overlap

Rock Of Ages

2009-11-20T17:58:00.002Z

I'll happily own up to being more interested in numbers than is healthy but then that sort of thing has kept me in a decent living for the last dozen years or so, so this shouldn't sound like I'm
complaining. It's now a matter of record that in the meantime I've seen Magnum once again, pulling off a performance that belies their combined 270-odd years of age. Still on excellent form, and the new album sounds even better in a live environment.

On that same note, it's another vintage line-up that leads to one of those great little venue incongruities. When you're in a council-run venue where getting into the gig means passing within sight of the bathers in the swimming pool, it doesn't quite seem especially rock n roll at its clichéd, dramatic worst, but at least we are spared the vision of Lemmy in Speedos. Once upon a time all gigs were like this; a decent raised stage and a line of big black boxes called things like Marshall, Peavey and so on. Add a stack of lights and a bunch of sweaty people in denim and t-shirts, and you're about there.

The guitar intro to Demolition rings out for some time before Girlschool come into view, closely followed by a broad grin that I can't shake for a day or two afterwards. By the time we get into Screaming Blue Murder, there's a tear in my eye and I'd have felt £25 was worth it for those three and a bit minutes on their own, because it's perfect popmetal guitar, and because of where in my life it takes me back to. In fact it turns out it's twenty years since I last saw Girlschool, and on this showing I really shouldn't let that happen again.

Kim cheers-you-lot McAuliffe seems ageless, Jackie Chambers plays a big white Flying V with a great big grin, Denise Dufort drives it along while doing a decent Chris Griffin impression, but the revelation for me is Enid, rocking singing and playing like there's no tomorrow. Setlist goes something like Demolition, Hit And Run, I Spy, Screaming Blue Murder, Race With The Devil, Emergency - I may have missed one, and I'd have loved Nothing To Lose to have been in there, but that is just nit-picking and they were the highlight of my night by some distance.

I like The Damned, and the last (and only) time I saw them was an absolute cracker. And again it's the pop sensibilities (pun intended) behind the franticness that does it for me. "Hello, I'm Captain Sensible and you might have seen me on Top Of The Pops…" remains a fantastic intro, before New Rose rattles the building, the crowd and half the town into submission. Dave Vanian demonstrates that it is possible to make the inappropriate indoors shades thing look cool, when you're not a professional Oirish tax exile lecturing people on their spending priorities. Also included between the less familiar to me material are Neat Neat Neat, Eloise, and a closing run through Smash It Up before the Captain's brief closing burst of Happy Talk sees them off the stage. Excellent fun, and no less relevant than they ever have been.

A long time ago we went to see AC/DC because the Wildhearts were supporting, and expected to stay for just a few songs of the headliners but ended up staying right to the end. This was much the same thing. I can't say I'm a fan of Motörhead, and on the only other time I saw them they didn't leave a lasting impression. But a decent vantage point means I get a really good view of Mikkey Dee and Phil Campbell doing their stuff, and tremendously gifted they both are. Ace Of Spades is a design classic, and something everyone should see live at some point – I probably won't be rushing for a third go, but they were very good.

Girlschool though. Fantastic.

Loveless Unbeliever, Better Than The Rest*

2009-11-03T20:19:00.000Z

There’s a couple of ways it can go when you put a lot of effort into setting up a venue. You can go down the utilitarian route that means all you need to do is replace lightbulbs and sweep the floor. Or you can go to town and end up with a deliberately decorated art space. While the red neon WHAT THE FUCK’ has gained its own reputation, it’s the sign that says ‘Please don’t talk over the quieter bands’ that catches my eye on the way in. The walls are covered with mostly black and white posters of mostly thirty year old pictures, a mix of the New York of the Ramones, Blondie and Warhol with some rather less interesting pictures of women with minimal clothes from an older era. There’s a string of seven inch vinyl records hanging along the wall, the odd candle burning on a table top and enough colour in the red paint on walls and ceiling for it to be a pretty warm and friendly place. Your average identikit chain venue this isn’t.

Going out on your own from a moderately successful, briefly charting band is always going to be easier than leaving a leviathan like U2. I loved the Pipettes’ manufactured indiepop far more than I’ve ever been excited by the choreography-led likes of Beyonce, but on your own any kind of show is going to be tricky. So it’s to Gwenno’s credit that she manages to combine playing her keyboard, using some sort of pedal to vary the sound and sing along with whatever sampled rhythm tracks she’s using, and also, er, pull a few shapes now and then. Where the peroxide crop looks like recovery Kylie, the net effect of the electronic sounds is more Pet Shop Boys, and while I can’t say I’ll be desperate to hear everything Gwenno does next, the overall it's more than pleasant enough.

The School, on the other hand, is a band that I have been waiting to see again for more than year. There’s been a couple of gigs on inconvenient days, and one I even had a ticket for, but one way and another it hasn’t worked out. So I’m delighted to get to hear a few new songs as well as those that have become regulars on my mp3 player. This time it’s a five piece line-up on stage, and I can pay a bit more attention to who is who, not that it matters so much.

What we get is the familiar sunshine pop tunes, and a few more new ones that are presumably on the forthcoming album, in the following sequence. Double-quotes mean I'm not certain of the title.

I Want You Back
"Gonna Be A Long Time"
Valentine
And Suddenly
"Is It True?"
"I Can’t Understand The Reason Why"
"Hoping And Praying"
Shoulder
All I Wanna Do

"Is It True?" includes a moment not unlike the 'she wrote upon it' part of Return to Sender, "Hoping and Praying" might possibly owe a tiny something to Bacharach & David's Wishin' and Hopin', as well as having a fabulous handclaps intro, and the familiarish moments of sweeping big 60s pop make the sound of The School at once retro and modern as the shuffling drums, the subtle guitar lines and the perfectly placed baby glock notes wrap around Liz's voice like a winter blanket.

While I gather there's been some mildly critical suggestion that the album title isn't all glossy, shiny and happy, I reckon there's a lot to be said for the bittersweet mix of upbeat melodies and heartbreak songs to give that little bit of balance. And from where I'm sat, the distinct mix of instruments and voice/s is precisely what makes The School sound so special.

School's in, as Alice Cooper never said.

