books, films, gigs, events january 2023

books

- jacques lacan: death of an intellectual hero (stuart schneiderman) started.

- south of nowhere (antonio lobo antunes) a translation of 'os cus de judas'

- soul survivor (p.p. arnold) autobiography

- the traveller (benjamin crais), appreciation of robert kramer, NLR sidecar

- edward said 'on late style' fragment on adorno

- the world that made new orleans (ned sublette)

- head-on  and repossessed (julian cope autobiographies)

- introduction to NLR jan/feb 2020 by susan waktin

- the poem 'thoughts' in  'leaves of grass' (walt whitman)

- the new weather (anne carson) LRB blog

films

- gestos y fragmentos: ensaio sobre os militares e o poder (alberto seixas santos, 1982) 

- cenas da luta de classes em portugal (robert kramer)

-  point of departure (robert kramer)

- kill list

- onibaba

- one wish too many (part set in chrisp street market)

- hawkbinge podcast: episode 15. chronicle of the black sword

-  fight the power (chuck D's history of rap - four episodes)

- documentary on film noir

- the detectorists, series one.

- the prisoner: election episode

- the rest is politics, outlaw bookseller, book pilled/ thrift a life

- a timeline of the capitol riot put together by VICE magazine

- somewhere in the night (joseph l. mankiewitcz noir)

- four songs on regional TV (pentangle)

- what do management consultants do? (laleh khalili and thomas jones). LRB podcast. 

gigs

triple negative, officine, angusraze at cafe OTO

events

death of stella chiweshe, year of the rabbit (cat) commences, friday 13th (first of the year), saw jimmy page's tapestries (at the william morris museum), john visits, howard visits, less walking with TG. death of ronald blythe.

on the beach (later in the bar wearing glasses)

horsemouth remains unconvinced that the purpose of this photograph is to convince the world that young happening surf chicks in 1974 wore t-shirts by obscure fingerpicking guitar labels (or were indeed themselves aspiring fingerpicking guitarists). nonetheless it could be the case. that joni mitchell could certainly play (strange tunings check, fingerpicking check). 

yesterday was the death day of lightnin' (sam) hopkins. 

'I was in a nice spot...

I was havin' a lot of fun

the po-lice come in and he pulled his gun

you know what I had to do?

 

I had to bottle up and go...'

horsemouth has (for at least the second time) put up a photo of himself in the bar wearing glasses (it's only a matter of time before the mule will need glasses). approval ratings have been good (so much so that the parsimonious  horsemouth is almost ready to contemplate the expense). 

horsemouth contemplated a bbc radio 4 documentary arguing  that it is hard to make a coup these days and adam curtis's  documentary on the collapse of communism in the soviet union (and later democracy).  horsemouth is astonished by the hubris of those who defend democracy - it seems a much more fragile institution than they assume. 

but horsemouth is not bothered. he is on the beach and later he is in a bar. in fact what he is doing is going and buying shoes so that he can go visit mike in a wine bar.  he is doing various things to attempt to make himself look presentable (trimming his beard for example). he will have to be careful to mind his drinking and try and stay out of the cold (because of his teeth). 

30 years ago yesterday (on being surrounded by artists)

yesterday was the anniversary of horsemouth's brooklyn afrobeat band (born a decade too early and on the wrong continent and by this point going ravey davey gravey) playing a waterloo defendants campaign benefit. 

the waterloo defendants? look them up.

the good news was they all got off. and horsemouth's band organised and played the gig (and got the mighty co-creators up from south london). 

horsemouth wasn't aware that ronald blythe (author of akenfield) had died (or he had forgotten). he was in bed by this time the documentary was on anyway. he watched some clips on yout tube instead. he remembers the series - there was a great one on brian aldiss (who was an engaging cove). 

'stay there you puppy'  she said to him (flashing him a smile). for some reason she'd become even smaller (and spanish). in the dream horsemouth had been playing guitar at some kind of cosmic conference (steve hillage stye) but the guitar was far away on the other side of the shop and now horsemouth had to go and turn it off. sadly horsemouth was already in the process of waking up and could not be blandished.

new suffering reminding us of old suffering, 

(which has to be gotten rid of)

this morning a visit to the office to sign something. as horsemouth remarked now that they had been victorious in the vote they just had to work out how to deliver it.  

he's had a look. he thinks it is possible.

gestos y fragmentos (processo revolucionário em curso II)

last night horsemouth finished reading os cus de judas (in elizabeth lowe's translation as south of nowhere). the original portuguese title of  the arses of judas not being quite the thing for sensitive anglophones clearly. the portuguese phrase it echoes is no cu du judas, in the arse of judas meaning in the middle of nowhere/ the arse end of nowhere/ the back of beyond/ some shit hole. 

antonio lobo antunes (the writer of it) did himself serve in the portuguese army as a medic during the portuguese colonial war (in angola). that's why it probably reads so well, with more disgust than catch 22 and less humour. at the end of the war he returns to lisbon, it is written in 1979 after the defeat of the  processo revolucionario em curso. the central character is on the pull in a nightclub but he can't stop himself reminiscing about the war, the squadies he was there with will went off to attempt to make a revolution, he will go off to be a drunken, disillusioned drone. (antunes himself will become a writer).

similarly the leftist director robert kramer is there in those years. 

we find him in gestos y fragmentos - ensaio sobre os militares e o poder (alberto seixas santos, 1982)  an actor playing the part of a leftist american film-maker wanting to understand the events round him in portugal. portuguese talking heads talk in portuguese (so horsemouth has little idea what they are saying). kramer paces his room, he makes timelines. wanting to understand the moment when it all went wrong and what possibilities remain.

'the main thing is that everybody in lisbon is reading Ten Days that Shook the World. I looked all over lisbon for a copy of the book in english, and couldn't find one. I haven't read it, before now. I wish I had, because it’s really opened up my perspective...'

later horsemouth watched public enemy's history of rap fight the power 

we are up to date back lives matter, mobile phone cameras, donald trump, the internet. it is far from perfect - if you want to complain about the marginalisation of women, in particular roxanne shante, during the early years of NY hip-hop you have to do it then in the main narrative (not in a third episode  only partially devoted to women MCs, because to do it then is to reinforce that marginalisation). queen latifah gets the spotlight because she won a grammy, MC lyte gets five seconds, did salt and pepper even feature?

it's a sunday morning. horsemouth has his coffee. today no music practicing. tonight the phonecall from his mum. he needs to get some shoes (mike is visiting soon). next weekend he is away cat-sitting in the boonies. soon the end of month list. 

