It’s kinda muggy today and I was glad that I only needed one short trip outside. The deck outside was kicking with revellers, the heat drives people nuts. There’s more graffiti on the back window, it’s pink and compliments the room, thoughtful of them. This made me wonder about Banksy, who is he? How has he managed to stay anonymous, has nobody ever seen him at work? The only explanation is that he is ‘hoody heavy’, with a false beard and one of those plastic noses and glasses, perhaps on stilts, so he can get to the higher walls. Then there are the accoutrements needed for his work, does it all fit in one small bag? Last but not least the value of everything he does is off the scale, what a strange phenomenon he is.

What exactly is physical graffiti, isn’t graffiti physical by definition of it being graffiti? My mates Dan and Dianne lived opposite the building on the Zep album cover in St Marks Place in New York. Whenever I went over there I acknowledged it, never ignoring it, but growing up in the Liverpool area I suppose I didn’t think much about Penny Lane even though I had a mate that lived there. Do people who live in Paris go and visit the Mona Lisa at the Louvre? Do people who live in Madrid go and visit the Bosch paintings, The Haywain Triptych, The Garden of Earthly Delights and the Museo del Prado? I remember once Boydie showed me where they filmed the famous scene in the underpass walkway for A Clockwork Orange in Aylesbury, haha, only concrete.

All the times I’ve been in Dallas I never went to the site of the Kennedy assassination, but I did go to the place where General Custer fell in the Dakotas, that was really interesting. When you see the topography, you can see how foolish he was and how he met his demise. I also went to see Elvis’ house, no, not Graceland (although I have been there twice) but the house in Tupelo where he spent his early years. Tiny little place, and it was late at night and completely quiet, to think that from there, the stars exploded so brightly.

I’ve also been to Frida Kahlo’s house (Casa Azul) twice, which may have contributed greatly to the idea of painting The Archive in what I call “South American colours”. It was so beige in here, it was dead, but now it’s alive, the colours gave it lungs and you can see its sweet breath in the hallway and in the rooms.

Music today is the patchy Led Zep album Physical Graffiti (1975), one wonders where they were going with this double album, it’s so varied that there would always be someone who was unhappy – Kashmir to Down By The Seaside. If you like variety, then this album is for you, but you have to like The Zep in the first place, many do, many don’t.

Music Of The Daze