Category: Classic Rock

S_V_H Runnin’ Down a Dream final image

Published on by Scott Von Holzen

The Tom Petty tribute painting, Running Down a Dream,  is finished with a big Woo Hoo!   Woo and hoo do not show up in any of the lyrics, but they repeat a remarkable THIRTY times throughout the song.  Okay, they are not the best lyrics of the song. My favorite line is ” me and Del were singin’ little Runaway.” But, woo hoo, sets the mood of the song, and reminds me of my Mustang days when driving could be just that,  driving. I do not do that anymore.  Now, when I am in my car it is to go get stuff, and that is about it. That reminds me of a favorite lyric quote from the famous, and missed, Leon Cohen:
“Those were the days my friend
We thought they’d never end
We’d sing and dance forever and a day
We’d live the life we choose
We’d fight and never lose
For we were young and sure to have our way”

This is an interesting looking, non commercial, non living room, artwork. This is also the first time I have altered the stems of my music in a way that is totally non sheet music like,  and surprise it still works.  In the past  the vertical look of the stems as the move up and down following  along with the music, was the obvious choice. What changed with this painting began with using extra small solid color canvases and then filling space with the metal frame. That got me to thinking that inflating the size and even going horizontal with the stems would add some bulk, improve interest, and fit the look and the mood of this artwork.  Because of their size I than could decorative the stems to add contrast with the canvases.  For their colors I found them on the album and single covers.

A lot of the other colors used for the painting come from Tom Petty’s other albums and his performances. For example,  the red used for those little circles inside the large bronze circle openings comes from the color red used in a number of Tom Petty’s albums, including Damn the Torpedoes.

Woo hoo, this completes this project in time to move on to this years Christmas Painting, which will be Silver Bells.

 

Scott Von Holzen

 

S_V_H Runnin’ Down a Dream image 1

Published on by Scott Von Holzen

Tom Petty is gone and over the years although I play a lot of his music, for some unknown reason I have never painted one of his songs.  I am doing that now.  I pick his song Runnin’ Down a Dream for many reasons, but mostly because I thought of it as a car driving song.

Here is his video, and this is the first and last time that I will ever watched it.  I believe the theme of the video is a dream. But I don’t see this music in that way. For me this music over all these years, is a car song.  You play this song loud while driving and enjoying the freedom of the road.  Although, in today’s driving world, I have no memory of what freedom means.   A guess than,  I am reliving my past life in this song.  It is Tom Petty telling me that this is a car driving song, and  that this is the meaning of the freedom of the road and this is what it once felt like:

“It was a beautiful day, the sun beat down
I had the radio on, I was drivin’
Trees flew by, me and Del were singin’ little Runaway
I was flyin’   ”

I grew up in rock music with Del Shannon and his classic song Runaway.  Hearing Del’s name and loving car songs,  and being raised in my youth on and in Mustangs, Runnin’ Down a Dream became an instant classic.

Let’s forget that awful video and turn to this classic live performance:

 

The main background colors of this artwork comes from Tom Petty’s 1984 Album Full Moon Fever.  Runnin’ Down a Dream was a hit single from that album.

Wikipedia

Now, for the words used in this artwork I picked “Woo hoo, Woo hoo, Woo hoo.” My,  you don’t ask, why did I pick those words? I know they are not really part of the lyrics, but for me they say it all, covering all the emotions for this music.

I don’t think this will be the last Tom Petty song. I am too much into rock.  Of all the long list of great songs by Tom Petty I am leaning to also paint Learning to Fly. That song title is a good fit with Runnin’ Down a Dream.  My take on both of the titles is that they both summarize this moment of my artist career:  I am running down a dream, and I am also learning to fly.

Scott Von Holzen

S_V_H My Back Pages Final Image

Published on by Scott Von Holzen2 Comments
Two Canvas with Aluminum and wood, 26 1/4 x 17 1/4

My Back Pages is one of the smallest of my artworks, under thirty inches in length, and has the least amount of music. Since there is so little music present there is also little in visual interest.  That is the reason I decided to go further with my use of words in this artwork. I took what I learned from Lovesong, and in a free poetic style I brought words together from different parts of the music.  I deliberately chose words that have meanings far beyond their appearance in the song, and then I placed them randomly.  It is the words that connect this artwork.  I think this trend will continue because it worked so well in My Back Pages and Lovesong.

I cannot but wonder what would have happened with my art if I had not stop painting in the early 1980’s?  Back than I had no connections to the local artist community, and few opportunities to show. Basically, when I started I had a dream,  a few art books, and a spare bedroom to paint in.  From 1975 to the early 1980s I painted a number of portraits mostly from photographs of family and friends. I than ran out of subject matter, and along with the demands of earning a living my artist ambitions faded. In reality an artist prodigy I was never. In truth the drive and the limits of painting portraits,  and the lack of interest in any other alternate artistic genre,  brought it all to an end.   That was back than: “Ah, but I was so much older than, I’m younger than that now.”  Twenty-five years later I found a vision and a genre, music, that offers endless possibilities. The internet gives me the start at building connections, and I now have the time and the money to pursue  it all.  The biggest difference from than to now is that I  finally have the knowledge, the drive, the purpose, the goal, and the ambition to see all this through. As I have said before I am in it for the long run, and I hope you as the reader find this pursuit interesting enough to check in once in a while.

Scott Von Holzen