On - Big Rain

I'm no Shelley, Keats or Byron,
No Hughes or Cooper-Clarke.
Just a speck on a spectrum.
The boy with the cardboard heart.
So I'll do this my way,
Be my own beacon in the dark.

Unstable as Uranium,
Gonna crack your cranium,
Put a short circuit in your brainium.
'Cos I'm firing on all cylinders.
Inspirin', it's tirin' and my busy fingers are dyin'
And I'm sick of fucking tryin'.

Collecting the uncollectable,
Forgetting the unforgettable,
Repeating the unrepeatable.
Every statement of status a state of explicit complicity
That believes in itself so seriously.

And the rain falls like suffering,
And suffering is truth
And it's a big, big rain
On a small, small town.
It's a big, big rain
On a small, small town.

You came like a crack in the ice.
Not who you said you were.
You wore a mask of integrity.
Your painted eyes, bitter lies,
Tattooed on your inner thighs.

You needed my dreams manifest,
The better to beat me with.
Pierced in the heart so your
Golden thread could drag me around,
Lead the parade, show me off.
Your broken prize from the merry-go-round.

You burned your brand on my arse.
Another tattooed barcode,
Kissing up to this paranoid farce.

And the rain falls like suffering,
And suffering is truth
And it's a big, big rain
On a small, small town.
It's a big, big rain
On a small, small town.

They say walking is the fine art
Of falling without crashing.
Well I started late 
And stumbled every step of the way.
But I threw myself wilfully,
Into the abyss of obscurity,
Laughing and screaming like a madman,
At the on-coming rush of anonimity.

And if every landscape is a condition of the soul,
Then I am a man of mountainous shadows,
Great, dark forests shrouded in the depths
Of Winter clouds.

Where the rain falls like suffering,
And suffering is truth
And it's a big, big rain
On a small, small town.
It's a big, big rain
On a small, small town.

____________________________

Another piece written entire by recital on my cycle commute to work each morning over several weeks in 2021?-2022? I like to ride along and recite out loud because it gives me a much better, clearer understanding of the "feel" of the words. I also find it easier than trying to just 'think' them in my head. Hearing the lines out loud in the open, somehow is just easier for me to remember them. Yeah, I know... I only actually wrote them down and editted them later, once they were more or less 'completed' by recital.

On - Simple Pleasures and Farlington Marshes

Simple Pleasures
Simple Pleasures like
A spliff and a can of Red Bull,
And walking the dog on Castle Field
Chasing gulls and crows for shits and giggles.

Clarence Pier keeping dry.
Abandoned buildings,
Dodging security and getting up high
With a bag of fat caps, burners and paint.
Tagging walls and comedy cocks.

Simple Pleasures
Simple Pleasures like
Dan's all-night parties,
Minesweeping shots,
K's and tequila, Jager bombs.

Off our tits, chased by cops.
Chatting up girls in Guildhall Square
- Getting nowhere....
Late for work, no surprise.
Hanging like a bastard - telling lies.
    (Ad Lib - "Some bullshit excuse")

Simple Pleasures
Simple Pleasures like
A can of Stella and a stolen bike,
Sitting in the sun having fun with the passers-by.
Try and blag a dollar for a Ginsters pie.

Back round to Dan's, he's got some weed
That helps the day go by.
Cheap Prosseco and a E for tea,
I'll tell you why - none of your business,
But I'll tell you why.

Simple Pleasures
Simple Pleasures like
Watching the sunrise over Farlington Marshes
With a spliff and a bottle of JD.

Lay back in the long grass
And listen to the birds sing,
As the dawn breaks.

Lay back in the long grass
And watch as the stars fade
And the sky turns from dark to light,
From pink to blue,

And the tide rolls in,
Bringing back memories of you.

And the tide rolls in,
Bringing back memories of you.

And the tide rolls in,
Bringing back memories of you.

