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I got up at 3PM today but I went to bed at 7AM, so that’s my eight hours. Olivia usually needs a little more than that, but it’s so ingrained in us that if we sleep late in the day, that we’re breaking some kind of code of acceptable behaviour, that we both got up. We like to be awake at night, we WORK all night, we sleep all day. It’s the best time to work, it’s the time of no distractions, Europe is asleep, no one in the rest of the world expects you to be awake. It’s perfect for writing, it’s bad for sunlight. Still, summer is on the way so the sun is still up and on our trip down to the sea today we managed to get some rays. The sun was high enough, that sky was cloudless, the sea was a constant grey blue with no patches, reflecting the sky. There was a chill in the air and as we looked out we could see two tankers docked in the bay, one smaller like a miniature, but the other large and daunting. Below the promenade wall there were people getting into the cold sea, shuddering as they did so. I have a very strange physical reaction to seeing this, it’s hard to explain but my skin reacts, something inside envelops me. It’s like physical empathy. It’s extremely uncomfortable, it’s almost how I imagine the cold chill of fear. When people say it made my skin crawl, I wonder do they mean literally? Because I understand, it’s like my flesh is reacting to the horror of the strangers’ pain. I don’t think I’d be good under torture, it would be unbearable. It’s as if my skin has an outer layer or is it that the protective layer has gone and left the skin exposed. My legs go weak, I have to hold on to something. This is just from seeing someone enter the cold water, just seeing them do it.

I suppose that as we are all unique we will experience things differently, hear music differently, react differently. There’s upbringing, there’s exposure and then there’s the fascinating unique self. That which makes you you. You can’t get away from it. You can try and improve it, educate the ignorant side of yourself, learn from your mistakes, simply, change if you need to, if you have to, if you want to. Realize your potential, work to achieve your aspirations. It’s difficult in this polarized world to find common ground. I’ve never felt so disconnected from the human race as I do today. It really feels like, look, you go and live on that side of the universe and we’ll live on this side of the universe and let’s agree not to bother each other. You can have your politics, your beliefs and society the way you want it. It used to be that this was how the West saw the rest, but now the battle is internal, it’s the best of the West versus the rest of the West and no one can agree on who are the best and who are the rest. This is where the common enemy theory comes in, we need an alien force from the other side of the Milky Way to attack us, then we can all band together as Earthlings, show that we’re all in the same boat, beat them off and start a new world of mutual respect and understanding. Pipe dream. Can you really imagine hating someone because of the colour of their skin, their sexual orientation, where they were born or even the team they support? Sad, sad, sad. Can you imagine intimidating medical staff in a pandemic? How it’s dealt with is another issue, what’s true is another issue, leave these people alone, not that anybody reading this needs to be told.

I was in the studio today for the shortest session in the history of the recording studio. I plugged in my Rickenbacker bass and played an F note. That was it. Dare was mixing the latest Space Summit track and I had a particular vision of the ending that needed to be sorted out and we were one bass note short of completion. I played it perfectly, my finger hovered above the first fret until the moment came and bang, there it was. It shook, it lingered, it faded and it was all over. It was exhausting. Afterwards I rolled up my guitar lead into a perfect circle and hung it off the nail on the wall. I replaced the bass on the guitar stand and left the control room with a feeling of absolute satisfaction. I needed to relax after the studio experience and did so with that great Star Trek episode, Arena, where the peaceful higher beings placed Captain Kirk and the reptilian captain of the alien ship on an asteroid to fight out their conflict to the death as individuals instead of as battleship crews. Entertaining stuff over last night’s leftovers.

The music today has been soooo now! I started with Lux Prima which is last year’s collaboration between Karen O from Yeah Yeah Yeah’s and producer Danger Mouse. It was way less angular than I expected it. Karen O wasn’t scary at all and Danger Mouse wasn’t sonically dangerous. It was actually pretty mellow, like a less retro Air album with a French girl singer except she wasn’t French.

