My top ten .... Gigs, man (part two)

I saw a lot of gigs in the late 1980s.  I was an Indie girl - into music that was independently produced and distributed.  None of the mainstream Stock Aiken and Waterman that dominated the airwaves for me thank you very much!  I didn't want style over substance pop, wasn't looking to swoon over the next pretty boy lead singer or formula-ted boy band.

I wanted something more real.  Street.  Credible.  Raw.  But above all I wanted music with a strong beat which you could throw your body around to (you couldn't call it dancing).  I didn't look for harmony, that was too simple, too smooth and too last decade/generation for me.  I needed lyrics which were more than a love song, I was looking to identify with someone who spoke my language.

I have seen, and been blown away by, and also wanted to crawl away and die for, Mark E Smith, of The Fall, many times.  I've lost count and can't remember the individual times I've seen them live, but at a rough guess I'd say at least six. 

The first time I saw The Fall play live was at The Festival of the Tenth Summer, at Manchester's G-mex venue Saturday 19th July,1986, three days before my 21st birthday.  They were on stage early in the day, around 1pm, and the halls had yet to fill.  I was already aware of their songs from listening to John Peel's late night show on Radio One, and they, or rather he, struck me in the guts with his non-sensical chanted/spoken delivery of the songs/poetry over the driving thumping beat of a backbone to the music that demanded my attention, and made my pulse race.  I think this was probably my first visceral experience of a music event that left me shaken to the core and emotionally drained, in strangely good way.  Visually he made an impression as well, dressed in what appeared to be full English hunting gear, whip in hand, Scarlet jacket, jodphurs and riding boots, striking a pose in the middle of the stage, as though this was the most normal thing to be wearing in the middle of the summer.

The next really memorable gig (1988) was after they had collaborated with the contemporary ballet dancer/choreographer Michael Clark to produce the music for the dance production 'I am Kurious Oranj'.  We'd travelled to Manchester again but I can't remember the venue, part pub, part club I think. We arrived late, got our drinks and went into to a darkened room with the familiar Fall sounds filling the air.  Mark E. Smith was doing his thing, but this time the spotlights were on the two male ballet dancers performing part of the routine.  I think they were on podiums to raise them up, but away from the stage, and within the crowd.  They were wearing traditional white tu-tus and I think they may have also had headwear from Swan Lake, but I'm no ballet expert, and my memory isn't brilliant. 

What struck me was their footwear. The only way I can describe it is 'yeti' boots.  Imagine a very hairy wellington boot, I mean VERY hairy, cumbersomely so.  Then try to picture these tu-tu-ed ballet boy swans, dancing in these yeti boots, en pointe - on tip-toe - to Mark E Smith growling/drawling something incomprehensible to a driving thumping pounding drum beat with the bass guitar trying to keep up, the guitarist keeping their eye on the singer, and the keyboard player melding with everything, and the ballet dancers' dancing being sublime, adding to the show, expanding the experience and somehow definitely being the icing on the cake.  I've got goosebumps again just remembering it.

Another trip into Manchester, and they were crap. Or, rather, he was crap.  Mumbling, rocking, rolling around on stage, obviously drunk, obviously wrong place wrong time, but also pathetic, upset, and upsetting, and nasty.  The show finished early, the rest of the band looked pissed off, the crowd were none too pleased as well.  The next edition of the NME (New Musical Express - newspaper for musicians) announced that Mark E Smith had split up from his wife (Brix Smith) because she'd cheated on him with classical violinist Nigel Kennedy. Made sense of the gig, and made me question the pressure performers are put under and that they put themselves under....

Nevertheless, my all time top ten live gigs number 4 - The Fall.

Back to the Festival of the Tenth Summer - 19th July 1986. The other standout performance and headliners was by The Smiths. The afternoon had progressed with other notable bands including Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark and New Order.  The day was a complete celebration of Manchester's finest influential music makers, and well before Manchester got the 'Madchester' reputation of house music and rap and ecstacy and trouble.

The penultimate act was New Order, one of my all time favourite bands who I've seen many times, but the climax was The Smiths.  This was the only time I saw them live, and less than a year later they'd split up, (nothing to do with me!).  The halls were in darkness, the last of the evening's sunlight filtering through over the back of the stage through the huge fanlights of the building's curved roof.  (The G-mex used to be Manchester Central Railway Station - see link for short history / pictures here:  http://manchesterhistory.net/manchester  ).

Then before The Smiths came on stage, they played the opening to Prokofiev's Montagues and Capulets (from Romeo and Juliet, 1935). Whenever I hear that music now, I am transported back to that crowd, the anticipation of the event to come, and the huge upsurge of an unanimous roar of approval as The Smiths came on stage, and did their set, Morrissey with his billowing white shirt, tight denim jeans, and gladioli flowers that he swooshed around the stage, and the crowd went wild. 

As it happens I don't actually remember much about the gig after that, but that first impression, and the fact that I can say 'I saw The Smiths' is really all I need.

Top ten gigs number 5. The Smiths.

Keeping it real!

Kat :) 

My Top Ten ... Gigs, man (part one)

At the end of November I took my husband (for his 50th birthday present) to see Joan Armatrading playing 'her last major tour' at the Hexagon Theatre in Reading. She was much better than I'd been expecting, not in a slick, professional sort of way, some of her timing was a little haphazard, and she gleefully admitted three times that she'd forgotten how one of the songs started... but in the warmth of her personality, which filled the theatre in a reciprocal hug.... and her voice, of course, was and is amazing.