_______________________________

Subject of the piece I painted for the Look Up Portsmouth paint festival in 2023. Written over a few weeks in 2021/2022 (?) on my cycle commute to work. I had the 'Can of Stella and a. stolen bike' line from seeing a bloke riding a bike the other way carrying a quite large flat-screen tv under his arm at half six one morning...

The process for writing this was reciting the line out loud to myself, repeatedly, and adding lines to it. There's something about speaking the lines out loud that embeds them more easily than trying to remember them for long enough to get to work and write them down. The metre was developed from the rhythm of the first line I came up with. The timbre of the last lines, 'Bringing back memories of you' is intended to be bitter sweet. Memories that just won't fade... 

On - Process

Having watched me working almost my entire life, I deeply love 'Process'. Whether it's printmaking, letterpress, typesetting, film/darkroom photography, bike maintenance, diy, making books, music, recording or playing an instrument. A significant proportion of the time the process is far, far, faaarrr more compelling and enjoyable than the outcome. The outcomes, are obviously important. But more often than not, are secondary to the process - if we're talking about 'What are you even doing that for?' I love wrestling with processes. I love mixing up and blending processes. I love knowing just enough about a process to be able to make it mostly work - and then working out the rest by investigation and experimentation. I love not really knowing every little detail of a process or how it will affect the outcome, but doing it anyway. There are things I Can do 'properly' (I used to teach them!) - but I just don't -why do I need to? Where's the fun in that? 

There's an old Monty Python skit about learning to play the flute that goes "You blow in one end and move your fingers up and down the outside". And that's it. That's really all you need to know.

There are pedantic people who get really deeply upset about other people "not doing it right/properly" - Like, properly offended. As if you've been rude about their mother by ignoring some intricate detail of the process be it whatever. Hm. Some things are important - others, just ain't. And here's a thing - my aesthetic is very definitely linked with my identity - probably in a more significant way than you would imagine on the surface.

It's all about the process. It is a Natural Sensibility too. By which I mean something key within the evolution of consciousness - as the brain of an animal gets better at processing (*not necessarily 'bigger'), evidently the functionality of the senses expands, awareness and 'imagination' seem to grow. One of my biggest questions about being a living H. Sapien is "Where does this fundamental urge to "make stuff" come from? What part of the brain, and how does it work?" (Right down to the level of Quantum Mechanics of synapses and the structures of neuro-proteins needed to make this shit work, right? - I have questions Prof. Jim Al-Khalili - local Southsea resident.....) (Next time I see you in Waitrose mate....)

We're unquestionably not alone in this. There are fish, birds, mammals, that build elaborate, temperature controlled, aesthetically attractive, highly camouflaged, secure nests - and decorate them, to the level of removing unwanted detritus - prospective mates judging what's good or 'better'. Rivals eyeing up their handiwork and nicking all the best ideas... Many, many animals build protective shelters for sleeping, breeding, raising young, storing food... There are insects that create sophisticated well-organised, socially structured, environmentally controlled earth mounds... 

What was the evolutionary trigger? What practical, evolutionarily advantageous function does an aesthetic creative ability, the ability to imagine an artifact, a state, a sound serve. But then also, the ability to work out a process by which that animal (*includes us - H Sapiens, monkey-boy) can identify and gather suitable materials, not just for the artifact, but for the tools and the method to make it. And to have a clear enough understanding of that process to be able to pass that knowledge on to others. 

I've tried to have this conversation with many people over the years, mostly hitting a wall where they cannot understand that we are just one of the other animal species filling an evolutionary niche. (We are just another one of the animals folks.) And the algae and bacteria waaay outnumber us. And that's just on this planet......

And yet... For sure, we've carved ourselves a pretty big niche. The iPhone is just the latest iteration/extension of this same functional process. The application of the conscious ability to imagine a thing and to work out how to make it. We have iPhones, cars, health care systems, multiple cures for multiple cancers... We have so much good shit going on. And it's very very easy to get distracted and forget that in the current geo-political climate. But we need to remind ourselves, and to remember, that we also have the inate ability to create some truly wonderful things.

