the strange tale of the north pond hermit

horsemouth is back from leytonstone folk club where he saw stick in the wheel (london/ essex), vincent cross (USA) and gemma khawaja (norfolk badlands) in the company of john clarkson.

gemma khawaja horsemouth has seen before at sutton house - good (if short) set, nice voice, good playing. (https://gemmakhawaja.bandcamp.com/)

vincent cross (ireland-australia-ireland-new york in fact) played clawhammer and two finger banjo, and great mississipi john hurt and carter family style guitar and harmonica'd and troubadored and raconteered. (http://www.vincentcross.com/)

stick in the wheel are recording their album and it shows they're much tighter and much more organised, more care and thought has gone into the voicings. they've emerged re-energised. if horsemouth has a criticism it is that all the structures are strophic, i.e. repetitions without variations, key changes etc - this on its own is fine (it's what english folk songs are like after all) but when all the tunes are put side by side this becomes apparent. just a thought. horsemouth supposes that what he is really asking for is more fake variation.

today will be sunny horsemouth will go lie in the park and read a bit.

yesterday horsemouth wandered down to greenwich (well no in fact he took the seaside towns light tramway down - walked back up to the wharf of canaries and then got bored and took the tram back). he bought a 3CD box set of mid-period miles davis - nefertiti, sorcerer, filles de kilimanjaro ('that's a lot of miles' remarked the dude in record and tape - it's even more ron carter/ tony williams thought horsemouth). horsemouth also bought (in halcyonandon) a collection of maupassant's short stories and richard jefferies' hodge and his masters, the story of a farm labourer. jefferies was writing for the standard at the time (so his political opinions on farm labourers are quite reactionary) but he writes well. you remember wild london the collapse and re-wilding novel by jeffries that horsemouth was praising abut a year ago.

a friend is thinking of making a dub album - horsemouth has vigorously promoted howard for the job (vocals on a dub album?). he gets a lot done but he seems to have a fairly laid back working tempo. horsemouth (himself) is indecisive, x amount of weeks on holiday and he's still got nothing done. he'll jam with andrew minty one evening this week, howard finishes work in a couple of weeks (and then what - more recording?), he needs to get on with the harmonium thing with john clarkson (before he becomes an importer of canal boats).