GET LAND, FILL IT WITH AS MUCH LIFE AS YOU CAN

Cover from the forthcoming Plankton Wat album...



More info * Thrill Jockey

Regarding paraslavery in China, The New York Times' gadget columnist David Pogue attempts to locate conscience, fails * http://nyti.ms/yBtkQx

"What we’ve seen over the last 30 years is a war on the human imagination" — Author/anthropologist David Graeber on debt, morality, ways of being * http://bit.ly/zuiRtn

If you're thinking about really shutting stuff down, not just talking about it, here's a successful technique: "Nearly 40,000 students from across Southern California staged walkouts, blocking traffic on four freeways. Youths marched down Sunset, Melrose, Laurel Canyon, the Hollywood Fwy in downtown Los Angeles and two sections of the Harbor Freeway. The protests appeared to be loosely organized—mass e-mails, fliers, instant messages, cellphone calls and postings on myspace" * LATimes

DIY MAGIC by Anthony Alvarado is being published by Floating World Comics next month. The book expands on Anthony's columns for Arthur's online presence in 2009-10, and features design work by the brilliant Lord Whimsy and lotsa illustrations by cartoonist folk like Ron Rege, Jr and Kevin Hooyman. My blurb: “Few books are as immediately useful as this delightful, inspirational tips ‘n’ tricks tome. I’m having a backyard betel nut party in five minutes and everyone’s invited!”



More info, pre-order * floatingworldcomics

A C60 of Peter Lamborn Wilson reading from his "Ec(o)logues" is now available from Sloow Tapes. Here's the cover:



"Wilson’s ‘Ec(o)logues’ is a collection of bucolic poetry proposing an anarcho-surrealist Temporary Pastoral Zone, abolishing monetary, electrical and other mediations in favor of a direct experiencing of Paracelsan tantra practices with sylphs and faeries." * Tape is via Sloow Tapes, book Ec(o)logues is available at Amazon.

Earth's Dylan Carlson chooses 13 of his favorite albums * thequietus

Dave Tompkins rolls a big one regarding one of his favorite films, the genuinely bugfuck "The Hellstrom Chronicle" * grantland

Rammellzee in the New York Times. Make sure to check out the slideshow. * NYTimes

D’Angelo and The Testimony – live in Paris, 2012 * http://bit.ly/zvMjS3

One from way back: my 2005 conversation with Ralf Hutter of Kraftwerk. *
arthurmag

OK Go guy confirms: "I am making a record for Lavender Diamond. Our label hopefully will be putting it out this summer" * bit.ly/AzpGsn

Sweet pics of THE GROWLERS recording at Easy Eye Sound Studio in Nashville last year for their new album, produced by DAN AUERBACH of the Black Keys * alyssegafkjen

Congratulations to my friend Mike Mills, writer-director of Beginners, for Christopher Plummer's Oscar win for best supporting actor. I am very happy for them both.

A talk by eco-political sensible radical and science fiction author Kim Stanley Robinson that I'm checking out...



Video description: "Climate change and population growth will combine in the twenty-first century to put an enormous load on humanity's bio-infrastructural support system, the planet Earth. Kim Stanley Robinson argues that our current economic system undervalues both the environment and future human generations, and it will have to change if we hope to succeed in dealing with the enormous challenges facing us. Science is the most powerful conceptual system we have for dealing with the world, and we are certain to be using science to design and guide our response to the various crises now bearing down on us. A more scientific economics—what would that look like? And what else in our policy, habits, and values will have to change?"



Barney Rossett, legendary publisher of Grove Press and the Evergreen Review, died last week at 89. I was lucky enough to spend an hour or two in his presence a few years ago. Obituary for Barney by Douglas Martin * New York Times

Photographer Stacy Kranitz and I did a short piece on the rather remarkable Dick the Butcher of Joshua Tree...



Check it out at Learning to Live Here

Stephanie and I have made some Defend Joshua Tree t-shirts, featuring a design by Arik Roper. They're available for $20 each plus postage. * defendjt.wordpress.com/

I have a twitterer: https://twitter.com/#!/jaywbabcock

"Join in the restoration of magic, a return to a world of spirits"; HELP FUND DYLAN CARLSON OF EARTH'S NEW PROJECT

text at kickstarter:

Dylan Carlson is creating his first major solo project outside of earth. There will be a limited edition lp/dvd/book and cd/dvd/book(500 of each format) and a special pressing of 150 copies(lp only) with personalized ex libris by Simon Fowler (Who will also do the cover and end papers). The illustrations will be by Kiyo Lappalainen. The limited edition books will be pop-up style. There will also be an open edition with regular flat printing in a cd booklet and flat lp printing. The recording will combine field recordings from various megalithic and other sites of human/fairy encounters across the UK, also the use of ritual and folkloric magical practices. The expedition will be filmed by Clyde Petersen.

These recordings will be layered with Dylan's interpretations of classic Scotch-English ballads about human/fairy encounters from early modern England and Scotland(15th-18th century). It will also feature guest vocalists to sing the songs. This is not being done through a label, as earth's output has, but is a labor of love/obsession of Dylan's. Being primarily of Scotch-English descent, this is an historical journey to his personal and cultural past, embracing music/folklore/the occult dimension and history. This is also result of personal experience's of 'the other side'. His blog, http://drcarlsonalbion.wordpress.com/ has details, if interested.

The field recordings will be accomplished in April-May of 2012. The rest of the recording/mastering will be finished in summer and early fall, the artwork is an ongoing process, already begun. Dylan is planning to have it all done for a May 2013 release.

Join in the restoration of magic, a return to a world of spirits. Where all objects have a will of their own and a language they speak in, and we have learned how to speak with them again. It will be titled "Coleman Grey presents 'Falling with a Thousand Stars and Other Wonders from the House of Albion'."