Taking A Cosmic Perspective + My Latest Cyberacoustic Guitar EP

"Death is a stripping away of all that is not you. The secret of life is to 'die before you die' – and find that there is no death."
– Eckhart Tolle

"What man can stand with autumn on a hilltop and fail to see the span of his world and the meaning of the rolling hills that reach to the far horizon?"
– Hal Borland

It isn't autumn – at least here in Austin.  But everyone I know is going through so much change – so much letting go, so much making room for new things – that the theme of autumn is timely nonetheless.

I'm proud to share with you my latest record, as well as the talk I gave at AURA Music Festival back in February – both of which center on facing the transcendental unknown with our heads up and our hearts open.  They're both free downloads.  Enjoy!

And stay in touch – I'm putting together a tour of the Southeast United States in early August and if you live nearby it would be great to connect.  Friends near Austin, Dallas, Denver, Boulder, and Kansas City, check out my concert calendar to check out the wonderful dates I already have planned to spend with you.  Love and blessings!

Yellow Leaves

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Recorded in a single take at a private backyard concert on Thanksgiving 2012, this 33:33 of improvised "cyberacoustic" instrumentals is my most spacious and poignant yet – evoking big autumn skies, far horizons, and the crunch of fallen leaves by bonfire light – but it defies expectations, remixing the familiar conventions of acoustic music with a fifty-pound pedalboard of beat slicers, filters, delays, and multi-channel loopers, welding fingerstyle technique into a cybernetic bed of live hardware production.

Picking (or often bowing, with an electromagnet) while twisting knobs and DJ'ing live samples with my toes, I perform as an embodiment of my training as an evolutionary biologist and futurist – liberating the organic into the digital, and the idioms of Americana into a new species of transcendental trance. 

Yellow Leaves is a definitive take on the adventurous and visionary musical attitude that earned my tenure as ReverbNation's #1 Experimental Musician in the world.

This performance was recorded on Thanksgiving 2012 and is a kind of musical fossil of that atmosphere of abundance and gratefulness. I hope that it serves you in your self-discovery. That its folksy-yet-futuristic vibe lends itself to your integration of past and future into the ever-blooming now. That it gets you laid by faeries.  (Based on the feedback so far, it may also be good for driving, painting, doing yoga, etc. I encourage you to experiment with set and setting.)

Pay whatever you like if the music works for you. I've had people reporting kundalini experiences, mad love sessions, and other wild shit going on with what I consider to be a pretty tame, if pretty, release.

Regardless, I would deeply appreciate it if you would share it with your people, and tag my music page.

Have a beautiful time with it, and thank you for receiving what I have to give!  Feedback welcome.

My talk from AURA Festival 2013

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My latest fleet jaunt through the wooded trails of the human imagination.  A philosophical performance examining our relationship to the transcendent – whether through awe and wonder or good old Fear of God, we all have an intense relationship with the Mystery – and how that relationship is due to change.

This time I took on the illusion of the individual, the evolution of technology, and the strangely familiar ancient future – weaving them all into a ripping speculative yarn on worlds beyond our imagination. I discuss right and wrong motivations for transhumanism, the prehistoric origins of the internet, and how the next industrial revolution might bring about a #festivalearth...

Here's the track list, to pique your interest.

1. My lifelong love affair with the Big-Loud-And-Scary

2. The universal desire for novelty

3. The kundalini yoga of techno-evolution

4. The paradoxically tribal, animistic future

5. Cybernetics, materiality, and the extended mind

6. Transcendent worlds in a fractal cosmos

7. Accelerating evolution vs. the ego and Olaf Stapledon's Last Men

8. 3D printing, living buildings, and the civil design revolution

9. Why don't I have a flying saucer?

10. Balancing the inner and outer worlds

11. Beginner's mind and the social incentive for playful brains

12. Living in the belly of the beast

13. LUCA and the illusion of the individual

14. The sacred geometry of convergent cultural evolution

15. What do I think about time warps?

16. Engineering consciousness & Phil Dick's Mood Organ

17. Wild-type transhumans

Download it here.  Talk about it here.  Feel free to tag or email me with questions!

Customized MGxGRC Signature Flatbills

I still have a few hats in every size except 7 3/4 and 8.  If you'd like to order one of these with or without custom paint, email me and I'm happy to give you the details.

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Custom Painted Hats

I don't have a lot of time to do hats before debarking for summer tour; but if you'd like one, hit me up!

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Triceratops T-Shirt, Salamander Painting, New Time-Lapse Videos, Dialogue w/ Marc Gafni

“Art tells the jokes that science insists on explaining.”

– Henry Warwick

"Every creative act empowers every other creative act."
– Alex Grey

I set two intentions for my art last year:  make it available on clothing; and paint pictures of local Austin animals to raise awareness of conservation issues.  Both of those dreams just came true.

