neil storey @ storeys

Jess Roden / The Rivits / Old Broadway / Hidden Masters

2012-01-19T07:30:00.009Z

Y’know… there really is a sense of magic – albeit an indefinable one – the moment one’s brogues touch down on Broadway.

I can recall the first time like it was yesterday; and, while the last time was just a few months ago, it’s still etch-a-sketched down memory lane just as vividly as if it was yesterday.

Those were the days when Pan Am flew from Heathrow; in fact this was to be my very first Transatlantic crossing and all of it was spent squished into a middle seat in between La Faithfull and her (then) husband, Ben E Ficial – more properly christened Ben Brierly.

Those were the days when food at 36,000 feet up was served on proper plates with real cutlery – not the abominable plastic, bendy-breaky-bollox knives and forks one is forced to employ today. You also got more than one bread roll.

Days too, when one’s pre-luncheon snifter (make mine a pretty sizeable Bloody Mary with extra Worcestershire Sauce please) was accompanied by a gasper or twain. We all smoked – heck, half the flight did in those days; walking back down the aisle from the lavatory was like strolling through an early 60’s London smog. No wonder they banned it – the air conditioning system that could have coped with that amount of fumes hadn’t been invented.

La F was off to do a week of promo for the Broken Biscuits (English) record… that’d later nail her a Grammy nomination; Ben was there ‘cos he was her fella… and me? Well, I was the bloke from Island and it was my job to ensure that everything ran tickety-boo.

Pretty obviously, it didn’t – and much of that was down to entirely unexpectedly bumping in to La Pallenberg in a hotel lift. This little reunion of kindred spirits and shared pasts distracted my charge somewhat.

Employing her deep dulcet Germanic tones that reverberated upward from her not inconsiderable bosom, La P beckoned toward the lift (elevator), saying (well, more commanding actually)… Ahhh, Marianne… so good to see you…come up to my room, I have a little something for you…’ Now, I reckoned I was relatively wise to the ways of… but… this was on an entirely different scale altogether; a small mountain of Peruvian marching powder was upended on the table and… basically… they weren’t going to stop until…

A lot of other mad stuff happened on that trip… but… trooper that MF is, the work did all get done.

Years later, she toured the 20th Century Blues record… taking in such exotic locales as Tel Aviv and Jerusalem as well as more conventional gigs in the more obvious places. And, for sizeable chunks, I was on hand too – more or less in the same capacity. About three-quarters of the way through the show each night, there’d be a bit of a break in proceedings (Paul the pianist would nip off to have a wee) which gave La Faithfull – who is a raconteur of astonishing prowess – the opportunity to regale the audience with tales of derring-do.

Most usually, this involved a lengthy narrative that involved serious narcotics shared with the late, great Harry Nillson, his untimely death, the manner in which it occurred, an earthquake and a strange burial. And always, but always, she prefaced the whole with the opening lines of… ‘Now, you… lovely audience that you are… need to understand that those were the days when we did proper drugs – not this nimby-pamby stuff you get handed nowadays’.

Anyway… I digress. So, after what seems an eternity mid-air, we land and my first encounter with US Customs and Immigration – I’m travelling with a former drug addict who just happens to be the head Rolling Stones’ ex and a punk who also goes by the name of Ben Dover. Needless to say, our time in Immigration was somewhat extended before, ultimately, passports were stamped and we were allowed outside… and squashed into a cab – no one thought to come and meet us – and hi-tailing it into central Manhattan.

It was like entering a picture postcard or… even better, a film-set. For some reason lost to the mists of time, we were in different hotels… so, after being deposited at the gates of the Essex House (on the 20-something’th floor of which CB kept an apartment at the time), I shuffled out, onto Central Park South and walked over to… Broadway.

At that junction and looking south toward the bottom end of Manhattan, the street sort of curves slightly right-handed down toward Times Square. It’s only a few blocks… and yet, as you trudge down toward all that the neon flashing in the distance, its like walking into the set of (say) Blade Runner. OK, so that film was still a couple years away but, you get the idea.

The next again morning, I woke unfeasibly early… one’s body-clock is absolutely fucked by this international travel malarkey and so, at about 4am I’m wide awake. What to do? There’s only one person in Manhattan I know and, I can’t call him just yet… Oh, I know… I’ll switch on the tv. Whatever the programme was, it goes straight in to an ad break. And, the very first bit of American TV I saw was… an ad for… Preparation H… hemorrhoid cream. Smashing.

Since MF hasn't got anything to do ‘til the afternoon, that means I’ve a free morning and, by now fed up with watching adverts for intimate ailments, I head off for a walk in the general direction of the Upper East Side 'cos that's the locale of the only person I know in this strange metrop I've tipped up in.

I’m not entirely sure where his lair is, of course, but guided by the sun I figure it has to be... that-a-way.

Skyscrapers… concrete canyons… hustle… bustle… the bums on the sidewalks… the drunks with their brown paper-bag covered liquor bottles… and the bag-ladies pushing their trollies… the air bisected by the billowing steam rising from the pavement grills like so much fog… the suits and briefcases scurrying, coffee in hand... the punks... the tourists like me (pretending to be anything other). Everyone talking loudly. I’m lost but at home.

Intent on calling the only person I know in New York, I find a pay ‘phone – don’t forget, this was aeons before everyone walked around with a cell ‘phone clamped to his or her ear… and long before the side-stepping of people texting while walking became an Olympic sport.

I push my coins in… and, after a few moments, the Singer of Songs answers. He sounds perplexed; ‘Crikey… what on earth are you doing here..? I explain. ‘Splendid’ says he, ‘Are you nearby? Can you come over for coffee? He gives me directions but, basically, that’s pretty hopeless ‘cos, within minutes, I’m lost… I’m a stranger in a strange land and a cab further uptown has to be the best solution.

We spend the morning together, drinking a lot of coffee… and he plays me a few tunes he’s working on with another chap called Pete. His deal with Island is over but, even so, he’s been writing… looks fitter than fit and slimmer than slim from daily runs around Central Park – and the songs sound really good. They’re thinking of maybe making a record… perhaps shopping it round a bit.

Fast forward a good few months and a new record pops up on the release schedule. It’s by The Rivits – the Singer of Songs did make the record he said he was planning to.

And, the final track on side one is something I’d heard months back as a rough sketch; it tells the tale of Connie and Clem The Clean and extols the dreams of the ghosts whose own shoes… some frayed, some torn, some perfectly polished… trod those self-same sidewalks that I’d walked.

Jess Roden / Sudden St / Hidden Masters

2011-10-27T14:01:00.005+01:00

Ok, Ok... I know, its been a long time but, honest injun, busy as busy is in the background... with masses going on down in the über-shed otherwise known as #HiddenMasters HQ.

So... here's a little something that's only just been finished off. Its a short clip of Bronco's Sudden St from the forthcoming Anthology.

It features ultra-rare footage of the band recording at Basing St during the Summer of 1971 (and a massive hat-tip to DJ Demitri who found this gathering acres of dust in the back of a darkened cupboard).

The original sound-bed was, to all intents and purposes pretty much fucked as was some of the grainy black 'n white imagery too, so I've married the surviving video to one or two stills and under-laid it all with this never-heard-before version of Sudden St.

Ok, so what news on the Boxed Set... the Anthology?

Right – annoyingly, we are a teensy-weensy bit behind where we’d hoped to be right now but this is purely due to the fact that the Anthology involves a number of masters’ owners – meaning that preparation of the documentation (which has to be completed before we move to the final steps) is a bit more complex for all concerned.

Nonetheless, the legal eagles and business affairs bods on all sides of the fence(s) have locked horns in the last two or three weeks and are now at it like rutting stags because there are innumerable Is to be dotted and just about as many Ts to be crossed.

And so, once all parties have signed off (doubtless employing judicious usage of their lucky pens), we’ll be pushing the final three buttons.

The first bit being the re-mastering of all the UK-based analog masters that we’re including. These'll be worked on by Richard Whittaker @ FX who's just become a dad for the first time to lil' Ed (so, thats caused a bit of a natural break as it is). The 7Windows tracks being included have already been re-mastered by Michael MacDonald in New York – so, we're somewhat ahead of the game there.

And, at that point, we can finally reveal the full track-listing!

So, after all the knob-twiddling, its the fine-tuning of all the artwork and then straight to manufacture.

In the meantime… what can be confirmed is: The Anthology will be issued as an initial limited edition of 950 copies – all of which will be hand-numbered.

And... within this run, there will be a number of really special (and very limited) editions.

We’re working out all the details right now (see, I said its been busy as... down in the über-shed) but, just as soon as these particular Ts have been crossed and Is dotted, we’ll be announcing what we have planned – here... on the JR FaceBook page as well as on the main JR website.

Further to all of that, the singer of songs and self are formulating something else that we reckon to be a bit special and as a way of saying thanks to everyone who’s shown so much patience while we’ve been putting all this together.

So... here's the vid – and if anyone's wondering why it appears out of sync... it is..! 'cos the original sound-bed was a different toon.

IF, by any chance, your browser starts to buffer and the vid goes a bit wonky - try it on YouTube - link is: http://youtu.be/vVO2y2rU90s

Jess Roden | For Granted #3 (I’m On Your Side)

2011-04-22T18:23:00.004+01:00

The blossom is on the trees, luminescent Cherry-Vanilla at its best.

Yet the studio in which we’re ensconced during this period of self-imposed confinement hides behind a couple of struggling trees of uncertain genesis. Neither of which appear to have known blossom once.

They stand like a pair of forlorn, Kevin-The-Teenager saplings; their leggy, Eyeball Paul, branches windswept by the diesel-breeze-rush of a speeding bus every twenty minutes of so.

It’s a surreal yet short walk from the bus-stop; past where Reginald Iolanthe Perrin hastened the demise of CJ and Sunshine Deserts, along the crumbling pavement to the studio door – tucked away in this downtrodden backwater of a demoralised north-west London trading estate

While the setting may be unlikely – neither does this place much look like what one’d imagine a studio to appear as.

The facade is about as far removed from the Fab-Four graffiti-scrawl of Abbey Road or the Edwardian splendour of Olympic in Barnes where Procul Harum recorded A Whiter Shade Of Pale; in which Jimi Hendrix reconstructed All Along The Watchtower to turn a Dylan masterpiece into his own magnum opus or where The Rolling Stones laid down six consecutive albums between 1968 and ’72 as is possible to get.

This space – our space for the duration – is decidedly more warehouse-veneer and on the utilitarian side of functional. It is what it is and does not pretend otherwise.

Inside is what counts and progress is such that we’re heading toward the sharp end. Upstairs is where we completed all the digital work on the ¼” tapes… now we’re downstairs and starting to delve in to all the crates that contain the 2” multi-tracks.

These, unlike their country-cousins, the ¼” tapes, come in a variety of configurations – many are 24 track but we’re also encountering their step-brothers – the 16 and 8 track variants.

And, in the middle of that lot, we’ll be returning to those tapes that are currently sitting in a temperature-controlled oven a little way down the corridor… baking away ever so contentedly in a Julia Childs’ styleee.

Baking..? Yes indeed – because they’re elderly (in tape-terms that’s 30+years old) and, frankly, they’re in pretty dodgy shape.

And, the only way to remedy this level of tape-degradation and all round dodginess is to bake the blighters for between 24 and 72 hours.

Crikey – am I starting to sound like a bit too Gordon Ramsay here..? I sincerely hope not, because, trust me, I’m no expert – but I do have a very good teacher.

Ladies and Gentlemen… may I introduce my newest best friend; a raven-haired Goth, who sits in front of rows of blinking lights, manipulating computers, software and ten dozen other gadgets all of which require an advanced degree in pure Einstein before they’ll even spark into life.

He can tell a tape’s age just by looking at it and can hear things coming through the mix that are inaudible to mere mortals – hmmm, that sounds about 2db out to me…

It does? I look over his shoulder at a bank of intermittently blinking lights, our very own studio aurora borealis. The lights appear – to me – to be lined up in a pretty satisfactory line but equally I’ve learned to trust the set of ears beside me. If he says its out, chances are that it is – and very probably by exactly 2db, whatever that actually means in plain English.

Yeah, I’ll just check via this gadget. He peers shortsightedly at yet another set of entirely mystifying flickering lights (obviously I’d been looking at totally the wrong set)… and, flicking his pony-tail out of the way, he leans over and makes a microscopic adjustment with an equally minute screw-driver and… sure as eggs are eggs, the lights (that he’s been studying) all line-up as they should… he’s correct.

Me – I heard nothing wrong at all. Matron – the earwax candles, please.

I stand and stare in constant admiration as one would at anyone at the top of their game. Occasionally, I am allowed to make the coffee… but only after having to be shown how that machine worked three times.

The advanced being-Delia stage in this entire process has been critical.

Because, without this tape-baking exercise, what’d happen is this: when the tapes roll through long-out-of-date (tho’ state of the art in the sixties and seventies) Studer machines, the tape would start to shed a very fine layer of oxide… meaning the play-back-heads would (in layman’s terms) eventually clog up. And eventually there would be a tragic outcome – what was recorded long ago would be lost forever.

This, therefore, is last-chance saloon for these tapes… fuck it up and… that’s it, gone for all time. Which is why, when the mane of hair in front of me nods sagely and says, off to the oven with you my boy… there’s no argument brokered.

These are precious commodities found in amongst a myriad of other jewels hidden away in dusty boxes in a dirty warehouse presided over by youngsters who simply have no idea what they’re custodians of.

There is no real criticism implied there, it’s simply that they don’t – by and large – have a clue about The Hidden Masters that they’re looking after.

Jess Roden | In A Circle

2011-03-24T16:03:00.005Z

Give or take a month or so, it’s taken nearly two years to get from there to where we are now. And, within that journey, suitcase life became very much part and parcel of the whole.

So, at this particular point in the burgeoning process of pulling the Project-X rabbit out of the hat and while being of budget-conscious frame of mind, I’ve checked into modest accommodation not too far from the studio.

Indeed, it’s no more than a couple of miles away from where the singer of songs and I munched happily away on a pile of popadums while concocting what we reckoned might be… a… bit of… a… plan.

Besides, I figured a quiet night would give me a few hours to get my head around some more of the music that we’ve been digitising before trotting westward chez JR for post-lunch discussions; we’re slowly arriving at the point where we’ll be shortlisting those that have made the grade and confining those not worthy back to the cupboard.

However, I’d only been inside the Hotel Splendide long enough to unpack, uncork a glass of the well-chilled and spread my spreadsheets (detailing all the work we’d been doing in the studio) over the bed before another visit to reception was rendered necessary. Or, rather, what passed for it – this splendid hostelry being on the unassuming side of wallet-threatening in terms of a home from home for the night.

Uber-drat… my carefully planned evening of reviewing work thus far was not running to plan… at all.

It took a while to attract the manager of this emporium’s attention – his gaze being fixed to the PlayStation machine that’d been hooked up to an oversized tv-screen on the other side of what served as his office.

He was playing carton golf.

Eventually, a little louder-than-discreet cough was enough to put him off his stroke whereby his ball landed ever so satisfyingly in a digital bunker. Hello, I grin (reckoning that his position in the pixelated sand looked frightfully tricky), My room is flooding.

He stared at me with a mix of disbelief and annoyance criss-crossing his face, his jaw opening and closing soundlessly much like an out of fresh-water-Salmon would.

Nevertheless, digital Phil Mickelson put his machine on pause and, blowing air like a beached whale, grudgingly trudged after me – all the way back to my room. There we halted as I struggled through various jacket pockets, searching for the key while the audible drip, drip, drip of water splashing happily away could be clearly heard behind the door.

There was enough water pouring through the extractor fan, right above the lavatory, to render needless any thought of pulling the chain should I require the use of said appliance – it’d be like peeing in a heavy rain storm. Ahh yes… the beached whale exhaled loudly… that would be the people in Number 5 taking a shower. Would you like another room?

We trudged back up stairs, down a few steps and up some more before suitcase, self, spreadsheets and the well-chilled were finally installed overlooking the rumbling thunder of mid-summer traffic below. With no air-conditioning and the nonadjustable heater set to maximum, the only thing for it was to open as many windows as possible. The thunderous rumble immediately turned to a Niagara-roar – time to take spreadsheets, headphones and self off to get something to eat .

But, not before perusing the book of words pinned to the back of the door – from which I gleaned that da-management weren’t much bothered if anything was stolen from one’s room. Paragraph eight stated that they’d not be liable for anything nicked that was valued at over fifty notes and nor were they insured for the contents of cars or horses.

I look about me and, before shutting the door firmly and trousering the key, confirm a Shetland Pony wasn't hiding in the shower cubicle.

A police car wailed in the background as I crossed the road that was nearly obliterated from view by a passing cloud of high-grade ganja; safely over to the sunny side of the street, it took but moments to size up the local culinary delights. It was a choice of one from one.

Settled beneath an abstract Himalayan scene that had somehow been stenciled onto cheap hardboard, it took mere seconds before two grinning waiters brandishing identical menus quickstepped across the shagpile that only a visually impaired person would have chosen.

There was a gay couple to my far left, both busy with their mobile ‘phones – perhaps searching out alternate dates since it quickly transpired (via the one with the restaurant-carrying voice and fringe of over-floppy hair) that he wasn’t planning on going home with his companion.

The later-than-me influx of customers included an all-girl group who brandished their ‘phones with aplomb taking picture upon picture of each other studying the menu. With fingers and thumbs set to dexterous, multiple Facebook profiles were being updated long before their starters arrived.

To my right another couple settled in – and, it was immediately clear from their touchy-feely, stroke me / stroking you / sit on the same side of the bench that they would place the Greek island of Lesbos fairly high on their summer holiday shopping list.

Given that they were on the next again table and I’m dining alone while being studious with my spreadsheets, it’s wasn’t hard to overhear their conversation. Within three minutes they’re discussing particularly intimate and very recent… errrr… occurrences… that… occurred… in a shower… Ah yes… they’ll be the occupants of Number 5.

The next afternoon, JR and I are seated at a table at the top end of the garden; there is a bit of a breeze getting up that’s rustling the tops of the Silver Birch trees that line the far end of the greensward.

As much as we’re starting to narrow the choices down now there has also been a mutually agreed consensus, a rationale behind that making of choices in place from day one. The tune, the song, the performance – whichever it may be – has to stand up in its own right all these years later.

In effect, that means making choices on the basis of fast-forwarding ourselves further into the future and being able to collectively look back and say; Y’know what… that’s actually not bad at all.

And, right now, we’re back in amongst those tapes that emanated from those sessions at The Fallout Shelter, the studio deep down in the basement at the back of Island’s London HQ in St Peters Square.

I have to say, that I don’t remember – until I heard them recently – that we’d actually finished many of these tunes. I thought they were still awaiting final vocal or finished mixes…

Attention is diverted for a moment. Perched on the fence is a pair of Squirrels intently studying the bird-feeder that’s suspended from the about-to-be-shorn Cherry Tree. They’re trying to figure out a way of bypassing the latest Roden-anti-squirrel device that has been deployed in the ongoing battle to defeat the enemy’s attempts at extricating food that’s not been left out for them. Bloody rascals… Y’know, they’re a lot more intelligent than you’d give ‘em credit for. This latest gadget we have looks like it could be the one tho’; its kept them out for a good couple of weeks but, you never know, they’ll probably figure it out. Another coffee before we get back in to it?

Two more cups of the well-frothed are placed on the table and we return to the subject of some of the songs that I’ve unearthed that would – had it not been scrapped – have constituted the first JRB album. The breeze has notched up a bit, rattling the sunshade against the table centre… or is my leg involuntarily twitching; much more of JR’s super-strength coffee and I’ll start to astral-project.

The Steve Smith album wasn’t finished – there was probably more material to add to it, but I think there was probably a sort of… a kind of impatience starting to develop in that I wasn’t having hits… and the band had been in the studio for a couple of months and there was a feeling of… ‘this ain’t gonna get him a hit either…’ which was, probably, a fair judgment on a musical level.

The entrance to that particular studio was to the side of the canteen – oft-presided over by Lucky Gordon, one time pimp to one of the Profumo Affair’s central characters, Christine Keeler – and where many of Island’s acts of the time recorded including Bob Marley, Aswad (who were almost fixtures there), Eddie & The Hot Rods, Steel Pulse, U2 (recorded a number of B sides with Steve Lilywhite who began his career there), Rico, King Sunny Adé, The Snivelin’ Shits, Rebop Kwaku Baah, as well as non-Island acts such as The Smiths (Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now was recorded with the then in-house engineer Stephen Street), Shriekback and countless dozens more.

Yes… that’s Steve (Winwood) on In A Circle. I’ve known him for years and… he must’ve been hanging about or whatever and y’know, we just wanted a keyboard player and, in some ways, it would have been very nervous for the band approaching him, I’m sure because he was a very busy guy – but, anyway, we’d got to a stage where we had a whole bunch of material but there was something lacking… so we asked Steve to come down… and he said, yeah.

He was just magnificent. There was a couple of passes and, basically, that was it… he just knows what to do, especially when it comes to Hammond.

Some days later we’re sitting at his dining room table – its boys night in and the hour is late; the remnants of our meal has been cleared away to the kitchen, two glasses of the well-chilled are before us as are two computers. Their respective cables stretch across the bare wood before trailing along the floor boards while various lists adorn random scraps of paper, post-it notes struggle to adhere to screen-edges and, in my open notebook track-listings are starting to take shape. Song titles have either been scratched through or have a tick beside them; other lists are emerging – the whole is slowly starting to take shape… So, which version of In A Circle do we go with?

JR looks back to the bigger of the two machines and scrolls down a bit and presses play. As the song moves from the extended chorus to where the Sax and Hammond start to interweave, he says, Has to be the one with Steve… don’t you think? For me, there’s something really special here.

Absolutely… Don't think anyone's heard it before either 'cos I'm pretty sure that it wasn't part of the cassette that Webbo had up on his site for a bit… I’d say, it’s a better version too… I pause. I mean… just listen to that, it’s just… floating… So, that’s a tick to that one…?

Yep… He agrees, That, Holmes, is a definite tick… So… moving on… what do we reckon for track four then..?

Gimme’ Some Truth

2011-03-16T00:10:00.003Z

According to the BBC’s web site (from a story – www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-12701664 – posted on Monday, March 14th ), Cory Doctorow is not just an author. He’s also a blogger and a journalist… and… stand by your beds, Matron’s on her way… he’s an activist too.

And, according to Auntie’s on-line presence, he’s passionately opposed to DRM (Digital Rights Management). Indeed it appears he’s pretty opinionated on the subject too since, in among many other quotes on that website within the self-same article, Mr and Mrs Doctorow’s son states: "The one thing that everyone should have uppermost in your mind when you're designing your business is that computers are never going to get worse at copying things."

Wow… Cory, that really is revelatory stuff… and not just because of your grammar.

Now then, that’ll be… Command (or Control) C for copy… and Control (or Command) V for paste… and, its been that way since… ohhhh… how long now..? Well, the Mac was introduced to the world on January 24th, 1984 and PC’s also use that same shortcut structure…… Ohhhh no… wait a sec, that’s not what he’s on about… oh heavens… nooooooo…

Goodness gracious, Mr and Mrs Doctorow’s grammatically challenged offspring is banging on about something much more important…

What’s that then? Well…. He – Cory D (lest we forget) – believes ‘digital content should be shared freely and that copyright laws should be liberalised to reflect this.’

Blimey… who is this radical thinker who’s discovered the road-map to Utopia?

Well, according to the BBC, he’s a Canadian who lives in London, he writes best selling science fiction novels and co-edits a blog called Boing Boing… He also (apparently) contributes to the Guardian (online) and was, in 2007, named as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum. Crikey…

But wait… there is more… He is also a former director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation and (golly, how does he find the time) a co-founder of the UK Open Rights Group as well as being a leading proponent of Creative Commons. Errrm… yes… and that is..?

In short, with a Creative Commons license, you keep your copyright but allow people to copy and distribute your ‘work’ provided they give you… a proper credit for so-doing.

So… what kind of ‘work’ falls into this category? Well, according to a Google search with that very phrase in the title, Creative Commons licenses can be applied to all works that would normally fall under copyright, including: books, plays, movies, music, articles, photographs, blogs, and websites.

I see… so… one get to keep one’s copyright… however… it’s also cool (maaaan) for others to copy the work that you have copyrighted (as your own) freely. How splendid, how very forward thinking: that’s a bit like allowing free run with the photocopier in the nearest Public Library.

I think those who read this little Voltaire out on its windswept knoll can safely assume that our newest Canadian pal, Mr Doctorow gets paid (ie, earns money with which he pays his bills) to write for the Guardian (online)… to co-edit Boing Boing… or… write his sci-fi novels… or sit on the Creative Commons committee.

If not, then he either has very understanding backers or is someone of independent means who doesn’t need to work for a living.

Either which way, the viewpoints he’s presented and as outlined within this BBC article are about as lop-sided as the Titanic was about ninety minutes after striking the ‘berg.

The fact of the matter is… IF creatives do not earn (and copyright is rendered worthless – as described above) then those ‘things’ that we all enjoy (music / books / films etc) are gradually (no… make that rapidly) going to dry up.

This Utopian idea as purported by Mr Doctorow of… oh, everything should be, like, free maaaan… is as misguidedly imbecilic.

Any internet economy based on that model or ethic will collapse like a pack of cards disturbed by the breeze when the door is opened.

Consider – if you will – how newspapers are facing meltdown right now… For why? Well… you don’t need to buy one… do you? They’ve been giving away all their 'content' for nothing on the wibbly wobbly web for aeons… and all of ‘em (save Murdoch behind his pay-wall) are wondering why they’re hemorrhaging money.

Duh… it's simple… you cannot give away your ‘goods’ for free and expect to break even let alone make a profit with which to invest in the future. Or, pay the bills. Or eat.

If MC Doctorow wants to give all his work away for nothing… fine, that’s his choice.

But, it is entirely wrong to purport the theory that it is the right way forward. It is absolutely not because that juvenile attitude is simply promoting the rape of creativity.

Jess Roden | Song 3

2011-03-08T17:08:00.008Z

The room to the back of the anonymous back-street building in which I’ve been placed is, at best, serviceable; it is approximately fifteen feet square with walls painted a uniform, hint of a tint (but now-fading), Magnolia. Truth to tell, the colour scheme is actually more off-white with no tinted hint at all.

There is just the one, metal-framed window. It is set annoyingly high on the far wall – presumably so as to preclude any view other than that of the gun-metal grey, rain-bearing clouds, scudding past on this dreary, mid-February, afternoon.

Beneath the window is an oversized, malt-brown melamine-topped desk – more junior accountant than office manager. The right-hand border is scored with blackened cigarette burns that spread along its edge like so many decaying woodlice; I’ve seen fag-end burns like this many times before – most often on old B3 Hammond Organs played by the likes of Steve Winwood.

On the desk and in a mug that’s known better days, there’s a half-drunk cup of coffee. It has been poured from a machine down-along the frayed-brown-carpeted hallway. Even behind the now-closed door, the percolator gives off its own signature odour of stale dregs at twenty paces.

The entire place reeks of early-Seventies, Habitat-inspired, office functionality.

My Moleskin notebook lays bare and untroubled (yet) by note-taking on the desk; my coat is hanging on a hanger that, itself, is suspended from the single hook on the back of the plywood door. My brown-leather briefcase is huddled against one of the desk-legs; much like a cat, hungry for its master’s affection.

Spread across the stone-carpeted floor are plastic crates – some are green, others are Air Force grey while a few began life as shout-out-loud iridescent orange.

Some are stacked, one upon another while others have been spaced apart in random order; all are heavily pock-marked – as if suffering from crate-acne – and scratched from being thrown into and around the back of Transit vans; their heavy contents man-handled with ease by burly men with muscles to match.

Functional boxes which, in their own simple way, are simply that – since there is no other requirement… strong but serviceable; sturdy and utilitarian.

And each of these containers that are approximately three foot long by eighteen inches by another eighteen or so in depth hold innumerable smaller boxes.

Most of these are twelve-inches square; some are over two inches deep, some are slimmer volumes. All are stacked vertically and… sprinkled amongst them are a handful of smaller boxes – a mere seven inches square and slender in width too.

All of them have been labeled at some long-past time or other; the labels themselves have been stuck on the actual box fronts – some have been scrawled on, some have a good deal of writing that’s been crossed out and replaced by other, almost-as-old, scribbles; some have a doodles and drawings while some of the labels have been neatly typed out.

Like ancient hieroglyphics high on a wall on the inside of a Pharaoh’s tomb, they offer their own clues… hints that these boxes contain the treasure which, Indiana Jones-like I’ve been hoping to find for many months.

Fast backwards: a restaurant from the Indian sub-continent on the main drag that connect Chiswick to Hammersmith; Popadum frenzy, Chapatti heaven and Korma bliss. Two Kingfisher beers have been part-supped yet we’re not quite ready for the next infill; the singer and writer of songs and I sit opposite one another.

“Sometimes,” he muses, “I do wonder what still exists… Me and my bands, y’know… over the years… we recorded a lot; over at Basing Street and just down the road at the back of St Peters Square… And… now that I come to think about it, I do wonder what… might have survived.”

“There was a lot that never got released… but… I suppose all that stuff probably got wiped… or, maybe recorded over… or, perhaps those tapes just got chucked out. I dunno… but… yes, absolutely, if you wanted to do your Sherlock Holmes thing and… see what really is there… then… yeah, I’d be up for that…”

He sits quietly for a moment or two; a sliver of Naan bread held lightly in his fingers, hovering just above his side-plate. “Y’know… there was some really good stuff that we did… so yes… it’d be interesting to see what they have… but, honestly, I don’t suppose there’s very much. Another beer..?”

Fast forwards a few months… the singer and writer of songs wanders back into his sitting room with two large glasses, each having been re-charged from the bottle of well-chilled in the fridge; a couple of reserves are laying in wait in the garage that's attached to the house... just in case.

A real-fire hisses and pops in the grate… the gentle scent of top-notch Welsh lamb being oven-roasted in the kitchen across the hall mixes with the wood-smoke to permeate the air. A cat trails in after him and struts past the small, elderly dog curled up on the hearth.

The singer of songs settles into the depths of the sofa as I sit on the floor, just in front of the drawn curtains in the bay window. There’s a MacBook attached to the stereo-system; speakers placed either side of the fireplace.

A portrait of him, his young son and his wife taken at the time of the photosession for his first solo-album hangs, ever so slightly off kilter, above and to the side of the left-hand speaker. Books of eclectic persuasion stand to attention like so many soldiers line abreast on their parade-ground shelves. The lights are low with music in the air.

“Y’know… I’m amazed at what you’ve found…already… and you say there’s lots more?” His trademark eyes are lined by no regrets as he leafs through the box-front scans from today’s work-in-progress for project-X.

“This… y’know what it is..? It’s pretty much the whole album I did with Rabbit who nowadays plays keyboards with The Who… the one that CB (Chris Blackwell – owner / founder of Island) kinda rejected… I mean, we kept one track… but… really, it’s quite incredible that you’ve found this.”

“I mean, some of it is a bit… y’know… but… this one still stands up, don’t you think..? I have to be perfectly honest, though… I can’t really remember writing this let alone recording it… Let’s have a bit of a memory-jog.” He presses play on the MacBook and the unedited song is counted in by an unknown voice and then sparks into life.

Three minutes or so later, the tune gradually fades into the distance… the singer and writer assumes a far-away stare. Abruptly he says, “Heaven's, what kind of compression did we use on that piano..! That’s Mike Kellie from Spooky Tooth on drums… Pat Donaldson who played with The Fairports as well as lots of others is playing bass… that’s Rabbit on keyboards… and me strumming away on an acoustic guitar…”

“Why is it listed like that on the box? Well… I never came up with a title for the song. I think… maybe… I was planning to call it Hallelujah or something like that… but… ‘cos it was the third song on the tape and had no proper title, the engineer or the tape-op would have written it up as that.”

“I think we can stick this on the list as a definite for inclusion… don’t you..?”

Ladies and gentlemen… this… really is… the very first Hidden Master we found… Song 3… by Jess Roden.

(nb, this is an edited clip – there being very real reasons why the full track isn’t being posted… a) this song has yet to be re-mastered (this is a lo-res MP3 audio) and b) to make it less attractive to the pirates - copyright must be respected. In time, however, this track – as well as the original non-vocal demo – will be part of the Hidden Masters : The Jess Roden Anthology set that is in preparation currently).

The Party’s Over

2011-02-16T15:52:00.007Z

So, it’s the morning after the night before: The BRITS has been, gone and put back in its cupboard for another year.

Collectively, the UK business of music is nursing a monumental hangover; drinks were drunk, little black dresses got crushed and without a shadow of a doubt, some woke up this morning with an unfamiliar person next to them – its not always that the best fun is had in the kitchen at after-show parties.

Yet, while this is the British equivalent to The Grammys, it strikes me as being extraordinary that neither organising ‘committee’ on either side of the pond can get their own flagship ‘awards show’ anywhere near right.

The Grammy’s, for example, have in excess of one hundred categories… that’s a bit like awarding a child at school a prize for attending class; you know – the modern ‘no one is a loser’ ethic which, actually, stifles competitiveness.

It’s also a way (they would argue) of covering all the bases… when the reality is that they (the Grammy organising wallahs) are simply finding more and more genre boxes into which they can conveniently put ‘music’.

Have a look at category 108 and tell me about its relevance… please. It is: Best Long Form Music Video and subtitled (presumably for the hard of understanding) as follows – For video album packages consisting of more than one song or track. Award to the Artist and to the Video Director/Producer of at least 51% of the total playing time.

This little Voltaire out there on its windswept knoll would argue strenuously that there are only two of these cardboard boxes… one is marked good… the other is labeled bad. End.

Anyhow, as a consequence of this boxing-off of genres, The Grammys go on for… hours… really they do; quite literally from mid-afternoon to lateish in the evening. How those attending get through that without resorting to the intake of advanced pharmaceuticals to stave off the boredom of all those acceptance speeches (Mum, Dad, my Record Company, Juan Pelota my underwear stylist, my managers, the person tending my Cairn Terrier, Auntie Joan, God and, before I forget… you – the fans!!! And, Mum – this if for YOU… etc etc) is entirely beyond me.

Besides which, there are – in reality – almost two shows… the first (lengthy) segment isn’t televised… that’s when the boxes labeled ‘Best Sleeve Notes’ or Best Traditional World Music Album / Vocal or Instrumental – that being category 72 of the 108) are ticked and the (doubtless) worthy winner steps forward to thank God, his / her Mum and Dad, Lover, Dog (again), MTV, the Fans etc etc).

To underline the absurdity of all the categories, back in 1996 Eddie Veeder said, when accepting Pearl Jam’s Grammy for Best Hard Rock Performance, ‘I don’t know what this means, I don’t think it means anything.’

The second part begins with the televising of the (ridiculous) parade down the blood red carpet when the interviewers ask, in the main, ‘Who are you wearing’ to each of the freshly-coiffed contestants. The answers that spill from between their professionally whitened teeth seem to (somehow) add up to enough product placement-endorsement to satisfy the likes of Armani, Malandrino, J-P Gaultier, Pucci, Cavalli, Givenchy and D&G as worn by the Beiber-ling.

After which, the main show begins with a mere twenty or so Awards… yet, this is so muddled as to make no sense… Best Recording is up against Best Song…? Errr. Hello?

The BRITS, on the other hand, only had – by comparison – a handful of trophies to give out… in which were categories described as… Best Male… Best Female… yes, but Best Male or Female what exactly…?

Well, in the former we had the likes of Paul Weller up against Robert Plant, Tiny Temper, Mark Ronson yet someone called Plan B won… other than observing that the ‘list’ is horribly mismatched, I find it hard to understand how someone like the constantly reinventing-himself Robert Plant isn’t recognised as being… the best.

As to the other ‘best’s of the evening… Adele is being lauded by the ‘real commentators’ for her performance of Someone Like You – sparse and real, just piano and vocal. Sure, it is a great song but, I couldn’t help feeling that – while great – that greatness could have been embellished with strings to turn her performance into something quite remarkable.

Money on a big string section that would, quite frankly, have been better spent by the organisers than on the horrid troops (sic) of totally unnecessary ‘dancers’ dressed up as quasi-Fascist riot police for Take That and… the aforementioned Plan B who reenacted some kind of eccentric court scene while strangling his lyrical language by rapping it at us in pure, unadulterated, estuary.

Best hair on the night belonged to uber-puppet Beiber – he turned up, looking far to fresh-faced from a transatlantic flight to be real – no dark glasses for him unlike Cee-Lo who swung very low in his.

Chaps – dark glasses indoors are a sign… a signal… of utter affectation; they’re not cool… not funny… not glamorous… they just make you look plain stupid.

