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A multi-millionaire plans to triple the size of his London mansion by digging down 50ft to create a four-storey basement complete with swimming pool, spa, ballroom and no fewer than 12 bedrooms. Architects’ drawings show how the vast house, originally built as a school in the 19th century, will be created by excavating deeper than the height of neighbouring homes. As well as the spa area, it will have servants’ quarters consisting of five staff bedrooms. There will also be wine cellars, an art storage room, parking for three vehicles and a car lift. Estate agents estimate the property could be worth up to £90million with the work completed. Neighbours who have objected to the plans include novelist Edna O’Brien and the Duchess of St Albans Gillian Beauclerk. The duchess said: ‘These plans are absolutely monstrous and unnecessary. It’s just absolute greed. No one needs that much space.’

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Just decrypted this blueprint of the White House from JFK’s term—it looks like he signed off on the construction of a secret safe room under the White House while Jackie O was renovating.

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A underground facility and bunker dubbed “The Facility” in Southeast Georgia two hours from Savannah just hit the market for $17.5 million. The property, which is exclusively listed by Sister Hood of Harry Norman, Realtors Buckhead Office, was built in 1969 and fully renovated to government standards in 2012. According to Harry Norman, it is the only hardened and privately owned underground bunker of its kind in the United States. The property features a commercial 3-Phase power plant, in addition to its own 8Kw new solar backup system. The facility is also equipped with a $100,000 CCTV security system.

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Worried about the end of the world? For those who can afford them, one company is creating subterranean housing complexes – modern-day super-bomb-shelters across the United States designed to survive any apocalyptic scenario yet imagined. Killer comets, pole shifts, super volcanoes, global tsunamis, extreme earthquakes, biological and nuclear war – each are scenarios supposedly covered in the design plans by Vivos of these luxury underground homes to be built in 120 locations in range of most major US cities.

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The Survive-a-Storm Max underground steel storm shelter is ideal for larger families or small businesses. Measuring 10-feet long by 6-feet wide, the Max Model can be buried in your yard in just a few hours. With its coal tar epoxy coating, you will receive the same protection against rust and corrosion as an underground gas storage tank or cross-country pipeline. This shelter has bench seating on three sides, with a stairway entering from the surface. We have even provided a steel handrail and non-slip stair treads for extra safety and convenience.

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Brett Jacobsen’s book Heaven’s Underground Blueprint has a twofold thrust: it is a prophetic work that paralells church history with Old Testament Israel, presenting insight into current happenings and great hope for the future. It also is instructive in the current reformation of the church into underground community.

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Have you ever heard about the guy who literally lived under a rock in the Californian desert, where legendary flying saucer conventions were held in the 1950s? We go back to the 1930s, when an eccentric German immigrant called Frank Critzer dug out this subterranean home for himself under the giant rock. He lived there alone, isolated from society with nothing but a radio antenna he set up on top of the rock to stay connected with the outside world. But in 1942, during a showdown with police who came to investigate rumours that he was in fact a Nazi spy, Frank died from a self-detonated dynamite explosion in his own bunker. Locals had reported strange behaviour, several incidents of Frank threatening trespassers with a shotgun and suspicion that he was a spy because of his radio antenna. After his death, Frank’s only friend, a former aircraft inspector named George Van Tassel, became the giant rock’s new tenant in 1947. In a few short years, George went from living a simple existence with his family in the rooms Frank Critzer had dug out under the Giant Rock, to building his own restaurant on the site, a small airstrip, and an extra-terrestrial research centre which would play host to his annual Giant Rock Spacecraft Convention, attracting more than 11,000 people at its peak. The dome-shaped “Integraton” structure still survives today in Landers, California, near the Giant Rock but not as a pilgrimage site for ufologists. After Tassel’s death in 1978 there were plans to turn it into a disco. Instead, the new owners turned it into an 0ff-beat tourist attraction offering “sound baths”, claiming it to be “the only all-wood, acoustically perfect sound chamber in the U.S.”

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After searching for photos for Hugh Hefner's upcoming April 9 birthday, the Playboy Mansion employee uncovered "some Polaroids from 1977 that showed a large excavation project at The Mansion." When the staff member inquired about the tunnels, the Mansion's general manager confirmed that Hefner had the tunnels built to connect the "bunnies" to celebrities' houses. The plans reference the homes of "Mr. J. Nicholson,""Mr. W. Beatty,""Mr. K. Douglas" and "Mr. J. Caan," which is enough information to distinguish the four highly recognizable monikers. All of the men lived near Hefner's world-renowned home during the '70s and '80s, so the underground maps could be legitimate. The tunnels were reportedly closed in 1989, around the same time Hefner married Playmate Kimberley Conrad, and, when asked, the general manager wouldn't disclose any more information about the hidden passageways.

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Plans to create a £70m dream mansion in the heart of Mayfair - complete with an underground leisure complex - have been submitted to planning bosses. At a huge 190-feet - more than half the size of a football pitch - the super-home could become the longest in London if plans are given the go-ahead. The 18th Century building on the corner of Grosvenor Square, Mayfair, will stretch all the way back so it incorporates the mews homes on Duke's Yard. It will boast large entertaining rooms, underground leisure facilities, luxury sleeping quarters, a courtyard and a price-tag of around £70 million. The hefty valuation is more than 250 times the price of an average home in the UK and around 450 times the average house price in the north east of England.

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I'm Burying My Camper





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The man who made a fortune out of building London's best known - and most controversial - estate agency and selling it for £390 million is planning an extraordinary subterranean playground at his home near Kensington Palace. Jon Hunt, founder of Foxtons, bought his Grade II-listed, eight-bedroom house in Kensington Palace Gardens - London's most expensive street - for £14 million in 2005. He now proposes to excavate a huge hole underneath the back garden, in which he wants to create a massive sports hall with viewing galleries. As well as a tennis court, pool and gym, the underground extension will also include a private “motor museum”, accessed from the road through a special ramp, for his multi-million pound collection of six vintage Ferraris. The excavation will be 50 ft deep, equivalent to at least four stories in height.

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This decommissioned military base complex turned silo home-in-a-hole is anything but Top Secret today. Its owners boast the set of converted structures to be the “world’s most unique luxury home. The subterranean launch control center is a cylinder surrounded by an epoxy-resin, steel-reinforced, three-foot-thick structural wall that (particularly given its depth in the ground) is essentially as apocalypse-proof as a home gets. The entire structure is suspended on springs to absorb the shock of a nuclear blast. Forget blueprints and standard floor plans: this historic house comes with its own top-secret, government-certified schematics. 2.3 million dollars might sound like a lot – even for a high-end mansion – but if you consider that the original cost of construction was around ten times that much (in 1950s dollars, without accounting for inflation) the current converted property seems a steal by comparison. Oh, and their FAQ page points out that the Russians are well aware that the silo has been decommissioned, so presumably they would no longer consider it a primary target should an all-out world war come along.

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You wouldn’t happen to be in the market for a 1970s underground family home, equipped to live in for up to a year without resurfacing in the event of a nuclear missile strike that wipes out humanity, would ya? Because it just so happens one has just come onto the market. And this piece of real estate gold could be all yours for the bargain price of $1.7 million. The subterranean Las Vegas home at 3970 Spencer St. near Flamingo Road boasts a 15,200-square-foot basement beneath a two story home above ground. From the street, number 3970 looks like any other American home, except with a few extra ventilation and air conditioning units planted around the yard. Camouflaged by clusters of rocks, an entrance with an elevator takes you down to the underground lair. Another stairway is hidden inside a shed. The house was built in 1978 to withstand a nuclear blast by an arguably ‘paranoid’ wealthy businessman, Girard “Jerry” B. Henderson. The ambitious homeowner made his fortune with several companies including Avon cosmetics and Gulfstream Aerospace Corp.

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KC, MO Area: $479,000.00 or OBO Comes with almost all the furniture and decor. Hardened Underground Bunker-Home on 10.5 acres/ml. A 1960s nuclear war-proof communication center, 10,700 sq. ft of usable floor space and can easily be expanded to much more, 2 ft thick concrete walls and ceilings, 3-4 ft of graded earth over the top, copper shielding against EMP, 2- 2,000 lb blast doors, 8 air vents with filtration and blast valve closure mechanisms. Water well on site with a new pump, 10,000 gallon underground stainless steel water storage tank, Aquasana Water Filtration System, escape hatch emergency exit, 177 ft tower that can be used for Hamm Radio or even possible cell tower. Lighting, pumps, heating, dehumidification and electric hoist operational. New water pipes and new aluminum roof on entry building. Occupied continuously for the last 5 years, the current owners remodeled much of the structure creating a two-story living space that includes a functional kitchen, bathroom, shower, large living room with a new electric fireplace, 4-6 bedrooms depending on use/needs, gym with equipment (treadmill, 2 bikes and workout machines), sound proof music studio with vocal/recording booth and connected storage room, very large 16 ft ceiling recreation area, other living and storage areas. All VERY NICELY done. Commercial zoning, low property tax. Ready to move in. Contact through Email if interested! Serious Purchasing Inquiries ONLY!







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A creepy graveyard complete with a decaying crypt. Inside the crypt are steps leading down to a mysterious underground house (unfurnished.) The lot size is 2x3. This lot contains the following custom content created by myself: 5 original mesh gravestones (Find in decorative/ sculpture. They can be placed anywhere indoors or outdoors.) 3 spooky trees - one being the Maxis spooky tree except it can be placed on floor tiles. The other two are derived from Maxis trees with texture/shape changed. (Find all in decorative/sculpture. They can be placed anywhere indoors or outdoors.) 9 floor textures, including a dead grass texture for floor tiles. 2 terrain textures, including a matching dead grass texture. 21 wall textures, many of them multiple tile textures. The house is not furnished. The one issue with this underground house is that objects that have to be placed against walls can't be placed against the exterior walls unless you use the "moveobjects on" cheat. I have a furnished version in my game and I found that I didn't need to use the cheat at all. All interior walls work as usual. The cost of this lot is approximately 27,000.

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This Minecraft underground house/base design/ideas build tutorial on Xbox, PE, PS3, and or PC is very easy to do and looks really great anywhere in your world.





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The author of this plan speculated on building this spherical city in Manhattan bedrock—a structure which so far as I can determine would have a volume of 1.2 cubic miles (5 km3) with its top beginning some 1,200’ under Times Square […] Newman published this in 1969 (?!) after somehow latching onto the idea of clearing out massive underground caverns with nuclear explosions—in this case, the space would be hollowed out under Manhattan. The underground sphere would be a miniature version of whatever was above it—along the medial there would be a “topside” of a regular city with streets and high rise buildings, underneath which would exist an underground city for the underground city. In this honeycomb would exist the means of production and energy, segmented in multi-block-sized enclosures of no charm.

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A luxurious underground mansion is being built beneath the grounds of Limehurst, a Victorian property converted into flats. The entrance to the two-storey, three-bedroom mansion, named the Earth House, is a front door disguised as a 2.6m-high garden folly, leading to a central spiral staircase down to the main hallway and living area on the lower ground floor. 'I am confident that this house in Bowdon will become an architectural landmark - albeit one that most people will never see.'

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While each risk situation is unique and requires a methodical threat assessment tailored to the client's needs, the experience of the Hardened Structures Team across the spectrum of threats has enabled us to design a modular, configurable system that enables survivability in even the most demanding scenarious. Called the Genesis Series, this underground shelter system provides protection against a wide range of disasters including 2012 scenarios. For protecting your family or family group, the Genesis Series is unmatched in the industry.

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This astonishing planning document illustrates why the London borough of Kensington and Chelsea has decided to outlaw the super-sized basement extensions that local billionaires seem so fond of. The multi-level subterranean recreation areas often go far beyond the boundaries of the aboveground properties, and have cracked walls and even affected the foundations of neighboring houses. In a famous case from 2012, excavation work under the mansion of a Goldmann Sachs director resulted in his neighbor getting trapped inside her home, unable to open her front door since it had shifted so much. A cabinet member for planning policy told The Guardian that basement extensions are "the single greatest planning concern our residents have expressed to us in living memory."

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I ran into the Hal B. Hayes residence, formerly in Hollywood, California, which Popular Mechanics Magazine described as a House For the Atomic Age. Ever practical, the magazine notes how Mr. Hayes designed the house to withstand or flex against the stresses of an atomic bomb blast. The outer walls are “fluted to resist shock waves” and the large front glass window, pictured above, will sweep away in the same blast. There is a secret underground sanctuary accessed only by swimming underwater, as well as another hidden underground room equipped with bottled oxygen.

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This was my underground home before the criminals at the DEPI demolished it.





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Like something straight from a science fiction or horror movie scene, this underground nuclear missile silo was once a dank, dark and deserted structure of interest to no one – until man saw past the pooled water and cracked concrete and began to build by hand the ultimate underground dream house for himself in the family. Occupying only a third of the nearly 20,000 available square feet of total military base, Ed Peden and his family live in a world of weird wonder purchased for a relative pittance at $48,000 and derelict for decades when he went to buy it. On the surface, former escape hatches now look like castle turrets and a shack-like structure is about all there is to mark the entrance to this domain.

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You may have heard stories about people renovating their homes, only to stumble upon a secret room. Perhaps it’s a play room? A cellar? A place to stash sensitive documents and treasures? All that mystery can be pretty scary yet exciting. But back in 1963, a resident of Nevşehir Province of Turkey found a secret room behind one of his walls. This secret room led to a tunnel ... which led to an incredible discovery: the ancient underground city of Derinkuyu. Derinkuyu is not the largest nor oldest underground city. But at 18 stories, it is the deepest.

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World was so much different back in the 60’s and fears and terror from Cold War was almost part of people’s everyday life. During that period, a businessman and philanthropist named Girard B. Henderson spent quite a lot of money for a project he called The Underground Home. From ground level, you would see a house. But it was not the house. It was just its entrance. There were obviously some stairs to take you down. There was even a control panel to control and adjust temperatures and radiation (yes…we are talking about nuclear holocaust, remember?)

