Art and soul

When you take a trip to the big city, you really have to do a few things you can't at home, don't you? So the other week on a visit to London my friends and I had (a very-nice-indeed) lunch accompanied by a sparkling flying horse - not just any old sparkling flying horse, either, this one has a 30ft wingspan.  

The striking sculpture - a crystal-encrusted Pegasus - is a Damien Hirst, and we were in the Brasserie of Light inside Selfridges.  Must admit - I'm not too keen on Selfridges itself, all that materialism/ consumerism, all those impeccable looking people contemplating which £700 pair of shoes to buy - it doesn't do anything for me and I'd far rather be sitting on the edge of a muddy pond looking at frogspawn (genuinely).   But, that said, having lunch in the Brasserie of Light was a lovely experience.  Gorgeous food, super service, and a trippy crystal horse soaring over our heads - they just don't have that down my local.

From there we headed away from the dust and crowds of Oxford Street and ducked down Duke Street, past some Georgian villas with hanging baskets and traditional lamp posts and across Manchester Square to see Grayson Perry's 'Delusions of Grandeur' show at the Wallace Collection. The exhibition really harmonises with its surroundings at the elegant Hertford House and the fanciful, decorative curviness of the Rococo furniture and fine art in many of its other rooms; it was a visual banquet.  And just to mix it all up a bit,  another Grayson alter ego is introduced in the form of an Eastender called Shirley Smith, who herself has another persona, the Hon. Millicent Wallace (do keep up!)  There were also some darker, bleaker references to mental illness and the inclusion of some work by (real) outsider artist Madge Gill intertwined with this.  Maybe that all sounds a bit complicated but, to be honest, I didn't mind - just soaked up the feel and the fantasy alongside the art, went with the flow and loved it.

Here she is - Grayson Perry's alter ego Shirley Smith's alter ego Millicent Wallace:

'The Honourable Millicent Wallace'

Tapestries, carpet, ceramics, paintings, sculptures, wood-cuts, drawings, a dress and even a bedspread made the whole exhibition very multi-layered, colourful, sensual and, sort of, hallucinatory.  I just kept thinking too how much I'd love to witness his creative processes - especially on some of the really big works.  I adored this gorgeously illustrated chest of drawers:

'The Great Beauty'

Detail from 'The Great Beauty'

There was one more thing I really needed to see whilst we were there at the Wallace Collection, though, an unexpected bonus upstairs.  A man whose face and moniker are so familiar and famous that I don't think I've ever really given him too much thought.  And yet...

'The Laughing Cavalier' Frans Hals

It's hard to describe that certain feeling you get when you see the original of such a well-known painting after having only seen it in print, isn't it?... ok, I can't!... apart from saying that the Laughing Cavalier (a name only later given to him by the Victorian press) looked so fresh and flirtatious and knowing and corporeal that I could almost swear I saw his upturned moustache twitch just a little and, as for that look in his eyes -  I think my cheeks may have reddened slightly.  

Doesn't art just make you feel good?

Hyde Park in plain sight

I stepped into a time machine the other evening and travelled back to 1971, courtesy of a charming documentary currently available as part of a BBC Four collection on the iPlayer.  If you’re in need of some uncomplicated escapism and have 50 minutes to spare, may I recommend this unhurried wander through London’s famous Hyde Park amid a fascinating variety of human (and a few animal) visitors from 50 years ago. 

It’s a lovely location, but of course it’s the people who make this so interesting.  There’s the man in his swimming trunks standing on his head, the novice rider with no sense of rhythm, the humble 'Geranium King' who doesn’t like geraniums.  There are the Cockney boys eager to get on camera  (“woss it all abaht?!”) and the not-so-Cockney boys eyeing up bikini girls through their telescopes (“…an hour with her!”)  It’s like a community within a community, with unabashed orators and placard-holders at Speakers’ Corner, a fashion shoot taking place on the bandstand and a fabulously percussive performance of ‘Roll Out The Barrel’ - not on the bandstand.  Then there’s the lothario strutting around in his teeny tiny trunks who… well, don’t let me spoil it for you if you want to watch!   And so many others observed without judgement nor comment, the combination of which seems to illustrate in the simplest terms both the frustrations and joys of just being human - the collapsing deckchair and the squeaky wheel could have come straight out of a comedy sketch show.  Of course my favourite character is the beautifully spoken lady taking her beloved duck for a swim.  Where is she now?!

