Richard Skelton’s Newest Ambient Works Are Inspired by 19th Century Magical Medicine

 

“For many years Richard Skelton has explored the natural world through sound. Ambient compositions that reflect nature often conjure up associations of soothing serenity, with the immersive soundscapes acting as the peaceful bliss and idyllic beauty of stretching landscapes. However, Skelton plunges deeper than this, exploring his own personal relationship and history to specific places, as well as the raging contradictions of nature, channelling its harshness and unforgiving unpredictability alongside its staggering splendor.In the early days Skelton never intended his music to be performed for, or heard by, anyone. His audience was the same as his inspiration: nature. ...”

bandcamp (Audio)

W - Richard Skelton

Articulate Silences interview with ambient/modern classical (Audio/Video)

Discogs

YouTube: River Song, Of the Sea, Noon Hill Wood, Threads Across The River

​See Reopening Plans and Mask Mandates for All 50 States

 

“All across the country, mask mandates are easing, restrictions are lifting and many states have gone back to business as usual. It appears much of the country will be open with few restrictions in the coming months. Throughout the coronavirus pandemic, it has been largely up to state and local officials to determine what restrictions, if any, to impose to slow new infections. A nationwide patchwork of rules for businesses and residents resulted over months of trial and error, as governors reopened some sectors only to later re-close and reopen them again as infection rates rose and fell. ...”

NY Times

​Pina Bausch Magazine

 

“A conceptual magazine spread detailing the life and career of ballerina, modern dancer, and choreographer Pina Bausch. The brushed type treatment is a nod to her own style, which created motifs of rapid movement, disorientation, and distress through dance.  The text is taken from the biography published to her webpage. The cover design is inspired by ArtForum's styling. Typefaces used are Avenir Next, Bratz, and Baskerville. ...”

Caitlin Stamper

ARTFORUM: The Auto-Representation of Pina Bausch (February 1984)

​The Pleasures of Destroying a Good Book

 

“It is a sin, she said, to damage the spine. My elementary school librarian showed us a cracked book. The creases and wrinkles looked like an exposed skeleton. After her elegiac presentation, we were sent to the stacks to find books. I handled them with more fear than care. When I got the nerve to peek inside, I eased open the pages as if each text would crumble to dust. My librarian had good reason for her method: she had to preserve books for years of students. Unfortunately, her warnings made me think that books were meant only to be borrowed. As a reader, I want to inhabit a book as a form of communion. Most books took years to write—and likely a few more years to rewrite. They deserve more than a single read before being consigned to silent prison among their cousins of other genres on untouched bookshelves. Some books become part of my weekly, daily life. Those books are inevitably flattened on my desk. Dog-eared. Highlighted. Circled. ...”

LitHub

amazon: Best American Short Stories 1983, Anne Tyler

​Beautiful Garbage

 

Talking Heads

“Beautiful Garbage is a journey through one of America’s most revered and impactful genres. Moving from the four cornerstones: TheMC5, The Velvet Underground, The Stooges, and The New York Dolls; to Punk’s birthplace in New York at CBGB; and finally to England, where The Sex Pistols propelled it to worldwide recognition before imploding and leaving us with The Clash and asking ‘what is punk?’ Written and hosted by Kevin Hogan, Beautiful Garbage shares the quest for that answer and the stories we found in the archives, told by those who lived them. Stories about innovations in sound and style, technological breakthroughs, and the sociopolitical factors that produced the punk aesthetic and its indelible mark on popular music and culture. ...”

Osiris Pod (Audio)

Dangerous Visions - Harlan Ellison (1967 - Editor)

 

“Dangerous Visions is a science fiction short story anthology edited by American writer Harlan Ellison and illustrated by Leo and Diane Dillon. It was published in 1967. A path-breaking collection, Dangerous Visions helped define the New Wave science fiction movement, particularly in its depiction of sex in science fiction. Writer/editor Al Sarrantonio writes how Dangerous Visions 'almost single-handedly [...] changed the way readers thought about science fiction.' Contributors to the volume included 20 authors who had won, or would win, a Hugo, Nebula, World Fantasy, or BSFA award, and 16 with multiple such awards. Ellison introduced the anthology both collectively and individually while authors provided afterwords to their own stories. ...”

