horsemouth wraps up the week with a pleasant night out

by the time horsemouth got the phonecall he was already asleep. he bundled himself out of the door to do some babysitting.

when he got there plans had changed but after a few beers and a glass of cava everything assumed a rosy beneficent disposition. horsemouth discussed slavic literature - ivo andric, ismael kadare and another dude horsemouth has forgotten. his informant had learned serbian. he mentioned dubrava ugresic's novel of refuge life the ministry of pain.

there was some discussion of malta too and sicily (leonardo sciascia, lampedusa), the global south where people stay out all night talking. the final songs - russian pop (and home to bed).

 horsemouth feels surprisingly good on all this. in the day horsemouth worked. he could find nothing in record and tape to tempt him.

recorded 49 years ago yesterday (excepting 'isis and osiris') by Alice Coltrane journey in satchdananda is one of horsemouth's favourite albums. the line up alice coltrane – piano, harp, pharoah sanders – soprano saxophone, percussion, cecil mcbee – double bass, rashied ali – drums, tulsi – tanpura, majid shabazz – bells, tambourine.

sing a song of the saints of god (in france they kiss on main street)

horsemouth is listening to joni mitchell’s the hissing of the summer lawns which is great, almost pet sounds in its genius,

‘a helicopter lands on the pan am roof, 
like a dragon fly on a tomb, 
and businessmen in button-downs, 
press in the conference room...’ 

curiously joni thinks it is a line that has dated badly - true she sings much better than it reads (imagine it read by bob dylan).

in france they kiss on main street it sounds like paradise. (a strange jazz-rock paradise reflecting on rock n’ roll (or is it france) granted). horsemouth knows all these tunes from various live albums (shadows and light for example). horsemouth would tell you who plays on it (but he’d need a magnifying glass).

the sun is low in the sky its rays reaching the back of horsemouth’s room due to its low angle, just emerging from behind the houses opposite (until they do their loft extensions - so a couple of years maybe). then horsemouth will only get the sun in summer and it will never reach the back wall again. the winter sun is gone in the back garden. the tomato plants have expired (thank you plants for your bounty). the decking has become slippery.

hissing has interrupted horsemouth’s usual listening (musicians of bremen volume four: the demos) - of course as these tracks get mixed they are changing, things get added, things get taken away, the goalposts move, songs that had sounded sorted already when opened up again reveal themselves as inchoate messes (by some strange digital kipplisation process).

gigs, books, films,events october 2019

gigs - triple negative at cafe OTO

 books

•  utopia - thomas more (norton critical edition and penguin edition) 
• the state of exception as paradigm for government (essay) - giorgio agamben 
•  the spirit of utopia - ernst bloch 
•  utopias of the british enlightenment -ed. gregory claeys (introduction) 
•  short stories (maupassant) 
•  neoliberalism (introduction) - david harvey 
• art forum october 
•  ranciere now - oliver davis 
• good morning brothers! - jack dash 
•  the space of literature - maurice blanchot (introduction trans. ann smock) 
•  practicalities - marguerite duras 
•  pulp - charles bukowski 

films space 1999, close encounters of the third kind, spirals, van helsing

events round minty's for the first time in ages, rehearsing with enza and pete, various back-to-work tiredness induced disasters. howard's half-term, check in on the mixing.

‘the croak of the raven was not heard’

so paradise was described in the epic of gilgamesh. horsemouth thinks is will be a pretty poor paradise without ravens. he picked this up from the introduction to utopia where various sources for utopia are discussed - travelers’s tales, descriptions of paradise etc.

on sundays horsemouth goes to practice johnny remember me, painbirds, dance me (to the end of love), he’s not sure what else. horsemouth’s temptation is to keep it short and sweet.

last saturday he watched two episodes of spirals 7. he did a walk over to the supermarket in the fields, he ate a cheap pizza covered in mushrooms, peppers and onions, and later he ate a vegetarian paella thoughtfully made by sten ok no sten says it was a risotto). they drank a bottle of beer. they watched a documentary about amy winehouse. the news is fucking terrible. the fucking of syria continues. the kurds are fleeing or being slaughtered because the US president is fuckwit child. at least it shows the utter futility of being ‘progressive’ and cosying up to the west (as does the position of turkey interestingly enough). brexit rolls towards god knows what.
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last sunday johnny remember me went well, painbirds went well, dance me (to the end of love) went well, fairytale of new york was a bit of a car crash but they have established a key and the broad outlines of it and it should all sort out next time. the get carter theme was not practiced.

horsemouth is back home with a cup of tea - he likes the peace. elsewhere the drama of the world continues (mental patients fighting cuckoos etc.). people like to repeat their patterns. there are no accidents just the elaboration of the deep plan of the subconscious using the cast available at that point in time.

the unicorn has fallen.

the unicorn has fallen off the gate at buckingham palace.

now this is as interesting as the heron visiting no.10 downing street (escaping a gang of ruffian crows and heralding the fall of david cameron) and as portentous.

in the lion and unicorn equation (heraldic supporters of the british crown) the unicorn stands for scotland, the lion for england 


notably a free unicorn is considered a very dangerous beast (that is why it is shown chained). the welsh and the irish don't get a heraldic beast supporting the crown because

