the decline of book reviewing (the defenestration of the greased piglet of downing street)

phew. good morning. sten is still alive (the assassins have failed again). 

‘sweet, bland commendations fall everywhere upon the scene’, elizabeth hardwick observed in her 1959 the decline of book reviewing.

 ‘a universal, if somewhat lobotomized, accommodation reigns’.

never mind book reviewing. horsemouth is experiencing great difficulty in even getting the books read. john clarkson in far off porto is shooting past him. horsemouth is stuck at the burning ghats with allen ginsberg (processing the bodies of dead indians).

also in portugal. john reports that the fall of bloco izquerda from their position in the government coalition is less noticed than the electoral success of chega (enough!) and other  right wing parties. for years since the revolution the fascists could make no headway in portugal and there was a cordon sanitaire against doing coalition deals to allow them into office. this has fallen. fabian figueirido (leader of bloco izquerda) writes about it. 

horsemouth will have to do more reading about how the portuguese elections actually work (he had imagined it was a proportional representation system but john thinks not). no wikipedia seems to think it is PR.

last night on tv louis theroux was in the world of the fascist internet trolls (jesus that was dispiriting). it's all the medicine show

here in this most united of kingdoms the greased piglet still has not fallen. it is tenaciously holding on to power (with its little trotters). if it fails it will be thrown out of the window and onto cobbles of downing street. 'while it only takes 54 tory MPs to compel a confidence vote, there is a larger and more important figure. that is 181, the minimum number of votes against him needed to ensure his defenestration.'

ok some activity over at hawkbinge towers (so they are not dead yet). yesterday horsemouth gave the chronicle of the black sword a listen (and the earth ritual preview). this is when he parts company with hawkwind. 

horsemouth liked the cottage industry synth duo (of dave brock and harvey bainbridge, church of hawkwind) that forms within hawkwind in the 80ies, the songs huw lloyd-langton brings are (mostly) good, even if (after levitation) his lead guitar is stretched too thin/ laid on too heavily on all the other tunes. there's a fair amount of the lyrical influence of michael moorcock and bob calvert still. there are still good things to be had. 8oies musical production is digitally  clearer and in many respects this does not help hawkwind in this period. the analogue scuzz of 60ies and 70ies recording is currently much more fashionable.  

soon enough rave will come. 

today (a monday) horsemouth does not know. he has the window open to ventilate his room. in a bit he will go for a wander. 

has hawkbinge in fact died? has the youngster has done a runner?

yesterday horsemouth child-minded. which was fun. unfortunately there seems to be a problem loading credit onto his burner phone (they may have reached the end of their rainbow together or it may be a temporary problem). but the gig dragged on into the evening so horsemouth was unable to go over to howard's and check out the live recording. 

horsemouth returned home to watch some french crime serial and make believe he could understand what was being said (rather than in fact reading the subtitles). he had a bag of chips on the way home. 

he hopes to get over to howard's sometime more like mid-week (but they'll have to arrange it via email because of the dead phone). 

there has been a worrying silence from the hawkbinge camp for the last little while (well the last six weeks in fact). horsemouth worries that, faced with the full horror of hawkwind's 80ies studio album discography, the youngster has done a runner.  the oldster makes a genial host but what makes the podcast engaging is the youngster's direct and unvarnished opinions on what there is on the studio albums. they have until the end of the month (59 days is their previous longest period of silence). 

horsemouth thinks there are three phases of hawkwind covered so far - the launch (hawkwind, X in search of space), the golden UA years/ the lemmy years (doremi, silver machine, space ritual, hall of the mountain grill, warrior on the edge of time), the silver 'charisma' age/ the calvert years (astounding sounds amazing music, quark strangeness and charm, PXR5, hawklords). 

to be honest hawkwind's  reputation is based on their 70ies work.

with live 79 we move into the bronze age/ the lloyd-langton years. they strike early gold with levitation (horsemouth is keen to hear the youngster's take on that) but thereafter (church of hawkwind, sonic attack, choose your masques, earth ritual preview, chronicle of the black sword, zones etc.) it is diminishing returns. they still exist as a live proposition (for when you are on holiday in the west country/ for lead guitar retrofitted outings of their back catalogue) but freed from the murk of poor recording practices you can hear not much is going on. they can invite nik turner back from his sojourn with inner city unit (and then fire him again) but it makes little odds. 

