LET’S ALL MAKE IT TO THE LIGHT

I lifted this image from our pals at Dangerous Minds because it seemed such a perfect summation of the corporate, TV commercial, here-comes-Santa Claus, Xmas miasma that engulfs December and almost makes us forget there ain’t no sanity clause, and what we are really doing is dancing and excessing in the pagan darkness to invoke the return of the light. And, here in the 21st century, heaven only knows we need all the light we can get. I don’t think we have ever been more on our own. No trust can be put in leaders and no hope placed in solutions other than those we devise for ourselves. The contempt of the power elite is revealed and palpable. All decency has been bent to pay of plutocrats and invested in solutions that risk the health of the planet, and all higher aspirations of humanity, in pursuit of goals that are no longer rational even in the contexts of greed and self-interest. And yet, friends and neighbours, we have a power of our own, a radical potential so strong we can surprise ourselves, if we only reach for it with a collective will and a universal mind, so we all walk out of this hard winter of discontent and make to the light united. Now let’s go get loaded and make the Mad Santas go away.

Click here for Jim, he’s always good at times like this.

The secret word is Future

YULE LOOMS BUT WE’RE STILL HERE

England freezes, Calfornia drowns, Yule looms, North and South Korea threatens all-out nuke rumble, both the Captain and the Judge leave the planet, Doc40 takes a couples of days off to reconfigure the wares – both hard and soft – plus the coming holiday supension of services and, if that wasn’t enough, just prior to the Solstice, some folks were suggesting that maybe the popular calculations of the End of Everything based on the Mayan Calendar stone were out by some two years and Reality As We Know it would totally cease last Tuesday lunchtime. But it didn’t, and here we are with little choice but to get on with it.

Click here for Penguin Whacking. Longtime readers will know it’s a Doc40 midwinter tradition.

Click here for an Xmas Edition of Simon’s cat.

Click here for a Dixie fried Elvis

The secret word is Pudding

BUT EVEN AT XMAS, SOME PROBLEMS JUST CAN’T BE POSTPONED

The moral of the tale would seem to be “never lust after a plastic pipe.”

"REMOVAL OF A LONG PVC PIPE STRANGULATED IN THE PENIS BY HOT-MELT METHOD.
Penile incarceration for erotic or autoerotic purposes has “Introduction. been reported in a wide range of age groups, and often presents a significant challenge to urologic surgeons. No ready method has been reported for removing a polyvinylchloride (PVC) pipe entrapped on the penis. We present our experience in using hot-melt method to remove a constricted PVC pipe on the penis. A long melting split was made on the Methods. PVC pipe entrapped on the penis by using the long narrow branch of forceps heated on a gas stove. The heated forceps was able to make a split on the PVC pipe. The PVC pipe was removed by pulling the edges of the pipe apart without much difficulty. The total operation time was 20 Penile incarceration is a urologic emergency, and resourcefulness is required in some unexpected cases. Hot-melting has proved to be an easy and effective method for removing penile strangulation by a PVC pipe. To our knowledge, it is the first report about the removal of PVC pipe entrapped on a penis.”

MARILYN SEZ...

“Why do I put myself in such wholly absurd and undignified situations for the amusement of idiots?”
(Image provide by the Yuletide Valerie)

I THINK I’D RATHER GO BY TRAIN

Seemingly a new generation of airport security devices is almost upon us, and these would appear to be a first set towards electronic mind-reading devices. I idly ask myself what other questions, over and above “are you a terrorist”, their operators might take it on themselves to ask.

