Notes & Jottings

For this cultural bulletin, there’s a slight change of emphasis. While music is still heavily represented, with 5 albums, 1 single and 2 gigs to be discussed, it’s the printed word I’d like to concentrate on first of all, as I’ve managed to gainfully squander some of my recent ill-health imposed inactivity by getting stuck into some proper reading again.

Books:

Last year I thought Irvine Welsh’s The Sex Lives of Siamese Twins was so lame and predictable as to almost self-parodic. When I learned his latest effort, A Decent Ride, was to be a comic account of legendary Leith lothario “Juice” Terry Lawson’s priapic exploits around Edinburgh, I shuddered at the thought of a banal Caledonian Robin Askwith pot boiler. However, I am delighted to say that Welsh has returned to form with this latest novel, mainly because of the affectionate, detailed and nuanced portrait of the central character. It often feels to me that Welsh is on firmer ground when writing about his home turf than exploring his stateside home, though Ray Lennox’s American adventures in Crime is an exception that proves the rule. In A Decent Ride, Welsh doesn’t just rehash previously introduced characters, but creates new and vivid ones, such as the gormless, well-endowed Jonty McKay, who is naturally depicted as a Hearts fan.  Plot, as is often the case in Welsh’s work, is of secondary consideration to the picaresque, uproariously grotesque set pieces. Welsh has managed to create the funniest and least erotic novel about sex that I’ve read in a long time.

A considerably less enjoyable read was the final journal of William Burroughs, Last Words, which retells his final months on earth in 1997. Whether it was the methadone, his age, infirmity or simply a deliberate, stylistic choice, the barely connected passages consist of stream of consciousness reminiscences, detailed retelling of dreams and sentimental depictions of his pet cats fail to engage the reader beyond a superficial level. You turn the pages hoping for insights or arresting images; there are none. This is only of interest to Burroughs completists, as even the most serious scholar of the Beats and beyond, will struggle to glean anything of note from these frustratingly opaque doodlings.

At the end of May, Laura finally decided to have a cull of her books; 13 boxes of police procedurals headed to Tynemouth Market. Sadly, 10 unsold boxes came back, which will have to go to Barter Books or somewhere similar at some point in the future. I hope. However, doing a little bit of crate digging, as I steadily and carefully alphabetised the unwanted tomes, I came across three books that intrigued me. The first was Studies in a Dying Culture by Christopher Cauldwell, which was the nom de plume of Christopher St John Sprigg, a British Marxist who died fighting in the Spanish Civil War in 1937.

When I say Cauldwell was a Marxist, I am indulgently and mischievously using the term he erroneously misappropriated for himself. As any Socialist with even a rudimentary understanding of Marxist theory would agree, Cauldwell was actually a doe-eyed Leninist, with an unquenchable belief in the essentially anti-Marxist doctrine of the revolutionary vanguard party. Cauldwell wrote openly and engaging about British society and ideas in the mid-1930s, but his ideological panacea for all society’s ills was the seizure of power, in all possible manifestations, by that dread phrase “the advanced sections of the working class.”  It is used in relation to Bernard Shaw, HG Wells and DH Lawrence when he discusses literature and, rather more predictably perhaps, in response to Freud’s theories. Cauldwell fulminates against psychoanalysis as “a bourgeois pseudo-science,” while praising the more “robust” discipline of sociology. It isn’t just Taaffe’s trots who are scared of sex; it seems vanguardistas have been stripping with the lights out for 8 decades of more. A well-written, but naïve and misinformed read.

