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Kenneth Anger RIP: The Magus of American Cinema dead at 96
05.24.2023
10:39 am
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Sad news to report, Kenneth Anger, the Magus of American cinema has died, aged 96. He’d been living for some time in an assisted living facility in Southern California. 

His art representatives at the Sprüth Magers gallery sent out the following press release:

With deep sadness, Monika Sprüth and Philomene Magers, along with the entire gallery team, mourn the passing of the visionary filmmaker, artist, and author Kenneth Anger (1927–2023).

Through his kaleidoscopic films, which combine sumptuous visuals, popular music soundtracks, and a focus on queer themes and narratives, Anger laid the groundwork for the avant-garde art scenes of the later twentieth century, as well as for the visual languages of contemporary queer and youth culture. His earliest works, such as the 1947 black-and-white ecstatic short, Fireworks, established Anger as an enfant terrible of the filmmaking underground. In his works of the 1950s and 1960s, he pushed the camera apparatus to its limits, incorporating double exposure, found footage, and manipulations of the celluloid itself. Anger’s personal occultism, explored most deeply in his masterpieces Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome (1954), Invocation of my Demon Brother (1969), and Lucifer Rising (1972), was a constant in his practice, with the act of transgression—from sacred to profane, from culture into counterculture, from old to new cinematic forms—becoming his defining mode of creation.

Kenneth was a trailblazer. His cinematic genius and influence will live on and continue to transform all those who encounter his films, words and vision.

Kenneth Anger (1927–2023) was a pioneer of avant-garde film and video art. His iconic short films are characterized by a mystical-symbolic visual language and phantasmagorical-sensual opulence that underscores the medium’s transgressive potential. Anger’s work fundamentally shaped the aesthetics of 1960s and 1970s subcultures, the visual lexicon of pop and music videos and queer iconography. The artist considered his life an artwork in its own right and frequently wove elements of myth, fact and fiction into his biography. His works can be understood as an integrative part of this life-as-artwork.

Anger’s keen perfectionism led him to assume all the usual filmmaking roles himself from the very beginning: In an unusual synthesis he handled all of the camera work, set design, costume design, film development and editing and acts as director, producer and actor in one. Even his earliest productions show the themes and artistic strategies that define his oeuvre. His experimental montage technique eschews spoken dialogue. Though possessed of certain narrative traits, its real power lies in a specific kind of suggestion. Anger’s first work, the 14-minute Fireworks (1947), was so provocative that the young artist was hauled to court on obscenity charges. Subject matter in the short film includes homosexual cruising, sailor fetish, sexual violence and gore. Its black-and-white images appear governed by an archetypal dream logic: phallic fireworks explode, the protagonist’s guts are crudely cut open to reveal a compass in his viscera and a sailor walks through a shot with a Christmas tree on his head. His 38-minute Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome (1954) sees this dream logic tip completely into a surreal Technicolor color frenzy. The result is a sexually charged, orgiastic mixture of myth and ecstasy somewhere between period film set, opera stage, Kabuki theater and nightclub.

Later films including Scorpio Rising (1963), Invocation of My Demon Brother (1969) and Lucifer Rising (1972–80) develop this exuberant visual language further and also involve an expansion of their film-technique repertoire. Cine-sculptural strategies including double exposure or physical manipulation of the celluloid, the striking contrast of superficial pop music and disturbing images, the integration of found documentary footage and the use of subliminally-charged religious and mythological symbols enhance the films’ completely hypnotic effect. Influenced by the theories of the British writer Aleister Crowley, these works are also distinguished by a clear affinity for the occult and the enactment of an explicitly “perverse” imagination. Images of motorcycle gangs, orgies of violence, Egyptian deities, archetypal volcanic and desert landscapes and satanic rituals produce highly atmospheric, psychedelic psychodramas rife with breaches of taboo, sexual neuroses and voyeuristic fantasies.

Anger is also the author of Hollywood Babylon (1959), a book that anticipates the highs and lows of celebrity journalism. Mainstream Hollywood cinema is both the matrix of Anger’s work and its antipode. The visual lexicon of his films refers again and again to its dominant images while simultaneously subverting them in a radical way. At the heart of his practice was the fundamental, mind-expanding power of the film medium, a power absent in the genres of mainstream cinema practices. Anger considered cinematographic projection a psychosocial ritual capable of unleashing physical and emotional energies. The artist saw film as nothing less than a spiritual medium, a conveyer of spectacular alchemy that transforms the viewer.

I last saw Kenneth myself in September of 2022 when I interviewed him for an upcoming TV docu series I’m making on modern occultism. He was in good spirits that day, but obviously very, very frail.

I think it goes without saying that “they don’t make ‘em like that anymore” but Anger was always a one-off. The world became a lot less interesting today. RIP Kenneth Anger.

Posted by Richard Metzger
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05.24.2023
10:39 am
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R.I.P. Cathal Coughlan: Microdisney and Fatima Mansions frontman dead at 61
05.23.2022
12:30 pm
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I just read the sad news that the great Irish vocalist Cathal Coughlan has died. The frontman of both Microdisney and Fatima Mansions was 61 and died in the hospital after what was described only as a long illness. He was one of the very finest vocalists of his generation.

I am a really huge fan of his music. Microdisney’s “Mrs. Simpson” is a desert island disc for me, and his unjustly ignored solo record Black River Falls is one of my top favorite albums of all time. (It’s the album I wish Scott Walker had made instead of Tilt. Yes, it’s really that good and you should go stream it now.)

During the course of the past few years, I’d become friendly with Cathal over email. Not that long ago I sent him a copy of Nico and Phillippe Garrel’s film La Cicatrice Intérieure, which he seemed highly amused by. We were planning to meet up in London in late Summer. Now that will never happen. I’m glad I got to tell him how much I love his music.

The world of music has lost a truly great talent. RIP Cathal Coughlan.
 

“Black River Falls”
 

“Payday”
 

“Witches in the Water”
 

“Are You Happy?”
 

“Mrs. Simpson”
 

“Singer’s Hampstead Home”
 

Microdisney on ‘The Old Grey Whistle Test’ in 1985, doing two of their best songs, “Loftholdingswood” and “Birthday Girl.”

Posted by Richard Metzger
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05.23.2022
12:30 pm
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Banana: After 50 years the ultimate Warhol Velvet Underground mystery is finally (almost) solved!!

