Tag: london

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Christmas thoughts

Christmas eve was lovely – midnight mass at St Luke’s. Church is v. important round here at Christmas. Mainly because, underneath all the debt, divorce, drink driving and mindless consumerism, Christmas is a celebration of God becoming human (well, at least it has been since we hijacked it from the pagans…) – the idea of the incarnation, the unknowable God making herself known, being born in a shed and spending his first few years alive as an asylum seeking refugee, is the pivotal point of the Christian story, the point at which an impersonal transcendent God became immanent, lived on the planet and demonstrated a radical alternative to human self-centred destructive living. It all began with ‘peace on earth, goodwill to all men’, and continued when Jesus started his ‘ministry’ by claiming the words of Isaiah as his own ‘I’ve come to bring good news for poor people, fix the broken hearted, give sight to the blind and tell you that God’s on your side today’.

Jesus’ birth contradicted everything that people thought about the idea of the coming messiah. It was weak, he was exiled, he wasn’t royal he was a tradesman and the son of a tradesman. If he’d been born in London now he’d be a refugee, a builder from Albania or Iraq. He didn’t come to set up an army, but to demonstrate that love conquers all. That God is love, and when we are motivated by that love, good things happen – the meek inherit the earth, the kingdom of God is there for the poor, peacemakers and prisoners of conscience are blessed, even in the midst of that persecution. It’s a crazy vision of ‘the kingdom’ and one that has sadly got lost in favour of ‘blessed are the mad power-crazed PNAC jihadists, for theirs shall be the White House’.

Which is why I celebrate Christmas – a reminder that Jesus turned all that on its head, said the last shall be first and the first, last. Said that God was bodily present in the homeless and if you help them, you help God, and if you don’t, please don’t try and tell her how holy you are. It’s a story about changed priorities, a story about Jubliee, about God being on the side of the downtrodden.

For the poor, Christmas is about hope. For Christians, it ought to be a wake-up call, a challenge and an inspiration. It is for me.

Soundtrack – Kate Bush, ‘Aerial’ (I bought this for TSP for Christmas, and it’s magic)

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Best Christmas records….

Robert Elms phone-in this morning on BBC London was top three christmas records. So I texted mine in which are –

1 – Cry Of A Tiny Babe by Bruce Cockburn
2 – River by Joni Mitchell
3 – Fairytale Of New York by The Pogues and Kirsty McCall (not the dreadful new version with Katie Melua which is only available as a download, the original which has just been re-released for a fantastic cause – – the Justice For Kirsty campaign)

there you go – post your top three in the comments.

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art vs totalitarian religion

I’ve just been listening to a fascinating interview with comedian Stewart Lee, on BBC Radio London – Stuart is the writer of Jerry Springer The Opera, a stage show that had a hugely successful run in the west end and then became the biggest watched opera or music in the BBC’s history when it was shown on TV. It also racked up 67,000 complaints from lots of people who hadn’t seen it and probably wouldn’t have understood it if they had.

The controversy arose from the supposed depiction of Jesus in the show – Jesus being a guest on the Springer Show, dressed as a baby. So the show was accused by a few people of blasphemy, and as the church loves a good scandal, an email campaign was started which lead to tens of thousands of complaints to the beeb and threats to the writers and members of the cast (oh yes, how marvelously Christ-like).

Anyway, Stuart on the radio made a very apposite observation, the the effect that ‘Good art is about questioning everything and then leaving those questions open to the interpretation of the audience. Bad or repressive religion is about absolutes and certainties’.

Which is true – I’ve been around a few repressive religious scenarios where questions and doubting were seen as dissent of the worst kind, and blind faith was encouraged. If you’ve got a question, just ask the leaders and believe their response, however bizarre it may be.

Conversely, I’ve also been around a lot of good people of faith, people who see the life of faith as a journey not a destination, one on which we have to constantly reassess our take on things, to question everything, to leave ourselves open to questioning and scrutiny, and keep searching, open to the possibility that we might be wrong. And I’ve met people like that from a whole range of faith traditions, be they christian, jewish, muslim, hindu, buddhist or agnostic/athiest. Whatever it is that you place your faith in has to be tested and questioned.

Which is where art like Jerry Springer The Opera comes in – satire is a very powerful tool in asking questions, a great way to expose elements of belief systems that require exposing, and should be a debate starter not a debate crusher. One of my favourites of late is the Church Of The Flying Spaghetti Monster – a spoof religion set up to counter the decision of the Kansas School Board’s decision to teach 7 day creationism as the alternative to Darwinian evolution. It’s hilarious, both as a pastiche of religions in general, and in its treatment of its main target.

