ACFM

After mulling over the problem of boredom in the last Trip episode, the ACFM gang return with a solution: hobbies. In this episode Nadia, Jem and Keir wonder why hobbies tend to mutate into jobs, which hobbies are appropriate for commoners, whether men and women approach their hobbies differently, and why having a hobby is often framed as uncool. It’s a weird-left spin on private pastimes with ideas from Engels and Gary Cross and music from Television Personalities and Shonen Knife. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching ‘ACFM’. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

When was the last time you were bored? Nadia, Jem and Keir wonder if ennui is a feeling that belongs in the past – and what a boredom-free life might be missing. Is compulsive scrolling a modern symptom of boredom? Why are spiritual practices often based around tedious repetition? Do bored workers make better organisers? What about the “stuckness” experienced by migrants, or the drudgery of housework? The gang offer their theories of Boredism (and Post-Boredism) in a perfectly mind-numbing Trip, with ideas from Lukács, Gramsci, the Pet Shop Boys and loads of 1970s punk. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching ‘ACFM’. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

[Audio error updated! Please refresh or re-download if correct episode isn’t playing.] Have the Greens got what it takes to become the main political vehicle of the radical left? Following their Trip episode on Ecology, the ACFM crew take a closer look at Zack Polanski’s party as it nudges past Labour in the polls. From the ’60s dream of ‘steady state economics’ to the anarcho-green convergence of ’90s rave culture, the Green tendency is mapped out by Nadia, Jem and Keir, with ideas from Playboy, Zack Goldsmith, David Icke and some sensible people too. Follow our Spotify playlist of all the music discussed on ACFM and subscribe to the ACFM mailing list to get weirder and leftier. Music by Matt Huxley. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Help us build people-powered media: https://novaramedia.com/support

Are humans distinct from nature? Are there natural limits to inequality? Can you have action without effort? Do bacteria have agency? Jem, Nadia and Keir find themselves dwarfed by the concept of ecology in this planetary-scale episode, which touches on cybernetics, systems thinking, ecofeminism and actor-network theory. Their ACFM guide to ecological thinking includes ideas from Rachel Carson, Peter Kropotkin and Donna Haraway, plus music from Joni Mitchell, Brian Eno and Marvin Gaye. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching ‘ACFM’. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

After a Trip episode about the meaning of mainstream, this time the gang go deeper into ‘Mainstream’ – that is, the new soft-left faction inside Labour. Yes, a festive episode about the inner workings of a political party! Don’t say we don’t spoil you. Jem, Nadia and Keir explain the emergence of Mainstream’s ‘radical realists’ – who include Andy Burnham and Clive Lewis – by exploring the lesser-known history of political tendencies that have shaped and split the Labour Party since the second world war. Further reading: Jem’s recent piece in Tribune. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Help us build people-powered media: https://novaramedia.com/support

Jem, Nadia and Keir debate the meaning of ‘mainstream’ – something none of them could ever possibly be, of course. Is ‘woke’ the new mainstream? Can there be a mainstream if we don’t all have access to the same culture? Is Tommy Robinson shifting the Overton Window? Why is nonconformity associated with coolness? And who engineers the ‘typical girl’? The gang answer these questions and more, with ideas from Raymond Williams and Perry Anderson, and music from Pulp and The Slits. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching ‘ACFM’. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

After last week’s episode on Parties, this time ACFM exposes the predicament facing Your Party, the new leftwing faction led by Zarah Sultana and Jeremy Corbyn. What expectations do leftwing voters have for Your Party? Does the Corbyn faction distrust the membership? Is Zarah a politician or a poster? And does ‘Yorp’ stand a chance of overtaking the ascendant Greens? Nadia, Jem and Keir analyse a turbulent few months in British left politics. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Help us build people-powered media: https://novaramedia.com/support

Amid the bumpy launch of a new left-wing party and the rise of the Greens and Reform, the ACFM crew turn their attention to parties. Do we still need them? Do parties work by drawing people together, or by excluding the uninvited? And should a political party have anything in common with a dance party? Nadia, Keir and Jem discuss, with reference to the Paris Commune, Unite the Right, Abigail’s Party and Jem’s own party, Beauty and the Beat, and music from Fred Wesley and The Beastie Boys. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching ‘ACFM’. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

