[do you still cry the way you used to?]

Saturday. The house is empty but for me and the cats sleeping downstairs somewhere in their special places. The futon in the back room seems to be the favoured place at the moment, probably because no-one ever goes in there except to iron a shirt. I’m going through my CD collection again, ripping selected ones with iTunes. I think this is the second or third time in the past year that I’ve gone through this process, for various reasons. This time it’s all down to getting to grips with partitioning drives in OS X, and forgetting that I’d already deleted my old (80GB) collection of ripped CD’s from my Windows PC to make space for large video files, transferring some VHS tapes to DV. All very dull and technical. Hmmm.

Whatever. iTunes seems fine when you do everything through it, but less good at importing files from other places. Do you really care? Do I really care?

The sad thing is that actually I do.

It seems like I’ve been spending a lot of time here on my own recently. It’s quite strange. I used to really rather like being left alone, but now it feels odd. I can’t pin down what it is that’s different. Maybe it’s just the fact that it’s a much bigger house to be alone in, and that amplifies the sense of isolation. Maybe it’s that I don’t drink anymore, and therefore the appeal of being able to get smashed whilst playing old (and new, but mostly old) records loudly just doesn’t seem remotely interesting. And maybe it’s just that I really am getting old and dull.

My iTunes library just went through the thousand song point. I haven’t even finished with the ‘B’s yet. And of course there’s lots of discs that haven’t made it through the selection process. It’s at times like this that I really wonder why the hell I have so much stuff. Why all the records? Why all the books? Is it really just a way of documenting my life; trying to show myself that it’s really not just a mirage? Is that all this is? The need to elude the reality of impermanence by investing in these artefacts into which one pours memory and the illusion of captured time?

Or maybe they’re just books and records.

This, as Robin so rightly points out, is what comes of ‘freedom’. We have the democratic freedom to worry about irrelevancies.

I’m listening to old Blue Aeroplanes records. Stuff I transferred from vinyl to CD a while ago. A year? Two years? I can’t keep track anymore. Like when the White Stripes came on TOTP2 last week, and I sneered ‘oh that’s so…’ and I couldn’t remember if it was two years ago, or just last year. It was two, wasn’t it? When I was spending the early summer re-reading ‘In The Place of Fallen Leaves’ and playing the first two White Stripes albums to death? Well, whenever the hell it was, that was a fine time.

These are fine times too, it’s just that I don’t want the White Stripes. As I have said before. And yes, it really is about snobbery and decay, as Claudia and Thomas once sang. My snobbery of not wanting to be like everybody else. Actually it’s more like a fear – like, you remember when in ‘Clingfilm’, The Sea Urchins sing ‘why weren’t you special’ over and over again and then add ‘and was I?’ at the end? Well, like that… the fear that, like everybody else I see on the street, I’m just not that special. And it’s more than that even; it’s building up a mirror image of a self that I make out is ‘special’ and clued-up and whatever else; an alter-ego to believe in because really, when it all comes down, I know I’m just nobody.

And decay because this passage of time is all that and more; is my skin falling off and my neck hurting and my hair turning grey, but is also the decay of that which once mattered so much mattering so much less.



posted by duke harringay at 12:14 PM

Flicking through the current issue of Mojo this afternoon, looking for some scraps of interest in what was otherwise a hinterland of dull mediocrity, I came across two items that made me smile. First was a piece on Barney Platt-Mills’ 1970 movie ‘Bronco Bullfrog’. I remember first hearing about this movie back in 1987, when James Roberts of the Sea Urchins (and later Delta) mentioned to me that it was his favourite movie of all time. I had to admit my lack of cool at the time by admitting I had never heard of it, although in a weird moment of synchronicty, a week or two later there it was on the telly, tucked away in the dead of night on BBC2. I stayed up and watched it, and could easily see why it would mean so much to a group like the Sea Urchins. It was all Chelsea boots, button down shirts, rough and ready end of the ‘60s reality as opposed to hippie love’n’peace fantasy. Cool stuff. And I’m sure that the sleeve of the Urchins’ second single for Sarah (the glorious ‘please rain fall’ and the shimmering ‘Solace’) was a still from the movie, with Bronco tending his motorbike, although I could be wrong of course. Maybe I’ll just have to fork out for a copy of the DVD from www.platts-mills.com to find out.

