Just as well I need to write a second entry today to make my weekly quota. Because I’ve got so much more to say about band life.

Regarding my group Fosca in 2007, I’ve started to wonder about the point of continuing with the band. What’s frustrating is that we do have fans who absolutely adore us, all over the world. Just not enough in any one place. Or not enough fans in positions of music biz power who could take the group to a higher rung on the ladder. Certainly no one that wants to be our manager or handle the nuts and bolts of the band machinery like website updating, hustling for gigs, hustling for labels and so forth.

There’s so many undignified, unstylish trappings – being one’s own roadie, dragging instruments around, paying for pricy rehearsal rooms reeking of sweat from the countless bands that have been in the room before you. I feel the weight of every loathsome soundcheck accumulated through my life, ever polite humouring of every disinterested in-house sound engineer. Having to round up band members who have day jobs and busy lives and find a time slot which they can all agree on. Having to rehearse against the noise of the band in the studio next door, who are going through their 20th take on ‘Knocking On Heaven’s Door’ for their residency at The Beergut And Firkin the following month. It’s a truly graceless world. I want less and less of it these days. Not when there’s books and libraries and cafes and gardens and parks and cathedrals and galleries and natural history museums with stuffed lemurs.

Whenever I see someone carrying a guitar about on public transport, I actually feel nauseous. Well, unless they’re female: that’s still far less of a cliche. The whole blokiness of the rock world is still very much in evidence. I would enforce a quota – only so many males are allowed to make rock music. And they have to justify being different to all the other males. On pain of having their guitar taken away. I would also apply the same capping to rock music journalism. There must be only a certain amount of writing about music by men.

There must be no more books or reviews or articles about Morrissey and The Smiths unless all the ones by men have been matched in quantity by pieces by women. That could only be a good thing. If you go to a Morrissey gig, there’s a healthy half-and-half gender representation in the audience. In fact, the fans who actually follow a band around on their tours, who send letters and honest fanzines (as opposed to fanzines written by budding music journalists) are more likely to be female. Yet the vast majority of published books and articles about rock are by men. Women are more honest and intimate about their love. Men prefer to work out their devotion in professional writing. The only truly useful kind of music criticism is a kiss. I’d far rather be hugged than analyzed. Who wouldn’t?

(By the way, the only honest book about Morrissey and The Smiths is the Mark Simpson one.)

I now tend to not go to gigs at all unless someone I want to be with invites me out. The awfulness of the lone not-young man at the indie gig is not a part I have any wish to play. Without a companion, something will annoy me about the evening sooner or later. Someone will dance too close to me and jostle me. The bar staff will take too long to serve me. There will be couples kissing and canoodling in my view. Happiness can be so depressing. Crowds can make one feel so lonely. And I feel I’ve DONE all this before. There’s so much else I could be doing which I’ve NOT done before.

You don’t mind the more tiresome trappings of band life when you’re young and more carefree. At thirty-five, life in general drags you down, age drags you down, younger people drag you down, and you have to really, really, want to do anything that you end up doing. It all requires more justification and arguing of the pros and cons. Every day I wake up and ARGUE with myself about how I’m going to spend the day. Aloud. It’s quite a sight.

Rachel in the band thinks we should avoid the whole ‘toilet’ circuit of small venues altogether and just play the gigs we know we’ll enjoy, if our expenses are met by the promoters. I have to agree with her. In Sweden, we are far more likely to be worshipped than politely applauded and talked over. One must never pass up any opportunity of being worshipped.

The last time we played in Sweden, people invaded the stage and hugged us. That’s what we do it for. That’s the only reason anyone should do anything for.