Music of the African diaspora

Wikipedia - "Music of the African diaspora was mostly refined and developed during the period of slavery. Slaves did not have easy access to instruments, so vocal work took on new significance. Through chants and work songs people of African descent preserved elements of their African heritage while inventing new genres of music. The culmination of this great sublimation of musical energy into vocal work can be seen in genres as disparate as Gospel Music and Hip-Hop. The music of the African diaspora makes frequent use of ostinato, a motif or phrase which is persistently repeated at the same pitch. The repeating idea may be a rhythmic pattern, part of a tune, or a complete melody. The banjo is a direct decedent of the Akonting created by the Jola people, found in Senegal, Gambia and Guinea-Bissau in West Africa. Hence, the melodic traditions of the African diaspora are probably most alive in Blues and Jazz. ..."
Wikipedia
KFAI: Jazz Diaspora (Video)
eScholarship: Excerpt from Jazz Diasporas
U.California - Jazz Diasporas: Race, Music, and Migration in Post-World War II Paris
The South African Jazz Diaspora
Top 10 Albums of the South African Jazz Diaspora
South African Jazz Diaspora
YouTube: Ibrahim Maalouf - Diaspora, Dollar Brand Duo - Moniebah (The Pilgrim), Dudu Pukwana & Spear - Baloyi

African Jazz 'N' Jive

G-20 Protests Grip Hamburg, and Dozens Are Hurt

Demonstrators were hit by a police water cannon on Friday.
"HAMBURG — More than 10,000 protesters took to the streets of Hamburg again on Friday to vent their anger at the Group of 20 summit meeting and the global political and economic system. And once again, they were met with a huge police presence — hundreds of additional officers were called in after clashes left at least 196 officers and dozens of protesters injured. It started early in the day: There were sit-down protests under a rainbow display of umbrellas. Students marched, calling for social justice. And some people took to a fleet of rubber boats, demanding solidarity with refugees. Protesters were soon engaged in a cat-and-mouse game with the police, who lined city streets to block off the areas where gatherings were taking place. ..."
NY Times

The Art at the End of the World

The jetty was completed in 1970 but was later covered when the level of the Great Salt Lake rose. Around 1999, the water began to recede.
"... We were flying 2,000 miles to see more than 6,000 tons of black basalt rocks extending 1,500 feet into the Great Salt Lake in the shape of a counterclockwise vortex, designed by the most famous practitioner of ’70s land art, Robert Smithson. ‘It’s called the Spiral Jetty,’ I told them. I showed them pictures. I admitted that maybe ‘the end of the world’ wasn’t the best way to advertise what I hoped we would experience, even though previous visitors had described the landscape as hauntingly spare, as resembling how our planet might appear following a nuclear holocaust. Smithson’s gallerist, Virginia Dwan, said the jetty ‘was something otherworldly, but I hesitate to say hell, because I don’t mean everybody being tortured and so forth, but the feeling of aloneness, and of it being in a place that was unsafe, and something devilish, something devilish there.’ ..."
NY Times

2007 November: Robert Smithson, 2010 April: Spiral Jetty, 2012 March: Asphalt Rundown, Rome, 1969

Space, Energy & Light: Experimental Electronic And Acoustic Soundscapes 1961-88

"All of these artists used electronic advancements in music technology as a means of exploring not only space and the idea of the future, but also of looking inwards to the soul and of creating music in harmony with the natural world. From computer software and hardware experimentalists and sound pioneers such as Laurie Spiegel and Kevin Braheny, as well as Mother Mallard's Portable Masterpiece Company - the first synthesizer ensemble created in collaboration with Robert Moog - through to the earliest musique concrète experimentation of Tod Dockstader, the album shows how technological advancements and creative artistic expression went hand in hand. In the mid-1970s artists Steven Halpern and Iaxos were instrumental in creating proto-new age music, experimenting in both the healing properties of sound and its relationship with the natural world. ..."
boomkat (Video)
Discogs
Spotify
YouTube: J.B. Banfi - Gang (Rock for Industry) 1978, MICHAEL GARRISON - TO THE OTHER SIDE OF THE SKY, Iasos - Lueena Coast, Carl Matthews - As Above, So Below, Stratis - By Water, Steven Halpern - Starborn Suite, Laurie Spiegel - Improvisation on a 'Concerto Generator' 1977 (Live), Michael Stearns - In The Beginning..., Beverly Glenn-Copeland - Ever New, Richard Pinhas - Sur Le Theme De Bene Gesserit VII, Tod Dockstader - Piece #1, Ancient Stars - Kevin Braheny

