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#1
05-29-2011, 12:34 PM
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Recurrent themes in mass-oriented entertainment
In the past, I have hinted about recurrent themes in mass-oriented entertainment. This is a complex subject that can only be understood and appreciated when analysed with an opened mind. It can certainly be the cause of some distress when one tries to comprehend the extent and the meaning of it all. Consequently, if you do not like topics that differ from the usual mundane information being fed to the masses, I would suggest visiting some other thread.
In previous discussions on AAm forums, I have tried to show (Tinker Bell “alter” in JPVA, for example) that there is an occult world below the surface or what we call our “reality”. Trying to link this topic to Alizée is not an easy task when discussions happen to be on an Alizée fan forum because, understandably, the vast majority of her fans are emotionally involved. Here I will try to present the some information that is not linked to Alizée (well, it is, but not directly) to see how it is received and if there is any interest. Popular entertainment infuses recurrent themes and symbols into the masses using different means, but mostly, it is hidden in plain sight. Indeed, for most people, this mass manipulation goes undetected, but for the initiated, it is pretty obvious. Again, this is a complex subject and for now, I would just like to show interesting connections to two movies that have used such fundamental recurrent themes and symbols; The Wizard of Oz (1939) and Alice in Wonderland (1951). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wizard_of_Oz_(1939_film) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_i...and_(1951_film) What follows can be watched and enjoyed for its aesthetical and/or artistic value only. For those who have more inquiring minds, you might want to analyse the phenomenon further and decide for yourself if there are real strong meaningful connections or just a series of random coincidences. The Dark Side of Oz (or The Dark Side of the Rainbow) This is the relatively well known “synchronicity” between TWOO and Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon. Yes, you have read this right; it seems there is a link between the two mass phenomena. Many believe (as I do myself) that TDSOTM is an “alternative” soundtrack to the children’s classic; basically, if one starts TDSOTM at a specific moment at the beginning of TWOZ, one can find what are usually referred to as “synchronicities”. Here, I would like to point out that although many do claim that you can loop the album through the movie and find very good “synchronicities” throughout, I do not agree, at least, I do not believe that you can find the same level of harmonization that can be experienced during the first playing of the album. So, in this particular case, I only refer to the first 43 min of TWOZ (one complete playing of TDSOTM). For those who do not know the album well, I suggest watching The Dark Side of Oz with printed lyrics. Here is some information you might want to read beforehand (a lot more information can easily be found on the Web): http://www.turnmeondeadman.com/index...d=17&Itemid=25 The movie: http://vodpod.com/watch/1060736-dark...z&c=weaselfuzz Alice on the Wall This is less commonly known. It the “synchronicity” between AIW and Pink Floyd’s The Wall. There is less information available concerning this one. Again, if you are not familiar with The Wall, you might want to watch this with printed lyrics. One interesting fact here is that "Comfortably Numb" is not present. The movie: http://vodpod.com/watch/654024-alice...z&c=weaselfuzz It is important to watch those “syncs” while one is relaxed and one allows himself/herself to get into it. One should just start the movies and sit back as skipping through it will likely kill most of the effect. For the one who enjoy these, you can download both movies (The Dark Side of Oz can also be purchased) in DVD-video format, already pre-synchronized. To watch/listen to these on a half-decent home theatre makes all the difference. There are more “synchronicities” to be enjoyed, but for now, let see how people feel about these. If anyone is interested to discuss this further we can go into more in depth analysis. “Somewhere over the rainbow...” For those who are not old enough to remember the original TDSOTM album jacket, one could point out that, just as in TWOO movie; we begin with black and white before entering a world of colors (white light being dispersed into a “rainbow” on the jacket front) to return to black and white at the end (jacket back). What happens in the middle is “over the rainbow” (inside the jacket - 1 and 2), which is one of the most pervasive meme in mass-oriented entertainment.
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_______________ Last edited by Corsaire; 06-03-2011 at 09:09 AM.. Reason: Added note about "Comfortably Numb" 
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#2
05-29-2011, 02:39 PM
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I love this thread. I don't know if I've ever said it here but Pink Floyd is my favorite band and The Wall is my favorite album; I first discovered them when I was nine, I remember hearing my great uncle playing his Dark Side of the Moon vinyl in the living room and thinking it was the most amazing music I'd ever heard. He went out and bought me the album, along with The Wall, and my first CD player so I could listen whenever I wanted. So many memories.
