Carl Abrahamsson's Blog, page 27
February 4, 2022
I’m in Satanic Mojo Comix!
I am VERY proud and honoured to be a semi-fictional (?) character in the latest issue of Satanic Mojo Comix (no 7):
https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/SATANICMOJO
http://satanicmojo.blogspot.com/
Also check out their manifesto in The Trapartisan Review:
https://store.trapart.net/details/00179
#satanicmojocomix #occulture #jasonatomic #carlabrahamsson
February 1, 2022
The Trapartisan Review is HERE!
The Trapartisan Review welcomes you to enjoy unique works of art created by a number of highly talented contemporary and international painters, writers, photographers, poets, performance- and collage artists, etc, jointly assembling a strong and elegant bouquet of timeless expressions for your pleasure and inspiration. This first issue contains contributions by Jason Atomic, Hector Domiane, Val Denham, Johan Hamrin, Billy Chainsaw, Andreas Kalliaridis, Jordi Valls, Peter Köhler, Nicolas Ballet, Carl Michael von Hausswolff, Carl Abrahamsson, Anna Sebastian, Gabriella Eriksson, Karl Max Fredriksson, Vanessa Sinclair, Susana Vico Valero, Jake Kobrin, Tom Banger, Tim Pewe, Gunner Wright, Sean Bonner, Charlotte Rodgers, Annsofie Jonsson, Jason Haaf, Hazel Cline, Ruby Ray, Lars Sundestrand, Åsa Ersmark, Nestor Povarnin, Hannah Haddix, Sergey Martyn, Gustaf Broms, MV Carbon, Steven Cline, Paul Bee Hampshire, Christopher Mealie, Gabriela Herstik, and Tom Benson.
YOU CAN ORDER YOUR COPY RIGHT HERE!
Trapart Books, 2022. 8,5 x 11”, 196 pages in full colour. Available in paperback and hardback editions. Please note: When ordering from Amazon, please make sure to choose the(ir) site closest to you in order to save on postage costs.
January 24, 2022
Sub Umbra Alarum Luna on YouTube
I’ve made “Sub Umbra Alarum Luna” available on Youtube. It’s a tribute to Derek Jarman’s amazing film “In the Shadow of the Sun,” with improvised music by Thomas Tibert, Joakim Karlsson-Kurén and me. Enjoy!
#thomastibert #whitestains #cottonferox #carlabrahamsson
January 23, 2022
Another gentle giant, fallen (Thomas Tibert, 1961-2022)
I first met Thomas Tibert at a party in Stockholm in 1988. I had gotten to know Peter Bergstrandh, bass player extraordinaire with one of my fave bands, Lustans Lakejer, and had courted him to be part of White Stains – my band that had already existed in a few different line-ups since 1987. Peter turned out to also play with Thomas, and Thomas had his own studio called Hit & Run. He made jingles and studio work, as well as recording independent bands, in his own apartment. Opportunities abounded!
When we had crossed the first introductory hurdle (“Do you like TG?” Affirmative!), it was all excitement and energy. We started recording with me, Thomas, Peter and Jan Ekman (the other original founder of White Stains), and we were immediately productive. Thomas travelled with me and Jan to the Hultsfred Festival for the first ever concert in the summer of 89. Thomas mixed us exquisitely while we were making a lot of noise, and the result is actually quite good (available on the “The Somewhat Lost Horizon” album). Three singles were released during 1989, and towards the end of the year we recorded our first album (with me, Thomas, Pär Aronson, and Genesis & Paula P-Orridge). This became the classic “At Stockholm,” released in 1990.
Thomas and me, At Stockholm era, 1989. Photo by Karl Max Fredriksson.We stormed on with album no 2, “Dreams Shall Flesh,” which was a weird mix of poppy stuff and experimental shenanigans (including one track by Anton LaVey and one by The Hafler Trio). Peter was a true musical motor and Thomas a very talented programmer and producer. Per Svensson was a new and great guitar addition, riffing away in wonderful ways. I did my impresario thing and wrote the lyrics and then I also… ahem… “sang” them.
Working with Thomas was a joy. He was sensitive, understanding, creative and simply a great sound man. He came up with weird production angles and suggestions that I certainly couldn’t have. It was in his mind, not his intellect, and when he had fiddled for a bit we were most often awestruck at his gift of making sounds considerably more than sounds.
This became even more obvious when we started making soundtracks together. Some were for my own experimental films, and others were just made for the hell of it – as in “imaginary” films. We spaced out and in, and came up with some pretty solid scores that work very well still; with or without accompanying films. Most of these were collected and released on the Anckarström album “The Somewhat Lost Horizon” (1992).
