Bureau of Lost Culture

Епизоди

• The Road to Rebellion - Part 1 03.07.2026 50мин

  Roc Sanford is a British writer, artist and climate activist whose life has been a countercultural journey from an alternative childhood through academia to a remarkable experiment in off-grid living and ecological resistance as a catalyser for Extinction Rebellion and Ocean Rebellion.   For more than three decades he has been associated with the remote Hebridean island of Gometra, where he lives much of the year without mains electricity, running water or many of the conveniences of modern life.    Roc was born to parents who deliberately turned away from wealth and privilege and chose to live closer to the working-class world they wanted to understand and write about. Amongst other works, his mother Nell Dunn was the author of Poor Cow and Up the Junction, and his father Jeremy Sanford was the author of Cathy Come Home, all made into groundbreaking hugely influential British New Wave films by Ken Loach in the 60s.   Their life choices carried Roc from Belgravia, to Chelsea to Battersea, and then to a remote valley in Wales where the family lived a very alternative life.   We hear about that and get into the tensions that can emerge when idealism meets reality.  We hear about Roc's unusual schooling, his years during the AIDs crisis in New York, studyomg the ideas that shaped his thinking about perception, systems, and the way we interpret the world.   And we head to Soho, meet Francis Bacon and Genesis P Orridge again, and hear about his first brush with British law.   Roc has led - is leading  - a big countercultural life - so this is the first part of a double-header conversation.    More on Roc, his work and life   --- Hello!   If you can contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that means a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with the spirit of the Bureau. But that does mean we can benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes, not just financial.     Stephen  
• Free Radicals - Tripping in the 18th Century. 10.06.2026 55мин

  In the company of historian of drugs, MIKE JAY, we journey back to the first psychedelic age - not the 1960s, but the 1790s, when Britain was at the forefront, at the frontier, of gonzo psychedelic science.  We explore the world of the 'Pneumatic Institution' in Bristol,  a community of scientists, poets, philosophers, and industrial entrepreneurs who formed a kind of proto-counterculture led by the extraordinary talents of polymath Thomas Beddoes and the boy genius Humphry Davy. We hear about Davy's use of nitrous oxide - laughing gas - and the self-experiments and consciousness-expanding trips he and his friends experienced as a gateway to radical societal ideas and revolutionary thought, laying the groundwork for later countercultures and today's psychedelic renaissance. More on Mike and his book Free Radicals: How a Group of Romantic Experimenters Gave Birth to Psychedelic Science. --- If you can contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that means a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with the spirit of the Bureau. But that does mean we can benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes, not just financial.     Stephen  
• The Shadow of the Counterculture 24.05.2026 1ч

  Ever thought the so-called ‘golden decade’ of the 1960s was only about peace and love? Think again. Beneath the surface, it was riddled with violence, paranoia, and chaos, even in its most iconic moments.   So says James Riley, a writer whose work explores the darker edges of late-1960s and 1970s counterculture. His 'The Bad Trip' is an acclaimed study of apocalypse, occultism, paranoia and the collapse of the hippie dream at the end of the 1960s.   We examine the romanticised narrative of peace, love, and idealism, revealing how beneath the surface lurked a shadow of violence, paranoia, and societal fractures. How figures like Charles Manson emerged not as aberrations, but as products and archetypes of the era.    We talk Jung, LSD, The Trickster archetype, Manson, John Lennon and Yoko Ono, the committee for The Summer of Love, to see how the darkness beneath the light reveals more about human nature than the utopian stories we often tell, and how it was the inspiration for some truly great art.   For the list of countercultural films we discuss - and more - go HERE    ---   If you can contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that means a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with the spirit of the Bureau. But that does mean we can benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes, not just financial.     Stephen   #Counterculture#1960sRevolution#DarkSideOfThe60s#CulturalLegacy#PsychedelicEra#MansonMyth#Altamont#AquarianAge#ShadowAndLight#CulturalHistory
• The Revolutionsts: How The Counterculture Turned to Terror 06.05.2026 53мин

