Arthur St, Onehunga

 

Quelle vibration de s’envoyer sur le paillasson

Thursday music corner: Plastic Bertrand (b. Roger François Jouret, 1954) is a Belgian musician and TV presenter who was catapulted to fame thanks to his 1977 (mostly) French-language single Ça Plane Pour Moi, which exhibits boisterous and perhaps semi-satirical punk-pop energy. The single topped the pop charts in France and Switzerland, hit the top five in Australia, Ireland, the Netherlands, Quebec and the Walloon region of Belgium, and reached the top 10 in the UK, Germany and New Zealand. The 1978 album that included the single, An 1, reached number 2 in the French album charts, and number 7 in Quebec. The song's title is an expression that translates as 'Everything's gliding for me'. Most of its lyrics, both French and English, are pure nonsense.

The musical backing track that was used to record Ça Plane Pour Moi was also used in a contemporary single recorded by English punk / new wave band Elton Motello under the title Jet Boy, Jet Girl. While this was released before Ça Plane Pour Moi and managed to reach the top 40 in Australia, it is now mainly remembered for the cover recording of it by Captain Sensible & the Softies, a side project during a hiatus for the Damned. The recording featured on a 1981 Damned best-of album. 

In 2010 Bertrand admitted that he didn't perform any of the vocals on his first four albums, from An 1 to 1981's Plastiquez vos baffles. The songwriter and producer of Ça Plane Pour Moi, Lou Deprijck, was the actual vocalist.

Plastic Bertrand - Ça Plane Pour Moi (1977)

It seemed now that only a miracle could save Chamberlain

FRIDAY 10TH MAY 1940

Perhaps the darkest day in English history. I was still asleep, recovering from the emotions of the past few days, when my private telephone tinkled and it was Harold [Balfour] speaking from the Air Ministry. Holland and Belgium invaded; bombs falling on Brussels, parachutists landing at The Hague etc. Another of Hitler's brilliantly conceived coups done with lightning precision. Of course he seized upon the psychological moment when England is politically divided and the ruling caste is seething with dissension and anger. I suppose he heard of Wednesday's debate and fatal division yesterday morning and immediately acted upon it.* It took only a few hours to prepare this further crime and all day Holland and Belgium have been invaded. I rang up Alan [Lennox-Boyd] who curiously enough never knows anything, nor did Rodney Wilkinson - who for all his really invidious charm has a middle-class mind - then I dressed and went to the [Foreign Office]. Princess Olga [of Greece and Denmark] rang up asking for news and suggested going out tonight! I telephoned about frantically to find a free young man and could only get Rodney. At the Office all was in confusion, and the mandarins, some of them, seemed more downhearted that the invasion of the Low Countries had probably saved Chamberlain, than depressed by the invasion itself. It was the popular view this morning that Neville was saved, for after all his policy had been vindicated swiftly, surely, suddenly in the last twenty-four hours. Had he sent immense numbers of troops to Norway, where should we be now? This latest coup is probably the prelude to a concentrated attack on England with all imaginable horrors [...]

Now the drama begins: the Chamberlains returned to No. 10, and sometime during the afternoon a message came from the Labour people that they would join a govt, but refused to serve under Chamberlain. Action had to be taken immediately: Neville hesitated for half an hour, and meanwhile [Alexander Douglas-Home, Lord] Dunglass rang me - couldn't Rab [Butler] do anything with Halifax, plead with him to take it on? Rab was doubtful as he had already this morning and yesterday had such conversations with 'the Pope' who was firm - he would not be Prime Minister. I don't understand why, since a more ambitious man never lived, nor one with, in a way, a higher sense of duty and noblesse oblige. Nevertheless I persuaded Rab to go along to Halifax's room for one last final try: he found H closed with [the Duke of] Alba, and waited. Three minutes later H had slipped out to go to the dentist's without Rab seeing him and Nicholas Valentine Lawford, the rather Third Empire secretary, who neglected to tell Halifax that Rab was waiting, may well have played a decisive negative role in history. Rab came back to our room, angry and discouraged, and we rang No. 10; but Alec Dunglass said that already the die had been cast: it seems that Winston [Churchill] had half thrown away his mask and was pressing the PM to resign and at once. Winston feared that the Dutch invasions would bring about a reaction in Neville's favour. A message was sent to the Palace and an audience arranged for six o'clock - it seemed now that only a miracle could save Chamberlain, and perhaps England.

- Henry 'Chips' Channon MP, in Simon Heffer (ed.) Henry 'Chips' Channon: The Diaries 1938-43, London, 2021, p.310-11.

* Heffer notes: 'He did nothing of the sort. Hitler had ordered plans for the invasion to be drawn up the previous October and had resolved to do it once matters were settled in Denmark and Norway'. At the audience Channon mentions at the close Winston Churchill became Prime Minister. Chamberlain would be dead of cancer within six months.

See also:
Blog: NZ declares war on Germany, 3 September 2014

Blog: The Audience, 14 July 2013
Blog: Chartwell, 12 August 2007

Most people I know think that I'm crazy

Thursday music corner: Manchester-born Billy Thorpe (1946-2007) arrived with his parents in Australia as a child. In 1964 he had his first hits with the Aztecs, which for a time until the emergence of the Easybeats was Australia's preeminent beat group. After a much-publicised bankruptcy and a hiatus for the Aztecs, the band had a new lease of life and adopted a louder, blues-rock style that built a considerable live following and eventually paid major dividends. 

Their most well-remembered track, Most People I Know (Think That I'm Crazy), was popularised by this storming live performance at the January 1972 Sunbury Music Festival (which also featured emigre New Zealanders The La De Das and Max Merritt & the Meteors). The single version of the song reached number 2 in the Australian charts and the August 1972 double live album Aztecs Live at Sunbury reached number 4 in the Australian album charts and was certified gold four times over.

Billy Thorpe & the Aztecs - Most People I Know (Think I'm Crazy) (live, 1972)

Nothing hides the colour of the lights that shine

Thursday music corner: English new wave artist Joe Jackson (b.1954) first achieved success with his 1978 debut single Is She Really Going Out With Him, which reached number 13 on the UK pop charts on reissue in August 1979, went top 10 in Canada and Ireland, hit the top 20 in Australia and New Zealand, and reached number 21 in the US charts. His fifth studio album, the Cole Porter-influenced Night and Day, was released in June 1982 and was his most successful of his career, reaching number 3 in the UK, and hitting the top five in Australia, Canada, the Netherlands, New Zealand, and the US. Steppin' Out was the third single released from Night and Day, and was widely popular, reaching the top 10 in the UK, Ireland, Canada and the US. The song received Grammy award nominations for Record of the Year and Best Pop Vocal Performance, Male.

