Tag: music

#365daysofbiking English as tuppence


June 8th – Riding 20 miles in the pouring rain to visit a country fair in a village on the border of four counties may not be many folk’s idea of fun. But I loved it.

I’ve always liked Clifton Campbville Country Fair, for it’s acute Englishness, parochiality and eccentricity. And on this Saturday, it was almost, but not quite rained off.

Most of the stalls had gone. But I sat in a beer tent, had tea, strawberries, listened to Morris music and endless jokes about the weather. I had cake, met a Kookaburra and enjoyed the company of damp but faithful dogs.

An event continuing despite dreadful weather is almost as much fun as one on a blazing sunny day.

Better luck next year, folks.

This journal is moving home. Find out more by clicking here.

from Tumblr http://bit.ly/2R9yxMo
via IFTTT

Beech dene grove

March 2nd – I think I might be the only unconnected person to ever remember this. In the early 90s, there was a Birmingham musician, composer and singer called Lou Dalgleish. She used to play regularly in a city centre pizza restaurant, and was a regular performer at Ronnie Scotts. She had a couple of albums out, and now tours with a an Elvis Costello tribute show. I still enjoy her solo work immensely, although she seems to have stopped recording her own work.

One of the earliest tracks of hers available – now long since deleted – was called Beech Dene Grove, and is about the street in Erdington in which she grew up. it’s a lovely thing I think most of us can relate to.

You can listen to the track using the player at the top of this post.

Yesterday, after I left the Erdington bike jumble, I cycled past Beech Dene Grove, and thought of Lou. 

OK, this is a bit odd, but it’s memories, and stuff like this has a huge influence on the things I create here. Last Wednesday, I noted that I had a love of railway stations at night and that I wasn’t sure where I got it from. I mentioned that in the late 70s there was a record label called ‘Late Night Feelings’, one logo for which featured a drawing of two children on a deserted station at night as an Intercity 125 went past.

This recovered memory has bothered me ever since, so I went searching.

Late Night Feelings was a label peculiar to Geno-era Dexy’s Midnight Runners, an Oldbury band who were hugely influential to me as a youth. The drawing of the station at night was actually on the flip side of the seminal ‘Searching for the Young Soul Rebels’ album, and is as beautiful as I remember; the train is actually an APT or Advanced Passenger Train, a tilting design that was never a success. I think it’s gorgeous and thoroughly encapsulates the period. I spent ages looking at that. I still have no idea why. Sadly, I couldn’t find a better image online.

There were three other crayon draw lables, two of which I’ve never seen before. They all seem to feature the same two blonde children. I’d seen the children in bed, as that was on the 45 of Geno, the massive hit. The other two are new to me, but I adore them, particularly the children looking at the city at night.

It occurs to me that in three of the four images, the children have a suitcase. Why? There’s a story there someone was telling. I find that sad, and a bit tortuous.

I have no idea who drew them, or if this has ever been commented on before, but this artwork was prominent enough to stay in my memory for over three decades, and I do think it’s an odd, curious little influence.

They were certainly a very odd feature for records made by the then infants-terrible of soul-pop.

To the artist: I don’t know who you were, or even if you remember, but I did. Thank you.

Funny how things stay with you.