Sunday, 13 March 2011

There are many things I would like to say to you [and you and you and you]

There have been thousands of words written about sounds. That imminent response to the music. That desire to share our thoughts with others. Or sell our thoughts. When I started my fanzine – I was 16 years old – feeling the world was ready to listen to my voice. There were those that read ‘em and those that writ ‘em. I in my youthful zeal wanted the world to know about the bands I liked – I wanted those bands to know that they were liked and in all of that came correspondence and shared dreams.

I remember putting the first ‘Get that Anorak Off’ together – not certain it would ever see the light of day but writing it nonetheless – because when you’re holed up in a dark northern world perhaps the primitives can add some brighter times to it all. And from that grew all this. The writing now I guess is a throwback to typed evenings about The Nivens or The Impossibles.

I would receive letters – tenfold through the box – from Sheffield, Rotherham, London and Derby. And sometimes a letter would wind its way to our Scunthorpe address postmarked New Zealand or Singapore. Those anoraks get worn around the world- and to have someone request a fanzine from another country felt exotic – we weren’t global connected by the technology – only by the pen and our shared understanding of The Brilliant Corners – Collin communicating from other worlds through a communal love of cheap guitars. I let him down to be honest – Collin was a charming, exciting, energetic young man – who ventured to these very shores – to study – to swallow the independent vibes. He rang me up – several times – and I was so far inside my love of the self – this club scene maaaan – that I never met the bloke. You know he’d taken time to write me a letter – about music and I never took the time to get on a bus and visit him in Huddersfield – it’s not on really. We could have talked about music for hours.

And I didn’t bother.

And one from a girl named Lucy. I let her down. And this post is the one where I say sorry – we’d communicated about this and that – about music that touched our hearts and fanzine writing and reading. She ventured to China – you can do that when you’re confident – or you do that to make you confident. And she sent me a fanzine – her fanzine – in a padded envelope – hand written – typed in places – and I still have it.

Our correspondence dry and fading.

I wish I could give it back to her – I don’t know where she is – but I should have made it up and put it out there – but the London life had curtailed friendship – as I fell in love with acid house. It isn’t a good enough excuse – it’s running away from responsibility. If only I had had a little more conviction back then instead of filling my poise with arrogance and wishful dreams of teenage romance. It takes guts to be gentle and kind and I was full of barbarism [it had most likely began at home] and that is not a state to be repeated, treated or re-heated.

So it still resides – in the envelope – all her expressions of excitement – locked down and going nowhere [fast]. I feel guilty about that – I feel guilty about lots of things but that one resonates at times. Because she trusted me to do it – and I didn’t.

I didn’t do it clean – I didn’t do it at all.

Aggi was another – all swirls and ink. She could write her heart on a page – all open and honest and beating to the sounds of the underground. I let her down too. All London trains and shared rooms as we made our way to The Pastels at the ULU. Where Ride played their first ever gig in London and she’s dragging me in from the bar to make me listen – and I’m talking rock n roll with Bobby G and being a shit host – I feel bad about that too. Perhaps I never professed to be a jingle jangle fey pop lover – but a little bit of common decency wouldn’t have gone amiss. Too much Thunderbird and fawning over myself.

You see gigs like the pastels united the fray. That simple response to rock n roll – without the posturing and posing. We weren’t looking for heroes – we just liked music. We like guitars that fed back, twanged and jangled. We liked singers who sang about simple things – but simple things that mattered. There was simply nothing else to be done. It was the love of the sounds and our fanzines allowed the magical connections to keep on firing. Music unites like that – so here’s to simple responses. I first heard The Pastels in the 1980s – this Scottish drawl over repetitive guitars. This DIY approach to POP – The Pastels were never twee – they often get held up as this overly fey group – but Stephen Pastel was a PuNK as the rest of ‘em. Their brand of pop – fizzed and chugged – it fell apart and fed back. It was independent.

And so was fanzine writing.