Next was my favourite, FKA Twigs and her unique vision. It’s like Judas Priest, you’re either there or you’re not. I love the idea of placing Judas Priest in the same paragraph as FKA Twigs simply because liking one, or should I say liking one passionately doesn’t mean that you have to actively despise the other, you don’t even need to despise it quietly. If it’s off your radar that’s enough. You can’t possibly understand everyone in the world’s reasons for their tastes so live and let live. If it’s ‘the dumbness’ that you don’t like, feel sorry for them, if it’s shallow don’t take it seriously and if it stimulates you love it to death. Twigs is stimulating, Cellophane is one of her many cool videos, the song closes her latest album, Magdalene (2019). Judas Priest ROCKKKKK!!! Ha ha.

Which brings me to another great album in a style that won’t have the Syd Barrett fans queuing up at the record store. Solange is Beyonce’s sister and to me her albums are masterpieces of challenging and contemporary R&B. I wish I knew how they did it. Her latest album, When I Get Home, was released in 2019. It’s inscrutable, the strange chords, odd timing, peculiar rhythms, weird arrangements, amazing production, often thoughtful lyrical ideas based on real life and real life issues. I can listen to this stuff all day, because I can never quite understand it.

Then there’s Flying Lotus. He pieces together sounds and makes songs, sometimes it’s weird and experimental, other times it’s Hip Hop, but what it always is, is complex. He’s like Zappa meets Prince in the modern world. It’s interesting how contemporary black music has become so mainstream, because it isn’t easy music. It gives the Progressive bands a run for the money. Its appeal though is always in the groove. The Flying Lotus albums are dense, there’s a lot to explore, I have the latest one, Flamagra (2019), on the turntable tonight. Take note David Lynch fans.

Today’s Song Of The Day is New Scientist from Noctorum’s Honey Mink Forever, an odd Jazzy hybrid with saxophone and unlikely Rickenbacker guitar soloing and riffs. Kinda suits tonight’s music somehow.

(Willson-Piper / Mason / Bowie / Hadley)

So the website went down today due to “exceeding bandwidth”. Seems like the site wasn’t able to keep up with a daily blog with pics and occasional vids, which means, we have to pay more. Hosting sites like In Deep, my site, the Marty & Olivia site, Noctorum and the Songwriting & Guitar Guidance site is taking some financial planning (my favourite thing, ha ha). On this subject thanks to the people that have donated to the blog, because as you see, it even costs to write. You’d think that to write would be free. It is, but you need a channel, a server and a website to get it to the people. What a different world it is for everybody since the digital revolution. The mobile phone and the computer have made access to entertainment infinite. Photography has completely been turned on its head, Kodak went bust! What?

When the internet came along it opened up a lot of possibilities for the consumer and the artist. In the old system you were either signed and promoted or just playing live, it was hard to afford to make and sell records without record company support. The internet opened up the world to the unknown artist and it levelled the playing field. Remember Napster? Remember Metallica fighting them to stop some company giving their music away for free. For the bigger bands it wasn’t just about earnings and royalties, it was about affording to record in proper studios. The expense of making music has remained the same for many artists, but there’s also been a massive drop in income. Bon Jovi or AC/DC or Foo Fighters or Black Mountain can’t really make a record at home. My ex band’s most successful records would have sounded very different if we hadn’t been able to record them in a proper studio. (Apart from GAF with the crappy drum machine.) Some musical styles need a proper studio and a proper engineer, it sounds different than it does at home or in the basement. Different types of music have different needs, but as soon as you could reach the world from your bedroom without a record label using your own recording set up, everything changed. Any band with a drummer needs a place to set the drums up and make a noise which is probably not your bedroom. I wouldn’t like to hear Led Zep recorded at Mum and Dad’s. Equally there’s a lot of bedroom musicians that can make music that is easily made at home, look at Finneas and Billie Eilish (recorded at Mum and Dad’s) and look at their success. (Great album by the way).

