Babbling Bobster Beatnik Poetry
October 27, 2006 10:36 AM   Subscribe

His fog, his amphetamines and his pearls
Lofi shot off the monitor at the recent EMP exhibit, the entire footage of an Eat The Document outtake recently edited by Martin Scorcese for No Direction Home.

I don't entirely get the Chaplinesque--To paraphrase crunchland, Hey, Skeezix--it's a talkie...
posted by y2karl (31 comments total) 1 user marked this as a favorite
 
were you on amphetamines when you wrote this?
posted by empath at 10:40 AM on October 27, 2006


Oh, thank you for this -- sublime. I think it is quite Chaplineque, actually. The b+w, 8mm quality, his somewhat stiff upper body with swingy arms and legs. particularly in the last bit as he steps off down the alleyway -- I can almost picture him wearing a bowler, swinging a cane.
posted by thinkpiece at 10:41 AM on October 27, 2006


Sit you down y2karl: Rest you.
posted by hal9k at 10:46 AM on October 27, 2006 [1 favorite]


In'shallah?
posted by matteo at 10:53 AM on October 27, 2006


What empath said. I read this fpp six times and I thought it was some science/art experiment. I thought some guy named Lofi was conducting and EMP (electromagnetic pulse) experiment and blew up a tv or computer monitor.

Imagine my disappointment.
posted by Pastabagel at 10:54 AM on October 27, 2006


What Pastabagel said. I was expecting non-directed energy weapons.

But early Dylan is pretty cool, too. This thread needs more dope.
posted by loquacious at 10:57 AM on October 27, 2006


*views video*

I take that back. What we need is cold, stark sobriety. Dylan's already soaking in it. That wasn't poetry, that was an acid-induced neurolinguistic fugue. If you watch carefully you can see the smoke sputtering out of his ears as he teeters precariously on the edge of an utter neocortical meltdown.
posted by loquacious at 11:00 AM on October 27, 2006


I think it is quite Chaplineque, actually. The b+w, 8mm quality, his somewhat stiff upper body with swingy arms and legs...

True that. The original and Scorcese's edit are in color and focus. And one can shoot sharper stuff off a TV. So, now the thought comes to mind that they sepiafied the video to bring out the Chaplinesque aspect. Which explains why it isn't so in sync with the audio.
posted by y2karl at 11:03 AM on October 27, 2006


I thought some guy named Lofi was conducting and EMP (electromagnetic pulse) experiment and blew up a tv or computer monitor.

The lyric allusion, movie titles and Martin Scorcese were three clues but perhaps the inadvertent puncronym was ill advised.
posted by y2karl at 11:10 AM on October 27, 2006


Uh. Um. What?

Nothing personal to Y2Karl but... never, ever, put anything from that idiotic miserable excuse for a rich guys storage unit, the EMP (or "supposed" SciFi museum), here again.
posted by tkchrist at 11:11 AM on October 27, 2006


I thought that was terrible, which is odd as I thought the segment in the Scorsese film was the only good thing about the documentary.

Also, how is it the "entire segment" when there's stuff in the Scorsese piece that isn't in the link? For instance, he's looking for someplace that's gonna "animal his soul" but the link is lacking.
posted by dobbs at 11:34 AM on October 27, 2006


And Chaplinesque is referring to the way he walks away from the camera at the end. It's a stretch to say the least but Dylan fans are always trying to give him more credit than he deserves (and he deserves a fuck of a lot).
posted by dobbs at 11:37 AM on October 27, 2006


Well, true all that, tkchrist, but that exhibit, while it was too small, was museum quality and did have some interesting artifacts and that clip--not exactly an official product of the aforementioned blight on the landscape, let it be noted--was one.

On review, dobbs, if that is true, my bad. I should have watched it closer. What bothered me about the No Direction Home clip was that it seemed shorter and jumpcut from the one shown at the EMP exhibit, which was funnier than hell in that context. Now I wonder if both original clips were edits and if whether the one in the post is an edit of the one at the exhibit. Or maybe it's another symptom of CRS. Well, thank you for providing that link. And I agree with you on the Chaplinesque.
posted by y2karl at 11:48 AM on October 27, 2006


Eats, shoots and leaves!
posted by 2sheets at 11:53 AM on October 27, 2006


hmm. If I was walking down the street in NYC and ran into some dude acting like that, I wouldn't think "that guy must be the folk genius of our time."

