despair

despair
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

from the filmstrip WHAT EVERYONE SHOULD KNOW ABOUT FABRICS PART I

every building everywhere

Eric Etheridge: Ed Ruscha: Internet Search Pioneer

Shouldn't pop artist Ed Ruscha be getting some credit for A9's new block-view feature in its yellow pages. Four decades ago, Ruscha mounted a motor-driven 35mm camera on a car and drove up and down Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles making the photographs that became his 1966 book Every Building on the Sunset Strip. The accordion-fold book was a literal, deadpan rendering of, well, every building on the Sunset Strip.

Now the folks at A9 have mounted digital cameras and GPS units on SUVs to photograph every commercial building in ten cities (so far), including Los Angeles.

via things.

free florence henderson!

WSJ.com - Rock's Oldest Joke: Yelling 'Freebird!' In a Crowded Theater

Kevin Matthews is a Chicago radio personality who has exhorted his fans -- the KevHeads -- to yell 'Freebird' for years, and claims to have originated the tradition in the late 1980s, when he says he hit upon it as a way to torment Florence Henderson of 'Brady Bunch' fame, who was giving a concert.

via tuning

The History of Footwear: Rock Shoes 1956-1990

Rock Fashion

portraits by alec soth

via gallery hopper.

sway

sway
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

daily commute

daily commute
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

i can sing for miles

She opened her mouth and the Who came out

''Petra Haden Sings: The Who Sell Out." The title is mind-bogglingly accurate; this is a homemade one-woman a capella re-creation of the Who's 1967 album. Haden, the daughter of jazz bassist Charlie Haden, sings every word, every drum roll, every guitar solo, and every mock commercial, note for note, front to back.

a dyin' can o' that commodity meat

a dyin' can o' that commodity meat
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

disclaimer

disclaimer
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

hulk hogan foam hand

an ebay auction won by user "brittneymurphyfan4life". i love america.

bob o'connor

bob o'connor took this. dag.
via conscientious.

kindergarten cop it's not -- one star! in blue

kindergarten cop it's not -- one star! in blue
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

from the found footage festival.
via wfmu's beware of the blog

art

the gates
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

The gates added a layer of visual intrigue to the already pleasant view of a snow-covered Central Park at night. The best place I found to look at the gates was at the zoo entrance - the light was strong and wind ruffled the curtains. They're alright.

At the Whitney. Tim Hawkinson is a sculptor. A few years ago I saw his Uberorgan, a huge biological model gone mad constructed from parachute material and pipes that sprawled through a maze of rooms and made foghorn sounds controlled by a kind of player-piano type "computer" base. That was in a Tribeca gallery, but for this retrospective the Uberorgan is on view at the Whitney's sculpture garden.

A huge aluminum-foil hanging is cut and contoured to look like an elephant skin. A ten-foot square panel looked like a pane of shattered glass, but the patterns were made of what must have been miles of silver mylar tape arranged to look like broken glass. He can work on a smaller scale too. A tiny sculpture of a pterodactyl is one of a series made from fingernail clippings. The guy has *lots* of time on his hands (and/or patient hired assistants). I have to admire somebody who can make something constructive out of OCD.

I just didn't get Cy Twombly. There's abstraction that seems chaotic or simple but is really quite beautiful and technically accomplished - Pollock, say, looks like a mess but his stuff is so dense and dynamic. Twombly's drawings really do look like a kid's random crayon scrawlings. Really. A friend and I took a first pass through those galleries, but on our way out a tour guide was leading a group through the show and we went through again, just to hear what the hell this guy was about. He's anti-technique, anti-composition (how?!) His graffiti-like "chalkboard" paintings are about the "contamination of space," an idea I can get with. He uses bright colors to seduce - at least that's what the guide and a sympathetic fellow in the tour group said, but I think he uses the tools of seduction - splashes and streaks of color, especially a deep slutty red - to turn you off. It's like a woman applying makeup really, really badly, not just too much but in places where it doesn't belong.

