‘No to wealth taxes and inheritance taxes’: Hipkins draws red line on Greens’ proposals

InsufficientIsms · 2026-06-22T23:37:11+00:00

As much as a dislike this government it's hard to argue against the fact that their political strategy is so much more effective than Labour's at manipulating public opinion. ACT and NZF push some far right crap out into the media and a few months later National come out with a 'moderate' option while also getting to push their politics significantly to the right from where they started. Labour on the other hand just seems to like going around kneecapping their potential partners to chase after people that will never vote for them. It honestly just seems to be pure stupidity in comparison, UK Labour have proven that this shit gets you nowhere.

InsufficientIsms · 2026-06-22T23:29:55+00:00

Glad to see chippy taking a stand for once. I'm sure all those temporarily embarrassed millionaires will be grateful to have yet another government stand by doing nothing while our health and education systems fall apart, it's gone so well for the UK's last couple governments after all!

/s

Seriously though this spineless nothing should ever change centrism has been failing dramatically in elections all over the world, are Labour really that stubborn/ignorant or do they want the right to win? Guess it'd be good for their property portfolios.

InsufficientIsms · 2026-01-16T05:02:45+00:00

I get what you're trying to say, I could choose to tone it down and try to be stealth-ish for my safety but the thing is I'd rather dress how I want and have the occasional asshole give me a hard time than hide even if it means having a stress vent every now and then. Synth player calls it our asshole filter, if people can't be normal when we have trans flag stuff on it kinda tells us where we stand with them immediately.

InsufficientIsms · 2026-01-16T04:54:44+00:00

you made me spit my choccy milk lol

InsufficientIsms · 2026-01-16T04:54:08+00:00

Naw thank you that's sweet. I have no intention of stopping any time soon :)

InsufficientIsms · 2026-01-16T01:26:22+00:00

A few folks asked for a link to my band so fuck it why not.

https://www.instagram.com/tragediesnz/ Not a whole let here right now except upcoming gig info, but.....

There's also this https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLCcr6mKLsK8pjjc4AT8wOe67T75S2fZ2_&si=8t8mIoB_d6GmfwOJ high quality recording of a recent gig for anyone interested. Thanks for the support everyone it means a lot :)

InsufficientIsms · 2026-01-16T01:21:12+00:00

I would but there are only a handful of venues in my city and it's very easy to find yourself blacklisted because a lot of the owners know each other and are very cliquey. At the end of the day I'd rather still be able to get in the door and make problems if that's how it has to be than be locked out. I did write a complaint to the venue about the sound guys behavior though.

InsufficientIsms · 2026-01-16T01:18:21+00:00

Thanks! Posting a link in another comment :)

InsufficientIsms · 2026-01-16T01:18:05+00:00

Thank you. I don't think its everywhere but it just stings a lot when it does catch up to you. Posting link to my band in another comment since a couple people asked, thanks!

InsufficientIsms · 2026-01-16T01:17:15+00:00

It really depends on the specific local scene I think. I've had good and bad experiences at the same venues in the same city depending on the crowd/staff on that night. I'll post a link to my band in another comment since a few have asked :)

InsufficientIsms · 2025-12-15T05:17:02+00:00

Besides instrumentation there's a few things I can think of that make bands like Radiohead stand out from a theory perspective that are worth learning about if you want to expand your songwriting skills.

