July 9-12: Pendu Org Presents NY Eye & Ear Fest II

nyeyeandear-pwierd1
Judging from its mile-long roster of musicians, filmmakers, and participating record labels, the second installment of the Todd Pendu-curated NY Eye and Ear Fest promises to be an even greater fulfillment of December’s inaugural ambition: to create a giant, swarming, lovingly handpicked showcase of grassroots cultural production in New York, along with the like-minded organizations and businesses that help disseminate it to the public. Pendu’s vision of an all-ages biannual concert and record fair devoted exclusively to the joy of discovery — that of new and unusual musics, emerging visual artists, and even “new friends” [the Pendu Org website]–seems to have struck a resonant chord with the local DIY contingent, and beyond; since premiering last year at Vanishing Point, the festival has already doubled in size, duration, and physical wingspan.

On July 9th and 10th, Eye & Ear II will take over all three floors of the Knitting Factory for two days of non-stop musical action, including a video art installation and “7-hour continuous drone room” in the basement. Next up, the festivities will travel to the 92Y Tribeca Cultural and Community Center for a “free” record fair (admission, not records, though these will be cheaply priced), additional live performances, and the debut of Women of NYCinema, a new Pendu-coordinated film series. Day four brings the party back to Brooklyn, which obviously had to feature somewhere in this celebration of predominately Brooklyn-based artists, for a finale concert at Death By Audio in Williamsburg.

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Tonight (Sat) 7:30pm, Philly: Peter Stampfel and the Ether Frolic Mob (featuring John Cohen), Brother JT, and deejay Ian Nagoski

Saturday, June 27

Arthur presents…

A special summer twilight show at Frankford Gardens

7:30pm

featuring two sets by

PETER STAMPFEL AND THE ETHER FROLIC MOB

plus

Just added! BROTHER JT

and

IAN NAGOSKI spinning vintage 78rpm music

2037 Frankford Avenue (enter around back on Sepviva Street)
Philadelphia 19125

suggested donation $5 * bring your own ether and other whatists

foul weather moves show indoors to the music parlor

peterstampfelpromo

This will be the Philadelphia debut of New York City’s PETER STAMPFEL AND THE ETHER FROLIC MOB who, Stampfel promises, will “stick our hands up the ass of American music, grab it by the throat, and pull it inside-out. It’s 21st century 19th century American music played in a vast variety of 20th century styles.” We’d expect nothing less—Mr. Stampfel is a founding member of the Holy Modal Rounders and the Fugs, and Frolicker JOHN COHEN is a founding member of the New Lost City Ramblers. (That’s them in the photo above.) Two sets from the Mobsters, who, tonight, will be:

* Peter Stampfel/ vocals, banjo, fiddle, guitar, ‘juke (steel strung National Steel Ukulele tuned like a banjo), assorted percussion
* Jeannie Scofield/ vocals, percussion
* John Cohen/ vocals, guitar, banjo, mandolin
* Hubby Jenkens/ vocals, guitar, percussion, ‘juke, ukelele
* Eli Smith/ vocals, banjo, harmonica, fiddle, ukulele
* Jane Gilday/ vocals, banjo, harmonica, fiddle
* Walker Shepard/ vocals, banjo, guitar, fiddle, ‘juke
* Annabelle Lee/ vocals, guitar, percussion

Get a swig of the Mob via this live performance and interview from 2006 on the Down Home Radio Show

brotherfromanother

BROTHER JT (pictured above) will be playing a mix of psychedelic spirituals on acoustic guitar, accompanied by Steve Gigante (Dark Inside The Sun).

