Thursday, August 7, 2008

Dabbling in the Occult

Continuing with the Rabbit Hole motif of The Beatles and the Occult, let's spotlight a Beatles artifact from the time of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. It was first published in 1968 in the Official Beatles Biography by Hunter Davies. This scan was borrowed from Nothing Is Real.



The document appears to have at least three sets of scribbles, each most likely done with a different writing instrument. There is a list of songs, probably a suggested sequence of tracks for the Sgt. Pepper album. Underneath "Fixing A Hole" is a partially scratched out item that was interpreted by Ted Goranson in a post on the Newsgroup Rec Music Beatles as "Lacie." Goranson has observed numerous connections between "Alice In Wonderland" and the music of The Beatles, and he believes both are strongly related to the Occult. Jojo shared a reformatted version of Goranson's post on NIR recently. The significance of "Lacie" is that it is an anagram for "Alice." As evidenced by the replies to Goranson's RMB post, not everyone agrees that it says "Lacie." It could easily be "Lucie." John would later use that name for the song "Bring On The Lucie (Freda Peeple)" on his Mind Games album. There is no doubt that the scribble referred to "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds," which certainly has connections to "Alice In Wonderland."

Lucy and Alice both seem to have a strong relationship with the Tarot. At the beginning of their respective journeys, Lucy has marmalade skies and Alice grabs a marmalade jar. There was an impressive marmalade sky in the recent debut video by wizardofpaul which has already disappeared from YouTube.



In addition to the list of titles and various notes that seem to apply to the structure of the song "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds," there is another interesting element on the document from the Hunter Davies book. It appears to say:

Brotherhood of Light
Doctring of Kabalis
Cop. 1935
by
Elbert Benjamin
Serial No 48
L.N. Fowler & Co.
Tudor St. London EC4




The book title isn't exactly correct, but there was a series of "lessons" published under the collective title "Brotherhood of Light" by Elbert Benjamine (AKA C.C. Zain). The texts deal with the Occult and Astrology.


Benjamine reported that he communicated with the dead from an early age. Like Aleister Crowley, he was an avid mountain climber. The books in his series dealt with such subjects as Tarot, Masonry and Spiritual Alchemy. His writings serve as the foundation for The Church of Light.



There is one more interesting detail about Elbert Benjamine. His date of birth was December 12, 1882.

26 comments:

MikeNL said...

Thanks taf.

great post again.

M.

Anonymous said...

Vince, here.
AND, let's not forget the as-yet-unreleased
"CARNIVAL OF LIGHT".
I've heard people say it's kinda like "Return Of The Son Of Monster Magnet" by Zappa, w/o a beat.
Being a ZAPPA fan, I'd LOVE to hear it!

Anonymous said...

Tafultong,
Have you heard about Paul and his new girlfriend traveling across America on old route 66 and stopping in truckstops and convenience stores meeting fans?There is a photo of Paul with a group of teenagers at suntimes.com.I envy him.I have always dreamed of doing this myself.I have two weeks vacation coming up but gas prices are making me crazy.

Aja

Tafultong said...

Thanks Mike.

Yes, Vince. I hope "Carnival of Light" still exists and will come out some day.

Tafultong said...

Hey Aja,

The Abbeyrd News page had an interesting theory about the motive of the trip. I think it's a pretty cool thing for him to do.

Anonymous said...

Oh, JEEPERS H. CREEPERS!
He owns the rights to "Route 66", huh?

Boy, he's been printing his own money for quite a while, huh?

Vince.

Anonymous said...

An answer.

YouKnowMyName231

Anonymous said...

Goranson is still around.

Anonymous said...

I saw Paul in Springfield, Illinois (He stoped there on his route 66 thing. I told him all about iamaphoney, and the possibility of stalkers being involved.

He looked a bit frightened when I got into detail. He thanked me and got into a conversation with one of his security gaurds. I don't know what happened after that, but expect iamaphone's page to be doen withing the next few days.

Your welcome.

-bern.

Tafultong said...

Anonymous said...

Goranson is still around.

Yeah, I hope he finishes his Beatles/Alice project. Reading his stuff left me wanting more.

MikeNL said...

I saw Paul in Springfield, Illinois (He stoped there on his route 66 thing. I told him all about iamaphoney, and the possibility of stalkers being involved.

