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“THE BIG SHINY PRISON” conceptual cover art.
“Ellis Gharib” manipulation by Klaus Von Valkenburg
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ATTN: To all recipients of the promotional PDF for “The Big Shiny Prison”
This electronic document is hereby offered to the public domain.
File sharing is approved and encouraged by its author, Ryan Bartek.
Having spent a Herculean effort on this project, his only wish is that it be circulated.
Mr. Bartek himself retains the copyright & trademark to “The Big Shiny Prison.”
He currently seeks a publisher for the physical print run of this manuscript.
Mr. Bartek has one prior book release to his credit (“The Silent Burning;” 2005).
He’s been a freelance contributer to periodicals such as Metal Maniacs, AMP Magazine,
Hails & Horns, PIT Magazine, Real Detroit Weekly & others.
Currently he tours as an acoustic artist under the alias “Jack Cassady” He is also
vocalist/guitarist for the grindcore act Sasquatch Agnostic as “Benedict Badoglio.”
Under his real aegis, Ryan Bartek has accomplished two national spoken word tours &
performed dozens of gigs. When in the United States, he lives and works in Seattle.
To schedule an interview with Mr. Bartek, or to inquire about the manuscript, please
contact him directly through ryanbartek@hotmail.com or bigshinyprison@hotmail.com
Thanks in Advance,
June Mansfield
Anomie PR
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THE BIG SHINY PRISON
(HISTORY OF A YEAR: 12.20.06-10.13.07)
c/o Dr. Ryan Bartek, GhostNomad & Benedict Badoglio
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“I had to travel about ten thousand miles before receiving the inspiration to write
a single line. Everything worth saying about the American way of life I could put
in thirty pages… Nowhere else in the world is the divorce between man
and nature so complete. Nowhere have I encountered such a dull,
monotonous fabric of life as here in America…
We are accustomed to think of ourselves as an emancipated people; we say that
we are democratic, liberty-loving, free of prejudice and hatred… Actually we are
a vulgar, pushing mob whose passions are easily mobilized by demagogues,
newspaper men, religious quacks, agitators and such like…
The whole white world has at last been turned into an armed camp...”
--Henry V. Miller
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To Sutter Cane, Keyser Soze,
And All Who Get The Joke
act vi vi vi
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Introduction: SAWDUST CAESAR
(THE ALUS REPUBLIC)
by Benedict Badoglio, former ambassador of The Alus Republic
This Book, called by its author, “THE BIG SHINY PRISON,” is actually a
long tract on what happened within the span of three-quarters of a year. During this period, Ryan
Bartek sacrificed himself to the most absurd of all addictions. Against all logic, against all laws of
self-preservation, against all conventions to which a young man his age normally submits, he
willingly & fanatically became a character in his own living novel -- the hapless, tragic pawn of
an organic manuscript shaped wholly by the winds of fate.
Despite the lunacy of this decision, his aims were clear – he would present to the world a
frenetic expose of extreme journalism. He was determined to unveil in a fashion never witnessed
before the secretive underworlds of American fringe. He would encompass the beat and the
gonzo, lunging headfist into the deepest of tribal undergrounds in punk rock, extreme metal,
industrial, the experimental & avant-garde. He was determined to showcase the true state of
American counterculture; to challenge the academia’s status quo of travel literature.
Thus begat the struggle, and so began the endless parade of freaks, mongrels, rock stars,
metal gods, punk icons, psychopaths, hobos, street crazies, ex-cons & clowns…
From December 20th 2006 until October 13th 2007 – for 297 days – he lived in a stasis
between worlds knowing that every action & line of dialogue, each twist & turn of fate would be
recorded. Once it began there was no escape, no life but the road. His only compass would be an
internal sense of where the manuscript should theoretically lead, and his only coordinates the
most engaging and immediate story at hand.
In fact the title of this book itself is a fitting double entendre – not only was Bartek
journalistically sculpting his country into a dark caricature of social/political prison, but he was
literally trapped within his creation as well – imprisoned by this glowing, shiny promise of
adventure and personal rebirth.
Yet for all the turbulence to follow, it is of utmost importance that we begin this tale with the
past, for the turgid history of Ryan Bartek is a depraved saga. True, THE BIG SHINY PRISON
begins its odyssey on December 20th 2006 -- but the chain of events which brought that moment
still cannot be explained without considerable effort.
The circles go far into the past and into the future – all centered right there, that
frostbitten December eve when the broken man charted a lone Greyhound destined for California,
his legacy concluding in utter humiliation and defeat. The man once cursed or acclaimed as one
of the most important counterculture journalists in Detroit’s history was then a mere bundle of
tired flesh, an uncomfortable superfluity -- a grotesque ghost that had once achieved a media
prestige none of his tribal background had ever acquired.
For within a single year he’d gone from prominent figure in a multi-million
redevelopment deal that would have saved Detroit to none other than haggard trailer trash -- a
desperate, powerless Sawdust Caesar handicapped by poverty; drowning in booze, curtiled by
sundry highs, grimly watching his life’s dream irrefutably crumble into nothingness…
The pre-BIG SHINY PRISON caricature of Bartek, with his shaved and shiny block of a head,
his pouting lower lip, pugnaciously out-thrust chin, his bantam-rooster stance, arms akimbo, belly
and chest straining against a $3 pin-stripe suit fit for a Jean Claude Van Damme villain -- these do
not seem the features of diabolicism so much as they do that of low comedy.
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We tend to think of him as a kind of eighth-rate pseudo-dictator, a wannabe revolutionary
genius, and ultimately, a failed insurrectionary. The fact is that Bartek is both worse than this and
far more important precisely because he built the edifice of his particular shuck upon the
emptiness of deception, delusion, and fraud. He cannot be rehabilitated.
As distinguished historian T.J.A. Paylor puts it: “Our principle interest in Bartek derives
from his authorship of the so-called ‘Pan-Tribal Socialist Manifesto.’ Yet this ‘Pan-Tribalism’
proves to be a highly elusive subject, for in the end, this great antagonist of society had no
ideology… He was a mountebank who governed by press statement. His leadership was corrupt,
incompetent, empty.” Empty at its core, an avatar of that very heart of darkness into which Mr.
Kurtz gazes in and can repeat but a single phrase: “the horror, the horror...”
There is no doubt that Bartek had been more popular in the Detroit underground than any other
local journalist since the early 90’s. He elicited the favor of a great majority, for he was one of the
people. His mad carnival was like a counterculture Vaudeville -- propaganda offensives & street
teams, publicity stunts & radio appearances, interpersonal meetings with ambassadors from every
subculture splinter in the city. In time he’d networked a beast that grew to phenomenal
proportions, gracefully moving through the gamut of underground politics from extreme to
extreme.
At his peak he booked shows for dozens of bands, hosted 2-3 concerts a week, engaged in
political activism, informed admiring radio DJ’s what their playlists should consist of, gave
dozens of “homework assignments,” physically worked to restore a half dozen venues, disc
jockeyed downtown. He performed spoken word gigs, ran international PR campaigns, assisted
contacts throughout Europe & South America, crafted 3 popular weekly music/political columns,
was a music editor at another well-respected local paper, and vital in the promotion of a
numerous Detroit record labels.
As a journalist he’d written quite a few newspaper articles on Detroit unity, but as a
politician, he nearly succeeded in rendering h