But one of the main things that makes this film report so delightful and immersive is its style.  It has such a lightness of touch which seems rare now.  There's no generic piano music in the background, nor those irritating pizzicato strings to lead us subliminally to an intended emotional reaction. No over-dramatic narration to humiliate its subjects and lure us towards a predictable opinion (I can't stand being subconsciously directed on what to think!) You can just let go and enjoy your guided tour... at a comfortable 1971 pace.

That’s how I like my observational documentary style.  You too?

Here's the link (Man Alive: Hyde Park):  https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00rzvww

And the song to accompany Mr Lothario:

Roy Brown: Mighty Mighty Man

In the capital

Around this time last week I was sitting on a bench at an unfamiliar railway station in Essex, drinking coffee from a paper cup, reflecting on the day I'd just had.   I wasn't supposed to be at this station, and although I convinced myself that an erroneous info board at Liverpool Street was to blame, maybe I was just guilty of being tipsy in charge of a train ticket…   

I was sure it had said Platform 18, but I’d been running to catch it, and what with the hurried flurry of girly goodbye kisses with only minutes to go and that extra glass of Chardonnay that the first glass lured me into having – on an empty stomach too – well….

Anyway, no harm done.  I knew where I needed to get to and how, and I’d  had a brilliant day with my old schoolfriends.  We’d just absorbed the vibrancy, the lovely blurry buzz that personifies a central London pub at 6pm on a Friday evening.  It’s infectious and it made me want to stay in the city all night, to stay up all night and breathe it in, diesel fumes and all.  Talk about the bright lights - they have me like a moth. 

So, this time last week - a cold station bench, a warm coffee, a mild Autumn night and that wine gradually wearing off as I waited for the (right) train.  I'm always happy in these moments of just observing, just thinking.

I was reminding myself of the small group of heavy metal fans in that pub earlier, how their style had me feeling oddly nostalgic  – all sew-on patches, leather and denim jackets with cut-off sleeves.   Bloody hell, I haven’t seen that look in years, and it suddenly struck me how old-fashioned it is.  I’m quite comforted by that.

My mind travelled through the day again – how my friends and I were dazzled by sapphires bigger than Custard Creams and a frankly excessive amount of gold,  troubled by evidence of archaic torture and equally troubled by prices in the gift shop.  We'd climbed hundreds of stone steps and queued with some bearded American tourists in baseball caps and three-quarter length shorts who looked like they should be in a sort of Blink 182 soundalike band….   And I fell in love with a raven.

You can probably guess where we went...

I‘d read about the Tower of London ravens recently and there was a fantastic snippet of info that I intend to commit to memory: ‘Raven George was dismissed for eating television aerials and Raven Grog was last seen outside an East End pub’…  I love that.

Anyway, yes, a little later than this time last week I got home eventually, but still buzzing.  A trip to the city always leaves its mark on me -  a restlessness which follows me around for a few days after I've been there. All sorts of memories, feelings and previous experiences get woven in.  Just like the wine, it takes a little while to wear off.

And, talking of being in the capital, here's a song I keep hearing on 6 Music from Australian band The Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever, and have rather fallen for too.  I like the distorted, watery guitars, the little signature theme, the slightly melancholy edge and the way it all goes a bit psychy at the end...

The Rolling Blackouts CF: In The Capital

This is still London

I needed a treat.  Thankfully one came in the form of some visual delights, courtesy of this recent purchase.

First published in 1959, this is one of a series of successful books created by Miroslav Sasek about cities of the world.  They may have been designed for younger readers but their charm, wit and contemporaneous detail is universally and timelessly appealing.

I sent myself off on a little search to find up-to-date images of some of the subjects featured in these illustrations.

Have things changed much in nearly 60 years?

It's quite comforting to notice that not everything has.

Perhaps people have changed more...

...or maybe not.

'This Is London' by M Sasek, is available as an updated reprint from Universe Publishing.

Home

On every trip I make to London something small usually happens to me which sticks in my mind, always to do with a stranger. 