• a) people don't like to think much above two 
• b) that would be silly and spoil the composition 
• c) they are subject peoples and so can't be relied upon to support the crown (the loyalists excepted - look at the sterling paid work the DUP put in) 
• d) the scots could object they are subject people's too seeing as the royal family are no longer stuarts (james Vi of scotland becomes james I of england, scotland and wales - the three crowns) but sax-colbergs or whatever. and they would be right. 

ok the irish do make it in because there is a shamrock (together with the rose and thistle) in the greenery at the beasts’ feet (but no leeks).

the queen has been lied to by the utterly implausible boris johnson and done as asked closing down parliament. the queen has been dobbed in for interfering in the scottish independence vote when asked to do so by david cameron (by that blabbermouth david cameron). ladies and gentlemen, the queen.

horsemouth and his amazing performing tables

horsemouth is a big fan of performance tables (truly that boy has the soul of an accountant). but he is also reminded of the preforming table in capital, the one that like a medium’s table dances a jig made to dance by the invisible hand of the market rather than the feet and hands of the medium. he was reminded of this by the tailors of northern ireland opposing brexit based not on the work that goes into the jacket (marx’s point in his parable of the dress) but by the multiple places that the cloth, the interlining, the buttons come from, all of which will require certificates to get there.

the dairymen of both sides of the border have joined in also - under a no deal brexit a vet will be required to certify that the milk is fit for export before it has even left the cow. currently it is reckoned that they only have a tenth of the vets they need to write the certificates.

 tick-tock tick-tock...

horsemouth has worked and now he is resting (reproducing his labour value). next week he will do it all again (slightly less of it sadly) - ideally horsemouth would like to make as much money as the tax threshold as this would support him comfortably for the year without any need to dip his savings to support his extravagant lifestyle. sadly his savings will be being dipped already by the falls in the market as a result of brexit and by the fact that they will buy considerably less in europe, the states, papua new guinnea etc.

this weekend - another trip down to pop(u)lar to work on johnny remember me with enza and pete, (that reminds him - he should really get on with learning it) and possibly not much more (the necessary work of reproducing horsemouth’s labour value is the absence of work or even play).

horsemouth the utterly knackered

horsemouth is utterly knackered having been to see triple negative and pious faults on a weeknight (bad horsemouth). he didn’t drink very much (so he says) because it was a weeknight (plus it was expensive beer at the venue - so that would have been doubly foolish).

horsemouth as you know is a very sensible mule (apart from the bit where he pretends to be a human being).
and here he is. in a library in the middle of the afternoon having traveled and worked early ( that ate most of his gumption - hail coffee, hail paracetamol). in a bit he works again. then he will crawl home (utterly, utterly knackered) and repeat the work and travel part of the equation thursday and friday. thereafter he will rest and reproduce his labour value until called upon to labour again. why do only fools and horses work.

ok - review the gig horsemouth.

triple negative - apparently if they added another member it would be quadruple negative (so it's not based on some complicated adorno thing like horsemouth assumed). contact mics - hmmm they can be tricky. despite the biblical floods and train derailments matthew seemed in almost cheerful mood. they soundchecked without anya - then anya came and soundchecked (straight from work) and then they played. at the end of his set matthew stomped off into the distance (for some reason) but then returned (by some magical means). various things happened and the gig seemed to go well.

pious faults were youngsters (and aussies allegedly). try to imagine indie re-imagined by black metal followers (but still dressed in indie clothes). at the soundcheck they’d done a bit of howling, a bit of droning, and then did a number that firehose could have done. so horsemouth was a little surprised. the drummer - mr.silk transparent shirt - horsemouth thought was particularly good, the singer went for it (and he bears a slight resemblence to the banjo playing kid in deliverance). it was sheer unredemed emotional excess - romanticism gone mad.

in comparison the the negative excess of triple negative is because the world (as is) is terrible - only its utter destruction could possibly produce a positive moment (and then only possibly) - the horror is justified (horsemouth argues the closest thing to it is in fact crass).

books/ films/ gigs/ events september 2019

books

• - concrete island - j.g. ballard  
• books and characters - lytton strachey 
•  how the music got free -stephen witt 
• the torygraph/ the times 
•  brandenburg concerto - julian rathbone 
•  italian writing today - in particular italo calvino 'a preface' 
•  lrb various articles (wolfgang streeck’s review of martin sandhu’s europe’s orphan: the future of the euro and the politics of debt and owen hatherley's one click at a time. 
•  the minuet (short story - guy de maupassant) 

 films

• league of extraordinary gentlemen 
• mark cousins' 50 years of the troubles 
• wolfs blood (early silent werewolf movie) 
• jalsaghar (the music room, start) - satyajit ray
•  50 years of monty python 
• rise of hitler doc. 
•  darkness: those who kill 
• the detectorists 
• the harder they come (perry henzell) 
•  two fleetwood mac docs 
•  red lights 
•  the wicker man (start)
• the keeper (alan garner) 

 gigs - charlie parr and j.d. wilkes

 events visit parents, back to work (get soaked)