Blog: ♥ And Before The First Kiss ♥

- Fieldnotes #261 - In a time almost forgotten the rusty big wheel will spin onwards; rotating left then right until a faint buzzing 'click' hints at a new start, a new fashion for 'Diamond Jim' to wear like he means that kind of business - a way to unlearn centuries of pretended, dastardly, evolution I suppose. An ill-fitting bolt coils right, a sugar-spark lifts the groove and a melody is unleashed upon a knowing world full of Lévi-Strauss wonder. But how much time is time enough 'in [...]

- An adolescent gull calls out playfully and performs seemingly impossible moves even a limber gymnast would baulk at. A light breeze from the East forces you to flutter-shut your tired twilight eyes. Once awoken, in a glimmer, you can't help but notice the way they just slip into each other's curved bodies; she gazes up at him with pounding hearts in her eyes whilst he just stares out, arms entwined, appreciating the serene beauty all around. It just seems so natural, so easy, relaxed. Is it really just like this, how it is meant to be? Contentment [...]

- Where next? It's a gradual approaching essence. Small steps of glamour. An idea of what might yet be. Apropos the virtues of leaving solitude and longing beside a lipsticked glass at the bar come closing time. Fateful strides around this town at 2am, in certain company, witnessing a falling chimney pot and sirens all guns blazing. Mirrored, battered souls reflect much more than just shadows of a former self. The promise of lurid dancing streetlights familiarise this unknown terrain, such new cultured surroundings. In truth, it's a stability and comfort not known for sometime. And this is [...]

- It did not have to be this way. This maddening, quickening sense of urgency; a golden-rushed incident detailed, laid out to rest, among the leaves. A flickering finger stubbed out in the jaded mildew of the year just past. A crashing cymbal cascades off a distanced, challenging cliff. It is out of the traps and away down the distressed tattie driel; there is no mistaking that sweet thud of hope being filled to the brim with wine and roses (for all). It explodes; a thick shard of glass skims past you, lightly grazing your left cheek. The [...]

- There is something, well, persuasive and convincing about these sounds. No? Maus music. It isn't 'forgettable', for me. To be sure, in places, it has those 80s post-punky synth hooks and, in a strange way, they are making out with disco music in the hidden alcoves of the club, kinda thing. A bit hipstah, perhaps. But is that such a bad thing, by definition? There are faint memories of 'classic' Hall and Oates, for some reason. But, this all works, curiously. And that voice. It resonates and stretches down to the depths of a long-abandoned well that is as [...]

- On days like these you tend to notice the awkward, vocalised, public sharing of intimate details. Witness: standing apart as their uneasy alliance purposefully marches in time to a beat unrecognised; clutched shopping bags in outstretched twenty-something limbs that keep their tentacled hostility at a bridged, safe, distance. This is Argyle Street at dinner time, yesterday, and although the physical space is paramount - 'The Silent Lanaguge' (1959) - the raised voices keep them locked together, but divided in domestic battles. Others passing by watch and listen for the hurt accusations to fly and the emotional retaliations [...]

- Where were you? It is everything good and right and effortless; and yet this fleeting moment is derailed and distorted via cheap cellphone CCTV. Beauty ill-defined; a star of the age is uplifted and the essence of an embodied, shuttered, memory bruises a tired heart. Come closer, for he is destiny as imagined in some other world, far from this palatial bothy. A scolded sting to those crumbling services, positioned on the outer edges of such lucious, golden lips. The sketched, swollen eye nodding towards a distant lens reminds you he really 'means' it. It's time to go home, [...]

- Gasp! So, the third record is finally in the making. Hurrah! And, if you are very quick, you might still be able to purchase a 'special solo performance' on Skype. ;) And, even more good news, this guy has a new record out at the end of May as well. Chris and Mark working together? OMFG. Yes please, Santa. Make it happen. - Chris Garneau - 'No more pirates' (live) (3.13) - Love Zombie Central. Yes, I was lucky enough to interview and photograph (!) Chris in May 2007. [...]

- The Twilight Sad , @ The Grand Ole Opry , Glasgow, 09-02-12 - It's about loss and death, the hipstah boy with a sharp haircut and letterbox-framed glasses, ponders. It's about past mistakes and associated bitter regrets, the petite girl with a heavily inked back whispers to a friend. It's a homage to post-punk and the memory of Curtis, the group of lads at the bar bellow like horses on heat. It's a necesary step change and shift of gear, argue those in the know, who are close to the [...]

- 'Ostinato', he urged. An uptight focus paired with singular direction; tears, pain and stubborn mentalities carved into the missing timbre floorboards. Another time escapes, your dacha in the frozen cantata wilds. Heads nod and give way, to a clef misplaced years ago. This looped recording process needs no summer daylight, oils or otherwise, scratching at droned soundboards, fading candles and engineers who know their place only too well. Such inability to sleep or to forget; reflections of self within post-shower puddles of sweated condensation. A captured piano lands a fatal blow in ebony, parched in [...]

