So, for the 50th post on the blog, here's a rough and ready, unedited and unpolished extract from the forthcoming Glasto book.
It's the Friday morning of Glasto 2015. I've just polished off some breakfast and and wondering about the nature of music and fandom...
And that got me to thinking as I
sat and had my belated breakfast. I was heading off to watch Courtney Barnett
play the Pyramid in a couple of hours and I was really looking forward to it.
Whether she’d played a blindingly good set or would be overawed by the whole
thing and crumble a bit seemed irrelevant. It didn’t matter to me. Seeing
Courtney Barnett at Glastonbury was going to be one of the highlights come what
may. I’d paid just over £200 for my Glasto ticket; I’d be seeing Courtney Barnett
twice and The Fall once. Just for those three sets alone £200 was money well
spent. I was more than simply looking forward to watching Courtney Barnett. I
had to admit that I was positively excited by the prospect. This was more than
a bit unnerving. So unnerving that I found myself questioning the entire idea
of feeling this way about music. It’s something that since that moment I have
been unable to fully figure out with any significant success.
This is the thing.
You can tell that I’m still
wrestling with this because my ideas are half-formed and not totally worked
through, and while this might not seem like much to do with Glastonbury, maybe
it’s got everything to do with Glastonbury.
It’s all down to music.
This is the thing that’s still
kind of baffling me. Like many people my age (early fifties), I guess that
music has played such an important part of my life that it would be hard to
imagine not having music. It always seems to be there. There’s been barely a
single day when I’ve not listened to music since I was 10 or 11 years old. In
fact I can’t think of a day when I’ve not listened to music. There’s been music
when I was at school in the 1970’s (70’s pop/glam rock/ prog/ rock/ punk/soul),
at college in the 1980’s (post punk/industrial/blues), when I was married and
we first had the kids in the 1990’s (dub/indie/noise) and thereafter to date,
well, anything else I can listen to. I’ve gone through listening to daytime Radio 1, to the still
massively missed John Peel, to On the Wire on Radio Lancashire (a great show by
the way), Radio 4, Radio 3, Radio 6 and
any number of radio programmes from around the world on the net. You think of
it; I’ll listen to it. I’ll get the records, listen to the radio, hear it on
the net, download it. Thousands of CDs, mp3s, records and tapes. Hundreds of
gigs. Music in any way, shape or form. I think the only blind spots I have are
folk music and opera, but God knows I’ve tried (and failed miserably) to get
into those genres. Anything else is fair game though. Classical, jazz,
electronic, hip-hop, grime; there’s not much left.
I sometimes worry that there’s not enough time left to listen to all the music that I want to hear; that I’m flitting from one genre to another, hardly scratching the surface. And yet...
And there’s always new music to hear. Always something new just around the corner. This is what keeps me going. Searching endlessly for that great new sound. And when you just think that it might all be getting a bit boring, well, something incredible pops up that blows your socks off and makes you realise that this is what it’s all about. That record that gives you a shiver down your spine, makes the hairs on the back of your neck stand up, brings a lump to your throat and a tear to your eye. (Maybe not all at the same time; that would be close to heading towards a medical emergency, but you get the picture.)
If I’m not listening to music,
then I’m reading about it, or writing about it or just thinking about it. It’s
such an integral part of me that I kind of take it for granted. That’s not
quite right; I don’t take it for granted at all. I still find myself marvelling
at something new, something jaw-droppingly good, so good that I need to tell
people about it. Music still has the power to amaze me. What I do take for
granted is, I suppose, that music is so important. I simply cannot understand
anyone who “isn’t into music”. It’s simply beyond my comprehension. It’s like
saying, “well, I’m not really that arsed about breathing. I can take it or
leave it, really.”
This kind of brings me back to
Glasto. Sort of full circle. Because however much I love the place for what it is;
that sparkling, magical place like nowhere else I’ve ever been to, well, I have
to admit it, I suppose I’d have never really gone if it wasn’t for the music.
As I finished the last of the toast and brushed the crumbs away, I took a ciggie out of the packet, lit up and sat back to think about music. See, always thinking about music.
Now, despite sounding as if I’m slightly obsessed with music, it all seems fairly natural and obvious to me that it’s the right way to be. There doesn’t seem anything wrong with being like that. It’s just like a hobby, I suppose. Like playing Crown Green Bowls or having a shed. Things that maybe I should be getting into at my age instead of fixating on music. But music is my thing.
