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We received a mail from Michael Traylor about a new project which involves Mark Boston. Here it is: [wp_quote]Just a note to let you know that Rockette and I have been working on a studio CD with a blues artist name Roger “Hurricane” Wilson….the CD should be released some time in early summer.. Rockette played bass and I played drums and am producing the project…one notable point is that we are doing a new arrangement of Sure Nuff and Yes I Do…there is some fun material such as a version of Exodus originally recorded by the Ventures…stay tuned for updates and links to the CDRead More →

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Shiny Beasts is a compliation of the early work of acclaimed comic book artist Rick Veitch. The title is taken from Rick’s 1981 creation, Shiny Beast, which according to Stephen Bissette in his MYRANT page is more than just a nod to Captain Beefheart. Stephen describes at some length just what it is about Captain Beefheart which inspires Rick Veitch and himself. Many of us fondly remember Stephen Bissette’s work Big Eyed Beans From Venus which included lettering by Rick Veitch. Mike Lorah’s interview with Rick Veitch about Shiny Beasts is available at newsarama.com. Shiny Beasts will be published in April.Read More →

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Here’s a photograph of the Van Vliet Flower Group’s tour waggon parked up at one of northern Englands newest music venues, the Don Van Vliet Lounge (click on the pictures for larger images). Sadly, the Van Vliet Flower Group is a multinational wholesaler of flowers and is not yet the name of a Captain Beefheart tribute band. The Don Van Vliet Lounge is just one of a suite of rehearsal rooms named after old musicians at the newly opened Rock and Roll Circus in Leeds.Read More →

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Is this the earliest surviving Captain Beefheart poster? The hand-painted graphic work on poster paper (12″x18″) was made to advertise a Captain Beefheart concert at San Fernando Valley State College in May 1965. Victor Hayden, the artist responsible, was later to join The Magic Band as The Mascara Snake. Pamela Des Barres says that she removed the poster from the wall of Cleveland High School and has recently found it in her attic. It is now for sale at eBay.Read More →

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Don is 66 today and so we would like to wish him felicitations, congratulations and commendations for many happy and healthy returns. All of us here at beefheart.com would like to express our thanks to Don for his great art which will never be forgotten as long as there’s a fly’s eye to see it with. Our smiles are most certainly stuck. If you need a soundtrack for your evening, there can be only one choice – break out the urine coloured lights and sing along to “Happy Birthday.”Read More →

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I’ve received a note from Mike Bugbee who provided us with his excellent eye-witness account of Don and Jan’s wedding a few years ago. He’s got a book coming out soon (unrelated to the wedding) and Michael Bugbee is the author of a soon-to-be-published novel, Notes from Hotel Misterioso, from Mline Books. The official publication date is April 1, 2007, but beginning in January 2007 prepublication copies are available through www.mlinebooks.com, $14.95 U.S. or $17.95 Canadian plus shipping. Inquiries to: info@mlinebooks.com. If you haven’t read Mike’s wedding account yet, you really should – it is one of my very favourite items here on beefheart.com andRead More →

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Herb Bermann, the legendary poet who wrote most of Captain Beefheart’s Safe As Milk lyrics (and some more) appears on a new DVD recently recorded at a poetry reading at Beyond Baroque. Good-Bye to the Rodeo Grounds is a sort of momento of one of the last artist communities in Los Angeles, evicted to make way for a state park. In his interview for this website Herb talked about this, and of course about his involvement with Captain Beefheart. The DVD is available from Custom Flix or Amazon. There are several excerpts from it at YouTube, including an 8 minute sequence of Herb Bermann readingRead More →

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Nigel Godrich, producer of Radiohead, Travis and Beck, among others, has become nostalgic for music videos as he remembers them. Curiously enough, his memory of music videos doesn’t seem to include the idea that music videos were always given away for free. So it is that if you would like to watch Nigel’s latest wheeze, From The Basement [now removed], an internet only music video source, you’ll have to pay for it. National Public Radio carries a story about this project. In From The Basement #1, Thom Yorke previews the new Radiohead album, The White Stripes perform Party Of Special Things To Do one more time,Read More →

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Author Kevin Courrier is currently completing a book about Trout Mask Replica which should be published later this year. The book will investigate some possible sources for the ideas which were realised in the making of the album. According to Continuum, the publisher, these include Walt Whitman, Gregory Corso, Charley Patton, Howlin’ Wolf, Ornette Coleman and Richard Berry and the Coasters. Continuum’s website says that this book will illustrate, “how Trout Mask Replica, far from being an arcane specimen of the avant-garde, was instead a defiantly original declaration of the American imagination.” Kevin’s Courrier’s previous books were about Randy Newman and Frank Zappa. Publication dateRead More →

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There’s a Captain Beefheart Tribute event happening in Sydney, Australia on January 28th when local movers and shakers The Captain’s Package, MC Jay Katz, Rica Tetas and last, but not with least words in their name, A Squid Eating Dough In A Polyethelene Bag Is Fast And Bulbous appear on stage at The Annandale Hotel.Read More →

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“Captain Beefheart is the shingle that gave me shingles,” complains Don Van Vliet in Lars Movin’s gentle evocation of Don’s life and circumstances since he became a full-time painter. “It makes me itch to think of myself as Captain Beefheart. I don’t even have a boat!” I don’t even have a boat – calling the Captain is a charming misty travelogue of the road leading to the place where Don Van Vliet has found himself as a painter, and the shoreline – land, sea and sky – which Don inhabits and describes. Waves lap, seabirds dry their wings, fishing boats bob and seals bask asRead More →

