23 Skidoo Afternoon

It's been a 23 Skidoo afternoon, started by a track someone posted on FB, which inspired me to play their first two albums with the mental snapshot I have of them playing The Venue (London) in 1982 flickering intermittently and in nanosecond bites therefore defying attempts to clearly remember but I think they wore military uniforms and one or two of them played enormous horns, like alpine ones...

Seven Songs (1982, their first album) was exciting at the time and still sounds great, reminding me that all was not lost after the glory decade that was the 70s (my personal odyssey from bootboy Glam/Art rock through Funk to Reggae/Punk) aided by Rip Rig & Panic, A Certain Ratio, Defunkt, The Lounge Lizards and others - it just always feels that way. Those bands, I know realise, acted as a portal to Jazz, that thing I spent the whole of the 80s exploring - well, there's a lot of it, isn't there? 

Listening to the (urban) Gamelan on The Culling Is Coming (1983) puts me in a contemplative mood...as if I might start practising some tai chi and reciting T. S. Eliot before slaughtering an ox...you know, I might...apocalyptic thoughts inspired by this track, of course...sampling the film...

...of their time (once) but keen to shed the white boy Funk shackles, 23 Skidoo had hinted at other things early on but when they really changed most critics boo-hooed (as usual) and fans who thought they knew them probably got confused too, so the band unwittingly did some 'culling'. It must be tough in music of you dare to evolve and explore new areas...or any other art form for that matter...people like you for one thing, only to see you doing a new thing later.

Around the time 23 Skidoo were changing I still dreamt of writing a novel...years later I realised I couldn't do it...and finally, I didn't want to, preferring the play of plagiarism and text sampling. 23 Skidoo knew all about that, being fans of William Burroughs. I didn't have a fan base to worry about, though, so my changes bothered no-one. When my biography is written is the time those changes will seem significant...naturally...