Bureau of Lost Culture (Stephen Coates)

'Health care is a right, not a privilege'   *Whilst many of his fellow physicians became business entrepeneurs rather than healers, Dr. Dave opened the Haight Ashbury Free Clinic in 1967, ministering to the thousands of young people and hippies flocking to San Francisco during the Summer of Love.    *Over the years, the patients using the clinic shifted from idealistic hippies with STDs and bad trip experiences to those with serious drug addictions, Vietnam veterans with heroin habits and early AIDS patients - the dispossessed and the marginalised cast adrift by the mainstream culture and excluded by the health industry.   *We hear about Charles Manson, the CIA, mind control, the history of Haight Ashbury, drugs and the darkening of the hippie dream. And we hear about the events and vision that made Dave turn his back on academic fame and fortune to pursue the countercultural life.   *His small office at 558 Clayton St. helped launch the free clinic movement, which has expanded to over 1,200 clinics around the US all built upon his principle of health care as a right, not a privilege.   #counterculture #drug  #lsd #acid #haightashbury #thegratefuldead #psychedelic #sanfrancisco #dr.dave #charlesmanson #CIA #MKUltra #medicine 

Forget California, swinging sixties London or the Paris riots for a moment, Estonian filmmaker Terje Toomistu joins us to talk about the hippie movement of the Soviet Union.

It had all the characteristics of Western hippiedom: long hair, groovy music, esoteric spirituality and drugs. The only thing missing perhaps was the radical public politics that would have pushed the repressive Soviet authorities into drastic, brutal  action  

Terji’s film, with its super groovy soundtrack of rare tunes, provides a fascinating glimpse into a moving, daring subculture that flourished east of the Iron Curtain. 

More about the Soviet Hippies film and Terje www.soviethippies.com

For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture:

www.bureauoflostculture.com

London’s East End and Soho were the centres of a unique musical culture in the years between the 20s and the 50s.   Award wining oral historian and radio producer ALAN DEIN returns to the Bureau to tell stories of songs that soundtracked that world and feature on ‘Music is the Most Beautiful Language in the World', the album of super rare tunes by London jewish jazz artists he has unearthed.   We hear tales of poverty and glamour, Soho gangsters, ghettos, vaudeville swing, comedy, cuisine and cabaret - and of some of the musicians who escaped the squalid streets of Whitechapel to become international stars. And we discuss what it means to be an oral historian, the power of story and how much radio still matters. For more on Alan’s work https://www.facebook.com/alan.dein For Don't Log off https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01jxzy9 For the ‘Music is the Most Beautiful Language in the World’ album https://jwmrecords.bandcamp.com/releases

----------

Get the Bureau's Newsletter   Support our wild endeavours   The Bureau of Lost Culture Home   Go on - follow, rate and review us - or be in touch directly bureauoflostculture@gmail.com We'd love to hear from you. -------------

 

He was a member of some of the most influential post punk bands: Magazine, The Birthday Party and The Bad Seeds. He's collaborated with a whole range of artists including Nick Cave, Iggy Pop, Diamanda Galas, David Lynch, Jarvis Cocker, Atticus Ross and Depeche Mode. He's written film scores, made films himself, made many solo records and recently published an extraordinary memoir of youth:  'Up Above the City and Down Beneath the Stars.’   The Jazz Devil Barry Adamson came to the Bureau to talk about his life and times - and about bones, about being an outsider, about Manchester in the 70s, about Punk, luck, trouble  - and about heroin addiction.    And we discuss the alchemical process of turning darkness into artness and signposts and signal moments along the way.   For more on Barry  http://www.barryadamson.com   Join us at the Bureau of Lost Culture https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/su/N0ZYoFu/BOLC   All shows www.bureauoflostculture.com #manchester #barryadamson #magazine #thebirthdayparty #thebadseeds #nickcave #howarddevoto #theclash #punk #postpunk #heroin #davidlynch #jazzdevil #nickcave #johnnymarr

In these days of constantly CCTV-surveilled, property over-developed London patrolled by health and safety wonks and paranoid private security forces, the wild world of the inner city squat party seems an impossibility.    DJ, veteran of a thousand festivals and squat party promoter WILL  WILES comes to the Bureau to tell tales of acid house daring do, breaking into a variety of buildings (including Newcastle's 19th century Tyne Bridge), rigging up electricity and lights and installing sound systems for DJs to thrill and delight a community of underground ravers dusk 'til dawn before vanishing again on Monday morning.   We hear of cooking up ketamine in the kitchen, police raids, psychic dance floor camaraderie and the exploits of tech-savvy wily, piratical, psychedelic pioneers carrying on their subversive activities right under the noses of the authorities and bemused neighbours - motivated by music, madness and a deep belief in the counter-cultural spirit.  

----------

Get the Bureau's Newsletter   Support our wild endeavours   The Bureau of Lost Culture Home   Go on - follow, rate and review us - or be in touch directly bureauoflostculture@gmail.com We'd love to hear from you. -------------

 

 

•He’s played with Jimi Hendrix, Sonny Boy Williamson, Paul McCartney, Rod Stewart, Jimmy Page, Billy Cobham, Spencer Davies, Long John Baldry, Rod Stewart, John McLaughlin, Tom Jones, Eric Burdon and many, many more. •With Julie Driscoll he had a huge hit with a masterful psychedelic rendition of Dylan's "This Wheel's on Fire”    •He's been hailed as the godfather of acid jazz, sampled by hip hop stars and nominated for a Grammy Award.   •At 82, BRIAN AUGER is still moving, grooving, sharp as a pin - and 'beginning again' as he says.   •We hear his extraordinary story and of the sign posts pointing the way on his musical journey - from the London Blitz - through the Soho jazz clubs of the 60s - to Venice Beach.   •Thanks to Greg Boroman and Karma Augur for making this happen.   *For More on Brian    * For more on the Auger Incorporated Archive release   *Let us know where you are at(a few questions about you) *Get Our Bulletin   #counterculture #music #hammondorgan #soho #sohoclubs #soho #sohohistory #londonhistory #juliedriscoll #brianauger #hendrix #6oslondon #acidjazz

* Withnail and I, Poets, Spiritualists, Irish, Spanish and Hugenot immigrants, Serial Killers, Artists, Railway workers, William Blake, Rimbaud and Verlaine, Walter Sickert, Sex, Drugs, Rock’n’Roll, Music Hall, Folk, Britpop, Levitation, The Roundhouse, Cecil Sharp House, The New Jerusalem, Markets, Markets, Markets..   * Writer, researcher and walker of Lost Rivers Tom Bolton leads us up and out of The Bureau to wander through the streets and stories of the London Borough of Camden - for decades, the down and dirty end of the countercultural city - in search of the strange spirits that still pervade its highways and byways.   * For more on Tom and his work https://tombolton.co.uk

 

* Bureau Home www.bureauoflostculture.com

* Bureau Instagram https://www.instagram.com/bureauoflostculture/

* The Bureau Newsletter  https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/su/N0ZYoFu/BOLC 

*Timothy Leary may have wanted to cause a revolution your head with LSD, The Beatles in your heart with Love, but countercultural activist and entrepreneur CRAIG SAMS went for the Gut.   *After bringing himself back from death’s door by curing the amoebic dysentery and hepatitis he contracted on the Central Asia hippie trail, he embarked on a mission to change the world and raise consciousness through food.   *We sit down with him for a feast of of fabulous food fables from feeding the freaks at The UFO club and the first Glastonbury festival, to co-founding Seed, London's first macrobiotic restaurant and the go-to healthy eatery for John and Yoko, The Stones and many other denizens of the London underground.   *Also on the menu: how he went on to co-found Whole Earth foods and then Green and Black's Chocolate, how macrobiotics will improve an LSD trip, how changing the way we eat can save us - and the planet - and how, at nearly eighty, he is still living the countercultural life. For More on Craig: https://www.craigsams.com   Join us at The Bureau of Lost Culture https://linktr.ee/bureauoflostculture #counterculture #macrobiotic #johnandyoko  #thebeatles #greenandblacks #wholeearth #craigsams

*During the Cold War era, the songs that Soviet citizens could listen to were ruthlessly controlled by the state. But a secret underground subculture of music lovers and bootleggers defied the censors, building recording machines and making their own extraordinary discs of forbidden jazz, rock ‘n’ roll, and Russian music, cut onto used hospital x-ray film.    *Today’s special guest is, er… me, Stephen Coates   *My new book BONE MUSIC details how the x-ray bootleggers worked, and reveals for the first time, the hidden history of their archivist precursors in Budapest. Who were they? Why did they do it and how was this Roentgenizdat (private pressing on xray) even possible?    *Cultural Commentator TRAVIS ELBOROUGH returns to the Bureau and we swap seats so that he can run the show    *We dig deep into the culture of the Soviet X-Ray Underground, the character of the bootleggers, cold war culture, cultural repression and ask if Bone Music has anything to say about current censorship in Russia.   *For More on BONE MUSIC the book: https://www.x-rayaudio.com/bonemusicbook *The Bureau of Lost Culture: https://www.bureauoflostculture.com   #bonemusic #x-rayaudio #xrayaudio #sovietunion #coldwar #forbiddenculture #roentgenizdat #bonerecords #rockonribs #

The Joy of Sex was published in 1972 and for years, was rarely out of the bestseller lists, generating sequels, revised editions and a lot of imitators - so how could it be countercultural? For two reasons: firstly that Dr Alex Comfort who wrote it was a deeply countercultural figure, and second, because its publication represents the moment when the sexual revolution of the countercultural years of the late '50s and ‘60s, threw off its remaining clothes and dived naked into the bourgeous middle class mainstream.   And it changed a lot of peoples’ live - well their sex lives at any rate.   Social justice journalist activist and anarchist Eric Laursen, author of Polymath: The Life and Professions of Dr. Alex Comfort, came to The Bureau to tell of the poet, novelist, doctor, biologist, gerontologist, anarchist, scientific humanist, public intellectual, pacifist and activist who also happened to write the world’s most famous guide to lovemaking..   For More on Eric   For More on Polymath: The Life and Professions of Dr. Alex Comfort  #sex #sexguide #thejoyofsex #alexcomfort #thesexualrevolution #counterculture #sexmanual #sandstone

Mike Jay, the UK’s foremost historian of psychoactive plants, joins us to talk about the deeply strange hallucinogen/drug/medicine/sacrament mescaline - a substance derived from the peyote cactus.

Whilst other psychedelic compounds are more popular - and much more in the news - Mike tells us why mescaline was actually the very first psychedelic.

We hear strange stories of drug use in 19th century London, Native American medicine ceremonies - and Bovril..

For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com

More about Mike's work

www.mikejay.net

 

We meet with legendary drummer and songwriter John Alder / Mohammed Abdullah, best known as Twink, who played for the In Crowd, Tomorrow, The Pink Fairies, The Pretty Things, Hawkwind, The Aquarian Age, Pink Wind and Stars - amongst others legendary acts.

One of the foremost figures of the late sixties London music scene, he tells us what it was like - from the inside.

We hear what Jimi Hendrix said to him when they jammed at The UFO club, about Syd Barrett’s tragic last gig and about a life beating out the rhythm of the counterculture from Colchester to Morocco and back again.

You can find out more about Twink’s legacy at www.thinkpink50th.com

For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture

www.bureauoflostculture.com

Cannabis, psilocybin, mescaline and LSD were not enough to fulfil Joey Mellen’s quest to expand his consciousness to the furthest limits 'in search of the miraculous'. So in 1968 he used an electric drill to self-trepan himself by boring a hole into his skull.   Now a delightful and very lively 82, Joey visits the Bureau to tell how an upper middle class English public schoolboy tuned in, turned on and dropped out, became a psychonautic beatnik and carried out the act of self surgery that made him infamous in countercultural London.  Along the way we dig deep into acid evangelism, how to avoid bad trips, the blood chemistry of the ego and the strange life of Bart Hughes, the dutchman whose theories inspired Joey, Amanda Fielding and various others to seek enlightenment through trepanation.     And we ask Joey if he acheived his goal of getting high and never coming down.   This episode was sponsored by the artist known as The Real Tuesday Weld    Joey’s book Bore Hole   Get the Bureau's Newsletter   Support our wild endeavours   The Bureau of Lost Culture Home      

In 1964 he was a working class hippie student crossing Haight Street, a road in San Francscso, when hit by a vision  - and life as he knew it was over

In 1994, he was a multi-millionaire new-age entrepeneur crossing Wilshire Boulevard, a road in Los Angeles, when hit by a car - and life as he knew it was over. In the years in between, along with the co-founder of The Yippies Abbie Hoffman, counter-culture icon, anti-war activist, new age/self-help proponent, social-networking pioneer and all round troublemaker JERRY RUBIN helped articulate the voice of young America in the '60s and early '70s.   He was arrested countless times, carried out many extrardinary protests that used performance art, pranks and provocation including an attempt to levitate The Pentagon and regularly hung out with John Lennon and Yoko Ono in New York. Unlike Hoffman, who lived off grid for several years following a drug bust, died by suicide in 1989 and was canonized as a countercultural saint, Rubin was accused by many of “selling out" - the worst thing a 1960s radical could do - and as a consequence got written out of the hippie history books.   Well that is until our guest for this episode wrote the biography, 'Did It! From Yippie To Yuppie: Jerry Rubin, An American Revolutionary'   PAT THOMAS, archivist, uber re-issue producer, countercultral author and music journalist returned for the third timr to the Bureau.   Previously he was here to talk about The Black Panthers and Allen Ginsberg,and this time, he traced  Jerry Rubin's journey from high school journalist to stoned political freak and multi-millionaire entrepeneur.   Along the way, we hear about The Yippies(the Youth International Party), The Chicago 8, John Lennon and Yoko Ono in the early 70s, EST training - and selling out   And we debate the question: 'Once a revolutionary always a revolutionary?'   Pat's book:  'Did It! From Yippie To Yuppie: Jerry Rubin, An American Revolutionary'     Check out this Rubin related playlist   #jerryrubin #abbiehoffman #theblackpanthers #blackpower #yippies #theyippies #thebeats #allenginsberg #timothyleary #activism #socialism #revolution #levitatethepentagon #eldridgecleaver #bobdylan #nixon #johnandyoko #vietnam #anti-war #protest #johnlennon #haightashbury #thechicago8   

What is a mystic, what is mysticism, what is the mystical?