We are H. Sapiens and we are the last of our kind.

On - The Walls Of Your Cage

This is not a state that
Gives a fuck about its people
They'll arrest you for the slogan on your shirt

Where is the integrity
The honesty of purpose
When Fascist legislation bears your name?

Naivety weakens
And threatens your authority
Your childish angry outburst set in law

Is a vain attempt to legislate
Against emotional responses
Against people feeling vulnerable and threatened

Well you're making an assumption
'Cos your ego leads your judgement
Like your opinion is the only form of Truth

And you believe your actions
Speak louder than your words but
Empty words and hollow gestures weigh the same

And there's a bigger picture
You're unpicking thread by thread
A tapestry of Natural Time and process

Where the voice of opposition
Is the catalyst of Progress
And incremental Evolution is the way

But every point of view is valid
Even though it's not correct
And something else is better written here

'Cos Democracy is beautiful
Like mathematical equations
Tho' beauty's rarely pretty, never pure

And there's an inner rage
That's dying to engage
And bring a revolution to the stage

And when the revelation hits ya...

Don't be afraid
It's just a picture on a page
And the surface of the image is your cage

Don't be afraid
It's just a picture on a page
And the surface of the image is your cage

Don't be afraid
It's just a picture on a page
And the surface of the image is your cage

Don't be afraid
It's just a picture on a page
And the surface of the image is your cage

Well it's Fear As Entertainment
And it's Fear As Entertainment
They love your Fear As Entertainment
They want your Fear As Entertainment

But I guess I never had that kind of Intelligence
I guess I never had that kind of Intelligence
I guess I never had that kind of Intelligence
Well I just never had that kind of Intelligence
_______________________________

There is an instrumental track for this piece on Bandcamp…

One of the characteristics of corrupted corporate consumerism is its ability to commodify the emotional voice of the opposition and to sell it back to its 'believers' so that they feel they have a 'voice'. Bought and paid for. (**Just because you paid for it, don't mean you 'own' it...)

It takes courage, strength and determination to stand outside of that circus. First you must gain distance from it. When you have distance between you and it, turn around and squint to see the bigger picture. 

On - Being Idealistic And Pretentious

Before Eno, there was John Cage.

And in 1993 a couple of things happened. Exact Change brought out a new edition of 'Composition In Retrospect', and I started Uni at Portsmouth. 

'Composition In Retrospect' is a fabulous tour of John Cage's ideas and methodology. The book is written as a series of poems based on mesostics, but the key part for me was the introduction to the second section, 'Themes And Variations', where Cage lists one hundred and ten ideas laid out in some of his other books - 'Silence'; 'M'; 'Empty Words'; 'A Year From Monday'; and 'Virgil Thomson'. 

These hundred and ten ideas were the spark that set my motor running. Not just the ideas, but the format. The simple, minimalist lay out, with no explication. Just let them stand on their own merits and explain themselves for themselves - and if they don't, or require some unpacking, then that is work for the reader to do. I love that. So I began to formulate a bank of such ideas for myself. 

Many of these stock statements I've come back to repeatedly. Some have bubbled up to the top, burst and sunk or evaporated, others have solidified into foundation strata that underpin parts of my output over the years. The rest make up the mountains, rivers, flora andd fauna of 'Dave World'. The landscape that I live in is largely made up of statements like these - in no particular order then, this is the Los Dave Matrix.
____________________________

Continuity and Change

The surface of the image is your cage

Be the pebble in the flip-flop of consciousness

Liberate our minds by any means necessary

Liberation does not always lead to Liberty

Everything - in moderation

Stand back and squint

Learn to listen

Listen to learn

Talk big; act small

There but by the grace of good fortune, go I

De-commodify the populist conception of 'creativity' in favour of the biological foundation of the urge to decorate 

Simplify, codify, unify

Arrogance and ignorance, or innocence and unsophistication?