After last week’s ACFM Trip to the Future, Jem and Keir reconvene to talk about science fiction. Is sci-fi a reaction to the “time-space compression” of the present? Is it inherently progressive? How did dystopian and paranoids visions of the future come to dominate sci-fi? Was Arthur C. Clarke an early acid communist? Find all the books and films mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Help us build people-powered media: https://novaramedia.com/support

What if we stopped treating the future like a speculative asset and started trying to actually build and prepare? The ACFM gang look to the horizon in this Trip episode. Did young people always worry so much about their futures? Has the currency of emergency been devalued? Does conservatism have an idea of the future? Nadia, Jem and Keir wonder what’s next with ideas from Max Weber and Kate Raworth, and music from LTJ Bukem and FKA twigs. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching ‘ACFM’. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

Are gardens a sanctuary or an enclosure? The ACFM gang sketch out a weird-left history of gardening, from the walled gardens of paradise to the tarmacked lawns of suburban Britain. Find the books, music and Dunmore Pineapple mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

Keir Starmer claims that growth is the only cure for a country in decline. But why is it the central obsession of modern capitalist economies? And can we think our way out of it before our planet runs out of resources? Nadia, Keir and Jem offer their weird-left take on growth, degrowth, radical abundance, ecomodernism and personal productivity, with ideas from Kate Soper and Kohei Saito and music from Minnie Riperton, 7 Samurai and Joanna Newsom. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching ‘ACFM’. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

Following their Trip episode about Cleaning, the ACFM crew take a closer look at the hidden labour that keeps the economy running. Would public canteens solve 80% of our problems? Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

In the socialist utopia of our dreams, who exactly is doing the cleaning? Nadia, Jem and Keir confront a tricky topic in this ACFM Trip. With music from X-Ray Spex, The B-52s and more, they offer their weird-left perspective on everything from dirty dishes and bodily secretions to circumcision, pollution and the caste system. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching ‘ACFM’. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

Following the recent Trip episode on Heroes, Keir and Jem return with a Microdose focusing on the masked, the winged and the mutated. Why are superheroes such a cultural mainstay? What psychological and political desires do they fulfil? Are they inherently reactionary? From Superman to Batman, Wonder Woman to 2000AD, it’s a weird left reading of superheroes and comic book culture. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Help us build people-powered media – pledge your support from as little as £1 a month: https://novara.media/support

The ACFM crew offer a weird-left perspective on the role of the hero (and heroine) in politics and culture. Nadia, Jem and Keir assess theories of Great Men, the myth of the hero’s journey and the lure of the anti-hero with ideas from Weber and Hegel and music from Tina Turner and Sonic Youth. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

The ACFM gang gather for a springtime reading of a prototype acid-communist text by Russian revolutionary Alexandra Kollontai. Download the text and follow along as Nadia, Keir and Jem get their teeth into Make Way for Winged Eros! A Letter to Working Youth, published in 1923.Check out the AK-47 podcast mentioned in this show: https://kristenghodsee.com/podcast Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Help us build people-powered media – pledge your support from as little as £1 a month: https://novara.media/support

The gang present a milestone 50th Trip all about acid: a drug, a genre, a political concept, a mental tool and a thought corrosive. Looking back on six years of the podcast, Nadia, Keir and Jem decide if ‘acid’ is still a useful way of thinking about left-wing politics. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

What’s the point of the arts when the world is on fire? To follow the pipeline from creativity to activism and back again, Nadia Idle is joined by Amber Massie-Blomfield, former chief of theatre company Complicité and the author of Acts of Resistance: The Power of Art to Create Better World. They discuss Dan Edelstyn and Hilary Powell’s Power Station, Samuel Beckett’s Waiting For Godot, the Gaza Free Circus, Rebecca Solnit’s Hope in the Dark, Blood of the Condor (1969), the writer Edouard Louis, Billie Holiday’s ‘Strange Fruit’ and the artist-activist Jay Jordan. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Help us build people-powered media – pledge your support from as little as £1 a month: https://novara.media/support

After last week’s ACFM on the meaning and morality of personal debt, Keir and Nadia zoom out to the macroeconomics of debt. Joining them to make sense of concepts like sovereign debt, structural adjustment and international ratings agencies is Heidi Chow, executive director of Debt Justice. She explains how and why countries borrow money, why Global South countries end up mired in debt, and how the climate crisis will affect national borrowing. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Help us build people-powered media – pledge your support from as little as £1 a month: https://novara.media/support

