Lotus Magazine was a pop cultural blip, a publication that catered to a niche of a subculture. Independently published from 1996 – 2002, Lotus served the West Coast's underground rave community. It was a free magazine, half electronica rag, half semi-spiritual/environmentalist youth outreach project. This online archive presents a sliver of the material published in the magazine during its six years of bi-monthly publication. Some of the content is still relevant, and some of it's just silly. All of it's very, very earnest. Enjoy! – Bookalicous, Winter 1999
Rave America: New School Dancescapes
By Mireille Silcott
The origin and history of "rave culture" as it sprouted in the UK during the late 1980s has been covered in detail by numerous books, most notably Matthew Collin and John Godfrey's excellent Altered State, but what happened when the culture found its way across the Atlantic to North America? Mireille Silcott explores this question in Rave America. After a quick chapter recounting the emergence of house music in New York City and Chicago clubs, the birth of raving in the UK, and the first Storm Raves in New York in the early 1990s, Silcott goes on to explore in depth the introduction and evolution of raving in four areas of North America. Focusing on San Francisco, Toronto, the Midwest, and Orlando, as well as a chapter on the gay circuit parties (similar to raves in many respects), Rave America is an interesting and sometimes disturbing look at how raving took root on this side of the ocean and was shaped into different forms across the continent. Through extensive first hand accounts and insightful commentary, Silcott takes us through the familiar "honeymoon period" in each community as raving takes root, flourishes, and later begins to experience growing pains. Though the lack of a chapter on LA seems a glaring omission, the book does an excellent job of exploring the forces that have shaped the North American rave community today, and how varied it has become from place to place. The chapter on Orlando in particular sheds some interesting light on the past that helped to create Florida's recent Operation Heat Rave. Though no book of this type can ever be complete, Rave America delivers an informative and well-balanced account of the history of the North American part of our culture and is sure to fascinate those who wonder where this all began. -David Center
Poptics
Inspired by Bungalow
Is it a book? Yes. Is it a CD? Yes. Is it a web page? Yes. Is it an art project that combines the work of musicians, graphic designers using CD-ROM, print and Internet as its media? Well…Yes! Poptics comes with a CD and a 70-page book, which includes info on the artists and a two-page graphic design spread created by either by the composers or a designer with whom they are affiliated. The focus is on the pop culture in which we all live, and each piece of design and song is created with that in mind. Each song, at only two minutes (or less), manages to expand on mere popular culture, succeeding as undeniable uber-pop. The web site (www.poptics.de) enables web miners and novices alike an opportunity to admire artwork both from eboy (www.eboy.com), the designer of the web-site, and from the designers featured in Poptics. Some of the pieces that you see in the book are even Flash movies on the site. The book will make a fine coffee table piece that won’t take up too much room since it is the same dimensions as a CD case, while the CD offers tunes catchy enough to turn a series of ringing doorbells into popish kitsch. The idea is marvelously imagined and absurd enough to make an interesting conversation piece at the very least. Respect is due for the fact that the entire project knows how silly it is and for sheer inventiveness. This is a wacky ride that could un-stuff many a shirt! -eli Huntington
Once in a Lifetime
Jane Bussmann
"Bullocks…You’re going out Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday you’d have to go out; Saturday was a definite. Sunday you might chill until something happened Sunday night, but you’d have to go out Monday night to tell everyone what you’d been through.” Who says this acid house thang doesn’t become a lifestyle? Once in a Lifetime, a rave-you-mentalricious book by Jane Bussmann, brings us all back to the glory (and the not so glorious) days of acid house in England and Ireland. Organized chronologically, Once in a Lifetime directly links us to the consciousness of the acid house scene. Most of the story is told by the promoters, DJs, ravers, anti-ravers, “acid-teds,” and the odd coppers who were there dancing, spinning, whirling, hugging, waving, stomping, Eing, tripping balls, quaffing (pints, of course), and vomiting (there seems to be an awful lot of this) at some of the first “raves.” The recollections are often quite frank, painting a dark depiction of those crazy days.
Certainly, this story is filled with enthusiasm and nostalgia as well. We are reminded of the ubiquity of the “rave” experience: "We had no idea what it would be like. David went up to DJ as normal. Then half an hour later it hit us–this wave of pure MDMA. I was whooping, running up to people and saying 'Let me feel your face! Wooo! It feels like velvet!'” If this all sounds too familiar then read on, at some point you will probably say to yourself “If I think I’m bad, take a look at these guys!”
Undoubtedly, we all can relate to many aspects of the acid house scene as depicted in Once in a Lifetime, however, what I find most interesting about this book is the music, traditions, and viewpoints that are quite apart from anything that transpired in the US scene. -TC, Raverbooks.
If you have trouble finding these books at your local independent bookseller, ask our friends at Raverbooks for help.