Many of us have sense that there is something mystical, or at least mysterious, underpinning things, some countercultural force that defies explanation but survives even in our 24/7 social-media drenched, junked up internet world of money, career and self promotion. Philosophy, along much modern science and many formal religions, poo-poos the mystical - relegating it to the woo-woo, of interest only to the less sophisticated, the superstitious - or the deluded.

Yet our guest Simon Critchely is a Professor of Philosophy. He came to the Bureau to suggest that modern philosophy has got it wrong, that mystical experiences offer a practical way to deepen the sense of our lives, whether through mainstream spiritual connection, by taking part in mind-altering experiences  - or just by opening to the mystical in ordinary life.   We hear about some of the extraordinary mystics of the past, talk about how the arts can point to the mystic, and digress into ecstasy,  sex, drugs and rock and roll, Jesus’s foreskin, William Blake, the covid pandemic, Nick Cave and Wim Wenders, More on Simon and the book On Mysticism, the Experience of Ecstasy     #counterculture #mysticism #nickcave #philosophy #mysticalexperience #relics #saints #heretics #consciousness #truth #madness 

45 years ago, two working class South Londoners took over a decrepit seedy gay bar in Neal Street, then a rather desolate and deserted part of central London. At a time when the Sex Pistols’ Anarchy in the UK antics had resulted in a virtual blanket ban on venues hosting anything associated with the word ’Punk’, they provided a home for an astonishing array of bands including The Clash, The Police, The Jam, Wire, XTC, The Damned, Generation X, The Stranglers, Siouxie and the Banshees and many, many more. Their tenure lasted for just 100 intense, crazed nights before they were kicked out, but The Roxy became a punk legend.   Susan Carrington and Andrew Czezowski enter the Bureau to talk about their life in music, clubs and the counterculture - from meeting at a mod night at the Locarno Ballroom in Streatham in the 60s to opening The Fridge, one the of the longest running and most influential clubs of the 80s, 90s and 00s. We will return to the latter in a future episode, but today we hear their tales of The Roxy, of managing The Damned and Generation X and of the DIY can-do punk spirit that has infused all their adventures in the underground.   For more on Susan and Andrew and their book about The Roxy check out  www.roxyclub.co.uk    For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com       

*Whatever happened to the Greek Gods? if you are a teenager living half way up a 1970s tower block listening to Drill, should you even care?

*On this epside we travel in time and space to Ancient Greece, the classical psycho-geographic birthplace of Western Culture (and therefore of counterculture), specfically to the mythic landscape of Epidavros and the sacred temple of Asclepius.

*Our guide and guest is Sarah Janes, one of Britain's foremost lucid dreamers, explorer and teacher of ancient mysteries. 

*We hear how the Temple of Asclepius's treatment of the sick involved diet, excercise, theater - and comedy - in addition to surgery and medicine.

*We revisit the subject of dreams, nightmares and countercultural consciousness  - and hear why the gods are still with us, whether we ignore them or not.

•And the Scottish band The Proclaimers make a surprise apearance.... 

For more on Sarah and her work

#dreaming #psychedelics #theunconscious #consciousness #truth #madness #counterculture #sleep #luciddreaming #dreams #neuroscience #consciousness #nightmares #epidavros #ancientgreece #greekgods #asclepius #jung #ecstasy #thegods

 

She says: ‘I was reared Catholic but got over it, was born male but got over it, stopped sleeping with boys about the time I stopped being one and am much happier than I was when I was younger'. ROZ KAVENY is a poet, a novelist, a writer of science fiction, a reviewer, a cultural critic, a literary journalist and a celebrated  activist.   She has also been a sex worker - a hustler - as she would say, and has been both celebrated and denigrated. She was born a boy in 1949, became a woman all the way back in 1982 and has led a very countercultural life indeed.   This is part of her story. It's a wild and at times shocking ride. It gives an insight into what it was like to come of age as trans in an era before even being gay was legalised in the UK.   Note: contains descriptions of sexualabuse.   #trans #transgender #rozkaveney #sexchange #genderdismorphia #gender #hustlers #gendersurgery  

Hawkwind: Never in fashion but never out of it, piratical pagan proto-punks, avatars of the underground, figureheads of the free festival scene, innovative heralds of the rave generation, cosmic space rockers with street fighter spirit  - there is no one like them.   We meet with Joe Banks author of “Hawkwind: Days Of The Underground – Radical Escapism In The Age Of Paranoia” (Strange Attractor Press) to explore the story of a much loved band that have gradually come to win the respect of many of the most cynical of critics - perhaps partly just by virtue of still being around, but mainly by sticking to their fiercely independent, idiosyncratc, anti-corporate, psychedelic ethos.   And we return to the West London musical, social melting pot we have previously explored with Nick Laird Clowes to uncover the fertile countercultural ground that gave birth to Hawkwind and in which they played such an important role.   For more on Joe Banks https://www.daysoftheunderground.com   For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com

Forbidden! Taboo! Shouldn’t be allowed!   Do you ever find yourself censoring yourself? Not saying quite what you think, feel or believe in case it is disapproved of?   Human rights lawyer ERIC BERKOWITZ comes to the Bureau to talk about his epic new book 'Dangerous Ideas: A History of Censorship from Ancient Times to Fake News.   It's a thrilling read, full of sometimes comical, often alarming and always thought-provoking human stories - from that of the ancient Chinese emperor who destroyed any works implying there had ever been a better era than his own, to the current Chinese leader's attempts to have Winnie the Pooh banned (after his and the bear's resemblance was pointed out). The UK and the US don’t fare too well either.   Why have books, films, images words and ideas always been censored by those in power? Are there times when they should be? Does censorship ever work?    Eric digs deep into the touchiness of tyrants, into our current issues around blame, shame and cancel culture and why he thinks that almost nothing should be censored. We explore why countercultural ideas are so necessary for the culture and why they are only really dangerous when denied expression.   For more on Eric and the book www.ericberkowitz.com  

----------

Get the Bureau's Newsletter   Support our wild endeavours   The Bureau of Lost Culture Home   Go on - follow, rate and review us - or be in touch directly bureauoflostculture@gmail.com We'd love to hear from you. -------------

 

 

We meet with film director Olivia Litchenstein and BBC Russian Arts presenter Alexander Kan to hear about the extraordinary musician Sergey Kuryokhin, ‘the Soviet Punk Frank Zappa’ who with his underground cohorts in Leningrad tried to soundtrack perestroika as the cold war crumbled around them.

Olivia tells of the strange circumstances of the making of the BBC TV series Comrades during the twilight of the Soviet Empire, with tales of tapes smuggled in diplomatic bags and a bizarre intervention by Ronald Reagan.

Alex tells of his friendship with Kuryokhin, an incredibly talented, charming musical provocateur whose live performances astonished Russian audiences.  And we learn of the bizarre prank Kuryokhin played on National TV claiming Lenin was a magic mushroom, just one of many dadaist interventions he made before his tragically early death.

The Comrades program featuring Sergey Kuryokhin: https://youtu.be/ibY2lXdgdnM

For more on The Bureau of Lost Culture:

www.bureauoflostculture.com

It is a tale of lost treasure, it is a tale of a lost - or rather forgotten - artist, a mystic, a cockney visionary.   •Curator Jonathan Allen comes to the Bureau to tell of AUSTIN OSMAN SPARE and the strange and wonderful Tarot Deck that lay for decades in the archives of The Magic Circle, undisturbed and forgotten.   •Now a growing influence on artists, writer and chaos magick  practitioners including Alan Moore and Jimmy Page, Spare became largely unnoticed in his lifetime.   •We hear of his curious, occult life in South London, his riches to rags story, cartomancy, divination and the discovery that may just change his future.    •And we hear of the efforts to bring that future into the present through a campaign by Strange Attractor Press that will make Spare's extraordinary visionary Tarot available for mystics, art lovers, collectors and the curious..   •For the Austin Spare Tarot Deck Kickstarter https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/strangeattractoruk/austin-osman-spare-occult-tarot-deck-and-book   •For the book Lost Envoy http://strangeattractor.co.uk/shoppe/lost-envoy/   •For The Bureau of Lost Culture https://www.bureauoflostculture.com   #bureauoflostculture #austinspare #austinosmanspare #tarot #lostenvoy #strangeattractor #strangeattractorpress #alanmoore #jimmypage #williamblake #pankhurst #mervynpeake #magiccircle #themagiccircle #tarotdeck #cartomancy #chaosmagick #magick #conjuring #southwark     

The giant stone heads of the fantastically remote Easter Island have gazed out mysteriously for over a 1000 years, fascinating the world since Dutch sailors came across them in the 18th century.   They were created by some lost civilisation it was said, or perhaps they may not have been made by humans at all, but by extra-terrestrial visitors. Most commonly the story has been that the original people who made them brought about their own complete destruction in a kind of unintentional eco-suicide - a narrative that acts as a moral fable, a warning against our own selfish destruction of the planet's resources.   But is that really true?   James Grant Peterkin, historian, author and educator lived on Easter Island amongst its people for 20 years. He is one of the very few outsiders to speak their language of Rapanui and to be accepted in their community.  He came to the Bureau to talk about how he came there, why he stayed and to dispel some of the myths, tell some of the truths about a very particular, and very peculiar lost culture.   James's thoughts on the Easter Island statue in the British Museum     #easterisland, #rapanui, #stoneage #polynesia #earthmystery #esoteric #archaeology #statues #island  

 

* Ninja Tune head honcho and Coldcut co-pirate Jonathan More returns to the Bureau to talk about his adventures hi-jinxing and hi-jacking the airwaves in the Wild West of South London. 

* For the second in our trilogy on illicit broadcasting, we hear tales of DJ derring-do during the birth Of Kiss Fm, once one of the coolest of the urban pirate radio stations and its transition to the commercial mainstream.  

* And in the mix, we debate how the mainstream is dependent on the underground, the culture feeds on the counterculture, and along the way go crate-digging into how Jon caught the disease of collecting vinyl, putting on warehouse parties, life-changing meetings in London taxis, pirate TV, Coldcut's Solid Steel show - and nuclear power station ephemera..  

* For Jon and Coldcut http://coldcut.net

* Jon’s Soho Radio show Out to Lunch https://sohoradiolondon.com/profile/jon-more/ 

Thanks for audio samples and info:

* DJ Food https://www.djfood.org/

* The Pirate Radio Archive https://www.thepiratearchive.net/

* AMFM.0rg https://www.amfm.org.uk/

* Death is Not the End https://deathisnot.bandcamp.com/album/london-pirate-radio-adverts-1984-1993-vol-1 

Follow Us:

* Bureau Home www.bureauoflostculture.com

* Instagram https://www.instagram.com/bureauoflostculture/

* Get the Bureau Newsletter  https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/su/N0ZYoFu/BOLC 

Enter the labyrinth. Perambulator and psycho-geographer Robert Kingham leads us down the twisting, turning tunnels and lost highways of the London labyrinth to meet author, mystic and cockney visionary Arthur Machen.   We explore Machen’s odd life and books - and some  strange parts of the city - as we uncover the ways he was to influence the folk horror movement and countercultural cult authors H P Lovecraft and Alan Moore.   We ask: Was Machen the first London psycho-geographer? Did he really take a packet of currant biscuits with him on his epic perambulations through the sleeping city? Where is the labyrinth?     For more on Robert and Minimum Labyrinth minimum labyrinth   For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com

What do Morrissey, Dorothy Parker, Le Corbusier, Harold Lloyd, Janis Joplin, Andy Warhol, Alan Ginsberg, Michael Caine, Gloria Steinem, Buddy Holly, John Lennon, Jarvis Cocker have in common?   Like around 65% of the British population they needed some sort of vision correction - aka glasses.   Writer and cultural commentator  Travis Elborough returns to the Bureau to talk about his forthcoming book: 'Through the Looking Glasses: The Spectacular Life of Spectacles’ (Little Brown).   We take a long look at the wonderful and wonky world of glasses from the Middle Ages to the present - along with a cast of spec. wearing monks, artisans, foppish dandies, wonks, nerds, bohemians, bands, spies and film stars as we examine the story of eyewear through the lens of the counterculture.    For more on Travis and his work https://traviselborough.co.uk   For more on Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com 

In the turbulent late 1970s, six-year-old Susanna Crossman moved with her mother and siblings from a suburban terrace to a crumbling mansion deep in the English countryside.   They would share their new home with over fifty other residents  - idealists from all over the world - armed with worn paperbacks on ecology, Marx and radical feminism and drawn together by utopian dreams of remaking the world.  They did not leave for fifteen years.   This was not a hippie commune or a new age retreat but a community run on radical socialist Marxist principles.  Yet, however noble the intentions of the adults, was this suitable place - a suitable home -  for a child to grow up? Susanna wrote a book to try to answer that question and came to the Bureau to tell us all about it - and about the pleasures and perils of growing up in the fallout of the Utopian Dream.   More on Susanna More on her book  Home Is Where We Start More on British Intentional Communities   #communes #counterculture #punk #radical  #utopia #alternativecommunities #intentionalcommunities #esoteric #hippie #marxist   

The Sexual Revolution? Yes. Liberation? Maybe. Penis Envy? NO!   *Youth culture in the sixties was progressive in so many ways but when it came to the relations between the sexes, it was perhaps much more traditional than it liked to admit.   *Sleeping around, Syd Barret, Pink Floyd, Groupies, Frigidity, the Pill, abortion, Oz magazine and of course The Female Eunuch make their appearance as we dig deep into what it was like growing up as a young woman in the underground scene of swinging sixties London.   *Author Jill Drower, once a member of The Exploding Galaxy experimental dance commune returns to the Bureau along with beat traveller, model and singer Jenny Spires as we ask if the story of counterculture has largely been one told by men about men.   *For Jill's book: The Exploding Galaxy: Performance Art, LSD and Bent Coppers in the Sixties Counterculture’   

*Sign up for The Bureau Newsletter: https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/su/N0ZYoFu/BOLC 

#SydBarrett #Pink Floyd #Groupies #Frigidity #abortion #Ozmagazine #TheFemaleEunuch #germainegreer #jennyspires #theexplodinggalaxy

*They were psychedelic outlaws holing up in hill country hideouts to escape police harassment, dealing drugs to survive and blasting out a mix of LSD evangelism, mystical philosophy and grooved up rock’n’roll.   *In their short existence, The 13th Floor Elevators succeeded in blowing the lid off the musical underground, logging early salvos in the countercultural struggle against state authorities, and turning their deeply hallucinatory take on jug-band garage rock into a new American institution called psychedelic music.    *Paul Drummond author of 'Eye Mind - the Saga of Roky Erickson and the 13th Floor Elevators’ deemed the band significant enough to spend eight years of his life researching and writing about them - along with producing the definitve compilations of their work.   *We dig into their craziness - and into Janis Joplin, LSD, peyote, Antonin Artaud, mayhem, madness, music and more.   For More on Paul and his work Get our Counterculture newsletter The Bureau of Lost Culture Home #13thfloorelevators #counterculture #the13thfloorelevators #lsd #acid #psychedelicsound #psychedelicrock #occult #psychedelic #peyote  #rokyerickson #esoteric 

Warning: this episode contains discussions of sexual and other adult themes.