Fanzine writing was about connections – making friends through words and sometimes we were all looking for friends. So what has any of this to do with the music? I suppose that music whilst a solitary act of appreciation and aesthetics is a shared understanding – it’s a glance or a look – a smile or cheer in the right [wrong] direction.

And sometimes you should look people right in the face – right in their eyes.

I would now

And I would say sorry

And hopefully a tune would be playing that made everything that little bit easier.

Friday, 4 March 2011

a message for the masses

I wake up sometimes unable to muster the energy or excitement for work. And fall quickly back into the realms of dole age infinity and endless time on ‘our’ hands. Of guitar tuning and twiddling and recording and listening. And walks through parades of 1970s shops where discoveries happened and moments were had. I don’t miss it. I just remember it.

This is not a longing for that northern town. This is not a call to arms to return to youthful ways – it’s recognition of what shapes you and how you end up here. I was called to jury service at 18 years of age – it was in Grimsby – they do that sort of stuff there. It was all low level violence and malevolence – youth armed with steel poles disputing the honour of someone’s dog or car and sometimes other humans. We’d dissect incidents and altercations in Cleethorpes back seats and pushing and shoving in Grimbsy club hall ways – it wasn’t pleasant. It wasn’t fascinating. It was the anger of the underclasses turned on itself – the seeds of destruction under the last throes of the Tory dice and the imminent arrival of a more powerful wrecking system from the Britpop politicians who would descend upon us.

I used to go out for lunch. Through the court halls, past the security guards with a nod and wander around the precinct and high street. I can’t picture it as vividly now – but it was all sallow concrete and shop fronts. There was a small independent record shop – it sold the usual and the unusual. I wasn’t on the lookout for vinyl – my tape player was in the bag for the train ride back and forth to the inns of justice – early starts with the Beach Boys 20/20 or the Paul’s Boutique by the Beasties – it all depended on the mood I awoke.

So it was tape digging – and there on the bottom shelf was a tape by Linton Kwesi Johnston. It looked interesting. Reggae fi Rodni, Fit them back and Bass Culture – title awash with low end theory and history. It had an oil painting cover – all heavy daubs and muted palette. And hearing LKJ for the first time was revelatory – it was chattin’ and bass – about politics and race. It represented Britain then, now and beyond – with its timeless clutch of reggae beats and reverbs.

So sitting in the courts – of Grimbsy with the air permeated with industry and fish – we listened to judges make judgements on youth. And LKJ toasted the ills of da police and the insurrectshun of the masses – as I and I considered the evidence from police officers in da dock. It was good to have LKJ by my side – because it noh funny when you sitting in the jury making decisions that affect lives and you know that the daily mailers want to take charge and you think the kids with iron bars just might have been right.

And so I return to LKJ as the EDL spews its shit on the streets [no rock in the clubs] and I watch the 70s hate seep back into the cracks and crevices of our daily routines and it reminds me about the fighting spirit – the real collective responsibilities that we have. To take on ideologies that need challenging ‘in these difficult times’. The ill informed can make you ill – but it’s the will of the people that matters.

Fit Them Back

It’s as simple as that. We need to fight them back. Living within a stone’s throw of Stephen Lawrence’s bus stop, the New Cross’ burnt house and walking the Welling roads. Things are bubbling and bubbling again – rising right to the top and given credence by the ‘red tops’ that hating will result in a ‘new England’ when I’m just looking for a better world. LKJ takes matters into his own hands – a rolling snare and falling guitar as the bass keeps it all rocksteady – smash their brains in – coz they ain’t got nuthin in ‘em – it’s a simple command. A straightforward ask, as the tempo keeps it uptown and we dance our moonstomp over the heads of the ignorant.

It’s a message for the masses.

It is music.




















