Faces and Snares
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Saturday, November 12, 2005
I haven't updated this blog in what seems like ages and to my three 15 year old fans in Wales - I'm sorry. I will try my best to start posting more often. Some of things I've been interested lately include but are not limited to the following.
Philippe katerine's - Robots After All - A conceptual record summed up best by Momus here
Moondog - The Viking of Sixth Avenue - An overview of his collected recordings from 1949 - 1995 along with rare 78 and multiple vanished records.- The guy with the viking hat was said to have inspired Igor Stravinsky, Bob Dylan, Mr. Scruff, Frank Zappa, Charlie Parker, Elvis Costello, Janis Joplin and Antony and the Johnsons.
Jacques Pepin. I once thought he was just Julia Child's bitch but I was so very wrong. He's brilliant, artistic, suprisingly hetero and apparently living in Connecticut. I picked up Jacques Pepin's "The Art of French Cooking" at a junk shop in Greenpoint and I've had my nose buried it in ever since. With easy instructions and full color illustrations on how to gut and butcher everything from frogs to rabbit - including dozens of recipes focusing on calf brains, (At best when made into spinch, artichoke and calf brain pate), baby lamb's feet (delicious in stew) and cow intestines (soup soup soup) - this book is Escoffier for dummies.
TAFC inspired me to take Jacques even further. I became obsessed with his WLIW TV show, Fast Food My Way, and ordered his book right off of TV. Not one recipe in the book takes over thirty minutes to make, including the Cassoulet. A cassoulet is a traditional dish from the Southwest of France that features white beans, roasted pork, sausage, duck or goose. Its assembled in a cast iron pan, covered with breadcumbs and is typically cooked anywhere from hours to days. So, to cheat the dish in 28 minutes is certainly respectable - purist or not. Trendy slow cookers like Kenan gasp at the notion of comprimising the cooking experiece Anthony Bourdain describes as a "Soothing..liberating expereience". Can someone call Peter please?
The Saucier's Apprentince by Raymond Sokolov. When I first saw this book I immediately noticed the author, Raymond Sokolov and couldn't help but think about Evguenie Sokolov, a character in a book by Serge Gainsbourg, who creates an accidental painting masterpiece when a massive fart causes a vibration in his brush stroke. Evguenie, then of coarse becomes addicted to breaking wind and sets out on fart fetish adventure and so on and so forth. For some reason - and its most likely most vulgar mind - I pictured some French dude farting out liquid sauces on to plates of Foie Gras and Duck Confit, which I suppose would also be a "soothing liberating feeling". Seriously though - this book is dope. Like the French, who began perfecting sauces to cover up the poor quality of beef they were supplied with, you too, can make your shit shine.
Last but not least. My boy, Mike M has an MP3 blog out. Oceanwastral blog is showing symptoms of promise and signs of great things to come. Already - some flipped out ninjaman mp3, a soothing podcast and a doozy of a Robert Wyatt track. Check it here yo.
Thursday, October 13, 2005
Monday, October 10, 2005
These flyers will show you how much Hip Hop has changed without having to listen to some rapper spit out one of those nauseating nostalgic tracks that queer white girls rhyme to. The only thing worse than "conscious" rap is "nostalgia" tracks.
While Puffy has his birthday party on a yacht in the Riviera, somewhere off the coast of St. Tropez, Eric B and Rakim were blowing up the Harlem YMCA for Dj EZ Rocks birthday.
Anyways this dude has a serious collection of old school hip hop flyer'., which look like a cross between punk flyer's and studio one era reggae posters.
Sunday, October 9, 2005
In 2002 I bought the reissue of Gary Wilson's "Do You Think You Really Know Me?" and though I really dug it, I set it aside and only listened to it on a couple of occasions. For those who don't know, Gary is an eccentric songwriter from Long Island who made, what some critics consider, a masterpiece in 1977 and then vanished off the face of the Earth. The songs sound Like John Fox playing smooth Jazz with random outbursts of Gordon Gano -ish angst. I make it sound a lot less interesting then it actually so just let the record cover speak for itself. Gary played in the late 70's CBGB's scene and built up a loyal and faithful following. infortunately, for some reason or another, he never quite made it out of the East Village.
