Sharing Letters (and Margaret Howell)

A couple of days ago I woke up from a bizarrely vivid dream about interacting with Margaret Howell who was being uncharacteristically unpleasant and snooty. (On a side note, I seem to have an obscene amount of 'celebrity dreams'- I have canoed with John Malkovich, hung out in a kitchen with Damon Albarn, taken selfies with Nick Cave and- quite the best- George Clooney once gave himself a mangina and then sent the results to my best friend. Waking up is always a heavy disappointment) 

Waking up from my Margaret Howell edition wasn't too bad because when I checked my email I found that Mel from Two Breads, Please? had sent me a brilliant email of 'minutes' from the Margaret Howell and Penny Martin in Conversation V&A event that I missed a couple of months ago. A spooky coincidence but a very happy one as I'd jokily asked for some in-depth 'event minutes' a while ago and she actually delivered!

I wanted to share her email because I loved the tidbits she chose to share "she showed us some pencil sketches of fields. Her pencil strokes were light but quite precise." and "Margaret Howell was captain of her netball team!" I've also been thinking about the sharing of letters and email recently. This is mostly after signing up to Miranda July's 'We Think Alone' project which leaves a weekly email in your inbox full of other peoples exchanges covering one topic. Last weeks was 'Emails to Mothers', for example and there is something strangely comforting about reading exchanges which are at times moving and mundane and never intended to be shared. I've also been reading Brainpickings an awful lot of the past few months. It is one of my favourite websites and editor Maria Popova is often posting extracts from anthologies of letters; there is John Steinbeck's letter to his son on the subject of falling in love, Sartre's letters to Simone De Beauvoir, the handwritten marriage proposal from Charles to Ray Eames, and a stack of parental advice from great Americans to their children. I know a lot of people read published letters in the same way that they might read an autobiography; I have rarely read either but when I next get paid a lot of these will be on my book list. It also strikes me that blogging is a sort of form of letter sharing. In this way it is similar to writing a journal; when I'm writing my journal I always wonder 'who' I am writing to but at the same time I am fairly sure that it is a future version of myself, someone who is older and affection towards their own youthful naivety. So in this way my entries always have an underlying awareness of the fact that the words may seem sweet or funny or ridiculous in years to come. It adds another quite bizarre dimension to the simple process of writing in a diary. I suppose that is why I like reading letters or emails, because I actually find that they are less self-conscious.

Digressions aside, here is Mel's email. I may end up posting some of our subsequent communications as part of a 'bloggers in conversation series', we shall see.

Hey Stevie,

Sorry for not getting back to your comment! I've unintentionally been on a mini internet detox recently - no blogs or facebook (but instagram keeps me coming back like a sucker).

The talk was interesting and structured chronologically, talking about her life generally and what sounded like the very organic development of her brand. Of course, Margaret was really charming (FYI, she wore a great breton top, crisp cropped trousers and lace-up shoes). As requested, a quick(ish) round-up of my favourite bits:

• Margaret was captain of her high school netball team! There was a great photo of her with her team, gym skirts and polo shirts, in front of her modernist-style school building (apparently her school has been demolished now).
• She studied Fine Art at university and she showed us some pencil sketches of fields. Her pencil strokes were light but quite precise which seemed to echo her personality to me. She spoke about drawing and practising fine art like a proper craft, completely separate to what she does now, and said something like "you need to practise every day and think about it all the time in order to be any good". 
• There were great photos of Margaret's early studios/factories. I think she started making shirts in her flat before expanding. There was a Hockney poster from an old V&A exhibition on the wall in one of the studios, which she bought after visiting the exhibition herself!
• An early Margaret Howell ad featured her PA (or something similar?) wearing a trenchcoat tied with Margaret's old leather belt and wet hair (they'd showered her with cold water for the effect).
• We looked at a few different adverts and editorial from the Margaret Howell archive. It was interesting to hear that she didn't like the recent Dree Hemingway shots as much because they seemed "too posed". She was much more enthusiastic about shots where the clothes were worn "as they would be in real life".
• Margaret said that she tries on every piece of women's clothing that they design every season. There's something about that which felt very reassuring - if it's good enough for margaret, it's definitely good enough for me. It was a running theme throughout the talk that she designs clothes for herself. She spoke a lot about "practicality" and "quality" but without looking "too smart". Which in my head sort of translates into "things that look good with loads of pockets but not too many frilly bits".
• She's a patron of Open House which is the BEST because I love Open House.
• She swims regularly at a lido in Blackheath. My boyfriend told me it would be creepy to make the trip and try to accidentally on purpose bump into her.

