Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes: academic to spend year as David Bowie's many personas
He plans to watch the same films Bowie would have done, and claims he has submitted himself to sleep deprivation and, some weekends, eaten only red peppers and drunk only milk. The project also involves listening only to songs Bowie would have heard.
He has read works by William Burroughs, the postmodernist writer of the Beat generation; Aleister Crowley, the English occultist; Michael Moorcock, the science fiction author, and ideas about the death of God and existentialism by the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.
Further article.
https://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/scholar-to-spend-year-as-david-bowie
Everyone's aware that Bowie referenced Crowley and the Golden Dawn in one of his early songs?
I can't imagine that any members of this site are unaware of that.
I tend not to get excited by references to Crowley in pop music.
I can't imagine that any members of this site are unaware of that.
I tend not to get excited by references to Crowley in pop music.
"Quicksand" (which references AC) is on "Hunky Dory". How well known was Bowie when that album was released?
I am (Eye wuz) unaware of that. But then ... I couldn't care less 😀
I tend not to get excited by references to Crowley in pop music.
Me too! I'm actually not aware of any refs by any band/performer ... except for AC's pic on a Beatles album cover. But then, I usually don't pay attention to the lyrics of any pop song unless they are crystal clear and audibly legible (please pardon the mixed metaphor).
Performers tend to drop AC's name or symbol or reference because it's cool or bad or sinister, I suppose. To sex and drugs, add rock 'n' roll metal-headery.
Please don't cancel my identity or membership because I'm so dull and stoopid >:(
But how many people will admit to being dull and stupid because they can’t understand the (reference in the) lyrics? (I don’t get it myself, with all the talk about imagery and uniforms! I preferred it when he stared in Jagger’s eyes and scored (♪ like the videofilms, etc).
Maybe someone who’s sufficiently cool could explain it all, please? 😀
Norma N Joy Conquest 8)
I don't understand the point you're trying to make, but to answer your question: Bowie's star was rising at the time "Hunky Dory" was released. I was aware of him, as were the people I hung around with. He was hardly an obscure, 'underground' artist, having had a huge hit with "Space Oddity".
So, anyway, this academic dude is going to pretend to be Bowie for a year in order to "understand" him better ... so he can write a book about it. Okay, this makes about as much sense as slipping "Thelema" into a song (preferably while wearing black with blood-red lipstick). In the end, it's all stuff about becoming famous (by selling books or songs or by raising controversy). In other words, it's a weird ego trip for gaining attention or money. I guess it works for some folks. ::)
Maybe I will dress up as the scarlet woman for a year while pretending to live at Cefalu? It'll make a great book. Please send your prepublication dollars to my PayPal account ... so I can be featured in a forum that belittles my name when the book never gets printed ;D
I don't understand the point you're trying to make, but to answer your question: Bowie's star was rising at the time "Hunky Dory" was released. I was aware of him, as were the people I hung around with. He was hardly an obscure, 'underground' artist, having had a huge hit with "Space Oddity".
This was a time when "pop stars" could be serious artists. Kate Bush managed to get a Gurdjieff reference into the top 20. It's an interesting cultural trend that the top 20 has become more and more mindless and anti-musical and anti artistic. I mean this sort of hell; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_uoH6hJilc or any Mylie Cyrus hell. It's literally like regressing to kindergarten experiencing this sort of soul-sucking drivel. This is perhaps the destructive aspect of the effects of the impact of Horus the Child. Synthesized computer technology had a lot to do with it.
David, not that I watch many music videos etc but i have watched many live recordings of performances, at events like the Super Bowl, Awards or sports events etc.
Quite a lot of music videos and stages these days, almost can be witnessed as a magickal ritual. Dark Horse by Katy Perry is one. [flash=600,400:2qcijslb] https://www.youtube.com/v/iiXOyOQJd30 [/flash:2qcijslb]
[flash=600,400:2qcijslb] https://www.youtube.com/v/COFBy-OFlos [/flash:2qcijslb]
Madonna at the Super Bowl another.
[flash=600,400:2qcijslb] https://www.youtube.com/v/X3ik_8QjM3U [/flash:2qcijslb]
There are many examples of ritualistic play in modern pop music. Massively surpassing a fleeting reference to a Gurdjieff quote IMO.
In order to achieve a full “understanding” of what, say, A.C. went through, surely it would be necessary for somebody to give all of their money away – maybe go bankrupt?! without “social security” – and go hand to mouth and cap in hand reliant on other people’s handouts, charitable outlook & kindly disposition? They should also become a fully fledged cocaine and heroin addict in order “to feel as the master felt”, and in order to fully immerse and drench themselves in the experience.
