I spent time with Euros Childs again.

It’s becoming a regular thing I guess. I could spend hours in the company of him and the Roogie Boogie Band. And I did uptown in London last week or the week before. A school night – the beginning of term but I needed that final special summer moment.

Euros tends not to disappoint.

I had arrived tired and sweating – meetings had and late leavings from workplaces – short stop offs to put children to bed with kisses and cuddles and then trains and tube rides to small public houses on busy roads. So I arrive and if I’m honest – I’m already over excited – I’ve got a good feeling about today. A simple download from the National Elf –oooh that’s better and my Summer can finally come to a wonderful end[s]

Euros Childs has created yet another pure pop classic in Summer Special – that is both familiar and new. It chugs – it rocks - and it resonates with feeling from beginning to end.  I arrive and Euros walks by – checking the parking tickets in pricey places. Or simply taking the air? I guess you might want to – at times. The album opens with Be Be High – first heard at the Vortex with H.Hawkline adding the rock – whilst Euros kept it rolling.  And I want to shout out at the top of my voice just because this song is ace – and that’s it. I’ve already got my boys and daughter shaking their heads and wiggling their toes to it – it's infectious – it creeps in – in a good way.  And from there it just gets better.  A record filled with instantly memorable melodies – and honesty. You can’t always find that these days.

So as I said – I arrive waiting, anticipating. Adam Stearns ambles on – all piano and falsetto – a baroque beatnik. A Van Dyke Parks with a Scottish accent. It is good. Different and a challenge for an opening act – to offer up that feeling so early in the evening. But the boy done well.

So I nip downstairs – cigarettes and cider – ready to find my place at the front of the stage for The Wellgreen. I’m not certain why I wanted to be down the front – just felt they would be something I wanted to see – up close and all that. I hadn’t heard them before – I have some vague recollection of a ‘tweet’ saying ‘harmonies and pop’ and to be honest that’s enough for me. You would wouldn’t you? If it’s going to be that simple it’s bound to be beautiful.

And they were.

Absolutely simple pop music. A Scottish Everly Brothers – I wanted them to be from Edinburgh so I could call them the ‘Waverley Brothers’ but they’re from Glasgow. So I can’t.  Marco and Stuart – two thirds of the Roogie Boogie Boys – making harmonic pop of epic proportions. There’s a Zombies undercurrent with a Bacharach twist amidst it all – but carried off with a modernity of a pop band living in a modern world.
 

I loved it.

Two lads – a snare drum, some bongos, a guitar, a keyboard and two voices. They have released an album Wellgreens – you should own it – I do. Purchased from Euros at the end of another blinding night.  I expect he’ll be selling more when the Summer Special rolls into autumnal nights in northern quarters.

As for Euros Childs and his band [which for those not in the know consisted of Adam Stearns and The Wellgreen] they simply rocked the spot. I remained at the front- after a brief conversation with Stuart Kidd – a Wellgreen and me well chuffed – I’ll write about the Jonny Joe Meek album at a later date – and let myself rock and jump and dance and bounce as this band added more power to already powerful songs. As I’ve said before – everybody should know at least one Euros song – and hopefully they will  - Summer Special wouldn’t be a bad place to start – although I was listening to First Cousins this morning – at work – writing reports – planning lessons – thinking – and that’s also a beautiful (K)rafted (werk)  - all synths and pops. I should write about the whole set – do it justice and tap into my NME journalist tendencies and make the connections and discuss the this and the that – but I won’t – I’ve already taken up far too much of your time.

I will simply say – they played Parents’ Place – and it brings me to my knees –it just does that – brings me to my knees. It is the saddest song ever written. But I had a good feeling about tonight/ day and The Roogie Boogies did not bring me down. This lovely reworking of Ends tracks that lifts and compliments the isolation experienced on that album to bring about a welcome sense of belonging. 