The time before last I was just checking my phone at a street corner and an old man made a beeline for me - uh oh - and then started to sing.  Directly to me.   I really didn’t know where to look.  He was serenading, “Everyone is beautiful… in their own way” which I wasn’t sure whether or not to take as a compliment, but he looked a little manic so I just said, “Thank you!” (?!) and then hurried off, my pace quickening as I turned my back on him.  His vocals continued in my direction and I found myself diving into the nearest shop - it could have been a funeral parlour for all I cared at that moment, as long as it got me out of his range.

Last week my brief moment of connection with a stranger was with a young guy who was homeless.  It's something I always find difficult to witness.  It’s not that I’m unfamiliar with walking past human-shaped mounds under blankets in shop doorways or studiously avoiding eye contact with swaying, swarthy street men whose hopelessness is hard to contemplate; sadly it’s something you expect when you visit any large town or city, isn’t it?  This boy, though – he was like someone I might have known.  He reminded me of the young lads I used to work with in an office several years ago.  Like the sort of fresh-faced trainee with whom I’d have shared some banter, or had a chat with at the coffee machine about the previous night’s episode of a sitcom.  Only... his face was no longer that fresh.  But I could tell he was intelligent and personable, and I wondered how come his life had got so messed up.   I realise that when he first approached me I must have automatically given him that defensive “PLEASE DON'T BOTHER ME!” expression - I just know it would have been all over my face, a kind of reflex, and I can’t imagine how it must feel to be on the receiving end of that type of response over and over again.  Anyway he asked me so politely if I had some change to help him pay for his hostel that night, but I knew I only had a handful of coppers in my purse.  “Oh I’ve only got a few coins – I’m a bit embarrassed!” I said as I scooped up the two-pence pieces.  “You’re embarrassed?” he replied, gesturing towards himself as if to say, “Hello-oh!  Don't you realise who you're saying that to?!”  My tactlessness hit me as he went on, not harshly at all, but very genuinely, “How embarrassed do you think I feel, asking you?”  Stupidly, I just hadn’t thought of it like that.  I apologised (and explained that I’d just wanted to give him a more useful amount), and then we chatted briefly and said friendly goodbyes.  On the train back I found it hard to get him out of my mind, more so than I ever have in that kind of situation before.  There was something about him.   I was going home to a safe, warm house on this chilly October night, and he was going… where?   And I’m obviously still thinking about him now, aren't I?  I find it hard to get my head around how relentlessly tough life must be if you're homeless, especially in an English winter.

Mind you, I once knew of a man who actively chose to live outside in all weathers for most of his adult life.  He had a little camp in a copse by the side of a main road in a village not far from my home town.  He'd amassed all sorts of random objects that he’d presumably either found or been given  – toys, bags, old clothes, etc. and decorated his makeshift home amongst the trees with them, the more brightly coloured and shiny the better.  It was a cheery sight - and site.  Somehow he managed to keep himself, and his little dog whom he pushed around in an old pram, alive and well for years.  His hair never went grey and his skin looked like bark.  He walked for miles every day, complete with dog and pram, and always waved to each car that passed him (including mine – it was a pleasure to wave back).  Every Christmas Day he would accept the invitation from one of the locals to join them for a full, festive dinner.  This was the one and only day of the year on which he’d take a bath too, thanks to the loan of their bathroom and some sweet-smelling unguents.  Well into his seventies when he died, he was liked and respected by all who lived in the area, his long life out in the cold no doubt made a little warmer by the kindness of strangers.

Dead of night

So, it’s the 31st October and the temporary signs are up in the local Co-op: ‘No eggs / flour sold to anyone under 16’ while at the same time the shelves are crammed full of tacky over-priced crap which is only valid for use one night a year.  What’s that all about?  Back in my day (oh, here we go…) we just draped old sheets with cut-out eyeholes over ourselves then ate baked potatoes before a game of Murder In The Dark (which I never really understood how to play, to be honest).  We didn’t dare venture outside (for fear of too many real ghosts).  

