity with the oxygen bottles, the parachute and the massive chest pack put me in this position. My plan was not to fight against the unfamiliar, and in fact incorrect, jumping position. Further down, when the air becomes denser, I’ll have enough opportunities to correct my position. ‘Just ride it out,’ is what skydiver pro Luke Aikins says, and, sure enough, I was able to assume a stable jumping position shortly afterwards.

After a six-second free fall we already

had the answer to one question, namely about which position would I find myself after jumping. Our bungee test jump hadn’t given us any clarity on this, because when you’re attached to a rope the fun is over after just two seconds.

For my record leap from 36.6km it means that I might possibly break the sound barrier on my back, blind and helpless. That is not what you want, but you can’t discount such a horror scenario. Scientists don’t even know what happens when you break the sound barrier. Anticipation is difficult because I don’t actually know what I should be anticipating. And then there’s the

pressure suit, which basically hinders any quick responses. Jumping in a pressure suit is like walking under water, very slow and arduous. In an environment that calls for 100 per cent from athletes, the equipment necessary for survival reduces your ability to 30 per cent. You can’t train to fly supersonically.

When I set out for my jump from 36.6km, I’ll have notched up just seven minutes of free-fall practice from two test jumps at high altitude: Three minutes from the first and four from the second.

That’s just seven minutes of experience to break a 52-year-old record: you have to look at this in direct relation. I had to 79

Action

Baumgartner plans to do another test jump from 27,432m before he tackles the big one

quickly gather the knowledge I’d need for the high altitude: first, how it feels to fly; second, how to handle the psychological stress of going beyond the ‘Armstrong Line’ where you’re aware you are surrounded by lethal danger, invisible, but nonetheless very real. Even though the first test jump has gone well, we were only just halfway there. Any mountaineer can climb to four thousand. But Mount Everest is a completely different calibre.

People often ask me if I’m afraid heading towards the jump. The opposite is true: I look forward to it because from the moment I take the leap I get closer to the safety of Mother Earth.

This is another thing you can compare to mountaineering: after reaching the summit, the mountaineers descend to base camp, for me I reach a breathable atmosphere. With each passing second, the air becomes more manoeuvrable, I can control my position and the greatest problem is relatively trivial, namely icy cold hands. From then on, the rest of the jump is no big deal anymore: I can do it, I love it, this is my world.

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allows time to react. Even if it had been a broken leg or arm, you don’t want to be lying around in the Chihuahuan Desert near Roswell, New Mexico. What if I’d been unable, for whatever reason, to open my visor? The oxygen runs out, I suffocate in my suit, and all because the onboard radio hadn’t worked? That can’t happen. I’ll only get back into the capsule when the radio works flawlessly.

We now know that the mistake originated in the chest pack, which aside from various controls and documentation functions also houses the radio. The device is now being rebuilt and the specialists from [German communications company] Riedel will sort it out.

In the meantime, I’m now feeling generally very confident as far as my equipment is concerned. Over the past few months you’ve read about the capsule, suit and balloon here. I’m very happy with how the parachute has been perfected. We should have answers to any problems we face up there.

The greatest unknown is still the breaking of the sound barrier. There is only one way to find out what happens: you have to try it. And that’s exactly what I will do this summer. www.redbullstratos.com

“Am I afraid heading towards the jump?

The opposite is true.

Because the moment I take the leap I get closer to the safety of Mother Earth”

7

Next month: Roswell Extraterrestrials, rattlesnakes, airplane parking and a river called Felix: we visit the launch site of Red Bull Stratos

photography: luke Aikinis/Red bull stratos

W

e’ve practised everything so many times, from different altitudes, with and without an inflated suit, from a bungee rope and in the wind tunnel. Because of this, the jump worked with almost frightening precision. When you climb the same mountain for the hundredth time it doesn’t seem as exciting as the first time. You don’t notice the speed. I reached 587kph at this test jump, the third highest free fall speed that any human has reached – but it felt like a normal jump. There are no reference points – you don’t feel the speed through the pressure suit. You don’t even notice the sound of speed: further up you hurtle quickly through few air molecules, further down you go slower through more molecules. At the end of the day it makes no difference.

I was afraid of a radio malfunction during the first jump from great heights.

Not because I want to talk during free fall, but because one of our mission goals is to communicate in free fall. Radio failure is dangerous as you saw from my landing: because I couldn’t direct the helicopter with the flares onboard, I landed with the wind and hit the ground at 4 G. Suit included, I weigh 140kg, so my ankles had to cushion two fat Harley Davidsons.

Radio means information, information

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Here’s mud in your eye: Why 1.5 million people make a pilgrimage each year to the Boryeong Mud Festival in South Korea.

