Take a mad ride past the event horizon of sanity

Take a mad ride past the event horizon of sanity with the band Babylon, in the final days of the American Empire. First in the psychedelic occult, myth and fairy-tale laced urban fantasy series, the Fallen Cycle.

"Grant Morrison's The Invisibles meets Fight Club, with ...a completely unique take on what makes myth tick," said Underground Reviews, and that's exactly what you get with this lean book, no choice but look the void right in the eye. As Nietzsche famously said, "When you look into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you." He knew the storm is coming. The fabric of the self, the fabric of a society, of a culture, of a species, all may reach the point of rupture without recognition. Is that not even more true in the psyche that wishes to distract, to look elsewhere, to numb out the terrible truth, that we live in that void already. It is an absence, the myth of no myths, no meanings.

Which sounds fucking awful, doesn't it?

Who could have predicted it'd be a band on the road that set it all off, the mad Bacchae and their rock apocalypse?

So don't be sad. The party is going to be a blast, drinking and fucking to the edges of oblivion; riding off with Lilith and Ariadne, Dionysus, transexual Jesus and Artemis into that sunset, (because who wants to remain virginal at the end of the world?) They offer polyamory and LSD instead of jealousy and fear, spiritual transformation instead of a 9-5 grind. When they pull into your town and open the door, who in their right mind wouldn't hop aboard? The feds say "these kids have to be crazy to go with 'those people.'"

Machines shouldn't speak for men. You'd have to be crazy not to go.

The joy, the release, at the end of all things is absolute. It's the getting there that's Hell. We must find our way out together, or not at all.

Those who wander through life without knowing who they are: No more. Unlock the Fallen God within your sleeping self. All it takes is the right story. Contact the Order of the Hidden Path, begin your initiation now. There is no time to waste.

-Gabriel De Leon, 2012. OHO, OHP.

Party At The World's End

Party At The World's End unveils Free Chapter

Party at the Worlds End Free Sample by James Curcio

[Take a Trip with us... Mythos Media.]

Summer Reading Offer

Wanted to read Fallen Nation, but never got around to it? Now's your chance. Here's some of what's been said about it (user reviews):

"Wow is my one word for this stunning novel." -Carrie Clevenger

"Fast-paced, well-written, with characters and imagery that grabbed me from the start." -Elizabeth Craig 

"The tagline says it best, "SEX. DRUGS. REVOLUTION. CROSSBOWS.", all things I'd've done well to have kept in mind throughout." -Xjane 

"An anthem for the mutant fringe, and a hell of a wild ride. The characters are instantly memorable, and the events inside are a projection of what could be all too real in the near future." -Tony Cancer

Order either an eBook ($2.99) or paperback ($15) copy of Fallen Nation: Party At The World's End anytime this summer, contact me with subject line "summer reading", and I will send an eBook of the companion piece the 404 Documents. 

[Take a Trip with us... Mythos Media.]

Fallen Nation: Free Chapter

I've been getting back into the spirit of giving away writing for free. Which probably means that the summer heat has been getting to me. All the same, feel free to take advantage of the temporary insanity.

Today's offering is the first chapter of Fallen Nation: Party At The World's End.

Fallen-Nation_PATWE-free by Jamie Lee

Download the PDF.

[Where is the fucking counterculture? Mythos Media.]

Fallen Nation: Welcome to the Apocalypse

Welcome to the Apocalypse. A free mini comic based in the Fallen Nation world. 

Illustrated by P. Emerson Williams, written by James Curcio.

Get the mini Free comic. 

Human Demonology: Salome

By P. Emerson Williams 
And when a convenient day was come, that Herod on his birthday made a supper to his lords, high captains, and chief estates of Galilee; And when the daughter of the said Herodias came in, and danced, and pleased Herod and them that sat with him, the king said unto the damsel, Ask of me whatsoever thou wilt, and I will give it thee. And he sware unto her, Whatsoever thou shalt ask of me, I will give it thee, unto the half of my kingdom. And she went forth, and said unto her mother, What shall I ask? And she said, The head of John the Baptist.
And she came in straightway with haste unto the king, and asked, saying, I will that thou give me by and by in a charger the head of John the Baptist. And the king was exceeding sorry; yet for his oath's sake, and for their sakes which sat with him, he would not reject her. And immediately the king sent an executioner, and commanded his head to be brought: and he went and beheaded him in the prison, and brought his head in a charger, and gave it to the damsel: and the damsel gave it to her mother. And when his disciples heard of it, they came and took up his corpse, and laid it in a tomb.
- (Mark 6:21-29, KJV)
The story of Salome is a familiar one in Western culture, the climax of wich with her lascivious dance and the severed head of John the Baptist has fired the imagination of artists, writers and composers for hundreds of years. Then there's Dracula as an allegory describing Victorian men's fear of female sexuality, Lilith in legend and art... The mythical Salome can be seen as both a product of and a window into the minds of those who told it. Salome was a real historical person, born EV 14, the daughter of Herodias and the stepdaughter of the Emperor Herod Antipas. Though she is unnamed in the New Testament, Salome is named in the writings of the historian Josephus.