Capitalism embraces and legitimises H. Sapiens' natural tendency to corruption

Everything is Not fair game

Some things are important, some things just ain't

All of this will have soon all turned to dust

Other timescales exist

Schemes and dreams, promises, platitudes and propaganda

Anti-propaganda is still propaganda

Conform to your own codes

Repels in a slightly attractive way, attracts in a slightly repulsive way

Live vicariously, live precariously

Choice is a privilege, not a right

One man's freedom is another man's cage

One man's freedom is freedom for all

Freedom by proxy is not freedom at all

The system of lies and hate? It's taught me what truth and honesty are

People come in two flavours; sweet and unsavoury

Even food poisoning has its benefits

Sometimes enlightenment is found in the darkest, furthest corners from the sun

The triumph of the irrational over the implausible

Learn to live

Live to learn

Just 'cos it ain't true, don't mean it's a lie

Not my camels, not my train

It's not just ok to not know, it's ok to admit you don't know

Learn the difference

If you want to know the answer, ask the question

Fewer statements, more questions

This cracked and fissured landscape

As far as possible do no harm

Not all of the days are equal

Truth don't give a shit about your dumbass opinion

Collaborate and compete

Don't be afraid to say no

Not my sax solo, not my jazz

Impossibility of knowing the unthinkable

None of this is important, none of this is permanent

True things are true irrespective of you

There's two kinds of opinions - informed and uninformed

Value is as value does

Buried amid a storm of words

Compliance is conformity

Conformity is complicity

Complicity is corruption

Anger is an energy

Grasses and saplings still stand when the wind has broken many great oaks

Knowing what questions to ask

Not my cherries, not my pie

Caught in the undertow

You are in high speed wobble. Hold on tight and enjoy the ride

All the words in the world won't save you

It all cuts both ways

A spear without a point is just a stick

It is, until it ain't

What's next?

You say the words without digesting their meaning

Think about it. Don't over-think it.

There are more ways to get answers than just asking questions

Why do you need to know? 

Just pick it up and play it

Ritual and circumstance

Identify as, identify with, not indentified by

Rebel and conform

The establishment wins by subsuming the rebellion

Simply shouting down your opponent is not the same as winning the argument

Commodify the spontaneous

It does, until it don't

Minimalism is refinement by distillation, not a hatchet job

Context is everything, except when it ain't

Everything is a commodity

Context is a commodity

Humility and humanity

What matters?

Mindful mindlessness

Last night it did not seem as if today it would be raining

Once there were no borders, no boundaries

The unwavering path crosses the river many times

The alternative is unthinkable

On - Burning Down The Oasis

Easy to assume

Easy to dismiss

Looking for - The Oasis

Searching for - The Oasis

All you can do with insanity

Is infect the rest of humanity

What do you want? 

What do you need?

Thumbing a ride back to reality.

