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THE ADVENTURES OF MARILYN (Part 2135)

In which, for some days, Marilyn has been followed everywhere by the wholly inane and annoyingly butch drag-queen Jane Russell replicant, who not only shows off her legs and wears identical clothing to Marilyn, but insists on looking at herself in a small mirror at approximately three minute intervals. Marilyn first theorized that the replicant was some kind of infiltrated Apollonian psyops device, but this was rejected out of hand by Dionysian Intelligence. (An oxy-moron, Marilyn thought, if every there was one.) They informed her that the Russell was a model 20 back-up guardian, and that Marilyn was lucky to have such singular personal protection. Realizing that she has no immediate way of ridding herself of the unwelcome presence, she turns her back on the thing and drinks a Coke.

(Pic supplied by Valerie)

(THE ADVENTURES OF MARILYN NOW HAS IT’S OWN PAGE SO THE WHOLE THING CAN BE READ WITHOUT SCROLLING. CLICK HERE)

WANT A DRUGLESS HALLUCINATION?

As a longtime connoisseur of hallucinations, I can totally assure you that this works really well, despite the somewhat lame music. Click here and follow the instructions.

OR WOULD YOU PREFER A BIZARRE RELIGIOUS ILLUSION?

As in the face of Jesus in the wafer of a Kit Kat. (Image supplied by Wendy)

The secret word is Worship
The secret message is 47616262612d67616262612068657921 (If you need the decoding instructions, just shout.)

SWINE FLU AND PUPPIES GLOWED IN THE DARK

Did someone say creepy, or maybe our just desserts? As the media panics about a swine flu pandemic, the following was sent by our friend Diva. Is humanity stone crazy now? Goddamn

“A cloned beagle named Ruppy – short for Ruby Puppy – is the world's first transgenic dog. She and four other beagles all produce a fluorescent protein that glows red under ultraviolet light. A team led by Byeong-Chun Lee of Seoul National University in South Korea created the dogs by cloning fibroblast cells that express a red fluorescent gene produced by sea anemones. Lee and researcher Woo Suk Hwang were part of a team that created the first cloned dog, Snuppy, in 2005. Much of Hwang's work on human cells turned out to be fraudulent, but Snuppy was not, an investigation later concluded.” (Click here for more.)

WILD ONE

WILD TWO

WILD THREE

WILD FOUR

WILD MORE

The secret word is Rebellion

The secret message is 576174746120796f7520676f743f

THEY'RE BACK...

I was sitting down to write some piece of Saturday cynical amusement and then, with dire synchronicity, I received this link from our good pal Jimmy, and also a breaking-news email that the WHO fears swine flu could become a pandemic. And, of course, should the Third Horseman really show up with all his droogs, the USA doesn’t have a healthcare system worth shit. But the good news is that an infestation of venture capitalist swine will make beaucoup bucks from the plague, and they are very fucking happy.

“LOS ANGELES, April 24 (Reuters) - The swine flu outbreak is likely to benefit one of the most prolific and successful venture capital firms in the United States: Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Thomson Reuters Private Equity Week reported on Friday.
Shares of the two public companies in the firm's portfolio of eight Pandemic and Bio Defense companies -- BioCryst Pharmaceuticals and Novavax – jumped Friday on news that the swine flu killed a reported 60 people in Mexico and has infected people in the United States. The World Health Organization said the virus appears to be susceptible to Roche's flu drug Tamiflu, also known as oseltamivir, but not to older flu drugs such as amantadine. (Click here for the whole story)”

Can we hang them now, please? From lampposts? (And isn’t there something very dubious about Tamiflu? I can’t quite remember the conspiracy theory.)

The secret word is plainly Pestilence

The secret message is 4920746f6c6420796f752049207761736e277420
6665656c696e672077656c6c2e

…OR IS HANGING TOO GOOD FOR CAPITALISTS?

This is from 1914. Sadly little changes unless forced to.

PROLETARIAT PINUP Saturday Special -- Jane Fonda

"No great idea in its beginning can ever be within the law. How can it be within the law? The law is stationary. The law is fixed. The law is a chariot wheel which binds us all regardless of conditions or place or time." – Emma Goldman

THE HEAT COOLED DOWN

The heatwave has passed and I'm back. Without irony or sarcasm, I’m touched by how, when I don’t post anything on Doc40 for a few days, some of you worry that I have died, burned out, been held for ransom or otherwise become incapacitated. Thanks for all the enquires and good wishes. I really appreciate them, but do remember that now and again I have to take time off to maintain my health, sanity, and also earn a living, which is a huge obstacle in itself through these troubled times.

