Why Didn't You Tell me? (Part Five)

 

Over the past few years, I have read an absurd amount of John D. MacDonald books and have grown to envy the way his stories flow so beautifully. He makes writing seem easy. It’s not. But then MacDonald worked diligently at being an author, in a disciplined, professional sense, which is partly why he was almost ridiculously prolific and why there are still plenty of his books left for me to read. He certainly could spin a cracking yarn, and some of his novels I would rate up there with the very best.

A particular favourite is A Flash of Green, a book dedicated to “Sam Prentiss, Jim Neville, Tom Dickinson, and all others opposed to the uglification of America.” It is essentially an environmental protest tale, with a strong theme of populist political corruption, and even some easily manipulated violent far-right Christian fundamentalists, so when reading it you can easily lose track of the fact it was published in 1962 rather than in the present-day. And it’s not without precedent in the author’s extensive canon, as 1959’s misleadingly titled The Beach Girls touches on the relentless tide of redevelopment threatening to tear the heart and soul out of a Florida marina community.

Why Didn't You Tell Me? (Part Four)

 

I’ve got to be honest: I do like a bit of incidental whistling in a song. In fact, I used to have this line about the holy trinity of incidental whistling being the Lovin’ Spoonful’s ‘Daydream’, Subway Sect’s ‘A Different Story’, and Otis’ ‘Dock of the Bay’, and how, in some way, symbolically these tied into Alan Horne’s Postcard Records Brochure, from way back in 1981, and how this really mattered. I would argue that it still does. Anyway, nowadays, I have a new whistling favourite, this being The Cheques’ ‘Deeper’, a song I heard first by way of Northern Soul Fever: Volume Two, a vintage 2CD set from the Goldmine/Soul Supply set-up which I found nice and cheap not too long ago.

Why Didn't You Tell Me? (Part Three)

 

“Betrayal takes two, who did it to who?” That line of Richard Hell’s has been buzzing round my brain since reading the books in Len Deighton’s superb spy trilogy, Berlin Game, Mexico Set and London Match, in rapid succession at the very start of this year. The series was written and based in the early-to-mid-1980s Cold War-era, featuring intelligence officer Bernard Samson. This is the first in a trio of trilogies featuring Bernard: is there a word for that? Not that I know of. Ennealogy doesn’t quite cover it. Words are funny things, aren’t they? You can feel lost without a book, and you can lose yourself in a book. This particular trilogy is perfect for getting lost in.

Why Didn't You Tell Me? (Part Two)

 

Dora Morelenbaum performing live at the Jazz Café in November 2024 was one of the highlights of the year. It was such a joyous show, and when she sprang into her lovely interpretation of Bobby Charles’ ‘I Must Be in a Good Place Now’ I almost melted in delight. It was so gloriously unexpected and unbelievably perfect. And it was not the only cover version performed that night. Months later I haven’t stopped grinning yet.

Why Didn't You Tell Me? (Part One)

 

Discovering Vera Caspary’s fiction has been a highlight of the past few years. I suppose you could say she wrote books that might be conveniently classed as suspense, mystery, detective, crime, noir, or none of these. They are really psychological studies that defy categorisation. What Vera’s books tend to have in common are strong, independent, career women, with some unusual themes, such as PMT-related depression. Anyway, Vera had a great way with words. To use a phrase of her own: “To write well is to write clearly.” And she did.

Rather like her contemporary Dorothy B. Hughes with In A Lonely Place, Vera’s most well-known work Laura is available in a handsome edition as part of The Feminist Press’ Femmes Fatales series. And, yes, it is the book that spawned the classic Otto Preminger-directed film noir, memorably starring Gene Tierney and Dana Andrews. But then Laura has been a magazine serial, a play, a novel, a film, a song. All of which suggests Lionel Blair and Una Stubbs (I nearly wrote Baines there!) effervescing in the fondly remembered Give Us A Clue.

Coincidentally ... Or Not (Part Two)

 

Act One

“I put a seashell to my ear, and it all comes back,” said Rod McKuen memorably in his poem The Gypsy Camp, with that beautiful setting by Anita Kerr and the San Sebastien Strings. That line, which many of us heard first via the immortal ‘Barefoot in the Head’ by the supremely cool A Man Called Adam, has been in my thoughts recently. This was partly through hearing ‘Night and Day’ by Everything But The Girl played very shortly before Jessica Pratt took to the stage at the Barbican on “strange and unsettling day” after the US election. It sounded so right, and I hope it was Jessica’s own choice. If not, it was still an inspired selection.

Coincidentally, or not, I had been thinking about that song, and how it was a huge part of the summer of 1982 for me, just as Jessica’s Here in the Pitch was this year. But also, how Tracey and Ben, largely because of that song, performed a handful of numbers with Paul Weller onstage at the ICA right at the start of 1983, only a few weeks after The Jam’s last concert. And I am still wondering why I wasn’t there at the ICA.  I was, however, there to see Speakers Corner Quartet a few days before Jessica’s Barbican show. Both of these recent performances were pretty incredible. Maybe just as incredibly it had been 38 years since I had seen a live show at the ICA.

Coincidentally ... Or Not (Part One)

 

Things fall apart. Oh yes. The old fabric is torn away, or disintegrates, and all that. But, sometimes, when you least expect it, things fall into place, and new patterns and stories emerge. So, towards the end of January this year, things were looking pretty grim. It was a tough time, but one bright spot was the Pauline Boty exhibition at the Gazelli Art House in Mayfair, which was a revelation. I went early one Monday morning, soon after opening time, and was the only one there. It felt a privilege to be there, alone with Pauline’s now famous works of art, at a time when her reputation’s at a high. This being, as her evangelist Ali Smith argues in her Autumn, part of the cycle where cultural figures are ignored, lost, rediscovered, and so on.