Lilith: The Original Vampire

By James Curcio
There is going to be a lot of information for you to delve into on Lilith in the forthcoming Immanence of Myth anthology, as well as a fictional portrayal of her - or someone who thinks she is the present incarnation of Lilith, anyway - in Party At The World's End. (To be released 2014)

Here is a little from the section on Lilith in Immanence of Myth, to get us started:

Lilith begins not as a Goddess, but as a demon, a malevolent force that you can hear when the wind howls in the desert, carrying with it the sharp sting of sand. The distinction between Demon and God is somewhat in the eye of the beholder; it isn't so much a matter of power as of function. Demons are that which is cast out, at the same time divine themselves. I'd like to point attention to the way that Lilith represents forces that are cast out of the social sphere, a force that must be banished to make domesticity possible, at least when conducted within the confines of the paradigm of marriage-as-ownership. From within that circle, she would certainly look frightful. Consider that, moving forward.       She appears in the screenplay I working on concurrently (and collaboratively) with this project. Or, at least, we find there a woman who believes she is the modern incarnation of Lilith. When she has led a number of would be initiates (nubile girls themselves) to a hot tub with her, she reveals this, explaining,

Women told tales of me...I would steal the men away from them. I would devour their children. I was an abomination. I lived inside mirrors to seduce the vanity of nubile girls. Can you imagine?

Lilith concept drawing for Party At The World's End

    Lilith, the first Eve, is first recognized by her defiant nature; she is another anti-patriarchal, anti-authoritative symbol. At least, this is the form we encounter her in as she left Babylon with the Jewish exile.       So on the one hand we have Lilith as a spirit of the desert, a creature that could slip into your house and devour your children. This is how she would be presented to women, a bogeyman to keep them in place. Of course, this fear tactic isn't often capitulated consciously; it is something that all the members of a cultural domain participate in unconsciously.      On the other, there is this idea of her as the seductress, luring men away from their societal commitment to the “good mother.” This is an element which some superficially similar symbols, such as Kali, lacks. Without needing to return to textual source, it's easy enough to typify “this sort” of woman. She has the audacity to do what she wants, and it very well might not be what you or the society wants. There is something impetuous and child-like about her, which can manifest as a resolute defiance when placed within the context of a system of rules. So long as she's cast in the role of villain, this arouses the suspicion and fear of the wives of men, and their shameful observance to whichever force is the stronger.

No, not quite. 

    This is an important point: Lilith often appears in a different guise to men than women. Of course, there are personal and cultural factors. To women, especially within sexually restrictive cultures, we see more of the “devourer of children,” aspect. To men, she appears as the seductress, the dark anima. The kind of girl that you don't take home to mother. But in either case she represents a direct threat to the established social order, especially the order of marriage and monogamy. She is an enemy of stasis, of duty and societal bonds. In modern contexts, the threat posed to women is re-enforced by the ad and fashion industries efforts to increases competition and insecurity, as well as the conflict of the myths of domesticity, “slut shaming,” and so on. In a softer, more romanticized form, it is not surprising that Lilith has re-appeared as a potent symbol in bi-, lesbian, and polyamorous communities, especially amongst those who might have some derision towards “breeders.” However, Lilith is not simply a symbol of liberation. She also represents a point of contention between personal senses of restriction and freedom.  

However, there is a thread I didn't have a chance to cover in either of those books, and I thought it would be interesting to delve into another element of this symbol. Despite many modern vampire myths fixating their origin story the idea of the Brother's myth, either Cain and Able or Osiris and Set, or some cases Judas being the first vampire (not the least of which being the White Wolf: Vampire / World of Darkness setting), it is actually more likely that we can find the very first origins of this story coming from two sources. And one of these, you guessed it, is from ancient Babylon and Sumeria, in the complex of demons called the Lilim, Lilitu, or Lilith, the queen of them all. Though we may not expect to see Lilith popping up in True Blood lore anytime soon--though I wouldn't rule it out--you can't really look at the romanticization of the vampire without her. (This is a process which we all pray can't be taken any further than the glittering-in-the-sun Twilight vampires.)
[Editors note: Season 5 of TrueBlood focused heavily on Lilith! Go figure.]

More Lilith...

Though historical records are scarce on this account, there is a fair amount of research, "Lilith: The First Eve" being a paramount source, that the succubi myth originated with Lilith as well, and in all of these complexes you have the core idea of vampirism: whether through blood, or another vital essence such as semen or breath itself, these beings, or this force, sustains itself through feeding off our own. Definitely check out that book if this is a subject that interest you ("Lilith: The First Eve.") 
Let's not forget, of course, that at the most basic level all life sustains itself off of other life, and the only way to cut yourself out of this web entirely is to slit your own throat here and now. 

But that's not what Lilith is really about, is it? That's not what the vampire myth is about, either. At least not since the 19th century. No, we don't actually care that vampires must "feed" off blood. The vampire myth transformed from fear to lust, from terror to sexual desire, because the feeding that we're actually talking about is sexual. When you tell a lover "I'm hungry for you," you aren't telling them that you plan on feasting on their flesh. (Unless you're from New Guinea.) And what you're talking about can't simply be reduced to carnal desire, although it certainly informs that. It has to do with that unnameable chemistry, that almost uncontrollable pull that attracts two (or more) people. Joseph Campbell recognized that demons, angels, gods and goddesses are all symbols referring to the forces that we experience. To a great extent, these are psychological forces. Then Lilith represents, among other things, that hunger, that attraction, which says, "to hell with the details. I want you now." 

