TODAY'S SOUNDTRACK
First of all, we overshot our opening date. That calamity was down to an insurance issue, which... seems to have been sorted. Thus, we had to pass on the bank holiday weekend. A couple of socially distanced gigs needed to be rearranged, but people aren’t queuing up for those at the moment. In a sense, we need to ask ourselves what reality we’re in right now because it sure ain’t Kansas. But in short, yes we should be open for the first weekend of June. There are a couple of surprise gigs coming up which should soften the blow. EDIT: WE OPEN TOMORROW, THAT IS 02/06/21
No news yet on the Arts Council Project Grant, the mysterious Black Stage Project. We’re waiting with baited breath for the ACE'S decision. I’m genuinely unsure of the outcome.
Our position here hasn’t changed. Whoever you are, whatever your persuasion; creed; colour or medical status, you will be welcome at The Peer Hat. We seem to be standing at a crossroads and honestly, as per usual, we don’t know which way the wind is blowing. Chaos rules. Make no mistake, we are not the servants of Order. We are a refuge for the weird, the fractal heart of the abandoned necropolis, Manchester. Remember that. Remember who we were before all this.
But I’m speaking in terms, somewhat grim, somewhat fatalistic. Optimism is the way forward, there’s no other choice.
What strikes me personally, is the sense that many people subscribe to the belief that human beings are isolated points - islands- that everything and everyone is distinct, separate, spinning away from the other. Think of an example of what I mean, you won't find it difficult. (If you suspect your example is what I mean... then trust your instinct: it's what I mean)
In fact, the universe is in bewildering dialogue. With the aid of the internet we can range with abominable swiftness, node to node….from the pseudo material connection of quantum entanglement, to the hidden systems shared by trees and mycellium networks, to the presence of a single idea within multiple minds---connections can be observed. And what of synchronicity? That sense of events a-causally connected? The old alchemist Jung finds common ground with plummeting star of theoretical physics, Wolfgang Pauli… the parallels the two men found in each others’ disciplines, would only find further reflection as the years passed. Various experiments have taken place over the years in an effort to expose what Einstein called "hidden variables" (or more famously, “spooky action at a distance”). Thus far said experiments have managed to point to these connections being not only possible, but common. Uncertainty rules, something connects particles in a way we cannot fathom, perhaps only intuit.
A whole heap of experiments in this field of connections, were undertaken at the Institute For Noetic Sciences, lead by Dr Dean Radin. Take a look for yourself. From proving the efficacy of prayer before eating, to showing that the path of a baseball can be affected in flight by intention alone...following a review of their work, only the dogmatic and truly ignorant, would call bullshit.
The bullshit is our vapid culture and the pop science that inhabits the void usefully vacated by religion. It seems people will go a long way to avoid responsibility…a connected world is a world with fucking consequences.
If this stuff is even remotely true…and it’s true to the extent that multiple experiments exist with tremendously convincing results (I advise you pick up Dean Radin’s book, Real Magic for a taste of what’s missing), then we have to ask ourselves about the whole shebang…the ‘how this is presented factor’…the perceived reality.
Dialogue and an appetite for questions. Therein lies a way forward. That and to inhabit the fringes fully and with the knowledge, that within them, realities are forged and are being forged right now. But oh how we’ve been pinned down.
A new world has arisen from the depths of the modern kaleidoscope; a Ballardian landscape of isolation, whispers, politics and ideology masquerading as science. Amidst the ever throbbing, constant pulse of scanned barcodes delineating our right to be (that tech has just been sitting there hasn’t it?), The Peer Hat crouches, plastered in safety warnings, unhappily situated somewhere between dental clinic and Korova Milk Bar.
Where we are now, is not the sole result of a virus. It has been a destination reached within a vehicle that has been driven to combustion, by the way we have lived our lives, the stories we have accepted and the conversations which we have turned away from. Robo-narcissists patrol the aether ways of the web, looking for signs of heresy. Never has it’s like been known, and yet, and yet…still the fragment of a star... the optimism shines. People want it to be better, for it all to go away. But that isn’t possible. Not by doing nothing. It is the world. It is the culture we inhabit.
Nacreous totalities express themselves without pause, leading the sane and the good to declare the official story as winner in the reality war. Did they ever realise that their power was so great, that they had it within them to forge their own set of rules? Here, on the hazy fringe, we boil elements and produce dangerous possibilities. You of all people will know, that there must be danger. And sure enough, this is the greatest flaw in the dream of Utopia. But then Utopia is not a place or a moment that is reached---it is a constant process, a verb (like all the greatest things). Here Utopia is happening and that, my friends, is about the combination of sweet, sweet elements. Out there, the blend of propaganda and narcotic, zero sum entertainments defines the boundaries of existence. Here, not so much.
