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Random Vintage Images Born in Brooklyn, New York, to working-class Jewish parents of Eastern European descent, Leonard Freed first wanted to become a painter. However, he began taking photographs while in the Netherlands in 1953 and discovered that this was where his passion lay. In 1954, after trips throughout Europe and North Africa, he returned to the United States and studied in Alexei Brodovitch’s ‘design laboratory’. He moved to Amsterdam in 1958 and photographed the Jewish community there. He pursued this concern in numerous books and films, examining German society and his own Jewish roots. His book on the Jews in Germany was published in 1961, and Made in Germany, about post-war Germany, appeared in 1965. Working as a freelance photographer from 1961 onwards, Freed began to travel widely, photographing blacks in America (1964-65), events in Israel (1967-68), the Yom Kippur War in 1973, and the New York City police department (1972-79). He also shot four films for Japanese, Dutch and Belgian television. Early in Freed’s career, Edward Steichen, then Director of Photography at the Museum of Modern Art, bought three of his photographs for the museum. Steichen told Freed that he was one of the three best young photographers he had seen and urged him to remain an amateur, as the other two were now doing commercial photography and their work had become uninteresting. ‘Preferably,’ he advised, ‘be a truck driver.’ Freed joined Magnum in 1972. His coverage of the American civil rights movement first made him famous, but he also produced major essays on Poland, Asian immigration in England, North Sea oil development, and Spain after Franco. Photography became Freed’s means of exploring societal violence and racial discrimination. https://www.magnumphotos.com/photographer/leonard-freed/ Vintage Big Hairdo's Sexist Computer Ads from 70's New York Rocker, a paper dedicated to music, was published from 1976 to 1982 (54 issues). These are the covers. Founded by Alan Betrock (1950-2000) and edited by Andy Schwartz, this hymned chronicler of punk and post-punk scenes in New York and beyond featured upcoming and already-there bands, photographs by Laura Levine and Ebet Roberts, and art direction from Elizabeth van Itallie. “The Rocker was way ahead of the game as far as knowing who was up and coming,” recalled Levine in 2001. “I was their chief photographer and photo editor. We were a very tight-knit group who went to see gigs together, threw parties, and pulled all-nighters pasting up the issues for press.” The covers below are tremendous. https://flashbak.com/new-york-rocker-the-covers-1976-1982-361672/ Vintage Creepy Dolls  Vintage Annals Archive Own - Rich Wexler (me) had the pleasure of being on one of my favorite podcasts MIDNIGHT MASS, speaking about HAROLD AND MAUDE! *For Patreon Members there are three deep dive related to Harold and Maude. One on the film, one on Bud Cort, and one on Ruth Gordon. Check out the episode below, and I highly recommend following the MIDNIGHT MASS podcast! If you want to sing out…sing out! This week, Peaches and Michael explore unconventional connection in celebration of 1971’s HAROLD AND MAUDE! In addition to discussing the film’s remarkable use of music, our hosts delve into Harold’s place as one of cinema’s first proto-goths. Joining the conversation is cult filmmaker Chris LaMartina, who digs into the continued impact this classic has had on his life and outlook. Then, Vintage Annals Archive’s own Richard Wexler stops by to offer up some of the more nuanced bits of the movie’s storied history. From modified hearses to Cat Stevens verses, this episode has it all! Go! https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/midnight-mass/id1571382053?i=1000605298072 More inappropriate comic panels  HIGHLY RECOMMENDED From Academy Award-winning filmmaker Laura Poitras (HBO and Participant’s “Citizenfour”) All the Beauty and the Bloodshed is an epic, emotional and interconnected story about internationally renowned artist and activist Nan Goldin. The story is told through her slideshows, intimate interviews, ground-breaking photography, and rare footage of her personal fight to hold the Sackler family accountable for the opioid overdose crisis. Credits: Executive Producers are Participant’s Jeff Skoll and Diane Weyermann; Clare Carter; Alex Kwartler; and Hayley Theisen. Producers are Howard Gertler, John Lyons, Goldin, Yoni Golijov and Poitras https://youtu.be/YD5pYQiT1D4  The podcast that gives Gen-X music maniacs a chance to smell like teen spirit again by connecting with a brotherhood obsessed with rating the entire discography of every single artist and band that ever mattered. With 3 new episodes a week, you’ll gain a comprehensive knowledge of an act’s history and output in the time it takes to listen to a single LP! Don't miss your favorite artists reduced to music geeks as they rate their favorite artists’ records. Ready to be flooded with music recommendations and connect to a brotherhood of friends? Then scroll up and click ‘FOLLOW’ https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/discograffiti/id1592182331 I also highly recommend joining their PATREON https://www.patreon.com/Discograffiti Hosted by Dave Gebroe, Discograffiti is the music podcast that delivers the objective truth about the entire discography of every single artist and band that’s ever existed! If you’re on our Patreon page, then chances are you already know how the show works: Every Sunday, our mothership show features a different act, to whom I listen to and exhaustively research. From the ultra-obscure to the toppermost of the poppermost, Discograffiti covers it all. Every last release is given a star rating from zero to five, and at the end of every episode we come face to face with the true shape of an artist’s overall arc. Simply put...it’s a music lover’s dream come true. We’ve already featured such guests as: John Landis Anthony Fantano Bart Bealmear from Dangerous Minds Lou Barlow from Dinosaur Jr Monkees manager Andrew Sandoval Spiral Stairs & Bob Nastanovich from Pavement Replacements biographer Bob Mehr Comedian Jim Florentine Bob Forrest Kevin Whelan from The Wrens L’Rain Jonathan Rado from Foxygen The Sleep With Me Podcast Marvin Gaye biographer David Ritz Our Patreon feed, then, is the last word in deep-dive music obsession. This is it. You wanted the best, and you got it! The most insane, all-in music universe that’s ever been, here are the multiple tiers available through which to gain entry to the psychedelically mind-melting music funhouse of Discograffiti’s Patreon: Private First Class ($5/month) - You simply realize the value of the show and appreciate the insane amount of work that goes into each episode. Thank you so much for listening. And for giving. In addition, you'll be emailed a Discograffiti Soldier of Sound backstage pass, as well as a link to join us in our 24-hour Patreon hangout community on Discord. Ditch your current deadbeat friends and hang with the kool kids over at Discograffiti Central. Lieutenant ($10/month) - Access to the Wild Card Episode, which means TONS of extra content, all of which is weekly and goes up every Thursday. You'll get any one of the following: Rock Cousteau (our buried treasure show), Queasy Listening (shitty music diss show), Battle Royale! (music debates with S.O.S. members), our Very Special Episodes (thematic extravaganzas like Rock Operas, Live Albums, Abandoned Projects, Bootlegs, etc), Soldiers of Sound Call-In Episodes, long-form guest interviews, bonus content from mothership episodes, and really any additional content that doesn’t quite fit the format but is equally indispensable. Major ($20/month) - Discograffiti’s Private Press with Paul Major. This is our flagship bonus show, and it’s comin’ atcha weekly—every Tuesday. The ultimate value for your music dollar--period, end of story. The greatest private press record collector of all time—and leader of the thunderously awesome band Endless Boogie—introduces you to a brand new incredible record you’ve almost definitely never heard of every single week, along with personal stories that rocket his recommendations into another category entirely. Not to be missed. Feel free to sample it and see for yourself. Colonel ($40/month) - Access to participate in our special Call-In Episodes! Brigadier General ($100/month) - You get to actually help choose the bands the show covers…and the special guests that cover them with us! Major General ($1,000) - Live, in-person record shopping assistance! ‘Three funky cats, all brothers, having just as much fun on stage as their audience,’ as the sleeve notes to their second album read. ‘What kind of sound do the Kaplans have? Three parts of harmony coming together with a new contemporary sound as well as a healthy golden Oldie Show. Interwoven voices along with guitar, congo drums and bass blend together in a crisp fresh sound of today that doesn't forget the best of yesterday.’ Playing around the Illinois, Iowa, Michigan and Wisconsin area, the Kaplan Brothers released their first album, The Universal Sounds Of The Kaplan Brothers, on their own Kap Records imprint in 1969. At that point the Chicago-based duo consisted of brothers Richard (aka Dick, guitar and lead vocals) and Ed (percussion and flute), backed on their recording by guitarist Scott Klynas and bassist Jeff Czech. Very hairy, very Jewish (their first two albums both feature covers of Hava Nagila), very oddball, the Kaplan sound mixes spaghetti western whistles with South American congas and a splash of Greenwich Village folk. For a while the two brothers performed on stage by Larry Andies (bass and backing vocals), before teaming up with younger brother John and issuing a second album, the much more pedestrian lounge folk collection The Kaplan Brothers which features three Beatles covers amongst its tracks. It’s a record that, according to Dick Kaplan himself ‘Hasn't gotten any better over the years’. For their third – and last – album the boys shot off in an altogether different direction: quite literally. In early 1974 they relocated to California and, a year later, issued their magnum opus Nightbird, a mellotron-drenched slice of kitsch like nothing else you have ever heard in your life. Timothy Ready, on his blog The Progressive Rock Hall of Imfamy, described it rather well when he called it ‘Yom Kippur and Purim combined, in one mega-dose of cheese’. Nightbird is a classic of wrongness, a prog-rock nightmare which is so gloriously perverse it somehow works. A song suite of sorts, Nightbird even includes a hideous (and hysterical) cover of the King Crimson classic Epitaph and an overwrought reworking of the Jose Feliciano song Rain. Small wonder that the Acid Archives called Nightbird ‘The ultimate lounge-rock extravaganza. A self-proclaimed 'electric symphony' that mixes Ennio Morricone with King Crimson as recorded by a Holiday Inn/bar mitzvah band from outer space. Crooner vocals soar on top of overly-elaborate keyboard arrangements as the music abruptly throws you from one intense mood into another in true psychedelic fashion.’ Although uncredited on the record, the title track Night Bird was written by Larry Andies. According to Kaplan Brothers’ fan James Webster (writing on Bad Cat Records in 2011), Larry ‘was also the composer of most of their original music’. You need to hear this record. In fact for a couple of quid you can own a CD reissue of it. Search eBay for a copy of the (less than 100% legit) Erebus Records release from around 2009: I found my copy for 99p plus postage! You won’t regret it. But for now, here’s a couple of tracks to whet your appetite, the aforementioned Epitaph and the nutso album closer He, a rewrite (of sorts) of the folk classic He Was A Friend of Mine. As a bonus, I’ve also added a track from each of the Brothers’ earlier albums: Running Scaredfrom The Universal Sounds Of The Kaplan Brothers and, from their second album The Kaplan Brothers, their batshit crazy interpretation of Eleanor Rigby. https://worldsworstrecords.blogspot.com/2016/05/meet-kaplans.html?m=1 25 Vintage Photos of Badass Women Riding Their choppers A chopper is a type of custom motorcycle which emerged in California in the late 1950s. The chopper is perhaps the most extreme of all custom styles, often using radically modified steering angles and lengthened forks for a stretched-out appearance. They can be built from an original motorcycle which is modified (“chopped”) or built from scratch Some of the characteristic features of choppers are long front ends with extended forks often coupled with an increased rake angle, hardtail frames (frames without rear suspension), very tall “ape hanger” or very short “drag” handlebars, lengthened or stretched frames, and larger than stock front wheels. The “sissy bar”, a set of tubes that connect the rear fender with the frame, and which are often extended several feet high, is a signature feature on many choppers. Perhaps the best known choppers are the two customized Harley-Davidsons, the “Captain America” and “Bil https://www.vintag.es/2020/02/70s-chopper-girls.html?m=1 The United States in the early 20th century wasn’t a hub of sex positivity or education, but there were exceptions. People still loved sex and reading sexy things, even if it wasn’t acceptable in mainstream publications. Enter