Bonjour, mes petits concombres!

If you’ve already experienced Will Sweeney and Steve Scott‘s animated psychedelic 2009 music video for Birdy Nam Nam‘s tune “The Parachute Ending”, look away. Or, hey, don’t. Because you know it’s trippin’ AMAZEBALLS and you probably won’t mind watching it again over a nice morning bowl of strawberries ‘n’ Special K.

Most Birdy Nam Nam-related things tend to be –in this blogger’s humble opinion– pretty thoroughly amazeballs. The BNN DJ crew is comprised of four fabulous Frenchmen known as Crazy-B, DJ Need, DJ Pone, and Little Mike. They joined forces in 2006 and has been steadily gaining notoriety ever since thanks largely to their novel and challenging style of music-making: they take thousands of samples gleaned from various sources, press all of the beats and patterns into towering stacks of vinyl, and then assemble/spin these kaleidoscopic collaged elements live. It’s bleepy bloopy bonkers brilliance.

Enjoy, and have a gorgeous day.

© Birdy Nam Nam / Steve Scott 2009

[Hat tip to Mr. Maps!]

“Soon…” Photo by Matthew Borgatti.

A frozen rainbow carousel, headless dinosaurs and lonely swan-shaped boats: this can only be Spreepark, an abandoned amusement park in Southeast Berlin. Conceived as a Socialist project to celebrate 20 years of GDR, Spreepark opened its doors in 1969, and shut down in 2001.  If you saw the film Hanna, images of a girl assassin running through this decaying fairyland park may spring to mind. Recently, Matthew Borgatti (previously on Coilhouse here and here) grabbed his camera and went exploring: he’s just published a beautiful set of photos showing both Spreepark’s ruins and signs of life, in tandem with a witty, comprehensive guide to urban spelunking. Spreepark’s story, writes Matthew, is one of “broken dreams, drug smuggling, and illegal things done with kiddie park rides in the dead of night.” You can’t tell the story of Spreepark without mentioning the story of Norbert Witte, as told by journalist Julia Jüttner.

An affluent funfair operator known as the “King of Carousels” to his friends, Witte walked into trouble when he decided to invest in Spreepark after the reunification of Germany. The son of a carnival performer and grandson of Otto Witte, an acrobat/swindler who once managed to be crowned as the King of Albania, Norbert Witte built his own carnival empire from humble beginnings. Together with his young bride Pia, the daughter of a bumper-car operator, he purchased one roller coaster (“The Catapult”) and began to tour with it, amassing eight rides over the course of two decades.

Photo by Matthew Borgatti.

At first, Spreepark seemed like a lucrative investment for Witte. But after the government eliminated 3,000 parking spaces near the park, people stopped coming and the park went out of business. Witte relocated his family to Lima, Peru, with the hope of bringing over Spreepark’s rides and establishing a new park called Lunapark. However, Peruvian customs officials refused to release all the parts of the rides, and the family quickly slid into poverty. Ultimately, Witte was caught smuggling 76 pounds of cocaine (worth $14 million) back to Germany in the mast of the “Flying Carpet” carousel. Norbert Witte received a lenient 6-year sentence in Germany, but his 21-year-old son, stuck back in Peru, received a jail term of 20 years. In a heartbreaking interview with Spiegel Online, Pia Witte elaborates further.

Unlike the story of Spreepark’s ruin, Matthew’s photos aren’t all that tragic. In fact, unlike most typical, ruin porn-tastic shots of abandoned theme parks around the world, his photos reveal the park’s vibrant, frenetic second life. Vinyl stickers depicting the step-by-step construction of an origami swan adorn a swan boat’s plastic neck. One of the dinosaurs still standing dons glam-rock makeup crafted from neon adhesive tape. A layer of graffiti art slowly encroaches upon the abandoned rides, often giving them a strangely modern look. Perhaps it’s because the German authorities seem pretty lenient, occasionally allowing fashion shoots, filming, and festivities such as “concerts, art installations, performances and a burning man” to take place in the park.

As hinted in Matthew’s photos, the future is bright for Spreepark: this summer, a new project called Kulturpark will set up a three-week artist residency camp producing public art inside Spreepark’s walls. Artworks will include “ecological grafitti, sustainable bicycles, a ping pong competition, learning events, radio station, [and] storytelling projects.” The public opening will be June 28 – July 1st.

Photo by Matthew Borgatti.

That might as well be the title of Decoder, a German film that came out in 1984. Unreleased in the United States and forgotten until the Internet recovered it in recent years, Decoder is a fascinating relic of the early industrial ethos.

