Catching The Eight 30

ja

wouldnt mind a soaking to fish a river like the kennet, though here the huisne could do with a roving by the likes of you and that perfection. you might get to take the same picture again, plenty of undiscovered chub under the parsnips. i'd coached mike walker in the art of pursuading you over here with talk of carp like pumpkins, but your tea kettles and bread punches must've gone to his head, or you spotted the hook. cant get bob on a boat neither. ten years of tea and lies and postal orders but the nearest he's got is a passport form which he's rolled his boilies on the last 5 yrs in any case. so your leave is really cancelled? well if it means the london book will get to print, then i'll put up with empty rodrests in the swim next door come november on walker's pitch. your waterlog "white house" article, and all your london gospels, is enough to stop the olympics. bob's right when he says you're the only contributor to waterlog who's doing anything important. the rest of them are just your tributaries flowing in all directions. your london book will turn even sinclair and ackroyd into lost becks disappearing down a thames sewage gully.
work has had me in snags all week. 7 days between outings, watching the rain dribble down the window, going outside like getting a slap with a wet cloth. by thursday, all fighting waterproofs wounded and down to the reserves, i found myself doing battle again. completely ambushed by a delivery of stair rods early afternoon, laure phoned with a get-out clause: could i drop her sproggs at the nogent swimmer and she'd pick em up later. well, if they wanted to get wet twice... the carp rods were still in the back of the vehicle, so in the downpour i left them there, squeezed the kids round the fishy pong and dropped them off. by rights i should've driven home again, but "the rods were with me". the way home goes past the gravel pit. my baits were rotton from the week before, the windscreen was a bathescope, but i'd left the logic at home. short shopping detour, a bag of frolic from leclerc to bait up with, and a little zip up case for my new digital camera, and i parked up beside the church and walked the mile round the pit in my t-shirt: best to keep the dry clothes in the rucksack for later. low-down anti-gypsy barrier means i cant get the land rover into the lane anymore, let alone down to the carpark; nearest slot's beside the church, an extra 400 yards walk.
fucking sick of waterproofs that melt like pva, and pva more water resistant than my army poncho. set the rods up squelching, then stood like a marsh duck till the five o'clock downpour began to ease off around 8. till then the morale was no fitter for the purpose than the pva. i put the dry clothes on, born-again, running on instinct at least. for 3 seasons i'd seen a good fish top in the same place 20yrds out, always the first up of an evening, always about 8 o clock. saved up this swim till i needed it, and today seemed right to put a bait there. i was just doing the settings on the camera when the run came at 8.30. 35lb mirror. didnt jump this time:



lit the stove too that night, but not for the first time. all the summer's corks long burnt and up in smoke through stove-pipe hat, the summer of rhumatics and trench foot and carp blowing water spouts like whales one over the plimsol line. i must've caught that carp as it was putting it's clock forward, half way through its tail turning orange.
it's the time of year too when i have to bushwhack into my caravan, the vegetation up & over, way into row F:



feel like a castaway in the wind in the willows myself, till the first cold snap will me unpacking the moleskin long johns and the weasel fur mittens.

goretex gift voucher on the birdtable

dp

Wind In The Willows

dp

parsnips on the bird table - dig for victory. every car boot here is like a harvest festival. deformed roots and cans of baked beans left by the altar. a feast in a time of famine. lost time, lost fish, the theme of the season so far. having bumped that common at bushy i went to the wasing estate on the kennet as a guest of roy, who has a weakness for good floats and a nose for barbel. never fished that stretch of the kennet before. what a contrast to bushy, a private estate rather than a public park, a wildwood with downed trees, reed beds, water meadows and moss covered bridges. no sawdust specimen hunters here, just the wind in the leaves. the river twice the width of the loddon with half the depth in places. didn't know whether to trot for dace, or weedle out chub with breadflake and lobs. went for the chub and lost a good 'un in the tree roots. then i lost the afternoon as the rain came down in a deluge. put up my b james kennet perfection, a john richardson avon and managed a perch, my first fish of the season, only a few ounces but celebrated nonetheless. in the swim with the fallen tree, then a chub no bigger than my little finger, a fat headed circus freak gudgeon that swallowed a lob and after that a couple more perch. it rained and rained and rained. a few claps of thunder. roy had a barbel and lost another. the river came up by a foot and by the time we left in the gloom the track was flooded. corsa just made it through and i never wanted a land rover so much in my life. a pint in the pub by the railway crossing and then the drive back into town. took three days for my gear to dry out.

mick walker came to the stall yesterday for a cuppa - good to meet him, he was trying to persuade me to get on the ferry but i've got pieces to write and an autumn of auctions. not to mention the london book. reading sinclair's edge of the orison, 'in 1841 the poet john clare fled an asylum in epping forest and walked eighty miles to his home in northborough. he was searching for his lost love, mary joyce - a woman three years dead.' the new victorian big emptiness. just like bushy park once the holidays are over and the carp's fins are turning orange. tell bob to look out for the stove pipe hat. northerlies for three days here, first fire of the autumn last night and august isn't out, old coal and the summer's corks.

