2012 encapsulated

Season's Greetings to you all.

100 RPM

I have a tiny flash fiction in this book, published today. 100 RPM is a collection of stories inspired by music found on YouTube, each story being 100 words or less.

The anthology, to benefit the charity One in Four, was edited by Caroline Smailes, who explains here how she went about publishing it as a Kindle ebook. I'm proud to be included with so many brilliant writers and look forward to discovering the work of those I don't yet know.

My own story, number 48, is called Barricades. It might not surprise you to learn that it was inspired by a famous Spandau Ballet song.

100 RPM is currently very cheap on Amazon and all profits will go to help survivors of sexual abuse. What's not to like?

Another legend gone

The last few months have been full of nostalgia.

There have been numerous television programmes about the 1970's, the decade in which I was a teenager. I'm currently watching 56 Up, the latest instalment of a series which which has followed a group of people from the age of seven. Although the participants are a few years older than me, the film clips are so very familiar, making me wonder if I ever looked and sounded like that too. The answer is, I think, yes. I can't help comparing how different we were back in the 70s to teens of today.

Then there has been the demise this year of three mighty pop legends of the 70s and early 80s, which has led me to rediscover their music on YouTube.

RIP Robin Gibb.

Death of a disco queen

It's always sad when you hear of the passing of a music legend, whose songs formed part of the soundtrack of your life as you were growing up. Today is no exception, with the news that Donna Summer has died of cancer. Perhaps her most famous song was Love To Love You Baby, but I've always loved this Jimmy Webb classic, so what better way to remember Donna?

Whitney Houston 1963-2012

Merry Christmas

Can you believe that Fairytale of New York by The Pogues, featuring the late Kirsty MacColl, was first released in 1987? No, neither can I. Enjoy.

Tragedies

This weekend has been full of sadness.

We watched the news in horror as heartwrenching photos of dying children in Somalia were replaced by those of a bombing and a massacre in Norway. At present the death toll is 93, most of them adolescents attending a camp. As the mother of teens I can barely comprehend the enormity of this tragedy and its aftermath, it almost seems disrespectful to even write about something which will have such profound repercussions for so many families and my heart goes out to them.

Then there was the death of Amy Winehouse yesterday and as soon as it was announced the social media started to buzz about her well-documented issues. Some people had little sympathy for her. But in amongst this I started to think about her family, about how helpless they must have felt over the last years. Because addiction, whether to a substance or a person, is a destructive illness and like most mental health issues it is not something you can switch off at will, even with the best professional input. This seems to be a point missed by many. I know from personal experience that caring for and about someone with a mental health problem, knowing that there is little you can do to help, is one of the hardest things. We don't yet know the exact cause of Amy's death, but addiction and despair can hit anyone and they are certainly reflected in Amy's music.

So I don't think yesterday was, as some have complained, about the perceived value of one famous life over many young ones. It shouldn't be about glamourising or demonising addiction either. It should be about remembering both the numerous young lives lost before they'd hardly begun and a tremendous talent who will never be forgotten.

Music for a rainy Friday

One of my favourite singers performing one of my favourite songs:

And while we're on the subject...

...of bands I saw when I was at university, I don't suppose anyone else is old enough to remember the early songs of Joe Jackson. I saw him twice and this video is a great reminder.

Going back in time

Today I went to visit a university with Son 1. Not just any university, but the very one from which I graduated 29 years ago, almost to the day.

We went with Son 1's girlfriend, one of her friends and her mother, A, who by coincidence also studied there, a year behind me.

For A and me it was an exciting day, a trip down memory lane. Whilst there have been considerable changes for the better over the intervening years, many familiar landmarks awaited us and I think I can say we both fell in love with the place all over again. I remembered all the good times and conveniently forgot the occasional heartbreak, perhaps she did too. And most importantly for me, Son 1 fell in love with the university too. He could see himself there and I think it may be a dead cert for his UCAS application.

