The Pink Flamingo: A Celebration of Soft Cell

Although the things that having Cystic Fibrosis causes me to miss at times breaks my heart, sometimes the pain can be lessened by a fortunate turn of events, and whoever made the decision to screen Soft Cell's last ever concert this Sunday in cinemas across the UK, has certainly come to my assistance on this occasion. That I can't actually be at the 02 Arena in London itself is a cause of great distress, but to be able to at least watch the concert on the big screen, 10 minutes away from home, is most definitely, in terms of consolation, as good as it can get. Soft Cell (and Marc Almond solo) have been a huge part of my life for as long as I can remember. I'll never forget my first real connection with them - which wasn't, as with most people, with 'Tainted Love' - but rather with the strange, haunting, and achingly poignant ballad, 'Say Hello Wave Goodbye.' I'll try and describe the scene. This would have been in 1982 so I would have been eleven at the time. The school I attended (this was before I went to drama school) had a Thursday evening Youth Club, and at 7.29 on the dot, everybody that was into music would pile into a little side room where the telly was housed. I watched so many Top Of The Pops episodes in that room, but the night that 'Say Hello Wave Goodbye' was on will stay with me forever. I already knew Soft Cell through 'Tainted Love', and although I loved it, it hadn't really entered my psyche. Perhaps, even then, I thought it was too popular? I'm not sure. Anyway, this time, it was very different. For when 'Say Hello Wave Goodbye' came on, it was as if I'd been pinned to my chair. Maybe I was feeling particularly wistful that day. My life was, in many ways, as sad as sad can be at that point. I'd been diagnosed with Cystic Fibrosis four years earlier, had been bullied in school and was going through a very tough time at home in what has emerged as being as bad as it can get for a young child. Maybe I would have loved it just as much without any of those things, who knows, but whatever the reason, within seconds of the song's opening, the world around me ceased to exist and all I could see or hear was the video and the song playing out on the TV screen. Marc's yearning, yet at times ever so slightly out of tune voice, the broken melody, the neon signs flashing, a young man looking sad and broken, and then the door of the Pink Flamingo bar opened, and the viewer (in this case me) was ushered into the world of the darkly glamorous & the bizarre, and there, sitting at the bar was the strangest creature of all, the utterly fascinating, almost gender-less, Marc Almond. As the song finished I came out of my haze to the usual type of remarks wherever Soft Cell were concerned: "Fuckin' weirdo...what a puff...etc, etc." This was from the boys who were into "proper music" such as Madness, The Jam & Bad Manners, and who I already well knew would kick my head in if I so much as breathed a word about how amazing I thought the song and video we had just witnessed was. And this hysterical (as in a form of hysteria, not "funny haha") reaction was something I noticed about Soft Cell, and Marc Almond in particular. In fact, when I was older, one of my friends around that time wouldn't even mention Marc's name if I was playing Marc Almond songs whilst he was around: "I see you're listening to Gay Almond, again," he would say with a tone of contempt. Yet how sad I feel for him and those people like him now. But back then, in my school days, this was a dangerous stance to take and I was already a target of the bullies because of my CF which made me different and weaker, and I knew that admitting to liking Soft Cell would put my beginning to blossom handsome looks in grave danger because of the assorted mods 'n' skinheads that prowled the school yard menacingly. But, despite all that, I'm proud to say that I decided to Walk Unafraid, and wore my love of Soft Cell on my sleeve, and what an impact they and that song had on my young soul at that time and 'Say Hello Wave Goodbye' is still not quite like any other song I've ever heard.

I actually loved all of Soft Cell's singles at the time they were released but because life and pop music in particular moves so fast, by the time I was getting a bit older and buying albums myself, Soft Cell had actually split. Frankie had taken the world by storm, as had Madonna, I was performing in Les Miserables and was therefore also being introduced to the wonderful world of musicals (Little Shop Of Horrors, Chess, etc) and every week it seemed as if the pop charts brought something new & exciting to listen to and watch. But I then had another quite monumental Soft Cell epiphany a few years later when I was around 19/20. There was a brilliant record shop in the indoor market in Chester that I used to frequent, and although the baggy scene was in full swing at that point, I spent a small fortune in there (not on the baggy stuff, darlings!!) as they had an incredible New Wave selection, which included pretty much every Soft Cell and Marc Almond 12" single or album that had ever been released. They also stocked CDs and I bought an import CD that had the extended version of 'Soul Inside' on it. I seriously fell in love with pretty much all of Soft Cell's 12" singles, which were so much more than just extended dance versions of the basic songs. 'Torch,' 'Insecure Me' 'Tainted Love/Where Did Our Love Go', and 'Bedsitter' were masterpieces in their own right, with masses of added lyrics and different melodies. They also introduced me to the character Cindy Ecstasy, who invaded my psyche and after which I've probably never quite been the same. And indeed, it was incredibly strange to me to be continually told that Soft Cell were just 'gay' by some of my friends and lots of other people I met who would only listen to jangly guitar bands who, for all their supposed hetero-macho posturing, couldn't have had a Cindy Ecstasy in their ranks or on their droning, sexless records even if their lives depended on it. You tell me, dear reader, is it possible to be an imaginative young man and hear Cindy Ecstasy, who's already been introduced by Marc on the extended version of 'Torch' as wearing a dress that "makes the young boys faint", recite the following lines and not be taken on a rather splendid and sensual journey of the imagination?:

"I may be soft but I made the top,

I like my cabaret non-stop.

It may be erotic, it may be ecstatic

down on your floor or in your attic...

You can take it low or shut your eyes, just let our love materialise.

And I don't mean love on a chocolate box, I mean the love that really rocks!

They all see me, the good time lady...so

Just look at me and it's easy to see why they call me Cindy Ecstasy!

'Cause I've got the eyes, the where's & why's

To make your love thing really Rise,

You don't need speed or a pair of wheels

Cause I'm the prize that will brighten your skies.

So look me up and I'll tell no lies,

Cause I'm the lady with the hot surprise,

If you don't believe me, just ask Soft Cell, 

Cause I shook them up and I gave them hell!

So call up Cindy Ecstasy if you're looking for a memory!

Just call up Cindy Ecstasy if you're looking for a memory!"

This was from the single 'Memorabilia,' which has now been recognised as a prototype Acid-house track. And on the extended version of 'Insecure Me', Cindy again entices the listener suggestively:

"Forget the lows, Just love the highs

And wipe that look out from your eyes

I forget the face that I despise

'Cause I know my mirror

Never lies.

