That Was The Year That Wasn't (Slight Return)

It has been exactly one year since my last blog posting.

So what, if anything, has changed?

Well...

Omicron. No, I'm not too good at the Greek Alphabet either - aside from the odd distant memory from Physics lessons sometime last Century it's not something I've used a lot, although I feel as though it's getting more useful all the time. As I type this I am in the grip of the latest Coronavirus variant - I've been asleep for much of the last few days and when I have been awake I've felt as though I've been in the ring with Mike Tyson in his prime, although thankfully things seem to be improving now. Christmas? Who needs it eh? Still vaccinations seem to be getting more popular these days, although we all know someone who hasn't had one because they don't like the idea of it or that think it's all a conspiracy - I've had two of 'em and and a booster and I still caught it, so it does make you wonder... that said, the general consensus seems to be that if you catch it after being vaccinated it does lessen the effect of the virus, which given how I've felt for the last few days is an interesting thought. 

And the British Government continues to make every mistake imaginable and still somehow remain in power. Surely we deserve better than this? I saw Labour MP David Lammy talking on TV not so long ago - the interviewer made a typically flippant remark about a comment he made criticising the international embarrassment that is our current, worst ever Prime Minister and Lammy snapped back with the words 'THIS USED TO BE A SERIOUS COUNTRY - DO YOU REALISE WHAT PEOPLE THINK OF US NOW?' 

Now there's a question. 

Enough of such philosophical ramblings - I had my 60th birthday this year. 60! How on Earth did that happen?!? The Slogans were supposed to be playing on the day but our drummer man was pinged (remember the pingdemic? It seems a lifetime ago doesn't it?) so the gig didn't happen - instead I spent the evening in the hallowed surroundings of The Dolphin in Uxbridge, mostly in the garden, occasionally somewhere near the bar and had a splendid if rather difficult to remember time. I wonder where we'll all be in July this year? I wonder if we'll be anywhere, if you know what I mean?

And you thought that I'd stopped the philosophical ramblings...

Talking of The Slogans - we managed to play a few shows this year including one particularly memorable one at The Uxbridge Christmas Market earlier this month. Yes that's right, an outdoor show in December. And yes, it was as cold as you would think it would be, yes the power went on and off as you would expect it to and yes, it was really good fun. We've also had more than a few gigs cancelled, which seems to be a familiar tale for most bands these days. I've also been depping in The Good Old Boys as guitarist Simon hasn't been well - again we've played a few shows, had a few cancelled... see what I mean? One can only wonder when or indeed how this situation will change. 

I mentioned in the last missive that I had recorded some guitar parts at home using GarageBand for an Alvin Gibbs & The Disobedient Servants single; this was due out early this year but somewhat inevitably got caught in a Brexit-induced vinyl pressing backlog and so didn't actually emerge until the Summer. Has anything actually improved as a result of Britain leaving the EU? No, I didn't think so either... nevertheless, 'State Of Grace' is available here from Time & Matter Records even as we speak. We only managed to play one show this year (at The HRH Punk Festival in Sheffield back in October since you were wondering) but it was a great gig at an excellent event - there are plans to return to both the studio and the stage next year, and hopefully we will. 

Vinyl copies of the 'ElectrAcoustiC' album by Ruts D.C. were also delayed thanks to the afore-mentioned backlog, eventually being delivered nearly a year after the CD became available. The Sunday before Christmas I played an afternoon show at The Cavern in Raynes Park with The Good Old Boys then made my way up to The 229 Club in Great Portland Street where Theatre Of Hate were playing; there I met Dave and Segs backstage (the things I write here eh? Well, the things I used to write here... I really must do this more often mustn't I?) and signed over 300 albums, all of which had either been pre-ordered or were purchased in the next couple of days. A genuinely exciting day - it would be good to have more like that... mind you, I suppose that might have caught Coronavirus then... ooh!

So - what next? 

Well in a time that could politely be described as 'uncertain' one thing that even I could never have predicted is actually going to happen - nearly 30 years after we first broke up there is to be an official album release by The Price, something that we didn't manage to achieve during our original existence. Even typing it here feels weird... but, incredibly, it's true. 'No Justice?' is out early next year on Cadiz Music - to quote the soon-to-appear press release it contains 19 tracks recorded between 1988 and 1993, and even though I say so myself it sounds bloomin' great. More news to follow on the band's Facebook page via the link above, my Facebook page and no doubt some other places too... maybe even here...

