Rebel Once was the Quote Was I supposed to Take Note?
So, how have you been? Yes I know it’s been an awfully long time
since we actually did a proper mailout, but on the other hand we haven’t
had a great deal to tell you, and now everything is suddenly all happening
at once it seems there is barely enough space to fit it all in. Fortunately
our best friends are Précis and Paraphrase, so we know how to fit
a whole lot of nonsense into a very short space – just check out
some of the lyrics on earlier Blyth recordings, when Our Glorious Leader
still thought it was just a laugh and piling any old words together was
fine as long as they rhymed. Oh how we squirm to recall some of those
monstrosities…
But we digress, when we don’t have time to digress. Clearly everyone
has been feverishly checking their emails and letterboxes for the last
ten months or so, anxious for the answer to our last caption competition.
It was, of course, The Kills, and featured the lyrics of our formerly
very own Mr. James Hince. Congratulations to E.Glottis of Wokingham for
the winning answer. Bet Hilditch doesn’t get this next one.
Me and My Actor’s Last Stand
Once more unto the breech then, dear friends, and once more let’s
make sure we don’t fill it with our English dead. The toilets are
booked, the venue ready and waiting, and we have even hired a stage this
year, so you won’t all need to stand on your chairs to see the bands.
Yes, it’s Ashes time again!
If you didn’t come last year, then you won’t have a clue how
much fun it was, as the worthless drones who toil here for mere shekels
have not updated the website for an age. This will be rectified shortly,
and we hope to post glorious images of all the super things we did. Basically
the venue was great, the food splendid, the management hospitable, the
music sublime, the cricket and the weather both positively co-operative,
and the campsite convenient and pleasant. Those attending were pleased
to note the police presence, due to the adjacent BNP rally – two
fields away up the adjoining bridal path, an unhappy coincidence not to
be repeated this year – and even more pleased when the obliging
constables allowed all our children to play with their riot shields. Sadly
this facility will be absent this time around, but we might try and get
the local TA regiment to bring along a tank or two. You never know what
might turn up.
So, the deal is the same as before. Wristbands are available for the entire
weekend for only £15.00, and if we’re lucky then costs will
be covered. In 2008 we came pretty close, and hopefully the money saved
by printing two year’s worth of wristbands last year will offset
the cost of the stage this time round. Let’s hope so – but
if anyone wants to complain about the ticket price they can ****** off
to Holidays in the Sun, or some such event instead. Under sixteens are
free, and once again we are paying up front for the use of the campsite,
so that will be included in the price of the ticket, as will use of Mr
Porter’s pride and joy, the hired portable toilet, which did a sterling
job last year and was the recipient of only one pair of soiled pants over
the whole weekend. Well done everyone!
What else do you need to know? Oh yes, the date! It’s all happening
over the August bank holiday weekend, 28th – 30th, so we’re
running a little later on the Sunday as Monday is a day of rest. The usual
galaxy of stars will be playing, and some new faces too, so don’t
imagine for an instant there will be any time to lapse into ennui. Acts
confirmed to play are Anal Beard, Pog, Chris Butler, Eastfield, Paul Carter,
New York Scum Haters, Alcohol Licks, Wob, Verbal Warning, Blyth Power,
Tres Y El Ingles, Kev Durberville, Mourning For Autumn, The Charlies,
The ReEntrants, Cracktown, Amateur Ninja Club, Rachel Pantechnicon, Project
Adorno, Gabi Garbutt, Burgess the Rhymer, James ‘Bar’ Bowen
and Henry Lawrence. Something for everyone – except chanson!
Sorry, that was an in-joke. Bottom line is it was a great weekend last
year, and we aim to make it a better one this time. Having the music indoors
worked for most people and enabled us to make sure everything ran smoothly,
and thanks again to everyone who performed, or helped out during the event.
Which reminds me, we really could use some volunteers to help run the
door and sell the wristbands, as well as doing the live sound. Last year’s
helpers were splendid, but we definitely need a few more this year, as
the only way we can keep on staging The Ashes is if everything gets paid
for at the end of the day. Maybe we should get vests and radios and stuff?
That would be cool…
OK, it wouldn’t. Perhaps we should emulate some of our peers and
charge suckling babies? Oh beautiful days!
Blank Pages of a Blank Book – there’s Everything to
Tell
Of course we’ve been promising this thing for years, but Mr Porter’s
opus is actually at the printers even as we speak. Too early to tell what
the price will be, as we don’t have a final page count yet, or know
the production costs, but within four to six weeks of this mailout being
issued it should have an ISBN number and be available on Amazon, so hurrah
for that. Regular readers will recall this is The Bricklayer’s Arms,
a 190,000 word fictional autobiography of Benjamin Jonson, who is the
ugly bloke on the CD of the same name that everyone thinks is Tom Baker,
and who TDL sometimes thinks he sees looking from behind his eyes in the
mirror with the same slightly cock-eyed dopey expression. You might think
he’s joking, but he really believes this, and while it may strike
some as supremely presumptuous, it gives him the willies on the occasions
he sees it out of the corner of his eye. Whatever. According to the author
this book is an expiation and atonement for all the stupid cock-ups he’s
ever made as an artist, a writer, and a musician. Let’s see if he
still thinks that when he’s lived with the finished thing for five
years or so.
