Grabbing whatever moments I can – when we’re both at home and the weather’s ok, a rare combo of late – I get a little time here and there to progress work on the shed roof.
I recently extended the longer edges, which previously didn’t project over the walls. This was to make sure rain would run off, not down/through the structure. I didn’t do the best or prettiest job.
Mixing wood filler paste.Mmm… yummy!
So today I mixed a paste of wood dust, wood glue, and a little water, and filled in the seams where boards didn’t meet quite as flush as we’d have liked. Hopefully this bodge will suffice to keep the pieces together, and stop water passing through?
Filling quacks…
What a rubbish photo the above is! My excuse is that I was more concerned with getting the job done than photographing the work in progress.
It’s good to be chipping away at what is a reasonably large job, and gradually getting nearer to completion. I hope I can get the roofing felt on before the snow arrives!
Wow! This is a pretty amazing animated film. The quality of animation is terrific. Especially for its (pre CGI) era. Whilst the visual aesthetic is not immediately to my own tastes, it’s so singular and powerful it kind of sucks one in. Well, me at least, at any rate.
I discovered the existence of this movie thanks to the inclusion of some music from it on the vinyl compilation Mindbending Nuggets, which a friend had bought. This latter is a great collection of slightly obscure music, with a good selection of odd and unusual but groovily funky tracks (released in ‘97).
The basic premise of the film (itself based on a book*) is that humans, called Oms, are kept as pets by Draags, big blue red-eyed and web-eared humanoid characters. These Draags spend most their time meditating and being a bit weird.
They live on a planet, Ygam, whose look reminds one of both surrealism generally, and in particular the paintings of scientist (and surrealist painter) Desmond Morris. All organic blobbiness, but with an appropriately ‘sauvage’ spikiness.
Tiva plays with Terr.
Apparently the movie was marketed as a stoner experience, best watched in an altered state. And I can see that that might well be a good way to see it. Although personally those days are, for the most part, very much behind me now.
The music, by Alain Goraguer is terrific. It’s often compared to Atom Heart Mother era Floyd. Although, to my mind/ears, it’s far more complex, focussed and funky than the Brit-proggers.
Funky keys, wah-guitar, and lush strings and vocals create the perfect aural companion to the visuals. It’s one of those rare instances where the music stands in its own right, and is as strong as the film it accompanies.
Mmm… sexy jazz!
Above, a bit more of Goraguer’s work. I’ll prob do a post on him at some point. But for this one, let’s get back to the animated film. Which is, frankly, visually stunning.
* Based on this book:
All told, there’s something a bit odd, and slightly limp or disappointing, in the ideas or the narrative. The visual imagination and invention is terrific, but the conceptual side occasionally feels a little lame.
There’s a definite hangover of both WWII and the hippy era. The ‘de-Om’ing’, or culling of humans, clearly resembles the Nazi ‘final solution’. Most obviously so when gas releasing pellets – Zyklon B springs to mind – are used to kill Oms en masse. But in the end, and rather quickly, it’s determined that peaceful co-existence is the only way forward. And, rather abruptly (and dissatisfyingly), boom, the film ends.
It almost feels like they just ran out of either budget or ideas! Maybe not? Who knows. Either way, it’s a bit of a damp squib way to end.
Nevertheless, the sheer visual richness, and the soundtrack, make this essential viewing, in my opinion.
What a strange film! Strange, that is, by modern standards, rather than those of the day. Filmed in ‘glorious Technicolor’ – it was the first Ealing comedy filmed in the new format – it’s a picture postcard fantasy of a certain time in and idea of England.
In essence it’s a comedy about the beginnings of ‘heritage’ railways; as The State withdrew from steam locomotion, the public stepped in. Apparently it’s even based on a real Welsh example, which was allegedly the very first such heritage line. It’s noteworthy that this is a whole decade before the infamous Beeching axe would fall.
Stanley Holloway as Walter Valentine.
Visually it’s beautiful, a celluloid time-capsule. And it’s also quite sweet in how it portrays the era. There’s a just-post-WWII ‘Blitz spirit’, as when the passengers of the train all pitch in to get water, after the dastardly bus crew get Harry Hawkins (Sid James) to sabotage the water supply.
