“Richard Edson's Year Zero Lockdown Journal is a dramaticeyewitness account of 2020-21 in Los Angeles, his observations matched by acavalcade of images, turns moody, haunted, ominous, meditative, andreassuringly banal--then the police riots following the murder of George Floydturn the mode to combat photography. This book is terrific, the pictures anddesign are perfect."- Lucy Sante (Writer, Critic, and frequent contributor tothe New York Review of Books)“Richard Edson's Year Zero Lockdown Journal marks a uniqueand riveting addition to the genre of Covid Lit. With a voice all his own andphotographs that capture the dark heart of plague-time Los Angeles, Edson'svision is evocative of work as diverse as Bill Owens, WB Sebald, or Bukowski ifhe owned a camera. Edson's text and photos make this the perfect tome to curlup with and ride out the next pandemic.- Jerry Stahl (Novelist & Screenwriter ofPermanent Midnight)“Richard Edson has always expressed a contemplative naturelaced with humor, mostly at the absurdity so rife in the human condition. It'swhat you see in his photography, glean from his words, and hear in his music.You certainly see it in his evocative and beautiful visage. The pandemic yearseems like a bad dream we've all woken from and do not want to hear aboutagain. But, in Richard's photo-journal, initially recounting a frightenedand confused state – as so many of us were in – leading into conflictedfeelings of self-regard through forced isolation, and then to the groupactivism spurred by the police killing of George Floyd, the power of resistancerefuting the discombobulation of community, Richard encounters his essence–that of positive vibrations, the manifest of his drums, his trumpet, his poetryand prose, alive in conversation, in exchange, sharing, caring, daring, andstaying aware – come hell or high water. This is a magnificent read."- Thurston Moore (Guitarist and Founding member of SonicYouth)“During the pandemic, Richard Edson chose to venture outdaily, with bicycle and camera, to discover once-familiar, even mundane detailsnow transformed by a new, unpredicted perspective. Finding a quiet beauty in aworld suddenly stopped, and later a turbulent energy heightened by socialdisturbances and the powerful BLM movement, what accumulates is a very movingpersonal document but one resonating with planetary implications." – Jim Jarmusch (Film Director, Screenwriter and Producer ofStranger Than Paradise, Down by Law, Ghost Dog, and Only Lovers Left Alive)
