Journey Through India (1988)

"Every part of creation is sacred if we choose to give it reverence." - Debu Baul
Historian Michael Wood goes on a journey from Delhi in Northern India to Tamil Nadu in the South, illustrating the cultural diversity of the country and the contrasts between ancient beliefs and the influence of the modern world. This film was first broadcast: 25 Jul 1989. 

Of especial interest is a short segment of a few wandering Bauls, those wonderful nomadic musician aesthetics. Calcutta, the most amazing city. Kali Ma....Krim Krim Krim! Kashi, like an ancient jewel. 

 I visited India for the first time in November 1989 and stayed until January 1990. I recognize the world this film describes. Today much has changed in India. Much of it is not positive in my mind.

Decoder (1984)

A burger shop employee (FM Einheit from german industrial band 'Einstürzende Neubauten'!) discovers hidden hypnotic frequencies in pleasant restaurant background music, alters them (after William S Burroughs tells him how to do it in a dream) and incites a revolution against a dark, dystopian regime. His girlfriend (played by 80s icon Christiane F) helps him with her frog collection. Oh yeah... and Genesis P-Orridge from Throbbing Gristle helps him on his mission too with some magick.

The P-Orridge family (and guests) at Beck Road London 1985

The P-Orridge family (and guests) at Beck Road London 1985 from Thee MediaShaman on Vimeo.

"It teaches that mind is the sovereign power of the universe, and that when its forces are properly concentrated upon any particular object, the true nature of that object will be revealed. Instead of using" How To Be A Yogi by Swâmi Abhedânanda

[1902] p. 66

Genesis P-Orridge at home speaking about culture, art, magick and revolution. Say what you want about Genesis, (self-absorbed, demanding, greedy, attention seeker, martyr syndrome, opportunist and performance junkie?), they were not stupid. The ideas and actions were forerunners and templates for millions of people who woke up and saw through the consumption and lies of post-Industrial culture.

This was filmed at 50 Beck Road, in the poorest East-London district Hackney, winter 1984/85. An italian film-crew makes a spontaneous visit to the family and home of UK-avantgarde musician and industrial music pioneer Genesis P-Orridge. Throbbing Gristle had split up and Genesis and Sleazy aka Peter Christopherson were committed to their new band-project Psychic TV and launching the Temple Ov Psychick Youth as a worldwide network system.

This unedited open talk interview-documentary includes Gen's beautiful wife Paula - highly pregnant with her second daughter Genesse - and friends discussing society and (po-)culture, religion, art, fear, media- manipulation, the heroin-boom and Dr. Margaret Patterson who treated drug addiction using electric stimulation aka "neuro-electric therapy", as well as war and existentialism during England's Thatcher aera ... and how it feels as a young family.

Participants and guests were Monte Cazazza, co-founder of the Industrial Records music label from the US who phrased the slogan "Industrial Music for Industrial People", as well as Hilmar Örn Hilmarsson, Jym Daly and Dorothy Max Prior, who released her song 'I Confess' (1980) on industrial records. youtube.com/watch?v=35ONE_dc2pQ

The original of this privat recording got confiscated when Scotland Yard raided the family's home in Brighton (1991) due to absurd accusations made in UK-tabloid newspapers and a 100 % fabricated one hour TV documentary (Channel 4, Dispatches). The Orridge's and their kid were touring through Nepal at that time and went into exile to the United States (California), where the father of Wyona Rider, US-publisher Michael Horowitz, helped them to settle down.

The VHS-tape was copied and archived by Boris Hiesserer aka. Eden 123, founder of the Pyromania Arts Foundation, a former german access point to the TOPY.

Morphine: Journey Of Dreams (2014) | Full Documentary

 

The band Morphine blazed like a comet across the global music scene in the 1990s, rising from local Boston clubs to major label record deals, international touring, and wide critical acclaim until their tragic and untimely demise in 1999. Intimate band member interviews, live shows and TV appearances, display why their unique and "low rock" sound continues to resonate with music lovers today.

Weed (1972)

 

Documentary about the prevalence and popularity of marijuana in the early 1970's. Featuring interviews with customs agents, a drug dealer, a law professor, and marijuana smokers, such subjects as the growing, smuggling, smoking, selling, and legalization of marijuana are all addressed. Moreover, the filmmakers take us on a tour around the world to various places that include Mexico, Canada, Cambodia, Nepal, and Saigon, Vietnam in order to show the ubiquity and availability of marijuana all over the globe. 

For the first couple years of his feature filmmaking career, X-rated auteur Alex de Renzy focused almost entirely on directing documentaries. His distinct style of cinéma vérité crossed with informal interviews resulted in a unique series of films exploring world cultures, as seen through underground and transgressive sex and drug lifestyles. 

