From B to A and back again

[imomus]

B: Hello A!
A: Hi, B!
B: So, what's been rocking your world recently?
A: Do you have to use such rockist language? If you mean, "What have you been appreciating culturally recently?", I'd say Harry Partch's "musical account of a transcontinental hobo trip", The Wayward Cycle.
B: Wayward is the perfect word for Partch. It's funny, although you talk a lot about Japan and collectivism, the stuff you end up liking is super-American, and super-individualistic. Who's "the Japanese Partch"?
A: Oh, there are Japanese Partches. Tomomi Adachi or Mamoru Fujieda, for example. There are people even further out than Partch. Toshiya Tsunoda, for instance. But I do like lots of American stuff. American stuff that somehow doesn't sound "American", especially. The other day someone called Ljova sent me a nice record called The World on Four Strings. It sounded like East European fiddle music, and it reminded me of the films of the Brothers Quay.
B: Never heard of them!
A: They're Americans too, but they live in London and they make these films which look totally Polish. I saw them on UK Channel 4, and they were the best thing I saw on TV in the 1980s. Someone's put one up on YouTube, Street of Crocodiles, the Quays' version of the Bruno Schulz story.
B: Thank God for YouTube, eh! Internet 2.0, they're calling it. That, and Flickr, and MySpace, and all these new Google services... the internet has the whole world covered!
A: I had dinner with the editor of Vice the other night, and he was saying something similar. "We're in the middle of a new dot com boom," he said. (He's deleted his MySpace page too, by the way.) But then we went to a gallery, the Artists' Space on Greene Street, and saw a performance by Ron Athey. He was suspended by hooks, with a baseball bat up his ass and oddly inflated testicles, covered in Native American tribal tattoos, and members of the public were greasing up his body with Vaseline. Now there's an experience they'll never put on the internet.
B: I just ran Ron Athey's name through YouTube. "Found no videos matching Ron Athey. Do you have one? Upload it!"
A: He's not on Internet 2.0, and he won't be on Internet 10. Another thing they'll never put up there is dance. There are one million videos of cute kittens and cars running red lights, but no videos of Japanese dance company Strange Kinoko. And no smells! That's what my next Wired piece is about. There are one billion opinions on the internet, but no onions.
B: Don't be silly, who needs onions on the internet?
A: I do! Just imagine a world where the internet could deliver us all free digital food as easily as it gives us porn! We'd never have to go out again!
B: It sounds awful. And speaking of going out, the sun is shining, and I don't mean on the internet. Are you coming out?
A: No, I want to listen to "Wayward" again. I prefer 1940s sunshine, it tastes better.

Comments

Unrelated...

[thetemplekeeper.livejournal.com]

...Feel very guilty replying first when this is only tangentially related to your post, but - look:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/happiness_formula/default.stm

Some very interesting stuff on what makes us happy (in a general sense). But time to give the floor to Japanese Partches, non-American Americana and 1940s sunshine, hopefully...

Re: Unrelated...

[imomus.livejournal.com]

And Americans are more ill than the English (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/4965034.stm)! Oh dear!

[klasensjo.livejournal.com]

The Brothers Quay were commissioned to make two very nice videos for "His Name is Alive". Both are available on YouTube. Although heavily inspired by Jan Svankmajer's dark and mysterious worlds, the brothers definitely hold their own.

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

My favorite remains "Gilgamesh," although "Street of Crocodiles" reveals new details upon every viewing.

[alphacomp.livejournal.com]

Did you resolve the whole skull controversy with the editor of Vice?

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Sort of. He told me he was planning to get a skull tattoo, and I said "Don't, they're going out of fashion!" He said he might reconsider. He deleted his MySpace page before my article, by the way, so I don't claim to be his style guru.

[cheapsurrealist.livejournal.com]

He was suspended by hooks, with a baseball bat up his ass

Reminds me of the time I saw Stelarc in the early eigties at a gallery in SF. Audience members inserted hooks through his flesh, no blood, and he was suspended by them. Fascinating and really creepy. Sometimes I womder if I actually saw it but there was a book about him at the time with a picture of the event and there I am watching it.

[d-g-m.livejournal.com]

Stelarc is still around. He gave a lecture at my High School in 2000. He is now into cybernetic body extension. He showed us a video of a deliberately uncompfortable body probe as it worked its way -filming- through his body.

[jasongtokyo.livejournal.com]

Your mention of The Brothers Quay (natsukashii) suddenly reminded me of Survival Research Labs (http://www.srl.org/). I don't think there's a link between the two, but I remember watching their videos around the same time.

[silenceinspades.livejournal.com]

of course there's dancing on the internet. (http://www.webhamster.com/)

[bopscotch.livejournal.com]

I can't believe that's still on the Internet.

[luolian.livejournal.com]

There are onions (http://www.theonion.com) on the internet too.

[shadowshark.livejournal.com]

Hella the Wayward. "I got a letter and the letter it said, 'May God's richest blessings be upon you!' la da da da da da da DA DA dum, la da richest blessings be upon you. ...And that's why I'm thinkin'--Chicago."
On that subject, what do you think of composers Iannis Xenakis and Einojuhani Rautavaara? Or, a better question, could you recommend some lesser-known composers along those lines? Sorry to be a bother; I just discovered this journal a few days ago, and I'm enjoying it a bunch. Thank you!

