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District 9 is the long-awaited sci-fi drama from director Neill Blomkamp and produced by Peter Jackson (of Lord of the Rings fame). It is inspired by the historical relocation of blacks in District 6 – a residential area in Cape Town in 1966, and adapted from the 2005 short film Alive in Joburg, directed by Neill Blomkapmp.

In 1982 an alien ship appeared in the sky above Johannesburg and simply hovered over the city – it didn’t attack or do much of anything, but the impatient government finally broke into the ship and then imprisoned the aliens – somewhat derogatorily called “Prawns” because of their arthropod-like appearance. The aliens are brought down from the ship and are quarantined in a city slum called District 9.

While the aliens are highly intelligent (they made it to earth with their technology), they are also highly discriminated against and treated poorly – an obvious parallel with the apartheid regime in South Africa. Over the next twenty years, the conditions in District 9 have deteriorated, and the general public, incited by the government-backed discrimination, begins to riot, fed up with the aliens and demanding them to leave. For the government, the land has now become more valuable than the aliens who live on it and they decide something needs to be done.

The aliens would much rather go back on their mothership and go home, however a piece of the ship fell to the ground and without it, they cannot leave (a veiled reference to Kurt Vonnegut’s The Sirens of Titan where an alien civilization is waiting for earth to develop their technology enough to make a part for their ship so they can return to their planet).

Flash forward to 2010 and the South African government hatches a plan to move the aliens to a concentration camp tent city a couple hundred miles outside of Johannesburg to diffuse the tension. The security of District 9 is now maintained by a shady Blackwater-esque quasi-government corporation called Multi-National United (MNU). MNU also happens to be the second largest weapons manufacturer in the world. Their main interest in the aliens lies in their highly advanced weaponry, which works symbiotically with the Prawns and can only be operated by someone with their DNA.

Wikus van de Merwe (Sharlto Copley), a mid-level paper pusher at MNU, is promoted to oversee the relocation of the aliens. While on a raid of District 9, Wikus finds a canister of liquid in an alien’s shack and accidentally sprays some of the liquid on himself and then begins to fall ill. Later that night, his left arm transforms into an alien claw and MNU detains him and finds out he can now operate the alien weaponry. Wikus, now empowered with the alien strength, escapes his captors and a MNU is determined to catch him at all costs.

As it turns out, the liquid was distilled from the parts of the mothership that fell to earth by an alien named Christopher Johnson in a secret lab below his District 9 shack, and this liquid is the key to fixing the mothership. If Wikus (now in an unlikely partnership with Christopher and his alien son) can get the liquid back from MNU, the aliens can return home as well as return Wikus back to normal.

I found it hard to empathize with Wikus, an anti-hero if there ever was one, who only garners a respect for the aliens out of a self-interest to fix himself. The plot leaves many unanswered questions that also make it difficult to support the alien cause. If they are stronger and have better weapons then their captors, why haven’t they revolted? Why did they visit earth in the first place? Why did they stop over Johannesburg and not some other city?

Despite these flaws, the CGI in the movie is impressive and does help to make the fantastical story somewhat believable. The small bits of alien technology that are shown (such as the controls on the mothership) are quite cool and will definitely appeal to detail oriented sci-fi fans (like me).

Still, the movie is more drama than science fiction and ultimately doesn’t succeed on either front. The Transformer-like body suit in the third act is too rooted present-day action thrillers and is not necessary since Wikus is already augmented by his alien transformation. The transformation itself forces Wikus to sympathize with the aliens, rather than his character going through a genuine change of heart.

While the movie brings to the fore some important issues like discrimination and the treatment of refugees, we are given so little information about the aliens that it is almost impossible to form a connection with them. We need more to like about these creatures, rather than just being faced with the fact that they are being treated poorly. Part of the reason that the world demanded the end of apartheid was the fact that the oppressed found strength in their unique cultural identity, and defended that with great fervor. In the end, we don’t know enough about the culture of the aliens in District 9 to want to support their cause.

Bonus Beats are dead.

For you old school djs: take a deep breath. Have a moment. It will be ok.

For you new school djs, here is a little background:

Most simply: “Bonus Beats” refers to a track on a 12′ single comprised of the beats (all the drum and percussion parts) of a song, without the vocals, keys, bass, melody and other musical elements. This track was used by djs to either extend the mix of the main track on the single, or sometimes played within a dj mix on its own.

Often the Bonus Beats were added to a single to fill out a side of a record but the adventurous dj in the past might buy a 12 inch just to play the bonus beats. Bonus Beats tracks are usually shorter than the main track so sometimes djs would buy two copies of a single to mix the two bonus beats tracks (from each of the records) together to make it longer. Or, the dj could play the bonus beats with the main mix of a track to extend it and create his or her own edit on the fly.

Nevertheless, when a dj bought a 12″ single with a bonus beats track, he or she was getting that bonus track whether they wanted it or not. But now, with the advent of digital music, the 12 inch single (or EP) format is dead. Thus, there is no incentive for a producer to include a bonus beats track with a release, let alone for a punter to spend $1.99 on that track when they could spend the same on another full blown track that is not simply a dj tool or stripped down version of another track.

The foundation of any good track are the beats and a good Bonus Beats track can stand on its own. Economics and the simple evolution of formats has driven Bonus Beats into the oblivion, but it shouldn’t be so.

Let me be perfectly clear: I am all for technology and I have embraced new methodologies of djing, formats and styles. However, Bonus Beats are an invaluable tool in a dj’s arsenal and should be preserved.

As music producers, we are going to have to think and market our tracks differently in order to preserve Bonus Beats and this can be accomplished with the following steps:

- Keep making Bonus Beats; make them dope!

- Make them free with a download of the main mix of your project; otherwise they will be skipped over and not used.

- Play Bonus Beat tracks! This is the only way other people will realize the importance and potential of these simple but crucial pieces of music.

At the end of the day, there are no good bonus beats without a good track so the simple process of making good tracks will generate good bonus beats. That said, it is up to us producers to utilize these tools we create and update them into modern formats and if we don’t, we will be losing an integral piece in our dj repertoire.

Joshua Iz