The World's End

What a funny turnaround last night ended up as.
The promoters had asked me to get there at 6, which I did, only to find a massive pub full of football fans roaring at a HUGE screen, steaming in their own enthusiasm and beer.
'Where does the music happen?' I asked the bar staff.
'The stage is there, behind the screen, but there's no-one here yet.'
So I sat like a pretentious twat working on some lyrics; I hadn't brought enough money out for more than one lemonade; eventually, the football fans disappeared in clumps, with their scarves and their red boozy faces, to be replaced by a cavernous silence. The huge screen slipped away too, and I went and sat by the stage, wondering if the whole set-up was a spoof.
No, there was a young chap who appeared to be setting up a P.A.
I spoke to him and he asked if I wanted a sound check; so far so good.
Someone else wandered in with a guitar, and they did a little soundcheck too
(competitively short soundchecks seem to be becoming the in thing these days!)
A worried looking man with a beard zipped back and forth at the back of the pub, holding a mobile phone to his ear; that normally happens when acts are pulling out at the last minute.
A woman with bright red hair appeared with a bag with a bass drum pedal in it; next, she appeared on the stage with a guitar.
I started sulking. Why hadn't anyone said hello? Just at that point, when I was thinking about going home and watching Frost, the worried-looking man came over and said hello and asked if I'd mind going on later than planned and playing for longer. I said no, but meant yes, and then the woman with red hair got up and started to play.
Well, I liked Gabby's songs; I think you could say they were kooky, and very dramatic. She has a brilliantly dynamic singing voice ( a little too dynamic for a couple of women who took their dinner plates next door) and her songs are structured like little plays that incorporate speech and waiting. But they were unusual, and interesting to listen to.
Then it was my turn, and I was glad I'd gone on late because in walked someone I have not seen for probably thirty years- Paul Gilroy! Remember him, Joby? He came and tried out for guitar with Joby and the Hooligans all those years ago in Brighton. And there he was, with his partner. In the intervening time he has become an established writer (There Ain't No Black in the Union Jack amongst lots of others). Two years ago I invited him to come to talk at the University of the West but he got the message too late; and now here he was on a glum night in Finsbury Park!
As soon as they walked in, everything else changed too. An audience appeared, who had come to listen. The sound was superb: it's a good P.A.
I really enjoyed the gig, in the end. The promoter said he loved my guitar playing (which was great to hear as I felt I was a bit below par, having lacerated my fingers with sewing the night before), quite a few people in the audience told me how much they liked it, and it was nice not to have to get it all over with in three songs. They were a smiley contented audience to play to, the vibe was cool man, and it was lovely to play to Paul and his partner too.
I hope to play there again; meanwhile the next gig is at Viva Viva (now revamped) on 13th November.

Tedphones

Shirt

Gloom and despondency, I defy you!
I sat last night with two old shirts and made them into one new shirt, by snipping the sleeves off one and sewing them on to the other. I was well into the second sleeve when I discovered that I'd sewn the first one on inside out. I then discovered that I'd sewn the right-way-out one on backwards.
I looked at the cats for help, but they were both sitting with their backs to me sulking because I had the shirts on my lap and not them.
Grittng my teeth, I removed the wrong-way-round sleeve (because it was only half sewn on and I hate sewing) turned it inside out too, and sewed it back on. Then I did the cuffs because I'd started watching Taggart and it wasn't finished yet.
The result is satisfyingly rockabilly. I won't tell anyone the sleeves are on inside out if you don't!
When I wash it, it will probably fall to bits but then so dies stuff from Primark. I've shredded my fingers with clumsy use of the needle and pins, but I shall be sporting my hybrid shirt at my gig tonight, complete with the totally over-the-top bolo tie I got from eBay in a moment of madness and sadness.

Shoplifting Dog

I went down to Diana's manor (where I played the pianner... no, no, no, get a grip!) this morning and we sat outside a cafe, catching up and watching the world go by. One of her dogs sat on top of the other dog because it felt chilly, which prompted numerous passers-by to take pictures.
Meanwhile I noticed her naughty little Greek dog eating a sticky pink doughnut liberally sprinkled with hundreds-and-thousands. Next time I looked the doughnut seemed to have changed to a caramel one, and it was only when I noticed an iced chocolate doughnut nestling in a nearby tree-root that I realised she'd been nipping into Tesco Metro and helping herself from the floor-height display unit. Ha ha Tesco Metro! There you were trying to get weeny children to nag their mummies for a sticky bad-for-you doughnut and you tempted a naughty doggy instead!

