I am so sorry for the radio silence but I’ve not been sat in a lilo floating in the ocean with a glass of sangria. I wish!
No, I’ve been an insanely busy one, firstly with NaNoWriMo (58,000 words = one month, go me) and then with the paper proof of Gunshot Glitter. After much effort and the kind help of my friendsLydia Nicolaides and Tina Gatt, I have a gorgeous print cover completed. And I’m working with Intype Libra on the print as we speak.
Over December and Christmas, to a soundtrack comprised 60% Snow Patrol/Tired Pony, 10% Katy Perry 10% Interpol and about 20% Cat Power, I proofed the 420 odd printed pages of Gunshot Glitter, found myself in tears thrice just re-experiencing the emotions of the narrative. They were welcome tears. I really engaged with my characters writing that novel and to be honest have missed them.
But come January, it WILL be printed. Finally! Thank you for your patience. It was important to me to do it properly and to do it well. I hope I’ve achieved that. It was a pleasure to re-read the book. Regardless of what’s happened this year, publishing it and having so much positive feedback has been . . . . to be honest, there aren’t words. Just THANK YOU if you’ve been on the ride with me.
Gary Lightbody: How can anyone not love this man? Just look at him!
Did you know by the way that the CD sleeve of Katy Perry’s Teenage Dream is candy scented? It’s a great record for a whole new reason now. Firework is my favourite track on it.
Right, stop looking at that amazing photo of Gary Lightbody ( I spotted that on his Twitter, whoever took it, you are a geeenius! Come here and let me credit you) In between Gunshot Glitter and life, I’ve really enjoyed reading his old Tumblr blog and just being knocked for six by his lyrics. I’ve literally sat and read the CD sleevenotes and just been reduced to silence by the images and scenes conjured up. It’s been a while since anything’s done that to me. I’m going to be enjoy being fuelled thus.
And he doesn’t actually seem to stop working, ever. The man is a great, big, 6ft 4″ poet of wondrous Irishness, emotion and humour and it would appear, Curly Wurlys. From one chocolate-adoring music-lover to another, God Bless You Mr Lightbody and your heart-breaking paens to romantic woe, especially ‘New York’. I don’t know how you do it. That song is devastating. And thank you for this brilliant, brilliant video which cheered me up a treat in the small hours of a late November night. For your viewing pleasure and a belated Xmas present, watch it with me:
Did you enjoy that?
Back to me!
I wanted to draw your attention to a great blog by Linda Parkinson-Hardman. She kindly featured me on it over Christmas and I’ve just had a lot of fun re-reading the interview. I loved it!
I thought you might too, check her out, she’s aces. Here’s the LINK. One of the questions was how would you dispose of a corpse. I love questions like that. So dear reader, how would you? And what’s your favourite TV moment? Check mine out, it’s class.
And my favourite writer, Lisa Jewell made my Christmas by featuring Gunshot Glitter on her books of the year review on her personal blog. Swear I felt all fuzzy inside. If you are anything like me, you’ll love book recommendations, especially from fellow passionate readers. So check it out. You might find your new favourite book among her selectionhere
Lisa published ‘Before I Met You‘ over the summer and it was a privilege to interview her on Hello You. Since then she’s actually had a hand in designing the cover of the forthcoming paperback edition. It’s a beauty. Give it a mooch, now.
I hope you’ve had a lovely Christmas. I did allow myself a day off on the day itself. I re-read Jojo Moyes ‘ Me Before You’ all over again, curled up on the sofa. It’s a stunning book, an unconventional romance where actions speak louder than words and two mismatched people change each other’s lives in completely unexpected ways. I found there were pages I re-read twice over before I could continue because I wanted to revel in the feeling engendered. I loved it. LOVED IT. Moyes deserves all the accolades this book has received and I thank her for dreaming it up. I felt the ending was pretty brave.
It was my favourite read of 2012. What was yours?
Promise to be more prolific come 2013. Make some good wishes when the bongs chime okay? See you next year and take care. Thanks for reading.
Yasmin Selena Butt xx
p.s Please email print requests for the novel to GunshotGlitter2012@yahoo.co.uk and remember the eBook is out on Amazon. In 2013 it will also be available on a wider network of eBook vendors.
Blogposts are funny little things. You don’t do one for ages and then two come along at once. This wasn’t the one I planned to post today, but it feels imperative that I do, because it marks a day, that many people around the world are taking a moment to pause and consider.
Life is hectic and I would be a liar if I said that if it hadn’t been trending on Twitter, I might not have noticed this very fact. But it was 15 years ago that singer song-writer, son of Tim and Mary, Scorpio, Mystery White Boy and the American boy with the gorgeous, multi-octave voice, actually christened Scott – but known as Jeff Buckley, drowned. He was last witnessed wading into the water, playing his guitar. It was widely regarded as an accident. I believe it was too.
He was young, barely thirty, and at the time he was completing his follow up album to cult success and his critically-acclaimed debut, Grace, with a record titled ‘ Sketches for my Sweetheart the Drunk.’ Back in 1994, Jeff had become a folk-rock poster boy. He was an attractive, more handsome version of his father,’ Song to the Siren’ tunesmith, Tim Buckley. A father who had been largely absent from his son’s life.
I remember reading about him in SKY magazine. If memory serves me well, he featured in the same issue that featured a young, stunning Cameron Diaz on the front. I think I took one look at her and decided ‘ Right, young lady, you are coming home with ME!’
