The Guardian’s recent amalgamation of photos from Osama bin Laden’s life opens with the above absolute visual gem, which the editors caption as follows:

1971: Osama bin Laden (second from right) on a visit to Falun, Sweden. That year 23 members of the wealthy Bin Laden family visited Falun while one of the elder brothers conducted business with Volvo. Osama is remembered from the occasion as a quiet and reserved boy who at 16 didn’t really stand out from the crowd…

Although it’s bounced around the blogosphere for a while, this picture’s still something to behold. Shot four years after the death of construction magnate/patriarch Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden’s accidental death by plane crash, the photo highlights the bright and brilliant fashion sense of a typical rich and cosmopolitan Saudi family on tour in early ‘70s Europe. Osama—the 17th of Mohammed’s 54 kids from 22 wives—peers out in seemingly pure velour and a comparatively subdued yellow-green and Carolina blue combo.

Of course, perhaps the most laden irony on a trip surrounding business with Volvo is the nearly obscured presence of what seems to be a sick pink Caddy.

Thanks to timmmiii…
...and also to metasonix, who spotted what I thought might have been a Caddy as actually a ‘67 Chrysler Imperial…

Previously on Dangerous Minds:
The Aging of Osama bin Laden
The Undersea World of Osama bin Laden

 
This Saturday night in London town, it’s Saturday Night Fulchfest!

Featuring that zany, madcap American in London himself, funny man Rich Fulcher, best known for his multiple roles in The Mighty Boosh and his own nasty piece of work, cult creation Snuff Box (with Matt Berry).

Appearing with Rich will be the very talented Alice Lowe, Pat Cahill, Brett Domino and the marvelous Simon Munnery (AKA “‘The League Against Tedium” from Attention Scum!). He’s also promising a very special exciting GUEST STAR.

Saturday Night Fulchfest, May 7th @ The Bull and Gate, 389 Kentish Town Road
Door: 7:30PM, £14.00, get tickets here

Listen to the “Gone Riffin with Rich and Abed” podcast on iTunes or get the RSS feed here.

Below, Rich Fulcher interviewed in Los Angeles recently on the Dangerous Minds talk show:
 

 
It’s the new new math. Try it out.

What’s That In Danzigs?

 
Black Hollywood: Blaxploitation and Advancing an Independent Black Cinema is an inexplicably obscure documentary that deserves a wide audience. Directed by Howard Johnson (Deep Roots) in 1984, the film offers an in-depth perspective on race and racism in America’s dream factory: Hollywood.

This 1984 documentary traces the history of black filmmakers, actors, and audiences in America. From Oscar Micheaux to Eddie Murphy, Black Hollywood amasses interviews and clips to explore the role of black entertainers and entrepreneurs. Although progress has been undeniable, the exposure ushered in by blaxploitation movies did little to advance a black cinema independent from Hollywood. After all, the majority of blaxploitation films were financed by white producers who reaped great rewards. Featuring Diahnne Abbot, Rosalind Cash, Alfre Woodard, Jim Brown, Vonetta McGee, D’Urville Martin, Lorenzo Tucker, Joel Fluellen, Vincent Tubbs, and Sidney Poitier.

Enjoy Black Hollywood: Blaxploitation and Advancing an Independent Black Cinema courtesy of our friends at See Of Sound.
 

 
Karl Marx, the 19th century social philosopher and historian who is regarded as one of the most influential intellectual figures in human history—Marx was voted the “thinker of the millennium” by people from around the world in a 1999 BBC poll—was born on this day in 1818.

Below, Marx for Beginners (look for a cameo from R. Crumb’s “Mr. Natural”):
 

 
Monty Python’s classic “Communist Quiz” sketch from Live from the Hollywood Bowl featuring Marx, Lenin, Che, and Mao.
 

 
Image by Savanna Snow

 
Live recordings of Can tend to be iffy things. Throughout their existence they steadfastly refused to do anything but entirely improvise each set including wildly divergent takes on pieces from the L.P.s. They tended to be far less disciplined live than their very tightly edited and economic recordings as well and could end up sounding like a trainwreck quite frequently. Not so on this recording, though. They are dazzlingly on point here and traveling stealthily throughout the Kosmos with minimalist drum wizard Jaki Liebezeit at the helm. The spontaneous radical changes in tempo and willingness to luxuriously zero in on the subtlest regions and repetitions reveal a five-man collective organism at its peak powers. Stream the whole thing right here:
 

 
Bonus clip: From another 1973 show in Paris two months earlier:

 
via Doom and Gloom from the Tomb, thanks !

 
Andrew Curtis shot this time lapse video at a Cinco de Mayo celebration at Waterfront Park in Portland, Oregon. I know Portland is a long haul from Mexico but the good energy in this video transcend borders.
 

 
Jaw-dropping portraits of Kurt Vonnegut and Twiggy made entirely from junk mail by artist Sandhi Schimmel Gold. The Kurt Vonnegut piece is still available for $800.00. From the artist:

My work reflects our society’s obsession with beauty through advertising - and the endless images that bombard us daily. It is a purposeful intermix of images derived from advertising and thousands of incongruent pieces - images and text - from advertising that arrives through my mailbox. Assembled like a mosaic; the paper tiles create an entirely new image - an eclectic and tactile portrait reworked in my imagination, utilizing materials that would otherwise go to waste.

Check out more of Sandhi Schimmel Gold’s mosaic portraits over at her website.

 
Previously on Dangerous Minds:
Found objects: Going gaga over Jason Mecier’s ‘junky’ celebrity portraiture

(via My Modern Met)

 
War School is a simple and effective short film written and directed by Ben Newman, in which a military training camp is transposed into a British classroom. The film brings home the brutal reality that affects 300,000 children in over 30 countries worldwide.

War School was part of the Ctrl.Alt.Shift Film Competition and has been a major hit with audiences at film festivals worldwide.
 

 
With thanks to Das Kraftfuttermischwerk
 

 
Psychoville, the brilliant BBC2 comedy series from The League of Gentlemen’s Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith is returning tonight to television sets in the UK and, no doubt, to many bit torrent savvy homes across the world like mine…

I am an absolute League of Gentlemen fanatic (as anyone who knows me can tell you) and Psychoville’s initial seven episode run in 2009 had me in TV heaven. The Halloween special was amazing. I’m really, really looking forward to more Psychoville. (So smart of them to end with a cliffhanger. That’s how to get a second series commissioned!).

Complex and multi-layered as 24 or Lost—and with distinctly Hitchcockian elements in abundance—Pemberton and Shearsmith’s series ties together several disparate characters: Maureen and David Sowerbutts, a mother-son serial killer duo; Mr. Jelly, a bitter one-armed alcoholic party clown for hire; Oscar Lomax, a blind millionaire who collects Beanie Babies; Joy Aston (played by Dawn French), a nurse who believe a doll is her real son and a dwarf actor with telekinesis trying to hide his “midget porn” past.

All six are connected by a mysterious letter they all receive that simply reads: “I know what you did.”