Belbury Poly – Page 6 – { feuilleton }

Weekend links 201

An illustration by John Kettelwell for The Story of Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp (1928).

• “The strain in everything I write, of not being taken with the bounteousness of humankind, was also the attitude of both my parents.” Jonathan Meades talking to James Kidd about his forthcoming memoirs.

• 7 Trumps From the Tarot Cards and Pinions (1969), and album of electronic music by Ruth White, is being given a limited vinyl reissue. Related: Ruth White—An American Composer.

• 82 minutes of Michael Moorcock talking in 1972 to Jean-Pierre Turmel, co-founder of the Sordide Sentimental record label.

If Verne’s protagonists often seem to stop short of revelation, it’s because the revelation is not meant to be known. Revelation has a way of putting man back at the front of the evolution chart, moving neatly toward a happily progressing future, out of the darkness and into the light. The characters who embark upon the Voyages Extraordinares move backward and forward and all about, spun around like blindfolded children trying to pin the tail on the donkey. The point of the adventure, after all, is not to have a conclusion; it is to get knocked off your feet.

Stefany Anne Golberg on Journey to the Center of the Earth at 150.

• Photographs of pre-Haussmann Paris by Charles Marville, and photographs by Amy Heiden of industrial ruins.

• Mixes of the week: FACT Mix 427 by Wild Beasts, and Secret Thirteen Mix 108 by Kangding Ray.

• Hear Italo Calvino read selections from Invisible Cities, Mr Palomar and others.

• William S. Burroughs in Dub conducted by Dub Spencer & Trance Hill.

• Cycles, Returns & Rebirth: Alexander Tucker on Derek Jarman.

• Harold Budd: the composer with no urge to make music.

• The Museum of Imaginary Musical Instruments.

• 80 minutes of Monolake playing live in 1999.

• At 50 Watts: Dyl’s Dance.

• Owls And Flowers (2006) by Belbury Poly | Learning Owl Reappears (2011) by The Advisory Circle | The Owls (2013) by Félicia Atkinson

The weekend artists, 2013

“Chloromgonfus detectis, a dragonfly that can detect volatile pollutants.” A speculative insect by artist Vincent Fournier.

The annual review of artists/designers/photographers featured in the weekend posts should have run at the end of December but MR James got in the way. Big thanks, and happy new year to Form is Void and Beautiful Century for pointing the way to many of these people.

Two cover designs from Eliash Strongowski’s 30 Days—30 Covers project.

Pink Boy by Melinda Gebbie.

Seam Stress (1987) by Laurie Lipton. The Drawings of Laurie Lipton is out now from Last Gasp.

The Baron in the Trees (2011), a book-cut sculpture by Su Blackwell.

Continue reading “The weekend artists, 2013”

The Book of the Lost

A recurrent feature of the music landscape of the late 80s and early 90s was the “soundtrack for an imaginary film”, a sub-genre that proved especially popular among the electronica crowd when DJs realised they needed a description to justify their collections of downtempo instrumentals. Two of my favourite examples were produced away from the dance world: John Zorn’s Spillane (1987), and Barry Adamson’s solo debut Moss Side Story (1989), both of which took their thematic cues from crime novels and film noir. The artists on the Ghost Box label haven’t gone down the imaginary film route but many of the tracks on the Belbury Poly and Advisory Circle albums are reminiscent of TV theme tunes from the 1970s. The closest you get to an imaginary film in the Belbury sphere is the unseen giallo horror in Peter Strickland’s Berberian Sound Studio with its score by Ghost Box allies Broadcast, and a title sequence by Julian House.

