1729 CommentsOn The Road Again…….
Well here we are back in the US……We are on the second stint of a floating tour of this country……Its going to run until at least September……..if not longer…….
Been away for so long that I just want to play anywhere and everywhere…….and believe me thats what we are doing……Quite a vibe this, coming here after seven years away. This is the twentieth year of World Party!!!!! And we have been away from the States for the last seven…….
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Meeting people after the shows has been a great thing……..hanging out.
The accoustic shows we have been doing have been so intimate……..its like meeting up with old friends, and amazingly some brand new ones.
People have been really great. Unbelievable that they are coming to see us after sooooo long….A big thanks to all.
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This country is just so big………sometimes its like you’re just getting dissolved right into the dense core of it…….sometimes its just a flat reflective surface, obvious and generic…..then suddenly its unique and totally individual….
Deep huh? Actually I am not even going to attempt a stupid discourse on this place. Like everything about today and these times that we live in , it is just too big and complex to encapsulate in a few jottings whilst watching the Germany v. Poland World Cup group match………..
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Just re-read these ramblings and I’ve decided to shut the f*** up until I have something to say……
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I have something to say…….yeh, I remember.
I was in a hotel the other day and the TV was really screwing around and the picture was gone but then suddenly re-appeared on the channel C-Span.
They were giving an environmental award to the Union boss of the Steel Workers Union..(yes a surprise in itself, however the union does have a strong history of being pro environment actually)
Anyway, there was a guest speaker talking when the programme came on and it was a guy called Larry Schweiger who is the president and CEO of an organisation called The National Wildlife Federation. He was amazing. He was quite quietly spoken but very eloquent and as I sat watching he described the need for the authorities to recognise that we have two choices.
He told a story of a character called ‘Baal’ (I think that was it anyway!) and his ass. (as in donkey, but yes he did make a pun onthe word as well)
This character found himself on a journey and confronted with two choices of direction.
One the way to material satifaction and the other the way to environmental balance….and he was getting advice from his ass……(ho-hum)
He had to listen to his ass.
Anyway the speaker was just a fantastic hero for the green side of things and I just wanted to say that I found it very moving and amazing to hear someone saying the very things I have been thinking recently since I heard a throwaway comment by an ex politician from the right, who was on a BBC chat show saying roughly the same thing, but just by chance really.
He (Michael Portillo, unbelievable that he would ever say anything memorable) was talking about how the government in the UK could not decide whether to give people cheaper cars (in other words what they want.) or a world of environmental solutions.Fear of rejection has kept governments following the destructive line. Pandering to what they think people will be grateful to them for. It was the same dilemma really as Baal and his ass…………..
(Please excuse my terrible prose and I forgive you if you have understood nothing of what I am talking about!!!) This is exactly where we are though. The choices just have to be understood.
We are in the doorway with two doors. One leads to our survival and one to our imminent destruction.
Frighteningly simple really.
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Anyway, all I can say is………
Its great to be back on the road……………..
Bertrand Russell Links
There are some new links here to Bertie stuff……
He was a great great man…..
I love him dearly…….
We miss him now…..
And I quote………
“PROLOGUE.
WHAT I HAVE LIVED FOR.
Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind. These passions, like great winds, have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course, over a deep ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair.
I have sought love, first, because it brings ecstasy — ecstasy so great that I would often have sacrificed all the rest of life for a few hours of this joy. I have sought it, next, because it relieves loneliness — that terrible loneliness in which one shivering consciousness looks over the rim of the world into the cold unfathomable lifeless abyss. I have sought it, finally, because in the union of love I have seen, in a mystic miniature, the prefiguring vision of the heaven that saints and poets have imagined. This is what I sought, and though it might seem too good for human life, this is what — at last — I have found.
With equal passion I have sought knowledge. I have wished to understand the hearts of men. I have wished to know why the stars shine. And I have tried to apprehend the Pythagorean power by which number holds sway above the flux. A little of this, but not much, I have achieved.
Love and knowledge, so far as they were possible, led upward toward the heavens. But always pity brought me back to earth. Echoes of cries of pain reverberate in my heart. Children in famine, victims tortured by oppressors, helpless old people a hated burden to their sons, and the whole world of loneliness, poverty, and pain make a mockery of what human life should be. I long to alleviate the evil, but I cannot, and I too suffer.
This has been my life. I have found it worth living, and would gladly live it again if the chance were offered me.”
Back in London -
We’re making plans for our return…….
We’re putting shows in the book and getting the set together…..
The big Cadac mixing desk at the studio is having its ten year maintenance and is currently splayed out across the room.
The cassette tapes of ALL our shows are getting digitised so I can start uploading them…….gig by gig…..song by song…..
The PAL version of the DVD is next off the production line…….
The initial “hello” has been said and the CDs/DVDs are all on schedule…….
We are moving tanks onto the slight elevation over-looking the town centre.
Snipers have been deployed in all the usual places…….
A small dog called Rodriguez is standing by the church steps unaware of the events that will soon unfold all around him.
He is just under the impression that today is like any other day.
