Friday, October 29, 2004
Last night...
I dreamt all my toes were falling off. It wasn't nice.
What does this mean?!
NJS
10/29/2004 10:45:00 am
Thursday, October 28, 2004
Stormy Clouds
The train home from work normally takes between 12 and 22 minutes, depending on whether I catch the 1722 (straight to Dawlish) or the 1727 (stops everywhere). Last night I left work just after quarter past five and ran to the train station, afraid I was going to miss the 1722 and end up having to wait for the 1756. I did have to wait, but not until 1756.
The 1722 arrived at 1741 or thereabouts, just after the 1727 had arrived on the other platform. They let us through first (they always do, because it’s a faster train – it’s often a gamble deciding which train to get, the safely arrived 1727 or the delayed 1722, which they often allow to pass the other train just before Dawlish) even if it’s departed Exeter 10 or more minutes after the 1727), and we trundled to Dawlish Warren. I knew the weather was bad because on the way to work a load of seawater had been dumped on my bag through the vent in ceiling of the train when a wave hit us., and I suspected the train might take it’s time traversing the sea wall. High tide was due at about 1840, so it was bound to be touch-and-go. If they just stopped at Dawlish Warren I could phone my dad or girlfriend and get them to come and fetch me, drive me the two miles or so from the Warren to home rather than having to endure a cramped train carriage being battered and buffeted by the engorged, enraged sea. But the train pulled some 50 yards past Dawlish Warren platform, and stopped. And remained stopped. For half an hour or more. So we sat there, being told nothing more than that the line down the sea wall being checked for safety and we were awaiting permission to use it. A guy I know phoned his brother and got him to go to Dawlish station and find out what was going on. I gather he couldn’t actually get to Dawlish station, because the whole of the sea front was flooded.
Finally, at half past six they announced they were going to take us back to Exeter and arrange coaches. I hoped and prayed they’d stop at Dawlish Warren, even Starcross, to allow people who had been travelling to Dawlish and Teignmouth to get off and seek alternative transport, lifts, local buses, taxis even. People (myself included) were standing this note in italics goes out to anyone who takes up two seats on a train to themselves because they are a sleeping student or a pig-headed businessman or an ignorant fuck of any other creed or vocation [little old ladies excepted] and leaves other people standing because your bag or feet or laptop is more important than another human being – YOU ARE SCUM, YOU ARE THE EXCREMENT ON THE SHOES OF HUMANITY, I HOPE YOU DIE IN YOUR SLEEP YOU SELFISH, INSENSITIVE, BAD-MANNERED FUCKS – end italics and the train was hot, cramped, and tense. A claustrophobic old lady said she felt faint. I opened the window nearest to me and got a couple of other people to open windows near them too.
They didn’t stop at Dawlish Warren, only fifty yards away, or Starcross, another mile or two up the line. They trundled us all the way back to Exeter. I phoned my dad and got him to drive to the station, knowing there’d be hundreds of people and not enough buses and not wanting to suffer the stress. It took him twice as long as it would normally take, because of flooding in Starcross and Dawlish. I went to the pub across the road from Exeter St Davids and necked two pints of Guinness.
I finally got home after 8pm.
NJS
10/28/2004 08:37:00 am
Wednesday, October 27, 2004
Floods in Devon = I am listening to The Penguin Cafe Orchestra and thinking happy thoughts...
fadeout95: who are they?
NickJSouthall: um
NickJSouthall: hard to describe
NickJSouthall: avant-garde twee orchestral chamber pop
fadeout95: valliant attempt.
NickJSouthall: melodies played on mobile phones and such like
NickJSouthall: IT'S MY JOB
fadeout95: haha. I like that.
NickJSouthall: hurdy gurdies and harmoniums and stuff
fadeout95: do you have any experience with really annoying roommates?
NickJSouthall: oh god
NickJSouthall: when i was 19 i tried to burn down my flat because i hated the people i lived with
NickJSouthall: THIS IS WHY I CANT REMEMBER 1998
fadeout95: hahhahahah
NickJSouthall: i told them satan was coming
fadeout95: my follow-up question was going to be "how did you handle them?" but now I'm not quite so sure I want to know.
NickJSouthall: i lft the flat
NickJSouthall: and drank a lot
NickJSouthall: read too much sartre
NickJSouthall: went into total existential crisis
NickJSouthall: wrote the maddest exam paper ever
NickJSouthall: got a 2;1
fadeout95: I have no idea what that means.
