Seb Palmer

I took these – my two art pads – with me. I seem to be taking these pads with me almost all the time, at present. Which appears all to the good!

I got the above Pink Floyd ‘special’, for Dan. I hope he can enjoy it?

Oh yes… I’m only on track four of disc one, and already I love this collection.

Sun Ra is… well, a Legend. In the face of his wildly fecund creativity, my paltry words seem pretty redundant. The best thing to do is… rack ‘em up, and knock ‘em down.

That said, Sun Ra was himself also a poet (and pamphleteer!); words were important to him… so…

I recall reading a rather sniffy review (of a different collection of early Sun Ra material, which also included some of these singles), in which Sun Ra’s own material was praised to the skies, whilst the doo-wop kind of stuff was panned. I think that’s a mistake. Ra and his Arkestra bring their wonkiness to everything they do.

From squeaking drum-pedals, to slightly out of tune organs, or bass instruments, all seemingly recorded, for the most part, in single room single takes (you can just hear the ambience of the whole band/the mix, live in the room). I’m sure Ra will have used overdubs, since he uses everything in the most experimental of ways, but there’s almost always a raw organic wholeness to an awful lot of what he does.

I must also mention something poss’ a bit arcane and off-piste. Such territory is, after all, home turf for Ra and co. And that something, or someone, is Fred Lane (& co.). Sun Ra and his cohorts are kind of the Afro-centric, madly prolific, and – whilst still filled with wit and humour – deadly earnest version of Fred and his ‘pataphysical’ loon-brigade.

Or, put (very rightly) the other way around, Lane et al were a pale and tiny chip of the mother block, that was Ra and his team-mates…Whether the resemblance, or echoes, are intentional or accidental, matters not a whit to me.

Did the bottom two whilst waiting for my shift to begin. Shades of grey to be added later, when time allows…

LATER…

Much fucking later (insomnia chews my butt, again!)… After deciding doing something was preferable to tossing and turning (and the dreaded itchy feet!), I came downstairs, shaved, and did this:

I’m staying downstairs, and having another crack at sleeping. This time on the busted couch. Don’t want to disturb Teresa any more!

I thought I should try doing some black and white stuff. It’s kind of nice to limit the palette. I’m still mining Picasso, as ever.

Meantime we’re watching – rather aptly – an old black and white movie, The Primrose Path,

Ginger Rogers is Ellie May, and Joel McCrea is Ed. Ellie May, a young innocent tomboy, is daughter to two generations of hooker. She meets Ed, falls in love, and gets married. But her family troubles follow, and blight things.

Ed abandons Ellie May. Ellie May’s alcoholic father, Homer, accidentally shoots Mamie, his wife/Ellie May’s mother. Ellie May seems doomed to follow the path of her female forbears…

Fortunately things turn out for the good, ultimately. I do like a nice old fashioned happy ending.

BACK TO ART…

I have to confess that I really love these two pieces. Are they just studies? Or are they something in their own right? I’ve no idea! And that’s fine.

I also feel that there’s lots of mileage in this direction. So I hope to keep producing stuff in this vein. And I hope I can transfer such ideas to larger format ‘proper’ paintings.

We shall see…

I feel that three of the above four pieces are coming along ok. The fourth, at bottom right, just ain’t working. It’s also the most heavily worked. And yet it’s still not happening. Still, three out of four isn’t bad, is it?

The top two I really like. I think they’re going in the right direction. The third, at bottom left… it’s kind of teetering on the brink.

LATER ON…

Further work on the top right still not really helping.

Hmmm… The top two, which I like best out of this lot anyway, also work very strongly inverted. I’ll prob’ develop these designs further both ways up.

Saw this on Gardener’s World (ep. 21?). Fantastic!

Oh boy… I can’t wait to start exploring this.

Sun Ra is undoubtedly a motherfucking genius. An introvert, and eccentric, and Picassian in the fecundity of his art. The more I learn about him, the more I dig him.

I didn’t immediately put theses discs on, upon their arrival today. As much as I really wanted to. Why? Because we had guests. And Sun Ra might well be an acquired taste.

But on finally getting to bed, after watching Basil Rathbone as Shylock Heims, in The Lady In Green, I started to peruse the packaging and booklet.

Ra’s poetico-philosophical musings are of a piece with the music. Dazzling, wide-ranging, and just plain wonderful…

Got two new spreads started today. All deriving from a single work by Picasso.

I intend to take parts of the Picasso painting and extrapolate something for myself from it all.

Something else I want to do soon, is to start working up some of this recent spate of creativity into ‘finished’ artworks.

Of the two most developed or worked up so far, I prefer the bold simplicity of the left hand piece. The right hand one has promise, but is a bit too busy and confused.

Wow! This is a blast from the past.

I had some pals who got this, back when it came out, way back in 1987. I’m thinking of Rowan and James. Steeped as they were in the lore of axe-heroes, such as Van Halen, Gary Moore, Yngwie Malmsteen, Steve Vai, and… the latter’s guitar teacher, Joe Satriani.

One of the things I personally like about this album is that it’s all instrumental. And another is that it’s more musically broad-ranging in mood and tone than some more metal-centric ‘axe-hero’ type albums of that style/era.

Ironically, as I type that, we transition from the mellow 6/4 ‘Always With Me, Always With You’, to the hyper-rockin’ ‘Satch Boogie’!

Instrumental guitar lead rock, it’s basically a solo recording, with a bit of help on the drums/percussion/rhythm programming front. Satriani plays all guitars, bass and synths, etc. He also did some of the rhythm programming, and all the production.

Three others musos are credited, in mostly drum/percussion related roles: Bongo Bob Smith (drum programming, percussion), Jeff Campitelli (drums/percussion), and John Cuniberti (percussion/engineering).

For sheer skill, this is five star fare. From a musical enjoyment perspective? There are a few standout tracks – for me the very best are ‘Always With Me, Always With You’, and ‘Echo’, effectively the album’s two ballads – and then a larger amount that’s very well done, but rather dated.

Fun to revisit, and pretty good, overall. But neither a classic nor a favourite.

*Could’ve been played by a young Daniel Day Lewis!

Phew! I often get mini-surveys at the end of a shift, frequently asking do I feel safe, doing Amazon Flex deliveries.

This news kind of puts the wind up one…

I realise it’s horrible to say this, but… I sincerely hope Mark Ross is brutally butchered in jail, frankly.