Wikipedia

A Look Back at Harlan Ellison's Dangerous Visions by Ted Gioia

[PDF] Dangerous Visions

amazon

A guide to New York City through the 10 best movie locations

 

“I have never been to New York. I do not regret it, however, as there are certain locations that seem almost magical in your dreams. As soon I hear the words ‘New York’, the first image that comes to my mind is people clad in crisp business suits, talking on their phones, rushing to commute to their workplaces. New York is the city of dreams, a city where commerce and art make love together, and a city that never sleeps. With a variety of people cohabiting the city together, it is a land of urban surrealism. Amidst the neon signs, the hustle and bustle of city life and the posh, swanky skyscrapers that make your existence seem nearly negligible, the city hides the dark underbelly which reeks of crime, violence and homelessness. Of course, this juxtaposition is arguably a key factor in what makes the city so fascinating; the constant dichotomy and the ever-widening gap between wealth and poverty. New York is full of surprises, turmoils, violence and love, and nobody is complaining.  ...”

FAR OUT (Video)

 

Taxi Driver 1976.

​Money, Power, and Respect at the Champions League Final

 

“The grand spectacle is almost upon us. Real Madrid, the great but ancient empire of European soccer, have been swept aside for now; Paris Saint-Germain, the fast-rising upstart, have faltered in their ascent. As Chelsea and Manchester City, their respective conquerors, prepare to contest the third men’s UEFA Champions League final between two English teams, there is a sense that they are announcing another next great rivalry. ... Now, Foden has been coached by Pep Guardiola for only a few seasons. Yet he is such an accurate embodiment of the Spaniard’s footballing philosophy—tactically versatile, endlessly fluid in his movement—that he seems to have been working with him since he was able to walk. ... Both should be leading figures for their club for several seasons to come. ...”

The Ringer (Audio) 59:24

Just Coolin' - Lester Young

 

“Lester Young was one of the most influential saxophonists of the swing era. His light, airy sound, and the melodic grace of his improvisations were in direct contrast to Hawkins's gruffer, more harmonically-based approach. Young's velvety tone and rapid articulation were major influences on the bebop generation of saxophonists that followed, notably Charlie Parker. Lester Young was one of the true jazz giants, a tenor saxophonist who came up with a completely different conception in which to play his horn, floating over bar lines with a light tone rather than adopting Coleman Hawkins' then-dominant forceful approach. A non-conformist, Young (nicknamed ‘Pres’ by Billie Holiday) had the ironic experience in the 1950s of hearing many young tenors try to sound exactly like him. ...”

moochin about (Audio)

2017 July: In Washington (1956), 2018 August: The Jazz Giants '56 (1956), 2019 March: Lester Young - March 15, 1959

​Night sky

 

The Milky Way is brighter in the Southern Hemisphere than in the North. 

“The term night sky, usually associated with astronomy from Earth, refers to the nighttime appearance of celestial objects like stars, planets, and the Moon, which are visible in a clear sky between sunset and sunrise, when the Sun is below the horizon. Natural light sources in a night sky include moonlight, starlight, and airglow, depending on location and timing. Aurorae light up the skies above the polar circles. ... The night sky and studies of it have a historical place in both ancient and modern cultures. In the past, for instance, farmers have used the status of the night sky as a calendar to determine when to plant crops. Many cultures have drawn constellations between stars in the sky, using them in association with legends and mythology about their deities. ...”

W - Night sky

Night Sky Planner

W - Sky & Telescope, W - Astronomy

 

The Flammarion engraving, Paris 1888

Greg Jager and a Roman Basketball Court: “Tiber Courtyard”

 

“The sheer number of painted basketball courts that we see in the last two years makes us think there may be an evolving new category of art practice somewhere between street art, land art, billboard takeovers, and municipal public art. Clearly, a coffee table book will arrive here shortly. Today we have a new project in ‘Valco San Paolo’ by Greg Jager. The press release describes the design challenges of creating something for a population that lives on a tract of land that is ‘not a real neighborhood, not a suburb, not even a victim of that phenomenon that some have called beautification.’ ...”