Twombly's recent paintings work more like "conventional" abstract impressionism, with bright and pretty colors applied in an abstractly appealing fashion. I guess these are more seductive, but I found them less interesting - his work was more intriguing when it tried to push you away. But I'm weird like that.

trike with raisins

trike
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

the superior

the superior
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

mp3s for pleasure and for pain

whip to the beat of a jazz pianist. via show and tell (the al wilson song has been going through my head today. maybe this is why.)

mix pleasure with a different kind of pain: chipmunk drag via copy comma right (it leaves a vision of Alvin as Marlene Dietrich that will not soon wash from the brain).

for pleasure without pain, hear trains of winnipeg. via zombizi

the dukes of hazzard want YOU

seeking vice president, cmt dukes of hazzard institute

The job responsibilities for the Vice President, CMT Dukes of Hazzard Institute are:

* watch The Dukes of Hazzard every weeknight on CMT;
* know the words to The Dukes of Hazzard theme song, 'Good Ol' Boys,' written and performed on the series by the legendary Waylon Jennings;
* serve as media expert on The Dukes of Hazzard for the CMT Dukes of Hazzard Institute: must be available for TV, radio and newspaper interviews to share passion for The Dukes of Hazzard on CMT;
* write the CMT Dukes of Hazzard Institute online blog for cmt.com;
* be passionate about The Dukes of Hazzard on CMT;
* make appearances at special events such as Dukesfest 2005 in Bristol, Tenn., (June 4-5, 2005).

who among us is not passionate about the dukes?
via kittytext

how do you say "duh!" in german

Bush in Germany: With a Hush and a Whisper, Bush Drops Town Hall Meeting with Germans

During his trip to Germany on Wednesday, the main highlight of George W. Bush's trip was meant to be a 'town hall'-style meeting with average Germans. But with the German government unwilling to permit a scripted event with questions approved in advance, the White House has quietly put the event on ice. Was Bush afraid the event might focus on prickly questions about Iraq and Iran rather than the rosy future he's been touting in Europe this week?

via the washington monthly

i am horribly bored

i am horribly bored
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

feel alright

ridiculous trio play stooges

I make music that is simple, direct, but layered with subtext. I aim to bring challenges and rewards back to the listener, through subtle melody and explosive energy. Free of irony, innocence is restored, reverted to its primal state, and any further notion of style or genre is flushed away.'

via cake and polka parade

under the tuscan sun

under the tuscan sun
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

hillbilly l. supine
weeknight t. staff
myopia v. dynamica
silverfish f. checkup
earthling u. outrigger

britney

britney
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

An Early Magic Lantern in a vintage Dutch Conjuring book. (1781)
from early visual media: conjuring arts

light slams like a pound of bacon

walker evans
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

ed ruscha lecture @ national gallery of art 2/13/05

notes towards almost timely art blogging.

Ruscha drolly commented on slides of his own work and work that's inspired him.

some names are approx.

A slide of what looked like a chrome sphere on a stick was projected on the screen while we waited. Ruscha began his talk from that slide, which after the lights dimmed he id'd as the gearshift of a 1950 Ford. Contrast that with the next slide, the gearshift of a 1950 chevy - a knobbier shape painted off-white, that doesn't strike him the way the ford does. Either pic could be considered boring (Rushca's one of the inspirations for my foray into boring photography) but at the macro level they're practically abstracts.

A bottle of higgins india ink. He admired it as much for the bottle design as for the versatile substance inside it: good for fine lines, dripped into blotches, poured on so thick it cracks, etc.

Spike Jones. Ruscha was a gofer for Jones and his City Slickers when they'd come through Oklahoma. They might send him to buy a dozen eggs, which he'd bring back for Spike and Co. to hurl at each other.

Arthur Dove's 1925 abstract Goin Fishin.

Kurt Schwitters (one gripe I have with the new Moma is that some walls are hung so densely that a Schwitters collage is placed at eye-level to a giant)

A dada ink drawring by Johnannes Barguild. Ruscha admired the mystery of it - that there was no answer to the questions posed: is it a musical score? bugs at the gate? this drawring inspired his own bugs at the gate, in the form of automobile parking lot lines (a theme he'd pick up again in his photographic studies of parking lot oil stains and sundry).

Jasper Johns flag 1958 (Ruscha is a distinctly American artist, and many of his signposts, from auto design to the 20th Century Fox logo to word drawings like BABYCAKES, are very American).

Walker Evans, cars parked on a residential street. (When I saw the Ruscha and photography show at the Whitney last year, it occured to me that Ruscha was the source of banal, deadpan photography, but the lines seem to come from Walker Evans, and maybe Atget before him). For Ruscha, Evans's pictures are completed by the viewer's sensual experience, adding sound and smell (which distinguishes him from some of his odorless successors).

Edgerton's picture of a bullet going thru an apple. Made for scientific purposes but also = art.

Imperial war museum object: a bedpost? Bertelli's "Endless Mussolini." It "broke the sound barrier for me."

ANVIL! "It's American," a theme he brings up again. "It's what people ask you to carry upstairs. Endless Dumbo."