Wednesday, 23 February 2011

when they scream they hurt your ears

There was a time when the incessant screech of feedback would be enough to hook me – to reel me in. This anti-musical sound. As the children now scream at the tops of their voices over everything from the type of spoon they have to whether they can have a bath – ‘right now’ it seems that I am living in my own version of Metal Machine Music – endless looping on the locked groove of side four. This appeal to wallow in the primal [scream] sound of fuzzing guitars and discordant melody that rattles and shakes the windows – let alone the bones was amply fulfilled in the teenage years of angst and anger.
There is a point in Sister Ray where the feedback curls into a phrase that I am sure was sampled by the Beasties. It’s the simplicity of the thing – the movement of the guitar, the speaker, the volume – and you can hear it – rushing to fill the emptiness. I would listen to those frequencies throughout my teenage years.



I think a steel town is made for feed backing guitars



And those moments in You Made Me Realise where guitars breakdown and the sound of screaming emerges. I had been into the valentines for some time – that anorak rush of ‘paint[ing] a rainbow’ while we [sunny sundae]smiled. It had all been bowlheads and treble guitars – our band ventured to a Leeds studio to recreate the highs of the Ecstasy long player – we were shrill [they were brill]. But the valentines kept on subsuming, rewriting, becoming fluid, this sound – this heavy heavy sound. Another Adelphi moment was had in the company of My Bloody Valentine, as I fired inane questions at Kevin Shields whilst he ripped pieces of paper from my question list to sort the floating tremolo on his Jaguar guitar. This was the start of Isn’t Anything - a disengagement from that Lazy past to a lazy future.



I stumbled across the video for You Made Me Realise – this super Super 8 footage of broken things and destruction as looped psychedelia washed over and over – not a bad way to start your day – as the Chart Show counted down the Top 10 Independent tunes. You knew it was a good day if you had managed to wake up early and have watched the Chart Show – how do you set your achievements with a rolling video station? If you saw the Chart Show you had made it up by 11.30 am – you’d seen in a morning.



And I would spend many a time in the company of My Bloody Valentine – I mean I would listen to them a great deal. The Tremolo E.P on tape- pushed into a Boots tape player all hiss and fizz in itself – as Honey Power played through the speakers as trains pulled in at New Cross Station – not the station’s speakers my headphones – but those merging of the everyday and the slow pulsating noise of Shield’s and Butcher’s guitars combining to create a new way of sensing the world – through haze and dreams as aeroplanes landed just outside. I witnessed the explosive effect of MBV several times – in Leeds, in York and London. Standing in the ULU alone within the crowd for two nights on the bounce – my body burning from the searing heat I had allowed it to be revealed to – this lobster turning redder – this celtic complexion having no favours done as the rough denim and large black jumper rubbed against that sunburnt skin. But I was there – right within the experience as You Made Me Realise came to a stop and the growl was released – slowly unfolding – sending us back – literally to the doors. I had a ticket for the Manchester MBV reunion – my brother having sorted them out – the tickets not the band that is. I couldn’t make the London shows and instead plumped for the sonic Sunday shenanigans in the North. Except I never made it – in a sad attempt to focus on my career I decided the futures of potential sixth formers was more important than Colm, Belinda, Debbie and Kevin’s attempts to make eardrums bleed and stomachs somersault. So the train was not caught and a well earned day off from school not had and the ticket remained unused – and my hearing was intact for a little longer.



So I have been listening to the ‘holocaust section’ from the ICA warm up concert – a stop start shambling sonic experience as the band slowly begin to lock into that symbiotic soul set up – creating beauty from noise. It lasts for fourteen minutess – I think it was stretched to around twenty minutes by the end of the tour. It isn’t the kind of ‘tune’ you kick off your Saturday night with. No that’s going to be a Sly and the Family Stone track. But as Kevin kicks in the effects and the initial squall begins to settle and through the chaos comes ambience [with teeth] it hurts and it rattles around and I have the option to switch it off – to forward the file. But I linger – I stay sucked in and listen – as pitches descend and tones ring with one another, against each other – discordant and melodic and slowly these frequencies take on even more shape – more substance as the rise and fall of the decibels continues – and somewhere in there I hear a plane – pushing its engines – searching for lift as the sky explodes in strobe light. As we begin to lose our breath and wake within that dream that Kevin and co. are beginning to soundtrack – and slowly we sway – we lose ourselves in this expansive mess of sound.



