Every Saturday, we’ll be posting a new illustration by David Lester. The Mecca Normal guitarist is visually documenting people, places and events from his band’s 29-year run, with text by vocalist Jean Smith.
Here at Curves in East Van, we have huge windows at a busy intersection where our logo is prominently displayed. Beneath it, our slogan, in hand-cut, foot-high, stick-on vinyl letters: The Power to Amaze Yourself (which I think may be outta the bible).
“Someone” switched out the “az” with “us” changing it to The Power to Amuse Yourself. Nobody noticed until a member finked to the manager, who then went running around trying to find out who would do such a thing.
“There’s a lot to be said for the power to amuse yourself,” I said. “Maybe it’s a sign.”
The manager dug out the lump of vinyl from which the letters were cut and laid this lump on the counter in the backroom, mentioning to me something about new letters needing to be cut and adhered to the glass, to which I said, “How about we simply give out prizes to any more members who notice!” Clearly we have different problem solving styles.
The signage scandal in the window at Curves reminded me of my first trip to New Zealand. I was met at the airport by my boyfriend’s boss, the owner of IMD (record label putting out Dunedin bands and distributing good stuff from the USA). No sign of the boyfriend. By the time I got out of the car in town (presumably on my boyfriend’s doorstep), I had a job at the label. My boyfriend was A&R and I was … wait, what were job titles at record labels? My job was to type and fax letters to other labels, to set distribution in motion. I used my connections at K and Matador to make things happen. IMD distributed their stuff, and they distributed ours.
At some point, feeling hard done by, for whatever reason, I designed and ordered an IMD rubber stamp and proceeded to stamp all the LPs, CDs and catalogs. “Disturbed by IMD” went unnoticed for quite some time. When the boss had it brought to his attention, he went bonkers. I forget what actually happened, but eventually the whole thing collapsed and I returned to Canada. Some years later, I noticed that he put out an IMD compilation album called Disturbed By IMD. Clever fellow.
“Greater Beauty,” from Flood Plain (K, 1993) (download):