Also, Penny Martin was a total babe. A good, intelligent interviewer. Keeping the conversation flowing and on-topic. I am so easily charmed by clever, modest, northern women.

I hope that was interesting rather than too long and boring! Let me know if you're ever down in London. It would be lovely to meet and I had the dreamiest peach and raspberry meringue slice at Ottolenghi's last week which I'm eager to scoff again.

Mel xx

Life Now

How to update the blog after a two month hiatus? A blank box is always sort of overwhelming but there are lots of fun things to talk about like 'GRADUATING' and 'REAL LIFE STARTING' although those topics can be tackled in a fairly easy way with these two photographs:

In other news I got a job! This is a very exciting development for me as I'm working at Creative Tourist which is a website that I've hawked from afar over the past 3 years and which helped me to locate the interesting 'non-studenty' stuff going on around Manchester while I was new to the city. In the mornings I get out of bed, make myself some porridge and then travel into work with 'I'm Every Woman' by Chaka Khan blasting in the background, just like Bridget Jones when she walks to work over Waterloo Bridge with her hair all tucked under her scarf. Just like that. 

I'm living with two of my best friends and a red cornsnake called Morpheus who we are looking after for a friend who has moved to America. We have little mice frozen in the bottom drawer of the freezer for him to eat every 10 days. 'Morpheus fed!' is marked on the calendar every few rows and watching him attack and consume a partially defrosted little mouse whole is fascinating and morbid in equal measures. Sort of like the footage you occasionally see from nature programmes of giant serpents lying very fat and still after tucking into a small piglet from a nearby village, but a lot of more bearable. I still haven't quite plucked up the courage to take him out of his tank (I'm more of warm-blooded pet person) but time will tell. 

In the evenings we have been working our way through the first season of Twin Peaks, drinking slightly too much wine and singing passionately along to the theme tune and shouting 'She's dead! Wrapped in plah-stic!' We all then hastily handwash our shirts to be worn the next day, hang them in the shower and head to bed. 

It's your festival and you can wear what you want

At the risk of being that arsehole who rubs the salt into the wounds of the unfortunate (or the arsehole who considers themselves fortunate over others..) I am going to Glastonbury Festival tomorrow. I mention this because when considering what I would wear I just wanted to find some source of inspiration that didn't require leafing through images of women in floral headbands and fringe tops. Any online retailer becomes cluttered this time of year with 'Festival Chic' features which are incredibly monotonous and actually not at all inspiring. All I wanted to find were some pictures of women looking awesome in a totally unique way. For me dressing for a festival isn't about being aspirational. Instead, here are a few things I consider. A big, obvious one is comfort. You have to veto from your packing any of those items that you regret wearing 'in real life'. A skirt that hitches up every time you walk? A jumper that brings out the worst in your sweat glands? An outfit that makes you feel like a third-wheel when you're completely alone. None of these things are allowed and that is final. Once you have figured out which of your clothes are the party-poopers then you can start deciding which great pieces to take. These are clothes that are like that friend you can always rely on for a good night. Even if everyone else bails the two of you can go out, drink fantastic cocktails and dance the night away as a pair. The clothes you want to take to a festival are the fabric equivalent of that friend. In essence, they make you feel like Carrie Bradshaw but better and more you. 

The other thing to consider is this; "if you can't wear it to Glastonbury, then you can't wear it anywhere." This of course applies to all festivals. Those were the words of wisdom my friend Gigi texted to me earlier. One of the most joyous pleasures a festival can bring is the chance to don a wig and wear that outfit that you wanted to wear to the pub last Friday but ended up chickening out of because it was 'too loud'. Gigi's mantra was justification for her persuading me to wear my beautifully vulgar snakeskin-on-snakeskin-on-snakeskin ensemble of hot pink items which all happen to match. Alas the skirt is too sweaty to dance in and therefore fails my 'festival comfort test' but it is indeed an outfit that feels too scary for 'real life' and therefore would otherwise translate really bloody well to a slightly muddy field. If I was to wear it out back in Manchester my friends would cock their heads, a look of confusion spreading across their faces. But wear snakeskin on snakeskin to Glastonbury and suddenly you're wearing your admission ticket to the Fun Party. Snakeskin on snakeskin at a festival says 'I came. And I came to dance.' It says 'We wanna be free. We wanna be free to do what we wanna do. We wanna get loaded. And we wanna have a good time. That's what we're gonna do. We're gonna have a good time."