The roof sunbathers of New York’s tar beaches

"Lying out to work on your tan just isn’t fashionable anymore. But sunbathers glistening with baby oil were once a ubiquitous summer sight on the city’s tar beaches. Tar beaches? That was the nickname New Yorkers gave the tarry black tenement or apartment house rooftop. Tenants would drag up a chair or blanket, maybe a book, radio or Walkman, and a cold drink, then pick a spot in the sun and happily bake themselves while taking a break from the crowds and noise many stories below. Up on a usually empty roof, there was the illusion of privacy. Of course anyone living above you could see you. But in an era before smartphone cameras and social media, it hardly mattered if curious neighbors stared. ..."
Ephemeral New York

Beautifully Designed Tiny Houses... For Birds

"Can't make the leap into tiny house life yourself? Maybe it's best left for the birds. Portland, ME artist Jada Fitch has woven her love for art, feathered folks, and stylish architecture into a series of impeccably appointed bird feeders. Fitch's artwork ranges from delicate realistic paintings of favored species to minute furniture design, and into DIY flat packing. All of the bird feeders feature a central benefit: you can stick them to the outside of your window and watch the feasting firsthand. ..."
core77

2008 September: Birds, 2008 June: Bird Songs, 2017 April: Of a Feather, 2017 June: Bird Sounds

Rhinozeros Archive

"Several months ago I received an email from an editor at Black Dog Publishing which operates out of London. Black Dog prints books on a variety of topics such as photography, architecture, film and design. They did a book on Independent record shops that I am dying to own. One of the publisher’s upcoming projects is a book on German rock, experimental and electronic music, and the 1960s counterculture. The editor contacted me for some images of Rhinozeros, a German little magazine published out of Hamburg, edited by brothers Rolf-Gunther and Klaus-Peter Dienst from 1960-1965. Klaus-Peter provided the iconic calligraphy. Burroughs appeared in four of the ten issues. I had Issues Five and Seven, which I purchased at the legendary Nelson Lyon Sale in 1999. I happily provided the images. ..."
RealityStudio
RealityStudio: Burroughs in Germany and Belgium
ruins or books

Can - The Singles (2017)

"Formed in Cologne, in the swell and fervour of the European student riots of 1968, Can were fashioned for spontaneous group action. Bassist and founding member Holger Czukay later said they became a rock band 'by coincidence. None of us were rock-oriented. But the only way to become an entire group with a new sound was to reduce ourselves.' They entered the sphere all but tabula rasa, a group of mottled musicians rapt by the notion of marching to the beat of their own drum. A diorama of rulebook-rescinding sound, The Singles portrays the full, heady transmogrification of Can from catalysts of the late 60s to nigh-on self-parodists of the late 80s. ..."
The Quietuus
NPR - Can's Singles To Be Reissued: Hear The Goofy Novelty 'Turtles Have Short Legs' (Video)
amazon
YouTube: The Singles 20 videos

2011 September: Can, 2011 February: Plight & Premonition, 2011 June: Persian Love, 2013 October: Flux + Mutability - David Sylvian and Holger Czukay (1989) , 2014 June: Holger Czukay - Der Osten Ist Rot, Rome Remains Rome (1984/7), 2016 March: Invaders Of The Heart - Jah Wobble (1982), 2017 April: Jah Wobble, The Edge, Holger Czukay - Snake Charmer (1983), 2017 June: The Legend Lives On… Jah Wobble In Betrayal (1980).

Noam Chomsky: Neoliberalism Is Destroying Our Democracy

"For 50 years, Noam Chomsky, has been America’s Socrates, our public pest with questions that sting. He speaks not to the city square of Athens but to a vast global village in pain and now, it seems, in danger. The world in trouble today still beats a path to Noam Chomsky’s door, if only because he’s been forthright for so long about a whirlwind coming. Not that the world quite knows what do with Noam Chomsky’s warnings of disaster in the making. Remember the famous faltering of the patrician TV host William F. Buckley Jr., meeting Chomsky’s icy anger about the war in Vietnam, in 1969. It’s a strange thing about Noam Chomsky: The New York Times calls him 'arguably' the most important public thinker alive, though the paper seldom quotes him, or argues with him, and giant pop-media stars on network television almost never do. ..."
The Nation
NY Times - Noam Chomsky: On Trump and the State of the Union

2011 January: Peak Oil and a Changing Climate, 2015 May: The Limits of Discourse As Demonstrated by Sam Harris and Noam Chomsky, 2015 October: Electing the President of an Empire, 2015 December: Noam Chomsky on Paris attacks, 2016 December: Chomsky: Humanity Faces Real and Imminent Threats to Our Survival, 2017 April: Requiem for the American Dream: The 10 Principles of Concentration of Wealth & Power (2016)

Fela & Egypt 80 ‎– Confusion Break Bone (1990)

