This is one of those odd songs that you can listen to and enjoy several times before you start listening to the lyrics and are startled into realising that it isn’t your typical pop or rock song. Unlike REM’s ‘It’s the End of the World as we Know it’,  ‘Belong’ isn’t gleefully belting it’s end apocalyptic credentials. It’s a quiet song with a soothing tone, offering us a mother’s mantra to her child:

[She] Stood and whispered to her child: belong
She held the child and whispered
With calm, calm, belong

The spoken lyrics are said in the same calming mode that we imagine the mother must be using with her child, and it’s easy to be soothed by them into not listening. But when one does, the words are striking indeed:

Her world collapsed early Sunday morning
She got up from the kitchen table
Folded the newspaper and silenced the radio
Those creatures jumped the barricades
And have headed for the sea, sea

There’s clearly a metaphorical mode to this. The video ties the song to a political message – the creatures jumping the barricades perhaps representing protestors fighting for freedom. But the song resists a direct, simplistic meaning. Such a broad, political meaning is contrasted with the deeply personal opening line. It is her world that has collapsed, and the little mundane details speak to a smaller, more personal event, the sort of thing that could go utterly unnoticed by the rest of the world. It is ‘early Sunday morning’ – a time evocative of peace and solitude: it’s early, before other people are up and moving about; it’s a spiritual time, in the Christian religion, and an empty time, in that (for Christians) work is forbidden – it’s evocative of the stillness and echoing quiet of churches. She gets up from the table, folds her newspaper, turns off the radio – the sort of details one would only put in a story – much less a song – unless they has some significance, and yet, there is nothing momentous in the actions themselves. Three lines are devoted to these very ordinary notes in a song that opens dramatically about the world (or her world) collapsing, yet fails to say why. What the barricades are. What the creatures are.

And we must note the oddity that it is not people who are describes jumping the barricades, but ‘creatures’. Even in metaphor, it is a startling phrase. If these are protestors fighting for freedom, it is strange that they should be cast in such an alienating light. But equally, if the creatures jumping the barricades is the cause of the world collapsing, it seems odd that they are headed to the sea, presumably away from the mother and child at home. And, moreover, the mother is inspired by them:

She began to breathe
To breathe at the thought of such freedom

It sounds as though she has been inspired to rebel, possibly against her own domesticity, the smallness of the details of her life. But then, one has to wonder, why does she tell the child to ‘belong’, which has such connotations of conformity, or repressing individuality?

I don’t think this song is meant to be open to an easy reading. I think it is meant to sooth us and wake us up at the same time. The calming voice of the spoken lyrics is contrasted with the hopeful (yet also somewhat melancholy?) wordless singing that rises up above the monotone, like a bird soaring to freedom. I suspect it is in part meant to express the unavoidable tension between our need to belong and our need to be free to express ourselves and control our own destiny. Which, of course, is central to the appeal of apocalyptic fiction. We imagine the apocalypse in part to scare ourselves – we depict it as hard and wild and dangerous – but also because we long for a peace and solitude that is unattainable in the press of rules and restrictions, and even the bodies of our fellow humans… the barricades can only hold for so long before we long to burst free.

I think this song shows the real genius of poetry in REM’s music, and I think, when the barricades break and the world collapses, this would be a very good song to listen to, contemplating the uncertain future. And I can’t help but not that it is particularly appropriate for the girls of the apocalypse, some of whom may be mothers with babes in their arms to care for.

– Apocalypse Womble out

He recently got me a wind up torch to keep in the boot of my car. It’s a cheapish one from argos that you can charge by hand winding or through the car cigarette lighter. An essential part of any Apocalypse Girls go bag. 4

This is the one I was given, but there are lots of options out there for a wind up torch.

It was unsettling how things changed. From the safety of social feeds, we watched as photoshopped spoofs and Michael Bay rip-offs paled before the quiet aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. Smouldering burns scarred into whiteboard neighbourhoods. A suburban block turned to some vast waste dump. A seafront bar dragged across a bay, a boat perched on railroad tracks. More than the Boxing Day Tsunami, this felt uncomfortably close to home.