the Tijuana Bible, an early relative of underground comics. These bibles were silly, and dirty, and fun. They featured obscene parodies of celebrities or well-known cartoon characters (including mice). WHAT ARE TIJUANA BIBLES? Tijuana bibles were also called eight-pagers, Tillie-and-Mac books, blue-bibles, and two-by-fours. In short, they were eight-page dirty comic books, about the size of your wallet. They were created during the 1930s–50s, but they were most popular during the depression era. Millions of them were printed during the 1930s. It is estimated that between 700 and 1000 unique books were created. In the 1940s, the war ground the industry to a halt and it never recovered. Most of the artists remain unknown because their publication was illegal. Dr. Donald Gilmore, one of the fathers of the study of the bibles, posited that 12 artists produced the bulk of these bibles. A few authors have been credited with making the bibles. Wesley Morse, creator of Bazooka Joe, had a hand in making some eight-pagers. Tijuana bibles gained their name because of the myth that they were smuggled from Mexico. This was never proven to be true. The book covers claimed that they were printed all over the world. The actuality is that they never left America. The comics were humorous and absolutely filthy. Some of the popular characters included in this are recognizable today. “Blondie”, “Dick Tracy”, and “Popeye” were all featured in these comics. Sometimes they would even feature political characters or celebrities. THE POPULARITY OF THE BIBLES The bibles were a form of escapism during the depression era. People delighted in the Tijuana bibles’ illicit content, but also in the hush-hush quality of buying something illegal. They were also incredibly cheap. Tijuana bibles cost 25¢ each, and nobody really knows exactly who published them to this day. It is suspected to come from a group of printers that also circulated pornographic playing cards and film reels. Another theory is that they were printed by bootleggers. Bootleggers had access to printers for bottle labels, and they were often found in speakeasies. Their popularity ended up sparking some conversations about copyright. Certainly, that was part of the appeal. Tabloids of the day capitalized on the controversy, with titles such as “Victimized By Smut!” Celebrities such as Rita Hayworth and Bob Hope appeared in these comics, and people went wild for them. As well as serving as entertainment, this was a time in history when sex education was nonexistent. Another likely theory is that the bibles were partially instructional. Most of the stories and situations were silly, but the sex acts were very real. It was entirely plausible that these pamphlets served as a type of marital aid. It’s easy to imagine a husband saying to a wife “Think we can do this?” while Olive Oyl seduces Popeye. Little else is known about these mysterious little comics. Almost nothing is known about how they came to be. Luckily, many of the comics survived to today for us to enjoy. TIJUANA BIBLES TODAY The human urge to draw and write porn persists even today. A close cousin of the Tijuana bible is dōjinshi. Dōjinshi are Japanese fan comics of copyrighted works. While only a small percentage of them are outright filthy, the ones that are remain notorious. Dōjinshi are also illegal, like the Tijuana bibles. They violate Japanese copyright laws, which is, of course, part of the fun and appeal. That said, they drum up business for the entire manga industry. Dōjinshi only stands for one small aspect of modern fan works, pornographic or otherwise. Anyone who uses Twitter knows that people are going to draw silly porn no matter what, be it Tony the Tiger or Popeye. Curiously enough, fan fiction and fanart is still considered unlawful to this day, despite its rampant popularity. The rarity of the Tijuana bibles was part of what made them so influential. They are a predecessor to the underground comics movement and zines. Their style even influenced Playboy magazine. While the bibles fell out of favour with the start of the Second World War, today they remain a popular collector’s item. Some universities have collections for educational purposes. It’s possible to find compilations of ridiculous dirty comics featuring Dagwood and Donald Duck. You know…if you want. https://bookriot.com/a-history-of-tijuana-bibles/amp/  Reminder JAMEL SHABAZZ and Karim Brown Podcast Out Now!
At a time when they are trying to erase black history education in this country, I have the honor of sharing a podcast episode of one of the greatest living photographers of the past 100 years, Jamel Shabazz. We will be focusing on his new book (among others things) "Albums" which if you haven’t gotten it, please do. It’s $50 and well worth it. No matter what they do in terms of trying to erase black stories and black history, they’ll never be able to erase the work and important archive of Jamel Shabazz! His book "Albums" is literally a Black History Textbook in a huge sense. This book features selections from over a dozen albums, many previously unseen, and includes his earliest photographs as well as images taken inside Rikers Island, all accompanied by essays that situate Shabazz’s work within the broader history of photography. Last thing I’ll say is that Jamel is honestly one of the most compassionate, spiritual, intelligent, authentic, kind, and passionate human beings I have ever met. Please get this book and all his past books. I want to thank Daniel Power and Sophie Nunnally for helping arrange this interview through Powerhouse Books who had put out Jamel’s books. Please support them if you buy his books, and in general. They put out such amazing and diverse books. Please also get Leonard Freed’s “Black and White in America 1963-1965” at $28 dollars as a re-issue. Leonard's book and work has ben the main influence of Jamel's work and career. I also want to thank Karim Brown for being part of this episode. His work was being shown in the African American History museum in Philadelphia where Jamel did a lecture called “Love is The Message” a couple of months ago, and I got to see his amazing work. He is a younger photographer, and as a tribute to Jamel, who mentors and supports so many younger photographers, I wanted to include the amazing work, insight, and work. Karim's work has also been greatly influenced by Jamel, they both work in the same spirit of documenting their communities, and creating a historical archive for future generations to enjoy. Karim is also a teacher and archivist, and we talk with him about that, and his connection to Jamel! Lastly I have to say that getting to talk to Jamel has definitely been one of the highlights of my life, so I offer this as a gift to others to experiece it. Hope you enjoy it! We start with Karim's (30 min.) then into Jamel's. Please listen to both episodes if you can. Jamel Shabazz https://www.instagram.com/jamelshabazz About Jamel Shabazz https://aperture.org/editorial/why-jamel-shabazz-is-new-yorks-most-vital-street-photographer “Jamel Shabazz Albums” Book $49.23 (available everywhere) https://steidl.de/Books/Albums-0120242856.html “A Time Before Crack” $39.95 (please buy from the publisher) https://powerhousebooks.com/books/35128/ “Back in The Days” $39.95 (please buy from the publisher) https://powerhousebooks.com/books/back-in-the-days/ Website https://powerhousebooks.com Karim Brown Karim Brown is a documentary photographer living and working in North Philadelphia. Keeping the Black Philadelphia community and its people at the forefront of his mind, Karim uses photography to intimately engage with Black ways of knowing and doing that he has been immersed in his entire life
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Vintage Buttons  Ep 25: Jamel Shabazz (Photographer) featuring Karim Brown At a time when they are trying to erase black history education in this country, I have the honor of sharing a podcast episode of one of the greatest living photographers of the past 100 years, Jamel Shabazz. We will be focusing on his new book (among others things) "Albums" which if you haven’t gotten it, please do. It’s $50 and well worth it. No matter what they do in terms of trying to erase black stories and black history, they’ll never be able to erase the work and important archive of Jamel Shabazz! His book "Albums" is literally a Black History Textbook in a huge sense. This book features selections from over a dozen albums, many previously unseen, and includes his earliest photographs as well as images taken inside Rikers Island, all accompanied by essays that situate Shabazz’s work within the broader history of photography. Last thing I’ll say is that Jamel is honestly one of the most compassionate, spiritual, intelligent, authentic, kind, and passionate human beings I have ever met. Please get this book and all his past books. I want to thank Daniel Power and Sophie Nunnally for helping arrange this interview through Powerhouse Books who had put out Jamel’s books. Please support them if you buy his books, and in general. They put out such amazing and diverse books. Please also get Leonard Freed’s “Black and White in America 1963-1965” at $28 dollars as a re-issue. Leonard's book and work has ben the main influence of Jamel's work and career. I also want to thank Karim Brown for being part of this episode. His work was being shown in the African American History museum in Philadelphia where Jamel did a lecture called “Love is The Message” a couple of months ago, and I got to see his amazing work. He is a younger photographer, and as a tribute to Jamel, who mentors and supports so many younger photographers, I wanted to include the amazing work, insight, and work. Karim's work has also been greatly influenced by Jamel, they both work in the same spirit of documenting their communities, and creating a historical archive for future generations to enjoy. Karim is also a teacher and archivist, and we talk with him about that, and his connection to Jamel! Lastly I have to say that getting to talk to Jamel has definitely been one of the highlights of my life, so I offer this as a gift to others to experiece it. Hope you enjoy it! We start with Karim's (30 min.) then into Jamel's. Please listen to both episodes if you can. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/vintage-annals-archive-outsider-podcast/id1645791721?i=1000604898067 Images from these articles Incredibly Stylish Mugshots From The 1920s These mugshot portraits - we'd call them pictures but their style demands more - are part of 2500 "special photographs" taken by New South Wales Police Department photographers between 1910 and 1930 . These people frequented the cells of the Central Police Station, Sydney, Australia. Their posture, styling and the tableau suggest an interesting modelling assignment. But their crimes, such as they were, ran the gamut from petty to heinous. We’ve included a few of their crimes to remind us that what we are looking are felons who have done people harm. https://flashbak.com/incredibly-stylish-mugshots-from-the-1920s-421164/ The Beauty of Misbehavior: 26 Vintage Mugshots of Bad Girls From Between the 1940s and 1960sFrom murderers, thieves and hookers, these are the faces of the many who were captured on camera at the lowest points of their lives. And while many people would say mugshots of the past hold a certain curiosity, one man confesses what started as an initial fascination turned into an obsession. Mark Michaelson has collected more than 10,000 photographs of men and women of all races and ages, taken after their run-ins with the law. The New York-based art director and graphic designer said he has always been drawn to ‘Wanted’ posters, but noted when he came across his first mugshot, “it was love at first sight,” according to Collectors Weekly. https://www.vintag.es/2012/06/vintage-bad-girl-mugshots.html?m=1 Shedding a light on the psyche of war: Zippo lighters from U.S. troops fighting in Vietnam give a unique insight into life under fire Some show the fear of death and regret of leaving loved ones behind to fight on foreign soil, others hint at the hatred for both the enemy and the government that put them in harm's way... others still show a remarkable sense of humour. A unique collection of 282 Zippo lighters from the Vietnam War era were recently put up as a single lot at Cowan's Auctions in Cincinnati, Ohio. The lot was the culmination of years of painstaking research by American artist Bradford Edwards, who picked up many of the distinctive lighters on site in the former war zone during the Nineties. While Zippos had been a valuable companion to U.S. servicemen since World War II, it became popular in the notorious and long-running Vietnam conflict to have the lighters engraved with personal messages - sometimes for loved ones they left behind, and sometimes for the individual who might find their body. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2171404/amp/Zippo-lighters-U-S-troops-fighting-Vietnam-unique-insight-war-life.html Book Link $30 https://www.penguinbookshop.com/book/9780953783960 Though adults tend to look back on youth as a time of innocence, childhood is actually terrifying. Kids are always privy to more of the world’s horrors than we realize, and those glimpses of war on the evening news or the mutilation on display in anti-drunk-driving films leave permanent scars on their permeable little minds. “I often couldn’t distinguish between what was real and what had been a vivid nightmare.” Richard Littler had a frightening childhood, too, but as a designer and screenwriter, he turned his memories of life in suburban Britain during the 1970s into a haunting and hilarious blog and book about the fictional dystopian town of Scarfolk. Littler mined the dark side of his childhood to create pamphlets, posters, book covers, album art, audio clips, and television shorts—remnants of life in a paranoid, totalitarian 1970s community, where even babies are not to be trusted. What started as a handful of faux-vintage images for friends’ birthday cards grew into this universe of fake memorabilia, so complete that the Scarfolk concept was recently optioned for a British TV series. Littler borrows liberally from authentic designs of the era to craft his artfully decaying images, which are so familiar at first glance that many have been mistaken for authentic found objects rather than re-creations. We recently spoke with Littler about the real-world inspiration for Scarfolk and what we can learn from its language of fear. https://www.collectorsweekly.com/articles/visiting-scarfolk/ Sleepless Nights in Paris' Red Light District: 34 Intimate Photographs Document the Lives of Parisian Transsexual Prostitutes in the 1950s and 1960s Christer Strömholm (1918–-2002) was one of the great photographers of the 20th century, but he is little known outside of his native Sweden. Arriving in Paris in 1959, Strömholm settled in Place Blanche in the heart of the city's red-light district. There, he befriended and photographed young transsexuals struggling to live as women and to raise money for sex-change operations. “These are images of people whose lives I shared and whom I think I understood. These are images of women—biologically born as men—that we call ‘transsexuals,’” Strömholm wrote in his book of the series, Les Amies de Place Blanche, published in 1983. His surprisingly intimate portraits and lush Brassaï-like night scenes form a magnificent, dark, and at times quite moving photo album, a vibrant tribute to these girls, the "girlfriends of Place Blanche." https://www.vintag.es/2012/03/beautiful-black-white-photographs-of.html?m= Vintage T-Shirts Fun With Newspaper Clippings CVLT Nation Salutes The Best Goth Magazine Ever Made PROPAGANDA ! If I had to pick one magazine that covered the Goth movement the best, it would be PROPAGANDA by Fred H. Berger. As a teenager in Venice, California I would go to my local magazine store and read every issue. What always got my attention were the covers, because the photos were always striking! This publication covered the underground from the perspective of someone that was a part of the community. Magazines like PROPAGANDA gave hope to youth who were in the middle of nowhere and felt isolated and lonely. I loved reading this magazine because it had so much style and conviction! Today CVLT Nation celebrates PROPAGANDA & Fred H. Berger for shining the the right kind of light on the dark side! https://cvltnation.com/cvlt-nation-salutes-the-best-goth-magazine-ever-made-propaganda/ Rare Photos of '70s Black Beauty Pageants Celebrate Women Defying Beauty Standards When Raphael Albert was photographing West London in the '60s and '70s, racist, anti-immigrant tensions ran high. Albert, from the Caribbean island of Granada himself, gravitated toward the West Indian community thriving at the time amidst discrimination, and used his lens to capture celebrations of black communities. One assignment he had as a freelance photographer was to cover a local Miss Jamaica pageant for the West Indian World. That sparked three decades of photographing London's black beauty pageants and eventually led to him organizing them himself. Now, his work is being displayed in an Autograph ABP exhibit called "Miss Black and Beautiful," launching today. "Not only did the pageants offer the opportunity to create a distinct space for Afro-Caribbean self-articulation—a wager against invisibility, if you will—they also responded to contemporaneous mainstream fashion and lifestyle platforms where black women were largely absent, or at best, marginal," Mussai, who has been working on Albert's archive since 2011, told Artsy. She continued, "It is absolutely crucial to see these pageants as 'of their time'—it was about 'owning' the idea of beauty, about occupying a space that has historically negated black women an existence within its terrains." https://www.elle.com/culture/news/a37666/rare-black-beauty-pageants-london-photos/ Sex usually comes with its own soundtrack, natural or synthesized, but the music of gay bathhouses, saunas and sex clubs in the 1970s has had an uncommon pull on contemporary dance music. Dropping its little terrycloth towel at the intersection of classic disco, extended funk jams, smooth vocal R&B, spacey jazz and early electronic experimentation, and now streaked with the nostalgic gleam of outlaw sexual liberation, the cruising culture of the post-Stonewall, pre-AIDS gay era has become a free-floating metaphor of sorts for unfettered physical communion, subcultural freedom and wild, wild nights. When gay men steamed up, society’s shackles slid off. The free-spirited transcendence and sexually charged imagery of retro homo sex clubs and dancefloors have penetrated the world of straight dance music producers, popping up recently in DJ Hell’s muscle-bulging “I Want U” video, a collaboration with the Tom of Finland Foundation, and director Pete Fowler’s ecstacy-engulfed clip for Joe Goddard’s “Home.” Before he died, George Michael was working with Australian bathhouse DJ duo Stereogamous on bringing that spirit to a new record. And gay bathhouse-themed parties like DJ Bus Station John’s The Tubesteak Connection party in San Francisco and the intrepid musical archeology of gay DJ collectives like Honey Soundsystemhave helped keep original bathhouse music from slipping into obscurity. Although it was decimated by AIDS and sexphobic politics, an actual bathhouse scene still exists in America. One bathhouse chain, Steamworks, with locations in Chicago, Berkeley, Seattle, Vancouver and Toronto, has been actively working to reconnect the bathhouse experience with its nightlife roots, through adventurous programming and regular DJs like Harry Cross, of Chicago party crew Men’s Room, who can easily slip from bathhouse booth to underground techno club. In their 1970s heyday, bathhouses were spots for gay men to hook up, dally around communal hot tubs or saunas and rent small rooms if they felt like some privacy. Dimly lit and with a convivial atmosphere, many were open 24 hours and featured live DJs at peak time. Almost every major city in America and Europe had them, meaning gay men could rely on meeting others during their travels. But not all bathhouses were alike. The legendary Continental Baths in New York City, for instance, was considered grand, and hosted live, well-produced cabaret acts, including Patti LaBelle, Melba Moore and Bette Midler with Barry Manilow on piano. The Baths also launched the careers of Frankie Knuckles and Larry Levan, and were frequented by future disco legends like Nicky Siano of the Gallery, creating the musical mixing grounds that gave rise to New York’s disco and house scenes. (On their first visit together in 1973, Knuckles and Levan reportedly spent two weeks there.) San Francisco’s Ritch Street Health Club modeled itself more after ancient Greek baths, keeping things classical and casual. Others went for Orientalist or all-American fitness club themes, while many more were simply anonymous, wet hole-in-the-walls. “The bathhouses were definitely part of a bigger scene back then that included the sex clubs and the dance clubs,” said Steve Fabus, a longtime San Francisco DJ who often played and partied at all three types of venues in marathon weekend sessions. “But in the bathhouses, you could get a lot more experimental with the music, it was much more free-format and relaxed. People were in a state where they were literally open to anything, if you know what I mean,” Fabus laughed. https://daily.redbullmusicacademy.com/2017/04/gay-bathhouse-musical-legacy ‘Sometimes pictures happen as you’re leaving a shoot,’ Mark says. She had been photographing a family for a story on violent children and was about to leave when the girl pulled out a cigarette and began to smoke it. ‘The mother was there, and didn’t mind.’ – Mark Swamped as we are with a flood of images, films and products from the United States, it would seem that the American legend has been affecting us for a long time. Each of us carries within them, however laughably or shamefully, their very own American dream. An omen of the insidious fascination that America exercises upon us can be found in the Declaration of Independence: “…that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. The New World against the Old. Happiness as a right. One that everyone here seems to demand. Mary Ellen Mark has been crisscrossing the United States for more than 30 years, and everywhere we sense the same quest, be it latent or manifest, for legitimate happiness–at any price it would seem. Often, in her images, while the quest is palpable, actually acceding to the “American way of life” is something else entirely. The photographer transcribes little Tiny’s comments, “I want to be rich, very rich… to live on a ranch with lots of horses, my favorite animal… I’ll have at least three yachts… diamonds and jewelry, and lots of stuff like that”. Eighteen years later: five children by as many fathers, welfare… and she hasn’t stopped hoping. She still has the right to search, to repeat the offense, to make another attempt. While Mary Ellen Mark’s photographs don’t probe the imposture of the American dream, they do expose it by unveiling the other side of the picture. The American dream borders on the pathetic here. Poverty and distress mingle with the glitter. Like this little black girl, a carnival mermaid, whose illusions seem to be hopelessly confined to a flea-bitten bathroom, between a broomstick and a roll of toilet paper. The abandoned, the prostitutes, the alienated, the gigolos, the bodybuilders are strewn throughout photographs that paint a fascinating composite portrait of a limping, disenchanted America. An obese woman in a ball-gown with a miniature dog licking her nose. Family photos proudly displayed in slum apartments. A provocative, overly made-up little girl in a bikini, smoking, while her feet dangle in a pool… This American odyssey is more of a human adventure than an expedition. When Mary Ellen Mark’s gaze rests upon someone, it obviously carries the respect that she manifests towards those who cross her path. Her images make no concessions, yet it is most certainly in their very crudeness that their delicacy lies. Pitiless (for all that, she never succumbs to gratuitous cynicism), this photographer is not without compassion. The time that she dedicated to little Tiny, to the prostitutes in Bombay, as to most of her subjects, betrays the profound humanity that animates her. Mary Ellen Mark is, without a doubt, a woman of images. As she herself says, it is because she is a woman that she can achieve this consent, this abandonment of self, this abdication of modesty, that would, incontestably, be refused to a man’s gaze. It is, too, through her capacity to blend in, integrate into and be accepted by the different milieus that she shoots. Neither moralist, nor partial, she knows how to create an effect without being overly sentimental. https://dreamsromanceexcess.wordpress.com/2011/12/06/mary-ellen-mark-american-odyssey/ Ladies and Robots Portraits of Punk Rockers in the Late 1970s Punk rock music and fashion blew out of New York City, exploded in London, and caught like wildfire in San Francisco, Los Angeles and the world over. It developed concurrently everywhere, and every region had it’s own identity. But it was in San Francisco and L.A. where the most radical behavior in stateside punk rock style and attitude was exhibited. It was anti-hippie, anti-disco, anti-parent and anti-“nice”. And it was shockingly new. These photos are ground zero of punk rock style—delirious innovation and a snarling takeover of youth culture still resonating more than 20 years hence. Jim Jocoy, traveling between S.F. and L.A., shot portraits of every interesting punk rock personality who caught his eye—with each subject posed amidst the scene’s ruinous and chaotic environment. Some were musicians and some were artists. All were fans and enthusiasts. And they were the original creators of what is regarded as the most potent subculture of the late 20th century. Some of the more celebrated individuals of punk legend featured in this book are Darby Crash, Iggy Pop, Lydia Lunch, Sid Vicious, John Waters, Bruce Connor and members of X, The Cramps, The Avengers, Flipper, The Screamers, The Nuns, and many others. https://www.vintag.es/2012/04/photos-of-punk-rockers-in-late-70s.html?m=1  PHANTOM OF THE PARADISE AND THE MAKING OF A TRUE ORIGINAL by Rosie Knight Brian De Palma’s misunderstood cult musical, Phantom of the Paradise, has long been relegated to the rep cinemas and high school film clubs of the world. But at this year’s Fantasia Fest the Phantom was center stage at a 45 year celebration of the marvelous movie that counts directors Guillermo del Toro and Edgar Wright amongst its ever-growing fanbase. During the Montreal-based festival, we sat down with the composer and star of Phantom, Paul Williams, and chatted on the phone with producer Ed Pressman as well as the makers of a new documentary about the Phantom fandom. Together, we revisited the history of how the strange, surreal, and unique film came to be and how its legacy has transcended the original lackluster response almost five decades later. Phantom of the Paradise is unlike any other film. Sprawling and strange, the epic musical masterpiece is uncannily prescient, predicting the nostalgia craze, glam rock, and multiple other musical trends. The project came about after Phantom of the Opera became one of two options that Pressman and De Palma picked up after the lauded director became disillusioned with big studio movies. “I first met Brian De Palma in New York. He’d done a film called Greetings, a low budget independent film with some political undertones, and we became friends and he went on to start directing for the studios. He did a film for Warner’s called Get to Know Your Rabbit and he was very unhappy with the experience and called me from Toronto, I think. There was a producer taking options on Phantom and Sisters, and Brian said, ‘Get me out of here. You can get the rights so we can make it the way I want to.’ So we did that,” Pressman told us. Though the producer preferred the strange vision De Palma had for the unexpected mashup of classic literary tales Phantom of the Opera, Faust, and Dorian Gray, the pair settled on adapting Sisters first, with a cast made up of De Palma’s housemates. “We had a decision to make about which film we wanted to do first. From the beginning, Phantomwas the most exciting out of the two projects in my mind but Sisters was more practical. At the time, Brian was living in a house in Malibu that was owned by Waldo Salt who wrote Midnight Cowboy. He’d left it to his daughter Jennifer and she invited Brian and Margot Kidder and Paul Schrader, a whole bunch of people. So the easiest thing was to keep it close to this group. So Margot Kidder would play one role and Jennifer the other lead, and it was a simpler form to make. It turned out that Sisters did really well, especially in the drive-ins.” After the success of their first collaboration, Pressman and De Palma began their passion project, Phantom of the Filmore. The reimagining centers on a young singer-songwriter, Winslow Leach, who’s overheard by a maniacal music producer known as Swan who steals the young man’s music. De Palma brought in composer Paul Williams to write the many songs in the film. “I was a staff writer at A&M Records, writing for The Carpenters, Three Dog Night, and a lot of great but kind of middle of the road music, you know, certainly not the Music of the Spheres,” Williams explained. “They opened a film department to try and get more of the music coming out of A&M Records into movies, and a guy there knew that Brian was doing Phantom of the Paradise, which at the time was called Phantom of the Filmore. I don’t know why Brian responded to my music because it was so different. I was known for writing what I call co-dependent anthems but for some reason, he really responded. So I came to it first as a composer and lyricist.” That might surprise fans of the film who know Williams best as the evil, Faustian producer who steals Winslow’s songs and later tries to trap him into becoming the voice and mind behind his new music venue, the titular Paradise. “The first song, Brian wanted Sha Na Na to perform and I said, ‘You know what, I’ve got this band I’ve been working with, these guys have been with me for years, they’re my road band. I’d like these guys to be the band.’ I think this may have been the beginning of when he started going, ‘Ah, there’s Swan.’ They eventually became the Juicy Fruits in the film and the bands that they evolve into throughout.” De Palma originally suggested that Williams play the Phantom and hero of the story himself, Winslow Leech, but the songwriter wasn’t sold on the idea. “I told him, ‘I could not, are you kidding??? I’m too little.’ And he said, ‘But you could be this creepy guy up in the rafters throwing things at people,'” Williams laughed. “For me, the idea of trying to perform with one eye through a mask…Bill Finley did things with that, there was just this essence to the character, something in the reading of Winslow that was so beautifully innocent, so touching. He was an amazing actor and it worked out because I got to play Swan!” Filming Phantom was off the cuff and collaborative, a process that saw input from those around cast and crew, as Williams recalls. “The first thing we shot was the contract scene. Yeah, my manager actually came up with a line that’s in the contract that I love. The concept for where the line came from is: if God signed a contract to create the universe, what would the contract say? ‘All articles which are excluded shall be deemed included.’ You know, it’s perfect. So that wound up in there.” Like most low budget films, the making of Phantom of the Paradise was incredibly intense. For the songwriter, there was no time to congratulate himself on his first acting gig. “There wasn’t a lot of time to really celebrate. I remember shooting all day and there was one scene that we had to reshoot the scene when I pull the knife from Winslow’s chest on the roof. We shot all day, and then I went directly from the set to the studio, recorded vocals until almost dawn, and then went right back to the set. They took my makeup off, put new makeup on, and then I shot the scene. I was so tired, I couldn’t understand me. And we were all like, ‘Oh, my God, that’s terrible.’ So we ended up reshooting it in New York.” For Pressman, Phantom was the kind of film he had always dreamed of making. “It was unique and original, closer to a kind of Cocteau fantasy that I’m drawn too. Sisters was more of a conventional thriller; I mean, Brian turned it into more than that, but on the page, Phantom was just far more expansive. The idea of Paul Williams doing the score was just this far more ambitious and exciting project.” Though the creative team was passionate, they were unsure of how the film would be received once they’d finished making it. “I don’t think we had an idea of the impact it would have. I think we were really happy with the film and we were happy that Fox picked it up when it finished, which was unusual in those days. They were doing less independent films and studios were not in the business of picking up other movies. They paid–today it would sound like peanuts–but I think they paid $2 million for the rights, and that was a big deal then.” Though the ambitious and audacious film was nominated for an Academy Award for Original Song Score and Adaptation, and a Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score: Motion Picture, it was a financial flop that failed to make money in almost every market except for Winnipeg, Manitoba. It’s not totally surprising as the film was ahead of its time in almost every sense. From showcasing an overtly queer character in the form of Paradise star Beef to a story centered on male toxicity and the abusive nature of the record industry the film pushed boundaries and didn’t seem to be playing to any kind of mainstream audience. The disappointing box office of the film would seed the passionate fandom that elevated Phantom of the Paradise from B-movie flop to every cult filmmaker’s favorite cult film. That’s not just a turn of phrase; two of the film’s biggest advocates have spent years trying to spotlight the underappreciated gem. Edgar Wright has spoken often about his love for the rock opera and even included it in his recent mini film festival at London’s Genesis Cinema. Guillermo del Toro loved the film so much that he bought a 35mm print and donated it to Los Angeles’ very own New Beverly Cinema so he could share his love with other cult cinema fans. He’s also currently collaborating with Paul Williams on the upcomingPan’s Labyrinth musical. Documentarians Sean Stanley and Malcolm Ingram recently debuted a documentary about the strange phenomenon of the Phantom’s popularity in Winnipeg. Made up of talking-head interviews with the fandom known affectionately as “Peggers,” the doc showcases the love and dedication of the hardcore fans who have kept the film in the spotlight for over four decades. The creative team first discovered the strange success story in an article. “I came across an article written by Doug Carlson, who was one of the original guys who brought Phantom to Winnipeg. He basically went through the experience and he was so affected that he just wanted to write about it. That was like sending a beacon out because one day I found it and was like, ‘Phantom is huge in Winnipeg, what?'” Ingram laughed. It was a story that would engage both the creators and with a little push from Ingram’s friend Kevin Smith who told him “that’s fucking genius,” the Phantom of Winnipeg was born. It helped that Stanley was already a huge fan of the rock opera. “I discovered Phantom in Toronto. There used to be this channel that showed late, great movies and city TV. And they would show movies on Friday at 11 o’clock. It would be like Black Christmas, stuff like that, and one of the movies they showed was Phantom. And the first time I saw it, it just fucked me up.” Though Winnipeg was the film’s biggest (and only) box office success on release, the film also became hugely popular in Paris. That slow-burn success has taught Williams a lot, as well as introducing him to some unexpected fans. “I think the eye-opener for me is that if Phantom had been even a mild success, it would probably be gone by now. The big lesson is don’t discard something as a failure. Give the universe a chance. Give people a chance to communicate with each other. What’s remarkable is these people that love this film, this isolated little community. But the same thing happened in Paris as well where it ran forever. The guys from Daft Punk met at a screening of Phantom, so I wound up with writing the lyrics to ‘Beyond’ and ‘Touch’ and singing on ‘Touch’ on the ‘Random Access Memories’ album because these guys saw Phantom 20 times together.” One of the things that stands out years later is the searing satire of the film. It’s a harsh analog for the brutal side of fame that eerily predicted the rise of reality tv in all of its extremes. Williams is passionate about the message of the movie which he feels is more relevant than ever in 2019. In an age of reality TV and stars who will do anything for fame, there’s a couple of moments from Phantom that particularly resonate. “In the original script, Beef died in the shower. But then we put it on stage and made it a part of a theatrical bit where the kids watched. That’s the heart of the movie to me; it’s the fact that these kids have seen so much theatrical violence that when they see the real thing they can’t recognize it. And that connects to my favorite line in the movie which is when Swan says, ‘Assassination live on coast to coast TV. That’s entertainment.’ That’s the dark heart and message of the movie to me.” As for the future of the groundbreaking film, Williams thinks it belongs on the stage, with someone like Lady Gaga at the heart of the story, bringing a new and updated vision of the parable to a whole new generation. He even teased that he’s written new songs for the potential production. Pressman revealed that a remake had been on the cards with del Toro attached but had never gotten off the ground. Still, the producer is hopeful about the potential of the Phantom returning once again in the near future, especially as the film’s legend and mythos continue to grow. credit - https://nerdist.com/article/phantom-of-the-paradise-oral-history-paul-williams/ Link Below. https://www.vintageannalsarchive.com/deep-dive---phantom-of-the-paradise.html A remarkable photo exhibit captures ‘a joyful moment’ of Black-Jewish unity in Miami Beach On fabled Miami Beach, land of sunshine and escape, Blacks and Jews share a shameful history of discrimination and exclusion. Into the 1970s, Blacks were prohibited by racist “sundown” laws from swimming or spending the night on the Beach, or to be there without a work ID. Jews could not buy or rent property on most of the Beach until after World War II, and early hotels advertised with signs like “Gentiles only” or “Always a view, Never a Jew.” Now a Miami photo exhibit, “Shared Spaces,” captures the two groups together during a brief, liberating – if still fraught – moment in the late ’70s which has implications that still reverberate in the present. “There’s a sense of empowerment,” said Carl Juste, a Haitian-American photojournalist and community art organizer presenting Shared Spaces at his Iris PhotoCollective ArtSpace in the Little Haiti neighborhood. “Empowerment in the relationships and in the participants on both sides, demonstrated in the space that was being occupied. Space in terms of how both communities were somewhat exiled, in terms of struggle and in terms of Miami’s history. “That’s the magic of this collection,” he said. “We have to look at them and imagine better possibilities.” The photos are by Andy Sweet, a young Jewish photographer whose pictures of the elderly Jews who filled a then-dilapidated