Smiley move

Finished. That was two days of very hard work.

My friends from today are a tiny bit older than I am, but plugged into similar worlds. They are an artist and a musician as primary, and like me they have learnt to follow opportunity to broaden and function wide. One of their good friends is a man I have admired for years. He made my young adulthood better. He was a focus for a lot of my unstructured feelings about how the established way made no sense. He was, essentially, the beating heart of the rave generation. He’s very much just their mate. I’ve met him through them before. Today I’ve been carrying his art.

I frequently walk with famous people. I am rarely if ever starstruck as I understand the construct and lots of my friends are now tarred with the brush. This guy gets my admiration though. I was given a mug of his a while ago and I love it. They have one of his smiley faces on their wall. I carried it upstairs today. I love it for the mischief of how it came about. I know too much about it and him. He burnt a million quid. Pretty much the most effective and nihilistic protest you could imagine. I cannot do anything but respect it, for the sheer anger it raises in all the people that don’t figure how it is the same for all the pop stars they liked of that era but for the fact it was done with fire on Jura instead of gradually up the nose and via parasite investments and corrupt producers over time.

It’s a simple thing really, a bin lid customised with tons of glitter. I have tried in the past to explain to Brian the extent to which rave was everything for my teenage generation, but it is hard. It always starts to sound like indulgence, whereas it was a safety valve. We had been compressed and compressed by endless Tories closing off all the options. We exploded with the joyful discovery of MDMA. Most of us didn’t need the actual substance, we just moved with the shape of the freedom. Yeah, fine, Es are good etc. And they were. But it was about breaking free. And this guy was a bit older than we were and ringing the bell. Nothing he did was selfish. He didn’t court celebrity. He can likely still go on the tube, unlike other less successful artists from that scene. Rave was about much more than E.

My friends are moved into their new temporary place. We sat and drank incredibly good wine and then ate tasty Indian food. It is done for now. Their old landlady is a total fucker. I’m glad I could help them move. Its a temporary move they’ve done. Hopefully they’ll find something soon…