The Afterword

Musings on the byways of popular culture

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Progrock in the potting shed. Jazz in the Gazebo. Glamrock in the greenhouse. From gardens where we feel demure….

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To my considerable surprise, one of the most enjoyable Spotify playlists I have listened to in the past few months is a selection of music from the soundtrack of Swedish gardening programme, Trädgårds tider (Gardening Times). Unexpected pearls of jazz , Americana, classical and ambient, compiled in a way that Gillett or Peel would have been envious of!

I’ll confess that my impression of gardening TV shows is violently out of date. It is either Percy Thrower puffing away on his pipe and giving charmingly low-key advice on how to win the top gardening prizes in the village fete. Or Bob Fleming spluttering energetically in his garden shed on the Fast Show.

Instead of that, this Swedish TV show provides a wonderful dollop of comfort TV. Exquisitely photographed, it has four very charming, rather good-looking presenters, (two man and two women), who get up to all kinds of inspiring horticultural and culinary activities in the heart of the magnificent Skåne countryside.

It is a great art to be the presenter on such a show. You should be knowledgeable but not an irritating know-it-all. They get it just right. ( If I say, not like Ernst, the Swedish contingent will » Continue Reading.

Coming soon to the Barcelona El Liceu Opera House: the Triifids, Green Day and the Flowerpot Men..?

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Many musicians, actors and other performers have performed in front of unusual audiences.

But an opera house bursting at the seams with 2,292 house plants is in a league of its own.

It’s been a good year for the roses.

Can we expect manure in the moshpits of gigs in 2020?

Would anyone dare to speculate on how this might impact the world of popular music?

I suspect the Roots are in for some great audiences.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJkzGRmdZB8

24 hours from Tolga – Egil Storbekken and the triumphant return of fhe tussefløyte!

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Stuck in lockdown with little chance of any live music all summer, I am tending to look back and remember past favourites. This pandemic is certainly doing some strange things to my memory.

If you are interested in the Proustian powers of Norwegian cheese, fiddle burning fanatics and the rise of Sami chartbusters, please read on,.

I woke up yesterday morning at 6.00 and my first thought was: “Egil! That Norwegian flutey geezer’s name was Egil.” What was it that suddenly triggered access to a memory that has been languishing in the deeper, darker recesses of my brain since 1980?

I dashed to my PC and googled “Egil Norwegian flutey geezer 1980” and to my absolute delight instantly found a wiki entry on ….. Egil Storbekken: born in Tolga, Hedmark in 1911, folk musician, composer and instrument maker.

Back in 1980 I spent the summer in Norway doing round tours for Tjaereborg, the Danish travel company. There were some long days of driving and so I stocked up with some cassettes. Brother and sister folk duo Kai and Ola Bremnes: Folk I Husan. Deatnogátte Nuorat (Tanabreddens ungdom), the first Sami band to achieve commercial success in Norway. Jazzy folk by » Continue Reading.

Making a statuesque splash in Bristol

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In Treasure Island, the good ship Hispaniola sails from Bristol. Watching a clip of that the motley crew of protesters de-plinthing Edward Colston and casting him into Davey Jones’s Locker with such gusto, I was reminded of Jim Hawkins and his shipmates.

Much as I disapprove of the re-writing of history and much as I dislike vandalism, I did feel a certain satisfaction at the sight of Bristol’s bloody-handed philantropist making such an enormous splash as he plunged into Bristol Harbour on Sunday.

A friend sent me a photo of the empty plinth. I do hope they leave it like that as a reminder. Of course, the statue should have been removed a long time ago but the powers that be hummed and hawed. The relationship between Colston and the city was anything but simple.

Did the police turn a blind eye and let the protesters get on with removing this embarrassing reminder of Bristol’s past? I sincerely hope that Colston is not airbrushed out of the history books. He belongs as an important exhibit in the City Museum along with an exhibit about the horrors of the slave trade. And the way that so many people were quite happy » Continue Reading.

Cads and tramps! Buffoons and battle-axes! Floozies and rotters! Carpet-baggers and hussies!

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Many thanks to everyone who has shared their favourite comfort movies with us on the Tawny Pipit thread. I am thoroughly enjoying myself reading through your comments and making lists of the actors, directors, scriptwriters and studios who could be guaranteed to delight. Again and again and again.

Paul Wad made this thought-provoking comment about cads.