This ambitious examination of marijuana takes deRenzy on an international journey as he meets dealers, users, and the various lawmen out to stop them. A sometimes funny, sometimes unsettling, but constantly engrossing examination of the then burgeoning "war on drugs".

500 minutes of trance drone breath beats

I just uploaded over 500 minutes of trance drone breath beats (my music) for free for all:

https://archive.org/details/Music-Against_Mind

https://archive.org/details/Still_Mind_Vali_DroneBow_Live  

https://archive.org/details/A_Vision_for_Vali 

https://archive.org/details/sound-wandering-bee  

https://archive.org/details/ems-drone-bow-1  

https://archive.org/details/Collective_Rituals 

https://archive.org/details/acidfolk-improvisations 

https://archive.org/details/TheNightFarmer

LET'S GO - Psychedelic era Vancouver 1968

LET'S GO examines Vancouver's psychedelic scene in 1968 on 4th Avenue, the heart of flower power. Bill Good hosts the show and among the celebrity guests in Part 1 are Country Joe (and the Fish), Pat Boone and Richard Pryor. The weekly Vancouver, BC edition of the CBC network series usually featured local bands and singers and occasionally celebrity groups like Eric Burdon & the Animals. In Part 2 the guests joining in the discussion were The Everly Brothers, The Beach Boys, Harper's Bizarre, Little Richard, Bobby Hebb, Ray Charles, Frank Sinatra jr. with comments from Timothy Leary and the Beatles' spiritual advisor Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.

SMOKING BABAS: Holy Men of India

A human approach to the mystical secrets of India. Documenting the sadhus as had rarely been filmed on many peculiar occasions. A charismatic character is the thread of the story revealing a hidden side of these sacred Hindu sects; "children sadhus". Shooting locations: Himalayas valley, Uttarakhand, North India.

The Substance - Albert Hofmann's LSD

 

THE SUBSTANCE - ALBERT HOFMANN'S LSD
by Martin Witz
35mm / HD, color-b/w, 89’, 2011
By coincidence rather then by design the Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann makes a sensational discovery in the spring of 1943. He realizes that he is dealing with a powerful molecule that will have an impact not only on the scientific world. An investigation into our troubled relation with LSD. Told from its beginnings until today.

Off Grid and Trad in the Italian Alps

 

Luca Ventrella was living in a dense city in Northern Italy when, on one of his weekend hikes in the Alps, he stumbled upon a rundown stone cabin. He bought it for 8,000 euros. Since the roof and walls were intact, he could move in and begin to turn it into a home. The dry stone cabin was originally built as a shepherd’s hut, "baita," where shepherds would spend months at a time here while their flock grazed during the summer months.

Given the home’s distance from the electrical grid, solar power was the only option. Ventrella first put in a simple system and later upgraded to something more powerful with lithium batteries and very potent and reliable inverters. Because power tools are expensive, but mostly because Ventrella likes the feel of hand tools, he built an outdoor shower, toilet, furniture, and stairs out of hand-hewn wood from the surrounding forests. “Hand tools are cheap. They always work. And they are very rewarding to use.”

His water comes from a stream located several hundred meters from the home. The pipeline was installed back when the mountain pasture was used for grazing, and the water was used for the animals. Ventrella has improved on the gravity flow system by installing cisterns that filter and store water for periods of drought.

The home is very rustic and minimal, both an aesthetic choice of Ventrella’s, but also because any building material had to be carried on foot up the mountain path. The isolation that the cabin affords allows Ventrella time to find a new rhythm, one more attuned to the cycles of nature. When not building, he spends his time here beekeeping (a potential income source), mushroom picking, and cooking elaborate meals. 

"Time changes here completely. I adapt to the rhythms of nature. I go to sleep earlier. I wake up earlier. The day can be very short when I work or expand when I also relax because the distractions are few."

For more videos by Luca, check out his YouTube channel. 

"Primitive London"(1965)

Exploitation film documentary on 'Swinging London' "as it actually happened" or a portrait of a society coming out of deprivation. Arnold Louis Miller, the director of 'Nudist Memories', interviews mods, rockers and beatniks. Wife Swapping, an overworked stripper, child birth, the killing of chickens, a tattoist and an interview with Billy J. Kramer also feature. The unsolved 1963-64 Hammersmith Nude Murders or the'Jack the Stripper' murders of Irene Lockwood, Hannah Tailford and Elizabeth Figg are presented. A concert by The Zephyrs is also shown. This band formed in London in 1961 as Johnny Saville and the Clee-Shays, then became The Zephyrs in 1963. They are not related to the group from Stockton-on-Tees (that band later changed its name to The Zephrons). Jerry Donahue later played with Fairport Convention and the reformed Yardbirds, while Peter Gage played with The Ram Jam Band and Vinegar Joe.