This year has been a good one for music. I have seen Imogen Heap, Hole, Emma Pollock, Patti Smith, Peter Gabriel, Sia and Tori Amos. I’m not sure if that’s all so far. I have the Manic Street Preachers, Tori again, Imogen again, Laura Marling for the first time and Melissa Auf der Maur still to go. I have travelled to Switzerland, Belgium, Italy, Ireland, France, Holland, Finland and Russia for Tori, stopping off in Germany along the way to walk through a park and play by the windmill, then catch a flight to the smallest airport I‘ve ever been to, Tampere. I’ve never had such a prolific music year, because up until I got together with my girlfriend a year ago, I had pretty much given up on seeing other artists apart from Tori Amos. I used to go to gigs all the time when I was younger, but then I started being more selective and narrow. During university, the good part of it, the number of poetry readings I went to far outweighed the gigs I saw, but then everything changed and wonderful writers like Alice Oswald were replaced with fuck knows who, and it wasn’t worth going anymore. Anyway, I’m not writing this to show off or anything, I’m writing it so that I can look back and remember exactly how good 2010 was. I’m talking like the year is over. I think it’s the cold weather and all the talk about Christmas.

Victoria Pier

I got back to my flat at midnight after being in Leeds with Chris. Now I'm propped up on top of my bed, warmish, leaning on a soft headboard that stops me from concussing myself. The curtains are slightly open and I'm listening to one of my favourite songs in the world, I Speak Because I Can, on my headphones. It's on repeat. I'm researching portable heaters and working on a poem I started last week. I'm thinking about how I want to visit my parents next week and brush my teeth for a long time. There's something very therapeutic about tooth brushing. That and automatic writing calm me when I'm not calm. I'm calm tonight. I have that eye-sting that used to only happen after a nightshift, but it's only 1am and it's happening. I've been sleeping a lot lately. Ready to hibernate, probably. I hated last winter. Most of my MA seminars were from 4-6 when it was dark. I used to find the darkness really comfortable and welcoming, but I just couldn't feel like that last year.

I'm not dreading the winter so much this year because I'm looking forward to seeing the river Humber in all different seasons. On Saturday I stood at the end of the pier and just watched the sky. To the left it was pale blue mixed with grey and some clouds which were just hovering and whisping- not really sure why they were there, I suppose. Straight ahead of me was a different blue mixed with a different grey, and a different set of clouds which were drifting there for a different reason. Then it became more and more windy. To the right was my favourite. Dark dark grey clouds which just looked on the verge of bursting. They were magnificent. I was saying to my dad that they looked so real that they looked like they were fake and made on a computer. Too polished, perfect and cloud-like. Then the wind carried on and the dark clouds to my right were suddenly almost in front of me.

Night.

Sometimes I like finishing work at midnight. I used to like it when I finished at five, but now I don’t think I could do that to myself again. But really, it’s always been the same things that I like. I like the quiet roads, the stars and the dark and the cold. I like coming home, making something to eat and not remembering that it’s the middle of the night. It’s very quiet, I know I’m near the water, there is nobody outside and it’s a very clear and still night. I want it to rain and pour and soak the ground. I like the sleepy kind of awake I feel at this time- like I don’t know what time it is, so I don’t know what I should be doing. But I do what I feel like. I forget about the time. It’s dark. It’s 00:34. But maybe it’s just a dark day.


...


I need to read more. Books. But I feel a bit lost when it comes to books. I think the main thing that stops me from reading as much as I used to is that awful feeling of guilt. I should be writing and if I don't feel like writing I should be reading but not this book, I should be reading something to do with my work. I should be researching and reading around and reading theory and making notes. There's no point reading this. I have actually thought that before: that there is no point reading a book because I'm not going to use it. What a horrible way to think, but I don't think there's any clearer way to prove how university sucks the enjoyment and the point out of the subject. No reading is wasted or pointless. So after posting this blog I'm going to find a book on my shelf that I haven't read before, or I'll go to bed and read another ghost story by Charles Dickens. Or I'll read one of my favourite books, which is a collection, or a selection, of Anne Sexton's letters. I will find something. I never finished Jacob's Room.

In a few days I'm moving out of the shared house I've been in since September and into a flat of my own. I moved out of my parents' house in 2006 and even though I still get homesick sometimes, I've enjoyed going it alone. A bit. As much as I'm looking forward to getting away from all the foreign strangers I've lived with over the years, and the people I have lived with but have never met, I'm wondering what kind of weird habits I'll develop from living completely on my own. It'll be nice, actually MORE than nice, to not smell like a Chinese/Bangladeshi take away anymore, or have the smell of meat or fish through the whole house. I'll definitely cook more. I don't enjoy cooking where others are hovering around, because others aren't clean and I'm not prepared to clean up other people's crap for them. So at least I can be very selfish, and Rachel and I can finally have some privacy that extends beyond one room.

Okay. I'm looking forward to it.

Very soon.

Here are a couple of (mostly) Rachel's pictures to try and describe how happy I am right now.

This is my summer.

Jul 09, 2010 Montreux Jazz Festival (Miles Davis Hall)
Jul 11, 2010 Brugge Cactusfestival (Minnewaterpark)
Jul 13, 2010 Milan Villa Arconati
Jul 14, 2010 Zürich Live at Sunset
Jul 16, 2010 Dublin Iveagh Gardens
Jul 18, 2010 London Apollo Victoria Theatre
Jul 19, 2010 Paris L'Olympia
Jul 21, 2010 Bloemendaal Caprera
Jul 23, 2010 Pori Jazz Festival (Kirjurinluoto Arena)
Sep 03, 2010 Moscow Crocus City Hall

Coloured sticks of chalk are passed around.

