Friday Morning

I was thinking August would be difficult to keep up my steps because of my Liver Biopsy at the start of the month, but surprisingly that's not actually been an issue hitting 20K steps on a couple of days and sitting with a 30K step surplus and close of play yesterday.

I was also thinking that #August50 was an impossible target but after this post I only need to post 18 more entries before the end of the month and we still have two weeks to go, so that's nine posts in each of the next two weeks which is more than doable (is that a word? and how many times have I asked that question).

The problem with doing an hour's walk it that it takes an hour of your time and  to hit my 11K a day that does take two hours and i often think that could be better spent doing someting else.

On my walk to work I am always looking for photo opportunities and vary my routes, but always in the direction of work (essentially Newcastle City Centre) from home. I seldom deviate from this direction except when I have to pick someting up from the Post Office, and to be quite honest I prefer traversing parkland to urban areas.

Walking is a simple form of exercise and anyone can do it and make it interesting. I always found gyms soul destroying but others swear by them, but it's different strokes for different folks.

Today on my walk in I kept with Mike Nesmith and listened to "Tropical Campfires" for the first time, and though it covers some standards such as "Brazil" and "Begin the Beguine" more than adequately the original stuff is excellent, I particularly liked the instrumental "One". Specific late period Mike Nesmith songs are difficult to find on Youtube (ie they are not there) but I found this full concert from 2012 at Union Chapel for your enjoyment, which includes a few songs from "The Prison"

While it is grey , it is Friday and we have a wonderful weekend to look forawd to. Enjoy

Reading The Garden

Tonight when I got home, I decided to read and listen to Mike Nesmith's "The Garden". It's surreal and follows on from The Prison, The narrative is fairly simple and the story can be read as you listen to the album. The narrative is split into chapters that take as their influes seven paintings by Monet:

1. The Artist's Garden of Giverny (1900)
2. A Bend in the Epte River, Near Giverny (1888)
3. Vertheuil in Summertime (1879)
4. Valley of the Petite Creuse (1889)
5. Poppy Field in a Hollow Near Giverny (1885)
6. Wisteria (1920)
7. Waterlilies and Japanese Bridge (1899)

The album clocks in at 55 minutes but it does seem to pass more quickly than that, or it seemed to for me. The Wiki page is here.

While you don't have to have read "The Prison" itis referred to many times in "The Garden" and it does help if you have experienced "The Prison" fully.

I enjoyed both, though I don't feel I have to reread either but can still enjoy the excellent music.

There isn't too much from either album on youtube so I have included the opener from "The Prison" to give you a taste.

First Visit To The Garden

A while ago I bought "The Prison" a book and album that should be read an litened to together. I read and listened on the train journey to Edinburgh and was quite surprised that I finsihed the book as the last piece of music finished and we rolled into Edinburgh.

I bought the follow up, "This Garden" but as yet haven't done the read / listen thing. On my walk to work this morning I thought it may be nice to listen to the (largely) instrumental album and it was particularly appropriate on my walk through parts of Nunsmoor (some pictures here), although my headphone power ran out halfway through the penultimate piece "Wisteria".

I may actually try to read the book tonight just to see what the experience is like. While Mike Nesmith is a far better songwriter than book writer, it is a engaging concept , and as I have mentioned previously done particularly well withe Camel's take on Paul Gallico's "Snow Goose". I would encourage you to try all three of these, each one will only take you around forty minutes and will definitely treat you to a new concept of enhancing your reading.

We have a lot of cloud, but some blue sky. Enjoy your Thursday.

Sheets

Probably a good description of the rain I've woken up to thi smorning. Not quite biblical but if it keeps up like this I won't be doing much walking, I didn't do much yesterday either but luckily Friday and Saturday I walked quite a long way. so still ok for August.

It is the 13th, it is Monday, it is raining the sort of day when everything doesn't seem exactly good or inspiring but it has given me something to at least start off this post.

One of the things with these blog posts is that it does allow me to share music that I either like or have eard and found interesting. One of the problems is that I only have a finite capacity to listen, but still manage to fit in quite a lot. I still haven't read and listened to Mike Nesmith's "The Garden" yet even though I had planned to this weekend. That is a record from my yeenage years that I completely missed. I knew about "The Prison" because it was the big box with a book, but at the time it didn't hold any pull for me, but having read and listened to it that has now changed., and I do want to do "The Garden"

This morning on 6Music John Hilcock played "Patience" by Gorgeous Bully which is rather excellent and you can find them here. Too often we always keep going to the past but we should always be open to new things., or life would be very boring, I think you should take a listen you may enjoy it too. Gorgeous Bully have been going for at least four years so it's another band who have past me (and a lot of others by).

It looks to be brightening up now, which is good, but now it's time for a shower. Have a good Monday everybody.

A Garden

It's strange how sometimes you find the time and energy to do things, in adverse circumstances. Due to a couple of unexpected events at work I ended up missing lunch, and after rising at 4:30 am I thought tonight I would be very tired.

While I am tired, I got home and looked at my back lawn that was more like a lush field and decided that it was time  to mow it. Four lawnmower bags later it was done then I came it and caught up on the latest episode of the excellent Gotham. I cut a fish finger sandwich for tea after taking drugs so it wasn't too musch of a surprise that I had a hypo, but that 's what you get with a lot of physical effort and not musch sustenance.

The problem is, in this weather you don't really feel like eating too much.