I was rather hoping david, that in view of your earlier posting you might be able to clarify the relevant lyrics of Quicksand for us all:
[…] I’m closer to the Golden Dawn
Immersed in Crowley’s uniform
Of imagery […]
Why do you think the singer felt closer to the Victorian order Crowley helped wreck, dressed up to the nines in his clobber or filled with a way of looking at the world through his language? No cheating by going to the temple of google and shamelessly cribbing somebody else’s pensées on the subject, do you hear now?! Your transparent attempt to do so will easily be found out!
Let’s also not forget either that “one magic(k)al moment from Kether to Malkuth”, as expressed in the song Station to Station from the eponymous album – itself feasibly a reference to the sephiroth on the Tree of Life, and also featured on some of the background art originally destined to go with the recording. (Incidentally P.-R. König’s website www.parareligion.ch/bowie.htm explores the “occult” and david bowie’s œuvre as a whole for those interested in taking this interest further, devoting a whole section to it.)
While I think of it david, you also never clarified the business of what you think constitutes ‘Thelemic’ music or art generally, which was left dangling from another couple of threads a while back. You didn’t seem to think that the performance of Ornette Coleman’s music qualified, whilst apparently favouring something different. What is your opinion of mr bowie in this regard? Although you appear to like chatting generally - and I am surprised you were never “one” for the delights of the “babble-on” box (literally) - you seem a little reticent & reluctant to expand your opinions on the matter in this department... or might I be mistaken?
Not the side effects of the cocaine (honestly),
N Joy
Ptoner, Perry exemplifies the mindlessness of modern pop music and if you think that all there is to Kate Bush is mere references to Gurdjieff then you are sorely mistaken.
@jbarter, I never passed an opinion on Coleman, please don't misrepresent me.
Bowie? The number one master-shaman of modern western civilzation.
Oooh, Katy Perry vs. Kate Bush Catfight - Ladies, get out your Popcorn!
Is Kate Bush a Thelemite? Am I missing something profound with your statement David? PS it was you who mentioned that a reference getting into top 20, being a roaring achievement.
Cheers William, for the prompt. I will just leave this question here and depart. 🙂
I note a few posts where somebody is launching out attacks upon modern pop culture. Hahaha. Every generation pulls this same stunt against the "new" generation's tastes and interests. We older folks have seen several such revolutions. "Things were better in the good ol' days when life was smpler and these crazy kids weren't allowed to run around doing crazy tings" >:(
Back when I was a growing-up high-schooler and early college twerp, we used to visit the Beatnik cafes on Sunset Blvd in LA, nd onder at their difference. They were weird, but already a dying breed. Our contemporary paradigm was early Rock 'n' Roll (The Coasters, Little Richard, Fats Domino) ... and Elvis Presley was the star who shone at the end of that era. Legal LSD also contributed to the end of that era and gave rise to The Aimals, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, etc.
Then came the discordant Metal bands, and they were perceived at "mindless" by us, but worshipped by that bunch of immature twerps who were younger than us. Soon stange Goths were seen in black, with black lipstick, black fngerpaint, and black hair, all of whom were surely destined for the looney bin.
And so it goes. Now we have posters who are decrying the modern pop culture. Probably they are not aware that the same old disgust at the younger generation is an ongoing scenario.
Along similar lines, it should be noted that various people (anyone, in fact) can get "stuck" at any age, due to trauma, or frustration, or genetic stuckness. That is, a person is drifting along in life and "something" happens that "freezes" their emotional and/or mental processes at that age.
Then, they continue to grow up, but their persona still functions (in ways small and/or large) at that earlier level. Usually, a stressful or traumatic event (similar to their original imprinting event) will kick them off and they will revert to the mental/emotional status of a disturbed 8-year-old (or 11, or 14, or 17, as the case might be). Any such conditions can easily be seen by onlookers. It is this syndrome that surfaces when a person becomes 4=7, and it is the cause of most failures upon the path (at Netzach) if they fail to unmask and neutralize their dilemma.
On the other foot, a person may become a poster on a semi-public forum, and their true identity and address are occulted, so that they feel free to express their repressed disturbances. Thus, a person of (say) 50 years of age may appear (online) to be an adolescent. And (as stated above) everyone who is onlooking can see it. They may actually be astounded when they discover the true age of the poster.
I am, of course, speaking (writing) about my own problem, and my remarks should not be identified with any other specific person. Unless it's so terrbly obvious that you cannot refrain from crying out, "Oh look, it's him, fit to a tee and that without question."
You obviously haven't checked out the top 20 lately.
Nor have I for that matter; I stopped paying attention to such things a long time ago. I dare say Shiva has better things to do with his time than listen to the hit parade.
Charmer that you are, david, you have slagged Coleman off considerably on these forums in the past. (Oh, you meant Ornette, not Jaz... Do forgive me there!)
Are you making a specific point here? I'm wondering what it is... Meanwhile it appears you have not grown out of your acquired bad habit of not responding to particular points put. That is the sort of malefic influence Los has had upon you... ;D (No ch-ch-change there then)
N Joy
Nor have I for that matter; I stopped paying attention to such things a long time ago. I dare say Shiva has better things to do with his time than listen to the hit parade.
