I first drafted this post in September or October, 2022. But I’ve only now finally gone back to and finished it!
If I’m honest this isn’t my normal mug o’ Java. But I’ve been softened up for it by Masayoshi Takanaka’s wonderful double-album of the same name, that’s both based on the story, and uses Ul de Rico’s art on’t the packaging.
Sometimes getting an entry into something this way – so, the fabulous Takanaka album predisposes me to being more receptive to the artwork/story that inspired it – widens one’s aesthetics. If I’d only seen the book, I might’ve rejected it out of hand.
Some of the artworks, such as the one that adorns Masayoshi’s album cover, or the one directly above this paragraph, really do draw me in, and seduce me. Others, like the one directly below, I’ve grown to love.
And this in turn leads me to dig stuff like this:
And in the end I’m won over, and full of admiration for the simple charms of the story, and the intensity of the artworks. How about this for endpapers:
Ul de Rico did a follow up, called The White Goblin. And Masayoshi Takanaka followed suit! I’m listening to the latter right now. I’m not as immediately smitten by it as I was by his Rainbow Goblins project. It’s a bit more mainstream rock/pop.
But, truth be told, I feel myself being sucked in and won over. Seduced ever further from my own usual aesthetics. In the end, it feels to me as if I’m relaxing and letting Ul de Rico and Masayoshi Takanaka take me, one by each hand, into their visual and sonic worlds.
And I think that’s a good thing…