all the william morrises, all the ruskins, all the rosettis in hackney these days - all that facial hair and still no decent wallpaper.

all the william morrises, all the ruskins, all the rosettis in hackney these days -  all that facial hair and still no decent wallpaper. perhaps a fetish for fay and fair folk music, perhaps a willingness to play the journeyman artisan. perhaps a fear of pubic hair (who knows). thank fuck the fashion for hanky over the head (the poor woman's wimple) has died out.

forgive horsemouth - he's grumpy - they've been making him work. he's been stitching sow's ears into silk purses - or at least things that look like they might be silk purses until they have been sold - but the next morning  you wake up and it's a sow's ear you've got in your pocket. this is the nature of all alienated labour- the nature of every impulse purchase.

william and jane morris, all those pre-raphaelite crazies (and their folksongs) still they had more political sense than all these sweepy sweepy broom broom peope - horsemouth swears when he saw boris being danced up the street (broom in hand) there was somebody waltzing with him saying in his ear remember thou art mortal! remember thou art mortal! eyes fixed on the glorious all swept out future, when london would be free of its rioting mobs and a hundred village greens would bloom. he swears that person looked familiar.

the cuckoo and the turtle dove will get even rarer (as their african wintering grounds are eroded away). whereas in greece even the dogs are rioting.

horsemouth has been watching zombie biker movie psychomania - it begins with formation motorcycle ballet through the standing stones in the mist.

saturday british summer time ends, the friday after is halloween, the wednesday after bonfire night - the world frays a little at the edges, the gates are opened up, things begin to appear strangely transformed and yet still within the old world.

on hearing a modern singer (we work against)

great voice.
bjorkish.
cute accent
.... and not that interesting.
no the one for horsemouth - does she do any trad?

she does trad - it works better.

horsemouth is not in love with lovely voices - what horsemouth wants is something about the voice that is revealed as it does the work of opening up the song - words and music working against each other (barthes much misused and always worth a read essay "the grain of the voice'). he feels the same about most classical singing. horsemouth would be more interested in hearing an amateur singer sing and seeing where they breathed or put the emphasis - voices with flaws, voices with imperfections, average voices working with dramatic material having to recruit other resources to cope. too many people are in love with the sounds that come out of their mouths (and recording gives you access to these seconds again and again) to worry about what the song is saying.

the music too has this problem. it is too sparse and willfully 'adventurous' (in a boring tasteful way - hello wire). a lot of this stuff shares this problem -  it is just too mannered and too overproduced for its own good - all texture loving recorded with expensive microphones but with no musical content for it to work against. horsemouth is not interested in acoustic textures themselves but in the portability of the instruments and  in the restriction of options that not having an electric guitar, a rack of effects pedals and an amplifier brings.

they cover a song horsemouth knows 

so they found that one did they - ouch - well the lyrics always were rubbish - 10 seconds and off- ok if you could sing like bjork, cerys mathews and liz fraser the I guess you would... could she not sing a song where it sounds like she thinks it's important? or could she not sing one where it sounds like she just thinks it's cheap throwaway commercial trash.

even when he sounds bored bob dylan at least sounds like he thinks the song should be sung (or if he doesn't that's interesting - often he sounds like he wants to kill everybody for making him sing the song) - even when he's singing god-bothering trash on a nationally syndicated tv show mid-evening johnny cash sounds like he means it.

'lies, damned lies and quotations'

"figures often beguile me, particularly when I have the arranging of them myself; in which case the remark attributed to disraeli would often apply with justice and force: 'There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.' - mark twain 

(ps. there is howeverno evidence disraeli ever uttered this line http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lies,_damned_lies,_and_statistics).

horsemouth recently got into a debate with john smith about child poverty statistics (in john's new role of fully paid up contrarian) wondering if  there ever a time in England when there wasn't child poverty? and when there were times of less, and why was this?

horsemouth held it was  post war - welfare state, more equitable distribution of the profits, running out of steam through the 80ies , 90 ies but admitted  that would be quite a bit a research - last year the child poverty stats weren't as bad (and before). he was not sure people bothered collecting statistic on the poor until victorian times - it's one of the things cobbett does in his rural rides is try and assess how well fed people are, but he's not collecting figures. this probably doesn't happen until the time of  engels, cole and postgate's the common people mentions a survey of london wages in 1747. being a contrarian John Smith suggested that maybe there were no poor to collect statistics on.

cobbett has a view of prosperous rural self-sufficiency (before the arrival of paper money and stock-jobbing) but songs such as four loom weaver (where during a cotton shortage the whole family shuts itself up in the cottage and starves to death) suggest that things weren't always so rosy.

horsemouth thinks that clearly if there are no statistics then the problem can't exist (this is the governments attitude - it is very careful which statistics it gathers and which could only e provided at 'disproportionate cost') - but wondered (on a practical level like cobbett) how many kids at john smith's school get free school meals. apparently lots of them, they've just started a breakfast club, because most don't get breakfast. Some were only getting one meal a day before this at lunchtime.

if there were only 20% of kids in a borough in child poverty would that be more acceptable? or 10%? or the 15% current national average?

horsemouth should probably read the report more carefully before rushing into 'print'.