I had no idea that it would be the boy with the eyebrows featured inside, who would steal my heart both musically and otherwise. I still have the issue. I loved the piece on Jeff. I remember buying ’Grace‘ on tape from Reckless Records in Islington for £5.99, which was a whole heap of cash to me on a student grant. Plus both the CD single releases for ‘ Last Goodbye,’ because I wanted the extra tracks. Not that I had a CD player to play them on. I was always a bit of a completist when it came to buying the things I loved.
I really, really wanted to see him play live. I remember scanning gig dates and then spotting with huge excitement that he was actually playing dates in the UK. But then the disappointment that I’d missed his London dates. There was one gig left listed. It was all the way in Cambridge. And I had my finals on at University. I would love to write and say that I dropped everything and went to see him play. But I can’t because I didn’t. It was too big an upheaval when I had a bunch of Russian history dates to learn and the suchlike. I told myself, I’d see him play the next time I spotted he was touring and playing live. But that time never came. Because on May 29th 1997, Jeff Buckley died.
I read about it in TNT magazine. One of those freebie titles you see handed out at tube stations and I still remember how utterly shocked I was. It was a lovely,sunny day and I was probably gallivanting around Londinium as you do. I just remember feeling numb and thinking, what a senseless, senseless waste of one so young. I couldn’t quite comprehend it. Accidental deaths are heartbreaking, because you end up thinking, if he’d decided to sunbathe he’d still be alive. If he decided to go and eat an ice-cream he’d still be with us. But that kind of thinking just leads nowhere fast thanks to the butterfly effect. Different actions herald different consequences.
The music press all debated what would happen to Jeff’s album ‘ Sketches for my Sweetheart The Drunk.’ I knew he’d not completed it, many of the songs were unfinished or in demo form. I just know that the idea of never hearing it felt awful, so I am so grateful that his mother, Mary, decided to finish it somehow and release it. As records go I genuinely think it’s a great one. It was released as a double CD I loved it. I loved the rawness and flaws of the lo-fi tracks especially, and the one that jumped out at me was ‘Gunshot Glitter.’
I thought what a title! What an absolutely cracking, fantastic title. It put all kinds of images in my head and I loved how twisted and raw his voice sounded on it. The music has an almost splintered quality to it. I never forgot that song. Almost a decade later when I was working on my debut novel, which is set in London and Manchester and features an anti-heroine who is dark, messed up, but struggling to find her way back to redemption, despite having committed some seriously heinous deeds, I had to name a club which was the focal point of the story and I remembered the name of the song I loved so much. Gunshot Glitter. The line ‘ Lipstick my name across your mirror/ Bloodred with faked gunshot glitter.’
It stayed in my head.
It never left.
And so I chose it as my title and named the club after it. As is the case when someone beautiful and talented dies, the media and the world eulogise them and the sales of their records shoot through the roof. We do that thing of coveting something, because we don’t realise what we had until it’s gone. Jeff Buckley was awesome and I am so glad I twigged that in his life-time. To me, music, art, film, books are enduring and it means a lot to me that I am surrounded by it and can look to it all for my own creative inspiration.
So, thank you, Jeff, for Gunshot Glitter. Thank you for being one of the key inspirations for my debut novel. It’s going to be self-published later this year because I wanted to do it my way and retain creative control. You ‘ll hear more about it all in due course.
There was a place for him in the world and judging by this beautiful outpour and the remembrances on Twitter, there was a place for him in many people’s hearts and music collections too. If you have your own memory of Jeff or his music, share it. Let’s all remember the Mystery White Boy today.
When I saw Ed Harcourt play his headlining set at Bush Hall in London last December, there was one thing I was very sure of. I wanted to interview him. I wanted to know what he was up to. It had been ages since we’d had a decent catch up so I was massively curious. He’s a man I could write a massive ‘Did You Know.. list about, but I’d rather let the musical one speak for himself. So I caught up with him earlier this month and this is what he had to say. Read on and enjoy what Ed Harcourt circa 2012 is all about and be sure to mooch his recommendations. I know I’m going to.
Yasmin Selena ; ) x x
YSB: How’s it going Ed? How’s 2012 treating you so far?
EH:Hi Yasmin. Life is pretty hectic at the moment, I’m juggling being father to two young children and writing my next record, as well as being a co-writer for lots of up and coming artists. As usual, I’m glad to have sailed through January without too much calamity, it truly is a tiresome month.
YSB: Musically, what are you working on at the moment? Can we expect some new music from you this year? Lustre was a lovely record!
EH: This next record is a little mad in places. I already have some immense heavyweights lined up to contribute to it, I’ll let you know soon enough, but I don’t want to jinx it. I veer between home and my studio which is five minutes away and so am tootling back and forth…there’s a lot more samples and weird sounds on the next record. The drums are much more loose and beat-driven. I have no particular aim other than be totally selfish and please myself! I’ve got four months left to finish the writing side and then I’ll go into production; the context of the record is very different to Lustre, much darker lyrically but very playful in an Eels/Beck sort of way.
Ed Harcourt co-wrote the title-track
YSB: I’ve noticed in the last few years you’ve increasingly started writing songs with other artists. I remember you working on Paloma Faith’s début record with her. Who are you working with at the moment Ed? What is that process like for you?
EH:I’ve been working with Paloma on her next record, a great new singer called Ren Harvieu, she’s amazing, Jodie Marie who is on Decca who’s also gonna do well I think… Jamie N Commons who’s got a really bluesy spiritual thing going on, Louise and the Pins who’s wonderfully warm and melancholy, Laura Jansen who is Dutch/American, beautiful voice, we wrote a killer song the other day!
