Please welcome TiamatsVision and Danny Chaoflux to Technoccult. Danny is the designer of the Technoccult logo, and my co-conspirator for both Portland Occulture and Esozone. And you probably know TiamatsVision for her prolific commenting here at Technoccult. I’m looking forward to seeing what they share with us.

Danny Chaoflux gives advice for occult groups based on our experiences with Portland Occulture:

Gathering.

Not an Occult group, but a group for Occult individuals.

The above has served as the simplest tenet behind PDXocculture.

There was a time when Occult groups served as the only place in which to find a network of quality subversive peers, but nowadays given advances in technology, they serve as a specific network to find a focused approach to particular styles of thought and schools of magical aesthetics.

Problematic issues with that setup are numerous, but there are those few examples which are doing it right, so I wont waste time disparaging the concept. The bigger question to ask is what the individual seeks out of their community.

PDXocculture began because there was the desire to have casual social situations in which people could mingle and discover one another, without any particular focus. With this scenario, good discussions are had and friendships naturally evolve.

Full Story: Irreality.

During the course of researching The Process Church of the Final Judgement I was naturally reminded of the “other” Process: the collective founded by Ogre, Genesis P. Orridge and others. Explaining the Process is sort of difficult, but Wikipedia explains it thusly:

The Process is an art and philosophy collective formed in the early 1990s. The idea was initially birthed at the same time as, and with a subset of the same people from, the studio work for the Skinny Puppy album The Process, though the direct interrelation ends there. Some of the early contributors included Nivek Ogre, Genesis P-Orridge, William Morrison, and Loki der Quaeler.

I was a member of the Process mailing list, drawn in by the Skinny Puppy connection, starting sometime in 1996 1997, but I was pretty much only a lurker (I don’t remember ever contributing). It was an early exposure to fringe thinking (this was before I’d stumbled across Disinfo), and I loved it even though I probably didn’t understand half of what the conversations were about. Looking back now, I guess it was a pretty big influence on me.

Messages still come across the wire every once in a while, mostly “hey does anyone still read this list?” messages. I actually managed to spark some life into it a couple years ago, indirectly with this post that got picked up by Disinfo. Members saw the Disinfo post and weren’t happy with being called a cult or the claim that it was started by Ogre and GPO. Oops.

Also, syncroniciously, two active contributors to the list, JFitz and Phil Farber, were online acquaintances of Danny Chaoflux around the same time he was being introduced to occulty memes.

Oh, someone recently started a web forum called The Process Underground.

More info:

The Process web site (Perpetually under construction…)

A partial reassembly of the original site.

Phil Farber interviews with Ogre and Genesis P. Orridge.

With his death, Beckham’s name was added to a growing list of British scientists who’ve died or disappeared under mysterious circumstances since 1982. Each was a skilled expert in computers, and each was working on a highly classified project for the American Star Wars program. None had any apparent motive for killing himself.

The British government contends that the deaths are all a matter of coincidence. The British press blames stress. Others allude to an ongoing fraud investigation involving the nation’s leading defense contractor. Relatives left behind don’t know what to think.

Did 22 SDI Researchers really ALL Commit Suicide?.

(Thanks Danny Chaoflux).

In case you’re reading in an RSS reader: there’s a new design at Technoccult, so Technoccult, so check it out. The new design was created by me based on the HemmingwayEx theme for WordPress. I will eventually package it for release on its own. The new logo was designed by Danny Chaoflux.

Also, check out the new subsite Hexx, where you can submit your own links through a Digg-style interface.

Oh, and I may break a few things here or there as I work out the kinks in the new design.

Two artists from Moscow are obsessed with an idea that a frog should fly too, so they make different photos of the frog in a ‘flight’, giving a name for each of them.

They think that ‘The jump of frog symbolizes thirst of flying. As genetic magic dream, about that far time, when frogs were the ANGELS’. Frankly this is the first time I hear about the link between frogs and angels…

Full Story: English Russia.

(Thanks Danny Chaoflux).

Last week, after months of investigation, police arrested three teens, two 15 and one 16, and seized stolen jewelry, burglary tools, a map of the city and several black ninja suits with hoods and climbing spikes.

[...]

Lewis said one of the three indicated they had been active for a year and a half, and the pranks escalated from flights across rooftops and petty vandalism.

Lewis said the teenagers used a stolen credit card to buy, online, costumes and equipment such as hand-climbing spikes, metal throwing stars and utility belts.

Full Story: Seattle PI.