The concept of debt is as slippery as it is powerful. In this Trip episode, Keir, Nadia and Jem explain why debt is more like a belief than a calculation, and wonder how to imagine a society without it. From credit cards to dowries, they discuss the reality and fantasy of debt, with ideas from David Graeber and Deleuze and music from Crass and Gwen Guthrie. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

The ACFM gang gather for a midwinter reading of one of the most influential political tracts ever written. Download a version online and follow along as Nadia, Keir and Jem reassess The Communist Manifesto, published in 1848 by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Help us build people-powered media – pledge your support from as little as £1 a month: https://novara.media/support

Which side are you on? Keir, Nadia and Jem consider the ebb and flow of political commitment with ideas and music from Jodi Dean, Gramsci, John Coltrane and the Raincoats. Is cultural production the same as political action? What’s the difference between an ally and a comrade? And why do some communists end up as right-wing turncoats? Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

Disruption is a byword for success in the tech industry, but when it affects people’s daily routines – say, when JSO activists are slow-marching down a road – it becomes nothing short of criminal. On this Trip, Jem, Nadia and Keir unpack the political uses and abuses of disruption and the ‘creative destruction’ inherent to capitalism. Featuring music from Björk, Disrupters and Stormzy and ideas from Joseph Schumpeter, Michał Kalecki and the Communist Manifesto. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

Of all the unseen forces that shape human society, could death be the most powerful? The ACFM crew take a leftwing look at mortality in this Trip, asking how capitalism has altered our approach to the inevitable. Jem, Nadia and Keir think about how industrialised workers were taught to prepare for death, why powerful men are obsessed with their legacies, why we failed to ritualise or remember the Covid dead, and their fear of being desensitised to killing. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

A month after racist riots engulfed the country, the ACFM crew ask what fascism – and antifascism – look like in Britain today. Do the riots and counter-protests mark a return to “street politics”? Why didn’t the Labour party align itself with opponents of the pogroms? And how popular are extreme rightwing views among Britain’s frustrated youth? Jem, Nadia and Keir take a closer look at the make-up of the rioters and the reaction from the public, the media and politicians. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Produced by Matt Huxley.

Everybody hates a tourist, as Jarvis Cocker once pointed out, and the ACFM gang are no exception in this ACFM Trip exploring the allure of holidays. Keir, Jem and Nadia consider all the different ways we avoid work, from holy days and vay-cays to grand tours and gap yahs. Does travel make fools of us all, or is there a smarter, more ethical way to go sightseeing? Is the promise of an annual getaway the only thing keeping the working population docile? Featuring ideas from John Urry, David Harvey and Arun Saldanha, plus music from Dead Kennedys, Cliff Richard and Madonna. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”.

What happens when you lose? In this Trip, the ACFM crew explore the role of humility – and humiliation – in politics. Should we cultivate humility to cope with political weakness? Is fear of humiliation a product of patriarchy? Can humility help us be better political thinkers and organisers? And who’s the humblest ACFM host of them all? Nadia, Keir and Jem apply their weird-left lens to the topic with ideas from Nietzsche and Lyotard, and music from Erik Satie, Kendrick Lamar, Ravi Shankar and Joni Mitchell. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Follow our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Produced and edited by Matt Huxley and Chal Ravens. PRS licence number: LE-0016481 * Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

The ACFM crew offer their first reactions to Labour’s landslide election win. Can Starmer’s government rescue the public sector? Where will the money come from? And can they make it to a second term? Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Produced and edited by Matt Huxley and Chal Ravens. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

After investigating the politics of cool on the last Trip episode, the crew turn their attention to another distinctly modern sensibility: camp. Digging into Susan Sontag’s formative 1964 essay on the camp aesthetic, Nadia, Keir and Jem think about how elements of the artificial, the theatrical and the sentimental come together in camp objects, from porn movies to Tiffany lamps to risqué radio comedy. Find our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Produced and edited by Matt Huxley and Chal Ravens. PRS licence number: LE-0016481 * Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

