'Wherever You Go, There You Are'

me looking at the two english actors in this lineup

lmao even

Strumpet City

Set in Dublin during the Lockout of 1913, "Strumpet City" is a panoramic novel of city life. It embraces a wide range of social milieux, from the miseries of the tenements to the cultivated, bourgeois Bradshaws. It introduces a memorable cast of characters: the main protagonist, Fitz, a model of the hard-working, loyal and abused trade unionist; the isolated, well-meaning and ineffectual Fr O'Connor; and the wretched and destitute, Rashers Tierney. In the background hovers the enormous shadow of Jim Larkin, Plunkett's real-life hero. "Strumpet City's" popularity derives from its realism and its naturalistic presentation of traumatic historical events. There are clear heroes and villians. The book is informed by a sense of moral outrage at the treatment of the locked-out trade unionists, the indifference and evasion of the city's clergy and middle class and the squalor and degradation of the tenement slums.

Sugar Street

My Goodreads review of Sugar Street, the third in the Cairo Trilogy by Naguib Mahfouz (Black Swan edition, translated by William Maynard Hutchins and Angele Botros Samaan)

Two main things struck me while I read Sugar Street: firstly that while I don't know Arabic, I got a strong sense of the elegant economy and poetry of the written language from this translation. The second thing was how much traditional Egyptian middle-class life in the 1920s and 30s as depicted in the book reminded me of Irish culture up until relatively recently. While on the surface there wouldn't seem to be many similarities, the conservative, family-focused, deeply religious patriarchy in which mothers dominated the home felt very familiar. Even the way religion infused the language and thinking of the characters, even the nonbelieving ones, was very like the way Irish culture was for much of the 20th century a Catholic culture. Like in Ireland, families observed religion, gossiped about neighbours, argued about the politics of a young nation and mothers hoped for a civil service career for their sons and a good marriage for their daughters. 

The story covers a long period of time and is a little episodic - there were many subplots that could have been explored more, and some main plots that could have been trimmed. I had limited patience for Kamal's endless romantic vacillating, but was engaged by his nephew Ahmad's adventures working for a Marxist magazine and trying to break free of the constraints of traditional middle-class life. 

Politics runs through the story constantly, as the characters debate and wonder where the new country will go once the double-crossing English are finally gone. It might be advisable to have a wikipedia entry on pre-war Egyptian history open as you read as the various parties and individuals are mentioned without backstory (and there's no reason why they should be, considering the novel was written first for an Egyptian audience.)

The dash of Beatles magic comes as they reach the end of the verse and bounce together on the strung-out “pleeeeeeease . . .” answered by Paul’s solo “ . . . love me do.” The spirit in the harmony and the expectant silence that follows heightens the sense of anticipation...

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In the drawn-out “plee-ee-ease” of “Love Me Do” the lilting harmonies yearn politely—in “Please Please Me” it’s dirty and polite all at the same time. John and Paul’s verse duet gains on the Everly formula: Paul stays on the initial high note as John pulls away beneath him (“Last night I said these words to my girl”), putting the Everlys’ “Cathy’s Clown” lilt to a brighter beat. The rasp in Lennon’s voice on the repeated “come on”s is far from innocent—he wants this woman to do more than just hold his hand. As they hit the second “please,” Paul and John leap away from the pleasantry of the first, soaring up to convey a real adolescent sexual frustration. Even the sound of the band has more rough edges than the thunking bass of “Love Me Do.” Where the first single is genuinely coy, the second makes a “polite” demand on the female, and Lennon deliberately tries to stir up a reaction.

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Although John and Paul can be worlds apart (as this album [“Please Please Me”] demonstrates), when they harmonize the common brilliance they achieve is breathtaking. The two share a space of musical effervescence that only they know how to reach for, and they hit it with uncommon grace.

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The first and last songs on the album, “I Saw Her Standing There” and “Twist and Shout,” are its bookends: both revolve around the idea of falling in love on the dance floor. But where Paul gets the dance floor jumping, Lennon makes the earth move. It’s as raunchy as anything the Beatles ever recorded, and it stands up beautifully to records with raunchier reputations (like the Stones’ “Satisfaction”). Where the opening tune suggests an adolescent sexuality, “Twist and Shout” conveys a loss of innocence; where Paul’s singing is charged but charming, Lennon’s delivery is nothing short of lustful.

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Throughout rock, and throughout the history of music—from Bach’s French Suites to Ravel’s La Valse—the image of the dance in music has been linked to the act of sex.

