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Few midcentury cultural figures would at first seem to have as little in common as Andy Warhol and Alfred Hitchcock. Sure, they both made films, but how straight a line can even the farthest-reaching cinema theorists draw between, say, Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960) and Warhol’s Vinyl (1965)?Hitchcock’s The Birds (1963) and Warhol’s Empire(1964)? Yet not only did both of them direct many motion pictures, each began as a visual artist: “Warhol had started his career working as a commercial illustrator, Hitchcock had started out creating illustrations for title cards in silent movies,” saysFilmmaker IQ’s post on their encounter in the September 1974 issue of Warhol’s Interview magazine. Yet in the brief conversation printed, they discuss not drawing, and not filmmaking, but murder:
Andy Warhol: Since you know all these cases, did you ever figure out why people really murder? It’s always bothered me. Why.
Alfred Hitchcock: Well I’ll tell you. Years ago, it was economic, really. Especially in England. First of all, divorce was very hard to get, and it cost a lot of money.
[ … ]
Andy Warhol: But what about a mass murderer.
Alfred Hitchcock: Well, they are psychotics, you see. They’re absolutely psychotic. They’re very often impotent. As I showed in “Frenzy.” The man was completely impotent until he murdered and that’s how he got his kicks. But today of course, with the Age of the Revolver, as one might call it, I think there is more use of guns in the home than there is in the streets. You know? And men lose their heads?
Andy Warhol: Well I was shot by a gun, and it just seems like a movie. I can’t see it as being anything real. The whole thing is still like a movie to me. It happened to me, but it’s like watching TV. If you’re watching TV, it’s the same thing as having it done to yourself.
“Warhol openly proclaimed that he was nervous upon meeting the legendary director,” adds Filmmaker IQ, “and posed with Hitchcock by kneeling at his feet,” resulting in the photo you see at the top of the post. They also include three portraits Warhol made of Hitchcock, the best known of which Christie’s Auction House describes as “a variation on the doubled self-image that Hitchcock played with in his title sequence, layering his own expressive line-drawing over the director’s silhouette, suggesting the mischievous defacement of graffiti as much as the canonization of a hero through the timelessness of the inscribed profile.” These images and the brief interview excerpt leave us wondering: can one call a work — on film, in a frame, in a magazine — both Hitchcockian and Warholian? A question, perhaps, best left to the theorists.
In 1969, a 14-year-old Beatle fanatic named Jerry Levitan, armed with a reel-to-reel tape deck, snuck into John Lennon’s hotel room in Toronto and convinced John to do an interview about peace. 38 years later, Jerry has produced a film about it. Using the original interview recording as the soundtrack, director Josh Raskin has woven a visual narrative which tenderly romances Lennon’s every word in a cascading flood of multipronged animation. Raskin marries the terrifyingly genius pen work of James Braithwaite with masterful digital illustration by Alex Kurina, resulting in a spell-binding vessel for Lennon’s boundless wit, and timeless message. ”I Met the Walrus” was nominated for the 2008 Academy Award for Animated Short and won the 2009 Emmy for ‘New Approaches’ (making it the first film to win an Emmy on behalf of the internet).
It is actually the 4th book I have read that was written by Victor Bockris and the third one about Warhol. I have never been deceived by Bockris in the past but I have to say that this one, written in 1989, must have been a very hard and complex task that he managed to achieve with his usual amazing brio. Bockris has this gift of being able to cut the crap and swiftly reach out to what is relevant. Bockris for sure have learned from the best since it was Warhol himself who taught him how to make an interview. You will get the facts, don’t worry about it but you will also get, and that’s what makes all the difference in the world, all the surrounding facts; friends, events, traumas and personal victories.
Bockris has this ability to be very thorough but also doesn’t make you feel like you are just showered with a timeline of events and facts. It is written a little like a documentary in which you get to hear the people who were implicated in the occurring events in turn, hearing from their mouth what they saw and what were their thoughts at that time, an ongoing non-stop interview in which people take turns to enhance Bockris’ interesting narrative until the very end.
I must say that I thought the book ended a bit abruptly. Still it fits with the whole concept of this as it doesn’t pretend to resolve the enigma of Warhol’s persona and anyone pretending to do so would be a fraud because Warhol precisely was a living contradiction of himself. Being at the same time as authentic, even if detached and minimal, as one could possibly be while at the same time declaring that ”art is anything you can get away with”. This is the perfect example of perfectly working paradox! While some will say on one side he was just exploiting everyone else and letting himself be exploited if he felt it was ok, he clearly must had a very clear path in his mind of what was art and what wasn’t.
Reading the book you can clearly understand as he went through a lot of heart breaks and traumas, and that led him to try to become a machine, a certain robot deprived of emotions and that feeds on pills instead of actual food, well, he certainly made an art of it! That right there is one essential part of starting to understand Warhol. This is why Warhol is such an important keystone in the history of modern art! Warhol made it possible for everyone to become an artist, he was the first to use multimedia coverage for an event, the Velvet Underground was not just a band playing, it was a multimedia event called the ExplodingPlastic Inevitable(EPI).
You get to really know Andy Warhol’s childhood, his relation with his mother, his first love, his first heartbreak, his friends, the ones that remained friends; the ones that became enemies and the ones he simply didn’t care about or apparently so.. Reading this bio, one really get to observe as Andy slowly, inevitably builds a fortress around his heart and his emotions.
How can one manage to never lose it even after anattempted murder. This clearlyhad a huge effect on him, very palpable in the book but he managed to turn it around and live the most prolific happy period of his life. Another thing that is interesting is to be able to see how and why he started to be involved in writing, photography, music, cinema and why he would always come back to painting, his insecurities, why his apparent ”numbness” , you get all the naked truth here. While we’re at it, I would like to do something that only has been done on very rare occasions, (one being done by Bockris) I would like to underline the relevance of his novel a:a novel as well as some movies like Flesh , Trash or Beauty No. 2.
One look at the very essence of the modern USA in a time where everything was possible and more but at the very base of it today, you find the hope given by Warhol that everyone is an artist or in other words that everyone’s life could be a subject of art. Of course, it isn’t literally true but you get the sense reading the bio that if you really believe in yourself, if you work really, really hard, you listen to what others people say, you support some of them, associate with them or if you take some parts that fits with your ideas and/or most importantly if you have the talent, you will have a chance to being seen and/or even better a chance at success. Of course another paradox may be that Andy managed to create the first corporation that became a millionaire by creating an art factory ( literally) and made art a monetary valuable product. Andy worked really hard. He did all that but reading the book it seems the most difficult part is to find some people who were trustworthy and not too greedy. Luckily Andy was very stingy.
Today, you can be your own PR agent, you can create your own window in the world and run it yourself! What an amazing, uplifting thought it is also to know that no matter if you are good enough to have worldwide or even nationwide success, some people will get to know you, some people across the world will like your stuff for what it is, not because they are your friends, just because they like it!! It is such a shame that Warhol died before all the computer revolution he had foreseen… But he knew!!
It never ever took me such a long time to read a book but with experience you realise that reading a very good book for the first time is a very rare and unique experience. I made sure that I didn’t miss a line!! But even if it took me a really long time to read it and make sure I wouldn’t miss a thing, there is so much going on that for sure I will have to read it again. This is NOT the kind of book you just borrow from the library! You have to own it!! I got the amazing surprise just as I finished the book to see that Jared Leto has bought the rights to Victor Bockris’ 1989 book Warhol: The Biography and not only will he co-produce the new biopic but he will also star in it as Warhol himself.
I always felt I had this gift to sense what was to be ”in the air” or anything that is about to get important somehow, but Andy was creating art with nothing, he was only slightly influenced by the beat generation and maybe Dali (according to Ultra Violet) but he wasn’t Dada, It was something different, it was Pop Art, an art that has more or less the same criterias as today’s art. Like I said, reading this book, I also got to know the fragile, heartbroken, insecure artist and human being Warhol was. I could so relate when he tried to be a machine, not showing any emotions, no love, no trust, no friends, no compassion and maybe he managed to pull it off for a while but you can feel that this isn’t working for him, deep inside, I’m pretty sure anyone who knew him felt he was lonely and sad but mainly uncomprehended. So for all the future greedy psychopath-by-choice to be, know that it is impossible to really be happy that way mk? . You will get hurt, you will be betrayed, you will suffer, just like Andy, but you have to keep on going, keep trying, always and until your last breath, something will come out of it. If anything, understand that message he left for us. RIP Edie.
I really am shocked at the amount of people who don’t really know who Andy Warhol is. I’m trying my best to make him known to the present and future generations and this book is an essential part of your culture (including the creation of the magazineInterview). Meet the guy who made the impossible possible to anyone who has the talent and the will. You owe it to yourself to read this book. Of course there are autobiographies but the way this book is written gives you more objectivity I think. Add that to Bockris’ talent to cut the crap and go to the heart of what is happening and you will realize why Leto chose this bookand not another one, not even one Warhol wrote himself, to base the biopic on. This book is a must for anyone that reads and I clearly must mention here the 16 pages of amazing pictures that illustrates key moments in Warhol’s life. Andy Warhol must never be forgotten. I sincerely thank Victor Bockris not only for this book, but also for all his amazing work allowing those who weren’t part of ”it” in the 60’s and the 70’s to feel as if they were, to be able to really get a sense of what was going on back then in such a heartfelt way. In the end I would simply state that even if the biography is, Andy Warhol’s personality still is and always will be incomplete to me.
Just a little update; This is the reaction about my review I got by the author himself! Don’t forget to read the related interview!
‘‘Thank you Tobe. This is the most comprehensive review of the book which has been published in nine countries since 1989 and remains in print in several. I appreciate your comments and insights regarding all of my work”. -Victor Bockris
This interview conducted by Gregg Barrios was originally printed in Fusion, March 6, 1970.
Sterling Morrison was once described as the most underrated person living. He has been with The Velvet Underground since the dawn of history and hopefully will continue in that capacity forever. He was also called indomitable as well as an astute Italian duke. In any case, he is generally conceded to be a superior musician, as far above in talent as he is distant from the hype of current guitarists. In an interview while on tour in Texas, he spoke with Greg Barrios.
The group originally included Angus MacLise?