See page 94

Contents 84 TRAVEL IDEAS Montreux Jazz Festival 86 GET THE GEAR What makes Pyro Pete’s job go with a bang 88 TRAINING Tips from bike racer Marc Márquez

Photography: Chung sung-jun/Getty images

90 NIGHTLIFE A top club, an exotic cocktail, the best in music and much more – everything you need to get you through the night 94 WORLD IN ACTION 96 SAVE THE DATE 97 KAINRATH 98 MIND’S EYE By columnist Kevin McCallum

more body & mind

get into the groove this month’s travel tips

Music, with Nobs on montreux jazz festival Bob Dylan and Miles Davis, Van Morrison and Paul Simon, Lana Del Rey and Janelle Monáe – every summer for the past 46 years Claude Nobs has invited top musicians to perform by Lake Geneva. The festival director reveals eight Montreux sights with a special place in pop history

‘Funky Claude’ Nobs, 76, an incomparable music connoisseur and international music stars’ host of choice

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For 349 days of the year, Montreux is a sleepy little Swiss town on the shores of Lake Geneva, complete with lakeside embankment and stunning views onto the Vaud Alps. But every summer since 1966, it has been the epicentre of the music world. The man responsible for all this is Claude Nobs. Led Zeppelin, James Brown, Bob Dylan, Prince, Radiohead and many other internationally renowned stars have all accepted an invitation from the 76-year-old music connoisseur, as do the 200,000 fans who turn up each year.

Nobs is famous for getting stars to Montreux before they’re stars, thus

ensuring their loyalty. Jazz legend Herbie Hancock, for example, will be making his 28th appearance this summer. And Deep Purple even paid tribute to Nobs in their song Smoke On The Water with the line “Funky Claude was running in and out, pulling kids out the ground” (see facing page).

Down the years, Nobs has collected an archive’s worth of anecdotes interwoven with hometown locations, so for anyone going to the festival this year – it runs until July 14 – here are a couple of suggestions for a magical history tour. www.montreuxjazzfestival.com

WORDS: adrian schrader. illustration: julia Pfaller.

PHOTOGRAPHY: Charly Rappo, Montreuxriviera.com, picturedesk, Mountain-Studios

more body & mind

Tracing the stars’ footsteps in Montreux Bob Dylan on a bike, Kid Rock in a police station and six more musically unique markers on the shores of Lake Geneva 1 Montreux Casino The casino was already a concert venue before the Montreux Jazz Festival existed. “My first ever live guest was John Lee Hooker,50 years ago. I had to come up with a US $500 fee for him.

Years later he was charging $50,000,” says Claude Nobs. The long nights after the festival are also memorable.

Fans and musicians would head for the casino garden after the concerts, first to restore their energy at the buffet and then for a naked swim in the pool. Things will be much more civilised this year post-disco night featuring Nile Rodgers and Mark Ronson: Nobs is inviting guests for a special muesli brunch.

rebuild, paid for by Queen. In subsequent years, artists including David Bowie, AC/DC and Duran Duran went on to record legendary albums there. It’s now home to a nightclub and the door to the club has become a memorial wall for Freddie Mercury.

2 Mountain Studio The casino almost burnt down during a Frank Zappa concert on December 4 1971 while Deep Purple were working on new material in another building close by. They immortalised the event in Smoke On The Water (and also heralded Claude Nobs as the fearless saviour of several youngsters). A basement recording studio was included in the

3 Montreux Palace The best hotel in Europe (rooms cost from R5,260 a night) would also be the one with the highest density of pop stars on the continent during the festival. You might end up getting even closer to them than you’d like.

Three years ago, Kid Rock was having a riotous party in his suite. One highspirited guest jumped out of a window

and landed, luckily enough, on someone’s balcony. He went to the wrong room on his way back to the party and an extremely frightened Chaka Khan started pummelling the putative intruder with an umbrella.

The police arrived and escorted the party host off the premises. “Kid Rock rang us distraught from the police station the next day,” Nobs recalls, with a laugh. “He didn’t have any money on him and he was in his bare feet.”

4 grand rue On Montreux’s chichi main thoroughfare, you can buy anything that glitters and sparkles: Swiss watches, jewellery, souvenirs. But Nobs thinks you’d be better off keeping an eye on the traffic instead. “Once we were waiting in front of the casino for the limousine that was meant to bring Bob Dylan from the hotel. But the car was empty. A few minutes later he appeared on a bike, fully kitted out in helmet, gloves and cycling shoes.”

5 Le Petit Palais The Art Deco building used to be home to Nobs’ spectacular nightclub where he would bring international flair of a somewhat different kind to Montreux.

“I’d seen psychedelic light shows where the colours merged into each other in San Francisco,” he says. “I wanted the same thing in my club but didn’t know how to go about it properly. So I took three plates and an overhead projector and mixed up blue shampoo, grenadine and peppermint syrup. One time I even put squashed cockroaches between the plates. It looked crazy.

People screamed.” Now Le Petit Palais is home to festival workshops at which musicians such as Trombone Shorty will be explaining just what it is they get up to with their instruments.

6 Hostellerie de Caux This restaurant directly above where Nobs lives is where his guests go to

eat when they decide their host deserves a break. The meat fondue (Fondue au Chaudron, R386) is exquisite, as is the view over the lake.

And right below you, on the lawn by Nobs’ chalets, the artists limber up for their performances. “Paul Simon was late once for a concert because he just had to see the sun setting over the lake from up here,” Nobs reveals.

7 Mercury’s monument A statue by Czech sculptor Irena Sedlecká on the embankment pays homage to one of pop’s greatest stars: Freddie Mercury. The Queen frontman was yet another good friend of Nobs’.

“One evening, David Bowie and the members of Queen were having dinner with me. I asked them, ‘Why don’t you go to the studio together?’ Two hours later they were back and they’d recorded Under Pressure.”

