METAL DISABILITY

Hey America, this is socialism in action. Don’t knock it.

“Roger Tullgren of Hässleholm, Sweden needs to listen to heavy metal music while he works. Mind you, that’s not wants to, but needs to. It’s such an essential part of his life that it’s been classified as a disability, entitling him to special dispensation by employers. The ageing rocker claims to have attended almost three hundred shows last year, often skipping work in the process. Eventually his last employer tired of his absences and Tullgren was left jobless and reliant on welfare handouts. But his sessions with the occupational psychologists led to a solution of sorts: Tullgren signed a piece of paper on which his heavy metal lifestyle was classified as a disability, an assessment that entitles him to a wage supplement from the job centre. “I signed a form saying: ‘Roger feels compelled to show his heavy metal style. This puts him in a difficult situation on the labour market. Therefore he needs extra financial help’. So now I can turn up at a job interview dressed in my normal clothes and just hand the interviewers this piece of paper,” he said. The manager at his new workplace allows him to go to concerts as long as he makes up for lost time at a later point. He is also allowed to dress as he likes and listen to heavy metal while washing up.”

Click here for Painkiller

The secret word is Bipolar

THE FROZDICK FAMILY

As Owen Frozdick moved through life, he left a sad trail of jilted sheep.

…WHEN THEY PRY IT FROM MY COLD DEAD FINGERS

(While we’re tagged as offensive anyway.)

Click here for Gene

AND NOW A WORD FROM OUR OVERLORDS...

LET SLIP THE ROBOTS OF WAR (Part 2)

We advance deeper into the murk if the future.

“The Pentagon released a long-promised cybersecurity plan Thursday that declares the Internet a domain of war. The plan notably does not spell out how the U.S. military would use the Web for offensive strikes. The Defense Department’s first-ever plan for cyberspace calls on the DoD to expand its ability to thwart attacks from other nations and groups, beef up its cyber workforce and expand collaboration with the private sector. Like major corporations and the rest of the federal government, the military “depends on cyberspace to function,” the DoD plan says. The U.S. military uses cyberspace for everything from carrying out military operations to sharing intelligence data internally to managing personnel. “The department and the nation have vulnerabilities in cyberspace,” the document states. “Our reliance on cyberspace stands in stark contrast to the inadequacy of our cybersecurity.” Other nations “are working to exploit DoD unclassified and classified networks, and some foreign intelligence organizations have already acquired the capacity to disrupt elements of DoD’s information infrastructure,” the plan states. “Moreover, non-state actors increasingly threaten to penetrate and disrupt DoD networks and systems.” (Click here for more)

Click here for “Stairway To Heaven” – but not what you might expect.

The secret word is Davros

WE WERE ALL SUPPOSED TO HAVE THESE BY NOW

WATCH SEAN BEAN DIE OVER AND OVER

Click here

SOMEONE’S BEEN BORROWING MY LYRICS...

...and he didn't even ask.  
Click here for a partial explanation

LET SLIP THE ROBOTS OF WAR

Okay, so Reuters report that the Pentagon is starting to figure human grunts are less than cost effective and maybe remote controlled combat is a pretty swell idea. Which it might be, taken in isolation. Unfortunately few things can be taken in isolation these days, and if you factor in Ray Kurzweil’s prediction of the Singularity, when the machines become smarter than we are, and the fictional speculation of The Matrix, Skynet, and HAL 9000, the time may come when the robots decide they’ve seen the enemy and it is us.

"As the United States draws down troops in Afghanistan and Iraq and cuts back on defense spending, its reliance on technology will only rise, benefiting a clutch of companies specializing in intelligence gathering, surveillance and reconnaissance. The U.S. military will need more equipment like infrared sensors, jammers and unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) systems to counter threats to its troops, with the Obama administration planning to cut troops in Afghanistan by a third by 2012, and exit from Iraq by the end of this year. "(The United States) will have to continue to keep an eye on what is occurring in these countries. So, we will invest in intelligence gathering equipment to complement the decrease in actual forces on ground," Lazard Capital Markets analyst Michael Lewis said. Defense technology companies such as signal intelligence systems maker Mercury Computer Systems , night-vision systems specialist FLIR Systems and unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) maker AeroVironment are expected to benefit from this shift in defense spending priorities." (Click here for more)

Click here for Marianne

The secret word is Terminator

…AND SOME DAYS THE HOG EATS YOU

A tribute to the late great Vaughn Bode (who also gave a lot of consideration to robot wars in his Junkwaffel comics.)