 
Gorgeous Entertainment, who mostly produce adaptations of Japanese novels and theater performances made a documentary on Gary, Do You Think You Really Know Me? that played around small theaters in New York last Winter. Though I never caught the film, I have seen photos of Wilson wrapped up in duct tape and others of him prancing around in panties covered in plastic wrap.
Click on Gary's website and listen to Gary's classic, "6.4 = Make Out". To me, it sounds like Ian Sevenous doing Prince backed by John Foxx doing Roy Ayers. The ending is very Violent Femmes!
For more info on Gary and other eccentric geniuses check out this cool site - weirdo music - it contains the usual cast of characters but leaves out some I'd really like to see there. The links page is great too!
Wednesday, October 5, 2005
Friday, September 23, 2005
Edgar Mata is a friend of mine from New Orleans, who has been living in New York and working as a photographer for various newspapers. His family home boarders the lake and miraculously survived the devastation. Though his family is currently and temporarily residing in Houston, he traveled down to New Orleans a few days ago and snapped some nice pictures.
On a side note, Edgar once did a photo project that involved hiding in bathroom stalls around the US and Europe. He would sit on the shitter, close the stall door and lift his feet to hide himself completely within the stall. Eventually, an unsuspected victim, assuming the stall was empty, would open the door and give that horrific look a person gives when they accidently walk in on someone pooping. At this moment, Edgar would snap a photo of the person's expression and scream bloody murder. The photos are often pretty hilarious once you know the concept behind them. I asked him how he managed to not get his ass kicked for doing such devious things and he replied, "You just have to act more pissed off then them". He later went on to do the same thing in elevators. I wish you would put those shots on your site. I also wish you would let me steal some of those New Orleans photos for my blog.
I've been hearing the name Panther for a while now and for the longest time I had him confused with another band. The band Panther I saw was this Oneida type, power rock quintent, who played hard and sleezy. I saw them open for Lightning Bolt at Brownies, back when I was living in the East Village and Brownies was still around. They opened with a confrontational introduction:
"We're Panther from New York City....What! We're Panther from New York City, I said What!"
Then Sonic Youth-like chainsaw guitars assaulted the crowd and sawed us in half.
That Panther was good but really not my cup of tea, so I never really got around to checking out this other Panther. That is until just now when I watched the video for "You don't want your nails done".
This Panther is funked out and buggs out like a breakbeat version of the Kooky Scientist The singer cops that Prince falsetto, which now I've grown to associate more with Ian Svenonius's days with the Make Up, then with his majesty himself. Panther even flails around on floor in similar fashion - crawling, turtling, popping and locking that looks just like you would expect it to - like an idie rocker trying to breakdance. Has this not been done thousands of times? Middle of the roaders like Chromeo is doing this and so are the more innovative uses of Prince squeeks, Captain Comatose and Freeblood. I like them.
Thursday, September 22, 2005
There's this guy in Montreal. He has a sweet blog, Golden Melodies. He just blogged about Kenneth Anger and Jack Smith. He has nice photos. Here are some.
Cruising 20jazzfunkgreats at the moment and I come across someone I've never heard before. Judy Nylon's her name and apparently she was down with Eno. They say it sounds it like Grace Jones and Ldyia Lunch, I think it sounds like an artsy, East Village 70's version of Nico singing a made up James Bond theme. Definitely dark. Definitely moody. Definitely interesting. Click here for the Mp3 - Judy Nylon - "Room Without a View"
 
Wednesday, September 21, 2005
Artblog is on the move and well worth a peep if you at all like visual art. They want to create a sort of a Pitchfork for the visual art set. They are on their way to doing a great job and I must admit I went trigger happy on their links section.
Riding The Tokyo Style in Gothenburg wave, I stumble upon the Dyez Experiment, a street art collective who freaked the shit out of their soon to be demolished Head Quarters. Reminds me of the early days of Willy B.