What exactly is cool? Well, if it was that easy to describe, it obviously wouldn’t be cool. In this Trip, Keir, Jem and Nadia wonder if cool can ever be politically useful, and what happens when cool is used as a disciplining force. With ideas from Pierre Bourdieu, Norman Mailer and Paul Gilroy, and music from OutKast, Gwen Stefani and Miles Davis, the gang adopt a blank expression to explore the mysterious rules of this singular modern concept. Check out all the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Find our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Produced and edited by Matt Huxley and Chal Ravens. PRS licence number: LE-0016481 * Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

How do mainstream politicians and pundits contribute to the normalisation of far-right ideas, even as they claim to reject racism and populism? That’s one of many vital questions asked by Aaron Winter and Aurelien Mondon in their book, Reactionary Democracy. Following ACFM’s recent Trip about Fascism, Keir and Jem speak to Aaron and Aurelien about the making of the “woke conspiracy”, how illiberal politics absorbs liberal rhetoric, and why the left has to stop falling for reactionary narratives – and give up “debating” the far-right. Follow our Spotify playlist of all the music discussed on ACFM and subscribe to the ACFM mailing list to get weirder and leftier. Produced by Matt Huxley.

A lot of people are saying that fascism is on the rise. But what are we pointing to when we call a system, or a person, fascist? On this Trip, Nadia, Keir and Jem map out a complicated ideology, from its roots in 19th century industrialisation to its resurgence in ethnonationalism and eco-apartheid. Exploring how different political traditions try to explain fascism, they look for signs of the f-word in contemporary politics and play music from Woody Guthrie, Heaven 17 and Black Sabbath. ACFM will be recording a live episode at How The Light Gets In, the philosophy and music festival at Hay-On-Wye in Wales, on 27 May. Listeners can get 20% off festival passes over at the How The Light Gets In website by applying the discount code NOVARA20. See the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm * Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

From fecal transplants to the yoghurt-industrial complex, we’ve never been more absorbed in the workings of our gut. But can we trust it? Nadia, Jem and Keir investigate the mysterious connections between mind and body, reason and instinct. How did capitalism separate our minds from our bodies? Is a belief in intuition filling the gap left by religion? And will reclaiming our biomes be a win for anti-capitalism? They digest their thinking with music from Björk and Olivia Rodrigo and ideas from Max Weber and Daniel Kahneman. Find our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Books and films: Jeanette Winterson – 12 Bytes / Chinatown / Eve Chiapello and Luc Boltanski – The New Spirit of Capitalism / Daniel Kahneman – Thinking Fast and Slow / Jeremy Gilbert and Alex Williams – Hegemony Now / The Last of Us Tracklist: Devo – Gut Feeling / FSOL – Stomach Acid / FSOL – Papua New Guinea / Frenzy – Fire in my Gut / Guts – Voyaging Bird / John Cale – Guts / Björk – Sweet Intuition / Olivia Rodrigo – Love is Embarrassing Produced and edited by Matt Huxley and Chal Ravens. PRS licence number: LE-0016481 * Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

Last time on ACFM, the gang explored the impact of UFOs on politics, from deep-state conspiracies to the Posadists. But to really understand how aliens influence our thought – and what our belief in E.T. says about ourselves – we have to go to the movies. In this Microdose, Keir, Jem and Nadia sweep through a century of aliens on screen, from Martian invaders to Mulder & Scully to talking heptapods. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Films, TV & Books: H. G. Wells – The War of the Worlds / The Day the Earth Stood Still / Invasion of the Body Snatchers / Quatermass / The Midwich Cuckoos / The Blob / Solaris / Close Encounters of the Third Kind / Alien / The Thing / E.T. / They Live / The X-Files / Men in Black / The Host / Godzilla / Cloverfield / District 9 / Sector Zero / The Expanse / Arrival / Nope Produced by Matt Huxley.

Should the left care about the existence of aliens? The ACFM gang explore the impact of UFOs on political thought in this Trip. Keir, Jem and Nadia discuss the connections between UFO conspiracies and right-wing thought, why some communists think aliens will bring about world revolution, and whether Fermi’s paradox means we’re not alone, with music from Sun Ra, The Carpenters and true believers Blink 182. Find our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Books: Mark Pilkington – Mirage Men / Susan Lepselter – The Resonance of Unseen Things / Carl Jung – Flying Saucers / Erich von Däniken – Chariot of the Gods / H. G. Wells – The War of the Worlds / A. M. Gittlitz – I Want to Believe / Kim Stanley Robinson – Aurora Music: Blink 182 – Aliens Exist / Sheb Wooley – The Purple People Eater / Sun Ra – Interplanetary Music / The Carpenters – Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Space / Pink Floyd – Interstellar Overdrive / Flying Saucer Attack – The Season is Ours / Radiohead – Subterranean Homesick Alien / The Byrds – Hey Mr. Space Man / Radiohead – Subterranean Homesick Alien Produced and edited by Matt Huxley and Chal Ravens. PRS licence number: LE-0016481

