Xavier Renegade Angel: Bizzaro Neo-Psychedelia

Hello All,

Let me share with you my favorite television show of all time- Xavier: Renegade Angel, a bizarre 2007 animated Adult Swim show from the creators of Wonder Showzen

Xavier stars a monstrous looking creature named Xavier who spent his childhood studying under a rude, crass shaman and shortly after began his spirit journey to right the wrongs of the world using bad excuses for philosophy. It is without a doubt the most complexly written and stylized show I've ever seen broadcast on a national scale. The fact that it got picked up by a television station and lasted multiple seasons still amazes me, because the content matter is completely beyond what an average audience would find acceptable, let alone enjoyable. You'll see what I mean...

Watch an episode here. They are short.

So what happened there? I don't exactly know, but it's offensive, unpredictable and odd nature always seem to make me laugh boisterously.

On the surface Xavier: Renegade Angel seems to be just a "straightforward" Adult Swim show that only exists to confuse and bewilder but when you dig deeper and watch the series enough to move past the confusing premise and visuals some serious social commentary and philosophy become wildly apparent. And if you dig even deeper and watch more you can begin to notice some intensely layered and complex writing; most, if not all, of Xavier's lines are some form of word play that flows out his mouth in a way that are incredibly ignorant and stupid, but play on language and philosophical theories. Consider all of these qualities and then add on the mass amounts of psychedelia and try not to be impressed by the quality of writing. How do people think of these things?

Xavier: Renegade Angel sits firmly within niche media, not because of its obscure or underground nature, but because of how utterly unapproachable the content is to the average audience member; sure people can find this show easily, it's all over the place, but an audience member actually understanding and appreciating the show? I can only think of a handful of people that have seen and enjoyed XRA (and I've shown it to a lot of people. A lot of people.)

Intent- The creators of Xavier: Renegade Angel are members of the production company PFFR and also created the MTV show Wonder Showzen. They clearly had some kind of artistic intent in mind when creating XRA and as far as I can tell it was to offer social commentary through a psychedelic and offensively disarming aesthetic.

Oddness- Xavier: Renegade Angel is bizarre, insane and (for lack of a better word) "trippy". It utilizes philosophical quandaries, psychedelic imagery, offensive dialogue and layered plots to create one of the most jarring and confusing shows ever broadcast.

Findability-  XRA is incredibly easy to find. It was broadcast on television on Adult Swim and many of the full episodes are online. Xavier is not an underground show by any means and is easily accessible by anyone who wants to find it, the challenge is finding people that actually want to find and watch it.

Satisfaction- Personally, I find Xavier: Renegade Angel to be stunningly hilarious and a fresh take on the television format but I also understand the unapproachable nature of the show. Audience's satisfaction will vary greatly, but if you go in with an open mind and give it a chance, you will certainly have a new television experience.

Check it out and don't blame me if you hate it. :)

Thanks for reading,
Alex

Freddy Got Fingered Roundtable Discussion

Hello All,

Over the weekend a few fellow film students/bloggers and I got together and had a roundtable discussion on Freddy Got Fingered.

My fellow speakers blog pages:

Mike Allan- Mic'd Up

Casey Bargsten- Culture Cuts

Anthony Brousseau- Laughin' at Me


Check them out and listen to the discussion below!




Thanks for reading!
Alex

Finals Week: A Post Full of Shameless Plugs and My Own Photography

Hello All,

It's finals week over here at Augsburg, so things are undeniably hectic for me so in the spirit of finals week I've decided to keep this weeks post relatively simple/fun and share a bit of my work and my favorites from friends along with some concept images for fake bands that I completely made up.

Enjoy.

I'll start by shamelessly advertising my very own music that I produce under the pseudonym C4NiiBOii. None of it has been created with any artistic intent other than my personal drive to experiment with novelty music. None of the music is particularly good or made well for that matter, but it's certainly interesting (and has managed to attract one seriously sarcastic "fan"). Check it out and hopefully enjoy...

C4NDiiBOii

Mess My Pants

Knart Fockin'

Baby Fighting

And here is a local ambient noise project by Abyssopelagic aka my close friend Mike Fetting.

Abyssopelagic


Rend

Rift


And finally a group of some album art I designed for completely fake bands that I wish existed.

AFTRNN CMDWN: a self title released only on tape by a indie lo-fi garage electronica group.

Corduroy Jumpsuit: a self title from a high concept noise electronica duo.

Unhappy Father's Day by Tank Monster God King: a drone album by a doom metal band

Brain by The Smooth Jefferies: a sex jam album by a clean cut jazz band

The Big Sex: A self title by me, Mike Fetting & Mike Allan (hopefully becoming a real album soon)

So there it is. Some of my own personal work and some album art for bands that need to be real (in my opinion). Hopefully this was a short enjoyable break from studying for all of you, it certainly was for me.

Thanks for reading,
Alex

NIKE7UP: Destroying Pop Music Since 2010 (and still no one's heard of him)

Hello all,

It's time to discuss one of my favorite musicians of all time: NIKE7UP, a remix artist that focuses on chopping & screwing pop music into heavy non-traditional club bangers.

NIKE7UP is an artist shrouded in mystery, there is almost nothing known about him or his identity, he rarely posts on his social media pages and has only posted a handful of songs but each song is more tantalizing than the next. NIKE7UP's mysterious underground practices don't end there; his minuscule following can be confidently described as "cult" (at most) and he has been known to randomly show up at NYC nightclubs and perform but this is a rare occasion that is never promoted. NIKE7UP is an enigmatic artist surrounded by rumor and conjecture but there is no doubt that his music is fresh and unique.

NIKE7UP's music can be characterized by heavy driving beats set over chopped and screwed pop music. When considered separately these characteristics may seem generic and uninteresting but mixed together the result is something unique. I will refer to my personal favorite NIKE7UP song "SO REAL NIKE7UP BELONG TO MIX"; this is a song that feels as though it's at home when being blasted over the buzzing speakers of some destroyed makeshift red-lit club in the basement of a hipster drug den. The compressed Mandy Moore vocals in the intro offer a bit of misdirection, making the audience feel as though they are just getting another run of the mill remix until 5 seconds later when a deep, buzzing synthetic bass beat over powers the vocals and sends the audience spiraling into a dark dream state of dub club catatonia; listeners feel compelled to turn off the lights, close their eyes and just bounce with the beat.

Another great example of NIKE7UP's dark, unique stylistics can be found in his song "ME MYSELF & TIME NIKE7 <3 MIX" (this song is download only but the download is small and safe). The song begins with a effect driven restyling of Demi Lovato's vocals with a heavy driving beat. The vocals repeat for minutes while the effects and back beat morph and dissolve into others and then the song snaps back into a fast beat with new vocals leading the audience to think the song has hit its peak; there can't be any surprises left right? Wrong. The second wave of Lovato lyrics and beat continue for another few minutes gradually slowing down with almost unbearable tension until the song breaks into a loud explosion of digital bass that seems to pound in your chest and you can't help but dance along in an almost orgasmic release of anticipation. This song could drive a club of X poppers into an unstoppable and likely fatal dance freak out reminiscent of something you'd see in a movie about drunk college kids.

Whether or not these stylings are up your alley they are certainly an interesting and new take on club remixes. With only a few thousand followers, NIKE7UP offers a truly underground take on club remixes, taking it into the realm of dark heavy digital remix rather than the poppy upbeats that many remixes currently thrive on.

NIKE7UP is a personal favorite of mine and I hope you enjoy it as well.

Check out NIKE7UP's complete catalog on Tumblr. It's free.

Thanks for reading,
Alex

Vaporwave Music

Hello All,

Out there in the vast entity that is the internet, there exists a new genre of music that was created to only exist in a hidden, low-key online only venue and after an explosion of new fans it was labeled a dead genre by its creators. This genre of music is called Vaporwave and its incredibly interesting.

Vaporwave music was created by musician Chuck Person (aka Daniel Lopatin of Oneotrix Point Never) with the release of Eccojams Vol. 1 which was posted into a music forum where it quickly gained fans and sprouted many forum boards dedicated specifically to sharing and creating Vaporwave music. The movement continued to grow from there, quickly developing many contributing artists and manifestos, until finally an online only event was created where lead Vaporwave contributors would invite fans to secret chat rooms where they could watch the artists perform via videochat; this event was called SPF420 and was considered the birth of Vaporwave. The Vaporwave community grew exponentially after the event and the number of contributing artists skyrocketed. Here is an image detailing essential Vaporwave artists that was created and shared to aid listeners in sorting through the masses of Vaporwave artists. Give some of the artists a listen here, here and here.

Vaporwave is characterized by a highly digitally manipulated dreamy sound created from chopped, pitch shifted and effect driven remixes of 90's commercial jingles and pop music meant to convey the feeling of drifting through a digital mall of the future.. Many songs are titled in Japanese or written as computer files and all accompanying visual media is highly rooted within a distorted 90's digital consumerist aesthetic. The Vaporwave community describes this aesthetic through a manifesto of sorts:

"Global capitalism is nearly there. At the end of the world there will only be liquid advertisement and gaseous desire. Sublimated from our bodies, our untethered senses will endlessly ride escalators through pristine artificial environments, more and less than human, drugged-up and drugged down, catalysed, consuming and consumed by a relentlessly rich economy of sensory information, valued by the pixel.

