By forming in 1973, Cabaret Voltaire managed the neat trick of embodying and codifying many of the aesthetic tropes, sounds, and strategies of post-punk before punk existed in the first place, serving as an indisputable influence on both the industrial noise and industrial dance scenes. A 1981 break with founding member Chris Watson saw the band turn away from difficult-but-rewarding noise to embrace New Wave accessibility. Remaining original members Stephen Mallinder and Richard Kirk continued to make excellent records through 1985, but by 1987’s Code the band had been far surpassed by its own imitators, and soon they’d be nakedly trying to retain relevance by glomming on to acid house. Watson went on to work as a recording engineer and make strange music with the wonderful Hafler Trio, a project that long remained as archly experimental and fascinating as CV were in the beginning.

But before Watson left, and while CV were still about utter disregard for pop norms, they recorded a warped and delirious version of Isaac Hayes’ theme song from the film Shaft. Session details aren’t easy to come by, but it was recorded sometime during the Voice of America/Red Mecca era, 1980/81ish. It wasn’t released until 1988s excellent Eight Crepuscule Tracks compilation, which collected early CV work recorded for the Les Disques du Crépuscule label (“Twilight Records,” roughly), a still-extant Belgian imprint once associated with Factory Benelux.
 

 
The song indulges in some cheeky humor not typically associated with the often rather grim early industrial scene. It’s almost entirely built on samples, looping the song’s distinctive guitar intro, horn, and flute themes for just about ever, and piling snatches of film dialogue atop that bed, forecasting by almost a decade the short-lived House fad for novelty tracks built on movie dialogue samples. The result is at once ominous and darkly comical.

The remake was later included on the 1991 album Moving Soundtracks Volume 1, a terrific Crépuscule compilation of film music covers made by its associated artists. It’s hard to come by; the easier-to-find 2008 reissue, disappointingly, does not include “Theme from Shaft.”
 

 
For your enjoyment, Isaac Hayes’ indelible original after the jump…

 
In 1989, GG Allin wrote to the Maximum RocknRoll fanzine and declared that he would commit suicide, live and onstage on Halloween night of that year. But when the date arrived, Allin—conveniently or otherwise—was safe… in prison. He continued to threaten a Halloween suicide every year after that, but he always ended up back in jail each time October 31st came around, before dying offstage of a drug overdose in 1993.

So it was through no fault of his own that the infamous scum rocker failed to off himself in front of a paying audience. And apparently few things pissed him off more than being accused of faking his suicide threat for publicity as can be seen in this extraordinarily strange video footage shot in Boston at what was apparently billed as a “reading.” A clip of this appears in the Hated documentary, but this is the entire thing, just under ten minutes in two parts below.

It begins with Allin ranting and raving about a local paper accusing him of “crying wolf” about his announced “in concert” harakiri. He’s not happy about this and burns the paper in protest. From what can be gathered from his huffing and puffing, GG Allin had not been booked to play a show in a Boston rock club for several years at this point. This also makes him very, very mad at everyone. In Boston. Someone has a laugh box in the audience which likewise infuriates him. He violently hits a woman and pulls her hair. He breaks beer bottles on his head. Throws chairs at people. Cuts his chest open with a beer can and bleeds.

And so forth and so on!

As unlikely as it may sound, for much of his life, GG Allin was actually employed. He held down a job. Not only was he gainfully employed, but if his resume is to be believed, he was employed long term. Remarkably, Allin held one job for three years, and another for five, something that doesn’t really square much with the popular image of the shit-stained performer: GG Allin was at least somewhat employable at one point.

This resumé, which was used to write a setlist on, is being auctioned off with some other GG Allin memorabilia at RR Auction in Boston on Thursday. You can read a larger version at their website.
 

