Music and Memory: 2010-2019 Part Six, "Sleep"

2015 brought some exciting/terrifying news, and introduced me to some very special music.

Over the next two years, the two became entwined in the most wonderful of ways, with Max Richter’s 8 hour masterpiece ‘Sleep’ sound-tracking the lead up to and actual birth of our son in 2016.

I hadn’t heard of Richter’s work until news of his all night live premiere of Sleep was announced, and I was instantly taken with the idea – music that you could truly immerse and lose yourself in whilst surrendering to sleep. Music that could saturate and sooth your subconscious.

It was a totally new way to explore music – piecing it together from the snippets you wake for, getting a sense of its expansiveness whilst never being totally sure you have heard it all. We were lucky enough to see it live in 2017, in at all-night performance in London (and in a rather wonderful/accidental double-bill with a matinee from Bill Callahan in Hoxton Hall earlier in the day)

It’s hard to do justice to how special this was, and to top it off we met and were interviewed by national treasure Jarvis Cocker for his Sunday Service show on BBC 6 Music, whilst in our pyjamas.

So here is my comic and album for 2015, Max Richter’s from SLEEP:

Music and Memory: 2010-2019 Part Five, "Before the Dawn"

Happy New Year and welcome to 2020!

I had hope to get further with this series before the decade ended, but the pressures of Christmas and some ill health over the festive break caused me to stall halfway through 2014.

I have decided to continue this project through to its conclusion as I have written and planned the remaining entries, and have some interesting music and personal experiences left to share. I may even continue it beyond 2020, maybe adding to it yearly as an ongoing record.

For now, I am pleased to share my Music and Memory blog for 2014 – this could only be one thing, Kate Bush’s wonderful return to live performance with ‘Before the Dawn’. I was lucky enough to secure tickets for the opening night of the 22 date run for my wife’s 30th birthday present, so we had the pleasure of seeing the show before anyone had any idea what to expect.

It remains the most theatrical and ambitious live show I have ever seen, and it was incredible to see it unfold in front of you in a small venue such as the Hammersmith Apollo. In 2016 it was released as a live album, which I listened to as I sketched out the story for this comic. It may lack the visual impact of the full show, but it is a wonderful reminder, and a testament to how well rehearsed and accomplished the band were in bringing the songs to life.

This was probably the last ‘care free’ year of our youth (if you can ever call it that), as the second half of the decade brought some life changing events, and all of the accompanying challenges. I will get to that soon, in the meantime please enjoy my recounting of an evening in August, in the middle of the last decade.

Music and Memory: 2010-2019 Part Four, "Push the Sky Away"

Part four of my exploration of music and memory covers 2013, and Nick Cave and the Bad Seed’s ‘Push the Sky Away’. This album marked a transformation in the Bad Seed’s sounds, as Cave’s collaboration with Warren Ellis began a journey into strange, ethereal and atmospheric places – a journey that has culminated in this year’s wonderful ‘Ghosteen’.

 In 2013, We were settling into life in Folkestone, or attempting to at least.  After an exciting first year working at Cognitive, I had been promoted, but tasked with steering a set of projects where we had over-stretched our capabilities by a staggering margin.

 Creatively it was a fun and frantic year spent building sets and filming puppets, but the pressure was at times unbearable and the weeks were long. I spent much of this time in the Old Post Office on Tontine Street, working with some friends with whom I had collaborated before. It was here that I first heard ‘Jubilee Street’ on BBC Radio 6 music, and the crawling guitar line, filled with an ominous menace, grabbed me in an instant.

 Perhaps because of the difficult time it is associated with in my mind, I hadn’t listened to the album as a whole much since this time. Listening to it now as I sketched out this comic, I was struck by how much had stayed with me, and how many memories it stirred.

Music and Memory: 2010-2019 Part three, "King Animal"

The third issue of my musical review of the decade reaches 2012, with a surprise flashback to the nineties. Soundgarden had reformed, and returned with a new album and a series of UK dates.

Of all the grunge bands that had soundtracked my teenage years, Soundgarden have had the most lasting influence and longevity. I bought Superunknown from Ourprice in Lewisham in 1994, after hearing Black Hole Sun on the radio. It was the first time I had made a decision on musical taste based purely on my own, with no guidance from the preferences of my older brother Simon.

They were and still are one of a select few bands that I can name every member, and describe their exact contribution to the band’s overall sound. As they mellowed through the bluesier ‘Down on the Upside’, their intricate arrangements and dynamic shifts had a major effect on my own guitar playing style, and I still get a lot of pleasure from listening to them today.

Over 2012 and 2013 I saw them live three times, which more than made up for missing them in 1996. ‘King Animal’ may not be the album of the decade, ore even their finest work, but it came with enough quality and memories to make an impression, that’s why I chose it to represent 2012.

Music and Memory: 2010-2019 Part two, "Apocalypse"

My second comic in this series takes me back to 2011 and Bill Callahan’s sublime ‘Apocalypse’. This is another one of those albums that I got to know so well in such a brief time that it gives me an intense sensory memory – an almost tangible evocation of a moment in time.

2011 was a difficult year, yet I have many fond memories of it. I was out of work, and as a result going through an identity crisis of some kind. My creative drive was faltering, and I had no idea where to look to find purpose.

I was diagnosed with depression that summer, and at the time believed strongly this was as a direct result and symptom of unemployment, as opposed to a more nuanced, cyclical flow of causality. This naivety has had ramifications for the years that follow, but was also the start of a journey back to the creativity that I had always define myself. Or perhaps a new, more focused incarnation of that impulse.

I can genuinely say that ‘Apocalypse’ is an album that helped be through this particular rut, and I will always have a deep fondness for it.

Music and Memory: 2010-2019 Part one, "the Suburbs"

As the decade draws to an end, I have decided to look back over the last ten years of my life through the lens of the music that has accompanied it. Part autobiography, part review of the twenty-tens, part exploration of music, memory and mental health, I will be releasing a series of one page comics focussed on a particular album and period.

This passage of time has seen highs of marriage, fatherhood and creative achievement, and lows of unemployment, depression, debt and relational strain. For each comic, I will try and capture why certain pieces of music have found significance in my life, and the meaning I take from them.

I will be working sequentially through the years, though I can’t promise I will cover each and every one. As we reach 2020, I will compile them into a single collection. First up is ‘the Suburbs’ by Arcade Fire – I would love to know your thoughts on both the music and my interpretation of it.

Dinosaur Bones

In the week that Great Britain & Northern Ireland was due to leave the EU, we celebrated something else that happened in 2016. Produced as part of a comic drawing challenge set at the Cognitive studio.

Edit 31st March: The ‘extracting the egg from a birthday cake’ analogy references this column by Gary Bainbridge - so many good metaphors for Brexit, this one is up with the best!

"It is what it is"

As Storm Erik lashed the south coast, I took quick trip to the chippy just before closing time.