Written by Klaus Maeck, directed by Jürgen Muschalek, and based on The Electronic Revolution by William S. Burroughs, the film focuses on a lone audiophile who discovers that multinational corporations are controlling populations through muzak. By playing the mind-controlling, sedative non-music in elevators, fast food joints, lobbies and stores all over the country, corporations such as the evil H-Burger are able to produce a docile population of consumers. To combat this, our protagonist turns to industrial noise, and inspires a legion of “cassette terrorists” to covertly swap muzak tapes for sounds that are much more subliminally sinister, inciting riots all over Germany.

The film’s score was a collaboration between F.M. Einheit (Einsturzende Neubauten) and Dave Ball (Soft Cell), with contributions from Genesis P. Orridge and Alexander Hacke. In addition to scoring, F.M. Einheit, a.k.a Mufti, also plays the film’s protagonist. Other characters include cult film actor, scholar and artist Bill Rice, playing a sad-faced security official on a mission to foil the cassette terrorists’ plot, and inadvertent heroin-chic style icon/musician Christiane Felscherinow, playing an amateur herpetologist/go-go dancer who looks eerily similar to Rooney Mara’s Liz Salander. Cameo appearances include Genesis P. Orridge and William S. Burroughs. The film is sprinkled with many other references to items you might find in a 1980s-era RE/Search publication, such as the appearance of a Brion Gysin Dreamachine inside a secret nightclub belonging to an industrial cult, as well as a giant Survival Research Laboratories logo on the wall of the protagonist’s  studio.

One of the film’s most stunning features is the color palette. “Lensed by Johanna Heer,” writes Samantha Anne Scott,  ”the film’s blunted, monochromatic color schemes — primarily red, green, and CRT blue — demarcate character, mood, and motivation … while doused with art house affectation, Decoder delineates a relatively cohesive narrative of corporatism, control, and the power of noise.” The full film is posted above.

[via wobbly]

Featured previously on Coilhouse for her debut music video Pon Pon Pon, 19-year-old blogger-turned-singer Caroline Charonplop Kyary Pamyu Pamyu (also known is Kyary, or Carrie Pam) is back with a new music video for her single Tsukema Tsukeru.

According to Super Happy Awesome, the song is all about the application, appreciation, and effects of false eyelashes. Kicking off the video with a sparkly-lashed wink to Kanye’s Power (which was also parodied to great effect by Freddie Wong), Kyary celebrates the art of eyelash extension through lyrics (“It’s the magic in a type of eyelash / My confidence changes, the way I see the world changes”), choreography (plenty of jazz hands emulating the batting of full lashes), set design (with some terrifying CGI depictions of the (lash-bedecked) Hamsa Hand floating in the background), and, perhaps most potently, costume design (featuring an extra head on top of her wig wearing lashes, a rather anatomical-looking corset decorated with an eye pendant, and two giant false eyelashes on her boobs).

The same team that created Pon Pon Pon was responsible for Tsukema Tsukeru. The song was produced by Yasutaka Nakata, one half of the electronic duo capsule. The video was art-directed by Sebastian Masuda, a pioneer of “kawaii culture” who also founded Harajuku fashion label %6DOKIDOKI. Masuda and Kyary also recently collaborated on an exhibition titled Table of Dreams.

In describing his first meeting and subsequent collaboration with Kyary, Nakata calls her “the ‘spirit bomb’ of Harajuku culture.” (The spirit bomb, the translator explains, “refers to an attack in the classic anime ‘Dragon Ball’, which channels the energy of surrounding life forms into a powerful sphere.”) Kyary’s success, writes Nakata, lies in her ability to infect people with enthusiasm for her projects. “I think it’s because everyone who gathers around Kyary feels like, ‘if I were with Kyary, I’d be able to express things that are new to me.’ That is, of course, how I feel too. So it’s different from a collaboration, and – to tell the truth – even saying that I produce her has a different meaning. The closest I can get is saying, ‘I’m doing it just for the fun of it.’ I feel like Kyary has this power in her to involve people that way.”

See also:

• Kyary Pamyu Pamyu: Pon Pon Pon
• Better Than Coffee: Duke Gets Yiffy Wid’ It

[via Nicole Aptekar]

Hot off the presses, a brand-new episode of Jiz: the bizarre, hilarious, raunchily dubbed version of 80s cartoon Jem and the Holograms. Where the original theme song was “Exciting adventures, fashion and fame / Once you’re a Jem girl, you’re never the same,” the Jiz refrain goes something like: “Trannies and drag queens doing cocaine / Once you’re a Jiz whore you’re never the same.” And that about sums it up.