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The Red Hot Chili Peppers closed the last concert of their 2006 tour by playing the Captain Beefheart composition Peon as final encore. John Frusciante took the guitar part and Flea played bass. Rolling Stone recently noted that John Frusciante is owner of some original Don Van Vliet paintings. Flea frequently name-checks and quotes Captain Beefheart, sometimes in the most unlikely of contexts such as his NBA blog. This is not the first time Flea and Frusciante have attempted to play this tune. On 15th October 2002 Flea wrote, “John and I can play “peon’ by Captain Beefheart all the way through now. It isRead More →

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Jeopardy Jaws dropped across a nation on December 11th when the B-word was used on American prime-time television. Captain Beefheart had become famous for a moment and fans rushed to write to internet discussion groups with the unlikely news. The cause of the excitement? A $1200 question in the game show Jeopardy, “Captain Beefheart is said to have a range of 4.5 of these.” If you don’t know the answer, go to the Jeopardy Archive here and point your mouse at the appropriate square in Double Jeopardy! Round The Big O. More video Bob wrote in from Boulder to mention that he’d spotted former MagicRead More →

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Coming Clean, a new album by Magic Band maestro and guitar-god Gary Lucas has been gathering hugely favourable reviews for Gary’s exemplary skills and for the killer line-up he has assembled for the current incarnation of his band Gods and Monsters. Among those appearing on the album, which was five years in the making, are Ernie Brooks (Modern Lovers) on bass, Billy Ficca (Television) and Jonathan Kane (Swans) on drums, Jason Candler (Hungry March Band) on alto sax and Joe Hendel on trombone, with special guest vocalists David Johansen (New York Dolls). Reviewing this album, Rolling Stone called Gary, “one of the best and mostRead More →

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The recent Fast’n’Bulbous tour was a great success, by all accounts. Sold out concerts and very positive word of mouth make those of us who weren’t present a little jealous of those who were. However, help is at hand in the form of some video footage of Fast’n’Bulbous in action in Amsterdam on November 17th. Clips of When It Blows Its Stacks, Sugar ‘N Spikes, You Know You’re A Man and Tropical Hot Dog Night are now showing at YouTube. The full Amsterdam concert will be broadcast on Wednesday January 31st 2007 at 22:00 on Co de Kloet’s Studio 6 show, NPS (National Dutch radio).Read More →

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Rockette Morton and Denny Walley joined Big Eyed Beans from Venus for the second set of their Captain Beefheart covers concert in Atlanta, GA on November 16th. The concert can be heard at Southern Shelter or at Dime a Dozen (torrent ID 122352). The Fast’n’Bulbous concert of Captain Beefheart covers in Amsterdam on November 17th was recorded by Dutch radio for future broadcast (and hopefully webcast too) . We’ll post full details as soon as we learn them. Thanks to all concerned.Read More →

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How could anyone visiting this website resist hearing instrumental versions of the Captain’s songs played like a New Orleans marching band imbued with extra weirdness? Resist no longer, Fast’n’Bulbous: The Captain Beefheart Project is unleashed on London and six other European cities over the next few days. Led by former Captain Beefheart guitarist Gary Lucas, Fast’n’Bulbous perform thrilling instrumental versions of the Beefheart canon. A tribute blazing with idiosyncratic precision and earthy abandon. Yes I know I’m paraphrasing the publicity material, but this is after all only a reminder of the information I posted here already in June and August. If you can offer aRead More →

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Generations of fans can testify just how difficult it used to be to find women who had any interest at all in Captain Beefheart’s music. Captain Beefheart always said that his music was for women, but not until recently did this message seem to be getting through. The Magic Band reunion concerts were notable for the number of women who attended and demonstrably appreciated the music. Now, in Trondheim in Norway, two hard rocking female students are hosting a weekly radio show called Ella Guru. Captain Beefheart’s Ella Guru is their theme tune. Thea Aarbakke and Sara E. Grønvold are Ella Guru’s DJs. Sara (toRead More →

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On August 31st, I noticed in The Salt Lake City Weekly that The State Governor of Utah was, “eager to discuss his love of Captain Beefheart albums and Grateful Dead concerts.” Had Captain Beefheart become part of a political demographic, a conservative icon like Jerry Garcia? I was intrigued. The only politician of note who had previously declared for Captain Beefheart was Czechoslovakia’s President Vaclev Havel, although even that story came from Don Van Vliet himself. I wrote immediately to Governor Jon M. Huntsman Jr’s office in Utah to find out just how eager he might be to discuss Captain Beefheart. I included a fewRead More →

China Pig

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Four works by Don Van Vliet are included in an exhibition to be held under the aegis of New York’s Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). MUSIC IS A BETTER NOISE is an exhibtion of art made by artists who are also musicians (or vice versa) or whose creative process has music as an integral part. Thurston Moore, Devendra Banhart, Alan Vega, Leigh Bowery, Eye and Kim Gordon are among the many other artists represented. China Pig, an oil painting from 1987 (pictured here) is the largest of Don Van Vliet’s works on display (102 x 76) . His other titles are: Untitled (Woman) 1986 GouacheRead More →