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TechGnosis

The work of Erik Davis

Erik Davis is an American writer, scholar, journalist, and public speaker whose writings range from rock criticism to cultural analysis to esoteric explorations of California’s history.

I’ve been publishing stuff for over three decades, and most of it—with the exception of my books—resides on this site, which I have maintained through various iterations since the late 1990s. With Burning Shore now disseminating my fresher communiqués, Techgnosis.com acts more than ever as an archive of my work, including lectures, interviews, personal reflections, and almost a decade of the Expanding Mind podcast. Like Techgnosis itself, still in print and more relevant than ever, my stuff combines deep research with vivid writing and oracular aims that resonate through the years. For this revamped trans-temporal site, I and my team have introduced more robust searching and cross-linking of materials, as well as a roll-the-dice feature, which will hopefully allow for richer, more entertaining, and more synchronistic wanders through this wunderkammer.  — Erik

  • Books

    Blotter

    The Untold Story of an Acid Medium

    The Untold Story of an Acid Medium

    Blotter by Erik Davis is the first comprehensive written account of the history, art, and design of LSD blotter paper, the iconic drug delivery device that will perhaps forever be linked to underground psychedelic culture and contemporary street art. Created in collaboration with Mark McCloud’s Institute of Illegal Images, the world’s largest archive of blotter art, Davis’s boldly illustrated exhibition treats his outsider subject with the serious, art-historical respect it deserves...
  • Featured, Music
    9 min

    Look! Listen! Vibrate! SMILE!: The Beach Boys

    The Apollonian Shimmer of the Beach Boys

    The Apollonian Shimmer of the Beach Boys

    When I was boogie-boarding the Del Mar waves in the mid-'70s, I remember hearing this surf tune that name-dropped my hometown and thinking, cool, we're on the map, right along with "Hollywood" and "Disneyland" and "Chico." But the Beach Boys sounded pretty dinky to my Led ears, and the images that crusted the band like barnacles—Sunkist soda, bearded burnouts, state fairs, longboards—were too lame to hook me much. And the canons of AOR, new wave, and indie rock didn't teach...

A Random Selection

The Heart of the Hereafter
Expanding Mind Podcast
The Heart of the Hereafter
Expanding Mind

Why Mrs. Blake Cried
Articles and Essays
Why Mrs. Blake Cried
Tantric visionaries in Georgian London

Terraforming Earth
Expanding Mind Podcast
Terraforming Earth
Expanding Mind

Maqroll the Magnificent
Articles and Essays
3 min
Maqroll the Magnificent
Latin American sea shanty tales

The Atmosphere of Heaven
Articles and Essays
The Atmosphere of Heaven
The universe is made of thoughts

Democratic Surround
Expanding Mind Podcast
Democratic Surround
Expanding Mind

Days of the Dead
Articles and Essays, Music
3 min
Days of the Dead
Sweet Chaos: The Grateful Dead's American Adventure, by Carol Brightman

Hölderlin’s Odes and Elegies
Articles and Essays
Hölderlin’s Odes and Elegies
Translated by Nick Hoff