Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law
"The human condition is Auschwitz, and the principle of Auschwitz finds its perpetuation in our understanding of science and political systems, in the delegation of responsibility to groups of "specialists" and in the silence of intellectuals and artists. I have found myself in permanent struggle with this condition and its roots. I find for
instance that we are now experiencing Auschwitz in its contemporary character. This time bodies are outwardly preserved ( cosmetic mummification) rather than being exterminated, but other
things are being eliminated. Ability and creativity are burnt out ; A form of Spiritual execution, the creation of a climate of fear perhaps even more dangerous because it is so refined." (Joseph Beuys)
History, Data, Articles,Interviews
Discography
1978-FAC 43- A FACTORY QUARTET-featuring 4 factory acts, double LP. Factory records.
1979-FAC-45 ART,DREAM,DOMINION- 12" Single. Factory records.
1984-FAC-95--"TEMPLE OF THE 13TH TRIBE"-The Project -Phase 1 L.P Factory records.
1985-FAC139-WHITE STAINS/WE LOVE THE MOON - 7" piture-disk single.Limited edition. Factory records.
1985-FAC-140-WE LOVE THE MOON - L.P. Featuring 10 new songs. Factory records.
1985 - Left Factory Records. Set-up cassette Label.
1986- -THE GENETIC TERRORISTS - C90 Cassette release Privately published.
1986 - ROYAL FAMILY & THE POOR-LIVE. L.P. A collection of songs recorded live from 1981-1985 - Released on Recloose Records, London.
1987 - Birth of GAIA COMMUNICATIONS.
1987- IN THE SEA OF E - New LP, 12 Tracks, privately funded & released on GAIA.
1988 - RESTRAINED IN A MOMENT ( I love you)/WHEN THE SHADOW FALLS/BEHIND THE VEIL - Released as 12" single- first release on new record Label.
1988 -CHALISE OF ECSTASY - Privately published by Gaia Communication as a Limited edition of Frater Achad's "Chalice of Ecstasy" - 93 hand-numbered copies.
1988 -THE GENETIC JOURNEY - Published " The Genetic Journey" by M.Keane -A Collection of writings and Artwork taken from Gaia archives. Limited edition 300 copies, distributed worldwide.
1989 - Recorded new tracks for planned Aleister Crowley Tribute LP.
1989 - GAIA records collapsed due to lack of funding. Lost all equipment.
1992 -FINLAND MUSIC FESTIVAL - Did 4 Performances, 2 Poetry readings and two Ritual workshops at a Music festival In Turku, Finland.
1993 - Failed attempt at releasing A.C. Tribute LP as two cassette & A5 book box set.
1998 - Inspired by the W.W.W. possibilities and capability to by-pass all the middle-men in the recording industry began the re-building of : GAIA COMMUNICATIONS WORLD NETWORK.
1999 - Secured distribution deal with Prime Distribution Ltd & worked on and released Gaia004 - " Songs for the children of Baphomet - A Musickal celebration on the theme of Magick &A tribute to the life & works of Aleister Crowley - 1875 - 1947 - A completly self-funded and personal tribute to the man, containing a full colour 28 page booklet hand numbered limited edition of 2000 copies.
2000 - Began work on new Royal Family & the poor CD LP - "ANTHOLOGY - 1978 - 2001" - A collection of songs dating back from RF&TP's very beginnings upto the present day. Released 2001
GAIA RELEASES
Welcome to the Gaia New releases page, here you will find all of our latest CD LP releases as well as regular up-dates on new publications which we hopfully plan to release later this year.
APRIL 2003
WE AT GAIA COMMUNICATIONS WORLD NETWORK ARE PROUD TO ANNOUNCE THAT THE ROYAL FAMILY & THE POOR HAS SECURED A 3 ALBUM RECORD CONTRACT WITH THE "LTM"LABEL -VIA THEIR "SPECIALIST" SUB-LABEL-"BOUTIQUE" WHICH SPECIALISES IN RE-RELEASES BY EX-FACTORY RECORD ARTISTS AS WELL AS OTHER "SPECIALIST" MUSIC,BANDS AND ARTISTS.
THE 3 RELEASES ARE BEING LAUNCHED/RELEASED IN JULY 2003 IN THE USA, SOON AFTER THIS ALSO IN GERMANY AND EUROPE AND TOWARDS THE END OF THE YEAR HERE IN THE UK. THE LTM RELEASES ARE AS FOLLOWS -
1- TEMPLE OF THE 13TH TRIBE-ORIGINALLY RELEASED AS AN ALBUM ON FACTORY RECORDS IN 1984 THIS SPECIAL EDITION WILL ALSO INCLUDE ALL OF THE EARLY RF&TP MATERIAL PREVIOUSLY RELEASED ON FACTORY IN 1979 ON THE NOW LEGENDARY "FACTORY QUARTET" DOUBLE ALBUM .
