Of all the great drug movies and novels, none have quite had the romance of Drugstore Cowboy. Gus Van Sant’s 1989 proto-grunge independent film endeared audiences to junkie protagonists who gang up to rob drugstores to support their habit. It was such an engaging story that Van Sant made the movie before author James Fogle even published the book- a literary gem lauded by William S. Burroughs, who appears in the film.
James Fogle wrote 11 novels, all in prison, but Drugstore Cowboy was the only one ever published. Despite the commercial success of the book, Fogle was in and out facilities for theft and drug use most of his life; he actually stole his first car when he was 12. His chances at a successful life in mainstream society always seemed frivolously tossed away in lieu of drugs or (often elaborate) thefts in order to obtain those drugs. In one of the great beautiful ironies of many a beloved junkie artist, he did not die of an overdose, instead passing in prison of a lung cancer related to asbestos. The cancer is believed to have developed as a result of his work pipe-fitting, a trade he was taught in prison so that he might have a skill upon his reform.
If Todd Akin’s asinine comment about rape moved people as high up on the GOP totem poll as Karl Rove and Mitt Romney to call on him to step down from the Republican ticket in the Missouri Senate race, then why aren’t the GOP bigwigs (and the media and frankly every single woman in the entire US of A) calling for Paul Ryan’s head over his EQUALLY offensive, head-shaking, gob-smackingly stupid comment that RAPE is but a “method of conception”???
There could be no greater testament to the utter abdication of responsibility by what passes for a “news” media in America in 2012 than that, despite the grotesquerie of this cavalierly callous comment, chances are better than good that this is the first you’re hearing of it.
Here, watch it—and try to figure out why this has gotten NO MAINSTREAM MEDIA play (not even here at the Huffington Post) despite it being, to my mind, a far more offensive remark than Todd Akin’s imbecilic blurt of last weekend. What, are we tired of stupid remarks about rape now, so Ryan gets a free pass?
Given the demands for Akin’s resignation from a mere Senate race when his musings on “legitimate rape” were publicized, what do you imagine the reaction would be if people were as familiar with VP wannabe Ryan’s stunning statement? Might there be a cacophony of outrage? Might there be calls for his resignation from the ticket? Might there be a focus on how fundamentally oblivious these people who would make our laws are to not just women’s but humans’ rights and dignity? Sure, there might, but then of course people would have to have heard about it.
According to the man who would be the proverbial heartbeat away from the White House, and who in any event would—given Romney’s utter hollowness—have an inordinate influence on the judicial appointments that will determine how much freedom our children get to live under, RAPE = “METHOD OF CONCEPTION.” And yet, unless you’re a frequenter of one of a dozen or so lefty blogs—or my friend on Facebook—you probably knew nothing about it.
I truly despair for the country my 14-year-old daughter is inheriting. That a remark this intensely revealing of the danger posed by this ticket can go basically unreported is as nauseating to me as the quote itself.
“Laurent Seroussi’s multifaceted imagery brings together his background in both graphic design and moving imagery. His immediate work stretches the imagination with playful visual tricks and postproduction wizardry.”
According to YouTube poster, bookheaven1thousand, the Captain and his band came onstage at 3:00 a.m. on the morning of December 10, 1980.
1. Hair Pie Bake 3
2. Best Batch Yet
3. Dirty Blue Gene (cut)
4. Sugar ‘n Spikes
5. Ashtray Heart
6. Doctor Dark
7. Sheriff Of Hong Kong (cut)
8. Making Love To A Vampire With A Monkey On My Knee
9. Suction Prints (cuts 20 seconds before end)
10. Big Eyed Beans From Venus
This set killed me. It’s one of the best and funkiest live performances I’ve ever heard from this band.
Some additional background from the YouTube post:
Peter Warner: Anyone ever come across a video of Captain Beefheart’s Mudd Club performance (the day [He means 2 days] after John Lennon’s death)? I was one of the handful of fans there and know it exists (Gary Lucas told me he confiscated the master: it was standard practice by the club for all performance to be taped). It was a wild night. Some girl in a big red sweater (good looking and drunk as all hell) was hangin’ all over me. She kept throwing change at the Captain telling him to shut up. I told the Cap I didn’t know who this chick was. (in hindsight, I shoulda gone for the chick.)
The Cap and I got into a stareing match—he singing away inches from my face as I growled back. What the hell, I was an obnoxious, drunk 17 year old. I actually made it to class the next morning.
Raymond Ricker: The band played there at 4 in the morning just a few hours after their Irving Plaza show concluded. I was about 1 of 30 people in attendance for that show (Don spent a good portion of the show putting up with an obnoxious girl who was drunk out her mind). If it wasn’t for Moris inviting me I would never have known there was going to be a performance there. As far as I know, this was the only time that band performed Making Love To A Vampire With A Monkey On My Back [He means “Knee”]
A longtime anti-gay activist, California Prop 8 donor, and elementary school teacher was taken into custody on August 17th after admitting inappropriate contact with young boys.Caleb Douglas Hesse, a teacher for the Morongo Unified School District since 1987 (most recently, he was teaching first grade at Friendly Hills Elementary School in Joshua Tree) and a longtime youth volunteer with the virulently homophobic Evangelical Free Church of Yucca Valley, has confessed to sexually abusing “numerous underage boys,” with authorities believe the crimes occurred between the early 1980’s and as recently as a week ago.”
