Three weeks ago I left my iPod on a train: it hasn’t turned up. So for three weeks I’ve been back in 2007, in the time before I carried my entire music collection and more besides around in my pocket. It’s shaken me a little from my well-established routines, but mostly not in a good way.
I’ve missed the times when I wake up early, and instead of getting up or trying in vain to go back to sleep, I listen to something quietly, warm, still in bed. I’ve missed having my iPod at the gym, where I could listen to whatever I liked, drowning out the noise of Kiss FM or The Hits! that inevitably seems to be blaring from the speakers. I’ve missed the serendipity of the Shuffle setting, when Bob Dylan can follow David Gray, or ELO precedes Boxer Rebellion.
Most of all, I’ve missed my favourite, regular podcasts; especially The Bugle, Filmspotting and This American Life. I’ve missed the introductory theme music to the first two, and Ira Glass’ laconic tones. They are my weekly routines, and with good reason. They are my friends, I trust them, I enjoy their company, I miss them when they’re not there. They accompany me to and from work every day.
One reason I’ve missed them so much is that, especially in the morning, the radio stations simply don’t cater for a 45 minute commute. The rolling news of BBC Radio 5 Live is just so much repetition and perilously close to the sort of What I Reckon phone-ins that inspired the title of my blog almost four years ago. Radio 4 features extended interviews with politicians that just make me cross, and after about 10 minutes I can’t listen to Chris Evans any more.
Nevertheless, a light in the darkness of most radio output is Simon Mayo. He has been one of my favourite radio presenters ever since the 1980s, when his personality and wit shone through despite some of the godawful trite pop he had to play on the Radio 1 playlist. His current drivetime show on Radio 2 carries on in much the same vein. He’s an excellent interviewer, he has a great team with whom he has a great rapport, and he is a terrific judge of people, able to speak warmly and freely with everyone.
I’ve also taken increased solace (at home – where we have digital radios) in The Joy of 6Music. Despite a voting mishap that led to Coldplay becoming its ‘best song of the last 10 years’ (don’t get me wrong, the Coldplay song is fine, but (a) 6Music simply don’t play Coldplay any more, and (b) it’s NOT the best song, not by a long shot…), this station is a music-lover’s paradise. Populated by presenters who really care and know about music, who aren’t afraid to declare their eccentricities or ‘uncool’ favourites, virtually every hour brings new treats and surprises. Of course there are things I don’t like, but almost everything is either new to me, or a long-lost gem I hear only rarely.
My last coping strategy has been the classical symphony. Sibelius has accompanied me in the car for the last few days, and it’s been an uninterrupted joy. The 5th Symphony, the violin concerto, Night Ride & Sunrise… all masterpieces of orchestration and control, of dynamics and tone.Having played several symphonies in orchestras over the years, I realise that generally it’s more fun to listen to than to play, as his compositions are often dense and abstract, richly layered constructions where ‘tunes’ are more like short motifs than anything you’d sing to yourself later. But they are wonderfully rewarding, and I love the way he writes for horns, with subtly shifting harmonies and chorales, and the triumphant call in the finale of that 5th symphony…
Sibelius’ music lifts my mood in a way few things can. I may well miss him while I catch up on my podcasts.
I was very lucky to see the Original Cast productions of the musical Les Misérables in both London and New York when I was still a teenager. The music and songs blew me away, I’d never seen anything quite this operatic, yet genuinely human and real. It was a mile away from remote, unintelligible operas with seemingly over-wrought acting from enormously healthy women playing apparently destitute women dying of consumption.
And so the musical rested in my subconscious for 26 years (ouch). I never saw it again, I never watched the anniversary concerts or bought the CDs. Every time I heard a song it resonated with me, like any other much-loved album or song from my youth just comes back to me, lyrics and tunes intact.
There has been an enormous amount of hype surrounding the new film production of Les Miz. Tom Hooper is fresh from his success with The King’s Speech and has an all-star cast to carry the songs. From the outset we were promised an intimacy and intensity of performance as he had used hand-held, extreme close-ups for most of the songs, as if we were almost sat on the stage/set with the performers.
Rachel and I went to the film with high expectations, me because I know the source material is pretty fantastic, Rachel because she has almost no knowledge of any of it, but has heard such strong recommendations from me about the music, and from others about the film. We were advised by many, many people to take plenty of tissues. I now seemingly have the ability to cry while watching Strictly Come Dancing or The Great British BakeOff, so knowing how much I love the music, I assumed that tears were inevitable.
So why, during, immediately afterwards and in the few days since we saw the film, were we largely unmoved? There were a few tears for me during Anne Hathaway’s amazing rendition of I Dreamed a Dream and her death scene, and again in the parallel scenes at the very end, but that’s all. Is this a problem of hyping up expectations, is it a failure of execution, an inherent problem with this musical?
I came to the film with lots of history, Rachel with none, but our reactions were pretty similar, which makes me Reckon it’s not the source material, but something about the film.
The adaptation is pretty faultless. There are additional transition scenes and titles to help explain the jumps in time and location that on stage are only really dramatised by a (nonetheless impressive) series of rotating sets. The locations are fantastic and there are wonderful examples of taking the single-stage enclosed feel of the musical into genuinely breathtaking moments, including the opening sequence in the docks, the truly nasty, grubby scenes in the alleyways and brothels of Montreuil, and the Parisian barricades. Hooper’s never afraid to let the camera swoop, even (or especially?) when characters are precariously positioned, like Javert singing to the Stars from a parapet.
