Jim Jarmusch – { feuilleton }

Weekend links 586

Cover by Gordon Ertz for The Inland Printer, June 1916.

• “I worry that enthusiasm is being mistaken for a moral virtue, and negative criticism for a character flaw.” Dorian Lynskey on the dying art of the hatchet job. Also a reminder (not that we require it) that the word “fan” in this context has always been an abbreviation of “fanatic”.

• Culture.pl explores the work of Stanislaw Lem, the science-fiction writer “whose works, abilities and quirky sense of humor convinced Philip K. Dick that he was too brilliant to exist and must have actually been a committee of people”.

• The electronic music of Paul Schütze receives a reappraisal on Phantom Limb in November with a compilation album, The Second Law.

• Aliya Whiteley on Amanita Muscaria, the hallucinogenic mushroom seen in hundreds of fairy-tale illustrations.

• Stuart Firestein talks to Roger Payne about changing the world’s attitude to whales by recording their songs.

• Jennifer Lucy Allan talks to Sam Underwood about his unique Acoustic Modular Synth.

• Jóna G. Kolbrúnardóttir sings Odi Et Amo from Englabörn by Jóhann Jóhannsson.

• A forthcoming release on Dark Entries: Back Up: Mexican Tecno Pop 1980–1989.

• Luc Sante looks at Jim Jarmusch’s collages.

• John Grant‘s favourite albums.

• RIP Michael Chapman.

• The Divination Of The Bowhead Whale (1978) by David Toop & Max Eastley | Keflavik: The Whale Dance (1980) by Richard Pinhas | Ballet For A Blue Whale (1983) by Adrian Belew

Weekend links 558

• One of the earliest posts here concerned The Suite of the Most Notable Things Seen by Cavaliere Wild Scull, and by Signore de la Hire on Their Famous Voyage from the Earth to the Moon (1776) by Filippo Morghen, a series of prints which depict the fantastic inhabitants, fauna and flora of the Moon. Morghen shows the Earth’s satellite to be a tropical place very similar to 18th-century conceptions of the New World or the Far East. Back in 2006 you couldn’t see copies of the prints as large or as detailed as this set at The Public Domain Review.

• “Last Call preserves the poignant irony that the trust and vulnerability that once made gay bars synonymous with gay community were also vectors of death, both in the form of murder and, later, HIV/AIDS.” Jeremy Lybarger on Elon Green’s study of the murders of four gay men in New York City in the 1990s.

• “No one in American letters ever pushed back against power over such a long time as [Lawrence] Ferlinghetti,” says John Freeman. Related: Ferlinghetti’s travel journals.

• New music with literary associations: Invisible Cities by A Winged Victory For The Sullen, and Star Maker Fragments by TAK Ensemble & Taylor Brook.

• Old music with no literary associations: The first of the forthcoming releases of live recordings by Can will be a 1975 Stuttgart concert.

• “The 120 Days of Sodom: France seeks help to buy ‘most impure tale ever written'”.

• The Joy of Circles: Vyki Hendy looks at some recent concentric cover designs.

• At Spoon & Tamago: Sculpted sushi made entirely from natural polished stones.

• My Hungry Interzone: Brian Alessandro on coming out and reading Naked Lunch.

• Andy Thomas maps Jah Wobble’s interdimensional dub.

• Mix of the week: XLR8R Podcast 684 by Ben Bondy.

• At Dennis Cooper’s: Jim Jarmusch Day.

• Circles (1966) by Les Fleur De Lys | Circles (1970) by Blonde On Blonde | Carry On Circles (2006) by Tuxedomoon

Weekend links 449

UK poster, 1950. Cocteau’s film receives a UK blu-ray release this week.

• Into the Zone: 4 days inside Chernobyl’s secretive “stalker” subculture by Aram Balakjian. (Again. There’s an implication in Balakjian’s piece that illicit Chernobyl tourism is a new thing even though people have been doing this for a while now.) Related: Jonathan’s visit to the Chernobyl reactor control room, and photos of Soviet-era control rooms (plus a couple of stray American examples).

• “He’s a very interesting author: a disabled, gay writer during the Third Reich…who somehow survived only to be shot by a Red Army patrol days before the end of the war.” At the Edge of the Night (1933) by Friedo Lampe will receive its first English-language publication via Hesperus Press next month.

• “The tradition of the painted still life has been reinvented by contemporary photographers with pictures that pose a puzzle and slow the viewer down,” says Rick Poynor.

