today you were far away, and i didn’t ask you why, what could i say?-The National

Duuuuuuude! Where the hell have you been?

I know, it’s a really good question, where have I been and what have I been doing? It’s fairly obvious, not blogging.

I could bore you with trivial tales about this and that, and that’s what I had planned to do up until last night. But….

Last night, I saw one of my favourite bands The National play at the Royal Festival Hall in London and it knocked me sideways (in a good way).

This was not from the gig last night, but youtube can’t produce everytime.

If you have never seen them perform, I command thee to do as soon as possible, they make great music and are committed to playing their songs with force and dedication, it’s as if there is no wall between the band and the audience, everything melts away and it’s just one group of people sharing in this ‘thing’, and it’s this ‘thing’ that’s so important to talk about.

As I have mentioned in previous blog entries I hold Andrea Fraser’s Why Does Fred Sandbeck’s Work Make Me Cry as a key text for me, and in a way I suppose I held her reaction to Sandbeck’s work as the penultimate response. If you have people crying then it works, it’s so great that it’s beyond words and the only reaction is to cry. But as the research has progressed my thinking on this is progressing as well. I am not saying that crying is right or wrong, what it is, is one particular individual’s response to a particular piece of work in a particular setting:yeah, context-it’s everything.

During the set I was standing there singing along, doing that strange indie white person’s dance and really feeling it. As the band’s set grew and their relationship to the audience developed and it was almost as if there was a swell, a combination of the audience being so caught up in their performance and the band being caught up in our adulation.

Aside from that something began to happen to me, as I stood there as they played Slow Show, there seemed to be this expansion in my chest, it was amazing. Suddenly I was filled with feelings so good I would like to find the drug that equals what I felt, I mean it was as if my heart and my chest might burst at any time because I felt so moved. It was a multitude of things, I was drawn deeper and deeper into the tunes, I felt this incredible sense of love for certain people in my life, and I honestly believed as I was standing there that I was in the presence of something that couldn’t ever be put into words. At that moment I have never felt better.I actually sent this email to myself in the middle of one of their songs because it was so important for me to remember this:

What if it’s about trying to create a physical being, why can’t we believe in thing we can’t see? What does it mean?

Slow Show

Dude, I know, we’re getting close to the G O D word, but maybe that is what it is about. I mean the whole thing is that I don’t know anything for certain, but as I stood there with my chest bursting and my head expanding because I couldn’t comprehend or define how amazing I felt-I thought, maybe this is how people feel about God. I am not going to tackle the God thing here because it’s not what my research is about, but part of me was thinking is this how we deal and experience the ineffable? In fleeting moments where the mediums we can grasp come together in the right way and suddenly we’re thrown into this feeling, this place, this experience that is big, so grand you just think-fuck me. What just happened?

What this is beginning to expand for me is how much I relate to the ineffable as a malleable idea/experience rather than a thing or object. It doesn’t mean that I don’t think these things can be ineffable, but for me, and my work, objects et. al are the sum of the parts of the thing.

I mean as I sit here recollecting what it is was I thinking it was that I was in the midst of an ineffable moment and I wondered if the band’s music is simply an instrument or a portal to make such an experience physical. In hindsight what is also interesting for me about that is that I was actively being self conscious and aware, yet the experience wasn’t dampened or destroyed, something I had previously thought would happen the minute one perceived themselves perceiving.

It’s so hard to try and decipher and as I sit here trying to put the ‘unutterable’ into words I laugh. To try is futile, so what is my research going to do? What am I trying to prove?

This is a bit of email I wrote someone this morning about the gig… it fits.

I have seen the National about 6 times already and every time it’s always been amazing and restorative, like I leave the gig thinking and feeling more whole. But last night’s gig was amazing, it’s been a while since I have gone to a gig solo-it’s has a sensation of loneliness but also complete freedom. I drank only water and was literally blown away by them. At one point I felt as if my heart was going to explode out of my chest because I felt so good. It deepened my love for people I love, you included and I just wish you could have seen it. I sent myself a lot of mini essays during the gig, as it’s really research related. But I get God now, like I get this thing, this sensation and I wonder if because the belief in that which can’t be seen is hard is everything we do a way to personalise that relationship and bring it to our own level? Is that what I am trying to do with my work? I don’t know, but I suppose this is my job. It was simply amazing. I really wish you could have been there, but I will make sure you get to see them either here or in the NYC.