Broken Hearts & Dirty Windows.

Storm Emma has been and gone and the Beast from The East has gone back to Siberia. On the news it was all about a Russian spy and his daughter being poisoned in Salisbury which is only down the road from here. I never thought the tentacles of the Kremlin would reach as far as sleepy Wiltshire. Anyway, I can’t be worrying about that, it’s got nothing to do with me. Spring is in the air again, so I thought today was the day to pot some seeds. I got a bag of compost from Davies and I had some packets of seeds from the cheap shop in the High Street. I think they were only fifty pence a packet. Much better than buying plants. This afternoon I potted some Stocks, Lupins, Sweet Williams, Marigolds, Impatiens and Sunflowers. I haven’t got room outside for a greenhouse, so they are in my kitchen window where I can watch them grow over the next few weeks. I’ll put some more on the window sill in the bathroom on another day.

I can multi-task. While I was doing that I was also listening to music. Today it was John Prine Live. This is a great album of nineteen songs that was released in 1988. I first heard of John Prine in 1972 when I bought a compilation album called The New Age Of Atlantic which had two songs I really liked. One was Motel Blues by Loudan Wainwright and the other was Sam Stone by John Prine. I haven’t followed Loudan Wainwright’s career that closely although I know he has written some great songs and I appreciate his connection with Kate & Anna McGarrigle. John Prine has always been around though. and I love his songs with Iris Dement who I must write something about soon.

This live album is great. John is a story teller as well as a great songwriter and introduces the songs with some funny tales. Bonnie Raitt makes an appearance on Angel From Montgomery. There are funny songs and sad songs. I find Hello In There, a song about ageing especially poignant. I got the title of this story from a line in the song Souvenirs. Other stand out songs for me include Speed Of The Sound Of Loneliness, Mexican Home and Illegal Smile. There isn’t a bad song on the album though. Highly recommended. I have added a video of Sam Stone below if you would like to hear it.

John Prine - Sam Stone

Oblivious by Mick Blake

A Facebook friend nominated me to come up with a playlist of ten albums over ten days. He seems to like the folk music, so I’ll try and think of ten albums that he might like. This cold Sunday afternoon I have been listening to Oblivious by Mick Blake. I first heard of Mick Blake two years ago at a Christy Moore concert when Christy sang a song called Oblivious which I had never heard before. After the gig I asked a friend Hilary who wrote the song and she told me it was Mick Blake.

I bought Mick’s album when it was released on St Patrick’s Day last year and I meant to write a review of it at the time but somehow I never did until today. I think the first thing to say it that this album won’t appeal to everyone. Listeners who just want to be entertained and hear love songs and humorous ditties will be disappointed. The songs on this album carry a powerful political message and are designed to give people something to think about. When the CD arrived in the post I was quite struck by the cover design. It is called White Horses by Kim Haughton and depicts two horses in front of some half-built houses where the work has stopped, during the crash of 2008 no doubt. I was pleased to see that Mick had signed the CD for me which was good of him.
The title track Oblivious is the first song and I can see why Christy Moore was drawn to it. This song and others on the album are concerned with how the dreams of those who struggled for Irish independence 100 years ago have been squandered by the politicians of today. I particularly liked Catch Cries because it is inspired by the poetry of W.B. Yeats especially September 1913 and The Fisherman. One verse includes a recording of Yeats himself reading a section of September 1913. The Rich Man’s Feast  is a well-researched song which refers to how a Turkish sultan and the Chocktaw nation tried to assist the people during the famine, much to the annoyance of Queen Victoria and how the modern neo-liberal idea that nothing must interfere with the markets is making history repeat itself. Heaven is a very moving song about suicide and tries to give a message of hope. The Giveaway is sung with ironic dark humour and is about how the countries assets are given away to foreign interests, even the children, who are educated but have to go abroad to find work. Also, how the airports are used by foreign military although Ireland is supposed to be neutral. Purple Ribbons is the true story of Mary Boyle who went missing in 1977 aged only six. She is Irelands youngest missing person. Some people may find the song quite difficult to listen to. I think Mick might have been inspired to write it as an appeal for justice and to keep it in the public awareness because somebody knows the truth about what happened. Sean MacDiarmada was an Irish political activist and revolutionary leader. He was one of the seven leaders of the Easter Rising of 1916 and was a signatory of the Proclamation of the Irish Republic and was executed for his part in the Rising at age 33. He is the subject of a song on this album because the injustices that he saw in Leitrim such as evictions and bailiffs have returned in the modern age. Another Child Another War  begins with the story of Anne Frank and then the cruel irony of children dying in Palestine. Mr Tepper like The Giveaway uses dark humour to illustrate a serious issue. It begins with a recording of Mr Tepper himself bragging about his ill-gotten gains on Bloomberg TV. The final song is Leitrim (A brief history) and compares how the warnings about the famine were ignored and how the warnings about the Celtic Tiger economy were ignored as well. 

That brings me to the end of this review. Although Mick Blake has used the problems of Ireland as his subject I think we can see that it applies to Britain and other countries as well. Just look how great institutions such as the NHS are being sold off by stealth to privatisation. I better stop now, or I’ll start a political rant. You could go on and on. There is plenty of food for thought on this album, that's for sure. I have put a video of Mick singing one of his songs below if you would like to hear it.

Oblivious - mick blake