'life is a pure flame. and we live by an invisible sun within us' (hard times dub)

today is the birthday (in 1605) of the accidentally knighted sir thomas browne. a writer celebrated by coleridge and johnson and connolly (and if horsemouth remembers correctly malcolm lowry - yes google supports this interpretation). horsemouth has found a copy of his the major works (edited by c.a. patrides) and will be making several expeditions into it today in celebration. horsemouth had forgotten the lowry- melville connection, furthermore he had not realised that lewis mumford had written on melville (pierre still languishes unread).

cobbett entertains - he sits on the hillside at old sarum (capitalised thus THE ACCURSED HILL) cursing malthus and cursing the political establishment and their plans to emigrate(soon to be transport) the poor. 'hard times' says a passing peasant. he curses birkeck and his enthusiasm for the backwoods, he remembers advising birkbeck's daughters not to let their father take them more than 20 miles from boston,  even though birkbeck died in the attempt.

howard (or john smith as horsemouth should now be calling him) is continuing to work on noah (now titled noah again) - he has a fine exhausted ending / middle 8 for it. noah is tenth in descent from adam, he is the father of shem, ham and japeth. the rainbow as a symbol of hope becomes important. 

yesterday horsemouth travelled to the supermarket to stock up on coffee and museli ahead of the collapse of civilisation, he also made soup and harvested some of his beans (he will store them for replanting next year). there are some tomatoes on the plant (but they have not gone red yet and it's a bit of a race to see if they will). horsemouth is pinning his hopes on the visible sun for this one. the catepillers have polished off his nasturtiums to the barest stem and vanished - apparently gardeners often plant nasturtiums to distract the catepillers (according to john clarkson). he has some nasturtium 'seeds' for next year. the peppers are doing well - especially the italian frigatelli , the fennel is still thriving.   

'when omac is born the truth shall be known'

sean has been in touch;

'Couldn't resist attaching a double page spread from 70ies jack kirby comic  omac - a space satellite that downloads information directly into a human brain on earth via laser beam (a fucking pink laser beam at that!). Can't believe I hadn't noticed before that brother eye is jack kirby's version of valis ( jack must have been contacted  too - after all, it doesn't make sense valis would only contact one human. That would explain the change in his work when he "went cosmic"; the sheer volume of pages, and the increased abstraction that matches pkd's description of the patterned geometric hallucinations, obsessively reworked over and over....it all fits. And of course, omac was produced in 1974).

And Is it my imagination, or does professor forest - the inventor of brother eye in omac - look like josef stalin (see attached pic in page header)?
Didn't philip k. dick suspect that valis may actually have been a soviet mind control experiment? We wonder if this means that kirby theorized in a similar direction....
(Although we might note forest is a benign figure.... kirby always comes across as an anticapitalist)'

this idea is supported by the writer  Christopher Knowles “something very, very powerful hit [Kirby] around ’65 or ’66, and transformed him from an already imaginative man into a psychedelic shaman disguised as a freelance pencil pusher”  as quoted in Jeffrey J. Kripal’s 'Mutants and Mystics: Science Fiction, Superhero Comics, and the Paranormal', University of Chicago Press, p.154. (http://www.tcj.com/jack-kirby-hand-of-fire-roundtable-part-2/)

Must have missed that bit in Divine Invasions (I skimmed a fair bit of it)
You're right about pkd's female characters... in fact, I'd go a bit further and say its more than the resentment of the needy; he really doesn't like wimmin. Donna in scanner darkly or alys in flow my tears are particularly unpleasant examples of this.'

horsemouth is typing this in the corridor a) to avoid mind control rays and b) because the internet connection is better (if that is indeed a different thing).

sunday horsemouth went out for a wander round the eastend of history with max and myk (and sundry italians, americans, britishers) this was after wandering back the long way round through the eastend. at the  quadrivium where john williams (the wapping vampire) was allegedly buried - one literary reaction to his crimes was thomas de quincey's on murder considered as one of the fine arts. horsemouth hastily chose a passage and recited the following. 

'soon after the secret was explained: in more than a figurative sense "the murder was out." For in came the London morning papers, by which it appeared that, but three days before, a murder the most superb of the century by many degrees had occurred in the heart of London. I need hardly say that this was the great exterminating chef-d'oeuvre of Williams at Mr. Marr's, No. 29 Ratcliffe Highway. That was the début of the artist; at least for anything the public knew. What occurred at Mr. Williamson's twelve nights afterwards — the second work turned out from the same chisel — some people pronounced even superior.'   

