January « 2011 « FranHealy.com

Rehearse Rehearse Rehearse

26 January 2011

I did rehearse today. I did, I did. And it was sparse but good. We await our bassist. We await our strings. But the good news was, Claes Travis Key Meister was in the room along with Jack Pollitt on drums. Oh and while running upstairs to get something, I bumped into The Kaiser Chiefs. They were all looking catwalk hot. They mentioned Liam and his Beady Eye were in… “Where?” said i… “There!” said they pointing to a big door… “Wow cool” and I about turned and they said “What…are you just going to walk in? That’s ballsy.” and I was all “It’s Liam!!” and of course… It was Liam. He looked fab. His hair in a sort of jazz age/mod bangs arrangement. Green parka on. Spotted my very cool Camper shoes immediately and was wanting details. Gem and Andy were there too and a blast from the Brit Pop past Matt Jones who played keyboards for Ultrasound along with much ampage and sehr cool equipment. My rehearsal space by comparison was bare. The strip lighting adding a coldness which made me sigh a little inside. But then I turned the strip lights off and it got alot better. Then we played a Bottomlesss set… bassless but not baseless. It was quite cool. Like playing on a red ash football pitch before the green grass of bass and strings arrive.

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JEFF WALL

22 January 2011

I was reminded of this photographer today.

we took this photo as one of afew starting points for the man who art.

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Radcliffe And Maconie

19 January 2011

Next Monday I’ll be on the Radcliffe and Maconie show. I’ve known Mark forever. His producer was responsible for getting us to play the infamous Britney Spears cover. People still seem to take that as an ironic cover but it never was. Anyways Mark is a dear and still the smartest and funniest on radio. Here he is with his mate and co presenter Stuart. Mark hasn’t changed a bit however live radio seems to have aged Stuart these past years.

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Licence To ill

19 January 2011

Been in bed since Friday with what is now confirmed as streptococcal pharyngitis AKA “strep throat” (don’t look it up on wikipedia as the picture is horrible and mine looks nothing like it. I don’t have tonsils. While convalescing, I followed a link on sarah silverman’s twitter to this

I had heard of this guy sort of in the air but never knew anything about him or his show… I spent today becoming acquainted with this american superhero. Some of the comments were funny. Someone saying they grew up watching Mister Rogers in the mornings before going to school but now as a parent she feels glad that he doesn’t live right next door to him cause of part of his vibe creeps her out. Anyways I watched afew episodes and he is a genius. And the way he talks to kids through the TV set. What every kid craves. Absolute attention and unconditional acceptance. Clay loved it. We all loved it! Anyways we have also been watching a couple of films. First was BASQUIAT a documentary about Jean Michelle Basquiat and his entire rise and fall all caught on film and laced with an interview done in LA at the height of his fame. The other was Exit Through The Gift Store… It was nice to see Space Invader and Shepherd Fairy at work. Banksy’s fingerprints are all over this. Our friend Wendy is in the movie, showing some of her paintings. They are big art collectors. Her husband Peter was one half of Peter and Gordon and the brother of Paul McCartney’s girlfriend, Jane Asher when he was a teenager. Here he is playing a song Paul wrote for them.

He went on to produce among others James Taylor and Linda Ronstadt. Annnyways. This morning I drove Clay to kinderladen. Came home and got back into bed. Still feelin’ a little Schlapp.

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CHRISTMAS 2010

16 January 2011

I’m writing from bed. I can hear Clay playing downstairs and the occasional car roll by on the cobbles. Christmas 2010 was very cool. We had my mum and Nora’s mum over on the 25th. I had some strange flu type thing which meant I was in bed alot over those couple of days… A week before christmas Clay asked me if Santa was real. I said “Ummm…. welllll… he is and he isn’t” and Clay said “He is! He’s real… He iiiisss” So this was our first Santa Christmas. We hadn’t written a letter to Santa so I thought we would call him and ask if it was too late to write. The call was very cool. Santa told us that we could write still and he would see if he could get what Clay wanted. That evening Clay wrote a letter and on the reverse side, stuck a cut out of a catalogue picture of what he wanted just so there was no confusion. We hung it on the tree and left a small glass of wine (Santa’s request) some water and some cranberries for the reindeer. Clay asked if Santa could leave his letter on the tree as he wanted to keep the picture. In the morning, the water and wine had been drunk, the cranberries eaten.

Clay woke me at 4am on Christmas morning. “Papa…” he whispered. We stayed in bed till six at which point I told him to wake Nora and Nana and stay upstairs while I checked downstairs. We hadn’t heard anything those last 2 hours. I went downstairs, gently picked up my sleigh bells, quietly made the hall look like some almighty ruckus had occurred, shoes strewn everywhere, sledge fallen over and front door wide open. Then I gave a howl of surprise, banged the living room door shut, shook the sleigh bells (then stashed them) and lay down on the hall floor like i’d been knocked over in the chaos. Santa had left the building. Clay and Nora and Nana came down. Cold wind and snow blew in from the open door. “I think I disturbed Santa” I said… “Let’s go in to see if he left anything” The living room was still. Beneath the tree lay a large parcel. Clay flipped out, and dragged it into the middle of the room. Brown Teddy and Brown Eddie helped us unwrap. Clay yelped when he saw Santa had managed to find the thing he wanted. The next hour was spent connecting train track and constructing a Playmobil train station. Then we played. Then I lay down on the sofa and watched, then I finally had to go and lie down in bed proper while nana took over.

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