Painterly Process

graphite & putty eraser/20x30cm
original source: 'The Times' 20/10/08

This drawing being processed from a newspaper reproduction of an unfinished portrait of Francis Bacon by Lucian Freud, stylistically belonging to the painter's mid period, when his brushstrokes had loosened up & the paint displayed a seductive liquid quality, given a luminosity akin to that of typical Pre-Raphaelitism or Impressionism through the use of a white ground, before the typically mature style with its clogged, clotted, crusty, profoundly corporeal quality. The subtle colour harmonies of the original are wonderful to behold, even in cheap reproduction on newsprint, demanding of great care in the attempt at tonal transcription.

Life Imitating Art...

"Watch a single leaf fall drunkenly to the ground
And you still got some shopping left to do"
Lambchop 'Uti'

Experienced something of a Kurt Wagner moment in town today, on the way to the 'li-berry' before braving the shops - it occurred just so, a leaf spinning slowly to a stop at my feet!

Soundtrack:


Cabaret Voltaire 'The Living Legends'
Nick Drake 'Five Leaves Left' & 'Bryter Layter'

In something of a bizarre coincidence, I contrived to hear Cabaret Voltaire's still-fresh-fabulous-&-remarkable-after-all-these-years proto-techno-punk stomper 'Nag Nag Nag' not once but twice in the same evening, it featuring not only on the 'Living Legends' CD but also later on the soundtrack of the film 'Me Without You': the band's influence on subsequent generations of musicians & electronic experimentalists still endures, the echoes being heard as vividly as ever, in any number of instances, especially those employing samples of 'found' voices, & otherwise an affected, self-consciously 'retro' aesthetic.
'The Living Legends', being a selection of EP & single tracks, is an excellent & recommended primer.

It also occurred that 'Five Leaves Left' might well be, considering its sonic aesthetic, the most autumnal album it's possible to imagine, so perfectly realised & evocative is its ambience, the atmosphere of wistful nostalgia permeating every note & even the spaces between, even allowing for the associations inevitably conjured when listening to Nick Drake.
Like the sound of the clocks going back...forever.

Remembering John Peel


On the 4th anniversary of the passing of the great John Peel, to whose guiding light the Opposite of Tomato owes an incalculable musical & wider cultural debt (I mean, where else would it have been possible to be exposed to the sonically-experimental delights of Cabaret Voltaire, for instance, back in the late 70s?), it seemed appropriate to devote at least the time for a listen to 'Uh Huh Her', the last album of PJ Harvey's that The Man would have had the opportunity to hear before his untimely death (see the wonderful, poignant photos on front & back of PJH's 'Sessions' CD for an indication of the fond mutual regard they obviously held).
Thanks, John - the melodies linger.