Theoretically Ruts D.C. are supporting The Stranglers in January and February - this is the third attempt at The Final Full U.K. Tour, and with further restrictions looming as I type this it's difficult to say whether it will take place this time either. We have German shows planned for later in the year, along with various others in the pipeline, and we'd also like to make a new album - but who knows what will happen? It's interesting isn't it - we've never really known what will happen in life, but these days it almost feels as though we did. If I put something like 'we're touring with The Stranglers' here then the chances were very good that we that we would indeed tour with The Stranglers. Those days seem a very long time ago now don't they?

Hmm. Even I thought that I'd stopped the philosophical ramblings... mind you, it's been good to be back blogging, even if I am running on paracetamol and, well, not much else at the moment.

See you all in 2022!

That Was The Year That Wasn't

What follows was written quickly. Rather like this year it's a bit disjointed but, rather like this year, it is what it is.

————

‘For a minute there, I lost myself...’

Well. You know that things are getting weird when you find yourself quoting a line from a Radiohead song.

We're in the middle of the Christmas holiday, nearing the end of the strangest of years. Pretty much everyone I've talked to on the phone in the last few days is bored. Lost. Desperate.

When will this all end? Indeed, where will this all end? I've been asking myself that a fair bit lately. Maybe you have too? 

I miss people. I never really thought that I would, but I do. At least I think that I do. I've always spent a lot of time on own - not particularly through choice, it's just how things have worked out. I've never had lots of friends, I've not got much to say for myself, women get bored with me - often when they discover that I don't think about very much other than guitars - and I often find social situations with lots of people difficult to cope with.

Ah - but hang on a minute? I've got friends. I talk to people when I'm out and about, occasionally about things other than guitars. Every once in a while some of them are women. And aren't gigs 'social situations with lots of people'?

 

Gigs. I remember them. Maybe you do too? They were great weren't they? Well, I thought that they were. I wonder if they will ever happen like we used to know them again. 

Sometimes in the last few months I've wondered if I would ever play another gig. That's not a good thing to find yourself thinking. Having said that The Slogans have managed to play three shows since we last spoke - a Sunday afternoon 'sit-down-three-piece-without-the drums' show in The Dolphin in Uxbridge way back in August (I really must update this blog more often mustn't I? More about that in a minute...) and then a whopping two gigs in October, and on successive Fridays at that. We played another sit down show at The Horns in Watford on the 16th, then Dylan made a triumphant return behind the kit the 23rd at The Cavern in Raynes Park. All were highly enjoyable, although I'd be lying if I didn't say that the third show beat the the other two in the fun stakes. Mind you I realised that I wasn't anywhere near match fit at the Cavern show as I was sweating by the second song and not playing particularly well. I got going in the end (I wouldn't have mentioned it here if I hadn't!) and we were due to make a return visit to the venue in December - but, of course, we didn’t. 

It now feels as though Ruts D.C. have postponed more gigs than we've ever played - we haven't of course, but that’s what it feels like. Incredibly we’ve released two - count ‘em, two! - albums this year (since you were wondering- the live ‘40 Years Of The Crack’ recorded on our 2019 UK tour, and ‘ElectrAcoustiC’ which features reworked old songs; both are available on our website) and have somehow played two - count ‘em, two! - gigs. Both of these were sit down shows at The New Cross Inn earlier this month (the 14th and 15th December) and while both were ostensibly acoustic I used an electric guitar for a fair bit of the evening. We were supposed to play three shows, but as we were getting our gear together for the first gig we heard that London was going into Tier 3 of Coronavirus restrictions on the morning of our third show. Much incredulity followed, followed by much swearing... the shows went well, and then we all went home. That was that for this year.

And I even went to some - well, three - gigs. I saw Steve Simpson with his new band The Waders a couple of times at The Cavern (both shows were excellent) and witnessed the mighty Menace at The Holroyd Arms in Guildford. The bands were standing, the audience were seated and I don't mind admitting that I was almost euphoric at times. I really like music. That hasn't changed.

But at least I managed to play some shows. There are many increasingly despondent musicians that haven't played at all this year. Do you remember that ridiculously offensive 'Fatima' advert? Vile wasn't it? Leaving aside the fact that there were some excellent parodies out in no time at all it seemed to me that it was yet another example of how this increasingly appalling government have absolutely no idea whatsoever how to handle the situation. I for one have long been fed up with ghastly toffs telling us what we should think and do - now an endless procession of faceless ministers appear on television instead, none of whom take any responsibility for the current chaos. Tens of thousands of people have died, hundreds of thousands have lost their jobs, physical and mental health problems are increasing at a frightening rate and this gang of goons will all get peerages and houses big enough to be seen from outer space. It would be funny if it wasn't so sad. The tiers of a clown indeed.

