Southeastern by Jason Isbell

The first half of 2013 hasn't seemed a classic year for music. I have attended fewer concerts and bought a smaller number of albums. Those I have bought seem less appealing than earlier offerings by the same artists.

The summer picked up with the Bruce Springsteen concert at Wembley, but in terms of new releases nothing has come close to Southeastern by Jason Isbell.
Previously I suggested that Jason's London concert in the Boogaloo in Highgate was the best gig I'd been to in 2012, therefore it was no surprise that I eagerly awaited the new album.

Having waited in anticipation, I discovered the European release date was being put back to autumn, the solution was buying a copy on import. Fortunately vis twitter I found a copy will to send a copy to the Uk with the added bonus that the lyrics insert was signed by Jason himself.

Jason's has developed as a songwriter since his time in DBT. The last studio album was strong both lyrically and in its musical direction, however Southeastern seems to cement his place as one of the most gifted songwriters of his generation.

His well documented  giving up alcohol and relationship & marriage to Amanda Shires  might have weakened many less talented wordsmiths, but Jason seems to use his personal experiences to anchor songs that are not necessarily autobiographical but relate to his life changes.



Tracks such as Stockholm, Living Oak,Different Days and the closing Relatively Easy suggest that this is likely to feature when I'm asked to vote for "Album of the Year" in a few months time. So glad that we have tickets when Jason play London at the end of August.


http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/18283-jason-isbell-southeastern/

Halfway through the Cricket Season

 July is coming to an end andit's a chance to review the cricket I've seen so far this season. It's been a mixed bag. Early season we almost succumbed to frost bite at the Oval. Determined to be there for the first day of the season, we spent more time buying tea from the new tea bar in the pavilion than watching Surrey's new captain imported from South Africa, Graeme Smith.

Smith in fairness didn't last long at the crease and in fact his stay in the country was soon cut short by an ankle injury. The county championship soon gave way to YB40 games,a new year, a new sponsor.  In recent seasons Surrey have had success in this form of the game, culminating in victory in the Lords final in 2011. Eighteen months on, finals seemed a long way away. That side has been dismantled for the number of reasons, the seasoned journeymen who have been introduced are struggling to find consistency.

The two individual highlights for the Rey have been a rare appearance by Kevin Pietersen, returning from injury, who plundered the Yorkshire attack at Headingley before returning to England duty, and finally a remarkable innings from Ricky Ponting, preventing defeat and ensuring that the former Australian skipper scored 179 not out in his final first class innings.

June saw us visit Lords for the Saturday of the test match v New Zealand and gave us an opportunity to see a fine knock from emerging star Joe Root and another impressive bowling spell from Jimmy Anderson. It's been a good two months for winning prizes and competitions. We won two tickets to Northants v Warwickshire at the County Ground,Northampton. Having been there a couple of times now I must say how enjoyable cricket is there. It is such a friendly club, very welcoming, and of course watching there allows the chance to keep up with the career of Matt Spriegel , former Surrey player who sadly felt he needed to move to get the chance to play county cricket at the end of the 2012 season.

We won two tickets to a YB40 game at Chelmsford and my son and I naturally chose the game v Surrey.Schoolboy error. I'm beginning to despair at Surrey's performance at Chelmsford, but hopefully we can salvage something in the T20 competition at the end of this month.

The first half of the season finally saw Surrey dismiss Chris Adams as coach; like many I felt Adams should have resigned at the end of last season for all too obvious reasons. Alec Stewart is now overseeing cricket at the Oval, and all fans know that Alec is Surrey through and through. No player needs to doubt his knowledge or commitment.

The T20 games have been a mixed bag , without doubt the highlight has been completing the double in El Clasico against Middlesex. At the Oval the game couldn't have been more even with Surrey winning on the final ball of the game.
We bought tickets at Lords and had no idea that the Rey would produce perhaps either finest display of the first half of the season in front of 28,000 spectators, the largest crowd ever to watch a T20 game in London. Surrey defeated the old foe by 92 runs, and in doing so all but guaranteeing progression into the quarter finals.

Finally we went to Wormsley in Buckinghamshire to see Old England v Old Australia in a game funded by Wolf Blass. A wonderful, a warm day and good cricket to entertain the 2000 guests.

At the time of writing England are 2-0 up in the Ashes tests, gates for the T20 tournament are at an all time high, with many games selling out. It's amazing what a successful team and good weather will do.

