Clean living in difficult circumstances

Published
by
Mark
on 2 July, 2009
in Kulture
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voodoo-record

SA pal and Equinox contributor Stephen Grasso has started an excellent new blog about his many passions, including voodoo, music (mainly, but not only, northern soul) and magic  – Clean living in difficult circumstances. Writes Stephen:

It will predominantly feature writing about Voodoo, magic, music, obscure records, psychogeography, and whatever else I get up to and feel like writing about.

It’s essentially a way for me to get regular new material out while I work on finishing my book, so I don’t feel quite so much like one of those guys who secretly makes a throne for the Archangel Metatron out of lightbulbs and toilet rolls in his garage, that nobody else ever gets to see or hear about.

Stephen has sensibly kicked started it with a number of posts, including a breakdown of this 1950s voodoo exotica record by Emy de Pradines and the Haiti Dance Chorus and Orchestra.

Get down!

Equinox 2009 Catalogue now available

Published
by
Mark
on 25 June, 2009
in Kulture, News and Strange Attractor
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equinoxcover_smallAvailable now from Strange Attractor Shoppe

Equinox Festival 2009 Catalogue, 208 pages, A5, paperback anthology. Edited by Raymond Salvatore Harmon and Mark Pilkington.

A book companion to the three-day festival of scientific illuminism held at London’s Conway Hall on 12-14 June 2009. Featuring full length essays and artworks from:

Carl Abrahamsonn, Aethenor, David Beth, Peter Christopherson, Comus, Erik Davis, Orryelle Defenestrate-Bascule, Paul Devereux, Phil Farber, Stephen Grasso, Andrew Hartwell, Barry Hale, Raymond Salvatore Harmon, Paola Igliori, Alan Moore, Ralph Metzner, Mark Pilkington, Jack Sargeant, Robert Wallis, Matthew Wiley, Z’EV, John Zorn.

Limited to a run of 777 copies.

‘a substantial 200-plus page book of essays by the speakers, beautiful artwork, pieces about the intent of the Festival from the organizers, background and interviews on the artists at the Festival, and more. This book is a wonderful take-away which supports what happened and will allow it to take root much more effectively for those who were there. I’ve read the essays of several presenters and the interview with the re-united band Comus after their performance and it really helped deepen my experience. … It stands well on its own as something of a snapshot/ad hoc manifesto of the current “occult revival” (if, in fact, such a thing is happening)’. Gareth Branwyn, Boing Boing

Anthony Balch rarities at NFT tonight

Published
by
Mark
on 25 June, 2009
in Events and Happenings
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horror-hospital-dvd-cover
Excuse the short notice but some SA favourites are screening at London’s National Film Theatre tonight as part of the excellent Flipside series:
THE ART OF EXPLOITATION: ANTONY BALCH NIGHT
BFI Southbank Thursday 25th June - TONIGHT
NFT1 at 8.15pm
As a director, distributor of lurid European horror movies, collaborator with William Burroughs, and cinema manager, Antony Balch distinctively straddled the divide between film art and exploitation. Tonight we celebrate the diverse talents of this key figure in the alternative film scene of the 1960s and 1970s.
HORROR HOSPITAL
UK 1973. Dir. Antony Balch. 91 mins.
Groovy pop songster Jason Jones – chirpily played by Britain’s first man of saucy sex comedy, Robin Askwith – gets a whole lot more than he bargained for when he books a stay at a strange ‘health hotel’ in the country. Manhandled by leather-clad biker boys, and subjected to Frederick the dwarf’s cruel taunts, Jason – accompanied by the beautiful Julie - slowly learns the awful plan of sinister Dr Storm (Michael Gough, in his finest mad-scientist mode). Intelligent and rich with cinematic parody, this blood-spattered black comedy somehow works both as genre horror film and experimental spoof.
TOWERS OPEN FIRE
UK 1963 Dir Antony Balch 11mins
This vibrant mix of exotic symbols and playful violence vividly illustrates William Burroughs’ cut-up novels - and features the resonantly-voiced beat author in a starring role, too.
KRONHAUSEN’S PSYCHOMONTAGE
UK 1963 Dir Eberhardt and Phylis Kronhausen 9mins
Balch contributed footage to this bizarre, extremely rare psychiatric test film. Strange noises – many emanating from agitated monkeys - mesh with images of women frolicking with dogs, probing insects and a human tongue to increasingly uncanny effect.
TICKETS
Tickets £9.00 (£6.65 concessions)
EASY ONLINE BOOKING
BOX OFFICE
020 7928 3232

Erik Davis at The October Gallery

Published
by
Mark
on 25 June, 2009
in Events and Happenings
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The Ecology, Cosmos and Consciousness lecture series presents:
IMAGINATION IS WHAT YOU ARE
by Erik Davis

