Writing While Moving

 I’m am slightly in awe of the way we are becoming a TV watching proletariat. Though that’s a discussion for another time. I decided to see if I could do a blog post as I walked and this is the result. I hope my edits manage to make it readable

One of the problems with writing, walking, doing things they always take time.I was just wondering that out on my morning walk could I actually record this and use phone and Google Docs to record my thoughts.

I'm not sure if I can do paragraphs or how to actually make breaks but anyway this is going to be a stream of text which I can then take apart when I actually get home and you know so that we can actually see if this actually works.

I do write about music and that is a big part of my life. When the lock down hit last February or whenever I suddenly spent a lot of time and listening to 6 Music listening to radio and hearing what they had to play and share.

The I also you realised that my CD collection is too big. I mean I've ripped most of it to my network but when CDs are in boxes or even worse in an attic then you may as well just get rid. I've actually got a pile that I've for sale on Discogs now .I'm not looking for money as such, more just to make space ,and as I say, I've got a lot of boxes of CDs but what then happened is that whilst I listened to stuff through my Kindle fire and speaker system, I realised that my radio also had a CD player so I thought well I will listen to some of these CDs I've got for sale because it's very close, while I work.

Then I thought you know so even the ones I have on saleI will listen to those as well and it's progressed so that I spend my working day listening to music on CD.

A lot of people have actually said oh well you're not with the times. You should be using Spotify or a streaming service and yeah I can stream on YouTube or whatever the odd one, there are full albums on there they do get taken down.

I now listen to my CD collection as it  is very convenient and as I say I have lots of CD box sets and I do believe that my purchase of CDs a lot of the time it was more about supporting the artist then actually getting the CD and you know I've not listened to lots of my music.

I probably I have hundreds of thousands of tracks and I know this from ripping them to my digital store. I've also bought albums from Bandcamp recently by Edward II and Jordan Reyne because Spotify does not support artists. Spotify is flawed because there are a few people making a lot of money from it and artists not the ones. If you're an artist trying to break through you are not really going to make all that money you can't. I tried it and I got paid 0.00001 didn't get paid anything because he was too small to pay but basically Spotify make a lot of money.

A couple of years ago daft punk's random access memory what's the biggest selling album and biggest streamed album of the year and they got paid £13,000 . When you can see that the people in Spotify are all millionaires making millions from this it's not the artist who's getting the money.

I'm told that I'm behind the times and I should have a Spotify account and you can get it free with advertising whatever but it's a very bad model for the artists.

The model does not encourage new music.It’s alright it's just using what's there and if there was no new music produced ever Spotify would still go on it would be ok.It would still make money because shall we say the market the market has now got so much music.

 I mean we've got music from a couple of centuries and even just normal popular pop music is like 70 years of Music so Spotify has this huge amount of music for people to actually stream and listen as and when they want and it's convenience but I once actually said that CD was the McDonaldisation of music by its convenience you can actually skip tracks sequence tracks in the order you want make playlists.

The move to mp3 and digital even made that's more convenient and Spotify you don't even have to o that you just let Spotify choose what you want to hear and you know it's a perfect medium for people to actually or the corporations to decide what you want to listen to.

When I was with EE the streaming service was Deezer and I saw an advertisement for it and it was just it just chooses exactly what I want to hear no it doesn't it chooses what it thinks you should hear and that is my problem

I see Amazon suggestions and old you bought this so you might want to buy this which force you to actually do it like listen to it and decide it's not what I want or he might listen to it in here something and decide yeah if it's what I want but you know side of my preferred way is you know when I listen to the radio or walk into a record shop and hear something and think what the hell's that .

Luckily these days with digital radio you can find out what you actually playing with online lists or it shows you on the actual DAB player and the DJ usually tells you.

When I was a teenager when you heard something and then the DJ didn't say who it was or it because they said at the beginning of the song in you came in like 20 seconds in then you know it was a little more difficult and that happened so many times with me where I heard things and I'm going like what the hell is that you know.

Today we've got you got things like Shazam which will recognise music most of the time so you know and then you should have it and then you can actually get it from wherever so there is no need for it for my old site apart from a legacy thing where people wanted to hear know what the music was so many years ago and such an advert you know but again it's just like people who want that it's so few now that the sites not worth maintaining all I've got it on Facebook and if I see a decent advert I will put it on there because the advert will be on YouTube and it's it is one of those things that even with adverts these days there are very few that are worth noting and again if you want music on your device then you got it

So the first song that made me start the Song of The Salesman site was a Guinness advert that used “Burke’s Law” by Prince Buster so I will signoff with that. Though I can’t find it so we will share “Guaglione” by Pérez Prado with the fabulous Dancing Man advert.

This has been mostly spoken into my phone and recorded by Google Docs so I will blame that for all my mistakes.

