War Stories: RAF Windrush and the Ghosts of Heroes

On my travels through the English countryside I chanced across a disused WWII airfield, RAF Windrush. It's located in Gloucestershire off the A40 Burford to Cheltenham road.  I parked my car at the end of a lane, walked across a couple of fields past a farm* and there it was. A large, shadowless 'blister' hanger,  two smaller Nissen or Quonset huts, the control tower, a pill box, some taxiways and a perimeter path running parallel to a field which was once the main runway. There's something fascinating about old military installations and battlefields: the ghosts of warriors that once occupied these places seem palpable and the echoes of the war machines as they prepared or retuned from battle still ring around the site. Here are a few photos I managed to grab:

Blister hangar, nissen hut (there are several on the site, all used for storage of agricultural supplies) and taxiways

Bricked up 'blister' hangar: these structures are shadowless from the air

A windsock still flies proudly: somehow it gives the site a living but slightly eyrie feel

The control tower still stands and is intact. Indeed it looks in remarkably good condition.   This was the operational centre of the site. My Uncle remembers that WWII a wooden structure sat atop of the building during the war years

A pillbox guards the control tower and provides shelter  from enemy air raids

Another view of the pillbox: this one is in remarkably good order and looks like it's undergone some restoration

This track was probably once a runway perimeter road                                   

I discovered this plaque on the wall of the control tower: what a great story! We must never forget the sacrifices made by these young servicemen

Pilot Officer Douglas Eaton, c1940, age 19, on the occasion of his 'going solo'. He was later stationed at RAF Windrush

Shortly after this excursion, I visited my Uncle. I knew that he was a pilot in the RAF during the war years and I thought he'd be interested in my snapshots. To my amazement he told me that he's be stationed at Windrush and had learned to fly twin engined airplanes there. His training on twins was carried out in Airspeed Oxfords: in wartime operations he flew Douglas DC3 Dakotas, notably resupplying General Wingate's special forces, the Chindits, in Burma.

*Update: 5th January 2014: My Uncle notes that the farm which I mention at the beginning of this article and on which the airfield is now situated, was originally the Sergeants' Mess.

Ray Manzarek

Goodbye, Ray!   We'll miss your mastery of the Fender-Rhodes keyboard. Say hello to Jim.

Spiny Norman

Earlier today I spotted this adorable little fellow snuffling around in my brother's back garden. I was fortunate to have a camera at hand: watching him ferret through the grass looking for breakfast made me feel incredibly happy on a cold and blustery May day.

Ten Influential Jazz Flautists

Renaissance man and newsreader, Ron Burgundy,  shows his dabbling skills on jazz flute

A few years ago I wrote a piece on the use of flute in popular music.  My focus was mostly on musicians playing classic rock and jazz-rock.  Although there are a few icons like Ian Anderson from Jethro Tull, there haven't been too many over the years.  I have always found this odd as the flute is a popular, accessible, expressive, instrument that is fairly straightforward to play (relative to, say, a violin or piano) and has a decent sound palette.

More recently I've been thinking about flautists in mainstream jazz. Again there are a few notables but not as many as you might think. Most are sax players extending their musical range.  Anyway I've cobbled together a Top Ten list of players who I think have been the most influential (not necessarily those with the best technique)  in developing the jazz flute soundscape over the decades. And before I get excoriated I must add the caveats that this list is highly subjective and there are bound to be omissions for which I apologize in advance!

1. Frank Wess

Frank was one of the pioneers of jazz flute.  He was classically trained and mostly played tenor sax but his flute work was a delight. Listen to this version of "The Midgets” when he was with Count Basie.  I love this song for its manic sense of fun.  It’s also one of the earliest jazz flute solos I know of…  Ed Jones on bass just rocks and Joe Newman is great (but then the whole Basie band was always superb).

2. Yusef Lateef

Dr Lateef is an American jazz musician and one of the first that made me sit up and take notice. His lyrical and tasteful improvisation was captivating.  I’ve been fortunate to see him perform several times  -he’s now in his 90s and still going strong although I don’t think he gigs very much these days. This is one of my all time favourite songs from his classic album "Eastern Sounds". 

3. Rhassan Roland Kirk

Possibly my all-time favourite jazz musician.  He was blind, very funny, and some say gimmicky (he would play three saxes simultaneously) but his talent was indisputable.  Again, I was lucky to see him in my youth, before he passed away, and he was certainly a phenomenal performer. His flute work influenced many, notably Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull who popularized the flute in rock music: Anderson's early recording included a rendition of   RRK's “Serenade to a Cuckoo”: here's the original. 

4. Eric Dolphy

Eric Dolphy is an interesting study as he moved away from bebop into hard bop and free jazz.  A very interesting musician who sadly died in his mid thirties.  He played all the usual reed instruments and odd ones like bass clarinet.  He was a very intense flautist and listening to him is de rigeur.

Try “Gazzeloni” off the Out to Lunch album. 

5. Herbie Mann

Not my favourite player in terms of technique and his trend towards commercialism detracted from his potential but he was capable of exceptional work as can be heard here with Bill Evans. Nevertheless he was a high profile flautist and his influence was enormous.

6. Jeremy Steig

I’ve discovered Mr Steig quite recently and have never seen him play. However, check out “So What” off the Flute Fever album (1963).  Steig was light years ahead of his time and  is the first flautist I know to use the overblowing technique: I've heard the technique attributed to the late, great (mostly saxman) Sahib Shihab but I haven’t found any evidence, one way or another, to support this claim.