I Reckon the choice to film all the key songs in close-up is inspired. It truly brings out the nuances in performance and can add levels of intensity that simply aren’t possible from 60 feet away in a theatre audience. This is especially true when the vocal performances can stand the scrutiny of the camera’s unblinking attention; which brings me to the very good and less good parts of the film…
Anne Hathaway has been rightly praised for her performance. Fantine is nailed-on Oscar-bait as a role, unremittingly tragic and almost entirely innocent, she only features for a few scenes in the very first act, and has two amazing songs, dies slowly and is physically humiliated in pretty much every way as she sells her hair, teeth and sex to send money for the care of her illegitimate daughter (who, tragedy upon tragedy, we later learn is being treated as a slave despite the money Fantine provides…). But to be fair to Anne Hathaway, she absolutely knocks her songs out of the park. She’s fantastic, a highlight of the film.
Just as good, if not better as he has more of a character arc, is Eddie Redmayne as Marius. I’ve previously been lukewarm to him, as he spent most of Birdsong wistfully or miserably staring into the middle-distance. Here he is a revelation, getting over not only Marius’ conflict between his aristocratic upbringing and revolutionary zeal, but also his romantic heroism and later guilt. Empty Chairs at Empty Tables was a brilliant scene here, a rare example of being than the stage version I remember. He has an amazing tenor voice that held up both in quite numbers like A Little Fall of Rain as well as the bigger choruses. I Reckon he deserves at least as much award-attention as Anne Hathaway.
Which brings me to the executional problems that make Les Miz less-than-overwhelming for me…
The comic-relief duo of Monsieur et Madame Thénardier, as played by Sacha Baron Cohen and Helena Bonham Carter, started off OK, but lost me by the end. They are important characters, as they link lots of the scenes together, and provide some relief within the gloom and despair of the Parisian poor. But their scenes focused so heavily on the visual that the performances were lost. Whirling cameras and intricate choreography crammed in so many comic moments that the brilliant lyrics of Master of the House were almost entirely lost, seemingly an afterthought to the visual trickery on display. The focus on their changing costumes and accents simply distracted, and by the end I was wishing they’d shut up. Pantomime caricatures, but not in a good way.
Russell Crowe has been pilloried for his apparent inability to sing. It’s not that he can’t sing, but that (in the wonderful words of a friend), never has a performance been so dedicated to mezzo-forte. Javert is implacable, monolithic, relentless and single-minded in his pursuit of The Law and his version of Order in the Universe, and Crowe more-than-manages that physically, but his voice simply can’t command the fear and presence Javert is supposed to have. His voice simply doesn’t quite get there, which contrasts clearly with many of the more supporting roles, especially Aaron Tveit as Enjolras and Samantha Barks as Eponine.
And here’s why I differ from many reviewers, in that I don’t think Hugh Jackman’s voice is all that. His performance in the central role of Jean Valjean was terrific. He looked awful as the bitter convict in the opening sequences, and his transformation to reformed citizen & mayor was fantastic. His emotional range was excellent, except his voice doesn’t quite manage with the very tough demands of the role, and especially not in extreme closeup. In the upper range (and there’s quite a bit of that), it loses the power and resonance it has wonderfully in the lower register. Sorry if this is being picky, but this is, you know, a musical, and his thin, full-throated vibrato really took me out of the songs in a way that the intimate camerawork was expressly designed not to.
This was most obvious in my favourite song in the whole story, Valjean’s desperate prayer for the life of Marius, Bring Him Home. After Fantine’s tragedy, this is the number that should bring the house down, to complete silence for the duration, and then in floods of tears afterwards. I was lucky to see Colm Wilkinson perform this. Sorry, Hugh, for all the extraordinary talents you do have, you’re no Colm Wilkinson.
The film of Les Misérables is by no means a failure. It has great spectacle and some fabulous moments, but its inconsistency is a major weakness. While the locations and settings are often wonderful, they do take you out of the immediate action in the way a single-stage doesn’t. There are no pauses between scenes like there can be on stage in a live performance, so it can feel like an onrushing treadmill, and despite the ambition to capture live performances, these don’t always work, sometimes with major consequences for the film.
I saw INXS in concert at Wembley Stadium in 1984. They weren’t famous in the UK at that time. They were the opening support act for my-then-favourite-band-ever, Queen, and they played half a dozen songs which I barely listened to, and they sounded awful. The stadium was barely 1/3 full, it was mid-afternoon, and noone cared. I’d be surprised if they’d had much chance to do a proper soundcheck. But they were definitely awful.
Just a few years later they had swept the world before them with their album Kick and its fantastic hit singles including Need You Tonight, Never Tear Us Apart, Mystify, New Sensation and Devil Inside. Yes, all those tracks are belters, but my favourite INXS album comes later. It’s more polarising even among fans, and I’ve recently revisited it, to find it’s even more impressive than that pop masterpiece.
Welcome to Wherever You Arewas released in 1992, when INXS’ popularity had already been on the wane for a couple of years. America had been taken over by the rise of grunge and alternative rock, U2 had ‘reinvented’ their sound with Achtung Baby, and INXS’ record label was sensing their light was fading.
Indeed, there’s a sense from the band that they were getting beyond the mega-stardom by the time of this album, as they never toured to support it, and hence its success was relatively modest. Nevertheless, I Reckon it’s pretty freakin’ fantastic, a collection of terrific songs from a group who knew what they were doing. This was billed as a(nother) attempt to strike a new direction, but IMHO it seems that, while there are interesting stylistic choices, its strengths are entirely drawn from everything that made INXS so successful in the first place.
