The following is the first segment of my tour journal from a trip I'm on playing acoustic music in Europe. It's less analytical than most of the content we post here, but since I moderate this site I was urged to share it. It's meant to be taken as an anecdotal reflection on my trip, and the anarchist and punk scenes in Europe. Enjoy!
-David Combs a.k.a. Spoonboy
8/26-28 - Ireland
On our flight from Baltimore to Philadelphia, there was an old woman sitting by the emergency exit who only spoke French and refused to cooperate with the flight attendants. Thinking it would be a good idea to get Jordan started on his translating skills, I prompted him to talk some sense into her. It seemed to work, as she switched seats, though Jordan later translated her mumbling as "Dammit, I payed for this fucking seat." It turns out that the woman she had originally sat next to, a young lady from France named Julie, was better equipped to translate, but she hadn't realize the obstinate woman was speaking French as her accent was so thick. Jordan struck up a conversation with Julie in mixed French and English which went well until I told her I was playing shows at people's houses, an idea she seemed to find repulsive. The thick accented woman inspired more contempt from the passengers on the flight by continuing to complain unintelligibly and were it put up to a vote, she'd probably have been elected least popular. So I was surprised when Julie approached her in French saying "You're getting the connecting flight to Paris? Follow me off the shuttle." Jordan and I were both touched by Julie's benevolence, until straight off the shuttle Julie bolted to catch her flight leaving the old lady her dust. Either the act of benevolence was immediately forgotten, or it was Julie's idea of a twisted prank, either way, a good beginning to our trip.
Two flights and a stop over in Switzerland later we arrived at the home of our host Dylan Haskins - the most famous punk in Ireland. He'll hate me for saying so, but over the course of the few days we were with him we saw some 7 or 8 newspaper articles about events he'd organized, as well as a headline on the cover of the Dubliner. Dylan has been putting on house shows outside Dublin for the past few years, but unlike almost anywhere else in the world his efforts haven't been received as a nuisance, but instead as an exciting innovation. The mainstream press in Ireland has turned to him as the poster boy for DIY music. He's been on the radio arguing against the Irish equivalent of the RIAA president about downloading mp3s and he's going to have a spot on national television to talk about music he likes. If you ask me, that's celebrity status!
Recently him and a couple dozen others have started a collective arts space called Exchange Dublin who's mission statement I'll let speak for itself:
"Throughout the twentieth century and into the first decade of the twenty-first, from our universities to our communities and workplaces, a culture of competition has created a society of isolated individuals. We find it difficult to understand our neighbours and our purpose. Exchange Dublin creates a common public space for cross-disciplinary awareness, conversation and action. Dublin is full of pockets of creative young people, some of whom are aware of each other but have no platform to engage with each other or their city. This space is intended to provide an infrastructure for inquiry, discourse and collaboration as an antidote to some of these problems."
I got to visit the space and play a sold out benefit show for Exchange opening for the fantastic fantastic acoustic duo Heathers.
The night before the show Dylan, Jordan and I drove north in search of the oldest known architectural structures on the planet - the passage tombs of the Boyne Valley. These are massive 5,000 year old buildings built around the tombs of some prehistoric old dudes, covered 30 feet high in rocks and overgrown by grass. From a distance they just look like giant hills. First we stumbled into Dowth, which I guess is the oldest and least excavated of the tombs, and it was completely unguarded. We walked around and climbed it, and chased some sheep around before heading off in search of Newgrange, the most famous passage tomb. Newgrange is famous because at the dawn of the winter soltice every year, the sun hits its only window in such a way that the entire building is lit up for a short period once a year. It was after visitor's hours so we had to hop the fence, which seemed like flimsy security for the oldest structure on the planet, but the Irish attitude is much more lax, I think, than I'm used to - regarding security. Leaving Newgrange we ran into an older couple who I'd feared had seen us hop the fence. We asked them for directions to a nearby castle, and when we asked whether they thought it would be open they replied in an encouraging tone "if it's not you can just hop the fence!" Given the history of British colonialism in the country, there seems to be a generalized contempt for the law amongst the Irish - something I can appreciate.