Good Morning

The other day was one of those hideous morning when I got woken up my my alarm clock. I know that is the point of the alarm clock , but I have never figured out how to snooze it , so when the alarm goes off I know I have to get up. Although I have also observed that the alarm actually stops after a while then restarts after five minutes. I like waking up and knowing i hamaybe forty minutes before the alarm allowing me a gradual waking , but the other morning it wasn't to be.

The good thing about being woken by my alarm is that I must have had a good night's sleep, undisturbed by anything and though I had to drag myself up , I knew that I had benefitted from the rest. I would hate to be awake throughout the night and when the alarm went off having to drag a tired ad reluctant body towards the shower despite the physical protests and desire to just stay in bed.

Todays' music has been mostly Jefferson Airplane's first five albums, Edward II's "Dancing Tunes" and some Continental Quilts . Follow the links to the artist's Bandcamp areas. All worthy listens , and was particularly impressed with "Surrealistic Pillow" which contains "White Rabbit" , "You're My Best Friend" . "Somebody To Love" and I will share the wonderful acoustic "Embryonic Journey" , which I loved when I first heard it many moons ago.

Y5G?

We are continually being sold 5G by every mobile phone network, but seriously who actually needs it? Yes it's faster but it's like telling your average punter that they need an HGV or Formula 1 Racing Car to get about. I'm not dissing 5G , and I can see that it can have many applications, but I remember streaming movies on 3G and 4G is generally more than adequate for all my needs. If my broadband is off I can use my 4G signal with no problem.

I can see possibly that when you are 5G you can stream very high definition movies but if you are watching on a phone or computer will you get any benefit from that?  Obviously your data usage will shoot through the roof but maube that's what the mobile phone companies are looking at.

The ads will tell you  you can download a movie or album in seconds, but given the amount who streaming platforms who is going to be downloading anything. I use Netflix, Amazon Prime , BBC iPlayer , All4 and lots of others to watch things on my 40" television , and I recently purchased "Dancing Tunes" by Edward II and "Chapter Zero" by Jordan Reyne from Bandcamp and downloaded them via my broadband , but 4G would have been fine. 

By the way a lot of Bandcamp artists make music available free such as the song "Dancing Girls" by Dead Eyes Opened (great goth band) or on pay what you want so a great source of music worth supporting if you can.

So given that I started on 5G and finished on Bandcamp here's "The Banana Boat Song" from "Dancing Tunes" by Edward II , it is a totally joyful album and if you can get a signal you can stream it over 3G, 4G or 5G.

They Can Look Good

When CD came along we were persuaded by the pristine sound and their supposed longevity, but this was what I called the MCDonaldisation of music (Check here and here). You could skip tracks , skim through an album , play it in a different order using remotes and programming.  The jewel case was homogenous and meant that if it got damaged then it was easily replaceable. So CDs have become generally homogenised and don't really stand out.

However there are exceptions such as the reissue of Lift To Experience's "Texas Jerusalem Crossroads" and Edward II's "Manchester's Improving Daily" both wonderfully packaged the latter containing a book about the Broadside Songs featured in the body of the album.

"Texas Jerusalem Crossroads" is one of those albums that is like nothing you have ever heard before or since.

Rhino Records have done an original album series which features five albums in cardboard replica album sleeves often for under a tenner, but these are a joy to look at as well as play.

Retrospective compilations are often superbly put together, possibly my ultimate possession being the Elektra "Forever Changing" box which , as well as five CDs contains a book and album covers, photos and memorabilia some bits of which you can see here. This was originally priced at £150 but I picked it up for £40 from RPM in Newcastle.

So I am going to share "A Humorous And Interesting Dialogue" by Edward II for the "Manchester's Improving Daily" album used for a support the NHS video under Cameron's Tories.

Just Smile ... You Know It Makes Sense

Over the past couple of days I've noticed a lot of smiles and a lot of glum faces. The people are all in similar situations. I don't know what their situations are but I find even (and maybe especially ) when things are not good a smile makes YOU feel better and it becomes contagious. Generally if you smile and someone , they will smile back at you and you will both end up feeling better.

I know I've written about this lots in the past and I may be repeating myself and you may read this and thing "Oh No he's going on about smiling and being happy AGAIN!". I make no apologies.

I know there are people who are only happy when they are miserable (often centred on Manchester .... only joking) , but it makes me feel much better when people are happy, so maybe I'm being more than a little selfish,

Beautiful

Just a thought one of my favourite albums of the moment is Manchester's Improving Daily by Edward II  , and it really is one of the most beautifully produced albums I've seen in my life. It retails at the same price as any other CD but when I got it delivered the package was secured by sealing wax and you can see what it looks like on one of my Instagram Posts here. It really is a beautiful package so I will use a song from it "A Humorous and Interesting Dialogue" that was used in support of the NHS.

But the weekend is almost over , so if you are with someone smile , and if you are going to work tomorrow , smile, and your day will be much much better.

Every smile you give , you will get back in spades. Enjoy my friends.