And, of the acceptance speeches… Laura Marling’s was – without doubt – the most real, most normal. I admit I was rooting for Rumer in this category but, Ms Marling – who looked like a rabbit caught in the headlights – was head and shoulders (sic) over the likes of Jessie J whose crocodile tears were as false as her eyelashes. Critics’ Choice..? Well, in that respect, those critics should be lined up against a wall and… because time will out on this, as I guarantee that, in five years time, people will be asking… Jessie who? And, the song was… Do It Like A Prude..? Nah, don’t remember that one.

And… the best album… the BEST British album of the last year was… really… honestly… you’re telling me that Mumford & Sons’ record was THE BEST British album of last year… ok, I’ll accept it was better than Take T’at – who’re collectively fast becoming the Queen Mother of The Brits… I mean, they’re like a standard fixture aren’t they, rather like that bloke seen at every Rugby match, wearing a Union Jack coat and a top hat being the epitome of a British Bulldog by the touchline.

And, James Corden… well, he looked (and acted) more like a safe Vicar who’d had one too few glasses of Sherry at Christmas… bumbling and smiling inanely. Time, if ever there was, to bring back a proper presenter or to say sorry to Jarvis Cocker and acknowledge that his stage invasion whilst wacko-Jacko was acting out his Christ-like tendencies surrounded by children was a genuine act that everyone in the hall that night (including self) wished they’d have been nearer the stage and been able to protest in like manner.

Oh… and its about time that the background TV presenter stopped using the word Platinum… honestly, luv… no one out their watching from the comfort of their sofa knows what it means… neither is it impressive.

But, hey, this was all about the ‘live’ music… wasn’t it…? Maybe so – and Adele and the rather loud Arcade Fire certainly showed how it could be done… However, the Mumblefords, scored a spectacular own goal by playing like a bunch of subway-buskers who are so ordinary that one hurries by without dipping the hand in the trouser pocket.

And Rihanna… I’m told that was a medley of her hit… hmmm… clearly lip-synching, it was not far short of a total travesty; guileless style over minimal content… and with choreography (was that what it really was?) that was about as exciting as watching a parody of all those old Top Of The Pops routines. Grabbing your crotch while wearing a ?dress? that shows all and sundry that your bottom is the size of Trindad isn’t raunchy, its just plain sad.

And so… the morning after… and as much-heralded 24 hours previously, up on iTunes are the live performances from last night to download and enjoy… for as long as one likes…

Well, actually, that’s not quite correct – not all of the performances are there due to technical hitches (according to my mole); hitches like auto-tuning and lip-synching... ha ha!

Be that as it may, some are... go to The Brits site and up there on the top right hand corner a graphic shows that the Cee Lo performance with Paloma Faith is available via iTunes…

Except, its not… it is geographically challenged… meaning that if (for example) one is logging on from the US or Australia… its not available.

Brilliant… how utterly fxxxxxg dumb is that? Someone in (say, Detroit or Adelaide) wants that recording and so how do they get it..?

Here’s what they’ll do: they’ll go to YouTube, engage a gadget called AudioHiJack (a free download - about which I've written and emphasised the dangers thereof in relation to pircay before) and… press record… Four minutes and thirty-two seconds later and it’ll nestle happily within their iTunes folder.

For free… that’s zilch… nada… nothing… FREE…

Fuck me, but record companies are about as stupid as they get… one day, those that forge these licensing arrangements will actually understand that the web is a global entity… global equals worldwide…

Is it any wonder that the ‘record companies’ are losing money / the war against piracy?

And, as a final comment on the success of this year’s BRIT Awards… we need look no further than Music Week who have just announced that the 2011 awards had the lowest viewing figures for five years and was outstripped by not only the film, My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding (6.5 million viewers against 4.7 for the BRITS) but also Holby City which attracted 5.6 million.

Re-make / re-model..? Yes, please.

One Moment In Time

2011-02-15T18:21:00.011Z

Today, via the auspices of Music Week – Britain’s one and only trade magazine for the business of music – came the news that tonight’s BRIT Award performances will be available online via a dedicated BRITS page on iTunes. All proceeds from said recordings will go to the BRITS Trust.

This follows last year’s ‘experiment’ of the same which saw the collaboration between Dizzee Rascal and Florence of Florence + The Machine sell over three hundred thousand copies of their mid-February BRIT Awards’ on-stage mash-up.

Not much to concern ourselves about here… is there?

Not really… so long as those involved (the artists / their management / the musicians involved / relevant record companies etc etc) are all totally cool flying by the seat of their proverbials.

And, so long as those who purchase said artefact of the night, fully understand what they’re shelling out their money for – ‘cos what the public will be offered to acquire will be nothing more than an officially sanctioned bootleg of song X / onstage collaboration Y.

Perhaps I should set my stall out here and state that I believe live recordings contain some of my most favourite moments within all music: this is when it really is down to those four fundamental chords and the truth. Its when the magic of a band at the top of their game can send shivers down the spine; moments that can never be replicated – it is, for the moment and of the moment – a true snapshot in time.

And, something that’s incredibly rare to capture since every single star has to be perfectly in alignment for it – the magic – to happen.

Come with me, if you will and we’ll head off to Hammersmith Palais on the night of September 29th, 1980.

This venerable building began life in 1919 as The Hammersmith Palais de Danse and, besides being a ballroom it hosted an ice rink and was also where tanks were constructed during the war besides doubling as a tram shed. It was also one of the greatest music venues in all of London… and I saw countless bands there… U2 supporting Talking Heads (standing next to Bruce Springsteen on the balcony and later helping smuggle his Broooceness into the dressing room so that Bono and Bruce’s first meeting could be committed to celluloid by (our) photographer who, himself, gained access to the inner sanctum through an open window); OMD, The Clash, the B52s, Nils Lofgren, The Cramps, The Alarm, King Sunny Adé , Orange Juice, The Waterboys and literally dozens of others.

Its a warm, balmy early autumn evening… outside and inside some three thousand or so punters are gathered – John Curd the promoter of many Palais gigs was never that fussed with fire regulations that called for specified maximum numbers of an audience to be adhered to.

Edged up onto the pavement is a big truck; a mobile studio… cables spill from its innards like so much spaghetti, trailing into the venue via side doors. Inside this state of the art (for its time) articulated lorry are slightly-bearded sound engineer Godwin Logie, a veteran from Island Hammersmith studios, The FallOut Shelter and the ever-suave Alex Sadkin, imported over from Compass Point in The Bahamas to produce the recording.

A large spliff smolders on the edge of the desk, the air is fetid with the reek of high quality grass. Marianne Faithfull and her then husband, The Vibrators’ Ben Brierly are hovering in the background. Richard ‘Hutch’ Hutchinson – more regularly employed as front-of-house sound engineer for The Jess Roden Band – meanders back and forth between his desk in the hall and the truck, checking and double-checking.

Inside, it’s a cauldron of noise, heat and anticipation – the latter most keenly felt by those at the sharp end of proceedings. A little over a week previously, a bit of a plan had been hatched… we’re going to create a bit of history here by putting out the fastest live recording in history; the Guinness Book Of Records are in our collective sights.

As near as dammit to the appointed hour, at nine pm, Toots and The Maytals bound on stage… theirs is high-energy reggae, not for them the languid build of a set… it kicks off in the overtaking lane with Pressure Drop (covered by label-mate Robert Palmer) and morphs along the central-reservation barriers almost seamlessly through classic Toots tracks such as Monkey Man, Funky Kingston, Time Tough and his timeless 54-46 That’s My Number… the crowd, predictably, go nuts… and, ninety or so minutes later… this one night of music is all there, committed to reels of two-inch, 24-track, analog tape.

The guys in the truck have been mixing on the hoof; they have time for one more pass of the entire show to readjust levels before filtering out the songs that – for whatever reason – are deemed (in those pre-ProTools days) as being sub-standard… thankfully, the key Toots songs have made it… Crowd noise is edited… the song sequence is chosen… before that is run off as a final, quarter inch, stereo mix.

A fast car is waiting… the stereo mixes – accompanied by Alex Sadkin – head to the mastering suite where the two sides of vinyl will start to take shape. The tapes are run through, levels are once again tweaked and the alchemy of mastering is underway; memory at a distance (in this instance) is hazy but, I’m pretty sure the knob-twiddler in chief would have been John Dent, one of the masters of this alchemic artform. In general terms, a good couple of hours would have been allowed for each track… but, on this particular night where time was of the essence, this vital process would have been cut to maybe two or, at a pinch, three hours max.

In the background – and only once the final album running order had been confirmed – the artwork was being completed… and sent straight to the printers, bypassing the usual colour checking processes.

Once the finished album had been mastered, the fast car was employed yet again – this time, destination EMI’s pressing plant at Hayes… the master became the laquer… the lacquer became the stamper that would produce the vinyl. The presses rolled early in the morning and each album was hand-sleeved… more fast cars stood by and, as record stores in London opened for business, the album was there to buy… recorded and in the shops in under twenty-four hours and yes… a few weeks later, the letter from the Guinness Book Of records people duly arrived.

So… how does all that relate to this evening’s little BRITS exercise…?

I’d say it was more down to the performance than anything… IF – and this a huge ask – IF everything goes according to plan for song X or Y then the sheer logistical exercise of putting that performance up on iTunes isn’t that much of a difficulty.

That IF, however, should be written in sky-high letters. For example – and lets take as one example the Grammys from the other night… in which Bruno Mars’ (sort-of) tribute to James Brown, a song called Grenade went horribly, horribly wrong.

For why…? Master Mars’ vocals were as flat as a pancake throughout much of the song… ooopsy, should’ve used the old auto-tune gadget, son… fixable after the fact in ProTools… yes, undoubtedly but… its time consuming.

So, lets imagine that there is a cock-up with an instrument… violas are notorious but lets think about something more fundamental, the bass drum pedal is at the root of most songs isn’t it?

So, consider what happens IF the mic isn’t securely-enough attached to the floor and, throughout performance Z… it moves… just a few centimeters but, trust me, that’s enough to matter. Why? Sonically (and noticeably) the song is out of kilter. Is it fixable… of course… ProTools to the rescue yet again. However… this, and trust me here, really can be time-consuming.

It’s a process I watched unfold during one of the archive projects I’m engrossed in currently – we wanted to use a particular live recording (from The Marquee since you’re wondering) and an absolute belter of a performance it is too.

However, during initial playback of the two inch multitracks something sounded… out… we couldn’t quite figure it out but, definitely something was wrong. My lankily-haired, cup-cake-eating, engineer cocked his head on one side… listened intently again and again then, one by one, started to ‘solo’ every single mic-input.

‘Aha… found it… the bass-drum mic moved.’ he pronounced after an hour of twiddling. ‘And the solution is…?’ I asked – worrying that this might be a problem too far even for his skill-set.

‘Well…’ he said, scratching what passes for a beard… ‘I could take one bass-drum beat right at the start where everything is aligned properly and use that and put it back on every beat in the song… that should, in theory, do the trick… you might want to go and make a big pot of coffee, though… we’re in for the long haul… it’ll probably take the rest of the day.’

The song was nine minutes long and… it did take the rest of the day. Ultimately, it did get fixed but the point is, it would have been unusable without that fix.

With the BRITS tonight… how will they do this; make sure that that we, the end-users – the iTunes purchasers, are on the receiving end of performances that are as good as they can be in every single way?

Well, if they’re heading down the sheer speed route, I’d imagine its highly unlikely that they’ll use the actual performance from the televised show – there will be a safety net in place whereby the run throughs, the sound-checks will have been recorded and those performances will act as audio-security… perhaps with a live (auto-tuned) vocal laid on top.

Why..? Well, I can’t imagine any of tonight’s scheduled performing (loosely applied adjective as that is) acts such as Take That, Plan B, Rihanna, Cee Lo or Tinie Tempah) comfortable enough with their own – raw – performances to allow anything sub-standard out there.

Arcade Fire or The Mumfords… perhaps… but then again and in the cold light of day, would one want to really head over to iTunes and pay to download a copy of The Mumfords backing His Bobness, growling out a dirge-like Maggies Farm from the recent Grammys?

You know what... quite honestly, I reckon its far better to leave everything as is... don't bother with the kerfuffle and uncertainty (and undoubted pressure) of recording to release from a show like this... leave it as a moment in time that can be found on YouTube in time to come, just like so many great performances where the visual combines with the audio - and its that which makes it work as well as it does - as a final example, Mick Jagger's solo Grammys performance of Everybody Needs Somebody To Love was hardly perfect but, the visual of Mick as man in motorway service station caught out by an over-hot hand-drier in the men's lavaotories, belting it out made it work.

Celluloid Heroes #1 John Barry (The Beyondness Of Things)

2011-01-31T17:58:00.010Z

There is an inescapable quietness, an unavoidable sadness that underpins today: the world is collectively mourning one of the compositional giants of modern music – John Barry.

There will, no doubt, be acres of prose written in the next however long in praise of his lush melodies and remarkable prowess with minor and major chords as well as his skill at letting notes just hang in the air like so much honeysuckle-scent on an evening breeze.

Yet – more often than not, it wasn’t (as I believe Miles Davis once said) the notes that were played that counted, but those that weren’t – JB created spaces within music in which one’s imagination was left to roam.

Above all, though, it is the sheer elegance of his music; exemplified by a series of unmatched film scores that were… still are… (and crucially) remain to be discovered by generations to come... his remarkable legacy.

Quite a few years ago (in 1999 to be exact), when a project involved a close working relationship with The English Chamber Orchestra, they played a couple of nights under JB’s baton at The Royal Albert Hall. This was a year of so after JB had signed to Decca and released his first non-soundtrack album for a quarter of a century, the timeless The Beyondness Of Things.

Not being on the ball as rapidly as I should have been, I missed out at the box-office. The shows were beyond sold-out; tickets were as hard to find as hen’s teeth – this being only the second time in many, many, years that JB had played a UK show and coming on the back of the critical acclaim that his Beyondness album had received. Thus, it was all about cadging a gigantic favour. So, it was after much grovelling and begging on bended knee, that a pair of guest tickets arrived in the post.

In the hall that night, as my pal Honest John (the financial adviser) and I settled in the side-stalls, the air was thick with expectation… could the maestro deliver; would these themes of his, these glorious and magnificent melodies translate to a space like this without the visual benefit of being set to celluloid?

The players took their seats, tuned up as they do – taking their cue from number one fiddler – then the lights dimmed. Smaller than imagined, a gaunt, somewhat insignificant-looking, grey-haired figure took to the platform…

He tapped his baton a couple of times and then… the distant thunder of kettle drums cracked the air; the strident shout of trombones marched to the beat as swelling strings added their own counterpoint to… the opening title-music to Zulu.

Three or so minutes later, as the final chords washed away, there was absolute silence for maybe five or six seconds (although it felt longer). Then the audience, as one, stood as an explosion of applause detonated throughout the hall.

Two and a bit hours later, the man who conducted by using his shoulders as much as his baton had satiated the five or so thousand people in the hall with music. As much as we’d been beguiled by the lushness of the Beyondness album, we’d been treated to a voyage through his soundtracks by way of symphonic sadness within the likes of Out Of Africa and Mary Queen Of Scots and the evergreen branches of enticement of a near-thirty minute James Bond medley.

It was one of the greatest shows (among countless hundreds) I’ve been luck enough to witness.

Was he a composer as important as (say) Puccini or Beethoven? Should he be revered as painter of musical sound-scapes as important as (say) Monet or Kandinsky?

Yes, I would argue that JB rightly occupies a pedestal alongside those who are rightly regarded as colossuses within their own field.

The world is a richer place for his music and a sadder one for his untimely passing.

Fare thee well then, JB… a lion of Africa sleeps tonight.

Thieves Like Us

2011-01-13T16:41:00.007Z

Woke up…
Dragged a comb across my head...

Yeah, you know how that song goes… part of the soundtrack to my youth as much as it is to this and every other generation that’ll follow.

And, this morning, I did exactly that… well, not really – took a bit of a squint in the mirror whilst gargling with the old Listerine Total Care (Cinnamint flavour since you’re wondering – I’ve become a bit bored with the mint only of late) and thought… hmm, ok, that’ll have to do… the bags under the eyes (which I thought’d look cool / make me look a bit lived in when I was younger than today but which, actually, are now permanent fixtures) aren’t gonna go away… time to get on with my day.

Then… the unmistakable sound of the Inner Terrier barking ferociously, straining at its leash from within its kennel.

Damn, whats got him so worked up… I’ve a load of research to complete, Skype calls with my lawyer later, masses of writing to do, dozens of emails to answer, designs to be getting on with as well as new designs to start and… just a whole shedload of… stuff… to be getting on with.

But the Inner Terrier is barking louder than before… interspersed with a strange kind of yowling sound. OK, best go see what’s up.

Aha… The headline (via TorrentFreak.com) was enough… RapidShare Accuses ‘Piracy Report’ Publisher of Defamation; Might Sue.

Ok… no wonder the Inner Terrier was way beyond just apoplectic yapping. This relates to the widely published story that was picked up by the likes of the BBC yesterday when RapidShare were ‘branded’ as being the leading digital piracy site.

RapidShare – for their part – have responded by emphasising that they are a legitimate company.

Well… it is clear that with such opposing viewpoints that one side or the other are trolling out Porky Pies.

And, this little Voltaire out on its windswept knoll would like to tell you who, precisely, is being untruthful. Yes, my Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen – readers of this little Voltaire as far flung around the globe as you truly are… it is RapidShare who are about as illegitimate a company as trades as makes no difference.

Indeed… of late, courts in Germany have ruled (that’s confirmed legally to the likes of you and me) that RapidShare runs a perfectly legal business.

However… that is absolute and utter CRAP. They don’t.

For the hard of hearing, I’ll repeat that… the people who runs these sites are deluded at best – they’re simply offering a service that rips off creatives.

Because… RapidShare (along with MegaUpload) are the leading conduits for any piece of music that you care to think of… the channel or means or… route (however you care to term it) … to download whatever you feel like listening to (or viewing) FOR FREE.

Which, basically, means that creative person X does not get paid.

Please, therefore could someone explain how that is legal?

Its not… is it?

Nevertheless, apparently RapidShare’s big-wigs are so incensed at being labeled the world’s largest ‘digital piracy site’ that they’re considering legal action on the grounds that this ‘statement’ by MarkMonitor – culled from a report via the RIAA and others – is defamatory.

Indeed, RapidShare have gone so far as to offer up their own statement… “This defamation of RapidShare as a digital piracy site is absurd and we reserve the right to take legal action against MarkMonitor. RapidShare is a legitimate company that offers its customers fast, simple and secure storage and management of large amounts of data via our servers.”

Defamatory… my arse… its not! It’s the truth…

And, for the disbelievers (and I fail to see who could fail to grasp this)… here’s how it works. This is how easy it is to download any piece of music you like / fancy – FOR FREE – via the likes of RapidShare or MegaUpload.

Step 1… Log on to your favoured internet browser… type in (for example) the album title you’re looking for and search for it using the ‘image search’ function.

Step 2… Scroll down a bit – past all the links to the likes of iTunes and HMV digital and so forth… down a bit further and you’ll find the blogspots that ‘purport’ to ‘write’ about particular Album X.

Step 3… Click on the image link and that’ll (generally) take you to the blog page so illustrated. Scroll down a bit, past the album cover… and you’ll find the track-listing and, more often than not, a box marked links.

Step 4… Hit the link – sometimes it’s not even hidden away in a box but there, in plain sight for anyone to see… and, that link will open up a new page.

Step 5… That new page will offer you your download and more often than not, you’ll find that page hosted by… yes, you’ve guessed it… either RapidShare or MegaUpload.

Step 6… Click on ‘download this file’ and, depending on the speed of your connection, you can be listening to your own copy of Album X – FOR FREE – within five minutes or so.

(for exactness, this isn’t a precise science… from time to time you have to kiss a few internet frogs along the way… but, ultimately, it shouldn’t take much more than ten minutes of searching to provide the link you’re looking for).

And… that is legal?

Nope… I don’t think so…

And… can it be stopped? On balance I’d say no… it cannot. The likes of RapidShare will not be shutting the doors to their zillion-times terabyte servers any time soon – after all, they’re making a small fortune acting as conduits.

Equals, this form of filesharing ain’t gonna go away.

So... is there a solution?

Fuck yeah… With the technology available, how hard would it be to enforce a methodology that makes this new form of distribution a legal way to dole out music (and film / games etc etc)?

And… via that methodology – which would mean the likes of RapidShare / MegaUpload etc paying a form of royalty based on downloads – it would mean that the creatives – the song-writers… the copyright holders… the people who invent games… the authors... the film-makers… are FAIRLY PAID.

Enough… I need to take the Inner Terrier out for his walk; he's howling like a banshee. However, I’ll end this by appending a few pithy sentences from the noted author, David Thomas (aka Tom Cain). Not much more needs to be added (other than to state he granted permission for his words to be used here).

One of these days, the entertainment industry will find the form of words that explains a few very simple ideas to the people who steal copyright material and the theorists who dispute the very meaning of copyright itself.

Such as, for example ... when you rip off a music file you steal the musician's work and deny them the means of earning a living ... no one would expect a plumber to work for free, why should a pianist, an actor or an author? ... if you larcenous fuckwits keep stealing stuff, then eventually no one will be able to afford to spend the tens or even hundreds of millions it costs to make a movie, or the months and years it takes to write a novel, and then where will you be?

Broken English

2011-01-07T19:50:00.006Z

It is the time of the year when those who’ve made their New Year resolutions start to break ‘em: you know the kind of thing… awash with Champagne on New Year’s Eve, gazing unsteadily into the eyes of the one you love, you pledge daily visits to the gym, self-discipline that equates to a pumping iron regime that’ll make you all the more attractive by… oh, Valentine’s Day latest.

Did I make one of these resolutions..? Well, not really – I certainly didn’t make futile promises to dust down my running shoes in a vague attempt at getting fitter.

Nevertheless, I did think to myself whilst quaffing a rather pleasing item from the Veuve Clicquot stable and watching the fireworks that perhaps 2011 would be the year when I became less of a perennial grump.

So, in between sips from the sippy-cup and as the clock turned, I decided that I’d let my Jack Russell tendencies off the leash.

And… you know what..? All was going swimmingly until… the inner Terrier bounded up and started snapping ferociously earlier today.

It had spied such utter hypocrisy it couldn’t be ignored.

Sadly, however, I can’t imagine that the little news item that the inner Terrier spotted will be among the front-runner on News At Ten tonight, nor would it fight for a place in the headlines on ABC News or France Soir or whatever the German equivalent is. Will it make the Antipodean equivalent of TVN 24 Horas in Chile…? I rather doubt it. Where will it be placed on RTPN in Portugal or will they ignore it just as much as CBC in Canada undoubtedly will? That, too, is highly probable.

So… what is this duplicity and double standards that have so incensed; what has raised the inner Terrier's hackles to vertical?

OK… here is the full quote from Daniel Raimer who is RapidShare AG’s lawyer (and spokesman). RapidShare have just overturned a court ruling where, originally, Atari (the gaming company) had said RapidShare did not take sufficient measures against copyright infringement.

“The ruling demonstrates once again that RapidShare is operating a fully legal range and has taken measures against the misuse of its service which go beyond the level that is legally required. We are confident that copyright holders will gradually come to accept this conclusion.“

This is absolute, total… BOLLOX.

This little Voltaire out on its grassy knoll has expounded on this before but, this latest court ruling – and the utterly contemptible accompanying quote - has started the inner Terrier growling as well as barking loudly.

Because… the simple fact of the matter is that RapidShare (and dozens of other similar ‘sites’) host files that are shared by ‘consumers’ from which the rights owners do not earn.

There is so much proof of the above being absolute FACT out there in wibbly-wobbly-web land that there is no requirement for further expansion or examples here.

File-sharing (in this manner) is, to all intents and purposes, the new distribution of music… (and film, tv, video and so forth).

And, no matter what all the worthy people at the tops of those respective industries say they’re going to do to stop it, they’re ignoring the incontrovertible fact that the stable door got left open long ago and… the horse went that-a-way.

So… while it is entirely galling to read the complete pack of lies that Daniel Raimer spouted earlier – and, being a lawyer he should know a lot better – isn’t it better to accept that Shanks’ pony has bolted over the near horizon and implement a practical solution whereby rights holders are paid?

I mean… its not difficult… is it?

IF music is to be freely available – and all the recently published figures detailing sales downturns point to that as an inevitable conclusion (cf recent editions of Billboard etc) – then these *new distribution channels* are going to have to contribute – otherwise the creators’ creativity will simply dry up… they’ll starve.

RapidShare (so it proudly notes) is one of the 100 most visited websites on the planet. It estimates that over 400,000 files are uploaded to its servers every single day. In any calendar year, that equates to more than 14.5 million. The company has over 1,000 servers with combined storage capacity measured in Petabytes (one unit being I million gigabytes). The bandwidth that their millions of visitors a day occupy means that the income they are generating is colossal. Oh, and lets not forget the subscription services they offer as well.

In other words, RapidShare are generating seriously huge sums of money and yet… as things stand… they do NOT make any payments to 'rights holders' for distributing those 'rights' as they do.

Hypocritical - yes, I would argue so... wouldn't you?

Limetorrents is another in a similar vein. However (and rather cleverly) on their web site they state that they are: a torrent search engine and directory which do NOT host torrent files but links to torrents hosted on other websites. We do NOT have any copyrighted or illegal content on Limetorrents, and we do NOT host torrent files on our servers.

Technically correct and very much holier than thou… But, straight out of the school of ‘nuttin’ to do with me guv’…

One wonders how they manage to keep a straight face (other than laughing all the way to the bank) when simple random searches show them to be offering links to literally any film, game or piece of music one cares to think of.

And… for taking their place within this new distribution egg and spoon race, what do LimeWire contribute to the creatives? Jack shit.

With the kind of numbers that companies such as these two (of very many similar) reporting, it would be impractical to try to instigate internal systems whereby ever single file uploaded was pre-screened.

Nevertheless, since this method of distribution is gradually becoming the norm and to stop it becoming what it now is – the unacceptable – then methodology has to be put in place whereby these distributors of ‘rights’ contribute.

This Voltaire on its grassy, windswept knoll, therefore wonders what on earth organisations such as PRS are actually doing to protect their members from the rape and pillage being meted out by companies such RapidShare who are contentedly boating down the middle of the fast-flowing river of pure profit?

Picture This

2010-12-20T18:47:00.008Z

Dunno about you but, I’m a bit of an information junkie… For instance, I devour sleeve notes; call me a train-spotter but I really do like to know the inner bits and bobs behind the recording of the record I’m listening to… and, I don’t believe I’m alone in that enjoyment.

Same goes for art galleries… as much as I like to go and gaze at painting X or Y by great-master A or B, the same goes for the captioning thereof. To me, its all part of the learning; the acquisition of knowledge if you like – the tale behind the painting adds immeasurably to the pleasure in looking at what the exhibit’s curator has hung on the wall.

The upper space in this particular gallery is all whitewashed walls and rectangular shapes. The floors are anonymous pine planks; Norwegian blonde – each footfall echo bounces back in an area otherwise bereft of meaningful life. It reeks of uninviting post-industrial chic.

And, this scrupulously scrubbed room into which I have wandered through a wide white opening is perhaps forty feet wide by maybe thirty deep and about fifteen or so in height.

And there, hanging artistically off-centre and suspended from the ceiling, occupying some (but not all) of the white space in this white box-lozenge that has no door, is a huge jumble of autumnal-hued… string.

The string – so I’m reliably informed by the caption that’s been stuck at eye-level on the white wall – entitled ‘Untitled Number One’.

The first line of this ‘caption’ reads as follows: You may imagine that this is unfinished.

Taking my cue from the caption – bible-black, 14 point, Times Roman on the scrubbed-white wall – I extend my imagination.

However, much like an engine running low on diesel, it only travels so far: it splutters to a halt at the point when I’ve decided the dangling mess of twine resembles nothing other than a poorly assembled squirrel’s dray that has recently been savaged by a hungry feline on its quest for hatchling breakfast.

Looking for clues, I re-examine the caption again, the one that solemnly informs me: You may imagine this is unfinished. Sorry pal, I don’t imagine anything of the kind actually… What I clearly see – and right before my eyes – is a heap of total bollox… full-throttle pretentious, art-installation, crap. The person who ‘assembled it’, the people who commissioned this thing… AND the person who wrote this ‘caption’ – all of ‘em should be ashamed of themselves.

But… why are you here Neil… especially when you know this sort of thing irritates the be-jaysus out of you? Ahh… I’m here because… but, you know what, I really wish I hadn’t bothered. Where, why, what, how, when… then?

Just the other day actually – when it seemed like a beezer idea to avoid Christmas shopping by nipping in to have a squint around an Exhibition that advertised itself as displaying loads of Edward Hopper pictures.

And, since I’ve been a bit of a sucker for Hopper’s art since my mid-teens… off I toddled. The only problem was that the advertising exaggerated somewhat… there were only a very few of Hopper’s work on display and very few had any meaningful captioning either. Plus, since the gallery's coffee-emporium was closed and they'd indulged in daylight robbery to actually get in to said gallery, exploration of the other floors seemed in order. Hence the reasons for the irritating ball of string encounter.

Anyway, Hopper’s art and I first became acquainted by way of another artist – Edward Kasper who I imagine, (tho’ honestly don’t know for sure), probably drank deep from the well of Hopper’s realism-inspired-inspiration. Edward Kasper… who’s he?

He’s the bloke responsible for this - the wrap-around poster-like sleeve to the original inner for The Band’s Moondog Matinee.

Not, frankly, the greatest album they ever delivered but it’s contained within one of my favourite covers. And, it’s not too far a throw of the imagination to see Kasper’s sleeve-art with its own antecedence in Hopper’s own Nighthawk’s masterpiece of 1942.

Which, led me to thinking… album art is not what once it was… is it?

Growing up musically (before) and during time spent at the coal-face of Island Records, one of CB’s (Chris Blackwell – founder of) firm beliefs that was imbued within us was… and I’m quoting him here; “If you felt that the artwork was intriguing then there must be something going on inside; there’s some thought, there’s some creativity. Artwork was very important to Island’s life”.

And it was… oh but it really was. Yet, as we moved from the 12 square inches – a format that gave designers space within and on which to create – through cassettes and in to CDs, the size came to matter. Why? ‘cos the combination of the art and the information became almost a by-product of the whole. It was as if… look, you’ve got the music, what more do you want?

And now, the art that comes with our music has been reduced to the size of a postage-stamp since that is what iTunes downloads dictate.

Time was when new-release record X or Y would appear in one’s local Diskery; the hard-earned would be handed over and one’d hop back on the bus and then it was either back home or to a mate’s house full of eager anticipation not just for the needle to make its first drop onto pristine vinyl but… to examine – in detail – the sleeve in which said new release resided. Why?

Because these sleeves were not only (in general terms) works of art in their own right but one also elicited a heap of information: who played what and with whom… who produced this or that… which studios were used… who engineered this or that… who was this or that person thanked and what role did they play in the overall proceedings? One stored this information up in one’s head and applied it to other albums, thereby drawing up a form of knowledge database.

Download your ‘product’ off of iTunes and none of this is contained within your download… you get the music (of course) plus the pea-sized replica of the sleeve. And that’s it.

The other day, I finally – and I’ll be beating myself for being late to the ball here – for some time to come… but, anyway, I managed to cotton on to what is rapidly becoming my album of the year. Seasons Of My Soul by the chanteuse otherwise known as Rumer.

And yes, the album art – a nice black and white image of the young lady – nestles quite comfortably in my iTunes folder. And (or should that be but) as much as I really like the music, there is nothing much – other than that nice black and white image – to look at. No real ‘information’ to acquire.

Big pity really… that the digital generation are cheated of this pleasure. I understand its not for everyone… but, I tend to think its for more than maybe people realise.

Perhaps that’s why there is a very real rise in vinyl sale… not just because of the (well-known) warmth of the musical-listening experience but equally because the sleeve designers can create better than is possible with a palette the size of a stamp.

You’re Not Going Out Dressed Like That

2010-12-11T16:03:00.007Z

It really has been a long old journey.

Ambling on stage is a five-piece band: first up is the boy-girl-boy bass player who sports short-cropped hair in a style that kd lang would ultimately confiscate as her own.

The lanky, shaggy-haired, drummer steps up to his mark: he wears an un-ironed Hawaiian shirt that could well have begun life by being drenched in the rabid colour scheme much-admired by Axminster carpet designers in the Fifties. The shirt has clearly lived a life of its own and looks as if it was lifted from a Salvation Army thrift store; impatiently, he raps out paradiddles on his snare-drum, waiting for the twin-guitarists to tune up.

The rangy axe-meister stage right – the one wearing the pencil thin tie, stands motionless; staring darkly into the middle distance, clutching the neck of his guitar so firmly that the veins on his stick-thin arms stand out.

The other tremolo-bender is raw-boned and facially angular as if chipped from the same block that carved Ian Curtis; un-smiling, he stares down at the assembled as if sizing up the length of a dole queue on Giro-collection day.

The singer who fronts this beat-combo is last to take his place.

Be-spectacled, possessed of thinning hair, he is anything but angular and more resembles a genial bookmaker or someone from accounts that you only see at Christmas parties – being violently sick into a potted palm in the corner after three too many Babychams.

It would not be unreasonable to say he looks entirely out of place in this place – he is sporting a slightly grubby, known-better-days, tartan dinner jacket above highly polished brogues and a quizzical grin.

Dateline: May 17th, 1980. Outside the University of Newcastle, the moon waxed in a perfect crescent.

If any of the History students attending to the bottom of their pints of Lager-top were thinking about it, they could well have been contemplating the 459th anniversary of the 3rd Duke Of Buckingham losing his head via a well-sharpened blow on Tower Hill. If that seemed unlikely, one couldn’t help but wonder if they were transfixed to the side of the Students Union bar by discussion of that very day being the 180th anniversary of the Relief Of Mafeking.

Maybe, however, their minds were further afield – contemplating the fact that martial law had, that very day, been imposed by General Chun Doo-hwan in South Korea in order to quell the student demonstrations that had broken out on the far side of their world. Maybe not.

In any event, the atmosphere that night was as sterile as a vasectomy, the room as welcoming as an under warmed oven; the only sound being the shuffling of feet wrapped up in a puzzled collective gaze at this bunch of misfits taking the stage.

Until…

The lights go down and the group’s first tune chugs into motion as the singer begins to sing songs drawn deep from the well of pure pop; collectively, they've reached deep down into the urn of angst where the shimmering light of soul meets the touch-point of dance. Collective heads, as one, turn…

Looking back, it was hardly a shock that uber-critics of the day (such as the NME’s David Quantick, Paul Morley and Sounds’ Dave McCullough) lauded this band from high in their marbled-towers as they did. The real bolt from the blue was that the great British public almost unanimously refused to catch on. The group were unceremoniously booted out by their record label and, after a period of time in the outer limits, fizzled out like a beautiful shooting star dropping over the far horizon.

Fast-forward thirty years and a little bit.

In the postbox are two card-sleeved CDs which, to be totally honest, I’d entirely forgotten were being sent. Yes, I’d been told that they were being mailed but, in this digital day and age, one is more used to ‘I’ll send them in the post’ meaning having one’s email in-box clogged with file-attachments that nestle up to solicitations suggesting I’d benefit from penis-enlargement than actually getting hold of the actual, physical… real thing… itself.

So… here they were, these two CDs – staring up at me from inside their dirt-brown Jiffy bag – that represented this group’s first new recordings in… twenty-five years or so. I gazed at the two sleeves – perfect little works of art in themselves – suddenly realising that I’d become just a little nervous for the music they contained.

Yes, the seed of doubt had taken hold – would these match up?

It’s all very well to hope, to hark back to those original recordings that remain as fresh today as when first laid down. But… would this just be a case of the two key components of a band giving it one last forlorn shot when really, they shouldn’t have bothered with booking the studio time? Only one way to find out…

That first moment of jangling guitar should have told me… the first moment of that voice certainly did. It has matured – and is now a subtle mix of summer sunshine honeydew melon infused with rich molasses; perhaps (quite possibly) a smattering of Smokey Robinson by way of Darryl Hall in there too… embracing yet not overtaking the space within the chord progressions. Here it was: three chords and the truth – alchemy within a melody pool.

But, above all… it’s all about the songs; and there are tunes here that are absolute, stone-ground, classics.

Yes, I know very well that that is a ridiculously over-used adjective, especially when used in a descriptive manner, nestled up alongside songs. But… you’ll have to trust me here. Really... you will.

Still unsure? OK… for the hard of accepting, lets put it this way: IF Jarvis Cocker had penned either Lost or Nicole, then the world of critics (swiftly followed by the public) would be all over ‘em like a cheap suit, claiming they were two of the great – lost – British pop songs.

Let us celebrate then: the globe’s most unlikely pop stars are back and… within the all-pervasive X-Tractor climate, my iPod is thankful that Father Christmas has dropped down the chimney a little bit early. So… why don’t you make yours a happy digital-download-device… put aside the mince pies for just a few moments and do the right thing… OK?

