Guitars and Life

Couldn't last for long... always seem to buy guitars around this time of year... Just bought one of these (Yamaha CPX) as a more appropriate stage guitar than my LL series Yamaha, which isn't electro-acoustic for a start.

Best gig of the year. Very difficult... after much deliberation Muse just edge it I think but Heaven and Hell at Sonisphere ran them a mighty close second. Others of note - I like Snow Patrol a lot and Judas Priest at Wembley in Feb were great as well. Best album of the year. Paradise Lost - Faith Divides Us Death Unites Us Saw these on the second stage at Sonisphere and I was impressed. I listened to this when released on Spotify and instantly bought it. One of the best "metal" albums from a British band in years. Rarely off my listening to list since. Brilliant. Worthy of note... a lot although this was a quiet year for a while. Okay U2 produced a good but not great for them album, Heaven and Hell showed that the old boys of metal can still produce the goods! Newton Faulkner's second effort disappointed a bit at first but has grown on me, less flashy but good song writing. Biffy Clyro continue to grow and impress with a strong showing on Only Revolutions. Marillion...

So 2009 – the end of the noughties... I’ve hated that title for this decade, oh crap what’ll the next one be the teenies? please I hope not. So this year has been one hasn’t it. The biggest recession in my lifetime which I have to say luckily has largely passed us as a family by so far. Quick summary then... January January was a sad month with some tragedies for including the sad loss of the great great John Martyn. Gives me an excuse to point you to spend 5 and a half minutes of your life just listening to this – if you want to get close to the emotion of the man. I found out I know John’s cousin which provided some amazing insight to him. Also I acquired my PRS CE22 in January – still now my principle “go to guitar” when I plug in the amp. February I was told that my old job had gone away and that I was “redundant”. I went frankly into a bit of a tail spin... I had no Plan B, I frankly had bugger all Plan A. In retrospect I probably should have taken the cash and gone off but...

And what have you done? Another year over? And a new one just begun... Hats off to Mr Lennon there. I'll soon have to to the Furtheron review of the year in terms of music and life. But in the meantime Happy Christmas to all the readers of this continuing ramble through my mind...

Christmas is nearly here. Daughter-of-Furtheron has broken up from school for Christmas, Son-of-Furtheron is home from uni, Mrs Furtheron has finished at school and all the Christmas performances are over. In the office we've had the end of year celebrations and day by day less people are turning up as those that haven't used up all their leave are using it up... I've blown that and am here until Christmas Eve, but never mind at least then I'm off until the 4th Jan as we have a site shut down. With all this though a phenomenon has arrived, Mum and Dad's taxi service. Mrs F was shuttling girls to and from the cinema yesterday evening and has some complicated movements through the day today. So I think I need to get some of these and those beady seat covers for the drivers seat and plastic ones for all the others and a meter to try to get payment for all this taxi service!!! :-)

I was so pleased that this hit the number 1 slot. Nothing against the X-Factor except that I am fed up with the manufactured pop star thing. It isn't a new issue... Bay City Rollers anyone? etc. but increasingly there isn't anything edgy anywhere. Funny the edgy track chosen is 17 years old!!! Still it is the message it sends which is good, there are a huge number of people out there who will buy music when moved to do so. Hmm maybe some new bands should take heart from this and get out there and promote themselves and we'll get something new interesting and different up in the charts in 2010... You can hope can't you?

That isn't a statement I often make but it was very sunny and lovely in Wales on Friday. I did run ahead of the snowstorm on Thursday down the M4 stopping about Chippenham for the night. As I say whilst our part of Kent was gridlock on Friday morning with several inches of snow I woke to a glorious sunny day and had a lovely drive right along the end of the M4 and up the coast road. We came back Saturday via the M40 and dropping of my sons girlfriend near Uxbridge - they had a bit of snow... but then as we hit the North Downs near our home the snow was piled high. Mrs F had spent a couple of hours digging out the drive thankfully and despite a scary slide on the approach we got home fine. Back to work today - getting there not an issue but getting back along our road to get home... now that is a different point :-)

Heavy snow is forecast for the South East overnight. Darn!!! I need to get down to Wales to pick my son up to come home for Christmas. Maybe I'll shoot off tonight instead then have the issue of getting back on Saturday...

Another brilliant song and video by Mr Giles Toller...

I've loaded up two new songs as promised. Go to here or they are in the widget in the right hand bar of this page just down a bit... You Make Me More - is dedicated to all the people I've come across in my life who have made me a better person... those that give energy to people not those that suck it out of you. My Baby - is a little diversion for me. This is a jazzy chord progression I've had lying around for ages. I thought it needed some tongue in cheek lyrics so this song is a play on the fickleness you sometimes see certain people have in relationships and love. Enjoy...

Number 27 Wash and hoover your car in the pouring rain. ... oh and thanks to all the wise arses walking up my road from the shop who thought it necessary to point out to me it was raining. I knew that but the car was covered in filth and I was doing it no matter what!

