Uncle Wilco from Shedblog sez, "Punks Not Dad have launched their video for the Shed Week Song - 'In me Shed' and if you like punk and sheds, then it's the video of the year for you."
Offical song for Shed Week Video & Live Show for Shed Week (Thanks, Uncle Wilco!)
Soviet Punks (Thanks, Murilee!)
(Download / Watch on YouTube) Today's Boing Boing Video episode is a special pre-Maker Faire warmup extravaganza: the oil-punk creations and sexy burlesque gyrations of the Boiler Bar. Creator and host Jon Sarriugarte (who I first met through SRL) explains:
Oilpunk: is Punk, Hot Rod, Geek, Blue Collar, and Maker Culture mixed together with the Petroleum Golden Age of the last century. It's the intersection of petroleum products, art, and science. It harkens back to a time when hard work, combustion engines and industry shaped us, yet it speaks to the future. It's taking the castoffs of modern industrial culture and objects from the last decade to reuse today. Dirty, greasy, sweaty, it's a work hard, play hard style.The Boiler Bar is what blue collar out of work down on their luck Bay Area artist decided to do with their spare time and last dollar. Come by and share our delight of the sparkle in the dust of this golden age of petroleum. Drink our hooch and watch the girls sing and dance their way to you heart, then be dazzled by the labor of men spent in seconds in glorious aerial and earthly displays of plenty. And as always ravers and DJ's are welcome to talk.
They'll be at Maker Faire this weekend, and Dorkbot very soon. Here's the Golden mean fan club on facebook for our email list for upcoming shows.
Also in this episode: The snail car! a real-live blacksmith! Who also happens to be a chick! And the Neverwas Runabout, cousin to the giant Neverwas Haul! All of this and more awaits this weekend at Maker Faire Bay Area 2009. Image below courtesy dharmabum90: the Neverwas Haul, being towed by a 90-year-old steam-powered tractor.
Where to Find Boing Boing Video: RSS feed for new episodes here, YouTube channel here, subscribe on iTunes here. Get Twitter updates every time there's a new ep by following @boingboingvideo, and here are blog post archives for Boing Boing Video.
(Thanks to Boing Boing's video hosting partner Episodic, and to Shannon O'Hare of the Neverwas and Jon Sarriugarte of Boiler Bar. And big thanks to BBV guest host Aaron Muszalski and our field producer and shooter Eddie Codel.)
In today's episode of Boing Boing Video, we experience the funky flaming glory that is DANCE DANCE IMMOLATION, a pyro-parody of the popular arcade game in which one jumps around on touch-sensitive pads underfoot in rhythm with music. With DDI, you do this inside a flame-retardant suit. Miss a step, you get torched with a giant flamethrower.
Dance Dance Immolation combines video games, music, and propane. You play DDR. A good performance wins you acclaim from flamethrowers. A missed step gets you a face full of fire! Yes, the fire is real. Put on a fireproof suit and give it a try!The contraption was created by the clan of happy mutant makers known as Interpretive Arson. We shot this at "How to Destroy the Universe," a yearly Industrial culture event which this year honored Throbbing Gristle's reunion tour. Laughing Squid has a related blog post here.
We hear they're next performing at the "Smukfest" art confab in Denmark.
(Update): Nicole Aptekar of Interpretive Arson pops in with more on the upcoming .dk gig:DDI next heads across the pond to burninate the Scandinavians, where we have been gleefully booked for the Smukfest music festival in Skanderborg, Denmark, August 5-9. It's a beautiful setting for our first European run, within a lush green forest. However, trees are flammable so DDI will run on a custom-constructed raft floating in the middle of a lake. We've had to skip our normal West Coast circuit to do it, but it might just be worth it if we get to shoot Kylie Minogue with fire.
CREW NOTE: About this episode's host, Aaron Muszalski (aka SFSlim): He's a Burning Man builder, visual effects artist and educator, and a wandering polyglamorous anarcho-Dada Buddhist biker punk. He's on Twitter. In this episode, you'll also see our delightful recurring guest host Charis Tobias, who is all of 18 years old if memory serves. And thanks to our SF-based shooter-producer Eddie Codel who did a fine job capturing the madness on this piece, yet again.
(Photo below by Kristen Ankiewicz, courtesty Interpretive Arson)
Sponsor shout-out: This Boing Boing Video episode is brought to you in part by WEPC.com, in partnership with Intel and Asus. WePC.com is a site where users come together to "share ideas, images and inspiration about the ideal PC." Participants' designs, feature ideas and community feedback will be evaluated by ASUS and "will influence the blueprint for an actual notebook PC built by ASUS with Intel inside."
So, what is it like to see industrial music legends Throbbing Gristle perform live?
"Next closest thing to an internal organ massage standing next to [SRL's] V1 pulsejet engine," said BB pal Karen Marcelo, after one of the dates on the band's 2009 reunion tour. "It was like my diaphragm resonated until my lungs became a subwoofer while words once from a man's mouth sprung from the same woman's mouth," twittered TG trufan T.Bias.
Before we shot the Boing Boing Video interview which is today's episode, above, Richard Metzger and I spoke to Throbbing Gristle's sound technician backstage, and asked what we should expect in the way of sub-bass frequencies -- rumored to be so powerful during performances that cameras can't hold a steady shot, and bowels sometimes can't hold their contents. Charlie Poulet, TG's sound tech, cracked up and flashed an evil grin.
"Oh, we got some frequencies," he laughed, "Yeah, we definitely got some frequencies ready for you people tonight."
