What not to say when someone dies

There was a nice piece about Wilko Johnson in Louder than War last week, but I had to laugh at the way it got promoted on Twitter. “Wilko Johnson who sadly recently passed away,” it said. 

“Sadly passed away” isn’t very rock’n’roll, is it?

There is a perfectly good four-letter word they could have used instead. D.I.E.D. Wilko always seemed pretty down to earth so I think he would have preferred that. Also, he was a former English teacher so on that basis I also think he would have preferred that.  

We are not Victorians. We don’t need euphemisms.

Anyway, I lost one of my best friends last month. And “lost” is not a euphemism. Yes, my friend died. And now I have a loss in my life. Another one.

How not to be scared of being yourself

 

I’ve been blogging here for nearly 15 years and I’ve always been anonymous. I can’t now remember why. 

It might have been because when I started I still had a job. There were things I didn’t want to be seen saying, like Why I’m scared to leave my job. And there were people who I didn’t want to see who I was behind the work persona.

It might have been because I was shy. You might not think it from what I share online, but I’ve always been quite a private person. Hiding behind a pen-name (pixel-name?) allowed me to be more open, because no-one knew who I was.

I think that might be about to change. 

Punk rock and feminist as fuck

Book review: Why Patti Smith Matters by Caryn Rose

This is one of those books that when you’ve finished you think to yourself “I’m GLAD I read that.”

And not just because I agree with the title. To the extent that I wrote a blog post with the same title many years ago. 

It’s because, I think, it’s life affirming to hear from someone who really loves the artist they are writing about, and makes you feel the same about them. And at the same time, someone who has the skill to go above and beyond fangirl stuff. 

Book review: This Woman’s Work

I don’t know what the point of this book is. 

Subtitled Essays on Music, the selling point is that everything in it has been written by a woman. Nearly all the reviews think the point is what’s on the publisher’s blurb – “confront male dominance and sexism” blah blah – but I don’t judge a book by its cover. Or even the inside cover. (The front cover – a woman musician, on stage, looking very rock’n’roll – is actually good.)

Things I have forgotten how to do

I keep thinking that life has gone back to normal after the pandemic. Then I remember there is no such thing as “after the pandemic”.

I kept the lockdown rules, all that time ago. I carried on with similar behaviour after lockdown was ended. When there were other lockdowns, I didn’t really notice the difference. I forgot that I once lived my life differently.

I became risk-averse. I kept my distance, kept away from public transport and public buildings, wore facemasks everywhere. (I still wear them, even though I know they only work when everyone does it.  Remember “I wear my mask to protect you…”?) 

I tried to remind people that just because the government tells you something it doesn’t mean it’s true. 

I got used to not going anywhere, to only meeting people out of doors, to rarely socialising.

There were things I forgot how to do.

Wear earrings.

Wear mascara.

Wear anything that isn’t the same two T-shirts.

Talk to people.

Generous geekiness: The sound of being human

 

There’s a lovely line in Jude Rogers’ new book, The Sound of Being Human, as she remembers how she papered her teenage bedroom with pictures of pop stars. She describes: “faces that made my connection to music human, faces that I stared at like a baby, trying to understand the new realms they represented.”

I don’t think a male music writer would have thought of "stared like a baby” but it’s a great simile. And as a female music lover (and one time music writer) it makes me happy to see women writers doing things in a distinctively female way.

Ways of listening: Glastonbury, new music and old age

Too Much Stuff

I turned on the television last weekend and Supergrass were on stage at Glastonbury singing “We are young”. I remembered buying that song when it came out, and how much that line – the cheek and celebration of it – meant to me. They were about 20 and I was in my 30s, but I felt young because of new-found freedom. 

I realised that Supergrass are older now than I was when I first heard that song. A lot older.

Why we need books about music by women

Here’s the good news: “In 2022, lots of women are writing books about music and getting them published.”

That’s the first line of a recent article by Jude Rogers in The Quietus. She has her own new book to promote and everyone says it’s good. I am trying to get my local library to stock it. They have a suggestion form. I also asked them to get the new anthology This Woman’s Work. “More music writing by women, please,” I said in the comments box. 

It's good that there’s more music writing coming out now by women, but it’s scuppered my plans for the Women’s history of pop section in my blog. I’ve got a backlog of books that I’ve read but not yet reviewed, and I’m not going to keep up.

A while ago American music writer Jessica Hopper put together a spreadsheet of books about music by women. (Actually it’s titled “non-men” but I’ll overlook that.) I was planning to work my way through it, but that’s now feeling a bit ambitious. If the list keeps getting longer, though, that can only be a good thing. 

Because writing about music has been a boys’ club for too long, and women have things to say too. 

Book review: She Bop

Last year, a friend posted on Twitter: “I’d like some big sprawling pop history books written by women now, please.” Obviously, it caused a bit of a discussion.

And it made me wonder. I like books, and I particularly like music books written by women, but I don’t think I like sprawling books. And I wondered if I actually like the word “sprawling” either. It feels like a male word. A word for people who are used to taking up space, regardless. More space than is actually necessary. Maybe a sprawling book is the literary version of manspreading. I can’t think of many books by women that do that. 

There are some long pop history books by women, but that’s not the same as being sprawling. She Bop (25th Anniversary Edition) by Lucy O’Brien is one example. It’s 423 pages long and it’s the opposite of sprawling. Because there’s a lot to fit in, so it has to be concise.