CHANHASSEN:

One night in the Spring of 1990, I lay awake in my
room, a box decorated in chins, fly screen windows,
windows open, airless, listening to the approach of
another storm. Every week they tested the tornado sirens
on the edge of town, prairie country,the state of 10,000 lakes
on the banks of the Mississippi.
We were billeted in a one street town with a dinner theatre,
a bar, a parade of local shops, a half built hotel &
a drive-in bank. Every morning the cops would call in for coffee
& donuts rest up talking to the owner, monitoring their radios.
“Thunderheads are coming in” he said, looking like Kenny Rogers
as I slipped back to the chins room after breakfast.
That night, as I lay awake in my room, listening to the
approach of another storm I reached for my note book & wrote,
‘Thunder, Thunder, Lightning ahead’

(K)

VODKA GURU & THE SQUIRREL::

Whilst, in ’78, punk was still havin’ it, the guru had 
up-scaled through the sale of unfashionable records to
the large country pile, with oak filled parkland that we 
now found him residing in on the Welsh boarder. 
Offa’s Dyke formed part of his grounds & we laughed out loud  
turning up the long curving drive that lead up to the big house,
having never known someone so rich who would answer the phone 
to us.
“That god-awful Punk has put music back twenty years!”
He moaned, drinking Vodka from a cut glass goblet & taking 
pot-shots at the squirrels in his oaks as we pulled up 
in Ross’s old Hillman Avenger & parked in the the courtyard 
next to the stables.
The Guru was in today (or was he out?).

(K)

RESONATOR:

The Black guitar lived next to my bed, in the communal
family bedroom, resting it’s head against the wardrobe
that gave me nightmares & divided me from Mom & Dad.
Every morning as I slide out of bed the floorboards
would give a little, making the black guitar rub against
the wardrobe, acting like the body of a giant double
bass, the guitar strings gently resonating like an Aeolian
harp. Downstairs The music of Kitchen preparations would
be coming up the stairs underscored by BBC disc Jockeys,
but the sound of the gently resonating guitar was my
morning music.

(K)

BLACK GUITAR:

Four my seventh birthday I was given a Black Guitar,
a gift from a mate of dad’s who was in a band. It was
something of a revelation, as , Until this point, it hadn’t
occurred to me that people this side of the tele could be
in bands.

(K)

OLD FRED:

Old Fred lived with his dog on a farm alongside the
railway tracks, deep in the forest. He traveled in &
out along dirt tracks that lead to the back of the
council estate that overlooked the West side of town.
This was the 60’s, dynamic modern times, Pop art,
the Beatles, Mini Skirts, Mini-Mokes, the Prisoner,
Swinging London. Fred’s mode of transport was a horse
& cart, affording him the luxury of being able to fall
asleep at the wheel & arrive without incident – a dyed
in the wool outsider.
As kids we would pile onto the back of Jackie Bishop’s
trailer (Jackie had the farm in the forest clearing,
I loved listening to the sound of his generator late at
night & watch his house lights flicker through the trees)
he would pull us by tractor down to Fred’s, delivering
supplies in exchange for Cornflake tokens,
“Presents for the children”. As I remember his house,
how dark it was even in summer, I recall there being no
light switches, no electricity, not even a diesel generator
chugging away in the yard, every room light by a single oil
lamp hung from the rafters, his brown felt hat pulled down
around his ears like an upturned flowerpot even indoors.
he looked ancient, held together by bailing twine & heavy
tweed. I found a photograph of him, a cutting from the local
newspaper, in it he looks exactly as I remember him & no older
than forty.

(K)

A FEW THANK YOU’S:

Stepped out into a floodlit alley from a brutal room,
exposed pipe & duct, the heat of attentive eyes on
seated bodies, come to watch The Outer Edges.
What’s seen from the front never tells the story of
life behind the curtain, it’s the tip of an iceberg,
a life beyond the lime light. There are people who don’t
get praised, Whose faces no one notices or sees, loaders
of trucks who haul equipment out in the alley when everyone
has left, riggers, technicians, enablers, greasers of wheels
without whom there would be no show.
At best the night’s entertainment would be a pale shadow
So
to all the Outer Edges crew who worked for weeks to pull
it off, to the Film Festival team who’ve put years into
building the success they rightfully deserve, my sincerest
thanks – you gave us a platform to do our thing.
Thanks
to friends who brought enthusiasm, light & energy to a hot,
dark & airless night.
And
to my two dear companions Leo Abrahams & Peter Chilvers who
always play so beautifully – it is a privilege
to perform with you both & long may we run.

(K)