“For the past twenty years Brother JT has made records that exemplify the ‘freeness’ and dark-green/blood-red hazy warmth of true psychedelia. As a songwriter, he is so proficient that no one takes notice; as a guitar player, he subtly outshines any slinger around (besides the Cheaterslicks’ Dave Shannon) with riffs, leads and solos that are consistently bewildering; as a rock star…well, he was just born for the job, regardless if anyone ever figures it out. He writes one-liner bits of philosophy that are as memorable as those of Yogi Berra, H. L. Mencken, or Will Rogers. JT is, in short, the most hidden of greatest treasures.” —David Katznelson, Arthur No. 8 (available from Arthur store)

Baltimore’s IAN NAGOSKI (compiler of “Black Mirror: Reflections in Global Musics 1918-1954”) will play recordings from the 78 rpm era including pieces from his new collection of music from the first half of the 20th century, “A String of Pearls” (Canary/ Mississippi Records), including music from Constantinople, Milano, Bucharest, Uttar Pradesh, Armenia, Sunda, Thrace, Jamaica, Serbia, Cairo, Huilotita, Seville, Hue, Aleppo, Rajastan, the Carpathians, a Zuni reservation and much more.

Ian on Baltimore public radio, playing and discussing his 78rpm music finds from around world:
http://bit.ly/130m0w

Ian blogs on Arthurmag.com:
http://www.arthurmag.com/author/ian-nagoski/

Today's Autonomedia Jubilee Saint — EMMA GOLDMAN

goldman
June 27– EMMA GOLDMAN
Writer and activist editor of Mother Earth, exile, she knew innumerable jailings, revolutions, love affairs.
Read Anarchism and Other Essays by Emma Goldman online.

JUNE 27, 2009 HOLIDAYS AND FESTIVALS
*Provence, France: Festival of the Thrasque. The man-eating monster charges down city streets, snapping at people.

ALSO ON JUNE 27 IN HISTORY…
1869 — Anarchist rebel Emma Goldman born, Kaunas, Lithuania.
1872 — Black American poet Paul Laurence Dunbar born, Dayton, Ohio.
1880 — Deaf, mute, blind socialist Helen Keller born, Tuscumbia, Alabama.
1884 — French philosopher Gaston Bachelard born, Bar-sur-Aube, France.
1905 — Wobblies (Industrial Workers of the World) founded in Chicago.
1969 — Police harassment provokes Stonewall Riot of gays in New York City.

Excerpted from The 2009 Autonomedia Calendar of Jubilee Saints: Radical Heroes for the New Millennium by James Koehnline and the Autonomedia Collective

UPDATED — R.I.P. SKY SAXON, 1946 – 2009

Obituary in the L.A. Record:
http://tinyurl.com/nychpo

Nels Cline on Sky Saxon, in the L.A. Record:

Guitarist Nels Cline (spotted most recently with Wilco) grew up in the shadow of the Seeds and Sky Saxon and later went on to perform and record with Sky himself. He takes some time today to send L.A. RECORD these thoughts:

I am truly saddened to learn of the death of Sky Saxon. As a boy growing up in Los Angeles, Sky Saxon was my first rock idol of sorts. The Seeds’ music was important to me, sure, but Sky’s amazing charisma—as he appeared rather ubiquitously on TV shows like “Boss City” and “The Groovy Show” around 1966—was galvanizing. I would stare in disbelief as he—clad in shiny satin Nehru shirts bedazzled with some gaudy brooch—would gyrate around lasciviously, holding the microphone in every cool way imaginable. He seemed from another planet. I thought he was amazing.

Years later, in the late ’70s, Sky became known as “Sunlight,” and manifested a few eccentric and quite acid-soaked (or so they sounded) recordings that led credence to the rampant stories of his decaying mind and artistry. He came into the record store I worked at for years and—with his face covered in a long mane of hair, massive beard, and shades—went silently through the stacks with wraith-like fingers. I was dismayed and a bit freaked out by this creature—the former beautiful god of rock ‘n’ roll otherness.

But only a few years ago as my friend and colleague Carla Bozulich and I were going into our local Trader Joe’s, we ran into a bass player friend of mine named Rick, who had in tow a gray-haired, aging hippie type of man with an unavoidably compelling face and style. Carla, not normally interested in old hippies, immediately whispered to me, “Who’s THAT?!” Of course, you know it was Sky Saxon. And Rick was playing in the new version of the Seeds, recording just down the street from Carla’s house! Long story short, I went and hung out a bit, ended up recording a song about a corrupt judge on the then-upcoming Seeds record. (Sorry that the titles escape me today.) Sky was really quite deferential to me. Plus he seemed to be in quite good shape. He gave me a record, recently issued, of some of his pre-Seeds 1950s doo-wop-ish rock songs. How old IS this guy? I wondered.

