Travelling on

I started the 'Passengers in Time' blog at the end of 2010. I'm not the most prolific blogger but I suppose I've averaged about ten posts a year here on this blog. I've covered a variety of topics from books that I'd been reading to books that I'd been writing, and from music I'd been listening to, to occasionally music I'd been making. Alongside these adventures with books and music has been a third thread - 'time travel', by which I suppose I've meant a blend of reminiscences, social history and real-life travel. My posts have often been written in a voice that suggested these were accounts of solitary adventures but, in reality, whether it was walking in Shropshire, drinking coffee in Chepstow, Chipping Norton or Keswick, wandering round lavender fields in Yorkshire, exploring disused railways lines on Dartmoor or ruined castles in Northumberland, staying in windmills in Sussex, appreciating Japanese art at Hanbury Hall, cycling in Kent, picnicking in Paris, visiting chilli farms and Sherman tanks in Devon or enjoying medieval festivals in Tewkesbury, through all of these experiences I'd been accompanied by my dear travelling companion - my beloved wife Sue.    

Reviewing the blog's activity over the years, it's noticeable that my blog posts became less frequent in the second half of 2018. This coincided with Sue being diagnosed with a brain tumour. Through much of 2019, Sue enjoyed reasonably good health and I continued to blog fairly regularly, chronicling some of our trips - to the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, to Portsmouth to view the recovered 16th-century ship the Mary Rose (which Sue had always wanted to see), to a very unusual concert by Sue's favourite pagan speed folk band PerKelt as well as the last concert we attended together - a China Crisis gig, and an account of our very last holiday together in Devon.  

At the beginning of this year Sue's health deteriorated so that, by the time the coronavirus pandemic had forced everyone into lock-down, Sue and I had already stopped going out and about. Sue was too poorly to go anywhere and I had become a full-time carer. And then, on 25 June, Sue passed away. 

The things that normally console, comfort, energise and enthuse me: reading, listening to music, writing, songwriting, all feel like an effort at the moment, but I know they still hold the power to sustain and renew me. This blog has become an archive - of the books and music I've enjoyed, of the places we've been and the things we've done; it felt wrong to go on writing 'Passengers in Time' blog posts as if nothing had happened, without acknowledging the loss of Sue. I'm going to try to keep on blogging and to go on documenting my adventures with books, music ...and, of course, time travel. 

Sue was always very proud of my writing and I'm sure she would have wanted me to continue, but things are bound to be rather different, now that I've lost my travelling companion.

In memory of Sue Gillam (1965-2020).

Are we having fun yet? Eleven kinds of loneliness in self-isolation

Eleven finely-crafted short stories

Like much of humankind at the moment, I'm self-isolating because of the coronavirus pandemic. My consolations  - as ever in any very strange and difficult situation - include music and books. For the past few weeks, my great companion has been an engaging collection of short stories called Eleven Kinds of Loneliness by Richard Yates.

The book's title might not suggest any kind of light relief and - it's true - it's not a laugh a minute. However, these eleven stories are witty, compelling, finely-crafted and highly entertaining. 

I'd never heard of Richard Yates before but I'm a fan of short stories and came across his name in connection with other perhaps better known American short story writers like Raymond Carver and John Cheever.  All three authors are published in Vintage Classics paperbacks.

The blurb biography tells me Richard Yates was born in 1926 in New York, served in the US army and, in the sixties, worked briefly as a speech-writer for Robert Kennedy. Yates' prize-winning stories began to appear in 1953 and his first novel, Revolutionary Road, was nominated for the National Book Award in 1961. He died in 1992. Though it passed me by at the time, I've since discovered Sam Mendes directed a 2008 film adaptation of Revolutionary Road, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet. (Maybe that's one to watch in our Covid-19 lockdown.)

Yates' stories are set in suburban 1950s America, where frustrated office workers and would-be novelists live in fear of redundancy, while at the same time desperately hoping to break out of their particular version of the American Dream gone slightly wrong.  There are unhappy marriages - Yates was twice divorced - and, alongside all the rat-race hack-writers there are brilliantly sympathetic portraits of misfit school-kids, reluctant soldiers and long-term patients in tuberculosis hospitals.