“Suspect Detection Systems is essentially an automatic polygraph. It consists of a booth in which the passenger sits, wearing headphones and responds to questions that are both spoken and appear on a screen. Sensors record data ranging from the skin's electrical conductivity to movement, both from the eyes and from the subject's left hand, which rests in a special cradle. The subject facing automatic interrogation doesn't even have to answer the machine's yes/no questions in order to record a response, and some of those questions will be very basic: 'Are you involved in terrorist activity?' or, 'Are you carrying explosives?' 'Suicide terrorists aren't scared of dying,' says Drukman, 'but they are scared of being caught. That gives us the hook.' SDS's detector depends on the fact that physical responses to such questions, aggregated and analysed by a computerised algorithm, are involuntary. Most subjects will be cleared after just one minute. A small minority will face more questions lasting a further five to seven minutes, following which the machine will decide whether they should be cleared or be interrogated by humans. The booths also record passport and other ID information, which can be stored.” (Click here for the full story)

Click here for Tapper Zukie

The secret word is Abject

ALL THE FUN OF THE FEST

The BBC documentary Festival Britannia, in which I contribe some choice remarks, is now up on YouTube thanks to our pal Butlin Cat. Click here

THE FROZDICK FAMILY (Colour Special)

“Beatrice Frozdick had the ability to turn white rabbits green.”
(Image from DBT)

SUNDAY BREAKFAST

The picture by Lee Sobell reminded me that I’ve known a lot of diners but there never was a diner like Dave’s Luncheonette on Canal Street in Lower Manhattan. Just around the corner from the punk and post-punk Mudd Club, its 24 hour red Rexene and stainless steel could play host to one weirdass selection of clientele around six am on any given Sunday – well beyond the imaginings of Edward Hopper (or maybe even Dennis Hopper.) Cops and junkies, all night girls a long way from the D Train, boys in smeared lipstick, debutantes in torn skirts, drunks eating off the alcohol or early hangovers, hungry freaks, sanitation workers on a break, mailmen on the way to work, alien lifeforms, and characters you wouldn’t even want to categorize, all consuming strong coffee, spigot Coke, and greasy heart-stopping fare as through their lives depended on it. Which was sometimes the literal truth.

Click here for Big Eyed Beans From Venus

The secret words are Egg Cream

MARILYN SEZ...

“Out here in the fields, I fight for my meals.”  

JEFF JONES ON SUNDAY

THE TEN COMMANDMENTS OF GUITAR PLAYING

Our pal Pat at Bomp sent the following this morning. What can I say? Such good advice is now missing from this planet.
1. Listen to the birds.
That's where all the music comes from. Birds know everything about how it should sound and where that sound should come from. And watch hummingbirds. They fly really fast, but a lot of times they aren't going anywhere.
2. Your guitar is not really a guitar Your guitar is a divining rod.
Use it to find spirits in the other world and bring them over. A guitar is also a fishing rod. If you're good, you'll land a big one.
3. Practice in front of a bush
Wait until the moon is out, then go outside, eat a multi-grained bread and play your guitar to a bush. If the bush doesn't shake, eat another piece of bread.
4. Walk with the devil
Old Delta blues players referred to guitar amplifiers as the "devil box." And they were right. You have to be an equal opportunity employer in terms of who you're bringing over from the other side. Electricity attracts devils and demons. Other instruments attract other spirits. An acoustic guitar attracts Casper. A mandolin attracts Wendy. But an electric guitar attracts Beelzebub.
5. If you're guilty of thinking, you're out.
If your brain is part of the process, you're missing it. You should play like a drowning man, struggling to reach shore. If you can trap that feeling, then you have something that is fur bearing.
6. Never point your guitar at anyone.
Your instrument has more clout than lightning. Just hit a big chord then run outside to hear it. But make sure you are not standing in an open field.
7. Always carry a church key
That's your key-man clause. Like One String Sam. He's one. He was Detroit street musician who played in the fifties on a homemade instrument. His song "I Need a Hundred Dollars" is warm pie. Another key to the church is Hubert Sumlin, Howlin' Wolf's guitar player. He just stands there like the Statue of Liberty-making you want to look up her dress the whole time to see how he's doing it.
8. Don't wipe the sweat off your instrument
You need that stink on there. Then you have to get that stink onto your music.
9. Keep your guitar in a dark place
When you're not playing your guitar, cover it and keep it in a dark place. If you don't play your guitar for more than a day, be sure you put a saucer of water in with it.
10. You gotta have a hood for your engine
Keep that hat on. A hat is a pressure cooker. If you have a roof on your house, the hot air can't escape. Even a lima bean has to have a piece of wet paper around it to make it grow.

