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Afterword
and notes on contributors
Blastitude first came on my screen while researching reviews
of psychedelic music. Blastitude was filled with strange left
turns; raging sports commentators in a rock zine, reviews of
CDR oddities, snake-oil reviews, and rants that kept me on the
page. When I first saw the name I thought, WYNDHAM LEWIS and
BLAST, the future has finally arrived -- later did I realize
this was an inspiration and vision direct from Angus Maclise.
We
tossed letters back and forth. I sent some THE END IS HERE promos
to blast honcho Matt Silcock. It was evident we had some overlap
of interests. We had a meeting in the bookstore and things started
clicking. I’d like to thank Matt for having enough blastitude
to try out this experiment. His suggestion to interview Ira
Cohen was dead perfect. Ira became a bridge, to and from many
of the ideas and people I cared about. He was central. Ira was
created for Blastitude and Eternity. Going forward, I began
to assemble a small group of writers and artists around eternity
and issues of personal interest.
The
collage or map for ETERNITY was meant to be an open-ended game
board, sort of an endless pinball loop without the scoring.
The game was developed for an OUTRAGEOUS CHERRY 12" double
album LP (an altered fold-out version appears in their current
US CD: THE BOOK OF SPECTRAL PROJECTIONS) The original game had
sets of cards, strategy and karma decks. It was a game meant
to be invented by the players, with no goal or end to it. Once
you got on the map, that was it, you never got out. The map
allowed 13 pages or "portals" of entry and was not
meant to be followed chronologically.
The
artists, writers and direction of this Blastitude issue were
all of key importance. They are passionate about their subjects,
experts in esoteric knowledge. Exotic consultants. I viewed
this issue as a spiral of overlapping adventures. Hopefully
there's something of interest for everyone who looks and perhaps
it will lead you too on an infinite journey. I'd like to also
thank Matt for his level headed approach, reason and clarity
in arranging the material. I threw a mountain of garbage his
way and he really plucked out the weeds and cleared a path.
I would like to hear any comments or suggestions you might have
about this issue. Please comment to: Cary@thebookbeat.com
ANNEKE AUER
is a conceptual artist, mother, excellent cook, and well noted
Dutch web designer. We began a long discussion about developing
the map as an electronic game board. We felt it would work well
on the net. When the idea of doing Blastitude came around we
discussed using it as a menu page for this new thing. Anneke
had total freedom to play and animate the collage. Hr animations
now appear as a menu and contents page on the Blastitude online
version. Without her efforts and enthusiasm this issue wouldn’t
have happened. One day we will complete the true map…. In the
meantime Anneke and I are now working on the very special GLOW
IN THE DARK GALLERY-- a farout online exhibition art space we
hope to have rolling soon. Thank you Anneke! She also runs her
own artsite under the SOMNILOQUY INSTITUTE. One of her recent
works was THE MISSING GENE PROJECT, you can test your own DNA
right now at: http://www.xs4all.nl/~cuckoo/TSI/index.html
TOSH BERMAN runs a fantastic small press called TAM-TAM BOOKS
in Los Angeles. His press has published the only known novel
of Serge Gainsbourg:EVGUENIE SOKOLOV, and the infamous noir
masterpiece by Boris Vian: I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVES-- Tosh keeps
me informed of worldwide Situationist events by his e-mails
and his touching essay on his genius/artist father is a lovely
treasure to have included. You can reach TAM TAM at: http://www.tamtambooks.com
BEN SCHOT is an artist, publisher, curator and English teacher
in Rotterdam, Holland. His SEA URCHIN press editions has reprinted
EDGAR ALLEN POE’S fantstic fiction and will soon reprint the
Dutch translation of LES CHAMPS MAGNETIQUES by André
Breton and Philippe Soupault. Sea Urchin is also producing (in
English) the 'comic opera' STINKFOOT by Vivian Stanshall and
his wife Ki Longfellow-Stanshall. He is a great friend and source
of support. We first met at his (and Ronald Corneilsons) invitation
for DAM to participate in the seminal exhibition “I RIP YOU,
YOU RIP ME”-- which was a cornerstone exhibition, seminar, film
screening, and workshop held in 1998 at the Boijmans Museum
and other venues in Rotterdam. This was the first time that
the various issues of Detroit, DAM and its cross-currents could
be seen and examined at one time. It was an eye-opener. This
one event has led to many other projects, connections, offshoots
and explorations which included DAM’s recent installation at
the Whitney Biennial. You can reach Ben and SEA URCHIN EDITIONS
AT: http://www.sea-urchin.net
LEN
BUKOWSKI is a friend, musician, occultist, teacher, SUN RA aficionado,
and collector, with over 110 original Saturns. He can be heard
on the recent CDs: 19 MOONS with the Northwoods Improvisers
w/Faruq Z. Bey and PEYOTEMIND with Monster Island and John Sinclair.
