Native name | |
---|---|
Conventional long name | Netherlands |
Common name | the Netherlands |
Image coat | Coat of arms of the Netherlands - 02.svg |
Map width | 250px |
Map caption | |
Image map2 | BES islands location map.svg |
Map2 width | 250px |
Map caption2 | Special municipalities of the Netherlands (green)in the Caribbean |
National motto | ''Je maintiendrai''(French)(''I will maintain'') |
National anthem | The ''Wilhelmus'' |
Official languages | Dutch |
Regional languages | Frisian (in Friesland), Papiamento (in Bonaire), English (in Sint Eustatius and Saba) |
Ethnic groups | 80.7% Dutch,5% EU varieties,2.4% Indonesians,2.2% Turks,2% Surinamese,2% Moroccans,0.8% Caribbean4.8% others |
Ethnic groups year | 2008 |
Demonym | Dutch |
Capital | Amsterdam |
Largest city | capital |
Government type | Parliamentary democracy under a constitutional monarch |
Leader title1 | Monarch |
Leader name1 | Beatrix |
Leader title2 | Prime Minister |
Leader name2 | Mark Rutte (VVD) |
Leader title3 | Deputy Prime Minister |
Leader name3 | Maxime Verhagen (CDA) |
Leader title4 | Current coalition |
Leader name4 | VVD-CDA Coalition |
Legislature | States-General |
Upper house | Senate |
Lower house | House of Representatives |
Area rank | 135th |
Area magnitude | 1 E10 |
Area km2 | 41,848 |
Area sq mi | 16,158 |
Percent water | 18.41 |
Population estimate | }} |
The Netherlands (; , ; ; ) is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders with Belgium, Germany, and the United Kingdom. It is a parliamentary democracy organised as a unitary state. The country capital is Amsterdam and the seat of government is The Hague. The ''Netherlands'' in its entirety is often referred to as Holland, although North and South Holland are actually only two of its twelve provinces (a case of ''pars pro toto''; see terminology of "the Netherlands").
The Netherlands is a geographically low-lying country, with about 25% of its area and 21% of its population located below sea level, and 50% of its land lying less than one metre above sea level. This distinct feature contributes to the country's name in many other European languages (e.g. German: ''Niederlande'', French: ''Les Pays-Bas'' and Spanish: ''Países Bajos'', literally mean "(The) Low Countries"). Significant land area has been gained through land reclamation and preserved through an elaborate system of polders and dikes. Much of the Netherlands is formed by the estuary of three important European rivers, which together with their distributaries form the Rhine-Meuse-Scheldt delta. Most of the country is very flat, with the exception of foothills in the far southeast and several low-hill ranges in the central parts.
The Netherlands was one of the first countries to have an elected parliament. Among other affiliations the country is a founding member of the EU, NATO, OECD and WTO. With Belgium and Luxembourg it forms the Benelux economic union. The country is host to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons and five international courts: the Permanent Court of Arbitration, the International Court of Justice, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, the International Criminal Court and the Special Tribunal for Lebanon. The first four are situated in The Hague as is the EU's criminal intelligence agency Europol and judicial co-operation agency Eurojust. This has led to the city being dubbed "the world's legal capital". The Netherlands has a capitalist market-based economy, ranking 13th of 157 countries according to the Index of Economic Freedom. In May 2011, the Netherlands was ranked as the 'happiest' country according to results published by The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.
{{infobox country|image map | Dutch Empire35.PNG |
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Map caption | An anachronous map of the Dutch colonial Empire. Light green: territories administered by or originating from territories administered by the Dutch East India Company; dark green: the Dutch West India Company. }} |
Under Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain, the Netherlands region was part of the Seventeen Provinces, which also included most of present-day Belgium, Luxembourg, and some land in France and Germany.
The Eighty Years' War between the provinces and Spain began in 1568. In 1579, the northern half of the Seventeen Provinces formed the Union of Utrecht, a treaty in which they promised to support each other in their defense against the Spanish army. The Union of Utrecht is seen as the foundation of the modern Netherlands. In 1581 the northern provinces adopted the Act of Abjuration, the declaration of independence in which the provinces officially deposed Philip II of Spain as reigning monarch in the northern provinces.
Queen Elizabeth I of England sympathised with the Dutch struggle against the Spanish, and in 1585 she concluded a treaty with the Dutch whereby she promised to send an English army to the Netherlands to aid the Dutch in their war with the Spanish. In December 1585, 7,600 soldiers were sent to the Netherlands from England under the command of Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester. However, the English army was of no real benefit to the Dutch rebellion.
Although Robert Dudley returned to the Netherlands in November 1586 with another army, the army still had little effect in the rebellion. Philip II, the son of Charles V, was not prepared to let them go easily, and war continued until 1648, when Spain under King Philip IV finally recognised the independence of the seven northwestern provinces in the Peace of Münster. Parts of the southern provinces became ''de facto'' colonies of the new republican-mercantile empire.
The Dutch Empire grew to become one of the major seafaring and economic powers of the 17th century. In the Dutch Golden Age ("Gouden Eeuw"), colonies and trading posts were established all over the world. Dutch settlement in North America began with the founding of New Amsterdam, on the southern tip of Manhattan in 1614. In South Africa, the Dutch settled the Cape Colony in 1652. By 1650, the Dutch owned 16,000 merchant ships. During the 17th century, the Dutch population increased from an estimated 1.5 million to almost 2 million.
Many economic historians regard the Netherlands as the first thoroughly capitalist country in the world. In early modern Europe it featured the wealthiest trading city (Amsterdam) and the first full-time stock exchange. The inventiveness of the traders led to insurance and retirement funds as well as phenomena such as the boom-bust cycle, the world's first asset-inflation bubble, the tulip mania of 1636–1637, and, according to Murray Sayle, the world's first bear raider, Isaac le Maire, who forced prices down by dumping stock and then buying it back at a discount. The republic went into a state of general decline in the later 18th century, with economic competition from England and long standing rivalries between the two main factions in Dutch society, the ''Staatsgezinden'' (Republicans) and the ''Prinsgezinden'' (Royalists or Orangists) as main factors.
In the 17th century, plantation colonies were established by the Dutch and English along the many rivers in the fertile Guyana plains. The earliest documented colony in Guiana was along the Suriname River and called Marshall's Creek. The area was named after an Englishman. Disputes arose between the Dutch and the English. In 1667, the Dutch decided to keep the nascent plantation colony of Suriname conquered from the English, resulting from the Treaty of Breda. The English were left with New Amsterdam, a small trading post in North America, which is now known as New York City.
On 19 January 1795, one day after stadtholder William V of Orange fled to England, the ''Bataafse Republiek'' (Batavian Republic) was proclaimed, rendering the Netherlands a unitary state. From 1795 to 1806, the Batavian Republic designated the Netherlands as a republic modelled after the French Republic.
From 1806 to 1810, the ''Koninkrijk Holland'' (Kingdom of Holland) was set up by Napoleon Bonaparte as a puppet kingdom governed by his brother Louis Bonaparte in order to control the Netherlands more effectively. The name of the leading province, Holland, was used for the whole country. The Kingdom of Holland covered the area of the present day Netherlands, with the exception of Limburg and parts of Zeeland, which were French territory. In 1807, Prussian East Frisia and Jever were added to the kingdom. In 1809, however, after a failed British invasion, Holland had to give over all territories south of the Rhine to France.
King Louis Bonaparte did not meet Napoleon's expectations – he tried to serve Dutch interests instead of his brother's, allowed trade with the British in spite of the Continental System and even tried to learn Dutch – and he was forced to abdicate on 1 July 1810. He was succeeded by his five-year-old son Napoleon Louis Bonaparte. Napoleon Louis reigned as Louis II for just ten days as Napoleon ignored his young nephew’s accession to the throne. The Emperor sent in an army to invade the country and dissolved the Kingdom of Holland. The Netherlands then became part of the French Empire.
