CULTURE BUZZ: Berkeley, California’s annual crazy parade takes place later this week, and will be replete with art cars and all of the city’s kookiest characters (read: everyone). The festival only further proves my thesis that Berkeley is the best place to play “Hobo or Hippie?” (via Laughing Squid)

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The Best Links:

1. How Berkeley Can You Be? An Existential Journey
2. Visit The 13th Annual “How Berkeley Can You Be!?” Celebration
3. “Only in Berkeley Do the Naked People Put On Clear Rain Coats When It Starts to Rain.”
4. Berkeley And Politics: A Marraige Made In Heaven
5. What Are Art Cards? They Are Not Floats.
6. How Berkeley Can You Be? On Flickr
7. How Berkeley Can You Be On Zooomr

CULTURE BUZZ: Between a new book about them and the recent reunion of their band Yo Ho Wa 13, the 1970s Los Angeles-based cult The Source is getting a lot of attention. The Source, led by Jim Baker aka Father Yod, was a pioneer in the organic food movement. Their restaurant on Sunset Boulevard was a hot spot for celebrities like Warren Beatty, Joni Mitchell and Bob Dylan and was the location for that scene in Annie Hall where Woody orders “the alfalfa sprouts and a plate of mashed yeast” from the white-robed waitress.

The Best Links:

1. Listen to the NPR Story: The Birth of Organic, Polygamous Spiritualism
2. Listen to the NPR Story: From Source Restaurant to ‘Cosmic’ Commune
3. Buy the Book
4. “Freak Folks”
5. Father Yod
6. Ya Ho Wa 13 interview
7. “Heavy Living: Father Yod and the Source Family “
8. YaHoWa13: A ’70s Spiritual Rock Commune Reunites
9. Hippie Cult Extravaganza This Week
10. Father Yod’s Children of the Sixth Root Race Deliver New Old Material
11. The Real Cult of California: Father Yod and the Source Family