Tag Archives: death

I speak to the dead but I’m insane so it doesn’t count! #spiritualism

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The process of death and humanity’s awareness of its own mortality has for millennia been a concern of the world’s religious traditions and the hub of philosophical inquiry. (Am I an existentialist or a spiritual soul?) You can simplify the basic belief structures surrounding death into roughly three convenient boxes.

  1. The belief in resurrection (associated with Abrahamic religions)
  2. Reincarnation or rebirth (associated with Dharmic religions)
  3. Or that consciousness permanently ceases to exist, known as eternal oblivion.

The belief in “eternal oblivion” stems from the hypothesis that the brain creates the mind; therefore, when the brain dies, the mind ceases to exist. This state can be described as “nothingness”. Many people who believe in an eternal oblivion, believe that the concept of an afterlife is scientifically impossible.

Any ways you are fucking DEAD – can I talk to you?!

Spiritualists believe in communicating with the spirits of discarnate humans. They believe that spirit mediums are humans gifted to do this, often through séances. Anyone may become a medium through study and practice. They believe that spirits are capable of growth and perfection, progressing through higher spheres or planes. The afterlife is not a static place, but one in which spirits evolve. The two beliefs—that contact with spirits is possible, and that spirits may lie on a higher plane—lead to a third belief, that spirits can provide knowledge about moral and ethical issues, as well as about God and the afterlife. Thus many members speak of spirit guides—specific spirits, often contacted, relied upon for worldly and spiritual guidance.

You could argue that by turning to the spirit world you are seeking reassurance and answers to life’s problems which are maybe caused through stress, or being afraid your world is falling apart,  or you’re experiencing sudden changes and disruption and you don’t quite know what to do. By subcontracting your responsibility to the dead you have a get out of jail card. Perhaps subconsciously you’ve wanted a solution to an issue but didn’t quite expect things to have turned out as they have. Using a spiritualist medium is an opportunity for a possible new beginning, a revelation or divine intervention. Is this an existential attitude or a sense of disorientation and confusion in the face of an apparently meaningless or absurd world?

My Grandmother was a ‘Spiritualist‘ by conviction – with local businessmen and tradesmen alike knocking on her door for advice and guidance,  her ‘messages’ influenced deals and life changes all around her. The respect she had was far larger than her diminutive size.

I speak to the dead but I’m insane so it doesn’t count!

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Original thought = original sin = so fucking sue me, I adore your arse From birth to death, it is the stuff in the middle that is sometimes slightly different. To say we are all unique is strictly not true – love, loneliness, disappointment, illness, parenthood (I love my boys) etc. are things we all experience in someway or another. Yes, it is probably true that I have gone […]

Clifford T WardI wonder how many of my old teachers from my old schools are dead – some were my age when I was at school? I wonder how many of my contemporaries are dead?

The only school teacher I know for sure is dead is Clifford T Ward, he was my English teacher (which explains a lot). He was a singer songwriter who had a ‘chart’ sucess with ‘Gaye‘ – the story was that she was a pupil in my class (she was also a girlfriend of mine). His English lessons were spent writting requests to ‘radio one’ DJs – Tony Blackburn et al. There is a bit more about how CTW influenced me here. He was a nice bloke (but a crap teacher) and his lyrics were sometime silly but then sometimes sentimental or poignant.

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Is This My God?

Download this,

Pay for the clicks.

Is this my God,

Is this my savior?

PB (aka TW) 2009

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Original thought = original sin = so fucking sue me, I adore your arse

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The Age of Reason

From birth to death, it is the stuff in the middle that is sometimes slightly different. To say we are all unique is strictly not true – love, loneliness, disappointment, illness, parenthood (I love my boys) etc. are things we all experience in someway or another. Yes, it is probably true that I have gone through a period of dramatic change and upheaval, however in this state of flux I have entered a period of great transformation and a new beginnings. It is time to re-evaluate – as difficult as the disappointment has been to take, change has created new possibilities that have never been dreamed of before but I am not unique – this shared pathway is what makes us part of a collective. It is most probable that anything you write about on the internet will become a shared emotion, concept, a facebook like or a thought or dream and somebody out there will be thinking, ‘I thought of that ages ago’ – Sin Nature? Surely it is our obligation to do things better and not worry about authorship, we are all guilty of plagiarism, even in our life choices.