Graham Masterton is a bit of a one-off. Formerly the editor of Penthouse and Mayfair, he turned to novel (and sex instruction manual) writing in the mid-1970s, with an emphasis on horror. Indeed, he also co-authored a short piece of fiction with William Burroughs. However, by early 2002, Masterton was living in West Cork. After sufficient time in the Rebel County, he managed to both master the nuances of the guttural, urban north Cork estate accent and the cadences of rural speech west of the Leap. He used this newly discovered talent to full effect by turning to police procedurals. These are not a genre I often have time for, but Broken Angels, the account of Detective Superintendent Kate Maguire and her attempts to hold her disintegrating personal life together at the same time as discovering who is behind the brutal slaying of a number of priests, linked to child abuse naturally, is a great read. The fact the 3 serial killers are a castrato choir of ageing orphans, taking an eye for an eye revenge by emasculating the very holy men who took their manhood from them in their boyhood, may be completely unrealistic, but the gory details that make you cross your legs almost involuntarily are grotesquely compelling. I’m now on the lookout for the other two novels in this trilogy.

The final of the 3 rubbish pile treasures was A Madman’s Defence by August Strindberg. I’d not read anything of Strindberg’s work since I was required to plough through The Father in first year at university. Depressing and oppressively grim would be the way I’d describe that play, though I had little more appreciation of Strindberg’s sworn enemy (“the Danish bluestocking”) Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House. If “Juice” Terry’s activities were seen as being potentially misogynistic by several reviewers, then goodness knows what they would have made of Strindberg’s extended tirade against women that serves as a character assassination of his first wife, Siri von Essen. While it is widely accepted that Strindberg was always slightly unhinged, this book, written after he’d abandoned his belief in Socialism under the influence of Nietzsche’s philosophy, is as clear evidence of Strindberg going completely off the radar as you could imagine. The bloke was a complete head the ball, to be frank.

Being serious, the main reason why this is evidence of Strindberg’s insanity is his oft stated belief that this book is not only based on his life, it is the absolute, factual truth of the events of his first marriage. Without any conscience, he describes how he persuaded Siri to abandon and divorce her first husband, where Strindberg was named as co-respondent in the explanation of adultery. From then on, Strindberg portrays his wife as a bisexual, alcoholic nymphomaniac, whole squanders all his money and persecutes the so-called loving husband. All of this was utterly untrue of course; Siri may have been a spoilt, social gadfly, but she was not the voracious sexual predator Strindberg describes her as. Frankly, I’d be amazed if anyone read this and took it seriously as a work of literature, though it does include some memorable phrases; Siri’s friends are described as “pestiferous oafs,” while those who denounce his work are “scrofulous criticasters peddling devious rodomontade.” This is a description of me I must accept, as I found the book a bizarre, anachronistic tirade.

If you’re one of the many people who former NME rock journalist Nick Kent fell out with, that is a phrase you’d either ascribe to him, or he to you. In Apathy for the Devil, Kent’s drug crazed rite of passage from the early 70s to late 80s, there are hundreds of emotional and drug casualties he came across, whom he either abandoned or who abandoned him. Those who survived have mainly lost contact with him, which Kent is only too pleased to confirm in uncomfortably private detail. It is a wonderful portrait of London of the time; almost like Withnail and I in its depictions of seedy bedsits, ropey pubs and the post hippy ennui. Kent puts us there at the time and expresses his love and contempt for many acts, several long forgotten or unknown in the first place. He successfully tracks his progress from wide-eyed, enthusiastic innocence, to jaded, junk-ravaged despair, without any self-pity. The only thing that gets me is, how on earth could he fall in love with Chrissie Hynde?

Music:

The election seems a long time ago. On the day of the vote, I learned I didn’t have cancer. Great news, though following the result, it may have been sensible to actually have the disease so I could get treatment while we have a health service to speak of. The night after the election, The Band of Holy Joy played The Cluny 2. I know I’ve loved this group for coming up three decades now, but they do keep getting better and better. I’ve subsequently done an interview with Johny for PUSH magazine, which will be out this week. I really don’t know what else I can say; they were brilliant this night, starting with Rosemary Smith and ending with an incendiary version of The Velvets’ What Goes On, via stunning takes of Tactless, There Was A Fall / The Fall and Crass Harry. There’s a new album out soon; buy it please.

