A Note from the Artist

by Bill Callahan (from the Lincoln Center program)

To start off with I should mention that I invented the sun. And also that it’s a pleasure to be here tonight.

They say life is short, but I’m not so sure. I’ve been putting off writing these notes for what feels like a century. And I know most of you quickly checked the length of this piece before you started reading it and hoped it was short—as if you couldn’t spare the 90 sec- onds out of the $86,000 in a day. I put the dollar sign in there to keep you interested. I do not know what tonight will hold. Because from where I’m sitting, tonight is a month away and a little brandy would help clear my head. Seriously.

I stepped away and now tonight is only three weeks away. Looking back over what I wrote, it is with a dragging heart that I must humbly note that I didn’t exactly invent the sun. Credit-giving can be a hazy thing. But you ought to treat me as if I did.

This band has been playing together for about a year or so. I’m bad with time because I see everything in 1-D as opposed to 3- or 4-D. I’m not talking about apartment numbers. If you live in apartment 1D, relax. I can’t see everything in there. Not with those curtains. What’s up with that? Memory is a flat surface. Everything I see is as if reflected in a pane of glass (of a window in apartment 1D). So what happened three months ago is right there next to what happened a year ago in my head.

Playing these shows for Apocalypse has been a most rewarding experience. I feel like tonight marks the end of the Apocalypse tour. I was looking for something to end it with, as it seemed it would last forever—and then this show came along and I was set.

Yours in etc., etc.
Bill Callahan