Those "frequencies" are part of what make TG's music so transcendental and disturbing, and in the BB interview with Chris Carter, Cosey Fanni Tutti, Peter "Sleazy" Christopherson, and Genesis Breyer P-Orridge, we explore their technical and creative underpinnings.
We learn about the hacked-together synth and sound modification machines built back in the early 1970s, like "Thee Gristleizer," shown below.
We hear TG members talk about the sort of mind-meld trance they all fall in to while performing, and we learn about the early days of recording work like "Hamburger Lady" to cassette tapes, then walking down to have a hamburger together at a corner sandwich shop down the street from their old studio in what was then a really shitty part of London.
Gen talks about her first time with Twitter, and we hear what it's like for the band once called "wreckers of civilization" to be celebrated, more than 30 years later, as living legends.
Information on TG's remaining 2009 tour dates here. Industrial Records just released a special limited edition framed vinyl LP to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the release of Throbbing Gristle's debut album, "The Second Annual Report" -- more info here. More recordings (digital and otherwise), t-shirts, and other merch are here.
RSS feed for new episodes here, YouTube channel here, subscribe on iTunes here. Get Twitter updates every time there's a new ep by following @boingboingvideo, and here are blog post archives for Boing Boing Video. (Special thanks to Boing Boing's video hosting partner Episodic, and to Target Video, who shot some of the archival clips shown in this episode).
Previously on Boing Boing: Throbbing Gristle: What A Day. (Boing Boing Video shoot notes)
(Snapshots from the BBV Throbbing Gristle shoot by Chris Cooper).
Boing Boing Video and Richard Metzger shot an interview with art-damage/industrial music godfathers Throbbing Gristle in Los Angeles. They're on a limited tour of the USA, with a show tonight in San Francisco, and dates scheduled in Chicago and Brooklyn (info on dates, venues, and tickets here).
The resulting BB Video is yet to come, but I wanted to share some notes, photos, and ephemera from the experience.
Metzger is a super-mega-otaku fan of TG, and covered their legacy extensively through Disinfo publications and video releases. My knowledge is nowhere near as comprehensive as his (he's even stumped TG members with knowledge of early songs they've forgotten!). But I have been fascinated with them since I was a teenager, when a friend in a punk squat loaned me a beer-stained copy of V. Vale's 1983 RE/Search book about industrial culture.
When I phoned TG's manager Paul Smith on Monday to ask for permission to shoot for Boing Boing Video, I explained that I believed TG were the cultural ancestors for much of the "mutant" culture we explore here on Boing Boing. Sappy but sincere. Without their early experiments in nihilistic machine song we would not have "industrial music." The projects that split off when TG first disbanded -- Chris And Cosey, Coil, Psychic TV -- only expanded their cultural footprint. Countless acts owe them a huge genetic debt -- everyone from Einsturzende Neubauten to Skinny Puppy to NIN to Aphex Twin to Radiohead to every other act you're likely to type in the comments.
COUM Transmissions, the experimental performance art collective which preceded Throbbing Gristle, was responsible for legendary shock-events so extreme, they'd make Tubgirl, Goatse, and the Two Girls with One Cup blush.
The TG show we witnessed (and shot for BBV) this week reflects less of that shock, anger, and taboo-bombing, and was almost entirely instrumental. More moody, doom-y, Faustian. But the physically overwhelming sounds "took the meat off the bones," as Metzger put it. And it was fucking amazing.
Tuesday night's performance was a reprise of a live, improvised soundtrack TG composed for the 1980 Derek Jarman film In the Shadow of the Sun (you can watch a snip of the original version here).
"These people are the wreckers of civilisation", said conservative Member of Parliment Nicholas Fairbairn back in 1976. He was talking about Throbbing Gristle. During the BBV interview, we talked about what it's like to go from being "wreckers" of culture to being celebrated as cultural heroes. We talked about Twitter and Flickr. Gen asked what the difference is between blogs and websites, and announced s/he'd recently acquired her first Blackberry.
Ruth has some snapshots of the shoot and the soundcheck here. TG member Chris Carter is on Twitter here, and his photos are on Flickr here -- don't miss this incredible photoset of historic "lost and found" TG photos. TG member Cosey Fanni Tutti is on Twitter here. Genesis Breyer P-Orridge is here. And Peter "Sleazy" Christopherson is here.
Some archival interviews I've been reading and re-reading, as we edit the interview: This one with Cosey, about her art and her explorations of the sex trade (for her, one and the same). And this amazing interview purportedly from 1978, by an Australian reporter for NME, which was apparently never published in NME. This article in Artlurker by Federico Nessi. And this review of a box set in Artforum.
Thee Boing Boing Video episode(s) are "coum-ing" soon.
(Special thanks to Richard Metzger, to Boing Boing Video's production crew, and friends who helped along the way: Ehrich Blackhound, Ruth Waytz, Chris Cooper, Jason Louv, Suzan Jones, and Greg Chong, to name a few. Very special thanks to Paul Smith, and to the members of Throbbing Gristle).
Richard Metzger is the current Boing Boing guest blogger
While the Sex Pistols were regurgitating old Who and Chuck Berry riffs in London, and the Ramones were dumbing down the Beach Boys' sound in New York City, something truly weird was going on in San Francisco. Formed in 1977 by multi-instrumentalists, Blaine L. Reininger and Steven Brown (and later joined by Peter Principle and puppeteer/weirdo, Winston Tong) Tuxedomoon are a group that, like their singular Ralph Records label-mates, The Residents, fall into exactly one category, the category of Tuxedomoon. With a sonic aesthetic difficult to describe (electronic, erudite, evil, with lots of strings and a sleazy sax, if that helps) but once called the sound of "ectoplasmic formation" (any better?), Tuxedomoon never fit into the San Francisco punk scene, they were viewed as "too European." Not surprisingly, the band decamped to Rotterdam, then Brussels in the early 1980s where they were more warmly received. Since then, Tuxedomoon have rarely played in America --just five concerts-- and I can count myself as lucky enough to have attended one of them.
