Robert Anton Wilson’s Take on War on Drugs

Posted on 30/08/2012 by theremainsoftheweb

In an interview to disinformation the great Robert Anton Wilson: Robert Anton Wilson ‘There are two kinds of crimes. Crimes which everybody agrees are a crime, that’s crimes with victims. If I get mugged or burglarized or somebody in my family gets hurt or killed I want the police tod o something about it and I’m eager to cooperate with them and so is everybody else of a sound and rational mind. We don’t want burglars and thieves and muggers and murders running around loose. On the other hand, when you’re trying to control victimless crime, nobody is very eager to help the police.

People who are smoking pot aren’t eager to turn themselves in and their friends aren’t eager to turn them in, either, in most cases. The whores don’t want to turn in the Johns; the Johns don’t want to turn in the whores. The gamblers don’t wnat to turn in the bettors; the bettors don’t want to turn in the bookies and so on. Nobody wants to do anything about victimless crimes, meaning things that people do consensually that they want to do and that they’re enjoying doing and there’s no victim to be found anywhere. So nobody wnats to help the police, ergo, the only way you can wage a war against sin –which is want these victimless criimes laws are all about– the only way you can wage a war like that is by spying on everybody more and more, creating the apparatus of a totalitarian state, which means higher and higher taxes. This is why so many conservatives lately are coming out in favor of ending the war on drugs: it’s getting so goddamned expensive.

The only way the goverment has any chance at all of winning is to establish a totalitarianism wackier and more total than Orwell’s 1984. We’ve already got the ‘Piss Police’ which is something that Orwell dind’t even dream of. Even Franz Kafka couldn’t imagine a society so crazy that you have to give urine samples before you can hold a job! There’s no way of winning without totalitarianism far beyond anything ever practiced by Hitler or Stalin or imagined by the wildest satirist. That’s the only way they can win. And that costs too damned much money. The people who are running it, they’re not trying to win. They know they can’t win; they just want to keep the war going because it makes money for everyone.

It’s a wonderful excuse to increase police power and surveillance so that they know everything that we’re doing so that nobody can be plotting subversion of any sort without them knowing about it. Like the old joke goes, ‘When four men sit down to plot against the goverment, three of them are goverment agents and the fourth is a damned fool’. Well that’s getting more and more true all the time. The war on drugs is an excuse for more surveillance. They’re scared stiff of us. They’re more afraid of us than we are of them’.

Candid Interveiw with Genesis Breyer P-Orridge

Posted on 30/08/2012 by theremainsoftheweb

Genesis Breyer P-Orridge is not famous to the mainstream, but she is a superstar to many. A founding member of the world’s first industrial band, Throbbing Gristle, Genesis emerged from that original rebellion to form the group Psychic TV, and created around it a loose collective of like-minded people called Thee Temple ov Psychic Youth. TOPY’s mission was to be a positive force through practicing ritual magic and D.I.Y. community building. Genesis created the symmetric symbol of the Psychic Cross to stand as an emblem of their tribe’s unity.

Collectivity has been Genesis’ life’s work, and it was something she shared intimately with her late wife, Lady Jaye. Through the practice of “pandrogony,” Genesis and Lady Jaye ritualistically became one by wearing the same things, referring to themselves as “we,” (which Genesis still does) and even surgically altering their bodies to look similar. Four years after Lady Jaye’s death, Genesis still believes in their bond and in their commitment to the community.

In this video, Genesis and Zeljko McMullen chat about the magic of names, gender/identity, the Book of Genesis, death and rebirth in one lifetime, dedicating one’s efforts to creation, the role of artist as shaman, life disruption, industrial music, technology and will, money and the impending economic collapse, and the need for autonomous communities.

Where Children Sleep by James Mollison

Posted on 29/08/2012 by theremainsoftheweb

Where Children Sleep- stories of diverse children around the world, told through portraits and pictures of their bedrooms.

James Mollison explains: It occurred to me that a way to address some of the complex situations and social issues affecting children would be to look at the bedrooms of children in all kinds of different circumstances. From the start, I didn’t want it just to be about ‘needy children’ in the developing world, but rather something more inclusive, about children from all types of situations. It seemed to make sense to photograph the children themselves, too, but separately from their bedrooms, using a neutral background.

The book is written and presented for an audience of 9–13 year olds ’ intended to interest and engage children in the details of the lives of other children around the world, and the social issues affecting them, while also being a serious photographic essay for an adult audience.

I’m So Excited, Almodóvar’s Next Movie

Posted on 29/08/2012 by theremainsoftheweb

… and that’s the title of the movie, not simply a description of your mental state upon hearing about it.

