Many times when I start a new painting I'm always tempted to stop
after about one or two sessions. A painting at that stage looks so
new and fresh, it could be anything to anybody.
Maybe one day when I'm old and tired, I'll just "finish" it when I
start it and that will be that. What nerve, what arrogance to believe
just a few hours of work is justified in calling a painting "finished".
I do like how this looks but will be spending weeks if not months
fleshing it out. I'll be done with this when I'm sick of looking at it.
Last Sunday started like any other Sunday, woke up early to paint.
I have been alternating between pieces on the bands Milton Mapes
and Wussy. As I get more settled in my creative ways, I prefer early
morning (6am-10am) and late afternoon/evening (4pm-8pm) for peak
painting times. Of course, Life always ensures that you're unable to
be available during those times but on Sunday morning, it's a safe
bet I'm up early painting.
About mid-morning I received a invitation to a free ticket for the
Dinosaur Jr. show happening that night at Delmar Hall. The show was
sold out and when it was first announcing I had no idea if I'd be able
to attend so I never bought a ticket, another sad reality of my adult life.
But the stars had aligned and I was indeed able to attend.
This was especially nice because I was extremely disappointed in
missing what would be an historic show the following Tuesday night
when members of Dinosaur Jr. would be playing in a Stooges cover
band at The Way Out Club on Jefferson along with legendary punk
band Negative Approach, Lou Barlow solo and St. Louis band,
Trauma Harness. Seeing the band live at Delmar Hall would be
just as good and a dream come true.
It's impossible to overstate the influence Dinosaur Jr. had over me
when I was a teenager. First hearing of them in 8th grade when I lived
in a small town in Maryland, the skaters there were a bit more hip than
the skaters in the small Missouri town I was originally from. The band
didn't really invade the skater popular consciousness until 1989 when
their song "Freak Scene" was featured in the skate video
"Speed Freaks" during what could arguably be called the
most anticipated skate video part of 1989, Mike Vallely's at the end.
Mike was one of the most popular pro skaters at the time and he
had just left the huge, corporate company Powell Peralta for the
smaller, independent company, World Industries and this was his
first video part since. When watching it today, it's easy to see how
absolutely defining it was then and even now. Once that
video came out, thousands of skaters like myself were
forever changed and Dinosaur Jr. will always be linked with that.
Because of that I immediately acquired the CD "Bug" and two
short years later "Green Mind" was released, which was
literally the soundtrack to my senior year in high school.
None of this really occurred to me until I was sitting there watching
them play all of these songs live and all these memories came
flooding back.
Which of course made me even more disappointed about missing their
Tuesday show at The Way Out. To capture an original photograph of
J Mascis at a small St. Louis club to paint from is what it's all about.
Thankfully, Jaime Lees was there, covering the show for the RFT and
she shared with me an unpublished photograph she took herself.
now playing - The Wagon
