Biography

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Born Jamie Curcio, (July 9, 1978, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania), Curcio has published numerous novels, graphic novels, and albums through Disinfo, New Falcon, New Fiction, and other counter culture presses.

Born an only child to a single mother, also an artist, much of his childhood was spent writing and drawing. He read J. R. R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings in third grade. This started a decade long fascination with fantasy and science fiction literature, which still seems to influence his work in subtle ways.

At the age of sixteen Curcio started going with friends back into the woods and practicing what he later jokingly described as “suburban whiteboy shamanism.” It wasn't until after a short hospitalization that he and this group extended their practice to include psychedelics. This group and their later misadventures would become the source for his first published novel.

The idea of suburban kids going back into the woods and playing at shaman later became an ongoing joke, which resurfaced in his presentation at Alex Grey's Chapel of Sacred Mirrors, and an interview with artist and musician P. Emerson Williams of Choronzon, with whom he has worked on both Chasing the wish and an upcoming album. P. Emerson Interview

At nineteen he was introduced to the works of Aleister Crowley and Joseph Campbell by a friend, which made mysticism, philosophy, and the occult the focus point of his life for a number of years before he seemed to discard it, oftentimes making public jibes at the O.T.O. and Crowley in general.

Halfway through his time at Bard college he changed from a focus on philosophy to the arts. In a later published article he hints at this change as a major life change.

It wasn't until he encountered the work of Neil Gaiman, (who wrote a brief introduction for the Fas Ferox World Walkthrough), Grant Morrison, and Dave McKean that he considered graphic novels a viable medium. This may have been a part of his change of focus.

Upon graduating college he co-founded Evolving Media, an artist collective in the Hudson Valley, New York. This company grew during the years he was a partner, merging with 32b, and increasing the range of their production with video production suites and two audio recording studios.

Curcio left for Los Angeles rather suddenly in late 2002, and rumors have spread about his relationship with some or all of the members of the company going sour. In 2005 he moved back to the Hudson Valley and worked with them again for a time, so this rumor may be false.

In Los Angeles he formed Babalon and released their first experimental album “Descent” with Collide guitarist Scott Landes, and his then wife Sarah Dudzic. They later recruited prog-rock drummer Rahul Iyer, and their sound began to evolve.

As they rehearsed and experimented in their home studio, they released tracks through their website, which according to reports received over 1,000,000 visitors that year. As they were preparing to record another album, Sarah and James divorced and the band split up. Live recordings from this period of time were posthumously released as Dreams & Reflections, and have been likened to a female led, proto- Tool (band).

Many of this projects use heavily applied viral marketing, a technique he seems to have honed in public friendships (and arguments) with other media theorists such as Ben Mack, Joseph Matheny, and Dave Szulborski. (His partnership with Szulborski in the production of Chasing the wish has been of particular interest to fans of alternate reality games.)

Criticism

Outside of the official reviews, which almost without exception were positive, Join My Cult has been the subject of much criticism, for being heavy handed, pretentious, or incoherent. Much of this argument seems to have helped to fuel the sales of this counterculture book, which have led some to believe that he may have had a hand in the neigh saying.

Curcio's work in general tends towards the abstract, and the often understated, self aggrandizing humor that permeates works such as Join My Cult is easily misinterpreted. He has also been accused of borrowing heavily from other artists, writers, and thinkers, most notably Joseph Campbell. Earlier versions of his projects, which can still be found online, have a found art, random and haphazard nature to them which he seems to have discarded in recent releases.

As he has the ambiguous title of “creative director” with many of the large collaborations he has managed, there has been speculation about his actual role in these projects.