NickJSouthall: sat ona seawall that summer reading american psycho and cried my eyes out cos i identified with him
NickJSouthall: 2;1 = grade b
fadeout95: nice.
fadeout95: mine's a theatre major. He keeps doing phonetic exercises and rehearsing lines badly and screaming a lot.
fadeout95: I'm trying to drown him out but it's not humanly possible.
NickJSouthall: is he kicking a football against your door atb 4am and screaming "wake up you weird cunt" at you?
fadeout95: no don't think so.
NickJSouthall: has his best mate (who you are sure he is in love with in a very repressed homosexual way) thrust his hand through your kitchen window, severing an artery and leaving you to pluck glass out of his hand?
fadeout95: not yet, no.
NickJSouthall: then yr lucky
fadeout95: I see.
NickJSouthall: in my third year my room mate and i fired eggs on our kitchen floor one night
fadeout95: fried eggs/
NickJSouthall: we poured absinthe on the floor and set it alight and cracked eggs in it
NickJSouthall: we had drunk lots
fadeout95: natch.
NickJSouthall: 9this might help you understand me better)
fadeout95: I think I get the general idea.
NickJSouthall: aye
NickJSouthall: university fucked me up
fadeout95: I so anticipate your autobiography when you turn 45 or so.
NickJSouthall: haha
NJS
10/27/2004 10:40:00 pm
More musing on death.
I think part of the reason Peel (and also Clough) dying has hit me so hard is the fact that we're at a point in history were we've had 50 years of television, radio, pop music, magazines, popular culture - and that first generation of "normal" people to become famous on an every day level, people who everybody knew but who weren't superstars, who moved in a different moonlight to Cary Grant or James Dean or Marilyn Monroe but who were just as much a part of history and even more so a part of our lives... that first generation are all in their 60s and 70s now, and beginning to die of natural causes. Early deaths, rock star deaths, overdoses, spectacular car crashes, shootings… in a way are all much easier to accept than someone who has, for people under 40, always just been there, present, a building block of the popular culture, just dying, dying because they’re old and have run out of time to live.
NJS
10/27/2004 10:49:00 am
Tuesday, October 26, 2004
Sometimes you just write and you don't really know what or why, you just have to type. Other people will say it better, more knowingly, more profoundly, but this is my two pence.
John Peel would, I’m sure, appreciate the fact that radio Five Live has just followed a tribute to his life and a commemoration of his death with an article about what kind of biscuits British people like to dunk in their tea.
I never really liked punk, and, if I’m honest, I probably only ever listened to Peel’s programme on Radio 1 a few dozen times. I did often catch the first ten minutes or half an hour or so of it in recent years as I drove home from football on a Tuesday night, but in recent months we’ve been finishing at 8.30pm and Peel had been bumped back to 11pm, so those few, warm moments of bumbling, endearing, unprofessional passion disappeared. But Peel wasn’t just about punk. The only Peel Session CD I own is by Boards Of Canada. He was the first Radio 1 DJ to play reggae, ska, krautrock, electronica, hip hop, everything.
“Teenage Kicks” and “Ever Fallen In Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t Have)” have been all over Radio 1 this afternoon, and every time I hear either I well up. He didn’t influence the choice of music I listen to, but he did influence the philosophy behind why and how I listen to music. I love the fact that his favourite single was released when he was in his late 30s and he still got it, the rush, the push, the adrenaline, the buzz of hearing a great song and feeling as if you’re about to pop. Who else now is going to play the music that no one else will touch?
Part of me worries that, as someone on ILM pointed out, some people at Radio 1 will secretly be saying “well that’s that problem solved”.
Possibly what I liked most about Peel, disregarding philosophy for a moment (never stop; never be comfortable; always move on and look for new things; help others if you can; enjoy life; be nice; you can be a normal, unassuming person and enjoy cutting-edge art and culture; everyone can enjoy art, as long as they get a chance to appreciate it; everyone deserves a chance; etcetera, etcetera, etcetera), was Home Truths on Radio 4. I remember vaguely crossing swords with Momus on ILX about it; he complained, said “who wants to know about the normal people, who cares about the average; I demand the exceptional!” but I saw Home Truths as being about showing how exceptional even the normal people are. The item I remember most from that programme was about a pub in Brighouse, and a group of local men who would go there on a set night every week and take their wives, and the wives would sit at one side of the pub and the men at the other and each group was like a different club having a meeting; if a man was going to be absent one week then he had to bring in a note from his wife giving permission. The situation reminded me of the Sunday night regulars in the pub where I used to work. I found it heart warming; just another example of the silly little things we do, the games we play, to pass the time, to make our lives that bit better, that bit more fun.