Joe Jackson - Steppin' Out (1982)

Allenby Terrace 'mural cat'

(Mural not pictured)

 

Rhapsody in Green

Tonight's penultimate Wellington FilmSoc outing of the year was the splendid and quite bonkers King of Jazz (1930) in glorious, bizarre two-strip Technicolor - a highly innovative film process that could portray red and green moderately well but couldn't cope with the colour blue. (This is a full nine years before colour pioneers Gone With the Wind and The Wizard of Oz, remember). Which makes this extravaganza of George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue - written originally for the Paul Whiteman Orchestra featured in the film - even more ambitious. And while it might not seem credible, this sequence involving a giant piano big enough to contain the entire orchestra is by no means the most overblown spectacle the film contains. 

A lawless league of lonesome, lonesome beauty

Thursday music corner: Irish singer-songwriter Lisa O'Neill (b.1982) grew up in County Cavan near the Northern Ireland border, and first came to prominence supporting David Gray on his 2011 North American tour. She has released four albums since 2009, with the most recent being 2018's Heard a Long Gone Song. Her new song, the haunting, wistful Old Note, was released on YouTube on 15 November 2022, presaging the release of her fifth album, All Of This Is Chance, in February 2023.

Lisa O'Neill - Old Note (2022)

Bedford St, Northland

 

When routine bites hard and ambitions are low

Thursday music corner: Formed in New Orleans in 1996, the Hot 8 Brass Band have released six albums of funky brass between 2005 and 2017. Joy Division's June 1980 single Love Will Tear Us Apart reached number 13 in the UK charts in June 1980 and returned again to the charts in 1983 and 1995, illustrating the wide-reaching influence and legacy of the band and its ill-starred lead singer Ian Curtis (1956-80). (The single also topped the charts in New Zealand). Hot 8's version was released online in 2018 and featured on the band's 2019 five-track covers EP Take Cover, which also included versions of the Jackson 5's Shake Your Body (Down To The Ground), Michael Jackson's Remember The Time and Baby Be Mine, and George Benson's Give Me The Night.

Other noteworthy covers of Love Will Tear Us Apart include those by Nouvelle Vague, Nerina Pallot, Mary Coughlan and, of course, New Order.

Hot 8 Brass Band - Love Will Tear Us Apart (2018)

How to swallow a pill

Decidedly chuffed this week because a great UK comedy podcast I listen to, Nobody Panic, has done an episode based on a suggestion I sent in: How To Swallow a Pill. Personally I'm hopeless at swallowing pills, and Tessa, one of the two hosts, had mentioned that she's the same a while back. I hasten to add that this podcast is the *exact opposite* of medically qualified advice! The scene is deftly set when Tessa, introducing her pill-based affliction, also mentions to her compatriot Stevie that she's "also never had a coffee" and then NEVER MENTIONS IT AGAIN. Highly entertaining medication-centric chatter, and there's the added bonus of a wild story about Tessa's mum's submarine iPhone, plus Tessa's valiant attempt at a NZ accent. 

(For guidance on the tricky NZ accent, consult Flight of the Conchords or that episode of Taskmaster when Rose Matafeo was mocked ruthlessly for pronouncing shed as 'shid'. It's not our fault, we're a long way away from everything & our vowels have slid around a bit).

Nobody Panic - How to Swallow a Pill (podcast, 31 mins)

Through my eyes it's a fine way to sleep all night and dream all day

Thursday music corner: Ette is a former solo project by Scottish singer-songwriter Carla J Easton. In 2016 in collaboration with producer-musician Joe Kane she released the full-length album Homemade Lemonade, which featured the boisterous indie-pop Attack of the Glam Soul Cheerleaders as its opening track. Since then Easton has released two new albums under her own name: Impossible Stuff (2018) and Weirdo (2020), plus a 2021 vinyl re-issue of Homemade Lemonade. In 2021 she also formed the new duo Poster Paints with Frightened Rabbits guitarist Simon Liddell; their debut self-titled album was released on 14 October 2022, and features Sundays-influenced singles Never Saw It Coming, Number 1 and Falling Hard.

Ette - Attack of the Glam Soul Cheerleaders (2016)

Linden Interchange, State Highway 1

Linden Interchange, from Colonial Knob walkway

 

The law of the gangsters

Thursday music corner: Italian film score composer Piero Umiliani (1926-2001) created music for many Italian films in a wide range of genres, peaking in productivity from 1965 to 1974. He released four film soundtracks in 1969, one of which was for Siro Marcellini's film La legge dei Gangsters (Gangster's Law), starring Klaus Kinski. Lui e Lei (Him and Her) was an album track from that soundtrack. (The full soundtrack can be heard on Youtube). It was also re-used by Dominik Galizia in the soundtrack to his 2017 German film Figaros Wolves.

Umiliani is perhaps best known outside Italy for his 1968 single, Mah Nà Mah Nà, which appeared in the Italian film Sweden: Heaven & Hell but achieved much greater fame after its adoption by The Muppets, and, to a lesser extent, the Benny Hill Show.

Piero Umiliani - Lui E Lei (1969)

Rimworld: The martyrdom of Karlsen

The settlement, shortly before takeoff

In the end, the lynxes of Rimworld were by far the worst. Barbarian raiders, pirates and mechanoids couldn't compete with the awesome destructive power of a prowling pack of scaria-enraged lynx foes. One of my colonists was stranded, as is so often the way, outside the settlement walls when the pack emerged, and in his flight back to safety managed to let the entire enraged furry crew inside to prey on my panicked crew. One by one the defenders fell, until there were more comatose wounded than survivors able to carry them to the blood-drenched sickbay. After a grim night of fighting grievous lynx wounds seven colonists had died, thereby halving my contingent. Not to be satisfied with this loss, the devastating effect of losing her husband to the lynx's claw meant my mild-mannered researcher Cathy suffered a psychotic incident and frantically stabbed one of her comatose compatriots to death in the medical ward. (Bit of an overreaction if you ask me, and hardly very neighbourly).