THE YOUNG ELVIS – ARMED AND WITH EARMUFFS

I FIND THIS JUST PLAIN PUZZLING

EXCUSE ME, OFFICER, BUT YOU FORGOT YOUR MACHINE GUN

Protect and serve -- when you can remember where you left your weapon.

“A Seattle resident named Nick snapped the photo above in late June, passing it on to The Stranger, a weekly newspaper. It shows an empty police patrol car with an unattended semi-automatic rifle sitting on the trunk. A SPD spokesperson professes to being "very embarrassed" on behalf of the force. "The department is very embarrassed that this happened," says Seattle Police Department Sergeant Sean Whitcomb. "We're incredibly grateful to the person that flagged down the bike officers and the woman who followed the patrol car driver around to let them know there was a rifle on the back of the car." But were SPD officers driving around with an AR-15 rifle on the back of their squad car???? "I'm not going to comment," says Whitcomb, adding that the West Precinct has launched "an investigation into the circumstances that allowed this to happen."

Click here for LW

The secret word is Mariah

THE JELLYFISH ARE UPON US

Yes, my droogs, we’ve warmed up the oceans and now the invertebrates are turning on us.

“They have no backbone and their slimey bodies are made up of more than 90 per cent water but they threaten to turn beaches into no-go zones within two decades. Huge amounts of jellyfish have forced the shutdown of nuclear power plants in Japan, already hit by the earthquake and tsunami, Scotland and a coal-powered plant in Israel in the past few weeks. And a sustained explosion in the population of jellyfish throughout the world's oceans has the potential to be "quite catastrophic" if it is not checked, said jellyfish expert Dr Jamie Seymour from James Cook University in Queensland.” (Click here for the whole story)

SPACE OPERA

Nothing improves a cathedral like an Imperial Star Destroyer.

GRATUITOUS BARDOT

CLIMATE CHANGE DRESDEN-STYLE

Seemingly the thousand bomber raids on Germany during World War II actually produced temporary climate change. The story comes from Geoff Manaugh of BLDGBLOG

"Allied bombing raids during World War II "inadvertently experimented on the weather" in England by creating massive concentrations of artificial clouds as the planes roared off toward continental Europe. Researchers quoted by New Scientist claim that "where the aircraft circled and assembled into formation," on one particular day back in 1944 for which military, meteorological, and even anecdotal eyewitness records are available, "it was significantly cloudier and 0.8°C cooler than the area upwind of the bases." In many ways, this is both obvious and uninteresting, as, of course, any uniquely large-scale act of artificial cloud-production-such as aircraft contrails-would have at least some effect on local weather. But what, to me, seems most remarkable about this story is the darkly poetic idea that war brings with it its own meteorology, its own skies, storms, and atmospheres, literally altering the very firmament beneath which human affairs take place. World War II becomes an even more frightening event, as sun-obliterating cloudfronts of mechanized combat roll eastward over the ruined cities of Europe."

Click here for Nat King Cole

The secret word is Liberator

THE FROZDICK FAMILY (A Two Part Special)

Olga Frozdick’s generosity to the Red Army knew no bounds.

THE FROZDICK FAMILY

While Bettie Frozdick had a soft spot for the Yanks.

JAMES BOND NEEDED RUBBER BANDS?

MOMMY DEAREST…

SUNDAY BREAKFAST

No brothers and sisters, that’s not me. Just a generic mad poet, but it does kinda reflect my momentary mood because – sometime in the wee hours of this morning – I completed my brand new collection of original poetry, and after one final agonizing read-through, I’ll email it off to the guys who intend to publish it. But, even after all these years, now running into decades, I still find myself awash in anxiety, shaking my head and worrying that it is altogether too self-revelatory. (First night nerves every one night stand?) The material is all brand new and was pretty much all written in the last year or so – very much from the heart, or maybe the psychosis. No one has heard or seen it except when I test drove a couple of pieces at a poetry show in Brighton a few weeks ago. The working title of the collection is Machines & Beautiful Women and I’ll keep you all posted as and when it will be unleashed on the world.

