I have been thinking about something Andrew K wrote in his diary recently� about the pressure of work � wondering whether these feelings are rooted in a certain age � they are certainly no fun especially when one thinks it is a permanent condition.

Listened to the Lamont Young, the Feldman and the Cage from the USA CD as much as I could � very inspiring. The Nancarrow 4tet and the Carter Elegy sound to me a bit like early Tippet SQs � they were all written about the same time. I bought the first three Tippet SQs as an experiment when I got my first CD player at the end of the 1980s � great experiment.

I have been trying unsuccessfully to load an oil pastel of Sandton where the recent UN summit was held in Johannesburg up into my other diary on www.kwase-kwaza.org. It doesn�t work � although I managed to get the picture of Ella into that diary OK this week. Hey-ho � that�s IT. Anyway finding these African pictures from two years ago is one of the benefits of clearing out my office.

The Simon Frith book on artskool pop is very strong on the 70s � it�s the era when he began to develop his theories. For him it�s a clear line from LmY through to Warhol and Cale and then into a host of figures - premier in the UK are Bowie and Eno. On the way, the idea of celebrity becomes utterly bound up in the enterprise � hence all that dressing up. You can follow this art and celebrity nexus through to D Hirst on the UK scene I suspect - one of the theme�s in Matthew Collings book on Britart and its antecedents.

The careers of Reich, Glass and Adams all have an element of celebrity. In the 1980s Cage never stops experimenting and Feldman sticks to his guns � he goes for great length � parallels the AbsEx grand gesture � and pulls it off. Then he dies and the world rediscovers him � as Fred pointed out in his interview all kinds of recordings begin to appear. From a personal point of view it was great to go back into the antecedents of Min and find that Feldman had followed his principles relentlessly.

Eno�s Year with Swollen Appendices � 1995 for him � 1996 for me � was a wake up call. Paul W and I read it and thought � we�re not going to let him have a clear run at this stuff

Another item from the office � the Fluxus pamphlet from the incredible Detroit Institute of Art collection � boy that was a day to remember � all that recent history plus Tinsley Ellis doing I�m So Glad in the blues bar half a dozen bottles later. I quote:

Yoko Ono: Painting to Be Stepped on 1960-64 / Takehisa Kosugi: Theatre Music �Keep Walking Intently� 1964. Fluxus Edition.

The score for this work is dated Winter 1960 and appears in her 1964 edition of Grapefruit published in Tokyo��Macunias� realisation of Ono�s Painting to be Stepped On during the John and Yoko Fluxfest was identical to the Kosugi which of course derives from Ono.

The Fluxus version involved placing cans of paint on the floor at an entrance and fine paper beyond. So it�s a kind of democratic installation � linked to Pollock but also say to Conrad�s basic assumptions behind the Theatre of Eternal Music that the output might be collectively generated and owned. The pamphlet has a reproduction of Macunias� Manifesto (1963) which includes the phrase � �promote living art, anti-art�.

The Situationists and music � I read a piece by Guy Debord, one of the key theorists about detournement. He explains that you take some piece of something � maybe from an artwork and put it in a totally different context � to encourage it to reveal its truer nature and undermine its place in the spectacle.

I have been working on the second Brown piece � at its simplest one of the ideas is to do with applying the maxim that sounds should be themselves to certain electric guitar sounds. I looked again at Four Fifths and the 3rd Little Piano piece.

I got the Maya guitar back from its set-up. The guy in the shop liked its build quality � but thought the pick-ups were kinda average. I think I feel happiest with it going through a virtual Vox AC15. James and I were discussing the Cambridge graffiti � he said it was good to see straight ahead rude words on the Archeology Museum. I told him that that wall said �God uses Vox amplifiers� in 1968 which he found an amusing period piece.

I cut more branches off trees � got sawdust in my hair and wondered about what might be happening to my wrist joints.

Paltrow to do Plath in a film, so I read � hmmm bated breath, I suppose. Watched R Crowe�s Beautiful Mind � surprisingly moving.