For some reason or other we drifted apart after this. I worked with Peter on different kinds of soundtracks that ended up on the albums “Misantropotantra” (1992) and “Why Not Forever?” (1994) I also drifted into solo work in Peter’s and mine “Immergeil Studios.” Life just happened, I guess.
Around the big “Y2K” (that’s the “millennial shift” for you youngsters out there) we resumed contact again. Thomas had moved with his family to Tärnsjö, a couple of hours northwest of Stockholm, and keeping busy with many exciting music technology and sampling products. Several of his series of sampling CDs and bundles became global bestsellers, and although this was surely great, he seemed to be missing some real dark music-making. We came up with the new project Cotton Ferox, and we agreed to alternate so sometimes he’d be Cotton and I Ferox, and vice versa. As written out in the “Cotton Ferox Manifesto,” it was all about transcending apparent dualisms, and we tried to keep that as a creative concept in the music making as much as we could.
We recorded, started performing live (Stockholm, Copenhagen, London) and collaborating with others (Genesis P-Orridge again, Krister Linder, Michael Moynihan). Gen came over to Stockholm again for a new project, and we used some bits of those recordings for the first Cotton Ferox album: “First Time Hurts” (2002). The second one was our second Gen spoken word album, called “Wordship” (2004).
There was always something going on: compilations, new collaborations, concerts (a Russian mini tour, Poland several times, London) and the compilation albums “Defragmental” (Cotton Ferox, 2007) and “Exploratorium” (White Stains, 2007). Whenever we felt motivated we got together or just sent files in-between us. A slow process of getting together the “third” album, something which never really happened. Instead, we created the side project The Mushroom Clouds, together with lovely singer Elisabeth Punzi, and released an EP in 2010.
With Genesis in Gothenburg, 2013.In 2013 we reformed White Stains for a night in Gothenburg together with Genesis P-Orridge and great guitarist Eriq Olin, and it was a great reunion of sounds, spirits, and souls.
In 2013, we also set the magical Mega Golem being free in a performance in Warsaw. We showed the Mega Golem film, and performed live together with Bartosz Szamitowski. I cannot describe this evening in any other way than that its was absolutely peak Cotton Ferox. We were never better; neither before nor after.
Istanbul, 2014.At about this time, our views and aesthetic preferences had started drifting apart, and it became more and more noticeable as we kept performing. This is just a natural process of development. I wanted to be in and on my own trip to a greater extent, and Thomas had moved to Poland and started making great music with Bartosz as “Audio Spirits.” Much of their amazing music will be released during 2022, I hope.
At the end of December 2021, we had resumed a positive contact, discussing a possible box set release of all the great music we’ve made over the decades. I’m sure this will still happen, but it’s sad that Mr T won’t be around in the physical realm to share the joy of us appreciating his sonic genius and audio wizardry.
In each creative relationship there are ups and downs, highs and lows. But whatever happened, we always drifted back to a Tibert-Abrahamsson “third mind” that was all about making a platform for what we both had inside. I wrote texts and weird lyrics on my own, but I was always sort of hearing Thomas’ dark soundscapes in my head while writing. They formed my textual output, adding to the psychedelic stew as much as I hope the vice versa case was true.
Moscow, 2007.We traveled near and far together, and in many different ways. Music became a ticket to experience more. One tour comes to mind. I had been invited to exhibit photographs in Moscow in 2007. Around this a Cotton Ferox mini tour bloomed, which also led to us recording with some great St Petersburg artists, which led to the album “Mother Russia.” We offered something uniquely ours, and received a whole lot more.
A substantial part of my life is now missing. Friendship, a unique sense of humour, a shared sense of illumination in or out of the wild forests, a wordless symbiosis of sounds and scapes, a tacit sense of wonder in regard to what’s actually possible. It’s all a matter of focus and collaboration based on a kind of intuitive, purposeful play. If that is temporarily not there, then you simply move onwards until it comes back. But now I’m sad to say it won’t; this collaboration is no more… A huge loss.
Thomas is surely making music in Valhalla already, and will find many others to work with. I wouldn’t be surprised if there will be a spoken word project with Oden himself, and I look forward in awe to some day listening to it.