After the gravity of Broken Embraces (2009) and The Skin I Live In (2011), Pedro Almodóvar has decided to return to comedy, a genre with which he broke in the 1980s, with his new film Los amantes pasajeros (lit. “Passenger/fleeting lovers”), for which shooting started yesterday, July 9, in Madrid. Described by the latter as “a light, very light comedy”, the film will be set almost entirely in a plane, which explains the pun in the film’s title: ‘pasajeros’ means both ‘passengers’ and ‘fleeting’ (which is why the director from La Mancha has decided that the film should be titled I’m So Excitedi n countries where a translation would not keep this double meaning.

As is usual with Almodóvar’s films, little is known about Los amantes pasajeros’s plot. In an interview with TVE, the director explained that the story is set mostly from the moment a plane breaks down to the moment it manages to make an emergency landing.

From a persistent leakage of information via mainstream and social media, we know that the film will have an ensemble cast made up of Javier Cámara, Cecilia Roth, Lola Dueñas, Raúl Arévalo, Carlos Areces, Antonio de la Torre, Hugo Silva, Miguel Ángel Silvestre, and Blanca Suárez, with cameo appearances by Antonio Banderas, Penélope Cruz, Carmen Machi, and Paz Vega.

The film is produced by the director’s brother, Agustín Almodóvar, for El Deseo. Recently, during the Madrid de Cine — Spanish Film Screenings celebrations, the producer confirmed that Los amantes pasajeros had already been sold worldwide and that these pre-sales have completely funded the film, without any need for any financial contribution from the Spanish market.

Los amantes pasajeros is set to be released in spring and is already from now, as is usual for Almodóvar, a candidate for the next edition of the Cannes Film Festival.

The LEGO Story — LEGO’s 80th Birthday

Posted on 28/08/2012 by theremainsoftheweb

LEGO blocks are one of the most beloved toys in the world, playing a role in many a person’s childhood. But for some creators, LEGO has evolved from toy to art form.

The name ‘LEGO’ is an abbreviation of the two Danish words “leg godt”, meaning “play well”. Coincidentally, Lego means “I put together” in Latin. The LEGO Group was founded in 1932 by Ole Kirk Kristiansen.

The company has passed from father to son and is now owned by Kjeld Kirk Kristiansen, a grandchild of the founder. The LEGO brick is teir most important product. In celebration of Lego’s 80th birthday, the following animated short film features the company’s path from wooden toys to the interlocking plastic pieces we’re so passionate about today.

We have previously posted some other articles portraying LEGO Creations and a similar product for the iPad generation. If you are interested check out these posts too:

LittleBits, LEGO for the iPad generation, Alan Turing’s Centenary and LEGO Mars Rover. You might also be ineterested in he Lost Art of Automatons. Finally, to leave you on a humorous note, watch below a Rage comic meme involving LEGO.

Atari Teenage Riot’s 20th Birthday Party

Posted on 27/08/2012 by theremainsoftheweb

‘2012 we celebrate the 15 years anniversary of our album ‘Burn Berlin Burn’ with a two day show in Berlin!
Yes, we will play different sets each night and it will be EPIC!
We also celebrate the twenty year anniversary of Atari Teenage Riot– we released our first single back in 1992 and played our first shows back then!
But we also celebrate the future! Our 5th studio album “RESET” will be released right after the summer of 2012! Most exciting year ever!’

The band – which formed in 1992 – was and is highly political. Their lyrics were anti-establishment; their sound mixed techno and punk to form a pulsating, controlled, but intense, rage. The influential band – featuring Alec Empire, Hanin Elias, Nic Endo and Carl Crack – released three full-length albums and numerous EPs/Singles before breaking up in 2000, at the height of their success.

In 2001, Crack died, seemingly ending any chance of the band reforming. Empire continued working with his labels – Digital Hardcore Recordings and Eat Your Heart Out – and recorded several solo albums. He also became a sought after DJ and producer working with a litany of acts including Bjork.

In 2010, ATR reformed an performed several gigs in Europe and Asia. After meeting Steve Aoki in Japan in 2010, the band decided to sign with Aoki’s Dim Mak label.

The band released their fourth full-length album, Is This Hyperreal?, in May 2011. The ATR line-up added CX KIDTRONIK joining original members Empire, Elias and Endo. After continuing performance and commitment issues with Elias, her relationship with ATR ended in 2011.

Long live Digital Hardcore!

RiP: A remix manifesto

Posted on 26/08/2012 by theremainsoftheweb

Immerse yourself in the energetic, innovative and potentially illegal world of mash-up media with RiP: A remix manifesto.

Join filmmaker Brett Gaylor and mashup artist Girl Talk as they explore copyright and content creation in the digital age. In the process they dissect the media landscape of the 21st century and shatter the wall between users and producers. Creative Commons founder, Lawrence Lessig, Brazil’s Minister of Culture, Gilberto Gil, and pop culture critic Cory Doctorow come along for the ride, but best of it all, Negativalnd also shows up.

