Saturday 6 July 2013

The Murdoch tapes: News Corp culture and the phone hacking scandal

News Corporation executive chairman Rupert Murdoch has been secretly recorded regretting the assistance given to authorities who were investigating allegations of phone hacking and corruption at his newspapers.
In a 45-minute recording of a speech to staff at his British newspaper The Sun made by a reporter in attendance and subsequently leaked to the press, the News Corporation boss also described payments to police and public officials as part of “the culture of Fleet Street”.
Of the police investigation, Murdoch added:

I mean, it’s a disgrace. Here we are, two years later, and the cops are totally incompetent.

In a statement, News Corporation said: “Mr Murdoch never knew of payments made by Sun staff to police before News Corporation disclosed that to UK Authorities. Furthermore, he never said he knew of payments. It’s absolutely false to suggest otherwise.”

Cover of the first BUY or DIE!, Ralph Records’ mail order catalogue

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(Thanx Mark!)

She's a Punk Rocker U.K. (Zillah Minx 2010)

The Full version of Documentary "She's A Punk Rocker U.K" Directed by Zillah Minx. Made by and about Punk Rock Women, 1977 Punk Rock an Oral History by the women who were part of Punk.
"Punk women changed the public face of female. It was very empowering for universal women. The story of punk could almost be a women's liberation story." Caroline Coon

Friday 5 July 2013

llustrating Twitter's #BooksWithaLetterMissing

Sometimes hashtags are annoying, but sometimes they bring out creative genius. Take “Books With a Letter Missing” (#bookswithalettermissing). Though many Twitter users have contributed ideas, one, @darth, has actually been Photoshopping the covers of these “fake” books.
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Guy Debord 3D Action Figure

3D-printed Guy Debord action figures. Produced by McKenzie Wark, design by Peer Hansen, with technical assistance by Rachel L. Modified by Patrick Lichty.
(Thanx to Ken for the images!)
DOWNLOAD FILES
HERE

A Cavalier History of Situationism: An Interview with McKenzie Wark

Guy Debord: La Société du spectacle (1973)

Info
The Society of the Spectacle

Thursday 4 July 2013

Adrian Sherwood on 'Tackhead Tape Time'

“Tackhead Tape Time was made from unreleased and exclusive versions of our recordings that were like Dub Plates, unique cuts of tracks but ones that only we could play out. In the studio we would make the “main” version and then would do dub versions that Gary Clail would play before and after the band went on stage for a live show. In this period we recorded everything using analog tape. A lot of the time when setting up the mixes I was running stripped down versions of the tracks and dubbing them up and Gary would be recording cassettes of the session…these sounded to a lot of people better than over produced and cluttered tracks,raw and somewhat mangled but with Keith Le Blanc’s great drumming and programming holding them together. Add the great grooves, the vocal samples that Keith referred to as “news on the beat”, Doug Wimbish’s bass, Skip McDonald’s guitar and keyboards, and my stripped down mixes -plus the fact that a lot of it was mastered straight from the often overloaded cassettes – this record has a great edge to it.”
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Out now!

Gee Vaucher: Liberty/Justice

(Pencil & gouache on paper)

(Screenprint over 'Liberty')

Gee w/ REsearch's Val Vale

Friendly as a hand grenade indeed!

Happy Fourth

As my friend Tommy says: 'Americans. Happy Independence Day. I wish we could be independent from these fuckers too.'

♪♫ Spoek Mathambo - Escape From '85 Mix (Free Download)

Escape From ‘85 – a mixtape of 12 tracks inspired by the year of Spoek's birth.
Escape From ‘85 celebrates the music and culture of the 1980s – featuring guest artists including Yadi, Terri Walker, BB James, Seye, Cherry B, DJ Wool, Cerebral Vortex, Fannie Sosa and DJ Maddjazz.

Interview

FUCK WIMBLEDON!

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Kate Moss: 'I’d go on the train to castings, changing from my school uniform on the train. I carried on like that for a few years, getting jobs in bits and pieces'

Corinne Day (1990)

Nick Knight (2003)

Chuck Close (2003)

Allen Jones (2013)

Kate Moss For Sale

Ad Break: Kate Moss for Versace

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After Marrow Transplants, 2 More Patients Appear H.I.V.-Free Without Drug

Two H.I.V.-infected patients in Boston who had bone-marrow transplants for blood cancers have apparently been virus-free for weeks since their antiretroviral drugs were stopped, researchers at an international AIDS conference announced Wednesday.
The patients’ success echoes that of Timothy Ray Brown, the famous “Berlin patient,” who has shown no signs of resurgent virus in the five years since he got a bone-marrow transplant from a donor with a rare mutation conferring resistance to H.I.V. ...

The Egyptian army’s removal of President Mohammad Morsi gives the Obama administration that rarest of opportunities in foreign policy: a second chance. Getting it right will require understanding where we went wrong the first time.
To some, President Obama’s fundamental error in Egypt policy was to withdraw U.S. support from longtime leader Hosni Mubarak in February 2011, when thousands of Egyptians first filled Tahrir Square demanding change. In this view, the United States should have stuck by Mubarak, a firm opponent of the Muslim Brotherhood whose soldiers fought alongside U.S. troops in the Persian Gulf war and who remained faithful to Egypt’s peace with Israel despite isolation in the Arab world.

That view, however, is wrong. Mubarak’s failing health meant that his rule was coming to an end, a fact he refused to face, instead surrounding himself with sycophants and acting like a modern pharoah. To U.S. interests, Mubarak had become a liability, and there was a reasonable alternative...

The Snowden Effect, Continued

And now the whole world is made paranoid.

"We want to say to the nations of the world that President Evo Morales has been abducted by imperialism and is being held in Europe." Early Wednesday, Morales told journalists in the Vienna airport who asked about the delay that officials were "surely consulting with their friend, and their friend must be the United States."

...and let's imagine the uproar if Air Force One had been re-routed!

Herbal stimulant khat to be banned in UK

In January the ACMD said khat should remain a legal substance, saying there was "insufficient evidence" it caused health problems.
But Home Secretary Theresa May has decided to ban it, saying the risks posed could have been underestimated.
Khat will be treated as a class C drug, like anabolic steroids and ketamine.
The Home Office said the ban was intended to "protect vulnerable members of our communities" and would be brought in at the "earliest possible opportunity"...

David Allen Green: Should we ban 'banning' things?

We all want to ban something. It is a staple of our political culture. All of us are perhaps one moment away from seeking to ban what someone else is saying or doing. The nod-a-long responses of "it shouldn't be allowed" or "there should be a law against it" are the common solutions to many perceived problems.
However, to "ban" something is not actually to eliminate it, whatever "it" is. The "it" is not extinguished; the "it" may just be attended by some different consequences. The legalistic prose in a solemn document is not some magic spell which banishes horrors by invocation. To say there should be a law against a thing is often no more than saying there should be a spell against it...

HERE

Macoto Murayama: Inorganic Flora

Macoto Murayama cultivates inorganic flora. First, he chooses the plant and finds the real flower, for example the exquisite Lathyrus odoratus L. Second, he dissects the flower cutting the petal and ovary with scalpel and observes it with magnifying glass. Third, he makes sketches and photographs the parts of dissected flower. Fourth, he models its form and structure using 3ds Max (3DCG software). Fifth, he renders separate parts and creates a composition using Adobe Photoshop. Sixth, he imposes admeasurements, parts names, scale, scientific name etc. Seventh, he prints out Lathirus odoratus L. at large scale printer and frames it... Here it is, The Flower of Totalitarian Scientific Conscious: properly fixed, totally measured, strictly nominated and distinctly shown. It is not only an image of a plant, but representation of the intellect’s power and its elaborate tools for scrutinizing nature. The transparency of this work refers not only to the lucid petals of a flower, but to the ambitious, romantic and utopian struggle of science to see and present the world as transparent (completely seen, entirely grasped) object. Paradoxically, this scientific challenge to measure the Universe might eventually become one of the sources where art of Murayama draws its strength of fantasy and odor of romanticism, becoming a part of Botech Art, symbiosis of Botanical Art and Technology
Macoto Murayama
Catalogue PDF
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♪♫ Atoms For Peace - Dropped/Default (Live @ Club AMOK LA)

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HA!

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Guess someone might be feeling a little embarassed this morning...

HERE

U.S. Postal Service Logging All Mail for Law Enforcement

Leslie James Pickering noticed something odd in his mail last September: A handwritten card, apparently delivered by mistake, with instructions for postal workers to pay special attention to the letters and packages sent to his home.
“Show all mail to supv” — supervisor — “for copying prior to going out on the street,” read the card. It included Mr. Pickering’s name, address and the type of mail that needed to be monitored. The word “confidential” was highlighted in green...

Morsi ousted in Egypt's second revolution in two years

housands celebrate in Cairo's Tahrir Square on Wednesday, following an announcement from the Egyptian army that Mohamed Morsi has been deposed from presidential office. Fireworks light up the sky over the jubilant crowd after the news was announced by general Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. He said Morsi and his government no longer lead Egypt and that the constitution has been suspended and new presidential elections will be held

Tahrir Square Protest Live Stream

Why We Fight (A Film By Eugene Jarecki)

".WHY WE FIGHT, which won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival, is an unflinching look at the anatomy of the American war machine, weaving unforgettable personal stories with commentary by a "who's who" of military and beltway insiders. Featuring John McCain, William Kristol, Chalmers Johnson, Gore Vidal, Richard Perle and others, WHY WE FIGHT launches a bipartisan inquiry into the workings of the military industrial complex and the rise of the American Empire.
Inspired by Dwight Eisenhower's legendary farewell speech (in which he coined the phrase "military industrial complex"), filmmaker Jarecki (THE TRIALS OF HENRY KISSINGER) surveys the scorched landscape of a half-century's military adventures, asking how -- and telling why -- a nation of, by, and for the people has become the savings-and-loan of a system whose survival depends on a state of constant war.
The film moves beyond the headlines of various American military operations to the deeper questions of why -- why does America fight? What are the forces -- political, economic, ideological -- that drive us to fight against an ever-changing enemy?

♪♫ James Blake - Live at Glastonbury 2013

Ken Kesey: What A World

Dear Wendell and Larry and Ed and Bob and Gurney:
Partners, it's been a bitch.
I've got to write and tell somebody about some stuff and, like I long ago told Larry, you're the best backboard I know. So indulge me a little; I am but hurt.
We built the box ourselves (George Walker, mainly) and Zane and Jed's friends and frat brothers dug the hole in a nice spot between the chicken house and the pond. Page found the stone and designed the etching. You would have been proud, Wendell, especially of the box — clear pine pegged together and trimmed with redwood. The handles of thick hemp rope. And you, Ed, would have appreciated the lining. It was a piece of Tibetan brocade given Mountain Girl by Owsley 15 years ago, gilt and silver and russet phoenixbird patterns, unfurling in flames. And last month, Bob, Zane was goose hunting in the field across the road and killed a snow goose. I told him be sure to save the down. Susan Butkovitch covered this in white silk for the pillow while Faye and MG and Gretch and Candace stitched and stapled the brocade into the box...

♪♫ Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry VS Adrian Sherwood - Live at Le Poisson Rouge NYC (5/13)

Listen
HERE

William S. Burroughs, Brion Gysin and a Dreamachine

Via
(Thanx Yotte!)

Eisenhower warns us of the military industrial complex

Dwight D. Eisenhower exit speech on Jan.17, 1961

(Thanx Fritz!)

Smoking! (Erika Linder)

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James Clapper is still lying to America

“James Clapper Is Still Lying”: That would be a more honest headline for yesterday’s big Washington Post article about the director of national intelligence’s letter to the U.S. Senate.
Clapper, you may recall, unequivocally said “no, sir” in response to Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., asking him: “Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?” Clapper’s response was shown to be a lie by Snowden’s disclosures, as well as by reports from the Guardian, the Washington Post, the Associated Press and Bloomberg News (among others). This is particularly significant, considering lying before Congress prevents the legislative branch from performing oversight and is therefore a felony.
Upon Snowden’s disclosures, Clapper initially explained his lie by insisting that his answer was carefully and deliberately calculated to be the “least untruthful” response to a question about classified information. Left unmentioned was the fact that he could have simply given the same truthful answer that Alberto Gonzales gave the committee in 2006...