Back For Easter

Our son has returned from London for a few weeks. He hasn't been home since Christmas. My wife is very happy to see him.

Old Man

Well it finally happened. I officially became old last week. By officially old I mean I celebrated my 50^th birthday. Well, celebrated maybe a slight exaggeration although me and the wife did go out for a meal at our old favourite Loch Fyne. 

 

But now I think – what should my reaction be as a 50 year old to life? Does my age give me a greater insight into the trials and tribulations of life? Can I now say without a hint of irony “Well, of course in my day……”

 

 I am planning on running a marathon this year and is that a good idea now I’m officially old and my health could go at any minute. Will I look at techno gadgets and say what's the point of that? What’s wrong with a pen and a piece of paper. Why don’t people just talk to each other any more etc etc

 

Or is 50 the new 40 and I can leave the corduroy trousers in the wardrobe for a few years yet?

 

Emotional Turmoil

 

My daughter and her boyfriend have split up. Cue much tears and wailings in the house over the last week. I am strangely not perturbed by this at all. Of course I don’t like to see my daughter upset and I hate her ex for upsetting her like this but I am not really moved by it all. At least not in the same way that my wife is who is fretting about our daughter,  laying awake at night worrying about her wellbeing  and has got emotionally involved in the situation. Is it a man woman thing? 

Or am I just a cold hearted bastard?

 

 

My Favourite Dress

There isn't much I can say about this song.It means too much to me. It is a song I have listened to probably at least once a week for over twenty years. And at certain, emotionally stressful times over the last twenty plus years I have listened to this masterpiece every day.

If you haven't heard a song by The Wedding Present before , listen to this , because it pretty much sums up David Gedge's output. Yes the sounds are better produced these days but this song and its two guitars bass and drums,  plaintive vocals and subject matter  is what it has always been about.

For me it is one of the best songs of the last 50 years.

My Favourite Dress- The Wedding Present

Musical Regrets- Northern Soul

One on my musical  regrets is never going to Wigan Casino or Blackpool Mecca ballroom when I had the chance and was  a student in Manchester in the late Seventies early Eighties.

 

I came to Northern Soul relatively late. Growing up in the Sixties and Seventies Motown was on the radio a lot  and later even Tony Blackburn kept the soul flame burning on his post Radio 1 shows on GLR. Growing up I ‘d seen the crossover hits mimed along to on TOTP but it took The Jam and the track Non Stop Dancing on their first album to really stimulate my interest in Northern Soul.

 

If there were any all nighters in my Hertfordshire market town home I never heard of them them and  anyway by the time The Jam came along  there seemed to be just so much new and exciting music to listen to  I didn’t have  a chance to pursue a new found interest in obscure-  and  at the time ,I thought, uncool, music, seduced as I was by other  Weller, Foxton Buckler songs  and The Clash and reggae and all the stuff John Peel played.

I got into the Mod Revival   through '79 and early 1980  after being blown away by the music and images on The Jam's All Mod Cons album and  so I kept an interest in Motown and Northern Soul.

In reality though it wasn’t until  1983 and the move  back down to the South and  into London and  where I discovered all the pirate stations playing soul music,  that I started to research Northern Soul in detail.  Compilation albums were easy to get hold of (still are).Some of the sound quality was (is) naff as most were(are) analogue recordings straight from the 7" vinyl and some of the songs are so poor they really do deserve to be obscure. 

But some of the songs are the epitome of good quality honest no nonsense dance music and  if you play some of them loud, really loud I defy you to not want to perform some daring moves in your living room. Or even just tap your feet.

 

This is one of my favourites.   A classic northern soul voice and sound.

 

In Your Spare Time- Cindy Scott

Day Off

I was off work today.It was a nice sunny day but still quite cold. We went out for a drive and ended up in Amble via Tynemouth and Druridge Bay. Blue skies all the way. A sort of day that makes you feel good.
Bands like The Wedding  Present make me feel good even when the sun isn't shining and the skies are overcast and grey like they have been for weeks here.
I discovered this live concert from 2006 whilst tidying up my music files. This is a concert filmed for French TV. I've got the DVD somewhere and here is the audio in full as broadcast.

Its excellent sound quality is only slightly marred by the over enthusiastic clapping at the start and end of each song.

Of course every decent music blogger knows  Gedge is a genius. This collection of songs from his career only goes to prove it.

Le Trabendo Session- The Wedding Present

Sunday Morning

It's Sunday morning.

 The wife is at a Zumba session (the latest get fit craze for women -mostly-sweeping  the gyms and village halls up and down the country apparently). Me and the dog have been out for a longer than usual Sunday walk. He is asleep at my feet whilst I post this entry. The daughter is in Doncaster with her boyfriend and my son has probably just gone to bed as he was out last night.

I am listening to some Jazz. Dave Brubeck to be precise.Currently listening to Kathy's Waltz from the Time Out album. This album was the soundtrack of my childhood. Listening to it brings a nice warm , happy glow to this miserable , cold and overcast March morning.

My wife has got another year's contract , albeit doing a different job, with her current employer. So financial disaster has been averted for the time being. Maybe this wont be an annus horribilis? Fingers crossed.

Enough of that, it's time to Take Five