You know all kinds of secrets… How did you find that out? Yes, originally we were just jamming around and live in this unheated apartment and Angus lived in the unheated apartment next door. He had just come back from India. He didn’t want to be in a group, though, he thought it was fun to play music now and then whenever he felt like it; so Angus couldn’t be the drummer though we were good friends. At that time, we did some of the absolutely first mixed media things…
…the Exploding Plastic Inevitable?
No, before that. The antecedent of that was done in the old Cinematheque – all done by film people – things which Angus called ritual happenings. “Rites of the Dream Weapon” did you ever see a poster for that? Yes, that was the first one. Before Ken Kesey or anybody. Angus had seen lot of Dervish dancing while he was in India. He had been there for eight years and he came back with his raga scales and assortment of drums and so we used to put on these things and they had films. Piero Heliczer was involved in that.
I’ve seen his Dirt.
Yeah, and his New Jerusalem. Piero just had a showing about a month ago. He’s back in the country. He’s enigmatic.
I gather from some of his poetry…
What was that? Aquarium Productions?
No. Some items in the Film-makers coop catalog and newsletters.
There are really underground personages who have never been transformed by public acclaim. People like Piero, Angus, Tony Conrad, and Walter DeMaria, though Walter is doing somethings in art at present. Underground movies didn’t mean a thing in 1964 in New York. You were just sneaking around with no money.
There are many of them still like that even those who have produced important works like Jack Smith.
Well, yes, and take someone ever more amazing like Harry Smith who should be restrained from destroying his films. He makes those incredible hand-drawn cartoon films. I don’t know how long it takes him, they’re amazing. Have you seen any of those?
I’ve seen the Mirror Animations which is quite short.
They’re really marvelous. And every once in a while Harry flips out and destroys all he can get his hands on.
I met him once at the Chelsea Hotel with Barbara Rubin.
Yes. Barbara is one of the illuminaries.
Getting back to the group. Where did the name Velvet Underground come from? Did Andy…
No, this was before that.
Was the group composed of yourself, Maureen, and John Cale at the time?
Right and Lou Reed. And every group has to have a name so one day we saw the name on a book.
That paperback s&m book?
Yes, and we said, that’s nice. It’s abstract and the word underground meant something, and so we said sure why not – never figuring we would rise above our particular little echelon at the time, so that was fun. It was outrageous, the only people playing in New York City at the time were ourselves and the Fugs. We were lurking around the old Cinematheque and the Bridge and occasional gala underground events at the Village Gate downstairs. It was us and the Fugs – living in the lower East Side with around $25 a month combined (just about).
The first introduction I had to the group was an NET film on television in late 1965. The film was on Andy Warhol and it showed him holding a tryout for a group to use in his EPI.
It wasn’t a tryout at all. They didn’t know what was happening. They came there to do a thing on Andy and found us. We were already working with him.
Part of that film used your music alone. It was very nice.
They (people from NET) didn’t know what to make of it except that it sounded very peaceful and what we were playing was actually an instrumental version of Heroin. The final thing as they were showing the credits and it went droning on, that’s what that was. They didn’t know what was going on. The Factory (Warhol’s studio) in those days was so hectic and they had certain security measures to enforce.
The second time I heard the group was on the soundtrack of Andy’s film Hedy in 1966.
Oh, Hedy. Mrs. Lamarr!
Yes. I thought the music added to the pretentious mood of the film. It was very funny.
The movie was very funny. Almost everyone had a cameo part in the film. I think Jack Smith played the judge.
It was Harvey Tavel. I think Ronnie Tavel wrote the script. How did the group actually become connected with Warhol for a period of time?
He heard us playing in the Village. Barbara Rubin brought Gerard Malanga to hear us and he brought Andy. He thought it would be real nice – he always had the idea to do a media type thing with all types of films, with all possible ways to involve people.
Did that begin at the Dom on St. Marks Place?
Yes. And that wised us up in a hurry about where business begins and that sort of thing. We had the Dom an a three-year lease believe it or not. It really sickens me still when I go to St. Marks Place because more than anyone we invented that street. There was nothing going on there. Absolutely nothing. The Spa at one end and just Polish type stores, and Khadija Design, and the Bridge at the other end. No one had been there very long. Khadija had been there longer than anyone. It was an African clothing store. That was in 1964. Somehow we showed up at the DOM looking for a big room, and we said, ah, Dom (Polish for home), this is it. No one went down to St. Marks Place. No people coming in off the street. There was no point in being there. It appeared to be a disaster.
No concerts in Tompkins Square Park going on at that time?
No. This was way before that. If it was used I don’t know what for. So we got the building for three years and we opened it up and did extremely well. The people came down there and a person who worked in our box office said I’ve got an idea, why don’t we go and play in California. We said sure, why not. So we all went out to California even though we had been at the Dom for about a month.
Was that the trip to California which they said they weren’t ready for?
Yes, we played at the Fillmore and the Trip. We had a great time. I loved it, and when we came back we went back to our room since that was our thing. We owned it for three years, and when we came back we discovered it was now called The Balloon Farm. Actually our lease had been torn up and the director of the Polish home had been bribed and bought off and so our building had been taken away from us and later sold to the Electric Circus for around $300.000.
We did have some valuable property – so I discovered early in life that when you have something valuable someone is going to try and take it away from you unless you go around knowing things. I couldn’t believe something like that could happen and if you bother to sue or do anything like that – by the time it came up in the courts, you’d passed caring.
Were items like The Whip Dance with Gerard Malanga and Ingrid Superstar used all along?
Gerard and Mary (Waronov) though Ingrid did some. They could do anything they wanted. The actual number of people who would travel with us varied. The dances were Gerard’s domain, and the lights Andy’s. We only worried about the music. The way the Whip Dance came about was when someone gave Gerard a bullwhip and one particular night – the night he came down to hear us in the Village, he happened to be carrying it with him and later he started dancing with it. There was no deep dark s&m motivations. Someone gave him the whip just for laughs. He also used flashlights and lifted weights. Gerard is amazing. He was a regular on Allen Freed’s old TV show.
“The Big Beat”? Wasn’t Baby Jane Holzer also on there?
Jane used to be around there, too. When Allen Freed got kicked off the air, his final publicity picture was of him and two regulars. Gerard happened to be one of them.
When did Nico join the group?
Well, she appeared with us at the Dom, so it was right before that.
Was it Andy’s idea that she join the group?
She was around because of Andy, but he couldn’t talk us really into anything. We thought it would be a good idea. I mean that’s how the whole thing was worked on the first album: The Velvet Underground and Nico. In other words, we were a unit with or without her. And she could do some things we really like, so we said do some songs. it was a complicated working arrangement because she said if I don’t sing, I don’t do anything. So it was always a question of how many songs Nico would do, should she do all of them, which we didn’t want, and that was the only cumbersome aspect of it.
Last night as Doug was singing “I’ll Be your Mirror” I detected the Germanic accent…
Oh yeah, we mimic the way she did it. She never said, “I’ll be your mirror,” it was “I be your mirrah.” It’s amazing how those songs are still so good.
What was the reaction to the first “banana” album? I know many people couldn’t get into things like “European Son” and a couple of the other cuts.
“European Son” is very tame now. It happens to be melodic and if anyone actually listens to it, “European Son” turns out to be comprehensible in the light of all that has come since – not just our work but everyone’s. It’s that just for the time it was done it’s amazing. We figured that on our first album it was a novel idea just to have long tracks. I’m not referring to any particular song, but any song running 8 or 9 minutes. People just weren’t doing that – regardless of what the content of the track was – everyone’s album cuts had to be 2:30 or 2:45 minutes.
The three-minute song.
Then here’s “European Son” which ran eight minutes or something. And basically all the songs on the first albums are longish though there are a few short ones. “All Tomorrow’s Parties” is rather long.
I have your first single which has an abbreviated version of “All Tomorrow’s Parties” on it.
Well don’t lose it. I really liked that record. You can’t get copies of it anymore. I have about two of those singles. There were never that many. “White Light/White Heat” was also a single. I don’t have many of those either.
I heard many rumors as to why Nico left the group. Would you clarify that?
It was all very informal. We stopped working for a while. We used to do that periodically – just refused to do anything. Nico needed money so she went out on her own. She was working downstairs at the Dom (Stanley’s) and we said sure, do anything you want, and so she was doing that. We’d take turns backing her up. I’d do it for one week, then John Cale, Lou, Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, Jackson Browne – everyone was showing up as Nico’s accompanist. When we decided to start work again we told her about it, and she said, oh, I have three more weeks here. So we told her to decide what she wanted to do and she decided that perhaps she could go on her own and be a big star, and we said okay. There never was any ill feelings. For instance, Lou played and composed some of the selections for her first album on Verve.
Didn’t you help compose the song, “Chelsea Girls” for her?
Yes I did some meddling with chords.
I liked the first album she did. It was mostly Jackson Browne but it did have some Dylan on it.
Dylan was always giving her songs.
There have been rumors that he wrote several songs with her in mind?
I don’t know, perhaps. It’s very hard to avoid these people in New York. Dylan was always lurking around.
Didn’t Andy use Dylan in a film?
There was one film with Paul Caruso called, The Bob Dylan Story. I don’t think Andy has ever shown it. It was hysterical. They got Marlowe Dupont to play Al Grossman. Paul Caruso not only looks as Bob Dylan but as a super caricature he makes even Hendrix looks pale by comparison. This was around 1966 when the film was made and his hair was way out here. When he was walking down the street you had to step out of his way. On the eve of the filming, Paul had a change of heart and got his hair cut off – closer to his head – and he must have removed about a foot so everyone was upset about that. Then Dylan had this accident and that was why the film was never shown.
What was the general reaction to The Velvet Underground’s second album?
They were stunned.
To the fact that Nico wasn’t on there?
Oh no. By what the album was – kind of raw electronics (most of it). We liked the album very much. Generally reaction to our albums is late in coming. They just lay around for a year and then people start to pick up on them. There isn’t much you can say about your own albums.
Have you always had the liberty to put on your albums what you wanted?
Yes… it was kind of… we just did it. The company wasn’t especially aware of what we were doing.
The production credit for the first album list Andy Warhol as producer. I assume he doesn’t operate like Phil Spector?