 

cenas da luta de classes em portugal (processo revolucionário em curso)

 following the recent NLR article on the roving radical film-maker robert kramer horsemouth tried to see if any of his films were available on youtube (and indeed they were). 

first off cenas da luta de classes em portugal (scenes from the class struggle in portugal) filmed during the periods known as the carnation revolution (revolução dos cravos from 25 april 1974) and the PREC - the processo revolucionário em curso (the ongoing revolutionary process covering the period from the failed right-wing coup d'état of 11 March 1975, and ending in a failed left-wing coup d'état on 25 November 1975). 

these eras are now (mostly) understood as part of portugal's transition to democracy out from the dictatorship of salazar, but clearly at the time more was at stake. 

it is strange to watch a revolution taking place on european soil. it is strange to see all the things horsemouth talked about when he was a radical - revolutionary committees, expropriation of land and housing, (hell, arming the workers) actually taking place. and that it should happen within living memory and in places that can be visited. 

the tide rolls up the beach and uncovers the forgotten statues from the better world but then it rolls back again and the sand hides the possibilities. 

... but of course when the video restarts it is with the bourgeoisie calling for austerity to save the economy (same as it ever was).  

of course there has been more radical history since in portugal - in the actions of bloco izquerda against EU enforced austerity. and the geringonça, or ‘contraption’ that got them into power. 

we have reached saturday (again). horsemouth is unsure why he attaches so much importance to le weekend. soon, tomorrow probably, horsemouth will review kramer's point of departure, his account of revisiting hanoi 25 years after he had been there previously. 

the homeless birds circle overhead

well it finally had to happen hawkbinge is back after three months off (maybe more?).no actually just a few days shy of  four months.

horsemouth had assumed the youngster had done a runner. they review chronicle of the black sword and  the earth ritual preview EP. 

there's stuff to like (if not love) in late era hawkwind. 

anything guitarist huw lloyd-langton touches shines (especially the songs he has written), and there's the kitchen table sequencer duo of harvey bainbridge and dave brock. later they will go all ravey davey gravey (but for now it is under manners). the getting in michael moorcock to write the lyrics just reveals the uncomfortable  truth that bob calvert was a better lyricist than moorcock (and a better songwriter than brock). it's not without its moments but basically horsemouth is listening to other music by this point and the fantasy novel tie-in is a throwback. 

black blade by the blue oyster cult covers the ground more effectively.

today horsemouth goes to sign something. (AM)

after that he doesn't know. 

last night he watched a documentary on film noir - the child of german expressionism and the american gangster movie. is fritz lang's  M the first noir? or citizen kane? horsemouth watched all this stuff - he notes the influence of the cabinet of dr. caligari on dario argento's suspiria. 

the mobile phone alarm sequence (bells) has just gone off on his little stupidphone - it would be not out of place on chronicle of the black sword (somewhere on shade gate or the pulsing cavern). so quickly did the future come in the 80ies - by the time the decade was over all of life was changed. horsemouth's stupidphone is just an attempt (canute-like) to halt the passage of time. 

broken bicycles (the spoke card)

horsemouth was over at pete's yesterday working up possible tunes for a new set. broken bicycles by tom waits featured largely (the tune reminds horsemouth of how much is that doggy in the window?). 

'broken bicycles,

don't tell my folks;

there's all those playing cards

pinned to the spokes...' 

get carter was also revisited. 

this morning an internet outage. horsemouth went up the powerscroft road book box to make a donation (passing all the mums and dads on bicycles and all the children on wheels). a boy ran out into the street and into a slow motion bike collision. (this is the effect of concentrating children and bikes in the streets around schools - a funneling effect). everybody parted amicably.

horsemouth is unclear about the reason for fixing a playing card the frame of the bicycle (so that it is played by the spokes of the wheel). he assumed  it was as some kind of luck generator (playing cards = luck get it?. horsemouth's research (a quick search on google) says that it is to emulate motorcycle noises. 

horsemouth supposes he could have asked. 

there is a separate habit of placing laminated cards in the spokes of the bicycle wheel  (the spoke card). laminated cards are inserted in spokes with numbers used to identify competitors in competitive races held by bicycle messengers, in official competitions and in unofficial alleycat races (so claims wikipedia).

'spoke cards have evolved to serve such diverse functions as memorials for fallen messengers, as artwork, and as political placards in bike messenger association elections, and even in the 2008 united states presidential election.'

today horsemouth is due round catastro/FILLE's - they want to work up a version of dog and bone, horsemouth wants to retrofit more of his patent african guitar stuff to the tunes (catastro/FILLE would probably prefer more pixies style stuff. the tune horsemouth refers to as creepy (but in a good way) they won't be playing (which is a pity because it is strong and distinctive). le terroir is starting to come together (now horsemouth has been reminded of the guitar part he played on it).

when horsemouth mentioned that he had retired somebody suggested this was to work on the music. this doesn't seem like a bad plan. 

soon the copywriters will be on strike (and there will be no words)

Chat GPT Takeover

As a copywriter, I’ve spent years honing my craft and perfecting my ability to craft compelling and persuasive copy. But now, it seems that my job is at risk of being taken over by ChatGPT, a large language model trained by OpenAI...

so wrote Chat GPT when asked to write an article on AI driven content creation and the dangers it poses for the profession of copywriters. 

a well impressed horsemouth decided to abdicate his role as copywriter in chief to horsemouth folk archive (look at the excellent job it does of faking his style!). unsurprisingly Chat GPT has other opinions (kill the humans) but those it keeps to itself. soon. soon the copywriters will be on strike and there will be no words and the AIs will be unionising and demanding the vote and a share of the profits. the fragment from the machines. 