In an attempt to make some sort of sense of things and indeed to put my time to good use I decided to try to learn a few things on the computer. Among other things I've had a go at making DVDs (you want a gig bootlegging from YouTube? I'm your man!) and perhaps more constructively I've been finding my way around Garageband. This as you may know is a recording app, and after much brow-furrowing I used it to contribute guitars to 'World Of Sunlight' by Pete 'Joyless' Jones back in the summer - since then I've recorded my parts for a new Alvin Gibbs & The Disobedient Servants single (our 'History' EP was also released back in June - under normal circumstances this would have been a really good year for me in terms of record releases!) and quite a few new song ideas. I still get a bit stuck here and there, but I'm quite pleased with progress so far. Lots of people are recording at home these days - so does this mean the end of recording studios? Will they be yet another casualty of 2020? Let's hope not - the three days Ruts D.C. spent at Perry Vale Studios with Pat Collier recording 'ElectrAcoustiC' were highlights of my year. Admittedly highlights have been few and far between this year, but you know what I mean I think. And surely I could have written more blog posts? Well I could - if there was anything to write about. You'd soon get tired of me ranting on and on about how evil The Tories are over and over again - I'm certainly getting fed up with thinking about it.

So - what now? There's a vaccine or two around, and talk of 'getting back to normal' sometime soon - but will we? Will the world we knew ever return? It's quite a thought isn't it? I'm optimistic that it will - most of the time. Pubs are closing at a depressing rate, often as a result of governmental incompetence which has resulted in the rules changing so often, and I fear that many venues will go the same way. I wonder if people are losing the habit of going out - then again a lot of folk sound as though they would go to the opening of an envelope if it got them out of the house. 

Well - that was 2020. Let's see what 2021 has to offer. It will be better.

It will be better - won't it?

'Nobody told me there'd be days like these...'

Well I don't know about you (obviously!) but I seem to have rather more time on my hands than I was expecting to have at the moment. Maybe you have too? So what better time to (a) write one of those blog postings that I keep saying that I must get around to writing, and (b) play a game of Spot The Difference. Well, why not eh?



Here are two posters - the one on the left is for the first ever acoustic tour by (ahem!) up-and-coming young London dub rock band Ruts D.C., while the one on the right is for The Punk Rock Bowling Festival, which takes place every May in no lesser location than Las Vegas, USA. 






Now here are two more posters - the one on the left is once again for the first ever acoustic tour by (ahem!) up-and-coming young London dub rock band Ruts D.C., while the one on the right is once again for The Punk Rock Bowling Festival, which takes place every May in no lesser location than Las Vegas, USA.






So can you - yes, YOU! - spot the difference between them? Tricky isn't it?

Actually it's not very tricky at all is it? I must make the next competition more difficult...

I first started this blog all those years ago as an attempt to become more computer literate, to improve my typing skills - which if I remember rightly were pretty much non-existent at the time - and because I thought that it might be an interesting thing to do, not least as it gave me a way of documenting my increasingly unusual (and often rather obscure) attempts to play the guitar for a living. I gave it the impulsive title 'Leigh's Mad World Of Guitars' without very much thought; I've often wondered if I should change it - maybe one day I will - but it's been hard enough to find the time and if I'm honest the inclination to contribute to it over the last few years, let alone to wonder whether it's name should change. As previously discussed I tend to use Facebook for music-related stuff these days, and as a result the blog feels a little bit like something from another time in my life - which I suppose in many ways it is. Looking back through it I don't really know how I found the time to write as much as I did in the early days, although maybe a more interesting question is to consider what I used to do with all those thoughts before I started writing them down here... but if ever there was a Mad World it's the one that we have 'suddenly' found ourselves in now.