Tuxedomoon celebrated their 30th anniversary in 2007 with a box set, "77-o-7" consisting of a new album (Vapour Trails), a CD of the new album played live, a rarities disc and a nearly three-hour long DVD of their multi-media film works and performance documentation. A friend gave me this box set not that long ago and it absolutely floored me. I played it for weeks on end and the video material was a joy for a longtime fan to behold. There's also been a definitive 450-page book book written on the group titled "Music For Vagabonds: The Tuxedomoon Chronicles" by Isabelle Corbisier, that looks really great. I can't wait to get my hands on a copy.
Official Tuxedomoon website
Tuxedomoon on MySpace
"No Tears" video
Tuxedomoon on Glenn O'Brien's TV Party (note Debbie Harry cameo)
"Jinx" music video directed by Graeme Whifler
"Special Treatment for the Family Man" (about Harvey Milk's killer, Dan White)
"59 to 1" music video
"Desire" (with Jean-Michel Basquiat on spray-paint) from "Downtown '81"
"Jinx" live, 1979
"Nervous Guy" on TV Party
"Found Films" trailer
"Victims of the Dance" (a loft jam)
"The Stranger" (with Winston Tong)
Totally Wired: Simon Reynold's extensive email interview with Tuxedomoon's Steven Brown
Thanks Frank Alongi from Ryko!
Richard Metzger is the current Boing Boing guest blogger.
We constantly read about how network television is cutting back on expensive scripted dramas and sitcoms that can cost $5 million dollars an episode and up, in favor of more cheaply produced "reality TV" programming. Reality TV can still prove costly to produce, but it doesn't have to cost a lot to be entertaining...
Television development executives of the world who are reading this post, I call your attention to five minutes of sublime entertainment that was made for the cost of a single can of Diet Coke (literally). This is my pal Lenora Claire's new webshow, "doNUTS" (produced in affiliation with World of Wonder):
Given the choice between an episode of "Grey's Anatomy," "Rock of Love" or "Don't Forget the Lyrics" on one hand or a smart, sassy woman with bright red hair and ginormous breasts interviewing shitfaced donut eating drunks, on the other, what would YOU want to watch? Each episode of "doNUTS" will see the lovely Ms. Claire interviewing the colorful night owl denizens of the finest 24-hour donut emporiums in Los Angeles. This is primo TV! Are you television exec types out there paying attention? (I personally think Lenora should do a "Pee-wee's Playhouse" kind of thing, a "wink wink" semi-raunchy/semi-sweet, semi-ironic show for "the kids." Little kids just love her, you should see it. So do "the gays." They love her, too. Sign this woman up, she's a demographic-spanning star ready for her close-up!)
But "doNUTS" isn't the only notable thing Lenora's got on her plate these days. She's also a wildly popular Los Angeles-based art curator with red-carpet gallery events like her "Golden Girls Gone Wild" and Dolly Parton-themed group shows. Coming up is a Bettie Page exhibit with some very special surprises.
No matter where you turn, there she is. You might recognize her portrait by Marla Rutherford that is part of the current USA Network and Vanity Fair's "Character Project" advertising campaign.
She was also recently painted by the great Olivia.
And here she is eating glass. I think Tim and Eric should invite her on their show to do this.
Lenora Claire "Booty Baby" sculpture (NSFW)
doNUTS on YouTube
Richard Metzger is the current Boing Boing guest blogger.
PEOPLE OF AMERICA, LISTEN UP: From the fine folks who brought you "Tim and Eric Awesome Show -great job!," "Superjail" and "Look Around You," at long last, "The Mighty Boosh" have a berth at Adult Swim!!! Thrill to the psychedelic adventures of Vince Noir, "rockstar" --raised in a forest by Bryan Ferry, can talk to animals, a big Gary Numan freak-- and Howard Moon, "generic-looking" unpublished novelist and delusional "intellectual." The Boosh have landed in the US of A!!!!
It's next to impossible to describe the riotous bubble gum confection of the audio-visual strangeness that is The Mighty Boosh, but, in brief, Howard and Vince, along with their friends Naboo the Enigma, mystical shaman and pot dealer, and Bolo the gorilla go on various surreal journeys. Along the way they meet meet killer kangaroos, violent hitchhikers, "mod wolves," and a hermaphroditic "merman" (with a "mangina"). Many of the episodes erupt into bizarre and elaborate music videos with inventive dance choreography. If any of this is starting to sound like something you might enjoy, grab yourself some herbal "entertainment insurance" (if you know what I am talking about, and I think you do --The Boosh are God's gift to stoners) and start watching The Mighty Boosh, Sunday nights on Adult Swim.
I have two favorite episodes: "The Priest and The Beast" (series 2, ep 2) where the boys go on a mystical journey to find "the New Sound"-- a comedic "Holy Mountain" meets a Carlos Santana concept album from 1973 (If that statement makes no sense, don't worry about it) and the series two closer (ep 6) "The Nightmare of Milky Joe," of which, my wife Tara remarked "There is 'Eraserhead' and then beyond 'Eraserhead' there is but 'Milky Joe.'" (Another friend said "These guys certainly carried that through to the end with the utmost conviction!" which is too true about this one, 'nuff said).
