When I wrote
my last cultural blog, I pointed out that I’d only been to 2 gigs in my life at
Whitley Bay Playhouse (a certifiably deranged Charlie Chuck in 1997 and a
wonderful, if slightly staid performance by Midlake in 2014). Lo and behold, I
go twice in a week; firstly to The Lindisfarne Story which I referred to last
time and then to Penetration on Friday 16th October. At The
Lindisfarne Story, I picked up a copy of Jack The Lad’s Live in Plymouth 1976, as I had nothing by the band, though I
remember much of their stuff from back in the day. How enjoyable it was to find
a band doing a Northumbrian take on what Fairport Convention were doing for the
Home Counties and West of England at that time. It was also a great surprise
that Ray Jackson, presumably after Lindisfarne II packed in after Happy Daze bombed, taking a place on
stage with the band. A minor treasure and a wonderful little period piece.
Unlike The
Lindisfarne Story, I didn’t take my homework away with me; I did my swotting in
advance, by getting a vinyl copy of Penetration’s first new album since 1979, Resolution, to prepare me for the show.
Frankly it’s incredible to think it wasn’t recorded in 1980, as the progression
from Moving Targets and Coming Up For Air is absolutely
seamless. That’s not to say it is perfect, as I do feel a couple of numbers are
a little plodding, but it has 5 tracks that I would describe as utter classics.
For their gig at The Playhouse, where they were supported by energetic New Wave
local lads The Middens, Penetration played two sets; the first being Resolution straight through. From the
opening Instrumata to the beguiling, avant garde closer Outromistra, the whole album shone. The band were tight, passionate
and invigorated by this strong collection of new material.
After a
short break, they came back to perform most of the hits; Don’t Dictate, Free Money and possibly the best version of Shout Above The Noise I’ve ever heard
them do. The encore was a storming I Don’t Mind, what with drummer John
Maher being a Buzzcock, before ending with the joyous, uplifting pop classic The Beat Goes On, which is obviously
from the new album. A brave but correct choice on a night where their judgement
was as infallible as their playing; with a dozen new songs, they have more than
enough reason to kick on and achieve even greater things in the future. And I’m
so proud of them as well.
The next
“gig” I attended was probably the second or third best I’ve ever seen in my
life, behind only Pussy Galore at the Riverside in 1988 and Teenage Fanclub at
Camden Koko in 2006. Other incredible gigs by Fugazi, Van Morrison, The Pop
Group, My Bloody Valentine and a thousand others simply fade into
insignificance compared to the utter majesty of Godspeed You! Black Emperor at
the Sage on Saturday 24th October. It wasn’t a gig; it was a
performance. How much of the Quebecois post-rock octet’s playing was scripted
and how much improvised, I do not know for sure; certainly I recognised most of
the set as being drawn from the last 2 albums, Don’t Bend, Ascend and 2015’s Asunder
Sweet and Other Distress, but the origin of the music was not the important
thing. The crucial factor was being present for intense, swirling, anthemic,
coruscating shards of jagged sound. There were superbly bleak back projections
to accompany the music, but I spent half the time with my eyes closed, head
pressed against the PA, drowning in sound. The cathartic effect was in no way
lessened by a 10 minute hiatus, as a rogue fire alarm took us outside. Many
thought it part of the set at first. Thankfully, we returned to be overwhelmed,
deafened and improved again. Godspeed You! Black Emperor are quite possibly the
most important musical entity of the planet at this point in time. Adore them for
their genius.
The next gig
for me was 2 nights later, in the same big hall of The Sage, when Christy Moore
came to town. It was his first gig in the area for 2 years, which was at The
Tyne Theatre and the year before had been the City Hall. Consequently, the last
time Christy had played the Sage was Monday 1st November 2010, the
day after we’d stuffed the Mackems 5-1. Perhaps this omen was why I’d been so
optimistic leading up to Sunday’s debacle. However, a sympathetic Christy said
he was a Blyth Spartans fan, which is grand as they wear green.