Click here for me

The secret work is Nervous

Wurzel – RIP

MARILYN SEZ...

“I hope this isn’t going to be the excuse for a bout of violent absinthe-fueled dementia.”

AN UNUSUAL APPROACH TO FARTING

DON'T YOU MISS THE 20TH CENTURY?

THE BULLSHIT GOES ON

I can only register my disgust that the Obama adminstration – of whom I once, long ago, had such high hopes – continues to fight the tired and discredited War On Drugs with the same misinformation and mendacity regarding marijuana. I would also point out that chocolate has no accepted medical use but that is not a reason to make its use a crime. Barack, you’re a shithead like all the other lying bastard politicians. (The following is from MSNBC)

“The federal government officially declared that marijuana has no accepted medical use and should remain classified as a dangerous and addictive drug. It will remain in the same class of drugs as heroin. The Department of Justice declared Friday: "DHHS concluded that marijuana has a high potential for abuse, has no accepted medical use in the United States, and lacks an acceptable level of safety for use even under medical supervision." The decision comes almost a decade after medical marijuana supporters asked the feds to reclassify cannabis. The activists point to research that showed its effectiveness in treating certain diseases, like glaucoma and multiple sclerosis, and the side effects of chemotherapy. The LA Times spoke to advocates who criticized the ruling, but said it came with a silver lining because they could now move the issue to the federal courts. "We have foiled the government’s strategy of delay, and we can now go head-to-head on the merits, that marijuana really does have therapeutic value," Joe Elford told the Times. He is the chief counsel for Americans for Safe Access and the lead counsel on the recently filed lawsuit. The Times notes that this is the third time that petitions to reclassify pot have failed to be approved. The first, filed in 1972, took 17 years for a ruling. The second was filed in 1995 and denied six years later. Both decisions were appealed, but the courts sided with the federal government. This will not help California's effort to legalize pot for medical use. Voters approved Prop. 215 several years ago, but it has never completely gelled with the feds who on occasion bust medical marijuana facilities.”

Click here for Ian Dury

The secret word is Revulsion

TODAY LONDON, TOMORROW THE WORLD?

Dare we hope that this might really be the decline and fall of the Murdoch Empire?

“News Corp. share values tanked to such an extent that it was estimated Murdoch and his family lost hundreds of millions on Wednesday alone. And the closure of a major property, and the threat to a high-stakes deal, will likely make things worse. British Prime Minister David Cameron, a favorite of Murdoch’s media, had made his break from Murdoch’s grip, declaring: “Let us be clear. There will be an inquiry, perhaps inquiries, into events. It is no longer just celebrities and politicians, but murder victims. The whole country is appalled.” Appalled he should be. Every hour brings new revelations of hacking—the BBC says thousands of cellphone accounts may have been targeted by Murdoch’s minions—that has violated the privacy rights of politicians, celebrities, soldiers, crime victims and others. Should Americans be appalled by a scandal in Britain? Certainly. It raises huge questions about how news stories are and will be obtained in an era of new media, and about the extent to which supposedly personal communications are private. These are not just British questions. Ask Anthony Weiner. And they also raise questions about how Murdoch’s media plays politics —on camera, and off. Murdoch’s empire is not merely a network of media that spreads around the world. It is widely viewed as a political project that is usually conservative, frequently prowar and consistently corporate-friendly. Above all, it has maintained influence over the political players who make definitional decisions about the shape of the media landscape on which News Corp. is often a dominant player. “The relationship between politicians and Rupert Murdoch’s newspaper empire is also under close scrutiny,” explained the BBC on Thursday, noting that “media commentators have argued that for the past two decades no politician with any prospect of power has dared to attack his empire.” (Click here for more)

Click here for Kid Creole and the Cocanuts

STREEP AS ATTILA THE HEN

One part of my motivation for leaving the UK for New York back in 1979 was to get the hell away from Margaret bloody Thatcher. (Only to trade her for Ronald Reagan.) Now Meryl Streep has recreated her in all her lacquered horror. Click here.