Then that renders Shiva's points about me perhaps becoming old and jaded and distorted, invalid. I have to listen to the top 20 on the radio, in my workplace, otherwise i wouldn't.
What station would that be on, david? I get the feeling Magic (no pun (intended). By the way - isn’t Cilla Black (who found fame as the cloakroom girl at the Cavern Club at the same time as The Beatles) meant to be number one at the moment?
Not quite sure of the point I’m trying to make here either... 😮 ::) ;D
N Joy
Not quite sure of the point anyone is trying to make here, except to note that I have been misquoted, mistreated and misunderstood. I am therefore comtemplating harakiri. The [s:3qd1ykfx]Lost Face[/s:3qd1ykfx], er, loss of face, is simply too much to [s:3qd1ykfx]bare[/s:3qd1ykfx], um, bear.
[/align:3qd1ykfx]
This may cheer you up 🙂 ;
What are your grounds for regarding David Bowie as "the number one master-shaman of modern western civilzation"? Though I like his music, that seems to me to be a tad overstated.
What's the significance of a Gurdjieff reference or two in Kate Bush's work? That she was a student of Gurdjieff? Or of Reich, if we listen to "Cloudbusting"? Possibly; but on the other hand, she could have been only marginally interested in these things.
Let me give you an example in another medium, film: specifically, "Magical Mystery Tour" featuring the Beatles. In one scene there are several issues of the Carfax Monographs pinned to the wall. This is interesting, since Kenneth Grant didn't really come to prominence until the publication in 1969 of Crowley's Confessions, although the presence of an article on Crowley in "International Times" in I think 1968 suggests that he was quite well known as an occultist in London at the time. However, I'm not sure that any of the Beatles themselves would have been familiar at the time (1967) with Grant's work, let alone the Monographs which were published in the late 1950s to early 1960s.
It's easy to overstate the significance of a smattering of references.
What are your grounds for regarding David Bowie as "the number one master-shaman of modern western civilzation"?
In the past (not on this forum) at this point someone usually tries to be funny by making a denigrating reference to "Laughing gnome" without realizing that that was a clever and insidiously planted pop song about connecting with omni dimensional entities via LSD or otherwise.
Are you asking me to question my subjective experience as having explanatory powerlessness? Fair enough but don't take it from me, look at all of the amazing artists he influenced. Read "artist" as "shaman" by the way, not Mylie Cyrus etc.
Probably not.
Actually it's a close one between Clinton and Bowie.
Hillary?
Or George, given david's recent space migration (and psychedelics) interests?
George Clinton was at one time a disciple of the Process Church; see the liner notes to America Eats Its Young (by Funkadelic), and perhaps a couple other early P-Funk recordings.
I see many of us are being vacuumed back into responding to the troll's bizarre ideas. Alas, for us and the AC Society ::)
Ignant, I was famiiarized with George Clinton circa 1993 and with Leary's SMI2LE circa 1989.
Bill, clearly.
In the past (not on this forum) at this point someone usually tries to be funny by making a denigrating reference to "Laughing gnome" without realizing that that was a clever and insidiously planted pop song about connecting with omni dimensional entities via LSD or otherwise.
Isn't that all a bit spooky-wooky & oojie-woojie for your tastes, david? Also, I'm sure that your master Los might not entirely approve...
In a word, Yes.
Ha, ha, ha! Hee, hee, hee!
N Joy
In the past (not on this forum) at this point someone usually tries to be funny by making a denigrating reference to "Laughing gnome" without realizing that that was a clever and insidiously planted pop song about connecting with omni dimensional entities via LSD or otherwise.
Isn't that all a bit spooky-wooky & oojie-woojie for your tastes, david? Also, I'm sure that your master Los might not entirely approve...
I didn't write it, Bowie did.
In the past (not on this forum) at this point someone usually tries to be funny by making a denigrating reference to "Laughing gnome" without realizing that that was a clever and insidiously planted pop song about connecting with omni dimensional entities via LSD or otherwise.
Isn't that all a bit spooky-wooky & oojie-woojie for your tastes, david? Also, I'm sure that your master Los might not entirely approve...
I didn't write it, Bowie did.
But you like(d) it! Gave it your approval: and apart from saying it was an insidious plant you described it as “clever”, being straight from the mouth of the number one master shaman etc etc grovel etc !? (Is that not an endorsement or is that not an endorsement?) ::) So you implicitly appear to approve of - what was it exactly? Supernatural, extra-terrestrial, omni-dimensional whatchamacallits?...
Was it “Magic”, by the way? The radio station, I mean…
Make mine a glass of dandelion wine, with a side order of roasted toadstools if you please (burp, pardon)
N Joy
Why are you dragging me into this conversation?