Strata of Thought: Christmas special

"Mary's boy child, Jesus Christ, was born on Christmas Day
and man will live for evermore because of Christmas Day"

Boney M: "Mary's Boy Child"

There are three things wrong with the above lyric. First and most glaringly of all, it demonstrates that you can't use the same damn word in place of a rhyming word in a song and make it work. Second, if we want to get into Christian theology (I do), the gospel actually points towards Jesus' death as being the reason everyone will be saved, not the fact he was born -his self-sacrifice is supposedly on behalf of the entire human race. Third and last of all, Jesus was not born on the 25th of December, Christmas Day, as implied here. I remember once at school, when we were in a special Christmas assembly, a boy asked our headteacher whether Christmas would have been in September if Jesus had been born then. He said it would.

He was either lying, ignorant of the origins of Christmas, or just unwilling to confuse us all. One extremely boring web-page suggests September 11th as his birthday, as it happens, and claims to derive this information from astronomical data. Outside of extremely shaky gospel assertions, I'd say it's impossible to tell when he was born, who he was or why he was executed in the 1st century AD. So why do we hold Christ's Mass when we do?

Like saints, sacred places and other customs, the first Christians stole important calendar events (the other big one being Easter, a pre-existing pagan tradition). December was not only the most important month of the year for Romans, who celebrated Saturnalia in a week around the 17th, but also the Celtic/Germanic tribes who observed the midwinter soltice. Where better to slap the feast-day of your most important religious figure? And it's not a big a leap as you'd think -after all, from the very early 4th century most emperors were Christian, not pagan, and had enough authority to make such a transition happen.

So, happy Saturnalia/Yule to you.

As for this week's Sunday Song, my thoughts consisted of a consideration of traditionally Christmas music: religious, uplifting, family oriented, happy, wintery. Tunes of the same calibre as Slade's 'Merry Xmas Everybody', Wizzard's 'I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday', or Wham's 'Last Christmas'. Yeah.

So naturally I chose something irreligious, anarchic, mad and summer-y, Led Zeppelin's 'Rock N' Roll'.


I really don't have anything to say about this song except that it's three and a half minutes of burning guitars and blazing drums, and about as much fun as riding the bomb in Dr Strangelove. The perfect Christmas antidote, I think.

Missive - a crucial edit

Two days ago a copy of the Borland song 'Summer Wheels' was posted on YouTube, likely as a result of my 5/12/2010 post about his best songs. I also considered uploading it for the article as a special treat to readers and fans, but decided in the end not to, due to copyright infringement. Nontheless, one perceptive and good-natured user called 'fnasksangen' has done so, and the version has been edited into my previous post. Since this is the only chance you or anyone else will ever have of hearing this song, and bearing in mind it could be deleted at any given time, I urge you to check it out (the full lyrics are now available here). It is a song that I believe was made for everyone to listen to and enjoy, and moreover to celebrate life and keep hope alive.

In addition, I would like to thank Robert Borland's (Adrian's father) kind words on the Brittle Heaven forum, and his own words on this deeply beautiful music. It is greatly appreciated.

Many thanks again to 'fnasksangen', who I should mention has also uploaded the exceptionally gripping Brittle Heaven song 'All The Words in the World:


Enjoy!
-James

A Brief Reprieve

Like the title suggests, this is just a brief reprieve from the lengthy posts SoT has been publishing these past few weeks. In any case I have 3 essays to do this week (or, from another point of view, 8000 words), so something big isn't on the cards this week.

This is a shame, because longer, more ambitious posts apparently do well when it comes to SoT; the three biggest posts on here are also the most viewed (as you can see from the new post-link section on the right). Last week's Sunday Song Special was not only the most viewed of all time, it also boasts the title of the Most Cosmopolitan, attracting as it did people from Benelux, Central and Eastern Europe, North America, Scandinavia and Australia, as well as my own native Britain. No one commented, however, so I can only speculate as to how much you all enjoyed it (hint). At any rate, I consider this an excellent start to the final month of the year, and hope SoT continues to grow in all kinds of ways.

On the other hand, you may have noticed that the 'pages' section has vanished. This is because one of my new essays is covering similar territory to the old one, and I don't want to be accused of plagiarism from the web, even though it's still my own material. In any case the article that was up there was a fairly lengthy piece of hot air that I doubt many people would really want to read, so perhaps an abstract is necessary. I'm envisaging a page that outlines my opinions on all kinds of archaeological matters, with my essay abstracts as a kind of guide. Again, let me know if this is something that will either interest you or bore you. I can't imagine it'll win many awards, but it's worth a try.

