Today was our first venturing out into the streets after getting home. We know the café people opposite and on the square, we know the people in the tattoo parlour, the plant shop, the hardware store, the coffee shop, the music store and the record store, so we went and showed our faces. I couldn’t figure out how cold it was, so I overdressed for the day and as the darkness came I was glad of my coat, Olivia under-dressed for the day, but I was able to give her my big warm scarf that sorted her out for later. We needed to get up to her first language school to pick up a certificate confirming her Portuguese language level (B2), well done, brainy.
We have been away for so long, but we are quickly adjusting to being back – all those friendly faces in the local shops help. Mind you, the friendly faces in the Dallas coffee shop also made us feel at home as well as everyone we were making music with. But now we are here dropping off the dry cleaning, and wandering around the streets reminding ourselves of the beautiful city that we live in. At the record store, I had records to pick up, saved for me by Jorge and José – some albums that were being released while I was away and others that I missed – Peter Gabriel, New Dad, Just Mustard, Anna Calvi, Hawkwind, Tiny Ruins, boygenius, Semisonic, Sevdaliza, Motorpsycho and The Smile.
One of the In Deep Music Archive goals is to be able to buy contemporary new releases as well as find second-hand albums from all eras – and from all places. It’s quite a challenge keeping up with the cost, but also the weight if you are bringing records on the plane. I was thinking that when The Archive is here, we need to set up a budget page, where donations go towards releases and I list them as I acquire them. In a perfect world, all the cool groups that release new records would automatically send their records here and we review them on the site, feature them and even invite acts here to do acoustic shows, release parties and general promotion. If we had the time, In Deep radio would feature these releases, there would be shows of old music and new music, and a lot of timeless music – but I need to be seven different DJs.
We came back home and watched the FA Cup, and saw Haaland score 5 in their rout of Luton Town, 2-6, we followed it with the last two episodes of Season 3 of Killing Eve. This is the jetlag days and we are settling into our Portuguese routine. Having said that, on March 9th Olivia will go to England and meet Sarah and they will be overseeing the move of The Archive, I can’t go because my residency demands that I have to stay in Portugal for a certain amount of days and after three months in the States, that is now till June. The countdown is now 14 days and thank you for the ongoing support towards this massive task.
Music today has been random (isn’t it always?), Uriah Heep – The Magician’s Birthday (1972). They were the first band I ever saw when I was 15 or 16, so there will always be a soft spot in my heart for them, although the whole band but guitarist Mick Box have since died. I met Mick Box once in Australia and he was a really lovely guy – and then there’s that guitar tone. There’s also the classic Roger Dean album cover. I also met him in Australia, he offered to do an album cover for the ex-band, haha, nope.