Music on Monday: A Man Not Playing No Rock and Roll.

Mississippi Fred McDowell. He did not play no rock and roll, but he can still put you into a trance.

Rust Never Sleeps #9: 177

'177' - Oil on canvas, 18" x 24".

A Number of Numbers.

 Three out of the five new Price of Fish paintings completed, apart from a few highlights here and there. With luck, a couple of these will be on show soon in a new gallery opening up in Dunbar.


Better photos to follow when they're completely complete.

"Is This A... What Day Is This?"

Inaugurating the first 'Music on Tuesday' blog post.

Right, carry on.

Dog

We've booked a stall at the National Sheep Dog Trials in Jeburgh in August so I'm working on some original scraperboard drawings from which I can make prints. Perhaps I'm doing the sheepdog people a disservice, but I imagine that they'll go for a more traditional approach and won't be interested so much in cubist collies.

Sketching

Doodling some ideas for a forthcoming comic strip project. Mutant baobabs, gnarled cactus trees and a futuristic solar powered scooter.

Rich Johnson: Fully Obsequious

Looking for reviews of your own work is only a minor step up from Googling your own name, but I came across a Polish review of New British Comics #3. I think, given the context, this section is about me:

Nie uchybiając pozostałym uczestnikom tej inicjatywy na „prowadzenie” zdają się wysuwać przekonujące rysunki Matthew Craiga, chwilami przywołujące skojarzenia z wczesnymi karykaturami Simona Bisleya (choć akurat w tym przypadku mocno „ugrzecznionymi”).

Online translation renders this as,

"Without prejudice to other participants in this initiative, the "establishment" seem to pull out a convincing drawings of Matthew Craig, sometimes mentioning association with early caricatures of Simon Bisley (although just in this case fully obsequious)."

This is either very good, or very bad. Whichever, I'm going to start putting "fully obsequious" on my business cards.

Music on Monday: Like Wrestling With a Live Piano.

Right, the accordion, then.



That's what I thought, anyway, but two things lately have started to change my opinion a bit. Firstly, the splendid Inge Thomson played with Karine Polwart at a live gig and then yesterday afternoon at a barbecue in the rain we met Andrew Waite.

I had a very odd feeling I knew him from somewhere, soon as they mentioned the accordion, and it turns out he's a Young Traditional Musician Finalist. He sat with his accordion in the lee of the house to keep it out of the rain and knocked out a couple of tunes. The young feller is dazzling, and in his honour I have learned for this blog post to spell accordion properly.

Click on the picture and be dazzled.

Rust Never Sleeps 8: H2 Blue.

May have been a bit previous in posting this because I've not quite finished the rope in the corner, but it's close enough for jazz.

And another one blocked out very roughly. Very excited about this one, it's going to be a beauty I think.