In The Ghetto

 Does anyone remember what happened in Warzaw?

High Speed Farce

The HS2 debacle – sadly – seems to sum up how badly Britain is broken.

The plan to build a high-speed rail link from London to the North of the UK was always going to be beset by controversies – over destruction of homes and serious damage to the environment.

But either build the damn thing or don't.

What we're left with now, it seems, is all the misery and uncertainty and negative impacts... without any of the benefits that might have accrued.

All we'll have is some sort of high-speed rail link between Birmingham and the London suburb of Old Oak Common (where? I hear you ask) plus some close-to-worthless promises about improving transport in the North.

When I visit my adored city of Naples, I like to take the train from Rome. The high-speed option does somewhere between 180mph and 200mph all the way, with no messing about. It's a fantastic ride. If it can be done there (and in so many parts of Europe), why not here?

I don't have room for all the answers... and anyway you can probably put them together yourself.

Which reminds me: my series See Naples and Live was among the most-read pieces on this blog, so I hope to be posting others soon with See Naples and Live More.

A Great Drummer – And A Great Man

 

John Marshall – one of the world's greatest drummers – has died. He was not only a great musician – who had played with literally hundreds of the biggest names in jazz and rock, and pioneered the fusion of those two genres into something powerfully new – he was also a great human being. And I am proud to say that he was my friend and teacher.

He was the driving force in Soft Machine – for whom he had played drums for half a century – almost to the end of his life. 

Although I didn't know it at the time, I was at his last gig, with the Softs, at Ronnie Scott's, in 2022. 

And I was also with him at his home, just a few weeks ago, when he picked up the sticks for the very last time – to show me how something easy for him (but not for me) could be done.

His passion for playing the drums was still there then. It never died.

My Heart on Rory's Sleeve

 

It's wonderful that vinyl has made such a great comeback... and with it the return of sleevenotes.

I'm particularly pleased with the 3,000-word booklet accompanying the new triple LP from Rory Gallagher – not so much because I wrote it... but because I was asked to write it. And that was genuinely one of the outstanding honours of my long career in journalism.

The blues-rock guitar genius Gallagher died prematurely in 1995, and I am glad to say that I lost count of the number of times I saw him play live. Thankfully, one of those occasions was his appearance at London's Town and Country in 1990.

It was my Evening Standard review of that night that led to my being involved in the production of the beautifully packaged new album All Around Man – Rory Gallagher Live In London.

Rory's nephew Daniel – whose father, Donal, was Rory's manager – saw a cutting of that review, tracked me down and asked if I would write an essay to accompany the release of the live recording.

I said yes immediately – even before I'd heard the tracks. Rory's performances were anyway still fresh in my mind – and a bonus was that I had also met and interviewed him around that time.

The rest is now part of blues history... and I'm beyond delighted to be a part of it too.

Chicks Storm The Castle

 

The Chicks at Cardiff   Photo©Nigel Summerley

I seem to be making a habit of attending great gigs in the grounds of ancient fortifications...

After seeing Dylan at the Alhambra [see previous blog], I found myself at Cardiff Castle for another sublime performance – this time by the Chicks.

Formerly the Dixie Chicks (but dropping the politically incorrect Dixie a while back), the Chicks are Texans with a twist: they opposed the Iraq war and they have pilloried the fakeness of Donald Trump. Their liberal and feminist standpoints didn't play well with some US country fans and radio stations, but they did cement the band's reputation for being unafraid of singing "protest" songs and handling the attendant controversies.

These three country women also rock and swing like the proverbial clappers – and their sweet vocal harmonies combined with razor-sharp songwriting are an irresistible combination.

They are the most acceptable face of so-called "new country", much of which is formulaic and anodyne. These women have immense talent – and they're not afraid to use it.

On A Night Like This...

 

On stage, Bob Dylan tends to be a man of few words – but then, why would the most creative and articulate lyricist of the 20th and 21st centuries need to say anything between his songs?

He made an exception the other night, however, when he played an extraordinary gig in the gardens of the Alhambra in Granada.

"Such a beautiful place to play... I wish it was like this every night," he said.

I think those of us privileged to be there in the audience had similar feelings. A Dylan concert is almost guaranteed to be memorable... but this one really was something else.

The Spanish ladies and gents were dressed in their finery, the gardens were warm and fragrant, and Dylan and his travelling band played great song after great song, beneath the darkening sky and amid the lovely trees and greenery of the Generalife.

Everything sure felt right... on a night like this...

A Sign That Something's Wrong

 

Photo©Nigel Summerley

Pictured above is the new sign that has appeared at the entrance to the most remarkable site on Ithaca... 

It's difficult to believe this is how the authorities are promoting a place that was described by Homer as the Palace of Odysseus – and unequivocally confirmed as such in recent times by the esteemed archaeologist Thanasis Papadopoulos, who studied the extensive Mycenaean remains here.

There's a further "explanatory" sign nearby (pictured below), which conveys precisely nothing – apart from labelling the site as Agios Athanasios (the name of the latterday church on the site which had absolutely no connection with Odysseus, apart from employing building material purloined from the much older palace).

The epic The Odyssey was arguably one of the greatest stories ever told and the foundation of western literature... Does Ithaca care nothing for the fact it has a site of such huge cultural significance crumbling away in a neglected corner of the island?

It is certainly not caring for the site, which lost vital coverings in a hurricane three years ago.

Nor is it providing any real information for curious visitors to the site, who can end up wandering about, not knowing what they are looking at.

The architect Dimitris Skirgiannis produced beautiful and detailed representations of what the Palace of Odysseus probably looked like, based on the work of archaeologist Litsa Kontorli-Papadopoulou. These drawings could be reproduced at the site, with a key to all the relevant locations there. This would cost almost nothing.

Meanwhile, it is left to the excellent exhibition set up by – and thanks to the passion of – Dimitris Paizis-Danias, in the nearby village of Stavros, to lay out in detail why this site is so important and why it is so clearly linked to the times and the tales of Odysseus.

Anyone with a serious interest in the remarkable legacy that Ithaca seems to be doing its best to ignore should read Papadopoulos's testament, The Excavation at Agios Athansios, which is now available on Amazon.

It would be rather good if the powers-that-be took a look at it too...