I'll come up fighting

Like the best

But then I'm different

From the rest

And I wonder if my looks will last

Because my life is really fast.

Don't worry about the way I dress

And if my make-up looks a mess

I'm not about to get depressed,

'cause I'm the one that loves to lose

Just love me in my fuck me shoes!

Cause I've got the touch and I've got the feel

To make your good time Really real!

Just love to love,

Just love to live,

Just love to live,

Just love to love!

And, baby, are you so, so sure,

That you're the one that's insecure?"

And of course, in those far off days, before the internet made imagination increasingly irrelevant, it was the imagination that was the most important part of the individual if he or she wanted to respond to anything artistic. And Soft Cell's music fired my imagination like crazy. And as I had precious little knowledge about Cindy Ecstasy (I'd seen her on the 'Torch' Top of the Pops performance but that was about it) it gave my imagination completely free reign. And to me, this party-loving denizen of the night, who was the band's drug dealer in New York and who had introduced them to all of the most glamorous and shady night spots that the the city had to offer, had the force of myth and legend. But I'm digressing really. For what I really want to relate is another moment in my life that I will never forget, the epiphany that I earlier alluded to. A moment where, once again, it seemed as if the music I adored came to my rescue like a sonic goddess, and, in a sense, saved my life, and if not my life, then at least some semblance of my sanity.

Picture the scene if you will, dear reader. I was 19, and despite my CF, was still a professional singer and actor at that point as it didn't have as much of an impact on my life then as it was to come to have and does now. But I was also, "in-between jobs." That's right. That awful place for a performer, that dreaded limbo where you are not working at the thing you love and have to make do with temporary stuff to get you through. And during that period, I was working as a night time garage attendant. I've had to do worse jobs in my life so I'm not going to complain about that, and as my shift was from 11pm - 7am there was plenty of time for me to read books and magazines and listen to music during my time there. But I also had to work that New Year's Eve, and I was, I have to admit, royally pissed off. All my friends were out partying but I was to be stuck behind the til in the garage, only on time and a half wage, and also gritting my teeth at not doing the thing I treasured the most: singing and acting either on stage or on screen. And then, at midnight, all at once, the urge in me to say "fuck you!" to the world overwhelmed me. I turned out all the lights on the garage concourse and in the shop so it looked like it was closed, locked the eleckie doors, put the 12" extended version of Soft Cell's 'Soul Inside' on my stereo (ghetto blaster!), and danced and sang every word as if my very life depended on it, thus somehow getting all that frustration out of me and afterwards, feeling like I was, once again, a living, breathing, thinking member of the human race rather than a pissed off drone. And that particular song, with its shrieking, pleading and yearning, practically saved, if not my life then certainly my sanity that New Year's Eve. I still get a tingle whenever I hear it now, and Marc's opening salvo of "It's a wild celebration of feelings inside," is like a mantra and there is still a piece of me that is taken back to that night whenever I hear 'Soul Inside.' 



And so, as you can probably imagine, dear reader, that song and particularly Soft Cell have a rather sacred place in my heart. Which leads me onto their last ever concert on Sunday, which I will be watching at the cinema with a frantically beating heart and with tears in my eyes. For not only is it Soft Cell's last concert, but also, perhaps it is also about the end of an era regarding pop music in general, as the pop music scene is now unrecognisable from those halcyon days when the charts meant almost everything, (does anybody even care what's number one, any more?) and, also, in acknowledging the passing of time, the death of old selves, getting older and facing up to mortality. As I've already mentioned, I was eleven when I first heard 'Say Hello Wave Goodbye' on that tinny telly in my school Youth Club. When it's played on Sunday (and I think it's safe to say that it WILL be on the set list - and only a crazy person would bet against it being the last song of the night) it will be not that far off forty years ago. A whole ocean of time has passed between then and now. Youth Has Gone (and don't think I don't cry). My Mum, Nain and Taid, all are no longer here. My adopted dad, Bowie, who I genuinely thought would live forever as he was a spaceman, died in early 2016. Lydia's mum has been very ill and her dad is having health problems, too. And it's not only the older generation. One of Lydia's best friends from her school days has been diagnosed with cancer and probably won't recover. He's only just passed his mid-thirties. I'm also trying to keep CF at bay and have a whole barrage of drugs and treatments to do every day, whilst knowing that I'm already older than the average age life expectancy for someone with CF. Against this backdrop, life can sometimes seem overwhelming. So... hopefully, this Sunday is going to be something of a Wild Celebration of Feelings Inside, about finding those oh so sweet moments of ecstasy in this sometimes incomprehensible journey of life with its inescapable facts of loss and mortality. Because music and feelings is where I find so much of the meaning that I'm looking for. I don't believe in God, so religion can't help me. I don't believe in asceticism or the denial of the senses so a religion/philosophy like Buddhism is no use to me. In actual fact, I believe the senses to be a sacred gift that have been given to us to treasure for the short time we are here on earth so taking the ascetic approach is for me, actually a kind of sin against life itself, but that discussion will have to wait for another essay. But I do believe in Art and Connection. And that's what singing, music and art is principally about: connection. That desperate need not to feel invisible. To connect with people. To feel like your existence is important and that you actually matter. To not hide behind computer screens but to look into someone's eyes & see them as they see you in return. But not just see them. I mean REALLY see them. And for a singer such as Marc Almond, who bares his soul on stage and on recordings, that is everything. His influence on my love of singing is absolutely immense. He has a style that would be ridiculed on shows such as The X Factor and The Voice. It is not perfect by any means. But as Brett Anderson knows so well and has sung about with such sensitivity, it's actually the imperfections that make things so beautiful and unique. The deep respect and love of the lyrics is also paramount in Marc's singing. His voice will obviously sound different to how it did on those old Soft Cell records as they were recorded nearly forty years ago. Both he, and we as audience members, will have to suspend reality with some of the lyrics. But which singer of a certain age doesn't have to do this? We have to do it when Suede play 'So Young', as both Brett and we know that he is not quite "so young and so gone" as the lyric maintains any longer, but it doesn't prevent that song being poignant, alive and electrifying when they perform it. And it won't matter with Soft Cell, either. Because Marc's extraordinary skills as a performer will shine through and keep it firmly in the realm of great Art. His melodramatic style will carry the songs into Giddy Stratospheres. We will also know that some of the off-kilter sharp notes that he sings will be because his hearing was damaged in the motorcycle accident he was involved in fourteen years ago that almost took his life. And therefore each time it happens our souls will be reminded that he, like us, as another famous song says, has, up to now, survived. And as so many of the songs portray, and as the songs urge the listener to accept, these are the kind of struggles that have to be faced. And facing them, and hopefully winning them, and not being ashamed of the scars they leave on our bodies and souls is all part of the game of life that we have to play. And that, just because we may be a little older, doesn't mean the fun and glamour has to stop. In fact, if anything, the fun and glamour as we get older becomes even more important, and although the occasions to do so will become less frequent, it's perhaps about going out a bit earlier than previously, and having dinner and some wonderful gin and cocktails rather than suffering the dreadful music that they now play in night clubs and then staggering in with ringing ears at 4am. (Although it's been over a decade since we did this, anyway, but you get my drift). And because that's what Marc's songs acknowledge. That we may be a bit older and have a few battle scars to prove it, but remembering that now and then, taking a Walk On The Wild Side is still vitally important, as the real truth of the matter is that we are only as old as we feel. And this is what Marc's singing attempts to convey. In fact, very few British singers have the depth and knowledge of the art of singing as Marc. He and the greatly missed Billy Mackenzie of The Associates have been the greatest torch singers that the UK has produced, in my opinion. Marc's unique phrasing, his love of French chanson, Russian gypsy songs, cabaret and burlesque, make him one of a kind. And to hear him wrapping his gin and battle-soaked tenor croon around those Soft Cell songs for one last time, celebrating the lonely and the dispossessed, and encouraging us to make the most of every second and not forget that we are can all be Brilliant Creatures, too, will really be something quite extraordinary. I'm also expecting my fine lady (or "The Idol" as she was once described by a lady sitting next to us at one of Marc's solo concerts that we attended) to be up and dancing in the aisles during her favourite Soft Cell song, 'Sex Dwarf', which has the wonderful, naughty refrain, "Isn't it nice, sugar & spice, luring disco dollies to a life of vice." And so... there we have it, Soft Cell, in concert, For One Last Time. And then they will pack up their things & go. This unusual duo that started out in Leeds have quite an incredible story and one that has touched my soul greatly. And not only mine, for without Soft Cell, I doubt if Pulp, Suede, The Divine Comedy, and The Sohodolls would have been exactly the bands that they all became. And I guess there are many others, too. I'm also reminded of hearing how Marc Almond and Nick Cave were best friends for a while and would frequently go out on the town together, along with Lydia Lunch... what stories I bet they could tell about those times! If only walls could talk, eh?! I can hardly imagine what they must have got up to, it's enough to make your very own Nocturnal Butterfly go green with envy! But Sunday will be all about celebrating life, Soft Cell, and their neon-bright tales of Beautiful Losers, frustration, love, romance, glamour, trash, ecstasy, obsession & seediness. And who, dear reader, would want it any other way? For as that great philosopher of existence Oscar Wilde knew so well and was kind enough to share with us, we are all in the gutter, darlings, but some of us are looking at the stars.