8 miles davis hall Miles Davis and Montreux went way back. The Picasso of jazz performed here 10 times, the last time in 1991, just two months before he died. One of the festival’s main venues was named after him in 2007. This year The Miles Davis Hall will play host to soul legend Bobby Womack, New Orleans voodoo funk-blues man Dr John, pop-rock chameleon Lana Del Rey, bossa-nova god Gilberto Gil, new-soul princess Janelle Monáe and many more.

Paul Simon insisted on seeing the sunset from here before taking the stage

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4

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The Rolling Stones use 275 to 365 litres a night of propane for their show; KISS, around 230 litres.

The difference? The Stones play stadiums

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more body & mind

Get the Gear A Pro’s essentials

Pyro Pete

KISS, The Rolling Stones, Mötley Crüe… if anyone wants to blow things up on stage, Peter Cappadocia is their man.

Here’s how the mayhem gets made

8

1

1. Road cases We have our own 14.6 semitruck. An average tour has 10 to 20 road cases on it, most tailor made for the equipment.

2. Pyrodigital Consultants controller Typically in a show, we’d have one controller and 50 to 100 modules laid out around the stage. You put in the program, or the script, and it gives the musical cues for fire shooting.

2

3. Whirlwind splitter It’s for redirecting cables. There is one cable coming in and six cables coming out. Those cables attach to the firing modules (4) from the board.

7

4. Pyrodigital Consultants field module Each one of those slots is one channel, and it connects to the controller. If you want number one to go off, you write a program for it. Once you write the script for a show, you download it, and the controller communicates with module.

3

9

words: Andreas Tzortzis. photography: mike basher

5. Fire button It’s an awesome feeling. You press that button and the whole arena goes ‘ooh … or ahh… and you’re like, ‘Thank you, thank you that was me.’

The button is all-powerful.

6. CO2 syphon tanks We get them from local compressed gas companies and they weigh about 110kg.

They power the CO2 heads that shoot jets of smoke into the air. Those jets have little LED lights at their base, so you can change the colour (at the edges of the photo).

7. Honeywell burner control system 7800 Series This is what controls the pilot light and ignition system for all of our flame effects. This is the brains behind the flame bar.

8. Stage & Effects stadium flame head, or gun We use this at outdoor shows.

It creates a column of flame about 25-30m high and 3m in diameter. With The Rolling Stones, we were running three stadium guns.

9. Stage & Effects 2.5m burn bar This is used wherever we need to get a wall of flame. It can shoot up to 3m. It’s powered by the accumulator (cropped out of the picture), which holds the propane gas supply.

10. McMaster-Carr safety switch/dead switch We’re always on the side of the stage and under the stage. You have to be on this switch for all of it to work. When you have your foot on that switch, you press the button.

11. Fire extinguisher We carry several different types: CO2 and dry chemical extinguishers. We use them all the time. Gene Simmons would wipe his face and throw the towel and sometimes it would land right next to the jets, and it would start smouldering.

12. Liquid CO2 tank It holds up to 900 litres, and it creates a fog effect.

It works well if you’ve got some moisture in the air.

13. The wispy goatee I dye it using L’Oréal red hair colour, otherwise it’s grey and I look like an evil Santa Claus.

14. CO2 jets The CO2 units are new and made for us and these are the prototype. The LED lights at their base can be changed to a different colour. Their unveiling will be the 30 of them we use on the upcoming KISS tour.

Light it up at www.stgfx.com

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WORK OUT

Need for speed

TRAINING WITH THE PROS

MARC MÁRQUEZ The Spaniard came second in last year’s Moto2 series and is flying again in 2012.

But his speed isn’t down to brawn or the throttle

Out of season Márquez keeps his exercise varied and his loads low to stay strong, lean and in harmony with his bike Monday 7am: “I start each day with a simple breakfast of cereal, yoghurt and fruit.”

8-10am: 40km mountain bike ride 2-4pm: Gym training.

Working whole body using free weights and lots of reps.

Tuesday 7am: Breakfast.

8-10am: Gym training as above. “Training with my motorbiking brother Alex helps keep me motivated.”

2-4pm: Tennis at the local court with trainer.

Wednesday 8am: Breakfast.

9-11am: 40km mountain bike ride 2-4pm: Go-karting with friends. “This is fun and also helps with relaxation.”

Thursday 7am: Breakfast.

8-9.30am: Light jogging.

12-2pm: Swimming.

2-3pm: Massage. This helps promote muscle elasticity.

Friday 7am: Breakfast.

8-10am: 40km mountain bike ride. “Cycling is not really like hard work to me as I enjoy it so much.”

1-2pm: Gym training. Working the whole body using free weights with lots of reps.

Saturday 8-10am: 40km mountain bike ride 3-5pm: Go-karting.

“As well as putting in the training, I try to enjoy my weekend.”

Sunday “Day of rest!”

Search for Marc Márquez at www.redbull.com

WORDS: RUTH MORGAN. PHOTOGRAPHY: GOLD & GOOSE/RED BULL CONTENT POOL

No one knows better than 19-year-old Marc Márquez that when you’re in charge of 135kg of metal travelling at 280kph, you need to be in complete control. But bulk isn’t the answer.

