September 2010

[Sweder]

My only mid-week plod occurred on Wednesday lunchtime. Neck-deep in a complex work tender I needed some headspace, or as I said at the time, a re-boot. One of my many distractions that day was a freshly-downloaded edition of an old favourite – Talking Heads’ Stop Making Sense. I hooked up my iPod and head for the hills.

Talking Heads was one of those bands spawned amidst the bubbling gene pool that was CBGB’s (referenced in the song ‘Life During Wartime’), the New York Underground venue that gave rise to The Ramones and Debbie Harry/ Blondie amongst others. Stop Making Sense is the soundtrack to the 1984 film of the same name, directed by Jonathan Demme. Demme would find fortune and fame seven years later with Jodie Foster/ Anthony Hopkins Oscar-winning The Silence of the Lambs. David Byrne, mercurial front man and the big brain within the Heads, said of Demme’s direction ‘it wasn’t what he did (that made the SMS movie so good), it was what he didn’t do.’

What he did in my view was to record a band at the height of its powers. The album is a collection of Talking Heads’ finest works. It’s hard for me to think about the tunes without association with the images from that concert/ film. The whole things kicks off with an odd rendition of their first hit, ‘Psycho Killer’, with Byrne walking onto a stage empty save for a lone microphone, carrying an acoustic guitar and an old-fashioned tape recorder. ‘I’ve got a tape I want to play you’ – and we’re off on a journey of magic and wonderment. As the songs build so does the band. Attractive and accomplished bass-player and vocalist Tina Weymouth joins him for ‘Heaven’ – ‘Everyone is trying, to get to the bar, the name of the bar, the bar is called Heaven’ – and so it goes until the full ensemble is gathered. The songs build in pace and complexity as stage hands slide drum risers and keyboard stations across the stage until we reach full steam ahead in a blur of wild, Lynchian lyrics delivered over high-energy samba/ salsa-rock.

The central figure is of course Byrne. His distressed vocals screech out over manic, wacka-wacka-wacka rhythm guitar as his associates offer a range of paradoxically soothing harmonies and descants. I favour the helter-skelter madness of the later tracks – ‘Making Flippy Floppy’, ‘What A Day That Was’ and ‘Once In A Lifetime’. Some of the song names don’t stay long in the memory, mostly because they don’t feature prominently in the lyrics. ‘Life During Wartime’ for example is best remembered for the chorus – ‘This ain’t no party, this ain’t no disco.’ Such idiosyncrasies are Byrne’s stock in trade. If you love the band (as I do) you forgive him his indulgences.

The whole thing wraps with a cover of ‘Take Me To The River’ written in 1974 by Al Green and Mabon ‘Teenie’ Hodges. By the time we get to this I’m rocking along at a fair old pace. Turns out most of the tracks (from ‘Slippery People’ onwards) are excellent running tunes. Who knew? But of course I should have known. In the film, when not wobbling about in an outrageously oversized suit, Byrne lives up to his name, raising the temperature with a series of maniacal spasms topped off with a crazy sprint around the set as his (beautiful) backing singers maintain the 'Still Waiting' refrain on the sublime Crosseyed and Painless.

Indeed, what a gig that was.
There are a number of bands I never got to see live – Zeppelin, Thin Lizzy – but if I could go back and be at one live concert I think this would be it.

Track du jour: ‘Girlfriend Is Better’

[Mid Life Crisis Marathon Man]

A sublime choice, Sweder. Both album and movie are magnificent, but brilliant not only for themselves, but for this spoof as well (got to love the drum kit in this):

[Sweder]

What a fine day for football upsets it was on Saturday.
Arsenal (comfortably) beaten at home by the Baggies, Chelski felled by the upstarts at Eastlands, Liverpool taking advantage of an incompetent official to salvage a point at home to Sunderland.

I witnessed it all via the miracle of portable DAB radio and the excited jabber of the Radio Five Live commentary team as I plundered eighteen hilly kilometres under clear but decidedly autumnal skies. My duties as Dance Dad were called upon, meaning a Sunday outing (probably joining Tom Roper & Moylebird for the Firle Half) was off the agenda. My travels resume with a trip to Cascais (Portugal) this week and once again running will take a back seat, so a long run this weekend felt essential to deposit a little more fitness in the bank. The footie offered quality distraction as I set off, later than planned, at just after 4pm, heading across the western corner of Lewes for the climb onto Kingston Ridge. My plan was to run up the last stroke of the Big W, up alongside Castle Hill Nature Reserve to Woodingdean, back down the Snake, up through Death Valley and back down the W into Kingston village and home. I estimated the distance at ‘somewhere between 15 and 20 kilometres’ – or in my language around a two hour run. Once I’d crested the W I chased the sun as it fled into the western hills, its' reflection shimmering off the distant sea.

Running down the Snake was a highlight for me. I’d not done this before and the joy that filled my heart as I lumbered down her winding coils knew no bounds. I grinned, a wolf amongst the hillside sheep, as I passed a lone runner taking it on in the traditional manner. By this time the footie was over and the shocks were in, my ears filled with Sports Report interspersed with news of Milliband the Younger’s election as leader of the Labour party, an incandescent Steve Bruce on what he (and many others) perceived as daylight robbery at Anfield and a thoroughly depressed Arsene Wenger admitting ‘we was rubbish’. I paused at the foot of the snake to swap DAB for iPhone, reloading Talking Heads. Despite my joy at pulling a reverse on the Serpent my legs were feeling it and I needed David Byrne’s flibbertigibbet screeching madness to infuse them with enough life to get me home.

The Head did the trick, although I confess to walking the last few hundred metres to the top of the Ridge. Low puffy clouds slid across the darkening sky, their edges tinged with pinks and purples as the light faded. I hot the hardtop at Kingston and set off for home, legs happy to be on flat(ter) ground. Home at last, chilled torso thawed under a hot shower, I considered the route and decided I liked it rather a lot. One to revisit I feel. The curious fatigue I’d felt was explained by the Garmin data. My ascending gain was +451 metres – over 100 metres more than last Sunday’s Firle route. Though some of that was achieved at snail’s pace it still proved a good workout. I’ll be back.

17.94 kilometres, 2 hours 2 minutes.

LtoR: Breakfast, Kingston Ridge, W approach, View of Lewes from top of W, Snake Foothills, Longman, Homeward

[The Beast of Bevendean]

A reverse snake? This will have conservatively-minded runners spitting their energy drinks out in shock.
Your altitude statistics are intriguing too.
As Walt Whitman put it:
Down the edges, through the passes, up the mountains steep,
Conquering, holding, daring, venturing as we go the unknown ways,
Pioneers! O pioneers!