The secret word is Stress

The secret message is 50656f706c652061726520737472616e67652077
68656e20796f75e280997265206120737472616e
6765722e

THE GUITARPLAYER'S BRAIN

Munz sent over this story from multi-instrumentalist Chris Darrow. We’ll ignore the obvious jokes.

“New German research indicates that when musicians play together, they think together as well.
Study author Ulman Lindenberger of the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin and his co-investigators looked at electrical activity in the brains of eight pairs of guitarists. They monitored patterns of brain waves as the musicians played a short jazz-fusion melody together up to 60 times, and published their findings in the journal BMC Neuroscience.
The study reported that the frontal and central regions of the guitarists’ brains synchronized to a high degree. But, more surprisingly, the temporal and parietal regions also showed significant synchronization in more than half of the pairs. These regions may be involved in simply enjoying the music, researchers suggested.To my mind, this study highlights one of the great joys of playing music, one voiced by many musicians: a sense of self-transcendence. Playing music together creates a rare chance to step outside of ourselves and our small concerns and join our minds wholeheartedly with others in creating something no individual could make alone. Seen in this light, creating beautiful music is simply a wonderful byproduct of a larger reward – connecting deeply with other human beings.”

OUR WHACKY UNCLE BILL

Uncle Bill is convinced the typewriter moved and he waits for it to move again.

THE HEAT AND THE HANGOVER

As cynics surmised, it did take me a couple of days to get over Friday night’s Hawkwind tribute. At events of that kind, I do rather feel obliged to address the alcohol and other stimulants with some rigor, if only to show the young people how it’s done. Then, just complicate matters, a 95F heat wave dropped on the city out of nowhere, leaving my brain limp and unusable, and my liver feeling like it attacked Akabar by land, plus generally demonstrating that I am not made of sterner stuff. Doubtless I will write more as it cools off.

THE BLACK LEATHER JACKET

Back in the 20th century I wrote an excellent book called The Black Leather Jacket which latter became a Channel 4/PBS documentary narrated by Dennis Hopper. Confirming that nothing ever really goes away, although the documentary isn’t be seen on TV too often these days, it has appeared on YouTube chopped into a bunch of multiple episodes. (Click here for the first.)

J.G. Ballard – RIP

SPACE OPERA

Seems like I’ll be gracing the stage at the LA Knitting Factory tomorrow, performing at a Hawkwind tribute, at the invitation of our pal Tommy Grenas . I’ll be reading Bob Calvert’s Sonic Attack and I hope a good time will be had by all. If you happen to be in Hollywood, the grand finale, of which I’ll be a part, as will master guitarist Andy Colquhoun, should launch at about half past midnight.

The secret word is Space

The secret message is 546970207468652062617274656e6465722e

MORE SPACE OPERA

I have a well reasoned rant about Grey Aliens posted on the L.O.W.F.I. website. (That’s League of Western Fortean Intermediatists, to you, pilgrim.) Click here to read it.

ULTIMATE SPACE

Our pal Elf Hellion has sent us a link to an amazing piece of archive material – a 1975 Rolling Stone interview with Philip K. Dick, by Paul Williams, and in full facsimile form. (Click here to grok the fullness.)

AN UGLY WIND

The sign read “AMERICAN TAXPAYERS ARE THE JEWS FOR OBAMA’S OVENS.” At first I laughed in disbelief. The Republican Party, just as I predicted back in January, moves closer and closer to becoming “a rump fragment of the GOP – the Raving Looney Shotgun Hillbilly Jesus Party who would, if lucky, constitute some 15% of the electorate and never manage to be more than a noisy nuisance the rest of us could tune out.” The only problem is that cable news in general, and Fox in particular refuses to tune them out. Even when only dozens instead of thousands turn out for the absurd – and unfortunately named – teabag tax protest, Fox goes on trumpeting as a “grassroots revolution.”
Unfortunately all this nonsense unwittingly backs the Raving Looney Shotgun Hillbilly Jesus Party in the direction of the White Supremist/armed militia/neo-Nazis fringe. A ugly wind blows through a ravaged middle American landscape, and lacking any appreciable philosophy, or even a pragmatic core of belief, conservatives follow the prime directive of protecting the rich and corporate, and fob off their benighted rank and file with nothing more than an irrationally venomous and sometimes racist personal hatred of Barack Obama. Earlier this week a report leaked from the Department of Homeland Security indicated that the extreme right was growing and on the move.