“Paddington 2 is ace. The first Paddington film was excellent, but number 2 moved it up a few notches, helped by the best performance of Hugh Grant’s career. Who knew he could actually act? It pips Timothy Dalton in Hot Fuzz as the best ‘cad’ since the heydays of Terry-Thomas, Leslie Phillips and George Sanders.”

Cad is such a marvellous word. So totally past its sell-by date and completely impossible to use seriously in 2020. I also like the fact that it is very difficult to translate into another language, without providing a lot of background information, You can only be a cad if you know how you should be behaving as a gentleman.

Jabba the Hutt is not a cad. Ming the Merciless perhaps might be. Darth Vader? Now there is an interesting question. Was he ever blackballed from an intergalactic gentleman’s club?

» Continue Reading.

Tawny Pipit or Maltese Falcon? Pink Flamingos or To kill a Mockingbird? The Eagle has landed or Hitch’s Birds? Time to crow about your cinematic comfort zone.

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In these troubled, confusing, anxious, limbo-like times, I have a great temptation to dust off a few feelgood movies. Of course my comfort zone could well be your “feel slightly nauseous I need to chunder zone”.

Off the top of my head, My neighbour Totoro, Gregory’s Girl, Happy as Lazzaro, Ed Wood, Pride and On Body and Soul (Indiko Enyedi’s magnificent Hungarian romcom set in a slaughterhoue) all fit the bill.

A comfort zone movie or TV show does not necessarily have to be a masterpiece.

During the week a friend mentioned a wonderful treat Tawny Pipit, a film I had never heard of. A 1944 Ealingesque comedy about birdwatching during wartime filmed on location in the Cotswolds.

It is like walking into the pages of an Enid Blyton novel or vintage Agatha Christie. The English countryside looks magnificent. A delightful Albion full of afternoon teas, crusty old colonels and friendly villagers who unite to protect some a pair of hatching tawny pipits.

An England that probably never existed outside the ages of the Torygraph and the imagination of Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells. But wonderful anyway.

Please share your comfort zone movies and TV shows.

Do not » Continue Reading.

Ooops! Suddenly Boris is in Sooty’s shoes

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There is a rather amusing meme that has been floating. around social media over the weekend. I don’t know who coined it originally.

Something along the lines of: Boris dare not sack Cummings. It would be like Emu sacking Rod Hull.

Equally true for Sooty of course. Sacking Harry Corbett was not an option for the ursine xylophone maestro.

Who are your favourite puppets and puppet-masters?

Songs, films, books, children’s TV, comics….. The choice is yours.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SreSj3j47GI

I won’t wait for the Guardians! In my pop Galaxy, the Rezillos are Top of the Pops!

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Interesting though it may be to guess which singles will make it onto the Guardian’s Top Ten of the 100 Best Number One Singles…

..I am just as interested to hear about those magnificent singles which were heart-breakingly pipped at the post and never made it higher than Number two. This was particularly painful when the Number was a real stinker. And hogged the Number One spot for months, years even,

And what about those gems which were bubbling under and then bubbled no more?

The Rezillos Top of the Pops should have been just that: Top of the Pops.

Let’s turn back time and honour the Number Ones that Never Were.

Your nominations please!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=roZ_plpJGCM

“Pop music made by people who have never actually heard pop music…”

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…. but have had it described to them by someone who didn’t really know what they were talking about.”

This is the Guardian’s Alexis Petridis’s hilariously accurate description of 1972 chart toppers Lieutenant Pigeon.

Does the description fit any other artists or tracks?

Shadowy, enigmatic figures who have sneaked in from another dimension to brighten the world of popular music.

Where shall we look? Berlin, Birmingham, Finland, New Orleans, the Bahamas, Madagascar, Iceland….??

Einsturzande Neubaten, the Wurzels, Joseph Spence, Laurie Anderson, Kate Bush, Philemon Arthur and the Dung, ……to name but a few.

Who dares to join me on an expedition to the Twilight Zone of Pop?

How many of us have joined the Zoomtown Brats?

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Four months ago, I’d never heard of Zoom. These days Mrs KFD zooms more often than I change my underpants.

“Can you two go out for an hour or so? I have to Zoom with Umeå and I’ll need to re-arrange the bookcase.”

My daughter and I just spent an hour in the sunshine at the local sportsground, watching as a maverick deer legged it past us into the woods.

Mrs KFD works at home now. She’s an archivist at Stockholm Uni and in academia Zoom is the flavour of the month. It seems to be less trusted in banks and other sectors where security is important. Our teenage son is also at home all week and does his schoolwork with a programme called Meet.