Brooklyn Street Art

Tiber Courtyard by Greg Jager

Makaya McCraven ‎– In The Moment (2015)

 

“Makaya McCraven‘s breakthrough debut album In The Moment captured 48 hours of live, improvised performances from McCraven and company. It was recorded at 1 venue over 12 months and 28 shows. The edited, remixed, and final product ended up displaying one of the most important recordings to date in the modern jazz world.The feeling still organic and never too far removed from the source material, the impressive, virtuosic playing reaches Sun Ra levels of hypnotic transmissions that keeps the listener fully engulfed in the spiritual plane. ...”

#vinyloftheday

Discogs (Video)

amazon

YouTube: In the Moment Deluxe Edition ((FULL ALBUM)) 1:53:44

The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967 - Hunter S. Thompson

 

“One thing that this collection of letters makes clear at the outset is that Hunter S. Thompson, he of the 'Fear and Loathing' books, for whom the phrase ''gonzo journalist'' was invented, has always burned to carve his initials onto the collective awareness. ... It is noteworthy that although just one in seven of the relevant cache of letters was included, this book, labeled 'The Fear and Loathing Letters, Volume I,' weighs in at just under 700 pages -- and there are still 30 more years to go. Even some of the photographs of Mr. Thompson were taken by the author himself, self-portraits of the writer at work and at play. Manifestly, this is a man who, while anti-snobbish to a fault, abusively contemptuous of self-promotion and pretension, had a powerful need to make a record of himself and to make that record public.  ...”

NY Times: Letters of the Young Author (He Saved Them All)

Google: The Proud Highway...

amazon

2014 April: Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas | Nov 11, 1971, 2017 June: Gonzo journalism

Love of a Woman (Horace Andy, Dillinger, Patrick Andy) etc.

 

“Horace Andy possesses one of the truly immortal voices of reggae -- a reedy tenor that cuts effortlessly through the mix and has influenced countless other reggae singers. He began recording as a teenager, and his voice and delivery have actually changed little since those early days, when he was cranking out hits for producer Clement ‘Coxsone’ Dodd at the great Studio One label. ...”

YouTube: Love of a Woman (Horace Andy, Dillinger, Patrick Andy) 17:59, Only A Smile (Paragons, John Holt, Dennis Brown, Gregory Isaacs, Big Youth) 20:23, Swing Easy (Soul Vendors, Augustus Pablo) 27:22

Reclaiming Africa’s Early Post-Independence History

A History of Resource Plunder

“This article is part of the ‘Reclaiming Africa’s Early Post-Independence History‘ series from Post-Colonialisms Today (PCT), a research and advocacy project of activist-intellectuals on the continent, working to recapture progressive thought and policies from early post-independence Africa to address contemporary development challenges. It is adapted from a recent webinar on natural resource sovereignty which you can listen to here. Sign up for updates on the project here. ...”

Africa Is a Country

Post-Colonialisms Today (Video)

YouTube: Post-Colonialisms Today   21 videos

Reclaiming Africa’s Early Post-Independence History

Accra Central, Ghana, 2019.

​Jean Dubuffet: Brutal Beauty

 

“Jean Dubuffet: Brutal Beauty is the first major UK exhibition of the work of French artist Jean Dubuffet (1901–1985) in over 50 years. One of the most provocative voices in postwar modern art, Dubuffet rebelled against conventional ideas of beauty, hoping to capture the poetry of everyday life in a gritty, more authentic way. Drawn from international public and private collections, Brutal Beauty brings together more than 150 works: from early portraits, lithographs and fantastical statues to enamel paintings, butterfly assemblages and giant colourful canvases. It opens at Barbican Art Gallery on 17 May 2021. ...”

