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Earl Sikkorski’s Golden Treasury: A facsimile of The Jazz Butcher fan club scrapbook, pinned out, examined under the microscope and expanded upon
Pat Fish, the incorrigible Jazz Butcher himself, shared the old fan club scrapbook with me when we were writing a previous book. He said something like “you might find this interesting”. The scrapbook itself consists of 41 pages of multi-layered origami and pasting, curated by Earl Sikkorski, president of the fan club.
After Pat died and I finished and published ‘Miracles and Wonders’ as best I could, I had planned to turn my addled brain to a giant Danish polar explorer and a mad, satanic Russian-French painter. The Jazz Butcher itch, however, had not quite settled. There was still a whole lot more to be discovered, …out there… I therefore embarked on a hunt for folks who had corresponded with Sikkorski, sent in letters, postcards, questionnaires and artworks to the fan club, in the period 1984 to 1986. This, of course, was a time when the first flushes of success and ‘stardom’ were beginning to be experienced by The Jazz Butcher band.
I managed to track down, with the help of the internet, via a network of Jazz Butcher fanatics and a few ‘missing persons’ APBs, enough of those mid-eighties correspondents to make something of this expanded facsimile of the scrapbook. Some have added their own commentary. Others have even rummaged in their attics for memorabilia. Whenever I turned over a rock, something surprising and miraculous popped out.
This is first and foremost a fan tribute piece. Not a fan tribute to The Jazz Butcher, although that is evident here too. It’s a tribute to the fanatics themselves. Like me, some of them are obsessive, meticulous and have plainly nothing better to do. Others, those with lives, may have just formed a temporary dalliance with the oeuvre, before skipping off into the wider world. We forgive them, except Pat was around until 2021, so please do explore the later work, much of which is rather fine.
“‘Mildly embarrassed’ doesn’t quite capture it! Mortified might.” An exercise in collective mortification it may be, but, as one of the correspondents said, if we can ‘embrace the shame’ for the sake of it, it may turn out to be a joyful piece.
Surprisingly, Earl Sikkorski herself appeared during the making of this book. Somewhat begrudgingly and bemused as to who on earth might be interested in all this. She threw light on the scrapbook’s travels. In fact it was she who had kept it for over 30 years, deciding during the course of many moves and sort-outs, to keep it. Then, through an intermediatory, it found its way back to Pat only a few years ago. He received it, without a word of thanks. Nevertheless, he kept it in the top drawer of his desk thereafter.
Anyway, here it is, if you want it. “You might find this interesting”.
After Pat died and I finished and published ‘Miracles and Wonders’ as best I could, I had planned to turn my addled brain to a giant Danish polar explorer and a mad, satanic Russian-French painter. The Jazz Butcher itch, however, had not quite settled. There was still a whole lot more to be discovered, …out there… I therefore embarked on a hunt for folks who had corresponded with Sikkorski, sent in letters, postcards, questionnaires and artworks to the fan club, in the period 1984 to 1986. This, of course, was a time when the first flushes of success and ‘stardom’ were beginning to be experienced by The Jazz Butcher band.
I managed to track down, with the help of the internet, via a network of Jazz Butcher fanatics and a few ‘missing persons’ APBs, enough of those mid-eighties correspondents to make something of this expanded facsimile of the scrapbook. Some have added their own commentary. Others have even rummaged in their attics for memorabilia. Whenever I turned over a rock, something surprising and miraculous popped out.
This is first and foremost a fan tribute piece. Not a fan tribute to The Jazz Butcher, although that is evident here too. It’s a tribute to the fanatics themselves. Like me, some of them are obsessive, meticulous and have plainly nothing better to do. Others, those with lives, may have just formed a temporary dalliance with the oeuvre, before skipping off into the wider world. We forgive them, except Pat was around until 2021, so please do explore the later work, much of which is rather fine.
“‘Mildly embarrassed’ doesn’t quite capture it! Mortified might.” An exercise in collective mortification it may be, but, as one of the correspondents said, if we can ‘embrace the shame’ for the sake of it, it may turn out to be a joyful piece.
Surprisingly, Earl Sikkorski herself appeared during the making of this book. Somewhat begrudgingly and bemused as to who on earth might be interested in all this. She threw light on the scrapbook’s travels. In fact it was she who had kept it for over 30 years, deciding during the course of many moves and sort-outs, to keep it. Then, through an intermediatory, it found its way back to Pat only a few years ago. He received it, without a word of thanks. Nevertheless, he kept it in the top drawer of his desk thereafter.
Anyway, here it is, if you want it. “You might find this interesting”.
210 pages, Hardcover
Published November 26, 2022
1 person want to read
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