No. This was “producer” in the sense of producing a film. We used some of his money and our money. Whoever had any money that just went all into it. Andy was the producer but we were the “executive producers” too. We made the record ourselves and then brought it around and MGM said they liked it. We just never cared to do it the way most people do.
There has been some bad reactions in critical circles toward narrative things like “The Gift” and “The Murder Mystery.” Last night, Lou said that he wasn’t going to do anymore of the narrative things because of the reaction to them. He felt “The Murder Mystery” succeeded. I do too.
I thought they liked “The Gift”. I don’t know. They might react against “The Murder Mystery” but “The Gift” is more coherent. I thought people liked it.
Do you perform either one on stage?
We used to play the music from “The Gift”, occasionally. We never did perform “The Murder Mystery”, it’s too hard. Anything involving narration is really ridiculous to try and do before a live audience.
Now with the third album you have some people saying, “now they’re on to Jesus.” Can you say that’s a progression?
No. It’s just something that you do.
In other words, they keep looking for another “Heroin,” or “Sister Ray,” and so forth.
I think the third album is a lot more subtle.
Exactly. There doesn’t seem to be anything that really comes out and grabs you like “Sister Ray.” (Excluding “The Murder Mystery” of course).
That’s okay by us. As an album, I think it holds up better than the other ones. The others, when you listen to them, something reaches out and hits you over the head, and something else drops back. The new album is a lot more cohesive. I mean why would we do another “Sister Ray”? For our purposes, we’ve already covered that ground.
Well, since you are now on the MGM label, some people thought you might have toned down because of some pressure.
That was only an administrative change so that we can use a different sales manager or something like that. Also, they have a prettier label, aqua and gold; those were my junior high school colors (laughter).
Which of the three albums do you like best?
I don’t know. It changes. Whichever one I haven’t heard lately. If I have been listening to one… for instance, I didn’t listen to the first album for a year… then I went back and decided I really like it. I’m sure no one plays much of what they do everyday. You just let it sit around for a long time, then you drag them out and listen to them.
It was nice last night when you played “Femme Fatale” and “I’ll Be Your Mirror” and later some new songs like “I Can’t Stand It Anymore.”
Yes, there’s all kind of things. We just shuffle them around.
Do you think the group misses John Cale and his presence or not?
Yes… no… it’s hard to answer.
I miss the viola.
Yes, but it wasn’t used that much, and it wasn’t an essential ingredient as far as we were concerned. Everyone thought when we first showed up doing that that it was a gimmick. It wasn’t that at all. You could get a sound out of it that we thought suited the song. It was used only for about three songs.
I think It’s a Beautiful Day makes excellent use of the electric violin.
The electric viola works better than the electric violin. One might say it’s an electric violin but it’s not. The electric viola registers a little deeper, so it has a nicer sound.
Have you heard John Cale’s Stooges album?
No, I haven’t listen to that yet.
Have you heard The Stooges at all?
Have you heard John’s album with Nico, The Marble Index?
Yes I like some of the songs on there. I haven’t heard The Stooges album, I’ll have to do that.
They have some of the early qualities of the Stones way back when Phil Spector would sit in and…
… play zoom bass… (laughter) if they sound that good I’ll have to listen to them.
Which of the current groups do you really like? (Doug Yule interrupting: Taj Mahal)
I do? (Doug Yule: Sure you do. I thought you did.)
I’ve always liked The Byrds. I’ve always liked The Kinks. I like Dr. John’s first album.
(Doug Yule: The Rolling Stones.)
Everyone likes them. Let’s see who’s unusual?
(Doug Yule: Creedance Clearwater.)
They get sort of monotonous.
(Doug Yule: But they have some good stuff.)
(Doug Yule: Just like us. We all have our ups and downs…)
… and all arounds
Indeed. And Quicksilver, I like them too.
Are there any groups you think have imitated The Velvet Underground’s style? or songs?
Yeah, everybody, kind of. It doesn’t pay to get into it, however, cause people might say, well you’re imitating Josh White, or someone else. If you release records you hope people will listen to them and whatever they do with it you should be happy about it. There isn’t anything to complain about.
What about people like Van Dyke Parks?
I dismiss him summarily. I don’t care what he does. I don’t think he has the credentials. Whatever he’s supposed to be doing – he isn’t good enough.
In the sense of a commercial success?
In any kind of success. If he’s such a great musician then let him go to Tanglewood. His work just sounds like some clever exercises.
He does a creditable job in co-producing Guthrie’s new album.
Oh, as a producer he might be able to do something. It’s that I don’t think classical music, or formal composition, if you will – needs people to release it on the unsuspecting pop world. If you want them to listen to that then go listen to Vivaldi or something Baroque.
But I don’t just sense the classical influence…
Okay, so he’s the great synthesizing mind of the 20th century, well he’s not that either.
Do you consider Zappa more appropriate to that title?
Zappa is incapable of writing lyrics. He is shielding his musical deficiencies by proselytizing all these sundry groups that he appeals to. He just throw enough dribble into those songs, I don’t know, I don’t like their music. I like some of the people in the group. Zappa figures how many opposites can I weld together. I’ll take this phrase from god knows who (i.e. Stockhausen – the magic name!) never heard of him. What is Zappa? I say Frank can I hear a song leaving out the garbage cans? I think that album Freak Out was such a shuck.
For instance, the following is something that would haunt me to the grave. He had this utterance in one of his albums – god knows which one – “I’m not saying I want to be black but there are times I wish I weren’t white.” Now how can anyone come on like that? And he just keeps going on. Now as a satirist, or something, he might be okay. Satirists are capable of knocking things. It’s a label you can hide behind. You might say that I myself am knocking him, well, not really. He’s doing something nobody else is doing. So in that sense he has his little niche.
There have been some comparisons drawn, somewhat outrageously, between The Velvet Underground and the MC5.
That’s a comparison that would drive me to an early retirement.
What do you think of the MC5?
I think seldom of the MC5.
Is there anything we’ve left out?
Well I don’t want it to appear that I’m knocking Zappa because too much has already gone down between us.
I thought his We’re Only in it for the Money was fun. It was a good satire on what they saw in the Beatles’ album.
Yes. But let me see him come out with something as good as Sgt. Pepper. If he comes out with one song that is as good as any song on Sgt. Pepper I revise my opinion. I can make fun of Sgt. Pepper. Everyone can. If anyone thinks that cover was clever, I have no art ability at all, and I can come up with one as funny. I mean here is what The Beatles did and without any stretch of the imagination one can come up with a parody. What Zappa saw in Sgt. Pepper was something good which showed real perception and talent, and lacking these attributes himself, he decided to do something else, and make fun of it. Is there anything on We’re Only in it for the Money that compares even remotely with anything on the original?
Well, the attitude of Zappa on some of the songs toward runaways seems more realistic that the maudlin content of “She’s Leaving Home.”
Yes. But Sgt. Pepper is still a great album. When I think of The Mothers I don’t think of anything they did – I just think of who they’re imitating. Who Zappa is deriving his horn lines from and so forth. The Mothers started out in the early days as essentially an old rock/boogie group. Zappa was doing what he knew best: old rock. There was a real good guitar player on the first album by the name of Elliot. He left because Zappa saw a chink in the social structure and he was going to fill the hole. For better or worse, he did it.
Well, he’s finally disbanded the whole group.
At last. The person Zappa always admired the most was his manager. He wanted to be his manager. Zappa is the kind of person who should be a manager or a publishing representative. He wants to be one of the really sleazy industry types. And he has some need for this too.
What direction do you want The Velvet Underground to go? Are you happy the way it’s going now?
I’d like to see us have a hit single. It’s really important that you do that. Our singles so far are a joke.
I thought some of the new songs you played last night have the potential to be good hits.
Everything, if perhaps not a hit, could be distributed. Most of our singles were never distributed. However where they appeared on jukeboxes, people have really liked them. “White Light/White Heat” as a single is nice. that single was banned every place. When it was banned in San Francisco, we said, the hell with it. That’s as far as it ever got.
You have a single out at present from the third album, “What Goes On.”
That was not a real single. It was just a cut put on a single. There’s a subtle distinction between what is a real release and what is a real real release.
In other words, a single produced for a market different from the album market.
It’s hard to say. It might, it might not. We have all sorts of strange things lying around in the can, as they say. We record them and get tired with them before they’re released. It happens many times. We get demos and we play the demos and get tired of them.
I think there is much humor in your music.
Oh, there is.
Many people, however, tend to emphasize the darker s&m qualities.
Yes, but this is not reflected in fact. We’ve made no attempt to dispel them but if anyone asks us, we say, no, don’t be ridiculous. We owe that legacy to Gerard who in his infinite wisdom did all kind of outrageous things. Suppose that title which we took for our name had been on a detective novel or whatever. It just happened that the book was about that. It was a really dumb book.
Many people consider the light show as an essential part of your image. Now that you are no longer associated with the EPI you no longer have any special lighting effects with your show…
… we got away from that. Actually we built the light show at Fillmore Auditorium. Bill Graham didn’t nor did any San Francisco entrepreneur. When we showed up Graham had a slide projector with a picture of the moon. We said, that’s not a light show, Bill, sorry. That’s one of the reasons that Graham really hates us.
In his recent book on San Francisco rock, Gleason says it (light shows) officially started in SF.
Marshall McLuhan gave us credit for it in his book. He’s the only one.
Right. I remember the photo he used of the EPI and Velvet Underground in The Medium is the Massage. That was quite nice of him.
It was nice. He showed the group that did at all. People like Gleason – he was one of our archenemies. They had the thing sewed up. The reviewer has a piece of the action. Bill Graham has the room, he has apiece of the action, too. San Francisco was rigged. It was like shooting fish in a barrel. The fish being the innocent heads prowling around Haight-Ashbury. We came out there as an unshakable entity. I’d never heard of Bill Graham, in fact. I’ve never heard of him since. I don’t know who he is, I just thought he was an insane sob, totally beneath my abilities to observe. He just didn’t exist as far as I was concerned. An absolute nonentity. He knew what we thought of him. The day I arrived at his club, I was thrown out. I just walked in with my guitar and he said, you, get out of here. They told him , you’ve lost your mind, he’s playing here tonight. He said, get out, get out, you s.o.b. I wish I had. If any man really needs a beating, it’s Bill Graham.