The Netherlands remained part of the French Empire until the autumn of 1813, when Napoleon was defeated in the Battle of Leipzig and forced to withdraw his troops from the country.
In 1815, the Congress of Vienna formed the United Kingdom of the Netherlands by expanding the Netherlands with Belgium in order to create a strong country on the northern border of France. In addition, William became hereditary Grand Duke of Luxembourg. The Congress of Vienna gave Luxembourg to William as personal property in exchange for his German possessions, Nassau-Dillenburg, Siegen, Hadamar, and Diez.
Belgium rebelled and gained independence in 1830, while the personal union between Luxembourg and the Netherlands was severed in 1890, when King William III of the Netherlands died with no surviving male heirs. Ascendancy laws prevented his daughter Queen Wilhelmina from becoming the next Grand Duchess. Therefore the throne of Luxembourg passed over from the House of Orange-Nassau to the House of Nassau-Weilburg, a junior branch of the House of Nassau.
The largest Dutch settlement abroad was the Cape Colony. It was established by Jan van Riebeeck on behalf of the Dutch East India Company at Cape Town () in 1652. The Prince of Orange acquiesced to British occupation and control of the Cape Colony in 1788. The Netherlands also possessed several other colonies, but Dutch settlement in these lands was limited. Most notable were the vast Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia) and Dutch Guiana (now Suriname). These 'colonies' were first administered by the Dutch East India Company and the Dutch West India Company, both collective private enterprises. Three centuries later these companies got into financial trouble, and the territories in which they operated were taken over by the Dutch government (in 1815 and 1791 respectively). Only then did they become official colonies.
During its colonial period the Netherlands was heavily involved in the slave trade. The Dutch planters relied heavily on African slaves to cultivate the coffee, cocoa, sugar cane and cotton plantations along the rivers. Treatment of the slaves by their owners was notoriously bad, and many slaves escaped the plantations. Slavery was abolished by the Netherlands in Dutch Guiana in 1863, but the slaves were not fully released until 1873, after a mandatory 10 year transition period during which time they were required to work on the plantations for minimal pay and without state sanctioned torture. As soon as they became truly free, the slaves largely abandoned the plantations where they had suffered for several generations in favor of the city Paramaribo. Every year this is remembered during Keti Koti, 1 July, Emancipation Day (end of slavery).
During the 19th century, the Netherlands was slow to industrialize compared to neighbouring countries, mainly because of the great complexity involved in modernizing the infrastructure, consisting largely of waterways, and the great reliance its industry had on windpower.
Although the Netherlands remained neutral during World War I, it was heavily involved in the war. German general Count Schlieffen, who was Chief of the Imperial German General Staff had originally planned to invade the Netherlands while advancing into France in the original Schlieffen Plan. This was changed by Schlieffen's successor Helmuth von Moltke the Younger in order to maintain Dutch neutrality. Later during the war Dutch neutrality proved essential to German survival until the blockade by Great Britain in 1916, when the import of goods through the Netherlands was no longer possible. However, the Dutch were able to continue to remain neutral during the war using their diplomacy and their ability to trade. were rounded up to be transported to Nazi German concentration camps in Germany, German-occupied Poland and German-occupied Czechoslovakia. By the time these camps were liberated, only 876 Dutch Jews survived. Dutch workers were conscripted for forced labour in German factories, civilians were killed in reprisal for attacks on German soldiers, and the countryside was plundered for food for German soldiers in the Netherlands and for shipment to Germany. Although there were thousands of Dutch who risked their lives by hiding Jews from the Germans, as recounted in ''The Hiding Place'' by Corrie ten Boom and ''The Heart Has Reasons'' by Mark Klempner, there were also thousands of Dutch who collaborated with the occupying force in hunting down hiding Jews. Local fascists and anti-Bolsheviks joined the Waffen-SS in the 4th SS Volunteer Panzergrenadier Brigade Netherlands, fighting on the Eastern Front as well as other units. Racial restrictions were relaxed to the extent that even Asians from Dutch East Indies (Indonesia) units were recruited.
On 8 December 1941, the Netherlands declared war on Japan. The government-in-exile then lost control of its major colonial stronghold, the Netherlands East Indies (Indonesia), to Japanese forces in March 1942. "American-British-Dutch-Australian" (ABDA) forces fought hard in some instances but were overwhelmed. During the Japanese occupation of Indonesia, the Japanese interned Dutch civilians and used Dutch and Indos (Eurasians of Dutch and Indonesian descent) alike as forced labour, both in the Netherlands East Indies and in neighbouring countries. This included forcing women to work as "comfort women" (sex slaves) for Japanese personnel. The Dutch Red Cross reported the deaths in Japanese custody of 14,800 European civilians out of 80,000 interned and 12,500 of the 34,000 POW captured. A later UN report stated that 4 million people died in Indonesia as a result of famine and forced labour (known as romusha) during the Japanese occupation. Some military personnel escaped to Australia and other Allied countries from where they carried on the fight against Japan. The Japanese furthered the cause of independence for the colony, so that after VE day many young Dutchmen found themselves fighting a colonial war against the new republic of Indonesia.
Princess Juliana of the Netherlands, the only child of Queen Wilhelmina and heir to the throne, sought refuge in Ottawa, Canada, with her two daughters, Beatrix and Irene, during the war. During Princess Juliana’s stay in Canada, preparations were made for the birth of her third child. To ensure the Dutch citizenship of this royal baby, the Canadian Parliament passed a special law declaring Princess Juliana's suite at the Ottawa Civic Hospital “extraterritorial”.
On 19 January 1943, Princess Margriet was born. The day after Princess Margriet's birth, the Dutch flag was flown on the Peace Tower. This was the only time in history a foreign flag has waved above Canada’s Parliament Buildings. In 1944–45, the First Canadian Army was responsible for liberating much of the Netherlands from German occupation. The joyous "Canadian summer" that ensued after the liberation, forged deep and long-lasting bonds of friendship between the Netherlands and Canada. In 1949, Dutch troops occupied an area of of the British zone of occupied Germany and annexed it. At that time, these areas were inhabited by almost 10,000 people.
After the war, the Dutch economy prospered by leaving behind an era of neutrality and gaining closer ties with neighbouring states. The Netherlands was one of the founding members of the Benelux (Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg) grouping, was among the twelve founding members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), and was among the six founding members of the European Coal and Steel Community, which would later evolve, via the EEC (Common Market), into the European Union.
The 1960s and 1970s were a time of great social and cultural change, such as rapid ''ontzuiling'' (literally: depillarisation), a term that describes the decay of the old divisions along class and religious lines. Youths, and students in particular, rejected traditional mores and pushed for change in matters like women's rights, sexuality, disarmament and environmental issues.
Today, the Netherlands is regarded as a liberal country, considering its drugs policy and its legalisation of euthanasia. On 1 April 2001, the Netherlands became the first nation to allow same-sex marriage.
On 10 October 2010 the Netherlands Antilles—a former country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in the Caribbean—was dissolved. Referendums were held on each island of the Netherlands Antilles between June 2000 and April 2005 to determine their future status. As a result the islands of Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba (the BES islands) were to obtain closer ties with the Netherlands. This led to the incorporation of these three islands into the country of the Netherlands as ''special municipalities'' upon the dissolution of the Netherlands Antilles. The special municipalities are collectively known as the Caribbean Netherlands.
The European area of the Netherlands lies between latitudes 50° and 54° N, and longitudes 3° and 8° E.
The country is divided into two main parts by three large rivers, the Rhine (''Rijn'') and its main distributaries, the Waal and the Meuse (''Maas''). These rivers functioned as a natural barrier between earlier fiefdoms and hence created traditionally a cultural divide, as is evident in some phonetic traits that are recognizable north and south of these "Large Rivers" (''de Grote Rivieren'').