“Muscle can actually hinder us,” he explains .

“You don’t want a lot of muscle in your legs or forearms, as it limits movement. We need flexibility to move with the bike and react. So Biker Marc Márquez training is difficult as you need to have power to control the bike, but you can’t go to the gym and lift big weights. I avoid heavy loads and go for lots of reps, followed by stretching to loosen up. That gives you power but not bulk.”

And a desire to go fast won’t make you a winner. “The key to speed is in your head,” says Márquez. “If you go into a race only thinking ‘I must be fast’ and ride aggressively, you’ll end up being slower. Your mind needs to be strong. For example, when I start riding after winter, I’ve spent two months without the bike. My physical condition is better than in the middle of the season, but because my confidence with the bike is lower, I get tired and I’m slower. When you have confidence on the bike you are free, you can ride it the way you want and the speed comes naturally. You need to do a lot of laps to feel that confidence, to get in sync. After a crash some riders struggle to regain their confidence but I’m lucky, I’ve never had a problem with that.”

Variety shows

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FATE DOESN’T ASK. IT COuLD ALSO bE mE. Or yOu. David Coulthard.

13-time Formula 1 Grand Prix Winner and Wings For Life Ambassador.

SPINAL COrD INJury muST bECOmE CurAbLE. In funding the best research projects worldwide focusing on the cure of spinal cord injury, the Wings for Life Spinal Cord research Foundation ensures top-level medical and scientific progress. We assure that hundred percent of all donations are invested in spinal cord research.

your contribution makes a difference.

Donate online at www.wingsforlife.com

Free advertisement.

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Nightlife Whatever gets you through the night

actiON

Night golf DO YOU NEED GLOW-IN-THE-DARK BALLS? Yes. Others have battery-powered lights. The fairways are illuminated by searchlights or floodlights – and you also need to take your sunglasses off.

WHERE DID IT ALL START? In Florida and California.

There are a number of lit-up par-3 holes there.

GOLF SANCTUARY The Nick Faldo Course at the Emirates Golf Club in Dubai is lit by 500 searchlights and so can be enjoyed at pleasant ambient evening temperatures. Only the locals could cope with 18 holes during the day when the mercury can rise over 40°C.

OUt NOW

Kraftwerk in our heads Hot Chip, that band of indie-dance mavericks who make masterly pop music loved by festival crowds, dance clubs and critics, are back with their fifth – and best – album With their large specs and colourful sweaters, Hot Chip are the band who made it cool to dress like an IT assistant, while their big-hearted electro tunes proved that nerds can throw some sweet moves on the dancefloor. Best of all, one of their songs was used in a recent episode of The Simpsons. Joe Goddard, one of the quintet's two main songwriters, talks new record In Our Heads and his own chart-topping form.

You take risks on In Our Heads – some songs head off in all sorts of directions, but still sound very pop.

We made it in an excellent little studio in London with a producer who makes making music fun. He has a mixing desk Kraftwerk used to make their records in Dusseldorf. He spent a lot of time and money restoring it and it’s beautiful.

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The first single, Flutes, doesn’t actually contain any flute, does it?

Well, there is a tiny sample of flutes playing in the background at the beginning, but it doesn’t feature massively. That track does have a sample of Buddhist monks chanting a mantra that’s 2,000 years old, though.

Were you surprised when your soulful solo tune, Gabriel, reached number one in South Africa in March?

I honestly don’t know how it happened.

I think house music is big there, and it started getting played on the radio, but I haven’t heard the whole story.

In our heads is out now. More details and samples at: www.hotchip.co.uk

the night golf Series concludes in august: www.charitypoolgermany.de

Wise WORDs

“Never be the first to arrive at a party or the last to go home. And never, ever be both” David Brown, US film producer (1916-2010)

cOcktaiL

Black Daiquiri

CLUB

Magnum

phoTography: sTeVe gulliCK, manfred Burger, magnum CluB (4), foTosTudio eisenhuT & mayer

HONG KONG

cLUB

“The golden front door promises a splendid night out” The Magnum Club is a party temple in the heart of Hong Kong. Patrons enjoy live performances, a luxurious atmosphere and crystals in the toilet seats

MagnuM CLuB 3 & 4/f, Silver fortune Plaza, 1 Wellington Street, Central, hong Kong www.magnumclub.com.hk

We love running a club in this town because…

We’ve brought a new concept to Hong Kong – not only a glamorous clubbing space, but also a perfect show platform for live performances.

The first thing that you see when you enter the club is…

Our magnificent and noble décor!

The golden front door entrance promises a splendid night out!

Our interior will wow you with…

More than 100,000 crystal inlaid bubble chandeliers, crystal staircase and three-sided LED walls with laser spotlight effects.

To get past the bouncer you should…

Be well dressed and good-looking.

A friendly manner would help a lot.

Your regular customers are…

Mainly residents and professionals living and working in the centre of Hong Kong, such as lawyers, accountants and bankers.

Your toilets are worth a mention…

Because we have 10 ravishing gold and silver flashing toilet seats inlaid with over 10,000 crystals.

When you get tired of dancing…

You can find rest on our two-sided terraces. We put in a colour-shifting lighted fountain, which helps make an elegant oasis within the city amid its hustle and bustle.