As far as the cost of making records and touring – If we can’t sell records and we can’t play live as musicians, we really are in trouble. We struggle to sell physical records, we make nothing from Spotify and now we can’t tour because of the virus. The backlog of tours is now probably taking us into late next year before we can get out there. The merch is so important to us, t-shirts mainly, but get this, t-shirt profits are way higher than the physical album sales, because of the manufacturing costs. Luckily the internet hasn’t found a way to dress us in digital clothes – so far. Musicians have discovered that a lot of people are willing to spend $20 plus on a t-shirt but not $5 to $10 on a CD. When you think of the cost of making the CD, the recording of the album, the artwork, the months of preparation versus the copying of the artwork from the CD cover onto cloth, well it’s simply because you can hear it for next to nothing online. The vinyl buyers are few and the costs so high to manufacture that profits are small. Yet we all know that downloads are not so exciting as you can’t feel them, they have no texture, they have no smell and it’s hard to value them, hold them next to your heart, admire the details in the artwork. But the bottom line, the main thing for most people is that you can hear them if you stream it, that’s all that matters. The quality of their listening experience doesn’t even matter to a lot of people, the quality of the wallet does matter though and you can’t argue with the lucky public accessibility to millions of albums for so small a financial commitment. Music is so available and there’s so much choice that it’s pretty hard to get a mass of people to buy something physical. Then there’s the space in your home issue, I need space for records, I can’t see the advantage of NOT needing to have space for books and records. What is more lovely than your own personal library? A clean white wall? A dust free zone? I love that dust. The aesthetics of the digital domain are difficult to grasp for my generation. I suppose horse riders felt the same about the introduction of the motor car. You can imagine the rider saying “But what about the relationship with the beast that is your transportation? You can’t talk to a machine.” – But you know all this.

So the alternatives for the musician that is not as successful as Bono or as young as Billie Eilish are few and far between. Writing for magazines was always something of a closed shop and badly paid. For me, the blog and the Songwriting & Guitar Guidance sessions weren’t ever really thought of as another income stream, it was more a service that I had to charge for, that’s why it’s not mind-numbingly expensive. When I left the ex band I went and worked in record shops in Stockholm for a couple of years. A nice break, I enjoyed it immensely, but it ultimately led me back to musicianland as that’s where I met Nicklas from Anekdoten – and you know what happened next. Suddenly I was in Japan playing a sold out show with a Swedish Progressive Rock band. All this led into all the other projects, MOAT was also based in Stockholm. Anekdoten led me to a festival in Germany that led me to meeting and marrying Olivia and to us forming our duo. A duo with a German violinist I was married to, who knew? This led to spending more time in Germany which led to working with Jerome Froese from Tangerine Dream and Loom with a project on the way. Of course the Songwriting & Guitar Guidance sessions led to Jed and the Space Summit album that we are currently working on. So along with the Noctorum project with Dare, a constant work in progress, I find myself very busy.

I don’t have engineering skills, I don’t drive and computers to me are posh typewriters with pictures. I need help to make records, I need help to tour. I finally have an American agent, all was planned for the autumn, of course it’s all cancelled. Before having an agent, I’d do some super low key things in America because I was there. My friend Melani would find some shows and I’d play together with her husband Ed and some mutual friends. So now I have a proper agent who was booking a proper tour that would take us all over the country with Salim playing with me here and there. But upscaling your situation means upscaling your costs. To get an American work visa for Olivia and I to tour, it costs over $3,500, that’s up front before you earn a cent. Then there’s the air tickets and the accom. Luckily I have good friends. But start up costs for a small operation are crippling. Plus now we also have to see the damage caused by the virus on studios, record shops, record labels, these places were already struggling. Now it’s the venues that are under threat, too.

The great thing about a daily blog is that one day it’s this kind of thing and another day it’s about the stripy fish that swim in shoals in the pacific ocean or Japanese Psychedelic Rock. Or possibly even this next tangent. Classical music, who buys it? I remember going into HMV or was it the ex Virgin Megastore in Oxford Street in London and there was a whole massive department dedicated to just classical music. It was always empty when I was in there, a nod to its relevance but impractical in terms of sales. The internet must have destroyed the income for classical music almost completely. I could always find second hand copies of beautifully recorded and mastered Deutsche Grammophon records with amazing orchestras conducted by Leonard Bernstein or Herbert von Karajan. There would be Mozart, Beethoven, all the famous composers of history and mostly in perfect condition and often for just 50p each. So how could shops afford to have a stock of new Classical records? Perhaps there was once a market for them between the sixties and the early eighties, but surely not anymore. And by the way, you might need a real studio to record a classical orchestra, it’s a little cramped in the bedroom and quite dangerous with all those stray bow thrusts.

