On Saturday morning we found ourselves holed up in an old aircraft hanger in deepest Suffolk, taking part in a well established Vintage Fair & Makers Market, where Mrs S had a stall exhibiting and selling her groovy artistic creations. It was gloriously sunny and I was enjoying the first day of an extremely rare weekend off work, coffee in hand, mooching around the stalls and chatting to all and sundry. As I made my way back through the throng to check-in with Mrs S, I noticed a smart oldish gent sporting bright pink trainers standing adjacent to her stall. It was only when I drew a little closer that I realised the anonymous gent was in actual fact legend and all round good egg, Brian Eno. It's a bit of a dilemma coming face to face with a 'celebrity' in an off-duty situation. Do you stick out your hand and tell him how much you respect his work, not to mention him as a human being, or do you leave him alone to enjoy his downtime. Long story short I did the latter and, in retrospect, I'm confident that I made the right decision. I would only have made a fool of myself.
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In 1973, along with records by the likes of ELP, Tangerine Dream, Amon Düül II, Klaus Schulze, Iggy & the Stooges, Focus, Greenslade and Lou Reed, Fripp & Eno's looptastic 'No Pussyfooting' LP was a soundtrack to my ever inquisitive musical mind, the track 'Swastika Girls' in particular. Fripp's bone-crunching guitar shunt at 8.13 remains one of my favourite moments in all music before or since.
Fripp & Eno - Swastika Girls
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8 comments:
I saw Suggs in a Soho boozer last week and did the former; despite toying with the idea of the latter. Good choices both, then.
Ah how lovely! I'm sure he wouldn't have minded at all especially as you would have been so genuine, but at the same time I guess it was probably nice for him to feel relatively anonymous. Although the pink trainers could suggest otherwise! I know he's a Suffolk man and went to Ipswich Art School; I shall look out for him around here too. Hope Mrs S did well on her stall.
Its a conundrum for sure. I don't know what the right thing to do is, having done both in different situations.
Looking forward to the song, not one I know.
I once met (actually bumped into) Elvis Costello and his then partner Cait O'Riordan in my hometown city centre and just had to tell him he was fab. Luckily, they didn't seem to mind. They were on their way to the Shetland Folk Festival but were held up because of an NUS strike on the Islands ferries. Elvis ended up getting the NUS to allow him to go and by way of a thank you, he did a live solo gig at Aberdeen Music Hall to raise funds for the NUS. Top bloke in my book.
You could have said to Mr Eno "I've bought a whole load of records, could you buy me a pint?"
(Not that it worked for me when I went up to a member of The Fall at the Riverside in Newcastle many years ago).
Nice move on the celebrity non-contact. I expect Brian could do with a day off from his oblique strategies. Hope Mrs. S's stall went well. Thumbs up for mentioning Greenslade in this post.
That had to be quite a surreal moment. I'm trying to think about the record or collaboration I would ask him about. So many come to mind. I guess that's why I wouldn't have approached him either.
That's a tricky one but you probably read the situation correctly and still had the joy of actually sharing the same air space with him so to speak. Exciting stuff.
Hope the fair went well for Mrs S - We used to do quite a lot of these sort of things and loved them. Met a lot of great fellow stall holders.
Alyson (lost my ID)
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