{ feuilleton }

Cassette culture

Three Spirits by Xenis Emputae Travelling Band.

Looks like I was premature in 2008 when I was eagerly contemplating the demise of the cassette tape as a music format. Earlier this year I bought a music cassette for the first time since the early 1980s, albeit inadvertently since this was the compilation that came with The Twilight Language of Nigel Kneale (more about that at a later date). This week Phil Legard of Xenis Emputae Travelling Band very generously sent a copy of his latest release, Three Spirits, which is another cassette edition. And to top things off, FACT magazine this week launched a review section for new cassette releases. So much for the format being moribund.

I have to admit my anti-cassette animus has largely dissipated now there’s no reason to rely on them for anything. And I did hang on to my cassette deck… Switching that on for the first time in years and pressing “play” was a considerable novelty, as was the inevitable tape hiss that’s absent from most contemporary releases unless your name is Pye Corner Audio. The resurgence of the format is both interesting and understandable: interesting for its being another example of the way the future never unfolds in a predictable manner; understandable because cassettes are relatively cheap to produce, and there’s still a very evident market for material, analogue artefacts. And the novelty is present, of course, for people young enough to miss out on the delight of friends’ cheap tape machines chewing their lovingly-crafted compilations.

As to Three Spirits, it’s an excellent release, two sides of sublime atmospheres which at times sound like a local equivalent of Popol Vuh. I’ll be playing this one a lot. Phil writes about the music here, and there’s also a video for one of the tracks.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Xenis Emputae Travelling Band
• Old music and old technology

Fatality by OCTiV

Catching up with more recent work, this was a quick collage for Fatality, a single by US musician OCTiV. This has been out for about a month. The main track—a kind of dubstep/metal hybrid—can be heard here. The request was for something on the cosmic horror spectrum which would also incorporate geometric elements, hence the swiping of a couple of polyhedra from Wenzel Jamnitzer’s wonderful Perspectiva Corporum Regularium (1568).

Among the other things which have yet to materialise there’s a book cover design for Tor, and the Ghosts in Gaslight, Monsters in Steam anthology which features some of my fiction as well as my cover design. I’m very pleased that the latter has achieved its Kickstarter funding. More about these projects later.

Abraxas: The International Journal of Esoteric Studies

A welcome arrival in the post recently was two issues of Abraxas, the book-format journal of esoteric studies from Fulgur Esoterica. I’ve always observed the contemporary occult scene from a distance, being more interested in cultural spin-offs whether those happen to be music-oriented—as was the late, lamented Coil—or art-oriented. Something I always enjoyed about Kenneth Grant’s books was the amount of unique art material they contained, much of it by his wife, Steffi Grant, or previously unseen work by Austin Osman Spare. Fulgur have for many years continued this artistic focus, starting out by reprinting Spare’s books (and publishing new ones, such as the revelatory Zos Speaks!), and more recently turning their attention to the work of contemporary artists following similar paths.

Study for Salome (2012) by Denis Forkas Kostromitin.

Abraxas is a venue for the latter group, especially in the most recent issue, no. 3, which features a wealth of new art, photography, essays and poetry. In the past I’ve complained about the misunderstandings Austin Spare’s work used to generate among otherwise intelligent and sensitive critics when faced with the artist’s occult obsessions; the usual response would be to lazily dismiss this side of his work as “black magic”, and therefore either kitsch or nonsense. Things have improved in recent years but it’s taken a long time for critics and curators who would show the greatest respect to a minority belief from South America, say, to offer the same respect to equally sincere artists who happen to be working in London or New York. One of the values of Abraxas for artists such as Jesse Bransford and Denis Forkas Kostromitin, both of whom are interviewed here, is that they can have a conversation with someone who won’t treat their work or their interests in a condescending manner. I’m particularly taken with Kostromitin, a Russian artist whose work I only discovered recently.

M L K (Moloch) (2011) by Denis Forkas Kostromitin.

Elsewhere in Abraxas 3 there’s a feature on the recent exhibition of Aleister Crowley’s extravagant daubs, an article by Francesco Dimitri about tarantism in southern Italy, a piece about Dada by Adel Souto, and text by Paracelsus with illustrations by Joseph Uccello which is printed on a different paper stock. The production quality is as good as any art book but then that’s standard for a Fulgur publication. Mention should be made of the interior design of this issue which far exceeds the often perfunctory layout of many publications from smaller publishers. Tony Hill is credited on the masthead as Creative Director so I’m assuming he’s the person responsible. Abraxas is an essential purchase for anyone interested in contemporary occult art. The hardback of no. 3 is a limited edition that includes a signed and numbered lithograph by Denis Forkas Kostromitin.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• I:MAGE: An Exhibition of Esoteric Artists

Fenella Fielding reads Colette

The latest post at Strange Flowers reminded me of some work of mine that appeared earlier this month which I can finally mention. Fenella Fielding reads Colette is another of those long-gestating recordings from Savoy’s audio division which has been released at last after a lengthy hiatus. This is a double-disc CD set of Fenella’s own selection from the writings of Colette, an author Fenella knows well having portrayed her in Colette, a play by Elinor Jones.

The CD set is a digipak which I designed using a variety of Art Nouveau motifs printed in metallic gold on white card. All the photos are either of Colette or Fenella herself, past and present; the lengthy booklet notes were by the late Monty Haltrecht, a novelist and friend of Fenella’s who followed her career for many years. Monty approved of my initial draft of the design so it’s a shame he wasn’t able to see the finished thing. For the moment the CDs are available only through Savoy but the readings should be on iTunes in due course.

The art of Ted Coconis

This poster for Massimo Dallamano’s 1970 updating of The Picture of Dorian Gray was featured here several years ago, and it’s taken me all this time to finally discover the name of the artist responsible, Ted Coconis. Better late than never. It could be argued that the illustrations below for Nabokov and Goldman tend more towards the artist’s own interests than representing the content of the books; I’ve not read Goldman’s novel (or seen the film) but online comments suggest that this was an unsuitable cover; Nabokov’s Ada is an erotic novel which presents its eros in a manner that’s a lot less direct than the painting implies. All I can say to this is that strict accuracy is for pedants; Aubrey Beardsley’s illustrations for Wilde’s Salomé aren’t in the least accurate yet they’re regarded as definitive. Sometimes illustrators are trying to convey in pictorial form an otherwise intangible impression of a book (or a film or play) which is what I see Ted Coconis doing here. There’s a lot more of his work at his website. It’s gorgeous stuff.

Cover illustration for Ada by Vladimir Nabokov.

Pola Negri.

Cover illustration for The Princess Bride by William Goldman.

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The illustrators archive