Richard Metzger is the current Boing Boing guest blogger.
Even the most hardcore rock snob has probably never heard of the female punk band, Snatch. If they have it's usually in connection with Brian Eno, who they recorded a song about the Red Army Faction with in 1978 ("RAF" is the b-side of "King's Lead Hat"). I discovered them when the elaborate picture sleeve of "All I Want" jumped out at me as I flipped through 45s at my friend Nate Cimmino's apartment in the East Village in the early 1980s. The cover, reproduced poorly here, was really something, gold-gilded text and faux silk portraits of hottie punkettes Patti Palladin on one side and Judy Nylon on the other. "They sound like The Shangri-las if they'd have been crack smokers, I think you'll really like them!" he said. He certainly knew my taste in music!
I promptly spent the next few years searching in vain for their ultra rare records. Eventually I found them all. And now I've found them on the Internet and you can check them out for yourself. There is not a whole lot written about them that I can find. They were two ex-pat American girls living in London. Judy Nylon was probably Brian Eno's girlfriend (I assume that "Back in Judy's Jungle" is about her) at some point and Patti Palladin later recorded an incredible duets album with ex-New York Doll Johnny Thunders. It's one of my top favorite albums. Listen to their Elvis cover "Crawfish" (from "King Creole") on the MySpace page for the "Copy Cats" album, it's a song I always put on mixed CDs for friends.
"Copy Cats" MySpace page
"All I Want" download
"IRT" and "Stanley" mp3s
Second source for "All I Want" single
Richard Metzger is the current Boing Boing guest blogger
It's sure gonna be a long, hot FUN summer...
Summit police fear attacks on hotels used by the G20 leaders
G20 to be most expensive police operation in British history
Britain at risk of serious social unrest, report warns
Mahalo G20 Protests round-up (frequently updated)
Daily Mail article: Anti-capitalists admit attacking Fred the Shred's home and warn other bankers: 'This is just the beginning'Anti-capitalists today claimed responsibility for vandalising the home of disgraced former Royal Bank of Scotland boss Sir Fred Goodwin.
Several windows in the ex-RBS chief executive's luxury villa in Edinburgh were smashed and a Mercedes in the driveway damaged early this morning.
Sir Fred, who is at the centre of a huge row over his £16million pension, was said to be 'shaken' by the vandalism but was not thought to be at the house at the time.
A group calling themselves Bank Bosses Are Criminals later claimed responsibility and ominously warned the attack was only the start of a campaign against executives.
A few hours ago I was interviewed by Douglas Rushkoff on his new WFMU radio show, The Media Squat. Also on the program was Miriam Raymon from The Financial Times. Topics include the financial crisis (is there anything else to talk about?), local currencies, Karl Marx being trendy again, Crass, punk rock, counter culture, Boing Boing being the most successful underground publication in history, socialism in the US and of course, we end with the financial crisis.
iTunes link, Stream from WFMU.org
Richard Metzger is Boing Boing's current guest blogger.
"There is no group more mythical than Faust." --Julian Cope.
Along with Can and Kraftwerk, art rock terrorists Faust are the prime exemplars of German rock music or "Krautrock." Until recently I'd never seen any film footage of them playing live in their early 70s prime, but someone kind uploaded this amazing clip to YouTube.
If you've not heard Faust's music before, I recommend visiting their MySpace page and starting off with "It's A Rainy Day (Sunshine Girl)" and playing it f**ing LOUD. Faust on Myspace, Julian Cope on Faust IV, Official Faust site, Faust perform "Krautrock" in London during 2008 reunion tour
Like Punk rock, like sheds, then this is for you. (Thanks, Uncle Wilco!)There’s a place where I wanna go
be on my own when I’m feeling low
Only place that I wanna be – ONLY PLACE WHERE A DAD CAN BE FREE!
If you want me - you know where to find me If you need me - you’ll know where to look – I’ll be…
In me shed - reading the paper
In me shed - stirring up some paint
In me shed - sorting out me jam jars
In me shed in me shed
In me shed - fixing a puncture
In me shed - oiling the lawnmower
In me shed - having a quiet fag
In me shed in me shed in me shed
Touch and Go Records, a pillar of the Chicago music scene and independent music worldwide, announced Wednesday that it is drastically shrinking its business, cutting ties with 20 independent labels and laying off an unspecified number of employees.Chicago indie powerhouse Touch and Go cuts distribution service, staff (Chicago Tribune via Glen E. Friedman)"The current state of the economy has reached the point where we can no longer afford" to provide manufacturing and distribution services for the labels, including stalwarts such as Chicago-based Drag City, All Natural, Overcoat. Flameshovel and Atavistic Records; Delaware's Jade Tree; and Kill Rock Stars in the Pacific Northwest, said Touch and Go founder Corey Rusk.
The move could drastically hamper the ability of these labels to get their new releases into retail outlets in a timely manner, and could affect their ability to stay solvent during the current economic downturn.
(...) Among the revered bands who have recorded for the label are Big Black, the Jesus Lizard, the Butthole Surfers, the Mekons, Slint, Calexico and TV on the Radio – virtually a Who’s Who of underground, punk and postpunk of the last three decades. "It’s not coming to an end," Rusk said, "but it won’t be the same company it has been for the last 20 years."
Today is a dark day. The lead singer of the Cramps, Lux Interior, has passed away at age 60. In the liner notes of the Cramps' "Gravest Hits" record, he was described as "the psycho-sexual Elvis/Werewolf hybrid from hell." He is survived by his wife and longtime collaborator, the beautiful and deadly Miss Poison Ivy.