My essays this week are on:
- The role of the private sector in archaeology
- The usefulness of the term 'Viking'
- An artefact description

This week's Sunday Song is Nick Drake's 'Place To Be', from his final album Pink Moon:



What I like most about this song is the pace -it seems to drift down along a river, without a chorus or tension or climax. The lyrics fit this exactly -Drake doesn't want to be kept in the same place, but always on the move, looking to be useful somewhere else all the time (just as he was constantly on the move in his own life). Looked at from another perspective there's a lot of sadness in this song, particularly as it suggests that he had no place to be in the first place. The use of similies draw together personal experience and natural symbology in a way that makes this one of the best, most relaxing, and most profoundly moving folk song in existence.

Next week: SoT Christmas special.

Sunday Song Special

Tomorrow, the 6th of December, would have been Adrian Borland's 53rd birthday. One of my all-time favourite singer/songwriters, he was the lead singer the 70s punk band The Outsiders, the 'seminal' 80s post-punk band The Sound, and, for a whole decade until 1999, an utterly forgotten solo artist. He was also a part-time record producer, and collaborated with many other artists in groups such as the Honolulu Mountain Daffodils and White Rose Transmission. After his suicide in April 1999, a vast backlog of his material was re-released, along with various demos recorded throughout his three-decade long career.

Last year I completely rewrote his Wikipedia article.

The vast quantity of his work, however, ignores the value of it. While his musical style ranged from the bleak and minimalist in the 70s, to the more augmented classic 80s sound in the following decade, to an almost U2-like quality in the 90s (or were U2 copying The Sound...?), it was his lyrics and personal character that defined his music, talented guitarist though he was. Never as self-absorbed as Ian Curtis, never as confident as Bono, never the one-hit wonder like so many 80s artists, Borland was sensitive, serious (but good-humoured), and always honest about himself. This week, SoT takes 5 of the best songs of his career in a special Sunday Song post.

Words Fail Me (Jeopardy, 1980)

Though recorded years earlier, Words Fail Me appeared on The Sound's debut album, Jeopardy. It was part of a New Wave watershed in 1980 that saw the beginnings of Echo & The Bunnymen (Crocodiles), U2 (Boy), and the Comsat Angels (Waiting For A Miracle)-and the demise of Joy Division, whose swansong (Closer) also appeared that year. Running through through the concept of communication failure, the track featured a brilliant-yet-unconventional chorus of a monotone, distressed-sounding guitar (akin the the last third of The Chain). Clearly, the bands influences were from the start grounded in traditional American rock rather than the punk movement as it was in Britain. A powerful, energetic song.

Crystalline (Alexandria, 1989)

After the collapse of The Sound in 1988 -concluding years of poor album sales and internecine tension- Borland struck out on his own career, kicking it off in the year I was born with the Alexandria album. The inclusion of a wide variety of different instruments and a much more open songbook and vocals to accompany them had finally thrown light on his work, marking a radical departure to what went before. Crystalline is the most representative piece to reflect this, and is probably the best track on the album with its easy rhythm and amiable -but preoccupied- lyrics.

Redemption's Knees (5:00AM, 1997)

Fast-forward to 1997, and Borland's fifth album, 5:00AM, and compare the difference again. By this point he had reached a little critical acclaim with Brittle Heaven (1992) and two quasi-demo albums, Beautiful Ammunition (1994) and Cinematic (1995). But from 1997 onwards Borland's work would feature markedly better production investment, and, as a result of that, more ambitious songs. 5:00AM was thus a bigger beast than its forebears, featuring punchy, harder songs like this, 'Redemptions Knees' -which for all its swagger, is still about personal weakness. Although I would rate the epic 'Over The Under' over this in terms of music and emotional depth, the latter was not available. This track surges with enough vitality, however, for this not to matter in the slightest.

