mark Wynn – Christopher's Headspace

‘Celebrated Author’ Christopher Nosnibor Edits New Book: Launch Event Details

August 23, 2014August 23, 2014 christophernosnibor

I’ve been keeping busy. Too busy to blog, in fact. Editing the new Clinical, Brutal anthology has been a big job. The quality of the submissions has been astounding, and the burden of responsibility of doing justice to the incredible pieces by the incredible contributing authors was immense. I like to think we’ve done it.

The first print run, which consists of 50 copies has arrived at the Clinicality office, and Stuart and I are in the process of numbering each one individually ahead of the launch and, of course, getting copies to the contributors.

We’re inordinately proud not just of the book, but the fact we’ve managed to secure The Woolpack in York for the launch even on Monday, September 8th. Initially, we’d been anticipating a late September launch, but The Woolpack will sadly cease to operate as a venue early in September. This means we were lucky, and decided to bring the launch forward in order to be able to get our first-choice venue.

For those who don’t know, The Woolpack is a small pub venue that over the last year or so has been a great supporter of the music and spoken word scenes in the city of York, drawing bands and readers from far afield. The vibe is exceptional, intimate, accommodating and quite simply something special. The beer is also superb. But as e know, artistic merit and commercial success are rarely synonymous, and while many events have drawn substantial crowds, financial viability is the bottom line. People need to turn profit in order to pay bills and eat.

The Woolpack’s Spokes night (which grew out of the Mark Wynn-hosted blahathon) has, over the last year or thereabouts, given exposure and opportunity to many excellent performers, the likes of whom are unlikely to get slots, let alone much of a reception at other spoken word nights. I count myself amongst these (although I still derive satisfaction from having driven people from the venue during the first paragraph of my performance the first time I read ‘The Drill’ at Spokes).

This means that the Clinical, Brutal book launch is also effectively the last Spokes night The Woolpack will host (although I’m pleased to be able to say it has found a new home at The Golden Ball from October). As such, it will be a celebration not only of the book,l but the venue and its achievements and the evening’s lineup, which includes Mark Wynn (whose ‘Culture Cock’ multimedia frenzy is the centrepiece of the anthology) and Dai Parsons (Spokes co-ordinator and mainstay performer) reflects this.

Entry will be free, and limited numbered copies of Clinical, Brutal 2 will be available at the special discounted price of £6.00 on the night, along with a selection of Clinicality Press titles from the back catalogue.

Below is the event poster. It’d be great to see as many people there as possible, to give the book and The Woolpack the best possible send-off.

Meanwhile, I’m off to celebrate myself…

The Changing Face of Consumerism: Public Opinion, Booze Culture and Bartering

May 25, 2013May 25, 2013 christophernosnibor

The local newspaper recently ran a front-page headline about proposals to open three new pubs in York’s city centre. Two local breweries – The Leeds Brewery, formed as an offshoot of the York Brewery, and the Ossett Brewery, had submitted plans to take over vacant premises – one a former cafe, the others retail units, previously an estate agent and an army surplus store.

The objectors raised all of the concerns you’d expect them to. Predictably, there was concern about the city centre becoming a mecca for drinkers, that having such a concentration of licensed premises would send a message that York promoted the already endemic booze culture that is, we so often told, a leading problem in Britain that causes the taxpayer billions, and that the opening of these three new hostelries would encourage an even greater influx of stag and hen parties and cause violent, alcohol-fuelled crimes and other such sordid scenes to soar.

But these aren’t the kind of places rowdy stag and hen parties would frequent. we’re talking about traditional ale houses that would also serve traditional pub grub. The kind of places tourists – particularly those from America and Japan – flock to in their thousands in order to experience a slice of culture they simply do not have back home. As a historic city, visitors to York want to see and sample tradition. They also want refreshment.

