Donkey Serenade

Issue 15 of Stand is out this week; as ever I recommend you buy it. It includes the following piece by yours truly, written in advance of Sunday's derby, where unpredictable events led to a predictable outcome. I don't really want to say much about that game other than two points; one trivial and one serious. On the point of triviality; yes it is cheese and small minded that the Mackems are doing "6 in a Row" merchandise, but then again, how do we defend LALAS 1 & 2? More seriously; Adam Johnson's goal celebration was ill-judged & confrontational, presumably borne from a desire to offend those who had relentlessly barracked him with an appallingly offensive song that has no place in a civilised society. However, it is safe to conclude that there is no link whatsoever between Johnson's celebration and the MH17 tragedy. To try and claim otherwise is mendacious at the very least. We lost a game; it happens, deal with it. To fall back on faux outrage and pretend morality is, to me, far more crass than Johnson's actions, though not as offensive as the chant he endured. The vexed question as whether Johnson should have been playing is a much more complex issue which I intend to return to at a later date. However, I have no wish to prejudice Johnson's trial, so it won't be in the immediate future. Instead, here's my article and the only photo that made me smile on Sunday -:

When it happened we walked through all the estates, from Manchester right to Newcastle.

In Darlington, helped a large man on his own chase off some kids,

Who were chucking bricks and stuff through his flat window.

He cussed us and we moved on.

(Mark E Smith, NWRA, 1980)

As a football fan, you’d surely laugh like a drain if your local rivals had reached the October international hiatus without winning a game, were languishing in a relegation spot and had commenced the search for their fifth manager in 3 seasons. Well you would, unless you were a supporter of Newcastle United, who were the only team worse off than Sunderland in mid-October. The state of affairs whereby two teams who pull in almost 100,000 disaffected and disillusioned punters a fortnight, have failed to register a victory in 16 league games, is beyond farce, beyond tragedy and almost beyond imagining.

Looking dispassionately at the Premier League table, anyone who enjoys the top flight of English football, regardless of their own supporting preferences, would surely fervently hope that the sides to be relegated at the end of this current campaign were the three occupying the drop zone when the league had its autumnal fortnight in abeyance. Let’s be honest, the minimal level of comic schadenfreude provided by the blundering travails of Aston Villa, Newcastle and Sunderland is far outweighed by the fact that the three sides have given absolutely nothing of note, much less value, to the division for at least the past 4 seasons. They are the sporting equivalent of landfill; prime detritus ready for fly-tipping into the Championship and ignominious anonymity thereafter. They won’t be missed.

Leaving Villa out of the equation, for reasons of geography more than anything else, the North East “Big” Two (please stop smirking at the back) have long been an utter irrelevance in the league, in Newcastle’s case since the end of 2011/2012, when Yohan Cabaye’s guile and Papiss Cisse’s goals propelled the Magpies to fifth place in the table. Sunderland had a heroic run to the League Cup final in 2014, but Manchester City denied them a fairytale ending, though their miracle run to safety at the end of that campaign, with wins at Stamford Bridge and the Etihad did stir the blood. Gus Poyet still got his P45 the next season because the drop seemed inevitable.

At the start of this season, Sunderland began to repeatedly apply the panic button after an opening day trouncing by Ranieri’s eclectic and joyful Leicester side, while Newcastle maintained an uncharacteristic air of stability until being dismantled away to Swansea in the second game. Remarkably, Newcastle have actually put in good performances in the supposedly more challenging fixtures against Southampton, Arsenal, Manchester United and Chelsea, though these have been offset by spineless capitulations against West Ham, Watford and Manchester City, where 45 minutes of graft and guile was undone by 20 minutes of cowardice. In contrast Sunderland have produced a mere 45 minutes of good football this season; the first half of Advocaat’s final game against West Ham. Reverting to type, they threw away 2 points and had a player sent off in the second period, precipitating the Dutchman’s departure. 

Since the spring of 2013, Sunderland have dispensed with the services of Martin O’Neill, a boyhood fan of the club in his native County Derry, the frankly unhinged Paolo Di Canio, Gus Poyet, an ultimately antagonistic empty vessel and the deeply frustrated and dignified Dick Advocaat. Now the ultimate Tyneside pantomime villain Sam Allardyce has inevitably got the gig and is no doubt is plotting an inevitable sixth successive derby win over Newcastle. Allardyce has plenty of experience of ensuring Newcastle United lose, generally when he was in charge at SJP.

In contrast to their local rivals, the Magpies have dispensed with the concept of sacking their bosses, however incompetent. Having endured half a decade of Pardew’s charm offensive (whenever he tried to be charming, he came out as offensive),  his departure to Crystal Palace, where he is proving his worth in a supportive environment by having an excellent season, ushered in the six month car crash of John Carver’s interim administration. Now, fresh from being shown the door for failing at Derby County, on the back of a similar experience at Nottingham Forest, also in the Championship, Steve McClaren is the one being asked to tame the raging beast of Tyneside anger and expectation. I must admit I thought his calm, rational approach would provide a measure of stability; so far, I’ve be totally wrong in that fond hope, as McClaren has been a conspicuous, anodyne failure. However as he was rewarded with a seat on the board when he was appointed, he’s probably safe for a while yet, which deflects the even stickier question of just who the hell would come in to replace him.

Ten years ago, Allardyce against McClaren would have meant Bolton versus Middlesbrough, which was the 2004 League Cup final. Despite the fact those two clubs are now both in the second tier (though Boro look destined for promotion until the superb stewardship of Aitor Karanka, who I’d hoped would get the Newcastle job in the summer), fans on Tyneside and Wearside would give anything for a day out, like the one enjoyed by Trotters and Smogs in Cardiff. The main problem is; Newcastle and Sunderland were both dumped out the League Cup at home in successive nights, where the final whistle called forth a torrent of booing from those left in their seats. Whining and moaning about the fate of the two clubs may be alluring if not an essential coping mechanism, but it doesn’t explain why they’re both such a joke.

If ever there was a club stalwart, both respected and eternally in tune with the nuances of the opinions of his club’s supporters, it would be Gary Neville who, as the terrace chants reminded us, “hates Scousers.” As well as being a grandstanding populist on the pitch, Neville was also an accomplished defender, though reappraisals of his career as a Mancunian Maldini are excessively fulsome. He is, and we have to remember the vacuous popinjays and intellectual plankton representing the biodiversity of the stagnant pond of television football punditry, a reasonably perceptive and articulate analyst of the game.  In his Daily Telegraph column at the end of September, Neville elaborated on a theme he’d touched on as a commentator during Newcastle’s last league loss at Upton Park, namely the seemingly irresistible drift southwards of footballing power and prestige, other than from his beloved Northern Powerhouse of Mancunia of course.

We could of course point out to Neville that the two Manchester clubs plus Arsenal and Chelsea (perhaps not this year though eh Jose?) have been the only realistic, credible clubs at the top of our domestic game, other than Liverpool’s inglorious slip-up with the title in their sights the other season. There are those far more conversant with the reasons why the Premier League sides have stunk the continent out in the Champions’ League so far this campaign and folks far more knowledgeable than I as regards the potential impact of Jurgen Klopp on Liverpool’s future standing in the game.  However, if we add Spurs as perennial Europa League qualifiers to the previously 5 nominated clubs, the stark reality is, other than the occasional muted glory of a cup run, there are 14 clubs in the Premier League who are left to do the sporting equivalent of busking in the tube station for chump change; marginalised, patronised, sometimes scorned and often impecunious.  

Ominously, with the insane levels of money sloshing around the Premier League, which rewards basic levels of competence in avoiding relegation with riches beyond the imaginings of mere mortals, 14 clubs are happy to aim for safety, pretending this is stability. The worst offender as regards this poverty of aspiration are Newcastle United. Despite a stated intent of finishing top 8 and winning a cup, the squad rebuilding was piecemeal, inadequate and tardy. If the club go down, it won’t just be McClaren’s fault, the dread hands of Mike Ashley and Lee Charnley are also gripping the tiller. Meanwhile, rich as Croesus hedge fund devotee Ellis Short has shown himself basically incompetent when it comes to building a solid foundation for the club he inherited in a cut-price deal from the Drumaville Consortium, headed by Ireland’s answer to Sir Roger Casement, Niall Quinn, when the Celtic Tiger foundered on the rocks of the 2008 recession.