Julie Peakman is a historian of eighteenth-century culture who specialises in the study sexuality and pornography.

She is the author of 'Sexual Perversions, 1670-1890', 'Whore Biographies 1700-1825', The Development of Pornography in 18thC England' and many other books.

She came to the Bureau to discuss her latest: 'The Pleasure's All Mine - A History of Perverse Sex' which contains many affecting stories of how benign sexual difference has, in the past, lead to what we would now perceive as unjust and brutal persecution.

'Perversion' has been defined as 'showing a deliberate and obstinate desire to behave in a way that is unreasonable or unacceptable' or 'contrary to the accepted or expected standard or practice' - rather like 'counterculture'.

It has at different times included masturbation, male and female homosexuality, cross-dressing, bestiality, sadomasochism, necrophilia, incest, exhibitionism, voyeurism, fetishism, even straight-up vanilla heterosexual sex in certain circumstances.

Julie's conviction is that the very word and concept of 'perversion' has reached its expiry date - we discuss.

#perversion #sex #london #pornography #fetish #bdsm #sexuality #gay #necrophilia #incest #masturbation #bestiality #prostitution #flagellation #homesexuality #morality 

 

Genesis P-Orridge was a performance artist, neo Pagan, Industrial music innovator, the co-founder of COUM, Throbbing Gristle and Psychic TV and an arch provocateur. He was variously described as a wrecker of civilisation, transgressive and blasphemous, accused of being a Satanist and of sexually abusing his children (a lie - in fact he was a loving father and grandfather), and claimed to be a threat to society. He could be both very alarming and very kind. In later life Genesis became infamous with attempts to unite as a “pandrogyne”, a single entity, with partner Lady Jaye through the use of extreme surgical body modification intended to make them physically resemble one another Filmaker David Charles Rodrigues, director of S/HE IS STILL HERE an extraordinary, moving film based around interviews made in the last months of Genesis's life, came to the Bureau to talk about the Cut Up technique, William Burroughs, Bryon Gysin, The Exploding Galaxy, industrial music, the Satanic Panic and much more in the life and death of a deeply countercultural artist.   #genesis p-orridge #throbbinggristle #coum #psychictv #thetempleofpsychicyouth #industrialmusic #templeofpsychicyouth #pandrogyne #coseyfannitutti #chrisandcosey #williamburroughs #bryongysin #cutup #thecutuptechnique #ica #censorship #transgressive #satanicpanic #ladyjaye #thexxplodinggalaxy        

*Their number encompasses the darkest bogeymen of countercultural nightmares- including Charles Manson, Jim Jones, David Koresh and the Reverend Moon -as well as saintly figures devoted to the good of others; outright charlatans, narcissistic psychopaths, deluded New Age prophets as well as genuine gurus. *Since the 1950s, certain charismatic individuals have taken it upon themselves to collect others around them in ‘cults’, rejecting mainstream religion and society in favour of a claim to secret knowledge of the path of liberation. The consequences have often been disastrous, involving the devotees actually getting liberated from their money, freedom - and sometimes, their lives.   *Artist and archivist MICAH MOSES has spent twenty years not only studying cults, new religious movements and individuals of a spiritually inspired nature, but broadcasting their soundtracks to a wider world.   *Micah came to the Bureau ahead of his ‘GODBODY' exhibition around the theme of the New Age showing in London at The Horse Hospital in September 2023.   *This episode of the Bureau contains a selection of strange, esoteric and sometimes sinister sounds from the vast archive he has gathered over the years.    *For more on Micah’s WFMU Music of Mind Control radio show *For the GODBODY exhibition *Join our cult

#counterculture #cults #cultleaders #newage #thenewage #secretsocieties #jimjones #jonestown #marshallapplewhite #heavensgate #thechildrenofgod #manson #charlesmanson #davidberg  #scientology #guru #godbody #thehorsehospital

*Starting in 1966, LLOYD JOHNSON not only sold clothes to a multitude of street smart, cool kids, but contributed to the very look of rock ’n' roll fashion. In the decades since, he has helped style Keith Richards, Bob Dylan, Jack Nicholson, David Bailey, The Clash, Iggy Pop, Tom Waits, Barry Adamson, Johnny Marr, Nick Cave,The Stray Cats and The Pretenders. *On top of that, his designs have appeared on many record sleeves including albums by Rod Stewart and Madness, in videos like George Michael’s" Faith”, in the films Quadrophenia and Jim Jarmusch's Down by Law and Mystery Train, and as stage costumes for David Bowie. *The Face said he is one of the crucial figures in the development of British style.  He just says: 'I created what I saw as stage-wear for the street. *Lloyd came into the Bureau to share some of his stories.  And we hear about growing up in Hastings, Kensington Market, the Kings Road, Mods vs Rockers, Fred Astaire, Freddy Mercury, model aeroplanes and much, more from a life lived in clothes for over 50 years.   *Thanks to Roger Burton for the intro   *Image: Lloyd outside Johnson The Modern Outfitters 1975 (sourced by Paul Gorman for the show he curated at Chelsea Space in 2012 https://www.chelseaspace.org/archive/johnson-pr.html)   *Join us to get our newsletter and hear more tales from the underground, the counterculture and the upside down.   www.bureauoflostculture.com

#RodStewart #Madness #GeorgeMichael #Quadrophenia #JimJarmusch #DavidBowie #KeithRichards #BobDylan #JackNicholson #DavidBailey #TheClash #IggyPop #TomWaits #JohnnyMarr #NickCave #TheStrayCats #barryadamson #ThePretenders #lloydjohnson #larocka

In the first of an occasional series of broadcasts around the subject of LSD, psychedelic historian Andy Roberts takes us on the first part of a trip through the extraordinary life and times of Michael Hollingshead.   Hollingshead's assertion that he ‘turned on the world’ may be wildly immodest, but he did introduce Timothy Leary (and many others) to acid and thus played an essential role in the evolution of the counterculture in the USA and the UK.   He remains relatively forgotten - and his home town of Darlington does not figure in the topography of Acid culture - despite his tremendous consciousness changing exploits.   But he was no saint. Andy, whose book Divine Rascal is the first biography of Hollingshead, charts the idiosyncracies and rise and fall of a man variously described as a Zelig, holy fool, trickster, black magician, sociopath, charlatan, genius, fabulist, junkie, alcoholic, secret agent, police informer, disruptor and sex mad preacher of Love who didn't actually understand love.   To be continued.   For more on Andy and ‘Divine Rascal' http://strangeattractor.co.uk/shoppe/divine-rascal/   For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com

*Roger Huddle is a born and bred Londoner, a working class music-mad mod who grew up in the 50s, got radicalised in the 60s and became a co-founder of one the most successful activist groups of the 70s - Rock Against Racism (RAR).   *RAR was a political and cultural movement which emerged in 1976 in reaction to a rise in racist attacks on the streets of the United Kingdom and increasing support for the far-right National Front at the ballot box.   •Between 1976 and 1982 RAR activists organised national carnivals and tours, as well as local gigs and clubs throughout the country bringing together black and white fans in their common love of music.   *The musicians came from all pop music genres including some of the UK's biggest post-punk and Reggae artists including The Clash, Misty in Roots, Elvis Costello and X-Ray Spex.   *Roger came into the Bureau to tell us all about it  and to school us in the London club scene of the 60s, radical socialism, agit prop, agit-pop, cultural revolution - and William Morris.   •For  more on Roger:  •For more on RAR and Syd Shelton check out the film White Riot  •Image courtesy: John Sturrock   #counterculture #rockagainstracism #rogerhuddle #sydshelton #thenationalfront #racism #thebeats #london #walthamstow #williammorris #socialism #revolution #rockrevolution #theclash #agitprop #trotsky

One our foremost living writers on the esoteric, Gary Lachman, enters the Bureau purportedly to talk about one of our most important, if rather forgotten, dead  writers on the esoteric, T C Lethbridge.   We do get around to exploring Lethbridges's various incarnations as a rogue psychic archaeologist, dowser and parapsychologist but only after some serious digressions into Gary’s various incarnations including his time playing bass for Blondie in mid 70s New York.  We hear how he was escorted out of David Bowie’s loft apartment by two glamorous bodyguards after a disagreement over Lethbridge, delve into the meaning of ‘Counterculture’ and dip into the subject of precognitive dreaming before finishing up with a story about a hedgehog.   In other words, there’s something for everyone..   For more on Gary Lachman and his work https://garylachman.co.uk   For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com      

*We take a creep through dimly lit London streets populated with prostitutes, bohemians, charlatans, junkies, spiritualists, drunkards and lost souls following magician, author, occultist and drug fiend ALEISTER CROWLEY,'The Great Beast’, as he prowls Piccadilly in pursuit of pleasure, power and yet more prostitutes.   *'Do What Though Wilt shall be the whole of the law’   *Our guide is Phil Baker, author of ‘City of The Beast’, part Crowley biography, part psychogeographic odyssey and part London gazetteer. We seek the man beneath the myth, the flaneur beneath the fiend and ask why do  many still find the often deplorable Crowley so intriguing, even inspiring?   *Along the was we get fascinating glimpses into a lost era, a shadowy underworld of Victorian and Edwardian counterculture, Sex Magick, ether, drugs and .. snails..    *For The City of the Beast book : http://strangeattractor.co.uk/news/city-of-the-beast/   *For the O.T.O https://oto-usa.org/

 

*Sign up for The Bureau Newsletter: https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/su/N0ZYoFu/BOLC 

* The Bureau Instagram https://www.instagram.com/bureauoflostculture/

#crowley #aleistercrowley #counterculture #magick #thegoldendawn #london #prostitution #occult #ether #666 #O.T.O.   

*Performance artist, actor and underground cabaret star Madame LePustra leads us on a journey back in time in search of the Berlin Cabaret and Kabarett of Weimar Republic era Berlin.   *We learn of the strange and progressive Golden Years of the 1920s when queer and trans identiities were accepted, even feted, within an underground culture that briefly flowered in the city between the wars.   *We meet some of the extraordinary women performers who pushed artistic, theatrical and social boundaries before the Nazis jackbooted the doors of the clubs and theatres and brought the era to a tragic close.   *And we hear of Madame Le Pustra’s work to remember and reinterpret the times through their re-imagined ‘Cabaret of the Nameless’.   For more on Madame Le Pustra https://madamelepustra.com  The Bureau of Lost Culture https://www.bureauoflostculture.com Image courtesy Madame Le Pustra  / Michel Dierickx    #berlincabaret #weimarcabaret #madamelepustra #cabaretofthenameless #counterculture

We revisit the wonderfully odd, lost culture of the coin-operated machines that allowed ordinary people to make a record of their voice long before the advent of tape or digital recording.(Jack White has been using one, The Voice O Graph, more recently to produce terrific lo- fi caught-in-the-moment records, including an album with Neil Young).   We are joined by oral historian and broadcaster Alan Dein to hear a selection of recordings of strange, moving ghostly voices from his collection and learn how the records were used to send messages home from the war, record visits to tourist destinations or to capture the sounds of loved ones in a way that had never been possible before.   For more on Alan’s award winning work https://www.facebook.com/alan.dein

----------

Get the Bureau's Newsletter   Support our wild endeavours   The Bureau of Lost Culture Home   Go on - follow, rate and review us - or be in touch directly bureauoflostculture@gmail.com We'd love to hear from you. -------------

 

Image courtesy Museum of London

"The Sun Machine is Coming Down and We’re Gonna Have a Party"   CHRIS TOFU artistic director of Continental Drifts, lies down on the Bureau’s couch for a session of psycho(delic)analysis. We take a rambling trip through the British free festival scene of the 70s, 80s and 90s  - with deviations into the lost worlds of Europe’s squatting scene, the new age travellers and guerilla gigs. And we hear about Chris’s crazy countercultural life getting lost at Stonehenge as a wide-eyed 15 year old from Devon, being 'Bez’ in anarcho-punk-celtic-squattng band Tofu Love Frogs and gigging in a thousand fields along the way.  

