The Sweeps Festival 2008

All this talk of English identity, small Bedfordshire villages and my ongoing penchant for folky acoustic troubadours... he'll be raving about bloody morris dancing next, you're probably thinking. Well, a couple of days ago I'd have laughed out loud at the prospect. Where I grew up, morris dancing meant white costumes, tinkly bells and handkerchiefs. It was twee and appalling, this heritage of mine. As a teenager, I found it a huge embarrassment and I hated it.

In fact, being English was rather a disappointment. Why couldn't we have a decent folk mythology like the Welsh, Scottish and Irish, I used to wonder. I immersed myself in the Mabinogion and Celtic culture in general. This persisted well into my twenties. When I got married in an Irish Catholic church, my status as a pseudo-Celt felt complete. I'm even entitled to an Irish passport now, though I've never felt the slightest inclination to apply.

Over the past ten years or so, I've become more interested in English traditions and folklore. It turns out that it's not all as pretty and neutered as I'd youthfully assumed. Nevertheless, I've not been able to work up much passion for it. This weekend marked the annual May Day celebrations in many English villages, but even though I now understand the origins and significance of traditions like maypole dancing, I haven't particularly warmed to them.

Until yesterday, that is, when I went to the Rochester Sweeps Festival. The chimney sweeps held an annual festival there for hundreds of years, either in celebration of the warmer weather - meaning that they would be getting more business as fewer fires were lit - or as a single day off from an oppressive 364-day regime, depending on which history you read. The tradition died out at the end of the nineteenth century, but was revived in 1981 and has continued every year since.

An appealing mixture of beer, food, music and dancing, the Sweeps Festival was - and still is - great fun. I had a feeling I'd enjoy it, but it exceeded my expectations. The first group of dancers who I saw blew me away. With a percussive, insistent, minor-key musical backing and a striking, black-faced, hybrid Dickensian-pagan-Goth appearance, their performance was as far removed from the hankie-waving of my youth as you could imagine.

I assumed that the black faces were specific to this festival, but it turns out that they're from a much older tradition of disguise in the "border morris" variant of morris dancing. That adds an interesting perspective on the phenomenon; although border morris doesn't appear to be specifically anti-establishment, nevertheless the element of disguise means that it's broadly anti-surveillance (to avoid being caught earning extra money).

The two sides that I enjoyed the most were Beltane Morris* and Grimspound Border, both coincidentally from Devon and dancing in the (English-Welsh) border tradition. The latter in particular, as an all-male side, gave a heady performance fulled jointly by beer and testosterone. That's not to imply that the former were any less powerful: I narrowly avoided getting a matchstick-sized splinter of wood in my eye during one of their energetic dances.

So, who'd have guessed... I'm a morris dancing convert. Would it be fanciful to draw parallels between border morris and other more modern expressions of ramshackle English anti-authoritarianism (Rolling Stones, Sex Pistols, and so on)? The echo of the Sweeps Festival certainly lends an interesting slant to Medway-phile and tabloid jailbird Pete Doherty's interpretation of the sweeps' song Chim Chim Cheree at the Royal Festival Hall last year.

However tenuous or solid the philosophical links between border morris and contemporary music, there are numerous tangible similarities: the costumes mirror youth cults like the Goths and metalheads, there's a sense of fun paired with a mild undercurrent of danger; it's a hugely communal, celebratory form of entertainment and, in one performance that I watched, there was something that most contemporary gig-goers would probably recognise as moshing.

Far from being an archaic remnant of the past, border morris is vibrant, alive and fascinating. Encountering it at the Sweeps Festival - a broadly urban environment, despite the town's occasionally shabby prettiness - was the perfect introduction. Now I want to see more. A tradition that involves dressing up in black, drinking copious amounts of beer and making merry - if only I'd come across this as a teenager, my life could have followed a very different path indeed...

Further viewing

• Flickr: my Sweeps Festival 2008 set
• Flickr: everyone's Sweeps Festival 2008 pictures

* incorrectly credited in the festival's official booklet as "Belthanc Morris".