Ali by Kersh - American hero.

Clark Beyers "Barnyard Rembrandt" - painted advertisements on roofs. "never passed up a good roof."

Marilyn Reese - designed clover leaf interchange.

Lichetenstein sneakers. Showed a "total disrespect for aesthetics." "it was repulsive, then appealing, then profound - it made a convert out of me."

word paintings: BOSS HONK OOF ICE

"Course of Empire" Thos. Cole, a series of paintings that charted the rise and fall of a civilization, marked by the same mountain peak in the distance; reminds me of a sequence of drawings in CRUMB where the artist traced the devolution of a country lane into succesive layers of "progress" that ended in a horribly homogenous (yet darkly beautiful) array of chain stores and telephone wire.

zoom of fox logo as train photography: standard gas -- > zoom painting, lower left to upper right diagonal.

1850 Millet's Ophelia--> LA museum on fire: tragedy in serene setting. as opposed to Guernica, all tragedy (he didn't denigrate Picasso but that hit on why I find that the more Picasso I see the more he annoys me)

Urich - Withdrawal from Dunkirk?

clinical "little military figures ... frozen in an landscape: ENGINEER SURGICAL HYDRAULIC

broken glass - a 2-d taxidermy

organic paintings - stained moray and satin

SHE DIDN'T HAVE TO DO THAT (blood on satin)

'39 ford=elephant climbing up hill fuzziness, out of focus

AN EXHIBITION OF GASOLINE POWERED ENGINES: the light comes through a window at such a hard angle it "slams like a pound of bacon."

mountain backdrops: BLAST CURTAIN, PORCH CROP (palindromes)

paintings of ideas of things rather than things themselves.

CLARENCE JONES 1906-1987 REALLY KNEW HOW TO SHARPEN KNIVES (from dream)

redesigned US currency. Andrew Jackson's face was one of historical dignity; now he looks like he could be somebody "babbling on his cellphone in starbucks"

the perfect face of contentment: Mr. Maple.

THE END

attorney general

attorney general
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

child watching ball

the kinetic sculpture of arthur ganson.

alf (season one)

alf (season one)
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

sexy-mini-super-flower-pop-op-cola

momus writes of the strange commercial in design observer:

Eventually all advertising will seem strange. Brad Stockshot and Cindy Clipart, modelling chunky knitwear on the beach, will look like absurd freaks. The 2005 Audi A6, as sleek as an arrowhead up on that billboard, will seem as archaic as a crossbow. When the endless repetition of these images stops, when the things they're referencing are forgotten and arcane, their power to define what's normal will stop too, replaced by an intriguing quirkiness. As they slip further away from their original purpose, the distinction between these commercial images and art will start to decompose. They'll hang in museums alongside art. Their power to evoke a lost Pompeii will be just as great, sometimes greater. And they'll seem as strange as art, sometimes stranger.

lip balm babylon

Cheetos LipBalm
Originally uploaded by fortune cookie.

Bagels och lemonad is an Icelandic (?!) site that catalogues lip balms of the world. Dig the bib record:

Märke: lotta luv, Cheetos
Lukt: Cheese
Vikt: 4,2 g
Inköpsdatum: 2004-04-12
Pris: 17 kr
Inköpsställe: Claire's Boutiques, Middlesboro, USA

the hearth

the hearth
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

file magazine : a collection of unexpected photography

today's featured file.

wheels of steel and string

"sound/visual" artist kitundu's phonoharp is a turntable rigged to play strings. listen.
via music thing.

stereo kafka

vladimir creates her own viewmaster or vladmaster reels based on original stories and the works of kafka and calvino. dag. via boing boing

mp3 babylon

99 cents
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

afri rampo (tzadik recording artist), via zombizi
sunburst (ex-feelies)
gilberto gil (from his tribute to bob marley), via mangos and mandolins

playmacaque

Monkeys Pay to See Female Monkey Bottoms

A new study found that male monkeys will give up their juice rewards in order to ogle pictures of female monkey's bottoms. The way the experiment was set up, the act is akin to paying for the images, the researchers say.

whoah

saxophonist/sousaphonist james carter has recorded atribute to pavement. the first sample is pianist cyrus chestnut's "trigger cut." yow.

What is an example of industrial melanism insects?

the surprising answer.

recorded sound babylon

Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

• edible chocolate records

• jazz bagpipist rufus harley

• captain beefheart's son is french

william eggleston in the real world

I've been getting hits (thirteen to date) lately on the new Eggleston documentary, so the least I can do is share vague thoughts two weekes and counting later.