South Beach have become locally famous in recent years. Sweet’s work has been featured in exhibits, a book, and a documentary, “The Last Resort,” that played major festivals and earned critical accolades. This, however, is the first time Sweet’s pictures of Blacks and Jews, at the time a largely aging, white community, have been displayed. Like Sweet’s other photos, they were taken in the late ’70s, as Blacks were finally allowed into the once-forbidden paradise. It was also the final moment for South Beach as home to an eccentric, vibrant Jewish community of former factory workers and Holocaust survivors, before they were decimated by age and the area’s transformation into a glamorous internation. More of the article below. Also I added a link to Andy Sweet's Legacy Project. https://forward.com/news/470899/a-remarkable-exhibit-captures-a-joyful-moment-for-jews-and-blacks-in-miami/?amp=1 Website https://andy-sweet.format.com/#1 Psychedelia supremo Paul Major is the undisputed father of record collecting Feel The Music Speaking to Paul Major is like flocking through a super chilled out encyclopaedia of alternative music. When I call him to talk about a new book chronicling his life’s work, it’s midday back in New York. He’s only just picked up his first cup of coffee, and is getting ready to turn on the news and get what he calls his “daily jolt of absurdity”. If you’re not into psychedelia or rare records, you might not have heard of Paul before – but the way we understand music today has his hands all over it. He is the original sound scavenger and vinyl collector, having spent the golden decades of rock music with his hands deep in the bargain bins of record stores all across the United States, looking for every odd sound that was yet to be shared with the world back in the 70s. Today he is recognised as an expert in music made on the fringes of culture, from private pressings to one-song bands. When we start talking, Paul lists off names of obscure records and artists like it’s nobody’s business, telling me enough stories to make it clear that we’re not really just conducting an interview, this is a chance for me to hear firsthand about a part of history. Starting out as a coin collector in rural Kentucky, 12-year-old Paul was oblivious to music as a kid, instead obsessed with UFOs, maths and monster movies. All that changed by the end of 1966, when the fuzzy guitars of Psychotic Reaction by The Count Five first graced his ears. From that moment on, a spark was ignited, Paul sucked into a whole new alternative universe: Rock’n’roll. From the get-go the records that attracted him were those which offered a gateway to the unusual – sounds that allowed him to escape the humdrum into a world of LSD, psychedelia and hippies. As a teenager, weekends were spent in record shops, carefully flicking through the titles of songs on the back of albums, in search of the surreal. When something seemed interesting enough, he would invest what little money he had. The first album Paul ever owned was Revolver by The Beatles. “I discovered soon that there were some used record shops near my house, which were cheap. I just started buying every record I couldn’t before – every single one that looked psychedelic and was part of this counterculture movement, this underground world of hippies and radical freaks that I, at the age of fifteen, desperately wanted to be a part of.” His record collection started expanding rapidly, but it was still just a personal pursuit at the time – Paul would listen to records with his college friends at parties and embrace his passion. Then in 1977 Paul moved to New York, in search of the newest musical phenomenon of the time: punk rock. He did end up finding punk, but that wasn’t all. In New York, Paul found a scene of record collectors, and that’s when his life’s work truly started coming together. Rest of the article below https://www.huckmag.com/art-and-culture/music-2/paul-major-record-collecting/ Portraits of Punk Rockers in the Late 1970s Punk rock music and fashion blew out of New York City, exploded in London, and caught like wildfire in San Francisco, Los Angeles and the world over. It developed concurrently everywhere, and every region had it’s own identity. But it was in San Francisco and L.A. where the most radical behavior in stateside punk rock style and attitude was exhibited. It was anti-hippie, anti-disco, anti-parent and anti-“nice”. And it was shockingly new. These photos are ground zero of punk rock style—delirious innovation and a snarling takeover of youth culture still resonating more than 20 years hence. Jim Jocoy, traveling between S.F. and L.A., shot portraits of every interesting punk rock personality who caught his eye—with each subject posed amidst the scene’s ruinous and chaotic environment. Some were musicians and some were artists. All were fans and enthusiasts. And they were the original creators of what is regarded as the most potent subculture of the late 20th century. Some of the more celebrated individuals of punk legend featured in this book are Darby Crash, Iggy Pop, Lydia Lunch, Sid Vicious, John Waters, Bruce Connor and members of X, The Cramps, The Avengers, Flipper, The Screamers, The Nuns, and many others. https://www.vintag.es/2012/04/photos-of-punk-rockers-in-late-70s.html?m=1 Choose Your Own Adventure Parody Covers Vintage Photographs of Men Arrested for Cross-Dressing in New York City in the Late 1930s and Early 1940s Cross-dressing laws are rarely, if ever, enforced in American cities today. However, between 1848 and World War I, 45 cities in the United States passed laws against cross-dressing defined as “wearing the apparel of the other sex”. In effect, the anti-cross-dressing laws became a flexible tool for police to enforce normative gender on multiple gender identities, including masculine women and people identifying as transgender or gender non-conforming. But as time progressed and fashion evolved, it was increasingly difficult to even define what “cross-dressing” entailed from a law-enforcement perspective. The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation organization defines cross-dressers specifically as heterosexual men who occasionally wear clothes, makeup and accessories culturally associated with women. “By the time the counterculture was in full bloom, cross-dressing arrests were routinely getting thrown out of court,” Susan Stryker, an associate professor of Gender and Women’s Studies at the University of Arizona, told PBS. “Arresting cross-dressing people was mainly just a form of police harassment.” https://www.vintag.es/2017/09/when-cross-dressing-was-criminal.html?m=1  New Podcast Episode! Ep: 24 Stuart S. Shapiro/Night Flight (& Night Flight Plus) Stuart S. Shapiro is a producer, writer, director, and Internet entrepreneur. Shapiro began his career as an independent film distributor in 1974 by starting International Harmony which distributed cult classics TunnelVision, Neil Young's Rust Never Sleeps, Bob Marley's Reggae Sunsplash, The Sex Pistols' DOA, and Tarzoon: Shame of the Jungle. As a producer, Shapiro's credits include Mondo New York and Comedy's Dirtiest Dozen, which helped launch the careers of Tim Allen, Chris Rock, and Otto & George. Other credits include USA networks TV series Night Flight, a youth–targeted variety show he created which ran from 1981 to 1996. Shapiro also produced the 72-hour live webcast of Woodstock '99, notable for being one of the largest of its kind at the time. Night Flight Plus is a video-on-demand service offering original episodes of the 1980s USA Network TV show Night Flight. In addition to archived episodes of the show, the service features films in the music documentary, concert, horror and cult genres. $3.33 a month/39.99 a year https://www.nightflightplus.com Identifi Yourself: A Journey in F**K You Creative Content Paperback $13.70 Identifi Yourself is a humorous and poetic journey to empower and inspire the reader to find their creative strengths. https://www.amazon.com/IDENTIFi-YOURSELF-JOURNEY-CREATIVE-COURAGE/dp/1947637886 https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/vaapod Please check out and support Nathaniel Russel's Work http://nathanielrussell.com/fake-fliers-1 Vintage Lounge Act Images Found Here https://www.polarityrecords.com/lounge-acts.html Vintage Ads Found Below... https://www.polarityrecords.com/bennetts-images-galleries.html Empire Roller Disco: Photographs by Patrick D. Pagnano Out Now!Brooklyn's Empire Rollerdome opened its doors in 1941 and soon became the borough's premier destination for recreational and competitive roller skating. But it wasn't until the late 1970s that the celebrated rink reached iconic status by replacing its organist with a live DJ, installing a state of the art sound and light system, and renaming itself after the nationwide dance craze it had helped to originate: the Empire Roller Disco was born. In 1980, the acclaimed street photographer Patrick D. Pagnano went on assignment to document the Empire and its legendary cast of partygoers. The resulting photographs, gathered in Empire Roller Disco for the first time, capture the vibrant spirits, extraordinary styles, and sheer joys of Brooklyn roller disco at its dizzying peak. https://www.thirdplacebooks.com/book/9781944860448 NEW JAMEL SHABAZZ'S ALBUMS BOOK OUT NOW! The influential New York photographer Jamel Shabazz has created portraits of the city’s communities for over 40 years. Born and raised in Brooklyn, Shabazz began photographing people he encountered on New York streets in the late 1970s, creating an archive of cultural shifts and struggles across the city. His portraits underscore the street as a space for self-presentation, whether through fashion or pose. In every instance Shabazz aims, in his words, to represent individuals and communities with “honor and dignity.” This book—awarded the Gordon Parks Foundation / Steidl Book Prize—presents, for the first time, Shabazz’s work from the 1970s to ’90s as it exists in his archive: small prints thematically grouped and sequenced in traditional family photo albums that function as portable portfolios. Shabazz began making portraits in the mid-1970s in Brooklyn, Queens, the West Village and Harlem. His camera was also at his side while working as an officer at Rikers Island in the 1980s, where he took portraits of inmates that he later shared with their friends and families. Shabazz had his rolls of color film processed at a one-hour photo shop that provided two copies of each print: he typically gave one to his sitters, and the second he organized into changing albums to be shown to future subjects. This book features selections from over a dozen albums, many never-before-seen, and includes his earliest photographs as well as images taken inside Rikers Island, all accompanied by essays that situate Shabazz’s work within the broader history of photography. 2022 Recipient of The Gordon Parks Foundation / Steidl Book Prize Co-published with The Gordon Parks Foundation https://steidl.de/Books/Albums-0120242856.html  New Episode out! I had seen John over the years on TV and film and always enjoyed his work. I used to be a one on one worker with kids and teens with disabilities which drew me to to his work on “Speechless” which I found comically and authentically true to life. I enjoyed all of the actors but John’s performance felt very true to himself. I identify as an intuitive (like a poorer lazier more Jewish Rick Rubin) and can always get a sense of actors being true to them selves in certain roles. I met John through the Vintage Instagram that this podcast is named after and asked him to interview him. In order to prepare I listened to his memoir via Audible “No Job For A Man” and was blown away by his humor, insight, passion, authenticity, pop culture knowledge, his love and knowledge of Broadway Musicals, and his love and knowledge of Punk Music. This was exciting for me because most men of my generation can’t hold any conversations covering both Punk, and Broadway, yet alone can also bring Ronnie James Dio and Iron Maiden into that conversation and still make sense of it. I am also a year apart from John and just saw some interesting parallels in my own life. Let’s just say I was really moved by the memoir. To summarize I’d say it’s really hard not to like John Ross Bowie. He is just a humble, intelligent, and passionate person. He has spent much of his life pursuing this own loves and dreams. He has written two books. The other being a Deep Focus (name of the series) on the film “Heathers”. He has also written and produced a play “Four Chords and a Gun” which is an intense black comedy about The Ramones during a Drama filled 1979 recording session that led to the album “End of The Century” produced by Phil Spector. This episode falls more into the category of a great conversation that explores topics such as why no-one gets to hate on the musical Annie, Documentary Now and the Co-op episode, his show “Speechless” and why that show was one his best acting experiences, his punk band “Egghead”, and lastly the Philadelphia Band “The Dead Milkmen“ of which John is such a super fan. That knowledge lead me to invite him as a co-host to interview the band with me. I ironically I had already planned to interview them right after his interview so it just made sense. That episode will come out in about three weeks and