Tuesday, 22 October 2013

WELCOME TO MY NERVOUS SYSTEM

My name is Pete Fij. Welcome to my world.



You might know me as  the lead singer of Adorable or Polak, maybe through my ongoing project with Terry Bickers, or perhaps my recent collaboration with Tiger Stripes. This isn't planned as a standard music artist website, although I'm sure that this will have more than it's fair share of musical aspects, but it's more of a meandering through my thoughts - a journey through my nervous system.



Not quite sure where it will go - it will probably be like a part-work magazine that comes out in instalments, and grows week-by-week into either a fascinating insight into a particular topic, or more often than not , an untidy pile of magazines in the corner of your room that you end up putting in a box and forgetting about for a few years, until one day you finally snap and take it to a car boot sale to sell. Of course it's only then that you realise that no-one else wants it either, so it remains unsold and ultimately the box ends it's days at the local rubbish tip - recycled so that they can make some more part-work magazines that no-one else really needs.


Hope this untidy pile gives you an insight into a little bit about me and some of my work. Don't be a stranger - pop on back as this will be an evolving, living thing. Enjoy your trip around my nervous system, though please be careful where you  probe, and if it all gets a bit too much, just head for the nearest orifice, and get the hell out.





The posts will be sporadic, but I aim to have something posted at least once a month.

Monday, 7 October 2013

THINGS I HAVE FOUND IN BOOKS


 I am giving a talk on Wednesday October 9th in Petworth, Surrey for the Petworth Society entitled "Things I Have Found In Books". 

Here is the official spiel:


By night Pete Fijalkowski is a singer-songwriter (formerly on the iconic Creation records label), by day he sells second-hand books. In 'Things I Have Found In Books' , first aired at the Latiutude Festival in 2012, he talks about some of the forgotten objects that he has discovered amongst the pages of the paperbacks that he sells by the broken down West Pier on Brighton seafront - lost photos, bizarre shopping lists and letters. Using slides, he guides us through the sometimes funny, and sometimes poignant flotsam & jetsam of these forgotten artifacts. 



In the second part of his talk "From Petworth to Baden-Baden" Pete tells how he set himself the task of selling seemingly unsaleable books culled at the end of Petworth Society's monthly booksales. Will he ever sell a 1986 book entitled 'Setting Up Your Own Mail Order Business', a 1971 hardback of "Better steeple chasing  for jockey's", a spotters guide to birds of New Zealand,  and is there anyone who wants to buy a 1974 guide book to the small German town of  Baden Baden? He tells of the people who bought some of these orphaned books that most had given up hope of ever finding a home for - and of the some of the intriguing & surprsing stories of why people decided to give these seeming lost causes a loving home.

It starts at 7.30pm at Leconfield Hall, Market Square, Petworth. tickets are erm...not sure - about £4 or £5 ish on the door.