Good Things From Long Ago
Good Things are everywhere, especially if we are willing to look backward.
In this week’s Good Things we start by listening to the nineties then travel back a hundred years and finally hundreds more years, finding beauty all along our way.
Thing To Listen To: Wildflowers At Home
I bought Tom Petty’s Wildflowers back in the nineties and fell in love, though I wasn’t sure I was supposed to. Even though the album was a classic it wasn’t cool when it came out —at least not in the world of mid-90’s alternative music. I bought the album anyways and loved it.
I was delighted to hear Tom’s home recording of Wildflowers on Spotify recently – part of a collection of extras and rarities that didn’t make the album. This recording reminds me that a good song holds up no matter how much you strip away from it.
This is just Tom Petty and his guitar and it is lovely.
Pair this tune with the excellent episode of the Broken Record podcast where Malcolm Gladwell and Rick Rubin discuss “Tom Petty and the Creation of Wildflowers“
Thing To See: Beautiful Books From the Art Nouveaux Era
Thanks to subscriber Edward for sharing this gorgeous collection of public domain book covers over on facebook. These covers feature rich, vintage colours and textures alongside charming hand-drawn illustrations just dying to be resurrected on a t-shirt, album cover, sticker, beer label … good thing these designs have entered the public domain.
Feast your eyes and make something beautiful!
Thing to Explore: Vermeer’s Giant Girl With The Pearl Earring
Vermeer’s famous masterpiece has been scanned with incredible detail in three dimensions by Hirox. This means you can explore every inch – nay, micron – of the painting in crisp detail that reveals every crack and bubble in the paint.
The 3-D view is surreal, letting you see the relief of brush strokes, and the blob of white paint that forms the spark in the girl’s eye.