One of my main priorities has been Kristina Train, who you’ll be hearing a lot of quite soon, she’s from Savannah, Georgia and her voice is ridiculous – it’s so good. We’ve written about half her album….also my wife ( Gita Harcourt – The Langley Sisters) and I write together sometimes when we can. I’m still waiting for the Lisa Marie Presley record to come out, got three songs on that and Mr Hudson & I have done some writing, he’s a great guy. I don’t know, there’s always stuff in the pipeline.. The process is different to writing on my own, it’s more of a 9-5 kind of feel, sometimes you hit it off and write a great song, other times it’s frustrating and fruitless.
YSB: Is it something you can see yourself doing a lot more in the future? Do artists approach you directly for collaboration? Is there an artist or band you’d love to pen a song for/with?
EH: To be honest this is my main priority now because I make more of a living out of it than as a solo artist, but I feel I’ve learnt from writing with others as well, it’s helped me fine-tune and streamline the lazier elements of my song writing. Some artists approach me directly, like Melanie Pain from Nouvelle Vague just sent me a Facebook message! We wrote a song called ‘Black Widow’ that’s on her forthcoming album, it’s a film noir duet! I would love to do something with Bjork or Tom Waits or even RZA or one of my musical idols, but off the top of my head I can’t think of anything new right now…my management are better at notifying me about new talented artists.
YSB: When I first got into your music, you used to gig prolifically, but I suspect since you and Gita have become parents it’s probably a bit trickier. How are you finding combining being a dad with being a musician? How do you and Gita make it work?
EH:There is a huge compromise; pretty much any time I have, is spent writing for myself or others. Today I’ve been looking after the kids since 6.30am, it’s a full-time job and I love being with them, but there’s always that unfinished song in the back of my head! I still play gigs here and there but my touring days are pretty much over, it’s hard enough to tour without label support anyway…
YB: Is being a father what you expected? What are Franklyn and Roxy like? Are your kids going to be singing ‘Hellraiser’ at you? : ) What do they make of your music?
EH:Roxy is a real performer and does not stop talking, she’s very switched on for a 3-year-old and completely hilarious. Sometimes she sings at the piano, I mean it’s hard for her to avoid it I guess? Franklyn is only 9 months, but built like an ox – yet very gentle and Buddha-esque. Roxy tells it like it is, she said one of my songs was boring the other day!
YSB:One of the things I love most about you is your passion for new music and culture. I got into Hush The Many and Sandy Dillon thanks to you! Who have you been listening to lately? Is there anyone out there that’s a must listen that you really admire that everyone should know about?
EH:Been listening to The Walkmen record, ‘You & Me’….Camille’s new album, Ilo Veyou ( I would love to work with her), Feist’s new record ‘Metals’ is so good, you should check out this girl called FOE, she’s pretty weird and dark I like her, like early PJ Harvey in a horror film or something; been listening to a lot of Ivor Cutler, my tour manager and I listened to him for about eight hours driving from Stockholm to Oslo about a year ago. Max Richter, I’m obsessed with his music I love it so much and also Mark Lanegan’s new record ‘Blues Funeral’ is brilliant. Also check out Willy Deville’s version of ‘Hey Joe’ from the early 90’s, (it’s) really great!
Lovers of gravelly voiced men will especially dig this
YSB: Excellent, loads of good new stuff to check out. And on the flip side, who do you thinks sucks and should be fired out of a canon to a land far, far away?
EH: WILL.I.AM
SIMON COWELL
'Smug? Moi?!'
They’re both rich enough so they should just stop right now and fuck off to a private island far, far away.
YSB: : ) So, what do you think of the current music scene in 2012? Is it in a good place if you’re an artist making original music?
EH:The kids are more savvy and PR-conscious these days. The Internet has made sure you can be a sensation over night, I don’t think that’s a good thing at all. I believe that record labels are still important, because they can sign a young band or singer and let them or help them develop and fund them before they make their first record. They have the potential to let these people spend a few years focusing solely on being better songwriters. But the Internet means we have access to everything whenever we want, wherever we are. YouTube spawned Justin Bieber’s career, there’s always a negative side to technology. Do I sound old? I FEEL OLD. Don’t get me wrong, YouTube and Facebook etc are powerful tools, I use them and embrace them. You have to.
At the end of the day you can be the hippest band in the world, but if you don’t have the songs then you’re screwed long-term. It’s all about the song.
YSB: I know you really loved the movie ‘Drive’, (which was my favourite film of 2011), but has anything else grabbed you at the cinema or on DVD?
EH: I went to see ‘Martha Marcy May Marlene‘ last night. Not a huge barrel of laughs. Great acting though. Right now I’m obsessed with ‘Breaking Bad’, it is seriously addictive. Oh and I loved ‘The Artist’, such a charming film I hope it wins lots of Oscars. I think ‘The Road‘ is one of the best films I’ve ever seen, really affected me.
YSB: I absolutely loved ‘The Road’ too. It’s my World Book Night title giveaway this year. It killed me Viggo Mortensen didn’t win an Oscar for that. I didn’t see it, but was The Rum Diary any good? I know you’re a fan of Hunter S. Thompson? Are there any films coming out that you’re really looking forward to seeing?