"... In Confusion Break Bones(C.B.B.), Fela mentions the earlier song he wrote titled ‘CONFUSION’ where he compared the present African situation (with particular reference to Nigeria), as an example of a crossroad in the centre of town with a permanent traffic jam — '..na confusion be that oh!'. Despite this graphic picture painted in 'Confusion', some people feel optimistic that one day the Nigerian situation will improve: ‘…Nigeria go better!’, Fela felt the contrary because he did not share their optimism, he did not see why a continent as rich as Africa, with all the natural resources, will have the majority of their population existing below the poverty: ‘how country go make money and people of the country no see money’. Continuing, Fela says: ‘…I see many wrong things for Nigeria!’, citing as an example of such wrongs, the acts of economic sabotage perpetrated by people in high places, only to punish the poor for the fallout of such wrongs. ..."
afrobeat, afrofunk, afrojazz, afrorock, african boogie, african hiphop ...
Discogs
YouTube: Confusion Break Bone

Laurel Halo – Electronic Musician & Producer

"Laurel Halo (born Ina Cube) is an American electronic composer and producer based in Berlin. She began writing music when she was nineteen, drawing inspiration from Detroit dance music, time spent performing in free jazz groups, classical theory coursework, and her on-air DJ shifts at the University of Michigan's college radio station. She released a handful of EPs between 2006 and 2009, garnering a larger audience with the 2010 release of the King Felix EP on Hippos in Tanks. A year later, she collaborated with labelmates GAMES on the Hour Logic EP. A full-length, Quarantine, followed a few months later via Hyperdub. In 2013, she moved to Berlin and released the Behind the Green Door EP and the Chance of Rain LP. ..."
Amoeba (Video)

Brooklyn Art Library - The Sketchbook Project

"Brooklyn Art Library is home to The Sketchbook Project collection in its physical form. Our walls are lined with shelves that hold the tens of thousands of sketchbooks currently in the collection, created by artists from around the world. The library serves as a reading room where you can get cozy and spend an afternoon enjoying artwork in a hands-on experience with the help of our librarians. With so many books in the library, we’ve developed our own system that makes it easy for anyone to explore. Each book is individually barcoded and cataloged with searchable details, like where the book is from, the materials used, the artist’s name, tag words, and much more. Whether you are interested in seeing a book about robots, a book created in Berlin, or even books selected for you at random, you can search and explore using your own mobile device when in our space. ..."
The Sketchbook Project
Join the 33,000 artists in the mammoth Sketchbook Project
This Library Is Home To Tens Of Thousands Of Sketchbooks (Video)
Q & A | The Sketchbook Project’s Steven Peterman
amazon: The Sketchbook Project World Tour

Canterbury Sound

Wikipedia - "The Canterbury scene (or Canterbury Sound) is a subgenre of, or sibling to, progressive rock. The term describes a loosely defined style of music created by a number of improvisational musicians, some of whom were based in the city of Canterbury, Kent, England during the late 1960s and early 1970s. These musicians played together in numerous bands, with ever-changing and overlapping personnel, creating some similarities in their musical output. Many prominent British avant-garde or fusion musicians began their career in Canterbury bands, including Hugh Hopper, Steve Hillage, Dave Stewart (the keyboardist), Robert Wyatt, Kevin Ayers, Daevid Allen, and Mike Ratledge. ..."
Wikipedia
CANTERBURY SCENE: A Progressive Rock Sub-genre
allmusic - Art-Rock/Experimental » Canterbury Scene
Spacial Anomaly (Video)
The Best Canterbury Scene Bands/Artists
YouTube: The Canterbury Scene: An Interview with Robert Wyatt - BBC South, The ultimate 'Canterbury Scene' Collection 2:08:36, The Canterbury Scene on BBC Prog Rock Britannia

Not Our Independence Day

A diorama depicting a battle in the Revolutionary War.
"The American Revolution is celebrated by many as liberal democracy’s inaugural triumph, a conflict that, in Lincoln’s words, 'brought forth on this continent a new nation conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.' This romantic narrative of the revolution still enjoys tremendous political currency, as the Right continues to deploy the memory of the Revolutionary War in the service of its agendas, from Tea Party tax paranoia to accusations of bureaucratic tyranny. More than anything, the American Revolution is celebrated as confirmation of American exceptionalism — a moral, political, and military victory so absolute that it justifies (and indeed mandates) two hundred years of American expansion across the globe. ..."
Jacobin

Sketching Performer Auditions for the M.T.A.