Director Michael Almereyda (HAMLET, NADJA) was there to briefly introduce the film. He said it's a rough cut, and it shows, particularly in the sound. The video footage that constitutes the bulk of the film needs a lot of audio work - so much so that Eggleston's speech is often subtitled. His sandpaper baritone, combined with a Memphis accent and less-than-ideal recording conditions, may have been rough going for some. But the titles distracted more than clarified.

The film follows Eggleston around Kentucky (where he was on assignment), Memphis (home), and other locations, over the course of several years. You see him scouting and shooting, hanging out with and sometimes arguing with friends and family; and making the odd appearance to accept an award or give a (laconic) talk. This is intercut with stills of his most famous pictures, and a framework of his career to date.

I was fascinated by shots of Eggleston at work, setting up a tripod outside a small Kentucky grocery store and shooting the rows of pastel-colored tissues that advertised the week's specials. (I think I saw a print of that one offered on eBay a few yrs ago.) I couldn't readily id. what he was shooting with. Could have been a bulk-loaded Leica, could have been some medium format rangefinder - it looked a bit unwieldly for street work. The only camera I could clearly identify was a Contax G-1.

I love the Eggleston aesthetic: finding beauty - color, composition - in the ordinary and neglected; sometimes finding tension in same. But I don't know if Almereyda has sold that aesthetic, or Eggleston the character, to a larger audience.

drum outtakes

of john bonham. not drum solos, mind you, but drum tracks - nonpareil rhythm sans excess. they take a while to load, but they of course rock.

sailing on THE RAGGED EDGE of miserable

an article in the typographic magazine Baseline led me to the 1885 ed. of the Barnhart Bros.' Pony specimen book and price list, a catalog for printers. the sample texts are wonderful concrete poems, and recall Bern Porter as well as the spam I've been getting lately:

filthy MINNESOTA alleys
(DBL. SM. PICA CLARENDON CONDENSED, $3.55)

PINCH CLEAN BABIES
LAMENTATION OF THE ESTHETICS
34 FATHER IS BALD NOW 56
(PICA VULCAN, $2.15)

FIRE
The Dude
Hard
(DOUBLE PICA ECLIPSE SHADED NO.2, $7.25)

One wonders whether the text was cribbed from extant print jobs, devised by copywriters of an unusual mindset, or simply designed to best show off a given typeface.

DENVER
Raging Storm
Eatland
(GREAT PRIMER ECLIPSE SHADED NO. 2, $6.30)

disco-fieber

german disco, which I found searching for a movie of that name. google provides a translation:

Disco fever is a prevention project for the avoidance of traffic accidents with young people and young adults. The action wants these young people on emotional level to address and without prohibitions attitude and changes of behavior reach. Major task is the activation of the target group, which is to develop even projects and actions. Here a substantial difference to other clearing-up campaigns lies. Under the slogan "we need you also tomorrow." it concerns also to obtain a positive life feeling.


Results of the action, in which in the last years in Schrobenhausen over 3.000 pupils and pupils took part, are e.g.. * Songs * homepage * poster rows * dance performances * Szeni performances


Disco fever understands itself as dynamic process, which acts including as large a number of interested persons and groupings as possible flexibly and situation. The project is promoted actively in the context of the health initiative "Bavaria" the Department of State for nutrition, health and consumer protection for two years. In May 2003 the starting signal for the Bavaria-far conversion was given.

the EPC Sound Room

is a collection of "sound poetry, audio art, audio hypermedia, and arts radio broadcasts." most of the audio links are to the indispensible archives of ubuweb, but dig this video directory with mpgs from the likes of bunuel and harry smith.

ubweb mp3 of the day: bern porter, whose visual poetry is brilliantly deadpan, contributes "the last acts of st. fuck you," which brings to mind a ranting alcoholic reading from the phonebook. has that been done?

the art of s p a m

type specimens from the quadrat, 1874

Subject: Livingstone Roxane
Date: Mon, 31 Jan 2005 06:20:47 +0600

jaünty góod-looking married W0MEN
I was apprenticed to Venner & Matheson; the well-known firm; of Greenwich. anothertotalitariancohortampere possibly leave until I have seen the machine.


