william_kent

Well-known member
I've read that book about the Laurel Canyon scene - I love a conspiracy theory as much as the next person, but I remember it being a bit 'weak' - the whole 'their dad was in the military' was especially flimsy considering that there was a high probability that your father was in the military if you were born in the 40s or 50s like the 70s rock elite, because World War 2...their fathers probably had no choice...

for a more grounded and prosaic look at the London Notting Hill / Ladbroke Grove / RELEASE / International Times / Frenz, etc., scene I'd recommend 'Days in the Life, Voices from the English Underground 1961 -1971' which is an 'oral history' which, when I read it, opened my eyes to the sexism that was prevalent in the 'scene' - almost all the women interviewed recall how their role was 'to roll joints for the men' or br pressured into unwanted sex by men who were telling them 'don't be so uptight', 'free love, baby'...

any book on the US 60s commune scene will reveal some horrible cases of child abuse ranging from simple neglect while the parents are getting high, to more serious cases of kids kept in cages as punishment, etc.
 

luka

Well-known member
the way i remember it their dads werent regular conscripts they were pretty high up in the establishment. it was suggestive rather
than conclusive which is the way conspiracy theory works as a rule
 

william_kent

Well-known member
the way i remember it their dads werent regular conscripts they were pretty high up in the establishment. it was suggestive rather
than conclusive which is the way conspiracy theory works as a rule

I'm really not opposed to the idea that counterculture was a CIA experiment, part of MK/ULTRA, in fact I am in favour, but that book was extremely weak

I'm looking forward to the proposed sequel to Tom O'Neil's CHAOS ( Manson as CIA test subject ) where he suggests that Haight Asbury was engineered by the CIA ( putting out messages like "let's all go to San Francisco and put flowers in our hair" ) so that Joly West could run experiments on the kids at the "Free Clinic", and then he suggests it will all tie-in with Jonestown, etc - which are all subjects that I've bored people with in the past with...
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
As for what I am reading right now. Think it was @martin who first mentioned Dead Fashion Girl by Fred Vermorel but I have a feeling others have mentioned it too. It ties in quite nicely with a few books on the period I have read lately - and in fact, in some ways it is similar to that blog that I mentioned above in the way it spirals off in new directions. For instance the titular girl was last seen at a club and then it starts talking about the owner of that club and then his wife, and then her relationship to her mother in law. Which could be a strange direction for it to go but it sort of seems to suit my mood just now.
In the tv thread I mentioned the documentary about the LISK guy that we were watching and to my mind the way that goes all over the place is quite similar to this - but the documentary does it cos they have run out of stuff to say about LISK and so they have to pretend that they really think the same guy did a load of obviously unconnected killings in Daytona Beach, Florida to pad out the show... whereas Vermorel seems to be doing it just cos he likes to write about everything with the hope that something will emerge from the big picture. Either way, at least in my head the effect is sort of the same even if it arises from a different process and I like it..
As an aside, I would like to say that I have picked up quite a few recommendations from this thread over the years, if I see something that looks interesting I often make a note of it at the time and sometimes return years later. I probably should make more of an effort to thank those who made the original post. I feel at some times this thread just barely limps along and I wish more people would contribute cos it can be a really good resource.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
I've read that book about the Laurel Canyon scene - I love a conspiracy theory as much as the next person, but I remember it being a bit 'weak' - the whole 'their dad was in the military' was especially flimsy considering that there was a high probability that your father was in the military if you were born in the 40s or 50s like the 70s rock elite, because World War 2...their fathers probably had no choice...

Luka
the way i remember it their dads werent regular conscripts they were pretty high up in the establishment. it was suggestive rather
than conclusive which is the way conspiracy theory works as a rule

I'm gonna agree with Luka hear I think. I mean, at the time we did obviously notice that it would have been more weird if their parents HADN'T been in the army, but, like Luka says, they were all super high (in the army I mean, not like that) which was I suppose what his theory was based on. To be honest though, the theory wasn't the important part, in fact I'd go further than Luka, cos it was barely even suggested or sketched out, just kinda alluded to.
For me the blog post as a whole was a very interesting history tying together all kinds of events and so on by place and it was written in a good, almost sarcastic style. And I learned a lot about the events in Laurel Canyon over the 20th century, some of which sounded so crazy you would think that they couldn't be true - except as I remember, when you looked them up they always checked out . But it could be that you (Kenty) knew more about that time than I so you found it less revelatory in that respect. Also, it sounds as though you read the book while we read the blog, might well be a factor cos I think it's quite often the case that things are diluted when they are stretched out to the length of one of the few formats that really exist in the world of publishing - and I do remember thinking to myself at the time "This blog is about forty pages and it is really good but how it can be a book?".