  The Weather Underground, The Baader-Meinhof Group, The Red Brigade, Carlos the Jackal, The Japanese Red Army. The counterculture has always had a shadow side. There have been bad actors, casualties, the needle and the damage done -  and in this episode, we dive into the world of revolutionary and political violence, exploring how radical groups emerged from countercultural movements and evolved into what my guest Jason Burke describes as Revolutionists     Jason is an award-winning British author and journalist, currently serving as the International Security Correspondent for The Guardian. He is widely regarded as one of the preeminent experts on modern radicalisation, terrorism, and global security, reporting from hotspots around the world.     His latest book, The Revolutionists: The Story of the Extremists Who Hijacked the 1970s, is an extraordinary sweeping history of the period  1968–1979, a decade defined by a global explosion of secular, leftist political violence.      The Revolutionists were the orphans of the 1960s, young people who grew up in a 1950s existential vacuum of consumerism and a 1960s idealistic overload. When the student protests of 1968 failed to topple the global order, a radicalised minority concluded that the "System" was too resilient for peaceful protest. Violence and spectacle in a 'theatre of terror' might be the answer.     It's an incredible story - and links the counterculture, through 9/11 with events taking place in the Middle East right now.   ---   If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that means a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with the spirit of the Bureau. But that does mean we can benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes, not just financial.     Stephen   #counterculture #terrorist #terrorism #revolution #revolutionists #TheWeatherUnderground, #TheBaader-MeinhofGroup, #TheRedBrigade,  #TheJapaneseRedArmy #Baader-Meinhof #carlosthejackal   
• 21st Century Mutoid Man: Joe Rush - Part 2 18.04.2026 1ч 2мин

  This is the second part of our conversation with Joe Rush, the initiator, mentor, and driving force behind The Mutoid Waste Company, that extraordinary countercultural endeavour to turn the waste of our industrial civilisation into art, performance, street theatre - and a way of life. If you haven’t heard the first part, you might want to start here: https://bureauoflostculture.podbean.com/e/20th-century-mutoid-man-part-1/ This time, we covered a huge amount of ground — Joe's personal story, the birth of the Mutoids and the UK counterculture of the ’80s and ’90s: squatting. We hear about the Peace Convoy, the Battle of the Beanfield, the free festival scene, the warehouse party scene, and how those worlds were pushed into exile in Europe, where they helped spark whole new cultural movements of festivals, parties, and creative rebellion including 'Tanghenge', the repurposing of abandoned Soviet MIG fighter jets after the fall of The Berlin Wall and much more.. ---- If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that really does mean a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with what we do. But that does mean we can really benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes. not just financial.     Stephen  #BureauOfLostCulture #JoeRush #MutoidWaste #ScrapArt #IndustrialArt #BurningManArt #Counterculture #RecycledArt #PostIndustrial #UndergroundCulture
• Sex - Men - War 02.04.2026 56мин

  Beyond the official story, the myth, of the Second World War — its maps and medals, courage and sacrifice — there is another hidden narrative. Written in rare memoirs, or in letters and diaries never meant to be read by us, it tells of a kind of underground culture that was secret, transgressive, forbidden With millions of young men and women on military service, the transitory nature of life under threat of sudden and violent death created a charged atmosphere in which conventional boundaries loosened. In London the darkness of the blackout became both cover and catalyst. Writer and cultural critic Luke Turner, is the author of the beautiful book  Men at War, Loving, Lusting, Fighting, Remembering 1939-1945, a book that excavates the sexual undercurrents of wartime Britain, how the social upheaval of wartime had a profound effect on the sex lives of British men in particular— in the city, in barracks, in prison of war camps.  This is a story that feels less like military history and more like testimonies from an underground scene — improvised, poignant usually invisible - and later to be deliberately repressed.. --- If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that really does mean a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with what we do. But that does mean we can really benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes. not just financial.     Stephen  IMAGE: Cecil Beaton /Imperial War Museum #sex #war #military #queerhistory #londonhistory #blitz #transgressive #  
• 20th Century Mutoid Man: Joe Rush - Part 1 17.03.2026 1ч 2мин

