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July 31, 2003
Apocalypse Pretty Soon In 2000 i bought a book that came out in 1999, just in time to cash in on the end of the millenium panic. I got a 60% discount, as the world still existed and everyone had long ceased to care. Although the millenium didn't really end until new year's eve in the year 2000... But I didn't read the damn thing until now.
Anyways, in the book "Apocalypse Pretty Soon -- Travels in End-Time America", WIRED writer Alex Heard travels around during a whole decade, visiting various esoteric and apocalyptic cults.
The Unarius Academy of Science cult in San Diego waits for a huge crowd of UFO's to swipe them away. Some people tries to live forever, or get cloned. Some tries to achieve out of body experiences (OBE's). Earth Changes thinks that Earth will strike back and wipe out 95% of humanity. Build shelters, man. Some organize in militias and prepares to fight the federal government and , if necessary, go down in a hail of fire and bullets like Randy Weaver or Waco's Branch Davidians. Some want to start their very own, totally independent country by building a structure at sea.
Some israelis and israeli-friends believe that if they can create a 100% red heifer, that is an all-red cow, then they can build a temple on the temple mound in the holy city and start the all-out apocalyptic war to end all wars.
A pretty diverse set of characters.
A cool and interesting book, and the author doesn't treat his subjects too badly, even though some of them would deserve a more thorough beating than they get.
15:53
July 29, 2003
World premiere of "Maybe Logic""Maybe Logic -- The Lives and Ideas of Robert Anton Wilson" is about to be released on DVD. Recently, the film premiered in R.A.W.'s hometown Santa Cruz.
18:52
Joe Coleman: "Rest In Pieces" out on DVD! This just in from disinfo.com today: New York and Los Angeles based The Disinformation Company announces second release in their new line of Underground Culture DVDs.
“A riveting examination of an artist who refuses to paint–or play–on the mainstream canvas... squirm-inducing." –New York Post
"His art is some of the best around these days." –Robert Crumb, artist and star of “Crumb”
July 29, 2003, Las Vegas, Nevada, VSDA’s Home Entertainment 2003—
Watch out this year for a repeat performance by The Disinformation Company's new home video division. Hot on the heels of their first DVD release DISINFORMATION: THE COMPLETE SERIES, the team at The Disinformation Company announced an October 15 release date for REST IN PIECES, a feature-length documentary portrait of apocalyptic painter Joe Coleman.
“We were incredibly happy to acquire rights to REST IN PIECES,” said The Disinformation Company president Gary Baddeley, “and we’re look forward to creating the same wave of shock and awe within the video industry as we have in book publishing.”
Baddeley promises shock and awe will be one of the milder effect of the company’s second contribution to home video entertainment. REST IN PIECES documents the life and passion of Joe Coleman, a nice, idealistic Catholic boy who survived a surreal, twisted upbringing surrounded by love and violence, and eventually settled on becoming an artist after abandoning early dreams of mass murder.
Now in his 40’s and just beginning to receive mainstream recognition, Joe paints inhumanly detailed masterworks commissioned by patrons in the international art world and celebrity admirers like Iggy Pop, Leonardo DiCaprio and Johnny Depp. His tools: magnifying glasses and a single-hair paintbrush to create visual intricacies that match the complexity of his imagination.
The film follows Joe through deserted New York City streets, an autopsy room in Budapest and live performances where he blows himself up with dynamite. Director Robert Pejo pieces together a portrait of his subject through interviews with Joe, his therapist, ex-lovers, his publisher and the filmmaker Jim Jarmusch. Pejo delves into the intimate folds of Coleman’s bizarre personal life, taking his camera into the artist’s home to film his family—photographer wife Whitney Ward and the couple’s adopted son “Junior,” a deformed baby preserved inside a jar of formaldehyde.
This special Disinformation DVD release of REST IN PIECES also contains these exclusive extras:
• Joe Coleman Opera – an intricate look at Joe’s work
• Film Diva Asia Argento on Joe’s influence on her work and life
• Film outtakes
• Interview with Joe’s photographer wife Whitney Ward
Title: REST IN PIECES
Director: Robert Pejo
Running Time: 89 minutes & 21 minutes of extras
SRLP: $19.95
Catalog No. DIS003
(My INTERVIEW with Joe Coleman. The above photo was taken at the leprosy museum in Bergen, Norway.)
18:17
July 28, 2003
Backwash goes to the freakshowThere's been a lot of freak and sideshow stuff in Marc Hartzman's excellent Backwash zine over the years, but in the new #18 it's all freaks all the time. Starting with the black dwarf pornstar Beetlejuice, presenting The Bindlestiff Family Cirkus and writing a piece on last year's Sideshow Gathering, where Marc drove in for the last day. I stayed for 3 days and had a great time watching all the sword swallowers, Zamora -- The Torture King, Johnny Fox, Todd Robbins, The Lizard Man and many more; and meeting vendors like Bob Blackmar (publisher of the Sideshow Newsletter) and James Taylor (author of the Shocked and Amazed series and proprietor of the Dime Museum in Baltimore.)