2- WE LOVE THE MOON- ORIGINALLY RELEASED IN 1985 ON FACTORY RECORDS-THIS SPECIAL EDITION ALSO INCLUDES PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED MATERIAL BY RF&TP. AS WELL AS THE "ART ON 45" 12" SINGLE
3- IN THE SEA OF E - PREVIOUSLY RELEASED ON MY OWN BELOVED "GAIA COMMUNICATIONS WORLD NETWORK" IN 1987 ( GAIA001) THIS SPECIAL EDITION WILL ALSO INCLUDE 2 TRACKS FROM GAIA002 - 12" SINGLE B -SIDE AS WELL AS OTHER PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED MATERIAL
LTM HAS ALSO RELEASED A NEW COMPILATION CD COMPILATION ALBUM THIS MONTH TITLED "BLACK MUSIC" WHICH CONTAINS MANY ARTISTS WHO HAVE RELEASES ON LTM/BOUTIQUE SUCH AS CRISPY AMBULANCE,ULTRAMARINE,LUDUS,SECTION 25,THE WAKE,MINIPOPS AND OF COURSE RF&TP. THIS OULD NOT HAVE COME AT A BETTER TIME FOR RF&TP AND GAIA COMMUNICATIONS AS WE SIMPLY DID NOT HAVE THE MEANS OR THE FINNANCE TO PUT OUT OUR BACK CATALOGUE OR RELEASE NEW ALBUMS AS DISTRIBUTION WAS ALMOST IMPOSSIBLE TO SECURE- INDEED-HAD IT NOT BEEN FOR TESCO ORGANISATION -THE DISTRIBUTOR IN GERMANY WE WOULD NOT EVEN HAVE SOLD THE ALIESTER CROLWEY TRIBUTE CD-WHICH-THANKS TO TESCO ORGANISATION HAS NOW SOLD ALL OF THE ORIGINAL 1000 COPIES THAT WERE PRESSED-MANY MANY THANKS TO JOACHIM,LERRY AND SONJA FOR ALL THEIR HELP AND SUPPORT DURING A VERY DIFFICULT TIME LAST YEAR. WE AT GAIA ALSO HOPE IN THE NEAR FUTURE TO BE RELEASING SEVERAL NEW RF&TP ALBUMS BOTH WITH LTM/BOUTIQUE AND TESCO ORGANISATION AND POSSIBLY LERRY AND SONJAS LABEL-"WHITE RABBIT RECORDS"- SO KEEP WATCHING THIS SPACE!!!
In 2004 THE ROYAL FAMILY AND THE POOR ALSO RELEASED A NEW ALBUM " NORTH WEST SOUL" ON THE BOUTIQUE LABEL WHICH IS CURRENTLY AVAILABLE ON THEIR WEBSITE LABEL.
REVEIWS
THE WIRE
Adventures in modern music.
Issue No 201 November 2000
OUTER LIMITS - Reveiwed by Edwin Pouncy
The Royal Family & The Poor. "Songs for the children of Baphomet.
Gaia Communications World Network.
This "Musickal celebration" of the life and works of self styled "Great Beast" Aleister Crowley (1875-1947) from one man band The Royal Family & the poor (aka Michael Anthony Keane) will be sure to raise the hackles of those who feel that Magick and music dont/shouldent mix. Keane's labour of love proves otherwise. He skillfully explains with sound,images and the printed word how well Crowley's revolutionary creed of "Thelema" touches the future of the planet as well as its past. Far from being distant and locked inside strange ritual, Keane attempts to show how Crowley's ideas contain a message that, when properly studied, have the power to unlock mysteries about who we are and where we are heading. Although the arangments veer somewhat untidily from synthesized incantation to (shudder) new romantic handclapping, this is a stylish and poignant tribute to a great and much misunderstood mind of the 20th century.
MELODY MAKER
OCT 25-31. 2000
THE ROYAL FAMILY & THE POOR-
SONGS FOR THE CHILDREN OF BAPHOMET. GAIA.004.
Album dedicated to devil-worshipping baldie Aleister Crowley. Dont beleive in any of it,but it gets five stars just in case. *****
UNCUT
ISSUE FEB 2001
THE ROYAL FAMILY AND THE POOR
Songs for the children of Baphomet
gaia communications *** ( 3 star)
Aleister Crowley tribute album featuring the
dark master's poems and prose set to music.