As we looked round the sparkling new function hall in the Students' Union I couldn't help remembering some of the bands I saw in the tatty old place. Here's The Tourists (the precursor to the Eurythmics)

Parisienne Walkways

Can this really have been a hit as long ago as 1979?

RIP Gary Moore and Phil Lynott

A song for a lost love

I guess we've all had our hearts broken at some time and can feed the pain back into our writing, whether it be a poem, a story or a song. I just love this so much.



(Thanks to lovely Cally Taylor for drawing my attention to this on Facebook, as I'd missed Adele's slot on the Later Live with Jools Holland TV programme last week.)

The X Factor -week 5

I love, love, loved Matt. And Rebecca.

That's all.

Back to the day job

The last two weeks have been half term, so my waking hours have been consumed by being Son 2's carer. It is something of a mental leap from being merely a parent to a carer but Son 2 is now 16, he should be trying to sneak out to the pub rather than watching CBeebies all day and when I look at the independence of his brother, I can make that transition. I can accept that it is a day job, if a very poorly paid one.

This holiday has been about broadening Son 2's musical tastes. He loves music, he actually spends all day plugged into an mp3 player in a most age appropriate manner, although for a long time his musical choices were not so age appropriate. Then a few months ago he stole an mp3 player from me. Yes, it's a pink mp3 player. Get over it. On it were some of my favourite tracks of all time, the soundtrack to my life. Son 2 loves it. But again, the music is not exactly what your typical 16 year old listens to. I'm out of date, I don't know what to offer him.

So this, dear readers, is where you come in.

Son 2 likes ballads and more up tempo tracks with a definite tune and perhaps a little bit of drama. As he is nonverbal the music is more important than the lyrics and he likes classical music and chillout tracks. I have found him listening recently to Amy Winehouse, Duffy and Adele but he also really likes Take That (Patience), Coldplay (Viva la Vida) and the Motown and soul of the Sixties and Seventies, while yesterday he was listening to Lady GaGa's Bad Romance over again on YouTube. I realise that his musical tastes are currently somewhat limited by our own and I want to download more contemporary tracks for him.

Any good suggestions?

Through The Barricades

This was one of my favourite songs of the 1980's and I've been listening to it a lot recently. That may, or may not, be writing related...

Lesley who?

I was sorry to read last weekend of the death of Lesley Duncan. Lesley who? Well, she was singer/songwriter and session singer with a beautiful voice, who recorded the vocals to one of my favourite songs ever, If I Could Change Your Mind by The Alan Parsons Project.

It's really old now, but this song is one I consider to be part of the soundtrack of my life. It saw me through the end of a serious relationship, the words just seemed to express everything I was feeling at the time. I still like listen to it and now Son 2 seems to enjoy it too.

Love is everything

I love, love, love this song.

I found this original Jane Siberry version by accident, when searching YouTube for the k.d.lang version which I have on my mp3 player. I've listened to it so many times since then, whilst writing the novel.

The man's still got it...

I first fell in love with Billy Joel's music when I was 17 and bought a copy of his album 'The Stranger' in the only record shop of the small town where I grew up. His music has stayed with me over the years, some of the tracks gaining extra resonance as part of the soundtrack of my life. In the 1980's I saw him live at Wembley and he was every bit as good as I had hoped.

I've just found this more recent video of my favourite Billy Joel song on YouTube. It doesn't say when it was recorded, but he can still sing and it still makes me cry.

X Factor update

This week I was loving Jamie. I always judge my favourite performances by whether I seek them out on the internet to view again and this was the only one.



I felt desperately sorry for Rachel, I don't think she has been given decent songs or much TV coverage. I hope that will be remedied for next week because actually she is a good singer who doesn't deserve to be in the bottom two so early.

The twins, well what can be said? They shouldn't still be there, yet they will probably survive until somewhere in the middle of the series because they make us laugh. Not in a good way.

PS. Whitney. Wardrobe fail and was she on the same as Robbie last week? Eek.

Will You

I'd forgotten all about this song, but I heard it recently and remembered how much I loved it. Memories came flooding back.