“If you think the conservative "Tea Party" movement is daunting, take a look at a new report issued by the Department of Homeland Security that says right-wing extremism is on the rise throughout the country. In the report (a full copy of which is below), officials warn that right-wing extremists could use the bad state of the U.S. economy and the election of the country's first black president to recruit new members to their cause.” (Click here for the whole thing)

I trust Homeland Security about as much as I trust Rush Limbaugh, but I did find it amusing that Limbaugh, Hannity, Malkin, Glenn Beck and the rest started screaming bloody murder about how conservatives were victims of an Obama police state, forgetting, perhaps, how gung ho they were when the DHS was hunting terrorists through the libraries of the land, and the NSA was tapping our phones. Back then they were prone to snarl how patriots who hadn’t done anything had nothing to fear, and that we should be willing to give up our liberty if we wanted to be safe. Bob Cesca notes in HuffPo…

“But back to that "fascist" accusation. I'm not convinced that tea baggers like Michelle Malkin understand that fascism is, in fact, a form of right wing extremism. Because for the last 24 hours or so, Malkin, Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and the usual band of apoplectic brainiacs appear to have been vigorously defending "right wing extremism" after having previously accused the president of being on the same flank of the ideological spectrum.” (Click here for the whole thing.)

Essentially if someone doesn’t shut the fuck up, it could all turn very ugly. The extreme right are not posturing media shills. They have guns and very bad attitudes.

The secret weapon is MAC10

The secret message is 546f206b6e6f772068696d20697320746f206c6f
76652068696d2e

FROM THE ABSURD TO THE UNBELIEVEABLE

Munz forwarded this and we swear that it’s real, and reproduced about as intact as we can make it.

---------- Forwarded message ----------

From: Rachelle Spector

To: undisclosed-recipients:;Date: Wed, 15 Apr 2009 03:50:52 -0700Subject:

Calling on ALL family, friends, acquaintances---I'M CRYING FOR HELP!!!!

FREE PHIL SPECTOR--NOW!!!!

Phil Spector, my husband, needs YOUR help now more than ever!!!!

A grave mis-carriage of justice has taken place and another innocent man has gone to jail for something he clearly and scientifically did NOT do.

Please help FREE PHIL SPECTOR!!!

Please do as many interviews as possible with regard to this case because NOW the gag order is OVER....we are ALL free to talk to whomever we wish!Do interviews for as many TV, radio and internet sites as possible; write letters to the president, the governor of California, councilmen/women...to everyone and anyone that will listen!!!

WE NEED TO EXPOSE JUDGE FIDLER. WE NEED TO GET OUT ANY AND ALL INFORMATION ABOUT LANA CLARKSON THAT THE JUDGE WOULD NOT LET IN.

This is a matter of life and death people!!!!!! Any thoughts, ideas, plans....PLEASE DO NOT HESITATE TO TALK TO ME....BUT LETS GET OUR BUTTS MOVING.....

THE ART OF MOSCOSO

BO DIDDLEY IS A WHITE HOUSE DOG

I had frankly grown bored with the Obama’s new dog. The First Puppy was taking far too long to arrive and had even developed its own politically correct political strings. But then I learned that the Portuguese water mutt had been named after Bo Diddley and I had to stop and think. That the White House Dog is named for the late lamented Bo has to be some kind of mildly significant symbol, even if Obama is flakey about legalizing dope.

And while you’re thinking about it click here for some Bo.

The secret word is Woof!

The secret message is 57686f20646f20796f75206c6f76653f

GENE VINCENT WILL NEVER HAVE A WHITE HOUSE DOG NAMED AFTER HIM

But this is the way we like to remember rock & roll’s first psycho. (Thanks Tom.)

AND NOW FOR SOMETHING TO WORRY ABOUT

(I notice the giant germs are only carrying off the women.)