Eyes Of Infinity

1

The young couple drove slowly up the long, winding drive-way. The natural beauty of the place put them in a state of awe. They had heard many wondrous things about where they were going but nothing could have prepared them for this, and they were left speechless for many minutes.

After booking into their room, the young lady, who was weary after a long day's travelling, retired to bed, whilst the young man gazed out longingly at the breath-taking scenery. He soon felt the strange energy of the place enter his soul &, as darkness fell, he began to have strange sensations & increasingly dark visions. The sounds that had met them at early evening began to change. The twittering of sparrows and the glorious song of the thrush had transformed into the haunted hooting of hunting owls. Instead of the yelps of domestic dogs, it was the cries & barks of prowling foxes that now echoed through the valley, as did the rhyme & slither of mating slugs, & every so often, all this was pierced by the bone-chilling scream of a rabbit or a vole that had been too slow to escape from its hungry captor. The moon cast its ancient glow over all the land, & the young man's attention was suddenly drawn to a rustle among the elm trees on his right. And then, before he was even aware of what was happening, a gleaming pair of eyes locked onto his. Instantly he was completely mesmerised, & it was only when those fiery eyes blinked that he felt himself released, & as he attempted to regain his awareness, he was sure he glimpsed a strange, white creature slink away into the wood. Entranced, but confused & utterly exhausted from the long journey, & believing he must have been dreaming, he climbed into bed & soon fell into a deep but restless sleep. His dreams that night were immensely strange, as animals & people, & stones & buildings, & trees & water changed shape & merged into one. On awakening he was haunted by the memory of a scintillating essence, of a creature that had teased him throughout & had seemed to be a highly sensual yet dangerous being.

The young couple spent the following day walking in the beautiful countryside, & each step seemed to bring new wonders to their eyes & senses. The perfume from the flowers & trees made their heads swim, & the dragonflies, mayflies & honey bees danced & flirted around them. The final part of their walk revealed a majestic waterfall, & it felt to them both, particularly in their current, enchanted state, that this mass of water & spray was the centre of all the energy that enabled such vibrancy, colour & scent to flourish. It was as if the waterfall was the divine giver of life & both its source & its end, as it began its long journey into the welcoming arms of the ocean far away.

Arriving back at the hotel, they prepared to meet the young man's father & both their families, at a celebratory dinner that was being held to celebrate his birthday, as well as their own impending engagement.

After the delicious meal the young man made a birthday toast to his father & to his new fiancee, before he wandered into the foyer of the small hotel, looking to replenish his drink. Imagine if you can his astonishment when two glittering, sparkling eyes, identical to those he thought he had seen in the garden the previous evening, met his! Stuttering, he just about managed to order his drink, & was then bade to follow the owner of those deep, beguiling eyes into the large garden. He followed the captivating being as if in a trance, & her sensuous feline grace made her look as if she was a new species of creature, but one as yet completely unknown to science.

Sitting down on the garden chairs, he was finally able to look at this adorable creature completely. And whilst her enchanting, pearl-like eyes devoured him also, he noticed her sumptuous white coat, which sparkled like glitter under the shining silver of the moon, & was more luxurious than the finest silk & softer than the snowy down on newly-hatched birds.

His gaze was, however, inexorably drawn towards her sparkling eyes, which were now blazing under the starlit sky. He felt his soul & will-power dissolving, & soon found himself revealing his deepest secrets to her. Within a short amount of time he felt his entire being crumble, & as soon as his willpower had completely deserted him, she led him with barely a sound, into the dark woods beyond.