Johnny Depp in his pants: Not Enough
EH I was so disappointed. I wanted to like it so badly, but it just didn’t cut it. It could’ve been so much better, I loved the book so much. Hunter S Thompson is one of my genuine heroes, I’ve had the honour to meet Ralph Steadman, I’m trying to convince him to do the artwork on my next album, fingers crossed.
YSB. That would be really cool if he does! As a novelist, I’ve got to ask you, what have you been reading lately? Who are your own favourite writers at the moment?
EH: I’m terrible because I read about five books at the same time, it’s a bad habit. I’m reading the lost Jack Kerouac novel: ‘The Sea Is My Brother’, ‘Little Hands Clapping’ by Dan Rhodes, very macabre book:
Magical realism
And I loved ‘The Psychopath Test’ by Jon Ronson. I like reading Charles Bukowski’s poems a lot, they resonate with me for some reason.
YSB And I have to ask you about Wild Boar! (Ed’s heavy metal outfit) Will the Wild Boar album ever see light of day? ‘I’m In Love With My Therapist’, actually made my body vibrate when you used to play it live!
EH: We’re the laziest, most disorganized band in the world. I have no idea, maybe one day when we get our ‘act’ together.
YSB: You and Nick De Cosemo used to run those fantastic days of music at the Nektar Bar and Paradise By Way of Kensal Green, are there any plans to ever run those again? They were awesome.
EH:Oh wow those were some very fun times, we keep talking about it, I hope so. Maybe we should do one this year. I’ll get on it!
YSB: I would absolutely love that. Your gig at Bush Hall at Christmas was a beauty – and it was clear from the audience’s response you’ve been sorely missed live. Do you have anything coming up in the next few months you’d like to tell your fans about?
Hello you! This is a blog post that I’ve been meaning to write for a while. In fact there are a handful up my sleeve. Firstly, a very happy new year to you!
Yep, I know it’s February, but January was proper hectic, so my apologies. I started the year thinking I was okay, but the truth is, though I wanted to be, I wasn’t. A pair of healing hands and a good chat has helped a bit. I don’t think I would have been able to complete the master edit of Gunshot Glitter otherwise. I got through about 350 pages in just over a month! That was exciting. I shaved off 45 pages and was pretty exhilarated and happy by the end. It’s now with some good folk being proof-read as I type : ) I’m nervous, but genuinely excited. I really hope you love reading Gunshot Glitter when you’re holding it in your hands.
And also I worked. I did a bit of freelance copy-writing role with Upad in Kensal Rise, so that was really, really cool. A bit of fiscal breathing space. Plus, on the weekend just gone I met a part of my childhood. I met this man:
Courtesy of Diana Jarvis, Daylight Sessions, Union Chapel
Do you know who he is? This is Nick Heyward formerly of Haircut 100. The dude is a honey. My muffs had him mesmerised. I didn’t have a pre-pubescent crush on him but I loved the songs. Love Plus One, Fantastic Day and my personal favourite Boy Meets Girl ( Favourite Shirt). My first popstar crush believe it or not was on Bob Geldof! I was all of six years old when that happened. It was those gangly limbs and eyes and mouth that did it for me.
Bob Geldof or as I like to call this 'Get off Kate Bush he's MINE!'
Him and John Travolta. I once wrote a letter to Mr Travolta. I put ‘John Travolta, America’ on the front but was literate enough to write our address on the back, drew on a stamp and posted it. This postman bought it back to our house and handed it to my dad. My dad did not look happy…
Getting back to 2012. I was on the Central line tube heading back to the newly snowy Greenford with my friend Trevor when I sighed – “I’ve got ‘Whistle Down the Wind’ going around in my head.” I was sat next to this man reading a play by Richard Harris who’d I’d got chatting to and he sat up and said “The Nick Heyward song?!” and then we excitedly started talking about music. I told him about Nick’s lunchtime ‘Daylight Session‘ set at the Union Chapel in Islington, how great his solo stuff was. And he told me how Nick Heyward had gone all beefcake like Arnold Schwarzenegger for a bit, which I still can’t quite comprehend, for the boy was such a delicate, milky-skinned poppet! I quickly established this playwright-dude had a passion for the ’80s, but I wanted to know what he was interested in now and he admitted he was out of touch with the current music scene.
And then I did the thing I always find myself doing when I get talking about music to new friends and complete strangers. I asked this immortal question:
“Have you ever listened to Ed Harcourt?”
Ed Harcourt. Edward Harcourt-Smith, Ed Harcourt formerly of Snug, Ed or the Wolfpup as I sometimes affectionately refer to him as, when he’s all beardy, is my favourite male singer-songwriter. Period. Also, in a weird way too, without really lifting a finger he’s been a catalyst of change in my life. And that is why I’ve decided to blog about him today. Sometimes you get people like that, they’re part of some larger butterfly effect that plays a pivotal role in shaping the dynamics of your life-story. I know I’ve played that part in people’s lives too. And if you think about it, lovely reader, you will have too. Most definitely. I am a writer first and foremost but I am positively fanatical when it comes to good music. And I am really, really fussy too. Trust me I wouldn’t have spent the whole day writing this if I didn’t think he deserved it!
I’d first heard of Ed Harcourt back in 2001. My friend Andy Steele had seen him support Beth Orton at a gig and liked him so much he’d bought his album’ Here Be Monsters‘, there and then.
Ed's debut. Here Be Monsters. He was just 24.
