Hmm, good post today. Don't you just love it when your postal delivery actually has items you want instead of bills and junk mail offering you loans (presumably to pay off the bills that came as well)? Well, today I got two packages that thrilled me. The first was a video that I'd ordered over a month ago of The High Life, as starring Alan Cumming, who has long been a comedy hero of mine. The High Life was absolutely brilliant, yet bizarrely only one series was ever made.
It remains one of my all time favourites but i've not seen it in years because the tape I recorded them on had a fault and the sound contantly jumped on it. However, now I can watch them again at long last. Excellent!
And the other thing that arrived were the three Hazel O'Connor albums that I won in an Ebay auction last week. I have been trying to get two of the three albums for *years* (I already have Breaking Glass, both on CD and vinyl) and I managed to swipe them for just �2.50. I was so thrilled with that - I've been playing them tonight and not only do they play perfectly but they came complete with the extras they were sold with; posters and stickers. Consider me chuffed!
It's got me thinking back. Songs can perfectly capture a moment, a month, a year, any time of a life, and in Hazel O'Connor's music I have a complete flashback to early 1998.
I have to admit that I'd never heard of Hazel O'Connor until sometime at the start of 1998, many years after her hayday. You know me and my dreams, and how much they influence me..... Well, one night I had a dream about some strange, underground market with a music stall. I looked through the CDs and found one that was either called Breaking Glass or Broken Glass, I couldn't tell which. When I woke, I thought no more about it for a while, until one day curiosity got the better of me.
I was in the library with a couple of friends and decided to look it up on the library system to see whether any local library had an album by either name. There was no Broken Glass, but there was a Breaking Glass. I'd never heard of it, or Hazel O'Connor, but the next week I decided that I might as well take this whole dream-related saga to its natural conclusion, and I hunted around what was then called Our Price for the CD in question. To begin with I couldn't find it. There didn't seem to be anything from a Hazel O'Connor full stop. But then on a whim I glanced at the movie soundtracks - and there it was. I snapped it up immediately, bought it, and raced home to play it.
It took a while to get used to the music. It was raw, different, and hit notes I'd never heard before. Her voice was so different to anything I'd ever heard. there were two or three songs that immediately jumped out at me, that I liked very much, and others that took a few listenings to like. I once heard someone say, though, that albums which take a while to truly enjoy are the ones which have longevity while ones that you like all the way through the first time you hear them can lose their appeal over time. It's very true.
Now that I had heard the music, the next step, i supposed, was to find the film that it was the soundtrack *of*. No one I knew had ever heard of it, and looking it up in books brought no answers. In the end, after unsuccessfully searching every video shop in the area, I decided a trip to Tower Rocords in London was called for.
That day in April 1998 will stay in my mind for several reason. It was also the day of my major pilgrimmage across Elstree and other such delights. But before all of that came my visit to Tower Records. It was creepy in a way because I have not seen a copy of the tape for sale before or since - but on that day it was on special offer - shelves and shelves of it. Row upon row. I bought a copy there and then, but the next time I went back a couple of months later there was not a single copy left.
That night, I watched the film and I was spellbound. It instantly became my favourite movie and over the years that followed I've collected everything to do with Hazel and Breaking Glass. Her music always takes me back to the start of that year, one of the happiest times of my life. It reminds me of taking my CD round to C's house and fighting off that blasted dog as we played it loudly and talked about how much we liked her. It reminds me of trips round London, singing the songs loudly, not caring who stared. And it reminds me of watching that film for the first time with the lights off, and a glass of red wine by my side.
Just one side left to play now. I hope my creaky stereo will survive this marathon :)
PS - I managed to grab those other copies of the BBC report!
..