Darkest Heart (The Amsterdam Tapes, 2006)

The Amsterdam Tapes, a session recorded in 1992, was eventually remastered in 2006 by Borland's friends, introducing 10 new songs and 2 alternate versions of songs to his published discography. Among them was this song, 'Darkest Heart', played live in this video by -among others- Kevin Hewick, as part of a 2006 dedicatory concert in The Netherlands marking the album's release (the album version is just as good, and can be listened to online here). Reaffirming Borland's obsession with weakness, frustration and the rogue aspects of life, this is among his most forceful, potent and immediately-listenable songs. The world is much better with it barging triumphantly into existence, all thanks to his friends.

Summer Wheels (Harmony & Destruction, 2002)


Unfortunately, my favourite Borland track is not available online [EDIT - see missive posted on 21/12/2010]. It is not on YouTube or Myspace, and a Google search result will drag up very little. The album it appears on, Harmony & Destruction: the unfinished journey, was recorded in the last two weeks before his suicide in April 1999. As such it is not light listening, and much of it is painful to listen to. It is not the music, or the quality of its recording. It is the presence in the lyrics of a struggle between two sides of a mind -one determined to stay, the other determined to destroy itself. There are frequent allusions to trains -he committed suicide by jumping in front of one- and previous attempts, as well as the source of his bitterness: the lack of recognition, personal decline and the antagonisms of others in his life. It was this dichotomy that gives the album it's name, and it would be the darkest heart that would eventually win.

'Summer Wheels' hails from the 'light side' of the album. A tentative, almost too-nervous-to-exist track, Summer Wheels is best described as a placid but vague stream of consciousness pushing towards escapism, to a hot, foreign beach away from the pressure of his presently cold, pressured reality; 'Stuck in a room with no view/Watching the wallpaper peel' perhaps refers to his time in the Springfield mental hospital. While the song could be finding optimism in his impending release from life, it seems more likely to me that he was actively looking forward to the summer, and all the plans that his March 1999 missive outlined. Whatever the intention, the song provides a uniquely ringing, polished sound without a clear precedent in his previous work, and positively shines with tragic optimism right at the end. The soaring, twisting and heart-wrenching solo dominating the last third (to the shouts of 'here come your summer wheels!' and 'don't go too long without light') is recognisable as a signature of Borland's musical style, but is performed here more perfectly and confidently than ever before. It is the greatest moment in musical history, and will never, ever be heard.

-Edited 6/12/10 (spelling & grammar)

-Edited 21/12/10 (video)

The Week in Winter

Winter has arrived. While this officially starts during the months of December, the recent snowfall (York pictured to the right, photo taken earlier today) had signalled a de facto initiation. Spare a thought to all the traders in stalls today participating in the St. Nicolas Fayre, whose stock was in places blanketed by snow and were constantly frozen themselves! Having volunteered at Holy Trinity Goodramgate Church on Friday morning I can empathise; stone floors eat through the thickest boots to make your feet cold, and unless you have gloves your hands are going to be frozen. That said, it looks nice outside for once, and I haven't had any major difficulties getting anywhere by foot.

This week has been fairly busy, with dissertation ideas being floated (I have a crazy idea about social dynamics that I want to expand on, but I'm awaiting a literature review on that one, so watch this space) work hours increasing, and module work to be done. In addition, my Post Hole article (see SoT passim) has triggered a welcome response from a certain Mr. Roberts in the latest issue of the Department's student-run electronic journal, and can be viewed here. I found his paper to be an interesting constructive critique, but not serious enough to warrant a head-on riposte. In my future planned articles I may have to address certain points, however.

Astute readers will have also noticed the creation of a standalone page, accessable via the link to the right. This is a home for my most representative essays, and currently houses one on postprocessualism and fieldwork. I may have to abridge it, however, since no one wants to read something 3000 words long recreationally!

Following complaints about the lack of a Sunday Song in last week's special blogpost, I am now proud to present this week's edition: Joy Division's Disorder.



Following the acquisition of a set of speakers, my musical sensibilities this week have been turned towards good stereo songs. Top of the experiment list has been Joy Division's (1979) debut album opener, Disorder, which was produced by Martin Hannett. Interviews by former band members later on revealed that the spacious, echoing sound that characterises Unknown Pleasures-era Joy Division was inspired by Hannett's own state-of-the-art soundsystem -thus leading him to tailor music to that rather than to the standard LP players that everyone had at the time.

