So far, this series has largely focussed on the early years of the False Dots and the stories that emanated from them. It may or may not surprise you to learn that the band have done more than half of the gigs we've performed since we got back together in 2000, following our hiatus from 1990. Of these around two thirds have been since lockdown. We've recorded two albums, releasing one last year and we've had more radio play etc than in the rest of our career. Whereas in the first five years of the band, we had over thirty members, since lockdown, we've had three, rising to four when Tom Hammond joined on trumpet in 2023. The stability of our line up has made it far easier to do gigs. When the band is constantly churning members, a lot of time is spent getting new members up to speed and familiar with the set. Another issue, especially true of vocalists, is that different songs suit different people. When Venessa left in 1984 and Allen joined in 1985, only one song survived the cull, Action Shock, which survives to this day!
The band are now on the cusp of finishing our new album. Things like a title and artwork need to be thought about. We are a very different band to the one that entered lockdown. Allen Ashley, who had sung, departed as the country opened up. I took over vocal duties. We recruited Tom Hammond to "play a bit of trumpet on a couple of numbers". Tom has become our secret weapon and will sing four of the songs on the new album. He has given us a range and variety of options that we've not had for a very long time, both musically and vocally. I am as excited as I've ever been about the music we are playing and that is really saying something. I think I'm pretty good at an Ian Duryesque presentation of a cheeky song, but Tom is far more tuneful and has a better vocal range, so this means we can introduce a few songs that simply wouldn't have worked. This has made the set infinitely more interesting. It has given us the opportunity to introduce a slow, moody song which I simply couldn't have done justice to. Tom has a very different take to me on delivery, so it means that our set can be a hell of lot more interesting.
On Sunday, we launched our new single Groovetown (which I sing for clarity) at The Dublin Castle. The whole set got an amazing response. The new material means we can pace things a bit better and not singing also gives me the chance to play the guitar in a slightly more intricate way on a couple of numbers, that again broadens the sound. As a band, I think it is always important to be excited by your own music. Let's face it, if you don't like it, no one else will! Our new album will see Tom fully integrated into the band. The soings were mostly written with him in mind, or were given a new arrangement to work better with him, whereas the last album had a couple of bolted on brass parts, that sounded great but were perhaps a bit rushed.
The brass arrangement on Groovetown is perhaps the piece of music that I am most proud of in the last year. I'd been listening to the Average White Band for inspiration and I think it shows. I spent a couple of hours chatting to Tony Gleed at Dublin Castle Radio and spinning a few of my fave songs recently. It is a blast, have a listen (you have to register for a free trial but hey ho, it is worth it) CLICK HERE. Have a listen to the new track here. I think you might like it!
The band have two free shows coming up, if you fancy seeing us.
Next Gigs
Saturday 5th July - Jester Festival - Fortune Green, West Hampstead - 4pm (TBC) - Free entry
Saturday 12th July - The Builders Arms, Barnet from 8pm with DJ Rebska - from 8pm - Free entry
In this blog, I criticised the Labour adminstration for wasting taxpayers money on rather poor videos promoting Art in Barnet. Ihad two issues with these. The first was that the videos made almost no mention of the art and culture that we actually have in Barnet. I referred to this video, which I was really disappointed with, which I felt did nothing to promote the rich culture that we actually have.
I was even more critical of this video, which seemed to confuse art and sport. I am a big fan of sports and people gitting involved. However, this has nothing to do with art and it is clear that Barnet councildo not understand the basic concept of art is.
I vowed to do two things. The first was to find how much Barnet Council had actually spent on these substandard and rather patronising videos. Today I got my answer in the form of a Freedom of Information request.
The council holds the information requested and it is attached/ the answers to your questions are below Please can you provide details of the cost to Barnet Council of the "There's Art in Barnet" you tube video that was released on Youtube on 19th March
The cost of filming and production of the suite of nine videos that were produced for the ‘There’s Art in Barnet’ campaign was £4,405.50.
The nine videos cost just a smidgen under £500 each. Although this is not a massive amount to pay for videos, it is a huge amount to play for something that is complete rubbish. I always wonder how the council can be so bad at such things. This blog started as a result of Barnet Council putting a BNP activist on their Youtube channel complaing about Jewish people in the borough. I've yet to see anything on there that warrants spending anything on it.
For a bit of fun, I spent an three hours having a look at Art in Barnet and filming it. I then spent two hours editing the footage. I'd probably have charged the Council around £250 to make this if they'd asked me (£50 an hour for my time and I'd have used a proper camera rather than my mobile phone).