Carl Abrahamsson a.k.a. Ferox, Vimmerby, Jan 23, 2022
Working on the road, Serbia, 2008.Cotton Ferox – My Psychedelic Prayer (2003, for Thomas Tibert)
How does one carry on in the spirit of psychedelic illumination without being called an old hippie? I have no idea. How does one bring about radical, personal change for others to take further? I haven’t got a clue. How does one come to terms with the fact that the most grand and overwhelming changes all stem from subtle and quite often invisible sources and forces? I have no say in the matter. When you try to describe the essentially indescribable, there’s always the looming danger of becoming a missionary. And the missionary position is not necessarily the best one. It’s never a question of specific vested interests or even of control of the masses. Let’s not get paranoid. Let’s not get frightened. Let’s NOT get lost. It is however a question of a more profound quality. The one that constitutes the essence of what most people call their bad conscience. That quality is called honesty. You know what it means: Your own relationship to truth. If everyone were honest, the world would be a very different place, wouldn’t you agree? If we go beyond the enjoyable trip trappings, the sensuous neon lights of the soul, the creation of eternities in fragments of seconds, the upheaval of space dissolved in one human sublingual metabolism, one thing remains. It always remains: The challenge to embrace honesty.
January 18, 2022
I’m on Praxis Behind the Obscure!
I’m on the Praxis Behind the Obscure podcast, talking about the #TOPY days, #AustinOsmanSpare, the so called #lefthandpath, and waking up to the importance of #magic and #occulture.
#carlabrahamsson #magicoanthropology #thefenriswolf Photo by Vanessa!
January 16, 2022
#PSYCHARTCULT on Polanski and Hitchcock
Don’t miss the new #psychartcult focussing on Roman Polanski & Alfred Hitchcock! Mary Wild & Todd McGowan delve deep into terror and suspense! Jan 23 … see you there!
#romanpolanski #alfredhitchcock #toddmcgowan #marywild #morbidanatomy
January 14, 2022
A new #psychartcult with me and Gary Lachman
Feb 20, 2022: Gary Lachman & Carl Abrahamsson deliver some serious #psychartcult fun for you!
GARY LACHMAN: ”Dreaming Ahead of Time: Experiences with Precognitive Dreams, Synchronicity and Coincidence”
Can we dream the future? Does time flow in only one direction? What is a ‘meaningful coincidence’? Gary Lachman, author of many books on consciousness, culture, and the western esoteric tradition (and former bassist for Blondie), has been recording his precognitive dreams for forty years – dreams, that is, in which bits and pieces of the future turn up “ahead of time.” In his talk, based on his new book Dreaming Ahead of Time, Lachman will relate how he came to discover that he “dreams the future,” and how this surprising ability is something we all share but are unaware that we do. Along the way, Lachman will look at the work of other “time haunted men,” such as J.W. Dunne, J. B. Priestley, P.D. Ouspensky, C.G. Jung, Arthur Koestler, and others who, like himself, discovered that the “tick tick tock of the stately clock” – with apologies to Cole Porter – is not the only way in which that mysterious something we call “time” can be understood.
CARL ABRAHAMSSON: ”Tripping the Dark Light Fantastic – Notes on the occult influence of filmmaker Derek Jarman”
Watching Derek Jarman’s experimental film “In the Shadow of the Sun” for the first time in the early 1980s formatted my own aesthetic not only concerning cinema but also art in general. An important individuation key for me since then has been to continually evaluate Jarman’s distinctly magical, alchemical approach (and its many ripple effects) as a conscious expression of, and connection to, occultural history and general occult experimentation. Meaning, what you are creating is not “only” art, but also a talismanic platform through which desires may or may not be processed. And that this approach is a living and thriving tradition; not just an odd intellectual occurrence in our own contemporary times.
“The Psychoanalysis, Art & the Occult series of events, curated by Dr. Vanessa Sinclair and Carl Abrahamsson, is dedicated to exploring the intersections and integration of psychoanalytic theory, the creative arts, occult practices, and folk magic traditions. By inviting psychoanalysts, philosophers, artists, writers, and occult practitioners from a variety of theoretical orientations and worldviews to discuss their work, personal experiences, and areas of research interest with one another, dialogue is opened up between practitioners in fields of study that traditionally rarely engage with one another though often operate in similar and complementary ways.”
#garylachman #carlabrahamsson #morbidanatomy #occulture #dreaming #derekjarman #topy
A Great Anathema Anthology
Just received this stunning beauty from Anathema Publishing: “PILLARS: A Wayfarer’s Hearth.” The theme is Pilgrimage, and I have a piece in there, fondly remembering a magic trip to Morocco with Vanessa, staying at Bou Jeloud’s house and partying under the stars to the live music of the master musicians. Time-space-less-ness!
https://www.anathemapublishing.com/a-wayfarers-hearth
“We were lulled into our own movements and transcendental emotions, swaying to the loud music, or sitting down and ”spacing out.” Blissful smiles on everyone’s faces. And then, out of the dark he suddenly popped up: Bou Jeloud! Our wonderful and serene old host had turned himself into a terrifying, raving beast, dressed in goat skin; dancing and moving spastically through the crowds; a source of laughter and fear at the same time.”
