Scientology in Folk

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Jack Campin
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 10:55 AM

I was not aware ARC is a Front for Scientology.
Please can someone provide links to confirm this.

Shared addresses.

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Alice
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 09:56 AM

ARC Enterprises is on this list

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Alice
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 09:53 AM

incomplete list of Scientology front groups

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Amos
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 09:32 AM

Well, it's not a shanty, but Hubbard himself once recorded a ditty on a tape and sent it to one of his ship's engineers as a spontaneous gesture of goodwill or something, I was once told by the guy who received it. On it, he played a guitar and sang the following Dianetic ditty:

Down on the old time track,
Down on the old time track,
When the good girls go to heaven,
Where do the bad girls go?
They go down, down, down down,
Down on the old time track.

(If it doesn't make sense, you probably don't know that Scientologists spend a lot of time addressing the "time track"--the chronological series of images of experience -- and straightening it out through regression and other techniques.)


A

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Jack Campin
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 09:15 AM

Jack, you're misreading the entry.

Aha, I getcha. At a megabyte per PDF page image, I tried to get my information from the summary alone. Mistake.

I'll download the whole thing when I have some firmer dates for the trip.

Meanwhile anybody got any engram-clearing E-meter shanties?

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: The Sandman
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 08:38 AM

never underestimate Scientologists.

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: TheSnail
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 04:56 AM

Jack, you're misreading the entry. Page 5 (1054kb) Roots Around The World, Grub Music Cafe East Grinstead, Brighton Folk & Blues Club (Fris). is a list of the three separate adverts on that page - Folk Diary Page 5

Roots Around The World is based in Chichester and the Grub Music Cafe is a Cafe in East Grinstead that puts on a variety of sorts of music. There is no reason to suppose that either of them have any conenctions with Scientology.

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Rasener
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 02:00 AM

Jack, just don't give them your name or address. I do like your expression "They're as hard to get rid of as herpes and about as much fun". That just about sums it up. :-)

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: GUEST,Arthur Stiffy
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 11:46 PM

I was not aware ARC is a Front for Scientology.
Please can someone provide links to confirm this.
Since buying their 10CD sampler box several years ago,
they still send regular mail-outs advertising new releases.
But as I said, I have never had any reasons for suspicions about their motivating ideology.

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Amos
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 11:19 PM

I wouldn't worry about it. ANyone from that lot who is doing folk music is not doing it to proselytize, I am pretty sure--it's just not a natural channel. If they're part of the organization, they would be looking for more financially qualified prospects, most likely, than folkies. And if they are just random students of the subject, they will probably keep it to themselves unless asked. So I think you're probably safe even in East Grinstead.

A

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Jack Campin
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 09:24 PM

ARC records too many artists for them all to be Scientologists. But very few of them do more than one album with the company, I guess they bail out when they find out who they're dealing with.

What rang alarm bells with me was the "Roots Around the World" phrase, which describes ARC's remit pretty well. If they were going to branch out into running a live venue related to the label, they'd inevitably call it something like that.

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Joe Offer
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 09:13 PM

There's a Celtic group here in Northern California, Golden Bough, and they're quite good. They record on the ARC label, which seems to carry mostly European artists. They perform at lots of events in my area, and I've seen them perform a number of times. I think once during a concert there was some mention of them having a connection to Scientology, but I'm not sure I remember that correctly. Anyhow, I figured out somehow that the group had a connection to Scientology, and this page confirms it. I never felt at any time that they were ever trying to do anything other than entertain me.

They also seem to perform frequently at Waldorf/Steiner schools, so is there a meaning to that?

I dunno. I guess it's better to judge a musician by his/her music.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: TheSnail
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 08:54 PM

Not so much a folk club as an all purpose music venue - Grub Music Cafe - that has chosen to buy some space in the Folk Diary.

I think you might be carrying guilt by association a bit far if you suspect the whole town on the basis that the Dianutters have their headquarters there. (Hideous building. Looks like an early twentieth century pumping station.)

When and how long are you going to be down? I could give some guidance.

Bryan

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Jack Campin
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 08:27 PM

What I googled ("folk club lewes", fourth hit):

http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~tinvic/fd.htm

ISSUE No. 239 OCTOBER - NOVEMBER 2009
Page 5 (1054kb) Roots Around The World, Grub Music Cafe East Grinstead, Brighton Folk & Blues Club (Fris).

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: TheSnail
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 08:21 PM

The OP's other logical fallacy is that there is not, as far as I know, a folk club in East Grinstead. Could you give us some details or contact information, Jack?

Just for the record, there are two folk clubs in Lewes, the Royal Oak on Thursday nights and the Lewes Saturday Folk Club (on Saturday, in case you hadn't guessed.)

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Jack Campin
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 07:45 PM

The ARC record company (Scientology front) was the link that worried me - it seems to be a pretty big operation and the people who run it must be persuading their artists and the outlets that stock their CDs that they're bona-fide folkies. So it seemed likely that they'd be involved in other stuff in the town.