Subject: Higuera Hortense
Date: Sat, 29 Jan 2005 16:33:43 +0200

fíné néedy W0MEN
been my escape. I was recalled to myself by a frantic plucking at my wrist; and I found decemberpusansteelmakesonataaqueductbrentacquiescent
Well I found my plans very seriously menaced It looked as if the pair might take anprobable Ou et quand l eut-il fait construire

GOATwhore

Goatwhore is currently looking for a new solid and permanent replacement on drums for the upcoming Metal Blade Records release and a ton of touring. If you or someone you know wishes to audition, please contact the band at xxx@aol.com. The band will then arrange a time for you to meet up with them in New Orleans for auditions. It will be your own responsibility to get to the audition! Serious inquiries only! Must be able to play everything as played on the albums and handle an extensive touring schedule. You may also submit your demo for consideration to the following address:

Goatwhore
P.O. Box 5991
Metairie, LA 70009-5991

The list of songs to learn for the auditions:

01. All The Sins
02. The Serpent That Enslaves What Is Worshipped
03. Baptized In A Storm Of Swords
04. Blood Guilt Eucharist
05. Graveyards And Dead Angels
06. Vengeance of Demonic Fury

Kelli Malella - Director of Publicity
Metal Blade Records
2828 Cochran Street
PMB 302
Simi Valley, CA 93065
www.metalblade.com

working for the man

instruction
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

PENNsound

PENNsound is an archive of poetry readings run by the writing department at the University of Pennsylvania. Featured authors include Kenneth Koch, Ted Berrigan, and Robert Creely.

via 'buked and scorned

pop and cigs for the boy-god

Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

rodney smith

umbrellas
Originally uploaded by liquidskyarts.

www.rodneysmith.com

gallery crawl I

Many of the people I saw at the new MoMa (pictured) looked awfully smug. Not just the staff, but some of the patrons. Stereotypical New York art-world, young and beautiful, stylish and full of themselves. But at Participant, a tiny gallery in the Lower East Side, the staff was friendly and nice and actually smiled when they spoke to me.

I saw a write-up of Julie Tolentino's "For you" in both art (Time Out) and dance (Village Voice) listings. It was a one-woman show for an audience of one. And it was free. I made a phone reservation and showed up at the gallery a few minutes early. (On the way, I took a picture of mannequin heads posted on stakes; the elderly woman minding the store scowled at me.)

The doorway opens to a landing that gives a partial view of the gallery's upper and lower levels. The performance space is above, in an open room set off by a curtain of clear vinyl strips. I waited below. For the end of the piece, you can choose what song you want her to interpret. The list included indie rock, some Lou Reed, some Joni Mitchell, some vintage soul music. I picked a Cowboy Junkies cover of Neil Young's "Powderfinger."

When my turn came, a cat-eyed gallery grrl with a nice smile led me up to the performance space. It was a white room, maybe 20x10x10. Video was projected at the far right corner of the room, with images and occasional text ("Welcome," first).

The dancer wore pajamas and lay in a bed at the near end of the room. I was seated at her bedside, just inches away from her. Music plays, a mix of menacing electronic sounds. She doesn't see her patron at first - for the first few minutes I sat and watched her toss and turn, her eyes closed.

It felt like a hospital. One reviewer wrote that the client-performance set-up suggested prostitution. Either way, there is an intimacy and a distance. She doesn't entirely dance *for* you, but in such close quarters - much of the time she dances in arms's reach - there must be some level of interaction, if only in her reaction to whoever she finds sitting in front of her when her eyes open.

She gets out of bed, looking very tired. She sleepwalks to the other end of the room and is distressed by the projected images of headlights coming down a dark highway. These dream images are of open space and night, but she's trapped in her white room. She paces between the right and left walls of the room, pushing herself off each side. Then the video projects a text instruction for me to move to a chair along the left wall. She's awake, and approaches me - somewhere along this point, she sees me for the first time, but our eyes meet only briefly, and hers don't appear to react. For the last segment of the piece she took me by the hand to a folding chair on the right side of the room. The original music had ended, and she hit a CD player next to me to play my request. She performed her interpretation, walking towards and away from me and collapsing at one point into a fetal position at my feet.

I'm not sure what I think of the piece - I wasn't sure how to react, really - but I am still thinking about it.

(Dear reader, feel free to mentally edit the wandering verb tenses in this post.)

mp3 babylon

from lacunae, indie-rock girl-group the gamma rays

from the of mirror eye, folk and pop music of myanmar (burma). listen to "really strange and weird things." it's insane.

from 'buked and scorned, brian eno and the winkies perform "totalled," which would become "i'll come running" on another green world

kunstkammer kid

photo by Pat Padua

From the "Cabinet of curiosities" show at Peter Freeman Gallery in SoHo, in association with the Kunstkammer Georg Laue.

han smith's fault

han smith's fault
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

the historic fowler theatre

Fowler (Indiana) residents bring movie theater back to life

FOWLER -- It's 7 o'clock on a Sunday night. Tyler Bruner, 13, of Oxford, sits with two friends in the Fowler Theatre, waiting for The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie to begin.

