Horse-Witch

In 1979, 25 years old and trying too hard to be Seamus Heaney, I wrote the following. One year away from graduating in Oxford, I had before this lived, studied and worked in Ipswich, three years as an agricultural labourer, thus the rustic roots celebrated in the poem and providing an affinity for rural preoccupations in the poetry of Heaney and Hughes. But who didn't revere these two at this time, whatever their themes, if you wanted to be a poet?

From working on a 3000 acre farm near Ipswich, I then helped to run with one other a 200 acre farm on the Chiltern Hills near Stokenchurch for two years. This poem was written two years after that time, those farming days still pumping the poet's blood.

I post this now having been reminded of the poem during research today about a wonderful man and farm worker [also horseman in his youth] I knew and will write much more about later. He is the Arthur of the haiku posted a little earlier, and that is a true story.....

The George Crabbe Memorial Poetry Competition
1979 Crabbe Memorial Competition - First Prize
Adjudicators: Wes Magee, Marguerite Wood

Tom turns a spaded clod upside
down and prods it to levelled crumbs.
He grips the handle between thumb
and palm while a laugh jerks his side,
then stabbing at the crusty surface loam
a booted step thuds it home.

His smiles are a unique arcana,
mysteries to break the slow toil
into rhythms: movements of compact soil,
once turned, are finished like a coda.
It's a simple talent. Using these secrets
his arms work on through leather singlets.

On stopping, his fingers stretch to unhitch
a clutch nine decades old. Tom stalls
to review through eyes that can recall
backwards as a Suffolk horse-witch
when instead of taming this dark loam
his skill with a dried fresher's back-bone

worked a different gardening.
Pocketed in thick farmer's corduroy
the thin frog-bone was a ploy
to coax some Punch to its tugging
charm. Sweating to the potion
its great legs heeled tight at Tom's motion.

The plough-team's raven-feathered shine
oiled itself through strange antidotes
Tom brewed and added to blander oats.
Each bait was mixed from some design
of his own, or a Horsemen's select cabal
whose shared magic suggest 'Paddock calls',

their witch-like exchange of ideas.
Now moving the stubborn rich earth
he is tending to a similar birth,
and this is Tom's silently smiled panacea.
Molding another cut turf to shreds
he casts his spells into living beds.

Arthur and the Elephant

The elephant walks

by, yet the only sound is

wind puffs from his feet

Thompson - Family

The Ties That Abide If Not Always Bind

Any long-times readers of this blog, and/or those who have dipped into my reviews of Teddy Thompson, will know how much I rate TT - therefore, it is little surprise how much I am looking forward to his project which unites the genetically talented but geographically and relationship dissipated family to record their Family album released on 18th November.

I am listening to a whole album stream of the album here, and I will comment now on the opening title track which is a musical preface for the whole by Teddy. It is a typically sweet and sweetly sung song about the album conception and the actual family, placing himself in the 'middle' of everything with his other trademark which is the self-effacing as well as self-deprecating confessional lyric. These opening lines are more premise than self-revelation, and set the scene with characteristic wit and candour:

My father is one of the greats to ever step on a stage
My mother has the most beautiful voice in the world
And I am betwixt and between
Sean Lennon, you know what I mean
Born to the manor, never quite clamoring free

It's family [repeated as chorus]

A number of the songs are reflections of their authors' familiar sound rather than outstanding examples [so perhaps damn good rather than always brilliant ] but there is an absolutely gorgeous song Bonny Boys sung by Linda, and this as well as the opener would be enough for me to be content with the collective offering. 

Ike, Tina and the Martian

Value in the Beholder

Two secondhand purchases today, both in very good condition. The Ike & Tina Turner is one I will enjoy listening to, but what has interested me most is that the photography for the album is by Dennis Hopper. That's a neat name-check.

Craig Raine's A Martian Sends a Postcard Home is a first edition of a poetry collection from 1979 that many English teachers will know, though perhaps that will mainly be the title poem which has been used since its beginning to present/teach the use of metaphor. It is a clever set of poems written at a time when such craft was playfully new and enjoyed for that purpose and effect, and it certainly had the capacity to engage a relatively wide audience. Not all of the poems are mere school fodder either, though Sexual Couplets wouldn't be considered highbrow! In reading through most this evening much of the figurative knockabouts seem a little dated, but I have smiled enough to counter any knowing cringes.