#anathemapublishing #carlabrahamsson #occulture #mastermusiciansofjoujouka #williamsburroughs #briongysin #paulbowles #thegreatgodpan
December 31, 2021
Summing Up 2021
Fortuitously Non-Conformist: Summing Up 2021
As far as years go, 2021 was one of my favourite years ever. It began with a heavy, lingering, positively pandemic-related feeling of being stuck – not so much in time of life in general as in space in particular. So… What do you do?
We left dear old Stockholm and settled in a small town instead. What I dreaded would be overwhelmingly hard and troublesome turned out to be overwhelmingly smooth and auspicious. The machinery seemed to grease itself along the way, and before we knew it we had uprooted ourselves from a city and general environment that in my mind for a considerable time had been more coloured by nostalgia and sentimentality than by sober analysis of both outer circumstances and inner desires. Today, I wake up in a magical house in a town that has everything I need. Vanessa and I often look at each other and comment upon the fact that we feel that we live in a very pleasant dream.
I can see an arch stretching over this year as I look back. It’s one of dreary routine being exchanged for a fresh re-boot of both vision and work. I do essentially work with the very same things but my mind and attitude are in a much more constructive space-time. It allows for more leniency and efficiency at the same time, much in line with our beloved Daoist concept of “Wu Wei.” We do a lot but it sure as hell doesn’t feel like it.
In packing things, and then also unpacking them, there’s both symbolic and concrete insight. You see what you have; you stay aware and conscious of it; and you hopefully realise that most of it is absolutely useable for work. My own deeper glimpses/insights into my own archive has been (and remains) an inspiring jolt almost every day. It’s almost as if I now have to ward off (or at least sternly compartmentalise) all the potential book projects that pop up. Everything in due time, thanks to everything finding its own correct space. Order is divine!
Book-wise, this year was a balanced mix of old and new. I carried on with The Fenris Wolf re-releases as well as a new edition of FanzinEra and Sacred Intent. New books included Temporarily Eternal, Different People, and The Mega Golem.
The Mega Golem volume made me extra happy because it is in many ways not an attempt at “explaining” what the Mega Golem is, but rather an opportunity to give it more time and space to define itself. Vanessa’s exquisite collages and cut-ups as points of intersection made everything even more tantalising and seductive. And it makes me wonder/wander: where will the Mega Golem go next? (A strictly rhetorical question, perhaps?)
Many people have given the Mega Golem form and substance so far, and it’s always been a question of a sublime balance between creator and the created. If we don’t know the creators’ intents, can we still derive second-hand power from the Mega Golem? Of course we can. There’s an almost “asemic” aspect to this golemic adventure that I really enjoy. It is a language expressed in many dimensions but the particular signifiers aren’t known to us quite yet. Perhaps they never will be?
This reminded me very much of a passage from one of my favourite books on magIQ (Laszlo Legeza, Tao Magic, Thames and Hudson, London, 1975, p 20-21):
“Magic diagrams, talismans and charms required a secret language for their expression, a symbolism outside the scope of the ordinary graphic vocabulary of Chinese writing and painting. For this purpose, popular Taoism was able to draw upon the unlimited resources of the Chinese inventive genius. But in order to find unorthodox calligraphic expression, or to modify existing forms for occult use, the artist had to solve an almost insuperable problem. The rules governing the use of the sensitive Chinese writing brush, one of the most ingenious inventions of Chinese civilisation, were rather inflexible. Strictly speaking, there was only one way of writing a Chinese character correctly. The rules of the brush were admittedly more flexible for painting and for the so-called ‘free’ calligraphic exercises, in which the character was sometimes modified out of recognition. To fulfil his function, the occult artist had to stay either partly or completely outside the traditional conventions of Chinese calligraphy which, for example, did not accommodate waves and curving lines, or circular forms in script. Hence the emphasis on these in ‘free’ calligraphic exercises. Sometimes, of course, the writer was an illiterate folk-artist, and therefore already outside the tradition, so that his contribution to the vocabulary of unorthodox expression was fortuitously non-conformist.”
(“Fortuitously non-conformist”? That I would take for my motto for 2022!)
I also worked some more on and eventually finished my first novel in Swedish, Codex Nordica. It’s a book I have really enjoyed writing, and I look forward to its release in 2022.
In terms of books for others was was also Anton LaVey and the Church of Satan – Infernal Wisdom from the Devil’s Den, for Inner Traditions. As you might know, this is a kind of expanded version of my film Anton LaVey – Into the Devil’s Den (2019), and it will be published in February 2022.