The Virtual Plaza welcomes you, and you will welcome it too."


After the release of this "manifesto" and a related article, the Vaporwave community experienced another population/popularity burst and more artists began contributing and (according to the original contributors) changing the genre from its original stylistics; after this burst the community then began to consider Vaporwave to be a "dead" genre despite the fact that artists were/are still creating and sharing Vaporwave music.


And this all happened within a few months. Online. At no point in the life of Vaporwave was there any physical media.


And it's all free.


Check out some more artists:

Saint Pepsi- Hit Vibes

Disconcious- Hologram Plaza

Unpleasant Nostalgia- 2D Memories




Thanks for reading,

Alex

Shaye Saint John and the Experimental "Deep YouTube"

Hello All,

I've been deliberating a proper way to introduce you all to the experimental side of YouTube, which is often called "Deep YouTube" or "That part of YouTube".  I've found the perfect introduction- meet Shaye Saint John and prepare yourself. Shaye Saint John is a quintessential introduction to the mind numbing, confusing material that is consistently uploaded to the depths of YouTube and missed by many.

Deep YouTube is a place on YouTube that many people reach after following the downward spiral of related videos until reaching hidden, under viewed content that has been pushed out of the public eye by popular, more viewed videos under similar search tags. It can typically be challenging to consciously get to Deep YouTube but it is easy to identify when you have reached it.

A Deep YouTube video can generally (not always) be identified by a relatively low view count , a lo-fi or digital aesthetic, garbled or highly compressed audio, and unflinchingly bizarre content matter. Many of these films are simple videos that have no purpose other than to confuse, humor and assault you with avant-garde or experimental imagery and sound. Not all Deep YouTube videos have a purpose or were created for artistic gain, many are simple editing or animation experiments that were never intended to reach the internet, but somehow did.

But this is not the case with Shaye Saint John; every SSJ film was created with purpose by the late Eric Fournier who had heavy ties to The California Institute of Abnormal Arts; there is very little information on Fournier other than speculation on his death and his online persona Shaye Saint John.

The SSJ films are incredibly interesting; watching them produce a unique feeling of confusion: do you react with laughter, screaming, or crying? Its tough to describe this feeling without experiencing it first hand, so watch this and be conscious of how the video makes you feel.

Are you disgusted? Amused? Terrified? Horribly confused? All of these feelings are appropriate. In fact, feeling confused after watching SSJ seems to be the exact intent of Fournier. The combination of brainless dialogue, the lo-fi aesthetic and cheesy Windows Movie Maker effects culminate to create a series of films that look like they came directly from an asylum and make you feel like you belong in one.

This is why I believe SSJ and other experimental Deep YouTube videos to be important; in a time where shock value, irony and insincerity reign over media, these Deep YouTube videos still find a way to instill genuine feeling into an audience through rejection of classic structure or logic and by embracing heavily stylized low quality imagery and sound that forces the viewer to challenge their view on the need for structure in media.

Shaye Saint John-

Intent- While information on Eric Fournier is limited, the info out there states that Shaye Saint John was a character created to confuse and terrify the few lucky enough to encounter his films. There is clear intent by Fournier to create a piece of art with his work as SSJ, although the exact reasoning and theory remain to be seen, although I believe it to be Fournier's attempt to instill genuine confusion within an audience that has become numb to internet media.

Oddness- The SSJ films are incredibly odd and confusing, to the point of being legitimately disturbing. There is almost no way to describe how odd the films are without experiencing for yourself. So here is another, I'm sure you'll agree...it's odd.

Findability- Shaye Saint John is easy to find online. His name is scattered throughout the internet and videos are posted on multiple websites and forums randomly in hopes that viewers will stumble onto them and have an intense reaction. The point of the SSJ films is not to find them and watch them, but to encounter them when you'd least expect and have yourself a confusing good time.

Satisfaction- Personally, I find SSJ to be very satisfying. The films create genuine confusion. But the true satisfaction of Shaye Saint John comes from sharing the film and watching others go through the same roller coaster of confused, disgusted, disturbed emotion. It's truly a communal experience. None of us really get it, and that's great.


Other Deep YouTube videos:

Sausage Groove

You're Correct Horse

The New Kid

Snospis Eht

Sad Toy Cats

2016

Mom Ordered Ants for My Birthday

Garfielf


What are some of your favorite Deep YouTube videos? Comment and share!

Thanks for reading,
Alex