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I awoke this morning to the extremely sad news that our friend Howie Pyro had passed. The rocker, cultural historian, DJ, founding member of D-Generation, bass player in Danzig, and frequent Dangerous Minds contributor, had a liver transplant last year, but then sadly caught COVID just when everything seemed like it was on a (TBH very unexpected) upswing in his health. I was just thinking about him yesterday and made a mental note to write and wish him well. Then this.

Although I don’t think anyone would have mistaken Howie for an angel—he wouldn’t have needed a liver transplant if he had been—everyone who knew him loved him, because he was just such a sweet man. Not that many people can be said to have been universally loved in their time, but I think it’s true of Howie. The first word that comes to mind to describe him is sweet. He was really sweet and kind and generous. Extra extra, you know?

Howie was also one of the world’s all time great rock-n-roll collectors. OH MY GOD was his collection amazing. Nothing else like it has ever been put together, anywhere in the world, I can say without hesitation. While Howie might have (quite reasonably!) appeared to be a hoarder—this stuff was EVERYWHERE, the kitchen the bathrooms, EVERYWHERE, and there were little pathways so you could walk through—it was all nearly Smithsonian Institute level items! Getting a personal tour was an astonishing show. The weirdest records (lots of rockabilly), hundreds of shoulder-high stacks of magazines and newspapers, memorabilia of every variety, as many times as I was there, I never saw more than the tiniest tip of a very, very big iceberg, but a few things stood out.

One of them was his collection of Andy Milligan movie posters. He owned ALL OF THEM, from all over the world. I mentioned Milligan casually—as one does—and out came several folders (only the movie posters were organized) that blew my mind. Another was something that he’d recently acquired, a small black lithographed poster on card, brushed with actual diamond dust, advertising a 1971 benefit show at the Hollywood Palladium (which never took place) with, get this—The Stooges, the GTOs, John Mendelssohn-Super Star, and the Cockettes! At one point we were standing in his stuffed to the gills kitchen and there was a two foot high stack of faded green newsletters from the late 1950s/early 1960s—crudely produced on an old fashioned mimeograph machine perched next to the sink. The modest publication turned out to be these one to three page listings of Southern California-based establishments that were gay-friendly at a time when gay bars were still being busted and the patrons hauled away in police vans. He’d found this dumpster diving in Palm Springs. Clearly the anonymous person who published this newsletter—which contained other items that would have been of interest to gay men, like recommending gay-friendly doctors and VD clinics—had been doing so for many, many years, as the height of this stack testified to. I couldn’t believe what I was looking at. How many other things like this existed that have been lost to the sands of time and basement flooding?

But the best thing of all, in a collection with literally hundreds of thousands of amazing and astonishing items, was his banana ashtray, but I’ll tell Howie tell you the story himself, in this Dangerous Minds post from 2017. RIP Howie Pyro, you will be missed.

It was fifty years ago this week that the future began with the Velvet Underground, Andy Warhol, and his banana. The destruction and rebuilding of rock ‘n’ roll music as it then existed commenced. This was all taking place even though only a few people knew about it at the time. The right few, as always. I have to think that anyone reading this knows the history of the Velvet Underground so I’m not going to rehash it here.

In the thirty years since Warhol’s death, the human race has bought and sold more “Andy” than Andy himself could possibly have dreamed of and more. Much more. Too much even. Year after year there are more Warhol books, toys, giant banana pillows, clothing lines, shoes, Andy Warhol glasses, movies, action figures (or maybe inaction figures, this being Warhol), pencils, notebooks, skateboards—literally everything ever! There’s been more most post mortem Warhol merchandising than for practically anyone or anything you can name. These days, probably even more than for Elvis, Marilyn or James Dean who had head starts.

Warhol and his entourage were infamous speedfreaks—speedfreaks with cameras, tape recorders, and movie gear who talked a lot and didn’t sleep much—and his every utterance was recorded, long before museums, historical posterity and millions of dollars were the reasons.

With the advent of the Warhol Museum, Andy’s every movement, thought, and influence has been discussed, dissected, filed and defiled ad nauseum. Every single piece of art he ever did can be traced back to an original page in a newspaper, an ad in the back of a dirty magazine, a photograph, a Sunday comic, or an item from a supermarket shelf and they’ve ALL been identified and cataloged.

Except for one.

Just one.

Probably the second most popular of Warhol’s images, standing in line right behind the Campbell’s soup can, is the banana image found on the cover of the first Velvet Underground album. Thee banana! But where did it come from? Everything else was appropriated from somewhere. What about this one?

I KNOW where it came from and I have known for around thirty years. Oddly enough it only just now occurred to me (when I looked up Warhol’s death date) that I found this thing, which I am about to describe, mere weeks before Andy’s untimely demise.
 
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I grew up in the sixties and I’ve loved the Velvet Underground since even before the advent of punk. And I love Andy Warhol, too. Just look at my Facebook profile photo. I have shelves of books on Warhol and all things Velvets and have amassed quite a collection of Warhol and Velvets rarities. My favorite book of all time is Andy Warhol’s Index from 1966, a children’s pop-up book filled with drag queens, the Velvets, 3-D soup cans and even a Flexi disc record with Lou Reed’s face on it with a recording of the Velvet Underground listening to a test pressing of their first LP. The one with the BANANA.
 
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The author’s Facebook profile pic. Duh.
 
Andy Warhol’s number one right-hand man in the sixties and the person who turned the Factory silver (among many many other things including being the primary photographer of the Factory’s “silver years”) was Billy Name (Linich). An online comment described him this way:

You can’t get more inside than Billy Name in Warhol’s Factory world. In fact he lived in the Factory - and to be more specific he lived in the bathroom at the Factory - and to be even more specific he stayed in the locked bathroom without coming out for months (years?).

 
And so to quote this definitive “insider” Billy Name on the history of the banana:

...bananas had been a Warhol theme earlier in the Mario Montez feature film Harlot mostly as a comedic phallic symbol. In the general hip culture, Donovan’s “Mellow Yellow” was going on [mellow yellow; roast banana peels in an oven, and then roll and smoke them]. The high was called “mello yellow.”

The specific banana image Andy chose came from I know not where; it’s not a Chiquita banana or Dole fruit company, because Andy’s banana has ‘overripe’ markings on it, and the fruit companies use whole yellow bananas on their stickers. Anyway, Andy first used this particular banana image for a series of silk-screen prints which he screened on white, opaque, flexible, Plexiglass (sort of like 2 feet x 5 feet). First an image of the inner banana “meat” was screened on the Plexi in pink, and then covered by the outer skin screened on and cut out of a glossy yellow sticky-back roll of heavy commercial paper (ordered from some supply warehouse). Thereby each banana could be peeled and the meat exposed and the skin could be replaced a number of times, ‘til the sticky stuff wore out. Naturally this was intentionally erotic Warhol-type art.

When thinking of a cover for the first Velvets album, it was easy for Andy to put one of his own works on the cover, knowing it was hip, outrageous, and original and would be “really great.” Andy always went the easy way, using what he had, rather than puzzling and mulling over some design elements and graphics for cover art that don’t really work. His art was already there, hip, erotic, and cool. The Plexi silk screen art definitely came first, in 1966. The album came out in ‘67. I do not recall any other design being thought of or even considered. The back of the album cover was a pastiche amalgam of photos from Andy’s films, Steven Shore, Paul Morrissey and myself and was messy and mulled over too much.

 
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So here we are on the fiftieth anniversary of The Velvet Underground & Nico and its mysterious banana cover art, and I felt that I have held this secret for way too long. I always wanted to use this in a book or something but it never happened.

This thing was hanging on my kitchen wall for three decades, in New York and LA and is now in secured storage for reasons which are about to become obvious. This is how I found it: One day in the mid 80s I was cruising around the Lower East Side aimlessly—as I had done most of my life up to that point—running into friends, looking at stuff people were selling on the street, stopping into Manic Panic, Venus Records, St. Marks Books, and any junk shops that caught my eye. There was one on Broadway that I had never seen before right down the street from Forbidden Planet and the greatest place ever, the mighty Strand Book Store. I went in and there was a lot of great stuff for me. I found some old records, a huge stash of outrageous and disgusting tabloid newspapers from the sixties which I kept buying there for a couple months afterward, and some cool old knick-knacks. I knocked into something on a crowded table full of junk and heard a big CLANG on the cement floor. I bent down to pick it up. It was one of those cheap triangular tin ashtrays that usually advertised car tires or something mundane. I picked it up (it was face down) and when I turned it over I was surprised to see…THE BANANA!!

It was an ad for bananas printed on a cheap metal ashtray.
 

Don’t you like a banana? ENJOY BANANA. Presented by WING CORP. designed by LEO KONO production”

 
I thought wow, this is cool! But over time I realized that I had quite literally stumbled across a true missing link. I figured I’d use it for something big one day, but I never did. UNTIL NOW. Ladies and germs, Andy Warhol and Velvet Underground fans and scholars, without further ado I bring you THE MISSING LINK! A true Dangerous Minds mega exclusive! (As Jeb Bush would say “Please clap.”).

A primitive, pounding Moe Tucker drumroll please for the reveal of THEE BANANA…
 
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Absolutely bananas, right?

I figured by now that there’d be at least some sort of information on this out there, as I honestly I haven’t looked in ages. But when I was reminded of the fiftieth anniversary of the album being released this past “Sunday Morning,” and took that silly Facebook profile picture it dawned on me. THE BANANA ASHTRAY, my own unique piece of Warhol and Velvets history!!! I spent two or three hours really scouring the Internet yesterday and there isn’t one word about it. No “banana ashtray.” No “Wing Corp,” no “Leo Kono production,” either. Nothing!

So now that I, Howie Pyro, have released this top secret banana, I hope all of you mellow yellow types out there in your yellow velvet uniforms go wild seeking out the info we need! So all you femme fatales, skip one of all tomorrow’s parties and run run run to find some heroin for all your European sons while waiting for your banana man, man.

Stay mellow, stay yellow and don’t slip on any banana peels (slowly, see?). Over and out. Warhol Museum, you know how to reach me…

(To read the comments left on the original post, go here.)
 
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Enjoy an early classic Warhol film ‘Harlot’ (aka ‘Mario Banana’) starring that icon of perversion Jack Smith and Mario Montez.

Posted by Richard Metzger
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05.05.2022
07:21 am
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‘Genius is pain!’: National Lampoon’s ‘Magical Misery Tour’ is the best John Lennon parody, ever


 
National Lampoon editor Tony Hendra—probably best-known as Ian Faith, the irritable, incompetent manager of Spinal Tap—died yesterday. He’d been diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease in 2019 and was 79. Hendra was an author, one of the creators of Spitting Image and he even opened for Lenny Bruce at the Cafe Au Go Go.

He also did the fucking funniest John Lennon parody of all time.

Technically “Magical Misery Tour (Bootleg Record)” isn’t a parody so much as it’s a pointedly vicious satire. Hendra used direct quotes from John Lennon’s infamous 1970 Rolling Stone magazine interview with Jann Wenner (later published in book form as Lennon Remembers) for this hysterical bit.

At the time of Lennon’s Rolling Stone sitting he was undergoing Primal Scream therapy with Dr. Arthur Janov and he really let it rip, shitting on his own fans, Mick Jagger, Paul and Linda McCartney and several others. All Hendra and Michael O’Donoghue did was handpick the best parts and arrange them into lyrics. Still as funny today as when it was released on the classic National Lampoon Radio Dinner LP in 1972.

Hendra does an absolutely boffo Lennon impersonation here, razzing the former Beatle’s very public bitching and moaning. The music’s by Christopher Cerf, it was arranged by Christopher Guest and that’s Melissa Manchester making a cameo appearance as Yoko Ono at the very end.

In his 1987 memoir Going Too Far, Hendra tells the tale of an FM radio disc jockey playing “Magical Misery Tour” for a visiting John and Yoko. Allegedly the color drained from Lennon’s face and he just got up and left.
 

 
RIP Tony Hendra (1941-2021).
 