I also wrapped up another anthology à la Occulture – The Unseen Forces That Drive Culture Forward (2018) for Inner Traditions. Its working title has simply been Occulture 2 but I have high hopes that it will be called Tripping the Dark Light Fantastic – Essays on Individuation and Occulture. Tentative release during the first quarter of 2023.
Music-wise there wasn’t too much going on. I did release a brand new album via the Canadian label Flesh Prison. This spoken word/ambient album is called Reseduction and I like it a lot. I might even release it as a film in 2022!
I also began work on the album with Vanessa and Little Annie Bandez. I recorded them together in Miami a couple of years ago, and this lovely collaboration will eventually bloom into a very dark and trippy flower of great nocturnal radiance.
Film-wise, Into the Devil’s Den was released on BluRay and on several streaming platforms. And I did make one new film: Genesis Breyer P-Orridge: Write Your Own Code. As Genesis and I were working on the documentary film Change Itself (released in 2016), we agreed that it would be great to also have Genesis reading poetry in the film. One clip was eventually used. Write Your Own Code contains all of the material we shot in Oslo, Norway, 2014. These sessions also became the creative ignition for the spoken word album we made together in 2017, and which was released in 2019 by Ideal Recordings: Loyalty Does Not End With Death.
Early in the year, I successfully crowdfunded the An Art Apart – Number One project, which will become a book and a film based on the interviews I have filmed with a great number of remarkable and inspiring artists. I am very grateful for all the contributions to this pretty massive endeavour. Both the book and the film will definitely be released in 2022.
One of the most stimulating things in 2021 was that I “lectured” more. Vanessa and I now have a monthly evening of talks and lectures c/o Morbid Anatomy, so that wonderful environment has been great to write for. But there were many other opportunities too, including Jake Kobrin’s ambitious “Magick 101” online course. These essays and talks have made me realise just how much I enjoy writing and talking about these topics that we could call “occultural.” It’s truly a blessing to be so immersed in something that I love so dearly, and judging from requests and offers, it seems an increasing amount of young people are interested, which is absolutely delightful.
The more I write about this intersection between art and the “occult,” the more I seem to see. It has become if not a “Perpetuum Mobile,” then at least a very colourful five-wheel drive hot rod drifting down the old yellow brick road.
I have jotted down some good ideas for the Society of Sentience, too. This is not meant to be or become some kind of magical order in the traditional sense. But I can certainly see the benefits in developing an occultural network that not only contains theory but also practice, and not necessarily one that is always “transparent.” There’s a lot to be said for the power-generating aspects of secrecy, and this is something to be seriously considered and worked with. This has potential and will definitely be interesting to develop further during 2022.
Speaking of which: the last book of the year was It’s Magic Monday Every Day of the Week, by Vanessa and myself. It’s a collection of our writings about our own ongoing magical practices. We have a segment on our Patreon specifically for this kind of magical sharing, and we intend to anthologise these texts in book-form on a yearly basis. The feedback we have had so far is inspiring, to say the least!
A lot could be said for 2021. It followed in the trails of the peak (?) pandemic year of 2020, and looking back at it, it makes sense. Mutating and adapting viruses led to us becoming more vigilant and careful; possibly healthier too in many ways. Moving to a small town has certainly made us realise how unhealthy cities are. I am actually surprised that there haven’t been more pandemics around… Humans certainly seem to facilitate opportunities and environments for optimal viral dissemination!
Well, no matter what, another year has passed by and in hindsight it was a truly great one. Not necessarily because things more or less went back to macro-level “normal” (whatever that means) but because I re-routed and re-rooted myself in new soil together with my beloved wife. It immediately changed things for the better, and every day is a blessing for which I am genuinely grateful.
Here’s to a wonderful, healthy and successful 2022! Vade Ultra!
Carl Abrahamsson, Vimmerby, Dec 31, 2021
(Photo by Vanessa)
https://www.patreon.com/vanessa23carl
December 30, 2021
Me & Mitch c/o Morbid Anatomy!
Did you miss our most recent #PSYCHARTCULT c/o Morbid Anatomy? With me & Mitch Horowitz, talking about “Hermeticism as a Path for Modern Seekers” and “The Necessity of Dynamic Darkness in Occultism”? The video is now available via Morbid Anatomy’s excellent Patreon. Support it to take part of an insane amount of interesting lectures and videos!
https://www.patreon.com/posts/video-recording-60432319
#carlabrahamsson #mitchhorowitz #morbidanatomy #occulture
