There’s a bridge that used to arch over a railway line, only the railway line has been ripped up for decades, and now the space beneath the bridge looks like a haven for late-night drinks for teenagers armed with spray cans and grudges. Much of the graffiti is typical teenage stuff about who might be a ‘slapper’ and who is ‘sexy’, but there, amazingly and somewhat incongruously in 2002 is also painted, in two foot high letters: ‘JOY DIVISION’.
posted by duke harringay at 9:36 PM

My Exploding Memory

So here I am, sat in a room that used to be my bedroom for, god, I dunno how many years... tries to think... takes a stab at at least 16 years, and for another four or five as a 'studio', the view from the window looking like a goddamn CURSE.

I used to think it killed me a little more every time, just being here, seeing the places, the scenes of the past, but at least now I’m starting to think it’s maybe just opportunities to lay ghosts to rest. Memories still hurt of course. They always do. Even the good ones. Maybe that’s especially the good ones.

My parents picked me up at the airport outside Glasgow yesterday morning and we drove back here to Troon, through little towns and villages like Dalry (Rupert!), along roads I used to ride in desperate afternoon escape attempts or something along those lines, then back in via the town centre of Troon itself, along the new road to the harbour and down via the prom, and the old beach shelter I once painted 'boredom or Fire Raisers you can't have both!' on, and then past the parking lot built on the site of the old open aired sea water filled swimming pool, and the prom itself where I sat and wrote about imagined daydreamed meetings with g.i.r.l.s. over and over, willing some kind of reality which of course never happened, except one woozy night when in late night early morning glory by the embers of a beach fire, and... and... and nothing. Names and lost faces. Whatever.

Then yesterday afternoon I took a walk around the old school grounds and golfcourse route of to-ing and fro-ing of childhood era and beyond. Spooky. The school looks fucking dreadful... a mess of smashed windows, graffiti, uprooted paving slabs and litter. It's depressing as all hell. See photos posted to the Tangents gallery for evidence sometime I guess. The little cottage they used to have the violin lessons in is still there, and it is a sorry sight. Plus I looked in the windows of the dining hall and they still have a mural on the wall that my friend Alan Connell painted so many years ago I hate to think. I’m sure I’ve said this in the past, but in the May when he was preparing for painting that mural we sat, the two of us, up on the roof of his Dad’s bakery in the centre of town, him drawing the scene and me just looking, drinking it in or something, I don’t remember. I was probably talking about girls again. Anyway, that mural still there only now with half the panels obscured by two fucking drinks vending machines, which somehow seems to reflect the different times perfectly, and makes me sound like some ancient moaning git. So be it.

On my walk I also started a new project... leaving written statements on a scrap of paper at sites of significance. I did one at the wall where I always got beaten up when I was playing the violin; one at the old gap in the fence to the school grounds, now fenced off by a big metal fence; one at the old 'white gate' where punks once told me I was a fake for wearing a P.i.L badge; one at the site of my old chemistry lab; one below the window to my art classroom. That last one said 'sanctuary' but I couldn't take a picture of the paper because the battery died. I also walked out by the line of trees by the playing fields; the trees all bent over and stunted by the wind, the trees that are in that story... I cant remember the title. 'Talking to the trees', yeah, that one. Just in case any of you were interested

There's a bridge over a burn by the edge of the playing fields, by the council flats, that has had 'Punk's not dead' painted on it for as long as I can remember. You can still just about make it out, although maybe if you hadn’t seen it fifteen years ago you wouldn’t be able to decipher it at all. There's also always been a rope swing hanging from the tree there too, although now it seems to be made of twisted metal wire... This, and the one up in Fullarton woods, is the swing I always think of when I hear the Wolfhounds’ ‘Ropeswing’. Now there's a rusting shopping cart in the bottom of the burn. And a red flag from one of the greens on the golfcourse... Such a beautiful sight.



posted by duke harringay at 10:37 AM

Metal???

I was most amused this morning to get some spam email from some folks doing pirate software and MP3s of current albums which had the new Six By Seven album The Way I Feel Today listed under ‘Metal’, thereby sharing list space with Megadeath, Nine Inch Nails and someone, or something called Hoobastank. Now, I’ll grant you that the Six By Seven album is a little heavy, but Metal??? Surely not. In fact if anything it reminds me of Loop in a lot of places, although I’m aware that’s as difficult a comparison to make as any, since there are many different takes on Loop by different people, but… but you know playing ‘Cafeteria Rats’ is like listening to ‘Head On’ from the first Loop album, only louder and nastier. And whilst there are those that would have once suggested that Loop were only ever a horrible Metal band too, I never thought that at all, and in fact I thought Loop were a magnificent noise, a great spiral of night wrapping the soul. And actually what is odd is playing those two aforementioned songs next to each other, and realising just how un-rock Loop sound next to Six By Seven, how ‘Head On’ sounds so much more mysterious and strange. And Six By Seven don’t. Maybe that means they are ‘Metal’ after all…

The British Condition

Well, the cloud has descended once more on the South West of England, and everything looks dull and despicable again as a result. For a whole week there we had clear blue skies, light breezes, and a warming early spring sun. It was really quite lovely you know. Not that it was summer, you understand, just the beginnings of spring, a chance to lift your face to the skies and feel that special warmth on the back of your neck. The British, though, are by and large a desperate race, and you would not believe the number of people walking around in shorts, t-shirts and open sandals… incredible. And hardly attractive.

Worst was the last day of term in school, when all our kids got to wear what they wanted. It was quite repulsive. So much bulging flesh on display, and so little poise. Teenagers, or teenage girls more precisely can be so, ah, tries to choose words carefully here, singularly unpleasant… I really do so wish that people would wear more clothes.

Sigh… is this just a sign that I am getting old? Would I have loved seeing people wear so few clothes when I was a teenager? I doubt it, seeing as I was always desperate to cover myself up as much as humanly possible, but you never know I guess.

And oh yes, I know I’ve wittered about such things in the past, and I know that this weary repetition most assuredly is a sign that I’m getting old, but I don’t care.


Bloody Typical

I kind of lost interest in the great Punk Rock survey last week. I think that ‘PUNK rock’ was in the lead, which proves to me that most people are living Americanised lives, or are fibbing about how they say it. Because I’ve never heard anyone except Americans or people who speak American English say it that way. Personally I think everyone was scared of looking like a Rock Bloke if they said their emphasis was on the ‘Rock’ part of the phrase, but hey-ho, what are you gonna do? Of course Marino was dead right when he said it was really only ever just PUNK, but again, hey-ho. I was going to write a boring piece about roots of Punk Rock but decided in the end that 1. I don’t know enough, and 2. I don’t care enough. I listened to some Seeds records last week though, and they were great Punk records. And then I was wondering if the first Punks were the folks who wrote all those original folk songs way back in the mists of time, the songs that got dragged across to the USA and then mixed with the Blues to make rock’n’roll in some kind of strange melting pot, and as soon as I started thinking about that I thought, uh, what’s the point in all of this? Aren’t there better things I could be doing with my time? Like riding my bicycle? Well exactly…

Except now it’s started raining.

How bloody typical.


posted by duke harringay at 9:47 AM