Adrian Baldwin
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The battle jacket and me

11/27/2017

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PictureThe battle jacket remains
I read this article on the BBC today about bepatched denim jackets.
​
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/in-pictures-41723065

​In the post, some photos by Dan Giannopoulos are shared along with his insights into his project to capture one of the long established style statements of the rocker/biker societies. 

In my younger years, 16-21 (1987-1992), I was a regular wearer of a battle jacket (though until I read the article above, I never knew that is what they are known as). As an owner of the “uniform” (my choice of adjective) and a stalwart, lifelong supporter of the punk and heavy metal scenes, I thought I’d reflect, reminisce and then share my personal experiences and thoughts.

As a teenager, for me, the patched denim jacket was an important way to associate with and, arguably, be accepted into the rock scene. Having discovered punk and heavy metal and found my niche, I wanted to broadcast my allegiance. I was part of a small group of friends and we all wore patched denim, biker style leather jackets, sturdy boots, studded belts, chains and grew our hair long. In the town I grew up in, the place I went to school, the environments I worked in etc. the uniform was not actually that common at all - the rock attire earmarked you as a nerd or a trouble maker, though in truth I was neither.

It was only when arriving at places like the Hammersmith Odeon, Brixton Academy, Wembley Arena etc. that what marked you out as different at home, became rather more clichéd. Football fans turn up to games in club shirts, hats, scarves; rockers turned up at gigs in battle dress. Patched denim was de-rigueur.

I bought my patches primarily from a market stall in Hitchin or from various locations in London. They varied over time, the longest serving back-patch was the album cover from Metallica’s “Kill ‘em all”. As I couldn’t sew at all, my sister or my mum stitched the things on to my jacket. It’s not very “rocker” to admit to that I guess, but hey, that’s how it was.

In regular use, the denim jacket was less practical than the leather, the denim, which needed cleaning more often, was harder to clean and less resilient to cleaning when you did (your patches got ruined). When the jacket needed replacing, you had to get all your patches off in order to get them stitched on to the replacement – that was a right faff for my sis. As such, and as I aged, the overall volume of patches displayed came down and eventually the denim jacket was abandoned altogether.

It was like I grew out of it. Once I stopped living in jeans and heavy metal t-shirts, the denim jacket was less complementary. As my hair cut was tamed and my working responsibilities increased, the patched denim was just less “me”.  Though, all these years later, I still have some of my favourite patches, see photo, I thought that the battle jacket was more suited to the teenagers than the adults.

Also, once I had been immersed in the scene long enough to have served my rocker apprenticeship, I didn’t need a patched jacket to feel a sense of belonging. The music collection, the connections made and the sheer volume of gigs attended were all the badges of honour that I needed.

That stated, I never turned away from the biker style leather jacket, in fact I still have the one I bought in Carnaby Street in 1987 (like me, it is grey and knackered). I never turned away from the music either, I am still a regular gig goer even now in my middle age.  

For the full grown adults that have the kinds of job that still allow them to have long hair, have the kinds of wives/partners/kids that are happy for them to have long hair and, most importantly, still have enough hair follicles to enable them to have long hair; the bepatched denim battle jacket will still suit. I am accepting that I’d look stupid in one now, but I am happy for those that can carry the look off.

To any of my old buddies out there (Mike, Chris, Ritchie D or Hughesy for example) that read this post, you had battle jackets too, why not add your sentiments to this post. Did you think the same things? Do you/would you wear one now?

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Six to itch

11/21/2017

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This month my website is six years old. That’s six whole years of social commentary, observational humour, moaning, groaning, occasional ranting and other general entertainment services provided to my readers free of charge.
 
Though no one else will give a shit, tradition dictates that I write my own birthday message.

Over the last year there have been some landmarks, the half a million plus cumulative page views was/is one that pleases me. More people arriving and more people coming back feels like a good thing.

In big picture terms, the inspiration is still present and the output has been pretty consistent, in volume terms anyway. I can’t claim there has been much consistency in terms of content but I don’t apologise for this. 

Though I haven’t earned any money (in fact I am out of pocket for the sixth year in a row), gone viral, achieved any kind of celebrity/notoriety, had attractive women throw their knickers at me, and still have a pitiful Twitter following, there are positives. I haven’t caused offence, been abused, trolled, hacked, blocked, shut down or murdered (this does happen to bloggers in far flung lands). 

From a parochial perspective, I continue to take some pleasure from my “hobby” and will crack on into year seven. It is of course the year of the itch so the future is uncertain - my advice is enjoy this space while you can and tell your friends about it too … please. 

Thanks to all of you for indulging me. 

Thanks also go to my alter ego for doing the whole writing thing properly. If you found me when you were actually looking for the other me then we can only apologise for the confusion. 

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The dead, the awful, the peaky and the entertaining

11/21/2017

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Malcolm Young from AC/DC died this week, he was only 64. Though young (in more ways than one), he had suffered from dementia for three years prior – what a crappy way to go. Another rock and roll legend bites the dust.

