Winterstar, the smaller, indoor version of Starwood, is not all that diiferent from a small sf or comics con, but it gives me and the band Einstein's Secret Orchestra an excuse to record/rehearse the new stuff that builds up in our glands during the hibernation period of deep winter. Also it gives the singles a chance to meet new potential fuckees.
In this case, I got to premiere both the new video, "DOBBSFILM SHORTIES," and my new preaching robes -- a SEQUIN-COVERED POPE-SUIT complete with ELECTRIC POPE HAT with BLINKING COLORED BULBS. This was made by Rev. Bunny, the textiles professor who also made my green fuzzy-shouldered preaching jacket and Chas Smith's orange-flamed ESO rock star coat.
I feel kind of weird in a Pope suit, since I was not raised around Catholics, and never really learned any of the cool Catholic ritual and mumbo-jumbo. My parents were Atheist Methodists in the Day, you might say, and Pappy still is one, though Mammy is a Republican now instead. The only papist hand-gesture I know is the forehead-tits-crotch variation on the Sign of the Cross, which Mark Mothersbaugh taught me. And a Texas accent doesn't really go with papal robes; indeed, it makes the whole thing look kind of KKK. But what the heck. It looks too cool not to wear.
We also unveiled the Bullet Proof Full Metal Dobbshead by Rev. Blackout, the first and hugest of the Metal Dobbsheads, this one being 4 feet high. When we get the Church Steam Locomotive, this art piece will be the cowcatcher. Until then, it has replaced the Giant Vinyl Dobbshead Painted by Jesus as Mightiest Stage Dobbshead. The fact that it's buletproof makes it doubly useful.
A mutated form of ESO, including Ron Slabe on second keyboard, jammed and/or rehearsed new songs for the March 15 Cleveland devival ALL NIGHT LONG, going through 6 90 minute tapes. I got to hear the rough versions of the new ESO covers like Crimson and Clover, Suicide is Painless, Kawliga, Oops I Did It Again, the Full Metal Jacket "I love the Marine Corps" chants, and more that I can't remember. The music from last year was so good (and decently recorded) that I used some of it for soundtracks of some DOBBSFILM SHORTIES segments, and of course it thrums along behind HOUR OF SLACK credits frequently.
While the band played, I ran projections of the new videotape, which exposed the ravers, hippie babies and neopagans to THOUSANDS of subliminally implanted Dobbsheads (via the art of LeMur and IMBJR) and images of SubGenius mutants having fun at Brushwood X-Day Drills.
At the last minute, before I had to return the borrowed DV gear, I was able to edit/animate THREE new "video slide shows" from old art and photos:
1) THE ART FROM A.B.S. OF IMBJR (1999a)
These 400-odd art pieces go by at 2 per second, for about 4 minutes. They represent only the FIRST THREE MONTHS of ONE YEAR of IMBJR's output (same period in '99 as the LeMur video slide-show I made earlier). IMBJR did one of these himself some years ago, but it was a teeny web movie running at one art piece per FRAME rather than 2 per SECOND.
Seeing this video makes you realize that what IMBJR supposedly did is impossible, and that there must be an entire committee of artists using that same name.
2) XX-DAY -- THE SUBGENIUS EXPERIENCE.
This 8 minute film (at 2 photos per second) contains every photo from BOTH XX-Day 99 and XXX-Day 2000 that is on SubSITE. ESO instrumental music goes with the pics. I CRIED the first time I saw the whole thing assembled. Because it brings back ALL THE GOOD MEMORIES AT ONCE -- all the cool people, cool art and timelessly cool moments, with all the headaches edited out.
It makes you realize how god damned wonderful the Church of the SubGenius really is, which is easy to forget when you're bogged down in text on a computer screen and worries about sales.
3) 3 minutes containing all the photographs by Wei and me of the last FOUR Starwoods. (I plan to do another one using only Pater Nostril's gorgeous Starwood photos.)
This one is not especially SubGenius-y so it won't be on future versions of DOBBSFILM SHORTIES. BUT, it was great for getting the attention of the pagans at Winterstar, who all go to Starwood, and it served as a wonderful illustration by contrast of how much more BIZARRE, COLORFUL and TIT-FILLED our events are than theirs, albeit with 100 people instead of 1,000.
OH YES!! Uunconnected to Winterstar or "Bob", Einstein's Secret Orchestra AGAIN won "Best Electronic-Instrumental Band" in the Free Times Music Awards, which must REALLY piss off the tekno people, since ESO isn't electronic nor instrumental most of the time.
Almost none of my pagan enemies were at Winterstar, and the ones that were kept a low profile, and most of my pagan friends were there, so I had TONS OF FUN and never once had to grab somebody by the caller and ask them if they wanted to go outside to get their teeth knocked out. I consider it a blessing every time that DOESN'T happen now.