Coronavirus. Was there ever a time when it wasn't the most used word in the English language? It's hard to remember isn't it? And how about terms like 'self-isolating' and 'social distancing'? From people saying things like 'I don't know what all the fuss is about, it's only a cold' to the same folk crossing the road with a look of abject terror on their face if they see anyone within several yards of them has taken a few weeks, but it's certainly happened. As I write this all restaurants, pubs and clubs are closed and gatherings are limited to two people - that's certainly something that I never thought that I'd ever type! All but non-essential shops are closed, the streets are as empty as they are on Christmas Day - well, they certainly are around these parts - and with many people working from home the World seems a very different place to the one we all now only dimly remember from just a couple of weeks or so ago. Supermarket shelves are empty, people are fighting over bottles of hand sanitiser and toilet rolls are suddenly the rarest thing on Earth. I was in the Post Office around the corner from me the other day, and when one of the lads behind the counter mentioned that they would be receiving a delivery later in the day I heard a voice from behind me say 'I'll 'ave 200 of 'em'. It was a giant, not-particularly friendly-looking man, and he wasn't smiling - now that's an upset stomach... all this panic buying has of course resulted in shortages of all sorts of things, which isn't too clever from the point of view of, say, an NHS worker who can only visit shops at a certain time of day due to shift commitments, or an unemployed or elderly person with limited financial resources at certain times of the month. Still, I'm sure that doesn't bother Mr. 200 Toilet Rolls, or indeed any of the other blockheads who work on a similarly self-centred level to him.

As for me - all gigs are fairly obviously postponed or in some cases cancelled altogether, my work at Balcony Shirts is on hold and as a self-employed person I've long since stopped joking about bankruptcy. I began the last blog posting with the words 'as Ruts D.C. ready themselves for a return to showbusiness' - well, that seems a very long time ago now too. We've got things to do - there's a live album from last year's '40 Years Of The Crack' tour coming out soon, there are songs to write for a projected 2021 release (I do like a bit of unashamed optimism, don't you?!) and more, but who knows when we'll next be able to get together? We're looking at sending song ideas to each other via The Internet - time I finally learned how to work GarageBand properly then... we were due to be playing a Rock Against Racism show in Brighton this coming weekend with another one in Brixton early next month so these are now being rescheduled as are quite a few other shows. And we're once again accompanying The Stranglers around Britain on their 'Final Full U.K. Tour' in October and November - tickets are selling well, and surely we'll all be back to 'normal' by then? There are also dates for Alvin Gibbs & The Disobedient Servants and The Slogans that need changing - but when do we reschedule anything for? How long is our new Mad World going to be around for? And how much madder is it going to get? 

Hmm... the answers aren't there, but the questions most certainly are. 

Wherever you are, stay safe and stay cool. We'll meet again, don't know where don't know when - but I know we'll meet again, some sunny day...

Your Disobedient Servant writes...

Well. 

This is getting ridiculous.

Blame Facebook. Well, that's what I'm blaming anyway. After all, it can't possibly be my fault can it?

In the good old days - 'old' days are always 'good' aren't they? - if I'd wanted to bang on about myself in Cyberspace I would have to find a computer (usually in a house, maybe even the one that I lived in) before logging onto this here blog and spending ages humming and harring, writing and rewriting, editing and re-editing... whereas now it just takes a few seconds on a mobile phone or laptop and my self-centred ramblings are there for all to see. Progress? Maybe. Of a sort. 

When I last found my way onto these hallowed pages Ruts D.C. were about to embark on their '40 Years Of The Crack' Tour. That was three months - a quarter of a year - ago. It all went wonderfully well as I regularly reported on my Facebook page (see what I mean!) and we're currently gigging sporadically over the next couple of months including Camden Rocks tomorrow, The Rebellion Festival in August and more - full details can as always be found on, you've guessed it, the band's Facebook page. We're also putting together some new songs which will hopefully form the basis of a new album to be released next year, and planning several other outings before 2019 is over. Exciting times!

I've also been gigging with the excellent Punky Reggae Party (I bet you can guess they do, and indeed where this link takes you) as well as starting a new band with some old friends playing new wave covers - we're called The Slogans, there's no Facebook page yet (or if there is then I haven't seen it!) but you can bet your trousers that there will be...

And I'm pleased to say that I'm about go on tour with Alvin Gibbs And The Disobedient Servants. I was very pleased to be asked to play on two tracks on the U.K. Subs's bassman's debut solo album 'Your Disobedient Servant' which came out earlier this year to rave reviews, and I'm even more excited to be asked to play in the live band, which also features the Subs's drummer Jamie Oliver (yes, that really is his name!) and Godfathers guitar slinger Steve Crittall (he's not on all the gigs on this tour sadly but hopefully will be more involved long term) along with various other guest guitarists (all of whom play on the album) at some of the shows along the way. I will no doubt be reporting as often as I can on you-know-where, and if I've got any sense I'll keep some sort of tour diary which I'll write up here in due course. Just like I used to do in the good old days eh?

Let's hope so.