TO WHERE I AM NOW

And suddenly it was gone, the sun not the blog. A cold, cloudy, gusty day in Penzance today. Us nutters that wear shorts in the winter call it “fresh”. The trees were swaying from side to side like the bridge crew of Star Trek during a Klingon attack. There were no birds, no birdsong, wherever they were they were surely huddled. Fluffed up and still in the lower branches they wait it out. It wasn’t raining but there was moisture in the air, like a threat. Outside the studio window there was a van broken down with its bonnet open and a man trying to figure out what was wrong (perhaps a family of sparrows were sheltering behind the radiator). There weren’t even any seagulls around today, they are usually so hardy, large as small dogs, aggressive. I’ve seen them swoop down and take an ice cream out of a child’s hand.

Dare and I were in the studio today working on vocals and guitars for my project with Jerome Froese (hence the pic), we don’t have a name yet, Jerome and Marty isn’t quite doing it for us but the music is. I redid some bass that might not have needed redoing, I redid some guitar that needed redoing in places and Olivia and I made a whole lot of weird noises with guitar and violin with Dare turning knobs that made things go whoosh! Dare and Olivia added backing vocals to the lead vocal that I did the other day and we left the studio with such a cosmic vibe that Olivia and I watched Episode 1 of Star Trek – The Original Series, Season 3 (“Spock’s Brain”). All this spilled out into tonight’s music, but more about that later.

Jed and I listened to the Space Summit mastered tracks yesterday and were really happy with the results, maybe a couple of adjustments here and there. Dare and I will be in the studio tomorrow and the first thing we will do is listen to the album and let Joe the mastering engineer know what we think. Sequencing, time between tracks, fades and bringing out the essence of the sound are all done in mastering, what fun to be so near the finish line, we hope the world won’t end before we cross the tape.

Yesterday’s ‘Blackout’ had us consider and contemplate, meditate on the issues that for the sane would not be issues. Martin Luther King said, “I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character”. I paraphrased this once on stage at an outdoor lunchtime show at Sydney University, I didn’t notice a reaction. The attentive part of the audience sitting on the lawn may have been looking for a context, but I was probably just trying to make the roaming lunchtime hordes take notice – it was never going to work.

This was also the show where a young ‘white man’, ha ha, stole my computer from behind my back whilst I was playing. It was a makeshift stage on some elevated steps that led to the rather large lawn. There was a small PA and behind me footpaths that led into and around the campus. There was no backstage, I just put my guitar case and belongings down on the floor behind me. There was a girl who used to come and see me play called Laetitia Rodriguez, she saw him do it and she and a friend followed him and as I remember confronted him and got it back. Thank you again and really, what can you do with people like that?

Every now and again I get a moron on Facebook, that’s what the delete button is for. Do not engage. You hear people say I have to get off Facebook because it’s driving me crazy. Arguments with trolls is to be avoided at all times. I mostly don’t follow anybody so I don’t get to see today’s breakfast. Try it (not the breakfast). Only follow people you like, inspired people, people you trust, interesting strangers. Facebook is not the place to have conflicts, because the cowards either hide behind anonymity or they are out to bait you. Delete, move on.

Music today has been inspired by the cosmic experience of working on the Jerome Froese project. So I decided to go Hawkwind crazy and only play Hawkwind albums tonight, oh what fun. I started with In Search Of Space from 1971, an album Dare and I and other members of our first bands would listen to all day in the early to mid-seventies. It’s a Space Rock classic and we used to play the track Master Of The Universe in our eternal rehearsals just because we liked it. I saw them live in the mid-seventies at Liverpool Stadium with Lemmy playing bass.

By the time I saw them, Terry Ollis on drums and Dave Anderson on bass who played on In Search Of Space, were gone, Lemmy and Simon King were in on the next album Doremi Fasol Latido (1972). It features the classic Hawkwind song Brainstorm written by Nik Turner who was always wailing on his effected sax, playing flute or singing. Lemmy sings The Watcher and mainman guitarist/singer Dave Brock sang and wrote the other songs including Lord Of Light that in a crazy experimental band Mercator Projection (I think) we played live at The Basement in Sydney to a shocked audience. Earlier in the year Hawkwind had managed a surprise hit with Silver Machine reaching No.3 in the UK chart in 1972 – sung by Lemmy.

Various musicians appear and disappear in Hawkwind’s history. Noise maker Dik Mik had gone by the next album Hall Of The Mountain Grill (1974), replaced by ex High Tide and Third Ear Band violinist and Mellotron man Simon House. Del Dettmar had gone by Warrior On The Edge Of Time (1975). Only Dave Brock and Nik Turner appeared on the first self-titled album (1970), which is somehow different to the following records. Space Rock might not have even been a term when this one came out, it was just freaky music from the underground. It was produced by Dick Taylor from The Pretty Things, but that might have meant he told the engineer to press record and sorted it all out later. I really love these three albums.

Also tonight I played their last album, All Aboard The Skylark (2019), which seems like a massive return to form. I really lost them after 1982 and have occasionally dipped into releases since then. The thing with Hawkwind is that you have to buy into it, like everything I suppose, like God! I saw them at Night Of The Prog a couple of years ago and they sounded like a Punk band. I haven’t even played all of the records that I love by them tonight and I wouldn’t be surprised if you loved their thing too, although I would never recommend them, it would be like recommending ice cream to a seagull.

Song Of The Day is some crazy track from Noctorum’s Sparks Lane, Qu’est-ce Que C’est (2003). Perfect after Hawkwind.

 

Qu’est-ce Que C’est

Qu’est-ce que c’est, ça?

Qu’est-ce que c’est, ça?
Ich weiß (weiss) nicht
Qu’est-ce que c’est, ça?
Ich weiß nicht

Hurt your feelings

Qu’est-ce que c’est, ça?

Qu’est-ce que c’est, ça?
Warum fragen Sie mich das? Ich weiß nicht.
Qu’est-ce que c’est, ça?
Warum fragst du mich das? Ich weiß nicht.

Qu’est-ce que c’est, ça?

(Willson-Piper / Mason)
Noctorum – Sparks Lane (2003)