This is my view for now. Well, from yesterday but it's much the same today. Dull then bright then dull then bright. It feels good to write again and it's always good to be surrounded by books.

Missing.

I think Diet Cherry Coke fizzes louder than normal Diet Coke. I feel very switched on and focused lately. Happy. But tonight I would do anything for a cuddle and a long sleep together.

Today.

Automatic #5

A funny sort of having it all and aching and then not really growing fruit properly but still dying to eat it. And never really worrying about dying but thinking about people and what they do when they get home then crying and walking down the path drinking juice and playing with really big balloons that are so big they carry cars and rocks and never burst because they are so strong and bright.

My Head Sounds Like That

All I want to do is sleep. Usually I don't particularly enjoy sleeping because I see it as a bit of a waste of time, because I can get so much done through the night if I choose work over sleep. But these days I fall asleep so easily and comfortably. So much so that when I'm awake I just wish I could go back to sleep. I've had a busy couple of weeks which isn't normal for me. I think it's catching up on me because I'm starting to feel quite rundown.

Zzzz.

So far I've spent today finding 1GB of music to put on my iPod when I go home tomorrow. I have 86GB free, so I have no problem adding to it every time I go back, which isn't often anyway. I found some old live Gabriel era Genesis performances of the Lamb, some Patti Smith, Bracket, CocoRosie and lots of others. I love spending the day listening to bits of things, even if it means never really finishing a song.

This week has been fantastic. On Saturday I went to York with my friend to see Emma Pollock at the Duchess. We spent the day eating and playing on musical instruments in shops. On Sunday I got up early and got the train to London to see my Rachel and Holly. We went for lunch and then saw Patti smith at the Union Chapel at night. Patrick Wolf played violin for her, which was a nice surprise. Both gigs I saw were brilliant. Yesterday I spent the day with my longest and closest Hull friend Heather. Tomorrow I am going back to my parents' house in the morning. I get to spend the whole day with my mum, so we're going to go for lunch :) Then on Saturday, fuck me, we're going to see Peter Gabriel in London. This will be the first time I have seen him live and I can't even begin to explain my excitement. He's like Tori in the way that he has always been in my life because my parents listened to him a lot when I was young.

There is a gap when it comes to art. A big gap, and it almost makes me with that I didn't rely on it so much sometimes. Think of a song- it is complete and it feels like a moment and it sounds like the person singing the song is feeling that moment too, and the musicians are playing with their eyes closed. It sounds like they are feeling as lost in the music as you are, but they're not. And it bugs me, but there isn't really any way round it, not even performing live, really. The writer will experience something, they will feel it and they will write it, then the music will happen however that happens, whether they write it or whether their band does it. Then they will decide to record it, they will do it layer by layer, take after take, and spend hours mixing and editing until it sounds like the song you end up hearing. The romance is taken out of it, and so is the impulse, the moment and the spark that made the artist write the song in the first place. Just like with a poem- it is edited, proof read, approved, published blah blah blah. The whole process of recording and publication takes away any initial drama and turns the work into something completely different. Processed. Not natural. This is a very pessimistic way of looking at it because it means that when we 'go' to music to share its power, we aren't anywhere near to the root of what it actually means.

Original Sinsuality- Tori Amos
Signal To Noise- Peter Gabriel
My Body Is A Cage- Peter Gabriel
I Can't See New York- Tori Amos
Another Girl's Paradise- Tori Amos
Apres Moi- Regina Spektor
The Drop- Peter Gabriel
After The Ordeal- Genesis
Here Comes The Flood- Peter Gabriel
In Your Eyes- Peter Gabriel
Mercy Street- Peter Gabriel
Sky Blue- Peter Gabriel
Red Rain- Peter Gabriel

I can't see myself getting sick of this list in the near future. When I make playlists I completely hammer them until I have exhausted every possible combination on shuffle, every time of day to listen, every way to listen, every emotion to feel. This playlist would fit anything. Two of the songs, I Can't See New York and Signal To Noise, are major disappearing songs. I used to love lying on the floor with Heather in my Washington Street bedroom in the dark listening to I Can't See New York as loud as we could before the speakers would start to crackle with all the bass. That impact is beautiful. I get that with the Gabriel song too- from the strings and the despair that pours from it.

It's 1am and I am tired. I am eating parma violets and drinking cherryade like a child. I'm not homesick or wishing to be anywhere different because I feel wrapped up and loved and content. I have been reading A Flame in the Mearns: Lewis Grassic Gibbon A Centenary Celebration which was given to me by Margery Palmer McCulloch who actually edited the book. She signed it too but I forgot to photograph it for the signed book entry. I am ready to get completely absorbed in LGG and his work because, if all goes to plan, I will be writing a hell of a lot about him over the next few years.

I was going to write a blog based on this earlier but my computer died and I lost all my thoughts on the matter:

'In the Republic Plato famously complained that one reason why poetry often has such a bad moral influence on people is that it appeals to their emotions rather to their reason, the 'highest' part of the soul.'

I can't even remember the last poem I wrote.