THAT'S WHAT WE DID TODAY

Washing our socks in the dark

Burning the snow in the park

Didn't have much to say

But that's what we did today

Shaking our fist at the moon

Tried to catch stars in a spoon

Watching the children play

That's what we did today

Drinking up a bottle of wine

Messing around with time

Looking for something to say

That's what we did today

Running around in the nude

Making the neighbours feel rude

Remembering how to play

That's what we did today

Holding our baby tight

Making it through the night

Trying to find our way

That's what we did today

Wishing upon a star!

How far away is far?

Don't understand what you say

That's what we did today

Lyric:  “That’s What We Did Today” (Ayers/Halsall), from “Falling Up.”

Kevin Ayers w/Ollie Halsall: Just Like The Animals (Link) 

 

10 Things I Remember About Ollie Halsall On His Birthday

1.  “Ollie may not have been the best guitarist in the world, but he was certainly among the top two."  --John Halsey, 1997


2.  Every time I hear a recording featuring Ollie playing that I haven’t heard before, I want to hear more “new” Ollie pieces.  Every time I hear Ollie playing, I want to listen to that piece of music over again and then again.


3.  Before we met Ollie, we knew Kevin Ayers, who spoke about him so often that we felt him as a known presence.  By the time we first knew Kevin, Ollie was an indispensible constituent ingredient in his music.  I don’t think Kevin had any regard for anyone’s musical opinion but Ollie’s.

4. When we finally met and spent time with Ollie, we anticipated his humor (which was hilarious and concentrated on deflating pretension), but were surprised by his courtesy, kindness, love of opera, and by his hypnotic effect on our cats, U and Santa.  Santa really loved him.


5.  Ollie’s modesty amazed me also.  I remember him dismissing some thrilling instrumental passages he played as merely “flypast” (the UK equivalent expression to “flyover” a la Blue Angels air shows) moments that were included as a matter of commercial necessity.  He was really about getting down to the heart and soul of emotional material and all about subtlety and “touch.”

6.  I remember once reading a quote from the normally frosty and fearsome Robert Fripp (who was attending an Ayers/Cale/Nico/Eno show) where he called Ollie “the Guv’nor.”  Ollie certainly deserved the traditional accolade, but I was unused to seeing Fripp so cuddly.


7.  Ollie’s enthusiasm for New York’s subway system (which we told him we hated) was fascinating and somewhat political. (Although he was an elite musician, he was definitely a man of the people.) 

8.  When we were negotiating Kevin’s recording terms with CBS Records, his only non-negotiable demand was that Ollie be included and flown over from London.  Business Affairs originally balked at the request but Paul Atkinson, the former Zombies guitarist who handled A&R, agreed immediately and without hesitation.


 

9.  I remember the New York City sessions very well and how the top local musicians who played on the date admired Ollie and hung around when they had finished their parts so that they could hear him record his solos.


10.   Although these were pre-internet days, I managed to learn about Ollie’s passing very quickly.  A friend of his, Neil, managed a liquor store on the Upper East Side of Manhattan near where we lived and, quite coincidentally,  I happened to walk into the store at a propitious moment.  The shock eventually passed, but I still feel the emptiness.  I think about Ollie every day – mostly remembering funny things he said, including one punch line: “Yes, I buy all my shirts there.”  (I won’t bore you by explaining the joke, but it was a good one.) 

The Ollie Halsall Archive -- Link

Fool After Midnight

A wise adviser once advised me this way:

"Don’t  move your mouth 

Till you've got something to say;

Talk in the morning, but when the Moon comes up,

Take my advice boy and Keep Your Mouth Shut."

Late at night when I'm feeling Divine,

I make the same mistakes Every Time.

I make myself promises that I always forget;

I talk too much, do stupid things

I always regret.

I’m just a Fool after Midnight,

My senses fade after daylight.

I’m just a fool.

Note:  This is another in a series "illustrating" song lyrics by Kevin Ayers.  Fool After Midnight, a really magical, wistful, depressive Kevin song (I apologize for the tautology)  appeared on the Kevin Ayers/Ollie Halsall collaboration album As Close As You Think,  released on the Illuminated label in the UK in 1987. You can listen to the recording by visiting This Link and searching for the record, song and "play" button at the lower right.  As Close As You Think was recorded at the home studio of former King Crimson/Bad Company bassist Boz Burrell, and, as I hope you will hear, is delightful, but definitely more on the order of a very good demo (Kevin's a highly resourceful and sophisticated recordist) than a polished master version, which would, no doubt, have featured real drums and a fewer synthesized sounds.  I'm sorry Kevin has never revisited the song, but maybe the mood and inclination didn't last.  I post it here partly because it brings back some Fool After Midnight memories of time spent running around with with Kevin and sometimes Ollie several years earlier than the song in Manhattan, Brooklyn and on Long Island.  I hope the various King Arthur legend illustrations I have chosen suit the lyric and do not seem irrelevant or superfluous.  If they do, the song paints its own, vivid mental pictures.


ILLUSTRATION KEY:

1. Aubrey Beardsley, Merlin and Nimue, 1893.

2.  William Morris, King Arthur and Sir Lancelot,  1862.

3.  Julia Margaret Cameron, The Parting of Lancelot and Guinivere, 1874.

4.  Gustave Dore, Guinivere, 1877 (illustration to Tennyson's Idylls of the King).