* Loveless Unbeliever is the title of The School's forthcoming album, available in February on Elefant records, and the title is taken from the lines 'loveless unbeliever/ better than the rest' from the song 'Let It Slip', which coincidentally is a perfect headline for lazy album reviewers everywhere to use when they describe The School's album!

I stayed on to watch Lisa Milberg's band, and while it was fine for something totally unfamiliar to me, I'd run out of descriptive powers by this point. But y'know, The School's album - buy it, when it comes out.

Well I Guess I Should Confess That I Am Starting To Get Old...

2009-10-28T16:30:00.004Z

Well, less of the starting and more of the firmly established, I think. In any case that's the first line of Frank Turner's song Photosynthesis, of whom much, much more later.

It's been a long time since I had a new back catalogue to go in search of, and after a day of almost constant listening to the limited songs on myspace and the rather more on youtube, I know that waiting for a couple of days before I do so will be a necessary step to avoid becoming rather saturated with those songs before I even get my hands on the CDs.

Trusted recommendations are few and far between, and by the time you reach your forties, even if you love your music in many forms as I do, there's just not so much room left to take on new things that either bring something truly new, or do something familiar in an novel and unfamiliar way. Sometimes you just have to take a chance, and the worst that happens is you know not to come back so you've learned something in the process. And while the no job situation remains less than ideal, I can still find eleven quid to take a little chance, and I lived to be glad of having done so.

It's October so it's the peak season of touring from now till Christmas. And it's a gig in a student venue by an artist with a sizeable audience among that demographic, so it's hardly a surprise that the gig is sold out and already over half full when I walked in. First act was already on stage, a guy called Jay who goes by the name of 'Beans On Toast' - you can guess what I think of that. He puts out a stream of wordy folk-acoustic ranting that could be improved for my taste by cutting out every other swearword, and for someone like me who has a full and lively vocabulary, that's some criticism. It's when it's in every other line of every song that it starts to come across less as effective self-expression, and more as flailing against the world. Which is something of a shame as he's got a smart tongue and undoubtedly a few things to say about the world which I could largely go along with.

Next up are Fake Problems, who have one notable feature you'll either get on with or not, and the rest of it is irrelevant. I like the lead guitar player, especially when he gets to play solos, but the singer's voice strikes me as like a mix of the worst of Tom Waits covering Green Day in a generic corporate punk fashion. There's the odd moment where the tunefulness of Stiff Little Fingers breaks through, but nowhere near enough for my taste.

Now, this also being the start of the academic year, give or take, means the venue is full of snappy young hipsters, and the waiting for Frank to come on meant I was indulging in a serious bout of handbag envy when someone walked past me and though surprised immediately addressed me by my first name while it took me a couple of moments to become clear of who it was.

You can draw your own conclusions about the timewarp aspect of my hairstyle that I was immediately recognisable to someone I haven't seen in a decade or thereabouts! And to be honest, running into someone I used to get on really well with when we worked together would have made my night even if FT had turned out to be rubbish. We had a little time to catch up on the last decade, and you can also draw your own conclusions about the fact my old mate was still in touch with what everyone else who was in that department back then had been up to since, while I pretty much left, full stop.

To a rousing reception, FT took the stage and did getting on for 90 minutes of cracking folk-angst-pop that had me grasping for comparisons. The musical feel is reminiscent of the Levellers when they started hitting the college venues, and a hint of Dexy's Midnight Runners' Kevin Rowland in his voice. The material is rather more the politics of the individual than of dogma and party policy. Looking like mid-70s Springsteen (and Johnny Barlow) from a distance is always going to be a decent move if you can pull it off, and what comes off the stage is a surprising amount of humanity and warmth, as well as a sense of humour and heritage, the latter coming through in a vocal only version of the ancient folk song Barbara Allen.

It would be easy to come across as po-faced and preachy when you're doing a song about war, but when it's introduced by saying that you're going to protest via the medium of the guitar solo, well, I'll forgive anything, frankly.

There's a lot made of his privileged background, but it seems fair to say he's paid his dues over hundreds of gigs in recent years. But what surprises me is that nobody's drawing the lazy comparison between his background and that of Joe Strummer, who ended up the sort of mythical figure that transcends the music they make. And if you wanted a candidate for a new youth cult leader, FT has the charisma in abundance and appears to be doing all the right things that that could just become a reality. Similarly to how Billy Bragg is cleverly marketed as someone who doesn't like marketing, the FT songs are polished to the point of just enough to remove the rawness but retain some rough edges, and it's a potent mixture.

Meanwhile I've another gig to get to tonight, and then I've a new entire back catalogue to buy up. Here's the video for Photosynthesis - and if you can't find something of interest or amusement in it, let me know and I'll pop round and clean your ears out for you!

Ain't It Time You Became The Girl That You Wanted To Be?*

2009-10-25T11:48:00.001Z

*So sings Traceyanne Campbell in Camera Obscura's song Away With Murder, and she has a very good point.

Starting getting ready before 4pm is a good guide to a gig being something special, in more than one way. With a long bath, and more than enough make up behind me, my new handbag and I headed off to see Camera Obscura once again.

I'm a very visual creature, and one of the things that makes my life easier is being able to rehearse the visualisation of where I am going, and what happens when I get there. With a familiar (and free!) parking spot only a short distance away, it's still something of an ordeal to get to the venue and inside it, a little bottle-related parking and moving on notwithstanding.

Despite the getting through the door security gauntlet-running, it's relatively easy to go and stand in the dark, even if I'm a head taller than most of the other women on the premises. In a cramped space, there's more than enough sweat to make even the best Hollywood make up artists' work run, so it's not exactly easy to keep my cool. The bar was rammed when I got in, and while the lots of people coming through the front door makes me one of many rather than an isolated individual, it's still a moment or two of fear mixed with panic mixed with hope.

Support act Magic Arm has a lot in common with Rob Jones' Voluntary Butler Scheme, in terms of sampled drum loops and so forth, but where the VBS makes a virtue of things that don't quite work, Magic Arm guy makes it look like technical probnlems rather than intentional vagueness, so it's not 100% convincing. I like the slightly more delicate acoustic guitar bits, I'm just not entirely certain how much is intentional.

Camera Obscura, on the other hand, seem to have everything under control, despite Traceyanne's difficulties with the in-ear monitoring. It's great to see a band who make proper pop music for grown-ups, amd middle-aged people like me included. It would be futile to go through the set in detail, but Teenager is fabulous, and the whole set is over bang on 11 pm so I can be home by midnight-ish and take forever to type this out as the wine takes hold of my typing fingers.