 Anyways, I also remember, when I was reading about the band on the internet, finding an article about the Dark Side of the Rainbow and trying it out. I always thought it was one of those rare, fantastic coincidences, but some moments make me think twice, like when The Great Gig in the Sky is perfectly coordinated to the tornado scene (on a sidenote, is it just me or does listening to the song with the movie make the music even more hard-hitting?). The themes in The Dark Side of the Moon are dark; mental instability, time passing, etc. The themes of The Wizard of Oz are, at face value, more light-hearted and optimistic, like growing up and finding everything you really needed right in front of you, or even within yourself. One could find some more interesting underlying themes (some sexual, as in FanDeAlifee's case) in The Wizard of Oz. I once read an article somewhere that the story was meant to be an allegory to populism*, and I've heard people claim it to be about drugs, the gold standard, and mental illness. With this in mind I suppose it's in the eye of the beholder whether the match-up was intentional. I also hadn't heard of the "Alice on The Wall" concept! I'll have to see about that sometime. Thanks for mentioning it.  *Here is the article: http://www.amphigory.com/oz.htm
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 "In any case, being sexy includes being natural. Anything can be sexy, except vulgarity." - Alizée
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#3
05-31-2011, 02:49 PM
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The tornado scene on “The Great Gig in the Sky” is probably my favourite moment of T DSOO. There are plenty of very intense moments where the movie and the music are in perfect symbiosis: - When Dorothy falls of the fence - The entrance of Miss Gulch on her bicycle to the chimes of “Time” - Dorothy’s reaction when she understands that Toto will be taken away - Toto’s escape and return - The tornado scene - The entrance in the world of Oz on “Money” (By the way, this is where you would have had to switch sides on the original vinyl!) - The military march at the end of “Money” - The little ballerinas on “Us and Them” - The “Black” witch entrance on “Black, black, black...” (“And who knows which is which” or maybe “which is witch”?) - Dorothy starting her long journey at the beginning of the yellow brick road... to the lyrics “Out of the way, it’s a busy day” - The whole encounter with the Scarecrow (“Brain Damage” playing while he sings “If I Only Had a Brain”) - The heartbeats as Dorothy listens to the Tin Man chest As for TWOO itself (the work of L.F. Baum), I have also read about many of its possible meanings, but myself, I have mainly analysed the meaning of the TWOO movie in the context of mass manipulation and “mind control”; the connections there are more than convincing. I will get into that later on if people are interested. Edit: Quote:
) when he refers to the impossibility of playing the movie at Abbey Road Studios. I, for one, do not claim that PF smoked a giant joint and started recording at Abbey Road Studios in one single session while watching TWOO. I believe there is a simpler way to accomplish such “synchronizations”. All one needs to do is watch the movie with a stopwatch and record the time at which key transitions moments are appearing. You then match the music to the key moments while at the studio. You can even use all kinds of sound bits and effects to help with the matching; it is easier to add or remove sound effects (rather then temper with the songs themselves) to adjust the timing to perfection. You can write new songs and you can even use songs that have been already written and modify the texture and feel so it fits the concept... Maybe it isn’t as simple as I describe, but to actually imply it would have been impossible because one could not play the movie at Abbey Road Studios or one did not have means to basically create a movie soundtrack in 1973 is just unconvincing to me. Here are other reasons why I think it is likely that it was intentional: - The matching works on many levels: emotions, rhythm, action, themes, songs titles... “The Great Gig In the Sky” during the tornado, “Brain Damage” while the Scarecrow sings “If I Only Had a Brain”. - TDSOTM jacket (see the OP) - The fact that other music by PF does match other movies to perfection. Beside what has been presented so far, “Echoes” (from the album Meddle) matches the last chapter of Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey to such perfection that it would be hard to believe it was not done on purpose. And here, it is noteworthy that Roger Waters and Kubrick did have a few tumultuous collaborative issues through the years. - For the most part, TDSOTM (just like The Wall) is a continuous “soundtrack” where a song ends where the next one starts. This is a quite an uncommon way to present popular music and it could indicate intent to make the content match some other content. - Alan Parsons has built his career based on occult symbolism. Here is 2001 with Echoes: http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=2d6_1303698770 And there are more “synchronicities”... How about Eraserhead matched to The Wall? <Content could be disturbing to some people>  (In this case the whole album is played, so, contrary to AIW, “Comfortably Numb” does appear.) David Lynch, the director of Eraserhead, is known to be fond of Alice in Wonderland. So, The Wall matches with AIW and with Eraserhead, a movie from a director who happens to like reusing AIW symbolisms... And both these movies were released before the album. This is quite disturbing in itself. Furthermore, you have mentioned in another thread that you like the Robert Zemeckis movie “Contact” (based on Carl Sagan’s book). What about a scene from “Contact” also matching with “Echoes” to perfection: Ohhh no! I just realized that it has been removed from YouTube: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&l...