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After two verses [“Twist and Shout”], the singers—John with Paul and George in support— back off to play their guitars for a verse, as if resting for the final round. When the voices come back in, the personalities we’ve heard throughout the record stack up one by one for the rave-up, building the chord with mounting excitement. At the top of the ladder, they spill over the edge with hysterical screams, the musical dam breaks, and before we know it they’re into the last verse. It’s the musical equivalent of an orgasm, and it counts among the most exciting moments in all their music.

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It’s not that they’re telling teenagers to dance or have sex: they’re simply enjoying life so much that they can’t contain themselves—they want the beat to seduce the whole world into having fun.

(Tell Me Why by Tim Riley, 1998/2002)

Blue on Blue

“MCGOUGH: There are poets who believe that when a poem arrives you write it down, catch the moment, as it were, and then that is it. Whereas other poets revise and rework until something shines through. What is your method? PAUL: For me, how art works is I get a mood, a desire to do the thing, usually writing songs, but sometimes this passion to paint. The feeling has to be there. I do it for pleasure. I’m not a great one for, as Linda used to put it, “Beating myself with a wet noodle.” So with a poem, a line comes to me and I sort of doodle with it in my head. I can’t stop it. I realised the other day that the great thing about being a composer is that you are doing nothing. What a doss! I was recently on holiday in India, having a fabulous time doing nothing, and I wrote three songs that I’ve just recorded. It’s a lovely thing to be able to say in my profession, “I have to be doing nothing.” MCGOUGH: Do you use a computer? PAUL: Pencil and paper. I’m not a typist. Funnily enough, John became a red-hot typist towards the end of his life. He had always had this “Arts Correspondent in Kowloon” kind of dream. But for me it’s pencil and paper by the bed… those moments between falling asleep and just before waking are good. I’ve got this little book that Stelly [his daughter, Stella] gave me and it’s full of scribbles and drawings. MCGOUGH: Are you interested in poetic forms? Have you tried your hand at writing a villanelle or a sonnet? PAUL: I really haven’t got into structure yet, but I can see how it can be effective from reading other poets. Like a mantra. Allen [Ginsberg] always used to say, “First thought, best thought.” And I’d think, “Oh, brilliant.” But the joke is, of course, that Allen was always revising. I think he was the first person I showed my poetry to. He came over to the house in Sussex to ask me if I knew anybody who would accompany him on guitar at a gig he was doing at the Albert Hall. So I suggested Dave Gilmour and Dave Stewart and a few others. Then when he’d gone it dawned on me that he wanted me to do it, so I rang him and said OK. So we met up and I stuck a little Bo Diddley jinkity-jink behind his Ballad of the Skeletons, a really cool poem, and he introduced me to the audience as his accompanist. He loved to be the Don, did Allen, the controller, and I loved to give him that. Anyway we sat down with my poems and he knocked out all the “thes”, and any word ending in “-ing”. And I said, “Allen, you’re going to make me into a New York Beat poet, and it’s just not me.” In the end I thanked him for going over them, and it was good to have an annotated version in my drawer, The Ginsberg Variations, as I called them, but I wouldn’t be using them. It was a lovely process, though, and I should be so lucky.”

— Paul McCartney, interview w/ Roger McGough for the Telegraph. (March 10th, 2001)

My latest Songs Tinhat theory is that Paul recorded "Kreen-Akrore" as a response to "Cold Turkey".

"If *YOU* can make weird sex noises on a record under cover of being about something else, then *I* can make weird sex noises on a record under cover of being about something else!"

From Japan Through John Lennon's Eyes: A Personal Sketchbook

Towers on the cusp of something

From the Irish Times, May 2008:

//PLANNERS IN Dublin City Council have rejected a proposal to preserve the Pigeon House chimneys at Poolbeg by adding them to the Record of Protected Structures (RPS), on the basis that they are not of sufficient architectural, social or historical value.

The 207m (680ft) candy-striped twin chimney stacks at the ESB’s Poolbeg generating station have been one of the city’s most recognisable landmarks for more than 30 years, but have never had protection from demolition.

The situation has a greater than usual urgency due to the fact that the Poolbeg power station is to close in 2010. It seems likely that the site they are located on will undergo a change of function.

The ESB said no decision had been made on the future of the stacks and it was unlikely that any decision would be taken until the plant closed.

The company has also yet to decide whether it will sell the 90-acre site on which the stacks stand. The site is likely to become prime development land in the coming years with plans to move much of Dublin port’s activities outside the city and proposals to turn the Poolbeg area into a high-density urban quarter.//

The change in the economic landscape since 2008, along with scandals relating to inflated property values in the Docklands, means that the value of the ‘prime development land’ around Poolbeg may not rise any time soon. At the present time (August 2010) the generating station appears to be still operating and the alternators and drums are still standing, along with the towers. The station compound is run-down and looks semi-derelict, but is still protected by CCTV. The Shellybanks strand in front of the station is still far quieter than its neighbour Sandymount, the quiet broken only occasionally by hikers and wanderers. A foul smell in the area, possibly emanating from the gas used to power to combined cycle generators, puts off the dog-walkers and joggers of Sandymount. I haven’t been able to find any information as to whether the station will be closing in 2010, as announced by the ESB in 2007. The next change to happen in the area, in place of property development, will be the new incinerator which was under construction on a site just to the west of the generating station until 22 July, when work was stopped after the Department of the Environment failed to approve a licence for an outflow pipe.