So here it is: the Jiz drug special. “I know what you’re thinking,” writes Jiz creator Sienna D’Enema. ”Isn’t every episode a drug episode? Seriously though, Jiz gets cut off from her Electronic Drug Dealer. Witness her descent into madness.”

If this is your first exposure to Jiz, check out some of the older episodes, starting with the canonical Abortion Episode, in which Jiz is pro-choice. Really, really pro-choice:

Coilhouse contibutor Angeliska Polacheck hosts a monthly new wave/old school goth night called Exquisite Corpse, in Austin, Texas. She originally posted this exposition into her errant youth as inspiration for this month’s theme: TEEN GOTH. The original posts can be seen in their entirety here and here.

This is Cinamon. I remember seeing her on the very same day, though I didn’t take this photograph of her. I was probably 12 at the time, and as I passed by her on The Drag down by Sound Exchange, the trajectory of my life changed forever. I was completely mesmerized by this vision in black tatters, a gorgeous alien-wraith who seemed like an apparition drifting down a banal sidewalk in the bright Texas sun. She was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. I stopped and told her how amazing I thought she was, and she was so sweet to me. I’ve held this photo dear for years, a treasured gift from a mutual friend. She was such a huge influence on not only my style, but also for scores of others, (maybe even yours!) – Cinamon was the original inspiration for Neil Gaiman’s Death character from the Sandman series. Her friend Mike Dringenberg drew her years before, and by an odd twist of chance (or fate), this woman unwittingly helped shape the style of scads of wee gothlings. Cheers to you, Cinamon – you continue to inspire and astound!

This was me at maybe 15 or 16? It was for a fashion show at the old Club 404, a legendary big gay bar from back in the day here in Austin. I was total monster-child jail bait, who spent most of my time scampering around in the woods on drugs wishing I wasn’t human, poring over Elfquest and Sandman comics and Storm Constantine’s Wraeththu trilogy. I made my outfit in five minutes out of electrical tape, eyeliner, wire and black tulle. Oh, and a thong. Heaven forbid that should I ever spawn a girl-child as naughty as I was! With any luck, I’ll end up with a Saffy.

(photo by Monte McCarter)

At the tender age of barely 17, I became the armed spokesmodel for FringeWare Review’s book catalogue. This involved posing in my underpants and various getups made of rubber and dollparts with books and guns. Real guns. That’s totally an actual Uzi or Tech-9 or whatever the hell, too. I was super blessed to be part of FringeWare when it was around – it was a strange and magical era.

“telemptyness”

Vinicius Quesada is a collage/street artist from São Paulo, Brazil. In 2010, he created a series of dystopian images titled Blood Piss Blues, “with real blood.”

The images suggest a world in which the peak oil crisis has occurred, where children play in dismantled subway cars and where dense, polluted cities house homeless refugees, sword-wielding geisha and… psychedelic cats. At least that’s one interpretation.

The paintings appear to be large and incredibly detailed; here is one tiny detail of the mega-cityscape, and another photo of one of the images wheat-pasted on Quesada’s wall. More images after the jump, and even more on Flickr. [via Surrogate Self]

“little kids playing on the subway”

I’ve no idea what led this young man to the idea of stacking 3118 coins upon a single dime. Perhaps, as alluded to in the title of this post, he was simply bored. Perhaps he had though long and hard about, what he perceived to be, a lack of coin-stacking research, a gap in the understanding of coin storage. Perhaps he simply got his hands on some grade A marijuana. We will never know. What we do know is that, regardless of the reasons, he ends up with 3118 coins, impressively stacked on a single dime after seven, time-lapsed hours. Isn’t that enough?

Another week another FAM. Time to FAM it up FAM style. FAM to the MAX! FAMtacular FAMmery.

Ok, that’s enough of that. (Editors Note: Please PLEASE, stop drinking at work.)

Today we present 1979′s 80 Blocks From Tiffany’s, directed by Gary Weis of All You Need Is Cash and Saturday Night Live fame. I first found this movie three years ago and it still fascinates me. Following two gangs from the South Bronx, the Savage Skulls and the Nomads, it provides a fascinating snapshot of New York as it limped out of one of it’s worst decades. It plays much better as a time capsule, I think, then a gang documentary. If you ever wondered how anyone could come up with the aesthetics of a movie like The Warriors, here’s your answer.

Budget for this music video:

• Toys: $350
• Fine Harajuku fashions: $400
• Kraft Macaroni & Cheese Dinner: $1.49
• Fake fruit: $15
• After Effects: Free
• Drugs: $232,598,231,142

This is fashion blogger and singer Kyary Pamyu Pamyu singing Pon Pon Pon, produced by Shibuya-kei duo Capsule. Lisa Frank on acid. Everybody dance! [via aerialdomo]