Capitalism

There are two statements that I’m able to make about myself that I feel proud to hear myself say; firstly, I have a 16 year old son called Ben and secondly I am the UCU Branch Secretary for the College where I’m a lecturer. Parent and union activist; two difficult, responsible but ultimately incredibly rewarding callings. It isn’t often I can combine them, but this October half term, I managed just that.

Cameron’s vile, deceitful, rapacious coalition Government, in their infinite wisdom, have decided to fund double-digit pay rises for their cronies in big business and the banking sector by hammering the Teachers’ Pension scheme. Instead of 6% contributions, we’re now expected to stump up 9% for a scheme that will not be based on final earnings, but average career earnings, which could cost anyone starting off in the scheme anything up to about £250k over a lifetime. The scheme is not short of a bob or two currently; this change has simply been mooted to enable financiers to bathe in money while upwards of a million education professionals are faced with penury in their declining years. It’s a scandal and a disgrace. Well, UCU along with many other education unions aren’t having it. We were out on strike on March 23^rd then June 30^th and we’ll be out with about 3 million other public sector workers on November 30^th. Before then, a representative of each UCU Branch was charged with the responsibility of lobbying Parliament on Wednesday 26^th October, in half term week to avoid disrupting the education of our students as we are professionals above all else. The task each of us were given was to talk to the MP for the constituency in which the College sits rather than where the union official lives. Hence, instead of contacting Nick Brown, MP for Newcastle East, I made an appointment to see Mary Glindon who represents North Tyneside on the Wednesday at 12.45.

This arranged, I decided to take Ben with me, as we’d had such a great time in Euskadi in the summer. Obviously, he’d require more than just politics to keep him interested, so I looked for a game to watch. Firstly there were the choices of Brentford v Stevenage in League 1 and Barnet v Southend in League 2, but I’d done both of those grounds and baulked at the idea of each of us paying £19 and £17 respectively. Instead, the Carling Cup came to my rescue. Following Percy Main’s dire recent form I’ve joked that I’m falling out of love with the amateur game and in love with the Premiership, so it was handy that Arsenal were drawn at home to Bolton Wanderers, especially as tickets were only £10 a pop.

I booked cheap train tickets and a room in the Best Western on Seven Sisters Road, which was The Bates Motel, meets Mind Your Language, boasting a brilliant view of Finsbury Park and clean enough to be well worth £55 a night. It also had the benefit of being within walking distance of the Emirates, which meant we could take a stroll down past Highbury in the early evening and amuse ourselves with an informal tour of the new ground, which is incredibly impressive and its environs, which were remarkably clean and orderly, considering the size of the audience (well Gooners are renowned for their mute passivity). Indeed the 56k crowd who turned up proved Arsenal to be a very different beast to Newcastle United; the support consisted of every nationality imaginable, all co-existing in perfect harmony. I think Newcastle’s crowd would be improved if we had more young Muslim women taking in the games, but that’s for my next Newcastle blog.

Outside the ground, food vendors sold everything from cous cous to jerk chicken and the discarded drinks containers were as likely to be Stowells mini wine bottles as they were fiery ginger beer. Bottles of dog were conspicuous in their absence from the N5 pre match palate. From a distance, the ground resembles a conference centre or airport terminal, but the clean, wide walkways and tasteful design made it feel welcoming and impressive at the same time. I was particularly impressed with the integral historical references that ensure Arsenal are a club who know football existed before the Emirates, before Wenger and well before the Premiership. To be fair, their hard core support know this as well; though the camera clicking day-trippers (ourselves excluded) may struggle to recognise names such as Charlie George and Liam Brady, never mind Cliff Bastin and Eddy Hapgood.

In the ground, we took our seats in the East Lower, only 2 rows from the front, but it was an excellent view. Around us fans of many different nationalities spectated in semi excited silence; it was like an outdoor pantomime in many ways. The fact that everyone in the immediate vicinity bar us changed seats at some point in the evening added to the sense of it being more of a family outing than a serious game of football. However, it was a bloody good second half and it was blessed with 3 great goals. Firstly the impressive Kakuta set up Mouamba for an unexpected Bolton opener, before Ashavin and then Park scored beauties to win it for the Gunners, despite an exciting late Bolton flurry.

As I don’t do away games, I’m unlikely ever to be at the Emirates again, but I’m delighted I went. Ben had initially been a little intimidated by the intense nature of Finsbury Park, but he relaxed and enjoyed the evening once we’d left Seven Sisters Road behind, so I took him for a traditional night out in those parts. I had thought of the notorious Silver Bullet, but opted instead for a few quiet pints in the famous Arsenal boozer, the Twelve Pins. Lousy Guinness mind.

Next morning we had our “continental breakfast” (self-assembly ham and cheese toasted sandwiches and yoghurts), before heading to Covent Garden so Ben could buy some overpriced stuff from Liam Gallagher’s Pretty Green shop, staffed by a couple of talking clothes horses with Hoxton fins that Nathan Barley would find parodic. Nice array of shirts on display, but I wasn’t allowed to buy any; Ben got a long sleeved Polo and a blouson jacket, with £5 change from a tom and a half. From here, we went to Parliament.

Queuing for entry, we were stood at the statue of Oliver Cromwell, which you’re unlikely to see at Hunky Dorys Park. I mused how history is told by the victor; to the English, he’s the father of democracy. To the Irish, he was a notorious butcher and mass murderer, who performed genocide on the Irish people. Ironically, the office where he signed Charles I’s death warrant is now occupied by the Labour MP Brian Donohoe, whose ethnic origins are fairly evident.

Passing through Westminster Central Hall to the Central Lobby, we were met by Mary Glindon, for what was the real purpose of the visit. Without being indiscreet, the former governor and student of the College, who had been a North Tyneside councillor for the ward in which I work, was a great supporter of our cause and gave UCU’s campaign her unequivocal backing. Even better, she took us for a tour of the Palace. We sat in the public gallery, received copies of the day’s order papers, took coffee on the next table to John Prescott (I didn’t see if he had 3 tins of Carnation Milk with his) and went out on to the terrace.