"Once a year, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority holds auditions for musicians to perform in subway and commuter train stations, and for the past couple of years, Joan Chiverton, an illustrator and music lover, has sketched the hopefuls. The auditions, which take place in Grand Central Terminal, have a festive atmosphere, starting with the master of ceremonies, Robert Holman, the poet and indefatigable poetry evangelist, who wears a referee’s striped shirt and blows a whistle on musicians who exceed their five-minute time limit. Because we all know the transportation agency will not tolerate delays. ..."
NY Times
MTA Arts & Design

Pond Scum - Henry David Thoreau’s moral myopia. By Kathryn Schulz

"On the evening of October 6, 1849, the hundred and twenty people aboard the brig St. John threw a party. The St. John was a so-called famine ship: Boston-bound from Galway, it was filled with passengers fleeing the mass starvation then devastating Ireland. They had been at sea for a month; now, with less than a day’s sail remaining, they celebrated the imminent end of their journey and, they hoped, the beginning of a better life in America. Early the next morning, the ship was caught in a northeaster, driven toward shore, and dashed upon the rocks just outside Cohasset Harbor. Those on deck were swept overboard. Those below deck drowned when the hull smashed open. Within an hour, the ship had broken up entirely. All but nine crew members and roughly a dozen passengers perished. Two days later, a thirty-two-year-old Massachusetts native, en route from Concord to Cape Cod, got word of the disaster and detoured to Cohasset to see it for himself. ..."
New Yorker (Oct 19, 2015)
Sierra Club: In Defense of Henry David Thoreau
Thoreau Farm: A Reply to Pond Scum – a critique of Thoreau in the New Yorker

2009 April: Henry David Thoreau, 2012 September: Walden, 2015 March: A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849), 2017 March: Civil Disobedience (1849), 2017 April: The Maine Woods (1864), 2017 June: This Ever New Self: Thoreau and His Journal

National Park Maps

Acadia
"The National Park Service publishes tons of great free maps; I’ve collected them all for you. Here on NPMaps you’ll find hundreds of PDF and image files of any U.S. national park map; you can view all parks alphabetically and sort by state. Or use the menu above to navigate to the park of your choice. If you’re looking for a single national parks map that shows all U.S. national parks, click the image to the left (2.7 mb) or download the PDF (21.2 mb). The PDF map will take a while to load; please be patient! Or, order a large poster of this national parks map from the NPMaps Store (links open in new window). I created this site because I love visiting national parks and planning trips by poring* over a classic national park map. However, I’ve always found it time-consuming to visit each park’s web page and use an embedded map viewer or muddle through the website to find a nice printable map. ..."
National Park Maps

Made to Measure, Vol. 1 (1984)

"Volume 1 initiated Made to Measure, a series of records of experimental soundtrack music, in high form as a compilation with several artists from Crammed Discs' roster. Minimal Compact offer some songs from a ballet, Tuxedomoon weigh in with three pieces from a film score, Benjamin Lew with a sound backdrop to a fashion exhibition, and Aksak Maboul bring in an excerpt from a private movie, as well as music composed for a play. Except for the Minimal Compact cuts, these are instrumentals of various moods and textures, and the various contributors complement each other with similar Euro-art rock aesthetics. Though Tuxedomoon expatriated from the U.S. and Minimal Compact from Israel, both groups have a very European sound, though Minimal Compact do throw some Middle Eastern flute and chanting on 'Too Many of Them.' Otherwise their tracks don't differ too much from what is on their regular albums, clunky rhythms, creepy and subdued art-rock songs. ..."
allmusic
Discogs
Crammed Discs
amazon, Spotify
YouTube: Minimal Compact - Animal Killers, Tuxedomoon - Fanfare, Aksak Maboul - Mort de Velimir, AKSAK MABOUL Ossip & Lili/Odessa, Tuxedomoon - No One Expects the Spanish Inquisition, Benjamin Lew - A La Rechèrche De B., Minimal Compact - Bat-Yam

Adam Lucas aka Hanksy on His Recent Venture at the Historic Essex Street Market on Manhattan’s Lower East Side

"This past weekend, the now-abandoned Essex Street Market at 140 Essex was the site of Market Surplus, an exhibit featuring ten huge striking murals in a range of styles — from meticulously rendered photorealistic to brightly colored expressionistic. Largely site-specific, they were the perfect homage to a soon-to-be-demolished historic Lower East Side building. While visiting late Sunday afternoon, I had the opportunity to pose a few questions to its curator, Adam Lucas aka Hanksy. ..."
Street Art NYC

