Ken Stringfellow dot calm

9.30.2007

NORTHERN HEAVIES
SEE THE DISCIPLINES THIS FRIDAY, OCT. 5, AT CAFÉ MONO IN OSLO

I spent the week deep in the work on Mateo’s album, with horn players, a quartet of professional vocalists, a percussionist, the guitar player, and myself all contributing noises of all sorts to the proceedings. On Sunday I had been out after the studio to the Pop In and Le Motel, two indie rock hipster watering holes, meeting a few friends including my friend from Seattle, Gavin, who was in town for the week. My friend Etienne, who is a wonderful guy and perhaps the ultimate music snob (he completely rebuked me for even considering liking the Yolks, for example—he said they were too happy and upbeat to be enjoyable—to which I thought, shit, I hope he never hears the Duloks…the Duyolks?), told me that the Raincoats were playing the next night at a tiny bar in the 18eme. The Raincoats! So, on Monday, since we had an early day anyway, and were finished at 10, Dom met me at the studio and we took a cab up to the 18eme. The 18eme can be described as the ‘hood, and to many white Parisians, it is a place described as dangerous and frightening. Unfortunately, it can be quite dangerous; there are plenty of crackheads and gang dudes and the like. The cab driver was even a bit nervous about where we were going, enough to make a joke about it. As we arrived we took a wrong turn and were in a very different Paris indeed, it looked like a kind of movie set—as most of Paris is sleepy and boring on a Monday night, here the streets were packed and bustling. It was Ramadan, so there were Mosque services going on in the streets; streets were blocked for them. It didn’t feel dangerous as much as it just felt like complete chaos, more like the busiest parts of Dakar than Paris. Anyway, we arrived at the club, and it was almost empty. But, I knew we were early. The Raincoats were in town as they were invited to the premiere of a French film that uses some of their music; they arranged a small gig for after the premiere at a new bar…a previously derelict space that Dom (who used to live in the neighborhood) had been looking at for years wondering what would become of it. It looks like the diner from “Nighthawks” turned on its side—it’s a building like the prow of a ship, thrust into the point of a pie-slice-shaped block, but with walls almost completely in glass. In fact the three floors float in a giant atrium, the two upper floors are like lofts, and they don’t touch the walls completely, at least not on all sides. It’s called the Floor, at 100 rue Myrha. The middle floor has a bar; the top floor has seats for a café—in the hipster diner style that has been in style in Seattle for some time (think Cyclops, et al). Anyway, when we arrived, there were maybe 4 people in the bar. I saw a backline set up on the ground floor, and little chalkboard hanging on the wall said “THE RAINCOATS” so I just went up and made sure it really was yet to begin (it was listed as 11.30 on their myspace—but on a Monday night in Paris, this is unheard of). The guy at the bar confirmed, and we paid the cab and came up. This block, compared to the block of rue Poissoniers that had all the mosques and nightlife, was totally dead. It didn’t feel like a show was going to happen at all. In fact, it was quite like “Nighthawks” in vibe. People trickled in tho’ and by 11.15 the bar was bustling. Dom ran into a friend, who had been the drummer in a band she managed, and as it turned out, he was the drummer in the Raincoats. He had moved to London in the 90s and auditioned for them, and got the gig—eventually. At the time, they didn’t feel that a French guy with no papers, or even a place to live, could be counted on to stay to play with a band at their level. So they chose someone else, and got rid of them in the middle of a tour at one point, and called Jean Marc on short notice, and he continued on with them from that day. Conveniently enough, here they were with a gig in Paris. By the time they were a couple of songs into it, the place was packed; it was free, and so I think there must have been 70-80 people there. And in that room, that was more than enough. But everyone arrived fashionably late, so when Dom & I went down for the start, we had them almost to ourselves. The two founding members, Gina Birch and Ana Da Silva switch between guitar and bass and lead vocals. A bit of harmonica. The songs are honest, confessional in a lighthearted way (check the great song where Gina describes a false alarm pregnancy and later applying her maternal instincts to caring for her dog). Punky, but in a thoughtful, non-testosterone way. You can see they set the stage for many primitivist bands from Beat Happening on. But their intellect and wit mean they aren’t primitive in terms of depth; just their presentation is without posturing, pretension or other b.s.

So, I was working in the studio all week, and thus my hours outside the studio were mostly limited to sleeping but this week was significant in our household as it was Aden’s first week of school! She came home from summer vacation, and started school on Thursday. As she is three, school is not voluntary, so they didn’t mind that she started late. In fact, one of the administrators told us, Aden was lucky to arrive late as the first week after vacation finds the kids overexcited, and more likely to be in fights, etc. Aden’s fashionably late arrival made her the subject of interest and she made lots of friends right off the bat. She’s learning music (singing in the choir, like her papa) and handwriting (she new ‘A’ and ‘S’ and ‘O’ already but it getting a could of letters a week now). I hadn’t seen her since we were on Ile de Re some 2 and a half weeks prior, and she had grown even bigger in just that time. Bigger in size, and more articulate, and more interactive: you can really converse with her now. In French, of course! English will come soon.

