April/May

A busier time of late than March and one that brought a much-needed break. I was glad to have a few days off at the start of the month to draw breath. The Easter holidays were pretty good, well apart from the fact that my boiler gave up the ghost. No doubt it had been slightly overworked given the winter we have just had. So far the quotes for a new one have done nothing but bring about a wince and a high pitched shriek from myself!

So away from home-based disasters, I went along to a gig at my favourite venue the Citadel to see Radio 2 DJ Mark Radcliffe's band the Big Figures. They have been playing in his local for a number of years and have this year ventured out on tour. They play a number of Dr Feelgood tunes and early classics. I’m sure there may have been one or two of their own songs in the set too. a band that before now had passed me by. It is quite timely given that Oil City Confidential the documentary about the band was released - it has even made it on to BBC4. I enjoyed the gig and Radcliffe is a fine front man. His humour and talent shine through. I’m looking forward to when he gets the Family Mahone back together for his now legendary Christmas gigs.

As a result of the gig I have checked out ‘Oil City Confidential’ the movie and the accompanying soundtrack. It includes a number of their songs plus a couple from Johnny Kid and the Pirates (a band that influenced the nascent Feelgood). There are some great tunes on the album (live and recorded). You can see why a number of punk bands have cited them as an influence.

Another album that I had been looking forward to being released finally materialised this month. Pavement is the American band who inspired Blur’s conversion from the Britpop style to a more American sound, have released a 23 track compilation album called ‘Quarantine the Past’. I was a late convert to the band and was looking to hearing something that encapsulated their whole career. I’m not sure this is it, the die-hard fan will probably say that there is a lot of stuff missing. ‘Stereo’ remains a favourite of mine, as well as ‘Spit on a Stranger’ that was covered by the folk singer Kathryn Williams to good effect on her ‘Relations ‘album. Its a good introduction to the band and is well worth checking out. Listening to it has got me inspired in checking out the other bits of back catalogue that have been remastered to coincide with this Greatest Hits and reformation of the band.

It was a good month for album releases, the Amazon wish list was served with a number of new additions. One that was instantly purchased was the new Paul Weller album ‘Wake Up The Nation’. Given my devotion of all things Weller, it was always an album that I would be purchasing. A number of publications have given it favourable reviews and compared it well with his previous release ‘22 Dreams’, which was quite eclectic in the number of styles on display over the course of the album. ‘Wake Up The Nation’ is a more stripped down approach and weighs in at less than 45 minutes long, but covers a similar range of styles. One song ‘Trees’ is like a mini-symphony at less then 5 minutes long. The title track rails at the Facebook-age and is quite an impassioned track. I have to say that the album has been seldom of my player since HMV sent it out to me two days before its release (thank you). To these ears I think it is possibly his best solo album and certainly not far off the Jam’s best album Sound Effects. It’s that good. Not bad for an artist who has passed the milestone of his 50th birthday and he is still going strong, where other contemporaries are churning pale imitations of their best work. I look forward to hearing these tunes performed live later on in the year.

The Arctic Monkeys album, I have to say it washes over me in some ways and the reviews that I had read about lacking a little lustre of the first two albums ring true. Lyrically it is still top notch, just lacking in tunes. There are probably two tracks that stand out, with first song ‘My Propeller’ being my favourite, as well as ‘Pretty Visitors’.

Another new band for me is Wild Beasts, who hail from the Lake District. Like the Arctic Monkeys, ‘Two Dancers’ is an album that was released last year, I have seen them mentioned in passing and have heard a few tunes on a number of Uncut free cds. I’m glad I bought the album, it is one of the best new albums I have heard in a long time. It’s very 80s in places and with a bit of Bunnymen thrown in too, which is no bad thing. The highlights for me is the opener ‘Fun Powder Plot’, reminds me of something that for now I’m sure what, and ‘Two Dancers (II)’. I look forward to checking out their previous album in due course.

The last day of the month a rare term time day off and off to Poland where a friend of Silvi was due to be married. We flew by Wizzair and thankfully the flight was less stressful than my previous flight with Ryanair in January. The weekend was busy to say the least we flew into Katowice and then had to get a bus from their to Krakow and then on to Tarnow, where the wedding was taking place on the Saturday. Sunday was spent Krakow were a short trip around the city was only possible.

It was good to finally see Krakow and would like to visit there again in future though with a longer time to sightsee and with less travelling. As is usually the case when flying for me these days, there was a delay to the flight of 5 hours. Which meant a 7 hour stay at Katowice Airport, a place not noted for its abundance of resources. Sadly it was Silvis birthday, so we had to spend the day celebrating it at an airport. When we finally made it back in the evening we only really had time for tea in a pub with my parents who had come to pick us up from the airport.

After that bit of excitement, May can be summed up by one activity. Marking, marking and more marking. Never mind, it will soon be the summer!