He, of course, has his own defense mechanism. He’s currently telling everyone how S.F. will be dead without his Fillmore West.
Well, it was always like that. When we arrived it was an attack against their way of life. Graham made so much money that week-end we played at the Fillmore, that he didn’t believe it. That’s what blew his mind. We arrived, at a time before Jefferson Airplane was known to anyone, they didn’t even have Grace Slick yet. Everyone was nowhere at the time, The Mothers, and of course, ourselves. Warhol was the name at the time that made the impact with the public.
What groups shared the bill with you that night?
The Mothers of Invention, you see. The Mothers were following us around California. they also had an audition group perform. During the show, Zappa would keep putting us down, like on the mike he would say, these guys really suck. But Zappa is really a great guy, if he weighed fifteen more pounds he’d be in a hospital. No, he’s just a jerk. So The Mothers were chasing us around California so we arrived in Bill Graham country. He always had an audition group. The reason for this was he didn’t get any money. He would say, if you’re really good, I’ll let you play. This guy’s an operator. The audition group that night happened to be The Jefferson Airplane, whom he was managing. They wanted publicity and The Mothers wanted publicity because they were so many people capitalizing on our show that night. We were just a neutral party. We were going back to New York to greener pastures, supposedly, but when we got back our club was gone.
I understand you spent much time in Boston after that.
Yes, because we were so furious about New York and a lot of people who should have been behind us at the time but weren’t.
Were you there during the infamous Boston Sound period?
Yeah, Alan Lorber was responsible for that. He just wound up ruining a lot of Boston groups. Boston, however, is a really nice city, we have lots of fun there. It seems to have much more potential than San Francisco. So we played in Boston as opposed to New York City. Last time we played in New York was at the Brooklyn Academy, private parties, that sort of thing, superbenefits like the big NET one.
Have you been back to The Scene?
It’s closed. The Mafia was beating people up. They were having these incredible fights, thugs coming in. So Steve Paul just shut it down. That was going on at Arthur’s, too. The liquor laws work in such a way that if you have a trouble spot your liquor license can be revoked. So organized crime come in and says, I want a piece of the action, and they say, no, you can’t have it. So they just start these giant fights there. And the clubs lose their license. That’s what happened at Arthur’s. The Mafia people will even beat themselves up just so the police will come. That’s what happened at The Scene.
It only took three decades or so after they split up for the world at large to recognize how thoroughly brilliant they were, but Ann Arbor, Michigan band the Stooges, widely considered little more than a sick joke by the time they finally called it a day in 1974, are now right up there alongside Chuck Berry, the Beatles, and the Rolling Stones when people start talking about rock ’n’ roll greatness. I spoke with drummer Scott Asheton a little earlier this week, a man who doesn’t generate quite the attention his bandmate Iggy Pop does, but whose contribution to the still unique sound of the Stooges is only underestimated by fools.
Ray Caesar says that issues with his father contributed to the arrival of Harry, an “alternate,” when he was 10. The boy is disguised as a girl in Caesar’s art, and remains present in his daily life as an alter ego. “Harry is beyond anger – he enjoys it,” says Caesar. “My job is to keep Harry under control.”
Caesar suffers from Dissociative Identity Disorder, uses his art as an outlet to express trauma. He was born in London, England in 1958 and moved with his family to Canada in 1967. He describes his childhood art as “atypical and aberrant” as it was unlike the bright pop art of the 60s and 70s. Drawing inspiration from era paintings, Caesar creates fantasy scenes that include innocent young girls, sensual young women or ageless divas or cold blooded predators, sirens/octopussy creatures. Some of these feminine characters seem out of place in their antiquated world, posing in a manner that would have been very unseemly a century ago. I hope you will like these surreal paintings. Ray Caesar is considered by many one of the best of the Pop Surrealist modern painters with Mark Ryden.
During his later years in Kansas, Burroughs developed a painting technique whereby he created abstract compositions by placing spray paint cans in front of, and some distance from, blank canvasses, and then shooting at the paint cans with a shotgun. These splattered canvasses were exposed in various Galleries during the early 1990s.
In an interview with Gregory Ego, entitled “William Burroughs & the Flicker Machine”, as published in David Kerekes’ 2003 “Headpress (the journal of sex religion death)”, William explains how he made shotgun art painting, and others. Here’s a portion of this interview:
EGO: Are you still doing your “shotgun art?”
BURROUGHS: Oh, all kinds. Brushwork. Shotgun. Paint. Knife.
EGO: What exact process do you use for your visual art?
BURROUGHS: There is no exact process. If you want to do shotgun art, you take a piece of plywood, put a can of spray paint in front of it, and shoot it with a shotgun or high powered rifle. The paint’s under high pressure so it explodes! Throws the can 300 feed. The paint sprays in exploding color across your surface. You can have as many colors as you want. Turn it around, do it sideways, and have one color coming in from this side and this side. Of course, they hit. Mix in all kinds of unpredictable patterns. This is related to Pollock’s drip canvases, although this is a rather more basically random process, there’s no possibility of predicting what patterns you’re going to get. I’ve had some I’ve worked over for months. Get the original after the explosions and work it over with brushes and spray paints and silhouettes until I’m satisfied. So, there isn’t any set procedure. Sometimes you get it right there and you don’t touch it. The most important thing in painting is to know when to stop, when everything is finished. Doesn’t mean anything in writing.
EGO: It does rely to a high degree on chance — the shotgun art?
BURROUGHS: It introduces a random factor, certainly.
EGO: Just like the cut-up method.
BURROUGHS: Yes. But you don’t have to use it all, you can use that as background. There’re a lot of other randomizing procedures like “marbling.” Take water and spray your paint on top of the water and then put your paper or whatever in the water and pull it out and it sticks in all sorts of random patterns. And then there’s the old inkblot. [Ruffles imaginary paper] Like that. Sometimes they’re good only as background or sometimes you get a picture that you’re satisfied with at once. There is no certain procedure.
EGO: Allen Ginsberg proposed to me that the cut-up technique you developed with Brion Gysin is a sort of counter-brainwashing technique. Do you agree with that?
BURROUGHS: It has that aspect in that you’re breaking down the word, you’re creating new words. Right as soon as you start cutting, you’re getting new words, new combinations of words. Yes, it has that aspect, sure. But remember that all this brainwashing and propaganda, etc., is not by any means expected to reach any intelligent corners. It isn’t expected to convince anybody that has any sense. If they can get ten percent, that’s good. That’s the aim of propaganda; to get ten percent. They’re not trying to convince people that have a grain of sense.
Hell’s Angels: The Strange and Terrible Saga of the Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs is a book written by counterculture icon Hunter S. Thompson, first published in 1966 by Random House. It was widely lauded for its up-close and uncompromising look at the Hell’s Angels motorcycle club, during a time when the gang was highly feared and accused of numerous criminal activities. The New York Times described Thompson’s portrayal as “a world most of us would never dare encounter.” It was Thompson’s first published book and his first attempt at a nonfiction novel.
Previous Posts on Hunter Thompson HEREand another one about his death HERE
40 years of fights, Drugs, UFOs and Doing All the Wrong Things…
The Stranglers are infamously known for inciting a riot in Nice, starting a fight with The Clash, exploiting strippers on stage and writing “Golden Brown” about heroin. Taking H was a conscious decision by the band to see what would happen creatively. Two members stopped after one day, while Hugh and Jean-Jacques fell deep inside the rabbit hole. These punks turned pop darlings have had a continuously successful career ever since they began in Guildford, England in 1974. Even though singer Hugh Cornwell quit in 1990, the rest of the band are still going strong without him today.
A Fight with Punk Royalty
Jean-Jacques Burnel (bass): In 1976, we played with the Ramones. In those days, [Clash bassist] Paul Simonon had a nervous tic: he used to spit on the ground. He did this just as we came off stage at Dingwalls in London, so I thumped him and it all kicked off. We were thrown out by the bouncers and it continued in the courtyard. On one side were the Pistols, the Clash, the Ramones and a load of their journalist friends. On the other side was us, a few of our fans and me, nose to nose with Paul. Dave [Greenfield, Stranglers keyboards] had John Lydon up against the ice-cream van.
Jet Black (drums): It polarised opinion against us, but we’ve always been at our best with our backs against the wall.
Burnel: Contrary to what has been written, Hugh [Cornwell, Stranglers singer] and I never had punch-ups. There was one incident in Rome where he tried jumping in the air during Hanging Around and managed to get two inches off the ground. I said something afterwards and he threw a glass against the wall. I pushed him and he just went straight through a paper-thin wall. It was like a Tom and Jerry cartoon, with a silhouette in the wall in the shape of Hugh.
Touring in an Ice-Cream Van
Black: I had an ice-cream business and decided to sell it to start a band, but I kept one of the vans. It was the perfect mode of transport for two years. We had a special way of arranging all the speakers and equipment so they’d all fit in.
Burnel (bass): Jet would drive and the rest of us would lie on top of the gear. After some gigs, we’d pile out and sleep in a field, surrounded by cows.
Black: In Bude, we once slept on a lawn by the sea. The next morning, we were woken by the sound of a lawnmower. We’d slept on a cricket pitch and they were cutting the wicket around us.
Burnel: There were some funny incidents in those early days. We were booked to play a Young Conservatives dance.
Black: At the start of the first song, there were 300 people in the hall. By the end, there were four left watching. But they started following us. It was a similar story all over the country
Gaffer-Taping a Journalist to the Eiffel Tower
Burnel: A guy called Philippe Manoeuvre – who’s now head of the biggest music magazine in France – was always bugging me. One day, he turned up at our hotel demanding an interview, so I agreed – if we could do it at the Eiffel Tower. We took his trousers off, gaffer-taped him to one of the girders and left him there to bephotographed by Japanese tourists. It was only the first floor. Admittedly, that is 400ft off the ground.
Black: He wasn’t best pleased.
Deciding to Take Heroin for a Year
Burnel: It was an artistic decision to see what would happen.
Black: It was crazy.