 

Posted by Richard Metzger
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03.05.2021
07:07 pm
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That Time They Opened Lord Byron’s Coffin and Found He had a Humongous Schlong

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At two o’clock on June 15th, 1938, a truck pulled-up outside the church hall at St. Mary Magdalene, Hucknall Torkard, England. The vehicle was packed with planks of wood, picks, shovels, crowbars and other assorted tools. The Reverend Canon Thomas Gerrard Barber watched from a side window as a small group of workmen unloaded the vehicle. The driver leaned against the truck smoking a cigarette. His questions to the men removing the tools went unanswered. Barber had ensured all those involved in his plans were pledged to secrecy. No one had thought it possible, but somehow Barber had managed it. This was the day the reverend would oversee the opening of Lord Byron’s coffin situated in a vault beneath the church. Once the men were finished, the driver stubbed his cigarette, returned to his cab, and drove back to the depot in Nottingham.

Over the next two hours, “the Antiquary, the Surveyor, and the Doctor arrived” followed by “the Mason.” It was all rather like the appearance of suspects in a game of Clue. Their arrival was staggered so as not to attract any unwanted attention. Barber was concerned that if the public knew of his intentions there would be an outcry, or at worst a queue around the church longer than the one for his Sunday service.

Near four o’clock, the “workmen” returned. Interesting to note that Barber in his book on the events of this day, Byron and Where He is Buried, used the lower case to name these men rather the capitalization preferred for The Architect, the Mason, and those other professionals. Even in text the working class must be shown their place. Inside the church Barber discussed with the Architect and the Mason the best way to gain access to Byron’s family crypt.

An old print of the interior of the Church shows two large flagstones covering the entrance to the Vault. One of these stones can be seen at the foot of the Chancel steps. It is six feet long, two feet four inches wide, and six inches thick. It was conjectured that the other large stone was covered by the Chancel steps, and that it would be necessary first of all to remove the steps on the south side of the Chancel in order to obtain an entrance to the Vault. Before the work started it was impossible to obtain any information whatever as to the size of the Vault, and to its actual position relatively to the Chancel floor.

Barber was a strange man, an odd mix of contrary passions.. He was as the Fortean Times noted, “a passionate admirer of Byron and a determined controversialist: a dangerous combination, it transpired, in a man placed in charge of the church where the poet had been buried.” For whatever reason, Barber believed he had some connection with the great poet. He never quite made this connection clear but alluded to it like Madame Arcati waffling on about her “vibrations” claiming he had “a personal appointment with Byron.” He was proud the poet had been buried at his church but was deeply concerned that Byron’s body might not actually reside there.
 
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Between 1887 and 1888, there had been restoration work at St. Mary Magdalene “to allow for the addition of transepts.” This meant digging into the foundation. Though promises were made (by the architects and builders) that there would be no damage or alterations to Lord Byron’s vault, Barber feared that this was exactly what had happened. This thought dripped, dripped, dripped, and made Barber anxious about the whereabouts of the dead poet.

Early in 1938, he confided his fears to the church warden A. E. Houldsworth. Barber expressed his intention to examine the Byron vault and “clear up all doubts as to the Poet’s burial place and compile a record of the contents of the vault.”

He wrote to his local Member of Parliament requesting permission from the Home Office to open the crypt. He also wrote to the surviving Lord Byron, who was then Vicar of Thrumpton, asking for his permission to enter the family vault. The vicar gave his agreement and “expressed his fervent hope that great family treasure would be discovered with his ancestors and returned to him.”
 
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At four o’clock, the doors to the church were locked. Inside, around forty (where the fuck did they come from?) invited guests (er…okay….) waited expectantly for the opening of Byron’s vault (what else where they expecting…vespers?). According to notes written by Houldsworth, among those in attendance was one name that Bart Simpson would surely appreciate:

Rev. Canon Barber & his wife
Mr Seymour Cocks MP [lol]
N. M. Lane, diocesan surveyor
Mr Holland Walker
Capt & Mrs McCraith
Dr Llewellyn
Mr & Mrs G. L. Willis (vicar’s warden)
Mr & Mrs c. G. Campbell banker
Mr Claude Bullock, photographer
Mr Geoffrey Johnstone
Mr Jim Bettridge (church fireman)

Of the rest in attendance, Houldsworth hadn’t a Scooby, other than he was surprised that so many had been invited by the good Reverend. As the workmen opened the vault, the guests discussed curtains, mortgages, flower-arranging, and the possibility of war.

At six-thirty, the masons finally removed the slab. A breath of cool, dank air rose into the warm church. Doctor Llewellyn lowered a miner’s safety lamp into the opening to test the air. It was fine. Barber then became (as he described it) “the first to make the descent” into the vault.

His first impression was “one of disappointment.”

It was totally different from what I had imagined. I had seen in my imagination a large sepulchral chamber with shelves inserted in the walls and arranged above one another, and on each shelf a coffin. To find myself in a Vault of the smallest dimensions, and coffins at my feet stacked one upon another with no apparent attempt at arrangement, giving the impression that they had almost been thrown into position, was at first an outrage to my sense of reverence and decency. I descended the steps with very mixed feelings. I could not bring myself to believe that this was the Vault as it had been originally built, nor yet could I could I allow myself to think that the coffins were in their original positions. Had the size of the Vault been reduced and the coffins moved at the time of the 1887-1888 restoration, to allow for the building of the two foot wall on the north of the Vault as an additional support for the Chancel floor?

Pondering these questions, Barber returned to the church. He then invited his guests to retire to the Church House for some tea and refreshments while he considered what to do next. The three workmen were left behind.
 
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With their appetites sated, the Reverend and his guests returned to the church and the freshly opened vault.

From a distant view the two coffins appeared to be in excellent condition. They were each surmounted by a coronet… The coronet on the centre coffin bore six orbs on long stems, but the other coronet had apparently been robbed of the silver orbs which had originally been fixed on short stems close to the rim.

The coffins were covered with purple velvet, now much faded, and some of the handles removed. A closer examination revealed the centre coffin to be that of Byron’s daughter Augusta Ada, Lady Lovelace.

At the foot of the staircase, resting on a child’s lead coffin was a casket which, according to the inscription on the wooden lid and on the casket inside, contained the heart and brains of Lord Noel Byron. The vault also contained six other lead shells all in a considerable state of dissolution–the bottom coffins in the tiers being crushed almost flat by the immense weight above them.

Then Barber noticed that “there were evident signs that the Vault had been disturbed, and the poet’s coffin opened.” He called upon Mr. Claude Bullock to take photographs of the coffin. With the knowledge that someone had opened Byron’s coffin, Barber began to worry about what lay inside.

Someone had deliberately opened the coffin. A horrible fear came over me that souvenirs might have been taken from within the coffin. The idea was revolting, but I could not dismiss it. Had the body itself been removed? Horrible thought!

