Three For Thursday, Three Times!

Syd Barrett of early Pink Floyd is for our friend Doug's son's birthday. I'm giving it to him in exchange for an awesome collection of '60s and '70s albums. Doug, like my wife and I, is nuts about music. In fact, he and my wife met at a concert when she was following the Black Crowes during their early days. I'm not sure what I'll do with the albums he gives me, but it'll be special.


Mike Love of the Beach Boys is another one for the David Lynch Foundation! The Beach Boys are doing a benefit concert early next month for DLF and they decided to have me do another one to auction. So cool. Mike is going to not only see this, he's going to sign it! Hopefully I'll get a picture of him doing so, but at the very least I'll get the painting back signed to frame, so I can take a shot then. I'll keep you updated about the David Lynch and this piece as far as the actual auction.

This Hendrix is for the guy with stellar taste who also commissioned the Peter Gabriel, Roger Waters, and Jim Morrison I painted recently. They look so cool together, it's going to be hard to part with them. But I'll take a shot of them framed all together before boxing and shipping them.

Speaking of commissions, I also just got a commission this morning from another guy with awesome taste. He wants Miles Davis, John Coltrane, and Thelonious Monk on albums with 'blue' in the title, IN BLUE! So cool. I've already bought the albums on eBay and am really looking forward to painting them. Another set of three.

Things are really getting exciting right now for whatever reason. A friend online noted that it seems I have something new going on every day. I hope it stays that way as I roll with more commissions, more exposure and more charity connections. My goal is to, sooner than later, be able to support our family with my art. And, since we're about to have a baby in January, I need to be working on probably at least 2 pieces a day. We'll see. I'm hopeful the Universe's plan heads in this direction. I'm trying to do what I can.

Along those lines, I've got over 50 fans on Facebook now! Pretty sweet. A bunch of people I don't even know yet. Even better. I really hope that page can be a gathering place for people who like what I do, and human creativity in general, getting some good discussions going. Make it about music trivia or deep philosophy, whatever, I'm game. I'll jump in when I have something to say and I'll post updates of relevant exciting stuff. So, if you're on Facebook and haven't yet, check it out!

Also, I'm still doing my monthly email newsletter with continuing stories of my life and art, presented in a little bit more organized fashion than this blog. If you'd like to subscribe, please email me and let me know!

And on a 3rd front, following the 3 paintings and commission of 3 pieces, for those out there reading regularly, please share this blog. At the bottom of every post, there's a button to share the individual post on pretty much every social site out there. The same button is in the sidebar if you want to share the whole blog. The more people who know, the more people who know! :)

Peace.

In Appreciation Of Powerful Exposure

I love "Animals" and "The Final Cut" personally. Besides the albums with Syd Barrett, I think they might be my favorite Pink Floyd Albums. This isn't anything against "Wish You Were Here", "The Wall" or "Dark Side Of The Moon" as I tend to LOVE full concept albums. And Floyd is the king, as far as I'm concerned. There's just something about those 2 albums, maybe because most people tout the others so much.

I'm not much for trivia. I honestly don't make it a point to learn in depth about bands I like, their histories. I just love the music. It's kind of like my art. I don't want you to have to know my major in college or that I'm an only child to appreciate what I do. That's one reason why I do what I do, because it is basically pop art. It celebrates our common popular culture. I'm not focussing on mass consumables like soup cans, but I am paying tribute to people who've changed our world en masse as individuals. Roger Waters was powerful.

That's why when the powerful expose the personal, it's that much more raw and impressive - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WKKOsVS3VQ4.

Peace.

SOLD - Roger Waters 08/13/09

P.S. On the subject of exposure, I just got REALLY great news about my show upcoming at Bookmans. If you want to know the story, please subscribe to my monthly newsletter. To do so, just email me at vinylart@danieledlen.com. Thanks!

Someday We'll Move There, You'll See

2 paintings, clear-coating 4, wrapping and shipping all in one day! Whew. Well, I want to make the deadline!

See, I just found out about an invitation only, art on vinyl show in London next month. London! I was tagged recently on Facebook to do a list of concerts I've seen. Turned out most were British bands, Peter Gabriel, Arctic Monkeys, Verve, Oasis, Kasabian, Gomez, Stereophonics... Heck we even WENT to London to see the Verve. Best show my wife and I have seen, and she's seen over 50 bands!

I WISH I could've seen Pink Floyd. One of the few bands I've sought out live bootlegs on vinyl, to be engulfed by their show would've been incredible. Like Jeff, who entered my contest with his story about "Wish You Were Here", Floyd was the first prog rock band I got into.

So I've been waiting for a show in London. These are the pieces I sent today, having painted Page and Lennon this morning. Strummer I'd painted before, as well as Hendrix. It should be a cool show, with some artists I've met on Flickr. We'll see how it goes and I'll share any pictures I get of the event.