Posted by Hg on Monday 05 May 2008 at 00:24.
Received 8 comments so far.

The Sound Of The Suburbs

London feels like a particularly petulant child at times. Voting in Ken Livingstone as Mayor in 2000 was a poke in the eye not only for the Tories (who had dismantled Livingstone's Greater London Council back in 1986), but also for New Labour, from whom Livingstone had temporarily defected and against whom he was standing as an independent candidate.

And now we've booted him out, in favour of that nice blond man who we like on Have I Got News For You. We've gone from the newt-fancying, terrorist-loving, Socialist scourge to the gas-guzzling, thug-hating, bumbling Etonian (exaggeration used for comic effect... just). It's quite the pendulum swing and very tempting to speculate upon the reasons why.

The key issue seems to be a higher-than-usual turnout in London's outer suburbs, generally more mono-cultural and conservative (not to mention Conservative) than the inner boroughs. Boris Johnson has adeptly targeted this demographic via a series of striking and iconic images of a traditional London, such as bobbies on the beat and Routemaster buses.

More generally, there has been unrest in suburbia for years. I've seen it, because I live there. From a south-east London viewpoint, it's very easy to take the view that City Hall has very little impact on one's everyday life. Day-to-day services are provided by the local Borough. The tube service is temporarily non-existent and DLR & Tramlink penetration is minimal.

Meanwhile, the number of Union Jack and St George's Cross flags flown in our area continues to increase. The Mrs feared for her life when our elderly next-door neighbour put one up, though I reassured her that this was an altogether more gentle kind of Britishness than the strain she'd grown up with in Northern Ireland (let alone the hateful ignorance of the BNP).

This, I think, is what led to the election of Johnson this week. Many English people feel their national identity to be under threat. Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have devolved parliaments/assemblies, yet England does not. It's a common complaint that the St Patrick's Day celebrations in London are more high-profile than those for St George's Day.

A glance at the pre-election candidates' booklet is instructive, particularly UKIP's "Fed up with not being listened to?" headline. It's also sometimes inadvertently hilarious. The BNP, for example, cites an Irish student as one of its supporters. Elsewhere, the English Democrats' candidate to "Save London from Labour's Tartan Taxes" is... Matt O'Connor.

The people living in London's outer suburbs tend to identify themselves overwhelmingly as "English". Many of them don't even feel part of the capital. The area where I live, for example, is administratively London but continues to align itself culturally with Kent, a county from which it was severed over forty years ago. It would rather fall under Maidstone than City Hall.

Nevertheless, part of London they are. In Johnson, they've found an empathetic candidate behind whom they've chosen to put their significant weight. Inner Londoners who sneer at the suburbs outside of Zone 2 might have had something of a rude awakening this morning. London's size defines it. Without these suburbs, it's just Northampton with trendier haircuts.

London's a big place and a significant proportion of its inhabitants has felt ignored and disenfranchised for some time. I understand their point of view, even if I don't share it. They didn't all distrust Ken Livingstone, but many couldn't really see what he had to offer them. Now, in Boris Johnson, they've found a voice. It'll be interesting to hear what they have to say.

Posted by Hg on Saturday 03 May 2008 at 13:59.
Received 2 comments so far.

Lewis, Son Of Lewis

A couple of months ago, I was contacted by a complete stranger via Genes Reunited, the sister site to Friends Reunited that deals with family history. GR is a cool site: a brilliant example of the power of focused social networking. You upload your family tree, in as much or little detail as you're comfortable with, and it matches you up with other people whose trees contain similar ancestors (based on name, date of birth and location of birth if provided).

Being contacted by a complete stranger isn't exactly a surprise: in fact, it's usually what you're aiming for. Assuming that you're still in touch with your immediate family, it's the strangers who can provide the most useful information. They're generally descended from several generations back - either by blood or marriage - and so you're able to make connections to the people who are your great-grandparents siblings' descendants, for example.