  If you had been at the Glastonbury Festival in 1987,  you may have seen a familiar silhouette emerging in the dawn light  - upright monoliths arranged in a circle. Was it Stonehenge - magically transferred here across the Salisbury plain? No, it was ‘Carhenge'- a circle of upright cars, their chassis standing like monoliths, the archaeology of the automobile age And imagine ‘Tankhenge', a gateway made from abandoned Soviet tanks assembled in Berlin just after the fall of the Berlin Wall — the wreckage of the Cold War turned into a piece of anarchic sculpture Or imagine a huge mechanical creature crawling across the desert at the Burning Man festival in Nevada These strange and spectacular visions all come from the same source: The Mutoid Waste Company— a collective that, since the early 1980s, has been transforming the debris of industrial civilisation into giant sculptures, mutant vehicles and temporary worlds built from waste. This is the first part of our conversation with Joe Rush, the artist at the centre of it all. It takes us into the world of late 1970s West London, the punk years, the alternative communities and squats of the People's Republic of Frestonia, and the signpist along the way to becoming a Mutoid... --- If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that really does mean a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with what we do. But that does mean we can really benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes. not just financial.   Stephen    Photograph: Courtesy of Guy Mayhew #BureauOfLostCulture #JoeRush #MutoidWaste #ScrapArt #IndustrialArt #BurningManArt #Counterculture #RecycledArt #PostIndustrial #UndergroundCulture
• The Library of Lost Maps 03.03.2026 59мин

  In the heart of London’s Bloomsbury, behind a scruffy turquoise door, the world lies folded into drawers. Here are maps that survived wars, regimes, and revolutions — not because they were valued, but because they were forgotten.   Some were reused when paper was scarce - a map of Cuba mounted on the reverse of a Second World War map of Berlin, the roads of one ruined city shining faintly through another place entirely, a haunting map of Hiroshima printed just weeks before destruction. Britain’s only Professor of Cartography, James Cheshire's book The Library of Lost Maps, explores the hidden collection of thousands of maps in a room at University College London. He joins us to tell us why paper maps still matter.   Maps tell us what was ignored, how ideology, hope and catastrophe have been drawn onto paper; they tell us how power wanted the world to look, and they reveal hidden patterns in everyday life. And when map libraries disappear, it isn’t just paper that vanishes — it’s memory.   --- If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that really does mean a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with what we do. But that does mean we can really benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes. not just financial.     Stephen  #maps #maplibrary #hiroshima #ordnancesurvey #mapping #cartography #johnsnow #tubemap  
• In + Out of Thee Temple Ov Psychick Youth - Part 2 17.02.2026 56мин

  This is the second part of a conversation with Alaura O’Dell / Mistress Mix, formerly known as Paula P-Orridge. In the first part, we traced Alaura’s journey from meeting the musician and cultural provocateur Genesis P-Orridge, as a 15-year-old schoolgirl in East London, to becoming a central actor in the underground art band Psychic TV and the occult network Thee Temple ov Psychick Youth (TOPY).  While public accounts often focus on TOPY’s founder, Genesis P-Orridge, we heard about Alaura's role in the organisation — not just as a participant, but as an organiser and practitioner, the one “who handled the workings”: the practical magick behind the grand metaphysical ideas.   In this episode, we rejoin Alaura and Genesis as they are in Kathmandu with their kids. Caress and Genesse. Back in Britain, the police have raided their home, prompted by unfounded accusations of moral deviance and child abuse in the media, during the infamous 'satanic panic'of the 1980s.  We hear how they embarked on a life in exile in California, finding unexpected refuge with the family of Winona Ryder and entering a new West Coast countercultural milieu that included encounters with Timothy Leary and Terence McKenna. before hearing about Alaura's life after Psychic TV, TOPY and Genesis. Psychic TV, was a multimedia art and music project that blurred boundaries between performance, ritual, and experimentation in sound and imagery, imbued with a sense of magick (in both the occult and transformative senses) Thee Temple ov Psychick Youth (TOPY),was  a loosely structured global network of artists, occultists, and seekers that emerged in the 1980s.  --- If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that really does mean a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with what we do. But that does mean we can really benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes. not just financial.   Stephen  #AlauraODell #PaulaP’Orridge #GenesisP’Orridge #TempleOvPsychicYouth#Counterculture#SacredSites#PersonalReinvention#SpiritualAwakening#TraumaAndHealing#CreativeExpression#ExileAndResilience#TimothyLeary #terencemckenna #PsychicTVHistory  
• What is a Shaman? 03.02.2026 57мин