The opening track, Questions, is an effective prologue: it starts as a definite statement of intent with what seems like a call to prayer and then the thrum of sitars. Indeed, it’s the first track (but not the last on the album) that reminds me of U2, but the U2-still-to-come; in this case the Moroccan influences on their most recent album. At the same time, there are vocal effects and electronic sounds throughout that struck me as being similar to Madonna’s Ray of Light album, still 6 years away.
For all its hints at a revolutionary sound, it leads again straight to U2 (Vertigo?), with the excellent Heaven Sent, a driving rock song, plain and simple.
Michael Hutchence continues his effects-laden imitations of Bono in Communication, a restless, shuffling track that features chord progressions that come right from Kick. The next song, Taste It, is properly old-school INXS (Need You Tonight?) and even features the saxophone so beloved of the 1980s…
Not Enough Time is a terrific track, starting with sultry bass and drum loops. Hutchence is intimate, even creepy, as he seduces the listener with promises of what he would do if only he had more time… before the song opens out with fabulous female backing vocals and anthemic keyboards, with the final refrain “Make time stop for the two of us…”
All Around and Baby Don’t Cry continue this anthemic phase of the album. The first is driven by another bass-led riff with guitar effects, the second features a full orchestra and brassy horn section, along with fully-fledged stadium rock chorus.
Beautiful Girl is from the same stable as The Rolling Stones’ She’s Like a Rainbow, with simple, plaintive piano, before morphing into an altogether darker feel of a girl “running from a bad home … from corner to corner” searching for security in the bright lights of the city.
Wishing Well, Back on Line and Strange Desire all lead towards the end of the album with further experiments, none of which stray too far from classic INXS; percussive guitars, shuffling rhythms, keyboard riffs, sax solos. And then the album closes with Men and Women. Low, clanging chords lie over an ominous, throbbing bass. Michael Hutchence whispers bleak, haunted lyrics. Dark orchestral chords accompany this complete change of mood, that speaks of betrayal and shame.
It’s the most surprising song on an album that sought to revolutionise INXS, but was ultimately an experiment that never got too far from their roots. But don’t for a moment believe that I don’t think it’s a terrific album, their best and my favourite.
The first time I saw Thom Yorke play was in a corridor in a Hall of Residence at Exeter University in 1988. He was strumming a guitar to something like a Beatles song, and other drunken students were singing along. Before last Monday, the last time I saw Radiohead was under a semi-tropical cloudburst in Oxford’s South Park in July 2001. It’s been too long.
I understand why people don’t like Radiohead. Their songs can be non-traditional at best, Thom Yorke’s vocal style isn’t easy on the ear, and their musical experimentation leaves many people cold. Not to mention that they’ve been accused of being the inspiration for bands like Coldplay and Muse, in which case they do have quite a bit to answer for.
I understand why people don’t like Radiohead, but after seeing them in concert last week, I’m more convinced than ever that those people are wrong. This was the most affecting and effective performance I’ve ever seen. Radiohead are like an arthouse film auteur in a morass of lowest-common-denominator blockbusters-by-numbers. Here are a few reasons why I Reckon they’re the best, most adventurous and interesting band around…
Nothing is like the album…
If you turn up to Radiohead and are disappointed by not hearing all your favourites exactly as they sound off the album, maybe you shouldn’t be going to see them in concert. You’re clearly missing the point. Go and see The Rolling Stones instead.
Intimate, shuffling tracks from The King of Limbs (like Bloom & Lotus Flower) become super-charged, blasting soundscapes with driving beats and amazing lighting colour palettes. Feral and Idiotèque always promised to be dynamic live songs, and now they become genuine explosions of energy, complete with strobe lighting in bright green and white, a wall of sound and bass reverb, smashing percussion, and Thom Yorke’s manic stream-of-consciousness vocals and dancing ‘like noone’s watching’. Good Morning Mr Magpie also transforms from a subtle, almost gentle song on TKOL into a furious, breakneck rage, full of clanging guitars, as though they’d switched on their ‘Spinal Tap’ amps and turned everything up to 11.
Alternatively, Like Spinning Plates (almost completely electronic whirring and beeps in the studio) becomes a showcase for Thom’s rolling piano arpeggi with a beautiful hymn-like quality set to warm red-orange lighting. In Give Up The Ghost, he layers up different vocal lines such that he’s singing a four-part chorale with himself. This is one of my highlights of the whole show, wonderfully intimate, simply gorgeous.
Rhythm & Percussion
I’ve always thought Philip Selway was the most under-rated member of Radiohead, especially as traditional drums took a backseat to programmed beats and electronica during Kid A/Amnesiac. His performances on In Rainbows are nothing short of miraculous, and increasingly rhythms are at the heart of everything that Radiohead do well. They now have a ‘permanent’ second drummer onstage, and indeed in some songs four members of the band were beating out repeated, shifting layers of rhythm and syncopation. The overhead video images stayed fixed on twitching drumsticks, focusing our attention on every rim shot, every ripple of the hi-hat cymbals.
“Are you lost yet…?! Good!”
Just over half way through the concert, after a couple of rarer tracks strong on pulsing electronica and hypnotic lighting effects, Thom pauses to ask the audience how they’re keeping up. Apparently Radiohead get criticised for not playing more of their singalong songs more often, which I Reckon is like complaining that JK Rowling should write more of those nice books about wizards. From my vantage point it did feel like many of the people down in the standing section weren’t exactly getting into the music. Were they waiting for Creep or High & Dry?
Radiohead have never made consecutive albums that sound alike (except perhaps Kid A and Amnesiac, compiled out of the same recording sessions). Their tours don’t present their ‘greatest hits’ so much as their current musical world and its interpretation of their entire catalogue.