“Celebrity” deaths don’t generally phase me at all. Joe Strummer dying upset me, as he was on the mental checklist of musicians I would like to meet, to have a beer with and chat to (alongside Bill Drummond and Mark Hollis). Peel was on the other mental checklist; the list of “good guys” (and girls). You never, ever came across anyone saying anything bad about John Peel. Negative or critical maybe, but never bad, not with feeling.
Rest in peace, John Peel. We love you.
NJS
10/26/2004 10:55:00 pm
John Peel RIP
John Peel, bastion of British radio for over 40 years, has died suddenly of a heart attack whilst on a working holiday in Peru.
BBC website report.
This has really shaken me up.
NJS
10/26/2004 02:43:00 pm
Monday, October 25, 2004
Do you have any Linkin Park?
Children and animals love me, for some reason. I’m not entirely sure why, because I’m not massively keen on either. I’m no animal hater – it’s just that I’m allergic to most things with fur (which I’m sure they’re aware of on some primordial, scent-based level, hence their affection for me), and as for kids… well, they can’t really talk about existentialism and cultural impact of hiphop and Chris Morris over a pint of Guinness with you, can they? But they do love talking to me, for some reason. Emma’s 13-year-old brother loves me. The three random kids of about the same age who’ve just spent the last 20 minutes harshing my buzz (or something) seemed to too. It’s probably my own fault. Emma says that because I’m not particularly arsed about children I don’t bother to make any special effort to communicate with them on “their level” (if such a level exists) like most adults do, and apparently kids love being talked to as if they’re normal people (there’s a surprise).
So how did it start? How do you think? Blasting the Embrace album via the iPod I get onto the train, spot a seat next to someone who won’t mind being assailed by my music, and sit down. So I sit by three kids, about 12 or 13 years old, because kids don’t mind noise, do they? One of them I recognise – he does a paper round on my estate and I walk past him every day. I always feel quite sorry for him, especially when it’s raining.
But I had my iPod in my hand when I sat down, didn’t I?
“Is that an iPod?!”
“Yes.”
“How much is it?”
“In money or capacity?”
“I dunno- how much?”
“Um, 20gigabytes. I’ve had it nearly a year, it cost £300 but they’re £220 now.”
“You spent £300 on that?!”
“Have you got any Tupac on it?!”
“Yeah, I have actually.”
“What are you listening to?”
“Embrace.”
“Embrace?”
“Who are they?”
“Um, a rock band, I guess.”
“Have you got any Foo Fighters?”
“Have you got any Blink 182?”
“Have you got any Green Day?”
“Um, no. No. They’re quite good. No.”
“Can I have a go?”
“How many songs have you got on it?”
“Have you got a girlfriend?”
“No. Um, three thousand and something. Yes.”
“I see you in the mornings. You walk fast. Why do you walk so fast?”
“To get to the train on time.”
“Where do you work?”
“He goes to college!”
“Does he?”
“No, I work at the university.”
“Are you a teacher?”
“What do you study?”
“I work in the library.”
“Does it use batteries?”
“It has an internal battery, it lasts about 7 hours.”
“Do you charge it every day?”
“Do you use it all the time?”
“Why do you have so many songs?”
“Do you read a lot of books?”
“What type of bird is that?”
“I don’t know. Oh, it’s a heron. I look after the music and films, I don’t have much to do with books.”
“Can you take sound off DVDs and that?”
“You could if you recorded it to CDR via an analogue stage, I guess, and then ripped from the CDR.”
“Yeah, I do that all the time. Weirdo.”
“Are you well into computers?”
“Are you a techno bod?”
“Not really, but I do like stereos.”
“Are you from round here?”
“What school did you go to?”
“Yes, I live where he does his paper round.”
“I know him better than you do. I see him every day.”
“Do you have any Jay Z?”
“Do you have any Eminem?”
“Yeah, do you like his new one?”
“I went to Teignmouth. Yes, I have lots of Jay Z.”
“Do you have Dirt Off Your Shoulder?”
“Yes. I have lots of Eminem too. I do like his new one.”
“Do you have Michael Jackson? Can we see all your songs?”
“Wow is that a touch-screen?!”
“It’s touch-sensitive, on this bit.”
“Is it loud?”
“Yes, it’s louder than most iPods, I downloaded software to make it louder.”
“I like the video when Michael Jackson’s nose falls off and he goes UERGHUERGHUERGH UERGHUERGH.”
“I go to Teignmouth! Who was your tutor?!”
“Do you know Mr Smiddy? Ask him about me. He was head of sixth form.”
“We can’t, we don’t know your name.”
“Do you have a girlfriend?”
“He does he said!”
“My name’s Nick.”
“Can I have her number?”
“Is she fit?”
“What’s your ambition in life?”