I love the Borough and I love our culture. The council are welcome to use this video to promote art in the Borough, should they wish. You tell me. Is it better? I'd like to think you know bit more about art in Barnet as a result of my video, rather than the Barnet one.
I am all for making videos promoting Art in Barnet, but I'd have preferred the council to set up a little competition, with small cash prizes for content providers and the opportunity to have their project showcased by the Council. What do you think?
One of my very best food memories was coming out of The Beehive pub in Edgware, with a rather attractive Italian Au Pair I'd just met, when I was about 18. We were both hungry and I offered to treat her to a Pizza from the Perfect Pizza takeaway which was around the corner, opposite the Police station. Now bear in mind, it was 1980 and Pizza's were still seen as a bit new and exotic. As I recall, The Perfect Pizza had just opened and the consensus was that it was the best!
Not being that familiar with Pizza's, I sought guidance. She said "Try the Hawaiian, it's ham and pineapple and it is delicious". I asked if that was what she ate in Italy, she laughed and said she'd never heard of it until she came to Edgware but it was wonderful. And guess what? It was, it was delicious. I never really thought too much more about it. My tastes changed and I tended to prefer a hot spicy pizza with chorizo and a biug lashing of chilli oil, but once in a while, I'd have the Hawian when the mood took me. In truth, like many of my favourite experiences in life, I'm not quite sure it ever really lived up to the first bite on that cold November night in 1980, but I've retained a fondness for them.
Over the last few years, I've noticed that there is a bit of a hate campaign against pineapple on pizza, with a general snobby view that it is 'not Italian'. This rather amuses me, as my experience of pizzas in Italy is markedly different to what you get in the UK. Firstly the bases tend to be thinner and crispier. The the tomato sauce generally tastes far better, fresher and with a tang and the cheese is also far better quality. So it is a bit ironic that people snobbily say "Italians would not stand for a Hawaiian!". In truth, I doubt they'd be too happy with any of the main UK pizza delivery services. The Perfect Pizza didn't last to long. As I later realised, it's Pizza's were just to authentic for the tastes of the British.
BTW, to me the one sure way to tell that a pizza will be a bit bland is if the edge is thick dough. My daughter bought a pizza oven and makes authentic pizzas with fresh ingredients. The edges are thin and slightly burned and are delicious. Thats how they tend to be in proper italian restaurants.
There is nothing that irritates me more than food snobbery, especially when it is ill informed. If you don't like pineapple on pizza, that's fine. Don't eat it, but what you do or don't like is irrelevant to the rest of humanity. There are things that I quite enjoy that I avoid, but this is usually because I think that the farming methods etc are not to my liking and are bad for the planet. So if someone says to me that hormone injected beef from the USA is not a good way to farm beef, I will investigate and take on board if the arguments are convincing. If, however, someone tells me that I shouldn't put ketchup on my sausage sandwich, or pineapple on my pizza, because they don't like it, I'd be a moron if I took it on board.
It always makes me chuckle that I was introduced to the Hawaiian pizza by an Italian, however if it had been my mate from Burnt Oak and I'd enjoyed it, then my opinion would be the same. In my experience, people who are influenced by food snobbery, or even worse, who expound it, are the most silly and miserable souls on the planet. If I thought a black pudding, mushroom and gherkin pizza was tasty, I'd have it and stuff what the rest of you think!
This is the 53rd in this series. This means we've done a whole year of Sundays and we are starting again! As I write this blog, the Sun has just come out. Is it a sign? It was raining five minutes ago. My Dad was a great believer that a peek of sunshine through the clouds was a sign from God that everything was going to be alright. I remember him telling me about his experience in a prisoner of war camp in Bucharest, Rumania in 1944. He'd been shot down, he'd had to identify the mangled body of his best mate and the rear gunner in his Wellington bomber F/O John 'Spud' Murphy, he'd sprained his ankles. The food was awful, half a cucumber, half a dry loaf of rye bread and watery cabbage soup. Although the war was going well for the allies, he had no idea how long it would go on for. He was feeling very down and depressed. Then a ray of sun peaked through the clouds and he looked up. The sky was full of menacing thunder clouds, lightening was flashing, but it seemed a thin ray of sunshine was shining down on him. For a second, he felt its warm rays and felt good. He said "Oh Lord, Please give me a sign things will be alright". At that very moment, someone walked up to him and gave him a letter from my mother, then his fiancée. It was the first letter he'd received, he'd sent a couple but had no idea whether they had been received. Her letter explained that she'd been told he'd been shot down, presumed killed, but she knew he was OK and knew they'd be together soon. He was lifted from his miseries and immediately started to plan his escape. He said to me "Always keep hold of your dreams, they will sustain you".