There are some thumping great ironies in there, as well; witness, for example, when there’s a joke about how, if the railway makes too much profit, it’ll be nationalised!
Modern history has demonstrated, over and over again, particularly under Toryism, that losses are usually nationalised (i.e. passed on to the public purse), whilst profit is privatised.
The Vicar and the drunk, crewing the train.
There are also all sorts of moments – for example at the public meeting, when Squire Chesterford (John Gregson) makes the case for the railway (as opposed to bus/road developments), on the basis of how it’ll change the nature of Titfield – that reflect what was considered, at the time, to make for a ‘good old fashioned’ British Utopia.
In this instance that revolves around the fear, also present in George Orwell’s very different 1984 (‘I am a name, not a number’!) that old country lanes will be tarmac’ed, and houses be numbered, rather than named.
Of course the quaint old trains were themselves, at one time, the harbingers of a modern industrialised doom. But now they are – and evidently even back in ‘53 they were – the stuff of ‘olde England’! There are many other little interesting insights into certain visions of how life was then (the squire and the poacher!), what constituted progress, and what makes for the ideal life.
Lovely old Bedford bus.
One of the things I like most about this film is the saturated slightly gaudy colour, AKA Technicolor. It’s very like the intense colouring of some design and illustration of that era. And so many things, from the clothes, to furniture, cars, trucks, etc, are, or rather were, so much more aesthetically pleasing than the vast bulk of modern mass-produced tat we are surrounded by now.
For example, the old Bedford bus, of the villainous rivals of the loco’ lovers, Pearce & Crump, is gorgeous. I absolutely adore the upholstery fabric inside the bus:
Dig that old fabric!
It has to be admitted I was only half watching this delightful old film, whilst Teresa and I played our Sunday afternoon Scrabble game, in between World Cup match viewing. I, or we, really ought to watch it again and give it my/our full attention.
It seems to me a good solid old-fashioned dose of ‘50s period fun. Balcon-era Ealing film at its cosily British best. I’d definitely recommend it.
I grew up with J. J. Cale’s Naturally. It was in my parents’ record collection. And I always loved it. One of the first covers I ever attempted, in my early teens, was the song Magnolia, from this superb album.
We also had a few Clapton discs, including both Slowhand and 461 Ocean Boulevard. Fantastic albums! Slowhand is interesting because it features two covers by other artist that are both superb in their original versions, by their composers – J. J. Cale’s Cocaine, and John Martyn’s May You Never – and none too shabby in Clapton’s readings. And in both cases Clapton’s versions helped make the original songwriters a little better known.
J. J. Cale… gone but not forgotten.
If you want to hang out, You've got to take her out, cocaine If you want to get down, Get down on the ground, cocaine She don't lie, She don't lie, She don't lie, cocaine
If you got bad news, You want to kick them blues, cocaine When your day is done And you want to run, cocaine She don't lie, She don't lie, She don't lie, cocaine
If your thing is gone And you want to ride on, cocaine Don't forget this fact, You can't get it back, cocaine She don't lie, She don't lie, She don't lie, cocaine
She don't lie, She don't lie, She don't lie, cocaine
What do I want to say about this song? Well, first off, I love both versions. Cale’s is more personal, with his unique ‘home studio’ vibe. Clapton’s benefits from the sublime drumming of Jamie Oldaker, whose buttery smooth press rolls lend the song a whole new feel.
Jamie Oldaker performing with Clapton and co.
Also, and perhaps more controversially, I love the ambivalence of the lyrics, and their stance re the titular drug. On the Wiki page on the song Clapton says it’s a clever anti drug song. I think he’s being a bit disingenuous!
The line ‘Don’t forget this fact, you can’t get it back’ is the only cautionary caveat to what is otherwise a fairly clearly pro-cocaine line, so to speak. But it has to be admitted, as the last statement before the recurring refrain ‘she don’t lie, she don’t lie, she don’t lie’, it does subtly and cleverfully skew the up until then positive perspective.
Of all the drugs I tried in my, um… what shall we call them… wasted years? It was the only one I have no bad memories of. All the others turned from happy highs to depressing downers. But cocaine was, for me, always pure fun.*
I never got this deep into it!
