NYC

Paris

No specific destination

I did the London Skyride yesterday. Days off are rare at the moment; even rarer are those that allow me to simply ride my ancient bicycle with no specific destination in mind.

After lunch near Marble Arch with a friend I freewheeled it along to speaker's corner to hear some semi-sane ravings for old time sake. I used to be addicted to Speaker's Corner. Whilst half listening to a man warn of The Robots impending takeover I noticed hundreds of people wearing yellow jerseys with the words "Skyride" emblazoned across them. I cycled down towards Hyde Park Corner where they appeared to be congregating.

As it turned out, our mayor Boris Johnson had closed down a huge part of central London to enable 50,000 cyclists to take to the streets without a car in sight. The route ran from Buckingham Palace, along the Victoria Embankment to St Pauls, to the Tower of London and back again. I merely planned to observe this post-apocalyptic/eco-warrior's wet dream car-less London; but instead, I became literally swept along into the whole event and completed the ride with a huge smile on my face. What a priviledge it was to pedal down Constitution Hill without a car in sight. London and it's September summer was on beautiful form. Dressed in all it's finery, with no Range Rovers to negotiate, the city revealed itself as a beautiful old friend. I was a tourist again in my own city.

It was 15km in total and although teams of 7 year olds on BMXs seemed to race by every 30 seconds it was a pretty graceful experience. With speakers installed in Blackfriars Tunnel, Kasabian's "Fire" reverberated around the grimy old tube like psych-rock from the bowels of the earth. It was a great moment - unique and surreal - and a great reminder of everything this city can be.

Mixtape

The rough trade counter culture compilation of 2008 is a cassette with a USB stick inside it. I was actually disappointed to see that it wasn't a tape. I used to worship my tape collection, the mixtapes especially, recorded for me by friends and girlfriends. I still have a few at my parent's house and I'm going to try and dig out those musical relics and love them again. Send me some pictures of your old mixtapes or some old tracklistings and we can reminisce together.

An odd state of affairs

I've got that year zero feeling again. A new album is in the can and I'm at that blissful stage where no one has actually heard the thing yet and no judgements have been made. If any of you have read Paul Auster's "The book of illusions" you'll remember the character who makes movies that no one ever sees. He seals them in a vault only to be seen once by one journalist after his death and thereafter destroyed.

Right now "The Pursuit" is in my car, it's on my iPod, it's on my home stereo and it's my favourite album. After it comes out I will probably never listen to it again unless by accident in a restaurant. It's an odd phenomenon, but I wouldn't change it for the world.

All things need to be this good

Music by Moby, video by David Lynch.

Uke

Depending on what mood I am in during an interview I'll say that I started my music career on the guitar/piano/drums within the rock/jazz/hip-hop/folk idiom. The bald truth is that it started with the Ukelele playing the tune "Show me the way to go home".

I am still fascinated by this miniature hawaiin instrument and wander around the house with it regularly close to my personage. I can't play any of my usual repertoire on it, or indeed any particular chords but I do appear to have amassed a large amount of original songs (no longer than two minutes) that have originated and will probably stay within the confines of the Uke. They are mostly about doing the laundry and other workaday activities.

My grandfather used to entertain me and calm me down as an overexcited toddler with his ukelele. Making up songs about robins and appropriating anything from Sesame Street or the theme from Columbo. It wasn't long before I made a grab for it myself and Grandad showed me the four chords that constituted "Show me the way to go home". I spent weeks mastering it and played it obsessively like some malfunctioning George Formby robot.

I soon branched out into other public domain classics - Amazing Grace, Oh Danny Boy, some Christmas carols etc. But it wasn't long before the seemingly cooler and peer approved electric guitar crackled into view. I became far more interested in playing "Wild Thing" and "Dizzy" by the Wonderstuff through a wall of distortion.

It was travelling on a tour bus that got me into the ukelele again. Guitars and keyboards always seemed to end up in the back of trucks or covered in cigarette butts. The uke however could fit in your bunk or in your bag. So I bought one in a little music store in San Diego - a little jewel of an instrument which rarely leaves my side.

Thanks Grandad. It may have been you that started all this.


My Brightest Diamond - The Gentlest Gentleman from LaundroMatinee on Vimeo.