All par for the course in the chaos of this sci-fi survival game, of course, and part of the rich tapestry of story-telling the game creates with its twists and turns. And for this playthrough the lynxes weren't even the most poignant incident. That came near the endgame, as hordes of raiders and mechanoids threw themselves at the settlement to attempt to steal the precious starship my colonists had painstakingly constructed. A troupe of raiders was preparing to assault from one corner of the map, while a clanking cohort of mechanoids lurked in the other extreme of the map. To draw the raiders into an unprepared attack, three of my colonists grabbed sniper rifles and ventured outside to soften up the enemy. This proceeded according to plan until one lucky shot winged my captain of the guard, Karlsen the Defector. Despite his gleaming Marine Armour, the minigun-wielding trooper was crippled by a lucky raider bullet, suffering a cruel wound to his leg. At that moment, the mechanoids commenced their attack, so the remainder of the colonists had to retreat inside the settlement walls. Karlsen, alas, was too slow to reach safety, and was abducted by the wicked raiders, to be taken to an unknown fate of presumed imprisonment.

Karlsen no doubt rues the day his compatriots fled the harsh Rimworld backwater for the safety and new opportunities of interstellar space, leaving him to his fate. Sorry old bean!    

Queen's Gardens, Nelson

 

Rainbow-tipped, heart of gold

Thursday music corner: Asha Puthli (b.1945) was born, raised and studied in Bombay, where she developed a passion for jazz singing. After a short stint as a British Airways air hostess, she relocated to New York. There she was signed to CBS Records, on which she released four albums in the seventies. Since then she's released six more albums and developed a cult following.

Puthli's third CBS album, the funky, fluid The Devil Is Loose, was released in 1976. In July 1976 New York Times music critic Robert Palmer (not the singer) wrote of the album:

Miss Puthli's singing is equally extraordinary. There just enough Indian training left in her style to give it an indescribably fluid quality. Her alternation of timbres, from the breathiest sighs to gospel‐derived moans, is unique. She improvises, shows off an impressive range and generally walks through the album with the assurance of a master performer.

Flying Fish is the opening track of the album. Space Talk, another track from the album, has been sampled multiple times by rappers including P.Diddy and The Notorious B.I.G.

Asha Puthli - Flying Fish (1976) 

A calculated, multipart effort to overturn the vote

After interviewing more than 1,000 witnesses and obtaining millions of pages of documents, the Jan. 6 committee has presented a sweeping summation of its case placing Mr. Trump at the center of a calculated, multipart effort to overturn the vote that began even before Election Day.

Despite losing the election, Mr. Trump ignored the facts and aggressively sought to subvert the results, pressuring state officials, strong-arming Justice Department leaders and seeking to create fake slates of pro-Trump electors in states that Joseph R. Biden Jr. had won, according to evidence presented by the committee. Then, with his hold on power slipping, Mr. Trump called a crowd of his supporters to Washington on Jan. 6, mobilizing far-right extremists, and told them to march on the Capitol. As hundreds of people stormed the building, assaulting police officers and disrupting the certification of the election, Mr. Trump did nothing for hours to stop the violence, the committee has shown.

Mr. Trump and his allies are the focus of several criminal investigations, including into the events that led to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. The Justice Department is conducting its own sprawling inquiry into the roles Mr. Trump and some of his allies played in seeking to subvert the 2020 election. In addition, Fani T. Willis, the Atlanta-area district attorney, has been leading a wide-ranging criminal investigation into the efforts to overturn Mr. Trump’s 2020 election loss in Georgia.

- 'Jan. 6 Panel Issues Subpoena to Trump, Setting Up Legal Battle Over Testimony', New York Times, 21 October 2022

Tripping at the Funkhaus

Thursday music corner: 40-year-old Hamburg native Nils Frahm has been releasing solo piano works since 2005, focusing on multi-instrumental synthesiser works in recent years. He has released 14 albums and 7 EPs, and in 2015 contributed the soundtrack to Sebastian Schipper's film Victoria, which is presented as one 140-minute continuous take. 

All Melody was Frahm's ninth studio album, released in January 2018. This captivating 14-minute performance of the album's title track comes from the live concert film Tripping with Nils Frahm, which documented Frahm's live experience at the Berlin Funkhaus in 2020, enthralling a politely-grooving German audience in the round.

Nils Frahm - All Melody (live, 2020) 

The timeless elegance of NZ telephone engineering

Bedford St, Northland, Wellington

 

I've come home to stop yearning

Thursday music corner: Singer-songwriter James Taylor (b.1948) had his first hits in 1970 and 1971 with the single Fire and Rain and his recording of Carole King's You've Got a Friend. His 1970 album Sweet Baby James was a triple-platinum seller in the US, and its 1971 follow-up Mud Slide Slim and the Blue Horizon went double-platinum. But his long-term success was truly secured by his 1976 Greatest Hits compilation, which went platinum 11 times over in America and eventually sold nearly 20 million copies.

Taylor's 1977 album JT was his first album release after this huge success, and was another triple-platinum seller. Taylor won a Grammy for Best Pop Vocal Performance Male, for the album's song Handy Man - his second of six Grammys throughout his long career. 

The album track Terra Nova, which is distinguished by its fine harmonies in its elegant coda, appears on side B of the album, and is the only track co-written and performed with his then-wife, singer-songwriter Carly Simon. (The couple divorced in 1983). In addition to the album's band - Danny Korchmar, Clarence McDonald and Leland Sklar - the track features Russ Kunkel and Peter Asher on tambourine and handclaps, and Red Callender on tuba. 

James Taylor & Carly Simon - Terra Nova (1977)

The importance of the movies to the good people of Gopher Prairie

They had gone to the "movies." The movies were almost as vital to Kennicott and the other solid citizens of Gopher Prairie as land-speculation and guns and automobiles.

The feature film portrayed a brave young Yankee who conquered a South American republic. He turned the natives from their barbarous habits of singing and laughing to the vigorous sanity, the Pep and Punch and Go, of the North; he taught them to work in factories, to wear Klassy Kollege Klothes, and to shout, "Oh, you baby doll, watch me gather in the mazuma." He changed nature itself. A mountain which had borne nothing but lilies and cedars and loafing clouds was by his Hustle so inspirited that it broke out in long wooden sheds, and piles of iron ore to be converted into steamers to carry iron ore to be converted into steamers to carry iron ore.

