Two slices of Balearica for today with the promise of sunnier climes and better days, both tracks I would have featured here back in December if things had been different. Both have the ability to transport me somewhere else for the duration they play. First, a Coyote remix of Tonarunur. Tonarunur is from Reykjavik, Iceland, Coyote are from Nottingham. On Paris From Above they find a sweet spot that links those three cities in a laid back, dreamy manner, gently pulsing synths and a heavily echoed voice saying things I can't quite hear. Buy it here.
Phil Mison is Cantoma, a doyen of the Cafe del Mar and Balearic scene. I posted To The Sea back in October, a lovely accordion led groove. It's been remixed by Italian duo Here & Now Remix, adding a lazy beat, washes of synth and pushing the topline melody to the fore. The accordion eventually shows up four minutes in and everything drifts towards the finish line. Buy it here.
Here's a song that never fails to lift the spirits. It came my way again yesterday morning while scrolling on my phone and avoiding getting out of bed, courtesy of a Big Audio Dynamite Facebook group I'm a member of. It was a clip of Aztec Camera and Mick Jones miming on what looks like Spanish TV in 1990. I can't find the clip on Youtube so can't post it but Roddy, Mick and the rest of Aztec Camera are giving it their all, miming enthusiastically and bouncing around, Mick in a BAD II bucket hat and white Stussy t- shirt and Roddy in a red Italia 90 Espana long sleeved t- shirt (there were a set of these available that summer- Brasil, South Korea, Espana and Italia. I got the Brasil one after seeing them in The Face and wore it to Glastonbury. As we walked to the Pyramid Stage from our tent on the Saturday morning to watch James a man started talking excitedly at me in Portuguese, assuming I was Brazilian. 'Sorry mate, I'm from Manchester').
Good Morning Britain is a cracking song, rattling along with a twangy guitar line, uptempo drumming and Mick and Roddy trading lines and firing off verses and choruses like it's the easiest thing in the world. The lyrics dissect the state of the UK after ten years of Thatcherism and an even longer period of England marginalising its neighbours and prods a finger at the relentless cheeriness of breakfast TV. Roddy manages to find some optimism in the chorus and in the last verse, 'Love is international/ And if you stand or if you fall/ Let them know you gave your all/ Worry about it later'
The Julian Mendelsohn Mix is pretty much the same as the single version. Mendelsohn is best known for his work producing the Pet Shop Boys Actually and Disco albums and he gives Good Morning Britain a radio friendly sheen. There was also this remix courtesy of Norman Cook, at that point riding high with Beats International. In truth, this remix doesn't add much to the song.
Here's the promo video. Whenever I hear Good Morning Britain now it always makes me feel that Roddy should update it, rewrite the words to reflect the state of the UK all these years later- although reading them now maybe, sadly, they don't really need changing at all.
Bagging Area is twelve years old today, a blog that started out as being something I thought I'd try for a year is now only one year short of being a teenager. There aren't many songs with the number twelve or 12 in the title. There are obviously hundreds/ thousands of 12" mixes or versions but that seemed like cheating. The best is this one from Bob Dylan, the opening song on 1966's Blonde On Blonde...
I saw Bob Dylan once, part of his Never Ending Tour, at Manchester Arena (then called Nynex). I'd struggle to tell you exactly which year it was but the internet tells me it was 9th May 2002- the setlist from that gig looks familiar. More familiar than some of the songs on the night some of which were well under way before they became recognisable. I know that's all become part of the fun of a latter day Dylan gig but it does lead to some head scratching moments and then laughter as you suddenly realise 'oh, it's Visions Of Johanna!'. On the night we saw him he finished his set with Rainy Day Women #12 & 35 and it was one of the songs which was identifiable fairly instantly.