Because… my Lords, Ladies, Gentlemen and other readers of this little Voltaire out on its windswept grassy knoll on the world-wide-Prairie … please charge your glasses and welcome back… The Distractions.

The Sound Of The Suburbs

2010-11-10T18:26:00.005Z

The other night, while watching a favourite TV programme, a new (well, to my eyes anyway) level of advertiser’s intrusiveness was laid in front of us; the consumers curled up on the comfy sofa.

The commercial break was, as usual, annoying enough since it – again, as usual – interrupted the programme’s flow. But, it was what followed said commercial break that proved so aggravating because it appears that advertisers now feel we – the viewers / the consumers – can be devalued by a new treat from their bag of tricks.

And this new indulgence of theirs is..?

Well, the programme in question kicked off again… but… placed at the bottom left of the screen occupying (at a rough guess) approximately ten percent of the physical screen-space… was a run-on of one of the previous advertisements.

And, this animated mini-ad remained in situ for the entire duration of that segment of the programme.

With its’ positioning, one’s eye cannot help but be drawn to what is going on at the bottom left-hand-corner of the screen. Clever in one respect but exasperating and deeply annoying in another since this particular ad takes up just enough screen-room to intrude into what is actually going on in the programme one has tuned in to view.

Did it work, did this advert communicate its message? Did it bollox.

Lets take another quick example – which, according to Steve Purdham (CEO of an internet music streaming service in the UK called We7) is tied up in something he likes to call ‘dwell-time’. This (apparently – yeah, I know, it’s a laughable phrase, isn’t it) is the time one spends on site X or Y ‘engaging’ or ‘interacting’ with what they – the provider – have to offer.

Bypassing the corporate bullshit speak, it links into how they – the advertisers – can specifically target their audience. This is done via all the ‘bots’ out there that track one’s movements on the web (and there are more than anyone even imagines – hence new legislation in progress to combat big brother’s snooping tactics).

Clever… for sure it is. But… what actually happens is that one is continually being bombarded with advertisements that, because of their intrusive nature, are now having very little effect.

The other day, I was prowling about on the wibbly-wobbly after information and eventually linked in to an instructional video for a particular PhotoShop CS5 element I was having trouble grasping. But, before my cyber-teacher and I could ‘engage’, I was subjected to a thirty second advert.

The same goes for (herewith just another random example) tuning in to view a BBC video news feed off their site. Sorry chaps… I do NOT want to watch thirty or even fifteen seconds of advertising before I get to the news item in question.

So, all you advertising wallahs out there… know what happens…? I’ll go and stick the kettle on while your beastly advert plays out. And, quite honestly, I don’t think I’m alone in this.

Y’see, this little Voltaire out there on its grassy knoll in the windswept prairie reckons this (new) level of intrusive advertising is completely counter-productive. And, it ain’t the way forward for this medium.

Advertising is and has – for as long as anyone who reads this can remember – been part of the daily function of our lives. No big deal… it’s just a part of modern life.

However… with the economic world still grappling with being part of the new Millennium, the advertising agencies are trawling the depths of the barrel marked ‘new ideas’ as to how to get their messages across.

Some – indubitably – work brilliantly; lets take the Nike ‘swoosh’ logo as one example… its just an image, a graphic, an emblem and yet… gradually its seeped into the public consciousness and its now known the world over for what it is. No need for ramming the word Nike down anyone’s throat; no need for copyrighters’ silly tag-lines… just the graphic unobtrusively positioned. Very clever

Rapha (purveyors of top-of-the-line cycling clothing) are another such. It’s a brand created by Simon Mottram and he’s very cleverly positioned his company as much by subliminal advertising as by generating high-quality apparel that is and yet doesn’t appear to be branded (much like Nike).

One’d have thought that the market for cycling and accessories (clothing being a key component) would be limited. Not so. Mintel (as quoted in The Independent on November 4th) have stated it is worth 700 million (yes… million) squiddlys in the UK alone. And, in 2011 it’ll be even higher.

Among the (many) component factors that have clearly helped are the Manx Missile’s exploits in the Tour making front page news to the Boris-bikes initiative; from Briton’s winning a sack-full of medals at the last Olympics to people in general getting the message that getting out and about on your bike is a good step forward to being healthy.

And Mottram and his Rapha brand are not just riding the crest of that wave but expanding step by step internationally. And doing so exceedingly cleverly; while the US is now their biggest market he’s recently brought in a chap previously at Adidas to spearhead their forays into Europe.

The other day, I was out and about in a bit of a shopping frame of mind – perusing the wares on offer in a sports emporium; a shop that offered (across its four floors) everything one’d require if one was a real back-packer to gadgets designed to get the very best out of a snorkeling experience; from football strips in one’s favourite team colours to hiking boots and biking gear; from tennis racquets to rugby balls.

And… ploughing along the rails of replica cycling team-jerseys one stood out from the rest. It was off-white with the maker’s (team) logo discreetly positioned over the left breast in a silvery-white. From a distance, it looked like a simple off-white cycling jersey. Close up, the cleverness of the design became apparent.

How can white on white work..? Well… let me assure you, this did… it was exceedingly cool… and, not to put too fine a point on it, this Rapha jersey was the absolute puppy’s privates. Had I the spare wherewithal, I’d have had the plastic swiped and the item in a carrier bag with no hesitation.

In design terms, retro-chic is, I believe, the adjectival expression.

And, retro-chic that’s classy as opposed to the shoddy stab at the same genre by the designers of Team Sky’s dreadful 2010 outfit which, incidentally, hung alongside the Rapha jersey on the same clothing rail.

In 1930, Jose Ortega was quoted saying, "We live at a time when man believes himself fabulously capable of creation but he does not know what to create."

The same rings true today. We’re in the middle of a(nother) industrial revolution… and, just because there are different variants on advertising delivery / brand-awareness now available, it doesn’t follow that the model of twenty or thirty years ago will work.

While those that do embrace it will succeed, equally, its time that advertisers (in general) woke up and got smart to the fact that they’re simply pissing off potential customers – otherwise and before too long, someone smart will set up a pay-wall behind which people who don’t want to be intruded upon can retreat and not be subjected to what is, nowadays, advertising harassment.

Remake Remodel

2010-11-08T18:29:00.005Z

So… to use (loathsome) modern music-biz parlance, Michael Jackson’s ‘new single’ Breaking News has… dropped.

And, dear reader, I have to inform you that... to all intents and purposes, it’s a bonafide turd.

It opens with 35 seconds of, poorly cobbled-together, spoken ‘news reporting headlines’ (eg: More allegations against the King Of Pop; Another lawsuit against Michael Jackson etc etc) played through static as if the listener was twisting the dial on an old fashioned radio.

Tellingly… the word unauthorised is used repeatedly.

Then, Jackson himself – so we’re led to believe – steps up the plate at 54 seconds in over a piss-poor breaking news (sic) shufflebeat accompanied by sampled violins with the opening line of: "Everybody wanting a piece of Michael Jackson; Every reporter stalking the moves of Michael Jackson; Just when you thought he was done; He comes to give it again," And, in the next line the singer mentions his (own) obituary.

And, it may well be – although probably not the one that he’d have liked.

Because… to the ears of this Voltaire out on its grassy knoll on the world-wide-windswept prairie, this doesn’t much sound like Michael Jackson singing before he entered or from beyond the grave.

It actually sounds like one of two things: either a very average MJ impersonator – you know the ones… young lads who appear of programmes like X-Factor and other rubbish TV like that. They’re all dressed up, their hair is done just so, they’ve practiced the moves, privately, in front of a bedroom mirror for months using a hairbrush as a microphone and someone, somewhere has said… ‘hey son, for you… Opportunity Knocks’.

Generally speaking, they disappear into the oblivion from whence they came.

Either that or this is conceivably a rough demo containing (probably) a guide vocal together with a 'rough arrangement' that a ‘producer’ has gotten a hold of and… ‘produced’.

According to Michael Jackson dot com, the song was cut during 2007 by someone called Eddie Cascio at his home in Franklin Lakes, New Jersey; ma and pa Cascio are, apparently, restaurant owners who specialize in Italian cuisine and gave their son his start in music by funding his piano lessons. Beats beating out pizza dough.

Graduating from Drew University, Cascio – via family connections – started writing for the New York based publishing company Sony / ATV Music before founding his own production company Angelikson Music and going on to work with the likes of Luther Vandross, Usher and NSYNC. And, apparently, Jacko tipped up in late ’07 chez Cascio and… laid down a few tunes.

However… and I confess to finding this pretty extraordinary, these ‘tracks’ that Cascio allegedly ‘produced’ of Jacko’s lay dormant (undiscovered / un-talked of) when Jackson’s estate recently concluded a deal with Sony – reportedly for 200 million dollars.

Hmmm… the woodwork squeaks and out come the freaks.

Sony have issued a press-statement that contains one or two interesting ‘wordings’ together with committing the cardinal sin within any media-release – that of using adjectival language. For example they state that this posthumous album (entitled Michael) is ‘much anticipated’. Is it…? That should be down to the public to decide, should it not?

Be that as it may, they also state that the album will be released by Epic in conjunction with the Estate Of Michael Jackson. Frankly as it should be but… how do they now quantify Jackson’s mother (Katherine) using the word fake (according to news sources) when discussing this posthumous album project (from which this track is culled) with… yes, you guessed – and who else but… Oprah Winfrey.

Indeed, TMZ are also reporting Prince and Paris (two of Jackson’s children) stating that they do not believe the vocals on parts of the album are their father’s.

Reading a bit further into Sony / Epic’s mdia-release we learn that: “Breaking News,” a never heard before song by Michael that appears on the new album was recorded in New Jersey in 2007 and recently brought to completion (my italics).

Aha… and therein lies the rub, the nub of the whole matter.

Clearly, even Sony / Epic are admitting that a producer has gotten a hold of this and… produced it.

Poorly at that.

IF it had the kudos of (say) someone with credentials such as Quincy Jones or even Will.I.Am then I should imagine people would take this posthumous offering a lot more seriously.

Do I have any authority to offer that as an opinion? Actually, yes I do.

Over the past year or so, I’ve been working on a number of tracks exactly as that – the only difference being that the artist with whom I’ve been working is very much alive.

Nevertheless, his view – to which I heartily subscribe – is as follows: while previously unheard track X or Y has value to the consumer within the context of an artist’s full body of work and therefore should be cleaned up and brought to the sonic standards people expect to hear in 2010; demos and especially those with guide vocals are best left as they were actually recorded. They are snapshots in time – and therefore should be left as exactly that.

Plus – although this was many years ago, I did have the singular pleasure of meeting the King Of Pop. We stood side by side in the gentleman’s urinals at the Grosvenor House Hotel in London when the annual BRIT Awards were hosted there. As his Giant Haystacks-sized minder guarded the door, we acknowledged the other’s presence by a simple nod of the head and got on the with business in hand (sic), staring at the white marble straight ahead, as gentlemen are won’t to do in such circumstances.

IF it began life as that, Breaking News probably sounded pretty interesting as a work-in-progress demo but now its been produced (with or without his own vocals) it sounds like extraneous matter within the largely formidable cannon of Jacko’s main body of work.

As it has been presented, "Breaking News" is the audio equivalent of a badly photoshopped picture.

And the thing is with turds… no matter how hard one tries, they cannot be polished.

Don’t Bang The Drum

2010-11-03T21:16:00.003Z

A few days ago, dear old Auntie BBC broadcast the first in their series of Electric Proms performances – the mighty Leon Russell musically re-united with Sir Reg of Pinner - live and direct from The Roundhouse.

Not only was one able to view Sir Reg’s hair-extensions as well as LR’s monumental white beard in High Definition but, one could – if one chose to – listen along in equally HD sound via the BBC's I-Player.

And I most certainly did. Not once but quite a few times – perfect music-while-you-work fodder. A few bits, frankly, didn’t bear repeated listens but… most certainly some of the stuff that featured more LR than EJ did.

And… it got me thinking… wouldn’t it be great to have an audio souvenir of that evening at The Roundhouse. Not least, as I know that stuff up on the old I-Player gadget is only available for a while, ie its time specific.

So… how would I listen to my favourite bits in, say, a couple of months time?

One phone call to the audio-equivalent of Dr Watson, located a couple of parishes away, three emails later and a bit more Holmes-like investigation on the wibbly-wobbly, and… a rather splendid solution presented itself.

Its a gadget called Audio Hijack.

And, while its perfectly legal, its one of the scariest things I’ve seen on the web.

In brief, no audio recording out there available to listen to via wibbly-wobbly land is safe.

Audio Hijack takes but a few moments to download… Since I was in pure research mode I went for the freebie variant but, if you want all the bells and whistles, it comes at a price (about 20 squiddlys).

Installation is a doddle… a simple case of dragging the App into one’s App folder and the regulation double-click and bingo… you’re ready to go. Obviously I didn’t read the help-file or on-line manual… that’s a bit like reading the instructions on an Ikea shelving unit… hardly manly, is it? Plus, that’s why hammers were invented.

Anyway… I figured I’d try it out…

I called up Sir Reg and Mister White Beard via the BBC’s I-Player thingie, set the slide-control to a particular track I like and… pressed the button marked record. Music, maestro please… but, to be honest, I wasn’t quite sure if I was listening (again) to the tune I’d chosen or if I was listening to it as being recorded by this gadget.

Pressed stop at the end as gales of applause from The Roundhouse hit the headphones and… drat, nope, must have fucked up somewhere as no MP3 file was in sight. Hmmm… maybe I should have squinted (however briefly) at the manual. Thirty seconds later, I’d found the object in question, did the old double-click fandango and… bloody hell, there it was playing away perfectly out of I-Tunes.

Eeeek… I’ve hacked the BBC.

But… and, I promise you, this is quite serious… over the past few weeks while I’ve been re-designing Website X, I’ve also been planning on integrating music into said re-design.

And so, I have been studying the whole SoundCloud scenario which, on the face of it, was starting to look like the way to go.

Because, from what I had worked out, SC gave out great quality (ie you can stream .FLAC files – ie, lossless quality). Plus, various friends of mine from a variety of (name) bands had started to use it as a way of streaming their music… so, if it was good enough for them, then certainly good enough for my purposes. And, most importantly, from what I could work out, it didn’t appear hackable…

Wrong.

I’ve hacked SoundCloud as well.

Which basically means, if I can, then anyone can.

After a bit of a prowl around the wibbly wobbly again, I selected a juicy nugget posted on SoundCloud and… oh, shit, within five minutes I’ve acquired a track that was bonafide posted there as one of two things: (a) for anyone’s listening pleasure or… (b)if you paid X, then you were able to download it.

(a) is a great method of letting one's 'fans' listen to (say) early demos or otherwise unreleased tracks, perhaps rough mixes from an album in progress or finished tracks... all manner of things really. But, most importantly, since the internal SoundCloud gadget is set to non-download... thats the way it is - the listener can listen only and the creative isn't ripped off... Splendid... IF it works.

(b) is equally perfect since it means that creative person Y is PAID for their creativity on tunes that they are quite comfy to have downloaded.

Only problem is - as I proved earlier... it doesn't work.

So.. the solution to my own web-streaming-of-music conundrum?… Well, I guess it’'ll have to be a case of just doing what Apple are about to do on I-Tunes… and that’s plonk up only 90seconds of music.

And… streaming music as being the ‘solution’ via ‘sound clouds’ for creatives being paid as they should be… errr… nope… I wish it was, but today’s little exercise proves worryingly otherwise.

Take The Cash (K.A.S.H.)

2010-11-02T19:14:00.005Z

It´s a secret operation, don´t want this getting out,
So watch it, watch it, watch it, if the payment doesn´t bounce,
It´s the sweetness of the readies, makes the bell ring on the till,
And if they say they’ll pay next week, you know they never will.

Take the cash, don´t let them pay you in kind,
Take the cash, before they change their minds,
And let´s see the colour of their money – take the cash

(words and music / E. Goulden)

Ladies and Gentlemen, please be upstanding for the downright brilliant songs of Mr. and Mrs Goulden’s lad, Eric – better known throughout the whole wide world (sic) as Wreckless Eric – whose songwriting, according to this little Voltaire out there on its grassy knoll on the windswept prairie, deserves far wider acknowledgement than it presently has or, indeed, has accumulated over the years.

Nevertheless, in this relative world, its probable that young Eric doesn’t do all that badly out of his songwriting royalties… even despite the fact that he (probably) signed a piss-poor publishing deal back in the day with his pay-meister’s at Stiff; the World's most flexible record label that was started up by Jake Riviera and Dave Robinson (Robbo) via a four-hundred quid loan from Dr. Feelgood’s Lee Brilleaux and which offered for our delectation some of the very finest (and also some of the most horrible) records issued in the Seventies and Eighties.

Amongst which, (the former that is), any discerning individual would list a high quantity of W. Eric’s tunes – lyrically as astute as it gets with a fine turn for a belter of a melody; consider the rhyming couplet delights within his second Stiff single (and, sadly, it was a stiff), Reconnez Cherie – On a convenient seat by the lavatories in the sodium glare; We used to wait for the bus in a passionate clutch and go as far as we dared; Do you remember when I passed my driving test; Took you to the pictures, forget the rest; Do you remember all those nights in my Zodiac; Playing with your dress underneath your Pac-a-Mac. And, on it goes into an entirely memorable chorus. I mean – c’mon… Cole Porter, eat your heart out.

And Eric… well, he’s been plodding along, ploughing his own, entirely unique, furrow these many years and, in an unlikely twist of circumstance, has returned to (some would say) his spiritual home by licensing his new record (with his wife, Amy Rigby) to the label – Stiff having risen once again, phoenix-like from its own ashes.

Aha… the key word here is licensed… as it looks as if our hero has his act together. And, is nowadays a lot more in control of his own work than (maybe) once he was.

Back in 1977, when his first record – Whole Wide World – hit the stores, young Eric was (quite possibly) relieved to have found an outlet for his music and (probably) never once thought about the long-term… At 32 Alexander St (Stiff HQ) it was all about madcap schemes hatched in any one of numerous nearby pubs with (probably) no real thought to how the label’s output would be considered (say) a quarter of a century later. At that point, the powers that be at Stiff were more concerned with what might happen next week.

Nevertheless, a true gem such as that (aforementioned) record was listed not so very long ago in Mojo Magazine’s ‘best punk singles of all time’ while also being acclaimed as one of the top-40 ‘alternative era’ singles between 1975 / 2000.

And, while written in its entirety by E. Goulden, the copyright would be shared (possibly at something of a disadvantageous rate) with his publishers. And, given the copyright laws in existence at that point, that’d be the case until the year of our Lord, 2033. Meaning – if my arithmetic is on song – that Eric wouldn’t have full control of his own song until he was 79 years old.

Quite a sobering thought that.

But, of course, more or less the same situation that any songwriter (unless they’ve either had exceedingly clever management or have been exceptionally astute themselves) will find themselves in for works (songs) registered before 1978. After that, the situation changes – and will do so radically – in 2013 when the 35-year-law comes into force… in other words, a fore-shortening of the length of time before copyright reverts. Yes, I realize this is all a bit publishing 101 but it’s for illustrative purposes.

This ownership and being able to work and properly earn from your own copyrights point being vividly brought home by a snippet spotted in today’s Guardian.

In which, we learn that Producers working at Channel 5 TV have been asked to ‘avoid’ using commercial music in their programmes as a method to bring down royalty 'payments'.

And, those 'payments' are songwriting Royalties which are collected by the PRS and then distributed to the Publishing Companies and then, eventually, paid – on a percentage rate – to the actual writer(s) are accrued from any public performance of said music be that on-stage, recorded, on the radio, on the telly, within a movie or… online.

Apparently this is all part of a cost-cutting drive to make C5TV more profitable.

But, what is not mentioned is the heinous manner in which they (and, it should be noted, most other TV as well as Film Production Companies) actually deal with the creatives – in this instance, those who write music which may or may not be included within said TV Programmes or Films and so forth.

The C5TV spokeswoman is quoted in today's Guardian saying "Channel 5 plan to commission more original music as they have excellent contacts in the creative industry.”

Well… on the face of it, that’s great – more opportunities for creative folk.

But, here’s the rub… C5TV (as above) are clearly wanting to pay as little as they can by way of Royalties but, at the same time, they’re also demanding their cut as a Publisher because, as the source said (and this was also quoted in The Guardian) “All publishing rights have to be assigned to Channel 5."

In other words, they not only want to cough up little as they can get away with or grab just a little slice of that nice (lucrative) publishing steak and kidney... oh no, they want the entire bloody pie, crust and all.

And, if you – writer X – do not kow-tow to their demands… then, like as not your music will not be used. Same applies if you’re already signed to a Publishing Company. If your Publisher doesn’t (or won’t) play ball then… that’s it, your music won’t be used.

And, either which way, you'll not earn as much as you should.

Double-edged sword or what?

All The Boys Love Carrie

2010-10-27T17:28:00.004+01:00

And so… and finally… a little cause for celebration – LimeWire is no more. Or, to put that into its proper context, the illegal part of LimeWire’s file-sharing activities has been closed down. At last, a little bit of action that will (hopefully) see the copyright holders reap their just rewards… as they should.

Mind you, its taken four years of legal wrangling for the RIAA to bring about this injunction that ‘compels the Lime Group to disable its searching, downloading, uploading and file trading features.’

If you link across to the LimeWire site, you’ll find a notice posted that says ‘This is an official notice that LimeWire is under a court ordered injunction to stop distributing and supporting its file-sharing software.’ Scroll on a bit and you’ll discover this nugget, ‘downloading or sharing copyrighted content without authorisation is illegal.’

Well well well… that’s big of them, isn’t it?

Unfortunately, LimeWire don’t – yet – appear to have been hit with the colossal fine that they so richly deserve; a fine that once imposed – and paid – should be plonked into the RIAA coffers and re-distributed amongst all those artists and writers (the creatives) who LimeWire have knowingly ripped off.

Meantime and besides striking (something the French are particularly adept at), their ISP’s are acting on that Government’s ‘three-strikes’ legislation. They are sending out an average of 25,000 letters a day to suspected illegal filesharers. Now, the French love paperwork and compiling what they call le dossier – I know this first hand since I used to live there.

But… sorry fellas… it won’t work… because you’re targeting the wrong people.

And, if I still lived there I’m wondering if I’d be on their radar for illegally sharing a (music) file?

Lets take a very recent example. A pal of mine (a highly respected musician for what its worth) recently got in touch asking if I had a copy of album X by artist Y. Frankly, while reading his email, I couldn’t remember – this being a pretty obscure record that I knew had never been digitally released.

Anyhow, a quick fizz through my bulging I-Tunes folder and… lo and behold… there it was; way back when I did live in France, I must’ve digitised this album myself by transferring the vinyl version across to my computer. Actually, it’s a fairly easy process to do that using gadgets (programs) like Audacity… and, even easier nowadays ‘cos one simply buys a turntable that connects to one’s computer via a USB cable.

So… I loaded it all up and, via a file-sharing program I subscribe to (regularly sending large graphics images and so forth) I fizzed the individual music files that comprised the full album over to my buddy in Ireland. Next again day, he writes back saying thanks (like you do) and… he’s happy that he can listen to something he’d been trying to find for some time and I’m happy ‘cos I helped an old friend out.

Does anyone have a problem with that..?

I should hope not – after all, the album in question was purchased – albeit many moons ago – legally.

In fact, now that I come to think about it, I probably paid 32 and 6 for it (which, in old money / pre-decimalisation equates to one pound sixty or so) thereby demonstrating just how elderly a recording it was.

However… IF I still lived in the semi-remote region of France that I once did, then chances are the cyber-authorities would have me ear-marked as a criminal. Indeed, how soon would the knock on the front door come… and would I face the prospect of being collared by the local Gendarmerie? Very probably.

And… this is why it (this three-strikes initiative) won’t work.

Because, while I freely admit (guilty as charged m'lud) that I sent a music file – files plural to be precise – to my pal, I’d have contravened legislation that says what I did wasn’t legal (based on the fact that the recipient didn’t pay for said files).

And, this is where it is going to go horribly wrong for the French. They get many things right – such as Confit du Canard in amongst some very fine wines indeed as well as more spectacular cheeses than there are days in the year – but… this clamp-down isn’t one of ‘em.

As with LimeWire, it’s the upload and download companies that have to be targeted – MegaUpload, Rapidshare, HotFile and all of those companies (there are dozens). These are the people who distribute the goods; these are the people who’re making zillions via subscription charges that allow ordinary folk to post links to albums / singles / 12” mixes (whatever you want) for others to download.

The other day, Q Magazine awarded its album of the year to The National – pretty sound choice in my view; it’s a cracking record but I’d hazard a guess that it wouldn’t take more than five minutes of searching to find it as an illegal download via either Rapidshare or MegaUpload.

This little Voltaire out there on its grassy knoll of the windswept www prairie reckons that’s serious food for thought.

Reasons To Be Cheerful (Part 3)

2010-10-14T20:12:00.002+01:00

No, I don’t have a hangover tho’ by all accounts, I probably should – having enjoyed a bit of a stonking evening at the Liberal Arse last night. Mellow Johnny was in charge of slapping the Martini’s down, Mother Mary having taken an early bath from her usual duties.

In any event, by the time I’m awash with the third cup of coffee (meaning some sense of order had replaced that merest hint of morning fuzziness – brought about by the fellas wielding a large hammer and cordless drill in diabolical harmony upstairs at the hour designated as ‘how best to really annoy anyone within earshot’) – a small news item posted on the Music Week site via CNet had grabbed the weary eye.

It’s a leaked letter from a chap called James Pond… and Master Pond, so it appears, is one of the top dogs at Google… Splendid, we do love leaks don’t we?

And… a quick ‘Google’ of Master Pond – there’s no hiding place on the wibbly wobbly web, is there – reveals his ‘job title’ at Google is Product Counsel… no idea what that actually means but that’s how he has listed himself on LinkedIn.

And, after a bit more Google-fed prowling, its quite easy to discover he was previously a media lawyer at Osborne Clarke, a paralegal at both Freehill and Freshfields… having been ‘educated’ at both Oxford and Cambridge as well as at the Inns Of Court Law School… Marvelous – that’ll mean he’s one of their legal eagles.

So, doubtless he’ll be a bit cross that a letter of his has been leaked but… hey, its out there now. Besides, given that what he’s had leaked is – or should be – really important, equals... so much the better.

Because, it appears that Google might just be about to step up to the plate and… just might… get involved in stemming online piracy as well as helping copyright holders track down material that’s being put up and out there as ‘free’.

And this little grassy knoll out there on the windswept world wide praire says… about fuckin’ time too.

Google have a moral obligation to do this – not least, because theirs is the biggest search-engine this side of Mars.

CNet reports that Google will charge a fee for this service… yeah and they should ‘cos, after all, they’ll be offering a service… they have a ‘product’ (hateful word as it is) and… ‘products’ should be charged for in order that the person / people who have created said ‘product’ earn a living.

Don’t think anyone’s got an issue with that… have they?

I mean… c’mon… we all have to make a living… you go to work, do whatever it is you do… and, at the end of the week or month, you get paid… from that wodge of dosh, you pay your bills, put food on the table and… so on and so forth…

And, if you’re a creative kind of cove who… lets say… writes songs from which you make a living… then, you’d expect to be paid for that… wouldn’t you?

But, of course, the vast majority – and, especially those who’s careers are in their twilight years – most often do not get paid.

For why?

Ahh… and here’s the rub… and this is a critical aspect of all of this file-sharing that’s going on – and a part that doesn’t affect the successful artists out there at all (they have their own issues).

Lets take artist X who, in his (or her) career, has recorded – lets say ten albums.

Those records, in their time, gathered a certain degree of caché and sold pretty well on vinyl but have lain dormant for the last however many years. And, now that we’re well into digital middle age, most of those recordings in our example aren’t available via the modern medium. Why is that then?

It is because the Record Companies don’t consider the cost-effective equation viable.

Cost-effective means them (the Record Companies – who are the copyright holders) not making a decent return on the cost of actually digitizing and re-mastering those old recordings because they reckon they’ll only sell a handful.

Which, essentially, is food on the table for the companies that host the files – that the fans and collectors want – that, in turn, are put up by fans of the music in the first place. They – the fans / music bloggers – aren’t making any money out of this… if anything, they’re paying to put records up on the internet (‘cos, to upload X amount of music files via MegaUpLoad or RapidShare or any other Upload service you care to name costs).

They (the fans and bloggers) like the records and feel like sharing what they like.

Any examples? Hell yeah, as many as you like actually… but just one should suffice.

There’s one particular album I like rather a lot from the Seventies (ok, so it proves I’m quite old – get used to it) that I spotted the other day freely available to download.

And this came with a really interesting statistic attached to said download… it had one of those counter thingies attached… which showed that particular full album download had been accessed a smidge more than 29THOUSAND times.

And that was on one site among dozens offering the same full album download of an album that has (I know for a fact) never been digitized.

Oh – and do I have a copy? Sure I do – quite some time ago and when the technology first became available, I digitized my own vinyl copy… its not great quality but, it suffices.

By and large – and if one really wanted to – I reckon old fogies like me could not only replace their old vinyl collection for nothing other than an internet connection charge but also top up on all those old vinyl recordings that one never quite got around to purchasing.

In a sense, the fans who post these recordings are offering a service of their own yet it is highly probable that they’re the people who are going to get their teeth kicked in when the outraged might of Google comes a-knockin’

When in actual fact, its is Companies such as those named above who should be taken to the cleaners…

And, by that I mean, they should have the bejaysus audited out of ‘em – and yeah, I know it’ll take a long long time – and the money they have earned from those who have paid to upload files should be re-distributed to those who have lost out who are... the creatives.

Google helping out with the file-sharing issue – yeah, I’ll go for that BUT ONLY if they deal with the companies who are making millions out of it and feed that cash back to where it should, rightfully, be.

The other solution would be to bring in some form of legislation that would mean that the companies (as above but there are loads of ‘em) have to pay a royalty / percentage of their income to a central fund from which the creatives who are missing out would be paid.

File-sharing is a bit like prostitution, it’ll never go away. But, it can be harnessed and, if done correctly, then those whose work is being prostituted can, rightfully, earn.

The Season Of The Witch

2010-09-03T18:43:00.002+01:00

Sitting in an English garden,
Waiting for the rain to come…

So, following the much trumpeted Apple announcement out of San Francisco earlier this week, we’ve learned that the world according to Steve Jobs has decided that we now ‘need’ a ‘new’ social networking gadget; one designed to help us all in our (apparently ongoing) quest to ‘share’ music one with another.

Snappy name the good people at Apple have given to this new social networking device (app) too… Ping.

So snappy that an explanation was required – Ping, apparently, is a term used by computer geeks when they connect, one computer with another. How splendid… yet how equally unforgettable. Ping simply reminds me of Pingu, a cartoon television character my youngest daughter was enthralled with in her earliest years – and equally now, long forgotten.

There is a certain logic behind Apple’s decision to launch Ping – one can (easily) see the sense – and money-making sensibility – in that it should (with luck and a following wind) call the final death knell to what is a truly horrid on-line experience: MySpace; ie, all part of Steve Jobs’ quest to rule the known world.

Time was when MySpace was a relatively useful tool… time was when it seemed just about everyone had a MySpace page; bands you liked; bands you’d never heard of; people you knew – it was almost as if you didn’t exist unless you had a MySpace presence.

But, what did it become?

I should explain here that the only reason I maintain a MySpace account is that it enables me – very occasionally – to link to person X or Y should the need arise when I’m in deep research mode for one of my various archival projects. And – even as recently as the last couple of weeks – it’s been a handy device to employ in that regard.

But, do I search for new music off of it..? Do I ‘interact’ with other people – by sending instant messages to any of my MySpace ‘friends’ that I see online at the same time…?

Errr… no, I don’t!

For a start, MySpace is (nowadays) festooned with ads from some organization or other asking me (whenever I log on) if I want to meet Russian women. Actually, I don’t thanks all the same.

And, how many bands or artists of real worth – by that I mean long term worth – have actually come out of the MySpace axis? Arctic Monkeys immediately springs to mind – not, I admit, that I’m particularly partial to them… in that I don’t exactly rush home after a long day thinking… heck, I’d better hurry along ‘cos I’m absolutely busting to hear a new Arctic Monkeys’ tune. Lily Allen – sorry but the same applies.

Besides, MySpace has, for so long, been a haven for a veritable myriad of people recording not-terribly-good tunes in their back-bedrooms that it has never really appealed to me in my (always ongoing) search for new music. It’s not just the (potentially endless) trawl through rubbish that puts one off; it’s the simple fact that there aren’t enough hours in the day… even if one wanted to spend one’s every waking minute staring at a screen wearing headphones… and listening; sifting the wheat from the chaff.

So, factor in the (unwanted and unwarranted) plentiful requests to befriend seventeen-year old’s from out west of the Pecos, another hiccup in their miscalculations has been MySpace launching their own ‘recommendations’ – suggesting music, videos and games that I might like to tinker with – all, apparently, based on my previous search habits. Hmmm… clearly they (believe) they know some things about me that I don’t.

Bottom line: its intrusive and far from what I require as an online experience.

I’d rather the ‘proper’ recommendation of a ‘proper’ friend who one actually speaks to… I know, a bit old fashioned that but, talking (in my experience) does have quite a bit going for it – as opposed to living your life as dictated by a BlackBerry; ‘cos that’s pretty much like chattering to someone who camps out behind their sunglasses.

And so, back to Pingu…

From all that I’ve read, its basically going to be much of the same… an integration of what I (again, apparently) search for popping up as ‘recommendations’ fuelled by what one’s ‘friends’ on either FaceBook or Twitter are, themselves, listening to.

One teensy weensy little problem; it won’t work.

Why..? Well, for example, yesterday… there I was, deep in research mode… and, working my way through another music (and other things) related site – Amazon. My purpose… pure research. And, this is serious archival research into the obscure and long forgotten.

But, within five minutes, Amazon – bless ‘em… they do try hard – were starting to make these ghastly recommendations based on what I was attempting to find – these possible needles within their giant haystack.

End result… click off and head elsewhere.

One only has to take a swift glance at the new I-Tunes top page and more of these ghastly – region specific – ‘recommendations’ are there… straight-in-yer-face ‘recommendations’.

They’re based on a couple of things… firstly, what the ‘majors’ are plugging – ie, we’ll pay you (I-Tunes) X and in return you’ll give us a prominent position. Secondly, behind the I-Tunes wall there’s a gadget that tracks everything you do, look for etc etc… and, based on what it finds / whats logged in to it’s own criteria… then it’ll spew back its ‘recommendations’ at you.

Thanks but no thanks.

I don’t want big brother dictating my musical (or otherwise) tastes.

The other aspect that hasn’t been thought through – at all and by either side of the coin – is the base fact that I-Tunes (and Amazon and others of that ilk) are all not just region specific but are at the mercy of the licensors.

How does this affect the end-user…?

In brief, it means that no matter how much you may want to purchase tune X or album Y by artist Z, IF the artist’s work isn’t licensed by the copyright holder in territory A… in which you’re logged on… then you can’t affect said purchase.

I could list dozens upon dozens of examples here but just one should suffice: one’d have thought that a band of the stature of (say) The Average White Band would have their entire catalogue on sale globally through the likes of I-Tunes… Fact is, that’s not the case – only in certain territories is one able to download certain albums / songs with some things available only (for example) if one is logged on via a UK ISP… meaning that, if you’re travelling (for example) or live in another ISP ‘area’ and logged on in that manner… then parts of their catalogue are unavailable.

Why..?

Its down to one thing and one thing only – the rights have only been granted (licensed) by the licensor (ie the record company) for certain territories.

Ok… so I accept that not every user of (say) FaceBook or Twitter partnering their I-Tunes up with the former might not be much interested in acquiring said records… but, the point is that while FaceBook and Twitter are global… the likes of I-Tunes and Amazon most definitely aren’t.

Ergo… IF one really was hell-bent on downloading those particular albums ‘cos you couldn’t acquire them through legal means… then, how do you do that..?

It is, frankly, far far too simple.

And, this is where the record companies and the ISPs both need to seriously wise up.

All you do is set your browser to search for images of the record covers… start hovering your mouse over the images – that way, the sites hosting said images will be displayed.

Don’t bother with any of the ‘proper’ sites but gravitate toward the blogging sites… the ones that basically list fan’s favourite albums by whatever genre you can think of.

You have to kiss a few frogs along the way but, it shouldn’t take more than six or seven clicks before you discover a nice picture of the album you have in mind and, below that, not just a track-listing but more often than not, a pretty good précis on album X or Y together with… a download link, generally powered by either RapidShare or MegaUpload.

Simply click on the link, hit free user and your download starts after a few moments.

It really is as simple as that.

Have I ever..? Yes – and I don’t mind admitting / owning up to the fact that I have.