Compiled by Will Harris from the words of the Captain

Click here for Willie the Pimp

The secret word is Moanin’

SPACE OPERA

RIP

I WAS THE EGG MAN

When I stumbled across this on the web, it looked vaguely familiar. Then I realised why. Back in Detroit in the 1970s, in a bar with Boss Goodman and Brother Wayne Kramer, I accidently took far too much really bad PCP thinking it was cocaine. In a subsequent dream/hallucination/nightmare, I found myself in a pod very like this. I assumed I’d died and reverted to the basic DNA helix. Later I woke up and everyone was very pissed off with me. Seemingly I had not been a quiet corpse.

“Environmentalists might just approve of this cheap housing, a mobile egg-shaped home covered in bamboo and grass seed-filled burlap sacks. But will it catch on as a real living space? Dai Haifei, a 24-year-old Beijing architect who developed the egg home, had been living in it on a sidewalk in the high-rent Chinese city for almost two months, until it was ordered removed by city managers who said it didn't conform to housing standards, according to the Beijing Review. The 6-foot-high, solar-powered home is just big enough for a small bed and a tiny dresser. Pegs hanging on the wall can hold books and articles of clothing. Although there's no kitchen, a water pump system stored under the bed can keep water for basic washing for about three days. There doesn't seem to be signs of a toilet, but perhaps a pot works just fine.” Click here for more."

The secret word is Encapsulate

Blake Edwards – RIP

THE PARADOX OF BOB

Yesterday I mentioned how Sony had pulled down all the Bob Dylan posts they could find on YouTube. They did, however, leave us a trailer. Click here.

THE FROZDICK FAMILY

Shortly after this photograph was taken Ray and Clay Frozdick were both arrested by the FBI.

HOW DO YOU LIKE YOUR BATPEOPLE?

There’s Bolshevik Batman…

…or BDSM Batman (Image lifted from Adam Gorightly)

Or click here for The Who

DON'T YOU MISS THE 20TH CENTURY? (Follow up to yesterday)

AN AGITPROP HERO

The following was supplied by our pal Heathcote. We should give Comrade Hudson a rebel medal.

“Gaining access to a maintenance control room, Lloyd Hudson, 35, from Ilford, Essex, was able to locate the chart and corresponding switches for Harrods’ 10,000 external lights. Barricading himself in, Hudson disabled the correct lights until he could spell out his feelings to Harrods bosses and Christmas shoppers alike. He was removed by security guards after an hour-long stand-off, then handed over to police. “He had drunk the best part of two bottles of whisky,” said a spokesperson for the iconic London store, “and it’s that kind of behaviour that got him the sack in the first place.” Hudson has since been released on police bail. Knightsbridge visitors were stunned and sensitive Americans became quite bent out of shape. “Honestly, I am disgusted, ” said Irene Rider, 59, from Gary, Indiana. “I was with my grandchildren. We had just gotten off the bus. I said ‘look everybody’ and pointed up to the lights – but you know what the lights said? They said fuck off. And that is not an appropriate message for a child. At least not at Christmas time.”

Click here for Jayne County

The secret word is Brilliant

ONCE AGAIN IT’S ALL ABOUT ME

Tomorrow night (Friday) I’ll be on TV in the UK. The show is called Festival Britannia, and it airs on BBC4 at 9.00 pm. According to the advance promo it’s a study of the evolution of open air rock festivals from the chaotic tribal gatherings of the 1960s and 1970s, to the consumer, music industry garden parties they are today, used as some kind of microcosmic metaphor for changes in society. I missed the advanced screening so I can’t comment, but those who saw it say I’m all over the allotted time space. Which, aside from my ego basking in the all screen radiation and facetime, might actually be interesting. Back in the day I gave a lot of though to the festival as a metaphor, especially after organizing Phun City. And those thoughts, and possible metaphors were, of course, the foundations of my first novel… 

AN INSPIRATIONAL MOMENT

Click here for an inspirational video (supplied by our pal Ed)

DON'T YOU MISS THE 20TH CENTURY?