The southwestern part of the Netherlands is a river delta and two tributaries of the Scheldt (''Westerschelde and Oosterschelde''). Only one significant branch of the Rhine flows northeastward, the IJssel river, discharging into the IJsselmeer, the former Zuiderzee ('southern sea'). This river also forms a linguistic divide: people to the east of this river speak Dutch Low Saxon dialects (except for the province of Friesland, which has its own language).
Over the centuries, the Dutch coastline has changed considerably as a result of human intervention and natural disasters. Most notable in terms of land loss is the 1134 storm, which created the archipelago of Zeeland in the southwest.
On 14 December 1287, St. Lucia's flood affected the Netherlands and Germany killing more than 50,000 people in one of the most destructive floods in recorded history. The St. Elizabeth flood of 1421 and the mismanagement in its aftermath destroyed a newly reclaimed polder, replacing it with the ''Biesbosch'' tidal floodplains in the south-centre. The last major flood in the Netherlands took place in early February 1953, when a huge storm caused the collapse of several dikes in the southwest of the Netherlands. More than 1,800 people drowned in the ensuing inundations. The Dutch government subsequently decided on a large-scale program of public works (the "Delta Works") to protect the country against future flooding. The project took more than thirty years to complete.
The disasters were partially increased in severity through human influence. People had drained relatively high lying swampland to use it as farmland. This drainage caused the fertile peat to compress and the ground level to drop, whereby they would lower the water level to compensate for the drop in ground level, causing the underlying peat to compress even more. The problem remains unsolvable to this day. Also, up until the 19th century peat was mined, dried, and used for fuel, further adding to the problem.
To guard against floods, a series of defences against the water were contrived. In the first millennium AD, villages and farmhouses were built on man-made hills called ''terps''. Later, these terps were connected by dikes. In the 12th century, local government agencies called ''"waterschappen"'' (English "water bodies") or ''"hoogheemraadschappen"'' ("high home councils") started to appear, whose job it was to maintain the water level and to protect a region from floods. (These agencies exist to this day, performing the same function.) As the ground level dropped, the dikes by necessity grew and merged into an integrated system. By the 13th century, windmills had come into use in order to pump water out of areas below sea level. The windmills were later used to drain lakes, creating the famous polders.
In 1932, the ''Afsluitdijk'' (English "Closure Dike") was completed, blocking the former ''Zuiderzee'' (Southern Sea) from the North Sea and thus creating the IJsselmeer (IJssel Lake). It became part of the larger Zuiderzee Works in which four polders totalling were reclaimed from the sea.
Additionally, the Netherlands is one of the countries that may suffer most from climate change. Not only is the rising sea a problem, but also erratic weather patterns may cause the rivers to overflow.
The following tables are based on mean measurements by the KNMI weather station in De Bilt between 1971 and 2000:
Ice days (maximum temperature below 0 °C) usually occur from December until February, with the occasional rare ice day prior to or after that period. Freezing days (minimum temperature below 0 °C) occur much more often, usually ranging from mid November to late March, but not rarely measured as early as mid October and as late as mid May. If one chooses the height of measurement to be 10 cm. above ground instead of 150 cm., one may even find such temperatures in the middle of the summer.
Warm days (maximum temperature above 20 °C) in De Bilt are usually measured in the time span of April until September, but in some parts of the country such temperatures can also occur in March and October (this is usually not in De Bilt, however). Summer days (maximum temperature above 25 °C) are usually measured in De Bilt from May until August, tropical days (maximum temperature above 30 °C) are rare and usually occur only from June until August.
Precipitation throughout the year is relatively equally shared by each month. Summer and autumn months tend to gather a little bit more precipitation than other months, mainly because of the intensity of the rainfall rather than the frequency of rain days (this is especially the case in summer, when lightning too is much more frequent than otherwise).
The number of sunshine hours is affected by the fact that due to the geographical latitude the length of the days varies between barely eight hours in December and nearly 17 hours in June.
Phytogeographically, the Netherlands is shared between the Atlantic European and Central European provinces of the Circumboreal Region within the Boreal Kingdom. According to the World Wide Fund for Nature, the territory of the Netherlands belongs to the ecoregion of Atlantic mixed forests.
In 1871 the last old original natural woods (Beekbergerwoud) were cut down, and most woods today are planted monocultures of trees like Scots Pine and trees that are not native to the Netherlands. These woods were planted on anthropogenic heaths and sand-drifts (overgrazed heaths) (Veluwe).
The monarch is the head of state, at present Queen Beatrix. Constitutionally, the position is equipped with limited powers. The monarch can exert some influence during the formation of a new cabinet, where they serve as neutral arbiter between the political parties. Additionally, the king (the title queen has no constitutional significance) has the right to be informed and consulted. Depending on the personality and qualities of the king and the ministers, the king might have ''influence'' beyond the ''power'' granted by the constitution.
In practice, the executive power is formed by the ministerraad, the deliberative council of the Dutch cabinet. The cabinet consists usually of thirteen to sixteen ministers and a varying number of state secretaries. One to three ministers are ministers without portfolio. The head of government is the Prime Minister of the Netherlands, who often is the leader of the largest party of the coalition. In fact, this has been continuously the case since 1973. The Prime Minister is a ''primus inter pares'', meaning he has no explicit powers beyond those of the other ministers. Currently, the Prime Minister is Mark Rutte.
The cabinet is responsible to the bicameral parliament, the States-General, which also has legislative powers. The 150 members of the House of Representatives, the Lower House, are elected in direct elections, which are held every four years or after the fall of the cabinet (by example: when one of the chambers carries a motion of no-confidence, the cabinet offers its resignation to the monarch). The States-Provincial are directly elected every four years as well. The members of the provincial assemblies elect the 75 members of the Senate, the upper house, which has less legislative powers, as it can merely reject laws, not propose or amend them.
Both trade unions and employers organisations are consulted beforehand in policymaking in the financial, economic and social areas. They meet regularly with government in the Social-Economic Council. This body advises government and its advice cannot be put aside easily.
The Netherlands has a long tradition of social tolerance. In the 18th century, while the Dutch Reformed Church was the state religion, Catholicism and Judaism were tolerated. In the late 19th century this Dutch tradition of religious tolerance transformed into a system of pillarisation, in which religious groups coexisted separately and only interacted at the level of government. This tradition of tolerance is linked to Dutch criminal justice policies on recreational drugs, prostitution, LGBT rights, euthanasia, and abortion, which are among the most liberal in the world.
Due to the multi-party system, no single party has held a majority in parliament since the 19th century, and coalition cabinets had to be formed. Since suffrage became universal in 1919, the Dutch political system has been dominated by three families of political parties: the strongest family were the Christian democrats, currently represented by the Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA), second were the social democrats, of which the Labour Party (PvdA), and third were the liberals, of which the People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) is the main representative.
These parties cooperated in coalition cabinets in which the Christian democrats had always been a partner: so either a centre left coalition of the Christian democrats and social democrats was ruling or a centre right coalition of Christian democrats and liberals. In the 1970s, the party system became more volatile: the Christian democratic parties lost seats, while new parties became successful, such as the radical democrat and progressive liberal D66.
In the 1994 election, the CDA lost its dominant position. A "purple" cabinet was formed by VVD, D66, and PvdA. In the 2002 elections, this cabinet lost its majority, due to an increased support for the CDA and the rise of the LPF, a new political party around Pim Fortuyn, who was assassinated a week before the elections. A short-lived cabinet was formed by CDA, VVD, and LPF, which was led by CDA leader Jan Peter Balkenende. After the 2003 elections in which the LPF lost most of its seats, a cabinet was formed by CDA, VVD, and D66. The cabinet initiated an ambitious program of reforming the welfare state, the health care system, and the immigration policies.
