On The Border

Woke up this morning to thick fog. 

I was dreaming , there was a guitarist and Cher , and he was playing in various styles and she told him to play like Carlos Santana, I thought there is no way he can just play like Carlos Santana without the right guitar and amplification set up.

He started to play and I thought it's nothing like Santana , it sounds like birdsong. This went on for a while and I then realised it was my alarm clock which wakes me up with birdsong. It's the first time for me , I think , that real life and dreams have meshed together so closely . I really don't know if that is a good thing. Is this real life or is it just fantasy indeed?

Obviously the multi style guitarist got me thinking of "Guitar Jamboree" by Chris Spedding , he is a brilliant guitarist but it's just a novelty song.

I finished Tony Hawks' "Piano In The Pyrenees" which turned out to be more about his attempt to build a swimming pool while integrating into the local French community , culminating in meeting up with a former lover. I hope it worked out.

Next book I've nipped over the border with George Orwell's "Homage To Catalonia" about his experiences in the Spanish Civil War. It is grim and the pages are huge blocks of text making for difficult reading but it is providing an insight into what happened then.

Now to work.

Walk On Gilded Splinters - #TenAlbumsInTenDays #3 - #9

I do find it amazing the amount of music that I have available to me, but I do keep going back to revisit old albums, but because they still sound incredible today. "Gris Gris" by Doctor John was something I missed in my teenage years but once I heard it's hypnotic gumbo voodoo tunery it's an album that has never left me.

I'm also doing  #TenAlbumsInTenDays which gives me another excuse to revisite enjoy and write about this stuff.

Similarly Captain Beefheart's "Trout Mask Replica" is another amazing epic piece that I did pick up as a teenager much to the chagrin on many of my Led Zeppelin / Bowie toting friends. This was several steps too far for them, as would have been "Gris Gris".

Rumour has it that Beefheart took the Magic Band into the desert and learned them to play from scratch. The album combines so many musical elements that if you don't approach it with an open mind you will not be able to appreciate the eclectic mix of brass, woodwind, free jazz, sea shanties, blues, garage rock and pure avant-garde. It is truly an experience and again, once you're in there you are truly in. You will never forget or fail to appreciate this masterpiece.

The back to the New Orleans Voodoo of Doctor John, The Night Tripper in full regalia for "Gris Gris". One song "I Walk On Gilded Splinters" has been widely covered by such luminaries as Cher, Marsha Hunt, Paul Weller and Humble Pie but that is just the grand finale of an album of seven amazing and hypnotic songs.

So really that has to be the song I leave you with but check out both these albums and the other versions of the song, you may love them.