He looked a bit frightened when I got into detail. He thanked me and got into a conversation with one of his security gaurds. I don't know what happened after that, but expect iamaphone's page to be doen withing the next few days.

Your welcome.

-bern.

---

lol

Anonymous said...

If you're going to take a route, then Route 66 is the best way to go.

Anonymous said...

Nothing to "lol" about. I even gave Paul iamaphoney's youtube address. He may be viewing the videos right now (If he has a computer availiable.)

The reason I had enough time to tell Sir Paul about this is that I'm the brother of an old friend of McCartney. We had lunch with him (charming man too, no way he's the beast of the apocalypse), and I felt I should tell him about it. I've been following iamaphoney for the past couple of months and have grown concerned, what with the fires and all. I think it's the fire phenomenon that really freaked poor Paul out.

I'm also concerned about the iamaphoney imatators, since they seem to be getting a little TOO into it.

My brother thanked me as well, he said Paul is getting on it right away. However, he said that Paul's "people" don't seem to be too concerned with some "freak with a camera and editing program" as they put it.

Stay tuned.

-bern

Anonymous said...

I highly doubt that Paul didn't already know about iamaphoney. As image-conscious as he is, there's no way a phenomenon this big eludes his radar.

Paul has planted many deliberate "clues", and it's a central theme of phoney's. The King of Cosmania is not unaware.

If Paul really did talk to that poster, then he was playing dumb.

Anonymous said...

Here's another clue for you all.

The Phoney is Paul.

-bern

Anonymous said...

"It" magazine...Front Cover TEDHA BARA..."ARAB DEATH"

Cus Cus

Anonymous said...

"At the beginning of their respective journeys, Lucy has marmalade skies and Alice grabs a marmalade jar. There was an impressive marmalade sky in the recent debut video by wizardofpaul..."

I was walking along, minding my business,
When out of an orange-colored sky,
Flash! Bam! Alakazam!
Wonderful you came by.

(Nat King Cole - Orange Colored Sky)

"Look
Soon" as wizardofPaul wrote in his missing video.

Anonymous said...

Sorry, but when I think of "Orange Colored Sky", I think of Screamin' Jay Hawkins' version.

Vince.

Anonymous said...

god T, you really just blew me away with the marmalade skies thing, mainly because I had just written something so similar somewhere before I even read your piece. Talk about synchro.

Anonymous said...

This Information Are Of FBI... You Morrons Do

NOTHING IS REALEAR SI GNIHTON

I Don't Believe In Iamaphoney,
is a f*cker.
And If You Don't Know is Name
Is Very Easy

Iamaphoney
Ian Martin Jr.


THE BEATLES FOREVER

MercuryBeatles753

Anonymous said...

as in son of the Martian Man?

Anonymous said...

Mojo L Likins here


Well, handsacross the water hands across the sky, Uncle Elbert. and Taf, with all due respect darling, that is most likely a corrupted "E": Doctrine not doctring...I think because I do the same thing with my "E"s, maybe it is a left handed thing...foot if eye know

Anonymous said...

ohhh and I forgot...BAAHHHH....you fuck one goat, just one.

XOXOXOX

Tafultong said...

Mojo L Likins wrote:


Well, handsacross the water hands across the sky, Uncle Elbert. and Taf, with all due respect darling, that is most likely a corrupted "E"

Of course you're right. I didn't want to commit myself to that because in a letter to Apple guy Ken Mansfield, John Lennon wrote the word "rond" instead of "round." Mansfield said he wasn't sure if that was John's shorthand or bad spelling.

The Prophetic Observer said...

http://www.amazon.com/Sacred-Tarot-Manual-Brotherhood-Serial/dp/B0017KE5OY

#48 is on the Tarot

Anonymous said...

Why am I always late to the party?

I wish "bern" had elaborated a little bit more. I'm rather curious about this:

"He looked a bit frightened when I got into detail"

What detail?

" and have grown concerned, what with the fires and all. I think it's the fire phenomenon that really freaked poor Paul out."

What fires? If anyone can elaborate on this, it would be great.

And IDK why on earth this person would assume Paul wouldn't be aware of this stuff. Not a lot of "fringe" Paul-related (PID / PWR / etc) sites online, and IAAP has been one of the bigger divers of the phenomenon.....