Robert Stark and Matthew Pegas talk about their recent trip to San Diego and their observations on cultural and urbanist trends.
Topics:
San Diego’s reputation as a smaller, cleaner, nicer version of LA and its unique attributes
The layout of the city with a centralized downtown near the waterfront surrounded by suburban sprawl
San Diego and Orange County among the largest areas of upper middle class sprawl in the nation Politics of San Diego as a historically Republican stronghold that has trended Democratic in recent years Demographics of San Diego and how they relate to overall CA trends
The most stereotypical American City located in CA while the State is culturally drifting apart from the rest of the Country After decades of suburban sprawl, San Diego eyes big shift to dense development
The historic Gaslamp Quarter which is the one section that feels truly urban
Horton Plaza: Will this PoMo wonderland in San Diego be saved?
Architect Jon Jerde’s inspiration for Horton Plaza from Ray Bradbury’s “The Aesthetic of Lostness” extolling the virtues of getting “safely lost”
Wealthy beach community La Jolla and it’s village layout
The importance of investing in communal places that the public can enjoy, particularly in wealthy areas TorreyPinesState Natural Reserve
The Victorian Hotel del Coronado FriendshipPark at the US/Mexico Border and political symbolism of the border wall
The InlandEmpire Heavenly Action by Erasure, the soundtrack of the trip with a message that friendship, love, and positivity can conquer anything
Brandon’s articles Yang Time! and Yangster’s Paradise
Brandon’s past support for Tulsi Gabbard and why Bernie Sanders is no longer the anti-establishment candidate
Andrew Yang’s unconventional coalition of Dissident Rightest, Radical Centrist, NEETs, Bernie Bros, and Leftist
Reasons for Trump supporters turning to Andrew Yang
Andrew Yang’s identity neutral agenda and context of comments on White demographic decline
Automation as inevitable and something we must adapt to
Trickle Up Economics in contrast to failed Trickle Down Economics
The importance of a basic income for artist and innovators
How a basic income will enable people to liberate themselves from society
Human centered capitalism that creates measurements around people
Whether the basic income will change the debate on immigration
Regulating Tech Companies to protect free speech
The Mall Act and Zoning issues
Robert Stark and Matthew Pegas talk with David Cole about the history, culture, and aesthetics of LA ‘s Malls. David Cole writes for Takimag and is the author of Republican Party Animal.
Topics:
David and Robert’s background growing up on the Westside of LA
The Open Air Century City Shopping Center, the original 60’s retro futuristic aesthetics, and the film Conquest of the Planet of the Apes
The recent $1-billion makeover of the Mall and plans to make Century City more urban and pedestrian friendly
The “Westfield Aesthetic”
The old underground 70’s retro futuristic ABC Entertainment Center
The first major indoor mall Fox Hills in Culver City
The Westside Pavilion, Jon Jerde’s 80’s Post Modernist aesthetics(original featured in Tom Petty’s Free Fallin’), and plans to turn it into office space
The 80’s Rodeo Collection, an archeo-futuristic urban oasis model for self contained cities, and the film Body Double
The Beverly Center, the amusement park “Kiddyland” before the mall , the original 80’s aesthetics with futuristic external escalators, and latter renovations
The lack of interest in preserving 80’s architecture
Young people’s interest in 80’s aesthetics and the magical dream like memories from early childhood(Hypnagogia)
The 70’s retro high-rise Mr. C Hotel(formerly the Renaissance) near Beverly Hills
The Third Street Promenade, the first major outdoor mall
The rise of outdoor malls such as Rick Caruso’s The Grove and Americana at Brand and how those are now becoming dated
Future trends, the under construction high-rise shopping complex, the Oceanwide Plaza in Downtown LA
The Jon Jerde designed neon lit Universal CityWalk
David’s joke about the City Walk’s old Rain Forest Cafe and the Museum of Tolerance’s Tunnel of Hate Westwood Village as the center of Westside nightlife and it’s decline in the late 80’s
The concept of beauty throughout history has been a force for creation, inspiring mankind to reach the pinnacle of civilization. From men accomplishing great things to win over a lover, the beautiful female as a muse for the artist, religions building great temples and cathedrals to attract worshipers, kings and emperors building monuments to demonstrate their greatness, and businesses using aesthetics in architecture and advertisements to attract more consumers.
In today’s society aesthetics serves primarily as a force to manipulate people to keep them striving and conforming to the liberal capitalist system. Advertisements use aesthetics to create a vision of a product to consume; not just the product itself but an overall aesthetically pleasing scene involving beautiful women, luxurious furnishings, great architecture, natural scenery, and music to create the mood.
