The Battleground

1 day ago | thebattleground.eu | Charlie Bertsch

Even the most beat-forward tracks, “Oneironaut sei wachsam” and “Die Ratten”, sound like they are being ripped apart by centrifugal force. Others, such as “Souterrain” and the finale “Nichts”, feel like dispatches from the ruins mentioned in the album’s title, pieced together from fragments that exhibit magnetic repulsion. Once you know that Das Kinn (The Chin) is the name Frankfurt sound artist Toben Piel chose for his one-man band, this makes a lot of sense.

1 week ago | thebattleground.eu | Ari Paul

Young men are seen taunting and harassing her while a police officer escorts her. Shot on the evening of 24 April, the recording only tells part of the story. The woman, who spoke with me on the condition that she remain anonymous, has lived in the neighbourhood for a decade. She is neither Arab nor Jewish and was not participating in the protests against a nearby talk by Itamar Ben-Gvir, Israel’s far-right national security minister.

2 weeks ago | thebattleground.eu | Charlie Bertsch

Abyss draws from all of Anika’s previous work, which ranges from the crackly, dub-adjacent grooves of her eponymous debut, through the muscular post-punk she released with the group Exploded View, to the delicate, ambient-inflected soundscapes of 2023’s Eat Liquid. The result is a supple mode of Dark Wave, accessible to a broad audience, but still tough as nails.

2 weeks ago | thebattleground.eu | Josh White

In a historic case, the Supreme Court just ruled that the definition of “woman” under the Equality Act is limited to biological women, therefore excluding trans women, even though the judges were careful to stress that the same law still protects trans people. The decision has sent shockwaves through the country’s LGBTQ+ communities. This ruling is the most significant victory yet for a small group of online campaigners who have waged a long struggle to change British law.

2 weeks ago | thebattleground.eu | Ari Paul

A person might be forgiven if they passed through and had no clue that it was on 29 April, 1945, that the lifeless body of Benito Mussolini was hanged at a filling station by partisans, a gruesome display foreshadowing Adolf Hitler’s suicide the following day. I walked around the square in early April in the hope of taking in the historical significance of this fiery end to Mussolini’s regime, as well as the current moment.