7. Bud Shank

As well as its gut churning car chase, the  1968 classic “Bullitt” with Steve McQueen also features a fabulous piece of jazz flute music by an apparently anonymous band. The tune takes off at break-neck speed and has a real pyrotechnic quality. It took decades and the invention of the internet for me to find out more about the musicians. The band that appeared in the movie was real and called “Meridian West”: the flautist’s name was Julie Iger-Roseman. However, although they did play in the scene, they were probably later overdubbed by session musicians: in the case of the flute by the legendary Bud Shank. Mr Shank was an exceptional woodwind musician and I find it unfortunate that he is probably best known for his his highly commercial, saccharine, cover of California Dreamin. His work with  the LA Four was much more satisfying.  Incidentally, I understand Ms Iger-Roseman still plays flute at various locations on the central coast region of California but I'm unaware of any recordings. 

8. Hubert Laws

I posted a clip of Hubert and his band onsite here quite recently. A truly meticulous and excellent player.  At his best with interpretations of Stravinsky rather than bebop/hard bop.

9. Barbara Thompson

Barbara is a stalwart on the British jazz scene and her primary band, “Paraphernalia”, has been around  forever.  I’ve seen her play on numerous occasions.  More rock influenced than say the chamber jazz of female peers such as Ali Ryerson. Sadly she is now fighting a battle with Parkinson’s disease but is still playing. Check out this clip (flute starts at about 4 mins).

10. Everybody I've Neglected to Mention
This could be a long list  but among those who deserve at least a hat tip are Buddy Collette,  Jerome Richardson, Harold McNair, Joe Farrell and Dave Valentin. Melissa Keeling looks like a promising up-and-comer with a refreshing original spin.

Into the Valley of Death Rode the Six Hundred

Perhaps it's a little overly dramatic to cite Tennyson's poem here but my reason for this piece of theatre is that I needed to say something about the number "six hundred".  According to Blogger, this is my 600th post since starting this web log lark almost nine years ago.  This statistic may not be particularly impressive by the standards of those who write for a living but at least I'm still here which is more than I can say for most of the personal blogs that started around the same time as me.  Like the luckier Lancers of the gallant Light Brigade, I've more or less survived the barrage of chainshot, grapeshot and other artillery fire of day-to-day life and kept going.  So onward to the next 600 posts  -the problem is that the flak is still incoming and I haven't caught a glimpse of the cannons yet...!

Outside My Comfort Zone (Again)

Only five days to go. The prospect of some formal education is incredibly exciting! Daunting too. I mean to have the Gary Burton as my Professor (you know, the legendary dude who did all the groovy vibes stuff with Chick Corea and has won zillions of Grammys and things) is about as cool as it gets.

Now let's check the check list:

• Flute re-padded and in good working order √

• Back-up plastic flute ready √

• Guitar(s) (for reference) tuned and ready √

• Keyboard (again for reference) functional √

• Audacity recording program working (and I think I know how to use it) √

• iPad app with all known scales and chords √

• Metronome(s) ready √

• Talented friends at hand who are real musicians and I can call if I need to cheat help √

• Sunglasses √ (this is jazz, remember  -if you can't play it at least try to look cool!)

• Familiarity with 50s/60s jazz patois √  e.g. "Check out the cat with the groovy horn, man, he's far out"

• Theoretical knowledge √  (I can lurch through major and minor [harmonic and melodic], chromatic, minor pentatonic, blues and bebop scales, arpeggios; I know what the modes are and can count most time signatures).

• Ability.....the critical issue is can I improvise any better than when I was 21 and didn't know any of this theory stuff?  Doubtful!

I'll keep you posted...!

Richie Havens

Bugger! Now we've lost two Woodstock alumni in about as many weeks.  I was fortunate to see this legend at the Plumpton Whitsun Festival, Sussex, England in May of 1970 where he performed this song.

RIP, Mr Havens

Spam, Spam, Spam and Spam!

For the past two weeks the comments sections of the posts on this site have been bombarded with spam. Ostensibly (almost) legitimate comments inviting me or others to click on a link to the sender's site. Don't ask me where they go  -I haven't looked for fear of being mugged or catching a nasty infection. Oddly they've been distributed randomly throughout the comments sections of all 600 odd posts I've made since 2004 (wow, doesn't time fly!?).  Well I've deleted them all and added one of those wretched "Captcha" word recognition thingys that are supposed to defeat spam-bots. We'll see if it works. In the meantime apologies to all for the inconvenience  -sadly I think this is just modern living.

Have a Heart

Congratulations to former Bellevue, WA, residents Ann and Nancy Wilson for their induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. I love having famous neighbors! Back in the day, their band, Heart, jumped out of the punk and perfectly-produced-Bee-Gees era music and proved that ladies could rock just as hard as the men. In the clip below they show that they are just about the only band in existence that can cover this perennial classic in a respectful, convincing and joyous manner without embarrassing themselves or the song's composers.  Jimmy Page is clearly diggin' it and Robert Plant is (amazingly) moved to tears. Well done girls!

Major Drag, Huh?

Man’s capacity to subject fellow members of his species to inhumane acts appears to be limitless.  In my relatively long lifetime which has been spent in almost equal measure in the UK and the USA I have witnessed a bloody and pointless war fought in SE Asia; a less protracted but vicious conflict in the islands of the South Atlantic that could have been avoided completely with just a little planning (in the style of “the fastest sword is the one that is never drawn”); a bitter internecine struggle, fought asymmetrically over 30 years in Ireland and the British Isles; six full-tilt wars in the middle east; and two superpowers with mind boggling arsenals of high-tech weapons and who each failed to learn the lessons of history regarding the fate of previous superpowers in the same location, brought to a humiliating standstill in the mountains of Afghanistan. Yesterday, breakfast television news was speculating whether a pudgy oligarch with a heinous haircut on the Choson Pando peninsula, would test fire a rocket with possible ICBM capabilities.