Maybe it was just that I didn’t take it in the quantities rock stars and Tony Montana types did? I did that instead with weed. And that soured the experience. But, whatever, as they say these days, for some reason this song is resonating with me right now.
I think it’s high time – sorry, can’t he’p maself – I both transcribe and learn the Oldaker drum part. It’d be a great tune to teach in my drum lessons.
Clapton’s version popularised Cale’s song.
* I’m not advocating it’s use, by the way. Merely relating past experience. One of the strongest objections to its use – quite apart from the well documented hazards for users – is that it inevitably supports the brutally exploitative international narcotics trade.
Whenever there’s been a brief interlude without rain (not often lately!) and I’ve been home/free, I’ve grabbed the opportunity to make progress – even in tiny little incremental steps – on the shed roof.
The four panels that I used to do the roof were more than adequate lengthwise, giving enough coverage to project at each end (front and back, I suppose?). But the 8 foot length boards were only just big enough to reach across the width of the roof.
New projecting strips added on the ‘south face’.
Also, the shed was a bit out of square. So once the roofing boards were up and in place, they didn’t present straight/flush edges along the longer axis of the whole roof.
This meant I had to trim them, to get a straight line. And then somehow add long strips. Fortunately the off it’s from the front and back were just enough for the job. I had to cut them in half lengthwise. Bit of a faff!
But I did it. And on one day last week – Tuesday perhaps? – I did the higher side. And today I did the lower side. It wasn’t easy! And I didn’t do a perfect job. Far, far from it!
The inside view, under the new roof.
But hopefully it’s adequate? At least now the roof project out over the shed walls on every face. I’ll prob’ want to mix some sawdust and wood-glue filler, and fill some of the gaps between panels. And I’ve tried to find screws long enough to go through the whole width of the add-on boards.
Anyway, a couple more small steps towards getting the shed shop shape, and ready to move all my tools out of the previous workshop. The latter will become our art studio. With room to paint. A small etching press, and – if I can get it working – a kiln!
I have a few ‘coffee table’ art books on the subject of jazz record covers. And whilst all of them contain great stuff, none of them quite capture or distil the real magic of the best album covers as I wish they would.
This one’s actually an homage…
I think to do that they’d have to be bigger than LP-sized, and reproduce all the covers at full size. Ideally with room to spare. There’s naught worse than beautiful images that run into the gutter/spine of a book! Well, I admit, there’s a lot that’s worse. But you know what I’m saying.
How can you not love this?
This post isn’t meant to be in any way comprehensive. For starters I’m limiting it purely to one record label and one artist: Art Blakey on Blue Note. But isn’t it amazing how great these covers are? For my money they elevate the packaging to a plane very much akin to the music.
This one belongs to a weird sub-category!*
And when both music and art are sublime, that kind of sympathetic synergy is a wonderful thing, to be savoured, treasured, and just plain enjoyed/appreciated… so feast your eyes. And, ideally, put on some Blakey, and feast your ears as well!
Sublime! What a face.
In Art Blakey Reid Miles and Francis Wolff found someone who had the musical spirit they loved, plus seemingly unbounded energy and charisma, and really striking looks to boot. He’s a funny looking dude, in some ways. But he’s incredibly photogenic with it.
Fontastic.
Wolff would be busy, snapping away at recording sessions. And then later Miles would work his hyper-aesthetic design magic. The resulting package is on a par with the music, as art in its own right. And it helps lend the era/genre a hard to define but instantly recognisable vibe, both rootsy and yet sophisticated.
A typical Wolff studio portrait.
Above is the kind of raw material Wolff would provide Reid Miles with, a fantastic studio shot of the artist at work. Interestingly Wolf’s photographic estate is handled (at least in part?), by the specialist jazz label Mosaic, who might very well have taken their name – they certainly share it – from a Blakey track.
A lot of the covers use black and white photos with single colours as screening tints. And the use of typography is just phenomenal. But as the images directly above and below demonstrate. Miles could still weave his spells with full colour imagery, and more colourful font palettes.
Whether using a fuller range of colours, or going super stark and minimalist, as on Three Blind Mice (below), these covers have a tremendous power. I absolutely adore them!
Sweaty, intense and stark.
Pictured below is one of the books mentioned at the top of this post.