And then when we are thoroughly submitted – stupefied by the screech –we are jolted back with Debbie’s push of bass and Colm’s thump of the skins. That final riff – left ringing in the air.



This is music.



It may be in debt to this and that – the Stochausen and Sonic Youth and No Wavers and 60s chancers – but this is music that asks to be acknowledged – to be confronted – fought with.



And sometimes I feel like a fight.


Saturday, 22 January 2011

They sold them and they played them

I used to live in Nottingham. It was a place I had escaped to from the confines of a small northern town that was guaranteed to bring you right down. Guaranteed to take you nowhere. I remember being deposited there by Mark and Anna – it was a Sunday. A car ride to Beeston Rylands – to Leyton Crescent – a car ride to the beginning of all of this.

The thing I liked about Nottingham was the fact it was run through with record shops – second hand, independent, the big chains all sat side by side – shipping out the vinyl to the streets – to the bedroom DJs, the newly formed bands, the rock obsessives , hip hop headz, pop tarts and dub troubadours. And I liked to browse - that simple feeling of flicking through piles of records and finding a spark, a name, a title or a photograph that grabbed you and forced you to look that little bit closer. Pull out the record, check it for marks. You know the drill. We don’t really change – although the autist in us all will have to evolve the ritual to include the wait to see if i-tunes can return the search.

You see that’s what fucks me off – I was getting ready for Christmas here – it’s always busy - the boys have their birthday on the 27th. And I happened to be getting something out of the cupboard – some secreted gift. When I was drawn to a pile of records - a pile of records I was definitely going to have a look through – suddenly off task. How can that happen when you have a list – already in order on your i-pod? You can search and find – search and order – search and sequence – the playlists of the mindless – it can sort it for you – it’s ‘genius’ like that. Now don’t misunderstand – I have tried to order my records from time to time. I have listed them and moved them around and put singles in genres. But as I have moved house at least five times whilst having them it’s safe to say that I have forgotten what I own and where to find it. That is I would love to play the second Razorcuts album or Caveman or the white label Electronica album from Fat Cat but would not be able to find it – easily. In fact I know there are two boxes of vinyl sitting in the garage – slowly warping and eroding.

And buying records was something I did a lot of in Nottingham.

I worked across and out of town – in a village called Radcliffe – in the school there. It was a wonderful place to learn and work. Free of responsibility and willing to take risks – sometimes the best things happen in the classroom when we’re not obsessing about the progress and attributing arbitrary levels to performance – and instead indulge in telling kids about stuff and getting them to use that stuff to make their existence that little bit richer. Anyway – I don’t want to rant about education. I got my education.

But working in the sticks meant I had to head across town to catch the bus to Beeston – just outside the library. Angel Row gallery – Nottingham was thin on the gallery ground in the late 1990s – now everyone has an institute of modern contemporary art. Actually I remember a series of canvases in the Angel Row gallery that depicted classic concerts – realised through simple dots – the band on stage – one was Joy Division represented by four white dots and the audience – represented by a hundred or so dots – all about 2ft by 4ft. Simple and effective. The artist had also made replica album covers on wood and left them stacked against a wall – inanimate objects – redundant images without the sounds - but somehow providing the rush of excitement when you came across an album you owned. So catching the bus home rather than taking a lift from Hutch [a wonderful Science teacher – a roll up in one hand driver – I once drove the wrong way up Electric Avenue with Hutch – but that as they say is another story] meant I could record shop in the centre of town. Again free from responsibility – not rushing home not wanting to stay out – it was a simple as that – I had time. Time has changed now – in a good way – but time has now changed. And of course Emma worked in the city – so I would meet her.


I would alight from the L3 [I think] at Broadmarsh bus depot and shopping complex – Alders, H&M, a Bookworks and all of that. HMV was just outside – opposite the ‘jacket spuds’ stand. A quick glance – a shake through the vinyl racks and then up to Virgin Records on the corner of Slab Square – that beautiful centre to a Midlands city. Civic and open – a genuine welcome for / from the people of Notts. In the city there’s a lot of things I want to say you. More rack raking – a possible purchase of a reduced CD and then up to Selectadisc – the big one – I would do the small one on the way down for some reason and Rob’s if he was open.