At that point I met someone who has been one of my heros for upwards of 35 years; Dennis Skinner, the Beast of Bolsover. At almost 80 years of age, he was as intellectually sharp as a tack and he gave a firm handshake, before launching in to an impromptu denouncement of the government’s policies and a call to Milliband to “realise that extra parliamentary protests are telling the party exactly what we should all realise; the fight doesn’t end on November 30^th, it starts then.” Inspirational stuff and even more important when he responded to my simpering and gushing by saying “we should always avoid the cult of personality.” It was an honour.

Having been shown to the tiny broom cupboard where Emily Davison, the suffragette who threw herself under the King’s horse in the 1913 Derby, had secreted herself, in order to fill in the 1911 census with the Palace of Westminster as her address, we took our leave of Mary. Frankly, this tour was the real highlight of our trip and I was both honoured and humbled to be shown around.

Anyway, from there we took the tube to Notting Hill Gate, took a trip down Portobello Road as the neighbourhood got progressively scruffier and scruffier, before stopping off in Rough Trade records, to get the new one from Veronica Falls and for Ben to purchase “Nevermind” by Nirvana. From there, we wandered up to Ladbroke Grove, which continues to be as intense as it was 25 years ago. Ben was clearly nervous in such surroundings, which are admittedly a far cry from the mean streets of High Heaton, so instead we got out of there to Euston Square and wandered down to Bloomsbury for a rather acceptable very late lunch / extremely early dinner at a little Italian place, before grabbing the train back. All in all, a great trip, spoiled only by Blackburn beating Newcastle after extra time but, as I said earlier, that’s for my next blog.

Fragments of Unpopular Culture 7: We Oppose All Rock & Roll

November’s going to be a busy month for me, music wise. On Wednesday 2^nd it’s Roger McGuinn at The Sage Hall 2, Friday 4^th is The Fall at Riverside (sic), Monday 7^th may be Magazine at the 02 Academy, while Monday 14^th is definitely Veronica Falls at The Cluny and Wire at the Academy on November 19^th round off a hectic couple of weeks. There’s plenty of football on as well of course, so I’ll probably not get to blog about the music. This is a shame as Hazel Plater’s marvellous book about Riverside includes a couple of my old gig reviews (EMF from January 1991 and Sugar from October 1993). As a kind of consolation, here are a few words I scribbed in May 2009 after seeing Maximo Park at the Academy and February 2010 when I saw Billy Bragg at the Tyneside Cinema. Hope you disagree with me….

The first gig I ever went to was a homecoming as well; Lindisfarne at the City Hall in December 1976. Well, the second gig actually, after I got taken to see The Clancy Brothers in 1968. Basically, I've seen a lot of gigs; brilliant ones, average ones and absolutely terrible ones. I've been at gigs so drunk I've almost fallen asleep and stone cold sober. Recently, I've been to two gigs in the space of 5 days with my 13 year old son, both of his choosing.

Last Sunday we saw Cage the Elephant at the Academy 2; now I'm no fan of Rage Against The Machine, but these lads, who also reminded me a bit of Beefheart were fabulous. Young enough to care and loud enough to impose. In a couple of years they'll degenerate in to woeful funk rock plodding like RHCP always did, but right now they are hot stuff.

Now I wasn't keen on seeing Maximo Park; I'd done my time with them in 2003 at the Cumberland and the Cluny in 2004. Not the 100 Club Punk Festival I’ll grant you, but I'd gone the distance with them. Frankly, I'd not heard anything since "Our Velocity" either. Young Ben wanted to go with his mates, so I paid for the tickets, with him promising to reimburse. Surprise, surprise, his mates didn't get tickets before it sold out, so I was left playing the role of Indie Dad.

I think there comes a time when gigs need an age limit; I say this as someone whose idea of heaven is Teenage Fanclub & The Wedding Present playing a 400 capacity room that's about two thirds full, with nobody under 30 present. Maximo Park should have had an upper age limit of 43, keeping me out. I didn't know how to conduct myself; sober, I whinged at the £2.50 pint of flat pop I bought, lost the bairn in purchasing it, complained about the beer showers ("at £3.50 a pint, how can they afford to throw it away?"), enjoyed the lightshow, didn't know any of the words & felt my feet ache after a long day at graft.

I did enjoy seeing two 30 something women have a punch up when one danced in to the other, as their husbands cringed and I felt the singer, who probably thought he looked like Malcolm McDowell in "A Clockwork Orange" actually reminded me of Freddy Parrot Face Davies.

Actually, it wasn’t a bad gig, though I think I'll give the Evolution Festival with The Wombats, The Maccabees & Mystery Jets a miss. The bairn is going with 14 of his mates, who he plays rugby with. Work that one out......

Very earnest, very worthy, in a patrician Social Democratic, Fabian sort of way. Billy could be the Sidney & Beatrice Webb of the 21st Century. He hosted a screening of the documentary about his sterling work in the Jail Guitar Doors project, followed by an excruciating Q&A session, when I lost the nerve about asking should he sponsor an Ex Con Factor talent show. Then 2 of the JGD "graduates," Leon Walker, who was the Jamie T it's ok to like & Jonny Neeson, who was Leo Kottke meets The Streets - both intriguing talents – did a few numbers. Then Billy did "Redemption Song" by Bob Marley, "April Fool's Day," written in conjunction with prisoners in Walton Jail, "I Keep Faith" and "Last Flight To Abu Dhabi," about the RBS bonus situation.

All in all, a very worthy cause. Glad I was there, but it had more than a whiff of the primary school end of term concert than I had been prepared for……

Eddy

I had a message on Facebook from my mate from Felling days Stevie Carruthers, regarding my dad. It appeared he is friends with the husband of my dad's first ever girlfriend, Lillie. She and her husband Tony live in Bathgate and he asked if I'd ever played for Bathgate Thistle, which of course I haven't, though I have twice been to Creamery Park, blogging about my second trip here http://payaso-del-mierda.blogspot.com/2010/07/bonfire-of-vanities.html  So, on what have been my Mam and Dad's 54th Wedding Anniversary, here are the notes of a talk my dad gave to my son Ben's classmates at Cragside Primary School about his memories of wartime Felling, which were then turned in to an article for The Chronicle.
 