Tuesday 30 June at the October Gallery,

24 Old Gloucester Street
London, WC1N 3AL, United Kingdom
+44 20 7242 7367

One of the most vital aspects of human consciousness is the dimension of the imagination, a broad domain that can be said to include the overlapping worlds of dream, fantasy, creative visualization, hallucination, and the spectres and phantasms of the paranormal. Any genuine engagement with spirituality and religious experience must take the imagination seriously. This is also true of any attempt to engage nature on a holistic level, for it is through the imagination that nature speaks, and the wilderness without can touch the wildness within. In this talk, Erik Davis will explore different theories and practices of the imagination, and will relate them to visionary experience, magic, dreams, and our ordinary engagement with “reality.”

Entry £7 /£5 Concessions, Arrive 6pm for a 6:30pm Start - Wine available

Please reserve your place as space is limited.
Email rentals@octobergallery.co.uk or call 44 (0)20 7831 1618

Equinox Festival Catalogue

Published
by
Mark
on 15 June, 2009
in Strange Attractor
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Further is taking a week off for travel in Western Lands and solstice revels, but when we return we’ll be making the Equinox Festival Catalogue available for mail order.

A document of and companion to the Equinox Festival held in London’s Conway Hall between the 12th and 14th June, it features essays and images from Alan Moore, Erik Davis, Ralph Metzner, Paul Devereux, Peter Christopherson, Stephen Grasso, Robert Wallis and many more.

Watch this space….

Cathi Unsworth & Pete Woodhead: Transmissions

Published
by
Mark
on 10 June, 2009
in Kulture
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Her body was found on 8 November 1963, buried in a shallow grave, in wasteland being cleared for a building site in Mortlake. No one had seen her in months. No one had reported her missing. She was 22 years old…

SA pal Cathi Unsworth, author of such noir greats as The Not Knowing, The Singer and the forthcoming Bad Penny Blues has teamed up with another SA pal, musician Pete Woodhead (O Yuki Conjugate and The Sons of Silence, Kosmische club), to produce a series of beautiful and haunting soundtracks to her writing. 

The first two entries in the Transmissions series, accompanying extracts from Bad Penny Blues, are available now from Cathi’s web site.

Humungous jellyfish crop circle

Published
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Mark
on 2 June, 2009
in Kulture
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jellyfish1_1414867c

[photo: Mike Walker]

A very impressive 600ft jellyfish crop formation landed in Oxfordshire last week – for comparison most formations are around the 300ft mark. I would imagine that two or more teams joined forces for this monster. I’m hoping we’ll get a giant squid before the summer is out…

Want to know how it’s done? Well I can’t guarantee that you’ll be producing 600ft monsterpieces without a little practice, but everything you need to know to get yourself started is laid out in SAP’s The Field Guide…

Thanks Al Robertson

Listening to Electric Fish

Published
by
Mark
on 2 June, 2009
in Far Out / Science
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small_elephant_nose

No, not a new synth band, but the Elephant Nose fish, Gnathonemus petersii.

The article at Sci-toys describes the electrical organs in the fish’s tail and how to mic one up to create uber-minimalist electronic rhythms. Just add reverb and echo to taste!

via Matrix Synth

International Times online!

Published
by
Mark
on 28 May, 2009
in Kulture
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it_1970-10-08_b-it-volume-1_iss-89_001it_1970-12-03_b-it-volume-1_iss-93_001

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now this is just amazing – the entire run of International Times, the UK counter-cultural newspaper, has been made available online for free! 

A random click through pulled up articles on Flying Saucer Cookery, telephone tapping, London’s decay, a 1972 review of a Zappa and Hawkwind gig at the Oval Gas Works, a 1969 head’s passage to India, Buckminster Fuller…  This will provide you with months, if not years of happy browsing.

Via John Coulthart

John C also has also linked to this online archive of OZ, the other key underground rag of the period.

Let the Machines Sing: Le Weekend

Published
by
Mark
on 28 May, 2009
in Happenings and Music & Gigs
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misty-vcs3-small

John Cavanagh (Phosphene) and Mark Pilkington (The Asterism) will be duking it out on an EMS VCS3 and MISTY (both pictured above, photo by John Cavanagh) at Le Weekend festival in Stirling, Scotland, this Sunday 31 May.

Their improvised performance, titled Let the Machines Sing, follows on from their debut at the Glasgow University music hall earlier this year, as part of a concert arranged by Drew Mulholland  of Mount Vernon Arts Lab.

Drew will also be performing at Le Weekend with Adrian Utley of Portishead.

Full lineup and info here.