2017 Tour de France

Wikipedia - "The 2017 Tour de France will be the 104th edition of the Tour de France, one of cycling's Grand Tours. The race will begin with an individual time trial in Düsseldorf on 1 July, and conclude with the Champs-Élysées stage in Paris on 23 July 2017. A total of 198 riders from 22 teams will enter the race. As the Tour de France is a UCI World Tour event, all eighteen UCI WorldTeams were invited automatically and obliged to enter a team in the race. ... The main pre-race favorites are Chris Froome, Richie Porte, Nairo Quintana and Alberto Contador. ... The top-ranked sprinters are Peter Sagan, Mark Cavendish, Marcel Kittel, André Greipel, John Degenkolb, Alexander Kristoff and Arnaud Démare. ..."
Wikipedia
Cycling News (Video)
Tour de France 2017: 5 key stages
Steephill (Video)
Guardian (Video)
BBC: Stage-by-stage guide (Video)
Le Tour 2017
Telegraph
Cycling Stage - Route and stages

Stage 9: Nantua to Chambéry (181km)

2008 July: Tour de France 2008, 2009 July: Tour de France 2009, 2010 July: Tour de France 2010,  2011 July: Tour de France 2011, 2012 July: 2012 Tour de France, 2015 July: 2015 Tour de France, 2015 July: Tour de France 2015: Team Time Trial Win Bolsters American’s Shot at Podium, 2015 July: Tour de France: Chris Froome completes historic British win, 2016 July: 2016 Tour de France.

Fred Frith - Field Days (The Amanda Loops) (2015)

"14 pieces originally written for dance and other practical situations, here reassigned and reconstructed for choreographer Amanda Miller and the Nederland Dans Theater. These are loop-based, textural, mood pieces, and invocations of spaces and landscapes, with some fine steel guitar playing. Mostly this is Fred multi-instrumenting, with pianist Daan Vanderwalle, percussionist Willie Wynant, saxophonist Lotte Anker, the Arte Sax and Arditti Quartets, Kiku Day (playing occasional shakuhachi), and violinist/nykelharpist Karla Kihlstedt. Hit from the show: Desert Sundown. Field Days is an exploration of the past--in this case Fred's past as a composer of music for dance. Using music originally composed for choreographer Amanda Miller, and working with her and long-time studio collaborator Myles Boisen, Fred created a vast number of loops of all shapes and sizes, and used them as the setting for additional material that was also largely drawn from pre-existing recordings of other works. Fred then added bottleneck guitar to some of the pieces to provide a certain sonic continuity."
Forced Exposure
W - Field Days (The Amanda Loops)
YouTube: Field Days 14 videos

Matisse: The Joy of Things - Claire Messud

Vase of Flowers, 1924
"Daily, I slice bread with my maternal grandmother’s bread knife. Neither beautiful nor valuable—its handle scored white melamine, its wide serrations still sharp—it connects me to my mother’s hands (that used this knife) and to my grandmother’s hands (smaller than my mother’s, arthritic already when I was born); to my grandmother’s kitchen, beloved in my childhood; and to the long-ago morning light that filtered through the sunroom into that kitchen, in a long-sold house, in a far-off city. All this is present when I take it up and tackle a loaf. No other knife will do. Matisse, unsurprisingly, had similar feelings about the objects of his daily life. They delighted, inspired, or confounded him, in their humble ordinariness and in all that they evoked: a chocolate pot, a green glass vase, a pewter jug, embroidered hanging cloths (haitis) from North Africa, masks and figurines from sub-Saharan Africa, a brazier, a marquetry coffee table, a low-slung chair. ..."
NYBooks

2011 December: Gauguin Tahiti, 2012 May: Gauguin, Cézanne, Matisse: Visions of Arcadia, 2014 May: Gauguin: Metamorphoses, 2015 April: Van Gogh, Manet, and Matisse: The Art of the Flower, 2016 April: Painting the Modern Garden: Monet to Matisse, 2017 May: Matisse in the Studio.

"Teenage Kicks" - The Undertones (1978)

Wikipedia - "'Teenage Kicks' was the debut single for Northern Irish punk rock/new wave band The Undertones. Written in the summer of 1977 by the band's principal songwriter, John O'Neill, the song was recorded on 16 June 1978 and initially released that September upon independent Belfast record label Good Vibrations, before the band—at the time unobligated to any record label—signed to Sire Records on 2 October 1978. Sire Records subsequently obtained all copyrights to the material released upon the Teenage Kicks EP and the song was re-released as a standard vinyl single upon Sire's own label on 14 October that year, reaching number 31 in the UK Singles Chart two weeks after its release. ..."
Wikipedia
YouTube: "Teenage Kicks"

