13 f Ranting & Reeling T
he award-winning film Whiplash has garnered much praise. It’s a masterfully-made drama about pure artistic ambition. But it’s also received its fair share of dissenting blog posts, mostly from jazz fans complaining that jazz isn’t about playing rapid para- diddles till your palms bleed. They were also irked that the character of Fletcher, played by J.K. Simmons, got an anecdote about Charlie Parker wrong. Seemingly forgetting that people often misremem- ber the stories they tell, particularly when those blurred facts serve their own per- sonal narrative. As in this case.
As folk fans we’re also inclined to make mountains out of erroneous mole- hills. So it’s unfortunate for us that English folk music and traditions rarely pop up on the big or small screen.
There was of course the Doctor Who
serial The Dæmons, in which Jon Pertwee was molested at a maypole by Headington Quarry Morris Men; an episode of Dad’s Army begins with the platoon larking about in Morris attire to the tune of Constant Billy; The Two Ronnies preceded their folk song parody Bold Sir John with an overlong and inaccurately choreographed Morris routine, and Russ Abbot's Madhouse included a thinly-veiled spoof of The Spinners for which the comic Dustin Gee blacked up.
More recently Stewart Lee’s meticu- lous depiction of Del Day – where the vil- lagers of Ferrety St Margaret celebrate David Jason falling through the bar on Only Fools And Horses – featured an entirely fabricated traditional dance as the genuine Morris side Stewart asked to take part refused, citing the damage done by the likes of Dad’s Army and The Two Ron- nies in the ’70s and ’80s.
But finally the folk pedants have something to sink their griping gums into. In February, ITV broadcast an episode of Midsomer Murders set entirely at a folk festival. This instalment of the detective series (that doesn’t have John Nettles in it any more) revolved around a festival organiser drowned in a bowl of eels and eggs seemingly because of an unreleased song by Seth Lakeman, which he has since released as a duet with a woman who was on the same series of The X Factor as Jed- ward. It also featured Lester Freamon from The Wire pretending to play a violin that was really being played by Jackie Oates hiding behind a curtain.
What’s angered particular viewers
isn’t the idea that a folk festival could economically sustain a small village, despite its largest stage being in a hall barely big enough to swing a Brownie. It’s the depiction of mass murder amongst
the folk com- munity that’s really got the blood boiling.
At a time
when the coun- try’s festivals are working hard to tackle trad-related homicides, a programme like Midsomer Mur- ders is simply fuelling preju-
dices. Stranglings at Sidmouth alone are down by 15 percent, and this year’s Shep- ley festival will be offering tankard cov- erings in an effort to thwart poisoners. Rapper on rapper killings are still a major problem, and police have admitted to EFDSS that they’re still no closer to arresting the notorious singaround slash- er, but progress has been made.
The producers of Midsomer Murders should also make it clear that any resem- blance between an Oxfordshire festival promoter angering locals with plans to relocate the event, and Joe Heap’s deci- sion to shift Towersey to another field was entirely coincidental.
Tim Chipping
ges before Spinal Tap defined a musicians’ sanity through his or her relationship with the rider, David Thomas of post-punk art rockers Père Ubu was specifying the thick- ness of the bread and width of the ingre- dients in his sandwich down to the last millimetre in a way that would leave Nigel Tufnel gasping with admiration. Thomas was, remembers Alan James who worked with him, notoriously picky, though appreciative if the food met the specs. “Delicious sandwich,” he would say.
ly stuffed olives seemed brilliantly dispro- portionate, fact is, the significance of the rider in a band’s life can’t be underesti- mated. Not only does it signify your place on the ladder of commercial success (100 white doves? Certainly, madam), it can actually mean the difference between life and death itself.
James remembers touring with a band where one of the members was dia- betic. Arriving at the sound-check at a gig in the-middle-of-nowhere to find the pro- moter hadn’t bothered with the rider at all, the band had no choice but to find somewhere to eat after the gig. At which point the diabetic collapsed in a hypo - glycaemic fit.
The Elusive Ethnomusicologist A
In other circumstances, it’s the careful provision of the rider that can do for you. On a rock’n’roll tour in America, one of the members of the band I was with, swig- ging from one of the many bottles of Jack Daniels plucked from amongst sea of beer and wine asked: “Where’s the snow? No snow, no show!” And so it appeared. Enough to keep the entire population of Colombia marching for years. He collapsed a few days later.
Whilst Tufnel’s reaction to his careless-
And excesses in the folk world? Alan James who now manages Spiro and 9 Bach, says: “Sometimes arriving at a gig after a long drive and being asked by the promoter ‘Would you all like a cuppa?’ makes all the difference.” He fondly remembers the joyful occasion when a cask of ale was provided unasked by the Brighton Dome to the Young Coppers and another time when the local baker in Holmfirth turned up at the stage door to offer the Imagined Village a tray full of his home-made pies. “I thought the band might like these.”
Then there was the time Joe Strum- mer who, playing a gig in Brixton sup- ported by the Drummers Of Burundi, was horrified by their rider: “The Drummers of Burundi liked chicken and chips. Their rider in Brixton was six half cans of
Heineken and a couple of sand- wiches. Joe saw this and
brought all the Clash’s rider into our dress- ing room, loads of fruit and cold chicken and bottles of beer and wine.”
The rider
protects the promoters’ interests. Giving the musicians something to eat and drink whilst they’re all at the gig – ie not get- ting lost in a strange town – the show’s more likely to go on. But more than that, aside from testing that the promoter has read the contract (the endlessly creative 3 Mustaphas 3 whilst on tour in America did actually get their request for “a fully stocked fridge on stage and a country & western band to serenade us in the dress- ing room” fulfilled), it sends a comforting message to the band. They are being lis- tened to. Their needs are being met. They are welcome and valued. And what’s mad about that?!
Elizabeth Kinder
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