This month one of the family cats, Lily, also had a crappy exit from the world, she got hit by a car and had her skull cracked open.  At least her demise was instant but it was frankly depressing to have to recover the corpse and then bury her.

Depression brings me on to Queen. The band’s music is being used on two TV ads at the moment that make me want to sob/scream every time they come on. The anthem “Another One Bites The Dust” has been bastardised to accommodate Dacia – “another one buys a Dacia”. Then there’s the flash ad with the dog accompanied by the “Flash Gordon” theme tune but with the lyrics changed to suit the singing dog wondering where all the dirt has gone. It’s truly dreadful.

If Malcolm and Lily are now enjoying an afterlife then they’ve probably come across Freddie Mercury feeling very peaky/downright angry about his legacy being rogered in such an awful way.

Peaky brings me on to the Blinders. The Brummie gangster series four is now underway and what an intense way to start to it. Aborted hangings and then the apparent death of John, one of the Shelby brothers and a key character. Can’t wait for tomorrow and episode two.

I only discovered the series because at the beginning of November, a lady I buy my cufflinks from recommended it. Series three was watched on the iPlayer, one and two have since been bought on DVD. Though it is quite possible I was the last person in the UK to have never heard of the show, I am now hooked and share the recommendation.

Another hooking of sorts has involved another hard man, this time, Jack Reacher. The fictional character, created by Lee Child has monopolised my relaxation time for the last few weeks (briefly interrupted by Bruce Dickinson) as 
I have worked my way through more than three quarters of the author’s output. The novels are rather formulaic but nonetheless thoroughly entertaining. The blurb on the dust jacket suggests that someone buys a Reacher novel somewhere in the world every 20 seconds … so I am very late to this party too. But just in case you need another recommendation, here’s mine.

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What does this button do? Well Bruce, it dims the lights.

11/18/2017

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PictureBruce Dickinson - What does this button do? - A review
Having been so enthusiastic about Bruce Dickinson’s autobiography “What Does This Button Do”, I can report that, having read it, I am now a little less enthusiastic about the book. My overall impression is that it was okay but could have been much more interesting.

Dickinson writes in an accessible, conversational way so the biography is easy to read. Some of the stuff about his childhood, growing up with his grandparents and going to public school is engaging (or “not wasted”, to paraphrase Bruce).

There are also some fascinating insights into Iron Maiden. It might be a band but it’s more of a business. I thought that the fellas in the group might be mates but, from the book, it seemed to me that Maiden is more like a company and the band members are co-workers. For example, there was no evidence of any real friendship between Bruce and Steve Harris, the two were presented more like sparring partners, think a sales director clashing with an operations director. When Bruce left Maiden and went solo, the prose was crafted in such a way that it felt like a change of job rather than anything more emotional.

When Dickinson writes about his later return to Maiden, I came away with the impression that his reinstatement was about business objectives more than comradery.

I was fascinated to read about Bruce’s battle with tongue/throat cancer. I wanted to know how it affected him, how he felt during the treatment and remission stages. What was included was thought provoking but, like a lot of other content in the book, more was about actions, events and facts than it was about feelings and emotions.  Dickinson is an alpha male, arrogant, action man of an individual and it was one of the few times in the book that there was any real suggestion of vulnerability, but even in this scenario, it was more implicit than explicit.   

Whilst some of the prose was bright and engaging, other elements were rather more prosaic. I’ll be honest, when Bruce was writing about the creation of various albums, I got a bit bored. I didn’t really care which recording studio was used in which part of the world. Even some of the Maiden tour content was rather bland and a bit too staccato.   

Perhaps frustratingly for me, my lasting impressions will be about the stuff that only got touched upon, or the material that was missed out altogether.

To illustrate the former, lots and lots of references in the book to the movie “Chemical Wedding” but there was nothing about the critical success of the film and how Bruce felt about it. Most of what I have read elsewhere would indicate that it got panned, so maybe that is why.

He writes about the Balkan conflict forever changing his view on the value of human life – but never expands on it. There’s a poignant picture taken in Sarajevo of a dead child but it’s not referenced in the copy, maybe it was related to Bruce’s observation but you don’t know for sure.

Late in the tome, Bruce almost gets to grips with his difficult relationship with his dad. There was potential for some deeper soul searching (I thought “excellent, this could be fascinating") and then there wasn’t, the topic effectively parked.

With regards to the latter, there was nothing about him piloting “Ed Force One” into Japan as the tsunami and Fukushima disasters unfolded. From a fencing perspective, there was lots of coverage of that topic but … I have read that Bruce was good enough to compete for the UK in the Olympics but couldn’t because of Iron Maiden commitments. Not a mention of this (but then maybe it’s just an urban myth).  

Most glaringly absent was anything about his immediate family. Personally I would have been interested to read about how he managed the demands of his careers with being a parent, how he managed to keep his marriage (the second one primarily) alive whilst being away for so much of the time.  I’d like to have understood more about the qualities of his wife who must a real trooper herself (behind every great man and all that).

As a family man myself, balancing all the responsibilities of being a husband, father, son, brother, grandson, friend, employee, manager etc. is hard enough and I am just a no one who works in an office. How hard must it be for a celebrity polymath?