 
 
Also to be noted from the Tokyo style in Gothenburg site is this link to an area near Shinjuko called Shinkokubo, which I guess is an Asian ghetto that specializes in S&M. Now the author from the blog I linked it from gave a little disclaimer and I'm going to give a little one as well. You see, I'm getting more and more pervy, don't ask me why, but I assure you it's harmless. I won't turn into Howard Stern, I'm leaning more towards the kind of pervert that Woody Allen is. I'm not going to go as far as to say I look at Playboy for the artivles, shit I don't even look at Playboy at all, (except for when they did that Helmut Newton retrospective), but I will add that I only like this site for the design. It proves once again that design is kinky.
      
Tuesday, September 20, 2005
David Hamilton (1933 UK) is a London born photographer, controversial in the US and UK for taking grainy, soft-focus photos of nude adoloscent girls. He has since moved to the South of France, where right wing Christian Extremism is less tolerated.
  
His work reminds me alot of Richard Kern or maybe it should be the other way around, who knows? Ever since I stumbled across Kern's book New York Girls in the St. Marks Book Shop, both my eyes and my penis have become dedicated fans.
Kern has made a bunch of short films with the regular cast of old school East Village characters, including Nick Zedd and Lydia Lunch. He's directed videos for Sonic Youth and has become quite a hip photographer, shooting for Vice and Index.
Getting back to David Hamilton, Momus wrote a song, David Hamilton, which is featured on his Stop This album,(19 demos of previously unreleased songs). These lyrics to the song were pulled from the imomus index and can also be found in Lusts of a Moron, a book dedicated to the lyrics of Momus. Note that though Momus wrote the song, it is performed by Laila France. Just thought I'd draw attention to that before you drew the mental picture of a naked Momus in a pond surrounded by lillies.
David Hamilton
(Performed by Laila France
Music and Lyrics Currie, 1995)
Mr David Hamilton is photographing me
Down among the lilies, down among the lilies
Shooting with his Hasselblad beneath a willow tree
One foot in the river, I'm bored and slightly chilly
Thursday goes and then Friday goes
And I long to strike another pose
Rain begins to patter on the leaves
Soft focus eroticism, art photography
Mr David Hamilton and me
Mr David Hamilton is photographing me
Like a pervert teacher with his languid creature
Sketching out an adolescent sexuality
Where Nature longs for Culture, Culture longs for Nature
His big umbrella flashgun goes
He comes to rearrange my clothes
I must ensure that my bare legs are seen
Romanticism, Classicism, Soft Pornography
Mr David Hamilton and me
In the south of France I hear he keeps a house for waifs and strays
Where teenage girls like me can come and learn
Stay in bed till three o'clock and lounge about with nothing on
He only asks for photos in return
(Instrumental)
Member of the Royal Photography Society
Mr David, really, don't you think it's silly
A tank of liquid nitrogen, a cloud of carbon snow
Just to gild the lily, just to gild the lily
But if this lazy suffering
Can bring erection to the lap
Of just one man, it hasn't been in vain
Mr David Hamilton is photographing me
Leaves begin to patter in the rain
(Instrumental)
Sunday goes and then Monday goes
And I long to strike another pose
A cow begins to nibble at my dress
Romanticism, Classicism, Soft Pornography
Mr David Hamilton I guess
On second thought, there was a series of photographs Kern took in the woods, near a lake, with these two girls posing in the sunlight. They were soft focus and very much like Hamilton's work. The more I think of it, other then those pics (Which I can't find online) the two photographers really don't resemble each other at all. So, before you call bullshit, I will.
Saturday, September 17, 2005
I took a break from dance music and pop this summer to indulge in some of that hippie revival shit going on. I spent a good deal of the summer listening to:
The Sunburned Hand of the Man
Sun 0)))
White Magic
Dead Meadow
Josephine Foster
Acid Mother's Temple
Black Pig Liberation Front
Gang Gang Dance
Six Organs of Admittance
AngelBlood
Cerberus Shoal
and whatever part of the triangle, Lansing-Dreiden's sixties flavored anthems (Metal on a gun) are part of.