A labour of love originally recorded in 1988 by
Michael Anthony Keane aka The Royal Family
& the poor ( formerly of Factory records) this album
features an atmospheric collection of tone-poems which
combine Crowley's cryptic but beautiful words with a
superior home-studio neo-classical backing. Track 1
actually features a 1947 recording of the man himself,
which,surprisingly,merges seamlessly with a musical
backing recorded some 40 years later.
Facinatingly bizzare.
Peter Huxley
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PAST REVEIWS OF ROYAL FAMILY & THE POOR LP'S.
"IN THE SEA OF E" GAIA001 1988
ALBUM OF THE MONTH
ROYAL FAMILY & THE POOR - IN THE SEA ORF E - GAIA RECORDS.
On leaving Factory records this is RF&TP's first releases on the new GAIA label and in my opinion is their finnest to date. The openning track," living Light" is vaugly New-Order-ish though with somewhat more imagination.
The rest of the LP gives way to some of the most unusual though inspiring songs Ive ever heard, ranging from the discoish tracks to strange,ritualistic,demonic chants, interpersed with some real,atmospheric,beautiful songsmy favorite being "Song for freedom. This album clearly demonstrates what a true genius Mike Keane is; he's managed to produce an album that is both avant-guard and instantly accessable.
If you ever thought he should have released "restrained in a moment" as a single well there are quite a few tracks worthy of single releases on this LP as well, notibly the exellent "Time", a true classic if ever there was one. In short this album is brilliant, worth a few quid of anyones money - so go out and buy it.
---------------------------------------------------------
EARTH WORKS - SOUNDS - 1988.
Contender for the title of Liverpools most neglected son, Mike Keane nowadays attracts the stigma of "hippidom" weather for his natural grown-out hair or for the traces of Earth-worship and his "children-of-the-revolution" innocence in his music.
More than 5 years ago the ROYAL FAMILY & THE POOR conceived of the provocational and inspirational retoric of the sixties and combined it with the emerging funk fixation. " We made up tapes of synthesiser noises together with Arthur reading extracts from the situationist tract" The revolution of everyday life" and sent it to Factory records as a joke but they immediatly asked for an Album." When the other members dispersed Keane was left with his tapes, the music was refined until it resembled Durritti Columns later albums. On "We love the Moon" and the recent Live LP the best tracks combine irregular percussion with translucient, introverted vocals and keyboards. The new LP, "In the Sea of E" has the pop electro-chattter of "Living Light" or "Feast of the supersensualists", but there's still the rain-water transparency of "Honesty" and the meditational, undirected Eastern scales and Chants of "Mr Crow" and "Creatura".
The label name "Gaia" is part of the "concept". " Gaia is the name of the Greek Earth-Goddess whose name was applied to a recently developed scientific theory, it was observed that changes at a mollecular level in isolated,undisturbed enviroments corrisponded to changes that happened elsewhere". "This beleif that everything is connected and inter-related, that everything coheres but only by unseen paths" is sympathetic to claims for autonomy and non-herarchical "molecular" revolution in the late 60's and 70's. Keane even see's it as a development of ideas of subversion by Ritual and Magick that were latent in Punks Situationist - inspired provocateurs.
" You should have a child-like wonder at life" he wants us to be " endowed with all the dreams you can hold" an experience of immersion and total sensory stimulation. "I once planned that where ever I played there would be a light-weight dome that could be built inside the club covered in white cloth on which film-projected-images could be displayed at a 360 degree angle - the stage would be at the center of the dome. Current plans retain this psychotropic theme - " I want to do an album based on colour therapy and the corrispondances between colour and music". Nothing this ambitious has been atempted since Alexander Scribin's "Prometheus" in the last century.
For the present seek out songs like "I love you" and "Honesty" for their chaste dazzlment.
REVEIWS
THE WIRE
Adventures in modern music.
Issue No 201 November 2000
OUTER LIMITS - Reveiwed by Edwin Pouncy
The Royal Family & The Poor. "Songs for the children of Baphomet.
Gaia Communications World Network.
This "Musickal celebration" of the life and works of self styled "Great Beast" Aleister Crowley (1875-1947) from one man band The Royal Family & the poor (aka Michael Anthony Keane) will be sure to raise the hackles of those who feel that Magick and music dont/shouldent mix. Keane's labour of love proves otherwise. He skillfully explains with sound,images and the printed word how well Crowley's revolutionary creed of "Thelema" touches the future of the planet as well as its past. Far from being distant and locked inside strange ritual, Keane attempts to show how Crowley's ideas contain a message that, when properly studied, have the power to unlock mysteries about who we are and where we are heading. Although the arangments veer somewhat untidily from synthesized incantation to (shudder) new romantic handclapping, this is a stylish and poignant tribute to a great and much misunderstood mind of the 20th century.
