NCN's series of the 'Best' (IMHO) prank phone calls set to abient music.

NCN - Ambient Phone Trolls Part 4 (Pranks Gone Wrong)

Phineas is the curator and primary creative force behind a multipronged 'Latent-Einstein Outreach Ministry' comprised mostly of 'mutated MetaMedia audio mixes' meant largely to be a therapeutic and sonic REPLACEMENT FOR DRUGS for the Masses and the 'Not-That-Reality-Oriented'. He is a self-styled 'MetaMediagician' in this respect, as well as a formerly official canonized (and carmelized) 'Church of the SubGenius' (lapsed) 'SAINT'.

The neologism (meaning literally a 'new word') 'MetaMediagician' is a 'Pre-Zuckian' use of the prefix 'Meta' (which may be confirmed through 'The Internet Wayback Machine's cached copies of Narco social media accounts so... 'nyyyah') and denotes an artist who utilizes content from the media at large like a 'painter's pallette' in order to make further developed or synthesized 'macro' media work out of that media content in a more or less 'collage'-type format. 

Phineas' efforts in this regard have evolved from the personally expressive to the social therapeutic and have been structured around more and more relatable 'universal themes' with the general goal of attaining a more enlightened understanding of the matter or matters at hand.

Phineas is a very late Baby Boomer (a 'Barely Boomer' as he terms it) and is a 'PROUD MENTAL PATIENT' (since 1984) who has never married and has no kids and who lives alone in Silicon Valley since age 9 after his family moved out to San Jose from the Midwest. He has been creating and distributing Experimental audio artwork of one sort or another SINCE THE 1970s. NOTE that the featured profiled pic is from 1983: the year right before he 'GOT SICK' and became disabled lifelong.

Phineas' birth name is James Scianna (surname is typically pronounced 'SEE-ah-na' although the proper Italian pronunciation is actually: 'SHIAHn-nah').

The alias 'Phineas Narco' was created by Phineas around the time of the onset of his overarching, disabling mental health condition at age 19 (guardedly referred to typically as 'the exact same diagnosis as had by Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys') and is serious.

Phineas' condition exists independent of and unrelated to his creative skills, artistic life and efforts although it often inspires the subject matter of those efforts that are about mental illness and its aspects.

The alias name 'Phineas Narco' was created around the time of the onset of Phineas' illness as a 'church name' for his inclusion in 'The Church of The SubGenius' an actual mind control cult that Phineas was involved with for many decades but resigned from in 2024.

The two names refer to figures in Greek mythology. 'Narco' is meant as a contraction of the name 'Narcissus' (in the non-pathological sense) and is not meant as a reference to drugs. The name 'Phineas' refers to an ancillary character in the story of 'Jason and the Argonauts'. In addition to this, there is some identification with the character Phineas from the John Knowles novel 'A Separate Peace' although the significance of this 'referential idea' would not fully blossom until life events from 2021 to 2024 had occured in Phineas' life.

In addition to his involvement in the SubGenius mind control cult, Phineas also had a months-long dalliance with The Church of Scientology in 1991 in San Jose, CA in order to see, from the inside, what it was all about, working for the organization for many months but cleverly 'escaping their clutches' by pre-programming into his brain, in the pre-indoctrination period, a predetermined 'escape response', in other words *Phinny's cue to 'exit stage left* when a Church representative uttered a certain inevitable phrase to him, which of course they DID.

Bye, bye Scientology.
They were NOT PLEASED.

Phineas's current religious identification is Christian. He considers himself to be a Man of God but does not ascribe to any particular 'church' organization, being perfectly comfortable with his own, personal sense, useful understanding and concept of God.

Phineas has had a robust, lifelong interest in Psychology and has earned a trained certificate in Peer Counseling which he has utilized in volunteer efforts in his local community. So he is 'certified and certifiable' simultaneously holding both 'consumer' and 'practitioner' status in the mental health community.

Phineas also has since childhood had a driven natural affinity for, and very keen interest in language and its usages, even studying vocabulary and etymology on his own as a child, long term as an interest. 

 When Phineas was given a standardized IQ test as a child, he was found to have a verbal comprehension score of 139 which is very, very high.