DOC'S PAPERBACK CLASSIC'S # 93

THE NEWS OF THE WORLD IS DEAD. GOOD RIDDANCE

The British counterculture and The News Of The World have had an adversarial relationship that goes back for almost half a century. I recall, way back in 1967, being beaten bloody by police outside the NOTW offices in London’s Fleet Street while protesting the newspaper’s part in the jailing of Keith Richards and Mick Jagger after the Redlands drug bust. And then there were the regular stamp-out-these-hippie-dope-fiends “exposés” that fueled the dangerous red-faced ire of all the saloon bar tweed blowhards who “only read the paper for the sports” and not the weekly catalogue of rape cases. And then, of course, the whole game was played all over again against John Rotten and his ilk in the punk era. Rupert Murdoch has closed down his disgusting organ and I hope its memory will yellow and decay. Unfortunately, I suspect the NOTW will soon be replaced by something equally loathsome like The Sunday Sun.

Click here for The Deviants

The secret word is Gutter

AND TALKING OF THE DEVIANTS…

The following came via Facebook from our pal Bob Fish…

"Hi Mick, Remember this? 1967/8? The Cricketers Pub, Westcliff-on-Sea (Nr Southend) Southend Art School Dance. You standing, singing on the back of a 850cc Norton Commando on stage, (gear lever removed) while I sat on the bike revving like mad. It was a great gig! I went to the Art School & booked you & ran those gigs at the time. Somebody had pulled down some plastic decorations and set fire to them in the middle of the dance floor... this combined with the carbon monoxide (from the Norton) and hundreds of joss sticks that I'd given away on the door, proved a heady mix. The manager of the pub (eyes streaming) found me & said "Mr Fish, I want to see you at the end of the night". Needless to say, I didn't hang around. Anyway... a great night! You & the Deviants were amazing. HAPPY DAYS!"

And I remember this happy day very well indeed. Bob doesn’t mention that before the show, some kind person handed out lumps of black hash and handfuls of yellow dexadrine, and by the time we hit the stage, were flying without wings. Standing on the bike, I didn't know the gear shift was gobne, and was wondering if Bob was going to pop the clutch and send it and us wheelying into the audience. I mean, Iggy threw peanut butter on the crowd, but a quarter of a ton of high powered motorcycle would have been wholly something else. It’s also one reason I sigh when people ask me to play the old songs and reproduce the old vibe. The above can never be recreated, and that was what it was all about when we were young and insane.

THE LAST SHUTTLE

I’m sad. I just watched Atlantis – the last space shuttle – take off. Is this the end of space exploration as we know it? Yes, I do miss the 20^th century when I took acid and other men went to the moon. Once we had space ships. Now we have smart phones. And yes, I know all the whiney arguments about solving terrestrial problems before blasting off to Mars and beyond, but, damn it, I come from a culture that thought nothing about sailing off to the edge of the world just to find out what was there, and maybe indulge in a little piracy along the way.

GRATUITOUS CHARLOTTE RAMPLING

IF THIS AIN’T A HARBINGER I DON’T KNOW WHAT IS #1

Click here for the monkey with the machine gun.

IF THIS AIN’T A HARBINGER I DON’T KNOW WHAT IS #2

Click here to watch the dust roll into Phoenix

Click here for Howling Wolf

THE FROZDICK FAMILY

Bobo and Ida Frozdick  were having too much fun to believe in harbingers.

MALAISE 1

This was lifted from Wonkette. America is ill.

MALAISE 2

This was hacked in to the Fox News Twitter account. Amercia is maybe too ill to recover.

MALAISE 3

When is Ray bloody Manzarek going to give up the wages of necrophilia? Our good pal Richard Metzger says it all on Dangerous Minds.

