Tue 16th May - Brussels
Woke up to find us parked next to some old botanical gardens thingy just on the edge of the city. Our little mobile home was parked on the curb and would be so for the next 48, making us basically the best paid homeless street people in town that week.
The venue was pretty similar to Amsterdam - basement vibe.....ticket count wasn't too sure for early on, but it got much better come gig time. It was more for the people from the label, to see what the show was all about, and they dug it big time. Late night cab to the Turkish kebab street for some ridiculous slabs of meat and bread which are always gluttinously delicious - the late night muso's curse.....
Wed 17th May - Brussels
Strangely enough, our one day off through the whole tour was after the second gig, so we wandered around town for a bit...a nice enough place, very French. Left the crew after a while to scout out some touristy things and take photos I'm sure everyone else has taken. Vietnamese for dinner, drinks after, and then those of us left over, in a vain attempt to find some late night carnage, followed the accordion player round a bunch of gay clubs....on tour, eh!
27 June 2006
N.B.
Apologies for any of you waiting for new entries with baited breath, as it's been kinda nuts lately....just briefly, in a bizarre turn of events to go down in the annals of sharehousing, I've been homeless since Thursday, staying on the floor at Mr N's place, with my few belongings distributed amongst north London, until the new house comes together sometime towards the end of the week. I've got this new girl, but she's taking off, also at the end of the week. I think I'm about to lose some teaching for the new school year, but the gigs are up to about three a week which is good. Oh yeah, and my visa runs out in six months, and so in the face of challenging prospects I'm trying to figure out some way to stay here in this godforsaken maelstrom.....
Bloody hell!
Oh well, on with the show....
Bloody hell!
Oh well, on with the show....
19 June 2006
In My Solitude....
Sometimes you just wanna run away from it all.
It could all be going great guns, or it could all be going insane, or (and I'm seeing the world more and more like this as I get old and wizened) both and other stuff too. But just sometimes, you want to leave it all behind and find a spot in the world where you get to do just want you want to do, responsibility free, with absolutely no-one else around. A fantasy of solitude, if you will.
Mine is living in a hut in the middle of the forest with a nine foot Steinway and a tape player learning to play stride piano. I could happily burn up twelve hour days eating baked beans out of a can and fully absorbing the intricacies of Tatum, Erroll, JJ Johnson and all the others....build up a massive left hand while watching my body waste away.....
So that's mine. What's yours?
Just curious.....
It could all be going great guns, or it could all be going insane, or (and I'm seeing the world more and more like this as I get old and wizened) both and other stuff too. But just sometimes, you want to leave it all behind and find a spot in the world where you get to do just want you want to do, responsibility free, with absolutely no-one else around. A fantasy of solitude, if you will.
Mine is living in a hut in the middle of the forest with a nine foot Steinway and a tape player learning to play stride piano. I could happily burn up twelve hour days eating baked beans out of a can and fully absorbing the intricacies of Tatum, Erroll, JJ Johnson and all the others....build up a massive left hand while watching my body waste away.....
So that's mine. What's yours?
Just curious.....
16 June 2006
On Tour (finally!) - Amsterdam
In a nutshell, my honours year was about six months of hanging out with my girlfriend who lived across the road, and about six months of intense catch-up practice and research. It got so full-on there towards the end that I literally couldn't take a free breath until the night of my graduation recital, in fact, until the very last chord (I remember it being more of a cluster* actually).
And so it was that my last Sunday in the Big Smoke was a bit of an echo of this. After taking Girl out to breakfast and putting her on the Bakerloo line, the next ten hours were madly rushing around, making tons of tedious phonecalls and emails, ridiculous last-minute leavings, and then at about 10PM I realised I still had to PACK! Nevertheless, the cab swung by and I loaded up for the short trip to Sophie's for the coach, leaving midnight Sunday.
And so it was, after two weeks of madness, it wasn't until the bus set off and I cracked open that first beer bottle (of many) that I could breathe easy, sink into the upstairs couch, and talk a little with the seven or so people whose pockets I would be living in for the next two weeks.
