DRUGS ARE NICE: A Post-Punk Memoir Lisa Crystal Carver (Lisa Suckdog), Paperback
(2005) 220 pages, New
In this eye-opening memoir, Lisa Crystal Carver recalls her extraordinary youth and charts the late-80s, early-90s punk subculture that she helped shape. She recounts how her band Suckdog was born in 1987 and the wild events that followed: leaving small-town New Hampshire to tour Europe at 18, becoming a teen publisher of fanzines, a teen bride, and a teen prostitute. Spin has called Suckdog's album Drugs Are Nice one of the best of the '90s, and the book includes photos of infamous European shows. Yet the book also tells of how Lisa saw the need for change in 1994, when her baby was born with a chromosomal deletion and his father became violent. With lasting lightness and surprising gravity, Drugs Are Nice is a definitive account of the generation that wanted to break every rule, but also a story of an artist and a mother becoming an adult on her own terms.
THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF NEW WAVE (2012); Hardcover
Daniel Bukszpan 304 pages, New
"This colorful and wildly entertaining look at the Punk and New Wave era in pop music (roughly, late 1970s through the end of the 1980s and defined within as “a straightforward songwriting approach relying heavily on synthesizers and other electronic equipment”) covers more than 150 artists and bands. Influential music-related personalities of the era, including Malcolm McClaren and Brian Eno, are featured. A foreword by Gerald Casale, of the band Devo, and the introduction by the author serve to define New Wave and explain who was included as well as what was left out. Entries range from one column to three page spreads. The longer entries are made up of many photographs, with larger, well-known bands getting more coverage. The text is highly subjective and meant to be more for entertainment than research. A snarky-but amusing-tone is found throughout. The eye-popping graphics-featuring a massive amount of photographs-will delight any fan of the music and the time period. Interesting sidebars are peppered throughout the text, such as 'Gender-Bending,' 'NY Clubs,' 'Heartthrobs,' 'Men's Fashion,' 'The Many Sounds of New Wave,' 'Music Videos,' 'Female Sex Symbols,' and 'Movies.' Appendixes include several 'Best of New Wave' lists, including 'Fifty Most Essential New Wave Singles,' 'Top Ten New Wave Bands with the Most Ridiculous Hair,' 'New Wave Timeline,' 'Ten Weirdest New Wave Singles,' and 'Top Twenty Essential New Wave Albums.' A bibliography and an index of artists and song titles round out the book..Cheeky yet incredibly informative, this is an inexpensive must-have for any music collection and will do especially well in circulation."
THE LEATHER NUN and Other Incredibly Strange Comics; Hardcover
(2008) 128 pages, Used
Entertaining, erotic, and utterly surreal, this eclectic collection is a delirious collage of the 50 most weird and wonderful comics ever published. From leather nuns, surreal Japanese baseball dramas, gigantic alien monsters in swimming trunks, hip-hop superheroes fighting street crime, and peasant girls worshipping the swastika, this amazing collection is the result of a trawl of the strangest comics worldwide. Containing titles such as Barnyard of Fear, Chaplains at War, Amputee Love, and Cannibal Romance, these bizarre tales are not for the faint of heart. Alongside each comic is a colorful double-page spread and an informative introduction that places the comics in context. This is the perfect quirky gift for collectors of curiosities, anyone with a taste for offbeat humor, and comic fans who think they've seen it all.
DESIGN FOR DYING: Timothy Leary; Hardcover
256 pages (1997), Used
As the fringe guru himself put it, "Mademoiselle Cancer moved in to share [his] body." But in the days before he died, Leary -- never one to miss an opportunity for a party -- used his approaching death to create an exuberant new vision of what dying can be. Optimism, courage, joy and spirituality were central to Leary's final days and his death. Design for Dying -- Leary's last book -- shows us how we too can make dying the high point of life. Irreverent, thought-provoking and hilarious, Leary's parting shot pioneers new ways to die and new ways for the living to think about death. Urging us to take control of our deaths (and even to determine when and how we will die), Leary relates his own plan for "directed dying," a death we plan and orchestrate to reflect our own lives and values. And the psychedelic prophet flings open a whole new range of beyond-death possibilites for the wired generation. From downloading consciousness onto the Net -- so that our souls can outlive our bodies -- to the way technology can enhance the final days of the dying to the far-out promises of cryogenics, Leary provides fascinating insights into how technology may eventually help us improve, and even sidestep, death. A thorough guide to death and dying resources and to online tools and further reading lists completes this surprising, funny and totally original look at the new frontiers of death. Speaking to everyone who has ever wondered if there's more to death - -if there's life beyond the final frontier, if death really means the end, if dirges and hearses and funeral flowers are really how we want to be remembered -- Leary's flamboyant final statement reveals revolutionary ways to die and redefines, with Leary's trademark creativity and joy, how the living can think about death.
THE BOOK OF GRASS An Anthology Of Indian Hemp; Paperback
60's counterculture - 242 pages (1968), Used
Indian hemp and its products, marihuana and hashish - variously known as pot, weed, reefer, boo, tea, mezzo, hash, or the 'grass' of the title - is a much discussed and - perhaps - a greatly maligned herb.