“Do you have a lot of CDs?”
“Yes, no you can’t have her number! Of course she is. Um, to get a better job at the moment. I have almost enough CDs.”
“Do you know Muse?”
“I was in Chris’ science group.”
“Can we come round and borrow some CDs?”
“No you can’t!”
That’s about as much as I can remember. When I got off the train they all vaguely followed me to my car, where dad was waiting to pick me up, and they said “BYE NICK!” very loudly. While the conversation was going on I was randomly playing them songs from the iPod, avoiding Jay Z and Tupac in favour of “B.O.B.” by Outkast and “Soon” by MBV. You gotta get ‘em young if you can.
Most odd, but strangely good fun.
NJS
10/25/2004 07:24:00 pm
Pulse
Yes I am alive, just in case you wondered. I fear the man on the cliff may not be, though.
NJS
10/25/2004 08:44:00 am
Friday, October 15, 2004
Bugger That First List
The Albums You Should Have Listened To Before You Die
Copy this list onto your blog, put the ones you have listened to (completely from beginning to end) in bold and then add three more albums that you think people should have heard before they turn into their parents - remember, it isn't necessarily your favourite albums but the ones you think people should listen to... and when we say listen we mean from track one through to the end... If you put a link to your follow-on post in the comments of the site where you found it, the chain will be trackable. You are also allowed to DELETE up to THREE albums on the existing list, if you feel a) that this is an album which should not reasonably be foisted upon anybody, or b) that one Steve Earle album is quite enough for one lifetime, thank you.
The original list was rubbish, frankly; too much boring guitar shite, no dance music aside from the tokenistic Orbital pick (Brown, how imaginative [Brown gets picked by rock fans because the song titles are on the cover, like a proper rock album from the 60s by someone like The Small Faces]), no hip hop, no jazz, just standard canon picks left, right and centre. If we’re going to do this we have to consider why we’re doing it – are we making a list to fill in the gaps of a music fan’s historical rock education, for instance? And if we are, why the fuck are we doing that? There are reams and reams of lists and papers and essays and books of collected reviews that tread that same, well-worn path, and they’re all fucking boring and written by 40 year olds. We’re the blogosphere; we should seek to be a vibrant and irreverent (but no less thoughtful or passionate) commentator, not bound by received wisdom and rock historiography orthodoxy. This list, of records you absolutely must hear before you die, shouldn’t be about being the same as any list you can get in Rolling Stone; it should be about helping the participants in the list become better listeners, it should be about broadening horizons and opening minds, not reinforcing the status quo. And as such, being the all knowing genius that I am, I have deigned to redraw this list in mine own image, or something.
So here goes…
Talk Talk – Spirit Of Eden
The Congos – Heart Of The Congos
Eminem – The Marshall Mathers LP
Orbital – In Sides
Michael Jackson – Thriller
Prodigy – Music For A Jilted Generation
My Bloody Valentine – Loveless
Gillian Welch – Time (The Revelator)
Miles Davis – In A Silent Way
Brian Eno – Another Green World
Public Enemy – It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back
The Buzzcocks – Singles Going Steady
Missy Elliott – Miss E… So Addictive
Nick Drake – Five Leaves Left
Genius/GZA – Liquid Swords
Spiritualized – Ladies & Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space
A Guy Called Gerald – Black Secret Technology
Blur – Parklife
Aphew Twin- Selected Ambient Works Volume 2
Kate Bush – The Hounds Of Love
Twenty records that you ought to listen to, in my (not so) humble opinion. Ben, Ian, etcetera, it’s over to you.
NJS
10/15/2004 10:55:00 am
Thursday, October 14, 2004
England
God, we were shite. Passing awful, movement awful, commitment absent. A “professional display” says Michael Owen. Bollocks was it. It was shite.
On the positive side of things, though, the pub I was drinking Guinness in last night after the match with my mate Andrew had some Middle Eastern satellite feed on (cheaper than commercial rates for Sky, but sadly no incidents of Ron Atkinson racially abusing black Frenchmen) which was showing the Italy v Belarus game, a 4-3 stunner replete with three fantastic goals (scorching Totti free-kick, left-footed Belarusian free-kick, and a 35-yard left-foot Belarusian screamer that swerved and slammed in off the post), a penalty which Totti scored and was forced to retake (he scored it again, in the same place but harder), a very good goal by De Rossi (my new Roma hero), and lots of niggly incidents and neat passing from both sides. In short, everything the England match wasn’t. Dom, I envy your nationality.