That was the situation until lunchtime. Then the report of the bombs in Boston broke and the old familiar pattern began.  There were a few harrowing video clips, news anchors went into overdrive analyzing minutiae in prosaic if not asinine detail and a string of allegedly expert talking heads were paraded across the screen. Déjà vu all over again!  Sadly I feel that in my dotage I’ve become resigned to the horror of these events. Terrorism has touched (or just missed me) on several occasions. In 1974, two pubs in my hometown of Guildford were blown up with loss of life and huge numbers of injuries. I heard the car bombs that killed a renowned Professor of Hematology at a British medical school (1975) where I was later to work as well as the politician Airey Neave (1979).  I saw and heard ambulance dispatches to the Hyde and Regents Park explosions of 1982 where cavalry horses and colorfully uniformed troopers were mown down by nail bombs in scenes of unspeakable carnage. In 1993 I watched a movie in a cinema in Charing Cross Road, London, only to learn a day or so later that a bomb that had failed to detonate was found under one of the seats and had been placed there several weeks previously. In 1996 the blast from a ten-ton truck bomb at Canary Wharf, London, nearly knocked in the windows of my flat two miles away across the Thames. Then came 9/11 and my cousin Robert, working for the investment bank, Cantor Fitzgerald, was tragically lost in the World Trade Center.

I have more examples but I’ve made my point and the list is long enough. The values of my generation in its youthful prime were of optimism and agreeable co-existence. “Give peace a chance” and “Make love not war” were common mantras but sadly dismissed as naïve and unworkable by our successors. Maybe they were but it was nice to be optimistic. Unfortunately my attempts over the years at conflict resolution have been only partially successful. Indeed I’ve had some spectacular, almost hilarious, failures and sadly I’ve come to the conclusion that no matter how illogical or painful this behaviour may be, the human race thrives on conflict.  While this trait is certainly species-threatening, it remains to be seen whether it will cause an extinction event. Hopefully not but I’m not taking any bets. Indeed I’m reminded of the movie Terminator 2 and the conversation between the young John Connor (Edward Furlong) and his time-travelling Terminator bodyguard (Arnold Schwarzenegger) in which they discuss the fate of the human race:

John Connor: We're not gonna make it, are we? People, I mean.
The Terminator: It's in your nature to destroy yourselves.
John Connor: Yeah. Major drag, huh?

Precisely!

Musical Postcards: Stephanie Porter

Here's another video clip of Seattle-area musicians. Earlier tonight I stumbled across this excellent combo: Stephanie Porter and her band. Absolutely superb!  Seattle is replete with talent  -the only place I know where you can pop into a neighborhood eatery for a bowl of soup and find musicians of this calibre just playing for fun.

All the usual caveats about photography with a telephone camera -it's dark and the lighting sub-optimal (my apologies to the band members who are nearly invisible). Noises from the bar and audience chatterings intrude on occasions but are bearable. The video was taken with Ms Porter's permission. 

War Stories: The Whispering Death

Wow! And it's near Cremona, too. I have a connection. Now I must get to see it. The Bristol Beaufighter is one of my favourite WW2 aircraft.  Despite being somewhat eclipsed by the sexier and faster DeHavilland Mosquito, the Beaufighter was a very capable aircraft. It was heavily armed and bristled with no fewer than 10 cannon and machine guns. In addition it could be fitted with rockets, torpedoes and bombs. It's large fuselage easily accommodated radar and the Beau excelled as a night fighter. It was also formidable in ground attack and anti-shipping roles.  Oh, and the name "Whispering Death" was apparently coined by the Japanese and is attributed to the aircraft's quiet Hercules engines that made use of sleeve valves instead of the more commonplace (and noisy) poppet valves. Oh Lord, I'm such a geek!

PS Seeing one of these aircraft in its physical form has been a bucket list item for quite some time. If the Italian site is not accessible there is always this one in Greece.

Buccal Up

As well as serving as a reminder that these spectacular collapses of Antarctic ice are telling us that Global Warming is real and species-threatening, a more personal and current metaphor for the phenomenon is that of my dental status. On Friday, while snacking on some roasted almonds, a seemingly gigantic piece of rear molar slid gracefully away from the rest of the tooth (the meso-lingual surface of tooth #19, to be precise). An emergency trip to the dentist today confirmed that a crown will be needed so in a couple of days I will be subjected to two hours of fun-filled numbness while the old stump is re-shaped and a temporary crown fitted. Apparently they have a large movie library for patient distraction purposes. I enquired whether they had Marathon Man (they didn't) -I wonder if they have Pulp Fiction or perhaps The Thomas Crown Affair...?

Gone Home: Alvin Lee

The last few months haven't been kind to musicians in the rock, jazz and pop arenas. If it wasn't bad enough with Jon Lord (Deep Purple), Lee Dorman (Iron Butterfly; -ok, ok but I loved "In a Gadda da Vida"), Dave Brubeck, Kevin Ayres (Soft Machine) all playing their last codas, Alvin Lee has now checked out. A terrible shock and a shame as I was hoping to catch him at one of his European gigs in the not too distant future. He was surely one of the first guitar shredders and arguably the most exciting guitarist at Woodstock. I'm sure he came close to melting his Gibson 335 on occasions. Here he is, appropriately enough, going home...RIP, Mr Lee.

Driving Stage ZR14: Rallye Monte Carlo Historique 2013

Want to know what driving a full historic rally regularity stage is like...? Here's a dashcam view of most of the ZR14 stage (Utelle to La Tour sur Tinee). It's a straight run (no junctions) on the D32 -an improbably narrow, winding, goat trail of road, with an appalling surface and strewn with large rocks that have fallen from the mountainside. To make matters worse there's no guard rail and the drop off the side is one of those "your clothes will go out of fashion before you hit the bottom" deals. A few things to remember (i) the camera lens is very wide angle so in reality the road is much narrower than it appears in this clip ad (ii) we are not racing but driving as a time-speed-distance regularity; that is to say we are trying to maintain a precise average speed (in this case I believe it was 47.7 KPH) and (iii) the cars we overtake are running below the average speed (an indication of the stage's difficulty)and we have caught them up. As you can see, at least one car, a large Mercedes, has gone off into the rock wall and bizarrely we encounter a broken down camper van. The RMCH is definitely not a wine and cheese party. And don't you love the way the Mini just flies by those Porsches...!