Now, sure enough, I could give you a classic rave about each date, but I've decided instead to provide a series of vignettes, if you will, little grabs of each place I seem to remember....
Monday 15th May (bus from Earls Court to Dover, ferry to Calais, drive to Amsterdam)....
Trying to read 'A Clockwork Orange' on the ferry at 5AM, with a beer. Note to self, o my brothers - nadsat is far less tedious and easier to read when you're drunk!
Monday 15th May - Amsterdam
A and I made for the nearest hash bar and then walked off into town. No real reason to stop, so we just kept going, for hours, until we found this place called Westerpark. Think the village where the hobbits live - a moat surrounding a very green park looking place with all these little huts on neat gravel streets, and it went for kilometres. Too curious to resist, Andy and I found one of the few bridges and wandered in, promptly getting lost, wondering if we would be suddenly be sprung upon by murderous Ewok-looking people and chopped up for sellable body parts...
It ended up being a complete Amsterdam experience:
1) Smoked some hash
2) Saw plenty of weirdos in town
3) Visited the little wood people in Westerpark
4) On the way back, saw some prostitution take place in a carpark
....lost in the Jordaan somewhere, we were surfing the old rolling cobblestones as they flowed down the street over tree roots towards one of the many bridges. On the corner was this gorgeous restaurant with people sitting having lunch....in the corner of my eye I picked up the flutter of sycamore leaves in a breeze.....what a beautiful place....
First gig rocked - basement vibe, and old mate Lucky dropped by (got him in for free) so we hung after for a bit.....all engaged and stuff, with his visa about to run out, he was destined for the homeland with his fiancee.....bye to yet another friend, for a while.....
Farewelling him out the side door I was bustled past by fellow band members, their arms full of consumables from the dressing room, destined for the bus. Okay, so I've been doing this for ten years and I finally hit a well-paid engagement, where everything is taken care of, and we're still racking stuff after the show? Nutty....
More soon....
* cluster - a collection of notes played simultaneously but not quite a chord, sometimes played with fist or open hand or perhaps buttocks if you're Frank Zappa....
And so it was that my last Sunday in the Big Smoke was a bit of an echo of this. After taking Girl out to breakfast and putting her on the Bakerloo line, the next ten hours were madly rushing around, making tons of tedious phonecalls and emails, ridiculous last-minute leavings, and then at about 10PM I realised I still had to PACK! Nevertheless, the cab swung by and I loaded up for the short trip to Sophie's for the coach, leaving midnight Sunday.
And so it was, after two weeks of madness, it wasn't until the bus set off and I cracked open that first beer bottle (of many) that I could breathe easy, sink into the upstairs couch, and talk a little with the seven or so people whose pockets I would be living in for the next two weeks.
Now, sure enough, I could give you a classic rave about each date, but I've decided instead to provide a series of vignettes, if you will, little grabs of each place I seem to remember....
Monday 15th May (bus from Earls Court to Dover, ferry to Calais, drive to Amsterdam)....
Trying to read 'A Clockwork Orange' on the ferry at 5AM, with a beer. Note to self, o my brothers - nadsat is far less tedious and easier to read when you're drunk!
Monday 15th May - Amsterdam
A and I made for the nearest hash bar and then walked off into town. No real reason to stop, so we just kept going, for hours, until we found this place called Westerpark. Think the village where the hobbits live - a moat surrounding a very green park looking place with all these little huts on neat gravel streets, and it went for kilometres. Too curious to resist, Andy and I found one of the few bridges and wandered in, promptly getting lost, wondering if we would be suddenly be sprung upon by murderous Ewok-looking people and chopped up for sellable body parts...