(Thanks Danny Chaoflux)

Torrent.

Direct Download.

From the New Introduction:

Join the Party

This is the record of the AAAZ, the Antarctic Astral Autonomous Zone, that occurred on the night of August 31st – September 1st, 1987.

Hakim Bey is the author of Temporary Autonomous Zone. It’s a cultural milestone for a wide variety of subversives from anarchists, occultists, vandal artists, and freaky festival people. The main idea of TAZ was to create exactly what it sounds like TAZ is about: creating places that serve as alternative realities to the prevailing system of control. Specific times and spaces designated to let chaos free, and allow psychological and social mechanisms to self regulate and mutate beyond the confines of so-called consensus reality.

The focus is on having individuals find and establish meaning on their own terms. Creating a TAZ requires face to face interaction and dialog, in a sense, creating an art form which is impossible to ever fully record or understand. In the void where stagnancy and boredom once ruled, wild fantasies called real life take root. The elusive genuine article, with no possible televised reenactments.

Before TAZ’s thought virus would reach the anti-capitalists and the rave scene as it did in the 90’s, many of the people who recognized the value of Bey’s work were few and far apart. Mail order culture was the primary mode of communication with the underground for many people in the 80’s. The postal world seen within the pages of High Weirdness by Mail by Ivan Stang has now mostly migrated to cyberspace, where many of these fringe cultures have exploded into bonafide phenomenas. In the meantime, the mutants who were plugged into the paper trail of fresh ideas were yearning for an opportunity to encounter a TAZ. This meant finding a ‘Zone’ which was totally unexpected.

It was decided to meet astrally or in dreams, at a specific sacred space in Antarctica. Bey sent invites out to his network, and arranged for everyone who participated to send him their experiences, which he would then compile and send back out. What you end up with is an compilation of rare works by an all-star cast of individuals who comprised the occulture before there was a word for it. In this instance, the media created here facilitated a syncing up of communal experiences, and was an essential component of the AAAZ, yet not the AAAZ in itself.

The objective reality of astral projection is inconsequential to the AAAZ. What is of importance is the narrative, lives encouraged to be lived mythically, drawing those lives together in the process. Then again, for those who do entertain astral experiences as accepted facets of reality, the AAAZ was most likely one of the earliest documented records of shared lucid dreams and consciousness. It is historically important for occultists, and personally fulfilling for those who got to participate in it.

The AAAZ is a window into the past, where long distance communications were laced with art and magic, and the viability of a tangible occult community was seemingly infinitesimal. This book provided my endeavors with a deeper sense of purpose to what I have been developing with esoZone, and PDXocculture, an open group in Portland, OR for individuals with esoteric interests. It was as if my magic was supplemented by ancient spells spoke at the AAAZ, spells that were finally close to reaching total fruition. “Find the Others”, Leary’s famous phrase, has become irrelevant. More people are networked than ever before, and they are well on their way to having an alternative reality subsume the toxic aeon preceding it.

This is a rare work that has only been previously released to the original participants. It is provided in its first reprinting to the participants of esoZone as a bonus gift, and as a memetic primer. Be sure to look out for works by Coil, Shirley Maclaine, James Koehnline, Ivan Stang, Feral Faun (aka Apio), Reverand Crowbar (aka Susan Poe), Trevor Blake, and of course Hakim Bey. All notables to be sure, but I can think of someone more important.

This is where you come in.
The coincidences you are experiencing as part of esoZone ARE REAL.
All the doorways of the venue have been transmuted into portals.
They lead twenty years into the past from Portland [Land of Portals] to the Antarctican AAAZ.
As you navigate the space of esoZone, you may notice dimensional leakage.
It is no accident and a very special effect. Have fun with it.
Interact with entities and your awareness of the past and present places, slipstreaming into the future.

Tell your friends.

If you are up for it, during the exact 20 year anniversary of the AAAZ, on the night of Aug. 31st, take an astral voyage. Bring your memory back to esoZone, and the experiences you had within it, and use the doorway Portals to the AAAZ of 87. The rest of this book should prep you for the journey.

This time, there will be no zine compiling the experiences. Take advantage of our Aeon. Post about your adventures online wherever you normally post, and if you do not have a space for that, start an account on Irreality.net. Your words will find their proper destination, and be part of a grand chain of events that leads to something currently inconceivable, twenty more years down the line.