NJS
10/14/2004 09:31:00 am
Wednesday, October 13, 2004
Another List
I suppose I’d better take two minutes to do this…
The Albums You Should Have Listened To Before You Die
Which I found over at Ben’s blog today. Most of the current choices on it are abysmal, so I shall do the best I can.
Here are the instructions. Pass it on…
Copy the list on to your blog, put in bold the ones you have listened to (completely from beginning to end) and then add three more albums that you think people should have heard before they turn into their parents - remember, it isn't necessarily your most favourite albums but the ones you think people should listen to... and when we say listen we mean from track one through to the end... If you put a link to your follow-on post in the comments of the site where you found it, the chain will be trackable. From now on, you are also allowed to DELETE up to THREE albums on the existing list, if you feel a) that this is an album which should not reasonably be foisted upon anybody, or b) that one Steve Earle album is quite enough for one lifetime, thank you.
London Calling - The Clash
Think Tank - Blur
This Is Hardcore - Pulp
Moon Safari - Air
Never Mind The Bollocks Here's the Sex Pistols - Sex Pistols
OK Computer - Radiohead
Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars - David Bowie
The Wall - Pink Floyd
Setting Sons - The Jam
Come From The Shadows - Joan Baez
The River - Bruce Springsteen
The Very Best Of Joan Armatrading - Joan Armatrading
What's Going On - Marvin Gaye
Metal Box - Public Image Ltd
Orbital #2 (The Brown Album) - Orbital
Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain - Pavement
Apple Venus Vol. 1 - XTC
Marquee Moon - Televison
Daydream Nation - Sonic Youth
I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Love You) - Aretha Franklin
The Velvet Underground & Nico - The Velvet Underground & Nico
Appetite For Destruction - Guns N Roses
Talk Talk – Spirit Of Eden
Eminem – The Marshall Mathers LP
Freddie Hubbard – Red Clay
The last three albums are my additions. I have chosen to delete;
No More Shall We Part - Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds - because it’s overblown AOR goth-drama shite,
The Kiss of Morning - Graham Coxon – because Coxon is a wanker, and
Elastica - Elastica - because I have Wire’s first three albums.
Like I said, pass it on. And please get rid of Springsteen and The Jam ASAP.
NJS
10/13/2004 03:28:00 pm
Tuesday, October 12, 2004
FORZA
I love playing football. Why? The thrill of physical exertion? The excitement of feeling yourself do something you’d only hoped you were capable of? Hitting the back of the net? The grace, the poetry, of a well-placed pass, a good finish, a dummy, a mazy run, a feint? Tonight, and this doesn’t happen often (trust me, I tell you every time it does), I had a GREAT game. Or, I had a marvellous 45 minutes or so, and a good next half an hour. 7-a-side, teams pretty even, but we communicated much better and had luck fall in our direction. I scored three inside the first ten minutes, one good finish after a nice move (simple, first-touch stuff), one accident that snapped through the keeper’s legs, and one lucky challenge on a defender that snapped in powerfully. And then a full-pelt run on the break, down the centre of the pitch, bellowing “BACK AND LEFT BACK AND LEFT BACK AND LEFT!” at John, tearing down the right in turquoise t-shirt, as if I was John Garrison played by Costner in JFK describing Kennedy’s ruptured head jolting backwards and spilling brains over the motorcade. And John pulls it back, I take one touch with my right, barge past Martin, still at full-pelt, and the second touch is instant, left foot, and the ball sailed, low and hard, into the bottom corner. Billy applauded, I yelled “FUCK YES” and ran back to start again. It was a great moment, as stupid and tiny as that sounds – a goal in a casual Tuesday night five-a-side, but little moments of joy like that are what life’s made of. Get them where you can. I think I scored six all in all, and we won about 15-4.
A good evening.
NJS
10/12/2004 10:08:00 pm
Term-time wonders
Students, especially male ones in their first year, are a bizarre breed. The most bizarre ones are... Well, it seems almost as if some of them have a list of bohemian student things to do, like
Monday - watch a French New Wave film, preferably a black & white one
Tuesday - listen to some Bob Dylan
Wednesday - ask the library guy if they have any black & white photography [like wtf?! just randomly?! not "photographs of X" or "photographs by X", but just "hi, yeah, do you have any, like, photography in the university, like, a collection? of black & white photography? it's on my wannabe-boho-student-boy itinerary for today": so say I "we have some slides of photography", and wannabe-boho-student-boy picks an LP of the poetry of Ted Hughes as read by Ted Hughes instead OH JOY
Thursday - listen to some Frank Zappa
Friday - watch a Kurosawa film
I was never like that. I really wasn't. I never went in the fucking library in the first year, for a start.