The blame rests squarely on the shoulders of those paid handsomely to ensure the future of two of England’s flagship regional clubs. Sadly it appears the North East is going the way of Yorkshire; a barren playing field of broken promises and unfulfilled dreams. The forthcoming Tyne versus Wear fixture has been dubbed the Donkey Derby. This may be true, but in Alan Clarke’s memorable description of First World War trench combat,  in the North East the Lions truly are led by Donkeys.

Slovene Progress....

A couple of great fanzines came out this weekend; issue 54 of Wigan's Mudhutter appeared for their 5-0 win over Colchester on Saturday and, a day later, Newcastle's 6-2 hammering of Norwich was accompanied by issue 9 of  The Popular Side. I had the same article in both fanzines, about the stuttering career of Haris Vučkić, who is currently on loan at Wigan from Newcastle. Predicatably enough, he's injured...

As everyone who farts about on the internet knows, the received wisdom holds that Newcastle United fans are thick, deluded, morbidly obese Geordies (or Jawdies if you want to be really hilarious) in replica shirts, who never used to follow their team a quarter of a century ago (10,004 v Oxford in March 1991 is a favourite statistic), but then suddenly started watching them, even though they’ve never won anything, from 1992 onwards and, since Keegan finally left, they’ve spent all their energies trying to drive the manager out of the club because he wasn’t born within the sound of the Tyneside shipyard hooters. Utter horseshit all of that, of course; even the stuff about Pards, who left of his own accord for a pay hike at Palace.

One thing (positive or negative; you decide) about Pardew is his longevity; he was the second longest serving manager in the Premier League when he decamped to Selhurst Park between Christmas and New Year last season. The Silver Fox’s last game was a 3-2 home victory over Everton; a shade over 4 years after he’d taken charge in December 2010, recording a 3-1 win over Liverpool in his first game.

Sat on the bench as an unused sub on that freezing Saturday teatime almost half a decade ago, as sleet fell incessantly, was an 18 year old from Ljubljana.  Even though Haris Vučkić didn’t kick another ball competitively for Newcastle United in 2010/2011, after his third and final appearance in his second full season at the club, all in the League Cup, which saw him named Man of the Match in a loss to Arsenal in late October, he must have made a positive impression on his new boss as January 2011 saw the Slovenian pen a 5 ½ year contract, which has just been extended by an extra year at the same time he heads to Wigan on loan. Strange though that combination of factors seems, it isn’t unique; Steve McClaren gave a 2 year deal to out of contract Sammy Ameobi, before sending him to Cardiff City on loan before the campaign started. For both Vučkić and Ameobi, this season is probably their last chance to gain enough playing time, even if it is away from Tyneside, to convince the club hierarchy that they have any kind of a future at SJP.

It seems that Vučkić has been permanently enjoying a late-night lock-in at the last chance saloon for half a decade or more. He arrived from Domžale for an “undisclosed” fee in January 2009, aged only 16. That season ended in farcical circumstances, with Newcastle United relegated after the cowardly, arrogant and demotivated collection of has-beens on huge wages we called a squad couldn’t manage to accrue the 35 points required to stay up. Luckily, the next year didn’t see the club “do a Leeds,” as had been widely anticipated. Instead, following a raft of free transfers and a small scale fire sale, Chris Hughton’s remodelled and chastened side showed admirable application and moral fortitude in assembling 102 points to be promoted as Champions. Somewhere, in very small print, is a footnote that says Haris Vučkić made 2 substitute appearances in August of that season; both at home, both in injury time, against Huddersfield in the League Cup and Leicester City, then suffered a training ground knee injury that ruled him out for the rest of the campaign.  All I remember about his debut were people in the crowd commenting what a big, strapping lad he was. Well over six foot, barrel chested, good in the air and strong in the tackle. Why didn’t he go on and cement a place in the team? Tough question…

Not having appeared on the pitch in a first team game since the previous October and in a league game since his brief, late debut almost exactly 2 years before, Vučkić came on in the 70^th minute of a 2-1 league cup success away to Scunthorpe in August 2011. As the game went to extra time, he actually spent 50 minutes on the pitch and retained a spot on the bench for that weekend’s game.  In the 78^th minute of a 2-1 home win over Fulham, Haris made his Premier League bow; sadly he left the pitch 7 minutes later, having suffered a dislocated finger. You couldn’t make it up.

He returned to the side as a substitute in an emotion-drenched 0-0 with Swansea, that was first home game after NUFC hero Gary Speed’s tragic suicide. Events on the pitch mattered little that day, but Vučkić must have done enough to impress Pardew, as he kept his place for the next two games, starting both of them, which we lost. The first was a 3-2 reverse against West Brom in a storming contest, where Haris got Man of the Match and hit the underside of the bar with a stunning volley from 35 yards that would have rescued a point. He also played an hour of a tight 3-1 reverse at Anfield. As 2012 dawned, with Newcastle having a good season that saw us finish fifth, everything seemed to be geared up for Haris to cement a regular place in the first team, but it suddenly all fell away.

For no readily apparent reason, his star began to wane. He spent a month on loan at Cardiff City, playing 5 games and scoring his first senior goal returning in March 2012, with niggling hamstring and knee injuries that meant his season had been curtailed. Ironically, his next appearance was as an early sub in a Europa League qualifying round tie, coming on for cruciate victim Ryan Taylor, who’d not be seen for 2 years in a first team shirt. Vučkić made the most of his chance, grabbing the only goal, sending the Magpies through to the group stages. He started the first of these games, a 1-1 draw away to Maritimo, as well as a 2-1 League Cup loss at Old Trafford the week after, but he was withdrawn each time. An injury to his knee sustained in the latter game ended his season and, as far as can be told, robbed him of the pace that helped him to function as an attacking threat.

Perhaps this injury, as well as his slow recovery, meant his card was marked as an underachiever. Haris was now about to embark on his fifth full season as a Newcastle player. He returned for his usual League Cup outings against Morecambe and Leeds (you know that’s what Eric and Ernie would have been called if they’d both adopted their birthplaces as stage names), but was nowhere near the first team. Eventually, he left for Rotherham United on loan and stayed until the end of the campaign, making 22 appearances and scoring 4 goals as The Millers achieved promotion to the Championship via the play-offs.

It was widely assumed he’d sign permanently for Rotherham and Vučkić made it clear he was keen on such a move, but it didn’t happen for whatever reason and he returned to Tyneside, but now in the number 23 shirt vacated by Shola Ameobi as the laughable, alleged striker Emanuele Riviere had claimed 29 ahead of the Slovenian former Wonder Kid. 2014/2015 started late for Vučkić; his first appearance was as a substitute in a 4-0 League Cup howking at Spurs in mid-December, followed by 8 minutes at Old Trafford in a 3-1 reverse on Boxing Day, before his last appearance in an NUFC shirt, which was an atrocious 1-0 non-performance by the whole squad, away to Leicester in the third round of the FA Cup. Astonishingly though, this dismal failure was not the end for him; from that point on, the only way was up for Vučkić.

Whatever Mike Ashley’s connections are with Rangers these days, they were close enough to see 5 of our fringe players journey to Ibrox on loan on deadline day at the end of January. These included Swiss defender Kevin Mbabu who has never made a senior appearance, Burundian midfielder Gael Bigirimana who scored in the 3-0 win over the Latics in December 2012 but hasn’t been seen in a black and white shirt since, leaden-footed centre back Remy Streete who is now a Port Vale player and proud follower of County Derry’s Gaelic Football team Shane Ferguson, who presumably kept that interest and everything else about his family background quiet while on the payroll of Her Majesty’s Team. Of those 4, the first two were permanently injured and the latter pair only played a couple of games each. The only success was Vučkić.

My Scottish team are Hibs, so I’ve seen a fair bit of Scottish Championship “football;” it isn’t great to be honest. What I’d seen convinced me Vučkić would be a massive hit at that level and so he was. Frankly, he looked like Zinedine Zidane in such company. His lack of pace was countermanded by speed of thought, strength and the ability, unseen south of the border, to find the net on a regular basis. He scored 8 goals, several of them spectacular solo efforts or thundering drives, in 15 games as Rangers just missed out on promotion, losing in the play-off to Motherwell. Same as the season before, Vučkić was keen to move permanently to a club that had offered him a chance of regular football at a level commensurate with his impaired skill set. However the complex and intractable financial problems that the Ibrox outfit remain beset by meant they couldn’t afford him. Instead James Tavernier is looking like Roberto Carlos against Alloa and Dumbarton.

