Each week, we’ll be posting a brand new illustration by David Lester. The Mecca Regular guitarist is visually documenting folks, locations and occasions from his band’s 41-year run, with textual content by vocalist Jean Smith.
At any given time, with David engaged on graphic novels and me promoting work to finance an artist residency program, it may possibly really feel like Mecca Regular isn’t on the forefront, but, in some way, the premise of it all the time is. This weekly column, the digital launch final month of an early album (1988) and, sadly, the way in which historical past repeats itself, carry Mecca Regular into the body. To not recommend that we’re related, however maybe a beacon of inspiration from a not-so-distant previous.
With David’s graphic novels, a thread that runs by the books is perhaps referred to as historical past from beneath, often known as “folks’s historical past” or “radical historical past.” As in, common folks in numerous brave struggles, endeavors which may in any other case be neglected or forgotten. This theme seems ceaselessly in Mecca Regular lyrics (“One Lady” and “I Stroll Alone,” for instance), and in essence, we’re very keen on the thought of broadcasting helpful snippets as a type of activism inside tradition.
“Crimson Dragnet” from Sitting On Snaps (Matador, 1995) (obtain):