I think he might even have put it on but we ended up talking over it. Then months later I’d gone to the V Festival in Essex and this Ed fella who there was a bit of a buzz about was on the bill. We missed his set by five minutes. He was on the main-stage. I remember looking at his non-smiling photo in the festival guide all dressed up smart with his floppy dark hair and thinking, he looks a bit grumpy! And that was it.
Then two years later when I was staying in the Scorpio’s pad in Newbury while trying to get my next job back out in the Maldives ( I can’t remember if you know that about me, I worked in the Maldives as an English trainer, I should blog about that sometime) – I remember MTV2 playing this wee clip of a song called ‘Jetsetter’ by him over an advert for his album, ‘From Every Sphere’. I liked the little clip, but I’d still not heard anything properly by him..
Fast forward to 2004 and the summer I made friends with the beautiful, but now sadly deceased Jeremy Smith, and we were doing that thing me and Jez loved to do, which was discuss music. And he told me he was really enjoying an album called ‘Strangers’ by Ed Harcourt. ‘ I’ve never really heard anything by him’ I told Jez, ‘but I have heard of him.’ Jez was really enthused about this Harcourt boy. I thought okay, I’ll bear this in mind.
He’d turned me onto some great stuff like Adem and Cat Power so I was happy to take his recommendations on faith. Months later I found myself in Virgin Megastore at the top of Regent St clutching a few CDs perusing the 5 for £30 deal section and there, sitting in front of me, where….two Ed Harcourt CDs. I didn’t know any of the songs on either of them. I looked at the covers, I thought the cover of ‘From Every Sphere’ was softer, more romantic. I liked the font more. That was my sole rationale for choosing it!
From Every Sphere - a slice of loveliness
I remember it was autumn by then, and I’d had a long day and I was really, really looking forward to a hot, bubble bath. I vividly recall putting on candles and the steam rising off the water, putting on this CD and sinking into the water with a satisfied sigh. And lying back and letting this CD wash over me. It started with a song called ‘Bittersweetheart’, which had this lovely, warm piano part and his voice. His voice was gorgeous.
I remember thinking of hot apple and custard. It was like being seated in front of a roaring fire with a cashmere throw around my body and eating a nourishing, hearty pudding. I hadn’t been expecting that. The cosy darkness and warmth. The whole album was just stunning from start to end. Just sheer class. The lyrics were brilliant, romantic, funny, morbid, dark, hopeful and the amount of variety in all the songs meant you got to explore a different part to this English boy’s soul. ‘Metaphorically Yours’ - ‘ Oh baby just admit, if both my wrists were slit, you’d bandage them with style and grace.’ Just cracked me up! It’s one of the greatest, sweetest love songs ever, despite that lyric I’ve just quoted you. I’ve requested it often at gigs. I might even have it played at my wedding if I ever get married.
I’ve said all that and you could be forgiven for thinking, God that sounds a bit depressing Yasmin, but I assure you, categorically, it’s not. Read the whole blog and then come back and listen to this or enjoy it now so you can see what I mean:
(I couldn’t find the whole song but hope you enjoy the clip!)
‘From Every Sphere‘, the title-track, just slayed me.
It was soft, whispery, sad, emotional and had layers and layers of melancholy instrumentation that gave it an almost ghostly, shimmery feel. It’s magical, mournful. I don’t think I’ve ever been so blown away by the first play of an album. It was the sheer warmth of it that undid me. It was just pouring out of the speakers and I was in love with it. I didn’t understand why this record wasn’t the biggest-selling record in the world. Later on I discovered it hadn’t done that well compared to his Mercury Music Award nominated début ‘Here Be Monsters’. I was incredulous, much the same way I was when Prefab Sprout‘s stunning ‘Goodbye Lucille,’ wasn’t a giant hit in 1986.
I wanted to know and hear everything by him. When I get into anything I am extremely enthusiastic. I want to know everything yesterday. Patience doesn’t exist in my vocabulary when I get like that. I love those moments. I swear I go off like a rocket. I wanted to see him live and remembered coming across a gig preview for a show he was playing at St James’s Church in Piccadilly in the Evening Standard and being beyond excitable. ‘I must go. That music in a church, wow!!’ Then my ensuing abject misery and dejection when I realised the paper was an old issue and the gig had come and gone.
Back then, I’d never used forums or frequented fan sites much. But I had a mooch on his. It was 2005 by then and I honestly didn’t expect anyone to be that genuine or friendly, but his fan base were a bit of a revelation. They were pretty lovely. Even the acid-tongued members had a sense of humour. There was no posturing or bitchiness. And the thing that struck me about them wasn’t just their love and protectiveness of the wolfpup and joy in his talent, but also their sheer love of other music. There was a lot of keen sharing or recommendations and intelligent wit and humour.
I discovered so much good stuff never gets on the radio. I’ve got my friend Fran to thank for getting me into Sol Seppy for example. A singer who used to be in Mark Linkous’ (rip) band Sparklehorse and had released a stunning album in 2006 called ‘The Bells of 12‘ on Bella Union. Listen to ‘Slo Fuzz’ if you are savvy enough to check it out : )
Sol Seppy: Magic
Jo turned me onto Metric and Patrick Wolf. Ella made me a CD of great alternative folk. In the three odd years that followed, I spent hours on that forum in the evenings and it was always a pleasure. (Except for deleting tons of horrific spam when the Heavenly site admin made me a moderator. I still have no idea who Danity Kane is, but there was always a bloody link of hers to delete of her dancing naked.)