The problem, of course, is that you end up in a situation where the two camps are polarised and the more mystical middle ground is ignored – either you believe that the world is 4000 years old, and God is the supreme bull-shitter who made the world look like it was a lot older just so he could send a load of people to hell, or you reject any notion of there being a creator who was involved in the development of the universe. The evidence for evolution in the trad darwinian sense does have a few gaps in it, but is nowhere near as impossible to grasp as the notion that the world was made 4000 years ago! But neither are where my head is at. I don’t see Genesis 1 and 2 as supporting a literalist interpretation of the jewish creation myth, but neither do I think that all of this could happen by accident.

Ultimately, if your faith in either god or there being no god is reliant on the veracity of the jewish creation myth, you really need to get out more…

Anyway, back to Springer the Opera… So they are off on tour – I’m told the show isn’t actually all that good, but I still really want to see it to support people who are asking questions, to have my own faith challenged and see where the answers sit. I missed the west end run, sadly, but will see what I can do to get to the stage show. And if I’m offended, so be it – it does us good once in a while to have our sensibilities scandalised. I can’t quite imagine what could be in it that would offend me though…

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the Vortex

Been spending far too much time at The New Vortex this last couple of weeks – last week I was there for Dudley Philips album launch gig, then Tuesday I went to see Lleuwen Steffan and her band. Last night was the Works.

Lleuwen is the singer on that welsh hymns album I was raving about last week – still getting lots of airplay here, definitely in my top 5 of the year. The gig on Tuesday was with her band, Acoustique, which featured, unbenownst to me until I got there, my buddy Owen Lloyd Evans on bass. Their set didn’t feature any of the hymn tunes, but did have a lot of originals, sung in Welsh that sounded a bit like a more funky, acoustic Bjork. Lovely stuff. They did a couple of standards, which were fine, but it was the welsh language stuff that really shone. Definitely one to look out for and see if you can.

the Works, formerly known as WoodWorks, is Patrick Wood’s marvellous band – Patrick is surprisingly little-known on the London jazz scene, despite his band acting as breeding ground for so many great musicians in the city – the list of who’s been in the band at one time or another is nuts, from John Etheridge to Andy Gangadeen, Cleveland Watkiss to Tony Remy.

The current line-up is Patrick on keys and guitar, Mark Lockheart on saxes and bass clarinet, Neville Malcom on bass and Nic France on drums. The tunes are lovely open forms that the band jam on and stretch out live – lots of eye contact and hardcore listening going on. The small audience were much appreciative, and hopefully they’ll be playing again soon so you can go see them too!

Both these gigs are yet more evidence that the London jazz scene is producing music of a quality to rival any jazz city on the planet. the Vortex is such a vital venue, and after the sadness of the original vortex closing, it’s great to have it back with the same eclectic booking policy in a great new venue in Stoke Newington. check out their online programme on the website and go see some stuff there!

I’ll almost certainly be back there tonight for Ingrid Laubrook’s quartet, featuring the marvellous Seb Rochford on drums.

And keep an eye out for Theo and I playing there in February.

Plan for today – some teaching this morning, Theo round this afternoon to plan our february tour promotion etc. Some bass practice/R&D for the album after that, and then to see Ingrid play tonight.

Soundtrack – The Pixies, ‘Bossanova’.

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Britain – fighting valiantly against totalitarian states

So, we invaded Iraq because Saddam was an evil dictator, who tortured people and took away the freedoms of the people of Iraq. We’re told the terrorists ‘hate our freedoms’ or whatever bollocks excuse it is this week.

And then this – Maya Evans was arrested and received a criminal conviction for standing outside Downing Street and reading aloud the names of the 97 British soldiers who have died in the Iraq conflict. Yup, it’s now an offense to remind the government of who their policies have killed. I wonder what would have happened if she’d started reading the names of Iraqi civilians killed – perhaps the fact that she knew their names would single her out as a terrorist sympathiser and she’d have been shot. It’s quite clear that the government don’t know anything about the numbers of civilians killed, and nor do they show any signs of caring.

The law under which Maya was convicted is Section 132 of Blair’s shiny new ‘Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005’ – which prohibits any kind of protest within one mile of westminster.

