Bob Dylan - Guilty.

Over the last year or so I have been collecting autograph stories from friends, family and work colleagues It has been a very pleasureable experience listening to/reading the 50 tales I have received.
Of course, I am having no luck with publishers or agents and I receive rejection letters on a regular basis. But, the project was fun to do, so I cling on to that thought as I tear open the envelopes.

Here is a story about Bob Dylan, it is one of my favourites, I hope you like it.

Dylan

I owned everything by Dylan and last saw him in 1967 at Manchester Free Trade Hall. Now I had the chance to see him again and if I was lucky, meet him.

I was a policeman in my early twenties, I think it was 1976, when Dylan played three or four nights at Earls Court. Dylan was on form around this time having released Desire and Street Legal. I was based at Notting Hill Police Station but for big concerts or demos worked with other policemen from all over London in what were called “Serials”, these were units of about 20 to 30 policemen.

I had worked at Earls Court a few times and seen Elton John, The Rolling and Queen all play there. But Dylan was different, I wanted to try and get to him.

I managed to catch bits of Dylan’s concert in the first two days but I was mostly involved in traffic duty and crowd patrol. The crowds were so bad in Warwick Road just opposite the venue, that I didn’t get an opportunity to see too much of the concert. But on the fourth night I managed to swap duties with another colleague who knew how much I loved Dylan.

I knew the venue quite well and had access to most areas so after the concert I went to see if I could catch a glimpse of Dylan backstage. When I got there I found lots of fans gathered around the stage door. Not having a valid reason to push through them all and worried that I might be caught by my Guvnor I decided to wait and see if the great man emerged.

After a short while a roadie came out to where we were gathered and people handed him various items for Dylan to sign. As fans handed him scraps of paper and programmes I realised the only thing I had on me was my police pocket book. I handed it over (I think I folded it over to a blank page in the middle). The man walked off towards a room where we could see Dylan sitting at a long table. He gave Dylan the bundle of bits and pieces to sign and Dylan signed the lot. (People say Dylan is aloof and doesn’t like to engage with his fans, but I never really believed that so it was nice to see him doing his bit for his fans).

I got my pocketbook back, looked at the signature and felt thrilled. I quickly put it in my pocket and rushed back to where I should have been stationed.

About 6 months later I was in Knightsbridge Crown Court (which is no longer there) giving evidence in a case that involved a drink driver I had arrested. The man had been too drunk to breathalyse and under section 15 (or 16) I was able to arrest him without breathalysing him. He also had an offensive weapon in his car, I think it was a sword. (NB Back then drink driving cases these went to Crown Court).

I was questioned by the Prosecution and the case was clear cut. Grasping at straws the solicitor for the defendant looked at my statement and then asked to see my pocket book (which was quite an unusual request in such cases). He pointed out that there was a page missing and he wanted to know why. I was shocked, I nearly said I didn’t know why it was missing and then I remembered. The Dylan autograph!

The judge (or the Recorder) sniggered when I explained why the page was missing. The judge decided that I couldn’t have made it all up and accepted my explanation, he said the matter was now left up to me and my superior officer to discuss.

The verdict: Guilty.

(Extract from the unlikely to be published - You can't sign a coconut by The Quiet Busker)

Martin Stephenson at the Half Moon Putney, 18th November 2009

I hadn't seen Martin Stephenson in years, the last time was at The Borderline in London maybe 10 years ago.

That night I had failed to book the tickets in advance and of course, it was sold out. My sister and her friend were not happy when I told them, her friend had come a long way to be there. My name was MUD. Then a vision appeared, a man walking purposefully towards us in the shadows, a combination of George Formby and Clint Eastwood.

"That's him" I said.
"Who" my sister asked angrily.
"Martin Stephenson"

He approached us, smiling and asked what was up, why the sad faces.
I explained what an idiot I had been. My glum face said it all, my sister, a storm, we were storm.
He told us not to worry and to follow him. He took us to the ticket booth and said:

"This is me brother, this is me sister and this is me uncle, can I get them in?"
The man nodded.

We were in!! And, we had a story to tell. I was flavour of the month, we couldn't stop smiling. We had a fabulous night, we grinned up at him for two hours straight, even during the sad songs. We must have looked demented. Loopy gargoyles.