It ended up being a complete Amsterdam experience:
1) Smoked some hash
2) Saw plenty of weirdos in town
3) Visited the little wood people in Westerpark
4) On the way back, saw some prostitution take place in a carpark
....lost in the Jordaan somewhere, we were surfing the old rolling cobblestones as they flowed down the street over tree roots towards one of the many bridges. On the corner was this gorgeous restaurant with people sitting having lunch....in the corner of my eye I picked up the flutter of sycamore leaves in a breeze.....what a beautiful place....
First gig rocked - basement vibe, and old mate Lucky dropped by (got him in for free) so we hung after for a bit.....all engaged and stuff, with his visa about to run out, he was destined for the homeland with his fiancee.....bye to yet another friend, for a while.....
Farewelling him out the side door I was bustled past by fellow band members, their arms full of consumables from the dressing room, destined for the bus. Okay, so I've been doing this for ten years and I finally hit a well-paid engagement, where everything is taken care of, and we're still racking stuff after the show? Nutty....
More soon....
* cluster - a collection of notes played simultaneously but not quite a chord, sometimes played with fist or open hand or perhaps buttocks if you're Frank Zappa....
12 June 2006
THE COUNT IN
A Thursday afternoon, long ago.... So I'm battling through my last week in cold London town, madly trying to reorganise my ridiculously busy teaching schedule, but of course I still managed to drop cute Japanese girl an email the next day, not expecting anything at all. Gotta give these things a go, right? And to my ultimate surprise she wrote back the next day with her mobile number! Bloody hell, I thought to myself, this is gonna happen, innit!? Right in the thick of it, at the worst possible time, just before I go away for a month. It's how it's always seemed to happen in the past. Oh well, it's not gonna stop me, right? I took the Thursday afternoon off the day job, funnily enough forgetting to tell anyone, and took my place on the pavement outside Green Park tube, wondering if I'd be able to recognise her on the Sea of Piccadilly. But sure enough, she emerged out of the melee and we took sandwiches and coffee into the park on a gorgeous London afternoon. The nine-month winter was finally over and we made our way to some shaded green. No pint-oversized confidence now, just me, her, and the pallid afternoon sun leaking through the leaves. Her English was a little slow but definite and intelligent, a suitable counterpoint to the native speaker sitting before her, bubbling away off a strange brew of nerves and caffeine high. Eventually I took a couple of deep breaths and levelled out, physically and mentally, and for the first time in I can't remember how long, I started to open up, chill out some, lying on my back on a sunny afternoon in a park (wow, when's the last time I did that?). Just the usual stuff, London, Oz, Japan, travel, all very amicable....she seemed to laugh a lot at my dumb joke-like statements...... We got to a natural pause in the flow and I asked her if she wanted to stroll some more. "No, I would like to sit here," she said slowly but surely, with those dark eyes and enigmatic smile, as the breeze sang softly through the boughs overhead.... She loves Brazilian music! My stars! AND she's going in two months to visit Salvador! Capital of Bahia, the African state of Brazil, home of music divine. I was instantly envious.... ......Well, I thought, there's nothing for it but to wander east to Guanabara, the hippest Brazilian club in town, to listen to some forro and drink cheap caipirinhas.... .....we get lost amongst the Circus and the theatres in the long afternoon.....the cool windowless club quickly melts the eve into night.... .......the music is crap so she knows another place, in the East End, some French Brazilian place...... .........yes you'll have to take me there after this one.........or the next one..... ......tube to Old Street...........tall palms indoors..........a table up the back........ ......dark eyes......smile..... .....lost...... A Friday Morning, long ago...... .......vapour..... .......herbal tea....... ......window in the kitchen....... .......a view across the terraces in the low morning sun....... .......wearing yesterday's clothes......... .......lost among the grim faces of a rush-hour crowd, while trying to hide the occasional smirk upon my own..... .......standing facing the girl in the tan jacket, with those dark, intelligent, humourous eyes and enigmatic smile...... ......"I'll see you soon, yeah?"....... ......"Yes."............ ......a peck on the lips in a crowded tube...... ......and gone.......
The Lead Up....
