Trish's Obscure Eighties Playlist

Trish, you should know you started me on a tangent with your post on the facebook:

Then Ted tagged me in his response:

You're not kidding, Ted. Translator was totally amazing that night. But I love the album just as well. In fact I still have Nothing Is Saving Me on my iPod. So let's begin our playlist with that...


Trish, I hope these are obscure enough for you. Click to hear and enjoy!




1. Translator • "Nothing Is Saving Me"

2. Suburban Lawns • "Janitor"

3. The Producers • "I Love Lucy"

4. Billy Clone & The Same • "She's So Primative"

5. The Primatives • "Sick of It"

6. David Sylvian • "The Ink in the Well"

7. B-People • "23 Can Can't"

8. The Photos • "I'm So Attractive"

9. Gang of Four • "We Live as We Dream, Alone"

10. Adrien Belew • "Swingline"

11. Tones On Tail • "Christian Says"

12. Everything but the Girl • "Crabwalk"

13. Choir Invisible • "Playing Cards"

14. The Vapors • "Waiting for the Weekend"

15. The Hitmen • "Bates Motel"

16. The Motels • "Cry Baby"

17. The Plugz • "Achin'"

18. Prefab Sprout • "I Never Play Basketball Now"

19. Ultravox • "New Europeans"

20. X • "Blue Spark"

21. Advertising • "A.R.T. - Art"

22. The Proof • "It's Safe"

23. The Housemartins • "I Can't Put My Finger On It"

24. The Unknowns • "Tax Deductable"

25. Josie Cotton • "Johnny, Are You Queer?"

26. The Colourfield • "Hammond Song"

27. The Rezillos • "It Gets Me"

28. Polyrock • "Body Me"

29. Holly & the Italians • "Rock Against Romance"

30. Magazine • "Model Worker"

31. Shellyan Orphan • "Burst"

23 Worldwide Poster No.1 2013

Eight Piece Drawing 1989/2012

A Drawing I Did Once 1990

Hands of Protection 1987

While deep in my 23 obsession, I had read in the Principia Discordia that the Erisians had adopted the Winston Churchill V-for-Victory sign as their own twenty-three hand-signal (two fingers up and three fingers down). Later, of course, that got co-opted by the hippies as a peace sign. Well, I wanted my own 23 signal free from any association to peace or victory so I closed the fingers or, as often, crossed them in the hope of creating something unique and still recognizable.

This image, by the way, was made on the old Sugar Turbine - the copier that Ed rescued, I repaired and we all used to print the 23 Press books.

Clinging Vines 1988

These are from Berlin as well.

Dept. 23 2008

The Photostatic Twentythree 1987

See, before we all had computers, people had to do their graphic design with prestype and photocopiers, drawing with scissors and scotch tape. Or at least I did. Ed found a copier once in someone's trash and called me. We took it to a service shop to see if we could get it going again. My sister, Harriet, staked me the two-hundred-and-some-odd dollars it took to fix the drum and replace the corona wire and in a week I had a photocopier of my own which, in that day, was a very big deal. Someone dubbed it the Sugar Turbine and I got to work printing books for the Twentythree Press (yes - no hyphen) and whatever else I wanted. Happy times.

Für Elise 1993

I met a girl right after moving to San Francisco, a girl named Elise with whom I fell tragically, unrequitedly in love. I made this for her, just before I let my heart get broken, as a Christmas gift and it became the first of the many object collage works that followed. Für Elise is now part of the collection of Ms. Tammy Derrigan of St. Louis and consists of an antique photograph, a cherry stem tied in a knot by the tongue of the object of my misplaced affection, nails pulled from the back of a very old frame, Prestype on antique paper reading, "In Other Words", one birth-control pill marked with the number 23, a bit of rice paper, a nail upon which hang two locks of hair (Elise's and mine) molded with hair gel into interlocking rings and a small piece of paper with a date on it - the date I met Elise.

23 No.1 1989

Wish I could describe just how and why I'm so drawn to the number 23 and one day I'll try. For now, here's a page from the Sentimental Sourcebook which I made as a personal reference to take with me to Budapest back in the Gasoline Days of 1989.

Pocket Sketchbook No.13 1987/2008

zero hour sex robot political gain nerd search ladies night action adventure maiden voyage love potion

My Favorite Things No.4 2008

Tanks 1999

I don't remember too much about these except to say that I saw something I thought was interesting off the side of the highway in St. Charles, MO and I pulled over and shot some pictures of it.

Detritus 1996

I made this when I was in San Francisco during that short time I was married to Jeanne McKee, in that posh apartment by SFMOMA. It showed a few times in St. Louis, most notably at Mad Art for a found objects show where it caught the eye of Tracy Varley. Turned out it was her birthday, so I gave it to her. If you ever wanted to see it, I guess you'd find it at her home in Chicago.

The 23's of Nogales

Check it out: My old buddy, Ted, who is currently a resident of Nogales, Mexico,

sent me some twenty-threes today, and with this note attached...

"For some reason on this one street today they had the numbers 1 to 60
painted on the curb on every block. New block, the count starts up again
from 1. Damnedest thing I ever saw."

Thanks, Ted!

Road Warning 2010

Fifteen More Portrait Treatments 2010

As you see, I've been going crazy with these things again. Can't really help myself. They're just too fun to do and they come so easily and yield such nice surprises for me as I go. So this is what I've been doing to just relax over the past few days.

Over at the Gustave Archive, I'm calling them The Willow Gray Portraits because most all of the collage material I'm using here is coming from Willow Gray's Image Farm (at her facebook page). Not sure if I'm supposed to feel weird about that or anything but, fact is, she seems to like a lot of the same stuff I like and much of the fun of making these collage images is in trawling her great collection and pulling images that especially appeal and that I think I might use. So I'm going to call this dubious application of her fabulous pictures a tribute her excellent taste. Thank you, Willow.

As with any series, I start by setting limitations for myself - of scale, of content, of pallet, materials... what have you. This time I've arbitrarily elected to make my subject matter always portraits of women. This was almost sort of happening with the Character Compositions but with this new endeavor, I've chosen a more strict and narrow route and, while unconciously going about my process, I've been sort of wondering just why. Honestly, attractive subjects kind of tend to make more attractive pictures. Not as a rule, mind you... but it's definitely something I've noticed while plying my trade as a photographer the past ten or so years. I've often made what I think are a lot of really pretty images of subjects who are (how to put this delicately...) possibly not widely considered pretty or handsome or whatever. I put these images in front of people and enthuse about the light and the moment but, in so many cases, if they're not looking at a pretty subject, they're not seeing a pretty picture. Odd, right? So this time, I'm starting out with only pretty faces for my central subjects. I'm not gonna cripple myself at the gate. Not this time around. There's opportunity enough for that down the line (you'll notice I have no problem messing up a pretty face for the sake of the mood or the vibe).

Or maybe I'm just trying to be this century's Patrick Nagle.

There're worse things, I guess.