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Another train of thought triggered off by a Radio program.

Listening to The Verb on Radio 3 from the Sage in Gateshead there was a discussion on dialect and the Geordie accent in particular someone said that before they came to the UK she thought everyone would speak the Queens English as heard on the BBC.

This reminded me of a time when I was young and had been to France with my parents on holiday. We were returning on a ferry from Le Harve to Portsmouth overnight and were sitting at a table talking. On the next table there were some Chinese people and at one point they asked my father “Are you English?” – he confirmed that we were.

They then asked “weren’t you just speaking a different language?”

I was listening to Radio 4 earlier and Ozzy Osbourne was on a feature called Inherited Tracks where someone discusses a song they feel they inherited (In Ozzy’s case it was Swanee River by Al Jolson) and one they would pass on. The track to pass on that he chose was Black Sabbath’s Paranoid.

He was saying how every time he does a gig he plays Paranoid at some point and it got me thinking what it must be like if you are in a band on tour and you feel the pressure to play the same songs night after night and what it must be like if you’ve been playing a song at every gig for 30 -40 years.

I think some artist may like the safety of knowing exactly what comes next. I remember seeing Genesis two night running at the City Hall in Newcastle and not only did they play the same songs both nights Phil Collins told the same stories and the same jokes in the same places. On the second night we may as well have just watched a recording of the night before.

Then there are some artists who obviously get fed up of playing the same song and drop it from their repertoire, often to the disgust of the fans. Barclay James Harvest decided on one tour that they weren’t going to play their song Mockingbird. We saw them at the City Hall and after the encore all the lights came on and the fans refused to move. They stayed their shouting and cheering until the lights went back off and the band came back out. They obviously played Mockingbird but instructed the audience not to tell anyone they had!

And then of course there are bands like The Grateful Dead and Phish who seldom play the same songs twice on the same tour. I went to see Phish two nights running in Amsterdam for example – they played for 31/2 hours on the first night and 2 1/2 hours on the second night without repeating a single song and the audience went away happy. Similarly with Ratdog, The Grateful Dead guitarist Bob Weir’s band – I saw them four times in one week and they only played one song twice.

And then there was Racing Cars – I saw them at Sunderland Poly (Now the University of Sunderland) back in the 70’s. They had been in the charts with a song called “They Shoot horses don’t they” which had obviously attracted a lot of people to the gig. It was probably the only song that any of us knew and they didn’t play it! The did encore with a cracking version of JJ Cale’s Cocaine which they played as the fire alarms were ringing but no one would move till they finished.

Rock and Roll – you pays your money and you takes your choice!

I’ve been having problems with the bandwidth allowance for my site which went over it’s limit yesterday. Basically as mentioned in a previous blog the bandwidth usage has suddenly rocketed in October from 500Mb a month to almost 5Gb. So I e-mailed the technical services helpdesk

I wrote

My bandwidth is showing as exceeded again. I still don’t understand this sudden increase in traffic.

to which they replied

We have seen your levels increase drastically this month, particularly since around
the 8th of this month. Do you know anything that might have happended then?

Well no I’ve already said that I don’t know why this has happened

But they helpfully added

The file types that are taking up the most traffic are .mht   7490 27 % 3.31 GB 94.5 %

Essentially these were archives of my old blog and I have no idea why they have been visited so much over the past few months

So I e-mailed back saying

at the end of the day if those files are the ones causing the problem they could be deleted – they only work in IE anyway!

To which I received the reply

Perhaps you could consider deleting the archive?

Is there an echo in here?

Sometimes I see or hear words which just stick in my head and this week has been no exception.

Firstly as I was walking through London’s West End I passed a group of people sitting outside a pub enjoying the autumn sunshine. A conversation was in full swing but as I passed the only words I heard were

“The girl with the Dragon Tattoo” *

These words just got stuck in my head – they would make a great title for a short story.

And then yesterday we were driving round Southampton when I saw a sign outside a shop which said

“Three men and a suit”

Which again resonated with me. It turns out that it is the name of a Southampton Graphic Design company who also have a web design company called three men and a surfboard – Crazy stuff.

(*Ok I’ve found out now it is the title of a book – damn beaten to it lol)

was telling us about her A level art project during a visit to Southampton Solent University yesterday. Her project was based on the works of Andy Warhol so I decided to Warholize her

Curiously this picture was taken a few feet away from a picture I took there last year which started my Rubbish Art series. Must be something about that room

A lone figure sits in a darkened room, the only light flickering from behind a window illuminates the scene. he sits at a table his shoulders hunched and his hands placed flat on the table.  His head is bowed as if he is waiting for something.

Suddenly he looks up, takes a deep breath and in a shakey voice he says

“Is there anyone there?”