So, what can you expect? Strength, power, tackling, physical presence, a few goals and regular absences through injury. Being positive, his two successful seasons have been out on loan; if he stays fit and replicates his form at Rotherham, he’ll serve you well. If he gets injured and fails to get regular game time, I can see a “contract cancelled by mutual agreement” scenario in summer 2016. One positive thing is that there hasn’t been a scrap of gossip about the lad in his almost 7 years on Tyneside. He probably knows he hasn’t got it in him to succeed at the top level, but he’s an honest pro and he deserves an even break. As do the Latics.

Ferry 0 Hull 4

I'm incredibly proud to be featured in issue 5 of Northern Correspondent, alongside such superb writers as Harry Pearson. I urge you to buy the magazine from www.northerncorrespondent.com - the magazine is beautifully designed and packed with 130 pages of excellent writing from this region. My piece is a discussion on why I believe Alan Hull and Lindisfarne are of far greater regional, cultural significance than Bryan Ferry and Roxy Music. In addition, it seems clear to me Newcastle has always been a city of long haired, anti establishment types, rather than clean cut conformists.

Perhaps one of the most unexpected temptations granted by the social media revolution is the opportunity for those of us whose teenage lives were, in Philip Larkin’s phrase, “a forgotten boredom” to reinvent one’s younger self as, say, a glamorous, Bohemian prime mover in the Tyneside punk explosion. However the obloquy that would descend if one were to be caught reimagining the mid to late 70s by someone who remembers you were actually in the bar when Joy Division supported The Buzzocks, is reason enough to be truthful. Thus I can honestly state that in 1976, when the likes of Penetration and Speed were championing  the north east New Wave, I was 12 years old and listening, in equal measures, to Lindisfarne’s Finest Hour and Viva Roxy Music!

Though I was too young to realise it, I was straddling a key cultural divide, by liking the region’s two most successful bands. Then, the lines of musical and sartorial demarcation were explicit. Mid 70s Geordies  opted for either long-haired, scruffy, down-to-earth Lindisfarne: recently reformed and selling out the City Hall for a run of their legendary Christmas Shows, or immaculately attired, sophisticated and glacially aloof Roxy, who were in the midst of a mid-decade hiatus that allowed Bryan Ferry to pursue both his solo career and Jerry Hall. The band you preferred was often decided by social class; the shipyards, factories and pits employed the hairies in overalls and hobnails from North Shields, Longbenton and West Denton, while Bath Lane College, the Ministry and Civic Centre harboured deskbound smoothies from Gosforth, Monkseaton and Cochrane Park.

Despite Bryan Ferry’s claim that Newcastle in the 1960s was “a Mod town,” the evidence says otherwise. Scooters and parkas were a Home Counties phenomenon; Eric Burdon and The Animals knew the blues and they knew how to rock. No wonder their bassist Chas Chandler became manager of Jimi Hendrix and then Slade. On Tyneside guitars and facial hair held sway. Even the Skinhead movement in the early 70s was restricted to a handful of peripheral sink estates and soon died out, leaving no discernible stamp on the region’s identity.

Perhaps the most striking difference between Lindisfarne and Roxy, other than the former’s preference for denim-clad mandolins compared to the latter’s androgynous synthesisers, were their leaders; Benwell born former psychiatric nurse Alan Hull and Washington raised, though Holland Park dwelling, fine art graduate Bryan Ferry. Hull was an unapologetic, unreconstructed Geordie all his life; a committed socialist, a renowned bevvy merchant, who released a protest single when Scottish & Newcastle Breweries were subject to a takeover bid, and devoted family man whose horizons extended as far as moving to Whickham to bring the bairns up “somewhere safe.” Alan appeared on the Old Grey Whistle Test in 1972 attired in a full Newcastle United kit, singing (what else?) Fog on the Tyne.

Hull and fellow singer, Wallsend native Ray Jackson, looked what they were; normal, working-class lads, albeit supremely talented ones. They were role models because they were ordinary and credible. In an interview with Melody Maker in early 73, Hull pointed out “most of the groups we meet were born with silver spoons in their mouths; we were born with pickaxes in ours.” This may not have been strictly true, as bandmates Rod Clements and Simon Cowe had been educated at fee-paying Kings’ School in Tynemouth, but statements like these had the required effect on their intended audience. Geordies knew that Lindisfarne were decent blokes. Unquestioningly, the overwhelming majority of north east men under 25 in the 1970s selected a uniform that comprised hair worn significantly below the collar, bike jackets or Afghans, cheesecloth shirts, flared Wranglers and cowboy boots. These lads drank Brown Ale or Exhibition in bars like the Haymarket, the Farmers, the Percy, the Hotspur and the Jubilee. They didn’t attend gallery previews or contemporary dance shows. They headbanged to heavy rock at the Mayfair every Friday night.

In contrast to Alan Hull, few people nowadays associate Ferry with the north east, partly on account of him hightailing it to the Smoke in summer 68. By the mid-70s, he was viewed with suspicion verging on contempt by the vast majority on Tyneside, because there was something of the Smart Alec about him. Bryan Ferry’s escape from what he saw as stifling provincialism acted as a beacon for those marooned up here, who harboured pretensions of social advancement and adventure, if not the chance to wear outlandish fashions and step out with dolly birds.

There is good reason to forget Ferry’s roots; despite his subsequent rediscovery of regional ties (mainly during Kevin Keegan’s tenure of Newcastle United, when his professed love of the Magpies seemed as convincing as Tony Blair’s), he sought to distance himself from his upbringing. Indeed other than inserting the word “Geordies” into a live version of Do The Strand recorded at the City Hall in October 75 and his tell-tale enunciation of the line “how can he be happy” in Let’s Stick Together, Ferry has made it his business to sound like a minor member of the aristocracy the whole time he’s been in the public eye.

One interesting revelation in former Guardian journalist Michael Walker’s book about north east football, Up There, is that former England international and Everton manager Howard Kendall played for the same school team at Fatfield Juniors as Bryan Ferry. Unsurprisingly, Kendall confides, young Ferry wasn’t the most naturally gifted of players and gave up the game on starting Washington Grammar. These days Ferry’s interest in sport seems to be confined to unstinting praise of the hunting, shooting and fishing activities (referred to euphemistically as “country pursuits”) of his convicted felon son Otis. In a recent interview Ferry praised Otis for wanting to live a traditional rural lifestyle, which isn’t the only daft thing Ferry has said in an interview.

Never being one to turn down the opportunity to praise David Cameron (sample quote; “he’s a bright guy”), Ferry has amply demonstrated his adoption of a socially conservative value system, not Thatcherism but the ancien regime brand of Toryism, beloved of the landed gentry and other recipients of old money: playing benefit gigs for the Countryside Alliance and signing a letter to The Guardian urging a No vote in the Scottish Independence Referendum for instance. Rather more disturbing was his 2007 eulogy of the Third Reich’s imagery and iconography; “the way that the Nazis staged themselves and presented themselves, my Lord!...I'm talking about the films of Leni Riefenstahl...And the buildings of Albert Speer and the mass marches and the flags. Just fantastic. Really beautiful.”

Thankfully, Ferry apologised unreservedly for this, but it was a bizarre thing for someone who was born in September 1945 to say. One can only speculate what Alan Hull, born six months earlier than Ferry, who stood for the Labour Party in council elections, would have said about such foolish inanity. Sadly, speculation is all that is possible as Alan Hull died suddenly on November 17^th 1995. It was tragic someone so talented passed on so young. There is the legacy of his songs; Lady Eleanor, Winter Song and Clear White Light assure Hull’s name will live on, as will Ferry because of Virginia Plain, Street Life and Mother of Pearl.

Of course both bands had peaked before punk, with their later releases only pale shadows of their original genius, but I’d like to think Alan Hull would be delighted to know there’s a blue plaque on the side of the City Hall paying tribute to all the wonderful gigs he gave there.That’s why, when considering the influence of Ferry and Hull, Lindisfarne and Roxy Music, on the region, I always think of Ashington’s own Jack Charlton’s famous words; “our kid was the better footballer, but I’m the better bloke.”

