Tuesday 24 November 2009

Homesick for a place that is no longer there

The joy of the iPod. I keep it on shuffle a lot of the time which means I am occasionally laughing aloud to the juxtapositions it throws out. More unlikely mixes have included Kraftwerk followed, without missing a beat, by Hugh Palmer (a fellow who's sermons I listen to regularly). It's even better when it's the other way round and following a sermon the guy says let us pray and where they haven't taped the prayer you go straight into something like Coz I Love You by the Wonderstuff (genuinely the last thing to come up on my listening).

Today the Skids came up with Working For the Yankee Dollar and I thought of Steve Mills as I always do when I hear the Skids. Neither of us were great fans but I remember an occasion when we all jumped over the wall of the school playing field we spent all of our time in and into the alley. Steve sang "Into The Alley" (a clever word play on the Skids' biggest hit) as we did so and we all laughed. He will not remember it and if he does he may deny it but it happened. I was there. Happy and uncomplicated days.

Funny how music takes you back.

2 comments:

  1. Catherine Chapple26 November 2009 at 18:22

    Oh, Steve, that's really poignant! It reminds me of A E Houseman's excerpt from 'A Shropshire Lad'

    Into my heart an air that kills
    From yon far country blows:
    What are those blue remembered hills,
    What spires, what farms are those?
    That is the land of lost content,
    I see it shining plain,
    The happy highways where I went
    And cannot come again.

    Lots of love Catherine x

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  2. Wow, that's way more poignant, I really like that in a way that I wouldn't have ten years ago.

    I must get in touch, sorry to be so lousy at keeping in touch.

    x

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