Tag Archive for 'friends'

ten artists: sleater-kinney;

Published on August 23, 2010 in music. 3 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , .
This entry is part 6 of 6 in the series ten artists

Another occasional series, this one involving actual writing and inspired by two of my favourite music boys. Scott, whose Black Powder Smoke ruminations on music and film are frequently more entertaining than the subject matter, has been working on a list he’s calling The Forty Artists That Shaped Me. While I don’t have as many as forty (that I love, sure, but that changed my life?), I really liked the idea… and then Steve pointed out that I never followed up on his Ten Albums To Tell Someone Who You Are.

So here’s my compromise: ten artists that shaped me, and quite possibly the albums they did it with.

Have you ever noticed that horrible habit I have of starting what seems to be a perfectly worthy project, only to abandon it as I get distracted or as I move onto something which at the time seems even more worthy? The other night I noticed a handwritten list of “the ten artists who shaped me” at the back of my travel journal, and I couldn’t remember how far I had gotten with it.

It’s been almost a year since my last installment, but with Sleater-Kinney next on the list and Corin Tucker’s solo album due for imminent release (here’s a great catchup with Paste magazine on the subject), it seems like the perfect time to get this project back on track.

Sleater-Kinney? Are they not estate agents? You’ll be disappointed if you show up and they try to sell you a flat.
- EDDIE, 2006

I found out Sleater-Kinney had split up (or “declared an indefinite hiatus”) from behind my old desk at my last job, trying my hardest not to cry. One of my favourite things about working in an office environment is the sense of camaraderie you get: when you’re sitting staring at the same people for eight hours a day every day without the customers or clients who are the main focus in other employment situations to act as a distraction a weird kind of shorthand develops, and you find yourself telling these people things that you maybe hadn’t even had the chance to tell your best friends yet. You become, for want of a better term, something akin to family. We didn’t always have a lot in common, but I enjoyed the good-natured teasing on who I was calling “my favourite band” in breathless, overenthusiastic tones that week (it’s where this blog’s my new favourite band tag originally stemmed from, ever-so-slightly tongue in cheek). So when I hiccuped back a tear and commented that “my favourite band” were no more, I didn’t really expect them to understand.

While I guess the Libertines were my Take That, for want of a better cultural touchstone (mummy, the pwetty boys aren’t going to sing any more songs about girls drugs/each other that I can close my eyes and pretend are about me!), Sleater-Kinney’s breakup was the one that really made an impression. There was no drama, no fanfare: just eleven years and six seven fantastic albums. It was arguably the first time that one of “my” bands had called it quits: Hole were already on their final (or so we all thought at the time) album before I even got there, and REM still show no signs of slowing down although it might have done their later output a bit of good. The Portland-based trio were true trailblazers, respected for their longevity and their talent and not just because god forbid they were girls.

As is so often the case with the most important things, I can’t really remember a time when Sleater-Kinney weren’t a part of my life or even how they got there. There was a mix from Staci at one point; and an mp3 disc from Stevie filled with albums he couldn’t believe I hadn’t heard already – One Beat being among them. But it was when I moved to Edinburgh that I started to pick up the band’s older recordings for £5 a time in places like Avalanche, and there that I began to listen to those albums constantly. There were drunken nights out, Amy and I singing “Little Babies” walking up through the Grassmarket, and there were nights in my room with the albums for company.

I saw them twice: once in London, the first time I traveled to the capital for the sake of a band. Stevie and Jo were there, and Sapph met a boy down the front. I was planning to make it a round trip with a night in Belfast too, but my boss threw a fit when she saw from the annual leave request I would have ended up jeopardising a professional commitment for the sake of words and guitar. And then, the month before the announcement, Dave M and I saw them at the Oran Mor – the only time I’ve ever seen my least favourite Glasgow venue brought to its knees, its shitty acoustics no match for a band in their prime touring the reinvention that was The Woods. That was the night I stalked Corin Tucker in the ladies’, and got her to sign my ticket with the kohl that was the only writing implement I had in my bag – a fact of which I am only slightly ashamed.


Nothing like some protruding shoulder blades to actually make you feel relieved to have put on a bit of weight.

Two months after that show, I was interviewing bands at T in the Park in my “Sleater-Kinney is for Lovers” t-shirt, prompting a conversation with none other than Ben Gibbard of Death Cab For Cutie. “That’s why you’re my favourite band now,” I told him, ever the picture of unflappable indie cool. But the words rang a little hollow, because until a certain Brooklyn-by-way-of-Minneapolis bar band came along, there wouldn’t be another band who would encapsulate that phrase as perfectly as Sleater-Kinney did.

