Some walks and a play

Apologies for the sporadic posting – I plan to mend my ways.  In doing so, let me tell you about what I got up to last week, which included a preview of Taking Sides at the Duchess Theatre, and a lot of walking around Highgate last Sunday afternoon.

Taking Sides centres on an American major’s investigations during the aftermath of the Second World War into the affiliations of German conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler – mostly because the musician happened to be Hitler’s favourite conductor.  Michael Pennington as Furtwängler was clearly the star turn in a demanding role; for almost all his time on stage, Pennington is confined to a chair and his dialogue consists very heavily of winding, layered monologues.  It is a mark of Pennington’s skill that this doesn’t drag, but other elements of the play undercut him, such as the heavy-handedness of its moral message at the end, as well as David Horovitch’s overbearing performance of an overbearing man.

Last Sunday was a glorious day here in London so we took ourselves up to Highgate to partake of a guided walk around the area conducted by London Walks.  While of interest, I have to say that this wasn’t my favourite of the London Walks that I’ve been on (and I’ve been on a good few at this stage) – I generally get more enjoyment from them if I know the area a little myself or they’re based on a specific theme, such as walking round the town centre looking for Sherlock Holmes stories.  We chose this one because the BF likes the area, and it is undeniably very pretty (particularly so on such a perfect summer’s day), but the stories to be had are, understandably, a bit of a hotch-potch.  For those interested, it seems Highgate has an unusually high hit-rate for literary types, including Coleridge, J.B. Priestley, T.S. Eliot, Betjeman and A.E. Housman (who lived in quite the loveliest house in London, by my reckoning), as well as other cultural behemoths, such as Terry Gilliam.  Enjoyable, but perhaps not worth a particular journey.

What is certainly worth a particular journey, however, is a tour of Highgate’s West Cemetery, to which access is only granted as part of a tour group.  Normally this makes me groan inwardly, but as it happened we got an excellent guide (should you meet him: Northern English, grey-haired) who made it very informative and enjoyable, pointing out the symbolism behind even the most trivial details on some of the monuments.  While a walk round a cemetery on a sunny day mightn’t be everyone’s idea of fun, it is (expectedly) extremely peaceful, the effect aided by the fact that the cemetery is currently very overgrown with trees (the guide informed us that a thousand are going to be removed in time, which won’t do anything for the cemetery itself but will revert it to the developers’ original plans for the cemetery to have exceptional views all over London).  The trees gave welcome shade on such a sunny day, as well as insulating us from whatever outside noise there might have been.  Highgate’s East Cemetery is the side that boasts the celebrities (George Eliot and Karl Marx, for instance) but also allows visitors to wander at will – no guide is necessary; we were a bit puzzled as to why the less starry West Cemetery stipulates the need for a tour, but the overgrowth seems to me to be part of the reason … you could easily get lost.  Also, while the West Cemetery is not so full of big names, it is still full of big stories, such as the one about the druid in Wales who had two sons, Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ 2 (no, not Jesus Christ the second, but Jesus Christ two), or the bare-knuckle prize-fighter whose funeral procession stretched from the gates of Highgate Cemetery all the way back to Tottenham Court Road.  I very highly recommend a visit on this tour, the more so if you have the good luck to get our guide.

The likeably preposterous “Egyptian Avenue” in Highgate Cemetery, courtesy of nick.garrod

Madness at HMV Oxford Circus

I was alerted via the Madness mailing list that the boys would be doing an instore at the HMV euphemistically said to be located at Oxford Circus on HMV’s website (why do places do this?  The HMV in question was between Oxford Circus and Tottenham Court Road, roughly in the middle of the two, and so it was by no means actually on Oxford Circus; the HMV opposite Bond Street Tube station could, with as much basis in fact, be called the Oxford Circus branch.  I digress) last Tuesday, followed by a signing.  Still without work, I headed along for what I anticipated would be a two-hour stay in HMV.  I arrived a little before the advertised time of 12.45 pm and bought my two copies of the album (one for me, one for the brother) for the signing; as it happened, the lads took to the stage at about ten or quarter past one, but this sort of delay was to be expected.

They played a great set, about equally split between classics and tracks from the new album, The Liberty of Norton Folgate, the release of which was the reason behind their appearance at the shop.  I felt the new material fully held its own against the old tunes, but also that everything was played with tremendous gusto – you’d never know they’ve been playing Baggy Trousers at every gig for the past 25 years – and everyone was pulling their weight technically.  The sound from the whole band was extremely tight, and this was helped by what was to me an extremely impressive sound system.  I suppose I hadn’t been expecting much from an instore sound system, but I think the combination of a good sound mixer and being quite close to the actual band resulted in a brilliant experience, more compelling than either of the gigs I’ve been at before, where for various reasons I had felt it better to stay some distance from the band.  I didn’t take notes at this one, but I know they opened with One Step Beyond, finished on It Must Be Love, and played Baggy Trousers, House of Fun and Our House, and off the new album, NW5, Forever Young and Dust Devil.  I think I may be missing one or two, but that should give some indication at least.