Selectadisc has closed now.

Sometimes cities lose the things they most need. I remember turning up to the first listen of Hello Nasty by the Beastie Boys at a Selectadisc – a 6 o’clock airing with bottled beers and bass – I was wearing a suit from work but you could do that in there – no one really judged you – the staff where there to help – source and recommend. Not like the staff at the selectadisc on Berwick Street – the one on the What’s the story cover – a great deal of the staff in there were twats. London/ Nottingham thing duck.

That Selectadisc is also closed.

The staff played records. They sold them and they played them.

Downstairs general / new releases – CDs that sort of thing – upstairs vinyl. A race up the staircase. The change of sound systems from the push of independent alternative strains to repetitive beats and twisted grooves – upstairs was the hipper cooler older brother – downstairs was rockin it – but upstairs knew that little bit more. And so to the racks – I would start with the latest hip hop releases – move into the new releases – possible over to the sales rack – back into the psychedelic or reggae area – maybe the sixties or just stand and listen to what was playing.

So I grabbed a handful of vinyl and had a look. Because that’s what vinyl obsessives do. Not that I am one now – the fatherhood thing means you spend real time doing real things. Although today – I just found myself moaning. But there you go – no said it was going to be easy. Once I had grabbed the 12 inches – I was hoping that Loop by LFO would be in there. First heard on an epic Weatherall Essential Mix – a bleeping builder – with repetitive beats – 303s sounding out the sounds of the underground – all K-holes and trance like states. I’ve been looking for it for a while – trying to track it down on the ‘net’ – but I can only find the LFO vs FUSE version. That is not the one I want. Funnily enough it was right in the pile – tucked into the Orbital Mutations record. And I was taken back to Nottingham – that moment of discovery as the hand flicked through the covers – or in the case of the second hand shops – the actual records. Also if you liked the look of a record – or recognised a producer etc they let you have a listen. Like Danny did in Record Village.

I haven’t mention Rob’s Records. It deserves a little more than a few sentences. But suffice to say I think it’s still open – and that’s got to count for something. I once sent Emma into Rob’s – in her lunch break – I wanted a copy of Shirley Ellis’ The Clapping Song – he had several copies – some more scratched than others – it cost three quid. A guaranteed floor filler. That ride cymbal introduction – into the rhyme as the r’n’b funk begins to bring the whole thing together – and the horns get hornier and by the end we’re all clapping and back patting and slap slapping. It’s finds like this that exist in record shops. Real record shops. My copy of that single smells a little – like it’s been hanging around a while.

But now it is found. I can clap my hands for that.


Friday, 21 January 2011

Picked her up on a Friday Night.

It had been the first term of teacher training – through the help of Colin I was still on the course – his cash injection had not gone up my nose – I had spent wisely and paid the rent. Bought sausages – frozen – they go further and had somehow managed to turn into Top Valley each day with a smile. To be honest I was quite enjoying the change from the drudgery of the post office.
In some ways Scunthorpe was out of my system – I’d had my friendly visit from the girl in the office. But it had been fumbles and disinterest that had put a stop to that. I couldn’t quite muster the enthusiasm as we had sat in a small local public house as men played darts and the jukebox played Foreigner.


And over those weeks – she had came into my senses – a glance at a table – a face in the crowd – a stomp up the hill. All green coat, cigarette and boots. I was still living the modernist dream – on the cheap – clean living in dirty times – well cleanish living. When I arrived in the midlands mayhem I wasn’t necessarily looking to fall in L.O.V.E...love. I thought I was going to hang around a little – get the script on the teaching lark and run to the warm embrace of Leeds or Sheffield. Back to the panic on the streets and [yeah, yeah] industrial estates. What little did I know. So with borrowed lighters and nods and small talk about this and that I realised I was smitten – bitten. No real conversation had passed our lips. But we had bonded over awkward moments in public forums– and that sort of ‘ting.