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Wrecking ball destroys underground safe room





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From the outside, it looks like an elegant Spanish-style ranch house but Hacienda de la Paz in L.A.’s Palos Verdes Peninsula is so much more than that. The $53 million mansion, which recently went to market, meets local building codes in the posh, gated city of Rolling Hills by keeping to one story. But those rules don’t say a word about building underground. What’s not visible from the street are five magnificent subterranean levels on 50,000 square feet accessible by labyrinthine passageways, two elevators and secret stairs. Once down the rabbit hole, you’ll find a tennis court built to U.S. Open standards (the outdoor court meets French Open specs), a Moroccan-style Turkish bath, a chapel, an English library, nine bedrooms and 25 bathrooms. Seventeen years in the making, Hacienda de la Paz is the dream project of John Z. Blazevich, chief executive of Viva Food Group, a shrimp importer.

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It's a spacious, secure home that could probably fetch a pretty penny on today's NYC real estate market - the only problem is that no one knows if it still exists. The mystery centers around The Underground World Home, a 12,000-square-foot subterranean residence that was built for the 1964 World's Fair at Flushing Meadows-Corona Park in Queens. After the fair ended, almost all of the exhibits were ordered to be demolished, but some think that the Underground Home's creator, Jay Swayze, may have left it intact. After all, why pay exorbitant demolition fees to remove the home when you could just tear down its above-ground pavilion and cover the entrance with some dirt? 50 years later, historians, students and regular Joes with shovels are still asking the question, "Is it down there?"

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Soon its name will join the ranks of Britain's great stately homes. Already, in the most elite of circles, it is being whispered in awe: 'Witanhurst. Do you know it?' The residents of London's Highgate certainly do, for this mammoth property has caused an ongoing row, as planners have repeatedly rejected lavish plans for its development. The Georgian-style mansion is London's second-largest private residence, after Buckingham Palace.But following a short-lived renaissance in 2002 as home to the BBC's Fame Academy, it had been allowed to decay. Now, the planning issues having been resolved, it is being turned into a modern-day Xanadu, the palatial mansion immortalised in the film Citizen Kane.The glittering 65-room palace will include 25 bedrooms and 12 bathrooms and an imperial walnut-panelled Grand Ballroom. A vast two-storey subterranean extension will almost double its size, making room for a 70ft swimming pool, sauna, hairdressing salon, massage parlour and a huge cinema suite. Diggers are carving an enormous cave beneath the house, which will make the property just 2,000 sq ft smaller than Buckingham Palace. Staff accommodation and a 25-space car park will complete the £50million expansion. Mystery shrouds the mansion, however. For despite being the size of ten generously sized detached homes, nobody knows who owns it.Indeed, it is said that even Robert Adam, the celebrated architect behind this extraordinary project, does not know who his client is. He receives his instructions via an intricate web of companies and advisers, designed to give the owner absolute anonymity.So just what is Witanhurst and who is behind it? It is perched above North London, on the verdant hill of Highgate, an ancient village that is one of the capital’s most sought-after addresses. Overlooking Hampstead Heath, the area once was home to the highwayman Dick Turpin, and philosopher Karl Marx is buried in the nearby Victorian cemetery.

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*

p.s. Hey. ** David Ehrenstein, Morning, David. It is, right? I only just discovered her stuff very recently, which seems very strange. From the squibs I read from Morrissey's novel, he seems to be a very deserving winner of that prize. ** Etc etc etc, Hi, Casey. Gary's a very longtime friend and colleague or whatever you call mutually sympathetic writers of roughly the same age. My favorites of his novels are 'Do Everything in the Dark' and 'Gone Tomorrow'. But he's consistently worth reading, and he's a superb nonfiction writer/critic, so a collection of his essays and reviews is another good way in. Enjoy your portion of the encroaching wintriness. I'm into mine. So far. ** Tomkendall, Hi, Tom. Oh, you're close-ish to there. I'm guessing that the ruins, which included this crazy great huge temple (to the sun?) are all gussied up and geared for tourists by now. Back in the '60s, they were just sitting there, lonesome and decrepit and seemingly forgotten, which was really special. Juan Villalobos ...hm, I don't know. I mean I know of his stuff, but I can't remember if I've ever read him. 'It's totally frenetic. Italicized frenetic.': That's definitely enough to get me in the door of his work. I'll head in his direction. Thank you bunches, Tom. ** Sypha, Hi. Thank you, thank you, thank you! ** Steevee, I've been getting headaches lately, and I've assumed it was the shift to cold and damp, so maybe that is the answer? ** H, Hi. I'm really glad you liked it. Oh my God, that meal you ate sounds so incredibly good. I just ate what I always eat, a veggie dog sandwiches feast. I need to go to a restaurant. ** Damien Ark, Hi, Damien! Wait, ... seriously? Well, the slave posts are taken directly from actual slave profiles, so, if that's true, that slave saw your poem somewhere and swiped it, which, of course, means he must be a pretty interesting slave. Huh. ** _Black_Acrylic, Hi, Ben. Am I correct in thinking you might have seen the title of this post and gotten your quickly dashed hopes up that it was going to be a music post, ha ha? Apologies, if so. ** Bernard Welt, Hey, B-ster. Yes, I just saw that, like, half an hour ago. How cool and unexpected and nice of that guy. Interesting piece too. Everyone, There's this new and interesting article just up at the Electric Literature site called 'The Spatial Poetics of Nintendo: Architecture, Dennis Cooper, and Video Games' if you want to read it. No, I don't know that guy. I think I've read something(s) by him before, though. You were asking Bill about hauntology, right? I know a somewhat fair amount about the musical genre version that was identified and named, or 'borrow-named' perhaps, by Simon Reynolds and written a lot about by David Keenan, but not so much about the larger thing. Does that 'foremost researcher' have anything written/published that I can access, ideally online? I'm curious, no surprise. That panel sounds super interesting. Record it, or have someone do that, please. Love, me. ** Misanthrope, I'm sure I'll like it. What's not to theoretically like? Big is good, duh. EF Day is finished, so you can see what you think ... when ... Monday. Big congrats on the guardianship! It's gross and depressing that his mom doesn't care, but I guess I hope that she continues not to? God, what a fucked up situation. But congrats! I would guess that Gisele probably knows Reiniger's -- Google spellcheck really, really wants her name to be Reindeer -- work, but I'm seeing G. tonight, so I'll ask. ** Bill, Hi, B. Yes, the new Maddin was partly shot on a set in the basement of the Pompidou during/as part of the same Nouveau Festival where Gisele and I presented our 'Teenage Hallucination' mini-festival. So I got to watch a fair amount of it being filmed, which was cool. Poor Mr. Furlong has had considerable life and drug and relationship difficulties, it seems, and he, well, looks very different now, let's say. Poor guy. He's on the new Star Trek TV series, though, I think. ** Right. I got in one of my little obsessive things that usually result in related post, and this brief obsessive thing was about houses built underground, and I hope that there is at least some interest in that topic out there where you are. See you tomorrow.

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'Being a writer is one of those no-guarantee professions: there are no guarantees that you will get published and, if you do, that you will be read and understood. No guarantees that even if you are a visionary and original writer, you will not be forgotten as soon as your last book is out of print.

'It’s not quite correct to say that Anna Kavan has been forgotten. Her books are kept in print out of sheer dedication by her publisher, Peter Owen. My colleague at the University of East Anglia, Karen Schaller, teaches her novel Ice on her course Fiction After Modernism. And a recent paean to this same novel appeared in the Guardian.

'One of only a few great British modernist writers and author of some 19 books in her lifetime, Kavan shares an era and a clipped, visionary style with TS Eliot, but never became as well known. Born Helen Woods to wealthy, indolent and emotionally cold parents, in her late thirties - after a life of improbable travels for a woman of her time - she reinvented herself several times, finally taking the name of one of her own characters. Anna Kavan (as she became) was a blonde, emotionally distant writer who became best known after her death in 1968 for being a near-lifelong heroin addict.

'‘She did everything she could to resist biography,’ her biographer Jeremy Reed writes in A Stranger on Earth, the life and work of Anna Kavan. She systematically destroyed her diaries, letters and other personal correspondence, Reed recounts. She never revealed her date of birth. She was also a talented artist, and Reed had to rely upon her paintings in part to reconstruct her life’s narrative.

'In 1967 she published the novel that was belatedly to make her name. Ice is a short novel, dense and strange. The precise nature of the apocalypse at its centre is never stated, but it seems that the Antarctic ice cap has fragmented, increasing its bulk and not melting, and so the albedo effect has cooled the planet and triggered an ice age. Biographers suppose that Kavan had the idea for Ice when she was living in New Zealand during the early years of the Second World War. The Antarctic’s proximity had a powerful subconscious effect on her.

'In our changing cultural and political thermodynamics, in which heat is likely to be our future foe, it is perhaps easy to forget that until the last forty years or so, writers and other visionaries imagined a different sort of apocalypse: the ice might return. Maggie Gee’s The Ice People described a futuristic ice age and its human inhabitants. Theirs is a frigid doom, although survivable, at least to an extent, once systems of artificial agriculture had been developed.

'Kavan’s novel is hallucinatory, a story built out of an anxiety which anticipates our current weather-climate nexus of worries: ‘Something had gone wrong with the weather. It should have been hot, dry, sunny; instead it rained all the time, there was a dank chill in the air.’ The impending ice apocalypse provokes war. The novel oscillates between this cold, dangerous world and fleeting moments of tenderness, between safety and warmth versus the cryogenic death of cold.

'The protagonist arrives in a ruined town after a long period of ‘soldiering’ abroad. He seems to resent any requirement to tell the reader of his background, his mission. ‘I had come back to investigate rumours of a mysterious impending emergency in this part of the world.’ The man (none of her characters ever earn names) is restrained, prissy, possibly – by his own admission – sadistic. Prone to glacial dream scenes, Kavan relates them in an gelid tone in which fear and beauty are intertwined: ‘Cold coruscations of rainbow fire pulsed overhead, shot through by shafts of pure incandescent thrown out by mountains of solid ice towering all round.’

'In the town he rents a room with the help of a man ‘who owns a telephone but believes in dragons’. The ice is advancing. ‘The ice will be here very soon,’ says the warden of a stern palace he investigates. ‘The harbour will freeze, we shall be cut off.’ The man’s eyes, the main character notices, emit blue flames. ‘You may be stranded here longer than you bargained for,’ he says. It sounds like a prophecy for life: we are here as if stranded; we can’t remember how we arrived, or what – if anything – happened before. We don’t know how long we’re here for.

'At the time of her death, Kavan was little-known. She suspected that Ice might make her name, as a writer, and she was correct. Posthumous notoriety came and went. The flyleaf sheet in my library copy of Ice, from the Senate House library at the University of London, attests that it has been taken out 24 times between 1973 and 2010. Scattered throughout the book are a reader’s underlinings: ‘looked thinner than ever.’ ‘completely silent’; ‘frightened, withdrawn.’; ‘silver in the flat light’.

'Although she clearly loved men in the final decade of her life, Kavan renounced sexual love, saying it had only fuelled her acute psychological distress, from which heroin had offered her a kind of refuge. Thereafter she would content herself with men who were homosexual, practising a wounded Platonism recogniseable to any woman who has been repeatedly burned in love. Kavan’s personal story and novel are haunting. Here we have a great interpreter of cold destined to die not in a heroic embrace on The Ice, as the Antarctic is known, but alone in a South Kensington flat, of complications arising from long-term heroin addiction.'-- Jean McNeil



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Further

Anna Kavan Society
Anna Kavan Fansite
Kate Zambreno on Anna Kavan
'What's the Story? Reading Anna Kavan's Ice'
'The Blackout', by Anna Kavan
'The Mysterious Anna Kavan'
'Stranger Still: The Works of Anna Kavan'
'INTRODUCING ANNA KAVAN'
Video: 'Jennifer Sturm and Debbie Knowles discuss Anna Kavan'
'ANNA KAVAN: THE BEST KEPT SECRET OF ENGLISH MODERNISM'
'Anna Kavan and the Politics of Madness'
'Neige, d’Anna Kavan'
'Un(der)known Writers: Anna Kavan'
'Dependencies'
'Moving Toward Entropy: Anna Kavan's Science Fiction Mentality'
'A SLIPSTREAM POST-APOCALYPTIC NOVEL'
'Winter Reads'
Anna Kavan @ goodreads
'Asylum Seeker'
Buy 'Ice'


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Extras


In R J Dent's Library - Anna Kavan


Verfilmung des Romans "Ice" von Anna Kawa


"Ice", song lyrics by Anna Kavan (feat. Hatsune Miku)


Extraits du spectacle 'Ice'à partir de la lecture d'un texte d'Anna Kavan



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Luz

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'The phrase ‘elusive protagonist’ might appear a contradiction in terms, but anyone who has read Anna Kavan’s Ice will understand. Its plot centres on the narrator’s pursuit of a desirable yet unattainable young woman through a dystopian ice-bound landscape. By its absence as well as its presence, her slender figure – depicted in turn as vulnerable, ethereal and painfully thin – dominates the narrative, for the greater part of it in absentia. As a recent reviewer has commented, it is nearly impossible to provide a plot spoiler for Ice, because “its meaning shifts with each reading”.

'Kavan’s creative powers extended to painting, and one of the Archives & Museum’s recent acquisitions is Kavan’s imagined portrait of Luz, “her extreme thinness corresponding as it does to Anna’s idea of the female stereotype…nonetheless sexualised by full breasts and defined curves”.2 This haunting image seems to capture well the impression of alternating corporeality and insubstantiality left with the reader of Ice. Kavan’s only association with Bethlem and the Maudsley was a brief spell as a research assistant at Mill Hill Emergency Hospital, to which Maudsley staff were evacuated for the duration of the Second World War. In the 1940s she also wrote for the literary review magazine Horizon. One of her pieces could be considered without anachronism to be a product of the anti-psychiatric movement, if only it had been published twenty-five years later.'-- Hive Mind



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Quotes

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“I know I've got a death wish. I've never enjoyed my life, I've never liked people. I love the mountains because they are the negation of life, indestructible, inhuman, untouchable, indifferent, as I want to be.”

