blind willie mctell

I'm writing about Willie McTell today but sometimes mere words can't do justice...

october 24th extract-emitt rhodes

Emitt Rhodes-Side We Seldom Show-Mirror

It’s not really possible or realistic to be writing a book of this nature and not to mention The Beatles. A bit like Elvis, they loom so large over late 20th century popular music that they’re impossible to ignore. Whenever I have a conversation with anyone about music that involves The Beatles, there always seems to be an inherent assumption that one should love or hate The Beatles. It’s a bit like following a football team. What I always find difficult to explain in conversation-and probably in print now-is how important and significant The Beatles were. The moment I mention this; the moment that I say that they were the biggest band ever and that there never will and never can be any group in popular music as influential as The Beatles then a light seems to faintly come on and it’s “ah, so you do love the Beatles then?” type moment. I find this totally exasperating. However much I try to explain that it isn’t really the point,  it always appears as if I’ve burnt my bridges and for all that I may have been raving about the newest album by The Fall or some wildly avant garde Japanese music, I’m really a just a fan of the four loveable moptops.

I do have mixed feeling about The Beatles. They’re just too big; too much of a myth and a monolith. It’s very difficult to work out what the essence of “The Beatles” is. They clearly are so much more than a 1960’s pop band that were commercially successful at the time. It’s not just The Beatles but “The Beatles”. You just can’t get away from them; just when you think that that last word has been said about them then they’re back again, every five years or so, and being cited as the main inspiration behind each successive generation of guitar bands. For a group that broke up forty years ago and didn’t even last for a decade that’s some achievement. They hang over Liverpool like a big cloud and each and every time that music is mentioned in the context of my city, then you know that The Beatles won’t be far behind. As a good example, a perfect example of this that with any television programme abut music in Liverpool and in fact with any documentary about Liverpool, then the stock footage of them playing at the Cavern will be wheeled out yet again.

For a long time the only Beatles albums I had were the Red and the Blue album, but of course I knew all their other songs, just like everybody else does. The Beatles though, didn’t exactly leave behind a massive body of work and their entire output of albums only takes up a small space on my shelves. Every few years of so-usually when they are back in vogue with the hip and fashionable-I pull them off the shelves, dust them down and listen to them all over again, vacillating between jaw-dropping admiration and extreme boredom.

I think that there’s a lot more of writing to be done about The Beatles before the end of the year but for now

1. Paul McCartney is one of the finest songwriters that Britain has ever produced.
2. John Lennon was a dickhead.
3.  Ringo Starr isn’t much better.
4. George Harrison?
5. Emitt Rhodes made some of the best songs that Paul McCartney never did.     

   

headliners for glastonbury 2013..the rolling stones?

there's been alot of speculation recently regarding the rolling stones headlining glastonbury 2013. bearing in mind that I gave them a bit of a battering in this blog some time ago and that I've got a ticket for glastonbury it leaves me in a bit of dilemma if they do play.

do I stick to my guns and see another band while the stones are playing or do I swallow my pride and see what all the fuss is about?

I still think that they are wholly overrated  but the new single is quite good (I'm sort of trying to convince myself at this point...)

glastonbury 2013...ticket..yes!

managed ..more by luck than anything else to get a ticket for glastonbury 2013 yesterday.

this blog therefore will increasingly be skewed towards glastonbury in the next few months I think.

but I'll still try to keep up with the usual mix of over-effusive praise for artists no-one really cares about and try to keep slagging off those ones everyone likes.

september 23rd extract-george jones

George Jones-Burn The Honky Tonk Down 

The number of things that I knew about George Jones before I started writing this piece are limited to three separate, but distinct, items. Firstly, he was married to Tammy Wynette. Secondly, he was fond of a drink or two. Thirdly. (I know that there isn’t such a word as thirdly but I’m writing about a country artist and although that doesn’t make difference I’ll bet the word is used in certain States of the U.S.) Thirdly, on one occasion when Tammy Wynette had hidden all the car keys in the house in a vain attempt to prevent George “nipping” out for a drink, she glanced out of the window to see George heading off down the road in a determined fashion, riding on his sit-down lawnmower. He was found a couple of miles away, having driven to the nearest bar and parked the lawnmower in the parking lot as if it was a normal car. (This third fact may not be entirely accurate, in part or in whole. It may not have been Tammy Wynette but one of George’s other wives who hid the keys. It may have not even have been George Jones but a different country singer altogether. There may not have been a lawnmower involved and it could have been a golf cart or some other sort of vehicle (Though I can’t think of anything else apart from a golf buggy or lawnmower that George-or whoever else it may have been-could have made a dash to freedom on.)  Of course, it may not even be a true story and may be something that I’ve half-remembered from a film or from reading somewhere. It may be some apocryphal myth thing, a shaggy dog tale that’s expanded over the years and has become associated (incorrectly) with country music stars. After all, it sounds like the sort of thing that country music stars of the 1960’s and 1970’s would do and even if it wasn’t true it would make a great subject for a country music song. Can you imagine it; “You took the car keys, I took the lawnmower”?)

Anyway, I’ve strung those three facts out for as much as I can. There are a couple of other snippets. I know that Elvis Costello covered Jones’ big hit “A Good Year For The Roses” on his (Costello’s) country album. I also know that George had hit after hit for decades and is, as far as I can tell, still going strong, despite giving his liver years of abuse. I think that he has been off the drink for a long time now and is a bit of a reformed character who only would use a lawnmower for cutting grass. (Wouldn’t a big star like George have a gardener? Maybe, in a down-home country style he does all his garden maintenance himself.) I think that his relationship with Tammy Wynette was tempestuous to say the least and that he’s been married at least three times. He has a nickname of Ol’ Possum because of his appearance. Coming from England and having no experience of possums this doesn’t mean anything to me nor does it make any sense. In any event why on earth do I know that fact-why has it stuck in my mind and of what possible use is it to me?     

the delgados vs the pixies

the delgados make the pixies look like one direction

three weeks today...7th Oct

three weeks today...7th October-I wonder if it'll be like this again-trying to get tickets for glastonbury

The number was already in the phone. It was just a case of redial and we would be through. Additionally the website was ready to refresh in case the phone option didn’t work. However, as soon as it was 9:01 the phone was “line busy please try later” again and again and again. The website kept crashing and wouldn’t get past the first page-even if it loaded at all. Still being optimistic we thought that this might be an initial rush and then we would be ok. As this continued for the first half hour or so it slowly dawned on us that this assumption was much too optimistic. It probably would be (as it really is) just a case of touching lucky and getting through by chance. Amy kept trying the phone and I kept tapping away at the keyboard hoping that one of us would eventually succeed. This went on for an hour and as ten o’clock headed towards eleven o’clock the mood got grimmer and grimmer. The feelings of anticipation at nine were taken over by waves of desperation and defeatism