Musical tribalism was once so ingrained in our region’s youth culture, as exemplified by the running battles in town and on public transport between long hairs and punks on June 12^th 1980, when Rush played the City Hall while The Clash were at the Mayfair, but such fanaticism now seems anachronistic. Teenagers and students these days seem so much more open-minded and eclectic in their tastes, giving download space to a multiplicity of genres and eras. It may make them less discerning, but also more tolerant and receptive to a wider range of styles than previous generations. However such cultural catholicism may be something certain oldsters are learning already; when Ray Jackson assembled his own Lindisfarne to play triumphant City Hall Christmas gigs in 2013 and 2014, as well as involving Alan Hull’s son-in-law Dave Denholm on guitar and vocals, Jacka persuaded Paul Thompson to play drums. That’s the same Paul Thompson who made his name in; you’ve guessed it, Roxy Music…

Octoberfest

It seems an absolute age since I last wrote about my cultural adventures; 22^nd June to be precise. The reason for my desire to talk about music and books now is mainly in response to the recent death of Lindisfarne founder member Simon Cowe. Camp Terrace reared Si left the north east and the music business for good in the early 90s, and emigrated to Canada, where he forged a new and highly successful career for himself as a real and craft ale brewer.

Si’s most famous composition was “Uncle Sam,” which remains my favourite song from “Fog on the Tyne.” Having already decided to ignore the so-called Lindisfarne Christmas Show at the City Hall this year as Ray Jackson has retired, only for Rod Clements to replace him in a less than authentic nostalgia fest, I had always thought about seeing Ray Laidlaw and Billy Mitchell’s Lindisfarne Story, but had somehow not got round to it, having twice opted to see Ray Jackson’s fabulous Christmas shows. Si’s death put things in perspective and I got myself a ticket for the almost sold out Whitley Bay Playhouse gig on 4^th October.

I’m very glad I did, as it was a fascinating show in two halves. Ray Laidlaw utilised a range of bongos, snare drums and other percussion instruments, while Billy Mitchell played guitar. Between songs, the two of them effortless narrated the story from their earliest days growing up in North Shields until Si’s death last week, aided by photos, film clips and sound excerpts from their whole career. Now as someone who adores the band’s oeuvre from “Nicely out of Tune” to “Roll On Ruby,” as well as the Jack the Lad and Alan Hull detours, I was particularly keen on the first half of the show, which ended around the turn of the 1970s. Great to hear versions of “Lady Eleanor” and “Meet Me on the Corner” as well.

At the interval, I thought this was one of the best nights I’d had all year. However, my personal preferences meant I lost a little interest once “Back and Fourth” came along. My suggestion would be, for the delectation of utter anoraks like me, that they get Jacka involved if at all possible. He could have given his side of the post “Dingley Dell” split, which was slightly brushed under the carpet. I must admit to not having heard the albums the band did from the 80s onwards; only feeling revulsion when I heard about their projects with Paul Gascoigne and the rock and roll covers album. Of course, for narrative completeness, those parts had to be dealt with. For someone without the devotion to their first few albums that I have, this would have been a 9.5/10 show, but for me it was 8.5/10, purely for reasons of personal preference. Wonderful to hear “Uncle Sam” in Si’s memory though. I may even go to The Sage shows in late November.

Other than this event, I’ve only been to 2 gigs since I last wrote about music. The first was the incredibly pedestrian and somewhat dull Home Fries Friday of the Americana weekend outside The Sage. At this stage, I remember nothing of the erstwhile charms of Caroline Mary, El Cid, Michael Littlefield or Gilded Thieves, though I did enjoy the blues shouter Miss Mary, who was accompanied by sometime Martin Stephenson collaborator Joe Guillen on guitar. After them, I cleared off to watch some cricket, with a clear conscience. Football and cricket kept me busy on the Saturday and Sunday, so I don’t feel I missed out on much. It all gets a bit samey, though a collection of bladdered Glaswegian gays and lesbians falling down Ballast Hill bank with their carry-outs, as part of Newcastle Pride, was a diverting sight. Shame the same couldn’t be said of the acts on stage.

However, the other gig I attended was a stunning evening; a landmark event in the development of a band I’ve long championed. It’s no secret that I adore anything and everything Trembling Bells have done. At last, with the release of The Sovereign Self the band are starting to get the kind of reviews, recognition and crucially, audiences they deserve. As far as I’m concerned, The Sovereign Self is the album of 2015, without question and Where is Saint George? is the song of the year. Whether they’re being folky, proggy or psych, Trembling Bells effortlessly and inspirationally scale the heights of artistic greatness. They deserve to be huge and I hope they will be; look at all their albums, there has been progression not deterioration from 2009 until now.

The best thing about their performance at The Cumberland Arms in Byker on 13^th August was the fact I had to stand at the back. You see, every other time I’ve seen them; the audience has been so sparse I’ve ended up right at the front. The vastly increased turnout meant people who’d never had the pleasure were seeing this astonishing band in the flesh before could do so without the distraction of a pissed middle-aged tramp ranting and raving in front of them…

Anyway, one tiny worry for me had been the lack of The Wide Majestic Aire on The Sovereign Self. However I needn’t have worried; this stand-out track will be the centre piece to an EP out late this year. Two other points; Alex needs to learn the proper words to The Auld Triangle and I wish Lavinia all the best on her PGCE Primary course. If she’s one tenth the teacher she is a singer, she’ll be Minister for Education in the Scottish Parliament by 2017.

I’ve bought two other albums recently; Yo La Tengo’s acoustic Stuff Like That There is pleasant enough, but it is far from being either memorable or essential. Two new tracks, three revisits, including In and Out of Movies, and a bunch of covers, played in a restrained, understated style are all absolutely lovely, but they didn’t really engage me. I understand with their punishing touring schedule and other projects, there may not be time to write a whole album’s worth of material, but exercises in treading water like this do little to widen their appeal or satisfy long term supporters. If Teenage Fanclub can take half a decade over each album, then so can Yo La Tengo.

At the other end of the creative spectrum are The Band of Holy Joy, who are undoubtedly in as rich a vein of form as their late 80s heyday. Live shows are applauded by all who see them, making my guilt at missing their two recent Teesside shows even more pronounced and their new album, The Land of Holy Joy is garnering fabulous reviews everywhere. I can only add to that, as it certainly vies with Godspeed You! Black Emperor as runner up to Trembling Bells in album of the year stakes. Together with last year’s Easy Listening, this pair of releases has established BoHJ as essential listening for anyone who wishes to understand the rotten core of current society. Johny Brown is a warrior poet of the dispossessed and his band, perhaps the first true rock Band of Holy Joy he’s ever put together, are the finest set of musicians imagine. For instance, James Finn’s guitar on the stunning Crass Harry is 2015’s virtuoso musical moment for me. If you want to buy 2 albums that sum up this year, get The Land of Holy Joy and The Sovereign Self; you will not regret it.

The other album I’ve come into possession of was my birthday present from Laura; an original Folkways release from 1955; Union Songs by Pete Seeger and the Almanac Singers, which was an augmented edition of the original 1941 version.  What a treasure; members of the American Communist Party singing songs of freedom and rebellion. Admittedly the delivery is the stentorian side of strident and this can cause fuzziness at the top notes in the recording, but I’m bloody glad I have it. However, I’m utterly amazed Joe Hill isn’t on there, but Casey Jones and Union Maid have me tunelessly barking along, with clenched left fist raised.

As far as reading goes, I’ve only managed to get through 3 books in all this time, which is frankly a disgrace. Indeed the only novel I’ve read is Texas Summer by Terry Southern; a minor, but diverting slice of southern gothic bildungsroman. Southern was a talented author and screenwriter, but Texas Summer is one of his last works, completed during his final, terminal illness and perhaps for that reason it isn’t either long or convincing enough to be a classic, though I enjoyed the wistful tragicomedy of small town USA in the immediate post war era.

I was delighted to be included in Jon Tait’s history of the Northern Alliance, which compiles exhaustive statistics with anecdotes from players, managers, officials and fans from the proper Geordie non-league. The book Goalmouth may have a restricted audience, but I’m convinced all those who read it will find it a treasure trove of recondite trivia and preserved ephemera.