I'm way beyond a sensible, objective review here, but I had a great time.

Welcome To The Sheep Seats

2009-10-23T16:57:00.003+01:00

One thing you're at the mercy of at a seated gig are the vagaries of who you end up sitting next to, or between. It's a factor that makes a bigger difference to me than it does to many people, particularly in certain circumstances, and one thing that leavens the question somewhat is knowing who your fellow audience may be. In any case I traded the delights of taking my new handbag out for a quick chat with the turn, but it was mildly pleasing to find my judgement turned out spot on. And for future reference, well that's worth knowing.

Getting inside the venue and heading up the stairs to hear 'ladies and gentlemen, tonight's performance will start in two minutes, please take your seats' is a slightly more elegant way for the show to start then a roadie shining a torch towards the sound desk and flashing it. And promptly at 7.30, Miles Hunt and Erica Nockalls walked onto the stage to play for what I suspect is a bunch of folk predominantly unfamiliar with them.

I gather I'm not the first to observe how grown-up and professional someone is when not swearing once over the forty minute set, and for just an acoustic guitar and a fiddle and mostly one voice, the sounds was flawless. Sat in the front row of a balcony section, I had a great view, and the mix of songs from Catching More Than We Miss and more familiar songs drawn from both Miles' solo work and The Wonder Stuff was pretty much spot on.

Erica singing on Plans In The Sky was a particular highlight, and one of the things it brought to mind was whether she might end up also providing the Kirsty MacColl backing vocals on Welcome To The Cheap Seats at some point. Funny that Miles then told a story about his first encountering the sainted Kirsty, and they played Welcome To The Cheap Seats. The final song of the set was, less predictably than you might think, Size Of A Cow. Less predictable because this is the first time I've seen it done in a duo format with Erica's fiddle dualling the keyboard lines and guitar stabs, which is both a refreshing re-invention and set-closing cue for most of the crowd's familiarity reflexes to be touched. Ace!

After a quick chat with Miles & Erica, and another venue PA warning to return to one's seats, The Proclaimers took the stage in front of a fairly partisan audience. I'm sure Cap In Hand has a certain resonance when it's played in a country that isn't England, and for me those subtler moments are the finer part of the set. I'm not sure whether the rhythm section were turned up to eleven on purpose, but at times it sounded more like the driving, muscular approach of The Who or Dr Feelgood than the sort of finesse or delicacy I'd rather hear.

I'm On My Way could be a rogue Status Quo song that escaped and grew up north of the border, Erica returns to the stage for Sunshine On Leith, and from my vantage point I'm watching the crowd as much as the stage. I mentioned before the familiarity reflexes, and it's true that I'm taking a slightly less partial view than I normally would just because I didn't come for the headliners really. It's more than diverting to watch the security staff trying to get certain people to sit down, and confiscating a bottle that was being passed around, but it's equally observable how 500 Miles in particular has everyone out of their seats clapping slightly out of time and for the most part immediately sitting down again once the one song they really know is over. Interesting!

After a brief excursion to play the return for the encore game, and a bit more help from Erica, the lights go up and it's all over bang on ten pm. This is both fitting for a proper theatre venue, and curiously un-rock n roll, but a gig where I could have been home well before half past ten had I not made a slight detour to run an errand on the way is a rare thing indeed!

Miles & Erica setlist
DWI\Fill Her Up and Foot Down\Corny But True\Circlesquare\The Cake\Stay Scared Stay Tuned\Amongst The Old Reliables\Plans In The Sky\Welcome To The Cheap Seats\Size Of A Cow

Power Of Two*

2009-10-21T15:23:00.004+01:00

It comes to something when the artist has got backstage video footage from the gig already up on facebook and I'm still days behind in catching up!

Sometimes you need an understanding of what makes an act special, in more than one sense, if you're not going to be taken by surprise. On the one hand it's hard to avoid pigeonhole limitations by putting a label on something, but on the other hand if you ignore it then you are definitely missing something. But it's natural enough that there are lots of women holding hands with women, in a concentration that's part reassuring that it's obviously a safe atmosphere for that to happen, and part raising the question as to whether such an event is needed for it to happen. Whatever, I'm not qualified to answer the question.

Last time I saw the Indigo Girls my brain chemistry was somewhat affected by a combination of alcohol and adrenaline, and despite the undeniable appeal of that option, this time I ended up fully sober and paying attention. Despite which, a couple of days later I'm now a bit short on detail!

The full detail of the setlist is irrelevant, but it runs roughly by alternating a couple of new songs with a couple of old ones with a couple of new ones and so on. There's some great banter as Amy takes forever to tune her guitar, Yield and Starkville are highlights, the newer songs come through in the live environment with a bit more flavour as they haven't really leapt off the CD at me. At some points that atmosphere heads almost towards political rally, while Emily is at pains to point out that the songs shouldn't need to be political, but the mix of celebration and serious is unmistakably potent.

And then they play Ghost, which is a song of tremendous personal importance and Three Hits is likewise accompanied by the crowd's voices in great number. The gig turns into an immense singalong, uplifting and inspiring in turn, and you can believe it when they comment from the stage that they've had a great time too. There's a general warmth from the gig that keeps us all company till long after we've finally made our way out of the lengthy car park queue, and gone our separate ways. See you next time!

* Power Of Two is a song from the Indigo Girls' 1994 album 'Swamp Ophelia', a fine description of how just two voices and two instruments can make for a top night of music, and a couple more relevant things besides.

At The End Of The Tour

2009-10-01T19:25:00.005+01:00

Keeping up my consecutive calendar month gig record was looking doubtful till I made a late decision to head up the M5 to one of my favourite venues, JB's at Dudley. No rush to be on time, but some incentive to make sure my ticket for collection on the door was actually there, and it was. So, what do you expect from an event called Metalfest? Right.

I came in while Warpath were on stage, and saw their last couple of songs: I imagine that's what watching Metallica looked like in 1983, but from a position that might turn into some surprise by the time they'd turned into the metal U2. Sure they know what they are doing and good luck to them, but it's not really my style.

