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OM OM

04 - let's get negative(live)

    this was written back in the spring of 2001. i had to retire this song because i didn't want to be the negative guy especially after september of that year. i must admit that it does bring me pleasure to hear it now. i was thinking about escape when i wrote it. i was thinking about a bonnie and clyde type of relationship, a love story on a destructive path. the glory of going down in flames. i was thinking about my depression and how it might be beneficial to me to surrender to it completely, to accept it as a truth. it's a tricky concept, but somehow it is empowering when you've been down.  i heard Jim Morrison say "hold on to your depression". i tread lightly, this road is filled with land mines. this goes against what nature has told me through the years. never did understand the concept of satanism. i guess it's more about aesthetics than it is evil. i must be singing about sex, for i know the french refer to an orgasm as la petite mort.  also, if i remember correctly, i wrote it as a reaction to a girl who said condescendingly to me while i was talking, "here we go again, let's get all negative"...so, it was a knee jerk reaction to that, you wan't to get negative? well, i'll show you negative, let's get negative!  all of this doesn't go over too well at a club on a friday night when most people want to feel uplifted. i performed it anyway, risked it and i am proud of that. i remember the bartender really dug it which wasn't much of an acheivment because nyc bartender's are generally very negative, at least at the places i used to frequent. anyway, it's about escape and freedom and depression and for some reason it makes me feel good. "laugh as you taste it." the thought occurs to me, that these songs are written by teams of spirits inside other dimensions traveling in and out of me. there's no explaination and i don't even understand it myself. "for the riches down below, let's...get..."

this could be temporary nausea or love at first sight.

 

you half step in my dreams, connect the phone lines, to the source, with television eyes, in a garden of ice. (dialing in the darkness) tires are falling from the sky but gravity has made an exception. as we go floating by wave to the boy in the window. somehow we have always known what it is i don't know, like following footsteps in the snow, oh oh. by the grace of the stars in outer space and the moon turning the tides away, we will find a way.

Some new drawings from my portraits book

   


  

Tattoo parlor sessions

Here are some drawings from the tattoo parlor sessions. These were from 20 minute poses. 

    

Elizabeth Stuart Gardner Museum

Out of all the museums i have visited in my life, Paris, London, Madrid, New York, San Francisco, I must say that the Elizabeth Stuart Gardner museum in Boston was/is the most impressive and over all aesthetically pleasing. The whole museum, 4 stories tall in which she lived on the fourth floor, is one with the art. There seems to be no distinction between  the art on display and the walls they are fastened to. The courtyard is a sight to behold from every opening that looks down on it as you ascend through the collection. 

El Jaleo by John Singer Sargent hangs on the wall at the end of a long hall on the left side of the courtyard. It had it's own section, just inside an archway probably brought over from egypt or morocco and reconstructed there to sit, as an opening in front of the large canvas.  The Flamenco scene spilled out of the canvas into the museum where antique pottery was placed on the grey floor that matched the walls in the painting, because of that the music and dancing came to life. To the left of the painting, inside it's little cove, was a mirror that reflected the whole painting, making the scene  stretch into another dimension. I later learned that it was there so that, from across the courtyard, at a certain angle, through a medieval, bullet shaped window, one could see the dancer's reflection framed by the stone. 

 Mostly, it brought me back to the back room of a bar in Madrid, where i sat in the past, drinking Sangria by myself, watching Flamenco dancers do their fiery dance and all the wine and music and sensuality of their movements mystified me, was that a dream? (all those distant memories, like the gypsy, sleeping on the desert floor under the moonlight and a lion has come to stand over him and sniff, never knowing how large it looms, he's at peace.) So i learned that paintings, to be successful, must first be fluid or composed in such a way that the observer's eyes shoot from here to there following the artist's design, and second, they should transport you to full blown reverie that touches all the senses.

