THE DEEP POOL - APRIL 2005

i'm rereading THE VOICES OF SILENCE by Andre Malraux - sample sentence -
'The Athenian spectator watching 'Oedipus' saw a servitude no longer his; the fresh blood flowing from the last quarry of the monstrous gods of old'. Or perhaps this one two lines later -

'It was the individualization of destiny, this involuntary or unwitting imprint of his private drama on every man's face, that prevented Western art from becoming like Byzantine mosaics always transcendent, or like Buddhist sculpture obsessed with unity'.
Well, there we have it!

A good friend of mine called Phil Oates (the creator of Jockstock) emailed me the other day to tell me that a beautifully abandoned local shop called Josephine had been demolished. I was very upset - Phil, his daughter, myself, and many other local people loved this alternative landmark - a long deserted shop next to a bog standard garage by a dreary roundabout where the city of Southampton dribbles into nothingness. just before the countryside proper begins. The sign which said 'Josephine' had weathered and greyed and the haunt of the building was magnificent - Josephine became a minor deity in our eyes - in fact Josephine WAS one of our eyes, holding an honest piece of the mystery without which it is difficult to understand the true weight of what is being said to you at any given time. (This will stop soon - i can only apologize...).

I had told Phil some time back that i was writing a song about Josephine the abandoned shop, and i'm not sure he really believed me - probably because i volunteered this information when very drunk on the way back from a show in deepest Dorset at a superb club called Hobo Club. He asked me again if it could be true that i'd actually, really started writing such a song. I wrote back:

'i see you on the wasteland
with your eyes shuttered closed
and the people who once knew you
are in cities buying clothes

josephine josephine josephine'

- and yes indeed this was a true verse from Josephine. I got a bit lost in the writing of this song when describing, or trying to describe a certain kind of backwoodsman farmer that you see in our village on Sundays. This kind of man turns up in the village shop to buy 'News Of The World' (shit UK newspaper full of stories about Robbie William's cock and dead footballers) - he says nothing, just pays for the paper, then returns to his old fucked up Land Rover which is full of swivel-eyed sheepdogs giving you a look that says ' i will kill you without warning then piss in your shoes'. This is the man's only contact with the outside world other than when he goes to the cash and carry to buy 200 cans of 'White Man's Burden' lager.

I got lost because i chose one particular man to be the model upon which to base my pivotal verse, but then was told by one of the village elders that this man's farm was built close to a series of very powerful pylons carrying electrical supply across the south and that his children were sick. This man once gave me one of the most hostile stares i've ever known (and boy is that saying something), even more hostile than the idiot Israeli woman who challenged me in January about my song The War Crimes Of Ariel Sharon - so hostile that i could not look away, and we stood locked in a look in the queue in the Co-op at 9am on a Sunday morning that made the rest of the queue shuffle and cough.

That's the problem with pain - everybody hopes it doesn't show and hopes it does at the same time, but there's 2 very different people fighting for control of the same mask, and only one of them can be called Josephine.

''Josephine Josephine Josephine' - i've just noticed that at this point in my song i'm imitating a song by Randy Newman from the Little Criminals album, the song is called Kathleen:
'Kathleen Kathleen Kathleen - i've always been crazy about Irish girls - i've always been crazy about I-I-I-rish girls...'.
What a great record - 'Beat-up little seagull on a marble stair - trying to find the ocean - looking everywhere' - or this from one of the world's most beautiful songs - Jolly Coppers On Parade - 'They're comin down the street - they're comin right down the middle - they got to keep the beat - they're as blue as the ocean - ooh mama, that's the life for me - when i'm grown that's what i wanna be'...such a lovely evocation of a child's portrait of the truth of man, recounted on whisky-stained manuscript with a picture of Robert Mitchum in the background - eyes moist with amusement and regret...

And the emptiness that accompanies the parade which has become a skeletal clang somewhere else in the town, too far away to catch up or even remember with anything but a steady lump in the throat - just a fading din and a lost library card: the heat still hangs round the buildings, but there is less humanity in the stifling breeze, not more.
The poet George Barker wrote a poem about the greatness of his mother which included a remarkable line about how people were compelled to follow her, as a little dog follows a brass band. As soon as you read the line you feel that you have personally seen the little dog he mentions, and then later you notice that of course you weren't there when he decided to put the little dog in the poem following the brass band, but that it is impossible to resist all that is saltily poignant about the little four legged chap's attempt to join The Great Walk. (God help us all).