1,000 Years, the debut album from The Corin Tucker Band, is released on Kill Rock Stars on 5th October. Carrie Brownstein appears in the video for The Thermals’ new single “I Don’t Believe You”, and Janet Weiss is currently performing with Quasi and The Jicks.

Corin Tucker Band – Doubt by Last Year’s Girl
Sleater-Kinney – One More Hour by Last Year’s Girl

BUY: The Woods (and other albums by Sleater-Kinney) at Amazon.co.uk

“c’mon laura… we’re married now”;

Published on August 10, 2010 in a little more personal and music. 8 Comments Tags: , , , , , , .


Photo by Neil Thomas Douglas, And Do You Take…

But first…

The day before the wedding, a wise woman gave me a piece of advice (in the form of a video, all the way from Australia). “Don’t try to record everything,” she told me, “just enjoy.”

And I didn’t write down a thing until Tuesday.

The best day of my life went a little bit like this:

  • Joking on Twitter that a mention in the trending topics would be a fantastic wedding gift turning into us being the highest ranking topic in Glasgow by about 12pm;
  • An impromtu photoshoot in the park behind my house, culminating with me falling off both a swing and the goalposts (I have just been sent photographic evidence of the latter, but no chance am I sharing). The petticoats protected me from most of the damage, but you should have seen the bruise on my leg…
  • Showing up at the venue, being continually surprised to see people I loved there and having to take a minute each time to remember that it shouldn’t really have been;
  • Managing to walk in early (what bride does that at her wedding!) while everybody was trying to sing the Bridal March because we forgot about entrance music;
  • Stevie heckling the celebrant after his reading, from Love Is A Mixtape: she mentioned that she really ought to read the book; and he yelled from the floor, “you should!”
  • Struggling to get Jay’s wedding ring over his knuckle so just leaving it half on. Figuring nobody else would notice. Um, now you know;
  • What my Web Hedgehog said to me afterwards. I will not repeat it for the sake of all of our modesty;
  • Striding through a conveniently-erected funfair to get some impromptu wedding photographs with my bouquet hanging low like a rockstar in a music video*, and some East End old timer yelling after me: “you’re gonnae get it tonight, hen!”;
  • The epicness that was my brother’s written, composed and performed on guitar-by best man’s speech. And my sister’s verse, with the best line you never made out: I especially like all the cool stuff she lets me steal, now let me think // makeup, shoes and clothes and my new party dress, wink-wink;
  • SHE MEANT MY WEDDING DRESS. GET IT?!;
  • There were cupcakes. There was dancing. There was everybody I loved in the same room, and me running around like a kid in a sweetshop MADE OF FRIENDS;
  • And of course, at the end, it descended into a guitar party as my family + alcohol is wont to do. I won’t tell you what I sang, but there’s a video on Facebook and let’s just say that my indie credentials are completely ruined.

If I have one regret, and it isn’t one really, it’s that I didn’t have enough of the delicious food because I was too busy being a social butterfly (and drinking all this gin that just kept appearing…). We were brought chocolate-covered strawberries in our hotel room that night, and I’m sure they were meant to be used for something kinky, but by that stage I was so starving I pretty much just ate them whole and then stuffed all the little jars of jam from the room service breakfast into my overnight bag the next day. As you can see, there would have been no point in abandoning my own name as I haven’t changed a bit.

Thank you to everybody who made the day what it was. Thank you to my new husband (!) for just being a bit of a legend; and to Jody Vickery, a minister from Georgia, who in coining the phrase “narcissistic cleavage convention” in the Guardian at the weekend managed to sum up our day perfectly. What can I say. Best. Day. Ever.

And there might not have been ice cream, but there was gin and tonic sorbet.

A couple of people have asked, and since this is predominantly a music blog it makes sense to also share with you our first dance. Making the final decision about half an hour before we took to the floor from a shortlist of five, it was:

Marah – So What If We’re Outta Tune (With The Rest Of The World) [mp3]

Thanks Whitney for not being too mad at me for borrowing it for a while.

[*Incidentally, if anybody knows what I did with my bouquet after the photographs, let me know? It would have been nice to hang onto it...]

excerpts from a travel journal: half-awake in my fake empire;

Published on August 5, 2010 in music and travellin'. 4 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , .

I heard someone say once that writing doesn’t happen when you’re too busy living. It seems as good an excuse as any for leaving the rest of my travel pages until I’m back perched on my own bed, surrounded by yellow lamplight and the detritus of my living.