The image is courtesy the incomparable ALAN LODGE To see his extraordinary archive of images of festivals and alternative culture: www.alanlodge.co.uk

For more on Continental Drifts https://continentaldrifts.co.uk/about-us/   For more on Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com     Image Courtesy of Alan Lodge https://alanlodge.co.uk  

*Psychedelics have made a comeback but they remain deeply mysterious.   *They may be now seen as potential 'breakthrough therapy' for mental illness but we still have only a vague idea how they work, and there is a limit to what studies in labs can reveal. Any one who has used them knows that to really understand them, we must broaden our experience of what they actually are. *Neuropsychologist ANDY MITCHELL decided to investigate for himself, taking ten different drugs in ten different settings - from a London neuroimaging lab to the Colombian Amazon via Silicon Valley and his friend's basement. Along the way, in a picaresque, deeply strange and often wild odyssy, he encountered scientists and gangsters, venture capitalists and con men, psychonauts and shamans.   *In this episode  - Number 100 - we follow him and wonder if, whilst big pharma is closing in and whilst psychedelics are being hailed (and monetised), can they still be countercultural, transformatory, consciousness raising?    *Can in fact they still be just .. fun?   *Andy's book TEN TRIPS *Join our cult #tripping #psychedelics #theunconscious #consciousness #truth #madness #counterculture #drug  #lsd #ayahuasca #neuroscience #consciousness

*Experimental treatment of the insane, secret tests by MI5 with volunteers thinking they were helping find a cure for the common cold, Cold War weapon research by the Ministry of defence on unsuspecting troops -  the early history of LSD in the UK was rather inauspicious.   *And then all hell - or heaven - broke loose..   *Britain's foremost psychedelic historian ANDY ROBERTS returns to the Bureau to take us on a trip through the revolutions in the head caused by Acid from the 1950s to now.   *Along the way we meet some of the characters who experimented, manufactured, dealt, swallowed and were transformed by it - as well as those who tried to stop them  - including an unlikely Breaking Bad style pharmacist in Islington, The Microdot Gang and even the Kray Twins..   *So sit back, relax, blow out the candles and kick off your sandals … (thanks The Lilac Time), tune in,  turn and ... *Andy and Albion Dreaming: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Albion-Dreaming-popular-history-Britain/dp/1905736274

* Sign up for The Bureau Newsletter to get countercultural treats https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/su/N0ZYoFu/BOLC 

* The Bureau Instagram https://www.instagram.com/bureauoflostculture/

*The Real Tuesday Weld https://www.tuesdayweld.com

Beatniks, Bootboys, Black GIs; Suedehead, Ska, Subculture; Rude Boys, Reggae, Racism; Football Hooliganism and Fashion.    Artist, film maker, writer and activist STEWART HOME comes into the Bureau to talk about Skinhead, an enduring subculture that generally gets left out of the countercultural history.   We also dip into overlapping areas of mod, punk, politics, northern soul, two tone - and doctor marten boots - as we explore the complex contradictions, roots and evolution of Skin style.   For more on Stewart Home and his work https://www.stewarthomesociety.org   For more on Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com

Tangier was a magnet for artists, writers, musicians, and political exiles throughout the mid-20th century, amongst them the writers Paul Bowles and William Burroughs   From 1924 to 1956 the city operated as an international zone under the joint administration of several European powers. This status created an environment of legal ambiguity, which, combined with the city’s strategic location at the crossroads of Africa and Europe, made it a haven for those seeking escape from the constraints of conventional society   The zone had  a sense of lawlessness and freedom, attracting a diverse mix of expatriates, spies, smugglers, and avant-garde intellectuals. The city’s permissive attitude towards drugs, homosexuality,and radical political thought made it a particularly alluring destination for members of the counterculture.   Composer and writer Paul Bowles, settled there and drew members of the Beat Generation to the city to be inspired, to complete their projects and to live the Moroccan dream. Few lived in human dialogue with the locals, operating rather as economically priveleged colonial bohemians    William Burroughs' time in Tangier in the 1950s deeply influenced his novel Naked Lunch. Burroughs saw the city as a place where the constraints of Western morality could be discarded in favor of a more experimental and uninhibited lifestyle.   He christened it THE INTERZONE   Although the Tnagier International Zone officially ceased to exist in 1956, its mythos lived on in literature, music, and the enduring image of Tangier as a place where the world’s outsiders could find a home   Multimedia artist and curator Abdelaziz Taleb, director of The Arab Media Lab Project has taken a deep dive into the Interzone - both its reality and its myth, exploring the blurred line between the two.  He came to the Bureau to talk about it, the often untold influence of Moroccans on the Beats,  and the mystery of Tangier.   For more on Aziz and the Interzone Project and Here   #counterculture, #thebeatgeneration, #thebeats, #tangier, #thetangierinternationalzone, #thetangierinterzone, #interzone, #burroughs, #bowles, #williamburroughs, #paulbowles, #heroin, #nakedlunch, #thearabmediaproject, #allenginsberg, #jakckerouac,#mohammedchakri, #bryingyson, #brianjones, #joujouka,#morocco  

 

•Cult icon, enigma, recluse, crazy diamond, he was the founding member of one of the world’s most  famous and succesful rock groups, but the life of Syd Barrett is full of unanswered questions.   •Was he a drug casualty of the sixties? Did he walk away from the pressures of the commercial music world? Did he suffer from an undiagnosed mental illness, did his muse abandon him? Was it a combination of these - or was it something more mysterious, something we can never really understand?   •'Have You Got It Yet?’, an extraordinary new film about Syd, pieces together his comet-like rise to pop stardom, his creative and destructive impulses, breakdown, his exit from Pink Floyd and his subsequent life alone, all set against the social context of the psychedelic swinging sixties. It is built around interviews with Syd’s friends, lovers, family and former band mates Roger Waters, David Gilmour, and Nick Mason. It is, as much as a tribute, a film about memory, friendship, lost youth, regret and the enduring power of music.   •Roddy Bogawa, the award winning co-director of the film and a crazy diamond in his own right, came to the Bureau to talk about 'Have You Got It Yet?’ - and to try to answer some of the questions about Syd.    •And along the way, we dig deep into London in the '60s, LA in the '70s, punk, underground films - and of course, counterculture.   •For more details on the film Have You Got It Yet •For more about Roddy *Join our cult   Thanks, as ever, to Jenny Spires for connecting us with Roddy.     #tripping #psychedelics #theunconscious #consciousness #truth #madness #counterculture #drug  #lsd #memorey  #pinkfloyd  #sydbarrett #haveyougotityet? #crazydiamond #darksideofthemoon #wishyouwerehere #shineonyoucrazydiamond #ufoclub #madcap 

ROGER BURTON started out working on a farm and ended up running a Horse Hospital. No, he’s not a vet but has spent most of his life clothing, collecting and curating the counterculture.  Along the way, he has designed shops for Vivienne Westwood and Malcolm McLaren, provided the clothes for Quadrophenia, and Absolute Beginners, dressed the New Romantics, styled 100s of pop videos and given a leg up to many fringe artists (inc. me).   We dig deep into Rebel Threads, his amazing book and collection of youth culture clothing from the 1920s - 1980s, hear about the birth of Mod, selling gear to the Kings Road boutiques of the 60s and 70s and how the actual 18th century Horse Hospital he runs has provided a venue for 27 years worth of unparalleled radical, fringe gigs, film, exhibitions and happenings in central London. And how, despite wide support across both the mainstream culture and the counterculture, it is facing closure due to the usual sad London story of property developer greed.)   For more on Roger, Rebel Threads and The Horse Hospital http://thehosrsehospital.com   For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com 

*"Punk taught us the future had only just begun” he says *For him that future was to include the bands Killing Joke, The Orb, Brilliant and The KLF; starting various record labels; hit records; producing and remixing a massive range of artists including Paul McCartney, The Verve, Tom Jones, Maria McKee, Kate Bush, Pink Floyd, Guns N' Roses, Primal Scream, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Art of Noise, Crowded House, Erasure, U2, INXS, and the Suns of Arqa- and a Grammy for his recent work with Toots and the Maytalls   *But running beneath it all is a deeply countercultural spirit.   *Uber-Music producer and druid Youth (Martin Glover)returned to the Bureau to talk about his life and times. We get deep into punk, post-punk, London as 'The City of Revelation', psychgeography, The Sacred Thames, squatting, the South London Arts Lab, druidry, turning Stonehenge off, having an epiphany, burning money, sampling other people's records, the second summer of love, the creative process, drugs - and, of course, counterculture.   Check out this playlist of just a selection of Youth's work and music.   https://music.apple.com/gb/playlist/youth-martin-glover-productor/pl.u-EzbdIa0z2vl     #psychogeography #psychedelics #theunconscious #consciousness #thepyramids #yout #counterculture #drug  #lsd #acid #martinglover #theorb #psychedelic #klf #druidry #killingjoke #occult

*He is widely recognised as one of the best comic book writers in the English language with works like From Hell, Watchmen, V for Vendetta, Killing Joke, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and Swamp Thing. He's the author of modern literary classics, including Jerusalem, a 1,266-page experimental epic novel, that have led to his legendary status and critical acclaim. *He is also an occultist, a ceremonial magician and an anarchist.   *ALAN MOORE beamed into the Bureau for a conversation about counterculture - in his own life and work, in the past, the present and in the future.   *We also dig deep into the 60s, the 70s, Thatcherism, Britpop, the power of The Arts Lab, why he doesn’t watch the adaptations of his work, the power of limitations to foster creativity and much  more.   *Alan’s storytelling course on BBC Maestro:  LONDON MONTH OF THE DEAD THE REAL TUESDAY WELD   Join us and support our wild endeavours    #alanmoore #michaelmoorcock #counterculture #artslab #london #malcolmmclaren 

Feeding the Woodstock thousands, acid, the Summer of Love, the Haight Ashbury, Timothy Leary, anti-Vietnam war protests, the problems of free love and living in communes, the Monterey pop festival, The Diggers, Wavy Gravy, Owsley, Bob and Sarah Dylan, Peter Coyote, helping Dennis Hopper though a bad trip..

In this episode we sat down again with 80 year old photographer LISA LAW in her home in Mexico to hear more extraordinary tales from the her life on the frontiers of counterculture.   We take up the tales as Lisa arrives in San Francisco in 1967, follow her behind the scenes at the Woodstock, Texas and Monterey Pop festivals, through the ups and downs of family life and motherhood whilst always taking photographs of a society in the turmoils of radical change.   Thanks to Roger Burton for the introduction to Lisa. During the episode we hear Tim Leary at 'The Human Be In' in San Francisco and the poet Adrian Mitchell reciting his poem To Whom it May Concern (Tell Me Lies about Viet Nam). For more on Lisa, her film, book and images: www.flashingonthesixties.com/ For more on the Bureau: www.bureauoflostculture.com   Images copyright Lisa Law  

#Dylan, #TheVelvetUnderground, #JanisJoplin, #TheBeatles, #OtisRedding, #PeterFonda, #DenisHopper, #TimothyLeary, #RamDass, #AllenGinsberg, KenKesey, #thehogfarm, #themerrypranksters, #wavygravy, #peterpaulandmary #haightashbury, #hippies, #psychedelicmushrooms, #lisalaw, #vietnamwar

 

How Queer Culture Shaped Pop Culture

"The 1972 version of David Bowie didn’t spring from nowhere.  Although he refused to affiliate himself explicitly with gay liberation, he had found both artistic and social inspiration in the gay world, in particular the renewed sense of freedom and possibility that rippled through the British gay subculture in the early 1970s."

We finally lured the award-winning, bestselling author, pop-culture, punk penman Jon Savage to the Bureau to talk about his life and epic new book The Secret Public: How LGBTQ Resistance Shaped Popular Culture (1955–1979)

It's an electrifying, massively entertaining - and at times, tragic - look at key moments in music history between 1955 and 1979, which helped move gay culture from the margins to the mainstream and changed the face of pop forever – from the ambiguous sexuality of stars such as Little Richard in the 1950s through to David Bowie, glam rock and Sylvester’s ‘You Make Me Feel(Mighty Real)'.

We talked about all that, about Punk, Joy Division, Tony Wilson, Johnny Marr, Factory Records and about how Jon grew up in the London of the late '50s and '60s, how he became a writer during one of the most exciting times for music journalism in the '70s and '80s - and about his own Secret Public Life..

More on the book here

More on the compilation album here

More on Jon here

#homosexuality #sex #london #queer #gayliberation #musichistory #sexuality #gay #tomrobinson #gladtobegay #queerculture #counterculture #punk #comingout #homesexuality #joydivision #theclash #sex #johnnymarr #factoryrecords #johnnymarr #faberandfaber #littlerichard #glf #gayliberationfront #bisexuality #pride #london #queer #gayliberation #lgbtq #sexuality #gay #thesecretpublic #musicpress #gaydisco #jonsavage #thesmiths #bowie

*A time when musicians were viewed as revolutionaries and revolutionaries might be considered pop culture icons   *Crate digger / rock critc / reissue producer and archivist extraordinaire Pat Thomas came to the Bureau to tell how black power intersected with counterculture and influenced folk, rock, soul and jazz in the years between 1965 and 1975.   *We hear astonishing stories from his book 'Listen, Whitey: The Sights and Sounds of Black Power’ and some amazing sounds from the accompanying album issued by Light in the Attic including tracks by John and Yoko, Dylan, The Watts Prophets and Elaine Brown.   *And we learn how the Black Power Movement, and the Black Panthers in particular, moved from militant political action to community activism whilst interacting with the wider counterculture - and, though bad things were done, how many of their adherants used a pencil, a book of poetry, a typewriter or a musical instrument to bring about change beyond violent revolution.  

#counterculture #rockagainstracism #backpanthers #blackpower #angeladavis #racism #thebeats #oakland #tomothyleary #activism #socialism #revolution #rockrevolution #eldridgecleaver #bobdylan #motown #johnandyoko #thewattsprophets 

*In this, the second of a two parter, we hear more of the crazy countercultural life and times of The Incredible String Band  - from the inside looking out  - with Rose Simpson   *Rose was one quarter of the band during what many regard as their creative and countercultural peak in the late 60s and early 70s.   •Her memoir 'Muse, Odalisque, Handmaiden' is an incredible story, relating how she rocketed (as a student without any particular interest in music or the counterculture), via an accidental meeting in a Scottish mountain cottage, to photoshoots in American Vogue and playing at Woodstock - and then came all the way back again.   *It's a fascinating tale, not just because the ISB were fascinating in themselves, but because it is beautifully told with a wealth of detail about a time that is usually dominated by mens' voices.   •She had many psychedelic adventures along the way, narrowly escaped getting involved in Scientology and then - and then left it all behind.   *And she knows where the sitars are buried...   *We dived into drugs, communal life, the ups and downs of free love, the catastrophe of the cult, making it up as you go along, the mysterious life and disappearance of Rose's bandmate Licorice, going full on and far out.   *Rose's memoir 'Muse, Odalisque, Handmaiden' (published by Strange Attractor)    *Adrian Whittaker's compilation book Be Glad for the Song Has No Ending    *Thanks to Peter Neal for the audio clips from his film Be Glad for the Song has No Ending       #tripping #psychedelics #london #consciousness #scotland #scottishcounterculture #counterculture #drug  #lsd #music  #joeboyd #1960s #scientology #rosesimpson #incrediblestringband #begladforthesonghasnoending #woodstock #stephenduffy #hippie

 

‘America’s leading scholar of High Strangeness’ Dr.Erik Davis, enters the Bureau.