Music has the uncanny power to stir up big feelings, which makes it an obvious vehicle for political statements of hope, anger, despair, or how to cast your vote. In this Microdose episode to accompany ACFM’s recent Trip on Protest, Jem takes us through 60 years of plugged-in protest music – no strumming folkies or broadside ballads this time. From hip-hop campaign boosters to new wave takes on British imperialism, from anti-landlord lyrics to a requiem for the post-war dream, it’s a narrated playlist revealing the manifold methods of musical persuasion. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Find our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Music: Marlena Shaw – Woman of the Ghetto (1969) / Iggy and the Stooges – Ballad of Hollis Brown (1973) / Max Romeo – Rent Crisis (1974) / Stiff Little Fingers – Alternative Ulster (1978) / Elvis Costello & The Attractions – Oliver’s Army (1979) / Pink Floyd – The Gunner’s Dream (1983) / Bronski Beat – Smalltown Boy (1984) / Grandmaster Flash & Melle Mel – Jesse (1984) / Midnight Oil – Beds Are Burning (1987) / Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy – Television, The Drug of the Nation (1991) / Asian Dub Foundation – Jericho (1995) / Le Tigre – My My Metrocard (1999) / Ms. Dynamite – It Takes More (2002) / Gina Birch – Feminist Song (2021) / The Coup – The Guillotine (2015) Produced and edited by Matt Huxley and Chal Ravens. PRS licence number: LE-0016481

The ACFM gang get together for the last time this year to deliver a Festive 50. Keir, Jem and Nadia select the best bits of culture and politics from 2023, from music, films, books to games, strikes and actions. Unwrap to find sci-fi blaxploitation, comedy history, gobby glam-punk, Judge Dredd analysis, a fresh angle on Silicon Valley billionaires and much more. Thanks for listening to the show and for all your support this year – we couldn’t do it without you. https://novara.media/support Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Find our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Produced and edited by Matt Huxley and Chal Ravens. PRS licence number: LE-0016481

Millions have protested against the bombing of Gaza by taking part in marches, boycotts, sit-ins and other demonstrations. But what difference does it make, either to the world or to ourselves? The gang confront a contentious topic in this Trip. Do “A to B” marches ever achieve anything? What about joining hands around an RAF base? Digging up roads? Refusing to pay your taxes? Is squatting a form of direct action? They discuss Irish hunger strikers, Montgomery bus boycotters, Greenham Common women and the people that Suella Braverman calls “hate marchers”, with music from Lowkey, the Plastic Ono Band, Steel Pulse and more. Find our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Music: Rolling Stones – Street Fighting Man / Dylan – Masters of War / Samba extract / Public Enemy – 911 is a Joke / Lowkey – Ghosts of Grenfell / Steel Pulse – Handsworth Revolution / The Plastic Ono Band – Give Peace A Chance / John Lennon – Working Class Hero Book: Charles Tilly – Social Movements: 1768-2004 Produced and edited by Matt Huxley and Chal Ravens. PRS licence number: LE-0016481

Ever feel like there’s too much change these days? Don’t worry, you’re not (necessarily) becoming more conservative. On this Trip, Nadia, Jem and Keir think about the ebb and flow of political currents, social movements and our inner lives. What’s the difference between being still and being stuck? When does a campaign turn into a movement? Why do we talk about feminism coming in waves? How can you tell you’re approaching a tipping point? The gang turn such abstract questions into concrete history, with examples from punk to Corbyn, and from Daoism to degrowth. Find our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Books: David Easton – A Systems Analysis of Political Life / The Free Association – Moments of Excess / Aristide Zolberg – Moments of Madness / Gilles Deleuze – Difference and Repetition / Gilles Deleuze & Felix Guattari – Anti-Oedipus; A Thousand Plateaus / Naomi Klein – The Shock Doctrine Music: Curtis Mayfield – Move on Up / Hiroshi Yoshimura – Urban Snow / Gang of Four – At Home He’s A Tourist / Moor Mother – Meditation Rag / Björk – It’s Oh So Quiet / Tony Scott – Za Zen / The Raincoats – The Dance of Hopping Mad Produced and edited by Matt Huxley and Chal Ravens. PRS licence number: LE-0016481