I like Disorder because of its strange, empty soundscape -in many ways it puts me in mind of 70's academic books about computing or geometry. I can't listen to such dehumanised music for long, though, and it's very easy to over-listen to Joy Division, but this song, along with its lyrics vocalised by a heavily sedated-sounding Ian Curtis, is perhaps one of the most coherent, streamlined and listenable songs that band ever did.

Note: next week's SoT blogpost will be a -very exciting!- Sunday Song special.

Strata of Thought: king-sized edition!

This week the media has been focusing on the UK's Royal Family. On Tuesday Prince William announced his engagement to Kate Middleton, and on Friday Charles hinted Camilla might become 'Queen' should he ever become king himself. The TV and the Internet have united together to discuss every aspect of Kate Middleton, including her lineage, character and fashion sense, or simply to say that they just don't care (Americans being the current leaders of this).

I would imagine that irritation and hostility is not just confined to myself. Alongside the worry that the wedding will be paid out of the public pocket, or that Charles & Camilla won't make the best state figureheads for the country, sits the age-old and forever feeble question: 'why do we need a monarchy anyway?'

Republicanism has never been a very strong movement in Britain. A MORI poll conducted in 2006 showed that 72% of 1006 people still favoured monarchy, and 85% were satisfied with the current queen. However, solid support to me seems vague; in 2000 ICM revealed 46% of 1094 16-24 year-olds thought the monarchy was necessary, compared to 43% who argued contrary, and in 2007 a Populus poll showed 53% of 1004 people thought the Royal Family were not 'out of touch', compared to 43% who thought so.

So most people want the Royal Family, but evidently aren't happy with them. So what's the benefit of keeping them?

1. Value For Money

Let's jump straight into the practical considerations: value for money. According to pro-royal think-tank Sovereignty, the cost of the Royal Family to the taxpayer is £37 million per annum, which is far below the revenue they produce. Legally the Crown Estate must give all surpluses to the taxpayer, and all other forms of income are taxable in the firstplace. According to BBC News, the 2010 surplus was £210.7 million. Sounds good, right?

Wrong. Firstly, Sovereignty purports that current Royal residences would be maintained even in a republic, and that non-occupied residences, such as Hampton Court, are maintained already through visitor money. So surely without the cumbersome Royal Family the former could support themselves? Secondly, the site suggests that in a republic the 3000 events the Royals attend and pay for themselves would be paid for by the taxpayer, although in this scenario the Royals would not exist. Their successors, the presidents (perhaps) -even considering protected former presidents- would not in total number the same as the current Family. Nor after a certain period of time would they be need to be protected at all, or even need to be funded. Thirdly, one presumes the Queen's private money is not raised through working, or working as everybody else defines the term. This is money derived through various property given/taken by the Crown from others. Fourthly, Sovereignty ignores the fact that the Crown Revenue surplus is the sum profit of all the Sovereign's revenue, including the visitor-run properties they were so quick to exclude, and the Crown Jewels, et cetera. So, would this be produced even without the Royal Family?

2. Tourism

According to a survey by VisitBritain.com, the Queen is 3rd on a list of top 10 international visitor attractions, presumably because of the glamour of the wealth surrounding the family, its celebrity nature, and the fairy-tale veneer of royalty that our republican neighbours did away with centuries ago, and subsequently don't have. They apparently become so central to tourism that occasionally appear on tours specifically designed to promote it. And next year's Jubilee year, so Britain has a lot of business to look forward to, to boot.

This argument has the immediate effect of devaluing the integrity of the Royal Family. As rich, controversial and historic magnets of interest they have no intrinsic importance. Their title is the importance; you could potentially label anyone 'sovereign' and they would automatically do the same 'job' just as 'effectively'. The obvious counter to this is that they couldn't -the Royal Family owes its legitimacy to its geneaology. But is this the only form of legitimacy? Of course not! Whose to say that this role -if it is needed and couldn't be performed in an abstract sense by the People, the State, or the Nation- couldn't be granted to a truly, organically popular person? This person would be, I suppose, 'preside' over the national image, but I'm sure no such precedent has been set by any other republican country. Right? As for the tourist board, I'm sure the old houses will be just as popular, more accessible, and more profitable under new management (look what happened to the Louvre, after all). No tourist ever gets to see the Royal Family in any case, so it's hard to imagine their absence causing much distress.