I WAS 11 years old when I was told that Hitler was finished and that we had beaten the Germans. I can recall the six years that had passed when we had to suffer blackouts, no street lights and shortages of certain foodstuffs. I remember being told to be easy on the butter I was spreading on my bread. We had a bigger supply of margarine so I said I would have that. I have never eaten butter since. You had to stand in long queues for any commodity. My gran used to send all of us to the wet fish shop at the bottom of the pawnshop stairs on Felling High Street where we would queue for what seemed hours to get into the shop, make our purchase and go out through the back door clutching one hen's egg. Woe betides any of us who did not get the commodity back home in its shell. The 1941 winter was particularly hard. I think we had snow about three feet deep. 

One day, I was about six years old at the time, my mother asked me to go to Storeys, the local corner shop. She gave me half a crown (2/6) which equates to twelve and a half pence these days, but back then probably half a week's wages. I remember running in the snow to the shop when suddenly the half crown flew out of my hand. No matter how my mam and I searched we could not find it in the snow. It must have been weeks later when all the snow had melted one of the neighbours turned up at our door and handed the coin to my mother. She had found it about 20 yards further down the street to where I thought I had lost it. Lots of areas of open ground were turned over to agriculture. In the field at the bottom end of Felling they planted potatoes, and I think they used Italian prisoners of war to tend them. One day one of these men came running up the street. The cry went up that he was an escaped prisoner. He passed us as we were playing in the street but a few yards further up a man ran out of his garden gate and tackled him to the ground. He was kept there until the police came and took him away. We all had Anderson shelters in our gardens in case of air raids. When the sirens went we had to scramble out of bed and go to the shelter and try to get back to sleep. I remember one night my eldest brother, Harry, was helping us to the shelter when he pointed out through the landing window 'Look at the Flaming Onions.' He said these were the tracer shells being fired at the German planes. I don't know if this was a local name for them or something he made up. 

When the raids became more frequent we did not wait for the sirens to start but went to bed in the Anderson shelter at our normal bedtime. If there had been a particularly long raid during the night next day's school would often be cancelled. I know I turned up at Falla Park Infants at least once to find that school was closed; having spent the night in the air raid shelter we were unaware that there had been a raid. One of the things we used to enjoy after an air raid was looking for shrapnel. After the shells had exploded in the air small fragments would fall to the ground and these were what we were looking for on our way to and from school. One night while in the shelter we heard a terrific thump at the back of the shelter. My mother was convinced we'd been hit by an unexploded bomb. However, next morning, when my eldest brother Harry got up to do his early morning paper round he discovered that what had hit was the empty casing of an incendiary bomb. Like most places in the North East there were mineral railway lines in the area. The nearest to where we lived was the one which ran from Heworth Colliery to Bill Quay Staithes. We often used to play there because next to the winding house was a pond where we could fish for tiddlers. 

One Sunday my brothers Harry, George, I think my sister Maureen and myself had been there as usual and were making our way home when this plane, which looked huge to me, flew very low overhead. It was so low we could plainly see the airman at the back. We were waving to him and he waved back to us when a woman from Grange Crescent, just next to the line, grabbed us and said 'get inside can't you see that's a German plane'. We were told that plane was shot down near North Shields. I wrote earlier of food shortages. One thing which disappeared completely during the war was bananas. I remember coming home from school with a few of my mates when a man in the next street asked us if we would like piece of banana. Of course we all said yes. He thought he was a bit of a wag and when I opened my mouth to try it he put a piece of cucumber on my tongue. To this day I cannot stand the smell or taste of cucumber. 

There were lots of slogans on posters on the walls, official ones like Dig for Victory, Careless talk costs Lives, Put that Light Out. One famous unofficial one was Mr Chad. He looked like the head of Humpty Dumpty looking over a wall with a slogan asking things like 'Wot no Fags'. One more thing I remember during the early days of the war was the smoke screens which were placed around the main roads of the town. These were about the size of a dustbin with a long chimney on top. I think they were filled with used engine oil and were set alight at dusk by soldiers. We were told these soldiers were conscientious objectors. We used to play around these and, of course, we got covered in filth. My mam would say 'look at the state of you, you look as if you had been working down the pit'. I recall these smoke screens stretching from Split Crow Road through Crowhall Lane and on down Watermill Lane. Some local residents were of the opinion that these smoke screens were an attempt to fool the Germans that this was the route of the River Tyne. Fortunately for us residents this did not happen and we were never bombed. 

There were also Ack Ack sites in any convenient spot, and during any air raid the adults would voice their opinions as to where the enemy planes were flying, they reckoned they knew the distinctive sounds of the guns from each site. I could understand the Nook ones (nickname Big Bertha) or the Wrekentons, but I never could fathom out the Langbentons or the Squareuns. We also had the barrage balloons, the one the Lairies was the one already featured in your paper which brought down a British plane, (incidentally it was believed at the time that the pilot was Canadian). There was another balloon site at Jonadab near Heworth Shore. Other wartime measures were the tank obstacles, huge barriers made out of concrete built out from the pavement on to the highway which cut down the width of the road to allow the passage of a tram but not a tank. We had one of these on Sunderland Road outside of the Duke of Conaught pub. I was never sure if this was to prevent tanks from moving into Felling from Gateshead or vice versa. Also scattered around the town were static water tanks in case of bombing by incendiary bombs. One of these was sited in an old factory building next to Adamson Greens engineering factory opposite the Duke of Conaught pub. Unfortunately one evening the factory wall collapsed and thousands of gallons of water flooded the shops and houses opposite. I remember seeing the state of Thubrons shop especially. I recall my mother telling us of the day she saw Spillars being bombed. She had been walking across the Bankie Fields towards Dorothy Street when this German bomber flew over quite low and dropped its bombs on the other side of the river and hit the flour mill. 

