It was a year after I arrived in Berlin, in the depths of winter, meeting Felix Buchner who’s my collaborator and bass player to this day, in a small fire-lit pub in Neukolln, Frosche Konig.

The place is teaming with board games, and a grand piano, a silent movie screen and the comfiest seats a man could ask for.

I’d never met Felix before, but, was assured by a friend we’d “make beautiful music together.”

I never heard him play. We briefly mentioned Tom Waits, and then moved on to discussing David Lynch for a solid two hours, every film, how trying to find meaning would kill your intuitive understanding, how the mood leads you through, how the gut feeling stirs you all you need to know.

That was it, I’d found my bass player, and a true friend.

As the years went on David Lynch became my Rosetta Stone.

Rather than discuss specifics in music, I’d figure it if they liked Lynch, or Waits, or Beefheart – or anything that you can’t just show to your granny, and have her swoon to – and see how comfortable they were with that feeling of unknowing, that showed me how well we’d work together.

It’s in the unknowing, uneasy end of your tether, that you find the juicy stuff.

If you’re too comfortable, you’re not doing anything new.

That’s what Lynch imparted on me more than anything else.

I watched Twin Peaks while finishing off university, and couldn’t believe how otherworldly it appeared, compared to all else that glazed the screen.

There was a darkness to it, and a giddy glee juxtaposed onto it from one scene to the next.

The dark and light danced beautifully together, no one did it better, or will come as close again.

During lockdown, I lived with three musicians I played with, and we sat to watch Eraserhead projected against by bedroom wall.

We were so taken with it, we made a corona-induced parody, owing to qual parts cabin fever, and exhilaration.

When you see something like that for the first time, you can’t help but feel stirred. You have to make something. Art. A drink.

It’s like what Lynch said about reading Dostoyevsky. He likes to read it, as his mind wanders to the most interesting pictures.

There’s no pretension there. Play-like visuals, due to the input of great art.

That’s as simple as it gets, and as profound as you make it.

Therein lies Lynch’s mastery. He spoke with a child-like picture-laden prose, but, his stories descended to the depths of you and the cosmos, all in one dunk of donut in coffee.

He had a gift of optimism, and unwaning spirit.

The simple joys were lauded.

One of my favourite stories is how Lynch travelled with Eraserhead’s Jack Nance through Europe, and how excited he was to show two ladies leaving the Soviet Union for the first time how incredible Coke tasted.

He bought each a bottle, and intook their delight like a savouring a painting.

While buying the bottles, though, he was barraged by a litany of giant moths.

There it is. The bizarre and beautiful, all at once.

They call him odd, a savant, a character – and he was some of these things, too.

But, above all else he was a singular artist, a humanist, spiritual, playful master.

The likes of which we’ve never seen before, or will again.

He’d never pigeonholed himself, painting till the end, occasionally filming, always an artist at work, whether it was fixing a hole in his trousers, making a weather report, or a masterpiece, he was one and the same thing.

A visionary, and, above all else, himself.

A beautiful thing to be.

17/Jan/2025