3. Our Heritage

My argument directly above anticipates the age-old notion that the Royal Family is part of our Great British Heritage. It has been singled out as a reason for others to visit Britain, is fully integrated into our past through geneaology and the built environment, and represents the country in one single, united face. Sure, it's not perfect, some members aren't as dignified as others, but on the whole the Queen is "known for her resilience and “stiff upper lip”", as england.mu puts it, "a kind of quiet toughness which captures the British personality and spirit". An inseperable part of our history!

Not that I'm condoning violence, but royal families have proved perfectly seperable to many countries, such as France, America, Russia and Germany. And although these countries didn't all have smooth histories from that point onwards, what country has? These histories were instead determined by people, to a degree determined by the the level of democracy. And who in the world has a finer pre-existing democratic tradition than the UK? More importantly, Britain can be viewed in all kinds of ways, is made up of all kinds of people, and is characterised by all manner of supposed national traits (many of which are contradictory). One person cannot embody them all, or claim to represent them all.

4. Unity/Stability

Which brings me to the final claim: unity and stability. While I have already demonstrated that the Queen cannot possibly unify the nation in representing them, monarchists claim that the Royal Family is a constitional institution capable of rising above petty party politics and acting as a safety measure against it by being techically higher in stature than the Prime Minister.

Which ignores the fact that kings have caused wars. Surely no one believes that the English Civil Wars of the 17th century had nothing to do with Charles' long history of extorting of the taxpayers? And wasn't Edward VIII considered a potential threat even after his abdication because of his extreme right-wing sympathies immediately before and during the civil war? It is impossible for monarchs to be fully objective and rise against party politics - haven't the social sciences over the last 40 years spent most of the time trying to demonstrate that nobody can be truly objective? Where was objectivity and tactful reserve when Italy became fascist? Victor Emmanuel III personally selected Mussolini to serve as Prime Minister after all, and look how that turned out. Both the German and Spanish ruling houses merely fled in times of national disaster -what makes the British one different?

But all things aside, no, they're worth it.

-Edited at 23:30.

A Bundle of Things

Pre-emptive: yes, I've changed the logo and colour-scheme for this blog. Let me know how you feel about it! Personally I think it's a change for the better.

Anyway, an anecdote for you: yesterday I was on the tills pretty much all day, half a mind on the job and another half looking at the clock. It's pretty dull just bagging cards and exchanging money, and customers don't usually talk all that much. Then one elderly woman came up to me with a few cards, buried in a fairly substantial hat, and I went through all the usual motions until I noticed she had a badge fastened to her coat. It said 'SCRAP THE WALL', and had a picture underneath of said wall.
"May I ask which wall?" I said (I really am that polite). She didn't realise what I was talking about until I pointed at her badge.
"Oh," She said. "It's the Palestinian Wall. They've [the Israelis] built a wall to keep the Palestinians out, and there's people starving over there. And our government won't do anything about it." And she said all this very passionately, tucking her cards into her bag as she did so. Ever since I've been wondering how on earth she became so involved with the movement, a corner of foreign affairs only RESPECT and Palestinians on BBC News ever really talk about. I don't think I've ever been so taken aback. Good for her.

Otherwise, it's been a very busy week for me. I've developed a three-point plan for archaeology which I hope to be able to share fully at some point, and have begun essay plans for the summative assessment a month down the line. My Wednesday presentation on Viking Normandy was comprehensive if hurried, but the reading for it made for an interesting essay. I get feedback on that in 2 weeks.

My hobby this week has been the production of my own Christmas cards, something I think is coming along very well. I still can't really draw for England, but I can diligently steal designs from history and make them look reasonably nice. No pictures of that yet, however, since they will be given out as mini-gifts to certain individuals.

A shoutout here to Rachel, and her most recent blog post regarding her late dog. It's very sweet and well-written, and I urge you to take a look.

Sunday Song: a second shoutout is necessary here, in order to thank Caroline for her music suggestions, particularly The Boxer by Simon & Garfunkel. I didn't even know I knew the song, but I definitely recognise it. The lyrics are exquisite.
I had a problem choosing this week's Sunday Song, however. After some deliberation I chose something in keeping with the 60s trend I appear to be setting, The Door's Peace Frog:



The main street I live on has always reminded me of The Doors. There's always a lot going on and, particularly in the blistering summer, it brings to mind American towns. There's also a court called 'tradewinds' that inevitably makes me think about a line in their song The Crystal Ship. On Wednesday I obtained a third parallel, when I returned from town to see the after-effects of an accident between a taxi and a girl on a bike. Peace Frog's constant references to blood resonated with this really strongly.