A Parable for the Distance Between Language and Truth

The Parable of the Blind, 1568
"In 1951, the writer Gert Hofmann, who was then twenty years old, fled the German Democratic Republic for West Germany. Ten years later, he left Germany altogether and found work teaching literature at universities in the United States and Europe. He also started writing radio plays. He was prolific, writing some thirty plays in as many years. Hofmann’s plays, produced mainly by West German public broadcasters, focus on the grim realities of Nazi Germany, the Second World War, and its aftermath. They are formally wide-ranging and often hinge on the murky relationship between language and reality. ... He continued writing for radio, sometimes transforming those plays into prose and sometimes adapting prose for radio, exploring the interplay of narrative and dialogue. His slim comic novel Der Blindensturz, first published in Germany in 1985, and translated into English by Christopher Middleton, in 1989, as 'The Parable of the Blind,' reads like the culmination of this work. It is told solely through dialogue and sets the reader adrift amid unreliable accounts. ..."
New Yorker

2010 May: Peasant, 2011 March: "The Harvesters", Pieter Bruegel the Elder, 2012 February: The Mill and the Cross - Lech Majewski, 2012 December: The Lord of Misrule and the Feast of Fools., 2013 July: Netherlandish Proverbs, 2014 August: Children's Games (1560), 2016 May: The Hunters in the Snow (1565).

James Blood Ulmer solo live @ Skopje Jazz Festival 2015

"... What followed for four consecutive nights was a firm confirmation of the festival's direction to build a strong program characterized by diversity and maverick artists rather than associate itself with an image of a typical jazz festival and a strict cast of profiles each year. The honor of opening the festival belonged to guitarist James Blood Ulmer and his unique take on the blues. In his hands the blues became simultaneously avant-garde and traditional. Well-versed in the harmolodic approach, the songs sounded far from the played—to -death kind of approach to the blues. Sang with a sly, husky, raw voice, the songs sparkled with many little ideas and harmonies, and he only referenced the blues along the way. The overall feeling was of warmth and as he was strumming his bright yellow guitar waves of warmth and feel-good feelings seemed to spread all over the hall. ..."
All About Jazz
YouTube: solo live @ Skopje Jazz Festival 2015

2015 November: Prime Time (1981), 2016 September: Black Rock (1982), 2017 May: Are You Glad to Be in America? (1980)

The Downtown Show: The New York Art Scene, 1974-1984

"First, let’s get the nostalgia out of the way. Sure, the bands were great, and if you were lucky enough to play in one, the clothes were great too. But if the young, wild, and barely employed could afford to live, make art, and party hard between Canal and 14th Streets in the mid- to late-seventies, it was for the same socio-economic reasons that govern affordability, or the lack of it, anywhere. Except for a few oases like the Ukrainian enclave around East 6th Street, the area that spawned the Downtown scene was blighted by poverty, unemployment, drugs, prostitution, homelessness, arson, and street crime; or it was simply bleak. New York City itself seemed a place without a future, battered by blackouts, riots, serial killings, and the onset of AIDS. The migration of industrial jobs to low-wage regions of the South and the subsequent flight of its middle and working classes eroded the city’s tax base and, coupled with the collapse of the financial markets, catapulted it toward bankruptcy. ..."
Brooklyn Rail
ArtForum: Scene Spirit
NY Times: The Downtown Scene, When It Was Still Dirty
Austin Chronicle
amazon

Ahmed Malek and Other Treasures From Habibi Funk’s North African Crate - Digging Expeditions

Jannis Stuertz of Habibi Funk Records
"Though Algerian composer Ahmed Malek was an established musician in his country—he passed away in 2008—and also the long-time conductor of the Algerian Television Orchestra, his music had largely been condemned to obscurity. Getting it back on wax has taken a bit of persistence. On May 14th, the Berlin-based imprint Habibi Funk will release Musique Original De Films, a collection of Malek’s film music. Written during the ’70s, the music has stylistic parallels to popular soundtracks of the era, particularly the work of Italian composer and spaghetti-western maestro Ennio Morricone. Yet it is also very much a product of North Africa. The songs are moody and slightly melancholy, but also surprisingly groovy. They fuse Arabic melodies and jazz harmonies with Latin-style rhythms and the odd scrap of psychedelia. ..."
Handcamp (Audio)
Discogs
Habibi 003: Ahmed Malek by Musique Originale De Films (Audio)
Soundcloud: Men Awel Deqiqa, Ebda' Men Gedid, Sah
YouTube: La ville, Maya, Halla, La Silence Des Cendres

White Material - Claire Denis (2009)

"... Denis’ most recent feature, White Material (2009), continues the director’s preoccupation with sound. Sparse in dialogue (save for explanatory purposes), the film also has a very spare musical soundtrack save for its theme, composed by long-time musical collaborator Stuart Staples from Tindersticks. Instead, the film relies heavily on diegetic sound to explore and imply moods and feelings, and most importantly to enhance the difficult and complex processes of the creation of the self. In White Material Denis follows the personal journey of Maria Vial (Isabelle Huppert), a coffee plantation boss in an unnamed French-African colony during the last days of colonial rule. As the film unfolds, we witness Maria’s struggle to retain her belief that while the country may not be her true home, she is accepted there. ..."
senses of cinema
Filmmaking
Wikipedia
Slant Magazine
Criterion - Video
Roger Ebert
NY Times: The 25 Best Films of the 21st Century. So Far.
YouTube: White Material | trailer