In June 2006, the cabinet fell after D66 voted in favour of a motion of no confidence against minister of immigration and integration Rita Verdonk, who had instigated an investigation of the asylum procedure of VVD MP Ayaan Hirsi Ali. A care taker cabinet was formed by CDA and VVD, and the general elections were held on 22 November 2006. In these elections, the CDA remained the largest party and the SP made the largest gains. The formation of a new cabinet took three months, resulting in a coalition of CDA, PvdA, and ChristianUnion.
On 20 February 2010, the cabinet fell when the PvdA refused to prolong the involvement of the Dutch Army in Uruzgan, Afghanistan. Snap elections were held on 9 June 2010, with devastating results for the previously largest party, the CDA, which lost about half of its seats, resulting in 21 seats. The VVD became the largest party with 31 seats, closely followed by the PvdA with 30 seats. The big winner of the 2010 elections was Geert Wilders whose PVV more than doubled in number of seats. Negotiation talks for a new government have resulted in a VVD-led minority government in coalition with CDA as of 14 October 2010. This minority government is supported by PVV.
The Netherlands is divided into twelve administrative regions, called provinces, each under a Governor, who is called ''Commissaris van de Koningin'' (Commissioner of the Queen), except for the province Limburg where the commissioner is called Gouverneur (Governor). All provinces are divided into municipalities (''gemeenten''), 430 in total (13 March 2010).
The country is also subdivided in water districts, governed by a water board (''waterschap'' or ''hoogheemraadschap''), each having authority in matters concerning water management. As of 1 January 2005 there are 27. The creation of water boards actually pre-dates that of the nation itself, the first appearing in 1196. In fact, the Dutch water boards are one of the oldest democratic entities in the world still in existence.
The administrative structure on the 3 BES islands is different. These Caribbean islands have the status of ''openbare lichamen (public bodies)'' and are generally referred to as ''special municipalities''. They are not part of a province.
Provinces of the Netherlands {| style="background:none;" cellspacing="2px" | |}
Special municipalities of the Netherlands {| style="background:none;" cellspacing="2px" | |}
The foreign policy of the Netherlands is based on four basic commitments: to the atlantic cooperation, to European integration, to international development and to international law. One of the more controversial international issues surrounding the Netherlands is its liberal policy towards soft drugs.
During and after its golden age, the Dutch built up a commercial and colonial empire, which fell apart quickly after the Second World War; the historical ties inherited from its colonial past still influence the foreign relations of the Netherlands.
After WWII, the Netherlands dropped their neutrality, and the Dutch army became part of the NATO army strength in Cold War Europe; holding several bases in Germany. In 1996 conscription was suspended, and the Dutch army was once again transformed into a professional army. Since the 1990s the Dutch army has been involved in the Bosnian War, the Kosovo War, has been holding a province in Iraq after the defeat of Saddam Hussein, and was engaged in Afghanistan.
The military is composed of four branches, all of which carry the prefix ''Koninklijke'' (Royal): ''Koninklijke Landmacht'' (KL), the Royal Netherlands Army
General Peter van Uhm is the current Commander of the Netherlands armed forces. All military specialities except the submarine service and the Royal Netherlands Marine Corps (''Korps Mariniers'') are open to women. The Korps Commandotroepen, the Special Operations Force of the Netherlands Army, is open to women, but because of the extremely high physical demands for initial training, it is almost impossible for women to become a commando. The Dutch Ministry of Defence employs more than 70,000 personnel, including over 20,000 civilian and over 50,000 military personnel. In April 2011 the government decided to decrease the amount of top officials and vehicles considerably, including all tanks, due to a cutback in governmental expenses.
The Netherlands has the 16th largest economy in the world, and ranks 7th in GDP (nominal) per capita. Between 1997 and 2000 annual economic growth (GDP) averaged nearly 4%, well above the European average. Growth slowed considerably from 2001 to 2005 with the global economic slowdown, but accelerated to 4.1% in the third quarter of 2007. Inflation is 1.3%, and unemployment is at 4.0% of the labour force. By Eurostat standards, unemployment in the Netherlands is at 4.1% (April 2010) – the lowest rate of all European Union member states. The Netherlands also has a relatively low GINI coefficient of 0.326. Despite ranking only 7th in GDP per capita, UNICEF ranked the Netherlands 1st in child well-being. On the Index of Economic Freedom Netherlands is the 13th most free market capitalist economy out of 157 surveyed countries.
Amsterdam is the financial and business capital of the Netherlands. The Amsterdam Stock Exchange (AEX), part of Euronext, is the world's oldest stock exchange and is one of Europe's largest bourses. It is situated near Dam Square in the city's centre. As a founding member of the euro, the Netherlands replaced (for accounting purposes) its former currency, the "Gulden" (guilder), on 1 January 1999, along with 15 other adopters of the Euro. Actual euro coins and banknotes followed on 1 January 2002. One euro was equivalent to 2.20371 Dutch guilders.
The Netherlands' location gives it prime access to markets in the UK and Germany, with the port of Rotterdam being the largest port in Europe. Other important parts of the economy are international trade (Dutch colonialism started with cooperative private enterprises such as the VOC), banking and transport. The Netherlands successfully addressed the issue of public finances and stagnating job growth long before its European partners. Amsterdam is the 5th busiest tourist destination in Europe with more than 4.2 million international visitors.
The country continues to be one of the leading European nations for attracting foreign direct investment and is one of the five largest investors in the United States. The economy experienced a slowdown in 2005, but in 2006 recovered to the fastest pace in six years on the back of increased exports and strong investment. The pace of job growth reached 10-year highs in 2007.The Netherlands moved up from the 11th position in the Global Competitiveness Index to the 9th position in 2007.
One of the largest natural gas fields in the world is situated near Slochteren. Exploitation of this field resulted in a total revenue of €159 billion since the mid 1970s. With just over half of the reserves used up and an expected continued rise in oil prices, the revenues over the next few decades are expected to be at least that much.
Rotterdam has the largest port in Europe, with the rivers Meuse and Rhine providing excellent access to the hinterland upstream reaching to Basel, Switzerland, and into France. In 2006, Rotterdam was the world's seventh largest container port in terms of Twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU) handled. The port's main activities are petrochemical industries and general cargo handling and transshipment. The harbour functions as an important transit point for bulk materials and between the European continent and overseas. From Rotterdam goods are transported by ship, river barge, train or road. In 2007, the ''Betuweroute'', a new fast freight railway from Rotterdam to Germany, was completed.
The fertility rate in the Netherlands is 1.66 children per woman (as of 2008), which is high compared to many other European countries, but below the 2.1-rate required for natural population replacement. Life expectancy is high in the Netherlands: 79 years for newborn girls and 78 for boys (2007). The country has a migration rate of 2.55 migrants per 1,000 inhabitants.
The majority of the population of the Netherlands are ethnically Dutch. A 2005 estimate counted: 80.9% Dutch, 2.4% Indonesian, 2.4% German, 2.2% Turkish, 2.0% Surinamese, 2.0% Moroccan, 0.8% Antillean and Aruban, and 6.0% others.
The Dutch are the tallest people in the world, with an average height of for adult males and for adult females. People in the south are on average about 2 cm shorter than those in the north.
Dutch people, or descendants of Dutch people, are also found in migrant communities worldwide, notably in Canada, Australia, South Africa and the United States. According to the 2006 US Census, more than 5 million Americans claim total or partial Dutch ancestry. There are close to 3 million Dutch-descended Afrikaners living in South Africa. In 1940, there were 290,000 Europeans and Eurasians in Indonesia, but most have since left the country.
