August, 2009 Archive

Saturday Signal: sifting the signal from the noise of the Internet’s occultural cacophony.

It’s been a crazy week with lots of great stuff to post, but I fear that there may be distinct lull in September.

No one (yet) has volunteered to take over the blog Update: One person has e-mailed me interested in taking over while I’m stranded in England on vacation in September, but there’s certainly still room for more. Position is still wide open, and I’d love for this to be an opportunity to widen the range of this blog to more than just my voice.

Hey! Signal!

• Rodney Davies has written a fascinating piece titled “The Last Days of Aleister Crowley, The Great Beast, at Hastings” for 21stcenturyradio.com, largely drawn from Davies’ 1975 stay in Hastings, and interviews with Crowley’s last landlady, Kathleen “Johnny” Symonds.

• Martin Fackler writes about Japan’s dying mediums for nytimes.com. It seems itako and other shamanistic mediums were common across Japan in medieval times, but were were suppressed in the late 19th century as Japan built a modern nation. Now, when they die, there’s none to replace them.

• Digging this up from aeons (not yet) gone by, read this piece about chaos magick, by Ray Sherwin, one of its founders. In it, Sherwin discusses some of the history of the chaos current, the IOT, chaote philosophy and its (non)beliefs.

Er…noise?

• Max Kaplan writes about “real-life Quidditch” for aroundphilly.com. Apparently, hoards of almost-adult students love nothing better than running around throwing balls at one another while straddling brooms – to the point where an “Intercollegiate Quidditch World Cup” has been created with official rules, and, oh gods, even a trailer. Ok, admittedly the geek dressed in yellow who runs around campus pretending to be a tiny golden ball is kinda funny. But seriously people, WTF?

Hey, remember back in June when I promised to let you know when I’d finished reading Francis Breakspear’s If It Was Easy, Everyone Would Be Doing It!? Well, the review is up on SpiralNature.com now.

As always, if you find something weird, cool or otherwise noteworthy, please e-mail me about it. If you’re pro-promotion, include your name and website for extra credit. Thanks!

My Mother’s Lesbian Jewish Wiccan Wedding was so last week. This week we’re all about Tales of the New Isis Lodge.

English Heretic, the producers of this fascinating new musical, describe themselves as England’s “very finest occult archaeologists, astral geographers and mystical toponymists”. They aim to “help people decode and realise the alchemical ciphers and conspiratorial interplay of the buildings and landscapes around them”.

Somehow this translates into making a 65 minute musical of “lush and occult exotica issuing from a transplutonic transmitter”.

The English Heretic blog, maintained by “Dr Champagne”, describes the musical as

Drawing its structure from the ultra decadent and ornate rituals described in Grant’s book Hecate’s Fountain English Heretic guide you through Egyptian pre-history to the fungi of Yuggoth, re-imagine flower power in an Indian Tantric idiom, describe the workings of Chinese sorcerers, realise the neither-neither hidden within the jump rhythms of Count Basie and invoke Choronzon in the Crimson Desert. Aeons in its reification and packaged in delicious artwork, stylised as a homage to Grant’s Typhonian tomes.

Wow!

The CD is £8 and can be purchased from their online shop. James of Mauve Zone Recordings is already a fan.

Spotted on LAShTAL.com, and further encouraged by Nova at The Third Mind.

In his blog on RitualMagick.co.uk, David Rankine, who with Stephen Skinner last year released Veritable Key of Solomon, announced that he has a new book coming out.

The Book of Treasure Spirits: A 17th Century Grimoire of Magical Conjurations to Increase Wealth and Catch Thieves Through the Invocation of Spirits, Fallen Angels, Demons and Fairies. will be published by Avalonia Books, and is set to be released September 7th, 2009.

In Rankine’s blog the book is described thusly:

Conjurations of Goetic spirits, old gods, demons and fairies are all part of a rich heritage of the magical search for treasure trove. During the Middle Ages and Renaissance the British Monarchy gave out licenses to people seeking treasure in an effort to control such practices, and this is one reason why so many grimoires are full of conjurations and charms to help the magician find treasure.

Considering the current economic climate, this might be a great time to invest in a book on treasure-finding spirits.

The book will be published in paperback, and retail for an economical £14.99