Some things you remember without help. The red, white and blue light of the Empire State Building that last night; yellow taxicabs in shadow and Matt Berninger in my earphones like the voice of my subconscious and the soundtrack to the city. I feel like I’m in a music video on Lexington and take a moment to just breathe.

empire state

Put a little something in our lemonade and take it with us…

This time we even leave the state. A day trip to my beloved Princeton as it meant I could meet my even-more-beloved Ms Lucero halfway with Dorinda in tow to provide hugs and baked goods and a damning indictment on the state of New Jersey’s highways. To me, Princeton keeps its toes firmly on the right side of twee – while its knowing quirkiness is as obvious as its sky-high property prices its so beautiful that I don’t find myself gritting my teeth by the chorus. And it’s home to some of my favourite places: Paper Source, where I pick up kitten-shaped Post-Its and some bits and pieces to create a scrapbook of the wedding cards (“How did you know about us?” asks the girl behind the counter when I tell her that despite my accent I’m already on the mailing list, and I blush as I think of the two-hour browse and giant shopping bag that punctuated my September); The Bent Spoon, now serving ginger cookie awesomeness in a cone; and PREX which still holds the honour of being my second favourite record store in the whole of the US.

prex

An in-store poster informs me they’re looking for a blogger. I wonder if locality is an issue (and, if so, whether they’ll sponsor our visa application…)

New Jersey has always held a special place in my heart, and it’s when we’re waiting outside the record store that the reason why roars up in a black car with a pink skull sticker on the back. The second friend I ever made online, Jill used to send me Hot Topic goodies and my yellow Hello Kitty pyjamas and calling her was the only thing I could think of to do on 9/11. When you’ve known somebody for eleven years, you can’t imagine what a relief it is to finally blast some Hole and go play minigolf with her and her boyfriend even if you quickly prove that you suck at it.

we are stardust

One day we spend five hours trailing around the American Museum of Natural History, guided by the Museum’s own iPhone app which turns out to be the only way to find the food court (verdict: overpriced, but if you can’t enjoy an incredible ten-dollar salad on honeymoon then when can you?). It’s the sort of place you could easily spend a week in, even if like me you find the history of man stuff more tedious than you ought to. It has dinosaurs! and a planetarium! Which I find myself returned to, giggling over the references, as I read my favourite fictional crime writer Richard Castle’s latest thriller which Jay buys me for the flight back to a Glasgow that feels a little less like home.

dylan's candy bar

I still deserve to spend the evening shopping for sweeties and Sephora though.

excerpts from a travel journal: we’re burning up the bowery;

Published on August 3, 2010 in travellin'. 1 Comment Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , .

“So… when are we moving here?”

It’s funny. No, it’s not funny at all. But in recent years I have let myself become distracted from my original goal of moving to the City. I can’t bear to live another four years without this place. Yeah, sure it’s ridiculously hot in the summer and I’ll do unclassy things like flash my knickers like Marilyn Monroe walking over a subway grate; and I know it’s not as simple as I spend every day here and I’ll never be miserable and I’ll always be inspired; but I don’t need to look any further to find that place Jesse Malin sings about where you’re safe to be more yourself than anywhere. I’ve found it.

And Jay gets it too. His legendary sense of direction has already memorised the grid, even as I want to turn in the wrong direction with a head full of certainties. Sure, he’s still got some things to learn, like the skeezy-looking guy is saying hi to the cute girl in the yellow dress and not you (maybe because she was flashing her knickers on a subway grate), but he’ll get there.

I brought four pairs of shoes for a five-night stay, which I was initially annoyed at myself for – this determination, you see, to never be one of those “shoe” girls – but something which has proven itself to be a blessing. Flat feet and a tendency to overheat make footwear a nightmare in the summer, particularly when walking the distances we have done, but this way I can trade off between cracked heels and aching knees. I kicked my sandals off at one point on the Brooklyn Bridge because I just couldn’t take anymore and my toes were raw and bleeding. In these temperatures, though, the pavements are more hospitable than the subway platforms.

