I received my first "happy birthday" message for this year, this morning. There is little that can make you feel more 'old before your time' than someone, with the best of intentions, propelling you in to another digit by the assumption that you are older than you are!
Actually, age and birthdays don't bother me in truth. They are the inevitable consequence of staying alive, not generally considered a bad thing. As I grow older I can increasingly see the truth in that Bob Dylan lyric from "My Back Pages" when he sings:
Ah, but I was so much older then
I'm younger than that now.
So, how to celebrate this annual event with my blog chums? What I've decided to do is to share the three episodes of a story called "A Birthday Treat", one each day, culminating with B-day. It is from the Just William books of Richmal Crompton, books that were a source of enormous pleasure to me as a boy. Now that I am a big boy, I still get pleasure from the tales of the impish ten year old, now in the form of audiobooks, intermittently released by the BBC. They are read by Martin Jarvis, who has become the voice of William Brown and does a delicious job of it. Fancy a secret meeting of The Outlaws at the old barn? Come on then...
Life would be a dull affair without the peaks we occasionally experience, those moments when our cares leave us temporarily, we throw back our heads and just enjoy being alive. What we sometimes forget is that there can only be peaks if there are valleys as well, otherwise it would be a long flat plain.
I'm not saying anything new here I know - energy can neither be created or destroyed, yin/yang, some days you eat the bear, some days the bear...yaddah, yaddah, yaddah (as our American cousins might say - cuttingly but accurately). What it does do though is allow me to play a belting song by a young British band, The Holloways, of whom you may or may not have heard. The message in the lyrics is a simple one, but it is too easy in our affluent society (you're sat in front of a computer connected to the internet reading this so, yes, you are affluent) to discount the things that we have and concentrate on what we are not happy about in our lives. No criticism is implied by this, I'm one of the worst offenders!
I don't presume for a moment that I'm part of The Holloways' target demographic, but isn't it great that we can learn things from people in generations that follow our own. Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings...
No copyright infringement intended, just spreading the word. Buy their album "So This Is Great Britain" - I did!
The Edinburgh International Festival of the Arts starts next week. More importantly for me, it's cuckoo, the fringe festival, starts too. To visit "Auld Reekie" as she is also known, at this time of year, can be prohibitively expensive and it is why I would thank God if I believed in a monotheistic concept of one God over all, that I have friends in that beautiful city with whom I can stay.
Unusually, due to my company giving us extra holidays (for a "voluntary" cut in pay ...hem, hem) I'm able to spend a week there instead of my usual long weekend. This is, without question, my highlight of the year. I scratch away, earning the corporate groat all year, but for these few fabulous days in August I connect with who I could have been and who I really am and wallow in the drama, comedy, art and wierdness of it all.
Naturally, the "bread heads" have smelled an easy buck and things have become "slicker" over the years with the ticket prices becoming increasingly more expensive* (there are several blog entries worth on their own whilst I expand on what is wrong with the fringe). There will be over 2000 shows to choose from, the usual price of entry in to which is £8-£10.
Luckily though, a fight back has begun and there is a new movement called "The Free Festival". The premise of this is that one goes to the show and admission is free, but a bucket is passed around in to which it is hoped that one will put the amount of money one thinks appropriate. It started small, but it is a rising tide and so God speed say I, caveats as outlined above regarding a single God still pertaining.
I don't want to be a fringe (or "Fest" as we cogniscenti say) bore, so I'll stop here and let you enjoy a humourous song by a long time Fest stalwart, Boothby Graffoe. His accompanyist on this occasion being the outrageously talented Antonio Forcione. Boothby now works with the similarly staggering multi-instrumentalist Nick Pynn. I'll be catching up with the lovely and unassuming Nick again, as per, this year.
Imagine then a small room with black hessian draped over three walls and fifty bentwood chairs arranged in rows. You've picked up a room temperature tin of beer at the door and now the act introduces themselves. Welcome to the Fest!
* My definition of "expensive" is something that you do not believe is value for money on a personal level. I've got a coat - it cost me £300 and every time that I put it on I feel special. Therefore, it is value for money.
Within that small, and I like to think select and hand picked, coterie of people who bother to regularly read my blog, I suspect that Charlotte (Jollyweez - for it is she!) needs no introduction.
I promised Charlotte a song. Those with some knowledge of her situation will have a greater appreciation of the one I have selected than others, but everyone is welcome to enjoy it.