Barbican

Dubuffet Architecte

Guardian - Jean Dubuffet: impish master of perpetual reinvention

amazon

2018 February: Jean Dubuffet

Jean Dubuffet sculpts a block of polystyrene with a hot wire in his studio on rue Labrouste

Lea Bertucci ~ A Visible Length Of Light (2020)

 

“Few images unmistakably capture the American West more than the image on the front cover of Lea Bertucci’s new album, even if this one has been vividly colourised. Sure, there are more distinct rock formations such as the Arches (in the same state) but for many, this is the USA – the remote, inhospitable, desert lands of Utah that served as a background for any number of Westerns that we grew up watching. A monochrome version of the picture could double for an Ansel Adams photograph, images that introduced the natural beauty of the States to a national and international audience. ...”

a closer listen (Audio)

Bandcamp (Video/Audio)

Lea Bertucci (Video/Audio), About | Contact

Rosa Luxemburg - Margarethe von Trotta (1986)

 

“In this moving biopic, Rosa Luxemburg emerges as a vibrant, sensual, intellectually brilliant, morally and physically courageous woman, whose legacy proves timeless, writes Tom Lock Griffiths. Rosa Luxemburg (1986), directed by German filmmaker Margarethe von Trotta, (who’s The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum is probably her best known film in the UK), is a biopic of the Polish-Jewish Marxist who worked tirelessly with the German Social Democratic Party (SPD), for peace, internationalism and the revolution. The film focuses on the period 1900-1919 the year of her assassination by the proto-fascist Freikorps, who were brutalised far-right ex-servicemen, many of whom would become the founders of The National Socialist Party. ...”

Rosa Luxemburg, von Trotta's 1986 film, receives digital restoration - review

W - Rosa Luxemburg (film), W - Rosa Luxemburg

Moments that Define A Century – Political Crossroads in Margarethe von Trotta’s Rosa Luxemburgt

Margarethe von Trotta on telling the story of Germany through the eyes of women

NY Times: 'ROSA LUXEMBURG,' NEW LIGHT ON EARLY LEFTIST - Vincent Canby (May 1, 1987)

Criterion

YouTube: Rosa Luxemburg - Trailers

2013 December: Hannah Arendt (2013), 2019 September: The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum - Heinrich Böll (1974)

 

Margarethe von Trotta

Lost in the Stars: The Music of Kurt Weill (1985)

 

“Not to be confused with Sony's 1997 soundtrack release, September Songs: The Music of Kurt Weill, which was inspired by this 1985 CD on A&M, and co-produced by visionary Hal Willner, Lost in the Stars: The Music of Kurt Weill indeed contains the ‘eclectic updates of Kurt Weill's distinctive German theater music’ with help from Sting, Marianne Faithfull, John Zorn, Lou Reed, Carla Bley, Tom Waits, Charlie Haden, and more. This deep and complex work contains a 12-page booklet chock-full of information condensed into tiny, tiny print. Did the onset of compact discs hold this elaborate project back? ...”

allmusic (Audio)

W - Lost in the Stars: The Music of Kurt Weill

Discogs (Video)

amazon

YouTube: Lost in the Stars: The Music of Kurt Weill    1:07:28

2009 December: Kurt Weill & Bertolt Brecht, 2011 August: W - Communards’ Wall 1871, 2012 March: The Threepenny Opera - Bertolt Brecht, Kurt Weill, 2012 July: Supply and Demand: Songs by Brecht / Weill & Eisler - Dagmar Krause, 2013 March: Pina Bausch - "The Seven Deadly Sins", 2015 February: The Partnership: Brecht, Weill, Three Women, and Germany on the Brink, 2016 October: Lotte Lenya Sings Kurt Weill's The Seven Deadly Sins & Berlin Theater Songs (1997), 2018 December: Kalifornienträumen: Bertolt Brecht’s Los Angeles Poems and Other Sunstruck Germanic Specters

​Facebook Oversight Board Upholds Social Network’s Ban of Trump

 

Donald J. Trump was barred from Facebook on Jan. 7 after he used the site to foment an insurrection in Washington.

“A Facebook-appointed panel of journalists, activists and lawyers on Wednesday upheld the social network’s ban of former President Donald J. Trump, ending any immediate return by Mr. Trump to mainstream social media and renewing a debate about tech power over online speech.Facebook’s Oversight Board, which acts as a quasi-court over the company’s content decisions, said the social network was right to bar Mr. Trump after the insurrection in Washington in January, saying he ‘created an environment where a serious risk of violence was possible.’ The panel said the ongoing risk of violence ‘justified’ the move. ...”

NY Times

NY Times: Judge Says Barr Misled on How His Justice Dept. Viewed Trump’s Actions

amazon: The Mueller Report (April 30, 2019), The Mueller Report - Large Print Edition (July 2, 2019)

​10 Hours Sci-Fi Futuristic City Ambience.