Sometime later, his fiancee, increasingly concerned as to the whereabouts of her beloved, came out into the garden to look for him. She thought that she heard an unusual sound, a low murmuring which sounded like somebody in distress. Full of anxiety & strange presentiments, she walked slowly towards the sound that was was coming from the bottom of the garden, & was astonished to find, not her fiancee, but a beautiful young man crying on the grass. As she approached, he gazed up at her & she was immediately astonished at the mesmeric eyes that met & captivated hers, & almost as if she had lost control of herself, she sat down next to him on the luscious, abundant grass. Her heart raced furiously as she beheld the eyes that gripped her firmly, tighter than the trap of a barbaric hunter & her soul now as helpless as a fly that had unwittingly wandered into the clutches of a Venus fly-trap.

With herself now as emphatically entranced as her groom-to-be had been before her, she gazed at the figure at her side, desiring him intensely, yet greatly confused by his feminine grace, and almost feline, slender hands. But all at once, those ravishing eyes once again met hers & as her resistance drained away, an enchanting kiss was placed on her sweet lips, the most sensual she had ever known or had even dreamt existed, & which felt to her like the touch of the gods from long departed times & lands. Thoroughly lost & enraptured in this sea of ecstasy, the last thing she heard was a low, deathly, ground-shaking growl, & she departed from this world seeing her face reflected in the pools of the eyes of neither a woman nor a man, nor a woman dressed as a man, but a majestic, snow white leopard.

II.

A few weeks later, a young boy was crying in his small hotel bed, after having been sent there by his parents without him having eaten hardly any of his supper at the hotel's restaurant. They were furious at how obstinate he was being, & were greatly concerned about where his passion for making things up & telling ridiculous stories could lead to. And although they got to finish their supper following his dismissal, it could not be said that theirs was a happy meal.

The first time they had told their son that he must stop telling lies, they had merely scolded him. But when he then flatly refused to retract his statement on the second time of being asked to do so, his mother had warned him gravely that he would be sent immediately to his room, no matter how hungry he was. But when they had asked him a third time to admit that he had been making things up, their son had stamped his foot in annoyance & shouted back at them at the top of his voice, scaring the rest of the guests in the process, that he wouldn't admit to lying, as he was telling the complete truth. His furious father had then grabbed his arm & marched him back to his room & informed him that he would continue to go without supper until he learnt to stop telling tales.

The young boy, crying back in his room, was quite certain though. As he had said to his parents after they had just sat down to eat, he had seen a strange white leopard at the bottom of the garden from the car window as they were arriving at the hotel, & no matter how hungry he was, & no matter how many of his tears fell before he finally managed to get to sleep, he wasn't going to pretend otherwise.

Old Myspace Gig Review - Roxy Music, Manchester Evening News Arena, Jan 30th, 2011

"For your pleasure in our present state,
Part false, part true, like anything...
We present ourselves."
- 'For Your Pleasure,' Roxy Music

WOW! Finally, after years of following Roxy Music, I finally got to see them live in concert and what an amazing gig it was.

Lydia wanted to get me the ticket for Christmas and despite my protests (because of the price!) insisted that she had to get it for me. Her argument was very persuasive and went along the lines of, "I know it's Capitalist bullshit to charge that much  but you have raved about Roxy from the very first day I met you, you've never seen them in concert before and it's about time you did. Just don't and go cop off with some Eno-crazed, cocktail-sipping Glam Slut whilst you're there because I know what they're all like!"

And so, Out Of The Blue, it came to pass that I was going to see them in concert, and it was s s s s s sensational!

Leading up to the gig I found myself wondering whether it would be an incredible evening of sleazy art glam or a set made up principally of their greatest hits, with even some of Bryan Ferry's solo stuff possibly thrown in. Fortunately, it was emphatically of the former and I got to hear Roxy play songs that I never thought they would play live again in a million years.

Arriving nice and early at my seat just to the upper left of the stage, I was thrilled at the amount of leopard print that was sprinkled around the venue, and the knowing looks of recognition between those so elegantly clad also warmed the cockles of my glittering heart. With Bryan Ferry's attention to detail, I also anticipated being introduced to a couple of interesting support acts...this part of the evening was an enormous let down however. There was nothing wrong in the acts themselves but boy were they not for me!

As 9pm approached, however, it was time for the Main Event, and my heart leapt as the house lights went down and the strains of 'India' filled the room. The band then took to the stage and opened with an absolutely pulsating 'The Main Thing'. Freed from its crisp, polished sheen of the 80s production on the Avalon album, the song was immense, and almost out-Sueded Suede in its sleaze and sultriness. The stage was also literally awash with performers...ranging from backing singers to burlesque dancers and the opening was everything that I had hoped a Roxy gig would be... and the following 'Street Life' was magical as Ferry vamped: 

"Come on with me cruising down the street,

Who knows what you'll see, who you might meet!

This brave new world's not like yesterday, 

It can take you higher than the milky way!

Street Life, Street Life, 

What a Life!"

And as well as the spectacle that was happening on the stage, I found my attention being increasingly drawn to the backdrop, where all manner of images and films were playing out, with each song having its own montage, ranging from Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca to various sultry sirens of the night and haunting visions of Neo-noir glamour.
The absolute highlight for me, though, other than the wondrous 'The Main Thing', was the distinctly Kurt Weill-esque, German cabaret inspired 'Bitter Sweet', which stomped along and alienated and confused the audience members who had come along for the hits with its strange time signature. The song was backed by exotic burlesque dancers, and featured an incredible film on the backdrop, which mixed Weimar cabaret images with moving pictures that looked like they'd been painted by George Grosz and Hieronymus Bosch.



This was followed by 'Sentimental Fool', which again was an absolute delight and it was brilliant to hear this weird, challenging music being played ahead of absolute tosh like 'Let's Stick Together', which is what I feared the set would be mostly comprised of.

As the night drew on, the experimental side of Roxy took a back seat as the likes of 'Jealous Guy', 'Like a Hurricane' and 'Love is the Drug' took centre stage. The set finished on a monumental high for me personally, as my favourite Roxy song, 'For Your Pleasure', brought the gig to its climax, each player leaving the stage as the song drew to its close and which was reduced to a simple icy piano refrain at the very end. 