The intellectual tension induced by the master film was relieved by a livelier, more lyric and less philosophical drama: Mack Schnarken and the Bathing Suit Babes in a comedy of manners entitled Right on the Coco. Mr. Schnarken was at various high moments a cook, a lifeguard, a burlesque actor, and a sculptor. There was a hotel hallway up which policemen charged, only to be stunned by plaster busts hurled upon them from the innumerous doors. If the plot lacked lucidity, the dual motif of legs and pie was clear and sure. Bathing and modeling were equally sound occasions for legs; the wedding-scene was but an approach to the thunderous climax when Mr. Schnarken slipped a piece of custard pie into the clergyman's rear pocket.

The audience in the Rosebud Movie Palace squealed and wiped their eyes; they scrambled under the seats for overshoes, mittens, and mufflers, while the screen announced that next week Mr. Schnarken might be seen in a new, riproaring, extra-special superfeature of the Clean Comedy Corporation entitled, Under Mollie's Bed.

- Sinclair Lewis, Main Street, 1920

You and your angelic shout, loud enough for two

Thursday music corner: Jellyfish were a San Francisco-formed power-pop group active from 1989 to 1994. Emerging from the Paisley Underground scene, they released two albums of XTC-echoing rock - Bellybutton (1990) and Spilt Milk (1993) - that cut against the grain of the early-1990s music scene's infatuation with hair metal and grunge rock. Their sound was bright, harmonious and strongly British-influenced: one June 1993 New York Times live review noted 'Its songs cheerfully invite listeners to spot the derivations: the bouncy chords from Squeeze, the falsetto voice over rumbling drums from the Beach Boys, the vocal-harmony glissandos from Queen, the arrangements from the Beatles's "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band'. They attracted growing attention by supporting World Party, the Black Crowes and Tears For Fears on tour, and played to 72,000 at Wembley Stadium in London as one of five supports to INXS.

That Is Why was the second single from Bellybutton, following the release of The King is Half-Undressed. Written by band-members Roger Manning and Andy Sturmer, it reached number 11 on the US Modern Rock Billboard chart.

Jellyfish - That Is Why (1990)

NZ television: the first 25 years

At the weekend I picked up a copy of Robert Boyd-Bell's 1985 book New Zealand Television: The First 25 Years at an op-shop in Featherston (Monsieur Fox, 74 Fox St). It's a fascinating time capsule of the development of TV at a time before the national network was fully commercialised, and when there were still only two nationwide TV channels. (TV3 didn't launch until November 1989).

New Zealand was a late starter in television terms, only implementing network TV in 1960, more than four years after it was introduced in Australia. Governments were wary of the additional cost involved in establishing a new broadcasting network, particularly because the existing radio networks were deemed to be furnishing all the country's mass media requirements in a cost-effective and easily regulated environment. But experimental test screenings led to growing public demand, and in January 1960 the Nash Government announced that TV would be introduced in the four main centres later that year.

Boyd-Bell's book documents the gestation of TV services and summarises the broadcasting highlights of the first 25 years. There are plenty of interesting photos included - below are some highlights of the colour inserts. (All reproduced images are the property of their original owners).   

Selwyn Toogood & the ladies in panel advice show 'Beauty & the Beast'

Scary sci-fi drama 'Under the Mountain', 1981

A shiny Phillip Schofield hosts pop magazine show 'Shazam'

Much-loved telly chefs Hudson & Halls, 1983

John Clarke as Fred Dagg

The 'Spot On' team, 1978

Play School (1972-90)

The Billy T James Show, 1983

See also:
Blog: TV flashback 1966, 1971, 1976, 1981, 1986, 1991

Probably still not past its best before date

A ship's biscuit from HMS Galatea, commemorating its 1869 visit to Nelson, captained by the Duke of Edinburgh HRH Prince Alfred (1844-1900), Queen Victoria's second son. The trip was New Zealand's first royal visit, and started in Wellington, before venturing on from Nelson to Christchurch, Dunedin and Auckland, before concluding with a final return visit to Wellington. The Nelsonian colonists very much looked forward to their royal visitor:

Nowhere in the colonies, we feel convinced, will the Prince meet with a heartier or more loyal welcome than in Nelson; grander and more expensive receptions he has had, but he will find that the son of England's Queen will be received with as much enthusiasm in our quiet little nook in Blind Bay, as in any of the wealthier and larger cities of Australia. The Galatea anchors at Port Hardy to-night, and will probably be signalled about mid-day to-morrow, when the Superintendent will at once proceed on board, the public landing however, will not take place until noon on Monday, when he will be received by the Reception Committee...

- Nelson Evening Mail, 17 April 1869   

HMS Galatea ship's biscuit, Aratoi Museum Masterton

 

So I'll light another cigarette and try to remember to forget

Thursday music corner: Little Feat, led by former Mothers of Invention member Lowell George from their formation in 1969 until 1979, were at the peak of their success around the time of their three US gold albums: Dixie Chicken (1973), Feats Don't Fail Me Now (1974) and Time Loves a Hero (1977). Their career success was topped by the platinum-selling 1978 live double album Waiting for Columbus, which was recorded across shows at London's Rainbow Theatre and in Washington DC. Tensions within the group inspired in part by musical differences led to it disbanding in 1979, a short time before George's untimely death in Virginia from an accidental cocaine overdose at the age of 34. Other surviving members got the band back together in 1987, and since then it has released nine more studio albums. 

Easy to Slip is the opening track on Little Feat's second album, Sailin' Shoes (1972), which features on its Neon Park-designed cover a cake on a swing, being observed by Mick Jagger drawn in the style of Gainsborough's The Blue Boy. Co-written with Martin Kibbee - credited pseudonymously on the album as Fred Martin - the track features additional percussion by Milt Holland of the famous Wrecking Crew band.

Little Feat - Easy to Slip (1972) 

From Wright's Hill

 

An old French peacock had told him 'Hell is other birds'

Thursday music corner: The Burning Hell are a Canadian indie-rock band formed by Mathias Kom in 2006. They have released nine albums, six EPs and eight singles, the most recent of which was Nigel the Gannet. The song refers to a New Zealand bird that the world’s media dubbed ‘the world’s loneliest’ after he was discovered living solo on Mana Island north of Wellington amidst a flock of concrete gannets designed to attract live birds to the island. The band is currently touring in Canada and is shortly departing on a tour of Europe and the UK. 