Some brief 'research' into the number twelve reveals that it is significant numerologically- it represents perfection or completion and cosmic order. It crops up in mythology, religion and the zodiac. There are twelve months and twelve lunar cycles. Twelve is also the number of years for a full cycle of Jupiter, the largest planet in our solar system and one of the brightest in our sky. The Jupiter 4 is a vintage Roland synthesizer and gave a name and a sound to this Sharon Van Etten song, a dark, moody, obsessive love song written on the distinctive synth.
My last post of 2021 is one of the first releases of 2022, a new single from Fontän, electronic- psychedelicists from Gothenburg, Sweden. Iriz is out on 7" vinyl in two weeks time but you can download it now. It's a slowly building six minute glide, spaced out psychedelia and is gorgeousness itself. Twinkling melodies, soft padded drums, a sliding guitar part, a warm bath of sounds, before a rattling drumkit joins in and pushes the song through its second half. It has an elegiac feel to it which strikes some chords with me.
Yesterday was one month since Isaac died. I don't know what to make of that- it seems like yesterday that we were in hospital with him and the days immediately following his death seem very recent. But already Christmas and his funeral seem further away. The pain is still very real and the smallest things can set me off. In some ways, I'm quite glad that it still feels so raw- the tears that come suddenly when in the frozen food aisle in the supermarket or when driving in the car- they seem to make 'it' and him seem closer, certainly closer than something which is already a month ago.
The press release for Iriz talks about the recording being 'dedicated to nomads, space travellers, free spirits that visit earth for a brief time to make a mark here on their way to other worlds' which is a strangely timed coincidence and a nice way to think of things.
Iriz (and previous 7" single Svett) can be bought from the always reliable Hoga Nord records. If you're doing anything tonight I hope you have a good time. Raise a glass to us all, as you see the new year in. Happy new year.
We got up yesterday and decided we needed to see the sea, walk on a beach, feel the wind coming onto the coast. A quick check of the weather website and North Wales looked the best bet. There's nothing quite like a British seaside resort out of season and Llandudno has everything you want- the faded glamour of hotels built for tourists before the foreign package holiday took off, a long promenade, palm trees, a pier, The Great Orme, tearooms and all only an hour and a half away. It was windy which blew some of the cobwebs away and the sun even came out for a while. It's difficult because these are exactly the kind of days out we did with Isaac and the three of us all felt him missing at different times but it did us good to get out here and away for a few hours. Although I always think of myself as a city person the coast and the sea have a really strong pull and just being near them does a lot of good.
This song came out at the end of November. I missed it (understandably) and it missed being in my end of year list but it's a beautiful way to spend eight minutes, a pulsing, electronic cosmic trip with a blissed out vocal, soaring synths and eventually sitars and backwards guitars. Dealer is at some kind of intersection of disco, Balearica and psychedelia with Giorgio Moroder's influence writ large. Lovely false ending too and reprise too.
In 2013 while installed as artist in residence for Faber and Faber Andrew Weatherall put out a limited edition multi- media release with Michael Smith. The package brought together Michael Smith's novel Unreal City as a 10" square book with Andrew's notes in the margins, a CD mini- album of ambient music made by Andrew, Nina Walsh and Franck Alba with Michael reading extracts from the book on top and a one sided 10" single. It's a lovely artefact, now only available second hand at three figure prices. If you haven't heard it, the six tracks plus the remix are at Mixcloud. The gentle ambient wash and mournful tone of the music matched by Michael's East Yorkshire voice and his tale of a flaneur returning to the city after some time living hand to mouth on the coast in Kent and his dismay at what has happened to London in his absence.
Andrew was interviewed on Janice Long's Radio 2 show in December 2013, an interview now archived here. Andrew and Janice chat for almost an hour, play some records and he read some short stories finishing with a play of a so far unreleased track from the Unreal City sessions called Sound And Light. Janice died a few days ago, another face and voice of our youth lost. Her championing of music, radio shows, presenter appearances on Top Of The Pops alongside John Peel and enthusiasm for so many bands loved round here, not least the great Liverpool groups of the 1980s, will be sadly missed. For some time my Twitter timeline was almost entirely people from all walks of life paying tribute to Janice, someone who no one had a bad word to say about. RIP Janice.