'what causes horse-hair to become living things?' (unfeeling oligarchs and their toad-eaters)

sadly today was not leadership wednesday (as previously advertised) where we learn to be leaders (horsemouth will have no problem applying these lessons due to his formidable personal charisma) but group and team wednesday (forming storming underperforming flatlining mourning). pity. horsemouth was looking forward to hearing about foxes and lions and machiavelli and pareto.

william cobbett (rural rides) describes MPs as either ravens or jackdaws, one cackles and one caws, but there's no real difference he says, they are only in opposition to each other to the extent that they sit opposite  each other.

cobbett also (anticipating ivan illich by a century and some decades) takes against the fashion for education as a cure for the ills of the poor (though he does so on the basis of the differing talents of different breeds of dogs, arguing that their differing abilitities cannot be put down to education.   he takes  against 'the monster malthus' who has furnished the unfeeling oligarchs and their toad-eaters with the pretence, that man has a natural propensity to breed faster than food can be raised for the increase...'  there is talk of  surplus population, cobbett's response is to go and verify if this is the case on the ground.  he finds it not so.

horsemouth's father often speaks of both malthus and cobbett approvingly - horsemouth wonders if he has noticed that they are in disagreement. 

a modest proposal on child poverty/ the shortest way with poor children

and today statistics (http://www.endchildpoverty.org.uk/why-end-child-poverty/poverty-in-your-area) - horsemouth's father's pet hate 'there are lies, damned lies and statistics' -   have been published on child poverty.

these give the breakdown of child poverty (after housing costs have been paid) to parliamentary seat and local authority borough. huzzah boroughs in  the seaside towns (bow, poplar, bethnal green etc.) have come top in all the land again with 49% of children living in poverty (horsemouth's former borough hackney make quite a credible showing too). but the point is this is just gives the concentration of poverty rather than the actuallevel of poverty (something quite difficult to assess given the different costs different families face).

however shocking these figures are  it important to realise that a solution is at hand - as the poor are rinsed out from the seaside towns and distributed all over the country (as far away as manchester if one of the offers made to an E15 mum had been accepted) one would expect these percentages to go down and the regional percentages not to rise by so much (just due to the effects of dilution). child poverty is experienced by individual families and individual children and lifting people out of poverty is a difficult business (when one does not want to pay living wages, charge social rents or fund affordable childcare), and yet for these figures to improve not one child will have to be lifted out of poverty - they will merely have had to have been driven out to elsewhere. how can the rich and prosperous city live cheek-by-jowl with such grinding poverty ? ask the bleeding hearts.only due to underdevelopment  reply the rich.

poptones / turn the heater on (revisions of you / the blue house)

horsemouth is back from the west. he's feeling a bit run down and de-serotonin-ed (toxic chelsea lager/ busy week probably) - having been to see jah wobble (and various invaders of the heart ) play. after he goes to howard's (and then maybe another gig).

jah wobble is a big man these days - when horsemouth and paul arrived the club resounded to koto playing, then there was some taiko drumming with some japanese singing ... then a break and then jah wobble and some film and t.v. theme tunes(midnight cowboy, get carter, the sweeney, take five)  just when the audiences patience was getting used up he switched to old reggae tunes (java augustus pablo - again with the koto player), there was a percussion  interlude with jah wobble playing timbales and rototoms and the taiko drummer. at the mid point of the set visions of you, becoming more like god, (played to click, sinead o'connor's vocals on a sample - did horsemouth mention the drummer was a bit good - as drummers are these days) ending out with johnny rotter (johnny rotten impersonator) poptones, public image, and then everyone back onstage for the grand finale. the players horsemouth didn't realy know - veteran improv'er clive bell was only added on the day, the guitarists were a little busy for horsemouth's taste (but ____ aziz the second one can really play) and the keyboards a little cheesy (always one of jah wobbles failings).

it was most strange to see the public image material re- created note perfect (that was the quality of the players), the audience kind of didn't know what to do with it, but applauded loudly enough at the end. they were kind of pretending they'd moved on and didn't do nostalgia.

later, in the pub, horsemouth pointed out that the garage track playing was (basically) a dub bassline against diso drums - so very pil.

turn the heater on (the blue house) and this is where the story really starts. 

