Reginald D Hunter and the Butler

I just loved this show at the Apollo. All good. Brilliant Canadian warm up act followed by the great man himself.

Ignoring for the moment just the comic bits, there was an interesting contrast seeing this and the film the Butler in close succession. The Butler was good, but incredibly worthy, and not altogether credible for something based on a true story. The subject, the life of a black butler in service to a number of presidents, stood as a story of all black liberation, from the butler's childhood picking cotton where his father is shot in cold blood in front of him for (rather politely) objecting to the young master raping his wife to going through all the liberation struggles (voting, education etc) as each president changes, his oldest son joins the Black Panthers, his other son is killed in Vietnam, he eventually joins the anti-apartheid protests and ends up celebrating Obama's presence in the White House. Just all a bit too much of a microcosm.

But the link with Reginald D Hunter is an early comment in the film where the son is admonished for using the word "nigger" as  a word white people use to do black people down.

Except famously its exactly the word that the very black Reginald D Hunter uses as a natural part of his vocabulary. Its all how you want to use words really. Of course if you are really PC you don't want to go and see Reg. For the rest of us its a brilliant entertaining evening as he is funny and interesting in equal measures.

Drawing the Line

A highly unlikely subject for a play, Drawing the Line is about the civil servant sent out to India to draw the boundary between India and Pakistan just before independence. It managed the difficult task of being interesting without there be any real action. A good piece of history - of course one doesn't know exactly how much is true, but its not a subject I would have read about, so seeing it dramatized was the best I will ever get on the subject. I suppose the interesting bit as much as anything else was that sometimes you can't win. None of the parties come out too well, even Gandhi, apart maybe from our civil servant who remained with integrity, even though he got little thanks for it. But it was a good view of realpolitik. We just had to get out of India quickly as we could no longer afford it, and the simple fact was that the Muslims and the Hindus just wanted incompatible things for Pakistan and India. Nothing could please both sides.

I should also say, go to anything by Howard Brenton...

Magic Numbers at the Union Chapel

Its been a while since the Magic Numbers have played live. Of course, they produce great harmonies. but I can't say this gig caught my imagination. To be honest what I enjoyed most was going down the pub with my mate Kieron beforehand. As a result of which we ended up arriving a but late and got seats (well pews, the Union Chapel is a working church) upstairs. Also they played a lot of new stuff which of course was totally unfamiliar to us. So, no doubt good but just not enough to float my boat at the end of a long week.

Best part was a guest appearance from someone who is an even better singer than the Magic Numbers - the much underused talent of Dave McAlmont

Imagine Dragons and Public Service Broadcasting

Sorry it has been  a while since my last post, due to computer problems. The problem being I am afraid as simple as the need to change a fuse in  plug.

So I am horrendously behind in gigs and plays and things.

The only link between the PSB and Imagine Dragons gigs is a personal one - in both cases I had to go alone as my young partners were both trapped in work commitments at the last moment.

PSB were brilliant again - I reviewed their set at Jodrell Bank earlier in the year.They are very much a one-off and play on their eccentricity. They take old public service films, sample them with dance music over the top, while showing excerpts from these old films. they played some new ones, including two based on inter-war films of ice-skating in holiday. "It was the only way forward for us" they commented wryly. Says everything. A must see.

And so also Imagine Dragons at Brixton. While I had arrived early at the PSB gig and walked in straight away, I couldn't believe the ID gig was literally queuing around the block. A lot of youngsters. I did rather rub it in to my mate James who couldn't make it by sending him the review in the Times which described it as the gig of the year. This was probably fair comment.

Lead singer Dan Reynolds is all one could want in an indie band frontman - strong rock voice and boundless energy with a personality on top. Another  top class American Indie band to enjoy great success over here - Radioactive is one of the best tunes of the year and their debut album Night Visions is excellent. Of course with only one album they don't have a mass of extra material to fill out a gig with, but they did a fine cover of Blur's Song 2 too.

Sheffield Park

Spent my first weekend back from Venice with friends in Haywards Heath. They have two lovely little kids who don't yet realise how lucky they are to have affluent parents. Did you have an electric car in which to run around your extensive garden?

 We went out with them to Sheffield Park, a National Trust property renowned for its autumn colour. And with our late autumn, most of the leaves were still there to enjoy.

 After that we deserved lunch in a village gastropub, just beyond the church.