(Unlike about 90% of the rest of the audience, I did not brandish a camera/camera-phone/whatever that would then inevitably block the line of sight of everyone else behind me, so I haven’t a photo.  I’m sure you’ll cope.)

Then began the interminable wait for the signing.  I, thinking I was being clever, went right over to the left in order to get a decent view for the gig, but this was the worst place to be in for the signing, as everyone to the left was automatically put at the very end of the queue for the signing.  This was a LONG queue.  In total, between waiting for the gig, the gig itself and the wait for the signing, I was in HMV for over three and a half hours.  However, I’m not complaining – once I got to the band’s table, I was delighted to see them and Chas, hearing my accent, asked me where I was from and we exchanged a few words about Dublin.  Moving down the table, Suggs clocked my office-wear get-up, which I’d worn thinking that I’d pop into Madness and would then go on to hand out some more CVs once it was done in the couple of hours I’d anticipated it taking.  Suggs asked me if I should be in work.  I said I was looking for work and that this was why I was there.  This made them laugh and Suggs said that all the positions in Madness had been filled.  I do have to say, though, that at least one member of the band looked somewhat subdued, and that if it hadn’t been for Chas, Suggs and Woody, who though he didn’t say much was particularly smiley, I may have thought the ridiculous wait was not entirely worth it.  I don’t feel it’s much to ask for a smile and a hello from people I’ve grown up watching and listening to, whose album I have bought, for whom I’ve done a lot of waiting round.  But I don’t want to end on that mean-spirited note, when I truly was thrilled to bits to have met them, to have been able to say a few words to them and to go away with a couple of signed albums, having heard a really tub-thumping performance from them beforehand.  It’s a good consolation prize, as I won’t be in the country for their enormous Victoria Park gig in July.  This will do, though.

Daniel Kitson, or East Dulwich Comedy

Last Monday night, while the dinner was in the oven, the BF and I found out about East Dulwich Comedy, which runs a night for established comedians to preview and try out new material every Monday for just £3, as well as a variety of other events.  Conveniently, all this happens in a pub about 15 minutes’ walk from our flat.  The big draw was that amongst the line-up last Monday was none other than Daniel Kitson, a comedian famous for spurning telly appearances (except for a sojourn with Peter Kay’s Phoenix Nights) and who has built up a reputation for himself purely on his live performances.  Though I’d never seen him live before, I liked him very much in Phoenix Nights and I’ve heard recordings of previous live shows that are really something special.  Before he came to the stage, we liked Lynn Chambers’ warm banter and I thought Rob Rouse was hilarious, though the BF felt he consulted his notes too much.  Kitson, though, was in another league altogether.  Though, as a new material night, some of his stuff was a little rough around the edges (as had been most of the other acts we saw), he clearly buzzes off audience participation in a way that made me feel that he was as funny in that context as in one of his more polished routines.  Kitson being Kitson, he kicked his bit off with a reminder that, try as we might to forget the fact, we are all going to die.  He riffed on this theme for a good five or ten minutes, to enormous laughter from the audience.  After he’d briefly moved on somewhat, a woman in the audience wanted to contribute (East Dulwich Comedy is a bit too polite and firendly to call this heckling – audience participation throughout seemed to be welcome without you having to fear for your life in case the comedian would rip you to shreds for it) but she was a bit incoherent.  Kitson said something to the effect that he didn’t understand her … but that he took comfort from the fact that one day, she would die.  Cue more enormous audience laughter.  I think that might give you a flavour for his comedy.

Anyway, I’m curious to go back to other EDC events going by the calibre of this night, for which I’d not had particularly high hopes, what with the price being a paltry £3 each.  I also liked the venue very much, which was comfortably ordinary rather than painfully hip, and small enough that the comedians simply have to hang around at the back during each other’s sets (hence I got nod a hello to Kitson while we were buying our tickets), which was a touch that made me feel at ease, for some reason – nothing was too regimented and professional, though the quality of the comedians was very high.

Goodbye Nassau Street, Farewell Merrion Square

I’m off to London tomorrow for the summer. and I hope as a result I’ll have a bit more to post on a more regular basis.  Tickets are already booked for Jarvis Cocker in June and, fingers crossed, I’ll be at a QI filming shortly.  More as we get it!

Bob Dylan

I have hesitated to write this review because I have only recently become a fan of Dylan, but I’d like to set down my own thoughts about it while it’s still fresh in my mind, however unworthy they might be in the minds of uber-nerds (such as the BF, who followed the set in real time from London via the internet, where some of the faithful were texting and emailing in the setlist as it happened – I was not surprised by the technology, but I was appalled).  I would like to say, though, that because of the cramped situation I was unable to take notes and so I’m working from memory with these comments.  On we go!

Photo by biscuitcrumb

I was well aware as I hared my way from Wood Quay to the Point (no small distance when you’re against the clock) that Dylan is extremely contrary and could equally have given a performance that would have been bitterly disappointing for the €50 price tag, or a magnificent experience, depending on the night.  I was also fully prepared that the setlist could have consisted entirely of songs I’d never heard before, considering the size of the back catalogue.  As it happened, I would put this gig, the last of the current tour, well toward the “magnificent” end of the spectrum, and the setlist consisted of plenty of favourites for me to feel I’d been very lucky, getting to see him on a night when he’d decided to turn on the charm (relatively speaking).