I've made contact with a handful of people in this way and thereby been able to trace specific branches of the family tree back to the 1600s. It's been fascinating. However, this particular contact was slightly different. Jean lives in a small village in Bedfordshire, the place where her husband's family was from. While he was tracing his own ancestry, she became interested in the village's families as a whole and researched them as her own pet project.

I had discovered only a few months beforehand that my great-great grandfather came from this village. Prior to coming across that specific nugget of information in a census return, we'd always assumed that my great-grandmother's family were Nottingham born and bred. It turned out that this wasn't the case; she was the first generation of that particular surname to be born in Nottingham. Her father was from Bedfordshire and her mother from Staffordshire.

Jean was organising a reunion of all the "old" families of the village. She provided copious documentation from her research, covering the village's history as a whole and my own ancestors' history in particular. They lived hard lives. Although the gentry controlling most of the village's land seem to have been unusually benevolent and enlightened, nevertheless poverty was rife and many families ended up leaving the village to seek a living elsewhere.

My ancestors lived in and around the village for much of the nineteenth century, though they had originally come from another village slightly further south. However, by the 1870s they clearly felt their lives there to be unsustainable. I discovered via my research that my great-great-grandfather, a farm labourer, had travelled north to Nottingham with one of his brothers. He met his future wife shortly thereafter; they married in 1878 and raised six children.

Elsewhere, I discovered that one of his brothers had ended up in Derby. The story passed down that branch of the family was that he had walked there from Bedfordshire. I wonder whether this other brother was the same one who accompanied him, according to my own family's collective memory? It's slightly humbling to think of the two of them making their way a hundred miles north on foot. (Of course, this could just be a myth that developed over the years.)

My mum says that when she was growing up, she and her parents never saw a great deal of my great-grandmother, my grandpa's mum. This Bedfordshire connection was news to her when I first discovered it. My great-grandma lived until I was six years old and apparently I met her several times, though I don't remember her. I remember the house though: small, dark, claustrophobic, with the same grandfather clock in the corner that now stands in my parents' hallway.

At this "family reunion" last Saturday, I finally met one of my distant relatives in the flesh: my sixth cousin once removed. Which basically means that his great-gt-gt-gt-gt-grandfather (born 1729, died 1789) was my great-gt-gt-gt-gt-gt-grandfather. A link so tenuous as to be almost unworthy of mention, yet a link nevertheless. A Bedfordshire farmer whose children's children's children's children's children's children's descendants had met again.

What would Lewis, son of Lewis, have thought of us? Firstly, he would probably have noticed that neither of us was called Lewis. (This name ran for at least seven generations in the family, but the last Lewis I'm aware of was my great-grandma's brother and I haven't yet traced his hypothetical descendants.) He would also have spotted that neither of us look particularly like sons of the soil and would have had no understanding of how I make a living.

In this sense, "family" is an abstract, theoretical concept. Yes, we undoubtedly share DNA and there's the nice poetic concept of "blood" that fires up my imagination. Yet I'm under no illusions; your family are the people who immediately surround you, related or not. I have far more in common with my brothers-in-law than with my distant cousin (clearly of a very different generation and mindset to me), or with our even more distant ancestor.

However, it's fun to make the connections and fascinating to think back to the lives of the people who ultimately made us and paved the way for us. It's also great to go to an event like this and talk to other people about what they've discovered about their own ancestry. The diversity is an eye-opener (one attendee was descended from one of the Norman soldiers who travelled to Britain with William the Conqueror) and the commonality of experience is rewarding.

The most tangible experiences of my visit to the village were the relics left behind from the period when my family still lived there. The "new" church clock, to which all the villagers subscribed (I saw the paperwork, detailing individual families' contributions). The church itself, with the family name on several headstones in the graveyard. The old blacksmith's building. The village hall in the former school they would have attended. The house where they lived.