At that point in my life, in 2005, I hadn’t ever gone to a small gig either. My smallest gig venue had probably been the Town and Country Club in Kentish Town seeing Julian Cope play live. So when I heard that Ed was playing at the Marie Lloyd Bar in Hackney to launch his friend Hadrian Garrard‘s music night ‘ Signed Unsigned‘ I was actually very nervous. You can’t hide in a small place. It took a lot of balls for me to go on my own. I remember taking a book in case no one talked to me, so I’d have something to do. The idea of being on my tod, feeling lonely with no distraction frightened the crap out of me. When I went home I counted I’d met eleven different people that night. Including Ed, himself.
I still remember him walking in, clad in a big black overcoat and how a little voice in my head went ‘Arrgghh!’, just like it does whenever you see anyone you admire in the flesh for the first time. You want to be cool but 75% of you is like jelly. He took a seat in front of me, turned around to make sure he wasn’t obscuring my view and then got on with watching the bands. I stared at his shoulder for ages, and then thought screw it! I tapped him gently on it and said something like ‘ Why didn’t From Every Sphere take over the world, it’s such an amazing record.’ or something like that. I remember it was a question about the album. And he smiled and we got talking. He was really sweet. I still felt shy but I was pleased I hadn’t cowarded out. The set was short and sweet, and he told me he was playing a gig the next night at The Buffalo Bar in Islington with his thrash heavy metal outfit Wild Boar. It was a band he’d put together for fun.
I decided to go along and he remembered me. It was freezing that eve. I put tights on under my jeans when I went out. This time I introduced myself to him properly, and later on we took this photo. I was heading out the venue when we collided with each other and this sweet Japanese boy obliged us:
Our first photo together. 2005. Wowsers, that’s 7 years ago!
The gig itself that night was mental. Wild Boar were hilarious but melodic. Song titles included ‘ My Baby’s Got a Monster Truck’ and ‘Henry Rollin’s Neck is Bigger Than His Head.‘ I also saw The Noisettes play, who were very up and coming back in 2005. I watched Shingai Shoniwa doing pilates prior to their set. Hard-Fi were headlining. I’d never been to two gigs in two nights. There is no guarantee a musician you dig will be likeable either. They could be a right tosser! But I liked him. Why? Because Ed’s very approachable. He’s a heart on sleeve kind of guy, if he’s happy you’ll know it, if he’s feeling stroppy or vulnerable you’ll know that too. I once asked Ed about his horoscope and he said a woman in Glastonbury had told him he was a Leo with a Leo ascendant. A true lion. And a gentleman.
Wild Boar at Meet The Greek!
The other thing that was cool about him was that he organised these music all-dayers at the Nektar bar in Kensal Rise called ‘ Meet the Greek’, because the place was owned by this spectacularly temperamental guy called Dimitri, who when he was cross would close his bar, forcing everyone up the road for their booze, which was a bit surreal if you think about it, because it lost him cash. And his electricity once went out when The Magic Numbers were playing as his meter had run out!
But the place was near some music studios so handy for Ed and his friends to store gear at. Those Saturdays were really great; Ed and Nick de Cosemo (Mixmag magazine editor and DJ/musician) would basically gather musical friends together and they’d all play a short set each, one after the other – interspersed with some fine djaying from Andre Shapps ( Ex-Big Audio Dynamite now in the Rotten Hill Gang). And the sweetest thing of all was it was free.
I love this photo! Romeo Stodart (Magic Numbers) Abby Stables and Gita Harcourt watching Wild Boar.
They did it because it was fun and it gave them a chance to hang out, relax and perform. Anyone could go along if you knew it was happening. I saw The Magic Numbers, Robyn Hitchcock, Headland, The Smoke Fairies, Johnny Flynn, performance poet Niall Spooner-Harvey, Jeremy Warmsley, Pearl Lowe, Sandy Dillon, Paloma Faith, Bikini Atoll, Ten Bears, The Veils, Graham Coxon, Tom McCrae and dozens of other bands play on various Saturdays. One of my favourite days featured Hush The Many, an incredibly *special* band who Ed championed and bought to his fans’ attention. I met Nima their lead singer at Meet The Greek and can still remember watching quite mesmerised as he played his guitar with a violin bow. I’d never seen anyone do that before.
Ed Harcourt with Paloma Faith at Paradise By Way Of Kensal Green
If Ed thinks someone is good, he wants everyone to know about it. In that respect, musically, he’s really generous and he enjoys originality. There are a lot of bands who owe him thanks on that score. When he took Swedish band The Tiny and Hush The Many on tour with him in 2006 he’d end his set with ‘Revolution Of The Heart’ from his album ‘The Beautiful Lie’ and have both bands join him on stage for it. How many headline acts can you say would do that?
Revolution of the Heart: Ed Harcourt on the piano accompanied by The Tiny and Hush The Many 2006 (thanks to Ella Mullins for the photo!)
I went to a lot of gigs during that era of my life and met a massive amount of musical or artistic souls. People I probably wouldn’t possibly have met otherwise. And at that point in my life I craved that. Hadrian Garrard, Ed’s trumpet player, encouraged me to take to the stage at the Marie Lloyd Bar in Hackney on my 32nd birthday and perform some of my poems live. I’d never done anything like that in my life. I was really nervous but it was also a lot of fun. At first he wanted me to sing but there was no way that was happening. I read out a poem about my love for Rik Mayall and how getting older was actually cool. Ed also played a set that night, ( fresh from a US tour with Martha Wainwright I think?) so it was extra, extra special.
