First Things First - Pretty overwhelmed at Gnu Inc Central with the responses to 30 ODD YEARS - Gratitude, Thanks and Appreciation To: everyone who contributed to getting 30 OYS off the ground, in particular Andrew Paul Shaw (Art work and Design Guru at http://www.vicgodard.co.uk/ ) and Mike Coe (Doctor of Music Guru) without whom 30 OYs would not be as supercalifragilisticexpialidocious as it is.
Thanks to everyone from All Over The World who has bought the CDs and a big welcome to people we've not had the pleasure of selling to before (I think we boosted the local Post Office business significantly over the last couple of weeks, the Postmaster remarked he hopes we start exporting in quantities to the US!) and to everyone who has done/is doing reviews, they are all on the main website here - http://www.vicgodard.co.uk/30_odd_reviews.html
From Gnu to You -
http://www.monorailmusic.com/
http://www.resident-music.com/
http://www.roughtrade.com/pages/about
http://www.probe-records.com/Contact/contact.htm
Plane tickets x 2, Train tickets x 9 & Hotels x 6 ( bit of a sporting theme with a couple of them following on from our stay at Headingley). Also booked hotel for Blackpool as all but the grim going fast if you want parking, proximity to venues and the chance of some sleep.
Followed by the the unbridled joy of a probably fruitless day spent on MCPS/PRS website - (Vic thought this was their logo - I can understand why)
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| Laptop Blues by TuBeLuv 2014 |
Talking of gigs.....the gnu said she's looking forward to what looks like a bonzer year of shows, a new '30 Odd Years' set and each gig booked so far looks like it is going to be pretty special, with some fab groups lining up with the Sect -
Kill Pretty http://killprettyuk.wordpress.com/ , Pellethead https://www.facebook.com/Pelletheadband?fref=ts , June Brides http://www.junebridesmusic.com/ , Yeah Yeah Noh https://www.facebook.com/pages/Yeah-Yeah-Noh/179922345453384?ref=ts&fref=ts , Teen Canteen http://www.teencanteen.co.uk/ , Blue Orchids https://www.facebook.com/pages/Blue-Orchids/421040661291884 and The Short Stories http://www.breakingdownrecordings.com/the-short-stories to name just a few. One of Particulat favourites of the gnu are Kill Pretty, thinks Eon Morse a positively mesmerising live performer, and Chris, Josh and Mike aren't half bad either -
Other News - There's been a spate of the Goddards lately, I don't know what set it off but it's contagious and definitely seems to be irking the gnu, noticed the middle one amongst the new T's.
In August a DVDCD of Vic's gig at the Town & Country Club 1992 is due for release, with Edwyn C, Paul C, Segs and Martin Duffy accompanying.
Incidental News - Vic was asked if the Sect might be up for supporting The Sonics on their European tour this spring but there was only one date that was possible, quite a few of the others clashed with 30 Odd Years gigs so a non starter, probably for the best.
Veering off in a somewhat different direction now - and I appreciate it's a vast over-simplification of events -
The Crimean War 1853-1856 devastated the economic and social foundations of the peninsula, the repercussions impacted globally and fundamentally changed the balance of power in Europe and set the stage for The Great War 1914-18, which fundamentally changed the balance of power in the World and set the stage for World War ll 1939-45, which fundamentally changed the balance of power in Europe and the World and set the stage for.................
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| Relief of the Light Brigade by Richard Caton Woodville 1897 |
Extraordinary early Crimean War Photographs here by Roger Fenton, March-June 1855 -
http://www.allworldwars.com/Crimean-War-Photographs-by-Roger-Fenton-1855.html
So are we on the very precarious edge of a cusp of a new era of People Power.........or as Private Fraser (Dad's Army - http://www.dadsarmy.co.uk/) often says " We're Doomed ".
It's a tempting thought but I can't actually see the UK clipping the financial wings of the likes of the pro putin oligarchs, etc, who reside on our shores, funnelling their huge gains from workers elsewhere through our economies without it seems to the lay person like me, much in place to check their progress and which, depending on your viewpoint, has some of us seeing it as a form of asset stripping.
A sad and bitter irony that we are commemorating the start of the First World War this year: http://www.warpoets.org/poets/
'The Old Lie' - DULCE ET DECORUM EST PRO PATRIA MORI - " IT IS SWEET AND GLORIOUS TO DIE FOR ONE'S COUNTRY "
DULCE ET DECORUM EST by WILFRED OWEN
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs,
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots,
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame, all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of gas-shells dropping softly behind.
Gas! Gas! Quick, boys! — An ecstasy of fumbling
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time,
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime. —
Dim through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams before my helpless sight
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin,
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs
Bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues, —
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.
This is a beautiful and touching reading by Sam West.
" Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose"
Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr - http://www.19thcenturyphotos.com/Alphonse-Karr-124333.htm
Before you decide you may as well end it all now, Spring has Sprung -
Daffodils by William Wordsworth
I wander'd lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
A host of golden daffodils,
Beside the lake, beneath the trees
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretch'd in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
The waves beside them danced, but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee: -
A poet could not but be gay
In such a jocund company!
I gazed - and gazed - but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought.For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills
And dances with the daffodils.
Bye for now.
PS Nearly forgot, set up a sound cloud thingy -https://soundcloud.com/gertie-grocott/vic-godard-end-of-the-surrey