#celestial navigations

Celestial Navigations Horses 1988 <3 by Sci-fi stoners and lovers of weird audio books

The other day, I was sifting through the "New Age" bin at a record store by my house, when I came across Celestial Navigations. Now my criteria for which random CD is worth purchasing is a little hazy. However, any time I find a ridiculous album cover - say, a pirate ship floating through space - I usually find myself scrounging through my pockets for loose change.

On the way back to my apartment, I opened up the CD jacket and  came across this gem in the liner notes: "It transcends all known categories. It has no limitations when it comes to age groups or backgrounds." That settled it; Lofty ambitions, a terribly awesome album cover. I had obviously discovered a forgotten, synth sci-fi masterpiece, that would either help me drift off into spacey-sleep or at least provide me with strange background music.

After popping the CD into my Mac, prepared to be blasted off into outer space, I immediately realized that the above quote couldn't have been more correct. In fact, for better or for worse, Celestial Navigations introduced me to a genre that I didn't even know existed: the experimental audio-book.

Celestial Navigations was a collaboration between a couple film-score composers and actor Geoffrey Lewis, who unfortunately passed away last year. Lewis, who did over a hundred TV and movie rolls throughout his career - tells 8 sci-fi, short stories over synth tunes that sound like 80's Nintendo boss music. The album has tracks with names like "Space Princess" and "Horses," which I posted below, a song about a stable-hand who murderously avenges the death of his team of horses.

 Because who hasn't been there, am I right?!?

Ripped from Al Jarnow’s Celestial Navigations trailer. 

Celestial Navigations: The Short Films of Al Jarnow

This is a fantastic documentary about avant-garde animator/fine artist/filmmaker Al Jarnow, whom some of you may know as the Sesame Street animator of the famous short “Yakety Yak.” I’ll let the documentary speak for itself, but his work is primarily fine arts-based, highly experimental, exploratory, and concerned with the cyclical element of time and nature. Pretty dang cool.

Acting Legend Geoffrey Lewis Has Died

Geoffrey Lewis has died. The actor was famous for his roles in several Clint Eastwoodfilms and made numerous guest appearances on a variety of television shows. According to a family friend, Lewis died on Tuesday in Woodland Hills, California of natural causes. His son Miles said he suffered a heart attack during a workout at the Motion Picture Hospital and had been suffering from Parkinson’s and…