"My mind is quite honest; it is my foul imagination that destroys me."

"Because of my fear that the daytime world would become real, I had to establish reality in another place."

"I relied on what I wrote to build a bridge which could not be cut down. It was my own self in which I trusted, not seeing self as that last cell from which escape can only come too late."

“I know that I'm doomed and I'm not going to struggle against my fate. I am only writing this down so that when you do not see me any more you will know that my enemy has finally triumphed.”

"Religion is a drug, and to take drugs is degrading. You must learn to look life in the face. Throw away your cowardly drugs, and see the truth, the ugly, cruel, ungodly truth, as it really is."

"I know I've got a death wish. I've never enjoyed my life, I've never liked people. I love the mountains because they are the negation of life, indestructible, inhuman, untouchable, indifferent, as I want to be."

"To wait - only to wait - without even the final merciful deprivation of hope.Sometimes I think that some secret court must have tried and condemned me, unheard, to this heavy sentence."

"I haven't felt anything for 20 years."



___
Book

Anna Kavan Ice
Peter Owen Publishers

'There is nothing else like it . . . This Ice is not psychological ice or metaphysical ice; here the loneliness of childhood has been magicked into a physical reality as hallucinatory as the Ancient Mariner’s.'-- Doris Lessing

'In this haunting and surreal novel, the narrator and a man known as ‘the warden’ search for an elusive girl in a frozen, seemingly post-nuclear, apocalyptic landscape. The country has been invaded and is being governed by a secret organisation. There is destruction everywhere; great walls of ice overrun the world. Together with the narrator, the reader is swept into a hallucinatory quest for this strange and fragile creature with albino hair.

'Acclaimed by Brian Aldiss on its publication in 1967 as the best science fiction book of the year, this extraordinary and innovative novel has subsequently been recognised as a major work of literature in its own right.'-- Peter Owen Publishers


_____
Excerpts

Reality had always been something of an unknown quantity to me. At times this could be disturbing. Now, for instance. I had visited the girl and her husband before, and kept a vivid recollection of the peaceful, prosperous-looking countryside round their home. But this memory was rapidly fading, losing its reality, becoming increasingly unconvincing and indistinct, as I passed no one on the road, never came to a village, saw no lights anywhere. The sky was black, blacker untended hedges towering against it; and when the headlights occasionally showed roadside buildings, these too were always black, apparently uninhabited and more or less in ruins. It was just as if the entire district had been laid waste during my absence.

*

Despairingly she looked all around. She was completely encircled by the tremendous ice walls, which were made fluid by explosions of blinding light, so that they moved and changed with a continuous liquid motion, advancing in torrents of ice, avalanches as big as oceans, flooding everywhere over the doomed world. Wherever she looked, she saw the same fearful encirclement, soaring battlements of ice, an overhanging ring of frigid, fiery, colossal waves about to collapse upon her. Frozen by the deathly cold emanating from the ice, dazzled by the blaze of crystalline ice-light, she felt herself becoming part of the polar vision, her structure becoming one with the structure of ice and snow. As her fate, she accepted the world of ice, shining, shimmering, dead; she resigned herself to the triumph of glaciers and the death of her world.

*

An insane impatience for death was driving mankind to a second suicide, even before the full effect of the first had been felt.

*

An unearthly whiteness began to bloom on the hedges. I passed a gap and glanced through. For a moment, my lights picked out like searchlights the girl's naked body, slight as a child's, ivory white against the dead white of the snow, her hair bright as spun glass. She did not look in my direction. Motionless, she kept her eyes fixed on the walls moving slowly towards her, a glassy, glittering circle of solid ice, of which she was the centre. Dazzling flashes came from the ice-cliffs over her head; below, the outermost fringes of ice had already reached her, immobilized her, set hard as concrete over her feet and ankles.

*

Nothing in the quiet cottage suggested that anyone but myself had observed the taxi's approach. I was the only person, so far, who had seen it, which, in terms of magic, gave me absolute power over it. I could make it turn back, disappear—thus preventing my father's departure—simply by giving the sign. ... I knew I ought to give the sign that would alter my father's fate. But I didn't want him to stay at home; on the contrary, I was rejoicing because he was about to leave me alone with my mother once more.

*

My ideas were confused. In a peculiar way, the unreality of the outer world appeared to be an extension of my own disturbed state of mind.

*

Systematic bullying when she was most vulnerable had distorted the structure of her personality, made a victim of her, to be destroyed, either by things or by human beings, people or fjords and forests; it made no difference, in any case she could not escape. The irreparable damage inflicted had long ago rendered her fate inevitable.

*

Her face wore its victim’s look, which was of course psychological, the result of injuries she had received in childhood; I saw it was the faintest possible hint of bruising on the extremely delicate, fine, white skin in the region of eyes and mouth. It was madly attractive to me in a certain kind of way […] At the moment, in what I took for an optical delusion, the black interior of the house prolonged itself into a black arm and hand, which shot out and grasped her so violently that her shocked white faces cracked to pieces and she tumbled into the dark.

*

Nothing but the nightmare had seemed real while it was going on, as if the other lost world had been imagined or dreamed. Now that world, no longer lost, was here the one solid reality.

*

As I grew accustomed to the scene, the details gradually emerged, and I saw a number of officials seated at large desks, like static islands, around which flowed sluggish streams of applicants, barely seeming to move. ... What first struck me was the uncomplaining patience of all these people, for whom no convenience whatsoever had been provided, not even a wooden bench such as is to be found in the most Spartan waiting-rooms. ... After I'd been in the room a few minutes, I found the light was starting to make my eyes ache. The naked tubes, fixed to the ceiling, diffused a stark white glare which lit up some faces with a ghastly pallor, distorting others by deep black shadows. This dazzle, no doubt, was the reason why all the officials wore eye-shades, extending in front of their faces like the peak of a jockey's cap, casting a black pointed shade, which gave them all a curious similarity to one another, almost as if they were masked.

*

Day by day the ice was creeping over the curve of the earth, unimpeded by seas or mountains. Without haste or pause, it was steadily moving nearer, entering and flattening cities, filling craters from which boiling laval poured. There was no way of stopping the icy giant battalions, marching in relentless order across the world, crushing, obliterating, destroying everything in their path.

*

Frozen by the deathly cold emanating from the ice, dazzled by the blaze of crystalline ice-light, she felt herself becoming apart of the polar vision, her structure becoming one with the structure of ice and snow. As her fate, she accepted the world of ice, shining, shimmering, dead: she resigned herself to the triumph of glaciers and the death of her world.

*

The weight of the gun in my pocket was reassuring.




*

p.s. Hey. So, tomorrow morning I have to wake up incredibly early and head out my door because we're doing some test filming for the TV series that Zac and I are writing for Gisele Vienne. As a consequence, I won't be able to do the p.s., and, as is usual in those situations, you'll get rerun post. I'll be back on Saturday to give you a new post, and, concurrently, to catch up with all the comments you leave in-between today and then. ** David Ehrenstein, Hi there. Apparently I did, yes. *slaps my own knuckles* ** Tosh Berman, Hi, Tosh. That's funny, -- well, not that funny, -- I intended to put the Batcave in the post, but I didn't like any of the photos or gifs or diagrams I found of it. Picky me. But yes. When I was in high school, a good friend of mine lived under Suicide Bridge in the Arroyo Seco about 100 feet away from where the entrance of the Batcave in the '60s TV series was supposed to be. Unfortunately, it was just a craggy black semi-circle painted on the canyon wall. ** Tomkendall, That rock is still there, but it split into two big pieces about twenty years ago, exposing what was left of the underground house, which then gradually filled with mud and dirt and is now just a dent in the ground, sadly. Mm, there were some interesting things written about 'TMS'. I'd have to comb through my disorganized links to find them, but I could. Oh, gosh, no I don't, about knowing the current novel the scrapbook post(s) are. I just did a search of the blog, but the 'scrapbook' search-term was too vague and brought up a million things. I'll make a note to watch for it when I'm going back looking for rerun posts. I would be curious to see it myself. That Chris Ware book sounds fun. I'll see if some friendly store here has it. They do like comix and graphic novels a lot here in Paris. Thanks, Tom! ** Sypha, Hi, J. I'm actually seeing if I can make a Santa's house/North Pole post right now, so thank you for pointing that one out! ** _Black_Acrylic, Hi, Ben. Oh, no, I must've misrepresented my thought. What I was trying to say/joke was that I wondered if, when you saw the title of the post yesterday -- 'Underground House Day' -- you've might have hoped for a moment that 'House' was referring to the music genre 'House'. In other words, it was an attempt at a very lame joke that didn't work at all. Oops. Sorry. ** Steevee, Hi. Ah, so the interview is finally out. Curious to read it, very naturally. Everyone, Steevee has interviewed Kent Jones about his documentary film HITCHCOCK/ TRUFFAUT, and I can guarantee you that it's a sweet and telling read. So ... read it. Thanks. I am not looking forward to being on Facebook today, that's for damn sure. ** Bernard Welt, Well, I do. No surprise, right? You have a point: pyramids. As do pyramids. Oh, I hadn't read or heard word one about Jayne Gackenbach until just now, thank you! I'll go read about her and watch her talk, and then maybe I'll find a way to read her herself. I keep meaning to just go ahead and join one or more of those academic papers-containing sites. For the blog's sake if nothing else. I'll try to do that today. I think it is in fact time for you to throw together some videos on dreaming, yes. Hm, interesting: Kerkrade is not impossibly far away from me. But I probably can't get up there for that. But it does sound interesting. And I will find out more about/from Frank Bosman. That description of him was kind of eerie, I don't know why. Not bad eerie, mind you. ** Misanthrope, Then I retroactively dedicate that post to you! Done! It sounds like you're about one chromosome away from being a survivalist. Glad you aren't. Although it would be interesting to be friends with a survivalist in theory. LPS will probably get fucked up inside by his mom's indifference to him at this point in his life over time, but that doesn't have to be an entirely bad thing. I didn't end up seeing Gisele yesterday, but I am today, and I have 'query G. about Reiniger' on my to-do list. Wow, you're, like, almost psychic, man. Kyler will probably disagree with me. And be right in doing so. So never mind. ** Okay. If you haven't read Anna Kavan, she's a fascinating writer. 'Ice' is her most well known novel, and I've spotlit it in particular mostly because it's the only book of hers that had a decent batch of excerpts/quotes online for me to use in a post. It's great, and most of her books are, or are supposed to be in the case of the ones I haven't read. Anyway, enjoy. As I said up above, a rerun and no p.s. tomorrow followed immediately thereafter by a new post and a p.s. on Saturday. See ya.

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'Now here’s a difficult case: an undeniably excellent poet who died in prison, serving a sentence for having molested his daughter; a poet whose early work seems to show a visionary breadth and bounding imagination, but who barely published any new poems (or republished, times over, older poems) during the latter part of his life; and a poet Charles Bukowski called “the best unread poet in America” whose style synthesized elements of the most opaque of Olson’s Maximus poems or the collage aesthetic of the Tennis Court Oath (but who was also, at times, sexually frank, morally unambiguous in his amorality, and could tell a good story, like a West Venice West Georges Bataille).

'Outside of this small group (most of which also appear in his first collection, called John Thomas), Thomas published a chapbook of poems called Nevertheless in 1990, and contributed to the volume Abandoned Latitudes (with Paul Vangelisti and Robert Crosson) in 1983. A good, if not probing, obituary was published in the UK Independent (1); a much more detailed, and harrowing, account of his personality by his daughter, Gabrielle Idlet, appeared a little later in the LA Weekly (2). -- Brian Stefans, Free Space Comix



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(1) fromJohn Thomas: Beat poet known for his inability to write
Adrian Dannat, The Independent

"How does one review the work of a poet who mocks the societal role of the poet, who has no desire to publish his poetry and says that he has no interest in the familiar moral values of poetry and poets?" This was the question posed by Lawrence Lipton, fabled chronicler of the "Beat" group in California, about one of his most fascinating subjects, the poet John Thomas. In many ways Thomas was the antithesis of the hipsters, Bohemians and Beatniks chronicled in Holy Barbarians and sometimes seemed trapped by the wacky underground counter-culture he was widely assumed to be part of.

Indeed, he almost seemed an active enemy of the sprawling, self-indulgent alternative literary community of Los Angeles. He was something of an 18th-century figure, with a certain fondness for antique weapons (he collected sabres, dress swords and foils and, as any poet should, had a weakness for duels or the idea of them), orgies and satire; at 6'4" and weighing over 300 pounds, even his physical build betokened another, more heroic age.

A self-proclaimed "writer", one day Thomas was asked by the poet Maurice Lacy, "What do you write?" Without thinking Thomas replied, "I'm a poet", and thus had no choice but to write some of the stuff. Poetry certainly suited Thomas better than novels; as he admitted, "The novel-writing ambition was just sheer, vulgar pretence, wanting to be a great man." But even free verse was still a painful process for Thomas and his NOT writing and deep inability to write became his central theme if not celebrity.

The eponymous book John Thomas was put out in a limited edition of 405 copies, 30 of which were signed, numbered and even "sealed" by the author, presumably so they could not be read. This was published in 1972 and followed in 1976 by the elegant Epopoeia or the Decay of Satire. (In fact this second volume was the same as the first, except Thomas had deleted some works rather than adding any, further reducing his oeuvre.)

