Invocation of My Demon Brother (1969) is an 11-minute film photographed, directed and edited by Kenneth Anger.
Its repetitive noise music soundtrack was composed by Mick Jagger playing a Moog synthesizer. It was filmed in San Francisco at the Straight Theater on Haight Street in Haight-Ashbury and at the William Westerfeld House. [1]
According to Anger; the film, starring Mick Jagger, Manson family member Bobby Beausoleil and Church of Satan founder Anton LaVey, was assembled from scraps of the first version of Lucifer Rising . It includes clips of the cast smoking hashish out of a skull and a Satanic funeral ceremony for a cat.
Invocation of My Demon Brother won the Tenth Annual Film Culture award. [2]
Author Gary Lachman claims that the film "inaugurat[ed] the midnight movie cult at the Elgin Theatre." [3]
Satanism refers to a group of religious, ideological and/or philosophical beliefs based on Satan – particularly the worship or veneration of him. Satan is a figure of the devil in Christian belief, a fallen angel and leader of the devils who tempts humans into sin. For many centuries the term was used by various Christian groups as an accusation against ideological opponents. Actually self-identified Satanism is recent, and is thought to have begun with the founding of the Church of Satan by Anton LaVey in the United States in 1966 -- that "church" being an atheistic group that does not believe in a literal Satan. Sharing "historical connections and family resemblances" with Satanism, and sometimes overlapping with it, are paganism, ceremonial magic, and "other dark entities such as Set, Lilith, Hecate, and Chaos", from the occult and the 'Left Hand Path milieu.'
The Church of Satan (CoS) is a religious organization dedicated to the religion of Satanism as defined by Anton Szandor LaVey. Founded in San Francisco in 1966, by LaVey, it is considered the "oldest satanic religion in continual existence", and more importantly the most influential, inspiring "numerous imitator and breakaway groups". According to the Church, Satanism has been "codified" as "a religion and philosophy" by LaVey and his church.
Anton Szandor LaVey was an American author, musician, and Satanist. He was the founder of the Church of Satan and the religion of Satanism. He authored several books, including The Satanic Bible, The Satanic Rituals, The Satanic Witch, The Devil's Notebook, and Satan Speaks! In addition, he released three albums, including The Satanic Mass, Satan Takes a Holiday, and Strange Music. He played a minor on-screen role and served as technical advisor for the 1975 film The Devil's Rain and served as host and narrator for Nick Bougas' 1989 mondo film Death Scenes.
Kenneth Anger was an American underground experimental filmmaker, actor, and author. Working exclusively in short films, he produced almost 40 works beginning in 1937, nine of which have been grouped together as the "Magick Lantern Cycle". Anger's films variously merge surrealism with homoeroticism and the occult, and have been described as containing "elements of erotica, documentary, psychodrama, and spectacle". He has been called "one of America's first openly gay filmmakers", with several films released before homosexuality was legalized in the U.S. Anger also explored occult themes in many of his films; he was fascinated by the English occultist Aleister Crowley and an adherent of Thelema, the religion Crowley founded.
The Satanic Bible is a collection of essays, observations, and rituals published by Anton LaVey in 1969. It is the central religious text of LaVeyan Satanism, and is considered the foundation of its philosophy and dogma. It has been described as the most important document to influence contemporary Satanism. Though The Satanic Bible is not considered to be sacred scripture in the way that the Christian Bible is to Christianity, LaVeyan Satanists regard it as an authoritative text as it is a contemporary text that has attained for them scriptural status. It extols the virtues of exploring one's own nature and instincts. Believers have been described as "atheistic Satanists" because they believe that God and Satan are not external entities, but rather projections of an individual's own personality—benevolent and stabilizing forces in their life. There have been thirty printings of The Satanic Bible, selling over a million copies.
LaVeyan Satanism is the name given to the form of Satanism promoted by American occultist and author Anton LaVey (1930-1997). LaVey founded the Church of Satan (CoS) in 1966 in San Francisco. Although LaVey is thought to have had more impact with his Satanic aesthetics of "colourful rituals" and "scandalous clothes" that created a "gigantic media circus", he also promoted his ideas in writings, such as The Satanic Bible. LaVeyan Satanism has been classified as a new religious movement and a form of Western esotericism by scholars of religion. LaVey's ideas have been said to weave "together an eclectic range of thinkers and tropes", combining "humanism, hedonism, aspects of pop psychology and the human potential movement", along with "a lot of showmanship", but also to be "contradictory". His ideas were heavily influenced by the ideas and writings of Friedrich Nietzsche, Ayn Rand and Arthur Desmond.
