2015 Week 32: As Is

The word artist gets thrown around a lot. And we all have our expectations and stereotypes of what we consider an artist. Is someone who sings, regardless of the genre, the quality or the substance, an artist? I don't know. It's all very subjective anyway. Never mind what is art, what makes one an artist, is an even more complicated question that I'm sure for many brings up the term "sellout" as some polar opposite. But I saw Patton Oswalt a few months back and he did a bit about selling out that perfectly illustrates what bullshit that concept is. Still, when someone comes along that somehow embodies this seemingly ridiculous ideal of what a "true artist" is, it's hard not to take notice, whether you're all in on what they are producing or not. I call your attention once again to Joseph Arthur, who I've mentioned a couple of times here.

Recently, we discovered a heart shape on Pluto, and in an era where we are having to justify to everyone why space exploration is important and how it gives mankind something to dream about, the one guy that gets it right and demonstrates it without being preachy, direct or even intentionally for all I know, is Joseph Arthur. He wrote a poem about it on his Facebook page and shortly thereafter, recorded a song. And of course, because this is Joseph Arthur, there are also paintings. That's what we're talking about. This is a guy that is not only prolific in multiple media, but he's not caught up in the bullshit of making a big deal out of saying he's doing something. He just fucking does it. Maybe we should all take inspiration from that sort of thing and realize something as a species. I don't know what, but something.

Anyway, I can't top that, so this week's Spotify playlist is simply as is. It's 10 songs that struck me this week, in the exact order they did so. I heard them all again as a playlist and it pretty much works. It has a sense of some progression towards, I don't know, something. Do it.