Our pal Tim has more than his fair share of family troubles. Doc40 offers him all possible comfort.

PHILLIP GOES DOWN

I guess this is the fall of the Wall of Sound…

"LOS ANGELES - Rock music producer Phil Spector was convicted Monday of second-degree murder in the shooting death of actress Lana Clarkson at his mansion six years ago, a verdict that will send him to prison for at least 18 years barring a successful appeal. A Superior Court jury returned the verdict after about 30 hours of deliberations. The jury had the option of choosing involuntary manslaughter, but did not do so. The panel also found Spector guilty of using a firearm in committing a crime."

The secret word is Loaded

The secret message is 596f75e280997665206c6f73742074686174206c
6f76696e67206665656c696e672e

OUR WHACKY UNCLE BILL

Uncle Bill falls asleep at the dream machine.

And HCB has coincidentally sent us this review by Jason Anderson of the documentary FlicKeR, directed by Nik Sheehan.

“Toronto director Nik Sheehan’s biodoc on visionary painter and writer Brion Gysin doubles as a cogent yet appropriately trippy primer on how the activities of a few freaks who drifted between Paris and Tangier in the ’50s came to have a vast cultural influence. It was Gysin who led the Beats to Morocco after the British-born, Alberta-bred artist first joined Paul Bowles there in 1950. And it was Gysin who pioneered the literary cut-up technique that would be popularized by his pal William S. Burroughs. What interests Sheehan most of all in FLicKeR is another of Gysin’s innovations, the Dream Machine. This mysterious contraption offered the prospect of a drugless high. Though Sheehan has his own custom-made, the film also shows how low-cost versions can be jimmied up with a light bulb, some construction paper and a record player. (An additional record player may also be employed to spin Pink Floyd’s “Echoes” or the astral music of your choice.) Iggy Pop, Marianne Faithfull and Genesis P-Orridge are just three of the countercultural icons we see experiencing the machine’s effects on camera — alas, none report having visions of Karl Rove being sodomized by a mountain goat. In any case, Sheehan succeeds at renewing interest in an artist whose influence far outweighs his fame.”

SPACE OPERA

This is not the Jetex spaceship referred to in yesterday’s post. But it’s close.

HAPPY EASTER

These are your brains on religion.

SPACE OPERA

"But you're not a pig."

"Seek bacon elsewhere, Earthman."

WHAT THE HELL IS JETEX?

Jetex was crucial in the development of my pre-teen personality, and thus, when I discovered an actual print ad for the Jetex motor on my favorite website I was both surprised and uplifted. The Jetex motor was a cheap, solid-fuel burning, rocket-propulsion unit for toy planes, cars, and boats.
My first encounter was with a Jetex powered car that was supposed to run on a line – at quite alarming speed – in circles around a central tether. Although it was my car, my stepfather insisted on setting the thing up and lighting the Jetex fuse. And, needless to say, he fucked up. The car was being run on a very uneven patio. It hit a bump, went straight up on the air for some distance and then came back down again, scared the dog, and pretty much wrecked itself, although the Jetex motor was still intact.

My second Jetex experience was with something called the Dan Dare Jetex Space Rocket that was launched from a spring-loaded ramp, supposedly released a parachute after it had achieved what Werner von Braun called brenschluss, and floated gently to earth. It came in kit form. My grandfather and I took almost a full month of one summer to complete the asbestos-lined, balsa wood construction. But we miss-timed the first launch, and the rocket fell off the ramp before the motor ignited, and then it lay on its side, burning grass and spewing smoke until the fuel burned out.
The second launch of the Dan Dare Jetex Space Rocket was much more successful. The rocket went up a hundred feet or more before the fuel was spent. Unfortunately the chute didn’t deploy until far too late in the fall to stop it ploughing into the ground. After it was glued it back together, the Dan Dare Jetex Space Rocket made one last flight, with an incendiary device aboard to blow it up in mid-air. Which gets me to my real romance with Jetex. Or, to be more precise, Jetex fuse.