that first new york cupcake

Our first full day we have lunch with my husband’s literary agent, which is the sort of statement Facebook was invented for, at a barbecue place called Hill Country. Texan barbecue is not real barbecue, my Southern friend Lilit reminds us later, but the place plays Ryan Adams and serves imported Coca-Cola with the real sugar we are used to and the food is mighty fine. We then sneak Lilit out of the office for a coffee at a little place two doors down from the Museum of Sex’s pretty window display of a basket of colourful dildos: we’re upstairs in a library with huge, comfy chairs and they’re advertising daily meditation sessions and a crossword club. There’s a Chinese girl with the latest issue of Cosmo, and Lilit borrows it to gleefully show me her article (she’s got a book coming out, you know, and it will be reviewed here about as soon as I can import a copy).

girl with a peach

The walking takes it out of us though. With our friend Josh we tramp around the East Village and then down into Williamsburg: a comic shop, frozen yoghurt, a slice of pizza, the Joe Strummer mural outside Jesse’s Niagara bar, a record shop full of dusty 7″s with a gorgeous cat sprawled lazily on the counter. I buy Best Coast and the reissued Sad Songs For Dirty Lovers record, something on Kill Rock Stars and a bowl made from a warped vinyl copy of The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan. Then there’s the Cake Shop: venue, record store, server of bacon-topped Elvis-themed cupcakes. It’s like somebody invaded my brain and live-streamed my vision of heaven.

a pilgrimage

burning on the bowery

It’s the hottest day so far and even though some brief, spitting rain provides temporary respite it only makes us feel stickier as our clothes dry into our skin. It means for the second night in a row we miss out on evening plans, preferring instead to hole up in our hotel room with the A/C up high, trying to figure out what it is about the only-very-intermittently funny 30 Rock that people keep raving about. Last night we ended up in the Hard Rock Cafe of all places before a midnight showing of Toy Story 3 because I slept through the gig we’d planned, drinking overpriced but oversized cocktails in souvenir glasses served by a waitress called Amber whose chest tattoos barely peeked through her shirt’s buttons; feeling for all the world like being married is the coolest thing in the world.

and i’ll dedicate this feeling to the ones in my life;

Published on July 5, 2010 in a little more personal and music. 6 Comments Tags: , , , , , , .

Certain songs get scratched into our shoulders, and certain songs get scratched into our souls. There’s no such thing as a glib one-liner in my life, even if the words spoken rarely correspond to the feelings they relate to. I’m still a “wee thinker”. Somebody told me once you get the bug after your first tattoo, but it took me four years of longing and planning before I settled on my cold rose and I didn’t think I’d feel that way again. There was this guy behind me in the queue when I went to make my appointment: how much for a tattoo? he asked. “What do you want?” came the reply. I dunno. I don’t understand that. Maybe it’s a… thing. You know what I’m getting at. Every scar, every ink spot, has to tell a story. I want to look at my markings in twenty years time, and I want to still understand. I want to bottle it up and tie it with a ribbon and a label saying 2010. I want every little moment to feel as good as it does right now.

Certain Songs… It’s a lyric of course, and a damn fine one at that. It’s a tribute to a band that exploded into my life one day and have continued to recapture that teenage feeling every day for as long as they’ve been in it. But it’s more than that. It’s a reminder about the songs that have kept you warm at night for a decade or more, and which continue to fill you with that heady rush of remembrance and longing every time you remember they are there. Jesse Malin’s The Fine Art of Self-Destruction is an album full of those songs; one which transports me to a rainy University Avenue or my mother’s living room or the New York subway. It’s one that, eight years later and me a few days from married, still vividly paints long-forgotten faces in every lyric.

allan fox

So, on the train to Edinburgh straight from work: it’s been a while, and I feel almost as if I have missed the city in which I used to exist if never actually lived. Early doors at the Cabaret Voltaire mean that I miss St Mark’s Social keyboard player Allan Fox’s solo set, but Claudia and Rachel are already in the venue and keeping me a space down the front. I make sure to be in plenty of time to see him the next night in Glasgow. His voice is smooth, soulful and polished and his playing is skillful, but his lyrics are angrier than the music gives them credit for. His slot only allows for four songs, but he assures us that he’ll be back before the end of the night.

the killing floor

I don’t know what to make of The Killing Floor when I see them first. Frontman Marco Argiro is all skinny jeans and sweat bands and rockstar posing and at first I giggle and wonder who he thinks he is, him and his band that have only been together for a few months after a chance meeting in Hendrix’s Electric Ladyland studios in New York. But then it dawns on me: you can get away with all of those things if you are mindfuckingly beautiful (sorry mum) and of course – if you have the tunes. I don’t even realise until the next day, when Claudia and I put their “limited edition” demo on as we get ready to go out for Round Two, but “Shout” in particular is a slice of perfect bass-heavy glam punk. Later that night I even sing along, before getting the band to sign my own copy of the CD.

jesse malin

But, beautiful boys aside, there is only one reason I’m on this intercity tour. It’s been far too long since Jesse Malin has graced a Scottish stage, and his Glasgow crowd in particular are pleased to have him back. King Tut’s shows almost seem like a homecoming for Malin, whose bar in New York once bore the same name. The St Mark’s Social are one of the strongest bands I have ever seen him play with, and they blaze through an incredible setlist which – although fairly similar both nights – runs the gamut of the singer’s entire solo career while incorporating covers from the Replacements and the Bad Brains.