The singer is an amateur from Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam. I love the guilessness of his rendition of this really old Bee Gees song. There are more polished versions available, but there are few with more love poured in to them by the performer. If you like this, check the rest of his YouTube posts out - some are just as charming, if not more so than this.
The lyrics are aspirational - whatever time it is in our lives, there will be a dawn tomorrow and so each new day brings the potential of being "The Morning Of Our Lives". Life is not behind us, it is in front of us.
I've just heard of the death earlier today of Harry Patch. He was the last surviving soldier to have fought in the trenches in The Great War. It is now no longer living history.
He was a quite remarkable man who did not speak of his wartime experiences until very, very late in his long life - he was 111 when he died. But when he did speak, it was with a humbling eloquence - unsentimentally recalling how it felt to be pitched in to that hellish conflict. If you have not yet heard him speak, when you do (and one should if we are to learn anything from history) I absolutely guarantee that you will be affected by his simple but emphatic words.
The clip I've chosen might not be thought of as appropriately deferential by many, but I have a feeling that Harry Patch would have understood and even been pleased with my choice. War is not glorious, and this song from the film "Oh What A Lovely War" makes that point as well as any song I know. For the common soldier it was all about surviving. The burying of comrades, as is depicted in this scene, must have engendered the extremes of mixed emotions in those who had yet to die.
I'm not an overtly political person. Naturally, I have my opinions on the right order of things and it would be fair to say that this is informed by an upbringing supervised by working class, Labour Party activist parents. I did not follow their dogma slavishly, but I respected the fact that they knew of what they spoke.
Maggie Thatcher and her governments loomed over my sweetest years and coloured my world. It was not a colour that matched anything I wore - and in an environment that celebrated excess, small people with no financial clout became increasingly disenfranchised. In this poem set to music, the at times quite breathtakingly good John Cooper-Clarke, "The Bard of Salford", captures perfectly the loss of pride and increasing social exclusion that a "greed is good" culture promoted.
I'm lucky - I am not one of the people of whom he speaks, but I'm still made angry, even now, by this perfectly formed (in my opinion) Kodak moment for the non-camera owning people of Britain's Beasley Streets.
Easily one of my favourite poems by one the great English poets of the 20th century and also one of the least easy of men to love I would opine. I'm not even sure that he liked himself that much.
Larkin's own reading of his poem is peerless. I've travelled on these same train tracks, Hull to London and in his pin sharp vignettes he captures for me all of the excitement and ennui of other people's late spring Saturday afternoons in a land now lost to us. I only wish that he had made more of his last line - ringing it like a bell - but this is a small carp.
For anyone interested, last night I promised you a song that is a challenging but, I believe, ultimately rewarding listen, from the same "Rogue's Gallery" album of piratically related songs - a project bankrolled by Johnny Depp after his 'Pirates of the Caribbean" success - as last night's more emollient posting.
Although North American, Baby Gramps' vocal stylings remind me of nothing so much as throat singing - something I have been lucky enough to witness in Mongolia. It is, there is no doubt, an acquired taste, but since you are all people of artistic precocity I expect that you'll all get it within a play or two. Even if it doesn't appeal first time through, can I please urge you to give it more than one listen? The song will reward the persistent...honest!
So, it is a traditional sea song, maybe even a shanty (pedants ascribe this epithet only to particular work songs, usually capstan based), but I hope that you'll agree that this interpretation lifts it above the ordinary.
As always, copyright, no intention, take down doodlee doodlee doo...
Tonight I'm posting a story song.
The singer is Loudon Wainwright III; the song is a traditional ballad culled from an album sponsored by Johnny Depp, hot on the heels of his execrable (personal opinion) "Pirates of the doodah..." franchise. Good on him that some of his money was spent wisely.
It is really a softener for a song that I really love on the "Rogue's Gallery" album on which a number of musical luminaries try their hand at songs of the sea. I'll post that more difficult to love song tomorrow. Meanwhile enjoy dipping your toe into those warm but treacherous waters...yo, ho, ho.
The usual no intention/copyright/take down straight away/just trying to spread the word stuff applies.
I don't suppose I'll keep this up here long. "Why post it at all then?" I hear you cry. My inadequate response is that I've just finished listening to a documentary on the radio (BBC Radio Four's "Archive Hour" - available on 'Listen Again' for just seven days...starting now!). It was about Soho (the original London district, no imitations countenanced) through it's glory days of the 40's and 50's to it's sad and seedy decline and on to some sort of half-arsed pseudo bo-ho revival now. The programme, fronted by Graham "Suggs" McPherson of the white-ska band "Madness" was rather better than I expected but that still isn't the point of my post.