On our last night in Ireland we had 5 goals: See Seomra Spraoi - Dublin's autonomous social center, eat, drink at an Irish pub, go dancing, and get in a fight. By all accounts, we accomplished 4 out of 5, but I don't think Jordan really wanted to get in a fight anyway. Seomra Sproai is a cool social center accessed by dark alley that has radical activist meetings, events, a bike shop, a kitchen and a kindergarten. They were having "cans," a fundraising night where Dublin's anarchists pay a cover to come hang out and drink beer. Initially the person who opened the door told us they were closed, but after explaining we were American tourists, they let us in, gave us a tour and didn't kick us out when Jordan and I cleared the dance floor. The volunteers at the space were extremely friendly, but the 5 folks on the dance floor didn't take to our moves apparently, and within minutes we were the only ones left. After Seomra Sproai we wandered around Dublin forever with Ellie from Heathers and her friend Emmy, had cheap "Chinese" food - rice, curry, and chips (fries), and went to dance at a more capitalist institution, where our dance moves were greeted just as poorly by the crowd at Doyle's pub. Finally we found some drunk yuppies hopping along to the Proclaimers on the jukebox. They were much more receptive, but at that point it was time to go home.
8/29-31: Ireland to England, Durham and Newcastle
The ferry from Ireland to Whales put us at a table opposite an elderly Irish couple, the husband of whom I engaged in a game of rummy. Having only a few stereotypes about the Irish, some of them descended from the movie Waking Ned Divine, my expectations were wholly met as one by one, seniors from a tourist coach trip sat down with us to tease Sean, our rummy opponent. Depending on who was present, Jordan and I were fast talking gamblers from Las Vegas or Sean was about to swindle us out of our money and clothes. Aside from the fact that we weren't gambling, it seemed entertaining to everyone present that two American young people had sat down at a table with a 65 year old Irish man to play cards. One of the onlookers was really cracking himself up, gasping violently as he laughed at his own jokes. "I wouldn't trust him as far as I can throw him... and I can't throw him far!!"
We were on the train all day until we were loopy from traveling and making faces at each other. We met a few people along the way whose names we are recording in Jordan's little book. We left Dublin around noon and at 10:30 in the evening we arrived at the train station in Durham where we were met by Nathan whose band One Night Stand in North Dakota (ONSIND) we're touring with for the next few days. I hadn't intended to tour with ONSIND, but 5 of the promoters in the northern UK had independently invited them to play my shows, so it worked out well. The band name is apparently in reference to the lack of abortion options in North Dakota and after playing and hanging out with them for the past few days, I can definitely see why the promoters felt we were suited to share the same bills. Nathan and Daniel, who make up the band are both really thoughtful guys who I've stayed up late with explaining the nuances of the American conservative backlash, talking politics, diy music, and exploring our shared love for Billy Joel. Their songs are really well written, particularly a series they have on patriarchy including a song called "that takes ovaries." Among the things we have in common - I have a song called "stab yer dad," and they have a song in which a daughter of an abusive father stabs her dad. Also, their northern accents and stripped down acoustic sound reminds me of the Proclaimers, who I love, so it's been a pleasure playing together.
We played a house show in their tiny living room in Durham and then a show with Asshole Parade (from Florida) in Newcastle. Asshole Parade were fucking great in spite of the awkward atmosphere of the St Dominic's Catholic Club we played at. And here's a curve ball: they don't serve Newcastle beer in Newcastle. It shouldn't have surprised me given that the only recommendation I could get for Irish whiskey in Dublin was Jameson, but still my tourist dreams were dashed. When I was 17, I played in a ska band called the Ratchet Boys who had a song about the beer Newcastle, which I'd pretty much forgotten about until today. Another time, I guess.
9/1-3: Bradford, Sheffield, Leamington Spa
After a farewell to downtown Durham, ONSIND, Jordan and I took off for Bradford where we were playing at the 1 in 12 club, a 20+ year old punk/anarchist club and library. Bradford was home to the textile industry before it was outsourced, and according to our buddy Joe (of the Dauntless Elite), it's sort of the Detroit of the UK in how outsourcing devastated their economy. The 1 in 12 is in a huge 4 story former textiles mill, and it's home to a pub, a large show room, an anarchist library, a kitchen, and hosts a community garden elsewhere in Bradford. In the early 80's some politician quoted some statistic that 1 in 12 people receiving welfare aid were doing so fraudulently, and a group of anarcho-punks looked at each other, said "yeah, that's us," and started a club! And in the 90's Chumbawumba donated some portion of the proceeds from "Tubthumper" to keeping the space alive. We played a really cozy show in the library. It was nice and comfortable to be surrounded by books as we played, and then we spent the night with Joe who was full of useful information about Bradford and Leeds, the anthropological makeup of northern England, and the Naked Gun trilogy.