All in all it was a fabulous evening. Bryan Ferry's voice, which has never been the strongest in truth, was quite weak in places but the power of the whole prevented that from being too much of a problem. His backing singers' voices soared like eagles when necessary, and we had oboe solos, clarinet solos, sax solos, and huge helpings of divine decadence! The visuals were in fact a complete representation of Glam sensibility, and mixed high art with low brow to stunning effect.

It was truly glorious to finally get to see Roxy in concert, and even better to see them perform such an eclectic suite of songs. For me Roxy were all about innovation and weirdness, especially during Brian Eno's time with the band, and their first five albums (Roxy Music, For Your Pleasure, Stranded, Country Life, and Siren) are pretty much masterpieces, and they were arguably as influential as Bowie during their peak. And my fine lady who got me the ticket as a wonderful Christmas gift had no need to worry about me getting pounced on and copping off with some Eno-crazed, cocktail-sipping Glam Slut whilst I was there, for although there were a great many of them stalking the venue looking for prey, and although I am certainly not the kind who would Kiss and Tell, they could see from the deep look in my eyes that it would have been a waste of their time as my heart already belonged to a bewitching Siren of the night for whom, in my eyes, there is simply no competition...

For Your Pleasure, indeed, and how utterly splendid it all was. Ah, The Thrill of it All!...

Viva Roxy!

Roxy Music 2011 Tour Teaser:


Roxy Music - The Main Thing (Live 2011)


Roxy Music - Bitter Sweet (Live 2011)


"Be daring, be different, be impractical, be anything that will assert integrity of purpose and imaginative vision against the play-it-safers, the creatures of the commonplace, the slaves of the ordinary."
- Cecil Beaton

There Goes A Supernova: Frankie Goes To Hollywood

"Live those dreams, scheme those schemes."

- Frankie Goes To Hollywood, Relax

The year was 1984. I was just about to start a new life at a school for the performing arts in Liverpool, which was exciting but also daunting (as a boy from sleepy North Wales, Liverpool seemed a mesmerising but also slightly terrifying prospect) and extremely long days were on the horizon as I would be commuting six days a week on the train, leaving at around 7.30 in the morning and not getting home until around 8 in the evening. But it was excitement that was the prime emotion in my young soul. North Wales had become boring beyond belief and I was sick & tired of dull as dishwater academic subjects (I adored English Literature and Art - but the rest seemed to me like a complete waste of time) and I was also fed up of the bullies and bell ends that surrounded me. But, the autumn before, in 1983, a band hit the charts and mainstream consciousness with a force I had never before witnessed and probably haven't since. Making every thing I'd heard about Beatlemania seem phony, they were literally a gift from the very god's themselves to the just about to become a teen, rebellious but sensitive young boy that was me. I did have a couple of good friends at this time, and one of them was a few years older and as he had more money he was able to buy more records. And I can still remember clearly the particular days he came round with two new singles. The first time, a few years earlier, was 'New Life' by Depeche Mode and the other, in a picture sleeve that I could barely understand at that age, was 'Relax' by Frankie Goes To Hollywood. When we first listened to 'New Life', it was crystal clear from the very first seconds that this was the future. The synth solo riff sounded like it had been made by someone in a space ship, and there was a slight dis-colouration on the record itself which made it look exotic as well as sound exotic as it span at 45rpm. It was an exhilarating moment. And fast forward three years (there were obviously many other occasions and records but these are the two that remain so firmly imprinted in the music box of my memory), and it was the turn of Relax to find its way to my own treasured music centre. The single was taken out of its strange and alluring sleeve and placed on the turn table. I can still recall the wonderful noise that greets the pin arriving onto the vinyl and the the slight crackle in that eternal couple of seconds that is the mesmerising anticipation as you wait for the music to begin. And, then, of course, it happened. The three minutes and 47 seconds that followed was one of the most incredible moments of my young life. The pulsing beat - which I seem to recall I thought actually echoed the rhythm of my own heart, although I know now that it was probably designed to be in rhythm with a very different kind of bodily experience! - drove the song like a powerful locomotive. There were explosions, harmonies, strange sound effects and although I probably wouldn't have been able to think of it in these words then, glorious, ecstatic and utterly orgasmic sounds coming from the speakers. When the record finished, we immediately played it again. And then again. We then played the B.Side, 'One September Morning', as that is what was done in those days, but I am sad to say I have no recollection of it from that particular day, although the song (if it can be called that!) is a wonderful insight into the personas of the band as they joke around in an interview over a very Frankie backing track. And, so, that was my first introduction to Frankie Goes To Hollywood (FGTH). I had, in a very real Frankie sense, been well and truly deflowered!



The next thing, of course, was catching them on the Holy Grail of my weekdays - Top of the Pops (TOTP). Thursday evenings were sacred and I would wait impatiently for TOTP to start. I can't recall the exact timeline of events as 'Relax' was banned from Radio 1, and I remember there being all manner of hysteria and outrage about the promo video, which I didn't get to see until a few years later. But I certainly do remember seeing them for the first time on TOTP. I remember being physically changed as the song played (and this would happen to me on an even greater scale with the following single, 'Two Tribes') as it all seemed so insistent and urgent. My life for the few years before this had been hugely troubling with what seemed a massive sense of loss and dislocation, and I had been diagnosed with cystic fibrosis at the age of seven which had enveloped my soul in a state of dread, tablets, medicines, hospitals, medical tests, operations, pain and fear. A friend of mine had also told me that his mum, who was a nurse, had told him that I would probably be dead before I finished school, so it was a lot for a young mind of twelve to try and deal with. But, somehow, and although I was too young to know exactly what 'Relax' was really about, the song's sense of urgency, fun, rebelliousness and wild energy struck a chord somewhere very deep within my soul. And seeing them in the flesh on TOTP only increased this feeling. Front man Holly Johnson prowled the stage like a panther, a strange mix of suaveness and aggression. "The Lads," as Ped, Mark & Nash of the band liked to be known, looked as if they couldn't believe their luck being on stage on TOTP. But it was the strange figure of Paul Rutherford who grabbed my attention most. He showed me what it was to dance. I had seen some great dancers on telly before, of course, but they either seemed like they came from a distant world or from the wealthiest dancing colleges that money could buy or from the Bronx in New York. I could never be like them, I thought, I'm just a young, skinny, ill white boy from a tiny Welsh village and most white men can't dance anyway. But there was something about Paul Rutherford that didn't give off that out of reach vibe. He did a few backing vocals, and I loved his husky baritone voice, which complemented Holly's light tenor wonderfully, but it basically looked as though he was in FGTH principally because he looked fucking great and knew how to get the party atmosphere going. I so desperately wanted to be able to dance like him. He was not technically great but I noticed how the music seemed to flow through him. He would throw his arms up in ecstasy or make a gesture as if he was a marionette puppet, the puppet master being the song. And as great music and art in general does at its very best, this Frankie concoction blew my rapidly emerging imagination into overdrive. And it became very clear, very quickly, that it wasn't only me. Because almost overnight, Frankie were everywhere. Everyone was talking about them. There were "Frankie Says..." and '"Relax" T Shirts wherever you went. It was bliss. It was just about okay to like them and not get a beating from the mods and the skinheads, unlike with Soft Cell, who if you admitted to liking put you in risk of losing your life. (I did have the courage to admit it, though quietly and with great trepidation!) But no wonder I still harbour such a deep seated hatred of mods and skinheads and their very own poster boys, Madness and Paul Weller. What a melting pot school musical politics was when I look back. And there was footy team rivalries (my team Everton, plus Liverpool and Man Utd) and Wales against England in all of this as well. Sometimes I wonder how I got through it all. But away from all of this, down at the school disco I would have been doing my utmost to move my limbs in as free a fashion as my new hero Paul Rutherford did. I am left in no doubt that I will probably have failed but in my mind's eye, when I think back, if he could have seen me, I reckon he would have been proud of my efforts. When it came to dancing - and I was still able to dance until my early twenties - I would in time discover another teacher, who, unbelievably, it seemed could dance with even more wild and ecstatic abandon than Paul Rutherford. His name, known to many who know Lydia and me, is of course Tim Booth, the front man of James, but his gargantuan role in my life will have to wait for another blog. This one, lest I digress too far away from the original subject, is about Frankie Goes To Hollywood, and I'm certainly not finished with them yet.