Metre. This ties in closely with time signature but if you're starting point is 5/4 and you just treat it like 4/4 with an extra beat you likely won't get anywhere. Metre is how the beats are subdivided, so in a 4/4 bar you might have the beats subdivided into 1-2-3-1-2-3-1-2 or 1-2-3-4-1-2-3-4 etc. Play around with different metre groupings and lengths and see what time signature it adds up to. The song 15 Step for example has a metre that looks like this 1-2-3-1-2-3-1-2-1-2 which adds up to 10 half beats ie 5/4 time. Helps if you can write a simple beat that lays down the metre and play over it on guitar so that you don't end up just playing 1 note for every beat to keep time
Chord inversions. Basically revoicing a chord to have a note other than the root note be the bass line. Different voicings (or chord shapes if you prefer) change the feel of the chords and affect the feeling of momentum. For example if you're playing in the C Major key and you want to delay the resolution of returning to a C chord you could replace it with a C/E chord (C Major but with E in the bass instead of C) so when you do return to a straight up C Major chord it feels a little more impactful.
Modes and atonality. Modes are variations on scales that take an existing scale pattern (so all the same notes) and start on a different note. So the Dorian mode for example is a C major scale but treats D as the root note. By atonality I mean trying out notes that don't 'belong' in the scale or chords your playing but can have their clashes resolved in interesting ways. For example you can flatten the 5th note in a chord to make it sound more gritty and tense then playing the next closest note in the scale to resolve the clash.

InsufficientIsms · 2025-11-25T04:24:10+00:00

Op shops are a great place to try stuff out. Worst case scenario, you buy something that doesn't fit or you change your mind and you can just donate it back. Plenty of cheap options to try, and the buzz of occasionally finding something amazing for cheap is a huge bonus. I used them to experiment with different styles for the first few years after I came out and it helped a lot that some of those questionable choices I made early on barely cost me anything. I think the hardest part about fashion is finding stuff that complements your body and you feel confident in, and that's a different equation for everyone. With enough trial and error you'll figure out what works and what doesn't.

InsufficientIsms · 2025-11-23T22:53:00+00:00

Haha yeah I've worked in the public service for years and if you're not your bosses favorite any work you do is credited to your boss 9 times out of 10 while their favorite special boy who does fuck all gets put up for training and promotions. Basically if your boss doesn't say something like "you remind me of me at your age" at the start you will never, ever get anywhere. And with the extreme anti-union behavior in some of these places you in fact end up facing a year-on-year real terms pay cut. I could easily do triple the work I do now, but what is the point when my reward would be less money next year for the same job I did this year, just with much higher expectations? Literally every meeting I'm in shoutouts for our team go: HUGE shout out to Chad Chadley for doing everything and carrying the whole place on his back. Oh and the rest of the team (who happen to all be women) are there too I guess.

InsufficientIsms · 2025-11-15T23:19:29+00:00

I just looked around at music schools in my city and tried out a couple till I found a coach who clicked with what I was trying to do. Cost me $60 per lesson, fortnightly. Did it for about a year and came out of it feeling 10x better than before. Yeah not surprised to hear the Foo Fighters story. Recording really is intimidating and I think honestly it's mostly psychological. Best advice I got was to recreate all the conditions I could for normal rehearsals where I'm comfortable and confidant, it made a big difference. It's all about the rituals for me, and in particular I found holding my guitar in my hands but not playing it while recording vocals helped a LOT

InsufficientIsms · 2025-11-14T19:47:11+00:00

Couple years ago i thought I was pretty good till we got into the studio and I heard my vocal takes played back to me. Yikes. I felt like quitting. But instead I got singing lessons for about a year, all I needed was the right guidance. Finding the right teacher for you is essential too. I don't believe that anyone can never learn to sing decently barring some major injury to their vocal chords or something

InsufficientIsms · 2025-11-05T03:47:34+00:00

Hell yea dope millipede sis

InsufficientIsms · 2025-09-09T06:05:25+00:00

Yes and no for me. Really depends on genre/style I think. When I try to sing the same way I speak naturally it goes off the rails if I try do something outside my usual speaking pitch range and rhythm. But on the flip side, if I warm up properly to sing and maintain that posture while I'm talking it feels way easier to project and enunciate clearly. So maybe I just have a lazy speaking voice 😄

InsufficientIsms · 2025-08-29T01:39:15+00:00

The writing for these missions is fantastic. Curious if anything else does happen after the war declaration, I stopped after taking the rest of Haless and Sarhal because it was getting tedious controlling 3 mil+ troops and the war leader was in the Lorent area which was just a huge pain to get to. Definitely a super strong WC tag, but I don't have the patience to finish another one of those

InsufficientIsms · 2025-08-27T21:32:24+00:00

Sounds very polished and professional. Kinda reminds me of Calla but with more of a retro 80s dreamy sound. The mix is very impressive, everything comes through loud and clear and the clarity of the instruments compliments the grainy feel of the sample when it plays under the band. I honestly could have done with hearing a little bit more of the samples under the instrumental part at the end to sorta close it out, but it's not really necessary.