for a more grounded and prosaic look at the London Notting Hill / Ladbroke Grove / RELEASE / International Times / Frenz, etc., scene I'd recommend 'Days in the Life, Voices from the Underground 1961 -1971' which is an 'oral history' which, when I read it, opened my eyes to the sexism that was prevalent in the 'scene' - almost all the women interviewed recall how their role was 'to roll joints for the men' or br pressured into unwanted sex by men who were telling them 'don't be so uptight', 'free love, baby'...
When I was in Hackney my flatmate's girlfriend had used to hang around various kinda scenes, at one point she had been part of a group with Amy Winehouse etc and then she had been hanging round with The Horrors... in the latter group she said that when they went back to someone's house after a gig or whatever there was a sort of hierarchy for putting songs on the stereo and basically the WAGS were simply not allowed to select the music.
 

william_kent

Well-known member
I have to admit that I haven't read the blog, it was the book that I read, and it did feel a bit insubstantial. It felt a bit like if I was going to make a conspiracy that the UK punk rock scene was a MI5 plot where they were using art colleges as a conduit to brainwash youth into carrying out their nefarious scene - look at the Sex Pistols, Glen Matlock went to art school, Malcolm McLaren went to art school, Vivienne Westwood went to art school...and then toss in some random crimes that happened in London in 1976, and hey presto! I've got a flimsy book to sell...
 

william_kent

Well-known member
but anyway, back to the main purpose of the thread - I'm currently reading Sabre Squadron by Simon Raven, an author I had never heard of until I noticed @IdleRich mentioning him. It's the third one I've read by him now, and I am thoroughly enjoying it - competing forces are after the, possibly world changing, secrets contained in a hard to decode mathematical notation, all set against a backdrop of possible nuclear calamity, with an insight into a weird world of regimental tradition and honour
 

luka

Well-known member
jan irving is the one to read for a massively paranoid totalising view of the counter culture as psy-op. hes probably a nazi too
that comes with the territory.
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
@version were you on dissensus a few years back when a fair few of us were reading this same article/essay/blog thing about Laurel Canyon? That gave me a similar sort of feeling to that which you just described.
I genuinely don't know if we actually read that at the same time and discussed it at the time - or if you didn't and you have no idea what I'm on about. I would ask the archivist to clear it up for me but that's you....
So let's assume you dunno what I'm on about and I will explain it.. in short some guy who was a kind of incredibly meticulous pop culture researcher and compelling conspiracy theorist had written this huge essay/small book (and I think he did in fact expand the blog post into a book some point) about all the seedy goings on in Laurel Canyon - the countless nasty crimes committed behind the scenes of the glamorous facade of rock stars, movie stars and beautiful people who either lived in the paradise that was the canyon or simply passed through. There was an incredibly high number of suspicious deaths going back to, I dunno, the thirties or whatever, often little people ground up in the showbiz machinery - though a fair smattering of film stars etc too. And I think he also tied in an idea that almost all the rock stars were the children of high up generals, admirals and intelligence operatives with a kind of suggestion that they were given songs (like I remember he claimed that Jim Morrison had no musical ability and then he was suddenly given all his songs by someone a bit like the Songwriter in Under Silver Lake who also created The Byrds and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young etc) and effectively used to invent the counter culture.
And it tied in Frank Zappa and Manson and I don't know who else.... some paedo rings I think, maybe the Black Dahlia, Kenneth Anger.
But yeah, I remember feeling the extent to which, if you were not one of the shining ones, you seemed to be pretty disposable.
And one more interesting thing about it was the fact that the blog was now being maintained by the author's daughter.... cos he had died a year or two back, and there were quite a number of comments on the blog which claimed that the author had in fact faked his own death or something. I dunno why but I'm pretty sure his accusers had a few good explanations for that too...
Anyway, it was well worth reading if you haven't already..... and if you have, please do feel to completely and utterly disregard every single thing I said.
I remember that article, and yeah, it was pretty convincing.