That was 81 years ago. Mum and Dad are long gone. There's not a day that I don't miss them, but life is for living, not looking back with regrets. The last couple of years have been difficult for me. I feel that the ray of sunshine was a small sign that things are OK, just as it was for my Dad 81 years ago. Our problems, fears and worries are very different. He was a young man, I am not. He had dreams of the future. For me, my dreams are pretty much of the present. Age, health and fitness issues have deprived me of some of my greatest pleasures in life. The horrific truth when you get to sixty two is that physically you will not really get any better. For me, there may be small improvements still following my cancer surgery, maybe my knees and ankles will stop hurting enough to get properly fit, maybe I will have another 10, 15 20 years of active and enjoyable life. The harsh truth though, is that that if there is something I really want to do in my life, I need to do it now, because if I put it off until next year, I've come to realise the chance may have gone completely.
In some ways, the problem for me is that life has been too good. I've seen all of the bands I want to see, I've been to all of the places I really want to go. Life is almost a series of sequels for me! Shall we go to Australia or San Francisco again, shall we go and see Blur, Madness or Squeeze again? But we can't see the Specials again, because Terry Hall passed away. The great egg timer of life is ebbing. The Ramones, New York Dolls, Toots, Desmond Decker, Bowie have all gone. There will be no sequels there. Last Xmas, I had tickets for aa Damned reunion gig. They were playing with Brian James, the original guitarist. I was really looking forward to it. Sadly Captain Sensible got ill and it was cancelled. Recently, Brian James passed away. Another sequel that has been cancelled by the bit promoter in the sky.
The one great gift that cancer gave me was an appreciation of the here and now. What does this mean for me? It means that I have thrown myself into my band. I can no longer play football, but I can play music and I think we are pretty good, even if I say so myself. So today, the band play at The Dublin Castle to celebrate the release of our brand new single Groovetown. The gig starts at 2pm, so come along if you can.
I've long thought about saying this, but have bit my tongue. I cannot stay quiet any longer. I just think it's too important for the whole planet that things change. I know that a blog on my little hyper local blog is not likely to change the world, if anything at all, but if no one ever says anything, then we lose. If I can start a debate, great, if I can't, well at least I tried.
1. I believe that the primary function of the music industry is to make teenagers politically disengaged and keep them stupid, until they have financial commitments and have to behave themselves and play the game that the powers that be make us play to control us. People in their late teens & early twenties are at their most idealistic, passionate and also their most physically powerful. They see that things need changing and want to enact that. This is why when Jeremy Corbyn became Labour leader, young people flocked to him. You may feel they were naive or mislead, but you cannot deny that their motivation was they believed he may actually change things. The Labour party let all of those dreaming teenagers down. I have come to believe that the Music Industrie's job is to keep the lid on such things. This is why it subliminally promotes recreational drug use and hedonistic attitudes. If people are stoned or partying, they are not on the streets causing problems for the establishment. Occasionally this all breaks down, but the industry does everything it can to subvert it. In the 1960's, artists such as Country Joe McDonald, who came to prominance for the anti Vietnam "Fish Cheer" were marginalised, whilst manufactured bubblegum pop acts such as the Monkees were plugged to death. The same was true of Punk, where anarchist bands such as Crass (who were one of the best live acts I ever saw) with their mantra of fight war not wars, were completely ignored by the mainstream industry, whilst bands that were prepared to drop the politics and play power pop, angst teen anthems were given the full backing of the industry. I've seen thousands of bands over the years and probably a couple of hundered artists that were amazing, but completely off message. They did there stuff, but you never hear them on the radio and they never get the support of major labels etc.
2. I believe that the gate keepers of the music media (not the presenters but the people who employ them) have created an environment where it is genuinely impossible to be a radical artist and have commercial success. There are artists that are successful that promote subcultures (hard drug use, etc) that get played, but artists writing songs about genuine change don't get played on air.
3. Far more songs have been banned than you can imagine. Nearly all are relatively innocuous, but the government of the day deemed them in some way politically subversive. Almost none have been banned for promoting drug use. Clearly some songs are banned for rude words etc, but check out the list on Wikipedia and see wh wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_songs_banned_by_the_BBC
4. The UK government spent decades clamping down on people running pirate radio stations, which solely played music. Why? Because they knew that they couldn't control them. Governments only spend money on things they think are important and in policing only on things that they think threaten their power.
5. The music industry loves drug addled stars, as they can control them. I once heard an interview with Lousiana voodoo Jazz legend Dr John, where he stated the first thing the label did when he was signed was get him hooked on heroin, so they could control him. It made me realise that the myth that hard drugs are subversive is a lie put around to screw up people who are creative. If you want to be truly subversive and creative, stay clean and write about what you care about.