We may be incredulous of the naive expectations of the massive storm; or the religious leader who blamed Sandy on New York State’s acceptance of gay marriage. Yet, what lay in front of us was a solid lesson in where the future may lead for many cities across the globe.

In Part One of What Hurricane Sandy taught us about the urban apocalypse, we looked at Corporate Sponsorship, Disaster Parasites, and the not-so sweet smell of the apocalypse.

Past the cut, in Part Two, we’ll be looking at the comfort of petty theft, how hipsters decorate their fallout digs, and why it’s not over til it’s over…

The Emerald City lies right across the street – and you terrify them…

As already noted, one of the most intriguing features of post-Sandy’s New York was the variation in recovery of different parts of the city. Not just between Manhattan and the “forgotten boroughs“. Not just within boroughs themselves – witness the relatively unscathed area of Brooklyn’s Bushwick and Williamsburg, versus the devastation in Coney Island and Gowanus – but even within individual neighbourhoods. Residents of Sheepshead Bay found electricity was available to sporadic pockets of houses in some streets, but not to others. You’d imagine this would be a sign of hope – but rather than open their homes up to their neighbours, many hid in their castles, frightened of being looted simply because they had working utilities.

Looking at the weapons some citizens carried after dark, perhaps it was the smart move…
 

Hipsters will always be Hipsters.

As the world collapses around you, it’s good to know some things don’t change. Amongst all the devastation, city dwellers were not only resourceful, but wonderfully generous. Churches could be relied on as a focal point for donated supplies, while those in tight knit neighbourhoods banded together to share phone charging, internet and food supplies – and even their own homes. For those with signal, there were constantly updated fuel maps of the city, and twitter feeds and youtube kept residents updated on food truck locations. Animal rescue workers worked to help pets trapped or lost after the hurricane. And there was still time for relaxation, as those frustrated by the cancellation of the Halloween Parade made their own celebrations.

Even petty theft had a comforting predictability about it. Amongst stories of thieves stealing from retirement homes and pharmacies, one photographer captured a pair of hipsters looting fallen, yet operational, stadium lights from McCarren Park. Meanwhile, four teens were arrested for breaking into a Dairy Barn in Syosset, Long Island to grab beer, cigarettes and supplies for a party – and then breaking in again when those ran out.

(via Occupy Wall Street‘s Occupy Sandy campaign)

 
This is not the apocalypse. THIS is.

So you’ve had your fireworks – the towering inferno, some massive Richter level earthquake, your alien invasion. You may think the worst of it is over, and all that’s left is learning to live in your brave new world. Yet Sandy showed that the apocalypse isn’t necessarily the disaster itself, but what follows.

In the wake of Hurricane Sandy, a savage Nor’Easter – a Winter storm – swept down the Eastern Seaboard, bringing with it gusts of up to 60 mph, and snow from Delaware to Maine. Parts of the Rockaways and Staten Island were encouraged to evacuate for a 2-4 foot storm surge – not as high as the hurricane waves, and certainly not usually enough to force residents to higher ground, but for the damage already caused by Sandy. On-going relief efforts for the Hurricane were hampered by the snow and wind, which brought fresh problems of its own, knocking down trees and causing yet more power outages, as the storm took down lines faster than repair crews could keep up. It’s one thing to be living in a shell of your suburban dreams, but when it’s in the midst of a Winter storm, it’s hard to find comfort – beyond the near guarantee the looters are suffering just as much as you are.

(Press conference – 8^th November 2012. Via NYC.Gov.)

The Apocalypse travels softly and carries salt.

So you’ve survived the “apocalypse”, the post-apocalypse. The real End Times may not come for decades down the line. In the wake of Sandy and Irene, many New Yorkers have begun to accept that drowned subways and spreading sewage are just something they’ll have to put up with as global warming increases. However, the real danger from flooding on the east coast came from the insidious damage it did beneath the city. Salt water is corrosive to the steel pipes used to carry utilities, and while the steel-reinforced concrete of building foundations is less vulnerable, rises in the sea level can have similar effects. Multiply this damage year on year, and you’ve got a city rotting at its foundations.