On Monday night at the O2, the 24 songs were culled from six albums spanning 15 years, plus two tracks not on albums and two new songs. So far, so very much like most other bands’ setlists. But the Big Difference is the choice of songs; nothing from the anthemic, verse-and-chorus The Bends, and only Karma Police representing anything like a ‘normal’ song. Many choices are the more obtuse, awkward, even inaccessible tracks. Both the extraordinarily bass-heavy Myxamotosis and the ambient twinkling and inaudible lyrics of Kid A came in the first five songs.
Bringing the music to life
While the stage set up looks pretty simple, the performance and presentation of these 24 songs is outstanding. A screen wall behind the band rises almost the whole height of the cavernous O2 Arena and create dramatic backdrops. Above these is a row of crystal clear video ‘squares’ that holds images, often cropped, of the band members, or sometimes elaborates on the visual theme for the song.
Hanging above the band and in front of the wall are more of these video screens. These move around between songs to form sometimes a low, intimate ceiling, focusing our attention on the band, or at other times a more epic feel, a grander space. The 12 screens offer awkward angles, voyeuristic viewpoints and closeups of Thom’s face, over Jonny Greenwood’s shoulder, fragments of the band and their performance. They are compelling and brilliant.
Each song has its own very deliberate lighting and colour palette to accompany the new arrangements. The restless, relentless 5/4 pulse of 15 Step starts blue and becomes a shocking pink midway through. After Thom introduces The Daily Mail as a song about “a quality newspaper” the stage is washed in furious red. Climbing up the Walls is perhaps the most disturbing song on OK Computer, and is genuinely menacing onstage as the distorted guitars and wall of sound are complemented by visual distortion in a sickly green, which again seems to explode into bright orange. The patterns during the spectral The Gloaming are spiky and harsh, while Separator and These are my Twisted Words are pulsing, softer patterns in red and turquoise, which constantly swirl and twist, creating almost hallucinatory effects, and probably motion sickness in some people…
Only when Nude opens, around halfway through the concert, do the images become static, giving our eyes some relief. This song (one of my favourites from my favourite album) is amazing, layers of sound building and building, topped by Thom’s astonishing falsetto that breaks through and silences the whole arena…
You’ll go to Hell for what your dirty mind is thinking…
Building to a Climax
The show, full of eclectic song choices and unapologetically avoiding the so-called ‘Hits’ is beautifully plotted. I Reckon any long-term fanboy (or girl) will have loved what it represented; a genuine, open and honest picture of where Radiohead are right now. As the main set finishes in a manic explosion of Feral and Idiotèque, the first encores start with the throbbing, virtually arhythmic piano chords of Pyramid Song, with Jonny Greenwood playing a guitar like a cello. Then there’s a brand new song, Staircase… I’m not sure how many bands choose to play new songs in a concert encore?! This features kinetic bass and percussion, which only serves as a warm-up for the frantic, furious Good Morning Mr Magpie, and a breakneck version of Weird Fishes/Arpeggi, which leads into the wonderful Reckoner, lit with dazzling silvers and golds.
This is dedicated to all of you…
The final few songs completely blow me away: the haunting vocal layers of Give Up The Ghost give way to a truly awesome version of There There, and the evening finishes with Everything in its Right Place. This is the song that opened Kid A, the album that followed the monster OK Computer, and shocked pretty much everyone in its apparent demolition of everything Radiohead had been, with its near-absence of guitars, melodies & choruses. Live, it’s an exercise in distortion and displacement. Thom’s vocals loop and fragment as if the sound system is broken and gradually the band leave the stage until only whirring electronic effects remain. It’s a stunning, complex, perfect finale.
After 9 years of intelligent, sometimes word-y, always informed and witty, usually opinionated, eclectic writing, podcasting, live events, sponsorship of Latitude, The Word Magazine is to close. I subscribed for several of those years, and still enjoy the banter on their excellent podcasts, and have eagerly anticipated the weekly emails since one of the first I ever received introduced me to the brilliant work of Kutiman.
But such is the current state of things that passion, good writing, and all that are no longer enough. The Word Magazine has been like BBC 6 Music for me, a source of frequent surprise and joy when I discover something I never would have without it. When I subscribed the magazine came with a CD of 15 or 16 tracks by different artists, covering any number of genres and styles. Selected by the magazine staff, it wasn’t all to my taste, but there were often things that were ‘interesting’, and usually things I wanted to keep. Occasionally there were real gems that have found their way into my collection, prompted me to buy new albums and become part of our whole family’s music.
So instead of mourning its demise, I’d prefer to celebrate some of the music The Word has given me. I wish its staff & contributors all the best. I hope they can continue at least some presence in podcast, email or event form. There isn’t anything like The Word, so I’m not sure how it could be replaced. But for now, just a small selection of how its made my life just a little bit better…
Kings of Convenience – Peacetime Resistance
I knew of this great Scottish band a few years ago, but the one album I owned had been neglected on the CD shelves, until I was reminded of their superb loveliness in November 2009. One of our family’s favourite chill-out/fall asleep tracks. More songs should feature the viola.
The Boxer Rebellion – Flashing Red Light Means Go
This band have been a genuine discovery for me thanks to The Word in October 2009. I’ve seen them at an intimate gig in Bristol, and their albums are terrific. Highly Recommended.
Speech Debelle – The Key
The first time I heard this I fell in love with the eclectic instrumentation. To say it rewards repeated listening is a massive understatement.
Stanton Warriors – Bushido
I’d never normally come across this style of music on my usual radio stations. Big beats that remind me of Fat Boy Slim, but better. Hannah loves this, and asks for it as her music of choice when we’re in the car. I’ve loved using track from The Word’s CDs to expand her musical experiences.