Danny Chaoflux
New Alamut, Portal Palace
July 2007

? The best advice I can give you is this: Never carry more marijuana than you can eat. If the police turn on the red and blues, just eat it. It’s not illegal to smell like pot-it’s just illegal to possess it.

? Don’t think that by hiding pot in coffee grounds, or masking the scent with Bounce fabric softener or vanilla extract, you’re gonna be okay. Police dogs are trained to cut through these scents. Petroleum and cayenne pepper don’t work either-a dog may jerk back after smelling it, but humans will recognize the reaction.

? If you are going to travel with marijuana, place it in a non-contamined container right before you leave. The drug odor won’t have time to permeate through the plastic. If you are handling pot at your house, wear latex gloves or wash your hands-marijuana dust can reside on your fingers, and dogs can smell it. You’d be surprised at how many people get busted when dogs start sniffing around car door handles.

? Hiding your drugs in food is also a wise move. The mixed smells will throw off a dog.

Full Story: Radar.

(Thanks, Danny Chaoflux)

A new NASA satellite has recorded the first detailed images from space of a mysterious type of cloud called ‘night-shining’ or ‘noctilucent.”

The clouds are on the move, brightening and creeping out of polar regions, and researchers don’t know why.

Full Story: Live Science.

(Thanks Danny Chaoflux).

EPISODE 16 :: “Hep”

Ingredients: One half Danny Chaoflux, one half Ray Carney. Stir thoroughly, serve at art gallery in rimmed glasses.

Duration :: 00:29:27
Download :: MP3 (26.965MB)
Hosts :: Brenden Simpson, Wu

An anarchist is not a wild child, but a mature, realistic adult imposing laws upon the self and modifying them according to an experience of life, an interpretation of the world. A ‘rebel’, certainly, he or she does not assume ‘rebellious charm’ in order to placate authority (which is what the rebel heroes of all these genre stories do). There always comes the depressing point where Robin Hood doffs a respectful cap to King Richard, having clobbered the rival king. This sort of implicit paternalism is seen in high relief in the currently popular Star Wars series which also presents a somewhat disturbing anti-rationalism in its quasi-religious ‘Force’ which unites the Jedi Knights (are we back to Wellsian ’samurai’ again?) and upon whose power they can draw, like some holy brotherhood, some band of Knights Templar. Star Wars is a pure example of the genre (in that it is a compendium of other people’s ideas) in its implicit structure — quasi-children, fighting for a paternalistic authority, win through in the end and stand bashfully before the princess while medals are placed around their necks.

Star Wars carries the paternalistic messages of almost all generic adventure fiction (may the Force never arrive on your doorstep at three o’clock in the morning) and has all the right characters. it raises ‘instinct’ above reason (a fundamental to Nazi doctrine) and promotes a kind of sentimental romanticism attractive to the young and idealistic while protective of existing institutions. It is the essence of a genre that it continues to promote certain implicit ideas even if the author is unconscious of them. In this case the audience also seems frequently unconscious of them.

Full Story: Archive.org.

(Thanks Danny Chaoflux).

From John Harrigan:

Ten Towers is an audio recording of Ten Magical people reading prose written especially for them by myself.

These people have been chosen because they are highly respected by the community they are a part of.

The Ten Towers is also a snap shot and attempt to comprise a state of the union address from the world of Occulture and Magic. This project is also my way of saying thank you to the people I care about. Giving something of myself in the creation of a piece of prose that will always belong to that person and that person alone. I do this because of how the magickal community has supported the work of FoolishPeople.

All Towers will also have access to the entire recording and everyone who works on the project and will be able to print and sell copies via CD. Any money made from the CD this way can be kept by the Tower who has printed and sold any CD’s. Towers can print as many cd’s as they like individually and then sell them. Each person designing the look and design, so as to create a modern day magical artifact. A limited edition specific to that Magical person, whomever they may be.

I have no idea how many of these recordings will get turned into artifacts until after the project is completed.

Tower number one is Danny Chaoflux. Danny Chaoflux is a Persian artist living in Portland OR, and the
founder of Portland Occulture. Hir main interests are crossdressing, dream travel, and ancient mysticism.

Download the mp3.

Two scientists from the University of Copenhagen have demonstrated that the spinal cord use network mechanisms similar to those used in the brain. The discovery is featured in the current issue of Science.

The research group behind the surprising results consists of Professor J?rn Hounsgaard and postdoc Rune W. Berg from the University of Copenhagen, and Assistant Professor and PhD Aidas Alaburda from the University of Vilnius. The group has shown that spinal neurons, during network activity underlying movements, show the similar irregular firing patterns as seen in the cerebral cortex.