  Over the last century, the word Shaman has been embraced by artists, hippies, psychonauts and spiritual rebels. In the 1960s and 70s, shamanism had become a kind of countercultural shorthand for altered states, secret, magical knowledge, and ways of seeing outside rationalism, capitalism, and institutional power. Shamans appeared in underground books, on psychedelic record sleeves, in communes and consciousness-raising circles. Writers like Carlos Castaneda blurred the line between ethnography and spiritual fiction. Psychedelics were framed as modern shamanic initiation rites.  But as shamanism was absorbed into Western counterculture, the messy realities of the original shamanic cultures - land, lineage, service to the community, and sometimes danger - were replaced with personal visions, journeys and individual transformation. Our guest today is social anthropologist Max Carocci whose work looks at how this happened. His latest book, Shamans: The Visual Culture, is an incredible portrait of the original shamanic worlds with an eclectic array of the sacred objects, tools, clothing and images shamans have made, along with the way they been photographed, filmed, and mythologised.  Max is especially interested in how these images have turned the shaman into a symbolic figure — part spiritual rebel, part cypher for Western longing — while the original shamans continue to live under pressure from colonialism, repression and environmental loss.   --- If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that really does mean a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with what we do. But that does mean we can really benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes. not just financial.   Stephen  #counterculture, #shamanism, #shaman, #tuvan, #galba, #newage, #spiritualisn, #magic, #ancestor  
• The Lost History of Skiffle - with Billy Bragg 01.02.2026 59мин

  BILLY BRAGG pays a visit to the Bureau to lead us on an extraordinary whirlwind tour through the music that the counterculture forgot.   Along the way we hear about the emergence of The Teenager in post-war Britain, the massive impact of Rock Around the Clock, the Soho espresso bar culture of the 50s and the birth of British youth culture.   We explore why Skiffle, which soundtracked that youth culture for a few intense years and was the inspiration for musicians in The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, The Who and The Rolling Stones, has been oddly forgotten.  And Billy explains why, as the first British DIY musical revolution, Skiffle provided the template for the Punk movement of the 70s that was to inspire him.   Along the way, we get educated about the post war 'trad jazz' movement, the cultural stranglehold of the BBC - and the terrific transformatory power of a guy - or a girl - with a guitar.   For more on Billy and his book Roots, Radicals and Rockers: https://www.billybragg.co.uk/product/roots-radicals-and-rockers-how-skiffle-changed-the-world-hardback-signed-by-billy/   Billy's Top Five Skiffle Tunes https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZtMpev7GhPIi-e2ajPxUd_FVyUQxMBbB   For more on the Bureau of Lost Culture www.bureauoflostculture.com  --- If you can contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that means a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with the spirit of the Bureau. But that does mean we can benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes, not just financial.   Stephen  
• This is Penny Rimbaud - Part Two 19.01.2026 1ч 2мин

