Life by Keith Richards

Strangely enough, I happen to be reading two books at the same time. What's strange is they both have the same title, Life.

One is about artist Chuck Close and one is about artist Keith Richards.

See the previous post to learn about the Chuck Close book.

Here are some interesting ideas I got from the Keith Richards book.

Keith grew up in rural England just after world war II in the generation influenced by Chicago Blues and early American Rock and Roll. His generation were anti-Establishment, revolting against Victorian Age morality and straight in line conformity. An artist like Keith wanted to create music and create his own world to live in. There was a lot of harassment towards those who wanted to be different and make their own rules to live by. Rednecks all around disapproving of your long hair.

One constant throughout the book is Keith's Process for making music. It seems on every page he is writing phrases in his notebook to make into songs collaborating to compose a song. His process is to record and dub layer over previous layers. Likes to use a smaller portable basic recorder and write the lyrics at the microphone. Their passion is performing this music. Process involves Persistence. His band, the Rolling Stones, performed as the house band in a club in London and played there at least once every day for over 3 years. Their 'instant success' as they went on a concert tour was the result of giving over a thousand performances.

I enjoy in the act of creation how as an artist I am in charge of the world I create in my art-making. Sometimes the world I create in is 20 by 24 inches. Some artists can create a whole new world culture because the music they made transformed the physical world we live in.