Nina Walsh has just put up a new recording at her Bandcamp page, a fifty minute spoken word/ musical piece called Headland. Michael Smith returns as narrator and returns to the coast, this time around Hartlepool, and tales from his youth and summer escapades by the beach. Nina and Franck plus friends provide the music, a longform piece that starts out with washes and ambient soundscapes which then gradually moves in a more folky direction with tin whistles and acoustic stringed instruments, some chanted backing vocals and an accordion. Later on the players pick up in a 60s style folk rock direction, transforming to match Michael's story as he grows his hair long and falls in love with a hippy girl. Later again, it becomes more electronic and cosmische, oscillations, saws and bleeps. Headland is perfectly pitched for this time of year where it's difficult to tell one day of the week from the next and it seems to be permanently dusk. You can listen and buy here.
I've done an end of year list at the end of every year since starting the blog in 2010. I started to pull a list of albums and songs together back in November and thought I should at least try to finish it off. Everything I've listened to since the end of November has been coloured by Isaac's death so I'm not sure if this is how the lists would have turned out if things had been different but we are where we are, as people say.
Albums of 2021
I've heard loads of good albums this year. My initial list ran to over twenty albums (and that was before the Pye Corner Audio album turned up) and there are several I've not heard yet that would surely be contenders had I got round to listening to them (I'm thinking of Carnage by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis and this year's releases from LoneLady, WH Lung and Low). Floating around somewhere outside my top ten are these albums (in no particular order): Andres Y Xavi's Sounds From The Secret Bar; Stinky Jim's It's Not What It Sounds Like; The Vendetta Suite's Kempe Stone Portal; Steve Cobby's Shanty Bivouac (which has a close to perfect side 2); Richard Fearless's unsettling ambient techno masterpiece Future Rave Memory; Roisin Murphy's remixed Crooked Machine; Bicep's Isles; Reinhard Vanbergen and Charlotte Caluwaerts' Souvenir Des Bon Gout; Sons Of Slough's Bring Me Sunshine; Sonic Boom's remix album Almost Nothing Is Nearly Enough; Cheval Sombre's pair of albums Days Go By and Time Waits For No One; Dry Cleaning's New Long Leg; Cerulean by Nashville Ambient Ensemble; The Liminanas and Laurent Garnier's De Pelicula; The Grid and Robert Fripp's Leviathan; Rose City Band's Earth Trip. The Bagging Area top ten looks like this-
10. Pye Corner Audio 'Entangled Routes'
9. Mogwai 'As The Love Continues'
8. Richard Norris 'Hypnotic Response'
7. Dean Wareham 'I Have Nothing To Say To The Mayor Of L.A.'
6. Sedibus 'The Heavens'
5. Daniel Avery 'Together In Static'
4. GLOK 'Pattern Recognition'
3. Coyote 'The Mystery Light'
2. Circe Sky 'Dream Colour'
1. Saint Etienne 'I've Been Trying To Tell You'
I wasn't expecting Saint Etienne to make an album as good as this, at this stage of things- made in isolation but sounding like the work of three people in a room together, I've Been Trying To Tell You is a woozy, reflective album digging away at late 90s nostalgia (but not sounding itself nostalgic), built around samples from that period and with a strong undertow of bass and a warm wash of effects. On top of this Sarah Cracknell's voice is used almost like a sample library, cut up phrases and snatches of dialogue.
EP of 2021
5. Rich Lane 'Camo'
4. Three EPs of outstanding new music from A Certain Ratio, 'EPA', 'EPC' and 'EPR'. I couldn't separate them so have bunched them together.