The last book I’ve read is another sporting one. Jack Chapman’s wonderful account of 250 years of amateur cricket in County Durham; Cream Teas and Nutty Slack. Remarkably, it seems everyone I watch non-league football with has a connection with Jack; I used to be a GCSE English examiner under his tutelage, my pals Gary and the Hudson brothers were taught by Jack at Hedworthfield, Phil helped Jack with his research at the Central Library and Jack sent Harry P a copy of the book, which he loaned to me. It is an exhaustive, encyclopaedic labour of love and confirmed my desire to be a local cricket hopper when the wonderful NEPL starts again next April. I will also hunt down Jack’s history of Blaydon Cricket Club, where he has been a stalwart member for over half a century, as soon as I can.

Jack’s previous job was as an English teacher, so perhaps he’d be proud of my membership of Shakespeare Club at the Lit & Phil. On the first Thursday of every month, led by Northumbria academic Adam Hansen, a dozen of us, of all ages and backgrounds, gather to read the complete works, play by play, in First Folio order. I wasn’t in at the start, but so far I’ve participated in fascinating and rewarding sessions on Merchant of Venice, As You Like It and Taming of the Shrew. Our next meeting is 5^th November, when All’s Well That Ends Well is the text under the microscope. It’s free, stimulating and utterly democratic. Come along if you can…

After almost 5 decades of never setting foot in the Lit & Phil, I’m becoming a regular. There’s a talk on Shakespeare’s authorship on 24^th November and Euros Childs on 10^th December, but there was also Harry Pearson and Michael Walker in discussion a few weeks back. Knowing both fellas, having read their books and so on, it was a bit like the Trembling Bells gig; people who didn’t know their work enjoying two of the most eloquent commentators on local football in a charming atmosphere. Superb fun for free; and even better when he had a good session in the newly refurbished and highly recommended Head of Steam afterwards.

One other event of note was a talk at Northumbria University by Michael Chaplin, son of Syd, mate of Harry and who I’d last seen in the Lit & Phil. He was discussing his book; There is a Green Hill, which is an updating of his father’s 1951 The Lakes to Tyneside. Both are accounts of scenic walks in the north east, with added philosophical, political and cultural musing about the nature of the North East. Interesting Michael and the social scientist academic he was in discussion with both feel Teesside is no longer emotionally part of the North East as they align themselves more with Yorkshire. Useful to know if Boro come up and us and the Mackems go down. Anyway it was an engaging and informative event, as a prelude to the Jeremy Corbyn Campaign’s celebration do at the Irish Centre that saw an outbreak of unchecked, undialectical dancing…

So, what’s next? The Tyneside Irish Festival. Gigs by Penetration (plus an album), Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Christy Moore, The Wedding Present, Vic Godard and Euros Childs, plus some proper reading I hope.

Caledonia Uber Alles

I'm delighted to be in issue #2 of "Hopeless Football Romantic," which is the brainchild of Stuart Mole, who will be delighted to sell you a copy (http://www.hopelessfootballromantic.com/). My piece is about my enduring love affair with the Scottish Juniors -:

It’s fair to say I like football, especially the grassroots version. During season 2014/2015, I saw a game every single Saturday from July 5^th, a pre-season friendly between my club Newcastle Benfield and Annan Athletic, all the way through to June 6^th; that’s 49 successive weeks. Of course, keen students of UEFA regulations will note that all domestic leagues that define themselves as winter competitions and are part of Platini’s protectorate must finish their domestic programme by the end of May, though they can finish considerably sooner. For instance, Benfield kicked their final ball on April 25^th and the lowest level of organised senior football in my region, the Tyneside Amateur League, of which I am proud to call myself Chair, wrapped things up with a 1-1 draw between Gosforth Bohemians Reserves and Hazlerigg Victory on May 20^th.  While national sides have always played games in June, it was something of a surprise to see the Champions’ League final played on June 6^th, as UEFA regulations had previously expressly prohibited club football in the sixth month.

Of course, it isn’t compulsory to be a part of UEFA. Indeed, a certain stratum of Scottish sporting culture has long led the way by having nothing to do with FIFA and their meddling, as running parallel to the senior game in Scotland, is a national (though regionalised) competition that includes 161 clubs, playing at a wildly varied standard in front of wildly varying  crowds in wildly varying stadia. I give you, the Scottish Junior Football Association.

Straightaway the title of the organisation may lead some to assume it is a youth league. However the term "Junior" does not relate to the age of players. Football for youngsters is generally known as "Youth" or "Juvenile.” In the late 19th century, membership of the Scottish FA conferred "Senior" status on league clubs who were exclusively professional and the Junior grade developed separate to the SFA framework, with part-time players. If you think the term Junior is illogical, think about our phrase “non-league,” which is plainly daft as every team play in a league. Today, Senior football in Scotland is played in the Scottish Professional Football League, as well as the four potential feeder leagues, the Highland Football League, the Lowland Football League, the East of Scotland Football League and the South of Scotland Football League, of which only the first provides a standard of football demonstrably above parks level. Over time, Scottish football developed its current pattern with either Junior or Senior non-leagues taking precedence in various parts of the country. Confusingly, there is also Scottish Amateur Football Association, but we’ll not even go there, as this article is about the Juniors who, being outside UEFA jurisdiction, unilaterally state their season must finish by “2pm on the third Saturday in June, regardless of the date,” as this is when the Juniors have their AGM.

As a result, I found myself in Memorial Park on the outskirts of Glenrothes in Fife on June 6th, with approximately 200 other weirdos, oddballs and social inadequates from the groundhopping fraternity, watching Thornton Hibs claim the McBookie East of Scotland North Division, with a 4-0 hammering of Lochee Harp from Dundee. Despite the obvious Irish roots of both teams, there was not a hint of sectarianism at the game; in my experience football, like much else, in the east of Scotland is considerably more relaxed and less intense than in the West. There may have been another game on that date between Barca and Juve, but as far as I was concerned, this was Europe’s premier club contest and a fitting climax to the 2014/2015 season. It was also the 12^th different Juniors ground (9 in the West region and 3 in the East) I’d set foot on since my inaugural trip to see Pollok 1 Arthurlie 2 in February 2003, so I’ve a long way to go to complete my set. Unlike my mate Mick, who got me interested in the Juniors on one of my regular trips north of the border. Mick moved from Ashington, first to Cowdenbeath in 1997 and then to Paisley, home of St Mirren, in 2001. He tried season tickets at both his local sides, which enabled him to complete all 42 Scottish league grounds. This done, he embarked on a never-ending tour of the West and East Juniors, both of which he’s now completed. The Sunday Post now employs him and another bloke who lives in Paisley, but comes from Newbiggin, to do match reports from the Juniors.  

In the North region, which covers the Grampian and Moray areas and where the Junior game is at its weakest on account of the strength of the Highland League, 37 clubs play in one of the Super League or the geographically split West and East divisions. Up there, other than around Aberdeen, games tend to be played on glorified park pitches. The Scottish Junior Cup, which has been contested since 1886, has only twice been won by clubs in the current North region; the last being Banks O’Dee in 1957. Even Mick hasn’t bothered investigating the North region. Yet. Moving further south, stretching from Montrose to Dunbar, is the East region, where 61 clubs play in 4 divisions; the East Super League, the East Premier League, the East North division and the East South division.  Here, the powerhouses of the game are found in the East and West Lothian regions; these include Linlithgow Rose, whose Prestonfield ground is a glorious arena, their hated local rivals Bo’ness United, Musselburgh Athletic, who lost in the final of this year’s Junior Cup which was played at Kilmarnock’s Rugby Park, as well as near neighbours, the twin Thistles of Armadale and Bathgate Thistle, who play at the magnificently named Volunteer Park and Creamery Park, which I’ve visited twice. The East region has competition from the Seniors, in the shape of the ostensibly higher standard East of Scotland League, which is strong in the Borders, but weaker elsewhere. It does have some magnificently named members though, in the shape of Civil Service Strollers and Burntisland Shipyard. Without question, East region facilities and playing standards are higher in the Juniors  than the Seniors from all I’ve seen and read.