There is a tradition of learning foreign languages in the Netherlands: about 70% of the total population have good knowledge of conversational English, 55– 59% of German, and 19% of French. The children start with English courses at primary schools when they are about nine years old. English is a mandatory course in all secondary schools. In most lower level secondary school educations (''vmbo''), one additional modern foreign language is mandatory during the first two years. In higher level secondary schools(''havo'' and ''vwo''), two additional modern foreign languages are mandatory during the first three years. Only during the last three years in ''vwo'' one foreign language is mandatory. The standard modern languages are French and German, although schools can change one of these modern languages with Spanish, Turkish, Arabic, or Russian. Additionally, schools in the Frisia region teach and have exams in Frisian, and schools across the country teach and have exams in ancient Greek and Latin for vwo.
The Netherlands is one of the most secular countries in Western Europe, with only 39% being religiously affiliated (31% for those aged under 35), and fewer than 20% visiting church regularly. According to the most recent Eurobarometer poll 2005, 34% of the Dutch citizens responded that "they believe there is a God", whereas 37% answered that "they believe there is some sort of spirit or life force", and 27% that "they do not believe there is any sort of spirit, god, or life force".
Currently, Roman Catholicism is the single largest religion of the Netherlands, forming the religious home of some 28% of the Dutch population in 2011. The Protestant Church of the Netherlands follows with 16% of the population. It was formed in 2004 as a merger of the two major strands of Calvinism: the Dutch Reformed Church (which represented roughly 8.5% of the population), the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands (3.7% of the population), and a smaller Lutheran Church. Other Protestant churches, mostly orthodox Calvinist splits, represent 6% of the population. In 1947, 44.3% belonged to Protestant denominations, 38.7% belonged to the Roman Catholic Church, and 17.1% were unaffiliated.
In 2006, there were 850,000 Muslims (5% of the total Dutch population). The Netherlands has an estimated 250,000 Buddhists or people who feel strongly attracted by this religion, largely ethnic Dutch people. There are approximately 200,000 Hindus, most of them are of Surinamese origin. Sikhs are another religious minority numbering around 12,000, mainly located in or around Amsterdam. There are five gurudwaras in the Netherlands. The Association of Religion Data Archives (relying on World Christian Encyclopedia) estimated some 6,400 Bahá'ís in 2005.
Although the Holocaust deeply affected the Jewish community (killing about 75% of its 140,000 members at the time), it has managed to rebuild a vibrant and lively Jewish life for its approximately 45,000 current members. Before World War II, 10% of the Amsterdam population was Jewish.
Freedom of education has been guaranteed by the Dutch constitution since 1917, and schools run by religious groups (especially Christian and Muslim) are funded by the government. All schools must meet strict quality criteria.
Three political parties in the Dutch parliament (CDA, ChristianUnion, and SGP) base their policy on Christian belief in varying degrees. Although the Netherlands is a secular state, in some municipalities where the Christian parties have the majority, the council meetings are opened by prayer.
Municipalities in general also give civil servants a day off on Christian religious holidays, such as Easter and the Ascension of Jesus.
All children in the Netherlands attend elementary school from (on average) ages 4 to 12. It comprises eight grades, the first of which is facultative. Based on an aptitude test, the 8th grade teacher's recommendation and the opinion of the pupil's parents or caretakers, a choice is made for one of the three main streams of secondary education (after completing a particular stream, a pupil may still continue in the penultimate year of the next stream):
The Netherlands has had many well-known painters. The 17th century, when the Dutch republic was prosperous, was the age of the "Dutch Masters", such as Rembrandt van Rijn, Johannes Vermeer, Jan Steen, Jacob van Ruysdael and many others. Famous Dutch painters of the 19th and 20th century were Vincent van Gogh and Piet Mondriaan. M. C. Escher is a well-known graphics artist. Willem de Kooning was born and trained in Rotterdam, although he is considered to have reached acclaim as an American artist. The Netherlands is the country of philosophers Erasmus of Rotterdam and Spinoza. All of Descartes' major work was done in the Netherlands. The Dutch scientist Christiaan Huygens (1629–1695) discovered Saturn's moon Titan and invented the pendulum clock. Antonie van Leeuwenhoek was the first to observe and describe single-celled organisms with a microscope.
In the Dutch Golden Age, literature flourished as well, with Joost van den Vondel and P.C. Hooft as the two most famous writers. In the 19th century, Multatuli wrote about the poor treatment of the natives in Dutch colonies. Important 20th century authors include Harry Mulisch, Jan Wolkers, Simon Vestdijk, Cees Nooteboom, Gerard (van het) Reve and Willem Frederik Hermans. Anne Frank's ''Diary of a Young Girl'' was published after she died in the Holocaust and translated from Dutch to all major languages.
Replicas of Dutch buildings can be found in Huis Ten Bosch, Nagasaki, Japan. A similar Holland Village is being built in Shenyang, China. Windmills, tulips, wooden shoes, cheese, Delftware pottery, and cannabis are among the items associated with the Netherlands by tourists.
In the Netherlands, football, speed skating, korfball, handball, swimming, rowing, cycling, field hockey, volleyball, equestrian sports, sailing, and tennis are popular sports. A lot of amateurs practice them, and the Netherlands is a strong competitor in international tournaments for these sports. In the Dutch Caribbean, baseball is a popular sport, with the islands frequently sending teams to the annual Little League World Series.
Organization of sports began at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. Federations for sports were established (such as the speed skating federation in 1882), rules were unified and sports clubs came into existence. A Dutch National Olympic Committee was established in 1912. Thus far, the nation has won 230 medals at the Summer Olympic Games and another 78 medals at the Winter Olympic Games.
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Category:Benelux countries Category:Bicontinental countries Category:Constitutional monarchies Category:Countries bordering the Atlantic Ocean Category:Dutch-speaking countries Category:European countries Category:Kingdom of the Netherlands Category:Liberal democracies Category:Northern Europe Category:Western Europe Category:Caribbean countries Category:Member states of the European Union Category:Member states of the Union for the Mediterranean Category:Member states of the Dutch Language Union Category:Member states of NATO
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Name | Elliott Smith |
---|---|
Background | solo_singer |
Birth name | Steven Paul Smith |
Born | August 06, 1969Omaha, Nebraska, U.S. |
Died | October 21, 2003Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
Genre | Lo-fi, indie rock, indie folk |
Occupation | Musician |
Years active | 1991–2003 |
Instrument | Guitar, vocals, piano, clarinet, bass guitar, harmonica, drums. Melodica |
Label | Virgin/Caroline, Cavity Search, Kill Rock Stars, Suicide Squeeze, DreamWorks, ANTI-, Domino |
Associated acts | Heatmiser, Quasi, Mary Lou Lord, Pete Krebs, No. 2 |
Website | sweetadeline.net }} |
After playing in the rock band Heatmiser for several years, Smith began his solo career in 1994 with releases on the independent record labels Cavity Search and Kill Rock Stars. In 1997 he signed a contract with DreamWorks Records, for which he recorded two albums. Smith rose to mainstream prominence when his song "Miss Misery"—included in the soundtrack for the film ''Good Will Hunting''—was nominated for an Oscar in the Best Original Song category in 1998.
Smith suffered from depression, alcoholism, and drug addiction, and these topics often appeared in his lyrics. At age 34, he died in Los Angeles, California from two stab wounds to the chest. The autopsy evidence was inconclusive as to whether the wounds were self-inflicted. At the time of his death, Smith was working on his sixth studio album, ''From a Basement on the Hill'', which was posthumously released.