“Sony pulled all my songs off YouTube.”
“I don’t care, Bob. I’ve been dead since 1987.”

NOW IT CAN BE REVEALED

A few months ago, a movie director called Kris Hipps emailed me to ask if she could make a short independent film based my old Tijuana Bible song/poem “Memphis Psychosis.” My response was “Why the hell not?” Since then the project has progressed with a will of it’s own. (Although I’m giving all input asked.) So far a teaser video – which features the Russ Meyer looking ladies above – accompanies the following pitch for funding. This all promises to be great fun. I wish I was twenty five again.

“HOW IT STARTED
A few years ago, while browsing through a second-hand music store, I picked up a CD called “Tijuana Bible” - a collection of songs and beat poetry pieces by an artist named Mick Farren. My favorite was a piece called “Memphis Psychosis”, the story of a trip to Graceland gone hellishly and hilariously wrong due to a handful of pills purchased in the restroom of a diner. For years I dreamed of putting this piece to film, and after founding PaperCat Films in 2009, decided to go out on a limb and contact Farren through his blog. He responded almost immediately, and our project was launched.
WHAT WE NEED
“Memphis Psychosis” is currently in production, and preliminary shooting has begun, but as a small independent company, naturally we could use some help in the financing department, to pay for travel expenses to England to interview Mick for the documentary section of the piece, editing costs, and festival entry fees.
WHO IS MICK FARREN?
After I started communicating with Mick, I realized what an amazing life he’s led, and decided to extend the piece to a short film within a documentary on the life and times of Mick Farren –British counterculture icon, musician, political activist, prolific sci-fi/horror author (the popular Victor Renquist vampire novels) and columnist for the Los Angeles City Beat. His musical creds include the British psych rock band “The Deviants, and the proto-punk band The Pink Fairies, and his popular solo album “Vampires Stole my Lunch Money” featuring Chrissie Hynde. So far we’re having a blast with this project, and Mr. Farren has been more than accomodating. He is one very cool guy.
As the protagonist, “Pilgrim” states in the piece, “I was in the mood for conspicuous consumption, and the ghost of Elvis was at my shoulder”.

Click here to see the video.

The secret word is Departure

AND TALKING OF BEING TWENTY FIVE AGAIN…

Yesterday Gary Hill posted video from 1967 video on Facebook in which the late lamented John Peel interviews me for a Dutch TV station about IT, the underground press and The Deviants. Strange to encounter one’s younger self coming back at you. Although I’m surprisingly lucid and even relevant, there are moments when I find the 24 year-old me a little scary. The idealistic determination of this radical youth seems very serious. It was a time, though, before the shitstorm still to come, when so much still seemed possible and the future might really be bright ahead. I guess I had yet to discover how reversals – and ducking and diving to survive them – can make a sense of humor so crucial. (And watch how the sexist egomaniac doesn't let Joy get a word in edgewise.)

Click here for this blast from the past.

And while we’re in the 1960s, click here for Billy the Monster. (That’s Boss Goodman singing the low backup vocals.)

THE FROZDICK FAMILY

The family tended to describe Caraway Frozdick as “unconventional."

(Image supplied by the equally unconventional Valerie)

HERBIVORE?

(Image from our pal Ray)

FORMER SPOOK SAYS MAINSTREAM MEDIA IS DEAD

Which makes it kinda hard to challenge.

“Traditional lines of communication between the people and the press have fallen into such disrepair in America that a whole new approach is necessary to challenge the military-industrial-governmental complex, according to a former CIA analyst sympathetic to WikiLeaks. "The Fourth Estate is dead," Ray McGovern, of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, told Raw Story in an exclusive interview. "The Fourth Estate in his country has been captured by government and corporations, the military-industrial complex, the intelligence apparatus. Captive! So, there is no Fourth Estate." McGovern explained that the term the "Fourth Estate," known today as the news media in the US, was first coined by 18th century British statesman Edmund Burke. Burke is said to have pointed to the balcony in Parliament and lauded the print media of his day for being the safeguards of democracy. "Luckily, there is a Fifth Estate," McGovern said. "The Fifth Estate exists in the ether. It’s not susceptible of government, of corporations, or advertisers or military control. It’s free. That is very dangerous to people who like to make secrets and to make secret operational things. It’s a huge threat. And the Empire – the Goliath here – is being threatened by a slingshot in the form of a computer and a stone through these emissions thrown into the ether to our own computers.” Click here for more.