Personally I’ve had lost less experience of video conferencing. One Zoomy book club, a birthday party and a pub night with just a handful of friends.

So how many of you or your family members have joined the Zoomtown Brats? Has it been a positive experience?

The undertakers, deep sea divers, dentists, prison officers, ballet dancers and milkmaids among us have probably had slightly less use of video conferencing.

Zoom is currently worth » Continue Reading.

Grab your tiara, tosh. It’s time for A Midsummer Night’s Stream!

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One of the greatest novelties and pleasures of the last month for me has been watching stupendous National Theatre productions (Jane Eyre, Twelfth Night, Treasure Island and Frankenstein) on You Tube

And the delights are by no means over. I just had a mail from DuCool pointing out that: “The greatest theatre company in the world, Complicité, led by Simon McBurney, is putting one of their productions, “The Encounter” online for one week.”

I warmly recommend that you take the Duke’s advice and try and watch that.

And talking of dukes, I bet that Phil and Liz are now enthusiastic YouTube users. Along with many other members of the high-brow, cultural elite. Such as the contributors to this blogsite.

From being the domain of gamers, teenage pop fans, graffiti artists, indie bands and boomers who want to watch Fireball XL5 and Bonanza, YT is now proving an excellent tool for theatres, opera houses, orchestras, museums and art galleries who want to stay in touch with their audiences, find new audiences and do some very vital fundraising.

So, have of you go any suggestions regarding theatre or opera performances we might enjoy? Is your local museum doing virtual tours?

Exciting times…. » Continue Reading.

Move over Rover! Let Mabel and Olive take over!

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These peculiar, disorientating, Groundhog, lockdown days have led to some peculiar ways of passing the time.

And some unexpected superstars.

Yesterday a friend posted this clip of Olive and Mabel, sports commentator, Andrew Cotter’s two labradors on his Facebook page. They are delightful pooches, but more importantly, he is a very witty chap. Dry and understated in a wonderfully Scottish way.

What a glorious tonic this clip is.

I suspect that I am a bit of a Johny-come-lately here.

By now Olive and Mabel have doubtless appeared on Blue Peter, been invited to Buck House to meet the corgis and relocated to Hollywood where their first movie is underway. I hope that being superstars does not go to their heads.

Lassie, Rin Tin Tin and Toto have some serious competition!

The Corona Virus is no laughing matter. But what has cheered you up and made you smile or laugh in the past few weeks?

I would dearly love to take a stroll down to the local pub with Mabel. Olive and Andrew. I can’t imagine better company,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26FIEX6muAo&t=14s

Punch and Punctuality – Time for a Jane Austen Boss Bitch Challenge?

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New Zealand stuntwoman, Zoe Bell, known for her work with Tarantino,came up with an novel solution to her lockdown blues. She set up an ingenious Instagram chain punch up with some of her female celebrity pals.

All rather fun.

And rather inspiring. This idea is just screaming to be imitated. And it doesn’t need to be fisticuffs.

In the serene world of Jane Austen, the weapons might be parasols, feather dusters or simply a sarcastic comment on an opponent’s choice of headgear.

In all Earnest, I think Oscar Wilde’s Lady Bracknell could be vicious with a handbag.

Some actors can demolish an opponent with a quizically raised eyebrow.

And a little nearer home, we could do a chain of Afterworders bashing each other, armed only with Bob Dylan Bootleg Boxset.

I’ll get my coat.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCO0DXAc0tk

Covid and Conviviality

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Which authors offer the most satisfying read in these angst-ridden times? Have you all been reaching for your favourite novels by European angst-merchants such as Camus, Kafka, Sartre and Dostoievsky?

Or have you been re-reading The Lord of the Rings trilogy? Or the complete works of Shakey? Perhaps some vintage Raymond Chandler or Agatha Christie is your comfort read of choice?

Josephine Tovey has written a witty and very convincing article about Jane Austen’s relevance to life in 2020. Our lives in lockdown have several similarities with the constrained existence of Sweet Jane’s protagonists. (See comments.)

There is great scope for a few Austen reboots!

Lockdown and Loquaciousness. Sensi and Sensibility. Covid and Conviviality. Boris and Bullshittery.

“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, after a month of social distancing and lockdown, will be in dire need of an evening down the pub and a decent gig or two.”.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOUm8mThnTs

We were never being boaring..

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With so much bad news around, it is a great joy to come across a sunshine story. Our friends in the animal kingdom are certainly doing their best to entertain us.

