Midweek Update #40: The Update Edition
Memorial Device, Ride, James, Bruce, Funk, Earth Day, hiking, and a certain St. George.
If you are reading this on the day of publication, Wednesday April 24, I am off in the wilds of the West Yorkshire Pennines undertaking the Three Peaks Challenge as an ‘event’ around my 60th birthday. I am with a group from Beverley and Beyond and our goal is to complete in 11 hours. If you are thinking of a big hike yourself and don’t know the lay of the land(s), you should definitely listen to my Phoenicia-based friend Brett Barry’s excellent new Kaatscast, Preparing For A Hike with Paul Misko.
This past weekend, I was in Aberdeenshire, staying with my best friend from school, Richard, who is featured heavily in Boy About Town as the ‘Ace Fce of the 4th Form’ (and beyond). Rich still dresses like he’s heading out to the Scotch of St. James, which stands him in good stead when he’s perusing 21-year old bottles of The Glenlivet at the distillery’s wonderfully plush tasting room alarmingly close to his rural home. But he’s also still “street” enough to have picked up a couple of tickets for the one-man play This Is Memorial Device which ran for the weekend at Aberdeen’s lovely Lemon Tree complex.
Based on the 2017 novel by David Keenan, it’s the wonderfully plausible story of a barely plausible post-punk band from Airdrie, as recounted by an ex-scenester and journalist, played by Paul Higgins (accompanied, as you can see below, by mannequins). With (taped) music by Stephen Pastel and Gavin Thomson, my only complaint with the riveting presentation, was that it concluded too quickly! (And that the theater seats are too cramped, which they are, but it’s still a great place.) While I would love to write a fuller review, I suspect I won’t get to it. The play has JUST started a two-week run at London’s Riverside Studios and if you live in the Big Smoke and enjoy your post-punk memoir nostalgia, get down to it. I am picking up a copy of Keenan’s novel to read back home; if anyone has already read it and wants to vouch for it, please leave a comment.
The new James album Yummy is… a new James album. And I love it. Tim Booth may be comfortably recycling the same themes as always – love, life, the Cosmos, God, the soul, and cleavage – but his enthusiasm for the subject matters only seems to increase with age. Ditto the band. James usually have a couple of overly instant pop songs that are immediate ear worms (sometimes to their detriment), and then at least half-a-dozen more that demand at least half-a-dozen plays.
It’s the slow burn of the best bands – many an R.E.M. album comes to mind – and I am now at that point where I wonder how I lived without Yummy. Richard showed me the Aberdeen arena where James will be playing shortly (and for which my London-Antipodean friend Denise flying in under the guise of going to see Richard). No such luck in the States where the group struggle to get a tour together. No matter; as per Oasis, James have always been better on record that in concert, which is not to negate the latter, only to state a preference. Below: the single “Our World.”
Ride also have a new album out, called Interplay, and it too is excellent, though the difference between Ride and James is that the latter only went on hiatus, whereas the former had a famously acrimonious split that kept them apart for decades. In recent years, Ride have toured twice with The Charlatans in the US, and it appears to have rubbed off on them: more than once, I have found myself wondering which of the two bands I was actually listening to. Anyone else? Or is it just me who hears the pronounced Northwich influence?
The Jesus and Mary Chain ALSO have a new album out, Glasgow Eyes, and it’s very good… in places. Stand-out track is too obviously “the Eagles and the Beatles,” not only because of its title, but because the song is just killer, full of fuzzed-up Joan Jett-like power chords. Oddly, it references the Stones (and Brian Jones and Charlie Watts) more than it does the bands of its title, and as such, it’s hard not to think of the House of Love song “Beatles and Stones” from that group’s memorable 1990 debut.
It may not be a surprise I’ve been a bit more tuned into British bands while over here, but have it be known I was sad to miss Bruce Springsteen at my local big city Albany’s Times Union Arena, especially once my friends’ reviews came in. Most of them were just pure raves on FB; Seth Rogovy, however, took the time to post a proper review at his Substack, Everything Is Broken which, despite his page’s title, was beautifully constructed.
Bruce’s show in Albany on the We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions tour landed at the same arena in 2007 just a day after I received US citizenship within a baseball’s throw at the state capital’s Supreme Court. That night’s concluding performance of “American Land,” a song all about immigrants, therefore held special resonance for me, another in the many examples of the kismet that makes life so fascinating.
Caryn Rose, herself a Bruce fanatic, writes about ongoing issues with the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s induction process, highlighting the historic delay in inducting influential women like Patti Smith, and especially women of color, like Sister Rosetta, Big Mama Thornton and Bessie Smith, without whom there wouldn’t be any Rock ’n’ Roll to begin with. She also points out that the MC5 are getting in on an unvoted-for “Musical Excellence” exemption, hot on the heels of Wayne Kramer’s death, whereas they never got past the shortlist before now.
Full disclosure: I get to vote on the shortlist of nominees, but I don’t have any say in who gets nominated. And from my perspective, you can’t induct modern rock ‘n’ roll bands till you’ve inducted the MC5, just like you shouldn’t induct Depeche Mode until you have Kraftwerk in there. But I don’t make the rules, and my lone vote seems to count for little. As to Caryn’s rightful complaints about the oversight of crucial women, I can only say… Jann Wenner?
My friend
got himself in a funk when he got a rejection letter. Recognizing that there are only three certainties in life – death, taxes, and rejections – he made himself a funky playlist. Dig.My own 2024 playlist grows all the time. It’s here:
Monday April 22 was Earth Day. A good day to dig into Sir David Attenborough’s latest series, Mammals, especially Episode 2, about “the New Wild,” in which wildlife like sea lions, elephants and otters come into town because their natural resources are depleted. On the BBC iPlayer and hopefully coming to the States soon.
From my runner’s perspective, I would like to highlight the great work of The Green Runners. And remind people of my interview with top British ultra-runner Damian Hall about his book We Can’t Run Away From This, Racing to Improve Running’s Footprint In Our Climate Emergency.
And because it’s not all bad news, let’s also highlight Bill McKibben’s annual Earth Day post of “Good News and Nothing But.”
Tuesday April 22, meanwhile, was St. George’s Day, when Englanders are invited to fly that white flag with the red plus sign on it, and root for “Ing-er-lund” and all it means. Fun facts: St. George was not born in England, did not die in England and, in fact, never visited England. And then there’s that thing with the dragon which, I hate to break it to you, was not a real animal like a dodo… But it definitely makes for great imagery.
Love to all from Ing-er-lund. And Scotland. And Wales. The so-called Great Britain. I’ll be back in the so-called United States of America a week from the day of posting this. Be green out there.
Thanks, T. We need to keep it funky, for real.
Thank you for the shoutout, Tony. It’s been a rough week. Lost a good friend to cancer yesterday, too.