around this time (the eighties as they were known) horsemouth would see nik turner with inner city unit and bob calvert's various outfits and (the gong affiliated)  here and now. these were all fun gigs. he would also see lots of anarcho-punk bands. dave brock has just compiled a record for cherry red of the festival circuit bands - it doesn't look definitive to horsemouth. 

in the nineties horsemouth finally succeeds in getting his own band together so he sees lots of bands on 'the circuit' in london trying to make it and he becomes more interested in making music of his own rather than listening to other people's. 

today a grey morning. in the world of books horsemouth is still with allen ginsberg at the burning ghats. when that is done he will probably start on the day of the triffids and the gary snyder/ ginsberg letters back to back. the upcoming week is warmer and wetter. it is half-term for many schools. there is stellar regions day to look forward to.

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elsewhere a discussion of rasta attitudes to vaccination. (hint: they are against it). 

 tbh a fair few of horsemouth's friends are anti-vax (on that natural health versus (evil) science basis) or have at least delaying getting jabbed. horsemouth remembers chatting with a bangladeshi child minder early doors (hist. he doesn't want to dob her in) and she wasn't getting vaxxed either (despite working with children and living in a multi-generational home). heartwarmingly (for horsemouth) she blamed her employers and their skiiing holidays for spreading the virus.  

it's no surprise if many rastas are anti-vax given the place natural and life have in their ideology and given the anti-vax positions of the jehovah's witnesses etc.. and then again many of horsemouth's friends are anti-lockdown on the basis that it is not necessary (debateable) and an infringement of their freedom (yes but er.) some friends (who work for the NHS) are anti- vaccine mandate. 

but these are not rastas - unreason is much more broadly spread (and for reasonable reasons).

preparing for stellar regions

good morning peoples. in a minute horsemouth goes to his child minding gig (which is the nearest thing he allows himself to an employment these days). this should take him up into the early afternoon. 

horsemouth is preparing for stellar regions day (15th february) but he will reserve what he has to say until then. it will be followed by interstellar space day on the 22nd when horsemouth will celebrate the release of that album.

yesterday horsemouth went for a walk with TG (across the marshes and over towards sunny leyton). later he had a zoom chat with john in porto (the old capital of the kingdom of porto cale of afonso I).  in the evening he watched roger corman's the pit and the pendulum. vincent price chewed the scenery most effectively. 

yesterday he tested for the plague (gentle readers, if he has performed the test correctly, he doesn't have the plague).

later (should time permit) he will be off to howard's to listen to the recordings from their previous gig together. 

'beware the ides of may' / on teaching the sultan's horse to speak

talking politics is ending. just a few more lonely episodes. horsemouth is saddened (he does like the reasonableness of it). 

but before that a last attempt to make sense of boris johnson. 

of course you can't make sense of any recent history without accounting for people's increasing disaffection from representative politics  (and yet their inability to think outside or round it). the US, the UK, all over europe the spectre of populism. 

for years the politicians would tell us that nothing could be done that it was all about economics, or the EU, or something somewhere else, so why do we have you then?  we would reply.

horsemouth is impressed by the great experimental insanity of brexit (but of course it is not bound to end up well). the it's nothing to do with us (but we are still important) political class were tasked with making 'it' happen, cue parliamentary mud wrestling and attempts at obfuscation and delay. but we wants it hiss the people from the wings. 

cometh the hour cometh the man. dominic cummings. with his tame political buffoon boris johnson on a leash. they battle it through. they stand on the side of the people versus the establishment and are rewarded for this. 

but now boris has spoiled his copybook (cummings had spoiled his earlier - and, like the servant he is, been dismissed). but when he was similarly caught boris would not go, he looks like a member of the establishment too good to live by the rules he imposes on others. (which is what he is and everyone always knew this). he could still be forgiven by the people with an indulgent chuckle. 'that boris, eh.' one third of the population would still vote for him (or vote tory which is the same thing), he is still popular within the tory party itself (just not with the MPs).

and it is the MPs who will decide his fate. however they will be looking over their shoulders at the rest of the country. 

boris has successfully disaggregated the coming shocks. nasrudin promises he can teach the sultan's horse to speak if he is given a year (anything looks like a good bet when you are under threat of death). 