I went on after him as a poetess. My friend Simon Toon who runs a fantastic website called Slam Idol for performing poets featured it on his show.
I made some great friends from his fan base too. Lovely people. Inevitably you’re going to meet not- so-lovely-people too, some musicians have egos too large to fit in a room and are pretty ungracious. But it was all exciting and it was all good. It was reality, not the stuff I’d grown up reading about in Smash Hits as a kid. I used to feel guilty at times in truth, because I’d been raised to stay a million miles away from that side of western culture. You’re reading a blog written by a girl who saw her first film at the cinema when she was eighteen. I’m a cosmopolitan soul with a massive innocent streak running through it, which some people probably don’t believe is quite for real when they encounter it, but it is. (You’ll be even more surprised by that statement when you read Gunshot Glitter. Especially the chapter titled ‘Sixteen Minutes.’ : ) ) But I enjoyed those musical Saturdays and the chance to chill out, enjoy a freshly-made minty Mojito and chat.
Ed about to introduce Hush The Many
Ed would open the day with a solo set, which Gita his equally musical wife would sometimes accompany him on, he’d take requests from everyone and then all the bands would play a set at the front of the bar. I took loads of pix and I’d blog about it all. And then he’d end the night with a riotous set with his thrash heavy metal alter-ego band ‘Wild Boar,’ sometimes dressed up in animal costumes or face masks. I still remember the gorgeous music producer Dimitri Tikovoi on drums dressed as a giant pink bunny.
I think the thing that a lot of people don’t know about Ed is how funny he is. He can be really, really funny. He once posted a MySpace birthday greeting photo of himself wearing a Native American head-dress on my wall.
Maybe not what you’d expect from a ‘singer-songwriter piano-playing troubadour’ as the music press like to earnestly bill him? Musically though, he deserves 100% to be taken seriously.
And this brings us onto MySpace. I mentioned blogs there : ) At this point in time I’d started to write again.
In 2004 I’d written a short story called ‘The Birthday Present‘ and shown it to Jez and my friends. Back then there was no social media, not really. Not on the scale there is now. And no one bar my friends had read any of my writing and I’d never tried to get published either.
Ed set up a page on a new website called MySpace for Wild Boar. I remember all of us on the Forum discussing it and then many of us over time created our own MySpace pages. For many of the fans it was also the first time they discovered what each other looked like. It was that whole English shyness thing up until that point. I remember going along to his gig at Cecil Sharp House and introducing various personalities to each other for the first time. That was a lovely night. MySpace was an amazing thing and I will always be grateful to it because it showed me I was a good writer and not just because my friends said so!
So, I started blogging and these blogs picked up an audience of hundreds which was a revelation to me. Complete strangers leaving positive comments. It was aces. I loved it. I wrote about bands, life, films, art, my heart and people dug it. I posted poems. I posted photographs. I’m sure I would have come across MySpace in good time as it was magnificent, but back then, I heard about it because Ed set up a page on it.
This is what I mean about the ‘butterfly effect‘. People affect each other. Musically, I love him and the dude deserves hugeness he really does. He doesn’t sit easily in any musical genre, he’s a versatile maverick in that respect but I’ve never taken anyone to any of his shows and have them come away going: ‘What a heap of crap!’
And his lyrics, I’ve not said enough about his lyrics. The stories he weaves into his songs and the weird and wonderful instruments he finds to play them on. Optigan anyone? There’s a song called ‘I’ve Become Misguided,’ which is a live favourite because of the amount of sounds he into the song about half-way through:
Ed can write a love song to make you melt like ‘This One’s For You’ and then ‘Scatterbraine‘ about a village idiot taking out some local maidens and going on the run from the law. ‘Scatterbraine, they smoked you out of the foxhole/Scatterbraine, you act like a priest in a brothel/Naive charm, the idiot boy from the farm/Father tried to save you with prayers and psalms/Grace and Lydia and Dorothy/The village idiot sent them to sleep – and make it sound like a riot.
He’s the only singer whose ever written a song which forced me to look the title up in the dictionary. That’s pretty cool. The title? ‘Lachrymosity.’ It’s an absolute fave of mine. You can hear it on ‘Lustre.‘
Ed Harcourt's most recent album
I think I’ve watched Ed play live over thirty times since 2005? That figure is a bit mad but I’m including the Meet The Greeks in that. He’s a great raconteur on stage, a lot of fun to watch, but hearing those songs live is a beautiful thing. Though between 2009-2011, which was “The Era Of Hermitude” for me focusing on Gunshot Glitter – and the dialing back of live shows for him, as he became a father, there was a lull. I somehow didn’t manage to see him live at all.
I kept tabs on him via Facebook, but our paths didn’t cross and he was no longer doing the Saturday all-dayers. I’d gone from twigging I’d seen more of him than my poor mum to not seeing him at all! Also the musical landscape that meant we bumped into each other at people’s gigs had altered too. Hush The Many split up in 2008 and we’d both them loved them very much. But then a lovely thing happened last year in 2011.
He booked a gig at Bush Hall in west London. This is one of my favourite venues. I was so excited about seeing him live after all this time and seeing a few familiar faces. I saw Fran for the first time in ages, met Charmian who’d posted on his forum, and bought two friends with me who’d never seen him before, but God they’d heard enough about him from me! My friend Richard was also there. I was stood near the front of the crowd next to Ed’s mum and his mother-in-law for most of it. When Ed turned to me for a prompt for a lyric he’d forgotten and I whispered it to him, his mum told me off for distracting him which was really funny! The set was awesome and the boy was swamped by fans when he came off stage. There was a lot of love in the room for him that night. The bouncers were pressing on everyone to exit. But I got this lovely snap of us.