And so for all of these reasons I will be wearing the ridiculous snakeskin boots that arrived from eBay just in time. There will also be anoraks. There will be the ever-faithful bumbag (hands-free is the only way to dance.) There will be the blue mechanic jumpsuit that will cause me problems in the portaloos but rewards in the longrun. There will be my comfy black stretchy pants with the tasselled hems which somehow simultaneously say 'comfort' and 'glamorous divorcee on Miami Beach' when I wear them with the matching tasselled top with the pineapple and palm pattern. These are all things I already own and that make me happy. No big festival shopping sprees (unless the £8 snakeskin boots count?) and definitely no dictating.  It's your festival and you can wear what you want to. 

Recent Adventuring

The weeks continue to race by and since I last posted I am now officially D-O-N-E with University. The other day I returned my last library books. I gave an actual lingering look over my shoulder as I exited through the revolving doors, as if I was in a film and waiting for the angsty soundtrack to kick-in. Or for the sub-title 'REAL LIFE... BEGINS' to appear across the screen. Neither of these things happened. Then I popped into the offices of my favourite professors to say goodbye and left having offered myself up as a cat-sitter to one and an open-day speaker to the other. At least I know I have my back covered if my employment prospects take a turn for the worst. 

Despite the slight bittersweetness of leaving the University of Manchester just as I was getting the hang of things (It honestly took me three years to learn how to write a really good essay) the past few weeks have been a ball. The sun came out fiercely and happily for a bit and finding an open body of water in which to swim within the city became of the upmost importance. We plumped for the lake in the Chorlton Water Park for the first outdoor swim of the year. We ignored the pondweed which flirted with our knees and the frogspawn and the swans and armed with determination (and a swimsuit which consistently flashed my tits everytime I did a breast stroke) I swam and swam. 

I've also managed a couple of trips. Last week me and Nanon went to Liverpool and wandered around the Tate and the Walker Art Gallery. At the Tate we mooched around the Chagall exhibition, though I think I actually got more enjoyment from the floor below which houses the 'Constellations' exhibition. There were Robert Morris's big mirrored cubes which created pleasing body contortions if you stood beside them. Helio Oiticica's Tropicalia 1966-7 was a playful installation that involved live parrots (caged, alas) and a pleasingly disorientating beach hut which offered a surprise following a blind entrance. One of my favourite parts was a chance to sit and chuckle whilst watching John Smith's The Girl Chewing Gum which is too good not to have a place here: 

An especially sunny day saw me, Charlie, Rose and Gigi cycling over to visit the Salford Lads Club. This was in a last-minute bid to 'do the things we said we would always do' before most of the gang leave Manchester. We spent a long time inside being showed around by Leslie who was fantastic and completely patient amidst the cooing and exclaiming of 'cooool!' everytime he showed us a new room. Of course the outside of the club is super-iconic thanks to the The Smiths and the video for 'Stop Me If You Think You'd Heard This One Before'. (And on the surface this was the initial vanity behind our visit) But once inside the boxing rings, gymnasiums, billiards tables (complete with the outlines of little willies drawn into the dust, natch) and wall-to-wall photographs of every club camping trip since the early 1900s were incredible. I sincerely recommend a trip to anyone who has an interest in the culture of instituions like the Scouts or Brownies (or hell, any Moonrise Kingdom fans would be down too) as this is the place that Baden Powell visited when considering the notion of setting up the Scouts. 

A faithfully fantastic Chic concert with the Mr Nile Rodgers, lots of time soaking up the sunshine in the park, a fruitful house hunt (I plan on remaining in Manchester for now... who knows how long, but for now at least) and some shifts at the Gallery cafe all passed the time until the inevitable move-out date came. Most of my friends will be leaving the city, and there are some that I'll really miss a lot but the past few weeks have been good for hanging out, whether all squeezed around the table and sharing homemade thai curry or sweatily dancing to Donna Summer at an incredible set by Horse Meat Disco at 2022NQ. Onto the next stage.. 

Outfit

Today I'm wearing a white sundress with a navy Benetton jumper, some red lipstick and my old suede riding boots. It has been a week since I handed in my dissertation and I've been spending my time like a teenager during the Summer holidays. I'm not even finished yet but the relief of no more essay writing has temporarily trumped all and I've been doing all of the things I've wanted to do over the last month, but free of the guilt. Last week I went to see Pedro Almodovar's 'I'm So Excited!' which was fantastic and camp and silly and perfect for a Friday night that was warm and had the smell of the day's sun still thick in the air. 

