Curious Alice

'Curious Alice' is an animated fantasy involving various dangerous drugs based on the characters in Alice in Wonderland. Alice is seen touring a strange land where everyone has chosen drugs: the Madhatter uses LSD; the Dormouse uses sleeping pills; and the King of Hearts represents heroin.

Advertisement above from a state pamphlet called "Drug Abuse Prevention Materials for Schools," from the Special Action Office for Drug Abuse Prevention. The film came out in 1971 or thereabouts. Never has anti-drug propaganda been so drugged out! I think this might be my new favorite Alice movie.



Edit: apparently this isn't viewable on Youtube in the UK. What a shame! Here are some screen grabs. Cool Raymond Scott-style electronic score too.

Sanne Sannes

Stills from Dirty Girl, a 1966 stag film by Dutch photographer Sanne Sannes. Forest nymphs/nymphos, bare tree branches, Angel wings, fake blood, etc.

Michelangelo

Southern MQ/LP 46 Folk, Pastoral, Small Group (Recorder).

A group mysteriously named Michelangelo gets credit in the liner notes, but don't let that fool you; this record is British through and through. Listening to these shiny plastic tunes you are whisked away to the pedestrian walkways and municipal fountains of some imaginary New Town circa 1971. You are peering into the crystal ball of a window-dressed display of new modern products designed to improve your life. Or you are an extra in the background of a karaoke video, cooing words nobody will ever hear into the ear of the actress hired to play your girlfriend. These are neutral incidentals for light activity. Twinkly, saccharine, prefab mood music for some concrete city in the sky. But like the similar-ish music at the beginning of The Stepford Wives there is something very dark lurking beneath the surface, as if the new leisure centre were built on a Romano-British burial ground. I love this record and its twinkly celeste and harp, its mournful woodwinds and proto-Stereolab suburban funkiness. Enjoy. And while I'm on the subject I wanted to mention Jonny Trunk's fantastic Radio 4 piece about library music. If you have been wondering just what all these austere, generic record sleeves that I post are all about, download here and listen to somebody who really knows what he's talking about (mp3 courtesy of some nice person on the Broadcast bbs). Composer Barbara Moore starts free-associating about the Amazon and it's pure poetry.

Vista Volunteer

from Vista Volunteer, published by the Office of Economic Opportunity

King of the Castle

First episode part 1, part 2, part 3
Second episode part 1, part 2, part 3

Une Femme Douce

The same sculpture, to scale.

Une Femme Douce, from a brief scene involving a trip to the Centre Pompidou museum.

Gapmag

Here's a mix my friend Nina asked me to make for GapMag. Cover art by Roger White, a birthday gift for my wife. It's a painting of a Steven Alan shirt she admired.



Diabolo Menthe - Diane Kurys
Upside Down - Woo
Quot Sunt Horae - Kay Hoffman
Confession - Nobuhiko Obayashi
Silence - Dom
Nie Bede Cie Kochac - Andrzej Korzyński
OK Man, This is Your World - Gilli Smyth
Molto Alto - Le Stelle di Mario Schifano
Intro (Summer Names) - Roy Sablosky/Gregory Jones
The Chimney Sweeper - Denis
Sportsman - Haruomi Hosono
Hapmoniym Part 5 - Magical Power Mako
New Tape - Paolo Renosto

Teenage

Amazing new flickr accompanying Matt Wolf's upcoming film Teenage. Take a look and contribute your own photos! Can't wait for the film, which features music by Bradford Cox. Super cool blog courtesy of Nothing is New. This photo is by Jamie McKerral.

Insetti

Buzz buzz. This album is about bugs. Very timely because it's been a nice sunny day today after the longest winter ever, and I can just feel the flora and fauna murmuring. No bees yet but soon they will be flying all over. I'm inspired by these amazing bee related photos over on even*cleveland.




Anyway the clinical looking pink vinyl oddity above is an Italian record from the 70s. It's a TV/film soundtrack full of wobbly avant garde abstractions conjuring up wasps and bees and insect-borne sickness (there is actually a song called "Malaria"). One of a series of addictive color-coded LPs devoted to marine life and biology and landscape and the like (another one can be found here). Some lovely electronic "beehive" incidentals.