....and the more that came in, the more it was actually going to happen. The biggest sub of them all, to date at least. G-Man had put my name forward for a short European tour with Sophie Solomon. Eleven shows in twelve days: Amsterdam, Brussels, Paris, and a week across Germany. From full time office work and no gigs less than a year ago, I was about to do the real thing, on a bus, with a band.
After a bunch of phone calls between G-Man, the manager and Soph, I finally met her for a coffee in Portobello Road where she gave me a copy of the album and some charts. I already had the album at home funnily enough through G-Man, and so shortly thereafter I hooked into learning the material with great gusto. An all day rehersal was scheduled in about two weeks, more than enough time to get the show together.
Sure enough, the day came around, and I was well prepared. It's an amazing thought really - a proper show where I had recordings and charts and ample time in which to learn the material before a direct, time-efficient rehersal where everyone knew their parts and knew what was going on.
You mean like a REAL job!?
After getting the material together, my next thought was a clothing upheaval. If I'm gonna be a touring rockstar, I need to look like one! So for the next available sunday morning, I called up my two most supa-stylin' mates, D-Funk and Mr N, to accompany me upon an excursion through the rambling markets of Camden Town in search of a list of crucial items. A resounding success on all counts, I walked away with a new suede jacket, new hat, not one but two new pairs of shades, and two crevatts (although I forgot how to tie them as soon as I walked out of the shop, but I'm sure I'll remember one day!). Their services were kindly repaid with a free lunch of their choice from the markets, and then Mr N and I took a walk up to Primrose Hill for the usual view and obligatory ales at the local establishments.
The evening saw us retire to D-Funk's apartment, and that's where it all started to go a bit blue and hazy, so by the time the Scorpion Dog requried my alliance on a dodgy venture to the usual East End haunt, the night had taken a far more inebriated turn....
Finally getting to the jam session at Uncle Sam's in Dalston, Mr N and mate were already there amidst a sea of long weekend revellers. It didn't take him long to find a Brazilian photographer sitting near to us, and it took me even less time to find the cute Japanese girl sitting beside her. I'd been drinking for most of the day, so in an uncharacteristically total lack of hesitation whatsoever I just launched in. It must have been like something straight out of Coota RSL - loud drunken Aussie, pure class!
Somehow all the usual questions of how are you finding the place went to can I have your phone number, and I was amazed to find that she was obliging with her email address, which I thought might have been a blow-off, but it ended up in the phone anyway, somehow! I knew that through the oncoming week of life upheaval and teaching reorganisation, it'd be worth dropping a quick note, just to see how it went....
After a bunch of phone calls between G-Man, the manager and Soph, I finally met her for a coffee in Portobello Road where she gave me a copy of the album and some charts. I already had the album at home funnily enough through G-Man, and so shortly thereafter I hooked into learning the material with great gusto. An all day rehersal was scheduled in about two weeks, more than enough time to get the show together.
Sure enough, the day came around, and I was well prepared. It's an amazing thought really - a proper show where I had recordings and charts and ample time in which to learn the material before a direct, time-efficient rehersal where everyone knew their parts and knew what was going on.
You mean like a REAL job!?
After getting the material together, my next thought was a clothing upheaval. If I'm gonna be a touring rockstar, I need to look like one! So for the next available sunday morning, I called up my two most supa-stylin' mates, D-Funk and Mr N, to accompany me upon an excursion through the rambling markets of Camden Town in search of a list of crucial items. A resounding success on all counts, I walked away with a new suede jacket, new hat, not one but two new pairs of shades, and two crevatts (although I forgot how to tie them as soon as I walked out of the shop, but I'm sure I'll remember one day!). Their services were kindly repaid with a free lunch of their choice from the markets, and then Mr N and I took a walk up to Primrose Hill for the usual view and obligatory ales at the local establishments.
The evening saw us retire to D-Funk's apartment, and that's where it all started to go a bit blue and hazy, so by the time the Scorpion Dog requried my alliance on a dodgy venture to the usual East End haunt, the night had taken a far more inebriated turn....