Me and Ed Harcourt, December 2011, Bush Hall. First time I'd seen him in 2 years!
The thing I probably love most about his songs is that they’re kind of comforting, and for me personally, have a kind of restorative quality to them. I spent much of December feeling pretty fragile and going to this gig sent me home with a smile and a feeling that everything would be okay. I saw the New Year in with him too, clad in a pair of ruby red glittery shoes in Camden. Ed played a New Year’s Eve show at The Bull and Gate which my friend Trevor kindly treated me too. We were there until 2am dancing, so 2012 started beautifully with music and hope. And I sincerely hope 2012 is filled with beautiful things for you too. Thanks for reading.. x x x
If you are new to Ed Harcourt, do go back to all those links I lovingly posted and check him out! And if you are a fan, I hope you enjoyed a little trip down memory lane : )
**Plus, keep an eye out for an exclusive interview with him I have coming very soon. You are going to love it!**
I’ll leave you with this beautiful video to ‘Until Tomorrow Then.’
Apologies to my subscribers who will have received a duplicate post from a few weeks back in their mailbox. I’m still finding my feet a little with the functionality of this blog and wanted to know what the ‘ Press This’ button did on WordPress and then I, er, found out!
*Blushes*
By way of recompense here’s a cover of Lucky Star by Madonna as you’ve never heard it before. I’m going to be featuring this lady in a future blog as she’s a bit special. But in the meantime enjoy this:
And I’ll try to be a little less trigger happy in the future ; )
Have a good week, proper new blog to follow soon. It’s time to put a name in that Writers I Love category… : )
Yours truly, in her study where much of Gunshot Glitter was dreamed up…
My name is Yasmin Selena Butt. I live in London, England. And I hope to be entertaining you and tickling your fancy for many moons to come.
I am a writer. I am in the process of editing my debut novel ‘ GUNSHOT GLITTER.’ It’s a very intense, morality tale about an incinerated boy who never quite goes away. I guarantee it will test your moral barometer. I will be posting the opening chapter up soon. So you can suck it and see so to speak. I have an amazing artist called Celene Petrulak ( http://www.celeneart.com/) in the USA painting the cover. Her work is stunning. It was very important to me to have artistic control of my story. I didn’t want to compromise its originality at the expense of Tesco deciding which shelf it would sit on!
The title was inspired by a great, rather lo-fi song by Jeff Buckley.
It came out on his posthumous album ‘Sketches for my Sweetheart the Drunk.’ I plan to do a post on the late, great boy soon. I’m still kicking myself for not going to see him play live in Cambridge in 1994. Why didn’t I go? I had an exam the morning after his gig. You’re probably thinking I should have winged it, but it was my finals and I suspect I was probably in my friend Kosta’s bedroom getting him to test me on dates in French and Italian history in a right old flap! I was a crammer. I went to a university in west London which was miles away, I wasn’t rock’n'roll enough back then to wing it!
As a writer though, I am extremely proud to have come this far, but it’s not been without some help and support. There are a lot of people to thank in due course who have been with me for the ride, some for a bit, others for the long haul. But I’m honestly grateful to all of them. Writing is a lonely business, you’ve got to be by yourself to do it, but I don’t mind that; it can be pleasurably intense to lose yourself in your made-up world. I love it! Writing my novel was akin to watching a movie in my head. I even had dreams about my characters. Once I’ve put Gunshot Glitter out there, I have many other ideas up my sleeve. I’m also a fan of telling short stories, you can read a few of those too if you like. There is a tab at the top for them just for you.
Writing is a muscle. You develop it. The only way to get good at it is to do it as much as possible and reading a lot helps too. You don’t become a writer to make a fortune, especially not in 2011 when book chains are closing down everywhere. You do it because you want to tell a story, have an idea, have something to say and the alternative of not expressing yourself fills you with such discomfort you end up reaching for napkins, menus and receipts to pin down your thoughts because they just have to come out. I carry a pen and paper where ever I go. It’s instinct or I use my phone. My flat is filled with hand-decorated jars filled with pens and pencils pilfered from all over the place! I am never far from one. In fact, I’m looking at, at least 12 pens as I’m typing this sentence…
I’ve been writing fiction, poems and short stories ever since I was a tot. I have written over a thousand poems. I even performed a few on stage at the Hackney Empire bar on the same bill as my favourite solo artist Ed Harcourt. It was terrifying but a buzz as it was also my birthday. The audience were sweet to me. Phew!
My parents were endlessly told by my school teachers that I’d be a writer when I grew up. Well, I guess they were right! It was this or become a rockstar, but I can’t see the guitar over my 36G cup breasts. Most frustrating.
Enjoy your stay and come back again ; )
Yasmin x x
p.s. If you enjoyed the post, subscribe – I’ll do my best to make it worth your while. x
Gary Lightbody: How can anyone not love this man? Just look at him!
I re-read Jojo Moyes ‘ Me Before You’ all over again, curled up on the sofa. It’s a stunning book, an unconventional romance where actions speak louder than words and two mismatched people change each other’s lives in completely unexpected ways. I found there were pages I re-read twice over before I could continue because I wanted to revel in the feeling engendered. I loved it. LOVED IT. Moyes deserves all the accolades this book has received and I thank her for dreaming it up. I felt the ending was pretty brave.