I've finished recording a great new record - most of the recording was done in Beirut with some Lebanese musicians, and i also sang out there south east of the city at a world gathering of Roma singers - a great privilege. People said 'oh, you should record that too', but it wasn't that kind of event, and would have been more than frowned upon. It was great to work with people who didn't want to turn an event into 'product' - this is what i like about working with American poet Robert Bly: when i used to help organize and run events for men which he lead, we had a constant barrage of requests to film, attend or in some way record the given event, and Robert always said no. This in itself pissed off 'media' and lent a sneering tone to the portrayal of this men's work which, not that i care, persists to this day. 'Oh, you hug trees do you? - hahahaha'. Well, yes i do actually hug trees, or a tree anyway - everyone should get a tree in their life - you'll feel better within days. But i've never ever seen a bunch of men told to hug a tree...
I also unblock drains - i've even got my own drain rods, left to me by a bloke called Mike from Portsmouth who had a major consciousness change in his life just as he was about to unblock my drain. He stood over the stinking sewage for a minute, staring into the shite abyss (haven't we all?), then said 'no, oi ain't gonna do this - here, you can 'ave these and do it yourself - it ain't exactly 'ard, just 'orrible'. And with this he dropped his rods and walked away from drain cleaning, presumably forever. As he left i called out 'er, Mike - any handy tips about doing this job?'

He looked back for a moment, then said 'don't turn anti-clockwise or you could unscrew the rods and one could get lodged down your drain, then you'd 'ave to jump in and retrieve it, and yer wouldn't wanner do thaat'. Now there's something you've learned if you were thinking of buying a set of drain rods for the missus' birthday!

I also wanted to record a couple of Greek musicians i know for this new record and suggested that they might want to come to Beirut to work. They wouldn't even discuss it, so i brought them to North Wales instead, to Bryn Derwen studio where engineer David Wrench and i mixed the record. We drink in a pub called The Douglas in Bethesda when we're there, and the landlady, Christine asked if the Greeks would like to play one night. They said yes, so Spiro and Mikilis - accordian and viola went completely mental one night and played up a storm - myself and Deborah Greenwood also sang and played - it's a Welsh speaking pub, and the evening passed in a great wave of cheering and Marston's Pedigree (as mentioned in the song 'i've never known peace on earth' by Sir Vincent Lone).

I've just discovered that i'm playing a place called Morden Tower in Newcastle on Sunday night - it's sold out. I didn't know about the show cos nobody told me and shall be at a wedding reception in Galway city until Sunday morning. Just what you want after a major Irish hooley - a hungover flight or two to Southampton, then change planes and straight to the land of broon ale. I've noticed that the young think that what you order is a 'Newcie Brown' when in pubs - it's not, you say 'a bottle of broon ale please', as opposed to 'brown ale'. I once heard an Englishman in Tralee ask for a 'slow pint', meaning Guinness. The barman gave him a look both courteous and deeply hostile, as in - 'i don't need instructions from you on how to pour a pint of Guinness'. However, Irish barmen can take it to extremes. When i lived in Castle Gregory, County Kerry, i once ordered a pint of Guinness in a pub by the sea. Four days later, the barman and i were still looking at the half poured pint. In the end i gave up - i needed sleep, a shave, food and the sound of human voices. As i opened the door to leave the barman asked if something was wrong. I explained that i had to get on with the rest of my life.

'If you were in a hurry you should have said so' he reprimanded.

I've made April a show-free zone - i've got other things to do, but May will be massive in terms of performance. I've got Porto with David Thomas' Mirrorman, Drammen, Norway - Working Class Hero Festival, the Bergen, Norway Festival as Ubudoll with David and Michael Cosgrave, then London, Perth and Kirkcaldy with Ian Rankin. Just finishing a new song called Kings Of Infinite Space -

'that men have died on the roadless heights
and the women who loved them lie alone at night
and children wake up with fear in their face
and a hunger for the kings of infinite space'

-or this from another new song called Book Of Hobo

'outside in the car park
there's a limping man
humming an old song
car keys in his hand
he stops and looks down the street
at something out of sight
right now it's the morning
but here comes the night'

jl