Today I will venture outside, in fact I am daring to venture down to London, to meet a stranger in a strange place (all in the name of work, you understand) just as dusk falls on the city and its streets no doubt fill with people rushing home from their jobs, perhaps to change into Hallowe’en costumes bought from Tesco.  I just hope I don’t encounter too many of them on the train home.  There’s something special about central London after dark for me, though: ghosts of a different kind.  I still find the city exciting, it's full of nuanced memories and part of me will wish I could extend my visit to have a few drinks and go to see a band maybe, before flopping down on an unfamiliar bed in a high-up hotel room, a parallel world away from my quiet rural existence - but I can't!

Anyway, as a mere nod to the date and hopefully as an antedote to all the crass commercialism surrounding it, here’s a little snippet from one of my favourite old films, Dead Of Night (1945).  If you've never seen it, it's a classy portmanteau style horror comprising five disparate stories, all linked through being experiences or tales told at a gathering by each guest in turn.   And there's a twist ending, of course.  It’s exquisitely English, exquisitely 1940s and exquisitely chilling in the most perfect, understated way. 

Don't be a dummy

London loves, part four

Could you ever give up the trappings of modern life and live in a cabin in the woods?  To be completely honest, I don’t think I could (well, not for long) - but there are certainly times when the idea of it seems very appealing.  I’d miss my home comforts and I’m not sure I’d cope too well with the more hostile aspects of the British climate.  But I could probably manage it in the long bright days and comfortable nights of a balmy Summer, my entertainment provided by drawing, wildlife watching and daily field studies of flora and fauna, isolated from an overcrowded, angry world and liberated from the oppressive worries of contemporary existence.

Anyway, what started me along this train of thought was the latest episode of ‘The Secret History Of Our Streets’ , the BBC2 series I wrote about in a previous post - and again I found it moving and fascinating.  As with all the previous programmes, the characters chosen to talk about their experiences of each street were from a variety of backgrounds but they all shared a great ability to engage with the viewer, and to tell their stories with natural flair.  Wednesday’s ‘Secret History…’ focused on Portland Street, Notting Hill.   While spotlighting different locations, the same themes have recurred throughout every programme so far: the concept of slum clearance, the awful treatment of poorer tenants, the changing characters and/or loss of existing communities, a national obsession with property ownership, and the class divide.   The story of Portland Street encompasses all these things particularly strongly, with its multi-million pound Georgian houses owned by bankers at one end, and its tired-looking council flats and ASBO reputation at the other.  Yet again I found a lot of things about it jaw-dropping, tear-jerking, uplifting and appalling in fairly equal measure.

Perhaps the most heart-warming and surprising revelation came at the very end, and was not about Portland Street itself, but about one of its former residents, Henry Mayhew.  I’d love to find out more about him.  From the programme I learned that he was from an extremely wealthy family, he’d been the owner of one of those multi-million pound houses, and he’d been in finance himself.  However, the more he said, the more my preconceptions of him were eroded.  He spoke with poignancy about the lifelessness of the “posh end” of the street, the grey-faced men with sloping shoulders who lived in the obscenely priced properties, but spent no real time there.  He called it a "dormitory town for the money factory". His acknowledgement of the class divisions and the different types of people who lived at opposite ends came across as reluctantly acceptant and tinged with a shrugging sadness.  He spoke of the way that ordinary taxpayers’ money went into bankers' houses, not the small businesses we thought (?) our financial institutions were investing in (no surprise there, then…) and that many new owners in Notting Hill were wealthy Europeans who simply chose London because it was a tax haven.   His attitude was not so different from that of John, another interviewee, who was by contrast a working class man born in an old house on Portland Street when it was a slum, and had been moved into the council flats.  John bemoaned the fact that the area had changed beyond recognition, “Where d’you go to get a paper or a packet of fags?” he asked, “You can’t even get a pint of milk.”  The old dairy located on the street in his youth is now an exclusive art dealership.  Their experiences were different but Henry and John were both disillusioned.  John now lives in a mobile home in Cornwall, and seems very happy to be there.  And Henry?  Well, Henry moved out of Portland Street too.   In the final scenes of the programme he was chopping wood and behind him was one of those building site cabins.  With a little bit of work to the inside, it was going to be his new home.  A cabin in the woods.  We last saw Henry outside in the clearing, pouring water from a bucket to wash his naked body.  He’s happier now.  Call me daft if you like, but my eyes pricked. 