OK, so we used to be a democracy. Surely in a democratic country, the right to dissent has to be upheld above just about anything else. The right to voice your protest at the behaviour of your ELECTED officials. Now, it’s illegal to stand out side parliment and say you disagree with the decisions being made inside.

On BBC radio London this morning, a guy from the people’s picnic – a weekly protest in parliament square told the story of a guy arrested for eating a cake with ‘freedom of speech’ written on it – this was an act of protest within one mile of westminster, and he was thus nicked. It was thrown out of court, but he still has a criminal record and DNA/photos/scary stuff was recorded.

This is insane, peoples. How the hell did we end up in this mess? How can the government seriously be considering whether evidence gathered under torture is admissable in court here when we claim to have invaded iraq over saddam’s use of torture!!! How can we be pretending to oppose totalitarian regimes when we arrest people for eating seditious food stuffs near Westminster.

We’re screwed. again.

but for now, Maya Evans, I salute you.

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We're screwed

I’ve just been reading a couple of incredibly depressing articles on George Monbiot’s website. The tragedy of them is that, he’s not being melodramatic at all, just telling it like it is.

The two articles are on the whole area of climate change, fossil fuels and alternatives – the first is his speech to the climate change march in London last Saturday and the other is from yesterday’s Guardian.

Simply put, if we keep consuming energy at the rate we’re going, we’re screwed. the planet is screwed. Those of us in the wealthy 3rd will stay un-screwed for a bit longer than those we’re working hardest to destroy, but long-term we won’t fare much better. and it’s not just a matter of finding energy alternatives. We need to use less, consume less, travel less. It’s not nice, it’s not easy, it doesn’t make life more fun, but there really doesn’t seem to be much of an alternative.

the biggie for me is air-travel. As a travelling musician, I fly a fair bit. I’m off to California in January to the NAMM show. I’m part of the problem, not part of the solution. I’ve booked the flight, and can’t really get out of it (cheap ticket ‘n’ all that), but I’m going to have to rethink my travel plans in the future, decide whether I can justify any air-travel. Is it ever legit to fly? Questions, questions. I think it’ll take me a while to come to some decisions.

Fortunately, I’m not alone in pondering this stuff – generous.org.uk is home to the ‘year of living generously’ – effectively a support group for people who want to make a difference. there are tips on ways of living generously, from using less energy to giving more time and resources to others. Travelling less to composting your vegetable peelings. And it’s normal people, not just eco-warriors. There’s no brow-beating, no hectoring, just a lot of people who are quite a way ahead of me on many of these things. People I can be inspired by, and maybe inspire a bit in return. That’s the plan. I’ve signed up, you should too!

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Radio Days

For the second (I think) time in my life, I just phoned a radio phone-in show. The story in question is the marvellous news that finally gay couples can have civil unions in registry offices, giving them most of the same rights as married straight couples.

The phone in, on Vanessa Feltz’ show on BBC Radio London was being populated by gay couples delighted at their new found freedom, and bile-ridden hate-filled so-called-christians railing against the evil abomination that they see homosexuality as being.

So, as a christian who a) sees no problem in permanent stable faithful gay relationships and b) recognises that this is fundamentally a human rights issue NOT a theological one, I felt ours was a voice not being heard. So I rang in and had a lovely chat with Vanessa, touching on the ambiguity surrounding the various interpretations of the biblical stuff about homosexuality, the dangers of applying post-enlightenment rationale to a pre-rational text (thankyou Middleton and Walsh!) and the need to uphold the right of self-determination to people with regards to their property after they die.

Anyway, the phone-call was fun, but the change in the law is a fantastic step forward for anyone looking to uphold human rights. It’s decades overdue, and has until today been a blot on British law. Thank God that we’ve now grown up, moved on, and recognised the human rights of gay couples who want to be recognised in law.

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Credit where it's due…

Tonight was the Doug Wimbish gig at the Bass Centre – Doug always puts on a great show, and tonight was no different. He was in town for the launch of the new Trace Elliot range – Trace, now owned by Peavey (after having been run into the ground by Gibson), have redesigned and relaunched their stuff, which was sounding mighty fine.

Anyway, the amazing thing about tonight was realising how much I’d nicked from Doug the first time I saw him give a clinic, back in the mid-90s. That was at the old Bass Centre in Wapping, and he and Keith LeBlanc played to a packed room. Hearing him again today, using loads of tricks and techniques that are now a firm part of my musical arsenal, reminded me just how pivotal that first clinic was in me getting my sound together.

