The Future Is Unwritten

Here's the last one for my solo show at Primitive Kool this Saturday night. This post's title is on the back of The Clash's "Combat Rock" album I used for this painting of Joe Strummer.

The show is part of Newport Nights that I participated in last year. This show will also showcase the kids from Paul Green's School of Rock franchise in San Diego, CA. Apparently they're getting well known with franchises across the nation!

I just found out today that I get to give the school $25 for each piece of mine I sell at the show! Sweet! So if you're in the area, check it out! Should be a good time and you can support rock music education.

Coincidentally, I also was just asked to take down my pieces from Rockzone Records, the local independent record store that had agreed to help me try to sell my work back last year at the same time as the Newport Nights show. Bummer. Stephen said nobody has ever even asked about the pieces he had on his wall.

So, I'm getting them tomorrow midday. On the off chance that anybody reading this blog is in the Phoenix area and wants to really surprise a guy, go take a look at the pieces and ask Stephen about them and, heck, if you like one, buy it! Support local art!

I certainly didn't know where I'd be today a year ago. I was just so excited people were even interested in seeing my work, let alone buying them as gifts for loved ones. In the in-between-time, Life has thrown our family a curve that painfully reminded us of how uncertain and unknown the future is.

"There's no absolutes in life, only in vodka." - a line from "Homicide: Life on the Streets", my favorite cop show EVER

Peace.

Joe Strummer 09/25/08

Two For Tuesday

Rockzone Records hung the ones I gave them! They look great. I'll take my camera next time I'm down there and get a shot of'em. I'm sending 3 to Wild About Music today and the ones for Primitive Kool are almost ready to go too.

Yesterday, I tried to contact the radio stations I listened to growing up to see if they'd be interested in my work. We'll see. They did play an important role in what pop music I listened to during my teens. I found out about classic rock groups from KLSX, heavy metal masters from KNAC, and all those great alternative bands from Pirate Radio. All of those are different now, but KLOS, KCBS, and KROQ are still there. Grunge certainly wouldn't have influenced me as much if it hadn't been for radio and MTV. I'm looking for a Nirvana record right now to do for Primitive Kool, but they're hard to come by for sure. Ozzy's available through PayPal in my online gallery, so if you're interested:

CHECK OUT MY WEBSITE AT: WWW.VINYLART.INFO

and scroll through the jukebox.

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!