If you will kindly allow me to fast forward a few months to the summer of 1984, dear reader, I had left the dreadful school in north Wales in May, that scene of so many unpleasant days, and was enjoying the holiday before I started at my new school in Liverpool in September. And Frankie's second single, 'Two Tribes' had been released and had unbelievably gone straight in at number 1, whilst 'Relax' climbed back up to number 2. I had never seen anything like it.

'Two Tribes' is still one of the greatest anti-war songs in my opinion, and the accompanying promo video is one of the finest ever made. Directed by Godley & Creme, it really is a masterpiece. But this was to become my last few months with the original incarnation of FGTH - as it was also nearly coming to an end for them. 'Two Tribes' made just as big an impression on me as 'Relax' had done. The threat of nuclear war was very much in the public consciousness at this time and I do remember worrying about it. My main concerns were for my Nain & Taid and my Mum, and, of course, for my beloved dog, Gelert. (All of them have now sadly gone) I simply could not comprehend any of them not being around and it became quite terrifying at times. I watched a very strange and sad film a year or so later called When The Wind Blows about an old couple who try to survive a nuclear war. It had music by David Bowie and it haunted me for years afterwards. But 'Two Tribes' had a different feel. It seemed to promote, as did 'Relax', the philosophy of singing and dancing as the bombs fall. Flowers, love and romance instead of bombs, hate and war. "Just think, war breaks out and nobody turns up," said the voice on the 12". The disco pulse, the energy, 'Two Tribes' is surely one of the best singles ever released in any era.




Frankie's 'Two Tribes' Video:


I loved the band's imagery at this time, too, which became militaristic and defiantly anti-American, and not too dissimilar from what my beloved Manics would wear in future years:

They were also like a gang, all so different as individuals yet most definitely all looking out for each other. Just as it should be in bands. The Us against the World mentality. Perhaps, in my imagination, there was a part of me that felt like I too was in their gang, as I certainly didn't feel that way in real life. No gang would have had me! Ha! But soon, my drama school days were to begin, and although I loved music as fervently as ever, Frankie fell of my radar somewhat. And if they had awoken something in me, which they certainly had, by the summer of 1985, another pop artist suddenly invaded my life and hooked their devastating claws into my young, budding young soul which had more recently begun to have increasingly sensual designs as well! Have any of you guessed who it is yet? Well, let me put you out of your misery. It was She of the groove and the silk white stockings, the corsets and the suspenders, and the sublime corrupter of many a young soul of similar age to myself. Someone who drove the boys wild and who made all the girls want to be her. Someone that so many of us were crazy for and desperately seeking. I am referring, of course, to Madonna.


Madonna, by Stephen Meisel.

I still have one lovely memory of Frankie from their original time, however, and I think it may have been in the summer of 1986. They had released 'Rage Hard' (inspired by Dylan Thomas's poem 'Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night'), which I absolutely adored, even though it seemed like it was a more "grown up" type of music than 'Relax' and they were playing a concert called 'Rock Around the Dock' in Liverpool which was to be broadcast on Radio City. I can still clearly recall sitting in my room, looking out of the window as the sun went down that evening listening to them excitedly on the radio. It was also the first time I ever heard 'Sittin' on the Dock of the Bay' by Otis Redding, which the DJ played during the build up & which truly enchanted me. But FGTH were pretty much done as the chart blasting and moral majority's favourite people to hate by this time. I personally was now so busy singing and performing in Les Miserables, attending drama school on the other days and living an insane life that flitted between London, Liverpool and North Wales that there wasn't a great deal of time for much else. And as pop music moved so fast in those days, (as does age, darlings!), the artists I was listening to then didn't have the same kind of extraordinary power and force as Frankie had. Pop music had become, in the main, a bit safe and kind of dull. Thatcher's materialistic philosophy of greed and the "there is no such thing a society" tag line, the fear of AIDS, and Live Aid had changed most of mainstream pop music that was around. It didn't seem to reach for the stars as much any more. It was careerist and money grabbing rather than ecstatic. Formulaic rather than euphoric. Everyone was buttoned up, hem lines were down, neck lines were high, the shoulders were padded, masculine and wide, the men ditched their incredible New Romantic clothes and make-up in exchange for boring, grey business suits, and a new Victorianism threatened to completely envelop mainstream pop. At least there was Queen, Madonna and Transvision Vamp to offer some kind of valiant resistance to this insanity, though! And I did actually forget Frankie for a while. Everywhere it seemed there were bands such as Dire Straits, Chris Rea, Phil Collins and Whitney Houston (who I actually quite liked!!) In the main, though, it was mind numbing, dull, dad-oriented rock. And then, in 1987, I decided I wanted one of those things that every one was raving about: a Compact Disc player. Advertising "crystal clear sound" and "discs that can't be scratched so badly that they won't play", (ahem!) I was fascinated. So I bought my first ever hi-fi stack system, which was a Sony and had a CD player, record player, radio tuner, twin tape deck and graphic equaliser. But then, of course, I suddenly realised: I haven't got any CDs! Which one shall I buy so I can listen to it? And all at once, as if from a hidden part of my psyche, came a memory, a thought, an insistent drive informing me, like a voice from my inner psyche: it has to be Welcome To The Pleasuredome by Frankie Goes To Hollywood.