I was thinking of going to that part of the world in a few weeks, and the Lewes folk club is one I'd want to check out. But there is also one in East Grinstead, which doesn't get discussed here, and I thought there might be a reason why not.

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Smokey.
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 07:15 PM

Few things irritate me more than religious cults. (sp?)

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Tootler
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 07:12 PM

I will have no truck with Scientology or with any other aggressively proselytizing sect.

However the OP had a logical fallacy.

Just because East Grinstead is home to the UK headquarters of the Scientologists, does not mean that the local folk club is a front for them. What is the evidence to back up your assertion?

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Jack Campin
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 06:45 PM

I have once heard "The Old Rugged Cross" done as pub entertainment, in a very rough bar in a hard-core Protestant part of Glasgow. The guy doing it had a terrible toupee and sang to the accompaniment of his own cheesy electric organ. The only other item I can remember from his set was a rugby-club version of "Abdul the Bul-Bul Emir". Quality stuff.

I have been involved in campaigns that got infiltrated by Scientologists. They're as hard to get rid of as herpes and about as much fun.

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 06:06 PM

Is it them wot does the old rugged cross sort of at the Gallop?

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Amos
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 06:03 PM

I feel it is important to keep out Baptists, who have begun leaking back into the UK now that you lot have stopped persecuting religions. They are hardnosed proselytizers and a real bore to get stuck with. Watch out none of them get into your folk clubs or it will be all "Old Rugged Cross" and "Amazing Grace" from there on out. Oy!!



A

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 05:24 PM

its all done with holograms

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Cats
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 05:04 PM

When I used to go to E G folk club many years ago it was run by folkies not scientologists although the poetry meetings were. I still have family there and it seems it isn't sc based, although there may be the odd sc who goes and they don't know

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 04:32 PM

Used to lurrrv all those old sci fi stories when I wus a kid.

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: longboat (inactive)
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 03:54 PM

Wes, if you're into the old sci-fi pulp, some consider that period of Hubbard's life to be some of the finest in sci-fi pulp fiction writing

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 03:51 PM

Irony or Iorny?
Actually I have to apologize to marks& Sparks.
His ideas about economics and politics were ok and They did make some memorable music.
Plus of course their shops help keep the chavs out of Waitrose

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Wesley S
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 03:38 PM

In the airport this weekend - Both Dallas and Atlanta - I was suprised to see that some bookstores carried 5 or 6 titles by L Ron Hubbard. They were all reprints from his pulp fiction days in Argosy magazine.

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: GUEST
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 03:35 PM

Communist Party?
Methodists?
Rotary?
....

"irony" does not begin to describe it.

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: longboat (inactive)
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 03:19 PM

Inavertently Jack Campin was serious...God I do love the irony on the threads here at Mudcat!! Art imitating life, or something like that.

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: The Sandman
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 03:02 PM

dangerous people

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 03:02 PM

What about the bloody Christians?
happy clappy bunch of weirdo's
Marks and sparks at play ?
Watch out for the fundamental Islamists making a play for our folk clubs.
They would find it quite nice what with the beards and all.
Our folk clubs should be kept traditional water not beer,no women,No music later than the Roman invasion,
LOl thanks for starting a tongue in cheek thread JC we could all use a laugh in the current economic climate.

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: longboat (inactive)
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 02:46 PM

There's nothing new here.

Incredible String Band and Scientology - 1968

Joe Boyd, in his book "White Bicycles - Making Music in the 1960s" and elsewhere describes how he was inadvertently responsible for their "conversion" to Scientology when he introduced the band to David Simons (Jim Kweskin's Jug Band). who, having become a Scientologist himself, persuaded ISB to enrol in his absence. The band's support for Scientology over the next few years was controversial among some fans, and seemed to coincide with what many saw as the beginning of a decline in the quality of their work[citation needed]. In an interview with Oz magazine in 1969 the band spoke enthusiastically of their involvement with it, although the question of its effect on their later albums has provoked much discussion ever since.

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Royston
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 02:39 PM

East Grinstead (or the area) is home to a number of wacko cults; from Scientologists to Mormons. The town itself is quite nice and you won't find either Mormons or Scientologists in pubs. So the folk club should be a safe bet!

Subject: RE: Scientology in Folk
From: Rasener
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 02:29 PM

I hope not. They are an absolute pain in the arse to get rid of, as I found to my cost when I lived in Amsterdam. I had to come back to the UK to stop getting all their crap letters. Spamming was invented by them I think.

Subject: Scientology in Folk
From: Jack Campin
Date: 21 Sep 09 - 02:18 PM

As if we didn't have enough aggro with the BNP threads, but here goes anyway...

Have there been instances of Scientologists trying to recruit through the folk scene, or otherwise exploit it?

What put this in my mind is that there is a folk club meeting in East Grinstead, which has the UK headquarters of of Scientology, and also home to ARC, the world music record label they run.   I wouldn't feel happy about going to a folk club that was basically a Scientology front.