Not really [someone's] style is also a good fit for Touchstone. I saw them a bit over a year ago, and wasn't quite convinced, and having had greater familiarity with a couple of their myspace tracks in the meantime, I'm still not. I'm not sure if it was the shoes that made singer Kim look more Jessica Rabbit-in-the-Headlights than composed and self-possessed. I wanted to give them another chance, and I like the sound, but maybe I just don't like watching them on stage. Curiously unsatisfying.

Next up were Eastern Front. When you've gone to the trouble of setting up a big visual impact to your onstage moments, it sort of blows the fun when you've got band members turning round to shout at the venue lights/sound staff when you are waiting to get going. Now, the visual impact was one thing, but when they start making a noise as well it's nothing if not memorable. I'm still not sure it isn't some kind of abstract art prank by Jaz Coleman to make fun of just what rubbish you'd have got if Venom had seen more of King Diamond and Slayer before they really got started, mind.

Full credit for the onstage spotlights to catch the white facepainted faces against the black jumpsuits in the dark.

Full credit for the Kerry King wrist spikes and the barbed wire hanging off your mike stand.

Well worth seeing once, purely for the mindwarp experience, but utterly unlistenable.

Headliners the Blaze Bayley band never disappoint, and this is part celebration, part the end of the touring for the Man Who Would Not Die album, as they go immediately into the studio to start work on the next album. I have to say I wouldn't know Lord Of The Flies from Lord Of The Dance, and as far as I'm concerned, well it's like your first girlfriend goes off, has a kid with someone else and in due course you all get over it but even if you and the ex eventually get on very well you're always going to see something else when you look at that kid. In which case, though I know Blaze isn't going to drop the Maiden stuff and there's no reason why he should just to suit me, I am looking forward to another new album and more new tracks. Which is the important thing.

Blaze Bayley 4/5 version in full flight.

Dave always gives really good hair onstage.

Walk Out To Winter

2009-09-22T18:58:00.002+01:00

I'm sure I've used this fine Aztec Camera song as a post title before, but it remains a great song and a reasonable description of where we are now. Looking out the window I can see rain and the coming of darkness, and the approach of autumn at least is banging right on the door.

Meanwhile I've found a couple of vacancies that look like the right kind of promising, I've done several binbags worth of paper shredding, re-organised my kitchen and made a start on sorting out the clothes mountain. I've even got as far as buying something that counts as suitable interview clothes, which is something that really bugs me to waste money on when I have a ton of stuff I'd rather be wearing.

But that's the nature of the game - and it is a game, trying to make the right impression to be more likeable than any other candidate while not being sufficiently honest to scare them off! And as long as I can keep that in mind, that it's a game I've done all right at in the past when circumstances have required, I'm hopeful it'll turn out ok in the end.

Almost Twenty One Again*

2009-09-07T15:00:00.002+01:00

At a point where the details of the redundancy paperwork are still not settled, it will surprise nobody that I have nothing to say on that subject. And indeed, once it's all sealed, and more importantly paid, I'm still not likely to to be discussing it. But the fact this is where we are should be a good guide to why I'm still rather in limbo, albeit now the signing on kind.

An awful lot has changed, both in my life and in the associated processes, since I last signed on. The forms are still sometimes an interesting exercise in logic, but the mechanism of making a new claim online definitely didn't exist all those years ago.

So what now? Suitable vacancies are not exactly plentiful, but the local training industry appears to have a few options which will improve my certificated employability, so that's what I'm hoping to make the most of next. Of course, there are inevitable bureaucratic hurdles to be passed before I can actually make a start on the training, so in the meantime my house is gradually becoming rather tidier and less cluttered. If nothing else, it needs to be presentable for the stage when I get sufficiently desperate that taking in a lodger becomes less a theoretical possibility and more an urgent need.

Last time I had this much time on my hands I was in rather a different position: I'm reliant on imposing a certain self-discipline to get on with doing various jobs around the house, not least because I'd rather not still have this amount of available time six months from now. Keeping some sort of routine is going to be useful, especially if nothing is going to be settled for another week or three, as I'm not expecting anyone to turn up on my doorstep offering me a gold plated job with a six figure salary!

It's not as if I have nothing to do, and there's rather more stuff on my list than there was when I was signing on in my twenties, but I'm sure this isn't going to be forever.

* Twenty One Again is track 6 on the Mega City Four album Tranzophobia

We Drive By Night And Sleep By Day*

2009-08-23T15:47:00.006+01:00

A certain lack of engagement in sweating my utmost for the company (that still can't decide whether to continue my employment or not, despite the very imminent deadline for a decision) means my conscience is pretty clear as I leave the office after less than a half a working day. Having not been to a gig in London for months, it's something of a refreshing reversion to normality to be on the motorway for half the afternoon, listening to England's first innings in the deciding Ashes Test as the wickets tumble. And a lesser experience that I couldn't face becoming a normality as I'm gradually working my way through the London traffic. 'Hold your nerve and hold your line' appears to be about the best approach, and is a decent line on the approach I'm taking in the face of my employer's unintentional brinksmanship.

For a change, and yet not much of a change, I'm pleased to see a bunch of people I haven't seen in a few months, including someone who's taking my spare ticket off my hands. The cash for the spare ticket is quickly exchanged for the Shared album, and it's straight inside to watch one of the artists on it, Timothy Parkes.

When I saw him last, I found myself mildly uncertain what to make of him but he's obviously got his own style and the acoustic guitar on his track Looks Like Rain sounds not unlike Fixer or something else by Vent414, so that's always going to be a bonus. Can't say I'm going to rush to travel for hours to see him on his own, but he's another to file under the category of support acts I intend to catch and keep an eye on.

This many years on, anything I have to say about the experience of The Wonder Stuff live on stage is hardly objective, and likely to be more about the peripheral aspects of the gig-going experience. Nevertheless it's a solid show in a tiny venue, and with either the live sound mix or my position relative to the speakers making Mark McCarthy's bass sound more like a Ned's Atomic Dustbin style lead instrument than just some background thudding. The recent reinventions of both 'Mother And I' and 'The Animals And Me' sound splendid, and it's a pretty damn good gig that finishes only just after the 11pm curfew.

Despite a brief tour of Mortlake as I miss a turning somewhere, the clear motorway sees me home before 2.15, which is also a welcome change. Apart from when I was slowed down by a burst of very heavy rain, this was one of those drives when I almost wish I had a CD player in the car, all the better to listen to the Shared album.