 

“A City Where Life Never Stops. If you are looking for more sounds to relax, just have a look at my channel! I have other beautiful and quiet dreamworlds that will make you dive away from everyday life with ease. You can use the scene for relaxation, or as a support to sleep easier and deeper. If you have special suggestions for further dreamworlds, please leave a comment! Thank you very much for your support! Don't forget to subscribe to us and leave a Like. Especially in these days of the corona, I want to help people that can not easily travel or go outside or just stay positive in their mind, with our collection from different places all around the world. ...”

YouTube: 10 Hours Sci-Fi Futuristic City Ambience. ASMR Ambience

YouTube: Sci-Fi City Soundscapes & Ambience    32 videos

​The G.O.P. Won It All in Texas. Then It Turned on Itself.

“Early on the morning of Oct. 19, an air-conditioner repairman named David Lopez was driving his small box truck in Houston, Texas, when a black S.U.V. slammed into him from behind and forced him off the road. After the vehicles came to a stop, Lopez heard the S.U.V.’s driver scream for help. He approached the vehicle, whereupon the driver, a man named Mark Aguirre, jumped out and ordered him to the ground at gunpoint. Aguirre had been surveilling Lopez for four days, convinced that he was the mastermind of a scheme to steal the election from President Trump. Aguirre’s investigation, it would emerge, was financed by Steven Hotze, a prolific Republican donor and Houston-area physician who made his fortune via ‘wellness centers’ where he marketed ‘hormone replacement’ therapies for everything from postpartum depression to hyperthyroidism, as well as a vitamin product called My HotzePak Skinny Pak. Hotze, 70, has long been prominent among the religious right for his opposition to gay rights. During the unrest following George Floyd’s death, he left a voice mail message for Gov. Greg Abbott’s chief of staff, urging him to authorize the Texas National Guard to ‘shoot to kill’ rioters. ...”

NY Times (Audio) 52:40

​How the Clash Embraced New York’s Hip Hop Scene and Released the Dance Track, “The Magnificent Dance” (1981)

 

“... The slogan stuck and has become something more than marketing hype. Of the slew of British punk bands who made their way to the US in the late 1970s/early 1980s, the Clash had more impact than most others in some unexpected ways. ... Moreover, godfathers of political rap Public Enemy found their catalyst in the Clash, and went on to create a raucous, militant sound that was the punk equivalent in hip hop, full of snarling guitars, strident declarations and sirens. ...”

Open Culture (Video)

W - “The Magnificent Seven” (song)

An Oral History of The Clash’s “The Magnificent Seven” (Video)

​The “romantic reality” of midcentury Village street scenes

 

“Can you feel it? Right now, New York has a vitality that went into a dark sleep in early 2020. People are out on the sidewalks performing the rituals of urban living; the city is emerging dynamic and alive. What New Yorkers are feeling this spring is hard to describe—but Alfred Mira captures it perfectly in his paintings. Born in Italy in 1900, Mira made his home in Greenwich Village and supported himself as an artist. His seemingly ordinary street scenes—like this two above of Seventh Avenue South and then a rainy Greenwich Avenue in the 1940s, or below of Washington Square Park in 1930—pulse with New York’s unique excitement and passion. ...”

Ephemeral New York

2015 September: The Greenwich Village vision of artist Alfred Mira, May 2020: The painter who captured the soul of New York

​When the Goals Come Out of Nowhere

 

“Giorgos Giakoumakis had never scored goals. Not in great numbers, anyway. He had played 22 games, spread across three seasons, before he finally managed a single one for his first club, a team of modest ambitions and close horizons called Platanias, based on his home island, Crete. In the early stages of his career, he broke into double figures for a single campaign only once, mustering 11 goals in his final season at Platanias. It appeared, at the time, to be his breakthrough. That summer, he moved to A.E.K. Athens, one of the three powers that dominate the Greek capital. ...”