Eventually after much dithering, Barber opened the casket to find another coffin inside.

Dare I look within? Yes, the world should know the truth—that the body of the great poet was there—or that the coffin was empty. Reverently, very reverently, I raised the lid, and before my eyes there lay the embalmed body of Byron in as perfect a condition as when it was placed in the coffin one hundred and fourteen years ago. His features and hair easily recognisable from the portraits with which I was so familiar. The serene, almost happy expression on his face made a profound impression on me. The feet and ankles were uncovered., and I was able to establish the fact that his lameness had been that of his right foot. But enough—I gently lowered the lid of the coffin—and as I did so, breathed a prayer for the peace of his soul.

 
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His fears were quashed, Barber was happy with what he had done. Basically dug up a grave for reasons of personal vanity. The Reverend Barber does come across as a bit of a pompous git. He was also disingenuous as the one thing he failed to mention about Byron’s corpse was the very attribute that shocked some and titillated others.

Barber was correct someone had already opened Byron’s coffin. But this did not happen during the church’s restoration in 1887-88 but less than an hour prior to his examination of Byron’s corpse. Houldsworth and his hired workmen had entered the crypt while Barber and his pals had tea.

Houldsworth went down into the crypt where he saw that Byron’s coffin was missing its nameplate, brass ornaments, and velvet covering. Though it looked solid it was soft and spongy to the touch. He called upon two workmen (Johnstone and Bettridge) to help raise the lid. Inside was a lead shell. When this was removed, another wooden coffin was visible inside.

After raising this we were able to see Lord Byron’s body which was in an excellent state of preservation. No decomposition had taken place and the head, torso and limbs were quite solid. The only parts skeletonised were the forearms, hands, lower shins, ankles and feet, though his right foot was not seen in the coffin. The hair on his head, body and limbs was intact, though grey. His sexual organ shewed quite abnormal development. There was a hole in his breast and at the back of his head, where his heart and brains had been removed. These are placed in a large urn near the coffin. The manufacture, ornaments and furnishings of the urn is identical with that of the coffin. The sculptured medallion on the church chancel wall is an excellent representation of Lord Byron as he still appeared in 1938.

There was a rumor long shared that Byron lay in his coffin with a humongous erection. This, of course, is just a myth. As Houldsworth later told journalist Byron Rogers of the Sheffield Star newspaper the idea came to the three workmen to open the poet’s coffin when Barber and co. had disappeared for tea:

“We didn’t take too kindly to that,” said Arnold Houldsworth. “I mean, we’d done the work. And Jim Bettridge suddenly says, ‘Let’s have a look on him.’ ‘You can’t do that,’ I says. ‘Just you watch me,’ says Jim. He put his spade in, there was a layer of wood, then one of lead, and I think another one of wood. And there he was, old Byron.”
“Good God, what did he look like?” I said.
“Just like in the portraits. He was bone from the elbows to his hands and from the knees down, but the rest was perfect. Good-looking man putting on a bit of weight, he’d gone bald. He was quite naked, you know,” and then he stopped, listening for something that must have been a clatter of china in the kitchen, where his wife was making tea for us, for he went on very quickly,  “Look, I’ve been in the Army, I’ve been in bathhouses, I’ve seen men. But I never saw nothing like him.” He stopped again, and nodding his head, meaningfully, as novelists say, began to tap a spot just above his knee. “He was built like a pony.”
“How many of you take sugar?” said Mrs Houldsworth, coming with the tea.

Whether any of the Reverend Barber’s guests saw Lord Byron’s corpse in the flesh (so to speak) and what they made of it, has never been recorded, other than some of the women felt faint when leaving the crypt, but there may have a light of admiration dancing in their eyes. Barber later returned to the vault on his own at midnight to keep his “personal appointment with Byron” and to most likely to ogle at the size of the great poet’s knob.

Lord Byron—poet, adventurer, rebel, adulterer, and a man hung like a horse.
 
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H/T Flashbak and Fortean Times.
 

 

Posted by Paul Gallagher
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02.20.2020
08:25 am
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Ivan Kral told us what it was like to write, record and tour with Iggy Pop (R.I.P., Ivan)
02.05.2020
07:13 pm
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Ivan and Iggy, 1979
Ivan and Iggy, 1979 (courtesy of Ivan Kral).

Sunday evening, I was saddened to learn that Ivan Kral had passed away earlier in the day. In 2015, I first made contact with Ivan, hoping he’d be willing to be interviewed about his time working with Iggy Pop. Thankfully, he was, and the result was the article we are re-posting today as a tribute. In 2016, after David Bowie’s death, Ivan got back in touch, wanting to share his memories of a 1979 evening spent hanging out with Bowie and Iggy, which we were, of course, willing to facilitate. Read that piece here.

Condolences to Ivan’s wife, Cindy.

*****

Ivan Kral sure has led an interesting life. The Prague-born songwriter and musician had his first brush with fame at the age of sixteen when a track by his band Saze broke the top ten in Czechoslovakia. But just as the song was breaking, his family relocated to New York City. In the early ‘70s, Ivan played in glam bands and, for a brief period, was part of Shaun Cassidy’s backing group. In 1974, he played guitar with an embryonic version of Blondie before joining the Patti Smith Group. As part of Smith’s unit, Ivan played guitar, bass and keyboards, appearing on all of her early records (including the seminal Horses), and was involved in writing a number of her songs (he co-wrote “Dancing Barefoot” one of Smith’s pivotal tunes). He’s also a documentarian, having had the foresight to capture Iggy and the Stooges on film, as well as the burgeoning punk scene happening at CBGB’s in the mid-‘70s, which became the documentary, The Blank Generation.
 
The Patti Smith Group, 1975
Ivan, center, with the Patti Smith Group, 1975.

The Patti Smith Group ended in 1979 when Smith began her self-imposed retirement, which left Ivan looking for a gig. He hooked up with Iggy Pop in time to play on the Ig’s 1980 album, Soldier, and subsequently became Iggy’s right-hand man, touring and writing a number of songs with the Godfather of Punk. Eight of those co-writes appeared on Party (1981), and while Ivan came up with some catchy and interesting tunes, Iggy’s lyrics often left much to be desired, and the production generally felt lifeless. If you’re in the mood for it, Party has its fair share of goofy charm, but it’s hard to imagine it appealing to fans, critics, or the general public at that time—and it ultimately didn’t. Party was a disappointment both critically and commercially, with Ivan quitting Iggy’s band before the year was out.
 