The tracks by Wayne Hussey featured at the Shared show in Jaunary, so there's little new there, Timothy Parkes I've already mentioned, and the three new songs by Miles Hunt and Erica Nockalls are up to their normal high standard, and unsurprisingly would easily have fitted on the Catching More Than We Miss album. Dirty Ray is someone I'm not about to rush out in search of as the Tom Waits growl thing leaves me totally cold but you know, Waits has had a good enough career to manage without me and Dirty Ray shouldn't lose any sleep over my taste either.

Which leaves the two new artists that impress me most on this album - Matthew Derrick's three tracks sound remarkably like early solo Miles Hunt, and could easily be outtakes from Hairy On The Inside. Better keep my eyes peeled for his name appearing in local listings, as I really want to hear more. Rob Dunsford's 'Millionaire' sounds inordinately like Liam Dullaghan's band The Have-Nots in the bittersweet blend of male and female vocals, but it's the slightly fuller sound of 'Dashboard Therapy', helped immensely by the accordion, which really catches my attention. There's someone else in there who he reminds me of a little, it may well be Rob from The Voluntary Butler Scheme, but that'll come to me in time. It's not as if I won't be listening to these tracks again, as a quick look at last.fm will tell you!

So for two brand new artists I'd never encountered before, Shared (the album) represents excellent value. Cheers, Milo!

* is a line from Rob Dunsford's magnificent 'Dashboard Therapy'.

Setlist
-------
Red Berry Joy Town
A Wish Away
It's Yer Money
Here Comes Everyone
On The Ropes
Caught In My Shadow
Circlesquare
Mission Drive
Size Of A Cow
Donation
Golden Green
Animals And Me
Don't Let Me Down, Gently
Radio Ass Kiss
Give
Unbearable
Ten Trenches
---
Cartoon Boyfriend
Mother And I
Ruby Horse
Poison

Back On My Seat Again

2009-08-16T20:43:00.003+01:00

One of the many benefits of a season ticket is knowing exactly where you're going. Unusually for us, the team shows the odd sign of knowing where it's going too, and from day one. Without a points deduction there's a temptation to start to ignore the lessons of many, many years and just this once to believe in a bright successful future, but one game at a time.

The commencement of the fixture list gives my life a little more structure too, and a framework around which to consider my forthcoming gigs. After a brief period in which I've either been out of the country or the summer festival season has meant a certain dearth of accessible and suitably appealing things to go to. Which is perhaps not such a bad thing as it simply isn't possible to do everything, but I'm back on the ticket-buying trail and gradually rebuilding the other stuff which isn't dependent on being in work or not.

Having places to go and things to do ain't a bad plan and I need to get out more anyway.

Back On The Streets Again

2009-08-13T23:25:00.004+01:00

After a couple of weeks enjoying the many splendours of the hills of nearby continental europe, I am now back on the streets again, as Saxon would have it. This ought to be approaching the end of six months of several varieties of trouble, and yet even now I'm not absolutely sure of exactly when my job ends, imminent though that is supposed to be. In between the research prior to my various travels and the clearing out the debris on my return, there hasn't really been a lot of time to keep up with the nuts and bolts of life.

And while I'm sure I've been doing the right thing to make the most of the fleetingly brief opportunities as they have presented themselves, I'm just about ready for a month of nothing but signing on, cleaning the house and irregular hours of sleep.

Just as Saxon bring me back to the most trad of trad metal, there's a warm familiar feeling in some things that have just always been there. On which note I'm saddened that my absence means I've come back to find that Bobby Robson and John Hughes are no longer with us, and just today Les Paul has taken his final bow. Robson's success in the FA and UEFA cups was a major achievement at the time, while Hughes' work on Pretty In Pink and The Breakfast Club in particular evokes another, differently significant time of my life. As for Les Paul, there's a whole musical landscape that might not even exist without his influence.

Which brings us right back to the reliance on the familiar, and in the last couple of days I'm delighted to find the recognisable in what is new to me: I've enjoyed a lot of novelty/comedy bands, and while I love Bad News and Hayseed Dixie, the likes of the Ukelele Orchestra Of Great Britain definitely take one joke and spin it out for way too long.

Dressing like an Australian rock chick's nightmare and sounding like an unholy mix of Mötley Crüe, Whitesnake, Saxon and Poison, Steel Panther just shouldn't work. And then you listen to the lyrics and its John Hughes' 1986 all over again, just with the comedic profanity of South Park ladled all over it. Just what I needed, to nick yet another song title from somewhere else!

Trust In The Power Of Music

2009-07-14T19:58:00.005+01:00

In the quiet part of the year, when it's mostly big outdoor festival gigs rather than theatres and clubs, it can be easy to get out of the habit. And with office-specific stupidity and tightened belts due to the ongoing redundancy saga - I'm still on a further stay of execution, for now - I'm well out of the habit on my local city centre shopping routine. Which is good because it keeps my postman busy, but it also means I don't get to go in a few places where buying stuff online has a sufficient postal cost overhead that it isn't worth it. Which is how I'm not exactly empty-handed going in to the gig.

Somewhere in the global picture dictionary I'm sure that if you look up traditional British folk music you'll see a picture of a bloke who won't see fifty again, probably with a beard and quite possibly with an Aran sweater. So it's good to see a bunch of young shavers taking to the stage, and better still to listen to their particular mix of jigs, reels and so on. It's never as good for me without words, and the mix of the fiddle, the guitar and the flute/whistle taking turns as the lead instrument does tend towards a feel that's slightly too disparate (for my taste) but all the same, if One String Loose are the shape of things to come in traditional music then the future looks bright enough.

At the other end of the scale, the Oysterband can hardly be called neophytes, and their status as veteran performers is precisely what seems them on a big theatre stage for this one-off show. With the band dressed uniformly in black, John Jones steps up to the mike and the venue fills with his voice. In some ways the content of the set doesn't really matter, this is timeless stuff that could come from any period. June Tabor comes out to join in with several songs off Freedom And Rain - Mississippi Summer is a particular highlight.

Some of the covers - Wheel's On Fire, All Along The Watchtower - could be better replaced with Oysterband originals, and even the haunting Love Will Tear Us Apart as maudlin ballad is a good trick I've seen done enough by now, though the rousing Blood Wedding at the end, and the totally unamplified finale song done right on the edge of the stage are great.