Was I justified in doing it – well, on the basis that I’d bought the album as a vinyl copy when it first came out and had re-bought it at least twice subsequently… then, my legal payment(s) had been made; royalties had been properly collected and earned by the respective performers / writers and, of course, the record company concerned had earned its proper whack too. So, on that basis… while what I did was illegal, it was also done with a clear conscience.

Further to which, it was part of an experiment… I simply wanted to discover how quick the process could be. In that instance, all was done and dusted from first tapping in the album title into a search engine to landing in my I-Tunes within fifteen minutes.

Until such time as the copyright holders act… and act together… then this unholy situation will remain where, ultimately, it is the creatives who go broke.

And Pingu… it’ll gradually fade away. Besides being not a very good idea in the first place, public acceptance will count toward its demise – the key thing that Steve Jobs and his lot miscalculated… people, in general, are becoming increasingly fed up being ‘recommended’ things.

And… literally the moment I finished writing this… Twitter informed me of this: Follow Coldplay on iTunes' new Ping service to check out some exclusive studio photo/video content

Bollox... beastly things, these ‘recommendations’.

New Amsterdam (so good, they named it twice)

2010-05-01T22:54:00.008+01:00

Two, maybe three weeks ago… cruising along in the overtaking lane on the world-wide super-wait, and hey… what’s this hoving into view at www.raphacondor.cc/blogs/..?

Its entitled A Knife, A Fork, A Bottle… and as sure as eggs are eggs – it’s the latest in a pretty much matchless line of Tom Southam’s thoughts and, as is fairly often the case, it’s a bit of word-play from him that doesn’t involve his profession but the next best thing… music.

In this instance, Tom and his Rapha / Condor / Sharp cohorts (including Kristian House, the reigning British Champion and the effervescent Dean Downing – all under the watchful eye of Bald Eagle (aka John Herety, the R/C/S team manager) are heading to the city of blinding lights.

First on the agenda, a spot of promo for their Rapha pay-meisters before heading upstate to indulge in a serious bit of racing at The Tour Of The Battenkill which is staged in Washington County.

This trip involves taking the silver-bird for as many hours as it actually takes – up a bit, along a bit, down a bit… bump, bump, bump… and clearly Tom’s i-Pod has been primed for the task…

So much so, that he’s posted his thoughts on the subject matter at hand.

But, while beguiling as his selection is – and I’ll tip my Trilby in a chapeau sort of manner to his proposals… here is a suggested companion CD to his original compilation.

Lets kick off with Take Me For A Night In New York – Elbow Bones & The Racketeers which, in brief, was a quasi amalgam of Dr Savannah & Kid Creole – under the baton of the zoot-suited ringmaster August Darnell himself.

This tune was the opening cut to their one and only record – but, it’s the full-length, six minute or so 12” version (a video of which is easily found on YouTube) that really late-night swings from its big-drums kick-in right through the truly sublime horn arrangements all topped off by a yearning, starry-morning-dewey-eyed, Cory Daye vocal.

Whats next..? Gawd, but there’s so much to choose from and… I think it should be…

Harlem Shuffle – yes, there’s the Stones version from 1986 but it’s the bump ‘n grind Bob & Earl original that cuts the mustard this end. It didn’t much bother the chart-compilers in America but the opposite was true in the UK when it slid gracefully into the top ten during 1969. Still sounds like it was recorded yesterday too.

Empire State Of Mind – ok, ok, I confess – after Grand Master Flash bewitched an unsuspecting world with his Wheels Of Steel and Tom Tom Club hit first base with Wordy Rappinghood, pretty much the entire genre of Rap and self became uneasy bedfellows…

I simply couldn’t get a grip on all that clutch-your-crotch / wear-your-jeans-halfway-down-your-arse and sport dark-glasses-indoors bollox until… Jay-Z and Alicia Keys’ total out-of-the-park homerun with its entirely glorious hook that fizzed the airwaves from Brooklyn to Fulham Broadway Station.

King Of The New York Streets – and, long ago, Dion DiMucci was precisely that. The man who gave up his seat in the plane that took off from Iowa on a frozen winter’s night in 1959 that took the lives of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper had a string of majestic 60’s hits (The Wanderer et al) before drink and drugs took hold.

Cleaned-up and having found God along the way, this is culled from his Dave Edmunds’ produced 1989 magnum opus Yo Frankie (that album also includes Written On A Subway Wall on which Paul Simon sings).

On Broadway – there are a zillion different versions of the timeless classic from the collaborative pens of Mann/ Weill / Leiber & Stoller that was first made famous by The Drifters (with a young Phil Spector playing guitar)…

For my money, however, the uber-reading is by the Kidderminster-kid – Jess Roden… originally demo’d in London, re-worked under Allen Toussaint in Memphis, re-mixed by Chris Blackwell in London and the opening cut on Jess’ first solo record. A stunning cut above the rest.

Take The 'A' Train – Billy Strayhorn’s classic / Duke Ellington’s signature tune that’s about as synonymous with the Big Apple as any song could be. It’s a toss up between Dave Brubeck’s version or Ella Fitzgerald demonstrating just how scat-singing should be with Brubeck winning by a short head.

Walking Down Madison – written by Johnny Marr and Kirtsy MacColl and opening cut to her Electric Landlady album… but… it’s the ‘6am ambient mix’ which gets the vote… looped percussion that resonates the city’s street drummers – the guys who sit on the sidewalks and ply their beats on tin cans and upturned plastic paint-tins… “from an uptown apartment to a knife on the A train, its not that far; from the sharks in the penthouse to the rats in the basement to the bag lady frozen asleep on the church steps… its not that far… I can show you if you’d like to…” A voice like no other.

The Apple Stretching – this paean to the city that barely sleeps wakening-up was originally included on Ms Jones’ Living My Life album (the last of her Sly & Robbie-centric Compass Point trilogy). Grace’s bitter-sweet snarl matched to the rolling thunder which is Sly & Robbie’s ridim section is, however, at its optimum on the hard-to-find eight+ minute version of Melvin Peebles’ original Broadway tune.

Hey, Manhattan – from the prolific pen of chief Sprout, Paddy McAloon – peerless lounge-lizard lyrics in amongst a beguiling swirl of Thomas Dolby infused strings and harps and an all-too-rare outing for Wendy Smith’s backing vocals. Genius stuff… Don’t believe me..? Try these rhyming couplets for size then:
The Brooklyn Bridge stretches below me
A billion souls all dying to know me
Well here I am ! Loaded with promise
And knee deep in grace
What I want is here on my face and
I feel like I own the whole damn place
Hey Manhattan ! Here I am !
Call me star-struck Uncle Sam.
Strolling Fifth Avenue
Just think… Sinatra's been here too
These myths we can't undo they lie in wait for you

Doesn’t get much better than that…

Downtown Train – its highly probable that Tom Waits’ grand-children will never need to work with the dollars their grandfather will have earned via covers of his songs.

This, 24-carat masterpiece is from his Rain Dogs album – and, for those who only know the ‘other’ the original makes Rod the Mod’s version sound pale, paltry and… well, basically pretty shit actually. Weirdly, though, that was the one that got Rod a Grammy nomination… which probably goes a long way to proving that people who judge those sort of things have limited (not to say, peculiar) taste.

With Tom’s song, you actually feel like you’re goin’ downtown.. a long, hard day up on 33rd and 9th and going home via Cortland Place or Rector St… That’s the difference between genius and plagiarism.

New York, New York – impossible to leave out (sorry Tom)… and despite Ms Minelli’s brave stab, there’s only the one that’ll do here. Yep, Ol’ Blue Eyes tonsils wrap themselves seamlessly around the song that’s about as synonymous with the city as any.

Last Exit To Brooklyn – the theme from the film from the book of the same name - Hubert Selby’s 1964 novel that documented working class Brooklyn of the 50’s seen through the eyes of all manner of low life including junkies and alcoholics.

The whole album’s worthwhile actually – a stunning soundtrack by the twang-meister himself – Mark Knopfler.

Times Square – three versions to choose from and, you know what… I’m really not sure which to go for.

There’s the live one from Blazing Away, Marianne Faithfull’s album recorded in St Anne’s Church in Brooklyn on which La Faithfull’s sixty-a-day voice is at its cracked finest; there’s her studio original from Dangerous Acquaintances and there is co-writer Barry Reynolds’ own from his hard-to-find solo album, I Scare Myself.

Damn, decisions, decisions…

Hooverville – biggish (British) hit for The Christians (and, yes, they were all named Christian) that centered around the popular name for the shanty towns that grew up in the Depression era in Central Park (among other places) that were named after US president Herbert Hoover.

First We Take Manhattan – torn again; should it be Jennifer Warne’s from Famous Blue Raincoat, should it be the bard’s original with its stir-fried concoction of synths (well, that’d be souped-up Leonard-style) or Joe Cocker’s windmill-armed Sheffield steel throat-like-gravel roar?

Cohen’s own – from his 1991 Live In London - just shades it

Downtown – Petula Clark, Frank Sinatra, The Killer Barbies… errr, nope… it has to be Athens, Georgia’s be-wigged finest - The B52’s… final cut on their eponymous debut – original vinyl copies of which came shrink-wrapped with their first 45, Rock Lobster.

And, finally…

Fairytale Of New York – a stone-ground, bona-fide classic and probably (very probably) the greatest Christmas song ever written.

Yes.. there is a version by Coldplay (honestly..!) and a truly terrible one by someone called Ronan Keating with Maire Brennan (Clannaad's chanteuse who, frankly, should have known better) and Kristy Moore chips in one of his own but… Shane, his no-teeth and band of drunken reprobates – The Pogues – trading bickering, hopes-crushed-insults with Kirsty MacColl win the day.

Little known factoid – Kirsty wasn’t actually due to sing on this, she only provided guide-vocals since her then husband Steve Lillywhite was producing the Pogues at the time. However, MacGowan liked what she’d done and the rest as they say, became history. And, for the uber train-spotters (factoid collectors) out there, a version survives that pre-dates the Shane / Kirsty version… we digress.

From those first minor chords… its all bittersweet call and response…

You took my dreams from me, when I found you

I kept them with me babe
I put them with my own
Can't make it all alone
I built my dreams around you..

But then… just as we get to the instrumental bit underpinned by “The boys of the NYPD choir were singing Galway Bay”... I’ll share a secret… when those drums and strings come in (at 3.24 exactly) I start to tear-up… because … the lost longing of Christmases passed is all forgotten...

That’s the moment of healing; its like the start of the most delicious waltz down a snow-filled 5th Avenue – when nothing else matters; you’re sailing in redemption, wrapped within the arms of the one you love.

Now… where the hell did I put that number for BA..?

Berkshire Poppies

2010-04-01T21:27:00.007+01:00

Oh… to be in Belgium – where the cobbles glisten as the rainstorms threaten. Oh… to be in Flanders fields – where the war clouds gather, ready to ride, ride, ride the wild wind from the West.

Ninety-five years ago – this coming April 4th… Easter Sunday that will be… Muddy Waters was born in Rolling Fork, Mississippi – while the shaping of a musical century was to be his destiny, its entirely debatable if Mr and Mrs Waters even knew of events unfolding on the far side of their world.

Seven and half thousand kilometers away and, on that very same day, it was more or less ‘all quiet on the Western Front’. The Ronde Van Vlannderen was just two-years old and had just been put on pause – the ‘war to end all wars’ had been raging barely a year.

As the trees left standing turned from bud into leaf, conscripts and regular militia on either side were recovering from the Battle of Neuve-Chappele while preparing for (another) oncoming onslaught in the vile mud-bath a bit to the south of Kotrijk; otherwise known (to historians and scholars alike) as the Second Battle of Ypres.

Just over 100,000 perished over the calendar month during which that battle raged… in the midst of which, Colonel John McCrae penned these – immortal – words on May 3rd:

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

And, war has, in its own way, shaped the epic battles that will be fought again across Flanders fields this coming Ester Sunday.

Belgium – probably more fought-over than any other country – was, of course, decimated and re-built only to be destroyed all over again in the 2nd War. However, turn off the highways – in immediate post-war times only the main roads were asphalted – and onto the by-ways and what remains is pretty much as it was after the first conflict; the countryside more or less re-built itself with what it had to hand.

And… that’s where the beating heart of this and any year’s Ronde Van Vlaanderen lays.

Sometime in the 1980’s, cycling historian, writer and all round bon-viveur, the late Geoffrey Nicholson observed, “apart from war itself, cycle-racing is the only international conflict that takes place on the doorstep”.

(ok, ok – in the spirit of a wee bit of plagiarism, the good Geoffrey’s 60-a-day quote actually referred to the Grand Boucle but, for this little Voltaire out on its windswept knoll in the fields beside the Oude Kwaremont, that’s as close as frankly makes very little difference).

This Easter Sunday, the scent of embrocation will outweigh incense swung from censers in churches and chapels alike; the air will be rich with the odour of frites mixed to the acrid exhaust fumes from the race convoy’s motor-cycle outriders; the fetid stench of over-extended burger-vans will mingle with cheap after-shave and the carefully selected best perfume of those out on the roadsides in their Sunday best.

This excursion into the tiny lanes of Flanders is an FA Cup Final, a SuperBowl, an Olympic opening ceremony and a Rodeo all rolled into one.

And, the cement that glues it all together consists of a vast volume of beer consumed amidst accumulated noise that makes a summer thunderstorm pale by comparison.

Because, come rain or shine (and many will pray for the most unseasonal – unreasonable – weather imaginable), around about a quarter of the entire population of Belgium will emerge from their doorsteps from dawn onwards, to gather along the roadsides that lead to the shrines of cycle racing that litter this tiny corner of Europe.

These shrines are, for the two-wheeled gladiators, their own stations of the cross.

The shrines are what define… and determine… the Ronde.

These are the short, sharp, ‘hellingen’ – quick-fire ascents that are more often than not cobbled; some rising to a 20% gradient, others that are little more than one, two or three-plus kilometre lengths of Napoleonic farm-track which end between high banks before bursting out onto decent tarmac’d roads for… a little bit.

The names of these ‘hellingen’ are the backbone to the Ronde Van Vlaanderen and trip easily off the tongue; Den Ast which comes first this year; the Klusberg and Knokteberg which precede the Oude Kwaremont – the pavé birth-mother to all of the sections of cycling-hell that follow.

The brutal 1 in 4 ascent of the Paterberg comes before the legendary Koppenberg – both lined from bottom to top ten-plus-deep with spectators screaming encouragement as the tv-helicopters chatter noisily overhead, transmitting the carnage unfolding below to millions watching around the world.

Then comes the Steenbeekdries, the Taaienberg, Eikenberg, Molenberg, Leberg and Berendries before Tenbosse. By now, the field (peleton) will have shredded – only the strong, the very very strong survive this far.

There'll be a slight lull in hostilities before… the Holy Grail of Flemish ‘bergs’ hoves into view… the fabled Muur… (in Flemish = wall).

And, aptly named it is – the ascent starts off in a relatively benign fashion… over the River Dender and then onto a pleasant enough (tho’ pretty steep) asphalt road before… suddenly… two right turns in quick succession and… ouch… big ouch… cobbles the size of bread-loaves that look (and feel) like they’ve been laid by a blind-man trusting to judgment rather than benefitting from using a spirit-level.

The Muur (or Kapelmur’s) cobbles kick up at 20% above Geraardsbergen. It is, in brief, the epicenter of the Ronde; its the fulcrum of all the viewing points and… as near as dammit a natural ampitheatre as if the climb itself was made for the race; where the slopes can accommodate many thousands of spectators and where the sound level approaches that of The Colloseum in days of old when the Emperor’s thumb hovered around the horizontal.

Imagine: a small, fairly non-descript Belgian market town – altho’ its actually a city (being proclaimed such in 1068).

Its perched half on and half off a medium sized hill above the River Dende and, in the fields on the banks of said river, not long before the Battle of Waterloo, Wellington and his Prussian counterpart Blücher, reviewed their troops.

There are the usual abundance of cafés; there’s a train station, boulangeries every few yards – touting mattentaart, a sweet pastry which is made locally - are interspersed with shops selling ladies undergarments - every shape or size and all tastes catered for. The market square is ring fenced with bars.

On this, coming Easter Sunday, the usual population of around 40,000 will grow ten fold.

And… this population-growth is not confined to rabid sports fans… by no means; we’re talking cuddling teenagers in the first flush of lust as much as babes in the arms of great-grandparents… and absolutely everyone one can think of in-between. Entire families dressed for the occasion and to impress too. Every sector of society, every race and creed… vegetarians to carnivores; men dressed as farm-animals, women with megaphones; drunkards and teetotalers alike (although it should be said this is not Lemonade Lucy territory… Geraardsbergen on Ronde day is not really a place for those who belong to the Temperance Society).

The Muur is one of these monuments (shrines) where disoraganised lunacy reigns supreme.

Goodness only knows what it must feel like to ride up through the cauldron of noise and emotion that erupts off of the side of the Muur.

Because, this is where the blood is shed; where the race is (most often) lost… or won… where the hell-hounds breathe down the neck of a potential victor… a few more kilometers, one more climb (the Bosberg) and twelve more rolling kilometers and God-like status is assured.

I’m not entirely sure who this quote should be attributed to but, whoever the wise person was, it rings true: “If you want to see a sporting event, go to the Tour de France, if you want to see a bike race, go to the Tour Of Flanders – the Ronde”.

Because… to this Voltaire’s way of thinking, the Ronde should be high on most people’s list of twenty things to see (experience) before you arrive at the Pearly Gates.

This coming Sunday evening, there will be many who saw the dawn, who lived the dream but whose sunset lays shattered and crumpled across Flanders' unforgiving fields...

The Weight

2010-01-21T10:59:00.006Z

Dateline: just a few days ago. Location: somewhere in the thirty-second row.

Three men are gathered. The most senior wears a mane of snowy-white, quiff-quaffed hair over his beatific, all-knowing, perma-grin; the one approaching middle-years is topped off under his trademark black beanie while the youngest gunslinger huddles under a medium-brimmed hat, cigarette dangling from his lower lip.

One hundred and fifty years ago, the same three would not have appeared out of place in a mid-west saloon; tinkling piano in the background, a pack of dog-eared playing cards to hand and fresh shots of whisky lined up in front of them.

Tempers might well have become alcoholically frayed, gunfire would possibly have been exchanged on the turn of a card and so, yeah… it may well have got very loud.

Today, however, they are sitting around what passes for an economy-sized circular coffee table having strapped on an assortment of acoustic guitars. And, in unison, they have begun picking out introductory notes before gradually strumming their collective way through the opening chords of a song that needs no introduction… whatsoever.

A few bars in, the one in the beanie leans forward toward a conveniently-positioned microphone and opens up proceedings in his reedy tenor; the white haired rebel-rouser of old keeps smiling his genial smile as familiar words tumble forth and the young pretender in the hat gets ready to obediently trade verses with beanie-man…

I just pulled in to Nazareth,
Was feelin’ about half-past dead
I just needed some place
Where I could lay my head

Dateline: the rural bliss of late-Summer 1968. Location: the outer-edge of Tadley – a village that lays more or less at the epicentre of the lop-sided triangle that connects Newbury, Basingstoke and Reading.

Similar to many rural communities in that part of Britain, the village would (probably) have begun its existence as a simple clearing in the forest – indeed, in Old English the word ‘Tadde’ can mean frog as well as toad while ‘Ley’ means a clearing.

Equals (maybe) – the bloke who cleared the clearing was called Tadde because of his looks and, possibly (perhaps), therefore, I ended up living on the edge of a village named after a bloke who… you get the picture.

London – forty or so miles distant, is the metropolis to which my Dad commutes each day but to which I’d only been a very few times; New York and San Francisco – names of cities on my (musical) atlas that felt as far away as the moon.

I’m still a bit shy of sixteen years old and, throughout that summer term at school, my friends and I had been avidly studying chapter and verse of our musical bible, The Melody Maker. These were the days when future passed as we tried to grow our hair longer than the regulation short back and sides permitted.

The previous year had seen Sgt Pepper on everyone’s turntable while we’d been embracing the Summer Of Love as best we could – heck, I may well have had my first, junior-pubescent, snog listening to The Byrds as Scott Mackenzie encouraged us to wear flowers in our hair. My parents weren’t particularly keen on this bit although I must confess I imagined myself as the puppy’s proverbials sporting a healthy crop of fresh-picked dandelions.

We’d all shelled out thirty-two shillings and sixpence of our old pocket-money on Cream’s Disraeli Gears and The Doors’ first album, spending hours studiously picking over every nook and cranny of each cover; days when 12-inch sleeve design was developing into an art form all of its own.

These both competed for needle-time on our fairly rudimentary record players with the likes of Pink Floyd’s Piper At The Gates Of Dawn, Love’s Forever Changes, The Who’s Sell Out – ohh, so many happy memories of staring at Roger Daltrey on that cover sitting in a bath of Mr Heinz’ finest produce.

We’d tripped-out (in our own way since we’d no clue what acid was really like or what it actually did… then; we just pretended we knew) to The Stones’ Satanic Majesties as well as records by the Moody Blues, Donovan, Booker T, The Mothers of Invention, Procul Harum and the Small Faces. We were entirely transfixed by Hendrix’s gattling-gun-guitar on Are You Experienced? and entranced by the enticingly-sleeved Axis: Bold As Love before we’d even got to place the vinyl on the deck.

And… at the end of 1967 came Mr Fantasy – Traffic’s first long-player which, that winter and for quite a time to follow, was barely off our family Dansette in all its glorious mono-aural deliciousness… my copy pre-dating the stereo release which, when purchased, led to further envelope-pushing of my own musical horizons.

Yes, all (and more) of the above-listed were (and, I would contend, remain) milestone recordings that’d transported me to ecstatic musical nirvana but this… now, this particular record – Mr Fantasy – was something else again and a record which triggered my very first musical g-spot orgasm.

So, there we all were, one year on and 1968 is tickling my fertile imagination by serving up yet another rich palette of sound. The counter-culture revolution is reverberating at London’s LSE (of which a certain Michael Philip Jagger was an alumni); there are anti-Vietnam war rallies and demonstrations being held in Trafalgar Square and outside the US Embassy in London and further from my own (then)-radar – all across the US.

It’s the year of Van Morrison’s seminal Astral Weeks; Cheap Thrills that catapulted Janis Joplin to fame, booze and heroin in more or less equal measure; we danced to the music of Sly and The Family Stone and grew curious over precisely who The Incredible String Band actually were and just what The Hangman’s Beautiful Daughter was as we got down with James Brown while getting bundled up in Dylan’s John Wesley Hardin – an album that actually straddled the previous year and this.

It was also the year when French wine growers got it in the neck when The Great Flood occurred – washing out much of southern England and with France particularly badly hit.

Which, in a sort of circuitous, almost-Freudian-like manner brings us to my second musical-g-spot moment (named, incidentally, after the gynaecologist Ernst Graefenberg).

As an aside, perhaps its worth noting that, two years earlier, Malcolm Muggeridge, the controversial British journalist, media-personality and latter-day Christian stated – “The orgasm has replaced the Cross as the focus for longing and fulfilment”.

And no, I’m not digressing with this mix of musical, biblical and sexual… bear with me. Please.

You see, my musical bible – the good old Melody Maker – had done a brilliant job as John the Baptist to a new offering on the altar of all that was good; so much so that, with my pocket-money in his wallet, my Dad dispatched his secretary to the new(ishly) opened Virgin Records emporium on Oxford Street to purchase a record that had been made on the far side of (my) world…

And, that night, following his return from London…

I found that my (own) next station of the Cross was contained within cover-art by Robert Zimmerman himself; a curious and child-like painting that featured a sitarist, a double-bassist, pianist, guitarist and drummer among the six musicians featured – although there were only five in the group – with an elephant staring in from mid-right. The group were not named on the cover, nor was a title appended.

(Later – and among other notables such as Millie Jackson’s Back To The Seat and Freddie Gage’s All My Friends Are Dead, it featured at an exposition entitled The Worst Album Covers Ever at the Fullerton Museum in California).

No matter the exterior, it was the interior that drew me in, deep within its velvet folds… then just as much as it has done every single time since. (whoops, am I grooving with Freud again?).

Maybe… ‘cos this was the open portal to what I’d argue strenuously as one of the finest débuts of all-time; where the warmth of vinyl fully encapsulated the uber-groove; where the furrow of music ploughed began a hay-ride into music’s nether regions that, on ending, begged another coin in the slot-machine marked… play me again.

Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the world of… Music From Big Pink.

Four-plus decades on and I still can’t fully fathom its arcadian-driftwood delta-blues reference points. I’m forever (and happily) lost in its indistinct smokestack that opened a rich musical seam of down-home country / folk-rock by sleight-of-hand.

From that very first moment when the needle touched the edge of side one, I’ve been mesmerised by singers harmonising from deep within the well of their souls; entranced by the modest virtuosity that can only be born of playing every backwater bar-gig; fascinated and hypnotised in equal measure by its ethereal sparse simplicity.

I picked up my bag, went lookin’ for a place to hide
When I saw Carmen and The Devil walkin’ side by side
I said, Hey Carmen, come on, lets go downtown
She said, I gotta go, but my friend can stick around

But, hey… wait a minute, Chester… this is all very well but, its 2010 or hadn’t you noticed? Your days of strolling arm in arm with the Devil by the riverbank are long since passed. So… what’s your point?

Ahh yes…

Perhaps rurality has something to do with this because, back then, Big Pink came at me like a miraculous locomotive breath of new mown grass.

This was Mr Fantasy’s long lost cousin calling from America. Which, frankly, was so far away it equated to being outer-space.

Perhaps, therefore, its that craving for rurality deep within that’s led me to embrace two records recently; one of which has more escaped as opposed to having been released, the other having made much more headway – indeed, its been lauded high and low (sic) as much as the former – in my view – should have been.

A Town Called Blue (Evan Watson) and Oh My God, Charlie Darwin (The Low Anthem) both contain elements of that impossible-to-define special-ness that circumnavigates Big Pink.

Its also true to say that both are flawed in as much as Big Pink was as near perfection as makes no odds.

But…

While that record has its own almost indescribable – unique of the time – orientation (as above); these two chart a similar course by harking back yet looking forward at the same time and, therefore, in their own manner creating a remarkable new roots synthesis that owes much to the sonic hedgerows surrounding Big Pink.

Some bright spark is bound to draw up a never-ending list of other records that would make commendable bed-fellows here… and that’s fine… Its just that the two I’ve chosen (which have nudged my musical trip-wire of late) are truly magical and… embedded within the silver-slither as they are, nowadays accompany me wherever I travel – just as much as The Band’s first album does.

And, I’d imagine that’ll still be the case forty-two years hence – the only fly in that particular ointment being that, by then, I’ll have (probably) become even more curmudgeonly and will be anticipating my centennial telegram from whoever – at that point – is in charge of the sum parts of Britain (Great or otherwise – your choice) and aspects of Northern Ireland.

Mind you, by then, the silver-slither will be an antique and vinyl… goodness, that’ll be like looking at old 78’s won’t it? ‘Hey great, great grandpa… did you really play music on… that?’

‘Yep… and, you know what… you should have a listen… ‘cos this is what broke the mould’.

New Year’s Day

2010-01-01T18:51:00.005Z

Around about this time a decade ago, we – the collective all-around-the-world we, that is – were mopping up after lashings of celebratory fireworks had been ignited amid a multitude of popping champagne corks; all to usher in not just a new decade but… a new century and therefore the dawn of a new epoch.

Birds flying high, you know how I feel
Sun in the sky, you know how I feel
Breeze driftin’ on by, you know how I feel
It’s a new dawn
It’s a new day
It’s a new life
For me… and I’m feelin’ good.

We all know the song – its been popularised by the likes of Nina Simone, Muse, Sammy Davis Jnr among many, many others as well as… dare one even mention it… something called The Pussycat Dolls and… Mr and Mrs Bublé’s son (whose warblings are, I confess, a long way off the Storey-radar although, according to those I know who’re in the know, his singing is said to be frightfully popular).

As much as that may be the case, the lyrics and the tune have also been sampled over and over again besides being used in tv-adverts the globe around… but… I’d suggest that one of the lesser-known renditions is the one that’s as near the definitive as it gets.

Think back a bit in time to… side two, track one – yes, we’re back in vinyl heaven – of a record entitled Last Exit. The final (at that time) Traffic album; comprising half studio material which, quite frankly, constituted little more than studio outtakes and singles’ ‘b’ sides cobbled together with two pieces recorded at the Fillmore West when the band consisted of just Mssrs Winwood, Wood and Capaldi.

A San Francisco show – about a nine on the scale of nought-to-ten of ‘jazz-cigarettes’ having been inhaled prior to (by artistes and audience alike) – that committed to posterity the uber-tight-looseness which was that band at that particular moment in time… smokestack-spiralling out from the traditional confines of mere ‘stoned-rock’ via jazz / folk and ending up in a hitherto unexplored musical universe.

Sure, from the first click of the needle in the grooves, the pungent scent of finest Moroccan was totally apparent… yet… there is something else – something that’s almost indefinable – within the ten minutes and forty-or-so seconds of their variant that places it on an entirely different plane to the more measured readings by any listed above.

Why mention it now? Well, for two reasons really.

One, because my entire archive no longer resides at what was Merle HQ. The rescue-mission came about via the generosity of Aunac’s very own Dark Lord, the Prince of Chisels himself (that’s as tight a fit as a pair of nun’s knickers, Neil) who offered to not only collect but store and catalogue the lot. Top fella indeed.

So, pretty much all that matters has made its way into one of his voluminous barns in my absence from French soil. And – among many other slabs of delicious vinyl – this little musical gem just alluded to and self will be re-acquainting ourselves before many more weeks are passed. Oh, joy.

Second is that it’s a tune which has been running around my head during the headlong rush of the last few days – not least as it evokes what could be / what can be / what will be. Thus becoming a fitting end to a decade that, to a large degree, was tempered by absolute betrayal.

Ah yes… the moment of perfidy – the lightning flash of tumblin’ dice within the bitter stench of that Judas kiss. Baby, I’m gonna crash your car in my Garden of Desire. Now, thank God, just a fading snap-shot in far-away time.

For way too long, I’d sipped from the poison flow and, it took a while to learn how to fly without wings and even longer figuring out that landing my suitcase in a safe harbour without a safety net was – truly – about as exciting as painting on a blank sheet of canvas.

Equals – those words above resonate. Because, this is a time to look forward and not re-cap the past.

Yet…every time one picks up a newspaper or looks on-line, we’re confronted by this full-frontal assault of ‘lists’ being trotted out. All pertaining to the great, the good and the ghastly; all relating to either the past year or the full decade.

Which, I suppose, is all very well – after all, it is that time of the year (decade).

But… this Voltaire on its windswept knoll out there in the wild-west’s-awake-prairie reckons a couple of things.

Firstly, that the commentators are blinkered in their thinking back… because, each ‘list’ one cares to peruse is as subjective as it gets.

As a – brief – for instance, the other night, I glanced through one of the UK’s leading newspapers’ listing of its top ten albums of the decade. I think there was one among the ten chosen which I’ve listened to a few times but not chosen to commit to the machine’s hard-drive / the silver slither i-touch… In other words, yeah, its ok but… am I really going to be listening to ‘that’ in another ten years… errr, nope.

So… was that ‘list’ a useful aide-memoire of music from the last ten years? Not particularly since choosing ten out of (probably) a million that have been issued is similar to saying X marks the spot of a single needle in that particular haystack.

Anyone can assemble these kind of lists – from the greatest sporting achievements of the decade to the most absurd hat seen on Ladies’ Day at Ascot in the last ten years. From the most useful gadget to the least appealing political leader.

And… all subjective; none objective

Indeed… this whole looking back exercise is (probably) better summed up by The Waterboys’ lynchpin, Mike Scott who, earlier this week, Twittered (or is that Tweeted?): only a very advanced consciousness can even part-interpret the meaning of a decade at its end. Our culture isn't filled with those. I mean, we're only now getting the point of the 19 feckin 60s. Give up now, newspaper article writers!

Secondly… given that there are a preponderance of this, that and the next thing lists… why have I yet to see a list of… lets call it, ‘one or two things the planet as a whole should buckle up and collectively address in the next decade’.

OK, as snappy titles go, it is absolute pants but – subjectively – it says what I want it to.

(a) Communicate – a hoary old soap-box subject this, isn’t it? But, the fact of the matter is we – and I’m in collective we-mode here – simply don’t communicate any longer. We think we do but, the real reality is, we don’t.

In fact, its almost becoming oh-so last century to actually… talk… one to another.

Think about it… people e-mail each other within office environments, thereby avoiding the physical act of walking from one desk to another and actually speaking to a colleague – the end result (far too often) being mis-communication because the written word is totally different to that which is spoken one to another.

Or what about this… the other day, I was out for dinner and, two tables along, there were three people sat together. One of the three sat for fifteen minutes studying the menu, repeatedly asking the waitress to return when they were all ready to order – the other two spent that entire time fiddling with their respective i-phone and blackberry. Time was when people went out to dine, to a bar, to a pub or a café to (yes) eat, drink, make merry and… talk.

There is a wealth of difference between relying on the technology one has at one’s disposal and utilising that technology to socially network as a screen behind which one hides.

The art of communication is – look around you – disappearing almost as fast as the ice-cap yet we have it in our collective power to put a halt to that… talking of which…

(b) Climate-change – this is a quote lifted from that most esteemed organ, Time Magazine – Scientists and serious minded people everywhere are saying that there is something wrong with the planet.

Even if we don’t travel, we have the technology now to see the facts for ourselves. The ice-caps both north and south are melting – that’s a fact; all over the globe, summers are warmer and winters colder – again, fact. So… why, on earth, is the ‘issue’ of climate change being addressed as something that’s clearly a lower priority than… that which is dressed up as ‘war on terrorism’?

The longer term of gaining climatic control will – of course – take time to implement; naïve I may be but… not that naïve.

Nevertheless, the shorter-term could be being taken care of better than it is currently… for example, wherever in the world one looks, new housing is being built. But… is any builder roofing with solar-panels as standard? We know the answer but it still begs the question – why not?

Why (just as one other example) are there so few wind-farms? Ecologically they make sense – like solar-panels, that’s been proven but… the aesthetic lobby appear to hold sway here. Fine, that’ll mean we’ll end up with a fxxxxd planet because we’re told that we can’t harness natural resources ‘cos the end result doesn’t look… errr…. pretty.

For pity’s sake oh ye political beings of whatever persuasion – this ain’t no beauty contest.

Lets just have a little look at what happened in Denmark the other day – lots of agree to disagree, lots of manoeuvring and posturing, political this that and the next bloody thing… The Chinese will only agree to this if Russia say that; America will only agree to something else if Pakistan don’t do another thing; Peru will only commit to whatever it is they’ll commit to on the basis that Holland says yes (or no) to something that Great Britain is dithering about but which Germany is quite keen on so long as France say maybe.

Ifs and bloody buts…

Isn’t it time for a David Attenborough equivalent to put every single world-leader into a vast bag and not let a single one of ‘em emerge until they all commit to radical change without these blasted reservations.

‘Cos, if they carry on the way they are, then there really isn’t going to be much left for our childrens’ childrens’ childrens’ children.

Ohhh… I could go on and on… In fact, I very nearly did…

My original notes for this piece contained other headings (Toleration – c/f the religious / oil wars; Fame – c/f society’s collective obsession with celebrity culture bound up in a world of reality tv that’s so un-real as to be (un)believable and Greed – c/f society brought to its knees by individuals / companies milking (hoodwinking) individuals / companies.

And, instead of ending with a few snappy stanzas from the prolifically splendid pen of Holt Marvell... remember this...?

A cigarette that bears a lipstick’s traces; An airline ticket to romantic places
A tinkling piano in the next apartment; Those stumbling words that told you what my heart meant
A fairground’s painted swing; These foolish things
The winds of March that made my heart a dancer; A telephone rings, but who’s to answer
The sigh of midnight trains in empty stations; Silk stockings thrown aside, dance invitations
Oh… how the ghost of…………

Ghosts..? Bah, humbug… its 2010.

Isn't this more apt; more appropriate..?!

All is quiet on New Year’s Day; A world in white gets underway
I… I will begin again
I… I will begin again

Careless Whisper

2009-11-22T18:21:00.002Z

I was prowling about in a shop yesterday lunchtime – a rummage around that included hunting down as-kitsch-as possible Christmas presents for two of my grandchildren; it not only being the start of the customer-bump-and-grind season but with the added rationale that they’d already have every slab of Lego or cuddly toy they could ever wish for.

Items X and Y – registering high on the kitsch-thermometer – were finally selected and, with my customer-barging tolerance levels already stretched to breaking point, it became time to stand patiently and await one’s turn at the till.

The summons forward was ushered in with a cry of, ‘will the next guest step forward, please’.