This problem may seem remote in the UK, at least at hurricane level. Yet many major cities around the world are built in the same locales – low lying flood plains, major port cities – with the same problems of rising sea levels (though admittedly New York’s sea level rise is above the global average), and the same complication: A problem buried deep underground. Solutions are available, ranging from EMP and ultrasound pulses, and maintenance tunnels for ageing infrastructure, to large scale engineering projects. Pitched battles rage between environmentalists in favour of building wetlands and oysterbeds, versus other scientists who favour large flood barriers across New York. Many suburbs, such as devastated Midland Beach and Breezy Point, may have to be abandoned entirely. Whichever solution is implemented – or whether they choose to use both soft and hard engineering solutions, as in the Netherlands – the face of cities may look very different in the future.

(Public Forum on Climate Change, Sandy and the Future of New York City, New York University – 5^th Dec 2012)

But this may not happen in time. New York’s flood defence program, for example, currently assumes a 2.6m flood once a century – but the recent New York City panel on Climate change guestimates that, with storm pattern changes, they could occur every 3-20 years. Even the latest FEMA flood maps of New York, produced after the frankenstorm, do not incorporate data on sea level rise. Following Sandy, New York politicians are beginning to wake up to these problems, but across the world, the fact remains: If changes aren’t made, the great cities of civilisation may, literally, just collapse into the sea.

(via ABC News)

 
There is no man in the mountain.

In the old tale, when the city falls, our heroine heads for hills to meet with an old sage, who gives her wisdom of the simpler days, and the skills she requires to survive these troubled times. Whether you plan on being the heroine, or the sage, let me disabuse you of this – there is no man in the mountain. Even outside the city limits, a one metre rise in sea level at the coast can lead to similar rises of salt in ground water within 2 kilometres of the coast.  And assuming you survived the city, you’re not out of the seaweed yet.

(TVJ’s Prime Time News, Jamaica – 25th October 2012)

The NYC-centric reporting on Sandy belied the true scale of the disaster. This wasn’t just a hurricane, it was a superstorm. Sandy affected 24 states in the US alone (indeed, Atlanta took more than its fair share) and reached as far north as Canada. In fact, windspeeds peaked between Jamaica and Cuba, making landfall at Santiago de Cuba at 110 mph (175 km/h), compared to the 90 mph (150 km/h) winds that hit the north eastern US. In all, 253 people died in seven countries as a result of Sandy – a relatively small percentage for the area covered, certainly. But don’t go looking for salvation and wisdom beyond the rat race. You may get little more than “run”.

***

Click here for Part 1 of What Sandy taught us about the Urban Apocalypse, where we looked at Coporate Sponsorship, Disaster Parasites, and the smell of the apocalypse.

It was unsettling how things changed. From the safety of social feeds, we watched as photoshopped spoofs and Michael Bay rip-offs paled before the quiet aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. Smouldering burns scarred into whiteboard neighbourhoods. A suburban block turned to some vast waste dump. A seafront bar dragged across a bay, a boat perched on railroad tracks. More than the Boxing Day Tsunami, this felt uncomfortably close to home.

We may be incredulous of the naive expectations of the massive storm; or the religious leader who blamed Sandy on New York State’s acceptance of gay marriage. Yet, what lay in front of us was a solid lesson in where the future may lead for many cities across the globe. Past the cut, here’s the first of a two part blog on what Hurricane Sandy taught us about surviving the urban apocalypse.
 

(Chris Tackett at Tree Hugger)

You’re not important enough.

