Everything?
Everything?
Five senses.
Something.
Everything?
The spectrum.
Part.
Everything?
The universe.
One planet.
Everything?
Life.
Short.
Everything?
Understand.
Nothing.
Opher – 10.12.2024
Here we are – tiny microbes in an infinite universe totally beyond our comprehension.
We see next to nothing.
We experience next to nothing.
We live a miniscule span.
We understand so little.
Yet we think we know it all.
We believe that what we do see is somehow all there is. We do not comprehend that we perceive a tiny portion of the spectrum. Reality is so much more.
Chapter 1 – Perspectives on a Sunny Day
Life goes on.
That’s all I know. As far as I’m concerned, right now, life is trivial, pointless and boring. It’s nothing more than a repetition of the mundane, periodically interspersed with equally nonsensical novelty. Nothing makes sense. Sadly, today, that is exactly how I’m seeing it. There is no purpose to anything. It appears to fall into a reassuring pattern – but I think that is an illusion. Change is all there really is. You can be sure that nothing will last for long. Everything you do is doomed to be destroyed in the vagaries of time. Nothing lasts. It’s a pretty miserable state of affairs when you really get down to thinking about it.
I stood in the sanitised room, breathed the Dettol and allowed my mind to run freewheel. Well, I didn’t really allow it to run free, so much as lose control of it. I’d let go. There was no hand on the rudder. It went where it wanted and that appeared to entail a long string of gloomy observations. Right at this moment in time life was looking pretty miserable to me.
Don’t get me wrong. I haven’t always been this morbid; my brain has not always flowed in such a melancholy manner. I used to be a happy, easy-going, positive sort of guy. But that seems a long, long time ago now. I’m no longer that person. Life knocked that naïve optimism right out of me a long time before today.
It is days like this that have robbed me of my positive outlook, and I’ve had a few of these kinds of days. Though fortunately not too many on a par with this particular doozy of an example. This was in a category of its own – a kind of one-off. This truth is, for obvious reasons, you can only experience this event once.
Back when I was young ….. I could laugh at my own naivety ….. I used to postulate solutions to the world’s problems. I even used to have faith in the intrinsic goodness of human beings and believed there were things worth striving for. What a fool I was back then. That was before I realised the true nature of all those movers and shakers out there, the wealthy and powerful, greedily clawing in all they can, and willing to carve up their own grannies for self-advancement. They are a bunch of callous self-servers.
The problem is that I woke up to the reality of humankind but probably didn’t really believe. Today brought it all home with a vengeance.
It is strange what pictures play out on your eyeballs as you stand helpless in a situation like this; what horrid thoughts go through your head. I was certainly no longer in control of my own mental processes. My mind was rampaging down an extremely morbid track. A parade of dark thoughts distil out of nothing and chase each other around.
It occurred to me that, when it boils down to it, we are just glutinous sacs of chemistry; bags of minerals dissolved in water and suffused with ionised electricity. Nothing more.
Right now I had a pretty dim view of my species – not surprising, given the circumstances, I suppose.
We’re all to blame. None of us are guiltless.
I know. Christmas is coming. You are looking for something unique, out of the ordinary, SPECIAL. Something that nobody else has! Something that you know they won’t be expecting but will love!!
It hits you!
You want an Opher Goodwin book!!
There are lots to choose from:
You could go to Burning Shed (The publisher’s own site) and purchase a book on a fabulous Rock Musician or band. Perhaps Roy Harper, Captain Beefheart, the Beatles, Bob Dylan, Neil Young or Phil Ochs?
You could go to Amazon for an Opher Goodwin book on Rock Music, weird alternative novels, anecdotes, the environment, poetry, art, antireligion, travel or antinovels. (something for everyone)
You could look at my take on education! Unique and informative, readable and insightful! A must for anyone in education or ‘owning’ a child.
Perhaps a Nick Harper?
Or you could try for one of my mind-teasing Sci-Fi classics written under my Ron Forsythe penname:
If you live outside the UK try your local Amazon!
If you really want to give someone something very special you can email the author directly and purchase one direct complete with the Author’s signature!!
opher.goodwin@gmail.com – all questions answered!
Words are what I play with.
Stories are what I imagine.
Interludes from life are what I illuminate.
I started writing 1n 1971. My first book was a strange sixties conglomeration of narrative, philosophy, poetry, spirituality, photography and cartoons. I thought it was brilliant. Unfortunately nobody else did. That’s probably because it was unreadable. I still feel a nostalgic love of it though.
I then set about writing Sci-fi. I wrote four or five novels without a glimmer of success.
In 1980 I had a re-evaluation. I went and talked to my friend Roy Harper about producing a biography. He was keen. It morphed into a book based around his lyrics. I spent 20 years on that project. It was in 4 parts but never saw the light of day.
In the meantime I was still writing Sci-fi and delivering a course on The History Of Rock Music. So I made that into a 4-part book. A publisher was interested but wanted it cut down from 1200 pages to 200. I wrote him a different book. It was pulled on the day of publication.
Undaunted I continued writing.
I had a job as a teacher and four kids. Every night, after they were in bed I’d write. Whatever took my fancy – Sci-fi novels, weird underground novels, antinovels, environment, antireligion, travel, education, art, poetry and rock music.
Then I discovered self-publishing.
Then sonicbond publishers contracted me for eight books on my rock heroes.
I write my Sci-fi under the name of Ron Forsythe.
115 books later I’m still writing.
Love it as much as reading!