Party
 
Ivan is a rock star in his native land (there’s even a mid-‘90s Czech TV documentary about him, with another in the works), and has released ten solo records in the Czech Republic; the most recent is called Always. For some time now he has resided in Ann Arbor, Michigan, which is somewhat ironic, as the college town is also the birthplace of the Stooges.

The following interview was conducted via email. A big THANKS to Ivan for letting us use some photos from his personal archive.

How did you meet Iggy?:

Ivan: There was an unknown blonde guy in a yoga pose—naked in my living room. He gets up, extends a hand and says, “I’m Iggy Pop and I’m producing your next album,” for Luger, my 1973 glam band. I was thinking, “Yeah sure, he’s just another nobody with big plans.” After I saw the Stooges I realized that I was the nobody with big plans.

So, I went to The Stooges show at the Academy of Music in New York City. He owned the crowd. Fans were begging to be humiliated by him. He’d spit and they’d thank him. Never saw anything like it. I was filming with my “movie camera” (no sound) anticipating his next move so I wouldn’t waste film. Every second counted. I’ve posted a few clips on YouTube.

What were the Party sessions like?:

Ivan: Fun! Torture! We were joking a lot, and I can still smell his pot from the Record Plant. At first, Jim [Iggy] didn’t want to be there. So I was in the studio recording the basics thinking, “Oh, this is going to be a great record”. Then he does his vocals and completely changes the lyrics. On one batch of lyrics he kept singing “I hear a sheep bleed.” English isn’t my first language so I asked him what it meant. He got very serious, into teacher mode, sits me down and starts explaining to me that it’s “sheep bleat” not “sheep bleed.” Then he quizzed me on it! I still haven’t heard anyone ever say it. The sessions were mostly a blast, but a few times I got put in my place.
 
Iggy and Ivan on stage
 
“Eggs on Plate” is a really interesting track that is a lot different than the other material on Party. How did that song come to be?:

Ivan: I originally wrote it for Mick Ronson as a completely different kind of song. Just a simple riff, no melody. It wasn’t cool enough so Jim turned it into a launch-pad to get creative. We were singing vocal backgrounds and rolling on the studio floor, hysterical. The producer was mad as hell, yelling “This is enough!”
 

 
Iggy fans seem to have mixed feelings about Party. What do you think of the album, 30-plus years later?:

Ivan: Well, who else can say they wrote Iggy’s worst album? It became his joke album. I didn’t know he had a personal vendetta against the record company and intended on recording a lousy album. I wasted all that time trying to write great songs, but he wanted the opposite. So, I don’t know if that’s a compliment or not. However, “Pumpin’ for Jill” and “Bang Bang” get licensed often, so it can’t be too bad. Most recently “Bang Bang” was on a TV show called State of Affairs.
 
Bang Bang
 
What was it like to get the news that David Bowie had covered “Bang Bang” on his 1987 album, Never Let Me Down?:

Ivan: Unbelievable. I saw Bowie’s Glass Spider gig at the Meadowlands and was blown away when he performed “Bang Bang.” Such a thrill to see choreography and production on some little song I just whipped up out of boredom one night. I needed the income then, so it was a blessing on many levels. Thank you, David.

Years ago, while reading the Iggy biography, The Wild One, I learned you wrote a lot of material with Pop. A couple of outtakes have been released over the years. Is there a chance we will hear more someday?:

Ivan: Oh, I think I remember that book because Jim was mad at me about something in it. Anyway, I have cassettes of some great unreleased stuff we wrote in my apartment between 1979 and 1981. One song is so sentimental. He has a sweet side and it shines through all that blood, guts and cocaine.
 
I'm Not Ivan Kral
Iggy and unidentified in Chicago, 1980 (courtesy of Ivan Kral).
 
One of the unreleased tunes that has seen the light of a day is a punky number called “Puppet World”—such a fun song! It’s a shame it didn’t end up on Party.:

Ivan: Someone just recently told me that she plays “Puppet World” when she wants to get out of a bad mood. You can’t help but love that.
 

 
In 1983, Iggy stepped away from the music business for a couple of years, and the early ‘80s are now seen as a dark period for him. What was it like working with him during that time?:

Ivan: His system was conditioned to handle large amounts of drugs and alcohol. Then he’d sweat it out while performing. It’d just evaporate. That was okay, but then there were times when he got scary and mean. I worried about him and dragged him to the doctor when we returned to New York. I wanted him to clean up, but I think he resented my good intentions.
 
Iggy
 
What are up to currently and what are your future plans?:

Ivan: My new European album has a few tunes that sound like old Stones. Some songs have that Detroit sound and were recorded with Tino Gross at his Funky D studio [in Royal Oak, Michigan]. I’ll be gigging in the fall. Until then, I continue writing with my lyricist for visual media, and even some classical stuff. I like it all.
 
Ivan Kral
 
A live video of Iggy playing one of the unreleased tunes you wrote with him, “Don’t Put the Brakes on Tonight” (which includes the “sheep bleat” lyric), recently appeared on YouTube. Have any memories associated with this song?:

Ivan: The record company “installed” us at the Iroquois Hotel for four weeks and basically said “don’t come out until you have an album of hits.” I think that was one of the first ones.

You can be seen playing guitar in the video of “Brakes,” which was filmed in Oakland on Halloween in 1980. Recall anything special about that night?:

Ivan: If I tell you, I’ll have to kill you.
 

Posted by Bart Bealmear
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02.05.2020
07:13 pm
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The story behind Michael Palin and Terry Jones’ comedy classic ‘Ripping Yarns’

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Poor Terry Jones, what a fucking dreadful way to go. Dementia—which sick fucker came up with that one? Death’s a right evil bastard. My old man had dementia and Alzheimer’s and a whole load of other shit, and I tell you it is not pleasant to watch anyone go through that disabling, destructive, and utterly horrendous disease. If that ever happens to me, well, I’ll be getting the shotgun out, so long as I can remember where I put it…

Terry Jones was an immensely talented, genuinely funny, intelligent, cuddly man, who along with his cohorts in Monty Python changed comedy as the Beatles changed music. With his long-term writing partner, Michael Palin, Jones produced some of the best comedy sketches and series and movies of the past sixty years. My word, that’s a helluva a long time.