Anyway- sorry about yesterday's rant! I also incurred a seventy pound parking fine at work because my parking permit fell off because of the condensation on my car window, and when I tried to email them to ask for a reprieve my email bounced back three times and they never got it.

Where would I be without playjoy? I have a gig tomorrow (Sunday) which is free, and I'm on at 7.30 p.m.
It's at the World's End pub at 21-23 Stroud Green Road, N4 3EF very close to Finsbury Park Tube.

Wings, tra-la!

Well, hello blog, and how are you? Me? well, I've had the most appalling day, largely because the cold damp weather encouraged every owner of an unroadworthy vehicle in the whole of London to take to the North Circular for a spin this morning... and this afternoon. Imagine the surprise of the owners of the not-fit-for-purpose conveyances when they broke down in the drizzle! Imagine their dumb numbness, as they gazed at the traffic jams and collisions resulting from their lopsided jaunts! It took more than an hour and a half to drive eighteen miles this morning, and more than two hours to return this afternoon, when a second batch of wreck-owners decided to take to the roads just to see if their cars really were at death's door, or perhaps there was a little mileage in them yet.

I tried public transport for a while, but after experiencing a train slipping backwards down the hill into Bank Station from whence it came, while the next train was simultaneously tootling forwards up the hill, plus numerous occasions when the Docklands Light Railway closed spontaneously for no apparent reason (tally-ho! Let's all take the afternoon off and go to Nandos for a bite to eat!), I've given up on that one, despite numerous romantic sightings of cormorants in the mist at dawn.

I'm contemplating not going to work at all any more, just staying tucked up in bed with a hot water bottle in a crocheted cover until the bailiffs come along and drag me off to Bedlam where I will spend the rest of my days doing scale drawings of broken-down white vans n the fog, topped with cormorants heads and spreading wide-spanned fully-functioning wings.

Watch Strap

Come to think of it, why did my father's leather watch strap never seem to wear out?

Candles at Dawn

I took ten copies of the new CD down to Rough Trade East today, which I'd been meaning to do for a while. I had taken some of the old CD down there a couple of months ago and accidentally laundered the receipt, rendering it into grey flabby flakes, but I was delighted because they had sold most of them and they paid me.
We shuffled receipts for a while, theirs haphazardly piled in a big grey box, mine neatly clipped together after an evening's panic-stricken scrabbling last night. They tried to call Rough Trade West to see if they had stock left but the phone was engaged for ages so we did more shuffling and I left happy, diving straight into Rokit for a red winter cardy.
Afterwards, I went with my pal to Tatty Devine. She's photographing window displays for Art College reasons, and we looked at the photos on their wall (and there was one of the beardy chap from The Duke of Uke there) and all their fab jewellery. I was particularly taken with the little mirrored angel wing earrings, and also the swallow tattoo earrings, but having a swallow tattoo anyway, I suppose I don't really need those. The girls in the shop were more stylish even than the jewellery and looked as though they had been carefully crafted by a master-jeweller themselves.
We went into a fantastic hat shop, that had trilbies with fair-isle brims, pom-pom hats with little black lacy veils, and a pork pie brimmed hat with a knitted bit and a pom pom at the top. If I had £90 to spend, that's where I'd spend it.
I was vaguely looking for an indoor hat for McDad, who gets cold extremities. I'd thought of a red fez with a dandy black tassel, but he has quite a large head and I'd be sure to get the wrong size. Ideally, I'd knit him a cosy cloche but I think I am too busy; my finger-exercise regime is spent on developing new geetar fingerpickin' styles. It's the trial'n'error problem that I have with knitting, really- I often have to unpick it and start again, or use unexpected gatherings and ruchings to disguise my mis-shapen botch-ups.
Maybe I could sew him a nice stripy flannelette Wee-Willie-Winkie hat? His cats would probably recoil in terror, but it might stop them from pestering him.

Humming

Mikhail Karikis told me once there was a conference on
humming at St Andrews University.
Funny, everyone seemed to be humming in Barnet today. The grey-haired lady in the PDSA shop, in her scratchy tweed skirt and maroon cardigan, was humming along accurately to a raunchy Stones track on the radio in a rich, deep contralto, several octaves lower than raunchy whiney Mick Jagger, emasculating him as neatly as a veterinary surgeon neuters a tomcat, but with no blood and less agony.
Later, I passed two school girls and realised they were keeping up a unison hum, one long note that stretched all the way from the entrance to the shopping centre to wherever it was they were going.