The question cuts through the stillness of the room, hangs momentarily in the air before it fades away leaving nothing but a low hum and the sound of a fan which is blowing cold air around the room making the shirt, wet with perspiration, stick to the mans back. His hands are clammy now and although they would appear to a casual observer to be steady are actually shaking as the man looks around the room as if he was actually expecting an answer. The beads of sweat which have formed on his forehead are starting to trickle down his temples as once again he takes a deep breath and repeats

“Is there anyone there?”

Again the silence envelops the room as the words wither and die in the stillness. The mans eyes dart from side to side as he waits and waits in the stagnant room. He shifts nervously in his chair as the shaking has started to spread from his hands and is now becoming noticeable and his whole body is drenched in sweat.  He is beginning to regret taking this course of action on Halloween and he is almost at the point of giving up when he finds the last ounce of strength in his body and he leans forward and in a shakey voice says

“This is Chris Moyles on Radio 1 – Is there anybody there?”

Just in case you don’t get this click here

Gillingham to Southampton 2hrs 10 minutes

Southampton to Gillingham 3hrs 55 minutes

I went to the Doctors this morning and while I was waiting 40 minutes for my appointment I was reading the notices on the wall. One in particular caught my eye it was a Swine Flu Information update and was pinned to the door between the waiting room and the reception and gave useful information about what to do if you suspected you had Swine Flu. Not that you’d be able to read it as another notice pinned to the front door warns anyone who suspects that they have it not to enter the surgery!

And while I’m on the subject of waiting 40 minutes for my appointment – there are notices everywhere that point out that if you arrive 10 minutes after your appointment time you may not be seen by a Doctor. So how come the Doctor can keep you waiting 40 minutes past the allotted time without so much as an apology?

I occasionally have memories jump into my head for no particular reason and this story came to mind this morning so I thought I would share it with you. It happened in 1982 when I was studying Physics at Salford University. I was in my final year and my brother was also at the university where he was studying Sociology.

One day I was wandering across campus when I happened to bump into my friend Brian. He asked what I was doing that afternoon and I can’t remember if I had lectures or not. He asked me if I fancied going to see U2 at the Apollo and I replied yes but isn’t it sold out. He said he had a plan….

The plan involved support band the Alarm – they had played at the University a couple of times and famously turned up to trash the final night of The Belle Stars tour and Brian had got on quite well with them and their roadie Gaz. He suggested that we go down to the Apollo and wait till they arrived and see if we could get them to put us on the guest list.

Whatever I was doing that afternoon was soon forgotten about as this sounded like much more fun so we set off to walk down to Manchester and the Apollo. I don’t remember how long we stood around but I do remember when the band arrived they saw Brian straight away and they all lit up as you would when you run into an old friend. Before we knew where we were we were on the stage of the Apollo watching both band soundcheck.

We had seen both bands before. I first saw U2 at the Gateshead Festival in August 1981 where they were somewhere in the middle of the bill with Doll by Doll and The Polecats (the latter band had replaced them at a Radio 1 Roadshow earlier that year at Salford University). I’d also seen them at the University later that same year which was a wonderful show which caused the dance floor to bounce, dislodging tiles from the ceiling in the bar below and sending people screaming out of the room! I’d viewed the whole show from the organ pit right in front of the stage and the only inkling I had that something was going on was when I saw some of my friends holding onto the PA stacks!

At that time both bands were on the up although as we know The Alarm split up and U2 went on to be a contender for the crown of Biggest Band in the World. At this time though they were still very much rooted and they even invited the fans who were waiting around in to watch the soundcheck. I got Bono to sign my bag that I carried my notes to lectures in (unfortunately it washed off when the bag was washed).

As we were with the Alarm we managed to stay on the stage while the others were sent to sit in the stalls at the front. I remember we helped fix one of The Alarm’s guitars and watched both soundchecks. And again while the others were ushered out of the hall after the soundchecks finished we managed to stay in for a bit. Our names were put on the guest list and at some point we picked up passes from the box office at the front. I remember we went to that little pub outside the back door of the venue and may have been joined by one or two of the band.

The highlight of the evening came when we were inside the venue and all of the fans were outside. When the doors opened and they came in I saw my brother. He had been going on about having tickets for ages and there I was standing there with my backstage pass!

I know I didn’t really enjoy the gig – I though U2 were dull and it was to be the last time I saw them. Still it was all worth it for the fun we had that December afternoon.

The set list that night was:

Out Of Control, Twilight, Surrender, I Threw A Brick-A Day Without Me, An Cat Dubh, Into The Heart, Sunday Bloody Sunday, Electric Co., I Fall Down, October, New Year’s Day, Gloria, I Will Follow

Encore(s): Fire, A Celebration, 11 O’Clock Tick Tock, The Ocean, I Will Follow

I was in a supermarket last week and I overheard a conversation about energy saving light bulbs which was prompted by a display of them by the till which were on special offer.

“I won’t use them” the voice said “they take too long to come on”

Well that’s good to know that people would rather continue to destroy the planet rather than wait a few seconds for the light to reach full brightness!

Saving the planet could be an uphill struggle.