phoenix on the birdtable

ja

Napoleon's Eyewash

ja

the last week has disappeared like an old master under new daubs, a clean sweep like your long shingle beaches. in other words, lost time, lost photos, lost fish. from your ballad of the back-roads i can't believe our bumpers didn't cross. except for the mackeral, we were in the same kind of land-warp. 2 friday teatimes ago me and laure took off for the loire on impulse, packing the streamlined version of the 4-day kit: tent, rods, box of matches and a corkscrew. we made beaugency by 8 under skies like a mafia thug's windscreen. the loire was high and belting and we pitched our tent on the embankment ridge and drank napoleon's eyewash from a green bottle. the next 3 days we navigated the dead arm of the loire, a basket weavers dream, a wadi of whicker saplings and ridged tracks where only land rovers dare to tread. we bucked in low box for miles alongside a wild river still running at spring levels. chub who haven't seen a fishing box since genevoix's day and carp rolling mid-stream who've never even seen a chub.



we chilled the wine in the landing net and laure gathered driftwood and built the fire in a rondel of stones. she sharpened roasting sticks from saplings and we ate grilled sausages and baked spuds. the sun came out and bomber harris spotted the smoke and sent faith, hope & charity in jospehine's montgolfiers as i trotted for dace in an evening feed.




came home to cold rain and dropping temperatures, the pit carp on autumn pay, only turning up for piece work on night shift now. took a hit-and-hold leather from under the trees on penelope pit in a big wind the other night, but blanked on the town pit after running into fellow poachers at midnight, fording the margins with buckets and nets, crayfish mafia as suprised to see me as i was to see them. a man and his 2 sons, an upbringing to save the world from your cider mutants. we swapped notes and passed like herons in the night back to our business. there were carp shelling the margins like lazy artillary from the ridge, but nothing on target.
still on photographic ration pack: the good camera turned up 3rd time lucky off ebay but with the wrong battery. former good one came back from kid's summer camp broken beyond repair, and the cheap substitute which took the above is no more: it went for 10 euros at a boot sale in the rain. i'll be sending in sketches of my fish, chalk outlines on the murder mat.

first parsnips on the bird table

dp

Nelson's Blood

dp

poacher's pond looks a goer, well worth getting on a lysander but don't wait for me, get in the reeds and get the eels in. i could be over in the autumn but the big push might be in the spring. must be a few wildies laid up in the silt, too. perfect for corn on a size six. after bushy park i took flight up the A11 to north norfolk, big skies, wide marshes, long shingle beaches and ancient oak woods. village after village with one pub and a pond full of crucians. bookshops and barrels of ale. grass growing down the middle of the road, colonies of sparrows. stayed for three days and mapped estate lakes for the winter, climbing red brick walls and taking the back roads. yellow corn fields against black skies, thunder storms on the beach, driftwood fires and mackerel boiled in a bucket. drank nelson's blood in burnham thorpe, then to the beach at cley in the dusk to take mackerel on a single spoon, the sniper's supper, the one eyed admiral's feast.

lady hamilton on the birdtable

ja

Max Roach, January 10th 1924 - August 16th 2007

The Mighty are falling, and you gotta pay your respects, even if we are reading more like Caught By The Reaper of late.
No words, just music. This is the one I’ll be playing today….



Down in Cornwall at the moment. Got two days on old china clay pits tomorrow and Monday. Old boy swears the Perch go 4 plus. Out for lobs tonight, will report back.

Tony Wilson, Factory, Manchester

very sad news this.

I was told of Tony’s passing on Friday night and he’s hardly left my thoughts since.

It wasn’t a surprise, he had been ill for sometime and I was told recently that he was coming to the end. Still shocked me mind.

I knew Tony and I liked him very much. I worked for him for a while. I had a company called “Capersville” that handled press for bands and labels. We looked after Factory from mid '88 - 1992, starting with the Mondays best album “Bummed” , then New Orders best “Technique”. It was a great job. To be in Manchester so much at such a very special time for the city was a real buzz especially as I was hanging out with a lot of the folks who had made it happen.

I’d known about Factory since their first record was released, A Factory Sampler in 1978. I would have been sixteen. It was the time when the punk singles you were buying became post punk singles. I bought it, my mates bought it. We liked the stickers and the sleeve. I wasn’t sure how much I liked the music but, you know, it was interesting.

I followed Factory forever and that was pretty much always my feeling towards their records. The Distractions; YES. Joy Div; OF COURSE; ESG brilliant; I loved the Life 7”; that great run of club records around “82 (Marcel King / Yashar / 52nd St / Quando Quango); “Everything’s Gone Green, Ceremony, Temptation….shit, I even liked The Stockholm Monsters. Plus a lot of yeah whatever. Still, it was always there and always evocative of it’s birthplace. I liked that.