Thomas's last and perhaps fourth wife was Philomene Long, herself no small local legend, who had left her cloistered convent as a Catholic nun to escape to LA and as poetess/ film-maker documented the scene in such movies as Venice Beat and The California Missions, with Martin Sheen. Long also introduced Thomas to the Zen Center of LA, where they studied with the revered Maezumi Roshi, who gave her the Buddhist name "Gyokuho" or "Fragrant Jewel". In 1983, in a burst of activity, Thomas published Abandoned Latitudes, or rather he contributed a thin shard, "From Patagonia", to this collection of three LA writers. This was Thomas's most engaging finale, even if he was to live for almost 20 more years.



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(2) fromHitting the Beats
Gabrielle Idlet, LA Weekly

My father, ”Venice West“ poet John Thomas, died of congestive heart failure on March 29 at the age of 71. His April 7 Los Angeles Times obituary describes him as ”the sage of Venice“ (Beyond Baroque executive director Fred Dewey), ”mentor“ (Wanda Coleman), even ”the best unread poet in America“ (Charles Bukowski). Another journalistic elegy, appearing in Los Angeles Magazine, depicted my father as a man with a ”piercing wit [and] generous spirit,“ for whom ”poverty and love were equal teachers in a life of wisdom.“ His obituary was carried by wire across the nation, even making news at the Washington Post.

No publication mentioned that my father was, at the time of his death, serving a sentence in Los Angeles County Jail for sexually molesting his daughter -- my half sister Susan. Posthumous descriptions of his life left out other significant information: that he was a fraud, a thief and an endangerer of children, and that, while he often bragged that he‘d ”retired at 28,“ he’d made an impressive career of consumption. In the nearly two decades my father spent with my mother, he didn‘t work, and he wrote virtually nothing except for ”From Patagonia,“ a prose poem about what he described as his inner landscape of desolation. Real-world decimation, however, was his true accomplishment.

His name changed frequently, in fact. A late-’60s issue of the men‘s magazine Oui published a feature on my father, celebrating him as the country’s leading perpetrator of mail-order fraud. Growing up, I watched him feast on raw hamburger, grabbing it straight from the Styrofoam package. In order to avoid taking out the garbage, he found two industrial-size trash cans for the kitchen and let scraps collect for months at a stretch. I knew it was summertime when I stepped barefoot onto a sea of maggots that dropped from the trash, wriggling toward the dog-hair-dense carpet.

Equally noxious and permeating was my father’s sexuality. While he made a game of insulting my mother and describing himself to me as her ”gigolo,“ he encouraged me to read his journals -- beautifully calligraphed legal pads filled with detailed sex fantasies. At his bedside, paperback porn invited attention -- one flashy spine read Father-Daughter Lust. Our walls were covered with photos of Hitler, outlaws, corpses and orgies. ”Tickle Time,“ a game that invariably ended with his giant hands making their way beneath the waistline of my underwear until I writhed in laughing confusion, punctuated our days at home alone.

In the early ’70s, my father flew his teenaged daughter Susan from his first marriage (whom he hadn‘t seen since she was 3) to Los Angeles, drugged her with a potent pharmaceutical hallucinogen, and submitted her to sexual abuse a several times over the course of her three-week visit -- on at least one occasion with the participation of my mother, who had also supplied the drugs. Afterward, my father bragged to friends about his conquest. In March of this year, thanks to a 1993 law allowing victims of child sexual abuse to file charges years later -- and my sister’s determination to find healing through justice -- he was convicted and incarcerated for his crimes.

While I lived with my father, he never pursued publication -- it was a point of honor for him. He responded to requests from editors, however, so his poems did make their way into the world. And his work was generally well respected. But as far as I can tell, his notoriety derives principally from two facts: He outlived many of his Beat cohorts, and he was friendly, for a time, with Charles Bukowski. Simply living long enough to be a rarity, though, should not give a person icon status. As for literary talent vs. humanity, Bukowski himself said it best: ”It‘s so easy to be a poet and so hard to be a man."




The last reading by John Thomas & Philomene Long, 2002 (8:00)




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(3) Letter to Editor LA Weekly, Aug 8th, 2002:

I had the tragic privilege of being the attorney for John Thomas in his criminal prosecution. In my 20 years of exclusively criminal-defense practice, I have rarely had a client walk into my office and say: "I did this. I am sorry." John Thomas not only acknowledged his wrongdoing of 30 years ago, but appreciated the gravity of his conduct.

Thomas was 71 years of age and had congestive heart failure. Because his health would not withstand the demands of trial, despite important constitutional, legal and factual defenses, John pleaded no contest to the charge of one count of oral copulation with a person under the age of 16, not "child molestation" as mischaracterized in Gabrielle Idlet's article. Moreover, the misconduct occurred under the influence of hallucinogens with his former wife, Rose Idlet, in 1972. Thomas told the sentencing judge, Michael Pastor: "I do not forgive myself" and "I will abide faithfully by all conditions of the judgment you lay down, whatever they may be."

I will never understand how the judge and prosecutor could sentence a 71-year-old man with congestive heart failure (and a statement from his doctor that he could not survive it) to 120 days in jail. John Thomas died on the 18th day. The criminal prosecution was subsequently dismissed, based upon his death during the pendency of the appeal. (This was omitted from your story.)

A luminary of the Beat generation, Thomas lived and wrote in Los Angeles for the past 40 years. He acknowledged to me and others that in his earlier days he was on drugs, his house was in great disarray, and he didn't write for 18 years. He was, in his own words, "committing slow suicide."

Also omitted in the published hate piece is that after 1983, with his marriage to poet Philomene Long, Thomas was, as he would say, "resurrected." For the next 19 years he transformed his former life, feeling regret for his past, and began writing again (over 1,000 poems) and teaching. This was the John Thomas whom Fred Dewey, the director of Beyond Baroque, described as a "generous spirit," for whom "poverty and love were equal teachers in a life of wisdom."

Whatever truth exists in what Gabrielle Idlet has written is secondary to the distortions. She and her sister distributed hate mail and death threats to their father for years before the legal system was corrupted to allow the unconstitutional repeal of the statute of limitations. Their stated wish to see their father's death was finally satisfied, and their thirst for revenge was a primary cause. May they be given the forgiveness that they refused to grant their father.

--Jeffrey J. Douglas, 
Santa Monica




*

p.s. Hey. I'm off today. See what you think about this strange story about the poet John Thomas. See you tomorrow.

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Echo and the Funnymen Back of Love (1983)
'Echo and the Bunnymen is one of the more interesting and innovative pop bands to emerge from the MTV-era British pop scene that also gave us the Cure, the Fixx, and XTC.  The group formed in Liverpool in 1978 and released its first album, Crocodiles, in 1980, and remained a rising U.K. act through Porcupine, their third LP, in 1983. This U.S. tour was launched when the band released Ocean Rain on Sire Records in 1984. Although a hit with critics and hardcore alternative music fans, unlike many of its contemporaries such as the Eurhythmics and the Fixx, Echo and the Bunnymen failed to have a commercial breakthrough in the U.S. They did, however, maintain a strong cult following and enough sales to justify continued support from Sire through 1987.'-- collaged






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Einstürzende Neubauten Ich bin's (1986)
'Of all their wonderful albums, this and Haus der Luge are my absolute favorites. They come from a similar pinnacle of their long and varied career where they coaxed each piece of metal, every giant spring, bucket of sand, etc. into a musical tapestry of pulsating rhythm. Blixa Bargeld's voice has come a long way from Negativ Nein's frightening scream, and on this album he manages to sing in a whisper, a chant and of course, his trademark screech that sounds less like a voice than it does a drill boring it's way through a bell. This album is more hypnotic and, at times, even cozy. Like sitting in the worlds most comfortable chair watching the fireplace blaze so fierce and brilliant that it burns down the entire room, but you are too comfortable and mesmerized to move.'-- M. Fatino






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The Human League Dreams Of Leaving (live, 1980)
'For Travelogue, the band worked with a new co-producer, Richard Mainwaring, who went on to produce OMD's platinum selling Architecture & Morality the following year. Travelogue entered the UK album chart at #16, which was also its chart peak, and remained on the chart for 9 weeks in 1980. Although a vast improvement on their debut album, Reproduction, which had failed to chart at all the year before, the lack of high success precipitated the departure of founding band members Martyn Ware and Ian Craig Marsh, who went on to form Heaven 17. Their departure led to remaining members Phil Oakey and Adrian Wright moving The Human League in a new musical direction with a new line-up.'-- collaged






______________
John Foxx No One Driving (1980)
'"No-One Driving" is a 1980 song by UK artist John Foxx, and was released as a single in March 1980. It was the second single release from the Metamatic album, after "Underpass". The song is typical of Foxx's musical output of the time, featuring a Ballardian dystopian scenario involving an automobile in the lyrics, with music produced using electronic instruments (synthesisers, drum machines, electronic percussion) only. The record entered the UK charts at no. 32, remaining at the same position for a further week before dropping down.'-- collaged






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The Associates Party Fears Two (1982)
'Unlike most bands’ much-repeated legends, the stories of excess and lunacy that quickly attached themselves to The Associates are - if one is to believe Rankine and Dempsey - completely true: they did indeed blow half of Sulk’s advance on luxury hotel suites (including one for MacKenzie’s whippets), top-of-the-range smoked salmon (again, for the dogs) and enough cocaine to give Iggy Pop and David Bowie a run for their money, before throwing the rest into making Sulk as opulent and extravagant as possible. Lead single 'Party Fears Two' certainly fits that bill, an oddball elegy to excess, albeit one tinged by a sense that all this coke and booze is so much hot air and empty pleasure. Behind MacKenzie’s cheerful, Ferry-esque croon, Rankine’s orchestrations are positively lush, a smorgasbord of glittering synths, treated horns and slinky guitar lines. 'Club Country', meanwhile, is straight-ahead synth-pop bliss, a track fittingly tailored for the dancefloor even as it skewers middle class inertia: “Refrigeration keeps you young I’m told." Again, Billy MacKenzie reaches impossible heights with his delirious voice, whilst the infectious beats and glossy keyboards would make even the most reticent club-goer get up and shake his or her arse. 'Club Country' is easily equal to 'Fade To Grey', 'Poison Arrow' and 'Antmusic' as a slice of pure, catchy synth-pop, and deserved bigger success than it got. Equally, The Associates surely tapped into the genre’s promise of futurism better than most of their peers, with MacKenzie’s lyrics equal parts behoven to Ballard, Orwell and Gibson, all wrapped up in his own glitter-bomb aesthetic.'-- The Quietus






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Devo Big Mess (Demo, 1982)
'Devo's song "Big Mess" on the Oh No, It's Devo LP was inspired in-part by letters that were written to an LA office that managed local game show hosts' fan mail. Devo had some friends who worked there, and the letters got passed onto them for the sake of strangeness. The writer of the letters referred to himself as "Cowboy Kim". I can only guess that Kim had some kind of mental handicap, and I have no idea if he was really a DJ or not.'-- Devo-Obsesso






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Wall of Voodoo Factory (1982)
'Wall of Voodoo formed in Los Angeles in 1977, originally as a soundtrack company. Led by singer/songwriter Stan Ridgway and rounded out by guitarist Marc Moreland, bassist/keyboardist Bruce Moreland, keyboardist Chas Gray, and drummer Joe Nanini, the group issued its self-titled debut EP in 1980. With the additions of bassist Bruce Moreland and his brother Marc on guitar (replacing Noland), the band's sound crystallized on 1981's full-length Dark Continent, which couched Ridgway's highly stylized and cinematic narratives -- heavily influenced by Westerns and film noir, and sung in the vocalist's distinctively droll, narcoleptic manner -- in atonal, electronically based settings. In 1982, following the exit of Bruce Moreland, Wall of Voodoo released Call of the West, which featured "Mexican Radio," their biggest hit. After an appearance at the 1983 US Festival, Ridgway left the group for a solo career.' -- collaged






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Psychedelic Furs Into You like a Train (live, 1981)
'The Psychedelic Furs, whose name was inspired by the 1966 Velvet Underground song "Venus in Furs," were formed in England in 1977 by brothers Richard Butler (vocals) and Tim Butler (bass), along with saxophone player Duncan Kilburn and guitarist Roger Morris. By the time they released their self-titled debut album in 1980, the group had become a sextet, adding guitarist John Ashton and drummer Vince Ely. That album, featuring Butler's hoarse voice (the tone of which suggested John Lydon without the sneer) was a bigger hit in England, where it reached the Top 20, than in the U.S. Talk Talk Talk (1981) did better, reaching the U.S. Top 100 and producing two British singles chart entries, one of which was "Pretty in Pink," later also a hit in the U.S. when a new version was used as the title song of a film. Forever Now (1982) saw the band reduced to a quartet with the departure of Kilburn and Morris. The rest moved to the U.S., turned to producer Todd Rundgren, and scored a U.S. Top 50 hit with "Love My Way." Ely then left, and the remaining trio of the two Butlers and Ashton made Mirror Moves (1984), the biggest Psychedelic Furs hit yet.'-- collaged






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Strawberry Switchblade Another Day (1985)
'There was more to Strawberry Switchblade than met the eye – their name was a clue. “Our image was colourful, but our minds were dark,” says McDowall on the phone from her home in Oxfordshire. Their self-titled first and only album featured "Since Yesterday" and other hit singles "Let Her Go", "Who Knows What Love Is" and "Jolene", a cover of the Dolly Parton song. But it also included their 1983 debut single, "Trees and Flowers", a song concerning Bryson’s agoraphobia. Other songs on the album, particularly "Go Away", "10 James Orr Street" and "Being Cold", essayed a devastatingly bleak, eerily beautiful brand of mid-1980s pop, all sugar-high vocals, a ponderous pace expressing the heaviness of existence and chord changes of the most exquisitely miserable kind. The phrase “sinister-sweet” seems to have been invented for these wintry ballads.'-- The Guardian






