THE STREETS ARE ALIVE!:

A day that didn’t stick to the schedule, a day made of randoms &
recognised opportunities – travelling different roads.
It started in the fields of  South Essex, a train, a tube, a phone call on
a street corner in NottingHill. An after party woman loading boxed
wine glasses into a hybrid car watched by a kindly grey gentleman
as three men stood close, negotiating the price of  a tiny piece of
real-estate. A phone call received, a forgotten promise that generated
stress & self loathing, waves you could feel across a small room growing
pastel Mondrian shelving. Tangled wires & rhythms.

There was obvious enthusiasm for staying right there & making music.
Maybe it was foolish, but a door opened with a path on the other side,
a suggestion there was something not to be missed, a suggestion was made,
a fuse was lit, a phone call made, a plan was changed. A tube ride with
a borrowed guitar, no longer inconspicuous in the street. A man in a red cap
provoking glances (surely it couldn’t be ‘him’ riding down here with the rest
of us?). A speed drawing on a cellphone in a crowded carriage.

Stepping out of an unfamiliar underground station, new marks on the walls,
new cracks in strange rhythms. Fresh combinations of images & words,
posters advertising stuff we don’t have in Essex. Crossing to another culture,
community, the way people walk in the street – It was vibrant, stimulating.
We we greeted with hand shakes though we were strangers, greeted with smiles like neighbours. Feasted on Jerk Chicken, red beans, rice & salad, sat down at tables made from logs to create titles of unwritten songs from the names of shops under a large loud flat screen tv. You turned the sound down to let us think, I noted how you took control over the room, a soap opera on a loop screwed  high into a fake wood wall. Fabulous posters of uncelebrated legends, churches, congregations gathered on pavements, fabulous vegetables & fruit with the dirt still on. Fresh things in unfamiliar natural forms, the world outside of  GM luxury styling.

The names of small shops & family businesses, all full of shoppers queueing
to buy. Through metal gates we were led into a small windowless room
that used to be a take-away & behind metal shutters we found drum & bass
& mint tea.

For the rain today I think Jaessica Slighter’s album, ‘Fear and the Framing‘

(K)

STANDING ON THE VERGE OF ABSTRACTION:

The morning greets in cool greys & pinks – a temperature so mild
that outdoors is the new ‘indoors’. On waking, the first thing you said was,
“It makes me want to walk & walk…no talking, just walking with you”.
Every morning, I look out the window to where there’s a place on
the other side of the hill. It’s full of ink & etching plates & calls to me,
wrapped in Brutalist Architecture, dug deep into the mud of Southern Essex.
White walls smeared with colours in my imagination, artisans dressed in
spattered aprons. Inspiration fuelled by the aroma of of indelible solutions
& store rooms stacked with acid free papers. The underscore today is
‘Salmesykkel’ by Moskus, suits my restless joy.

(K)

A DANCE IN FOOTSE:

The sun came dancing over the horizon in pinks, golds & purple-grey’s.
The dirt clung to the soles of our shoes in orange clumps making succulent
rhythms as we walked. ‘Smalhans’ by Lindstrom was playing on a lap top
in the kitchen & the skin on our faces stretched tight as drum as we came
to shelter from a chill wind.

(K)

SOUTHERN CROSS:

A beautiful day in the fields under skies almost as big as Texas. New friends
meet to listen to new things, hit things, eat things. New friends drive from
Brixton to Essex, like a memory of a sleepless driver at the wheel of a new
Mercedes, doing pick-ups at 3:00am, navigating with two conflicting
sat-navs. Today birds hover over long grass turning rich shades of grey
like a camel’s pelt blowing in a chill breeze that lifts the spirit. I want
to sing & show you how I feel.

(K)

CROSSING THE OCEAN TO VILLA PARK:

It was Fish n Chips all round, the night before we went down to the quay
to wave Shady’s ship off. The morning was clear as crystal, sharp as a pin
& freezing. Men tipped their hats as we passed & we made note of their
names. Shadows lined the road, standing to attention as is customary
for a man who lived with honour & earned the right to sail a ship reserved
for only the finest.

(K)

THE GHOST OF YOU:

I found you smiling back at me like a benevolent Halloween
pumpkinhead. I woke at 4:00am & wrote a long letter to you.
It’s how I love you best, you look good too me when I’m sitting
in a favourite room to the far north of Essex. I’ve seen this view
a million times, but it’s more beautiful this morning that I remember.
A tiny piece of the world & all it’s children illuminated by golden rays.
A crystal clear sky above our heads & the frost crunching beneath our feet.
Perfect weather for capturing the rich black of long winter shadows.

(K)

WE MET ON A TRAIN:

Rain & long distance driving – what a winning combination for a thrill.
Will we get there? Where is ‘there’? Whose driving? Who are we?

(K)

COMMUNITY:

Sending goodvibes to friends in New York. People working together for one another.

(K)

TODAY:

Fuelled on fast coffee & loud Brahms, writing floods of words & rehearsing
in a room filled with plastic flowers.

(K)

HELLO WEEN:

Last night the streets erupted with dunk zombies & devils, Jocks in dresses
with death clown faces herding girls with legs up to the limits of imagination
down roads strewn with broken glass. Queueing in shirt sleeves, three deep,
in a freezing wind. Dazed & tired eyes, but hanging on, expectant of something
amazing. The bones of legend are exposed, damp scattered between
closing time & the Garden of Earthly delights.

(K)