John killed it! Please enjoy getting to know John Ross Bowie. You will be glad you did. I want to personally thank John as he went above and beyond to help create this special episode. Please check out John’s acting work, Music (Egghead can be found on many music services) and definitely get a copy of “No Job For A Man” which is a stellar memoir. It’s available at most book sellers. https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/No-Job-for-a-Man/John-Ross-Bowie/9781639362462 https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/vaapod What About Gay Bob? The First Openly Gay Doll (for everyone) Was a Trailblazer Toy Thirteen inches tall and plastic, Gay Bob was marketed as the first openly gay doll and made his retail debut in mail-order catalogs. He was sold in a cardboard box designed to look like a closet. Gay Bob's packaging proudly (and wordily) explained what “coming out of the closet” meant: "Hi boys, girls and grownups, I’m Gay Bob, the world’s first gay doll. I bet you are wondering why I come packed in a closet. ‘Coming out of the closet’ is an expression which means that you admit the truth about yourself and are no longer ashamed of what you are... A lot of straight people should come out of their 'straight closets' and take the risk of being honest about what they are. People who are not ashamed of what they are, are more lovable, kind, and understanding. That is why everyone should come out of “their closet" so the world will be a more loving, understanding, and fulfilling place to live. Gay people are no different than straight people. If everyone came out of their closets, there wouldn’t be so many angry, frustrated, frightened people... It’s not easy to be honest about what you are; in fact it takes a great deal of courage. But remember, if Gay Bob has the courage to come out of his closet, so can you!" At face value, Gay Bob’s message about the merits of coming out seems earnest, espousing the values of courage, honesty, and living authentically; however, the branding and design of the Gay Bob doll are brash. Gay Bob’s story is deceptively complicated and intertwined in toy and LGBTQ+ history. THE CREATOR - WHO MADE GAY BOB? Gay Bob was created by an advertising executive named Harvey Rosenberg. Rosenberg put $10,000 of his own money into getting Gay Bob manufactured through his company, Gizmo Development. More of the article below in link. https://nhm.org/stories/what-about-gay-bob  Biography Bud Cort, Walter Edward Cox, ,American actor/comedian, was born Walter Edward Cox in New Rochelle, New York. The second of five children, he grew up in Rye, New York, the son of Joseph P. Cox, an orchestra leader, pianist, and owner of a successful men's clothing store in Rye, and Alma M. Court a former newspaper and Life magazine reporter and an executive asst. at M.G.M. in New York City. From early childhood on, Bud displayed a remarkable acting ability and appeared in countless school plays and community theatre. Also a talented painter, he earned extra money doing portraits at art fairs and by commission to the people in Rye. However, he knew acting was his real dream and began riding trains into New York City at the age of 14 to begin studying with his first teacher Bill Hickey at the HB Studios in Greenwich Village. Upon graduation from Iona Prep School run by the Christian Brothers of Ireland, Bud applied to the NYU School of the Arts, now known as Tisch. Unfortunately, the acting department was full but after seeing Bud's art portfolio he was admitted as a scenic design major in 1967. Bud continued to study with Bill Hickey and secretly began to work in commercials, - off Broadway Theater, and the soap opera, "The Doctors." He formed a comedy team with actress Jeannie Berlin, and later with Judy Engles, performing Bud's original comedy material all over Manhattan's burgeoning nightclub scene. Bud and Judy won first place during amateur night at the famed Village Gate and were signed to a management contract with the club's owner. Soon after, while appearing at the famed Upstairs at the Downstairs in the musical revue "Free Fall," Bud was spotted by Robert Altman who was in New York looking for actors for his film "M. A. S. H." Bud was hired and from that went on to play the title role in Altman's next film "Brewster McCloud." A quirky May-Dec. love story, "Harold and Maude," next saw Cort opposite Ruth Gordon in arguably his most famous role. After a confused reception, the film went on to become not only one of the most successful cult movies in history, but eventually was crowned an American Film Classic. Bud was also awarded the French equivalent of the Oscar, the Crystal Star, for Best Actor of the Year. He was also nominated for a Golden Globe and a British Academy Award. https://www.vintageannalsarchive.com/deep-dive---bud-cort.html  The Story of The Shaggs Depending on whom you ask, the Shaggs were either the best band of all time or the worst. Frank Zappa is said to have proclaimed that the Shaggs were “better than the Beatles.” More recently, though, a music fan who claimed to be in “the fetal position, writhing in pain,” declared on the Internet that the Shaggs were “hauntingly bad,” and added, “I would walk across the desert while eating charcoal briquettes soaked in Tabasco for forty days and forty nights not to ever have to listen to anything Shagg-related ever again.” Such a divergence of opinion confuses the mind. Listening to the Shaggs’ album “Philosophy of the World” will further confound. The music is winsome but raggedly discordant pop. Something is sort of wrong with the tempo, and the melodies are squashed and bent, nasal, deadpan. Are the Shaggs referencing the heptatonic, angular microtones of Chinese ya-yueh court music and the atonal note clusters of Ornette Coleman, or are they just a bunch of kids playing badly on cheap, out-of-tune guitars? And what about their homely, blunt lyrics? Consider the song “Things I Wonder”: There are many things I wonder There are many things I don’t It seems as though the things I wonder most Are the things I never find out Is this the colloquial ease and dislocated syntax of a James Schuyler poem or the awkward innermost thoughts of a speechless teen-ager? The Shaggs were three sisters, Helen, Betty, and Dorothy (Dot) Wiggin, from Fremont, New Hampshire. They were managed by their father, Austin Wiggin, Jr., and were sometimes accompanied by another sister, Rachel. They performed almost exclusively at the Fremont town hall and at a local nursing home, beginning in 1968 and ending in 1973. Many people in Fremont thought the band stank. Austin Wiggin did not. He believed his girls were going to be big stars, and in 1969 he took most of his savings and paid to record an album of their music. Nine hundred of the original thousand copies of “Philosophy of the World” vanished right after being pressed, along with the record’s shady producer. Even so, the album has endured for thirty years. Music collectors got hold of the remaining copies of “Philosophy of the World” and started a small Shaggs cult. In the mid-seventies, WBCN-FM, in Boston, began playing a few cuts from the record. In 1988, the songs were repackaged and rereleased on compact disk and became celebrated by outsider-music mavens, who were taken with the Shaggs’ artless style. Now the Shaggs are entering their third life: “Philosophy of the World” was reissued last spring by RCA Victor and will be released in Germany this winter. The new CD of “Philosophy of the World” has the same cover as the original 1969 album—a photograph of the Wiggin girls posed in front of a dark-green curtain. In the picture, Helen is twenty-two, Dot is twenty-one, and Betty is eighteen. They have long blond hair and long blond bangs and stiff, quizzical half-smiles. Helen, sitting behind her drum set, is wearing flowered trousers and a white Nehru shirt; Betty and Dot, clutching their guitars, are wearing matching floral tunics, pleated plaid skirts, and square-heeled white pumps. There is nothing playful about the picture; it is melancholy, foreboding, with black shadows and the queer, depthless quality of an aquarium. Which leaves you with even more things to wonder about the Shaggs. https://www.vintageannalsarchive.com/deep-dive---the-shaggs.html NYC Cab Driver Spends 30 Years Photographing His Passengers In 1980, aspiring photographer Ryan Weideman landed in New York City from California, looking to make a name for himself. But he soon found himself focused on more practical matters, like paying the rent. Thanks to his neighbor, who was a cab driver, he found himself riding along in the taxi one night, and by the next day, he'd found both a way to pay the bills and the perfect outlet for his creativity. Over thirty years, Weideman would continue working as a cab driver part-time, photographing his clients to view the changing city in a new way. “After the first week of driving a taxi I could see the photographic potential,” shared Weideman. “So many interesting and unusual combinations of people getting into my cab. Photographing seemed like the only thing to do. The backseat image was constantly in a state of flux, thronged with interesting looking people that were exciting and inspired, creating their own unique atmosphere.” Not wanting to waste time turning around to capture the action, Weideman found himself both as subject and photographer. Acting as a visual narrator in the scenes, his appearance speaks for the viewer who is also looking in, observing the lives of strangers. From 5 pm to 5 am on weekends, the interior of his cab became is his studio. Weideman studied the backseat scene intently, just waiting for the right time to pop the flash. Sometimes he asked permission, sometimes the flash “accidentally” went off. Notable passengers include Allen Ginsberg—famed Beat Generation poet. The photo now belongs to the Brooklyn Museum. Other passengers simply made an impression. Weideman sharpened his skills to understand who was interesting—or not—over the years. And occasionally, he would spot a face on the street he remembered photographing. He recalls seeing a voluptuous woman walking down the street who reminded him of Ruby Duby Do. Running to catch up with her, he asked if she remembered being photographed in the back of a taxi, and to his delight, she did. “I told her to meet me on the corner of 9th and 43rd the next day and I would share my pictures of her. She was thrilled, and so was I. When I gave her some pictures, she thanked me, and as we parted. I watched her show the photos to the passersby as she walked away.” https://mymodernmet.com/ryan-weideman-nyc-taxi-photographer/?fbclid=IwAR37DqKV0x7GkPbkyXcbKGEiaDkrLbYEHGCwC5L1pHs8IVwsl4u70Je8IbM Sexual Innuendo in Vintage Comic Panels Tabloid Covers
BRING IT: MEET THE GORGEOUS LADIES OF JAPANESE WRESTLING Professional wrestling has a long, storied history in Japan. Active cultivation of the sport was started following WWII as the country was collectively mourning and recovering after the horrendous bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, killing approximately 200,000 people and other wide-spread, war-related devastation. The sport became hugely popular, and sometime in the mid-1950s wrestlers from the U.S. would make the trip to Japan to grapple with the country’s newest star athletes including an all-female “Puroresu” (professional wrestling) league, All Japan Women’s Pro-Wrestling Association, formed in 1955. Just over a decade later, the league would become All Japan Women’s Pro-Wrestling (AJW), and instead of going at it exclusively with American or other foreign wrestlers, the sport started to pit female Japanese wrestlers against each other which is just as fantastic as it sounds. All-female wrestling in Japan in the 1970s was a glorious wonderland full of tough, athletic women happily defying cultural and gender norms. Matches were broadcast on television and a duo going by the name The Beauty Pair (Jackie Sato and Maki Ueda) were huge stars. Teenagers themselves, Sato and Ueda, were inspirational to their young female fans leading to the pair (and Sato as a solo artist), to be signed by RCA, producing several hit singles. They starred in a film based on their wrestling personas and sales of magazines featuring The Beauty Pair and other girl wrestlers were swift. The masterminds of the AJW--Takashi Matsunaga and his brothers—knew their ladies-only league was now unstoppable. Female wrestling in the 80’s and 90’s in Japan was reminiscent of American producer and promoter David B. McLane’s magical GLOW (Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling), and introduced more theatrics into the sport by way of heavy metal makeup, wild hairdos, and eccentric individual personas. In the 80s, televised matches would glue an estimated ten million viewers to the tube much in part to the insane popularity of The Beauty Pair’s successors, The Crush Gals. Both women had signature closing maneuvers; Chigusa Nagayo was known for her Super Freak and Super Freak II, and her partner, Lioness Asuka often finished off her opponents using one of her go-to moves like the LSD II, LSD III and the K Driller (a reverse piledriver). Like their predecessors, The Crush Gals were also musicians and put out a few singles during the 80s, often regaling viewers with songs during matches. Other ladies of the AJW such as Bull