Above, here he is with the band in their early days, performing a free concert in 1978 for patients at the Napa State Mental Hospital. It is perhaps not the best quality recording of their work, and not even their best performance, but it's the kind of reckless, free-floating awesome they were. (Thanks, Derek Bledsoe)
WATCH: Flash video embeds above and below, click "full" icon inside the player to view it large. Our YouTube channel is here, you can subscribe to our daily video podcast on iTunes here. The Boing Boing Video episode archive on boingboing.net is here.
The Boing Boing Video crew has been taking a few days off, and I thought today might be a good time to recap the four-part series we recently completed on punk/hiphop/skate photographer Glen. E. Friedman, and graphic artist Shepard Fairey. Sometimes they team up together, and that was the occasion for producing these episodes on both artists together. Above, part 3 in our series which focused on Glen's hardcore and skate culture photography. Below, the episode about a punk-themed collaboration between Shep and Glen around the band Bad Brains. If you missed any of these last week, check 'em out now!
PART 1: BB Video: Shepard Fairey and the Obama Poster, on Inauguration Day
PART 2: BB Video: Photographer Glen E. Friedman in Conversation (and Collaboration) with Shepard Fairey
PART 3: BB Video: Glen E. Friedman, Skate + Hardcore Punk Photo-History
PART 4: BB Video: Photographer Glen E. Friedman - Early Hip Hop, and The Liberty Street Protest
And don't forget, you can purchase books with Glen's amazing photography here (free shipping right now!). Shepard Fairey's prints, posters, books, and other cool stuff are all here.
Flash video embed above, click "full" icon inside the player to view it large. You can download the MP4 here. Our YouTube channel is here, you can subscribe to our daily video podcast on iTunes here. And here are the archives for Boing Boing Video.
Today's Boing Boing Video episode is the final installment of a series of conversations shot during a visit to Shepard Fairey's gallery in LA, as the work of legendary punk / hiphop / skate culture photographer Glen E. Friedman was going up on the gallery walls, for his first ever career retrospective "Idealist Propaganda."
The first episode focused on Fairey's famous Obama poster, the second episode on a collaboration between Shepard and Glen involving the hardcore group Bad Brains. The third was all about Glen's early work in skateboarder culture and hardcore punk.
TODAY: We explore Glen's work documenting hip-hop in the 1980s, and moments he captured with great artists like RUN DMC, Public Enemy, and Ice T, shown below.
Also in today's episode, Glen tells us about the Liberty Street Protest, a graphic statement against the Iraq war. This visual protest took place right across the street from the ruins of the World Trade Center site, destroyed in the 9/11 attacks.
As Glen explains, graphic images were hung in windows in a loft belonging to Def Jam mogul and hip-hop pioneer Russell Simmons, and the message was: "New Yorkers were right here when 9/11 happened, and we don't want this war in our names."
Glen's books are available here.
Big thanks to Boing Boing pal Sean Bonner, who coordinated this series of conversations. And very special thanks to Michael Donaldson, aka Q Burns Abstract Message, for generously allowing Boing Boing to use music from his Eighth Dimension label in this episode.
Below, a song from a Public Enemy record which featured Glen's photos on the cover. The track is "Rebel Without a Pause."
Previously on Boing Boing:
* BB VIDEO: Glen E. Friedman, Skate + Hardcore Punk Photo-History
* BB VIDEO: Glen E. Friedman in conversation and collaboration with Shepard Fairey
* Glen E. Friedman's photo show at Shepard Fairey's gallery
* BB VIDEO: Shepard Fairey and the Obama Poster, on Inauguration Day
Flash video embed above, click "full" icon inside the player to view it large. You can download the MP4 here. Our YouTube channel is here, you can subscribe to our daily video podcast on iTunes here. And here are the archives for Boing Boing Video. An "un-bleeped" version of this video, profanity preserved, is here.
Last week, we aired two Boing Boing Video episodes shot during a visit to Shepard Fairey's gallery in LA as the work of legendary punk / hiphop / skate culture photographer Glen E. Friedman was going up on the gallery walls, for his first ever career retrospective "Idealist Propaganda."
The first episode focused on Fairey's famous Obama poster, the second episode on a collaboration between Shepard and Glen involving the hardcore group Bad Brains.
TODAY: we bring you part 3 of this conversation. This episode's all about Glen's early work documenting skateboarder culture, and the beginnings of American hardcore. Below, an image from the very first roll of color 35mm film Friedman ever shot, which he discusses in this video. Also in today's episode: Glen shares the story behind the Circle Jerks "Golden Shower of Hits" album cover, which he also shot. His work was so much a part of these subcultures, which were in turn so much a part of my own formative years -- so this episode means a lot to me. I hope you dig it.
We have one more planned in this series, focusing more on his Hip-Hop work, so stay tuned.
A very special thanks to the great Ian MacKaye, and to Fugazi, and the Dischord records family for generously allowing us to Fugazi's music in this series. Mr. MacKaye was the subject of some of Glen's early photos of the D.C. hardcore scene, and in this episode we dive into some of those images of MacKaye's seminal hardcore band Minor Threat. I was there, too, and Minor Threat changed my life. Glen captured the spirit of this time like no one else.
Glen's books are available here. Below, here is a short film based on his latest artistic treatise and book "Recognize. The video includes every image in the book, which is available in limited edition through his website.
Special thanks to Boing Boing pal Sean Bonner, who coordinated this series of conversations.
