Russell Cuzner – { feuilleton }

Weekend links 413

Cover art and design by David Pelham, 1974. The author’s name is set in Marvin (see below).

• Revelation of the week is a lengthy, career-spanning interview with Igor Wakhévitch, the French composer whose extraordinary run of albums from the 1970s are cult items in these parts. (Previously) Wakhévitch isn’t exactly reclusive but he lives in India, and hasn’t recorded anything since the 1980s, so in recent years he wasn’t visible or even known much at all outside France. The release in 1998 of a CD collection, Donc…, and a handful of vinyl reissues, brought him out of obscurity, although all the reissues to date have been in limited quantities. Work of this quality really warrants a wider release.

• The Sky Torn Apart is a new album by Paul Schütze, his first for several years. Very good it is too, 56 minutes of growling and glittering atmospherics that could equally suit the enervating heights of summer (as in Wendy Carlos’s drone piece from Sonic Seasonings) as the depths of winter, the inspiration being the apocalyptic cycles of Norse mythology.

• At Lambda Literary: Cathy Camper talks to cartoonist Justin Hall about his planned film, No Straight Lines, about the history of queer comics. There’s a Kickstarter for the project, and more background detail at QueerClick (NSFW).

• Introducing Marvin Visions, a digital revival of Marvin, a photoset typeface first launched in 1969, and very popular during the 1970s on science-fiction cover designs. Marvin Visions is free for personal use.

• The second number of the relaunched Wyrd Daze—”The multimedia zine of speculative fiction + extra-ordinary music, art & writing”—has arrived.

• At New Noise: Dylan Carlson (again) talking about the influences on his solo album, Conquistador.

• Video Drone: Russell Cuzner talks to Rose Kallal about her audio-visual concerts.

• Mix of the week: a Dark Souls-inspired drone mix from Justin C. Meyers.

• RIP Glenn Branca

• The Ascension (1981) by Glenn Branca | Ascension (1992) by O Yuki Conjugate | Ascension (2014) by The Bug

Weekend links 382

Raven (2015), a metal sculpture by Taiichiro Yoshida.

• “Lumia: Thomas Wilfred and the Art of Light [at the Smithsonian American Art Museum] restores Thomas Wilfred (1889–1968) to his rightful place in the history of modern art.”

• At Brown Noise Unit: a fascinating, lengthy interview by Philip Kaberry with Stephen O’Malley of Sunn O))) et al, with particular focus on O’Malley’s work with Japanese musicians.

• Erik Davis talks to scholar, writer, and mythographer William Rowlandson about Jorge Luis Borges, magical trees, Yankee mysticism, and the power of the weird and murky.

• The first issue of the world’s first magazine of fantastic art and literature, Der Orchideengarten (previously), has been reprinted in full with additional English translation.

• At Muddy Colors: the month in covers for September/October which includes my cover for Under the Pendulum Sun by Jeannette Ng (and which is on sale now).

• At 3:AM Magazine: Adam Scovell talks to horror author Ramsey Campbell about the ghost stories of MR James.

• Paralysis: Live at Silent Night #8, a new release on (limited) cassette and digital by The House In The Woods.

• At Dangerous Minds: Jozef van Wissem buries the dead in his new video, Virium Illarum.

• PKD Files — A podcast about the life and work of Philip K. Dick.

• Russell Cuzner on The Strange World of Nurse With Wound.

• Clark Collis on the rise and fall of Fangoria.

• The North Star Grassman And The Ravens (1971) by Sandy Denny | Flight Of The Raven (1979) by Emerald Web | Kill The Great Raven (1979) by Snakefinger

Weekend links 306

• The Midian Books Occulture catalogue launched this week sporting a cover that I pieced together for Midian’s Jonathan Davies. The design pastiches the look of the Process Church magazines of the early 1970s; inside there’s a haul of Process material on sale together with COUM/Throbbing Gristle ephemera (that’s Cosi Fanni Tutti on the right, as seen on her modelling business card), Kenneth Anger ephemera (that’s Bobby Beausoleil on the left) and much more.

• More occulture: Lost Envoy: The Tarot Deck of Austin Osman Spare launches on 11 May at Camden Arts Centre, Arkwright Road, London NW3 6DG, from 7–9pm. All are welcome.

• Out this week: Close To The Noise Floor – Formative UK Electronica 1975–1984: Excursions in Proto-Synth Pop, DIY Techno and Ambient Exploration.

• Mixes of the week: Spin Doctor’s All Vinyl Prince Tribute Mix, and the Rum Music Mix by Russell Cuzner.

• David Gentleman’s illustrations for New Penguin Shakespeare books, 1967–1977.

• More electronica: Walberswick by Jon Brooks is now available in a digital edition.

• Blown up: Steve Rose on how cinema captured the dark heart of the swinging 60s.

