Song(s) of the Day # 4,148 Roy Harper

 

I'm in Canterbury at the family home of my beloved parents. They're ninety years old and have seen and experienced an incredible amount. Multitudes. They are at church at the moment. They will return soon and we will eat together and then later in the afternoon I will pack my bags and catch a train to Canterbury West. Get off the train at St Pancras and cross a road to Kings Cross and catch another train and return to Newcastle to my flat and hit the sack pretty immediately. 

Tomorrow my alarm will ring.I will rise early. Send a song to someone special. Run my bath , fix breakfast and start again. An online lesson will  start at 8.15 with insurance people in Dussledorf. We'll laugh and learn. .We all must all walk this way. Living life a day at a time, Putting bread on the table..Learning. What do they say 'lifelong learning'. The first thing you need to recognise is that life is a mystery essentially. And that change is inevitable.And go from there.  .

Yesterday there was a wedding ceremony down the road from my parents where my marvellous. Spanish  sister in law lives in a large house with her family.  It was a wonderful celebration of life and love.And endurance. Immaculate creation and existance. I've just popped down the road to see her and her daughter and her husband  who were rising to clear up and get started on the new day.To thank them and bid them farewell. Until the next time we're together . 

Big fat raindrops are dropping outside in Canterbury. After seeing my sister in law I nipped back and bought my mother some croissants and a pint of semi skimmed milk. What my mother wants my mother gets. My parents have  just arrived home . My mother has rushed to the TV set and tried to get a pictire. The Sky set has failed due to irregular weather. I said 'Why don't we talk to each ohter?' I fear this has fallen on deaf ears.

So I'm back upstairs listening to Roy Harper's Stormcock on headphones in my small box bedroom at the front of the house while my mother prepares Sunday lunch. Roy Harper always reminds me of a dearly departed friend. Thirty years ago when I was so much younger, much younger than today I used to visit him on Friday afternoons in his flat in Dortmund when the working week was mostly done. 

Matt would roll fat joints and we'd pass them back and forth beween the two of us while Nick Drake, Roy Harper and Kevin Coyne records played on his stereo, Then we'd switch to Grunge, Led Zep or The Beatles or R.E.M. He'd pick out his acoustic guitar and play a passable version of So.Central Rain while the shadows darkened before we were called out into the night to catch a tram into town to commune with fruends in some German hostelry. Those were the days.

But there's no point dwelling on the past because time marches on. The one thing we must all realise is that time has a remoresless tread and will sweep all befoer it. Stormcock, which Matt always used to insist was the Roy Harper album, sounds pretty good to me.

There's an interview with Roy Harper in the current edition of Uncut. I read it on the train down to Canterbury on Friday night. When asked about his legacy, the legacy of his artistic spirit he said

;' That's a kind thought. But I don't think any of us can afford to think about anything like that. There are hige changes coming along in any case. Legacy as a concept  might be incredibly irrelevant. It might be possible that within fifty years we might be looking at this age n the way we now see Cicero or the Jurrasic era. AI is one thing but certainly the changes that are coming are are going to carry us into a very different place than the one we occupy at present . So thinking of me and my legacy is pure rainbow.'

This post is done. My mother has found a documentary on silverback gorillas to watch. It's time for lunch.