Think Tank September 7, 2008

If we stop dreaming now, lord knows we’ll never clear the clouds…

Today, again, was marvellous on account of simplicity. I feel like I’m rediscovering weekends, even if it’s impossible to actually do most of what I want. I still think weekends should be three days: Monday should be replaced with FUNDAY and the work week proper should start on Tuesday, which is appropriate because ever since school, Tuesday has been by and large the most shit day of the week.

I had this feeling I had to listen to Blur. 1992 had been in my head, so I put it on my headphones as I walked on to the train. What an amazing song! Not at all relevant to my life right now but there was a time it was, and as someone told me years ago “Blur is the band that soundtracks your experiences growing up.” They’ve been my favourite band for well over a decade now as a result. I hadn’t meant to listen to Blur all day long, but I just kept listening, kept rediscovering hidden parts of songs I hadn’t fully appreciated before. That’s when you know you love a great band.

I listened to most of 13, Blur and Think Tank along with the associated b-sides. Black Book is a track I couldn’t fully appreciate when I was younger, but what a stunning song. The fact I can still get so excited about a band after so many years and years is something I’ll be eternally thankful for – this band gave me everything, opening my ears to new bands along the way and, eventually, my career.

I was standing on the platform at 145th on my way home, waiting what felt like an eternity when Out Of Time came on. This was one of those great moments. Damon’s vocal on that track is arresting. I paid more attention to the words… if we stop dreaming now, etc. Things are changing in my life. It’s one of those periods where you can feel things changing bit by bit and it leads you in an altogether new direction.

This week I decided to start my own label – Foster Kids. It was evident – this was the moment to capitalise on my newly recaptured creativity and enthusiasm for music. I believe in music, I believe in bands, I believe in the industry, I believe that people want to buy it and I believe I can give it to them. That’s not really happening at work and hasn’t been for some time, should that stop me? I say no. I can’t say how long it’s going to take to get started. I’m targeting January 2009, could be sooner, could be later. I’ve been working vigourously on all manner of details that need to get sorted out, vision, branding, business plan, logo, packaging concepts, artists, deals, meetings. It’s very exciting.

The weekends have been playing out at a fairly routine pace, not sure if that is good or bad. It’s a ritual for me to head down to Beard Papa for refreshments, and lately walk across Soho to look at clothes and furniture I largely can’t afford but will someday and then stop off at Kid Robot to buy toys. Sometimes meeting up with friends, sometimes for a movie, sometimes not. I’ve been obsessed with the Me! I’m French Dunny series at Kid Robot and there’s a new series that’s just come out this week. I got some crayons to create my own Munny, I feel like I’ll want to create quite a few. The beauty of Blur in all of this is that it’s music that inspires nostalgia and creativity and, in the midst of all the chaos elsewhere (mainly the workplace), gets back to my ROOTS. I say it time and again, I sound like a broken record: there’s a reason you come to a place like New York and that’s because you want to become an even bigger fish. For every person that comes from somewhere else, it’s inevitably because they’re living life in a goldfish bowl and can’t grow any more. Drawing on toys obviously isn’t a part of that but recapturing the process of creation is what it’s all about. It’s symbolic.

There’s going to be a lot happening, the label is one piece of the jigsaw puzzle and the others are going to start falling into place. It feels very much like the end of a chapter, with a new chapter up ahead. Which there has to be I suppose, otherwise you die – literally or figuratively – and there isn’t much to the story. At the end of the day, I guess one goes and looks at furniture in and for houses they couldn’t manage to live in because they aspire to comfortability, they look at clothes they want to wear but can’t for the same reason. The only thing I can’t get is more hair, other than that, everything is attainable. If I didn’t walk out of work every day frustrated and angry I might have more… but I guess on the other hand I wouldn’t be able to reproduce the ambition that is the most valuable commodity right now.