I hadn't listened to that album or any of Frankie's stuff that I had on vinyl for quite some time, but immediately my inquisitiveness now reached fever pitch. The title track will sound unbelievable on CD if what they're saying about the sound quality of CDs is true, I thought. Thankfully, Woolies (Woolworths) in Mold had it in stock, and about an hour later, I was basking in the golden experience of listening to Welcome to the Pleasuredome on CD, on my new stereo, for the very first time. And as I was now sixteen/seventeen, it all made sense on a different level to previously. The title track is a staggering piece of music that touches the stars. But soon, as I became re-acquainted with this wonderful album, it was the famous singles that I started to press the 'skip' button on the most, as I now got more engrossed in the album tracks. My favourites were the divinely decadent (darling!) 'Ballad of 32', 'Black Night, White Light' which meandered gently along, as did 'Happy Hi.' But it was 'Born To Run' which now well and truly stole my heart. Opening with a scouse laugh/howl of derision/rejection/disavowal of Thatcher's neoliberal values, 'Born To Run' exploded on my soul this time around like a call to arms. I would dance manically to it in my room, often collapsing on to my small black sofa in tears at the end of the song such was the longing that it inspired. Lines such as "I want to know if love is wild, I want to know if love is real," "Together we can live with the sadness, I'll love you with with all the madness in my soul," and as Holly's voice grew ever more yearning as the song reached its climax: "...And we'll walk in the sun, But till then, Tramps like us, Baby, we were born to run..." completely overwhelmed me. The song reaches a towering crescendo before virtually collapsing in an exhausted heap, exactly as I would do on to the sofa. It's another lyric that also seems, when I look back, to have had a sense of prophecy in its veins, as years later, I found in Lydia someone who answered all of those deep, extraordinary yearnings, and it is almost Suede like in its celebration of outsiders in love. And as a rather humorous side note, a couple of years later I heard Bruce Springsteen playing 'Born To Run', and immediately thought, Oh...he's doing a cover of Frankie's song. I thought it was absolute crap, dull as dish water and an abomination when compared to the excitement and thrill of Frankie's version. It was only then that I was informed/discovered that Frankie were actually covering Springsteen and that he was actually singing his own song. I still still stand by my belief that it's as drab as a door nail when compared to Frankie's version, though, no matter who wrote it!

And since then, Frankie Goes To Hollywood have never really left me. Their second album Liverpool is hugely underrated and 'Watching The Wildlife' and 'Warriors of the Wasteland' are two of my favourite Frankie songs. And as I've got older and more knowledgeable, I'm also able to appreciate what a towering achievement they really were. In amongst the songs were quotes from the likes of other artists and writers I was to grow to love and admire: Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Nietzsche, Picasso, and many others, some of whom I went out to discover because the artwork on their albums suggested to the "attentive fan" that they may find it a richly rewarding experience. This "attentive fan" that somehow missed the Springsteen song credit" on 'Born To Run', that is! Oh well, maybe I just wasn't that bothered about things like that at that stage. Well, whatever the cause, there is no denying that FGTH were truly a phenomenon. There is so much speculation now about whether the band could actually play or not, or whether it was all Paul Morley and producer Trevor Horn with studio musicians but do you know what? I really couldn't care less. I didn't then and I still don't now. The songs, the artwork, the videos, the TOTP performances, the modernist strategy of having a manifesto and using the media to gain attention, the winding up of the moral majority and the middle class hypocrites, it was all sheer magic and a work of absolute genius. And because whoever wrote the songs or played on the records, the whole is certainly greater than the sum of its parts. It was (and still is) exciting, sexy, literate, subversive, playful, profound, fast, slow, teasing, profane, individualistic, collective, political, Left wing, satirical, explosive, philosophical, romantic, dreamy, it had everything that pop music, at its very zenith, should have. Having a charismatic band member who basically did nothing but look amazing was also pretty new at the time. And Paul Rutherford's stylish, sexy camp scally persona pisses all over the stoned, scruffy, much-lauded Bez of The Happy Mondays. I certainly know who I would rather be in a band with and it certainly isn't the incoherent one with a Manc accent! It was also a joy to hear 'Relax' turn up on the recent T2: Trainspotting film, and the placing of it at the particular point that it is used could be explored as a PhD paper in its own right! Their influence on me has been different to the Manics, Suede or Bowie, they haven't made me want to make my own version of their hair cuts or their style of clothes, for example, but they have always been there, especially when I've needed something gloriously uplifting to listen to.  Full of a pagan type joy of saying "Yes" to the finer things that life has to offer, 'Welcome to the Pleasuredome', 'Relax', and, indeed, the majority of Frankie's body of work, will no doubt strike a chord and be embraced by people for as long as people still have a pulse, a soul and a libido. And 'Rage Hard, becomes more poignant and important with each year that passes, and as the ravages of time do their treacherous thing on our bodies and souls, making the mantra that it explores ever more vital: "Rage Hard... Into the light! Rage Hard... Against the dark." In other words, Do Not Go Gentle into that Good Night. Rage, Rage against the dying of the light."

Amen, to that.



And so, to finish, if I was asked, where would FGTH stand compared with some of the other famous bands that have hailed from the fine city of Liverpool?

The Beatles?
The best known, obviously. But too common and too obvious. Lennon had the politics but they also had too much Drug Drug Druggy stoner stuff going on and it's quite difficult to think fondly of a band that had George Harrison and Ringo Starr in its ranks. (Dons tin hat!)

Echo & The Bunnymen?
Certainly the coolest but not quite as grandiose as they once were. (And as I get older the whole notion of being "cool" strikes me as something increasingly limiting and unimportant in the grand scheme of things). But truly magnificent at times, Ocean Rain being just one example of their majesty, and another of my very favourite bands.

And Frankie Goes to Hollywood?

"Shooting stars never stop, even when they reach the top."