Which takes me to today’s music. New York Rock And Roll ensemble are surely forgotten, even though you know at least two members of the band. Michael Kamen worked with everyone from Guns N’ Roses to Kate Bush as an arranger. He sadly died in 1993 at the age of 55 from a heart attack after being diagnosed six years earlier with Multiple Sclerosis.

Martin Fulterman you also know but as Mark Snow. You’ve seen him on many TV theme credits including The X-Files. The band were all attendees at New York’s famous Juilliard Music School and had the idea to combine their Classical skills with an interest in Rock music. They released their first self-titled album in 1968, their second, Faithful Friends, in 1969 and more records into the seventies. The first was produced by John Linde and the legendary Shadow Morton. (The Shangri-Las, Vanilla Fudge, Janis Ian, New York Dolls producer.) Is it your thing? Who knows, it’s of its time and I find throughout albums like these that there’s oddly insignificant and equally great stand out tracks.

On the subject of the influence of ‘serious music’ in the Rock world, Gryphon were certainly made up of talented thinking musicians exploring new realms. Progressive, Classical, Rock, Folk, Contemporary, they are famous for being played on all four BBC radio stations in the same week despite them all catering to different audiences. Today Olivia picked a couple of records randomly from the selection. Their last album Treason (1977) and their 1974 album Red Queen To Gryphon Three.

Song Of The Day is How Come They Don’t Touch The Ground, recorded in my front room in my flat in Bondi Beach sometime in the middle of the eighties. This was the album where I used the Sydney Morning Herald as a snare drum and a Gizmotron invented by ex 10cc men Kevin Godley and Lol Creme for cello sounds. This was a true bedroom album recorded on a Teac 4-track tape machine. Ah, those were the days.

How Come They Don’t Touch The Ground

Even yesterday has gone away
Has tomorrow ever come
Will next week last forever
How come it’s funny but it’s not fun

Have the fingers slipped, has time been cut
Has the face misled the eye
Break the glass let me out of here
Why doesn’t six come after five

Turning, turning round and round
My feet are burning
How come they don’t touch the ground

I play a game on the paving stones
The cracks seem so small to me
I suddenly shrink and meet some insect friends
And need binoculars to see across what now is wide to me

They close the doors on another train
The windows dirty as the floor
You can play games with your reflections
But I don’t do that anymore

Turning, turning round and round
My feet are burning
How come they don’t touch the ground
How come they don’t touch the ground

I got up to leave
But something I couldn’t see stopped me, stopped me

Turning, turning round and round
My feet are burning
How come they don’t touch the ground

(Willson-Piper)
In Reflection (1987)

Walking past the pub today there was a message written by the publican in pink writing on the blackboard outside. Usually it would say free pool, or something about football. Today it said “We are closed and refurbishing, so stop calling the police and wasting their valuable time.”. It was a nice touch that it was in pink. People don’t walk past you anymore, they circle around you like a lion, except they won’t be doing any pouncing. I wonder if muggers are keeping their distance? This is the fifth week of lockdown and the cabin fever has begun to hit. Even I feel it and my life hasn’t changed that much from studio, sessions, writing, but for me it’s not the now as much as the unknown future that is causing the anxiety, not having an approximation of what’s happening eight weeks from now, the uncertainty is hard to deal with for everyone.

I would have been due to leave Penzance soon to go to Stockholm to rehearse with Anekdoten before we flew to Canada for the festival shows in Quebec. I probably would have spent my birthday in London (May 7th, hint) with Olivia flying to Germany the next day, with us meeting in Canada a couple of days later, where we would also do some duo shows. Can we re-book shows? Well, it seems everyone that had their shows cancelled now is booking for next year which means that those of us that were supposed to tour at the end of this year can’t just move it forwards a few months because there is so much traffic. It might be autumn 2021 before we can tour in America.

