sailorette’s diary - a diary writen by a sailorette for her loved ones to read after returning safely home from sea

Photo from Steve Asenjo’s flickr

Last Sunday I went with Nico and Karl Ringman to see Ani Difranco at Shepherd’s Bush Empire. It was my first Ani Gig.

It was amazing.

She is an extremely good performer - not just in a musical sense, but with a stage sense that really engages her audience. Each song was mixed up with mini-monologues and her crazy laughter, which makes for the perfect environment to really listen to her music. I found I was hearing new lyrics with every song.

Leaving an Ani gig, you want to fill in the blanks of a conversation you started with her in your mind.

A little mind-blown. It’s all a bit like a whirlwind romance.

Listen to the following at your peril…

The new Jordan and Andre Christmas single:
the original
after the magic of retouching and lip synching

What a wonderful world this could be!

We are buying more vinyl records than ever. According to the Recording Industry Association of America, vinyl sales have doubled in percentage of music sales since 2000. Last year in the UK record sales topped 1,072,608, compared to a poor 178,831 in 2001. The last White Stripes single, “The Denial Twist”, reaced #10 in the charts due to 10″ sales.

People who don’t even have record players, are seeking out 7-inches of their favourite bands, purchasing them as collectible tactile trophies that visually contain the treasured music. Music Labels are reporting that c.d. sales are down to such an extent that they plan to release two 7-inch singles for every one cd single made, especially in the case of new bands,

“If you put out a James Blunt 7in, no one’s interested – but if you put out something by a new group, where the artwork and packaging represent them stylistically, it’s a different story.”
Khalid Mallassi, co-director of the Brighton-based independent Catskills Records, from The Telegraph

“Its just the idea of the cd. Now it seems very outdated… and tacky.”
Kate Malkin

In a time of ‘invisible’ media where music is ready and available at the click from the itunes music store, or a few hours from a torrent, the vinyl record rebels against this with its very visible and analogue behaviour. A record player is very honest and open. The record is out in full view, and physically moves round and round as the music plays. A user may press a switch to automatically play the record, or, more often, manually place the play-head upon the record. And of course there is the size of the record, and the size of the artwork that the record is packaged in. The whole package is a very ordinary and yet beautiful object that, I find makes the playing of the music all the more rewarding and the listening all the more pleasureable.

The history of the record shows the circular disc as a symbol of rebellion:

“During the reign of the Communist Party in the former USSR, records were commonly homemade using discarded medical x-rays. These records, nicknamed “Bones”, were usually inscribed with illegal copies of popular music banned by the government. They also became a popular means of distribution among Soviet punk bands; in addition to the high cost and low availability of vinyl, punk music was politically surpressed, and publishing outlets were limited.”
Wiki

And so in this time where the ‘ownership’ of music is being challenged by the internet and global sharing, it is quite fitting that the black circular slab, first born in 1888, that pioneered the music industry, should continue to thrive in the digital age, where other formats are failing.

With a voice you wish would read you bedtime stories, Stuart Staples took the stage at the barbican last night to rekindle the voice of the tindersticks. What a wonderful way to spend a sunday evening being lulled by the tindersticks performing Tindersticks II for “Dont Look Back, a Barbican season of gigs with bands performing their best albums back to back.

Wandering in an hour late, on-time to see the Tindersticks come out on stage, I cursed our fashionable timeing at the site of an old guy, sitting on a chair in the middle of the stage, with an old wooden record player on his lap, playing one brilliant record after another. This was Dj nick brown, a disc-jockey in the old, and true sense of the word.

He was brilliant and a perfect warm-up to the vinyl sounding quality of the Mr Staples and his accompaniment.

“can you hear my lovebuns?”