Post- and Apocalyptic Fiction make fertile staging ground for authors exploring preconceptions of government, big business, and their perceived attitudes towards their wayward charges. During Hurricane Sandy, we had a taste of one scenario. While New York City workers rushed to restore electricity, heat and water to Manhattan, parts of  The Rockaways and Sheepshead Bay were still without power a week and a half later. Staten Island found its reputation as the forgotten borough prescient it waited days for Red Cross relief. Vast differences in the availability of medicines and food across the city intensified problems, such that, on visiting one borough, Mayor Michael Bloomberg found himself assailed by furious residents.

(via www.CapitalNewYork.com)

For their part, city and state leaders were just as outraged, New York governor Andrew Cuomo launching scathing attacks on utilities companies for their slow response to power and water shortages. Only one incident springs to mind where a government employee deliberately abused his position during the clean-up – diverting workers to clear a fallen tree from his garden – and was promptly fired. However, the experience of NYC does show that unless you are living in an economically significant part of the city, it may be a while before you get help – which, in any potentially apocalyptic scenario, leads to another problem. Exactly how long do you wait to find out how bad the situation is?

You will be saved by what kills you.

We all get a kick from knocking our consumer-led land of privilege – look at the Dawn of the Dead’s infamous mall zombie scene, for instance. But while we scoff at the Snookies and Twinkie sponsorships of this world, bear in mind the apocalypse is likely to boast as many ad breaks as your day to day. In post-Sandy NYC, you couldn’t move without tripping over a telethon, fundraiser or a big name benefit concert – and, granted, it was good to see Trey Anastasio from Phish helping out of his own account.

However, when it came to the free shit, it was the big brands to the rescue. Amongst donations, Home Depot supplied free rakes, shovels and gloves, and Google reportedly gave iPads to help relief efforts. Elsewhere, the office of the governor secured the “generous” contributions of Walmart and Pepsico, who sent several truckloads of Mountain Dew, Doritos and, um, board games to stranded New Yorkers. An interesting development in the wake of the city’s much publicized block on supersize sodas launched in September, not to mention the 2008 trans-fat ban – but perhaps it’s a moot concern. Much as you might wonder about the nutritional value of this generous offer (or indeed, the usefulness of iPads in areas without electricity), are you really going to turn down free crisps when your local supermarket’s been empty for ten days?

(via Walmart corp)

You are not prepared.

I know what you’re thinking. You won’t need those free film snacks, right? You’re going to have all your provisions prepared, a backup generator full of juice, and enough artillery to defend your fortress from the hordes. Yet even the best laid plans went to Maldivian waste when Hurricane Sandy hit. Cynics among us will be unsurprised to learn about the aforementioned issues with public utilities, delays in help from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (or FEMA – the federal government agency responsible for coordinating responses to large scale disasters), or the design flaw in NYU hospital that meant first one, then the second backup generator went down – because both pumps were located in the basement.

(via Climate Desk)

Maybe some of us in cosy old Blighty titter at the Manhattanites who figured Sandy would be just like 2011’s Hurricane Irene, and hunkered down with frozen supplies and DVDs – only to discover that these things require working electrics. With appliances melting out, not all of these poor souls found solace in books alone, leading to the phenomenon of the Sandy Seven – the extra pounds put on by those stuck in the central city neighbourhoods with nothing to do but eat. You may scoff (they did) – certainly compared to their more unfortunate neighbours, they were in hogs heaven. Lack of refrigeration has more serious consequences than melted ice cream for diabetics and transplant patients. However, food can be an easy emotional crutch for us in times of crisis. Got enough supplies for six months? Sure about that?

Getting screwed over.

And the utilities issues didn’t end there. It’s debatable whether, in a truly apocalyptic event, much of the old empire would be left standing – but let’s postulate a scenario where either the bare minimum of government has survived, along with a handful of larger multi-/national companies. Already that sounds like utopia compared to the Roads of the apocalyptic canon. Don’t let the free nachos lull you into a false sense of security. It all comes down to a little phrase: “Act of God”. Simply put, if the company can’t realistically plan for a natural disaster, they won’t take responsibility for any service downtime as a result. In the case of cable companies serving the Eastern Seaboard of America, pressure from the noticeably unwashed masses won out, and after initial reluctance, Time Warner automatically refunded lost credit, while most other companies restored credit when applied for. Unfortunately, despite free bus services, the Metro Transit Authority wasn’t of the same mind on travelcards. Even financial security wasn’t guaranteed. Many with Hurricane insurance found themselves unable to claim, since Sandy was downgraded to a tropical storm after making landfall in the US.