The polar opposites of the Band of Holy Joy are Ride. While both bands were feted by the music press as the 80s turned into the 90s, Ride were able to translate this critical acclaim into massive popular appeal.  Unfortunately for me, while I adored their early trio of EPs (Ride, Play and Fall), I felt that once they’d released their debut album Nowhere, they fell between two stools; seeing them at the Mayfair in October 1990, I wrote them off as neither as anthemic as Swervedriver or as ethereal as Slowdive, both of which I loved. Despite seeing a stunning show in May 1990 at the Riverside, after the release of Play, it appeared they’d lost relevance once it was time to record an album. Rather like Chapterhouse, Ride were a bit safe and a bit predictable, certainly when compared to grunge or shoegazing, neither of which genres they successfully encompassed. Creation would release truly epochal albums the year after Nowhere, when Bandwagonesque and Loveless came out. Apparently Ride were very successful commercially, but I wouldn’t know about that.

News of Ride’s reunion sort of passed me by, until I realised I’d be in Glasgow at the end of May. On the same Friday night, Belle & Sebastian and Ride were playing the Hydro and Barrowlands respectively. As I thought the new Belle & Sebastian album stunk to high heaven, bar two tracks, I decided to see Ride, even though I was staying right next to where Belle & Sebastian were playing. A trip to Mono ensured I met up with old TFC buddies (hello Terje, Brogues and Stephen Pastel) for a few drinks and a slow walk up to Barras. There really isn’t anywhere quite like the old place for atmosphere; Glaswegians know how to enjoy themselves on a Friday night and the mood was hedonistic, despite the age of the crowd and Ride lived up to the expectations invested in them. Tellingly though, the highlights were Chelsea Girl, Drive Blind and Like A Daydream, all from the opening three EPs, though the closing Leave Them All Behind was marvellous as well. A great night and a good gig, certainly preferable to Belle & Sebastian’s current material, but I seriously doubt I’ll bother with Ride at the Academy on October 18^th. If you do go, try not to laugh at Mark Gardener’s ridiculous trilby, which fools absolutely no-one, you baldy bastard.

As regards recorded material, I’ve been gifted a couple of burned CDs recently. Ginger Dave, who loaned me the Nick Kent book, burned me Jackson C. Frank’s solitary solo album. Frank was an American folk singer who came to England in the late 60s, did some recording with Joe Boyd, had a relationship with Sandy Denny, broke up, went home, became a homeless derelict after being in a fire and died young. His actual album hasn’t particularly stood the test of time very well, other than his signature number Blues Run The Game, a singer / songwriter standard of the late 60s and early 70s folk club circuit. Interestingly, an additional 5 tracks that Frank recorded in 1975 as part of an uncompleted second album, which appeared when his debut was released on CD, are excellent and hint at an enduring talent that had developed from the stentorian hesitancy of a decade earlier.

The other CD was given me by one of the fellas from the Over 40s team; the Irish instrumental band Lunasa with the RTE Orchestra. Lunasa use Irish traditional instruments to record their own compositions, with “an authentic, timeless Celtic appeal.” Actually they sound like the Penguin Café Orchestra impersonating The Chieftains; the sort of bland, inoffensive mood music that could be used as a backing track for a BBC1 property programme. Meh.

Before we get on to recently released albums, can I just point out the two I’m most excited about are the mythical Teenage Fanclub and the imminent Trembling Bells offerings. The latter outfit were the only thing that enthused me about Record Store Day this year; the sight of door staff controlling the queues outside Reflex and counting how many were allowed in at a time, acted as conclusive proof of the corporate takeover of this formerly independent show of strength. Thankfully, queuing up was worth it what I got my hand on the latest splendid slice of hippy-drippy, proggy-folky Glaswegian glory in the shape of Halelujah; it’s a magnificent madrigal, with a video that reminded me of The Wicker Man. Roll on the end of the month and the release of the album; Sovereign Self, as well as the August 13^th date at The Cumberland Arms.