3. SUSS 'Night Suite'
2. Hugo Nicolson 'Lost And Found'
1. Andy Bell and Pye Corner Audio 'The Indica Gallery EP'
No question here, the single piece of vinyl/ mp3s I've probably played as much as any other this year since it came out in April, six wondrous remixes of Andy Bell's 2020 album The View From Halfway Down. Pye Corner Audio's sunshine dreamscape remixes were the sound of this year for me in lots of ways, especially the analogue cosmische of Skywalker, Indica and Cherry Cola.
So many good songs/ tracks/ remixes, I could easily list a top fifty. Someone wrote recently a top ten should be enough and I kind of agree- but all of these have been essential listening in 2021 (again, in no particular order); AMOR 'Unravel' from Lemur; Daniel Avery's Lone Swordsman as remixed by Chris Carter; Craig Bratley and Amy Douglas' No In Between; 10:40's Sleepwalker; a pair of remixes of Fontaines DC, one of A Hero's Death by Soulwax, the other Televised Mind by Dave Clarke; A Mountain Of One's Stars Planets Dust Me; Perry Granville's Dexter In Dub; Mat Ducasse's Bunny's Lullaby; Dan Wainwright and Rude Audio's Early Morning; Future Beat Alliance's Primordial Sky; Daniel Avery's remix of Winter In The Woods by Leaving Laurel; Coyote's remix of Original Cell by Projections and Coyote's two track 12" Will We Ever Dance Again; Cheval Sombre's Althea; various Pye Corner Audio one offs (Fictional Drilling and Eyes Open stand out); and last but not least Woodleigh Research Facility's All Is Not Lost and Vernal Invocation releases.
As well as all of those Sean Johnston has been responsible for a steady stream of remixes in his Hardway Bros guise, any one of which could/ should be in the list below but they can have their own sublist here-
Hardway Bros Sublist
10. Martyn Walsh and Simon Lyon 'Afterglow' Hardway Bros Dub
9. Shadowlark 'Come Around Here' Hardway Bros Remix
8. Cold Beat 'Double Sided Mirror' Hardway Bros Meet Monkton Noch Einmal Remix
This song, a tour de force from Mr Holmes with vocals by Raven Violet, provided a glimmer of light in a year that has been bleak as fuck for all kinds of reasons, personal and political, macro and micro. The song is political, a call to arms, a lyric about not putting up with it any more,a demand to say enough is enough, but it works on a variety of levels for me. Hopefully 2022 will see it get a vinyl release.
Christmas has come and gone and in some ways that's all I can say about it- I'm glad we spent time both on our own and with family but I can't pretend it wasn't really hard at times. A friend who has a lot of experience in the grief caused by losing a child sent us a card that said 'the first everything fucks' and that definitely seems to be true.
Today's musical distraction is a thirty year rewind all the way back to Christmas Eve 1991 and Andrew Weatherall hosting a radio show at Kiss FM. Things start off in a manner you'd expect with the dance sounds of 1991- a three track mix of Future Sound Of London including the mighty Papua New Guinea, Inner City, The Orb, S- Express, 23 Skidoo, Bernie Worrell and Depth Charge. Then Bobby Gillespie turns up with a bag of records and The Faces, Pharaoh Sanders, The Impressions, Haysi Fantayzee, Dub Syndicate and Lee Perry all show up, things becoming more eclectic and wide- ranging. It finishes in most un- Kiss FM style with a visit to Patti Smith's Piss Factory. Stream at Mixcloud or download below.
We live close to the River Mersey. Isaac's wake, a week ago today (and how quickly that week has passed) was at Ashton- on- Mersey cricket club, down by the river. It was somewhere we walked with him quite often and when we were looking for a venue for his wake we needed somewhere which had a good outdoor space so anyone who wanted to be outside could be. I still don't feel fully comfortable being inside a pub and sit outside out of habit now. We walked down by the river yesterday, a good round trip past the cricket club, over the river, skirting the edge of Urmston and back under the M60. It was peculiar seeing the cricket club a week on. We don't get many sunsets in south Manchester but the picture above caught one of them, the sun dipping below the treeline behind the river. We're going to go back to see him today at the cemetery. We went twice in the days after the funeral, once to leave him a mini- Christmas tree. We said to each other last Friday we were going try to have a Christmas of some kind and that's what we're going to do.
