i am not in spain in spain.

I have spent the last week, finishing the artwork for a limited release of I am not in Spain, which is ironically, being released on a small label {moonpalace records} in Spain. I’m not sure why it has taken so long to finish this project, but much of it was my finally letting go, realizing that it was holding onto me, not the other way around.

Compounded of course by the fact that I spent some time trying to find a label to release it {an effort which I have not stopped yet} and was wishing to have it mastered professionally. On some level, I didn’t want to accept the fact that I was going to have to release another record myself, without a label paying for it. Without distribution. Reviews. Etc. But in the end, I guess what really matters most, is that we made it. That it exists.

I find myself always moving quickly as an artist {perhaps too quickly sometimes…ie: lacking patience} and don’t like it when these things linger as they sometimes do. Perhaps one of the most difficult things with making a record, is that it seems to take so long, I’m always writing new material when I’m only ten percent done with the recording, therefore making it difficult to stay focused on the task at hand. Here I am releasing “I am not in Spain,” with three records begun after that unfinished, and the batch of new, unrecorded songs growing. Such it is with me.

With some distance finally, I find that I am indeed proud of the record, as strange as I find that it is in many ways. As I’m not playing live this winter, I’ve given myself many goals creatively, namely the finishing of four cds which are all incomplete, this having been the first of those projects. Forward movement. I imagine this time next year, that I will likely have a great deal less time than I do now, so “now” becomes the mantra.

Anyway, I finally accepted the fact that I would be releasing these myself, and decided to do something that I thought would be meaningful to both me, and anyone who might buy it. As displayed above, I hand painted covers for the release. Voila. Music about a book with a painting. You can read more about the record here here, and there are a small number left, if you would like to order a copy. On that note, I still have about ten copies of the inexplicable falling left, if anyone wants that either. There. America. Sell things. Buy things. Be happy.

Meanwhile, the fire continues. The bike riding, indoors on a trainer. The walking across frozen lakes, accompanied with a lunging sense of vertigo. The ice creaking at the edges, the whole thing free of footprints. The frozen waterfalls. The endless ice. The white. Until one has felt this lack of sun, one cannot know how glorious it feels to be driving that perfect stretch of road, coming down around the curve, the split-rail fence flitting by, nirvana on the tinny car stereo. The sun, falling before us, as we drive west.

Posted by jeff pitcher at January 29, 2005 09:59 AM

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