At age eleven, I was a mad bomber. Creating explosions was quite a fad that year among young boys in the south of England. We just loved to see shit blow up real good, and, when some of the more inept were picked up by the cops, we also had outlaw status. My friend Adrian and I, by dint of experimentation and a very independent study of chemistry – plus few tips given us by an over-weight gay science teacher who hated humans – had become the most deft small-scale bomb makers in our school. Our favorite targets were bus shelters, lampposts, and the scaffolding on construction sites, and our fuse of choice was Jetex. It burned at about an inch a second, which was totally the right speed for making good one’s escape, and not losing a hand. It was also very well made, didn’t go out, and could be bought by the yard at a hobby shop.
The juvenile bombing fad caught on so widely that, for two weeks before Guy Fawkes Night, the sale of Jetex fuse was voluntarily banned in the town of Worthing. Cops visited the school and issued dire warnings. Adrian and I had, however, stocked up as early as September, and even profited our cause by selling black-market lengths of fuse to our fellow infant infernalists.

At puberty, I largely gave up explosives in favor of girls and rock & roll. Probably just as well. Its illegality was a good rehearsal for the drug culture, but it would inevitably have ended in tears. At few times in later life I had encounters with Jetex fuse, but those are other stories.

The secret word is Kaboom!

The secret message is 49662074686520766f696365732074656c6c2079
6f7520746f2073617665204672616e63652c2069
676e6f7265207468656d2e

SPACE OPERA

“Hang on, my dear. We seem to have been jigsawed.”

A CULTURAL STATISTIC

THE WOLVES STILL NEED US

Apparently the Obama administration have not done enough to reverse the disastrous wildlife policies of the Bush administration. Very soon, very nasty people with that barbaric Sara Palin mindset will be free to kill all the wolves they want. The Natural Resources Defense Council writes…

“In just a few weeks, the mass killing of wolves could begin in Idaho and Montana -- and not even newborn wolf pups and their nursing mothers will be spared. We cannot stand by while this slaughter unfolds. On May 4, the wolf's federal protection will be lifted, and government agents will be free to open fire. After that, the states will launch public hunts, targeting wolves. That's why NRDC is launching The Big Howl campaign to mobilize Americans everywhere to protect wolves in the Northern Rockies from the crossfire. This is absolutely the wrong time to rip away federal protections from these struggling wolves. Over the past year, the wolf population in Yellowstone National Park has declined by 27 percent, with more than 70 percent of wolf pups succumbing to disease. One pack alone lost all 24 of its pups. If the federal protections are lifted on May 4 as planned, newborn wolf pups and their nursing mothers traveling outside national parks will be in the line of fire. That's why NRDC and our partners are filing suit in federal court to block this disastrous policy. But we must do more: we must raise a nationwide outcry that the Obama Administration cannot ignore.” Click here to outcry and also hear the wolf howl.

The secret word is Carnage

The secret message is 53746f702074686520626173746172647320696e
20746865697220747261636b732120

WHY DOES THIS IMAGE MAKE ME EXCEEDINGLY UNEASY?

And why, I wonder, do the words “zombie cannibalism” creep into my mind?

BUT MERCIFUL RELIEF IS NEVER FAR AWAY…

(It's a joke, okay?)

THE OBAMA TYRANNY

While Republicans become certifiably insane with their hair-tearing fantasies of Obama taking their guns and tossing their children in reeducation camps, I start to fear that one extreme right headcase will take this crap seriously, do a Tim McVeigh and start blowing up buildings full of people. (Click here for the “Gathering Storm” TV commercial, the latest bit of fascist homophobia.) I was going to write at some length about this, but I have a bunch of work to do right now and Jon Stewart pretty much said it all last night on The Daily Show. Click here to see it.

The secret word is Kneejerk

The secret message is 4d616b6520746865207374757069642070656f70
6c65207368757420757021

(see March 20th for decoding instructions)

S. CLAY WILSON NEEDS OUR HELP

Roldo has sent us a heads up that S. Clay Wilson the highly respected, veteran underground cartoonist – the creator of Captain Pissgums and The Checkered Demon – needs our help. Click here to find out why and what you can do.

OFFICIAL -- OBAMA IS THE ANTICHRIST (Pleased to meet you, now you guessed my name)

Okay, so I guess that proves it. If you play Barack Obama’s campaign slogan “Yes we can” backwards, it becomes “Thank you Satan.” Look no further. We are under the cloven hoof of the Antichrist and fucking doomed. No question. We’re toast. (But why do these holy rolling paranoids insist on playing everything backwards?) Click here for the damning proof and here for even more insanity.