As ever, the
bank clerk from Moorefield, Newbridge, was in superb form. On stage at 7.30 and
finished, after an encore, by 9.45; ideal timings for a school night. All the
classics there, as usual; Don’t Forget Your
Shovel, Viva la Quinta Brigada, Lisdoonvarna and Well Below The Valley in particular. However, the stand-out moment
for me was getting Spancill Hill;
even better it was the acapella version. You could literally have heard a pin
drop as the great man’s stunning rendition of this magnificent song came to an
end. Then, the deserved tumultuous applause. The only sad thing for me was he
didn’t come a week sooner to be part of the Irish Festival.
I got myself
along to a couple of events at the Irish Centre during this year’s festival.
Firstly on Tuesday 13th October, I attended the closing lunch for
the Raised on Songs and Stories
project, whereby Northern Stage has been collecting memories and recollections
in an oral history project, chronicling the lives of Irish immigrants, first
and second generation, in the north east. The idea is to synthesise these
interviews into a production in the future. I think this is a tremendously
valuable and important initiative and I look forward to its realisation with
great anticipation.
The next
night, I swerved Benfield’s 6-0 hammering at North Shields to take in Dr.
Claire Nally’s lecture on W.B. Yeats and Irish Nationalism. It was a
fascinating explanation how the Sligo grump went from being a fervent supporter
of Larkin and the workers during the 1913 lock-out, to acting as a kind of
1920’s David Norris, before consorting with O’Duffy and the Blue Shirts and
eventually ending up swamped in a kind of vague and tendentious Gaelic
mysticism that had more in common with Aleister Crowley than Eamonn de Valera.
Yeats was a tremendous poet with a sharp mind, who squandered his later days in
rancorous recriminations and cynical contrarianism. Best ignored after 1925…
Another
controversial Irish literary figure is the poet Paul Durcan. At a recent trip
to Tynemouth Market, I picked up a copy of his Berlin Wall Café collection, written after his divorce. As ever, it
combines comic, grotesque vignettes from his bizarre and dysfunctional family
(they kidnapped him from University and forced him to endure ECT at one point),
together with self-recriminatory evaluations of his married life and
shortcomings as both a husband and father. Not pretty, but compelling and
memorable, unlike the rather limp and tame proto Movement poems of Pauline
Kirk, whose Scorpion Days collection
was another purchase.
I hated Mr Nice by Howard Marks, so it was with
a little trepidation I turned to his Canadian counterpart Brian O’Dea’s
autobiographical tome, High.
Thankfully it managed to steer a course between arrogant justification of
squalid hedonism and dealing drugs, as well as avoiding the whining auto da fe of guilt-suffused addicts. To
be honest, it’s long and O’Dea’s writing is plodding at times, but his insights
into the Californian penal system where he was incarcerated, is fascinating.
Finally, I
made it through David Firth’s unremittingly bleak Silence of the Heart, which chronicles cricketing suicides around
the world, starting with the mid Victorian era. Quite frankly it is a
distressingly solemn litany of thwarted ambitions, middle-aged regret, poverty,
alcohol abuse and infidelity. I bet many cricketers wish they were more like
footballers; thick, rich and happy.
So, we move
on to gigs by The Wedding Present, Vic Godard and Euros Childs, who has a new
album out soon as well. Also, it is almost time to put the releases into some
kind of order as the lights come on at 4 at the end of another year.
STOP PRESS: Just arrived is the double vinyl
album of British Sea Power’s Sea of Brass
project. 14 tracks of varying quality with Foden’s Brass Band. In some cases
the orchestra struggles to keep up with the band, and occasionally the band is
drowned out. Yet, despite some imperfections, this project is yet another
testimony to British Sea Power’s eccentric genius and innovatory creativity.
There are some lovely moments, such as the glorious climax of Heavenly Waters, while Atom has a pulverising strength to it,
though elsewhere, the two parties make for less sweet music: Machineries of Joy sounds as if the band
are trying to play it while an orchestra blares away at another number entirely.
Best of all
are the extended and noisy closers of side 4; Wooden Horse and Lately
are reworked and improved.
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