Not everybody makes it. Life's a long road. I remember an imagined vision I had once. A long time ago. Drinking beer with a friend in a bar on Richmond Hill when I was in my early twenties, .I probably shouldn't have been drinking. I was on medication.In my mind's eye as the alcohol began to kick in, I saw a couple of hot air balloons rising across dark heavens and I thought to myself 'life is not short' as you're constantly told. Life can actually be a long and incredible and mysterious journey.
Listen to Sun Kil Moon's latest album All The Artists for further evidence of life being a strange road..Or hot air balloon trip if you prefer. Sun Kil Moon is the alter ego of Mark Kozelek. Kozelek started out in the Nineties with Red Hill Painters who put out a number of completely remarkable but slightly medicated sounding records that might appeal to medication inclined consumers..
Over thirty years the man has put out any number of beautiful, luminous but evidently slightly depressed and potentially depressing records.,If anything with the years he seems to go further and further into psycholgical decline. Though not artistically I'd say. Listen to All The Artists thirty years almost on now. Be warned Kozelek hasn't cheered up much, even though his records are still very much worth immersing yourself in,
Kozelek can be a problematic and irrascible figure. I'm not entirely sure if he's cancelled, He's certainly had some rocky times of late. Numerous charges of sexual misconduct and unwanted advances of a sexual nature to a number of parties. Stripping naked in a hotel room with an unconsenting woman. Violent verbal abuse of other artists. Notably War on Drugs. .An aggressive and increasingly litigious attitude to accusations about his behaviour. Mark, Mark. That's what Donald Trump does. It's not pretty whichever way you look at it. Whether this makes you reluctant to listen to his work anymore is an open question. He's clearly troubled and troubling. The problem (if that's a problem), is that I still think he's very good. As are his records.
I've listened to All The Artists over the last few days. It doesn't have tunes so much as stream of consciousness monologues. It lacks the beauty of Kozelek's Red House Painters records but does emit a powerful claustrophobic atmosphere that's still impressive. I suspect it would be getting a lot more attention than it is if Kozelek hadn't backed his own career into a siding of his own making of late and made media uncomfortable about giving him any more coverage than they need to. This is a really intense record of narratives and depressed literate thought. If that's what you're after. It's not easy listening..
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