Graham used surprisingly little music to counterpoint his story of this special quarter where gangland met art on equal terms, but right at the end he used a montage of Soho related tunes, one of which was "Rainy Night in Soho" by The Pogues.
The lead singer and major songwriting force behind The Pogues, Shane MacGowan, is worthy of a post (or several) on his own. Suffice to say here that the enigma of Shane is that he has written so many beautiful, meaningful and touching songs given his chosen (?) alcohol preoccupied lifestyle. His greatness will only truly be celebrated on the announcement of his long postponed, though daily expected, death. Listen to his music - including this song, to hear the soul of a sensitive summariser of our age, crying out whilst trapped inside of a pint of plain, so to speak.
I'm fond of saying that my love affair with modern verse began in the mid-sixties with the Penguin edition of "The Mersey Sound", featuring the poems of Roger McGough, Adrian Henri and Brian Patten. But that's not quite true. It began with my brother who, unwittingly or otherwise, left his copy of the book behind in a bedroom we had been sharing, upon returning to the navy from home leave one long ago summer. Without that, and the ennui of an August afternoon in my callow youth leading me to pick it up, I may have missed so much.
That book lit a spark with many thousands of people and is famously the UK's best selling poetry book ever. Of the three poets featured I connected most with Roger McGough, whose voice has never lost it's wonderment and celebration of the prosaic. I have remained a fan ever since.
His reading of "To Macca's (Paul McCartney's) Trousers" here has the ring of truth; Roger worked for several years in a group called The Scaffold ("Lily the Pink") with Paul's brother Michael. I find it an inconsequential but very winning poem, describing as it does an ordinary pair of trousers that once knew fame. Why on earth would the multi-millionaire Paul want his trousers back? Well, because it's part of Roger's hopes and dreams to be asked, thats why!
I hope that you enjoy this and, if you do, please let me recommend the poetry blog run by "kendrive". If you haven't been over to it yet, you should.
I haven't posted for a few days so, despite running against the clock to do so, I thought I'd make a quick attempt now.
I've chosen to share a rendition of his own poem, "To Whom It May Concern" by the much missed Adrian Mitchell, who passed away late last year. It is hard for people today, particularly those not around in 1965 from when this short recital dates, to imagine how powerful this verse was back then. The USA's involvement in Vietnam was still ramping up at the time and there was a real fear in the UK that we would get sucked in to the war too.
Luckily, contemporary art was starting to be taken seriously, entering the mainstream, and the poetry boom was starting to gain momentum too - not least because of The Beatles patronage of such things.
Even if you listen only once to this heartfelt performance of probably his most famous poem, let me thank you for at least doing that. I hope that it gives some food for thought. A troubled world is sadly, not a new phenomenon.
"Clean Elvis" by Dan Reeder from his album "Dan Reeder" on Oh Boy! Records.
Don't be fooled by your initial impression of the music of the criminally neglected Dan Reeder. Listen closely and you'll soon start to see how he often smuggles strong messages past the guards under cover of pretty tunes... He is capable of writing straightforward ones too, and ones that just make you smile.
Dan's got a MySpace page and two albums out at this point: an eponymous one and "Sweetheart"; both are available on Amazon. I don't "do" iTunes on principal so I don't know if he is up there or not although I would guess that he is.
No copyright infringement is intended by posting this song here, I'm just trying to spread the word. I'll take it down any time Dan or his people ask me to.
For anyone outside of the UK the title of this entry will probably be lost. No matter, the kernel of the matter in hand is readily understood.
Rolf Harris (an Australian "light entertainer" who found fame on the BBC in the early sixties - The Beatles were guests on his Saturday night TV show, THAT'S how famous he was here) has had "mixed press" for his music all of his career but this is - and I sincerely believe this - one of his finest musical moments. I'm using it as my theme for 2009, which is designated at the the year in which I drag myself in to a sunlit future. I hope that this song jiggles with your optimism button as much as it does mine!
I'm pressed for time this week, but wanted to post something so I had a look in my documents folder and found this poem that I wrote...guess when!