I suppose - if we assume for a moment that the basic premise is true - that it was probably tied in with some idea of promoting capitalism and individualism in any way possible, to counter the communist threat, even if that meant hijacking (or creating) a culture that notionally critiques capitalism/consumerism and promotes communalism, or that outraged traditional conservative values with drugs, free love and racial mixing.

People have said the same thing about abstract expressionism: https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20161004-was-modern-art-a-weapon-of-the-cia
 

luka

Well-known member
People have said the same thing about abstract expressionism: https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20161004-was-modern-art-a-weapon-of-the-cia
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
any book on the US 60s commune scene will reveal some horrible cases of child abuse ranging from simple neglect while the parents are getting high, to more serious cases of kids kept in cages as punishment, etc.
@WashYourHands was on about the kids-in-cages thing the other day, I think - one of many weird cults that were around at the time, although this one was notably conservative and militantly anti-hippy, with the small but important exception of taking huge amounts of LSD. Can't remember the name of the main guy involved, though...
 

WashYourHands

Cat Malogen
Mel Lyman in Boston

If you pissed him or the group off, you’d get taken to this cellar with a holding cell, get dosed 1500mics and get laughed at by Lynam and his clique

It’s referenced in Mindfuckers a bunch, PDF’s are online in various garbs

06117364-E40D-4FA9-B878-4F64E6A33A8F.jpeg
429C8C6F-3853-409B-BEFD-65CF5C61E8A1.jpeg
 

WashYourHands

Cat Malogen
He was discovered in the henhouse

where she had confined him. He was

incapable of saying anything
.



When the lamp glowed,

A yolk of light

In their back window,

The child in the outhouse

Put his eye to a chink--



Little henhouse boy,

Sharp-faced as new moons

Remembered, your photo still

Glimpsed like a rodent

On the floor of my mind,



Little moon man,

Kennelled and faithful

At the foot of the yard,

Your frail shape, luminous,

Weightless, is stirring the dust,



The cobwebs, old droppings

Under the roosts

And dry smells from scraps

She put through your trapdoor

Morning and evening.



After those footsteps, silence;

Vigils, solitudes, fasts,

Unchristened tears,

A puzzled love of the light.

But now you speak at last



With a remote mime

Of something beyond patience,

Your gaping wordless proof

Of lunar distances

Travelled beyond love.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
I have to admit that I haven't read the blog, it was the book that I read, and it did feel a bit insubstantial. It felt a bit like if I was going to make a conspiracy that the UK punk rock scene was a MI5 plot where they were using art colleges as a conduit to brainwash youth into carrying out their nefarious scene - look at the Sex Pistols Glen Matlock went to art school, Malcolm McLaren went to art school, Vivienne Westwood went to art school...and then toss in some random crimes that happened in London in 1976, and hey presto! I've got a flimsy book to sell...
I don't think that the blog went into the punk scene at all as i remember it. It really was 99.9 percent inside Laurel Canyon, I do remember that one of the only times it did venture outside was indeed to London but the bit I remember was to Mayfair or something in the 60s.

but anyway, back to the main purpose of the thread - I'm currently reading Sabre Squadron by Simon Raven, an author I had never heard of until I noticed @IdleRich mentioning him. It's the third one I've read by him now, and I am thoroughly enjoying it - competing forces are after the, possibly world changing, secrets contained in a hard to decode mathematical notation, all set against a backdrop of possible nuclear calamity, with an insight into a weird world of regimental tradition and honour
Oh brilliant, I am glad to hear that! I really did think that from some of the things that you mentioned liking, as well as the way that you wrote about such things, that there was a good chance that Raven would be up your street. Are you gonna read the whole of the Arms to Oblivion series? They slip down pretty easily I'd say and the way the characters are treated over the many years involved really does mean it adds up to more than the sum of its parts.
And Simon Raven had this real viciousness about him I guess and that certainly creeps into his writing at times and.... I'll be honest, I thought that was a quality that you might enjoy. I am not saying that you're nasty, merely that at times you enjoy some nasty writing - is that a fair comment?
Do let me know what you think of him though.
 

