"November's days are thirty
November's earth is dirty
Those thirty days, from first to last
And the prettiest things on ground are the paths
With morning and evening hobnails dinted
With foot and wing-tip overprinted
Or separately charactered
Of little beast and little bird."

Edward Thomas 1878-1917

NNNNNovember Newsletter 2009

Er....hallo. For the time being, things can get back to abnormal. News?
You want news? Well this Hythe Public Art project is all written now and even as I write this, is being set, mixed with the art work and I hope, will be ready to go up on the new Colchester Hythe station sometime in December. It;s taken three months. As soon as it's up I'll let you know and we might put some pics up or something.

The book. After racing to do it all through summer, we (that's Terry the Okapi, Cllr. Deirdre Coalhammer (Lab) the bookshop ladies, my lawyers and Ms Rita Vavoom my secretary) decided not to rush it out before Christmas. There's no point. It'll be a much better early springbok ( er, that's spring book, Martin ). Oh and it's been retitled Horses Seen Through Trees because nobody liked the other title much.

This means that the pressure is off for now and I can get on with a bit of bloggery and I hope, a new download EP before Chrizza. I can also tidy my house and get a bit of a life. Last Saturday I had my first weekend off since June.

Music: Big news is that Burger Records of Americy are currently putting into process a re-release of 3 Cleaners From Venus original tapes. These are Midnight Cleaners, Under Wartime Conditions and the once-lost In The Golden Autumn. They've cleaned them up (I've heard them-they're good.) and well, watch this space!
Live Stuff: Christmas with Johnny and Martin is on Saturday 19th December at Colchester Arts Centre 01206-500900. Ring them up and ask them why we're not in the brochure again.
I'm also reading a poem Lucy In The Sky at St Margarets, Westminster Abbey, London on Thursday 3rd December. This is a Christmas concert on behalf of The Lupus Trust. Lupus is an inflammatory disease and affects the immune system. It kills you. More women get it than men.That's as simple as I can say it. When Lucy Vodden, the little girl who inspired Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds died of the disease last month aged 46, I wrote a poem about it. The Lupus Trust asked me if I'd do the event and I said that yes, of course I would. That's where I'll be that evening anyway. www.lupus.org.uk Look it up. It kills mums, sisters and daughters and I hate anything that does that.

I've been using November for walking round fields and woods, getting my energy back and generally doing things that Martin does. Won't be long before I'm back in the thick of it again. Call back now, won't you? We never clothes.

Lucy In The Sky

Some half-remembered
afternoon
Of green and golden
dappled light.
When anything seemed possible
And not a ragged cloud in sight
The four pied pipers of the age
Sequestered in a studio long
Cooked up a cornucopia
Which overflowed with
English song
And dream-like images
of things
It seemed had always just
been there

Familiar immediately
Arriving on expectant air
As if the space had been
reserved
Until the tunes came
sparkling by
Ready for eternity
A place for Lucy in the sky
Till suddenly, you were
aware
Of time, the slow-train,
passing on
The river flows, the boat
casts off
The turnstile moves
The girl has gone.

He noted in mid autumn that the light possesssed a rather softer quality to it now. A heavily-rouged sun sank wantonly down in the west, with only a few flimsy raiments of brown and purple cloud to preserve its modesty. It was time to draw the curtains. After all, trying to complete a fully-worked oil-painting of them at this hour would be sheer folly and would probably take him all night. While he mused upon this, there was a light tapping at the door. It swung open. Framed in the doorway was Cordelia, his young and recently-widowed housekeeper. "Sir Nartin, " she said, in a her faint west-country burr: "There's someone to see you." Beside her stood a small apologetic figure. "Aaah, sit down. I've been expecting you," he said. "You must be...

nnnnnTHE OCTOBER NEWSLETTER

AAA thoroughly enjoyable Golden Afternoon this year, with a very relaxed quality to it. Probably the least stressful of any that I've done. A very eclectic mix of guest artists. Someone else can do the match report if they feel like it. Rev Matt Simpkins was exemplary however. Fiona and Nick were riveting and proceedings were finished off by Hurricane, Wivenhoe's sprightliest acoustic trio. With a combined age of 175 years 'Tai Chi' Dave, Alec Selley and Sir Nartin Mule managed a whole three numbers without needing the aid of the medical support-unit standing anxiously by in the wings. Photos, films and recordings of the entire event may eventually leak out for public scrutiny and any consequent legal actions.

WORK: I am currently smack-bang in the middle of the Hythe Public Art Project, which the artist Dale Devreux Barker (look him up) and I (Look me up, too -. there's far too little known about me for my liking.) are working our little buns off to complete it by end of October. It is very challenging, good work and this is all that I'll say. It also has to be got right, because it's going to be up on display for at least ten years at a brand new railway station. The sheer amount of work, mostly, precludes me doing anything else apart from my regular work for the East Anglian and the Sunday Express. More news next news.

BOOK: The new book Psycle Geography is finally in the copy-edit/proof-read stage and will come back to me for corrections and author queries soon. We hope it will be out for Christmas.

DOWNLOAD MUSIC AND ONLINE SHOP: All still ticking over nicely, thank you. We hope to have another EP available in the next couple of months.

GIGS: Apart from this year's Christmas With Johnny and Martin which is at Colchester Arts Centre on Sat 19th December, there are no more gigs for now.

Stay safe and remember: " There's no Newell like an old Newell."

Happy Birthday to Julie Andrews

And the days dwindle down.....

.......................................SEPTEMBER NEWSLETTER

"The summer was over and the woman had gone.. He threw some cold water over his face, brushed his hair, found his keys, checked his change and went down the road to buy a cup of coffee. There was work to be done..."

The Golden Afternoon 2009 is at Colchester Arts Centre on Sunday 20th September.
It runs from about 1.30 p.m. (doors open) to about 5.30 p.m.
As well as "The shattered loveliness that was once Sir Nartin Mule" will be stunning new Colchester act, Rev Matt Simpkins as special guest. And Wivenhoe's First Lady of Analogue: Fiona Harmon with bandmate,
Dashing Young Nick Munt.
There will be tea, there will be cakes. There will be a bar. There will be music.
Frankly dahlings, you'd be maird to miss it.

Recordular News.
A new four-track download is up on the site to buy now. "EP2" contains some of my best new songs for ages. You'll love it, you tarts.
We'll be selling CD copies of this at The Golden Afternoon
There will be third four-track download going up on the site during autumn and for the first time Live In Japan will soon be available too.
A new album with Cherry Red has been agreed upon. The problem is that I don't have time at the moment, to do it. This is because a massive public poetry project for my local area is happening. It's a big (2 or 3 month) job and I've won the contract.
All I can say at present is that it concerns trains, stations, poetry, art and history and I'm chuffed to little mintballs to have been commissioned to do it. There'll be news about this on the blog over the next few weeks
Apart from my work for The East Anglian Daily Times and for the Sunday Express
this project will be taking over my life, from next week.

Bookular News :
My new book Psycle Geography is now in second draft and being corrected. I expect to have it out by mid November. See you at the Golden Afternoon or around this site.
I won't be very far away. Merry autumn, readers!

OLDER NEWS ITEMS HERE>>>>

Images are Golden Arvo 2009 poster image (probably) Anxious Newell fans awaiting download news and top totty, Anita Harris.