BERGEN 9/28

Over the course of the week in the studio, and esp. in the calm before Aden’s arrival, I packed my bags for this trip, did my ironing, etc, knowing that on Thursday I would be in the studio til late (I got home after 1am) and I had to be up at 6.30 on Friday to catch my flight. Even still, I was panicking running out the door at 7.40, having to throw my bags in the cab and run to a cash machine for some € (now at an all time high against the dollar—and more growth to come. I predict the euro to reach €1.50 by my birthday. It’s the new peso. Check the Canadian dollar at parity for the first time in my memory, etc. I thought Republican presidents were supposed to be good for business, with their bottom-line ruthlessness, versus the Dem’s and all their sclerotic social programs—oh, except which Republican added 34 million people, who happen to be Iraqi, to the welfare rolls? And, oh, what about the unprecedented prosperity under the last democratic president that has almost completely under the current admin.? The Small Government GOP is a total lie; gov’t is not smaller under them, it’s just re-budgeted—to the black arts of killing. I say black because the Iraq war isn’t even on the budget, right?).

I flew to Oslo, checked in for my segment to Bergen, and arrived in the mid afternoon. The approach to Bergen when the sun is out (as it was) is glorious—slate colored islands with Vermont-in-October foliage—in fact Norway often reminds me of a giant New Hampshire crossed with a more pulverized and expanded version of the San Juan Islands. I took the bus into the center and checked in to the hotel, and caught up on some online work. At 6 I went across the street to the Garage, where I played solo in 2004, and with the Posies the following year. Bergen is analogous to Gothenburg in Sweden—it’s a west coast second city that rocks harder than its dominant sibling. I’ve never had a bad show in Bergen (the other visit being the acoustic Posies show in 2000 at Hulen). And this night was no exception. Even tho’ I had been working long hours in studio in the days leading up to this Disciplines show, and even tho’ I was up at 6.30, I had had plenty of time to rest on the two flights, and felt really good when we showed up for soundcheck. And it sounded great onstage. I have reversed what used to be a golden rule in my life. Previously, with the Posies for example, when the soundcheck was good, it typically raised our expectations of the show, made us overconfident, and set us up for a fall. When the soundcheck was bad/arduous, we bonded and rallied against the prevailing difficulty, and the show was often better than we expected. These two shows reversed this principle. I think it’s a sign that at this stage in my life, things mean what they mean, and adversity isn’t as much of a motivator as is success. So, we had a great soundcheck, and a great show. I mean, really rockin’! People loved it, and I was even able to do the real rock star thing where the crowd was signing Best Mistake loudly enough that I didn’t have to sing my part! We debuted a new song, “Shadow of Your Doubt” which went over very well too. It’s a slower song, so it gives me a much-needed chance to breathe in the set. But I sang harder than ever, and really made it a furious rock show. What’s with Norwegian rock clubs and barricades, tho?

STAVANGER 9/29

The 29th is Jon Auer’s birthday—I sent him an email after the Bergen show…we loped down to Stavanger, which takes 4 hours, with two ferry rides. We pulled in to Folken, where the Posies had a very good, if sparsely attended, show in 2005. Our info had the load in time listed as 3; we arrived at 4.20, worried we were late. But we found things in a peculiar state when we arrived. In fact, as Folken is run on a volunteer basis by students of varying degrees of experience, things can be a little kooky in terms of organization. So, we found everybody hungover (most of the staff had been drinking til 7 that morning in the place) and out of it; they made an assumption that we would have been drinking in Bergen and unable to make it til 6—I mean, they just made that up and so were surprised to see us relatively onetime. They also made an assumption that we had a sound engineer, even tho’ our contract requested they provide one. And, they made an assumption that we were bringing no backline, so they had set up the support band’s backline already, even tho’ our contract didn’t mention anything about backline. Bottom line is, I didn’t advance these shows, tour manager style, as I left it in the hands of my Norwegian colleagues, since they were in contact with our Norwegian agent for these shows. I know better now! Well, we had them break down the support band’s set up; we brought in our stuff. They found a sound engineer (none of the qualified volunteers were available—they were probably still in bed!), and said it would cost us NOK2500—about $460. I said, we weren’t going to pay, as we had contracted for them to provide sound, lights and personnel (anyway, this is absolutely standard at the club level of touring). They backed down, agreed to pay, and the guy came down. I started, tour manager style, to get the backstage organized with drinks, wifi, and the access codes to the locks. We soundchecked and I thought it sounded a little strange—but Folken is really big, so it can sound a bit messy when it’s empty. However I found it inconsiderate that the soundguy kept muting my vocals in the PA, when he knew that I don’t use monitors (I am rather unique in this regard). After soundcheck, he asked us if we minded a little ‘slapback’ on my voice. I was thinking he wants it to sound like Elvis. Great! Robin Zander always sings with slapback, so if it’s good for him, it’s good for me. Oh, yes, one other interesting note on the disorganization—they told our agent on Friday they had sold over 100 tickets, and before the show they showed me a report that indicated we had sold over 200 tickets—which seemed to good to be true. We don’t have a record out, we’ve never played in Stavanger before, so…who would they be? But, there were the figures, in their files. Of course, we had about 80-90 people show up, similar to Bergen; in other words, what you’d expect. Turns out a student had entered the amount of tickets printed in the ‘tickets sold’ column. Weird, huh? But it's all inexperienced people running the place, so you have to give them a break.