Festivals. The perfect embodiment of the ACFM aesthetic, and even social politics… or are they? As the season comes to a close, Nadia, Jem and Keir ask themselves what festivals are really about. Is it music? Camping? The breakdown of everyday hierachies? Or is it just 20,000 people standing in a field? With help from Bakhtin’s concept of the “carnivalesque” and Bataille’s “excess”, the gang discuss hippies and punks, counterculture and commerce, and the role of Glastonbury in the national imagination. Music under discussion comes from Banco De Gaia, Hawkwind, The Magic Mushroom Band and more patchouli-scented wanderers. Subscribe to the mailing list: https://novara.media/ACFMnewsletter Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support Music: David Bowie – ‘Memory of a Free Festival’ / Pulp – ‘Sorted For E’s and Wizz’ / Seize The Day – ‘With My Hammer I Break The Chains’ / Hawkwind – ‘Silver Machine’ / The Magic Mushroom Band – ‘Revolution’ / Ozric Tentacles – ‘Dissolution (The Clouds Disperse)’ / Culture Shock – ‘Stonehenge’ / Autechre – ‘Flutter’ / Banco De Gaia – Excerpt from Deep Live TV: Festivals Britannia (BBC) Books & articles: Mikhail Bakhtin – Rabelais and His World / Jeremy Gilbert & Ewan Pearson – Discographies: Dance Music, Culture and the Politics of Sound / Georges Bataille – The Accursed Share / Frederic Jameson – Archaeologies of the Future / Penny Rimbaud / The Last of the Hippies

In this bumper Trip, the gang survey the totalising modern phenomenon that is The Internet. Nadia, Keir and Jem dredge up their early interactions with a primitive web and explain how the dream of free and open communication was displaced by closed networks of e-commerce and data harvesting. Following Keir’s recent Microdose episode with Malcolm Harris, they discuss the connections between self-optimising techies and the pseudo-science of eugenics. They also talk about digital hygiene, the “Californian ideology”, why the Soviets didn’t invent the internet, and whether psychedelic drugs were the driver of Silicon Valley’s dominance. Music comes from The Fall, Le Tigre and the very online Lil Pump and Macintosh Plus. Join the mailing list: novara.media/ACFMnewsletter Help us build people-powered media: novara.media/support Music: Knife Party – ‘Internet Friends’ / Le Tigre – ‘Get Off The Internet’ / The Fall – ‘Telephone Thing’ / The Penguin Cafe Orchestra – ‘Telephone and Rubber Band’ / Wiley – ‘Eskimo’ / Hannah Diamond – ‘Hi’ / Grimes – ‘Oblivion’ / Macintosh Plus – ‘リサフランク420 / 現代のコンピュー’ / Lil Pump – ‘Elementary’ / FKA twigs – ‘Ride The Dragon’ Books and articles: Daniel Levitin – The Organised Mind / Alison Winch & Ben Little – The New Patriarchs of Digital Capitalism / Benjamin Peters – How Not to Network a Nation / Richard Barbrook & Andy Cameron – ‘The Californian Ideology’ / Malcolm Harris – Palo Alto / Jeremy Gilbert & Alex Williams – Hegemony Now / Nick Couldry & Ulises Ali Mejias – The Cost of Connection

Ahead of an ACFM Trip about the internet, Keir Milburn is joined by Malcolm Harris to talk about the unique political history of his hometown of Palo Alto, the intellectual laboratory for a century of American hegemony. The Kids These Days author tells a story that connects the founding of California, the violent removal of its native population, Stanford University’s eugenicist agenda and the parallel emergence of Silicon Valley and the military-industrial complex. Is the entire project of personal computing and the internet tainted by this brutal history? Malcolm’s book, Palo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism, and the World, is out now.