The team would like to say a big "thank you" to Justin Jeffrey at Mini Spares UK for generous sponsorship as well as participating as a member of our service team.

Sound Byte

In case any of you gentle readers happened to to be curious about what it sounds like to be inside a Mini Cooper S prepared for historic rallying, try dropping a fork down your sink waste disposal unit, mic up to a decent sized PA system and turn on. The decibel meter on my iPad registered 90dB at 4000 rpm. I didn't try on a stage (no time) when the revs were pushing 8000rpm. The use of an intercom with good noise cancelling headphones is highly recommended. And before you ask, this short clip was taken on a transit road section between stages and we weren't speeding. Honestly!

Weather in France

Not much here for the casual reader, I'm afraid. This page was constructed mainly for the use of members of the Mad Dog Rally team so they could get an instant take of the weather at a number os strategic points on the route of the imminent 16ème Rallye Monte Carlo Historique. Members of Team GB, a motley collection of seven cars (which includes Bill Richards and me) are also most welcome to browse around here. Clicking on a specific town will link to the French Meterological Office ("Meteo") and the four day forecast will pop up. I'll post something of more general interest soon...

Antraigues sur Volane
Burzet
Clelles
Die
Digne-les-Bains
La Bollène-Vésubie
La Chapelle-En-Vercors
Lantosque
Nice
Puget-Theniers
Saint-Agreve
Saint-Jean-En-Royans
Sospel
Tournon-sur-Rhone
Utelle
Valence

Shedding Some Light on the Matter: An Illuminating Evolution

When I first started rallying at the beginning of the new millennium, the Mini was fitted with two, period correct, 7" Lucas Flamethrower spotlights. These very quickly revealed themselves to be little better then useless when the going got tough and the term "candlepower" was never more apt. Subsequently I added two more Lucas 5 1/2" fog lights which also proved to be minimally effective. I then had the Flamethrowers (an optimistic term if ever there was one) rebuilt with modern reflectors and high output bulbs. In addition the Mini's headlights were replaced with quartz iodine units. This was a small improvement but we still weren't getting anywhere near enough light on the road, especially with Bill's (who was now in the pilot's seat) aggressive driving style on twisty mountain stages. So then we added a set of four classic 180cm Cibié Oscars. This was a lot better and night stages were becoming less scary. But the lighting evolution continued and for the subsequent rally we substituted the two center lamps for 220cm Super Oscars. Now I was beginning to feel that we were no longer outgunned by some of our competitors who seemed to have military-grade anti-aircraft searchlights bolted to their vehicles. But there is an old saying about the Monte, "You can never have enough light on the road". Too true! So for the 2013 event we have four 220cm Super Oscar spotlights with long distance beams and two 180cm Oscars with foglight reflectors to give us side scatter illumination which is particularly useful for 180° hairpins turns. Oddly we have never found a light which is any use in fog; maybe one year we'll fit radar for that...!

That Time of Year Again

Well it appears to be that time of year again when we engage in ritual combat with Porsches, Alfa Romeos, Jaguars and other automotive iron on the Rallye Monte Carlo Historique. It's come around very fast. I'm now madly making pace notes and doing a million things before I fly out to to fettle and calibrate the car next week. This time the "off" is from Monte Carlo on Monday 28th January and finishes at the same place in the early hours of Saturday 2nd February. A good place to spectate is the Quai Albert, MC, at the start of the Turini night loop on the afternoon of Friday 1st February or a little later at the top of the Col de Turini itself. Please come and watch if you are anywhere near the south of France or come and say hello after the finish. I won't bore you with more details now as everything will get published in the motoring press anyway (thanks Jeff)but in the meantime here are a few nice action snaps of the MiniSpares-Mad Dog Rally Team on the 2012 event.

Oh and you can follow us on Facebook and Twitter, too.

Musical Postcards: Hubert Laws

For some reason I didn't get around to posting this clip I captured last summer at Bake's Place in Bellevue, Washington. It features veteran flautist, Hubert Laws and members of his band joining up with the Lary Barilleau Latin Collective and taking off on a fantastic jam together. Rob Mullins dominates the piano in rare fashion. I can't remember when I last saw such a spontaneous and exciting session. Bravo!

Musical Postcards: The Blooming Heather...

No, this is nothing to do with Francis McPeake's wistful folksong about bonnie Scotland so if you came here looking for stuff about wild mountain thyme and so forth you're going to be sorely disappointed. This is another vignette in my local musicians series and features the terrific Heather Sullivan and an assortment of talented friends tearing it up at the Pogacha bar in Issaquah, Washington. Jackson Rice's trumpet solo is simply outrageous! Rock on, guys!

Musical Postcards: Pearl Django

Collecting video clips of local musicians seems to have become an inadvertent hobby. Sometime ago, while wandering around a local shopping mall in Bellevue, Washington, I chanced across this delightful nugget of  gypsy jazz.  In this clip, Seattle-based Pearl Django perform the Reinhardt/Grapelli classic, "Djangology".  If this doesn't make you tap your feet, there is no hope. Excellent! Usual excuses about image quality with a mobile phone...

Happy Halloween!

Beautiful full moon over Bellevue, Washington, this evening.

I caught this lovely, eerie, full moon over Bellevue this evening. Now I'm checking to see if I've got hair growing on my hands...

Happy Halloween!

PS Note to my shutterbug readers: sorry about the fairly average snap but I was caught with just my phone (HTC One S) so this will have to do. 