horsemouth headed up to howard's in hackney to make some music. they appear to be writing a song about noah using the technique of book divination, horsemouth's ear picked out a pentatonic melody (probably a hangover from the japanese music at the jah wobble gig), the chords aren't (perhaps they can try the classic motown trick of posh chords/ pentatonic melody). they then tried a 6/8 one named (by object divination) as the comet (a song of the type unwelcome visitor). they then tried blue crystal fire  and then kieth hudson turn the heater on (probably because new order covered it) - howard had recorded a great harmony version of it - but harmonies are precisely what throw horsemouth when he's singing. all this was on lucy's guitar, the slide tuned bad taste country and western guitar stayed in its case, perhaps (horsemouth thinks now) it's the right thing for noah . 

then he was off to a cunning folk gig in sutton house (or the blue house as it was in squatter days) -when he was being filmed for the hackney documentary horsemouth took django there as one of the first squat venues he'd been to in london god told me to do it, antisect(?), and as john reminded him another green world.  this time he was there to see stick in the wheel  and john constable (aka john crow) and to look over the building - he'd heard there was a room they'd left as the squatters had left it -  but they couldn't find it. horsemouth has to admitstick in the wheel  are great (hey they even have a song about looting) - they do a version ofraggle taggle gypsy-O  (the one with 7 gypsies who sang so neat and so complete) and a version of two sisters (a song of the type murder and the supernatural revenge). the woman who opened (at 8 sharp!) was from the norfolk folk clubs (good voice) - horsemouth liked the guitar playing on the first one (song of type - lover wants access to the house)  but (sadly) has forgotten her name. and at the end john constable ('the live poet not the dead painter'). 

all thing very london - which is strange seeing as its ending - even the high net worth individuals (what are we to say of this) are being driven out by the ultra-high net worth individuals.  

horsemouth may go for a walk today (or he may bottle it). sociability has cured his gringe - maybe he should try more of it. 

'as I sit mending clothes you will never ever wear.' / 'sometimes I wonder where the poor people went'

so goes the harshest line (in horsemouth's humble opinion) in anne briggs' you go your way (my love), a classic song-at-parting, the chorus functioning to get the object out the door against the daydream of love brought back by the repetition of everyday tasks.

the usual picture you see to go with this is bert jansch and anne in their youth sitting in a pub, bert the archetypal toussle-haired romantic hero, anne the dark girl. years later (after leaving off singing for many years and becomming a market garderner) she's persuaded to sing it again for the folkbritania programme (or some such). 'there's a lot of ghosts about' mutters archie fisher (probably), 

'at that time one thought it would never change, it would never be different , but it has changed, you know we're all different and in a way it sort of... um... highlights the differences for me between what we were than and what we are now.' 

'even though the structure has changed there's a lot of ghosts about'

'yes, the fact... as I say that it opens the door on ones youth and all that... sense of hope, faith, and musical belief, and exploration'

today horsemouth goes to look at houses - it is the first grey day of autumn - is he keeping busy enough do you think? yesterday, horsemouth was up early (oops. no he was not)  - it was a beautiful day outside (he went for a walk). it was the third anniversary of bert jansch's death (he almost forgot).

'sometimes I wonder where the poor people went'

horsemouth has been listening to michael goldfarb's description of driving a taxi in new york in the 70ies (think Taxi, taxi driver, the 'drop dead'  decade). the decade of 'planned shrinkage'  - an 'unofficial policy' straight out of the RAND corporation, in some ways the inevitable consequence of  moses and his expressways, his bronx clearances - where people would move out of town then the tax base will fall then the city would cut services (fire stations, doctors surgeries, hospitals - sound familiar?) but to its poorest members first so that they would go too, leaving more of the pot for those who were left. years later he's chatting to a black guy in a bar in brooklyn, the neighbourhood had always been middle class, just black middle class the guy says, and now it's hipster hell. 'sometimes' , the guy says 'I wonder where the poor people went.'

Moses and the cross Bronx expressway makes it into Tricia Rose's book on hip-hop black noise, the thing goldfarb comments on is the grafitti bombed trains - he gets it. out in the ruins people remake what has been left behind into a new music, a new culture - it's an astonishing victory.  horsemouth went to new york first in 1990, there were public enemy posters everywhere and  it was still pleasantly grimey, conversely when horsemouth went in the early 2000s it had been scrubbed clean - early breakdancers (crazy-legs, pop-master lock) were wheeled out as if on the heritage cicuit on municipal stages, and even that was rare and had to be looked out for, his friends were being rinsed off manhatten, beginning the exodus to brooklyn.

horsemouth is reading the flaubert  (mainly). friday night he went out for a quick couple of pints with marike in the somewhat hopeful hipster pub in an old council office on the blackwall tunnel approach road (like he said it's hopeful). soon the balfron will become the ghost of social housing past the high rise icon of modernism gone bad will become aligned with the forces of regeneration, more commuter rabbit hutches will be chucked up as fast as the speed of setting concrete (abervan village or something, city island)  the city is thriving by means of accelerating the calculated exclusion of its poorest.