London loves, part three

I was completely and unexpectedly captivated last night by the first in a new BBC2 series, ‘The Secret History Of Our Streets’. 

It presented some quite touching personal stories of the inevitable way that a community changed in the early 1960s when a new breed of idealistic town planners were inspired by the concept of rebuilding our capital city ‘as a machine’.  According to location and associated affluence (or lack of it), big changes to London's urban landscape were proposed.  Compulsory purchase orders were issued on many houses and entire streets of Victorian terraces declared as slums, leading to their demolition and the relocation of residents to modern estates and new towns.  For some this may have been a very good thing, but for others it clearly wasn’t.  Whatever your political views and opinions, or perhaps personal experiences of such situations, there is no doubt that such extensive measures had a massive impact on close-knit communities, where many families had lived and worked together for generations and then found themselves split up and moved into different areas. 

Archive footage showed young and no doubt ambition-driven representatives from the council being sent to inspect houses and report back on the state of them.  I can’t imagine how humiliating, imposing and surely intimidating that must have been for most residents – to have a judgement cast on the condition of your home by an officious stranger who didn’t live in the area, and for that judgement to have such a potentially irreversible effect on your future.

I expect that, for several families, the opportunity to move out of damp, cramped and insanitary homes into brand new apartments was very welcome, but it seems it wasn’t always the case. The kick in the teeth for some one-time residents of Reginald Road in Deptford, who were surprised when their homes were considered to be slums, is that fifty years later original papers have been unearthed in which the houses were noted as being perfectly fit for human habitation and that any remedial work could have been easily and cheaply done.   But, at the time, these reports and recommendations were ignored.  It was a poignant revelation and a reminder that, in the face of an authority that has already decided its intentions, the ordinary man in the street barely stands a chance.

My parents were born and brought up in East London and were children at the time of World War II, experiencing the trauma of being evacuated during the Blitz and then returning to streets damaged by bombs. I have difficulty relating to how life must have seemed for them - and particularly for my grandparents - with such destruction going on around, so close.  Perhaps, even if only to a very small degree, it was those thoughts that  resonated as I watched last night's programme, particularly the scenes in which the bulldozers turned family homes on Reginald Road into dusty piles of rubble (even when some occupants still refused to leave) - and I felt quite moved by it all.

Anyway, it was a very promising start to the series and I’ll be watching the remaining five episodes with great interest.

Well, it's just such a good song....

Playing along with the art school boys, part two

I was lucky enough to spend a little time recently in some London galleries and museums.  I say lucky because I think of it as a lovely treat to myself, something special - to get to the city and have time to savour a bit of culture.  Whilst wending my way between the exhibits, stopping to “ooh” and “ahh” at some, to be curious and intrigued by others, or simply remain nonplussed at a few, it occurred to me how much I’ve changed since my student days.  Seeing a few clusters of chatty teenagers whose pink hair or unconventionally combined items of clothing screamed out ‘art school trip’ reminded me of my own student group excursions.  We all loved those days out to a place deemed to be of sufficient cultural and educational merit for the tutors to organise a special coach to the Smoke – but not for the right reasons.

Trips to the Barbican, the Tate and the like presented opportunities to do three main things: pose, skive and drink.  We did at least appear well-intentioned on first disembarking the coach, glad to stretch our legs after the dull drive down the M11, having been cramped into the seats of rough textured orange and brown fabric, with flat, matted bits that had resulted from the unsociable chewing-gum-disposal habits of previous occupants.   Stepping into the fresh-diesel air from the stuffy vehicle with its smeary condensation-wet windows, we’d be ushered into whichever exhibition space we were visiting and, at first, it would all be very interesting and exciting.  I have a particularly fond memory of a show at the Hayward in which I was smitten by a mock-up bathroom painted, tiled and kitted out entirely in black (it went with my taste in clothes at the time).   The National Portrait Gallery was appealing too – I’ve never been able to resist looking at and enjoying faces.  But after we’d walked around once and the tutors had disappeared (doubtless to the nearest pub) we had other things on our agenda.  I’m sure I could have learned so much more had I not been as distracted by other attractions but, as they say, youth is wasted on the young.