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Gang of Four We Live as We Dream, Alone (live, 1982)
'Lead singer Jon King (currently a chief executive of World Television) stalked the stage, owned the stage, his Mao-like suitcoat half-unbuttoned, undulating and Jesus-Christ-posing and crabwalking among three microphones, barking his words out. And, yes, there is a microwave involved. If you've seen the concert film Urgh! A Music War, there's a performance of "He'd Send In The Army" by a much younger Go4, with King hitting a block of wood with a drum stick. For this tour, the drum stick was replaced with a duct-taped aluminum bat, and the block of wood was replaced with a microwave. Like a well-trained assembly-line worker, King banged on the box as the song stuttered and surged around him. If the sound from the last knock disappointed him, he would hit the microwave with a full swing, rearing back with the bat and coming down square on the top of it. As the song finished, King knocked the microwave off its pedestal with an inside-out stroke, and proceeded to give it ! an old-fashioned arrhythmic beat-down.'-- David Raposa






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The Teardrop Explodes The Great Dominions (1981)
'Wilder is The Teardrop Explodes final fling but this is no half-hearted, "can it, shift it and move on" enterprise. Instead it's a rich, dark tapestry of tightly woven, neo-psychedelic pop tunes which could have been recorded any time in the last 25 years. The sound is crisp and clean and beautifully varied in texture which results in upbeat exuberant pop imbued with a sense of mystery and loss. What is glaringly evident is that, notwithstanding the band's untimely demise, Julian Cope was a force to be reckoned with and one who was never likely to simply fade away. He has a bizarre knack of being lyrically opaque yet passionately revealing. I'm not sure I'll ever understand the meaning behind some of these tracks but I'm not sure I need to.'-- Grampus






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Siouxsie and The Banshees Into The Light (1981)
'One of the band's masterworks, Juju sees Siouxsie and the Banshees operating in a squalid wall of sound dominated by tribal drums, swirling and piercing guitars, and Siouxsie Sioux's fractured art-attack vocals. If not for John McGeoch's marvelous high-pitched guitars, here as reminiscent of Joy Division as his own work in Magazine, the album would rank as the band's most gothic release. Siouxsie and company took things to an entirely new level of darkness on Juju, with the singer taking delight in sinister wordplay on the disturbing "Head Cut," creeping out listeners in the somewhat tongue-in-cheek "Halloween," and inspiring her bandmates to push their rhythmic witches brew to poisonous levels of toxicity. Album opener "Spellbound," one of the band's classics, ranks among their finest moments and bristles with storming energy. Siouxsie's mysterious voice emerges from dense guitar picking, Budgie lays into his drums as if calling soldiers to war, and things get more tense from there. "Into the Light" is perhaps the only track where a listener gets a breath of oxygen, as the remainder of the album screams claustrophobia, whether by creepy carnival waterfalls of guitar notes or Siouxsie's unsettling lyrics.'-- Allmusic






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The Jam Private Hell (1980)
'Between May 1977 and November 1979, the Jam released four albums and nine singles, a pace of output that peaked when Setting Sons was hurried along by a record company keen to capitalise on the band’s connection with Britain’s youthful masses. As a result, the album – intended as an Orwell-inspired concept – seems flawed next to 1978’s All Mod Cons and 1981’s Sound Affects, but captures why the young Paul Weller was (reluctantly) dubbed the “spokesman for a generation”. The still-relevant 'The Eton Rifles' is the colossus here, but 'Thick As Thieves', 'Private Hell', and 'Little Boy Soldiers' show what a fast and furious roll they were on.'-- The Guardian






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Killing Joke Requiem (live, 1980)
'"Requiem" was released in September 1980 on 12" vinyl by record label E.G. by E.G. Records as the second single from the band's debut self-titled studio album, backed by two B-sides, "Change" and a demo version of "Requiem". That same year, E.G. released a 7" version of the single, minus the demo version. Polydor also released the single in on 7" vinyl in Italy only. The single did not chart in the UK but reached number 43 on the US Billboard Dance Music/Club Play Singles chart.'-- collaged






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Adam and the Ants Feed Me to the Lions (Demo, 1980)
'I’d seen Adam and the Ants before, the previous September at the Electric Ballroom in Camden. My older brother and his mate Olly had taken me, edging me past the doorman into the packed, smoky venue where the band’s seminal line-up were undertaking their penultimate show; Adam Ant, the late Matthew Ashman, Dave Barbe and Andy Warren - it was the 28th September 1979 - and for a twelve year old boy it was a thrilling experience. I wandered around wide eyed and fascinated by the bizarre mix of people, a kind of punky-soul-a-billy mix. Standard peroxide spiky heads with the band’s name on the back of their leather jackets. A lot of younger kids, perhaps a bit older than me, wearing intriguing Ants or Seditionaries t-shirts, kung fu slippers, moccasin-style shoes or creepers. Older guys and girls sporting a look that was quasi new romantic I guess, a taster of what was to come as punk rock curdled into the sham (69) of its former self and a slicker club culture was born. It was pre-Goth and post-punk. The UK Subs and The Exploited would soon be on Top of the Pops, a glue sniffing parody of what the Ants represented, while Adam himself would appear on the same show, resplendent in gold and black Hussar jacket, one of English pop music’s most iconic looks.'-- Sabotage Times






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Soft Cell Meet Murder My Angel (1984)
'This Last Night in Sodom represents a shift in style from the delicate, erotic, dancefloor-friendly pop of their earlier records and contains a more eclectic mix of styles as well, from the Spanish-influenced "L'Esqualita" (inspired by the drag bar in New York City of the same name- the actual real name being "La Escuelita") to the rockabilly-tinged "Down in the Subway". The thematic elements of the songs are also noticeably darker, even for Soft Cell, and center around self-destruction and the breakdown of innocence. "Meet Murder My Angel", according to Almond, is about the mind of a murderer before he slaughters his victim, while "Where Was Your Heart (When You Needed It Most)" centres on a girl who loses all self-esteem after being raped while intoxicated. The first single from the album was "Soul Inside", which reached number 16 on the UK charts in September 1983. "Down in the Subway" was released as the second single, peaking at number 24 in March 1984.'-- collaged






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The Cure A Strange Day(live, 1982)
'Pornography is the fourth studio album by English rock band The Cure, released on 4 May 1982 by the record label Fiction. Preceded by the non-album single "Charlotte Sometimes" late the previous year, Pornography was the band's first album with a new producer, Phil Thornalley, and was recorded at RAK Studios from January to April. The sessions saw the group on the brink of collapse, with heavy drug use, band in-fighting and group leader Robert Smith's depression fuelling the album's musical and lyrical content. Pornography represents the conclusion of the group's early dark, gloomy musical phase which began with Seventeen Seconds in 1980. Following its release, bass guitarist Simon Gallup left the band and the Cure switched to a much brighter and more radio-friendly new wave sound. While poorly received by critics at the time of release, Pornography was their most popular album to date, reaching number 8 in the UK charts. Pornography has since gone on to gain acclaim from critics, and is now considered an important milestone in the development of the gothic rock genre.'-- collaged






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Bow Wow Wow Chihuahua (1981)
'Bow Bow Bow was a 80s new wave band, organized by the Sex Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren in 1980, whose music is described as having an "African-derived drum sound". McLaren persuaded guitarist Matthew Ashman, bassist Leigh Gorman and percussionist Dave Barbarossa of the original lineup of Adam and the Ants to leave Adam Ant and form a new group, fronted by teen singer Annabella Lwin. McLaren was also going to use Boy George (later of Culture Club fame) as a second lead singer, but he was deemed to be "too wild" for the band. McLaren discovered fourteen year old Lwin while she was working at a dry cleaners, and the group's sound was a mix of her "girlish squeal", Balinese chants, surf instrumentals, new romantic pop melodies, and Barbarossa's Burundi ritual music-influenced tom tom beats, though later moving towards heavy metal. The group released three full-length albums before Lwin quit to pursue a solo career, or was kicked out, in 1983. Ashman went on to form Chiefs of Relief, and in 1995 died from diabetes complications.'-- last.fm






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XTC Rocket From a Bottle (1980)
'The ever-evolving group had its biggest successes in the ’80s with driving, off-kilter pop songs that made hay of socio-political critiques and Beatles-like guitar hooks, and as they moved into the ’90s, they were beloved by the post-collegiate crowd that didn’t cotton to mainstream radio but was also turned off by what the post-Nirvana or Lollapalooza worlds had to offer. And as the band reached its autumn years, critical and commercial interest waned almost entirely — particularly here in the States — leaving their last two albums to be virtually ignored by the record-buying universe. Yet looking at XTC through any one of those lenses is terribly myopic. The group, which started in Swindon, England back in 1976, has gone through one of the most fascinating career trajectories right up until their dissolution in 2000. They evolved from amphetamine-fueled imps to a sturdy modern rock group to psychedelia’s second cousins to a kind of amalgam that kept an eye on each of these musical stopping points. And through it all, the band’s two preternaturally gifted songwriters, guitarist/vocalist Andy Partridge and bassist/vocalist Colin Moulding, created work that only got deeper, more thoughtful, and more complex.'-- Stereogum






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Magazine Because You're Frightened (Peel Session, 1980)
'After leaving the Buzzcocks in 1977, vocalist Howard Devoto formed Magazine with guitarist John McGeoch, bassist Barry Adamson, keyboardist Bob Dickinson, and drummer Martin Jackson. One of the first post-punk bands, Magazine kept the edgy, nervous energy of punk and added elements of art rock, particularly with their theatrical live shows and shards of keyboards. Devoto's lyrics were combinations of social commentary and poetic fragments, while the band alternated between cold, jagged chords and gloomy, atmospheric sonic landscapes.'-- Allmusic






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Cabaret Voltaire Sensoria (1985)
'Though they're one of the most important groups in the history of industrial and electronic music, Cabaret Voltaire are sometimes forgotten in the style's timeline -- perhaps because they continued recording long after other luminaries (Throbbing Gristle, Suicide, Chrome) called it quits. Also related to the fact is that CV rarely stayed in one place for long, instead moving quickly from free-form experimentalism through arty white-boy funk and on to house music in the late '80s and electronica the following decade. The band, formed by guitarist Richard H. Kirk, bassist Stephen Mallinder and tape manipulator Chris Watson, were influenced by the Dadaist movement (whence came their name) and as such, came closer to performance art than music during many of their early performances. After several years of recording with no contract, the group signed to the newly formed Rough Trade label in 1978 and began releasing records that alternated punk-influenced chargers with more experimental pieces incorporating tape loops and sampled effects. Following Watson's departure, the remaining duo inaugurated a new contract with Some Bizzare/Virgin in 1983 by shifting their sound, away from raging industro-funk and towards a more danceable form. The singles "Sensoria" and "James Brown" hit the indie charts during 1984, and Cabaret Voltaire moved to EMI/Parlophone in 1986 for The Code.'-- Avantgarde.com






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ABC That Was Then, But This Is Now (1983)
'Beauty Stab is the second album by the British band ABC. Released in November 1983, it was a departure from the stylised production of the band's first album, The Lexicon of Love, featuring a more guitar-oriented sound. The album was certified Gold by the BPI for shipments in excess of 100,000 copies, but was not as commercially successful as its predecessor. It peaked at no. 12 in the UK album charts and spawning only two top 40 singles (neither of which made the top 10). In a 1995 article, music journalist Simon Reynolds listed Beauty Stab among "the great career-sabotage LPs in pop history".'-- collaged






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Pete Shelley XL1 (live, 1983)
'With XL1, Pete Shelley integrates layers of guitar into the electronic synth-pop he essayed on his solo debut, Homosapien. While the result isn't quite as bracing as its predecessor, the music benefits from the guitar -- it sounds edgier, making the record fairly captivating. There's still some weak material on the record, but "Telephone Operator" and "If You Ask Me (I Won't Say No)" are terrific, ranking among Shelley's best.'-- Allmusic






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Scritti Politti Absolute (1984)
'For the sleeve of their first single, 1979's "4 A Sides", Scritti Politti opted not for a picture but instead showed a breakdown of costs-- every element of the record's production itemized. This kind of fascination with and demystification of the rock process seems like an orthodox post-punk move, very of its time. But it also revealed for the first time one of the unifying threads in Scritti's career-- an idea that things become more interesting when they're broken down, and that what's on the surface can reveal that stuff, not obfuscate it. This is pop exploded, fractured and rebuilt as a mosaic where almost every beat seems to have a different sound from the one before. Hi-hats, triangles, drum pads of every kind flicker across the mix for a second or two then never reappear. In fact the tracks hold together only thanks to Green Gartside's deceptively light voice and sweet melodic touch, making songs like "Absolute" and "Wood Beez" into exhilarating sculptures rather than a swingers party for drum presets.'-- Tom Ewing






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Simple Minds King in White and in the Crowd (Peel Session, 1982)
'One of Scotland's finest imports, Simple Minds deliver a strong synth-reared release on New Gold Dream. This album harks the darker side of the band's musicianship, and such material alludes to their forthcoming pop-stadium sound which hurled them into rock mainstream during the latter part of the '80s. They were still honing their artistic rowdiness, and Kerr's pursuing vocals were still hiding. But Simple Minds' skill of tapping into internal emotion is profound on songs such as "Someone, Somewhere in Summertime" and the album's title track. But the dance-oriented tracks like "Promised You a Miracle" and "Glittering Prize" are lushly layered in deep electronic beats -- it was only a matter of time for Simple Minds to expound upon such musical creativity which made them a household favorite through the 1980s.'-- collaged