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Looking At The Impact Of Symbols 3: Lilith, Babalon, Kali

(Read more Personal myth posts)

By way of another example of how symbols can enter and effect our lives, I wanted to touch on another fairly volatile image: Lilith, and the similar Thelemic Babalon, based in part on Crowley's drug-induced imaginings of the Whore of Babylon. (For those interested in exploring the psychological & historical history of the image, I suggest the book you'll find through that link.)

There are many interpretations of this symbol. As with all mythological symbols, she is a mirror; and it isn't my point in this post to follow its myriad permutations through time. Most to the point, her origins are not as a Goddess but as an air or desert demon. The distinction between Demon and God is somewhat in the eye of the beholder; it isn't so much a matter of power as of function. To quote a little from the Fallen Nation screenplay I've been working from, told by the present incarnation of Lilith in that script:

Women told tales of me...I would steal the men away from them. I would devour their children. I was an abomination. I lived inside mirrors to seduce the vanity of nubile girls. Can you imagine?

Lilith, the first Eve, has a positive element as a defier; she is another anti-patriarchal symbol. But to compare her to Dionysus, one might compare the Lust to Art or the Devil cards in Tarot. (Refer to the Book of Thoth.) In the terms of those symbols, her craft is most likely to lead to the Blasted Tower than any kind of immediate synthesis. Not even Lucifer has such a defiant nature. This is one of the things that distinguish Lilith from a "dark mother" symbol like Kali. Kali represents a synthesis. In Qabbalistic terms, you could say the entire tree is contained within her. In other terms, it is enough to simply consider the linkage of the womb and the tomb, of sex and death, of time and eternity. Kali may appear frightful from within the field of time, but she is a synthesizer. Alchemically, psychologically, synthesis is a process of union. Lilith is precisely the opposite: she divides, even seemingly without point. This too serves an important psychological / alchemical purpose, but it is often a destructive one. Perhaps synthesis is the result, but that is up to the individual. She certainly isn't going to do it for you-- she'll be on to the next mark. 

Enough with abstractions. My most obvious first contact with Lilith came through my relationship with my ex-wife. This was quickly became an intentional endeavor: our first music project together was called Lady Babylon. We changed the name to simply Babalon with a new lineup. Most of our music dealt with our relationship, and our relationship dealt in great part with our art, our dreams, and our magick workings. They bubbled one into the other. At a point I don't have any idea what meaning those songs had for anyone else, because they were so internally motivated; but there is no doubt, what we were invoking was potent, and it had teeth.

I mentioned in my first post in this series that symbols of these kind can actually obscure our genuine relationship with the person that evoked them. This was quite true with us, I think. I have the benefit of hindsight now. At the time, I couldn't make the distinction. In the process of bringing up such a potent, and destructive archetype, our relation ran constantly between explosive fire and torpor. I can only imagine that, whatever our conscious motivations in bringing such a symbol into our lives, we were truly yearning from a release from prior "karma." This is where her role and Kali remain somewhat the same. When the fire has burned everything to the ground, you are finally at a point where you can truly leave the past behind and begin anew- supposing that you survive the process with something intact.

That is very much what happened. The band and our marriage went up in flames. While I clung to the personal element, I was stuck in a downward spiral. All your attachments will be burned away, one by one, until you learn to truly let go, or there is simply nothing left. I eventually did let go, and, though many new trials have followed, I have become who I am today as a result. I very much believe that without having performed the working that we did - difficult as it was - I would in some way still be stuck where I was psychologically, still a child. In that way it was my initiation. And I think many Americans never get that, and are stuck in a kind of perpetual psychological limbo: not quite a child, not quite an adult. They yearn for an initiation, brought about by this symbol or another, but often don't even know what they're yearning for.

Dionysus may be a patron of sorts, but Lilith was my initiator. I bear her little love, but plenty of respect.

At this point - and I mean this quite genuinely - I am thankful for everything that happened. Nothing subtle could have helped me grow. It is only when nothing short of personal apocalypse can shake up the status quo that a sane individual would call upon a symbol like Lilith, certainly not with such regularity.

Lilith The First Eve

This is a concept piece done between myself and Daniele Serra. It's for a movie that is still in pre-production. Available in print form for now on Deviant Art.

About Lilith:

Lilith has two faces: that of the stealer (and devourer) of babies, and the seducer of men. The former is a myth that arises for women, the other is how this energy interacts with man. This is focusing on the latter. Originally, Lilith was not one but a fairly terrifying legion of Sumerian and even pre-Sumerian desert/air demons that eventually got codified into this new form, especially by the Jews.

There's a fair amount of Jungian analysis on the symbol in "Lilith the First Eve" by Siegmund Hurwitz.

All that said, I've always had a thing for red heads. So it's been a naturally appealing image for me to explore.