Made a really corny mix CD for Alex last night. Here’s the track listing:

belle and Sebastian: the state I am in
r.e.m.: so. central rain (I’m sorry)
the apartments: the shyest time
the colourfield: thinking of you
old 97’s: big brown eyes
stars of heaven: I can’t seem to make you mine
clinic: kimberley
my bloody valentine: clare
slumber party: why do I care?
galaxie 500: summertime
jonathan richman: that summer feeling
clem snide: your favourite music
scritti politti: the sweetest girl
trembling blue stars: saffron, beautiful and brown eyed
the wake: melancholy man
the television personalities: the girl who had everything
the sixths: falling out of love (with you)

hadn’t listened to some of those tracks for ages, and they sounded as good as ever, if not better… in particular the Galaxie 500 and Clinic cuts, and of course ‘that summer feeling’ which is just the greatest thing EVER, yes it is. Oh, and the Colourfield track, what a great Pop song that was/is, although that might be just personal experience kicking in again, but what the hey.

And I resisted the temptation to put in the Trembling Blue Stars’ ‘last summertime’s obsession’ in place of ‘saffron…’, even though it would probably have been really fitting.

It’s still raining.


posted by duke harringay at 1:46 PM

At some point in the last couple of months I found a scrap of paper on my desk in school. I think the cleaner had put it there maybe, rescued from the floor. On one side it had the handwritten word ‘directions’, whilst on the reverse were printed, well, directions. The directions were quite detailed and clearly led to someone’s house out in the wilds of Devon, although whose is anyone’s guess.

I say this for a couple of reasons. One is that it’s fascinating what you find in classrooms, and starting next term I’m going to collect all the notes I confiscate in lessons and ones I find on the floor, or kicking around any place within the school environs. I have this notion that eventually, when I have enough, I shall make an exhibition, and it will be really cool. The second reason I mention this found ‘directions’ note is that whilst I was twiddling my thumbs this afternoon, wondering where to ride on my bike, and not feeling inspired by the thought of riding any of my regular routes, I remembered that note and decided that actually it might be rather fun to ride out and use those directions as at least a part of the route.

So I did. And I saw the honey coloured house mentioned in the note, and found too a great many hills which generally made my legs sore. I also got a bit lost in Cheriton Fitzpaine, riding down the road one direction and then discovering on hitting the middle of the village that my sense of direction was all to pot and that I had to turn around and head back the way I’d just come. And it was uphill.

And although the wind gusted and some rain fell, it was great.

posted by duke harringay at 8:31 PM

the rain fell down

The weather this morning reminds me of a Troon summer, which is never a good thing. The rain is coming down in a torrent, which is very miserable of course, but at least it isn’t windy. If this was Troon it would be blowing a gale into the bargain. It all makes me remember when I got the first Hellfire Sermons single in the mail one summer morning back in 19… ’88? ’89? Time disappears so quickly. Anyway, it was a suitably wild morning, and ‘Freakstorm’ never sounded better than it did that day, those first few listens.

Today I’ve got iTunes on random. Just heard that great sample in Colourbox’s ‘baby I Love You So’ that goes ‘are you crazy? No-body gets to meet The Duke!’ which raised a smile. Currently playing is ‘twin human highway flares’ by the god-like Mountain Goats, seguing perfectly into ole Stephin singing about Lady Day, his only friend.

Right, I’m off to start making things.

posted by duke harringay at 9:27 AM

Yeah, so the Cocteau Twins. I bought ‘Garlands’ and ‘Head over Heels’, haunted by some lines I once wrote about the Cocteau Twins being overblown Gothic frippery or somesuch… And of course in the context of where I wrote that I stand by it, it’s only, well, you know, I have these memories of those first two Cocteau’s albums drifting into my consciousness, and really those memories can’t be ignored, because… hmmm, well maybe just because and maybe ‘just because’ is the best excuse/reason for anything.

So just because in the summers and winters too of the early 1980s in the transition from knowing nothing to knowing a little, those Cocteau Twins records were valuable moments that sparked a certain awakening of something special perhaps; and even if it was a growing awareness that there was Something More, something almost hidden, something stranger than the worlds we normally inhabited, well, then maybe that was enough.

Scott bought the albums, as I recall, and I taped them. I in turn taped him Bluebells singles and Friends Again and Strawberry Switchblade and April Showers and as I recall it was a fair trade; my records being full of TeenPop summer magnificence and his Cocteaus being full of otherwordly oddity; a voice spooling off somehow into the ether and guitars that spooked and scraped along the spine. Listened to now they still sound so, and sit nicely next to the first Banshees album, which I got from Amazon recently.

So what is it with buying up things from my youth? I don’t know. Maybe a vague sense of looking for something in the misting shifting sands of time, maybe just a desire to hear once familiar sounds with new ears to see how it stands up. Actually though that’s impossible of course; you can’t listen with new ears and anyone who says otherwise is either lying or has no soul.

