What do rich people do when they have too much money? Get wrecked. So it was for Conrad Rooks, who by the age of fifteen was a full-blown alcoholic. Money may give you many things, but apparently not self-control or a conscience.

Rooks’ pappy owned Avon. Ding-Dong, no need to worry about quitting the booze or getting a job. Instead Rooks started a new hobby - drugs. He jumped from booze to dope, to coke, to LSD, to peyote, to heroin, then decided to get clean. Off to Switzerland, where he was given a new treatment - the sleep cure.

This is what happened to Rooks. His story formed the basis for a 1966 movie Chappaqua, which Rooks produced, directed, wrote, and starred in. It is an interesting mess of a film. It picked up a Silver Medal at the Venice Film Festival, and became a “legendary” underground hit due to its association with drugs and the Beat Generation. This is where its importance lies today: in the appearance of William S. Burroughs as Opium Jones. Along with brief cameos from Allen Ginsberg and Peter Orlovksy, and the beautiful, quite stunning cinematography by Beat film-maker, Robert Frank, who made Pull My Daisy and went on to make Cocksucker Blues for The Rolling Stones. Add to this performances by Ravi Shankar, Ornette Coleman, The Fugs, and a score by Philip Glass. There is enough going on to keep interest, with perhaps the finger occasionally on Fast Forward.
   

 
Colorado residents with a doctor’s prescription for medical cannabis will soon be able to purchase a mass-produced THC-infused soft drink that comes in several flavors. A Colorado-based company called Dixie Elixirs is preparing a line of marijuana-laced sodas for the medical-cannabis market that now numbers 14 states. Not sure exactly how something like this would work across state lines, but I suppose that they’re about to find out. Maybe they’ll have to have plants in each state, which will—HELLO—provide new jobs. Decriminalizing pot is a no brainer.

It’s amusing to note that “discretion” is one of the key advantages to the product (i.e. not smoking something) but maybe they’d want to leave the pot-leaf off the bottle, then! Strikes me as like when people have Grateful Dead bumperstickers. Might as well have one reading “I’ve got pot (and/or LSD) in the car!”

It’s also worth mentioning that a hundred years ago Coca-Cola famously used to have a coca leaf extract which provided its “kick.” This seems tame in comparison.

I’ve tried a similar type of cannabis soda (not a Dixie Elixer, to be clear) but it didn’t do much for me. Okay, I drank three and still felt nothing. Maybe these guys will get it right. The market for something like this could be massive, especially if California’s voters pass Prop 19.

Via Discovery

 
via Creative Review:

In death as in life: Peter Saville and Ben Kelly’s memorial to their friend and collaborator Anthony H Wilson is three years late, but it was worth the wait. Factory Records founder Anthony H Wilson died in August 2007. Just over three years later, a memorial headstone designed by Wilson’s long-term collaborators Peter Saville and Ben Kelly was unveiled in The Southern Cemetery in Chorlton-Cum-Hardy, Manchester. The headstone carries a quote from The Manchester Man, the 1876 novel by Mrs G Linnaeus Banks (aka Isabella Varley Banks), the story of one Jabez Clegg and his life in Victorian Manchester.

And yes, there is a FAC catalogue number involved ! According to a comment on the Creative Review site his casket has the FAC number 501 and his estate has vowed that would be the last thing cataloged.
 
Close-up on the quote after the jump…

 
See more distortions after the jump…

 
This pooch is quite possibly the most talented dog on the planet. He’s like a damn bullet! Just watch this! 

(via TDW)

 
Turn on, tune in, happy birthday! Dr. Timothy Francis Leary, the revolutionary philosopher, “most dangerous man in America” (as per Richard Nixon) and High Priest of LSD was born on this day, October 22, in 1920.

More Timothy Leary on Dangerous Minds

 
Burroughs reads Morrison’s ‘Is Everybody In’ on this track from Doors tribute album ‘Stoned Immaculate’ released in 2000. The surviving Doors provided the music. 

Bill Burroughs, the originator of the mashup.

 
Fitness-Gymnastik 2 - Aerobique mit Erobique und Katharina - Kunst und Sportverein

When I first saw this video I didn’t know what the fuck to think. Was it for real? A joke? Performance art? Well, it turns out the dude playing the keyboards and smoking the cigarette while leading the group in an aerobics workout is German musician Erobique. And based on this video, I think he’s some kind of genius. Check out his Facebook page here.

