when the time comes to act - act!

the night before his gig at sinclair auditorium in 1978 (the anniversary of which is tomorrow) robbie basho played four songs at the deli natural restaurant, cedar rapids, iowa (july 21, 1978). here he is singing "omar khayamm country" a song that was never featured on any of his publicly released albums.

horsemouth has been out sunbathing and this has cheered him up. he has been waiting for problems to solve themselves and reading umberto eco and jean-claude carriere’s this is not the end of the book. he was a little uncertain about reading it so he started reading the chapters in reverse order (it seems to be working).

it’s an amiable book where two old duffers (known for their interest in books) talk about books.

in the sun, on the decking in the back garden, with the odd seagull cry, it is like the seaside.

eco and carriere answer questions such as ‘what will happen to your book collections when you die?’ (this is the last chapter in fact). but this is a bigger problem for your average book-loving schmo rather than your published author. your published author can give his carefully curated collection to a university or a museum or a library, your average schmo is threatened with his life’s collection (all those good friends) going in a skip (or at best off to the charity shop to be distributed to the four winds a purchase at a time).

of course a similar question would arise should horsemouth decide to (re)move from the seaside towns (not that his library is carefully curated you understand). there are the gothics, shading into the decadents and such like; there are the russians (the poles etc.) - but what about russian decadents?; there is all that theory (the frankfurt schoolers versus the normaliens), there are the french 19th century novelists and their relay race across the century - balzac handing off to flaubert, balzac and hugo at the start, zola and maupassant at the end; then there are the books on music (as pointless an activity as could be wished for).

his music collection is much reduced. except for his own music (that he has kept close). the CDs get played (some of them). the vinyl stays in its sleeves and in its boxes. the cassettes are long gone (most of them). when the time comes act. meanwhile...