Stephen Lane and The Fenestration at Hertford Museum

Well, I spared you the distress of the flat car battery, how annoyed I got with the AA and all that two weeks ago. The upshot of all this was that I was told to run my car every week, I saw this gig advertised on Facebook and running the car to a destination seemed like a great idea. We missed the first act, Afternoon, which was a shame, but saw Stephen Lane's quiet set. His style is appealingly simple: picked notes on a Spanish guitar with storytelling-in-song integrated into the music. I was also impressed by his matching music stand, lead and socks, presumably chosen to match the lyric about the colour turquoise. He even had a blue biro in his breast pocket. Now that's attention to detail!

The Fenestration have A TRUMPET!! What a perfect addition to a Sunday afternoon! With vintage guitar, vintage bass, a small Gretsch kit and Gina Davidson on vocals, they played a set of garage-influenced music. I particularly liked the song they ended their set with, or so it seemed until they found a song called Grass on a band member's mobile phone, had a brief listen, and then played it as an encore. I loved their informality- the backing vocals were the shouted instructions between the band, almost as though the songs were being reconstructed in front of our eyes: "Do that twice at the beginning, then four of them...". Such fun! I can't imagine a better way to spend a Sunday afternoon. There were lots of friendly people to chat with, including Looking Glass Alice who had DJ'd at the gig me and Robert did at The Betsey Trotwood last year. It was lovely to hear Gina singing, and I do so love these gigs with a Youth Club vibe. Yes I do.

The Jasmine Minks and McCookerybook and Rotifer at The Waiting Room, Stoke Newington

Remember The Jasmine Minks? They were signed by Alan McGee to Creation Records back in the pre-Oasis days, and I'd met Jim Shepherd at Glasgoes Pop last year and had a really nice chat with him. It was an honour to appear on the same bill last night- a gig to play and a gig to watch at the same time, my favourite sorta gig.

The sound engineer, Tamara, was incredible. They had seven people on stage and she took the time to get everything sounding perfect for them, and apparently this was also the first time some people could properly hear my guitar for our set. I think we won the crowd over with our exuberance as much as anything else; despite rehearsing there was the odd duff lyric and chord here and there. Basically, though, we enjoy playing these songs together so much we can latch into that groove and really do the stuff. It's a pity we play so rarely in this duo format, but we both have other things keeping us very busy so gigs like this are a treat.

The Jasmine Minks have a lot of singers (they were augmented last night by a female singer with a gorgeous voice). It's unusual to hear so many male voices singing together and swopping lead vocals at a gig. I suppose Jim is the main guy and he was in fine voice last night. I fully expected to see yet more personnel appearing as the night drew on... seven... eight... nine; but they remained a seven-piece, telling anecdotes between the songs (nicking the demo tape they made for London Records was one of them), and delivering a hearty encore to the extremely enthusiastic crowd. Here's a photograph of Tamara, one of the essential people who rarely get a shout-out, checking the sound.

Excellent evening, big thanks to Caryne and Dave for putting it on, and lovely to see Ruth and Dave out and about! Oh yes- Stewart Lee was there, too.

Video Of McCookerybook and Rotifer From Last Night's Gig

 

Tonight in Stoke Newington

Tickets available on door: early start and finish (7.30 start, 10 p.m. finish)

Chelsea Pensioners

 

Young Chap Relaxes In Digger Bucket, Barnet

 

Rehearsing with Robert Rotifer

Here we are in our tea break. It's been a long time since our last gig (last summer, I think), but we slotted our respective musical contributions together quite easily, and I'm really looking forward to Saturday. Tickets here: https://www.wegottickets.com/event/594015

Punk Sews on New Patch In The Café at Rebellion Festival, The Winter Gardens, Blackpool, 2023

 

Wylam Institute

When I was a child the Institute felt like the centre of the village. There was a yearly village show upstairs, and I went to dancing classes up there for a while. The village shows were a hoot- one of the primary school teachers, who ran the school choir, wore very short mini-skirts and the Dads jostled to sit in the front row. The village choir, starring Mrs Hibbert (scourge of Mr Sleightholme, whose bantams I used to feed when he was away), always sang 'I've got a bonnet trimmed with blue, do you wear it, yes I do!'. They were mega-coy, and most of them seemed to wear that bright coral lipstick so we could observe just how heartily they articulated the words. The jumble sales were brilliant: I'd buy stacks of vinyl singles with no sleeves, tied up with hairy string, and take them home to see what I'd bagged. You could only see the top and bottom labels. I bought a fencing foil once, and a wooden Robert Thompson 'mouseman' ashtray which I sold on eBay in 2018 for £95 when I was selling stuff so I could go to New York. I think it cost sixpence! I also once bought a long 1930s pale green coat with bell sleeves and a satin lining; my friend at the time refused to walk down the street with me when I was wearing that.

And downstairs, that's where I went to Girl Guides every week. Sometimes I'd take my Spanish guitar and me and my friend Anita would sing the song that seemed to be ubiquitous at the time: I think it's called 500 Miles and was released by Peter, Paul and Mary. I was the patrol leader for the Kingfishers, and we got told off for doing art stuff all the time. Weird co-incidence- I don't think I've heard that song for 40 years, and it's just appeared in an episode of Professor T that I watching online!

Much later, there were a couple of discos there and even a live gig: there was a young chap called Gabriel Schuster who wore an academic gown and played long guitar solos, as I remember. So here is a gig in the Institute, alongside Floppy Posture, a band formed by my friend Simon Brough who used to do bellringing in Wylam Parish Church as part of a young posse. I joined first (McMum told me I should because I found the bellringing practices so annoying). His brother Andy, one of my best friends, died a couple of years ago. What a pity he can't come too.

Rams Micropub, Rochester, 1st June

 Tickets here: https://www.wegottickets.com/event/617904/

mp3s

I bounced everything down last night to make mp3s of the demos, just to see how they're doing. I wasn't intending to do any recording today but one of the tracks had a few lumbering guitar mistakes which I had to re-record this morning so I can relax over the weekend. I know the next couple of weeks are going to be busy: Robert's coming round to rehearse for the support gig with Jasmine Minks next Saturday, then I'll have to rehearse my own set for the gigs in Edinburgh and Manchester the following weekend. 

I'll have to record the lead vocals at the beginning of May when the hay fever season has calmed down a bit, but I might have a go at tidying up the backing vocals before then. Half the time, I think it's sounding really good, and the other half, I don't. It's funny how the tracks that sound best are often unexpected ones. I've written a song that sounds like A Proper Song. There's another that is possibly too sweet for this record; it's sounding quite energetic! 

I think you can hear in the music that I've left my lecturing job. Working there was like wearing a concrete hat that was compressing everything bouncy and joyful in life, and a mask of insecurity that nibbled at your face all the time because nobody ever said you did anything well, or appeared to notice if something you did outside the university environment was successful. It was all one big downgrade, designed to make you feel like an impostor for not going to a posh university or conservatoire to study music formally. What an upstart I must have seemed! 

In a world of my own, where I'm happy, I can spend 24 hours being creative and another 24 being political if that's the way the cookie crumbles. I will always treasure the relationships that I had with the students, the majority of them. I miss being surrounded by their ideas.

Anyway, I think I have a poster for the gig a week tomorrow. Oh yes, I do.

Boys Watch A Drain Being Repaired

 

Man Cleans Steps With Henry

Talleyrand, Manchester, 27th April

 

Knowle Constitutional Club, May 5th