We ended up doing a duo gig of almost totally improvised music one night at Zen Sushi. I was ecstatic. I suggested we call ourselves the Flower Lady & Her Assistant, but Sky immediately countered with the Flower God Men and Their Assistants. I had gear problems on the gig, and Sky had a bit too much sake before we played, but it was amazing to me. There were barely 30 people there anyway! I started plotting ways to do some more improvising with him. He was going off in a very Beat-style manner. I thought of collaborations with my trio, The Singers, but then Sky went off to more European touring, headed back to Shasta. Rick moved to New York…

I won’t ever be able to do those things with Sky. I feel lucky to have ever even seen him on TV, yet alone to have played some wild, extemporaneous psychedelia with him. They say Mick Jagger copped tons of his moves and style, and I believe it. But there was so much more to this man that remains to be revealed.

– Nels Cline
Glendale, CA
6/25/09

NY happenings!!

Please tell yer NY peeps to come on out, or come on down and join in the fun!!

Friday June 26–
Thee Plastic Crimewave Vision Celestial Guitarkestra will be happening at the Cake Shop 152 Ludlow St., New York, NY–with openers Prince Ruperts Drops, Samara Lubelski and the Bubble Electric, and Puffy Areolas (from Ohio–they rule and are on Siltbreeze now). Hope you are down with helping lift us to the sonic heavens –if you or someone you know wants to join in the ruckus, load-in is at 8pm (it’s a first come, first-serve/play sorta deal, as the space is small) and please bring a guitar/amp/powerstrip/extension cord (if possible) and get ready to drone out in “E”.
Special guests include members of Oneida, Charalambides, Espers, Metalux, Tower Recordings, Bunnybrains, White Hills, La Otracina, Vetiver and more!

Sunday June 28–
New York Night Train’s Tripped-Out Happening, Santo’s Party House, 96 Lafayette St Manhattan, NY–9pm-4am, $10 – DJs Gibby Haynes (Butthole Surfers), Plastic Crimewave (Plastic Crimewave Sound, GZD), Josh Styles (Smashed! Blocked!), Jonathan Toubin (New York Night Train) – live performances by Psychic Ills and Soft Circle (ex-Black Dice). Projections by Mighty Robot AV Squad, Spencer Bewley, and Larry 7…

New York Night Train Tripped-Out Happening w/Psychic Ills, Gibby Haynes, Plastic Crimewave, Larry 7, y mas

