RJ Battles

I love writing this blog, RJ Battles. It's given me a chance to write about things that interest me and I've found a lot of images that I otherwise would never have seen (for example, the Frank Black poster below).

In 2000 I started buying the re-releases of old Elvis Costello albums- deluxe editions with bonus tracks tacked on at ther end and full liner notes written by EC. The liner notes, in fact, were sometimes my favorite thing- he's a great storyteller.

I looked around on the internet, hoping that I'd find a site that reprinted the liner notes and I found such a page once. Over the years I've tried to find pages, other than Eyesore, that showed record sleeve scans. Eyesore is great, but in most cases they only show the front cover. I'm always looking for backs and insides.

I've had the best luck with actual record selletrs online. Often they'll have scans of the front, back, inside, and even the CD or record label itself.

Here at RJ Battles I've tried to collect all these things in one place. RJ Battles is the kind of site I've been looking for all these years. If you want to see all the different versions of the Belly "Feed The Tree" tree photos and the inside and back cover sleeves, this is the place. I've been looking for my Sweet Ride booklet (I think it's in my parents' attic) so I can post Tanya Donelly's liner notes.

I think this page appeals to a very small audience- I know there aren't a lot of people looking for Belly record sleeves from 1992, but I think that the people who are looking for that will be very happy to find this site.

Plus, people coming here are going to see a lot of cool things that they might not ever see otherwise, for example, Christiane Kubrick's floral oil paintings.

I started RJ Battles in October of 2008. In the fist year almost nobody was reading this blog but that was fine. In fact, I think it was better. That way, once someone found this page there was a big backlog of posts that readers could explore.

Even though I write this blog for my own enjoyment, I'm glad that other people have found it and enjoy it too. I'm thankful that people have taken the time to read RJ Battles and comment on the posts; it's very encouraging.

Thank you for coming. I hope to see you again soon.