Burnel: Jet and Dave were sensible and quit after a day. Hugh and I didn’t. We headed into a surreal, dark, necromantic abyss.
Black: We were making an album called The Meninblack, which was based on this phenomenon back then known only to a small coterie of UFO obsessives – that people who saw UFOs were visited by strange people wearing black to shut them up. Anyway, as soon as we started making the album, studios blew up, tour buses broke down and gigs became riots. People working for us dropped dead. We were convinced something occult was going on.
Burnel: One night, I was so blissed out I thought it would be wonderful to die. I wrote a lovely suicide note, took loads of heroin and woke up three days later. The band hadn’t even noticed I hadn’t been in the studio.
Being Escorted Out of Sweden by Armed Police
Burnel: This happened twice. The first time, 200 members of this teddy boygang who hated punk drove up in their big 1950s American cars, beat up our road crew and smashed our equipment. We were locked in our dressing room, but managed to escape by throwing a few Molotovs before the police arrived. The second time was your fault. You destroyed the hotel restaurant!
Black: That’s true. I kicked up a fracas because I couldn’t get served any food and the hotel threatened to call the police, who turned up with machine guns again to escort us on to the next plane. There’s been so many incidents in hotels. We once locked a hotelier in the broom cupboard, where he was found the following morning by the receptionist.
Performing with Strippers in a Park
Burnel: The Battersea Park incident was completely misinterpreted. I was living with my girlfriend, Tracy, who shared her flat with a stripper called Linda. When we became the focus of attention, right-on shops such as Rough Trade banned our records, saying they were sexist and misogynist. So Linda said: “Look, I’ve got some friends who’d love to strip for you – to show we’re in control of our bodies.” So these girls stripped off on stage at Battersea during Nice’n’Sleazy and, of course, everyone thought we were being exploitative.
Black: The police inspector wanted everybody arrested, but he couldn’t find his coppers. They were all in the front row watching the show.
Being Jailed for “Inciting a Riot”
Burnel: We were booked to play Nice University but unknowingly walked into a war between the students and the authorities, who wouldn’t let us use any of the power points on campus. We ended up having to run elevated cables from generators outside the university, because the authorities wouldn’t let them touch the campus grounds. It was ludicrous. Every time we went on stage, the power failed. In the end, we gave up and told the crowd: “We’re really sorry. Just remember it’s not our fault.” All hell broke loose. A full-scale riot ended with us being put in prison, where I shared a cell with two murderers.
Black: We were facing 10 years. In the end, a large fine was split between us and the university, but we laughed all the way to the bank. Before that, we were unknown in France. From then on, we played to packed houses.
Burnel: You might well ask why we are still here. The latest tour is our biggest-selling ever. We’ve done all the wrong things – but they turned out to be right.
BBC Choice documentary presented by jazz singer and art critic, George Melly. Producer/Director: Angus McIntyrethe tells the unusual story of The Stranglers, charting the band’s rise to fame in the 1980s to present day:
Cobain greatly admired Burroughs, instigating their collaboration on The “Priest” They Called Him and visiting the Beat legend at his home in Lawrence, Kansas. And while Burroughs does not seem to have been especially impressed with the music of Nirvana, he was greatly saddened by Cobain’s suicide. Here is the story.
At Timberland Library [high school senior Kurt Cobain] discovered S.E. Hinton and William Burroughs, whose work would have an increasing influence on Cobain’s life. He read Burgess admiringly and J.D. Salinger without complaint. Cobain hated Scott Fitzgerald, whose critical resurgence was in decline, neither liked nor understood Faulkner and couldn’t talk about Hemingway without losing his temper. – Christopher Sandford,Kurt Cobain
When the tour hit Rotterdam on the first of September , it was almost with a nostalgic wistfulness that Kurt approached the last show. He was wearing the same T-shirt he’d had on two weeks earlier — it was a bootlegged Sonic Youth t-shirt — which had gone unwashed, as had his jeans, the only pair of pants he owned. His luggage consisted of a tiny bag containing only a copy of William S. Burroughs’ Naked Lunch, which he had found in a London bookstall. – Charles R. Cross,Heavier than Heaven: A Biography of Kurt Cobain
Kurt’s got a literary bent, and jokes that he likes “anything that starts with a B. I think I like Burroughs best, and I’m into Bukowski and Beckett.” He’s a fan of William Burroughs’ dense style, and admires the “cut-up” writing technique he pioneered in the ’40s, calling it revolutionary. – Katherine Turman, Smells Like… Nirvana
In the autumn of 1992 Burroughs and Cobain collaborated on The “Priest” They Called Him. (Listen to an excerpt.)
Cobain himself was an acknowledged fan of Burroughs’ oeuvre and first met with his hero in culture-space on a recording entitled The “Priest” They Called Him. This EP is constructed from a reading by Burroughs (recorded at his home in Lawrence, Kansas on 25 September 1992) overdubbed with Cobain’s guitar accompaniment (recorded in November 1992, at Laundry Room Studios in Seattle). Cobain later faxed Burroughs asking if he would play a crucifixion victim in a video for Nirvana’s forthcoming “Heart-Shaped Box” single. Burroughs declined but a meeting between the two was arranged and took place at Burroughs’ home in October 1993. –New Dawn Magazine
“Narcotics have been systematically scapegoated and demonized. The idea that anyone can use drugs and escape a horrible fate is an anathema to these idiots. I predict in the near future right-wingers will use drug hysteria as a pretext to set up an international police apparatus. I’m an old man and I may not live to see a solution to the drug problem.”
Interviewer: How did you get on with William Burroughs when you recorded together recently?
Cobain: That was a long distance recording session. [Laughs] We didn’t actually meet.
Interviewer: Did he show a genuine awareness of your music?
Cobain: No, we’ve written to one another and we were supposed to talk the other day on the phone, but I fell asleep — they couldn’t wake me up. I don’t know if he respects my music or anything; maybe he’s been through my lyrics and seen some kind of influence from him or something, I don’t know. I hope he likes my lyrics, but I can’t expect someone from a completely different generation to like rock’n’roll — I don’t think he’s ever claimed to be a rock’n’roll lover, y’know. But he’s taught me a lot of things through his books and interviews that I’m really grateful for. I remember him saying in an interview, “These new rock’n’roll kids should just throw away their guitars and listen to something with real soul, like Leadbelly.” I’d never heard about Leadbellybefore so I bought a couple of records, and now he turns out to be my absolute favorite of all time in music. I absolutely love it more than any rock’n’roll I ever heard.
Interviewer: The song you’ve recorded together makes references to shooting up, and Burroughs’ own history of drug-taking is no secret. Were you worried that this collaboration might throw the spotlight on press rumours that you’ve had considerable experience with hard drugs yourself?
Cobain: I don’t think it’s any secret any more, it’s been reported so much for so long. I really don’t care what anyone thinks about my past drug use — I mean, I’m definitely not trying to glorify it in some way. Maybe when I was a kid, when I was reading some of his books, I may have got the wrong impression. I might have thought at that time that it might be kind of cool to do drugs. I can’t put the blame on that influence but it’s a mixture of rock’n’roll in general — you know, the Keith Richards thing and Iggy Pop and all these other people who did drugs. I just thought it was one of those things that you do to relieve the pain, but… As I expected before I started heroin, I knew at the beginning that it would become just as boring as marijuana does. All drugs, after a few months, it’s just as boring as breathing air. I’ve always lied about it because I never wanted to influence anybody, I didn’t want anyone to consider the thought of doing drugs because it’s really stupid. – Martin Clarke,Kurt Cobain: The Cobain Dossier
”I’ve collaborated with one of my only Idols William Burroughs and I couldn’t feel cooler”. – Kurt Cobain, Journals
”Courtney returns, so we head back downstairs and, after a little difficulty trying to get the tape deck to work, myself and Courtney sit cross-legged on the floor. An avalanche of records surrounds us; Sub Pop singles of the month, Kleenex, Opal, Mudhoney, even Suede is here, PJ Harvey’s “Rid Of Me” is on the turntable, and a few books are scattered on the carpet; John Steinbeck, Jean Paul Sartre, William Burroughs’ Queer. Kurt grabs a book by Leonard Cohen, looks at us bemusedly and retreats upstairs.” – Brian Willis, “Domicile on Cobain Street,” NME, 24 July 1993
”What “Heart-Shaped Box” meant to Kurt is best surmised by the treatment he wrote for the song’s video. Kurt envisioned it starring William S. Burroughs, and he wrote Burroughs begging him to appear in the video. “I realize that stories in the press regarding my drug use may make you think that this request comes from a desire to parallel our lives,” he wrote. “Let me assure you, this is not the case.” But exactly what Kurt hoped to achieve by casting the writer was never clear. In his attempt to convince Burroughs to participate, he had offered to obscure the writer’s face, so that no one other than Kurt himself would know of his cameo. Burroughs declined the invitation.” – Charles R. Cross,Heavier than Heaven: A Biography of Kurt Cobain
The journals sketch the evolution of the video’s symbol-laden, elliptically autobiographical narrative. At first, it was to star William Burroughs, whom Cobain evidently revered as a long-lived defier of convention (overlooking the fact that Burroughs survived only because he switched from heroin to marijuana early on) and for his aleatoric compositional technique, morbid mythology, and sardonic W.C. Fieldsian cynicism. Here was the first scene, expressing Cobain’s sense of himself as repository of Burroughs’ artistic spirit: “William and I sitting across from one another at a table (black and white) lots of Blinding Sun from the windows behind us holding hands staring into each other’s eyes. He gropes me from behind and falls dead on top of me. Medical footage of sperm flowing through penis. A ghost vapor comes out of his chest and groin area and enters me Body.”
Burroughs wouldn’t do the video, so Cobain used a generic old man on a cross and pecked at by crows. To him, birds also symbolized old men advocating death: “Me–old man,” he writes. “Have made my conclusion. But nobody will listen anymore. Birds [are] reincarnated old men with tourrets syndrome . . . their true mission. To scream at the top of their lungs in horrified hellish rage every morning at daybreak to warn us all of the truth . . . screaming bloody murder all over the world in our ears but sadly we don’t speak bird.” Clearly, Cobain spoke bird. –Seattle Weekly
In October 1993 Cobain met in Burroughs in Lawrence, KS.