We were scheduled to play in Sheffield at a club called the Stockroom, but when we got there the electricity was out. Some speculated it was a trick the club was playing to get out of doing the show, but the promoter, a nice guy named Ian, explained that the club had failed to pay their back electricity bills as he scrambled to get the show moved. The Stockroom had the courtesy to call up another club called Nelson's to see if the show could be moved there and they said it was on, so we went over there only to find that the people at Nelson's had no idea what we were talking about. Eventually we sorted it out and realized that the Stockroom had called the wrong place, a little dive bar no one had heard of called Lord Nelson's, and booked it there accidentally. The clientele at Lord Nelson's were mostly older locals who were pretty good natured about their bar being run over by punks playing acoustic music. I sat down next to one particularly hammered 60 year old dude who was extremely enthused to relate the news to me that Dolly Parton was Miley Cyrus's godmother. "Cool," I said. In the end, a wrong phone call might have been the beginning of a new venue for Sheffield.
There was one person at the show wearing a Propagandhi t-shirt, who managed to embody my pet peeve of meeting sexist Propagandhi fans. Not only did he announce that he'd rather be at a strip club than the show, but at one point I actually overheard him saying "you know, girls are pretty stupid." It never ceases to amaze me that fans of the band who wrote the song "Refusing to be a Man," can be so dense.
In Leamington Spa, we played with a kid who goes by Ste, which is short for Steve, which is short for Steven. He won the crowd over with Strike Anywhere and Bruce Springstein covers and then took it home with "Semi Charmed Kind of Life" by Third Eye Blind. By the time he was done singing in American accent, I'd forgotten he was British. Ste interrupted my set after I played my song "my generation," a song about getting in touch with your own criminality, to tell the following story:
Years ago, Ste was searching on the internet when he came across someone's web page who had my song playing. He was grooving to it thinking "I like this, it's different, kinda quirky," but when the burly plumber who was working on his house came into the room he got embarrassed and turned it down. But the plumber had heard enough to pique his interest and he asked what it was. "Oh, nothing. Just some music on the internet," Ste muttered. "No really," the plumber said, "I quite liked it, let's have a listen." So Ste cringed as he played the plumber my subversive lyrics, only to find that the plumber was not only into the music, but he'd just returned from militantly occupying endangered rain forests in South America. His picture was even in the newspaper for having taken direct action to save the trees. Someone remarked "I hope Ste learned a lesson - never underestimate the working class!"
9/4-6: London, Brighton, Kingston
After Leamington Spa, we sadly parted ways with ONSIND and hitched a ride to London with a nice family who's three year old daughter started to cry when we got in the car. We dropped our bags off at Houssman's, where I was playing later - a 50 year old radical bookstore in King's Cross, London. Houssman's was a product of the 1930's British pacifist movement, who by the mid-50's had raised funds to buy a building. The building has since been home various radical groups over the past 50 years including the gay liberation front, the McLibel campaign, the original anarchist Greenpeace, anti-zionist jews, and many more. We headed over to the Freedom Press book store, where I was looking for back issues of Colin Ward's 1960's Anarchy Magazine, but they didn't have any, so I bought the anthology. From there we walked over to RampART - 5 year old squat that had a note on the door that said "come around back and pull on the rope." We went around back, pulled the rope that was hanging out the window and then came back around front where they let us. The folks at RampART were practicing martial arts and building props for an upcoming anti-arms demonstration, and seemed uninterested in us as we walked around the abandoned three story building. After getting the impression that they thought we were asking too many questions, we headed back to Houssman's for the show.
We stayed the night with Edd and Natalie who run a great zine/website on punk and anarchist culture in the UK called Last Hours, and after a chaotic game of Cranium (that referenced so much England-specific trivia that I was completely useless) I curled up under the desk in the Last Hours office and went to sleep.