When we got home, or maybe the next day I wrote a post about the experience on FaceBook, and said that I'd put her in my all time top ten gig list.  Which surprised me, because in my humble opinion, I've seen some good music gigs in my time.

Going back, I'd have to put my first ever gig in the top-ten because it was my first gig, but also because it was good.  My mum took me and my sister to see Darts playing at Preston Guild Hall back in 1977 or '78.  I'd have been about 12, my sister 10, and we both wore full circular skirts which my mum had made.  The songs were in the charts at the time, and the deep-voiced Den Heggarty was the memorable star of the show with his acrobatic climbing of the theatre interior, like some urban orang-utan with a quiff, drainpipes and crepe sole shoes....

Chronologically, the next few bands I remember seeing would have been at Blackburn King George's Hall.  Punk and NewWave were doing the rounds, and I was fortunate to see The Undertones, Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, Sham 69, and some others at this venue. My wisdom in deciding not to see The Police because I didn't think that they were any good, is still questionable.

Over at Preston Guild Hall I remember seeing Gary Numan drive around the stage in his wierd Sinclair C5 or something similar.  He ticked my teenage angst boxes.  Someone had to.

Time and friendship circles moved on, and in my all time top-ten I'd have to put the magnificent 'Eek-a-Mouse' a Jamaican Reggae performer who I saw with my friend SG in Bristol in around 1984 or so.  I listened to John Peel's late night radio programmes a lot back then, so Eek-a-Mouse seemed the obvious thing to be doing that night.

The gig was in a de-consecrated church which still had its stained glass windows, and the early evening setting sun made the stage glow with a multitude of colours.  You could have counted the white people in the audience on the fingers of two hands, and we were two of them, and girls to boot, but the atmosphere was good, if a little hazy, if you know what I mean.  In fact I seem to remember that we tried and spectacularly failed to 'score some grass'.  I'm fairly certain that instead of the weed we thought we were rolling into our poor excuse for a joint, we were actually rolling some weeds....

Anyhow, Eek-a-Mouse was electric, lithe and clad in black leather trousers and waistcoat, which accentuated his 6ft 6in lean frame.  He was mesmeric, charming, and a little dangerous, and the audience and we two girls loved him. According to Wikipedia he's fallen from grace of late, serving time for felonies in USA which I won't go into here as this is not the time nor place.

So that's three of the top ten so far: Joan Armatrading, Darts and Eek-a-Mouse.  More next time.

Kat :)

The cycle of life, warts 'n' all

The personality trait I admire most, and strive to attain is tolerance. In my opinion the world would be a much better place if there was more of this around, but I can only do what I can do, and in my small way I try.

Which is why, if and when I get a moment to reflect on things, I'm quite surprised by how my life has changed, for the better, since having children.

I'm not a naturally maternal woman.  I don't ooh and aah over small fluffy cute things. I don't often coo about babies. My instinct has been to avoid small children, medium sized children and teenagers, they're all too needy and noisy, too whiny, too sticky and smelly, too tangible.  I was quite happy without them.  For quite some time.  For 35 years to be specific.  Well, for 34 and something years.  To be frank, I didn't want children, and they equally didn't want me.

And then Mother Nature caught up with me, my biological alarm clock went off, and happily, in the year 2000 we got Phoebe, and in the year 2006, we got Tom.

So life changed. From being the happily independent, working woman, to part-time working mother, to full time mother, and back to part-time mother working again, has been an education in self-perception and tolerance if nothing else.  And what have I learned from this experience?

I've learned that not all children are as bad as I'd imagined.  Which is a good thing.  When we moved to Oxfordshire in 2007 I did what many mothers do to get established, and went to the toddler groups.  This was a new experience for me at the age of 41, and often made me the oldest mother in the room. A strange feeling whichever way you look at it.

Luckily I saw that I could benefit if I became more actively involved and for 18 months I ran one of the toddler groups when the other mums moved on.  I didn't realise it at the time, but looking back this exposure to very young children (en masse) gave me the confidence to expand my horizons when I started work in the Library.  I got to grips with organising and conducting rhymetimes for the under 5s, and that gave me confidence when I had to handle a class visit.

Now I'm settling down in my new job as Library Manager (I still can hardly believe it), I really enjoy the aspect of the job that involves children, as much as any other part of the role.  To this end, I've been volunteering my time on Wednesday mornings (my branch is closed on Wednesdays) in my son's primary school library.

Sadly, the school library had become neglected, and hadn't properly been used since 2010. Ah-ha. I spied an opportunity. I could volunteer - they get the benefit of a 'real library person' working for free - I get the benefit of working more closely with children, learn a bit more about what makes them tick, and then take the benefit of this knowledge back to the library to make it tick there too.

Woo hoo. It's a win-win.  This morning in the school library I had great fun introducing 30 Year 3s (ages 7-8) to the library, explaining who I was, why I was there, how I could help, and then putting it into action as they each chose just one book to take away from the shelves that aren't quite in order yet, but we'll get there, and why should we have books in order on the shelves, and if they'd written a book themselves where would they look to find it on the shelves? and go and stand where they think their book would be, and I sat on the floor by the letter 'L' because that's where my book would be if I'd written one, and it was funny to see a grown up sitting on the floor just chatting happily with them about choosing a book, and with a promise that when they come back, they'll tell me something about the book, no right or wrong answer, just how did they get on with it, how did they feel? even if they don't like reading, just to tell me something, even if they didn't like the book.  And do you know what?   They all looked me in the eye and said they would.

That's why I love my job. And I couldn't have, wouldn't have done this job without having had my two lovely (mostly) children, Phoebe and Tom.  The cycle of life. What goes around comes around.

Kat :)