&aqi=&aql=&oq= This is sad because it was one of the best syncs I have seen. Oh, well... There also seems to be a thread going through all these “syncs”. In all cases, a protagonist seems to venture to unknown territories: alternate reality, dream-like worlds, the world of Oz, Wonderland, space exploration, alien encounters, the origin of the Human race, after death experience... Edit: Quote:
Myself, I try to analyse a phenomenon for what it is. I do not rely on “official” people to give me “official” versions of events. @Chuck (... are you still reading this...) Have you even attempted to watch just the first movie. 43 min long... That is not much time wasted. Better, just watch the first 20 some minutes of TDSOO (up to the point where Dorothy enters the world of Oz) and see how it feels.
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_______________ Last edited by Corsaire; 05-31-2011 at 03:56 PM.. Reason: Automerged Doubleposts
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#4
06-01-2011, 01:13 AM
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#5
05-29-2011, 03:20 PM
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I love "The Wall" and "Dark Side of the Moon" as well. I have tried matching "The Wizard of Oz" up with TDSOTM out of curiosity and have seen these “synchronicities”, and it does seem rather eerie to me. But the skeptic in me also noticed there was a lot of time where nothing synchronizes.
Looking into it further, the drummor of Pink Floyd, Nick Mason, has said that the album had nothing to do with TWOZ. The engineer on the project, Alan Parsons, said no one in the band ever mentioned TWOZ during the recording, and the rooms they worked in at Abby Road Studios lacked the facilities to watch or synch anything to film. Furthermore, the songs on the album were recorded out of order and during 2 separate sessions. Therefore, I have to conclude that this is all a very interesting coincidence. I remember listening to one of my favorite albums with some friends one day. We had the TV on with the sound turned off. They were showing a documentary on egg production and processing, and the "synchronicities" were uncanny. One also must consider the human brain's ability to recognize patterns and "synchronicities", even if they are not real or not intended. Either way, I find music can sometimes be enhanced by watching video along with it, even if the video doesn't seem like it would have any connection at first to the music. And of course sometimes it just doesn't work. If nothing else, experimenting with playing music along with seemingly unrelated video can be quite entertaining, and when you happen upon a number of "synchronicities", it can be really interesting.
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http://www.youtube.com/user/lefty12357
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#6
06-06-2011, 04:29 PM
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Quote:
Actually, I have always thought that Alan Parsons had been disingenuous about his comments concernnig the TDSOO “synchronization” topic. I believe that AP knows very well that you did not need to play a movie in the sound studio to produce a soundtrack. He also knows very well that in 1972-73, there was nothing magical about making studio recorded songs and sounds fit any specific pre-established time patterns. In a way, it's almost as if AP is having fun at the expense of PF fans. It is also interesting to point out that three years before the release of TDSOTM, Roger Waters collaborated with Ron Geesin on creating songs and sounds to match the images of the movie The Body. The soundtrack was released in 1970 and was titled Music From the Body. Here is an excerpt from the movie “The Body”: Incidentally, it is worth noting that you can hear here the predecessor of TDSOTM’s “Breathe”. More information about the soundtrack: http://www.floydianslip.com/pink-flo...lbum.php?id=34 Why would it be so inconceivable that Roger Waters and the boys would have secretly created a soundtrack to TWOO when Roger Waters collaborated on such a project 3 years before TDSOTM? Also, "Us and Them" is known to have been based from a piece originally composed by Wright for the film Zabriskie Point. BTW, it is not as if PF discovered something that had never been done before 1973. Scoring a movie is quite a simple process, really. There are different ways to go about it, but, as explained before, you can simply watch the movie and record the exact time where each song has to start. Also, you record the exact time of key moments where you might want to add sound effects, solos... This process is nothing unusual, it is called “spotting”. Afterwards, you get busy writing the music (you can also reuse songs and/or modified existing songs to make them fit the concept). Then, you record the songs and effects. You do not have to record in any particular order. In the last stage of production, you make all the pieces fit the pre-established time signature, and to have plenty of room to play with timing, you can add some “filling” between the tracks (as PF did for TDSOTM and The Wall). This way, you can adjust the start of a song by adding or removing some of that filling. Edit: Quote:
It is interesting that you mention this. A friend of mine often correlates mind control or mass manipulation with ancient Greek culture in the very same way as what you wrote. Myself, I believe that from the dawn of Humanity, people with certain knowledge have always controlled the non-initiated. In each epoch, the manipulation techniques used by the elite have been unknown to the masses. I believe every modern society is also controlled to a certain extent; a culture necessarily implies a certain degree of control. For example, people erroneously think that music and movies (or any mass-oriented entertainment) show a reflection of what the masses are or what the masses want, when in reality, it is the music and the movies that mould the masses. Mass-oriented entertainment is primarily a mass manipulation enterprise before it is a money making business. I might write more about this topic (in the context of recurrent themes) at some point...
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_______________ Last edited by Corsaire; 06-07-2011 at 07:46 AM.. Reason: Automerged Doubleposts
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#7
06-07-2011, 12:23 AM
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I agree Corsaire that it is possible that AP and RW could get together collaborating in this way, but It is more interesting to understand their motivation beyond being high and or bored. That is also my query regarding the mc dimension. I would think it would have to have a purpose beyond recurring themes and or just screwing with PF fans.Also if you play Dark Side of the Moon backwards you can hear Roger saying " Your scratching the record stupid".
I am not as much doubting your analysis as trying to understand their motivation to do such a thing. Matrix synchs music with Alizee video's he creates. His motivation is obcession with Alizee. That I can understand. Speaking of mind control lol They say L. Ron Hubbard wrote dianetics on a lark and a bet that he said he could write jibberish and sell a million copies. He won the bet. That is one of the few books I just couldn't get through. Speaking of MC. That book is full of it on so many levels. Sorry for getting off subject everyone. Actually Corsaire I would like to hear your take on their motivation/strategy for synching to AIW and WOOz. 
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#8
07-10-2012, 11:48 PM
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A while back, I came across this piece of information and I remembered this thread. Well, it seems PF synchronised their music to films the exact way I proposed they could have done it. It is fairly simple, really, and I still cannot understand why most people believe it is ludicrous to think they synchronised TDSOTM to TWOO.
From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obscured_by_Clouds At this point in their career, the band were not new to scoring movies. They had already scored the films The Committee in 1968 and More in 1969. The band was already working on The Dark Side of the Moon during this period, but production was interrupted when the band travelled to France to score the movie. Nick Mason refers to the project: "After the success of More, we had agreed to do another sound track for Barbet Schroeder. His new film was called La Vallée and we travelled over to France to record the music in the last week of February... We did the recording with the same method we had employed for More, following a rough cut of the film, using stopwatches for specific cues and creating interlinking musical moods that would be cross-faded to suit the final version... The recording time was extremely tight. We only had two weeks to record the soundtrack with a short amount of time afterwards to turn it into an album."
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_______________ Last edited by Corsaire; 07-10-2012 at 11:53 PM..
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#9
05-30-2011, 12:16 AM
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Like Lefty said, some friends and I were once watching "Shock Corridor" while listening to "Starless and Bible Black" (Crimson) and amazed at how well that synchronized, too. After that, I seem to recall we were amazed by refrigerators, fingernails, and Doritos, in succession. I guess I'm sayin that you can put all kinds of odd things together and get amazed by the results. Like take my kids, f'r'instance.......
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#10
05-31-2011, 03:14 AM
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Pink Floyd is one of my all time favorite bands. It is amazing all of the sinchronizing, but I have never heard any credible statements from anyone in production or members of Pink Floyd make any references to AIW or TWOOZ. I personnally would like to delve into this subject and if you have any more evidence than what you have presented Corsaire, I would like to see it. Very interesting subject.
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