head dream -- jung-yeo min

The creative act is a letting down of the net of human imagination into the ocean of chaos on which we are suspended, and the attempt to bring out of it ideas. - terence mckenna

everything is a remix pt.1

first episode of a 3 part series by kirby ferguson. its pretty fun and gives good insight to remixing as a type of art. i was writing a manifesto before correlating hip hop culture to collaging and cubism and i think this doc definitely picks up on the same ideas i was trying to put down. in this short 7 min episode he takes us through chic's legendary 'good times' bassline, some william burroghs, and goes through a couple of old blues songs that led zepplin ripped off. nice

Remixing is a folk art but the techniques involved — collecting material, combining it, transforming it — are the same ones used at any level of creation. You could even say that everything is a remix.

the history of hacking

great short doc put out by discovery channel awhile back. i'm not exactly sure how old it is but it does look a little dated but that just adds to the ambiance for me. i had no idea what phone phreaks where but now its all coming together... do you remember all that rollerblade phone stuff that was in the movie hackers with angelina jolie? soooooooo jokes!

maria -- koreless

its been raining the past two days in los angeles and its gonna rain the rest of the week. time to chill out and watch puddles collect water. here's a beautiful downtempo tune by glasgow's koreless. the light etheral pianos + the sub bass do it real nice on this one.

Maria by Koreless

it was never meant to be (ford & lopatin a.k.a. games remix) -- cfcf

synths and sportscars is a motif a lot of people are using nowadays. i've been wanting to do one since last year but wow i might have to give up cuz its going to be pretty hard to top this. originally unofficial but now semi-official music video by franck deron

apollo throwdown -- the go! team

fun video for a fun song

nostradamus -- john jerome o'connor

graphite and colored pencil on paper, 2005
53 inches x 83 inches

A Nostradamus prophecy predicting religious turmoil and wars was the foundation of this drawing. I began by translating three manifestations of the prophecy – the original French version, the English translation and the editor’s summary – into inches and centimeters. Emanating from the upper center, I plotted each letter of the original text in inches (A=1 inch, B=2 inches, etc.). I then translated the English version’s letters into inches and connected them to the original lines, at different angles. Finally, I connected the editor’s summary. The overlapping lines created a dominant inner shape, which I reinforced with solid graphite and grey colored pencil. Several lines extended outward from the perimeter of this form, which I capped with circles and filled with patterns derived from their distances from the perimeter. In the lower section of the drawing, there are other textual references to the prophecy. I counted the number of letters in each word of Nostradamus’s original writing, and chose an equivalent amount of random numbers (1 to 26). For example, if Nostradamus’s original written word had 3 letters, I then chose 3 random numbers from 1 to 26. I then re-translated these numbers back into letters and entered the random configurations into my pocket dictionary, which searched for the closest English approximation. The resulting words are interspersed throughout portions of the drawing. I also included the punctuation of the Nostradamus text, and a portion of his original writing appears outside the yellow bands, written in cursive.

simulation theory and glitches

when i used to play "tokyo xtreme racer zero" (freeway racing video game), my ex gf would ask about the lives of the drivers in the civilian cars i was passing up (or crashing into). "i wonder where they are going and where they live. they must be driving to work or going to see their girlfriends in the middle of the night." i thought this was cute and even though there weren't actual drivers in the cars, there were little sims in there programed to drive like law abiding citizens to make the simulation i was playing seem more real.

that was almost 10 years ago. simulations are much more real now. enter simulated reality and sweedish transhumanist philosopher dr. nick bostrom.
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Dr. Bostrom assumes that technological advances could produce a computer with more processing power than all the brains in the world, and that advanced humans, or “posthumans,” could run “ancestor simulations” of their evolutionary history by creating virtual worlds inhabited by virtual people with fully developed virtual nervous systems.

Some computer experts have projected, based on trends in processing power, that we will have such a computer by the middle of this century, but it doesn’t matter for Dr. Bostrom’s argument whether it takes 50 years or 5 million years. If civilization survived long enough to reach that stage, and if the posthumans were to run lots of simulations for research purposes or entertainment, then the number of virtual ancestors they created would be vastly greater than the number of real ancestors. - NY Times
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dr. nick puts us at about a 20% chance that we're living in a simulation right now. other simulation philosophers now propose that the "creator/designer" not tending to the simulation could be the reason why everything bad is happening. it could even just be for entertainment, hurricanes, famine, glitches and all. that's kinda heavy... and then i entertain myself with my own simulation glitch.


it cracks me up because of the realistic commentary by joe rogan, mike goldberg and the crowd chanting, but man i'd probably flip my wig if this happened in "real" life

history of house music pt2

here's the second installment of 'the history of house.' this episode breaks down: the disco backlash of 79',the underground rise of frankie knuckles, where the term "house" comes from, the hotmix 5 and WBMX

war talk -- dominique young unique

oh man i like this song too much. dominique has some fast raps. yaaaa, so does rye rye, but rye rye doesn't rap over funky disco house beats!

international -- mathewdavid feat. dogbite

hmmmm, new stuff from brainfeeder crew, mathewdavid. nice vhs feedback music video. they sampled an ethiopiques groove. the overall feeling is like flying lotus vs. animal collective. give it a try if ur into that downtempo.

kathleen -- james pants

i've been listening to james pants for awhile now and i think his stuff is really great. he has this really great DIY electro funk feel which im kind of unsure about when it's translated to a live performance. i tired looking up his live videos and they're kinda meh. it's ok though, he has tons of tracks that are fun and sound like they came from the basement and thats how i like it.