A Chip off the Old Block

At the risk of appearing nepotistic, I'm going to recommend this as an entertaining way of spending five minutes. It would appear the girl can not only write but has a well-developed sense of humor too. Enjoy!

Dorje

Despite my advanced age, I still like to listen to modern music including new and emerging bands.  I"m very aware that "my era" produced some of the most innovative and enduring rock anthems of all time but I have no intention of getting stuck listening solely to the likes of Cream, Zeppelin and Hendrix for the rest of my mortal existence. Recently, this jolly bunch from the UK caught my attention and are one of the best rock bands I've heard in a very long time. And they do ROCK! Dorje [dawr-juh] comprises musical virtuosos Rabea Massaad (guitar), Dave Hollingworth (bass) and Ben Minal (drums)  - the ensemble is fronted by the charismatic YouTube guitar guru, Rob Chapman (guitar, vocals).

Take a listen. In contemporary vernacular it's pure filth!

Laptop or Stovetop?

Here's a cautionary tale for laptop users (I would guess most readers of this blog).

One hot day, back in the summer, I noticed that the front of my thighs were sore.  Nothing awful but there was a pronounced tenderness in the region of my quadriceps muscles as I moved around. At first I  didn't think anything of it but the discomfort increased.  Twenty four hours later, both my legs were quite painful and eventually, when I could no longer ignore the problem, I pulled down my trousers to examine the tender spots.  What I saw was quite horrifying. The skin above my knees on both legs was vividly red and blotchy. Several blisters were evident: the left side was particularly bad. At first I was mystified  about the pathogenesis of these lesions (see Picture #1 below).  I cogitated on the matter for a bit.  Was it some strange bacterial infection?  A Staph perhaps or worse some horrendous, flesh-eating, bug (technically necrotizing fascitis caused by a Group A Streptococcus)? Possibly it was an incipient autoimmune condition such as pemphigus or even a T cell lymphoma.  I felt distinctly neurotic as my imagination ran riot. Sometimes it doesn't help to have a background in immunology/microbiology. And then the light bulb went on...!  The previous day(s) I'd done quite a bit of work on my laptop with the machine on my, err, lap. Generally I try to work with it placed on a desk as I'm very aware that extensive typing with a computer placed on one's knees leads can lead to postural problems (I have the chiropractor's bills to prove it). However for a number of reasons I'd been using the machine on my lap on this occasion. The computer in question is a 2011, metal-cased,  MaBook Pro with a 15" screen. It's quite powerful and its heart (or should I say brain?) comprises four Intel microprocessors clocked at 2.2GHz. All this grunt comes at the price of power consumption and heat is produced as a consequence. I'd noticed that the bottom of the Mac became quite warm after use.  But could it have been burning my skin without me noticing? I'd never had any problems with laptops in the past although they were invariably plastic case models and did not have the conductive problems of aluminum. Furthermore I'd never owned a machine as powerful as my MacBook Pro.

1. Author's left thigh above the knee. Large florid blotchy patches and blistering that  occurred after laptop use. The right leg was slightly less affected.

2. The temperature almost anywhere on the rear of the case exceeded 110°F.                                                                              

3. Around the rear left of the case, directly below the microprocessor cluster, the temperature approached and exceeded 120°F within a few minutes. 

4. Another temperature reading after being revved up for 3 minutes  with  YouTube usage or the video game "Rage". 120°F was achieved very easily and more intense provocation would probably generate temperatures in excess of those recorded here.

I fiddled around with the machine, deliberately trying to make it work hard by giving it demanding jobs such as playing big videos from YouTube and running various games. It did seem to get pretty hot. but was it enough to burn skin?  I had to be more objective so I purchased a small thermal scanner, revved  up the Mac again and took some readings. The results were surprising. The temperature at the bottom rear of the case was always well in excess of 100°F and went up to a peak of 120°F around the rear left side of the case, exactly below the microprocessor cluster (see photos).  The ambient temperature was 72°F (sorry for the use of Imperial units but the US is locked into it and regards the metric system with suspicion -if my little scanner had a built in Celsius readout, I couldn't find it).  Although I repeated the procedure a couple of times, I concede it wasn't a very scientific study but if anything the readings were conservative.  One thing is clear, however: the Mac gets bloody hot with just fair use and the heat is conducted very efficiently through the metal case.  The Burn Foundation states that a temperature of 133°F for 15 seconds will cause third degree burns so I'm pretty sure that a piece of metal heated to 120°F+ will cause tissue damage when pressed against skin for 60 minutes or more. I was wearing trousers when the injury occurred but thy were just light, summer weight, cotton chinos which didn't provide much in the way of insulation. Why didn't I feel the burn occurring? Well, in retrospect I did notice that the Mac was disagreeably warm and I moved it about a bit to mitigate the discomfort but at no time did I suspect it was causing a burn of any kind.

Anyway that's the story. Two, no three, months later my skin is still quite red and blotchy and I think will take the rest of the year to fully heal. I did mention the incident to a resident Genius in the local Apple Store and he pointed out that MacBooks aren't meant to be used on a lap even though they are universally termed "laptops".  There's an irony in this somewhere. Let the user beware: you have been warned! P.S. Note added two weeks after the initial post: I've just learned that my condition is a well documented phenomenon and is known as erythema ab igne or toasted skin syndrome. How I hate hindsight...!

Immunologically Speaking

As one of the longest, most expensive and certainly most toxic US election campaigns in history approaches its peak, I thought I'd share a scintilla of humour. As an immunologist, I've always loved this cartoon which I found many years ago and borrowed from the now sadly defunct  British satirical magazine "Punch" (May, 1981 issue). Somehow the depicted situation seems more relevant today than ever before; B cells, T cells, T bags...Oy!