Also worth noting is how the Wolff/Miles house style lives on. The following images are all later non Wolff/Miles productions that clearly owe a debt to and seek to emulate (with varying degrees of fidelity/success) the classic Blue Note house style.
The above is, by normal standards, a great cover. But frankly it’s not in the same league as the real deal. The effort below is a lot better.
Another later ‘in the style of’ example.
I intend to get a body of these and similar record covers decently printed, and then frame and display them myself, both in my office/home studio, and around our home. To finish, a very early example, from back when Blue Note issued 10” discs. And this last one finds Blakey sharing the billing with another Blue Note legend, Horace Silver.
Wow! So g’damn groovy.
* I’ll prob do another separate post on the sub-category of Blue Note album covers that favour semi-abstract photos, often either out of focus, or treating imagery in almost purely textural terms.
I managed to get home early enough to catch the England Iran game yesterday. I missed the first ten minutes or so, and arrived back during what turned out to be a marathon time-out, due to the Iranian goal keeper bashing heads with one of his defenders.
This wound up adding 14 or 15 minutes of extra time to the first half. Is that a record?When I got home I knocked on our neighbour’s door, knowing he had the day off, and thinking watching the footy on the social might be fun. It was. Too much fun, in the end!
The match itself was goalless when I arrived. But, once play resumed, the goals started coming thick and fast. I think it was 3-0 by half time. Not the dull game I had worried it might be.
Saka – scored twice – celebrates.
In the end we wound up having dinner round there; I picked Teresa up at the station, and Regina very kindly fed us all. The only bum note was my excessive intake of alcohol (ah, the irony!*). I bought a couple of cases of Shipyard Ale, on a two-for-one (almost) promo’, at Sainsburys. And then drank way too many cans.
Now I’m paying for it. With a hangover, and a gassy bloated tummy. Aaargh…. How I hate being an idiot! Still, at least the football was fun.
* Qatar tried banning booze altogether, upsetting sponsor, Budweiser. I’m still not clear what the situation is! Here’s something on the subject.
Pickford and Kane celebrate.
Amazingly, with six goals, Kane – instrumental in a few of them (feeding Sterling the third goal, and Rashford, the fifth – on his third touch! – for example), and still key to our success – didn’t actually score any of them. He must have been both very chuffed at the result, and a bit gutted not to be on the scoresheet. Speaking of which:
England J. Bellingham 35' B. Saka 43', 62' R. Sterling 45+1' M. Rashford 71' J. Grealish 90'
Iran M. Taremi 65’,90+13' (P)
Taremi’s first goal for Iran was superb. His second – a penalty – prob’ shouldn’t have been given. But you can’t begrudge him or Iran their two goals, in the end. England’s emphatic dominance and victory were still more than adequately reflected in the final result.
How good was it to get off to such a good start!? Amazing.
And, amidst all the political controversy, it was lovely to note that Jack ‘Calves’ Grealish dedicated his goal (England’s sixth of the match!) to a young fan:
Grealish meets Finlay.A celebratory move is agreed upon…… and, very sweetly, a promise is kept.
BTW, the politics of the region once again made itself apparent: the Iranian players didn’t sing their own national anthem – which caused Gary Lineker to make the observation that it was ‘a powerful and very significant gesture’ – and there were protest placards in the crowd, with slogans such as ‘Iranian women’ (in ref’ to the death in custody of Mahsa Amini).
On a lighter note, I met Miklas’ pet rat (very cute!), and had a go on their Carlsbro e-kit. I was so drunk and the kit is set up for southpaw Chris… I could barely sit on the stool, never mind play!
Thanks to a FB pal’s post I learned of Joe Hill today. Not heard of him before.
An itinerant worker of Swedish ancestry, Hill was a ‘Wobblie’, or member of the IWW (Industrial Workers of the World), rising to prominence in that organisation as a songwriter and cartoonist, as well as for his vocal activism.
Hill was executed, aged just 36, in 1915. Allegedly for a robbery in which two men, father and son (the elder an ex-policemen), were killed. I know next to nothing about all this. So I’ll be looking into it. It’s pretty fascinating!
Tom Morello of RATM credits a whole lineage of protest music to Joe Hill’s leading example, which is interesting. As a musician and artist I’m immediately drawn to Hill, not just because I share his politics to some extent (to what extent I don’t know as yet!), but because art and music are my ‘bag’.
