THE DEEP POOL - August 2005

In strange lemon-grey eerie morning light i walked the dogs yesterday morning up past the allotments, past the gypsy smallholdings where coloured horses and their foals stood becalmed in the damp heat, through the field towards the railway line where i sat on a style and let the animals sniff around, roll in fox-shit, and eat selected grasses which they took time to seek out and then ate with tender care.

There was much to think about but my mind decided not to do it - instead i concentrated on the important things in life, like, did i have 25 pence to put in the honesty tin on the old horse cart where the gypsies had left marrows, courgettes and eggs. I wanted to buy a marrow - 25 pence (or £2 40p in Waitrose). Where i was sitting there is a fine collection of thistles entwined with barbed wire and parched wooden fence posts - the sort of small scene that artists have drawn for generations, then you find catalogues for obscure shows at obscure art galleries showing such work in beautiful second hand bookshops in places like Bell Street Market in London. Or i do anyway. When i lived in Lisson Grove in London, next to Bell Street Market, i could never stay away from the wonderful bookshops there, and i became a specialist collector of such catalogues, and privately or obscurely printed collections of poetry.

I remember once, the impossibly handsome young bookshop owner of my favoured port of call asked me if i'd like him to put aside things as they came in that may appeal to me, or would that 'detract from my line of enquiry (or is it inquiry? - never ever got my head round this). It was a lovely slight moment of bonding for me at a time of tremendous loneliness in my life. I declined the offer with an appreciative smile, saying, yes, looking through all the other possiblilites and coming upon the rarities was half the fun. He was nodding sympathetically before i even made the point, but still gathered the material i was likely to be interested in into a more formal shelf space from then on, which gave me more time to look at 60's American pulp science fiction magazines - Fantasy, Astounding Science Fiction, Galaxy, than i would otherwise have had. Having made my purchases, i would cross the road for expresso in the ramshackle Bell Street Cafe where the Italians would always ask 'do you want egg-a-bacon?'. If you didn't you were favoured with a look that said - 'you're weird, but you're still a valued customer'.

Back in the field, the dogs had become bored with grass eating and shit rolling and a South West Trains Pendolino had battered past on the downline bound for Portsmouth - the dogs are not exactly scared of these trains, but just have a kind of 'it's time to go' attitude towards the event. We returned slowly through the warm field - i put Basil on a lead before we reached the smallholding so that he couldn't attack the hens A few hours later, Basil, a supposed Jack Russell variety of dog who looks like a cross between a chihuahua (spelling?) and an exceptionally stupid bat, stood transfixed in the garden as Mr Big, our unfeasibly large cat caught a squirrel under the bay tree. There was a ferocious tigers-into-butter kerfuffle round the base of the tree, with lots of hideous squealing, then Mr Big appeared victorious with the squirrel still in its death thoes between his jaws. Big put the squirrel down by the outside wooden table, whereupon Basil went over to inspect the spoils - the cat went beserk, flying at poor little Baz, teeth bared and bloody, clearly saying 'fuck OFF and get your own squirrel'...

I paid for my marrow in the honesty box and put it in a plastic bag that i hadn't used for picking up dog shit. As we walked on we passed a big gypsy girl in her teens who never speaks to me on principle and who sniggers about me when she's with her mates. On this occasion she was alone and passing with her head down.

'Hiya!' i said jauntily as we drew level with each other. This took her very much by surprise, and to her credit, she pulled herself together quickly and said hello back. I've never said hello to her since then when she is with her mates, or indeed alone, but she's eased up on giving me a low-intensity hard time - i'm allergic at the best of times to thinking women are laughing at me, so this development has been a small but huge relief.

Walking further down the track toward the main road, i noticed some CDs swinging on a rope line, acting as scarecrows to fend off birds from eating runner beans. I went over to have a look at who these CDs might be by. The first one was by Depeche Mode live in Japan, the second was the best of The Searchers. This seemed a little harsh - i loved The Searchers when i was young - their version of the great Jackie De Shannon song 'Everytime That You Walk In The Room' was masterly, and i felt a twinge of sadness for the band. Then i saw that the third CD was a promo copy of my own next studio release Elegy For Johnny Cash. This could only be because in a drunken moment a few nights earlier in the Brewery Bar i had given a copy to Big Steve after i had heard him going on about how much he loved Johnny Cash. I wasn't best pleased and wondered if Steve had even listened to it before sticking it on his scarecrow line, or, even worse, HAD listened to it and decided the scarecrow line was the best place for it. It reminded me that a copy of the album had appeared on Ebay, and that this was probably a journalist who had given me a bad review for the album, and to makes matter worse, was selling it at an inflated price. My day was suddenly going downhill fast and i caught myself rehearsing ostensibly humourous remarks to make in the pub to Steve about the scarecrow CD, but letting him know my feelings were hurt and i wasn't the sort of guy he wanted to make an enemy of -- oh, and don't go telling people how i remonstrated with you about the abuse of my generosity etc...No it wouldn't work - there was no tone i could adopt that would work on Steve, and anyway, he might have an amazing, unimaginable reason for it being there which would make me look really really stupid and have to apologize for my poor attitude. Nor could i just adopt a sulk towards him about it - i just had to forget all about it, and accept that i'd brought it upon myself by being on a drunken ego trip in the first place. Ego trip -- do people say that anymore?

Deborah laughed at me the other day when i called Richard Branson a breadhead.