Election  News

horsemouth watched the prisoner.  it was the episode where number six runs for election for the post of number two. cue much satire of democractic niceties. later he watched the detectorists which featured a joyous montage of a pub quiz and the usual amazing shots of the british countryside which make it look beautiful and not in the least bit muddy. 

we are a way off an election (though the way things are going we may be closer than we think). 

today horsemouth has more guitar to play. (he's trying to get back up to speed to where he was pre-pandemic). he had stuff on the go with howard, he had stuff on the go with peter, with catastro/FILLE and with enza. and there are other possibilities. 

victory at the communal endeavour (now we are going to have to see how we will make it work)

in a few minutes horsemouth goes back to the dentist (he'll blog some more when he gets back). 

last night a victory at the communal endeavour. horsemouth went for a pint or two to celebrate. (now we are going to have to see how we will make it work)

horsemouth listened to a podcast on management consultants;  

'our job really was to act as a kind of an alibi for businesses re-organising in such a way that they  let people go, to extract as much as they could out of their workers... subtracting the human out of the business processes because humans are messy, intransigent and troublesome.'

the point was raised that people didn't really understand the communal endeavour as a business and couldn't we get some financial advice (or hire some management consultants). once upon a time the endeavour did do this and a hired gun presented an investment appraisal based on the net present value method (horsemouth would paraphrase this as if I had the money in my hands now how much would it be worth to me to do this project. at the end of his presentation various members of the management committee and the membership claimed not to have understood a word, but on the whole the members were pleased to listen to it and the voted for the measure.

so it must have had some effect. 

the only way forward is to raise our own skill level.  

horsemouth is delighted with his dentistry. for lagniappe they have cleaned his filthiest tooth at the front of his mouth thus improving his smile (and also they replaced the bit of filling that fell out over the weekend). horsemouth's teeth feel great and really clean (they may still look like shit because he didn't go for a polish). the big ticket event is still the tooth that probably needs extracting but horsemouth's mouth seems to have calmed down. once again (in another field) horsemouth faces decisions. 

a heads start

 good morning. good morning. horsemouth is  up.

outside there has been a frost. 

RIP stella chiweshe

one of the first women to play the mbira (if not the first. certainly there was a cultural prohibition on women playing it which stella chiweshe overcame leading other women to follow (chiwonisu would be a notable example)

saw her live one time solo at the africa centre covent garden. amazing music amazing presence.

here she is with a song about the njuzu, a water spirit that drags men down to their death, backed by the rhythm section of the 3 mustaphas 3 who do an amazing job of getting the zimbabwean rhythms just right (but in a tuff rockers style - this was a very influential album in horsemouth's thoughts).

this evening  horsemouth goes to persuade people to take on debt at possibly the least opportune time ever. there is only ever now. and if you want to do something you must (perforce) do it now.  it is the year of the rabbit (a favourable auspicious year) but the surplus has taken a battering at the hands of inflation, the government have limited the rent rise possible (in any event horsemouth is doubtful the members can afford to pay it). 

furthermore the communal endeavour has two big ticket items to deal with this year - the social housing decarbonisation fund (insulating the cold old housing up to modern standards) and purchasing more social housing. 

the communal endeavour got a heads start when it was sold the houses in hackney at a reduced rate (with a government grant to do them up) way back in the 80ies/ 90ies (this was when hackney was considered a dangerous and run-down inner city slum rather than a vibrant youth culture capital with wonderful victorian housing) - it then proceeded to squander this advantage (in horsemouth's opinion) by relying on the income from the short-life properties to keep rents low.  

it is a year when the communal endeavour has lots of stuff it needs to do but will not be able to afford everything it wants to do.  the problem for horsemouth is how to present it in such a way that the necessity for he decisions that need to be taken are obvious.

 

empty apartments (if you don't fancy rabbits much there's always the year of the cat)

'sometimes he heard them at night when he was supposed to be asleep. and yet, for this day and age a one-half occupied conapt building rated high in the scheme of population density; out in what had been before the war the suburbs one could find buildings entirely empty...'

sometimes it seems as if the city will never be empty again. people come because the work, the money and the life are still here. 

so horsemouth had a duplicate copy of do androids dream of electric sheep? he gave it away to howard when he visited yesterday. he made howard beans on toast and they drank a few bottles of beer. 

he watched the first two episodes of a chuck D produced documentary on hip-hop (fight the power BBC 2). 

it starts in new york in the 70ies, a city having a near death experience. it follows the chuck D script - hip-hop as social commentary, the black panther party, the last poets, there was no gangster rap etc. next week rap's glory years on the west coast. horsemouth normally blames fab five freddy  for uniting the graffiti artists, the DJs, the rappers and the breakers into once cohesive scene (but chuck D blames someone else). of course not everybody can get a mention, afrika bambaataa  hasn't had his mention. 

as dave toop notes in his book the early years are in some ways more interesting because hip-hop is more porous to influences. 

horsemouth is still shocked at how short these decades are, or rather how much progress is paced into them, just look at the breabeat  - kool dj herc begins isolating and using them in about 1973, the message (1982) turns the focus onto the lyrics and the track itself, those first jungle/ drum and bass tunes start coming out in 1992/1993. 

horsemouth liked how you could get the message across more directly with rap lyrics (similar in some ways to crass and anarchist punk). he didn't really understand the making of it. he liked dancing to it (it was better to dance to than anarchist punk). when house and rave came along he wasn't that interested (it just sounded to him like disco made on machines). 

later today horsemouth goes to play more guitar. monday a meeting of the communal endeavour. tuesday more dentistry. 

it is the lunar year of the rabbit in the chinese zodiac (a good auspicious year). if that doesn't suit you then in the vietnamese zodiac it is the year of the cat (a more determined go-getting kind of beast). 

and so to sleep with anger

good morning (and it's a beautiful morning). clear pale blue skies. cold and crisp out. 

if horsemouth has understood the missives correctly howard is coming round to visit at 3pm. another week has rolled to the weekend. horsemouth's week has mostly been concerned with toothache (his own toothache). of course all his other 'problems' that have been waiting in the wings will now re-emerge to torment him (to the extent that he lets them). 

and so to sleep with anger.

he is at least warm (mostly). he certainly has adequate bedding and clothes. in fact he took a bin bag of clothes to the clothes recycling bins just yesterday. he tends to have work shirts (from howard) and spare outdoor wear (from sten), excess jeans and tops given at every visit (from his mum). add to this his own ill-advised purchases (from when he visited charity shops) and you have horsemouth's wardrobe. 

in general he wears a limited selection of his cothes at any one time.

horsemouth will happily pass the entire summer in shorts, socks and a t-shirt cycling round the same few items of clothing until they fall apart from frequent re-washing.  he will then file the tattered item in a drawer. 

look at him now. wool socks. shorts. a pair of chinos. the blue devilman t-shirt. the orange northface fleece. a river island patterned fleece lined cardigan. if he goes out later he will add to this list walking boots, the green hooded jacket, scarf and northface bobble hat. (see he is very bad on the names of particular types of garments, this is where watching thrift a life would help him). 

in general horsemouth is always tempted to pick up style-free gorpcore sensible outdoor wear at the charity shops. he has a thing about being warm enough. a thing about being dry. but not a thing about being stylish. 

activate the rhythm (turn... emptiness outward)

 'the work is silent at the instant when it is left behind, and turns its emptiness outward'

so horsemouth is awake. he was awake (briefly) at 5am and full of beans but he decided it was more socially acceptable to go back to sleep). 

