I really love that film, but had forgotten (or not been aware) that it relied so much on Coil. It really captured the gnarly dimension of DMT, as well as the whole bardo quality of psychedelics in general. A harrowing journey but one of the best drug films of recent decades for sure.
Hi Mike. Not an error! This is a convention that has been used inconsistently but regularly in the underground when discussing both DMT and 5-Me0 to make sure to distinguish them! Yes N,N -DMT is generally referred to as "DMT" but can just as well be described as "N,N-DMT" and often is. Just following Erowd on this one, they often use that nomenclature (or whatever) to distinguish the substances.
Hi Rob, thanks for responding with your feedback on Blotter. It is especially meaningful that you weren't already interested in the topic -- that shows that I am doing something right, or at least that the topic is pretty interesting! It was a fun project to work on, I liked getting my hands into the archives and selecting and arranging the presentation with the designer...Right on!
Big screen...nice! One of my favorite subgenres of film are "bardo films", where the fictional otherworld may or may not be the afterlife...Jacob's Ladder, Beetlejuice, Abre los ojos, Dead Man, Into the Void, An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge.
What are some other good additions to the list? Not ghosts in reality movies, but movies where the entire reality may or may not be the afterlife.
I love it, what a rich response to the fundamental absurdity of tying music too tightly to drugs or drug experience. I also really enjoy it when sophisticated music folks "get it" regarding the Dead. Inside I am like, That god its not just the drugs! Although the shows I caught when I was straight weren't as fun, it was less about the music than the lack of gooey mindmeld with your fellow travelers.
My best friend is an incredible abstract artist. Studied with Ram Dass at Harvard, went to India with him. Melted crayons swirling around in a fractally way. He hates when people label his art psychedelic. But it's like that SCOTUS justice's definition of pornography. We just know.
50th anniversary of Mars Hotel. One of those tunes I believe was on the first Dick's Pick. I never could keep track of that shit, maybe because I think it's all rather silly. But when the 2nd came out, I took my dad for a spin in my new car that had a killer stereo. My graduation present to myself after graduating med school in NYC, and a necessity for residency. Old man was a classical music genius, runs in the family with a couple cousins who are famous (Gil and Orli Shaham). I played Dark Star for him, and he freaked. Said goddamn sounds just like a concerto for guitar. Now I see why you love this band so much. Guy never so much as smoked a joint in his adult life (well he might have indulged in hashish as a young teenager in Jerusalem). My rhythm guitar player is a strange cat, 60 years making a living playing the clubs in Los Angeles. Never listened to the Dead until I turned him on several moons ago. He's never smoked pot or taken any drugs. Now he sounds better than almost any dude in most Dead cover bands when he jumps on some Dead songs. Some, because I can't get him to learn 40 songs at once, and I'm learning a shit ton of new songs that he enjoys playing.
What's ridic? To think that one would need to be under the influence of a psychedelic, let alone a specific one, to enjoy a work of music or art. For some of us it certainly doesn't hurt, but it's far from necessary. That would be the old joke of deadheads thinking the band is fantastic until the drugs wear off.
Erik, just dropping in to say that Blotter is fantastic. I bought it because I like you and your work, but didn't think I was especially interested in the topic. I ended up reading it in one sitting over the weekend, couldn't put it down.
I learned so much, lots to think about (in particular, I have a new appreciation for the potential of LSD precisely because the wellness and medical industries seem unlikely to wrest control of it from us), and I always, really enjoy your writing. Beautifully written, photographed and assembled, thanks for putting it into the world.
Since it's so relevant to what you're describing, and yet unmentioned, I wonder if you consider Gaspar Noe's 2009 film Enter the Void -- with its heavy use of Coil in the score, its depiction of smoking psychedelic crystals, its expansively rendered hallucinations, and its pursuit of the protagonist's actual post-murder journey though the Bardo -- a sucker cut? It's so on-point to what you describe in this essay I was curious.
Yes, DMT certainly is N,N,DMT but this is not special to DMT.
5MeO-DMT is also N,N,5MeO-DMT, just as psilocin is N,N,psilocin, psilocybin is N,N,psilocybin and bufotenine is N,N,bufotenine, etc. These two Ns refer to the symmetrical disposition of the two methyl groups at the end of the tryptamine tail - a feature shared by almost all psychedelic compounds in this group.
Please share this information as so may people (even your good self) fall into this error.
I really love that film, but had forgotten (or not been aware) that it relied so much on Coil. It really captured the gnarly dimension of DMT, as well as the whole bardo quality of psychedelics in general. A harrowing journey but one of the best drug films of recent decades for sure.
