NIK: All the Christmas Parties No. 1

[Jon Jarrett]

        Dear All,
                  very very late, I know. Massive backlogs of e-mail,
tribes of hostile natives, all kinds of stuff: but I did promise Alan that
this would be sent out to the list, and I wrote it on the train out of
London after the Greasy Truckers Party last November so it woudl be
fresh... ha. Anyway.

        "The Mean Fiddler's not a bad little venue apart from the
management and the drinks: the staff are always friendly, and the floor
space and stage is good." Though now I think of it the stairwell being in
the middle like that is a bit annoying. But if I subedit this it'll be
even longer so I'll stop. "Inner City Unit (or whatever it was; the Inner
City Pompadours was I think Nik's final decision) started while I was
still outside, well before Nik's site's claim of 19:30, but I think I
only missed one number. I came in just as they started `Solitary Astrid',
and then spent a while taking in the lineup, which was, um, unorthodox.
>From left to right, then, we had Commander Jim Hawkman on synths, Nik
Turner on sax and vocals, Dave Anderson on lead bass, Nasr Ali-Khan on
rhythm bass", yes, two bass guitars and no normal ones, you got it, I did
make sure honest, "Terry Ollis on drums and the woman with the big hair
who was at the last few gigs and whose name I have never heard. Can I say
now, but for the fact that she's tone-deaf, amateur, has no sense of
timing, and can't sing or play, she's lots of fun. I don't think this
brave attempt at a rally when the the group won't play came off, but had
she not had her oar in, it might just have done.

        "Anyway, setlist was whatever they started with, `Solitary
Astrid'. `Little Black Egg', `Watching the Grass Grow'. `The Crusher',
`Space Invaders'. `Fungus Among Us', `Bones of Elvis', `Gas Money' and `In
The Nood'. Of these some definitely didn't work with that little treble,
`Astrid', `Grass' and `Space Invaders' most obviously. For all of them had
Anderson been playing with all he had it might have worked but he only let
loose a few times. Better than Nasr though, who couldn't stay on as well
as one might have liked. On the other hand, `Fungus' was barely affected
and `The Crusher' and `Bones of Elvis' became different songs that worked
just as well. None of it was good enough to work better though. A brave
try, as I say, but not good enough. And Hawkman was nothing as usual: I
mention this only because of later.

        "Tell you what though, Tractor were rather fine. I didn't know any
of their stuff but the drummer is very good (still) and the other guy
still has a good voice. They did a song about war leaders which was very
powerfully put over and several other pieces I was pleasantly surprised
by. For the last two numbers they were joined y Eric Bell, a man whose
sole claim to fame appears to be having written `Whiskey in the Jar', so
they did that, with Bell on guitar that may have been good once; he seemed
to remember this but not how to get there and Jim Milne on bass (which he
did well) and some blues number where Bell really started to grate. But
the actual Tractor set was really quite pretty.

        "Did I mention the MC was Andy Dunkley? It took me a while to be
sure. He has become a grey-haired man in a puffer jacket, but still quite
sharp and unhecklable.

        "Then there was the Hawkestra. This was chaos for much of it, but
a real freakout also. Line-up was as follows, stage right to stage
left: Commander Jim Hawkman on synths, Sam Ollis on drumkit two, Jerry
Richards on lead guitar, Ron Tree on bass and occasional vocals,
Adrian Shaw on bass, Nik Turner on sax, flute and vocals, Dave
Anderson on bass, Thomas Crimble on guitar and twelve-string acoustic,
Mick Slattery on lead guitar, Alice Rhubarb (apparently) on vocals, Marian
Windmill on djembe and for a few numbers Thomas Hewitt on guitar and Nick
Calvert on backing vocals (`D-Rider' and `Silver Machine' only).