I guess they're just lonely. Or maybe idiots. This one is wearing a black trenchcoat and is very well-spoken.
Also, wtf is up with people born in 1985 wearing Nirvana tops?
NJS
10/12/2004 01:07:00 pm
Monday, October 11, 2004
Franco Baresi would be proud
Jamie Theakston, being the most knowledgeable man in the country when it comes to pop music, is presenting a new series on C4 which aims to get viewers voting on who should be inducted into the UK’s Rock N Roll Hall Of Fame. Oh my. There were five artists included automatically, bypassing the shortlist and vote kerfuffle and going straight past Go and collecting £200; The Beatles (yawn), Elvis (yawn), Bob Marley (yawn), Madonna (yowl) and U2 (wtf?!). U2? Why the fuck do they get a pass straight in? Because their career’s passed across more than one decade so the organisers didn’t know which show to put them in? Jesus. No Stones, no Velvets, no Marvin, no Stevie, no Clash, no [insert name of favourite redundant canonical rock artist here]… So U2 are one of the five Greatest Artists Ever. I guess they’ve sold a lot of records, but I still don’t get what the fuss is about beyond bits of Joshua Tree and Achtung Baby.
But anyway, last night was 90s night, with ten possibles up for the vote, including Prodigy, Oasis, Radiohead, Dr Dre, Blur, Robbie Williams… and Missy Elliott. Who, granted, released two solo albums and did a whole hump of production work in the 90s, but who surely didn’t break through into the UK mainstream until 2001 when “Get Ur Freak On” was released? So wtf is she doing in the 90s show?
There were many, many things wrong with this programme, from the completely redundant talking-head commentators (Stephen Dorff says he likes Red Hot Chilli Peppers! WOW!) to the inclusion of Red Hot Chilli Peppers (and some woman, Sylvia someone, saying something about how they’ve changed their sound with every album yes they’ve got slower and more boring is that what you mean crazy woman?!) to John cunting Harris wearing a Happy Mondays t-shirt and a BAD haircut (almost as bad as Vernon cunting Kaye rubbing himself in the presence of Paul cunting Weller on T4 earlier in the day – “Do you think you’re cool?” “Anyone who thinks they’re cool isn’t cool” he says wearing sunglasses indoors and sporting a cunt’s haircut - I hope they both catch impetigo and die, or at least have very nasty rashes which make them appear unsightly to ladies they find attractive) and perpetuating even more BULLSHIT about stuff. John Harris – you’re a cunt.
But of course no one really cares about this programme, because everyone was watching Ralph Little mark Paul Gascoigne on Sky One. Chris Waddle… Viv Anderson… Trevor Francis… Sheffield Wednesday Old Boys vs Some Pesky Famous Kids? Robbie Williams’ boyfriend flatmate / cousin / whatever scored an almost mirror-image copy of the Beckham goal against Wales after Gary Pallister had driven the Legends ahead after Bosnich went off to snort some coke injured and they had to put some TV presenter in goal, before Ally McCoist restored order by scoring the winner in injury time. And on Five there was a documentary about Stan Collymore, possibly my favourite non-Wednesday/Arsenal/Roma player ever, for a bunch of reasons including (but not condoning) the fact that he decked Ulrika.
Sunday nights are bizarre.
Drove to work so as to avoid being confronted by a frozen corpse atop the cliff.
NJS
10/11/2004 08:56:00 am
Friday, October 08, 2004
The Brattleboro Rat
The man on the cliff was wrapped up in a big coat and a woolly hat today. What do I do when I walk past his frozen corpse in three months' time? I can see my own breath in the air as I walk to the station in the mornings now. Heaven only knows what it's like before sunrise.
The title of this post is the title of the novel.
The train journey is becoming increasingly frustrating each morning, as the sun is slightly further down in the sky and the light correspondingly more golden, the air correspondingly cooler, and the mist over Cockwood, Powderham and Turf Locks correspondingly more beautiful - every glance out of the window sees another photo opportunity, if only I was outside and walking, pulled from my grasp. Every power line, every telephone pole, every mist-shrouded heffer, every stark and naked tree thrown into relief by the rising sun, is a possible picture, and I can't take any of them because I'm on a fucking train.
NJS
10/08/2004 10:11:00 am
Wednesday, October 06, 2004
A Noisy Bristol Crowd
The man on the cliff was wrapped in a sleeping bag yesterday morning, which I am taking to mean that he is definitely living in the observation shelter. It’s turning cold enough at night now, but I pity him when it gets to January if he’s still there. One morning I’m going to walk past a corpse. What does one do if this happens?
