Nothing much to say, but an observation. I used to come rolling in from the disco in the early 80’s when I had a little flat, and put on ‘Night Flight’ - a music and oddities show. They would show the fast-talking Bob Dobbs nattering on and on, and he creeped me out so bad I was paralyzed as if watching a cobra. I didn’t know if he was a ‘real thing’ or not, but I found the whole bit skin-crawling…matter of fact, ‘Night Flight’ showed a few other things etched into my memory, unpleasantly so.
Bob Dobbs had a voice? I thought he just had a pipe. But then I’ve only read their literature.
Another Night Flight fan! Ow!
Remember this one?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNl3g2FswOw
I’ve been a “member” since (IIRC) 1984. I’ve met both Ivan Stang and Philo Drummond; my copy of the Book is signed by Stang. Best Subgenius party I’ve been to was prolly during the 1995 Dragon Con in Atlanta. That whole fucking con was a blast!
ETA: I used to use a kind of low-key Project Mayhem method for disbursing the coupons from the back of the book!
EATA:
I remember this!
I joined the quest for slack in the late 80’s.
The right Reverend Bob Dobbs is the man.
Very odd. I still see COTS stickers around now and then.
A typo in the column: “Philosophically, the church owes** it’s** origin to the Discordian movement of the late 60’s and 70’s.”
There is a kickstarter to do a documentary of the Church: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2049586998/the-church-of-the-subgenius-a-documentary
Thankfully, I missed that one!.. I did see ‘The Cameraman’s Revenge’, a turn of the century stop-motion feature by Ladislas Starevich. Using insects dressed up…and devils, and gorillas. And that too was all so horrifiyingly mesmerizing, like a dream, a real, unsettling dream.
Yes, that one too.
Night Flight had a real instinct for finding mind-bending oddities that you couldn’t believe you were seeing on television. Such as “Dr Heckle and Mr. Hype”, with Oliver Reed! And Jackie Coogan as “Sergeant Fleacollar”. Cool music videos by the Cramps, Ramones, Raybeats, Fuzztones and others MTV would never play. A real beat-up, splicey 16mm print of the Beatles’ “Magical Mystery Tour”. "Andy Warhol’s Dracula. Animated shorts like “Quasi at the Quackadero” you’d never see anywhere else. And yes, there was Subgenius content too.
It was curated with remarkable care, but you never knew who was behind it - it just existed.