“Yesterday, on the 40th anniversary of Jim Morrison’s death, Ray Manzarek and Robbie Krieger played a Doors gig after visiting Morrison’s grave site at Pere Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. Fronted by one of the band’s endless series of faux Lizard Kings, Morrison look-a-like David Brock of Doors cover band Wild Child, Manzarek and Krieger did their best to remind anyone watching why their music careers have been utterly insignificant since Morrison died. John Densmore had the good taste and wisdom to not attend. Advice to Manzarek: stop pissing on your legacy. I know your Muse - and cash cow- abandoned you when Jim checked out in that bathtub but your determination to milk every last drop out of the Doors’ legacy has been arrogant, pathetic and shameless. If you must perform, call up the former members of your Doors knock-off Nite City. They could probably use the work. And Ian Astbury has probably got some holes in his Cult tour schedule. Every time you drag out another version of The Doors, you remind us all of how utterly empty the band is without Jim’s voice and presence.”

Click here for Jim

The secret word is Reptile

SHORT ATTENTION SPAN APOCALYPSE

It’s now more than a hundred days since the massive quake, the tsunami, and the Fukushima meltdown, but the western media hardly mention it any more. The only consolation in this deafening lack of extended interest is a growing measure of concern that floods and wild fires the USA could damage American nuclear facilities. I suppose that’s something, but damn…

“Just 100 days after a deadly earthquake and tsunami devastated the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan, concerns are being raised about several U.S. nuclear stations that are facing natural disasters of their own. Rising floodwaters from the Missouri River are threatening to damage Nebraska's Fort Calhoun Station and Iowa's Cooper Nuclear Station, while a raging forest fire is advancing towards the Los Alamps Nation Laboratory in New Mexico. The Los Alamos lab has been shut down since Monday, one day after a wildfire was sparked in the Santa Fe National Forest, while Fort Calhoun has been closed since mid-April for routine refueling. It remains closed, as floodwaters have crept up to 306 metres above sea level – 2.4 metres short of the plant's threshold "design base". Floodwaters at Cooper station are also below shut-down levels, "and the river would have to rise several feet even beyond that to reach a point where we'd be talking about Cooper's design base," Nuclear Regulatory Commision (NRC) spokesperson Scott Burnell told IPS. Still, many are comparing the United States' readiness for a disaster with Japan's emergency response in March.” (Click here for more)

Click here for Johnny Cash

The secret word is Cobalt

DID YOU EVER SEND OFF FOR SEA MONKEYS?

Talking about my generation and how possibly millions of us kids got conned by this comic book scam. Instead of the cute humanoid family as depicted in its submarine suburban home, all we got was bloody daphnia, only good only to feed fish. But that was nothing compared with the invisible goldfish…

“If you so much as flipped through a single comic book sometime after 1962, von Braunhut’s ads might have gotten you curious about whether his doodads worked even approximately as advertised. For Sea-Monkeys, the ads portrayed a cheerful family of humanoid creatures bearing crowns of some sort and hanging out by their underwater castle. Mom had blond hair. The fine print said something about “caricatures,” but never mind—the bigger type spun a magical tale of pets that would be “like a pack of friendly trained seals” if you followed the directions. Von Braunhut wrote the copy himself, for at least the first couple decades. Ads for another von Braunhut invention, the X-Ray Specs (not to be confused with the English punk band X-Ray Spex), promised the power to see through obstacles and showed a guy grinning at a woman in a dress. Again there were words like “illusion”—the effect is created by feathers or grooves in the lenses, von Braunhut’s patents show—but that wasn’t where the average comic book reader focused his attention. In von Braunhut’s most impressive marketing coup, he peddled “Invisible Goldfish." The kit included a glass bowl, a handbook and fish food. That was it. He said they sold out. There was a 100 percent guarantee that the buyer would never see the fish, and I’m 100 percent sure that guarantee never failed. The greatest trick the Invisible Goldfish ever pulled was convincing the world they existed.” (Click here for the whole sorry story)

A CUNNING PLOT (Dadaism in action)

This little mindfuck blueprint was lifted from our pals at World of Wonder.

DON'T YOU MISS THE 20TH CENTURY?