 
After the jump the footage of the explosive Boston “reading” from 1989. He doesn’t read anything…

 
The bigoted elephant in the room: Donald Trump’s popularity reveals racism of Republican base. (Al Jazeera America)

Tweaking one enzyme doubles a worm’s lifespan: It could work the same way in humans. (Popular Science)

“God’s plan”: These GOP candidates claim the Almighty wants them to run: You can’t say God doesn’t have a sense of humor! (Salon)

How Exactly Did Ant-Man Make Michael Douglas Look So Young? How did the film undo 25 years of time’s cruel work? Trent Claus of Lola VFX, the company that de-aged Douglas for Marvel, can tell you. (Vulture)

Ben Carson Says Prison Is So Comfy Some People Never Want to Leave: Yeah, think of it as an enforced indoor vacation with really bad food and psychopaths. What’s not to love? (Mother Jones)

GOP’s problem isn’t Donald Trump; it’s the voters: Trump might be a deeply clownish figure, immune to facts, evidence, and good taste — but he’s not stupid. He clearly understands, as many members of the Republican Party did before bashing immigrants became a political liability, the way to the heart of a rank-and-file Republican voter. (Boston Globe)

Youngest Killers Ever Convicted In America To Be Released From Prison: The brother and sister murderers are scheduled to be released from prison in early August after spending 16 years behind bars, according to reports. (Inquisitr)

Donald Trump Insult Generator: Perhaps no presidential candidate in history has wielded the put-down quite like Donald Trump. John McCain’s a “dummy.” John Kasich is “desperate.” Rick Perry “needs new glasses.” Karl Rove is “a total loser.” Now Trump can insult you or someone you know. (TIME)

New York Acts to Mandate a $15-Hour Wage in Fast Food: The increase would represent a raise of more than 70 percent for fast-food workers earning the state’s current minimum wage of $8.75 an hour. This is a big fucking deal. (New York Times)

Swing State Polls: Bernie Just As Strong As Hillary: Democrat Hillary Clinton is trailing some potential Republican opponents in three key swing states, according to a new poll from Quinnipiac, and doing about as well against the GOP as one of her rivals for the Democratic nomination, Bernie Sanders. Both Clinton and Sanders are losing to Walker, Rubio, and Bush in Colorado, Virginia and Iowa. (The Weekly Standard)

Rupert Murdoch Wants to Stop Donald Trump, But First He’s Got to Rein In Roger Ailes: The mounting problem Donald Trump poses to Republicans is also a mounting problem for the country’s most powerful conservative media mogul. (New York)

Below, Noel Coward performs an astonishing rendition of his “Mad Dogs and Englishmen” on American television in the mid-1950s:
 

 
Multi-talented musician, designer, and hacker Martin Backes from Germany has designed a robot to croon a pop ballad like a superstar from the ‘90s. As Backes writes,
 

“What do machines sing of?” is a fully automated machine, which endlessly sings number-one ballads from the 1990s. As the computer program performs these emotionally loaded songs, it attempts to apply the appropriate human sentiments. This behavior of the device seems to reflect a desire, on the part of the machine, to become sophisticated enough to have its very own personality.

 
In comments, Backes explained that the sounds were generated by digital signal processing, or DSP: “the sound is generated by the real time synthesis language called SuperCollider, same for the Visuals, so you have to write code. There`s almost no Audio FX or something like this, its basically a sine wave, the most artificial sound.” You can find out more about the device on Backes’ website.

The results are strangely impressive; even if the enunciation of the words isn’t always ideal, at least in the case of Whitney Houston’s version of “I Will Always Love You,” the computer does a good job of matching her vocal range and expression.

Unfortunately, the robot’s repertoire consists of only five songs:
 

Whitney Houston, “I Will Always Love You”
R. Kelly, “I Believe I Can Fly”
Toni Braxton, “Un-Break My Heart”
Bryan Adams, “Everything I Do, I Do It For You”
Celine Dion, “My Heart Will Go On”

 
Below, you can watch a demonstration video for “What do machines sing of?”:
 

 
via Das Kraftfuttermischwerk
 

 
Here’s a video of one-man-band street performer located in Buenos Aires, Argentina flawlessly playing his homemade didgeridoo meets plastic pipe drums kit for an unusual rendition of Depeche Mode’s classic “Just Can’t Get Enough.” And then he plays something that sounds like Hot Butter’s “Popcorn” meets Grieg’s “In the Hall of the Mountain King” meets “Swamp Thing” by The Grid???