The secret word is Lucifer

DUDE...

And while we’re on the subject of hidden secrets, Leonardo’s lost drawing of the Big Lebowski contains more hidden secrets than you can shake a stick at. Remember you read it here first.

416c6c206861696c204265656c7a6562756220
(see March 20th for decoding instructions)

OUR WHACKY UNCLE BILL

Uncle Bill lands on the moon. He intends use his Geiger counter in the search for Loretta Lynn’s deadly secret.

Meanwhile, since it’s Sunday, here are two videos by William Burroughs -- Click for Ah Pook the Destroyer and The Western Lands. (Ah Pook was sent by Valerie and the image by HCB.)

The secret word is Crater

MO' EGO

Below is a glowing commentary of Darklost, the second novel of the Renquist Quartet. I don’t know if any movie directors visit Doc40, but if they do, I would draw their attention to the second paragraph. (But do movie people still read, or do they just look at the pictures? I’d be happy talking with an artist who was looking to do a graphic novel.)

"The second novel of vampire Victor Renquist, now shifted to LA where there is a rich and mad cult planning to raise Chthulhu, plus a woman who was halfway turned before the vampire concerned died (she is termed a darklost), plus a squadron of violent off-the-books cops, a rock band, a feral Mexican vampire, some armadillos (don't ask me) and Marlon Brando. It's highly compressed - almost 500 pages, nearly all of it covering a couple of days of beautifully orchestrated action, full of exciting set-pieces, with the overall megathreat never occluded at all.

He's also great at creating memorable visuals (my oldest friend was particularly captivated by the opening of Phaid The Gambler). At the climax of this, LA is in chaos: riots, people going crazy, strange energies flashing around, covered in a toxic fog. The vampires are coming to save the world: 1000-year-old Victor with his cursed samurai sword, Brando looking as he had in The Wild One, a little girl in Victorian schoolgirl garb, with her bald teenage sister, another who has worked for decades as an unstoppable Mafia assassin, and others. This lot come striding out of the fog, everyone instinctively getting out of their way - any movie director could make a career out of that scene."

THE ADVENTURES OF MARILYN (Part bfb4948)

In which Marilyn finds herself sitting beside the Big Fat Bastard. The Big Fat Bastard has
the girth of a Dionysian, but is really something else. The Big Fat Bastard reaches for Marilyn’s knee, and she attempts to halt him with a withering look, but she knows the Big Fat Bastard is not so easily stopped. The Big Fat Bastard has the ability to affect minds. The Big Fat Bastard is able to make others think in shorter and shorter sentences. Even a Blonde Goddess cannot easily resist. She sends out a counter-though. “Get away from me. You are a big fat four-sandwich eating motherfucker.” But it doesn’t work. Marilyn finds it harder and harder. Her thoughts are too simple. Too simple. It is not good. What shall she do? The Big Fat Bastard closes. Marilyn scowls. To be. Continued?

Pic supplied by Valerie

(THE ADVENTURES OF MARILYN NOW HAS IT’S OWN PAGE SO THE WHOLE THING CAN BE READ WITHOUT SCROLLING. CLICK HERE)

TOTALLY TAKEN BY CAPTAIN COMEBACK CON

When the news of a new album and a comeback tour by no less than Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band, I was, to say the least, excited. I completely believed the press release, and refused to notice how a few things didn’t seem quite right. Like a whole bunch of the other people, I wanted it to be true, and was totally taken in. But then I noticed that it was posted on April 1st. The stuff that was not quite right became harder and harder to ignore, and I realized it was a fast and bulbous hoax. (Click here to see for yourself.)

The secret word is Gullible

THIS BLOG IS STILL PROTECTED BY...

HARD TIMES AND AMERICA KILLS (Again!!!?)

I woke up this morning, flipped on MSNBC to see that the world was still there, and found that all other news had been preempted by the shooting massacre in Binghamton. Coming so hot on the heels of Wednesday’s post, it all gave me pause and the weirded feeling that maybe I shouldn’t be posting any TGIF fun and frolic before the bodies are cold. A strange Cartesian paraphrase slips into my mind. “We kill, therefore we are.” Or is it “we are, therefore we kill.?”