Full Story: Science Daily.

(Thanks Danny Chaoflux).

Chinese scientists are conducting laboratory work hoping to identify a 2,800-year-old mummy presumably of a shaman in the northwestern Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.

The well-preserved mummy of a seemingly Caucasian man with a Roman nose and deep-set eyes was unearthed from a cluster of ancient tombs in 2003 and research work has been going on ever since.

Archeologists found the mummy most intriguing because a sack of marijuana leaves was found buried alongside the corpse.

The mummy remains intact in its original outfit despite the passage of time: leather hat, heavy coat and boots, huge earrings of copper and gold, a turquoise necklace, a copper laced stick in the right hand and a bronze ax in the left, according to Li Xiao, head of the heritage bureau in Turpan.

Full Story: People’s Daily Online.

(thanks Danny Chaoflux)

Danny Chaoflux talks with Triskele and Squink about the new version of Irreality, set to drop in a few days:

The initial idea was to create some initial conditions that would allow the development of a complex adaptive system analogous to the third-order emergent properties found in the stock market, ant colonies and cloud formation. In this sense we have created a system that has mechanisms for rapidly adapting to the chaotic whimsy of meme-space; responding to the needs of the individual whilst simultaneously enacting the will of the hive mind.

Letting a culture develop around an intent is, to me, a much more sensible option for the long term survivability of a community than the concept of developing a community around a culture.

Full Story: Frequency 23.

Russian scientists from the city of Novosibirsk, Siberia, made a sensational report at the international conference devoted to new methods of treatment and rehabilitation in narcology. The report was called “Methods of painful impact to treat addictive behavior.”

Siberian scientists believe that addiction to alcohol and narcotics, as well as depression, suicidal thoughts and psychosomatic diseases occur when an individual loses his or her interest in life. The absence of the will to live is caused with decreasing production of endorphins – the substance, which is known as the hormone of happiness. If a depressed individual receives a physical punishment, whipping that is, it will stir up endorphin receptors, activate the ‘production of happiness’ and eventually remove depressive feelings.

Full Story: Pravda.

(Thanks Danny Chaoflux).

William S. Burroughs:

Danger is a biological necessity for humans, just like sleep and dreams. If you face death, for that time you are immortal. For the Western middle classes, danger is a rarity and erupts only with a sudden, random shock. And yet we are in danger at all times, since our death exists. Is there a technique for confronting death without immediate physical danger? (quoted from Hashisheen: The End of Law)

(Image swiped from Chris Noeth).

Been slacking on your holiday shopping? We’ve come up with a list of great gifts for the mutants in your family or social circle.

Klintron:

The God That Wasn’t There.

Psychopedia of Slack.

Paul Laffoley posters.

Lost Girls.

Fell the Don:

Titillation Lip and Nipple Balms, by Agent Provocateur

Seriously, if your gonna play it up this winter season, get your better half these little gems (bundled as one) from this popular European lingerie company. Use it wisely.

Viva Pi?ata, for the Xbox 360

I hate console games and the only game I like on the PC is Company of Heroes, but this gem has the perfect balance or addictiveness and appeal that anyone can enjoy. It’s like crack for kids and anyone that hates video games.

Spectacle, by David Rockwell & Bruce Mau

We’re all obsessing over Second Life and virtual communities, but it’s worth remembering the universal power of the town square, the arena, and the other very real places where we come together. The book to read about why we love to experience things together and publicly is David Rockwell and Bruce Mau’s Spectacle. It’s a coffee-table-size exposition of NASCAR, Burning Man, Hindu religious rites in the Ganges, and other glorious spectacles that people experience together.

Baraka, by Ron Fricke

Baraka is an incredible journey through 6 continents, 24 countries. It is a collection of high quality images, presented in a moving and compelling manner. Hopefully everyone you know has seen it, but, if not, smoke a joint and sit down to one of the most beautiful pieces of cinema ever made. It’s a nice reminder seeing as how Fricke’s next piece – the spiritual successor to Baraka – called Samsara, is set to be released in 2007.

The Griffin & Sabine Trilogy Boxed Set, by Nick Bantock

Few books are more romantic than this trilogy, nor more surreal. The legendarily popular trilogy of books containing the Griffin-Sabine correspondence literally contains the correspondence: postcards, front and back, and letters in envelopes pasted into the book, which the reader must open and read. Nick Bantock’s story was way ahead of the computer game Myst, with which it shares a moody allure. His artwork is gorgeous, and countless romances have been intensified by exposure to that of Griffin and Sabine.