2009 September: Claire Denis, 2013 October: Claire Denis Dialogue with Eric Hynes

Their Satanic Majesties Request - Rolling Stones (1967)

Wikipedia - "Their Satanic Majesties Request is the sixth British and eighth American studio album by the Rolling Stones, released in December 1967 by Decca Records in the United Kingdom and London Records in the United States. Recording sessions saw the band experimenting widely with a psychedelic sound in the studio, incorporating unconventional instruments, sound effects, string arrangements, and African rhythms. The album's title is a play on the 'Her Britannic Majesty requests and requires ...' text that appears inside a British passport. ... Following the album's release, the Rolling Stones abandoned their psychedelic style for a stripped-down return to their roots in blues music. ... The Stones experimented with many new instruments and sound effects during the sessions, including Mellotron, theremin, short wave radio static, and string arrangements by John Paul Jones. ..."
Wikipedia
11 East 14th Street
Psyched Master
allmusic
Genius
amazon: Their Satanic Majesties Request
YouTube: Sing This All Together, Citadel, In Another Land (Original Single Mono Version), 2000 Man, Sing This All Together (See What Happens), She's A Rainbow (Original Single Mono Version), The Lantern (Original Single Mono Version), Gomper, 2000 Light Years From Home (Original Single Mono Version), On With The Show
YouTube: Psychedelic-2000 light years from home (Live), In Another Land - Clips taken from Kenneth Anger's "Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome", Acid In The Grass Brian on Harp 1967
YouTube: Sing This All Together - Satanic sessions, Majesties Honky Tonk (instrumental 1967), The Lantern (instrumental 1967), She's A Rainbow (instrumental 1967) Nicky Hopkins, In Another Land (instrumental 1967 v1), Child Of The Moon (instrumental v2) Nicky Hopkins, 2000 Light Years (instrumental v1)

2015 August: Exile on Main Street (1972), 2015 October: "Let's Spend the Night Together" / "Ruby Tuesday" (1967), 2015 December: Brian Jones Presents the Pipes of Pan at Joujouka (1971), 2016 January: Some Girls (1978), 2016 January: The Rolling Stones (EP), 2016 March: Five by Five (EP - 1964), 2016 May: "The Rolling Stones: Charlie Is My Darling — Ireland 1965", 2016 December: Singles Collection: The London Years (1989)

Saving Queens’ Secret Wetlands

Asters grow around the old reservoir.
"One early-March afternoon in 2007, Rob Jett climbed through a hole in a chain-link fence and thought he had entered a lost world. He and two fellow bird-watchers rappelled into a dense swamp forest of birch and sweetgum, mosses and lichens. They were standing in ankle-deep water in the west basin of the 160-year-old Ridgewood Reservoir, the last vestige of Brooklyn’s old waterworks, smack on the border of Brooklyn and Queens. Inside this wilderness, the sounds of the city faded away above the reservoir’s stone levees. ... Jett, 61, had never seen a place like it, even though he had grown up only two miles away and for years had been writing about bird-watching throughout the city. The reservoir was once important to the growth of Brooklyn as it became one of the largest cities in the country. ..."
Voice
Following Hook Creek Through Ghost Towns and Wetlands
The Nature Conservancy: New York - Protecting Wetlands and Marshes
NY Times: Come On In, the Swamp Is Fine; Wetland Beauty Restored, Just Off Flatbush Avenue (Aug. 24, 2000)
[PDF] Wetlands Strategy

Kensinger Hook Creek. Located just across Rockaway Boulevard.

The CIA Reads French Theory: On the Intellectual Labor of Dismantling the Cultural Left

"It is often presumed that intellectuals have little or no political power. Perched in a privileged ivory tower, disconnected from the real world, embroiled in meaningless academic debates over specialized minutia, or floating in the abstruse clouds of high-minded theory, intellectuals are frequently portrayed as not only cut off from political reality but as incapable of having any meaningful impact on it. The Central Intelligence Agency thinks otherwise. ... For in an intriguing research paper written in 1985, and recently released with minor redactions through the Freedom of Information Act, the CIA reveals that its operatives have been studying the complex, international trend-setting French theory affiliated with the names of Michel Foucault, Jacques Lacan and Roland Barthes. ..."
The Philosophical Salon

2010 March: Roland Barthes, 2011 June: Gaston Bachelard, 2012 October: Hervé Guibert, 2014 March: Semiotext(e), 2014 November: What Is Schizo-Culture? A Classic Conversation with William S. Burroughs, 2016 December: Can We Criticize Foucault?