'beware the ides of may' 

a week is a long time in politics, a year is a very long time, much can happen in a year, and much can happen before may, before the local elections. world events may even happen. boris may have his falklands moment (er. in ukraine? possibly not). 

but there is no obvious successor.  and boris has gotten up and onto the front foot (smearing starmer) assembling mobs in the street, refusing to play the game of politics even by the westminster rules (such as they are). boris appeals over the head of the chattering media and metropolitan elite to the country (has everyone forgotten that this is his game not parliamentary wrangling). 

of course in many ways horsemouth hopes that the tories can't run with the levelling up agenda. if they could run with it they would have a built in structural advantage in english politics,  a built in majority, a divided opposition. 

'what about the working class?' yells a member of the mob at starmer (sounding briefly sensible, before going all elite paedophile ring conspiracy and anti-vax) 'traitor! traitor!'  

it is strange to watch the hannah arendt origins of totalitarianism world re-emerge from out under the pandemic. (remember that's where we were). 

of course many anti-vaxxers and anti-lockdown people believe that they are resisting totalitarianism rather than paving the way for the plague). they too have noticed the weakness of the supply chain, look at the truckers blocking the bridge between windsor ontario and detroit, and are applying pressure at the choke points.

of course starmer can't deliver the change people want and he can't reconnect labour with the working class, not in scotland, not in the north, he can only lead us back into a supressing normality (which was what got us here in the first place). 

ultimately talking politics pin their hopes on a rebuilding of the centre ground (with a side order of democratic reform). but the toys of populism (and their followers in the street) are by no means guaranteed to go back in the box so easily. 

once people realise power is in the street the temptation is to come out and play. 

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

today looks pretty good. let's check the weather. ok looks good sunny and cloudy. no rain. getting warmer and rainier next week. 

last night another morocco set giallo dead of summer/ heatwave/ ondata di calore (1970). the wife of the architect is stuck at home in a malfunctioning apartment block, baking heat, the howling winds full of desert sand,  ogling moroccan men. 

yesterday's radio and podcast? 

an in our time  episode on the library cormorant himself (walter benjamin) followed by michael ignatieff discussing late montaigne. the outlaw bookseller turns out to have been from a small hamlet just outside caerphilly, he wanders round pontypridd. 

horsemouth has agreed to child portage at the weekend, he will seek to rearrange meeting howard into the afternoon/ evening. today he doesn't know. 

vampires or suicide? (live in tasmania)

horsemouth, as you know, is a big fan of the blue oyster cult (largely on the basis of hearing don't fear the reaper as a kid). it is probably their best song he has to admit. it is 'creepy but in a good way' as two teenage reviewers recently described it. the album it's from agents of fortune is probably their best too and definitely worth a listen. 

in the states they are not just a one-hit wonder band. the later burnin' for you was a hit too. astronomy from the previous album secret treaties is well known enough to be covered by metallica. they tended to let other people write their lyrics so you get the rock critic richard meltzer, patti smith , the manager sandy perlman, the science fiction writer michael moorcock, cult actress helen trees etc. 

horsemouth always thought you could do a great cuban version of this song. 

but question - what do you think is going on in the song? vampires or suicide? 

horsemouth was having a listen to a monastic trio by alice coltrane for the first time in ages. in its modern incarnation on CD it's assembled from songs from three sessions (mostly from two sessions at the coltrane family home and then one track from a session with john coltrane at the van gelder studio). 

the original vinyl album begins with ohnedaruth (john coltrane's spirit name, allegedly with pharoah sanders on bass clarinet and ben riley on drums) but features otherwise the trio selections with alice alternating between harp and piano recorded later at the coltrane home with the great rashied ali on drums and jimmy garrison on bass. the voice of john coltrane appears on oceanic beloved (at least according to discogs) and on the sun on the CD reissue. pharoah sanders also appears on lord, help me to be (which seems to be the track that opens the CD.

it is a little confusing (but the music is great). horsemouth can't fault the selections in any form. it's deep and heavy.