Oh dear, the hapless being behind the counter has been indoctrinated into the criminal school of bollox-talk – doubtless his / her overlords have decided, by calling us customers ‘guests’, we’ll all feel that much better about the entire shopping experience.

Long, long ago a similar corporate indoctrination was taught (if memory is correct, it emanated from Japan) – primarily in building societies (nowadays banks) and a manner of employee-training-as-propaganda spread mercilessly whereby personnel started to address each other with team-analogies… for example, staff weren’t… errr… staff… nope, they were players. And they didn’t work within a branch office (for example) but… in a team. One didn’t have a boss or a supervisor or a manager…. but a team-leader.

Not only were hapless customers back then forced to come to grips with this new, entirely meaningless, terminology but that entire corporate, quasi-motivational, pop-psycho-babble has bolted like a recently gelded stallion through the open stable door to become prevalent in way too many lives.

Does this make me cross...? No, not particularly since, by and large I either ignore it totally or... find it’s inherent absurdity side-splittingly funny.

And so, besides this weekend’s shopping experience, it was difficult to avoid the recent verbiage uttered from the lips of a bloke who, quite frankly, should know a lot better – the Holy Grailsford.

Who he..? David John Brailsford CBE is – and, its only right and proper to address him by his correct title – British Cycling’s Performance Director and nowadays Team Principal of the fledgling Team Sky.

His (well-deserved) honour was upgraded from the MBE he was awarded after British Track Cycling’s Olympic success in Athens to a CBE in the 2009 New Year’s list following the same teams astounding haul of precious metal in China.

So far, so superb.

And, this weekend, his new Sky-baby is getting ready to divest itself of swaddling clothes at its Madchester home and preparing to fly (or, perhaps… roll… would be the better adjectival word).

And, given that this is a project which has caught the attention of not just British National media but similar around the world, the shaven-headed Companion Of The British Empire (next step arise Sir Dave..?) has been indulging in a few interviews… after all, he’s the team’s head-honcho and… well… who better to outline the inner workings, the team’s aims and aspirations and… all that sort of stuff?

The only problem is, DB (CBE)… has miscued disastrously.

Actually, as this Voltaire on its windswept grassy knoll sees it, he’s scuffed it toward the side-netting rather too many times over the past couple of months; in fact – ever since the much-heralded initial rider-announcement that was completely bodged by entirely school-boy PR in September.

Lets back-track a bit, shall we?

Because, the mis-fires have been occurring with alarming regularity since then – with, for instance, all of the news regarding rider / staff acquisitions emanating from 3rd party resources – as opposed to the mother-source. The most recent example being the disclosure of two (middle-ranking) Italians signing on the dotted being broken by the widely-read Italian sports daily, La Gazzetta Dello Sport and immediately fed out by Cyclingnews.com (arguably the widest read cycling news portal globally) and all across the Twitter network.

Indeed - Sky's own announcement of Sean Yates' recent appointment as one of their Director Sportif's came hours after every other cycling site and news feed had published the information. No understanding of how the media works in the 21st Century - sadly so.

Even more recently has been the heavily rumoured transfer of rising British starlet Ben Swift from the ranks of Katusha to Team Sky… widespread published rumours that have reverberated across Europe fed by angry comments by Katusha’s own head-honcho, Andre Tchmil saying – ‘I think it is very bad that a new team like Sky goes around thinking they can buy up riders who are under contract. I’ll say once and for all, Swift will be part of Team Katusha in 2010. He’s not for sale. I don’t sell my riders’.

Be that as it ultimately may be, its also interesting to note that, with reference to the same story, Road.CC.com stated – ‘as we go to press on this the Team Sky press office remains uncontactable… read in to that what you may’.

Then, factor in Wiggo-gate – the will he ride for Sky / won’t he remain with Garmin with regard to Bradley Wiggins – a (presumed contractual) stalemate that’s become as soap-opera a saga and about as annoyingly drawn out as one of East Enders’ ghastly plot-lines on TV.

Whether cycling’s own Weller-Rhys Ifans’ look-a-like does or doesn’t matters not – because, as a sheer PR exercise, Team Sky have played this about as poorly as it gets.

And, that’s simply been fuelled by the latest ‘revelations’ from the Holy Grailsford which have caused the vast majority of cycle-sport fans who really do care about Team Sky and the success thereof (and I’m holding my hand up here as one of the many) to absolutely shudder.

Which brings us neatly back to (one of) the latest interviews.

So… let’s consider a few choice quotes drawn from chief sports’ writer Owen Slot’s article in this Saturday’s Times – that’s the thunderer of London for the uninitiated – under the headline of: Team Sky’s secret weapons? Ants, chimps and crowns, but riding is not essential.

‘If individuals feel valued, they will be far more productive in their work’

– ummm… yes… gosh and golly… that’s truly ground-breaking thinking isn’t it…. Actually, this Voltaire tends to think that that sort of a man-management (whoops, person-management just in case my Voltaire gets disconnected for being politically incorrect) ethic has been in play for ohhhhhhhhh, lets see… absolutely aeons.

‘I’ve got two bus drivers from Formula One. I don’t want to see your driving. Think about it. We give the pre-race team-talk in the bus, that is our dressing room. The drivers take us to the start of the race in the morning and that’s where the nerves come on, where the riders get edgy. I said to the drivers, ‘What I do want to know is what you are like under pressure, when you are tired do you shout and scream?’

– Errrr… wow… that’s revelatory. Why, for example, would a bus-driver be tired in the morning, en route to a race? Shouldn’t they / wouldn’t they have had a good night’s sleep? Further to which, bus-drivers work to rigorous time-behind-the-wheel strictures.

The bus as the dressing room – sure, cycling is, after all, rock ‘n roll on wheels. Besides, a good bus driver is actually way more than someone who can get the assembled to place X at appointed time Y – in any event, going from A to B is guided by sat-nav nowadays (whoa, did anyone say the word Garmin?). The main attribute for a good bus-driver in this day and age is to combine invisibility and reliability with being the fount of all local knowledge.

What, however, is more concern-making is Grailsford’s use of I – the first person singular… perhaps this Voltaire is missing a fundamental point but… isn’t this about the team as a whole?

‘One of the first things we’ll do is ask riders to create their own rules. Shove them in a room: ‘Can you discuss how you want to be treated, can you discuss timings of the bus? If someone is late, what do you want us to do? I can promise you they will be more extreme than we would be. They’ll say, ‘If someone’s not there, we go.’ I guarantee.'

– Phew… that’s… ground-breaking thinking too. Actually – and here’s another rock ‘n roll metaphor, the real responsibility is down to Sky's tour manager equivalent to ensure that shaven-legged thoroughbred Z is on the bus and… on time. Does Grailsford really believe that Tour-contender H, being three minutes late for the scheduled departure of said-bus, would lead to a strict on-time roll-out with the end-result being Sky’s team-leader is left behind to make his own way to the start line? In a realistic world, that’s hardly going to happen… is it?

‘We are not malicious or vindictive, but if anyone’s behaviour is not allowing us to get where we want to be, we’ll give them a chance to modify it and, if they can’t, then they are out.’

– Right… so that’s a case of do it like we say and, if you don’t, then fuck-off… is it? That – to this Voltaire – smacks of despotism… and that equates to being dictatorial; hmmm – does the man behind all those glittering medals at recent Olympic Games wear Rasputin’s cloak? Is he, in reality, something of an autocrat?

‘Ants don’t worry, they operate like a fantastic team, they accept obstacles and deal with them in a positive manner, they don’t complain and remain positive. An ant doesn’t work on emotion, is proactive and always chooses the ant role.

– Ahhh… yes… now, that’s truly a magical quote; a prince among prose-thieves.

The team principal of – arguably – the most important and certainly the most interesting British sports’ formation this century… can not only talk to… but… is able to get inside the mind of… a metaphorical ant.

Y’know… this quack-religious, attention-seeking jargon simply doesn’t wash…

Can you imagine one of the director-sportif’s in the team car, waffling in like-manner and issuing instructions to his riders, as they’re approaching a major col in the Pyrenees… it’d probably go something like this: We need to seamlessly engage with our key-enabler and think out of the box proactively to leverage the initiative that RadioShack and SaxoBank are implementing.

Strong leadership – oh yes… Visionary – oh, absolutely… Single-minded – but, of course.

Nevertheless, it should never be forgotten that there is a fine line between megalomaniacal (corporate) vision – which can so easily lead to hallucination – and reality.

Blackberry Way

2009-11-16T21:27:00.003Z

The voice coming through the public address system is honey-toned, calm and reassuring.

‘Ladies and Gentlemen, my name is Silk and I’m your senior cabin-attendant this afternoon. The Captain has advised, due to severe weather conditions at our destination, that we will be remaining on the ground for…’

Here, the amateur-thespian within the afore-mentioned 'Silk' inserts a melodramatic pause; the drama ahead clearly to be played out to the maximum. Part-repeating herself, she continues: ‘We shall be remaining on the ground for a further fifty-one minutes.’

Another farcical pause ensues – presumably to allow us all time to admire Captain Fantastic’s stop-watch precision regarding the hold-up – before her pearly-dew-drop-vocal chords announces that ‘due to statutory regulations’ no ‘refreshments’ will be served during the enforced wait to become airborne but…

‘For those of you who have cellular devices, feel free to use them at this time.’

The elation felt within seat 24D is palpable.

Across the aisle to my left, the lady occupying the window seat is first out of the traps… within moments she’s loudly engaged in discussing a recent appendectomy in all its most delicate detail.

Other ‘phones further up-front squawk into life; within this enclosed space, a cacophony of personalised ring-tones abounds… ranging from Celine Dion trilling a chorus to one of her songs (a perennial favourite of mine) to the sound of a cat miaowing…

The man of middle-age at eleven o’clock (tick tock) of me, meaning he’s occupying seat 23C, ingratiatingly announces himself as Howard to the small child seated across the aisle from him and, thus directly in front of me.

The child makes no response so the mother, seated next to her, informs Howard – in an equally booming voice – that said four year old is known by the unlikely name of… Madison.

Doubtless the parents were of Posh / Becks persuasion – naming their offspring from where the child was conceived… which’d mean nooky was conducted in either the boon-docks of Madison, Wisconsin or somewhere along Madison Avenue, NYC.

Madison’s father is seated immediately across the aisle to my left. He has been forcibly placed there by the voluble mother who has forcefully informed the woman chattering gaily about the appendectomy that he (that’s how she refers to her husband) has to sit next to an ancient lady who’s make-up style has been derived from the Bette Davis school; all plucked eyebrows and severity of lip-line. As appendectomy-lady moved seat, the Bette Davis look-a-like turned a strange shade of orange, looking like she may expire any moment.

Madison herself, however, proves not terribly talkative so Howard unrolls his laptop and starts editing what I presume to be a speech he’ll be giving in the next few days: glancing down the aisle, I can’t help but notice that he seems to be a leading expert in the effects of Methane production in animals.

Meanwhile, the appendectomic conversation three seats and an aisle away from me has reached a crescendo of intimacy – signalling it is time to retreat under the noise-abating headphones and get back to my book; a fabulous yarn called Requiem concerning the end of The Crusades and Edward Longshanks war on Scotland and William Wallace in particular thereby tickling all of my Mediaeval leanings.

However, the next page-turn leads me into a sombre dissertation on the precise levels of pain that a prisoner banged up in the Tower of London would undergo in 13th century England when sentenced to being hung, drawn and then… quartered.

Mediaeval agony or modern day aural torture – time to unfurl the trusted i-Touch and lurch into a tune-shuffled world of my own; one that’s not peopled by bloody Celine Dion ring-tones – a smattering of operatic choruses before Massenet’s exquisite Meditation of Thais cuddles up neatly to some of Malcolm MacLaren’s sadly-unheralded ambient musings that dovetail tidily into The Maps’ own quasi-Icelandic ambionic delights.

Which all goes swimmingly until a larger than life figure hoves into view, waddling up the aisle – her posterior (which is the size of Bermuda) brushing each arm-rest at the same time - while her lips have been not only rouged but glossed into an unlikely shade of crimson, one that my Dad would have described as being the colour of a Baboon’s arse. Her eye-make-up is synchronised to a rather fetching shade of powder-blue.

The name on her lapel reads… Silk… and I’m informed that, since we’re about to get airborne, I have to unplug.

As we bump, bore and claw our way upwards, my own musings lead me to thinking about this emerging cellular-device-dominated generation.

Consider…

Lets just imagine that one is pretty high up the food chain in corporation X and been working like the proverbial for the preceding Y months – putting in a heck of a lot of long, seriously stressful, hours and therefore badly in need of a break; a few days away from the hurly-burly and the inherent pressures of modern-day commercial life.

Time away to recharge the batteries with a spot of good, old fashioned, R+R somewhere warm, tinged by palm-trees, fabulous food and beautiful sunsets.

Everyone at your office knows you’re off on a short holiday; one’s in-bound email alert has been set to something along the lines of: ‘I’m away from my desk until such and such a date and will respond to you at that point.’

Cases have been packed and re-packed; swimmies and sun-cream are to hand, the far horizon beckons.

So far, so splendid.

However… such is the dominance of the Blackberry / i-Phone / HTC / Palm – take your pick… it means that, however one wants or tries to unwind – nowadays, its harder than ever.

Because… the time to chill-out and switch-off in this cellular-device-led age has been set by the bullying bosses and un-thinking power-brokers… to… zero.

And, man / woman management is in crisis-mode.

Harsh economic times mean jobs are at a premium equals bosses have become empowered by… fear.

In any situation you can conceive, look around you… people are checking their mobile e-mail. From lifts (elevators) to the beach; from restaurants to dinner at home; from the back of a taxi to a ‘plane just landed. Shopping and what happens.. one constantly collides with militant mothers weaving from one aisle to another, their eyes diverted to the small screen. In any municipal park you can think of... Paris, London, Cairo, New York, Cape Town or Melbourne... joggers are jogging and runners are running but... next time you're out and about viewing the self-same, just have a look to see how many stop to check... their mail.

Because...

Our new economic, mass-communication-led, culture has bred a work-ethic of fear of being out of touch.

And an even worse fear of... not being seen as ‘available’ twenty-four hours a day.

Both are pressure-fears of ‘if I’m not then person X might be’ which equals… the bosses know you’re cornered, therefore they – unthinkingly and entirely unreasonably – believe they own you and your time.

No matter that one’s in-bound e-mail alert has been set as it has – messages (no matter how trivial) still keep popping up.

No matter that one is attempting to enjoy the pleasures of a pair of dolphins frolicking under a tropical sunset, there is always someone trying to reach you – most often on a inconsequential issue that can, quite properly, be solved / sorted out on one’s return.

No matter that human nature dictates that any person needs to recharge overwrought life-batteries, work in the 24 hour-a-day, 21st Century now has assumed a level of self-righteous importance whereby bosses (surreptitiously) demand that one keeps in touch.

As handy a device as the crackle-berry or its many variants are, its building a culture that is slowly but definitely signalling the end of an epoch.

And, in this Voltaire from its position on the windswept prairie’s view… its ushering in an era that is unbalanced.

Mass-communication is absolutely brilliant but it should never, ever, result in dis-respect.

Lest we forget.

Shout To The Top

2009-11-08T16:25:00.003Z

The room is stark… not Phillipe Starck but just downright plain; unadorned ordinary with cold (not chilled) white-washed walls unencumbered by pictures or, indeed, imagery of any kind.

There are two windows but only one will open to little more than a crack; the air inside smells suspiciously of cleaning fluids.

There are two beds, neither double nor single but somewhere in-between; both are topped by sterile –probably disinfected – lightweight duvets, encouragingly turned back. No chocolate on the pillow though – this is low grade but high rent.

The television – seriously hi-definition and gadget friendly – is positioned high on the wall facing the beds – presumably such that one can lay back and enjoy all on offer.

The remote control is, helpfully, hidden in a jar on a tray next to the orange-brown coffee cups and miniscule plastic milk containers. Hunting high and low, it takes me fifteen minutes before I’m able to locate said gadget. Attempting to operate it, I wish that I’d listened more carefully instead of dreaming about bike races and music while studying O-level physics at school.

Access to all of the premium channels (with premium meaning low-grade pornography) is set at a premium price – I know this because, flicking through the channels with only the remote to guide me, I click on a button I don’t mean to and am but a hair’s breadth from adding a premium charge to a room already costed-out at pure rip-off. Only nimble dexterity of thumb and forefinger leads me back to the remake of a remake of a film I saw when I last wore short trousers.

The bathroom is next door and looks (and feels) like its been used by a generation of corpulent business men who, presumably, have lain back on one of the two medium sized beds having chalked up a further premium charge to their expense accounts that, ultimately, will be filed by Miss Jones at the outer limits of her desk under… miscellaneous. Oh, how they must miss their wives and loved ones.

This noble emporium has, however, announced itself as being wi-fi friendly; ahhh… splendid – that means I can connect to the world wide west and, at the very least, keep in touch with loved ones as well as stay on top of inbound work-related ‘stuff’.

Well travelled machine is plugged in; it sparks into life in an entirely satisfying manner yet… falls at the first hurdle.

Oh yes, it can see the connection but until I enter a password it’ll accept, I won’t be able to travel behind this particular iron curtain.

Fabulous, its late night, my stomach is reacting volubly and not particularly noiselessly from a rather splendid meal from the Indian sub-continent partaken with my lawyer and all I really want to do is log on, collect, respond and log-out.

But in order to do that, I’ve got to jump this unforeseen, technical, Beechers Brook.

Trudge downstairs and request the access key from the disinterested bloke behind the desk.

You want how much… for how long…?

An old fashioned audible gasp escapes while displaying my best quizzical expression – which, in turn, renders both eyebrows shooting north beyond the hairline.

This ‘charge’ of theirs is about as absurd as those rumoured to be put into place by Ryan Air who, pundits claim, will shortly (if they’re not already) be requesting their customers to pay to use a lavatory whilst mid-air. Heaven help any passenger who is low on change after eating a dodgy prawn sandwich.

Disinterested bloke displays no customer-care attributes whatsoever as – reluctantly – a note is fluttered across the desk toward him. Very little coinage comes back by way of change.

A middle-aged, slightly paunchy, German is standing beside me; he too requires www access… not only is he deeply shocked at the price quoted but actually kicks the counter in frustration whilst loudly airing his Teutonic views at the hotel’s swindling attitude – clearly this doesn’t happen in Hamburg… or Bonn… or even Munchengladbach – curiously enough twinned with the Franco / Belgian city of Roubaix; whose own stadium is home, of course, to the final pedal-strokes of the Queen of Single Day Classic cycle races.

So here’s the thing…

This place I’m staying in is a known brand the world over; their logo instantly recognised by millions. I’d not intended Room 203 as an overnight stop – indeed, I’m only here ‘cos the lady of the house in which I was to stay has unexpectedly succumbed to a bizarre form of skin-eating disease…

Be that as it may, I’m in a needs-must situation but, even so… is it really necessary for corporate brand X to dupe its customers?

It’s a brand that, at one time, was synonymous with a certain level of quality; now it (to this Volatire’s thinking) just equates to… how much can we milk our customers for.

See… I would argue that a brand has a certain responsibility and, when brand X or Y gets complacent then their brand-loyal customers don’t just get lost and confused… they ultimately move on… to a brand that, essentially, does what it says on the tin.

The old adage rings true: it takes a long old time to cement a reputation and, it takes but moments to smash it to smithereens.

Alison Bain, (one of) if not the head honcho of American Express puts it like this: "Providing superior customer service that goes above and beyond the norm is something we place considerable emphasis on within our organization."

And… given how fickle customers are nowadays allied o how fed up most of the world’s populace have become with traditional forms of advertsing, this seeking out of new ways to acquire ‘brand awareness’ is central to most companies thinking nowadays; not just the cementing of brand X but taking it to new levels – as emphasised by BP’s top-chap, David Bickerton who states, “The importance of brand coherence across geographic boundaries and across internal and external audiences contributes to building a successful brand."

Using a different form of corporate gobbledygook-speak, Erich Stamminger, top terrier within the Adidas Group says: "We have a clearly defined brand mission, vision, and values. Authenticity plays a vital role here... It builds trust and credibility with the consumer and provides the basis for identification with your brand, and it must never be jeopardized."

Which, in a slightly circuitous manner, brings us to sport on two wheels, peopled by blokes with heavily muscled, shaven legs who whizz up hill and down dale and over unforgiving terrain at impossible speeds while, at the same time, being emblazoned by tight-fitting outfits proclaiming the names of sponsoring companies. Yep… cycle-sport is one of those rarities within sports sponsorships whereby the team is known by the name of the sponsoring company.

Now, just have a wee think here… that doesn’t occur in Soccer… nor in Baseball… not in Hockey (ice or otherwise)… neither does it in Show-Jumping, Athletics, Rugby, Fencing, Volleyball, Squash, Badminton, Curling, Ten-Pin Bowling, Tennis (table or lawn), Synchronised Swimming or even Welly-Throwing… does it?

Nope… Formula One is… to a degree… the only exception…

Which, essentially means cycle-team-sponsorship is a pretty beezer form of marketing device. Added to which, its been well proven over the years that a company which puts in amount Z more often than not, sees return Z+++ multiplied as a return on their investment.

Equals… come 2010, two of the latest companies to throw their sponsoring hats into the collecting ring are… RadioShack and… Sky.

Now, lately, all of the debate – most especially with the formation of the latter team – has centered around the inclusion or otherwise of Britain's cycling’s mod-meister, Bradley Wiggins.

So… while having a bit of a squint at this… lets also consider that within the context of the whole.

Wiggins is currently under contract to the US based squad, sponsored by the multi-media Sat-Nav developer, Garmin. He, through barely-veiled comments, has made it plain - using Soccer parlance - that to achieve his aspirations (bettering his 2009 4th place finish in the Tour de France) means he’d need to move to what he’s termed the Manchester United of cycling, stating he’s currently riding for the equivalent of Wigan Athletic.

To a UK registered team, Wiggins has clear value – via his multiple Olympic Gold Medal’s and, now, with his just-off-the-podium Tour finish, he’s one of only three (British) household names associated with cycling.

Cycling aficionados would argue strenuously that other names are well-known but, pose the question to the man or woman in the high-street and the facts emerge: the only recognisable names would be the lad Cavendish, the recently knighted (Sir) Chris Hoy and… Wiggo.

Cav-lar is (for a wide variety of reasons) unattainable for Sky until at least 2011; Hoy only competes on the track and is, already, a de-facto team-member since British track-cycling is sponsored by Sky-HD… which leaves the team in an almost must-have position in their quest for Wiggo.

Garmin (headed by the savvy Jonathan Vaughters) obviously knows all of this – equals, the lawyers on both sides are now involved and sums approaching the million pound mark as a contractual buy-out are being freely bandied about via Twitter and any other rumour-mill one feels like consulting.

But… what is the true significance and why, for a start, are Sky involved in the first place?,

The real benefit of a Wiggo buy-out to Sky is (to this Voltaire on its grassy-knoll) obvious but… its not the equally obvious comments that have, thus far, been proffered.

The value is the increased media exposure in Sky’s key markets (the UK being just one) and taking their five-year plan forward… It is, put simply, all about global brand awareness.

Because, lest we forget, modern-day cycle-sort is all about the furthering of that.

The Murdochs (via News Limited in Australia which owns over 170 Newspapers alone ‘down under’ / News Corp globally as well as Fox TV etc) aren't in this for self-agrandisement; they've recognised that cycling (and branding thereof) is a key, cost-effective, manner in which to promote their 'products'. Its also hits the ecological / green sweet-spot that translates into a corporate feel-good factor; plus, they’re targeting the youth-market and so, in a sense, Sky’s sponsorship of cycling is sound business strategy, psychology and brand awareness all rolled into one.

Therefore, while sporting considerations are, obviously, of paramount importance in (the make-up) of the fledgling Sky team, it is (has to be) also about their own markets and penetration thereof. Further to which, while Sky may purport to be a ‘British’ team, the reality is entirely different… it is (and has to be) international - witness the inclusion of Australians, Norwegians and Germans among others into the line-up for 2010.

Italy – as just one example, is a key Murdoch-territory… not so long ago, Italian premiere Berlusconi and Murdoch were buddying up (cf a fairly recent Time Magazine cover story)… of late, matters have soured – and the Italian stallion has decreed a twenty percent tax on Sky-Italia tv subscriptions since he’s woken up to the fact that Rai tv are swiftly becoming eclipsed. And, given that we’re in the realms of billions of Euros here, the sums aren’t insignificant.

Thus, is the most recent team news much of a surprise for the (perceived) British squad in that its has just been revealed that Sky have signed two mid-field Italians (fuelled initially by the signature chasing rumours valued at over a million for TdeF top ten finisher, Nibali). Why..? Its again obvious, they’ll be the spearhead for further incursions into that territory. Further to which, the Murdochs have recognised the Italians as sportive-passionata… and they recognise, perhaps more than many, the power of the people’s vote. Consider… the combination of The Sun newspaper and Thatcher and the war (for want of a better term) with Argentina… Oh, and who owns The Sun...?

As such, and given that both India and China are more on the Murdoch radar than is perhaps suspected… should we be surprised – in time – by..? This Voltaire wouldn't be in the least surprised...

Further to which… consider Garmin principal Jonathan Vaughter’s own comments made in the last couple of days concerning the recent date change for America’s (now) primary cycling event… "In my opinion I see the Tour of California as a Grand Tour. It’s the eighth largest economy, directly behind France. The race will be televised in over 100 countries and it has a broad following in Europe already. The concentration of these fantastic races in a 90 day period is pretty fantastic for the sport. You’re going to see the world’s eyes on cycling."

The world’s eyes… televised in 100 countries… Ahh yes, absolutely… The mondialisation… globalisation as another word to describe the same.

To quote Paul McGuinness, U2’s manager – ‘be the best band on your street, the best in your town, then be the best in your country… only after that, can you become the best on the world stage.’

And therefore Wiggo… and, in time, Cavendish… as sensational athletes that they undoubtedly are, still simply multi-million dollar / euro / pound early-move pedalling-pawns in the global game of brand-awareness chess.

Superstition

2009-09-10T03:47:00.003+01:00

It probably began with the quick glance to my right, which was rapidly followed by one of those, oh bollox moments. Don’t know about you but walking under ladders isn’t something I do. Whether I technically and actually… therefore physically… walked right under it is – immediately – open to debate…(but only) in my head.

Except, there it is, up-against scaffolding to my right – equals, I’ve (sort of, in a maddening head-fxxk manner) walked my walk… under it. Darn, that’s not good… ‘cos, I’m superstitious.

Reverse steps, cross street away from scaffolding and aforementioned ladder and take the long way around.

While superstitions are pretty bonkers in the main, I’d suggest most of us suffer (if that’s the right word) from them… so, consider these random selections; apparently, seeing an ambulance whizz by is terribly unlucky unless you either pinch your nose or hold your breath until… you spot a brown dog… Not good enough?

Ok, try these few then: If you say good-bye to a pal while standing on a bridge, you will never see one another again (scary monkeys); a knife received as a gift from a lover means that the relationship will shortly end (very scary monkeys – cue the Hitchcock directed Anthony Perkins shower scene); it’s bad luck to cut your fingernails on either a Friday or a Sunday damn, I’m pretty sure I clipped mine last Sunday morning); if you have mirrors in the house they should be covered during thunderstorms because – apparently – mirrors attract lightning… hmm, not sure I’ve ever believed that one.

The number thirteen, however, is a pretty good one… on streets in Florence, for instance, the Italians won’t use the obvious digit but employ… twelve and a half instead. Pretty cool, the Florentines.

On the other hand, combine the number and Friday and you’re in superstition heaven (or hell, dependant on your point of view). In days of long ago, Friday 13th was usually associated with the day set aside for public hangings – and, needless to say, there were (reputedly) thirteen steps leading to the scaffold up which the heavily manacled condemned trudged. Don’t worry, this won’t hurt a bit, son… clunk, swish, snap… gonner.

Anyhow… my favourites are: it's bad luck to put a hat on a bed (actually, that I never do – the trilby and similar others reside elsewhere of a night); it is bad luck to light three gaspers with the same match (I always use a lighter and only smoke one at a time – yeah, ok, I know… I’m a walking health-hazard); if one’s right ear itches, according to myth, someone is speaking well of you (ok, but my right ear rarely itches, the last time was probably in the 20th century) and should you plant Rosemary (the herb that is) by your doorstep, it’ll keep witches out. Ahh… that’s good… but what if the witch is already in residence?

Be all of that as it may, I arrive at my destination having circum-navigated said ladder and join a short queue before the reception desk that is protected from wrong-doers, terrorists and sundry others of criminal-bent by a large sheet of plate glass.

The line moves forward slowly and… just as I am about state my name and the reason for my being there to the elderly, uniformed, gentleman manning said reception desk… when…

Now, I don’t know about you, but this little Voltaire on its grassy knoll, believes that should one be at the forefront of the (any) queue then its somewhat impolite to feel onself barged completely out of the way and to one side by an entire family – from Granny down to screeching babe-in-arms – who, patently, believe that – due to their skin colour – it is actually their right to be seen first.

Maybe I’m just a bit old-fashioned – but, here’s what I believe in:

Until the philosophy which holds one race superior and another inferior is finally and permanently discredited and abandoned; that until there are no longer first-class and second class citizens of any nation; until the colour of a man’s skin is of no more significance than the colour of his eyes… everywhere is war… And until the basic human rights are equally guaranteed to all without regard to race, there is war. And until that day, the dream of lasting peace, world citizenship, rule of international morality, will remain but a fleeting illusion to be pursued, but never attained… now everywhere is war.

Words that began with H.I.M. Emperor Haile Selassie I (from his 1963 speech to the United Nations) but which really came to global prominence via Bob Marley’s song War.

Makes you think… eh?

In any event, the lady clasping the squalling child to her stomach – itself the circumference of the New Delhi ring-road – led the charge past; husband (surgically attached to his BlackBerry) and three other children (each screeching into their own cell-phone) bumped and bored their way by in similar fashion while Granny rode shotgun.

The uniformed elderly gent shrugged an apology.

Ultimately, I’m shown to the lift… head upwards… find next reception desk… state business… fill in a few forms… ask for help on a couple of questions… complete forms… all is proceeding in the swimmiest of fashions until… in order to complete X and Y, they require photographs of self..

Ahh… I have come unprepared, I didn’t know this – though, if I’d thought about it a bit – given that pretty much everything nowadays needs to have mug-shots attached – I’d have done the deed at some accommodating chemist’s emporium along the way.

Clearly I’m not the first who hasn’t brought pictures so I’m directed in the general direction of where I can get this done… stride manfully up to the cabin… enter… close curtains… adjust glasses to read the instructions… read them twice so that I know what I’m doing… place loot in the slot which says insert money… press the green button… and…what the fxxk was… that..?

The photo-booth is bellowing at me.

It is shouting its instructions out… I cannot stop it, nor can I find the volume control that is set to eleven. Worse still, the process (which I’ve paid for) is ongoing… and this is a very talkative photo-booth… every few moments, fresh instructions are bawled at me at ear-piercing volume.

Humiliation trapped by the arms of technology… just a bit.

The sound of giggles and muffled guffaws can be plainly heard from outside the booth – the emporium into which I’ve entered is full… and clearly, the customers are relishing this unanticipated comedy act.

After what feels like an eternity, the photographs have been taken and the countdown in seconds from ten to nought (since the count-down is shouted out by the talking photo-booth) become the longest ten seconds I can remember.

Throughout, I’ve cowered behind the curtain and only emerge when I feel the photo-booth has (finally) shut up.

Trudge back to the counter and offer up the (red-faced and embarrassed) images; they need two not four – bollox, I pressed the wrong button. Enquire as to whether they know of another (perhaps quieter) photo-booth and am directed elsewhere.

Four hours later, I’m back to collect the documents and just as they’re dangled before me, the (unanticipated) price is proposed… shit, I could’ve flown most of the way to Jamaica for… that… amount.

Emerge into sunlight to be met by Camp Freddy… gay activists I have no problem with; straight, lesbian, sideways, gay, up & under, bi, lengthways, try-anything… whatever your sexual-calling… that’s all fine with me…

However, Camp Freddy and a lot of his equally mincing cohorts are brandishing clipboards, right under my nose and right outside where the shouting-photo-booth is… plus I’m hardly out the door and barely got a fag (sic) out of the packet before he, too, is yelling at me…

Down into the bowels of the earth to catch a train and… confronted by a bloke who’s playing Auld Lang Syne on a weird, two-stringed Chinese half-fiddle, with pre-recorded but louder than he is accompanying back-beats.

Oh no… this is drivel… time to consider other things…

The first six combatants for the SKY (cycling) team roster have been announced today; yet, sadly that’s been another own-goal by the field-marshall's of team SKY… its an International team so… why on earth just name the first of six British blokes who… when all is said and done… and, no matter their career history and how individually good they are… make an announcement which hardly sets the world alight?

We live on a global stage… equals… this is absolute crap.

Its public knowledge (rumour / conjecture with no public rebuttal) that a good deal of serious, international, stars have been signed so… why this tack / route?

Harsh words...?

Ok... check the web-sites for the daily nationals and those who’ll pick this up internationally… Guardian – tick, Torygraph – tick, Daily Stale – tick… BBC on-line sport - tick... and – sadly – that’s it. None of the other broadsheets (even) in the UK have picked this up.

On the one hand, SKY are finally (yet belatedly) entering the mainstream… (plus points)…on the other… they seem to be intent on shooting themselves in the foot by, initially… announcing – in the globally greater scheme of things – names that won't make editors sit up and take notice… (minus points).

In time to come, SKY will (I have no doubts) be a great team… they have fantastic resources… a superlative and proven director sportif in Scott Sunderland plus… great riders. So, once out on the road in 2010 and in competition, I’m convinced the results followed by the awareness will come.

Within the next twenty-four hours, news feeds say that another ten riders (most of whom have been rumoured without public rejection) will be announced… terrific… in the next however long, the remainder of the squad will be (apparently) announced. Again, terrific news…

However, unless there is a seriously big-hitter in there, an international name, then SKY… once again… will have self-imploded.

So much is expected… so much – so far – has yet to be delivered… And, without a shadow of a doubt, there are – currently and on the international stage – big question marks against the formation that carries so much hope for the ongoing globalisation and cleanliness of the sport.

This all… to this little Voltaire on its grassy knoll, looks like its being manipulated (not terribly well) by the senior-management above who, unhappily, believe in an attitude gained from recent past (we’re super successful – look at our Olympic results – so… fxxk you).

Pity.

In any event, its also the day after the bizarre evening that was this years’ Mercury Prize. Sponsored… ‘cos that’s the name of the game… by BarclayCard.

And the winner is (was)… Speech Debelle…

20 thousand quid in her pocket and now lapping up the attention of GMTV, BBC and… eeek, C4 too.

And, provoking a fair old bit of debate in the process too.

The Mercury is… with no questions… the most prestigious of all the UK music prizes… after all, its for ‘album of the year’.

That’s nothing to do with album sales… the marketing campaign… the actual sales (download or otherwise)… the sleeve… the singles… the videos… Nope, just the music.

She’s won… yet… the question remains… was it really the ‘album of the year… the best music you’ll listen to that was released in GB and Ireland (the MMP's remit) in the last 12 months?

Do the judges – the twelve angry men and women festooned with canapés – believe that… ?

Was Speech Debelle’s record the best on offer..? Or was it an album that hit all the right notes with the judges and reflected all the current trends..?

Can’t imagine I’ll be listening to it in five years time… but hey… who am I to become exasperated at bickering-in-a-back-room – so-called – experts?

The enjoying of music is, after all, subjective and nothing other than an opinion.

Absolute Beginners

2009-09-08T15:18:00.002+01:00

Its the time of the season for... the making of preserves.

This recipe began life by combining three factors:

Firstly, Régis (the stone-mason with hands the size of large hams who lived at the back of Merle HQ) had a fig tree that overhung the top of the garden which was over-laden with fruit and neither he nor Mrs Régis liked figs – equals, propel rickety step ladder and washing up bowls toward said tree, balance precariously and harvest all in reach before the wasps got ‘em;

Second – with buckets of figs happily harvested, search for a challenge-free recipe – and, given that I couldn’t find what looked like even a half-decent one, unearth an elderly edition of Mrs Beeton’s Household Management and peruse the pages marked ‘Preserve Making’;

Thirdly – in that the foodie-Madame from the mid-19th century hadn’t penned one specific to figs, marry one of dozens she had written-up pertaining to other fruits to a bog-standard jam-making recipe off the back of a packet of French preserving Sugar.

And then trust to luck because I’d absolutely no idea what I was doing.