Malin is one of those artists you have to see live. He’s engaging, funny, angry – and sweats more than any artist I have ever seen. Tracks from Love It To Life hold their own with such storming memory-makers as “Hotel Columbia” and “Wendy”; in particular album (and set) opener “Burning The Bowery” and the incredible “All The Way From Moscow”. Inspired, Malin tells us, by a long-distance breakup with a girl who shared his name, a support slot with gypsy punks Gogol Bordello and his discovery under the golden arches of McDonalds near Red Square that “we’re all the same, we all fall in love and we all get fucked over by corporations”, it’s the kind of song that makes me realise that I’m still devastated. But in the best possible way.

That night in Edinburgh, I ask Malin to play “TKO” – the song that inspired the title of this blog, and one I haven’t heard live since the night I changed its name. I’m half kidding, of course – there’s rarely much point to bellowing requests particularly when, as in this case, a relatively new band won’t have learned the words – but after complementing me on my new tattoo (“Certain Songs”, again) he says he’ll see what he can do. And since it’s not on the next night’s setlist, it’s the most incredible surprise when he breaks out the acoustic guitar and forgets the words before launching into my all-time favourite of his songs – and another oldie – “Downliner”.

Let me bottle that one up and label it 2010: the night one of my favourite artists went away and learned my song, just for me. And, thanks to my wonderful friend Murray and the sort of artists who don’t think show taping is killing music, I have the soundtrack to go with it. You can even hear me screaming down the front, if you know what you are listening for:

DOWNLOAD: Jesse Malin – “TKO/Downliner” [live at King Tut's, Glasgow, 1st July 2010]

and they sell it out to the girls like you;

Published on May 11, 2010 in a little more personal. 1 Comment Tags: , , .

Wedding Season starts on Saturday with the Blonde tying the knot in her native Oban, and T&J following suit the following week. Appropriate then that, when Saturday comes, Stringer and I only have ten weeks until we become… well, Mr Stringer and Ms Ferla reloaded, this time with Tory tax credits and immunity against testifying should the other ever be accused of a crime.

Do you know why it is that girls like me don’t get married? Pay a visit to Berketex Bridal, or indeed any similar blancmange factory, ideally on a Saturday afternoon like my sister and I did. It’s probably just me – I suspect I was at the back of the queue or had my headphones in when they were handing out that particular give-a-crap chromosome – but doe-eyed brides-to-be surrounded by clouds of fluffy ivory train leave me cold. Indeed, it’s fair to say they freak my out a little. Such princess dresses might be every little girls’ dream, but I felt as if I’d stumbled into an episode of Doctor Who. I wouldn’t have been surprised if each on cue had turned around and started shooting killer laser beams out of her nipples.

“Can you see yourself getting married in this one?” I heard a sales assistant coo. It would have been quite sweet if the next bride hadn’t been addressed with exactly the same inflection by the next sales assistant.

Saying that, I did almost well up when I saw how gorgeous my little sister slash Maid of Honour looked in the perfect bridesmaid gown. Perfect apart from the price, of course: “she wouldn’t let me see the label as she put it on me,” Cha hissed as soon as our guard’s back was turned. Strangely, not being allowed to take a photograph to help me make my decision given her co-anchor’s London location without being expected to fork over five hundred quid did not exactly fill me with the required warm fuzzies to place an order. If the Internet was good enough for me, then take me to those Chinese eBay outlets.

Just comparing dress shopping to my only other proper bridal experience – Bobby, Jules and I stuffing our faces with chocolates and champers while trying on pants in Boudiche – makes me glad to have a blog in which to whine about these things. Knickers to dresses, frankly.

i wanted a drink, i wanted a dance // i wanted to love you, i wanted a second chance;

Published on May 2, 2010 in music. 3 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , .

I meant to go out tonight, to the launch of eagleowl’s frankly stunning new EP, “Into The Fold”. Instead I curled up at home and made chili and watched this week’s Doctor Who and Ashes to Ashes. Sometimes you need Saturday nights like that. It shouldn’t put you off buying the EP, which you can preorder before its Monday release via Bandcamp.

I’m planning on getting along to the first Words Per Minute, my mate Kirstin’s new monthly spoken word/film/music event at Creation Studios tomorrow afternoon. There will be readings, and Miaoux Miaoux from last month’s mix is playing, so I’m looking forward to it.

So, blogging. I know a lot of people either don’t understand what it is that I do here or think that the whole medium is a waste of time, but I haven’t half had some great nights because of it – as well as meeting some of the best people I have ever met. And last night, what will hopefully be the first of many gigs promoted by my blog brothers Peenko and Aye Tunes was just one such night.

I was a bit late, as is my wont these days unfortunately, and so missed Campfires in Winter which is a shame as I think I still owe Bob a drink from Hinterland. Plus the other two bands on the bill were fantastic, and I was hearing them both live for the first time – there’s no reason to doubt the other wouldn’t have been the same.

300410 - Mitchell Museum
mitchell museum

So Mitchell Museum bounced onstage pretty soon after I wriggled to the front with the enthusiasm of wide-eyed puppydogs, and suddenly it’s all speed and mental and yelps and catchy choruses and awkward sentences like this that stumble through conjunction after conjunction and these giddy Casio samples that sound like they should be on the soundtrack to some low bitrate version of Super Mario Brothers. They play this ace song called “Tiger Heartbeat” or something like that, and then they play their debut single which is coming out on Electra French Records on the 14th of next month. That one is called “Warning Bells”, and it is almost as good.

kid canaveral
kid canaveral

And THEN, just when I think it isn’t going to get much better and I might want to sneak off early because I have work in the morning, I remember that actually I really liked this one Kid Canaveral song they gave away as a free download the other month enough to put it on a mix and, you know what? That isn’t anything like a fluke – Kid Canaveral can spit out shiny breakfast cereal pop nuggets like “Smash Hits” and new single “You Only Went Out To Get Drunk Last Night” they’re going out of fashion and I’m not just saying that because the song I loved before is called “Good Morning”. That said, with their catchy melodies and cute boy-girl harmonies they can tug on the heartstrings with the best of them: just listen to “Stretching The Line”‘s lovelorn tribute to the London to Glasgow train if you’ve ever been in a long-distance relationship – even if it only turned out to be for three months – and tell me I hope you’ll always keep my bed warm // and when you’re not I’ll keep it empty doesn’t bring a lump to your throat.

For the most part though, this set is sheer joyousness: ba ba ba and la la la and arms flailing, crazy dancing particularly from Lloyd and Jim themselves. If they’re a sweaty, drunken mess by the end (no change there then), it’s thoroughly deserved for a job well done.

I walked the full three miles home from work tonight, all the old favourites like “Constructive Summer” and “Hotel Columbia” playing in my ears, a spring in my step and full of the joys of summer and music and plans and friends. The end of June is shaping up to be incredible: in the space of a week I’ll be seeing the Hold Steady and the Gaslight Anthem, in London and Glasgow respectively, and potentially Jesse Malin twice if I decide to spring for the Edinburgh date too among his just-announced summer UK dates. In a way I wonder if the next six weeks are going to feel like a way of marking time but I always did have a problem with anticipating too hard – I’m starting to realise that the best times really are right now.

By the way, you can still become a fan on Facebook! :)

exerpts from a travel journal: if you liked it then you shoulda built a church on it;

Published on April 25, 2010 in photography and travellin'. 6 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , .

A wise woman once told me that joy is a gift from Jesus that cannot be lost, only relinquished. I would do well to listen to her, because we crammed so much into so few days that my enthusiasm started to wane towards the end of our Israeli adventure. There is so much beauty in these buildings: the gorgeous Church of the Annunciation in Nazareth; the flower-strewn basilica which commemorates the Transfiguration on Mount Tabor, with the grille at the entranceway under which people have pushed dollar bills and prayers scrawled on folded scraps of paper. But by the time we get to Cana I am so tired that it would have taken a miracle just to get me off the bus.

nazareth
church of annunciation

Once we drive to the Galilee we stay in a gorgeous hotel run as part of the Kibbutz Lavi. Breakfast is freshly squeezed grapefruit juice and pancakes hot from the griddle – I fall in love immediately. Lavi is one of the last truly “socialist” kibbutzes, where each gets according to his or her needs. It was founded in 1948 by young Jews who had escaped Nazi Germany as part of the kindertransport, and you wouldn’t know to look at the gorgeous rose gardens now but at the time it was nothing but bare rocks. The hard-working people of Lavi got lucky: the furniture they made for their synagogue because they couldn’t afford to buy in became a successful furniture business, and instead of a simple guesthouse a luxury hotel now provides their largest source of income. We got to tour the kibbutz one morning, and I was touched to hear that even the doctors and lawyers who go out to work contribute their earnings to the communal pot. As a way of life it sounds idyllic – but I suspect I’d miss the wifi as much as I’d love the socialist ideals.