After peace was declared practically every street became decked out in flags and bunting with huge white cloths saying 'Welcome Home' with the name of the serviceman who was expected, whether he was a returned prisoner of war or a serviceman who had just finished fighting. I remember the bunting outside of my grandmother's house saying 'Welcome Home Mattie'. I remember a priest asking me where he had been held prisoner when I said he hadn't been a prisoner but had fought in the desert he just said 'Humph' and walked down the road. Of course there were bonfires on any available site whether suitable or not and I must not forget the street parties. Trestle tables were commandeered from church halls and such or people used their own dining tables and chairs. Some of the tables appeared to stretch for hundreds of yards to my young eyes, covered in white cloths and laden with more food than I could ever remember seeing. Pianos and wind-up gramophones were brought out into the street and everyone joined in singing all of the wartime favourites such as White Cliffs of Dover, We'll Meet Again, etc. Of course it was not all over then. There were still three months to go with the war in the Far East with Japan, and some of the families still had sons or husbands out there.

The following is the eulogy I was honoured to give at my Dad’s funeral in August 2009. RIP Eddy; I miss you every day mate.

Looking at all those of you, from whatever aspect of my dad’s multi-faceted and richly rewarding life, who’ve come here this morning, not simply to pay your last respects to him, but to celebrate what a fine, fascinating and enduringly supportive man Eddy Cusack was, fills us all with humility and a deep gratitude. Of course Eddy himself (and by referring to him in such a way I hope you don’t feel I’m being disrespectful; I was proud to call him my dad, but, like you all, I knew him as Eddy), wouldn’t have expected you all to have traipsed all the way over here just on his behalf, as the absolute keynote of his entire life, as shown in his dealings with every single one of us here today, was an unassuming humility and an insistence on putting everyone else’s needs and requirements ahead of his own. He was, as a husband, father, grandfather, brother (in all the senses of the word bearing in mind his varied interests and commitments), friend and colleague, utterly selfless to an extent I’ve never seen in another human being.

The music you heard as Eddy’s coffin was brought in, was “The Peers’ Chorus” from “Iolanthe,” which was a piece of music Eddy particularly relished singing and a fine singing voice he had, which my sister Elaine was lucky enough to inherit. Through my dad I developed a deep and abiding love for Irish traditional folk music (indeed, in matching Arran sweaters knitted by my mam’s late sister Maureen, we attended my first live gig at the City Hall in 1968, when we went to see The Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem, on the second anniversary of whose death my dad passed away).

A few days before my dad died, we shared a final musical moment. I took my ipod in with me when I visited him in the Freeman Hospital and, placing an earphone in his good right lug and the other one in my left ear, I played The Clancy’s song “The Parting Glass,” as he loved the song. If I may I’d like to quote from “The Parting Glass.” Perhaps its most famous lines are contained within the second verse -:

Of all the comrades that ere I had, they're sorry for my going away,
But since it falls unto my lot that I should rise while you should not,
I will gently rise and I'll softly call, "Goodnight and joy be with you all!"


While such sentiments are admirable and sum up a great deal of my dad’s love of life and his delight in the company and affection of his family, his friends and his acquaintances, I feel the final verse of “The Parting Glass” describes perfectly the essential selflessness and humility of the man I was proud to call my father, the man who was devoted to my mother and as much in love with her on the day he left this life as on the day almost 52 years previously when they’d married -:


Oh, if I had leisure time to sit awhile
There is a fair maid in this town that surely has my heart beguiled
Her rosy cheeks and ruby lips, she alone has my heart in thrall.
So fill me to the parting glass. Goodnight and joy be with you all.


Goodnight Eddy: I’ll miss you. We’ll all miss you, but we’ll all be forever in your debt for having known you.

Fragments of Unpopular Culture 6: Where's Dan Treacy Now?

Recently, news has emerged of the ill-health of Television Personalities frontman Dan Treacey. He has sustained head injuries, cause unknown. Here's a review I wrote of their April 2010 gig at The Cluny; it may explain things. Incidentally, my cousin John HATED this review.

In many ways, I think obscurantist elitism is a reasonable personal philosophy to avow. I voted Communist at the last General Election, I support Percy Main Amateurs and I think going to see Vic Godard on a Sunday night is a populist gesture; frankly, I’m used to being in small crowds. This is why when I heard the Television Personalities were playing The Cluny, I was in a state of near hysteria for at least a month beforehand.

Essentially, my musical tastes haven’t evolved that much in the past thirty-odd years. In 1978 I bought dozens of DIY 7-inch post punk releases, on account of half hearing John Peel playing them on my badly tuned transistor that I kept hidden under the bedclothes. One chilly November night, aged 14, I called in to “Listen Ear” records on Ridley Place in Newcastle and shelled out just less than two quid that I’d scrimped and saved from my school dinner money to get a couple of complementary releases; “The Malcolm McLaren Life Story EP” by The O-Levels and “Where’s Bill Grundy Now” by The Television Personalities. I particularly loved how the musicians on these records were as inept on the guitar as I was. I found their DIY spirit life-affirming and essential and it still exists as the spark that attracts me to all the music I’ve loved since; a spirit of independence and innovative aesthetics that rejects career moves in favour of integrity.

The Television Personalities disappeared off my radar until 1992 when a magazine I was writing for at the time ("Paint It Red") asked me to review their album “Closer To God.” The sound had changed: darker, more melancholy, less whimsical and dangerously musically proficient. It appeared that only the original singer Dan Treacy was with the band still and the songs were an exorcism of his personal demons. I gave it a positive review and the band disappeared off my radar, with only “The Part Time Punks” from a Rough Trade compilation on my ipod to remind me of their existence. However, a new turntable purchased the other Christmas has allowed me to rediscover my old 7-inch treasures; pragVEC, Fish Turned Human, Swell Maps, Essential Logic and dozens more, including “Where’s Bill Grundy Now?”