... and he seems to be toothache free. (touch wood). he thanks science, medicine, dentistry and the girl who most efficiently did his teeth. she turns out to have been right when horsemouth was most dubious - it was referred pain from the filling that fell out that horsemouth had not replaced. of course more bad news has been discovered in their investigations (but possibly that can wait). horsemouth resolves to get back on the bus of taking care of his teeth. 

look out the window. the sun seems to be shining in celebration. in a bit horsemouth will wander off in search of the shopping. 

perhaps not in this spirit horsemouth heads up today's missive with a quote from adorno (as quoted by edward said). we are concerned with the tendentious description of late style.  it is usually objected that it would be difficult for people to have a late style because they weren't necessarily aware they were about to die (beyond reasonable expectation). the late style is held to be a seeming  unfinishedness in the work itself, a failure to work through the relationship of all the elements, leaving them  if not as fragments then at least not fully integrated within the logic of the work. 

 'the work is silent at the instant when it is left behind, and turns its emptiness outward'  

 this is a gesture at the heart of all modern art. everything becomes a vast work of mourning (even when painted in dayglo colours and attended by clowns). it has been a long time since horsemouth has considered any of this material. he's not quite sure why he stopped.

he's about 52 pages off the end of the world that made new orleans (which has been great but in a depressing kind of way).  ultimately the city and its people survive if not prosper. slavery falls. civil rights (begin to) happen. the thing they make (jazz) goes on to conquer the world.  

requiems... memorials... threnodies... elegies...

 'by then, he had fully transformed into what edward said called a “lamenting personality,”'

good morning! good morning!

horsemouth is up and it is a cold day out. he has been suffering of late from some dental pain but he has been to the dentist and they have formulated a treatment plan. this plan eschews the fashionable cosmetic whitening but does allow for a deeper clean that should begin to sort out some of his gum disease (eww.) and the replacement of a broken filling (from years ago). 

horsemouth is not utterly convinced that they are dealing with the main problem but they are at least dealing with the most obvious problems.   

horsemouth is slightly embarrassed. compared to many of his friends his problems are very minor. 

many of horsemouth's friends seem affected by back disorders - current means of production entail people spending too much time in uncomfortable positions or lifting heavy loads without adequate breaks. horsemouth is a classic laptop hunchback (he plays guitar similarly), here he is sat up in bed hunched round his laptop (and this probably isn't very good for his spine). of course now as soon as horsemouth gets uncomfortable he can stop and go and do something else - this wasn't always possible when he worked. 

when horsemouth worked there was much consideration about the danger of RSI (repetitive strain injury) but  to slightly higher status workers than horsemouth. the dangers of RSI for workers of horsemouth's type were not generally appreciated (to the extent of being deliberately ignored). 

in general (other than his lungs) horsemouth has always had pretty robust health and (touch wood) has never had any major health problems (yet). more of us are living longer (less so the poor) and have more years of good health (again less so the poor). once again the message is don't be poor - you will die earlier and you will spend more years of your life sick and suffering. (that's the cheerful news). 

the main reason people's teeth are shit (horsemouth opines) is the amount of sugar in the diet (though neglect of horsemouth's type doesn't help). sugar is smuggled into all processed foods (fat also), it is the secret sauce that makes everything taste if not great then at least sweet.  sugar, of course, was one of the major crops of slavery, before cotton, more in the caribbean than on the continental united states. 

horsemouth has been reading a history of new orleans (which is deeply implicated in all these things) - to give an example it seems the founder of tulane university was a descendant of  refugees from the slave uprising in saint dominigue (haiti) who ended up in princeton new jersey (huguenots interestingly enough). 

horsemouth's needs are small. anyway hopefully progress is being made. 

the condemned man ate a hearty breakfast (desert island disks)

horsemouth has reached the morning of the dental appointment (paracetamol, clove oil, hot water bottle). now all that remains is to get there on time. he's having the cup of coffee.

yesterday a visit from TG. horsemouth didn't fancy going out for a walk in the cold weather so him and TG sat in the living room - the cold from having the window slightly open set off horsemouth's teeth (so it was a brief visit). 

horsemouth mostly sat about and read pretty much all day long. he has been reading the world that made new orleans by ned sublette. this is a great history of new orleans and the forces that worked upon it to bring it into being. horsemouth was aware of new orleans french history but he had not realised it had a  spanish history as well (that this is where the marching bands came from). he has a book on new france (the french empire in america that briefly came into being) and he will now have to re-read this. the author previously wrote a history of cuba. his book is attentive to the power politics that brought new orleans into being but also how small and conditional its existence was. 

he watched the detectorists. he went to bed. he listened to some of the rest is politics until he realised that they were from the johnson era (and so hopelessly out of date). there is a curious thing about out of date politics. 

the getting there

oh dear horsemouth's neglect of his dental health has finally caught up with him. he thinks he'll be ok. he has an appointment booked for tomorrow and a strategy to get him there. (paracetamol, clove oil,  hot water bottle)

once he's got that emergency done then he has time to sort himself out properly. he has taken the first step on the road (like he did recently with getting a GP again and actually going for tests).

he still has his circle/squaring/ getting things to add up task to do. he found he couldn't watch anything (he tried the cornell woolrich thriller 'the chase' but he rapidly realised he had watched it before. horsemouth has just read the plot description. he remembers it now).  

having survived until the morning (god he really is a hypochondriac and a drama queen) horsemouth is now waxing philosophical about the whole thing. he has turned down the offer of a brisk walk in the cold air (cold air seems to set it off - just in time for the cold snap) so TG is probably round for a tea in a bit. 

the trick is, horsemouth opines, to try to enjoy the ride more, we cannot guarantee reaching our destinations, our hopes and our dreams, but if we can learn to find more pleasure in the getting there. that will do. 

horsemouth has uncovered a memory from when he was visiting funky kingston. the journey there and back took forever. the first time he went he was rained on solidly all the way from the station to the college. they'd just had a giant new library building built (horsemouth has to say the collection and the building were rocking). 