 

the bridal shop experience

  i'm not sure why she asked ME to go, but there i was, on a Thursday night at the bridal shop watching her try on dresses for the big day. When i agreed to go i had no idea what i was getting myself into. because she bought me dinner i felt i had to go despite every nerve in my body telling me to run for the hills.

  bridal boutiques are very bright, everything's bright, the salespeople have bright accommodating attitudes, the other patrons all seem so...bright and chipper. there was music playing, light jazz coming from the speakers on the ceiling, that non-de script, muzak, kenny g type of jazz. one lady squealed "you're NOT the groom?!?" i said "that would be bad luck, wouldn't it?"

    i sat and waited each time she'd go into the changing room and put on another dress. as i sat there i caught a glimpse of my reflection in a three way mirror across the room  that showed in it, another three way mirror perpendicular to it. there i was, sevenfold, viewable from many angles, at the bridal shop. who is that person? i thought as i peered at my very own profile, removed from myself. shockingly pale, hunched figure dressed in dark brown, grey and black...and would you believe it, sticking out from my jacket pocket, a paperback novel, the title in full display, The Stranger by Camus, as if to inform everyone, if they couldn't tell already that, bridal dress shopping isn't high on my list of leisure activities. 

  There was all that but then i surrendered to the moment and gave my best fashion consultation for what it was worth. i was struck by how heavy and costume-like the dresses were as they hung in a row on the racks. as a haberdasher i had known the other side of this ying yang and suddenly appreciated the simplicity of a tuxedo. each dress told a different story, one was absurd in it's grandeur, one was old worldly in it's intricate lace, another was simple and understated. each ill-fitting dress offered a different version of the bride. as she came out of the changing room, it wasn't so much about how the dress looked but more about how it suited who she was as a woman. there were other brides and women there to offer their opinions too. it wasn't long before my two cents were completely out shined, which relieved me from the struggle of saying something more than "that one's nice too!"  the truth is, she looked beautiful in each one because of her smile, not to mention her figure which the other ladies looked on with slightly detectable envy. by the time we left i was completely exhausted. my brain had shut off.

...

  

journal entry

  I'm glad summer is over. Although i'm not looking forward to the cold winter. I am content that Autumn is about to begin. I guess it will be just right for a little while. I'm not used to things being just right. I'll do my best to enjoy it.

  Last night i was at the tattoo parlor in Chelsea called Sacred Tattoo to sit in on a figure drawing session. It was a pristine room to work in and the crew was very friendly. I could hear the buzz of tattoo needles coming from the other side of the studio walls. The model was burlesque star Plum Manchego. I had my headphones on when she entered the room like a peacock. She was curvaceous and confident in her pose striking. maybe i'll post some of the drawings.

    This past Sunday was fun playing the open mic trail in brooklyn. I sang songs into the air and watched them float off, outside and down the street where the twilight was orange on passersby's shoulders. I have no ambition beyond the thrill of being in the song and to feel it take flight inside that passing moment. Old man Joe was there smoking doobies and singing Hank Williams again, still breaks my heart to hear those lyrics and see Joe doing it knowing that two weeks after we met, his wife of fifty years, passed away. 

   President Obama made me proud on Monday when he addressed Wall St., declaring a new level of accountability in the future. I hope that he is successful too in his plan for Healthcare reform and that one day i could visit a doctor and not feel swindled and dehumanized. i've been reflecting on the idea that any second it can all be taken away. I want to live and breathe freely and fully. I look forward to meditating with Oh Kyung in the near future.

  An odd phenomenon has been occurring lately in the form of women wanting to share my bed in a platonic manner. Quite peculiar it is. On the one hand, i guess it's nice and could be quite cozy. On the other hand it's like a cruel test of will being handed down by a laughing god. i picture him there like the wizard of oz giggling behind the curtain...tehehe! "well, ok, let's go to sleep, golly gee". Not that everything needs to be about sex but in my world girl+boy+bed usually equals...well you get the point. I guess they're not reading Henry Miller like me at the moment. Life is a barrel of absurdities, you just have to laugh.

 I will be seeing some friends that i haven't seen in a long time. I look forward to reconnecting with them and catching up.