We hear about Erik’s career charting the highs and lows of counterculture, esoterica and psychedelia in America and meet three of the most influential radical psychedelic characters of 1970s - the writers / thinkers / lunatics Philip K Dick, Terence McKenna and Robert Anton Wilson.

Each had extraordinary mystical experiences in the heady days of early 1970 countercultures which kickstarted an incredible outpouring of radical theories, fiction, speculations, conspiracy theories and consciousness exploration.

We hear about radical politics, drugs, strange new religions, environmentalism, cults and the darkening of the psychedelic dream as the sunny uplands of the 1960s turn into the confused melting pot of the 1970s.

For more on Erik Davis:

www.techgnosis.com

For more on Bureau Of Lost Culture

www.bureauoflostculture.com

The evolutionary leap from ape to human was precipitated by primates eating psychoactive fungi, there is an ancient shamanic lineage of psychedelic plant use in the West, mushrooms have their own consciousness, drinking Reindeer piss can get you high.. there are many myths about magic mushrooms.   Meanwhile, we are living through a kind of psychedelic renaissance: psilocybin is often in the press, hailed as a potential treatment, for depression, addiction, grief, psychosis - and a way to be more productive and well-adjusted.   What to make of it all? Has the counterculture gone mainstream? Never mind The Age of Aquarius, is this The Age of the Mushroom?   Andy Letcher is a British scholar, author, activist and musician. His work explores the intersections of psychedelics, culture, paganism and folk traditions, and 20 years ago he published 'Shroom: A Cultural History of the Magic Mushroom'.     He came to the Bureau to discuss it, how things have changed since he wrote it - and the myths behind the magic.   For more on Andy

#bureauoflostculture #magicmushroom #psilocybin #terencemckenna #psychedelic #grahamwasson #mariasabina #libertycaps #tripping #psychoactive

Multi-award winning writer, musician, editor, essayist and inventor of the multiverse, Michael Moorcock, beams into the Bureau for the first episode exploring his deeply countercultural life in literature and London   It’s an action-packed hour involving The Beats, William Burroughs, Soho, J G Ballard, Tarzan, Conan the Barbarian, anarchists, a Rolls Royce, myth, skiffle, fanzines, comics and books, books books.   We hear how a precocious teenage Michael sets out on a career that led to the writing of over a hundred books and the creation of the well-loved characters including Elric and Jerry Cornelius who inhabit them, and we hear a revelation that will surprise even die-hard Moorcock afficionados..   For more on Michael http://www.multiverse.org  

----------

Get the Bureau's Newsletter   Support our wild endeavours   The Bureau of Lost Culture Home   Go on - follow, rate and review us - or be in touch directly bureauoflostculture@gmail.com We'd love to hear from you. -------------

 

 

Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday Dizzy Gillespie, Rod Stewart, Otis Redding, Wilson Pickett, Eric Clapton, the Moody Blues, Mick Fleetwood, Pink Floyd, Georgie Fame, Ginger Baker, Long John Baldry, the Small Faces … the roll call of those who played in the Soho basement called The Flamingo is a who's who of 50s and 60s cool.    Journalist and author Pete Watts takes us on a trip through time and down the stairs of 33 Wardour Street to hear stories of one of London's most important lost and legendary venues.   We hear how the Flamingo was hugely influential on up and coming musical stars of the 60s like Pete Townsend and The Rolling Stones, how it played an influential roll in the history of black music in the city and how you can perhaps still catch its spirit in the gents’ loos of the Irish theme pub that now occupies the site..   For more on Pete Watts: the great wen   For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com 

Writer and cultural commentator Paul Gorman takes us on an exploration of the countercultural designer Barney Bubbles. It is an extraordinary story, magic and tragic by turn.   Bubbles, who, despite his effervescent alias, was so modest that he declined to have his name included on the many extraordinary album covers he designed, has rather faded from public awareness since his untimely suicide. But he remains much admired by lovers of album cover art and has influenced a growing coterie of graphic designers.    Paul, who has championed him with a biography and three exhibitions, traces his life and work from the hard boiled world of advertising and commercial graphics in the 60s, through the psychedelic West London underground scene of the early 70s, to the post punk era of Stiff Records and beyond. Along the way we hear of some of the outpourings of the cornucopia that was Bubbles’ mind, including the designs of Frendz magazine, the Hawkwind Tarot, The Specials' Ghost Town video - and those album covers..   And we hear about Paul’s own journey and, as usual, speculate on the nature of this creature called ‘counterculture’.   For more on Paul Gorman https://www.paulgormanis.com   For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com   

*In a remote village in the Ahl Srif tribal area of Northern Morocco, dwell a collective of Sufi musicians. They play a form of trance music which is used for healing.  Timothy Leary called them The 4,000-year-old Rock’N’Roll band - rather superficial hyperbole perhaps - though it is true that what The Master Musicians of Joujouka play is thousands of years old - and shares something in common with the wildest and most inspired of  rock music.   Record producer, film-maker and Beat historian Frank Rynne, who co-organises their annual festival,  came to the Bureau to tell the strange and wonderful story of the musicians of Joujouka, their culture and their interaction with the counterculture of the 50s and 60s   We hear about Tangier at the time - and the life there of Beat artists Bryon Gysin and William Burroughs with digressions into the dark side of bohemia - along with the story of doomed Rolling Stone Brian Jones who came to record the Master Musicians shortly before his death.   For more on the Master Musicians of Jojouka Get our Counterculture newsletter The Bureau of Lost Culture Home

 

#joujouka #counterculture #themastermusiciansofjoujouka #sufi #brianjones #psychedelicsound #psychedelicrock #williamburroughs #briongyson #rollingstones  #beatgeneration #thebeats

*Dylan, The Velvet Underground, Janis Joplin, The Beatles,  Otis Redding, Nico, Peter Fonda, Denis Hopper, Timothy Leary, Ram Dass, Allen Ginsberg and many, many more  - Lisa Law's images are extraordinary. But then her story is extraordinary.   *On Christmas eve, Lisa sat in her home in Yelapa, Mexico and recounted some of her countercultural life and times in this, the first of two episodes that provide an unparalleled glimpse into the music scenes of the 60s and 70s and California's blossoming counterculture.   *We hear about the American folk revival ,beatniks, bohemians, Mexican shamans and the weird and wonderful world of hippy communes in New Mexico, some of the many moments that she lived, witnessed, and recorded on the frontier of society on the brink of cultural change.   *For more on Lisa's life, images, book and documentary: www.flashingonthesixties.com/ *For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture: www.bureauoflostculture.com

 

Images copyright Lisa Law

 

#Dylan, #TheVelvetUnderground, #JanisJoplin, #TheBeatles,  #OtisRedding, #PeterFonda, #DenisHopper, #TimothyLeary, #RamDass, #AllenGinsberg, KenKesey, thehogfarm, themerrypranksters, #wavygravy, #peter,paulandmary #haightashbury, #hippies, #psychedelicmushrooms, #lisalaw

 

 

DIANA CRAWSHAW's countercultural journey took her from a small north Yorkshire town to the centre of swinging London and the glamour of St Tropez; from selling, designing and making clothes in 60s London's hippest boutiques Lord Kitchener's Valet, Mr Freedom and Paradise Garage,to reading palms at the Holland Park office of Richard Branson.   One of our most modest and delightful guests, Diana tells tales of her times with the designers that dressed the great the good and the glitterati, including David Hockney, Picasso, Rock Hudson, The Beatles, Elton John and Freddie Mercury. We hear how she set out to find herself, how she made Dennis Hopper cry and how she fixed Raquel Welch’s hot pants.   Diana reads palms at Wilde Ones in the Kings Road https://wildeones.com/tarot-readings/   Thanks to Paul Gorman http://www.paulgormanis.com  

----------

Get the Bureau's Newsletter   Support our wild endeavours   The Bureau of Lost Culture Home   Go on - follow, rate and review us - or be in touch directly bureauoflostculture@gmail.com We'd love to hear from you. -------------

 

YOUTH, producer of a huge range of artists (including Kate Bush, Crowded House, The Orb, KLF, The Verve, Guns ’n’ Roses and Primal Scream) and Jesse Goodman of the Allen Ginsberg Estate come to the Bureau to talk of the beat poet’s impact on music and the British counterculture.   We hear about Youth's 'Iron Horse' project and two albums of interpretations of Ginsberg's Fall of America poems by an astounding range of artists and we get deep into counterculture, the power of poetry, creativity and the possibility of a third summer of love.. -- Youth and Jesse will be with us in  March, when we are presenting a program of happenings to celebrate Ginsberg's London Life.   See the EVENTS page for full details. --

In May 1965, Allen  arrived in London and gave a free reading at Better Books in Charing Cross Road. It was an event described by poet-provocateur Jeff Nuttall as "the first healing wind on a very parched collective mind” and one that provided the impetus for the International Poetry Incarnation at Royal Albert Hall, a hugely significant catalyst for the first British Summer of Love.

Music featured prominently in Ginsberg’s work - both in his self-accompanied performances and live collaborations with artists including Dylan, Paul McCartney and Patti Smith - and in the inspiration it has had on the wide range of musicians who have set it to music.

Ginsberg In London Events  Youth’s Iron Horse Album Youth at The Horse Hospital March 15th The Fall of America albums  Volume 1 and Volume 2 Images courtesy of the John Hopkins Estate

 

* In 1967 and and 1968, an ordinary north London house contained an Exploding Galaxy - a psychedelic commune and carnival of theatrical performers, artists and performance poets bent on transforming the city through spontaneous happenings, countercultural interventions and street activism..   * One of them was only 15 years old. Now all grown up, JILL DROWER comes to the Bureau to talk about her time at 99 Balls Pond Road as a Galaxy member - how the whole crazy endeavour came about - and how it exploded into and out of existence   Alson the way we visit The UFO club, The 14 Hour Technicolour Dream, hear about  ‘scrudging’ , bent coppers intent on busting hippies for being hippies and the lost dream of peace, love and understanding that once might have changed everything.     * For More on The Exploding Galaxy http://www.djfood.org/category/bureau-of-lost-culture/     * For Kev's amazing psychedelic DJ FOOD archive https://djfood/org  

* The Bureau Home https://www.bureauoflostculture.com

* The Bureau Instagram https://www.instagram.com/bureauoflostculture/

* The Bureau Newsletter  https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/su/N0ZYoFu/BOLC 

 

This Episode explore three stories of cold war era radio in the USSR: Soviet Radio Jammers, the Russian ‘Woodpecker’ and the Soviet Radio Hooligans

We meet with Russian broadcaster Vladimir Raevsky to talk about radio jamming in cold war era Soviet Union.

As East and West super powers square up to each with nuclear weapons, a parallel invisible war is being fought in the airwaves.

Hundreds of millions of dollars are spent on broadcasting propaganda and music into the Soviet Union - and on attempting to block them from being heard.

Stephen tells the strange story of the ‘Russian Woodpecker’, a dystopian broadcasting station near the Chernobyl nuclear reactor and alleged attempts to brainwash the West using radar.

BBC Russian Arts correspondant Alex Kan, sits in a London cafe and tells of the brave young ‘Radio hooligans' who broadcast their own individual pirate radio shows during his youth in the USSR.

For More on the Bureau of Lost Culture:

www.bureauoflostculture.com

The Waterboys' MIKE SCOTT grew up in the '60s in Edinburgh and said: “I accepted the incredible happenings of that decade — with all its rapid evolution, colour, revelations and magic — as the normal order of things".   At the age of 4 he had his first mystical experience and remembers that from the minute he bought "Last Night in Soho" by Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich in 1968 he knew he had to live a life in music. In the years since he has toured the world with The Waterboys and as a solo artist, had hit records with The Whole of the Moon, This is the Sea and Fishermans Blues and has released 15 albums.   Mike has been unashamedly open about the importance of spirituality in his life - even when that has been deeply unfashionable in the mainstream culture.   Now, The Waterboys have a new record about to land. It features Bruce Springsteen, Steve Earle and Fiona Apple and it's a song cycle around the life of legendary actor and countercultural polymath Dennis Hopper.   Mike came to the Bureau to talk about all of that, his time at the Findhorn Foundation, Life, Death and Dennis Hopper - and much more.  For Mike and his work, music and adventures Universal Hall   Findhorn Foundation   #thewaterboys #mikescott #brucespringsteen #findhorn #findhornfoundation #steveearle #fionaapple #ladbrokegrove #thewholeofthemoon #dennishopper

Alan Moore first gained recognition in the 1980s with his work for the comic 2000 AD, and DC Comic's Swamp Thing. He went on to create Watchmen, V for Vendetta, Batman: The Killing Joke, From Hell, an extraordinary take on the Jack the Ripper story, and The League of Extraordinary Gentleman. 

He's often been at odds with publishers and with Hollywood, and in recent years has removed himself from the mainstream, focusing on writing novels, esoteric pursuits, and the practice of a particular kind of Magic. 

This is a slightly unusual episode. 

It's a recording of an event we held last October as part of our London Month of the Dead festival.  It features, Alan in conversation with the writer Gary Lachman and the artist John Coulthart. 

The occasion was the publication of 'The Bumper Book of Magic'. a kind of modern grimoire, which Alan had written with his friend the late Steve Moore (no relation), another writer of comics and fellow magic practitioner. It is a book that took 20 years to come to publication. John Coulthard was the main artist and designer of the book.

Alan is somewhat of a recluse these days so it was great to have him with us to talk about the book, about his friend Steve Moore, about his practice of Magic, and about the unconscious, dreams, consciousness and creativity.

Gary Lachman, a previous guest on this show, was once the bass player for Blondie before he put down the plectrum and picked up the pen, gave up rock'n'roll for writing, and has become the U.K.'s foremost writer on the Esoteric

John Coulthart is a wonderful graphic artist who worked with Alan on many projects and is a cultural phenomenon in his own right

We also hear from the audience with questions to Alan about his practice of magic.