This dude is deep.
 

 
via WFMU on Twitter

 
In 2004, Ben Folds produced William Shatner’s album Has Been which included a surprisingly great cover version of Pulp‘s hit song “Common People.” Folds enlisted ‘80s icon Joe Jackson to sing on the choruses of that cover. The Has Been album was surprisingly well received by critics, and many agreed that “Common People” was the “hit” on that record.
 

 
Pulp’s Jarvis Cocker even praised the cover version, stating, “I was very flattered by that because I was a massive Star Trek fan as a kid and so you know, Captain Kirk is singing my song! So that was amazing.”

A fan has created a video for Shatner’s “Common People” using clips from Star Trek: The Original Series.

What makes this edit truly incredible is the attention to detail in matching shots with the lyrical content, even nailing specific lines of the song to lines spoken by Kirk in the show. Check twenty-seven seconds in where “I want to live,” or forty-seven seconds in where “I’ll see what I can do” sync perfectly.  The amount of work that went into this is apparent and astounding.

You can’t say Trekkies aren’t a dedicated lot.

This is totally worth four minutes your time:
 

Previously on Dangerous Minds:
‘Common People’: Identity of slumming Greek socialite in Pulp song revealed at last?

“What’s wrong with being sexy?”

In a 1995 interview with Rolling Stone, Mick Jagger admitted that Their Satanic Majesties Request wasn’t a particularly good album. Interviewer Jann Wenner actually compared it to Spinal Tap, and perhaps unable to deny the resemblance to “Listen to the Flower People,” Jagger answered, “Really, I know.”

However the hippie-dippy experimentation of 60s Stones is in no way their most Spinal Tap era—that would be the mid-70s. In 1975 Jagger would ride a giant inflatable phallus onstage. In ‘76, they released Black and Blue with the very Smell the Glove-reminiscent advertisement you see above; the feminist group Women Against Violence Against Women protested until it was removed from the Sunset Boulevard billboard it adorned. The tour that promoted Black and Blue was a singularly debauched affair, complete with elaborate riders and highly specific luxury travel demands.

This 1976 mini-doc is a great record of the period, with footage of the band, crew and adoring fans. Highlights include a crew member trying to explain the inflatable pee-pee stage design; watching Mick and Bianca taking pulls off a champagne bottle celebrating their fifth wedding anniversary; a short Keith Richards makeup tutorial, and a surprisingly candid Charlie Watts reflecting on his ambivalence towards fame. There is a tension to the film. A fan made the Beatles/Stones comparison, despite the Beatles being long gone at this point, and the the interviewer actually questioned the band on a final album.

If he only knew…
 

 
Via Network Awesome

 
Nirvana fans worldwide were devastated, when on April 8th, 1994, Kurt Cobain was found dead. Adding to the distress, it was revealed he took his own life, dying from a self-inflicted shotgun wound. Over 20 years later, a new documentary, Soaked in Bleach, examines the possibility that Cobain’s shocking death wasn’t due to a suicide, but a homicide.

Largely told through information provided by private investigator Tom Grant, writer/producer/director Benjamin Statler takes another look at the case. Grant was hired by Cobain’s wife, Courtney Love, in April 1994, supposedly to find Kurt after he went missing following a stint in rehab. Almost immediately after taking the case, red flags started popping up, and Grant began recording all the conversations he had with Love and others. Statler airs selections from those audio recordings, along with interviews with Grant, various law enforcement experts, and friends of Cobain’s, taking the viewer down a path that is revelatory and often chilling. I was surprised to learn of all the myths we’ve taken as truth in regards to the crime scene, how much the media played a role in disseminating this misinformation, and just how badly the Seattle police department bungled the case. Statler also filmed several recreations, and while such a technique can often appear cheesy and cheap looking, here they are highly effective and stylistically pleasing.
 