Other critics argued that it was essential that the city preserve retail premises for retail when conditions improve. Will they ever? This is also the same council that approved another out of town retail park, which objectors – not least of all local business owners – have opposed on the grounds that by taking the retail trade away from the city centre, the place is slowly dying. It’s a complex argument, not least of all because the major chains and small independent stores serve different markets. Nevertheless, they can’t have it both ways, by encouraging more retailers to move out of town and then complain that there is an abundance of vacant premises once occupied by retailers, especially in the middle of a lengthy economic downturn. Remember the words ‘credit crunch’ and ‘recession’? For some reason, people seem to think things are improving just because the FTSE’s up and more houses have sold in the last 6 months – never mind the huge numbers of redundancies announced by large employers like Aviva, Co-op and HSBC.

There is of course another angle to this, namely, if everyone’s redundant, they’ll need nice pubs to sit in and while away the hours as they drink their redundancy pay-offs and dole cheques.

The same day I read the article, I was walking home through the city’s pub-packed centre when I ran into musician, poet, diarist and rambler Mark Wynn, a man who’s inspiring in his complete disregard for any kind of consumer trends or capitalist-led operating models of industry. As ever, he’d been travelling the length and breadth of the city, the county and the country, playing poorly-paid gigs in pubs of the very sort the Leeds and Ossett breweries run and giving away most of his CDs for nothing or in exchange for a beer. It’s something to be applauded. he’ll never be rich, but in sharing his art, he never goes thirsty. Moreover, his approach represents the epitome of the punk ethic: he’s out there doing it himself on zero budget and building a fanbase from a grass roots level. that’s what I call sticking it to the man!

We exchanged pamphlets: I had the very last copy of my Liberate Yourself! pamphlet folded in my bag (there are now 100 copies in circulation, and having been left on trains, in pubs, inside self-help books in WHS and who knows where, their whereabouts and readership I haven’t a clue) while he had a batch of a new A5 publication called Dirty Work containing some selected highlights of his spectacularly off the wall and very funny tour diaries and, stapled inside the back page, a PVC wallet containing his last album. Arguably, I was up on the deal, but these things always balance out over time (some weeks later, Dirty Work 3 would see the light of day, containing more rampant ramblings and a new CD EP by Mr Mark E Wynn with additional text by Sam Forrest of Nine Back Alps and The Sorry Kisses, and myself). The important thing was, we had traded our art with one another, we’d both received something we wanted and what’s more, the cash-free barter had taken place on the street. Retail outlets are just so last year.

Shops? Who needs ‘em?

And if you’re loving my work, The Changing Face Of Consumerism – the book – will be out some time in June.

A Total Groove: Record Store Day 2013

April 20, 2013 christophernosnibor

Record Store Day has become an insanely big deal, and while it’s something of a double-edged sword for both stores and collectors alike – a debate I don’t feel the need to cover here – the fact is that I like RSD, and I’m certainly not alone.

While I have, in recent years, spend a lot less in record stores than I used to – partly because the opportunity isn’t there, partly because I simply don’t have the disposable income I once did and partly because I get sent a lot of music to review that I would have historically paid for – I do still put money into independent record stores whenever I can. I do so not out of a sense of dutiful charitability born out of sympathy (although there may be an element of that), but because they’re the places that tend to stock the stuff that I want.

Of course, larger independent stores still usually carry more stock than smaller ones, and have more buying power when it comes to things like Record Store Day. For this reason, I could have easily been tempted to make the trip to Leeds, raid Jumbo and Crash and return home with an armful of vinyl from my ‘wants’ list plus another armful of stuff to flog on at three times the price, thus covering my own expenditure, plus train fare and even potentially leaving me with a near profit.

Instead, I stayed local and hit The Inkwell. Why? In recognition of the fact that it’s a great little boutique shop. In recognition of the fact it’s my local record store, the one I drop into and invariably leave with something cool whenever I have any spare funds. In recognition of the fact that it has a community vibe. And in recognition of the fact that Paul, the owner, asked his customers for suggestions, recommendations and requests for items to order from the RSD release list. That’s a cool thing to do. Not having the budget to get a rack full of everything, it made sense. Moreover, look after the regular customers, and they’ll look after you.

I arrived for opening, and left happy with a clutch of singles, including a copy of the Twilight Sad 7” I’d recommended (one of only 500 numbered copies) and The Fall’s single.

