NVUJ

Well, it looked better than HELP.

I love stories of why things happen like that. I love stories period. Attached to objects, they kind of carry with them the human intent captured by the object. My head spins when I think of all the stories attached to the albums on which I paint.

Like with these 4 albums of the Beatles. Robert sent them to me because they were too scratched to do anything with but throw them away. Two of them even had a second copy of the same album! I don't know exactly where they all came from, so maybe he'll leave a comment about that for me, but in any event, what happened to them? Why are they so trashed?

Records of the Beatles are by far the most plentiful in my playable collection. I went a wee bit nuts collecting bootlegs on vinyl when they were still available in West Los Angeles record stores. I've talked about some of them here, those that I've archived digitally with my iRecord. I couldn't imagine doing anything even to duplicates to leave them in the condition of these records I just used.

I love records because they are a physical manifestation of something ephemeral. Records were the first way sounds were preserved, captured "for the record", as it were. It's pretty cool when you think about it. Like the Internet and printing press and video, the invention and mass production of vinyl changed the way our culture works a great deal. Beatle bootlegs are great, like the story of the "Help!" album cover, because they show how the creation of the music fits into the greater story of humanity and our creativity. Marvelous.

Peace.

Ringo Starr 11/07/08