As the longest day arrives in the northern hemisphere, Jeremy, Nadia and Keir ponder our obsession with the great outdoors. How did parks become political? Why do we seek out the strenuous discomforts of hiking, camping and cold water? And what does Jem have against music festivals? They look back on a century of changing attitudes to the outdoors, from radical Edwardian cyclists and the woo-woo ways of the Kindred of the Kibbo Kift to the modern obsession with lidos and wild swimming. Plus, pastoral music from Peter Gabriel, Arthur Russell and Bow Wow Wow. Books: Robert Blatchford – Merrie England / Richard King – The Lark Ascending Music: Shonen Knife – ‘Cycling Is Fun’ / Ewan McColl – ‘The Manchester Rambler’ / Peter Gabriel – ‘Solsbury Hill’ / Kate Bush – ‘Running Up That Hill’ / Vaughan Williams – ‘The Lark Ascending’ / Muckers – ‘Out Of County’ / Bow Wow Wow – ‘Wild In The Country’ / Blur – ‘Parklife’ / The Small Faces – ‘Itchycoo Park’ / Pink Floyd – ‘Grantchester Meadows’ / Arthur Russell – ‘Let’s Go Swimming’ / Mark Stewart & Maffia – ‘Jerusalem’ Produced by Matt Huxley and Chal Ravens. PRS Licence Number: LE-0016481

After last week’s look at the politics of comedy, this time the gang turn to the gogglebox for a Microdose about sitcoms. Specifically, we’re watching comedy shows set in the workplace – from shoddy B&Bs to big-box superstores, from Wernham Hogg to Springfield Nuclear Power Plant. What lies beyond the double entendres and cheap sexism of the ’70s? Where did workplace humour go in the ’90s? How did TV cops reckon with Black Lives Matter in the 2020s? And which sitcom is a favourite of both Nadia Idle and Mrs Thatcher? Only ACFM has the answer. Subscribe to the ACFM mailing list at novara.media/acfmnewsletter TV shows: The Dick Van Dyke Show / Steptoe and Son / On The Buses / Are You Being Served / Fawlty Towers / Taxi / Yes Minister / The Simpsons / The Office / The IT Crowd / 30 Rock / Parks & Recreation / Party Down / Brooklyn Nine-Nine / Silicon Valley / Superstore / Atlanta / Corporate / Severance Produced by Matt Huxley and Chal Ravens. Music by Matt Huxley.

What’s the point of comedy? Stand-ups were at the forefront of the cultural backlash against Thatcherism, but today’s meme-driven lols are rarely in the service of left-wing politics. Meanwhile, the world’s most powerful people seem intent on having a laugh, from podcasting politicians to presidential comedians. In this Trip, Jeremy Gilbert, Nadia Idle and Keir Milburn put together an ACFM theory of humour. Does satire make us more cynical? Is there such a thing as a national sense of humour? Are men funnier than women? Where did all the comedy songs go? The gang consider theories of laughter from Lauren Berlant, Freud and Bergson and the efforts of jokemongers like Phyllis Diller, Larry David and Alexei Sayle. Brace yourself for musical humour from The Wurzels, Afroman and Half Man Half Biscuit. Subscribe to the newsletter: novara.media/ACFMnewsletter Books & articles: Juvenal – The Satires / Lauren Berlant and Sianne Ngai – Comedy Has Issues / Christopher Hitchens – Why Women Aren’t Funny / Henri Bergson – Laughter: An Essay on the Meaning of the Comic / Sigmund Freud – Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious / Thomas Hobbes – Human Nature / Alenka Zupančič – The Odd One In: On Comedy / Todd McGowan – Only a Joke Can Save Us Music: Benny Hill – Ernie / The Wurzels – The Combine Harvester (Brand New Key) / The Commentators – N-N-Nineteen Not Out / The Tiger Lillies – Gin / Spinal Tap – Big Bottom / Calimar White – Never Do S#!t At Work / Chumbawamba – Bigmouth Strikes Again / Half Man Half Biscuit – Joy Division Oven Gloves / Bob Dylan – Lenny Bruce Is Dead / Afroman – Because I Got High / The Beat – Tears of a Clown / Monty Python – Always Look on the Bright Side of Life TV & film: The Thick of It / Brass Eye / Have I Got News For You / Spinal Tap / 30 Rock / Curb Your Enthusiasm Produced and edited by Matt Huxley and Chal Ravens. PRS Licence Number: LE-0016481

