But is it Art Hmmmmmm

The other night (days blur at the moment) I attended with friends a production of Oscar Wildes Salome. It was being billed (verbally) as directed by Nick Cave. Hmmmmm

It was performed in the dirt yard (no one in their right mind could call it a garden) of a Pimlico squat.
The performance was billed to start at 8.00 prompt. We sat uncomfortably drinking cheap box wine from styrofoam cups (oh how eco friendly these grubby inheritors of the world are) and waited; at first giggling at the circus unfolding and the couples trying to stick tongues down others throats (I can only assume there were tasty morsels down there, yum yum), then with impatience and finally no patience we left.

I cannot review the performance... It didn't happen. I can only cringe at the memory of the scuzziest place I've ever been. My intrepid assistant(with the courage of a young Martha Gelhorn) entered the lavatory in order to photograph it.

Photo. Daisy Caren Vispi

The guide to the British Museum on the lavatory floor disabused me of the notion that there was no culture here... Sadly they were wiping their arses on it.

Nick Cave... Oh deary me.

Dylan, Scott Fitzgerald and Carribou coffee

Babs skypes from A coffee shop in St. Paul Michegan, she is on the run from Rusty and hanging out there before moving on. Over a carribou coffee she tells me that she is on Wabashaw; a street imortalised by Dylan in the song 'Meet me in the morning' which goes meet me in the morning 56th and Wabashaw, honey we could be in Kansas by the time the snow begins to thaw.

There is no 56th street in St Paul.

F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote 'This side of paradise' sitting in a house on Grand Avenue; Babs tells me that as well.

Babs teaches me a lot.

Tangled up in blue

A shop window stopped me in my tracks last night. Or rather something in the window stopped me; it was a blue velvet Playboy bunny girls costume.

A costume iddentical to the one that Babs had worn for a few weeks while working at the Playboy club in Chicago back in the sixties. I had caught sight of Babs as she bent to tie the shoelace of a young folk singer who I could quite plainly see would be soon tangled up in blue, the scut on her arse sending alarm signals as it bobbed in the neon glow. I ducked behind a pillar as she leant into him to pick a piece of lint from his coat then left when she was out of sight.

I stood at that shop window transfixed as the Blue velvet spoke through the glass.

It said: I first came to consciousness in 1962 as a girl called Gillian slipped into me and then twirled for Hugh, then giggled nervously as he adjusted the gusset and smoothed the knap on her breasts and her arse.

A string of men begged her to slip out of the club and then out of her costume and then post-coitally out of their lives. Until the last one (to my knowledge anyway) took me as a memento, a trophy.

I hung on his wall until he handed me on to a new girlfriend who kept me for many years in the dark with occasional outings to be slipped into and out of prior to her being slipped into and out of.

Over the years I developed my patina of cynicism.

that woman handed me on to her son who handed me onto his girlfriend who has slipped into me from time to time and now hangs me in this window, in all my faded glory for all the world to see.

I can see her face on the inside of my hands

The Doorman

There is a club I visit called 'The doorman'; I cannot tell you where it is because it is oversubscribed already, but it exists.

When you arrive at the club you are greeted by the doorman who says: 'I cannot talk now but if you go into the waiting room , have a drink and a dance, chill for a while.

I will spare you a minute when you leave'.

Art and its profound affect on rock & roll

Back in the sixties I put on a show in swinging London that almost became the talk of the town.

however a few minor celebrities turned up, especially from the music world.

Yoko Ono came along a few times and took notes

one of my pieces in the show was a ladder standing in the corner of an empty white space, painted on the ceiling above the ladder and unreadable without climbing that ladder, were two words; 'FUCK OFF'.

Gary, a pop star of sorts climbed that ladder and read those two words then having climbed back down left the gallery in silence.

Years later I met Gary again, in more troubled times for both of us.

He said. 'Jan if only it had said YES on that ceiling I would never have left the Glitter Band and gone off to interfere with children in Thailand.

Picadilly urinals

A well balanced diet

SSSSHHHHH!!! YOU'RE IN A LIBRARY

I saw the sign and had to go in.

Mick Jones' Rock & Roll public library at Portobello green. It is there until the 23rd of August. GO.

It is not only Mick's personal archive on view it is also a walk through ones own life; the ephemera that I failed to keep is all there to be pondered over and celebrated. It is like finding something long lost and long cherished in a forgotten cupboard.

there is none of the pretentiousness of say Sophie Calles birthday presents installations. It is to me a celebration of 'My Generation'. How many librararies would allow mick and others to play Sex Pistols songs in a rehearsal room on view to the public.

how i became a coppers nark.

True story but I cannot name names or venue or city even.

I met tonight a very beautiful woman, a talented woman, an intelligent woman, fortunately i am still suffering from the after affects of the bromide slipped into my night caps by nurse Caz so was able to listen to her story.

At some stage she informed me that she was a police officer and flashed her badge.

I gave in, admitted everything, took the blame for crimes I had never committed, pleaded to be handcuffed and interviewed at legnth. I longed to help her with her enquiries on condition that there was no question of bail and that I would be kept in captivity for ever.

I went home to a warm fish and chips supper.

Caught bang to rights.

Only in London

the Muse and memories

Sitting at the Muse at 269 on Portobello road with a coffee and looking back over all those years and remembering fondly the muses who have slipped into and out of my life; Mona Hebuterne, the ballerina, Babs, Lula mae, nurse Caz.

It dawns on me that 'Muse' is a collective noun now; they are all still with me, goading me, bullying me, kissing my metaphorical neck and laughing with me each time I clean my teeth.

The Muse at 269 is a gallery/restaurant that puts on some interesting stuff. It is also the place that rusty, fluente, tristan and I hang out at and shoot the breeze over a coffee and a beer. Check it out

http://www.themuseat269.com/

Rusty tears and kitten heeled cowboys

Walking on Portobello Road this morning I spotted Rusty weeping on the pavement outside a shoe store.

'Rusty' I said, 'pull yourself together man and tell me the problem.'

'come' he said and taking me by the arm led me inside. at the back of the store on a shelf was a pair of antique cowboy boots with kitten heels.

'Them's the identical boots to the pair that Lula mae always wore when baking pear pie' he wailed.

I left him there weeping under the suspicious gaze of the stores foxy owner. 'There's a man who is going to get stung'. I said to no-one in particular.

it's a lovely store full of vintage shoes boots and clothing. I bought a pair of boots there back in the days when nurse Caz was pushing my wheelchair.

282 Portobello, notting hill, London.