I'm still absorbing it all. I think maybe the most significant impact this will have on me is to send me back to the village in Nottinghamshire next to the one where I grew up, where both of my dad's parents came from and where their ancestors lived for several hundred years. I've taken that proximity for granted for far too long and now it's time to start seeing the place with fresh eyes as the most significant source - of many possibilities - of where I'm "from".

Further reading

• Remembrance
• Roots That No Storm Can Dislodge
• The Big I Am

Posted by Hg on Friday 02 May 2008 at 11:44.
Received 4 comments so far.

Interview: Michael McLinn

The harp has a rather chequered history, as far as popular music's concerned. Mention solo harpists and until recently I'd have thought of Mary O'Hara, Enya or Joanna Newsom. None of their music fills me with a great deal of enthusiasm. Actually, I'm just being polite. I think I'd rather slice my reproductive organs into morsel-sized bites with their instrument of choice than have to endure more than a few seconds of their music.

Then I came across Michael McLinn, whose contemplative, graceful and occasionally subversive songs are based on nothing more than his own voice, the occasional burst of piano and the pure, untreated sounds of the very same instrument that has so often been the basis for nothing more than bland hotel lobby music. Investigating further, I found a performer whose approach and attitude is about as far removed from the conventional as you could possibly expect.

Take, for instance, the lyrics to Hobnob With The Gentry ("stick classical technique up your arse on my behalf"), the list of influences encompassing Harpo Marx, Siouxsie And The Banshees, Marie Antoinette and Madonna, or the picture of him looking every inch the Kashpoint kid in thigh-high silver boots. With one self-produced album already under his belt (Some Strings Attached from January 2007), he was clearly a performer to investigate.

The obvious first question is why you choose to play the harp rather than any other instrument?

I had been writing songs on a keyboard, which I stole from my little sister. I really wanted some classical training, but thought it would be silly to take piano lessons as I could already navigate one. At the time I was listening to a lot of Björk and when I heard her Vespertine record, which uses a lot of harp, I thought "Thats it!" My songs are little and fiddly, not so full-bodied, so the harp really suits them. I managed to track down the [Brighton] Pavilion harpist - Andrew Ballantyne - and he has been teaching me for about three years now.

When did you start writing and performing music?

I have been writing for about five years. In the beginning I knew nothing about music and would have to go through each note to find the ones that were the same as the ones in my head. If you think how many notes are in a song, it was a very slow process. Now music comes more naturally, and what I write is actually good. Performing took a lot longer. I did not want to compromise... that these songs were for harp, but I did not own a harp till much later. Andy Drake, my harp, cost a lot, and I don't drive so he is really difficult to move around.

Your harp has a name? How did that come about?

My instructor's harps have names. He told me it's bad luck not to name your harps. Andy is the name of my instructor, and he choose the harp for me. I had a certain budget and I just said to him "Look, I trust you go and get me a boy harp," so he played a part in the birth of my harp - not only my learning of it. "Drake" is just there, like many things, to pull in the naval nautical theme.

How would you describe your music to someone who hasn't heard it yet?

If someone has not heard my music I try not to describe it to them. What I do is make a mental note to get them a copy of my record as soon as possible.

There's a big "folk" resurgence at the moment (a.k.a. nu-folk, antifolk, folktronica, and so on). Is this something you feel part of, or would you rather distance yourself from it?

Musically I am influenced by each. There are two traditional songs I sing at shows sometimes. I don't like the idea of being part of a scene though - having to wear certain clothes or play certain clubs would depress me.

Which traditional songs do you sing?

I play Lord Ronald, which I first heard recorded by Alisdair Roberts, who I love. Its a really simple song musically, but has a little twist in the storyline. I also sometimes start with an accapella version of Visur Vatnsenda Rosu, which is an Icelandic song. I first heard an instrumental version of this at a Björk concert, then looked the lyrics up in a book. I would sing over the instrumental as a warm-up, then just decided to include it in shows. Musically the chord progression lends itself nicely to the beginning of Vessel And Machine, which is usually my second song.

You call your songs "the boys". That makes them sound like children, or friends. Does it feel like they have a separate existence to you?

The boys... yes, they do feel seperate. This is basically me trying not to take credit for what I consider to be an age-old tradition. I have some control over them, as far as when they come, which boys turn up at a show. But how they are, I cannot control too much, or maybe I just try not to. But they are not always friendly... never childish. I have only had one experience of talking to somebody make-believe who actually dictated how the song should be, but this comes into play with each. I don't know whether its the harp being male or me being male that produces boys and not girls.

Is there any sense in which the boys are potential lovers, however platonic?

That's quite funny. but it also makes me feel a bit old and sad if that were the case. Not really though, because whilst I find them to be male and I find them sexually exciting to play, they are not humans. I suppose though my soul mate would be a potential lover I feel as connected to as I do one of the boys.

What do you mean when you say that they're "not always friendly"?

Well an example would be the song Mouth Port. I thought for a long time that I can't say "fuck" so much if I want to be on the radio, even though that was the lyric that came to me. So I tried changing it, I think to "spark" or "rush" or something, and the song reacted in an unfriendly way. I would forget the words, I would play the wrong notes. The song would not volunteer for set-lists. I changed it back and it's probably the song I find easiest to play and play most often. Keeping Luff is another, this boy refers to my best friend as a bitch. I knew this would go down badly, but that's how the boy looked when I met him and who am I to say "Well I need to cut your hair before you come to my show"? That would make me the unfriendly one.

Your list of influences includes, amongst others, Björk, Madonna and Sinéad O'Connor - strong women with distinctive visual identities and a talent for constant reinvention. What's the appeal?

Aside from the obvious camp appeal strong women have generally to gay men, it is their artistry: how their visual identity helps explain their music. I always love what Jarvis Cocker wears, and Sophie Ellis Bextor, but it does not take me to a deeper understanding of what they are doing musically, that is the difference for me with these examples. Sinéad uses a lot of history and mythology in her lyrics. I try to do this. Björk is a total musical genius, I hope one day to write an album that gives Homogenic a run for its money. I could never in a million years be as cool as Madonna, thats why I like her, but they have things in common too.

Homogenic is one of my favourite albums as well. Such a raw, elemental collection of songs that seems as rooted in landscape as human emotion. Maybe I'm being fanciful, but it always seems a much more "Icelandic" album than her others. Is Iceland somewhere that interests you as a place?

Iceland interested me in the first instance because of Björk, rather than listening to her due to an interest in the country. However, since then I have gone on to study a lot of its folklore, which I find amazing. It's not all shit morality fiction, some of it is quite aggressive. I am not very well travelled at all, sadly. It's one of lots of places I would like to go. Romania and Germany are other big ones.

From the pictures I've seen, your own visual identity covers quite a wide spectrum: from Celtic warrior via preppy student to Barbarella-style space pirate. Does this feel like part of the same creative process as making music, or is it something completely different?

Not at all. Very different indeed. A boy will have been played a hundred times before I have any idea what he looks like. How to represent something visually takes me a lot of thought, plus it is at the mercy of my own tastes. I am a bit of a clothes whore. How to represent something sonically comes much more naturally and I try not to mess too much with an initial idea, regardless of my liking or disliking of it. It can be a lot of fun though. The idea of being a space pirate rather pleases me!

You say you've been inspired by the cities you've visited. Which city has made the greatest impact on you?

Portsmouth, where I grew up, has certainly influenced my interest in all things nautical and naval, themes which come up in each boy at least once. The Brighton gay scene has influenced me a lot. I moved there when I was eighteen. All the exhibitionism! London does not influence the boys as much as what I decide to do with them. Though I have only been to Cornwall once (and for a short while) I wrote three songs about it. The ancient turkish city Ephesus is also responsible for one.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean about London. Is this related to you having moved here recently?