I watched people queuing for
breakfasts, bleary-eyed and hung over. It was like the day before. Nearly
everybody who was there was considerably younger than me. I wondered how many
of them were at Glasto for the music or if it was something else. What did it
mean for them? Was going to Glasto a rite of passage thing for them? Would they
still be going to Glasto when they were my age, in twenty or thirty years time?
Would Glasto still be going? Would I still be going? I’d be 73 in twenty years
time if I was still around. Would I still be into music? Of course I would! I’d
be still searching for the next big thing, the new discovery just around the
corner, just waiting to happen, just out of reach.
Would I still be into music?
Would I still be a fan? Would I still be excited about legging it down to the
Pyramid Stage to see 2034’s equivalent of Courtney Barnett? Or maybe I’d still
be going to see Courtney Barnett in 2034!
But this was the thing that got
me wondering and it sort of relates to sheds and Crown Green Bowling and all
that age-appropriate stuff and music and Glastonbury. Yes, I am a music fan and
yes, I’m into music. Maybe at my age I should have moved onto something else. Maybe
it was time to put those childish things away. Christ, I was a Grandad now! Music-
and pop music at that- it should really be something that was part of my past
and not of my present or future. But I couldn’t see that happening really. Not
really. There would always be music.
I looked up at the sky. It was
completely blue by now. Not a cloud in sight. I thought about scribbling a few
notes down yet everything was a bit unfocussed. I was still thinking about it
all. Maybe thinking about it all a bit too much.
This was the real kicker though.
I worked out that it was ok to be into music and be a music fan at my age,
however ridiculous it might sound but could I call myself a fan of Courtney
Barnett and The Fall and all the rest? Isn’t it a bit daft to say the least to
call myself a “Fan”? I think it is. But I was exhibiting all the fan-like
signs. Buying all the records, reading about them in the music press, scouring
the net, Googling and looking for live recordings? Getting overly excited about
seeing them play at Glasto? What is all that about if not being a fan?
Then there’s Dylan of course, Bob
Dylan. Although he wasn’t playing Glasto (I might have just mentioned it if he
was), I’m sitting here writing this bit and looking at the bookshelf in front
of me, I count 27 different books just about Dylan. A whole bookshelf full of
nothing else except books about Bob Dylan. To my left is a CD tower with 100
plus live Dylan recordings. There’s three more in the other room. In yet
another CD tower there’s all the studio albums. And there’s DVD’s and radio
documentaries. And mp3’s all over hard drives on two laptops, three iPods and
an external hard drive (just in case). When Jackie says, “Do you really need
another book/CD about Dylan?” I suppose she has a point.
Maybe I'm an afficionado rather than a fan.
Maybe being a Dylan aficionado is
acceptable. It sounds better than being called a fan. You can put it down to
being a bit eccentric. That’s more of a hobby, a pastime.
But being a fan of Courtney
Barnett or The Fall? Or Miles Davis? Or Nils Frahm? Or all the others?
At my age?
The word “fan” has connotations
of being in some awful 1970’s Offical Fanclub thing, you know? Badges and
stickers and cheap-shit iron on t-shirts. Membership cards. Pre Smash Hits.
“I’m a Courtney Barnett fan.” Or “I’m a Fall fan.” Well, it just sounds...odd.
This is the dilemma then. The
question that I can’t still answer. If I tick all the fan-like boxes (the
records, the magazine and internet stuff, the gigs etc) then am I a “fan”?
There’s not that blind devotion, that hero worship, that they-can-do no-wrong
stuff from me. I am not that naive and I’m old enough- much too old enough- to
realise that they are just ordinary people with flaws and faults like the rest
of us and yet, I do think that they have some extraordinary talent for making
great music and great art. I can admire their work, I can love what they make
and still not admire them as people. Maybe that’s the difference. It what they create that’s important. The rest
is slightly irrelevant.
So what do I do? Call myself a
fan? Or is there another word, another term, a word that fits the bill a lot
better? If I don’t call myself a fan then what should I call myself? There must
be another word! One that doesn’t sound so daft and geeky when applied to
someone in their middle-age? I would love to know!
(Since that late Friday morning in
June I’ve been wondering about all of this. Not to the point of worrying. More
in a sense of being curious and slightly perplexed. As far as I can tell, I’m
not listening to music in a different way or made me listen to any less music
or any different music. I’ve not taken up a latent, dormant and deep-seated
interest in DIY or some similar middle-age hobby. Music is still there, at the
forefront. And it always will be.)
My previous three books about Glasto are all available here-
either as Kindle e books or in paperback:
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