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Mostly the darker stuff from what everybody's calling anti-folk or New Weird America or whatever Devendra Bernhardt is said to be spearheading.
I read Drop City, a book about a California hippie compound along with interviews with Kerista Commune members, The Diggers, The Farm, The Sexual Freedom League,Mel Lyman's digs, The actionist squats and recent propaganda pamphlets from Zendik Farm, a modern hippie commune started by Wolf Zendik, a friend of Roman Polanski, in the rural mountains of North Carolina.
I watched films about commune living. Documentaries and Fictional ones alike:
Antonioni's Zabriskie Point
Kenneth Anger's abstract oddities
Lukas Moodysson's Together
Lars Von Trier's The Idiots
to name a few
I pretty much tried to find a common aesthetic with all these communes that bands today are so attracted to. I researched most of the German, French, British and American communes that are written about and can be found online.
With all of this information it was impossible to avoid the inevitable, the inevitable being the most famous, or infamous hippie commune of them all. The Manson Family.
Everybody knows who Charlie is. His face has become immortalized in pop culture and has left a mark similar to that of Andy Warhol, who was also involved in a seedy underworld and was a product of the 60's counterculture that today is mainstream pop culture.
 
Manson has become so mainstream and his story is told so often and in so many different ways that he almost seems mythical and in extreme cases, such a joke, that his gruesome crimes seem almost downplayed.
This is one of the angles that the documentary, Charles Manson Superstar, takes on Manson. The film attempts (In the beginning at least) to show how Charlie is a "branded" product of American Culture, much in the same way of the McDonald's Golden Arches or the logos for Coca-Cola or Nike.
Ever since I read about John Waters obsession with the Manson Clan I can't take the guy or the story seriously anymore.The site of Manson's scowel or the mention of his birngs to mind John Waters jokes about Squeaky Fromme or flashbacks to Water's witty remarks on the Family while flipping through his Manson Family scrap book in Nick Zedd's Documentary. Even Woody Allen has managed to squeeze Manson jokes into two movies.
Never the less, my interests in researching communes lead me in a full circle and I found myself going from the obscure to the obvious and decided to rent Charles Manson Superstar to wrap this hippie shit up once and for all What struck me most about this documentary, (which was given horrible reviews and is, at times, head banging boring,) is the people involved with making the picture, who happen to be some of the major , if not lesser know cast of characters from the underbelly of the age of Aquarious.
THE CAST OF CHARACTERS
Nikolas Schreck is the Producer, The Director, The Writer and at times, The Narrator. For those of you unfamiliar with Schreck, he is an author of tons of occult and satanic novels, most notably the sex magic book, Demons of the Flesh. He is also the founder of The Werewolf order. (click here to read about that) and wife to Zeena Schreck, the other Narator.
Zeena Schreck is of coarse, the wife of Nikolas and the daughter of Anton Levey, the infamous and legendary founder of the Church of Satan and one of the most written about characters to emerge from the Haight Ashbury Scene. Zeena has authored books and started her own religions with sexual magicians that began when she started studying the Left Hand Path.
* Click on the Chruch of Satan link to see famous members of the Church of Satan, which inlcluded Marc Almond of Soft Cell, Sammy Davis Jr, Jayne Mansfield and dozens more. The official website is here.
Anton Levey served as the film's, Music Supervisor. Besides what I've already told you about Levey, he hung around such 60's icons as Timothy Leary, to The Dead, Manson, Beach Boys, The Airplane, Anger and so on and so forth.