I realised yesterday as well that I haven't done the annual self- indulgence that is the Bagging Area end of year list. I did start putting a list of favourite albums and songs together back in November so that'll give me something to do in a few days time.
Some festive songs to take us into Christmas. First up Cocteau Twins 1993 cover of Frosty The Snowman, originally released on the Volume CD. There's something about the Cocteau's sound, all that reverb and those chiming guitars which is very wintry. I'm not a big fan of Christmas songs but this one will do.
Back in 2011 when Johnny Marr and The Healers put out a freebie download, an instrumental with plenty of guitars, acoustic and electric. In a world where ex- Smiths have veered in divergent directions morally and politically, choose Marr.
I was listening to Life's Too Good by The Sugarcubes recently, an album I think I'll come back to on these pages soon. In 1988 Iceland's finest released Birthday on 12" with three remixes by The Jesus And Mary Chain (Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Christmas Present). This one is the one for today.
And finally, something bang up to date and released yesterday by Pye Corner Audio for Christmas (if you fancy your Christmas a tad dystopic). Get Thee Behind Me Santa is all backwards sounds, drones and distorted synths. Find it at Bandcamp (free/ pay what you want). And well worth whatever you feel you should pay.
Music is a really useful distraction at the moment, a good displacement activity. Some of it genuinely helpful, a balm of some kind (or respite from tinnitus), and some of it just allows my mind to go elsewhere for a while. Later on of course it all suddenly crashes back in unexpectedly and you're crying while eating your tea.
Two long mixes to take you/ me elsewhere on 23rd December. First, last month's edition of God's waiting Room, David Holmes' monthly visit to NTS radio. David is a star. This month's two hour show takes in everything from the cinematic sounds of Pierre Barouh, psychedelic folk and off kilter 60s pop to Don Cherry, African Head Charge, Daniel Avery and Chris Carter, a wealth of sounds from around the globe and at the end Sault and Group Zero. You can listen here and the tracklist is here.
Meanwhile over at The Rotating Institute on Soho Radio Justin Robertson takes the controls for two hours of fun starting with Tangerine Dream and scooping up a chugging, shuffly, psychedelic and cosmische selection with tracks from the likes of Jezebel, Mugwump, Komodo, Pye Corner Audio, Jas Shaw, Tokyo Offshore Project and Curved Light before finishing with the latest release on Golden Lion Sounds, the label running out of The Golden Lion in Todmorden- the B-side of the forthcoming 7" is from The Summerisle Trio, a three-piece comprised of Sean Johnston, Duncan Grey and Sarah Rebecca and their cover of Willow's Song from The Wicker Man. 21st century psychedelic folk- it'll make perfect sense when you hear it. Listen to Justin's mix here.
Willow's Song in the film The Wicker Man was written by Paul Giovanni and played by Magnet (there's some dispute about who sang it). Willow (Britt Ekland) sings it to Sergeant Howie (Edward Woodward, the actor not the useless chief executive at Manchester United). Haunting, lilting, slightly trippy and somewhat entrancing.
Most years since I started this blog I've marked the anniversary of Joe Strummer's death and this year more than ever I think I'll do that. A few weeks ago I began thinking about a post about Sandinista! and how rather than being the outlier in The Clash's back catalogue it is actually the record that contains the absolute essence of The Clash and how it is an album that makes more and more sense as each year passes. That post never got written and I don't have the space to do it right now but we'll do Joe anyway.