        I have to mention the dancers. I may possibly lech. The woman
who's danced for ICU was there, powerful and dignified and most
importantly a good dancer; but there was also a big blonde lass of
abundant stature who couldn't dance as well but was really giving it
everything she had. It was very difficult not to look at her and figure
she must, generally, be a lot of fun. People behind me were decided she
was a stripper but if they were hopiing for Stacia they were disappointed,
she only got down to her underwear. But they were both lots better than
Hawkwind's usual dancers, Kris of course excepted because of being
incendiary. They made it lots of fun to watch. Alice Rhubarb on the other
hand appeared to be a kind of sub-fusc Iggy Pop, who realising that he
would never be Iggy, had dragged up and covered himself in glitter, and it
didn't really help. Neither could he sing. The woma with the djembe could
also have been dispensed with, In fact so could (it's heresy I
know) Adrian Shaw, who was right at the back and indistinguishable for
the bass noise. But everyone else did well, especially, and this did
surprise me because he's never been anything other than forgettable ever
while on stage before now", where I've seen anyway, "Jim Hawkman. He was
no Del, but he did better than Dik Mik would have done undrugged. Lots of
swoosh, quite well-felt too, I would have kept him on if I'd only ever
seen that performance. Jerry was also very good, but seemed to be taking
his job much more seriously than everyone else. There was a lot of space
noise and some damn good solos coming from him but only once did anyone
else in band apart from Ron, who stayed close to him, seem to notice.

        "So the set-list opened with a rather shhaky `Born To Go' that
took a very long time to take form. Vocals were uncertain (Ron and
Nik) and out of place, or the case of Rhubarb just random. It didn't
really take off, it managed a minute or so of hop but otherwise it was
thud thud along the ground. Last year I gave a deep analysis of all the
communication going on; it wasn't there this year. Jerry was watching
other people by the end so as to try and be relevant and involved, but
otherwise there was not much communication, and this made stopping,
especially the Ollis power drum duo (the boy is the spit image of young
Terry, it's very scary, and was clearly feeling the rhythm very strongly,
he was well away), very difficult. `Born To Go' actually ended fairly
cleanly, I think because everyone was lost. They followed it with `Orgone
Accumulator' which was only just recognisable, and didn't sound much
good. There was one patch where Jerry got a solo and the band brifely
became his backing group but that didn't really save it. There was no free
flight section as there is on the original, just monophonic bashing at the
riff, and if anyone left it he was drowned out. I could hear Slattery this
time, sometimes, but though at least he was playing out a bit he was
nothing geat. But the swoosh was very good.

        "So, not very good so far, which only shows how wrong you can be
because now they did `Master of the Universe' and it was _great_. Perfect.
Best I've heard, except possibly the Fairfield Halls '98 one where Nik
playd in tune; but with the real bass part which hits harder. I loved
it. And they followed it with `D-Rider', which was, well, as it always is,
how much can go wrong, and that was therefore good. After that a rattling
`Brainstorm', not great but perfectly good, and lastly `Silver Machine'
with Nick Calvert singing out of pitch at points and looking, again, very
lost. Then they cleared us out, but very slowly, I was favourably
impressed by the floor staff considering what they're normally like.

        "Afterthoughts: the dancers wee good. The big blonde lass got a
lot of applause, partluy because a lot of the audience clearly appreciated
her as much as I did, but partly just for having so much fun on stage. A
second thing: it was all freaky and pretty lights, and the venue has a
cafe that does decent burgers, and the bar staff boither to smile as they
overcharge you. And the atmospheree in the crowd was really good. ICP got
heckled, but lots of people were very happy to see Tractor, and I got
dragged into dancing by several people during Hawkestra and I wasn't the
only one.

        "A last thought. As I'd been walking to the venue from college, I
passed the British Museum, which is currently", or was when I write this
originally anyway, "hosting a Korean exhibition. Some function on there
this evening was being announced by a Korean drum duo outside, and thet
were very very good, and why I was late for ICP. I could have watched
them all night for free, and I only didn't because otherwise I'd never see
waht happened with ICP. But I heard them mightily in my head all the way
there and I could still hear them after ICP. I forgot about them during
Tractor and only remembered as I walked north to St Pancras for a strange
weekend. So I think it must have been fun, don't you?"

        Yours,
                Jon

ObCD: The MC5 - _Kick Out The Jams_

--
"I recognise that I have transgressed many of the precepts of the divine
law, and that I am subjected by various vices and iniquities, disobedient
to the words of the divine mystery brought unto me and a worshipper of the
delights of this military age." Marquis Borrell of Barcelona, 955 A.D.

             (Jonathan Jarrett, Birkbeck College London)