Yates has a fondness for titles with multiple meanings: Out with the Old (a kind of One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest set in a tuberculosis ward) describes the experience of being an in-patient on the eve of New Year, but sombrely reminds us that not all the patients would survive the best available treatments for TB in the 1950s.

But there are touches of lightness in well-observed character descriptions. Describing Bernie, a character in Builders who's a cab driver in search of a ghost-writer for his memoirs, Yates writes: "His head must have been half again the size of mine, with thinning black hair washed straight back, as if he'd stood face-up in the shower..."

A Glutton for Punishment is an outstanding example of a story with a twist - but supremely satisfying - ending while Fun with a Stranger compares the very different experiences children in third grade can have, depending on whether their teacher is a Mrs Cleary or a Miss Snell: "It was not uncommon to cry in Miss Snell's class, even among the boys. And ironically, it always seemed to be during the lull after one of these scenes - when the only sound in the room was somebody's slow, half-stifled sobbing, and the rest of the class stared straight ahead in an agony of embarrassment - that the noise of group laughter would float in from Mrs Cleary's class across the hall..."

Yates is brilliant at capturing that sense that everybody else must be having more fun than we are. He's also subtle enough to show that, whether it's in a schoolroom, in the army or in the workplace, we can all learn something from situations that don't, on the surface, seem like a whole lot of fun.

From Scotland to Sweden via Estonia: three world music albums you might have missed...

At the Wrong Gig by Eriska - Muutused/Zminy by Svjata Vatra - Hillevi by Emma Ahlberg Ek 

 

Every so often, a radio station will produce a playlist of the best songs for driving. The likes of Bruce Springsteen or The Eagles usually figure as top drive-time tunes. But I discovered the perfect alternative soundtrack for heading down the highway on the rain-drenched motorways of the UK on my first hearing of Eriska's debut album. At the Wrong Gig sounds unmistakably Scottish and is ideal for keeping you moving – and keeping your spirits up when you're not.  

Eriska are a six-piece folk-rock band based in Glasgow that includes musicians from New England and Argentina as well as from Scotland. Scott Figgins' highland bagpipes, whistles and bellow-blown pipes are to the fore, as is Aileen Sweeney's accordion and Madeleine Stewart's fiddle, all giving Eriska's sound a traditional Scottish backbone. But what makes At the Wrong Gig really rock is Gavin Paterson's spot-on drumming and Dario Palazzo's guitars, while Julián Pombo's bass adds a jazz flavour to the whole affair, particularly on tracks like 'Discharged'.

'Two More Weeks' features a guitar solo that channels the spirit of Carlos Santana, while 'Sparrow' is a rare moment of relaxation. At the Wrong Gig is a high octane, highly enjoyable debut album.

If you prefer Estonian bagpipes to the Scottish variety, you might enjoy Svjata Vatra. Svjata Vatra formed in 2005 when Ukrainian singer and trombonist Ruslan Trochynskyi moved to Estonia and teamed up with local musicians. Muutused/Zminy (whose bilingual title translates as Changes) is the band's sixth studio album, and certainly displays an ever-changing sound, from the drama of 'Kohannija Zminyt Vse' to the boisterous knees-up of 'Marichka Chycheri'. Funky bass lines blend with ocarinas and Estonian bagpipes. There are moments of swaggering musical freneticism that recall Gogol Bordello or a kind of Cossack version of The Pogues.

While the interplay between whistles and flutes, trombone and guitars is very effective, the use of Jew's harp is a little grating in places, and the music-loving world could probably manage without the frantic rendition of 'You Are My Sunshine' (which appears as 'Oj, To Ne Ruzha'.) Guest vocals from Rute Trochynskyi work well, and the duet 'Oj U Poli Dva Dubky' sees Svjata Vatra at their most charmingly accessible, with a lilting pop tune reminiscent of Gotye's 2011 hit 'Somebody That I Used to Know'. There is a strong sense of playfulness in this music. Svjata Vatra's latest album shows how unexpectedly enjoyable and uplifting Estonian/Ukrainian folk-rock can be.