I went to The Factory a couple of times. Went up from Nottingham to see The Human League in ’78 and also saw Dexy’s there for the very first time (supporting The Specials). It was cool, especially to a sixteen year old in a nightclub out of town for the first time. I saw Pete Shelley at the bar. It was fucking brilliant. We used to have to walk the streets all night or find an all night café before getting the first bus home in the morning.

I liked the atmosphere of the city. It was old and dark and imposing and it looked like everyone had left there years ago. Very melancholy.

A year or so later I thought of living there. I got a bus up and bought the local paper to look at jobs and flat prices. I walked around the city looking at posters on walls. THE FALL plus support LENNY BRUCE FILMS at The Kim Philby Club. That one sticks with me. what a cool name for a club. Who was Lenny Bruce? I’d heard the Fall and the jury was out, in fact I’d seen them the previous year and thought they were rubbish. Had to check out Lenny Bruce. Shit, I loved him. Read everything I could. Huge influence. . Wasn’t ready for the move mind, felt lonely already.

See, this was all Wilson. Him and his mates. The records, the Factory club. The Kim Philby was them too. So I got tons to thank that man for and that’s before he gave me a job.

The first time I met Tony was at my interview. It wasn’t really an interview but I didn’t realise that until I left the office.
86 Palatine Rd. An address I knew by heart. I had it on so many record sleeves. That’s where I went to meet Tony and fellow directors Tina Simmons and Alan Erasmus about the job.
Dave Harper took me. He was about to be the ex Factory publicist, on his way to RCA (Dave now co manages, Goldfrapp, The Shortwave Set, among others). He recommended me. Knew I loved the label and knew I really loved the Mondays.
So we got to to the office, said hello to Tina and Alan and waited two hours for Tony to turn up. It was OK for a while, sat looking at great posters (Leigh Festival) and rare records (“have you got Rob Gretton’s dental records here?”) but fuck he was late and I was a bit nervous.
So, he arrives, “Sorry I’m late darlings”, he says. Quite an entrance. Chucks his coat down, sits in front of me and proceeds to tell us all about his day. Whilst making a huge spliff. Which he smokes himself. He asks me about about myself, a little bit, then he’s off. The most unorthodox job interview imaginable. Fucking brilliant.
I so wanted the job. Couldn’t believe it was happening really.
On the way back in to town I asked Dave when he thought I’d hear anything. “What about? The job?”. “Yes”, “Oh, you’ve got that” he said.

So, that was the start of a very amazing adventure. During which I saw Tony in fantastic full effect on a regular basis.
He couldn’t shut up. Or keep still. He was full of ideas and theories and was determined that they had to happen.
He knew that the Mondays were important. As a band, Sean as a poet. For the city and for progress.
I’ll never forget being with him when he had just picked up the artwork ideas for the “Madchester” EP. “Madchester”, for fuck sake. He couldn’t contain himself. I think Pat & Matt at Central Station, Ryder cousins and artists responsible for Mondays artwork, had coined it, but he loved it. It was like a great big plot coming real. A fuck you, to everyone else, especially London. His dream come true. And it did.

JB

Record Of The Week

I never listened to Edgar Jones Jones’s first solo album when it came out. I read all the reviews, I saw it on lots of the end of the year charts, people i love and trust kept raving about it. It was even nominated for the Mercury, wan’t it?
Still, i didn’t give it a chance. For some reason – even though I knew and had dug Edgar’s previous work in The Stairs and as a brief member of The Saint Etienne Live Experience – I was convinced that Edgar’s solo album was gonna sound just like The White Stripes. Why? Propbably just because everyone kept mentioning them in the reviews of Edgars album.
Almost a year later, listening to records pretty late one night in a friends house in Kensal Rise, the host just said ”have you heard this?”.
And he put it on. Jesus.
This was something else. It sounded like nothing around. It still does. And so does his new album.
From the Bo Diddley beat of The Way It Is to the rocksteady riddim of Mellow Down Pussycat and the new groupversion of that oustanding timeless groove of More That You’ve Ever Had. Who else would even dare to go so deep into some of the most beautiful and intense music created in New Orleans, in the Sly Stone mansion in the Beverly Hills, on the outskirts of Kingston or those fingeclickin’ doo-wop harmionies on a street corner in Chicago?
It’s about time Fats Domino, Mac Rebbenack and The Meters open an embassy in Liverpool.
As Nick Lowe recently said – anyone can Rock, but very few know how to Roll. We’ll do anything to find the Roll. M.I.A and Lethtal Bizzle both looked to The Clash to sample some Roll to their new albums.
Edgar ”Jones” Jones doesn’t have to sample anything. He already has the Roll flowing through every bone of his body.

AL