So… what you need is:

(About) 5 lbs of fresh figs – preferably freshly picked but, if needs be, shop bought will suffice. Make certain they’re well washed in clean, cold water to ensure that both miniscule grubs and other nasties are disposed of (from fresh-picked) and the preserving shit that supermarkets cover them with (if shop-bought) is well away by the time you start cooking.
6 mugs (ordinary coffee-mug-size) of preserving sugar – one of the two key elements to this entire process; preserving sugar is a different density and consistency to other sugars.
1 mug of cold water.
½ a mug of fresh lemon juice.
1 large pan.
1 wooden stirring spoon
6 or 7 preserving jars – or use already used Bonne Maman jars in which marmalade and other preserves have been bought; these are an ideal size plus have nice, colourful lids. Ensure that whatever receptacle and lid that you use is not just clean but… fully sterilised.

And… this is what you do:

Quarter the figs – obviously, discarding any manky bits;
Plonk the quartered figs, all of the sugar but only half of the water into a big pot and gradually – and slowly – bring this to the boil – stirring gently the entire time. Stirring throughout the entire process is key element number two;
As the mixture – hey, you’re making jam – starts to bubble away (keep it to a medium simmer) and the sugar starts to dissolve it is absolutely critical to keep stirring;
Add the lemon juice and the rest of the water… and keep stirring as the mixture simmers gently;
After a bit… not very long, maybe ten minutes, the jam will have reached a rather nice consistency – take it off the heat and set to one side;
Once it has cooled down a bit, ladle enough mixture to pretty much fill one of your pots, seal the pot and then turn said pot upside down and leave it for twenty-four hours – preferably somewhere dark, like a cupboard;
Uncork a bottle of the well-chilled and pour yourself a glass – you’ve earned it;
24 hours later, turn the jars upright… about a week later (or less, depending on how hungry you are) the jam / compote is ready for eating.

Now… if you’re feeling of adventurous disposition, there are a couple of variants on this theme which work rather splendidly.

The first is chucking in the zest of one lemon alongside the lemon juice – it’ll give the end result a bit of a piquant flavour.

The second is to add half to three-quarters of a mug of either Cognac, Armagnac or… way better still… home made Walnut Liqueur. Addition of the latter is the absolute dogs-bollox and turns this Fig Compote into something really rather special.

Besides the obvious and conventional manner of serving Fig Compote (on toast for breakfast etc), it works brilliantly as one of two key accompaniments to Foie Gras… the other being Slow Cooked Red Onions.

Bon appétit.

Night Boat To Cairo

2009-09-07T00:41:00.008+01:00

The transfer season is now wide open (no, not as part of the unfolding soccer season…). This is to do with my other love in life – bikes; the kind ridden by fellas with shaven legs because, upon us has come the season of the witch.

Plus, the start of September is also a time to consider what the ‘record label’s’ have decided we should be spending our hard-earned upon come the following autumnal months. And so, given that I’ve always held the view that bike-racing is rock ‘n roll on wheels – so much is the same, its just the stage that moves… lets have a quick peruse of what’s what.

OK, so… am I more excited about the makeup of the about-to-be-launched British mega-team sponsored by Rupert Murdoch’s SKY… or the imminent release of Mariah Carey’s Memoirs Of An Imperfect Angel?

Am I spending more time wondering about what the new Lil’ Wayne album will sound like or what SKY’s jersey will look like? Have I chuckled at the title of someone called 50 Cent’s new release (Before I Self Destruct) while wishing his music would or have I self-debated what bikes will be used in 2010 by Scott Sunderland’s (the senior director sportif) team?

Questions for sure… the answers are blindingly obvious.

And, with regard to Tommy Mottola’s ex, proof positive, if any were needed, that over 60 million in the US alone (and another 140 mill around the globe) can be wrong… very wrong indeed.

But, seeing the SKY boys astride - like so many lycra-clad Italian stallions - the beautiful lines of a Colnago (or even a Bianchi) would be just about as yummy a collaboration as it gets but… somehow, I can’t see that occurring… but hey, one never knows. And... just to clarify one little bit here... I don't... errr... how do I put this... bat for the other side... just to make that clear, you understand.

Anyway... September 1st was the due date for the unveiling of the riders that SKY’d hired – any formal announcement made earlier and the team would have been fined zillions of euros for breaching one of the many UCI codes of practice.

Talking of which (codes of practice) and as an aside, it does strike me as a bit peculiar that, in trying to eradicate the internal war of doping within cycle-sport that the UCI haven’t – for once in their existence – decided to be tough… by that I mean, properly tough. For sure, the dopers (for that read cheats) are being slowly weeded out but… is the received punishment adequate?

This Voltaire (on its grassy knoll) says its not.

You’ve been proved beyond a shadow of doubt that you have doped (cheated) equals… you get life – that’s it, you’re out of the sport for good. Make the deterrent tough enough and only the truly stupid will attempt to buck the system. And, for what its worth, I’d also advocate that across all sports. Period.

Because, only then will players play on a level playing field.

And, one good thing coming out of Team SKY hq over the past months has been this total zero-tolerance level as regards anyone in the entire team’s make-up who carries even a whiff of (cheating) suspicion with them.

Anyhow… currently… no announcement has been made.

In many respects no big deal as what (who) will be, will be… and, doubtless all will be unveiled in due course.

However… it does strike me that the grand-fromages at Team SKY are not that conversant with the way the media is working as we reach the final quarter of 2009 and are, for reasons best known to themselves, stuck back in the dark-ages of working the media.

For example – while they may well be biding their time to ensure (in their own minds) that their announcement is seen as really major news… the rumour mills are running ragged. And, with every passing day, rumour and conjecture will lead to a lessening of impact.

Other established squads (notably Garmin, BMC, Katusha, Saxo Bank as well as Lance Armstrong’s new formation, RadioShack) are cleverly drip-feeding the information of newly acquired riders and co-sponsors etc; thereby generating ongoing interest but, what SKY appear to be doing is withholding absolutely everything and waiting (for their own agenda) to unfurl when they believe it suits them best.

In times past, this might have worked to their advantage but, my suspicions are that – with companies seeing bigger and better news dissemination & comment-led articles led via the likes of Twitter and on-line as a general rule – the head-honchos at Team Sky aren’t playing this terribly cleverly.

For a start, the rumour-mill has – over the past month or so – produced a number of names that have been ‘leaked’ as probables.

Lots of will they / won’t they / perhaps they should etc etc…

The most obvious conjecture and (inevitable) ongoing media-debate has been over the Manx-missile, the lad Cavendish but – unless someone, somewhere has pulled off an almighty financial and sporting coup, it would seem more than logical that he’ll sprint out his current Columbia / HTC contract; after all his job is to win and he has an established team that delivers him specifically for that purpose.

SKY – at present – is untested and (in my view) he’d be barmy to make the move for 2010. The next again year, well, that’s a different tale indeed and will be as much down to his undoubtedly huge asking-price as anything since the publicity value that he’d return any potential team sponsor would be colossal.

The other major contending Briton is the fourth-placed-finisher from this year’s TdeF – the Weller look-a-like, Brad Wiggins – but, he too, is contracted (to Garmin) for 2010 and… as things stand, it looks improbable that he, too, would jump ship to SKY; not least as that transfer would (inevitably) mean a sizeable buy-out of his (currently final year) with Garmin who – logically – aren’t going to kiss goodbye to one of their prized assets without putting up a serious financial fight.

As to former TdeF yellow-jersey wearer David Millar – well, he’s a share-holder / part-owner in Garmin (again, so far as I know, until the end of 2010) and it – again – seems logical that he wouldn’t make the switch until at least then.

And, while one and three on the above list appear to have publicly ruled themselves out of contention; Wiggo who – as this is being written has just secured the British National Time Trial Champion’s jersey – remains a dark-horse.

Be that as it may, cycle-sport is – nowadays – more international than ever before and despite this being the first really major British team, SKY will – undoubtedly – contain significant names from a number of countries other than the UK; most probably Scandinavia, Australia, Germany as well as the other (obvious) British talent.

And… all of them (those of non-British nationality) will have their own relationships with their own, home media – this is one of the reasons why the rumour-mill has been churning, because, without a shadow of a doubt, its been fed by international riders (or their managers / ‘informed sources’) offering ‘off the record’ comments to their own local journos / media folk… after all, one of the tricks of working the media is keeping the people who write about you… sweet.

Plus, over the past month or so, there have been quoted statements, stating that the vast majority of the riders they’ve targeted are now contracted.

So… what is the delay and… what is the delay in making these announcements achieving?

Well… it looks like the major-domo’s at SKY are requiring that ALL of their ducks are lined up in a neat row before – officially – saying anything. That’s fair enough – after all, its their team and their cash that’s set it all up.

However, in this day and age, that is (again, in this voltaire’s view from its own grassy knoll) a bit of a strange tactic and one fraught with all manner of potential to back-fire.

How would I have done it..?

Firstly, I'd have eradicated the rumour mill by drip-feeding the riders announcements from the due (and given) date

And secondly, properly considered the overall picture appertaining to 2009 and not 1990.

Because…

Within the major announcement, there would be a number of smaller announcements that would all combine to make up the whole.

This isn’t just about the riders who’ll spearhead the team but will (necessarily) include the clothing manufacturer; the bus-supplier; the logo / jersey design; the bikes and components to be used (from wheels to tyres, from pedals to handle-bar tape and bottles and more), the off-road clothing and nutritional suppliers; the doctors, physios, masseurs and mechanics – and so on and so forth – because the formation of a cycling team will include literally dozens of people and sponsoring partners alike.

So… given that September 1st was the key date, I’d have dealt with (1) above by issuing ‘notices’ on a regular basis from that day forward… when the initial riders had been confirmed, their names would have been released; and as regards (2), once the bike supplier had been finalised, another press-release; once the key components for the bikes had been sorted out – another… so on and so forth.

This way, the drip feed effect would have garnered more and more publicity – after all, that’s the real name of the game – and each supplier would have had their own level of media exposure.

However – the way its going – it looks like the final announcement will, in reality, become so huge that – inevitably – only the cream from the top will be written about or commented on… meaning that the (deemed-by-the-media lesser ‘components’) won’t get much of a look-in – creating less media value for those – be they suppliers or riders themselves.

And, this is the bit that this Voltaire believes the field-marshalls at SKY have got wrong; this is the bit – however much you think you can control… you absolutely cannot.

As such, it is also highly probable that – given the nature of this ‘announcement’ – that the major-domo’s are all preparing their own wordings for inclusion in said ‘official press-releases’.

IF that’s the case (and I can’t imagine it wouldn’t be) then, there is another lesson to be learned here… as much as the major-domos will all want their ‘corporate words’ to appear in magazine X / on-line publication Y / newspaper Z, chances are that those worried about / much fiddled about with pithy corporate phrases will not be used at all. History shows that and that’s a fact. The media – as a whole – don’t much care for corporate this or that; what they’re looking for is key – one-to-one – words from the key players…

The end result… I’m anticipating more and more rumour running amok over the next week or so and would imagine (since I’m not part of the circle, let alone an inner one) that those at the sharp end right now – Scott Sunderland being one – are going quietly bonkers with their cell ‘phones ringing off the hook and e-mail in boxes full to bursting with… questions.

Questions that I’d imagine (since all I’ve done is apply a bit of logic fuelled by years and years of doing that PR job to the above arguments) he – and maybe one or two others – are probably forbidden from answering.

Ahh well, that’s life at the 2009 corporate coal-face no matter what game you're in.

So… what else do we have to look forward too?

Stephen Still has a new record coming out by all accounts; David Gray too… Muse and Vampire Weekend as well... There is to be a massive Miles Davis retrospective boxed-set issued and REM are due to release a live album too.

All far more intriguing than the poodles – Leona Lewis and Mary J Bilge – who’ll both be unleashing volumes of… errrr… warbling to beats… later this year. Gosh, I’m so, so very excited.

However, in between waiting on the SKY team news, I will be really waiting on Maps who – so I’ve read – will unleash a new album (Turning The Wind) in late October and Guy Clark’s Some Days The Songs Writes You that should (grammar not withstanding) also be out by November; well – at least there is some light on the musical horizon then.

The last Maps album came out what… three or was it four years ago… to this day, its a permanent fixture on the I-Touch wherever I travel and Guy Clark… thank heavens he is still making music; one of the truly great songwriters of all time and, from memory, his first album (Old No 1) came out roughly when The Cate Brothers released their first record on Asylum… I wonder if both still sound as good as they did back then… darn that’ll mean a trawl off to 991.com to try and find a copy of both (given that both vinyl languish far away at Merle HQ currently).

Ah well… no matter the delays and the rest, three things to really look forward to for when the days of summer start to properly shorten.

From Langley Park To Memphis

2009-09-06T18:40:00.004+01:00

As September opens up its account, those of us of a certain age mourn the passing of Simon Dee who passed from this life to the next on August 29th, falling to bone-cancer. Sad enough as that is, sadder still to relate that he died in more or less complete poverty and total obscurity – a far cry from his heady Sixties days as… the DJ; the first voice ever heard (under the bed-clothes) from Radio Caroline; stalwart of Radio Luxembourg and whose own, eponymous, TV show was as much a must-view as (say) Ready Steady Go or TOTP was back then.

If you ever wondered just who played the cameo role of the gay tailor in the original Italian Job film – kitting out Michael Caine with kipper ties after the latter’s release from jail… that’s Simon Dee. My autograph-book (as much cherished by a star-struck twelve-year-old as absolutely anything) contains his large, scrawled, signature from one heady afternoon spent in his company; watching intently as he recorded one of his night-time Radio Luxembourg shows – my Dad’s friend was Ken Evans, programme controller of the same and, without knowing how it worked in those days, a few strings had been pulled in order that I could sit in (quietly mind you) on the recording. I thought that was all fairly normal – I’d no idea (at the time) just how lucky I really was.

And so – as the days grow ever-shorter, the silly-season continues apace: factor in the latest intrigues as set forth by Colonel Gaddafi… can he really be serious – cue early-twenties John McEnroe Wimbledon-voice – with his proposal to the UN that Switzerland should be done away with meaning that, essentially, it’d be ‘folded’ into France, Germany and Italy.

From a brief study of the UN charter, no member country can threaten the existence or sovereignty of another. Nevertheless, Gaddafi is set to present his bizarre plan when Libya takes over the year-long presidency of the U.N. General Assembly on September 22nd or therabouts.

In amongst the wailing sirens and the inevitable overhead chatter of multiple helicopter gun-ships that’ll accompany the SWAT teams and NYPD blue-boys up and down the West Side Highway each morning and evening as the delegates are (securely) whisked to and fro to debate, one can but hope that something as entirely ludicrous will be thrown out at the first throw of the UN dice.

The silly-season also marks the ending of the holiday season. And for the first time in an inordinately long time I’ve been lucky enough to indulge in a few days of wave-jumping in the frothing surf of a far-away angry sea; washing sand from in-between my toes, kite-flying at the same time as trying to avoid the pull of a fierce rip-tide while bronzing-up on a beach reading one book after another.

To be honest, I’d completely forgotten just how truly wonderful it could be to while away sunshiney hours simply hanging about on a beach; that this activity – if it can be termed as such – was aided and abetted by people I really wanted to ‘hang-out-with’ helped… immeasurably.

The body has been refreshed by inactivity; the head freed from its lava-flow of mud(dled) detritus; the mind liberated like a prisoner no longer having to report to a parole-board of head-debris; the brain no longer clogged like a car-engine run dry of diesel; the spirit reinforced by concrete-clarity of mind.

Oooops, is that all becoming a bit too Oprah Winfrey; journeying a tad too far down the road of self-seeking humanistic counselling?

Probably… but hey… there’s certainly something to be said for the rejuvenating powers of salt-water.

Besides which, it was also the perfect antidote for a somewhat peculiar wedding attended; and – as much as I probably shouldn’t say this – about as far removed from what I believe celebrating nuptials should be… as could be. Strangely strange… oh yes… and anything but oddly normal.

It began innocuously enough with the time-honoured pre-hangover-riddance hotel-lobby rendezvous that transported groom plus six like-minded to indulge in the Royal & Ancient sport of… a good walk spoiled.

The front nine holes went as swimmingly as they should for a bevy of hung-over high-handicappers; however…the home-bound nine was played out accompanied by inbound texts at six-minute intervals to the groom from his bride-to-be explaining that his testicles would be neatly wrapped around his seven-iron should he arrive even thirty seconds late for the ‘wedding rehearsal’.

Ah yes… the not-too-dressed-up rehearsal… This aspect was overseen by the ‘wedding coordinator’ who, before long was referred to by the more irreverent amongst us as plain-old… wc; she brandished her clipboard full of notes from behind a crocodile smile under a leonine mane of bottle-blonde hair with... all-seeing, expensive aplomb.

Suitably primed from a generously proportioned bucket of Margarita, we all assume our places; we are then talked through the ‘service’ (this being an exterior affair); are shown – via her ingratiating school ma’am-manner – precisely how to comport ourselves from here to there in some form of mad(dening) entrance of the gladiators but, after a few minutes, all is done and we trot off back to the bar.

So… here’s the thing… what, precisely, does a wc… coordinate?

The next again day there wasn’t a great deal to do until dressing up time and so the beach was hit with a vengeance. That too went swimmingly until the kite I was flying crashed slap-bang into an elderly couple’s beach-picnic about a hundred yards from where I was wrestling with the sudden (and unanticipated) decrease in the off-shore-breeze. That’d be a somewhat unexpected forced landing from the picnic’ing couple’s perspective too, I’d imagine.

Anyhow, at the appointed and fully scrubbed up, we all gathered to wander around in a rather aimless fashion – this being the norm at every single wedding one attends. Then, wc hoves into view like a young dreadnought ploughing through the North Atlantic swell in an old WW2 movie with a phalanx of photographers in tow. Drat, these fellas hunt in packs and they begin their ‘work’ upfront of the ‘service’. Plus, the whole shebang is being video’d. Merde multiplied.

While the video-bods are relatively (pleasantly) discreet, the photographers are entirely ingratiating and, consequently, supremely irritating. Let the show begin.

Wc opens proceedings requesting that I please place this wilting-white-rosebud in position X on my lapel – nope, I’m sorry, I don’t do stuff like that… this refusal clearly means that self is accumulating minus-points on her clipboard with alacrity. Ok, stand like this then, shake hands like that, put your left leg forward... place your right hand over there... no, look this way, eyes in that direction... now – please adjust your cuffs, too much white shirt is showing... now say cheese. I utter fromage under my breath instead; bollox – I’m not a fxxxking contortionist... Ordeal over, its obviously time to return to the trough.

However, as everyone of similarly bent knocks back a swift one pre-nuptials, I realise that I’ve left the reading I’ve been asked to deliver in my bag and its a ten minute walk back and forth to room... and, mother hen with her stopwatch set to Apollo 18-style countdown, is saying we have but six minutes to kick-off.

Run to the room; hunt high and low in an A-Ha style while perspiration drips down my arms and onto my shirt-cuffs and, eventually find offending article hidden neatly under other articles; the cleaners have been in. Find hair-dryer in bathroom, plug in and blow-dry arms and shirt-cuffs before trudging back to position A. Brilliant, proceedings can now commence...Only they can't...

Vicar (substitute) doesn’t know that I’m doing a reading... My name doesn’t seem to be on his own clipboard; he evidently isn’t a rev-substitute who does unscheduled (nor does he seem to much care when informed)... His lackey is prodded, Lazarus-like, back into active service and instructed to produce a mic and stand as vicar-substitute marks a spot on his one page of 'notes' for self's inclusion in the proceedings and all, finally, is well.

We wander back (again) to position A and then proceed to march back across the lawn as instructed by the wc to position B (which she'd totally cocked-up and which the front rows had to interchange themselves) and every single lady present, even the ones with tattoos, rues the fact that high heels don't work terribly well on freshly watered grass. The bride, propelled across the greensward by her father, arrives to canned music and the hankies come out... her mother is seriously ill in hospital so a web-cam for her (the mum) to view the service / exchange of vows has been set up – unhappily and despite enough technology to pale Jodrell Bank into insignificance, its malfunctioning.

Nonetheless, the vicar-bloke talks the talk, vows are exchanged while a single white rose is waved about in the bright sunlight as loads more tears are shed and then its my turn to strut my stuff… but… not before the best man has tripped and fallen flat on his face over said mic and stand as the reverend-substitute, his Lazarus-like cohort, bride and groom and… photographers… and videographers all hover in the background.

Then follows the final wordy stuff from the vicar-come-quickly which, on his cue, is followed by huge yee-hah-ing applause. While everyone assembled is (naturally) delighted that bride and groom to have tied the knot and are, thereby, allowed the luxury of their first official – wedded - snog, I (genuinely) never could get that bit; it all seems a tad too manufactured to me.

The exit is as contrived as the entrance; we’re all video’d as more photographs are taken at strategic points (resulting in progress across the grass being funereal) but, eventually, we’ve all shuffled back across the lawn and, in light brigade style, the charge to the bar begins... but not before all the wedding flowers were rescued from being plonked into the dumper - weird as this may be, the guests had hardly moved away before the cleaners moved in.

Two hours later the cocktail hour ends and we're all ushered into the 'room'... that is, everyone bar the principals. Our table is so garishly bedecked that I’d take pity on anyone who’d quaffed a few magic-mushrooms as a pre-dinner bracer. Moments later, the master of this part of the ceremonies – equipped with his very own microphone and with the volume pumped to eleven and counting – starts extolling the assembled as to the next part of the proceedings. The grand entrance.

However, we’re not making sufficient enthusiastic noise for this particular mc. Oh dear.

To compensate, he then begins to whipp and whupp the assembled up into a complete yee-hah-ing frenzy and, only when satisfied – much like a stage-craft-bereft rapper extolling his audience, ‘hey Minneapolis… are you ready to p a a a a r t e e e e’ – do the happy couple trot into the room; their every step accompanied by blinding flashbulbs going off – the entire thing retained for posterity by… you’ve guessed… the videographers.

Eventually everyone settles and our table eagerly anticipates a couple of bottles of the well chilled arriving. Not so fast... first, there is the first dance. and, it seems to go on forever... and, the song is massacred by (hide your eyes) Celine Dion. It is utterly ghastly. Our entire table starts glancing around expectantly for waiters and waitresses bearing down on us with bottles. Once again, not so fast.

Because… next up is some kind of communal dance which – so the mic-brandishing mc informs us in a scarily loud voice – we shall be ‘sharing’ this with the happy couple. With a half decent bottle of the well-chilled on the near-horizon, I lead the charge to the dance-floor and we all we scurry around, treading on everyone's toes to another unidentifiable but equally abysmal song and scuttle back to our table as fast as possible.

The waitress arrives with one bottle.

Clearly this isn't half good enough, dancing gives one a bit of a thirst – and she is despatched post-haste straight back to the ice-bucket with a request that she brings a further three. In the meantime, food is served.

Within forty minutes, three from our table together with the best man are praying to the porcelain-lavatory-god under lock and key in the ladies and men’s cubicles.

Following this minor incursion into the good-natured proceedings came not just the ceremony of ‘throwing the garter’ (which, thankfully, I missed, having wandered outside to ingest a much-needed gasper) but, another treasure which the mc announced as... people touching. Now, bride and groom doing the old table hopping routine I get but... this, to my ears, was one announcement too far.

There were more speeches, mostly of the random variety and quite a bit more hip-shimmying... but the final furlong was, mercifully, in sight.

The only wedding speech I can remember was actually relayed to me second hand – this delight occurring many, many moons ago: friend X was to be second-time around married to a rather fetching blonde filly… everyone is gathered… the trough has been emptied and, on full stomachs, the speeches begin. The best man – who has flown in from Australia and landed but a day before – is suffering from jet lag and stumbles over his words like a man who has quaffed three too many Valium. Ultimately he gets to the end of his piece of paper and proposes the toast… to the happy couple… only… using the name of the groom and… his first wife.

Twenty-four hours later everyone has miraculously recovered but, my passport (always kinda handy to have about one’s person as a means of identification and so forth) is nowhere to be found… forty-eight hours further on and bride and groom are back from their honeymoon and at the bride’s mother’s bedside; she’s become dangerously ill and within a further moon and sun rotation, has (sadly) nipped off to be met by St. Peter at the pearly gates. Fast forward a further ninety hours and my ‘phone joins the passport on the missing list.

Annoying as this may have been, I stand by what I said about the rejuvenating power of salt-water.

The very same day, I come across this saying: Life is not about waiting for the storm to pass but to learn dancing in the rain.

Twist In My Sobriety

2009-08-12T17:03:00.002+01:00

The first gun-metal-grey streaks of dawn knife their way across the slow-to-materialise sunrise-skyline while the tugboats plough their way up the oh-so-still Hudson; up river a couple of hours by train and turn left, inland a bit and over the hills and not too terribly far away… and, there’s Woodstock – forty years ago this weekend – oh, boy.

But first, look left and there’s Union City on Jersey’s shore; home to the Union Dry Dock upon which Blondie shot their helicopter-led, day/night-time video for the track from Eat To The Beat that, curiously, was never issued as a single in America yet reached #13 on its first outing in the UK. A song penned by the ubiquitous Ms Harry together with bass-player Nigel Harrison, one time native of Princess Risborough, itself not too far down the road (or up, depending on one’s direction of travel) to one of the legendary UK venues of the seventies and eighties, Friars Aylesbury.

And home, at that point in time, to one of the very best independent record stores in all of Britain – run by a couple of music aficionados (Steve and Sue) and owned by the man behind Friars itself – Dave Stopps. Just a small middle-England market town yet one which boasted not only that tiny shop which was stuffed to the gunwales with must-have domestic vinyl as well as the very latest, de-rigeur imports but also an absolute must-go concert venue whose reputation was such that it could justifiably claim to have been pivotal within the development of a number of acts; Genesis (like ‘em or loathe ‘em) would be one of many.

I lost count rather a long time ago of the number of times I made that one hundred-plus mile round trip; seeing some extraordinary acts in the process – Queen (as one example) supporting… now, who was it… pretty sure that’d have been Cockney Rebel. Otway and Wild Willy Barrett; the Ramones; Jess Roden not long after the release of his first solo record in tandem with Iguana when they’d become the imaginatively named Jess Roden Band; Lindisfarne; String Driven Thing; Mott The Hoople who, for one reason or another, will always be associated with that particular gig; OMD; Osibisa – that was a hot night indeed – and of course… Stackridge… nights when Let There Be Lids rang out loud, proud and clear; the Saw Doctors of their day – a band who never sold a great deal of records yet who were utterly irresistible live.

Friars was also a jumping-off point to the US for so many bands of that era touring new albums.

Hey, Manhattan – look, there’s the Carlyle where Kennedy stayed… The Brooklyn Bridge laying before me… Paddy MacAloon’s paen to the city of blinding lights from Langley Park To Memphis; and off to the right, the signs for Queens that’ll eventually lead to the Whitestone Bridge, immortalised in Sonny Condell’s song on Tir Na Nog’s third, Matthew Fisher (the court-case-winning organist from Procul Harum) produced, magnum opus Strong In The Sun; just a little below that would be other signs for Jackson Heights – the group formed by Lee Jackson from the ashes of The Nice when that band imploded and Todmorden’s favourite son, Keith Emerson took his organ and knives off to fill enormadomes with Lake and Palmer. Jackson Heights, of course, variously featured both Mike Giles and Ian Wallace on drums – both, equally, stalwarts of King Crimson with the former also part of the long-forgotten duo MacDonald & Giles who recorded their one and only, eponymous, album for Island – the gatefold cover featuring both arm in arm with their ladies of the time, perhaps wives of now.

Further still up on the Jersey-side there’s Hackensack – giving of itself (by name) to Nick Moore’s band that formed in 1969 to release just the one, Roger Dean cover-designed, Polydor album Up The Hardway which, by all accounts (cement-hard-rock not exactly being my forté) is quite a considerable collector’s piece some forty years after the warmth of that and other vinyl hit the shelves of record stores up and down, across the length and breadth of… days when the newspaper adverts proudly proclaiming ‘available at your local record shop’ meant exactly that.

Now, there’s barely a record store at all.

At present, in the UK, there’s something like four-hundred independent record stores trading; in 2003 – there was well over a thousand. And, way back then – there must have been in excess of five times that number.

Do I bemoan the days of vinyl passed?

Yes… actually… I rather do.

Because there is no longer any real experience that goes with the purchase of a new recording.

Look at it this way – nowadays, the new (for sake of example) Bob Dylan waxing sits alongside a Beatles 2010 calendar in a book-shop; Waterstones, Barnes & Noble – take your pick, they’re one and the same. Woolworths (r.i.p.), Boots the Chemists, Sainsburys, Tescos, Wal-Mart or WH Smiths – their ‘record’ departments trotting out top forty as if there was / is nothing else to tempt the eager punter with. Fill up with petrol or diesel and take your pick from dozens of compilations that sit right next to the crisps, nuts and chocolate bars in any Shell / Mobil garage. Did you crave the new U2 album? Available at cut price when you purchased a cappuccino at Starbucks.

And online – what’s really there? A huge mass of… stuff – you can look but can’t touch. And, about as enticing a manner of shopping as glancing at the cellophane-wrapped top shelf volumes in an immigrant run, seedy newseller’s in East London.

The online process is… well, there isn’t a ‘process’ as such. Think about it for a moment – you dial up your latest, all singing, all dancing version of I-Tunes and log in to the I-Tunes store. So far, so ok – but, what greets you? Their (beastly) recommendations – which aren’t really theirs at all – nope, corporate label X or Y has ‘paid’ to have their ‘product’ ‘promoted’.

There is no possibility – any longer – of wandering through the racks, looking through album sleeves; all the cds that are for sale are so heavily protected by being put inside security coffins that, the simple pleasure described above is no longer available.

And here, maybe, is where the grey area is – for me at any rate – no longer grey. This is where black becomes the new white.

And… it comes down to the one, single, word – product.

And, many years back, it got me into a whole heap of trouble… for daring to question my (then) paymasters at EMI. Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to 1972. Act one, scene one – the EMI annual sales conference.

I’m twenty years old (ok, so that means you now know how ancient I really am). The venue is some terribly swish London hotel and all of us nonentities (ie, sales reps) are there in our best haircuts, suits and kipper ties.

Some of us – self included – had beards; they were all the rage back then and, I confess, I rather thought I looked a little like a young King Charles – the first of that line who, you’ll recall, had a minor disagreement with Parliament which ended with one single blow of a well-sharpened axe when his head rolled onto a sawdust laden scaffold outside the Banqueting House in Whitehall, one chilly Tuesday lunchtime, the 30th day of that particular January in 1649.

The great and the good were there from ‘head-office’, those inhabitants of the hallowed turf known as Manchester Square – the office building that featured, rather fetchingly I always thought, on not only the cover of an early Beatles album but also on the blue and red double-compilations of later years.

Many of them sported beards too. And, one by one, they took their turns up at the lectern in front of a slide-show to deliver a ‘presentation’ of their new ‘product’ for the coming autumnal sales drive.

And what delights did they and the relevant label-heads from the EMI distributed labels of the time have to tempt us all with..? Well now, 1972 was, of course, the year when quadraphonic sound came out to play… remember that or never heard of it? No… ok then, a little refresher – quad sound meant that you had to buy a load more audio equipment (amp and two more speakers being the bare minimum) and, in essence, sit in the middle of the room with the speakers cunningly positioned so that the sound… surrounded you.

It was a little like sitting in amongst the violas if orchestral was your preferred take on music or being uncomfortably close to Jon Lord and his Hammond if that’s what musically got your rocks off.

Quad meaning four and… speakers set in four corners of one’s room wasn’t a bad first step. Did it work… well, it was an interesting audio experiment but, really nowhere near as sophisticated as the kind of surround-sound you get in film theatres today.

The boffins loved it (of course) as did my pub-landlord of the time. Late night sessions with him and his wife just outside of Newbury (he was a monocled, Swiss baron and she learned the art of cooking Steak Dianne from the French bloke who actually invented the dish) playing Elgar, Wagner and Vaughn Williams at colossal volume whilst imbibing too much whisky saw to much of that year… as did the bar bill which saw a goodly portion of my EMI wages.

So… what did we get… hmmm… Deep Purple and Machine Head (and yes, they released a quad – or Q4 – version); Babe Ruth, Pink Floyd and Obscured By Clouds, a Gallagher and Lyle album, most probably Steely Dan’s Can’t Buy A Thrill which was on ABC but, so far as I recall, that was distributed by EMI at the time (and did anyone actually know that a steely dan was a name of a dildo-variant… I think not); there’d have been a Gensis album – Foxtrot; Island would have weighed in with the first Roxy Music offering. The Music For Pleasure label would have given us a Magic Roundabout album and Twiggy – that was the year of The Boyfriend. There was ELO because Roll Over Beethoven had already clogged up the summer airwaves and The Shadows – of course there was a Shad’s album, there always was… and… yes, The Wurzels too – on the Starline label. Oh my, such delicious memories.

And, up they trotted, one by one, to extol the virtues of this or that… piece of… product.

Ultimately the assembled company were introduced to a new high-up-in-the-ranks chap. I think he may well have had a beard too. His name was… Bob. And, for the life of me, I can’t recall his surname. No matter… Bob had a background in… canned food. And, during his speech, extolling the virtues of the fabulous EMI, he used the P-word a great deal.

Later that evening, there was the company dinner at which we were all jumbled up with regard to seating – meaning that you’d have someone frightfully important hosting a table which’d be filled with people within the organisation but all from disparate backgrounds and jobs.

I was on Bob’s table.

And, after partaking a couple of glasses of the well-chilled, I was in belligerent mood and took him to task for using the P-word.

How on earth could he justify calling the music that an artist / act had sweated over for (perhaps) weeks / months and which had been committed to vinyl with a cover / jacket / sleeve that had been equally lovingly designed (so long as it wasn’t on Music For Pleasure) and… term the end result… product.

So far as I was concerned, that was equating music to baked beans.

And, it was as fundamental as that.

And so, in no uncertain terms, I made my views known

What I didn’t know – at the time – was that the canned food company from which he’d been recruited was called… Heinz.

Needless to say, my opinions didn’t go unnoticed and a severe dressing down was my reward a few days later, administered by my area manager, one Jimmy Parmenter… a kindly soul who did what he had to with, I believe, a heavy heart since he equally well knew that what drove me was passion. Equals – was it any wonder / surprise that I jumped the EMI ship at the earliest possible opportunity to join Island in ’74.

Passion – it drove me then, it does today and will until the day I bowl up at the pearly gates… and its passion about music. I’m just not passionate about music seen as / termed as / known as / referred to as… product.

Which, basically, is all one gets nowadays.

Unless…

Trawling around the wild west wait a lot earlier this year, I came across an absolutely fascinating site. It was almost as if it’d been built purely to satisfy me / my kind of person… One quick look and I immediately knew that DB, holed up in his Aunac lair in the rural idyll that is the Charente would love it… and… in fact, pretty much everyone I knew who loved… music.

I fizzed the link across to France. Two days later came the reply which I’ll paraphrase here… thanks hugely for sending that link, it is indeed amazing and fully satisfies my vinyl-junkie cravings. However, you’ve not endeared yourself to the wife, she unplugged me after five hours spent online, gazing avidly – claiming that was enough for anyone. I plan to have another look when she’s out shopping tomorrow.

And the site… its called 991.com.

Its run by a couple of blokes who’ve set up what could be, loosely termed, the ultimate vinyl-junkie’s fix – they specialise in rare or hard to find, vinyl and other recordings. In short, a collectors site.

And, I’d argue strenuously that its probably the very best out there.

A few weeks after discovering said site, I’m parked up in my borrowed car in a once and almost forgotten backwater in Kent – the home of 991.com. It’s as non-descript and somewhat run-down as the warehouse looming large before me.

The façade belies the interior, however. Because, once through the portals, it’s a different matter altogether – a veritable treasure-trove of vinyl / cd – long forgotten jewels are racked cheek by jowl and all lovingly tended / catalogued by staff who care equally passionately about… the music.

In one respect, I’m almost glad of my suitcase existence since it precluded the purchase of a great deal laying before my eyes.

Yes, its an online shopping experience but… what sets it apart from the rest is this: the manner in which everything is laid out is as close as it can (online) get to browsing through the shelves and racks of yesteryear. Its (almost) as good as sifting through the imports bin in a shop that simply doesn’t exist any longer. Its also markedly different – and all the better for it – from the other collector’s sites out there because, the cataloguing is done / written up by people who one just knows would have worked in one of those stores; the kind of people who’d have unpacked a gleaming new import, inbound from the States way back when, and immediately played it to a shop-full of curious customers.

What could make it better... hmmm, only one thing - and, that'd be the boffins at 991.com installing a facility to play bits of music (a bit like they have on I-Tunes).

This weekend, forty years ago, half a million – give or take a few – trudged to and from the mudbath that was otherwise known as Max Yasgur’s farm in Sullivan County, upstate New York.

The counter-cultural revolution was in full-flow yet man had, but a few days before, walked the Sea Of Tranquillity having journeyed to the Moon on board Apollo 11 while Jimi Hendrix closed out the three day Woodstock Music & Arts Fair by de-constructing the Star Spangled Banner – one was a product of man’s invention, the other as eloquent a musical statement as can be made that, no matter how many times its is heard or viewed, could ever be described as… product.