The Burning Hell – Nigel the Gannet (2022)

'Those two Australian stretcher bearers couldn't do enough for me'

A New Zealand infantryman writes of his escape from the front lines at Gallipoli in 1915:

'After I had covered a hundred yards or so I began to feel pretty bad; then an Australian spotted me. He wriggled over to where I was and told me to lie down while he tied up my wounds. Then he soused his handkerchief from his water bottle and spread it over my face. It was a scorching hot day, and what he did for me revived me tremendously. I lost so much blood, though. I did not seem to make further progress, so he got stretcher-bearers to come for me, real heroes.

My word, what a mistaken idea that some people have about the Red Cross boys! Do you know, I'd always thought they were inclined to be cold footed or something. I know better now. Those two Australian stretcher bearers couldn't do enough for me. They had me on the stretcher and were off with me before I had time to think. I begged them to lie down and wait until there was a lull in the firing, particularly as we had already learned that the Turks had no respect for the Red Cross men, but they said, 'No, you're shot and we've got to get you back as soon as possible; besides, we're too busy to wait.'

How they got back with me I don't know, for bullets whizzed all round and frequently they went zip-zip-zip over my prostrate body and between those two game chaps. They were completely fagged [i.e. tired] by the time they got me to the beach, but they would scarcely wait for a spell. They were off again in no time for more wounded men. They were game, those fellows, real game - fired at all the time and never a chance of hitting back or making cover. Like the rest of us, they're game'.

- Private B. Smith, Auckland Battalion, letter to his mother, printed in The Dominion 26 June 1915, quoted in Glyn Harper, Letters from Gallipoli, Auckland, 2011, p.102-3.

See also:

Blog: The mercurial naval legacy of HMS Maori, 10 May 2020

Blog: 'Europe is mad. The world is mad', 25 June 2009

Blog: The Western Front, 11 December 2007

Are you so blind that you cannot see?

Thursday music corner: The Specials had eight UK top 40 singles between 1979 and 1982, seven of which entered the top 10; famously Ghost Town topped the UK charts in June 1981. The band's name was somewhat fluid - two of the eight singles were instead released under the name Special AKA. This was the name the band preferred after the breakdown in band relationships that led to the departure of Neville Staple, Terry Hall and Lynval Golding in 1981, who left to form Fun Boy Three. 

With some new members Special AKA spent two years recording its 1984 album In the Studio, with many of the tracks written by keyboardist Jerry Dammers. While the album was not broadly successful, and its first two singles, War Crimes (The Crime Remains the Same) and Racist Friend, failed to breach the UK top 40, the album's third single was its most memorable moment.

Free Nelson Mandela, written by Dammers, produced by Elvis Costello and with lead vocals by Stan Campbell, reached number 9 in the UK charts, achieved considerable success across Africa, and topped the charts in New Zealand for three weeks in June 1984. In 2013 Dammers recalled the song's impact and legacy:

We shot the video in a church hall with these kids doing crazy jazz dancing, and we used the sleeve to give people information about the Anti-Apartheid Movement. The song was banned in South Africa, but they played it at football matches, which were communal black gatherings. It was an international hit and helped build momentum against apartheid. Dali Tambo [son of exiled ANC president Oliver] approached me to form a British wing of Artists Against Apartheid, and we did loads of concerts, leading up to a huge event on Clapham Common in 1986 that attracted a quarter of a million people. That was the proudest day of my life. It led to the Wembley Stadium concert with people like Dire Straits and Whitney Houston, which was broadcast to millions around the world – comparable to Live Aid. And then things really took off, with a lot of people who hadn't previously supported anti-apartheid coming on board.

On 11 February 1990 Nelson Mandela was released from 28 years of imprisonment by the apartheid regime of South Africa. He served as the first President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999.

The Special AKA - Free Nelson Mandela (1984)

Kenya Special

In the spirit of moving on from the music of 2016, I spent a lot of my downtime in Amsterdam seeking out albums from literally any other year. One of the albums I tried to track down was by a late-1970s Kenyan group called Gatanga Boys Band. I'd first heard them on a compilation I'd bought years ago called Kenya Special; a collection of rare, archived Kenyan rock music, that I'd clearly bought in order to feel like I'd moved to Kenya after all and still believed in the Bible. Kenya Special featured two outstanding songs by Gatanga Boys Band but I couldn't find anything else by them anywhere online. I whinged to Chris all day long about how much I desperately wanted a Gatanga Boys Band album and he advised me to talk to his housemate who conveniently owned a record store specialising in East African music. The conversation I had with his housemate went like this:

'Do you know where I can find an album by Gatanga Boys Band?'

'How have you heard of Gatanga Boys Band?'

'I've got two of their songs on a compilation' 

'Was it called Kenya Special?'

'Yes.'

'Oh, cool, I actually compiled and released that album myself.'

'What?'

'I'm afraid you can't buy anything else by them, those two songs are all there is, but we did release a second Kenya Special album if you'd like that instead?'

'Yes please, I'd like that a lot.'

*He hands me a vinyl copy of Kenya Special, Vol. 2*

- James Acaster, Perfect Sound Whatever, London, 2019, p.264-5.

[The tracks in question are Wendo Ti Mbia and Keep Change Kairitu]

We held our breath, they held their place

Thursday music corner: British singer-songwriter Anna B Savage released her debut EP in 2015 and promptly disappeared, despite the favourable attention it garnered, finding the spotlight troubling and dealing with the aftermath of a breakup. But the break, Savage told Rolling Stone magazine in March 2021, was ultimately cathartic:

In hindsight, she says, the break was beneficial for more than just her mental health. Through therapy and introspection, she eventually found her way back to making music, and rediscovered her strengths. In addition to her distinctive, brooding alto voice, Savage has a way of meticulously working through life’s conundrums over the course of a song – even if she doesn’t always arrive at a solution, or a happy ending.

Her follow-up, the 2020 debut album A Common Turn, attracted even more positive reactions from the music press, and spawned five singles. A Common Tern - the avian spelling is intentional - was the third of these, released in September 2020. It's another dramatic, swirling break-up classic, with an impressive video performance. She told Out Now magazine in the month it was released that '[f]or me, a common turn means the common moment where you decide you just don't / can't love someone any more, and there's nothing any of you can do about it'.