Green Essex 2013

In the county council elections held in early May, the Green Party captured its first seats on Essex County Council. There was no great secret as to why James Abbott and Michael Hoy were successful in taking seats in Witham and Rochford, the answer was consistent hard graft over a number of years.

The final make-up of Essex County Council is as follows:Conservative 42 seats

• Liberal Democrat 9 seats
• Labour 9 seats
• UKIP 9 seats
• Green Party 2 seats
• Tendring First 1 seat
• Independent 1 seat
• Independent Loughton Residents Association 1 seat
• Canvey Independent Party 1 seat.

The "targetting to win" strategy worked in that the party now has representatives in County Hall.  The advantage of county council elections is that there is no deposit to find, unlike in general elections, and this enable the party to field candidates in the vast majority of districts in Essex.

In Brentwood we had to field candidates who had little contact with the borough, and finance and targetting meant that no leafletting or canvassing was possible. Across the whole of the borough the party collected 500 votes (the overall turnout , 27.6%,was disappointing across the county). The 500 were fairly evenly spread across the four districts :

Brentwood Hutton 152
Brentwood North 116
Brentwood Rural 126
Brentwood South 106

It leaves us to decide what areas to focus on in preparation for the Euro-Elections and Borough elections scheduled for May 2014

In the darkness on the edge of town

Bruce Springsteen at Wembley

Bruce had played Wembley before, most notably during the Born in the USa tour of 1985, however this was his first gig since the stadium was rebuilt some years ago. It says much of his enduring popularity that after 80,000 plus here tonight ( Saturday 15th June), he's returning to play in the Olympic Park in just a fortnight.

After a few memorable tracks, I remember Radio Nowhere most vividly, Bruce played Badlands and then told the audience that he could continue to take requests, or alternatively the band could play the entire Darkness on the Edge of Town album. The reaction of the crowd ensured that we'd get the chance to hear the whole of the album released back in 1978.

In many ways looking back on Bruce's career, "Darkness" seems a seminal album, where he matured significantly, the optimism that is exhibited in Born to Run seems to have been replaced by the reality of a working life in "Darkness"
Where the author can no longer permanently run, instead he needs to take his chance for temporary escape as shown in Racing in the Street. The reality of life ahead is shown in "Factory" and although he still believes in the "Promised Land", there is a feeling that hope is tempered with what he sees all around him.

The whole evening was wonderful. I realise that every time I see Bruce I leave thinking that it was possibly the best concert I've ever seen him perform, however Wembley 2013 was special, yes it was part of the Wrecking Ball tour that seems to have yoyoed across the world for over the past year, but it was the chance to hear such an important album performed live by an artist who never disappoints.

 

The day after the concert this review appear in the UK press and it seemed to sum up the concert so well I've decided to use the link:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/bruce-springsteen/10123300/Bruce-Springsteen-Wembley-Stadium-review.html

Somewhere between anguish and acceptance

" So much has happened to me that I don't understand"

(Bruce Springsteen - Walk like a man)

The last three months have been been dominated by the personal, matters that I rarely write about. Having reached sixty earlier this year , perhaps you begin to appreciate that you are in all probability at least three quarters through life. You want to look forward but somehow you keep glancing back. As someone who rarely experiences ill health having a burst abdominal cyst knocked me sideways and left me feeling drained for more than six weeks. Some ten years ago following a shoulder injury a surgeon told me that I was trying to get a 50 year old body to perform like a 30 year old model, well for the first time I struggled to recover quickly and the infection dragged on.

This coincided with a sharp and quite sudden deterioration in my mother's health.
I always felt that I had sympathy and empathy with people experiencing mental health problems. However I felt and still feel ill prepared to cope with my mother's dementia, witnessing a close relation changing on a weekly basis, become less and less rational and more and more distant.

At the same time my grandson had his first birthday; in recent months I've experienced his progress up to the point a couple of weeks back when he walked unaided across our garden. Here I saw one family member learning new skills,developing visibly week by week, whilst at the same time I 've witnessed another member losing the ability to do what my grandson has just achieved.

In June my son got married, a wonderful day, I couldn't be happier for him, now both my children have moved onto the next phase of life, perhaps that also made me more aware that life is moving fast, and that now wasn't the time to pass up opportunities.

It reminds me of a song on the latest Patterson Hood album  where he talks of changing the old guard to the new, with the parting line of somewhere between anguish and acceptance. Those words anguish and acceptance sum up my mood, and prompted me to return to the blog, the next few posts will allow me to focus on other areas of life.