The second sliver of interest in Mojo was on the page after the Bronco Bullfrog piece; a box-out about George P. Pelecanos and his ‘Soul Circus’ novel. Nice to see the mainstream press catching up, even if they are four or so years late… And call me a petty detail-worrying pedant if you will, but ‘King Suckerman’ really wasn’t much of a part of the ‘Stefanos family story’, and actually the whole DC Quartet it belongs to mostly has Stefanos only cropping up tangentially, the focus instead being on Marcus Clay and Robert Karras. Whatever. Also, the photo accompanying the piece is subtitled ‘Pelecanos’ world’, which it clearly isn’t at all. I mean, I love that photo, it’s from maybe my favourite photography book ever (Bruce Davidson’s ‘Brooklyn Gang’), but it’s from 1959 Brooklyn for goodness sake, not contemporary Washington, DC. Which is where Pelecanos’ world is at… so… so I’m a petty detail-worrying pedant. Who cares?

Interestingly, Mojo mentions also that a movie of ‘Right as Rain’ appears to be in the offing, which would be great if true (personally I’d prefer one of ‘A Firing Offensive’ or Nick’s Trip’’), but lets not forget that several years ago it seemed like there was going to be a movie of ‘King Suckerman’ and all that came to nought, so yeah. That’s the film industry for you I guess.

posted by duke harringay at 5:28 PM

The Map Room was locked up – no-one home, but I got some photos of the stencils by the College buildings. I think I’ve got all the stencils in the city now, but there may be some I’ve missed in places I haven’t been yet. It’s like a neat mystery tour of the city, travelling the sites of the stencils. I mean, it’s neat if you like that kind of thing.





Pevsner doesn’t have a great deal about the RAM building. It’s by John Hayward, built in 1865-6 and features ‘an impressive symmetrical tripartite composition with the use of several types of coloured stone so favoured by Ruskin.’ So now you know.

I like the RAM building well enough, but it’s not my favourite in the city. My favourite building currently is one of unknown function that sits near the RDE hospital. It’s probably some kind of hospital related plant, like incinerator or something, but I love it, with its weathered unclad concrete and its shape echoing St Peter’s church that sits beyond it as you come up Barrack Road. It’s brutal and honest, and I love it. As I also love the Debenhams building, but that’s another matter entirely.

posted by duke harringay at 12:36 PM

Raining this morning. It’s the first time I can remember it raining in a while. Which is a lie because it rained last week, maybe Friday night. I forgot to bring the cushions in from outside then and they got soaked. I suppose the rain is good for a lot of things, but it does make the world seem greyer and drearier than ever. Town this morning, for example, where I had to go to early for an optician appointment. Grey streets, and streets of grey, indeed. Which reminds me that I hear Cherry Red are finally to reissue all of Felt’s back catalogue this year; that’s all the Cherry Red and the Creation albums together at once, something which never happened in the past. Naturally I’ll be sad and snap up all the CDs despite having all the vinyl. Well, not all the vinyl. There are still some singles I don’t have, although it doesn’t bother me. I’m not that much of a completist. The only think I really would love to have is a copy of that French 10”, and maybe a copy of Crumbling The Antiseptic Beauty with the full face portrait.

So streets of grey, and a mug of coffee in the Boston Tea Party. It’s just gone 10am. Maybe I look like a sad nerd git sitting here tapping this out on my PowerBook, but hell I don’t care. It’s actually really nice to be somewhere other than the attic, and maybe that’s been part of the problem recently too: too many hours spent indoors. I don’t know. It seems impossible to pin down what the problem with eczema really is, and infuriatingly the specialist consultants are among the first to admit this. Seems like the best you can do is try and understand your body through time and trial and error. I think the sour cream and cheese we had last Thursday in our Mexican dinner was partly to blame too. I should know better: dairy products really are evil. I thought I could get away with a little, but it seems not. Oh well. I’m reading ‘Special’ at last now, and there’s a character in there who has eczema and is ostracised as a result. I know how it feels, even though the detachment from the world is self-imposed as much as anything else.