Songs I recall by the time of writing which I enjoyed include Native Son, Dark Eyed Sailor and By Northern Light, but the evening's highlight for me is Everywhere I Go, which plays to local sensitivities and turns the crowd into a choir. Having earlier done Bells Of Rhymney, a song which rarely fails to send a shiver up my spine due to my familiarity with the places and the spirit it evokes, this time it's the inclusivity and the joining in which sums up the band. It's the trust in the power of the music as the chorus echoes around the theatre which means for a couple of minutes we are all the Oysterband. The Oysterband is a party where you're always on the guest list, and sure of a good time in good company. And it doesn't get much better than that.

John Jones, preaching to the converted.

* Trust In The Power Of Music is a line from the Oysterband's 'Dancing As Fast As I Can'

Out Of Season*

2009-07-06T22:56:00.002+01:00

So, fixtures have been out for weeks, the speedway GP has come and gone like a Scott Nicholls punch on the chin of a full-face helmet, my garden's been subject to a bit of hack and slash, and we're nearly back to normal.

My diary shows I might possibly have two free weekends between here and October, and the brief pre-season burst of enthusiasm will soon be swept away. Just once I'd like to see us win our first two or three games and top the table, but it'll be a relief just to start the season on zero points.

Meanwhile I'm still chasing airline staff to get a definitive view on who is going to own up to losing my luggage so I can get my insurance to do something about paying out for the urgent and ongoing replacement of things I already own but have had lost for me. It would be foolish at best to name any names at this point, but there's one airline whose customer service has been highly impressive even if they can't really help, and one whose efforts I'm rather less impressed by. So for now what should have been a highly memorable, one-off trip is book-ended by bereavement and the inordinate hassle of chasing what ought to be a fairly straightforward process to claim for my lost luggage, and a definite disinclination towards using a certain airline in the future.

We'll see what happens, but it's hardly the ideal background to the ongoing redundancy shenanigans, which have already seen my departure delayed for one extension, and further developments of that sort are not out of the question.

Not really what you'd called settled conditions!

* Out Of Season is a song by REO Speedwagon, and an entirely different one by The Icicle Works - take your pick depending on taste and credibility concerns!

Great Adventure!

2009-07-01T23:12:00.005+01:00

Going to see the same band dozens of times invites questions about why keep on going, and in many cases it's the different songs, different inter-song anecdotes, different venues and different support bands that keep things from becoming routine.

In this case it's a trip to the Midlands back to a venue I've been to a few times now, and including a trip to a nearby out of town shopping centre that allows me to make a start on replacing all the stuff lost in an airport somewhere in Asia. It's not just not having the stuff, it's the research it takes to find out what is currently available and what my realistic options are that makes life difficult. Bearing in mind that some of this stuff absolutely has to be replaced before I'm out of the country again inside the the next month, I don't have too much time to spare and getting on with buying replacement items feels rather more like taking some control of the situation than just waiting for an airline and an insurance company to do something. I manage only to buy more or less what I'd planned, and leave without yet another new handbag, so that's progress on two fronts!

Unusually there are few people at this gig that I know, and the ones I do know are working, either selling t-shirts and CDs, or on the stage. Which means I'm free to take in the support band with all my attention. The first track is a nice enough piece of brass-flavoured pop, and if that makes you think of the Zutons you are somewhere along the right lines. This is no preparation for the second track, when the seven musicians and singers are joined on stage by a vision in red and grey gloves. Check out the picture!

For anyone who, like me, is not aware that there is a significant visual element to Misty's Big Adventure, this is something of a surprise! Not an unwelcome one, but one that threatens to distract from the music, though happily the band are obviously used to this and it rapidly becomes just their kind of normal. There's a risk of accusations of novelty act, of stuntmanship and of cheap attention-seeking but for me it's pretty straightforward that Erotic Volvo (made-up name!) is both an integral part of the MBA performance and something that elevates MBA from being just another band. Their laid-back, jazz-tinged and laconic pop is a welcome tonic in the bland age, and I'm happy to appreciate them for what they are rather than what they're not, and what they are is great fun.

It's a refreshing change for The Wonder Stuff set to switch closer to a greatest hits set rather than performing the entire Eight Legged Groove Machine album as we've seen recently, and Radio Ass Kiss and Piece Of Sky dedicated to Swells both hit the spot. I'm hardly in any position to pass unbiased comment, but I had a great time.

* Great Adventure is a song by classic Midlands hard rock band Magnum, who have recently released another new album. Misty's Big Adventure are also from the Midlands, and great!

Hey Jack Sarawak*

2009-06-28T00:54:00.001+01:00

I've learned a few things on my recent travels, and there's now two
different flickr streams showing stuff from the two parts of the trip.
One flickr account you may already know, and one I've just set up in
the last few days - ask if you need directions.

One thing I learned was that a better class of accommodation or
transport does not necessarily guarantee a better class of punter -
I'm thinking of the guy flying business class who went a long way out
of his way to complain about his crackers not coming with a postage
stamp sized piece of cheese. To the point of telling the poor air
steward guy he was 'really not happy about this' on his third go.
Blimey but life's too short, and I bet the guy working on the plane
doesn't get paid enough to put up with much of that sort of nonsense
either.

Something else that seems to be inescapable fact is that some people
will never be happy wherever they are. And as with the guy on the
plane, some fabulous surroundings are wasted on some people who are
determined that everything is a problem that requires being
extraordinarily pissy with people.

Another thing I learned is not to be too trusting of people who say
they are going to do something if you can't stand there and watch them
do it. There are gradual signs of progress from my insurer and the
airline on looking for and I hope eventually paying up for the
contents of my lost luggage, but it's certainly not going to get
sorted out overnight, and it's a bit of an inconvenience in the
meantime.

Despite the aggravation, I met some great people too and took a couple
of thousand photos of all sorts of things and places, so on balance I
had a pretty good time. And I'd never seen a tarantula before either!

* Hey Jack Kerouac is a 10,000 Maniacs song. I have just been to Sarawak.

Back In Circulation

2009-06-19T14:44:00.002+01:00

After some time out in the wilderness of no network access, it's good to have been able to have the first bath in maybe a month and slap on a little make up to even out the sun damage on my skin. Still four flights and a few thousand miles between here and home, but I'm already up to date on my email, and making a start on knocking together a few pictures from my trip. By the time I get home and unpacked and so forth, it'll be the middle of the week though, I reckon.

