Not Up

24Nov09

A combination of a lack of sunshine and Holly’s poor health means that I’m packing all this in for a while – blogging, tweeting, facebooking etc. Being positive when I’m feeling so down down down is difficult, so I’m off for a bit and will maybe see you soon.

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Less Wonky

18Nov09

Disappointingly I’m now having to call time on my second attempt at a 365 project (in fact I’ve been running with two of them concurrently here and here). My first attempt failed due to my computer chomping on a whole batch of photos and thus stopping the flow in it’s tracks, whereas the only recently failed second attempt is entirely down to me going a bit wonky due to a poorly family cat.

Thankfully Holly, the aforementioned poorly family cat, is now no longer poorly (although is trying to help me type) and I’m a little less wonky so hey it’s not all bad is it ?

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Tags: 365, Holly

Struggling To Keep Calm

16Nov09

I always loved the ‘Keep Calm And Carry On’ poster since I noticed in on display at Barter Books in Northumberland (my favourite book shop in the UK – I’m sure I’ve rambled on about it before on here) despite the fact that it’s been slowly and steadily abused by a whole host of unimaginative retailers.

However my love is being sorely tested given that one of the least imaginative bands in Britain, The Stereophonics, has decided to forgo any attempt to use something of their own and instead steal the ‘Keep Calm’ message for the title of the latest album. Curses on all their respective houses.

I’ve always wanted to maintain a degree of positivity with this blog so in order to counteract the grumpiness of the above why not go and read about the history of the original poster at Barter Books and about the story of what’s happened since they found it at Mary Manley’s (the owner of Barter Books) blog – which includes details of a certain Mr Mark Coop, a man it seems born to help allow the continuation of the use of the term ‘brassneck’.

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Tags: Barters Books, Keep Calm And Carry On, Mary Manley, The Stereophonics

Mundane

15Nov09

For many years I worked for Her Majesty’s Civil Service. Somewhat by choice but to be honest mostly out of an almost chronic lack of ambition and to be really really honest because Texas Homecare turned me down.

Anyway life in the Civil Service was interminably dull (even for someone with said lack of ambition) and as such my mind would wander,  (‘wander’ is underplaying what happened to an almost heroic degree). Most days I would will the wood yard next door to implode into a raging inferno (a raging inferno please note where no one was hurt and those involved in the business of quenching said fire went about their duties safely – albeit quite slowly), however despite the effort of my will I failed to insitgate even a flicker of a flame *.

So it was great to see the wonderful (I can prove that by using an etch-a-sketch) Russell Davies talking about games and playfulness (not that sort of playfulness, behave) at (appropriately enough) Playful, and now reprised on his blog :

“It’s that experience of driving in the back of the family car, scrunching you eyes up at night to turn the streetlights into laser weapons and shooting other cars. Or watching the passing shadows on the road beside you, imagining shapes and rhythms.“

Which is just lovely isn’t ? He continues the thought by going onto say :

“Just like when I walk through the crowds on Oxford Street a tiny part of me is pretending I’m an assassin slipping steely-eyed through the crowds in order to shake the agents on my tail. And I bet it’s not just me. I’m not saying I’m massively deluded, just that, very often, some bit of us is always trying to play those games, to make mundane things more exciting.“

and illustrates his point with this clip from one of my favourite films, Billy Liar.

And that’s just great isn’t it, “making mundane things more exciting” – shouldn’t we all be doing that ?

Which is all a rambling route to get to a place to introduce noticings, a relatively new example of a ‘barely game’ ((c) Russell Davies) where the point is the game is to notice the world around you or to put it another way to help “make mundane things more exciting“.

*It was shortly after I left and moved into my new job that a fire did break out in said wood yard – not an inferno but a decent sized blaze. It was this day that I knew there was no God.

Filed under: Ideas, Uncategorized   |  1 Comment
Tags: Billy Liar, Games, Noticings, Play, Playful, Russell Davies, Texas Homecare, The Civil Service

S – L – O – W

11Nov09

Attempting to apply the brake.

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Tags: Slow

Keep Watching The Skies

05Nov09

I’ve been waiting to post this for a while now because it may be appearing elsewhere on the internet, however as a couple of people have asked me about my visit I thought I’d put it here at digyourfins for the moment as well. If it does appear elsewhere I’ll be sure to say . . .

Anderby Creek is not somewhere you arrive at by accident, in fact I was intending to visit and I still struggled to locate it after driving through a great deal of the very deepest and darkest Lincolnshire. Further confusion arose through my inability to understand the subtle difference between Anderby and Anderby Creek but eventually I did indeed arrive.

Part of the problem in my efforts to locate Anderby Creek was due to the fact that it doesn’t really consist of a great deal bar a large number of caravans and a wide expanse of (very pleasant) sandy beach, however since the 1st April earlier this year it’s also been the location of the world’s first ‘Official Cloudspotting Area’ and this was the reason for my journey, after all as member number 14364 of the Cloud Appreciation Society it’s surely a must see.

The Anderby Creek Cloud Bar, to give it’s official title, came into being after a disused beach shelter was given a new lease of life as part of the Bathing Beauties project. Designed by Michael Trainor it’s a simple wooden, (larch I believe), building featuring a number of cloud spotting menus, some cloud viewing seating, (which admittedly are better to look at than to sit on), and some slightly Heath Robinson styled self-operating parabolic cloud-mirrors – to aid in the viewing of clouds across the wide East coast skies.