At the time I lived just outside of Harrogate, North Yorkshire (a beautiful town - it won my affections). Home was the servant's quarters attached to a rather grand house a couple of miles down a sheep track in the middle of nowhere. Sally, with whom I rented what we called "the cottage", and I thereby had all of the perks of living in a country pile (gardeners, peace lovely peace and pheasants to wake one up each day)with none of the expense!
It wasn't all a bed of roses and I was living there for one of the saddest of reasons, but all in all it was a special place. As I drove down a hill on my way to the cottage, leaving Harrogate on the Skipton Road, the scene before me filled my heart and so I wrote this poem. I probably shouldn't say this, but for me it catches those moments perfectly. Maybe you had to be there...
YORKSHIRE, FROST, FEBRUARY 2008
Outside
The fingers of the frost are touching up the grass again
The grass might like this I don’t know; sweetness could be transferred by the cold one’s kiss.
What I do know is that for today, mid-February,
We had all that late spring days should bring
Including sun until dusk, and when driving down the Skipton road I saw
The mist like candyfloss flow round the trees
As they stood helpless in the valley ahead.
The chill arrived unsaid but felt, and ripped us from the fruiting time to coal.
Inside
Half promised, part consumed within the hearth whose heat I half resent.
The smoke will drift in to the wind and maybe warm the errant sheep* up on the lane
This is unlikely though, since frost has gripped the grass and acts
Like skinny snow.
*As I drove up the lane from the cottage this afternoon my way was blocked by a dozen sheep who had got out from the field and were grazing on the hedgerows. They panicked at my arrival in the car and could not understand the threat I represented so, fearful of a sudden move that might damage my car I drove with great caution until got past them and up to the farm. At the farm I said “Some sheep are loose in the lane”.
“Not mine mate” came the less than useful reply.
I'm sat hear listening to a radio adaption of the John Buchan adventure yarn "The Courts of the Morning". It is a ripping tale of derring do and I'm enjoying it hugely.
I remembered that the John Buchan books are a real favourite of a pal of mine - an author probably best known for "The Thirty-Nine Steps". I don't share my pal's fondness for these books although he'll be pleased that I even gave "earspace" to one the more obscure volumes in the canon.
Regrettably, neither was I able to counter - enthuse him about one of my favourite authors - Graham Greene (Our Man in Havana, The Quiet American, The Honorary Consul and many more). The book I had selected to entice him with was the carefully selected "Travels With My Aunt", a picaresque and darkly humurous tale of a quiet bank manager whisked away in the late 1960's on to a series of jaunts by his gutsy and eccentric Aunt. The novel also has a nice twist which I won't spoil here.
If you have a favourite author, who is it and how (and with what volume) would you try to recruit further fans?
I've been a fan of John Prine's music since I first got interested in music at all and it is great that over recent years his own countrymen have recognised his greatness too.
The song I've chosen to share today is not so deep and meaningful as many he has written, but it is full of heart and affection for it's subjects, a decidedly blue collar couple bereft (or robbed?) of very high aspirations. Still, they get by, have a little fun where they can find it and love each other. Hopefully it will make you grin as much as it does me!
For what it's worth, the line that makes me smile most is "He drinks his beer like its oxygen"...fantastic.
A mellow and reflective way to mark the close of the "new" Americans big day...I hope that Tess appreciates that I've chosen a Swedish concert version (for me, and for other reasons, this song will always mean Gibraltar).
If you don't know about Spinal Tap I'm afraid that the title of this very brief entry and the contents themselves will not mean a lot to you.
For the rest, guess what? I've just gone on to "listen again" on BBC7 via Mozilla Firefox. The volume wasn't great on the iPlayer so I turned it up to max and yes, it really did GO UP TO ELEVEN!!!
The recent run of hot sunny days left NW Ireland a couple of days ago, to be replaced by ineffective showers and a very uncomfortable, sticky humidity. I was teaching yesterday and (I hope this is no reflection on me!) one of the attendees nodded off :-). He is an older guy and carrying too much weight says me!) and I think that those climate conditions are a bit of a struggle.
Anyway, since the early hours of this morning it has been raining properly and pretty constantly. Whilst I miss the sun, it is nice to have some clear air to breathe...although it can stop when it likes now!
This song is from Clive Gregson and Christine Collister. As soon as I heard it (I was living in an industrial town in Northern England at the time) I immediately connected with it. It doesn't have much to do with today's rain but I thought I'd share it anyway. Yes, that rain did eventually wash me away from that town.
(No infringement of copyright is intended and I will remove it immediately if the artist so wishes - but hey Clive, please don't!).