Come show time (after an excellent meal at the “Half 12” restaurant in the old Customs House; the restaurant has a very good sommelier— he paired an Austrian sauvignon blanc with my Hardanges Mountains wild trout, which seemed left field to me until the wine warmed up a bit, then it was a very suitable pairing) we came back, assessed the ticket count as a mistake, new better than to let that discourage us, and went onstage. The thing is, the stage is REALLY high at Folken, and there was another barricade, so it makes everything seem a bit overblown and it’s hard to get close and sweaty with the crowd (it was easy in Bergen, even with the barricade). We came out, and opened, as usual, with our cover of the Duloks’ song “Children of the Sea”. Being a cover, we can fuck it up/punk it up and sort of adjust everyone to us, us to the sound, etc. and then get on with our stuff with the kinks worked out. And there some kinks…as it turns out, his idea of ‘slapback’ was actually a massive echo/delay on the voice, drums, whatever—it sounded a total mess, and we almost couldn’t feel the beat of our own music anymore, you could hear it thru the PA. I tried to be subtle, saying tonight was the first in a series of collaborative gigs with Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry at the board—I saw him high five his friend when I said that—but he never got the hint, and random echoes as loud as our music came out of nowhere all night. But, it’s a true test to face such situations with humor and creativity, and I think we did really well. I managed to clamber down to the audience, falling down a lot, and I used my mic cable, in the hands of two audience members, as a limbo bar! I got some other people to limbo with me…anyway, we had fun, and people were more than happy. Stavanger has more of a cool stance than Bergen, so when people are a little demonstrative, it means a lot. And, for the first time in our live career, we played an encore! The problem is, our set has all our songs, so we played “Flavor of the Month” by the Posies…very funny! After the set, we never saw the $460 soundguy again—I think he realized he had been inappropriate, and slunk off. As it turns out, the soundguy for the opening band, who told us initially he had to leave after their set, so he wasn’t available to do our sound, ended up staying, as he thought our soundcheck was so great sounding! Next time, HE gets the call!

After the show, we were flagged down by two tipsy young women who thought we were a taxi (we have a silver Opel van, and in Stavanger, the cab companies also have silver Opel vans). We ended up giving them a ride to our hotel, which was near where lots of clubs were! Then I went to my room, and watched a pay-per-view film (“Hot Fuzz”, with Simon Pegg and a hilarious Timothy Dalton as a cheesy/slimy villain). My room was at the end of the hall, so I had my own lounge, more or less, a little library room that was like my own private front room; then the room itself, almost REM-style comfort. Of course, there is one rule of thumb from touring that applies—the nicer the hotel, the shorter the stay. Seems every time the Posies would be in Le Meridien, we would have a drive the next day that had us leaving at 7am or whatever.

Today we’re driving back to Oslo, where I’m spending the week, and almost the whole drive, which is virtually across the breadth of Norway’s widest section, is thru incredible mountain scenery, with fall colors, dramatic cliffs, and one-lane roads.

See some of you in Oslo this Friday, when the Disciplines play Café Mono.

Love
KS
on the highway between Stavanger and Oslo, NORWAY

9.22.2007

THE CAPTAIN'S TRUE PARADISE
SEE THE DISCIPLINES THIS WEEKEND IN BERGEN AND STAVANGER, NORWAY...

I was just watching the acclaimed 1950's comedy 'The Captain's Paradise' starring Sir Alec Guinness. He plays the captain of a ferry shuttling between Gibraltar and Morocco--and in each town he has a wife. Hilarity ensues? It's more...psycho...he creates and abandons two disposable sons to keep his British wife occupied lest she think of accompanying him on his travels; he more or less has two disposable wives, neither of whose needs interest him in the least; he not only fakes his own death, but actually has someone killed in the process. I guess the inhabitants of 1950s Britain were of a stranger mindset than I imagined...but perhaps the whole nation was experiencing PTSD post war.

I have spent the last few days in the studio producing Mateo, a project I started this summer (meaning that it's autumn now--but only as of today. The 23rd is the autumnal equinox--Libran balance indeed). Studio days are really consuming, I'm taking care of little things in the morning and night, and sleeping--and the other half of the day, literally, I'm in front of a computer assembling music, editing vocals, directing players, etc.

Dom & I traveled back to Paris on Sunday last, we never saw our host again, we had a morning train so we were up much too early for the rockers of London. Monday I appeared on a TV program called 'Direct 8', playing piano for Olivia Baum. It went quite well, and it was quite funny to run into Repi Rep from Housse de Racket, having just played together two nights before in another country. It wasn't expected. I ran into him in the hall at the soundcheck. He was playing with someone, but when I asked who, he said he didn't know--but he knew the songs. I didn't have time to delve into the mystery any further. As it turns out he was playing air guitar for two artists who were doing their songs to playback and needed a band to mime along. Hilarious.

PARIS, 9/19

This was the Olivia Baum show at L'Europeen, wherein I had to learn all those difficult keyboard parts. Dom and I arrived at 10.30 to the venue, to start the setup. Soundcheck, and I had some keyboard programming to do (on the Kurzweil, everything has many many steps). Then I went back home, and returned as the second soudcheck (more like a rehearsal) with a round-base mic stand for Olivia to use.