Well, Brighton and Portsmouth I think affected the boys themselves. Certain places I have been hanging out recently, and people I have met, influence more in the way of who I show the boys to, where I take the boys, how I go about getting the boys noticed by people. It has certainly made me more proactive. But then it would, Brighton is so small.

Read any good books recently?

Lots. I have worked for three bookshops over the last four years. Reinaldo Arenas was my most recent bender. I read three of his in a row. They are all out of print now so not so easy to get hold of, but if you can do... beautifulness!

Tell us about "the lunatics I seem to end up courting" (a quote from your MySpace page) and how they've influenced your music.

The thought of somebody - lunatic or otherwise - knowing I am singing about them rather bothers me, so this has influenced my way of addressing things sideways. Romance given or taken will always produce boys. Gladiators was hard for me to write and is still hard for me to sing.

One of your lyrics bemoans the fact that "I can't source any love" - is love a commodity?

In this boy, yes. It is all about recycling. If you are not given love from someone, to love them back you must use up your natural resources, and that is when emotional global warming happens.

You mentioned in a radio interview that Vessel And Machine was inspired by a Tomi Ungerer picture. Which other visual art inspires you?

Fashion. it is hard to be a showman when you are sat behind an instrument bigger than you are, so I try to keep an eye on that. The photography of Sarah Maple recently inspired my London Mer Gentry project. Like yourself, people were confused about the concept of "boys" so I thought... fuck it, lets dress up as the songs then stand in a big line and point rudely at the camera like Sarah Maples does. Some sleeve design and art work is as narrative as the record itself, so I always examine that.

The London Mer Gentry picture on your MySpace page is fabulous. It's the one I've been pointing people towards when I've mentioned in passing that I'm interviewing you. Would it be too trainspotter-ish to ask which outfit goes with which song?

Well, the Michael character is not song specific. He is there to represent the channel of the other three. The becardiganed character is the embodiment of the fact that as well as a dedication to the craft of musicianship, I want a big house and young girls to fancy me and to do sparkly shows regardless. He is a bit of a piss-take. He is also songs about lovers like Vessel and Gladiators and Little Gun. The helmet character is historical and songs like Oh Dear Vladimir and Just Be Right On and Lord Ronald. The aggressor club kid character is "oh, that's what I should have said" type of songs, like Gladiators and Credit For Daddy and Keeping Luff.

Where do you see your music going next? You've said that you feel more lyrical than musical, though you've become more confident musically as time has passed. Do you have any grand ambitions for a more sumptuous sound, or would you prefer to keep things simple?

There are a lot of things I would still like to do. If I had the time and money, I would buy, learn and write with synthesizers, accordian, hammond organ, wurlitzers and so forth - of course, doing the skeleton of each boy on the harp still. But I do not have any of those things and I struggle with the idea of having other musicians involved with something with my name on it. Also, I do not like the idea of tampering with a boy's DNA too much. On the other hand, I think Some Strings Attached proved that songs can be executed well enough with just a harp and a voice. This is why a record label would be nice. I could arse around for hours with all sorts. This is why I moved from Brighton to London, though that does not sound so logical.

You say you're wary of involving other musicians, yet clearly most of the artists whose work you love (e.g. Björk) manage to involve other people without diluting their own sense of identity. Do you think this is just down to a lack of confidence on your part (maybe about losing control) because you've only ever worked on your own musically, or is it more a point of principle that the only channel for the boys to enter the world is via you?

I think bits of both. The fact that I have not done it before, of course, does not help. Were I to work with other people, I know I would at least feel better about it... not necessarily change my mind, but feel better. I think in the early days I just got too fed up with people telling me I should play guitar and write songs about how much I love women. It's weird, that whole thing is totally arrogant and disgusting of me but also comes from a total lack of confidence. To write with someone means them seeing you playing the same four bars for half an hour before you get it right.

When & where are your next live performances? Do you have any plans to record new material?

