This past Saturday night Eddie Jobson and the band UK (reunited) was playing here in Montreal at a very intimate theater with 400 seats, the line-up was??Eddie Jobson (keys/violin) – John Wetton (bass/vocals) – Alex Machacek (guitar) – Virgil Donati (drums)
So I had the chance to meet with the drummer Virgil Donati who played on the Semantic Saturation album “Solipsistic” and snapped picture with him, that I very much like to share with you.
It saddens me to hear that one of the best, if not “the best” cover and artwork artist; Storm Thorgerson has passed away yesterday, April 18, 2013.
Mr. Thorgerson worked with legendary artists and created many classic album covers for bands like Pink Floyd, Dream Theater, Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin and even Muse.
The first part of this series Making of Solipsistic Artwork part 1 was published earlier in February. But now is the perfect time to publish part 2 because just yesterday, Saad Fanari the Solipsistic artwork designer published a beautifully illustrated article on Behance to tell the story behind this magical creation, and shed some light on the concept.
Solipsism is the extreme form of skepticism which denies the possibility of any knowledge other than of one’s own existence. People experiencing solipsism syndrome feel that the world is not ‘real’ in the sense of being external to their own minds.
According to the sign post, if we go forward down Amnesia Avenue, the buildings are nearly completed, the street is popping with life on many levels, we can even see a couple of newly weds are running across the street, but a small party of construction workers are blocking half of the road, mending and reshaping our worlds, refining our overall steps towards the future, the way we dress or talk or even think.
Redemption Road: To the left we see an apartment building, an asylum, Sane Asylum, a reference to all who had cracked, fallen, traumatized, suffered or simply couldn’t cope with the rules that govern our many lives. The kids on the floor drawing and writing are a reference to the state the mind remembers most during such crisis; one’s childhood. And even among the kids, a small boy keeps to himself in silence and solitude, to maintain the fact that alienation can begin in childhood, and the fascination of an early troubled mind with flight or birds..
Rivendell: The kingdom of the Elves, immortal, wisest, and the fairest of all beings.. The street or square on the right is complete, though the buildings surrounding it are still with empty fronts. Immortality would seem as the counter part to Insanity, from an alienated point of view. So the whole concept is revealed (once u take the CD out) with Time and the dead tree, a tree nevertheless that has apples scattered around it. Time governs all, from stone to flesh, all are infected with Time, and though we can’t remove it, stop it, or even try to think without it, we are forever helpless against it.