... apart from the ladies at the flower stall, who were cascading with laughter, oblivious to credit crunches, gloom, threatening loomings and all; they were bursting bubbles of joyful hilarity, loud, open and uninhibited, sending a whoosh of good humour through the afternoon that flushed out sinister rumblings and miserable naggings and that matched the jolly autumn sunshine perfectly.

Interactions

Yesterday morning I swished down to Green Park for coffee with Lucy O'Brien at the Wolseley. We sat in the bar area, which was quiet and away from the glamorous tourists and businessmen (did I tell you about the chap with a baby sling who tenderly placed a napkin on his baby's head before chomping on a croissant?).
One of the waiters told me he gets there at 6 and the doors open at 7; sometimes there's even a queue. But those early-breakfast customers are having two-hour meetings and are not at all friendly, even though they are regulars.
It was lovely to see Lucy- sometimes she's busy, sometimes I am, and we meet rarely but always have a lot to talk about. Both of us are independent-spirited, which makes fierce career-climbing difficult, but in the end, what other way is there to be? If you get to where you are by stamping on other people's heads, it's not an honourable position to be in. And I am firmly of the belief that you meet the same people on the way down as you did on the way up!
We had a conversation with the bar manager, who is from Sydney, about being a small fish in a big pond (Sydney) and being a big fish in a small pond (London), and how wherever and whatever you are, you hanker after the other.
Lucy loves my CD and I am delighted, for she started off in a punk band just as I did, and it means a lot to me.
Propelled by caffeine, I shot back to Barnet and whizzed through the afternoon's chores.

I had a successful upward learning curve with Garageband on Sunday, which was totally absorbing, and I realise that I don't need to go to recording studios to record demos any more.
Last week I had a mini-rowette with the guy in Digital Village who sold me a guitar cable for 50 quid that he said I needed; later, talking to Martin on the phone, I discovered that I didn't need such a complex thing at all, so I took it back to the shop to get my money back. The guy was most pompous, saying I wouldn't be able to do what I wanted at all, and telling me that he was 'only an expert'. Well, Mr Sarky Expert, it would appear that when you looked in the mirror and decided you were the expertest expert of all, a more expert expert was getting on with recording her guitar easily, with no trouble, and is fighting back the urge to ride into the shop on a huge horse shouting and swinging her music round her head in triumph:
and stamping on your head, perhaps?

Somehow

Somehow the Tamil-English bilingual magazine found my laughing horses. I would love to know what they said about them!

http://www.mazhalaigal.com/net_granny/granny-001/0804ng_bee.php

Out for Tea with the Teaists

Yesterday afternoon, I went to tea with the Teaists in the cafe at the Wallace Collection, my all-time favourite London museum; it's stuffed with Majolica plates (such beautiful colours!) rococo paintings, ornate gold clocks, Hilliard miniatures, bizarre silver armour with bird-encrusted helmets, you imagine it, it's there! The thing I like best is a little brooch in the shape of a leaping hare.
Anyway... I digress...
The Teaists are a group of burlesque performers and artists who meet up regularly for tea in posh places, and this was the first time I had been invited. It was terribly exciting and I found them very friendly and welcoming. It was Lawrence's birthday; he was dressed in Edwardian splendour, and sat surrounded by hes and shes all beautifully turned out and made up. Jamie and Jacob had invited me and we sat under the glass roof, sipping Earl Grey tea and basking in the glow of the pink walls. A feature of the afternoon was the absolutely appalling service; it took two hours for tea to arrive (imagine that!) (how????). But meanwhile we chatted; I sat opposite Dickon Edwards, who is a performer and flaneur, and it turned out he is also a Monochrome Set fan and played with Bid in Scarlet's well for a while. We all had the same diaries and notebooks with little checkered pages. I found the four-leafed clover that I was given in Ross-shire and told how the person who gave it to me didn't seem to have much luck; it was decided that he must be a conduit to other people's luck, rather than having any himself. I chatted about kind bus-drivers to Sebastian, who is studying at Oxford. Later, some of the assembled Teaists went to Selfridges to look for a wig, and others went to Primark.
Jamie, Jacob and I went to the Office Sale Shop and browsed there for more than an hour, trying on about 40 pairs of shoes between us. I regret to say we all came away with rather a lot of eccentric shoes, having discovered that the chap behind the till gave us bigger and bigger discounts the more we chatted to him. I had an irritating carton of pomegranate juice that was leaking and getting stickier by the second, so eventually we walked down to Covent Garden and cooked dinner. Jamie copied a new Irrepressibles track to take along to Sin,the club they were going along to later; Jacob showed me how he lowered their bin bags down to pavement level using a rope and a hook from their upper window, potentially knocking a cyclist off his bike in the process.
It had been a lovely day, and I retired home to my suburb feeling urbanly contented and replete with footwear.