The stop-and-start nature of industrial and commercial development in Ireland is frustrating from an economic point of view, but the upside it results in strange, intriguing half-derelict landscapes like that at Poolbeg and Pigeon House Road. This is a time for collecting images of industry winding down and the sense of poetry they evoke

Joanna Newsom at Grand Canal Theatre, Dublin

Joanna Newsom and band performing in Vancouver. Photo: Skot Nelson

It’s been three years since Joanna Newsom’s last gig in Dublin, so on Tuesday evening fans from all over the country eagerly converged on the Grand Canal Theatre for the opening date of her latest tour. As some commentators noted, there was a positive outpouring of hipsters into what is normally a suits ‘n’ heels kind of area, with trendily dressed people at varying stages of youth milling around the windswept square and gleaming lobby of the theatre from the early evening onwards. But unlike some events that draw that kind of crowd, this was no exclusivist gig designed to alienate those ‘not in the know’. From the moment a smiling Joanna appeared on stage to rapturous applause, she showed yet again why she and the musicians she works with deserve all the praise they get.

Her music is complex but hugely accessible, even more so when performed live. My companion, who’d never heard her music before, was astounded and delighted at the beauty and richness of the arrangements performed, reproduced almost note-perfectly from her latest album Have One On Me. The band, comprising uber-arranger and multi-instrumentalist Ryan Francesconi, percussionist Neal Morgan, two women on violin and viola respectively whose names I didn’t catch and Andrew Strain on trombone (who, incidentally, looked like the love child of Dougie Howser MD and Spencer from The Hills – thanks to Alice for that observation!) performed such epics as the album’s title track, ‘Easy’, ‘Kingfisher’ and a tremendous new arrangement of Ys’ Monkey and Bear with passion and military precision.

Joanna’s harp playing is better than ever, showcased beautifully on the show opener, ‘Jackrabbits’ and on ‘Peach Plum Pear’, performed as an encore. She took to the piano a number of times too, though the location of the instrument toward the back of the stage meant her voice carried less powerfully during these tracks and was sometimes drowned out by the drumkit. (I have heard since that those sitting further back actually had a better acoustic experience, as the instruments sounded more balanced when heard from further away). Her voice is less abrasive than in recent years but still carries a tune powerfully, with only a few bum notes hit. Uncharacteristically for her, she mixed up some of the lyrics in Soft As Chalk, but considering the vast quantity of words she manages to learn by heart and sing perfectly every night a small blunder is easily forgiven. A slightly fuzzy memory was also revealed when she repeated a story she told the last time she played in Dublin, about how she overheard some people criticising her performance. From what I can tell, this incident occurred the first time she was in Dublin, not in 2007, since she told the same story at the last gig. Anyway, the criticisers would be eating their words if they were in attendance last night!

Small mistakes such as these also makes her seem more human, a side of her that came out during a brief interlude when she interacted with the audience while re-gluing her fingers (necessary for harp-playing). Joanna may look the picture of innocence, but I laughed heartily when she commented ‘This is taking longer than I anticipated because I haven’t finished gluing my fingers….that’s what she said’. A funny back-and-forth between her and Neal Morgan about Twitter and its lack of appeal for them indicated a good rapport within the band.

She played two tracks, Kingfisher and Autumn, that I tend to skip over on the CD, but the live context brought out a richness to these delicate tunes that I will be going back to investigate further. Soft As Chalk and the the aforementioned Monkey and Bear were highlights, full of excitement and drama. Neal Morgan’s percussion was astounding, on a par with Joanna’s harp playing, as he switched between a variety of sticks and surfaces to get exactly the right sound.

The show was just under 90 minutes long, time that seemed to shoot by. The pre-encore closer was the wonderful Good Intentions Paving Company, with its piano and trombone coda extended to a rocking jam that nearly had the audience on its feet – proof yet again that Joanna can really rock out when she wants to. A richer arrangement of Peach Plum Pear was actually an improvement on the album original. The near-capacity crowd (in a venue that accommodates 2,000 people) gave a riotous standing ovation and the trendyheads even cracked a few smiles on their way out. Let’s hope Joanna doesn’t leave it as long for her next visit.