Tried to get some trainers in Bristol yesterday afternoon, some Nike Air Max preferably, but the only good designs were £90-£110. Except for a pair of very nice Air Max Rock Roach (or something), which were only £60. But which they didn’t have in my size. Bastard Bristol. Maybe I should have just pimped out for a £90 pair? Brown Air Max are not easy to come across in Exeter, because it sucks for shopping.
But anyway, the gig…
Normally at Embrace gigs I’m either with loads of people I know and/or hideously drunk; last night I was only with Emma and, as I was driving the 80 miles back after the gig, sober as a judge (not a drop passed my lips). I met two new people – one kid to sell a ticket to (for a bargain £5) and also Nathan (Cavs), who was sound as a pound / a good egg / refreshingly normal compared to some of the people you occasionally meet prior to gigs after arranging it via the net. Nathan, we must meet for a proper beer sometime, and discuss the vagaries of higher education and useless degrees in full.
Dogs Die In Hot Cars were very good, very early 80s spiky songwriting, a bit Cure, a bit Dexys, a bit XTC, a lot Elvis Costello. Good harmonies, good dynamics, interested in getting hold of the album = result for DDIHC (despite their shitty name. Danny did the lighting for them, disguising himself with a woolly hat and Mickey’s glasses (he tried mine but they were too strong and sent his eyes weird). While he was arranging his cunning disguise we got a playback via Mickey’s laptop of a preliminary edit of the video for “Ashes” – it looked very good, but the band all agreed that they preferred the previous edit (which I didn’t see).
Embrace came onstage to a medley of songs that have heralded their arrival over the years – “I Want To Take You Higher” by Sly & The Family Stone, “Wonderful World” by Louis Armstrong, “Down To The River” from the O Brother soundtrack. They forgot “Don’t Believe The Hype” though, which was a shame because that’s what they came onstage to (in conjunction with Sly) when I first saw them in Bristol some seven years ago, a cheeky riposte to all the glowing press they were getting at the time, and early evidence of the band’s always-ignored (by the press) sense of humour and pathos.
So… swathe of white noise, building and building, the band standing stock still, barely visible, and then… big house beat vanquishes the noise, four-to-the-floor, held for a few bars to raise tension to a stupid level, a slither of guitar from Richard and “Ashes” implodes, explodes, lifts-off. It’s a great way to start a set, probably the best opener they’ve had, huge yet also tight and utterly valedictory and vindicating. Vocals spot on, crowd singing and bouncing from front to balcony (where we were), band in control and on the edge too. In the dressing room beforehand Mike and Steve had been napping side-by-side, perhaps synchronising circadian rhythms to keep them in better time on stage. (Or perhaps, after the chaos of the last few months, they’re just knackered?) This will be, when it’s released in November, a smash hit single. It can’t fail, surely?
A word on the venue. This is the third time I’ve been to the Bristol Carling Academy with Emma (Flaming Lips and Ash being the other two – the Lips gig their being one of the best gigs I’ve ever seen [only partly because of the company, J & Josie!]), and the third time it’s rained on us when we’ve left. It’s also the umpteenth time I’ve been distressed at how badly run Carling venues are. £2 for a bottle of water, only able to buy cans of Carling and even then you have to have them (messily and wastefully) dispensed into a plastic cup because you might use it as a weapon or something, possibly. They don’t let you have the lid to your water bottles because you might throw it at the band or you might use it as a weapon as well or something. Plus shit with cameras (I didn’t bother to take mine this time because last time I had to run back up Park Street to put it in the car, the assholes) and all sorts of other petty shitty, badly-thought-out commerce-over-experience nonsense. Carling? Mean Fiddler? You fucking suck. But they have a total monopoly over live music venues for any band wanting to play to between 1500 and 2500 people in this country (or 6000 in London or whatever).
Highlights… “All You Good Good People” now climaxes tighter and with more noise than ever before, Rik’s guitar playing and the tautness of Mike & Steve much improved from 7 years ago, an intense wash of delirium now awesome even when sober and on the balcony watching onstage antics via a monitor because I was too short and not aggro enough to be able to see properly (I’ve seen them plenty of times, it was nice to be able to listen). Danny’s constant exhortations to the crowd, getting them to dance, sing along, wave arms. His announcements of “Richard McNamara on guitar!” prompting Rik when he has to play a fiddly bit – he even did an announcement for Mike, Steve and Mickey at one point too, proof positive (if any were needed) that he loves Sly & The Family Stone (“you might like to hear my organ!” indeed). The introduction to “Come Back To What You Know” – “I was on a TV show with Lemmy, and I asked him if he ever got bored of playing The Ace Of Spades. He said Well you know, Dan, it’s a fucking good song; it’s not Agadoo”, proof, if proof were needed, that they’re right to play it again. People want to hear it, so who are the band to deny? I’m still not overly keen (I sang along, as per, and everyone else loved it), but, as Emma pointed out, I’ve always been an awkward sod.