Last night I cooked a big lebanese meal with some of my close friends. Lots of Ottolenghi food-porn (slow-cooked lamb, roasted aubergines and butternut and couscous) and conversation all washed down with delicious vodka/vermouth/mint concoctions made by my friend Charlie. This morning I ate a cheese sandwich and read more of Jerusalem with my tongue hanging out of my mouth. It's all about eating and reading about more food simultaneously. 

On Friday I had a couple of job rejections which put me in a funk for a day but I'm feeling okay about them now and realising that rejections are an inevitability and will help me to build a thicker skin as well as generally helping me to get better at the things I love and want to do. In the words of Aaliyah.. 

In the Meantime

Please bear with me while I finish my dissertation and tie up some loose ends. This weekend I went to my friend Rose's 'Carnival of the Animals' themed party dressed as Bjork's Swan dress and ate lots and lots of fantastic homemade falafel. The next day we miraculously managed to get some Glastonbury tickets in the resale and then celebrated my best friend's birthday with a champagne breakfast in our pyjamas.

But now the slog continues and this blog will remain a little empty until my May Day deadline. In the meantime, why don't you listen to this fantastic song by Pete Dunaway from the 'Black Rio 2: Original Samba Soul 1968-1981' album? Reading wise I recommend 'Faster or Greener.' It's a new blog written by my friend Joanna. Often when I read a new blog I find that I can tell it's new and needs a bit of time for improvement. But Joanna's is fantastic and not at all like that. She's been a big blog reader for years (as well as being generally one of the most well-read people I know) so she knows how it's done and Faster or Greener is already packed with well-written and thoughtful posts. From beautiful photographs from around Montpelier (where she is currently living) to helpful documentary compilation lists. Anyway, I like it and I think you will too. We had a fantastic time couchsurfing across the United States a few years ago and for the sake of nostalgia and friendship I will post some photographs of our adventures here. It is also worth a shout out to Lily, my childhood best-friend who introduced us in the first place and Patrice who we shared fun, a comfortable room and Denny's breakfasts with at Coachella (and who took most of these photographs)

Hobbies of the Flimby New Balance Men

This morning I found myself on the 'Visit Flimby' website which is the love child of New Balance and the West Cumbria tourist board.  Flimby is a town on the border of the Lake District and home to the UK's New Balance factory, and indeed you can 'visit Flimby' and have a tour around the factory which is exactly why I found myself on the site in the first place on a rainy Thursday morning when a day trip elsewhere is an attractive prospect. The site is a great read with some beautiful photographs and videos (by North West photographer Percy Dean) documenting the community and some of the men who work in the factory.

I'm always interested in people who are dedicated to a particular hobby- I wrote about hobbies here last year- and these videos focus on the curiosities of the New Balance factory employees. Bill climbs the local peaks when he's not working, Wayne races pigeons, Mark plays in a band and Roy who is a leather cutter during the day, is a fan of Northern Soul and still has the recordings he used to make from the balcony of the Wigan Casino in 1973. You can watch the other videos here but naturally the irresistible pairing of New Balance and Northern Soul was too good an opportunity to miss for posting Roy's video:

No, really. What's In Your Handbag?

If I was a magazine editor I would run the show with an iron fist. I'd keep the iron fist in the top drawer of my desk and bring it out on one occasion, to enforce one very special rule. The only rule. I'd send a memo around to all staff on a Friday night, just as they're leaving the office and thinking about all of the fun ways they're going to spend the weekend. They'd quickly scan my email, informing them about the meeting being scheduled for 9am on Monday which will be held in response to one of the features being run in the April issue. I will tell them that it has come to my attention that a feature is being run which violates The Rule. Every experienced member of staff will know word-for-word how this meeting will go, even before it happens. They will think about it as they're putting on their coat to leave the office that night and again while they're browsing flowers on Columbia Road on Saturday morning and again when they're handwashing their tights over the bathroom sink on Sunday evening.

The meeting will be tense but short and to the point. And everybody who attends the meeting will never forget the words of The Rule. The assistant who wrote the feature will absolutely never forget the rule and for 6 months will carry her belongings to work in her pockets in order to avoid the associations with The Rule as provoked by her handbag.

The rule goes like this:

"In the event of a 'What's In Your Handbag?' feature, please ask yourself these questions and only proceed with the article is the answer to either is yes. 1. Is the subject Mary Poppins? 2. Does the bag belong to a traveling salesman specialising in now-defunct magical sweeties only available on the black market (which are still, miraculously still within their expiry date)?"