Easy to assume

Easy to dismiss

Show me the way - to The Oasis

Take me down - to The Oasis

All you can do with insanity

Is infect the rest of humanity

Based my whole personality

On a t-shirt I saw in captivity

Easy to assume

Easy to dismiss

Waiting in line - at The Oasis

Fitting in down - at The Oasis

All you can do with insanity

Is infect the rest of humanity

Bones of words learned from kids toys

Janet and John, and a popular song

Easy to assume

Easy to dismiss

Talk to the walls - at The Oasis

Shouted down - at The Oasis

All you can do with insanity

Is infect the rest of humanity

Crowd-fund appeal for a remedy

Gaffer tape, cable ties

Recycled self-help books from the seventies

Easy to assume

Easy to dismiss

Setting fire - to The Oasis

Burning down - The Oasis

All you can do with insanity

Is infect the rest of humanity

Wrestling smoke and shadows

Lipstick, masks and eyeliner

Easy to assume

Easy to dismiss

Toeing the line - at The Oasis

Keeping the peace

Sneaking around

Spiking them up

Strapping 'em down

Freaking out

Climbing the walls

Breaking down - at The Oasis

There's a lock-in - at The Oasis

Sink or swim - at The Oasis

Easy to assume

Easy to dismiss

Setting fire - to The Oasis

Burning down - The Oasis

Setting fire - to The Oasis

Burning down - The Oasis

All you can from the other side of sanity

Is infect the rest of humanity

All that you consume

All that you resist

All aboard - another crisis

All aboard - another crisis

Breaking down - at The Oasis

    *Ad hoc repeat*

Hear the track here -> Burning Down The Oasis by The Vulture Is A Patient Bird

Words by Los Dave; Music and samples by Rusty Sheriff and Matt Chuter
Published by Press Without A Press October 2017

Your well-being is a vanity.

Recovery is the responsibility of the sick.

Mental health is subordinate to dental health. 

This is fearasentertainment. Performed live at Southsea Castle as part of Portsmyth Darkfest in October 2017

Suffocating and culturally undermined by its fear of the consequences of failure,

for decades, our health services have subsisted on a thin gruel of funding, anaemic and starving in a culture of political intransigence and neurosis. 

On - The Next Evolution Of Hominin After SAPIENS

We are Homo Sapiens, and we are the last of our kind.

We might very well be the final iteration of Hominin species.
We are certainly the only surviving species in the genus Homo.
We are most likely the last surviving species in the entire genus.

Which must suggest, surely that as an evolutionary pathway, big brain/bipedalism is not particularly successful. All of the other Hominin species have gone extinct, and now we are extincting ourselves... Arguably, not that good. 

The period with the most hominid species alive at the same time was around 300,000 to 200,000 years ago, when at least nine different human species coexisted, including Homo Sapiens, Homo Neanderthalensis, and Denisovans, among others. The map of human diversity was much more complex than the single species (that's us - Homo Sapiens) that exists today, though the exact number, timescales and overlap of species is still a subject of scientific study and debate. 

What is however, undeniable is that they are all gone.

The most recent period when multiple hominid species coexisted was the Late Pleistocene, around 100,000 to 40,000 years ago, a time when Homo Sapiens, Neanderthals, and Denisovans inhabited parts of Eurasia, with evidence of interbreeding among them - we still carry some of their DNA in our genome today - mmm ancestral DNA... We're all descended from a bunch of monkey-shaggers. - The power of our ancestry lives within us! Yeh, that ain't gonna save you.

Around 50,000 to 67,000 years ago, a few even smaller hominins like the Indonesian Homo Floresiensis and the recently proposed Homo Luzonensis of the Philippines - it's really not very easy to distinguish between what is and what isn't an actual different species - also lived concurrently with other human species. So as recently as 40,000 years ago, there may have been as many as five different hominid species all coexisting concurrently. That's not that long ago, archeologically speaking.

When we finally extinct ourselves, Nature will literally have to go back to the Great Apes, and begin again... Yus!! Planet Of The Apes was real!  Unless we extinct all of them on our way out the door...

Even if we can survive our own self-inflicted socio-pathological implosion, we have absolutely no defence against one really good solid asteroid or solar flare. Zero. None. 

Has all of this happened before? Yup. Many, many, many times long before we got here with our bipedalism and big heads... Maybe not to our entire genus, specifically - yet. But we definitely ain't the first, and we won't be the last full genus to go extinct. Evidence for the prosecution your honour? I give you the dinosaurs m'lud.

Will it happen again? Yup. We are just the latest in a continuing evolutionary process that will go on for another 5 to 10 billion years, and then the sun will torch everything here.

What will replace us in the evolutionary continuum? Dunno. But I bet they look back at us and think "What a dumb bunch of .... !"

Goodbye Earth.
Goodbye Homo.
Thanks for the ride.

Dang, we didn't even make it quarter of the way round the galaxy....

Cheers y'all,

Los Dave