Kudos to Liam and a great post on music, coolness and parents.

I bumped into Liam's nice music blog and really enjoyed this post: Fuzz Box: Help! My Parents are Cooler than Me!

It helps that I know the people involved - but it's great (and a bit strange feeling) when someone you've known since they were (what?) about 8 yrs old turns into a grown-up - and not only that but a wise and thoughtful one.

Nice post - great writing.

David Byrne @ The Sage - 1st April 2009

[caption id="" align="alignright" width="240" caption="David Byrne - not my own photo - click to see a nice set at Flickr by user pebblesfromheaven"][/caption]

Alison and I saw David Byrne's concert at the Sage (Newcastle) last night (Songs of David Byrne and Brian Eno Tour tour).

It was absolutely amazing - brilliant, funny, heartwarming, touching.... and funky... great musicians, 3 dancers, that amazing voice, that back-catalog of songs in collaboration with Eno (Talking Heads & Solo) mixed with the new (Everything That Happens Will Happen Today) album.

It's hard to pick a highlight - there were so many...:

• The long funky grooves of the Remain In Light era


• The simple beauty of "Heaven" ("is a place... a place where nothing... nothing ever happens")


• The art-pop classic "Once in a lifetime" - one of Byrne's/TH's best known - still fresh and intriguing ("...and you may ask yourself.. how did I get here... where does that highway go to")


• The dancers (simultaneously all NY artsy pretentious and yet funny/quirky) - added to the spectacle and showed DB's love for presenting a "show" whilst avoiding "rock clichés".  Praise to him to take 3 dancers on a world tour... I'm sure it would be more profitable to tour without dancers.. but he chose to bring them along.


• The country gospel tinged new stuff... and the amazing "Take me to the River"...


• DB "being the sampler" and vocalising the sampled sermon from "Help Me Somebody"...
  
  
  
  • "There`s no escape from Him. He`s so high you can`t get over Him. He`s so low you can`t get under Him. He`s so wide you can`t get around Him. If you make your bed in Heaven He`s there. If you make your bed in Hell He`s there. He`s everywhere."
  
  
  
  


• All those great lyrics:
  
  
  
  • this aint no party.. this aint no disco....
  
  
  • I'M AN OR-DI-NARY GUY!
  
  
  • I'm changing my shape-I feel like an accident
  
  
  • Same as it ever was...same as it ever was...same as it ever was...
  
  
  
  

Wonderful evening - a priviledge to be there.

UPDATE: These 2 reviews (of other concerts on the tour) are fair and good:

• The Times


• The Guardian

David Byrne @ The Sage - 1st April 2009

Alison and I saw David Byrne's concert at the Sage (Newcastle) last night (Songs of David Byrne and Brian Eno Tour tour).

It was absolutely amazing - brilliant, funny, heartwarming, touching.... and funky... great musicians, that amazing voice, that back-catalog of songs in collaboration with Eno (Talking Heads & Solo) mixed with the new (Everything That Happens Will Happen Today) album.

I have loved this music since I first listened to Talking Heads back around 1980/81 - I was lead there via Bowie/Eno collaborations and the Talking heads albums were a continuation and extension of the Eno produced experimental art pop/rock... leading then to the wonderful My Life in the Bush of Ghosts and The Catherine Wheel. Up until recently most this stuff had become "orphaned vinyl" - lost in the loft and un-played. Fortunately Alison bought me the complete set of Talking Heads CDs (remastered, re-released with extras etc.) for my birthday a few years ago and I went through phase of listening to them all again... like old soul-mates reunited.

Last night's concert featured a fine mix of the older stuff and the new...

[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="240" caption="Photo on Flickr (not my own)"][/caption]

Treee !

Ages ago, we said we would plant an apple tree in our garden, for Granny Pam.  Pending the new veg garden, we weren't sure where it would go but now that is all sorted, it was time to get it done.

So, here is the evidence - Granny Pam, ably assisted by Charlie, planting her tree. But not any old tree, it is a 3-apple tree. There are Gala and Sunset dessert apples AND Bountiful cooking apples all grafted onto one dwarf tree. Not sure how long before any of it will bear fruit, but we shall offer the first harvest to GP to make pie !

At the same time, we planted a dwarf dessert cherry nearby.

Germinating Parnsips

First parsnip seeds have been set to germinate, using the widely recommended kitchen-roll method. Basically, the seeds are put on damp kitchen roll, kept warm until they germinate and then moved out into a prepared drill by which time the soil has warmed up a bit more. The bed isn’t even dug yet so we need to get cracking on that asap.

If this works, I will start another batch off in a couple of weeks time for succession planting.

The wireworm risk is high for parsnips (and all roots), given that we are planting on land that last year had sheep and cows grazing on it, so I am a little nervous about how well they will perform, but we have to give it a go.

The parsnips (Picador) will share a 3m x 1m bed with a few different types of carrot – round ones - cant recall the name, came free on a magazine, as well as Purple Haze, a rainbow mix and Samurai (red). Some of the local kids want to grow the coloured and round carrots too, so in return for their help moving stones, I have set aside a 1m square bed for them to share and they can choose any of my seeds that they like. So far, all have gone for the ‘funny carrots’, with one considering a side order of yellow cherry tomatoes. I think a few pumpkins will be fun too, if only for making lanterns.

Asparagus beds - almost done

Having read in various gardening forums that 2009 asparagus deliveries are already underway, it was time to get the beds to their next stage of readiness.

Steve has moved a whole load of the topsoil from front garden to back – an ingenious ramp system on the wooden steps made it possible to get the whole way with the barrow without having to unload/reload it or use buckets, phew.

We now have both beds filled to ground level. We are allowing them a day or two to settle during which my job is to get the edges weeded and straightened up, line up the raised bed surrounds nice and straight, then fix them into position for Steve to top them up with more soil. We will fill them almost full, as they will sink down as the compost composts and we can top up as required from there. I will also add some fertilizer to the topsoil layer – probably bonemeal.

Planting will be in blocks, 11 plants to each 2m x 1m bed which is perhaps too many but I am hoping it will be okay:

X X X X

X X X

X X X X

I will use 7 of each green variety and an extra purple one. The rest of the order will go to BooLou for their lottie:

Stewarts Purple x 12 early, sweet, purple

Ariane x 10 (organic) early season

Backlim x 10 (organic) mid to late, can be grown as white asparagus after a few years