As it turns out, the show was quite good--I actually played my parts really well. Dom tells me that I looked way too serious during the show but honestly it was all I could do to not fuck up. I actually made two mistakes but they were not wrong note choices, just playing parts sort of in the wrong places but they still fit. The really hard stuff worked out really well--of course, I had worked on it the hardest.
I got a lot of compliments after the show on my playing and its physicality--and I directed everyone to look up NRBQ on YouTube to see where I got all my moves. I'd sort of forgotten the debt I owe Terry Adams for my onstage persona as seen by millions of REM fans til Scott McCaughey sent me the link for this.

I have to get up in 5 and half hours and fire the ProTools back up.

Love
KS
Paris

9.17.2007

New photos are up in the photos section...tonight you can see me on the "TNT" show on Direct 8 TV France at about 10pm, playing piano for Olivia Baum... Love KS Paris

9.15.2007

LONDON, 9/15

I had my doubts going into this one…I can’t tell you why. Although I thought that entering the lion’s den of Vice Magazine hipsters would result in our non-neon-colored/non-electro-ness being chewed up and spit out with great indifference. But of course, it’s not like the staff of Vice Magazine hangs out at the Old Blue Last. It’s just a pub, but in the hipster quadrant of London…and the people at the show were just…Londoners…and London visitors…anyway, I think I have found, or re-remembered, a real secret about performing—if you just forget about what people * might * think about you, and relax, and enjoy yourself, chances are, the audience will follow suit. And I really enjoyed this show—a lot. I think I have finally learned to stop being inhibited or defensive as a lead singer, and it worked marvelously! People were even jumping up and down a bit, and bless Mina Dulok and her b.f. for singing along really loudly to “Best Mistake”! The Disciplines vinyl had arrived, and we sold a ton of them after the show—they look cool! They are simple, punky, b&w. Like us, really. You know it’s a good show when things like two songs having a horrifically out of tune guitar (so much that we had to stop once in mid song for a re-tune—I sang “I Gotta Girl in Kalamazoo” to fill the space) JUST DON’T MATTER because everyone is having so much fun.

I spent most of the week kind of stressed out, as I was hired, as I mentioned in the last post, to play keyboards for the Parisian singer Olivia Baum, for her show this week in Paris, and a TV appearance. And guess what: some of the parts are * really hard *. I know I said I had 7 of the songs totally down, but the other ones turned out to be the tough ones! So, we rehearsed a couple more times last week, and I actually went to the venue and rehearsed on my own for an afternoon (my gear was living there in between rehearsals). The benefit is that I think rising to the challenge has been really good for my keyboard skills, and the music has some different styles than I normally play (like jazz/swing, and kind of funk rock—seriously!) and it’s good to be versatile.

Those two things, the Disciplines show and Olivia rehearsals, kind of equaled my whole week. I mixed on my home set up a song for Cheap Star that I produced a few years ago, they are just finishing the rest of their album now (they worked with my bandmate Jon Auer for the second half of the album) and thus I had time to revisit one of the songs whose mix I wasn’t happy with. I think it sounds cool now, I’m ready to mix more…working at home is fun, as you can pick at it and don’t have to worry about the clock/euros ticking away.

Dom & I had dinner with Alex Chilton, as he’s been hanging in Paris for a while (and I haven’t been, so it took this long to catch up). To make a long story weird, I was planning to call him on Thursday to see if he wanted to have dinner before he left town, and on Wednesday after Olivia rehearsals, Dom & I and the lighting guy and his g.f. went to have a drink and ended up in a random Irish pub, packed with viewers watching the Scotland-France football match, just ending when we entered. People started to disperse when the game was over, and Alex hisself walked out of the downstairs room—not 15 minutes after I rounded the corner thinking, “I know I’m going to run into Alex any minute”—not having any idea where he was staying in Paris! Turns out we were 5 blocks from his hotel. Anyway, he and some of his friends from New Orleans who were passing thru town joined Dom & I for a really fine evening. Alex is always fun to talk to, and he even indulged me a few questions about his early days in music, forming the Box Tops, etc. But one of the many things I enjoy about Alex’s company is that unlike many people I know, one of his least favorite subjects of conversation is himself…I know I’m guilty of filling my end of the conversation with recounts of my own experience, and I lack a little the knowledge of relevant examples and accounts of other people’s ideas, accomplishments etc.

Now I’m feeling embarrassed to point out the recent release of “Jardim Electrico—A Tribute to Os Mutantes” by the Madcap Collective from Italy. The album features artists such as the Wondermints, Tater Totz and White Flag covering the music of the wonderful Brazilian innovators of the 60s/70s, recently reunited. A certain Kim Crimson contributed vocals, guitar, and tambourine to the White Flag track, and rumor has it he/she sounds kind of like me.