• Comic artist Matt Howarth has been writing short reviews of electronic music for many years. Sonic Curiosity is his archive site.

• Bauhaus at 100: what it means to me by Norman Foster, Margaret Howell and others.

• RIP Jonas Mekas. Related: a conversation between Jonas Mekas and Jim Jarmusch.

• Beyond the Buzzcocks: Geeta Dayal remembers Pete Shelley‘s electronic side.

• Where to begin with Jean Cocteau: Alex Barrett goes through the mirror.

• Mix of the week: Secret Thirteen Mix 278 by Sarah Louise.

• At Dennis Cooper’s: Jud Yalkut Day.

• Undulating Terrain (1995) by Robert Rich & B. Lustmord | Darkstalker (2000) by Bohren & Der Club Of Gore | Stalker Dub (2012) by John Zorn

Weekend links 363

The Constant Drumbeat of Terrible News (no date) by Allison Sommers.

• Nadia Khomami on Gay UK: Love, Law and Liberty, an exhibition at the British Library. Related: Simon McCallum‘s potted history of LGB characters on British screens. Elsewhere: writer and philanthropist Chuck Forester on gay sex in the 1970s.

• The Panic Fables: Mystic Teachings and Initiatory Tales by Alejandro Jodorowsky. Finally available in English, a collection of all the comic strips written and illustrated by Jodorowsky when he was living in Mexico in the 1960s.

• A trailer for the restored print of The Fabulous Baron Munchausen (1961) by Karel Zeman. Related: collage designs by Graphic Manipulator for a Japanese collection of Zeman’s films.

• “Whether divining ancient wisdoms or elevating the art of cold reading, Tarot is a form of therapy, much like psychoanalysis,” says James McConnachie.

• James Reith on “the Icelandic publisher that only prints books during a full moon – then burns them”.

• Mixes of the week: Wire 400 Mix #6 by Emptyset, and Secret Thirteen Mix 223 by Constantine.

• Mud And Flame: Penda’s Fen re-examined by Matthew Harle and James Machin.

• Tilda Swinton in a Leonora Carrington-inspired fashion shoot for i-D magazine.

• At Dennis Cooper’s: Spotlight on William Burroughs’ The Wild Boys.

• Applied Ballardianism: A Theory of Nothing by Simon Sellars.

• At Dangerous Minds: The Dark Rift by Jim Jarmusch’s Sqürl.

• French Underground Rock: 1967–1980; a Discogs list.

• Suzanne Ciani‘s favourite albums.

• Infinite artwork: Untitled, 2017

• Rip, Rig And Panic (1965) by The Roland Kirk Quartet | Panic (1984) by Coil | Flash Of Panic (1994) by Axiom Ambient

Weekend links 345

Wasted Alice (2017) by Sonia Lazo.

• Brian Eno: “We’ve been in decline for 40 years—Trump is a chance to rethink.” An equivocal headline, and the usual misinterpretation from the hard-of-thinking, prompted Eno to issue a clarification. More Trumpery: Jonathan Meades wonders what kind of wall “The Lout” might want to build. Related: almost all of Meades’ smart and witty television essays may be viewed at MeadesShrine (click through to Vimeo for download links).

• “Once you’ve turned entire buildings into instruments as on Medium, and then you’ve made the ionosphere itself an instrument as on Signal, where do you go next?” Emptyset discuss their forthcoming album, Borders, and a change in their working methods.

• Christopher Burke & David Davis at Weird Fiction Review talk to Valancourt Books about reprinting neglected works of horror and gay fiction.

• At the BFI this week: All about Jim Jarmusch’s leading men, from Tom Waits to Bill Murray, and John Hurt (RIP): 10 essential films.

• “Claude Arnaud’s biography of Jean Cocteau shows how the artist lived a life nourished by infinity,” says Ricky D’Ambrose

• Sukhdev Sandhu on John Berger: “a pathfinder who was alive to the present”.

• Theodore Carter on Doll Part Art: Visual Feasts Made of Plastic Bodies.

• Count Backwards from Ten: Peter Bebergal‘s Top 10 Occult in Media.

• Books from Strange Attractor will now be distributed by MIT Press.

• Eero Saarinen, the architect who saw the future.

• Mix of the week: FACT Mix 585 by Niagara.

• RIP Maggie Roche.

• Hammond Song (1979) by The Roches | Losing True (1982) by The Roches | Keep On Doing What You Do / Jerks On The Loose (live, 1990) by The Roches