Infernal Noise Brigade Joins Armada

The Infernal Noise Brigade marched into the sunset for the final time recently, a fact which saddens us all. Something good has passed. The upside is that the former members of the INB are now free to pursue other projects and today WorldChanging gives us a look into what those might be. According to WorldChanging some of the Brigade are headed to the Midwest to particpate in the Miss Rockaway Armada.

The Miss Rockaway Armada is a group of artists and performers who are building a flotilla that they'll eventually pilot down the Ole Miss. Along the way they'll stop for various performances and workshops.

Here’s the plan: We meet in Minneapolis in late July with sections of our raft in tow. We piece together our pontoons and fill them with salvaged blocks of foam. We make it beautiful and tie on anything that floats, adding it to our junk armada, our anarchist county fair, our fools ark. Our precious cargo is everything we hold dear: pieces and parts of the culture we are already creating. Our zines and puppets, sewing projects and poster campaigns. Mutant bicycles and punk rock marching bands. Plus our thoughts and dreams and irrepressible energy.

Together we float down the Mississippi river, as far as we can—all the way to St. Louis—anchoring here and there to perform, give workshops, and create the big huge stinking spectacle we wished would have stopped in our hometowns. And at each place we invite anyone to contribute performances or workshops of their own.

Our flotilla is built green with precycled materials, rainwater collection, solar ovens, and steam calliopes. If we make it right everything will run on sunshine and french fry grease. We want a floating garden, a bicycle-powered sound system, and wind-powered lights. We want to steal hippie technology from the hippies.

Pretty cool, eh? You know, the Mississippi is navigable by private craft far below St. Louis (as we learned in Jonathan Raban's Old Glory). Why stop at the Gateway to the West?