How we’ve howled this to the void! Not many people read this blog, but if you happen to be one of them, then we are calling upon you to empower The Peer Hat. This is the moment of starkest need within the imaginal. Choked on repugnant corporate art, at that eats it’s own tail after sucking it’s own cock, art that does not break the skin--- the people are lost--- now rendered mewling, enfeebled, a nation of incels, pale, flopping caricatures of our former selves. And yet even before things changed we were blindly cruel, pampered imperial dilettantes with pillbox horizons.
Yes this is the time when the imaginal must be savagely occupied and the terms redefined. It can begin here. The hunger is there still, we teeter on the precipice and somehow, after all the efforts of politicians, scientists and priests, we find it our responsibility, to map the space, to boldly go where no motherfucker has gone before.
Friends, we must invent the world, the outer mirrors the inner. Let The Peer Hat, temple to the Nine Muses, be the stage for the psychodrama that will reverberate, a cosmic explosion of art that mutilates, of art that burns, of art that raises anew.
And what of the promise of further lock-downs, of an ultimate end to The Peer Hat and places like it elsewhere? It matters not. We shift our real estate, hard and fast...with no small violence, into the soul, into the hand that wields the brush or the hammer. She wills it, She whose breath is pure telluric fire, the cosmic flame of inspiration.
Oh the Black Stage is a virus, a mimetic virus that hooks itself to your dream. Why… it is happening right now. It is your turn.
"Do What Thou Wilt" is back in fashion.
How does a magpie speak?
It doesn’t turn it’s beaked and inquisitive face to you and say “hello”, that is a given.
The sun falls upon the trees, the wind blows across the surface of the brown water. Somewhere a child screams in glee. The magpie never faces you directly. This is how it speaks. Nothing is isolated, new meanings form, ruthless they are ruthless, you are not what they were told they would find.
In a chorus then. Sure enough, you too are part of the choir
This is how a magpie speaks.
What On EARTH Is Happening?
Well we’ve quite a few lights on the horizon. Believe it or not… a first for the blog. Live shows...the possibility of gigs! I would hazard a guess, that you cannot wait for me to give it a rest with the side long glances and finger to the nose, ‘be seeing you’ winks. Let’s cut to the chase.
Astrid Williamson
Astrid was introduced to me by a mutual friend; I was genuinely surprised that I had not questioned the source of a voice I’d heard, I thought, within a dream… sometimes as a part of another act’s vibration. I’m thinking of this:
Sometimes like a nostalgic reverie I’m thinking of this:
With time, her vibe has seemed to accumulate stellar mass…. there is something majestic in the quality of her recent music
It’s something isn’t it?
Broken space dreams, this is where I place her, a lonely voice drifting upon the solar winds. Needless to say, we can’t wait.
Let’s get some tickets here.
MIFFF’d
MIFFF’s started as some kind of response to Manchester International Festival’s distinct lack of Mancunian underground talent. But now it’s something else. We recognise some of Manchester’s worthwhile talent, whilst offering up a cry of un-distilled rage for the blood crime of Peterloo… and those that lost their lives, the crime unavenged. It is to the criminal, that we entrust our reality.To those that hold it up with their dead universe of cogs and spectator robots, fashioned from corruptible meat.
But yeah, there’s going to be some interesting bands and a party. You want a party right? So do we all. Let us raise a glass to Peterloo, wherever you happen to be on that day/evening.
Rat Alley TV
Looks like somebody else has got onto this new media thing before us. It’s only bloody Lane Xup, who’s irrepressible nature and fierce drive has produced Rat Alley TV. What is it? A video zine I’d say, and of course, one invested with passion and belief. Check it out!
Flowing Backwards
Always a pleasure to recommend the continuing reminiscence of one Ian ‘Moet’ Moss. As per usual, tune in via the link below.
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STEAM RADIO Hulme
Eternal shout out to one of the hottest independent radio stations around. Naturally I have a show on there which you can hear at 4pm this coming Sunday! You’d be likely better served by tuning into Justin’s show OG OR MAN, which is ram packed with great local, independent talent. Check him out as regularly as you can, every other Sunday, 6-8 pm. Steam cloud below!
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There are some other things which we can’t 100% stamp, so I’m not going to mention them here. Believe me, I’d love to spew them out, but...not yet. Best not. Instead, let me re-iterate how keen we are to have you back with us. Here’s hoping that the mad and relentless tide, washes away from the shores of live music for a time . We could sure do with some respite. And if not? Well, it’s low hanging fruit to be sure, but you’d be well advised to pick up surf skills, and failing that, learn to scuba dive.
So, with excitement and anticipation we hope to see you by this very Wednesday! Omnia sub petasum.
