It’s a classic theme, one of the seven songs in rock ‘n’ roll – the break up, lovers parting in glorious colour, and of course, in tragic black and white. For some reason I’ve always written these songs (!) but I wrote very my best break up song not in a space of suffering, anger, denial or sadness, but in contemplation of what happens, that recurring cycle of promises made in passion, which prove to be no more than chimeras.
“Wouldn’t Do That” has a double meaning which runs all the way through it, and while I don’t want in this blog to be my own literary critic, I’m happy to point out the obvious: Is the promise made not to leave, or once gone, not to look back? is the question I was asking, and it’s one which is poignant to this day.
I’m quite proud of this song, because the major/minor chord progression expresses the bitter-sweet idea I was trying to articulate before I even began to say it. I quite naturally fell into singing a falsetto, and played the most soulful harmonica I’ve ever managed, which you can hear in this demo.
“I promise I will never hurt you”
“I promise I will never leave”
Promises made are broken so easily
Brave words are just wind in the trees
What are these worlds we live in?
Doing our thing separately
Surely we must have forgiven each other
Wasn’t our loving for real?
Well I’ve been so long in lonely world
Living without a loving soul
And I know it won’t be long ’til I’m missing you
But I made myself a promise
That I wouldn’t do that…
And it’s a long and lonely road
Living without a loving soul
And I know it won’t be long ’til I’m missing you
But I made myself a promise
That I wouldn’t do that…
Some songs stand out for having changed your life. This once changed mine in one, classy Thursday afternoon radio moment of inspiration which I shall never forget. Dave Cash, Capital Radio, London 95.8FM. Ian Dury and the Blockheads – What a Waste.
I was astonished at the music, physically entranced to the extent that I grabbed the pretty powerful mono transister set and pushed my ear up against it so as not to lose a moment of the incredible hypnotism that was pouring out of speaker and into my lug hole. He was singing in English, in my accent, or close to it, using words which spoke to me about my life – over a beautiful lilting, funky reggae beat, with a screaming chorus of sexual intensity
“WHAT A WASTE WHAT A WASTE – BUT I DON’T MIND!”
I adopted this band and this man instantly. I have very few heroes, but Ian Dury is one. He blended funk with punk, poetry with blasphemy, vulnerability with defiance, sympathy with the anarchy of the day. Like many a true innovator, to this day he is less celebrated than he should be. It was truly a golden cross-over moment for both pop music – punk spawning really interesting hybrids as it became new wave – and for me.
I lost my virginity to the album, New Boots and Panties; and the songs of Ian Dury became entwined with my destiny. He set many good and bad examples, which is just the way it should be. I went to art school in part because of Ian Dury, and leaving art school, went on to make music professionally, just like he did. Mr Dury died tragically young of liver cancer just as his second career as actor was taking off, but still, he was brave to the end.
Ian, old fruit, I miss your honest and wry majesty, and I salute you.
Some songs have me singing along like a drunk, eyes misting and as passionate as a fool, and these of course are generally ballads. Time by Tom Waits is one of my favourites.
Tom Waits tells some of the best stories in contemporary music, tales of regret, penury, lost love and broken dreams. Lilting pace, acoustic guitar and accordion, and the Brechtian theatrical mask drops to reveal unexpected sincerety and tenderness, an oasis in the middle of an album of cacophonous guitar and cranky lyrics. “The rain sounds like a round of applause.. ” “And the things you can’t remember tell the things you can’t forget that history puts a saint in every dream…” And, what a chorus:
Black and white, the twin musical threads of our culture, with roots in slavery and church music, oppression and salvation have been my constant companions. Growing up in the melting pot of west Croydon, south London suburb stuck at the end of the line, a place rich with new arrivals gave me the best of both 1960s and 1970s worlds as the melodies and beats sowed seeds in my fertile consciousness.
Since I started to sing in tune as soon as I could speak, much to my parents’ pride, I was aware of these beautiful twin flames of our cultural heritage. Aged five, my favourite music was acoustic folk and big band jazz, mainly because my two first (donated) records were The Spinners and Glenn Miller.
While my older brothers rocked out to white music – Deep Purple, Springsteen, The Who, Bowie, I and my schoolfriends, half of whom were the sons and daughters of immigrants from the West Indies, Africa, India, Pakistan, Cyprus both Greek and Turk, mostly preferred black music – Motown pop, sweet soul, and the blissfully tuneful reggae of Bob Marley.
Mixed race fraternisation was normal in 1970s and 80s sunny Croydon, though we suffered the same institutional racism which led to the Brixton riots as well as high local membership of the BNP. I hadn’t studied the history of music at that point, but I knew my social history, including the story of Wilberforce’s fight for abolition, and it was no stretch for me to enjoy emerging militant black consciousness. But before race became truly politicised via rap, music created its regular miracle in our hearts, instilling love for blackness in our essentially white British culture. Many bands of the time were not just paying homage to black music, but were truly infused with it. Even between polarised tribal extremes, skinheads and rastas, there was an occasional coming together via the guitar – the Isley Brothers, Jimi Hendrix, very few remained unmoved by these masterly tours-des-forces.
