This is going to be good.
If you recall director Ron Fricke’s fantastic movie, Baraka, you’ll almost certainly want to see this, his new “guided meditation on the cycle of birth death and rebirth.” (Or, if you’ve seen Koyaanisqatsi, etc.) And if you don’t recall Baraka, you’ll want to see this AND Baraka. Here’s the story from the film’s website:
Samsara is a word that describes the ever turning wheel of life. It is a concept both intimate and vast – the perfect subject for filmmakers Ron Fricke and Mark Magidson, whose previous collaborations include Chronos and Baraka, and who, in the last 20 years, have travelled to over 58 countries together in the pursuit of unique imagery.
Samsara takes the form of a nonverbal, guided meditation that will transform viewers in countries around the world as they are swept along a journey of the soul. Through powerful images pristinely photographed in 70mm and a dynamic music score, the film illuminates the links between humanity and the rest of the nature, showing how our life cycle mirrors the rhythm of the planet.
Coming soon. In the meantime, visit the website for details.
(Thanks, as always, to Sam DeWitt for the heads-up.)
Huge thanks to the eagle-eyed Sam DeWitt for giving me the heads-up about Yamantaka // Sonic Titan, a band which, according to Pitchfork, “blends philosophies of Buddhism, meditation, and mantra with the band’s love of extreme sounds like black metal, industrial, and noise. Their name, for example, pins a reference to the Buddhist deity Yamantaka with a song title from doom metal band Sleep’s Dopesmoker.” [A true classic, sez the Horse. And so far, YT//ST seems to be very much my cuppa tea, too.]
You can listen to the band’s whole new LP online here.
There’s a video, too:
YAMANTAKA // SONIC TITAN – COUNTING TRACK from LZKA on Vimeo.
More from Pitchfork:
Pitchfork: What‘s the narrative behind your new rock opera?
Alaska B: We’re Buddhists, so it’s about the Buddhist concept of struggle to enlightenment. The sound started out trying to approximate the energy of rock’n'roll — that strong psychic energy that’s been carried since the 50s. We had this idea that when you see Tantric Buddhists, it’s people making a lot of noise together; it’s this long journey where you start in one place and don’t know exactly where you end. We were trying to imagine the same vibe but in the rock’n'roll context– replacing those sounds with our sounds.
Ruby Kato Attwood: Our aim when we perform is to create an empty space– a sacred space– compared to what’s called the Samsaric world, which is ever-changing and full of chaos.
Check out the full Pitchfork piece, which has LOTS more to it, here. It also includes online streams of three songs. Whaddya think?
Perhaps you know of Buddhist teacher Ethan Nichtern and his first book, One City: A Declaration of Interdependence. (A great book that I was truly honored to work on back when I was at Wisdom Publications.) I hope you do. Well, now Ethan has released his second book; only it’s not a dharma book — at least not in a traditional way. Ethan’s new book is a novel.
It’s titled Your Emoticons Won’t Save You, and it comes out in a variety of electronic formats this week. My congrats to Ethan; I know he poured a lot of himself into writing this book. But then, that’s how he does things. Read on for a description and a link. (more…)
So now Andrew Sullivan, who has touched on meditation in his videoblog before, is now going on at some length about Buddhism in a new installment.
The person who made me aware of the video’s existence criticizes Sullivan’s take as “shallow.” He goes on: “Again with the ‘extinguishing of the individual,’ the nihilist error. The point being, of course, that *no* independent self can be identified or proven as having *ever* existed as an entity beyond false concepts imputed on the dependently arisen, temporarily-hung-together, psychophysical array – i.e., there’s nothing to extinguish except erroneous ideas that keep us in cycles of dissatisfaction. Who wouldn’t want to extinguish those? All Buddhism asks is that we give up false ideas. But don’t expect a political commentator to embrace that any time soon. [...] I do agree with him that Merton’s cool, though.”
What do you think?
UPDATE: The same person who commented above now writes with this update:
“A reader has followed up with Andrew, quite intelligently and gently. I don’t know what’s the matter with me. Maybe my perception of his attitude set me off. Also I said ‘nihilist’ when I should have said ‘eternalist.’ Now who’s the dope?” Click here to read the followup post.