The finished or almost finished records are starting to catch up with each other. But the delay is also creating uncertainty. Salim Nourallah still has to mix in Texas, Paul Simpson still has to sing and mix on the new Wild Swans album in Liverpool, Jerome Froese is working on our collaboration in Berlin. Just the talk of all these locations is reminding me of life before the lockdown. Space Summit, which has been made in Minneapolis, Penzance, Borneo and Bristol, plus all the places Jed and I worked together on the songs before we even got to the studio, it makes you realize how small the world – was. At this stage we are three mixes from being done with perhaps an added acoustic song should we come up with one. Nightjar is hoping that the postponed Record Store Day date is going to really happen on June 20th. But will people be able to queue by then? Last but not least and perhaps most frustratingly, MOAT’s new album Poison Stream is done, but because of the uncertainty we can’t commit to a release date and therefore can’t get a crowdfunding campaign started for all those back bills for making it and all those future bills for manufacturing it.

In the news there’s lots of talk of easing lockdowns as they talk of needing one in Stockholm. How is it that there are so many opinions about the cause, the solution and the truth about all this? Wouldn’t something like this clearly be based on fact? But then there’s the “alternative facts” (ha ha, the best phrase from the legacy of the Trumpers). Can’t we ever just have the complete truth, a truth that everyone sees to be the truth without doubt, suspicion or blame. A truth where people own up to their mistakes instead of hiding them, a truth where provocation or taking advantage of the situation isn’t even considered. Are we doomed to disagree about the colour of the sky or the scent of a rose? Does our right to opinion defy our right to the truth? It’s complicated and yet it seems like it should be very simple.

Music today has been all about Japanese late sixties and early seventies CDs that live in the archive. In the sixties and seventies the Japanese were seriously influenced by Western sixties Pop and seventies Rock and out of that came some fascinating albums. (They often covered songs by their influences.) One of the better known legends is guitarist Shinki Chen who recorded with Powerhouse, Food Brain and Speed, Glue & Shinki. There are two albums by the latter, but Eve (1971) is the only one made when they were still together as a band. The second is mainly an album by Joey Smith, their crazy Filipino drummer and singer that he put together using Shinki’s guitar bits long after he left the band. Shinki left due to Smith’s antics – drug related of course. Their name comes from Smith’s love of speed, bass player Masayoshi Kabe’s penchant for sniffing glue and simply Shinki’s name – was it ever going to last? Smith went on to be a legend in his own right in the Philippines with the Juan de la Cruz band. Before all this Shinki was in lots of bands (Powerhouse and Food Brain also included Kabe) and also made a self-titled solo album (1971). He (like everybody) was influenced by Jimi Hendrix and the sound coming out of Western amps and guitars, his playing reminds me of the first Blue Cheer guitarist Leigh Stephens. If you would like to read all about it you could buy Julian Cope’s book Japrocksampler where you’ll find all the important details.

There was Yuya Uchida And The Flowers’ Challenge (1969) and Carmen Maki, whose second album Adam And Eve released as the sixties became the seventies has influences of both eras. Born to a Japanese mother and an American father she is some kind of Japanese sixties Psyche chanteuse. She went on to make the influential album Carmen Maki & Blues Creation (1971) with important Japanese guitar player Kazuo Takeda. There is so much to discover about Japanese guitar music, but I’ll have to leave it for now with an introduction to Flower Travellin’ Band, Far Out, and the Far East Family Band for a Japanese vinyl sesh sometime in the future via Yonin Bayashi, whose album Ishoku-Sokuhatsu signals an era of more restraint. Final mention for Yuya Uchida and Joey Smith, who both died in 2019. I can’t find anything out about Shinki Chen except that he tired of making records and just became a live player. Arigatou.

Tora Tora Tora from Noctorum’s third album Honey Mink Forever (2011) is probably as far away as you can possibly get from the Japanese music that features here today as it invokes the famous war film. But the song is more about simple entertainment and relaxing on a Sunday afternoon with the tele on in the innocent seventies more than anything else, so forgive me if this song choice feels inappropriate.