Plus, I'm participating in a dialogue next week on art, culture, and spirituality with acclaimed author and Kabbalah expert Dr. Marc Gafni – and I've been playing with my new GoPro camera and have some fun time-lapse videos for you.  Thanks for reading and have a magnificent weekend!

Preorder MG Dye-Sublimation Tees

From Ravenectar!

–––> Preorder Here! <–––

Dye-sublimation is the only way to get vivid, high-resolution printing on the entire surface of your apparel.  Ravenectar is a new label out of Montreal whose mission is to make visionary art available on t-shirts.  It's a match made in heaven – and their mockup for the shirt with "As Awesome As Three Unicorns," my painting from Sonic Bloom 2012, is the most popular concept so far.  If you're a dinosaur dork, this shirt is a no-brainer.  

Contribute to Ravenectar's kickstarter to preorder yours today for less than retail price!

Barton Springs Salamander

(Eurycea sosorum)

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Painted live with pens on 24"x48" masonite panel at:
• 2013.01.23 - Cirque Blanc @ La Zona Rosa (Ill.Gates)
• 2013.02.01 - The Parish (KiloWatts, OTT & The All-Seeing Eye)
• 2013.02.09 - HeARTs Aware @ La Zona Rosa
(DJ PWR, Metranohm, Happy Happy James, Rena Jones, Jamie Janover, Govinda)
• 2013.03.02 - Head For The Hills @ Quiet Valley Ranch
(Holding Space, The Nadis Warriors, Kyle Hollingsworth Band)
• 2013.03.09 - Luminaria @ 300 E Houston, SA (San Antonio Dance Fringe)
• 2013.03.11 - The Parish Underground (The Nadis Warriors, Rena Jones, IndigoSun)
• 2013.03.12 - Big Bang Bar
(Profresher, Nico Luminous, Lafa Taylor, Future Simple Project)
• 2013.03.16 - MusicUs Showcase @ Whomp (DVS*, Rena Jones, Profresher)
• 2013.03.17 - High Times Awards @ Red Eyed Fly
(The Memorials, G-Eazy, Diemonds, Gypsyhawk, Interstellar Transmissions, The Effinays)

Austin's Barton Springs is home to a totally unique salamander that exists nowhere else in the world. I painted this to raise awareness of the valiant efforts by Save Our Springs Alliance to preserve the habitat of this beautiful creature, and to alert people to the importance of the Edwards Aquifer in general – which is also the source for clean water for millions of people, and is currently endangered by both deregulated development within city limits and secret fracking about 40 miles west of Austin.

Wherever you live, take care of it. Other creatures depend on you.  If you live nearby, you can support the Save Our Springs Alliance by donating here.

Click for a close-up view of each the entire process:

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Barton Springs Salamander Gear:
iPhone 5 Case | Laptop Skin
Postage Stamps | Greeting Cards
Belt Buckles | Doodle Mini-Speaker

New Time-Lapse Videos!

BusToShow SXSW 2013 Mural Time-Lapse

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For SXSW in Austin this year, my live painter friends and I decided to go big and paint a mural on the side of a bus.  BusToShow let us borrow theirs – they use this decommissioned school bus to provide safe rides to and from concerts across the country while raising money to support the arts.  We set up in the side yard outside Whomp on South Lamar and The Boston Boys were gracious enough to join us with their tasty live music while we worked.  It was one super magical afternoon.

We didn't get to finish the mural, though – so stay tuned for part two!

Jurassic Park Tattoo Time-Lapse

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It doesn't take a genius to realize I am one fierce dinosaur fanatic.  Here's to hoping the people at Universal Studios appreciate my new ink (courtesy of Lily at Austin's Golden Age Tattoo) enough to give me a free ticket to the 20th anniversary 3D re-release of Jurassic Park...!  Either way, my slain dragon now rides shotgun, forever.

Join me for a conversation with Dr. Marc Gafni

on Visionary Art, Transformational Culture,

and Unique Self Expression

This coming Tuesday, April 16th, I have the amazing opportunity to join Marc Gafni for a discussion on the transformational power of visionary art and the evolution of planetary consciousness.  Marc is the author of Your Unique Self, a groundbreaking book that examines the role of the ego in spiritual evolution and how to live as a whole, balanced person – embracing the whole spectrum of human experience.

Register here to dial in or stream online for free.

If you're as curious as I am to explore how the Unique Self teaching applies to creativity, community, and identity in the electronic age, then join us on the call this Tuesday at 8 pm Central.  Details here.

That's all for now.  More great news to come – thanks again for your time and support.  You know where to reach me...

Angels, Dragons, & My Live Painting From AURA 2013

"It is high time to ask whether it is really any scandal, any deplorable inconsistency,
for a human being to be both angel and animal with equal devotion."