El Mariachi Bronx – Slave Labour
Another eclectic song the like of which I almost exclusively encounter through the monthly CD. Wonderfully simple, with some terrific melodic hooks. I like it even more now I’ve seen this video of the excellent singer and the deadpan band.
C.W.Stoneking – Brave Son of America
I’m not sure how a 30-something Australian can (or would want to) sound like someone from Louisiana in the 1920s, but he does. He appeared on the podcast and was fantastic.
The Candle Thieves – The Sunshine Song
Another skittish, beautiful song I’d never have experienced but for the CD. I love the sentiment in the chorus
You know we can’t stay young forever, but we can stay young for the rest of our days.
Roddy Woomble – A New Day Has Begun
I’ve written before about the immediate effect this had on me when I first heard it. If I’m feeling less than positive, or overwhelmed by what I haven’t done, this lifts my spirits. Something else to thank The Word for…
I fear I’m well past the tipping point of being annoying or a stuck record about how much I love the staged musical version of Roald Dahl’s timeless story Matilda. We saw it at the RSC in Stratford last Christmas and it wowed me completely. Now it’s wowing the London theatre crowds, has already won some awards and is lined up to win many more.
We went to see it again last weekend, and if anything I enjoyed it even more. The breathtaking surprise and excitement was of course slightly changed, but the exhiliration, joy and range of emotional reactions were (if anything) even more intense. We bought the soundtrack CD, and have listened to it pretty much every day since. Even my favourite podcasts have taken second place.
It seems that my reactions to Tim Minchin’s amazing songs, combined with the memories of the performance, are unlike anything I’ve ever experienced. More than any film, this show triggers emotional responses in me: I laugh at Bertie Carvel’s astonishing Miss Trunchbull, I weep on cue to the opening bars of “When I Grow Up”, I try desperately to keep up with the wordplay in “The School Song” and “The Smell of Rebellion”. This reaction (I’d go again next week if I could) has been threatening to take over. I sing the songs out loud / under my breath at work.
Right now I can’t imagine not seeing it again, and it made me think last night that I would need to rewrite my entire selection for my Desert Island Discs… But I managed to extract myself from that thorny problem. Of course, I would make Matilda my luxury; a filmed version of the live performance with the original cast. This would make my life on the island much more bearable, as it would remind me of two of the best experiences I have had with my family, of the joy and innocence and wonder and naughtiness of being a child, of the importance of nurturing and inspiring children, and of the excitement and joy I share with my children as we all sing along to and re-enact the whole drama…
I’d love to post the whole show here, but as I’m urging you to see it, I am torn in not wanting to reveal spoilers, jokes and surprises. The opening song “Miracle” satirises the attitudes of many parents towards their own ‘miracle’ children, while at the same time wholly celebrating the wondrous miracle that life and children represent. And it throws us headlong into the intricate and brilliant wordplay of Tim Minchin and Roald Dahl, which keeps coming back, and is a constant source of pleasure throughout the show…
One can hardly move for beauty and brilliance these days,
It seems that there are millions of these one-in-a-millions these days.
“Specialness” seems de rigeur,
Above-average is average, go figeur.
Is it some modern miracle of calculus that such frequent miracles
don’t render each one unmiraculous?
Matilda’s first song is at once heart-rending and joyous. Despite the (mostly comic) horrors of her family life, she is defiant and positive…
We’re told we have to do what we’re told, but surely sometimes you have to be a little bit naughty…
And then we meet The Trunchbull, English Hammer-throwing Champion (1969).
If you want to throw the hammer for your country you have to stay inside the circle all the time.
And if you want to make the team, you don’t need happiness or self-esteem,
You just need to keep your feet inside the line.
Matilda’s parents are brilliantly realised by Josie Walker and Paul Kaye, who both get their own showpiece songs. Mrs Wormwood rebuffs the timid Miss Honey’s earnest intentions about Matilda’s academic talents…
What you know matters less than the volume with which what you don’t know’s expressed. Content has never been less important, so you have got to be LOUD … …it really doesn’t matter if you don’t know nowt, as long as you don’t know it with a bit of clout.
…while Mr Wormwood, in a terrific ‘interval announcement’, celebrates his much-loved “Telly” and rejects Matilda’s books…
Jane Austen, in the compostin’!
The heart of the musical for me is the start of the second half, with the beautiful “When I Grow Up”, whose simple melodies and gorgeous words are complemented by the children swinging across the stage and over the audience.
When I grow up I will eat sweets every day on the way to work and I will go to bed late every night. And I will wake up when the sun comes up and I will watch cartoons until my eyes go square And I won’t care ‘cos I’ll be all grown up.
...I will be strong enough to carry all the heavy things you have to haul around with you when you're a grown-up...
I’ll avoid most of the rest of the second half, as the action and surprises are too important to give away. But as it all builds towards a triumphant ending, the oppressed children revolt against The Trunchbull in a riotous finale…
We’ll find out where the chalk is stored and draw rude pictures on the board! It’s not insulting, we’re revolting!
I’ll try not to keep going on about how fabulous this show is. But I can scarcely remember having such a reaction to anything in a long, long time.
I’ve recently been working my way through the archives of BBC Radio 4′s seminal Desert Island Discs. When I started listening I was nervous it would involve a lot of well-off people talking about their comfortable lives (kind of like I’m about to). I like to think of myself as a bit of a ‘muso’, so I’m also very cautious about listening to people I might otherwise respect make musical choices of which I disapprove!
