Hello!
I have a few dates coming up in March in Italy, and one in Switzerland:
10/03/10 : Usine (Kab) – Geneva
11/03/10 : Spazio 211 – Turin
12/03/10 : Init – Rome
13/03/10 : Centro Stabile di Cultura – San Vito di Leguzzano
All shows are supporting the great Githead. Speaking of which, here’s a South Bank Show episode on Scanner:
Wrote a song in my head today
Pushed two cars up a hill
Over shopping.
So, as is the current trend, I was asked for my ten favourite records of the decade for raggedwords.com. The link for the list, which includes a few thoughts of mine on each choice, is here.
Also the site has some more top-of-the-decade lists from other great artists like Tune-Yards and A Hawk And A Hacksaw.
In other news, probably a bit more touring come March. Will let you have more details as they come through.
Have a good new year ok?
Marklandx.
Liz and I got back yesterday from a week’s tour with Great Lake Swimmers around the country (and Ireland). It was a lot of fun and somewhat rewarding, especially as we rearranged the songs in a way I hadn’t done before, and did a couple of songs we hadn’t played live before. New experiences all round. Plus Great Lake Swimmers are great folks. If you came and saw, I hope you enjoyed. If you didn’t make it, maybe see you next time?
I played a live acoustic session on Bob Harris’s BBC Radio 2 show on Saturday evening, confusingly with Gideon Coe (although he was a nice man, so no harm done). For reasons I won’t go into here I’ve always preferred to go electric, but this particular occasion went well at least. Anyway, you can listen to it via the BBC iPlayer here until this coming Saturday.
I just noticed that I drafted the following as a blog post back in January, but never posted it. It was a draft of writing that became part of something else. I thought I’d post it now since it was just sitting there…..
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Setting out as morning comes again; every day, so many times we never see you anymore. But, oh, this is what you leave us with – the coast at your cheek, a Norfolk maze (the name of which I forget now), the bones of lost towns lay before your gaze.
And lights flicker out before the rising sun. There you will see them (following the meridian), they’re rising from the bones, from sleep, everyday… something about that anyway – I’m sorry, the details drip away, and over time we have remembered less, and even less.
And so you’re setting out. We never see you, but ever further down the coast you describe for us. Is your goal in other places? Or another time?
Every day, so many times, we never see you anymore. But, oh, this is what you leave us with – these old memories in stories, the hearts of which I forget now. But over time you still provide light impressions of the rising sun.
This is how we see you. With a smile, I will forget. You will forget me too.
I forgot to mention it at the time, but a few months ago one of my songs, ‘Rings of Saturn’, was used in a new piece of video art called ‘The First Studio Visit’ by the artist Ryan Gander for an exhibition at Villa Arson gallery in Nice, France, which ran until last week I believe. The exhibition was called The Die is Cast and exhibited old and new works by the artist. I’m a big big big fan of Ryan Gander’s artwork and could listen to him talk on the subject (which he’s done on numerous public occasions) all day long, so it was an honour for my stuff to be included in his stuff. I was just reminded of this occurrence now and thought I’d share.
That is all.
'Missing object' by Ryan Gander
In the Gardens of the North came out in Australia and New Zealand this week! Thanks to the guys at Etch’n'Sketch for that.
In other news, the London date with Great Lake Swimmers has moved to the Jazz Cafe in Camden. That’s on the 18th November.
Also, if you have the chance to see Francois and the Atlas Mountains on tour (which they are on at the moment), please do! His new songs (album and EP) are amazing and the live show is super, super fun.
Here’s his new video:
