clivemurray.com

This is the best fact ever: Saul Hudson is a perfect anagram of A Lush Sound.

Cool, huh?

–c.

PS. You do know who Saul Hudson is, don’t you?

Survivors often regret their decision in midair, if not before. Ken Baldwin and Kevin Hines both say they hurdled over the railing, afraid that if they stood on the chord they might lose their courage. Baldwin was twenty-eight and severely depressed on the August day in 1985 when he told his wife not to expect him home till late. “I wanted to disappear,” he said. “So the Golden Gate was the spot. I’d heard that the water just sweeps you under.” On the bridge, Baldwin counted to ten and stayed frozen. He counted to ten again, then vaulted over. “I still see my hands coming off the railing,” he said. As he crossed the chord in flight, Baldwin recalls, “I instantly realized that everything in my life that I’d thought was unfixable was totally fixable – except for having just jumped.

Full article here.

(This may leave you a little low. If you find that to be the case, go here and play some games for a bit. Trust me, it will help.)

Watched From Hell last night, with Johnny Depp, and thoroughly enjoyed it.

Recommended, though I admit to feeling disturbed a little… not by the gory killings or the sinister Victorian atmosphere, but by finding myself mildly attracted to Depp.

Last time I checked I was straight, but then again… it is Johnny Depp.

Well that was a hell of a weekend, and no mistake.

We, the Monkeys, played a monster covers gig on Friday night. It was probably the most fun I’ve ever had on stage bar none. A couple of songs went mildly awry, but for the most part we were on the money and rocking out in full effect. Ahead rock factor five! The fact that The Carlisle sells Addlestones cider was another bonus, of course.

Saturday was recovery and pottering back up to London, in readiness for Sunday, which saw the wedding of good friends Andrew & May. That was also great fun, and being the people they are I knew I would be OK to rock up in my snakeskin suit, so I did. Amusingly, on the ramp down to our train from Euston, I was accosted by a lady asking “Excuse me, are you a singer or something?” Well, I was wearing wraparound shades, a snakeskin (it’s actually printed leather) suit, cowboy boots, silver nail varnish and jewellery, and a pretty blonde on my arm. It was quite nifty to be able to reply “Guitarist, actually,” and keep walking.

The wedding went off without incident, May looked stunning, Andrew did his groom’s speech in the form of a Powerpoint presentation, and there was booze and dancing. All pretty much as you might expect, and grand it was too. Here’s wishing Mr & Mrs Lament well on their honeymoon in Tobago.

So yesterday was another day off, to recover from the weekend, and what did I do? Managed to drink a bit too much cider in the evening and thus now I feel like shit. It’s not like a normal hangover – no headache or noticeable dehydration – I just feel sick to my stomach, and lots of little things hurt. Even typing too hard is making my fingers hurt a little bit.

I’m going to stop now.

Still not 100%, but back at work – though I’ve left it long enough so that I’m probably not contagious any more. It’s because of people coming in to work when they’re plainly radiating germs that I got this bloody thing in the first place.

Hum. On reviewing my inbox it seems that half the company is either dead or dying. It feels like working in a plague-pit.

–c.

Christian, the singer in the band, really frightened me last night. A little context, if you’ll bear with me…

I’ve been extremely stressed at work lately – what with projects piling up and a core member of the tech team on holiday, workloads have escalated at a time when I have very little free time at home due to excessive musical commitments (gigging and rehearsing with the Troupe, getting ready for playing on the Arrowhead Guitars/Tipton Amps stand at Music Live this weekend, trying to learn a bunch of songs for the annual UKMG get-together next weekend…), and it was likely this stressed-out state which made me so appreciative when this album came on the MP3 machine at work.

Not my usual fare, to be sure, but it soothed my aching caffeine-bathed brain beyond belief, and I fell in love with the ambient piano-and-synth vibe of the whole thing, and immediately resolved to buy the album.

So! That very evening (Monday) I firstly perused the electric supernet, and found that while play.com listed it for £6.99, it was ominously “No longer available.” Amazon had it for £10.99, which was a little more than I thought an internet shop should be charging for a 48 minute ambient CD from the 70s. I thought a bit about it, and then I struck out down Oxford Street – carefully avoiding HMV for reasons previously stated – and tried Music Zone. Two Eno albums, but not the one I wanted. Further down Oxford Street I discovered that Virgin will let you pay £14.99 for it if you let them. This nearly got them onto the same blacklist as HMV, but I’m willing to give them one more chance, as I like Branson’s pioneering spiwit. I returned home dejected, but resolved to try again when I had time.

Yesterday lunchtime I decided to look and see what HMV were doing in this matter, and found that they side with Virgin, also charging the positively extortionate sum of £14.99. “Fuck that,” said I, and marched off towards Piccadilly Circus, and Tower Records.

£9.99, sold. And all was well. And I love it.

So, to return to my original point, I was at rehearsal last night and while waiting for two of the guys to turn up, I turned to Christian and Rick and said, “Oh yeah, I bought an album today – guess who by? You’ll never get it in a million years,” and with zero hesitation Christian looked up and said, “Brian Eno,” and went back to his coffee.

I was frankly stunned. Then I thought maybe it was sticking out of my coat pocket on the floor somewhere, before realising that no, it was in fact in a rucksack in a closed desk drawer in a locked office in W1, and there was no earthly way he could have done what he just did.

So that’s what shook me up.

— — —

In other news, remember the band I mentioned yesterday? My mate Jez’s band Indigo Down? Well get on over there NOW and download their song “Give Me Freedom”. It’s one of the best fucking rock songs I’ve heard since… I don’t know when. It’s brilliant. Then go and see them live – I certainly intend to.

The ever readable Rick reviews the second Charlie’s Angels film in his inimitable style.

“It might give you brain cancer, but if you let it it’ll make you happy for an hour or two on the way.”

Nice.

For what it’s worth, I disagree with Rick though – for me it’s Diaz and Liu all the way.