(Download this video: MP4)

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)

Flash video embed above, click "full" icon inside the player to view large. You can download the MP4 here. Our YouTube channel is here, you can subscribe to our daily video podcast on iTunes here. Get Twitter updates every time there's a new ep by following @boingboingvideo, and here are the archives for Boing Boing Video.

The legendary Les Claypool of Primus fame visited Boing Boing Video's new studios recently to kick out some "unplugged" jams and talk to us about his new album and forthcoming tour, which kicks off tomorrow night. The Colonel's new studio album, Of Fungi and Foe, hits the streets on March 17th, and his "Oddity Faire" tour is described as a "mutated mini fest" featuring freaks and odd performers in addition to Claypool's musical backing -- Mike Dillon [Percussion], Paulo Baldi [Drums] and Sam Bass [Cello].

Some of the acts traveling with Claypool in this tour will be familiar to Boing Boing readers and viewers. They include Yard Dogs Road Show, Mutaytor, Saul Williams, Secret Chief 3, Devotchka, and O'Death.

BB Video pal Matty Kirsch, a longtime Primus fan, hosts this sitdown. My favorite part of the episode is at the end, when Les obligingly takes a slew of requests from Matty for the bass lines from classic Primus songs. Very Chris Farley.

Claypool's creative legacy includes the faux fest movie "Electric Apricot," and we talk with him about his past collaborations with animators and multimedia artists. Perhaps the best known of these collaborations is his work with the South Park guys (he wrote the show's theme), and we take a look at some of the weird, surreal, cool music videos he's produced and released online.

Below, a short promotional video produced by Claypool with a peek ahead at the "Oddity Tour."

(Thanks, Leanne Lajoie, Jason McHugh, and very special thanks to Boing Boing Video's video distribution partner Episodic.)

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. Get Twitter updates every time there's a new ep by following @boingboingvideo, and here are the archives for Boing Boing Video.

Boing Boing Video is proud to debut a second video from the forthcoming music documentary N.A.S.A. (Myspace Link), directed by Syd Garon and Sage Vaughn, who also created the art.

The track is "Way Down," and features RZA (of Wu Tang fame), vocalist Barbie Hatch, and John Frusciante (Red Hot Chili Peppers.)

If you dig the track, you can buy the entire N.A.S.A. "Spirit of Apollo" album on Amazon here. There is not one tosser in the collection, the whole project is amazing. Full credits and tour dates after the jump -- if they're coming to a town near you, you can't miss the show, really.

Q&A WITH DIRECTOR SYD GARON

Xeni Jardin: Syd, can you tell us about what we're seeing here -- the story this video tells? How did you develop this visual narrative, in relation to the message of the song (about a woman who falls in love with the Devil?)

Syd Garon: Sage was painting these warring gangs of Blue Jays and Cardinals in the trees of Los Angeles and the song was about a forbidden love, you can see how the west side story naturally evolved from that, in fact it seems like it was inevitable. The pitch on this video was Winged Migration meets Straight out of Compton and I think thats how it turned out.

Xeni: How did you and Sage develop the project together, can you tell us about the collaborative process?

Syd: Sam from N.A.S.A approached me to do a video and he suggested artist Sage Vaughn as a good collaborator. We all worked out a story and then Sage painted hundreds of frames over thousands of hours. Once we got the paintings we photographed them and animated everything. Most of the animation was done in After Effects, there were a few impossible shots my friend Paul Griswold did in 3d with XSI. Every now and then a project goes super smooth and everyone is happy and had fun, this was one of those projects.

Xeni: How did you develop the movement of the birds -- the fighting sequences, the cuddling couples -- what did you use as study references, and how did that evolve?

Syd: We were trying to keep things a kind of realistic fantasy. The idea was the birds should be anatomically correct, yet they fought like Crips and Bloods, they couldn't use a gun but they could get a tattoo. It's sounds insane when I write it out but there is an internal logic and it makes sense to us. We also wanted *mostly* realistic flight and behavior even though its animated. Cardinals don't really fall in love with Blue Jays or fight to the death so we would need to find footage of an eagle battle or two Brown-headed Nuthatches preening and Sage would paint them as if they were our hero birds. To find that kind of reference we watched hours and hours of bird movies including "Audubon VideoGuide to 505 Birds of North America on Two DVDs". We watched both dvd's. It's not really roto-scoped its more like we sampled the movement and behavior of real birds and then tried to mimic it with still images.

Special thanks to Geoff Sherr of Squeak-e-Clean, to Syd Garon, to Susan Applegate, and to the folks at FLUX, and massive mega-props to Boing Boing Video's excellent video hosting provider Episodic.

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