'We don't have a show in Oxford. It would be cool if we did,' Bruner says. 'So every other weekend, I'm here.'

In most small towns, downtown is dead, or at least comatose, on a Sunday night. The local movie theater, unable to turn a profit, closed 25 or 30 years ago.

But Fowler, population 2,413, is a happy exception. Thanks to a not-for-profit organization and more than 320 volunteers, the historic Fowler Theatre features a new movie each Friday, Saturday and Sunday evening.

Sometimes, all 196 seats are filled. It's like a scene from 1957.

Gail Russell

"I was possessed with an agonizing kind of self-consciousness where I felt my insides tightening into a knot, where my face and hands grew clammy, where I couldn't open my mouth, where I felt impelled to turn and run if I had to meet new people. When my parents had guests, I would run, get under the piano and hide there."

"Everything happened so fast. I was a sad character. I was sad because of myself. I didn't have any self-confidence. I didn't believe I had any talent. I didn't know how to have fun. I was afraid. I don't exactly know of what - of life, I guess."

Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

meditation on a pair of wire cutters

meditation on a pair of wire cutters
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

life in these united states

life in these united states
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

I had a great time at the dentist last week. My hygienist rocks. I'll call her Ginny. She reminds me of Doris Day, and is always good for a story. I never believed the stories in my blog were true before thursday.


Last summer my dentist left her practice. Her replacement was Dr. V, a drop-dead gorgeous Finnish woman fresh out of dental school with raven hair and green eyes and dripping with bling. I would have let her do most anything to me. Except follow through. I was supposed to have a follow-up a few weeks later but the office had to cancel and I never rescheduled.

She didn't work out. Ginny told me Dr. V turned out to be something of a princess. She didn't respect the staff; she'd show up to work in tight skirts and high heels; she wouldn't wear a labcoat (and the spring line was especially fetching); she let her long silky raven locks flow down unrestrained. And that was her undoing, as a silky strand fell onto a little old lady's false teeth.

Ginny went on scraping my teeth. I lay supine, and after a few moments of silence, confessed, "I'm still thinking of Dr. V in a tight skirt and high heels." Ginny, the dear, waved her hands over my face and offered to hose me down.

That's when she told me about the thong. How could you tell? Dr. V had leaned over the receptionist's desk in such a way that you knew.

I have changed names and, I hope, enough details, to evade charges of libel. I'd be happy to refer readers to Dr. V. but she left no forwarding info. I can recommend a swell hygienist.

measure for measure

measure for measure
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

memorial day weekend 2002

Among the saturday theatre listings in Time Out New York was a production of Measure for Measure at Show World, a former strip club .

On the way to the theatre I had to find a bathroom, and stopped in an Irish bar on 8th Ave. A bonnie lass welcomed me inside, where big Irish guys gathered around a bagpiper. The loo was downstairs. The floor above me shook with jigging. I was smaller than most and darker than all of the men. When I threaded the chanting crowd on my way out, a fat slob of an Irishman shouted at me: "WHO LET THE DOGS OUT! WHO LET THE DOGS OUT!" I shrugged. I met a few sympathetic Irish eyes who wondered what was up with this guy. When I walked out of the bar, I could hear O'Lardboy belting out "GOD BLESS AMERICAAAAA..."

Show World was a few doors down from the Port Authority. In the lobby, a ceramic monkey rode a ceramic tiger. In one of the spaces now used for legitimate theatre, such carousel beasts had once been straddled by live dancers. Parts of the ground floor and basement still operated as an adult bookstore, with video peep booths. One wall of the bookstore was lined with large synthetic phalluses, and synthetic orifices intended to represent the inner touch of various porn stars. How would you know?

This production of Measure for Measure was set in 1979 Times Square, when Koch was Mayor. But when the Duke brings down his decree against vice it's meant to reflect on Giuliani's [then-]reign. Granted, Giuliani's decree against live nude dancing (which still does exist around Times Square) is exactly what turned Show World into this alternative arts space.

When the house opened, the audience was led into a room the director called "Go-Go 1". "That's the way I like it" blared. Donna Summer too. The main stage was a runway/dance platform, flanked by smaller stages on both sides (which would reveal a confessional and a St. Sebastian convent), and a narrow walkway along the opposite wall. The ceiling and walls were lined with diamond-shaped glass tile decor, garish red and black color schemes. There was little mistaking the former purpose of this room.