Kurt in 1994

So if Kurt Cobain was murdered, who did it and why? In Soaked in Bleach, all roads lead to Courtney Love. Kurt was planning to divorce her and was drafting a new will at that time of his death; the two had signed a prenuptial agreement and Courtney had a lot to lose financially if the couple divorced. She’s portrayed, often through recordings of her own voice, as being highly manipulative and contradictory. In the documentary, she’s all but accused of orchestrating Cobain’s murder, which will surely be a stretch for many, while others will find it impossible to deny the possibility after watching the film. It’s worth noting that Love has yet to file a defamation lawsuit against Statler, nor Grant, who’s been pursuing the case, publicizing his findings—and his interpretations of those findings—for decades. (including his appearance in Nick Broomfield’s Kurt & Courtney documentary of 1998). Her lawyers did send Statler cease and desist letters and recently threatened theatre owners set to screen Soaked in Bleach, but no further action was taken.
 

Kurt and Courtney

Though the documentary is one-sided, and Statler doesn’t offer conclusive proof of foul play, what’s presented does raise many questions. One indication that Kurt’s death may have been a homicide is the unusually large amount of heroin found in his bloodstream. In the below clip from Soaked in Bleach, the query is put forth that if Kurt did inject the quantity of heroin that’s been stated (the toxicology report is still sealed by law), how could have he possibly fired that shotgun?

Soaked in Bleach will be released on DVD on August 14th. Watch the trailer and pre-order the disc via MVD or Amazon.
 

Previously on Dangerous Minds:
Listen to ‘Montage of Heck,’ Kurt Cobain’s mind-blowing music montage—made years before his fame

Half-Life? Never heard of ‘em.

A friend recently shared some vintage garage-rock goodness with me from the Saginaw, Michigan band, Half-Life and man, it knocked me for a loop. On June 27, 1969 Half-Life recorded the track “Get Down” at GM Studios in East Detroit (the same studio that the MC5 recorded Back in the USA).

The minute I hit the play button, I was immediately floored by the opening riff in “Get Down” and its remarkable resemblance to Tony Iommi’s fuzzed-out riff on “Paranoid.” Even the opening percussion is eerily similar to the Sabbath classic. Recorded in only one take, when the band started shopping “Get Down” around to local Detroit radio stations they were told it had no commercial viability. Half-Life would later drop the song from its
 

Half-Life, a garage band from Saginaw, Michigan. Circa 1969

So this could mean one of two things. Either Half-Life are actually time bandits of the most awesome kind or Black Sabbath somehow caught wind of “Get Down” from 3,652 miles away (the approximate distance between Detroit, Michigan and Birmingham UK), allowing Iommi to claim the sweet lick for his own. Not only do both scenarios bear the markings of a lunatic conspiracy theorist, the first one has no real basis in reality. No matter much I wish that it did. Another interesting fact to add to this weird mix is that “Paranoid” almost didn’t make it onto the record and the track came came to be in a somewhat similar way that “Get Down” did—according to Sabbath bassist, Geezer Butler:

The whole story of how we created that song is funny. It became the most popular song from the album, but it wasn’t something we thought much of when we wrote it. In fact, we finished the record and then the producer told us we needed one more song to finish up the album, so we just came up with “Paranoid” on the spot. Tony [Iommi] just played this riff and we all went along with it. We didn’t think anything of it.

In all seriousness, the riffy similarities between “Get Down” and “Paranoid” are rather uncanny, but I’ll leave you to judge that with your own ears. Just press play below. Now do I believe that Tony Iommi, one of the most influential guitarists of all time lifted the epic riff for “Paranoid” from a little known garage-band from Saginaw? Of course not, and neither do you. However, if you dig “Get Down” (and I strongly suspect you will), I recommend that you pick up the compilation A-Square (Of Course): The Story of Michigan’s Legendary A-Square Records which features “Get Down” and other rare recordings from the Ann Arbor-based label from bands like the legendary MC5 and The SRC (The Scot Richard Case).
 