During this first week of the tour, Alex MacLeod drove Kurt to Lawrence, Kansas, to meet William S. Burroughs. The previous year Kurt had produced a single with Burroughs titled The “Priest” They Called Him, on T/K Records, but they’d accomplished the recording by sending tapes back and forth. “Meeting William was a real big deal for him,” MacLeod remembered. “It was something he never thought would happen.” They chatted for several hours, but Burroughs later claimed the subject of drugs didn’t come up. As Kurt drove away, Burroughs remarked to his assistant. “There’s something wrong with that boy; he frowns for no good reason.” – Charles R. Cross, Heavier than Heaven: A Biography of Kurt Cobain
Burroughs describes the meeting… “I waited and Kurt got out with another man. Cobain was very shy, very polite, and obviously enjoyed the fact that I wasn’t awestruck at meeting him. There was something about him, fragile and engagingly lost. He smoked cigarettes but didn’t drink. There were no drugs. I never showed him my gun collection.” The two exchanged presents — Burroughs gave him a painting, while Cobain gave him a Leadbelly biography that he had signed. Kurt and music video director Kevin Kerslake originally wanted Burroughs to appear in the video for “In Bloom.” – Carrie Borzillo,Nirvana: The Day-By-Day Chronicle
“I’ve been relieved of so much pressure in the last year and a half,” Cobain says with a discernible relief in his voice. “I’m still kind of mesmerized by it.” He ticks off the reasons for his content: “Pulling this record off. My family. My child. Meeting William Burroughs and doing a record with him. –Rolling Stone Interview, 25 October 1993
Cobain killed himself on 5 April 1994.
In Lawrence, meanwhile, William Burroughs sat poring over the lyric sheet of In Utero. There was surely poignancy in the sight of the eighty-year-old author, himself no stranger to tragedy, scouring Cobain’s songs for clues to his suicide. In the event he found only the “general despair” he had already noted during their one meeting. “The thing I remember about him is the deathly grey complexion of his cheeks. It wasn’t an act of will for Kurt to kill himself. As far as I was concerned, he was dead already.” Burroughs is one of those who feel Cobain “let down his family” and “demoralized the fans” by committing suicide. –Christopher Sandford,Kurt Cobain
A group calling itself “Friends Understanding Kurt” faxed a press release to various news organizations, claiming a “string of suicides associated with the [dream] machine since the 1960s.” The press release stated after he obtained one of the devices, “Kurt immediately commenced a habitual, perhaps maniacal use of the Dream-machine, then took it with him to his and Courtney’s shared Seattle mansion where he stationed himself with the device in a room above the garage.” It stated the Dream Machine was found in the room where Cobain died, although police and medical examiner reports contradict that. Nevertheless, the claims were widely published. William S. Burroughs, who knew Cobain and had collaborated with him, dismissed such speculation as “nonsense…” The Cobain story was ultimately proved to be a hoax. – John Geiger,Chapel of Extreme Experience
An old diary of mine from my love affair (marriage) surfaced at Sanctuary today. I read it. I miss being loved by a husband very much… there were pictures of Kurt in there… pictures of Kurt walking with William Burroughs. I really miss him. – Courtney Love,Dirty Blonde: The Diaries of Courtney Love
A source that wishes to remain anonymous provided these pictures of a painted collage that Burroughs sent to Cobain for his 27th birthday, less than two short months before the singer’s death.


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"In the end, they are an original distillation, a tasty burn that goes down with a kick and lingers beautifully when it hits your gut."- Dennis Cook, Jambase.com Poor Man's Whiskey plays "High Octane Hootenanny" music???Dance, laugh, sing. Emerging from the San Francisco bay area music scene this quintet has developed a sound that is eclectic and engaging. PMW has been winning over national audiences with their upbeat performances, zany stage antics, and infectious songs. While seamlessly integrating acoustic and electric instruments the band weaves tales of everyday life, inviting the audience to become a part of each show. PMW has released three studio albums, "Train to California" (2003), "Roadside Attraction"(2005), and in 2009: "Dark Side of the Moonshine" (a double disk set featuring original music as well as the bluegrass interpretation of the Pink Floyd classic album). Notable festivals and shows: Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival, High Sierra Music Festival, Kate Wolf Music Festival, The Fillmore, SF; Harmony Festival; Strawberry Music Festival; The Great American Music Hall; The Summer Melt Down, Las Tortugas; finals of the Telluride Bluegrass Festival.
The Pains of Being Pure at Heart have long set the benchmark for big-hearted, idealistic pop songs. On their forthcoming self-released LP, they push beyond their many inspirations and embrace their role as indie-pop heroes in their own right. Showcasing the deft, poetic songwriting of front-man Kip Berman, The Pains??? fourth album is their most confident and accomplished. After three critically-acclaimed records, 2009???s ?The Pains of Being Pure at Heart?, 2011???s ?Belong? and 2014???s ?Days of Abandon? received praise from ?The New York Times, Pitchfork, The Guardian? and ?Rolling Stone?, they have put together a collection of songs that possess a timeless grandeur, deeper and more satisfying than anything the band has done since their now iconic debut. From their earliest days of C86-worship to Alternative Nation-sized anthems to a matured, ???Simple and Sure??? pop refinement, the new music is what Berman describes as sounding ???heavy and hopeful, like love.It???s an album that reflects the band???s most joyous moments while ?maintaining Berman???s candid and critical lyricism, free of the self-abasing insecurity of youth. ???The album is loving. The music is heavier, more expansive,??? he says. ???To me, songs about love shouldn???t be thought of as light. Love is big - sometimes it???s emphatic, overwhelming or simple - other times it???s tense, anxious or just exhausting. But at its best, it makes you want to be something better.??? In their decade long career, Berman has stood at the center of The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, and with a changing lineup, it???s become more apparent. ???On [the last album] ?Days of Abandon,? I was on my own. There was no one in the room making decisions with me. It felt strange experiencing that isolation while trying to make sense of it through writing,??? Berman admits. That album was about loss, and I think it conveyed that feeling well ??? but I???m glad to move on from that place. On this new collection of songs he???s learned to take full agency of something he???s always owned. ???With this record, I???ve made peace with the fact I am Pains. It???s always been my band, but I haven???t been super comfortable saying that, partly because I???ve enjoyed working with so many talented friends, and also because the songs I wrote seemed to mean more than anything my actual life could live up to. Berman enlisted the help of ?Days of Abandon? producer Andy Savours (My Bloody Valentine, The Killers) to help him record a Pains record like none-other. ???The logistics of it were so different. When I recorded the record, my wife was six months pregnant. We only had a limited amount of time. There was an absolute uncertainty hanging over our heads, but it was also a kind of escape from worry for that time.??? He explains. ???What???s going to happen when I have a kid? Am I going to be able to go on tour? Is this the last record I???m going to get to make? It???s not a bad thing to be worried when you???re expecting this huge transition of life. If you didn???t feel scared, you???re probably not feeling the right emotion. I tried to make the best record I could, knowing it might be the last time.??? The Pains and their new album navigate and call attention to variability and safety without unraveling. Berman is no stranger to fragility; here, it???s structured with warmth, the kind found after life-altering moments. The music is augmented by guest vocals from previous Pains collaborators: Jen Goma on vocals (A Sunny Day in Glasgow), bass guitar by Jacob Danish Sloan (Dream Diary), and horns by Kelly Pratt (Beirut, David Byrne, St. Vincent). The Pains of Being Pure at Heart live band consists of long-time guitarist Christoph Hochheim (Ablebody, ex-Depreciation Guild), drummer Chris Schackerman (ex-Mercury Girls, ex-Literature) and vocalist/keyboardist Jess Rojas. The band will tour the UK in late May, returning to New York for Northside Festival in June with more selective dates to be announced shortly.
American indie folk band from Portland, Oregon. Members: Luzelena Mendoza: guitar, vocals Ben Meyercord: bass, vocals Mike Kitson: percussion, vocals Sean Flinn: guitar Eric Schrepel: accordion Paul Cameron: guitar, vocals Scott Magee: ukelele, clarinet, percussion, vocals
Public Service Broadcasting is a London-based pseudonymous musical duo consisting of J. Willgoose, Esq. on guitar, banjo, other stringed instruments, samplings and electronic instruments; and Wrigglesworth on drums, piano and electronic instruments. They take samples from old public information films, archive footage and propaganda material, attempting to 'teach the lessons of the past through the music of the future'.
THePETEBOX is a solo performer, musician, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist whose pioneering live show has ignited audiences across the world. Breaking out as an award-winning beatboxer he soon redefined the genre through the use of his loop pedal, guitar and an otherworldly, multi-phonic voicebox. Witnessing a THePETEBOX live show is an immersive experience as he creates songs sound by sound, layer by layer, reveal on reveal, loop on loop, one man building tracks that are as sonically massive as any full band setup or DJ set. He possesses a primal talent and has transformed it into music that captures the imagination of people from all walks of life and from every corner of the world. THePETEBOX is a singular artist untouched by trends or fads, someone who is genuinely and fiercely independent who has tapped into an art form of true expression that connects directly with the hearts of a rapidly growing fan base. THePETEBOX???s debut album ???Future Loops???, a ???live, studio, video??? album comprising of original tracks and reworks of his favourite songs has reached over 30 million views on his YouTube channel. Through working with visionary director, Simon Ellis, his videos have reached audiences worldwide and his covers endorsed by their legendary creators, most recently Brian Wilson singing his praises for a unique cover of "I Get Around" and The Pixies posting the viral "Where Is My Mind?" video on their official website. Future Loops, (released on his own label, Light River Records) is on its third pressing and has sold over 50,000 digital copies through word of mouth alone. THePETEBOX???s versatility is reflected in the variety of settings he has performed in, from clubnights world-wide to multiple Grand Prix, the major stages at festivals, Glastonbury, Reading/Leeds, V-Fest, Bestival UK - Lake of Stars, Malawi - Woodstock Poland to name but a few, private parties for the stars and sold out headline tours around the UK, Europe and USA.??With a packed tour schedule and nearing completion of his Fan funded most anticipated a sophomore album of entirely original material THePETEBOX will continue to reach and transform the sonic horizons of people across the globe.