Brighton was recommended to us as the gay and vegetarian capitol of the UK, which sounded good. Some guy on the bus told us, "if you're looking for a woman, you'll definitely find one. They're everywhere." It was strange, because I've noticed women in every town we've been to in the UK, not that I've looked for them specifically, but I see them all the time. Sometimes we'll have conversations. He also told us about the roller coaster on the pier which we made a point to visit. Anyway, the bus dropped us right in front of the Cowley Club, an awesome anarchist pub and show space, with a meeting space and library in the back, awesome artwork on the walls, and the Dropkick Murphys blasting on the PA. All Cowley Club shows are benefits and they had designated the night's benefit to be the Institute for Anarchist Studies (IAS), which was very cool, and our host Elliott interviewed me later about playing music and about IAS for Last Hours zine.
The next day was punk rock Sunday with Tom. The Brighton crew and us spent the morning wandering the alleys of Brighton - home to tons of independent shops and vegetarian restaurants and we wasted some money on the pier. We took a train up to High Wycomb in a failed attempt at seeing the Shitty Limits, and then I caught a ride with a sick band from Amsterdam called Sweet Empire who had Mortal Kombat in their van. In Kingston I played a loud punk rock show where I didn't expect anyone to be quiet during my set, but amazingly, everyone was really receptive! The Dauntless Elite and Fashanu, two awesome punk bands played, and I rocked out a bit.
Joe (of Dauntless) talked about how he wished 29 year old him and 16 year him could have a conversation with each other, because they could probably learn a lot from each other, which I found thoughtful, because it's an easier conclusion to come to that our younger selves could learn from our older selves, but it's equally true that we could probably learn a lot from our younger selves as well. Anyway, maybe that made sense...
9/7-8: Cheltenham, Southampton
From Cheltenham to Southampton we had an easier time hitchhiking than we'd expected and arrived there with time to spare. After a relaxed backyard show and some pasta we caught up on rest, got up early and caught a ride from a guy named Moses.
Moses had moved to the UK from Uganda to get an education, but he surprised us with how flippantly he dismissed his degree as an arbitrary piece of paper he kept in his closet. "I started working on my master's degree," he said, "but then I dropped out of graduate school and adopted more of a 'fuck it' attitude. It was too much thinking about things without doing anything." He used to work with severely learning disabled men and he told us the story of Harry, someone he'd worked with who had the likeness of, and an affinity for, gorillas. He'd taken Harry to a safari to see the great ape, but the gorilla had no interest in any of the people at the safari. Harry called to it, and the gorilla turned around and looked directly at him. Harry met the gorilla's gaze. "You could tell," Moses said, "that there was an understanding." Moses told us he'd once hunted a monkey in Uganda and he regretted more than anything else in his life.
We asked Moses if when he'd lived in Uganda whether he'd traveled to other parts of Africa and he told us "sadly, no." He made an interesting point. He said, "until you've lived in a multi-cultural society you don't consider that there are other cultures outside of your own, and so you've less interest in exploring them." Having grown up in America, I can only take his word.
The remainder of the trip was with Angela, a truck driver who transported Bentleys to rich people. She was the most enthusiastic truck driver I've ever met and possibly the only grandma truck driver in England. She'd been driving trucks for 7 years and kept saying "best job in the whole world, it is!" She told us she'd drive down the highway and see stuck up rich people who looked at her as a contemptuous truck driver and she'd think "ha! I probably drove that car before you did!"
The bus into Southampton took us straight to the Homestead, a giant punk house that's been doing acoustic shows for about 5 years. I actually played there in 2005. House shows are a fairly rare occurrence in the U.K. and all over England we met people who referred to the Homestead as England's sole institution for gigs in the house.
Our host Jim Millipede met us at the Homestead, and since we had time to kill we went to visit the New Forest, a national park where ponies, pigs, and donkeys graze freely. Apparently the 140,000 acre park is all that remains of the former English tradition of common grazing land where farmers from all around would let their cattle graze freely and only round them up a few times a year. We had a particularly English experience, after chasing a yorkshire terrier we sat on a grassy knoll above a thatched roof house and a cricket field. We also sighted the rarest reptile in England (there are only 6 species), the smooth snake.
The show at the Homestead was a nice farewell to England complete with a funny moment where it was revealed that Jim used to be a police officer. He'd lived on the Falkland Islands for a few years (which explained his uncanny affinity for British wildlife) and when at first he couldn't find any work he took a job as a cop for 6 months but managed never to arrest anyone. We need more cops like that in D.C. I dedicated a "fuck you" song to him in response to his former occupation but it was all in good fun. We stayed the night at his place and he woke up at 6am to drive us to the ferry - a story for another time!