This weekend in London, we’ve been staying with my friend Duncan, who housed the Posies when we played London in the summer of 2005—a night that ended up with Jon owing the Islington academy quite a few quid for the destruction of a full length mirror, Matt on an ecstasy binge, and other crimes against nature. In fact, we’re not sure WHAT Jon did in Duncan’s spare bedroom, but Duncan’s KISS Platinum album didn’t survive, and some unknown liquid…was…uh…anyway. You see, when we arrived the night before, Duncan was super disappointed as we were so UN rock and roll—Matt asked about clean towels, and I proceeded to iron my clothes in his kitchen. He accused us of not living up to the standards of true rock and rollers…and then in a classic “Be careful what you wish for” turnaround, the next night after the show we brought beer, wine, uh, upper respiratory comestibles, a Swiss, a German, an employee of Stringfellow’s Club, and our friend Neil from Brighton…and proceeded to tear the joint up and then down…so this time, when Dom & I arrived late last night, he was all about being the perfect host, and asking us if we needed to call, like, drug dealers and stuff. He even invited some friends over, and we were having a nice glass of wine, and watching “Yacht Rock” on his TV (that has a connection to upload stuff straight from YouTube). Just as he hoped that things might get crazy, Dom & I went to bed…once again, he was like…”you are traitors to the cause!” But with love, of course…

Love
KS
London

9.11.2007

THE DISCIPLINES PLAY THE OLD BLUE LAST IN LONDON THIS SATURDAY (15TH) FREE ADMISSION
NEW "BEST MISTAKE" SINGLE OUT VINYL/DOWNLOAD ON WEEKENDER RECORDS UK
(you can order it on the Disciplines myspace)

INVERARAY/ARGYLL, 9/2

After spending the afternoon on the phone (at £2.50/minute!) organizing the pickups for the various members of Big Star (long story) plus taking full advantage of the hotel's facilites, we started to head up to Connect Festival in the late afternoon. The drive from Glasgow is fairly dramatic--mountains, heath, plunging valleys with little cabins at the bottom, slate colored lochs, etc. The weather was practically nice this day, which didn't seem very Scottish at all...as artists with a drop off, we were driven all the way to the backstage--well--there was a security guy, as always, who thwarted our ambitions at one point, just 50 feet short of the backstage. Whatever! By the time we had unloaded the guitar tech's stuff and the spare guitar from the boot, another security person came along and said the the first one, "WTF...these are people from one of the bands...". Like, I so don't care! I will walk 50 feet...in the mud...boo fucking hoo!

Given the fairly vast spread of the festival site, and the fact Dom & I had trudged it the previous day (the backstage being the furthest point from the mainstage and much of the food stuff, etc) we pretty much didn't go around...there weren't any bands we were dying to see...anyway, I needed to rehearse, so I did that in the tiny trailer we had. There was a tent in the middle of the backstage that was very nice, with kind of a spa feel--lots of beige, candles...and an espresso machine, complete with barista! So we were hanging out there, or out on the picnic tables--before it started to rain again! In fact, most of the bands were hiding in their trailers. Dom did get a hello from Björk, tho! I would have watched her set...if it hadn't been 8 miles and a muddy road away. So, most of the day I was hanging with Dom and "Guitar" George Borowski, our tech! As George works for Teenage Fanclub, we got to know him when the Posies toured with TFC in 2005. George is really one of the nicest people you'll meet. He's been the Pixies guitar tech and he's famously mentioned in a Dire Straits song...that's enough of CV there...he has his own albums as well, I think there's a new one coming out soon. He rocks.

As darkness and drizzle fell, Jon, Alex & Jody arrived (along with a couple of Alex's friends and our friends Mark & Suzy). Some of us watched the Polyphonic Spree (which was kind of an exhausting mess, but that's the charm). Dom & I ate all the smoked salmon that was in catering (and the odd cranefly). And then Big Star...gently spilled onstage. We set up our stuff and didn't do the "we're changing into rock stars now, be right back" thing. Alex in fact had a kind of Mac on...I introduced us as "Old Age Fanclub" and we were off...it was a great set--you'll never find a guy who has more of a "I don't give a fuck" attitude than Alex...superb. Some of the songs evolved spontaneouly into extended guitar duels between Alex and Jon...there was artificial fog (as if Scotland didn't have enough of the natural stuff)...all the hits. Afterwards we got the fuck out of dodge. I helped Jody count the money afterwards...just as so we could all pile into our people mover and be people moved back to Glasgow. I wish I could say that Connect was this great 'hang out with all the bands' kind of vibe, but I think people were just too cold to do much socializing, and most bands limited their stay to the bare minimum. Counter that with say, Primavera Sound, where the hotel is a 5 to 10 minute walk from any of the stages! And it's in June, in Spain...different vibe!

Monday we visited Krista Blake's shop, Hitherto, and had a quick cafe with Norman, and spent lots of time browsing in the shop (and buying a few things). Hitherto is like a kinder, gentler Collette. It's a mix of art and art objects, design objects, books, and little things that you didn't know about before but could easily find essential. It's great one-stop shopping for the most interesting names in the Glasgow art scene, plus you can buy genuine Audubon Society birdwhistles.

You can't anywhere near the terminal for Glasgow Int'l anymore, since the burning car incident this summer. So, the huge Mercedes with the 'Stringfellow' sign on the dash dropped us behind the parking garage. I got a luggage cart and found that it had a vintage women's jacket with a gold/pearl pin on it. I turned it in to the lost and found--you have to fill out a form with your name and address and phone number on it! It made me feel weird. Then we flew to London. That night we stayed with our friends James and Katinka, meeting them in a pub at Notting Hill Gate, frequented by music biz types--meaning, tour managers, techs, etc. I chatted with one Ian, who is PJ Harvey's TM about her upcoming solo tour. James himself has been TM for Depeche Mode, Snow Patrol, etc. Katinka lived in Paris for awhile and knows Dom, after we all met on the REM tour (Katinka once worked at one of the top hotels in Berlin, where I stayed a few times with REM). Anyway, J&K are super nice, and not only put us up, but sent us out to have a quiet dinner on our own while taking our luggage home with them, and drove us to the train the next morning--remember, our arrival coincided with the tube strike in London--we had to cab from Liverpool St. Sta. to Notting Hill Gate when we arrived--the tube had just shut!

