Issue 001
The first issue of our digital zine features music from Head Cut and Geneva Jacuzzi, LA's punk connection to the Hillside Strangler, and J.G. Ballard's prescient short story used for the Met Gala.
ISSUE 001:
Editor's Note
Outlaw Sounds
Impact Makers
Making It
Editor's Note
In the first issue of our digital zine, we highlight fellow artists and creators who are making an impact in media, music, fashion, and more. In upcoming issues, we will share a behind-the-scenes look at the projects we've worked on with artists we admire and insights into the creative process.
As a creative agency, Occulture offers services to fellow creatives that amplifies voices and calibrates the visual representation of artists to have integrity and impact among fans and the media channels that market artists to potential followers. We find it important to expand our discussion outside of our own client work to the larger view of the collective and bring to our readers a collection of items we think are worth your attention and provoke thoughtful discussion.
Outlaw Sounds
An exploration of music from the fringes featuring artists that have the maverick heart we admire.
Head Cut
Fusing a variety of musical influences from the underground, Head Cut's second album Corazón Negro explores themes of our inner world like anxiety, interpersonal dynamics, and fear about the future mirrored with the macro social and political factors that invites us to question where we stand and what we stand for. “Red Cloud,” the video for the first single from the album, was premiered on 3 May and hints at the fervor behind these themes in the other eight tracks that comprise Corazón Negro.
Geneva Jacuzzi
An artist who defies easy categorization, Geneva Jacuzzi offers an audio-visual experience with each single release. She was recently announced as the latest addition to the roster of Dais Records and premiered her latest video for “Dry” which features the artist suspended in a German Expressionist-style depiction of the twelfth card of the tarot's major arcana, the Hanged Man. We love the nod to and the occult theme she infused into this video.
Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari
Impact Makers
Media that caught our interest from writers and content creators that have a refreshingly distinct point of view.
“The Tragedy of Jane King: How a Murder Spree Collided With
Hollywood's Punk Revolution”
Joe Pompeo's article from 29 February for Vanity Fair still has us thinking about how fragile and important venues are for building communities and creating a safe space for innovation to occur, especially for subcultures. As Pompeo notes in the article, “In the popular imagination, late-'70s LA was a sun-kissed Xanadu of disco and yacht rock. The Masque nurtured a dark and irreverent alternative, creating a space where an influential subculture could thrive. It was a heady atmosphere of vice, debauchery, art, rebellion, and the requisite dash of danger. 'To a punk rocker'” recalls Kid Congo Powers, who went from Masque regular to guitarist for the Cramps, the Gun Club, and Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, 'few things were more alluring than danger.'”
That danger became all to real for one young member of the punk community in November 1977. Jane King was an aspiring actress who frequented the Masque, a Hollywood live music venue that is now iconic for being the short-lived meeting place for the weirdos comprising the first wave of punk in Los Angeles. King met her fate one evening when her path collided with the infamous late 70s LA serial killer the Hillside Strangler (which turned out to be a duo instead of a lone killer). Pompeo’s article is thoughtful as well as thorough and he elegantly summarized the tragedy of Jane King, writing:
At the Masque, King inhabited the same social space as people who would become stars, some in the most conventional sense of the word, others in their capacity as subcultural icons. Whether King herself actually had a chance of making it is beside the point; the killers took more than her life—they took her dreams.
Although Jane King’s story ended too soon, her involvement in the punk community created enduring interest from the peculiar intersection between mainstream media headlines about a serial killer and the dark side of Hollywood, echoing the Black Dahlia murder and reinforcing the lore of Hollywood Babylon. Poignantly, Pompeo closes the article with a statement from Los Angeles punk icon Pleasant Gehman, saying “There’s something about Hollywood that people who aren’t from Los Angeles don’t understand. The energy here is so hopeful but also so doomed.”
See more about the article from the Joe Pompeo’s Substack.
Making It
Events and exhibitions from the world of visual arts and fashion that dabbled in or paid homage to subculture.
The use of such a strikingly dystopian and melancholic narrative for an over-the-top fashion event seems odd at first but hints at the zeitgeist of our collective experiences, echoed throughout the arts both in mainstream and alternative channels.
The Strange Connection Between J.G. Ballard and the 2024 Met Gala’s Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion
The abject contrast between the glittering red carpet of the latest Met Gala (Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion) and the protest demonstration taking place just beyond the camera's reach seems fitting for a theme based on J.G. Ballard's early work, a short story from 1962 called “The Garden of Time.” The use of such a strikingly dystopian and melancholic narrative for an over-the-top fashion event seems odd at first but hints at the zeitgeist of our collective experiences, echoed throughout the arts both in mainstream and alternative channels. Among the short story's themes are beauty's fragility and the inevitability of decay, social inequality, and the facade of a disparity between the aristocracy and the masses--including the hoarding of wealth for the few at the expense of the many. We find it interesting to consider Ballard's influence from the fashion elites of the Met Gala to the references of his work that appear in alternative music, including favorites like The Creatures' “Miss The Girl,” The Church's “Chrome Injury,” and The Normal's “Warm Leatherette” among many others.
Standout visuals from the event included the attendees who seemed to understand the subtext of the directive and perhaps took the time to read the Ballard short story beforehand (or tasked a team member with doing so). Our favorites were Doja Cat's “wet t-shirt” dress (Vetements) covered in water and hair gel as a statement about the (over)use of textiles and its environmental impact as well as South African singer Tyla's “Sands of Time” sand dress (Balmain) with hourglass purse which literally eroded throughout the evening, a direct reflection of the land erosion seen as a result of climate change.
With that said, it's challenging to see the event singularly as an evening of elevated beauty and haute couture fashion when considering the vast amounts of money that went into each guest's presence at the event. The collective's response to this display of wealth—not dissimilar to that displayed by the wealthy couple in "The Garden of Time"—feels like life imitating art in the darkest way. Love it or not, the Met Gala and the cultural response to it is emblematic of the times we live in. Our hope is that it continues to stir social activism and thoughtful consideration from passive viewers about where they stand and how each of us can make our voices heard.
Words: Liz Rhodes
Graphics: Tanya Jessica
ABOUT OCCULTURE
Occulture is a creative agency publishing materials and offering services including editorial, creative direction, marketing, and advertising within the arts and music industry. We respond to the call for reviving the ecosystem of subcultures through meaningful discourse, projects, and community building so that its artists are heard, seen, and thrive.
We collaborate with fellow creatives in the arts and music industry to co-create a world where underground artists' legacies and voices are seen and heard while being fairly compensated for the impact they catalyze.
We know art impacts culture, creates legacy, and moves our collective forward and we are fellow agents changing the landscape into a place of community solidarity and hope.
Occulture 1825 N. Vermont Ave #27446 Los Angeles, CA 90027, USA
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