So I went to the Half Moon concerned that I was going to ruin a fond memory and spend the evening glum faced, even during the upbeat songs.

Things didn't get off to a great start, Martin's girlfriend sang a few songs and blushes burst through the skin on my cheeks and spread to my neck, I felt like I was getting shingles. I am sorry Martin (if you ever read this), your strengths, are her weaknesses. She looked like your older sister yet her lyrics sounded 6th form, they were less mature than the words that you wrote twenty years ago. You smiled throughout, but i wonder what you were really thinking of her performance? Your love for her was there for all to see, your grin, as warm as ever but it was all too much for those who loved you in a different way, we had to leave the room. A few others did the same, one woman sticking her fingers down her throat as she left the room.

Jokes galore punctuated a night of the purist, sweetest entertainment in the capital. It was medicine. A delight to witness and hear. Martin sang to us like we were old friends sitting by a campfire in the back garden. I am not a blues fan/bluegrass fan, so when he veered that way, I got a drink in. But my fear of missing a tale plucked form his string pull bag of golden nuggets made me nervous of missing a golden anecdote, so I only had three pints.

Playing an acoustic guitar throughout, he charmed the creaks from the stage. "How many bags of crisps are you going to
have?" he asked his rustling friend in the dark of the audience. The sneezing fat man in the front row brought a song to a halt, Martin said next time he needed some brass he would give him a call. He told the tale of how Colleen was written, it was a song of revenge in which he made his sister a lesbian to get back at her (he was in love/lust with her best friend, something she found funny/preposterous). He chatted about being 13 years on the wagon and meeting Ian McNabb who was still living with his mum and was a big drinker. Stories about his manager asking him to write songs like Paddy McLoon otherwise he risked ending up being a taxi driver when he was 27. About how a lack of success meant success as far as him and the Daintees were concerned. Tales of driving a Vauxhall Chevete to Cork. Of a blues man with a big beard giving him horse tranquilisers to calm his nerves/hangover resulting in partial paralysis of his face. He told a girl in the audience she looked like Etta James and that she should look her up on the internet when she got home (something a few of us noted) and see for herself. Tales of writing songs in Tescos. The creak in the floorboards resulted in a Peter Hook pose, maybe that is why Peter Hook stood like that? A move to the left of the stage, a la Bruce Foxton. References to Jonathan Richman and his love of little noise, then playing a snippet of Roadrunner. The Edge at an airport, ping ping, time to board your flight. Joking of Tom Robinson taking coke in the dressing room. Meeting Lloyd Cole on a golf course, Martin picking mushrooms, Lloyd in a turtleneck, driver in hand. The mention of Garageband, how he uses the mastering effect that makes the recording sound like a scratched record.

I should mention the songs. His voice as warm and kind as ever. He means it. He might be on auto pilot for all I know, but it doesn't come across that way. Unlike Lloyd Cole, Martin plays the songs he knows people have come to hear. He wants to rekindle, to stir. He wants people to enjoy, to smile, to remember, to feel young, to feel good, to feel. He played without seeming bored. Running Water, Colleen, The Crying, We are Storm, Crocodile Cryer......all played for us. After all we had come along to see him, so he gave us what we wanted and we felt he really wanted to.

Everyone left the room with a smile on their faces, no one stuck their fingers down their throats. I was a smiling gargoyle once again.

The Lilac Time ~

How tired must Mr Duffy be of being a referred to as a lost treasure? Neglected? Overlooked? He isn't lost, neglected or overlooked, if you look hard enough you will find his music. If you are curious you will find his music. But be prepared for sadness.

The Lilac Time ~ Stephen Duffy, Nick Duffy, Claire Duffy

Love Lost

On Saturday I visited the Wallace Collection, I was there to see the Damien Hirst hangings. After that I headed for the Anish Kapoor exhibition at the Royal Academy. Not particularly original choices I know, but I wanted to see them both, simple as that. I am not an artist or art reviewer, I was not looking for credibility I was looking for art.