A trip to the Royal Academy could end up with a wander down the Kings Road, having first bought cans of Skol that would be swigged from as we peeked in the doorways of posh shops we didn’t dare enter.  A morning at the ICA meant an afternoon at HMV and the small, musty-smelling record shops tucked away down nearby back streets.  We ventured tentatively into pubs - classic London dives with large central bars, high ceilings and flock wallpaper, so different from those in our suburban home towns with their copper kettles nestling amongst vases of dust-grey dried flowers.  Some of the nudes we viewed in the metropolis were not just the marble statues or Modigliani models, but the garish photos in Soho shop windows that made us giggle blushingly, and the front covers of magazines which I’m quite sure they never stocked at my local Martins.  Well, I suppose in some ways I did learn a thing or two.

I’d come home not so much with a head full of culture as with a throbbing lager-fuelled ache, a seven inch single in a paper bag, a new T-shirt or earrings and my one concession to the reason for the trip in the first place - a postcard of a Picasso perhaps, from the gallery’s over-priced shop.  The coach journey home was always a far more subdued affair than the outbound drive – the windows misted up with our beery breath this time, as we drowsily added new patches of over-chewed Wrigley’s to the existing ones on the upholstery.  Teenagers, eh?

Anyway, I’m very glad to report that my last trip was a cultural pleasure and made up for all those wasted opportunities.  I came home with a head full of imagery and experiences that educated, inspired and delighted and made me so glad I could go and fill my boots this time in an altogether different way.  I bought a couple of over-priced postcards too – well, you have to, don’t you?  I must say, I don’t really miss the student jolly.  This way was far preferable.

(...life is the art that you make...)

The Sixties soundtrack of our lives, part one

Don’t you sometimes just hear a song and think “this should be in a film”?  I mean the kind of song that brings to mind images of Susannah York - or Michael York for that matter – in the type of movie that is probably set in London or another cosmopolitan city.  Both song and film have to be from the Sixties, ideally.  This is a world of coffee bars with Formica table tops or bowler-hatted men lusting after their dolly-bird secretaries.  Perhaps the scene shows two young lovers walking down a quiet street in early evening, pigeons fly upward as the couple approach them, then our hero and heroine turn a corner and we view them from the back as they disappear into the distance and the closing credits take their place on the screen.  Or maybe the kohl-eyed female lead is leaning out of a window, chintzy net curtains and blonde hair blowing in the breeze, as the camera pans out to the view she sees, of a city full of bustling crowds and red double-decker buses… introducing us to a world we’re going to be immersed in for the next ninety minutes.

Songs which work really well for me which are already in films include the wonderful ‘To Sir With Love’ which just succeeds on so many levels.  Who could fail to be moved by it in some way?  Or how about the superb intro to ‘Up The Junction’…

But other songs are just random singles, lone B-sides or album tracks perhaps, which never did get included in a film score, and I reckon they should have been.  Cue this song from 1968, the B-side to ‘Race With The Devil’ by The Gun.  It’s somewhere in the middle of my imaginary film, and I see a beautiful man, maybe he’s driving along a coastal road in an open-top car, the early morning sun refracted artily on the chrome trim of his MGB.  I don’t know what his story is yet, but it’s sure to be full of surprises, secrets and probably a fair few groovy club scenes.

More make-believe soundtrack songs to follow in future instalments…

British Design 1948 - 2012

My eye was caught recently by news of this exhibition which celebrates over sixty years of classic British design.  The show will feature 300 exhibits, including furniture, ceramics, sculpture, photography, fashion and more  – look out for such classics as Jamie Reid’s ‘God Save The Queen’poster, and art from David Hockney and Henry Moore. A trip to the V&A always strikes me as good value and worth the effort of taking the train down to London, especially if I can combine it with doing something else.  So here’s an early heads-up, if you’re in the area some time this Summer. 

British Design 1948 - 2012 at the V&A
(Runs from 31st March to 12th August)

And this cries out for a little bit of British sixties pop...

Story train

I know lots of people do it every day but, for me, travelling on public transport is a bit of a rarity.  Working from home requires no commuting and living in a rural area means that when I do occasionally go out I use the car.

