The Limit

Yesterday and today I have played a lot of vinyl on my GPO turntable, you can see a few posts on my Instagram Channel here . Music playing has sort of evolved , my own take on it is here , but while I sometimes use Youtube and did use Grooveshark , I am not a fan of streaming services. Radio stations are good because there is human intervention. Digital storage is convenient when you are on the move , but it can become background music.

I'll Be Bach

Vinyl requires your attention, I have just listened to Wah Heat!'s "Seven Minutes To Midnight" and Holly Johnson's "Americanos" and now I have "The Moog Strikes Bach" by HansWurman playing . All of these records required more than the touch of a button to play , and it's a joy to see the vinyl spinning. You don't get that with CD or digital (although I am playing it through a digital soundbar and I do rip vinyl through the GPO deck to digital, but that is just for stuff that is not available digitally. It does amaze me the number of glaring omissions still not available digitally.



 


But this is the limit I mentioned in the title, after three minutes I may have to change the record, put it back in it's sleeve , get another one out and put it on the turntable. This is while I am typing this out. You have to give the vinyl your attention.

So I have to get on today, and as Prince Buster left us I am leaving you with his rendition of Judge Dread on vinyl on Blue Beat.

Time to go and do my stuff now, but playing vinyl is therapeutic and enjoyable.

Still Looking For My Swirly Vertigo Vinyl

EnjoyTheBedFeeling

I thought I'd write a poem.

I pretty rubbish at this

But it's how I felt

EnjoyTheBedFeeling

EnjoyTheBedFeeling

The Mattress Fits You

The Sheets Do Too

The Feel Just The Right Warmth

The Pillows are Perfect

The Window is Open

The Breeze is Lovely

EnjoyTheBedFeeling

I don't want to get up

I wish it was like this

When I got into bed

I know work is a neccessary evil

But I have an Hour yet

To 

 EnjoyTheBedFeeling

Warm

Cozy

Warm

Perfect

Perfect

EnjoyTheBedFeeling

The thing is it's Saturday tomorrow so this is a distinct possibility for all of us.  And I need some music to go with it, and I think Kites by Simon Dupree and The Big Sound (who later morphed into the excellent Gentle Giant)  but be a perfectly ethereal way to wrap this up. The video is something I took at the Washington Kite Festival in 2010 which I went to with Fiona, my friend Nicky and her children Sharné, Alisha and Donovan

Sleep well and have a brilliant weekend my friends.

Surprises , Thunderstorms, Sting, Johnny Cash and Bruce Springsteen

I was well impressed by Johnny Cash's American series, and "I Hung My Head" always struck me as a perfect archetypal Johnny Cash song, that would fit in with "Don't Take Your Guns To Town" or "The Wall", then my friend Paul said

"Do You Know Who Wrote It?"

I said "Isn't It A JC song?"

He said "No, you want to know who wrote it?"

I said "Yes"

He said "Sting!"

That was a huge surprise to me, though when Sting writes good songs they are good. So I thought I'd include the Sting version, then I found a Springsteen version as well, so in this post you you are getting three versions of a great song, two American Icons and one Geordie.

And when you hear Springsteen sing it, you could be excused thinking it's a Springsteen original.


Then last night we had thunderstorms and rain, and I really didn't want to leave my bed. Anyway it's time for work now and I will leave you with the Sting version, all these are excellent, but I like the Johnny Cash one best , but they are all good.

Memory

I may have written about this before, but I've forgotten about it, but it is an excuse to play Robert Wyatt's beautiful "Memories" again.

My memory , ability to remember things , has never been that good. I can't remember quotes, I couldn't remember case names when I did Law (although I could the remember Case outcomes and the reasons for it), so often people will ask me how to do this and I won't know how to do it, but I will know how to find out how to do it generally, not always but generally.

The other thing is that I can usually do maths, so I can work things out and instantly understand formulas and am OK with algebra but get lost with calculus, and I am ok with the geometry. If I can't remember things how come I can sometimes so things without thinking.