The mood was set before the play started. Hookers alternately danced on stage and milled around the audience, along with a purple-jacketed pimp and barker, who encouraged patrons to buy a drink from the bar (cheap red wine and bottles of Russian beer in a bucket). Other street types srtutted: a statuesque madam in fishnet stockings; sailors; a doughy Irish cop, who scuffled with a black sailor. A curbside priest read scripture in condemnation of the iniquity. Three different actress-prostitutes [or prostitute-actresses] flirted with me. The first was a platinum blonde who wore only a bra and aqua gym shorts under her boa and pancake makeup. She stopped at my table and put her hand on my shoulder. We exchanged boilerplate: "I haven't seen you around here before." "This is my first time." "I hope you become a regular."

The pre-play atmosphere was already worth the price of admission (a cool $15). A beautiful black woman was next, cooing "Hi sailor." I asked if I could take her picture and she said sure, blowing a kiss at my lens as she walked away, blurring the shot. The actor who played the Duke came along and asked me not to take any more pix - there are "scantily clad" ladies around. [Above is the one good picture that came out of this session.] He did give me a fake dollar bill to give to one of same ladies. I left it on my table.

Next was the blonde-wigged woman with Sara Gilbert small eyes and thin lips. She was the bondage woman, writhing on stage with a whip. In the audience, she walked between me and a guy next to me, lifting herself past us with her hands on our shoulders. We smiled. Then I noticed the bruises on her arms.

The black goddess came back for my fake dollar. I wasn't sure how much was allowed here - does anybody get carried away during this part? Did I seem like somebody who wouldn't get carried away? Did I look safe? She said it's okay, go ahead, so I put the counterfeit bill in her panty string (which was on top of a somewhat less revealing undergarmnet), resisting the urge to, say, brush the back of my fingers against her creamy hips. "Stay in school," I told her as she left.

Then the play started. The set-up was so fascinating that I was distracted from the language, but aside from that it all worked great. The cast was inconsistent (Isabella was in high dudgeon throughout), but the Duke was terrific, powerful yet human. Other standouts were the slimy smooth-talking Aeschylus, and a transgendered (according to a conversation I overheard from his/her roommate) jailer who could have passed for a lost member of Los Lobos. In between acts, Elbow, the Irish cop, would come in and tell us to move on to the next stage - because of a gas leak, or because Mayor Koch had shut the place down. Act II was in Angelo's office; Acts II and IV were in a prison stage; the final act was in a strobe-lit red ballroom, the players in the round. As the Duke and Isabella come together, she takes off her frock to reveal a white lesiure suit - matching his. The lights dim, the strobe-light stars dance across the floor, and "Celebration" plays. It's the kind of thing that might have made me cringe, but it was oddly touching.

Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

eggleston documentary to premiere at moma

at the new moma:

William Eggleston in the Real World. 2005. USA. Directed by Michael Almereyda. An intimate portrait of William Eggleston, who revolutionized color photography in the mid-1970s and who continues to conjure spellbinding images from the ordinariness of everyday life. "Peter Schjeldahl has written that Edward Hopper was ‘excited by the unguarded moment, the exposed innocence, of a person, a building, a place.' If you equate ‘innocence' with ‘mystery,' I think you can apply this to Eggleston, and to this movie about him" (Almereyda). 87 min.
Monday, January 17, 7:30. T2; Wednesday, January 19, 6:00. T1 (both introduced by Faggioni and Almereyda)

I am so there. [read my review here.]

meekmania

telstarweb is an mp3 blog dedicated to the work of joe meek

bedazzled is a polygamous mp3 blog which just this week has featured tracks of soft pop and psychedelic soundtrack I would have blogged had I thought about it; videos from serge gainsbourg; and more joe meek, including a scopitone from the tornados, random flakes and some good old Heinz dammit! just go and spend a few hours.

on a semi-related note, here's a fine webjay list: extreme lounge terror.

I'll never get any work done ever again.

Jazz Funeral to be Staged in New Orleans During Bush Inauguration

photo by pat padua

from common dreams:

NEW ORLEANS -- January 1, 2005 -- On January 20, 2005, when George W. Bush is taking the oath of office to begin his second term as president, a "Jazz Funeral for Democracy"€ will parade through the streets of downtown New Orleans lead by the world famous Treme Brass Band to mourn the occasion...

