I wanted to courier something to myself from Ballymena, County Antrim. It is 171 miles from home.
It was quite pricey (understandably). I was surprised to realise, however, that “as the crow flies” Ballymena is almost exactly the same distance from me as Arinagour, the village on the Isle of Coll we go to for weekend breaks/ summer hols / New Year etc.
That surprised me.
I genuinely heard the following (from memory) waiting on a bus this morning. 2 lads in their late teens – clearly working as labourers in town – took me by surprise with their conversation:
Tall lad:
“So, you don’t have any time for that religious shit”
Stocky lad:
“Lot of shite. “God so loved the world” – aye right. He so loved the world he fu**ed off and left it to it’s own shite and did f*ck all to fix f*ck all. Know what he is? He’s a f*cking absentee father – how much f*ckin child maintenance should he pay. C*nt”
Now – I admit their language was profane – but I cannot overstate how surprised I was at the observation.
I usually have respect for folk doing a hard physical job – but I found myself looking at them with an even greater, new found respect.
One of the consequences of having been on this planet for a few years is that you acquire experiences. Relationships start and end. Holidays come and go. Books are read. Films viewed. Loved ones lost. New family members arrive. It is the human condition.
Music – it appears – is consumed.
I try and try and try to find modern, popular music which captures me the way things like Bowie or the Stones or the Beatles or Kate Bush or any number of mainstream musicians did when I was young. Artists who keep producing music and make me think wow… where did that come from. It is the kind of thing which defies explanation. We all have some music – some obscure and some very “popular” – which has meant something to us. I like Radiohead and U2. I have fond memories of concerts such as Hawkwind and Rush.
Now the thing is… for me it has changed. Music often seemed a bit rebellious when I was younger. It wasn’t really. Punk alarmed people needlessly, Black Sabbath were not really satanic. It was all a performance. But it meant a lot at the time – the feeling of being rebellious and edgey.
I miss that so much!
When people mention bands – I am always keen to pick up the names and rush onto Spotify and YouTube to see if I will enjoy it. Will it have a beat and melody which captures me? Will it have unusual harmonies – decent lyrics? I still have a desire for music but it is so rare to hear anything which does not feel like I have heard it 1000 times before.
Which defies what modern music used to bring to me.
I love classical repertoire but it satisfies a different part of me. It does not alter the way I feel in the same way hearing “Pretty Vacant” did back in the 70′s. Fusion and concept music can be interesting but it is cerebral and I want something tribal. Guttural.
As a very-youngster I remember hearing “A Day in the Life” by The Beatles for the first time. I was awe-struck. There and then. Immediately. I truly thought the world had changed. I can still remember it vividly. I remember the fear of hearing the Jam for the first time at a church hall in Portobello – I was terrified – it sounded so angry and the place was full of Mods and Skinheads. The experience was electric. I still sense that mixture of exhiliration and anticipation – I thought the room was going to break out in a massive fight! The lyrics to “Down in the Tube Station…” still make me nervous of the Tube!
Then it seemed to all die away. The music became synthetic. I liked Duran Duran at the time – although no guys of my age admitted it – but it was a melodic thing. I am ashamed to say it but it felt like sentimental “girl/lovey-dovey” music. (I am aware that sounds so bad!)
I – and a lot of people my age – felt that some of the bite and the angst were missing. It was the music changing – not us. Music is manufactured in meetings, we said, not in bars, clubs or school halls or in kids’ bedrooms.
So today I pricked up my ears since people around me were buying tickets for The Script. “You’ll like it” was said to me. “It is guitar based – you’ll like it”. I read a bit about them. From Ireland, tick. I have much love of so much music setting out from Irish musicians. Then to YouTube. Big hit numbers – they are popular and successful… and I have never heard of them. I felt slightly ashamed! On to listening – and … nothing. Not a thing happened inside. It was so disappointing.
This is not what it sounds like. It is not The Script. It is me.
The comments under the videos reflected what I hoped to find for myself. They showed me that people thought of their girlfriends when they heard the songs. They sounded invigorated. Girls said they loved the guys in the band. They played well and they seemed a decent bunch. They were all experiencing the very same connection to the music I had hoped to find. It is me.
