neon lit city
your broken teeth don’t detract
from your winning smile
Despite the ticket server crashing (probably was put together in the 70s by Kraftwerk themselves), I managed to get tickets for Kraftwerk at the Tate Modern in February. So excited by this. People who say they are cold or emotionless I think just don’t get it. Neon Lights is one of the most beautiful love songs ever written.
Cleopatra eyes
jump suits, disaffected youth
flowers of romance
Trying to capture (cheesily!) the spirit of the late 70s/ early 80s. Some great bands around then. Siouxsie and the Banshees, PIL (whom I quote in the final line), The Stranglers, Joy Division, Depeche Mode, Tubeway Army and many more. I wasn’t old enough to see those bands then, but with this trend in bands reforming, I’ve had many opportunities to catch up for some of them.
Tonight I saw Ultravox live at Hammersmith, they’re a bit older, greyer, but were still fantastic. This was the second incarnation, fronted by Midge Ure of course, although I love the John Foxx stuff too and saw him live recently (check my other blog).
Shame some nutter lady smashed a trifle/custard pie on Midge’s head during the encore!
Anyway, here is one of the tracks from their 1980 Vienna album. “Mr X”. Not a single, but crazily dystopian with great synth and drum work, not forgetting Billy Currie’s Viola.
eyes closed in Eden
a freedom in solitude
rainbow melts deceit
Went to a gig with an old friend Alex. We saw various acts pay tribute to Talk Talk. For me their two last albums, Spirit of Eden and Laughing Stock are just sublime/seminal.
Frontman Mark Hollis’ solo album was also beautifully melancholy. Although we weren’t overly enthused with all of the acts playing live, the double covers album of Talk Talk/Hollis songs which was being played sounded amazing.
Although the original albums didn’t do well commercially, the amount of musicians who cite them as influences is impressive, hence the array of talents who have dropped a cover version for the covers album.
I draw on Hollis’ writing themes in today’s Haiku, although I’d never claim to be as good of course.
For your listening pleasure, the incredible Laughing Stock. Stick with its strange mix of rock, jazz, noise and silence. It’s incredibly rewarding. A little known masterpiece.
the mud finally
relents when the baking sun
toughens the earth skin
The sun shone, it was glorious. A great final day to the festival.
One by one they come
swift sorties tight to the hedge
insect gathering
So I’m at Electric Picnic, a great music festival, but I’m inspired by birds again. Swifts loading up for their massive migration to Africa by acrobatically flying against the hedges, elegant twists and turns in mid air to catch unknowing flies or spiders floating on gossamer.
Seven swans flying
a silent glide across the grey
the sky a still pool
I was on the bus going from the airport into central Dublin and I saw the unusual sight of seven swans flying. So powerful yet effortless they drove through the sky. It made me think of the Children of Lir, enchanted by their adopted mother, cursed to spend nine hundred years as swans. When their curse was lifted and they became human again, no one they knew was still alive, the world had changed. Such a sad tale.
In the evening I heard this song live. I felt introspective and reflective. I was listening to this album around the time my mum died.
agitated wait
bloodshot pacing, night walking
depart in darkness
I should be in bed. Early early flight in the morning. Off to Ireland for Electric Picnic.
Faded indigo,
Whispered constellations glow,
Honey stained by smoke.
Went to see the Mark Lanegan Band at Shepherds Bush, with the Bossman. Great gig. I’m inspired to write a Haiku about Lanegan and his music (and his hands). Do you think it sounds like I love him? Well, I guess I do, a little bit, in a chest bump, knuckle tap way.
(photo source is noisebloc)