This volume (revised and up-dated for Penguin Books) offers a wide range of writings about this ancient plant, its remarkable products, and its long and varied history. Among the authors represented are Rabelais, Baudelaire, Rimbaud, Aldous Huxley, Gerard de Nerval, Allen Ginsberg, C. G. Jung, Henry Miller, Hermann Hesse, Alan Watts, Lewis Carroll, William James, Anthony Storr, William Burroughs, and Paul Bowles. Extraordinary, illuminating, fascinating essays by many great minds on this plant. There's even an entry from George Washington's diary notes of 1765 saying he sowed Hemp by a Swamp and that he was rather too late separating the Male from the Female hemp. (Book cover may be different than picture shown)
GIVE MY REGARDS TO EIGHTH STREET : Collected Writings of Morton Feldman; Paperback
(2004) 256 pages, Used
Composer Morton Feldman (1926-87) was a crucial figure in the post-war New York art world, using elements of chance composition to construct exquisite, quietly powerful scores that produce wonderfully varied interpretations. In Give My Regards to Eighth Street: Collected Writings of Morton Feldman, Feldman reflects on his own work and ideas, as well as on those of Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Robert Rauschenberg, Frank O'Hara, John Cage and many others. If "Silence is my substitute for counterpoint," these occasional articulations give us a way into it.
"There are people who say, "If music's that easy to write, I could do it." Of course they could, but they don't. I find Feldman's own statement more affirmative. We were driving back from some place in New England where a concert had been given. He is a large man and falls asleep easily. Out of a sound sleep, he awoke to say, "Now that things are so simple, there's so much to do." And then he went back to sleep." - John Cage
GANGS AND THEIR TATTOOS: Identifying Gangbangers on the Street & in Prison; Paperback
(2000) 176 pages, Used
In this book, Bill Valentine, author of Gang Intelligence Manual, shares the latest intelligence on the predominant street and prison gangs and other disruptive groups, with particular emphasis on their identifying tattoos. Supplementing the text are scores of detailed illustrations by Correctional Officer Robert Schober that replicate some of the most common tattoos worn by members of each of the groups discussed. This groundbreaking work makes a substantial amount of previously classified information available to the general public for the first time. In addition to presenting the latest intel on white, black, Hispanic and Asian gangs, it also includes new information on groups such as the White Afrikaner Resistance Movement and the Russian Mafia, which add to the mounting challenge faced by those laboring to hold the line against the menace posed by gangs, hate groups and organized crime.
FIGMENT (All those shapes - Melbourne Graffiti); Magazine
200 pages, Independent Magazine; Used
Figment is a Melbourne street art / graffiti / urban art book produced by Street Art collective all those shapes. 200 pages of adventures from around Melbourne; Fitzroy, Collingwood, Northcote, Brunswick East, Preston, Brunswick, Footscray, the inner suburbs of Melbourne, abandos and railway. While most of the art in this book no longer exists, the book itself is no more a figment of my imagination, but something real; if only for a while. From simple lines to intricate patterns, figment contains character and characters, words and metaphor, graffiti street-art paste-ups stickers, humour despair decay, colour & dark, stories, shapes, mystery with Leagues, Makatron, Merda, Nock, Rapoela, Vexta, Snotrag, Dvate, Bailer, Kid Zoom, Mymo, I & The Others, Nails, Reka, Be Free, Urban Cake Lady, Shida, Mio, Junky Projects, Philthy, Kyle Hughes-Odgers, Alice Pasquini, Kofie, Nelio, Lucy Lucy, Barek, Kaff-eine, Slicer, Itch, Drewfunk, Twoone, Ghostpatrol, Miso, Mishap, Simz, Stabs, Al Stark, Stormie Mills, Ears, Happy, Will Coles, Maumau, plus many more and many unknowns.....325 images many in full landscape A4. Get inspiration, ideas get syked. Piece together adventures as you would walking the streets, randomly.
RUBBING MIRRORS Brigitte Lewis (Melbourne); Paperback
Queer/Gay interest/Lesbian, Used
Welcome to a brave new world where cunt is a beautiful word and social critique is the cutting norm. Let Alexis take you by her short nailed hand and thrust you fingers first into the dark corners of Melbourne's lesbian scene. The divide between sex and love has always been a tightrope line. She'll make you swoon make you laugh most of all she'll etch herself into your mind long after the last page is turned. Trust us you'll never look back she doesn't. Independent Melbourne paperback....
GRAFFITI JAPAN (2011); Hardcover
Remo Camerota 144 pages, New
Japan has long been a breeding ground for innovative appropriation of Western traditions, as with cinema and baseball. But the fanatical embrace with which Japanese artists have welcomed graffiti has made for a street-art scene wholly apart from its Western origins. As the first English-language book dedicated to Japanese graffiti, Graffiti Japan is an obvious choice for a hardcover edition, featuring all the same great photographs and artist interviews with KRESS, BELX2, FATE, TENGA, EMAR, SUIKO, QP, and many more. The graffiti featured in Graffiti Japan replicates the calligraphic intricacies of the Japanese language with spray paint, depicting how anime and manga characters, national pride, as well as foreign influences, are integral parts of the country's scene. From sprawling, legally sanctioned murals to illegal throw-ups hidden in alleyways, this work could not exist in any other country.
TIM BURTON: A Child's Garden of Nightmares (2007); Paperback
Paul A Woods 192 pages, Used
This definitive study charts the career of Tim Burton from his days as a malcontent animator at Walt Disney Productions to his current place as one of America’s most remarkable directors. It examines Burton's “monster culture” influences — from the films of Ed Wood, Jr. to Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine — that imbue his films with rich visual imagery and emotional depth. For each film, the book provides a detailed analysis, articles and interviews, and a vivid selection of stills.
SAVAGE CINEMA (Hardcover) Rick Trader Witcombe (1975); Book
Books of this quality are like a drug for cinema fetishists of a certain disposition... of course it is'dated'... there are even a few morsels of arcane trivia/inaccuracies (the days when rumour held a firmer sway over the imagination) that might raise an eyebrow ... You only want it for the cover anyway, and that's fine. All the film books in this series (Ape: The Kingdom of Kong, Cut - The Unseen Cinema) are extremely sought after by the cool people, and that's all who need to know...... Rare.