Head Space Daily Words...

Life is all about peaks and troughs. Not mountain peaks like Everest and Kilimanjaro, or containers used on farms to hold pig swill; what I am talking about are the highs and lows that keep this thing interesting and prevent you from disappearing into a deep swirling abyss of dark nothingness, like the figure of the man caught in the spinning fractal of the posters for Hitchcock’s movie Vertigo. Speaking of which, I saw Vertigo on TV last weekend and by Christ, it is mental. Talk about suspending your disbelief!! In the Night Garden on Cbeebies is more credible – although Vertigo is a cracking film – and Igglepiggle in the James Stewart role, wouldn’t quite work. Anyway, back to peaks and troughs. One long running trough has been a lengthy workless stint, from which I have just emerged for the next two weeks but firstly, I am going to talk about the wonderful peak from last Saturday night at the Jazz Café in Camden Town, where we went to see Carleen Anderson. For those of you who do not know or remember, Carleen Anderson was the vocalist on Young Disciples 1991 LP Road To Freedom, which is one of the all time great albums. If you don’t own a copy please go out and buy one, as artists who make exceptional music deserve our support.  Carleen commanded the Jazz Café stage. Her voice and vocal range is gob smackingly profound. On her opening track I was surprised by how deep and full her voice was in the opening section but by the end of the same song, she had taken us through a breath taking array of high note vocal acrobatics.

That was the warm up. When a singer gives you a moment so perfect that time seems to stand still, when your surroundings seem to melt into oblivion and a sense of ecstatic disbelief takes you over, it is an extremely precious event. This happened when Carleen sang a version of Deniece Williams’ Free and my word you were taken to another place, at the wonder of how such a beautiful sound could be emanating from another human being’s mouth. Speechless.

On the Sunday following the gig, I was asked to begin a two week spell of work, starting on the Tuesday. This was a significant peak, rising from a tedious workless trough and is one that will hopefully grow higher. Being around people again is a novelty in itself after a time out and a welcome change. I can hold conversations once more. It is like being set free!!

At the time of writing this HSD entry, I was on the District Line, just leaving Gloucester Road Underground station, with Deep Inside by Hardrive playing on my i-pod. This is another one of the tracks I have recently converted from vinyl to audio file. I have good memories of this tune, when Masters At Work were at the height of their powers. Take a listen at Head Space Daily Daily Tune.

Future high points include next weeks Unknown Mortal Orchestra gig at Islington Assembly Hall, which will be a new venue for me. This band has really caught my imagination in recent years and I am enjoying what I have heard from the new album. I saw them play live around eighteen months ago at the Electric Ballroom in Camden and was blown away by their live performance. They will play Shepherd’s Bush Empire in November, which could be another future peak.

Next up is Aston Villa’s final Premier League game of the season at home to Burnley, followed a week later by the FA Cup Final at Wembley. You never know what to expect as a Villa supporter. Take today for instance. A 6-1 thrashing away to Southampton was a trough, wrapped in the peak of guaranteeing Premier League survival, due to other results going our way in the afternoon. Now we are staying up, we can get well and truly focused on the Final. The FA Cup is the greatest Cup competition in world football so for myself to be going to the Final with my two lads, is sensational. The occasion will be a landmark in their young lives. Arsenal are at the other end of the scale to the Villa but this is a one off match, so you never know and being serious underdogs against the Gunners is no bad thing. It stands to be a huge day, regardless of the result and if we won, it would go down in history and become one of the all time great peaks.

With one more week to go at work, another trough looms large but hopefully more work will follow soon to enable me to fund a more peaks. Peaks and troughs – make the world go round.