Anyway, caffeine on the other hand seems not to be as much of an issue as I had thought, so the occasional caffeinated mug is a pleasant luxury that has few ill effects aside from making me a bit manic for an hour or so. It’s not an altogether unpleasant feeling.

*

Back in the Boston now after popping next door to the Victoria and Albert Museum (I bet Pevsner has lots to say about that – I must check when I get home). Lots of the museum feels wearily familiar after years of taking kids there to draw every October, but even there, selected artefacts are like comfortable old friends. The exhibition rooms have a couple of shows on, one of which is a collection of hideous watercolours, whilst the other is a mildly diverting show of works by Martin Prothero. Prothero’s work involves laying out carbon coated glass sheets in rural-urban environments (parks, railway embankments, town beaches) and then waiting for something to happen. Specifically, waiting for wildlife to interact with the plates and leave their mark. As with any work where the element of chance plays a large part, there are pieces here which are really rather unengaging, and others which are wonderful. Creatures which for me show the most interesting artistic endeavour would be the shore crabs from Exmouth beach, who leave fluid, bold strokes on the glass; edgy and with a real sense of purpose. Also worth noting would be the slow-worm which evidently had some difficulty moving up the glass on a railway embankment and which as a result left dense, vigorous marks full of frenetic movement. Very dynamic artist, this slow-worm.

Also of note are the insects, particularly the cricket and centipede, which leave minimal marks of great sensitivity, whilst for sheer exuberance it’s impossible to match the collaborative piece by two badgers (adult and juvenile) who leave wonderfully expressive brush strokes, like a Franz Kline or Robert Motherwell with inverted colours. Terrific stuff. Well, terrific stuff for a quarter of an hour or so. I wouldn’t want to make out like it’s any more than that… don’t want to sound like a nature loving hippy, after all. And of course I really do prefer the stencils down on the wall by the college, which I’m about to go photograph whilst dropping by the Appliance Map Room to see if anyone is about.

Okay, PowerBook, show me your pulsing white light.







posted by duke harringay at 12:10 PM

Took a bike ride this afternoon in the sun to raise my spirits and maybe help my skin. It usually helps. Headed east through Pinhoe and out to Clyst Honiton and the airport, but instead of heading right up to Woodbury via Sanctuary Lane (sanctuary from what is never clear, but it’s a lovely little lane regardless) I headed straight on and up to Aylsebeare, past Minchen Cottage and up to the top of West Hill. From there I dropped down into the valley, taking an alternative route into Tipton St John along a lane I’d never ridden before. Past kids on horses and a group of men pulling something from the leat outside more cottages (yes, thatched, since you ask – it really is that picture postcard pretty around these parts, in the right parts. Or the wrong parts if you find that kind of thing nauseating.). Through Tipton St John with its primary school faced with bright mural of myriad greens (how is it you never see such things on Secondary Schools?), over the bridge and past the old motor garage that always reminds of the one in William Golding’s The Pyramid, and then down the lane towards the coast, the one lined with what always seems to me to be the most lavishly appointed homes, no doubt full of grey haired retirees withering away their autumn years. And speaking of whom, it was St Georges day today, and a whole parade of grey haired ladies and gents wended their weary way up Sidwell Street and then Blackboy Road this morning, carrying their England flags, Union Jacks and assorted placards that held variations on the ‘we don’t like the EU’ theme. They might as well have worn t-shirts that said ‘we’re bigoted old Conservatives on a day trip from Sidmouth’. Or something.