I can ride a bike, drive a car, cook , make meals up and I'm ok with electrics. My home network works though at times that is a bit mystical to me, more "Oooh that did work" that knowing something will work.

These days we have computers , the internet and hand held computers that double as phones. There are very few phone numbers I remember these days. You have an app to solve anything you want, hand held dictionaries and scientific calculators as well as satellite navigation (which I have not yet succumbed to, I would rather trust my own knowledge and intuition).

Anyway that's just something that came into my head today, I can remember somethings but I do use technology quite a bit to supplement that.

Have a wonderful evening , enjoy this baking weather and have a great time.

This Has To Be Quick

I've been getting into work later , essentially with buses disappearing between 8 and 8:30 or just being very slow. I'm sure that that I used to know off blog posts in ten minutes, after all they are just diary entries aren't they?

Recently some of my posts have taken up to an hour to complete, yes they may need links and pictures, and sometimes it's difficult to find just exactly what you want but I really wanted to find out if I could write this and leave the house by 7:30 , I started it at 7:19 , it's now 7:27 , so I am not going to do it , maybe another five minutes,

The music I've chosen is "Where Were You?" by The Mekons which was originally on Fast Records (see what I did there?) and I've bookended it with the live and studio versions.

Oh and it's the 13th , and the number 13 can be lucky , it's just the way you look at things , I'm thinking Bakers Dozen.

How Do You See It?

Anyway you still have two hundred words of mine to pick over , and yes it's taken me about quarter of an hour to write this, enjoy the music and  have a brilliant day.

I Find It Difficult To Get Angry

I started the blog And Annoyingly  to vent my spleen and The Red Tops and their readers and supporters and the idiotic right wing and racists, but to be quite honest I find such things a waste of energy hence the fact I have only put up three posts (so far). While I am exasperated by the electorate and public, unless I do something to change it, it is pointless wasting energy getting bothered about it.

So I won't, it is a Sunday and the weather is wonderful, lots of my friends are running in the great North Run and lots of people will achieve a dream today. It's things like that that spark me, make me feel positive, knowing that people are doing something THEY want to do , often for the benefit of others. It's like Jessica Salmon's "Storytelling Of The Ancients" exhibition (which you can watch here) , Jessica put time , effort and ideas into a presentation that was free for the public, and she provided wine and cake. Absolutely wonderful.

Some people spend their life whining about whatever slightly irks them , instead of doing something positive, but then some people are only happy when they or others are miserable. Bad things do happen but you need to try and find something good to hold onto , however difficult that might be.

Ken Loach is making all his films free to view on Youtube , he doesn't need to , but he is allowing people to see his work effectively for nothing. What he will get out of it is a lot of exposure, and deservedly so.

I thought I'd choose The Rolling Stones I'm Free , because most of the time we do have a choice, and if you get the chance take it, don't  pass it up.

Anyway go out and be positive and have a great Sunday everybody.

256

I've just got to page 256 in Pete Townshend's autobiography "Who I Am" and again with my recent semi obsession with numbers he's just on about the story and completion on Quadrophenia , the lead single from that being 5:15 . 256 stick out because it's just the number two to the power eight , that is multiplied by itself eight times. If you do the same with one it's still one. One never changes, multiply it by itself or divide it by itself and it's still one. If you go up to 3 then the powers create much bigger numbers 2^8 = 256 but 3^8 is 6,561 , I doubt I will ever read a book with that many pages.

Yesterday the new Nick Cave album Skeleton Tree was released, and it's great that people are still producing things I want to hear, I love the new single and am sure I will love the album when it turns up.

The Vertigo Swirl In Action

I ordered a copy of Rod Stewart's Gasoline Alley album and Black Sabbath's Paranoid single as I wanted some vinyl with the original hypnotic Vertigo Swirl label. I do like the look of vinyl playing and the Vertigo Swirl does look good. I got a copy of Split Enz "History Never Repeats"  on laser etched vinyl which you can see here.

Anyway it's Saturday and I am going to get back to watching Casino Royale , which is enjoyable. You all have a great Saturday everybody.

I just found this unaccompanied performance by Rod, absolutely brilliant.