Is it a phone? Is it a car? Is it an app?

Went to a Promenade Concert this week with Mrs K. I left My Teenage Self cringing in the bedroom. “Classical music? Yuk”  he said, spitting out the chewed-up fingernail in his mouth, “They’re not even old – they’re dead.”

Listen to me, MTS, Beethoven’s Violin Concerto rocks. There are killer tunes. There are solos Eric Clapton would have trouble getting his fingers round. There’s lots of Ludvig’s stuff you could bang your head to.

Except you don’t at the Proms. People just listen. That’s what I like about them. Unfortunately some of the crapness of modern life has been seeping in. It’s getting a bit “Whoooh!”. People clap in between movements, which is really dumb because the piece hasn’t finished. You don’t clap Hamlet halfway through “To be or not to be” (“Whahey, that was one great iambic pentameter!”) If you’re applauding, you ain’t listening. If Coldplay launch into one of their hits and everyone roars, it’s because they can’t bear to hear it.

Mobiles twinkle across the Albert Hall like glow worms. Soon they’ll be waving them over their heads and filming the violinist. Promenade floor? Mosh pit, more like.

The orchestra was playing Schoenberg. Schoenberg, I know -  gives me a headache too. Too tricky altogether, apparently, for the two young guys in front fiddling with their iphones. Guy 1 started whispering to guy 2. I leant forward to hiss “Phones down and shut the **** up”. Then I saw what he was googling.

It was “Atonal music.” “It’s the same theme as his Piano Concerto” he was saying. Young bloody people. They don’t even misbehave properly. 

“Hair” today

What makes them think they'll all fit in the taxi?

Believe it or not, it’s just under 45 years since “Hair” opened. It was bollocks, but some people said it was the theme music of my generation.

Let’s listen to what those guys in the hippy tribe would be singing today…..

Ain’t got no teeth    ain’t got no eyesight

Ain’t got no breath    ain’t got no knee joints

Ain’t got no muscles  ain’t got no hair

Ain’t got no liver

Ain’t got no memory   ain’t got no wind

Ain’t got no hearing    ain’t got no hips

Ain’t got no friends left   ain’t got no six-pack

Ain’t got no reflexes

And what have I got?

Why am I alive anyway?

Yeah what have I got

Nobody can take away?

Got my cramps

Got my nose hair

Got my prostate

Got my spleen

Got my dyspepsia

Got my false teeth

Got my prescriptions

Got my bad breath

Got my aches

Got my floaters

Got my shrink

Got my bar stool

Got my check-ups

Got my alimony

Got my spectacles…… Hang on, I did have them somewhere, now where did I put them?  Give me a minute, I’ll find them, they’ve got to be…..

Walking Blues

Not available at Footlocker

Just come back from a week with the Ramblers. You don’t meet any teenagers when you’re rambling. It’s extremely uncool, you see. You’re out in the country. There are no shops to loot. The mud does nothing for your Nikes. The rain flattens out all the spikes in your hair.

My Teenage Self, in fact, is disgusted with me spending all that time with boring sexagenarians (that’s a misnomer – there’s not much sex). But I’d like to reassure MTS that the holiday conversations of sixty five year olds are no more mind-rotting than those of younger generations.

In my 30s, people on walking breaks obsessed about gear. Gore-Tex was the thing. At first I thought they were discussing the next phase of Massacre Movies.

People in their 40s went on about their kids. Damien had just got an A in History so was clearly destined to be PM in twenty years. Rambling, of course, only took second place to their main holiday in Mustique – just because they didn’t buy you a drink they didn’t want you to think they were cheap.

Ramblers in their 50s waffled on about equity release and endowment payments. “Stop!” yells MTS, “This is just so boring and irritating”. Well, MTS, wait till they got on to their garage extension. And then their Audis...

Now I’m in my 60s ramblers have finally got real. They talk about styles (the country walk type, not the catwalk). Specifically, how they’ve suddenly got higher. “I have no problem myself, of course – it’s the others I’m worried about.”

And they talk about cats. I spent half an evening hearing about Sue from Chorley’s killer tom who’d dragged a seagull through the catflap. That was more fun than mortgages. Especially after a large Glenmorangie.

Now, whatever happened to Damien?…

Jumping for Misery

What goes up......

To the Canary Wharf Jazz Festival over the weekend with Mrs K and a picnic. The headliner was horn player Courtney Pine, known for mashin’ up the classics, as they say.

Courtney was determined to get down with the kids.  “Hey London” he shouted, “What’s all this sittin’ down? Get up and shake your booty!” The twenty-somethings round us leapt up like a warrenful of rabbits being chased by a ferret. Not wishing to be party poopers, we said “Oh, alright” and staggered up.

“Now wave your arms and pump your fists!” roared Courtney.

I was balancing a glass of Cabernet Sauvignon in one hand and an olive on top of a knob of Roquefort on top of a chunk of bread in the other. No go, Courtney.

Things improved as he began to play some actual music. After a couple of Ellington numbers even the girls next to us dropped their iphones to clap, though they may well have been simply dialling into smaller phones.

But Courtney wasn’t content. It was all getting too listen-y. He wanted everyone to jump on the count of four. By now I had added ¾ of a can of Polish Lager to the wine inside me. Jumping was out of the question. So was counting. Mrs K and I raised our eyebrows instead.

Courtney still was unhappy. He wanted us all to do ten jumps. Then a hundred. Then a hundred and ten.

I was quite keen to stay on familiar terms with the anchovies, the Roquefort, the sausages, the bread, the olives, the wine and the beer.

I’ve seen Jimi Hendrix. I’ve seen the Rolling Stones. I’ve seen Bob Dylan. Never did any of those people tell me to jump.

Jumping is done by teenagers, ballerinas and circus dogs.  Jumping fuses your intestines with your liver and causes cancer. If God had meant us to jump He wouldn’t have made beer sloppy.

After fifteen minutes of being jostled by leaping girls, Mrs K said “He’s not going to play any more music, is he?” so we took the train home where another delicious can of Polish beer awaited. Ice cold, and to be drunk on the sofa.