The Red Krayola With Art & Language
Baby and Child Care

Probably few musicians have been as influential over the years as Mayo Thompson and the Red Krayola. Likewise, among all these, he and his band have formed such an eccentric and particular reality in the landscape of 1960s and subsequent psychedelia to receive much less recognition from critics and the general public than they actually deserve.

Let's try to set some points. Number one. Mayo Thompson is a great guitarist, one of the greatest guitarists in the history of psychedelic music. Personally, I can say I've never seen anyone play like him, and I can say I've seen a lot of guitarists play (live), and besides this I believe he also has a great voice, a very particular voice and a tone that perfectly accompanies his genius and at the same time hallucinatory and somehow strange compositions, which I would even describe as 'skew'. Crazy and visionary like that of his dear friend and adventure companion in Pere Ubu David Thomas, but at the same time soft and sinuous, just like the slow glide of his guitar notes.

Number two. Not everything Mayo Thompson and the Red Krayola recorded over the years was then published. In any case, it is practically impossible or at least very difficult to make an exact and documented reconstruction of the entire discography of this artist and this band. Even taking into account, of course, the many and countless collaborations over the years.

Number three. Among these, those that have been performances with the collective known and recognized as Art & Language occupy a relevant space, a group of conceptual artists founded at the end of the 1960s and which had a certain fame and following in England and the United States and that over the years have collaborated several times with the band in what were artistic and musical projects that had predominantly political and social content. An example in this sense are the design studios for social activities and initiatives for the development of communities within the activities of workers' unionism. Consequently, number four. Probably among the reasons that have not led this band to be so popular over the years, there is also the fact that the Red Krayola have never been somehow 'mainstream'. As conceptual artists themselves and involved in projects with political and social content, they were never a mass psychedelic group, nor at the same time something aimed at an elitist audience composed only of intellectuals. Far from all this, Mayo Thompson, on the other hand, has always been on the ball. The Red Krayola were part of the new wave movement actively between the late 1970s and early 1980s and in the 1990s they were involved and among the promoters of post-rock and musical experimentalism collaborating with artists such as Jim O'Rourke or David Grubbs among others.

Number five. 'Baby and Child Care' is an album recorded in 1984 by the Red Krayola with the avant-garde duo of theorists of the Art & Language movement (with whom the Red Krayola recorded three other albums in the 1980s and two more recently in 2007 and 2010) Michael Baldwin and Mel Ramsden and with the 'Black Snakes' band.

Number six. In practice, the album is dedicated to the figure and personality of Dr. Benjamin McLane Spock, a pediatrician born in the United States of America in New Haven in 1903 and died in La Jolla in 1998, famous for being the author of the book 'Baby and Child Care' which, published in 1946, quickly became a famous bestseller, and whose most famous quote is probably a message that Dr. Spock addressed to all mothers, 'You know more than you think you do.'

Number seven. I realize only now that I have practically said more or less everything there is to say about this album. At this point, however, you might ask me, why? Why did the Red Krayola and Art & Language decide to record an album dedicated to Dr. Spock's thought in 1984 and why are they releasing it only now (the album was indeed released on the last May 13th, obviously via Drag City Records) and more than thirty years after the recording. Well, what can I say, there is no exact answer to these questions, but, think about it, we are talking about conceptual artists and a band, the Red Krayola, that has always been beyond every rule and every form of thought. There is nothing strange then that they considered and still consider today Dr. Spock's thought as current and revolutionary. He was not just a pediatrician or a writer. Politically and socially active, he was a candidate for the People's Party in 1972, when he proposed a platform that suggested free medical care, the decriminalization of abortion, homosexuality, and the legalization of soft drugs, a guaranteed minimum wage as support for families and the immediate withdrawal of all US troops engaged on foreign territories. What can I say, all things that could very well and even today be current and even considered revolutionary. He was not just a pediatrician, as mentioned, Spock was a real thinker, and in his capacity as a doctor and social man, he did not propose to tell people how to educate their children, but mainly tried to encourage people to act actively and responsibly, just as raising a child was at the same time some way to grow also as men and women within society.

Here it is. An album that responsibly deals with the growth and upbringing of children and that picks up Dr. Spock's legacy. Everything else is clearly rock'n'roll and good psychedelia and free form freak out. Enjoy your listening.