*

p.s. Hey. ** _Black_Acrylic, Hi. My timing or phrasing or something was not at its sharpest. Yeah, the strikes are already underway even. Unbelievable. ** David Ehrenstein, My pleasure, and thank you for saying that. Yes, and it seems that Mr. Thomas had one. The news of the Carax/ Sparks film is public? Interesting. Yes, very sadly, Holly seems to be at the end. So, so sad. ** Tosh Berman, Hi, Tosh. Kavan is very good. I had a very similar experience with John Thomas and the Venice poets back when I had your job. He always treated me like some lowly peon who was standing in the way of the worldwide dissemination of his genius. And I too never heard word-one about any of that stuff when he was earthbound. Bob Flanagan used to do this spot-on imitation of Thomas. Anyway, grim. ** Bernard Welt, Hi, B. Yes, I knew nothing of any of that. Wow, okay. That particular Agnes B space is quite nice. I saw a show there not two weeks ago. I'll see the show for sure, and I'll try to get to the Saturday event at the very least. And I'll hope to meet Jayme somehow. Yeah, no, $300, theologian, that's probably enough to ward me off. Cool: your Bechdel talk! Sooner the better re: writing to Chrystel, but probably not an extreme rush, and I would really think you're a shoo-in. Really nice about your poem in Colby's show! Snap that. And about the Theater department thing! Wow, you're good, my pal. ** Thomas Moronic, Yay, you did the opposite of deprive us! They look splendid. I'll read them carefully a little later as I was up late and then woke up early, and I'm half-brained this AM. Thank you, thank you! Yeah, John Thomas hovered around Beyond Baroque when I was doing the programing there in the early '80s. Like I said to Tosh, he always treated me like an extremely lesser mortal. I'm good, really, really busy, but it's all good. ** H, Hi. Slurp. Oh, thank you, then I'll will get to NYC at the soonest opportunity. I really love Alice Motley's earlier work. I don't know her more recent work so well. My favorite book of hers is 'How Spring Comes', and I love pretty much all of her work and books up to and just after that point in time. She lives in Paris, but I've only run into her once since I've been here. ** MANCY, Hi, Stephen! Cool you love Kavan. Really excited for your new thing! ** Steevee, It's very unique: the Kavan. Zac and I saw the new Grandieux at the Montreal festival when LCTG played there. I thought it was quite amazing, as did Zac. It was very controversial at the festival for reasons that you will quickly understand if you see it. I'm a huge of his work, and it has all of the things I love in his work, and it's also I think his most ambitious film. It's very, very dark. I guess if you've read the synopsis, you know that already. ** Kathe Burkhart, Wow, Kathe! Hey, old pal! How are you doing? It's so very, very sweet to see you here! Thank you! Big love, me. ** Jamie McMorrow, Hi, Jamie! Really good to see you! Oh, man, I hope that whatever's dragging you down physically and otherwise is melting like winter snow in April. Or even late March. Yeah, totally, about 'Ice'! Really nicely put! Fascinating that your girlfriend is doing her PhD partly on Kavan. What's the overall thing/theme of her focus? Yes, please, hang out here more often, if you feel like it. That would be lovely. xx, Dennis ** Chilly Jay Chill, Hi, Jeff. Shit, I think you were under the weather the last time you were here, or one of the last times. Fucking winter offshoots. I ... wait, have I done a post on Jem Cohen here? Huh. I'll go back and check. If there's stuff out there to borrow, I definitely will if I haven't. No, I haven't seen 'Counting'. I'll see what the availability in my parts is. I wish you a hyper upswinging. ** Alistair McCartney, Hi, Alistair! Always a joy! The TV thing went well. The proposed TV series will star one of the performers in Gisele's my piece 'The Ventriloquists Convention' and her dummy. 'TVC' wrapped up its Paris run last night, so we used her locality to test-shoot two short scenes just to see how it will look/work and also to help Zac and I understand what the dummy can and can't do as far as writing the series. It was very, very helpful and went extremely well. Holy shit, it's ready! Your novel! That's amazing news, man! Congratulations, and I'm so very, very excited by news of its completion and inevitable journey to the world's eyes, mine especially! I don't think we'll get to Perth when we're in Australia, damn. But you never know. We're still figuring out our itinerary. We'll be based in Melbourne. There is some possibility that our film LIKE CATTLE TOWARDS GLOW might show at a festival in Sydney while we're there, and, if that happens, we'll go there for that. Definitely Tasmania. We think we'll rent a car and try to get as far as we can into the Outback. That's kind of the general, hoped for plans at the moment. Then to Japan on the way home to Paris, probably for a week or so at the beginning of February. Anyway, big hugs to you, pal, and you have a fantastic weekend! Love, me. ** Misanthrope, Hey. Oh, cool. I'm glad the Kavan book intrigued you. Yeah, you never know what effect stuff like that will have on you. I mean I went through a pretty rough time in my teens, and I'm fairly okay, I think, considering. I can't say that I've ever liked anything I've heard by My Chemical Romance, but I haven't spent all that much time or that many brain cells investigating them. Our title -- 'This Is How You Will Disappear' -- was a twisted, slightly changed offshoot from the title of a Scott Walker song. I wonder if they did the same thing? ** Okay. So, let's see ... I got to remembering '80s New Wave the other day, and I got to remembering tracks I especially liked at the time by very to fairly- to well-known bands of that era/'genre', and I gathered those tracks together and stacked them up and called it a gig. That's what I did. And now, what will my gig trigger off inside of you that will then pass through your body and end up in your typing fingers? That's the question for this weekend. Have good ones. See you on Monday.

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'In 1991, Edward Furlong was just a 12-year old Los Angeles child who was on the brink of stardom. Terminator 2: Judgement Day was just about to be released in cinemas and revolutionise blockbusters for years to come. Furlong's surprisingly soulful performance as John Connor, the eventual leader of the human resistance against the Terminators, was praised by many critics. Like his character, Furlong was destined for greatness.

'Furlong's home life wasn't exactly the most conducive to a normal life. He didn't know his father. His mother eventually lost control of him, resulting in an aunt and uncle suing for custody and raising him until his early teens. Perhaps more shockingly is the fact that he sued for his emancipation and won it. Why did he do that?

'Furlong was in a relationship with a 29-year old woman who was his on-set tutor during filming of Terminator 2: Judgement Day. He was 15. She eventually became his manager, although she did little to steer his career in any meaningful way. Furlong starred in a number of critical and commercial failures, none that came close to replicating the success of Terminator 2: Judgement Day.

'Furlong would eventually get engaged to - and split from - his manager, both personally and professionally. In 1999, she sued him for money owed to her for acting as his manager. She also claimed he was physically abusive. Throughout this time, Furlong is said to have taken hard drugs - heroin, cocaine - and was in the depths of serious alcoholism.

'In the middle of this chaos, Furlong surprised everyone by taking off to film the family tragedy Little Odessa. On Jan. 7, he called his mother from Los Angeles International Airport to tell her he’d taken the job and was headed for New York — without her. This was the first time Furlong was on a movie set without family members, and a funny thing happened: Nothing.

'”It was a delight to work with him. He was always emotionally present. I think he’s a very accomplished actor. And, in many ways, he was the most cooperative actor in the picture. Other than the fact that I got a Coke with Edward after shooting, I would never have known about his family,” says Odessa director James Gray, who watched the young actor hold his own with Vanessa Redgrave and Maximilian Schell. ”His role was that of someone from a troubled, broken family, and in many ways he used his background to his advantage and funneled his personal tumult into the role. At 16, he’s been forced into adulthood, and he’s handling it better than I would have.”

'His career uptick continued in 1997 when he starred as the vulnerable, damaged younger brother to Edward Norton in American History X. The role won Furlong a nomination for Young Artist Award and the film was a critical success.

'Furlong enjoyed a brief moment of success again with Detroit Rock City, where he starred alongside and eventually dated Natasha Lyonne, one of the stars of Orange Is The New Black. His fortunes spiralled downward again, with Furlong unable to secure any meaningful work other direct-to-DVD films.

'His addictions prevented him from being recast as John Connor in the 2002 follow-up to Terminator 2: Judgement Day, with the role going to Nick Stahl instead. Throughout the 2000s, he was arrested several times for domestic abuse, drug addiction and various driving offences. He's admitted publicly in court that he's completely broke.

'According to iMDB, Furlong's only starred in one film in 2015 and hasn't had a theatrically-released film in ten years. Despite this, Furlong is still believed to be a talented, if troubled actor. "I shot Ed Furlong when he wasn’t even aware that we were filming," said one director. "He’s a very unpredictable and a brilliant actor when he wants to."'-- collaged



___
Stills

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Further

Edward Furlong @ IMDb
EF @ Twitter
EF page @ Facebook
THE EXTREME EDDIE SITE!!
Absolut Furlong
Edward Furlong Central
EF fan tumblr
Edward Furlong Fan Fiction Stories
'A Look At Edward Furlong - Before And After Success'
'The John Connor Curse: Nick Stahl, Edward Furlong and Christian Bale'
'Edward Furlong Charged with Assaulting Girlfriend'
'Actor Edward Furlong hides, then is arrested
'Edward Furlong's Lobster Tale'
'Edward Furlong: gueule d’ange (noir)'
'DER TIEFE FALL DES EDWARD FURLONG'
Edward Furlong - Hold On Tight (CD, Album) at Discogs
'EDWARD FURLONG JOINS ‘STAR TREK : RENEGADES'



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Extras


EDWARD FURLONG Interview and Q&A


Edward Furlong sings 'Hold On Tight'


`Die Another Day' Premiere


Edward Furlong singing for Detroit Rock City


Chicago Comic Con 2011 - Interview With Edward Furlong



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Interview

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.


What have you been up to?

Well, right now I'm just getting up. I know I sound like a lazy bastard, but I had breakfast in bed, you know. I'm being kind of a lush, I guess. But lately, I've been being a dad, putting food on the table, doing movies once in a while. Same old, same old, nothing too exciting.

You were awesome in Terminator 2 and American History X and Little Odessa and Pecker, and then it seemed like you disappeared.

What happened? I became a crackwhore! After selling my body for crack for a couple of years... no, no, I'm just joking. [Laughs] It's the way it goes. It's just the way it is. It goes up and down. I still consider myself blessed enough that I can still put food on the table for my son. I still do stuff, I guess it's just not as big as I used to get. I did just do CSI: NY - that's probably the biggest thing lately.

You're so good in Pecker. When that came out, I hoped you would start acting in arty indie movies and become the the sexy cute young Steve Buscemi or something.

Yeah. [Sighs] I should have been in more of John's films and films like that. That was a valiant attempt by him to renew my filmmaking industry. It just didn't work out. I fucked it up. That's what I used to do. Fuck things up.

You still could.

Nah. [Long pause] I got fat and ugly. Another huge fuck up right there. [Sighs] Can you change the subject possibly?

Yeah. You were scouted to be in Terminator 2, correct? It was your first movie.

It was random. I was hanging out at the Boys and Girls Club. They had trouble finding someone in young Hollywood at the time to play John Connor, and I guess they were looking for "normal" kids. This woman came up to me at the Club and asked me if I wanted to be in a movie. She didn't tell me what kind of movie it was, so I went [in my mind] to the worst possible thing, so I said, "Sorry, I'm not into child porn." She laughed and said it wasn't child porn. I went in and kept reading lines, and eventually I got the part!

Did being in a movie so laden with apocalyptic undertones and Doomsday messages mess with your psyche at all?

Nah, man. I think if maybe I was a bit older when I did the movie, I might have made better decisions - like save my money. It was fun for me to make the movie, though. The hardest thing was probably growing up in the business, in the public eye. I know a lot of people my age are still trying to figure out what to do, and I consider myself lucky that I can make a living doing something that I truly enjoy.

True. And there were a lot of actors in the same boat as you, and a lot of them have died. Hey, at least you survived.

So far! I'm alive today, and that's good. I feel very blessed.

Did you follow The Crow before you starred in the fourth Crow movie?

No, not really.

Did you watch all the movies?

Yeah, I did, actually. Before I knew I was doing The Crow I saw the first one and was a pretty big fan of it. Of course, when I signed on for the fourth one, I watched the other two.

It looked like a pretty physical movie. What do you think was the toughest sequence in the film to shoot?

In terms of physicality?

Well, you can do both. You can do physicality and acting, too.

Well, physical wasn't quite as bad, because you have stunt doubles and everything. Also, the funny part is I accidentally broke my wrist not too long before the movie, so a lot of the physical stuff was a little bit harder for me. I had to take of my cast prematurely, and that was kind of a bitch. I've always played real life sort of characters and this is sort of like a mystical character with him coming back for revenge, for lost love, lost life, coming back from the dead, and all of that sh*t. At first it was scary, I guess. I'd never really stepped into those shoes. And when I saw The Crow on websites and shit, I had no idea it had so many fans. So, I guess the stressful part acting-wise was just stepping into those shoes and hoping that we could do a good job with it.

In the movie, you die and come back to life. It's a second chance, or almost an immortality. Would you ever want to be immortal?

No. I don't think so. By the time I'm old, I'm sure I'll have lived a full enough life. I think we're mortal for a reason. Life gets tiring, man! I get tired, so I don't know. Being immortal might exhaust me or make me go crazy.

If you could have any superpower, what would you want?

Oh God... I'd have a couple. I'd have the ability to just make money trees. Like make money appear. I would be able to have Angelina Jolie and Shakira just fall magically in love with me and just wanna stalk me. I'd be able to eat whatever I want without gaining any weight. There's definitely many serious superpowers I'd like to have.

Your first movie was with James Cameron. How was working with him at the time?

It's funny. I can kind of remember. I was so young at the time, only 13. And the amount of pot I've smoked in my life... [Laughs] No, Jim was great. He has this image of being a tough director, but he was very nice to me. I loved working with him. He was the first director I ever worked with, so with every director since him, he's like the number one. I base all my other experiences on him. I cared more about working with him than I did about Arnold Schwarzenegger. I was tripping out because it was around the time he was doing Aliens and Abyss, really cool stuff for a teenage boy.

Any funny stuff you can remember from your on-set days?

I remember one time Arnold accidentally hit me with the butt end of a rifle. That's the only thing I can remember. I don't know. Jim Cameron used to call me "Special Ed." [Laughs]

What about the first time you met Arnold Schwarzenegger? Do you recall that?