When the gig was announced, I started to delve in to the internet netherworld to find what happened to The Television Personalities, whose name and experiences are interchangeable with Dan Treacy; the answer was a recorded CV extensive enough to make Billy Childish blush and a personal story that told of a tough life and many, many setbacks on the way; problems with drink, drugs and mental illness, not to mention periods of homelessness and imprisonment. However, stories hinted at life looking up for him, with recent releases and a new backing band.

I headed to The Cluny on Easter Saturday full of hope and was pleased to run in to several friends and acquaintances who’d never see 45 again, all looking forward to one of those rare occasions where a minor legend graces us with his presence. Frankly, I very rarely regret attending gigs, no matter how bad the band, but on this occasion I felt as if I’d been responsible for the unnecessary exploitation of a tragic figure, who is clearly desperately unwell and not long for this life if he continues in this fashion. Drunk doesn’t even begin to describe the shambolic state he was on as he eventually staggered on stage.

Unlike Vic Godard, the consummate professional who combines a responsible job as a postman with carrying the torch for angular post punk, Dan Treacy is a shambles. Vic may look like Charles Hawtrey transmogrifying in to Martin O’Neill, but he drinks Rachel’s organic milk on stage. Dan Treacy drank anything and everything he could get his hands on. Slurring incoherently, he combined the worst behaviour of Mark E Smith and Shane McGowan; he insulted the audience, dropped his guitar repeatedly, missed lyrics, made 4 atrocious attempts to sing “All Tomorrow’s Parties” and appeared confused, dazed and on the point of collapse.

However, he isn’t just a drunk. He is ill. He needs medical care; he does not need to be on stage, as a kind of post punk Bethlehem Asylum touring show. Many of the people I knew at the gig left early, disgusted, appalled and ashamed, not by Dan Treacy, but at the musicians who surround him and indulge him, instead of seeking help for him and at themselves for being party to such a sickening spectacle. I stayed, hoping a miracle would occur and everything would be alright. That didn't happen of course.

I came home after the gig and wept bitterly at the torture I had endured. Poor Dan; I hope you get help soon, or I fear you’ll not see Christmas.

mar ná beidh ár leithéidí arís ann

It isn’t a secret that as well as spending my leisure time on matters pertaining to football, music and Real Ale, I’m also a bit of a fan of cycling, Literature and Irish politics. Sometimes it’s nice when everything can combine, Venn diagram style; “Ich liebe es wenn ein Plan funktioniert,” as Hannibal Smith used to say on Das A Team.

I like to think of myself as the living embodiment of Antonio Gramsci, Stewart Lee and Brian O’Nolan, who you may know by his pen names Flann O’Brien or Myles na gCopaleen. At University in County Derry in the 80s, the depiction of student life in At Swim Two Birds, especially “the painful and blinding fits of vomiting brought on by an addiction to brown bottled stout” and pints of black porter connected with my own experiences. However, the desperate puns of Keats and Chapman and the bizarre demi monde of The Third Policeman have proved to have a more enduring appeal. Every time I pedal past a police station, Sergeant Pluck’s words repeat themselves; "Is it about a bicycle?"

This year marks the centenary of O’Nolan’s birth (he died in 1966; on April 1^st fittingly enough) and it is refreshing to see that he hasn’t been forgotten in the League of Ireland, which is reaching the business end of the season with 2 sets of fixtures to go in each division. Bohemians’ manager Pat Fenlon is keeping the tradition of putting on the poor mouth very much alive in tribute to O’Nolan’s satirical Irish language classic An Beal Bocht. As ex Big Club contemplate their second successive trophy-free season, following a disappointing 1-0 home reverse to Sligo Rovers in the FAI Cup Semi Final at a sparsely populated Dalier and an inconsistent league campaign that will provide them with at best a 4^th place finish which won’t be good enough for European qualification, Fenlon continues to paraphrase Corca Dhorcha’s most infamous resident, Bónapárt Ó Cúnasa, in decrying the terrible series of unfortunate events that leave the Gypsies with a decrepit ground and not a pot to piss in.

Of course, Bohs are not alone in their tribulations; their city rivals for 4^th or 5^th place in the league, St Patrick’s Athletic managed to wrestle failure from the jaws of victory to end this campaign empty handed. On the 50^th anniversary of their last FAI Cup victory, they were 1-0 up against 10 man Shelbourne (who’d only been restored to the competition after non-league Sheriff YC, who’d come back from 2-0 down to win 3-2 at Tolka in the last 16, had been kicked out for fielding an unregistered player) in the semis, only to concede an equaliser, then lose the replay 3-1 at home after taking the lead. Great news for Shels, or so you’d think, but it means their stuttering promotion campaign (at one stage they were 10 points clear at the top) still hasn’t come to a satisfactory conclusion. Below them, Bray, Dundalk, UCD and surprisingly after their last few seasons, Drogheda, have secured Premier Division football after quiet campaigns.

At the bottom of the Premier, Galway United, a tragicomic soap opera of a club that would stretch the bounds of credibility in a work of fiction, have amassed the grand total of 6 points from 34 games, but may yet avoid relegation, though liquidation may be their final destiny. The proposed 2012 League of Ireland campaign will see a 12 team Premier Division; current teams 1-9 inclusive are safe, the top two from D1 will be promoted and Galway will play off against the third placed D1 side to complete the full complement of clubs. We’ll deal with the top of the divisions later.

Mid-table in D1 sees Longford, Waterford, Athlone, Mervue and Finn Harps going through the motions, while Wexford Youths and Salthill Devon (rumoured to be considering chucking it all in come what may) are level on 11 points, 14 points adrift of Finn Harps. They meet in the final game of the season at Ferrycarrig; I wish I could go. The bottom placed side may face a play-off, but with the abolition of the A Championship, this is by no means assured. Quite where this leaves the 8 or 9 teams outside of the Premier Division, depending also on a close examination of the accounts at Terryland and Dalymount Parks, nobody really knows.

