ianbee: this is instead of getting a dog

Billy Bragg and me

I've been at Greenbelt Festival this weekend past, helping to run a small photographic exhibition (more later). I was classed as a 'contributor', a title which gave me a purple wristband-ticket, meal vouchers and access to the luxurious 'contributor's lounge', which had proper coffee and board games.

Soon after arriving, I went to the lounge to pick up my contributor's pack, which included my meal vouchers and a festival programme. The lady behind the welcome desk flicked through a pile of envelopes stacked in alphabetical order. "Let me see ... Billy Bragg ... here we are, Ian Braithwaite!"

The first and probably only time I will be legitimately mentioned in the same sentence as Billy Bragg.

David O'Doherty (feat. Shakira)

My third Edinburgh fringe choice was a safe one. David O'Doherty, a large Irish man with a tiny keyboard. (Minor rude word alert.)

 

 

He told us about a friend who thinks computer games are the modern equivalent of reading a novel. "No they're not", he said. "They're the modern equivalent of throwing a novel through a hoop. The modern equivalent of reading a novel is ... reading a modern novel."

 

 

Anyone for Tennis?

Remember when I used to live in Edinburgh? I used to bore you all with reems of tedious chat about the festival and all the fancy shows I went to. Well don't worry, this year you only have to read three posts. Here's the first.

 

I'm a sucker for Australian or Kiwi novelty bands. This one seemed fun, I took a risk, persuaded three friends to join me, and spent an hour revelling in inappropriate content sung with appropriate harmony. It was a struggle to find some video to share with you! Their songs always seemed to follow the same pattern; an innocuous start, catchy melody, predictable but inoffensive key change, and then out of nowhere a breath-taking side step into inapt hilarity! I loved the one about how the clock in the bedroom says 10:04 and the clock in the kitchen says 10:02. It was called "Time Portal in the Hall". 

Fans of Gladiator or Braveheart should check this out. Fans of Wallace and Gromit click here.

Marble steps

There is a flight of stairs in Edinburgh that has always been a great short-cut from Waverly station to North Bridge. If you exit the station by the Fruitmarket Gallery, the Scotsman steps are almost opposite. The trouble is, they were always a place to sleep for the un-housed. And a run up them was always accompanied by the heady stench of urine. To the extent that I would often see how many steps I could climb whilst holding my breath.

The homeless have had a dramatic upgrade to their quarters. I'm sure they would have preferred a duvet or a mattress, but as consolation, their steps are now cased in an array of the most brilliant, luxurious marble.

Every step is a different shade and hue, there are deepest blues and sparkling greens, royal cream and palatial red. The city has paved a toilet in gold and it is fantastic.

Read the Scotsman article here.

 

No photo is complete without a pigeon

Here's the photo I walked away with after the Greenbelt Photoswap exhibition. It's entitled "No photo is complete without a pigeon". It's a photo of a photo of a pigeon, which is a bit surreal. Anyway, like I said, it was my fourth choice! Perfect for displaying on a fridge.

Greenbelt

Carrying on with the history posts, I had a great weekend at the Greenbelt festival last summer. I was a volunteer with the visual arts team. I particularly enjoyed helping to organise the photoswap exhibition. Festival-goers were encouraged to bring along a photo that they had taken. I hung them in an exhibition for everyone to enjoy over the weekend. Some were great - professional in both thought and execution. Some were less ... um ... although interestingly the most professional looking pictures weren't always contributed by professional photographers. Children were encouraged to enter, and a camera in the hands of a child inevitably produces entertaining results.

Hundreds of people came to view the exhibition over the course of the weekend. Those who had donated pictures often visited several times, as they had a special reason to be interested. Since in the final moments of the festival, each photographer was given a sticker to place on the photograph which they wanted to take home with them.

There was a countdown. Then a rush. An old lady with a stick suddenly found a hitherto hidden turn of speed. Small children were crushed. Fit young men were fighting with mature women. Negotiation, tears, compromise. Disappointment, ambivalence, triumph. I knew what I wanted, but foolishly took a photo, and missed out on my first, second and third choices. Despite initial misgivings, my fourth choice has grown to be a great souvenir and I display it with pride.

I'll show you what I took away with me another day. It's stuck to my fridge and I'm not at home.

Hidden Door (3)

The five stages allowed for an intense concert experience. They were arranged around the outside of the room so a band on one stage would finish and the next could kick off with barely a crotchet's rest. There was no time to catch breath, all the audience had to do was rotate on their heels through 72 degrees at the end of each set.