In 1983 The Clash released Combat Rock and one of the songs was Sean Flynn, a seven minute lament (before it got cut down for the final record) for Sean Flynn, the photographer son of the actor Errol who went to Vietnam and was never seen again, murdered in 1971 either by Vietcong or Khmer Rouge. Topper plays south- east Asian drums and percussion, Gary Barnacle adds sax and Mick Jones creates texture and mood with guitar and echo box. Meanwhile Joe sings of the missing photographer, the son of a Hollywood legend, lost in the jungles of a war that consumed the USA for over a decade and that achieved nothing.
A few years later in 1990, his band split and gone and Joe struggling to find his place in the world he recorded a song for the film I Hired A Contract Killer. Burning Lights is in the film and came out on 7", backed on the B-side by The Pogues. On the A- side it's just Joe and that chugging guitar sound and some hard won wisdom/ poetry.
Joe came back in the late 90s after a decade in the wilderness, rebuilding his life and his music. Moving to Somerset seemed to fix him. He became a regular at Glastonbury, his campfire a home for like minded souls. His famous quote, 'without people you're nothing', came from a radio interview which you can find here.
While everything has been going on for us for the last three weeks the real world has been continuing to spin on its axis. The death of Michael Nesmith was a sad loss. If you grew up in the 1970s you couldn't escape The Monkees TV show (and why would you want to?). Mike was a talented songwriter and before he even appeared in The Monkees had written his classic song Different Drum, although he wouldn't record it as a solo artist until 1972. Linda Ronstadt and The Stone Poneys had a big hit with it in 1967 but I think the first version I heard was a cover by The Lemonheads in 1990. Evan Dando drawling 'You and I/ Travel to the beat of a different drum' over some crunchy early 90s indie- rock makes a good claim to be the definitive version of the song.
The Monkees 1968 film and soundtrack Head are legendary, a trippy, satirical attempt to throw off their pop image. As We Go Along is one of the soundtrack's highlights and although it's sung by Micky Dolenz rather than Mike Nesmith I thought it was worth posting here today regardless. There's a bit of an all star cast playing on this one- Neil Young, Carole King and Ry Cooder.
Also gone is Robbie Shakespeare, a man whose basslines run through my record collection like the writing through a stick of rock. As half of the Sly and Robbie rhythm section he's appeared on more great records than most. Take Grace Jones in 1980 as as good an example as any.
The days are very strange at the moment. Wake up early, everything crashes back in a millisecond later. The anxious knot reappears in the stomach, the tightness in the chest. The realisation that emotional pain can be so physical, so bodily present. Lie in bed for ages because it seems better than facing the day. Then the morning disappears, you shake yourself into doing something and then suddenly it's going dark. Evening stretches out and it's bedtime. Repeat.
The funeral was attended by huge numbers of people, the wake too, and we gave him the send off he deserved. It was all consuming but now it's done- the planning, organisation and the detail and the tenseness of waiting for it- we're left the dealing with the absence of him. And Christmas less than a week away. I've only just really twigged that it's December. Time seemed to pause on the last day of November and now someone's unclicked the pause button and it's the 20th December.
My unplanned Elizabeth Fraser vocal trip took me down to the inevitable end of that road yesterday when I played Song To The Siren, a three minute and thirty second wave of sadness and loss.
This re- edited version by In The Valley is depending on your point of view either a crime or a beautifully Balearic, slightly dubby re- imagining of This Mortal Coil's cover of Tim Buckley's song. I'm going with the latter.
I'm a bit raw at the moment so I'm just going to stick to some music until I get my thoughts together. Thank you to everyone who sent messages ahead of the funeral on Friday, to those of you who wrote posts and to JC (The Vinyl Villain) who came from Glasgow to South Manchester, in his words, to represent the blogging community.
This Norman Cook remix of Trouble Understanding is a very nicely understated thing indeed, from a man who isn't necessarily always known for restraint or understatement. There's a Massive Attack Teardrop sample in there too. A gorgeous five minutes of sun coming up Balearic/ indie- gospel.
This is Massive Attack's Teardrop dubbed out by Mad Professor and Elizabeth Fraser making another appearance on these pages after the Ian McCulloch song a few days ago. .