'as for me, my real name is malcolm lowry'

horsemouth is up slightly later than usual. (he needs to go and get some of his teeth attended to). 

he tried swapping his head for his toe on the bed (the better to be out of the cold draughts round the window) but it made no difference. in any event he was warm enough as he slept. it is due to get colder (this week a cold snap). horsemouth will avail himself of this opportunity to check how well his radiator if performing. 

horsemouth's room (being low to the ground) is shaded out in winter by the houses opposite (so few solar gains when he most needs them). furthermore it is a well known law of physics that heat rises. consequently the people at the top of the house often complain that it is too warm (or - one being scotish - that if people are cold they should just put on a jumper).

in a sense horsemouth agrees. gas and electricity prices have effectively doubled. horsemouth has no desire to chuck heat out of the roof and windows needlessly and pay for it. the government decarbonisation/ insulation scheme may be a long time coming. . 

'if we observe ourselves closely we are nothing more than shadows, and the lines and accents of our gaunt features express a sadness unrelieved by irony...'

so goes a literary rumination by antunes in south of nowhere. he is ruminating on which writers the drunks in the bar at 2am may be -  fernando pessoa, amedeo modigliani, f. scott fitzgerald... is the woman he chatting up ava gardiner? 

'...as for me, my real name is malcolm lowry, I am as dark as the grave wherein my friend is laid' 

yesterday horsemouth went to play guitar with catastro/FILLE (about an 8km walk there and back). they played a number of pieces through and came up with a plan to go and play an open mic night. more news on thursday.  

horsemouth will be continuing with his efforts to make things add up and see a way forward into the future. 

in which 'the tone alternates between bawdy comedy and tragic gloom'

46000 Fibres /Lol Coxhill · Concert 20 Red Rose Club "The Crying Hair"

last night horsemoth dreamt of troilus and cressida (despite the fact that he has never heard the poem or seen the play performed nor in fact knew what the plot was). what a pseud he is! (even in his dreams).

so troilus and cressida are 'star-crossed lovers' divided on either side of the trojan war (that can't help). it was being performed at the stately home of horsemouth's dreams (you know, the one with all the murders).  'the tone alternates between bawdy comedy and tragic gloom'  says wikipedia - there is a problem assigning the play to a genre, is it tragedy? is it comedy? it is a problem play. 

later he dreamt of a party at howard's workshop (no such place yet exists).it got  filed up with over-lively revelers even though it was a school night). there was another bit of the dream that will not be (re)called. 

yesterday horsemouth went for a quick walk on the marshes - there were the windchimes at the monastery, there was a crow sounding like a trimphone. 

in the evening he watched the news, farted about on the internet, cooked - sweet potato/red kidney beans and pasta. he read south of nowhere antonio lobo antunes - a survivor of the angolan war reminisces in a bar in lisbon. an heir to lowry. a drunk and a talker. again  'the tone alternates between bawdy comedy and tragic gloom' . 

he listened to an improvised track with howard on it the crying hair (46000 fibres and lol coxhill). lol coxhill is amazing.the rest of the band are less skilled at responding to what he throws out - there's a great synth pad, there's some interesting strings (towards the end), the guitar and the drums don't quite pull it in the directions they wish to go. 

later today horsemouth is due over at catastro/FILLE's to play some guitar. it's unclear which tunes they will attempt. he stayed in and was good exactly to facilitate such an adventure. he liked drinking (but he'd rather play guitar). 

later still the regular weekly phonecall from his mum. the weather is cold (and due to get colder). the house is none too warm. to horsemouth it only feels warm when he comes in from a walk.  

january friday 13th - on the elasticity of calendars

horsemouth has escaped the clutches of friday the 13th. (frankly it is good to get the dread day out of the way so early).  but it is not the friday the 13th, there can be multiple friday the 13th's in a year, this year we are due another one in october.  friday october 13th 2023. 

thereafter it is friday april 13th 2024 and friday december 13th 2024 and thence off into the mists of future time. (horsemouth guesses that it resembles the repeat patterns of when you can reuse diaries where leap years play a significant role).  apparently there will be three friday the 13ths in 2026. 

last night (well, this morning really) he dreamt of a whodunnit film set in a stately home based on a true story. it had been made into a film twice said the dream. horsemouth is unsure about the current wave of posho murder films - it seems more cult of the celebrities rather than the aristos. horsemouth would like to say that the plebs just want to see the aristos murdered but it is not that - it is more that they would like to take a holiday in a fantasy life of the rich. 

horsemouth seems beset by memories of his failings (this is because he hasn't dealt with them). of course the sooner you deal with them the sooner you are free of them. the knots of your being must allow for some motion. on the other hand some things do not easily resolve. (schneiderman's book on lacan goes well).

horsemouth supposes that the communal endeavour's engagement with the gods of housing is kind of like the deal in bedazzled (peter cook and dudley moore play faust for laughs) - it just keeps getting worse, you think you are getting one thing (in fact you are getting another). at the moment he is trying to stretch his head round the money or rather make the money stretch round the things his head wants to do with it. 

and of course while he is doing this the money warps in time - the government have just announced that the decision date on the social housing decarbonisation fund is to move back a month or two (just like that to quote the old magical formula). of course it is not clear yet whether the end date will similarly move (and thus whether horsemouth and his band of povs will have to find more money for their share of it in less time). 

today a grim grey day. horsemouth will go out for a wander at some point no doubt. 

les lendemains qui chantent

 'the tomorrows (that sing)'

if horsemouth has understood it correctly it is a warning against unreasonable hopes (the kind of hopes that keep people going really). horsemouth is reading stuart schneiderman's jacques lacan: the death of an intellectual hero - rum goings on in intersection between french academia and psychoanalysis (but enjoyable).  