Anyways, get Marc's zine, and if you're into sideshows, you'll also need back issues #17 (w/Melvin Burkhart -- The Human Blockhead) and #15 (w/Johnny Fox' Freakatorium ).
Hartzman is also the author of the book "Found on eBay" with 101 weird things he bought on eBay, including old dentures and a can a rattlesnake meat.
18:43
July 26, 2003
Famlende Forsok -- new album!After decades in the works, the norwegian experimental trio Famlende Forsok has finally released their album of HP Lovecraft lyrics set to music. The vinyl of "One Night I Had a Frightful Dream" is on the german September Gurls label and the CD with 2 extra tracks is on their own Crawling Chaos label. Their first vinyl album, "Ars Transmutatoria" appeared in 1990, but this is appr. their tenth album, counting all the cassette-only releases since 1983.
Review at Luna Kafe.
Artikkel paa spot.no.
There's five compilations w/FF contributions at the HWEB shop.
23:37
Rare polish DePress albumsWithout telling anyone, Andrej Nebb of the legendary Norway-based bands DePress and Holy Toy, have released at least five whole albums only in Poland! Check out this mailorder business. "Russian Party" is also known as "Vodka Party", and the comp. "3 Potocki" is fairly well known. But all the rest are very, very obscure releases, left out of any discographies or fan sites you'll find. And this from a non-active band with only 3 studio albums, one live album and 2 EP's released on their other home turf in Norway...
In 1999 the band's drummer put out the unofficial 2XCD compilation "de finite", limited to 100 copies, with half of the 30 tracks being re-recordings of old hits and the other half new songs, most of which can be found on the polish "Groj skrzypko groj" CD. All recorded in 1992-93.
Nebbs fourth solo album "Bare Tull" is scheduled for release soon. Reportedly, he's performed for the Pope(!) lately as well.
23:05
ABUSE YOUR ILLUSIONS Report Scoops Front Page News by Two MonthsFrom disinfo.com: July 25, 2003
New York, NY — "Pieces of the 9/11 Puzzle", an essay by Russ Kick, contributor and editor of Disinformation's recent anthology, ABUSE YOUR ILLUSIONS (May 2003) outlines the most intriguing and troubling aspects of 9/11, as reported on by newspapers across the country today due to the release of a Congressional report:
• Missed Opportunities and Lapses by US Intelligence
The Congressional report, by a joint panel of the House and Senate intelligence committees, found many missed opportunities to prevent an attack by al-Qaeda in the United States. One newly disclosed intelligence document from December 1998 said: "Plans to hijack U.S. aircraft proceeding well. Two individuals had successfully evaded checkpoints in dry run at NY airport."
This bombshell was reported on page one of the New York Times today, but had been reported in ABUSE YOUR ILLUSIONS by Russ Kick in May 2003. Russ Kick found that intelligence document before it was reported to us by our major newspapers.
• Evidence that at least one foreign country was behind 9/11
Further reported in the New York Times today, the relationship between Omar al-Bayoumi, an employee of the Saudi Arabian civil aviation authority, and two 9/11 hijackers has "raised questions about possible connections between Saudi officials and the Sept. 11 attacks, links that Saudi Arabia has strenuously denied." The report further states that Omar al-Bayoumi, who befriended two of the hijackers and helped pay their expenses, "had access to seemingly unlimited funding from Saudi Arabia."
As reported prior in ABUSE YOUR ILLUSIONS, Senator Bob Graham, Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, stated on the December 11, 2002 broadcast of NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, "I think there is very compelling evidence that at least some of the terrorists were assisted not just in financing — although that was part of it — by a sovereign foreign government…"
• The Congressional report echoes Russ Kick's essay
As one senior law enforcement official stated, "What you have here is a narrative composed of all the information that the government now possesses about the Sept. 11 attacks. As the information was gathered over time – like a collection of puzzle pieces – by a number of agencies over a period of time, no one person or agency had the complete picture of Sept. 11 we have now."
If the Congressional committee investigating the 9/11 puzzle had read ABUSE YOUR ILLUSIONS, published months before the release of this report, they would have had a more complete picture due to the efforts of Russ Kick.