Luckily this only happens occasionally. Lawrence Dallaglio was a fabulous England rugby international and is a decent TV pundit now who has a very interesting and moving family history, but when he described how “this one will remind me of my mum Eileen”, my heart sank. But then I’ve listened to Cath Kidston talk with searing honesty about why she hadn’t ever had children, Martin Clunes about his childhood bed-wetting and Danny Baker about surviving cancer. This last week Mark Gatiss spoke beautifully about the loss of both his mother and sister in barely 18 months.
All of this prompted me to consider what I would choose… If I could only listen to 8 discs for the rest of my life, which would I choose? What aspects of my life do I want to remember in my isolated island paradise? After barely a few minutes thinking off the top of my head I had almost 20 titles written down. The idea of never hearing all of these again almost caused me physical pain. Narrowing this down to a favourite 8 seemed nigh-on impossible, like asking me to choose my favourite film.
But I have had a go.
Within hours of posting this post last week, I was plagued with doubts about my choices. New ideas sprang to mind, and one particular omission kept coming back to me. The truly difficult thing here is what to leave behind, not what to pick. I started thinking about spoken word pieces, like Eddie Izzard’s priceless ‘Death Star Canteen’. But in the end I have chosen to leave out the band who have influenced my music possibly more than anything.
When I was a child, the music in our house had two distinct flavours. Mum had a ‘pop’ sensibility, especially anything she could sing along to. I remember Ed Stewart and Alan Freeman on Radio 2 playing the hits of the 1960s and 1970s, and have an uncanny ability to remember the lyrics of songs I haven’t heard for decades. Dad has a large classical collection which only rarely got played, but he was also a Queen fan, which meant that I soon became a Queen fan, poring over the gatefold sleeves of A Night at The Opera and A Day at The Races. Queen weren’t like other pop bands. They looked weird, definitely not cool. Their music was weird too, wonderfully played and intensely complicated, layers of arrangements and vocal harmonies. Most of the time they rocked.
Queen were the reason I have liked ELO, heavy and prog-rock in various guises, the dense orchestral textures of symphonies, Muse and Radiohead (among others)… but they have no place on my island, because their influence is clear in many of these other tracks, and because I realised I needed a space for a track specifically dedicated to my two daughters.
1. Elizabeth Mitchell – You are my Sunshine
When Hannah was born, I already knew that I wanted her to enjoy singing, so I sang. Quite a bit. A common favourite was Stevie Wonder’s Isn’t She Lovely, and she had a cot-mobile that played this version of Brahms’ Lullaby, which was apparently meant to help her fall asleep, but I remember is sitting up with her for what felt like days, listening to this or humming it myself, willing her to succumb…
But we first heard this version of this song on a compilation CD by Putumayo World Music, which introduced us to all sorts of world music folk tunes and arrangements. These have proved wonderful lullabys for our girls, and they especially love this one. Whenever I listen to this one I will hear their voices singing it, and I shall probably be in floods of tears.
2. Led Zeppelin – Since I’ve Been Loving You
It was a relatively simple step into my teenage years from Queen to ‘proper’ heavy rock, but it wasn’t until I spent 6 months in the US that I discovered Led Zeppelin. I’ve written before about the majesty and musicianship in this; vocals, guitars, drums. It doesn’t get much better.
3. Mahler – Symphony No.2 “Resurrection”
My main ‘activity’ at university was playing in the orchestra. One day after my 23rd birthday, Wednesday 11th March 1992, was probably my finest hour. We tackled this massive work, I was playing 1st Horn and pretty much nailed it. It’s a genuine test of endurance with enormous climaxes but also sections of limpid beauty (like just after 2’00″ here). After 4½ movements and over an hour, the huge choir finally makes its entrance, astonishingly quietly…
…and then the final sections: after so much playing and concentration, these are an ordeal in themselves. But I will never forget that final chord and being overwhelmed by the cheers of our audience.
4. Deee-Lite – Groove is in the Heart
There were a huge number of what I think of as dancefloor classics from my time at university, from Primal Scream to The Happy Mondays to The Stone Roses. Mostly indie / guitar-based rock with extra bite, beats and groove. The wonderful exception to prove this rule for me is this infectious piece of kitsch, over-the-top, uplifting magic. This will never grow old. I would dance to this even if I could barely stand.
5. Debussy – Clair de Lune
Many of these choices are richly layered pieces. I can listen to the Mahler over and over for different parts, but this is a complete contrast. This will remind me of my wife Rachel: I’ve listened to her playing it for 20 years, and I wouldn’t want to stop now. I could lie on the beach, gaze at the moon and listen to this.
6. Saint-Saens – Symphony No.3 “Organ”
Another seriously big orchestral work that thrilled me when I was lucky enough to play it with an amateur orchestra from Cheltenham in a seriously large church in Cherbourg. The organ was mighty and we made a pretty fantastic sound. It is most famous for the final movement and the massive role of the organ, but the beautiful 2nd movement is the heart and soul for me.
7. Radiohead - Weird Fishes / Arpeggi
Radiohead are the antithesis of X-Factor-manufactured-pop bands. They seemingly don’t care whether their music has tunes, verses or choruses. I vaguely knew Thom Yorke in my first year at university, and I have a demo tape of On A Friday from 1989. Just when people started thinking of them as a coruscating guitar band, they went all trippy and electronic. This ethereal track seems perfect for swimming the reefs around my island, although I don’t have any intentions of being ‘picked over by the worms’…
8. Sinead O’Connor – In This Heart
We had this sung at our wedding – although we did alter some of the words to be less about loss and death! Another piece I could play at nights, when I’m about to sleep, to remind me of Rachel, Hannah and Ella. I’d probably weep buckets listening to many of these, but I suppose that would be a way of remembering how blessed I have been, that I’m alive, and that I still mean something.