120410 - Kibbutz Lavi
church of annunciation

Mount Tabor is, as Mike our tour guide explained to us, the “bellybutton” of the Galilee: the same word loosely translates as “centre” in Hebrew. On a clear day you can see three countries – Jordan, Syria and Lebanon – from the top and the beautiful grounds of the Church of the Transfiguration. We journey to the top in groups of six, bundled into kamikaze taxicabs which take the hairpin bends at a rate of knots. The journey back down was like a fairground ride, with whistling Salim our driver getting us to count one-two-three around the worst of the bends and stopping halfway down to let us lean out for photographs.

church of transfiguration

Our early morning wooden boat ride across the Sea of Galilee was one of my favourite moments of the trip. I may not like to be abandoned to float in water, but I sure do love to sail on it. Halfway across we cut the engines and sat as the sunlight dappled on waters that played such an important role in the early part of the gospels. It was tranquil, beautiful and pretty much blew my mind. Later we visited the biblical town of Capernaum, and I dipped my toes in the baptismal site on the River Jordan.

sea of galilee
sea of galilee

I couldn’t sleep that last night, which we spent in the shabby but charming little seaside town of Netanya. I ended up staying up to keep the night porter company; talking politics and our alternate careers in marketing, drinking tea with lemon instead of milk and smoking (him), watching Beatles videos on YouTube. His name was Leo and he used to work for an airline, which is useful because he seems to spend a lot of his time fling between his mother’s home in Israel and his own base in Paris. He insisted on calling me Lisa, which I didn’t mind as much as I do usually because he told me it was a beautiful name and he was very charming with it. And then I started to wonder if perhaps I could make Lisa my glamorous cosmopolitan traveling name for those late night conversations with strangers in hotel lobbies.

Regardless, it was nice to have a friend awake to say goodbye to me when we were ready to head back to Tel Aviv at 5am.

[A small postscript: I caught up with some of my traveling companions on Friday night. "Israel has changed me," one friend said, "I just haven't figured out how yet." She was completely right.

I'm still uploading photographs from the trip, but you can keep an eye out here.]

heaven is whatever;

Published on April 18, 2010 in a little more personal and music. 5 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , .

Still, I believe, four Israel related posts to come – but it’s been a good weekend, and I’m going back to work tomorrow for eight days out of the next nine, and I wanted to take a little break to celebrate it. Sorry Mummy :)

It started at Auntie M’s Cake Lounge, on the upper floor of the old deCourcey’s Arcade; fast becoming my favourite little shopping spot in Glasgow. Neil-bear and I had been foiled by illness in our quest to sample Auntie’s wares before I left for Jerusalem, but I’m happy to announce it was worth the wait. A perfect little space to finish up my travel journals, like sitting in somebody’s front room only back in the 1950s, and in the raspberry and white chocolate the most incredible cupcake I have experienced in Glasgow to date. And I have eaten a lot of cupcakes.

2010-04-16 at 13-46-28

Those first days of Glasgow sunshine, when it’s still pretty chilly but half the city runs outside in t-shirts and ice cream sales skyrocket anyway, are my favourite. It’s like we appreciate them all the more after a long winter and rainy spring. I met Miss America for a wander, and we sat in the Botanics for a while messing around with the camera and peoplewatching. There were the usual overaffectionate young couples and crowds of students, two pensioners in shorts with their shirts off and a scruffy-haired boy with a pile of books by the pond. “You’ve been here fer a while if you’ve read aw them!” somebody shouted. Ah, Glasgow.

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Credit to Miss America for the bottom photograph.

And then yesterday, of course, was Record Store Day so I got up early and planned to be at Monorail before opening hoping I could get my hands on one of the limited edition Hold Steady vinyl albums. However the queue was already halfway to the Note, and the guy two places in front of me was a lot luckier (as, unfortunately, was this chap). “Someone got in front of me at Avalanche, I know exactly how you feel right now,” he told me once I settled for the Bruce Springsteen single. All’s well that ends well though, because at least I got to go home and preorder my copy – even if it’s not the limited edition clear one.