And the cold dark nights came rushing in. I had spent that first term in the company of LTJ Bukem, Andrew Weatherall, The Charlatans, Elvis Presley and The Small Faces. I would spend many a night with the company of her and The Small Faces. It was a Friday – dogtooth check flat fronted trousers, a red check button down shirt – it was a late 1970s one – could possibly have been the start of the eighties – purchased in the RSPCA charity shop on Ashby High Street. The scene of numerous special finds – through book, shirts, jackets, vinyl and cassettes. And a denim jacket – press stud fastening – deep blue and fitted.


I’m the face if you want it – a fat face .


So with some trepidation I rocked up from the Rylands to the campus block – past Ula’s – the site of white cider purchases and 10 silk cut/ number 1s – depended upon who was smoking the most to Helen and that northern lass’s birthday/ Christmas bash. Not hoping – just partaking. She was there – I was pointed out. Promptly felt and fell into broken conversations. Harvey was there too – what sort of a bloody girl’s name is Harvey – Hello I’m Harvey and I’ve come to give you gip – I’ve got one of these for you sonny Jim – I’ve got one of those for you – my name is Harvey.


All the while the disco rattled the bass cones – these fragile bones - as I tried to engage in serious conversation with a frivolous edge. So well and truly picked up on this Friday night I walked her home – with the northern cuddle – and tales of crisps and brothers.


And every time I hear that guitar – not distorted but ringing with its opening to love and adventure and Marriot rasping those lyrics I get carried back to those times and i know everything is gonna be alright. And that’s what music can do – the power to transport and move. It’s just a swirling mass of energy – the rush of new love and it catching fire right down to where the story ends – when we invited just a few close friends. Simplicity. You see this is the real r ‘n’ b wrapped up in style – with content – there’s a difference see [which clearly wasn’t noted during the Britpop era – menswear anyone?] These are genuine soul artists – veering on the heavy. The stomp of the tiny feet that create a much larger sound – much like my two boys in the morning as they find ever more elaborate things to throw onto the floor as they charge around the upper deck.


This is a gang – man.


It might not be my favourite faces tune – I think You Better Believe It could be the one – but it chimes with the times and it chimes with us. Sha la la la lee. It’s all those Carisbrooke times and Peveril Road walks rolled into three minutes or so. It’s a taking back and looking forward feeling – it’s walking up to meet her by the Beeston Man [I think they’re wasps] – and feeling on top of the world [if attired in the get up of a Likely Lad]


It’s feeling like there’s some kind of possible.


It where modernism takes you.

Friday, 31 December 2010

A happy new year

Today I have trampled in the mud and sludge of Danson Park, whilst arguing about this and that. We have travelled to Halfords and purchased a ‘Disney Princess’ Bell and a car vacuum cleaner, we have journeyed to the M&S for a hairbrush and mozzarella. And visted the 'Christmas lights' of Broadwalk.

Once I would be gearing up to listen to the dejaying prowess of Todd Terry in the Leeds Corn Exchange – six hours of the finest house music the world had to offer.

I miss dancing

But I wouldn’t change anything else. Here’s to the new year. I will refuse to describe or engage with the selection - I will simple say it is a tune. Enough said.

Wednesday, 22 December 2010

No nostalgia rides

I was on the telephone talking to Paul the other night. About the concretes, his journey around the nation in the grip of ice and snow and how Stephen Pastel had come to walk him back to his hotel. And we spoke of the days when going to a concert was the straightforward. Seeing things is harder these days – for so many reasons – tiredness, disinterest, a better television schedule, fucked transport systems and of course children. Sometimes things just stop. Although I watched the end of some tacked together BBC4 festival programme with abhorrent middle class fathers leading their children through fields of mud in an effort to tap into some sort of a vision of a utopian Britain where everyone – I mean white C2 families can listen to dirge like rock and non threatening ‘other world’ bands whilst their children eat ‘vegan’ foods and paint themselves as they embrace ‘free politics’. I will never parade my children as accessories for festival fun times. I for one am social responsible and secondly – hippies do festivals and you should never trust a hippy.