I would cross the street to avoid him.
posted by mathowie at 12:04 PM on October 27, 2006


Yeah, LSD would do that to you.

At a rave several years ago, someone stopped me while I was babbling about something or other while under the influence and said, "Those are called 'thoughts'. They're supposed to be INSIDE your head."

That's basically how I feel about this video.
posted by empath at 12:15 PM on October 27, 2006 [3 favorites]


I'd cross the street to ask what in the hell he was holding in his bag, so to speak.

More seriously he's either baked out of his gourd on the dreaded devil weed or he's about an hour away from peaking on acid. Which might explain why he bails out. I've seen that look before, and I have heard those words. He's munching God-flesh, and how.
posted by loquacious at 12:17 PM on October 27, 2006



He grew up in my home town, and pretty much hates how he was treated. My little town just couldn't handle him - I can't imagine his energy in that place. Glad we both left...
posted by fluffycreature at 12:31 PM on October 27, 2006


My wife and I seriously debated going this Halloween as a tweaker couple but in the end realized that the only way to act like this is to, you know, actually take amphetamines.

Tweakers are very funny people.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 1:00 PM on October 27, 2006


the EMP is lame
posted by dminor at 1:13 PM on October 27, 2006


Oh, I should think a protein packed lunch, no dinner and three Venti drips would do the trick quite well.
posted by y2karl at 1:15 PM on October 27, 2006


What a coincidence. I was just about to post to AskMe looking for a place that would knit me a cigarette.
posted by nebulawindphone at 1:36 PM on October 27, 2006


How to knit a cigarette. (self link.)
posted by loquacious at 2:00 PM on October 27, 2006


Johnny's in the basement
Mixing up the medicine
Lofi shot the monitor
at the EMP exhibit
edited by Scorcese
No Direction Homey
Entire footage of
Eat The Document outtake
don't entirely get the
Chaplinesque - but hey!
Look out kid
It's somethin' you did
paraphrase crunchland,
Hey, Skeezix--it's a talkie...
You better duck down the alley way
Lookin' for a new friend
matt in the coon-skin cap
In the big blue
Wants five dollar bills
You only got two
posted by hal9k at 2:23 PM on October 27, 2006 [3 favorites]


Paging cortex!
posted by loquacious at 2:39 PM on October 27, 2006


He was truly the Mark E. Smith of his generation.
posted by koeselitz at 2:49 PM on October 27, 2006


Chaplinesque

We make our meek adjustments,
Contented with such random consolations
As the wind deposits
In slithered and too ample pockets.

For we can still love the world, who find
A famished kitten on the step, and know
Recesses for it from the fury of the street,
Or warm torn elbow coverts.

We will sidestep, and to the final smirk
Dally the doom of that inevitable thumb
That slowly chafes its puckered index toward us,
Facing the dull squint with what innocence
And what surprise!

And yet these fine collapses are not lies
More than the pirouettes of any pliant cane;
Our obsequies are, in a way, no enterprise.
We can evade you, and all else but the heart:
What blame to us if the heart live on.

The game enforces smirks; but we have seen
The moon in lonely alleys make
A grail of laughter of an empty ash can,
And through all sound of gaiety and quest
Have heard a kitten in the wilderness.
posted by bardic at 3:19 PM on October 27, 2006


I love Hart Crane.

I like this Dylan segment because it shows how he loved to play with language, that it was really an end in itself, and also how young he was while all of this was taking place.
posted by luckypozzo at 3:43 PM on October 27, 2006


As were we all then.
posted by y2karl at 3:53 PM on October 27, 2006


I loved that clip in No Direction Home for the same reasons luckypozzo said.
Such a joyful and creative moment.
Thanks!

The EMP thing confused the hell out of me, too.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 6:01 PM on October 27, 2006


The schizophrenic/Tourette's dude I see occasionally downtown sounds remarkably similar to this.
posted by surlycat at 7:52 PM on October 27, 2006


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