Investigators say Hesse met the majority of the victims during overnight outings with a youth group at the Evangelical Free Church.
During his arraignment on August 21st Hess recanted his confession and changed his plea to “not guilty.”
HOW could you recant a confession like that? “Ha ha! I was just messin’ with your heads!”??? How would that even work?
Einstürzende Neubauten’s ‘Jewels’ visualized in 3D.
Flavor Wire hipped me to the research and experimentation studio Realität. Their latest project is called Mircosonic Landscapes which is “An algorithmic exploration of the music we love. Each album_s soundwave proposes a new spatial and unique journey by transforming sound into matter/space: the hidden into something visible.”
“Each piece was created with the open-source, three-dimensional data visualization programming language known as Processing, and then printed via a programmable machine that can print in plastic called MakerBot.”
Portishead’s ‘Third’ visualized in 3D.
Nick Drake’s ‘Pink Moon’ visualized in 3D.
Visit Flavor Wire to see 3D-printed visualizations of Antony and the Johnsons and the composition “Für Alina” by Arvo Pärt. I wonder how an album of music that is much more rhythmic and syncopated than any of these examples, say something where Tony Allen was drumming? A Phillip Glass piece? Bitches Brew? Sea santies? “Rapper’s Delight”?
Three wonderfully cutting satires of GOP morality appeared in the pages of Tikkun, America magazine and plenty of other places.
This “parable” of The Rich and Therefore Blessed Young Man was my favorite:
1. As Jesus was setting out on a journey, a man ran up to him and knelt before him, and asked, “Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” 2. And Jesus said to him, “What have you done so far?” 3. And he said to Him, “Well I was born into a wealthy family, got into a good school in Galilee because my parents donated a few thousand talents for a building with a nice reed roof, and now I have a high-paying job in the Roman treasury managing risk.”
4. Looking at him, Jesus felt an admiration for him, and said to him, “Blessed are you! For you are not far from being independently wealthy.” And the man was happy. Then Jesus said, “But there is one thing you lack: A bigger house in a gated community in Tiberias. Buy that and you will have a treasure indeed. And make sure you get a stone countertop for the kitchen. Those are really nice.”
The disciples were amazed. 5. Peter asked him, “Lord, shouldn’t he sell all his possessions and give it to the poor?” Jesus grew angry. “Get behind me, Satan! He has earned it!” Peter protested: “Lord,” he said, “Did this man not have an unjust advantage? What about those who are not born into wealthy families, or who do not have the benefit of a good education, or who, despite all their toil, live in the poorer areas of Galilee, like Nazareth, your own home town?”
6. “Well,” said Jesus, “first of all, that’s why I left Nazareth. There were too many poor people always asking me for charity. They were as numerous as the stars in the sky, and they annoyed me. Second, once people start spending again, like this rich young man, the Galilean economy will inevitably rebound, and eventually some of it will trickle down to the poor. Blessed are the patient! But giving the money away, especially if he can’t write it off, is a big fat waste.”
The disciples’ amazement knew no bounds. “But Lord,” they said, “what about the passages in both the Law and the Prophets that tell us to care for widows and orphans, for the poor, for the sick, for the refugee? What about the many passages in the Scriptures about justice?” 7. “Those are just metaphors,” said Jesus. “Don’t take everything so literally.”
A pair of soiled and stained underwear worn by The King of Rock and Roll himself, Elvis Presley, will be going up for auction next month at Omega Auctions. Elvis wore this particular pair of undies beneath one of his flashy white jumpsuits back in 1977.
It’s expected that The King’s fecal-stained briefs could fetch up to £10,000.
Omega Auctions will be live streaming the auction on its website September 8.
Brian Sewell, considered by the Guardian to be “Britain’s most famous and controversial art critic” gives his appraisal of the nude photograph of Prince Harry, as published on the front cover of the Sun.
When Matt Groening hired Danny Elfman to write the theme for The Simpsons, he gave him a mixed tape of songs that he wanted the music to sound like: The theme from The Jetsons, some of Esquivel’s “space age bachelor-pad music,” a teach-your-parrot-to-talk record, selections from Nino Rota’s Juliet of the Spirits soundtrack and this unused Frank Zappa-produced radio commercial for Remington electric shavers that features the vocal stylings of none other than a young Linda Ronstadt.
The future queen of country rock is nearly unrecognizable here, speeded-up, multi-tracked and sounding like she’s just taken a hit off a helium balloon. At the end, Zappa tells listeners that the Remington electric razor “cleans you, thrills you… may even keep you from getting busted.”
According to legend, after giving the tape several listens Elfman told Groening, “I know exactly what you’re looking for!”