Relocating soon to the Boston area he will be sorely missed,
along with his trademark citation: BE IN PEACE.
IRA COHEN,
mystic bard, tantric photographer, film-maker inside of God's
eyelid, international rice paper adventurer from Tangier to
Katmandu, pothead, wiseman, crackpot-saint, electronic multimedia
shaman, jackass guru, publisher of GNOUA, the STAR STREAM
series, and other cosmic debris. Ira Cohen is a man of lavish
panache, an overabundance of energy, delirium, class, wit and
spontaneity, a lovely beatific combustible soul who has peppered
the planet with his own surrealist intelligence Seek more of
this grande sage at www.iracohen.org.
DIANE DI
PRIMA is one of the most accomplished women poets working today.
She is most famously known for her X rated send up: MEMOIRS
OF A BEATNIK. In the early sixties she began THE FLOATING BEAR
press which also published Ray Johnson and Jack Smith. Last
year she published RECOLLECTIONS OF MY LIFE AS A WOMAN: THE
NEW YORK YEARS, a phenomenal autobiography that will have you
glued to every page.
WILLIAM
S.WILSON has been a close friend of the artist Ray Johnson for
over 40 years. From his essay on Ray in THE PAPER SNAKE, published
by SOMETHING ELSE PRESS in 1964, to his 1997 essay WITH RAY:
THE ART OF FRIENDSHIP in the Black Mountain College Dossier
series #4: (RAY JOHNSON), Bill has kept up a constant flowing
stream. His apartment is a refuge, archive and world headquarters
for all information regarding Ray Johnson. There is no question
that Bill is a gate keeper to the eternal network. His comments
on Ray and the number 13 are a sublime and welcome contribution.
MIKE KELLEY
is a friend, humorist, musician and artist of great magnitude.
A fellow founder of Destroy All Monsters, its always a great
pleasure to meet and conspire together. He is one of the most
original thinkers on the planet. A collection of Mike's critical
writing will appear in the fall of 2002, published by MIT press.
LENI SINCLAIR
works in both film and photography, and has captured the Detroit
1960s like no other. She continues to photograph and has been
published widely in magazines, newspapers, books, and CDs. She
lives in Detroit and you can visit her website of legendary
music photography at: http://home.earthlink.net/~lenisinclair
JEFFREY
SILVERTHORNE has been a photographer for over 40 years. He has
taken on projects many would consider raw, undeserving, inelegant
and subversive. He has documented morgues, prisons, whorehouses,
transvestites, border towns, missing persons, Coney Island parades
and goth kids. Jefffrey is a longtime friend and Book Beat gallery
regular. In 1992 we published a small monograph of his work.
JOHN
SINCLAIR is a poet, performer, author, music journalist and
award winning radio programmer, record producer, former Professor
of Blues History at Wayne State University in Detroit, ex-Chairman
of the White Panther Party, ex-Manager of the MC5, ex-political
prisoner… founding producer of the Ann Arbor Blues and Jazz
Festival, Executive Director of the Detroit Jazz Center, founding
member of the Detroit Artist Workshop… the legendary John Sinclair
("one of the hardest working poets in show-business"
-- Ben Edmonds) continues to kick out the jams from his
modern-day headquarters in New Orleans. Visit the Big Chief
at: http://www.jass.com/sinclair/
BYRON COLEY
is a top-ten writer, record producer, book publisher, and left
field agent provocateur. We've been lobbing projects like grenades
since 1995 when he took on co-production for the DAM 3CD boxed
set. Byron and company's NEW GRASS CENTER FOR UNDERGROUND CULTURE
brings in the riotous acts and the Ecstatic-Yod collective produces
and sells some of the most respected sound rarities on the planet.
You can find Yod pontificating at: http://www.yod.com
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