In the afternoon, I went back to check out the two live acts who were playing: the ubiquitous and prodigious Mark Wynn, and purveyors of tinnitus-inducing garagey grunge, …And The Hangnails. Again, although scheduled as part of the RSD goings-on, The Inkwell hosts shows from time to time, either for the launch of local bands’ releases or just because, which is another reason stores like this (not that there are many stores quite like this) deserve support.

Mark and I exchanged goods: I traded him a hot-off-the-press print copy of This Book is Fucking Stupid for a copy of his new vinyl pressing, Social Situations, a split release with The Sorry Kisses. He proceeded to deliver one of his marvellously idiosyncratic performances, interspersing songs of social observation and gloriously off-kilter anecdotes with banterous ramblings that are awkwardly hilarious and hilariously awkward.

…And the Hangnails weren’t as loud as I might have expected and were nowhere near as loud as Swans the other week, but for a room with a standing capacity of 20 or so, the powerhouse 2-piece were pretty fucking loud. The shop got extremely warm and I began to worry the vinyl might melt (although by this time, only four or five RSD exclusive releases remained). Some kids looked uncomfortable and left, probably because they couldn’t hack anything as gritty and authentically rock ‘n’ roll as Hangnails (they’re certainly not White Stripes or The Black Keys), but the rest who stuck around really dug it. …And rightly so.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is rock ‘n’ roll. And this is what Record Store Day is really about.

…And the Hangnails crank it up to ten and a half in a confined space

Check out The Inkwell here.

Check out …And The Hangnails here.

Check out mark Wynn here.

And if you’re loving my work, there’s more of the same (only different) at Christophernosnibr.co.uk

Nutjobs, Pissheads and Pains in the Ass

January 26, 2013January 26, 2013 christophernosnibor

I don’t know what it is about me that seems to draw the crazies. I certainly don’t go looking for them, but they spring out of the woodwork and in an instant decide that I’m the kind of person who wants to converse with random strangers. In actual fact, little could be further from the truth. I’m a fast walker and I habitually avoid eye contact with people in the street. Wearing tinted glasses makes this easier, I find. More often than not, I have earphones in, too, just to create more of a barrier between myself and the world. But where the crazies – and drunks – are concerned, this exterior seems to send the opposite message. Or perhaps they’re just oblivious.

So I was walking back home after watching The Yawns play at The Basement. It was a little after eleven. I was more or less sober, having only consumed three and a bit pints (it would have been four, but while trying to photograph the band, I’d managed to spill the majority of my last pint, much to my extreme annoyance), but feeling buoyant because it had been a good show, and I’d had the chance to catch a few words with Joe Coates (the man behind Please Please You, and the majority of decent gigs in York), and Mark Wynn, cool music scene people I don’t see nearly often enough. I had just parted company with my mate Big Sam, the Balaclava Boy, and had not yet plugged myself into my MP3 player to create my hermetic space. I was, however, wearing a black Thinsulate hat pulled low to the bridge of my nose and felt pretty sealed off.

I’d clocked a guy leaving Sainsbury’s with a carrier bag as I crossed the road, and had seen him remove a bottle of wine from the bag, crack the cap off and take a long slug from the bottle. I thought nothing of it, and wasn’t concerned by the fact I’d probably have to overtake him. Up ahead a way, he stopped to roll a cigarette, and it was at this point I came to pass him.

“’Scuse me, mate.”

I should’ve walked on by and feigned deafness. But I’ve tried that before, and been harangued all the way down the street for ignoring such people. I figured he was going to ask me for a light. It happens a lot. I simply explain I don’t have a lighter because I quit smoking and that’s that. So I stopped and looked at the guy.

“Do you like heavy metal?”

Shit.

“I hope you don’t think I’m, like, stereotyping or making assumptions, but I thought you looked a bit alternative and like you’d be into different stuff like heavy metal. I hope you’re not offended or anything.”

“Not at all. It’s not my first choice of music,” I professed, “but I like some metal.”

“Yeah? Like Sepultura an’ that?”

“Not so much,” I replied.

“No? What then?”

