It’s 4pm and I find myself wandering around somebody’s back garden somewhere on the Dutch/German border. I’ve seen the landmark local windmill and water tower, so this seems like as good a place as any to be. A face stares at me from the window. Fearing I’ve become a part of the German version of ‘Deliverance’, I walk away and … Read More

I’m back in England reflecting on the fact that the strangeness of the entire Duomo event and the accompanying experiences meant that I felt like I was experiencing some kind of pleasant breakdown throughout my time in Milan. My excessive consumption of coffee probably didn’t help! Alice, as always, was hospitable and generous towards everyone, and it was nice to … Read More

It’s 2am and just after the after show meal at the Hyatt. An Italian ‘society’ photographer, who obviously thinks I must be someone if I can walk around here without being arrested, asks if he can take a photograph of me. Looking worse than the ghost of Samuel Beckett, I agree. “So, you’re Tim Bones, the American poet?” He offers. … Read More

It’s 3am in the hotel bar and Steve Jansen, pleasantly drunk and pleasantly intense, keeps on asking, “But are you balanced?” to anyone who’ll listen. Guru Jansen’s lessons in life and love abound in this faintly surreal post-rehearsal gathering. Earlier in the day, on the Milano Malpensa bus, I’m face to face with one of my favourite writers, Harold Pinter. … Read More

On Thursday I’ll be performing my first ever gig in Italy. I’ll be joining Alice (and Steve Jansen) in the fantastic Milano Duomo, as part of an ambitious event which the organiser tells us ‘sets out to combine poetry, film and music in interesting ways’. In addition to my singing a duet with Alice, after one of the performers dropped … Read More

With three more songs and four ‘musical miniatures’ completed over the last week, it’s been a fairly productive time as regards the development of the prospective solo album, which now seems to be developing a strong and emotive identity of its own. Lyrically, so far the work is combining the narrative touches of ‘California, Norfolk’ with the sense of personal … Read More

Saturday saw Centrozoon performing as a part of a festival of electronic music which also included UK band, Radio Massacre International (genuinely nice people making a fine noise in the style of the early-mid 1970s work of Tangerine Dream and Klaus Schulze) and an intriguing Finnish band, Cartes Art Machine, featuring legendary local Jazz musician Juhani Aatlonen (Wigwam, Pekka Pohjola, … Read More

It’s 2am Helsinki time and despite being up since 5am, The Man Mountain, Die Mensch-Maschine and myself are led semi-willingly into a late-night disco by Tanya and her ten words of English. After enduring a half hour walk in sub-zero temperatures, we feel we deserve a break from the cold. Five more words of broken English later and we change … Read More

Escaping a snowbound, gridlocked country to fly to another snowbound, gridlocked country, doesn’t make too much sense, but to compound the agony, I’m off to frosty Finland for four days on Friday (depending on whether there are still any flights leaving Germany, that is). Saturday’s performance in Helsinki will mostly consist of improvisations, interspersed with the occasional blast of light … Read More

Nine days into the year and, bizarrely, No-Man have already had four tentative approaches regarding making a career-overview compilation album. As, like Highlander, in the end there can only be one, we await the results of the subsequent bloodbath with interest. ——- The saga of the forthcoming No-Man reissue of Flowermouth gets ever more complex and nasty, with three labels … Read More