Chicago-based singer/composer Thomas Negovan has recorded the first new songs on an Edison wax cylinder since the 1920s as part of an ambitious art and music project cheekily titled By Popular Demand:

While a number of other musical acts have toyed with anachronistic ideas and themes, this record may be the first to truly act as a time machine to the early days of recorded music. Thomas Negovan’s debut solo album By Popular Demand features 8 original songs recorded using the most archaic of techniques: the wax cylinder. By stripping the music-making process of the gluttonously infinite possibilities of the digital age, By Popular Demand relied on the intimacy of the singer, his instruments, and the wax cylinder recorder. This meant no overdubs, no equalization, no editing, and most notable of all: NO ELECTRICITY. Using the most sophisticated recording techniques of 1911, By Popular Demand by name possesses a quality that is retro enough to be charming and ridiculous enough to be entertaining.

The album was recorded in two grueling one day sessions, requiring Negovan to use the sheer power of his voice and 12-string guitar to move a small sapphire needle across wax cylinders. By utilizing the bygone artistry of wax cylinder recording popularized at the turn of the century by Thomas Edison, Negovan’s decision to bypass modern digital method makes for a sound that is undeniably haunting and organic.

The record itself comes in three versions with limited pressings. The retail version features marbled black and translucent red vinyl housed in a sleeve overlaid with work by colloidial photographer Greg Martin. The other two are deluxe versions, pressed in both black lacquered and red translucent vinyl, with hand silkscreened sleeves adorned in artwork by Cursed Pirate Girl creator Jeremy A. Bastian.

By Popular Demand features the debut single “The Divine Eye,” to be released on wax cylinder in a limited edition of 50. The single is a first of its kind since 1924: recorded AND released on wax cylinder.

Negovan is performing in Los Angeles on January 25th at the La Luz de Jesus Gallery to celebrate the release of By Popular Demand. He explains how the recording was accomplished and you can see one of the tracks being recorded, in the video below:
 

Above, Dean Karr’s “Prague Twins”
 
Ack! I missed out on posting about the opening of this incredible looking art show currently hanging in the Windy City, but it’s still up for a few more days should you live or find yourself in Chicago this week:

Century Guild invites you to investigate the dark and sensual wilderness of two of history’s most vilified figures: THE WITCH and her dark master, SATAN.  “Grand Guignol II: HÄXAN – Satan + The Women who love Him” explores not only turn-of-the-century artists’ fascination with these embodiments of evil, but also brings together a roster of acclaimed contemporary artists who’ve rendered their dark visions for a one night only special exhibition.  This event marks the one-year anniversary of Century Guild’s showroom, which opened its doors in Chicago’s industrial Kinzie District last October for the beyond capacity show, “Grand Guignol: An Exhibition Celebrating the Legendary Parisian Theater of Terror.”

Artworks include original historical posters from the French theater of terror Le Théâtre du Grand Guignol, antique works on paper by Gustav Klimt and Alphonse Mucha, a selection of 19th century Devil imagery, and modern contributions from contemporary painters Dave McKean (cover illustrator of Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman), Michael Hussar, Gail Potocki, and Chris Mars; photographers Dean Karr (video director for Marilyn Manson), Austin Young, and Steve Diet Goedde; Italian poster art collective Malleus, and more.

You can email Century Guild curator Thomas Negovan for a private appointment to see “Grand Guignol II: HÄXAN – Satan + The Women who love Him”

Below, Dangerous Minds pal Austin Young’s fab portrait of infernal opera diva, Diamanda Galas:
 

 
“Unkept and Whispered,” a triptych by the extremely talented Gail Potocki, below:
 

 

Dangerous Minds friends Century Guild announce the release of “The Fracture of the Universal Boy,” a new graphic novel by Michael Zulli, years in the making. Zulli was a regular artist on Neil Gaiman’s Sandman comic and is well-known to the 4-color literati. Century Guild proprieter Thomas Negovan blogs about the new book here:

Speaking of focus, the kind of focus that makes electrons shudder, imagine being at the top of your game for decades.  Say, being one of the go-to artists on something as seminal and powerful as Neil Gaiman?

Voluptuaries and Vivisections: A Celebration of Sex, Murder, and Anarchy curated by Thomas Negovan and Century Guild. A selection of rare 19th and 20th Century Symbolist work. Decadence, dandyism, sex, and murder: this work provides windows into the darkest corners of human compulsion. La Luz de Jesus invites you to be a part of an unprecedented show that explores the taboos that have titillated and tormented since the turn of the century. Masterpieces of lithographed poster art from 1880-1940 illustrating subjects ranging from seminal S&M literature to STD warnings to serial killers will be shown.

Opening night party, Friday August 14, 8-11 pm at La Luz de Jesus, 4633 Hollywood Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90027