Man In The Mirror

2009-07-08T20:29:00.006+01:00

It was hard not to avoid the gruesome spectacle coming out of Los Angeles yesterday; the Lennin-esque laying in state followed by the highly questionable ‘celebration’ of the boy-man-boy who died last week in, what can only and best be described as, questionable circumstances.

Musician, singer and song-writer supreme – no shadows and tall trees of a doubt there.

But… why wasn’t it left at that; why – or what caused – most of the known-world to react in the manner in which they have; this out-pouring of communal grief, the like of which hasn’t been globally seen since the (public) death of Diana, Princess of Hearts.

Yes, it’s a tragedy that someone so absolutely talented died so young – but, its this comparison-thing that so grates: the whole over-the-topness of ‘he / his music was there for me, he wrote / sang the soundtrack to my life’ – all total, utter, bollox.

Jackson’s music – like so many others’ – just touched a part of all our lives.

However, the fact of the matter is that it was simply that – a touch – no more, no less. Equals, why this apparent (self fulfilling) requirement to make it into something it never ever was?

Its like being on the receiving end of a discreetly flirtatious smile from a pretty girl at a party… that's something rather nice, makes one feel good. Doesn’t mean – in the telling of it later – that one enjoyed a full-blown relationship or had children together.

This outpouring of ‘public’ grief; the gnashing of dentures; all of the hysterical wailing and tear-smudged make-up; the ‘fans’ 'comments'… one wonders if – in time to come – they’ll think back and consider more wisely; somewhat like those who chucked flowers at Diana’s coffin en route to the island in the middle of that lake in Northamptonshire; the Lady of Shallot on her way home.

Unfortunately, the very same that happened earlier this year when someone who’d had their own Warhol-like fleeting brush with ‘fame’, publicly died of cervical cancer – the absurdity of all of that bloom-laden hysteria proven these last few months by example; how often is that particular person thought about, discussed, commented upon… today?

And... where was the dignity?

The Los Angeles television-transmitted images owed as much to the psychedelia-tinged pictures from Johnny Depp’s new Alice in Wonderland as it did to a funeral (for a friend); the grotesque spectacle of the ‘family unit’ in single white gloves while hiding their crocodile tears behind a uniform of the blackest of dark glasses – hey, we’re Los Angeles royalty so lets look completely preposterous indoors; their fake(d) D’Artagnan solidarity – all for one, one for all – when, in real life, family harmony had been a daily misnomer.

Once again, I wonder… where is the dignity?

And what or who caused the spectacle of his daughter being pushed forward to howl her own, ten-year-old anguish straight into the cameras and millions of homes, bars, cafe's and over-sized plasma screens around the world?

Grief is an incredibly private thing; coming to terms with and mourning the death of a parent is a unique experience – not one single person can compare their own knowledge of that to anyone else – and that’s a fact.

Yes (of course), people can sympathise with one another but to say – yes, I know what x or y is like – bollox. You don’t, ‘cos everyone is different. So… for someone who’d been ‘protected’ and pretty much out of the public spotlight for as long as she’d been alive, to have the older members of her family push her forward on the dais and have her speak – how utterly irresponsible was that?

Dignified… no, I don’t think so.

But then, the entire ‘show’ smacked of being a public-relation’s led extravaganza – less Cirque du Soleil and more freak-show circus.

And, as much as that was truly ghastly, witness the phalanx of so-called friends and celebrities who’ve been coming out of the woodwork like so many termites to pontificate about someone that so few, so very few ever knew.

Which leads one to wonder… what was this all in aid of? Unhappily, this last ten days or so has been just the beginning – the squabbles will go on for years if not decades and, in all probability, the regiments of lawyers and aides will be the only ones to reap massive remuneration, Allan Klein-like from the dying embers of his estate.

This is a line taken from Danny Eccleston’s excellent piece written for Mojo Magazine: In death as in life, Jackson was the canvas on which the circling carrion-birds projected their desires: for love, fame, money and copy. Next up: the "revelations", fact and fiction, with no way of telling one from the other. After all, you can praise the dead, or bury them – or both – but one thing you can't do is libel them.

Precisely so… Because… and without a doubt, his highly dubious ‘other-life’ will also continue to be air-brushed under the carpet just like it has been ever since his death was announced. Almost as if that part of MJ didn’t exist – which, clearly, it did.

Which, in itself, presents another paradox – because he created the body of (musical) work that he did, is it ok to sweep that (wholly unpalatable) aspect of his existence to one side? Clearly, from the way he was eulogised yesterday, it seems so.

This little Voltaire says bollox to that... entirely.

While one (and this should be emphasised) was markedly less ‘flawed’ than another, much like it was with Diana, so has it been with Jackson.

And, as curious and bizarre a fact as this may be, I met both Jackson and Diana at the same venue; different circumstances but, nevertheless, the same place.

With the latter, I was in the line when Kid Creole performed at The Grosvenor House Hotel – can’t for the life of me remember the occasion, perhaps a Prince’s Trust charitable event… the precise circumstances are now lost in the mists of my mind’s time but, the handshake and the short conversation ensued. She was taller than I’d imagined; very softly yet firmly spoken and had the most exquisite eyes. Being on the receiving end of the full nuclear blast of them is something one never forgets.

Jackson and I stood next to one another at a BRIT Awards ceremony at the same venue – equals, that’d make it early eighties; after a few glasses of the well-chilled, nature had come a-knockin’ and I’d made my way to the men’s room on the first floor of the very same hotel.

Positioned all alone and half-way along the urinals and mid-flow and there was the unmistakable sound of the door opening and – while gentlemen stare straight ahead (unless, your name is George Michael that is) – it was impossible not to notice a smallish quasi-military-clad figure arrive and stand next to me; immediately unbuttoning the fly of his black uniform trousers.

Not a moment to either introduce oneself or to proffer the hand to be shaken, I think you'd agree.

Anyhow, we stood there, side by side – neither uttering a word, both focussing intently on both the task in hand (as it were) as much as the gleaming white tiles at eye-level, straight in front of the pair of us – letting nature take its course. Ablutions over, I turned, washed my hands, dried them and the door was opened for me by Michael’s gargantuan, Giant Haystacks’-like minder, standing guard over his charge.

Very different to another occasion when, out on the road with the Irish group and support act The Waterboys in northern France (equals more or less same sort of era); a motorway pit-stop is called. This was in the days when tour-buses were not the luxury means of conveyance that they are nowadays; in fact – its unlikely that the Irish quartet bother with such in this day and age, far easier for them to fly from show to show.

Anyhow… there we all are… like cartoon animals from one of those French paintings from the turn of the 19th century that my parent's had hung in both the downstairs cloakroom and above the lavatory in the upstairs bathroom; lined up and ready to go. Only… one of us was in a spot of bother. Yes, the fly-buttons had been undone and the porcelain had been pointed at but… action came there none.

One by one, we all buttoned or zipped back up and turned to exit the urinals. Yet, with one remaining, legs slightly astride in that most manly of stances and staring straight ahead. What’s up, Bono? Quoth long-time tour manager, Dennis Sheehan, can’t go… you got stage fright?

Was Diana really Queen of (all our) Hearts; was MJ the King of Pop; is Bono the penguin-Emperor of rock ‘n’ roll? Its all relative and, most probably, era specific.

And, in a peculiar manner and within this Voltaire on its grassy knoll on the windswept prairie of other Volatires (and there are zillions if one cares to look with regard to MJ) death - viva la vida - is a common, binding factor.

We’ve witnessed the public displays – quite a few years back for the flawed-princess and over the last few days for the pop-sovereign – but, what was instructive was being at Earls Court (again, a few years back now) to attend one of about a week’s long stint of shows that the Irish band played; dates that coincided with the death of Bono’s dad.

As mentioned earlier, the death of a parent provokes unique feelings; there can be no debate about that – yet, that night, the band played one of the most emotional sets I’ve ever witnessed. Its likely that very few in the audience would have known – this being pre-Twitter days – but, it’d (almost certainly) be true to say that the ‘emotion’ emanating from the stage would have been felt from the very front to the very back of the 18,000 people in Earls Court that night.

There was (as I recall) but the single mention from the stage; during Bono’s intro to their song Kite – when, among other things, he mentioned that he thought he’d written the song but, in actual fact, he realised that his father had.

It's summer, I can taste the salty sea;
There's a kite blowing out of control on the breeze
 I wonder what's gonna happen to you;
You wonder what has happened to me

  I'm a man; I'm not a child 
A man who sees; The shadow behind your eyes  

Who's to say where the wind will take you
Who's to say what it is will break you 
I don't know 
Where the wind will blow  
Who's to know when the time has come around

 I don't want to see you cry
 I know that this is not goodbye  

Did I waste it; Not so much I couldn't taste it
Life should be fragrant; Rooftop to the basement  
The last of the rocks stars; When hip hop drove the big cars
 In the time when new media; Was the big idea 
That was the big idea

Who's to say where the wind will take you
Who's to say what it is will break you
I don't know 
Where the wind will blow
Who's to know when the time has come around
I don't want to see you cry 
I know that this is not goodbye

The other night, while on stage at The NeuCamp in Barcelona, Bono dedicated Angel Of Harlem to MJ whilst citing the fact that the song had been inspired by another (tragic) Harlem Angel, Billie Holiday.

There was dignity in that… dignity in music.

Let The Earth Bear Witness

2009-06-26T18:08:00.002+01:00

OK... this is important.

And, its a message to anyone out there who reads this... please, watch and then forward the you-tube link across to anyone / everyone you know.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEoEUdOKhsA

Its a video montage of stills from whats going on in Iran set to music by The Waterboys' Mike Scott utlising words by the great Irish poet, WB Yeats.

Its incredibly powerful and moving... not easy to watch but... maybe thats the point.

"Let The Earth Bear Witness is inspired by the amazing scenes of hundreds of thousands of Iranian people standing up for their rights and freedom. I took the words from two old Yeats poems, in which he was writing about Irish freedom fighters. But his words apply to any freedom fighters, anytime, anywhere in the world." Mike Scott.

LET THE EARTH BEAR WITNESS words by W.B. Yeats

They shall be remembered for ever
They shall be alive for ever
They shall be speaking for ever
The people shall hear them for ever

Let the sea bear witness
Let the wind bear witness
Let the earth bear witness
Let the stars bear witness!

American Pie

2009-06-26T18:04:00.001+01:00

Most people can remember where they were or what they were doing when news broke of a major icon’s passing.

In my lifetime, that’d include Kennedy being assassinated; Hendrix choking on his own vomit; HRH The Queen Mother sipping her last Martini; Elvis not making it out of his ensuite bathroom; Monroe – was she, wasn’t she murdered; Sinatra no longer able to run with the Rat Pack; Marley succumbing to cancer and Lennon being shot outside the Dakota Building in New York City, his adopted hometown.

And, Michael Jackson’s adopted home – given that he had been stripped of so much a few years back – one rental mansion after another in California. And, there’s a strangely quirky comic-book parallel – in that Orson Well’s Citizen Kane died fictionally and cinematically in pretty much similar circumstances; alone in his own never-never-land, warped of mind, corrupt and corrupted, fighting a losing battle with himself and long-since removed from the genius who’d created his own kingdom.

All over the globe, Michael Jackson’s death reverberates; the whys and the wherefores, the how and if, what might have been and what was – just a few of the subjects uppermost on everyone’s lips. From classrooms to chat shows; from news rooms to blog-sites – the tributes pour forth and the debate rages.

Not least over the legacy that he left behind.

But… what, precisely, did he bequest the world?

Its probably fair to say that over the past fifteen or twenty years, Jackson became a caricature of himself; exhibit-A in the celebrity zoo – modern day music’s Elephant Man equivalent.

Behavioural issues relating to his being a child-man; friendships with chimpanzees and snakes; the wealth of allegations; abused and abuser; the court cases; the fortune(s) earned and squandered; the list goes on and on.

However, underneath the flawed exterior lay the inner-talent that can, justifiably, entitle him to the title of supreme artiste of his generation.

Because, at the root of it all is one, single thing – Michael Jackson created the soundtrack to a generation.

So… how does this fit into AlphaBetaMusica..?

Every TV news-cast has, over the last few hours, been reaching out to people who had touched the hem of the garment; from Rabbis to Rappers; from lawyers to tax avoidance authorities; from medication experts to a-z list celebrities. If they can’t get them in the studio, they want them on the ‘phone with the prime requisite being… make sure your people can supply a picture of you cuddling up to Jacko. Illustrate to our viewers that yes, you knew (no matter how fleetingly) the man-child himself.

All of which is diametrically opposed to what lays behind the initiative that is AlphaBetaMusica.

What is of interest here is the other story; of what really happened behind the musical talent.

And, in this respect, only one commentator – that I’ve found thus far – has chosen to hint at this aspect; Richard Williams in The Guardian who disseminates the music within a crop of phrases in amongst a few paragraphs that are stylistically way beyond anything I could hope to write.

More importantly though, he uses his own first hand experience of seeing The Jackson Five perform a showcase at London’s (now defunct) Talk Of The Town to a handful of carefully selected media folk back in the seventies and how he and the late – and equally legendary – John Peel sat together, awestruck – at which… we shared looks of amazement as the group went through the fully choreographed routines of a Motown act, providing a platform on which Jackson demonstrated every ounce of the gifts and the potential that would make him, by the end of the decade, the biggest attraction in the world of showbusiness, the star of stage shows of previously unimaginable lavishness.

What makes this significant..?

It’s the fact that there was a carefully orchestrated ‘machine’ behind the talent. Just as there was when the HIStory album was launched via a colossal effigy of Jackson; a statue that took about a month to create and which was towed up the River Thames right into central London to announce the arrival of his new record. The man who, on Sony’s behalf who ‘choreographed’ all of that – Jonathan Morrish. And, there are a hundred other examples – the people behind the scenes – from whom generations to come can glean knowledge.

Michael Jackson totally revolutionised ‘pop culture’; he didn’t just re-invent the rule book – he threw it out the window, trashing racial lines in the process and, under the tutelage of Quincy Jones, gave birth to three astonishing albums; each unbound by restrictions of race, ethnicity or genre – Thriller, Off The Wall & Bad.

Each, in its own way not only set the music meets image bar at a new height but… cemented his place as a generation’s role model, arguably the first of his type for young, black America – and long before Obama came along and transformed a nation.

And, it is the underbelly of all of that which – to AlphaBeta – is the important part of the whole. Those are the socio-musical hows and the whys, the whats and the wherefores that matter.

In under twenty-four hours, the outpouring of emotion has already reached Diana-levels; obligatory televised shots of grief-stricken, tear-stained faces. Commentators across every available medium dissecting and unraveling, dismembering and scrutinizing every tiny detail of a life less private, trying (and failing) to simplify a life that bred new meaning to the word complicated.

Nothing is that simple – indeed and as with so many true greats, the genius was (is) tinged with a modicum of madness. The tittle-tattle that ultimately became central to the circus-drama will, I hope, eventually evaporate; people trying to figure out the meaning to and of his life – meaningless in the greater scheme of things, because those ‘opinions’ can only ever be informed by the individual interpretating from their own particular stand-point.

The legacy is the music.

And, for AlphaBetaMusica – its what lay below the surface of the grooves.

Lest we forget.

Pull Up To The Bumper (12” dub version)

2009-06-16T15:59:00.003+01:00

Pop music is the classical music of now – Paul McCartney, at the time of the release of Sgt Pepper, Summer 1967.

The ring-tone volume has been set at a level that’d scare someone breaking concrete paving slabs with a jack-hammer and its intrusive screech splits the air – all William Tell, bow, arrow and Granny Smith apple-like – twelve rows behind where I’m sitting.

Within a few moments, the ill-informed fashion statement that comprises this half-mast-trouser-wearing, semi-mohican’d hairdo has answered his incoming call and trebled the decibel count; within thirty seconds he’s engrossed in a full-scale argument in which every third word is an expletive.

To all within earshot – and that’d include most of the municipal borough of Cheltenham and many of the large, deliciously green, swathes of the Cotswolds – his hapless co-respondent would, similarly, seem to be of argumentative bent.

Twelve seats to the fore, I’m beginning to wonder if he can shout his profanities any louder?

Quite clearly this self-important style-declaration, this arbiter of tasteful attire – who’s breathing and snorting as hard as a Derby winner through his heavily-studded, spotty, nose – doesn’t give a toss that their ‘domestic dispute’ is invading the personal space of a bus-load of passengers.

Privacy… discretion… maturity… tact… diplomacy… prudence… good judgement – oh heavens no; after all this is the year of our Lord, two-thousand-and-nine in England’s green and (un)pleasant…

Fairly obviously, it is time to reach for the trusty i-Touch and the little white ear-phones.

My silver-surfer kicks into life, ears and ‘phones get nicely acquainted. And yet the honeyed tone of Gary Christian within the long mix of ‘Words’ blessed by its cathedral-like wall of sound turned to maximum is absolutely no match for the missing link, seated twelve rows aft.

Is this a three minute argument or the full half hour?

Time to delve deeper into the bag of tricks – now is the moment to attach the super-deluxe, heavily cushioned Bose beauties to each ear. The manufacturer’s promise being that no sound will escape to annoy anyone close by – equals, no sound will get in either.

The people at Bose do not (in this particular instance) speak with forked tongues.

Offering up my very nastiest (best) evil eye, I glance back at mister angry; to all intents and purposes he appears like a deaf-mute, his mouth making fish-shapes in a now-silent world, his facial expressions contorting like a salmon out of water breathing it’s last.

Finally, clad in earphones that protect me from his entirely selfish, self-seeking, belligerent and aggressively argumentative world, I’m free.

Or am I..?

Since, in a Calendar Girl kinda way, its dawned on me that we’re getting frightfully close to the grunters and groaners who masquerade as ladies tennis professionals – yes, the All England Championships at Wimbledon are almost upon us. And, for those of you watching in black and white, the pink is just behind the blue.

Is it just me who thinks this nonsense has got out of hand now? I mean, this whack the ball and howl like a stuck banshee at the same time ethic has been part and parcel since 1992 when Monica Seles won her only Wimbledon final. I’m not taking anything away from that (or any lady’s) achievement; just wondering why its taken seventeen years or so for people to get pissed off with the incessant bawling… or is that testament to the famous stiff upper lip of the British? I wonder.

Anyway… apparently, sounds over eighty decibels are considered hazardous. Which begs the question, will we – sooner rather than later – see some form of legal action brought against the groaners on the grass under health and safety regulations?

For example, Michelle Larcher de Brito’s squeals, groans and otherwise porn-film-friendly ‘noises’ have been measured at one hundred and nine decibels. Maria Sharapova regularly breaks the one hundred barrier while the Williams’ sisters exceed the eighty-count by sounding like they’re going through advanced labour pain with every serve and volley; their bass-line hits make it appear as if the epidural has yet to take effect.

All of which proves my theory as to why Apple invented its i-Pod range in the first place and precisely why the likes of Bose designed proper headphones: it is to stop people like me from committing actual bodily harm on egotistical twats like this bloke on the bus… or the train or… wherever they may… or tennis players whose verbose method of play is more suited to y-shaped position porn-actresses.

And so, whilst we’re on the subject… how about these blokes who (also) wear their trousers (pants if you reside in the Americas) below the waistline? A joyous vision, this new variant on builder’s bum, wouldn’t you say; a treat upon the eyes, hugely attractive and all that? But why… why?

Actually, I’ve started to wonder if this is really an anti-Simon Cowell movement; he, of course, famed for wearing the trouser quite a bit higher than traditional waist-level. Apparently not – it emanates from cell block H.

Prisoners are not allowed to wear belts – due, fairly obviously, to the inherent risk of suicide and so, in that trousers handed out to the incarcerated were often one, two or even three sizes too large, this led to the ‘sagging’ look.

That’s all fine and dandy and entirely logical. However, it appears that once prisoners were released they continued this fashion (?) trend to show that not only had they been put behind bars but that… they were… hard. (if you come from Liverpool that’d be well-‘ard).

Terrific eh… wearing your trousers half-way down your arse … signifies you to be… hard. Like blokey-bloke yelling in to his cell-‘phone on the bus… right?

Ok, lets look at a few synonyms for that particular word, shall we? Firm… solid… stiff… rigid… tough… unbreakable… durable… inflexible.

Well, what do you think, eh? I think it just publicly states that you (trouser-wearing-bloke at half-mast) look like a total turd.

Almost, but not quite as irritating as the mosquitoes that have been feasting on the Storey flesh these last few nights; I’m plagued every single Summer by these blighters – in times past having been told its due to the fact that I consist of ‘sweet flesh’. I don’t think that at all; I subscribe to the view that mosquito X – bandits at 10 o’clock, Roger… chocs away – sees the snoring-Storey body whilst hovering above my recumbent form and, basically, thinks… yummy… dinner.

Crikey, you’re a happy camper today, aren’t you?

Actually, I am.

My pair of seedlings are growing rather well – in fact, one has now flowered its first flower while the other’s budding beautifully.

Yes, its been that kind of last two weeks or so; a period of time that’d be marked as alpha-plus.

Been interviewed; been interviewing; have walked, bussed and trained from one meeting to another; drunk more coffee than is probably good for me and been to the bank too.

You have..? But you don’t like banks very much, do you? This is absolutely correct – and a direct throw-back to when I unwittingly achieved my very first overdraft.

The bollocking issued by be-suited bank-manager-bloke that day scared the bejaysus out of me and scarred me for life; I was ten shillings and threepence overdrawn and he decided to treat me like a criminal; this being not that long after the Great Train Robbery which saw Ronnie Biggs (pre-Sex Pistols) get banged up for a very long time indeed.

Mind you, Ronnie and his cohorts had made off with sack-fulls of cash and killed someone in the process; my error was over-investing in a newly imported, floor length, Afghan coat. Dedicated follower of fashion – you bet and then some; I was the only person within a twenty mile radius with a coat that utterly reeked of ‘cool’ at Everest level.

The fact that it stank to the high heavens of ancient, unwashed, far-away, fatty mutton when it got rained upon was, to my adolescent mind, neither here nor there.

Totally groovy… and ever so slightly overdrawn.

Maybe I should have gone in to that particular bank meeting wearing my trousers half-way down my backside. This would have told the be-suited bank-manager-bloke I was as tough as nails. Wouldn’t it?

However, the fashion of the day dictated skin-tight, emerald green, crushed velvet loon-pants, a loosely ruffled buttermilk granddad-style, three buttoned shirt under the aforementioned Afghan coat and, its entirely possible that my chosen attire might have had a direct bearing on proceedings.

Be that as it may, the bank that I’ve been to recently isn’t like that. No, this isn’t what one would term a High Street bank. It’s a place inside of which one only goes if invited and, better still, introduced. I have a bit of previous in this respect as, quite a few years ago, I trod the Italian marble tiles of their well appointed atrium once before – a rattling good surface on which the sexy, sexy boots clickety-clack in a most satisfying manner indeed.

That particular time, ultra-connected-lady (she should be, given her antecedence) and self arrived primed by a great deal of strong coffee courtesy a number of caffeine-emporiums en-route, marched straight up to the entirely discreet reception desk that was overhung by a good deal of flora and fauna to inform the lady presiding over this throwback to Kew Gardens that we had an appointment with the Chairman. Not, the Chair-person, not the Chair… the Chairman – this is a bank which conducts its business in a refreshingly old-fashioned manner.

A uniformed lackey ushers us up stairs and along corridors before pausing outside a vast, highly polished, oak door. The knock is as discreet as his approach is deferential. The door opens on well oiled-hinges and clicks shut almost as silently as we both sink into the carpeted interior.

The air is blue-thick with cigarette smoke.

After being introduced, coffee is ordered and poured into bone china cups as pre-meeting niceties ensue.

With cigarette ash raining like so many grey snowflakes onto his shirt-cuff; we’re informed by our genial host – his, instantly recognizable, wizened face criss-crossed by so many age-furrows a plough-boy of old would have been proud – that he’s only taken the position conditionally – I was asked to return to run the place but told them (one assumes the board though it’s not mentioned) I only would if allowed to smoke. They gave in and I have this office. Noticing that we’re both quivering with nicotine withdrawl, he says. I say… care for a gasper..? It takes one to know one.

During the course of the next hour, I was treated to an insight into the ways things would be – the dot.com revolution was at its zenith and everyone I knew was getting carried away with arranging loads of noughts into satisfying rows. The creased face in front of me – one as much used to Yorkshire grouse moors and duck shooting near Peebles as boardrooms within high-end financial institutions the world over – could see the future (where most of us couldn’t) and declaimed it.

Way back then, he was firm in his view that it’d crash to a large degree but would – eventually – rise up in a different manner ultimately creating a new business model the basis of which being that it had to financially sustain itself.

And, he wasn’t far wrong.

This time around, the (non-smoking) office I’m led to is underground; not quite as plush as before although the coffee has, without doubt, been hand-ground and the sugar lumps are offered via silver tongs – just as they were some years back. Unsurprisingly, the cups are bone china. Old world courtesy, charm and… discretion.

An hour later and the people I’ve come to see have listened, asked questions, had those questions answered and… when people like that say they’ll be in touch, one knows that lip-service isn’t being paid. Time to head to the next appointment.

And, a matter of hours later, one nagging worry in my head about the monetisation of ABM has been answered. Now, by monetisation, I don’t mean the seeding – I mean the physical method of ABM earning as well as paying out; the model that I’ve worked out in my head (and on paper) yet which, up until now, I couldn’t find a way of making work.

The bearded-wonder who’s been drinking two glasses of orange juice to my one (any more coffee and I really would have astral-projected) has explained that my idea isn’t as batty as I’d hitherto imagined and… this is his particular expertise; we draw maps and diagrams on random bits of paper – me by way of asking is this, that or the next thing possible – him by way of illustratively explaining how it works, why it works and… yes, it works.

Time to hit an internet café as the London Tube strike bites. Getting about has become twenty-degrees more problematical with the capital’s underground system pretty much shut down. There are queues of people waiting on buses; not being entirely conversant with what their routes are, there are times when one hopes for the best in order to get a bit closer to where one’s headed. Even more fun (sic) is when one of them breaks down in a hissing, gushing haze of diesel-smoke; the platoon of passengers disembarking to listen to a Russian immigrant berating the hapless Jamaican driver.

In amongst which a few other key things occur, all in fairly rapid succession.

Firstly, this bunch of music that’s been burning a hole in my bag; everyone who has heard what I’ve let them hear has got it, yes the songs are that good. But, within that, talking to people I’ve had – without revealing too much – my own, shall we say, shopping list. After a couple of false starts the top of that shopping list returns the call, the appointment I’ve been after is made and, a few days later, we convene south of London Bridge one sunshiney afternoon.

Ninety minutes later we both emerge into the late afternoon London heat-haze to go our separate ways having made a plan to meet again in a few days time; I’ve played the songs, the reaction was exactly what I’d hoped for, I’ve been told – yes… the songs really are that good and so… from my perspective, cautious optimism for proceeding to second base has become the order of the day.

Then, quickly following on those heels, is the news that ABM is now out there, in the public domain. The interview that I gave a week or so ago to the editor of Music Week has been published. Hence the need (above) for an internet café in order to download the pdf of the article that they’ve chosen to spread over two pages.

For so many years, I’d go about my daily duties, arranging interviews for person X with publication Y, occasionally catching subject X’s nervousness with regard to the end (published) result – had they said the right thing, would they have been quoted in the manner in which they’d wanted to be… all that sort of stuff.

Now, the boot is on the other foot; and I find myself approaching the download with a fair degree of trepidation. What if it’s a lousy piece, what if I really have been mis-quoted, what if… oh shit, push jensen button Z and… lets see what they’ve said about what began as a germ of an idea conjured up in a French field via a long-distance call with Tony the Greek and which, until fairly recently, has just been called Project-X.

So, lets see what one of the two most important music trade publications in the world has to say about AlphaBetaMusica, shall we? .

Its very much ok… in fact… its fantastic. I read it through twice, then a third time… whew – this is somewhat to the upside of as good as it gets… its all accurate… yes, those are the things I said and they’re all in context… crikey… this is… a bit bloody good.

Fire it over to those within the inner sanctum and, as the weird Arabian music plays away in the background – yes, it was a strange internet café to say the least – within minutes the notes flood back in; this is the public start of the initiative that I’ve been striving for and other believers had hoped for.

Within the course of the next few days I’ve struck further gold-dust; three – subject to contract – deals with separate entities as 3rd party strategic alliances.

Entities… hmmm, I suppose one could call them that – and nope, I’m not about to reveal exactly who, right now; lets just say these are serious, dormant at present, multi-year archives that will – over time – combine with ABM’s own, self generated content to provide a serious educational resource.

And that, self-generated content… how’s that coming along? Pretty well, I’ve been film-interviewing a wide diversity of people over the past wee while now; generally speaking utilising similar questions but, of course, tailored to each individual subject. The library of content is growing apace.

And, down that particular alley-way I’ve met up with a number of truly mesmerizing characters; one of whom really bears mention here – Bill Holland… a name not that widely know yet a man with career history than most would give their eye-teeth for. Amongst many other things, he’s the fella who was sought out by John Lennon and Brian Epstein when they were shopping for imports at HMV Oxford Street and he has a truly astonishing in-depth insight into record retailing on both sides of the Atlantic from the earliest days; and thats a small fraction of the knowledge he has - and which he's happy to impart to ABM's burgeoning content library.

My pink half of the drainpipe… you know what? I may very well paint it blue.

One Love

2009-05-31T19:24:00.003+01:00

One love, one heart, lets get together and feel alright – Bob Marley

Baaba Maal and his musicians have all exited stage-right (or is that stage-left, I never can tell) yet the boards of the old music hall theatre known as Shepherds Bush Empire remains in semi-darkness; nor have the house lights haven’t come up as one would normally expect them to do.

The drums and all the other accoutrements that comprise the back-line is still in place as sundry stage crew scuttle and scamper about, placing chairs in different places and adjusting microphones like crews always do. One, two; one two, testing… one, two three. Back right, from where Doe Phillips, Oasis’ tour manager and I are standing, someone is assembling a set of small hand-drums on top of one of the keyboard-risers. The lights remain low.

That’s a really quick turnover intones the voice of experience in my ear, I don’t think the set is over yet… do you?
No, I don’t… I murmur back into the leonine mane of curls standing beside me, it looks like something else is about to happen ‘cos normally the MC comes on and does his bit at this point.
Oh, you mean the big black guy with the head that looks likes its been freshly varnished. Who is he?
He’s Count Prince Miller, one of the first of the JA sound system pioneers from outta Kingston from aeons ago.
Count Prince…? The eyebrows that belong to the mass of golden-brown tresses shoot upwards in disbelieving curiosity.
You’ve been hanging around the Gallagher brothers too long, I reckon. Its a sort of self-aggrandisement thing that they did way back when in Jamaica, a kind of self-promotion thing… my voice is drowned out as the level of hubbub around us increases several notches.

Barry Reynolds walks back on stage clutching an acoustic guitar, settles down, plugs himself in and starts gently picking out the chords to what sounds suspiciously like the opening to Redemption Song. A keyboard player wanders on and positions himself deep in the gloom of the semi-lit stage as Baaba Maal – mega-star throughout all of Africa – re-enters from our right… is that stage left… maybe it is.

Then a shout… a couple of high-pitched whistles rip through the clamour… before all-about screaming and shrieking kicks in … and then the hall absolutely erupts.

A small bloke in entirely preposterous and (to my way of thinking) totally superfluous, almost-red-but-not-quite-pink, Channel (sun?)-glasses wearing a russet coloured, black embroidered, leather jacket shambles on; his head having recently subjected itself to a fairly close farmer’s-crop. A grey-blonde tall chap follows wearing a bemused expression and a bass guitar; the elegantly angular features of another in tight black jeans walks purposely out of the shadows and up onto the keyboard riser and immediately starts tapping out a rhythm – not a man to mess about, one who prefers to get on with the job in hand. Stage left another over-sized acoustic guitar walks out wearing a tight-fitting-black-tea-cosy on his head.

By now, the packed house is going completely mental; everyone with a camera phone is holding it in the air; clicking away in the general direction of the stage, more in hope than good judgement. Auto-focus a-go-go.

I’m nudged by a cider-sipping couple to my left who seem curiously unmoved by what’s occurring just a few yards away. Who’s that? I’m asked. Who’s just come on..?
Oh… that’s U2.
Really..? he says as she intently drinks in the unfolding spectacle. Bloody hell, didn’t see that they were advertised for tonight.
Well, that’s true, they weren’t; but then again, its hardly a surprise, is it, I think to myself.

I’m remembering back to a conversation with Dennis Sheehan (their own tour manager of ultra-long service to the cause) about a month ago over lunch when he’d said, y’know, I really don’t think they’ll want to miss out on all of that – we’d been talking about the, then upcoming, Island50 celebrations – I’m sure they’ll find a way of doing… something.

The song has now identifiably turned into One with Edge and Barry trading chords as Baaba Maal and Bono embrace before trading vocal lines. Its curiously magical; a little shambolic yet – as under rehearsed as it probably is, the untidy rough edges somehow gives the tune even more resonance; a song with Africa at its core, one of the great modern day hymns – musical redemption from the pandemic of Aids throughout that nation.

The song naturally segues into a couple of choruses of One Love which, in a strange yet entirely appropriate way, seems to have become a metaphor for this entire week of shows before Baaba exits stage-right (or is that left, again); Barry and Edge shake hands and Bono asks no one in particular if there is time for one more.

As the crowd howl in unison and with an attitude of – this is our playpen now, the Irish four piece launch into a spectacularly average semi-acoustic rendition of Vertigo – for all the while sounding like a covers band attempting a tune far beyond their capabilities. It doesn’t matter; the crowd go berserk – they’ve had the treat of their lives.

The Thursday night half-time oranges beckon.

What with one thing and another, its been quite a remarkable week – watching my seedlings grow while, at the same time, stepping back in musical time.

One that has been interspersed with a series of AlphaBetaMusica appointments as well as garnering more attention to this clutch of songs in my bag. Songs that are now eliciting clear responses that undoubtedly prove I’m not the only one to hear their potential. After a fair bit of time away from the coal-face, its good to realise that one can still trust one’s ears.

Besides, with a few more doors being nudged open on my behalf by converts to the cause, being able to present what was Project-X face to face to those higher up the table than I normally sit is starting to prove its worth. Running way past their allotted time-spans has become routine for meetings as the scope of the whole is properly realised by those I’ve been facing.

Further to which, interesting sub-strategies have begun to emerge, most especially with regard to the seeding of this little blighter.

Am I going to detail any of that now – absolutely not… All I’ll say is – there is a line on the horizon; a line that’s slowly but surely coming into sharp relief.

In the midst of which, there’s also been the minor distraction of the man in the gabardine suit; is his bow-tie really a camera? Not this one – his suit was a curious shade of mauve tinged with plum… not quite blue, not really purple yet with a splash of lavender-wine, deadly nightshade thrown in for good measure… somewhere in between something and something else altogether.

The Fedora was, needles to say, worn at just the correct rake and the man’s three Coconuts looked young enough to be his daughters. Its entirely possible that at least one of them was.

Their performance – the opening set of the Island50 shows – closed with one of the big hits, Annie (I’m Not Your Daddy); the moves were as slick as ever, the band (all new bar one) had been drilled to perfection; the high-sheen of their eighties choreography morphing seamlessly into 21st century big band swagger proving great music is, indeed, timeless.

Late night and August Darnell is holding court in his dressing room on the third floor backstage at the Empire while eating a noodle and chicken takeaway; the suit in which he’s wowed the audience earlier has been carefully packed away.

The shirt on his previously sweat-soaked back has been replaced by one that’s been freshly starched; his meticulously selected tie has been tied carefully and knotted perfectly; the trousers to this particular brown suit are hoisted to precisely the correct height with a pair of discreetly patterned braces, the creases are, of course, razor sharp. His brown and cream brogues gleam from being freshly polished and the slightly larger than pork-pie sized straw hat has been tipped to an angle that can only be described as jaunty.

Darnell detects a slight movement in the doorway from out the corner of his eye and turns. Holy fxxk. Storeyville. Its been three hundred and twenty-eight years.

He gets up, wipes a overhanging noodle from his mouth with a freshly laundered handkerchief and advances, arms outstretched, grinning wildly. Damn… You look good, my man – pronouncing the word good as only a man out of Harlem by way of the Bronx can. He glances up and down. Your shoes are clean too; and that… is a very fine coat indeed. We embrace… its as if twenty-something years have passed-by in a split second.

I step into the muddled chaos of the dressing-room and find a chair, place the hat-box that’s occupying it on a window-sill and turn to face the man the world knows as Kid Creole. I was going to wear a hat but I didn’t want to upstage you. You’ve still got that ridiculous, same old pencilled-in moustache, I see… The guffaw that follows sounds like a cross between a man choking on something unpleasant caught in his oesophagus and a throaty, wheezing, chuckle. The crinkle-chip laughter lines around his eyes confirm the latter.