Nakano, Dump Matsumoto, Jumbo Hori and others had their own personal theme music. And since lady-wrassling was such a sensation (as it should be), the theme music created for various stars of the scene was compiled on a neat picture disc called Japanese Super Angels in 1985. Video games based on the goings on in the AJW started making the rounds in the early 1990s with titles from Sega and Super Famicom. So, in the event all this talk about Japanese female wrestling has you wondering if it is still a thing in Japan, I’m happy to report it looks to be alive and well. I’ve posted loads of images taken from Japanese wrestling magazines, posters, and publicity photos from the 70s, 80s, and 90s featuring some of the ballsy women which took on the game of wrestling in Japan and won. Deal with it. https://dangerousminds.net/comments/bring_it_meet_the_gorgeous_ladies_of_japanese_wrestling CASTRATION SQUAD: THE UNSUNG HEROINES OF ALICE BAG AND DINAH CANCER’S EARLY DEATHROCK BAND Back in the Canterbury Apartments days of Los Angeles’ punk scene Alice Bag, of the Bags, met neighbor Shannon Wilhelm whom she eventually ended up living with. After the end of the Bags—and more or less the end of the seedy Canterbury Apartments—Alice Bag was recruited to play bass for a new band called Castration Squad. This early deathrock band was made up of Shannon Wilhelm (vocals), Mary Bat-Thing (vocals), Tiffany Kennedy (keyboards), Alice Bag (bass), Tracy Lea (guitar) and Elissa Bello (drums). The fairly unknown band was comprised of some quite legendary female rockers. All female bands were still quite a novelty at this time so it’s noteworthy that not only this was a proto deathrock band but also that there were six women in it. Mary Bat-Thing was known as “Dinah Cancer” as part of 45 Grave; Elissa Bello joined after a brief stint in the Go-Go’s and Tracy Lea was in Redd Kross. Lesbian folksinger Phranc (who’d been in Nervous Gender) also played with the group If you want to talk about badass “squad goals” for Halloween…. you and your gal pals should consider dressing up as Castration Squad. These ladies, led by the late, ever so stylish Shannon Wilhelm all donned uniquely goth outfits adorned with crosses and religious medals. You could even play “Wild Thing” on the jukebox and change all the words to “Bat Thing”! In all seriousness, Castration Squad was an extremely original group during their era. As Alice Bag said in her book, Violence Girl: “Castration Squad anticipated the styles of death punk, goth and riot grrrl.” Mary Bat Thing and Shannon’s deadpan vocal performances created a spooky aura that paired well with Bag’s gothy bass lines. This live performance of “A Date with Jack” really captures their overall vibe well. While they never released an album, their song “The X Girlfriend” is on the Killed By Death #13 compilation and “A Date with Jack” was released on Alice Bag’s Alice Bag: Violence Girl compilation in 2011. https://dangerousminds.net/comments/castration_squad_alice_bag_and_dinah_cancers_early_deathrock_band?utm_source=Dangerous+Minds+newsletter&utm_campaign=79fb9151a6-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_ecada8d328-79fb9151a6-65871573 How punk and reggae fought back against racism in the 70s Syd Shelton’s photographs capture the Rock Against Racism movement that confronted racism in 70s and 80s Britain. When Syd Shelton returned to London in 1977 after fours years living in Australia, he was shocked at how much things had changed. "The recession had really hit and the Callaghan government had attacked living standards for working people - very similar to what's happening right now," he explains. "Whenever that happens, there's always a rise of something like the National Front." Syd was desperate to fight against the hatred and was lucky to meet one of campaign group Rock Against Racism's founders, Red Saunders. Before long he was their unofficial photographer and designer for their newspaper/zine Temporary Hoarding. With an exhibition of his work from that period opening up at Rivington Place next month, we caught up with Syd to hear about some of Britain's most tribal and transformative times. So what were the main messages of RAR? Putting black and white bands on stage together was a political statement in itself. We didn't go on stage shouting "smash the National Front" and all that sloganeering, but we did want to extend the argument and talk about Zimbabwe, South Africa and apartheid, Northern Ireland, sexism and homophobia. We wanted to go, "Look, the National Front is not just against black people, they're against all of this as well." Why does the exhibition just cover 1977-1981? Like Jerry Dammers said, two tone took over the baton, so in a way we'd succeeded because bands were multi-racial. And the chemistry was starting to fall apart a little bit. We were all exhausted. We'd been doing this for five years. Of course, the fight against racism never goes away, as you can see with the anti-refugee situation at the moment. We're not born racist - we learn it and it takes a lot of looking at the Daily Mail to get that in your head. You have to argue against it. https://i-d.vice.com/en/article/ywv3mb/how-punk-and-reggae-fought-back-against-racism-in-the-70s NYC Cab Driver Spends 30 Years Photographing His Passengers In 1980, aspiring photographer Ryan Weideman landed in New York City from California, looking to make a name for himself. But he soon found himself focused on more practical matters, like paying the rent. Thanks to his neighbor, who was a cab driver, he found himself riding along in the taxi one night, and by the next day, he'd found both a way to pay the bills and the perfect outlet for his creativity. Over thirty years, Weideman would continue working as a cab driver part-time, photographing his clients to view the changing city in a new way. “After the first week of driving a taxi I could see the photographic potential,” shared Weideman. “So many interesting and unusual combinations of people getting into my cab. Photographing seemed like the only thing to do. The backseat image was constantly in a state of flux, thronged with interesting looking people that were exciting and inspired, creating their own unique atmosphere.” Not wanting to waste time turning around to capture the action, Weideman found himself both as subject and photographer. Acting as a visual narrator in the scenes, his appearance speaks for the viewer who is also looking in, observing the lives of strangers. From 5 pm to 5 am on weekends, the interior of his cab became is his studio. Weideman studied the backseat scene intently, just waiting for the right time to pop the flash. Sometimes he asked permission, sometimes the flash “accidentally” went off. Notable passengers include Allen Ginsberg—famed Beat Generation poet. The photo now belongs to the Brooklyn Museum. Other passengers simply made an impression. Weideman sharpened his skills to understand who was interesting—or not—over the years. And occasionally, he would spot a face on the street he remembered photographing. He recalls seeing a voluptuous woman walking down the street who reminded him of Ruby Duby Do. Running to catch up with her, he asked if she remembered being photographed in the back of a taxi, and to his delight, she did. “I told her to meet me on the corner of 9th and 43rd the next day and I would share my pictures of her. She was thrilled, and so was I. When I gave her some pictures, she thanked me, and as we parted. I watched her show the photos to the passersby as she walked away.” https://mymodernmet.com/ryan-weideman-nyc-taxi-photographer/?fbclid=IwAR37DqKV0x7GkPbkyXcbKGEiaDkrLbYEHGCwC5L1pHs8IVwsl4u70Je8IbM Some fun vintage tabloid covers. Sexual Innuendo in Vintage Comics
This amazing book of one of my favorite series of photos by @patrick_d_pagnano_photography is finally out. $32. Hardcover. Available from most booksellers. Brooklyn’s Empire Rollerdome opened its doors in 1941 and soon became the borough’s premier destination for recreational and competitive roller skating. But it wasn’t until the late 1970s that the celebrated rink reached iconic status by replacing its organist with a live DJ, installing a state of the art sound and light system, and renaming itself after the nationwide dance craze it had helped to originate: the Empire Roller Disco was born. In 1980, the acclaimed street photographer Patrick D. Pagnano went on assignment to document the Empire and its legendary cast of partygoers. The resulting photographs, gathered in Empire Roller Disco for the first time, capture the vibrant spirits, extraordinary styles, and sheer joys of Brooklyn roller disco at its dizzying peak. About the Author Called “one of the most versatile and adaptive street photographers in the genre's history,” Patrick D. Pagnano moved to New York City from Chicago in 1974 and immersed himself in an art practice that would grow to include street work, portraiture, and documentary photography. His work is in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art, the Brooklyn Museum, the Art Institute of Chicago, and numerous other institutions. ALSO PLEASE ADD @patrick_d_pagnano_photography #patrickpagnano Book available at most booksellers. Info on publisher below https://anthology.net/book/empire-roller-disco/ HISTORY OF THE ANTI-GAY MOVEMENT SINCE 1977 Read a timeline of the radical right's thirty-year crusade against homosexuality. 1977 Born-again singer Anita Bryant campaigns to overturn an anti-discrimination law protecting gay men and lesbians in Dade County, Fla. Inspired by her victory, Bryant founds the first national anti-gay group, Save Our Children, drawing unprecedented attention to gay issues and motivating gay groups to organize in response. James Dobson, author of 1969 pro-spanking book Dare To Discipline, founds Focus on the Family in Arcadia, Calif. Focus will move to Colorado Springs, Colo., in 1991, become America's wealthiest fundamentalist ministry, and spearhead the campaign against gay marriage. 1978 Gay activist Harvey Milk, elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1977, is assassinated on Nov. 27 (along with Mayor George Moscone) by right-wing religious zealot Dan White, a former city supervisor who had resigned in protest after the board passed a gay-rights ordinance. John Birch Society trainer and "family activist" Tim LaHaye publishes The Unhappy Gays (later retitled What Everyone Should Know About Homosexuality). Calling gay people "militant, organized" and "vile," LaHaye anticipates anti-gay arguments to come. California State Sen. John Briggs floats a ballot initiative allowing local school boards to ban gay teachers. "One third of San Francisco teachers are homosexual," Briggs says. "I assume most of them are seducing young boys in toilets." The initiative is defeated, but the campaign inspires anti-gay crusaders like the Rev. Lou Sheldon, who will found the Traditional Values Coalition in 1981. 1979 The Rev. Jerry Falwell founds the Moral Majority, a national effort to stimulate the fundamentalist vote and elect Christian Right candidates. Early fundraising appeals include a "Declaration of War" on homosexuality. 1980 Paul Cameron, former psychology instructor at University of Nebraska, begins publishing pseudo-scientific pamphlets "proving" that gay people commit more serial murders, molest more children, and intentionally spread diseases. Expelled from the American Psychological Association in 1983 for ethics violations, Cameron will continue to produce bogus "studies" widely cited by anti-gay groups. More in article below https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence-report/2005/history-anti-gay-movement-1977 Jaw-Dropping Christian Ephemera From The 20th Century Putting the fear of God in everyone: Christian ephemera from the 20th Century. It’s not about God; it’s about the people https://flashbak.com/jaw-dropping-christian-ephemera-from-the-20th-century-51651/ Vintage Psych and other Drug Ads
