PmWiki | LeftBeyond / CulturalNotes

Cities still exist, and are largely devoted to manufacturing - "dirty" industry, the kinds of things that are Not Allowed in Jerusalem but that need to be made to maintain a modern standard of living. Not coincidentally, the disaffected youths gravitate towards cities, where they can find many people like themselves.

The immense, fertile fields are dotted by isolated farms with small villages every hour's travel or so, to provide basic services to the farmers; dwellings are simple and robust, and most people build their own furniture. Wood is widely used as a construction material, coming from neatly managed forests that are harvested every thirty years or so; large trees exist almost exclusively for decorative and monumental purposes.

With a few exceptions such as the Highway of Holiness, roads are not paved; cars and trucks are designed with this in mind, with a high wheelbase. Due to the slow pace of life and the long (technically endless) day, traveling on horseback has returned to some popularity. Rail infrastructure has been at least partially rebuilt, but is used almost exclusively for cargo. Travel, while not discouraged, is rare, and much of the shipping infrastructure of the pre-Rapture world that has survived the Tribulation has been allowed to degrade gently; modern airplanes tend to be small, privately owned, and designed to operate from unimproved airfields.

Language

A standard language derived from Biblical Aramaic and Jewish Hellenistic Greek has been downloaded into the mind of every glorified and every natural who survived the Tribulation, and functions as a world language; it integrates elements American English for concepts that did not exist when the first two languages were formalized. Oddly, an exception to this is country names, which have been generally rendered in American English when following modern boundaries (This is exemplified by Egypt being renamed to Osaze; both Hellenistic Hebrew and modern Arabic names for Egypt have nothing to do with the deity Ptah, so no renaming would have been necessary otherwise). Languages other than this "Standard Hebrew" are not generally taught, although some literature has been translated. Glorified citizens are assumed to have perfect recall of any language they knew before the Event.

Media

Freedom of the press exists in most territories, including Jerusalem; views that countervail the global government are restricted by limiting their access to mass media through the managed economy, rather than by direct censorship. Similarly, Internet usage is not restricted, but dissenting websites are effectively throttled by being restricted to home hosting and the fact that not many people care to be online. On the other hand, television and broadcast radio exist and are enjoyed by much of the population.

The press is alive and well, with the various territories generally making their own decision on freedom of print save direct direction from New Jerusalem; Internet diffusion has returned roughly to where it was just before the Rapture, and has more or less plateau'd. Broadcast media (radio and TV) remains the premier means of information dissemination -- the commercial AM band had to be extended to prevent overlaps, and thanks to the water canopy obviating the need for over-the-horizon broadcasting, over 80 channels are available anywhere in the world (plus a few local pirate stations).

Music

While most musicians have returned to the melodic tradition dominant before the 1960s and classical music has enjoyed a return to prominence since the Appearing, mostly due to the approval of glorified audiences, pop music still enjoys popularity with the youth market. Raised Commission is the latest Newsboys tribute band to complete a global tour. Country music remains popular among the older set, with upcomers Meaning Of Prairie now having been on the Top 7 charts for fifteen seasons; easy-learn country and blues is considered responsible for the revival of live music, as opposed to broadcast or record, since the Appearing. Non-Christian music remains a niche genre with no prominent groups able to hold a career for more than a year or two, and is mostly either played live in derelict dance halls, or subject to derivative interpretation by synthesizers. The reestablishment of urban areas has brought youth culture and with it hip-hop and similar extemporaneous music; Christian hip-hop is considered disrespectful in Greater Israel, but enjoys some popularity elsewhere, although record labels are hesitant to promote controversial music even when it carries a positive message.

So with music that isn't Christian, you got a few really popular flavours: a-rock, e-rock, chorus, hip-hop, vaud, and techno.

A-rock's acoustic rock. If you can play it with just a guitar and a set of drums, it's a-rock. This is one of the more popular (for a given value of 'popular') kinds of non-Christian music, because it's easy to cover, remix, and mess around with. If you've got a guy in your haunt who can play guitar, one who can keep a beat, and one who can sing, you've got a band. No guarantees as to quality, but you got a band.

E-rock's electric rock. If you need old-school electric guitars, bass, and that kind of thing to play it, it's e-rock. E-rock is much harder to make, just because it's difficult to create or salvage the things you need to pull it off. When someone does, it's insanely popular and is likely to be remixed until the end of the world. E-rock concerts are often raided by the salties, regardless of whether or not anything wrong is going on.

Chorus is the closest thing left to heavy metal, often (but not always) complete with suitably satanic imagery. Everything's created with the sheer power of the human voice, with a drummer to keep everyone in rhythm. When the final battle comes, the battle hymn of the children of men will be a chorus.

Hip-hop, like chorus, mostly survives in 'acoustic' form; if you've got someone who can beatbox, and someone who can rap, you're golden. Rap battles are pretty common, and as usual, rappers have 'rivalries' that are about as serious as anything in pro wrestling. Rap battles between believing and nonbelieving bands do happen, with mixed results. (I don't know enough about hip-hop to be able to tell how it'd evolve post-Appearing. Could someone who enjoys it help? -KH)

Vaud (warning: NSFW) is short for vaudeville, though 'cabaret' is a better word for it; the nuance was lost in translation. It's often highly creepy, mildly sexualised music, absolutely full of double-entendres and dire puns. Instrumental versions of these songs are sometimes used in that kind of club.

Techno is... well, exactly what it says on the tin. It's music that's made with electronic equipment, and designed to be easy to dance to. Sometimes it's utterly instrumental; sometimes it's got vocals, usually taken from another source. Chip music is a subgenre of techno- it's music that's made with a piece of video game equipment, like a Gameboy or a SNES, and it's popular with the quaker crowd for the obvious reasons.

Remix culture is a strong part of the music scene, especially by 900 Post-Appearing. There's no such thing as copyright; individual artists might get pissy if you copy their stuff, but copying, remixing, sampling, and so on are the best ways for your music to survive, especially if your concert gets raided or worse. Sometimes, Christian-brand music gets mixed in, usually as samples used in highly ironic fashion.

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