A Cholesterol-Free Apple Puff

Here is my present to you this Saturday morning: a virtual apple puff, calorie free and cholesterol free, from the Victoria Bakery in Barnet.
First fold back the paper bag: you need it to hold the apple puff in case you lose any delicious bits!
You bite the nearest corner, through a layer of crunchy melted granulated sugar, some still granulated and grating beneath your teeth, some melted into a sheeny hard crust on top of the pastry; next is compressed edge-pastry, the puff pastry clenched tightly to hold in the filling. There is the merest tang of apple, for this is just the edge, and the doughy base is almost unpleasant, but not quite.
Next mouthful, you bite through cloudy moist layers of pastry just under the crunch, and you hit the apple big time: sour, sweet, cold, juicy, deliciously slimy; your teeth come to a halt on a layer of pastry solid with apple juice and syrup at the base of the apple puff.
More,more, more... the proportion of apple to pastry swings in favour of apple at the centre, and back pastrywards as you approach the final corner.
At the end, you have to decide: do you want to end on a note of appley pastry, or a note of pastryey apple? Personally, I savour a final corner of just puff pastry with s tiny hint of apple syrup glueing it together.
Or rather, I used to.
Every time I pass the baker's shop, I long for my former cholesterol-rich diet as I head back home for a bowl of lentil soup!

Leafsweeper

They lay all over the grass, sparkling and twinkling in the autumn sun; next door's pear tree leaves, challenging me with a cheeky nudge. I tried to ignore them; been at work, no energy for raking, starving hungry, too lazy, etc etc etc.
But every time I passed the window they were staring back in at me, giving me evils and messing with my head.
So reluctantly I wedged my feet into my elephant-hide gardening shoes with their well-worn treads, plodged across the muddy grass and clumbered the wire rake out of the shed from its tangled pile of garden implements.
'Pring!' exclaimed its musical prongs as I extricated it from behind an upturned lawnmower, redundant vacuum cleaner and two grubby cat-baskets.
'At last I can be useful!
It grappled playfully with the mower lead that was hanging from the back of the shed door in a knotted lump.
Scrape, scrape, scrape, scrape, scrape and endless scrape...
Two piles of soggy, leathery pear-leaves were heaped on the lawn, finally.
I put the kettle on.
As I looked out of the window while waiting for it to boil, little wisps of wind played breezy little tricks on my leaf-piles.
'Hee hee hee', they snickered. 'We're gonna make her do all that work again!'
Leaf by leaf, they started to dismantle the leaf-piles, placing the dislodged leaves just far enough apart to be a nuisance.
'Merde!', I said in English.
Back to the shed to fetch a rusty shovel, round the side of the house to drag the Green Bin up on to the grass. Shovel-plop, shovel-plop, shovel-plop, into the bin go the leaves.
Except for the last shovel-load.
Do you know what? I just couldn't be bothered. Let the wind have 'em!

How can you guess there's nothing on TV tonight?

Nutty Professors

'I've been drinking a lot of whisky recently, and whisky makes me dream. I get messages from my rabbit, little coded dream messages...'
Overheard on the stairs, University of the East

Fear

Today, I awake in a familiar state: Fear-of-Tomorrow.
There's a James Brown symposium at the University of the East today that I was wildly excited about and all ready to go to, and then I looked at Tomorrow in my diary.
9 a.m. lecture to more than 100 students
10 a.m. to 12 seminar for twenty
1 p.m. to 3 p.m. 'nother seminar for twenty
5.30 p.m. to 7.30 p.m. Songwriting for indeterminate number of students.
Oh dear. Neither of my cats understand; they are still stamping about on my computer (my old cat pulled the letter 'G' out of my first laptop and reduced me to tears). The dog can't understand why I don't take him out for a walk in the rain.
'It's all about Tomorrow', I tell him, but he couldn't care less because he has a golf ball where his brain should be.
I have lazed about, but I'm unable to go back to sleep because of Fear-of-Tomorrow; I will plan, plan, plan:
what to say
what to wear
what to eat
when to eat
but until I remember the way I deal with it, it will all be useless.
How do I deal with it?
I deal with it by thinking, 'Tomorrow evening, it will not be tomorrow daytime any more. I will have done all the fearful things, and I will be tired and relieved, and all ready for....
Fear-of-Friday!