NY Times (Video)

W - Giorgos Giakoumakis

YouTube: Georgios Giakoumakis DESTROYING Great Players

A Woman Under the Influence - John Cassavetes (1974)

 

“When Gena Rowlands, his wife, expressed her interest in appearing in a play about the difficulties that contemporary women had to face, John Cassavetes wrote a script so emotionally profound and exhausting Rowlands immediately understood it would be too much for her to perform it eight times a week. Cassavetes turned the play into a screenplay for the big screen, but A Woman Under the Influence was too much for Hollywood studios and producers to swallow. Nobody wants to see a crazy, middle-aged dame, they said. Luckily enough, both for Cassavetes and for all of us in the audience, the filmmaking couple had a lot of friends who fell in love with the powerful script and who were willing to chip in and even become a part of the project. Peter Falk provided half a million dollars of his own money just so he could watch his friend’s impressive vision turn into a movie. ...”

‘A Woman Under the Influence’: Cassavetes’ Intense and Emotionally Exhausting Slice of Life (Video)

Criterion - A Woman Under the Influence: The War at Home

W - A Woman Under the Influence

11 Influential Facts About A Woman Under the Influence

YouTube: A woman under the influence. Gena Rowlands, How we live with mental illness, John Cassavetes / Rowlands and Falk discuss „A Woman Under the Influence”

2008 September: John Cassavetes, 2010 December: Shadows (1959), 2012 February: His Life and Work, 2012 July: A Constant Forge, 2013 June: Minnie and Moskowitz, 2013 July: BAM: Cassavetes - Jul 6—Jul 31, 2013

Sign of the Times - James Harkin (2018)

 

“In Chapter Five of Caliphate, the now-debunked podcast from the New York Times, a young Canadian named Shehroze Chaudhry explains how he came to stab a man in the heart on behalf of the Islamic State. Back in 2014, Chaudhry, who went by the nom de guerre Abu Huzayfah, allegedly emptied his bank account and traveled to Syria to join the Islamic State, which assigned him to a police unit tasked with enforcing its strict interpretation of sharia law. Over the next six months, he told the Times, he killed two people on behalf of the group. Eventually, he became disillusioned and returned to Canada.The interview was recorded in a Toronto hotel room in November 2016. Asking questions in a mellifluous staccato was Rukmini Callimachi, the paper’s resident expert on the Islamic State. When Caliphate aired in 2018, it was a roaring success, drawing millions of listeners, many of whom had never read a Times article about Syria or Islamist terrorism. ...”

Harpers

NY Times: An Examination of ‘Caliphate’ (Audio) Dec. 18, 2020

2018 September: Caliphate

Reading the History of Manhattan in Its Diagrams, Maps, and Graphics

 

“From a booklet of charming Manhattan maps, probably made for readers of The Sun, sections of the city as they looked in the late 19th century. The story of New York’s Downtown-based avant-garde unfolds over a tumultuous century in a tour de force of narrative painting. ... Steven Guarnaccia updates the traditional streetscape with an overhead view of the buildings along 53rd Street that captures a slice of Midtown with a large number of Manhattan’s more recognizable postwar skyscrapers. The axonometric projections are ideal for capturing the large bulk and unusual forms of the buildings, just as the elevations used for the New York Mail and Express project almost a century earlier suited the architecture of that era. ...”

LitHub

amazon: Decoding Manhattan: Island of Diagrams, Maps, and Graphics

Steven Guarnaccia and Pentagram New York, A Walk on 53rd Street, map for the 53rd Street Association, 1987.

Art Tatum - The Art Of Jazz Piano

 

“Art Tatum (1909-56) is considered by many to be the greatest soloist in jazz history. The pianist not only could play with blinding speed but he was so harmonically advanced in the 1930s that it would take the jazz world at least 30 years to catch up with him. The documentary begins with Les Paul talking about he thought he was a good piano player but, after he heard an Art Tatum record, he immediately quit playing piano and switched to guitar. There is only a limited amount of film on Tatum and all three clips including ‘Yesterdays’ are included in the documentary. By having informative interviews about Tatum including from Dick Hyman (who is rather remarkable himself as he demonstrates several styles), Hank Jones, Eddie Barefield, Milt Hinton, Maurice Waller (Fats’ son), and Karl Tatum (Art’s son). ...”

Jazz on the Tube (Video) 51:47

2018 September: Art Tatum & Ben Webster - The Album (1956)