More highlights… “Even Smaller Stones” is a fucking amazing song and I cannot wait to hear it recorded. Mickey, after the gig, was full of enthusiasm and eagerness to get onto working on new material, the new modus operandi the band have regarding the creation of their music obviously a positive new phase for them – if other results of this new method are as good as “Even Smaller Stones” then the fifth album will be their best (four songs and one chorus totally finished already). “New Adam New Eve” and “Out Of Nothing” were both awesome as well, likewise the D12 cover. Rik’s mad harmonies during “Someday” and the “dur-dur-dur-dur” intro he did to the chorus of “Save Me” at one point. News that they’re very close to sorting a deal for Out Of Nothing to be released in America. The cavernous kick-drum in the intro to “One Big Family”. A wry smile from Rik when I asked him if they’d play “Blind” and told him, through a big grin, that it was their best song because “all the others are shite”.
Lowlights… The venue. Danny’s voice cracking during “Looking As You Are” and faltering during “Spell It Out” (Rik carried him through it, thankfully – that’s what brothers are for). TP (good man, as ever) mentioning that the band looked tired, and the fact that he was right. I doubt anyone else in the crowd (with the exception of Stu) noticed because the reaction from front to balcony was phenomenal, and the energy the band put into the gig was awesome, but they were clearly tired after the show when I nipped back to say cheerio before the drive home (I walked in my front door at five past 1). The absence of family, friends and loved ones (and, Emma pointed out, drugs) was obvious – after the high of being onstage, the expended energy, the fatigue and melancholy that I imagine kicks in as they board the bus again must be deadening. There’s no one there to give them a hug and say well done, apart from each other. Still, a couple of weeks (after tonight and Liverpool) to sort things out, rest and recuperate, and do a fuck-load more publicity for “Ashes” before hitting the circuit again in November.
But even despite the rapturous reception and raucous performance I went away with the impression that this is still the calm before the storm. Shepherd’s Bush was a celebration, a welcome home. This was one of the last missiles in the final volley before invasion.
Seven years ago there were crowd surfers. We're a bit old for that now. But not too past it.
NJS
10/06/2004 09:02:00 am
Friday, October 01, 2004
Funeral
Third funeral I’ve been to, and they don’t get any less strange, whether they’re for your brother’s housemate who died slowly of testicular cancer or for a 70 year old philandering ex policeman who pickled himself with gin. The readings were well chosen – “Religion did not play a part in Ron’s life” – too right – “Two things you never talk about in the pub, Nick, and that’s religion and politics. Unless someone else brings them up and gets uptight about it, in which case you have fun with both of them. I’m a radical muslim” – on other occasions he’d be a radical Marxist, a devout atheist, a communist, a conservative, whatever it took to try and alter a perception of the world that he thought was too narrow (which was ALL OF THEM, except his, obviously). For the first week, back when I was 18, I thought he was amazing. For the next four months I thought he was a bastard and hated me. Then somebody pointed out that the reason he vanished upstairs every time I came on shift wasn’t because he thought I was a twat, but because he trusted me to run the bar in his pub while he spent time with his daughter. Over the next four and a half years, three of them spent away at university and only back at Christmas, Easter and summer, the pub was my second home and he was my second dad. I told this to his – not wife – partner last night. I said “He was a sod, but I loved him to bits.” She laughed. And then she cried a bit more. “He was; he absolutely was. But we did.” One time his best mate in the village went away on holiday to Spain (he was on holiday yesterday too – he departed the day his friend died – I don’t know if he knows yet, but his son was at the funeral) and by the time he got back my (ex) boss (Rocket) had procured a “Sold” sign and attached it to the gate of his (Swifty’s) house. Then there was the incident with the football and the river, when Bam Bam had to save Swifty with a hosepipe after Rocket had made a bet with Swifty that he couldn’t kick a football across the stream. Father’s day, that one. Lots of others. Silly things. Numerous faux-official letters sent on properly headed paper acquired from friends who worked for the council or university or Tesco or who ran funeral directors, more wind-ups than you’d imagine business men in their 50s would- there were a lot of very hard men not quite crying yesterday. A lot of men who run businesses and have shares in race horses and spend weekends away drinking legendary amounts of alcohol. Like I say, very strange.
The man on the cliff was lying down on the bench in the observation shelter this morning. I wondered if he was dead.
NJS
10/01/2004 09:03:00 am
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