Finally getting to the jam session at Uncle Sam's in Dalston, Mr N and mate were already there amidst a sea of long weekend revellers. It didn't take him long to find a Brazilian photographer sitting near to us, and it took me even less time to find the cute Japanese girl sitting beside her. I'd been drinking for most of the day, so in an uncharacteristically total lack of hesitation whatsoever I just launched in. It must have been like something straight out of Coota RSL - loud drunken Aussie, pure class!
Somehow all the usual questions of how are you finding the place went to can I have your phone number, and I was amazed to find that she was obliging with her email address, which I thought might have been a blow-off, but it ended up in the phone anyway, somehow! I knew that through the oncoming week of life upheaval and teaching reorganisation, it'd be worth dropping a quick note, just to see how it went....
I Just Called....
A Wednesday morning, long ago.....
Great! A free Wednesday morning. No little kiddie keyboard groups to battle with. The better part of two whole hours to go practice piano....
Sidling up to one of my preferred mistresses in room two down at Jaques Samuels, I dumped my stuff, eased onto the stool, started concentrating on breathing and posture, and laid my hands to the black and white....
Phone Call 1: didn't answer....left message....some teaching thing....deal with it later....
Right, back to the breathing....
Phone Call 2: answered strangely.....silly gig up north...said yes, then realised it would be no....handball it to D-Funk....deal with it later....
Okay, back to posture and breathing....hang on, someone tried to call while checking message two....
Phone Call 3: old mate G-Man offering me a European tour.....
Hold on a sec.....that's the kind of call you don't blow off. G-Man had been murmuring to me about this for some time now, but as I've found with most things in the freelance music world, I wasn't gonna start up a mortgage on it.
But this was for real.
Called him back straight away, and as he spoke more, I believed it more. And then I couldn't believe it!...
Great! A free Wednesday morning. No little kiddie keyboard groups to battle with. The better part of two whole hours to go practice piano....
Sidling up to one of my preferred mistresses in room two down at Jaques Samuels, I dumped my stuff, eased onto the stool, started concentrating on breathing and posture, and laid my hands to the black and white....
Phone Call 1: didn't answer....left message....some teaching thing....deal with it later....
Right, back to the breathing....
Phone Call 2: answered strangely.....silly gig up north...said yes, then realised it would be no....handball it to D-Funk....deal with it later....
Okay, back to posture and breathing....hang on, someone tried to call while checking message two....
Phone Call 3: old mate G-Man offering me a European tour.....
Hold on a sec.....that's the kind of call you don't blow off. G-Man had been murmuring to me about this for some time now, but as I've found with most things in the freelance music world, I wasn't gonna start up a mortgage on it.
But this was for real.
Called him back straight away, and as he spoke more, I believed it more. And then I couldn't believe it!...
11 June 2006
Gig Review - Marc Ribot and Ceramic Dog
One Sunday afternoon, long ago...
Your correspondent had the privilege to share an intense hour and a bit with Ceramic Dog, Marc Ribot's new three-part invention, recently on tour through here and the continent. After house reds and a bowl of wedges with J-Sax, my usual concert-going partner-in-crime, we ascended the steps at the Royal Festival Hall to the Purcell Room, one of the best settings for small ensemble music I've seen in this city to date.
Surrounded by a to-be-expected black-shirt die-hard weirdo audience, Senor Ribot and co slinked their way through the one door at the back centre of the stage. A welcome unexpected beginning to the gig was going from customary fiddling and tuning straight into the first free improv. We had the name to the left on guitar with various electronics before him, then centre stage was Chad Smith, this big surfer looking guy who accompanied any athletics on the kit with an unusual slack-jawed sway. Then to the left, by far the most interesting looking player in the room, was (forgotten his name)....this guy somehow missed out on the Weet-Bix at the childhood breakfast table....tiny head, wearing a giant shoulder-padded jacket from which emerged long spindly unnatural looking arms, also fortified with various electronics and an empty water-cooler bottle.