Pretty intelligent for a Chihuahua.
He has lived in this city for three years now….today seems no different from any other day.
But today we are making plans.
The charts come in.
We are not in the charts.
The milk is delivered.
We are not in the milk.
The papers are delivered.
We are not in the papers.
Wrong country.
We are in the papers three and a half thousand miles away.
So no chance of getting laid over here.
We are on this planet with billions of other lunatics.
Heavily armed, pissed off, detached from any guiding traditions.
Without 3G.
We can stare down on ourselves in the google earth pictures.
Was that table really visible in the back garden from space?
Should we change the patio……..?
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There seems to be some kind of dilemma.
It is whether or not you are more interested in the price of a car or the health of the world. Michael Portillo summed it up the other day. I can’t remember his exact phrase but I do remember thinking that he had accidentally summed it all up. First thing he ever said that made any sense. (He’s an ex-politician here) Car/World. Car/World. Heads or tails.
If you want a revolution baby
there is nothing like your own.
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We are so wrapped in our own worlds.
And it is really hard to write things that will make sense to people all over the planet.
Someone has to do it now.
And I am not talking about having a world-wide number one……..
I am just talking about detaching the concept of business and profit from every thought in every body in the west and east and some of the south and north.
We need to embrace change.
Huge change.
Stop the world being run like it is today.
Blind.
As me old mate, Marcus Aurelius used to say:
“Observe how all things are continually being born of change; teach yourself to see that Nature’s highest happiness lies in changing the things that are, and forming new things after their kind. Whatever is, is in some sense the seed of what is to emerge from it. Nothing can become a philosopher (you) less than to imagine that seed can only be something that is planted in the earth or the womb.”
Funny how stuff just catches your eye…………
I’m going to make a tea……….
What a week……..
Just got back earlier today…….
What a mad and great week that was……
First time in front of a mic and a monitor speaker and an audience for five years…..Didn’t even rehearse with a mic and a monitor…. just an accoustic guitar……
I can’t even believe I did it all on accoustic……..
We are coming back soon.
The atmosphere on the street in Austin was kind of indefinable……….slightly unintelligible. I really wanted to check some people out but the opportunity……
The atmosphere at the gig was just fantastic, very warm and good humoured.
I spent a few weeks leading up to this trip wondering what it would be like…….then when we got to the US there were far more things to do……..radios and interviews……..Lots of people to meet……It was great.
It just turned into a “this is the first week of the rest of your life” kind of a week.
I left feeling stronger, enthusiastic and, as usual, hit by all the many contradictions in US culture/society…….Oh, and I met Stan Ridgway….
You see, despite everything, something good always happens.
Yes I met Stan and visited Jefferson and Lincoln in Washington.
Thanks to all who gave us a helping hand or just a smile…….
In the States Again!
Well its great to be back. In New York working for the first time since late last century…..Sometimes didn’t think I would ever get back here………But hey, here we are.
This trip is just a way of saying hi!
We will be back to play shows from May but this is just a way of saying we are still around.
Having a laugh so far, we are a happy crew.
(See how long that lasts!!!!!!)
There are a few early starts and crucial plane times and rail journeys but I am sure we will get where we are going on time…..
We are just going to have a run through some of the material. I am here with John Turnbull (electric guitar) and David Duffy (fiddle, mandolin)
They are both fantastic musicians and I hope they can put up with my inability to rehearse seriously……That’s what happens most of the time. Musicians rebel and get grouchy if not routined correctly. But hey thats what its all about to me. Finding a performance that is fresh and a little hopeful in its search for the right moment. If you rehearse too much, you kill the vibe…..Now rehearsing is different to knowing the songs, everyone playing should know the songs. Just not know the way they are going to play them, exactly………..Well its difficult to explain and retain the interest of blog readers so………..
Lets just say a big hello to the USA and leave it at that.
I just want to say how much I appreciate the messages I have been getting from you people. I am really amazed. It feels like starting over.
A big thankyou. See you soon.
Exciting Day
I must admit it has been a very exciting day and for the whole of it, I have never left the studio.
I have released four albums in the US and launched a brand new website…..
Quite a rare day really.
A day for running next door with a ransom note shouting verses from the Koran.
A day for visiting Salisbury Cathedral and wondering why it’s there……
A day to be an antheist living in a technological spiritually reversing age.
The glue of certainties is too binding.
What did Iggy sing? Man is the village animal, united only by the glue of his loathesome qualities……..(Phew! nothing like starting of on a high note…….Ed.)
I don’t know how regular this blog is going to be…….how much I can be arsed to share this life with the world outside……Who knows, although reading from the top I wouldn’t blame you for making a cup of coffee and going to watch a DVD of the whatever show.
In fact, that’s probably what I am going to do right now. While I try to avoid thinking.
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Anyway, as you may have read elsewhere, “Welcome to the new WorldParty Website”
We will be adding content and more stuff soon…….Let us know if you have any suggestions…….
Here’s to 2006.
When I think of something I will write it here.
Hello World (party)!
Welcome to my blog… I’ll post some news soon!