  This is the second part of a conversation with the poet, musician and thinker Penny Rimbaud, co-founder, with Steve Ignorant, of the anarcho-punk band and activist art collective Crass   Crass emerged as a band in 1977, but quickly became something more complex, rejecting rock stardom, record industry norms, releasing records on their own label and using their platform to challenge war, nationalism, consumerism, sexism, and state violence.    In this second part of the interview, we about the events that led to Crass and hear more about Dial House, an old rambling farmhouse in rural Essex, a long-running experiment in collective life — part commune, part refuge, part creative hub. It was here, where he still lives, that Penny's music, philosophy, artwork, debate, and daily survival are entangled. And we hear about the founding of the Stonehenge Free Festival and the death of Wally Hope, cultural terrorism, Penny's work since Crass, and his thoughts on art, spirituality and the self. Music played:  Futility and The Soldier’s Dream (The War Poems of Wilfred Owen)So What (Crass)The Song of Self (With Louise Elliot) You Brave Od Land (With Youth)   For more on Penny and his work   --- If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that really does mean a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with what we do. But that does mean we can really benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes. not just financial.   Stephen  #counterculture #crass #pennyrimbaud #anarchism #capitalism #dialhouse #artschool #wallyhope #stonehengefreefestival
• A Supernatural History of the Atlantic 06.01.2026 59мин

  The sea, its myths, and the supernatural is the theme of this special New Year edition of the Bureau when we leave behind our usual waters to set sail into the past of a very unusual counterculture.   For most of human history, the sea has been both a road and a riddle. It promises fortune and freedom — but it also swallows ships whole. And in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, as Britain’s empire spread across the globe, the sea became seen, not just as a physical frontier, but as a psychic one  — a vast, perilous deep where faith, science, fear, and fantasy collided. This is the story the British cultural historian Karl Bell tells in The Perilous Deep: A Supernatural History of the Atlantic, his epic study of sailors’ lore, ghost ships, sea monsters, superstitions, omens and uncanny maritime experiences. We hear about 'the caul' - the protective embryo of an unborn baby said to keep sailors safe, the 'jonah', a scapegoat eyed suspiciously by those on board as responsible for the ship's misfortunes, H P Lovecraft, cross-dressing pirates and  more. This is not a history of battles or trade routes, but of dreams, fantasies and terrors — of the sea as it existed in the minds of those who sailed upon it The Perlious Deep: A Supernatural History of the Atlantic --- If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that really does mean a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with what we do. But that does mean we can really benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes. not just financial.   Stephen 
• Tales from the Ambient Underground 21.12.2025 57мин

  In early 1990s South London — a time when rave culture was mutating and London’s squats were pulsing with creativity, Aphex Twin, Global Communication, Nightmares on Wax, Autechre,Andrea Parker, Scanner — could be found DJ-ing and performing in spaces where a strange new sound-world was blooming. This is the story of Telepathic Fish, the ambient afterparty scene created by the Openmind Collective. Telepathic Fish parties and club rooms were DIY countercultural happenings with turntables, psychedelic installations, living-room lamps, photocopied zines and a lot of imagination, becoming a meeting place for bohos, ravers, multimedia explorers and a new wave of electronic musicians.  Now, as a new vinyl compilation and a beautifully illustrated 20-page booklet, The Telepathic Fish has resurfaced to rave reviews, Kevin Foakes — DJ, designer, archivist and cultural custodian — returns to the Bureau to talk squat party ‘finstallations’, Aphex Twin, Mira Calix, illegal Roundhouse raves, ambient zines and what DIY culture can do when technology, community and youthful imagination collide. The Telepathic Fish Compilation For Kevin  / DJ Food --- If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that really does mean a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with what we do. But that does mean we can really benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes. not just financial.   Stephen  #ambientmusic #aphextwin #autechre #miracalix #orbital #theorb #counterculture #diyparties #diyculture #telepathicfish #djfood 
• In + Out of Thee Temple Ov Psychick Youth - Part 1 10.12.2025 1ч