Interview with Rocky Wong, owner

This month, award-winning cocktail crafter Josh Harris, the man behind San Francisco’s Bon Vivants, gets all tropical on our behinds.

Blending high-quality rum with the Sicillian liqueur Averna and an easy-to-make-at-home coffee tincture, the black daquiri is a direct line to Cuba: manna from Havana. Says Harris: “It’s Caribbean, but classy Caribbean."

IngredIentS Pampero aniversario rum, averna, limes, coffee tincture* MeaSureS 45ml Pampero aniversario 15ml averna 30ml fresh lime juice 30ml basic molasses (2 parts sugar: 1 part water) 6-8 drops coffee tincture* glass: Coupe trimmings: orange zest

Method Put the ingredients in a cocktail shaker, add ice, pour twice through a sieve into a Coupe cocktail glass and decorate with orange zest *Coffee tincture: fill a sealable jar with coffee beans and cover with some high-proof alcohol (eg Wild turkey 101).

Leave for a week, shaking regularly, then strain the liquid. use an eye dropper, or similar, for the drops

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Leonard Cohen Songs of Love and hate This album was always on my parents’ record-player; the songs are etched in my mind.

Leonard Cohen played a concert in Iceland in 1984. I was only seven, but begged my parents to take me with them. I couldn’t understand the lyrics back then, but I could understand the magic of the music. I still listen to the album a lot now, preferably my parents’ old vinyl.

Nightsnack

Take 3

“Like actually fly, not with an aeroplane”

Paul Auster Mr. Vertigo I never read a book twice, but I devoured this one five times.

The story is fascinating: a boy meets a strange man who promises to teach him how to fly.

Like actually fly, not with an aeroplane. The way it’s described comes across as so incredibly real. You end up believing it could really work. It’s an amazing book and perfect for a journey because it takes you on one itself.

Sigur Rós Their haunting music is perfect for a night-time train journey, but what inspires the Icelanders when they're on the road?

Their music is as rambling and spherical as the landscape in their Icelandic homeland. They play their guitars with violin bows and for some of their songs have created their own language: Hopelandic, a mixture of Icelandic and tonal singing. Sigur Rós’s new album, Valtari, could not be more appropriately named. Georg Hólm, the group's bassist: “It means steamroller. Steamrollers are heavy and slow, just like our songs.” Indeed, Sigur Rós’s music is not for people with a short attention span. It’s a soundtrack for wandering minds and walks in the snow. On Valtari, gentle strings, meandering piano and the fragile voice of lead singer Jónsi make a sound both comfortingly warm and probingly epic. The quartet will present the album live this summer at festivals including Lollapalooza (Chicago, USA, August 5), Rock en Seine (Saint-Cloud, France, August 24) and Electric Picnic (County Laois, Ireland, August 31). Here Hólm tells us what boils his creative kettle during downtime on the tour bus.

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VALERIE AND HER WEEK OF WONDERS When I discovered this Czech vampire film from the 1970s on video at my sister-in-law’s place, I watched it three times in a row. I couldn’t believe my eyes. The plot, images, colours and music were all strange, but also surreally beautiful.

I got the film on DVD, and every time I watch it, I discover some new strange aspect to it.

It's a forgotten masterpiece.

Tokyo: Ramen At dawn, after the tuna comes under the hammer at Tsukiji, the world’s largest fish market, noodle soup goes on the boil MORNINGS AT THE MARKET People start cooking ramen from 4am in the little shops around the Tsukiji fish market in central Tokyo.

Not only do you get the freshest sushi at Tsukiji, the best noodle soup is there too. Ramen connoisseurs either take their place in the longest queues, or look for where the workers, their clothes stained with fish blood, are slurping their ramen the loudest. In Japan, to eat noisily is to mark appreciation of the food.

Text: words: Klaus kamolz. photography: emi, fotostudio Eisenhut & Mayer

national treasure There are 200,000 ramen-ya, or standard noodle soup restaurants, in Japan, and more than 5,000 in Tokyo alone. The basic recipe is wheat noodles, broth (usually meaty, but it could be fish), sliced chicken, pork or beef, with miso or soy sauce for the salty kick. Other ingredients can be included; regional variations abound.

You might get eggs, tuna, negi (a leek-like onion), nori seaweed, shitake mushrooms, bamboo shoots or pak choi.

BOWL o' Ramen Recommeding one ramen joint over another is a difficult task, but the culture of noodle soup, has long been a big part of the Japanese national discussion, debated passionately on the printed page and on TV. Now, of course, the chat also takes place online. Useful English-language sites are: www.ramentokyo.com www.goramen.com www.ramenadventures.com.

'that looks souper!'

The discerning visitor to Japan knows that there is very little English spoken or seen there, but this does not make ordering ramen difficult. You just look around the noodle counter and point to one of the soups someone else is eating.

A good bowlful from a central ramen-ya will cost about R60.

From Counter to SCREEN Ramen plays a leading role in Tampopo (1985), a Japanese film championed as one of world cinema's best-ever on the dual topics of sex and food.

The Ramen Girl (2008) is a US film in which Britanny Murphy, stuck in Tokyo, learns to cook the titular dish. Ace Korean monster movie The Host (2006) features a Seoul family who run a ramen stall.

