Beck Hansen's (The Rock Musician) Book About His Grandfather, The Artist Al Hansen Titled: "Beck & Al Hansen Playing With Matches"
Beck Hansen's (Rock Musician) Book About His Grandfather, The Artist Al Hansen Titled:
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- Beck & Al Hansen Playing With
1960's Fluxus Art Movement founded by Beck's Grandfather Al Hansen, was based upon the repurposing of ordinary junk & detritus and the creation of art that took the form of wave forms, and model towers created using burnt matches and match books, cigarette butts, old envelopes, used Hershey Bar wrappers, old envelopes, German beer coasters, found print advertising, erotica and politics held together with glue.
Al Hansen also wrote performative texts and intermedia poems from stream-of-consciousness remembrances of war and peace influenced by John Cage to instructions of "Happenings", or "Crazy Theatre" that Al founded in the late 50's. In the late '60's he collaborated with Andy Warhol and John Lennon.
With input from Yoko Ono he devised a Fluxus performance that involved pushing a piano off a high roof and recording the sound of hitting the ground and called it the Yoko Ono Drop. The act of pushing the piano off the roof of a building would seem to be a Happening/Event Art and the recording of it's impact and selling cassettes would be Fluxus.
Al transformed the ordinary detritus of consumer society turning the images back on themselves to better re-evaluate their contrived beauty
Beck Hansen's music is an extension of and is greatly influenced by his Grandfather's work. The song on his 90's album Odelay "Two turntables and a Microphone" is the audio equivalent of his Grandfather's cut and paste collages. Through the use of music samples and jumbled vocals, Beck's music places a spotlight on the imperfection and transience of all that is tangible and intangible.
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Where Did the Term "Three on a Match" Originate?
Where Did the Term "Three on a Match" Originate that implies that it's bad luck to light three wooden tapers or cigarettes with one match from a match box?
THREE ANSWERS:
1) Three is the symbol of the Holy Trinity.
To make mundane use of a match was to defile its sanctity and to transgress holy scripture. Man would invite disaster and put himself into the power of the 'evil one.' Thus, the use of a single match or lit wooden taper, would light the fires of Hell for one's own soul.
2) Self-protection in time of war.
The superstition first arose among British troops during the Crimean War. British soldiers, entrenched against Dutch foes in the Boer War, learned by bitter experience of the danger of lighting three cigarettes from one match. When the men thriftily used one match to serve three of them, they gave the Boer Sniper time to spot the light, take aim and fire to kill 'the third man'.
3) Ivar Kreuger, the President of The Swedish Match Company who was known as the 'match king', certainly did not create the term or the superstition surrounding it, as it has been alleged back in the 1930's. But he certainly exploited the term to promote sales for his company's matches! He surmised that most people, innately thrifty, were not using enough of his matches through their habit of conserving them by using a single match to light multiple candles, cigarettes, etc. After his successful campaign perpetuating the superstition of the wartime precaution and it's association with the mortal consequences of using just one match, he earned millions of pounds of profit for his company by greatly increasing sales of his Swedish Matches.
There was also a famous movie Three on a Match
That was based upon the story of three friends from childhood, Mary, Ruth, and Vivian, who meet again as young adults after some time apart. They each light a cigarette from the same match and discuss the superstition that such an act is unlucky and that Vivian, the last to light her cigarette, will be the first to die.
Make sure to load up and avoid the curse of THREE ON A MATCH by buying your own batch of branded matches for your business from TheMatchGroup or call one of our experienced "match makers" at 800.605.7331.
Old Advert. Torn From a Late '80's New York Magazine Featuring Matches from Famous Iconic NYC Night Clubs
Sorry for the old water stains and general tattiness of this old ad but I thought that I was obligated to share it with my fellow Phillumists!
This is an old advertisement for New York Magazine from the late '80's that featured matches from some of the most iconic nightclubs in NYC beginning with STUDIO 54 (1977), XENON (1978), MAGIQUE (1980), AREA (1981), PALLADIUM (1985), NELLS (1987) AND M.K.(1988).
Among the ones depicted in that ad, my favorites were AREA in Tribeca, PALLADIUM on East 14th St with it's famous private "invite only" celebrity packed Michael Todd Room and NELLS on West 14th street offering it's comfortable shabby chic old 'Victorian Library' theme. I experienced many unforgettable good times while attending each of those clubs, as well as many others at the time including The TUNNEL CLUB, The LIMELIGHT, CBGB's, MAX'S KANSAS CITY, THE ROOFTOP, SAVE THE ROBOTS and The PYRAMID CLUB in Alphabet City back when I was living in an apt in the '80's on Thompson St. in Greenwich Village.
In my opinion, the New York City of the '80's was the last era when NYC was the center of the nightclub universe; a period where one was able to experience the REAL unvarnished NYC club scene & live music without being forced to fork over $100-$200 for the privilege, a time when the City was a daily adventure (that was sometimes pretty scary) but I lived to tell the tale. It was the City that literally NEVER SLEPT! A time before the Bloomberg NYC of today that has sadly shed it's reputation as "FUN CITY".
Today's NYC sold it's soul by allowing itself to be dominated by the giant corporate footprints of a Starbucks on every corner, a GAP on every avenue, a "fill in the blank name" of every National Bank on every other corner that isn't a Starbucks, a Duane Reade/Walgreens, a "fill in the blank name"-Fast Food joint, and every national retail store stuffed into any available storefront that could be found inhabiting a mall in Anytown USA. The lack of today's diversity of locally unique NYC retail and entertainment venues is the sad result of skyrocketing rents offered by greedy landlords that only National & International corporations could afford.
Well, that's enough of my ranting for now....
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