Honestly, I think this Dharma-Burger is cool. It makes sense, it’s safe, it seems to be well-designed: It’s the electric butter lamp.
Really. Offered by “Offering Light” who describes the product as:
We design and create innovative electric butter lamps for butter lamp offerings, Buddhist lamp offerings & Tibetan light offerings. [...]
How do butter lamp offerings become safe and clean? Make them with flameless candles! Learn how you can brighten up your world with these electric butter lamps.
Our Offering Lights are a brand new illumination on this classic Tibetan Buddhist ritual. It uses earth-friendly, super low-energy LED flameless tea lights that flicker just like real candles! Order now–you’ll love them!
I don’t have one so can’t vouch for the product but I have no problem endorsing the idea and the spirit behind it. Check ‘em out here.
PS: Thanks to online friend Ross B. for bringing this to my attention.
From Scott A. Mitchell of the Institute of Buddhist Studies — he’s also the blogger behind the fun and enlightening blog The Buddha Is My DJ, and a longtime friend of the Horse — comes a very nice note:
“I wanted to let you know about a book that might be of interest to your readers. It’s called “Buddhism in the Modern World,” edited by David McMahan. The reason your readers might care — apart from it being a pretty accessible book about the various iterations of Buddhism in the contemporary world — is that the last chapter, by me, is about Buddhism and media and pop culture. And I make several references to the Worst Horse because, well, if you’re gonna write a chapter about Buddhism and pop culture, you gotta mention the Worst Horse!”
Well, dang, Scott. Thanks for that. I can’t wait to see the book — luckily, it’s on its way.
As for you, dear reader, to order yourself a copy, just click here. And let us know what you think when you’ve had a look.
I often think about the luck I’ve had in getting to speak to the comedian, Mike DeStefano. Mike had been around a long time, then went on NBC’s Last Comic Standing — and almost won.
I got to speak to him a couple of times, one of which was for an audio interview for Shambhala SunSpace. It’s good stuff and I do recommend you checking it out. But if you really want a concise taste of who Mike was, check out this new piece, “Uneasy Rider,” culled from the WTF Podcast for “These American Lives,” a NYT piece curated by Ira Glass about people who died in 2011.
Mike was hilarious, and a beautiful, fearless guy.
(Thanks to the great Sam DeWitt for the heads-up on this one.)
Photp by Kristin Dos Santos (w/permission)
Thanks to friend Konchog Norbu for the heads-up on this one — it’s hardly news, but it’s kinda cool when celebs go public with their interest in dharma. Seems David Duchovny (of Californication, X-Files, and Larry Sanders-crush fame) just did a retreat at what sounds to be Zen Mountain Monastery, and he’s told Perez Hilton’s pet-gossip site (yes, you read that right) TeddyHilton.com about the experience.
Again, not news, but at least Duchovny’s not looking for star treatment. “I’m a beginner,” he says, “I’ve only been meditating for a little while. You pay a fee to go for this weekend and what I didn’t know is that even though you pay a fee they put you to work immediately. You go there and first you bus some tables after you eat and they had me working in the garden everyday for an hour-and-a-half. It was fun, I was shoveling horse shit out there. You pay money and then you shovel horse shit!”
Zen, life…. Sounds like Duchovny is getting the basic gist of it.
More here.
I just learned that that’s how comedian Eddie Pepitone identifies and markets himself. (A documentary by the same name is also forthcoming.)
So is he Buddhist? I can’t really tell. His new album is called “A Great Stillness.” That seems like something, no? A Google search turns up a reference or two or three to Pepitone from Zen teacher Brad Warner — who counts the comic among his favorites — and some gags from the Pepitone’s Twitter feed:
- “Watching Saturday Night Live is like watching a Buddhist monk light himself on fire except for no reason.”
- “As a buddhist child I got teased a lot for renouncing all thought.”
- “I studied zen Buddhism with Maharishi Gus Lobotomovich and he always said “shit, did you hear that?”
And here’s a quote from a new AV Club interview with Pepitone: “You wanna give life meaning against all of this pain and anguish. You’re trying to give it meaning and you’re trying to be happy, but you have all this stuff that is in the way. And that’s the stuff I talk about.”
Know anything about the Bitter Buddha? Let us know.
