As you can see, in this video, Daniel Romano is a rat. What’s less clear is why. On his EIGHTH album of the year, the Ontario artist is getting loopy— or perhaps just generously cerebral, feeding us inscrutably damning lyrics through the sugar coating of orchestral folk-rock. Here’s the statement Romano issued with the track: “A rat without a tale, history falsified, bring your rodenticide, for the things that claw and bite, spread disease and blight, the cowards, the scourge, the wingless bird, the voice of the sewer, the great ill-doer, like a spoiled egg, the original plague. They move, they dance, they loan and finance, they curse and prevail like a rat without a tale. Look out baby.” Look out, indeed, but first, listen.
Cheers to Bettina Makalintal at Vice for codifying The Gentrification Font, something you knew about but never thought to name. You’ve seen it on shitty condos everywhere: house numbers printed in the Shake Shack typeface, indicating that whoever lives here now is richer, and more temporary, than the people who lived there before. As you may recall, the numbers started popping up post-Recession when all the developers were slap-dash renovating old spaces for Snake People* who preferred a sleek surface to function or quality (or, you know, community engagement). Those spaces— and their typeface badges— have since proliferated all over the country, signaling to that class of people that they belong anywhere the numbers are (and to everyone else that they don’t). Ironically, the font is named “Neutraface” after the architect Richard Neutra, who designed low-cost, high-quality living spaces and clearly had no say over his legacy. Send him your thoughts and prayers.
*Millennials
Can municipal projects use the gentrification font? I ask because there’s a proposal out to turn Port Authority into a mall. Port Authority, for those who don’t know, is New York city’s vast, underground bus depot, utterly drab but also fairly effective at shuttling people affordably to and from the outside world. Under a Trump infrastructure plan to stimulate Covid recovery, it could become the Hudson Terminal Market, a shiny pocket of commuter shops and hip food stalls, which would also mean digging a new set of bus tunnels, included in the $15 billion proposal. Could New York use $15 billion of stimulus money elsewhere— say, in schools or hospitals or homeless shelters? Sure. But wouldn’t it be nice for all those commuters to come back to underground tacos when they eventually return to the office?
Speaking of slippery utilities in New York City: you know to avoid calling 911, but which non-police entities should you call in case of trouble? We have answers in “Not 911,” a directory of numbers you can dial when you need support around mental health, substance abuse, homelessness or violence. Built by Emergent Works, a group of formerly incarcerated and justice-involved folks in the early stages of their coding careers, the web app lists numbers by category so you can still dial quickly, especially if you add the shortcut to your home screen. Bookmark the app here and pass it on.
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