From the epic of Gilgamesh to the archetypes of Carl Jung, the mysterious power of myth is at hand. Is Genesis as mythical as Oedipus? How did the fantasy of Brexit become a reality? And what stories underpin the emerging theory of Gilbertism? In this Trip, Jeremy, Nadia and Keir explore the alternate realities created by psychoanalysts and professional wrestlers, and discuss how theorists of myth have fed into both left and right-wing ideologies. Along the way they explore ideas from Barthes, De Beauvoir and Jordan Peterson, and music from Okkervil River, Bob Dylan, This Mortal Coil and Sun Ra. Join the mailing list: novara.media/ACFMnewsletter Books: The Epic of Gilgamesh / George Eliot – Middlemarch / Sigmund Freud – Totem and Taboo / Carl Jung – Man and His Symbols; The Archetypes and The Collective Unconscious / Claude Levi Strauss – The Structural Study of Myth / Shakespeare – Hamlet / George Lakoff – Metaphors We Live By / Roland Barthes – Mythologies / Simone de Beauvoir – The Second Sex / Ernesto Laclau – New Reflections on the Revolution of Our Time / Joseph Campbell – The Hero with A Thousand Faces / Georges Sorel – Reflections on Violence / Leo Strauss – The City and Man; Natural Right and History / Yves Citton – Mythocratie: Storytelling et Imaginaire de Gauche / Greil Marcus – Lipstick Traces / Greil Marcus – Mystery Train / Mark Fisher – Capitalist Realism / Jordan Peterson – Maps of Meaning Films: You May Be Pretty, But I Am Beautiful: The Adrian Street Story / Generation Zero Music: Okkervil River – ‘We Need A Myth’ / Cocteau Twins – ‘Persephone’ / This Mortal Coil – ‘Song to the Siren’ / Sun Ra and his Solar Myth Arkestra – ‘Realm of Lightning’ / The Doors – ‘Hyacinth House’ / Brian Eno – ‘Apollo’ / Bob Dylan – ‘Isis’ / Siouxsie and the Banshees – ‘Mirage’ / Lloyd Price – ‘Stagger Lee’

The ACFM groupmind went into overdrive on last week’s Trip, a wide-ranging conversation about the long and violent history of strikes. This time, Nadia, Jem and Keir take a closer look at cultural representations of worker organisation – that is to say, they sat themselves down with a huge stack of old movies and an extra-large bucket of opinions. From blacklisted Hollywood dramas to bawdy British comedies, the gang survey nearly 100 years of strikes on screen – courtesy of directors like Danny DeVito, Sergei Eisenstein, Barbara Kopple and Boots Riley – and consider the changing public attitudes to labour and capital. This episode contains some spoilers, so if you’re not sure what happens to Billy Elliott in the end, proceed with caution… Get bonus content from this episode and enhance your weird left experience by signing up to the ACFM newsletter: novara.media/ACFMnewsletter Films: Strike / The Man in a White Suit / Salt of the Earth / I’m Alright Jack / The Working Class Goes To Heaven / Carry On At Your Convenience / The Rank and File / Tout Va Bien / Norma Rae / Matewan / Riff Raff / Hoffa / Billy Elliott / Made In Dagenham / The Full Monty / Pride / Sorry To Bother You

In the midst of Britain’s biggest wave of industrial action in years, the gang turn their attention to the long and bloodied history of strikes. Who do we find on the picket line? Nadia, Keir and Jeremy explore a lineage that stretches back hundreds of years, from matchgirls to miners, from 1840s century Chartists to 2020s university lecturers, and from smoggy cities to leafy suburbs. Along the way they ask whether 18th century sailors were the original tech workers, why Britain’s only general strike was a failure, and if civilisation itself might have started with a sex strike. Plus, the gang discuss their favourite pro-union hits from Paul Robeson, Judy Collins, The Flying Pickets and more. Want more? Get the ACFM newsletter: novara.media/ACFMnewsletter Find our complete Spotify playlist – just search ACFM. Music: Strawbs – ‘Part of the Union’ / Florence Reece – ‘Which Side Are You On?’ / Judy Collins – ‘Bread and Roses’ / Bev Grant – ‘We Were There’ / The Flying Pickets – ‘Only You’ / Paul Robeson – ‘Joe Hill’ Books and pamphlets: William Benbow – Grand National Holiday, and Congress of the Productive Classes / E. P. Thompson – The Making of the English Working Class Films: Pride / Made in Dagenham Produced and edited by Matt Huxley and Chal Ravens. PRS Licence Number: LE-0016481