Which is why the Bass Centre putting on these clinics is such a fantastic addition to bass life in London – if you’re a bassist in London and you’re not yet going to these, YOU’RE MISSING OUT! These are free events, put on by the shop, where we get to see up close what these amazing musicians do, and then ask them questions about it. It doesn’t get much better than that, and there are few good reasons for not being there. That the building isn’t rammed to the ceiling with music students amazes me.

anyway, it was a good crowd, Doug played his arse off, and everyone went away happy.

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Dudley Philips at the Vortex last night

Yesterday day time was spent finishing off the mastering of Julie McKee’s live album from the Edinburgh Festival. Julie’s a fabulous singer – we’ve been working on some duet ideas between doing the mastering, the latest of which is to do the entire soundtrack to ‘Bugsy Malone’…! the mastering went pretty well, considering the source material. Sadly, the guy who recorded it didn’t send the multitrack sessions, just his own mixdown, so we were limited in terms of what we could do, but some compression, stereo expansion, judicious reverb and the tidying up of the bits where the recording had clipped have made it just fine. We compared it to a few other live recordings, from Donny Hathaway’s live album to my first album, and it stands up well, despite the odd pop ‘n’ crackle. Anyway, isn’t that what live albums are all about? There’s squealing feedback in the middle of Bob Marley’s live version of ‘No Woman No Cry’ and that was released as single!

Anyway, that was the daytime. Yesterday evening involved a trip down to The New Vortex in Stoke Newington to see Dudley Philips launch his album Life Without Trousers. I’ve had a copy of the album for a few weeks, and am loving it, so was excited to go and see the gig. The place was pleasingly full, lots of musicians in – Julie McKee, Orphy Robinson, Filomena Campus, John Parricelli and others, as well as friends of Dudley’s there to celebrate the album coming out.

The gig was marvellous – Nic France, Mark Lockheart and Carl Orr were the band, along with Dudley on 4/6 string electric and upright bass. great tunes, great playing, all in all a fab night out. The Vortex is such a great venue, and a vital part of the london jazz scene. I’ll be back down there next Thursday to see the Works – Patrick Wood’s band who played such a spellbinding set at Greenbelt in the summer. Please come down if you can! While you’re at it, check out the rest of the programme for December on the Vortex website, they’ve got so much great stuff on!

I also picked up a new CD while I was there, which was playing before the gig – it’s a collection of hymns sung in welsh, by LLeuwen Steffan, Huw Warren and Mark Lockheart. A truly beautiful album, on the oh-so-cool Babel Label – Babel are putting out so many great albums of late, go and check out their website and have a browse around. Marvellous stuff!

Soundtrack – Steffan/Warren/Lockheart, ‘God Only Knows’.

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too much bass?

Is there such a thing as too much bass? Let’s explore…

Sunday started at 6am – get up, load the car, get on the road. If you’re thinking of driving to Manchester, I highly recommend 6am on a Sunday as a time to go – v. easy drive, no traffic, bit frosty and a frozen window washer, but a breeze.

Trip and I arrived at the Life Cafe, unloaded our gear into the venue which was already full of lovely bassists and big PA stuffs. Park car, come back, chill out.

The running order was marvellous – started with John Lester (saving the best ’til first?), who won over the entire crowd within about 5 minutes, as he always does. Marvellous start to the day.
the breakdown – Bass solos? Yes, lots. slapping and tapping? yes but minimal and tasteful. Great tunes? oh yes. vocals/other instruments? All vocal tunes.

next up, Trip Wamsley – Trip and I have been playing together for the last week, so I caught the beginning of his set then headed off to have a shave and a wash so as not to go on stage looking like a slightly camp homeless dude. But anyway, Trip did his thing, sang a couple of things, played some lovely fretless.
the breakdown – Bass solos? Yes, all bass solos! slapping and tapping? mucho both. Great tunes? again, in abundance. vocals/other instruments? All solo bass, but a couple of vocal tunes.

and after Trip, Jon Reshard – Jon’s a phenomenally gifted player for his slender age – at just 20, he’s already playing beautifully and writing some fabulous compositions. There’s more than a small amount of Victor Wooten in his playing, but each time I hear him play he’s adding more of his own sound to the mix, and is on his way to being a truly outstanding musician.
the breakdown – Bass solos? all bass solo! slapping and tapping? yes, and just about every other imaginable technique. great tunes? some v. cool tunes, and some other more groove-oriented rhythm experiments. vocals/other instruments? no, except a little bit of audience sing along which worked beautifully.