The best live performance I’ve seen in 2015 was Wire at the Radio 6 weekend at The Sage. The best album I’ve heard in 2015 is Wire’s eponymous release. Following 2013’s Change Becomes Us, which re-worked early 1980s song sketches into full songs, Wire feels at first almost strangely normal. Cryptic song titles have been replaced with more prosaic tags like In Manchester, High, Swallow and even Blogging, the moody, drily observational, and tense opener. Lyrics like "fucking by proxy…selling on eBay" show Wire simultaneously engaged and removed, which has always been their unique gift. The unease with the self, with the band as a fixed organizational point, that sense of relentless questioning and observation, continues. In Manchester, for instance, could almost sound like something from early Factory Records days, except that the lyrics have nothing to do with the place aside from the title. And it’s still a lovely singalong.

At points, you can hear Wire nodding to themselves; the brisk chug of Joust & Jostle and the even more thrilling Split Your Ends show once again how they can create a clean, stop-and-start energy. Wire could have just done a 154 album tour or the like for a lot more money and attention.  Instead Wire chose to make an album for our times, which ends with the eight and a half minute Harpooned; a slow, churning leviathan song of madness and anxiety, of someone pushed past the breaking point. The crushing weight of the music seems to suck all the air out of the room as it dissolves into wordless wailing before breaking down into a scraping grind; a brutal, ugly, pitiless sound. Thank goodness for a band that had no plan but continues, as they choose, to succeed far more than many who did.

One of the reasons Teenage Fanclub haven’t managed to release their new album yet is because Norman is always so busy with his other projects; Jonny with Euros Childs, The New Mendicants with Joe Pernice and now Yes with Jad Fair, teaming up together for the first time since 2002’s Words Of Wisdom And Hope. Predictably, the results are rather lovely. Yes ticks all the boxes you’d expect; Jad unleashing adorably wide-eyed spiels of squeaky-voiced positivity, while Norman’s sweet, hummable arrangements keep the sugar down to palatable levels. It's quietly marvellous. Norman’s on fine form here, whether dabbling in sombre piano minimalism, cutesy college rock or just straight-up guitar heroism, as he does for three thrilling minutes on the excellent Thank You. As a bonus, steering away from Half Japanese’s noise actually makes the Michigan veteran seem less manic; his proclamations hit home harder. It’s not all sweet guitar pop though; Now Is Your Time is built around banjo and piano, with a drifting country swagger. A fun album. A good album. I do wish Norman would concentrate on his day job though.

One of the reasons I was so pleased to be in Glasgow at Whit weekend, was so I wouldn’t be at SJP when Newcastle had to stare down the barrel of possible relegation against West Ham. Additionally, The Fall were playing the night before and I would do anything these days to avoid having to see them live, though I still buy all their releases. While NUFC amazingly stood up and were counted with a 2-0 win over the Irons, I’ve yet to talk to anyone who did The Fall gig, though the reviews on the snarling bear pit of a forum at www.thefall.org are uniformly positive.  The set list was, apparently, Systematic Abuse, Venice with the Girls, The Remainderer, Dedication Not Medication, First One Today, No Respects, Auto Chip 2014-2016, Weather Report, Fibre Book Troll and an encore of Snazzy. So, the only track that was pre 2015 was 2013’s The Remainderer; the rest were off the new album Sub Lingual Tablet. Glad I missed it.

I approach each new Fall album with the kind of dread I used to unwrap Christmas presents of clothing from relatives; expecting garish, unsuitable, ridiculous or just plain ugly contents meant I wouldn’t be disappointed. Frankly, this album is none of those things; it’s just what The Fall are. A tight, organised, proficient outfit making straight ahead, uncompromising modern krautrock with a veneer of electronica, topped off by a huge dollop of incomprehensible lyrics by a toothless derelict. To my ears, it’s neither good nor bad; it’s just The Fall. There are highpoints and juddering lows; Stout Man, a reworking of Cock in my Pocket by The Stooges, sounds like karaoke in a care home. However Venice with the Girls is great. The problem for me is that The Fall are just too proficient and, dare I say it, predictable these days. It’s time for Smith to sack the band and take some risks again.