Russ Kick, is the editor of Abuse Your Illusions: The Disinformation Guide to Media Mirages and Establishment Lies, Everything You Know Is Wrong: The Disinformation Guide to Secrets and Lies, You Are Being Lied To: The Disinformation Guide to Media Distortion, Historical Whitewashes and Cultural Myths, and Hot Off the Net: Erotica and Other Sex Writings From the Internet. He is the author of Outposts, Psychotropedia, and the upcoming 50 Things You're Not Supposed to Know (The Disinformation Company, November 2003). He's contributed to the Village Voice, Loompanics, the free speech magazine Gauntlet, The Murdering of My Years: Artists and Activists Making Ends Meet, Busted: Stone Cowboys, Narco-Lords, and Washington's War on Drugs. He is also the publisher-editor of The Memory Hole www.thememoryhole.org.
"Pieces of the 9/11 Puzzle" is part of The Disinformation Company's ABUSE YOUR ILLUSIONS: THE DISINFORMATION GUIDE TO MEDIA MIRAGES AND ESTABLISHMENT LIES. Russ Kick, Editor. Published by The Disinformation Company. Oversized softcover (8.5" x 11") * 352pp * US$24.95 * ISBN 0-9713942-4-5
12:38
July 24, 2003
Paranoia in all shapes and sizes Paranoia is a magazine for conspiracy freaks that has been running for 11 years now, and I've followed it from issue 2 onwards. It's a weird mix of rabid, eh, paranoia, religious fervor, superstitions like astrology, UFO obsession, crypto-zoology -- and from time to time -- valid articles with something that looks like real thought and information thrown in, not just schizophrenic fantasies about cloned nazis inhabiting the dark side of the moon.
Speaking of the moon, the latest issue (#32) takes on the "Moongate" controversy. Did the americans really go or did they stage the whole affair? I actually tend to believe they faked it to win a propaganda victory over the russians, which was viewed as very important at the time. A Fox tv show on the subject claims, among many other fatal obstacles, that the radiation would have killed anyone trying to travel that far into space.
Also: That Which Has Fallen: Gods and Water by Boyd Rice (of Dagobert's Revenge which also has a new issue out), Covering the Tracks on the State-Terror Trail by Len Bracken, Jesus the Globetrotter: The Myth of the "Lost Years" by Acharya S, The Department of Homeland Security: More than Meets the Eye by James John Bell and lots more.
The quite similar but more political-minded and Wilhelm Reich-obsessed Steamshovel Press is only published once a year at the most. New issue shipping now (#20). Many of the same writers as in Paranoia. Features: Spy and conspiracy story surrounding the 1980 hostage crisis in Iran, interview with John Judge; Jim Martin on Wilhelm Reich's connection to the MJ12 UFO group; more from the editor about Jim Keith and the Octopus; and much more.
20:29
July 23, 2003
70's icons robbing their pastRight now, two iconic bands rooted in the 70's have new records out. The records trade heavily on their past efforts, and both bands start with the letter "K". Yesss! I'm talking about Kiss and Kraftwerk.
Kiss released "Alive IV" a few days ago, a bloated, egomaniacal "symphonic" double live CD, recorded with the Melbourne Symphonic Orchestra. Kiss' ultra-simple garage-glam-rock doesn't wear the "symphonic" treatment as well as the more epic efforts of, say, Deep Purple or Metallica. Wait for the DVD in the fall, the 60-piece orchestra all wear Kiss make-up...
www.kissasylum.com
Kraftwerk has just put out a remake of their 20 year old "Tour De France" single, with a whole album, "Tour De France Soundtracks" to come Aug. 4th. This is their first album of new songs since "Electric Cafe" in 1986, and the first new tracks since the "Expo 2000" single in 2000.
10:15
July 22, 2003
Headpress' site redone Headpress just completely re-designed their entire website and added a lot of new content and a cool new look. Their imprint Critical Vision has several new, great books out, with many more in the pipeline. My current favourite is Jack Stevenson's "Land of a Thousand Balconies". More tales from the nether regions of filmmaking and film distribution, in his usual style, known from his mag Pandemonium and the books "Fleshpot" and "Addicted".
Also, look out for the next issue of Headpress (#25), which is a special "flicker" edition with interviews with the late William Burroughs and Paul Bowles. Also, an interview with the (p)requiem composer and dreamachine builder David Woodard, written by yours truly. Later this year, they'll launch their new movie mag "Creeping Flesh", which includes an interview I did with the trash film aficionados Bill Landis and Michelle Clifford, the brains behind the magnificent film zines Sleazoid Express (now also a book!) and Metasex.
The website also sports a selection of promotional videoclips, and many articles and excerpts from books. Check it out!
16:08
Jim Goad's site redoneThe notorious Jim Goad recently revamped his entire website. The new version looks and navigates a lot better, and includes several new features, like the blog you see when the site opens , and the discussion forum "The Netjerk Lounge" , open only to Goad himself and 11 chosen disciples. If you roam around long enough you'll find several episodes of the comic strip "Trucker Fags In Denial".
14:53
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