What's music about?

 

At first, I thought music was important, and power was inherent within it - but after all these years, I think that might be nonsense. My understanding of chaos theory played a huge role in this - how everything dissolves into fractal chaos, yet there's a beauty and a grace within that disorder. Above all, I think music is utterly hollow until it attaches itself to us. Once that happens, it follows the fractal pattern of our lives, as they seek contextual belonging to a broader world of uncertainty.

My favourite XTC song is "Generals And Majors" - but is it because it's great? Again - I don't think so. It's not their best song; there are many others I admire more, and love more. So, why is it number one? It's all context. I love the song because I can see rows of the sleeves piled up in my local Woolworths in Devizes. I can feel how important it was for me to be connected to music and to a love of these objects. I can see how that single was an object of desire and slotted into everything else around it. The music, of course, is performed by a bunch of blokes from Swindon - it has the bucolic, West Country twang - melancholia, whistling, it feels - distant, yet close. And it's all about Cold War paranoia - I was living on the edge of Salisbury Plain at the time, and I can recall seeing low-loaders with ICBMs being driven through the streets of our village. It normalised armageddon and placed it into the bucolic little place I called home. Again, context. And those blokes from Swindon felt like me, too - outsiders - removed from the big city, slightly cast adrift. 

The power that song has is all contextual. It's power I bestowed upon the song, not power that the song had to begin with. 

I think that's what music is. It's nothing, but it's everything, so long as you can map out that personal context, and tie it to the ever-expanding fractal beauty that lies at the periphery of one's understanding. Beauty doesn't lie within; it lies on the outskirts, at the boundary where fractal lines blur and escape our power to control them.

I can still feel the pavement under my feet

I can still feel the same way I did in 1990, walking these Akasaka streets for the first time. The sense of optimism, of hope and possibility. It's all there, in the air, buildings, and skies over East Tokyo. 

I'm older now, but I've not lost anything over all these years. Tokyo still feels like home to me - or like a home, perhaps. The streets seem to envelop me, and the noise of the city fills my head. I tried to listen to music whilst walking the streets early in the morning - but it was somewhat futile. The earbuds came out, and the city's sound rushed back in; it was all I needed. 
 

I really, really needed that.

 The past few weeks have been vindication for the worst of years: a cavalcade of sensory overload, an embarrassment of riches after the paucity of grief and confusion.

Japan for a week? How could it be anything other than extraordinary? In truth, it was almost overwhelming. A chance to revisit old haunts with friends old and new. So much memory and happiness. The sensation of a life that unfolded around the joy of travel and exploration. Not just of mere countries - but of life itself. I was assailed by nostalgia for something still living in front of my eyes. A dream that refused to awaken. 

And this weekend was the Shiiine festival. A meeting of the tribes, for us - seeing Neds, Stuffies, Poppies, EMF. So many friends. Watching the Stuffies, as we did from the side of a stage thirty-four years ago. Feeling humbled that our lives still afforded us the luxury of feeling the same way. 

I needed these weeks. 

Chasing

 I've been thinking about the music I loved when I was a kid. Why it still has the most powerful hold on me. Why the deep sense of melancholy haunts even the sunniest of songs. I think it's because the music was a window to a bright world - one which I wasn't sure I could even belong in. Those songs, for me, were like the piece of paper that the wind blows out of your hand; you reach out to grab it but swipe the air instead. You can always see the paper in front of you as every gust carries it further away; you remain as close as you ever were, but the distance between your fingertip and that paper always remains. In that small gap is the fluttering heartbeat that holds all of your childhood longing, hope and love. Yet it also holds the sigh of disappointment and unfulfilled dreams. The drift, the languorous pitter-patter of expectations dashed on the rocks of our lives realities. 

It bears repeating

 So, I will.

I've said on here before that I've been assailed by the sensation that time is a circular construct, that I'm buffeted by memories and all that has been and will be. That's come into even sharper focus over the past two weeks. I'm living everything at the same time. It's exhausting in a psychedelically brilliant way. 

I'm grateful for everything I've done, even if there are a million regrets laced into the cloak of memories that swim around my head. Those regrets are the sharp inhalation before the gentle sigh of senses fired into action by the people and places that define me. 

I think I should post this.

 Though my father was a huge Jazz buff, and that music defined and shaped his entire life, there are other things that I associate with him, too.

Dylan, Simon &Garfunkel, Pentangle, Steeleye Span, Dan Fogelberg. But above all (and rather oddly) Gladys Knight & The Pips. I know there's another post in the archives about GK&TP (a tale from a US tour, IIRC), but this one is just...Dad, really. We both watched this performance in May 1976, and he taped it, too, on his SOny TC-377 Reel-to-Reel tape recorder. This faster, funkier mix (performed and recorded especially for TOTP) was unquestionably his favourite and mine too. As a ten-year-old kid, I loved it; as a nearly sixty-year-old man, I love it even more. Every note is sheer, joyous perfection. 

Well, this terrible year got a lot worse.

 My father passed away on August the 25th. I held his hand as he took his last breath. It's been a year of frustration, pain and anguish: but nothing has come close to this. I keep thinking he's just gone on some sort of temporary journey and will be back. He won't. I think it'll hit me later.