Our previous episode with Alan on Counterculture

#counterculture, #alanmoore, #johncoulthard, #garylachman, #dreams, #magic, #magick, #magik, #paracelsus, #glycon, #stevemoore, #2000AD, #grimoire

 

Soho and Chelsea have always been hailed as the epicentres of swinging London.   But there was a third, and now rather forgotten place which gave birth to The Cool - a place that was the home to one of the most influential jazz clubs of the 50s before providing a launchpad for The Rolling Stones and the bourgeoning British R+B and psychedelic scenes of the 60s. It was a place that went onto to host an extraordinary roster of artists including Cream, The Yardbirds, pre-Bowie David Jones, Pink Floyd, Black Sabbath, Jimmy Page, Genesis, Yes and many, many others before morphing into a hippy commune in the 70s.   Author Andrew Humphreys comes to the Bureau to tell the strange story of Eel Pie Island - a bucolic bit of London in the middle of the river Thames - an island which for 15 years played an essential role in the history of British counterculture.   For more on Andrew and his book Raving Upon Thames http://www.paradiseroad.co.uk  

----------

Get the Bureau's Newsletter   Support our wild endeavours   The Bureau of Lost Culture Home   Go on - follow, rate and review us - or be in touch directly bureauoflostculture@gmail.com We'd love to hear from you. -------------

 

*'This is the Dawning of the Age of Aquarius' claimed the first song in the hippie musical Hair in 1967.  And perhaps it was.   *As thousands gathered at Stonehenge to welcome the summer solstice sunrise and hundred of thousands gathered at the Glastonbury festival, Ethan Doyle White came to the Bureau of Lost Culture to talk about Paganism.     *Glastonbury itself is regarded by many as a ‘pagan place’ and many of those 8000 people who gathered at Stonehenge might describe themselves as 'pagans' - part of a counterculture that has roots going back to the pre-Christian era.   *But what does Pagan mean? Where did the word come? We take a trip through pagan history and ask what do modern pagans believe, think and do? We hear about Wicca, Heathens and Druids and delve into earth mysteries, magic, the New Age and psychogeography..   *Happy Solstice Brother and Sisters   For more on Ethan and his beautiful visual history of the Pagan Get our Counterculture newsletter The Bureau of Lost Culture Home

 

#pagan #counterculture #wicca #heathen #dionfortune #psychedelicsound #witch #esoteric #thegoldendawn #aleistercrowley  #magic #pre-christian

*In the summer of 1964, a very strange vehicle was seen making its way across America. it was a school bus covered in psychedelic colours, driven by NEAL CASSADY, a beat generation character made famous in JACK KEROUAC'S beat generation classic On the Road and piloted by KEN KESEY, the best selling author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.   *The bus contained a raggle-taggle crew of crazy psychonauts calling themselves The Merry pranksters allegedly dispensing LSD in orange kool aid to all and sundry in attempt to turn on America.   *In this episode, we leave Soho to travel to the far west of the USA, to a farm in Oregon to meet KEN BABBS the last of The Merry Pranksters.   *We talk of all sorts of things - Ken Kesey, the Magic Trip and the Acid Tests of course, plus Kerouac, Ginsberg, Viet Nam, Timothy Leary, spontaneity, the good life and dreams. *And at the end we hear some very positive news about a question that I suspect is troubling many of us   *For The Bureau of Lost Culture https://www.bureauoflostculture.com    #bureauoflostculture #kenkesey #kenbabbs #tarot #themerrypranksters #kerouac #ginsberg #themagicbus #lsd  #acid #tomwolfe #counterculture #psychedelic #thegratefuldead #acidtests #nealcassady #beatgeneration   

 

Forty years ago, in the late summer of 1981, a group of women walked from Wales for over a hundred miles carrying a hand-made banner proclaiming their protest against American nuclear cruise  missiles that were to be sationed in the UK. Their march to the US military base at Greenham Common led to the establishment of a camp that, for nearly two decades, drew women from all over the world to make their voices heard in the name of peace - and inspired fellow protestors internationally Artist, activist and banner maker Thalia Cambpell one of the original marchers and founders of the camp, visits the Bureau to tell tales of dancing on nuclear silos, clashes with the authorities and the creation of vibrant protest art amongst the mud and mayhem. And we are joined by historian Charlotte Dew, author of 'Women For Peace: Banners From Greenham Common’, a book published to coincide with the 40th anniversary of the protests that presents image of the amazing banners made by Thalia and her fellows celebrating the collective power of women, women’s art and the history of peace campaigning.  For more on the book, the banners and the bomb www.fourcornersbooks.co.uk/books/women-for-peace-banners-from-greenham-common/

----------

Get the Bureau's Newsletter   Support our wild endeavours   The Bureau of Lost Culture Home   Go on - follow, rate and review us - or be in touch directly bureauoflostculture@gmail.com We'd love to hear from you. -------------

 

Britain’s own Tin Pan Alley, Denmark Street was once alive with the sound of hammered pianos, and sung melodies and choruses. Its songwriters knocked out tunes on the fly and rushed to the street to sell them to pay for the next round of drinks. In the '60s, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and The Kinks came here, so did Donovan and Jimmy Page, Eric Clapton and Elton John, Jimi Hendrix and Jeff Beck. A popular rendezvous was La Gioconda, an Italian cafe which most visited at some point or other – David Bowie was said to practically live there. Later when Malcolm McLaren was looking for a rehearsal space for The Sex Pistols, he was delighted to find room in Denmark Street, installing his upstarts in the heart of the traditional music industry - like Greek soldiers inside the Trojan Horse.    Journalist Pete Watts returns to The Bureau to tell us tales of this lost street of dreams  - and at least of one nightmare.   Pete's wonderful book on Denmark Street is HERE     #hipgnosis #pink floyd #london #pop music #london #musichistory #counterculture #soho #musicpublishing #music  #1960s #jimihendrix #thesexpistols #davidbowie #the kinks #the beatles #DenmarkStreet #tinpanalley

* From Colin Wilson to Tony Wilson, Patti Smith to Mark E Smith, what was it like coming of age in the counterculture of Manchester in the 60s, 70s and 80s?   * Johnny Marr has just released his latest record and his band's on tour with Blondie. He's worked with Billie Eilish on the Academy award winning theme for the Bond blockbuster No Time to Die and with all sorts of other artists including Hans Zimmer, Modest Mouse, The The and The Pretenders.   * He’s had chart hits with Electronic, and, oh yeah, he co-piloted one of the best loved and influential British bands of all time - The Smiths.   * We don’t really talk about that - but we do dig deep into archetypal psychology, northern peak experience, clothes, records, books, youth culture and reading the road signs along the way to your destiny..   * Image credit: Andy Cotterill   * For More on Johnny: https://johnnymarr.com  

* The Bureau Home https://www.bureauoflostculture.com

* The Bureau Instagram https://www.instagram.com/bureauoflostculture/

* The Bureau Newsletter  https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/su/N0ZYoFu/BOLC 

Chick.Trip.Dope, Pad. Heavy. Cool. Scene. Man. Beat. Freak. Weed. Bang. Square. Blast. Cat. Gas!   In an action packed episode, we spend a Soho afternoon with 'Mr Slang’ Jonathon Green discussing his amazing life in the counterculture, writing for Rolling Stone and the underground magazines including IT, OZ and Friends.    Then we dig deep into his ground breaking catalogue of the counterculture: ‘Days in the Life: Voices from the English Underground' with its interviews of over a hundred figures involved in the counterculture including Paul McCartney, Barry Miles and Jenny Fabian.   And, as Jonathon is our foremost lexicographer of slang, he takes us on wander into the weird and wonderful world of countercultural language, exploring where all those hippie and beatnik words came from and discovering why ‘Fuck' is not in fact a swear word.   For more on Jonathon’s books http://jonathongreen.co.uk   For more on Jonathon’s Slang Dictionaries https://greensdictofslang.com   For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com   

Gary Lachman, the original bass player of Blondie (as Gary Valentine), returns to the Bureau to tell of his time in the New York underground music scene of the 1970s.   Now the UK’s foremost writer on the esoteric, with 24 books under his belt including works on Aleister, Crowley, Jung, Gurdjieff, Magick and the occult, Gary was once deep in the heart of New York's 'Blank Generation'.   We hear about living with Debbie Harry and Chris Stein in a loft on The Bowery, playing CBGB and Gotham's underground clubs, hanging with The Ramones and Patti Smith, touring with Television and Iggy Pop and living the countercultural life on the Lower East side in the years before and beyond new wave.   For more on Gary www.garylachman.co.uk  

----------

Get the Bureau's Newsletter   Support our wild endeavours   The Bureau of Lost Culture Home   Go on - follow, rate and review us - or be in touch directly bureauoflostculture@gmail.com We'd love to hear from you. -------------

 

Journalist Tom O Neill, author of 'Chaos: Charles Manson, the CIA and the Secret History of the Sixties’, joins us to reveal the truths, untruths, secrets and conspiracies behind the most famous crime of the 60s.   The Tate-Labianca murders and the subsequent trial of 'The Manson Family' were among the events that marked the turning of the countercultural tide and the darkening of the hippy dream.   Tom tells how a straightforward 1999 magazine commission to write an anniversary piece on the murders turned into a 20 year investigative odyssey that revealed a devastating story of corruption, deception, lying and abuse - and that was just from the authorities.   Was Manson a CIA asset gone rogue? We are not fans of conspiracy theories but Tom's research reveals an extraordinary and deeply worrying web involving the CIA, the Beach Boys, LSD, hypnotism, doctors, psychologists and bent lawyers.   For more on Tom and the book: https://www.littlebrown.com/titles/tom-oneill/chaos/9780316477574/   For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com    

Jon More, one half of cut-and-paste collage kings Coldcut and co-founder with Matt Black of Ninja Tune record label, joins turntablist, crate digger Strictly Kev of  DJ Food as we dig deep into the wild and wonky world of sampling - the borrowing, plundering, adapting and re-imagining of existing audio, songs and sounds to create new audio, songs and sounds.   Sampling  might have started off as a countercultural underground cut-and-paste technique used by experimental artists but it ended up powering a huge amount of hip-hop tunes and some very big hit records.   We hear some of Jon and Kev's favourite sampling selections, learn about the creative use of the tape recorder pause button, and delve into sound art, musique concrète and pop cultural pick-pocketing down the ages.   For more on Jon and Coldcut http://coldcut.net   For more on DJ Food / Strictly Kev https://www.djfood.org  

----------

Get the Bureau's Newsletter   Support our wild endeavours   The Bureau of Lost Culture Home   Go on - follow, rate and review us - or be in touch directly bureauoflostculture@gmail.com We'd love to hear from you. -------------

 

 

*From heroin to Hollywood,  Here is the second part of our conversation with the writer, countercultural activist, Zen priest and erstwhile movie star PETER COYOTE at his farm in Sebastopol California.    *Last time, we left him isolated and lost in the throes of drug addiction as the countercultural dream had started to turn sour. Now we pick up the story in the American communes of the early 70s, hear how he transitioned to become a successful actor appearing in over 160 films, and dig deep into counterculture, creativity, charisma, drugs, buddhism, how he navigated Hollywood Babylon.   *And Peter gives some amazing advice for actors, artists  - and for all of us   With thanks to Jenny Spires.   Join the Bureau of Lost Culture for countercultural news, stories and special events http://www.bureauoflostculture.com   For more on Peter and his work http://www.petercoyote.com #counterculture #thediggers #petercoyote #psychedelic #mescaline #peyote #haightashbury #freefamil #london #hellsangels #kenkesey #zen #america #heroin #drugaddiction 

The People's Republic of Frestonia, a countercultural micronation, was formed in three streets in North Kensington in the heady years of late seventies London.   *Long before the Occupy movement, a group of squatters, radicals, artists and activists decided to fight back against a local authority bent on evicting them from their homes and declared the area independent of the UK. Drawing huge media interest, some derision and lot of goodwill, they had their own passports, stamps and theatre and even applied to join the United Nations.   One of them, the psychotherapist Josefine Speyer, Frestonia's minister of Culture, comes to visit the Bureau for an hour or so to tell us what it was all about - and all about the countercultural journey she made to live there from her youth in Germany. We hear of communes in Berlin and Scotland, travelling in a gypsy caravan in Wales, home births and hash cookies in a cow shed and of some of the many alternative projects initiated by her radical activist husband Nicholas Albery.   *And we learn how they came to found the Natural Death Centre, blowing the lid on the secretive cabal that controlled the funeral industry and returning death and dying back to where it belongs - with the people..   For more about Frestonia:  http://www.frestonia.org A list of Micronations: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_micronations For the Natural Death Centre: http://www.naturaldeath.org.uk More on Josefine:  https://deathcafe.com/profile/25/    

*Niels Bohr discovered the structure of the atom in a dream, Coleridge wrote Kubla Khan after a dream, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein was inspired by a dream, Hergé ’s 'Tintin in Tibet' - the first of many Tintin stories - the same. *Keith Richards claimed to have dreamed the riff to 'Satisfaction', Paul McCartney the melody to 'Yesterday’ - the most covered pop song in history. Hell, even Aphex Twin says that 70% of his album 'Selected Ambient Works Volume II' was written whilst lucid dreaming *This episode is all about The Dreaming - and our guide is one of the UK’s foremost dream researchers: SARAH JANES. *We talk about dreaming as countercultural consciousness, lucid dreaming, dreams and psychedelics, neuroscience, dreams as creative inspiration, the imagination, sleep cycles, REM, memories in dreams, alchemy, wet dreams, the dream space as the underworld - and dreaming as preparation for the afterlife. *Sarah gives some great tips on how to become a lucid dreamer, tells us about her work - and drops a couple of mind bombs on us. *For more on Sarah and her amazing work   #dreaming #psychedelics #theunconscious #consciousness #truth #madness #counterculture #sleep #luciddreaming #dreams #neuroscience #consciousness 

A Zelig, a holy fool, a trickster, a black magician, a sociopath, a charlatan, a genius, a fabulist, a junkie, an alcoholic, a secret agent, a police informer, a disruptor, an often loveable preacher of Love who didn't actually seem to know what it meant? LSD evangelist Michael Hollingshead might or might not have been all of these, but he was certainly a father.  What is it like to be the child of such a person? Comedian Vanessa Hollingshead and writer Jeannie Hilton tell the dark and intense story of Vanessa’s tumultuous life with Michael, the working class Englishman who, according to his own claim, 'turned on the world' - or at least, many of those who did - including Timothy Leary and The Beatles - and who, like many who have advocated universal love and cosmic enlightenment, led a tragic and toxic personal life.