Anna B Savage - A Common Tern (2020)

Young man and the sea

Petone foreshore, 28 August 2022

 

Adir adirim, baruch

Thursday music corner: Balkan Beat Box are a three-man group from Israel who play electronic gypsy-punk music with Mediterranean, Balkan and Middle Eastern influences. Founded in 2003, the group has released five studio albums from their self-titled debut in 2005 to 2016's Shout It Out, plus one remix album. According to their website biography:

Balkan Beat Box coalesced in the mid 2000s around the core trio of saxophonist Ori Kaplan, percussionist Tamir Muskat, and singer Tomer Yosef. Each of the three musicians in BBB is a visionary with a distinct perspective essential to the BBB vibe. Together in BBB, the trio, plus an extended family of trusted collaborators, have issued five vibrantly varied albums. Their work has been sampled by Jason Derulo, rapper Mac Miller (produced by Diplo), collaborated with Stargate and Fifth Harmony, and their music most recently appeared in FIFA 17 and in the Andy Samberg movie Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping.

The devilishly catchy Hebrew spiritual Adir Adirim features singer Victoria Hanna, and appeared on Balkan Beat Box's debut album alongside the similarly dancefloor-filling brass-laden single Bulgarian Chicks. 

Balkan Beat Box - Adir Adirim (2005)

All you gotta do is be around like this to please me

Thursday music corner: Christine McVie, born under the name Christine Perfect in Lancashire in 1943, has been a core member of Fleetwood Mac for most of its existence, joining the band in 1970 after her marriage to Mac member John McVie. The marriage lasted until 1976 but McVie stayed with the band much longer, choosing to retire in 1998 after nearly three decades of hit-writing. She rejoined the band in 2014. The many hits McVie wrote for Fleetwood Mac include Songbird, Say You Love Me, Don't Stop, You Make Loving Fun and Everywhere, and she co-wrote Hold Me, Little Lies and As Long As You Follow. 

McVie wrote the Glyn Johns-produced single Slow Down for the soundtrack of the 1985 Kevin Costner road cycling movie American Flyers, which was not a box-office success. Her song was not used for the soundtrack, and wasn't released until it appeared on McVie's 2022 solo compilation album, Songbird. In a June 2022 Rolling Stone interview for the album's release, the now-79-year-old McVie expressed doubts that the classic Mac lineup would ever tour again:

 “I don’t feel physically up for it,” she says. “I’m in quite bad health. I’ve got a chronic back problem which debilitates me. I stand up to play the piano, so I don’t know if I could actually physically do it. What’s that saying? The mind is willing, but the flesh is weak.”

Christine McVie - Slow Down (1985)    

Traveller RPG: Spinward Marches naval shipyards, 1105

Source: Travellermap.com

After a recent campaign of Mongoose's edition of Traveller with friends, I've gotten back into reading my collection of vintage Games Designers' Workshop Traveller RPG books from the early 1980s, and messing about with Traveller Map online. Having greatly enjoyed The Spinward Marches Campaign book from 1985, which covers the Fifth Frontier War between the Zhodani and the Third Imperium, I've been doing some research within the context of the vessels explored in Supplement 9: Fighting Ships (1981). 

The great majority of the naval warships detailed in Fighting Ships are Tech Level 15 vessels - TL-F in Traveller's hexadecimal system - with the odd exception like the Azhanti High Lightning-class 60,000-ton Frontier Cruiser and the Gazelle-class 300-ton Close Escort (both TL-14). This means in practice there are limited numbers of A-class starport shipyards in the Marches in which the Imperial Navy can construct its prime fighting forces. 

In examining ship building potential in the Third Imperium in the year 1105, there are four types of A-class shipyards in the Marches - A-class being the only ones capable of building jump-capable starships. Planets are presented with their Spinward Marches hex reference and name, with high-population worlds over one billion population denoted by their names being rendered in capitals.

They are presented here in descending order of importance to the Imperial Navy:

Priority 1: High-tech, high-population producers

3214 MORA TL-F population 10 billion

3235 TRIN TL-F population 10 billion

2716 RHYLANOR TL-F population 8.3 billion

2036 GLISTEN TL-F population 8 billion

These shipyards produce the vast majority of the front-line fighting force of the Imperial Navy in the Marches, from 1000-ton Destroyer Escorts like the Chrysanthemum and Fer-de-Lance classes, to the largest fleet carriers and dreadnoughts with displacements over 100 kilotons. The worlds they are situated upon all feature both Imperial Navy and Scout Service bases, and are highly defended both by interstellar naval forces, plentiful system defence boats (SDBs) and fixed defensive installations. They are the only shipyards in the Marches capable of producing the fastest Jump-6 vessels like the 400-ton FF Fleet Couriers that are the backbone of naval communications and liaison. 

Priority 2: Second-tier high-tech shipyards 

3029 PALIQUE TL-E population 3 billion

1826 Tenalphi TL-E population 30 million

2327 STROUDEN TL-D population 9 billion

2124 LUNION TL-D population 8 billion

1705 EFATE TL-D population 4 billion

1904 Boughene TL-D population 100k

If a Gazelle is encountered in the Marches, it was probably built at the huge shipyards on Palique/Mora, which also construct a range of larger second-tier vessels for reserve fleets and support vessels. In a pinch they can construct Jump-4 craft, but the technological compromises required when compared with TL-F vessels means that the resulting ships can seldom stand in the line of battle. Trusted client states outside the Imperium might also win contracts from the Palique yards if they pay a sufficient price. The yards at Strouden/Lunion, Lunion/Lunion and Efate/Regina are also adept at producing vessels that don't require jump-drive technology, like asteroid monitors, battle riders and SDBs large and small.  

Priority 3: Third-tier mid-tech shipyards

1106 JEWELL TL-C population 6 billion

1910 Regina TL-C population 900 million

3025 FORNICE TL-C population 20 billion

0534 Karin TL-C population 40 million

0732 Iderati TL-C population 20 million

2334 Ffudn TL-C population 900 million

2336 Bendor TL-C population 8 million

TL-C worlds can only construct ships with up to Jump-3 drives, so are mostly unable to construct front-line naval vessels that can keep up with the Imperial Navy's Jump-4 fleets. These shipyards produce short-range starships such as bulk freighters, tankers, fleet tenders, maintenance vessels and troop transports that aren't required to keep up with fleet maneuvers. They also devote plenty of shipyard space to routine vessel maintenance and upkeep for active and reserve fleets. 