It has focused my mind on so many things - an almost constant churn of ideas, memories and emotions. I suppose I'll be processing this gradually. 

RIP, Dad. 

Having a moment

 Whilst listening to Stars Of The Lid. Bloody hell, it doesn't get much better than that, does it? 

Lots of cycling over the weekend, with a ride that saw myself and Phil (ex-JJ road crew) tooling around the Surrey Hills. There was a glorious moment where we got passed by an over-enthusiastic young bloke, only to sail past him on the third ramp up Coldharbour. Pacing is everything, in cycling as in life.

I've also spent the weekend thinking about my next steps. I need more focus, and I need to be tighter, generally. I've not quite worked out how that's going to happen (quelle surprise), but I'll press on, regardless. That's my default setting.

A month drifts by.

 And, I'll be honest: I needed that.

I'll get back to everything, but I had to withdraw, a little. TO regroup and breathe. I was completely unprepared for how much the saga with the tour hollowed me out. It was a voyage into myself, into the heart of what makes me tick. And, of course, you find out some good things, but plenty of bad stuff too. That's life.

I've enjoyed getting back out on the bike, pointing it along the road, and just...going. No real thought for a destination. No real plan. 

Life On the Road

 A lot of people always want to know what it's like? 

Well, it's dull. Lots of gazing out of the window of a van. But, having said that, there's a lot to be said for that sort of drift: the glorious knowledge that you don't have much to do, except wend your way to the next town on the list. One of the things that can help is something to while away the hours. On the last couple of tours, myself, Jerry and Gen have spent some quality time listening to the Madness audiobook "Before we was we". I really can't recommend it enough - it's just perfect. Funny, moving, nostalgic - but more than that, it's a window into the life of a band. All of the myriad ways that a group of people come together, interacting with each other. The bonds that are created, the threads that join everyone together. All bands go on a journey, but it's not just about a path from obscurity to fame; it's the making of a family. That resonates so much for all of us. It was a hugely entertaining experience - and I'm already plotting to listen to it again when we're back in that van.

It also made me dive deeper into Madness' back catalogue: there's some truly wondrous stuff in there, if you did deep enough. And when I say deep, I mean it. My favourite Madness track is this overlooked gem, just an album track from the record that almost marked their career's final phase. But - what an absolute gem.

A recommendation

 We've not had one of those for a while, have we? Anyway - Hands On Bike is a wonderful cycling blog, it's going straight into my links. 

Internal Jukebox

 The jukebox is now playing....

Rachmaninov. I'm such a fanboy - that intricate yet romantically direct style is just perfect for me. His music has complexity, but the purity of intention allows it to move you without your brain constantly having to analyse the content. 

Of all the varying musical genres, classical has suffered the most, I think, from algorithmic laziness. You can ask your smart devices to churn out monolithic music blocks specifically tailored to dinner parties. Or doing homework or sleeping. The resulting sounds are there, merely to wash over you. Rachmaninov has that language of romanticism, which fights so hard against all of that. There's a simple power to his work, a piercing intent. 

I'll try and listen to him, to add context to my own life - and isn't that what music is about, always?

Old, old, school.

 I ventured back into the archives of this blog yesterday. Just wanted to get a sense of what still exists in the long cavalcade of descriptions, links, and more.

Well, a lot of it certainly now suffered from "link rot". So much pop culture detritus, so much merely fallen by the wayside. It's odd, looking back on those sorts of posts; sometimes there will just be something like "Oh wow, THIS is just fantastic!" and a signpost to nothing. I wonder where my head was, what I was searching for, and what made me smile.

But sometimes, it's still there. I'm incredibly heartened to find that this is still active. Ah, the internet. 

Well, it's certainly been a ride

 Hasn't it?

Remind me to not do this for a while. I plan on riding my bike when this is over, to forget about the responsibility and the pressure. All the time I'm heading up those hills, this will be playing on a loop in my mind.

I love being obsessed with things that everyone else seems to have overlooked. A few hundred views, in three years? What the hell is that all about, then?

I was going to tell you about all the other things going in in my life, but they're all under a cloud, for the moment. There are a few other music business things, and some long-term planning, too.

I'd like to think about the future. But I need to deal with the present, first.

Trying to find solace

 And it isn't easy. 

I've been lucky enough to be back outside on the bike, so that's helped. Overall, the past week or so has been fraught with many issues, but above all it's been a case of one issue just creating another. Logistics is like an ever-evolving fractal: it just keeps sub-dividing and expanding. 

One issue makes two more. Then those two make four. Sometimes the biggest test is not solving the eventual issues, but trying to maintain a thread back to wherever it was that started everything.  The album above, has certainly helped put my head into a better space, while the storm rages around me. 

 Meanwhile, It's the Coronation weekend, so I'm hoping for memories to be imprinted. I'm certainly no royalist, but I'm acutely aware of the fabric of our society, how it shifts, and the things which ground our values. Extraordinary days like this are a chance to see history unfurl - you don't have to like that history, or agree with it, or cleave to it in any way; but it's something that shapes your life. I may not be a participant, but I'm certainly a watcher.