jenks

thread death
As for what I am reading right now. Think it was @martin who first mentioned Dead Fashion Girl by Fred Vermorel but I have a feeling others have mentioned it too. It ties in quite nicely with a few books on the period I have read lately - and in fact, in some ways it is similar to that blog that I mentioned above in the way it spirals off in new directions. For instance the titular girl was last seen at a club and then it starts talking about the owner of that club and then his wife, and then her relationship to her mother in law. Which could be a strange direction for it to go but it sort of seems to suit my mood just now.
In the tv thread I mentioned the documentary about the LISK guy that we were watching and to my mind the way that goes all over the place is quite similar to this - but the documentary does it cos they have run out of stuff to say about LISK and so they have to pretend that they really think the same guy did a load of obviously unconnected killings in Daytona Beach, Florida to pad out the show... whereas Vermorel seems to be doing it just cos he likes to write about everything with the hope that something will emerge from the big picture. Either way, at least in my head the effect is sort of the same even if it arises from a different process and I like it..
As an aside, I would like to say that I have picked up quite a few recommendations from this thread over the years, if I see something that looks interesting I often make a note of it at the time and sometimes return years later. I probably should make more of an effort to thank those who made the original post. I feel at some times this thread just barely limps along and I wish more people would contribute cos it can be a really good resource.
Agree Rich - I’ve picked up All the Devils are Here after the enthusiastic discussion earlier. I’ve also got The Sea View Has Me Again: Uwe Johnson in Sheerness by Patrick Wright which is also heavily based in Kent.

As a thread this kind of limps along and then flames into life before dying down again which I have kind of got used to - the same for the threads on individual books/writers - Prynne/Pynchon/Pound/ Melville are the only ones I can think of that have had a relatively healthy existence
 

jenks

thread death
And I really enjoyed Fashion Girl - I think you’re right - he’s throwing out lines of enquiry, just to see if anything coheres. I don’t mind that, in fact I think it’s a lot of fun.
 

william_kent

Well-known member
I don't think that the blog went into the punk scene at all as i remember it. It really was 99.9 percent inside Laurel Canyon, I do remember that one of the only times it did venture outside was indeed to London but the bit I remember was to Mayfair or something in the 60s.


Oh brilliant, I am glad to hear that! I really did think that from some of the things that you mentioned liking, as well as the way that you wrote about such things, that there was a good chance that Raven would be up your street. Are you gonna read the whole of the Arms to Oblivion series? They slip down pretty easily I'd say and the way the characters are treated over the many years involved really does mean it adds up to more than the sum of its parts.
And Simon Raven had this real viciousness about him I guess and that certainly creeps into his writing at times and.... I'll be honest, I thought that was a quality that you might enjoy. I am not saying that you're nasty, merely that at times you enjoy some nasty writing - is that a fair comment?
Do let me know what you think of him though.

Oh, I was just using punk as an example of how I could pick some subject and then just toss out some theory based on circumstantial evidence, I wasn't critiquing the Laurel Canyon bloke directly - I'm not even sure that the book I read was by the same guy as the blog to be honest, I've been too lazy to fact check

The Laurel Canyon scene is interesting, although when it comes to "Canyons", it is the late 60s Topanga Canyon scene that I'm more interested in - home of the "Spiral Staircase" party house, snuff films ( allegedly ), satanic sacrifices ( allegedly ), and rampant drug abuse...

which proves that your suspicion that I like nasty sleaze is entirely correct!

and that may be why I am enjoying the Simon Raven books, and intend to read the Arms To Oblivion series in its entirety - should finish Sabre Squadron tonight and make a start on Fielding Gray
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
And I really enjoyed Fashion Girl - I think you’re right - he’s throwing out lines of enquiry, just to see if anything coheres. I don’t mind that, in fact I think it’s a lot of fun.
Yes I am enjoying it. I dunno if you saw that post I made in the TV thread but basically we have been watching a documentary about the Long Island Serial Killer there, and that is also going all over place in a slightly similar way, but I contrast that with this book in that in that case, I do feel that it is just sort of thrashing around out of control. And I am enjoying that for what it is, but it doesn't really feel as though there is a hand at the wheel. It's sort of revealing things around the subject and in various areas of the US, but almost by accident or maybe, in spite of what it's trying to do, rather than because of it.
 
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