here’s way too much info:
PSYCHIC ILLS, named “Best Psychedelic Rock Band” by the Village Voice Best Of NY Issue, since ascending into stratospheric global cult popularity with their canonical 2006 Social Registry LP Dins (the finest psych rock album since the 1970s. Hands down!), remain uncompromising in their artistry and continue to blaze new sonic trails every day of their relentless touring and recording schedule. Still one of the supreme mind-melting acts in the world!
SOFT CIRCLE is the ambient/tribal/electronic musical project of Black Dice’s Hisham Akira Bharoocha who releases records on the Eastern Developments and PPM labels. Hisham takes a seat behind the drums and proceeds to record and loop sounds in front of your eyes then adds layers of drums and singing to create a cyclical symphony of rhythm and sound. Soft Circle, regularly touring with Boredoms, No Age, High Places, and a number of other subcultural notables, is also the musical director for Boredom’s 77 BOADRUM and 88 Boadrum performances featuring 77 and 88 drummers respectively. Hisham’s exquisite soulful percussive mantras need to be seen and heard live to be believed
LARRY 7 has been a huge force in a variety NYC underground scenes and mediums for years. From his musical work with everyone from Jarboe to Tom Verlaine to Can’s Michael Carlioli and Malcolm Mooney to his visual work with Warhol’s Factory, Matthew Barney, etc., to his longstanding mobile multimedia +/- night and live performances at galleries, museums, and live events all over Canada and Europe, though he’s a secret treasure at home, Larry 7 is a household names in the international avant garde. Larry, whose performances are all distinct, always makes the nature of his live work a surprise (last time Einstuerzende Neubauten’s Alex Hacke turned up to join him!).
ANNA COPA CABANNA, the sexy Australian showgirl icon who performs her choreography, plays her xylophone, and roller-skates in venues around the world, is equally well-known as the official go go dancer of the New York rock and roll underground.
DJ’S: GIBBY HAYNES is of course the gargantuan cultural force and musical talent best known for leading innovative Texas acid-punks Butthole Surfers as they changed the way underground music was played and presented throughout the 1980s and 1990s and reunited to much acclaim last year. Outside of his thousands of noteworthy exploits with the Butthole Surfers, Gibby also sang on Ministry’s MTV mega-hit “Jesus Built My Hotrod,” played in a band with Johnny Depp, and acted in a number of major motion pictures. More importantly for our purposes tonight, Mr. Haynes has become a popular DJ and successful visual artist the last few years – spinning and exhibiting for a growing fanbase around the world.
PLASTIC CRIMEWAVE is the one-man empire of Chicago artist/musician/DJ Steve Krakow. Leader of hallucinogenic sonic adventurers Plastic Crimewave sound, author of Drag City’s incredible hand-drawn zine Galactic Zoo Dossier, and the DJ behind WGN radio’s Secret History of Chicago Music show, Krakow is an international psychedelic cult-of-personality.
MR JONATHAN TOUBIN, New York Night Train’s Conductor and Soul Proprietor, has shattered the face of nightlife in the wormy apple, and lately, around the world, w­ith his revolutionary parties and wild and wooly approach to his trademark 45rpm “maximum rock and soul” sets!
JOSH STYLES, Smashed! Blocked!’s DJ/conceptualist, who also moonlights as the drummer for Stalkers, is internationally celebrated as one of the world’s most prominent freakbeat DJs – throwing down the most choice 45s chock full o’ heavy duty beats, flipped-out guitar sounds, shimmering Hammonds, catchy riffs and choruses – plus loads of bounce and energy!
VISUALS: LARRY 7 (see above)
SPENCER BEWLEY, the English projectionist who has wowed crowds everywhere the last few years on the road with the likes of Death In Vegas, Warlocks, and A Place to Bury Strangers, manipulates found, purchased, and assembled loops on dueling 16mm projectors to blow peoples minds
MIGHTY ROBOT AV SQUAD, operating the multi-media visuals for years not only at their Mighty Robot and Secret Project Robot art spaces, discos, rock venues, museums, and other elsewhere on both sides of the Atlantic, employ an infinite overlapping juxtaposition of motion collages to form a kinetic visual feast! ambient, the symbolic, and the thematic!

and then running back to Chicago for this excitement……

Wed July 1–
Sandy Bull film screening at the Chopin Theatre–1543 W Division St, 8pm. Performing will be DRMWPN, 500MG (Mike Gibbons of Bardo Pond) and Ultimate Vag (Members of Kahoutek and To Live & Shave in LA), and Drag City DJ’s. Here’s a description of the film from the filmmaker:
“No Deposit No Return Blues” is a documentary K.C. Bull made about her father, psychedelic rock legend Sandy Bull. He played the role of the outsider, writing meditations on his instrument and bringing classical music to the cosmic happening. He was many things, but the way the film remembers him is through his instrument and how it connected him to the outside world. In the early sixties, before such six-string heroes as Ry Cooder, Leo Kottke and Richard Thompson impressed with their ability to hop among and fuse musical genres, Sandy Bull glided from classical and jazz to ethnic music and rock & roll with grace and verve. Incorporating elements of folk, jazz, Indian and Arabic-influenced dronish modes, Bull’s ethereal, psychedelic folk-rock recordings– which looked beyond American roots music for its inspiration–and performances, made him a cult-hero to a generation of musicians and adventurous audiences. In 2001 Bull died of lung cancer, but not before his daughter began to fashion a personal portrait of a gifted musician and moving ode to a father and daughter relationship.
The film is KC Bull’s understated way of saying, “Have you heard of my dad? No? Oh, you should.” I agree, you should.