  There are figures in counterculture whose names appear only in the margins of the story — whose influence is eclipsed, overshadowed, even dismissed, by more mythologised personalities. Alaura O’Dell — known to many under her earlier name, Paula P-Orridge - is a musician, artist, occult practitioner, and was a co-conspirator in the band Psychic TV For a long time, Alaura was described almost exclusively in relation to her then-husband, the arch provocateur and musician Genesis P-Orridge but she joined us to talk about life before Genesis,  the formative years of Psychic TV: the chaos, the energy, the experiments with magick and media, the turbulent times of TOPY - Thee Temple Ov Psychick Youth - the global network of seekers and outsiders, where she was not merely a participant but an organiser — the one who handled the workings,  the practical magic behind the grand metaphysical gestures.  Alaura’s life didn’t end when she parted ways with the band, with Genesis, or with the Temple. In fact, in many ways, it began anew. We will be hearing more about that in the second part of our interview in a future episode. For more on Alaura and connect with her here (as Mistress Mix) --- If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that really does mean a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with what we do. But that does mean we can really benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes. not just financial.   Stephen    #psychictv #TheeTempleOvPsychickYouth #paulp-orridge #genesisp-orridge #throbbinggristle #satanist #satanicpanic  #counterculture #coseyfannitutti #occult 
• Geiger-Counterculture: A Journey Through Atomic Albion 25.11.2025 1ч 3мин

  We are on the brink of a new nuclear age - the energy crisis, the push towards net zero and the gargantuan power requirements of AI demand it - or so we are told.     But here in Britain, the old nuclear age isn’t just a historical footnote - it’s etched into the very landscape.   Tom Bolton went on an epic journey around the UK to explore the extraordinary, imposing locations in that landscape, from the 16 vast concrete cathedral-like power stations on remote coasts to the hidden nuclear missile silos that cast a long, physical, cultural and environmental shadow over Albion - past, present, and into the distant future. His extraordinary new book, Atomic Albion: Journeys Around Britain's Nuclear Power Stations, not only maps the physical geography of Britain’s atomic ambitions, but also digs into their psychic, mythic and cultural impact.  With great power comes great responsibility, as Spider-Man's Uncle Pete said. And of course, where there is state power, there has always been countercultural dissent, quite rightly in this case, because the power we unleashed by splitting the atom could bring us to the very brink of oblivion..   --- If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that really does mean a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with what we do. But that does mean we can really benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes. not just financial.   Stephen  #atomic #atomicage #nuclear #nuclearpower #nuclearweapons #atombomb #powerstaions #albion #atomicalbion #counterculture   
• The Spell of David Lynch 12.11.2025 1ч

  When the filmmaker David Lynch died earlier this year, fans created shrines filled with coffee, doughnuts, cigarettes and blue roses; a level of spontaneous mourning more common for dead rock stars or royalty than filmmakers. His auctioned belongings sold for staggering sums, almost as if they were relics, showing how many people felt deeply connected to his work. Why? David was that unusual figure - an artist who had mainstream success but seemed to remain defiantly and deeply countercultural. How? And, this was a man who had an adjective  - ‘Lynchian’ - named after him But what does that mean? The writer and cultural historian  John Higgs, returns to the Bureau. His new book ‘Lynchian: The Spell of David Lynch’  tries to answer those questions while taking a deep dive into the hidden depths of Lynch's films - where beauty and horror, dream and reality, suburban innocence and lurking evil co-exist; where simple pleasures—coffee, pie, music—take on a sacred resonance in contrast to violence and decay. Where we can take a journey into darkness and out again - changed. And we dig into art, consciousness, dreaming, ideas and the writer's life in these changing times.   --- If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that really does mean a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with what we do. But that does mean we can really benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes. not just financial.   Stephen  #DavidLynch #Lynchian #TwinPeaks #CinemaOfDreams #SurrealCinema #BlueVelvet #FilmNoir #Mulhollanddrive #CultFilm #DreamLogic #transcendentalmeditation  
• This is Penny Rimbaud - Part One 29.10.2025 1ч