Divine worked with the groundbreaking gender bending theater and art troupe The Cockettes. Here is info from Fayette Hauser's (original founder) site http://fayettehauser.com/cockettes.html The Cockettes were born on stage on New Year’s Eve, 1969 at the Palace Theatre in North Beach, San Francisco. The troupe emerged out of a group of Acid Freak artists and hippies that were living communally in the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco in a Victorian flat on Bush St. We were all intent on re-creating ourselves in the way of a New Myth, expressing our deepest Fantasies, Dreams and Desires on our bodies. Dressing as outrageously as possible, we tripped around the city in a large pack, going to concerts at the dance halls; The Fillmore, Winterland and The Family Dog on the Great Highway, thus attracting even more like-minded Freaks. Into this wild bunch came Hibiscus, the biggest Freak artist of them all. He had been an actor named George Harris III and had come from New York City where he performed with his theater family in avant garde productions such as the seminal play Gorilla Queen by Ronald Tavel. He was brought to San Francisco by Alan Ginsburg, his lover who led him to Kaliflower, a commune run by the Beat author and gay guru Irving Rosenthal. After much LSD, George changed his name to Hibiscus and rebelling against the restrictive atmosphere of Kaliflower, presented himself to the house at Bush & Baker, announcing that the glory and beauty of our outrageous lifestyle should be on the stage. His dream was to create an avant garde theatre troupe similar to what he had experienced in New York with John Vaccaro’s Play House of the Ridiculous and the films of Jack Smith but to now include the bright and shining zeitgeist of the culture of LSD. The original name for the troupe was The Angels of Light Free Theatre. Everyone at Bush & Baker was enthralled and leaped at the idea. We had all attended the iconoclastic theater experience presented by The Living Theatre with their show Paradise Now where they completely dissolved the invisible “fourth wall” of the stage to encompass everyone in the moment. Experimental and experiential theater, real, no bullshit. Absurdist and Surreal, in life and on the stage. Hibiscus brought in an old velvet scrapbook and began filling it with pictures that represented ideas for the stage. He included all of us in the creation of this fantasy filled dream of a new theatre vision. The book held many ideas and became the basis for all performances in the first year. Hibiscus was determined to have the first performance on New Years Eve 1969 in order to proclaim the New Theatre for the New Decade. He found an old theater on Fillmore St., a very run-down place that showed porno films. The owner seemed amenable to the idea until Hibiscus showed up with our entourage from Bush & Baker, to perform a wedding ceremony for Teena and Boop. We were naked wearing only great floral head wreaths and a few scarves. While everyone was dancing ceremoniously on the stage, the owner burst in shrieking, “I can’t allow a live sex act here! Get out!” Alfred Jarry’s Ubu Roi: The Most Punk Play Of All Time Michael Meschke’s adaptation of Alfred Jarry’s scatological and chaotic play Ubu Roi was performed at the Marionetteatern performing arts theatre, Stockholm, in 1964. Costumes, sets and puppets were designed and created by Franciska and Stefan Themerson. This post is illustrated by photographs from Meschke’s show. Ubu Roi was first performed in Paris at the Théâtre de l’Œuvre on December 10, 1896. Jarry, only twenty-three at the time, had come to Paris five years before to live on a small family inheritance. He frequented the literary salons of the time and began to write. It didn’t take long for his inheritance to disappear and he soon lapsed into a chaotic and anarchic existence in which he met the demands of day-to-day life with self-conscious buffoonery. He died in a state of utter destitution and alcoholism. Ubu Roi, however, was an innovative, avant-garde satire on power, greed, and malfeasance. It caused a stir, provoking riots in the theatre and a national scandal and Ubu Roi was banned after only two performances (one of which was the dress rehearsal). It really was that good. The story, a re-telling of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, begins with Père Ubu (played by Firmin Gémier) exclaiming “Merdre”, which can be translated as ‘Shitsky!’ or ‘Shite!’. The story than becomes a little oblique. The action centres on Ubu, a grotesque caricature based on Félix-Frédéric Hébert (14 January 1832 – 14 October 1918), Jarry’s physics teacher at a Rennes lycée – “la déformation par un potache d’un de ses professeurs qui représentait pour lui tout le grotesque qui fût au monde.” We know something of Jarry’s unwitting muse. In June 1882 the school inspector noted: “M. Hébert’s speech is ponderous and muffled. His lessons lack both clarity and organization. His influence on his pupils is almost nil. He does not know how to impose his authority, nor how to get the slightest attention from his pupils.” Might we feel a pang of sympathy for the lampooned teacher? Hold that thought as we deliver an aside full of context: Finally, in 1892 and after eleven years at Rennes, he was persuaded to retire, on reaching the age of sixty. A few years later the events of the Dreyfus Affair obliged his return to public service. Alfred Dreyfus had been the highest-ranking Jewish officer ever to serve in the French Army until, in 1894, a court martial found him guilty of passing military secrets to the Germans. After a ceremony of public denigration he was imprisoned on Devil’s Island under particularly arduous conditions. It soon became obvious that he was the victim of an anti-Semitic plot, and the “Affair” became the greatest political controversy of its day. Dreyfus’s second court martial, in 1899, happened to take place in Rennes; the courtroom was within the lycée building itself. He was again found guilty, and sentenced to an additional ten years in prison, even though the evidence brought against him at his first trial had been shown in the interim to have been forged. The verdict was so obviously unjust that the French President pardoned him anyway. Hébert was so outraged by this attempt, in his words, “to rehabilitate a justly condemned traitor” that he entered local politics and was elected a town councilor in 1900. Later the same year a local paper carried this report of a council meeting. More of the article in link below https://flashbak.com/alfred-jarrys-ubu-roi-the-most-punk-play-of-all-time-372959/ Vintage Buttons
 Ralph Eugene Meatyard was a visionary photographer known for his dreamlike black & white photographs of family members in masks, elegant portraits of bohemian friends and radical experiments in abstraction. Meatyard’s unique visual language was the product of a naturally curious mind stimulated by a love of literature and the spoken word. His shadowy photographs – often featuring dark dilapidated locales populated by enigmatic characters – have drawn comparisons to Southern Gothic literature. Meatyard’s interest in Zen Buddhism guided his intuitive process for making photographs. His practice relied upon the photographer achieving a “sensitized state,” putting trust in the mind’s eye instead of intellect to clearly see the intricacies of the physical world. Meatyard’s metaphysical approach to picture-making helped redefine the genre of fine-art photography in the 1960s. Through a myriad of complex projects, many predicated upon the constructed or staged photograph, Meatyard created “tableau vivants” filled with symbolic language that served as signifiers in the creation of the artist’s visual vocabulary. Meatyard’s subjective use of the camera has since influenced new generations of photographers. Today, he is recognized as a pioneer of surreal, experimental and nonobjective photography. Meatyard was an integral part of Kentucky’s post-war art and literary intelligentsia. His circle of friends included photographers, painters, poets, scholars, writers and philosophers. Meatyard’s interest in photography grew from his professional life as a practicing optician and working knowledge of lens technology. A desire to document his growing family led to his purchase of a camera in 1950. From the 1950s onward, he would photograph exclusively in his hometown of Lexington, Kentucky and the surrounding countryside. The Photographs of Ralph Eugene Meatyard opens at Ogden Museum of Southern Art on October 1, 2022 and will be on view through January 23, 2023. The exhibition is curated by Richard McCabe, Curator of Photography at Ogden Museum of Southern Art, in collaboration with Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco and Ralph Eugene Meatyard Estate. ABOUT THE ARTISTRalph Eugene Meatyard, Untitled (Self Portrait), (REM.1464.Y), c. 1958, Gelatin silver print, 11 x 14 inches, Collection of the Estate of Ralph Eugene Meatyard, Courtesy of Fraenkel Gallery Ralph Eugene Meatyard lived in Lexington, Kentucky, where he made his living as an optician while creating an impressive and enigmatic body of photographs. Meatyard’s creative circle included mystics and poets, such as Thomas Merton and Guy Davenport, as well as the photographers Cranston Ritchie and Van Deren Coke, who were mentors and fellow members of the Lexington Camera Club. Meatyard’s work spanned many genres and experimented with new means of expression, from dreamlike portraits—often set in abandoned places—to multiple exposures, motion-blur, and other methods of photographic abstraction. He also collaborated with his friend Wendell Berry on the 1971 book The Unforeseen Wilderness, for which Meatyard contributed photographs of Kentucky’s Red River Gorge. Meatyard’s final series, The Family Album of Lucybelle Crater, are cryptic double portraits of friends and family members wearing masks and enacting symbolic dramas. Museum exhibitions of the artist’s work have recently been presented at The Art Institute of Chicago; The Philadelphia Museum of Art; the de Young Museum, San Francisco; The International Center of Photography, New York; Cincinnati Museum of Art, Ohio; the Center for Creative Photography, Tucson; and Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, Texas. His works are held in the collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, SFMOMA, J. Paul Getty Museum, The Eastman Museum, and Yale University Art Gallery, among others. Monographs include American Mystic, Dolls and Masks, A Fourfold Vision, and The Family Album of Lucybelle Crater and Other Figurative Photographs.  Ralph Eugene Meatyard was a visionary photographer known for his dreamlike black & white photographs of family members in masks, elegant portraits of bohemian friends and radical experiments in abstraction. Meatyard’s unique visual language was the product of a naturally curious mind stimulated by a love of literature and the spoken word. His shadowy photographs – often featuring dark dilapidated locales populated by enigmatic characters – have drawn comparisons to Southern Gothic literature. Meatyard’s interest in Zen Buddhism guided his intuitive process for making photographs. His practice relied upon the photographer achieving a “sensitized state,” putting trust in the mind’s eye instead of intellect to clearly see the intricacies of the physical world. Meatyard’s metaphysical approach to picture-making helped redefine the genre of fine-art photography in the 1960s. Through a myriad of complex projects, many predicated upon the constructed or staged photograph, Meatyard created “tableau vivants” filled with symbolic language that served as signifiers in the creation of the artist’s visual vocabulary. Meatyard’s subjective use of the camera has since influenced new generations of photographers. Today, he is recognized as a pioneer of surreal, experimental and nonobjective photography. Meatyard was an integral part of Kentucky’s post-war art and literary intelligentsia. His circle of friends included photographers, painters, poets, scholars, writers and philosophers. Meatyard’s interest in photography grew from his professional life as a practicing optician and working knowledge of lens technology. A desire to document his growing family led to his purchase of a camera in 1950. From the 1950s onward, he would photograph exclusively in his hometown of Lexington, Kentucky and the surrounding countryside. The Photographs of Ralph Eugene Meatyard opens at Ogden Museum of Southern Art on October 1, 2022 and will be on view through January 23, 2023. The exhibition is curated by Richard McCabe, Curator of Photography at Ogden Museum of Southern Art, in collaboration with Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco and Ralph Eugene Meatyard Estate. ABOUT THE ARTISTRalph Eugene Meatyard, Untitled (Self Portrait), (REM.1464.Y), c. 1958, Gelatin silver print, 11 x 14 inches, Collection of the Estate of Ralph Eugene Meatyard, Courtesy of Fraenkel Gallery Ralph Eugene Meatyard lived in Lexington, Kentucky, where he made his living as an optician while creating an impressive and enigmatic body of photographs. Meatyard’s creative circle included mystics and poets, such as Thomas Merton and Guy Davenport, as well as the photographers Cranston Ritchie and Van Deren Coke, who were mentors and fellow members of the Lexington Camera Club. Meatyard’s work spanned many genres and experimented with new means of expression, from dreamlike portraits—often set in abandoned places—to multiple exposures, motion-blur, and other methods of photographic abstraction. He also collaborated with his friend Wendell Berry on the 1971 book The Unforeseen Wilderness, for which Meatyard contributed photographs of Kentucky’s Red River Gorge. Meatyard’s final series, The Family Album of Lucybelle Crater, are cryptic double portraits of friends and family members wearing masks and enacting symbolic dramas. Museum exhibitions of the artist’s work have recently been presented at The Art Institute of Chicago; The Philadelphia Museum of Art; the de Young Museum, San Francisco; The International Center of Photography, New York; Cincinnati Museum of Art, Ohio; the Center for Creative Photography, Tucson; and Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, Texas. His works are held in the collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, SFMOMA, J. Paul Getty Museum, The Eastman Museum, and Yale University Art Gallery, among others. Monographs include American Mystic, Dolls and Masks, A Fourfold Vision, and The Family Album of Lucybelle Crater and Other Figurative. e Photographs.https://www.vintageannalsarchive.com/deep-dive---ralph-eugene-meatyard.html Biker Love & Asstrology
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