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World in Action July & August

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Sport 19-22.07.2012, ROYAL LYTHAM & ST ANNES GOLF CLUB, UK

The Open Championship It started in 1856 and has been roaming the land for 156 years: the British Open is the oldest golf tournament still played today. A few things have changed over the years, most notably the prize money on offer, which has gone from nothing at all (18561862) to £6 (1863), and the current £5m. Darren Clarke, 43, from Northern Ireland, comes to Lancashire as title defender of the famous Claret Jug Trophy.

Having won more than 20 tournaments around the world, last year marked his first victory at a major.

1

29.07.2012, LAGUNA SECA RACEWAY, USA

Red Bull US Grand Prix one of the biggest events on the MotoGP 3 As calendar, the Red Bull US Grand Prix is well known in the world of motorcycling for its full-on action all the way round the famous 2.2-mile circuit near Monterey. A famous feature here at the Laguna Seca Raceway is ‘The Corkscrew’. “You feel like you are blasting off into space,” says Ducati rider Nicky Hayden of the curve. The Corkscrew surprises riders as it is hidden from view behind a crest after a long straight which ensures riders go into it at high speeds.

5

Sally Fitzgibbons defends her title in California

The grand final: at the last stop of the Women’s World Tour, it comes down to a title showdown between Australians Stephanie Gilmore (four times world champion) and Sally Fitzgibbons (runner up 2010 and 2011). But there’s much more than just surfing here: last year more than 500,000 spectators turned up to enjoy a full-on festival featuring world-class surfing, BMX, skateboarding, music and fashion.

4

WRC Rally Finland

Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series

You won’t get higher speeds or wider jumps anywhere in the rally world: the 1000 Lakes Rally, staged since 1951, holds the record for the widest recorded jump (in 2003 Estonian Markko Märtin set down at 57m) and the highest average speed (Finn Marcus Grönholm reached 122.86kph in 2005). The Finns are famous for mercilessly exploiting their home advantage on the difficult gravel roads and have claimed victory in all but three rallies over the past 20 years. Those three wins were claimed by Markko Märtin in 2003 and French mega star Sébastien Loeb in 2008 and 2011.

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ASP Women’s World Tour Nike US Open

02-04.08.2012, JYVÄSKYLÄ, FINLAND

20-21.07.2012, VILA FRANCA, PORTUGAL

The third stop on the Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series is serving up a first: in the Azores, the divers will be launching themselves from an actual cliff rather than a platform. Competitors like two-time Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series champion Gary Hunt and former world champion Artem Silchenko will dive from the volcanic island Ilheu Vila Franca do Campo into the crystal-clear waters of the Atlantic from 27m.

30.07-05.08.2012, HUNTINGTON BEACH, CALIFORNIA, USA

Sébastien Loeb takes off in Finland

PHOTOGRAPHY: MARCELO MARAGNI/RED BULL CONTENT POOL, GETTY IMAGES (5)

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Janelle Monáe will perform at Slottsfjell in Norway 14-27.07.2012 DAECHEON BEACH, BORYEONG, SOUTH KOREA

19-21.07.2012, TØNSBERG, NORWAY

Slottsfjell

Boryeong Mud Festival

Tønsberg is a small, sleepy harbour town just south of Oslo, with a forested hill in its centre.

And that hill is crowned with an imposing Viking tower, which is taken over by the organisers of ‘Slottsfjellfestivalen’, as this open-air event is known in Norwegian. A pathway winds through the Narnia-style enchanted forest to the fort, and at the path’s edge there are four stages of magical aural refreshment, from synth-pop heroes New Order, retro rockers Wolfmother, new funk queen Janelle Monáe as well as Chase & Status, the drum ’n’ bass gods of thunder.

9

A mud festival! And not just any mud festival, but the biggest in the world, Boryeong lures 1.5 million bog-loving visitors to South Korea each year. They wallow, slide and grapple in the grey sludge which is taken from mud flats and spread out on the beach. This decadent festival is a global summit meeting for anyone incapable of passing a puddle without secretly wanting to jump in it.

7

Culture 06-14.07.2012, PAMPLONA, SPAIN

The running of the bulls The tradition stretches back to the late 16th century and fearless men in search of a thrill have been in its thrall ever since: as part of the San Fermín Festival, every morning a herd of bulls stampede through the city; foolhardy bull runners drive them on with red scarves and sashes, dashing in between, in front of and sometimes ending up under them. Their goal is to run as close as possible in front of the animals without being rammed or skewered. If you don’t fancy experiencing it live, Ernest Hemingway raves about the festival in his novel The Sun Also Rises.

03-05.08.2012, CHICAGO, USA

6

Lollapalooza

Alternative rock hero Perry Farrell has been making dreams come true for more than 20 years by bringing stars together on his Lollapalooza stage. This year offers the colourful combo of Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Black Keys, Black Sabbath and Jack White. And because Farrell can sniff out up-andcoming talent like no other, he’s also invited the hottest rising stars to Chicago: Tune-Yards, SBTRKT and LP.

