Clouds, silver linings and missing tails...

ttttailypo
Originally uploaded by El Luz Perpetua!

Hello again.












The above are really early sketches for an illustration project I'm trying to get my wisdom teeth into.



1985ish, West Midlands, a primary school teacher decided to scare the snot out of a class one afternoon in "storytime" and read the nervous, jittery children the story of "The Tailypo"



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tailypo



This folkish yarn -about a starving hunter shooting and eating the tail off an innocent, mysterious forrest creature only to have himself ripped to shreds after a night of nightmarish torment- quite possibly washed over the rest of the 6year olds huddled together on the rug, but scared the shit out of one particularly timid, sensitive little soul. That little soul grew up to one day develop a love of folklore and anything macabre and to eventually aspire to re-tell and illustrate this amazingly bleak tale with the intention to put the shivers up a whole new generation.
(I'm well aware that this story has been illustrated before, but it's such a great one -and stuffed full of anti-greed, pro veggie morals)
bracket number 2:
(I'm also well aware that the initial tailypo looks a bit like "the Groke" from the Moomin cartoons. This is intentional as it scares the bejesusses out of Dicky)

God bless the days before bubblewrapping everything! Exposing a class to that kind of story these days would provoke a national outcry and possibly a lynching.






Anyhow on with the life.
Well, that was a glum monthish.
Statistically, January / February 2009 was the worst on record.
Every news item carried the doom and gloom of the recession that until recently was not going to be a recession. Every other news item opened with the line "despite the recession..." and carried with it the joys of some other fecker's wonderful fortune.
January, and especially "blue Monday" as it is apparently known (-it's the first time I've read about blue monday, I swear it's just another device to assure us we're not the only ones having a crap time, a media fabrication if you like, mass manipulation of one and all) saw the highest rates of suicides, break-ups, job-losses, shop / business closures, repossessions and other such miserables on record.

The fickle glimmer of hope raised its head with the swearing in of that Obama chap. Sadly I missed the whole thing in order to join one of the above statistics. Sufficient to say I'm not writing this from beyond the grave (nothing so cool) and I can assure you that my business (whatever it might be) is thriving.
I spent that monumental evening spliting up with my partner of three years- pausing breifly as George.W's helicopter took off- just on the chance that I was about to witness the greatest spectacle ever caught on camera as a single white dove of peace was sucked up into the helicopter's vital parts sending it plummeting back to earth in a majestic fireball. Sadly and predeictably, that didn't happen and everything continued to fall to pieces through the rest of the swearing in ceremony, Eastenders and Casualty. Although in hindsight it was probably Holby City.Three years, out with the recyling, just like that.

Burdened with such a biblical amount of nonsense I was luckily taken in like a mewing stray in oxbloods by Dicky, Ian and Claire and dragged my rucksack back to Kings Heath bringing my life back round in a massive circle. Two steps forward, three steps back.I will be forever greatful for the company that they've all provided me with over the last month. I lugged the basics into the spare room's little sister room as the spare room was full of old band gear, a soundsystem's worth of amplifiers and cabs and a treadmill the size of a landing strip.
My room was full of all of the houses unwanted furnishings and a peculiar smell.
A musk.
The first week was chaotic and I had little time to sort anything out due to the stupid hours I'm doing at work in order to complete my Post-grad. Then, the snows came. A day and a half off work was enough to stop me turning to dust. Cleaning out the room I eventually located the source of the musk; deep under the bed lay a number of pairs of Dick's infamous brogues, all thick in mould and rock'n'roll mucus. It's amazing how this puts everything in perspective, all I really need is bed, clothes, laptop and guitar. I'm going to start flogging everything else.

Then I went out drinking for a couple of weeks.
As usual, The Actress has provided me with a home from home and an awesome array of barflys, characters and a never ending rummy teet.

There's all manner of good stuff aswell. I refuse to let the gloom creep in.
I'm trying to get back into music at any given opportunity. I've been kindly informed that I'm on bass for Mapatazi Bob from now onwards- first show is tomorrow night at The Old Wharf in Digbeth with The Hunchbacks, Murderburgers and The Sedations. It promises to be an evening of pure 1-2-3-4! Ramonic joy!
The High Commissioners on the otherhand are unlikely to play again. I guess we just grew apart.
Big news of the grim opening of 2009 is that we've finally decided to reform The Klopeks.It won't be until later in the year (Unsurprisingly Hallow's Eve) and it won't be the original line-up, or thankfully the crapper line-up either. There will be new stuff to hear aswell as I've never really stopped writing for The Klopeks- that's just how things sound when you crack open my brains and squeeze the juices onto paper and tape. Expect the best Hallow's Eve show you ever shuddered along to.
I'm being quite untruthful and immeasurably arrogant in assuming that the new stuff will be the missing link between The Pogues and Tom Waits, but hell, it's a lovely thought.

Musical highlight of the year so far is without a shadow of a doubt The King Blues big issue benifit show at Barfly a week or so ago.
I really liked under the fog and hoped that this was a band the world would get behind. Lordy, lordy! they did.
This rammed home just how important music can be. Both for the world and for the soul. Nothing lifts or crushes the spirits like music. Those who slid their way to Digbeth in the Arctic conditions were rewarded with the most empowering show in beards. This show introduced me to what have become my two fave songs of the moment and no doubt song that shall forever be synonynous with this time. Download "Let's Hang the landlord" and "Boulder". Elsewhere I have discovered just how many amazing songs Bacharach wrote. I've been on a Dusty Springfeld / Dionne Warwick binge.

Creative wise, The Old foundry street art / comic art project moves forward with the pace of a bullet train. More of that next time I commit to writing this utter twaffle.
Here's to a better month hey?