MELODY MAKER
OCT 25-31. 2000
THE ROYAL FAMILY & THE POOR-
SONGS FOR THE CHILDREN OF BAPHOMET. GAIA.004.
Album dedicated to devil-worshipping baldie Aleister Crowley. Dont beleive in any of it,but it gets five stars just in case. *****
UNCUT
ISSUE FEB 2001
THE ROYAL FAMILY AND THE POOR
Songs for the children of Baphomet
gaia communications *** ( 3 star)
Aleister Crowley tribute album featuring the
dark master's poems and prose set to music.
A labour of love originally recorded in 1988 by
Michael Anthony Keane aka The Royal Family
& the poor ( formerly of Factory records) this album
features an atmospheric collection of tone-poems which
combine Crowley's cryptic but beautiful words with a
superior home-studio neo-classical backing. Track 1
actually features a 1947 recording of the man himself,
which,surprisingly,merges seamlessly with a musical
backing recorded some 40 years later.
Facinatingly bizzare.
Peter Huxley
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PAST REVEIWS OF ROYAL FAMILY & THE POOR LP'S.
"IN THE SEA OF E" GAIA001 1988
ALBUM OF THE MONTH
ROYAL FAMILY & THE POOR - IN THE SEA ORF E - GAIA RECORDS.
On leaving Factory records this is RF&TP's first releases on the new GAIA label and in my opinion is their finnest to date. The openning track," living Light" is vaugly New-Order-ish though with somewhat more imagination.
The rest of the LP gives way to some of the most unusual though inspiring songs Ive ever heard, ranging from the discoish tracks to strange,ritualistic,demonic chants, interpersed with some real,atmospheric,beautiful songsmy favorite being "Song for freedom. This album clearly demonstrates what a true genius Mike Keane is; he's managed to produce an album that is both avant-guard and instantly accessable.
If you ever thought he should have released "restrained in a moment" as a single well there are quite a few tracks worthy of single releases on this LP as well, notibly the exellent "Time", a true classic if ever there was one. In short this album is brilliant, worth a few quid of anyones money - so go out and buy it.
---------------------------------------------------------
EARTH WORKS - SOUNDS - 1988.
Contender for the title of Liverpools most neglected son, Mike Keane nowadays attracts the stigma of "hippidom" weather for his natural grown-out hair or for the traces of Earth-worship and his "children-of-the-revolution" innocence in his music.
More than 5 years ago the ROYAL FAMILY & THE POOR conceived of the provocational and inspirational retoric of the sixties and combined it with the emerging funk fixation. " We made up tapes of synthesiser noises together with Arthur reading extracts from the situationist tract" The revolution of everyday life" and sent it to Factory records as a joke but they immediatly asked for an Album." When the other members dispersed Keane was left with his tapes, the music was refined until it resembled Durritti Columns later albums. On "We love the Moon" and the recent Live LP the best tracks combine irregular percussion with translucient, introverted vocals and keyboards. The new LP, "In the Sea of E" has the pop electro-chattter of "Living Light" or "Feast of the supersensualists", but there's still the rain-water transparency of "Honesty" and the meditational, undirected Eastern scales and Chants of "Mr Crow" and "Creatura".
The label name "Gaia" is part of the "concept". " Gaia is the name of the Greek Earth-Goddess whose name was applied to a recently developed scientific theory, it was observed that changes at a mollecular level in isolated,undisturbed enviroments corrisponded to changes that happened elsewhere". "This beleif that everything is connected and inter-related, that everything coheres but only by unseen paths" is sympathetic to claims for autonomy and non-herarchical "molecular" revolution in the late 60's and 70's. Keane even see's it as a development of ideas of subversion by Ritual and Magick that were latent in Punks Situationist - inspired provocateurs.
" You should have a child-like wonder at life" he wants us to be " endowed with all the dreams you can hold" an experience of immersion and total sensory stimulation. "I once planned that where ever I played there would be a light-weight dome that could be built inside the club covered in white cloth on which film-projected-images could be displayed at a 360 degree angle - the stage would be at the center of the dome. Current plans retain this psychotropic theme - " I want to do an album based on colour therapy and the corrispondances between colour and music". Nothing this ambitious has been atempted since Alexander Scribin's "Prometheus" in the last century.
For the present seek out songs like "I love you" and "Honesty" for their chaste dazzlment.