Priority 4: Low-tech shipyards

1204 Mongo, 1903 Pixie, 2202 Kinorb, 2509 Paya, 3110 Aramis, 1116 Frenzie, 1119 VILIS, 1719 Lanth, 2613 Fulacin, 2712 Risek, 2715 POROZLO, 2814 Jae Tellona, 2912 Henoz, 3212 Margesi, 1824 Ababicci, 2621 Fosey, 2728 Duale, 2927 Maitz, 1731 Grote, 1934 Weiss, 2536 Squanine, 2537 Dobham, 2733 Edenelt, 2936 Hammermium, 3039 Youghal.

These worlds either have low tech levels, or in the case of places like Pixie and Fulacin (TL-D) and Margesi (TL-C), have such tiny populations that there is an insufficient workforce to produce starships locally. 

Film festival roundup 2022

Navalny (dir. Daniel Roher, US, 2022)

A compelling slice of high-energy documentary journalism, with lashes of espionage and resistance against the authoritarian Moscow regime, replete with jaw-dropping evidence of state-sponsored attempted murder. The film makes no attempt to explain Alexei Navalny's backstory, and little attempt to unpick his motivations - rather, the filmmakers are unashamedly along for the ride as he wages his quixotic campaign of rebellion against the Kremlin, famously exposing his would-be murderers, and heroically (and/or self-destructively) plunging back into the viper's nest by flying back to certain arrest in Moscow in January 2021.

Ali & Ava (dir. Clio Barnard, UK, 2021)

A pleasing drama of middle-aged romance in working-class Yorkshire between hyperactive, kindly Ali, who's hiding the secret of the breakdown of his marriage from everyone including his in-laws, and stalwart mum Ava, whose children are everything to her, but has been unable to put herself first since the death of her abusive ex. A solid mix of believable performances from the supporting cast and a very watchable turn from the two leads help Clio Barnard's fairly conventional material remain memorable.

Godland (dir. Hlynur Pálmason, Iceland, 2022)

An Icelandic odyssey in which a 19th-century Danish priest treks across the blasted wilderness, enduring Fitzcarraldo-like hardships to build a new church in a remote settlement, where he wins the attention of the local farmer's beautiful daughter - but all is not as it seems. The outsider learns harsh lessons of the Icelandic way of life and how men take the law into their own hands in a land where crime and retribution live on in the spirit of Norse vendettas. The film's visual appeal is considerable, with tremendous cinematography, and its premise - based on seven real wet-plate photographs discovered from the era - is intriguing. My only minor niggle is the use of Academy ratio throughout, when the Icelandic scenery cries out for widescreen treatment.

Exposing Muybridge (dir. Marc Shaffer, US, 2021)

An effective photography doco on the pioneer of early motion photography, Eadweard Muybridge, whose colourful life and photographic innovations in the service of millionaire Leland Stanford revolutionised 19th-century understanding of animal and human motion, and laid the groundwork for the cinematic revolution after 1895. The traditional talking heads are much enlivened by the presence of actor Gary Oldman, who is quite a Muybridge expert and lends a pleasing enthusiasm to the story of this strange, sometimes deceptive, fellow.

Corsage (dir. Marie Kreutzer, Austria, 2022)

The much-filmed life of the glamorous, dangerously wasp-waisted Elisabeth, Empress of Austria and Queen of Hungary, is depicted with engaging skill by Luxembourger actor Vicky Krieps, in the Empress' middle-aged years of increasing alienation from her husband, the Emperor Franz Josef. Writer-director Marie Kreuzter prefers to tell a stylised version of the famous 'Sisi' tale, highlighting the notorious tight-stayed corsetry Elisabeth used to maintain her impossibly thin figure, but adding intentionally anachronistic flourishes such as 20th century music played on 19th century instruments, an appearance by a movie-camera years before their invention, and, most jarringly, in the use of a 21st-century ferry for the film's admittedly impressively staged finale. Rather than acting as subtle treats as in Sofia Coppola's films, these intentional breaks in authenticity - a defiant middle-finger flip to the Viennese court here; a modern tractor left in a rural scene there - distract from the otherwise impressive period detail and the intriguing tale at hand.

Triangle of Sadness (dir. Ruben Östlund, Sweden, 2022)

Ruben Östlund's Palme-d'Or-winning film Triangle of Sadness brings a wicked satirical skewering to its vacuous, uber-moneyed subjects but is anything but subtle. Crass excesses such as the copious vomiting sequences second only to those of Monty Python's Mr Creosote will divide audiences, and Östlund's sledgehammer scorn for the film's subjects make this an almost unremittingly bleak perspective on the supposed irredeemable one-percenters. Throw in plenty of raucous physical comedy, sharply pointed satirical commentary on the class divide, an engaging Woody Harrelson cameo, and the hypocrisies of the gig economy, and you've got a mostly entertaining amalgam of slapstick, didacticism and the commodification of human existence. Whether it amounts to a wholly enjoyable experience - at 150 minutes, it's certainly overlong - depends on personal taste. Perhaps the film's blunt finger-wagging takes some of the shine off, particularly in comparison with the wittier, precision-honed Parasite by Bong Joon-ho.

Movies: Film festival roundup 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016 part 1 / part 2, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2009

Jackson St, Petone

 

Hard hands, get your soul together

Thursday music corner: New York-born Latin musician Ray Barretto (1929-2006) had his first hit, El Watusi, in 1962 and was a stalwart touring artist until his death. A variety of names for the genre of music he help popularise include salsa, boogaloo and pachanga, all influenced by his Puerto Rican heritage. Barretto was primarily a solo artist, but was also a long-term member of the Fania All-Stars until 1990, when he formed his own New World Spirit jazz ensemble. His many collaborations with fellow artists include playing congas for the Bee Gees on their 1975 album Main Course (which featured the smash single Jive Talkin'), and playing percussion on George Benson's 1970 album The Other Side of Abbey Road.

Hard Hands is the title and opening track of Barretto's 1968 album Hard Hands, his second album released on the Fania label. Prior to joining Fania he had released two albums on the Riverside label, five albums on Tico, and five further albums on United Artists in the three years from 1965 to 1967. 