Fernando - Old Man Motel Domingo and True Instigator album reviews

Icing On The Gig-Cake

As I wrote in my recent review of The Delines in Bristol, it was a genuine pleasure to meet and hear their support act Fernando. It was evident then and since in my research that there is considerable love for Fernando from the band and the Portland music community: not surprising as he is such a friendly and enthusiastic person [I have mentioned his genuine joy at performing here in the UK, and this has been articulated further on his Facebook page, apart from a fight he had and lost with an English breakfast fry-up].

On the strength of his actual performance on the night, but also that warm Portland musical camaraderie, I searched out and bought a couple of his cds, Old Man Motel Domingo and True Instigator. The two immediate qualities that make one wonder how and why he isn’t better known are his songwriting and beautiful vocal. I heard a harsher voice live, but one which has that pleasing grit ground out from experience and emotion, yet on these two albums – certainly TI - there is also a sweetness and gentle strength that resounds from the many slower, balladic folk numbers – I mean ‘folk’ in that Americana tradition. The more recent True Instigator has Fernando to the fore but with subtle and/or atmospheric instrumental and vocal support, as with the screeching guitar that adds a haunting tone to the cover of Hank Williams’ Angel of Death. The title track is an actual rock number, and this is interesting when one has only heard Fernando as a live acoustic performer – there is a Steve Earle feel to the driving beat, but Fernando’s vocal is by contrast a much clearer though nonetheless powerful part. Third It’s A Shame is by another contrast a softer, pop-rock track that reminds a little of the Everlys, probably in its early 60s rhythm and lilt. 

There is a danger in always citing reference points, but as ever I do so as compliment and defining. The rock’n’roll nod of fourth Tribulation Waltz perhaps tells us a little more of where the influences come from, but by now the vocal is established as distinct. It is a wonderful instrument. And it is a wonderful set of songs. I will just also mention tenth Selos which is sung in Fernando’s native Argentinian/Spanish, and it begins a cappella before the guitar twang and organ accompaniment add that atmospheric layer to the beauty of the song and the singing. The vocal harmonies here and elsewhere – not sure by whom – are sweetly tight.

Old Man Motel Domingo is overall a rockier affair, and perhaps this itself reflects Fernando’s earlier role in ‘hard rock’ band Monkey Paw which I haven’t been able to track down for a listen. But there are classic folk numbers here too as with fourth So. California with plucked acoustic guitar and an echo of The Byrds a la Ballad of Easy Rider era. I do like the simple sweetness of this. That rockier edge, and grit-in-the-vocal can be heard on seventh track Swing Low which is a prison dirge in both its storyline and grinding rhythm – a potent song [and followed by a somewhat poppy Old Man Motel that evokes the Beatles and one of their many whimsies]. Eleventh and penultimate Angeline is a Country folk delight that rounds up the eclecticism of this earlier work, but it also therefore embraces and exemplifies that breadth of Fernando’s musical history and experience, one that, as I have said, deserves more recognition.

In the glorious way a support act can be the icing on the gig-cake when going to see a favourite act, I am pleased to have met and heard Fernando, and to now recognise him as a memorable artist and perhaps pass this on to others. As any genuine good reference will conclude, I commend him to you without reservation. We should all look forward to his new album out in early 2015.

Haynes Ultimate Guide To covers

Not a review of the various contents which seem fine as I will have made thousands of my own already, but I do like the idea of Haynes car manuals for the series and covers [there are more]. The 'Dad' duo is clever.

Purson - In The Meantime EP review

Purson Precursors

Having reviewed Purson's debut album here, every accolade and recommendation still applies for this latest EP release, and I would only want to add - really, emphasise yet again - that the vocal of Rosalie Cunningham continues to charm and mesmerise especially on closing track I Will Be Good which is outstanding. Fuzz and organ further their rooting to a psychedelic past. It is such a mature re-working of its precursors.

Outlaw Pete - Bruce Springsteen and Frank Caruso

Pete's Impulse

Received my copy today, and it is a nice book to have: large and with vivid illustrations [though also cartoonish], and written by Springsteen so collectible for the fan. Not entirely sure who the audience is - not exclusively the young [it is violent, not that this shouldn't be an aspect of children's reading], perhaps adults because of the theme of crime/violence/sacrifice, maybe the Christmas market....

It doesn't seem to me to be a tale of redemption; and maybe there is an underlying theme of acting honorably. Or it is just the telling, with the rhyming that would make it a pleasure to read aloud, and those colourful, evocative images.

An impulse buy for me and I am happy to have.

Watch the interview Jon Stewart has with Bruce and Frank here. Bruce calls the book an 'existential fairytale' - I think it is more commercial than this - and then makes an interesting admission about its authorship. Jon works hard to get meaning out of the interview, and perhaps the best bit is how he links his naked body with one of Springsteen's songs!