Rather strikingly, Hill’s will, reproduced below (along with a post-mortem photo showing his corpse, complete with the execution bullet holes!), is in verse. A poet to the last!
The popular perception on the left is that Hill is a martyr, a scapegoat, a ‘pesky agitator’ silenced by the boss class. Hill refused to exonerate himself entirely, claiming he was innocent. But unwilling to name a lady for love of whom he had, he said, been shot by a another man!
The gunshot wound, which he presented to a doctor on the same day as the fatal double shooting of which he was eventually accused, was, it seems, what got him the death penalty.
A tantalising tale! I must find out more.
One of Hill’s cartoon. I’m assuming the pianist is a self-portrait?
* Quite a striking/good looking dude! Could’ve been played by a young Willem Defoe, perhaps?
Bubbles… what an ace track! I just acquired the rather excellent Butterflies Are Free set, which is the complete recordings of The Free Design, covering seven albums, plus a few oddments, over the period 1967-72.
I emailed Chris Dedrick – their de facto musical leader – years back, and got a lovely reply. I’d hoped to interview him for my putative music book, on music of the early ‘70s. Sadly, since then, he passed away. The ‘Big C’, alas.
Prior to getting Butterflies I had a couple of their albums on CD, and the most of the rest as digital only downloads. I also have a Chris Dedrick solo album, from ‘72, called Be Free. I don’t think I’d ever had their kid’s album, Plays For Very Important People, until now.
Initially a trio of siblings, they were augmented by a fourth family member, (?), becoming a vocal harmony quartet. They also played instruments, with Chris the most active that way (guitar, keys, trumpet, etc.). But in the studio for their recordings, they were backed by stellar sessionistas, such as (names!).
Enoch, avec le pipe!
One of the reasons they’ve remained a bit under the radar might be that they weren’t on a major label. Fearing that a major would be too constraining, they went with audiophile Enoch Light, on his Project 3 label. This ensured them total artistic freedom (and great sound!). But it also meant they didn’t have the publicity machinery of a major label promoting them.
The marks of the late ‘60s era are strong, their whole sound and vibe partaking of a groovy hipness that, ironically, dates the music a little, and is also in danger at times of coming across as a little naff. But, having said this, at the very same time they also have a beguiling mixture of naïveté and musical sophistication that has a timeless appeal. And, despite sharing certain qualities with other similar-ish ‘sunshine pop’ acts of the era, they’re pretty damn unique.
And, for me, Bubbles – posted at the head of this entry – captures this all extremely well. Bill LaVorgna’s drumming is particularly noteworthy, on this oddly funky nugget, negotiating the odd time signature with a lithely supple and elastic groove that makes the whole thing groove very nicely.
But right from the get go, the first and title track of their debut album, Kites Are Fun, sets out their stall; goofily child-like, lyrically, musically adult, and whilst outwardly joyful, there’s nearly always a wistful lonely teardrop in there somewhere. Lovely stuff, as Alan Partridge (or Shakin’ Stevens, if you credit Coogan’s alter-ego) might say.
And as a little additional bauble, the lyrics to Bubbles:
Blowin' bubbles outta the window Chewin' bubblegum and blowin' big bubbles Gettin' gettin' ridda ridda all my troubles, Watchin' the tadpoles glubba, glubba in the puddles Soap bubbles carry my dreams up high Bubble gum kinda keeps my heart from gettin' heavy and cryin'
Ma 'n' Pa are arguin' again, today I lost my best friend The kitty has a little cold, 'n ' grammama is getting older My tummy has a little pain, 'n' when does Jesus come again?
Blowin' bubbles outta the window Chewin' bubblegum and blowin' big bubbles Gettin' gettin' ridda ridda all my troubles, Watchin' the tadpoles glubba, glubba in the puddles Soap bubbles carry my dreams up high Bubble gum kinda keeps my heart from gettin' heavy and cryin'
Blowin' bubbles outta the window Chewin' bubblegum and blowin' big bubbles Gettin' gettin ridda ridda all my troubles, Watchin' the tadpoles glubba, glubba in the puddles Soap bubbles carry my dreams up high Bubble gum kinda keeps my heart from gettin' heavy and cryin'