I found some refuge in Ian McCulloch's album Candleland yesterday. I'm not sure why. It just suggested itself to me. When Ian recorded and released it in 1989 he was coming at it from going through the twin losses of his father and Bunnymen drummer Pete de Freitas. I've been listening to Treasure by The Cocteau Twins the day before so maybe the Elizabeth Fraser connection prompted me to dig it out (she sings on the title track). Ian McCulloch solo albums may not carry a huge amount of significance or currency at the tail end of 2021 but this song carried me through for a few minutes yesterday.
This version from a session for John Peel is a less smoothed out, rawer take on the song with Ian singing on his own and lots of natural echo on the guitars and voice. The session went out at the end of September 1989 and was recorded with Ian's new live band, The Prodigal Sons (who included Edgar Summertyme on bass and the legendary Mike Mooney on guitar).
Brother Joseph's Sonic Treasures went out two weekends ago, a six hour radio show on Radio Magnetic and dedicated to Isaac. I wrote yesterday about the tribute to Isaac in the first half hour recorded by Brother Joseph. That opening section of the show includes two of my favourite songs, Otis by The Durutti Column and the Beatless Mix of Smokebelch by The Sabres Of Paradise, and hearing them in the show and in the immediate aftermath of everything we are going through was deeply moving.
Joseph uploaded the show (in seven sections) to Soundcloud yesterday. You can listen to it here.
After the tribute to Isaac there is some mighty dub from Stephen Haldane, some ambience, psychedelia and cosmic splendour from Joseph, lots of those dreamy pedal steel guitars and analogue synth sounds, more from Stephen and then Chris Mackin's guest mix which starts with his special reworked version of 86'd for Isaac and then Chris' song selection, a beautiful mix of ambient and western taking in Gene Clark, Dennis Wilson, Link Wray and Chris Bell among others. Here's Chris' handwritten tracklist.
Chris signed off with a quote from Nick Cave, no stranger to grief and loss. Nick's son Arthur died in 2015. Nick wrote a lengthy piece on his blog about grief (I glanced at it a few days ago but haven't read it in full yet, it seems too soon. I will though). He finished with this and Chris put it in his message for his mix- 'In time there is a way, not out of grief, but deep within it'.
Sitting here now, typing this, that seems hopeful. While writing this post last night I found an interview with Nick Cave from 2017 and in it there was something that resonated very strongly with me-
''A lot is said about grief, especially the conventional wisdom that you do it alone. I personally have found that not to be the case. The goodwill we received after Arthur’s death from people who I did not know, especially through social media, people who liked my music and kind of reached out, was extraordinary...'' I've definitely found this to be true.
It's Isaac's funeral on Friday. Planning and organising your child's funeral isn't something you really ever think you'll have to do but with Isaac I guess it was always somewhere at the back of our minds. The reality is much more than you can ever imagine.
Some things happened yesterday which show the impact Isaac has had on people and the never failing to amaze me kindness of people. I hope some day we can pay it all back some way. At the weekend Nina Walsh contacted me to say she wanted to do something to raise money for the MPS Society, the charity that support children and adults with the group of rare genetic diseases that included the one, Hurler's Disease, that Isaac was born with. Nina wanted to auction off her and Andrew Weatherall's 39p museum, a treasure trove of sweets, crisps and pop that used to line the shelves at the Facility where so much of the Woodleigh Research Facility recordings were made. As an additional treat she said she'd throw in the original reference master CD of Andrew's Convenanza album and all these items would be bundled together in a brand new Facility 5 tote bag. To say this left me floored is an understatement. The auction is taking place at The Flightpath Estate Facebook page. There's a JustGiving page here for anyone who'd like to donate to the MPS Society. Here's a pair of pictures of part of the 39p museum and Mr Weatherall himself posing with a 39p can of bubblegum flavoured fizzy pop.