  Penny Rimbaud , who has spent more than half a century living the ideals that most of us only talk about, has been described as an activist philosopher, an anarchist, a Zen Buddhist. Though he would likely not recognise those descriptions, he is certainly a poet, a musician, an artist. Born Jeremy John Ratter in 1943, in the late 1960s, together with artist Gee Vaucher, he founded Dial House, an open community and creative refuge in rural Essex. It became both a home and a hub — a living experiment in anarchism, art, and radical living, from which emerged Crass, a band that tore apart punk’s nihilism and replaced it with a fierce moral energy: anti-war, anti-sexism, anti-consumerism — but pro-peace, pro-freedom, and defiantly DIY. Their black-and-white graphics, polemical lyrics, and uncompromising stance made them one of the most influential and challenging acts of their time. When Crass disbanded in 1984, Penny kept on creating, often with Gee. He became a prolific poet, writer, and spoken-word performer, continuing to explore themes of love, pacifism, and spiritual autonomy. Now in his eighties, he still lives and works at Dial House — still questioning authority, still seeking truth through art and language. We range back and forth across Penny's personal history and his thoughts on culture, capitalism, art and the very notion of the self.   In his own words:  “There is no authority but yourself.”   ---- During this conversation, we hear: 'Dulce et Decorum Est’ - from What Passing Bells (The War Poems of Wilfred Owen) ‘How?’ - from How? ‘Of Summer's Passing' - with Peter Vukomirovic - from Of Summer's Passing 'Oh America'  - with Youth - from Oh America   --- If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that really does mean a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with what we do. But that does mean we can really benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes. not just financial.   Stephen  #counterculture #crass #pennyrimbaud #anarchism #capitalism #dialhouse #artschool #  
• Who Owns The Ground Beneath Our Feet? 14.10.2025 59мин

  We walk the streets every day — and through parks, across squares and pavements and along beaches, and mountains, over 'The Commons' — without much thought for who really owns them. These apparently public spaces have often been battlegrounds over public rights. From the rural enclosures that fenced off England’s open fields, through the city squares where protesters have clashed with police, to the gated plazas and shopping malls of today — the story of The Commons is the story of who belongs, who is excluded, who can gather, and who makes the rules. In this episode, we’re diving into that story with historian Katrina Navickas, whose book Contested Commons: A History of Protest and Public Space in England traces how people have fought, for centuries, to claim, reclaim and defend shared space. We hear about The Chartists, about The Greenham Common protests, Occupy, Reclaim the Streets, trespassing and hear some surprising answers to the question 'Who Owns The Ground Beneath Our Feet?' We finish with a recording of 'The World Turned Upside Down' by the wonderful Leon Rosselson --- If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that really does mean a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with what we do. But that does mean we can really benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes. not just financial.   Stephen  #trespassing #thecommons #commonland #theclearances #protest #thechartists #occupy #reclaimthestreets #counterculture  
• Roots, Radical and Rockers - With Billy Bragg 03.10.2025 59мин

  As musician and activist BILLY BRAGG makes a welcome return as a voice of countercultural sanity, we revisit the Lost History of Skiffle as he takes us on an extraordinary whirlwind tour through the music that the counterculture forgot.   Along the way, we hear about the emergence of The Teenager in post-war Britain, the massive impact of Rock Around the Clock, the Soho espresso bar culture of the 50s and the birth of British youth culture.   We explore why Skiffle, which soundtracked that youth culture for a few intense years and was the inspiration for musicians in The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, The Who and The Rolling Stones, has been oddly forgotten.  And Billy explains why, as the first British DIY musical revolution, Skiffle provided the template for the Punk movement of the 70s that was to inspire him.   Along the way, we get educated about the post-war 'trad jazz' movement, the cultural stranglehold of the BBC - and the terrific transformatory power of a guy - or a girl - with a guitar.   For more on Billy and his book Roots, Radicals and Rockers: https://www.billybragg.co.uk/product/roots-radicals-and-rockers-how-skiffle-changed-the-world-hardback-signed-by-billy/   --- If you’d like to get involved and contribute to this crazy endeavour, join our Patreon HERE   Thank you to everyone who’s signed up to support the show —that really does mean a lot. We have chosen not to carry ads here; it simply wouldn’t sit right with what we do. But that does mean we can really benefit from your support, in whatever form that takes. not just financial.     Stephen  #skiffle #billybragg #beatles #rock'n'roll #teenager #1950 #musichistory