Of course, all this is assuming folks from the authorities are who they say they are. From the Rockaways and more distant neighbourhoods, stories were rife of supposed company workers visiting homes and walking away with half the contents. On the scale of a larger disaster, it’d probably just be you, your bow and arrow, and your free crisps.

In short, the apocalypse stinks.

Delayed response times, limited supplies, the emotional fallout, getting screwed over by every company around… The massive queues  for overpriced gas… Maybe you can cope with all that, but frankly, the apocalypse stinks. Once you’ve got used to your own pungent scent after a few days without hot water, there’s the rest of the world to get used to, starting with your neighbours. With utilities down, many who refused to evacuate improvised their own toilet arrangements – or simply used the hallways.

(via NYC’s Metro Transit Authority)

If you’re thinking you can find some fresh air outside, forget that too. New York after Sandy certainly smelled of damp, if you were lucky. Naturally, refuse collection was put on hold while city workers concentrated on getting things up and running. Sewage flooded the subways, while the polluted Gowanus canal, already an Environmental Protection Agency Superfund site, flooded Brooklyn, and plastic suited workers with utilities trucks pumping the streets became a common sight.

And while some areas experienced severe food shortages, others found that a surplus brought its own nose-bothering problems. As one local put it…

If you think Chinatown normally has an unpleasant odor, imagine what it smells like 24 hours following no refrigeration.

[The Gothamist]

There’s just no getting away from it – the apocalypse smells really, really bad.

***

In Part 2 of What Sandy taught us about the Urban Apocalypse, we’ll look at the upside of petty theft, how hipsters decorate their fall of the empire digs, and why The End isn’t always The End.

I’m waking up to ash and dust

New on the Apocalypse Girls radar is the teddy apocalypse!  Yes, really! With cagefighting stuffed toys in a fun video from Imagine Dragons!

I’m breaking in, shaping up, then checking out of the prison bars
This is it, the apocalypse

Video aside, this is one of those great tunes that rocks an addictive beat with some cool melodies to get you into the zen zone when all about you is going a bit, well, apocalyptic.

battleaxebunny out

Last year we gave you a Christmas Music for the Apocalypse Playlist, this year, we’ve revamped the old one, replacing dead videos, and made you a brand new one with brand new songs!

Even if the literal apocalypse hasn’t reached your household yet, you may be in need of a little light relief from the usual Christmas fair your family insists on playing. Trest yourself to these tunes, both bleak and chipper, and feel the hectic Christmas holiday world melt away.

Playlist 1

The eagle-eyed amongst you may have noticed that some of the videos that were a part of the list last year had been deleted. These have now been replaced, and the list is whole again.

We’d also like to remind you that most, if not all, of these songs are available for purchase at the following sites:

Track List
#1 Christmas at Gound Zero, by Weird Al Yankovic
#2 Stop the Cavalry, by Jona Lewie
#3 Carol of the Old Ones, by the HP Lovecraft Historical Society
#4 Chiron Beta Prime, by Jonathan Coulton
#5 Death to the World, by the HP Lovecraft Historical Society
#6 A Post Apocalyptic Christmas, by Art Elliot
#7 Little Rare Book Room, by the HP Lovecraft Historical Society
#8 Post Apocalypse Christmas, by Gruff Rhys
#9 Old Men’s Brains (A Zombie Christmas), by Julie Webster
#10 The Night Santa Went Crazy, by Weird Al Yankovic
#11 Nuclear Winter, by The Department of Public Safety (can’t find an mp3 anywhere! I’ll gladly link if you know one)
#12 Silent Night, Blasphemous Night, by the HP Lovecraft Historical Society
#13 The Power of Love, by Frankie goes to Hollywood
#14 Have Yourself a Scary Little Solstice, by the HP Lovecraft Historical Society

Playlist 2: 2012 bonus tracks

I’ll be honest, I snatched the most professional apocalypse-themed Christmas songs for last year’s playlist, but the Internet is a creative place, and there are some fun little ditties floating round YouTube. Most of these you can’t download and buy and seem to be just on YouTube for now, but let’s show our support – if you like the tune, go like the vid!