All the Frankie Goes To Hollywood pictures that I've shared can be sourced here, a fantastic site for all things FGTH:

http://artofztt.com/

A Few Thoughts on Life According to Goethe

I discovered through social media that it was World Book Day last month. It is one of those quirks of modern life that I find absolutely mind numbing. Are we so uncultured that we need to have a World Book Day to remind us what a gift great literature & reading is? It reminds me a bit of a conversation I had with someone a few weeks after Prince had died, & the chap I was talking to said he had heard so much Prince on the radio in the wake of his death - an artist who he in fact claimed to love - that he had forgotten just how amazing his songs were. My reaction was a bit like Monty's in Withnail & I when Withnail's friend - the "I" in the film's title - says that he can sleep anywhere he likes & Monty replies, "Errrr..." (I guess you have to have seen it to get the gag). Anyway, my point is that I trust that I shall never need one of my great musical loves to pass away & then hear them played on the radio for me to remember just how great they are. The music I love is with me constantly. Whilst I'm doing my meds & other treatments. In the morning, before I go to sleep, in the car on the way to hospital, on my headphones in the hospital treatment room whilst waiting for different specialists to arrive; it means the world to me so it is a constant as every note is so precious. And so is my love of literature & reading. And a few weeks ago, I started reading Goethe's Faust again for the first time in about twenty years. And some of his other stuff, too: The Bride of Corinth, some of his essays on art, & selections from his Erotic Poems. And the thing that stood out for me was just how in love with life Goethe truly was. I knew this already, of course, but reading him at this time in our cultural history, when a New Puritanism is slowly but surely enveloping us all in its anti-life cloak, I was struck by just how strong an antidote to the ascetic mafia he really is. His writings are full of praise for the sensual life. He himself was a gigantic force of nature, & he found the idea of his own death impossible to fathom, genuinely believing that nature would provide him with another body once the one he had that was called 'Johann Wolfgang von Goethe' finally gave out, such was the enthusiasm for life that beat in his soul. At the age of 72 he fell hopelessly in love with the 17 year old Ulrike von Levetzow & asked her to marry him & was devastated when she rejected him. Whereas I see this as a sign of his wondrous lust for life, nowadays it would no doubt be dismissed as creepy & he would probably be called out as a dirty old man on the covers of our ever so gallant moral guardians The Daily Mail & The Sun. I suppose we should thank the heavens that we have those spotless publications & purveyors of truth & justice to keep us on track! And he was much more than just a writer & poet. He studied plants, designed a scientific Theory of Colours, & for a time was part of the court at Weimar. He travelled to Italy & wrote a Diary about his time there & was a society man, a lover, & a husband. He wrote plays for the stage & was a theatre director as well. And as I mentioned before, although he was writing in the late eighteenth & early nineteenth centuries, he seems particularly modern, especially when compared with our current, conservative times. I love for instance the fact that he didn't believe in a National Literature, but in a World Literature ("Weltliteratur"), a term he himself invented. Goethe's thoughts on such matters are far removed from today's Conservative sensation, the Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson, who complains that "we have been withdrawing from our tradition - religion - and even nation-centred cultures." Such sentiments would have been anathema to the cosmopolitan Goethe. And I can actually almost forgive myself for only being able to read Goethe in translation when I recall how he himself preferred a French translation of his own Faust, & when on reading it was struck by "how much brighter & more deliberately constructed" it was than his own German original. In art, he believed, as did Oscar Wilde, that beauty reveals the soul of the artist & that art is created from the artist's desperate struggle for self-expression. When Goethe eloped to Italy - he basically had to make a secret dawn departure as everybody he knew in Weimar would have tried to detain him if they'd known of his plans - he felt completely liberated by the Italian approach to life. In Rome he was free from the constraints of his tasks at the court of Weimar & he was able to devote himself to observing the beauty of art & nature. He met beautiful women in Rome society & although it is unclear whether rumours that he had a wild affair with a famous widow are true or not, on his return to Germany he wrote a group of poems entitled Roman Elegies which could easily scandalise middle class puritan society even now, with their glorious, life affirming descriptions of the pleasures (& the insecurities) of sex & sensuality. In poems such as The Bride of Corinth, he writes of the importance of enjoying the gifts that nature offers us, as the hero of the poem tells Corinth, surrounded as they are by a bounty of food & drink (and a bed!):

"Ceres - the goddess of agriculture - & Bacchus - the god of wine
Their splendid gifts to us they are bringing.
What you yourself bring is sweet Amor - love - that wondrous delight.
Now let us praise
These joyous gods, & their gifts, with our glad appetite!"

And he also sees the connections between the natural world & humanity, writing about the wonders & magic of the natural world. And in this vertiginous age we are living through - where we are slowly (or perhaps not so slowly) destroying the climate that enables life on earth to survive due to our disregard for non human life forms & the planet itself, Goethe gives his character Faust these few beautiful lines, where Faust thanks the Spirit of Life for giving him consciousness & meditates on the connections that are part of all species:

"You gave me, sublime Spirit, all I asked of you.

You gave me glorious nature as my kingdom,
And the power to feel it & delight in it...

I learned to know my brother creatures here, 

In the quiet woods, in the streams & in the air." 

I first read Goethe many years ago as a late teen, & he has always been on heavy rotation on my reading list. Yet somehow, something of his modernness seems to become more apparent every time I pick up one of his books. He is an author I am glad to have as a guide & teacher in my life, if for nothing other than how he reminds me that we should be grateful for so much of the beauty & colour in our lives. He didn't have much time for people who preach one thing yet do the other, suggesting that it's what you think & do - not just what you say - that defines who you are as a person. For as Goethe himself wrote, "To think is easy. To act is hard. But the hardest thing in the world is to act in accordance with your thinking." He also stresses the importance of being open to new possibilities, believing that not being constrained by who you think you are or what you think you are supposed to be, will lead to a richer, ever changing experience of life. And that to remain unchanged through life is perhaps not really living at all & is closer to a form of living death. The shedding of parts of our personalities as we get older so as to become something new he would undoubtedly see as a positive. He doesn't say that any of this will be easy, but that even the struggle is worth it. And in conclusion, that allowing your soul to open up to the world would be one of the best ways to get the most out of this strange, mysterious thing called life.

August Macke, Oriental Women, 1912

Works Cited:

Goethe, J.W. The Essential Goethe. Princeton University Press (2016)

http://www.nybooks.com/daily/2018/03/19/jordan-peterson-and-fascist-mysticism/