The music may well be more manufactured but, ultimately, I changed. And that is the thing. I never realised so clearly as I did this morning.
That is what the mid-life crisis really is. The point when you still want that youthful excitement and you realise it is not something you can simply replicate. I think that zeal and intensity are still to be found. I just think it is recognising the fact you cannot buy into it which matters.
So I shall keep listening for bands which trigger that feeling – and I do not want it to simply be nostalgia. I hope I can find the pleasure in the new again – overcome the calloused part of me which years of bill paying and tedium produced.
Let’s see if the same feelings still await me but in different ways. I’ll keep listening to the radio and see if anyone really can replace John Peel 
I spent a couple of hours in St Mary’s Church, Haddington yesterday evening.
The Scottish Symphony Orchestra were performing Elgar, Nielsen and Sibelius. The music was beautiful, the setting wonderful and the atmosphere was very tranquil.
Just what I needed. Lifted my spirits.
This afternoon I am in Edinburgh. On my laptop I have been reading about the death yesterday of a lady – who lived and worked in this city for many years – blown and burnt to tatters in Afghanistan. She and many others died after a female suicide bomber drove into the minibus carrying them to the airport in Kabul.
It could be any other day. These things happen so often they scarcely make the news any longer. We seem pre-occupied by Royal stories and television show ratings. Two police officers, both female, died yesterday too. Possibly as a result of a grenade being detonated. It shocks because it happened on “home” soil. It was an act of criminality.
It is the brutality in Afghanistan which has left me numb this afternoon. There are so many assaults carried out every day that humanity feels to me like an unconscious, beaten figure suffering repeated blows to it’s prostrate body. Everyone seems to want to kick it. Thump and hack at it, jump on it’s swollen, lifeless head. Stamp on it’s knees. That is how I perceive so much of humanity this afternoon. An ugly, spitting, furious, obscene and twisted face on a repugnant thug. On all sides the perpetrators have a list of justifications and they all have so much revenge to call to their defence. Everyone has a horror story to tell.
Nobody is able to see that the demons they perceive on “the other side” share their love of family. Their pleasure at meeting friends. Dehumanising opponents makes it acceptable. “We” do it. “They” do it. “We” are righteous – “they” are clearly evil. “It” is all so wrong.
And deep inside of this weary, disappointed head of mine there remains – after several years – the thought this was not inevitable. The shutdown across the world did not need to follow on from the awful attacks of 11 years ago. I feel very strongly that the fissure need never have developed.
The world would not have been perfect had we responded differently. I do believe it would have been an awful lot better.
There were far fewer Swifts this year than usual – in my local neighbourhood at least.
In the City Centre of Edinburgh there were a good few. However, they appear to have departed – I have not seen nor heard them this last couple of days in town or at home.
I feel a bit down to see them go.
Americana by Neil Young and Crazy Horse.
I am rarely captivated by albums these days – so I wanted to “shout out” (is that right!?) for this album. I suspect many will automatically hate it – or hate the thought of it. The band have recorded “dark” and heavy versions of old American folk classics such as “Clementine” and “Oh, Susannah”. Seriously, it is fantastic! I love it!
I also like Kate Bush and the “50 words for Snow” album. Just saying.
I found a lot in this article which I agreed with:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jun/27/young-people-are-rubbish
Many in Britain love to pretend we exist in a meritocracy. We do not.
“weed out bad workers”, “work harder”, “no-blame sacking”. Good old Tories – same old lazy view of the world. All hair cream and lazy rhetoric.
They read about things – usually at Oxbridge – and then try to squeeze their learning to fit into their inherited view of the world. This they then pretend to be insight. They insult us by believing they are using intellect to evolve our society.
They then claim that perpetuating the divisions between wealth and poor is “caring”.
They change nothing – that is why they describe themselves as Conservative. They want it to be the same way it always was.
How could a young person choose such a shut-down and intellectually extinguished view of the world?
The current government appall me.