If you want to stay with us a little more time, you can watch the whole movie below. Immerse yourself in the energetic, innovative and potentially illegal world of mash-up media with RiP: A Remix Manifesto. Let web activist Brett Gaylor and musician Greg Gillis, better known as Girl Talk, serve as your digital tour guides on a probing investigation into how culture builds upon culture in the information age.

R.I.P. Neil Armstrong

Posted on 26/08/2012 by theremainsoftheweb

It has been said that ten thousand years from now, only one name will still be remembered — that of Neil Armstrong.

A quiet, private man, at heart an engineer and crack test pilot, Mr. Armstrong made history on July 20, 1969, as the commander of the Apollo 11 spacecraft on the mission that culminated the Soviet-American space race in the 1960s.

On that day, Mr. Armstrong and his co-pilot, Col. Edwin E. Aldrin Jr., known as Buzz, steered their lunar landing craft, Eagle, to a level, rock-strewn plain near the southwestern shore of the Sea of Tranquillity. It was touch and go the last minute or two, with computer alarms sounding and fuel running low. But they made it.

Watch below the video of the very first moon landing of the apollo 11 mission in 1969! Neil Armstrong was the first man to set foot on the moon with his now legenday words “One small step for man, a giant leap for mankind.” This is a truly amazing video.

In the BBC documentary below, Andrew Smith, author of the best-selling book Moondust, journeys across America to try and discover the real Neil Armstrong. He tracks down the people who knew Armstrong, from his closest childhood friend to fellow astronauts and Houston technicians, and even the barber who sold his hair, in a wry and sideways look at the reluctant hero of the greatest event of the twentieth century.

Today, the world lost a great one. Neil Armstrong has died at 82, after undergoing heart-bypass surgery earlier this month. Neil Armstrong’s death should be a wake-up call for the world.

Nobody born after 1935 has walked on the moon. Nobody since the nineteen thirties. The children of eight decades since have still not made it back there, or reached further to touch the red dust of Mars.

Neil Armstrong’s death means that the first man on the Moon will never meet the first man on Mars. It is a chilling reminder that we are unlikely to reach another planet in the lifetimes of any of the surviving Apollo astronauts. It may not happen in my parents’ lifetimes. I’m beginning to lose faith that it will even happen in my lifetime. How have we allowed this to happen?

Emil Alzamora

Posted on 26/08/2012 by theremainsoftheweb

Emil Alzamora’s figural sculptures challenge our conceptions of the classical body. At once beautiful and grotesque, his figures writhe sensually in space, seeming to defy gravity as limbs extend and contort beyond their natural limits. Alzamora works primarily in gypsum and bronze, creating unorthodox forms that range from brobdingnagian and life-size to miniature.

Emil Alzamora was born in Lima, Peru (1975) and raised in Boca Grande, Florida. He later attended Florida State University where he graduated Magna cum Laude in 1998 earning a B. F. A. Alzamora is interested in exploring what it means to inhabit a body, often exaggerating or distorting different aspects of the form to reveal emotional or physical situation.

“The human form is a constant within my work. I often exaggerate or distort it to reveal an emotional or physical situation, or to tell a story. Limitation and potential are as human as the flesh, yet hardly as tangible. In my works, I strive to make visible this interaction.”

Alzamora initiated his formal sculptural at Florida State University and honed his talents at the Polich Art Works in Newburgh, New York, a sculptural foundry where he worked after graduating. In 2001, Alzamora left the foundry to practice art full-time and continues to do so at his current home and studio in Beacon, New York.

“Michelangelo, Rodin, and Bernini really captured something beyond the materials, something beyond the artificiality. They created a portrait of something that had the capacity to move you in some ways the way another human being can move you. It was a haunting illusion of life that drove me to no end to want to capture it, to find out what can be said in that context.”

Watch Emil in action below on a time-lapse video of his working process.

Watch the second part here.

The Glitch Mob

Posted on 26/08/2012 by theremainsoftheweb

The Glitch Mob is a three-piece electronic music group from Los Angeles, California. It consists of edIT (Edward Ma), Boreta (Justin Boreta) and Ooah (Josh Mayer). Creating their own futuristic dance style with their noisy bass-driven electro, their material recalled the more raucous elements of works by electronic pioneers Aphex Twin and Autechre, as well as the heavier European breakbeat sound.

Watch below the video of their song Beyond Monday:

Their original musical style combines hip-hop with aspects of glitch, drum ”n” bass, and myriad other electronic styles. Making the transition from DJing to live-music performance, The Glitch Mob at one point performed shows where each of them had a laptop, and the three were synched together by MIDI.

Although the word “glitch” is in the band’s name, the band says their name doesn”t mean that they play that styles per se. “We didn”t intend for that to mean anything concrete,” Boreta says about the name. “[But] we did sort of use the glitch technique of the stutter edit and the splatting, cutting and dicing of sounds.”

If you like what you’ve seen and hear so far about this band, listen below to some mix-tapes from their SounCloud site which you should also visit for some free downloads and cover songs: