Nostalgia

'So I continue to continue to pretend that life will never end and flowers never bend with the rainfall'..,which is an old Simon and Garfunkel tune Feelin Groovy never did get around to covering, and now they’ve split up. It also happens to be a personal favourite. While we’re talking covers bands just yesterday I spoke with former Vinny Peculiar drummer Neil Carter; we spoke of the old days, recording Ironing the Soul, Glastonbury antics, families and fate. Neil is playing again after a four year lay off in a Genesis tribute band called The Carpet Crawlers and having a ball. Then I spent the best part of Friday afternoon listening to The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway for the first time in a very long time and was reminded of a kid at our school called Chris Long who shaved his head in triangle at the front like Peter Gabriel, all very impressive at the time, he got expelled pending the re-growth. Years later I think he became a Swinging Cat but that’s so long ago I might as well be making it up. Earlier in the week I met Neil Brighouse [CMP lynchpin] and Rob Ferrier [independent record producer] in Liverpool’s Everyman Bistro and it felt like 1996 all over again when we were in a band together called GOLDWIRE; the fate of which none of us have properly recovered from which leads me on nicely to the future… which is happening sooner than you think. This Friday 3rd Feb I play the Dog House in Halifax and have a couple of other solo gigs in Feb slotted in between the recording. In May I’m supporting Durutti Column over three nights as well as playing a few shows in Ireland and the band tour starts end of May; the future’s brighter than you think...you best check the tour dates for details. Big thanks to all as ever for bothering to, VPx

Soft Drive

We’re back in the recording business after Tim’s recent PC crash [there’s always something] thanks to the legendary PC fixing genius of Steve Cowell; where would we be without him? We also have a title for the solo album, which is progress of sorts. ‘Goodbye My Angry Friend’ it is then, taken from a scrap of paper on Tim’s notice board and something to do with his counselling alter ego, so of course we named a track thus [which just happens to be the albums only instrumental]. I think it has a certain resignation, a certain coming to terms with something, of letting go and moving on…that kind of thing seemed to suit the mood of these sessions [more are to follow so apologies for what might constitute premature speculation]…it’s just that I’m prone to looking ahead, often longingly towards all kinds of impossibility...and this feels like the death of some longstanding angst within, the end of the longing. Hmmm…I’ll leave it there for now. The other songs are Seasonal Affective Disorder, Pathetic Lament, Lost for Words, Too Late, Lazy Bohemians, The Happiest Man in the World, Song 4, Vinny Peculiar is Dead, Kiss Me I’m a Social Worker and Batman. Some of these songs have been around awhile and some are quite new, all get a Tim and Vinny makeover and sound like everything you’ve heard before but can’t quite place…well that’s one way of putting it and a nice way I hope. ? Incidentally; this will be the first VP record to feature saxophone. I always find it hard to describe what stuff sounds like but like I’ve said previously we have throughout the making of this record [and it’s not even finished yet but we’re getting there] been thrilled to emulate the 70’s pop rock of such notables as Pilot [Tim’s favourite band], Sailor [my current favourite band], John Miles [tragically underrated genius]. Then of course there’s Cockney Rebel and Supertramp but everyone loves them don’t they? It’s not that we don’t like or want to name check any cool stuff, TREX also get a look in…it’s just not as much fun to cite the likes of Dylan, Bowie and all the old dependables. Anyway, that’s all well and good I hear you say, but we think you’re full of crap and making it all up and of course you could be right…I guess we’ll just have to wait and see. I should be adding something to the downloads section in the next few weeks…I just need to work out how to do it as it all went to pot last time and I had to call the web police at feel design. Finally just to say thank you for bearing with me in this the year of Vinny Peculiar, the year in which everything changes, the year in which I kill the Vinny muse and write him off like Ziggy Stardust, the year in which I rip it up and start again….there I go again…the longings back already, but for exactly what I’m not really sure, best wishes to all, VPx

New Years Daze

It must be the champagne, that and the Italian film I just watched entitled The Consequences of Love. A body in concrete, a pretty waitress, suitcases of dodgy cash, a lapsed lost mafia man and his philosophical flights of fancy; I really enjoyed it. A sub titled sensation [it’s true…I’m always better with sub titles in the afternoon]. The central character, male, 50, falls for a waitress but ever so slowly, he says nothing to her for two years, she is aware he is burdened with secrets and seems to accept this.Their relationshiop doomed and quite beautifully so. The understated interiors of the hotel, where our hero resides and heroine works, work perfectly. ‘I’ve been lucky to have been loved in my life...but with love comes pain loss longing and delusion’ he cries… a man after my own heart. Sort of. On a more practical level it seems a long time since I was talking the tripe fantastic with Tim Browne [now known to all his friends as the mystic vicar]. We met up for recording last week but the computer wasn’t having any of it. We are still on schedule to finish the solo record by the end of Jan but I guess we might well be delayed a few weeks, which seems to have been par for the Vinny course all year. Then there’s a release schedule to finalise. In fact this last year has been so incredibly delayed it should by rights be discounted from memory. OK so I’m being a bit silly now but you know what I mean [which is what Jenny always says..hello Jen should you be visiting]. I watched Jools Holland last night, new years choice on the part of the party poop classes [most people I know seem to watch it…hmmm]. It was all in all as ever it was though to me it seems to be getting blander, a pretty woman with an acoustic guitar, over confident and altogether average seemed to have them dancing and a swaying…I forget her name, she was awful, then of course the bagpipes and the Big Band Sound. I suppose the Kaiser Kids are alright...aren't they? It's getting hard to tell nowerdays.I toured with Jools years ago playing supports, Tim and I as a duo, big theatres, I made the same joke every night about putting the beer on his piano. It was all very cheesy and cheerful and the joke always went down a storm without fail, funny what you remember. The other striking thing was the audience, lots of young people were there, when we asked why and did they like boogie woogie bluesy music they just said they were there because of TV. They were there because Jools is on TV which is all well and good and shouldn’t have come as a surprise but it did somehow. Still I’m not complaining...I did sell a lot of CDs on that tour. Another great moment on that dim and distant tour was meeting Rico the trombone player in Jools band and legend of many a ska classic. He was really sweet and very gentle. I looked out for him last night but must have missed him. I only ever met Jools once at the end of the tour show in Kirkcaldy [I think it was in 1999]. He was really nice, polite and encouraging and he liked the artwork on the GONE album. I’d had four cans of Boddingtons and a half a pint of champagne at the time then I did something really stupid…remind me to tell you about it sometime. The fireworks around our way seemed less deafening than last year or who knows it could be my hearing in decline and on that sombre note I bid you happy new year, lets hope we can move mountains in 2006…or failing that arrive at some conclusions that matter, take good care, VPx