Work became what is typically known as the grind. The corporate sludge machine was pouring administrative muck all over my being.  Weeks had become gridlocked and blocked—draining the creative energy necessary for happiness. I began to look for refuge.  I started going to concerts in the middle of the week as a form of salvation.

These events became islands in the sun amidst the recurring chaos within the padded cubicle walls.  Magical in their ability to draw a crowd and transfix those who wanted to be hypnotized, rock shows, electro-shows, whatever, wherever.  Light shows and visuals playing a role no less than the music itself. I would pour my mind into these cinematic odysseys going on behind wild-eyed musicians swirling in their own colored layers of sound.

Booze and that lovely smoke clouding the mind, creating palm trees spinning in my iris … the mixture not unlike descriptions of 60s paregoric.  Floating in a dreamlike state always.  Indeed that is the value of these mid-week shows, these creative stop offs and layovers that top off somewhere near the sublime.  

 -J.P. BRIGGS / New York NY