- 'I would like to be an architect' said the sweaty young Czech student in shining, multi-coloured sports lycra as he exited the local Aldi shop to his pal who, rather bemused, just turned to him and said 'But then why are you doing an economics degree?' . 'Well' , said our erstwhile hero, 'You have to start somewhere' . And I think that's exactly it: you have to start somewhere. Even if you don't want to be an architect, in fact. - Ally Kerr - 'The sore feet song' (3.07) - [...]

- His assisted height nearly matches his fanciful strides; footloose stomps travelling to a railwayed destination, I would guess. The bag on wheels and A-Z map in hand are the rather unsubtle clues. A bitten cigar tossed carelessly to the side just misses a neatly scarfed woman, on cardboard knees, pleading for offerings from those walking by, the same people pretending to be too busy to acknowledge her being or ordeal. I steal a glance to his side, his left-side, attempting to keep pace with the final furlong approaching. There is no tie but an open-necked [...]

- I keep dropping and lifting the magical needle to hear the same '45 play over and over - 'it's all relative' - whilst at the same time knowing I am absolutely not a relativist. Does this make me a card-carrying hypocrite or merely reading the street-sign entitled 'confused'? I am rather unsure. Er, so, belated good tidings for Christmas and tentative greetings as we speed towards yet another New Year, and all that kind of m'larky. I guess I should offer up my sincere apologies for having very little to say just now. Sorry! I [...]

- Whenever it gets to this rusty time of year I am always inclined to think of Seattle. This photograph, of the famous Gasworks Park, was taken three years ago today. It's thirty six months on that I thought I'd never live to see, quite frankly. Visiting this special place, that crisp, frosty morning, will always remind me of a song by Mother Love Bone and an urge to carry on in the face of a few (personal) mountains to climb. The Park, for those of you unfamiliar with this particular space, is a dead industrial atmosphere turned into a [...]

- Fieldnotes #324 - Lost buttons and used chewing gum; spent matches and tarnished coppers. You search stolen pockets for what you thought was left behind from the night before it began. The loose change cascades into unemployment; stripped fortunes will melt pritt-sticked hearts. Across to the left, behind the till, a pretty girl with a turned down mouth and a fluffy coat waits patiently for a Latte that will take its time to arrive. Stubbed fingers drum in marching time, punching digit holes into an interesting Ikea-lite table. The boy's turtle-shell glasses continually slip down his nose and an [...]

- She stares back like she means it; as he sees you, faking it weakly. Those hourglass waterfalls cascade down decorated window frames masking years of poor construction. Passing playmobil cars shuffle and dance, spinning out of time to erratic traffic lights on frozen city centre lakes. Reconstituted families move in bored silence through competing hordes to bargain bin promises within excluded galleries. In the wilderness, out on the steps, forgotten teens without coats or spatial awareness huddle together for meaningless gossip, infectious warmth and heavenly cigarettes. A still, mirrored reflection is caught with a shadow of her presenting utmost; [...]

- It's that thing. If I lose you. Again, and so it goes. Stumbling in, falling out.... payday loans are 'Go' in this day and age. Grim, grin... and bear it? No ta. Just like me in this 'visual world'; those ghostly moments of rage, fear, sadness. Tears and the end of time; wheeched away on a Megabus to who knows where. Poundland? Iceland? Where the jumble sale mums go to meet the boil-in-the-bag dads, Brett. Time travel with you beats the odds. In annoyance and irritation of your behaviour, at my ineptness - not knowing what to say or [...]

- Of course, Edward Shanks included the word 'English' in relation to his ghostly landscapes, but it would be foolish to think that such hauntings are the preserve of one nation. Anyway, enough of all that, more NPL indie-pop dancing tomorrow evening. Woot! - Horse Shoes - 'I can't decide' (3.04) - Visit / Purchase / Reading -

- Cameron Crowe: Kris Kristofferson once said, “I write a sad song when I’m happy, because generally when I’m sad, I’m too sad to write a good song.” Where do you stand on the subject? Mark Kozelek: I’m the opposite. When I’m happy, the last thing that I want to do is shut myself away in a room and write. I generally write when I’m feeling down in an attempt to find some peace and contentment. - Exactly this, really. [...]

- Today I am old. I mean Old, Old. Really quite old indeed, actually. I guess half my life and a bit is now over. What a cheery thought that is. Hurrah! But I will dance the day away, anyway, playing this on repeat, repeat, repeat. It is really good! It is not my usual kind of listening, I admit - not enough limp handclaps, twee screeching or jingly-jangly guitars - but there you go. You like what you like; the groove, the beat, the swing. It makes me want to move. In that way. And, when you turn a [...]