Tick tick tick...boom

The Great British Public.

Yesterday and today myself, Effie and Rory rocked out a seamless ramble of improvised songs, themes from TV shows (Fresh Prince, Baywatch etc), and wrong-headed jams about prostitution, kiddy fiddling and girls with big haircuts.

The skinny-jeaned youth of today watched in helpless hilarity, the one demographic finally taking note of the wit and improving dynamic of our band. We are famous in schools, for sure.

Yesterday, Newcastle saw a blind woman sing a frankly stirring folk song with us. Today Durham saw a pair of teenage boys absolutely beside themselves with laughter at a demolished version of 'Sweet Child of Mine'. They seemed to be clinging to each other to make sure they didn’t fall over, helpless from tears.

Then one of the lads tells me he’s an ace guitarist, and with me taking the drums from Rory, we did a disappointingly (for him, I guess) un-lucrative rendition of 'Live Forever'.

I guess no one really wants to see a hairy drummer singing ruined Oasis.

It was a glorious, sunny and fun-filled day in Durham, and now you find me restless, totally caffeinated and unable to get some well-required sleep.

The freedom of busking is increasingly spiritual.

Yesterday as Rory and Effie did some grocery shopping in one of those obscenely cheap, second rate food shops, The Food Co., I sat on our stool, outside the shop, put the hat out and just tapped on the drum and sang some nonsense that went a bit like:

It’s the Food Co.
Yeah
The Food Co.
Come inside for your food.
Uhuh. Yeah. Food.
Food Co. Yeah.

I was totally prepared to sit and serenade myself, and provide some light amusement to passers by, clearly wondering what such a talentless prick was doing outside this deserted, budget part of town, tapping a drum and dribbling total nonsense while two guitars sit promisingly behind me.

Of course, within seconds I had a quid in my hat.

I reckon the guy must have thought I was doing a rap tribute to Foucault (I was) and therefore he had to reward my intellectual offering.

Just a couple of minutes into my now rather lucrative-seeming side project, a fat old Geordie man in a white shirt came bounding outside making official-sounding announcements. Saying things like ‘stop’ and ‘police’ and ‘no begging outside (this high quality establishment)’. I put my hands up in protest, and smiled. He took from his pocket two black tags with ‘SECURITY’ written on them in a bureaucratic white.

He was deeply undercover, this one.

I agreed to wear my hat (making me look not unlike The Gun’s ‘n’ Roses’ Slash) and put down the drum for a bit, while he bafflingly walked off down the street.

At the crushing sight of this, a man I’d generously describe as looking like a tramp, came waddling over and put twenty pence into my hand. He muttered some kind words of support and he seemed rather pleased that we both, in a way, got one over THE MAN.

“It’s my decision who I give my money to. That basstard!”

But what knowledge. To know that at the literal drop of a hat and by doing a little dance or making some kind of gutteral squelching noise is enough to impress the Great British Public.

Observation: teenagers these days look really cool.

Now, don't be too quick to leave a sarky comment.

But it’s true, I think the youth of today look pretty fucking cool. Much cooler than my generation. We were all low-slung, non-committal baggy trousers and primary-coloured ironic t-shirts.

Today’s team are all skinny jeans and sneakers; straightened hair and lots of black. They all look like little punks from the seventies. Which, it occurred to me today, is fucking cool. (Is swearing cool?)

Look at them as they parade past you in the street. Even the Goths, in some cases, seem to be acquiring a sense of tasteful proportion with their uniformly black colours.

It should be noted, as fashion expert, that skinny jeans should not be worn by anyone approaching the descriptive phrase BIG BONED.