Smith endured a difficult childhood and a troubled relationship with his stepfather Charlie Welch. Later in life, Smith would come to believe that he had been sexually abused by Welch at a young age. He reflected the impact of this part of his life in the lyrics of "Some Song": "Charlie beat you up week after week, and when you grow up you're going to be a freak." The name "Charlie" also appeared in the lyrics for "Flowers for Charlie" and "No Confidence Man". The family was a part of the Community of Christ through much of Smith's childhood, but eventually began attending services at a local Methodist Church. Smith felt that going to church did little for him, except make him "really scared of Hell". In a 2001 interview, he stated, "I don't necessarily buy into any officially structured version of spirituality. But I have my own version of it".
At the age of nine, Smith began playing the piano, and at 10 began learning guitar on a small acoustic guitar bought for him by his father. At this age he also composed an original piano piece, "Fantasy", which won him a prize at an arts festival. Many of the people on his mother's side of the family were non-professional musicians; his grandfather was a Dixieland drummer and his grandmother sang in a glee club.
At 14, Smith moved from Texas to Portland, Oregon, to live with his father, who was then working as a psychiatrist. It was around this time that Smith first began using drugs, including alcohol, with friends as well as experimenting with recording for the first time, borrowing a four-track recorder. During high school, Smith played clarinet in the school band and also played guitar, piano and sang in the bands Stranger Than Fiction and A Murder of Crows, billed as either Steven Smith or "Johnny Panic". He graduated from Lincoln High School as a National Merit Scholar.
After graduation, Smith began calling himself "Elliott", saying that he thought "Steve" sounded too much like a "jock" name, and that "Steven" sounded "too bookish". According to friends, he had also used the pseudonym "Elliott Stillwater-Rotter" during his time in the band Murder of Crows. Biographer S. R. Shutt speculates that it was either inspired by Elliott Avenue, a street that Smith had lived on in Portland, or that it was suggested by his then-girlfriend. A junior high acquaintance of Smith speculates that it was so as not to be confused with Steve Smith, the drummer of Journey.
Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts, in 1991 with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years," he explained to ''Under the Radar'' in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor’s degree in philosophy and legal theory."
While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. After graduating from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums ''Dead Air'' (1993) and ''Cop and Speeder'' (1994) as well as the ''Yellow No. 5'' EP (1994) on Frontier Records, and were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, ''Mic City Sons'' (1996).
Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment, which they considered an "artist grant".
Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band. Heatmiser disbanded prior to ''Mic City Sons''' release, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought-out by DreamWorks prior to the release of his album, ''XO''.
Smith felt his solo songs were not representative of the music Heatmiser was making: "The idea of playing [my music] for people didn't occur to me... because at the time it was the Northwest—Mudhoney and Nirvana—and going out to play an acoustic show was like crawling out on a limb and begging for it to be sawed off."
The instrumentation of the recordings was primarily acoustic guitar, occasionally accompanied by brief electric guitar riffs or a small drum set played with brushes. Only the final track, an instrumental titled "Kiwi Maddog 20/20" (a reference to the low-end fortified wine), had full band instrumentation.
One of Smith's first solo performances was at the now-defunct Umbra Penumbra on September 17, 1994. Only three songs from ''Roman Candle'' were performed, with the majority of the ten-song set being B-sides, Heatmiser tunes, and unreleased tracks. Soon after this performance, he was asked to open for Mary Lou Lord on a week-long U.S. tour. Several more short tours followed, and Smith helped her record one of his songs "I Figured You Out", which he once called "a stupid pop song [written] in about a minute" that he discarded for sounding "like the fucking Eagles."
By this time, Smith's already-heavy drinking was now being compounded with use of anti-depressants. At the end of the ''Either/Or'' tour, some of his close friends staged an intervention in Chicago, but it proved ineffective. Shortly after, he relocated from Portland to Brooklyn.
Smith commented on the surrealism of the Oscars experience: "That's exactly what it was, surreal... I enjoy performing almost as much as I enjoy making up songs in the first place. But the Oscars was a very strange show, where the set was only one song cut down to less than two minutes, and the audience was a lot of people who didn't come to hear me play. I wouldn't want to live in that world, but it was fun to walk around on the moon for a day."
Christopher Cooper, head of Cavity Search Records (which released ''Roman Candle''), said about this time in Smith's life: "I talked him out of thinking that he wanted to kill himself numerous times when he was in Portland. I kept telling him that he was a brilliant man, and that life was worth living, and that people loved him." Pete Krebs also agreed: "In Portland we got the brunt of Elliott's initial depression... Lots of people have stories of their own experiences of staying up with Elliott 'til five in the morning, holding his hand, telling him not to kill himself."
Smith's first release for DreamWorks was later that year. Titled ''XO'', it was conceived and developed while Smith wrote it out over the winter of 1998, night after night seated at the bar in Luna Lounge, it was produced by the team of Rob Schnapf and Tom Rothrock. ''XO'' also contained some instrumentation from Los Angeles musicians Joey Waronker and Jon Brion. It contained a more full-sounding, baroque pop sound than any of his previous efforts, with songs featuring a horn section, Chamberlins, elaborate string arrangements, and even a drum loop on the song "Independence Day". His familiar double-tracked vocal and acoustic guitar style were still apparent while his somewhat personal lyrical style survived. The song "Waltz #2" even touches upon the abusive tendencies of his stepfather toward himself and his mother with lines like "XO, mom, it's ok, it's alright, nothing's wrong."The album went on to peak at number 104 on the ''Billboard'' 200 and number 123 on the UK Album Charts, while selling 400,000 copies (more than double that of each of his two Kill Rock Stars releases), becoming the best-selling release of his career. Smith's backing band during most of this period was the Portland-based group Quasi, consisting of former bandmate Sam Coomes on bass guitar and Coomes's ex-wife Janet Weiss on drums. Quasi also performed as the opening act at many shows on the tour, with Smith sometimes contributing bass guitar, guitar, or backing vocals. On October 17, 1998, Smith appeared on ''Saturday Night Live'' and performed "Waltz #2." His backing band for this appearance was John Moen, Jon Brion, Rob Schnapf, and Sam Coomes.
In response to whether the change to a bigger record label would influence his creative control, Smith said, "[S]ometimes people look at major labels as simply money-making machines, they're actually composed of individuals who are real people, and there's a part of them that needs to feel that part of their job is to put out good music." Smith also claimed in another interview that he never read his reviews for fear that they would interfere with his songwriting.
Smith relocated from Brooklyn to Los Angeles in 1999, taking up residence at a cabin in the Silver Lake section of town. That fall, his cover of The Beatles' "Because" was featured in the end credits of DreamWorks' Oscar-winning drama ''American Beauty'', and also appeared on the film's soundtrack album.
The final album Smith completed in his lifetime, ''Figure 8'', was released on April 18, 2000. It featured the return of Rothrock, Schnapf, Brion, and Waronker, and was partially recorded at Abbey Road Studios in England, with an obvious Beatles influence in the songwriting and production. The album garnered very favorable reviews, peaking at number 99 on the ''Billboard'' 200 and 37 on the UK Album Charts. The album garnered praise for its power pop style and complex arrangements, described as creating a "sweeping kaleidoscope of layered instruments and sonic textures." However, some reviewers felt that Smith's trademark dark and melancholy songwriting had lost some of its subtlety, with one reviewer likening some of the lyrics to "the self-pitying complaints of an adolescent venting in his diary."
Album art and promotional pictures from the period showed Smith looking cleaned-up and put-together. An extensive tour in promotion of the record ensued, bookended by television appearances on ''Late Night with Conan O'Brien'' and ''The Late Show with David Letterman''. However, Smith's condition began to deteriorate as he had become addicted to heroin either towards the end of or just after the ''Figure 8'' tour.