Previously on Boing Boing:
* BB VIDEO: Glen E. Friedman in conversation and collaboration with Shepard Fairey
* Glen E. Friedman's photo show at Shepard Fairey's gallery
* BB VIDEO: Shepard Fairey and the Obama Poster, on Inauguration Day
(Image: Tyler Hicks for the New York Times.)
Photographer Glen E. Friedman, who is the subject of our Boing Boing Video episode tomorrow -- he shot some of the greatest skateboarding photos of our time -- pointed me to this interesting story in the NYT from a few days ago. Glen asks, "Isn't there someone [reading this blog post] who can figure out how to get this guy some more boards for these kids?" Snip:
Afghan youth have learned to recover almost instantly from such routine violence. One person determined to inject some normalcy into their lives is Oliver Percovich. A 34-year-old from Melbourne, Australia, he plans to open this country’s first skateboarding school, Skateistan, this spring. He sees sport as a way to woo students into after-school activities like English and computer classes, which are otherwise reserved for the elite.Full story, pics of super cute Afghan kid skaters, and a neat video all here: Skateboarding in Afghanistan Provides a Diversion From Desolation (NYT). Here is the Skateistan website. And here's how you can help.“Teenagers are trying to dissociate from old mentalities, and I’m their servant,” Percovich said. “If they weren’t interested, I would’ve left a long time ago.”
Now, when he pulls his motorcycle into a residential courtyard here, a dozen youngsters pounce before it comes to a stop, yanking six chipped skateboards with fading paint off the back. The children, most participating in a sport for the first time in their war-hardened lives, do not want to waste any time. Their skateboard park is a decrepit Soviet-style concrete fountain with deep fissures. The tangle of novice skaters resembles bumper cars more than X Games.
But Percovich has raised the money needed to build an 8,600-square-foot bubble to house the nonprofit Skateistan complex, and the Kabul Parks Authority has tentatively donated land. He is still waiting for official permission to begin the project. And since a spate of kidnappings and the car bombing in late November, he has reduced his daily sessions at the fountain to once or twice a week.
Among those who look forward to his visits is Maro, an elfin 9-year-old girl who was terrified of skateboarding at first. “It gives me courage, and once I start skating, I completely forget about my fears,” she said.
WATCH: Flash video embed above, click "full" icon inside the player to view it large. You can download the MP4 here. Our YouTube channel is here, you can subscribe to our daily video podcast on iTunes here.
Earlier this week, we aired a Boing Boing video episode in which we visited Shepard Fairey's gallery in LA, and spoke with him about the most well-known of his works, the Obama poster. That episode was shot as another artist's work was being hung on the walls: legendary punk / hiphop / skate culture photographer Glen E. Friedman. Together, Shepard and Glen were also working on a collaboration together that brings Shep's visual style together with some of Glen's most iconic images.
Today, we present the second episode from that evening of conversations. This one's all about Shepard and Glen's new collaborations together.
One of those creative collaborations involves the great DC hardcore band Bad Brains. The image below, of lead singer H.R. mid-scream at The Whisky in LA in March 1982, was shot by Glen (and appears in this book). The first punk show I ever saw was the Bad Brains live (as I mentioned in yesterday's guest DJ spot on KCRW!), and this image captures exactly what those moments of stillness in the midst of phenomenal speed and force felt like, up close. Watching H.R. perform in those early days was like watching a plane take off -- headed right towards you.
Glen's books are available here, and they're amazing. Below, here is a short film based on his book "Recognize." The video includes every image in the book, which is available in limited edition through his website.
Special thanks to Boing Boing pal Sean Bonner, who pulled this awesome series of conversations together. I really enjoyed hearing two of our creative heroes talk about their work, and I hope you dig the video as much as we did the experience. Also, special thanks to Glen, who put up with a lot on our behalf: he'd just got off a long plane flight from NY to LA, and survived hellish Friday LA rush hour traffic, to get to the taping.
And a very special thanks to Ian MacKaye, Fugazi, and the Dischord records family for generously allowing us to use a couple of Fugazi clips (from the album Instrument) to accompany Glen's work in this piece. You guys f'n rule. Boing Boing is grateful!
Previously on Boing Boing:
* Glen E. Friedman's photo show at Shepard Fairey's gallery
* BB Video: Shepard Fairey and the Obama Poster, on Inauguration Day
This is a blog post I've been really excited to hit "publish" on for a while. KCRW is my favorite radio station in the world. I listen to them when I'm driving around LA, but also tune in online when I'm traveling, and subscribe to some of their podcasts, too, so I can listen while I'm running on the beach or wandering around in some strange city overseas where all other sounds are unfamiliar. They've pretty much been the most important source for my own personal music discovery habits over the past decade or so. The voices and personalities of the hosts are so familiar, they feel like friends or family -- guiding ghosts who point me toward all that is cool, beautiful, and audible.
Because of this, it was an honor and surprise when KCRW's Rachel Reynolds -- who reads Boing Boing! -- invited me to participate in the station's Guest DJ Project.
Even more sweet, the fact that this guest DJ session would be hosted by my favorite KCRW DJ (I swear I'm not making any of this up), the inimitable music curator and velvet-voiced host Chris Douridas.
Chris and Rachel asked me to select songs that meant something to me personally, and revealed something of my life experience. Then, they invited me to come in and talk about the songs with Chris, and today, they've published the resulting music/conversation audio piece. It's the most personal thing I've ever done in public, if that makes sense? Telling the world about why your favorite songs are your favorite songs is like liveblogging your id, or having one of those dreams where you're riding the subway naked. So it feels weird to type this. But these songs actually do mean a lot to me, so I'm really excited to share the experience.