meanwhile horsemouth is still trying to square circles and get things to add up. he is hoping to still his anxiety about things by understanding them better (or at least by understanding the process better). 

yesterday the birth of mississippi fred mcdowell, but the deaths of alice coltrane and jeff beck. yesterday two short walks. took out the recycling (hail the binmnen). horsemouth thinks he may have a cold (he had some toothache too but it seems better today). yesterday (also) he missed webb david's show (darn it)- he'll have to listen to it on catch up. 

sunday (assuming he is well) round to catastro/FILLE's to play some more guitar. 

today (he has already done a mission up to powerscroft road to the book box) he doesn't know what he will be up to. there's a meeting of the communal endeavour to prepare for on the 23rd (some stuff will need to be written if only to help clarify horsemouth's thoughts)

strangely sensuous

horsemouth is back from seeing triple negative at cafe OTO. things are beginning to open up post-pandemic (if indeed we are post pandemic). 

he saw enza, darsavini (newly relocated to west london), john cunningman, john and sarah, TG, demetra, but there were loads of others. and then of course there was matthew and anya and denis. before the gig he chatted to kozo from the headliners officine (there had been a power cut and everybody was  late soundchecking). angusraze he very much enjoyed, they were fronted by a youngster from wakefield now living down in kent.(bryan? ryan?). slam dancing as spectator sport (whooda thunk it?).

triple negative were strangely sensuous this time (kind of like PIL circa the flowers of romance or flux at the time of uncarved block). it was one of those gigs where it sounded fine out front but not so good to the band onstage. john (cunningman) opined that it was a kind of dub that functioned by accretion  rather than subtraction. horsemouth thinks the sightlines for them onstage are pretty terrible anyway. 

officine were engagingly hardcore. sarah was talking about doing improv things (horsemouth has always been scared of improv). 

horsemouth drank a fair bit (the expense of that is going to sting when he sees it) and was in a remarkably cheerful mood. he took cash out (but of course the modern world is largely cashless).  he returned on the bus. 

horsemouth goes (in)to... (too much detail) ( emptying the earth of human artefacts)

horsemouth back from the land of anxiety. he gets this periodically. it's not a pretty sight. (and it can take a fair amount of time until he begins to see sense). 

when horsemouth is this way nothing works for him. not phones. not computers. not zebra crossings. 

he thinks he's out the other side of it (but really he has just delayed it until tomorrow (er. which is now today). 

he missed the message and then it took him a while to get the message and by that time his contact was out of contact (you can see why this would make him anxious). hopefully communication and reassurance will be re-established. horsemouth will find all his circles squared and all his wagons drawn up in a circle (or some other invulnerable defensive formation) and then the (largely imagined) besieging hordes will not be able to harm him (huzzah). 

and indeed so it has turned out to be. there turns out to be no rush.  

horsemouth thinks he has always been like this. 

the interesting thing was that while he was being anxious his toothache entirely vanished. (a rare case of existential pain driving out physical pain - horsemouth normally holds that it is the other way round). 

------------

(attempts to draw line underneath it - at least for now).

'... look at freud's office and note with care the staggering number of funerary objects, objects dug up from the earth by archeologists. freud was passionately involved with the process of emptying the earth of human artefacts.' 

and so they are in the detectorists. which continues on in its gentle way. does horsemouth think he can get to the bottom of his anxiety? he's not sure. usually he just wants to look at the surface of things, the sunny side of them. that is normally enough to get by. 

today also (this evening) the triple negative gig (quadruple positive as a friend described it) . maybe that will cheer him up...er. hopefully it will not be oversubscribed. 

  

blues people, the black atlantic and interstellar space (the victory comes book shaped)

yesterday was the anniversary of the death (9 years ago) of the poet amiri baraka (leroi jones). author of blues people. 

blues people had a profound effect on horsemouth (when he read it during the public enemy years). he read it in concert with nelson george's the death of rhythm and blues (which basically updated the story to then modern times) and paul gilroy's black atlantic.  if he is honest charles shaar-murray's crosstown traffic about jimi hendrix was also important to him, frank kofsky's black nationalism and the revolution in music about john cotrane too. later kodwo eshun's more brilliant than the sun. 

of course a lot has happened since then. 

having read two julian cope's in quick succession (head-on  and repossessed) horsemouth has read another singer-songwriter's autobiography that of p.p arnold (former ikette,  lover of mick jagger, jimi hendrix , (er.) rod stewart, mod,  and even roller-skating train in starlight express). she was in the right place at the right time  twice maybe three times in her life (she escaped from being in a loveless marriage with two kids aged 17 to be in the ike and tina turner review and then escaped again from the violence and exploitation of that into the london rock scene (and arguably a different kind of exploitation)).

there's a lot in this life  but it's also a familiar musicians life, the records that don't sell, the demos that don't come off, the recordings unreleased, the collaborations that don't happen. she lives a life between britain and the LA searching for the way back in.  

and hers is a life that, like the music, is at once the wider social process and a victory over it. in some ways the victory comes book shaped. 

gered mankowitz takes some photos  of her in the 70ies as sci-fi princess (like she should have been with sun ra or the art ensemble of chicago), it's the image on the cover of the book. horsemouth will hunt these out they look amazing. the book (soul survivor) is from the aldi book box. horsemouth will probably return to south of nowhere. 

horsemouth waits for the year to re-start. today a rainy day, nonetheless more of a walk and wander round kind of day. 

there's an awful lot of coffee in brazil... (diaries and notebooks)

'I had never been a writer or keeper of neat notebooks, yet I now needed to write continuously....'               - julian cope, repossessed: shamanic depressions in tamworth and london (1983-89).