I was lying in my bed last night
Staring at a ceiling full of stars
When it suddenly hit me
I just have to let you know how I feel

We live together in a photograph of time
I look into your eyes
And the seas open up to me
I tell you I love you
And I always will

And I know that you can’t tell me
And I know that you can’t tell me

So I’m left to pick up
The hints, the little symbols of your devotion
So I’m left to pick up
The hints, the little symbols of your devotion

Its wonderful that both times i’ve been to see Death Cab they have put such emphasis on coming from Seattle. Slogan: “We are Death Cab for Cutie from Seattle” …a town that is famed for its rain and that terrible film starring Tom Hanks. I think this topographical origin influenced the band’s first performance that I saw at the Astoria. The band seemed a bit shy and overwhelmed but far from effect their performance, this added to the band’s onstage personality.

This time they rocked the house! Maybe it was the Brixton atmosphere, but they rocked the 13 year old girls, the 40 year-so mums and our 20-so’s cotton socks off. Mr Gibbard, with his voice that sits on the corner of your mind, was on top form, jumping up and down to every song. The little guitarist, Nick Harmer, was also rocking with his bass like a drinking bird.

One thing.
The drum duet was the highlight of the set. Ben and the drummer, Michael Schorr, did a lovely jam to ____________ (to fill in the name later). Interesting how I keep seeing these talented singers who can also drum.

Death Cab is a very accomplished band. Their lyrics are crafted and full of visual imagery, and their music is anti-decorative, bringing the visual lyrics into the audial world.

Go see! It’ll rock!

My desert island disks. I think i should do one of these every year and see how they change.

The Number of the Beast - Iron Maiden
Enter Sandman (cover)- Motorhead
Requiem - Mozart
Everlong (acoustic) - Foo Fighters
Gravity of the Situation - Vic Chesnut
Karl Marx and History - Randy
Back in Black - ACDC
Saeglopur - Sigur Ros

luxury: teddy bear sleeping bag
book: Aldous Huxley - Brave New World
record: takk - sigur ros

Found
above the begger spot,
outside the garage,
along shoreditch high street,
on 28th June,
before the Death Cab for Cutie gig.

I first heard these lads when I got a hold of their song ‘I will be there when you die”. A lovely song, the lyrics and the singer’s voice exhale a haunting sweet-bitterness through the music. Since then I got a hold of another album, but it didn’t seem to ring true to this first song I heard.

Now I’ve slowly been collecting their complete disography and it is, without being to understated, rather good. I have heard they are even more rather than good live, so heres for another gig.

I think this will be a very hard post to write. Mainly because my writing style lacks the lyricall power to explain just how staggering, word-taking, mouth-drying, flesh-tingling, stunning and wondrous the foo fighters acoustic gig at Victoria Apollo really was. I still haven’t gotten over it. On the bus ride home, me and nuzz sat in euphoric silence, the only way which can trully express what the gig was like. So far from offending the gig with my juvenile inexperienced words, I will instead talk about my discoveries, that many will know, but that are rather shiny in their newness to me.

Chris Shiflett
The lead guitarist of Foo is Chris Shiflett. While Grohl was off moonlighting with the queens of the stone age, Chris released an album with his brother in their band Jackson sometime before the Foo’s One by One came out. Chris also played guitar in a favourite punk band from my youth - Me First and the Gimme Gimmes.

Taylor
The tazmanian devil of drummers. I do believe he always drums in shorts and a bare chest. When he sang, on Cold Day in the Sun, his voice secured his tazmanian devil origin.

Rami Jaffee
Then there was this dude who played the acordian and piano and cigarette (a constant part of his stage get up). A proper character he conjured up images for me of blackface and Al johnson

Pat Smear
And the rather characterly dressed bleached blong hair guitarist turned out to be Pat Smear, the guy who played with Nirvana in their last 6 months. A complete hybrid, Mr Smear has an african american/native american mother and German Jewish father. Supposedly this was a big deal he was touring with the Foo’s as he has been keeping a really low profile.

Mr Grohl
And then there was Dave. what a lovely person this guy seems. One who laughs with life and with a glowing ego that doesn’t rule the band. A true talent and like all trully talented individuals, a workaholic, he has this rolling almost mid-east accent so it wasn’t surprising when I found out he was born in Ohio, nextdoor to where my mom grew up, and now lives is Virgina.