Sounds good? Then imagine, once the novelty of that trick wears off, that five bands take to the stages simultaneously having learnt each other's songs. The resulting set spins the audience into delirious confusion as, after a gentle start, choruses are harmonised from every corner or the room and a guitar solo rises from behind and slightly to the left. 

Whilst that wonderful concept remained fresh with the music still ringing in our ears, the following evening saw multiple bands perform a join composition which pounded the unsuspecting audience from all sides. A miracle of synchronised guitar tuning and complex sound engineering produced a gig that managed to be all about emotion and the collective power of sound.

You've read this far, why not watch a video? You deserve it.

 

Wish you'd been there? Why not taste a sample of the event through the Hidden Door iphone app. This cunning tool will play a dynamically changing location-aware music mix as you travel towards the venue. Which has unfortunately gone into administration. But the app still works.

Hidden Door (2)

The main hall was home to five stages, each the creation of a different group of artists and musicians. One stage was a simple white box, to be covered in projections and visual detritus. Another bought the outdoors inside with a dirt floor, picket fence and blue sky. The centre stage was a tiered construction that rose grandly up into the spacious roof. As the bands played below, artists scurried about above our heads painting amongst the music.

(left - tramp blues band on the white stage, right - indoor lawn complete with cake stall)

In my role as general helpful person, my finest hour was when I was called upon at a moment's notice to ascend into the upper levels of the stage with a screwdriver to remove a giant letter 'C' which had been catching on the costume of a ninja bellydancer. Whilst RBRBR played the tunes below, I crouched focused and undistracted amongst the smoke, the lights and the bellies. I was equal to the task and the entertainment continued.

Hidden Door (1)

Let me tell you about Hidden Door. It was a while ago now (October). I wrote about it in my head, as is often the way, but I realise that is a poor substitute for sharing.

Hidden Door was an Edinburgh weekend of home-grown music and art, assembled by a hard working and passionate group of highly talented optimists. I'd been disappointed not to be able to make the first event, back in January last year, so the autumn sequel had been on my radar for a while.

I turned up early to find a building full of people all looking for somewhere to charge their powertools. It was an old stone church- once used as an exam hall by Edinburgh University. In a former life, a young engineer/nurse sat one of his finals under its roof, little realising that one day in the future he would return and would be pointed towards a stone pillar and asked to build a platform for a video projector, given only a sketch, some scrap wood and a drill with an empty battery to help him in his task.

I think I did alright. It certainly lasted the whole weekend, and didn't fall on anyone's head.

24 hours in Edinburgh

(This is posted from my iPod so please forgive the lack of capitals, line-breaks or coherent spelling.)

Edinburgh is the most beautiful city in the world, rain or shine. but particularly shine, like today, an unexpected reprise of summer which we thought had slunk away with a shrug. I've had an amazing twenty-four hours. it actually started at midnight. I was asleep in my flat when the tattoo fireworks started. bedtime fireworks! i leapt up- how could I have forgotten! evening explosions viewed from my residence used to be the highlight of my summer. 

I caught Daniel kitson at the Traverse this morning. he told two simultaneous tales, one about an old man, starting with his death, and one about a young girl, starting with her birth. the man got younger, and the girl older as he alternated between moments in their lives. their ages coincided halfway through, and the story ended with her death and his birth. I believe it takes the story-telling skills of a comedian to make someone cry with sadness, particularly before lunch. 

Recovering in the leafy courtyard of the book festival, I watched middle class parents juggle with babies, the sunday papers and mint-choc-chip ice cream. I promised myself I would stay until I saw someone I knew. it took a stubborn hour, but then I called over to P who actually works here, passing books under a pen for authors to sign and marshalling queues of literary five-year-olds. 

I caught the bus to leith and met a friend whose own music studio had been taken over for the day by artists. we hung around and watched capawera (?sp) dancing, heard a blues singer and slipped out of a talk by a comic artist. we were served miniature marzipan fruits by tall leggy fashion models and when a picture fell off the wall I answered the call and dangerously balanced on a sofa to hang it back up, to the admiration of all who were present. 

Seeking a less eclectic vibe, I left and met D for a pint on the Shore. we sat in the sun by the water and swapped stories of Dhaka. I remembered the spice markets and the old capital, he had seen the garment factories and took a trip down the river. between us we had Bangladesh covered. 

I find myself back at the book festival jealously guarding chocolate orange cake and waiting for my tenant to deliver my flipflops. we have tickets to hear a brave man talk about his adventures in the snow, an appropriate way to end this hot day.