later today horsemouth will try ptah el daoud with joe henderson and pharoah sanders.

it was suggested to horsemouth that he should 'put out the live recording warts and all as a bootleg... B/W cover, letraset and typewriter vibe. after a while any bum notes or fluffs or forgotten lines will be part of it´s charm.'  as horsemouth said his plan had been to heavily fake it (in the style of thin lizzy's live and dangerous).

it was also suggested that 'it could be your Live in Tazmania... re-record the songs at home and keep the audience sounds...' in reference to fahey's notorious addition of a pre-recorded song to a notionally 'live' album (and under a different title too). fahey was a trickster. he couldn't resist the opportunity to play with expectations and subvert conventions (like carlos castaneda). 

last night horsemouth watched jacques tourneur's 1948 berlin express (which is similar to, but not as good as the third man). it has its moments. 

today a grey-ish morning. horsemouth kills time (or does it kill him). 

'between the powers of darkness and the powers of the mind'

Tourneur, précurseur du giallo. Analyse par Jean-François Rauger from La Cinémathèque française on Vimeo.

looks like a nice morning out. horsemouth spent some time reading about the careers of maurice  and jacques tourneur (father and son directors - whence 'between the powers of darkness and the powers of the mind' ). 

above we see similar scenes from jacques tourneur's the leopard man and dario argento's four flies on grey velvet - locked in the park/ or cemetery after dark. 

yesterday a meeting with the bank for the communal endeavour and thereafter some shuffling about. 

this included  an episode of the rivals of sherlock holmes featuring professor van dusen the thinking machine in the problem of the superfluous finger first published in  associated sunday magazines, 25th november 1906. earlier in the series they'd featured his cell 13. 

and later an episode of alexei sayle's podcast on the spycops, 'what kind of a fucking psychopath does that?' said alexei seemingly genuinely outraged (possibly not outraged enough to avoid trying to broaden the issue out or get in a few gags but still).

one of horsemouth's friends sent him a documentary on independent record shops (or such ones as still survive) again (like the one on NY booksellers) horsemouth loves it (despite the fact that he no longer has a record player set up and hasn't purchased a record since he doesn't know when). 

ok today food and beer shopping. 

horsemouth looks towards the weekend, jeremy bentham's birthday and to going over to howard's to listen to the live recording from the water into beer gig. he is adjusting his expectations. he expects that his own stuff (while fun on the night) will contain too many errors to be saveable. he expects that there will be difficulty in overdubbing to hide any errors given the ambient qualities of the room on the existing recording which will have to be matched for any overdubbing not to stick out like a sore thumb. 

 

hurry up time vs. the masque of the red death

in a bit horsemouth goes to a meeting (and then he comes back). he will write more (because he doubts he has enough time to write what he wants to now). 

he's growing reflective about the gig. he does hope he wasn't too much of an arse once he'd finished playing. as someone pointed out he played pretty much a different set from the one he'd had planned.

and now he has to wait to see if he caught covid. 

howard is pretty much over plague paranoia into a 'you can't stop life' frame of mind  - horsemouth is still in favour of the hide out and wait strategy (as in the masque of the red death and the decameron). ultimately it doesn't help the masquers. death still gets them. 

horsemouth (indeed musicians of bremen) should go out and play more gigs but horsemouth is still trying to keep travel and sweaty rooms to a minimum. they may release some of the gig as a free/ pay what you want download rather than as a limited edition CD, all their CDs are limited edition (so far). he'll go up to howard's and give it a listen next weekend. 

horsemouth has inveigled a friend into the cult of huw lloyd-langton, sample dialogue 'just reached 5th second of forever, class.' levitation and motorway city get the thumbs up. horsemouth has never understood how huw plays that acoustic guitar part on levitation (he's asking around because genuinely he has no idea how it is possible to play that - blitz away in 16ths with the right hand, hammer on and pluck with the left .he guesses - or is it just a studio cheat?)

5th second of forever features a nylon string guitar in a semi-classical moment but the bends on it seem non-classical to horsemouth. it's really quite posh it could easily be from the film as the track description claims. 

ok meeting done. horsemouth prepares for an afternoon of news listening.