Tora, Tora, Tora

It’s noon, no rush
No bus, no boss
No shower, no suit
No shoes, no queues

I’m going to ring you up
And have you come on down
And lie here next to me
We’re not going to need the sattelite
‘Cause we’ve got ITV

Tora Tora Tora
Women In Love
Tora Tora Tora
On this Sunday afternoon

It’s three, it’s free
The Great Escape
Planet Of The Apes

If you press the eject
Then we can both reflect
On what the best scenes did for you
We’ll be Glenda Jackson & Oliver Reed
In this epic bedsit room

Tora Tora Tora
Women In Love
Tora Tora Tora
On this Sunday afternoon

[TV Announcer]
It’s just coming up to 3 o’clock here on ITV. Time for your afternoon movie.

[Movie dialog]
Tarry no longer.
This is no drill.
[…Japanese dialog…] Tora! Tora! Tora! Huh!

Brush away the crumbs from the bottom sheet
Waiting for the break
And you can hit the kitchen at lightning speed
For another piece of cake

And while you’re there put the kettle on
And try to get back in time
‘Cause this is the part that you knew from the start
And it has your favourite line

(Willson-Piper / Mason)
Noctorum – Honey Mink Forever (2011)

The picturesque splendour of Mount’s Bay, an expansive body of deep blue and shaded green translucent water full of life, incessantly driving towards a semi-circle of land that hosts Penzance, a deserted town that looks out in awe towards the horizon. Today whilst seagazing, a seagull, red legs stretched backwards tucked into its body behind the belly, streamlined and floating on the air current, swooped down onto the surface of the water and took a small unsuspecting silver fish straight up into the air and swallowed it whole. The brutality of nature in a backdrop of absolute beauty. (I was reading somewhere that in the present crisis, a zoo is contemplating feeding the animals to each other.) Is every beautiful thing at the expense of some violent action? The magnificent mountains exploding out of the Earth spitting lava and stone, the rivers cutting through the land, flooding the valleys, the gradual erosion of weather shaping the landscape, destructive storms creating desolation until life comes bouncing back. Beyond natural things, the pyramids that cost the lives of thousands, palaces, aqueducts, temples and fortresses, churches, bridges, railway lines, all these things built through toil and hardship. Sometimes slave labour, sometimes low paid workers, all for awe-inspiring beauteous edifices or magnificent feats of engineering, that conveniently connect people to each other across gorges and through the mountains.

I wonder if those workers that were still alive when the pyramids were completed were proud of the results? Did they look on the Taj Mahal, The Vatican, The Houses Of Parliament and think, good job! Ha ha. And when they were finished were they suddenly unemployed? Or were they on the ‘palace workers list’ for the next monuments project?

But although the digging of the ditches and the carrying of the stones and the removing of the rubble might be executed by the low paid workers, the craftsmen, those that decorate and design must always have been treated better by the planners, the architects, the foremen and the team leaders. How do you coordinate all those hands? Who even has a vision of building a structure that’s completion isn’t even feasible in multiple life times? How could their work be so successfully completed. I wonder what do we not know about the mentality of people in history? Ingenious skills and the commitment to see their visions through to the end, across centuries. Who were these sophisticated and learned superhumans from a time before industrialization or before the Renaissance. People who could dream and create the fantastic whilst coldly disregarding the human cost. I also wonder what other superstitions there were that were not handed down, simply because times passed and people began to understand what was true. And also what knowledge has been lost over the centuries, knowledge that we would benefit from now?

On this crazy planet with too many people I wonder about the future, a hundred years from now. It will surely be a bigger dilemma unless some huge wake up call makes us change our ways, maybe a destructive war or a plague beyond the virus, something much worse. Or simple slow destruction at our own hand through pollution or the general collapse of society. I always thought that I lived in an amazing era. Born in the fifties, the revolution of the sixties, the luxury of growing up in the seventies, being able to choose to make music to a willing audience throughout the eighties and into the nineties. But now we’re in the computer age and something has changed. With all the convenience there is, there is the loss of a personal touch, with all the ease of communication something is lost. With all the availability of information, there’s the mire of distraction. My goal is to focus.