[silenceinspades.livejournal.com]

'Or, a better question, could you recommend some lesser-known composers along those lines?'

i can, momus.
his music tends to be xenakis-eque (xenakis-tastic?) at times.
:)

re Rautavaara

[thetemplekeeper.livejournal.com]

Actually, if you DO like old Uncle Eino, there's another Finnish composer worth checking out: Aulis Sallinen; seems there's been a bit of a Finnish Rennaisance in music these past 40 years or so... they all appear to absolutely brilliant...

[cargoweasel.livejournal.com]

He was suspended by hooks, with a baseball bat up his ass and oddly inflated testicles, covered in Native American tribal tattoos, and members of the public were greasing up his body with Vaseline. Now there's an experience they'll never put on the internet.

Hey, that's a typical evening on the Internet. Pretty vanilla in fact.

[benchilada.livejournal.com]

I want an interweb that gives me onions.

My friends and I once had a discussion about how, if the interwebs gave us vegetables and fruit--no junk food--we'd all be in better shape today.

Nothing like a 2am web-surfing snack of a banana to curb the urge to go out and buy Cheetos.

[crucible.livejournal.com]

If you like baseball bats in people's asses combined with native american iconography, check out Steven Leyba and his Apache Whiskey Ritual piece.

Vice is a pox, a hipster-generation/ meaning-appropriation-shit-machine. They moved their store here in Toronto from Queen West to Parkdale, just so they can better ruin everything for EVERYBODY.

The Brothers Quay should do videos for Gogol Bordello. They should also open a church dedicated the to the veneration of hane McGowan's teeth.

And, for good measure, someone should feed me Grapefruit Sorbet out of the trepanned head of John the Baptist, as in, fucking YESTERDAY.

Selah.

read formats

[(Anonymous)]

warhol?

[cityramica.livejournal.com]

i had no idea that the Brothers Quay were American! I guess I just assumed they were from the same general area as Svankmajer, having often seen their works back to back...

is a "durational performance" (as used describing Athey) the same as "endurance art"? that stuff generally comes across better in description [internet-capable], re-constructed in imagination....but then i don't find the idea of a baseball bat up someone's ass particularly appealing.

i'm getting sandwich and green tea and nori all over my keyboard and mouse as i write this. Perhaps you are correct about the internet being incompatible with food, though I do appreciate being able to have meals sent to my home or work via web boxes & buttons.

What do you smell like today? What have you consumed? What kind of shampoo do you use?

[thetemplekeeper.livejournal.com]

I find the worst thing about the internet is that you just CAN'T eat an orange and type at the same time...

olfactory therapy.

[(Anonymous)]

I saw you briefly at the Whitney today. You mentioned the smell of the Sturtevant room. I was glad you did. My sense of smell is my strongest sense and I, amidst New York's olfactory playground, am happiest (for whatever reason) when I can associate a pleasing smell to an experience. I more often than not carry a ripe orange around with me so that I can occasionally smell its freshness, its crisp aroma. Perhaps this is strange, but it calms me down when I am feeling overwhelmed by crowds, noises, etc.
I look forward to your Wired article.
-vivian r.

Athey

[(Anonymous)]

While I cn see the attraction Athey has for the "skull crew" (a la NYC and Vice magazine) I find the attitude and motivation for his performances quite different from their negative trips. I was lucky enough to take a seminar from him while at CalArts. What I remember most from it is the feelings of trust and acceptance he fostered in the class. Momus, if you run into him outside of his performances I recommend talking with him. He's approachable, kind and articulate.Same goes for Vaginal Cream Davis.It would be fascinating to read you interviewing them. It's been awhile since I met them and it would be nice to know more about what they're up to. thanks Justin Lincoln

Re: Athey

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I've actually met both Ron and Vag, they were together at the Threadwaxing Space on Broadway and someone introduced me to them. They did seem very friendly, surprisingly so.

I repaid Ron by mentioning him in a song, Protestant Art (http://www.phespirit.info/momus/20010106.htm).

[cityramica.livejournal.com]

"Play-Doh scented cologne and other unusual scents (http://www.boingboing.net/2006/05/03/playdoh_scented_colo.html)
The Demeter fragrance library (http://www.demeterfragrance.com/product.aspx?t=f&id=1025) is selling the new, Play-Doh scented cologne ($19 a bottle). They library also sells lots of other interesting fragrances, such as "Cannabis Flower -- The shredded flowers of Cannabis Sativa, the hemp plant," and "Laundromat" -- which smells like a laundromat."

[mo-no-chrome.livejournal.com]

Ron Athey is wonderful. Have you ever come across work by his ex-boyfriend, Rozz Williams (unfortunately now deceased - he killed himself on April Fools' Day), originally of Christian Death but later working on experimental projects like Premature Ejaculation and movies like Pig? I don't think you'd like his work as such, but it's definitely worth checking out...

[bricology.livejournal.com]

Funny coincidence: I was just up at Gate 5 in Sausalito on Sunday. The ghost of Harry Partch (and of Alan Watts and Sterling Hayden) is still palpable there in some of the run-down industrial sheds on the waterfront. I tried to recite as much of Partch's "The Letter" as I could recall, as I wandered around.