I found this painting and an unpublished blog entry of mine from the first Covid lockdown in Spring 2020. Its interesting to look back as an observer of your own thoughts and offerings from a period of time in the past. As a songwriter and musician this happens quite a lot. Once a song is recorded and released it is sealed to the ether for what could be your whole lifetime. Your thoughts and feelings from a moment in time are caught in a capsule. They can be hard to revisit, joyous to revisit, but either way, when so much of life passes in the blink of an eye, I feel lucky to have these song capsules to bring back memories of times past….The me I found in the writing and painting from a nearly a year ago was feeling rather trapped it seems…
Joe
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So here’s another themed piece of ‘something’ for you. I’ll be the first to admit that I’m a bit of a contrarian when it comes to trending attitudes or ideas, themes, movements etc blah blah blah. I’ll also admit I’m bored of lockdown (I believe in it and that it needs to happen) but I’m bored, and I’m bored of lockdown lists, meme’s, photos and all the rest. Yet here I am making one. Why I tend to lean towards the contrarian path I couldn’t really tell you. Its not because Its a secret club (for one) that you can’t mention, ’First rule of contrarian club, don’t mention contrarian club’! Maybe its the lure of the outlaw maverick highwayman like Dick Turpin, Jesse James or the fictional Ben Wade weaving inbetween the lines of society to gain a little pie for themselves. Or the intrepid trekkers such as Alexander Supertramp or Cheryl Strayed who ditch all ties to societal norms and simply head out into the wild to find a piece of themselves for themselves.
So to be a true contrarian unto myself (a double bluff) I find myself here making a lockdown list/rant of lockdown novelty. A hypocritical contrarian!
A good friend of mine taught me a very insightful mantra to use when conversation meanders or debate gets a bit heavy. I find it helps to level the playing field and bring a bit of tongue and cheek light heartedness to a situation. So take a deep breath and say it with me;
“Its all a load of bollocks”
Now not everything is a load of tripe and serious matters deserve the attention they require, but sometimes when you’ve had enough of the small talk, this mantra will free the spirit inside.
For me to rant on about being contrarian is all a load of bollocks, it’s self preservation of the ego, which also, is all a load of bollocks. What I miss the most these days, like a lot of us do I’m sure, are the mass gatherings; Parties, pubs, gigs, festivals, hugs. Social events where all those in attendance have a shared mutual philosophy of what we are going to achieve out of this gathering. So in honour of a collective vision and embracing the the trends of the masses here are a list of Films (some mentioned in the rant above) and tracks that I am loving at the moment.
Here’s to Peace Love and collective community.
(Highway men always end up alone anyway.)
Top Films:
- Fight Club
- The Assassination of Jesse Jame by the Coward Tom Ford
- 3:10 to Yuma
- Wild
- Into the Wild
- Hunt for the Wilder People
Top Tracks rocking my world:
- Lizzo – Good as Hell
- The Mysterines – Take Control
- Emma Ruth Rundle -On Dark Horses (whole Album
- Khruangbin, Leon Bridges – Texas Sun
- Taj Mahal – Queen Bee
- Curtis Mayfield – Move on up (extended edition)