Thus Spoke The Spectacle is a music video media critique concerning the nature and effects of media, technology, celebrity, news, empire, consumerism, propaganda and other forces at work in the experiment in civilization called "America."
The project has been screened and performed across the United States at theaters, colleges, high schools, festivals, conferences, galleries and other performance spaces, and its videos have been viewed and used in classrooms worldwide.
Follow the links in the Times Square scene above to watch and share videos, learn about previous and upcoming shows, add comments, and follow TSTS happenings on our blog. Or, first read on for a brief overview of the project and the people who produce and perform it.
The Spectacle
Influences
About Us
Why We Do This
In 1967 French revolutionary Guy Debord published a landmark critique of consumer culture, The Society of the Spectacle. In that book, Debord described "the spectacle" as not merely a collection of pervasive media outlets, but as corporate capitalism's domination of every aspect of life.
In that spirit, Thus Spoke The Spectacle begins from the premise that the spectacle is not a benign provider of information and entertainment, but rather the voice of corporate power which justifies and maintains that power through its onslaught of information and entertainment.
Over eighty years into the spectacle experiment, each fully spectaclized generation now raises the next in its own image; that is, in the image of the spectacle. We gaze perplexedly at the vast problems before us in denial of this fundamental fact, oblivious to the enormous damage done to entire generations by cradle-to-grave mental abuse, psychic warfare, and indoctrination into a so-called "way of life" which at its core is immoral and unsustainable. Thus Spoke The Spectacle is concerned with understanding and confronting this project of social control that has rendered itself nearly invisible by its ubiquity.The Spectacle speaks to us every day of our lives.
Thus Spoke The Spectacle is influenced by the lives and works of numerous artists, activists, and scholars.
Major sources underlying the project include:
Eric Goodman is a musician, writer, and videomaker living in New York City. He is a graduate of Cornell University, where he led off the first annual "MIDI Madness" Digital Music Festival. He has studied electronic music, music composition, video production and film scoring at Cornell and the Center for the Media Arts.
Eric's series of conceptual music videos, Thus Spoke The Spectacle, fuses original compositions, filmed and found footage, and dialogue from the fields of media studies, literature and philosophy. Drawing upon a wide range of theories, Eric's writings and videos explore the meaning and effects of our corporate-controlled, media-saturated, technological society.
Mike Stevens began playing drums at age eight, carrying on a long musical family tradition including two grandfathers who were professional musicians. He began playing professionally at age 16, and performed with several bands on the Florida bar circuit while obtaining a philosophy degree from the University of Florida. In 1994 Mike spent the summer in New York studying at the Drummers' Collective NYC.
Mike moved to NYC in 1997 to pursue music full time. In 2004, he replied to an ad in the Village Voice which read, "Drummer Wanted; Nietzsche meets Pink Floyd," hoping that the project would satisfy his musical and intellectual interests. After viewing a screening of Thus Spoke The Spectacle, Mike joined the project in April of 2004 and today contributes his talents as drummer and creative collaborator.
site designed by Eric Goodman
The project has been screened and performed across the United States at theaters, colleges, high schools, festivals, conferences, galleries and other performance spaces, and its videos have been viewed and used in classrooms worldwide.
Follow the links in the Times Square scene above to watch and share videos, learn about previous and upcoming shows, add comments, and follow TSTS happenings on our blog. Or, first read on for a brief overview of the project and the people who produce and perform it.
The Spectacle
Influences
About Us
Why We Do This
THE SPECTACLE
In 1967 French revolutionary Guy Debord published a landmark critique of consumer culture, The Society of the Spectacle. In that book, Debord described "the spectacle" as not merely a collection of pervasive media outlets, but as corporate capitalism's domination of every aspect of life.
In that spirit, Thus Spoke The Spectacle begins from the premise that the spectacle is not a benign provider of information and entertainment, but rather the voice of corporate power which justifies and maintains that power through its onslaught of information and entertainment.