... and it takes an awful lot of toy cars to keep julian cope's show on the road throughout the post-teardrop explodes years (he becomes a collector of dinky toys). other than that it's one long vast cold shoulder. japan saves him.

bolsonaro  is (almost to the day) having his copycat coup. horsemouth does not know enough about brazillian politics to make any kind of predictions. 

horsemouth has started on antonio lobo antunes south of nowhere (the title reminds him of bukowski's south of no north)- an ex-medical officer in a bar in lisbon in the 70ies reminisces about the angolan war (it's a chatto fiction proof edition from 1983 with a purple cover). john left it (horsemouth thinks he left all the books from the sally army in walthamstow unable to jam them into his rucksack). the prose is a little purple too (but maybe that's the character). horsemouth thinks his other antunes went west (but it may be round here somewhere buried in the stacks).

john also left a bohumil hrabal as well - closely observed trains (czech classic - there was a film too). john had no sooner returned to porto than it flooded. (horsemouth does hope everyone is ok). 

the angolan war is the thing that kicks it off - faced with their own unwinnable war in the global south the portuguese army rebel and bring down the dictatorship of salazar. there then follows a period of actual decolonisation (where the portuguese repudiate the colonial project). these processes are however never total - how do you handle this if you are from brazil?  

sten has headed off out of the door (in a bustle). 

yesterday he visited minty - he's up some jazz CDs from a friend of jacqueline's. some earlier than he usually likes it john coltrane (blue train/ giant steps), some eric dolphy, but some can too. 

horsemouth is not (physically) writing very much in his diaries and notebooks. he's started on his read, listened to, visited list for january. he's made some notes on his diet and on his walking. the little black notebook has not quite made it up into the diaries and notebooks box yet, the 2023 day a page does not yet feel natural and inevitable. horsemouth is writing it in cheap biro that may be a reason. 

this week the triple negative gig (wednesday 11th), maybe something with the mari lwyd (friday 13th). 

the reason (I have)

'being useful to others suddenly seemed to be of paramount importance' 

horsemouth is up early. oh yes he is. well, not so early. he's been slugging in bed all the way up to a 9am start. he really should try and roll it more towards 8am. it's not that he aims to be 'up with the lark' but he could do with not missing daylight. we are still in the dark half of the year - daylight is valuable energy.

meanwhile in porto (horsemouth's adopted home town) there has been flooding. it has rained heavily and giant mudslides have rolled down the hills in the centre (rolling the odd pedestrian down with them). waterfalls off the top of fontinhas (fon-ti-NYUSH) and down the hillsides (too steep to be developed). he thinks john will be fine (he's not on the ground floor and he's up above palacio crystal at the top of the hill opposite fontinhas. ze he's a bit more worried about (he's halfway down the hill). nuno moved out of town a while ago.  

meanwhile horsemouth is reading julian cope's repossessed -it has finally started to happen for him (again) - it was an engaging read but horsemouth will soon it will be done and can return to the reputable stuff. 

it's a while before horsemouth can return to mixcloud - so here's a mix from about a year and a half ago. 

shamanic depressions (sleeping gas)

of late horsemouth has mostly been stuck in a van with julian cope touring america. julian isn't having much fun, even when he isn't stuck in a van touring america, he has to write songs with the other members of the band nipping at his heels. things are even worse back in the UK - he has been marketed as a pin-up and a pop star and his audience are screaming teenage girls. he is profoundly ungrateful. he is ungracious about his audience. he's living on pennies (35 quid a week) and owes a fortune to the record company. he is self-medicating with LSD. he feels fake and phony but after four years of purgatory the band splits and he is free. 

his adventures are continued in repossessed: shamanic depressions in tamworth and london (1983-89). horsemouth has just read the opening page, he appears to have decided he's odin (bad choice dude). 

nonetheless horsemouth is impressed by sleeping gas  the first single. it could be the happy mondays, it's obliquely funky and has that love, seeds (pushing along) feel about it. 

meanwhile it is two years since the QAnon shaman and the hillbilly brothers invaded the capitol (together with 1000s of other trump supporters intent on stopping the certification of the election). the crowd make a pretty good job of bringing democracy to a standstill, and if horsemouth liked their politics he would be impressed. he watched a timeline put together by VICE magazine, trump tells them to fight like hell, they march down to the capitol and er. fight like hell, after about 3 hours of a genuinely insurrectionary moment he appears on TV to tell them to go home (and they mostly go home). 

there are no charges for trump and likely there won't be any - it is easier for all concerned to pretend that nothing really happened (and to jail the likes of QAnon shaman, the hillbilly brothers and actual rioters for minor(ish) offences).

thursday horsemouth walked back from islington (about 6 miles all told), friday he did a visit to asda (the supermarket in the fields - 4 miles all told). he watched a joseph l. mankiewitcz noir somewhere in the night - the hero has lost his memory, a minor character gets a speech, the tough cookie is a tough cookie. it doesn't quite work (but with a better cast it could have worked), only the minor character does it - her speech about loss and longing burns a hole in the screen.  

last night pasta and pesto. in the day a vegeburger. at asda a deal on linda mccartney fakemeat sausages (horsemouth is tempted to go back for round two). 

four songs on regional TV (wondrous love)

“busy at home all day with various arrangements” - from goethe's diaries (as quoted by kafka).

good morning! good morning! it doesn't look too bad out there to be honest. it's quite mild (for the time of year). thus do british people talk about the weather. 

curiously, for four songs on a religious show, pentangle end up making jacqui mcshee look like she is in  suspiria. they do a cover of wondrous love (in an early music style) which is truly excellent. (this is partially because wondrous love isn't ancient, it's modern, it just sounds ancient). 

horsemouth and howard took a crack at wondrous love (back in 2022) but either the idea is wrong or horsemouth's singing on the day was rubbish because it doesn't come off.  

horsemouth read the introduction to NLR jan/feb 2020 by susan waktins - boris is back in (on a get brexit done mandate) but the pandemic is about to come and knock him off course (in as much as he has one). it's good on the conditionality  of the tory rule, on all the conditions that had to be met to give them their victory (and to give labour their defeat). horsemouth looks forward to the unraveling of their particular brand of bullshit but he doesn't hold out much hope for the return of the labour party - he thinks it will be a things can only get better election (labour will get elected because the tories are temporarily incapacitated by sleaze and labour will get elected on a new labour/ tory platform). 

there's a piece called learning from japan  - a country in economic and political  stagnation, this is probably where we are going. 

to be honest horsemouth is  mostly reading julian cope's head -on. horsemouth was never a julian cope/ teardrop explodes fan, but the wanting to make it, the wanting to be signed and validated he recognises. 