However, the real jewel in the Juniors’ crown is the West region, incorporating the strongest teams at this level who are drawn primarily from the former Ayrshire coalfield. The top four teams in the West Premier were all from this area; Auchinleck Talbot, Hurlford, Irvine Meadow XI and Glenafton Athletic. Auchinleck Talbot hold all the bragging rights this season; winners of the West league, Ayrshire Cup and Scottish Juniors Cup, while their loathed local rivals Cumnock (games between the two can attract crowds of 3,000; as many as Ross County or St Mirren get!) were relegated. There are 63 clubs in 5 divisions; a Premier and First Division, two Central Divisions and an Ayrshire League. The main Glasgow clubs are Pollok and Arthurlie, who also attract crowds in four figures to their well-appointed Dunterlie Park and Newlandsfield grounds. The grounds are bigger and better; some even have floodlights. The award for best named ground must go to Larkhall Thistle, who call Gasworks Park their home. The one geographical anomaly are Kelloe Rovers from Kirkconnell in Dumfriesshire, who are the only Junior side in an area dominated by the frankly dire South of Scotland League. If you’re intending to go to Kirkconnell, as I did for a 4-1 loss to Yoker Athletic on June 8^th 2013, take a packed lunch; there are no shops in the village. In fact, there isn’t anything other than the football club, whose social club is a portakabin called The Rovers’ Return.

So, as we’ve established, the fact the campaign ends in a flurry of Cup finals in early to mid-June (I didn’t bother on June 13^th, as the three games were at grounds I’d already visited) gives you an excuse for a late season football fix. Mind, as well as having the authentic Scottish summer experience of bathing in pale sunshine while being devoured by midges, I’ve also shivered on Caledonian terraces in the winter. You see I don’t just love Scottish football, I am a passionate devotee of Scottish indie music and home town gigs by the likes of Teenage Fanclub, The Pastels or Belle & Sebastian make ideal excuses for a weekend away, especially when combined with a Junior game. At the end of May, a trip to see Ride at Barrowlands on the Friday was embellished by a Saturday trip to Irvine Meadow XI v Arthurlie in a West of Scotland Cup semi-final (each Juniors club plays in a minimum of 4 cup competitions each season). Cup ties are something else. While games in the West kick off at 2.00 and in the East at 2.30, when there’s a cross regional cup draw, games start at 2.15; that’s what I call a proper compromise. Also, if the game is drawn after 90 minutes, it goes straight to penalties.

Irvine is not a scenic spot on the whole; blighted by unemployment, social deprivation and rampant sectarianism (the world’s first Orange Lodge is a few miles down the road in Kilwinning), it does boast the atmospheric Meadow Park. Having lunched on Scotch pie and Irn Bru, I took my spot on the terrace next to the man with the worst case of Tourette’s in Ayrshire. The fact Irvine went into a quick 2-0 lead didn’t satisfy him; he berated his team in the strongest manner possible. There is something so stylish about Scottish cursing don’t you think? He gave his vocabulary free rein all afternoon, especially when Arthurlie came back to 2-2, courtesy of a horrific keeper error and a last minute equaliser. The script was written; Arthurlie were 6-5 up when a home player thundered his kick against the top of the bar. Mr Sweary responded to this misfortune less than stoically, with an impassioned bellow of “YOU F*****G NODDY,” as the unfortunate lad slumped to his knees. That image and that sound are, in a nutshell, why I’ll keep going back to obscure, bleak corners of Scotland to watch games of questionable quality at ramshackle grounds for many years to come.

Joyousness

Sadly last week I was so busy, I missed two Band of Holy Joy gigs on Teesside. However their astonishing new album "The Land of Holy Joy" is available now from http://www.stereogramrecordings.co.uk/audio/the-land-of-holy-joy-band-of-holy-joy-cddl-album/ and I urge you to buy it. Also out this week is PUSH 18, another essential purchase from joe.england64@gmail.com - to square this circle, here's an interview I did with my dear friend Johny Brown from The Band of Holy Joy that appeared in PUSH 17.

July 1977. The first Saturday evening of the six weeks holidays in Newcastle upon Tyne. Two weeks previously Queen Elizabeth II had been in town on her Silver Jubilee tour. Six weeks earlier my cousin John brought the Chilside Road Jubilee street party to a juddering, premature close by repeatedly blasting The Pistols through his open bedroom window. A week earlier Mohammed Ali had turned up on Tyneside to officially open Eldon Square shopping centre. He drew a bigger crowd than Mrs Windsor and autographed my mate Roy Fox’s copy of Pretty Vacant that he bought in Listen Ear that morning.    Now, three weeks shy of my 13^th birthday, I’m at my first ever punk gig. The University Theatre has been occupied by a disparate gang of lefties, artists, students, beatniks and other marginal subcultural species, after it was announced that funding would cease and the place could close. Tonight is a benefit gig to raise funds for the protest. Four of us take the 59 from Felling Square into town; wander up Northumberland Street, drop 30p each in collection buckets and take an uncomfortable pew on the sagging velvet couches in what is normally the bar area, which is closed. Three bands are playing; local long hairs Raven top the bill, ironic comic book new wave funsters Harry Hack and The Big G are on middle, but first up are Speed. A female drummer smashes the kit like she’s a grudge against all snares and cymbals. The bespectacled bassist is wearing a rugby shirt. He can’t play properly. The guitarist, all bike jacket, bleached hair and defiant poses slashes away at barre chords on numbers such as Suck, Job Shop and Gonna Hit You. The singer seems shy, almost diffident. He’s in a blue v neck jumper and clean, white shirt; like he’s just taken his school tie off before coming to the gig. He’s electrified once the music starts though. Mesmerising. He’s called Johny Fusion and he changes my life. I don’t see the bloke again for ten years, save a quick glimpse of him from the upstairs window of the 529 walking down Gateshead High Street, clutching a blue Adidas holdall.

December 1987.  Surfers Bar. Tynemouth.  A freezing Wednesday by the bleak North Sea two days before Christmas.  I’m living in Leeds, where that autumn I’d seen Big Black, The Swans, The Gun Club, Age of Chance and The Men They Couldn’t Hang, but this was the one I had to come back for. Summer 87 my mate Karl introduced me to the work of this incredible group, who amalgamated Viennese klezmer music, with Brechtian tales of woe and excess on the streets of South London and North Tyneside. Rosemary Smith was outside North Shields Metro station in the first song I heard by this astonishing ensemble. I recognised the voice from a decade earlier; it’s unmistakably Johny, but he’s using his surname Brown now, as lead singer of the Band of Holy Joy. As a glorious, riotous, anarchic gig comes to its conclusion, I end up with a microphone in my hand, somehow, singing along with Johny to my favourite of theirs; Who Snatched The Baby? I’ve never heard them play it live since that night. Three days later, floating deliriously out of the Gallowgate after beating Man United 1-0 on Boxing Day, who do I fall into conversation with going out the ground? Johny Brown.

May 2015. Johny’s 54^th birthday. The night before he completed a 10 kilometre sponsored run for Mencap. Two weeks previously, the night after the election and the day before his hometown team North Shields win the FA Vase (for amateur clubs) at Wembley, which Johny gives his ticket away for, he plays a gig with Band of Holy Joy at Newcastle Cluny. It is a triumphant homecoming and, over a backstage beer, I present him with a copy of PUSH #16.  He’d read us lots of times before, ever since Joe England sold Johny a copy of PUSH #7 at an Irvine Welsh reading down the Mile End Road. Johny’s partner Inga flicked through and came across the story A Quick One and said “Ian Cusack?” Two degrees of separation at most…

Small world it may be and Band of Holy Joy are a big part of mine. It hasn’t been a breeze for them; endless critical acclaim and public indifference. Shortening the name to Holy Joy then a hiatus for a decade from 1993. A false dawn of reformation, before another period in the long grass. However since 2007, Band of Holy Joy have released a series of ever improving albums, backed up with storming live performances and a regular presence on air at Resonance FM (check out their Friday night BAD PUNK show). Not only that, but Johny has assembled the best band he’s ever played with; Bill Lewington (drums), Mark Beazley (bass), James Stephen Finn (guitar), Peter Smith (keyboards), Inga Tillere (visuals) and Johny Brown (vocals and harmonica), who spared some precious time from recording their new album to answer some questions.