The Orientation of D E C A Y’s Political Views
DECAY’s outlook on human dynamics can be described as “right-wing”, but without stereotypical “right-wing” stances, such as laissez-faire free-market economics or moral traditionalism
DECAY’s left Wing stances on environmental and public health regulations, worker and consumer protections, and a social safety net Alt-Apoliticism
Meta Politics The Bearer of “Trad” News
A post American perspective
Futurism and technological progress
Predicting Future Trends
Independent City States Where Should One Live?
Urban neighborhoods, Sreetcar Suburbs, Retrofitted Suburbs, Small Towns, College Towns, and the reemergence of the village model, where people live in close proximity to where they work, shop and recreate
Growing up in the San Francisco Bay Area and thoughts on the region’s cities, suburbs, and wilderness
The need for a balance between urbanism and wilderness
Retro Futurism and an affinity for 80’s Synthwave
Growing up in Los Gatos which is a small town on the edge of the Silicon Valley
Studying architecture at USC and observations on LA
Art Deco and Mid Century Modern Architecture in LA
New Urbanism and Retrofitting suburbia
The Bay Area Housing Crisis and the importance of developing smartly while protecting greenbelts
How ugly architecture leads to NIMBY sentiment and why the YIMBY movement needs to address aesthetics California Senate bill would force more dense housing near transit hubs
Working on a redevelopment project at the Walnut Creek BART Station
San Francisco’s SOMA district’s new skyline
San Francisco’s new Transbay Terminal
Architect John C. Portman; The Embarcadero Center and Hyatt in San Francisco and the extension of the urban realm to the inside
Architect Jon Jerde; his projects including Westside Pavilion and the Universal City Walk in LA, Horton Plaza in San Diego, and the Wynn and Bellagio in Las Vegas
Architect William Pereira who designed the Trans-America Pyramid in San Francisco
Brutalism
1980’s architecture and whether it will make a comeback
Frank Gehry
Modernism vs. Postmodernism and where to draw the boundary
How current architecture lacks one cohesive aesthetic
Adam’s work as an architect in China, master planned projects, and observations on architecture in China Winner Take All? Richard Florida’s ‘New Urban Crisis’
How to accommodate families in cities
Robert Stark and co-host Francis Nally talk to Vaporwave artist Spear 槍. He is a musician and DJ who attends Pennsylvania State University. Check out his music on Facebook, SoundCloud, and Bandcamp.
Topics:
Intro: 名誉
The Vaporwave genre
Slowed down compressed 80’s music
Lo-Fi Trip Hot
The revival of cassettes and VHS
Adult Swim
Vaporwave as a surreal idealized consumerism
Mallsoft
The visual art for the videos
The Vapor Room show
Saudade; a Portuguese term to describe the longing for and memories of good times
Hypnagogia; the state between being awake and being asleep where you can’t distinguish between what is real and what is not Vaporwave Literature(Robert Stark’s Journey to Vapor Island)
Intro: Compare and Contrast
How Brandon got into making music in the mid 90s (weird early releases like Birthday Boy)
The meaning of songs on the EP, “Compare and Contrast”
How some lyrics were taken from poems in Beatnik Fascism
The song For a Sunny Day inspired by The Sunrays – I Live For The Sun
90’s Indy music and how the artsy indie music scene seems dead
Influences of 60’s mod bands and 90’s mod revival bands like Majestic
How Brandon never liked or could relate to the Beatles or Rolling Stones but mostly only obscure and forgotten bands from the 60’s
Minimalism in music
Brandon’s interest in the 60’s mod style in music and design
Brandon’s album cover designs and inspiration from 70’s advertisements
Majestic’s Live It Up! album cover design
Songs inspired by 80’s cartoons and commercials
80’s Mall culture, DeadMalls, The demolition of the Metro Center Mall in Phoenix, and Brandon’s interest in the Logan’s Run aesthetic Beatnik Fascism by Brandon Adamson (review by Pilleater)
Outro: Something Fun a Trampoline
The Hollywood imagery and outsider stereotypes of LA
The history of LA
How LA’s urban core is spread out over a large geographic area from Santa Monica on the Coast to Downtown LA
Robert’s disclaimer that the photos capture the best of LA, but that most of the spaces in between are unappealing due to the cities sprawl
LA’s transit system
South Central LA
West Hollywood, and Rabbit’s experience living there
Downtown LA, the gentrification of the historic core, the grittiness and vintage signage of Broadway, and the Serial Killers Who Haunted The Cecil Hotel
Downtown LA’s architecture including John Portman’s Bonaventure Hotel, and the the 80’s Art Deco revivalHome Savings Building where Charles Lincoln worked