Kangaroos spotted hopping around downtown Melbourne. Dolphins frolicking in the canals of Venice. Elks in the Systembolaget in Eskiltuna.

But surely this tale of the policia and the porcellini in Perugia must take the biscuit?

Some Albanian mafia wise guys buried a packet containing cocaine with a street value 22,000 USD in the forest near Arezzo. The perfect hiding place: the cops would never find it. They didn’t.

But then along came some wild boar snouting around for something tasty. They dug the packet up and scoffed the lot.

The gang members were arrested and as they were led away commented angrily: “We’d have got away with it if it hadn’t been for you meddling pigs.”

Anybody else got a touching story from the animal kingdom to share? Dragons in Dagenham? Unicorns cavorting in St James Park?……

https://allthatsinteresting.com/feral-hogs-destroy-cocaine?fbclid=IwAR0g0vM0gNOCOm65-crXADvTVzvP90O3pV7Ie1APzIe0UdtcEoO9c9kBkOc

“I feel like a lost sock in the laundromat of oblivion”

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From Hove to Heaven

My pal Steve, who lives in Brighton’s twin town, recently commented on Facebook:

“You know that Escher picture called “Relativity” with figures walking on the stairs? Well, that’s how I feel, that is.”

With only one hour’s exercise allowed a day, I imagine the coronavirus is far more depressing for those of you living in the UK, Italy, Spain etc.

He is onto something there about the articulacy of a visual image. So I would like to ask you:

Is there a painting, photo, cartoon, statue, drawing, tapestry or other work of art that sums how you are feeling in April 2020?

Munch or Mona Lisa? Frida Kahlo or Jack Kirby? The Far Side or Moomintroll? Caravaggio or Chagall? Dali or Degas?

I will now try to think of a painting that sums up my feelings right now.

In the meantime, here is Heaven, a Talking Heads song that well sums up the year when EVERYTHING got cancelled.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZpZuIWu1tw

Calvin Seibert – Brutalist sandcastle beauty on Rockaway Beach

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Thanks to the James Blast Appreciation Society Page on Facebook, this morning I discovered the magnificent brutalist sandcastles of Calvin Seibert. His flair, ambition and imagination are a total tonic.

Grab your bucket and spade and head for the local sandpit and let your creativity flow!

Has anybody else discovered an unexpected new favourite that has brightened their week in these savage, peculiar, gloomy, unpredictable times in which we live?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgyDJFjHH_A

Greybeard loons and ancient Welsh marinations

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A new, ambitious on-line mass-reading of Coleridge’s Rime of the Ancient Mariner is to be launched today with a whole range of talents including Jeremy Irons, Iggy Pop and Marianne Faithful, (Poor lass. She is currently in hospital with the coronavirus. Fingers crossed for her recovery).

This led to a friend mentioning to me that Iron Maiden produced a 13 minutes metal epic inspired by the poem.

Have there been any other attempts to put the Mariner to music? Or pieces of music inspired by it?

It’s the sort of thing Rick Wakeman might have a stab at. What a stage show there would be! Giant inflatable albatrosses. Towering icebergs Hallucinations on the high seas. The Death-in-Life ship…..

No disrespect to the current project. If it leads to people discovering Coleridge, it gets my vote.

However, here by way of contrast, is something old school. Back in 1955, Richard Burton released an album in which he read poetry. No music. No sound affects.

Simply, a great actor reading a great poem.

Go on! Treat yourself.

But beware. If you start listening you will never get to the wedding on time

» Continue Reading.

Would you trust a man with the sartorial elegance of an “old-fashioned PE Teacher”?

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There’s been a lot of international press coverage about Sweden’s response to the coronavirus crisis which is significantly less draconian than its Nordic neighbours. Some of he British media seems to have given the impression that things are pretty much business as usual here, which is certainly not true.

My pal, Paul, got to thinking about the Swedish approach and decided to write an article. And articulate, witty chap that he is, he got it published in The Local, the on/line English-language newspaper.

Do please give it a read. To my mind, he hits more nails on the head than a convention of carpenters! But would doubtless be very interested to hear the incisive, witty, articulate response of the Afterword hivemind.

https://www.thelocal.se/20200416/coronavirus-opinion-are-swedes-naive-or-the-only-adults-in-the-room

Time for the Folk on Foot Front Room Festival! Meet me at the Virtual Beer Tent !

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I suspect I am not the only one here who is looking forward to this event organised by the Folk on Foot Podcast. Some cracking artists. Martin Simpson, Karine Polart, Julie Fowlis, Peggy Seger, Jon Boden….