But if all this playful freneticism is too much, perhaps you'd prefer a journey back to the golden age of Swedish cinema. Concept albums are a rare thing in folk music but Hillevi is a fine example: the result of Swedish fiddler Emma Ahlberg Ek's fascination with the life of Hillevi Alexandra Oberg (1897-1979). As Ek explains in the charming booklet accompanying this CD, one area dominated by female musicians in the 1920s was that of cinema musician. Hillevi, widowed with two children, earned her living arranging and performing live music to accompany silent films until the advent of the talkies. Ek pays tribute to the life and times of her predecessor, fellow fiddler and countrywoman, in this wonderfully varied collection of tunes.

Supported by a sympathetic ensemble of accordion, double bass and percussion players, Ek recreates a few of Hillevi's own compositions, but most of the tracks are original tunes charting the ups and downs of Hillevi's life. The album is full of variety and atmosphere. The moody interlude 'Livhanken' has the crackle effects of an old 78 record. 'Hillevis Sorgevisa' and 'Ljuskronan' are reminiscent of The Albion Band's more plaintive moments while, with 'Kirunahambon', it is easy to imagine hordes of Swedish cinemagoers chortling at the antics of Charlie Chaplin. Hillevi is a delightful, highly original album.

Eriska At the Wrong Gig (Eriska) - Svjata Vatra Muutused/Zminy (Nordic Notes /Broken Silence) -  Emma Ahlberg Ek Hillevi (Caprice Records)

Town Musicians of Bremen - They may be town musicians but they're certainly not from Bremen

Two out of three Town Musicians
...but no sign of the nykelharpa yet!

Just before Christmas I had the pleasure of seeing Town Musicians of Bremen perform live in Worcester. This was the third time I'd seen this trio in action (although, on this most recent occasion, they were one man down!)

There are a few things you should know about this highly original band. First, they're not from Bremen at all but from the West Midlands of England (Stourbridge and Evesham) and, of course, take their name from the folktale popularised by the Brothers Grimm. Leon Gormley is the understated front-man, on lead vocals, guitar and cittern, with Andrew Lowings on bouzouki and Lewis Jones on melodeon and nickelharpa (a Swedish bowed-string instrument with keys, that makes my mountain dulcimer - normally a bit of a conversation piece - look like a very commonplace instrument indeed!) All three musicians are relaxed and consummate players who blend perfectly together and seem able to effortlessly produce deeply sympathetic music.

There's no sign yet of an album but the Town Musicians of Bremen debut EP is a tasty little appetiser, featuring two of Leon Gormley's very affecting songs 'Stranger to my Eye' and 'My Friend Remembers' plus one of Andrew Lowings' instrumentals 'Alfrick' and a rendition of 'Magpie' (not the Dave Dodds' song covered by The Unthanks, but a version of the theme to the 1970s children's TV show originally played by the Spencer Davis Group under the alias of The Murgatroyd Band.)  

Perhaps it's my age, but I'm particularly fond of Leon's song 'My Friend Remembers' with its chorus that sounds a bit like 'What shall we do with the drunken sailor?' and its lyric that combines nostalgia with political comment, expressing bafflement at modern life: "It's all in the hands of the new computers, it's no good if you can't use 'em, I'm not able to understand!" A full album of TMB music is eagerly anticipated. 

"I could lose myself in this honesty"

China Crisis

Thursday 3 October

Live at Huntingdon Hall, Worcester

Whereas most people can instantly name at least one Human League or Duran Duran hit, people often struggle to recall any of the five Top 40 hits of China Crisis. Formed in Kirby in 1979 by vocalist/keyboardist Gary Daly and guitarist Eddie Lundon China Crisis were part of a remarkable wave of bands arising from the Liverpool area in Thatcher's Britain, a surge of talent that included Frankie Goes to Hollywood, the synth-pop of Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark and A Flock of Seagulls and the darker post-punk sounds of Echo and the Bunnymen and The Teardrop Explodes. 

If you mention China Crisis's hits - African and White, Christian, Wishful Thinking, Black Man Ray, King in a Catholic Style - you may still be met by blank faces and slight puzzlement at the oddity of the songs' titles. Finally, you may have to resort to singing the keyboard riff from Black Man Ray; people may half-remember the pizzicato strings motif from Wishful Thinking; there may be something vaguely familiar about the words of the strange, un-pop-song-like chorus of Christian: "I could lose myself in this honesty..." Their sound has been described as "wistful pastoral pop" and is a reminder that the music of the 80s, despite the synths and drum machines, produced haunting and deeply moving records epitomised by the songs of China Crisis along with the The Lotus Eaters' 1983 hit The First Picture of You (that would be The Lotus Eaters from... oh, Liverpool again.)