So, Tueday we flew home, and that night we went to see Jon play at La Fleche D'or--which was really good. Xavier "Axe Riverboy" B. from Tahiti 80 was there and volunteered to join the bill for Jon & my show at Fleche D'or in November! Many of our usual Parisian friends were there; we rode up and back home on the bus with my neighbor, Remi from Cheap Star, and his wife Isabelle. LFD is actually a pain to get to by metro but it's super easy by bus from my house.

Wednesday I went to see the Gossip at the Nouveau Casino. I had been mixing something for Cheap Star at home all day and was kind of burnt but I cabbed up with Dom (who was on her way to do some recording of her own--!) and got there just after they started, so it was perfect timing. Yes indeed they rock, and of course they sound good--my friend Julian, from Seattle, was doing sound!

PARIS, 9/6

I have never really DJ'd a full night before--Jon & I did some tag-team DJing at Sonic magazine's anniversary party in Stockholm in 05 and that summer I DJ'd, sort of after my show at Schuba's in Chicago...but 4 hours of standing there and picking songs to fit together is a long time--and it's kind of stressful. Then you realize that if you're doing the DJ-in-an-indie-rock-bar thing, no once is dancing, just getting pissed, and as long as you don't drive them away, you become part of l'atmosphere. Fine with me! I played some vinyl but I don't have much here in Paris so mostly it was off of my two laptops, either mixing them together or mixing inside them with Traktor. I did get compliments for playing 'El Paso' by Marty Robbins...I played lots of soul, Metric, and an unreleased track by Flairs! This all went down at Le Motel, my local. Super nice people run the place (who were psyched, as we brought them back from Scotland, Le Motel being the indiepop epicenter of Paris--think it's supplanted the PopIn--an autographed set list from TFC!) and all of my Parisian friends came down--which didn't matter, as I couldn't talk to anyone! I was too busy cueing.

Earlier in the day we used Le Motel to tape a TV appearance by Jon & I, playing one song from each of our 6 albums live. This will be put together with an interview and prob. some live footage from one of our next shows for airing early next year...details to follow. I also spent the day with jitters from having a long band meeting with Jon about our future plans, and I met with Michel P., who runs Fargo Records...and needs to play tennis with me again! I have all but given up...it's been like 2 months since I played.

Friday evening Dom & I took a late train to Ile de Re. This weekend was our 4th anniversary. Dom & I met in 1993, and saw each other sporadically, but never were really together (other relationships, 10,000 miles of geography, and the fact that the internet and Skype were a few years away from practical use were contributing factors). When Dom came to visit me in Seattle for a 'let's see what's really there' visit in 2003, I hadn't seen her in two years. However, I do know the following things: one, when I first met Dom, I had love at first sight. Two, when Dom arrived in Seattle on that visits, I had no doubt right at that moment that we would get married and have a child (I had had no previous wish to have another child at that point, I figured with the birth of my son in 1986 my obligation to the continuation of the species was a box well ticked--sorry, I couldn't resist the d.e.) and that it would be more than OK, it would be something that would bring me great happiness, and Dom was a partner I could trust and grow with. Dom has never disappointed my judgment since that day. you could say that prior to that I had never spent enough time with Dom to *really* know her, and that I had no right to jump into something as serious as parenthood under those circumstances. And yet, I knew everything I needed to know about Dom--as everything I have learned since then has only shown Dom to be exactly who I thought she was, and exactly who she presented herself to be--and more. I have gotten to know that Dom is someone of great strength, great vision, great perception. She's honest, to the point where she doesn't flatter anyone--so when she says something positive it has absolutely zero hot air. She's a dedicated and responsible parent, and she's intelligent and loving and...unique. She's Dominique. I love her more with each day/year that passes...GTM dom cheri!

We spent our anniversary weekend on Ile de Re, quite a bit of Dom's family were there (including her aunt & uncle from the south, who brought me tons of foie gras, which is verboten under my current regime...hope it keeps!). The weather was unbelievable so we spent both days on the beach with Aden. Aden and I found another big sea slug in the waves, alive, and I found for her later, a seahorse, but dead. We brought it home to dry out and keep. Dom & I hadn't bothered to make a reservation for dinner and the nice weather had kept people on the island, but we managed to bum rush a place by pretending we had made a reservation that had been lost! They tried to call our bluff ("who did you speak to, male or female? Can I see the number in your phone to prove that you called?") but we were tenacious. And we let the owner/chef have a small glass of the bottle we brought, a 2004 La Creu Alta Priorat that was a gift from the sommelier at the Arola Restaurant in Barcelona. Aden was jealous we went out without her so the next day between trips to the beach we took her to the terrace at Le Richelieu, Ile de Re's only Michelin-starred restaurant. Aden fell asleep for the duration, and we put her on a canapé and enjoyed lunch, then after a quick change in the car we went back into the sea right in front of Le Richelieu. At high tide the sea comes right up the harbor wall, but at low tide there's a sliver of delicious soft sand. There's even a diving platform floating out in the area, kind of an American style thing, in my mind.