So fucking sue me: Yes this is us being aggressive and confrontational, a call to war, used as a response in situations where we are criticised for stealing an artistic, creative idea (or maybe guilty of a sin). Who gives a fuck about the consequences. – we might get a facebook like out of it.

Original sin: Ancestral sin, is the Christian doctrine of humanity’s state of sin resulting from the fall of man, stemming from Adam’s rebellion in the Garden of Eden. This condition has been characterized in many ways, ranging from something as insignificant as a slight deficiency, or a tendency toward sin yet without collective guilt, referred to as a “sin nature”, to something as drastic as total depravity or automatic guilt of all humans through collective guilt. Guilt is a pointless emotion, we all steal (I’ll steal any creative idea if I want to make it mine) lust (I adore your arse) and indirectly murder  – I don’t give a shit about sin (maybe?) so fucking sue me.

Original sin. (2014, May 21). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 07:11, June 1, 2014, from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Original_sin&oldid=609525144

The Age of Reason: Being an Investigation of True and Fabulous Theology is a pamphlet, written by a British and American revolutionary Thomas Paine, that challenges institutionalized religion and the legitimacy of the Bible, the central text of Christianity. Published in three parts in 1794, 1795, and 1807, it was a bestseller in the United States, where it caused a short-lived deistic revival. British audiences, however, fearing increased political radicalism as a result of the French Revolution, received it with more hostility. The Age of Reason presents common deistic arguments; for example, it highlights what Paine saw as corruption of the Christian Church and criticizes its efforts to acquire political power. Paine advocates reason in the place of revelation, leading him to reject miracles and to view the Bible as an ordinary piece of literature rather than as a divinely inspired text. It promotes natural religion and argues for the existence of a creator-God.

The Age of Reason. (2014, March 22). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 07:10, June 1, 2014, from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Age_of_Reason&oldid=600737545

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Grass on a wall Morte Point

Grass on a wall Morte Point (Photo credit: 35mm_photographs)

This is a land of hope, hope and glory, glory boys, glory, glory, hallelujah.

The bells ring out for obedience,
Like a chorus of funeral bells.

The drugged out hippy cries for peace,
And then tries to find his head.

Bloody whores whip them,
Watch them bob and dance.

On the end of a rope,
On the end of a joke.

PB (aka TW) 1988

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I want to kiss the scars you hide…

Metal Garden Furniture

I want to kiss the scars you hide, caress you from inside, like the sunshine that follows a rainy day. I will make them my lovers, show them with pride to others, I’ll be with you all the way.

The calming dreams you have and then horror comes flooding back, the fists, the words, cutting like knives. I will take them all away (you no longer need to pray) I’ll be inside you everyday.

I want to kiss the scars you hide, caress you from inside, like the sunshine that follows a rainy day. I will make them my brothers and take them from the others, I’ll be with you all the way.

PB (aka TW) Feb. 2014

I found the above words written on a bit of scrap paper. We are all covered in scars, cat scratch, twig scratch, dog nip, fights, electric hand tools, knife slips, broken bottles and broken souls. I would like to point out I am not sad or feeling sorry for myself – I’m interested in the journey. Maybe time to go and record some ‘love songs’… Links below are from Wikipedia and might not work.

Articles/Reviews

  • Review in German magazine ‘Epitaph’ 1991, contains list of solo releases from 1988 – 1991 [1]
  • Review and interview with the BBC in 2005 about the release of ‘The Sampler No. 05’.[2] There is a link on this page to an audio clip of the interview.
  • Review by Mick Mercer: [3] in 2007
  • Review in Grave Jibes Fanzine (Russia) February 2010 [4] pages 64 to 71. This includes an interview and a review of ‘Cassette Culture 1989 – 2009’
  • Article on early experiences of home taping [5] from the ‘The Living Archive Of Underground Music’

Music production

Alumni

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Slaughterhouse

In 1977 I was asked to ‘crew’ for a video (In those days the equipment was huge, I had to carry a box the size of a suitcase). The video was of the processes involved in producing meat in a slaughterhouse, I did this for a painter who was creating images based on dead things. I witnessed the slaughtering of pigs, lambs, and beef. The video shoot was over three days and although horrific it was surprising how quickly I adapted to the  mass slaughter – the analogies between what I witnesses and the images of Jewish concentration camps during the Second World War were obvious – what I was surprised with was the speed in which such volume could be processed.

I’ve just read an article on American Slaughterhouses. The same issues and questions exist 30 years on. – Define cruelty when you take a life? What isn’t fit to harvest?