It's a wild and crazy trip, at times funny, at times disturbing. Be warned!

To find out more about The Divine Rascal film project www.thedivinerascal.com

----------

Get the Bureau's Newsletter   Support our wild endeavours   The Bureau of Lost Culture Home   Go on - follow, rate and review us - or be in touch directly bureauoflostculture@gmail.com We'd love to hear from you. -------------

 

Peter Whitehead was an innovative English writer and filmmaker who documented the counterculture in London and New York in the late 1960s.   His film Wholly Communion captured The International Poetry Incarnation, a groundbreaking event at The Royal Albert Hall in 1965 that was to prove pivotal in the evolution of the underground  scene. The film featured poetry readings by Beat poets including Allen Ginsberg, Michael Horovitz, Adrian Mitchell and Lawrence Ferlinghetti and established Whitehead as the London counterculture’s 'Man With a Movie Camera’.   Film event producer Marek Pytel walks us through Whtehead's life and work including the iconic 'Tonite Let's All Make Love in London’ documentary that helped define the "swinging London" scene of the sixties with psychedelic performances and interviewees including Pink Floyd, John Lennon, Yoko Ono, Mick Jagger, Vanessa Redgrave, Lee Marvin, Julie Christie, Allen Ginsberg, Eric Burdon, Michael Caine and many others.   We hear how Whitehead went onto film with The Rolling Stones and Jimi Hendrix and to make provocative work about the countercultural protest movement in late 60s New York before making an extraordinary career swerve.   For More on Marek Pytel's work see www.realityfilm.co.uk   For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com  

*Angels in London *You've probably seen him in a film - he’s performed in more than 130 as an actor for some of the world’s greatest directors including Roman Polanski, Pedro Almodovar, Steven Spielberg and Steven Soderberg, or maybe you have heard his voice - he's an Emmy Award-winning narrator of over 200 documentaries. *He is a writer, a poet, an ordained Buddhist priest who has been practicing Zen for over 50 years.  *But that's not the half of it - as we find out in this, the first of two episodes charting the extraordinary life of PETER COYOTE.   *We did deep into the American counterculture, Hells Angels in London, heroin addiction, radical theatre groups, The Diggers, the Free Family, the birth of the communes, mescaline and how the atom bomb created rock and roll.   *AND Peter reads some of his poems from his collection 'The Tongue of a Crow'   *With thanks and appreciation  to Jenny Spires for connecting us.   Join the Bureau of Lost Culture for countercultural news, stories and special events http://www.bureauoflostculture.com   For more on Peter and his work http://www.petercoyote.com   #counterculture #thediggers #petercoyote #psychedelic #mescaline #peyote #haightashbury #freefamil #london #hellsangels #kenkesey #zen #america

The story of SYD BARRETT, the doomed original founder of Pink Floyd has fascinated, obsessed and mystified generations of fans for decades.   The tragic trajectory of the psychedelic poster boy who had it all and ’lost it’ has all the hallmarks of an icarus myth. Yet, as our guest writer ROB CHAPMAN tells us, the myth has totally eclipsed the man, the legend obscured the legacy.  Rob's 2010 biography ‘A Very Irregular Head’ - the first to be authorised by Syd's family - set out to right the balance, to tell the human truths about a tragic but talented artist.   Rob joins us to talk about the new book he has edited: ‘The Lyrics of Syd Barrett’ (Omnibus Press) that gives a wonderful insight into the mind and art of someone who was yes, a crazy diamond but also a countercultural experimenter, an innovator and a psychedelic poet.   Along the way we did into the meaning of counterculture and fandom and hear about a newly resurrected poem of Syd's   For more on Rob Chapman http://www.rob-chapman.com/pages/profile.html   For the official Syd Barrett site http://www.sydbarrett.com    

*Julie Taylor was a police officer who gave her name to  'OPERATION JULIE', the biggest drug bust in UK history and one which resulted in the conviction of over a hundred individuals involved in the trafficking of LSD, including some of the most prolific chemists of the era.   *Christine Bott was a practising doctor living a classic 1970s rural countercultural life in mid Wales, growing organic vegetable, rearing goats and ministering to the local community. She also happened to be part of the biggest LSD manufacturing gang in UK history, an activity that led to her arrest under the Operation Julie bust and imprisonment amongst 'the 36 most dangerous women in Britain' - including the child murderer Myra Hindley.   *Whilst much has been made of Operation Julie in articles, books and even a musical in recent years, Christine's story, like many of those of women in the counterculture, has been largely sidelined - until now.     *Before she died, her friend KATE HAYES promised her that she would tell it - and she has kept that promise by publishing two books: 'The Untold Story of Christine Bott' and 'After Julie: The Kemp Tapes', the latter a record of the only interviews with Christine's partner Richard Kemp, the chemist who invented 'The Microdot' (generally recorded as the best LSD in Christendom.   *Both were driven by a desire to change the world for the better, to save the planet and, however naive their actions may have been, they held to that vision and paid the price for it.   *Kate came to the Bureau to tell us how it all came about and how Christine survived - and even thrived - despite the darkness of prison.   Its truly gripping stuff.   For more on Kate and the books   #tripping #psychedelics #theunconscious #consciousness #operationjulie #christinebott #counterculture #drug  #lsd #acid #richardkemp #myrahindley #psychedelic #microdot #tripping #druglaw #timleary 

They helped inspire a whole generation of young ravers and lit the fuse for what was to blow up with Technival and Burning Man - as well as more mainstream festivals across Europe and the US - but their (counter)cultural contribution remains largely unacknowledged in their home country.   Marc Angelo Harrison, one of the orginal founders of the people’s sound system, techno, free party, DJ collective Spiral Tribe came to the Bureau to tell some of their story - and about his own journey up and down the spiral. His book A Darker Electricty published by uber-cool electronic music publisher Velocity Press is a rollocking, rumbuctious, beautifully written testament to a deeply countercultural spirit and time.    We dive deep into the free party scene of the early 90s and talk squatting, sound systems, Ladbroke Grove, doing things for free, police brutality, the 'new age’ travellers, the tragedy of Castle Morton, ongoing inspiration, community - and the power of bass..   A Darker Electricity- Mark's book A Darker Electricity- The Audio book Free Party: A Folk History - Aaron Trinder’s wonderful documentary of the last 80s and early 90s free festival scene   #festivals #counterculture #freefestivals #spiraltribe #squatparty #travellers #newagetravellers #battleofthebeanfield #hippie #castlemorton #techno #drugs #lsd #soundsystem #raveculture #raves #breakbeat #stonehenge 

“Ima­gin­a­tion thrives in dark­ness” 

We talk about The Undergound often at the Bureau - not London’s subterranean rail sytem, but the countercultural alternative society of the 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s.

But that is just one of the undergrounds - the underworlds - that are the subject of this episode Dizzying ossuaries, freakish creatures of the deep sea, astounding colors of agates, lava and crystals,  mind bending organic structures of mycorrhizal fungi, caverns, crevices, burrows,  bunkers, burial chambers, ghistly shipwrecks, religous hellscapes and surrealist dreamscapes, natural and constructed subterranean realms and the imagined and unconscious worlds of dreams and the human psyche.

Image Alchemist Stephen Ellcock came to take us on a deep dive journey down under with his truly astonishing, visually stunning guide book Underworlds, a volume in five sections covering both the real and the imaginary, moving between continents and time periods and disciplines such as philosophy, biology, art history and literature.   We talk of how the actual physical world beneath us has fed our fears, visions and imagination – and conversely, provoked us to imagine a mythic, esoteric, mysterious underground - the afterworld of the dead, of the fairies and of the psychogical unconscious.   For more on Stephen and his amazing work  

Scar-faced, ex-jailbird Frank Norman was part of the '50s and '60s Soho bohemian set and friends with Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, Dylan Thomas and other habitues of the infamous Colony Room club.   After being abandoned as a child, growing up in institutions, and working as a fairground worker, he landed in Soho, became a petty criminal and spent time in prison where he learned to paint and write.   Back in Soho on leaving jail, astonishingly he became a succesful author, writer of the smash hit cockney musical 'Fings Aint What They Used To Be’, the acclaimed prison memoir Bang to Rights, and several novels - but never painted again.   In the early '60s he penned 'Soho Night and Day', a evocative survey of the area in its seedy, cosmopolitan prime, with photographs by his pal Jeffrey Bernard (later to become the most famous alcoholic in London).   Frank's grandson, Joe Daniel, came to talk  Bureau to talk about him and about the bohemian low-life of Soho in the '50s and '60s.   If you are listening to this in early 2025, and can be in London, we have curated an exhibtion in Soho of Frank's never before shown prison paintings: See BEHIND BARS- Frank Norman’s Prison Paintings  for details   The republished wonderful Frank Norman and Jeffrey Bernard book Soho Night and Day   #soho #london #bohemian #colonyclub #colonyroom #Lucien Freud, #FrancisBacon #DylanThomas #FrankNorman #JeffreyBernard #murielbelcher #outsiderart    

Cold War Spy meets The Fab Four in the USSR   When Leslie Woodhead was asked by Granada TV to film a new young music group in a club in Liverpool in 1962, he had no idea what he was in for - and neither had the rest of the world. He was witnessing the birth of a phenomenon that was about to have a huge impact on both the culture and the counterculture. But by then he had already had another extraordinary experience - serving a stint as a cold war spy, learning Russian on a remote Scottish pig farm and spending time eavesdropping on Soviet pilots from West Berlin.   These experiences continued to influence his life as a multi-award winning film maker, finally coalescing in his documentary ‘How the Beatles Rocked the Kremlin’.   In this episode, we trace the almost unbelievable transformational effect the Fab Four had on young Russians in the 60s and 70s - an effect that many believed was more significant than all the cold war western propaganda and the threat of nuclear attack combined, in helping to bring about perestroika and the fall of the Soviet empire.    For more on Leslie and his work https://www.lesliewoodhead.com   For more on Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com

She worked as a go-go dancer, stripper and glamour model. She's been a performance artist of masochistic tangos and twisted mambos, a ballroom dance teacher, a street arts choreographer and a punk-rock drummer. She worked with Throbbing Gristle, Genesis P Orridge, Monte Cazzaza, and Derek Jarman.   *And she was there at the formation of Adam and the Ants and the Monochrome Set.   *Dorothy Max Prior joins us to talk about her wonderful book '69 Exhibition Road Twelve True-Life Tales from the Fag End of Punk, Porn & Performance’ published by Strange Attractor Press. *We hear about gay London in the 70s,  the derelict city, bedsit land, fetish wear, rubber miniskirts, Westwood and Mclaren, The Sex Pistols, The Clash, The Roxy, The Monochrome Set, her own band Rema Rema and of course Stuart Leslie Goddard, better known as Adam Ant..   *For more on Max’s book:  http://strangeattractor.co.uk/shoppe/69-exhibition-road/ The Bureau of Lost Culture: https://www.bureauoflostculture.com   #counterculture #punk #thesexpistols #theclash #remarema #theroxyclub #dorothymaxprior #adamant #adamandtheants #themonochromeset #london

*Under the counter-culture..   *They were handmade illegal obscene books, a little like early punk zines, typewritten mimeographed manuscripts with two or three pornographic stories or a novella.   *Many contained drawings or photographs and were sold in post-war London and provincial second hand bookshops  Thousands were produced, but only a small proportion survive today.     *Titles like Orgy Twins, Lust and Agony in Double Domination Nunnery Versus Fuckery or Discipline in the Home gave a sense of the contents to eager suburban punters wanting their share of the sexual revolution.   *Archaelogist and curator of forgotten, neglected, stigmatised or hidden phenomena, Dr. HELEN WICKSTEAD, who has written first major study of The Soho Typescripts (or The Soho Bibles as they have become known), takes us through the door and under the counter to take a peep through the curtain at a lost world of smut, desire and money. *And we talk about Mickey Mouse having sex, the secret room of The British Museum, the private case of The British Library, a prehistoric phallus, erotic fish, police corruption, The Obscene Publications Act, Holywelll Street -  and pornography as counterculture..   *For more of Helen *Let us know where you are at(short survey about You) *Join Us   #counterculture #pornography  #porn #sohobibles #sohotranscripts #soho #sohohistory #londonhistory #zines #sex  *Images courtesy of Helen Wickstead /Dave Notaro   

What was it like to live in a commune? What was it like to grow up in a commune?

NANCY THOMPSON came to the Bureau to tell us. She was born in The Shrubb Family Commune - one that was set up in a big old farmhouse in rural Norfolk in 1970 - and, remarkably, one that is still going today.

In the early to mid '60s many Western cities were magnets drawing the young and hip in from the regions, shaking off the austerity of the '50s, joining their urban peers in experimenting with new and radical ways of loving and living. Communes and squats sprung up all over places like London.

But as the '60s drew to a close, there was a reverse movement and many left the cities heading back out into the shires to try to build a new kind of sociey in the quieter, slower life of village and market town.  Some settled in North Suffolk and South Norfolk, an open countryside of low hills and wide plains with few towns and many villages where a commune movement had been established from 1965.

Nancy's is a complex, tumultous tale  - at times a rather bewildering tapestry of overlapping relationships and familes, the British class system, rural life, travellers, gypsies and the gentry, encounter groups, blackmail, rogue psychiatrists, lsd - and horses..

-------------

*For more on Nancy and her childhood in the commune, check out her Substack HERE

*For more on the British commune and intentional community culture of the 60s and 70s see below

The countercultural movement of the 1960s and 1970s in Britain gave rise to a surge of communal living experiments known as hippy communes or intentional communities. These collectives emerged as an alternative to mainstream society, rejecting consumerism, conventionality, and materialism in favor of a more liberated, eco-friendly, and cooperative way of life.

The origins of this communal living trend can be traced back to the mid 60s, when a confluence of social, political, and cultural factors created an environment ripe for such experiments. The rise of the hippie counterculture, and the burgeoning environmental and back-to-the-land movements all contributed to the growth of communal living arrangements.