• Six Quietus writers choose favourite Prince songs. Related: The A–Z of Prince

• A Timeline of Slang Terms for Male Homosexuality by Jonathan Green.

• Berenice Abbott’s views of New York streets then and now.

• Jan Svankmajer is crowd-funding his next film, Insects.

• Laurie Anderson on the creation of O Superman.

• Blood Ceremony: The Great God Pan (2011) | Oliver Haddo (2011) | Ballad Of The Weird Sisters (2013) | Let It Come Down (2014)

Weekend links 280

Keepers of the Moon by Bill Crisafi.

• More Thomas Ligotti for obvious reasons: Weird Fiction Review now has two Ligotti interviews, one from 2011, and a new one prompted by the Penguin edition of his stories. Also at Weird Fiction Review, two Ligotti narratives: The Night School, and The Red Tower. The latter demonstrates how weird fiction can dispense with character and story and still have a powerful effect.

• Related to the above: Terrors supernatural and psychological: Laird Barron on Ray Russell’s The Case Against Satan; Russell’s novel is also being reprinted by Penguin this month. And at Dangerous Minds: a collection of vintage dolls and ventriloquist dummies.

• “Time and again his books—even as they tell of remote planets and their inhabitants—foresee something perplexingly close to our present-day society, from visionary constructions to machines of destruction.” Strange Flowers on Paul Scheerbart.

• Coil’s out-of-print discography gets a career-spanning reissue through Threshold Archives. Related: Russell Cuzner interviews Thighpaulsandra.

• Mixes of the week: The Ivy-Strangled Path Vol. XI by David Colohan, and Sounds From Beyond (October 2015) by Glossop Record Club.

• Bill Crisafi: Artist, Dreamer, Feral Mystic. An interview with the artist by S. Elizabeth for Dirge magazine.

• Also being given the revenant treatment, out-of-print short stories by Aleister Crowley.

• Alex Mar on the powerful appeal of modern witchcraft—even for a skeptic.

• A Rest Before The Walk is a new album by Keith Seatman.

• The Wounded Kings set out their stall at Bandcamp.

• The Witch Queen Of New Orleans (1971) by Redbone | Witch (1977) by Goblin | Ditch Witch (2009) by Pink Mountain

Weekend links 270

Cover design for UFOs and Extra-Terrestrials in History (four vols, 1978) by Yves Naud.

• Come To The Sabbath, “a festival of dark arts delving into the influence of Black Magick, Witchcraft, Demonology and Satanism in pop culture”, takes place at Apiary Studios, 458 Hackney Road, London, from Tues 18th–Sun 23rd August.

• “Visitors, if there had ever been any, would have said that the little town of Mansfield was haunted.” Showdown is a previously unpublished short story by Shirley Jackson.

• “A sandbox stealthy immersive sim in a surreal, horror-y world inspired by writers like Burroughs and Ballard…” Alice O’Connor previews the forthcoming computer game, Tangiers.

Sometime in the late 1960s, the artist Robert Smithson took a trip to southwestern Ohio. He saw the Great Serpent Mound there and decided that he would make a great spiral too. […] Because the Great Salt Lake’s levels vary several feet from year to year, and also from season to season, Spiral Jetty is not always visible even if you make the trip to Utah. You could go out to Spiral Jetty and find that the entire earthwork is invisible underwater. When Robert Smithson created this earthwork in 1970, he did not care if it could be easily seen or who owned it. And so, even today, no one knows to whom Spiral Jetty really belongs. To view it requires a pilgrimage.

Stefany Anne Goldberg on earthworks, new and ancient, and the art of disappearance

• “Commercial book cover design is a minor portion of Gorey’s award-winning legacy, but not a lesser art.” Steven Heller on Edward Gorey: cover designer.

• “You are accepted,” he says, “by the genre that can accept you.” Samuel R. Delany talked to Peter Bebergal about being an outsider in the world of science fiction.

• A battle of Witts: A brief look at ‘Taboos’ and the work of The Passage. Mark Griffiths on a great, if seldom-remembered, Manchester band.

• “Hispanic photomonteur Josep Renau aimed Technicolor jets of scorn at the mirage of US consumerist culture,” says Rick Poynor.

• Because the internet is really big… Kelli Anderson reworks the Eames’ The Powers of Ten using imagery found via Google searches.

• Against Nature is a forthcoming musical adaptation of Huysmans’ À Rebours by Marc Almond, Jeremy Reed and Othon.

• “What makes a film noir?” Adam Frost & Melanie Patrick have an infographic for you.

• Mixes of the week: Gizehcast #20 by LCC, and Jenny Hval‘s WEIRD Quietus mix.

• Mysterium Tremendum: Russell Cuzner on The Strange World of Lustmord.

• The charming march of the Penguin Books logo.

• Cosey Fanni Tutti: Agent Provocateur

• Dark Times (Peel Session) (1980) by The Passage | XOYO (1982) by The Passage | Revelation (1982) by The Passage