So, Hirst first. I am an admirer of the man, he makes me laugh whenever I read his interviews or hear him on the radio. In the past I have messed about with music and "wrote" (not the right word) a song in which I sampled him and Jay Jopling, I recorded it on a four track and you can find it on : http://www.myspace.com/thequietbusker.

Hirst has a twisted twinkle in his eye and I believe (hope) he has a lot of fun being in such a powerful position in the art world. However, power and the guaranteed pampering that comes with it has its downfalls and one is that Damien was allowed to show so many pieces. If merit was essential, then three or four paintings would have made it into the exhibition, I fear no one dared say no to Damien or the publicity that accompanies him. It's a shame, because three skulls and a vase of flowers seeding butterflies would have left many feeling, well, it's not great, but it was worth the trip. But the cloud of black, white and blue paintings that hover in the first floor of the gallery look, well, a bit studenty (not an adjective I know, but it should be).

As I said I am not qualified to review the "show"(?) so I will move on to what irked me about No Love Lost - the price of the posters. £30.00. The most expensive I have ever seen at an exhibition. Why? The paper looked ordinary, the print quality unremarkable, it wasn't signed or advertised as having being touched, sneezed on or glanced upon by the great man, so why the hike in prices when compared to other exhibition posters? (Newsflash: I just received an e mail from my sister. She wrote to the Wallace Gallery asking why the posters were so expensive - they have confirmed it was Hirst's representatives that set the price).

I felt a deep sense of being let down by Damien. I know he couldn't care less about it but I consider myself a defender of his whenever his name comes up in conversation (when he is usually being slagged off) and this made me feel a little of the bitterness towards him that others have in abundance. I guess the diamond encrusted skull was a sign of the greed that powers him these days. His Leeds accent (which i love, having being brought up just outside the city) wins me over each time I hear him talk about his work, is all that is left of his old self and maybe (like Morrissey) it will get stronger the longer he lives away from the north of England in an effort to appeal to his old followers and seem still real?

I toyed with calling this blog Wallace and Vomit, but that seemed a bit hard, I didn't feel the urge to vomit at the price of the posters, just violently irritated. And for those of you reading this (few do) thinking I am a stingy northerner, you are wrong, I didn't see any southerners splashing out on the posters in the ten minutes I deliberated in the shop about buying the bloody thing.

For your entertainment have a peek at this: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/video/2009/oct/16/damienhirst-banking

Anish review will follow, at some stage.

TQB

A Change of Surname

I posted this a few days ago on the Ars Notario site:

Yesterday someone said something that made me think in a way I have never thought before. It was so simple. He said that when he and his girlfriend decided to have children they wondered what surname to give their children. They didn't believe in marriage and all its connotations, nor did they like double barreled names (which name would get dropped?). So, like in days of old, they considered changing their name to one that reflected their occupations or where they lived.

I won't say what they chose, but somehow it was a perfect choice. It seemed right. It suited them, and even though I have never met their children, I bet it suits their children. It also made me think of the freedom of such a move. History smacked into the past and left there, a clean slate, no associations, a freshness, a newness, a sense of starting again, a cancelling out of all that has gone before, a clean break, an invention, a rebirth, how refreshing and liberating. A new family. A new future. An end to ancient family feuds.

But what about the past? Family history? Did it hurt those who believed the continuation of the family name was important, that their place, that their ink/digital existence had been threatened by a new and tiny family tree (a seedling). Did it seem disloyal? A slight? A stab in the back?

So reader, what if you decided to change your name? Now. Right now. Change it to suit your occupation, or the place you live? Joseph Journalist? Anthony Twickenham? Andrew Doncaster? Thomas Teddington? Philip New Malden? Lawrence Lawyer? Colin Weatherman? Brian Banker? Janice Insurance? Sue Southampton? William Wimbledon? Roger Public-Relations? Julie Animator? Bernard Biddulph? Nick Racist? John Plasterer? Bob (middle name - the) Builder? Mick Richmond? David Inverness? Simon Welder? Eric Programmer? Alan Administrator? Sharon Marketing? Bob Artist? Daisy Social Worker? Danni X-Factor? Tracy Counsellor?