Links to Listen: Here is a downloadable MP3. Here's where you can listen on a streaming web player. And here's the text transcript.
Tracklist:
1.) Tomita - Claire de Lune
2.) Bad Brains - Banned in DC
3.) David Byrne and Brian Eno - The Carrier
4.) Lucho Gatica - Encadenados
5.) Ryuichi Sakamoto - Boing Boing video episode with Joi Ito
Well, this is one effect of the housing meltdown I didn't see coming -- a resurgence of hardcore sk8 culture. Skaters in Southern California are repurposing dried-out pools in the backyards of abandoned, foreclosed homes, cleaning them out and transforming them into illicit skate parks. Let a thousand reverse ollies bloom. Snip from New York Times article by Jesse McKinley and Malia Wollan:
In these boom times for skaters, [a 27-year old Fresno skateboarder whose alias is Josh] Peacock travels with a gas-powered pump, five-gallon buckets, shovels and a push broom, risking trespassing charges in the pursuit of emptying forlorn pools and turning them into de facto skate parks.Skaters Jump In as Foreclosures Drain the Pool (NYT, Photo: Jim Wilson)“We can just hit them back to back,” said Mr. Peacock, who preferred to give his skateboarding name because of the illegality of his activities.
Skaters are coming to places like Fresno from as far as Germany and Australia. Mr. Peacock said his floor and couch were covered by sleeping bags of visiting skateboarders each weekend.
Some skateboarders use realty tracking sites like realquest.com and realtor.com to find foreclosed houses with pools, while others trawl through satellite images from Google Earth. On the Web site skateandannoy.com, where skaters trade tips about how to find and drain abandoned pools, one poster wrote about the current economic malaise. “God bless Greenspan,” the post read, “patron saint of pool skatin’.”
Photographer Glen E. Friedman is best known for iconic images that captured the roots of three truly indigenous American pop cultures: skateboarding, American hardcore, and hip hop. Starting tonight, you can see all three represented at Shepard Fairey's (relatively new) gallery, Subliminal Projects, over in the Silverlake/Echo Park area of Los Angeles. Sean Bonner, who has worked with both Shep and Glen (and exhibited their work at a gallery he co-owned), says:
[Glen's] retrospective exhibition Idealist Propaganda will open at Shepard Fairey’s Subliminal Projects gallery. The gallery is located at 1331 W Sunset Blvd and the opening is at 8PM. It’s going to packed so I suggest getting there earlier rather than later if you can. I was there last night and got a sneak preview (as well as to help film and upcoming episode of BoingBoingTV about the show) and it’s breathtaking. Trust me, you don’t want to miss seeing all these photos in person.I second that, and if anyone wants to make me really happy this holiday? Buy me like one of every print there, please. I cannot WAIT to share the BBtv episode(s) with you all. I don't want to spoil anything, so I'll stop there. But they're gonna be pretty special, and it was an honor and a total kick to tape them (thanks again, Glen, Shepard, and Sean).
More info: Glen E Friedman at Subliminal Projects this weekend (Los Angeles Metblogs).
Also: Several books of Glen E. Friedman's photography are available, and make killer holiday gifts.
PHOTO: Joseph "DJ Run" Simmons, Darryl "D.M.C." McDaniels, and Jason "Jam-Master Jay" Mizell, collectively known as RUN-DMC. Photographed by Glen E. Friedman in 1985. This image is in the Idealist show, and it's one of my favorites. Mizell was murdered in 2002. To date no one has been prosecuted for his death, despite much evidence and a room full of eyewitnesses.
I don’t know. I’m nervous, but also kind of excited to see what Cox comes up with. My biggest question, though, is about the soundtrack: how can the sequel even attempt to match the original in terms of music, when it remains one of my favorite soundtracks of all time? Iggy Pop, Suicidal Tendencies, Black Flag, The Plugz, and The Circle Jerks...the music is the heart and soul of Repo Man, and perfectly captured the essence of the gritty Los Angeles punkdom of the time. Not that there’s not a ton of great music out there, but what really compares nowadays? At least Iggy’s still out there rocking, same as he ever was, but it will be interesting to see who else will help Cox fuel his anarchic punk vision all over again...Here’s Hoping Alex Cox’s Repo Man Sequel Isn’t One Big Circle Jerk
Survival Research Laboratories, the legendary machine performance project that started it all, turns 30 today. Founder Mark Pauline has a blog post up about this milestone, with a copy of SRL's first-ever ad, above. Mark says,
Id like to thank all those who have helped me make SRL what it is, both voluntarily and involuntarily. Im still having a blast. Even moving all 160 tons of my stuff to the new shop in Petaluma has been kind of fun. In a few more weeks, Ill be totally out of here and SRL will lurch into the next 30 year chapter. 2038 here we come!A huge congrats and deepest respect to Mark, the SRL team, and their respective family members -- the meat-based kind, but also the magical metal machines who are the real stars of SRL. On behalf of all Boingdom, we wish all of you another 30 years of happy mutancy.
For BoingBoing readers not familiar with SRL, here's how they describe what they do:
Survival Research Laboratories was conceived of and founded by Mark Pauline in November 1978. Since its inception SRL has operated as an organization of creative technicians dedicated to re-directing the techniques, tools, and tenets of industry, science, and the military away from their typical manifestations in practicality, product or warfare. Since 1979, SRL has staged over 45 mechanized presentations in the United States and Europe. Each performance consists of a unique set of ritualized interactions between machines, robots, and special effects devices, employed in developing themes of socio-political satire. Humans are present only as audience or operators.