I've a couple of new songs that'll be debuting on the Drunk Punk show on Scooter Forums radio tomorrow night from 9pm I'll be posting them up to Reverbnation and hence into my widget... look right and down on Sunday.

... the Peter Cook bass that is. This beauty has been in the collection for about 20 years now, but I'm no bass player, it only ever came out rarely to add bottom end (mostly root and fifth) to my home recordings. Given I took about 8 years out from any of that activity it generally hung on the wall for a long time. My son did use it briefly when he was playing bass in a band about 4 years back, then he converted to 6 string and that was that. However also in that period he convinced me that really a 5 string was required for modern bass playing so I bought a black Ibanez 5 string off a guy at work and now I have two basses I hardly play. Prior to that her only real use was when the bass player in a band I was briefly trying to get together about seven years ago used it as a backup and Drop D ready tuned for a while. The recent upsurge in my home recording hasn't found me pulling the Peter Cook from it's place in a gig bag behind the rack of other guitars at all even though...

I'm behind on book reviews so here is a catch up on the last couple. Jon Fashman - Unpossessed City I loved his first novel - Geographer's Library. This wasn't quiet as good but was intriguing as the plot switched back and forth and you weren't exactly sure who was who and what was what in it. It is set mostly in Moscow where an American finds himself after getting into debt and deciding that "run away" was an appropriate tactic. He then unwittingly finds himself caught up in a complicated plot to spirit ex-USSR scientists out of the country. I'd recommend this as a good read - the description of Moscow and the life within it was excellent giving me a better insight the underlying plot than many novels do. Will Adams - The Lost Labyrinth This is his third novel I think, and with a similar plot and many returning characters. The main one is Dan Knox who is an archaeologist who has a knack of making the greatest discoveries of the century... book after book ...

Anyone remember the old rhyme? Christmas is coming, the geese are getting fat Please put a penny in the old man's hat If you haven't got a penny, a ha'penny will do If you haven't got a ha'penny, then God bless you! My Dad used to often recite it. Today would have been his birthday but sadly he was taken from us back in 1984... blimey I've been alive more without him now than with him! I was 22 when he died, I'm 47 now. Anyway - Christmas is suddenly baring down on us at a huge speed. Only a week and a day or so and I'll be off to pick up my son from university. Looking forward to him being home again. We've put the tree up - well Mrs F and I did that bit and put the new 200 multi-function lighting rig on it. I have to say they do look better than the batter old two other sets we used to wind around the tree hoping it'd look ok and every year saying we'd buy some new ones, well now we have and all the options for flashing etc. boggle me, we u...

Okay stretching a point since I actually mean - In the little box room that is crammed with guitars, books, AA paraphernalia (I hold the stock for Public Interest stuff in our local area), Christmas presents... etc. But it has my little recorder in it so today it is the studio. :-) I'm recording a couple of new tracks - so watch this space. I've signed up to Reverbnation as an artist... nothing like self publicity is there. My page is here . It's quiet neat as you can then get a player for your material without it being available for Download - well it is up to you to set that and then you can get widgets to bung on your blog... note the two news one to the right of this post. If anyone would like to promote me on there blog then go here and you can grab the code for a widget of different types which you can put on your blog etc. (If you are on blogger in layout tab click on add a gadget and then select the one that allows HTML to be pasted in and viola - done! I have ...

Well a lot!! Soon I'll have to put up an "Upcoming gigs" widget on this blog. :-) Yes true folks I've got another gig. This time in March and actually not just a gig... look I'm of the age when live music on the TV was a huge rarity (although actually it's probably rarer now!) and as a teenager I waited for a new series of Rock Goes to College, or Sight and Sound in concert. Ones that stand out... the last ever Lizzy TV gig, John Martyn blowing me away with just him and a guitar and that voice!, The Police, Supertramp, Queen... etc. Anyroad the March date isn't just a gig I'll be broadcasting live... yes live... to the world... yes the WORLD on the legendary Scooter Forums Radio! Well I think the date is in March there is some confusion on that at the moment :-) So now two live dates fixed... blimey it's nearly a tour :-) Okay in preparation for the next Rock-Til-You-Drop acoustic gig I'm planning to do, which is btw 14th Feb at The Libert...

Well I'm in the good olde US of A this week for work. First time I've traveled on work related stuff for something like 18 months, which is so odd given I've had a USA boss for over 6 months and the rest of my team is based here, but that is how life is sometimes. I've had other less "global" jobs and traveled much more. Today is a big workshop (the pretext for traveling) with another group then I've got a couple of days in the office to try to catch up with "customers" and "partners" before flying home on Friday. I'm staying in the same hotel I've used now for years and which the family stayed in the summer on our USA holiday. Funny it seems all so familiar now - I almost was confused as they've moved the TV in the breakfast room! The trip out was ok but very tiring. Why do airlines get you all to bundle on the plane thinking that you daren't hold up the process or all the other passengers and crew will think you a...