But back to my bike ride. I darted right down past the church in Harpford (St Gregory’s) and the churchyard cross (restored in memory of the Rev. Augustus Toplady who as well as being the Vicar of Harpford at some point before his death in 1778, was also the author of ‘Rock Of Ages’ – trivia here thanks to Pevsner’s Buildings of England, Devon). The little stream that runs alongside the road at this point was bone dry, just sand and pebbles stretching beneath the bridge, which goes to show how dry its been here recently. From Harpford it was a quick shimmy across the A3052 and off down the lane towards the sea, or Otterton at least. More youngsters on horses and the sand blowing across the road like from the dunes at Zandvoort. Frank Stella knew all about the dunes at Zandvoort, referencing the former home of the Dutch Grand Prix in one of his assemblage paintings of race tracks.

The leats that run down the length of Otterton main street were running low as well. Barely a trickle of water, as dry as I’ve ever seen them in the height of summer. Weird. At least most of the trees have burst into green now, and the hedgerows are approaching the lushness one expects for this warmth, if not exactly this time of year. Pevsner has a page and a bit devoted to Otterton, so I really ought to slow down next time and have a proper look around. I did however notice the old railway station which is now a house and ‘a model of simple restrained conversion’. Quite. The OS map shows the old railway line going from Budleigh up to Newton Poppelford, and one assumes it originally continued up the valley through Tipton St John and Ottery St Mary to join the London Waterloo line at Honiton. Closer inspection seems to show embankments near Feniton, so I guess it joined the main line there. It’s nice round Feniton too, although I haven’t been out that way for ages. Memo to self: ride out Feniton way sometime soon.

From Otterton it was more or less downhill all the way home, scurrying through Woodbury and hitting 64kph to Topsham, legs unable to spin my top gear any faster. Tail wind, you see. Downside of all this of course being drivers who pull out of junctions not realising how fast I’m going, and me having to hit the brakes to avoid hitting their back window. Car drivers suck. Oh, and being stopped at the level crossing at Topsham station, waiting for goodness knows what. No train appeared, and a good five minutes or more passed before the barrier lifted. Everyone in the queue was grumpy, but I scooted off and was almost into Exeter when I spotted some of the cars from the queue coming past me. That’s a good couple or three or four kilometres I guess. Usually I can beat the bus back from Topsham, given favourable traffic lights and, okay, a tail wind. I love skanking up the side of traffic queued at the lights, weaving to the front. Nearly got knocked off by a Ferrari too, jumping the lights. The Ferrari I mean, not me. Okay, so me too. If I’m going to get hit by a car I’d rather it was a Ferrari. Although obviously I’d rather not be hit at all.

I did get hit by a car before. I don’t know if I told that story. It’s a dull story, and it happened a long, long time ago. The friend I was riding with is dead now. He was killed driving a car when he was twenty. I think that’s one of the reasons I never learned to drive, at least subconsciously. Anyway, we were turning a corner one evening and this car appeared from nowhere, skidding around in front of me. I rode right into the front wing and sprawled over the bonnet. Or the hood… it was a learner driver at the wheel, and the passenger had pulled the handbrake on. Very weird. My bike frame was bent and I had some bruises, but nothing more. You could see the skid marks on the road for months afterwards. We used to look out for them when we got the bus into Ayr on Saturday mornings, and writing that I’m sure that I have bored everyone with this story at some point in the past so I shall shut up now.

After that crash I got a new bike frame. Actually it wasn’t new, it was a second hand Flying Scot. British Racing green. That was my favourite road bike, the best ever. The one that got bent was a red Roberts, and I got that one second hand for my sixteenth birthday. The first proper road bike frame I got that was new was a Graham Weigh, just before I moved to Devon. I hardly rode it. It’s in the space behind the wall in the attic here, gathering dust. I still can’t bear to part with it though.

I once thought it would be good to write something based on all of the bicycles I’ve owned and ridden, but I’m not so sure. I think it would be something that would appeal to a very limited audience. As I think I just proved with everything I’ve written tonight. Oh well. It was just an idea.

posted by duke harringay at 9:36 PM

Playing MP3s randomly on Audion, and up comes the Subway Sect's 'we oppose all rock and roll / sister ray'. Checking Audion's 'info' box, it has the 'genre' listed as 'general unclassifiable'. This seems hugely appropriate.
posted by duke harringay at 11:06 AM