Thurs June 25, Portland, Oregon: THIRD ANNUAL FLOATING WORLD ANIMATION FEST at Holocene

Floating World Animation Fest 2009 Trailer – Holocene, June 25th from Floating World Comics on Vimeo.

“The 3rd annual Floating World Animation Fest features mind melting video art and psychedelic animation from the secret world of motionography. “Secret” meaning these are the geniuses that make your music videos, on air graphics, commercials, credit sequences, and movie fx by day… but a closer look at their resumes reveals a true passion for artistic expression and creativity in their short films and experimental personal work. This year’s fest screens at Holocene, Thursday June 25th, with a special bonus program curated by Show Cave Gallery (Los Angeles). Trailer features: Nicolas Djandji, David O’Reilly, Mato Atom, Carolina Melis, Justine Ashbee, Nofun, Steve Scott & Will Sweeney, Peppermelon, Kaliptus, Rohitash Rao, Yoshi Sodeoka, Robert Seidel, Superbrothers, Eve Duhamel, Bruno Dicolla, Erin Dunn, Throne Boogie, Dale Hayward. Music by: Nola. Poster by: Psilo Design”

“Join us at Holocene for the full Floating World Animation Fest lineup: Show Cave Best of Videocation, & Floating World Animation Fest 2009 present 3+ hours of mind melting, soul loving psychedelicanimation… this summer’s ultimate videocation! Plus live music from: Deelay Ceelay and Flaspar!”

Floating World Animation Fest 2009 – Holocene, 1001 SE Morrison, Portland OR – June 25th

Kuipers tours his book on eco-warrior Rod Coronado

operationbiteback1
From Dean Kuipers:

Hi all — My new book, “Operation Bite Back” is out today (June 23) and I want to let you all know about the first reading, this Saturday, June 27, 5 p.m. at Book Soup,8818 W. Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood. Email info@booksoup.com

A far cry from the farcical and easily ignored rhetoric of green-capitalists, indigenous eco-activist Rod Coronado’s zine Strong Hearts, written entirely while imprisoned for an arson on a Michagan State animal-testing facility, is written with enough inteligence and compassion to remind any passive mind that our culture’s treatment of animals and the Earth is an undienable attrocity, and urges real action. Operation Bite Back details Coronado’s life, how his direct action against the vivisection, fur, and trapping industries helped spearhead the notoriety of the ALF and ELF, and how the movement he helped build “was ultimately forced to turn its back on him.”

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RE_HRK5HRxs&feature=related
(Above video starts at 43 seconds)
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DW9ALTh1CqU

Kuiper continues his West Coast tour in July:
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Today's Autonomedia Jubilee Saint — George Orwell

June 25– George Orwell
British novelist, anarchist journalist, anti-Stalinist.

*Spain: Fiesta of Santa Orosia. Pilgrims climb to murdered maiden’s mountain sanctuary where the saint’s head is displayed, picnic, sing, dance, drink, fight and make love.

ALSO ON JUNE 25 IN HISTORY…
1822 — German phantasist E.T.A. Hoffman dies, Berlin, Germany.
1852 — Catalan architect Antoni Gaudi born, Reus, Tarragona, Spain.
1868 — Six southern, former Confederate states readmitted to U.S.
1876 — Genocidal General George Armstrong Custer killed at Little Big Horn.
1878 — Ezra Haywood gets two years hard labor for advocating sexual emancipation in the U.S.
1903 — George Orwell born as Eric Blair, Motihari, Bengal, India.
1913 — Anti-colonialist surrealist Aimé Césaire born, Basse-Pointe, Martinique.
1950 — War breaks out in Korea as North Korean troops invade the South.
1983 — Alexander Haig reluctantly relinquishes control of the U.S. White House following near-assassination of Ronald Reagan.
1984 — French philosopher Michel Foucault dies of AIDS, Paris, France

Excerpted from The 2009 Autonomedia Calendar of Jubilee Saints: Radical Heroes for the New Millennium by James Koehnline and the Autonomedia Collective