i was watching that the other day! his high pitched laugh injections are a wonder to behold.
there's still a weird vibe of contradiction in everything he says, though, because of his megalomania and the inherent tension between his trying to be calm and warm and humble while also explaining that understands the secrets of the multiverse
― 1994 ball boy (Karl Malone), Wednesday, 26 August 2015 14:35 (eight years ago) link
this video is another example of that psychotic mindsplit:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-QR5_58xPk
(he's performing a song from his 1991 tropical dance album, bora bora 2000)
on one hand, he's just playing his song for audience of zero to 1 people (depending on if you count the camera as a person...which he seems to), clearly having a good time and just losing himself in his music. but there's also a menacing egomania on display here. like when he switches to different sections of the song in ways that he finds delightful and brilliant, he can't help but look into the camera and smile. but it's not a normal smile, it's like a Iasos "i surrendered to the higher frequency and it made me do that, do you understand?" smile. when i first viewed the video i thought it was great and i was just kind of bouncing around my apartment to it, but imagine being in a closed room with him for a weekend, morphing into an extended stay, and then someone comes to visit you and you're like the peaceful version of brando in apocalypse now. it's by far the most disturbing tropical dance music clip i've ever seen
― 1994 ball boy (Karl Malone), Wednesday, 26 August 2015 14:43 (eight years ago) link
and the interaction between iasos and laraaji in the video at the top has similar layers. they're competing to see who can be the guru with the coolest outlook on the universe, but the genre forces them to battle passive-aggressively. at first laraaji seems to be incredibly chill and accepting of iasos as one possible outcome of the infinite. but (and i'm probably reading way too much into this) when laraaji gets a chance to explain his views at length, there's definitely a sense of him trying to envelop iasos. iasos counters by trying to bring laraaji's views within his own. it all blows up in the final section when they disagree over what the center is. for iasos the center is out of himself, but he's aligned with it. for laraaji, the center is the self. laraaji IS the universe. it's a fundamental disagreement, and a weird moment because it laraaji ends up injecting anger into the facade of tranquility. it also makes laraaji seem slightly crazier to me, almost like a higher order of insanity
― 1994 ball boy (Karl Malone), Wednesday, 26 August 2015 15:02 (eight years ago) link
haha, well said. laraaji's reaction shots are priceless. i love their music but i'm so glad i will never have to interact with either of them (iasos especially).
― lil urbane (Jordan), Wednesday, 26 August 2015 15:48 (eight years ago) link
I love the splash happy music and also the video
― saer, Wednesday, 26 August 2015 16:18 (eight years ago) link
i have a ticket for a laraaji yoga workshop next month, will def report back to this thread
― Merdeyeux, Wednesday, 26 August 2015 16:28 (eight years ago) link
oh man, that's amazing. please do!
― 1994 ball boy (Karl Malone), Wednesday, 26 August 2015 16:30 (eight years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.
― System, Friday, 28 August 2015 00:01 (eight years ago) link
when I went to buy a CD from Laraaji after his Big Ears laughter workshop, he seemed unexpectedly angry
― welltris (crüt), Friday, 28 August 2015 14:38 (eight years ago) link
what happened?
― 1995 ball boy (Karl Malone), Friday, 28 August 2015 14:57 (eight years ago) link
once me and a friend got into an argument on the street with a Hare Krishna guy and he lost his temper pretty badly
― MC Whistler (Noodle Vague), Friday, 28 August 2015 14:59 (eight years ago) link
(xp) He just heard Nixon got re-elected.
― Fields of Fat Henry (Tom D.), Friday, 28 August 2015 15:02 (eight years ago) link
http://www.wsj.com/articles/from-stand-up-comic-to-master-of-trance-music-1440192031
would love to hear Laraaji's stand-up set.
― lil urbane (Jordan), Friday, 28 August 2015 15:37 (eight years ago) link
― 1994 ball boy (Karl Malone), Wednesday, August 26, 2015 11:02 AM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
This makes me think of this awesome issue of the Fantastic Four (early 80s but before the Byrne run) where The Sphinx and Galactus went head to head
― banned on ixlor (Jon not Jon), Friday, 28 August 2015 15:39 (eight years ago) link
btw you guys might enjoy this mix i did including both of them + similar sounds.
― lil urbane (Jordan), Friday, 28 August 2015 15:41 (eight years ago) link
haha, that link opened up an empty tab for me, but somehow that's very appropriate for this thread
― 1995 ball boy (Karl Malone), Friday, 28 August 2015 15:44 (eight years ago) link
ha, oops. how about this one? https://soundcloud.com/loveisnoiseblog/love-is-noise-mix-026-chants-bedtime-mix
― lil urbane (Jordan), Friday, 28 August 2015 15:55 (eight years ago) link
guru's partner leaves him. guru moves home with mom. guru buys keyboard from radio shack.
― am0n, Friday, 28 August 2015 15:59 (eight years ago) link
they both seem like little children, and not in a good way
― rip van wanko, Friday, 28 August 2015 16:00 (eight years ago) link
https://38.media.tumblr.com/7e7e45d921c1da0c1bf7e47fe90433a6/tumblr_ntsvswB98m1qdmmiqo1_500.gif
― 1995 ball boy (Karl Malone), Friday, 28 August 2015 16:15 (eight years ago) link
oh wait, i can do better
― 1995 ball boy (Karl Malone), Friday, 28 August 2015 16:18 (eight years ago) link
ok, it's almost the same. whatever. IASOS!
https://33.media.tumblr.com/ba9ac428b6512170cf59daa47dc180aa/tumblr_ntsvswB98m1qdmmiqo1_r1_500.gif
― 1995 ball boy (Karl Malone), Friday, 28 August 2015 16:34 (eight years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.