Peace.

David Gilmour 08/08/09

The Sculptading of Paintrature

I realized I haven't shared very much of my artistic upbringing. I'd listed some artists who'd influenced my aesthetic growing up, but haven't shown much of what I did back in school.

This image of Roger Waters of Pink Floyd is one of the more sculptural ones I've painted. So I'll take this opportunity to show you a couple sculptures I did back at the Brentwood Art Center with Jonathan Bickart.

Like my portraits, which kind of emerge from the vinyl, I tended to create figures emerging from chunks of clay. The woman's general shape looked like a triangle from a certain angle, so I had her fade into the geometrical shape. The man's face was more of a study, so I just took the block of clay straight from the bag and sculpted him into the corner, adding back on removed clay for the nose and beard, so it sort of look embedded in the block and sort of like a mask.

This tendency might be attributed to a bit of laziness on my part. With my portraits on vinyl too, as I don't use any black paint. Just using white, and very little at that, makes my job easier on one hand. With painting, it's more difficult on the other hand because I can't screw up, I can't remove the paint. So if I get a part of a face too bright, it'll pop out too much, messing up the contour of the face.

I'm basically sculpting the painting, or shading the portraiture. After I've gotten the shapes of the face, I rely quite a bit on my sculpture training to understand the flow of the face and to brighten or raise the right places. Both painting and sculpture use light to create relief. Sculpture has the benefit of actually being raised, while I use paint density to create the illusion of relief on the vinyl. But I definitely think like a sculptor while painting.

Next, I'll show you how my high school art teacher got me hooked on dots, dabbing, and basically density.

Peace.

Limited Time

Yesterday I talked about abundance of value. The counterpoint is time, its value in its uniqueness AND scarcity. Our time as individuals is limited. Attention is precious. Thus my overwhelming gratitude at your sharing yours with me, spending it on me.

So, to those paying attention, a return more than expected. I'm going to introduce framed double albums with a limited time offer. My framed single portraits go for $175 plus shipping ($10 US, $40 int'l) currently. For commissions paid for through the end of February, double portraits framed in the same type of frame, just a double-wide, will be $300 plus the same shipping.

I've done three examples. Sorry the picture above is a wee bit blurry. Here are closeups of the Kings Of Leon: Caleb and Jared and Matthew and Nathan. I also painted Smashing Pumpkins and Pink Floyd. The Kings Of Leon and Smashing Pumpkins do have 4 portraits, so they would be an additional $20 ($10 per added portrait).

A last detail: if you want 2 single albums each with a portrait, framed side-by-side, you can do that too for the same cost. So, for instance: Page and Plant of Led Zeppelin.

When you Email me I can send you a PayPal invoice or I do accept personal checks. Thank you so much for your time.

Peace.

Man, I Sure Do Love Music

A friend said that to me when we were discussing the idea for my contest. It says how I feel pretty succinctly.

After my dad introduced me to The Beatles and to vinyl in general, I spent a LOT of time in used record stores in the West L.A. area. Moby Disc, Record Surplus, Rhino Records, Record Rover, and Penny Lane became regular haunts.

This was during the transition from cassette to CD, so I was resisting buying CDs at the time. I listened to tapes in my car and records at home. So my vinyl collection grew. I discovered the existence of Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab and virgin vinyl, half-speed mastered audiophile quality pressings. I've talked about the copy of "Revolver" I recorded with my iRecord.

Yesterday, still thinking about Michael and how much we loved sharing our passion for music, I decided to record the 2 albums involved in this amazing phenomenon. I have a decent copy of MFSL 1-017, Pink Floyd's "The Dark Side Of The Moon", and a mint condition copy of MFSL 1-100, The Beatles' "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band". Such incredible musical creations.

These are albums that I like to listen to straight through. Having grown up listening to records, I've gotten used to hearing complete sides as units. I also listened to the radio and watched MTV a lot, so there are songs that I only know by themselves and don't know the rest of the band's music. Mostly though, if I heard a band on the radio with a song I liked, I'd find the album and listen to the whole thing, and even try to collect a group's entire recordings.

So, I recorded these albums and joined together all the songs using Audacity into one MP3 for each side. These are concept albums anyway, so like Dark Side's second side recorded as one track automatically. That's one thing I never understood with CDs is how they decided where track breaks were between songs with no real break.

In any event, this ramble, which I tend to do when talking about myself instead of my art, is to get you to remember how you listened to music growing up. How did the media, whether it be 8-track or MP3, you listened to impact your appreciation and love for music?

Peace.

Revolutionary Revelation

It's up! It's live! It's... well it's there anyway. The new site, I mean.

Yay!