Music today started with an exploration with that incredible and terrible tool Spotify. The beast that leads me to artists that I may never have discovered. In my case when I can afford it, I use Spotify to seek out the artists whose records I would like to buy. So today I explored Danish singer Agnes Obel and listened to her latest album Myopia. It was beautiful and I put in some bids on eBay for two of her albums on CD. She has four albums, how can I buy them all, especially on vinyl? This led me to my own collection and I realized I was craving Juana Molina. If you don’t know her she comes from Argentina and started as a successful actress before changing paths and making, to date, six captivating albums. I have four of them on CD, one rather tragically warped and damaged on one track on Side 1. It’s called Segundo and I found it very cheap somewhere with its water damaged buckled cover, but overall it plays ok. What kind of music is it? I’m not sure, that’s why you have Spotify, go see.

How do you follow Agnes Obel and Juana Molina? Easy, listen to Yasmine Hamdan. One of my great more recent finds. She was born in Beirut and lives in Paris. She was part of the influential Soapkills (first release 1999) and is an important voice in introducing contemporary Arabic music to the world, but also with references to the past, a forgotten Arab world. One of her favourite singers is Syrian vocalist Asmahan. I have Ya Nass (2013) (“Hey People”), which includes the song Hal which was featured in Jim Jarmusch’s film Only Lovers Left Alive (2013). In 2017 she released Al Jamilat (“The Beautiful Ones”). There’s a selection below to see her intoxicating performances. The first is Beirut from Ya Nass, then Live At KEXP on her Al Jamilat tour. Next is the Jarmusch film scene and then an amazing video from what I presume is the thirties with Asmahan. Don’t get too picky about lip-syncing. Listen to the voice, look at her clothes, check out the people, hear the song.

Song Of The Day today is the moody Watching Us from Hanging Out In Heaven (2000):

Watching Us

On this walk
Interlocking fingers
On this day
The devil cringes

Death is crying
He can’t have us
Pity him
Angels gather
Watching us

The bride of the light
Trailing petals and passion
This gigantic bite
Of peace and compassion
Delirious beckoning
The soft and bejeweled
The breeze in the heat
First cooled then fueled
A necklace of grace
‘Round the heart of your face
All commotion and fuss
And they’re watching us

Up in heaven
Silhouettes of gods
In butterflies wings
Delicate nods

As we touch
Near the jaws of envy
As we sway
To the dance you send me
Watching us

In a goblet of wine
Sipping mutual pleasure
And the gold of the rim
Frames our endeavor
At the foot of the throne
With its flowers and fruits
Like a pack of cards
That only has suits
A tremor of tears
From a satisfied heart
All commotion and fuss
And they’re watching us

(Willson-Piper)
Hanging Out In Heaven (2000)

Nooooooooooooo! I caught the lead that was going from my laptop into the stereo and knocked my laptop onto the floor. It all happened in a second but now 24 hours later the truth has sunk in, I broke my computer. I still have my old one that I’m using now, but the computer I do everything on is damaged beyond use. (I knew there was a reason to keep my old heavy MacBook 17 inch.) My super cool computer guy Mohamad is in London, is he around? I’ll try him tomorrow, but it means I have not only the cost of fixing it, but also the cost sending it to him and him sending it back – should he be able to fix it. What can I learn from this? Don’t have black leads in a dark room? I was just thinking recently how wonderfully efficient my computer had been the last year and then this happened, you never know what’s around the corner, death or glory.