And this is no coincidence -the lyrics were apparently inspired by an accident Jim Morrison once saw as a child.

Essays and Musical Archaeology

Two essays totalling 5000 words, two presentations and extra reading -this blog post is brought to you live from the eye of a storm.

I exaggerate, it's not all that bad. My Fieldwork question (Are post-processual approaches to fieldwork a dead-end?) I finished Friday night, and I'm pretty proud of the result. Since I am never averse to accepting a theoretical challange, I've prepared a critique of p-p theory building on the work for The Post Hole. The second, for The Vikings, is currently being produced and will be ready (hopefully) for Wednesday submission. The theme for that one will be early Normandy, and is already looking markedly less confrontational than the former. No less theoretical, however.

The essay will be my basis for a presentation I am scheduled to give that Wednesday.

Such endeavours naturally impinge on Nanowrimo, and Rachel and I are, unfortunately, at 5,000 words when we should be over 10,000 -we'll make up the difference I expect during the second half of the week when everything calms down. A shoutout for Steve is necessary here, who recently broke 20,000! We can only for the moment look on in envy.

On another note, there was only ever going to be one choice for today's Sunday Song. Simon & Garfunkel's Mrs Robinson has easily been the song of the week in this house, on some occasions being played 5 consecutive times. But more than that, it is a personal link to over a decade ago -when I was about 9 years old- when I was first introduced to music from the sixties. This song and others I listened to heavily over the course of a year (Keep The Customer Satisfied, Homeward Bound and The Sound of Silence in particular) remind me of long winter nights when everyone was late coming from work, being ill, trying coffee for the first time, and my collection of Ladybird books. Sadly my own personal sixties ended when my classmates subsequently made me embarressed about my musical taste, and I stopped listening to these songs completely from that point onward -only to rediscover them this week! Special distinction goes also to the Mamas & Papas song California Dreamin', which shared a similar history until its discovery a year or so ago. As Sony will not allow me to embed a YouTube video of Mrs Robinson for reasons known only to themselves, this song has been embedded instead:

A Sunday Post on Monday Morning

There are websites I go for information, ideas and entertainment, and there are websites I go to, for want of a better phrase, review the opposition. The EU Times is one of these sites. Despite putting on a pretence of objectivity with its detached news-writing style, the article names and tagging system quickly reveals an unhealthy interest in 'immigration', 'homosexuals' and 'terrorism', and simple deconstruction reveals an extreme-right bias. It appears to be run on donations and, judging by the copious image links of the prize-to-be-won variety, advertising money. It was the subtle title 'Europe Becomes Less European With Each New Wave of Mass Immigration', however, that caught my eye -in particular the curious mention of Yorkshire & Humberside's own BNP MEP, Andrew Brons. He reportedly states:

"Third World cultures are like overcoats that can be taken off at the port of entry and replaced with a European cultural overcoat that can be issued with residence and citizenship papers...The children of such immigrants are allegedly as European as the indigenous population. They’re not. Distinctive cultures are made by distinctive peoples and not the other way round...We are not the products of our culture; our cultures are the products of our peoples."

Several thoughts immediately sprang to mind -first of all that there is some kind of inadvertant praise placed on the 'distictive', homogenous culture of the 'Third World', and secondly that this University of York educated, National Front leader understands culture very, very little. Not to mention the fact that cultural contact is more likely than not going to give rise to cultural blending, whether or not the contact is hostile, cultures are too flexible to be passed onto succeeding generations wholly intact. Cultures are not static as he and the extreme right wing tend to assume.

But in mor uplifting news, Nanowrimo has started, and has already impinged on my tardiness by making this post too late for Sunday. Nontheless, I have just over 1000 words down on the page, as does Rachel, although we intend to double that each night this November. Excerpts from that later.

Over the week I may introduce another poll and change the logo. There's also a planned move to Wednesdays for a second weekly post, although Sunday Songs will remain here.

Speaking of which, this week's song is Jefferson Airplane's White Rabbit.



After a lot of thought and competition by other songs, I chose this one for a variety of reasons. While the lyrics are good for once I think they are of secondary importance to the powerful and talented voice of Grace Slick, whose delivery here is a superb, building tension that relates so well to the other instruments. It also keeps me uplifted on my cold, depressing journey to work in the mornings, and so deserves extra special praise.