Like: watched Donnie Darko the other night and was struck by a few things. One, how it was a bit like watching a John Hughes movie with added ‘spook’ factor (and that’s a good thing, naturally). Two, how it was like watching a movie I’d have made if I’d gone into movie making and not, uh, whatever the hell I did go into, by which I mean, uh… I mean that when I was younger I would listen to music and it would almost always be visualised. In other words, the music would become part of a inner movie, would become a soundtrack to imaginings, to fantasies. Maybe that’s why I loved those John Hughes movies so much. I dunno. But I know that watching Donnie Darko was like that, mainly because the songs used in the soundtrack were the kinds of songs I’d have built my own fantasy movies around. Also, three, the power of mainstream songs to stay in your head years after you have ever heard them, and how immediately associated memories crash into place along side them. Specifically thinking this when Tears For Fears’ ‘Head Over Heels’ kicked in; not a song I ever really liked, but one that was around a lot I guess at a certain time. Hearing it again I suddenly saw a field, an orange football, flagons of Somerset scrumpy, teenagers in cycling shorts, distant stereo’s and tree-trunks in the woods. Which is really crazy because those images belong to year earlier than ‘head over heels’, which maybe means I’m still blocking thoughts of 1985, but whatever…

I think 1985 might be the last year where any mainstream music can have this effect, since that was pretty much the last year when I bought anything from ‘the charts’ or listened to the radio. Tellingly, and perhaps fittingly, it is also the last year in which I was always a teenager.

And I only say this to explain away why I have been spending lots of time recently downloading dodgy ‘80s Pop via Limewire, and to prelude the fact that hmmm, isn’t the Snowdrops’ version of ‘Mad World’ (new 7” release on Matinee) the best thing ever (this week)? Yes it is.

posted by duke harringay at 2:40 PM

Darth Vader walked into the Phoenix café and ordered a coffee. A ladies’ voice off was heard to say ‘exterminate’… Ah, the post-modern tableau that is the modern world.
posted by duke harringay at 2:18 PM

If there are better days in the year than this one then I’m not sure I know about them. The first day of the summer holidays is always special; a day to drift into things that one would normally like to do but for which the time just never seems to be there. Or more precicesly perhaps, the time to do those things without the constant feeling that there’s school lurking just around the corner, spoiling everything. So this morning, a stroll into town (‘stroll’ is important, because normally I charge everywhere and get hot and bothered – today I can stroll and it’s ace), a browse in the record store (I bought two old Cocteau Twins albums, more of that later perhaps…), a riffle through the shelves of the book store (I bought two novels: ‘July, July’, and ‘Big Mouth, Ugly Girl’ just because I liked the titles) and a coffee (pushing the boat out with a ‘real’ coffee – with caffeine!) in the Boston, from where I tap away on these keys on this glorious PowerBook. Yesterday I told C that my PowerBook is just about the best thing I ever bought, and it’s true… alongside my new Trek carbon bicycle, that is.

Having said that today is a great day, yesterday was pretty fine too. I had a lovely afternoon, at least, with the kids from my tutor group hanging out in my class eating chocolate cake and sweets that I bought for them at lunchtime. Or at least, I gave Dana a twenty and sent her and The Gang of Four (actually there’s more than four, but I wanted to insert a cool Pop reference) to Safeway and told them to splurge, which they did admirably. So everyone was eating chocolate and laughing at the Tangents lucky dip CD box (a pale relation to the legendary Careless Talk Lucky Dip CD freebie box, but heh…) which was filled with a bundle of things I really have no room or need for anymore… mostly promo/review copies of stuff. Several kids took big armfuls though, which was kind of fun. I’m sure they’ll hate most of it (actually most of it got the same reaction from me to be honest), but it was nice to see a few kids willing to take a chance on something they’d never heard of. Maybe the spirit of exploration isn’t dead in the youth of today after all.

So it was sweets all round, and relaxed conversations, and laughs and smiles. Then I took down all the things from my wall (except the Things That Shall Not Be Removed, like Claire’s Refreshers and Lily’s Lovehearts and the ‘Pope’ card and Pam’s Valentine’s greeting and Neal’s Power Rangers stickers and the two photos of yours truly; one standing beside the Fire Raisers graff and the other of me showing off in a Laura Ashley dress and Lois t-shirt) and felt a bit sad as I do every year because it’s all so bare suddenly and all the memories are stowed away, and hmmmm… well you know how it goes. Then Jo started strumming her guitar and singing real quiet, and that was cool, and I thought of the genius of Lois Maffeo again, and hey, I should dig out those old Courtney Love singles when I get home maybe.

And then the bell went for the end of school, and everyone cheered and headed off home with lots of nice goodbyes and have a good holidays, and Georgie stood in the doorway and said ‘goodbye sir, it’s been an emotional year’ and thinking about it now looked like she’d had a few (you know that look), and well, yeah, it has at that, and even more so if you’re fifteen, because sheesh, if your fifteenth year ISN’T an emotional year then something’s wrong somewhere surely?

So, the kids are alright… and all the crap I’ve been moaning about recently really is worth it.

And when I start bleating again next year, someone email me this blog entry please.

The caffeine is kicking in, and I need to go meet C for lunch.

posted by duke harringay at 2:05 PM