“Get Down” by Half-Life (1969)
 

Previously on Dangerous Minds:
‘New’ footage of Black Sabbath on German TV, 1970

 
Donald Trump and ‘the little cracker’ and ‘the little wine’: Trump on religion: Trump tells Iowa religious conservatives at the Family Leadership Summit that he’s never asked for God’s forgiveness. What do they think he is? A loser? (Rachel Maddow)

Really, it’s time to shut down the GOP: A deeply unserious party, hijacked by lunatics and Fox News, is driving us all into a ditch: “News” without truth. A base that celebrates a clown. Tear the party down and start over—for the country’s sake. (Salon)

How selective outrage over Trump is dooming the GOP: The problems of the Republican Party are in high relief. It is saddled with a loud mouth who will say anything and is getting substantial support for doing so, no matter how callous. And its selective outrage — quick response on McCain and crickets on anything else — only enhances its image as a party that couldn’t care less about anyone who isn’t white, Southern, straight or male. If the GOP’s goal is to never win the White House again, it’s off to a great start. (Washington Post)

When Capitalism Turns to Cannibalism: With authentic growth scarce, there’s no other way to reap huge profits but cannibalism. (Of Two Minds)

Governor Bobby Jindal Ransacked Louisiana: He’s one of America’s worst governors. Since taking office in 2008, Jindal has steadily driven the state into a deeper financial hole while handing off an astonishing amount of taxpayer money to already profitable corporations. In his two terms, Gov. Jindal has given $11 billion of public money in the form of taxpayer subsidies to multinational corporations – more than any other state – costing the average resident there $2,500. (Occupy)

National Review says Bernie Sanders is a national socialist: National Review writer Kevin Williamson has a hot take on Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders — he’s a Nazi. Here’s a hot take on National Review writer Kevin Williamson — he’s a fucking idiot. (Vox)

Grooveshark creator found dead weeks after music streaming site shut down: Joshua Greenberg, 28, co-founded music streaming website in 2006, gaining 35m users before closing in April after copyright row with major labels. (Telegraph)

Indian Woman Beheaded For ‘Witchcraft’: Mother-of-five Moni Orang was snatched from her home by machete-carrying locals after priests accused her of casting spells. (Sky News)

Clinton to propose increasing capital gains taxes: Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Rodham Clinton plans later this week to propose raising capital gains taxes for some investors, pivoting from a 2008 pledge not to increase the rate beyond 20%. (Yahoo!)

Democrats Plan To Introduce Sweeping LGBT Rights Bill In Congress This Week: The measure, which lawmakers plan to file in the House and Senate, would ban discrimination in seven categories — including housing, education, and public accommodations. (Buzzfeed Politics)

Study: Probability of Obese People Reaching ‘Normal’ Weight Less Than 1%: Despite the fact that the diet industry does several billion dollars worth of business in the U.S. alone each year, a new study published in the American Journal of Public Health suggests that most obese people will never achieve a “normal” weight. The annual probability of reaching a normal weight was less than 1 percent for both groups — just 1 in 210 for obese men and 1 in 124 for obese women. (CBS Local Washington)

Cost of insurance forcing many in Detroit to ‘drive dirty’: Like most Americans, the drivers of Detroit are required to carry auto insurance whenever they get behind the wheel, but many law-abiding residents can’t afford the Motor City’s highest-in-the-nation auto premiums, which top $5,000 a year in some neighborhoods.So fully half of Detroit drivers do what’s known locally as “driving dirty” — taking to the streets without any coverage. It’s practically a tradition these days. (MyWay)

This $153,000 rattlesnake bite is everything wrong with American health care:  In May of this year, a snakebit Missouri man died after refusing to seek medical care, saying he couldn’t afford the bill.(Washington Post)

“Barely Legal” voters on the 2016 candidates: