Today's random thoughts and big news

• It just occurred to me that Simon [the electronic game] is based on Schnitzelbank [the German drinking song.] Now I want to make a circuit-bent Simon that says, "fette sau" and "gefährliches Ding."

• Every time I read "WHO" I think, "what the heck does Pete Townsend have to do with influenza monitoring?"

• Just found out that Dethlab has been selected by The Prodigy to open for them Friday, May 22 at the Fillmore [formerly the State Theatre] Detroit, at the official DEMF opening party. [WTF?! We're extremely flattered, but the pressure is on...]

Soft Furnishings: The Erotic House of Peter Saville

SHOWstudio's latest project teams them up with design iconoclast Peter Saville.

As backdrop to an editorial story for July 2009 Wallpaper* magazine, Peter Saville's febrile imagination constructs an imaginary 'Erotic House' of Pop perversity, sexualising an entire post-modern environment and fetishising furniture, fashion and flesh alike.

Follow the shoot and watch interviews with Saville and Nick Knight at the Soft Furnishings page.

Before Daft Punk

or: A Brief History of Helmeted Robots in Electronic Music

[via Synthtopia via Christopher Bissonnette]


Jonzun Crew - Pack Jam [1983]


Space - Magic Fly [1977]

UPDATE [thanks Adam!]

The Droids - The Force [1976]

Dethlab in your intertubes

Our brand new DJ mix Hurrah, die Butter ist alle! is now available for download. If there were a dark comedic Blade Runner spin-off that followed the mohawked street urchins, this might be the soundtrack. Get it right here!

track list:
Intro by STEVIE
Einmusik - Jittery Heritage (Egoexpress remix)
Play Paul & Nicos Marcos - Breathe
Alva Noto - Xerrox Monophaser
Imiafan - Epidemia (Sneak-Thief Paranoianoia remix)
Circlesquare - Dancers (remixed by Lowfish)
T.Raumschmiere - Lass Knattern!
Goose - Masters On Top
Gui Boratto - Atomic Soda
Robbie Parodel - Digdagger
Les Petits Pilous - Jolie Fille (The Bloody Beetroots remix)
T.Raumschmiere - E (version)
Motor - Death Rave
Julien-K - Someday Soon (Motor Deconstruct Mix)
Fixmer/McCarthy - Come Inside
Andreas Henneberg (STEVIE darkk edit) - Federschwarz
Neo Filigrante - Right Hand Bob
Adriano Canzian (feat. David Caretta & Gigi Succes) - Letherbich 01
Miss Kitten & the Hacker - Party in my Head
Sad Mafioso - The Lamb
Goose - Everybody (Les Petits Pilous remix)
Butter - The Bloody Beetroots
Greg Punkov - Soda So Prompteleks
Polygamy Boys - Ghostz
Rude 66 - The 1000 Year Storm
Ricardo Tobar - With You
Micron Sixty Three - Anatomy Of No Escape


Josh Dahlberg recently interviewed us for his new program on WDET HD2, Babes in Hi Def. The show airs this Wednesday 9pm-12am and you can tune in here.



As a reminder, we're very honored to be bringing Terence Fixmer and Douglas McCarthy to perform live this Thursday night at THC in Hamtramck. They'll be playing everything from Nitzer Ebb classics to material from Terence's brand new LP Fiction Fiction.

Fixmer/McCarthy LIVE
+ Terence Fixmer LIVE
& DJs Dethlab & Gabe Sandler
Thursday, April 23 2009
Trowbridge House of Coffee
10241 Joseph Campau, Hamtramck MI 48212


Fixmer/McCarthy - You Want It [live, 2005]


Fixmer/McCarthy - Join in the Chant [live, 2007]

Fernando Vicente illustration

Re-blogged from the always awesome Coilhouse: Pleasures of the Flesh: Fernando Vicente

1950s Vogue meets Zombie in these inspiring paintings by Fernando Vicente. The textured cyan background works beautifully with the fleshy yellows and reds. I love the Hepburn-like aristocracy of the women in these portraits.

For many more images from this series, go to Fernando Vicente’s website, click NOVEDADES, and then click VANITAS.

Taking Nadya's advice and poking around his website, I came across these stunning machine illustration/pin-up/advertisement hybrids under PINTURA, ANATOMIAS... kind of like sexy robots if imagined by John Heartfield.

New Circlesquare video by Bienvenido Cruz with a nod to Robert Longo

Circlesquare - Dancers from Bienvenido Cruz on Vimeo.



The first music video from Circlesquare’s new album Songs About Dancing and Drugs, Dancers is inspired by Robert Longo's seminal drawing series Men in the Cities. [No Wave fans will recognize his work from the cover of Glenn Branca's The Ascension - pictured below.]



Also see some of Bienvenido Cruz's wonderful previous videos for Circlesquare:


Circlesquare - Fight Sounds Pt.1 from Bienvenido Cruz on Vimeo.


Circlesquare - Non-Revival Alarm from Bienvenido Cruz on Vimeo.


Circlesquare - Sub-Reminisce from Bienvenido Cruz on Vimeo.

Own a piece of science fiction history

... for an estimated $100K-$150K.



Hollywood memorabilia auction house Profiles in History is currently offering the Syd Mead designed gun used by Harrison Ford's Rick Deckard character in Blade Runner. See the listing here.

(Warner Bros., 1982) Arguably one of the single most important weapons in Science Fiction history is the hero firing blaster used by Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) to "retire" replicants in Ridley Scott's timeless Sci-Fi classic Blade Runner. While few rubber stunt guns have surfaced in the collector's market over the years, this particular Hero-blaster has been thought to have been lost for decades. Purchased by Hollywood Marketing specialist Jeff Walker, in a sale by the film's production company after filming had wrapped, this iconic piece has been in Walker's private collection for over 25 years. It was briefly displayed at a convention around the time of Blade Runner's 25th Anniversary and immediately caused a frenzy among Sci Fi fans, who had never thought to ever see the “holy grail” of Sci-Fi weapons in person.

Only one hero firing weapon was made for the production which was created by mating a Steyr-Mannlicher Model .222 SL receiver on to a Charter Arms .44 police bulldog double-action revolver. It features custom amber grips, dual triggers, and futuristic illuminating LEDs (four red and two green) that can be activated by a small switch mounted beneath the barrel.

Besides its cult-classic status and tremendous re-release success on its 25th Anniversary, Blade Runner is a leading example of the neo-noir genre and is regarded by its director as one of his most complete and personal films. It has been selected by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant". It is also ranked by the American Film Institute and Time Magazine as one of the “100 All-TIME best movies” and the popular British movie magazine Empire voted it the "Best Science Fiction Film Ever" in 2007. This blaster is most likely the most representative artifact for this important contribution to cinematic history.

Road of Knives

This is rather wonderful: On the Road of Knives

"Zak Smith, Shawn Cheng, and Nicholas Di Genova take turns drawing monsters fighting each other...

"So this is how it works: Zak draws something. Shawn draws something that will fight it. Zak draws his thing fighting back. Shawn draws his thing fighting back and maybe tripping over a statue. Then maybe Zak's thing kills Shawn's with the statue's head. Then Shawn draws a new thing. Zak's surviving thing attacks it. And so on. Zak and Shawn got things started, and now Nick has joined the fray. Though not exactly an exquisite corpse, it will be exquisite, and there will be many corpses."

Closer Deconstructed

Fantastic. Director Mark Romanek narrates the making of Nine Inch Nails' Closer video, including the creative process, unusual production techniques and visual influences including Francis Bacon, Man Ray, James Van Der Zee, the Quay brothers and Joel Peter Witkin.


NIN: The Making of the "Closer" Video from Nine Inch Nails on Vimeo.

Read more at Wicked Halo.

Your business card is CRAP!

Wow.

I'm pretty sure this guy is the Antichrist, but he's so funny.



[thanks Robert Gorell!]

Terence Fixmer & Douglas McCarthy + Dethlab & Gabe Sandler 4.23.09 in Detroit

[We're baaaack...]



Fixmer/McCarthy LIVE
+ Terence Fixmer LIVE
& DJs Dethlab & Gabe Sandler
Thursday, April 23 2009
Trowbridge House of Coffee
10241 Joseph Campau, Hamtramck MI 48212

Thanks to the interwebs, I’ve developed musical A.D.D. I am forever on the prowl for something new, and when I find it, my feeling of satisfaction is fleeting. After a few listens I’ve mentally moved on and resumed my quest for the new again.

So when something stays in rotation for days, or maybe even weeks it’s worth noting. Shine by Louderbach (on Minus) is just that kind of song. With Joy Division inspired vocals and haunting melodies, Louderbach is at least a temporary antidote to my acute disfunction.

Although I couldn’t find an official video, I did stumble upon this fan-made version created as part of a contest hosted by the Minus label:



PS: Also, best of luck to Bruce Sterling...his words continually inspire. I especially enjoyed his talk at SXSWi 09, where he spent no less than 15 minutes shouting angrily at us for not living up to our responsibilities as an audience (e.g. twittering when we should be listening, pirating books and records instead of earning the fulfilment and street cred associated with searching out obscure records on vinyl or second hand paperbacks).



If only I could quiet my A.D.D for long enough to absorb Mr. Sterling’s words, there might be a lesson in there that could help with my condition.

Bruce Sterling and Jasmina Tesanovic Request Your Moral Support

[This hits a little close to home, since they're friends and heroes to us, we have similar stories and paperless lifestyles, and Bethany and I got the 3rd degree from US customs about our relationship status just a few weeks ago - but they didn't try to deport one of us! Apparently heroic, independent female creative geniuses are super-duper-extra suspect...]*

*Bethany may have a follow-up to this shortly.

Bruce Sterling and Jasmina Tesanovic Request Your Moral Support

The "Exotic Enemies Do Get Married" Campaign

by Bruce Sterling and Jasmina Tesanovic

Surprising news has just arrived for us at our American home address. Although we have been married for four years now, the American Immigration services can't find any paper trail for the two of us.

We have no joint bank account, no insurance accounts and no joint children. The authorities therefore suspect that our marriage is a phony "Green Card marriage," and they would like to have Jasmina deported from the USA.

This is not too entirely surprising a mistake, since we're an Internet couple. By our nature, we just don't generate much paper.

We use electronic banking. Bruce uses American banks, while Jasmina uses Serbian banks. Why would anyone want to make his or her alien spouse use an American or Serbian bank?

There's no reason for us to jointly speculate in American real-estate, since we each already own places to live. No sane European would ever want American health insurance. And so forth.

Like a lot of geek couples, we live out of our cellphones and laptops. Furniture, wedding china, massive home improvement loans: we don't even go there. We have a light material footprint that'll generally fit onto a couple of rollaboards.

We're nevertheless a genuine married couple. Any reasonable Internet person would recognize this fact in two minutes.

What proof can we offer to you, the Internet websurfer?

Well, Wikipedia says! When have they ever been known to err?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jasmina_Te%C5%A1anovi%C4%87

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Sterling

We got married in the LAX Airport in late 2005. BoingBoing's Xeni Jardin was our bridesmaid. That online news source gets more unique hits than TIME magazine!

http://www.boingboing.net/2005/11/17/nice-day-for-a-cyber.html

Bruce's new novel THE CARYATIDS is dedicated "To Jasmina," not the sort of thing authors generally do as part of an illicit human-trafficking scheme.

We've been together so long now that we're starting to look like each other. Older friends of ours will recognize that this didn't use to be so.



However, the American immigration authorities would rather prefer more cogent assurances than a blog post.

Luckily, even people without a consumer tonnage of joint material possessions can establish that they are married -- if enough people say so.

We must therefore implore your help. Have you ever witnessed the two of us hanging around together? Were you convinced that we're the real deal, spouse-wise? Do you have solemn, impressive, legal-looking letterhead? For instance, are you some kind of American federal agent yourself? Lord knows we know some.

If so, then, please -- write to the American authorities, using your own letterhead. Please tell them we are, indeed, a "bona fide marriage." You are addressing the "UNITED STATES CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION SERVICES" in Vermont, USA.

Then send us a dot-pdf or a scan of your paper. We will truck them over to our lawyer. She is offering a possible template you might care to use. It's in the next blog post.

Please get cracking. The immigration feds are eager to bring out the hounds. April 15, 2009 is your deadline.

We would do the same favor for you. In fact, if you will send us a scanned copy of your letter attesting to our marriage, we will sentimentally treasure that for years to come.

Bruce Sterling -- bruces@well.com

Jasmina Tesanovic -- politicalidiot@yahoo.com

Then, if you ever end up in our weird situation -- (we know you're not planning that, but frankly, neither did we) -- then we solemnly pledge, right here and now, that we WILL do the same favor for you.

We will write to your national authorities -- whoever they are, wherever they are -- and we will bear witness to your union and your desire to go about your joint existence. Gay marriages welcome! As a Serb married to a Texan, we're not fussy and judgmental about any of that stuff!

Consider this an investment in our planet's marital future! It may be, in glittering days of tomorrow, that almost EVERYONE will be married to some foreigner -- yes, just like noted futurologists Bruce Sterling, Pat Cadigan, William Gibson and Cory Doctorow! There is clearly a groundswell here! People whose intimate relations are primarily electronic need to mobilize!

Will you help us to deal with this, please? And spread the word about our situation? Thank you very much.

Yours sincerely, Jasmina Tesanovic and Bruce Sterling

Der Sheriff

You know what I don't miss at all? Having W to kick around.

You know what I still don't understand? It took the majority of Americans until half way through his second term to get angry.

When a band called "Deutsch Amerikanische Freundschaft" ("German American Friendship") gets back together just to make an anti-Bush song, that shoulda been a sign maybe.


DAF - Der Sheriff [2002]