IC: 38 years is a hell of a long time to be involved at the margins of the music industry, however much quality you’ve produced. Where do you get your inspiration and motivation to keep doing stuff from? What would the 1977 Johny say to the modern day one?

JB: I think Bill and me both share an urge to improve as musicians. Bill especially is really driven, but maybe we’ve got something to prove as we weren’t exactly technically the best when we started, and this phase of the band is us trying to catch up and make records of worth at last. Stuff you can be really proud of. Though when most people our age have long thrown the towel in, it seems that we’re just limbering up.  Shadow boxing. The ability of the rest of the band and especially their dedication (all of them do stuff at Resonance as well) is so high that there’s definitely something to aim for. Being honest, I don’t think I’m ever going to be a proficient vocalist in the accepted sense, but I still like to try and work keenly with the limited range I’ve got. That’s why we did a cover of Don’t Dictate when Rob Blamire and Pauline Murray (of Penetration) came to see us, and of course we’ve been playing with Gary Chaplin recently, who is writing brilliant new material; it’s such a blast to do. Although it sounds like a new song to young bucks like James and Peter. What Goes On was for a Velvets tribute / Resonance benefit night. It fitted our strengths really well and was such good fun to do it has stuck around, and maybe it might point to where we might head on our next album musically, but who knows. At the minute we’re listening to lots of Sun Ra, The Monks, Ethiopian Funk and Joe Meek. I think the 1977 Johny would dig this 2015 version, as he was listening to Nuggets, funk and reggae back then, as well as punk, I would hope so anyway. He would be absolutely appalled at the thought of having to exert himself in any physical activity or do corporate charity fundraising shenanigans though.

You’ve been in London now for twice as long as you ever lived on Tyneside; which city do you prefer? If pushed, could you say which place feels more like home for you?

I think I’m lucky to have and know both places. Depending on mood and circumstance, both Newcastle and London are equally inspiring, stimulating, depressing, irritating, boring, life enhancing, soul destroying and so on. As the years pass, I grow more regretful that I never had the opportunity to live in Paris, Athens or NYC properly for an extended period of time. Being honest, I see this question as being as much about people as places. For instance, I would be happy to live in Latvia (Inga’s home country), I think, or indeed, as we’ve often talked about, Edinburgh or Glasgow.

Ah; Edinburgh, or Leith in particular. You’re great pals with Irvine Welsh, sharing a passion with him (and me) for Hibernian FC. How did either of those things come about? Is that why you shot the stunning video for “There Was A Fall / The Fall,” about the murder of Ian Tomlinson, with the superb Scottish actor (and Hibee) Tam Dean Burn? Your music isn’t expressly political in ideological terms, but there’s a strong sense of morality and social justice to it; how conscious is this?

A friend of mine Max moved up to Glasgow in about 1987 and we sort of fell into company with Irvine one time and hit it off really well. Quite ordinary really.  As a matter of fact, I went to my first Hibs match with Kenny MacMillan, a school mate of Irvine’s. It was a derby at Tynecastle, Hearts’s ground, on a really cold snowy New Year’s Day. We were still tripping from the previous night’s activities, but had a pretty dramatic comedown after a terrible nil nil that was probably the most dreary football match I’ve ever attended but I’ve had a soft spot for them ever since. Football players and teams come and go but it’s the supporters that make a club good or bad, mediocre or legendary in my book and I love the vibe at Easter Road . I get on well with a load of Hibee fans. Tam is a long-time friend and collaborator; I’ve done four stage plays with him and countless radio dramas. He’s looked after me a lot over the years. He’s a top man and a great fucking actor.  The best plays that Tam and myself have worked on together do have that strong sense of morality and social justice in them as well as a theme of unquestioning love for the underground and counter culture. Funnily enough, the only time we ever came a cropper, and it was a big cropper, was at the Traverse in the Festival, when we tried to write something that was expressly political in content and narrative. Disaster. Total. Don’t want to talk about it. Sniff.

Your last Newcastle gig was the day after the general election, as well as the day before your hometown club North Shields FC played at Wembley, to win the FA Vase. I know you gave up a ticket for that; any thoughts on the relative benefits to Shields of those two events?  And, staying in the north east, how do you feel about Newcastle United these days?

Bad timing for me, but a great day for the town and I do wish I’d been there. The election will do the town no favours at all. But then again, when have the powers that be ever thought about rough and unpolished diamonds like Shields? ‘A town where no town ought to be.’ I think Ralphie Gardner (the man responsible for North Shields becoming independent of Newcastle in the 17^th century) said that! As regards Newcastle, you used to find me in the Leazes End every other Saturday and any Wednesday night match from 72 to 77, but with the advent of punk, there seemed to be a mismatch between liking football and liking music. I don’t know if this was a peculiarly Geordie thing, but I  stopped going until I moved to London, then started again around 82, so most NUFC games in the south in the 80’s I was at. I still love Newcastle away; the collective craic and the vibe. I watch it on the internet on dodgy links these days as the Premier League is sadly mainly a TV spectacle. If I was signed up to a ten year season ticket deal, I would be tearing my hair out. It seems that the soul or spirit or whatever I knew Newcastle and our support had when I was a youth is gone. Imagine going for a pint with Mike Ashley or Lee Charnley? No, me neither.

I’m going to miss Upton Park.

The Band of Holy Joy’s next album, “A Night of Fire and Stars in the Land of Holy Joy,” is out on Stereogram records on September 21^st; more info from http://www.bandofholyjoy.co.uk/

BAD PUNK is on every Friday night at 10pm on Resonance FM; 104.4 if you live in London, http://resonancefm.com/ if you don’t

Close of Play

Just before 6pm on Sunday 13^th September, Chester Le Street 2nds clinched the Banks Bowl by dismissing Tynemouth 2nds for 160 to win by a margin of 79 runs. Comfortable enough in the end and perhaps no great surprise, considering Tynemouth had been forced into 7 changes due to unavailability, almost entirely occasioned by the Great North Run. Perhaps it was also a case of justice being done, as on August Bank Holiday, the first attempt at staging the final saw Chester Le Street amass 280 or thereabouts, before the rains came and washed away any chance of play before Tynemouth had a go at such an imposing target.  On a personal level, the conclusion of the game was tinged with sadness; not just because Tynemouth lost, but because it meant we had reached the end of the 2015 NEPL season. Well, possibly we have, but more of that later.

My previous cricket blog (http://payaso-de-mierda.blogspot.co.uk/2015/08/summertime-in-england.html) at the end of last month was written with South North poised to win the Premier Division in the penultimate round of games on the first Saturday in September; this not unexpected event duly occurred with a 9 wicket win away to Stockton, who were bowled out for 89. At the same time, Chester Le Street had a losing draw with Durham Academy to erase their slim, mathematical hopes. On that particular Saturday, with Benfield away to Marske United, I’d stayed local for my football, taking in a half at a couple of Tyneside Amateur League games between Newcastle East End and Wardley (3-0) and West Jesmond against Killingworth YPC (2-2), played on the superb 4G astro at Walker School, in my role as league chair. Not only was this a responsible thing for me to do, the earlier kick offs of 2pm in the TAL allowed me more time to see some cricket. At least, that was the plan…

On a rare day without the bicycle, I was reliant on public transport. The initial plan had been to head to Jesmond for Newcastle versus Benwell Hill.  However, the visitors were bowled out for 76 and the home side knocked the runs required off in 20 overs, so the game was over before I’d even made it to the Fossway. Consequently, I had no option but to head south side to the crunch relegation clash between Gateshead Fell and Blaydon. The good news is the mythical number 1 which goes from Whitley Bay to Kibblesworth heads through Low Fell. The bad news is it goes down Durham Road and not Old Durham Road, meaning I had to get off at Valley Drive and slog it up there on foot. Compounded with the fact that the bus takes an age, it meant I only saw about an hour’s play. Contrast this with my mate Raga, who had been to the 3pm kick-off 0-0 draw between Dunston and Ashington, before driving to the Fell in a matter of minutes, arriving before me. It was great to catch up with him and set foot in Fell’s ground for the first time in more than three decades.

Blaydon had to win this game if they were going to avoid relegation; sadly for them they were bowled out for 156 and saw Gateshead Fell achieve the target for the loss of four wickets. It must have been a crushing blow for Blaydon, but what genuinely moved me was the sincerity of the post-game handshake, especially when one considers what had been at stake in this meeting of local rivals.