And they play ‘First time I saw You’ – all looped bass and repetition [in the music and we’re never gonna lose it] It is a blistering sonic experience (trademarked any discussion of loud music and that) as that loop shakes the room from the beginning and Euros keeps it simple on the ‘moog’ or should that be Casio (my first keyboard- I formed a band with my friend Richard – we recorded a song called Nightclubbing with it – it was the eighties – I got mumps the very same evening – my career did not blossom) and slowly the band come alive  as she comes alive in my mind. It was ace too. As I said – it was all ace. I first saw ‘First time I saw You’ at the ULU when Chops was first released – it was incredible – and still is – it was a pleasure to see it back in the set. It was a pleasure to see this Summertime show. It was a pleasure to see Euros Childs.

And as always – like the first time – I bought the CD and Euros scrawled on it. I will continue to do this.

I am a fan. It’s great to be a fan of music.

Here are two for you. The Wellgreens and Euros Childs. Buy both of their albums – you’ll be smiling over Winter. 

They have not heard of Euros Childs

I ventured to Dalston last night on a trip to see Euros Childs – all edge and that as I hopped stations to pastures new [but not green] to stand in the company of many more and marvel at the simplicity of it all. I have written several times about Euros Childs – he’s kind of gotten under my skin [and gotten hold of my heart] It’s the simplicity coupled with the lunacy that I like. The turn of phrase and the subtle shift in lyrical matter that sends you smiling but at times reeling and [poodle] rocking.

He’s a slip of thing with a voice rich in insight – a kind of genuine soul artist. When I was asked in the office what he was like – I found myself stumbling and using words like psychedelic, welsh, a folk artist, a comedic Skellern, a raconteur, a good musician, that bloke from Gorky’s. It fell on deaf ears – I should just direct them to the National Elf Library.

He is none of those things – he’s more than that. And because of that we were treated to a slice of the magical misery that is Ends – another new album’s worth of diamond material that will never take out the X-Factor Xmas release. It was him and a piano – a lovely great grand piano on a tiny stage in East London. It says something that he sticks with the new material – he isn’t one to change his view – he’s often out to change ours.

I saw him once at King’s College and he gave us the entire Miracle Inn – all 14 minutes of it – told us not to clap. We just listened. It was wonderful. And last night was like that to – from the gothic horror of Cavendish Hall to the suffocating lament for safety in your Parents’ Place – it all made sense and touched me – I guess. As music is wont to do. I know I’ve argued that it doesn’t change the world – and I’ll stick by that.[ And don’t throw Live Aid at me – that changed fuck all – apart from the further removal of the state to intervene and a nice sideways Thatcher/ Cameron – we’re all in it together - so give us your fucking money hey hey hey Pyjama punk fuckers] But it can touch you – and you could feel that last night as Patio Song was wrestled away from him and into the mouths of the audience as we sang and he listened – all cruise sHIP and nods and winks.

It is always a pleasure to be in a room with him. I don’t think I’d feel the same with the X Factor ‘stars’ all tantrums and talc. I had a chat – got the CD signed – talked with the support act H.Hawkline and thoroughly enjoyed myself.

Life gets simple when you get to forty. As for the X Factor – if I’m honest it is no different to the whole music scene – be it independent or major [and it’s hard to see the split these days] but part of me feels we should take all of those fuckers and do a Wicker Man on them. I guess it’s because afterwards as I stood shoulder to shoulder in a crowded train – slightly damp from the rain and awkward to overheard conversations from ‘city boys’ all devoid of politics and rage discussing corporate deals and bullshit power – I genuinely heard the following exchanges about the X Factor as a couple spoke to a fellow city minion:

He [out of focus and suffering from drink]: She was in the first round – yeah the ones before the judges come.

Her [all lashes and lipstick – but slightly saggy and a touch too shabby]: Yeah they’re just looking for a story at that point.

He: Yeah they either want the really good singers or the totally shit ones

Her:[not understanding that her boyfriend had confirmed her mediocrity in his attack of the whole media system] I mean I’m not bothered – I’m working on my own material – and if I can make it on my own terms then that will be better.

The conversation did not gather pace – it died in sighs and stupidity. They have never heard Euros Childs - they never will.

Everybody should know at least one song perhaps even two.

Everyone.

Costa Rica [going wrong] followed by Love radiates Around [A cover but on Ends]

and Horseriding [on Miracle Inn]