Kata Rokkar — Kata Rokkar – A Bay Area based blog about music, life and stuff by Shawn Robbins.

Where is Your Masterpiece?

8

06/1/2009

Music, Uncategorized

My friend Ryan Pink passed away last weekend. Without getting too much into detail, he was haunted by a life that never gave him much room to breathe. What came out of it was art that I admire to this very day and will admire for the rest of my life. I have revisited it with a bit more care, and I continue to find amazing beauty in the way Ryan takes jagged, rusty words and puts them together with duct tape to create these vivid scenes. Through both his poetry and his music, Ryan expressed himself like no one I had ever known and it always felt honest and fluid. Nothing was forced or saturated with influence. The only influence he knew was the life he lived and he translated that for anyone that cared to listen (or read). He trusted me with his music and I did what I could to promote his music through websites. Sometimes I fear I didn’t do enough.

What I can do for you now is share his words and his music with you. Below is the last poem he shared with us as well as his full album, “Hate Speech.”

There is so much talent and so much truth in this art. I hope these songs find you as they did with me.

Where is Your Masterpiece?

What he expected was something magical:
laughter and music and smoke and billiard balls,
banging into each other
like drunks with a purpose.

He expected conversation until the orange dawn
under the blue glow of the fading moon and those comfortable sighs
that bring those comfortable silences.

He said, “Tell my boy I could’ve done worse.”

He lived in an empty house,
’bout a mile up the road from purgatory.
A home too cluttered with ghosts and refuse
to walk a straight path to his bed,
in a room too quiet to lay his head
and find rest.

He said, “California… now that’s ’bout nine hours west of Bernallio County
and a few blocks from the concrete towers standing in my way.”

The rosy green mountains stood to the east
and the dry, dying river to The West was once mighty,
even grand,
before it shrank into mud. The sight of it made him tired.
The sight of it made him uncomfortable.

He said, “Spirits walk the riverbank, wishing they were lost.”

He understood the difference between medicine and medication
and found relief
in neither.

His father was a strong man – never a boy, never a son,
but always,
always,
he was joy…
just like she was.

He said, “Tell my boy I can be the same; I don’t need to be saved.”

When they asked him where it was, where he was going,
he had no answer. Vague, yes, but sincere, honest,
and headstrong,
eyes gazing away from the orange blister
of the rising sun.

He said, “You can’t raise a boy on shame.”

And so he grabbed his paint
and his brush
and waded the river,
before the sun could cross
and blind his sight.

“Beauty,” he said, “a true masterpiece, is the joy
that I am.”

And so he got to work.

Ryan Pink

Sleep well my friend. I will miss you.

Full Download of Hate Speech

Click to Download Ryan Pink – Just Like A Real Person

Click to Download Ryan Pink – What’s So Great About Being Happy?

Click to Download Ryan Pink – God at Gunpoint

Click to Download Ryan Pink – Sadie Smiles The Same Way When She Tells The Truth

Click to Download Ryan Pink – Something That Happened

Click to Download Ryan Pink – Gasoline

Click to Download Ryan Pink – Miller Was A Liar

Click to Download Ryan Pink – We’ll See

Click to Download Ryan Pink – Bash’s

Click to Download Ryan Pink – As Modest as You Want to be

Click to Download Ryan Pink – His Night

Click to Download Ryan Pink – In The Middle of the Castle

  • Danielle Kerley

    Nice Work:) thanks for sharing…..

    CHEERS PINK:)

  • Gareth

    Thanks for uploading this Shawn, I despaired of ever tracking down his mp3s again after losing them ages ago. RIP Ryan, you magnificent and troubled son of a bitch.

  • Kira

    I also knew Ryan very well. He was an amazing man in every way possible. He altered my life in many ways. I will never be the same with out him. Rest in peace Ryan. I love u and I will miss u always.

  • http://www.cougarmicrobes.com Cougar

    I didnt know Ryan, but the tracks you posted really got me emotionally. Thanks for sharing.

  • http://katarokkar.cribble.net kata.rokkar

    Cougar,

    Thank you for listening. It means a lot.

    – Shawn

  • Mike Whitt

    I knew Ryan since we were 13 years old. We both played guitar in a band together for a few years in Junior High and High School.

    I just found this out.

    Godspeed, Ryan.

  • KarenZ

    I never met Ryan. I never actually spoke with him. But he is an important person in my life. In a very real sense he helped me to see; He took a step that no doubt caused him some emotional pain, but which ripped the blinders off me and made me see some important realities. We exchanged email occasionally after that. He wrote an account of TB that I have often used to help other parents understand the realities; powerfully validating what their own kids had tried to explain. This account is one that has touched and helped many people. He was clearly so intelligent; and he seemed (as far as I could tell) to be achieving his goals; successful,happy and content. He isn’t one of the “kids” I worried about. I can’t tell you how shocked I was to read of his death – or how sad it makes me. I wish so much – and I am sure everyone who knew him wishes the same – that I could have helped – that he would have given me the chance to help. . .

  • ARA

    I wish I could read a new poem or hear a new song. I miss him in ways I don’t miss people from real life.