The secret word is Information

Little Smokey Smothers -- RIP

OR MAYBE A LESS LURID GRAPHIC?

BUT WHERE ARE THE SPIDERS FROM MARS?

I have no idea, and I don’t really care because Zmyth the IT Girl sent us spiders on drugs. Click here.

DALEKS IN DRAG?

"Exterminate, bitch!"




Click here for Mick Jagger

MOUSEKETEER MUTINY

Our pals at Delancey Place sent this small nugget, suggesting that maybe a kind of revolution can flourish from the smallest seed. (Watch out for that little fucker bottom right. Potential Charlie Starkweather-style mass murderer?)

“The pre-teen boys who starred in The Mickey Mouse Club defied the wishes of the show's producers and tilted their Mouseketeer caps back to show off their golden pompadours. Then, as usual, one of the paunchy Mickey Mouse Club producers would come along and flatten the twelve-year-old Mouseketeer's coif with one glunk of his black-winged beanie straight onto the top of his head, suctioning it to his cranium and cutting a line across his eyebrows as if, perhaps, his brain might come off with it if squeezed tightly enough. A guy could have the coolest hair in town, but no one would know about it if he wore his Mouseketeer cap according to regulation. This fact alone made many of the older, teenage boys among The Mickey Mouse Club's two dozen cast members hate those ears that would become such icons of the 1950s. Pompadours were the rage. The guys had to have their waves out. The solution: the boys would act like they were going along with the producers' ridiculous rules until the last second before shooting started, then sneak the cap back two inches or so, just as cameras started to roll, pushing as much hair as possible forward with it to approximate a decent wave. It was the dawn of the rock 'n’ roll era, and hair was a priority.” Jennifer Armstrong – “Why? Because We Still Like You” (Grand Central)

Click here for Stanley Kubrick

The secret word is Rodent

I GUESS IT WAS INEVITABLE

SPACE OPERA

SUNDAY BREAKFAST

To employ a tried and true, but maybe tired, cliché, I woke up this morning. It was much earlier than I intended, and found I myself suffering a certain disorientation as the transition from the madness of the USA to madness of Merry Old England continued the spontaneous rewiring of my consciousness. And that’s no fucking fun when find yourself all alone in loveless, old-fool isolation with a cat that eats Weetabix. Thus I could only do the sensible thing and resort to the ever reliable hash pipe so kindly provided by a kind friend and filled by another.

Click here for Elvis

The secret word is Keef

AND AFTER A WHILE IT ALL SEEMED MUCH MORE MANAGEABLE

THE FROZDICK FAMILY

Ramalama Frozdick had, in essence, the right idea.

DON'T YOU MISS THE 20TH CENTURY?

(If I remember righly this image was supplied by Munz, but correct me if I'm wrong.)

Click here for Lowell Blanchard and the Valley Trio

BACK TO WORK

I have a shitload of catching up to do, especially because, in my time of technological challenge, I have not trolled the webs for fun material. I did, however, just post the following on Facebook.

“Isn’t maybe time that we cut through all the details and simply demanded an old school Workers Paradise with free beer and pluocrats dangling from lamposts? (But with maybe more drugs and less Isadora Duncan dancing.) It made revolution so much more simple. We’d have to get it right this time, though.”

I mean, I move back to the UK and student mob actions are on the street and the headlines scream how royalty (Charles and Camilla) were bodily threatened. Lively, right? I have to reflect a little sadly, though, that the confrontation is about funding and how the kids think they’re screwed -- not going the total the jugular and the overthrow of the whole fucking system. Shit, even Greenspan as good as told us 21st capitalism is dead. (No philosphical basis?) Maybe we just need to drive the stake through its vampire heart.