Gary and Eddie were joined at Worcester's Huntingdon Hall by Jack Hymers on keyboards and Eric Animan on saxophone. With no support act the band played two sets either side of the interval, and Gary proved himself to be as entertaining a comedian and raconteur as he is when singing. Quickly building a warm rapport with the audience, in a style that was somehow a cross between Tommy Cooper and Roger Moore, he told tales about working with the Human League and Midge Ure and regretted the fact that he wouldn't have time to visit the tomb of King John at Worcester Cathedral.  

I wasn't expecting to laugh so much at a concert of "wistful pastoral pop" but somehow it's fitting that China Crisis are able to have a laugh at themselves - and with the audience - while effortlessly performing these delicate, elusive songs. 

The Papermakers of Tuckenhay

The old papermill at Tuckenhay

The gravel track that wound uphill by the side of Tuckenhay Mill was marked as an 'Unmetalled Road'. I wasn't sure what was meant by unmetalled, but I've since learnt that an unmetalled road is a bare earth or grass track that has no surface covering, (whereas a metalled road has a concrete or asphalt surface.) My car's exhaust may not have appreciated the narrow country lanes and unmetalled roads of the South Hams district of Devon - and ultimately it showed its displeasure by working loose from its corroded bracket - but we humans had a perfect week this summer tucked away in Tuckenhay, the tiny hamlet on the south bank of Bow Creek, just a few miles from Totnes, on the estuary of the Harbourne River which flows into the River Dart.

There are a few theories about how Tuckenhay got its name. The most prosaic is that it's named after Joshia Tucker who built the quays here in 1806. A more poetic version is that it comes from the process of 'tucking hay', or tucking textiles. Little over a century ago, this tranquil place was a bustling centre of industrial activity where lime, corn, malt, rope, cider and road-building materials (no doubt for metalling roads) would be loaded on to merchant ships. Among the cargo would be paper made by Millbourn's paper mill, whose imposing and rather beautiful building still dominates the village, though nowadays it provides holiday accommodation rather than paper.  

At the mill, high quality paper and parchment was produced, much of it by hand, from rag pulp. This superior quality paper was used for legal deeds, cheques and banknotes for Jamaica and Cyprus. At one time the mill employed a hundred people, including the skilled papermakers for whom our holiday cottage (and the rest of the little terrace of houses) was originally built in 1900; (a further two houses were added to the terrace after the First World War.) Papermaking was a highly skilled certified craft and papermakers from North Wales and from Kent moved to take up residence and employment in Tuckenhay.

It's claimed that the proclamation for the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II was read from paper produced at Tuckenhay. Yet, despite its proud heritage of quality production and skilled craftsmanship, the mill eventually closed in 1970.  The elderly lady who was our neighbour for a week told me she grew up in Tuckenhay and her family had worked at the paper mill. She had moved away when she married, and then moved back here again to care for her parents as they grew older. Now she and her husband remain in the shade of the mill, "rooted" (in the words of WB Yeats) "in one dear, perpetual place", while transient holidaymakers like us come and go.

The Maltsters Arms

Apart from being, officially, an Area of Outstanding Beauty in its own right Tuckenhay - with its proximity to the lovely towns of Totnes and Dartmouth and to Agatha Christie's former home of Greenway (now a National Trust property) - is a perfect centre for a peaceful holiday. And if you want to go easy on your exhaust pipe, and enjoy some real ale, there are not one but two excellent riverside pubs within easy walking distance. Our favourite was The Maltsters Arms, an 18th century inn that is as popular now with holidaymakers as it must have been with all those 19th century paper mill workers.

Most evenings we would walk to The Maltsters and enjoy being in the riverside beer garden drinking local Otter Ale. But other people would arrive in canoes or sailing boats and, one evening, we watched as a little boy came alongside the pub in a kayak and joined a school-friend at the table next to us.

"Where's your mum?" asked the mother of the boy's friend.

"Oh, she's following along in a bit," he explained.

