We have photographs of how the flat was when we moved in. Since then we moved everything around and as it was furnished we didn’t need to buy much, until now. We have to try and remember which knives are ours in the cutlery drawer, I know I bought that bread knife in Cornwall but what about the breadboard, did we buy that or was it already here? It’s all trivial crap but we need to get our deposit back so we’re cleaning and putting everything back just as precisely as we can, oh the joys of moving with three weeks to do it after two years of nesting.

We had to be down at The Archive at 3 PM to meet the ‘gate men’, they looked at the gate we have, the impossible-to-open gate, and the more impossible-to-close gate and they told us what we knew, it’s f*****. They told us 3-5000€ for a new security gate and fixed grill at the top where there is a larger space that also needs to be covered. We gotta do it. It’s like the security at airports, just think, all that because one nutter might just bring a plane down.

We said bye-bye to the large lava lamps (always difficult), the Fender Hot Rod Deville disappeared out of the door, the little Orange amp and Olivia’s Engl. The old drum machine that is the original ex-band Roland drum machine (see it on the gear page) used for the early songs before I joined, before the first single and album. Somewhere there are probably some demos of those old songs. Some songs we worked on that were never used, Fall Away, Miracle Street, As Above So Below, Insect World, Everything’s Red. Whereas, Fraulein, You Gotta Go, Fighter Pilot, Bel Air, For A Moment Hydrangeas (as we used to call it) and some others made it, even Bus Driver.

It wasn’t exactly heartbreaking dismantling the stereo but whenever I do it (and I’ve done it many times) I wonder when will be the next time that I’ll settle the needle down onto a record, eyes closed in front of the speakers, some inspired performance by someone old or new, can’t wait.

It was chilly today but it didn’t matter, there was so much running around, moving furniture around down in The Archive space trying to get it in some kind of order before they start to fix it up, not that we’ve heard from the builder Julio since last week and Nuno the landlord is away. We leave here Wednesday, March 1st, it’s Friday tomorrow and it just gives us two days next week to approve what he wants to do, the materials, the actions, the budget, nothing happens quickly, except the passing of the years.

Music today has been Tommy (1969) by The Who. It was released in the same year that the Bee Gees were releasing Odessa, The Beatles were releasing Abbey Road (and Yellow Submarine), The Stones were releasing Let It Bleed, (Hendrix was between Electric Ladyland and Band Of Gypsys,) Dylan was releasing Nashville Skyline, The Kinks were releasing Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire), Led Zeppelin were releasing both Led Zep I and Led Zep II, The Stooges were releasing their debut, I could go on and list a whole lot of more obscure releases but then I’d be here all night.

My point is if I ever get The Archive together in one place I’m very tempted to put it in chronological rather than alphabetical order. It’s just so interesting historically to see what was happening in a certain year, musically, lyrically, artwork, fashion, who was breaking ground and who was treading water and who was leaving – Small Faces for example who released a compilation, The Autumn Stone, and broke up. It’s something to ponder.

Music Of The Daze