The secret word is Rise

Judge Trev -- RIP

DID SOMEBODY SAY SOMETHING ABOUT THE CHILDREN OF THE REVOLUTION?

Click here for Marc.

FINALLY...

“It’s about goddamn time!”

Good news! My broadband is now connected and up to speed, and Doc40 will be easing back into business over the next few days bringing back Marilyn, Bardot, the Frozdicks, Space Opera, and all of the other bizarre obsessions this blog is heir to. In the meantime, I will be playing a set tomorrow night with Tim Rundall and Jaki Windmill at the Inn On The Green off Portobello Road. I’m hoping all our London readers will be there.

The secret word is Back

MARILYN SEZ...

“See the show, I promise it will be great fun, and Farren's insecurity needs all the support it can get.”

RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY

Should us old boys still be doing this kind of thing? I dunno, but while Keith and Bob are still doing it, I will also endeavor to keep going. I don’t think I’m boasting to say that, at last night’s Boss Goodman benefit at The Inn On The Green, the old firm of the usual suspects really pulled it off, and now we hope for even better in the future. I also have specially thank Russell for his over-and-above help with staging the show, playing like an ace, and so very much more, Zoe Smith and Jaki Windmill for all their unflagging support, Tim Rundall and Greg for some excellent playing, and also the barstool that held me up and enabled me to make all the old moves at my advanced age.
(Image by Billy Oblivion)
The secret word is Implacable

GRATUITOUS RUNWAY MODELS

WE'RE PUTTING THE BAND BACK TOGETHER (Kinda)

Although I still wait for a satisfactory phone and broadband connection, I have been provided with have the most amazing TV service and am profoundly grateful. Meanwhile all focus is on preparing for Friday’s launch of the Boss Goodman tribute CD on Friday at The Inn On The Green on London’s Portobello Road. Plus there’s a very nice review in the current Terrascope Online…

PORTOBELLO SHUFFLE: A TESTIMONIAL TO BOSS GOODMAN & TRIBUTE TO THE MUSIC OF THE DEVIANTS & PINK FAIRIES (Easy Action)
I’ve always thought of tribute albums as a bit of a mixed bag. Well, when I say “always”, ever since the mid-1980s when I took a hand in helping one-time betting shop manager and future Porcupine Tree lyricist Alan Duffy launch a series of ground-breaking tribute LPs on his Imaginary Records label (mine was in point of fact a very very small part - I pointed him towards a few bands, and wrote some sleeve-notes for the second, a tribute to the music of Captain Beefheart). It was a brilliant idea, and Alan’s execution and choice of artists - both covering, and being paid tribute to - was exemplary; however it’s a measure of my unease perhaps about the whole idea of one artist covering the music of another that bands being invited to contribute to Terrascope compilations over the course of the following 20 years or so were invariably encouraged to contribute something original. There were of course exceptions – but generally speaking, I thought it better that a band which few people were familiar with (and to be fair, the very nature of the magazine’s cover discs were such that many of the artists featured were at the time either overlooked or just starting out) would be doing themselves more favours if they showed off their own originality rather than demonstrate their prowess at performing someone else’s material.
‘Portobello Shuffle’ is an entirely different kettle of fish though - in so very many ways. To begin with, it’s far, far more than a tribute to the music of the Deviants and Pink Fairies, as deserving as those two legendary outfits of the British underground scene are of all the accolades going. The sub-title ‘A testimonial to Boss Goodman’ reveals the importance of this release: and what says it all is the stellar line-up of artists who have freely given of their time, and talent, to help raise both spirits and funds for the bands’ now ailing former road manager, sound-man and booking agent Dave ‘Boss’ Goodman, a man who was generally regarded as the fourth, fifth or even sixth Pink Fairy depending on which line-up you care to shake a stick at. (Click here for the rest.)

The secret word is Creativity

MARILYN SEZ...

“We’re all addicts for a stage and an audience.”