Dom & I took the last train back on Sunday which gets into Paris at midnight; it was completely full with summer's last gasp attendees, we had to go first class (which doesn't get you much on a late night TGV) last minute but, you know, a weekend amongst the stars, sun, waves, flittering bats, golden light, etc. of Ile de Re was more than worth it. Saturday night after the restaurant we were walking to the beach by our place to stargaze and a white chouette was perched on a road sign on our street. Good sign. The next day was the start of hunting season...it's a big deal on IDR and very loud. I don't think it's a very good time for even the non-hunted animals.

Last night I rehearsed with Olivia Baum & band til late, I am filling in as keyboard player for upcoming shows and promo including a show at L'Europeen in Paris next Wednesday...I found out last minute, when Olivia and I were discussing the matter before our pilates class, and she hired me on the spot...! Honestly, I think that's how all them Hollywood types make decisions...with 5 minutes of chatting while they are on the treadmills at the gym. So I guess I am on to something! I learned 7 songs (and they're not all easy) Monday morning/afternoon and had them totally down by the end of last night...now I have time to forget them...uh oh.

Love
KS
Paris

9.02.2007

TWO PARADISES

I love the way time moves on Ile de Re. It’s a place populated by so many constants, that it doesn’t mark time conventionally—things creep forward but my visit this year, my visit last year, and the two years before have so many interchangeable frames. I don’t have the same shocks like I do when I come back to Seattle after a year’s absence—where has everything gone and what the hell is that in its place?—everything—the beach, the village, the fields—is right where I left it. The first time I came to Ile de Re, Aden was a newborn and we were up in the early mornings giving her feedings; she was completely captivated by the simple switching on of the light fixture in the main room; after dinner I would pass out on the couch with Aden on my chest…three years later she’s a bit bigger, watching DVDs on her personal player, speaking full and lively sentences, eating with a fork (tho’ she still sits in a high chair, and sometimes mamie still feeds her…she regresses a bit in the grandparents’ care, but I say…the rest of life with its cold comforts is on us soon enough, enjoy being a little thing while it’s here.

I settled into enjoying the island extensively this last week. Riding my bike on ever longer arcs, I rode to St. Martin and back no problem (my bike, however, being the cheapest model I could by, pretty much threatened to vibrate apart on this 10 mile ride) just for the pleasure of checking email and having a café at the 4bis Café, which is in the Hotel La Jetee, Ile de Re’s most stylish hotel. There are a couple of 4 star ones on Ile de Re, and I haven’t been in them, but the vibe seems distinctly old school, and La Jetee is not only placed directly in the middle of the harbor area, but it has a lovely style to it and a sense of fun about it…the higher-rated (Somehow, La Jetee is a three star hotel, prob. because it doesn’t have a full on restaurant—but being where it is, there are loads of good ones within a five minute walk) places are tucked off in odd corners of the island, standing alone and not inviting my curiosity whatsoever. Le Richelieu’s restaurant has a Michelin star but even that has never gotten me interested—I’d much rather spend an evening at Bô, for example. The 4bis Café has free wifi (and a free computer for internet access—the net cafés in St. Martin charge like 10 Euros an hour or something ridiculous), sandwiches, good café, and juices and the like…and like the hotel, groovy, colorful décor.

On Sunday night Dom & I watched fireworks that were accompanied by a music and narration over a PA system that triumphed the island’s failure to be surrendered into English hands in the 17th century—and in fact Dom said the narration was rather a taunt. The fact is, the English are staking their claim now, and succeeding in maintaining it. The fact is, Easyjet, Ryanair, and Flybe all come to La Rochelle now, and by the number of passengers I saw boarding the Easyjet flight to Bristol on Friday, I would say that there are a substantial number of commuters living part time on the island, and part time in some soggy chunk of the bigger island up north. Someday, everyone in the UK will live in Almeria or Umbria etc., and take a £9.99 flight to their job each morning in Wolverhampton or Leeds etc. and back home again each night.

I watched three wonderful bits of odd cinema this week, Guy Maddin’s “Twilight of the Ice Nymphs”, “Archangel”, and “The Heart of the World”, which are all on one DVD released by Zeitgeist Video. All three films (the latter being a 6 minute short) have oddly mannered characters who continually search for love and miss the obvious, throwing themselves at the mercy of indifferent or horrified objects of affection…and always end up pilloried on a petard of ice grown in their own hearts, having passed a worthy ship in the night, circling it, even…all of these dramas play out in wonderful/absurd landscapes with incredible amounts of detail scattered around each frame, creating completely realized, completely and consistently stylized worlds.

On Friday I had my last aquagym, my last bike rides, my last trip to the village to the café, journaux, poissonerie, boulangerie etc. The whole family accompanied me to the airport, where I was horrified to see a line of passengers stretching out the front doors of the tiny terminal into the parking lot. As it turns out, these were Easyjet passengers; the Ryanair line was much shorter. I gave one last goodbye hug and kiss to Aden about 25 times. Dom & I found we have the same feeling when leaving Ile de Re: that we may never return. I think the time we spend there is so powerful, inspiring and rejuvenating that we think it too good to be true. But it’s true that my heart breaks when I have to go, and it was doubly hard to say goodbye to Aden after having these uninterrupted days to play with her.