– Alan Watts

Seraphim

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Painted with opaque markers on 24"x36" stretched canvas at:

2013 02 15, 16, 17 AURA Festival at Spirit of the Suwannee Music Park

(Consider The Source, Break Science, Kung Fu, Perpetual Groove, 

Greenhouse Lounge, Papadosio x2, Infinite Geometry)

02 23 Cirque de L'Amour at Austin Music Hall (Vibesquad, Quixotic, Tipper)

02 28 The Parish (The Digital Connection, ONE4ALL, Chris B.)

03 01, 02 Head For The Hills at Quiet Valley Ranch (Eliot Lipp, A Live One)

Click below to check out the whole process of this piece:

How many different animals can you see in this painting?  I obviously meant to put snakes in there, but was surprised to find forms that remind me of an owl, an octopus, and a tiger (or crocodile)...and someone surprised me with "elephant," as well.

The chimeric nature of this piece makes sense, since it's a remix of several of my earlier paintings.  There are many different visual references to my other work collected here and alloyed, sublimated.  Taken together you can see my work as a kind of evolutionary progression – not a linear march but a melody, returning time and again to weave through certain themes...

Painting is a process of discovery for me, a kind of intuitive listening, and this painting connected more dots for me than most – namely, the relationship between angels and dragons.  The Old Testament word for the highest angels, "seraphim," literally means "the burning ones," and is used throughout the Bible as a synonym for "snakes."  Flaming snakes with wings?  Gosh, that sounds familiar...

I don't know why it hadn't occurred to me – even after years of savoring the connection between "Archangel Michael & The Serpent" and "St. George & The Dragon" (and "Lord Garuda & The Naga," further East...birds versus snakes, world round).  The snake – which as many of you know shows up in the yogic traditions as a symbol for the wriggling, electric life force called "kundalini," sprouts wings when our animal nature reaches its crescendo and sprouts from the crown of the head, fully integrated with subtler, perceptibly "feathery" celestial energies.

Following that rabbit down (or up?) its hole, I remembered that to the Chinese, the dragon is an occulted natural force, a terrible mystery that reveals itself through what insurance companies call "Acts of God" – lightning, wildfires, and floods.  In other words, the dragon appears worldwide as a kind of mythological shorthand for the terribly transcendent, especially in what author Erik Davis calls "the electromagnetic imaginary" – our collective mystical experience of electricity and magnetism, whose awesome power has captured social imagination for thousands of years.

In a blog post describing his vision of the coming alchemical, musical paradigm he believes will replace materialism, cultural historian and former MIT professor William Irwin Thompson draws a straight line through angels, aliens, and electromagnetism:

"Since [our experience of] space would no longer be empty and separating, space itself would be a plenum of vibrating streams of energy that in the medieval lore of the Jewish Zohar in Spain and of the Muslim Sufis in Andalusia were known as angels. At the end of industrial civilization, through the popularity of science fiction, these beings were often re-presented as high-tech extra-terrestrials."

In other words, aliens = electricity = dragons = angels.  Chew on that for a minute.

(Then watch this documentary, Thunderbolts of the Gods, which argues that enormous electrical storms in space were responsible for much of our ancient mythos...)

It's no wonder that all of these things captivate me, and so many other people.  Whatever else they are, angels and dragons and aliens (as well as flames and lightning, the concrete natural phenomena in which these symbols are experientially anchored) are all wrapped up in one big ball of myth together, implicated as the various faces of the transcendentally Big-Loud-And-Scary.  Their popularity persists because they help us discuss the Mysterium Tremendum – that truth greater than our own, before which we quake as children...

Speaking of which:

Definitive New Live Recordings

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Definitive live recordings of nine incendiary guitar tapping etudes and space-hued transpersonal love songs, performed to an intimate listening room audience at Flipnotics in Austin, TX, 30 January 2013. 

A return from improvised electronic guitar work to my roots as an instrumental composer and singer-songwriter, this album features my "nice guitar," a 2001 Martin D35, and its new LR Baggs Anthem amplification system - the first pickup capable of reproducing the gorgeous tone of this instrument.

Seriously, these songs have never sounded this good.

You can get the album free for buying a print of the cover painting.  It's $3.33 or more if you just want clear, brilliant live recordings of my most dazzling solo guitar work, without the art.  (And if you like my music but not enough to support it, here are some decent live recordings you can have for free.)

"Michael Garfield has some absolutely amazing chops...
the musicianship on this album is truly wonderful."

- Marquee Magazine (on Alive With You, 2010)

"Esoteric and intricate, I found myself struggling to describe his sound and style...
some surprisingly pleasurable heartbreak."

- Mousike Magazine (on Double-Edged Sword, 2008)

(More reviews here if you need convincing.)

That's all for now.  Thank you for reading!  In the next update I'll share pics of my Barton Springs Salamander painting!  I'm super excited to show you that – but in the meantime be well and have a beautiful day!