Remodelling

OK, as you have doubtless noticed, I've had the decorators in. I'm not sure about the new look yet but the old template was definitely worn and faded. This one is fresher, warmer and has a retro feel. I seem to have lost a few of my old links  -not necessarily a bad thing as many were out of date and putting long lists of hypertext links on one's site looks "so 2005".  I'll restore one or two once I've figured out how to do the HTML again (damn, that was a chore last time) in the next week or so.  In the meantime please feel free to leave me feedback (preferably polite): I now have a "Comments" box again. The old one disappeared awhile ago with the loss of the Disqus free service and was actually the straw that broke the camel's back in terms of my tolerance for the old template.

War Stories: The Spitfire Table

Old friend and noted furniture maker, Huw Edwards-Jones, has a table for sale. Now this is not like anything you'll find at IKEA or advertised on eBay. Indeed it's such an astonishing fusion of art and engineering that it caused me to emerge from my blogging hiatus to comment.  The table is essentially an authentically reconstructed nosecone of a Supermarine Spitfire -the iconic WWII fighter aircraft. It is constructed from many original parts of verifiable provenance. For example the propeller blades are numbered and Huw has a complete history of each airplane to which it was originally attached. The aluminium has been shaped to the original size and contours of a Mk IX Spitfire and is assembled using original fastenings. The exhaust stubs are genuine Rolls Royce Merlin parts (did any engine ever sound better than that glorious supercharged V12?) and the propeller and nose cone rotate noiselessly on a crankshaft bearing. The time from concept to completion was is excess of five years and the details of the table's construction can be found here.

I can say, honestly, that I've never seen anything like it: the construction is a work of genius and the overall effect is breathtaking. I should point out that Huw is not a common or garden chippy  - among other things he is Liveryman of the Worshipful Company of Furniture Makers and a Freeman of the City of London. This is kind of a big deal. First of all only 300 individuals are admitted to the Company, membership of which entitles him to herd sheep across London Bridge and "go about the city with a drawn sword, to be drunk and disorderly without fear of arrest, and if convicted of a capital offense, to be hung with a silken rope”. Handy stuff. I should add that Huw's portfolio is amazing and stewards of his furniture include members of the British Royal Family. 

So if you are thinking of a rather different Christmas present for a loved one or you feel your current dining table is looking a bit passé, why not consider acquiring this brilliant conversation piece and give Huw a call. Be warned though, he told me the parts alone cost close to £60,000 (let's say $100,000 US, give or take a bit) so it's not going to be cheap...!

Musical Postcards: Nearly Dan

The excellent, Seattle-based, Steely Dan tribute band, Nearly Dan perform, virtually note-perfect, the classic "Deacon Blues" at the Triple Door Theatre.

I'll learn to work the saxophone
I'll play just what I feel
Drink Scotch whisky all night long
And die behind the wheel...

Sounds like an epitaph for somebody.

Usual caveats about the picture and sound quality with a Canon point-and-shoot.

On the Waterfront

Phew, it's been awhile...! Anyway this clip, cobbled together by yours truly, is axiomatic. Just press the 'Play' button and enjoy. Many thanks to Paul Murphy of Claremont 56 records for permission to use the excellent album track by Almunia (if you like it, you can download it here).

Lights, Camera, Auction

The original post has been removed (possibly ordered removed) but this hilarious advertisment was recently posted on Ebay's UK site. Read right to the very end and don't contact me if you want to buy any of this stuff.


You are bidding on a collection of 50 (approx) 12" singles and LPs of crap music.


My sister found these in her attic last weekend, where they has been sat gathering dust for the last couple of decades. They used to belong to her ex-husband, who is one of the biggest arseholes ever to draw breath. I never liked the wanker, and based my initial antipathy towards him on his taste in music. Not to put too fine a point on it, he was that most contemptible form of pond life, a Jazz Funker. This meant that as well as shit taste in music, he had appalling taste in clothes too. Pringle jumpers, pleated Farrahs, shoes that looked like pasties, white socks, revolting shirts and a comical wedge-cut hairdon't. Add to this 80s fashion horrorshow a Ford Capri and Super Mario-style moustache underlining his bulbous nose, and you get an object lesson in twatdom. No wonder Northern Soul fans (and everyone else) treated the Jazz Funk fans with sneering comntempt.

I couldn't comprehend what on earth my usually sensible sister could possibly see in the pillock. In vain I pleaded with her to send him packing. My argument that his hankering for Earth Wind & Fire records and attendance at soul weekenders made him a poor choice of mate was waved away as the rantings of a callow youth. She felt my reasoning was unsound.

Reader, she married him.

He made her life miserable for a few years with his moping, moody belligerence (and playing horrendous records like these). He told her lies and generally behaved like a platinum c*nt. Then he dumped her for his mistress when my sister was four months pregnant.

It's now nearly 20 years later and I would still like to take a meat tenderizer to his face. But his most horrendous crime, worse than wiring up my granny's shower so it was electrically live, worse even than his infidelity or the awful way he treated my sister, was the fact that he actually liked the abomination known as Jazz Funk. Here is the evidence. What a bastard.

Well, I suppose I'd better tell you what's for sale, though why you would actually want to own this dreck is beyond me. It's basically music for people who have a deep-seated hatred of music and want to inflict their pain on the world. But here goes nothing.

First the 12" singles.

