Ramón 73

Penchant for a uniform

 

Ivor Bertie Gurney

Born in Gloucester in 1890, he was considered a musical prodigy from an early age.  He is probably the only one of the War Poets to combine a passion for both words and music.  As he grew, scholarships followed and he ended up at the Royal College of Music.  As a young man just before the outbreak of the Great War, his mental problems got the better of him and he suffered a nervous breakdown.  Thinking it a good cure he joined up, and found that the rigours, discipline, and camraderie of the war a tonic for his troubles.  It worked for him - until it didn't.  He later suffered shell shock, what is known to us now as post-traumatic stress disorder, but was able to write poems and music from inside the trenches themselves.

The above poem was written in honour of a great boyhood friend of his, Will Harvey, who went out on patrol and was declared missing, presumed dead.  Along with Harvey, Gurney and Herbert Howells would explore the Severn river in Gloucester in a small boat as young boys.  Gurney was straight, but this did not mean he shied away from the strong feelings he had for a very good friend whom he thought he had lost.  Harvey in fact survived, and spent the rest of the war as a POW.  By this time Gurney's old maladies began to reappear.  He stopped taking care of himself, went about slovenly and called himself a 'dirty civilian'.  He retrained as a machine gunner, only to watch at a distance as his comrades from the Gloucester 2/5ths went over the top and were slaughtered on the Ypres Salient.  He was shot cleanly in the arm and recovered, but was later gassed at Passchendaele and invalided out.

After the war he returned to the Royal College and studied with Vaughn Williams, but his mental troubles encroached upon him again and he never completed his studies.  In September of 1922 he was declared insane and committed to Barnwood House, Gloucester.  He was later moved away from his beloved Severn river and Gloucester, and died insane and tubercular (his lungs weakened by mustard gas) at the City of London Mental Hospital in 1937.

Taking a small break in two warm spots

No doubt I will hear from you soon 👍

The Art of FCB Cadell

Toy boy

Aside from its wonderful humour, the song itself bounced around in my head every time I saw the commercial air here in Canada.  The beat, and its sort of slinky suggestiveness kept me thinking in the back of my head that I had heard it somewhere before.  Returning to it after many years, I read in YouTube comments that the tune was based on a song by Serge Gainsbourg - and it all made sense.  It's lifted from L'anamour.

Serge's louche presence as a cultural bad boy, his hooking up with Jane Birkin, ever-present cigarette, and public drunkeness, endeared him to my heart.  Back in the early 70s he had a big hit in Europe and French Canada called Je t'aime.  Even as a ten year old boy I was pretty shocked by Birkin's orgasmic cooing.  That opening bass riff, the sliding finger, uff love it.  If you want to see him drunk and messy just type 'Gainsbourg Whitney Houston' into your browser and watch him proposition and paw poor Witley live on air.  "Are you sure you're not drunk?" she asks, incredulously.  I can bet he was an absolute PIG in bed.  Oh my wonderful pig. 

With Birkin. Trouser snake.

Toned-down Paul Mauriat version

The hairiest science guy I know

Cute quirky Trace Dominguez has been an internet presence for years now.  I've always enjoyed his boyish enthusiasm and goofy humour.  The last image in this small series is from a video about parabens in everyday household products.  He flashes to the shower about three times during his talk, and drops the bottle (not the soap) in the last flash. 

 

Tim (Marcel) Kruger 1981 - 2025