Syliva Thyssen from Erowid is my copy editor, so I do what she says!
Hi Mike. Not an error! This is a convention that has been used inconsistently but regularly in the underground when discussing both DMT and 5-Me0 to make sure to distinguish them! Yes N,N -DMT is generally referred to as "DMT" but can just as well be described as "N,N-DMT" and often is. Just following Erowd on this one, they often use that nomenclature (or whatever) to distinguish the substances.
Happy you are coming to LA! Got my tix for Zebulon!
Hi Rob, thanks for responding with your feedback on Blotter. It is especially meaningful that you weren't already interested in the topic -- that shows that I am doing something right, or at least that the topic is pretty interesting! It was a fun project to work on, I liked getting my hands into the archives and selecting and arranging the presentation with the designer...Right on!
Big screen...nice! One of my favorite subgenres of film are "bardo films", where the fictional otherworld may or may not be the afterlife...Jacob's Ladder, Beetlejuice, Abre los ojos, Dead Man, Into the Void, An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge.
What are some other good additions to the list? Not ghosts in reality movies, but movies where the entire reality may or may not be the afterlife.
I love it, what a rich response to the fundamental absurdity of tying music too tightly to drugs or drug experience. I also really enjoy it when sophisticated music folks "get it" regarding the Dead. Inside I am like, That god its not just the drugs! Although the shows I caught when I was straight weren't as fun, it was less about the music than the lack of gooey mindmeld with your fellow travelers.
Nothing compares to Ether, no matter what.
It's all rather ridic.
My best friend is an incredible abstract artist. Studied with Ram Dass at Harvard, went to India with him. Melted crayons swirling around in a fractally way. He hates when people label his art psychedelic. But it's like that SCOTUS justice's definition of pornography. We just know.
50th anniversary of Mars Hotel. One of those tunes I believe was on the first Dick's Pick. I never could keep track of that shit, maybe because I think it's all rather silly. But when the 2nd came out, I took my dad for a spin in my new car that had a killer stereo. My graduation present to myself after graduating med school in NYC, and a necessity for residency. Old man was a classical music genius, runs in the family with a couple cousins who are famous (Gil and Orli Shaham). I played Dark Star for him, and he freaked. Said goddamn sounds just like a concerto for guitar. Now I see why you love this band so much. Guy never so much as smoked a joint in his adult life (well he might have indulged in hashish as a young teenager in Jerusalem). My rhythm guitar player is a strange cat, 60 years making a living playing the clubs in Los Angeles. Never listened to the Dead until I turned him on several moons ago. He's never smoked pot or taken any drugs. Now he sounds better than almost any dude in most Dead cover bands when he jumps on some Dead songs. Some, because I can't get him to learn 40 songs at once, and I'm learning a shit ton of new songs that he enjoys playing.
What's ridic? To think that one would need to be under the influence of a psychedelic, let alone a specific one, to enjoy a work of music or art. For some of us it certainly doesn't hurt, but it's far from necessary. That would be the old joke of deadheads thinking the band is fantastic until the drugs wear off.
Erik, just dropping in to say that Blotter is fantastic. I bought it because I like you and your work, but didn't think I was especially interested in the topic. I ended up reading it in one sitting over the weekend, couldn't put it down.
I learned so much, lots to think about (in particular, I have a new appreciation for the potential of LSD precisely because the wellness and medical industries seem unlikely to wrest control of it from us), and I always, really enjoy your writing. Beautifully written, photographed and assembled, thanks for putting it into the world.
Well done, such a great read! ॐ ♥︎
Since it's so relevant to what you're describing, and yet unmentioned, I wonder if you consider Gaspar Noe's 2009 film Enter the Void -- with its heavy use of Coil in the score, its depiction of smoking psychedelic crystals, its expansively rendered hallucinations, and its pursuit of the protagonist's actual post-murder journey though the Bardo -- a sucker cut? It's so on-point to what you describe in this essay I was curious.
Yes, DMT certainly is N,N,DMT but this is not special to DMT.
5MeO-DMT is also N,N,5MeO-DMT, just as psilocin is N,N,psilocin, psilocybin is N,N,psilocybin and bufotenine is N,N,bufotenine, etc. These two Ns refer to the symmetrical disposition of the two methyl groups at the end of the tryptamine tail - a feature shared by almost all psychedelic compounds in this group.
Please share this information as so may people (even your good self) fall into this error.