Try it. How does it make you feel? Does it suit you? If you adopted it, what effect would it have on you? On your future? On your confidence? Your ambition? How people perceived you?

If you are doing a job that you love, that fits, that is right, and you live in a place that you feel secure and happy with, then why not change your name? Go on, give it a go....

Willy Mason and friends at St Giles Church Soho, the Pain of the Pew.

This is not a musical review of his music as such, it is a review of an evening watching and listening to Willy Mason, his friends and family. I don't know many of his songs or many of their titles (apart from Oxygen), so apologies. I also need to put it in context: I went by myself, my first ever gig alone.

As I queued I felt self conscious being alone. Everyone was talking to someone. An old man near me with a sandwich and a coffee was also alone. I thought - great kindred loner. He kept trying to push in, nudge in front of me. I felt aggression rising within me, his Hovis bag was bothering my arm, he was edging into me in an elderly manner. No, no, he is fellow loner, don't say anything. Then he got a call from someone, he said he would be in the building soon. Shit. He was not alone. Maybe I should give him a piece of my mind? No, not at a Willy Mason gig.

So, I get through the door and a woman passes me an "eatyourownears" wrist band. She says: "Just one ticket?". "Yes" i whisper. That hurt. I am feeling very Leperish. An outsider. Billy (Willy) no mates. I want to tell everyone that this is the first gig I have ever been to alone, to stop staring (no one was staring). But when I got inside I found a friend, my notebook. I really didn't intend it to look pretentious, it was a prop to occupy my time (as Michael Stipe once said) and it kept me company, in a way. Here is what I wrote:

St Giles Church, the Black Plague started in this area. I feel like I have the Plague. I am alone at a gig. Someone I know is here but they are in a pew - with a friend. Willy comes on to the stage, i thought he was a bouncer or a roadie or a lost rugby player. He looks like he can handle himself, I thought he was a sweet and tender man, slight, delicate and breakable. No. He is broad shouldered. Filled out. A man. I was expecting a boy. Musicians are not normally built this way (though Nick Heyward is now no longer the puny framed boy he once was).

I have not eaten. I have not had a drink. I am hungry and thirsty. Those on their way to be executed in the 16th century would stop by the church gates of St Giles to have a drink, a soporific ale, to dull the senses, dull the pain when the pain comes. I need a drink. God I need a drink. I am in the right place to ask God. Maybe. I am willing to slip behind the altar and steal the altar wine, scuttle off to some tomb shadowed corner where the dead are remembered in stone, and neck it. I suddenly realise Willy plays bluesy music. I am not a a fan of THE blues. I have gone off the colour because of its musical connotations.

Willy says he is going to sing a lot of new songs and you can see shoulders in the pews slouch a little, a reverse Mexican wave. He sings a couple of songs, which are probably new. His voice is pure and fitting somehow, the church suits him. Fits him. I could imagine him singing at the back of a church on a hot Sunday , somewhere in the midwest, in Little House on the Prairie land. Behind him, his band play with laid back precision and beauty. He sings: "That smile poured Heaven right into my soul". I like the delivery of the line, i believe him. He has me. I am charmed, for a while.

Then Jemima James, a guest, sings a song. Before she starts she says how great British audiences are which gets an easy but embarrassing cheer. Just as well as she does not stir the crowd with her singing (singing an embarrassong), but as it is early in the night she receives a warm and encouraging response from the crowd (congregation).

Willy steps up to sing some more, alone, no band, but everyone is relieved. His voice blows warm into the pews, tickles the chandeliers, sweeps over the altar and hovers above the pulpit. His lyrics though get stuck in the aisle, they are sometimes too predictable and when he sings"face" i know that the word "disgrace" will follow. It does and my heart "sinks like a stone". Then he fakes a hiccup as he sings a country song that involves someone drinking too much, it is met with uncomfortable half laugh from the crowd. I think the audience are squirming but when the song ends, they go mad, they loved it. I am wrong.

The next guest takes to the stage, Sophie Tan I think he said. She is wearing a headscarf, oh no, a bad sign. It was. Her voice is lost in the grandeur of the church, frail folk, she sounds like a child or a church mouse, her voice lost and nervous. I am amazed that she has the confidence to get up there and sing, I admire her for her courage, she might be nervous but she had the nerve to get up there and sing in the first place. She sings of a "lowly pawn". We clap her courage. We miss Willy.