I chose a really bad time of year to move city and book shows, so sadly no shows at the moment. I am in negotiations with the Ginglik [a club in Shepherds Bush] and also hoping my teacher will invite me to play at his yearly charity concert at St George's Church in Brighton. There are eleven boys to record, ten of which were written since Some Strings Attached. One of them is older, but did not really fit that record. This comes back to my "other musician" quandry. I would hate to look back on something and think I was not bold enough...

Whatever short-term obstacles life might happen to throw in the way of booking more gigs or recording a second album's worth of songs, I suspect that lack of courage will not be an issue. Beneath that cool, measured, occasionally self-deprecating exterior clearly lies an uncompromising character of considerable focus and persistence. Hopefully 2008 will see him settling into London and moving forward with his unique brand of creativity. The boys deserve nothing less.

Further reading & listening

• MySpace: Michael McLinn
• SongMeanings: Michael McLinn
• Flickr: live at Monkey Chews on 25 March 2008
• Hydragenic: Seeds And Sparks 2

This interview took place in January 2008 and was originally published in issue 4 of DrunkenWerewolf magazine.

Posted by Hg on Tuesday 29 April 2008 at 08:01.
Received 2 comments so far.

The Truth In Performance

Wendy Fonarow takes a fascinating anthropological view of gig attendance, in an article in today's Guardian. I've been banging on a lot about identity and authenticity in music recently, so this passage struck a particular chord (sorry) with me:

"One of the things going on in music performance compared to theatre is you want people to play themselves. The reason surrounds authenticity. This is a really weird thing because if music is art, then music is artifice - it's made up. But people are always looking for truth in performance and they want this because if the performer is experiencing something true then so is what you're experiencing."

Posted by Hg on Saturday 26 April 2008 at 01:49.
Received 0 comments so far.

DrunkenWerewolf 4

DrunkenWerewolf issue 4 is now out, including interviews with The Go! Team, Shrag, Talkshow Boy, Michael McLinn (by me) and more. It also includes my reviews of releases by Lupen Crook & The Murderbirds, Goldfrapp and Black Kids, amongst many others.

This Brighton special is stocked in shops in Bristol and Brighton and is also available via PayPal & post. More details here. You can also keep up with Drunken ravings and recommendations via the blog, as well as becoming a fan of the magazine on Facebook.

Posted by Hg on Friday 25 April 2008 at 19:38.
Received 0 comments so far.

The Artist's Armoury

"... one of the most common ways in which people underestimate Björk is in assuming that the absurdist element in her self-presentation is not intentional. Rather than seeing self-parody as a state into which a performer must try not to lapse, she seems to view it as one of the most important weapons in an artist's armoury; a way of shaking things up by reminding yourself how ridiculous you are."

- Ben Thompson in The Sunday Telegraph, 20 April 2008

Posted by Hg on Thursday 24 April 2008 at 16:25.
Received 2 comments so far.

A Benchmark Conversation

"Do you mind if I join you on the bench? No? OK? You're not called Mark, are you? 'Cos that... »

Posted by Hg on Sunday 20 April 2008 at 23:23.
Received 1 comments so far.

Written On The Body

After the demon flower and the mark of admission comes the barcode. I find myself growing ever more fascinated... »

Posted by Hg on Thursday 10 April 2008 at 10:21.
Received 1 comments so far.

littlelostdavid / Little Lost David - EP

Look, I rave about some Brilliant New Music or other all the time. I know it, and you know... »

Posted by Hg on Tuesday 08 April 2008 at 09:02.
Received 8 comments so far.

Murderbirds Unplugged 3/4/08

Two days after Tuesday's solo gig at The Slaughtered Lamb, I was down in Rochester for the evening to see... »

Posted by Hg on Sunday 06 April 2008 at 19:48.
Received 0 comments so far.

Electroacoustic Club @ The Slaughtered Lamb 1/4/08

Tuesday night saw one of the best line-ups I've watched in a while, at the Electroacoustic Club night at... »

Posted by Hg on Saturday 05 April 2008 at 16:48.
Received 5 comments so far.

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