The tops of both tables look quite exciting, with this being the current state of Division 1, where to finish fourth is a disaster -:

1	Monaghan United	28	20	4	4	55 / 26	64
2	Cork City	28	18	9	1	68 / 24	63
3	Shelbourne	27	20	2	5	53 / 21	62
4	Limerick	28	18	6	4	45 / 22	60

Shels have a crucial game in hand at home to Finn Harps, before ending their season at home to Cork.  Don’t rule out suicide at Tolka, as a 94^th minute Limerick goal in 2008 prevented them from automatic promotion; it may happen again.

In the Premier, much as it pains me to say it, Michael O’Neill’s Shamrock Rovers are easily the best team; their Europa League adventures are not flashes in the pan and they will be worthy champions if they beat UCD next Monday. The table currently stands like this -:

1	Shamrock Rovers	34	21	8	5	63 / 23	71
2	Sligo Rovers	34	20	7	7	66 / 17	67
3	Derry City	34	18	12	4	62 / 22	66

Third placed Derry won’t be too upset, as they won the EA Sports League Cup at the end of September, defeating Cork City at Turner’s Cross and Sligo must fancy their chances of retaining the FAI Cup they won in a dramatic penalty shootout against Shams at the AVIVA last November.

Division 1 ends on Saturday 29^th October and the Premier Division the night before; by then Mary McAleese’s successor in Áras an Uachtaráin ought to have been decided, as Ireland elects the 9^th President in the history of The State on October 27^th, which is coincidentally my mam’s birthday. She’s not standing, but almost everyone else is.

In the year of Fine Gael’s crushing victory in the February General Election, it should have been a given that this largely ceremonial and effectively useless role would have gone to a Blue Shirt nominee; the only problem being their candidate Gay Mitchell is less popular than Fianna Fail were at the last election. He’ll get nowhere near winning, but at least his party has put someone up, unlike Dev’s Diehards, unless you count former FF national executive member Sean Gallagher, who is pretending to be an Independent as having FF next to your name on the ballot paper is akin to a public admission of a penchant for coprophilous tendencies.  That said, he’ll do okay, but he won’t win.

Neither will other independents: Mary Davis, former head of Irish Special Olympics Delegation and all-round good egg, who was nominated on account of being called Mary, like the last two Presidents, hasn’t a hope. David “Dottie” Norris, of whom we said too much in this blog in the past, has resurrected his campaign amidst further unpleasant revelations about his arrogant attitude to sexual misdemeanours by his former confidantes and playfellows. Don’t forget about the rabid clericofascist candidate and certifiable loony. Former Eurovision Song Contest winner Dana Scallon may pretend to be all kinds of everything to the electorate, but he bile-spattered utterances mainly comprise the flint-faced Opus Dei philosophy of Pearse, with the barefaced deceit in the face of a whiff of sexual abuse scandals generally associated with the Holy See. I’d rather see Clodagh Rodgers fronting the DUP, to be frank.

That only leaves Lord McGuinness of Londonderry, aka P O’Neill, aka Don’t Mention the Armed Struggle, who appears to have more of the armalite than the ballot box about him in recent weeks, especially when questions get too near the knuckle about his other career. Consequently, if Labour’s Michael D Higgins doesn’t limp home against this shower of head cases, someone needs to organise a séance to get the spirit of Douglas Hyde to assume control.

Vote early; vote often, as they say in on Parnell Square.

Entertainment!

Today sees a charity rerun of the teams from the classic Liverpool 4 Newcastle 3 game. Here's an article I've written for the programme -:

Kevin Keegan signed for Newcastle United from Southampton in August 1982. It is almost frightening to think that 29 long years have passed since that momentous month, which also included my 18^th birthday. As a result I was legally allowed to enter licensed premises and have a pre match pint to settle my nerves before the visit of Queens Park Rangers to St. James Park on August 28^th 1982. I didn’t though; Kevin Keegan’s debut was one occasion I wanted to enjoy sober. Unlike thousands of others I’ve no amusing stories to relate of the incredible queues to get in or mad crush in the Gallowgate during the game, as my mate Chris and I were smugly sat in the back row of the New Stand (I still call it that now, to the confusion of most punters under the age of 35). We held this coveted perch on account of the generosity his season ticketed neighbours, the Hanlons, a pair of reserved, elderly, bachelor brothers who habitually missed games the week before and after the August Bank Holiday Monday as they took their annual holidays in Girvan, Ayrshire the same time each year. They always passed their tickets on to Chris and his dad, but on this occasion his old fella had to work so I struck lucky with a free ticket.

I’ve no idea if either of those eccentric and slightly intimidating gentlemen is still alive, but I must credit them as much as I credit Kevin Keegan with reigniting my love for Newcastle United. Following relegation in 1978, I decided my pocket money was better spent on 7 inch singles by The Fall and Cabaret Voltaire than on Newcastle United, so I attended infrequently during the 4 seasons of dull second division plodding until KK turned up on Tyneside. Following that wonderful afternoon, which afforded me a great view of the winning goal, unlike another mate Graham who spent 75 minutes in The Corner with his back to the game and lost a shoe in the pandemonium after the ball hit the net, I knew I had to be here for every game. Kevin Keegan had been bitten by the Geordie bug, but I and thousands others were reciprocally bitten. Thank you to him, but thank you also to the Hanlons for providing me with a means of seeing history made.

Of course, things on the pitch weren’t brilliant from the off; ordinary, average D2 players were suddenly required to step up to the standards required by a European Cup Winner, England international and Footballer of the Year. Many of them floundered as we followed up our second successive win on the Wednesday at Blackburn by taking 2 points from 5 games. Then came the era-defining trip to Rotherham; anyone who was there can confirm the Match of the Day footage still knocking around on line tells the truth.  Newcastle were Brazil 70 and Holland 74 combined that day as we steamrollered the hosts 5-1 with KK getting 4 and Kevin Todd the other one. The trip to Millmoor was my first away game beyond Joker Park and still one of my happiest football memories. Only Peterborough and Grimsby in the Promotion seasons come close to the feeling of having completely taken over the town and ground with Geordies packing the place out. Fabulous times. Sadly, despite Keegan’s 20 goals, we only finished 5^th that season, but the bond between fans and our superstar number 7 was sealed and remains unbreakable to this day.