My point and my question really is this: "Why are handbag features a thing?" Like all brilliant imaginary magazine editors, (or the Carrie Bradshaw of 2013) I voiced this question aloud on Twitter. These features are really, really not very interesting. I would much rather see the contents of a fridge or a wardrobe or a personal photo album because these things are actually revealing of a person. (Well, the fridge doesn't really, in the food department I'm just nosey) But anyone can carry around keys and a phone and some lipbalm. And what makes these features boring is the fact that they are usually completely unbelievable, comically so! If you look into one of these bags, on a blog or in a magazine, they contain 2 heavyweight SLR cameras, a dog-eared copy of Camus's The Plague, a Stila blusher, a small shell-shaped compact mirror, an iphone and a moleskine. Come on! Where are your tampax? Look into your best friend's bag and it will contain a bus pass, some loose filters, a snotty tissue and a McDonalds straw wrapper. (I know this because she faithfully replied to my tweet listing the exact contents.)

For research purposes, please allow me to reveal the mediocre contents of my bag for your delectation:

You will find: Wallet (in dire need of a sort-out in light of fact that fat receipt situation will not allow the clasp to close), 2 separate sets of keys, a bike light, headphones, a make-up brush (yet notable absence of blusher) Railcard, Make-up bag, 2 pens, an orange, deodorant, chewing gum, lots of tissues- grabbed from the dispenser of the toilet on the train I travelled on this weekend.

I very much enjoyed some of the contents of bags on Twitter which did indeed reveal something about the owners and lack any of the glamour of the unbelievable magazine features. See Anna's rotten apple and selection of whiteboard pens which show in very real terms her progress as a teacher-in-training. Teachers in cartoons have shiny apples on their desks! They must end up buried forgotten in handbags, slowly rotting.. Kat, who describes herself on her Twitter bio as 'A lover, not a fighter' carries Pom Bears in her bag. Naturally, the ultimate sharing, caring, extended olive-branch of animal shaped potato snacks. Fiona's bag pays tribute to her Easter bank holiday, containing confetti and eggs shells from a 'drunken Easter egg hunt'. Brilliant. Evidently a lot of what these features are missing is the crucial back story behind our bag crap. As the famous saying goes, "On the shoulder of every Great Woman, hangs a mediocre handbag."

Letter From Manchester

 

In Manchester, the End is Nigh. Of course, only for those who are at the end of their University experience and must remind themselves this is a rite of passage and one that has been lived by many before. There are those, like myself, who live everyday leaning towards some Reality Bites inspired 'end of University angst', occasionally sighing forlornly 'only 8 weeks to go now. We'll never see each other again.' There are also those who roll their eyes in response, swig their last slug of beer from their can before realising, equally panicked that the End is indeed Nigh. The time is 2am and that was the last can. Such small crises continue in the midst of the bigger one.

Final papers are being handed in, bikes are cycled through bitter winds and into University to collect grades which finally mean something. Those in relationships are determinedly ignoring June and the future, and others are snogging old friends before it is too late.

Future plans consist for some of blank pages, for others trips to Malaysia or graduate schemes in which one must once again start at the bottom as the runt of the litter, but with the pride of telling relatives at parties that a salary is in sight. While we stir our meals in big communal pots at dinnertime someone asks 'who will be the first of all of us to have a baby?' with the same wariness and excitement reserved for the one who will cure cancer. Gigi, obviously, we quickly conclude and go to scrape the lentils which started to burn in the pan while we shallowly contemplated our own lives as if we were starting to sketch the storyboard for our own future-montage scene. The rest refill their glasses and continue with the next and darker instalment of 'Would You Rather?' with a gruesome scenario which involves a life of being forced to watch your parents most intimate moments, or worse.

Lots of us have left already for Easter and today me and Nanon spent all of our time together, walking along desirable streets after stopping at the greengrocers, pointing at the houses we fantasise about living in next year. I put on a comedy Lancashire accent and tell Nanon "ooh, you could be a modern day Lowry with all them bricks around you, stand still and I'll take a picture." She poses and says "I'm just like Ian Dury" before realising that she meant Curtis, but that Curtis definitely wouldn't have worn a camel coloured coat with slightly puffed shoulders. We continue the househunting like an older and wiser couple and come up with equally fantastical life plans and wonder if they might actually be achievable. We'll get jobs as waitresses and rake in the tips which are currently elusive to us, and in the evenings write the screenplay for a truthful sitcom all about women in their early twenties which will be dazzling and successful and will inevitably recieve comparisons to Girls, because it's about girls, but that's okay, you can't change everything at once. We'll never fall victim to those days when try as you might you can't get out of bed and we'll do all the things and more.