One of the highlights that Jones and Palin devised, wrote and made was Ripping Yarns. Now, there were three series that came out of Monty Python that had an equal revolutionary effect on television comedy. Firstly, and only in order of broadcast not in order of success, there was John Cleese with Fawlty Towers (co-written with Connie Booth); then Eric Idle’s god-like series Rutland Weekend Television—from which came the Rutles; and thirdly, Palin and Jones’ Ripping Yarns, which planted its flag on the map first long before The Comic Strip Presents….
 
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After the Pythons went their separate ways, there was an idea idly passed around the controllers at the BBC over lunch and in the club that maybe there should be a Light Entertainment show with that lovely Michael Palin. It seemed a winner. Palin was approached but no one had the right idea what The Michael Palin Show should be. Only Palin was certain it should be different, original, and breaking new ground. Though the BBC seemed to only want to work with Palin, he was determined to work with his writing partner Jones. The two writers came up with a new kind of comedy series called Ripping Yarns, with a different story, a different genre every week, and no repeating characters. It was a bold move. The BBC tested out the writers’ idea with pilot called Tomkinson’s Schooldays.

Loosely based on Palin’s own experiences at school, Tomkinson’s Schooldays was a tremendous hit with both the public and critics alike, and the BBC immediately commissioned a series. Each episode presented a mini-comedy drama in 30-minutes. Tales of derring-do from a bygone age, well, really from the Boy’s Own stories popular when Palin and Jones were lads. The first series contained six episodes. A second series was commissioned, but due to production costs the BBC lost its nerve and cancelled the show after three episodes. A great loss, which also had a detrimental effect on the writing partnership of Palin and Jones who drifted apart after the series.

Over ten years ago, I was fortunate enough to produce a documentary strand for the BBC called Comedy Connections, which examined the stories and connections behind classic British TV comedy shows—just like the title suggests. I had a shortlist of what I wanted to make for the series, but had to drop some favorites like Rutland Weekend Television and The League Gentlemen in favor of programs like Sorry! I know, you’ve never heard of it either. Anyway, thank fuck I didn’t have to do Duty Free or The Brittas Empire. However, I did squeeze in quite a few faves, including Michael Palin and Terry Jones’ brilliant Ripping Yarns. Now, run VT.
 

 
More from ‘Ripping Yarns,’ after the jump…
 

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Posted by Paul Gallagher
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01.29.2020
08:57 am
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Star-crossed Lovers: Intimate photographs of Marc Bolan and Gloria Jones

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Marc Bolan said that from an early age he felt he was different from everyone else (don’t we all, dearie…). He believed, like say Churchill, he was born to do something momentous with his life. Something that would have a lasting importance, where his name would be known a hundred years after his death. He claimed when he was a child he didn’t feel like any of the other kids. But how he knew what these kids felt is a moot point. However different Bolan felt from everybody else, he sincerely believed it was in his fate to succeed.

Strange superstitions and odd beliefs the supernatural have caused some mythologizing around Bolan’s life and young, tragic death. This, in large part, has been inspired by the singer’s own words and writing. We all know the story of how Bolan idolized James Dean. This hero-worship led the Bolan’s first manager, Simon Napier-Bell to jokingly suggest he could imagine Bolan dying in a car crash just like Dean, but in a Rolls-Royce rather than a sports car. To which Bolan replied a Rolls-Royce wasn’t his style, a Mini was more in keeping with his image. Two weeks before his thirtieth birthday, Bolan was killed when the Mini his partner Gloria Jones was driving hit a metal fence. A bolt from this fence smashed thru the windscreen, hit Bolan in the head and killed him. The car then crashed into a tree where it came to a halt. The car’s number plate was FOX 661L, which led some fans to suggest this tragic event had been predicted by Bolan in the lyrics to his song “Solid Gold Easy Action” when he sang about “picking foxes from a tree” and sang about a “Woman from the east with her headlights shining.”

Then there was Bolan’s long-held and frequently mentioned belief that he would die young like some poet-artist. Or, the time during the recording in Germany of the (much under appreciated) album Zinc Alloy and the Hidden Riders of Tomorrow when Bolan claimed he saw the ghosts of a dead Jewish family who had perished during the Holocaust. This deeply troubled the singer and gave him an overwhelming sense of death. Not long after, he quit Germany never to return.

Of course, Bolan often embellished the events of his own life. He once claimed he had a met a wizard in Paris during the 1960s who had shown him how to use the power of occult magic to achieve his ambitions. This meeting became the basis for one of Bolan’s early singles “The Wizard.” Napier-Bell later suggested this “wizard” or “magician” was nothing more than a stage conjuror who showed Bolan how to do a few card tricks. Whichever version was true, it’s fair to say there was always something otherworldly about Bolan.

He was born Mark Feld on September 30th, 1947, in Stoke Newington, east London. His Jewish father was a truck driver and his mother worked at a local street market stall. Bolan was named after his uncle Mark, who had been brutally murdered during the war by an army sergeant called Patrick Francis Lyons. Surprisingly, at a time when murder meant the death penalty in England, Lyons received a ten-year jail sentence for the lesser charge of manslaughter. Bolan was well-aware who he had been named after. In part it inspired him to do something with his life. At the same time, it gave him a sense of great sense foreboding that maybe for all his possible future success he might in some way be cursed—as he later claimed “all rock stars are cursed.”

Bolan was the younger of two brothers. He was by all accounts spoiled by his mother and was given anything he wanted. One day, on a trip with his Mother to the cinema, to see Frank Tashlin’s The Girl Can’t Help It, the young Bolan discovered his future destiny. He was to be a rock ‘n’ roll star

The Girl Can’t Help It starred Jayne Mansfield (who also died in a bizarre, occult-tinged, road accident) and Tom Ewell. The movie featured a whole roster of rock ‘n’ roll stars like Little Richard, Gene Vincent, The Platters, Fats Domino, and Eddie Cochran. It was Cochran who caught Bolan’s attention. The eleven-year-old Bolan quickly formed a band, well a duet, and managed to blag his way into playing at the 2i’s Coffee Bar—“birthplace of British Rock ‘n’ Roll.”