Of all the times for this to happen, we recently had purchased an interface that will work on the damaged computer, but so far not this one as it is older, an antique by computer standards. Any live streaming plans are herewith (barrister’s voice) postponed. We were at an early stage of considering the possibilities, but if we did it we wanted it to be of a decent sonic quality with proper equipment, proper mic, camera and violin and acoustic with microphones, not direct into the interface with that horrible tinny sound. If you look at old footage of singer-songwriters with acoustic guitars there are no direct lines, they are playing into microphones (they are mic’d up) which means that they have to be careful not to move the guitar too much as you’ll lose the sound of the guitar in the PA system. Next time you watch the Woodstock movie, check out Ritchie Havens or Melanie. As I remember Tim Hardin (who I love) isn’t in the original film (he is in the extra footage version). He is having trouble with feedback, probably because he is swaying too far away from his vocal mic and the sound man is trying to turn the mic up so he can pick up the sound of the voice. Consequently he didn’t make the film. When you see the footage, it looks like the vocal mic is too far away and he can’t get closer to it because he is hindered by the position of the guitar mic. Can you imagine playing at Woodstock and not making it into the film? How disappointed you would be, I was there, I played there, but the world never knew.

 
I’m not sure how many people are aware of this fact but Woodstock was not held in Woodstock. What? No, it was held in Bethel which is 60 miles away. I know, because I’ve been there, I danced around the field. One thing that struck me about the location was how small it was. A slope and a dip, one hill. It’s hard to believe that this legendary event unfolded in this quiet little place. Why was it called Woodstock when it was held in Bethel? The annual Woodstock Music And Arts Festival site wasn’t deemed big enough for the expected 100,000 people plus they didn’t get site approval. Farmer Max Yasgur offered his 600 acre alfalfa farm, 500,000 people showed up, but the stage and location was way smaller than you could ever imagine. There must have been tens of thousands of people out of earshot and/or stuck on the road.

While we are on the subject of mislabelling the tin, you’ve probably heard of the famous Battle Of Hastings fought in 1066 between the Normans and the English in which King Harold was allegedly struck down with an arrow in his eye. Well, the Battle Of Hastings wasn’t in Hastings, it was in Battle. I know this, I’ve been there. You could say the village was called Battle after the battle, that might be true, but it wasn’t in Hastings. Hastings is 8 miles from Battle, granted it was close and probably the nearest town. Other fantastic facts about Hastings: One day I was visiting my friend and ex band mate Andy Cousin from All About Eve (he lives along the coast in Folkestone) and we decided to go on a lovely day trip to Hastings. There we found a record shop, where I found a vinyl copy of the All About Eve album Ultraviolet which I’d been looking for for years. The shop owner was quite amused to see the excitement over our own record and was especially excited when he saw the gorgeous picture of Andy and I inside.

I had two sessions today, one with Eric and his talented daughter Ava in Minneapolis and Doug in Wappingers Falls. Dare was in the studio control room mixing another Space Summit track and I also managed to watch a whole episode of Elvis Costello’s Spectacle from the Apollo Theater on 125th St, NYC. This week’s guests were Richard Thompson, Allen Toussaint, Nick Lowe and Levon Helm. I like this show, music and talk, check it out (Toussaint and Helm have since sadly died):

 
Music today has been exclusively John Martyn. Bless The Weather from 1971, Solid Air from 1973, Inside Out from 1973 and Sunday’s Child from 1975. Little known facts about John Martyn: His real name was Iain McGeachy and both of his parents were opera singers, it explains a lot. A terrible drunk and an amazing singer-songwriter and innovator, who straddled Folk, Blues Rock and Jazz, he died at the age of 60 in 2009.

Last thought – the first track on Bless The Weather, Go Easy, has the lyric “Life, go easy on me”.

Song Of The Day has to be You Bring Your Love To Me from Hanging Out In Heaven, dreamy Floydy Folkiness, probably thanks to John Martyn and of course Roy Harper.

You Bring Your Love To Me

Diamonds and snow
And crystals that grow
A tune in the trees
That hangs on the breeze
And you bring my love to me
You bring my love to me

If I had a choice of an angel’s voice
If I could empower
For one single hour
Then you’d bring your love to me
You’d bring your love to me
And we’d kiss and entwine
For all time

Garlands of flowers
And sweet springtime showers
Your hair in the clouds
Your tresses unwound
And you bring your love to me
You bring your love to me

The patterns and shapes
That fall into place
The light of the moon
That shows me your face
And you bring my love to me
You bring my love to me
And we’d kiss and entwine
For all time

(Willson-Piper)
Hanging Out In Heaven (2000)