#173
Artist: Alexander “Skip” Spence
Album: Oar
Year: 1969
Length: 44:38
Genre: Rock / Folk / Psychedelic Rock
“Weighted down by possessions
Weighted down by the gun
Waited down by the river for you to comeA best friend to your ear of true said I was guilty of sin
Said my being gone was the best thing for you
But the truth, it all comes through for me and my kin
It wasn’t the best thing for me but was the best for him”
A letter from the brink of mental collapse:
Dear diary,
Today is three or four weeks into self-isolation. Things can go better but they can’t too. Another day in and up from bed, sun sometimes pours in other times it’s cloud and fog. What to do today? Same as everyday? Wallow, think of things, productivity very low. So low. hard to stay up and about when your mind is a mush. Mushy, gooey potato salad, scrambled eggs in the old noggin, skull smoothie. Yummy milk shake that brings all the boys to the yard.
Another day passed by in a haze the other day, wasn’t sure what day it really was. Kind of scared to go outside, rarely step outside anymore and when I do it’s high intensity, panic levels up to 11. Danger seems to be everywhere the more I stay in, the worse outside seems to get. What is it all? What is the world now? Who knows? Do I? Not at all. Will things get better? One can hope, but what is hope in a time like this? Is it really there? Yes… No? Bah, sheep bleat.
Is it possible that as the days go by, the more I don’t feel like myself anymore? Whoever I was before all this, is not who i am now. Will i get back to that old me once all this is done or will i be stuck in this state forever now? Big questions with no answers, only time will tell. Time, so much time now to do anything we want, but nothing to do. How do you fill time when you have so much of it but nothing to do? I could practice skills, learn new things, write that thing I’ve always wanted to write. But to what purpose? Whodawhattawhenawherea?
Well good thing I had my good old friend Alexander “Skip” Spence by my side. A man who understands, a man who knows how it feels. Poor guy, his career never could seem to get started. First he’s int he highly underrated and underappreciated band Moby Grape, then makes one solo album that completely bombs due to Columbia Records not wanting to promote it. A man meant to live in retrospective and never in the moment. Shame, shame, I know your name Skip and so should everyone. Talent like this doesn’t come around much but at least you live in infamy years later.
Here’s a man on the total brink of mental collapse, an album considered the incoherent ramblings of someone who admitted to the hospital after a delusional attack on his old bandmates, trying to kill them with a fire axe he did. Spending tons of time in the hospital, writing a way, creating something that is both beautiful and haunting at the same time. Reminiscent of Leonard Cohen’s style, what sets this apart though is the underlying sense that the singer has a completely fractured mind. This isn’t poetry but a lens into a completely broken mind on the verge of imploding in on itself. It not only adds a new layer tot he music but brings it up to a new height. It’s kind of scary what you hear but oddly kind of nice as well. Mixing in eccentricities of his fragile mind to normal (normal?) songs, creating an odd yet enjoyable experience for all.
Poor Skip. His legacy lives on but at what cost? his mind? Is art really that of the broken? To create true art, do you really need to suffer? One must suffer for their art, right? But to what extent? Can we really enjoy that of the pained? Yes. Yes we can. I think so… I think so…
Favourite Song: Grey/Afro
-Bosco
Bosco's Modern Life 