After spending years as a major presence in Brooklyn???s thriving music scene,??Frankie Rose relocated to her familial home of Los Angeles for 18 months, with the intention of establishing yet another moment in her storied indie rock m??tier. Gradually, she found herself short on sleep, funds and optimism. "I moved to LA, drama ensued and I ended up on a catering truck. I was like, how can this be my life after being a touring musician and living off of music. I had really lost my way and I thought I was totally done." ???? Towards the end of her time spent in Los Angeles, Frankie reached out to??Jorge Elbrecht (Tamaryn, Gang Gang Dance, Violens)??and began sketching what became the basic outline of what felt like a new album. Then, rather fortuitously, Frankie ended up back in Brooklyn with the realization that "in the end, I???m on my own. I have to do these things on my own." ???? The result of this existential odyssey is??Cage Tropical, Frankie???s 4th album. It is awash with vintage synths, painterly effects pedals, upside down atmosphere and reverberating vocals. It evokes a new wave paranormality of sorts that drifts beyond the songs themselves. "My references aren???t just music," says Frankie, "I love old sci-fi.??They Live??is one of my favorite movies ever, same with??Suspiria. 80???s sci-fi movies with a??John Carpenter??soundtrack, with silly synths ??? that makes it into my file, to the point that I???ll write lyrics incorporating that kind of stuff. It???s in there." ?? Beginning with the shimmery, cinematic and percussive sparkling of the album???s opening track "Love in Rockets," the song???s refrain of "a wheel, a wheel of wasting my life: a wheel, a wheel of wasting my time" immediately alludes to those darker circumstances that led to the creative origins of??Cage Tropical. "It???s all essentially based on what happened to me in Los Angeles and then a return to Brooklyn," says Frankie. "Misery turned into something good. The whole record to me is a redemption record and it is the most positive one I???ve made"
Widowspeak remain purveyors of mood. Whether painting an image of a basement apartment with blinds closed or conjuring the sweeping openness of a desert, they???re an outfit ever preoccupied with the influence of place and the passage of time on personal experience: the way vivid memories can feel like movies or dreams. On their newest album for Brooklyn???s Captured Tracks, Widowspeak use familiar aesthetics as a narrative device, a purposeful nostalgic backdrop for songs that ask, ???How did we get here???? Sonically, they exist somewhere in the overlap between somber indie rock, dream pop, slow-core and their own invented genre, ???cowboy grunge.??? At the heart of the band, there is a palpable duality, a push and pull between the delicate and the deliberate: the contrast of lead singer-songwriter Molly Hamilton???s strikingly beautiful voice and poignant melodies with the terrestrial reality of being a four-piece rock band. These songs sound like the dark bars and rock clubs they were imagined for just as much as the bedrooms where they were written. Expect the Best sees Widowspeak finding their greatest balance between opposing forces: darkness and light, quiet and loud, tension and calm. The album was written while Hamilton was living in Tacoma, Washington after previous stints in upstate New York and Brooklyn. So much moving around, and specifically a move back to the place she grew up, was the catalyst for a record concerned with self-examination and the sense of dread that comes from feeling adrift (???Dog???). Whether navigating the anxieties of social media and self-preservation in the digital age (???Expect the Best???), struggling to maintain motivation (???When I Tried???), or critiquing western-centric wanderlust and aspiration (???The Dream???), the songs here recognize that there???s no going back in time. Hamilton???s lyrics explore the space between regret and anticipation, reconciling the desire to dwell with a need to ???expect the best,??? even as the best seems unlikely. ???In the past I???ve felt compelled to write songs that are more optimistic than I???m actually feeling, as if I could make it true, as if everything in the past was significant or beautiful in a way, even if it was painful. But the truth is that not everything makes sense, and not every day of your life is an experience of clear cut emotional clarity,??? says Hamilton. ???I struggle with this compulsion to pull away from people, pull away from the things I enjoy doing, and sometimes literally picking up and moving away when I am feeling uneasy and anxious about my future in a given space, physical or mental. Social media these days can exacerbate that as well.??? Although Widowspeak???s last two records ??? Almanac (2013) and All Yours (2015) ??? were conceived as a duo with lead guitarist Robert Earl Thomas, Expect the Best finds them playing to the specific strengths of the current touring incarnation (James Jano on drums, Willy Muse on bass). The album, recorded by Kevin MacMahon (Swans, Real Estate), exhibits a marked increase in energy that reflects the band???s live show and the organic way it was created: by four people in a room together. The band collectively navigate dynamic changes with subtlety and restraint; the nine tracks here reach highs of wide-eyed lushness and plumb the depths of resigned melancholy. Their usual palette of dusty guitars and angular twang are still here front and center, but now with a bit more 90s homage, even if abstractly. The Pacific Northwest influences creep in throughout, as do varying flavors of New York???s legacy, the city the band still partially calls home. It???s their heaviest record to date, but never loses the sense of quiet intimacy that Widowspeak is known for.
The Hotel Utah open mic is the epicenter of San Francisco's singer-songwriter community. Its stage attracts performers at all stages of their careers: from seasoned veterans to first-timers. It attracts music fans who know a good thing when they see it. The musicians who come regularly don't come just to get a little "stage time" - they come because of the community that calls Monday at The Utah home - and the musicians that come in for the first time eventually start to come regularly... So come on down this monday, have a beer, bring your guitar if that's your thing, and sit back and enjoy.

domain: entertainment


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Varietal: Cabernet Sauvignon
By far and away the most recognized and widely grown red wine grape varietal in the world is the Cabernet Sauvignon. First cultivated in the 18th century in France, this wonderful cross of Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc grapes has long since been the most important varietal for red wines across the globe. Now grown everywhere from its native France to the furthest reaches of the New World, Cabernet Sauvignon is adored and prized by wineries for its hardiness and resistance to rot, as well as its large and sharp flavors and wonderful capability for fine aging Indeed, many of the finest wines of history and the modern age would be simply unimaginable without Cabernet Sauvignon grapes, with the famed wineries of Bordeaux and other important regions using it as the primary grape in their oak aged produce. High tannin levels, acidity and powerful flavors are the characteristics most commonly associated with this varietal, however, when blended and slowly aged, it is capable of a world of flavors and aromas unmatched by any other grape.
There are few regions in the world which are as renowned for their historical and cultural importance as Galilee. However, as a wine region, this area of Israel remains relatively undiscovered by much of the western world. As one might expect, Galilee is an important producer of kosher wines, with the vast majority of the produce made there carefully overseen by religious specialists ensuring that purity laws are observed. The result of this is a reasonably large industry focusing on Jewish communities around the world, who wish to enjoy classic, Old World style wines packed full of fascinating flavors and aromas. Galilee's mineral rich and volcanic soils allow vintners in the area to experiment with a wide range of grape varietals, and dozens of popular imported French varietals flourish well there.
For thousands of years now, Israel has been an important country when it comes to wine production. Today, wineries across Israel are having great success with the imported French varietals which have proven to be a fine match for the climate and soil types across the country, and grapes such as Cabernet Sauvigon, Merlot, Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc make up for the vast majority of varietals grown on Israeli soil. Israel enjoys a Mediterranean climate in many parts of the country, and even more desert-type regions such as the Negev are proving to be ideal locations for viticulture, thanks to a combination of traditional and modern techniques, and advanced irrigation methods. Israeli wines are almost always made to kosher requirements, and as such have a high demand all over the world by Jewish communities, as well as being popular with many other people due to their quality and characteristics.

domain: agronomy


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Reply To: LAS VEGASBack to Forum
I found the signature suites @ the rear of the MGM grand to be a great compromise. These are individually own apartments that MGM have rights to use for most nights of the year.
Consists of 3 towers totally separate from the main MGM hotel with their own gated arrival entrance and own check-in areas. No casino in any of the towers, moving covered walkways take you to the rear of the MGM itself in 10-15 minutes depending on which tower you are in where you have all the eating options, shops etc. Walk straight thru the MGM and you are on the strip. After a day of the lights and sounds of vegas, I found it a great way of leaving “vegas” behind for the night and having a normal nights rest.
I rented one of these direct from the owner, and saved about 30% on the MGM website price. Can’t recall the owners website I used. Was only up and running a year or two at the time, so the 1 bed apartment looked very fresh, and had upscale features. Rear over-looks airport, some rooms have a partial strip view.
Stayed in both the palazzo and venetian in a 2011 holiday, good upmarket properties, big rooms. Especially good experience if you are an IHG Royal Ambassador, as you get access to the VIP lounges and upgrades etc.

domain: travel


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"New Worlds Are Our Oyster."
A Fine TIME ..... for Romance!
Although I live in the State of New York, which is so different from the vast open prairies of Montana and Wyoming where my story A FIND THROUGH TIME takes place, I have always loved the West and the people whose struggles and perseverance has had such a great impact on our lives today. If not for those first pioneers who traveled across our great continent in search of a new life, if not for the people who fought for what they believed in, who struggled to preserve their way of life and sacrificed everything in the name of progress, we would not have moved on to become the society we are today. It is from their blood, sweat, accomplishments and sometimes their deaths that we have learned and grown. I hope you enjoy reading A FIND THROUGH TIME as much as I enjoyed living it though the eyes of Two Moons, Roy and Gabrielle.
Marianne Petit is Vice President of the Long Island Chapter of the Romance Writers Of America and is a member of the New York City RWA Chapter. Her love of writing stems back to high school. She spent hours reading Nancy Drew, Alfred Hitchcock and poetry. At the age of fifteen she wrote a short story for children, as well as numerous works of poetry. Her love of history stems from her father, Roger, a Frenchman, whose love of American history greatly influenced her writing interests .
She is a member of the Melville Lions club, a service organization that raises money for the less fortunate - especially the sight and hearing impaired. She was recently elected to the Board of Directors.
When she's not writing, Marianne works with her husband in his chiropractic office. She loves to ski, raft, horseback ride, and enjoys the theater. Marianne lives on Long Island with her two teenage sons and she is happily married for 21 years.
Marianne P: Despite what the big houses, at this time, are saying, people love time travels; I think in part because not only are they a combination of a contemporary and a historical, (in my case), but the idea of traveling in time is intriguing.
