While I have been a visual artist as long as I could hold a crayon, and it’s visual arts where my most developed talents and heart reside, my exposure and tastes in the world of visual arts was somewhat limited until high school. However, growing up in an active enthusiastic musical family shaped me early on. My music collection - and favorites - as a curious child ranged from Motown to Led Zepplin to Itsvak Pearlman w/ the London Philharmonic to Dick Dale and The DelTones to Hall and Oates and early Madonna. It’s music that’s always had the most immediate inroad to my heart among the arts, and still does to this day- even if MOMA’s 2011 exhaustive retrospective of DeKooning’s indomitable career is one of the best concerts of the soul I’ve ever heard with the ears of my heart.
Like the letters of St Paul, the Gospel of Thomas is not openly gnostic, but lends itself readily to gnostic exegesis. In this mixtape I’ve considered Logia 2, which reads:
Jesus says,
“The one seeking should not cease seeking until he finds.
And when he finds he will be dismayed.
And when he is dismayed he will be astonished,
and will be king over All.”
This 17 song cycle comprises 15 lyrical songs and 2 instrumental arrangements. The 15 lyrical songs are organized to represent the three stages of the “one who finds”.
We have here 3 sets of 5 with an instrumental interlude between set 2 and 3 and then a final instrumental.
The track list for this 69 minute playlist is as follows:
Dismayed:
1- Hell is Chrome, Wilco (from A Ghost is Born)
2- Rabbit in Your Headlights, UNKLE - Thom Yorke w/ DJ Shadow (from Psyience Fiction)
3- Disconnection Notice, Sonic Youth (from Murray Street)
4- You and Who’s Army?, Radiohead (from Amnesia)
5- Have A Talk With God, Stevie Wonder (from Songs in The Key of Life)
Astonished:
6- I Know I’ve Changed, The Staples Singers (from Faith and Grace: A Family Journey 1953-1976)
7- Banking on a Myth, Andrew Bird (from The Mysterious Production of Eggs)
8- A Distorted View of Reality is Now A Necessity to Be Free, Elliott Smith (from Songs from a Hill)
9- Only A Fool Would Say That, Steely Dan (from Can’t Buy A Thrill)
10- Wild Imagination, Kurt Vile (b’lieve I’m going down)
Interlude -
11- Vladimir’s Blues, Max Richter (from The Blue Notebooks)
King:
12- Higher Love, Stevie Winwood (from Back in The High Life Again)
13- Pink + White, Frank Ocean (from Blonde)
14- Coming Down For You (live), Joan Shelley (from Live at The Bomhard)
15- Graveyard, Feist (from Metals)
16- What Light, Wilco (from Sky Blue Sky)
Gnosis (God Needs Our Songs In Silence):
17- I Remember (Jon Hopkins)
Enjoy this while I finish up three new illustrated essays coming very soon (and a complimentary podcast or two). That decoding precog art essay / podcast will also get a video for those much appreciated paid subscribers.
They cover, among other things:
Decoding Precognitive art 2
Joker 2- Folie a Deus - a Gnostic exegesis
‘Gnosticism’ Never Existed (what is gnosis?)
I’ll be back here before Christmas, but none the less, enjoy the holiday spirit - and be safe navigating parking lots!
-Jason
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