― System, Saturday, 29 August 2015 00:01 (eight years ago) link
I think this was an amazing thread. Great stuff.
― winnebago taco, Saturday, 29 August 2015 07:31 (eight years ago) link
iasos reminds me of ricardo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxAxRy93RiA
― saer, Saturday, 29 August 2015 11:51 (eight years ago) link
"I once had an interesting experience with a tree"
― though she denies it to the press, (Joan Crawford Loves Chachi), Saturday, 26 November 2016 02:09 (seven years ago) link
did this video get taken down :(
― global tetrahedron, Tuesday, 6 February 2018 17:11 (six years ago) link
i'm not seeing any of the embeds in this thread, at least when i view it in Chrome. but i've been having all sorts of strange issues with browser videos lately with my computer, so that could just be me.
here's the link to the OP video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsdAp3OpJrc
― Karl Malone, Tuesday, 6 February 2018 17:15 (six years ago) link
whoops, i didn't mean to embed that.
link to video
― Karl Malone, Tuesday, 6 February 2018 17:19 (six years ago) link
http://thequietus.com/articles/23592-laraaji-interview-baker-s-dozen-favourite-albums-cafe-oto?page=7
― linee, Sunday, 11 February 2018 04:22 (six years ago) link
any opinion on the new laraaji reissue on numero?
― the late great, Sunday, 11 February 2018 04:26 (six years ago) link
http://f4.bcbits.com/img/a1315680768_16.jpg
The greatest album artwork of all time?
― mirostones, Tuesday, 3 April 2018 23:28 (six years ago) link
hahaha possibly. I really wanna hear that now.
Numero Group doing God's work uploading full episodes of Laraaji's public access show from the 80s:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgE5wb9bXKI
― J. Sam, Tuesday, 3 April 2018 23:48 (six years ago) link
You're in luck, J. Sam: https://iasos.bandcamp.com/album/music-for-accelerated-consciousness-love-making
― lbi's life of limitless european glamour (Le Bateau Ivre), Wednesday, 4 April 2018 11:37 (six years ago) link
I don't find either of them as malevolent or off-putting as people in this thread seem to, I guess. I mean maybe if I knew them personally, I'd feel different -- I spent my late childhood through early adulthood in a California town where many dudes had a bit of the would-be guru schtick going, and as I grew older it became clear that the fx of this was largely getting laid. But neither Laraaji nor Iasos strike me as opportunistic in their stuff; they're interested in some metaphysical questions which they think are bigger than language can really contain, or that's hard, anyway, to get at in words. when Iasos gets going about the now-ness of music and what that suggests about the self, he's really commenting about something I think most of us who love music also feel -- that the moment of music is inherently metaphysical, that it transports us to a moment where we can understand through experience the concept of an eternal now.
Their backgrounds, too, have to be informing their ideas in important ways - Iasos went into music after college -- showed up on the scene in Santa Cruz in '68 with an anthropology degree from Cornell under his belt and immediately began making music with Steven Halpern. Laraaji has formal training from Howard in composition, and worked in clubs both as a comedian and as a musician in ensembles before arriving at his spirituality. He comes to his ideas about music are formed after having played "regular" music for some time. I guess that doesn't really pertain to much in the video this is about but it feels like an important difference to me.
― she carries a torch. two torches, actually (Joan Crawford Loves Chachi), Wednesday, 4 April 2018 13:20 (six years ago) link
I mean, I don't know...http://iasos.com/services/index.html#GoddessCouncil
― brimstead, Thursday, 5 April 2018 00:22 (six years ago) link
Iasos has been functioning as a goddesss-facilitator/activator for over 25 years, and will be sharing from the feminine aspect of his being, so it "feels" more like a woman sharing with her sisters.
― brimstead, Thursday, 5 April 2018 00:24 (six years ago) link
yeah idk. I don't think dudes who take an active interest in hippie dippie sacred feminine shit are automatically creepanoids. who knows, maybe iasos is only in it for the chicago world's fair rich exoticist women ready to get told they're aligned with the cosmos but I don't think that's the only possibility for this stuff. nb I could be hopeless naive and overoptimistic about ppl's motives & it would not be the first time.
― she carries a torch. two torches, actually (Joan Crawford Loves Chachi), Thursday, 5 April 2018 00:27 (six years ago) link
rest easy Iasos you were an absolute trailblazer in this kinda music.
― J Edgar Noothgrush (Joan Crawford Loves Chachi), Tuesday, 9 January 2024 17:24 (four months ago) link
damn, i am sorry that i made this dumb thread title and that it had this dumb premise. iasos is a stone cold legend and he brought a lot of peace and serenity to a lot of people. rip iasos
― z_tbd, Tuesday, 9 January 2024 20:56 (four months ago) link
On that note, Z! This was a lovely salute to him from Brent Sirota
https://aquariumdrunkard.com/2024/01/10/iasos-crystal-love/
― Ned Raggett, Wednesday, 10 January 2024 19:28 (four months ago) link