He’s right, it has been a long time but… no matter the years, the kinship, the solid-bond of friendship that was forged those many, many years back remains unbroken. The banter chatters back and forth like a revolving sten-gun on automatic for the next twenty minutes. Later we swap cell-‘phone numbers as his chicken and noodles lay idle and forgotten on an upturned flight-case at his knees and make loose arrangements to meet for lunch in a couple of days. Later that night I text, saying how good it was to see him and that lunch on Thursday would be a pretty beezer idea since, by then, I’d be hungry.

Thursday and I’m just out of a lengthy meeting and into the leaky cauldron known as Tottenham Court Road and a text arrives on my ‘phone. Storeyville, can’t do lunch today, have to go up North (Manchester Liverpool) to trim my moustache. Call you when I return. Great to see c ya again. We need 248 hours to catch up! X. No matter, time to head off to Kensington anyway, I’m in as urgent need of an internet café as a man with an upset stomach is of a public convenience.

Outside in the bright afternoon sun, a gleaming black car-front with what looks like some kind of customised extension behind pulls up; a vehicle that began life as a Mini but which has evidently been elongated – it probably has a name but, not being car minded, I’ve no clue as to the exact marquee. The man who steps out, ignores the nearby parking meter and wanders unconcernedly into the reception area and tosses something resembling a car-key onto the table.

CB, who began Island life out of the back of his Mini Cooper and without whom this whole Island50 thing wouldn’t have come about isn’t someone who much bothers with parking meters. I can’t imagine its because he knows someone else will look after something that mundane, I rather think that its just because parking meters are way off his radar. He greets everyone in sight with a smile and a handshake, asking opinions of the previous evening’s event.

I’d only gone down to that particular show only to see Steel Pulse – not, I admit, being much interested in The Fratellis. Overrunning somewhat after another late afternoon meeting, a message had been left that my ticket was to be collected. No problem, been used to this for many years and the routine is always the same. Stride manfully up to the necessary window, give over one’s name, smile nicely and… all is well in the world. But not this time, drat and double that – no mention of my name on any guest list, no ticket in an envelope squirreled away behind the grill at all. Drat and then some.

I stand and ponder… and, mid-ponder in marches Mark Ellen, the Word magazine’s editor and dead-ringer for the Beatle that plays his bass guitar left-handed. We exchange greetings and after a rapid explanation that no one can find my ticket, I take up his offer of being his plus-one for the evening and we head for the bar. Ten minutes later and a rumble of bass-thunder announces that Steel Pulse are taking the stage; we take up our pints and walk the walk.

An hour later and there’s a slight sense of musical let-down; they were good but not great. David Hinds – the only surviving front-man had not (in our combined view) got the set right at all – too much from unknown recent work when (we reckoned) most of the assembled would have wanted (like us) to have been treated to songs from the earlier Island outings. True, the mighty Handsworth Revolution got aired but too many crucial cuts from their illustrious back-catalogue such as Klu Klux Klan and Tribute To The Martyrs were confined to the past that night.

That said, the band were as tight as a tick and David, himself, looked quite extraordinary – clad in raiment that would have suited Joseph down to a tee, this predominantly purple and silver striped coat of many colours was floor length and bottomed out with impeccably-shone black shoes – not for him Rasta-foot-wear. His locks were completely another thing altogether.

From times past, David’s locks tended to grow straight up… which always struck me as being particularly uncomfortable having that weight of hair vertically ascending from one’s head. Indeed, Tony the Greek tells a story of transporting him to a radio interview one time and having to open his car’s sunroof in order to more properly accommodate David’s up-standing locks. Rasta ina Red Cortina-styleee.

Time has seen that gravity has had it’s pull and David’s locks now more resemble tree trunks sprouting out of the top and sides of his head, cascading down like so much Bonsai root-formation. In fact, throughout the week, locks of varying length and wonder have been on display… hey, this is Island50 – what did you expect? Night one and man about Ladbroke Grove, Don Letts is standing at the barrier, hailing anyone and everyone in sight; his have been unfurled from his outsized-cap that he wore at the Portland Place party and, fluttering in the night air, reach almost to his ankles now.

Ahh yes, that first evening… after the aforementioned break, Sly & Robbie fronted up the Taxi Gang or Compass Point All Stars (take your pick, both bands were pretty much identical) and showed the world how to dub-it-up rub-a-dub style on stage. The sound was, in a single word, enormous; rhythm metronomic with horn-stabs and clattering percussion competing in echoes. They took the likes of Black Uhuru’s Shine Eye Gal and eviscerated it, turned it on its head and then, Frankenstein-like re-assembled it before one’s very eyes like a dub-master class.

With no let-up, Aswad came on and mashed it up yet again with a trilogy of hits before Brinsley led out the I-Threes; Rita Marley as Queen of Reggae in the obligatory ball-gown of red, gold and green, a statuesque Marcia Griffiths at her far-side and new I-Three Erica Newell more soberly clad on the other. With Brins taking Bob’s own role, it was like going back in time with the I-Threes’ call and response to their leader; One Love sounding as sweet as ever it did.

A brief pause before something called Tinchy Stryder takes the stage – apparently he’s at the forefront of a musical genre called ‘grime’. Thirty seconds of grunt-rapping and my nicotine habit was badly in need of a fix. Outside in the cooling air, there are three blokes by the barrier, with a sizeable spliff on the go; it appears that they too are not much enamoured by Mr Stryder and his bought-at-Woolworths attitude-rap either.

Then came Grace. Its highly probable that everyone in attendance knew that Miss Jones was going to appear in a costume that would, quite literally, pale everyone else’s into insignificance. Perhaps that’s why Darnell had opted for the plum-purple gabardine; maybe that’s why Rita had gone for the Rasta infused ball-gown. The bar was set to Olympic heights and Grace absolutely did not disappoint.

How do you describe legs long enough to walk over the Great Wall of China, topped with a bottom-less black leotard, above which the giraffe-like neck; her heavily mascara’d eyes masked by a sequined eye-mask above which came… what looked to all intents and purposes like a black feathered mushroom… worn upside down. Grace looked like she was off to Ascot… but not necessarily the Ascot that the anointed Queen attends.

The obligatory Pull Up To The Bumper, a good deal of buttock-wriggling for the happy-snappers in the front rows and another few choruses of One Love and that was it. But it wasn’t really – that was just the end of one night; the Thursday was capped off by the appearance of one of Island’s pillars; one of the four musical cornerstones. If its true (and why wouldn’t it be) to cite Bob Marley, U2 and Steve Winwood as keystones then the fourth has to be Cat Stevens.

To be honest I wasn’t sure what to expect… I suppose I imagined him to sit there, strum his guitar, look at his feet and sing his songs. Dunno why I imagined that sort of performance given his pedigree but, maybe because of the whole embracing of Islam and the long-past ending of his having anything to do with his alter-ego, Cat Stevens.

How utterly wrong one can be.

From the moment he walked on stage he exuded presence by the bucket load. His band were nothing less than masterful, sporting one of the best keyboard players I’ve ever come across and, alongside long-time collaborator Allun Davies, Eric Appapoulay on slide guitar, first encountered when he played guitar in a former client of mine’s band… and boy, can he play.

The sound was exquisite; the arrangements were to die for and the voice… oh my Lord, that voice. Yeah, ok… and the songs aren’t half bad either.

It wasn’t one of those greatest hits nights – much as probably most of the hall wished for; there was a very fair smattering of old material in amongst the newer stuff but, above all the one thing that stood out was the in-between songs chat. This was clearly a man at ease with himself, at ease in his surroundings and very, very much at ease with his quite extraordinary body of work.

Cat Stevens, Yusuf Islam – call him how you will. Try also – funny bloke with a great line in self-deprecating humour.

Midway through the set, Cat / Yusuf announces that his two young grandchildren are in the audience. He stands there, staring out into the darkness and eventually sees where they are on the balcony. He does the ‘hello, grandchildren’ bit and blows them an amplified kiss. All really rather sweet. Moments later, as he’s picking out the start of the next tune – appropriately his stone-ground classic, Where Do The Children Play – a piercing two-year old voice cuts through the acoustic strum… Grandpa… Grandpa… I can see you…

A rare privilege to have been there.

Friday morning and its back into work-mode… yet its hardly as if I’ve been out of that modus-operandi for goodness knows how long. The Steel Pulse night had elicited one further piece of good ABM fortune; as their set ended, Mark Ellen and I started to walk up the aisle toward the bar but were stopped by a hazily remembered face.

Not for the first time in recent weeks, a vaguely familiar face has suggested that they know me. And, this time around, Mark as well. We introduce ourselves and he does the same… we all do know one another; its Mykaell Riley one of the co-founders of Steel Pulse. Mark starts talking about an NME cover story that he conducted for the band way back when but, its unclear if Mykaell has perfect recall of that event.

More recently, however, and for quite a while now, Mykaell has been one of the leading lecturers to students on popular music studies. Indeed, he’s someone I’ve been trying to track down for the last few months yet, for whatever reasons, have met brick wall after dead end. Now we’re standing face to face. As Mark heads toward the bar, Mykaell and I swop contact details and I pass on a few choice tidbits about ABM.

Friday early morning and the e-mail pops up… he’s had a good look through everything to do with ABM and… when can we meet, this is right up my alley. An hour later and yet another incoming ‘phone call from a publisher I’ve been wanting to hook up with concerning these songs that are burning a hole in my pocket. Appointments are made in amongst the many others already in the diary and...

Next week looks like being really rather busy.

Trench Town Rock (12" extended mix)

2009-05-24T18:06:00.003+01:00

The bigger labels are supermarkets, I like to think of Island as a very classy delicatessen. Chris Blackwell.

It’s like walking straight into a sonic explosion, somewhere deep in the heartland of Kingston’s underbelly.

Dub-fire bass-lines throb through the room like a heat-seeking nuclear missile-strike. The depth-charge echo of a far-away guitar ricochets from the ceiling as the forked-lightning of a disembodied high-hat matched to an off-beat kick-drum scythes from wall to wall before rebounding in a welter of ghostly, synchronised, recoil.

The volume control that’s calibrated to ten has clearly been set at twelve. The cat in the hat, who’s setting these controls for the heart of this sun – Natty Dread – nods his flowing locks in satisfaction; his deftness on the decks is disembowelling music into a whole new art form.

It’s a little before the witching hour and, clearly, the night – this night – is still young. Fast backwards.

The emporium into which I’ve entered promises me a wi-fi connection. I know this because there is a sign on the door proclaiming precisely that in very large letters. A frothing mug of cappuccino is procured, the laptop is plugged into the mains and fired up – emails need to be written and sent and, like anyone else on the move in a 21st century metropolis, I’m ready to roll. Or so I imagined.

Ninety minutes later and with everything written and my second coffee drained, I’m poised, ready to connect through the promised wi-fi, up into the ether and out onto the glories of the wild west wait. Oh my, I love all of this technology, don’t you… No wires – just fresh air.

All of the right buttons pulse and glow, launching satisfying arrays of miniscule emerald green lights, welcome screens fire up and… off we go.

No we bloody well don’t.

Quick as the proverbial flash, another screen pops up asking me to register with this, put card details into that, sign up with the other and check all manner of disclaimer boxes above which the typeface is so small that I wouldn’t have a clue as to what I was actually saying yes (or no) to.

All I want to do is send off everything that I’ve been writing and get on with my day but I’m being assaulted by a five bar(red) gate that will only offer the privilege of opening up if I shove plastic cash at it. The mail I want to send will take milliseconds to fire off; equals this is nothing other than daylight robbery. Using the analogy of what is now termed as snail-mail, this’d be the equivalent of any government run institution charging three or more dollars / pounds / euros to send a single letter.

Bollox to all of that – the sign on this emporium’s front door is misleading to say the least.

Thirty minutes and one ‘phone call later, I’m trudging up the stairs to Coalition’s offices – with the PR side now a memory, there are free desks a-plenty and, yes do come in and do what you need to here. An hour or so later and I’ve got all I needed to be done plus a whole heap more.

Neilo… Tina (Rob’s widow – and how sad is it to use that word) is standing on a chair, watering a straggling plant by the window, absent-mindedly plucking off some of its withered leaves. Why don’t we go and have a pizza first, then we can go off together and be really fashionably late?

Two hours later than our invitations state, we’re wandering the length of Poland Street. There it is… it must be. Mustn’t it? Look, there’s loads of photographers… I wonder who they’re waiting for? Tina’s arm links through mine; six months on, she’s still getting used to going to things like this without Rob – the epitome of a couple; their lives inexorably inter-twined having achieved the perfect balance of togetherness without being permanently joined at the hip.

I glance ahead. Gotta be it… you can almost smell the music industry gathering.

Our invitations are scanned, we’re given the once over by an over-sized bully in a tight-fitting suit that barely disguises his muscle-bulk and in we go. Thirty seconds later I’ve a pair of arms around my neck, being pinioned in some kind of mad, backwards bear hug. My name is screamed into my ear.

Its Brinsley Forde from Aswad; a group first encountered when they were but a bunch of musically gifted hooligans from Ladbroke Grove and now recognised as some of Reggae’s elder statesmen. Nothing was safe at St Peter’s Square back in the day when these teenage dreadlocks were in the building; it wasn’t uncommon to come in the morning after they’d been recording down in the basement studios to find not only most of the promotional vinyl gone but entire office hi-fi systems missing as well.

Nowadays, Brins hangs his hat in the warmer climes of the Canary Islands, is back and forth to Jamaica, London and elsewhere working on a number of album projects. We swap tales of suitcase living as a pair of grizzled dreads that constitute a percentage of Steel Pulse hang around the background.

Jon Turner, Island’s current marketing director stretches out his hand. Great to see you, come in for a coffee and a chat? Stiff co-founder Dave Robinson wanders by offering a quick, Call me, lets meet for a coffee; the legend in his own lunchtime that is John (Knocker) Knowles – one of my earliest bosses when Island’s sales force was in full cry – proffers and affectionate but bristle-bearded kiss on my cheek. You look well, Cory – been ill or somewhere nice? Give me a call, come in and have a coffee. You goin' downstairs..? Its fucking loud, PJ Harvey’s just come on and she’s heavier than Zeppelin. Knocker grimaces and plods off into the night.

Crikey, if I took up all these offers of coffee, I’d astral project. And Polly Harvey – another eeek, musically somewhat of an acquired taste and a fair ways from mine. Tina and I meander down the stairs to be met by a barrage of discordal noise. Blackwell said once that PJ had wanted to sign to Island because of Tom Waits – that’s all very well, but while Tom’s music is also something of an acquired taste, at least he has amazing songs.

Immediately to our left, pinioned to a side wall by this sonic bombardment, stands the ramrod-straight back of Captain Bill, more properly addressed as Nick Stewart, the man who signed U2 to the label. He’s alongside their perfectly suited and tied, (though, nowadays somewhat portly and slightly sweating) manager, Paul McGuinness. He’s keeping a watchful eye on his other charge – Polly Harvey… this, obviously, isn’t the time to offer up any opinion of her ‘music’.

Besides, conversation is pointless – we mouth smiled greetings at one another.

One song later and PJ’s primeval feedback howl and I aren’t getting along terribly well; time to move on – the over-populated bar is over there in the gloom… and, mercifully, it’s a bit further away from the cranked up PA system.

More and more handshakes and hugs; people I know, people I think I recognise, people I should but don’t, this is through the past darkly.

Fruit-juice in hand I wander along a darkened corridor destination the exhibit proper and slow-motion stumble over a trailing wire and straight into a slightly stooping grey-bearded figure who has a young lady in full-throttle Muslim attire on his arm.

Drat… how am I nowadays meant to address Yusuf Cat Islam Stevens… the Tillerman clearly doesn’t recognise me – hardly surprising since we’re peering at each other through shadow and haven’t clapped eyes upon one another in more than a quarter of a century. Nevertheless, honour is satisfied on each side with an exchange of smiles with both of us saying, I’m so sorry at the same time. Last thing I need right now – with AlphaBetaMusica rolling along as nicely as it is – is a fatwah being issued.

Osama Bin Lowrey is standing nearby; his current beard would worry the hell out of immigration staff at airports the world over. You need to be a bit more careful, man – Phil’s small dark eyes crinkle laughter-chips in amongst his mass of carefully sculpted grey-white facial hair; you can take a Geordie out of Newcastle, but you can never take the accent away.

Tina comes to my rescue; did you just bump into who I think that was..? Ohhh, Neilo…look, that’s your handwriting… wow… Look at that. We’re now standing at the entrance to the exhibit proper and, blown up to about ten feet in height is a U2 guest list from a show at The Clarendon, a west London venue that most probably doesn’t exist any longer. An upstairs room that sported a small stage that’s a far cry from the enorma-domes they nowadays frequent with attendant guest-lists that constitute small novels.

This one is dated March 1980… and yes, its typed out from the days when we’d just got golf-ball typewriters in the Press Office, long before wi-bloody-fi laptops had been invented. And yes, that looks suspiciously like my scribble across it.

An interesting relic – because, quite a few names have been left untouched on the list, designating them as among quite a few no-shows that particular night. One such being a certain Chris Blackwell + 1; his first U2 show came a bit later on; at a pub in Herne Hill, the same hot night that Bob Marley had headlined his last ever UK show at Crystal Palace Bowl on a glorious summer’s afternoon.

The centrepiece of this, main, exhibition room is one of the Trabants that were suspended high above the stage on the tour that followed the release of the Achtung Baby record. There is a cameraman on the outside and the presenter is struggling to get comfortable inside before voicing her piece to camera. As much as she’s having her own difficulties getting into the vehicle, one can’t help but wonder how Adrian Boot (who curated all of this) and his merry team of pranksters got the bloody thing inside in the first place.

Behind a Perspex wall are amassed dozens and dozens of wide-ranging artefacts; stuff – for want of a better word – that illustrates Island’s rich history from way back then to nowadays. It is widespread indeed and arranged more or less chronologically: from a blown up memo from CB himself to the five members of Spooky Tooth that informs them that while they’re all on weekly retainers of 30 pounds each, they’ll each be fined 10 pounds for any no-shows at forthcoming gigs via Nick Drake’s guitar to a drum used by Tom Tom Club. Tina and I wander around staring through the glass accompanied by the even-later arriving Guardian's Robin Denselow.

There are a few silkened tour jackets which were all the rage in the seventies; PJ Harvey has donated a dress worn on stage that hangs beside a pair of what look suspiciously like Edge’s flared and sequined trousers worn on… now, which tour would that have been? Would it have involved a Lemon I wonder?

There is the expected glut of concert tickets and back stage passes from the well-known bands or artists; a set of Island promotional playing cards is artfully displayed; a Bad Company sweat-shirt; lots of old yellowing contracts; company’s incorporation papers; a few original reel-to-reel tapes including one of Mille’s album; an Island clock, a fair smattering of Spencer Davis Group memorabilia; a Steve Winwood and Tony Hutcheson signed print of the original artwork for Steve’s first solo record; displays of seven inch singles on the Black Swan label as well as a number of the different imprint variants of the original Island pink label; a set of Bob Marley stamps issued in Jamaica to commemorate his passing; a very fair smattering of original album covers as well as loads of other fascinating ‘stuff’ but, as with all things, there is a fair amount of ‘stuff’ – rare as hen’s teeth ‘stuff’ – that’s not represented.

Noting that – by the way – is by no means any intended criticism or slight; far from it. It’s a remarkable collection of objets d'art.

However, it’s also a slight pity that its been laid out as it has been with barely any captioning. It could, of course, be argued that little needs captioning – a Bob Marley tour pass is, for example, date specific.

Nonetheless, this Voltaire would argue that all of this ‘stuff’ is of major social – and educational – significance and, as such, it would have been worthwhile to have properly captioned more than has been. Indeed, doing so would - according to this Voltaire - have made for a much more interesting and informative experience for the casual passer-by, interested bystander or student of music.

On another wall hang a wide range of magazine and news periodical’s front covers featuring Island acts. This, very sadly, demonstrates that Island’s own archive must be in terrible shape – for why..? Well, because there are so many of true importance that are quite simply missing.

For instance (and this is just a random observation), the week Bob Marley died, three of the four – what we called, inkies (the weekly music papers) – changed their planned front covers to portraits of Bob.

As an aside here, the Melody Maker didn’t – and that is to their eternal shame; they’d done a deal with Virgin to send journalist X and photographer Y to some far-flung place in exchange for XTC being that week’s cover feature. Rob took great delight in bunching up that weeks edition and kicking it, forcefully, around the office. Below a wonderful Adrian Boot portrait of a long-locked Bob, the NME’s caption was both simple and moving: The Lion Sleeps Tonight.

To my way of thinking, its almost criminal that none are featured. Nor indeed, are any of the very early U2 front covers; Grace Jones and others from the Face Magazine; Kid Creole in the Telegraph colour supplement – these are just arbitrary examples but… within Island’s history, these were major moments in the breaking of these acts. Further to which, every single one was framed… all of which begs the question – where are they now? Or… did someone without a real depth of knowledge assemble this particular part of the exhibit? That hardly seems likely, given Boot’s lengthy association with Island… which leads me to think rather a lot has been lost to the mists of time. Big shame.

Dotted around are numerous other pieces of either artwork or sleeve images or black and white and colour photographs of acts signed to the label. Many have never been seen before while as many are iconic images from this trawl through a musical time. Fabulous stuff indeed.

Unfortunately, once again, a large degree of captioning just isn’t there (that I could see, anyway) – for instance, I spotted an outtake from (probably) the first ever Jess Roden Band photo-session yet, from what I could see and unless one knew who the band actually were, you’d look at the image and wander away clueless as to who was actually portrayed. Similarly, the four Tony Wright variants on Winwood’s Arc Of A Diver sleeve are grouped together – yet, its just those four (albeit beautiful) images that are displayed.

Every picture tells a story – from this particular grassy knoll, it’s a crying shame that the story’s not been told here.

Closing time; the be-suited bullies are rounding us stragglers up and we’re unceremoniously herded outside. The gaggle of photographers are still milling about but, by now, their intended quarries will have long gone… a small group of us, led by Ted Cummings, pr bloke-of-the-moment, head for the pub up the road; thirsty work this exhibition-going and a bracer is needed before we all hit Portland Street where the party out of bounds is already underway.

Mojo’s editor Phil Alexander and I discuss the inside tale of their recent cover-mount CD compilation – he offers a fascinating insight (which I’m not about to detail here) and we arrange to meet again to talk through a few other things before, once more, closing time is called and we end up trolling along together – towed by the tireless, BlackBerry wielding, Cummings – across Oxford Street and toward Portland Place.

One more time, darkened-windowed limos are lined up alongside the pavement, the phalanx of photographers are in-situ, there are barriers everywhere, more be-suited bullies man the door and girls in mini-dresses and luminous lipstick begin the process of checking our names against their clip-boards and our tickets. Gaining access to Fort Knox is probably less stressful.

Eventually we are allowed in, though with such security diligence being afforded us, it is mildly surprising that no one has been strip-searched.

The mass of humanity inside is like entering a surreal kip of the serenes rugby scrum; was that really Pete ‘18 With A Bullet’ Wingfield, walking past with his now-grey beard… how would I recognise a Dr Strangeley Strange, an Amazing Blondel or a Fratelli for that matter… in amongst this mish-mash of grey-haired fogies, little black dresses and an abundance of dreads are hundreds of early-twenties, elegantly windswept, coiffed hairdo’s; its difficult to tell who’s who or what's what.

Such is the scrimmage that, unless you’re close up to someone, reach out, grab and miss and the moment’s gone. Barry Reynolds and I get set upon by an overly protective bouncer as we try to swap ‘phone numbers in the hallway. Mim Scala who I’d really been looking forward to seeing, scurries by but someone gets in the way, balancing a tray of drinks and contact is lost.

Lucky Gordon is holding court upstairs; he came to the nations attention when outed as Christine Keeler’s pimp in the Profumo affair, the scandal that brought down the Tory government in the fifties. He was also, for quite a long time, a cook at St Peters Square.

Lucky had plans for Rob and I to write his cookbook of jealously guarded recipes for him. That all came to a bit of a sticky end when, one evening hanging about in our press office lair, he demanded money (without menaces) from us for what he considered the privilege of writing his cookbook for him. Lucky, it’s the other way around, you’d need to pay us to write it for you, Rob told him. Ras-clat, you no understand, countered Lucky. These are my recipes. You two g’wan pay I. Lucky’s reputation preceded him; he wasn’t really a man to argue with and whether he still packed a gun was open to debate but his hard-man reputation was very real.

Spread over three floors and across vast acres of prime London real estate, by way of Island ‘events’ attended over the years, this has to be unique since there is one thing missing; the heady smell of ganga smoke hanging in the air. A sign of the times of course.

However, as I discover after wandering about for a bit, the smoke-rebels have been catered for… The sign saying smoking is arrowed as being downstairs and out into a basement area with a clear view of the sky. Why did I ever doubt that this particular facility would not have been thought of.

And, quite needless to say, this little part of the ‘party’ is holding court to so many people that it more resembles a Tokyo subway-station at rush hour. Even if you don’t smoke, you can’t help but get (ever so slightly) stoned.

Brinsley is there swapping cell-phone numbers with a leggy blonde, Chris Salaweicz (who edited the about-to-come-out Island book) is in the corner deep in conversation with former NME editor Neil Spencer; friends are calling other friends on cell-phones to tell them in which part of the building they are as a lady, some six feet away starts mouthing at me… I vaguely recognise her; no more. She barges her way toward me, spilling rum punch everywhere.

Over the hubbub of idle chatter near at hand, she yells I know you into my ear. You do…? I counter. Yes… I’m Eve… and I know you. Ahh… I’m struggling a bit here, the face is vaguely familiar but that’s about it. Yes, she says, you know my Mum too. And, I’ve been to your house. That takes me aback – blimey, what’s her next revelation going to be?

She takes another sip of her rum punch. I’ve had eight of these already, they’re rather good, she tells me. If she’s had eight of ‘em I’m a trifle surprised she’s still upright but, a bit like a runaway train, she carries on regardless. My Mum’s Anna Capaldi… and I’m Eve. The penny is slowly dropping into the slot machine of memory. Gotcha – there aren’t that many people who’ve had a song written about them who I have met before.

Then something else registers. This particular Eve has been to my house… back in the day when she was newly-married to the fiddling fiend Kennedy who I was managing; during the period when Nigel had decided – all Pavarotti-like – that he only wanted to be known by his surname.

Nige was – at that juncture – in Transylvania as we were involved in making a South Bank Show documentary. All was going swimmingly until Nige crashed the film-crew’s hired car into the border barricades that separated the land of Vlad The Impaler from Romania (I think). It transpired that he then decided to empty his bladder all over the offending barricade that had halted onward progress.

This didn’t exactly impress the officials who promptly surrounded him brandishing loaded machine guns, arrested him and threw him in jail.

Artists’ managers are responsible for many things – the normal such as negotiating contracts and the abnormal – such as getting one’s client out of clink. Time to call the British Ambassador.

Finding an unlisted number in Romania in the middle of the night was, I admit, a trifle tricky but, find it I did. The Ambassador – whose name was Ivor and who was possessed of the most sing-song Welsh valleys voice I’ve ever heard – was unflappable charm and courtesy itself. Five hours after the first call had been made, a few strings had been pulled and the fiddler had been released.

The next again day, Nige is on the ‘phone. Oi, Badger – that being his usual greeting. Thanks for getting me out mate but… I’m not impressed y’know. Why…I query… whats gone wrong now..? The prison was fine but you know I have to have synthetic pillows ‘cos of me allergies. And, I was a bit surprised that you hadn’t sorted that out for me.

Less than a year later, I’d had enough – fiddling genius he certainly is but… everyone has their limits and mine were reached not long after he demanded that a grand piano be put into his suite in his Malvern Hotel. Normally not a problem – it was always part of his ‘rider’ when travelling. This time, it was a bit of an issue since he and Eve (who’s standing beside me) are in the midst of parting; equals he’s moved into the best hotel in the neighbourhood and the manager of said hotel is doing his utmost to be as accommodating to his new resident as best he can…

The only problem is the hotel have to hire a crane to lift the hired grand-piano in through his bedroom window which they have to take out in order to get said piano indoors…

That, so he informs me, is not too problematic – it can all be achieved in the morning but Nige is causing a bit of a fuss. He wants it done… now; the morning is inconvenient as that’s when he practices. And, once again, it’s the middle of the night.

Yes, he was a bit unreasonable wasn’t he, suggests Eve. Mind you, we were both control freaks. Did you really fire him? I nod. I'm not that surprised... Mind you, he always said nice things about you. Hang on, I’ll be back shortly, I’m just going to go and get another of these rum punches… do you want one? I decline.

I hang about a bit longer and then decide that I’d be better pottering off into the night rather than hanging in and aiming for the breakfast that’s due to be served at six a.m.

Besides, tomorrow’s another day. While Island life was a way of life, I’ve recently planted two seeds in my own work-garden and they’ll need tending.

One will shortly bloom, the other is just starting to come into bud. Both are evergreens.

Later still the self-same-night: I can hear the sound of a nightingale singing; its Bob Marley singing Nick Drake songs that have been arranged by John Martyn – Sandy Denny, Robert Palmer, Jim Capaldi and Jacob Miller are trading harmonies and in the background is Chris Wood’s ethereal saxophone and Paul Kossof’s gentle guitar fills.

Cry Me A River

2009-05-20T18:05:00.001+01:00

It is a conventional cardboard (as opposed to the more normal jewel-case) cover to a CD and is, I suspect, designed to sit within one’s own CD storage device (no, not a personal hand held device, I wittered on about them last time out).

The front displays a CD-sized image of a lot of vinyl albums racked tightly together with just their multi-coloured spines on view.

It reminds me of various book-shelves that I’ve adapted (OK, that should read fiddled-about with) over the years as well as the ones that I’ve either constructed myself – with varying levels of success – and those I’ve had purpose-built. Each variant on the theme has been crammed with many hundreds of vinyl recordings.

Oh, alright then, I'll own up – the hundreds bred a bit over the years to become thousands and despite the oh-so-fashionable change to all things digital (either compact disc or download) have travelled with me to wherever I’ve lived. And, as has been referred to more than once since I first stood up on the grassy knoll out there in the prairie, their present home is where I’m not – down in the dungeon at Merle HQ.

And much missed they all are as well.

Not least since a very fair proportion of those I have squirreled away over the years on vinyl have never been digitised.

Digitised or not, there is something quite magical about a vinyl album and its cover; yet that something isn’t quite so easy to define. People talk of the warmth of sound that is elicited from a vinyl album – perhaps its that which makes it so special. Perhaps its that tangible thing whereby one can actually hold it, something of proper size in one’s hands. Perhaps its because that was when the true art of sleeve design came into its own – designers actually having a bit of space within which to weave their own breed of creativity that, no matter how hard they’ve tried, simply doesn’t cut it when it comes to the jewel-case format.

A time when size came to matter.

Cue double albums, gatefold sleeves and special inner bags, luxurious boxed sets and one really had something of substance to gaze at, to mull over while the vinyl that its exterior contained revolved at thirty-three and a third revolutions each minute before one’s very eyes. Perhaps its because it was always a dead handy surface for constructing herbal cigarettes back in the day. Yes – there’s another pair of personal hand held devices to add to the growing list.

Over time, some (not many thank goodness) sleeves have become slightly watermarked or damaged; some from many, many years gone past show their owner’s name – when I’d write my name (albeit in small letters) on the back cover top right or left – this to identify them as mine as opposed to any of my friends when we went to early-teenage parties, clutching the newest release with which to appear ever so cool in front of girls who were growing tops to go topless in (so we hoped).

Across this phalanx of closely stacked 12-inch vinyl spines someone has Photoshop’d the image whereby the 5 and the 0 are picked out as if the sleeves, themselves have been lit up by a strong light.

A magnifying glass (actually this effect is achieved by the judicious use of two pairs of my glases) – because I’m needing to be in mega-magnification-mode – shows me the Island albums they’ve found to group together and make up this display.

A Uriah Heep album is right next to Nick Drake’s magnum opus, Bryter Layter; John Martyn’s first mono recording of London Conversation (ILP 952) rests against Tom Waits’ masterpiece, RainDogs; the double-album soundtrack to Countryman (starring… you guessed it… Countryman) with its bank of Wally Badarou propelled synth-driven mellow-moods is alongside Richard Thompson’s Henry The Human Fly – his first solo album, the sleeve photograph being shot in some baronial hall… somewhere; the first Renaissance album (ILPS 9114) bookends Third World’s, Tony Wright deigned sleeve to Journey To Addis; The In Crowd’s Man From New Guinea which probably sold in the tens as opposed to tens of thousands is in there alongside Lee Perry’s Super Ape; Mott The Hoople’s Rock & Roll Queen is nestled up close to Head Hands And Feet’s Tracks; Alan Bown’s Stretching Out with its bizarre (probably Hipgnosis-designed) black and white front cover of a man pulling his chest skin (or was it a nipple) hard is there as are records by Marianne Faithfull and Vinegar Joe.

Luther Grosvenor’s Under Open Skies – again, hardly a best seller, is there alongside the Jess Roden fronted, Doors minus Morrison, The Butts Band’s Blue Thumb release, that particular cover depicting one of those Fender amplifier / four-speaker combinations so beloved of road-crews from the late sixties / early seventies. Eddie and the Hot Rods Teenage Depression featuring a sleeve with someone putting a gun to his head snuggles up to an Emerson Lake & Palmer album; and there’s Jimmy Cliff’s Goodbye Yesterday – but, I wonder, is that the original sleeve, the cover that was almost cloth like in texture?

There’s another Marianne and Nick Drake record further along the line, Inner Circle’s Everything Is Great is in there, Mountain’s Nantucket Sleighride and Roxy Music’s Stranded compete for space with Paul Weller’s Modern Classics, Sheep On Drugs and Keane albums – the new(er) Island as opposed to when CB was at the helm.

Robert Palmer’s Sneakin’ Sally – with the sleeve shot at the entrance to the tunnel that leads to Heathrow Airport, backlit by the twin-headlights of a Rolls (I think) – I really should know that as I wrote about some of these covers for a book that was published in the late Nineties that contained a few choice pieces of Island poster art. Looking back, that really was a great sleeve – one for the connoisseur.

The second Traffic album is represented too – this must be an original as the catalogue number which carries a capital T after the index number is plain to see; the original sleeve had a four-page, stapled in insert filled with grainy black and white images shot up on the Berkshire Downs (the White Horse at Uffington for completists) fronted by Gered Mankowitz’s studio portrait that would have been taken in his Mason’s Yard studio; the very same studio in which his legendary portraits that became defining images of Hendrix were taken.

Oh and look… there is the Kid Creole, Fresh Fruit album – licensed in from ZE Records this was the zoot-suited one’s calling card; floating back through the night from New York, I played its final cut – Dear Addy – over and over again as the dawn rose. From that day to this, cemented into a top twenty position on the all-time Storey juke-box. Back then, not just the only person on the ‘plane with a copy but about to land at Heathrow and be (for a short while) the only person in Britain with a pre-release cassette tape of it.

Fairport Convention’s Angel Delight is there – I wonder if this, too, is an original since the very first copies had a stuck-on image of the band as it was at that time; Jim Capaldi’s Oh How We Danced is there as well – though that was never a record to much trouble the compiler’s of the charts – those were the days when solo albums by band members were almost de rigeur… and, in amongst all of the others there looks to be a little gem that I’ve not come across before entitled The Island Scene… I wonder what that was or is? Perhaps a compilation from… hmmm… methinks that might be some Euro compilation because it certainly isn’t in any of my (as near as dammit definitive) lists that I’ve compiled over the last few months.

Below, it says, off-grey-back on white, A celebration to mark the 50th anniversary of Island Records. Inside, there is (predictably) no CD at all but another wedge of cardboard on one side bearing the message: Island Records and Chris Blackwell would like to invite you (in this instance, that means me) to the launch of Island Life. A celebration to mark etc etc on Wednesday 20th May at 10.30pm.

Entry to the holy of holies is, so it says, strictly via this invitation which, in turn, is absolutely non-transferable. Nor can I bring a plus-one, the music industry’s obligatory arm-on-one’s-arm manner of referring to one’s guest be they partner, wife, husband, live-in lover, concubine, rent-boy rented especially for the evening, gigolo, high-profile colleague (male or female), associate, co-worker or even ex-lover.

I wonder who’ll be there?

Prior to which, I’ve got a day of advancing AlphaBetaMusica to be getting on with interspersed with pulling together further meetings on behalf of my newest recruit… whose music – if yesterday was anything to go by – is falling on the exact opposite of deaf ears.

What with one thing and another, all really rather encouraging.