I was impressed with the visual presentation of the band, though, entirely unprepared for the suits and hats, and I was taken with the effective simplicity of lining the band up (as can be seen in the photo above) so that they can all be in Dylan’s view at all times.  But none of the first three songs struck me particularly, prompting me to think that the night might be something of a damp squib, if not objectively then at least for me, though they were undoubtedly performed well and reasonably coherently, with a crowd who were determined to be on-side.

However, this all changed with Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again, the first song I could confidently identify (I’d failed, annoyingly, to pinpoint Girl from the North Country, despite knowing it was familiar) and the first that I felt Dylan started having fun himself.  I love Dylan’s old-man voice, which necessarily makes a current live performance completely different to the original recording on Blonde on Blonde, but, as far as I’m concerned, there’s massive fun in the difference of the interpretations of the songs.  The way in which the “ooh, mama” refrain is transformed by his grizzled old voice has to be heard to be believed, and he was clearly having great fun changing around the phrasing and rolling the words around.  The band were fiercely impressive technically for the whole set, but they seemed to pick up energy with this song, whether it be from the zest of Dylan’s performance, the audience’s clear enjoyment, or a mixture of the two.

I was amused when I very quickly realised that each song – each and every song – ended in exactly the same way, with a song slowing in the last line, then pausing dramatically on the penultimate chord for the maximum milking of applause, allowing the drummer to do at least two circuits of all his collection of cymbals, finishing as loudly as possible on the last chord.  This is just about the only criticism I have to make of the night, but by God it got tedious by the last song.  Change it up, lads.

Next up was Blind Willie McTell, which stayed with me more for the immensely cool lighting as for the performance – the orange lights shining right into the faces of the band from the side, keeping the background in complete dark, combined with the suits, had a very film noir effect.  If Stuck Inside of Mobile had made me sit up and take notice, Desolation Row ensured I was prepared to lap up anything else they chose to throw at me for the rest of the night.  This was pure magic – music from the band, Dylan’s performance, audience appreciation, every variable gelled.

After a mesmerising version of Po’ Boy, we were treated to possibly my highlight of the evening (I can’t decide whether Desolation Row deserves that title), a fantastically tight Highway 61 Revisited.  Dylan absolutely ripped into the lyrics on this one and the audience were really going for it.  I don’t really know how else to describe the sound of the band on this one except that it was tight as a drum-skin, not a thing out of place, the effect heightened by the cool-as-a-cucumber guitarist who just stood there, no dramatics at all.  Oh, and the rhythm section absolutely RULED this song.

This was followed by a really enjoyable Ballad of a Thin Man (another one that was especially of interest because of the change wrought by the difference between Dylan’s young and old voices), during which I was thinking that my luck wasn’t going to run out with identifying the songs for the whole night.  As the main set drew to a close, I was fully prepared for the band to leave the stage after a barnstorming Summer Days, which would have been a perfect note on which to end – pacy, fun, full of energy and wit.  As it happened, it was followed by a superfluous and not particularly inspired airing of Like a Rolling Stone, but which delighted the masses.

We got a four-song encore (every other night on this leg of the tour got three songs; said the BF, “You don’t know you’re born”), which, like the opening trio, were more likeable than flabbergasting – though “likeable” probably isn’t the right word for the retooled Blowin’ in the Wind, a song I didn’t identify until well into the lyrics so different was the musical arrangement (Dylan’s initial “How many roads …?” being somewhat incoherent).  It was enjoyable, but only in so far as I was comparing the changes against the version I knew; this is something I enjoy greatly, but I know it annoys others, such as my brother (who, not coincidentally, has no time for Dylan), to distraction.

In all, I was delighted with the gig, and delighted to have seen Dylan live.  While it might not compare to his Roundhouse gig (which the BF, the jammy get, was at) for intimacy or line of vision (I only intermittently got to see the whole stage), it certainly exceeded my expectations, which I had intentionally tried to keep low, for performance as well as setlist.  Excellent end to the tour, in my opinion.

See comments section for setlist.

Fairy cakes

A dozen vanilla fairy cakes with E-number-riddled butter icing, in honour of a nephew’s second birthday today.

My latest acquisition

Isn’t this lovely?  I got this in the Winding Stair this weekend.

The bumf says that the Observer said of this book that “It is indeed a Baedeker to all anthologies, furnished as it is with comfort and counsel and cocktails, pleasantry and poetry, maps, music and pictures.”  Some of the topics included are Great Poems, State Poems, Hate Poems, Epigrams and Songs, First Aid in Divers Crises, Bird Song at Morning, Star-Shine at Night, Food and Drink, The Law and How You Break It, Games and the like.  My favourite page, from leafing through it, is the “Qualities” page, where you rate yourself and others in various topics, including “Beauty”, “Brains” and “Moral Sense”.