I had a trip to London yesterday though, so I went by train.  I like train journeys.  I love to absorb the gradually changing landscape as the flat Suffolk fields we travel past become replaced by suburban back gardens and then industrial estates, and just before we are swallowed up by Liverpool Street Station’s gaping mouth we witness the rapidly developing Olympics 2012 site.  I used to like looking out at the old wasteland that preceded it, an unintentional wildlife haven on the edge of the urban chaos, but that’s another story.

I love observing my fellow travellers too.  I find myself wondering what their stories are, and creating some for them myself.

Yesterday a woman got on at my station and she was very, very drunk.  It was 2 in the afternoon.  She had an air of tragedy about her.  With a slur and an apologetic smile she paid for her ticket with pocketfuls of small change all spread out on the counter; it was as if she’d just raided a parking meter. 

She had one of those faces that was probably once very attractive but was now worn-looking beyond her years.  The deep tan (with a reddish tinge) that looked out of place in an English winter had given her skin a leathery finish.  She got on the train and poured a drink from an ordinary vacuum flask, but I could smell spirit rather than coffee.  Then she produced an aerosol fragrance and sprayed herself all over, for what seemed like several minutes.  Her jacket, jeans and trainers all got liberal soakings in something rather floral.  If I’d been sitting any closer I would have too.  When we got to our destination I wasn’t surprised when she got up and left her large bag behind her, realising a few moments later and having to squeeze past everyone else going in the opposite direction, wafting gin and lilies with a hint of stale tobacco over us, her eyes a little glazed and her gait unsteady. 

Her story?  I decided she was a prostitute down on her luck, maybe she’d got all that loose change from begging, or maybe she’d done a few very cheap, ahem, 'jobs' for some quick cash…  But I hope I haven’t done her a disservice and I do hope she was ok.

Halfway through the journey we go through some typical Essex towns.  I can’t quite figure out how Essex’s much-parodied stereotypes became real and why they are so prevalent.  Is it just that fashions and tastes catch on quickly in some communities and then nobody wants to be seen as the odd one out? Or is it that, if you like those particular stereotypical things you naturally gravitate there and that vision of Estuary Englishness is perpetuated? Anyway, if I had needed proof that the only way in Essex is the Essex way, I simply had to notice the passengers that got on at Romford.  Every female seemed to be bottle-blonde.  (This is not meant to be a put-down, just one of those observations that jumps out at you.)  One in her twenties sat near me and was talking on her mobile phone. “No way!  I can’t believe it!” she exclaimed to her friend on the other end.  “Kelly’s had botox?  OMG!  I can’t believe Kel’s had botox… “  I felt slightly reassured by her reaction to the botox revelation.  But then came the unexpected punchline: “But she’s a dying woman…”   There was clearly a story there too, but I didn’t really want to make it up.

I was cheered up soon after by the sight of five young Elvises.  Well, I mean five lads dressed in full Elvis attire with big black wigs and mirror Aviator shades. Just one would have been eye-catching - five was surreal. I started to wonder what the collective noun for a group of Elvises might be.  When I put this to the friend I met with later, explaining that they’d all gone for the white-jumpsuit-and-rhinestone-belt look, the perfect answer came back:  why, a Vegas of Elvises.  Of  course!  I trust they enjoyed the Elvis themed party they must have been going to; it didn’t take much imagination to work out that story.

London loves, part two

I don’t know what you think of Lulu….but then, actually, I don’t know what I think of Lulu either...   She’s one of those people I feel strangely ambivalent about. It’s like:  feisty young teen singer (check out her version of ‘Can’t Hear You No More’): cool. Eurovision winner with ‘Boom Bang A Bang’: uncool.  The voice behind the wonderful ‘To Sir With Love’: cool.  Being a supporter of Thatcher’s Tory party during the early ‘80s: uncool.  Staying incredibly youthful for her age: cool.  Too much Botox and/or fillers or something?: uncool…Getting machine-gunned, Peckinpah style, in ‘French and Saunders’: cool, etc. etc.  Oh, I’m SO confused!