Phineas was also tested positively as being on the 'autism spectrum' in an official capacity much later in life although the severity of this was not deemed to be problematic enough to require treatment.

Phineas' post-Highschool educational efforts can be classified as 'some college' but also as 'MUCH some college' taking many, many courses of interest in a number of local community colleges all with no intention or desire of ever earning any sort of degree during his 20's and 30's. These self-interested,  self-motivated educational efforts typically resulted in high grades and included a number of efforts in artistic, drama, media production, Psychology and English courses and curricula. Otherwise, Phineas has  mostly acted as an 'autodidact' (a term meaning essentially someone who is 'self taught') in his extracurricular learning efforts.

Phineas has worked intensively and creatively with the likes of such groups and artists such as Negativland, Bran Flakes, TradeMark Gunderson of (The Evolution Control Committee), Doktors 4 "Bob" and Big City Orchestra with whom he has collaboratively help create online virtual theatrical video events for his 'musical mashup movies' for the 3-D immersive VR community environment 'Second Life'.

His work has been lauded by the likes of the late comedian George Carlin and mainstream media critics such as Brad Kava (The San Jose Mercury News) and Richard Von Busack (The San Jose Metro).

https://www.metroactive.com/papers/metro/09.05.02/midnightvoice-0236.html

Phineas has also worked extensively and creatively, for decades collaboratively, at the Pacifica Radio flagship radio station KPFA in Berkeley, CA as well as the prestigious, exclusive and critically-acclaimed college radio station KFJC located at Foothill College in Los Altos Hills, CA. These former creative efforts were reviewed favorably by the aforementioned mainstream media critics at the time.

Despite all this 'impressive display' of extraordinarily unique talent and brainpower, Phineas frequently has difficulty putting on his own pants.

Phineas notoriously once mailed a package containing one of his radio shows to Ted Kaczynski ('The Unabomber') in the mid-nineties to where the notorious insane criminal resided at the time at the Supermax Federal Penitentiary in Florence, Colorado after having secured the notorious serial bomber's exact mailing address through the help of a local (and quite amused) reference librarian.

The program in question was called 'Bombscare', the result of a year-long creative effort by Phineas and was broadcast mixed live around that time by Phineas and Negativland band member, the late Don Joyce on KPFA. The show was, in part, about Mr. Kaczynski, his schizophrenic illness, and the years-long federal investigation into his serial mailbombing crimes.

The program represented a 'high-watermark' in Phineas' creative efforts and the IRONY of Phineas' sincere (yet arguably more than a little irrational and probably uhm... misguided) motivation in going about MAILING A PACKAGE TO THE *FUCKING UNABOMBER* containing his SHOW which was *ABOUT THE FUCKING GODDAMN UNABOMBER* was eclipsed in Phineas's semi-deranged mind by a literally a genuine and curious desire to 'find out what Ted thought about it'. 

Uhhhh... YEAH.
We *wish* we were kidding about that, but we're actually uhhm... NOT.

The package in question was summarily and promptly returned to Phineas, by Supermax prison authorities via US Mail, unopened and without comment.   Which MAKE SENSE. After all, ANY PRISON which houses the *GODDAMN FUCKING UNABOMBER* that gets... *a package* for... UH...  *HIM*... 

...is CERTAINLY... 
** NOT GONNA FUCKING OPEN IT!!! ***

And so, that... as they say... was THAT.

Around this time as well, Phineas mailed an identical tape copy of the 'Bombscare' show highlights to a very different person: the late iconic and legendary comedian George Carlin under the somewhat disingenuous guise of procuring 'permission' for using a Carlin audio sample in the show. 

However there was, like with Kaczinsky, the somewhat diffuse motivation of 'wanting to know what he thought about it'. 

The somewhat 'ruse' of offering the tape up to Carlin 'for review' to 'get permission' arose when Phineas self-consciously realized Carlin was 'in the show' he wanted to send and was offset by the perceptive comedian 'understanding' most likely that Phineas really just wanted feedback. Also, Phineas too was in fact sincere in that he would have snipped out the Carlin sample if permission was not forthcoming from George. 