Brenden Simpson:

Barry Sautner Tree of Life Sculpture Vessel Vase.

KJB Security Omni Spectral Correlator.

Val Saint Lambert Crystal Bateau Ivre – Caviar Bowl.

TrekStor i.Beat organix Gold MP3 Player (1 GB).

Grizzly Bear Coffee Table.

Technoccult graphic designer Danny Chaoflux:

The Cone.

Ball Chair.

Somatron Clinical Recliner.

Former guest editor Nick Pell:

Bargain priced Disinfo hardcovers (Check your local Barnes and Noble)

The Da Vinci Enigma tarot deck

Peep Show DVD.

An Interview with Magister Michael Kelly of the Temple of Set:

2. How have you studied Enochian magic?

By referring to Dee’s own records. There has been so much rubbish appended to the Enochian system over the years, such as pyramids with Tarot attributions, etc.

To break down the system into a few basic steps:

i] The Call of the Thirty Aethyrs can be used to visit in sequence the various parts of the psyche, calling forth the Hidden dimensions of Self. Through repetition of such Work an integration of Self is effected. Future Work with the Aethyrs can create a resonance between the inner and outer worlds, thereby Magical Change can be wrought.

ii] Learn by heart the Enochian Keys (neither a swift nor a painless process, but a rewarding one): (a) In learning the English Keys, we can approach an Understanding of Dee’s original Work, and can penetrate the Mysteries that lie behind his J/C phraseology. Setians have the record of the _Word of Set_ Working as a considerable aid in this regard. (b) In learning the Enochian version of the Keys, more attention can be applied to discovering the sonic Keys of the system, the sequences of sounds which stimulate the psyche in certain precise ways.

iii] Study of the Enochian alphabet is important. Those bizarre letters can be studied in a manner similar to the Runestaves. Unlike the Runes, whose Mysteries are angular, the Enochian letters are hooked and serpentine. The combinations of shape / sound / number are interesting and revealing.

Numerology is also a Key, the Enochian system is based around the number seven.

The above steps constitute a Work which I cannot presume to have completed. It is a curriculum which will occupy even the most fervent student for years, without recourse to “pyramid squares”, Enochian chess, Tarot and Cabalistic symbolism. This can all be done with the bare bones which we possess of the pure Enochian system. To my way of thinking; the purer the system, the purer the results.

Full Story: Way Back Machine of xeper.org.

(Thanks, Danny Chaoflux).

Is it a coincidence that the very same day I read this article in Forbes about the book as a networked object (and Cory Doctorow’s article on giving away your books for free) that Danny Chaoflux sends me a link to an online re-mix of Paul D. Miller (aka DJ Spooky, that Subliminal Kid)’s book Rhythm Science?

Rhythm Science on MIT Press.

A Gallup poll this summer of more than 1,000 Americans showed that 39 percent were in favor of requiring Muslims in the United States, including American citizens, to carry special identification.

Full Story: Reuters.

(Thanks Danny Chaoflux).

See also: Is It Fascism Yet?

Full Story: We the People.

(thanks Danny Chaoflux).

Modafinil is just the first of a wave of new lifestyle drugs that promise to do for sleep what the contraceptive pill did for sex – unshackle it from nature. Since time immemorial, humans have structured their lives around sleep. In the near future, we will, for the first time, be able to significantly structure the way we sleep to suit our lifestyles.

Full Story: New Scientist.

(Thanks, Danny Chaoflux).

From Satanis (which Danny Chaoflux was kind enough to loan me, and is actually pretty good).

Danny Chaoflux suggests an Ultraculture Sunday ritual:

Remember the first time you got excited about the occult and the subversive? Do you remember when it started coming together for you? Connecting all of those dots? When you felt the tingle of ancient shaman ancestors in the same breathe as electric future possibilities? Why the occult mattered to you? Do you remember how drawn in you were, and how inescapable the lure of the Mystery was? Remember taking quiet walks and having close encounters with the extremely unlikely, where your mind seemed to spill into the world? Reading the words of friends and heroes like they somehow hacked into your soul? Early Coincidences and Deja Vu?

Full Story: Danny Chaoflux.

I’ve been putting a lot of thought into tracing my occultural roots lately, all the things over the years that have made me start studying and practicing magic. I like the sound of this ritual, though I’m not sure what it has to do with the general purpose of ultraculture.