I do know what I think about this song clip, though, and it’s a bit of a guilty pleasure.  I know, it strays into schmaltz balladry which is not my usual cup of tea, but it doesn’t seem to matter as I just can’t help but like it.  What does it for me though is this film, as Lulu sings her heart out against the backdrop of the Thames from the Embankment, and each time I view it I feel like I’m there too.  I can watch it again and again and imagine I’m walking by, leaning over the wall to watch the boats, or sitting on that bench.  I know it’s not quite like that in reality nowadays – the pavement is usually crammed with people and the traffic heavier. Lulu would probably have difficulty even trying to lip synch with lungs choked by the diesel fumes.  But next time I’m there I’m going to imagine the street is empty and I’ll sing “oh me, oh my, I’m a fool for you, baby…” quietly to myself as those long shadows stretch out across the paving stones, leaves whisper in the trees in a cool breeze and there’s not a piece of litter in sight.  Luckily for me I do have quite a vivid imagination…

Oh me, oh my!  Even that wide-collared yellow jacket and red flares don’t put me off.

I must get to the city again some time soon!

London loves, part one

I’ve been thinking about London a lot lately.  I haven’t lived there for any length of time that counts, only in an outer north eastern corner of it for the first three years of my life, about which I remember very little.  Oh, apart from a rather bloody incident involving the back of my head and a brick, from which just the memory and a faint scar on my scalp have remained.  (The moral of that tale is: toddlers, do not play games pretending to be a naughty child who won’t go to bed in which you and your friends use house-bricks for pillows). 

I was born in the London Hospital at Whitechapel, a big, rambling building with centuries of history, once home to Joseph Merrick, the Elephant Man, and (perhaps apocryphally) within the sound of Bow Bells, which apparently makes me a Cockney.  You won’t find me down the rub-a-dub rabbiting with the Pearly Queen about jellied eels, though… my family relocated to the sticks before I was four.   London, however, can still make me feel childlike in some ways as it holds a degree of magical appeal.   For me it’s a bit like a fairytale mixture of good, bad and ugly, as well as sometimes very beautiful: a place of contrasts.  Whenever I step off the train into Liverpool Street Station, where flocks of people in dark suits dash about purposefully in all directions like hungry starlings, I feel like I’m entering another world.  A metaphorical world of secret rooms in high towers, deep dark caves, scary ogres and charming princes, not to mention the genuine palaces, a real-life castle and some very much alive-and-kicking rats in underground tunnels.  I find our capital slightly unsettling at times yet often thrilling, full of people and things with the potential to fascinate, horrify, annoy or beguile me; it is big and different and legendary.  I know, it’s just a city – but it is an inspiring one.  And it is its legendary aspect that inspired this little magazine called One Eye Grey, ‘a penny dreadful for the 21^st century’.

Each edition of this pocket-sized publication is a spine-tingling collection of pieces based on traditional folktales, ghost stories and a sprinkling of urban legend, but what makes them so uniquely appealing is that they are retold in the context of modern London.   In the first three issues the stories, all written by the magazine’s creator Chris Roberts, are skilfully linked through a main character and his group of friends and this provides a sub-plot which enriches each individual tale very satisfyingly.  In subsequent volumes, discrete stories have been contributed by a number of different writers, but all are evocative and chilling enough.  I’ve long been a fan of a good scary story – adolescent memories of reading what seemed like an endless number of volumes of the Pan Book Of Horror are lodged deep within my psyche – so reading about apparitions, shape-shifters, witches and metamorphosing rodents is appealing.  But what enhances One Eye Grey is the contemporary setting, the more adult approach and content (some nice juicy helpings of sex, violence and modern slang) - and London.  I want to read each story and visit every associated location, then scare the pants off myself, not just by the price of a London pint but with imaginings of a shadowy female figure on Maiden Lane or the giant rat with eyes of different colours (the eponymous One Eye Grey) lurking near Cannon Street Railway Bridge.  These often specific geographical references make each account more vivid and help satisfy a teasing desire to believe in them.

If you want to scare the pants off yourself too, One Eye Grey is available from http://www.fandmpublications.co.uk/pages/pennydreadfulevents.htm

Unsurprisingly, I’m going to conclude this post with a London-themed song - I know it's obvious, and there are too many good ones to choose from! - but this could be the first of a few.