As I said, there are many, many tracks that I’ve had to exclude. If Kirsty Young asked me to choose one from these, I’d probably pick the Led Zeppelin. My luxury would probably be a French Horn with a comprehensive collection of music – both solo music and orchestral parts, so I could recreate the symphonies at least in part.
For my book I’m torn between three.
A Suitable Boy (Vikram Seth). I read this in The Maldives, and as it’s 1400 pages it would offer great value for money
Cloud Atlas (David Mitchell). Possibly a bit bleak in its view of humanity, but the brilliant writing, rich texture and structure of six thematically linked novellas would again offer great repeat potential
The Road (Cormac McCarthy). The poetic beauty of the prose would give me endless pleasure to read it out loud to whatever animals might be around to listen, despite the terrors of the story. The Father-Son relationship is among the most amazing things in prose.
And so, dear readers, what do you think? What would you take?
There’s a lot of guff (and good stuff too) written about what makes the perfect pop song: the hook, the riff, the beat, the rhythm, the vocals, all of the above. Seemingly at random, a discussion started today at work about the best introduction to a song. And forgive the mashed up pun, but they really shouldn’t have got me started. It only took a few of us at work and via Facebook, and suggestions were flying in from all directions.
For that reason alone, this will be an imperfect selection, but these are some of the ideas that resonated with me and, for me at least, several themes or categories emerged pretty quickly. I’d love to hear about the glaring omissions I’ve made…
The Rockin’ Riff
This is full of examples, possibly starting with The Kinks and others, going through Heavy Rock Classics like Led Zeppelin and AC/DC, to include David Bowie, Oasis and many more. It’s a powerful statement about what’s to follow, smacking the listener in the head, a declaration of intent.
The L-o-n-g scene setter
U2 often make a habit of these, building up an atmosphere before launching into the song. The long introduction generates anticipation, often not hinting until the last seconds how the song will be constructed, so that when the themes emerge and the vocals start, we are eager to immerse ourselves in the song, like in this piece of brilliance by The Rolling Stones. Other examples come from funk and disco, like The Temptations ‘Papa was a rolling stone’, and my Guilty Pleasure…
The Very Brief, but Very Brilliant
Sometimes less is very definitely more. The two beats of Maggie May are simply brilliant. Fleetwood Mac’s Go Your Own Way similarly doesn’t bother with an introduction, simply a few muted strums before hurling us straight into the bitterness of the lyrics: Loving you wasn’t the right thing to do…The Beatles don’t even give us that with Help!. These are all seemingly sad, slightly bittersweet songs, and my chosen favourite certainly continues the theme. It’s the longest of these at nearly 9 seconds, but it’s definitely inspired by Maggie May…
The Soulful & Funky…
Stevie Wonder features strongly here, as does Michael Jackson. Curtis Mayfield’s blinding Move On Upis pretty much unmissable, and I’ve always loved loved loved this one. I’m probably committing all kinds of sins for not looking up James Brown, but a personal favourite introduction followed by just about a perfect song, comes from The Reverend Al Green…
The Big Piano Intro
These came back to me so thick and fast that they came to require their own category. For a starter…, and then apparently inspired by that killer introduction, this. As a Queen fan I shouldn’t ignore Freddie Mercury, but I am going to. On a similarly epic scale, The Boomtown Rats topped the UK charts for what seemed like months with this cheery piece of timeless pop about a classroom massacre…
As I admitted right at the start, I’ve omitted things like The Stone Roses, The Smiths, Madonna’s Ray of Light and countless others. I’d love to be held to account for my omissions. Please let me know your favourites, dear readers. But let me leave you with perhaps (at least for today) my true and actual favourite.
Nina Simone sings a capella, with a voice so rich and soulful it could melt ice at 100 yards. It’s absolutely perfect, every breath, every pause. It seems ever-so-slightly mournful, such that when she announces “…and I’m feelin’ good” we can scarcely believe her. We’ve barely an instant to reflect when in comes the band. The brass and bass belting out that descending motif, interspersed with rippling high-hat cymbals and shimmering repeated piano chords. It’s powerful yet fragile, and her voice is sublime.
I like to think I have reasonably wide-ranging musical tastes, if not particularly cutting-edge. In fact, I’ve rarely ever been anything close to cool. My first loves were perhaps Queen and ELO in the late 1970s, influenced by my Dad. As a teenager in the 1980s I seemed to like Heavy Rock like Led Zeppelin, Iron Maiden, Black Sabbath and AC/DC as well as things like Pink Floyd, Genesis and Rush. I never much liked The Smiths, and only belatedly discovered The Cure. The nearest I get to cool is that I was in the same Hall of Residence at university as Thom Yorke from Radiohead. And all the time I played French Horn, building my love of classical music from Bach to Mahler, Mozart to Gershwin.
In amongst all this I have barely a passing acquaintance with The Blues (Jimmy Page aside, more of which later). Perhaps more than any other genre, The Blues have an astonishing mythology and heritage, and indeed influence upon much of current popular music. But I was more simply inspired to write this piece today by a letter to The Word Magazine last month from Graham Jones, Proper Music Distribution Ltd. This made me laugh out loud more than once, and IMHO is perhaps the best letter ever… below are transcribed some edited highlights for your amusement.
WRITING AND SINGING THE BLUES – SOME GUIDELINES…
1. Most Blues begin, “Woke up this morning…”
2. “I got a good woman” is a bad way to begin The Blues, unless you stick something nasty in the next line like, “I got a good woman, with the meanest face in town.”