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10 7 Muddy paradise on Boryeong beach, South Korea 05-21.07.2012, MONTEGO BAY, JAMAICA

Reggae Sumfest

Since 1993 Sumfest, on Jamaica’s north-west coast, has been the country’s largest music festival, and with 55,000 revellers in attendance each year it’s also the largest reggae event in the world. That said, the festival has opened up musically over the years: last year even pop princess Nicki Minaj was on the bill. Thursdays are the big dancehall night featuring local heroes like Bounty Killer and Lady Saw, and The Red Bull Music Academy’s very own stage, broadcasting shows live at www.redbullmusicacademyradio.com.

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Jack White brings his blues-rock to Lollapalooza

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Save the Date

Some top snowboarding talent will be on display just over four hours away from Joburg

July & August JULY 21-22

Get down in Mankele There’ll be some low-flying going down in the heart of Mpumalanga as the SA Downhill Mountain Bike Championships take place at Mankele Mountain Biking. Set in beautiful mixed-terrain forest by the Houtbosloop River, the hosts have some challenging surprises in store at their 1.8km downhill course.

Riders can expect hectic rock gardens, berms, jumps, bridges and some supremely tight switchbacks. www.mankele.co.za

Take me to your surf Master The SA Masters Championships is an inter-provincial surfing competition that crowns a winning team as well as surfers in individual categories. Border are defending champions, and the team’s stars Greg Emslie, Kevin O’Brien, David Malherbe and Dave Fish will be out to keep various titles. This is a cool event for older surfers who prefer bigger waves rather than beach breaks, which are better suited to groms contests, so the SA Masters Championships could be held at Durban’s New Pier or Cave Rock. www.surfingsouthafrica.co.za AUGUST 18

Welcome The Pumas With the inclusion of another southern hemisphere rugby nation, Argentina, the Tri-Nations becomes the Four-Nations – or to give it its proper title, The Castle Rugby Championship. In the company of South Africa, New Zealand and Australia, the South Americans will find the going tough. The Pumas have yet to beat the Boks (losing all 13 Tests since 1993), but with the team going from strength to strength in recent years this could be their time. An interesting opening fixture awaits. www.sarugby.net

Argentina will be looking to get to grips with the Boks

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AUGUST 2-4

Hit the Slopes The local snowboarding fraternity – and a couple of international ringers – once again head to the Afriski ski resort nestled up in Lesotho’s Maluti mountains for the Quik Snow SA Snowboarding Championships. The riders competing in this slopestyle event will have a world-class variety of kickers, slides, handrails, benches, butterboxes and bonks to showcase their skills, but that doesn’t mean you have to get on the slopes as well. Instead, simply throw on your thermals and catch all the action from the resort’s Gondola Café – the perfect spot to enjoy the best of SA snowboarding. www.afriski.net

JULY 28

It’s the Burger.

But you can’t eat it Stellenbosch hosts the seventh running of the popular Die Burger MTB Challenge. It’s a race for all levels of mountain bikers, with the four routes (15km, 30km, 42km, 62km, 75km) designed by legendary trail designer Meurant Botha of Dirtopia, taking riders through the beautiful area of Stellenbosch. It’s a particularly spectator-friendly set-up, with the start/finish at the Paul Roos Gymnasium school’s Markötter Fields.

Of course, not only is this one of the more beautiful valleys in South Africa

with plenty of viewing points along the picturesque routes, but it’s also wine country. And that means great wine and food guaranteed – essential ingredients for a top day out. www.dieburgermtbchallenge.co.za

PHOTOGRAPHY: QUIK SNOW QUIKSILVER PATTERSON, BURGER MTB CHALLENGE, GETTY IMAGES

JULY 26-29

illustration: dietmar kainrath

K a i n r at h

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I

n the window of a T-shirt shop in a mall in Rosebank is a work of art that is not for sale. It is a Raleigh Chopper, bright red with yellow decals, a big back wheel and a long, black seat. I wanted it when I first saw it. I still want it every time I walk past and it drags me into the shop like a puppy to a slipper.

“How much for the Chopper?”

“Sir, like I told you the last time, it’s not for sale. The owner doesn’t want to sell it.”

The owner also doesn’t want to ride it, obviously, as it has not moved in the past six months. Sometimes I’ll go in on the pretence of looking at the T-shirts and Vans, and leave with R450-worth of T-shirts and a new pair of skateboard shoes I didn’t really need. “Are you sure it’s not for sale?”

It’s a new model Chopper, one made when the icon was revived in 2004 after a spell when it was one of the biggest-selling bikes in history.

Some 1.5 million were sold from its introduction in 1970 until production ceased in 1981. It was the bike that saved Raleigh as the company was struggling, losing money. Alan Oakley, who designed the Chopper, died in Nottingham, the traditional home of Raleigh bicycles, on May 18 this year, some nine months after discovering he had oesophageal cancer.

Oakley got his inspiration for the bike during a trip to the United States, where he saw the choppers of Henry Fonda and Dennis Hopper in the movie Easy Rider.

It launched in September 1969 for the going price of £32.90. “Alan had been over to America looking to pick up a design for a bike,” his wife told the Daily Telegraph. “While he was flying back, he had an airmail envelope and just drew this bike on the back of it and that was that, the creation of the Chopper.”

However, in 2004, when the Chopper was revived by Raleigh as the market for old-school bicycles grew, a Dr Tom Karen, who was the MD and chief designer for Ogle Design, said that the

Mind’s Eye

Raleigh Rally There’s an iconic bicycle that Kevin McCallum is determined to get his hands on Oakley story was a “lie”. “I can assure you that I have got all the evidence.