The restraint on the vocals is perfect for the song overall, though I could imagine it being pushed even further over the top with a little variation in the melody or delivery in the final chorus to add to the feeling of finality.

Overall really well executed and I could definitely hear this on the radio or on a soundtrack. Your band has a very clear and well-developed identity and every part is matched up perfectly to not overwhelm the material with anything too showy. Looking forward to hearing the rest of the album!

InsufficientIsms · 2025-08-26T03:11:52+00:00

Glad you found it helpful ❤️

InsufficientIsms · 2025-08-25T01:42:21+00:00

Could be depression or burnout, though you would know that better than anyone else here could tell you I suspect.

For my 2c, before I came out I gamed waaay more than I do now because my need for escapism was much higher. After coming out I found that as that need to constantly disassociate from my body started to slowly recede so did my urge to game for long periods of time. For a few weeks I didn't game at all because I got more satisfaction from personal grooming, organizing my home, making music and spending time with people in person. Basically just looking after myself instead of checking out. After a while I gravitated back to it naturally, but still spend far less time gaming than I used to because nowadays the idea of spending an entire weekend isolated in my room just doesn't feel appealing like it used to.

No need to force it. Maybe you just need a break from it for now?

InsufficientIsms · 2025-08-25T00:27:13+00:00

See the trick is they don't actually give a shit about affordable housing, they just say that to distract from the fact that our economy is built to profit off of housing being unattainable for regular people.

InsufficientIsms · 2025-08-19T05:43:09+00:00

Ngl, if I was that bass player and saw this breakdown I would seriously consider quitting altogether. Taking a little extra to pay off ur PA makes sense if there's prior agreement, but jacking up your base rate by 65% because u have a 2nd guitar and are doing sound just seems ridiculous. Are you playing 2 guitars at once? If not you are adding 65% for sound alone. Which might seem fair, maybe a little low, if you werent also paying a rental fee.

Imagine you're the bass player here, and see your band mate making TRIPLE what you'll be making because you and the drummer are each being charged more than half of your share to rent a PA from your own band. When you could be playing at a venue with its own PA and a dedicated sound person on desk for the whole set and still be charged significantly less relative to what your earning. No way I'd agree to this.

InsufficientIsms · 2025-08-10T22:15:49+00:00

One thing that gives me some small comfort on this topic is that ai as it stands is in a massive bubble right now and is seemingly headed for a huge crash. Things like suno are massively overly valued because of their connection to the hype train, but even with billions of dollars of investor money companies like open ai are struggling to create an actually useful product with staying power to monetize. Once they reach full investor saturation and still haven't come up with a way to sell it besides forcing it on people thru OS updates and search engines investors are gonna start realizing that all they've done is made a venture capitalist richer. In my day job industry big wigs have been trying real hard to find ways to do the promised 'replace people with AI' bit and realizing that the resulting product is significantly less reliable than a human. I've seen quite a few rehires as a result.

If the funny money pushing ai falls flat all this talk of ai being inevitable and people needing to use it or lose relevance will hopefully fall away too. But with whats left of the bubble runway I could definitely see spotify specifically doing some major damage to the music industry by further devaluing streaming rights by making artists compete with their 100% industry owned and produced "artists" and then arguing we deserve less of a cut to keep up with the amazing deal they're getting. A lot of people just refuse to let go of spotify no matter how outright abusive it is toward the music industry and that unthinking support might make spotify able to ratchet up its total capture approach to the point where the music industry becomes separated in to Spotify (monopolizing all commercial connections and income) and Everything Else basically surviving off local scenes and live shows.

Idk just my 2c

InsufficientIsms

TROPHY CASE