Then me – my set was the usual affair, set list was Grace And Gratitude, Kindness Of Strangers, MMFSOG, Despite My Worst Intentions, Shizzle, then a bit of a Q&A before finishing with People Get Ready. Response seemed to be great (CD and t-shirt sales were amazing, so clearly lots of people were digging it), audience very attentive and supportive. All in all v. happy with my set.

After me was Stevie Williams – fantastic Manchester local, highly respected jazzer and occasional solo bassist, this time Stevie was playing with a quintet, playing some exceedingly funky stuff – the perfect balance to all the solo bass stuff that had opened the show. At this point I realised that I’d been treating the day more like a proper gig than any bass-day i’d been to before – lots of great music, an audience that really seemed to be listening, it all added up to being a fine day thus far…
the breakdown – Bass solos? a few, but shorter and tasteful. slapping and tapping? Some slap, I think, but didn’t see any tapping at all. Mainly solid fingerstyle grooving. great tunes? yup, lots. vocals/other instruments? yup, full band, drums/keys/guitar/trumpet/bass.

Who was next? Er, ah, yes, Jan-Olof Strandberg, a Finnish bassist that I’ve known for quite a few years. Lovely guy, and fantastic bassist. Started out with some solo stuff on acoustic bass guitar which was beautifully played, but sounded a bit harsh through the PA to really do it justice. Having heard Jan play solo ABG before, I know how good he can sound, so it was a shame that it wasn’t quite what it could have been, but still very good, and very well received. He then assembled a scratch band, his band not having been able to get there, including Dave Marks on guitar. Dave’s usually a bassist, but is clearly also a very fine guitarist. The bastard.
the breakdown – Bass solos? lots, but some grooving as well. slapping and tapping? plenty. great tunes? some cool tunes, some more meandering technical things. vocals/other instruments? quartet stuff was very good.

Then British-born-of-Polish-descent-New-York-residen Janek Gwizdala was on. Another player stricken by fallen band members, Janek’s guitar player is currently in hospital in London with unknown scary ailments. So Janek and his drummer improvised a set, starting out playing to a drum ‘n’ bass thing Janek had programmed in Ableton Live, which sounded great, lots of v. creative bassing and drumming. They played a few more improv things, Janek looping on a DL4, and shredding over the top in a jazz stylee. I’d have really liked to heard the trio, having heard the CD, but the duet set was still good, especially for an impromptu thang (even most improv gigs are planned as improv gigs, so this was double-improv!), Janek’s another player who is developing his own thing away from a strong Matthew Garrison influence. He’s already great, and could well end up world-beating…

The last two acts of the day switched order due to travel problems. So second last on was Lorenzo Feliciati, a good friend and very fine bassist from Italy. He had his band with him, and they played incredibly tight, funky and beautifully arranged fusion. Great compositions, fantastic playing, great sounds. By this time my ears were beginning to fatigue from bass overload, but Lorenzo was just marvellous. Great stuff.

And last up, Linley Marthe – bassist with the Zawinul Syndicate, fantastic player, some killer ideas, and an amazing array of sounds from a really simple set-up (about four stomp boxes and a wah pedal). His improvised set was a bit meandering in places, but contained enough moments of brilliance to keep me interested. Just the range of sounds he was squeezing from the bass was amazing enough, and add to that some great musical ideas, and I was with him most of the way (though he did slip into ‘Tears In Heaven’ which seems to have become something of a solo bass staple… I dunno, I’m not sure about performing songs that someone else wrote about their child dying… but maybe that’s just me.)

Anyway, that was the music – except Linley, I’d met all these guys before, and it was great to catch up with so many old friends, to make some news ones, meet people from my street team that I’d emailed a lot and who’d been so supportive for years without us ever having met, and just to get a chance to chat with lots of people who were into what I was doing. We like that a lot.

A great day all round, the best lineup I’ve heard at a bass day, a very cool venue, well organised, great audience. What’s not to love?

And now I’m knackered, having done nearly 500 miles in two days, had v. little sleep the last two nights, and needing some rest. g’night.

Soundtrack – Cathy Burton, ‘Speed Your Love’ (I love this album more every time I listen to it).

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