Scorpio Rising is a 1963 American experimental short film shot, edited, co-written and directed by Kenneth Anger, and starring Bruce Byron as Scorpio. Loosely structured around a prominent soundtrack of 1960s pop music, it follows a group of bikers preparing for a night out.
Charles Manson Superstar is a documentary film about Charles Manson, directed by Nikolas Schreck in 1989. Most of the documentary was filmed inside San Quentin Prison. Nikolas and Zeena Schreck narrated the segments while images were shown, and music played in the background. There was brief footage of Spahn Ranch, and a short clip of James Nolan Mason being interviewed about the Universal Order, and Manson. Olivier Messiaen's "Death and Resurrection," Bobby Beausoleil's "Lucifer Rising," Krzysztof Penderecki's "Apocalypsis," Biff Rose's "Fill Your Heart" and Anton LaVey's "The Satanic Mass," and Manson's own songs "Clang Bang Clang" and "Mechanical Man" from the album Lie: The Love and Terror Cult, were played during the film.
Robert Kenneth Beausoleil is an American murderer and associate of Charles Manson and members of his communal Manson Family. He was convicted and sentenced to death for the July 27, 1969, fatal stabbing of Gary Hinman, who had befriended him and other Manson associates. Beausoleil was later granted commutation to a lesser sentence of life imprisonment, after the Supreme Court of California issued a ruling that invalidated all death sentences issued in California prior to 1972.
Lucifer Rising (ISBN 0-85965-280-7) is a book written by author and Church of Satan priest Gavin Baddeley and published by Plexus Publishing in 1999. The book covers both the recent and ancient history of Satanism, and provides an examination of modern Satanist culture.
Donald Seton Cammell was a Scottish painter, screenwriter, and film director. He has a cult reputation largely due to his debut film Performance, which he wrote the screenplay for and co-directed with Nicolas Roeg. He committed suicide after the last film he directed, Wild Side, was taken away from him and recut by the production company.
Antony Balch was an English film director and distributor, best known for his screen collaborations with Beat Generation author William S. Burroughs in the 1960s and for the 1970s horror film, Horror Hospital.
The Elgin Theater is a former movie theater on the corner of 19th Street and Eighth Avenue in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. The theater showed films from its opening in 1942 until 1978. Its longtime manager, Ben Barenholtz, invented midnight movie programming for the theater. Following a full renovation, the building reopened in 1982 as a 472-seat dance theater operated by the Joyce Theatre Foundation.
The Infernal Names is a compiled list of adversarial or antihero figures from mythology intended for use in Satanic ritual. The following names are as listed in The Satanic Bible (1969), written by Church of Satan founder Anton Szandor LaVey. When calling the names, all of them may be recited, or a given number of those most significant to the respective working may be chosen. Not all were demons in their source culture; this list represents LaVey's interpretation of them and is presented below as they were written in the SatanicBible, and therefore is prone to historical errors and personal misconceptions.
Lucifer Rising is a short film by director Kenneth Anger. Although virtually completed in 1972, the film was only widely distributed in 1980, after Bobby Beausoleil delivered the finished soundtrack master.
The William Westerfeld House, also known as the "Russian Embassy", is a historic building located at 1198 Fulton Street in San Francisco, California, United States, across the street from the northwest corner of Alamo Square. Constructed for German-born confectioner William Westerfeld in 1889, the home is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is San Francisco Landmark Number 135.
Greater and lesser magic, within LaVeyan Satanism, designate types of beliefs with the term greater magic applying to ritual practice meant as psychodramatic catharsis to focus one's emotions for a specific purpose and lesser magic applied to the practice of manipulation by means of applied psychology and glamour to bend an individual or situation to one's will.
Zeena Galatea Schreck, known professionally by her mononymous artist name ZEENA, is a Berlin-based American visual and musical artist, author and the spiritual leader of the Sethian Liberation Movement (SLM), which she founded in 2002.
Lucifer Rising is an album composed and recorded by Bobby Beausoleil and the Freedom Orchestra, a band consisting of inmates from Deuel Vocational Institution also known as Tracy Prison. The album is the soundtrack to the 1972 film Lucifer Rising, directed by avant-garde mystic Kenneth Anger. The soundtrack album was initially released on vinyl LP in 1980, and has since been reissued multiple times in CD and LP formats.
Joy of Satan Ministries, also referred to as Joy of Satan (JoS), is a website and western esoteric occult organization founded in 2002 by Andrea M. Dietrich (a.k.a. Maxine Dietrich). Joy of Satan Ministries advocates "Spiritual Satanism", an ideology that presents a synthesis of Theistic Satanism, Nazism, Gnostic Paganism, Western esotericism, UFO conspiracy theories and extraterrestrial beliefs similar to those popularized by Zecharia Sitchin and David Icke.