So, I thought I'd take this auspicious occasion (two words that always look weird to me, by the way) to share something that is the stuff of urban legends. As far as I know, only a high school friend of mine and myself know. But I bet it shows up on YouTube now!

It's that big. Way bigger than my artwork or me. It's no less than a cultural cosmic revelation, if you ask me. Well, who knows. I'm sure some people'll dismiss it. But I think it's incredible.

I've not discussed it with anybody but my wife. So why now?

Dunno.

Just thought you'd like to know. And if Michael wants me to give him credit, I will for sure. He figured it out and then told me a couple years later I could share it. He was going to write an Ebook about it, but to my knowledge never did.

So what is it?

Ok, here goes. It's well known even in mainstream culture that Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of The Moon" can be considered a second soundtrack to The Wizard of Oz. It's been dubbed Dark Side of The Rainbow, even getting a well documented entry in Wikipedia. But the album ends before the end of the movie. It ends during the introduction of the Tin Man. That leaves a lot of movie left.

What other album could rival the importance of Dark Side in its own right and possibly synchronize with the rest of the movie?

*cue drum roll*

The Beatles' "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band".

At the end of Dark Side, pause the movie. It's right about when Tin Man has started to move. Start Pepper and resume the movie. The best part is during "Being For The Benefit Mr. Kite", but throughout the album, there are scene changes that match with song changes and many cues that when added up seem more than coincidence.

I wasn't even on anything and I was laughing quite maniacally. Try it.

I send this information out into the world naively, hoping it won't be used for evil. Don't really think it can be, but you never know.

Now, Pepper doesn't reach the end of the movie either. What comes after it?

Peace.

Miles, And Miles, And Miles!

Newport Nights rocked! It was a great gig, lots of people. I got to watch quite a few checking out my work. Ocean Beach is a cool place and getting to see the ocean was wonderful. A couple pieces sold, with more commissions as well. The Miles Davis they had sold online and another of him was requested by one of the employees of Primitive Kool. We'll definitely be heading back there for a future show!

Red Dog Gallery in downtown Phoenix is going to be displaying 8-10 of my pieces during the upcoming First Fridays! I've been hoping to find a place that participates in that monthly event as well, as the turnout of people interested in local culture is supposed to be huge. Woohoo!

I also found an inordinate number of records today at 2 local used stores. Bob Marley, Hendrix, the Dead, Pink Floyd, SRV... man, that was sweet! So now I'm stocked up and ready to paint. Besides the Miles Davis movie, I've also got the shots taken for a Jim Morrison and Jimi Hendrix so I'll be posting those this week. In the meantime, I've still got my gallery so:

CHECK OUT MY WEBSITE AT: WWW.VINYLART.INFO

and, please, leave comments here, on YouTube, or email me!

EDIT: I wanted to note that the image I use for the Miles Davis piece is the 1985 photo by Anton Corbijn. He's well known in the music world for his photography and music video work and I wanted to make sure to give him credit for the initial beautiful vision of the legend on muted trumpet.

15 Musical Landmarks In My Life

Rockzone Records in Chandler has six pieces now: Lou Reed, Jim Morrison, Michael Stipe, Bob Marley, Pink Floyd, and KISS. I've got pics in my online gallery. Jerry and Otis are for Primitive Kool. I realized I haven't really talked about what music has been important to me over the years. Here, then, are some of the bands and musicians that were pivotal in shaping my musical taste and have become part of my musical culture:


The Beatles - my dad introduced me to Revolver, on vinyl of course
Genesis w/ Peter Gabriel - lead me into prog rock, thank you MTV and "Big Time"
Pink Floyd - prog rock/psychedelia crossover
Jefferson Airplane - full-blown psychedelia
Jimi Hendrix - psychedelia/blues rock connection
The Doors - added in more keyboards and hammond organ
Led Zeppelin - blues rock/heavy metal transition
Black Sabbath w/ Ozzy - "Paranoid" was my first heavy metal CD
Nirvana - grunge diversion, I was a teen in the 90s
NIN - moving into industrial, helped with teen angst too
Autechre - headlong from industrial into electronica, got a little intellectual around then
Acetone - hometown band that combined grunge, heavy metal, and interesting vocals
Lou Donaldson - got a little funky on the horn as electronica lead me into sampling
Stereophonics - a move to Phoenix and it became more about the vocals in front of the rock
Blind Melon - and passionate, pure, raw beauty

This is by *no* means near complete, but it does give a bit of an outline of my journey, musical landmarks if you will. While in college, I spent a LOT of time in used record stores listening to anything I hadn't heard before, so my interests got very diverse, and quite weird at times. Maybe someday I'll actually catalog my CDs and post a list or something. For now, here's mister Otis Redding:

Tell me about your musical journey!