Gonzo journalism

Wikipedia - "Gonzo journalism is a style of journalism that is written without claims of objectivity, often including the reporter as part of the story via a first-person narrative. The word 'gonzo' is believed to have been first used in 1970 to describe an article by Hunter S. Thompson, who later popularized the style. It is an energetic first-person participatory writing style in which the author is a protagonist, and it draws its power from a combination of social critique and self-satire. It has since been applied to other subjective artistic endeavors. Gonzo journalism involves an approach to accuracy that concerns the reporting of personal experiences and emotions, in contrast to traditional journalism, which favors a detached style and relies on facts or quotations that can be verified by third parties. Gonzo journalism disregards the strictly-edited product favored by newspaper media and strives for a more personal approach; the personality of a piece is as important as the event or actual subject of the piece. Use of sarcasm, humor, exaggeration, and profanity is common. ..."
Wikipedia
Open Culture - How Hunter S. Thompson Gave Birth to Gonzo Journalism: Short Film Revisits Thompson’s Seminal 1970 Piece on the Kentucky Derby (Video)
The Atlantic - Before Gonzo: Hunter S. Thompson's Early, Underrated Journalism Career
Guardian: Why gonzo journalism is crucial to our understanding of cities and their tribes

The "Gonzo fist", characterized by two thumbs and four fingers holding a peyote button, was originally used in Hunter S. Thompson's 1970 campaign for sheriff of Aspen, Colorado.

"I Need Your Loving" - Donald Gardner & Dee Dee Ford (1962)

Wikipedia - "Donald Gardner (born May 9, 1931) is an American rhythm and blues singer, songwriter, and drummer. His records included the 1962 pop hit 'I Need Your Loving', with Dee Dee Ford. ... When the Sonotones played at the Smalls Paradise club in Harlem, New York, they were heard by blues performer Arthur Crudup, who recommended them to the Fire record label owner Bobby Robinson. He produced a song written by Gardner, 'I Need Your Loving' (also known as 'Need Your Lovin'), a 'gospel-drenched', call-and-response number in the mold of Ike & Tina Turner, and the song became their biggest hit, rising to number 4 on the Billboard R&B chart in 1962 and number 20 on the pop chart. ..."
Wikipedia
YouTube: "I Need Your Loving"

Painter Among Poets: The Collaborative Art of George Schneeman

Rita Hayworth's Theory (with Ron Padgett)
"Painter Among Poets: The Collaborative Art of George Schneeman is the first retrospective presentation of the wide range of artworks that Schneeman has created with poets over the past thirty-five years. It not only investigates Schneeman's enthusiasm for free-wheeling collaboration, but also considers his work as part of the remarkable modernist tradition of poet/painter collaboration. Always open to spontaneity and engagement, Schneeman encourages poets to contribute visual elements in order to create surprising works that neither artist nor poet could have done alone. Painter Among Poets offers a behind-the-scenes look at the high-wire process of collaboration as an outgrowth of Schneeman's friendship with poets Bill Berkson, Ted Berrigan, Michael Brownstein, Tom Clark, Edwin Denby, Larry Fagin, Dick Gallup, Allen Ginsberg, Ted Greenwald, Steve Katz, Lewis MacAdams, Alice Notley, Ron Padgett, Harris Schiff, Peter Schjeldahl, Tom Veitch, Anne Waldman, Lewis Warsh, and many others. ..." - Ron Padgett
Granary Books
George Schneeman: Collages
[PDF] A Painter and His Poets: The Art of George Schneeman - Poets House

Bob Dylan Plays First Live Performance of “Hurricane,” His Song Defending Rubin “Hurricane” Carter (RIP) in 1975

"This weekend, Rubin 'Hurricane' Carter passed away. He was 76. An American middleweight boxer, Carter was tried and convicted twice (once 1967, again in 1976) for homicides that took place in Paterson, New Jersey in 1966 -- despite the fact that there were no finger prints or eyewitnesses connecting him to the crime. (Both convictions were later overturned when courts found that the trials were tainted by prosecutorial misconduct.) ... He's backed by Scarlet Rivera on violin, Rob Stoner on bass, and Howie Wyeth on drums. It was apparently Dylan's first live performance of the eight minute song. ..."
Open Culture (Video)
W - “Hurricane”
NY Daily - ‘Hurricane’: For Bob Dylan, Rubin Carter fight was personal
“Hurricane” (Written by: Bob Dylan and Jacques Levy)