Robert Fripp's Diary

Tuesday 19 June 2007

Bredonborough An inbox of Russian

12.09

Bredonborough.

An inbox of 286.

Russian piracy is on the agenda, plus addressing the practicalities of establishing an account for GC tithes.

On the Guestbook, Mr. jimsabis has put more effort into the seeming paradox (yesterday’s diary) than have Messrs. Crimsoid & PyramidHead…

Riddle:: Posted by jimsabis on June 18, 2007

No mystery, or riddle, really. What appears to be mutually opposing requests at first glance is

1) a continuing request for consideration of the artist in his creative environment so that the creative process may have some reasonable hope of proceeding successfully and

2) a practical, pragmatic acknowledgement that material from past years, illicitly or otherwise gained, is out there and has value regardless of its source.

Art is not always practical, but a successful artist is likely to be one who recognizes the need for practicality…

Essentially, yes. Reservations:

firstly, art is always practical, but its field of practical endeavour is not the mundane;

secondly, for an aspiring artist, practice is necessary;

thirdly, practicality is earthing to the creative leap;

fourthly, it is not necessary for the professional to be an artist; it is necessary that the artist has the qualities of a good professional: eg competence, reliability, acting freely from like & dislike, knowing what is possible.

Two guiding principles re: bootlegs…

Turn a seeming disadvantage to your advantage.

Redeem the error.

Perhaps an obvious question, in retrospect, might be:

The hypocritical Fripp is squeezing the hard-earned pay from insulted innocents & selling them bootlegs that they had the right to own anyway! Now these are an unofficial archive profiting his person, is that terrible man presently happy that bootlegs / photographs were made / taken in the first place?

There is a simple answer to the question: no. I regret that any of them exist, and I wish none of them had ever happened.

Firstly, these acts are non-consensual; this sets up negativity & oscillation that must then be neutralised & stabilised.

Secondly, bootlegging & photographing have taken away much of my joy in live performance.

Thirdly, it has killed many shows for me, sometimes whole tours.

Whether innocent audients just couldn’t help themselves, knew they had consumer rights, just don’t agree or sense this, changes nothing. Now, with lotsa wrong stuff out there continuing to exert its resonance, what to do?

There is no one answer, no one strategy, no straightforward finishing or concluding act to bring completion and closure. So, in the meantime, we are…

Turning a seeming disadvantage to our advantage; redeeming the error.