In the meantime, here's what sunset over the South China Sea looked like this evening.

An Accordion From Italy That Had Never Played A Tune

2009-06-08T16:05:00.001+01:00

I guess it's no stranger than going for a Chinese or an Indian in
western europe, but coming this far round the globe to end up in a
restaurant called "Italianni's" still feels a little questionable.
Especially to the sound of "buona sera, I'm your waiter and my name is
Ken..."

Then again, I only ended up there on my way back from the local M&S to
see if they had any food, so who is the joke on now? It amused me
greatly to see the minimal amount of stock in M&S includes more than
one pair of pretty shoes that I have back home, and I think they were
made in Vietnam so they have travelled rather less far to get here
than me.

* a line from Mick Thomas' song The Cap Me Granda Wore, a song about
faux "Irish" pubs, and the paraphernalia of Irishry.

Making The Most Of

2009-06-07T15:57:00.001+01:00

One week in, and nearly done with the work stuff, I've had a fairly
productive day. After minimal sleep, I was up through all the early
morning hours, had some laundry done, crucially bought some of the
food items I have really been missing, had a couple of hours sleep and
went on a three hour guided trip to see a whole load of stuff I would
not have seen by myself, nor understood. Here's hoping I can get a
whole night's sleep, because I damn well need it!

Culture Shock

2009-06-04T01:45:00.002+01:00

I know this is a long way from home, but the focus on security arrangements is also something else. You can't go inside anywhere - shops, office building, the hotel - without having your bag searched, which I guess is fair enough. Round every corner is another armed security guard, some with what look like shotguns hanging round their necks but I'm not planning on getting close enough to ask.

There's some sort of incongruity with that against the opulence of the hotel, where there's hot and cold running 'good morning, sir', 'have a great day sir', 'how are you today, sir?' everywhere you go. Just when you think you've run the gauntlet of the lobby staff, it's 'good morning sir' from the security guard in the car park, and then again from the security guard with the very serious dog. And then I end up in the lift with one of our transatlantic cousins who joins in and
wishes them 'have a great day' back. This may be a certain kind of normal if you come to this sort of place anywhere, I don't know, but when I'm rather more used to the 'what-choo-lookin'-at' style of address, well it's a very noticeable difference.

Maybe it's a contrast, or maybe they actually belong together and I've just never considered it that way, but among all the security paranoia I can also see signs for Vuitton, Prada, Gucci and Vulgari [sic!] from my hotel window. In any case it doesn't feel like a natural combination to me.

The mix of utterly banjaxed body clock and the incentive to get the work done so I can get off to somewhere rather more interesting instead means I have so far seen very little beyond the hotel and the office, and the ten or thirty minute between the two - the variance is based on prevailing levels of heat and\or rain. I need to try to get a little further away, as time is short.

At the same time as my investment in this netbook is proving a great means of staying in touch, I've been wondering whether the easy online access to familiar places and people means I'm much less likely to be in touch with whatever's going on locally. By this time next week, I'll be in a different country again, with substantially reduced levels of luxury, and that may no longer be an issue as I am not going all the way out into tropical jungle to spend as many hours a day online as I normally do, and I'm not expecting that to be such a ready option there anyway.

Look At Me Here Overseas

2009-06-02T00:42:00.002+01:00

This whole alien culture thing is quite something. My body clock is so far out of whack it's not true, and being in this hotel is a whole other world of bizarre. I'm really not accustomed to an environment where I can get half a dozen goes at 'how are you, have a great day!' in the twenty yards between the lift and the front door. Where a guest with a birthday gets six or eight staff approach their table in the restaurant, rattling a tambourine and singing 'happy birthday', and
gets it more than once. Perhaps it's after every course, I don't know.

Leaving aside the obscene way that just four nights here more than covers my mortgage for a month, and the total cost of my trip will equate to eight or nine months' mortgage, and all because getting rid of my job will save a few quid. It does seem rather arse-backwards.

The wall of heat effect is noticeable, and it is easy to understand that the equator is not that far away. I know I live in a place where rain is common, but this is something else. I could see the torrential rain outside from the airport when I landed, but on roads where it seems all bets are off and flashing your headlights at anything and getting within inches of every other vehicle appears to be the norm, whole lanes inches deep in rainwater is beyond my experience!

I guess there's some kind of perverse pleasure in doing work at 5am because I have already been up a couple of hours, but today I am staying up in the hope I will be so knackered by this evening I can't help but sleep. Meanwhile I've established that the plane lost off Brazil is the same model I was flying on the day before. Which is reassuring!

* 'look at me here overseas' is from The Wonder Stuff song 'Ten Trenches Deep'

2009-05-31T23:29:00.001+01:00

It's something like half past six in the morning, I''m halfway round
the world on no more than a dozen hours sleep in three nights, and I
just got the call to say my favourite cat's died. It's fair to say
I've had better days.

I Never Saw My Hometown Till I Went Around The World

2009-05-28T23:22:00.003+01:00

It's a funny feeling, sitting here with one big bag almost fully packed, and my hand luggage around my feet waiting for its final bagging and weighing. Last time I travelled to somewhere more exotic than continental mainland europe, it was all hugely new and exciting. Having never been on an aeroplane before, Heathrow to Boston as the first leg of a series of three out and three back was a good kill or cure approach to finding out whether I had any problems with flying!

I have no plans to visit the States again, and it would take a lot to get me out there. It's a big but increasingly small planet, and there are other more interesting places I'd love to see first. This time I'm heading towards the East, and making rather more out of it than just the business trip it is based around.

Earlier I was thinking about how the mind-broadening properties of travel sits in my family background. I have no problems with never having flown till my thirties, and I'm fairly sure my parents must have been closer to their fifties. One pair of grandparents visited a number of mediterranean sun resorts, and the other pair may or may not have visited the one of their children that lived abroad, if that. It's not a well travelled or especially broad outlook.