'I never, ever thought i'd hear someone actually use that expression' she said. I tried to justify it, saying that i was using it in the cultural context of the time - back then he WOULD have been called a breadhead and nothing else.

'My point exactly' she replied with a cheery smile - she'd lost me...

I played a festival in Calgary a cuppla weeks back - the Calgary Folk Festival - a remarkably well-run event full of great music and brilliant people. I liked the city of Calgary a lot - it reminded me of Australian cities like Perth or Adelaide - i sought out the seedy bars as is my wont. One, the French Maid, just round from my hotel was a kind of stripper bar - i didnt know this before entering. It was nearly empty and there appeared to have been a turnaround of roles, whereby two drunk fat young geezers were on a small stage at one end of the bar, slowly peeling off T shirts in what they obviously considered to be a sexy fashion whilst a french language version of Roxette was playing. They kept twirling with beery grins and putting their hands on their hips and thrusting their groins forward with tongues lolling out. At a pool table, two young women whom i took to be real strippers were engrossed in a game of pool wearing bra and pants, looking up now and then to shout encouragement at the guys stripping. I couldn't make out what they were shouting - it sounded like 'War -ippya nezzle shanto BOOGIE fahra!!!' Then they'd fall apart laughing while a morose but tolerant bartender looked on as he absentmindedly picked at an arm tattoo that seemed to be of George Bush having anal sex with a chipmunk which was winking.

The Calgary festival has hundreds of workshops on different stages where unlikely acts come together with a theme for the workshop to which the acts can either adhere or not. I was dismayed when i saw from the programme that this format constituted a huge part of the festival. But i was moderately encouraged to see that most of my workshops had titles which were actually titles of songs of my own. I figured that this at least meant that when the artists were milling around wondering how to represent the title of the workshop, i could grip the thing, saying it was a song title of mine, the song was about this, so let's follow on from that - and so it proved, to my relief, to be. My workshops were with some fabulous acts, some of who i knew, some not at all - Mary Gauthier, Waterson Carthy, Wendy O'Neill, The Weakerthans, Christine Fellows, Instinkt (Danish band - great), Ron Sexsmith etc.

Ron, as ever, told me a good sex joke - i'll be telling it on stage. All these Canadian acts i didn't know at all were much much better than i anticipated, but Wendy O'Neill stood out for me. She sang a song about being dumped in a letter which was bloodcurdling and deepest grey - i was stunned. She was singing it right next to me onstage, and her thin blackclad body leaned into every narrative twist and turn as she artfully unfolded the horror. Wendy O'Neill - remember the name...

On the other side of me in the same workshop, Mary Gauthier with a 3 piece band sang a song about mercy, its absence in our lives, and the reason for that absence which had me blubbing. I'd watched her before she took the stage, pacing quietly like The Panther in Rilke's great poem, unusual facial makeup that made her look like a porcelain figure of a transexual hitman from Louisiana. She made no concession to the community spirit onstage (this also included Waterson Carthy with Eliza on scintillating form), just got to the mic and started singing. Nobody minded - it's obviously how she performs - she's like a creature from literature - maybe a book by Julian Green, or a missing discarded character from Of Mice And Men.

Les, who brought me over for this festival, turned out to be a man amongst men, and had lots of words of wisdom for me. I was moved by the huge amount of goodwill towards me from so many people, and i thank Les for making me see that i can find a sort of home in Canada if i would like one - i would.

Back at the hotel i went to use the sauna. While i was sitting there a suspicious employee of the hotel came in the sauna and looked under the benches in a pointed way. 'Can i help you?' i asked politely.

'Do you have an animal, perhaps a dog, in here?' he asked.

I was taken aback - 'No - i'm from the UK - i didn't bring a dog with me and haven't aquired one since i got here - why do you ask?'

'Another hotel guest says you brought a dog into the sauna'.

'Well, as you can see, i didn't'. At this point i was very jetlagged and could hardly believe what i was being asked.

'Well - okay' he said in the voice of the terminally unconvinced, then, as he left, he flapped his hand meaningfully at a sign on the sauna door that said 'No Animals'.

What the fuck i thought to myself as i dressed. Then as i was leaving the health club, i noticed that on my washbag there is a painting of a gay-looking dog lying on its belly smirking and could only think that someone on interesting psychoactive drugs had seen me carrying the washbag and managed to transmogrify (or should that be transdogrify) the illustration into a real animal. And why did they have a sign saying no animals anyway? What sort of crazed society would even begin to think that people would take animals into saunas? - first i've heard of it anyway...

I'm reading remarks by Coco Chanel - 'how many cares one loses when one decides not to be something but to be someone.'

And where am i going? To Summer Sundae in Leicester to play this Sunday comin', then a pub in Sidmouth on 26th August - can't find the name -- shall let you know in the week...

I shall be in Berlin and Munster talking about my new album on September 7-9.

Before that on 3rd Sept i play a show for Mad Pride at, i think Ryan's Bar in London, Islington, but i'll check details and let you know - i'm so useless...i told my agent Harry about this show. He said 'it sounds a bit crazy'...quite Harry.

End of Sept, shows in Norway, and then on to mega-touring in Europe and the UK through till Christmas.

Right now i dread it all: i just want to sit quietly writing new songs, watching the plums on the plum tree get more purple while the dogs root around amongst the early-fallen apples, looking up at me from time to time as if to say - 'are we going for this fuckin sauna or what?'

jl