Willy returns and says he is going to sing about the "religion of booze" - big cheer. Someone coughs, a dirty Black Plague cough, a Swine Flu cough. Willy sings about THE blues, so I think I might have got it wrong, he must have said the "religion of THE blues". Oh dear, why am I here? THE blues. I have them and I don't like them. But still his voice warms and soothes, rarely if ever dipping out of tune. I like him. I notice not many take photos, is it the church? Respect for the dead, for God? Fear of photographing a ghost?

Another song, with a line "With the front door of my heart open", he sings it with his heart open. Jemima and Sophie sing quietly in the background to sweet effect, tapping on his heart. They sound little. Was the song called "Holy Restless Fugitive"?
His ad libs are a little awkward, though it is early in the set. He is still warming up. The next song tests me - show me the way to go home he sings - reading my mind. "We're all trying to find a way home" a used to death line that Willy's song does not resurrect. I am tired and I want to go to bed. A theremin (or saw of some kind? - I can't see) adds eeriness to his candy voice, the spirits are waking. My backside is hurting, the dread of prayer from my youth haunts me. The boredom of priestly sermons, butt dull.

Willy announces that the planned intermission will not now take place, he blames the Post Office, as it "took time filling the place". Presumably tickets were delayed in the PO (industrial action), "Pews were designed with discipline in mind" he says smiling.

The band are back. His brother on drums. David Walsh on guitar, met with a big cheer (I wonder why, the only David Walsh I know of was a friend of mine at school who bought me Raw Power for my 17th birthday). Willy sings a song that one of the girls wrote for him. A 16th century prayer rip off, apparently. After this dirge he sings a that shone like a halo in a stable, the title of which might be "For the Need of Love". I forgot my pew bum. "She's drinking poison, nobody filled her cup, I've seen heroes cry for the need of love". I am interested again, I am charmed, a little hypnotized. Then one of the girls return to the stage - OH Christ no, please, not now. Oh no, she is singing about fouls, beasts, alabaster and masters. Master faster cast her master alabaster. A girl in front of me whispers "disaster".

Another song, it features pick up trucks. It makes me think of a friend i once had, an American. He accused me of being an attention seeking Hugh Grant type, I pray for his perception. Alter it, altar it. Two people leave as Willy ends his song. I am tempted but the band are getting into it. Some thump, some beat, some thud, some light. God's heartbeat. The dead are kicking the floorboards from underneath. The accordion is lost in the mix, a shame. "Turn the boat around" "Run us to the ground". I want more, more to consider and think about.

One of the girls gets up to sing again. Shoulders slouch again. BUT this time the voice wows us, she is a female Lou Reed (Pew Reed), a gorgeous God given voice. Nina Violet? Jesus. Sweet, cool and warm, like a just slept in bed. First goosebump of the night for me. I think she sings "Don't move me down with the pretty girls". I am converted. "How did you get so close to me?" she asks someone in her song. I feel close to her. Close to her voice anyway. The loneliness was worth it.

But then, oh no. The English singer returns to sing a song called Boldface in Provence, which is apparently about an electronic music festival in France. Her introduction did not get the laugh she expected (her pause was a giveaway). The pain of the pew returns "I have hurt my heart, I feel nice, I feel right, I feel nice, I feel right, my face aches...I am killing myself". Oh please no more. I decide that it is time to leave. Alone. People stare.

Crossing the bridge over the river, oh the beauty. The lights of the Hayward Gallery, of the Oxo Tower, of the London Eye, of St Pauls, of Festival Hall, I don't know why, all make me think of the girl who gave me the goosebumps in the church, Lou Reed's sister (in musical terms). Do do do do do do do do do do.

I heard from a friend at the gig (who I didn't meet up with ..... it's a long story) that later on Oxygen was a triumph. But, when we talked the next day, she said she was not a musician, but felt that the music didn't go anywhere, she felt a little let down overall and she is a Willy Mason admirer. But we both agreed, he had a lovely voice, that never went out of tune the way his lyrics did.