And sure enough, his mum turned up a few minutes later on a paddle-board. Just imagine having a mum who follows you to the pub on her paddle-board. It left me pondering how different life might have been if we had brought up our family in an area like this: our children would probably have grown up to be confident in the outdoors and on the water, my wife could have been an enthusiastic paddle-boarder instead of an irrepressible cyclist and I ...well, I would be a happy pub-goer, impoverished by constantly having to replace my car's exhaust pipe.   

A game, a problem and an homage – three acoustic albums that you might have missed

The Janus Game by Steve Tilston & Jez Lowe – A Problem of Our Kind by Gilmore & Roberts – Hommage à Marcel Dadi by Various Artists

Before the recent release of his solo acoustic retrospective Distant Days Steve Tilston collaborated with fellow stalwart of the English folk scene Jez Lowe to produce The Janus Game. The rousing title track sets the scene with alternating vocals, a memorable hook and a mellifluous blending of Tilston's guitar and Lowe's bouzouki and harmonica.

These finely-crafted songs treat their subjects with great affection, whether focusing on child refugees, a young woman heading off to holiday in the sun or a pair of elderly friends. Unexpected lyrical flourishes abound. In 'The Strings That Wizz Once Strummed' Tilston sings: 'electrical bananas may have played their part'. 'Leaving for Spain' has the wonderful couplet: 'Beneath some hot sun she believes she belongs, Factor 50, silk sarong'. There are musical surprises too – the melody to 'Mrs Einstein' is pleasingly reminiscent of Whistling Jack Smith's 'I Was Kaiser Bill's Batman'.

The contrast between Tilston's vocals and Lowe's tender, lulling voice (with its discernible north-eastern accent) is very effective, as is the subtle use of Lowe's mountain dulcimer on 'Tattered and Torn'. The stirring 'On Beacon Hill' could almost be a Gordon Lightfoot song while 'Shiney Row' is wonderfully warm-hearted. The Janus Game shows how contemporary English folk music can embody dignity, strength and compassion. 

Like Tilston and Lowe, three times nominees at the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards Katriona Gilmore (fiddle, mandolin) and Jamie Roberts (guitar) are an impressive duo. Comparisons with that other folk twosome, Kathryn Roberts and Sean Lakeman, are a little inevitable - Jamie is Kathryn's brother (while Sean is, of course, brother of Seth Lakeman.) Katriona demonstrates some of the urgency of Seth's fiddle style on opening track 'Gauntlet' but, on the whole, Gilmore & Roberts' approach is more restrained and gentle.

The cleverly punning 'Just a Piece of Wood' is Katriona's affectionate homage to her instrument. We imagine the narrator talking to a lover ... until the chorus: "I wish you could explain every mark and every grain/Whose hands caressed your neck before I could..."

This, their fifth studio album, alternates Katriona's contrasting compositions with Jamie's. The centrepiece of the collection, 'On the Line', is a reflection on the public's reactions to suicide on railway tracks, and what this tells us about our society. This song's lyric also gives the album its title: "And it goes much further than this station, it's a problem of our kind/But a change must come somewhere down the line..."

  

Tunisian-born French guitarist Marcel Dadi was a master of the finger-picking style associated with Chet Atkins and Merle Travis. A popular performer, composer and interpreter he was also held in affection as a guitar teacher, thanks to his instructional videos and the tablatures that accompanied his albums.

Tragically, in 1996, after being honoured in Nashville's Country Music Hall of Fame, Dadi was killed when TWA Flight 800 exploded. Marking the twentieth anniversary of his death, German label Acoustic Music Records decided to assemble a host of outstanding guitarists to pay tribute to Dadi's music with the release of this collection. Care has been taken to vary the tempo between upbeat tracks like Albert Lee's version of 'Swingy Boogie' and more reflective pieces like Martin Taylor's 'En attendant Joachim' and Muriel Anderson's delicate 'Winther's Waltz'. Inevitably, though, a whole album of guitar instrumentals performed by virtuosi players in honour of a celebrated guitarist is likely to appeal more to guitar devotees than to the general listener.

Pierre Bensusan contributes 'Waltz For Paula' while Jacques Stotzem's driving 'L'écho des savanes' and Roland Dyens' haunting 'Nous trois' are both astonishingly beautiful. Fittingly, the collection concludes with Dadi's own version of 'Song for Chet'.