A follow-up to Smith's 2000 album was originally planned to happen with Rob Schnapf, but their sessions were abandoned. Smith also began distancing himself from manager Margaret Mittleman, who had handled him since the ''Roman Candle'' days. He finally began recording a new album with only himself and Jon Brion as producers sometime during 2001. The pair had recorded a substantial amount of music for the album, when Brion confronted Smith about his drug and alcohol abuse. Their friendship promptly ended, and Smith scrapped all of their work up until that point. He later said: "There was even a little more than half of a record done before this new one that I just scrapped because of a blown friendship with someone that made me so depressed I didn't want to hear any of those songs. He was just helping me record the songs and stuff, and then the friendship kind of fell apart all of a sudden one day. It just made it kind of awkward being alone in the car listening to the songs."
When Brion sent a bill for the abandoned sessions to DreamWorks, executives Lenny Waronker and Luke Wood scheduled a meeting with Smith to determine what went wrong with the sessions. The singer voiced what he believed to be intrusion upon his personal life from the label, as well as poor promotion for the ''Figure 8'' album. The talks proved to be fruitless, and soon after, Smith sent a message to the executives, stating that if they did not release him from his contract, he would take his own life. In May 2001, Smith set out to re-record the album, mostly on his own, but with some help from David McConnell of Goldenboy. McConnell told ''Spin'' that, during this time, Smith would smoke over $1,500 worth of heroin and crack per day, would often talk about suicide, and on numerous occasions tried to give himself an overdose. Steven Drozd of The Flaming Lips and Scott McPherson played a few drum tracks, Sam Coomes contributed some bass guitar and backing vocals, but almost every other instrument was recorded by Smith.
One of the few highlights for Smith in 2001 was inclusion of his song "Needle in the Hay" in Wes Anderson's dark comedy ''The Royal Tenenbaums''. The song plays during a suicide attempt. Smith was originally supposed to contribute a cover of The Beatles' "Hey Jude" for the film, but when he failed to do so in time, Anderson had to use The Mutato Muzika Orchestra's version of the track instead. Anderson would later say that Smith "was in a bad state" at the time.
Smith's live performances during 2001 and 2002 were infrequent, typically in the Pacific Northwest or Los Angeles. A review of his December 20, 2001, show at Portland's Crystal Ballroom stated concern over his appearance and performance: his hair was uncharacteristically greasy and long; his face was bearded and gaunt; and during his songs he exhibited alarming signs of "memory-loss and butterfingers". The crowd would often have to shout out the lyrics (and in some cases, guitar chords) when Smith could not think of them.
In the first of only three concerts performed in 2002, Smith co-headlined Northwestern University's A&O; Ball with Wilco on May 2 in Chicago. He was onstage for nearly an hour, but failed to complete a single song. He claimed that his poor performance was due to his left hand having fallen asleep, and told the audience it felt "like having stuff on your hand and you can't get it off." Smith's performance was reviewed as "undoubtedly one of the worst performances ever by a musician" and an "excruciating...nightmare". A reporter for the online magazine ''Glorious Noise'' made the statement, "[I]t would not surprise me at all if Elliott Smith ends up dead within a year."
On November 25, 2002, Smith was involved in a brawl with the Los Angeles Police Department at a Flaming Lips/Beck concert. Smith later said he was defending a man he thought the police were harassing. Assuming that Smith was homeless, the officers allegedly beat and arrested him and his girlfriend, Jennifer Chiba. The two spent the night in jail. Smith's hand and back were injured in the incident, causing him to cancel a number of shows. Wayne Coyne, lead singer of The Flaming Lips and a friend of Smith's, stated concern over Smith's appearance and actions, saying that he "saw a guy who had lost control of himself. He was needy, he was grumpy, he was everything you wouldn't want in a person. It's not like when you think of Keith Richards being pleasantly blissed out in the corner."
Two sold-out solo acoustic concerts at Hollywood's Henry Fonda Theater, on January 31 and February 1, 2003 saw Smith attempting to reestablish his credibility as a live performer, yielding mixed results. Before the show, Smith scrawled "Kali - The Destroyer" (the Hindu goddess associated with time and change) in large block letters with permanent ink on his left arm, which was visible to the crowd during the performance. On several songs he was backed by a stripped-down drum kit played by Robin Peringer (of the band 764-HERO), and on one track, members of opening band Rilo Kiley contributed backing vocals. Smith would play only one more concert in his adopted hometown, three months later at The Derby.
After his 34th birthday on August 6, 2003, he gave up alcohol, caffeine, red meat, refined sugar, and his longtime (sometimes abused) regimen of psychiatric medication. Director Mike Mills had been working with Smith during his final years and described Smith's troubles and apparent recovery: "I gave the script to him, then he dropped off the face of the earth...he went through his whole crazy time, but by the time I was done with the film, he was making ''From a Basement on the Hill'' and I was shocked that he was actually making music." With things improving for Smith after several troubled years, he began experimenting with noise music and worked on his girlfriend Jennifer Chiba's iMac with the intent of learning how to record with computers, noting that it was the only method with which he was still unfamiliar. Smith jokingly labeled his experimental way of recording "The California Frown" (a play on the Beach Boys' "California Sound"). He said of the songs, "They're kind of more noisy with the pitch all distorted. Some are more acoustic, but there aren't too many like that. Lately I've just been making up a lot of noise."
He was also in the process of recording songs for the ''Thumbsucker'' soundtrack, including Big Star's "Thirteen", and Cat Stevens' "Trouble". In August 2003, Suicide Squeeze Records put out a limited-edition vinyl single for "Pretty (Ugly Before)", a song that Smith had been playing since the ''Figure 8'' tour. Steve Hanft described the last six months of Smith's life as being "like the light at the end of the tunnel" and was convinced that Smith was clean and recovered.
According to Pitchfork Media, record producer Larry Crane reported on his Tape Op message board that he had planned to help Smith mix his album in mid-November. Crane wrote, "I hadn't talked to Elliott in over a year. His girlfriend, Jennifer, called me [last week] and asked if I'd like to come to L.A. and help mix and finish [Smith's album]. I said yes, of course, and chatted with Elliott for the first time in ages. It seems surreal that he would call me to finish an album and then a week later kill himself. I talked to Jennifer this morning, who was obviously shattered and in tears, and she said, 'I don't understand, he was so healthy.'"
The coroner's report revealed that no traces of illegal substances or alcohol were found in his system at the time of his death, but did find prescribed levels of antidepressant, anxiolytic and ADHD medications in his system, including Clonazepam, Mirtazapine, Atomoxetine and Amphetamine. Also, no hesitation wounds were found on Smith, a trait typical of suicide by self infliction. With his death not being officially declared a suicide, a journalist noted that some have suspected foul play, but also that the authorities do not seem to be investigating the case further. Smith's body was cremated. No public burial site or memorial was ever formally announced.
Memorial concerts were held in several cities in the United States and the United Kingdom. A petition was soon put forth with intent to make part of the Silver Lake area a memorial park in Smith's honor. It received over 10,000 signatures, but no plans to establish the park have been announced. A memorial plaque located inside Smith's former high school, Lincoln High, was hung in July 2006. The plaque has the line "I'm never gonna know you now, but I'm gonna love you anyhow," from Smith's song "Waltz #2".
Since Smith's death, many musical acts have paid him tribute. Songs in tribute to, or about Smith have been released by Bright Eyes ("Reinvent The Wheel"), Beck ("Broken Drum" on "Guero"), Rilo Kiley ("Ripchord" and "It Just Is" on ''More Adventurous''), Sparta ("Bombs and Us"), Third Eye Blind ("Elliott Smith (There's No Hurry To Eternity)", meant to be on ''Symphony of Decay''), Ben Folds ("Late" on ''Songs for Silverman''), Brad Mehldau ("Sky Turning Grey (for Elliott Smith))" on Highway Rider, Rhett Miller ("The Believer" on ''The Believer''), Earlimart ("Heaven Adores You" on ''Treble and Tremble''), Joan As Police Woman ("We Don't Own It" on ''Real Life''),, Bayside (''Baby Britain'' from the album ''XO'')and Pete Yorn ("Bandstand in the Sky" on ''Nightcrawler'', a song jointly dedicated to Jeff Buckley). Several tribute albums have been released since his death, including Christopher O'Riley's ''Home to Oblivion: An Elliott Smith Tribute''.