More Developments

The first version of this post was intended to be a discussion about dissemination. It failed because, in writing it, it grew into a gigantic beast that would not make easy reading, and so for that reason it now resides in a Word document, waiting to be tamed and released as part of a coherent package. Perhaps it will form part of my anti-postprocessual manifesto, but for now it exists merely as an independent critique. With two presentations to do and two looming essays to bear in mind, there are also a number of other ideas for the future, and possible avenues for this blog to explore. I won't bore anyone too much by producing a list.

Nanowrimo is fast approaching, and my plans for my own story have been developing accordingly. After drafting my plot three times, I have finally felt confident enough about the story to release a brief synopsis (which can be viewed here), although there are many details that still need to be figured out. Steve's advice has been to keep some aspects fluid and seed in some ideas that could be chased later if necessary, and this seems prudent. Rachel too has decided to get involved this November, and has started her own blog in order to cover it. She informs me that it will detail many other things, so watch out for new posts:

Link to Rachel's blog

Ever since work I have had The Nolan's I'm In The Mood For Dancing relentlessly buzzing around my head, and the only cure has been Neil Young's Rockin In The Free World.



And on this basis alone it deserves to be this week's Sunday Song. Anti-Republican, forceful and almost angry, it has been perfect listening on cold trips to the outside world, as well as being an interesting exploration of the concept of freedom, and its upsides and downsides. It also rips George Bush snr's 'Thousand Points of Light' speech to shreds, champions the poor and marginalised, and provides a reaction to religious turmoil in the Middle East -making this song especially relevant and enduring.

Archaeology Time?

This week, I've been inducted (induced?) into the Archaeology Department graduate society, run clean out of money and worked long shifts that take up the hours of daylight.

But apart from that, I've also been focused on archaeological writing. By and large I've been taking notes in anticipation of the de facto start of term, of which my time will be divided between 'Field Archaeology', 'The Vikings', and 'Narrating Our Pasts'. There is also a Centre For Medieval Studies lecture running tomorrow from 5:30pm, entitled 'Popular Politics in Late Medieval English Towns' and delivered by Christian Liddy of Durham University, which I intend to make an appearance at.

But my main interest this week has been the development of an article I drafted several weeks ago, now titled 'Post-Holier Than Thou'. A 4-page toe-in-the-water affair, it was always my intention to gather my thoughts before the autumn term, summarising my academic opinions from the end of my undergraduate degree and through its gestation period over the summer. The finished work, the first of three planned articles, has been submitted to The Post Hole (a student-run archaeology magazine at York) with the prospect of being published on Monday 25th October. It concerns the results of my dissertation research, and the problems I have harboured for a while now with postprocessual archaeology -but it is delivered, I hope, in a manner that allows it to be accessible to all years of students of archaeology. As soon as the resources I require for the second installment exist in an accessible format (which I am ensured they will be within a few weeks), the process of writing the second part will be underway.

In other news, today's Sunday Song is one that I've found myself turning to secretly all week. A mainstay of iPod playlists ever since my AS year, Interpol's The New, from their debut album Turn On The Bright Lights, has always been listenable to me. From the tired, almost optimistic lyrical openers in the melodic first half to the avant-guard detuning of guitars in the choatic second, a sense of self-doubt in ability dogs Bank's tone throughout. While the sense of urgency in the second half is fun, I find the more conventional first more rewarding.

And there's your lot.

Nanowrimo

So the last few days have been dominated by the prospect of original writing. With November fast approaching, The National Novel Writing Month rears its' head once again. Nanowrimo, as it is known, is a challenge whereby thousands of people across the world attempt to write a 50,000-word novella within the 30 day month of November. Derided for not actually having a reward other than the satisfaction of completing the challenge, the upside is a more informal attitude in the absence of monetary gain, and the sense of community and support fostered in the forums. For the last two years I found out only during November itself and was, consequently, too late to get involved, but this year I was prewarned and have been considering my contribution ever since.