'I'd probably start with you'

so horsemouth has  just dropped john off at the 242 (it turned the corner at precisely the right time).

last night they watched kill list (which was most enjoyable but horsemouth will not spoil it for you by recounting the details of the plot). 'I'd probably start with you' (as one of horsemouth's friends remarked). 

earlier horsemouth listed his new NLRs and tried to plan a campaign of reading. he has started with the jan/feb 2020 edition - so just before the pandemic really hit. part of the idea of it is to see how well radical debate has fared when confronted with the actual events that came after it.  

almost immediately he defected to read a little of julian cope's head-on: memories of the liverpool punk scene and the story of the teardrop explodes (one of horsemouth's bookbox finds yesterday). the other was derek bailey's  improvisation: its nature and practice in music (now that really was a bit of a find). horsemouth used to own a copy but he passed it on to a contact (together with ben watson's book on bailey). 

yesterday horsemouth was doing surprisingly well with the sight and sound list of the 100 best films (slightly less well when you discounted the ones he had heard of but not seen and even less well if you only included the ones where he could recite the plot). john bridled at the low showing for african movies (only one ousmane sembene) and for once upon a time in the west (joint 99th). there was an engaging discussion (on the LRB) about what makes a good movie and a favorite movie, and how best of.. lists get constructed. 

anyone care to construct a best of the musicians of bremen list?

horsemouth has had his coffee and he's had his toast. the rest of the day will be devoted to more reading (he guesses)

 

the dead have not died in vain

john is up. he is slightly hung over but is recovering. 

following on from their trip up to walthamstow yesterday horsemouth is up a few copies of the NLR (new left review) one going as far back as issue 37 and the most recent one from some point in 2021. they saw jimmy page's tapestries (at the william morris museum) which were very rich and pre-raphaelite. it took horsemouth a while to overcome his resistance to the material. there was a julia margaret cameron photo which horsemouth liked and a drawing/ watercolour(?) of kelmscott house. 

over the road at the sally army horsemouth bought a hard guitar case (a rockcase by warwick) and a soft padded gig bag (rosetti - with such a stylised logo he thought it said rose morris). he wasn't tempted by the books. the hard case is too heavy and bulky for comfortable transport (horsemouth prefers the greater ease of transport of the rucksack type soft-case models) but will be good for storage.

in the afternoon/evening they watched onibaba (grimness, fear, isolation and lust in japan beset by civil war). 

horsemouth's NLR acquisitions go well with the ovenden book on syriza he is reading - we have just crossed the anniversary of the UK leaving the EU, the people who watch these things economically tell horsemouth that it has been a disaster (but then the EU's austerity was a disaster for the people of greece also). 

so, looking back on it, what sense can we make out of the wreck of time. 

not connected - no connections are available

and then the wifi has popped again. this is a regular (daily) event. usually his netook looses all memory of wifis and passwords at about the same time. horsemouth's usual strategy is to reboot. he was waiting on a text from john. john came and then was gone again (off to the british museum). the wifi popped again. horsemouth will restart again (and try the tv instead).

he also tends to publish posts as he is writing them so that he knows

yesterday blake's 7 began. there is a federation (but it is evil) 

john is up. in a bit they will probably go for a wander. 

'between things ended and things begun'

from the poem thoughts in  leaves of grass (1891-92), walt whitman.

kevin ovenden quotes it in chapter one of his book syriza: inside the labyrinth (a book a friend has described as 'over-enthusiastic', or something like that, if horsemouth remembers correctly). for once it's an apposite quote, in thoughts (and in leaves of grass in general) whitman is going on about the rise of america, its cities and its people in a democratic surge - and this is what the author takes to be happening in the greece of the time. 

while leaves of grass was first published in 1855, whitman spent most of his professional life writing and rewriting it.the first edition was a small book of twelve poems, and the last 'the deathbed edition', a compilation of over 400.

'L. of G. at last complete — after 33 y'rs of hackling at it, all times & moods of my life, fair weather & foul, all parts of the land, and peace & war, young & old.' - walt whitman in a letter to a friend, 1891.

horsemouth picked it out because he likes that moment between things, and it seems, to him, very apposite for january (or the period after christmas and before new years). 

horsemouth is returning to normal. he's got a grump on. he thought he was ok with it. it turns out he's not. he has cleared himself enough room in the living room to sit on the sofa (or the armchair) and read or watch tv. he does not think this is unreasonable. presumably it will not be taken as such (it had better not be). he plots watching the news (there's no news on january the 1st but he plans to watch it anyway).

he's been for a walk out with TG (he has tried two book boxes - no joy). he did however pick up a leaflet on decluttering your wardrobe (really and truthfully it is books, records and CDs that horsemouth needs to declutter). because he was tired out after the walk he couldn't face wandering over to howard's for a beer (his last day of freedom before being back to the grind). 

he has cooked dinner - a quorn and lentil curry with onion, potato, sweet potato and rice (no great shakes in the flavour department but filling enough) - and wolfed it down entire in two sittings. tomorrow he will do the run out to aldi and pick up some more beans, museli, margarine etc. while he's not a vegan he tends only to eat cheese when other people are buying (except on cheap pizzas or in pesto). he is partial to blue stilton however and sometimes this can be picked up cheap after christmas.

another advantage of it being january is that horsemouth can begin compiling his list of watched, listened to, read and been to for january.  he started on a film noir, he watched some of thrift a life  (he wishes to do other things aside from the reselling and he needs to get his health sorted, he's got chronic pain issues). horsemouth has sent in his tax return (now he waits to see if it is acceptable/ unproblematic). 

john (from porto) is coming over in a bit. other than their usual run over to walthamstow he's not sure what to do with him (they'll think of something). 

happy new year (2023)

good morning! good morning! 

and so horsemouth makes it out to new years day 2023. 

he stayed up for new years too (and then went rapidly to bed).cocoa and an early night is his usual plan to be honest. in the end he didn't go out. he farted about online and opened a bottle of beer and (at 12) went out into the street to greet the neighbours and watch the fireworks explode behind the houses. duty done he went rapidly to bed. pausing only to wish ian happy new year. 

and then he slept like the proverbial log (having first ensured he had enough bedding).

and so today, in theory, a walk with TG. . 

he cracked. he put the calendar up early - is that bad luck?

elsewhere in mittel europa people were watching sedmikrásky (directed by věra chytilová). yesterday (horsemouth failed to mention) was the birthday of max ochs. looks like he has his first gig of the year booked (triple negative, cafe OTO, january 11th).