My perspective is affected by the way I don't like surprises, in general, and I do like to know where I stand on all sorts of things, so the whole unknown of the business trip aspect is on my mind. It's not just the wine talking when I say that my next few nights in the sort of luxury hotel I would consider extravagant far beyond anything I would ever choose to use myself is not going to sit well with me. Nevertheless, I've always been a pragmatist, and if my soon-to-be-ex employer wants to fly me thousands of miles round the planet for the limited benefit to the business my visit will offer, then of course I'll take it. And when I'm not in the office because I've already headed off to somewhere a hell of a lot more exciting, interesting and rewarding, what are they going to do, sack me?

I'm likely to amuse myself by listening to the Icicle Works song 'I never saw my hometown till I went around the world' at some point on my travels, and here's hoping it'll bring me back in one piece and with some slightly more focused thoughts on what I'm going to do with the next phase of my life. But in any case, I am expecting to bring back a few pictures, and some stories.

Over And Over And Over And Over

2009-05-24T21:24:00.006+01:00

I'm sure that I said I had certain misgivings about the recreation of a whole album during the first shows of this type last year. While those misgivings were blown away by the freshness of how it sounded, it's not for no reason that there is the odd song from most albums that gets lost along the way. There's a couple of singles I'd happily add to that category too, though possibly not the ones you might immediately imagine. But it's not every day I get to go out in vintage clothing - see above!

Support on this tour is The Men They Couldn't Hang, peddling their new album Devil On The Wind to a bunch of people who possibly aren't so familiar with TMTCH as they have been with previous tour supports. No matter, their folk-rock meets traditional songwriting meets agit-pop approach warms up the crowd a treat as they fill the stage with musicians and tunes. A very good start to any evening.

Possibly the pivotal album in my life, The Eight Legged Groove Machine comes from a time when singles existed on vinyl and had PO Box numbers or postal addresses on the back, and came with b-sides and bonus tracks that were often as good or better than stuff on the associated album. It seems a very long time ago from a world where an album is now only a notional concept, but the first songs sound like long lost friends coming back from years out of the picture. If I never hear Like A Merry Go Round live again it'll be a shame, but it's great to be reminded I should listen to it perhaps more frequently than I ordinarily do.

The real reward (part one) of making the effort to get to the two more convenient gigs on this tour is the tracks that weren't on the original album. Goodbye Fatman, Astley In The Noose and Song Without An End is a trilogy of stone cold classics, despite what anyone say about the Astley lyrics.

There follows a short hits set, lamentably including Golden Green which is a song I could happily never hear again, but all the same it's a cracking show even from a band I've seen more times than I'm tempted to admit.

The real reward (part two) in paying the extra few quid for the VIP ticket to the London show is a final short set of the other three tracks from the original Wonderful Day ep, which I am pretty certain I have never heard live before, or if I have it's not in the last twenty years. The thrill of witnessing these few songs is jaw-dropping, and worth the trouble and the travel on its own.

If we do go through the same routine for the second album Hup!, I'm already excited about hearing It Was Me live again for the first time in a couple of decades, what a great excuse to Get Together!

* 'Over and over and over and over' is from Who Wants To Be The Disco King?, another single from the ELGM time, and for a band who it currently turns out have been at one gig in every nine I've seen over the past twenty-odd years, there's a certain resonance there too!

Ohhhhhhhhh, Let Me Go Hoooooome

2009-05-18T16:00:00.002+01:00

In a world where tickets come with postage fees and handling fees and all manner of administrative charges that appear to have minimal background in people actually doing anything for the money, proper value for money is something you don't see much of at events these days. But you can have too much of a good thing.

I missed the very first band, and of the next two I especially liked the cover of 3 Colours Red's Nerve Gas and a track called 'Sorry Ain't Enough'.

Touring support band Fury UK take to the stage long after I've started getting twitchy about just how late a night this looks like being, nevertheless I'm pleasantly distracted by them. There's only so much you can do with a trio, but they seem to be plentiful enough. Drummer Martin McNee sports a beard that would easily get him past the first audition for ZZ Top, and brothers Luke and Chris Appleton complete the line-up with (respectively bass, and guitar and vocals). There's no shortage of technical skillz on show, and to be honest I'd rather Chris either played and sang another song or that they got off the stage rather than the guitar showboating that closes the set. That's one way to stick in people's minds, that they want you to get off so the next lot can get on, so they can go home before tomorrow, and while it may not be their fault it does demand an extra special show to overcome it. Like 'em, yes. Want to watch *anybody* while every song makes for a further delayed trip home, definitively no. And you might guess what I'm going to say about that name - hilarious logo opportunity though the F UK abbreviation provides, if you really can't come up with a name nobody else has used and have to tag on the UK then it doesn't make me think I should be expecting vast amounts of originality and imagination in your songwriting either.

On the stroke of 23.15, it finally looks like we are ready to get the hell on with it, and with the characteristic intro - My name is Blaze Bayley... This is the Blaze Bayley Band... We. Play. METAL. - the set begins. While stood around waiting, it occurs to me that this is within touching distance of the 21st anniversary of the first time I saw Blaze laying waste to a stage. Blaze can never be accused of not trying, of not putting everything into his show, and there really is nothing quite like standing within touching distance of his intense frame as he reaches out into and around the front row, demanding attention and insisting on more hands in the air. This is British panto metal at its finest and all the more thrilling for the backing of an effortlessly capable line-up of musicians. I finally got a couple of pictures of Larry, and having done my best to get a few pictures from close range I moved backwards out of the immediate front of stage area.

Writing this several days later, I'm no longer sure of exactly which tracks were played, but Kill And Destroy and Ten Seconds were definite highlights. An hour into the set, I found myself increasingly fussy and considering leaving, which is something I've done before the end of few enough gigs that I can still count them all on one hand. As far as I'm concerned, Iron Maiden broke up my favourite band, and though I've long since got over it, listening to Blaze doing Maiden songs isn't something that's going to make me resist further the pull of the road and of my bed. If it had been two hours earlier I'd have stayed. I'm a big fan of Blaze, and I'm not complaining about him doing whatever material he chooses, and I can do nothing but applaud his commitment to metal and to playing music. But I'm also perfectly comfortable with walking out as he introduces The Clansman - some unfamiliar Maiden track that means nothing to me has no appeal. Having seen four bands for under eight quid, there's no shortage of value for money, and once again I'm going home with money in my pocket that I might have spent on merch if I'd felt the show was an absolute killer and I'd still been there at the end.

* 'Oh, let me go home' is a line from Blaze's song 'Smile Back At Death', and in itself should be explanation enough!