Who ever said that quantity is not a quality? The past months’ veritable floodgate of Breyer P-Orridge-related material deserves a closer look. Or are you perhaps already aware of all of these things? The publishing of First Third’s monumental memory lane volume Genesis Breyer P-Orridge, containing hundreds of images of Genesis in formal transition over the decades, is an impressive feat. Not only is the project as such highly interesting and revealing (transition and morphing being one of Genesis’ main tools of the artistic trade). It’s also such a beauty of a book, with standards of production worthy of a Steidl, Rizzoli or Taschen. The underground in an overground package, so to speak. Mind boggling stuff! Dais Records in New York recently released an LP with COUM Transmissions. This isn’t all music per se but recorded sounds from the COUM era. It’s a nice release, and a must have for completists of course (read: Industrial Culture philatelists)...

Taschen re-issues Peter Beard’s mega volume with some added material and of course it’s a feast for the eyes and the adventurous at heart. The American psychedelic multiversalist presents a life-loving tour de force that almost leaves you with a bad conscience for not having achieved as much as he has. Well, there’s still time to change that, of course. And this magnificent book provides ample inspiration. This is a heavy book, although it’s shrunk in size from the original Taschen mega bumper XXL size that required a special table back in 2006. Now you can actually keep it on your lap, which will ache after a while though. There’s something psychologically smart about that. Because if you take in everything at once, you’re likely to be utterly swamped. Peter Beard’s palimpsestic mind is a beautiful whirlwind of a filter that us normals best handle in adequate doses. This is also a heavy book in the sense that it encompasses a lifetime of...

Magic is not only a cultural sphere consisting of compensatorily inclined individuals with inflated egos wallowing in arcane structures and symbols (I can hear you: “Look who’s talking!”, right?). Let’s call that “Sphere 1”. There is also another cultural sphere based on trickery, illusions and mentalism that goes by the same name: “Sphere 2”. Sometimes they seem to co-exist. The megavolume Magic 1400s-1950s, recently issued by Taschen, touches upon Sphere 2 and its related cultural impact. Amply illustrated, the book is also a mind blowing tour of classic advertising for magic shows and other alluring events. Flyers, posters, photos and reviews are superbly reproduced, and it’s an absolute joy to flip through the 650 pages of this truly heavy volume. It’s in this image material and in the introduction to stage magic that Magic 1400s-1950s earns its merits. Textually, it draws many erroneous conclusions in comparing Sphere 1...