Like Joe Harvey before him and Sir Bobby Robson and Chris Hughton subsequently, Kevin Keegan instinctively grasped the importance of Newcastle United to the whole of the region. With roots in Stanley, Kev knew that Northumberland and West Durham pit towns were as much the core of our support as those from the banks of the Tyne. Wherever we came from, we were united by our love of the club; Kevin Keegan as well as the other gentlemen mentioned (and I use the word gentlemen deliberately) shared that love.  In every one of his 78 league games in our colours, he strove to do his best at all times and, as a natural leader, he encouraged and supported the other players, whether nervous youngsters at the start of their career or more experienced fellas who had been around the block to achieve more. Bits of kids like Chris Waddle were able to grasp immortality when obscurity beckoned and cast-offs like John Anderson put the bad times behind them and dug in for the team.

It’s one of my biggest regrets that I went away to University in September 1983, the day after Peter Beardsley signed in point of fact and missed most of the promotion season. If I’d had a crystal ball I would have picked Newcastle Poly and not Ulster University (it’s a long story) as the place to improve my pool skills and ability to sleep past noon, but there you go. At least my week off for revision before the exams allowed me to see the 4-0 stuffing of Derby County and the 2-2 at Huddersfield (“Kenny Wharton; Pride of Blakelaw” is officially the best banner ever) as we roared back to the top flight, though I missed the 3-1 end of season party versus Brighton, mugging up on Shakespeare and “Paradise Lost.”

Of course KK had decided to call time on his career and wouldn’t be around to help us adjust to life in the top flight; the 4-0 howking at Liverpool in the Cup had told him he could no longer achieve the high standards he’d set himself. It was a shock, but it was a typically brave and professional decision from a man who knew what he was capable of and what the team required. Newcastle United were a duller side without him, despite the stellar skills of Beardsley and Waddle. It’s fair to say that Pat Heard and George Reilly didn’t replace what we lost when King Kev called it a day. As Keegan retired to Spain, we settled in to mid table mediocrity under Charlton then the likeable Willie McFaul, before the policy of flogging the family jewels (Waddle, Beardsley, Gascoigne) saw Jim Smith and Ossie Ardiles lead the team to the foot of Divison 2. Come February 1992, we were on our uppers as the Third Division beckoned for the first time in our history; there was only one man who could save us and back from Marbella he came.

The rest, of course, is history; the Houdini escape from relegation in 92, the breath-taking promotion in 92/93, the Entertainers of 93/94, the European adventure of 94/95, the gut-wrenching near miss of 95/96 and the arrival of Shearer in 96/97. We all know the script, but let’s remember amidst all of those brilliant memories that Kevin Keegan led the club with dignity, with professionalism and above of, in a principled way. In March 1992, Newcastle beat Swindon 3-1 and at full time, Kevin Keegan threatened to walk out as promises for money to bring in players weren’t being kept. This wasn’t a strop, it was his strong principled, morality coming through and he was right.

He was right to sell David Kelly in 1993 after promotion, right to read the riot act to Lee Clark for kicking the dugout in October 1993, right to sell Andy Cole in January 1995 to bring in Les Ferdinand and, sadly, right to leave the club in January 1997 when the share flotation and internal politics had taken the club away from being a sporting focus for the region in the direction of a cash cow for faceless businessmen in grey suits. This wasn’t the Newcastle United Kevin Keegan had fallen in love with in 1982 and we had to lose him to learn how much we’d loved him.

Sir Bobby Robson gave us the great times back, before his appalling dismissal and it seemed as if Kevin Keegan could do it again when he replaced the fatuous anti-football of Allardyce in January 2008. It all looked good for a while as it seemed we’d a sporting chance of pushing on towards the top echelons again until the current owners decided to wreck all the good work Kev was putting in by undermining him; read the tribunal judgement yourself and see how this principled, moral man simply could not work in such circumstances. His departure and the subsequent revelations simply cemented his reputation as the Geordies’ favourite adopted son.

However, let’s not gnash our teeth and wail about the present; let’s wallow in nostalgia with today’s glorious game. If I’m asked for a score prediction, I’ll go 4-3 to Newcastle!

Riverside Remembered....

This weekend sees a series of events in the Ouseburn area to celebrate the release of Hazel Plater & Carl Taylor's book about Newcastle's great lost venue, the Riverside. Here's a piece I sent to Hazel to help with the book, which you should all buy from Tonto Publishing.

I wouldn’t like to say for certain just how many gigs I attended at Riverside, but it would have to be pushing 1,000, not including the innumerable Friday nights I ended up there for a late one and sometimes, to my shame and amazement, even a dance. However, I was rarely if ever there on a Saturday as that was Newcastle United day. As well as gigs and club nights, there was the fact I wrote for Paint It Red from 1988 until 1997, which meant I was often on Melbourne Street for meetings or to drop off or pick up stuff to review. I even remember taking in handwritten articles, before I got a word processor, back in the days when email was a glamorous and unattainable technological marvel.

Basically I couldn’t even begin to guess my total number of visits to the Riv. The strange thing is that, despite the overwhelming importance of Riverside and the other activities that went on in the building, which was my social hub for around a decade, I was pretty much a latecomer to it all as I had not been involved in any of the planning that had gone in to the opening of the place, as I was living away at the time.

From the age of 12, on Christmas Eve 1976 when I heard John Peel play Richard Hell’s Blank Generation and Bob Dylan’s Desolation Row, music dominated the parts of my brain not occupied with football, ultra left wing politics or the opposite sex. Amazingly enough, I also had enough space enough in my head to be good at remembering dates and to appreciate books. Being a lazy bugger, the very last thing I wanted in life was to be forced get up early and work for a living, so my whole teenage ambition, aside from being invited to deputise for Andy Gill in the Gang of Four, appear for Newcastle United in goal and to go out with absolutely anyone who’d have me, was simply to go to University, preferably to somewhere that had a happening musical scene.