My ears weren’t only ringing from the gig – I’d left the house in a hurry and irritatingly forgotten my earplugs – but from the clutch of upcoming Southern Lord releases Lauren at Rarely Unable had recently put my way and that I’d spent the afternoon getting my lugs round. These were still fresh – and loud – in my mind and represent, to me, the only kind of metal worth listening to. The really heavy, abrasive stuff. The nasty, gnarly stuff, the full-throated sonic annihilation of grindcore and crust is far more my bag than the overblown fretwankery of the ‘big’ metal acts. I attempted to explain this to him, although as succinctly and as accessibly as possible.

“So, like Slayer an’ that?”

“Not really,” I said. This really wasn’t going anywhere and I rather hoped my less than leading response would leave the conversation as extinguished as his poorly-rolled ciggy.

“No-one listens to metal,” he moaned. “I mean, I don’t want to blow my own trumpet, but I’m a shit-hot guitarist. You probably think I’m just a drunk wanker, and I am drunk, but I can play all the songs. Metallica, Iron Maiden. I’m 40 years old and I’ve been playing guitar for 20 years but I just can’t find a band to play in. Do you know where I could go to find other people who are into metal who’d want to be in a band with me? Do you play?”

“Nah. I play guitar a bit and can move a bar chord around in time but it’s pretty basic. I gave up on playing music and now I write about it instead.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m a music writer.”

“Like a journalist?”

“Yes. I review stuff. CDs and live music. And I can tell you that a lot of people do listen to metal. It’s a huge market.”

“Yeah but I can’t find anyone. There’s nothing I’ve ever found that I can’t play. I can do all the solos, even. But no-one’s interested. It’s all DJ this and fucking MC that and… you know what I mean? You’re not a DJ are you?”

“Hell no. I’m a writer.” The guy was beginning to get on my wick and I was pleased to arrive at my turn-off from the main road. “I’m off down here,” I said.

“Me too.”

Shit.

“I know you’re probably thinking I’m some drunk twat, and I am drunk, but don’t worry, I live round here, I’m not trying to stalk you or follow you home or anything. I am a bit drunk, but I’m a decent bloke, y’know, and I know I’m a good guitar player. I mean that. I don’t like going up to people and saying ‘I’m a shit-hit guitar player, though.”

“Maybe you should. If you’re serious, you need to get out there.” I believed he wasn’t going to stalk me or follow me home, and I doubted he was about to turn and knife me, kick me head in or smash the now half-empty wine bottle over my head, but figured it was still wiser to humour him – because he was clearly a drunk twat – than risk it by tying to shake him in an obvious fashion.

“Is that what you’d do?”

“Yes.”

“And you’re a DJ?” There was a broad hint of incredulity in his voice.

“No, a writer.” There was a broad hint of weariness in mine.

“So how does that work?”

“I get sent music and I review it. I go to see bands play and I review them.”

“Where? Who do you write for?”

“Various websites.”

“Websites, eh? And you’re a journalist? But you don’t know where I can go to meet people who’d give me a chance? How do I find people that are into metal? I’m a fucking awesome guitar player – and I’m not just saying that, and it’s not just because I’m drunk – although I am drunk – I can play everything and I love metal. Satriani, you name it.”

“Maybe you could go and see some bands playing. Talk to them. they’ll know other musicians, people in bands who are looking for a guitarist.”

“And they’ll be into metal? I mean, I’ve got a band in theory – like me, and a bassist and a keyboard player but we don’t need a fucking keyboard player.”

“No, that’s a bit 80s hair rock, I’d have thought.”

“Yeh, exactly.”

And so it went on in this way until we reached a junction where our routes diverged, much to my relief.

“It’s been good to meet you,” he said. “Thanks for listening. A lot of people wouldn’t have done.”

“That’s the kind of guy I am.”

“You’re a good guy. What did you say your name was?”

“Thanks. I’m Chris.”

“Right, yeah. I’m Steve. And you’re really a DJ?”