And all the proceeds go to support musicians who have lost vital income due to Covid 19.

https://www.folkonfoot.com/festival

I’d never heard of the podcast but I am told it is excellent.

I’m not sure about venturing out on foot myself today. Yesterday we strolled through the Globe Arena area. It was like a scene from Dawn of the Dead or a lost episode of Dr Who.

I steered well clear of the flowerbeds in case some triffids were lurking there, hoping for a spot of lunch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZP75BKsrPM

Old Possum at the Palace, Her Maj at the pub quiz

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I was very amused by a piece by Nancy Banks Smith in today’s Guardian about the Queen’s speech to the nation on Sunday night. It mentions the time that T S Eliot came to the palace to read poetry.

“The royal family are not partial to posh poetry. The Queen Mother was once reported describing a poetry recital at Buckingham Palace during the war. “A rather lugubrious man in a suit read a poem. I think it was called The Desert. At first the girls got the giggles and then I did and then even the king. We didn’t understand a word. Such a gloomy man, he looked as if he worked in a bank.”

It was Old Possum in person who, when not dashing off The Waste Land, did indeed earn a crust in Lloyds. In view of the hostile audience reaction, someone should have warned TS Eliot to switch to his Book of Practical Cats. “ (Link to article posted in comments)

Anyway, I sent the article to a few friends and one of them countered with this clip of Alan Bennett reading from his short story “The Uncommon Reader” in which Queen Liz develops an illicit taste » Continue Reading.

Oldfield? New bands! From Asturias to Brooklyn: a plethora of Tubular Tributes.

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Tubular Bells tribute bands are rather like London busses. You wait ages for one and then a whole fleet of them appear all at once! Which makes me ask the question: Is there any other band, artist or composer working in contemporary pop or jazz who has inspired so many interesting tribute projects with such a high quality of musicianship? Listening to the clips I discovered, I start to wonder.

Of course I had the album back in the day. Bought at the extremely groovy Virgin Records shop in Brighton A hippy progster heaven full of cushions, joss sticks and grateful dead bootlegs.

My quest for tubularity began late last night when I discovered that our very own Hubert Rawlinson had been involved in a project called Tubular Kazoos. YouTube rapidly pointed out to me that this was the tip of the Oldfield Iceberg. Hells Bells!

Asturias, Rome, Brooklyn, St Petersburg, Muswell Hill…

Tubular Tribute from Asturias in the north of Spain. A very talented six piece band led by guitarist Ruben Alarez who play material from the whole of Mike Oldfiield’s career and have done a mini-tour in the Netherlands.

Tubular Brass – a large brass ensemble version. Here’s » Continue Reading.

A Woodstock classic from 1969 gives hope to a Choir that does not Exist in 2020

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Who’d have thought that in 2020, that old CS&N classic, Helplessly Hoping, would suddenly become popular again. All thanks to a young Italian choir from Rome who are singing it in quarantine. David Crosby has commented on Twitter that their version is now his favourite and is better than the original.

il coro che non c’è (The choir that does not exist) must have been very chuffed to hear that. It consists of students from different High Schools and Universities in Rome and the tale about how they have inspired so many all over the world is a real sunshine story.

An ABC news article about the choir tells it very well.

My question to you is: What other examples can we think of songs or other pieces of music that have had a remarkable, unexpected revival, a while after their initial success?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtX1r0SzxlI&list=RDKtX1r0SzxlI&start_radio=1

Good vibes from the Vaskivuori Upper Secondary School (Virtual) Chamber Choir!

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Upper-secondary kids all over Scandinavia and the rest of Europe are currently carrying out their courses as distance learning from home.

I take my hats off to all the teachers who, almost overnight, have had to make the transition from classroom teaching to on-line learning. Our own @Declan in Germany is one of them. And let’s not forget all the kids whose school life has been so violently disrupted and who have had to struggle to adapt to the new situation. Studying from home when the whole family are locked in together is not optimal.

Mercifully, it is not all doom and gloom. I rang a friend during the week and could hear his daughter, who is studying music, singing away as she did choir practice on line. And my pal in Turku, just sent me this uplifting clip of the Vaskivuori Upper Secondary School (Virtual) Chamber Choir!

More power to these Finnish choristers and all the singers and other musicians who are still making music. It is possible to live la vida lockdown without going loco!

Is there ny other on-line music making we should know about?

» Continue Reading.