I arrived as the sun was coming up and if nothing else the view of the North sea from the Cloud Bar’s viewing platform was worth the journey alone. When the Bar opened earlier in the year the weather wasn’t very kind at all, in fact the day was marred by, well by clear blue skies. I had no such problem during my visit, in fact quite the opposite in so much that almost as soon as the sun appeared it disappeared behind a thick unrelenting band of Altostratus, not the most attractive of clouds but I suppose cloud all the same.

It may seem a little perverse to travel any kind of distance to view something that’s available to you outside your front door but the Cloud Bar is worth a visit nevertheless and as Gavin Pretor-Pinney, founder of The Cloud Appreciation Society, said: “The Cloud Bar is an inspired way to remind the public that some of nature’s most varied and beautiful displays take place daily above our heads”, something we could all do with being reminded of eh ?

Filed under: The Seaside, Weather   |  Leave a Comment
Tags: Altostratus, Anderby Cloud Bar, Anderby Creek, Bathing Beauties, Cloud Appreciation Society, Gavin Pretor-Piney, Heath Robinson, Lincolnshire, Michael Trainor, Official Cloudspotting Area

Smashing Pumpkins

31Oct09

Aren’t they ?

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Tags: Halloween, Orange, Pumpkins

Happy Birthday Maida Vale

30Oct09

Earlier today I was alerted by the fine people of Twitter to the fact that today is the 75th anniversary of the BBC’s famous Maida Vale Studios, a place very dear to my heart.

Those of you who know me will know that I’ve been ‘involved’ with the band Magoo for more years than I care to remember, ostensibly managing them but in fact as a sleeve note mentions somewhere more accurately – in charge of ‘telephones and typewriters’.

When I first started working with the band I only really had one goal and that was to record a session for the late great John Peel (yes him again). I made a vague deal with them that I’d help as much as I was able as long as when or if (not sure what I thought at the time) they ever got to record a session for John Peel I would be allowed to appear on it.

So you can imagine what the 12th December 1995 meant to me, as that was the day Magoo travelled down to the BBC’s Maida Vale recording studios (number 4 I believe) to record their debut session for the John Peel show.

As ever with these events I don’t recollect much about the day, other than feeling wildly overawed and hugely out of place. After all this was the place that almost every band I’d ever loved had come to record – Joy Division, Pixies, The Smiths, The Specials, Sonic Youth and of course the mighty ever present Fall. This was the place where Delia Derbyshire had laid out huge lengths of tape loops to produce the theme tune to Dr Who for the Radiophonic Workshop. The place even that the BBC Symphony Orchestra called home.

And here we were.

Magoo recorded four tracks that day, namely Baxter Preminger, Eye Spy, Goldwyn and last but not least Valley As A Whole which features just a single chord played by yours truly – but boy what a chord.

Happy birthday Maida Vale.

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Tags: Baxter Preminger, BBC, BBC Radiophonic Workshop, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Delia Derbyshire, Eye Spy, Goldywn, Happy Birthday, John Peel, Joy Division, Magoo, Maida Vale, Pixies, Sonic Youth, The Smiths, The Specials, Valley As A Whole

“John Peel Was A Hell Of Man”

26Oct09

Well yesterday was the fifth anniversary of the death of John Peel.

If you’ve visited here before you may have caught my ramble about John in respect of my work with the wonderful Magoo and in particular my efforts to get their second single played on the radio :

“I tried to instigate this radio-play by hand delivering copies all over London town and remarkably bumped into John Peel outside BBC Radio 1, who commended me on my Bill Shankly t –shirt (boy was I trying hard) and promised to listen to the record that very evening – whether he did or not remains unclear however he played the all the tracks from the record over the next few weeks and remained a fan / friend of the band up until his death in 2004 – in fact Magoo were one of the very last bands who recorded a session for him).”

And you may have seen some thoughts I posted in response to reading ‘The Olivetti Chronicles – Three Decades Of Life And Music’ – a collection of John Peel’s various writings :

In one piece for the Observer from 1986 entitled ‘Aural Vandalism’ he writes about attending a Sonic Youth / The Jesus and Mary Chain gig at the Hammersmith Palaisin London (I know it will make me sound like the old man I’m rapidly becoming but hey they don’t make gigs like that anymore do they ?). He talks of the Sonic Youth’s obvious desire to disturb and confront and of The Jesus and Mary Chain’s chaotic and often short lived live outings – “If twenty minutes is the time it takes The Jesus and Mary Chain to achieve whatever effect it is they wish, it would be fatuous to play longer.”

However (and admittedly I might be on my own here) it’s the pay-off lines that really makes you fall back in love with him.

“As I left the Palais I overheard one twerp braying to his companions. ‘What a waste of money,’ he cried, and for moment I wished I were a fighting man.”

John Peel was a hell of a man and round our way he’s very very much missed.

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Tags: Bill Shankly, John Peel, Magoo, Sonic You, The Jesus and Mary Chain, The Olivetti Chronicles

I’m Going To Take You To A Cloud Bar

22Oct09

It’s been a busy week and I haven’t even had the time to mention my visit to the Anderby Creek Cloud Bar.

First thing Sunday morning I was on a rather lovely and wholly deserted Lincolnshire beach watching the sun come up – seems a world away now. Anyways Cloud Bar report coming soon although possibly via a different location.

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Tags: Anderby Creek, Cloud Bar, Lincolnshire