In a 2003 interview with Jazz Times Barretto discussed his formative years:

“I got my first congas from a bakery on 116th Street in Harlem that used to import drums from Cuba. For 50 bucks you would get yourself a nice drum with a tacked-on head that you heated up with Sterno to get in tune. Chefs used to keep food warm by putting these cans of flames under trays. So you would put the Sterno on the floor and turn the conga over, and it would dry the moisture from the skin and bring it up to pitch. This was before there was a rim on the conga drum. Now you just turn a wrench and it tightens the skin.

I used to take those drums and put them on my shoulder and get on the subway, and anywhere between 110th Street and 155th Street in Harlem there were places to jam every night. I spent three, four years just going to jam sessions. It turned out to be the best thing I ever did. I met Charlie Parker, Dizzy, Max Roach, Roy Haynes and Art Blakey.”

Ray Barretto - Hard Hands (1968)

Cairo's haze of heat and odours

Scottish poet G. S. Fraser (1915-1980) was one of many Allied soldiers who visited Cairo during the Second World War. In his memoir A Stranger and Afraid (1983) he recalled his sojourn in olfactory fashion.

When I think of Cairo now, I think of something sick and dying; an old beggar, propped up against a wall, too palsied to raise a hand or supplicate alms; but in a passive way he can still enjoy the sun.... But who can possess a city? Who can possess it, as he possess his own body, so that a vague consciousness of its proportions is always in his mind?...

Cairo probably seemed to me a more confusing city than it really is because I saw it through a haze of heat and odours - the smells of spice, of cooking fat, of overripe fruit, of sun-dried sweat, of hot baked earth, of urine, of garlic, and, again and again, too sweet, of jasmine; a complex that, in the beginning of the hot weather, seemed to melt down to the general consistency of smouldering rubber ... a smell of the outskirts of hell. Ceasing, soon, consciously to notice all this, I would sometimes, in the Garden City near the Embassy, pass a lawn of thin, patchy grass that had just been watered through a sprinkler; and I would realize, for a moment, how parched and acrid my nostrils were. The smell of the Nile itself, of course, was different; by its banks, at night, there was a damp, vegetative coolness, that seemed to have, in a vague, evocative way, something almost sexual about it. And it was voluptuousness, in a cool large room, to bend over and sniff, in a glass bowl on a table, at a crisp red rose. But in such a room there would be European women; and their skins would have dried a little, in that cruel climate, and one would be aware of their powder, and their scent. Beauty, whether of body or character, lay, in that city, under a constant siege. In my memory, that hot baked smell prevails; that, and the grittiness - the dust gathering thickly on the glossy leaves of the evergreens, and the warm winds stinging eyes and nostrils with fine sand - and the breathlessness, the inner exhaustion. Under the glaring day, one seemed to see the human image sagging and wilting a little, and expected sallow fingers and faces to run and stretch, as if they were made of wax.

- G.S. Fraser, quoted in Peter Furtado (ed.), Great Cities Through Travellers' Eyes, London, 2019, p77-78.

Before the pain, the damage done

Thursday music corner: Toronto-born Tami Neilson emigrated to New Zealand in 2007, and now resides in Auckland, where she has built an award-winning musical career through her country and soul-influenced singer-songwriting. She has won eight New Zealand Music Awards since 2009, plus the 2014 APRA Silver Scroll for Walk (Back to Your Arms), co-written with her brother Joshua. Neilson has released seven albums, with 2022's Kingmaker being the most recent. It features a collaboration with octogenarian country legend Willie Nelson, Beyond the Stars, the cinematic, female-empowerment-anthem Baby, You're A Gun, and the newly-released album title track, Kingmaker.

Neilson is currently touring New Zealand, and shortly will appear at the Tønder Festival in Denmark to start a European summer tour that will also visit Paris and a Dutch music festival in Vlieland.

Tami Neilson - Baby, You're A Gun (May 2022)

The meticulousness of Cary Grant

[Cary] Grant insisted that 'it takes 500 small details to add up to one favorable impression'. His attention to detail, however, went far beyond his own appearance. A reporter visiting Grant as he began shooting a new movie observed, 'On the set, he was the only star I have ever known who personally examined each extra before a scene to make sure they were dressed right.' His perfectionism was not always appreciated by his colleagues. The production manager of [1946 Cole Porter biopic] Night and Day wrote in his daily memorandum, 'I don't think there is a set in this picture that hasn't been changed by Cary, and it has cost this studio a terrific amount of money.' 

There are countless stories of Grant's insistence on minor and major changes to the dialogue, the costume design and the décor: rooms that looked, he is supposed to have said, too small or too large, paintings that needed to be replaced, doorknobs painted different colours, windows changed, camera angles altered, lenses switched - it all became too much for a few people, such as the highly experienced but no-nonsense English cinematographer Christopher Challis, who complained that Grant, although a 'consummate artist' and 'not in any way unpleasant', was also 'the biggest "old woman" I have ever worked with'. 

Normally, however, he had an unusually clear sense of what it was that he wanted, and, just as importantly, why he wanted it. The actor Thelma Orloff noted when she worked with Grant that 'he had grasped every aspect of the business... He never did anything that wasn't right on the button'. When Peter Bogdanovich asked several of Grant's directors about certain 'particularly delightful moments in their Grant films', he often received the same reply: 'That was Cary's'. Alfred Hitchcock, who did not often welcome the advice of his cast on technical (or any other) matters, always showed considerable respect for Grant's opinions. On the set of North by Northwest, for example, Grant assisted Hitchcock on the choreographing of several complicated scenes, such as the commotion in the auction-room.

Some might have been exasperated by Grant's meticulousness, but others were fascinated by it. When James Mason worked with him on North by Northwest, he began by studying Grant's playing in an early scene in which his character is kidnapped: 'I had been most eager to watch this Grant at work and figure out the secret of his perfect comedy playing. He was earnest, conscientious, clutching his script until the last moment. Then onto his feet and it would just happen'.

- Graham McCann, Cary Grant: A Class Apart, London, 1996, p.179-180.

See also:
Blog: What, no Two-Lane Blacktop?, 6 September 2015
Blog: Homer Simpson's first appearance, 20 October 2012
Blog: Age and guile beats youth and inexperience, 25 February 2006