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At least I got a cupcake. Although, Mono being Mono, it was a vegan one and made I think from flowers instead of flour.

You know what though? It was amazing to see my favourite record store so busy. I was evesdropping on the conversation the two guys behind me in the queue were having – basically one playing devil’s advocate, asking exactly what it was that labels get from bricks-and-mortar stores in an age when everything is accessible for cheaper online, and what sense of community do stores provide when we can trade recommendations on blogs and via Twitter. And I’ll tell you what it is: because had I managed to go home with that record tucked under my arm and if I had been able to play it that very afternoon, I would have been the happiest little girl in Glasgow. As it is, I’ll hope the planes start flying again so I can look forward to its arrival.

Which isn’t to say that there’s nothing to be gained from instantly accessible .mp3s downloads. “Ten Times”, the second single from the Kays Lavelle’s forthcoming Be Still This Gentle Morning, is out tomorrow from Wiseblood Industries – complete with a Japanese War Effort remix of the track. You can download it for free here.

exerpts from a travel journal: curiously literal, or the time i went to north berwick without the right notebook;

Published on March 28, 2010 in a little more personal and travellin'. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , .

Travel sickness medicine is one of those things that taste so vile that they remain permanently etched on your childhood consciousness, like that time I stuck a fork in a butter bean and a little bubble popped out. I think I only had it the once, as it was never something I really suffered from – only when I brought it upon myself by reading too much in the backseat of the car. You can quell the waves of nausea by looking out of the window – I think I read that somewhere, probably on a dual carriageway headed north at 65mph.

But this weekend I’ve been feeling pretty queasy. I’d like to think it’s the excitement of being on the move again, finally; but I’m pretty sure it’s because I told myself that Julie’s hen weekend was always going to prove a break from my Lenten pledges* and I’d already been to two different Starbucks by the time we boarded the Edinburgh train.

[*Incidentally, I've got less than a week of my forty days of water challenge so if you were of the inclination to sponsor me a little I would really appreciate it!]

North Berwick’s solitary platform was chilly when Bobby and I got off the train, and with our assortment of bags and bottles we were glad that Rachel had given us a local taxi number although we had been assured the cottage was only a ten minute walk or so. I dialled. An older woman picked up. The noise in the background sounded as if it was coming from a television set in somebody’s front room. “Hello?” she said suspiciously.

“Uh… is this the taxi?”

“It’s already booked tonight,” she snapped and put the phone down.

Luckily the girls at the cottage already had had a similar experience, and were expecting our calls for help. As we waited, a car decked with genuine L-plates pulled up and four skinny teenaged boys climbed out on their way to a night out in the city. We were reminded of William’s first Black Sabbath show in Almost Famous as somebody’s mother hugged goodbye and got into the driver’s seat. Bobby and I looked at each other, grinned and shared the same thought.

DON’T DO DRUGS!!!

The bite of the ocean in the air. Long walks on the beachfront. One shopping street stuffed with charity shops and curios, flanked with lanes with curiously literal names: Bank Street with a branch of Bank of Scotland on the corner, Abbey Road where the nunnery was. I’m sure I wouldn’t want to live there, but it was a lovely place to lose myself for a while. With everything in the gift and homeware shops so cheap and pretty it was a struggle to remind myself I don’t have the money to spend on those little treats anymore and I did come away with a new necklace. “You deserve it,” said Hayley – who I wish I saw more often because although she is Julie’s friend I have always been at least halfway in love with her – “you work hard at… being your own protagonist.”

The house was beautiful, a treasure trove of lovingly-assembled knick-knacks: a broken old radio, a gingham bedspread, a garden swing, a wooden plaque with the names of shipping forecast regions. It was the perfect location for a weekend of laughter, friendship and girlish fun – good food I wish I could have enjoyed more of, seventies wigs and the usual hen memorabilia. Last night we went down onto the beach and as sand crept into the gaps between my shoe straps and tights we tried to write our wishes to one of the best couples I have ever met on sky lanterns the wind wouldn’t let us set aloft. Later Jules and I danced and sang every word to We Are The Pipettes like it was still that night in 2006. And I thought about how, whatever else I may think I have lost or be struggling to find and whatever else has changed beyond recognition or refuses to do so, I am lucky to have filled my life with the most wonderful people I know will still be in it for the adventures that are to come.

To Julie and Allan, and roll on May!