At fifteen, Bolan was expelled from school for “bad behavior.” But he knew academic qualifications weren’t a requirement to graduate as a rock ‘n’ roll star. He was clocked by photographer Don McCullin who photographed Bolan and his Mod mates for Town magazine. This gave Bolan a brief career as a model for fashion catalogs looking tough in sharp suits for the flash Mod-about-town. But he still chased his dream of a successful career in music. He signed up as a folk singer, changed his name, and became half-Bob Dylan, half-bohemian pixie poet. He was spotted by manager Napier-Bell who suggested he join up-and-coming band John’s Children as “their Pete Townshend.” It was a brief but revelatory experience. Throughout his life, Bolan adapted elements to his personality from characters out of movies or comic books to shape his own persona. From the battling Mighty Joe Young to Tolkein’s The Lord of the Rings. From John’s Children Bolan learned how to perform on stage. He then learnt a different approach to stage craft from watching Ravi Shankar perform cross-legged sitting on a rug next to a tabla player. It led him to form Tyrannosaurus Rex. Bolan played his guitar cross-legged on a rug next to a bongo-playing Steve Pergerin Took.

Bolan wrote ethereal songs about nothing much in particular where words were used for their sound rather than their meaning. Tyrannosaurus Rex was championed by DJ John Peel, who considered the band “revolutionary.” It was short-lived infatuation. Peel later denounced Bolan’s naked ambition for fame describing the singer as “a hippie with a knife up his sleeve.” Ain’t no pleasin’ some folks… However, producer Tony Visconti recognized Bolan’s immense talent from the beginning stating in an interview with the Guardian in 2015 that what he saw in Bolan:

...had nothing to do with strings, or very high standards of artistry; what I saw in him was raw talent. I saw genius. I saw a potential rock star in Marc—right from the minute, the hour I met him.

Tyrannosaurus Rex arrived at a time when students were rioting on the streets of Paris and an anti-Vietnam demonstration almost became a pitch-battle between protestors and police outside the American embassy in London. Peregrin Took was more far radical than Bolan. He wanted to take the band in a more political direction…
 
More Marc and Gloria, after the jump…
 

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Posted by Paul Gallagher
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07.03.2019
10:17 am
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Lux Interior: Ten years gone, but his bones keep rockin’! Unheard 1981 interview!

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Yesterday was the tenth anniversary of the passing of Lux Interior, the great frontman of The Cramps, one of the most influential bands of the last 40+ years. Lux lived up to all expectations and truly walked it like he talked it in such a way that he just might be in a group of one. As has been written by myself and a great many others, this band created a style. Not just music, but in every area of life from film subcultures to sexual freedom and just about everything in between, whether they planned to or not. And it’s showing no signs of stopping.

As we learn over and over again, with the Cramps, when we think there’s nothing left to find, something always pops up! Yesterday on the actual anniversary of Lux’s passing, this rare, very early unheard 1981 interview from radio station KALX appeared! This is an early (and interesting) interview as it was done right when guitarist Kid Congo Powers (who is still going strong and making incredible records) joined the band. So let’s transport ourselves 38 years back in time and listen to the beginning of a journey. Who can conceive of a band like this happening now??
 
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And to quote that 50s rockabilly song, “Rockin’ Bones,” made popular in the punk era by The Cramps:
 

I wanna leave a happy memory when I go
I wanna leave something to let the whole world know
That the rock in roll daddy has a done passed on
But my bones will keep a-rockin’ long after I’ve gone
Roll on, rock on, raw bones
Well, there’s still a lot of rhythm in these
Rockin’ bones
Well, when I die don’t you bury me at all
Just nail my bones up on the wall
Beneath these bones let these words be seen
This is the bloody gears of a boppin’ machine
Roll on, rock on, raw bones
Well, there’s still a lot of rhythm in these
Rockin’ bones

 

Posted by Howie Pyro
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02.05.2019
12:29 pm
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Before Bikini Bottom: Watch Stephen Hillenburg’s first ever animated short


 
You don’t have to be a child to appreciate the genius of Stephen Hillenburg. I think that’s why his passing especially hurts. I still watch Spongebob and Rocko’s Modern Life regularly. And I’m pretty sure both are even better as an adult.
 
Before he was an animator, Stephen Hillenburg taught marine biology. As a visual aid to his course curriculum, Hillenburg wrote and designed an informative comic book titled The Intertidal Zone. It was about anthropomorphic tide-pool animals and featured a particular sea sponge - one who would go on to warm the hearts of millions. As the story goes, the educational comic eventually developed into the fifth longest-running animated series in American history - Spongebob Squarepants.
 

 
Hillenburg always had a passion for the arts. When he was in third grade, in 1970 and during the Vietnam War, his teacher commended him for an illustration that he did featuring “a bunch of army men… kissing and hugging instead of fighting.” It was at that moment that Stephen’s creative talent (and potential) was first recognized. After getting the nautical comic book idea turned down by publishers (it still is unpublished), Hillenburg followed his artistic ambitions and enrolled in animation school at CalArts.
 

‘The Green Beret’
 
Stephen Hillenburg created two animated shorts while at CalArts, both in 1992. The first was The Green Beret. It was about a Girl Scout with enormous fists who toppled homes while trying to sell cookies. Rife with political satire (George Washington in the war trenches) and a hint of farce directed at American excess and television culture, the short contained the same tongue-in-cheek humor that made Hillenburg’s later works so satisfying. The Green Beret kind of reminds me of Meet the Fat Heads, the absurd in-universe cartoon program that had several cameos in Rocko’s Modern Life.
 

The only online evidence of ‘Wormholes’
 
Hillenburg’s thesis film was a seven-minute animation titled Wormholes. It was based on the theory of relativity and while the short does not exist anywhere on the web, Hillenburg has been quoted as describing it as “a poetic animated film based on relativistic phenomena.” The film was shown at several international film festivals, including the 1992 Ottawa Film Festival, where Hillenburg met Joe Murray, creator of Rocko’s Modern Life. After seeing Wormholes, Murray offered Stephen the directorial role on his new cartoon for Nickelodeon. And the rest was history.
 
It is without a doubt that Stephen Hillenburg has inspired something special within us all. May he rest in peace.
 
Watch Hillenburg’s first animated short film ‘The Green Beret,’ after the jump…

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Posted by Bennett Kogon
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12.03.2018
07:03 am
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