Some drunk bloke I found on the Internet

And if you’re loving my work, there’s more of the same (only different) at Christophernosnibor.co.uk

Wynning! This is the Heart of Music… A Night off Listening to Mark Wynn’s ‘Stories, Rags and Stomps’ Album Launch

September 23, 2011 christophernosniborLeave a comment

The Habit, the tiny bar venue in York that Mark Wynn plays often and has chosen for the launch of his new album attracts an odd melange of beatniks offbeats, hipsters, scenesters and hangers-on. With its artisan interiors and late-night opening, it has a distinctively cosmopolitan vibe, and I often find myself thinking of Henry Miller whenever I’m in there – and I like to go there every so often when I’m taking a night off, because I can sit or lean and blend into the background while someone or other – sometimes Mark, sometimes different people – play tunes, and I can enjoy a drink and watch and listen in on the ‘characters’, the cool kids and the wannabes, the has-beens, could have beens, never weres and never had a hope of beings. From a writing perspective, it’s a great place to go to simply observe.

It’s also, in many ways, representative of the way I see the music industry evolving – or devolving. As artists are rejecting the industry that rejected so many of them, they’re going cottage and taking things back to grass roots. The heart of music now doesn’t really lie in the big gigs and the major label multi-million selling albums. No, we’re entering a time when artists play day in day out to small audiences in intimate venues. They may eke a living and get paid a pocketful of change that they subsidise by flogging a few CDs on the night, and it’s a fucking hard slog, but existing at the opposite end of the spectrum from all the X-factor cal, it’s real-life, not reality TV. Without the cameras, the wardrobe, the production, the digitization and editing, playing up close and personal requires real talent and commitment.

Tonight, The Habit is more packed and buzzing than usual. In fact, it’s hard to get to the bar. The atmosphere’s a little different. It’s not full moon, but there’s definitely something in the air. Then comes a point two songs before the end of Mark Wynn’s set when the madness takes over. The drunken old fruit in the vulgar shirt who’s been busting moves all night knocks the mic stand – by no means for the first time. Mark pauses for a beat, moves the mic back so it’s positioned in front of his mouth and he launches into an improvised number ripping the piss out of the guy, who, it seems, is renowned for his tedious tales told in an inebriated state. Mark could be forgiven for being frustrated. His rant’s not overtly mean-spirited, though – it’s all in the delivery – and besides, it’s extremely funny, and I can’t help but be particularly amused when he riffs on how the old duffer resembles Henry Miller.

Y’see, Mark Wynn is a real one-off. There’s no doubting his musical skills, but in a world where there’s a singer/songwriter playing a mix of originals and covers, picking and strumming an acoustic guitar in every pub and on every street corner (especially in York), what makes Mark stand out is his apparent unwillingness to do just that. He’s a low-key and self-effacing kinda guy playing low-key, self-effacing kinda songs. His demeanour is slightly shuffling, shy and awkward seeming, and he has a tendency to play sets full of downbeat songs quietly. His between-song banter is characteristically mumbled, a little rambling, but it’s equalled by a deceptively sharp wit, and his unique brand of inverse showmanship is a welcome alternative to the big egos, the musos clamouring to be discovered.

Mark’s a genuine artist, relentlessly carting his battered guitar up and down the country on his endless ‘getting ignored in bars’ tour because that’s what he does. He’s a musician and he’s all about the music. He sings songs. Often sad or frustrated, but sometimes happy. and sometimes spinning yarns, a true troubadour, and the turnout for the launch of ‘Stories, Rags and Stomps’ (which he describes as ‘low-grade trash’) indicates that his work is appreciated.

After support slots from David Keegan and some other dude, and the rabble-rousing folksters Rat Catchers Mallets, who, er, roused plenty of rabble, Wynn’s set brings things down a notch. It’s no bad thing, however. He doesn’t actually play much material from the new album, as far as I can tell – although there are points where it’s so loud it’s difficult to tell what he’s playing – and instead plays a slew of unfamiliar material. It doesn’t matter. He plugs away, casually, affably, supping a pint and simply doing his thing. It’s what he does – and I hope he keeps on doing it.

The album’s pretty good, by the way, and costs less than a jacket potato or cheese toastie at The Habit.

Mark Wynn on Bandcamp: http://markwynn.bandcamp.com/

And if you’re loving my work, there’s more of the same (only different) at Christophernosnibor.co.uk