Beverly Hills, the 80’s futurist Rodeo Collection, the “Vaporwave” Roman Fountain , and the the 70 futurist/late modernistRoxbury Plaza Century City, which originally had a 60’s futurist aesthetic, was the the film location of Conquest of the Planet of the Apes, and the Century City Mall
1980’s Malls including the Beverly Center(Original image), Westside Pavilion, which reminds Pilleater of the game Myst, and the renovation of those malls which ruined their aesthetic
Historic preservation trends starting with demolition of the Art Deco Richfield Tower in Downtown LA, to the lack of preservation for 80’s architecture today
New architecture inspired by past styles including the new Streamline ModerneUnder construction Beverly Hilton tower, 70’s futurist inspired renderings for skyscrapers, and Rabbit’s observation that many apartments are being retrofited in mid-century modern styles
Santa Monica, the waterfront, architecture including the Art Deco Clock Tower, and Santa Monica NIMBY Restriction on heights
The Interactive Cafe, which is one of the last surviving independent businesses in downtown Santa Monica, and Pilleater’s point that it has a Cyberpunk aesthetic
The high cost of housing in LA, even in unappealing areas
The San Fernando Valley, which was traditionally home to LA’s middle class
Demographic trends, the destruction of the white middle class, gentrification of the urban core, and new suburban ghettos in the desert
Rabbit’s point about SWPLs he met in LA who look down on the suburban middle class
The Alt Left dilemma between identifying with SWPL Culture, and urbanist aesthetics, and supporting white middle class identitarianism, which often lacks strong aesthetic visions
Trump’s debate performance far exceeded the first debate, and was consistent yet combative from the beginning
How despite that Trump did more to solidify his base, rather than appeal to undecided voters
How Trump responded to the leaked lewd comments of his Trump vows to get rid of carried interest loophole, despite his support for tax cuts for the top 1% WikiLeaks Dump: Hillary Dreams of ‘Open Trade and Open Borders Excerpts from $Hilary Clinton$’s $Wall Street Speeches$
How Hillary Clinton represent the worst of both the left and right(ex. corporate plutocracy, anti-worker, anti-white and male discrimination, and a Neoconservative foreign Policy)
In contrast, Bernie Sanders proposed policies that would of benefited the working and middle classes, and like Trump posed a threat to the establishment
How the political ideal would be to combine the best aspects of Trump and Sanders(ex. Radical Centrism)
How Trump’s economic policies are not ideal, but he is going as far as he can within the limits of the GOP’s overton window
Healthcare in the debate, how Trump focused on criticizing Obamacare, but only briefly touched on his proposal to allow insurance companies to compete over state lines
Robert’s point that in the American Healthcare model your screwed if you can’t afford healthcare, but in the public model in England where he lived everyone gets healthcare, but the quality is not the same as private hospitals in the United States
Rabbit’s point that socialized medicine works best in small homogeneous societies, but not on a large scale in the United States
Robert’s point that the Swiss Model for Health Care is the best out of existing models, but ideally insurance should be a usury free public utility
Trump correctly admitted Russia, Iran and Assad are a counter balance to ISIS and Wahhabism, to the dismay of GOP foreign policy hawks
Why there needs to be restrictions on democracy
Rabbit’s article A Proposal To Go Away, about the Alt Left, and how many of the new members are saying that Rabbit isn’t Alt Left, despite being involved much longer
How Alt Left founder Robert Lindsay has been involved in left race realism for a long time
The article Sub Types on the Alternative Left, and how Rabbit, as well as Robert and Alex fit into the Left Wing of the Alt Right
How the Trump’s campaign, Milo, and Breitbart are bringing mainline conservatives into the Alt-Right, and the Alt-Left is attracting disaffected Bernie Sanders supporters, who still hold onto a degree of political correctness
Rabbit’s article Milo Inc. – Not One of Ours Either, about how Milo is a mainstream capitalist conservative not Alt -Right, and supports importing foreign tech workers, and a neoconservative foreign policy
How despite that Milo has been useful in trolling political correctness
How Rabbit’s socially liberal views, and interest in futurism and modern art often make him feel out of place in the Alt-Right
Robert’s point that the Alt-Right is adopting Retro Futurism, New Retro Wave/Synthwave, and Vaporwave(ex. Alt-Right Synthwave Artist Xurious)
Rabbit’s response that they are attracted to the aesthetics and popular memes, but still hold onto reactionary traditionalist views
Rabbit’s article Blood, Soil and Food Courts, about the demise of the 70’s and 80’s malls