My initial idea, now discarded, was a science-fiction piece called Remus Restored. The plot concerned a youth on a distant planet 600 years from now, colonised by a group of pioneers from Earth from the settlership Remus, who is desperate to return to the homeplanet (now abandoned). Raised on old, traditional stories about the Blue Marble, this youth escapes the drudgery of his backwater world and embarks on an adventure, encountering space pirates, slave ships, and ambitious interplanetary empires. Upon encountering Earth, my character was to discover that the planet was under strict quarantine, enforced by a rouge AI-controlled missile silo on the Moon that had systematically destroyed all inbound and outbound traffic (initially to stop the spread of a real contagion), but which had never been deprogrammed after its controller's own demise. After besting the missile silo, the character was to then return to Earth, and discover the remains of humanity.

To hell with that, I thought later. I'm an archaeology graduate, and qualified to write much more than that. Thus I am proud to present my next idea, the provisionally titled An End To Eagles.

While this is so far a very briefly sketched-out option, the plot is as follows:

The protagonist is an auxiliary in the militarised zone around Hadrian's Wall towards the end of Roman rule, patrolling and pacifying the northern tribes. After a succession of ambitious generals drain the army of manpower, crisis erupts. The Picts beyond the border are beginning to break through to the north as the Roman forces are starved of manpower, law and order in the cities is beginning to lose out to civil revolt, and Gaul has been overrun by foreign forces, cutting off contact with the rest of the Empire. As the new military chief Constantine proclaims himself emperor of the west and departs to take the imperial throne, the protagonist begins to feel the strain of being Roman in a new world where being Roman isn't enough anymore. As the Picts, Saxons and rebels start to rise, the walls of empire are soon to cave.

As the point is not quality but quantity, hopefully I'll be able to draw on enough material with this to hit 50,000 words. Research is going to be necessary, but since making it perfect is of secondary importance having a coherent plot will be key.

In other news, today's Sunday Song is In An Aeroplane Over The Sea, by Neutral Milk Hotel (the lyrics are published in my Facebook Notes). A stream of consciousness, the lyrics appear not to fit together and seem dream-like. The strange noise that occurs both on the track and throughout the album, made as far as I know from feedback produced by playing a violin directly into an amp, resembles the ghost of Anne Frank. This overall dream-like effect makes the track singularly brilliant and endlessly listenable, with bittersweet lyrics drifting between happiness and sorrow. Best of all are the skilfully delivered one-liners like 'how strange it is to be anything at all' (the song's final line) that define feelings previously thought to have been too vague to put into words.

Also, it's very easy and satisfying to play on guitar.

The First Step

Perhaps the first post is always the hardest to write. An introduction to myself, an introduction to my ideas, and an introduction to the content that will inevitably find its way here -all of these are such a mouthful to coherently produce in the very first missive. Then there's writing style, post format and regularity to formulate, and I don't even know exactly who I'm addressing at this stage. Or even how many of you there are! I'm going to attempt it anyway, of course. You know me well enough by now.

First: myself. While I very sincerely doubt I'll attract followers who aren't known to me personally in some way, I find it necessary to properly introduce myself. A young, poor, and persistently anxious person, I am a masters student at a northern English university, studying archaeology but with an interest in history, philosophy, literature, politics, geography (of the human variety) and music. I verb for a noun: I work for a pittance, I volunteer for a conservation charity, I write for pleasure, I study for a variety of reasons. Which leads me to:

Second: my ideas. While I reason that my ideas will naturally surface from time to time in my future posts, some sort of rationale is needed. This is not easy, given the variety of subjects I intend to explore. At a higher level I am a socialist, of a sort of Orwellian bearing. I sympathise with feminist, anarchist, communist, libertarian, internationalist and environmentalist tendencies, although I wouldn't consider any of these to have a hand directly on the rudder. In my work I tend to advocate processualism and shun post-processualism (post-modernism), as well as history-based approaches, purely economic explanations for the past, and purely military explanations for the past. I believe societies are and have always been much more complex than that, and always try to view things in a relativist manner.

Third: the nature of this blog. I intend to use this blog as a sounding-board, or perhaps echo-chamber, for my many various thoughts, and mantelpiece for curiosities and experiences. Thus we come to the rationale behind 'strata' as a name for the blog: it encompasses a plethora of topics while evoking the field of archaeology, which this site is, primarily, a depositary for (I have Rachel to thank for the name). But hopefully ideas for creative writing, world theories and interesting factoids will make an appearance as my thoughts lead me to interesting and strange new landscapes.

Hence the logo, by the way.

James