In the 90s my first wife Kim befriended a lovely guy who was an editor at Random House. She sent him promos from SubPop Records, where she worked, and he sent us boxes of great books. From Philip K. Dick to Martin Amis to Richard Ford…in the split I ended up with probably 50 great titles, most of which are in storage but let’s say that it’s very odd for me to buy a book. I have just been narrowing down the list of unread titles on my shelf for years. I blazed thru the two books I brought to Ile de Re (they were, after all, comic books, albeit 350-page ones) and found myself on Friday evening in a situation I hadn’t been in for some time—having time and money to spend, in an English-speaking country, with the glorious obligation to supply myself with reading material. After checking in for my flight to Glasgow, I checked in to the Borders in Stansted airport and proceeded to browse my way slowly thru title after title. I finally picked up Rajiv Chandrasekaran’s “Imperial Life in the Emerald City” which is essentially a shopping list of absurd examples of the incompetence of the US administration in Iraq in the Bremer era. I’m only a short way in and the smugness and detachment I am starting to observe America with from my CESM viewpoint is bubbling over.

The second part of this blog is to be called: God Bless Norman Blake. Norman, the humble genius brogue-ing away at the center of Teenage Fanclub, was kind enough not only to put me up on Friday but he picked me up at the airport, at 10.20 on a Friday night. That’s a friend.

The Blakes live in a lovely flat, which is astoundingly similar in layout and external appearance to another Glasgow address I’ve crashed at many times, Eugene Kelly’s. Norman, his extremely kind Ms. Christa, and their daughter Rowan, live in a place that reminds me of what Dom & my place would be if a) it was just a bit bigger and b) my stuff wasn’t in a storage place 10,000 miles away. It’s a kind of cheerful museum to their pursuits (music and art collecting) that’s neither cluttered nor stodgy…it’s just the home of three very cool people, that reflects quite tastefully their warmth and good peeps-ness. Rowan, 11, gave me her room, after moving her gerbils to an undisclosed location. I slept with the protection of My Chemical Romance looking over me as guardian angels…when I arrived Rowan was already in bed but the adults split a bottle of wine and listened to the new Kevin Ayers album that Norman helped work on, and talked about many things. In fact, since I’ve been eating lights and not drinking for like a month, the 3 glasses of wine I had left me absolutely hammered, so I spoke freely on a number of subjects! You could also say I felt at home.

In the morning Norman was up early working on some faceplate designs for some audio components he’s building from scratch; he also made me café latte that’s more or less the best I’ve had in months. Rowan emerged and introduced me to her gerbil, who proceeded to eat part of my finger! After the usual confusion and scramble of show day with guests and kids and all, we set off to drop my stuff/check me in at my hotel, pick up Dom at the airport (who had boarded a plane directly after leaving Universal Music’s big convention party in Paris at about 5am!) and haul ass out to Inveraray, to the estate of the Duke of Argyll, who is playing host to a lovely little party called Connect Festival.

I was determined to see Vashti Bunyan, having missed her at Primavera Sound last year as her set was the exact same time and length as Big Star’s soundcheck. I had arranged that our arrival would be about an hour before she went on—except that a) she went on an hour earlier than planned and b) my passes were about a mile away. I apologized to Dom, who was more or less not interested in running down a muddy track thru the woods, and dashed down same in search of the box office to pick up my wristband. The head honcho of the festival happened to be driving the golf cart I flagged down, and took me around the back way to the stage where Vashti was performing (the car park, box office and stage were all at opposite points of a very large triangle) so I managed to see 4-5 songs, which was more than enough to satisfy me. Having played solo shows at festivals in the past, I felt for her as she grimaced each time a huge clatter came from behind the backdrop as the next bands’ backlines were being loaded in. I remember playing Falls Festival in Australia on New Year’s Eve 2001, being almost drowned out by the Hives who were about 150 yards away. And, during Vashti’s last song, a techno bass drum started to thump quite audibly out of time with her music. But still, I loved her set!

The rest of the day Dom and I wandered around, ate haggis/neeps/tatties, ran into Eugene Kelly, Michael Cerveris and other musical friends, watched Teenage Fanclub’s amazing set (their first show in over a year), watched a bit of the Divine Comedy, watched a bit of Modest Mouse (Dom remarked that they sound like they’re from Ghent, and indeed they are now like an American Zita Swoon in many ways. They have a percussionist as well as a drummer, plus of course Johnny Marr, and I have to say, it all works together really well. Isaac is more of a component than a focal point now, so it really feels like a big band working together, rather than songwriter with musicians behind, which is a little more how the earlier stuff was to me (which I also liked a lot). We spent a lot of time shivering in the drizzle. And, at last, Norman & co drove us home…I can only say: God bless the Family Blake, kindest in the land.

Today we stayed in the hotel, to postpone exposure to the drizzle and mud, enjoyed the pool, endless cups of tea (I have now perfected my technique) and wished that I was in the same time zone as the U.S. Open; hope it's on tonight when we get back.

Love
KS
Glasgow, UK

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