My sermon was mostly a truncated version of the "To Depressed Middle Aged SubGenii" rant that I suddenly woke up spewing the other week, combined with the Revised List of Priorities rant that was brewed during a phone conversation with Dok Frop. And then when that ran out early I did the "One Conspiracy of Rich Fucks?" rant about war-spawned paranoia. Plus I worked in stuff from the stash of funny one-liners and "too-high-concepts" that I wrote down on napkin scraps since the last string of devivals. I love to surprise Princess Wei with these old gags, since she was usually there when I wrote 'em down -- often being the one quoted -- but never remembers having said or heard them. (Neither do I until I go through the One Liners Stash.)
This rant went over GREAT with the pagans, and I got a good recording of it, something almost impossible to do at a REAL DEVIVAL, since every single individual in a real SubGenius crowd is hollering inanities as loud as the preacher is half the time. That makes for a FUN audience experience, but is fershlugginer as far as airworthy recordings go. Also, the preachers are inclined to cuss a lot more at a SubGenius event in a BAR, than at a nice pagan event in a nice ballroom, causing that irritating fuck-cutting one hears on American radio broadcasts of HOUR OF SLACK.
Speaking of THE HOUR OF SLACK, the Conspiracy has apparently decided to start cracking down on the Internet, especially in the area of webcasting sound. The new laws governing Internet audio or video broadcasts in the U.S. are suddenly MUCH MORE STRINGENT than the ones governing air broadcasts. In other words, from now on, no cussing on the Internet, every single ASCAP artist must be credited, listed, logged AND PAID, etc. etc. etc. Oh, and it all has to be on a file too big to be downloaded by mortals -- 5 hours.
Chas and I have discussed this and have decided that both of our shows can be made to meet these rules, without too many changes. No fucks and shits, of course... but, also, NO MORE CONSPIRACY MUSIC. In other words, playing ONLY recordings by people who are NOT signed with ASCAP or with any label or with ANY DAMN BODY BUT THEMSELVES.
PRAISE FUCKING "BOB"!
Hour of Slack only uses a smattering of Con-approved
rock and roll, and movie soundtracks; using NONE would
hardly impact us since we're already 90% original-content.
The fucking fucks.
I am SO GLAD that I dropped everything else in 1995 and put my every spare effort into getting our shit up on the Internet, come hell or high water, paid or not, because I just KNEW that the incredible Slack of being able to post any god damned thing one wanted would last about TEN YEARS before the FUX figured out a way to implement total control. (Actually for awhile there I thought that They would NEVER be able to control the Internet -- but then I saw my first BANNER AD and realized the End had already Begun.)
And now the end is here. It really is a police state and we really can't do anything that might lose Them an extra penny in, say, Britny Spears record sales.
Enjoy your X-rated Hours of Slack while you can. Pretty soon the only uncut ones will be those on the "11 Hours of Slack in MP3" series. Assuming there's a SubGenius PO Box and website to purchase them from. Which there WILL be if I can help it. Sooner or later, somebody WILL purchase something from Connivin' Ivan's... of this I am sure.
Although, to tell the truth, if things don't pick up soon, we won't be able to pay our server bill even, and then I'll REALLY be able to relax. Hell, I'll be able to become NORMAL if I want to. Ahhhhh... think how much easier it would be.
But, until that unpayable bill comes, I... OH FUCK!!! I JUST REMEMBERED!!! THE GOD DAMNED HOUR OF SLACK!!! I STILL HAVE TO DO ONE! AND DUB AND MAIL IT! TODAY!!! AND THE POSTCARDS to MEMBERS in OHIO about the MARCH 15 DEVIVAL -- I HAVE TO FIGURE OUT HOW TO COPY THE WINDOWS VERSION OF THE OHIO MAILING LIST OVER TO MY MAC PROG -- PRINT THE LABELS -- BUY THE STAMPS -- AFIX THE POSTCARDS -- AND MAIL THOSE TOO!
WHAT THE FUCK AM I DOING SITTING HERE *TYPING*??!?!?
P.S. -- DOBBSFILM SHORTIES was shown in pieces at Winterstar and I sold all the VHS copies I had. The pagans sure seemed to like it. Whereas, of FOUR new CD-Rs of our killer audio work, not one copy has sold yet, anywhere, to Sub or Pagan. This tells me to work much less strenuously on the Hour of Slack, and to concentrate on the on the animation and bug porn. DUH! People want things with high price tags on them, and tend to flee from anything that might once have been given out free. I keep FORGETTING!!!
FUCK-- that SHOW!! I forgot. EEEEEEEEE EEEEEEEEEE EEEEEEEEE EEEEEEEEe shift out of text mode -- shift to audio edit mode -- prep duplication/labelmaking mode.
MEEEP MEEEP MEEEP
Original file name: Winterstar Reporttxt.txt - converted on Thursday, 29 May 2003, 16:43
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