Over eighty years into the spectacle experiment, each fully spectaclized generation now raises the next in its own image; that is, in the image of the spectacle. We gaze perplexedly at the vast problems before us in denial of this fundamental fact, oblivious to the enormous damage done to entire generations by cradle-to-grave mental abuse, psychic warfare, and indoctrination into a so-called "way of life" which at its core is immoral and unsustainable. Thus Spoke The Spectacle is concerned with understanding and confronting this project of social control that has rendered itself nearly invisible by its ubiquity.
The Spectacle speaks to us every day of our lives.
Thus Spoke The Spectacle is an attempt to show you what it says.
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INFLUENCES
Thus Spoke The Spectacle is influenced by the lives and works of numerous artists, activists, and scholars.
Major sources underlying the project include:
The Society of the Spectacle ---- Guy Debord
Amusing Ourselves to Death, Technopoly ---- Neil Postman
The Myth of the Machine, Technics and Civilization ---- Lewis Mumford
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, assorted writings ---- Friedrich Nietzsche
assorted writings and speeches ---- Martin Luther King, Jr.
Understanding Media, assorted writings ---- Marshall McLuhan
Frankenstein ---- Mary Shelley
The Technological Society, Propaganda ---- Jacques Ellul
Walden, Life Without Principle ---- Henry David Thoreau
Manufacturing Consent, assorted writings and speeches ---- Noam Chomsky
The Image ---- Daniel Boorstin
The Sane Society, Escape from Freedom ---- Erich Fromm
Manhood of Humanity ---- Alfred Korzybski
Amusing Ourselves to Death, Technopoly ---- Neil Postman
The Myth of the Machine, Technics and Civilization ---- Lewis Mumford
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, assorted writings ---- Friedrich Nietzsche
assorted writings and speeches ---- Martin Luther King, Jr.
Understanding Media, assorted writings ---- Marshall McLuhan
Frankenstein ---- Mary Shelley
The Technological Society, Propaganda ---- Jacques Ellul
Walden, Life Without Principle ---- Henry David Thoreau
Manufacturing Consent, assorted writings and speeches ---- Noam Chomsky
The Image ---- Daniel Boorstin
The Sane Society, Escape from Freedom ---- Erich Fromm
Manhood of Humanity ---- Alfred Korzybski
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ABOUT US
Eric Goodman is a musician, writer, and videomaker living in New York City. He is a graduate of Cornell University, where he led off the first annual "MIDI Madness" Digital Music Festival. He has studied electronic music, music composition, video production and film scoring at Cornell and the Center for the Media Arts.
Eric's series of conceptual music videos, Thus Spoke The Spectacle, fuses original compositions, filmed and found footage, and dialogue from the fields of media studies, literature and philosophy. Drawing upon a wide range of theories, Eric's writings and videos explore the meaning and effects of our corporate-controlled, media-saturated, technological society.
Mike Stevens began playing drums at age eight, carrying on a long musical family tradition including two grandfathers who were professional musicians. He began playing professionally at age 16, and performed with several bands on the Florida bar circuit while obtaining a philosophy degree from the University of Florida. In 1994 Mike spent the summer in New York studying at the Drummers' Collective NYC.
Mike moved to NYC in 1997 to pursue music full time. In 2004, he replied to an ad in the Village Voice which read, "Drummer Wanted; Nietzsche meets Pink Floyd," hoping that the project would satisfy his musical and intellectual interests. After viewing a screening of Thus Spoke The Spectacle, Mike joined the project in April of 2004 and today contributes his talents as drummer and creative collaborator.
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WHY WE DO THIS
"We are deeply in need of a new way beyond the darkness that seems so close around us... Every man of humane convictions must decide on the protest that best suits his convictions, but we must all protest... Some of us who have already begun to break the silence of the night have found that the calling to speak is often a vocation of agony, but we must speak. We must speak with all the humility that is appropriate to our limited vision, but we must speak... A time comes when silence is betrayal."
- Martin Luther King, Jr.