As we grew out of our school uniforms and into civilian clothings, we got disco and ska. Heatwave, KC and the Sunshine Band, Stevie Wonder would all be turned up on our always-on kitchen radio, along with the Specials, Madness, Ian Dury and the Blockheads. Parliament and Funkadelic weren’t on the radio – I traded album loans with the dapper Ken French to experience psychedelic funk in all its otherwordly wonder.
I know now that these outward ripples of black music, from Jazz to Soul to Pop to Rock, were echoed all throughout the developed world, Europe and America and elsewhere. A friend of mine, Ashley Slater, Canadian by birth but brought up in California joined the British Army at 16 years old, partly to afford his musical training. In the barracks, he told me, at first he was the only one playing and digging Earth Wind and Fire, to the disquiet and derision of his fellow squaddies.
It didn’t take long in this musical hothouse for the exquisite brass arrangements, beats and harmonies to win over these hardnut whites. They ignored the afro hair, the ludicrous costumes and the disco glitter – the music was too good. They even started diggin’ on James Brown, saying it loud, black and proud. By the time he bought his way out of the army, to sign a deal with Island Records, they were converted.
As colour and race has become less of an entertainment business novelty and more of an everyday marketing ploy, the cross-over tradition became less apparent, but it is still significant. My enduring love of funk, as well as much music in other traditions stems from a hybrid blending of cultures, the opening up of new avenues for exploration.
Many of my favourite artists retain some pronounced elements of blues and jazz and dance music, where it collides most beautifully with western folk or classical academic traditions – Prince, for example, and latterly Little Dragon, who are actually a Swedish band with a Japanese singer, Yukimi Nagano. She has a superb voice which seems at once both east and west, and the music lays her artfully modern, soulful, poignant melodies over stripped-back cool electronic funk. It’s as good as anything I have ever heard, and it defies pigeon-holing – just the way it should be.
I don’t believe that music will ever be contained by boundaries for very long, because it is so connected to what makes us tick on a soul level. That doesn’t mean disempowered kids in grinding poverty won’t look for music which speaks to them in a language which can be understood, disregarding all other forms in their passion; but it does mean that the rawness of oppression will still have the power to invigorate and transform the subtlety of the orchestra, and that the Devil, having the better tunes, will still find his way into church.
The image is of myself playing Richard’s guitar several hours into a wake.
Recently, I’ve had the dubious pleasure of attending several funerals. I’ve not been with hardcore drugs gangs, suicidal goths or trick motor cyclists – there just happened to have been a series of deaths this year. It’s a sad by-product of being in one’s 40s.
I’m quite used to being with my Generation X peers, hanging around, socialising, making merry, and being creatively spontaneous, but it’s quite another thing having to conform to society’s expectations after all this time. Few of us are even married.
Sometimes we don’t know what we’re doing and mostly we don’t care, but in doing what feels natural, we are stripping away the hackneyed remnants of centuries, and in being true to our punk generation, we’re returning to more elemental ways of expression. The fact that we are re-inventing rituals doesn’t even occur to us, but that is what we are doing.
I feel that the future of my own performance should include ritual in some way – not constructed from other rituals, but emerging from the realities of life as it is lived.
The only performer I have ever seen who has really pulled this off is David Byrne, during his arty Talking Heads days. Somehow he managed to absorb as well as model charismatic movement and gesture – in particular the wonderful video for “Once in a Lifetime” shows this clearly, with dress, choreography and declamation all orginating from Pentacostal preachers.
Studying the process he went through to arrive at this extreme artistic end point, it shows me that he used a process of observation and instinct. Like many artists he also found a sympathetic working partner, in his case Brian Eno, whose biggest gift seems to be becoming an effective catalyst for others, exploring with them their expressive outlets, pushing not just the envelope but the entire stationery shop, and often arriving at quite remarkable outcomes.
Both Eno and Byrne are from an older generation, but they still speak directly to mine. Their legacy which we cherish is the inventive flair and fearlessness which distinguishes them from so many conservative artists.
If I were to model myself on Byrne, that would be missing the point entirely, but he shows me a means by which I can navigate to find my own new ritual space.
It’s a classic theme, one of the seven songs in rock ‘n’ roll – the break up, lovers parting in glorious colour, and of course, in tragic black and white. For some reason I’ve always written these songs (!) but I wrote very my best break up song not in a space of suffering, anger, denial or sadness, but in contemplation of what happens, that recurring cycle of promises made in passion, which prove to be no more than chimeras.
As we grew out of our school uniforms and into civilian clothings, we got disco and ska. Heatwave, KC and the Sunshine Band, Stevie Wonder would all be turned up on our always-on kitchen radio, along with the Specials, Madness, Ian Dury and the Blockheads. Parliament and Funkadelic weren’t on the radio – I traded album loans with the dapper Ken French to experience psychedelic funk in all its otherwordly wonder.
I know now that these outward ripples of black music, from Jazz to Soul to Pop to Rock, were echoed all throughout the developed world, Europe and America and elsewhere. A friend of mine, 