Esher Demos

As time goes on, it becomes less and less tedious to write about The Beatles. Fifteen years ago, when I wrote my first piece on Revolver, it just felt wrong. Five years ago, when I wrote about The White Album, it felt unnecessary. These days, as I write about the newly released Esher Demos, it feels exhilarating. 

My history with The White Album has always been complicated. I've never rated it, not least because I've never seen it as a Beatles album. For me, it has always been a collection of songs from three (four, arguably) individuals whose commitment seemed suspect. Come to think of it, I've never even asked myself that all-important question: The White Album, should it not have been a single LP? Frankly, I've never seen ten undisputed classics here, never mind fourteen. 

But then I couldn't let it lie. All these years, I've been going back to it again and again - trying to figure out the simple magic word, like some Gandalf the Grey. This new White Album reissue would just be another opportunity wasted... but it isn't. Not with Esher Demos proving that my unease had been justified all along. 

To get straight to the point, Esher Demos are fantastic (I mean, "What's The New Mary Jane" is horrendous, but come on). Unbaked, half-assed, unfinished, they are nevertheless full of energy and verve and excitement that the finished product never really offered. Suddenly, "Honey Pie" isn't schmaltzy and the chorus of "Bungalow Bill" isn't schlocky. Suddenly, "Rocky Raccoon" is a classic and "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da" doesn't sound embarrassing. And what's that with "Junk", "Circles" and "Not Guilty" not making the cut? Great melodies all around.

So what is it, anyway? Could it be the fact that they were having fun playing those songs together at Harrison's house or could it just be something as simple as McCartney singing 'awful' instead of 'dreadful' in "Back in the USSR"? I really don't know. What I do know is that the Beatles magic, if you ever believed in such a thing, is all over this record. The White Album? I still don't get it. But the songs - well, I do get them now. And how.  

travelling notes (lxxv)

One bartender in a Paris bar called Blue-something once told me I frightened him when I ordered Old-fashioned. "Why?" I asked. "Because that's what bar critics usually order", he replied. To which I said: "Well, maybe I am".

On Anarchism

I will never forget that American family I once saw in a European bookstore. The bookstore was located inside some grand old railway station and, by the looks and the sound of it, the four Americans were seriously late for their morning train. Which, admittedly, made little sense as they were currently inside this huge bookstore, erratically groping for books. 

It took me seconds to realise that despite Noam Chomsky's slim but heavy-going treatise on anarchism I was currently holding in my hands (I was not going to buy it, but my train was some fifty minutes away), I was, in fact, carefully following the hilarious predicament of the American family. As you would, in a quiet European bookstore.

The predicament was such: the girl, who was about 16 years of age, was not leaving without a book. The train? Fuck the train. Cajolingly, her mother was suggesting various novels while the father was fuming by the entrance and the little brother did not much care for any of it. The girl was rejecting everything that was coming her way, until at some point the clearly desperate mom grabbed George Orwell and shoved him into her daughter's face. 

"1984?!?" the girl exclaimed. "I hated that thing. Animal Farm was so much better". 

At which point I put Chomsky back on the book shelf and moved further down the alphabet, though not as far as to not hear the rest of it. I'd had enough anarchy for one morning... but the best part was that all of a sudden - I was very much enjoying it. 

travelling notes (lxxiv)

Once, in a foreign record store, I saw a young man guiding this tall long-haired Italian girl through endless rows of LPs and trying to explain to her which ones to get. The whole thing seemed ludicrous until at some point it transpired that the girl was looking for a vinyl record to impress her boyfriend that very night. The young man was supposed to give her sage counsel. As we came together to the counter, I noticed she was buying an early Bob Dylan LP. I have no idea whether it worked or not, but to this day I think she should have chosen Leonard Cohen.

Album of the Month: POSSIBLE DUST CLOUDS by Kristin Hersh

This LP is such an unassuming little thing that calling it the best album of the month feels like a stretch. 10 songs, 36 minutes, Kristin Hersh doing her usual manic depressive rock'n'roll. In a way, too slight. In a way, what more can you possibly wish.

It would be true to say that you are unlikely to stumble upon this album by accident and if you do actually have it in your headphones, it means that at some point in your life you fell under the spell of Throwing Muses' eponymous debut or else Kristin's Hips and Makers (may I just stress one more time that "Me and My Charms" is one of the greatest songs ever written). It means you have been here all along, and you know it hasn't been a smooth journey by any stretch of the imagination. All the more recently, because while 2013's Purgatory/Paradise was patchy in the best possible way, I struggled to find a standout tune on the endless Wyatt at the Coyote Place from 2016. 

Thankfully, Possible Dust Clouds is focused songwriting and no real filler. The songs are tasteful, edgy and charismatic. Some are propelled by masterful, intense grooves ("Lethe") and some are relatively subtle and feature Kristin's quieter side that I wish was a little more prominent (I absolutely love the first half of "Fox Point"). The guitarwork is heavy and delicious, the vocals are rough and charming. I wouldn't exactly call these songs hook-filled, but then you never did think "Delicate Cutters" had a catchy melody... 

Kristin Hersh's songwriting is often murky yet it has so much suppressed melodicism bubbling underneath. Possible Dust Clouds is a modest triumph, and nothing but a half-hour outburst from one of rock music's most idiosyncratic artists. There could be a troubled personality there, but it translates beautifully into music. 

travelling notes (lxxiii)

I could spend hours watching this girl writing something on the train, on her way to Milan. There's a huge and rather old-fashioned exercise book on her knees, and she keeps writing this endless piece I can only see as the greatest story ever told. That it could be a diary or a letter to a friend never enters my mind - not when I'm on the train.  

Dekalog

There is no easy way of watching Krzysztof Kieślowski's masterpiece. And there is no way of making that experience less than memorable. 

Oddly, this brings me to Paul Dano. I have once read about his experience of watching Dekalog. Apparently, Paul's idea of impressing his then girlfriend was to watch all ten films with her, over a whole night, one by one. 

Which is like listening to Goldberg Variations on the bus through one flimsy earphone or else reading The Sound and the Fury while talking to someone else who is in the room. 

The story stuck with me because really, you do not need any props. These ten films, each shot on a measly budget of ten thousand dollars, are some of art's most impeccable creations. File alongside Pnin and Seize the Day. 

I know when I finished watching Dekalog: Eight, and saw the face of an old tailor peering through the window, I felt this was the most devastating ending I would ever see. And it is, to this day. 

There is nothing you can say after the screen goes black and you hear that snippy piano. There is nothing you can say - never mind experience.