666ties Series

1969. The freewheeling, mind-opening sixties are disappearing down the throat of a vortex of hardlined isms, and in the land of manmade paradises, unmade paradises, and things you don’t talk about, the Ad Man is just doing his thing, man, wow, doing his Ad Thing, mesmerizing you into thinking you belong, or thinking you stand out, whatever it is you’re after, man. What’s everybody after? There’s power, here, if you have what kids are after. There’s gold in the hills of Hollywood and cash in the capital temples of amusement. Three unholy alliances are tumbling in a bloody niner rush to stake the Lost Youth of America, armed with sex and drugs and rock and roll and black, black magick, poison versus charm versus cure. The Ad Man’s not worried, man, he’s just got his assignment to stick to, but the mission is still a mystery to him when our captivator becomes captive, you dig? From the boxy hands of Ayn Rand & Ken Anger’s Angelus Temple thugs, to the depraved amenities of Jack Parsons & L. Ron Hubbard’s inside-out Magick Kingdom, the Ad Man hasn’t even warmed up for the unconstrained lunacy that lies ahead when he’s delivered to S.M.I.L.E. But the Ad Man’s working out a peace he can sell, a commodity like any other, if he can just figure it out. What’s everybody after? What’s everybody after?

TICK...TICK...TICK...TICK... Spring, 1968. Memphis is cool but tense. Otis Redding has enough static in his life already: struggling to balance his family life with his career at the top of the pops—and the undercover side job as a superhero isn't helping. TICK...TICK....TICK... Known in his other work clothes as the Mississippi Kite, based in a gadget-filled cave hidden on the banks of Ol’ Muddy, Otis serves as a shadow protector of peace in Dixie, along with his colorful compatriot crew: Marvelous (the Brother of Rubber), the Zapper, Canada Goose, Old Mad Johnson. Together they put the drop on would-be evil-doers; today, they’re rescuing vivacious Fifi La Voom and the Mayor of Memphis from a bevy of backwards-blackface bozos. No sweat, brother: just another day of work for our world-weary hero and his Famous Players. TICK...TICK... But bigger fish are coming up to be fried. The South is rocked by race riots, the Invaders stand accused but every man seems to have his own story, Dr. King comes to town to curb the hate and mend fences, and Otis still has to deal with supreme jive turkey Elvis Presley—er, Captain Whizbang—and his headline-hogging Phenomenal Five. TICK... Robert N. Lee’s “Finest Kind” is an alternate history escapade, placing four-color caped vigilantes in a black-and-white age of black-and-white battles: the very real, very troubled Civil Rights era, just at a potential tipping point for a true Black Power revolution. This violent and oppressive world is calling for action...what kind of men will dare answer?

Start playback: 1967, London, the Roundhouse, the Million Volt Light and Sound Rave, Unit Delta Plus, the Lady. Live. Delia Derbyshire is Helen AmeriKKKa, electronic superstar, goddess behind the spacey sound of Doctor Who, accidental mother of a sonic genre, and bookish idol to frenzied teen devotees of the UK and the USR and Nippon and the world. Melissa is sixteen, American, and exploring for an opening. On a winter visit to London, with a studied-Brit cousin as her sherpa, everything opens for her. The clanking brass service robots are merely charming; the real attractions are the slang, the drugs, the mods, the rave, the sounds: banging around and making an experience. Derbyshire makes. Through dragging, breathing, distorting, repeating--repeating, repeating, repeating--layer upon layer, reel upon reel, she makes a noise. Makes a culture. Makes an experience. At the Million Volt Light and Sound Rave, with a million damaged stars making her, she makes Melissa, she makes it all happen. Robert N. Lee’s “The Live Lady of Down Town” is a trip to a 1967 that largely wasn’t, a tribute to the ecstasies of youth and electronic music, an exploration in experience and vice-to-the-versa. Switch sides. Reverse playback. Helen AmeriKKKa’s new record is dropping.

1966. Phil Dick wishes he’d never started writing. Phil Dick wishes he’d never stopped writing. Phil Dick wishes he could do his work. Phil Dick wishes he didn’t have to work. Phil Dick wishes the robot cops’ horse was his friend. Phil Dick wishes he didn’t have to have any friends. Phil Dick does drugs, but not at work. Except sometimes. Phil Dick hates computer games, but he makes them for a job. Phil Dick hates the Beatles, but got on the backstage list for their show at Candlestick Park. Phil Dick hates Bruce Lee, but he has to make it through dinner with that preening rock star. Phil Dick has a lot of harsh judgments about everybody else for someone who has a wife and a mistress and a total inability to pay his bills or generally handle his shit. Phil Dick does drugs, but not at work. Except all the time. Phil Dick can’t get any work done, because he can’t stop reading about the mystery of the Lead Masks, like everybody else with a HeadyTM, or wondering where the hell the Grey Ghost has gone. Finally, utterly failing at life on every level has got to feel like the end of the world. Right? Phil Dick wonders how it’s going to feel.