One of the earliest and most influential British hippy communes was Findhorn in Scotland, established in 1962 by Peter and Eileen Caddy and Dorothy Maclean. Originally a small caravan park, Findhorn evolved into a thriving spiritual community centered around principles of sustainability, meditation, and harmony with nature. Its success inspired many other like-minded groups to establish their own communes across Britain.

As the movement gained momentum in the late 1960s, a wave of new communes emerged, each with its own unique philosophy and approach to communal living. Some, like The Diggers in Cornwall and the Laurieston Hall community in Scotland, focused on self-sufficiency through organic farming and sustainable living practices. Others, like the Freestone community in Essex and the Newbold Trust in Worcestershire, emphasized artistic expression, alternative spirituality, and personal growth.

Many of these communes adopted a back-to-the-land ethos, seeking to reconnect with nature and escape the constraints of urban living. They often established themselves in rural areas, repurposing abandoned farmhouses, old mills, or purchasing inexpensive land to build their communities from scratch. This allowed them to embrace a more self-reliant and environmentally conscious lifestyle, growing their own food, generating their own energy, and living off the land as much as possible.

While each commune had its own unique character and rules, they shared several common principles. Communal living, non-hierarchical decision-making processes, shared resources and responsibilities, and a commitment to peace and environmentalism were hallmarks of these communities. Many also embraced alternative lifestyles, such as polyamory, nudism, or open relationships, challenging traditional societal norms.

As the 1970s progressed, the hippy commune movement faced various challenges, including internal conflicts, financial struggles, and external criticism from more conservative segments of society. Some communes disbanded or evolved into more structured communities, while others managed to endure and adapt to changing times.

One notable example of a long-lasting commune is Braziers Park in Oxfordshire, founded in 1950 and still active today. While not initially a traditional hippy commune, it embraced many of the same principles in the 1960s and 1970s, becoming a hub for alternative living, education, and environmental activism.

Another enduring community is the Findhorn Foundation, which has grown from its humble beginnings into a thriving eco-village and spiritual center, attracting visitors and residents from around the world.

Beyond the more well-known communes, countless smaller collectives and intentional communities also emerged during this period, often existing independently or flying under the radar. These included urban squatting communities, housing co-operatives, and alternative living arrangements that embraced the communal ethos without necessarily adopting the full-fledged "hippy" lifestyle.

These communities served as laboratories for experimentation, pushing the boundaries of what was considered acceptable or possible, and leaving an enduring legacy that continues to influence various aspects of modern life.

 

Many of the principles and practices pioneered by these communities, such as sustainable living, cooperative decision-making, and alternative education, have been adopted and adapted by various organizations and movements.

The communal living ethos has remained alive, albeit on a smaller scale, with contemporary intentional communities and eco-villages continuing to explore alternative ways of living and coexisting with nature.

#communes #counterculture #findhorn #findhornfoundation #utopia #alternativecommunities #intentionalcommunities #esoteric #hippie #shrubbfamily #globaltruckingcompany #drugs #lsd #psychiatry

 

*In 1969, the poet, Beat generation godfather, countercultural guru and political activist ALLEN GINSBERG bought a farm in upstate New York to provide a creative hub and rehab refuge for his friends - a collection of poets, artists, washed-up drunks, strung-out junkies, ne’er do wells and exhausted underground figures, all reeling after the intensity of the 60s.   *One, his lifelong friend and biographer Barry Miles, chronicler of the counterculture, returns to the Bureau to tell of a bucolic summer he spent with Ginsberg and an assortment of crazy characters on the farm, archiving the poet's vast collection of tape recordings.   *We also visit The Chelsea Hotel and meet some the equally crazy characters who lived and loved there in 1970s Manhattan including Janis Joplin, Arthur Miller and Leonard Cohen - and along the way we discuss The Beats, Buddhism, Burroughs - and beards.     *Thanks to Stephen Cleary and The British Library Sound Archive for providing the recordings of Allen and to Peter Hale of The Ginsberg Estate for permission to use them.   *For More on Miles: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Miles *The Allen Ginsberg Project: https://allenginsberg.org

*Sign up for The Bureau Newsletter: https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/su/N0ZYoFu/BOLC 

* The Bureau Instagram https://www.instagram.com/bureauoflostculture/

*The British Library Sound Archive: https://sounds.bl.uk   #ginsberg #kerouac #williamburroughs #beatpoets #beatgeneration #counterculture  

*As the 60s turned into the 70s, and as some of the technicolour idealistic visions of the first summer of love started to fade, many of the denizens of those decades began to seek Utopia outside the cities of America and Europe. *Communes and communities sprang up in rural areas as spiritual seekers, hopeful hippies, fugitives, folkies, freaks and wild wanderers on the seas of fate tried to create new societies, living by their own values - often away from the watchful eye of the authorities.   *After experiencing a personal catastrophe, musician and writer DAVID BRAMWELL set off in search of salvation by exploring some of the alternative and intentional communities where folk are still trying to build utopia. He came across all sort of strange things and people along the way in an odyssey that took in a 1950s caravan on the northern shores of Scotland, a dominatrix community in the Czech republic and a time machine hidden in a vast underground temple in Italy.   *And he came in to the Bureau of Lost Culture to tell us all about it…   *Check out David's book 'The No. 9 Bus to Utopia', other writings, radio and countercultural projects.   *Get our Counterculture newsletter   *The Bureau of Lost Culture Home   #damanhur #counterculture #findhorn #findhornfoundation #utopia #alternativecommunities #intentionalcommunities #esoteric #hippie #commune #esalen #christiania #pan #devas #cosmic #sohoradio

Bird markets, sacred springs, border crossings, silk weavers, street drummers, games with headless goats, anti-aircraft rockets, courtyard songs and refugee choirs..   Documentary maker Monica Whitlock returns to the Bureau to paint an evocative sonic picture of the people and places she encountered whilst working in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Afghanistan as the BBC’s foreign correspondent for Central Asia.   We hear some of the extraordinary archive of field recordings, conversations and music she collected whilst living and travelling in Tashkent, Samarkand and Andujan and while crossing the borders between a family of ancient states. And we learn something of these regions with their deep rooted tribal loyalties as they were being reborn and reformed in the ruins of the Soviet empire.   For more on Monica: http://www.story-scapes.com  

----------

Get the Bureau's Newsletter   Support our wild endeavours   The Bureau of Lost Culture Home   Go on - follow, rate and review us - or be in touch directly bureauoflostculture@gmail.com We'd love to hear from you. -------------

 

 

*"Teenage savages go wild in a jungle of lust and lawlessness!"   *Countercultural commentator and writer JOHN HIGGS comes to the Bureau. We head out into the feverish febrile pheromone filled phase of self consciousness, sex drugs and rock’n’roll known as adolescence as we investigate the birth of the teenage in the late 40s and 50s.     *Was it all really kicked off by Little Richard’s Tutti Frutti?       *We chart the rise of youth culture on both sides of the Iron Curtain and debate that while ‘all you need is love’, ‘you can’t always get what you want’ as we trace counterculture through beats, mods, hippies, punks, ravers, grunge and britpop, touch down briefly on gender politics and the death of Kurt Cobain and wonder if 70 will one day be the new seventeen.   For more on John https://johnhiggs.com   The Bureau of Lost Culture https://www.bureauoflostculture.com #counterculture #littlerichard #teenage #rockandroll #kurtcobain #beatles #rollingstones #hippie 

*Every society is a high society.  Getting high has been a pursuit of civilisations throughout time.   *Every day, people drink coffee in European cafes, chew betel nut in Indonesian markets, nibble coca leaf on Andean mountainsides and smoke tobacco in every nation on earth.   *Mind-altering drugs have been part of virtually every human culture that has ever existed - from prehistory to the present day. They have shaped cultures, kick-started global trade, transformed our understanding of the mind, built empires and threatened the fabric of society.   *Cultural historian and writer on the psychoactive Mike Jay returned to the Bureau to tell us why   For more on Mike and his book High Society

 

#drugs #drugwar #opiumwars #psychoactive #opium #heroin #mescaline #lsd #cocaine #khat #betel #psychedelics #highsociety #gettinghigh #addiction #cartels 

*You couldn’t turn up at at any self respecting psychedelic hangout, countercultural club, happening, be-in or even disco in the late sixties and seventies without being immersed in the cosmic cloud of swirling dreamy liquid images, shapes and colours of the light shows illuminating and enhancing the music.   *Our counterculural companion in arms, Kevin Foakes, DJ Food, turntablist, graphic designer-par-excellence -  and now author - returns to the Bureau to talk about his wonderful new book 'Wheels of Light’, published by Four Corners Books - a visual voyage through the history of British light show from 1970 to 1990,  and a gorgeous multi-coloured sensory experience in itself, bursting with amazing images and art.   *If we took a trip in a time machine we might find them a little primitive given the multi media hi-tech laser extravaganzas we've got used to, but back in the days of love, the psychedelic light shows were genuinely revolutionary, mind bending, consciousness enhancing and state altering - particularly if augmented by a large dose of LSD.   *We hear about lighting up the UFO club, Pink Floyd and Soft Machine and we are joined by Neil Rice, co-founder of Optikinetics, one of the main suppliers of the projectors and gizmos that created the psychedelic light shows of the 60s and 70s - and by Jennie Caldwell, practicing light jockey for many bands in the subsequent summers of love of the 80s and 90s, including those cosmic warriors on the edge of time, Hawkwind.   *For More on Kev / DJ Food:  https://www.djfood.org *For Kev’s 'Wheels of Light’ book: https://www.fourcornersbooks.co.uk/books/wheels-of-light/ *The Bureau of Lost Culture: https://www.bureauoflostculture.com #lightshow #hawkwind #pinkfloyd #sydbarret #UFOclub #softmachine #psychedelic #lsd #ravescene #summeroflove #tripping

 

Writer, film maker, poet, flaneur, metropolitan shaman, curator of lost cultures, beat aficionado, and underground poet Iain Sinclair takes us on a walk through his life in the counterculture.    We have brief encounters with Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, Alan Moore, Michael Moorcock, Peter Ackroyd, J.G.Ballard and Nicholas Hawksmoor as we hear tales of the poetry underground, life working as a Hackney council gardener, blacklegging in the London docks, cigars in Clerkenwell, an epic ancestral journey from Leadenhall Market to Peru, DIY-publishing, writing, writing, writing, and of course The City, as we circle towards hearing Iain reading selections from Lud Heat, the epic 1975 piece that was destined to become the root text of London psychogeography.   For more on on Iain and his work: www.iainsinclair.org.uk  

----------

Get the Bureau's Newsletter   Support our wild endeavours   The Bureau of Lost Culture Home   Go on - follow, rate and review us - or be in touch directly bureauoflostculture@gmail.com We'd love to hear from you. -------------

 

*In 1918, Billie Carleton, a West End actress, came off stage, went partying with friends, returned to her flat and was found dead the next morning - apparently of a cocaine overdose. A few years later, Frieda Kimpton, a dancer in Soho bars, committed suicide - with cocaine.   These events blew up into a huge media dope drama - with a cast of characters includes villians - Brilliant Chang, a Chinese restaurant proprietor and Edgar Manning, a black jazz drummer  -  and victims, Billie, Frieda and the other 'Dope Girls'.    *Around them, in the Soho streets off Shaftesbury Avenue, there swirled a raffish group of seedy and entitled hedonists. Britain was horrified and fascinated, and so the drug underground and the moral panic about it, was born amid a gush of exotic tabloid detail.   *MAREK KOHN whose newly revised cult classic Dope Girls has inspired an upcoming BBC TV series, came to the Bureau to tell us how the  panic about drugs that kicked off on the 1920s (bringing in drug laws that are still with us today), was more about the fear of newly emancipated women in society and an imagined menace of foreigners bound on enslaving them, than about any damage done by the drugs themselves.   *More about Dope Girls HERE *More about Marek HERE *More about the upcoming BBC series Dope Girl   #drugs #psychedelics #cocaine #opium #morphine #druglaws #counterculture #drugculture  #drugunderground #soho #overdose #dopegirls #dope #drugunderground 

*In the swinging 1960s, after nearly a century of colonisation, Cambodia was ready to rock. Young musicians from the countryside flocked to the vibrant cosmopolitan capital city of Phnom Penh. The city was a melting pot of sound: old fashioned rock’n’roll, early heavy metal, crooners and swooners and love duets.    *Then on 17th April 1975, the music stopped. the Khmer Rouge captured Phnom Penh and began a genocide. Around 90% of the musicians died in the killing fields.  

*DEE PEYOK joins us to talk about 'Away From Beloved Lover'(Granta), her extraordinary book detailing the lost world of amazing music that flourished between 1955 and 1970 in Cambodia.  

*And we hear of Dee’s own journey - an extraordinary odyssey into the heart of darkness -  and light -  in search of this lost world.

For more on Away From Beloved Lover: https://granta.com/products/away-from-beloved-lover/

For The Bureau of Lost Culture: www.bureauoflostculture.com

#Cambodia #KhmerRouge, #Sinsisamouth, #DeePayok, #PhnomPenh, #killingfields, #surfrock, #censorship, #Cambodiarocks, #Vietcong,  #genocide #vietnamwar

 

Being the further adventures of English musician broadcaster and LGTBQ activist TOM ROBINSON, as he gets deeply involved in the gay counterculture of London in the '70s whilst on his journey to having a huge hit with the song 2-4-6-8 Motorway We hear about the genesis of another hit - (Sing if You're)Glad to Be Gay - a remarkable, unprecedented protest song that climbed into public consciousness in the late 70s (despite the best efforts of some in the establshment), and about Tom's later hit War Baby.

We talk about the desperate times in between, about his activism - not only for the queer commmuity but as part of the Rock Against Racism movement - and how he had to face one his greatest challenges in coming out for a second time, risking the disapproval of the very community he had fought for for many years…

  And we learn about Stonewall, the UK’s ’Sus Law' and get some terriffic tips for songwriters aspiring stars..   For More on Tom For More on Glad to Be Gay #homosexuality #sex #suslaw #section28 #stonewall #glf #gayliberationfront #bisexuality #pride #pridemarch  #london #queer #gayliberation #quaker #sexuality #gay #tomrobinson #gladtobegay #suicide #counterculture #cafesociety #comingout #homesexuality #morality