Below, an early photograph featuring Mark Pauline with one of his first creations. Performance artist Karen Finley and V. Vale of RE/Search Publications are among the bemused onlookers. (thanks, K0re!)
Boing Boing tv's UK-based music correspondent Russell Porter catches up with Cold War Kids frontman Nathan Willett for a brief chat about the band's new record, Loyalty to Loyalty, just as Willett and the band finish a set at San Francisco's Outside Lands fest.
Link to Boing Boing tv blog post with downloadable video and instructions on how to subscribe to our daily video podcast.
(special thanks to Virgin America for air travel, and to Wayneco for the magic bus)
Related Boing Boing tv episodes from Outside Lands:
* Andy Gould, rock band manager, dances on the labels' graves.
* Primus: Xeni interviews Les and Ler (music)
* Kaki King, guitar hero: performance, interview with Xeni (music)
* BB Gadgets' Joel at Outside Lands: Crowdfire deconstructed
* Carney at Outside Lands - a "Boing Boing tv Bus Session." (music)
* Steel Pulse founder David Hinds at Outside Lands (music)
* Boing Boing tv backstage at Outside Lands: (Xeni + Russell Porter)
Fleet Foxes and Wilco covered Bob Dylan's "I Shall be Released" at a recent live show, and they're giving it away online if you promise to vote. Wilcoworld (via James Home on Twitter; photo of guitar rack on-stage at Wilco's set during Outside Lands via Crowdfire; image by John Battelle).
The best pre-natal advice I ever got was, "Pick one book, any book, and only one book." They all get you there, but they take different, and often mutually exclusive paths. I cheated -- I read several -- and of the lot, the best was My Mother Wears Combat Boots: A Parenting Guide for the Rest of Us by Jessica Mills (horn player in several punk bands such as Less Than Jake, and columnist for MAXIMUMROCKNROLL). Mills, a touring punk musician, silversmith, anarchist and pacifist, wrote the book based on her experiences as a punk parent, trying to raise a baby without "gender-coding," punishment, or authoritarianism, in a world that is hardly cooperative to such goals.
Mills is a great writer -- of all the baby-books I've read, only COMBAT BOOTS deserves the adjective "compelling" -- and while I don't agree with 100 percent (or even 85 percent!) of her parenting ideas, I found them provocative, well-informed, and, above all, humane. Mills has high ideals, but she freely acknowledges that her parenting often falls short of her objectives -- her kid ends up watching Disney cartoons, pitching tantrums, and wanting to wear frilly pink dresses. It's this human fallibility that really makes the book -- Mills's insistence that we're all human and parents can, will and should make mistakes. Mills's book is as much about how to cope with your own challenges as it is about coping with your kids'.
I was especially taken by Mills's descriptions of her boyfriend's struggles to co-parent without either smothering or allowing the easy gendered roles to take over. There's a great guest-written chapter about punk-fathering, and a really heartwarming interview with the bright-as-anything 15-years-old daughter of a couple of punk parents who pioneered taking kids to shows, protests, and on tour.
COMBAT BOOTS goes from prenatal to four, and it's just the thing for your different friends who are already being buried under heaps of What to Expect When You're Expecting or worse, Nestle- or P&G-published "parenting magazines" that are just thinly disguised pitches to get you to buy a ton of crap you and your kid don't need.
My Mother Wears Combat Boots: A Parenting Guide for the Rest of Us
BBtv guest teen haxxor correspondent 5t311a teaches us how to do guerilla t-shirt silkscreening, as described in Cory Doctorow's novel Little Brother, and as detailed in a series of Instructables posts.
(Thanks, Charis Tobias!)
Iggy and The Stooges are in the middle of a huge tour and this is a disaster - not to mention some rare kit gone forever. Please help if you can. If anyone who reads this and lives in or near Montreal, Canada or if anyone has information, ANY INFORMATION! please, please, PLEASE as soon as possible contact Eric Fischer at:More details on the stolen stuff, with photos and serial numbers, after the jump.
nycentral13@gmail.com
cell phone: +1 646 932 1907
IGGY AND THE STOOGES
EQUIPMENT STOLEN ON AUGUST 4, 2008
OUTSIDE THE EMBASSY SUITES HOTEL
208 SAINT ANTOINE OUEST,
MONTREAL, QUEBEC, CANADA
all equipment was in a rented penske 15 foot yellow truck
with u.s. (michigan) license plate number AC46493
parked immediately outside the hotel, the theft had to have happened in the morning, between 6:30 and 7:30 am...
Today on Boing Boing tv, we are proud to share the sneak-preview of a television pilot, the AQUABATS! SUPERSHOW!, a live-action and animation program featuring the popular superhero ska band, The Aquabats (MySpace).
Jon Berrett of Yo Gabba Gabba explains:
This spring the Aquabats completed a pilot for a new television show based on the misadventures of rock and roll's greatest super dude men. The Aquabats have been a band for over a decade, have toured the world, and put out 5 full length studio albums.The excerpt we are world-premiering on BBtv today is an animated portion of the show's first episode, and includes angry mushrooms, vengeful unicorn princesses, and a subterranean paradise with lakes of hot pink lava. The AQUABATS! SUPERSHOW! also includes live performance and real-world hijinks. We think it's pretty awesome.The AQUABATS! SUPERSHOW! TELEVISION PILOT will have a special screening at the San Diego House of Blues show on July 25th, 2008 [during Comic-Con]. If you already have tickets, you are STOKED!
the latest
latest episodes