Bobby Beausoleil was a member of the band Love before he became a protege of Kenneth Anger when he took over the job for writing the music to Anger's Lucifer Rising when Led Zepplin dropped out. In turn, Bobby wrote one of the greatest psych records ever for Anger's film and served as this films other music director. Bobby was a fixture on San Francisco and LA's counter culture scene when he got involved with Manson and ended up murdering some dudes over drugs. He recorded the album for Lucifer Rising in prison, with homemade instruments. His fascinating story is in the interviews section,here
The outsider artist, Joe Coleman, made much of the films art film's art work. Needless to say, the documentary was a bit more personal then others made on Manson, due to the fact that the makers involved hung around, or at least knew Manson during the time of his family.
THE LOOK AND FEEL
Charles Manson Superstar is beyond indie and is more like home-made. At times it's production value is so low and the narration so monotone and slow it takes up the tediousness of a Warhol flick and becomes painful. If you've ever read anything on Manson most of the stuff talked about in the film you will already know. The narration is a bit too preachy and wordy but the music is cool and watching Manson in his interviews is like watching a nut case doing impressions. He's a total freak (obviously) and if you have a chance, turn off the picture and just listen to the sound . You'll swear you're listening to George Bush. Manson has the same southern drawl and cowboy swagger that Bush, pontificates. The two leaders share a similar style of preaching, that is simple and matter of fact and can be engaging and simple to grasp when Manson is acting sane. I kid you not, Mason's "Bush Isims" is the first thing about him you will notice. When Manson is not sounding like W, he adopts another identity, which is sort of like a redneck white man trying to sound like a jive talkin' black man. This became extremely hilarious because I couldn't help but associate Manson with Vanilla Ice.
Have you ever seen one of those recent interviews with Vanilla Ice when he tries to defend himself for being such a herb? He still acts all hard and tough and cool while trying to street slang his way through an interview that's sole purpose is to tell everyone what a dusche-bag this guy was then to watch the spectacle of him making an even bigger ass of himself as he attempts to fight his way out it. Well, Charles Manson does the same thing. He follows all his points, which are incredibly lame, and his pathetic philospohies with the saying, "Ya Dig". I'm assuming all the years Manson spent in solitary confinement have numbed his cult leader charisma, because whoever would buy into the shit he spews is beyond me.
WHO SHOULD SEE THIS
Manson enthusiasts, obscure documentary enthusiasts and anyone at all interested in the dark side of the Age of Aquarius. People who already know a little bit about Kenneth's Anger's Russian Embassy, Anton Levy, Jack Parsons, Thelema, Magick and basically the less written about side of Haight Ashbury that doesn't involve tie-dye, flowers and peace signs. The two most interesting and cohesive parts of the story are the DVD chapters on Levy and Anger.
WHAT I LEARNED FROM THIS:
Sharon Tate (The Hollywood actress married to Polanski who was murdered by Susan Atkins) practiced White Witchcraft and Magick.
Susan Atkins was a Satanist
Anton Levy served as technical adviser to Polanski on Rosemary's Baby, and even played the Devil in the film. He was also a firm believer in law and order which made him despise hippies. In the film, Nikolas Schreck goes as far as to say "The decline of the hippie era came when Levy put a black magik curse on the hippie movement".
Bobby Beausoliel was a protege of Kenneth Anger who in turn was a protege of Aleister Crowley.
Charles Manson took up the persona he is most famous for after reading, How to Win Friends and Influence People and the Scientology
book, Dianetics.
The house that Sharon Tate was murdered in, which was later owned by Trent Reznor, first belonged to Walt Disney
Charles Manson refers to certain people as "Rupe scoops", which in Manson's context, is an adjective, which means (I'm guessing) asshole or idiot or something like that.
Charles Manson would carve his name and date into things like park benches, trees and bus stops, some of which are still around today.
THE MOST INTERESTING
There was once a time in American history where bands of hippies roamed the countryside and deserts looking for land to live on and create their own little worlds. Land was plentiful and country folk were open to letting these "families" take up residence on a portion of their property in exhange for upkeep and minimal labor. This practice was pretty common and virtually excepted as a legitimate, though flaky path that youth cultures were taking. This is something you don't see too much of anymore in the Northeast. Sure, there's the moldy leftovers from the sixties and the contemporary urban factory compounds in Providence and Brooklyn, but you don't see too many young kids running out to the wilderness in packs to play dreamland, not even in Vermont.