The next day, Sunday 6^th, was glorious; just the sort of cloudless, late summer day on which to watch cricket, providing you could see properly that is. Waking in plenty of time at mine, I realised I had neglected to bring any of my newly delivered (to Laura’s) disposable lenses with me. Consequently, I had to throw myself at the mercy of Vision Express in Eldon Square, who found me a couple of pairs (spare set for emergencies), enabling me to head for the Banks Salver final at Eppleton against Tynemouth.  Again I was on public transport; this time the X1 to Easington Lane. It’s a great cricket bus; not only does it go up Old Durham Road, right past Gateshead Fell, but it also passes by several NEPL clubs in the former sunderland coalfields that must be on my agenda for visits next season: not only Eppleton, but also Hetton Lyons, Philadelphia and on to South Hetton, while Burnmoor and Washington aren’t too far off the X1 flight path. I’ll take it as read it goes close to South Hetton, as I got off at Hetton Le Hole, where Eppleton is located rather than continuing to the romantic terminus of Easington Lane.

Having only previously been in the area on a couple of occasions to see the former Northern League club Eppleton CW in what is now the Durham FA ground, I assumed the cricket club was in the same complex; not a bit of it. Thank goodness for phone GPS technology, which got me there without further mishap. Eppleton are blessed with a lovely, earthy, traditional ground as well; Jimmy Adams was the professional here back in the 90s. Sadly the enforced route march back through the village and messing around with lenses that caused me to get a later bus than I’d intended, resulted in me arriving after 10 overs, with the home side 31/2. For the first time when watching NEPL cricket, I was charged an entry fee; £1 with a programme. Perhaps more clubs should try this, as it must have earned Eppleton at least £100 with the healthy, partisan crowd in attendance.

Eppleton attract a very different following to Newcastle, South North or Tynemouth; you only have to hear the accents of both the players and supporters, who grew increasingly passionate and raucous as the game went on, to learn this. Alternatively, contrast the kind of dogs you see at games: Labradors and King Charles spaniels at Tynemouth; pit bulls and Jack Russells at Eppleton. This is unapologetically working class cricket and wonderful to see, including a knot of local Asian teenage lads following the game intently. Eppleton had all but secured the Division 1 title and promotion spot the day before, seeing off the challenge of both Burnmoor and Washington and will be a credit to the top division. I’d seen them once before this summer; easily disposing of Newcastle at Jesmond in the 20/20 quarter finals, with some lusty batting. 

They’d also scored 340 to beat Newcastle in the semi-final of the Salver, so it was no surprise to see Gary Burlison and Kamran Shah both hitting 75 to set Tynemouth a total of 225; exactly 5 an over. This total could and should have been much lower, but Tynemouth couldn’t hold their catches, unlike Eppleton who took the first 3 Tynemouth wickets with blinding bits of fielding. From that point, defeat became firstly likely, then inevitable as Tynemouth stumbled to 124 all out and a loss by exactly 100 runs. However, there was a silver lining to this defeat; ambling back down to the bus stop and preparing for a lengthy journey home, I was deeply humbled by Tynemouth Director of Cricket Vince Howe offering me a lift, not just part of the way, but to the end of my street back in High Heaton. Another reason for me to be grateful for discovering the wonderful world of local cricket.

And so to the last weekend of the season; on Saturday 12^th I played for Winstons in the Over 40s in the morning, drawing 1-1 away to sunderland Oddies in Pennywell (got lobbed for their goal; 3 yards off my line… schoolboy stuff), then headed to Benfield to see us lose 3-1 to a rejuvenated Bishop Auckland, who had lost 7-0 at Whitley Bay on the Tuesday. Well done to them. The weather, until around 4, was truly filthy; sheeting rain and a strong wind. As a result, the choice of either Tynemouth v Whitburn or South North v Newcastle (or the reverse fixture for the 2nds) was an academic one; all NEPL top division games were abandoned without a ball bowled. Therefore, Blaydon were relegated and replaced by Eppleton, who managed to reduce Boldon to 63/6 before their game was washed out by the second wave of rain across the region. Sunderland’s game fell foul to the weather as well, enabling Chris Youldon to turn out for Benfield. I bet South Shields wished Jonny Wightman had been available for them in Northern League Division 2; despite the goalscoring debut of Julio Arca and a crowd of nigh on 800, their stumbling start to what was assumed to be inevitable promotion continued with a 1-1 draw against hitherto pointless Stokesley.

Back to cricket; South Hetton finished bottom of the first division, but their relegation has not been confirmed just yet. Ordinarily, they should be replaced by Esh Winning (I’ve played Over 40s at their ground; we lost 7-0) who have won the Durham League, but there are concerns about the facilities and club infrastructure there (promotion would theoretically be for 3 Esh Winning teams, not just the first XI of course). Consequently the NEPL management committee have rejected Esh Winning’s application, though the club have appealed. A decision is expected this week; if their appeal is unsuccessful, South Hetton will host a play-off against Durham League runners-up Mainsforth (I’ve played there in the Over 40s against West Cornforth; won 2-0) next Saturday, or Sunday if it rains. Complex and exciting times; I don’t know anything about the 3 clubs involved, so I’ll remember the words of Thumper’s pa; “if’n you can’t say nuthin’ nice, then don’t say nuthin’ at all.”

Thankfully Sunday 13^th  saw splendid sunshine, providing the final chance of sunstroke for the season. Buses take forever to Chester Le Street, so I took the train. At the station, there are direction signs pointing to the cricket ground; they mean the Riverside of course, though Chester Le Street’s home of Ropery Lane is another lovely spot to watch cricket. The floodlights of the test venue in the distance show the proximity of the two grounds.

On arrival, with Chester Le Street 30 without loss, I was greeted by Vince, who again offered me a lift home; my gratitude abounds to him for that. The home side clocked up 239/9, with 15 year old Tynemouth bowler Owen Gourley, who had played football for Wallsend Boys Club in the morning, taking 7/53. Unfortunately, this wasn’t enough for either victory or the Man of the Match, as Matthew Cranston made 106 for the home side to take the award. Interestingly, players don’t get trophies for playing in finals; instead they get 2 pint vouchers to be used in the bar. Vince purloined a couple and we toasted the end of the season with some delicious Shropshire Gold for me and Bitter & Twisted for him. Perhaps the assembled grumpy and glum faced Mackems who’d made it back from their home defeat to Spurs should have been drowning their sorrows with that one.  

There weren’t many home players imbibing though; apparently the night before they’d had a serious end of season do. Newcastle 2^nd XI captain Phil Hudson, soon to be unveiled as a Popular Side contributor in issue 9, had also severely been on it the night before, celebrating his side winning the title. I felt his pain as he attempted, through the chokehold of a hangover, to explain the intricacies of the bonus points system in the NEPL. You need a degree in statistics to grasp the nuances and I was minded to agree with the apparent response of Captain Nicotine himself, Jacques Du Toit, when being told of the complexities of the system; “ach, if we fucking win, we fucking win and if we fucking lose, we fucking lose.” Well said that man!

So, as the sun sets on the 2015 season, statistics show I’ve now been to 7 Premier Division grounds, with Hetton Lyons, South Shields, Stockton and Whitburn still to be ticked off, but only Felling visited in the First Division. I can see what I’ll be doing on Saturdays and Sundays from next April onwards. Can’t you? Though I know I'll divide my support equally between Newcastle and Tynemouth, as South North are rich enough and successful enough without me following them. I'll still go to the beer festival of course.

In the First Class game, the county championship has 2 rounds of fixtures to go (even as I speak, Durham will be conjuring up more and more unlikely ways to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, to flirt agonisingly close to the relegation trap door; has John Carver got the job of batting coach at the Riverside I wonder?), not to mention the final of the Royal London Cup. While the bewildering pace of test cricket continues unabated, with tours against Pakistan and to South Africa on the horizon, the local club game has now gone into hibernation, though there is the small matter of the Tynemouth beer festival this weekend; tough decision whether to attend that or not, as it’s the same night as the  victory celebration for renowned cricket devotee Jeremy Corbyn at the Irish Centre. What would CLR James do? Attend both probably; it’s what I intend to do.