One song they played that I’d never heard (apart from on the new album) was actually a really old song from Grohl’s pseudonym ‘late’ first solo album, pocketwatch. It was really lovely, and with lyrics like:

“He’s never been in love
But he knows just what love is
He says nevermind
And no one speaks”

makes you wonder if its about Kurt, and it probably is, but more based around the time when Grohl moved in with Kurt, who he didn’t know all that well, and the two spent a rather lonely depressing winter with Krist. This was before nirvana became big. It was the first acoustic song Grohl wrote.

And theres much more to write.. but words are falling now. So I suggest you take a pop over to nuzz’s blog for a much more indepth and educational account.

“After silence that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.” - Aldous Huxley

“And after a song, that which comes nearest to expressing its meanings is a cover.” - me

Loudon Wainright III: “One Man Guy� [I’m Alright; 1985]
Rufus Wainright: “One Man Guy� [Poses; 2001]

Taken from letters to the magazine VIZ and, I might add, written by a fellow jesmond-er.

Hats off to the witty burglars who stole my entire CD collection with the exception of “There is Nothing Left to Lose” by the Foo Fighters. I hope that when sentencing, the judge takes into account their splendid sense of humour.
Chris Scaife, Jesmond

I saw this film a few nights ago. An unpimped story about a pimp. The film took a sympathetic angle and also unearthed a few points about the resurrection of hip hop.

Now the word pimp itself is thought to come from the 6th century French verb pimper, which means “alluring or seducing in outward appearance or dress”.

The word pimp and pimpin’ has today been encrusted with ghetto cool. But, as the only white character says, hip hop and rap isn’t about the big chains, the super-suspension cars and flash brands. It’s soul is in its roots grown from captivity, suppression and sex. Also that “every man deserves to give this world a verse”.

So I ain’t gonna turn this into an essay, but finish with some words from the celebrity ‘pimp’ himself, Snoop Dog.

Pussy is my dish and I’m fishin, wishin
upon a star, to come up on some ends
but she caviar, and I let her bet her pussy
so I can get my pimp on
Cause my pen gets my pimp on from G to ozone.

Hello little miss Martha,

I’m starting this one off with a song - “I can’t help falling in love wiiiiiiiith you”. Now why is it that the majority of songs are written about love. nn said to me it is so much easier to add meaning to a song when its about love, than say, a bottle of half empty coke on the coffee table.. that is unless the half empty coke is a metaphor for lost love. Love and song are a very good match, the sirens sung to make men fall in love with them, elton john writes songs to make others fall in love with each other and so on. Songs make love and visa versa. And this leads us on to…

KAREOKE! The word karaoke means the song without vocals. The origin of this genius is thought to come from a small bar in japan which was too small to fit a band. The band recorded their music onto tape and the singer would sing along.

Anyone reading this most probably has sung along to their favourite band, while driving in your car, or with mister mop or miss hairbrush, in bedroom abandonment. It is liberating. I have to be careful, for I find myself singing aloud to my ipod while cycling home. Not exactly a very comforting sound for a passerby - my screeching voice, sirening out of the darkness, signaled by a red flashing light.

The japanese are crazy for this, and devote alot of attention and development to create such technology as the tsuushin karaoke, a midi compatable machine, and james bond stylee places such as this. My one regret about visiting tokyo was that we were on the brink of visiting a well known karaoke tower, which could have been here, or here. So when the chance to go here arose, i was not going to let screeching bonding antics get away again.

I’d like to take a Discovery Channel break here and discuss the origin of song. Anthropologists cannot explain why we can sing. Some explain that song came first, then language. Others suggest that singing was a way for our ancient relatives to maintain pair and group bonding. There is something rather sweet about imagining my great x1000 hairy ancester singing to his current squeeze.

And back to the main feature. Well its true. Singing breaks down barriers. It makes the world a happier place. And it really doesn’t matter weather you can hit the right note.The evidence

tunefuls of love
vv