HEY APATHY! Alternative Comics
Forced out of the studio by the suffocating humidity as part of my regular practice I retreated this afternoon in work the park. Most days this ritual proves more than satisfying as well as productive as I pass a few hours with my sketchpad and a book. I consider myself quite fortunate to have such an opportunity as a freelance illustrator with no particular schedule and truly enjoy passing the hot summer days leisurely doodling and researching in a shady quiet corner sprawled across the Kensington grass. Of course this limit’s my capabilities to develop any of my finer ink drawings or anything the computer centric animation but I fret very little as the time proves rather healthy. The fresh outdoor air relieve me from the flickering screen and the light table as well as the endlessly repetitive hours of typing and uploads. In fact it would appear that by stepping away from the technologies my mind retains a fresh human inspiration permitted me to accomplish more in the long run avoiding any frustrations or mechanized burn out. I highly recommend that you to shut off the power once in a while to let bugs crawl all over you while you read a real book ( that is one printed on paper).
Obviously the park is not without interruptions but the occasional skirmish, unwanted social activity or show boating is far less common than the beautiful silence and breeze under a tree. The silence too is not wholly impenetrable but the truth is that I actually enjoy the sound of the acoustic guitars and the occasional banjo. However I have encountered an increasingly aggravating trend which often passes as music but comes from no instrument. It is a little clicking and clacking muffled by a static buzz and it has perpetually grown and haunted my life. I tried to ignore in and at first assumed that my ears were out of sorts, possibly as a result of my years working the loud metropolis as a professional street artist. But alas as the buzzing and multiple clicks insisted on invasion I soon identified the sounds. They were activated by people and playing out of small phones as I finally correlated the noise to certain bobbing movements among small packs of pot smokers.
The static obscenities, which sound like nothing more, were apparently on purpose and as I have been informed, entitled electronic music whatever that is. Never mind my criticism though I am not here to discuss taste nor talent for what truly bothered me was the fact that these devices were being used in the park. Maybe it is music after all few people can endure the Stravinsky or Miles Davis that I’ve come on to depend but from a safe distance the sounds sound a lot like the city, an endless distortion and conglomeration of noise. I’ve been hearing a lot of phones lately but this afternoon was the worst.
There were at least three of these devices crackling from varied directions when as though to add insult to injury a new sound joined the party. Pulling up right beside me a car slowed to a park and the driver got out of the vehicle leaving his door open and radio on. He actually laid down in the grass with his bass hideously blaring and started to read the paper though I do not know how. Shortly thereafter a large tour bus pulled in and decided to idle. The vehicle easily two-thirds the length of the small park just kept vrooming and vrooming. The driver of this vehicle also got out and sat down to enjoy a cigarette in the now volumous park. Three phones playing static clicks, a car with popular music and a perpetually revving giant noise and pollution machine had me surrounded and had I not a coffee and some food to finish I’d have already left.
Then to my dismay as I forced down my hot drink another addition to the line of inconsideration. Some ---- brought in his electric guitar plugged in a bunch of laser beam effects and cranked out a programmed beat. Not only was he loud enough to be heard above all the rest but he was completely incoherent by any standard of song. I don’t favour speed death metal but I can understand it. This player however couldn’t even make the scene in a Japanese experimental noise band for the deaf ( just for the record I know deaf people actually do enjoy music by grooving on the vibrations but the analogy works well).
So there I was burning my mouth on the coffee while laughing to myself at the entire absurdity and even more so at the anger telephone owners who couldn’t enjoy there buzzing noises any more. Though not a single one of them relinquished there sonic projections and the fun just kept coming. Now if you think all sounds crazy you’ll scarcely believe what happened next. A couple sat down beside me gossiping aloud about some magazines, reviews and photo shoots when out of nowhere they produced a small screen. They turned on the laptop and video screen and started to watch a reel of commercials while laughing hysterically. COMMERCIALS! Not a show or a concert or even a moving but one after another they entertained themselves boisterously watching commercials!!!
Phone playing music, a car blasting beats, a huge bus running it’s engines, and a television playing commercials all at the same time while I was sitting in the park. Sitting in the park on a hot Friday afternoon eating my lunch under the trees, drawing reading and watching the birds no more. With not other choice but to find a quieter place upon which to rest I walked into the middle of the city, down Spadina avenue and sat under the Gardiner Expressway. Noting there were no devices nor people nor ads, I fell peacefully asleep hoping, if only just a little, never to waken again.
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