With that, Phineas procured permission to send the tape to Carlin through the comedian's publicist and a voicemail message from George. The sequence in the 'Bombscare' program that includes the Carlin sample may be heard here in a track from the album/show's full listing on Bandcamp:

https://nationalcynical.bandcamp.com/track/more-fun-for-me

Some weeks after sending that tape of the show to George, Phineas discovered a message response from George in his voice mailbox.

In the voicemail message, Carlin was almost 'beyond enthusiastic' about the tape Phineas had sent to him. His praise of the work was almost uncontainable and Carlin articulately and happily lauded and sang its praises sincerely for over a minute, with all the salty facility of language and attitude he was so well known for in is in his lifetime, waxing eloquent about how great and fabulous he found it, and specifically praising the 'middle ear' range of artistic efficacy in which the sonic power of the program had 'hit'.

The uncut recording of Carlin's enthusiastic voicemail message to Phineas about the show can be heard here:

https://nationalcynical.bandcamp.com/track/carlin-voicemail-to-phineas-narco-about-bombscare-c-1997-8

Phineas' immediate reaction to hearing this message of personal endorsement from this hyper-known source there in his own personal voicemail at the time was one not so much of elation, pride and happiness but rather an almost *stunned awe* as if he had thought of one day to get an interesting looking penny assessed by a pawnbroker only to suddenly learn that the coin was in fact worth TEN MILLION DOLLARS.

It is interesting to note in regard this phone call message that George started out his performative career as a radio DJ working at WINO in New York and that his brother the late Patrick Carlin (who George tells Phineas in the message his wants to send the show tape to) also worked in radio and ran a podcast. So, both men would have had a firsthand appreciation of the program as a live-mixed radio effort.

Also, and I have been unable to definitively confirm this, although I seem to recall hearing this from somewhere at one point: Carlin's brother Patrick also kind of lived 'out in the woods' Walden Pond style far away from the mainstream infrastructure of the more developed sections of society. So, if this were in fact true, his 'lifestyle' could be said to be not all that different than that of 'The Unabomber' himself.

Minus the 'exploding' part. *Ahem* 

WELL, A MAN NEEDS A HOBBY!! When he LIVES ALONE so what are you gonna do? Sometimes it's RUNNING A PODCAST and sometimes it's BLOWING PEOPLE UP!!

Further to this: in researching Carlin's life, it became known to Phineas that prior to him becoming the legendary, well-known mainstream comedic show business talent that he turned out to be (which he was rather forced to do in order to raise a family which was expensive to do and also ultimately to pay off his massive tax bills) Carlin originally only had the ambition or 'dream' or intention of being just an obscure artist doing abstract, weird art like in an apartment somewhere on his own merely for his own enjoyment and just living his life like that.

Sort of like... how... Phineas Narco... does.
Go figure.

The phone call from Carlin ultimately motivated and accelerated Phineas' artistic career at a crucial time of growth. It gave Phineas the confidence of knowing that his work had worth and was on the right track with an appeal to an audience, who was like George in terms of sensibility and values, and he was able to rest assured that this endorsement was one HUNDRED PERCENT genuine, no bullshit and SECURE because Phineas knew that Carlin was NOT the kind of guy for Hollywood bullshit. 

So, this ringing endorsement was like a shiny gold coin of the purest stock gifted to him right into his pocket. IT WAS HIS. And he was able to use that currency for capital in the artistic journey to come.

Thanks, George.

==================

To view, stream or download (at NO required cost) Phineas Narco's mediage artwork which is freely available to everyone online, go to any of the following sites:

YouTube
Mixcloud
SoundCloud
Bandcamp
or
archive.org

...and search for "Phineas Narco" [using quotemarks] and also 'NCN' and/or "National Cynical Network" [with quotes around as well] in combination if need be:

Recent interviews with Phineas on Youtube for 'Innerviews' with former Carlin and Zappa employee Gerry Fialka:     

Part 1: https://youtu.be/AsaZK74Qqu8
Part 2: https://youtu.be/0t9Suf8490o

Phineas Narco's ENTIRE DIGITIZED BODY OF BODY OF WORK (Including much special, rare and heretofore otherwise unreleased, unfinished. upcoming and never-heard before material) termed 'THE VAULT' is now available via DROPBOX in a 1.5TB-sized comprehensive online archive and can be now accessed using THE FOLLOWING LINK:

http://bit.ly/4dllBLQ

Enjoy!g