The absence of family orientated detail was bugging me but it got resolved (sort of) when I completed the book and got to the acknowledgements. Bruce makes the statement that he intentionally left out anything about births, marriages, divorces, deaths etc. That was a genuine shame in my opinion.

Bruce never goes into detail about his regrets (and he must have some), his failings (ditto), his weaknesses or his desires for the future. He, perhaps sensibly, avoids comment about politics, religion, but all those subject areas would have added much more human interest.

Bruce stated that his original work was about 800 pages long (the book is only 384 pages), with half the content side-lined, it’s perhaps no wonder that it felt patchy and incomplete in places. Bruce states that nobody would have bothered to read the thing if it was so long but I suspect the reading would have been more rewarding without so much cutting.   

In summary, and in reference to the title of this post; for me, the button in question is one of those infra-red dimmer type switches that you can activate with your finger or a remote control. The lights can be bright and then fade to black at a touch. As an analogy, bright and then fading reflects how well I was gripped by the book.

Having stated that, it is still worth a read so why not get a copy and make your own mind up. But if you want some alternative  recommendations, “I am Ozzy” is more engaging and funny. “White Line Fever” is more cerebral. Both are better reads.

​Bruce Dickinson’s buttons, the Troxy and sycophantic tendencies​
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Brocker and the Bleach Boys rock Baldock … again

11/7/2017

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On the evening of Friday 27th October, I went to see Brocker and my favourite punk band, The Bleach Boys, at a pub in Baldock called the “Hen and Chickens”. I saw both the bands at a different venue in the town back in December last year (previous review available) and the pairing was so good that when the opportunity arose to see them again, I was right up for it.

With regards to the pub, I had never heard of it before – it’s a little, out of the way bar that I didn’t know was there - but fortunately I had my sister with me and she knew.

Unlike in December, I was at the venue in plenty of time to watch the whole of Brocker’s set. After the obligatory sound checking, the fellas got into their strides and played a good collection of tunes from their back catalogue. I didn’t grab a set list at the end so cannot report back what was played though some of my favourites like “One Man Mosh Pit” and “A Quiet One” were included.

When it was the turn of The Bleach Boys to entertain us, Matt (singer) mentioned that the gig was a warm up for the band’s upcoming trip to Berlin. At the end of the evening John Barnett, the bass player, suggested I should tag along. I’ll admit that I was more than half tempted too. Back in 2005, I did just that and had a good laugh with the guys.

Part way through the Bleach Boys set, John was clearly wincing in pain and massaging his left hand. Though he was obviously suffering, to his credit he carried on playing. When the show was over, I asked him what had been up. He reported that his fingers sometimes dislocate and he has to force them back into their joints. He’s rock hard that one, makes me wince just thinking about it!

Here’s the Bleach Boys’ set list:
  1. Stealth Bomber
  2. Taking the ‘O’ out of country
  3. Pogo
  4. Nuclear War
  5. We hate you
  6. Kill all celebrities
  7. Wake up Wako
  8. Guantanamo Baby
  9. Deathlist
  10. Cardboard Cutouts
  11. Plastic Sex
  12. I married a lesbian sex commando
  13. The Bicycle Song
  14. All Over You
  15. Shithead
  16. Chloroform
  17. I don’t want to live your dream
  18. Weirdo
  19. No Moral Fibre
  20. Tapeworm
  21. Zombie
  22. Stocking Clad NDSB
  23. Slapper
  24. Psycho Semtex Sex
  25. We’ve got the bomb and we’re going to use it
At 10 minutes to 11pm, with 25 songs completed, there was still some scope for more. Matt joked that the band was looking more energised that the audience (to be fair, he had a point too. Still it was a Friday night and by that point long days had been endured by many). The extra tracks, if I remember rightly were “Death Before Porno”, ”Hooligan Uber Alles”, “Fi Fi Foe Fum (the crouton song)” and “Chav” – though not necessarily in that order.

At the end of the gig I bought the Bleach Boys album “We’ve got the Bomb” on CD … again. I originally purchased it in 2009, at an event at The George on Bucklesbury, Hitchin. I’ve still got it too. But eight years later, I bought another copy just to get a different artwork treatment for the back cover. That’s how much of a fan I am!

Having purchased the Brocker album “Out of Order” in December last year (it’s excellent by the way), I bought the latest single “Gimme Gimme Rock ‘n’ Roll”. Only two songs on it but both are good.

Since the gig, I have visited the band’s website to find out that the guys released their first, self-produced album called “My First Claudio”, it’s not available to buy via the site or on bandcamp so if you have a copy that I can listen to, let me know, I’d appreciate it.   

To wrap, both the bands were on good form, the event had an almost party like atmosphere. There were lots of people that already knew each other and all in attendance were good natured and in good spirits. I had a good night out with my sis and am already looking forward to the next occasion.

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Dec 16 - Baldwin, Baldock, Brocker and Bleach Boys 

Links:
The Bleach Boys
Brocker  

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