6. The music industry positively discriminates against new artists and new material, as established artists are far cheaper, more profitable and easier to control. When a band like the Rolling Stones releases a new album, they get a massive boost in sales on old material. This costs the labels nothing. New material and new artists are expensive to promote.
7. The media and the music media in particular, are not interested in promoting up and coming artists. If you watch a show such as Graham Norton, he will chat endlessly with big stars. At the end, a new act might be reeled on, play a tune, then get 30 seconds to say something. I am not having a pop at Norton, who does not produce the show. The one person who bucks the trend is Jools Holland. Needless to say, the BBC puts his show on at a time that is pretty inaccessible. The BBC dropped the TOTP show, where new artists did get played. They maintanined the brand though, endlessly showing old repeats, that are free to produce.
8. When musicians speak, it can make a difference. If this was not true, Donald Trump would not have posted this about Bruce Springsteen.
Springsteen is in the lucky position of being established and not giving a flying ****. The media ridicules "pop stars who dabble in politics". Why do you think this is? Succeeding in music is perhaps the most difficult thing in the world. No one gets handed success on a plate, yet musicians are always portrayed as being lazy substance abusers. When someone such as Britney Spears has mental health issues, the media glory in it. Why? Because it is a useful tool in undermining the credibility of people like Springsteen who are eloquent, articulate and highly intelligent. To what purpose? To protect the likes of Trump IMHO.
9. The people who control the music industry are two faced liars, who pretend to support the grassroots music scene but in truth hate it and just see it as a breeding ground for talent, to be robbed of its riches with no payback. I was shocked to learn that my band, The False Dots are second only to Madness in the number of times we've played the Dublin Castle. We've been around for 46 years. How could this be? The answer is simple, apart from Madness, who come back for the odd small show, most bands either split up or the industry swallows them up and they move to larger venues. The smaller venues get nothing back. There was talk of a ticket levy from major labels. I personally think the PRS should also pay a 2% levy on all artists who earn more than £100,000 a year in royalties back to the the grassroots industry. They'd have no career without the likes of the Dublin Castle. But this will only happen if theya are dragged their kicking and screaming.
10. The music industry actually likes it when young stars die. This may sound horrific, but I've heard it said dozens of times, when an artists tragically passes away that "It's good for sales". The first few times I heard this, I just took it as a joke, but I realise that labels actively have plans made and teams ready to plug the music of artists when they die. There is the mythology around artists dying at 27. There is nothing a label loves more than when an artist has passed the peak of their career, the label is considering dropping them and they drop dead. That way, the label doesn't have to invest in new material that won't sell and they'll turn a quick buck on the old material, as fans have one last hurrah.
I'm only pleased that I rarely have to deal with big labels and big players in the music industry in my business area. We are just part of the business that work our nuts off helping artists get a foot on the ladder, so the industry can take advantage of them. I've spent my life, since I became a punk rocker in 1977, hoping things would change. The only way they will is when artists can control their own fate. The sad truth is that all manner of people make billions from music, but artists at the bottom get no support at all and if they show any creativity at all, they will get squashed.
One of the saddest things for me, is I am actually glad that my band never became superstars. We had and are still having a blast and doing the music we love, and there is a bit of a message in there. The nearest the band ever got to a deal was in 1984, when Venessa Sagoe was singing. The key song we presented was Action Shock, which is a song that is deeply critical of politicians who destroy young people in the pursuit of war and and also looks at the challenges that a young man faces when he has to kill a fellow human being for reasons he doesn't fully understand. Oddly we didn't get a deal. Although Venessa doesn't sing with us anymore, we still peform the number albleit in a different way. You can hear it tomorrow at The Dublin Castle, we are plaing a matinee show (Click here for details) to launch our new, independently released single Groovetown.
One week to go until the start of Mill Hill Music Festival - click on the image for full tickets and full details
One of the highlights is the BBC Elstree Concert Band. Check out this amazing video of the band in action
It's nearly upon us. Mill Hill's finest, The False Dots launch their new single at The Dublin Castle this Sunday. If that wasn't exciting enough, two amazing local support bands. Dubvocaliza are a brilliant Dub Reggae band and Niall Logue is an amazing singer songwriter, who has recently signed to Marquee records. Click the image for more details and tickets
Dubvocaliza in action!
Niall Logue's recent video
As for all you Jazzers, check this out. The Bohemia is a brilliant pub, a microbrewery where they brew the beer on the premises! www.b3lounge.live
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