Please leave a like, a review on Amazon and buy a dozen or so books!!
It would be great if we were to share our best albums. So if everyone put forward a view of what they love. I’ll put them up here for everyone to share. I’ll have a page of recommended albums (with connections to You Tube where possible).
Now it just so happens that I’ve already done this with my book 537 Essential albums. It was also a bit of synchronicity that Andrew suggested Stormcock as Stormcock is also my number one album of all time.
So that is a good place to start (This is an extract from my book 537 Essential Albums). This is my number one recommended album.
Roy Harper is the greatest British song-writer and poet. There is no one who even gets close. His acerbic lyrics and social commentary are unsurpassed. He rivals Bob Dylan as the greatest songwriter of all time and is greatly undervalued. This is not surprising as he has constantly shot himself in the foot and sabotaged his own career. He remains the foremost British dissident and commentator on the human condition. His epic songs are legendary and the music sublime.
Stormcock is arguably his best album but is strongly pushed by both HQ and Lifemask. I would place at least ten of Roy’s albums in my top 400 albums. He’s that important to me.
The Stormcock album features only four tracks but the album is one of his masterpieces. It consists of brilliant songs with poetic imagery and wide canvasses that challenge your imagination. The music and musicianship was innovative and of an excellence that puts this album top of my top ten thousand. It is one of four Harper albums that would make it into my top ten albums of all time. I have a penchant for great meaningful lyrics put to brilliant music and this hits the spot. I never tire of hearing these songs and simply cannot understand why Roy has not been lauded from on high. I love the depth and insight he brings to bear and the risks he takes in developing his ideas through epic songs. Few people can match it. Roy’s shorter songs are also great but these four songs show how Roy has matured and taken his art to another level. ‘Me and my woman’ is one of the very best tracks ever recorded. The scope is immense and Roy was at the top of his game. I am fully aware that not everybody shares my opinion. I can see that it is never going to be commercial. Roy’s work is thought-provoking, intelligent and musically intricate. You have to concentrate. It’s not your catchy pop song – fortunately! But it is well worth the effort. For me Roy is the James Joyce of music as opposed to Simon Cowell’s Barbara Cartland.
Catch ‘Me and My Woman’ on You Tube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QC5gebGthAs
This is ‘Same Old Rock’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KlBr1eVYq90
OK – Now it’s your turn. I’ll put out some more of these. But I want to hear from you with your favourite albums, a reason why and if possible a You Tube connection.
That will be fun and interesting – Looking forward to hearing from you!
Circle
‘Circle’ is the first of Roy’s epic songs and certainly not one that Shel could turn into a commercial success. It lasts over ten minutes and has five sections to it, including a spoken part – absolutely unique for its time. The song is the central point of the whole album.
Each of the sections involves different tempos and instrumentation.
The piece starts with Roy strumming on acoustic guitar to a subdued drumbeat. Then follows a spoken word section of a strained conversation between Roy and his dad over the sound of traffic. This leads to a faster sequence featuring drums and bass, and then subsides into a slower but more intense part augmented by strings with drums in the background. The mood builds in intensity with fast plucking of guitar, drums and strings coming in strongly, followed by a return to a softer section in which Roy’s voice rises at the end of each line to a falsetto. The strings appear again as the finale is reached.
A very ambitious and exacting piece of work that must have tested both Shel and Roy in the creating of the final successful recording, I can only imagine the conversations.
The lyrics deal with the constant pressure in Roy’s childhood to succeed, and success being measured in wealth. Roy’s father is addressing Roy about his accomplishments and Roy is responding. The topics move through Roy’s rejection of religion to his adolescent striving for importance and acceptance towards his realisation that the only thing he can be is himself. The song covers betrayal of relationships along with the inability to find answers. Roy’s final assertion is that all we can do is to live our lives.
The last spoken word is his Dad’s, who ironically, not understanding a word of the long introspection, says ‘Aye Lad – but I always knew you had it in you.’
We have to go back a little further to see what else induced this full-throttle burst into rock, back to where The Beatles burst onto the scene, revitalising rock, reawakening it and bringing it back from the dead.
The Beatles had taken the UK by storm in 1963. ‘Love Me Do’ was released on 5 October 1962 and reached a modest number 17. However, ‘Please Please Me’, released on 11 January 1963, then ‘From Me To You’, followed by ‘She Loves You’, all raced to the top of the charts. A sold-out tour sent the young girls screaming hysterically, and by October 1963, Beatlemania had been born in the UK, a phenomenon that was unlike anything witnessed before.
The United States was a little slower to catch on. Those early Beatles singles were not released in the States. The Americans were blasé. The US was the seat of all genres of popular music. Hardly anything of worth had come from outside the States. The hysteria of Beatlemania was viewed with amusement from afar.
Then, the dry tinder caught. The vacuum in rock music created by the payola scandal of the late fifties, with its subsequent clampdown on rock ‘n’ roll, had left an empty gap. Rock had become soft. It was all soft rock and pop with clean-cut pop idols. It had lost its rebellious edge. With the release of ‘I Want To Hold Your Hand’ on 26December 1963, The Beatles shot to number one and that gap was filled. Their subsequent tour started on 7February 1964. It featured an incendiary slot on the highly influential Ed Sullivan Show, which helped to shoot them to the very top. All across the country, families tuned in to see what the fuss was all about. The kids were instantly smitten. Beatlemania took off in the States with a vengeance, with radio stations playing non-stop Beatles tracks and The Beatles dominating the American charts. The British invasion had begun.