Barely, but I do. We were doing a read-through. I remember thinking, 'Man, this guy wears really loud clothes.' He was wearing a big, flowery Hawaiian shirt. I had just seen him in Predator, you know, and here he is in some bright-colored shirt.

Do you have a favorite scene from the movie, or do you cringe watching it?

I don't watch it. I saw part of it on TV a while ago, and it was the part where I'm outside taking off on my bike, in the garage, talking to my step-parents, and my character's like: "She's not my mother, Todd!" in some whiny voice. I was like 'Oh my God, change the fucking channel!" It was horrible. It's hard enough for me to watch my more recent stuff.

I was reading that you released a single and it got really big in Japan.

Yeah.

Did you do a lot of touring then?

No, I didn't tour. It was a huge thing out there. Definitely not my kind of music.

I haven't heard it.

You don't want to hear it.

Is it like pop?

It's like me at 14, 15 singing for like 12-year old girls and stuff. It's awful.

What's the next thing we're going to see you in? I have a movie coming out pretty soon, called This Is Not a Movie, directed by Olallo Rubio, and co-starring Peter Coyote.

It's a very, very cool movie. Guns N' Roses' Slash did the movie score. There's all sorts of shit in it. It's weird and really hard to explain. It's an apocalyptic, end-of-the-world, druggie movie with naked chicks dancing around. It makes sense once you watch it all the way through. There's a twist to it that I can't reveal here. It's really good. I also have a movie called For the Love of Money coming out soon, too. James Caan is in that one. And I did a sci-fi movie. There's a couple things on the horizon for me, so I'm looking forward to it.



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21 of Edward Furlong's 60 films

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James Cameron Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
'Much like John Connor, The Terminator and Terminator 2: Judgment Day (a.k.a “T2”), are both the products of and creators of their time. The Terminator came from a grittier, meaner brand of R-rated, 80s action that melded bloody action with desperate measures. They’re movies that are sweaty, ugly, and gleefully violent mixed with just a bit of campiness. Move to the 90s and everything is much cleaner and glossier. It’s the decade that saw the rise of the PG-13 action film, and the vanishing of the gritty aesthetic. Even though the movie is rated-R, Terminator 2 helped set the tone for this new wave of action movies. It’s drastically different than the original, features far more visual effects, and at the time was the most expensive movie ever made (James Cameron: Wanting His Movies to Cost More than the GDP of Small Countries since 1991). T2 showed that The Terminator may have been influential in the 1980s, but the sequel was a game-changer that redefined the character, the franchise, and, the blockbuster action movie.'-- Collider



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"Shit" montage



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Mary Lambert Pet Sematary II (1992)
'Essentially, Pet Sematary II is the embodiment of one of its resurrected victims: an emotionless husk that looks like the thing it used to represent but features none of the qualities that made people care for it in the first place. The two films are so different in tone it’s actually difficult to believe they were both directed by the same person: however, with Stephen King having nothing to do with the sequel it just goes to show the person with the pen is often more important than the person behind the camera.'-- That Was a Bit Mental



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Martin Bell American Heart (1992)
'There are many reasons to watch Martin Bell’s American Heart (1992). A philosophical drama with Coming-of-Age nuances, the film focuses on the hardships of life by telling the story of Jack (Jeff Bridges), a recently released convict and his teenage son Nick (Edward Furlong). I did not really feel an emotional connection to any of the characters, but this did not lessen the experience. On the contrary, the distance between viewer and characters contributes to the authenticity of the film’s narrative. Most of the action is set in Seattle and we evidence the gritty daily fight of survival of its underprivileged inhabitants: drugs, violence, prostitution and robberies. A shocking, yet genuine, portrayal of the street – likely influenced by a documentary on the homeless kids of Seattle directed by Martin Bell some years prior to his work in American Heart.'-- The Sky Kid



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John Flynn Brainscan (1994)
'When Eddie and his legal guardians Sean Furlong and Tafoya arrived on the Brainscan set, a pitched battle began between the guardians and their charge, who, according to a draft of his contract, earned $350,000 to star in the sci-fi thriller, which opens nationwide on April 22. Tafoya said she and Eddie had three fights on the set and numerous fights off the set involving discipline — and Domac. ”’No, you can’t go visit Jackie now, you have to give your dog a bath,”’ she recalls saying. ”That’s when Eddie punched a hole in the ceiling of the trailer — over that. ‘Eddie, you just worked 12 hours. You can’t go visit Jackie; you have to go to sleep.’ ‘Get off the phone with Jackie — it’s 3 a.m.”’ Tafoya also claims she found Domac asleep in Eddie’s bed. Midway through the seven-week shoot, the moviemakers moved to resolve what they saw as a crisis. ”Sean and Nancy disrupted filmmaking,” says producer Michel Roy. ”Edward was in constant conflict with them. As a result, he had more difficulty performing his work. At one point, the group behind Brainscan, including me, decided the disruption was creating a major problem. I called Bruce Ross and said if they continued to disturb my days, you guys are going to have to pay for it.”'-- EW



the entire film



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James Gray Little Odessa (1994)
'Tim Roth is an amazingly versatile actor; compare this character from Brooklyn with his Cockney thief in Pulp Fiction and his foppish con man in Rob Roy. He does what he can with his character, but the story, written and directed by James Gray, is neither a family drama nor a crime melodrama, but a series of disconnected scenes that play like exercises - some of them very good ones. Consider, for example, the kid brother. Edward Furlong is a skillful actor, but what can he do with a role that requires him to materialize uncannily at key moments, just so he can witness things it is unlikely he would even know about? Or what about the father, played by Schell, who is written as such a ham-handed heavy that he bursts through credibility? And what, given the movie's Jewish milieu, are we to make of a closing scene in which a furnace is used as a crematorium? There is symbolism there, I'm sure, but I don't feel like working it out, and I don't think the movie has earned it.'-- Roger Ebert



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Barbet Schroeder Before and After (1996)
'In Before and After, Meryl Streep is a small-town pediatrician and Liam Neeson is a successful artist who makes big, John Chamberlainish metal sculptures. As Carolyn and Ben Ryan, they have two children and live in a rambling old house in New England. One day, their 16-year-old, played by Edward Furlong, is accused of murdering his girlfriend. Furlong’s Jacob runs away. Unsure whether his son did the deed but determined to protect him, Ben destroys potential evidence and lies to the authorities. Jacob’s younger sister, Judith (Julia Weldon), and Carolyn are appalled by Ben’s actions. Streep and Neeson are awfully good at conveying the parents’ agony and confusion, but only Weldon is permitted to tug at the audience’s hearts, in touching voice-over narration. Her character, however, is also the only member of the Ryan family who’s superfluous to the action. In Reversal of Fortune and Kiss of Death, Schroeder’s cool irony energized his material; in Before and After, it enervates the story he is trying to tell.' -- EW



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John Waters Pecker (1998)
'If you didn’t see the movie when it came out back in 1998, the film follows 18-year-old amateur photographer Pecker (Edward Furlong) (so named because he pecks at his food, also because it’s funny) on a rags-to-riches adventure in the world of high art. Pecker is just a blue-collar kid in Baltimore, with a mom who runs a thrift shop where she offers fashion advice to the homeless, a sister (Martha Plimpton) who recruits go-go boys to dance at the local Fudge Palace, and a grandmother, Memama (Jean Schertler), who is the “pit beef” queen of Baltimore when not conducting prayer meetings with her talking statue of Mary. Pecker’s snapshots of family, friends, and laundromat-owning girlfriend (Christina Ricci) catch the eye of hip Manhattan art dealer Rorey Wheeler (Lili Taylor) who becomes fascinated with Pecker’s photos and offers him a big exhibition in the offing, followed by overnight fame as the young man becomes the new darling of New York. Soon Pecker discovers that fame has its price.'-- IFC



Pecker Recut as a Thriller


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Tony Kaye American History X (1998)
'Although American History X marked Tony Kaye's feature film debut, he considered himself a veteran filmmaker already because of his work in commercials and videos. A decade earlier, he was already billing himself as "the greatest English director since Hitchcock." Kaye's initial edit of the film drew notes from New Line on how he might improve it. He spent a year recutting the film. "In that time, I found a whole new film, one that they never allowed me to finish," he told the Guardian. New Line found the second cut even more unacceptable. At that point, film editor Jerry Greenberg and Edward Norton worked on a third cut. "I was so staggered by what [Norton] was doing to my film, and by the fact that New Line approved, that I punched the wall and broke my hand," Kaye told the Guardian. Norton wasn't the only star with whom Kaye had strained relations. He also had difficulty with Edward Furlong (the Terminator 2 actor, who played Danny, the younger brother whom Derek tries to keep from following in his own racist footsteps). During post-production, while he was on the phone with Furlong's management, he stomped on a VHS cassette of the studio edit of the movie and tried to flush the pieces down the toilet.'-- moviefone.com



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Adam Rifkin Detroit Rock City (1999)
'Detroit Rock City is KISS’ best merchandising move ever. Released about six years after Dazed and Confused, this movies follows four Cleveland teens on a trip to Detroit to see the greatest band in the universe: KISS. You know you’re in for an amazing time when the biggest name in the movie is Edward fucking Furlong. Edward Furlong, pre-downward spiral into drugs and irrelevancy, plays Hawk, the group’s leader. The rest of the cast includes Shannon Tweed, Sam Huntington, Nicky from Orange Is The New Black, and a few others. The movie is actually pretty funny, and while it is a giant KISSadvertisement, it’s one of the movie’s endearing qualities. You’d be hard pressed not to see some kind of KISS merchandise on screen, and in that sense, it feels like some used car salesman trying to get you to buy a bunch of shit.'-- Noisey



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Steve Buscemi Animal Factory (2000)
'Steve Buscemi, with his wry and jabby hostility, is such a vivid actor that few people seem to realize he’s becoming a major filmmaker as well. In Animal Factory, the finely tuned prison drama that’s his second feature (after Trees Lounge), Buscemi displays a pinpoint humanity, reminiscent of Jonathan Demme, that lays bare the inner turmoil of everyone on screen. Ron Decker (Edward Furlong), a soft-faced 21-year-old, doesn’t belong in prison, but there he is — convicted on a marijuana charge, tossed in with men who could eat him alive. Fortunately, he wins the attentions of Earl (Willem Dafoe), a veteran con who has mastered the Machiavellian intricacies of prison society. Dafoe makes Earl a tough-nut sociopath with an oxymoronic streak of restraint. He refuses to turn Ron into his ”punk,” and the film pivots around this enigmatic grace note of civility in hell. Oddball cameo of the year: Mickey Rourke as a pumped-up drag queen who’s like Blanche DuBois crossed with Elmer Fudd.'-- EW



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Andrew Lauer Intermedio (2005)
'I thought the presence of a known actor like Eddie Furlong might mean that this movie has a certain level of budget, if not quality. Neither is the case. This is a cheap movie with cheap "effects" that are eye-rolling at best, laughable at worst -- the "ghosts" are guys dressed in skeleton costumes, a la Karate Kid (Plus, I'm getting sick of digital blood in horror movies.). The dialog is a ridiculous heaping of clichéd yelling ("We're not gonna get anywhere yelling at each other like this!" and that sort of crap). The actors are no better -- just a bunch of overacting, and Furlong is not immune. He's seen better days. His hunched over, paunchy stoner body, and baggy eyes make him look increasingly like Peter Lorre.'-- Bruce LeRoy



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Lance Mungia The Crow: Wicked Prayer (2005)
'The Crow: Wicked Prayer is just like the first one -- if the first one had been made by a room full of mean-spirited six-year-olds with a finger-paint budget of $12.00. Appealing to the lowest possible tastes, it elevates violence to new levels of pander. Well, it's better than Crow 3. The only thing holding it together is Edward Furlong, who's deep, passionate performance is worthy of a better package.'-- collaged



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Randall Rubin Jimmy and Judy (2006)
'A teenage outcast road movie, Jimmy and Judy follows a of a pair of outsiders who fall in love and out of control as they travel across an American landscape dotted with hypocrisy, materialism, drugs and violence. The film focuses on the classic themes such as adolescent rebellion, love, and anger. Jimmy and Judy are a modern day Bonnie and Clyde: destructive young lovers who leave the comfort of their suburban community in rural Kentucky in search of a better life. The film is presented in the form of a video diary from the point of view of the main characters.'-- Wiki



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Micheal Bafaro The Covenant: Brotherhood of Evil (2006)
'David Goodman is on the pick of his career as a PR executive when he suddenly loses his chance for a big promotion and, unfortunately, his sight at a street attack. Soon after a message is left on his answering machine about a doctor, named Guillermo List, who can help David to regain his eyesight and get his career back on track with only price... his soul.'-- howoldwas.com



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Uwe Boll Siegburg (2009)
'According to director Uwe Boll, Stoic centers on a true incident which occurred in Siegburg prison in 2006 where three prisoners raped, tortured and ultimately forced their cellmate to commit suicide over a period of ten hours in a series of events that began with a poker bet involving the consumption of a tube of toothpaste. The film is based on a film treatment created by Uwe Boll. The dialogue was almost entirely improvised by the actors.'-- collaged



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Michel Gondry The Green Hornet (2011)
'Just days before The Green Hornet hits theaters with expectations of a #1 bow, one of the film’s stars, Edward Furlong, is struggling to stay out of the spotlight. The former child star who launched his career in 1991 in the role of a young John Conner in Terminator 2: Judgment Day was arrested on Tuesday in Los Angeles on suspicion of violating a restraining order that requires him to stay 100 yards away from his estranged wife, Rachael Kneeland, according to the Los Angeles Times. Furlong made it to Monday’s red carpet premiere of The Green Hornet in Los Angeles, but was then taken into custody the next day during a court appearance for violating the stay-away order in December. The couple are going through an ugly divorce, and People magazine reported that in court documents Kneeland alleged that, back in September 2010, Furlong “pushed” and “bruised” her and left threatening messages claiming he would “hire people to come and beat [her] with chains and bats.” Furlong has denied the allegations, but a judge issued a three-year restraining order against the actor and ordered him to undergo counseling.'-- mtv.com