SUNDAY BREAKFAST (Posted a little early)

Back in my Brighton lair with my cat and my pipeweed, and the dark legions of Mordor maybe at bay, (but don’t speak too soon) I’ve finally had time to reflect on all of the recent adventures that my teenage mind has inflicted on my ancient body. As the whole Glastonbury experience recedes into perspective, I discover just how mixed my feelings really are. The combo of former Deviants and Pink Fairies I laughingly call The Edgar Allan Poe Blues Band was everything I could have hoped for. It’s early days yet, but the music is really coming along amazingly well, and the only debates are of the kind that happen between creative people who want to improve the work. Beyond the band, however, the experience was decidedly lacking. Okay so the mud and chaos couldn’t have been helped, but – with a round trip drive of almost 300 miles – to arrive at the site and wait three hours to get accredited and then finally reach the stage to find no food, very little water, and not so much as a fucking beer, indicated that we were in the bowels of a vast and arrogant corporate clusterfuck. Individuals were aces – Becky the Glade coordinator, the guys working the stage, and the heroic 4x4 drivers. RH has said it all in last Monday’s post so I won’t go on. On another level, though, I keep a very open mind about mystic places and belief in John Michell’s laylines. But I do remember the feeling – as I lay in the sun on the hill above the first pyramid stage in 1971 – that there was a kind replenishment coming from the earth. (Of course, I had taken quite a bit of acid.) Certainly no replenishment was happening in 2011. If anything the Magic of Avalon was being choked off by a slurry of the worst of contemporary pop culture. Beyonce? Beyonce? I can figure no equation that relates Beyonce to the Once & Future King. Blake's Jerusalem wasn't not being builded there. (When I got back from the trip, I flopped into a chair and cut off my performers wrist band. Finn the cat immediately seized it and ran away into the bathroom. He clearly didn’t want me going back there again.) I’m now looking for to a period without any epic challenges. A time to relax, to write, to get back to my poetry and fiction. But let me not temp fate. The way my luck’s been running, aliens could land in the back garden on Tuesday.

Click here for Hank Williams

The secret word is Ra

MARILYN SEZ...

“Call me if the aliens arrive.”

THE FROZDICK FAMILY

Oswald and Unity Frozdick learned the word dissolute at a very tender age.

ELVIS DIDN’T LIKE THE SHOW

CROWS CAN HOLD A GRUDGE

The moral of this story (lifted from io9) is that you don’t mess with Corvus Corvidae.

“Crows will not only remember your face and go after you repeatedly if you bother them, but they will also teach other birds to do the same. Their scolding and physical harassment can last for years, possibly for the life of the bird. Crows are the devil-birds of the sky. Not only do they look like the kind of bird that would be perched on the shoulder of a Disney villain, they do frighteningly smart things. For one thing, they use tools to assess and find food. They even make frogs explode. (The crows swoop down and tear the frogs' livers out. The frogs swell up in a belated self-defense reflex. Unfortunately, they're used to swelling up with their livers in place to provide counter-force and so they split themselves open.) Now it's been shown that crows aren't just smart, they're organized. Two researchers at the University of Washington trapped, banded, and released crows at a site near Seattle. They did so wearing distinctive masks - to freak out not only the crows but any poor hikers who were going by. Unlike the meek Seattle hikers, the crows started fighting back as soon as they were released. They scolded the researchers, which didn't seem too sinister until the scolding brought other nearby crows into the fray. Neighboring crows joined in, until at some release sites the researchers were being scolded and dive-bombed by fifteen crows at a time. When the researchers put the masks back on and ventured out, they were again scolded, dive-bombed, and mobbed by crows. But not all the mobs contained crows that were banded. This meant that some of the crows that had participated in the original scolding sessions remembered the researcher's 'faces' and went on the offensive when they saw those faces again. The crows they were with joined in the mob, and the masks became known as trouble to an even larger population of crows. Researchers have only tested crow memory for five years, but they believe that the birds remember faces for their entire lives - fifteen to forty years. Get on the wrong side of one crow in your forties or fifties, and you could be mobbed everywhere for the rest of your life.”

Click here for The Great Society

The secret word is Gallows

SOME ALSO PLAY THE SAXOPHONE

(This is the work of the late and sorely missed Edward Barker.)