On July 30, 2004, Jennifer Chiba filed a lawsuit against the Smith family for 15% of his earnings (over $1 million), claiming that she and Smith lived as "husband and wife", that the singer pledged to take care of her financially for the rest of her life, and that she worked as his manager and agent from around 2000 until his death. A state labor commissioner ruled her claim as manager to be invalid, as she had worked as an "unlicensed talent agent" under California's Talent Agencies Act. The case made it to the California appellate court in October 2007, but was defeated 2–1; Chiba could potentially appeal the case to the Supreme Court of California.
''Elliott Smith and the Big Nothing'', a biography by Benjamin Nugent, was rushed to publication and hit stores shortly after ''From a Basement on the Hill'', barely beyond the first anniversary of the musician's death. Smith's family, as well as Joanna Bolme, Jennifer Chiba, Neil Gust, Sam Coomes, and Janet Weiss, all declined to be interviewed and did not support the publication of the book. It contained interviews with Rob Schnapf, David McConnell, and Pete Krebs. The book received mixed reviews, with ''Publishers Weekly'' remarking that while "Nugent manages to patch together the major beats of Smith's life, he can offer little meaningful insight" and that Smith's fans "will be disappointed by this short and shallow biography."
On May 8, 2007, a posthumous two-disc compilation album entitled ''New Moon'' was released by Kill Rock Stars. The album contained 24 songs recorded by Smith between 1994 and 1997 during his tenure with the label that were not included on albums, as well as a few early versions and previously released B-sides. In the United States, the album debuted at number 24 on the ''Billboard'' 200, selling about 24,000 copies in its first week. The record received favorable reviews and was Metacritic's 15th best-reviewed album of 2007. A significant portion of the proceeds from album sales are to go to Outside In, a social service agency for low-income adults and homeless youth in Portland, Oregon.
On October 25, 2007, a book titled ''Elliott Smith'' was released by Autumn de Wilde, which consists of photographs, handwritten lyrics and "revealing talks with Smith's inner circle." De Wilde was responsible for the ''Figure 8'' sleeve art, making a landmark and de facto Smith memorial of the Solutions Audio mural. A five-song CD featuring previously unreleased live recordings of Smith performing acoustically at Club Largo in Los Angeles was included in the release.
Following the singer's death, the Smith estate licensed his songs for use in a number of film and television projects, such as ''One Tree Hill'', ''The Girl Next Door'', ''Georgia Rule'', and ''Paranoid Park''.
In a March 2009 interview, Larry Crane said that the estate of Elliott Smith was now "defunct" and all rights previously held by the singer are now in the control of "his parents." Crane went on to say that his parents own the rights to Smith's high school recordings, some of the Heatmiser material, all solo songs recorded up until his 1998 record deal with DreamWorks Records and ''From a Basement on the Hill.'' DreamWorks Records was acquired by Universal Music Group in 2003, and Interscope Records currently "owns all studio and live recording from Jan 1998 to his passing, except for the songs on ''From a Basement on the Hill''."
In December 2009, Kill Rock Stars announced that it had obtained the rights to re-release ''Roman Candle'' and ''From a Basement on the Hill'', originally released by Cavity Search and Anti-, respectively. ''Roman Candle'' will be remastered by Larry Crane. Along with the press release, Kill Rock Stars posted a previously unreleased track of Smith's, titled "Cecilia/Amanda", as a free download. ''Roman Candle'' and ''From a Basement on the Hill'' were re-released on April 6, 2010 in the US.
A compilation titled ''An Introduction to... Elliott Smith'' was released by Domino Records on November 1, 2010 in the UK and Kill Rock Stars on November 2 in the US.
There remain over a hundred unreleased tracks. Many have leaked and appear on bootleg releases such as ''Elliott Smith Rarities'' and ''Grand Mal: Studio Rarities.''
Smith mentioned his admiration for Bob Dylan in several interviews, citing him as an early musical influence. He once commented: "My father taught me how to play "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right". I love Dylan's words, but even more than that, I love the fact that he loves words." Smith covered Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece" several times in concert. Smith has also been compared to folk legend Nick Drake, due to his fingerpicking style and vocals. Darryl Cater of Allmusic called references to "the definitive folk loner" Drake, "inevitable", and Smith's lyrics have been compared to those in Drake's minimalist and haunting final album.
Smith was a dedicated fan of The Beatles (as well as their solo projects), once noting that he had been listening to them frequently since he was about "four years old" and also claimed that hearing ''The White Album'' was his original inspiration to become a musician. In 1998, Smith contributed a cover of the Beatles song "Because" to the closing credits and soundtrack of the film ''American Beauty''. Although this was the only Beatles song that Smith ever officially released, he is known to have recorded at least two others ("Revolution" and "I'll Be Back"), and played many songs by both the band and the members' solo projects at live concerts.
Regarding his songwriting, Smith said:
Smith said that transitions were his favorite part of songs and that he preferred to write broader, more impressionistic music closer to pop rather than folk music. Smith compared his songs to stories or dreams, not purely confessional pieces that people could relate to. When asked about the dark nature of his songwriting and the cult following he was gaining, Smith said he felt it was merely a product of him writing songs that were strongly meaningful to him rather than anything contrived. Larry Crane, Smith's posthumous archivist, has said that he was surprised at the amount of "recycling of musical ideas" that he has encountered while cataloging the singer's private tapes: "I found songs recorded in high school reworked 15 years on. Lyrics became more important to him as he became older, and more time was spent working on them."
!Release date | !Album | !Label |
July 14, 1994 | Cavity Search RecordsDomino Records | |
July 21, 1995 | Kill Rock StarsDomino Records | |
February 25, 1997 | Kill Rock StarsDomino Records | |
August 25, 1998 | DreamWorks Records | |
April 18, 2000 | DreamWorks Records | |
October 19, 2004 | ''From a Basement on the Hill'' | ANTI-RecordsDomino Records |
May 8, 2007 | Kill Rock StarsDomino Records | |
November 2, 2010 | ''An Introduction to... Elliott Smith'' | Kill Rock StarsDomino Records |
;Bibliography
;Others
Category:1969 births Category:2003 deaths Category:2003 murders in the United States Category:American alternative rock musicians Category:American indie rock musicians Category:American male singers Category:American rock guitarists Category:American rock singer-songwriters Category:Deaths by stabbing Category:Hampshire College alumni Category:Kill Rock Stars Category:Musicians from Los Angeles, California Category:Musicians from Omaha, Nebraska Category:Musicians from Portland, Oregon Category:People from Duncanville, Texas Category:People from Brooklyn Category:People self-identifying as substance abusers Category:Lincoln High School (Portland, Oregon) alumni Category:Live Music Archive artists Category:People from Echo Park, Los Angeles Category:Musicians from New York City
cs:Elliott Smith da:Elliott Smith de:Elliott Smith es:Elliott Smith fa:الیوت اسمیت fr:Elliott Smith ko:엘리엇 스미스 id:Elliott Smith it:Elliott Smith he:אליוט סמית' la:Elliott Smith lv:Eliots Smits lt:Eliotas Smitas nl:Elliott Smith ja:エリオット・スミス no:Elliott Smith nn:Elliott Smith oc:Elliott Smith pl:Elliott Smith pt:Elliott Smith ro:Elliott Smith ru:Смит, Эллиотт simple:Elliott Smith fi:Elliott Smith sv:Elliott Smith tr:Elliott Smith zh:艾略特·史密斯This text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
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