ARTIST A B Label No Comment Year Condition (visual)
Beggar & Co (Somebody) Help me out b/w Rising Sun Ensign ENYT201 1981 VG++
Bob James Sign of the times b/w Westchester Lady ; Tappan Zee CBS 1608 1981 VG
Central Line Nature Boy (full version) b/w Nature Boy (83 mix) ; You've said enough Mercury MERX131 PS 1983 VG++
Change Searching b/w Angel in my pocket WEA K79156 Company bag 1980 VG+, small WOL
Chi Lites feat Gene Record Have you seen her b/w Super mad (about you baby) 20th Centry Fox 2481 1980 NM
David Joseph You can't hide (your love from me) b/w You can't hide (acapella/Instr) Island 121S101 PS 1983 NM
Debra Laws On my own b/w Long as we're together Elektra 12529 1981 VG++
Eddy Grant Do you feel my love b/w Symphony for Michael, opus 2 Ensign 4512 Company Bag 1980 VG++
Eddy Grant Can't get enough of you b/w Neighbour Neighbour ; Time Warp Ensign ENYT207 Company bag 1981Ex
Fantastic Four Bring Your own Funk (BYOF) b/w Sexy lady (remix) Atlantic LV14 1978 NM
Galaxy feat Phil Fearon Dancing Tight (dancemix) b/w Dancing Tight (instr) Ensign 12ENY501 Co bag 1983 Ex
Gap Band Burn Rubber on Me (Why you wanna hurt me) b/w Nothin' Comes to Sleepers Mercury MERX52 PS 1980 VG+
Heatwave Gangsters of the groove b/w Someone Like you GTO GT13 285 1980 Ex
Johnny Bristol Love no longer has a hold on me b/w Til I See you again Ariola Hansa AHAD567 1980 VG++
Kid Creole & Coconuts I'm a wonderful thing (baby) b/w Table manners (remix) ZE 12WIP 6756 PS 1982 VG++
Level 42 Love Games (full length ver) b/w Forty two Polydor POSPX234 1981 VG+
Light of the World Time (remix) b/w I'm So happy Mercury MERX64 PS 1980 VG++
Light of the World I shot the sheriff (ext mix) b/w Painted Lady; A new soft song Ensign 4612 Co Bag 1980 VG+ small WOL
Love Unlimited Orchestra Lift your voice and say (united we can in peace live today) b/w My Fantasies Unlimited Gold ULGA 13 1496 1981 VG++
Lynx So This is Romance b/w So This is Romance (Rio mix) Chrysalis 2546 PS 1981 VG-
Machine There but for the grace of God go I b/w Get your body ready RCA PC1456
Co bag 1979 VG++
Melba Moore Love's comin' at ya b/w Let's go back to lovin' ; Love's comin' at ya (instr) EMI America 146 1982 NM
Odessey Inside Out b/w love's Alright RCA 266 1982 Ex
Patrice Rushen Never gonna give you up (won't let you be) b/w Don't blame me Elektra 12494 1980 VG+
Players Association Turn the music up (remixed disco ver) b/w Goin to the disco (remixed disco v Vanguard VSL5011 PS 1979 VG+
Roberta Flack Don't make me wait too long b/w God Don't like ugly Atlantic K11555 1979 NM
Seawind What cha doin' b/w I need your love A&M 7575 1980 Ex
Shakatak Brazilian Dawn b/w You Never Know Polydor POSPX282 1981 VG
Shalimar Dead Giveaway (ext ver) b/w I don't wanna be the last to know Solar E9189T PS 1983 Ex
Sharon Redd Never Give you up b/w Beat the Street (instr & vocal) Prelude 13 2755 1982 Ex
Sugarhill Gang Rappers Delight (long version) b/w Rappers Delight (short version) Sugarhill SHL101 1979 VG+
Yarborough & Peoples Don't stop the music b/w You're My song Mercury MERX53 1980 VG+
Unlimited Touch I hear music in the streets b/w In the middle Prelude PRL D 605 1980 VG+
Fantasy You're too late b/w You're too late (instr) Pavillion 4z8 6408 1980 VG+
Kid Creole & Coconuts Annie I'm not your daddy b/w You had no intention Island 6801 PS 1982 VG+
MFSB Mysteries of the world b/w Manhattan Skyline CBS TSOP 9501 1980 VG++
Kool & the Gang Let's go dancin' b/w Stand up and sing De Lite DEX9 PS 1981 Ex
Third World Dancing on the floor (hooked on love) b/w Who gave you (Jah Rastafari) CBS 1214 1981 VG+
Sharon Redd Can you handle it b/w Leaving you is easier said than done Epic 9572 Cobag 1980 VG++
Shakatak Dark is the night b/w I lose myself Polydor POPSX 595 PS 1983 VG+
The Whispers It's a love thing b/w Girl I need you Solar SOT 16 WOL 1980 VG++
Donald Byrd Love has come around b/w loving you Elektra 12559 1978 VG+
Roberta Flack feat Donny Hathaway Back together again b/w Only heaven can wait Atlantic 11481 1979 VG++
Now the LPs


ARTIST TITLE Label No Year Sleeve Disc Comment
Linx Intuition Chrysalis 1332 1981 No sleev VG
Level 42 World Machine Polydor POLH 25 1985 VG++ Ex two copies!
Earth Wind & Fire Raise CBS 85272 1981 Ex VG
Odyssey hang together RCA 13526 1980 VG++ VG+
Summer Flying Home Touchstone BBT 113 1979 VG++ Ex
Earth Wind & Fire I Am CBS 86084 1979 VG++ VG+
Earth Wind & Fire Best of vol 1 CBS 83284 1978 VG++


VG++


I mean, Shakatak for fucks sake. What a prick. And surely he must have realised that buying anything by Shalimar would open him up to ridicule. Even those bands' mothers couldn't bear to listen to that stuff. I know I couldn't. None of this is play graded, only visually. I just could not bring myself to dirty my stylus with this bollocks.