When it came to applying, I used the NME gig guide as an aide; my question was not about academic content or quality of teaching, it was simply a query about where could I see the most bands each week? The answer certainly wasn’t Coleraine Co. Derry where I somehow ended up studying Literature in 1983. While I was forced to hitch or organise Student Union trips to Belfast to see The Fall or That Petrol Emotion, something was happening on Melbourne Street that I knew nothing about.

Arriving back in Newcastle, the city I’d escaped from as there wasn’t enough musical action, at the end of each term, I’d always touch base with Has Gaylani in Volume, using my student overdraft to stock up on essential releases. In June 1985 he told me of a new club that was opening up. Having witnessed the supernova of Dingwalls (a lousy venue, but where else could I have seen The Gun Club, Orange Juice, Nico and Big Country at that time?), I was not convinced Newcastle could support another venue. However, as it was ex Fall man Marc Riley who was playing the opening night I ventured down, as he’d been brilliant playing the little room at Tiffany’s the summer before.

Frankly, it wasn’t an auspicious start; Mark E Smith’s classic description of the Riverside as a youth club run by Communists seemed strikingly apt that night as a kind of gentle chaos was the defining mood. The gig itself was good, with Riley dedicating a song to me, and I liked the ambience of the place, so headed back to see A Certain Ratio, Inca Babies and James over the next month or so. The place was never as full as that first night, possibly due to the disappearance of alcoholic drinks from the equation. Still, aged 21, I was still earnest enough to focus on bands as the reason to go out. How naïve I was back then.

Education called me back to Ireland for final year, meaning I missed out on seeing The Fall in October 1985, though the first solid gold classic gig I saw at the Riv was their performance in June 1986, when me and Paul Flanagan, subsequently the bassist in Puppy Fat and Nancy Bone were thrown off stage for dancing to City Hobgoblins. Around that time I also remember seeing The Mekons, one of my all time top 5 bands, pulling in a crowd of about a dozen; half of them went off to play pinball.

Again I moved away to London and then Leeds doing postgraduate study, but I did get back quite a few times to see dazzling sets by the likes of The Gun Club and Swans in 1987, before finally settling back in the North East in 1988, by which time Riverside had become the standard venue of choice for up and coming bands visiting the region.

As I’d developed an interest in writing about music and football, arriving in the north east at this time showed a great sense of timing; Paint It Red satisfied my musical inclinations and The Mag printed my jottings about football. I have mates who to this day will not miss a Newcastle game home or away, but last bought a record when coloured vinyl was the rage, while others will tour the country following obscure Swedish indie bands, but think Imre Varadi still leads the line for Newcastle. Personally, I’ve never been able to make a choice between football and music as the most important aspect of my cultural life; I wouldn’t know how to.

Luckily, I wasn’t asked and enjoyed being sent by Paint It Red, then still based on Claremont Road, to review bands. Over the next decade it is impossible to do more than scratch the surface when talking about who was good and who was rank, so I’ll pick a highlight from each year.

1988: Pussy Galore; A freezing Friday night in November and they turn up as a last minute thing as part of the club night and blow the place to pieces with a set of brutal, destructive NY attitude.

1989: Sonic Youth & Mudhoney: an ocean of sound as the walls expanded to allow a defining moment in time to be marked by all who witnessed it. One hell of an important night. More important than Tad & Nirvana? Just!

1990: Fugazi; they must have played the Riv half a dozen times, but touring Repeater they were at their very best. A Goth girl vomited cider & black down my arm in the mosh pit.

1991: Teenage Fanclub; not the first time they played here, but the first time it was clear they were geniuses. My all time favourite band.

1992: Mercury Rev; long before Deserter Songs, when they seemed to spend half their time on stage arguing and looking for the crazy singer who wandered through the audience, they produced one of the most eccentric evenings I’d ever seen.

1993: Huggy Bear; possibly only time I’ve ever wanted to fight a band. These original Riot Grrl clowns had a moronic bloke for a backing singer who managed to irritate me fairly comprehensively. The band themselves were calamitously crap.

1994: Killdozer; the slow, grinding, 16rpm recreation of Flannery O’Connor’s world, by a singer so diminutive he stood on a box to reach the microphone. Punishing fun.

1995: Black Grape; the hottest night in Newcastle for a decade, a crazy sold out crowd and Shaun Ryder in his pomp. One hell of a good gig!

However, just when the venue seemed to be at its most imperious, it all fell apart. Frankly, I would struggle to name a single gig I attended in 1996 and by 1997; everything had gone to pieces with Riverside after it stopped being a collective. The vibe had gone and the bands just stopped coming. Friends I’d known drifted away as we had nowhere to meet up.

Of course, as I was now a proud dad of a little lad (who’s now a 6ft 2” rugby player who is as mad about British Sea Power as I was about Joy Division back in the day), I had other interests. Also, I fell foul of the regime in charge. Hence….

1998: The Fall; as I was barred from the place, having made my views on Riverside’s transfer to private from public ownership abundantly clear, I was forced to watch this through the side of the building. Still sounded good I have to say.

1999: Fugazi: the last time I set foot in the place. They were brilliant, obviously, and as bemused as the rest of us exactly why it had to close down. As it was the dying embers of the place, I was no longer persona non gratia; hence I got to see Fugazi and my beloved Riverside one last time.

Now as I’m closer to 70 than the age I was when Riverside opened, I still see bands. I love the energy of youngsters falling in love with music and seeing bands in lovely venues like The Cumberland, the Star & Shadow, The Cluny, or even the magnificent Sage. However a part of me dies every time I have to pay £4 a pint for rancid slop in the corporate hell of the Academy.  The beer was dismal in the Riv, but for most of its existence, the money it made didn’t go in the pocket of The Man and that’s important.