But sometimes I would like to watch a moment of live music. Now if that moment of live music was a multi-platinum act and tickets were timed to go on sale at 7.16 am on the first Tuesday in March when the moon was waxing and not waning, then I guess I would have to join some sort of internet/ phone ticket system feeding frenzy with the masses – but I mean I would like to watch a band who are not moderately famous – who have not released a record – who have only played a handful of dates. I wanted to watch Jonny.

This crossing over of the independent, because we’re all ‘indie’ now both saddens and utterly unfazes me – I mean I shouldn’t be shocked by the nature of the capitalist control of culture – see how we fetishize all areas of existence. Note the build up to the forthcoming Creation Records documentary – I know I will watch it – will comment on its authentic voice and rally against the Sony sell out saying McGee had no option etc - but really Creation was a record label – it wanted my money – McGee and Dick Green wanted our money. Eventually they got it with the safety of simple driving rock guitars for mindless souls who love to sing in packs and enjoy the mob mentality of the imbecilic sections of the football terraces. Doing it for the kids? Really? Remember this was a label with Momus on it.

However – there was a time when you could turn up at a venue and venture inside and see the acts - without having to have a specific printed out piece of paper with several reference numbers and a time to collect. Of course I have bought tickets in advance – but it was a case of in advance – not at the first point of sale – the very minute they are released. Everyone wants a piece of it nowadays – how can Jonny sell out?

I first saw Euros Childs supporting The Concretes at the ULU in London. I had seen a glimpse of the Scandinavian group on a Glastonbury afternoon programme – they were wearing wigs and singing ‘You can’t hurry love.’ [Not a Phil Collins tribute – more a Nordic Velvets] I told Paul - as ever he had seen it - was already on the concretes tip - as he is wont to do – I bought an album and I thought very little else about it.

I read The Concretes were playing – I gave Paul a ring – we decided to get some tickets - I actually think he had purchased tickets for the tour already - but I was in London so we could go together –there was no rush. We purchased tickets – and Euros was on the supporting bill. First on – early start. He was an absolute revelation – I had dabbled on the outer fringes of the Gorky’s Zygotic Monkey catalogue of sounds. Listened to some Peel sessions, bought an EP but to be honest I didn’t even know who Euros was and that the Gorky’s had split. But I was mesmorised by his performance and that of his band – two from Radio Luxembourg at the time [now Racehorses – and they are always worth a listen with their wonderful craft of Floyd, Furries and Cole Porter ] and Richard/ or James Tam – they were awesome. It was mainly Chops – possibly with Henry and Matilda and Billy the Seagull – and what prime cuts they were – finishing the set with ‘First Time I saw You’ – this brooding, beautiful bass filled grower full of pure sentiment and love. First time I saw you – skirt was white and blue – first time I saw you. And throughout enthused with good cheer. I was laughing, dancing and feeling thoroughly entertained.

I have since seen Euros on several other occasions. I have always got inside the venue. I buy my albums off the fella himself normally after a concert – yes I am nearly forty but I get some sad flash of ‘teenage excitement’ in meeting the artist, having the record signed. And I once stage dived at a Teenage Fanclub concert – it was being filmed for Snub TV. It was busy – the Manics were the first act – all clashed and fired up - but we [me and James – a super cool young continental] got in. Probably bought our tickets a week or so in advance.

Now Norman Blake from Teenage Fanclub and Euros Childs from Euros Childs are Jonny and everyone wants a piece of the indie action. How everyone has suddenly awoken to the subtle charm of ‘Do the Caveman’, or ‘Which Witch is which?’ is new to me but it seems I can’t get a ticket for this gig. But as I said -no nostalgia rides – the whole shape of the music scene has changed – has mutated and the mob has muscled in. I will read the review in the Guardian. I will put ‘WegotTickets’ web page in favourites and their telephone number in my mobile and next time be that little bit faster.

Or I might just decide to stay at home.

Sometimes that is just that bit easier.