Boring stuff: - I grade conservatively, particularly when I don't like the records. Don't ask me to split this lot. You buy it, you buy all of it and pay the shipping. I'm not keeping it in my house any longer than strictly neccessary. For the same reason, no returns. I don't want it back. Shipping in UK is £15 because the weight is approx 10kg. I'm willing to ship overseas at cost, but it's likely to be expensive (maybe £45 in europe) and frankly this crap isn't worth the stamps. If you want to collect from Croydon, that's OK but I will look at you with a contemptuous sneer as you stand in my doorway, proving by your purchase that you are tone deaf and tasteless.

Good luck, and God help you for liking this drivel.

A Right Royal Affair

Nearly 30 years ago, on 29th July, 1981, I sat glued to a little television set in my flat in Finsbury Park, London, and watched Charles and Diana get married. Three decades have gone by in the twinkling of an eye. Now I'm awake in the middle of the night, 6000 mile from Westminster Abbey watching Prince William and Kate Middleton (a "commoner" -only in the UK can class stratification be so overt) take the plunge. These events seem to have an effect on me as here I am coming out of my blogging hiatus to comment. Curious as I'm not really a Royal fan; "go figure" as they like to say on this side of the Atlantic. Anyway these goings on have given me cause to reflect on the Then and Now.

In 1981, at the dawn of the computer age, Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister (I'm still traumatised) and Elizabeth II was Queen of the United Kingdom and Colonies (somethings never change). The country was reeling from race riots in Brixton and elsewhere. The Irish troubles were very prominent and IRA detainee, Bobby Sands, died while on hunger strike. Tottenham Hotspur won the FA cup in fine style after a replay (Yay, Ricky Villa!) and John McEnroe won at Wimbledon. The Specials' "Ghost Town" was #1 and Bob Marley's "No Woman, No Cry" was also in the charts (surely pop music really was better back then). On the technology front, Germany launched its TGV, Europe's first high speed train and IBM started producing the first PC. It wasn't a good year for assassinations: Anwar Sadat was killed in Egypt and attempts were made on the lives of Ronald Reagan and Pope John Paul II. Elias Canetti won the Nobel prize for literature -I bought Auto-da-Fé at the time and it still resides, unread, on my bookshelf. The first case of a peculiar skin cancer (Kaposi's Sarcoma) in a gay man was diagnosed in Britain, although other cases had been observed in California -little did I know that this disease was to keep me employed for many years after.

Since then the tragicomedy of the Royal Soap Opera proceeded in a way that could not have been made up. In other areas we've witnessed wars (Falklands, Gulf I and II, Afghanistan) and diseases (AIDS, SARS, H1N1, Mad Cow to name but a few). Technological triumphs have taken place in space (the shuttle, international space station and Hubble telescope), medicine (statins, Prozac, Viagra, anti-retovirals) and communications (FAX machines, personal computers, cell phones, the internet, iPods, email and Facebook). Global warming has worried us and the Irish Troubles largely ceased. Video games have kept us entertained to the point of addiction. Cars have acquired catalytic converters, crumple zones, computers and airbags. Football (soccer) has become a global marketing opportunity although cricket is mercifully (mostly) unchanged. Popular music now mostly consists of people I haven't heard of although fresh talent like Adele, Joss Stone and bloody Coldplay still emerges. Britain now has great food (it was never that bad) and the US makes good beer. London has acquired The Eye, the Erotic Gherkin, the Millennium Bridge and Dome, the Lloyds building, the Assembly building, Docklands, Canary Wharf, the Tate Modern and the Globe Theatre. Transport developments include the Jubilee Line extension, bendy buses (boo), bike lanes, Boris' bikes and congestion charges. Smoking, which was even permitted on The Tube back then is now banned just about everywhere including pubs, thank goodness.

Like it or not, William and Kate's wedding is the kind of event that causes reflection. I suppose this is a good thing -at the very least it's snapped me out of my blogging stasis. So today I'll put a small placemark in history as well as my own life events. I'm now looking forward to the next 30 years and wondering what the wedding of the Royal Couple's first offspring will look like and of course what will occur on the World Stage in the intervening years.

On Sabbatical

It doesn't take Sherlock Holmes' powers of observation to notice the paucity of posts over the past year. The reasons for this slowdown are multifactorial and I'm not sure that even I understand them all. The simple fact is that after six years of fairly regular commentary, I no longer have the inspiration or inclination to produce copy with the same frequency as I did a year or so back. Thus I've decided to take a sabbatical until the summer. In this time I intend to pursue personal and business projects and maybe even take time to smell the roses. So thank you all, gentle readers, for your patronage of this site -I hope we can resume our relationship in the not too distant future.

Chimes at Midnight!

Well there goes another one...

Happy New Year, Everyone!

Musical Postcards: Mumford & Sons

In previous posts I may have opined to the effect that contemporary popular music is inferior to that of my youth (60s and 70s). Well I went to see this lot in Seattle last week (Thanks, Olivia) an am delighted to report that they've gone a long way to redeeming this current generation's penchant for dire, milk-toast pop and heinous rap. Great job guys -keep up the good work. A brilliant concert all round.

Where There's a Will There's a Way

I'm excited. Soon I shall be going to see this production at Ashland Shakespeare festival:



"Shakespeare?" you ask. Well, yes. I should point out that the clip above is the stage adaption of this film (I'm not responsible for the wretched music that starts playing halfway through):



Still not getting it? Don't worry, it's a bit tricky. The second clip is from the film is Throne of Blood, by Akira Kurosawa and it's an adaption of the play in the clip below -a very entertaining film version of the original, if you see what I mean. Note that these last two clips are different interpretations of the same scene.



Brilliant or what...? Old Bill is great in any language!

Something Wrong with this Picture

Last summer I was going to the gym 2-3 times per week. This year I'm going to the physical therapist 2-3 times a week to fix the damage to my musculoskeletal system (L frozen shoulder if you must know) I incurred in last year's activities. According to my doctor, the problem should resolve in about a year whereupon I can go back to the gym. There's something strange about this cycle of events...!