36 Years old. Played piano from the age of 8 until today. Member of International Pony (with DJ Koze & Cosmic DJ), Tex & Erobique (Just Drums and Piano Improvisation), Songs for Joy (yearly Songproject at the Gorki -Theater in Berlin with Jacques and Chris Dietermann).
Did Music for Theatre for Schorsch Kamerun and Studio Braun, Remixes for Justus Koehncke, Comercial Breakup, the Happy Couple, etc…

A truly inspired piece of weirdness and one of my favorite videos of the year. Watch it all. I think you’ll dig it.
 

 
Via misterhonk.de

This coloring book, which was purported to be from the Black Panthers, had actually been rejected by them when it was brought to them by a man later revealed to have intelligence connections. Not to be troubled by the fact that the Panthers found the coloring book revolting, the FBI added even more offensive illustrations, and mass mailed it across America.’

If Glenn Beck gets his pudgy white hands on this, he’ll go apeshit.

To view the coloring book in its entirety click here.

 
In 1967, I hitchhiked from Washington D.C. to the Haight-Ashbury to get in on some groovy hippie shit.

As a former acidhead who took multiple trips in many different settings, I never encountered anything remotely like ‘Blue Boy’. But,  I’m glad that I didn’t see this episode of Dragnet when it aired in 1967. Talk about a bummer. This probably triggered a few bad trips.

I remember the anti-acid hysteria that dominated the media of the time, from chromosome damage to people jumping out of windows to kids staring at the sun until they went blind. All of which were lies. It seems there’s a renewed interest in LSD and MDMA among psychologists and therapists. I’m looking forward to the day when pharmaceutical grade LSD is made available to those of us who respect it. I haven’t done acid since 1970 and I’m about due. But, it’s gotta be the real deal.

Warning: this video could trigger flashbacks and/or serious injury due to laughter-induced hyperventilation.

Starring Michael Burns as Benjie “Blue Boy” Carver.
 

 
Ad in toy trade journal - circa 1960. Every kid must have one! Play real tunes with your nose.

Didn’t Roland Kirk play one of these?

I wish I’d had a Snoot-Flute in my old coke snorting days. Snorting and Snooting. I would have killed at the Mudd Club.
 
Via History Will Absolve Mike

 
Psychedelic cumshot.

Lab footage of human sperm cells transformed via Adobe After Effects.
 

 
This short interview with Ari Up, conducted by Jonathan Ross for the BBC, captured some of the singer’s vitality, exuberance, and sheer joy, especially when she told Ross “to follow the poom-poom.”   R.I.P. Ari Up
 

 
Ten for Two: The John Sinclair Freedom Rally,  directed by Steve Gebhardt is a filmed document of the John Sinclair benefit concert held in 1971.

John Sinclair managed the MC5 and was the founder of The White Panther Party. His uncompromising radical political stance made him a target of the U.S. government. He was busted in a sting operation for selling two joints to undercover cops. He was sentenced to 10 years in jail. Musicians, politicians, artists and friends organized a rally to bring attention to Sinclair’s unjust sentence. It worked. Three days after the rally, Sinclair was released from prison when the Michigan Supreme Court ruled that the state’s marijuana statutes were unconstitutional.

Ten For Two was produced by John and Yoko, who also perform in it, and features Allen Ginsberg, Phil Ochs, Leni Sinclair, David Peel, Jerry Rubin, Ed Sanders, Bob Seger, Archie Shepp, Bobby Seale, The Steve Miller Band, Commander Cody, Stevie Wonder and more.

The rally was held in Ann Arbor, Michigan. John and Yoko came on at 3 a.m.

Why hasn’t this been released on DVD?  Rumor has it that Yoko owns the rights to the film and won’t release it. In the meantime, this funky video is all I’ve been able to get access to.

Here’s an in-depth article on the concert here.

Part 1 kicks in at the 15 second point.
 

 
Part 2 after the jump…

 
Westboro Baptist Church, eat your heart out.

A scene from the half-hour Comedy Central special “This Show Will Get You High,” created by Matt Besser, one of the founders of the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre.

(via The High Definite)