Free improv melted into tune melted into wacky bleep-infested groove and so on....first highlight was 'Todo El Mundo Es Kitch', which I suppose was Ribot's sung/spoken version of Paul Kelly's song about every city feeling the same....'In Paris, we sat at a cafe / we were drinking coffee'....by far the other lyric highlight of the afternoon was 'When We Were Young We Were Freaks.' "This next song," went Ribot's intro, "was written by the leading gay S and M poet in the East Village in the 70s. He was also my accountant at the time......"
Some cubano grooves popped up, well appreciated by your reviewer who originally came to know Ribot's work through the two outstanding albums with Cubanos Postizos (The first, self-titled, and the second "Muy Divertido"). Various instrument swapping went on throughout, as well as using each player to his full extent (J-Sax recalls the Martian-looking bassplayer pulling out some groove with big toe on keyboard on beat 1, one hand on bass and other hand on some electronic thing, I think)....
After the dramas of a forgotten battery, the session came back to earth with a final lyric contribution ("George Bush, fuck you! Tony Blair, fuck you!") before encore. In the obligatory post-gig recount, I agreed with J-Sax's early observation that it sounded pretty much like you would expect it to sound, but this didn't detract from the product one electronic bleep. Original but accessible, unusual but not confronting, highly original. Ribot is definitely one to keep an eye on.....
Your correspondent had the privilege to share an intense hour and a bit with Ceramic Dog, Marc Ribot's new three-part invention, recently on tour through here and the continent. After house reds and a bowl of wedges with J-Sax, my usual concert-going partner-in-crime, we ascended the steps at the Royal Festival Hall to the Purcell Room, one of the best settings for small ensemble music I've seen in this city to date.
Surrounded by a to-be-expected black-shirt die-hard weirdo audience, Senor Ribot and co slinked their way through the one door at the back centre of the stage. A welcome unexpected beginning to the gig was going from customary fiddling and tuning straight into the first free improv. We had the name to the left on guitar with various electronics before him, then centre stage was Chad Smith, this big surfer looking guy who accompanied any athletics on the kit with an unusual slack-jawed sway. Then to the left, by far the most interesting looking player in the room, was (forgotten his name)....this guy somehow missed out on the Weet-Bix at the childhood breakfast table....tiny head, wearing a giant shoulder-padded jacket from which emerged long spindly unnatural looking arms, also fortified with various electronics and an empty water-cooler bottle.
Free improv melted into tune melted into wacky bleep-infested groove and so on....first highlight was 'Todo El Mundo Es Kitch', which I suppose was Ribot's sung/spoken version of Paul Kelly's song about every city feeling the same....'In Paris, we sat at a cafe / we were drinking coffee'....by far the other lyric highlight of the afternoon was 'When We Were Young We Were Freaks.' "This next song," went Ribot's intro, "was written by the leading gay S and M poet in the East Village in the 70s. He was also my accountant at the time......"
Some cubano grooves popped up, well appreciated by your reviewer who originally came to know Ribot's work through the two outstanding albums with Cubanos Postizos (The first, self-titled, and the second "Muy Divertido"). Various instrument swapping went on throughout, as well as using each player to his full extent (J-Sax recalls the Martian-looking bassplayer pulling out some groove with big toe on keyboard on beat 1, one hand on bass and other hand on some electronic thing, I think)....
After the dramas of a forgotten battery, the session came back to earth with a final lyric contribution ("George Bush, fuck you! Tony Blair, fuck you!") before encore. In the obligatory post-gig recount, I agreed with J-Sax's early observation that it sounded pretty much like you would expect it to sound, but this didn't detract from the product one electronic bleep. Original but accessible, unusual but not confronting, highly original. Ribot is definitely one to keep an eye on.....
That Guy Returns
Yes, friends, back from one of the most amazing months of my life....so much to recount I'm not quite sure where to start, so I guess it'll come through in dribbles, here and there.....here's the first one.....
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)