I've just watched the clouds turn red as the sun goes down in 'Nam so I am not sure if we will get rain anytime soon.

Anyway although I am a little tired I think I am improving, and as I have been talking garden things I will share The Levellers "This Garden" with you, though I could have shared Mike Nesmith's "The Garden" , his follow to "The Prison" the former of which I have still to read and tell you about.

Sleep well my friends.

Reading Out of The Prison

It is very hot (for me) . My phone says 17°C but it feels a lot hotter so I have taken action, but enough of that. On Friday' on the way up to Scotland, I decided I would read Michael Nesmith's "The Prison" novella / Short Story while listening to th eaccompanying album. You should finish the book when the soundtrack finishes.

But doesn't everyone read at different speeds? During reading the ticket inspector needed my tickets and a stopped reading but the music played on.

And guess what, as the final notes of the "Closing Theme" played, I finished the story.

That was a bit of a surprise as I just read at a fairly leisurely pace.

The story is slightly surreal and confirmed what many people had said that Nesmith is a better songwriter and performer than he is an author, but it's brave and , in my opinion, successful attempt. I 've read the book, listened to the music and am still coming to terms with what it was about, but I still have a wonderful album that I can revisit at my leisure.

When I got home Edgar Froese's "Solo" was waiting for me, and this is an example of how the value of music has plummetted. There are six albums spread over four CDs and it cost me a little more than a tenner. That's close on five hours music for the price of a single album. It's a great collection and I would have thought twice about paying twenty pounds for it but at that price I thought it was fine (rightly or wrongly) to inflate my music collection.

I alsmentioned to my friend Maureen about how brilliant Bill Bryson's "A Short History Of Nearly Everything" is and how I bought a lot of copies when it first came out to give to my family and others.

So on this hot first of July what to play, well Stevie Wonder had an album called "Hotter Than July" and from that we'll borrow "Master Blaster (Jammin)".

Hope you can sleep

A Prison, A Garden, A Country Singer, A Snow Goose and A Camel

A far longer title that the post itself. Today I will be going up to Scotland and the other night I listened to "The Prison" by Michael Nesmith and the concept was that you read the book that comes with the album and the album is a soundtrack. The music stands on it's own but on the train up I am going to read this while listening to the album.

The general consensus is that Nesmith is a far better musician thatnauthor but that's a moot point as far as I'm concerned.

He followed the concept of "The Prison" up with "The Garden" which I am going to order after writing this very short piece. I'm not going to analyze or even tell you the story of these because I actually don't know. When I get back and have listened to both and read both books I will follow this up.

This concept was also used by Camel with Paul Gallico's "The Snow Goose" which I know a bit more about because I have done the read / listen thing with this, set in the wild, desolate Essex marshes and is an intense and moving tale about the relationship between a hunchback (Rhayader) and a young girl (Fritha) who nurse an injured bird and Rhayader's involvement in Dunkirk. It is very short and very moving and takes about the forty minutes which can be soundtracked by Camel's album based on the book. A fuller synopsis is available on Wiki here.

The weather is hot, England have been beaten, and the weekend is here so have a great Friday and a great weekend and do try to investigate these albums and books.

However I am not going to choose a song from the albums but another Michael Nesmith song "Some of Shelly's Blues".

Have a great day.

Turn This Crazy Bird Around

I switched on the radio this morning and that line came out of the speakers sung by Joni Mitchell singing "This Flight Tonight" from her album "Blue". I think my first introduction to this song was hearing Nazareth's excellent heavily rocked up version with Manny Charlton's ghostly guitar solo which I bought as a single, but was on their album "Loud'n'Proud".

Soon after Judas Priest did the same to "Diamonds and Rust" penned by Joan Baez on their "Sin After Sin" album although it doesn't have the intensity of the Nazareth cover.

But these are two iconic songwriters covered by two iconic metal bands and it is an excuse to play these songs.

These albums haven't been on my playlist as I have a few more racked up to listen to but last night I listened to "The Prison" by Michael Nesmith which I will dedicate a future post to.

A couple of weeks back I bought some vinyl on albumwas "Electric Warrior" by T. Rex with it's incredibly cool cover, and it came with a download code. Surprisingly I haven't got it on CD, so I decided to download the album and was surprised that it was in WAV rather than MP3 format resulting in significantly larger files but without sound loss. One of te songs was like 24Mb for a two minute song. That is 2.5 times the capacity of my first hard drive computer which I got from my friend Chris Brough. How times change.

Anyway enjoy all this, I'm off to Scotland for the weekend.

Listening To More Albums

While out walking today I listened to a couple of great albums. Actually prior to that I had listened to some vinyl, namely Nadine Shah's "Stealing Cars" a Tenpole Tudor album and Emerson Lake and palmer's take on Mussorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition" all worth listening to and you can see them here if you follow my Instagram Channel.

Nadine Shah's "Holiday Destination" features some amazing percussion driven songs recall Tom Waits and Van Der Graaf Generator, tackling todays issues. The title track written as a response to holiday makers complaining that their holiday had been ruined when refugees were washed up on their beach. If our country wasn't supplying weapons to various regimes maybe things like this wouldn't happe. However the album is highly listenable also tackling growing into "aldulthood" and reading the labels on food. Well worth getting a copy.

That was followed by "Listen To The Band" and early Mike Nesmith compilation featuring great country song after great country song and if you haven't heard them before you certainly won't forget them once you have.

Anyway it's time for bed and I will leave you with the title tracks of both those albums.