I have diaries going back to 1966 and a record of 20 meetings I had with people from Raleigh, including Alan Oakley,” said Dr Karen, who wrote to Oakley twice when he learned about the story of the envelope design.

“From that day I challenged them, starting with the chairman of Raleigh and working down the hierarchy,” he told the Cambridge Evening News.

“Alan Oakley is a very able guy and did all the engineering and put it into production, which is good stuff, but the envelope story is a lie.”

That matters little to those of us who loved it so, and still find its lines strokeable. To see it was to want it.

Oakley (I’ll stick with Raleigh’s story as it fits the romance of the bike) fitted it with a sissy bar behind a long banana seat,

those ape-hanger chopper bars and even a kick-stand. It came with a single-speed hub or three or five gears and the gear lever in the middle of the top tube of the frame was just like a car gear shift. That was the reason behind the success and the attraction of the Chopper – it was as close to a motorbike as you could wish for.

Norman Jay, the British DJ now has a collection of 18 Choppers and remembered the first time he saw one: “It was the summer of 1969. I was playing 20-a-side football in my local park and a guy rode past on a canaryyellow Raleigh Chopper. Suddenly our game stopped and 40 kids ran up, staring in disbelief at this bike, and asking if they could ride it. It was the first bike that came with its own prop stand.

Parked up, it looked like a motorbike.

I was bowled over when I discovered that a Chopper Mark I cost £38 – my father only earned £28 a week. It was beyond the reach of the mortal man.”

I wanted one as a kid growing up in an estate in Newtownards in Northern Ireland. It was the coolest thing ever, but it was an expensive bike when it first came out and so the McCallum boys were given Raleigh Chippers, the smaller version of the Chopper. One day my parents gave me a Chopper. It was yellow, a secondhand Mk2. We lived at the top of a hill in the estate and I’d fly down that descent into the park, where I’d trash along dirt paths the bike was not designed for.

The Chopper is now a collectors’ item, with the Raleigh Chopper Owners Club having members from England to the US and New Zealand. Some will spend over R8,000 on restoring their bikes. You can pick up a new Mk3 for around R7,000 and a second-hand 1970s bike for a lot less on eBay. I want one. I want one bad. I want the one in the T-shirt shop window. I wonder if they’ll sell it to me.

Kevin McCallum is an award-winning sports journalist and acclaimed columnist for the Independent Newspapers group

The Red Bulletin South Africa, ISSN 2079-4282: The Red Bulletin is published by Red Bulletin GMBH Editor-in-Chief Robert Sperl Deputy Editor-in-Chief Alexander Macheck General Managers Alexander Koppel, Rudolf Theierl Publisher Franz Renkin Executive Editor Anthony Rowlinson Associate Editor Paul Wilson Contributing Editor Andreas Tzortzis, Stefan Wagner Chief Sub-editor Nancy James Deputy Chief Sub-editor Joe Curran Production Editor Marion Wildmann Chief Photo Editor Fritz Schuster Creative Photo Director Susie Forman Deputy Photo Editors Ellen Haas, Catherine Shaw, Rudolf Übelhör Creative Director Erik Turek Art Director Kasimir Reimann Design Patrick Anthofer, Martina de Carvalho-Hutter, Silvia Druml, Miles English, Kevin Goll, Carita Najewitz, Esther Straganz Staff Writers Ulrich Corazza, Werner Jessner, Ruth Morgan, Florian Obkircher, Arkadiusz Piatek, Andreas Rottenschlager Corporate Publishing Boro Petric (head), Christoph Rietner, Nadja Zele (chief-editors); Dominik Uhl (art director); Markus Kucera (photo director); Lisa Blazek (editor); Christian Graf-Simpson, Daniel Kudernatsch (iPad) Head of Production Michael Bergmeister Production Wolfgang Stecher (mgr), Walter Omar Sádaba Repro Managers Clemens Ragotzky (head), Karsten Lehmann, Josef Mühlbacher Editor, South Africa Steve Smith Finance Siegmar Hofstetter, Simone Mihalits Marketing & Country Management Barbara Kaiser (head), Stefan Ebner, A product of the Elisabeth Salcher, Lukas Scharmbacher, Peter Schiffer, Julia Schweikhardt. The Red Bulletin is published in Austria, France, Germany, Ireland, Kuwait, Mexico, New Zealand, South Africa, Switzerland, the UK and the USA. Website www.redbulletin.com. Head office: Red Bulletin GmbH, Am Brunnen 1, A-5330 Fuschl am See, FN 287869m, ATU63087028. UK office: 155-171 Tooley Street, London SE1 2JP, +44 (0)20 3117 2100. Austrian office: Heinrich-Collin-Strasse 1, A-1140 Vienna, +43 (1) 90221 28800. Printed by CTP Printers, Duminy Street, Parow-East, Cape Town 8000. Advertising enquiries Anthony Fenton-Wells, +27 (0)82 464 6376, or email anthony@tfwcc.net Write to us: email letters@redbulletin.com

The next issue of the Red Bulletin is out on August 11

Illustration: Albert Exergian

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