Your heroine is a perfect candidate for time travel. She is emotionally
Marianne P: She is emotionally overwhelmed by her mother, her job and her love life and wants desperately to get away from everything and everyone.
Gabrielle Camden isn't interest in any kind of relationship with a
man, someone is very much interested in her. Tell us about Roy Prescott.
Marianne P: Roy is really a sweet heart, who is trying to change his ways and put his past behind him. He's cleaned up his act and wants a second chance in life.
PNR: How does Gabrielle's occupation lead to her time travel experience? What is the significance of the place and time she has traveled to, and why did you choose it?
Marianne P: She is a forensic artist who reconstructs a skull found at an archeological dig site. When she goes back to the site to look for more clues as to who the person was, she is sent back in time when she climbs into the hole where the body was found. My idea for this story came from a documentary on TV about a skull found in the fields of the Battle of The Little Bighorn and the idea intrigued me. Although the skull from the documentary was that of a soldier who fought that day, my love of the Native American culture, led me to tell their side of the story and I decided to make the skull that of a Native American woman.
PNR: Gabrielle's experience could be called reincarnation in reverse. She finds herself in the body of her find, a half Native American female?
Marianne P: Yes, the skull she reconstructs turns out the be in her image.
She is discovered by Two Moons, a Lakota
warrior. He distrusts her instantly. Why?
Marianne P: When Gabby goes back, she is in the body of a Crow woman. The Crow are the hated enemy of the Sioux. Plus, since it is said that the eyes are the "window of our souls," her eyes remain blue, thus she is half white, and he hates the white man more than the Crow.
How does an independent 21st century woman cope with her treatment
at the hands of Two Moon's people?
Marianne P: Well, not easily. The fact that she is used to living and working from one archeological dig site to another and living out doors, helps, but she does miss her comforts. Being interested in relics from past societies also helps, because now, living in the past, seeing things first hand, she is excited to learn about a culture she could only read about.
spite of his reservations, Two Moons is very attracted to the woman
he calls Blue Eyes. What does she do to win his respect?
Marianne P: He admires her spirit, her independence and that she challenges him. Then, she earns, not only his respect, but his people's, when she does a courageous act.
is Roy's reaction to Gabrielle's disappearance? How does he deal with
Marianne P: Although he doesn't know that she disappeared and is told that she is away doing research, his gut instinct tells him that she is in danger, so he goes out to find her.
obvious advantage of being from the future is knowing what will occur
in the past. How does Gabrielle feel about using this knowledge?
Marianne P: She is torn between warning his people about the battle and changing history.
does Gabrielle ultimately gain from her experience?
love of her soul mate. An understanding about a past occurrence. A
you plan to write additional time travel romances in the future? What
is next for Marianne Petit?
Marianne P: I'd love to write another time travel, in fact I do have one started that takes place during the discovery of gold in CA. But, time travels are a hard sell right now, so I'm working on a contemporary, suspense, that leads to murder. I also have a historical set in Virginia in the late 1700s finished, which I am trying to sell.
A FIND THROUGH TIME - Struggling with severed family ties and a love life gone sour, forensic artist Gabrielle Camden immerses herself in sculpting the face of a young Native American woman whose parallel life takes her on an incredible journey back in time to Custer's Last Stand.
The path leads her deep into the heart of the Sioux nation and into the arms of a Lakota warrior named Two Moons.
Gabrielle must reconcile her life on the plains with the one she left behind and the man who awaits her return. But before she can give her love to one man, she must lose the love of another.
Featured in this Issue:
Paraphernalia is a feature of PNR, the official website of firstname.lastname@example.org
Copyright © 2000 - 2006 paranormalromance. All rights reserved.

domain: literature


The Supreme Court has denied the appeal of pork barrel scam architect Janet Napoles to be released from detention on humanitarian grounds amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
In a resolution penned by Associate Justice Mario Lopez, the SC’s Second Division junked the motion for recognizance and bail or house arrest.
The resolution was promulgated last January 13, 2021 but only released by the tribunal recently.
Senior Associate Justice Estela Perlas Bernabe, then-Associate Justice and now Chief Justice Alexander Gesmundo, and Justices Amy Lazaro Javier and Ricardo Rosario concurred with the ruling.
In her motion, Napoles told the high court she was at risk of contracting COVID-19 inside the Correctional Institution for Women in Mandaluyong City because she is allegedly suffering from diabetes.
Napoles also cited what she claimed as compelling reasons to support her acquittal from plunder as well as the international community’s call for temporary release of persons deprived of liberty (PDLs) due to the threat of the coronavirus.
In denying her plea, the high court resolved that Napoles’ plea for temporary liberty must be turned down considering that she was found guilty of plunder, a capital offense, in the pork barrel scam case involving Senator Ramon “Bong” Revilla Jr. in 2018.
“The presumption of innocence and the constitutional right to bail end after the accused’s conviction of a capital offense,” the SC resolution stated.
“Accordingly, Napoles’ motion for bail pending the appeal of her conviction must be denied,” it said.
Napoles submitted to the tribunal an unauthenticated medical certificate signed by her physician stating that she has diabetes and hypertension.
However, the high court pointed out that even assuming that Napoles is indeed suffering from diabetes, “that, in itself, is not sufficient to grant her provisional liberty, post-conviction.”
“Napoles’ allegation is a question of fact which is not within the province of this Court to determine. Neither can the Court take judicial notice of her medical condition,” it said.
The SC also said neither the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, the Bureau of Corrections Act of 2013, nor the global trend to decongest jail facilities due to COVID-19, support the release of PDLs pending the appeal of their conviction of a capital offense.
“Aside from her conviction of plunder which necessarily imports that the evidence of her guilt is strong, Napoles failed to establish that there are exceptional and compelling considerations for her temporary release,” the high tribunal emphasized.
“Be it noted that the constitutional and statutory requisites for the grant of bail are neither suspended nor supplanted by the existence of a pandemic,” it said.


BENEDICTUM singer Veronica Freeman and CHASTAIN frontwoman Leather Leone were interviewed on the latest edition of "The Classic Metal Show", which is heard live on Saturdays from 9 p.m. to 3 a.m. EST at TheClassicMetalShow.com. You can now listen to the chat using the audio player below.
Veronica (pictured below) is currently recording a solo album which will be released under the moniker THE V. She states, "I had a lot of input and encouragement from Frontiers in the previous months to try and stretch myself with different musical styles and approaches. So I have decided to accept their proposal for a solo album."
Musically, Veronica is pursuing a much more melodic and hook-friendly direction. John Herrera is producing this endeavor and there should be some special guests appearing in the writing and performing department, including Leone, a song from Jerry Dixon from WARRANT and some bass performances from Brad Lang from Y&T and Jeff Pilson. BENEDICTUM guitarist Pete Wells will also show his other side with some of the music he is contributing to this project.
Speaking to Examiner.com, Freeman stated about how the idea for her solo album came about: "The story happened is that the owners of Frontiers, the president and vice-president, happened to be in Los Angeles this year when I had the broken-foot thing. I live in Phoenix now, but I didn't want to miss a chance to meet them. So I went up there and we had lunch together. They told me they really believe in my talent, all that stuff. I was flattered and it was great to hear. But being so ingrained in metal, it was really kind of frightening to not do metal. The proposition was to do a solo based on the concept of you, meaning what we had done, but it will be a lot more melodic hard rock, a lot more hook-oriented. So [laughs], I was like, 'Wow! That's really cool!' It kind of morphed from 'We'll give you the songs' to 'You can write them, but we have to kind of approve them first.' That allowed me to still write with Pete, so it's still a Wells-Freeman type of thing, but he has so much other music too. So it worked out well, actually. And as long as it wasn't going to be too tame! It's definitely melodic; some of it rocks, but some is really soft too. I'm doing a tune that Jerry Dixon from WARRANT submitted, which was kind of cool and some music from some other people. So, I just have to get used to it, do you know what I mean?"
She added: "It's out of my comfort zone a little bit. Some of the songs are right there and I'm like, 'This will be fun!' Others are, I'm not going to lie to you, I'm like 'I don't know!' but then as the songs develop, I'm, like, 'Okay, I can see where this is going.' Jeff actually played bass on about four tracks, which was very cool of him to do. We have other musicians and stuff, but it's still pretty much me, Pete, and Rick [BENEDICTUM and ex-JAG PANZER drummer Rikard Stjernquist] for the most part, so we'll see how it goes."


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Percentage of pregnant women who had elective deliveries 1-3 weeks early (either vaginally or by C-section) whose early deliveries weren’t medically necessary.
Cesarean Delivery (C-section) is a surgical procedure used to deliver a baby through incisions in the abdomen and uterus. This medical procedure requires multiple services from different providers. Episodes of care combine these services to create a single estimate of average cost.
The estimate above reflects costs for all medical services received between the admission and discharge date or on the date of service. The average cost displayed is based on insurance paid amount, plus patient’s copay, coinsurance, and deductible amounts. See the Methodology page for more information.

domain: medical


IoT-based Intelligent water system monitoring helps organisations to maximise water safety by continuously monitoring and measuring water temperatures to identify and reduce the risk of legionella and other bacteria.
Sensors continuously gather data and provide real-time alerts based on defined parameters to detect hazards and reduce dangerous water conditions.
By calculating risks based on current and historic sensor measurements, organisations can understand and manage risk in real-time, allowing a more proactive approach to water risk management.
- Reduced risk by identifying high-risk conditions and alerting operators, enabling them to intervene quickly to reduce any risk of a legionella outbreak and create create safer environments.
- Maintain ongoing compliance by regularly monitoring temperatures across water assets to minimise bacterial risk
- Increased efficiency as remote monitoring provides results in real-time and enables more precise procedures and more accurate information
- Reduces the need for frequent manual visits. As time is saved travelling, less fuel is consumed, resulting in less emissions and lower costs.
- Improved accuracy as data is automatically collected by sensors, reducing errors that can occur through manual data entry.
Intelligent Water Monitoring Use Case
An IoT-based Intelligent Water Monitoring solution is helping The Highland Reserve Forces and Cadets Association to safeguard health and wellbeing and eliminate the risk of legionella and other bacteria.