Nina wrote this-
IN MEMORY OF ISAAC TURNER
My thoughts have been very much with Adam and Isaac Turner this last week.
Baggingarea has always been the one stop shop that Andrew and I would visit when we needed to remember something about ourselves!
Sadly Adam's son, Isaac, who brought so much joy to so many via his pictorial everyday doings posted on social media, passed away last week and many a heart has been broken.
Isaac lived with a condition called Mucopolysaccharide disease (MPS), a condition I knew nothing about until getting to know Isaac, albeit through pixels alone. He was a brave young man with a terrific smile and we will all miss him dearly. My deepest condolences to Adam and the Turner family.
As a way to raise some funds for the MPS Society I have decided to auction Andrew's beloved 39p Museum that was curated over the duration of our partnership from Facilities 1 to 4. I will also include the original reference CD master of Convenanza, mastered by Noel Summerville at 3345 Mastering, bundled together in a brand spanking new Facility 5 tote bag (awaiting delivery!). 100% of proceeds will go to the MPS Society, payable via the JustGiving fundraiser page set up by the marvelous Martin Brannagan of the legendary Flightpath Estate Facebook page. There is also the option to just donate if you are feeling generous
The auction will end at midnight Christmas Eve.
Bids in the comments below this post.
Do I hear £10?
Yes, there are a couple of parts of that which have me blushing through my tears. And to have Isaac, the Woodleigh Research Facility and Andrew brought together in such a way just leaves me speechless.
As if that wasn't enough, there's this too. Last weekend Brother Joseph's Sonic Treasures radio show went out on Radio Magnetic, a Glasgow based internet radio station that I've supported in the past with guests like Sonic Boom, Andy Bell, Justin Robertson and David Holmes. I'll be able to share the full show soon, a six hour musical treat dedicated to Isaac and with an opening half hour that was a mix done especially for Isaac by Brother Joseph. The show's guest was Brother Chris Mackin, otherwise known as Chris Rotter. Chris was the guitarist in the live garage band incarnation of Two Lone Swordsmen and releases music on his own as Bad Meat Club. Back when Andrew Weatherall did a radio show for 6 Music he played a then unreleased Bad Meat Club tune called 86'd, a glistening skyscraper of a song, all soaring guitars and motorik rhythms. Chris messaged me to ask if it was OK to go ahead with the radio show. I replied to say it was and asked him to play 86'd for Isaac. Chris then took my breath away with a twenty three minute reworked version of 86'd, one minute for each of Isaac's years. Chris has now shared 86'd (For Isaac) at Bandcamp, asking only for a donation to the MPS Society as payment.
I can't fully put into words how this leaves me feeling. Thank you Nina and Chris.
This is very lovely, a new one from Mat Ducasse and available at a name your own price deal at Bandcamp. Synths and twinkly melodies, some xylophone and a bit of Vangelis in there in inspiration I think. Two versions, Love Theme and Love Theme (Remix). Back in March Mat released a gorgeous cosmic lullaby with guitars from Kenji Suzuki and the ever wonderful Chris Mackin (who went above and beyond last weekend for me). Bunny's Lullaby was written for Chris' friends Charles and Lisa when they lost their baby, and, well, that's pretty close to me at the moment. All proceeds from Bunny's Lullaby are going to Great Ormond Street Hospital. When I posted Bunny's Lullaby earlier this year The Swede described it as 'moving and profound' and I can't do any better than that.
I clicked play on the new Saint Etienne single the other day and it hit me in the chest. There's a general anxious knot in my stomach much of the time at the moment and I'm just accepting it as a part of grief, trying not to fixate on it or worry too much about when it will go.
Her Winter Coat is following hot on the heels of Saint Etienne's autumnal album I've Been Trying To Tell You, and is tinged with the sadness that permeated the album. Pete, Bob and Sarah are saying Her Winter Coat is a Christmas single but it just sounds like a song to me, no novelty or Christmas artifice about it at all.