3. The Blues is simple. After you get the first line right, you repeat it. Then find something that rhymes – sort of. “I got a good woman, with the meanest face in town. Yes, I got a good woman, with the meanest face in town. Got teeth like Margaret Thatcher, and she weigh 500 pound.”
4. The Blues is not about choice. You stuck in a ditch, you stuck in a ditch. Ain’t no way out.
6. Teenagers can’t sing The Blues. They ain’t fixin’ to die yet. Adults sing The Blues. In Blues, “adulthood” means being old enough to get the electric chair if you shoot a man in Memphis.
8. A man with male pattern baldness ain’t The Blues. A woman with male pattern baldness is.Breaking your leg ‘cos you were skiing ain’t The Blues. Breaking your leg ‘cos a alligator be chompin’ on it is.
10. Good places for The Blues: the highway, the jailhouse, an empty bed, the bottom of a whisky glass.
11. Bad places for The Blues: Nordstrom’s, gallery openings, Ivy League institutions, golf courses.
13. You have a right to sing The Blues if: (a) you older than dirt, (b) you blind, (c) you shot a man in Memphis, (d) you can’t be satisfied.
14. You don’t have the right to sing The Blues if: (a) you have all your teeth, (b) you were once blind but now can see, (c) the man in Memphis lived, (d) you have a pension fund.
15. Blues is not a matter of colour. It’s a matter of bad luck. Tiger Woods cannot sing The Blues. Sonny Liston could.
19. If death occurs in a cheap motel or a shotgun shack, it’s a Blues death. Stabbed in the back by a jealous lover is another Blues way to die. So is the electric chair, substance abuse and dying lonely on a broke-down cot. You can’t have a Blues death if you die during a tennis match or while getting liposuction.
20. Blues names for women: (a) Sadie, (b) Big Mama, (c) Bessie, (d) Fat River Dumpling.
21. Blues names for men: (a) Joe, (b) Willie, (c) Little Willie, (d) Big Willie.
22. People with names like Michelle, Amber, Debbie and Heather cannot sing The Blues, no matter how many men they shoot in Memphis.
23. I don’t care how tragic your life: if you own even one computer you cannot sing The Blues.
Let me leave you with Led Zeppelin. They could apparently Play The Blues, despite being middle-class white boys from England. Perhaps they’re the exception that proves the rule.
As I mentioned a while ago, I play French Horn in the Stroud Symphony Orchestra, a happy group of amateur musicians who rehearse weekly and play 3 concerts a year. The immediate aftermath of our most recent concert, last weekend, prompted (almost compelled) me to write this post. The experience was almost overwhelming. We played Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto with a terrific young soloist, Emil Huckle-Gleve, whose confidence and fearlessness was astonishing to behold. We then tackled the majestic 5th Symphony of Jean Sibelius. This is one of the pieces I have longed to play since I was a teenager…
In many ways I owe a lot to my school music teacher, John Willson. When I was 12, he suggested to my parents that “Christopher seems to be interested in music, and has some aptitude, perhaps he would like to learn an instrument…”. Indeed, he indicated he had a ‘spare’ French Horn that I could ‘try, if I liked…’. So began my musical ‘career’, in which I’ve regularly played as part of an orchestra for most of the last 25 years.I met my wife in the Exeter University Symphony Orchestra, and have lifelong friends from that same unruly mob of students!
I achieved Grade 7 in my late teens, but finished school too late to ever try for Grade 8. I haven’t had any lessons since leaving school, and am well aware of my technical limitations. I can get by in most amateur orchestras, and often relish the challenge of more demanding parts, as they force me to practise more regularly and indeed ‘properly’. Strangely, practising tends to make me a better player…
Playing in an orchestra is an immense privilege. I love playing the French Horn, and genuinely wouldn’t want to play anything else. It’s uplifting and moving in so many ways, the collective playing experience, the mutual respect for the talents of others, the relationships within a section, between sections, and between players and orchestra. Perhaps most of all, I can have strong physical and emotional reactions to music, especially when I’m helping to create the soundscape and it is developing around me.
I’m biased towards the ‘bigger’ orchestral pieces. There’s not a lot like a meaty symphony to stimulate body, mind and soul. I love the complexities, the layers of orchestration, the shifting harmonies and melodic invention.
I love the thrill as the brass really go for it and belt out a chorale or fanfare, like this one: 20 (unamplified) musicians filling The Royal Albert Hall. Forget Phil Spector’s produced ‘wall of sound‘, this is the real thing.
Some composers write cracking symphonies for huge orchestral forces, which can be exhausting and exhilirating to play. While it’s by no means my favourite piece, I was left literally breathless at the end of Mahler’s First Symphony. More than an hour long, it’s intensely demanding for every section of the orchestra. It ends in typically bombastic fashion, with tunes bouncing around all over the orchestra. Every instrument is playing hell-for-leather, everyone is exhausted, lips are at melting point, fingers and wrists aching, lungs burning. And then in an act of lunatic stagecraft, the composer notes in the score that the Horns should stand up, so as to rise above the rest of music. It’s adrenaline-pumping like few things I’ve experienced.
(this is quite a long clip which I really recommend for the full experience, but the climax kicks in at around 10 mins…)
It’s not all ear-bursting stuff though. This is another reason I love playing the Horn. I’ve never played this one outside of my own practice room though…
And then there are the parts I’ll probably never play, mostly because I don’t have the time for lessons, reconstructing my technique, the required hours of practice, or indeed the natural ability. But I can still bask in the amazing glow that such music offers me.
To aficionados out there, I realise I’ve selected a very partial set of clips and excerpts here that don’t even do justice to my full experience of playing music in an orchestra. They’re the ones that come to my mind. I would love to get other suggestions and recommendations. Thanks.
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