Tracks:
#1 Happy Christmas (It’s the End of the World), by Trojaniksr
#2 Post Apocalypse Christmas Song, by Matt Falk
#3 Apocalypse Not Now, by Polly Wolf
#4 Have Yourself A Merry Apocalypse ( Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas Parody), by ROSE!
#5 “All I Want For Christmas Is You” PARODY Zombie Apocalypse, by AmandasChronicles
#6 Zombie Christmas Medley, by James Lacey and Edith Murphy

Now you can with Plague Inc from Ndemic Creations.

http://www.ndemiccreations.com/

As an apocalypse girl I can tell you I have had hours of fun destroying the earth. I eventually moved on from slightly rude plagues to fluffy names like ‘Weasels’ yes it amused me reading ‘Weasels has destroyed humanity’.

I particularly like the little news flashes ‘Society has broken down in the UK’ or ‘Greenland executes infected’.

It’s like tetris, it’s brilliance is it’s simplicity.

Comedy, the most essential of tools in your survival kit. If you can’t keep your morale up, you’ll be lost, so keep this song from master musician and comedian, Bill Bailey, to hand. Especially if you find yourself to be a human slave in an insect nation.

And remember: the spiders are not insects, but in the war they will side with the insects.

- Apocalypse Womble out.

Not all songs suitable for the Apocalypse have to be depressing and downbeat. When the end comes I want to go out fighting – I want to cheer my sisters on and win the day. It’s impossible not to feel uplifted by this song. The slow, the swell of the melody, building throughout the song provides the perfect counter-point to the tired and plodding beat. This is a song for the downtrodden who are not beaten. This is a song for celebration in a hard world.

We are the champions, my friends. The champions of the world.

- Apocalypse Womble out.

Some people met the hurricane in swimming trunks and a horse’s head.

Jimmy Kruyne has taken credit for this little piece of joy, having tweeted ‘The news crew is down the block, Im thinking horse mask and swimming trunks?‘

Props should also be given to David Tra for one-upman ship:

The caption on YouTube pleasingly reads ‘On a scale of one to horsehead jogger…’, and whilst I think videoing yourself is not quite the same as high-jacking national news coverage, you have to admire a man who, according to Metro, said: ‘I see your shirtless, horse-head jogger and raise you a shirtless, unicorn-head roller-blader.’

Some people took slightly mean pleasure in tricking Twitter users into retweeting pictures of other storms. istwitterwrong has made an excellent post debunking these. Whilst others responded by satirising this practice and tweeting links to pictures like these:

Naturally, spoof twitter accounts popped up for the hurricane itself:

And amidst all this good humour, good people were also on the ground, helping each other out. Witness this haunting image of ambulances moving patients from one hospital where the power had gone out to another:

Meanwhile, 190 firefighters battled through the night to tackle a catastrophic fire that had broken out in Queens, and Emily Rahimi, a seven year veteran of the Fire Department of New York sat by a Twitter feed through the night providing vital support to people who couldn’t get through the over-taxed 911 calls. Truly a woman you’d want with you, come the apocalypse.

If this were in Britain, we’d call it ‘Dunkirk Spirit’, but really it’s just the simplicity and goodness of people pulling together in a crisis, to stand by one another and keep their spirits up. Not just the heroes, although we should never undermine the work they do, but the jokers who bring us around to the funny side of our situation – who play us a song, or make a silly image, or run around in the rain with a horse mask on their head.

To all of the people keeping it together in the face of Sandy, we at the Girls’ Guide to Surviving the Apocalypse salute you.