James Pants: "Kathleen" by alteredzones

infinite glitch -- ben baker-smith

all i can say is live streaming data mosh of the whole internet happening now!!!

from the website:

Every day an incomprehensible number of new digital media files are uploaded to hosting sites across the internet. Far too many for any one person to consume. Infinite Glitch is a stream-of-conciousness representation of this overwhelming flood of media, its fractured and degraded sounds and images reflecting how little we as an audience are able to retain from this daily barrage.

Infinite Glitch is an automated system that generates an ever-changing audio/video stream from the constantly increasing mass of media files freely available on the web. Source audio and video files are ripped from a variety of popular media hosting sites, torn apart, and recombined using collage and glitch techniques to create an organic, chaotic flood of sensory input.

watch the live stream here http://infiniteglitch.com

technocalypse

i haven't finished watching this yet but i have to share it. it's a 3 part documentary by belgian visual artist frank theys. part 1 is about transhumanism. part 2 is about singularity, and part 3 is about the digital messiah. i read that terence mckenna, kurzweil and many others appear in this film. below is part one.

forever dolphin love -- connan mockasin (erol alkan rework)

great rework of new zealand band 'conan mockasin's song 'forever dolphin love.' this dance version is eerie like the original song and even reminds me of crystal castles. love it.
Connan Mockasin - Forever Dolphin Love (Erol Alkan Rework) Radio Edit [Phantasy] by Erol Alkan

forever dolphin love -- connan mockasin

epic strange music video for 'forever dolphin love.' kinda gave me the same weird chills as the first time i watched 'zardoz.' i like it. different. i wonder what its like live though. ill be shortly posting the erol alkan remix...

suburban dream (live) -- the stepkids

you know i hear their name around but i never sat down and checked em out till now. i guess this is a vid of them practicing. i checked out other live vids of them and they use the same white clothing/projector visualization set up at shows. they get pretty funky.

80 blocks from tiffany's

i just finished watching this siiick documentary. its one of two definitive 70s south bronx street gang films, the other being 'aint gonna eat my mind.' directed by gary weiss, it mainly focuses on the two gangs 'savage nomads' and 'savage skulls.' if you know the movie 'the warriors,' this is like that, except real. it also has the same feeling as the hip hop documentary 'style wars,' but this predates that by 8 years. watch the whole doc below!

out in the streets -- africa hitech

what can i say? this song is just on constant attack mode. it's super intense and i'm really looking forward to the whole album release. africa hitech is collab between mark prichard and steve spacek. i'm familiar with spacek as a singer so i wanna see if he sings on the other tracks.

Africa Hitech - Out In The Streets by Warp Records

tv troubles -- boxcutter

'tv troubles' from boxcutter's album 'the dissolve' which will be released in april. music video by sabrina ratté. some of the most beautiful visuals...

antlers wifi

manga farming -- koshi kawachi

maybe its just me but i feel these calming peaceful post apocalyptic notions from this. it just reminds me of a 'jungle overgrowth on the ruins of mankind' thing. i think its beautiful and koshi kawachi has a lot of other neat object artworks. http://www.koshikawachi.com/

holographic buddha network -- viradical

"You have to take seriously the notion that understanding the universe is your responsibility, because the only understanding of the universe that will be useful to you is your own understanding."
— terence mckenna

triptych -- rumspringa

here's my best friends band, rumspringa, from l.a. you might have heard of them, might have not. they've been underground for a long time. i guess the most condensed way to describe their music would be a sort of psychadelic indie blues. this song was recorded when the band was a duo before the band member change up, but! it does feature guest vocals from cecilia, who is now the current rhythm guitarist and backup vocalist. the video is by winona reagan, who my homie joey(lead singer) met at a film festival, where she showed her film 'haunted heart'. he hired her to this this video and let her do whatever she wanted to do with 'changing faces' and 'crystals' as a guideline. pretty tripped out, enjoy!

avoiding you -- lux repeat

had a lot of fun watching this especially after i saw the nova special on fractal geometry last week. video by bartholomäus traubeck made with google earth.

shamanisim: archaic techniques of ecstasy -- mircea eliade

this is a must have book if you've ever been interested in shamanism. i haven't read it all the way through yet but it is one of the most interesting non fiction reads i've had yet. shaman myths are some of the most fantastical/psychedelic stories, and i think they provide a lot of insight if you are the type to embark on psychedelic journeys yourself. it was written by religious historian mircea eliade and first published in 1951. its written like a history book and its not new agey if that sort of thing turns you off and it's also not a book of prayers and spells. it follows different shamans from north, central, and south asia, to north and south america. some chapter titles are: "initiatory sickness and dreams", "obtaining shamanic powers", "parallel myths, symbols, and rites."

to be honest, i feel like the creators of xavier: renegade angel studied this book and took a lot of shaman myth imagery out of it and it makes the show that much mind twisting.