We come home to mine once the snow has returned and our eyelids are too cold to take any more fantasising outdoors and we cook more lentils and together with Yas we youtube 'Can't Hold Us Down' by Christina Aguilera and Lil' Kim and remember who great it is, being overly nostalgic about something that only happened in 2002. We think about how nostalgic we'll be in 10 years time, we'll really have license then, but realise that in 10 years time nostalgia will probably be a luxury, and just a way for students with few hours of classes and no real concerns to pass the time, which is okay for now.

The Conversation

Click for Part 2, Part 3, Part 4. 

It is rare that I read or watch an interview and feel that I've been left with something useful. Every month a glut of interview features amass the shelves of newsagents and supermarkets and bookshops and yet they mostly lack any wisdom or thought-provoking nuggets. The work commitments of actors, creatives, business people and musicians who have albums, books and records to promote seem to be viewed as separate from an opportunity to have interesting conversation. It is understandable, I've watched Notting Hill, I know how these tedious press junkets work. But it is disheartening to buy a glossy magazine and to always read the same formula. Female subjects are usually wrapped up in an oversize mohair jumper, looking natural and wearing little make-up and talking about things that ultimately aren't massively interesting in a self-deprecating way. Or maybe the problem is that so many of these subjects aren't massively interesting to me in the first place. So you have a slightly bland star dominating the interview feature for 4 pages and then someone who really is interesting- Tilda Swinton, say, who is featured in the 'My Life in Books' feature, with something a little more meaningful crammed into 300 words. It is frustrating but also a practice that I shouldn't expect mainstream glossy magazines to move past anytime soon.

If I want something really satisfying I have learnt to bypass the usual titles (even those fashion magazines that parade as different and as promoting strong women but ultimately don't) and stick to some tried and tested formulas. Jessica Stanley's blog is one of my absolute favourites and I always feel satisfied after reading one of her compilation posts of interesting articles and interviews from across the internet. She has a knack of finding opinion pieces or articles, from random blogs I would never have found, or maybe something from the Paris Review archive. Maybe it will be about the romance of being single, or the creative process or a really touching and well-written piece about a memory of living in New York. Either way it is the sort of thing I'll read while I eat my porridge in the morning and it will stay with me for the rest of the day, or maybe even longer. Magazines like The Gentlewoman and Apartamento also hit the mark for me in terms of insightful encounters with subjects and I remember enjoying this interview with Sheila Heti on KCRW via 10.17.

When I read an interview I'm ultimately curious about how people live their lives, because if we're not making it up as we go along, then we're quietly watching others for clues. I want to know about their routines or their self-doubts or what they've recently watched or read or thought about. I'm a big fan of 'isms' and maybe my requirements of interviews are ultimately selfish, by wishing to be left with something for myself at the expense of a subject revealing something about themselves. Really though, I know it isn't selfish, more a wish to be left with something more meaningful than the release date for a film.

Last weekend I spent 45 minutes or so watching a 4-part interview with Nick Cave on Youtube and it is absolutely an example of the 'satisfying interview'. A conversation between the interviewer and the subject rather than a personal portrait laden with a heavy portion of flattery. The interview is from 10 years ago, and very informal with the conversation between the two men starting with some memories of the last time they met and Nick Cave asking "Are we doing this? Are you filming?" about 3 minutes in, after their conversation has become the interview but without a cue to indicate it. I would really recommend sticking the kettle on for a cup of something hot and watching the 4 parts which are broken into the topics of discussion 'Habits and Routines', 'The Creative Process', 'The Love Song Lecture' and 'Self Image'. A lot of the brilliance of this interview is down to the interviewer himself, by asking interesting questions and knowing what Nick Cave has to share. Nick Cave, cigarette in hand, is all the time speaking very much within himself, and using his energy to find the right words rather than channelling it into being self-deprecating and fun and liked. This is definitely something I notice a lot in a majority of interviews and I think it is something we do on a daily basis in our conversations with each other and sometimes it takes away from what we're actually saying. Not that we have to always be serious and thoughtful, but the very British habit of being self-deprecating is one that sometimes becomes draining in social situations. Either way, I recommend all 4 parts to be enjoyed with a cup of Earl Grey and a slice of Banana bread and a blanket over the knees.