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Olallo Rubio This Is Not a Movie (2011)
'Edward Furlong vehicle This is Not a Movie tragically lives up to its title, failing utterly at having a plot, being remotely entertaining, or making any valid points about anything at all. On the upside, it has an original soundtrack from Slash of Guns ‘n’ Roses (if you’re into that), and there’s a scene where faceless chicks in American flag underwear shake their asses for five minutes in a room full of lights and confetti. Also, there’s this other scene where Edward Furlong throws his arms up in the air and screams “I NEED P*SSY!” for no real reason, while wearing a cowboy hat. Other than that, the movie is boring and worthless. I’m pretty forgiving of low-budget movies that lack coherence or entertainment value – it can be a tough grind getting a film finished on time, working under severe budget constraints without sufficient resources. This is Not a Movie, however, is so wanktastically self-congratulatory about its inability to function as a narrative that it inspires only annoyance and disdain, seeming blithely convinced that its preschooler-at-mealtime refusal to conform to traditional rules about storytelling and characterization makes it automatically transcendent and artistically relevant.'-- Crave



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Justin Thomas Ostensen Below Zero (2011)
'Below Zero last made headlines in 2010 when cameras on the production were just getting rolling. Nearly two years later, we’re receiving the first stills released for the film. The story is said to be “based on true events,” but let’s be clear, the “true events” were not ripped from the headlines. Rather, the screenwriter put herself into the same situation the movie’s protagonist finds himself in. A bit gimmicky, but if it inspires interest in the film, so be it. So, what are the “true events”? A screenwriter – played by Edward Furlong – locks himself in a meat locker to complete a script. There, he faces his own demons. Silly.'-- Shock Til You Drop



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Ellie Kanner For the Love of Money (2012)
'Thesp-turned-scribe Jenna Mattison shows an immediate willingness to leave no verbal cliche unturned, filling the early passages with such opening-voiceover banalities as “A wise man once said,” “Times were simple back then” and “We didn’t have a lot, but we had each other.” Izak (Cody Longo in a fright wig) and his best friend/cousin, Yoni (Jonathan Lipnicki), are carefree teens in 1973 Tel Aviv whose fun in the sun is terminated by a dustup with vicious thug Tommy (Edward Furlong). To avoid reprisals, the entire family packs up and moves to Los Angeles, save Yoni’s black-sheep sibling, Levi (Oded Fehr), left cooling his heels in prison after a bank robbery. There’s a miniseries’ worth of narrative complication here. But For the Love of Money is so compressed, there’s no time for character development, stranding good actors with bad dialogue and zero chemistry. Nor does director Ellie Kanner-Zuckerman exhibit any feel for the pulp style and violent setpieces the material cries for. The most the pic can manage in living up to its own obvious reference points (Goodfellas, Casino, Scarface, etc.) is to predictably paper the soundtrack with period-evoking oldies from Three Dog Night to A Flock of Seagulls.'-- Variety



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Nicholas Gyeney Matt's Chance (2013)
'"You know, when it comes to Eddie, today it seems to be popular to first think of him as that actor who's in and out of trouble with the law," begins the firm's director. "But when it comes to his acting abilities, as well as his work ethics, Eddie is extremely respectful and professional. Every time I yelled action, Eddie would LEAP into a zone that is difficult to describe. He would nail deliveries with ease, and his performance has elevated Matt's Chance into a complex character journey that I'm very proud of. I will step out on a limb and say that his performance in our dark comedy was one of his very best, and his current circumstances in life only build on the tension and humanity of his work in the film."'-- collaged



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Behind the scenes



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Uwe Boll Bailout: The Age of Greed (2013)
'This film isn’t unequivocally horrible. Early desire to set up the serious circumstances surrounding Wall Street’s fleecing of the American public and the regular Joe victims finding their lives spiraling out of control proves effective until eventually languishing in Boll’s overwrought montages of silent emotion. I felt for Jim (Dominic Purcell) and his wife Rosie’s (Erin Karpluk) plight, understanding the pressures of unavoidable illness and the yearning to hope love can truly conquer all. Finally receiving a clean bill of health where her tumors were involved, a few months of hormone treatment promise the green light on pregnancy and building a family. But happy thoughts soon disappear when their insurance cap is hit, their life savings are lost courtesy of faulty investments, and a sixty grand bill for owed interest on their shares is drawn.'-- jared mobarak



Trailer


The Making of 'Bailout: The Age of Greed'




*

p.s. RIP: Holly Woodlawn. ** Liquoredgoat, Hi, Douglas. We did the email thing this weekend, cool. Thank you again! Me too, re: Rose McDowall. Although I was a little disappointed with that recent album of her unreleased, semi-SS stuff, mostly '80s era. 'Jubilee', yeah. it keeps getting better with time, that film. Interesting. Oh, my pleasure. ** David Ehrenstein, Hi, Nice, thank you for the link to the Terry Southern piece. I'll devour that. Norman Lloyd: I don't know why I don't know who that is. I'll find out. ** Tosh Berman, Hi, T. When you go into the corners and cracks in the '80s, it was actually a very wealthy time for experimental pop. But there is a ton of stuff by bands who kowtowed too greatly to the prevalent 'New Wave' production sound that's not worth much to non-nostalgists or era-fixaters. ** Bernard Welt Hi, B. I remember making those tapes. Echo&theBM (first three albums only) are still one of my all-time favorite bands. Good question. One uncontrollable factor is that, in the case of the '80s, a lot of the bands, good and bad, worked heavily with electronics. And the electronics of that era were relatively primitive, so, for better or worse, a lot of music from that time has the sound of bands trying to do advanced things with electronics, synths, etc. that weren't possible, and you hear that attempt/strain/limit, which is interesting but does lock the music into that time period. Yeah, Norman Lloyd doesn't even ring a bell for me. Weird. Sure, thanks, about alerting Jayme. I'll try to look characteristically me-like at any events. Bausch's 'Rite of Spring' is just about as great as dance has ever gotten. And, of course, Holly passed very sadly yesterday. Death is the absolute fucking worst. ** Sypha, Hi, James. Sweet. Personally, I would say 'Tainted Love' is the least interesting thing Soft Cell ever recorded. Anyway, glad the gig inhaled you in. ** Bill, Hi, Bill. I hope your nostalgia wasn't too powerful. You know know how nostalgia makes me reach for my garlic supply and cross. Right, yeah, re: that John Foxx vid. I never saw any of the Gang of Four reunion shows, but, as I'm sure I've mentioned here, the best gig I've ever attended in my life was Gang of Four on their first, 'Entertainment!' tour. Did you get to tinker? Gabrielle Wittkop: hm, interesting. I'll check that out. Thanks, pal. ** Misanthrope, Sounds likely. I mean re: the Scott Walker song title thing. Belated happy birthday to your mom! I saw a photo of her on FB yesterday, and now I know what she looks like. She doesn't look anything like the vague mental image I had inadvertently composed of her based on everything you've said about her. Which is cool. ** James, Ah, great you and the great Kevin have now moved into the face-to-face, in-person phase of your colleague-ship. Awesome. Was he up where you live, or were you down in SF? ** H, Hi. Oh, no, I've known Alice a little for decades, pre- and post-Ted, from the times the I lived in NYC. She's great, personally, and we get along good. She's just even more reclusive than I am. Yikes, that shouting ignoramus by-passer! ** Steevee, Hi, Steve. Thanks a lot, man. You may well know this, but the ABC track is particularly interesting because it's, I think, the best track from their infamously career sabotaging second album 'Beauty Stab' wherein they turned both on their fans and on 'themselves', i.e. the 'Look of Love' band, and tried to distort/destroy the thing they were famous for, and, yeah, basically killed their career, although they eventually snuck out a couple of minor hits, still subversive, by sticking to a closer mimicry of their earlier electronic sound. They're a more interesting, intelligent band than they're generally remembered for being. Good news about the new Spike Lee! This is the first time in a long, long time that I'm excited and anxious to see a new film by him. Well, you know it was just the first round of the elections. The media in the US seems to be reporting what happened as though it was the actual election. But, yes, it's bad. At best, it means the 'mainstream' conservatives are going to gain more ground. Unsurprisingly. Ugh. No, there is no one here remotely like Trump. Closest would be one of the Le Pens, Jean-Marie or the granddaughter, but, as horrid as they are, they're not openly -- that's the key word -- raging racism-spouting fascists. ** _Black_Acrylic, Hi, Ben. Thanks, man. I would imagine you're at least something of a fan of Scritti Politti? Or ... are you into early Electro? Excited to hear about the writing/blog project reaching fruition. Obviously, please alert the fuck out of us when that is actualized. And good luck re: the meeting with Andrew, natch. ** MANCY, Yay, it's there and real! I'm ordering mine in just a minute! Everyone, the utterly fantastic artist of multiple stripes Stephen Purtill aka MANCY has a new, limited edition, hand-numbered zine work just now out and available to you. I'm ordering mine the very second I publish this p.s., and I urge you most passionately to do the same in your context. In any case, go have a look at the announcement page before you do anything else, yeah? Here. Oh, and here's a note from SP: 'If people have issues with my paypal button (for instance, it doesn't seem to appear on mobile browsers), they can just email me(steventpurtill@gmail.com).' Awesome! Yeah, nice Gang of Four clip, right? That's one of the best of the tracks from their later phase, I think. ** Okay. I have suggested that you give it up for Edward Furlong today. Is my suggestion sufficiently suggestible? See you tomorrow.

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*

p.s. Hey. ** Liquoredgoat, Hi. I agree with you about 'AHX'. Oh, Fairuza Balk, yes! She's great. Whatever happened to her? She's the subject of a bunch of really good gifs, mostly from 'The Craft'. Here's my favorite. ** David Ehrenstein, Hi. He's wonderful in 'Pecker', yes. Please link us up to your piece about Holy at the soonest opportunity. ** James, Hi, James. Post-'Pecker', he's quite good in a few films, especially, for me, in Steve Buscemi's interesting but hardly talked about 'Animal Factory'. Glad SF was so good to you. And I hope your voyage north was smooth as silk. ** Bill, Hi, B. No Nick Stahl Day yet, no. Should I? Hm, I'll go look at his credits and think about that one. I can't say that 'Detroit Rock City' is a must-see or anything, no. It's basically a film-shaped love letter to Kiss. I've never given much of a shit about Kiss. EF is quite charming in it, but that's about it as far as I'm concerned. Oh, that new experiment of yours is very dreamy. Everyone, As luck would have it, you get to go see/watch a new experiment by the maestro Bill Hsu today, if you so wisely choose. It's called '3D height map of Gray-Scott Diffusion/Reaction', and it's right, exactly, precisely here. I just put together an upcoming post about guys who make murdering roller coasters in Roller Coaster Tycoon 2, and, although lacking in the sublime and art and etc., a couple of them have a little brother-like visual resemblance to that experiment, sort of. I'm reading that new Brian Oliu book right now. It's really good! ** Tosh Berman, Hi, Tosh, Nice '80s picks. The first Pete Shelley album is great, yeah. And there are a bunch of aces on the second one, 'XL1', too. ** Steevee, Hi. Yeah, 'Beauty Stab' is a lot more interesting to analyze than to listen to. Unfortunately. I hope your eye is less pink and fucked up when you awake today. Or, rather, that it was when you did. ** Magick mike, Hi, Mike! Oh, man, happy to be able to help a little bit. I'll send you my address today. I would so love to get books if you really don't mind sending them over here. How are you, man? ** Thomas Moronic, Hi, T. Yeah, so sad about Holly Woodlawn. She was truly a great. On a quick first read, the EF poem is terrific! I'll scale it from top to bottom with greater intricacy post-p.s. Thank you sharing it, buddy. ** _Black_Acrylic, Hi, Ben. Totally with you re: 'The Girl With the Patent Leather Face'. Really good to hear that again. I don't know Assemble. I did a quick look at their stuff, and I still don't think I get what they're doing. Which is a good, refreshing thing, of course. Bravo on the more advancing half of your projects! ** Alistair McCartney, Hi, A! I saw the novel completion announcement on FB. Officialdom! I know that post-writing a long project/book mood/energy thing very well. It's an interesting, fruitful energy if you can figure out the right vehicle for it. Maybe your trip is enough. You so should go to Japan, man. I fell totally in love with it as soon as I got there, and now I wait semi-impatiently to go back there between trips. Great day to you! Love, me. ** MANCY, Hi, S. I'm excited to get it. Cool that it sold out so rapidly. Yes, if you don't mind, I would love to get it here. My stupid Paypal account won't let me have things delivered over here. I'll send you my mailing address. Thanks so much! ** Misanthrope, Hi, G. Yeah, I imagined gray hair for sure. That's so incredibly rare to have dark hair at her age. Her follicles should be studied, non-invasively, of course, by researchers or whoever. And she should paid for it, naturally. Oh, geez, those two shitheads, urgh. ** H, Hi. My birthday is January 10th. I got the first buche. There will be others. It was a gift to someone who is currently eating it and says it is delicious, thankfully. It was a buche that was announced too late to have been in my Beauty Pageant. It's a pretty great looking, complicated buche. Let me see if I can find a photo. Hold on. This one. All the toys and decorations and things you see are chocolate, as is the entire box they're in. When you lift up the box, there's a cake underneath. Richard Siken's publisher of the time sent me the galley of 'Crush' and said Richard was a fan of mine and wondered if I would blurb the book. I read it, loved it, and blurbed it. I've never met him or even interacted with him, but I remain an admirer. 'War of The Foxes' is wonderful and one of my favorite poetry books this year too. ** Okay. Uh, the post today happened inside my head and then I made it. See you tomorrow.