Given all of this, The Book of the Lost, a collaboration between Emily Jones and The Rowan Amber Mill, is a logical next step: a CD collection offering a theme from a forgotten TV series “shown on Sunday nights in the late ’70s and early ’80s” which broadcast four of the equally forgotten horror films upon which the accompanying songs are based. Between each song you hear a brief snatch of dialogue, just enough to whet the appetite without getting too involved. One of the films referred to, The Villagers, belongs to that current of British folk-horror that runs through Witchfinder General, and Blood on Satan’s Claw, to Ben Wheatley’s intoxicatingly weird A Field in England. Pastiching aside, all projects of this kind depend upon the quality of the music, and the folk-inflected songs here are very good, as is the Book of the Lost theme itself which is as spookily evocative as Jon Brooks’ Music for Thomas Carnaki.

If that wasn’t enough, there’s a special numbered edition of the CD which comes packaged in a die-cut slipcase (above) containing cards giving details of each of the films. In addition to promotional artwork there’s also a synopsis, a production history and even a cast list. Other films are mentioned in passing—The House that Cried Wolf, Ghosts on Mopeds—that imply there was a lot more happening in Wardour Street in the 1970s than we previously suspected.

The Book of the Lost isn’t officially released until January but it’s available for purchase now at the project website.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• The Outer Church
• The Ghost Box Study Series
• A playlist for Halloween: Hauntology
• The Séance at Hobs Lane
• Ghost Box

Weekend links 166

The Julian House cover art for the forthcoming collaboration between John Foxx and Belbury Poly (here renamed) has been revealed. Single no. 9 in the Ghost Box Listening Centre Study Series is now available.

• In addition to new Ghost Box records there’s more Hauntological (for want of a better term) cinema on the way this summer with the DVD/BR release of Ben Wheatley’s A Field in England. The potted description at Movie Mail is “a monochrome psychedelic trip into magic and madness set during the English Civil War”. Julian House has made a trailer. Meanwhile at Fangoria, there’s a PIF mixtape from The Advisory Circle. This accompanies an interview with John Krish, director of the most bizarre of the UK’s many strange and alarming public information films from the 1970s.

• More mixes: The hour-long OH/EX/OH show for The Geography Trip on Chorlton FM. “Expect slumber / tension / euphoria in almost equal measures.” It’s marvellous. At Self-Titled mag there’s DJ Food with O Is For Orange: Boards of Canada, Broadcast, The Books, etc.

• Tangiers is a computer game based on the fiction of William Burroughs. Jim Rossignol talked to Alex Harvey about the development of the project.

Walpurgisnacht (1917) by Amadeus. A drawing that could easily be from the late 1960s. If anyone knows the full name of the artist, please leave a comment. Via Beautiful Century.

• Rebecca J. Rosen asks “What would the night sky look like if the other planets were as close as the moon?”

• The mystery of Charles Dellschau and the Sonora Aero Club.

• The Surreal Cave Paintings Of Stockholm’s Metro Stations.

• At 50 Watts: More strange art from Marcus Behmer.

• Ry Cooder in 1970. Directed by Van Dyke Parks!

• The Post Office Tower: now you see it…

• At Little Augury: 99 Meninas.

• Sartori In Tangier (1982) by King Crimson | City Of Mirage (2010) by John Foxx

The Ghost Box Study Series

01: Youth and Recreation; 02: Cycles and Seasons
03: Welcome to Godalming; 04: Familiar Shapes and Noises

The Ghost Box Study Series, a sequence of occasional seven-inch singles on the Ghost Box label, is looking increasingly good as a set. The design, as usual, is by Julian House, while the music is by Belbury Poly, Moon Wiring Club, The Advisory Circle, Mordant Music, Broadcast, The Focus Group, Hintermass, Jonny Trunk and Pye Corner Audio. Being collectible items, the vinyl editions are sold out, but all the releases can be purchased in digital formats at the label shop.

05: The Open Song Book; 06: Animation and Interpretation
07: Autumnal Activities; 08: Inversions

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The album covers archive

Previously on { feuilleton }
• A playlist for Halloween: Hauntology
• Forbidden volumes
• The Séance at Hobs Lane
• Ghost Box