Friday, September 16, 2005
Thursday, September 15, 2005
While on mushrooms, sometime in 1996, I found myself in a bathroom stall with two other dudes and one girl. We were all on fungus and we were all trying to take a piss in the same toilet at the same time. This was my first "group piss" and also the first time I came across a certain saying written on the bathroom stall which I will never forget.
"Gnaw on thy deflated breasts while thou art ejaculating fiecies"
At the time it was the most brilliant and hilarious thing I had ever read.
Three years prior a fellow by the name of Kenneth Goldsmith noticed a quip of his own, scotch taped to a pay phone, on Avenue A in the Lower East Side of New York.
A few days later and few streets down, scotcehd taped to a street sign he read:
...and so for the next few years, Goldsmith cruised the L.E.S. is search of more "Street Poems" and a clue as to who this mysterious poet was.
Years later, with two folders full of found poems he collected, Goldsmith found out.
The story and a sort of "best of" from the poet can be found on UBU Web, here.
  
Neu is re-releasing their viynl re-releases this week. 20jazzfunkgreats the blog, not the album,  has nice selection of musicians like Lou Reed, Lee Renaldo, Ian Svenonius, Richie Hawtin, Stereolab and son on, sharing their two cents on the band.
Here is an mp3 for Isis
ARE Weapons, another band with roots from UMASS, has a new album out complete with a parental advisory sticker. Dude, that's cool.
Here is the mp3 for Who Rules the Wasteland
and last but not least WFMU has some cool video downloads for Joy Division, Sun Ra and Syd Barrett.
Wednesday, September 14, 2005
Walk me down the street to the front porch swing. Sing me something sweet until I fall asleep.
 
Darling lyrics from one of my most guilty pleasures, the Detroit / Ann Arbor, 15 member plus music collective, Saturday Looks Good To Me.
Anyone into cutesy American girl singers, (Go Sailor, Aisler Set, Tiger Trap, Heavenly(Uk), Quixiotic, The Go Go's, The Feminine Complex), who blend punk rock with 50's / 60's Brady Bunch style pop should pick this up right away. They write perfect sing alongable 2 minute tunes that catch on right off the bat and make me wish I had tits.
 
They play tomorrow as part of CMJ at the Knitting Factory
Monday, September 12, 2005
Last week I watched the 1970 adaptation of Henry Miller's Quiet Days in Clichy, in which Miller collaborated with the Scandinavian art radical, Jens Jorgen Thorsen to write the screen version for Thorsen to direct. Considering Miller's involvement in the project the screen version is more or less faithful to the book which chronicles the sexual exploits and conquests of a failed American choreographer and writer living in Paris.
Miller is said to have approached Thorsen for this project due to the duo's mutual respect for each other and likewise contempt for the state of the avant garde at the time. Before Thorsen's role as the director for Miller's novel, he was probably best known for his Situationist films and prominent role as one of the 7 Rebels, a revolutionary art and intellectual group who established Scandinavia's Situationst Chapters and were responsible for the CO-RITUS Manifesto and the CO-RITUS Action Manifesto (1962).
Prior to splitting the French Situationist movement into a Scandinavian Sect, Thorsen was deeply rooted in the French Scene and it was there where he first met Miller. The two formed a kinship, partnered up and produced the film, which though super cool, is hardly watchable unless you're either really into art-house films, Country Joe and the Fish (He made the soundtrack) or watching pseudo porn flicks featuring very nice looking sixties beat and Ye Ye girls.
Although Thorsen went on to direct a few other films of minor merritt, his major impact on Avant-Garde culture was the grouding of the Second Situationist International (His Scandinavian Sect), which excluded every newcoming group who tried to form an independent SI Action sect, including the US groups Black Mask and the most fucked-up radical US gang of undesirables to ever walk the Lower East Side, the UP AGAINST WALL MOTHERFUCKER group, AKA THE Motherfuckers. But that's a whole other story.
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