...According to Buddy Spell, one of the archetects of the action, "While the rest of the country will be focused on the beginning of Bush's second term, our objective is to show the world that we are not in support of a continued war in Iraq, the torture and inhumane treatment of percieved enemies, record inflation, flagrant disregard for the constitutional rights of all citizens, state sponsored homophobia, government deception, and four more years of rule by a small group of wealthy, elite, corporate hacks. This will be a time to remind the president that he has a sworn obligation to represent and respect the rights and wishes of ALL Americans, including the 56 million people who voted against him."

Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

multi-symptom daytime

multi-symptom daytime
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

television tape

aka 2" videotape. a production video (kttv, 1961) selling the new technology. see vidipax for a guide to video (and audio) formats.

the real orgasmatron?

the blaster beam

Sometime in the 70’s, Craig Huxley – a former child TV star who appeared briefly on the original Star Trek – created a truly remarkable musical instrument called the Blaster Beam. Basically, it was an 18 foot long piece of aluminum fitted with movable pickups and numerous strings which, when plucked, produced some seriously visceral bass tones. The Beam’s first 15 minutes of fame came when it was used to produce the signature theme for the sentient space probe in 1979’s “Star Trek: The Motion Picture”.

And that might have been the last of it, were it not for a 1990 concert in New York’s Central Park where "over a dozen women reported having intensely sexual feelings from the Beam sound, up to and including orgasm". And this experience wasn’t confined to live performances... Here's the testimonial of the owner of a synth with Beam settings who recently subjected a lady-friend to the resulting sounds:
“The expression on her face abruptly changed. When I asked her what was wrong, she blinked for a moment and said, "Please play that again. Louder." I did so, and had the odd experience of watching her eyes glaze over as she half fell into a chair breathing hard. "I...*like* that sound," she managed to get out in a whisper."

via rummage through the crevices

i want a new drug

i want a new drug
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

from the filmstrip "survival skills: exercising and lifting your leg and stuff"

luxury

the torture tape experiment

The Mission: Create for combat purposes a tape so wretched and foul that anyone who listens to it for 24 hours will never be able to think straight again...

Objective: Survive a full waking day (roughly 18 hours) of an opponent’s battle mix.

recommended: "I feel fine" by The Beatle Barkers.

today in sound: compare and contrast

BODY FALLING DOWNSTAIRS
from authentic sound effects vol. 3

BODY FALLING DOWNSTAIRS, VICTIM GROANS
an unreissued sound from the Elektra lp series excerpted above, yet fallen silently downstairs through the memory hole of digitiania. please loop.

boring wall (detail)

boring wall (detail)
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

a correction from the washington post:

In a Dec. 26 CD review, Husker Du drummer Grant Hart was incorrectly described as having a handlebar mustache. Bassist Greg Norton is the mustachioed band member.

fun things to do on the hill

Baiting The Religious Right

So at break this morning, who should be sitting at the cafe two tables over from us but Christian Coalition director Ralph Reed? I could find no way to discreetly alert my colleagues of the opportunity afforded, but fortuitously the conversation happened to turn on various injuries friends and loved ones and ourselves had sustained while drunk or stoned. One friend recounted a teenage time drunkenly snuckt back home, unaware that his hands, slashed by broken wine and beer containers, trailed blood all over the living room furniture and walls. "Honey, have you been hanging out with those Satanist kids again?" I helpfully suggested.

That'll show him!

Reed blabbed into his headset about some deadline two days from now, persuading his friend not to be caught "flatfooted" on "this". Hmm.

flanked by the deranged

i am surrounded by deranged fans
Originally uploaded by a nameless yeast.

nyt: Annals of Medicine, Yellow With Age

The room, at once grand and intimate, is richly paneled in dark wood. Iron chandeliers and glass-shade table lamps give off a warm light. The walls, from parquet floor to molded ceiling, are lined with important old books, the upper ones reachable only by ladders.

The tone, as you might also expect, is serious and scholarly, the air heavy with history, the hush broken only by the whisper of turning pages.

All of which will leave you unprepared for the hairball.

top things of 2004
tarnation
Fancey
history of the photobook v. 1
eternal sunshine of the spotless mind
jesper just at perry rubenstein
belle and sebastian, "i'm a cuckoo"
ed ruscha and photography at the whitney
delays, "nearer than heaven"
ny dolls and stooges @ underground garage fest
mimi's piano bar on 52nd and 2nd
skye sweetnam, "tangled up in me"
douglas gordon
opening night at artomatic with the picture is dead quartet and joey patina, talent
the new ennui

failures:
time of the wolf
an irish pub band playing sweet home alabama at the 4 p's in a sea of
nearly unbroken homogenity on new year's eve
the media
the government
nationalism