While on the subject of books, Mr Porter is still receiving polite requests
from authors keen to interview him and discuss the people he knew thirty
years ago, so look out for another volume on The Day My Giro Stopped Coming,
and other anarchic things from the distant past.
I Can’t Believe it’s all in Aid of the Great Society
No, no! That’s not all. Not content with the book and the live show
and the caption competition we also have a brand new CD under production.
This should be having its launch party at Lumb Farm, over the Ashes Weekend.
By ‘launch party’, of course, we simply mean we’ll be
flogging the things for all we are worth to try and pay off the overdraft,
so with that and the book both being on sale, make sure you bring your
chequebook. Sorry, we don’t take chip and pin.
Anyhow, the third part in the Land Sea & Sky trilogy is booked into
Trinity Heights studio for three weeks in July, and we are all hot to
trot. Line up is the same as on Fall of Iron, and with Mr. Fred Purser
at the controls we are looking forward to finishing the thing off in style.
Look out for a very special guest appearance on the finished recording,
and be assured that plans for the boxed set with an enormous book full
of pretentious nonsense are even now taking shape in the mind of the deranged
Mr. Porter. Someone tell the fool it won’t wash.
Tracks listed at the moment – and probably definitively –
are: Heart of Me, Fleurs du Mal, Ass in the Oak Tree, Follow the Band,
House of War, On Top of my Lot, Devil and Sister Helena, Battle of Naseby,
I Who Came in from the Cold, The Mermaid, Probably Won’t be Easy
and Land Sea & Sky. Yes we know you have heard most of these before,
but not with the full band, and those from the long-deleted Death Went
to Bed solo CD have been clamouring for a fair hearing for years. Probably
Won’t be Easy is back as it missed out on The Bricklayer’s
Arms, and the ruthless rewriting of the band’s history, which will
eventually see all the deleted and unavailable CDs re-recorded in the
fullness of time. The new CD can be ordered now, so send a cheque and
we’ll get them sent out as soon as we have them.
While on the subject of old recordings, those of you addicted to old stuff
are advised that the original tapes of A Little Touch of Harry in the
Night are coming out on vinyl. Yes, we kid you not. Nothing to do with
us, although Mr. Porter has written the sleeve notes. As most people reading
this will probably never have heard the original, suffice to say it was
recorded in a dank cellar in Hackney, and as an atmospheric artefact typical
of the sounds and emotions we experienced as doley-claiming squatters
back when we were young it is pretty much in the zone. Those of you more
attuned to the latter-day Blyth Power will probably not find it to your
taste, although as a historical document, it may well serve to indicate
just why it was that all the cool anarchos stopped coming to see the band
once they found out we weren’t The Mob.
You Just Can’t Hide You Know
Not only this, but the band are playing a couple of festivals as well.
June 20th will see a 45 minute set at the Big Sessions Festival at De
Montfort Hall near Leicester. We’re on the Marquee stage in mid-afternoon,
and for those of you as ignorant as the Glorious Leader about popular
culture, it’s the event hosted by The Oysterband, and there will
be lots and lots happening, so check out www.bigsessionfestival.com for
more information.
Also on the cards is the Rhythms of the World Festival 2009. This is on
July 5th and takes place on a nice Greenfield site on the outskirts of
Hitchin, a town we know and love of old, and one we remember with affection
for the quality of the curries served to hard-working bands at Club 85.
Blyth Power are on between 5 and 6pm and it should be a blast. See www.rotw.org.uk
That’s it on the live front for now, partially due to the ongoing
demands of husbandry, and partially due to the ruinous expense of getting
the band in one place when they are so widely dispersed, and need so many
child-minders. Mr Porter may well be out and about flogging his book in
time to the music later this year – but only if someone offers him
hard cash to do so – the greedy, grasping, capitalist, money-grabbing
sell-out. Doesn’t he know that music should be free and that you
should ‘Pay No More Than…’ (continued on page 94 of
any one of a number of books on how a bunch of foolish young people took
lots of drugs and listened to music).
You
All Just Sit Their Gathering Dust
No, not the new CD we hope. Maybe some of the last dregs of old vinyl
which we are relieved to see now occupy less than eight inches of shelf
space in the stockroom? We are pleased to report that CDs have been moving,
and we now have Alnwick &Tyne available in limited quantities. These
found their way back from an overseas distributor, where they have been
languishing for a decade or more we presume. Viking Station has been re-pressed
and we still have a few Paradise Razed to eke out. Best of all, there
are only thirty-seven Pastor Skull cassettes left on the books. There
will be a new T-shirt with the CD, but that’s till in the workshops.
You know you want one…
One Day’s Boredom That Goes On Forever You Can’t Give
In Now Or You’ll Be Lost Forever
So, finally, this website. As you may have noticed we have finally been
updating the site - news pages, last year’s ashes pages with lots
of lovely photos, and a new lump of Genesis to Revolutions, just in case
anyone reading the learned tomes on 80’s anarchism get the impression
that Mr. Porter was living on a completely different planet to so many
of his contemporaries. Add to this the sample chapters from the forthcoming
book, and there should be more than enough to distract you from Facebook
for a few minutes.
Ironically, since we opened a My Space page, we receive lots of messages
from folks wondering where we’ve been for the last decade or more.
We’ve been at www.blythpower.co.uk Where were you?